2 Years Later
September 11, 2001
Ethan
On September 11, 2001, the terrorist attacks in New York City occurred at the World Trade Center in Lower Manhattan. Hijackers flew two commercial airliners into the Twin Towers (the North and South Towers), causing their collapse.
Today is the morning of September 11.
He was standing on the ledge of the terrace of his orphanage. In the distance, he could see the Twin Towers. Ever since Ethan arrived in this amalgamation of worlds, he had been searching for some sort of secret society—although a five-year-old trying to be part of one could be considered a minor case of chūnibyō.
Ethan had not encountered a curse stronger than Grade 4. By his estimate, he had grown considerably stronger—so much so that he could break brick walls with a reinforced cursed-energy punch. He had also noticed that normal people were unable to see his shikigami or curses for that matter, though some people could instinctively sense them and move out of the way.
Currently, the seven-year-old Ethan was plagued by the question of what to do about the 9/11 terrorist attack.
Should he try to stop it? If so, then how?
Nobody would believe a seven-year-old. Or worse—what if somebody did believe him and the attack still happened? How would he explain his foreknowledge?
Then there was the question of whether the attack would even happen at all. This was the MCU universe. Technology here was far more advanced than in his previous world, thanks to Stark and several other megalomaniac scientists. He had not seen any Baxter Building in New York's skyline, nor had he found anything when he searched for the Osborn Corporation on the public computer available at the orphanage.
He had also searched for Tokyo Jujutsu High, but considering jujutsu was a secret society, he understood why it wasn't available on Google. He would have to visit Japan when he was older.
But—
Right now, he had a much more severe problem at hand. In about eight hours, two planes were going to hit the Twin Towers.
He didn't really care about rich people losing their money in the collapse of the World Trade Center, but the loss of life was far too great for him to ignore. His conscience would not tolerate it.
Ethan had a simple philosophy—rules, so to speak. He would not go out of his way to patrol the city preventing crimes committed by humans. However, if he encountered one while out killing curses, he would stop it.
The attacks on the Pentagon and the World Trade Center happened almost simultaneously. There was no logical way to prevent both. He could run fast, but he couldn't teleport long distances—at least, not yet.
With the help of his dual Divine Dogs, he had been able to tame:
Great Serpent Orochi (Grade 1)
Nue (Grade 1)
Gama (Toad) (Grade 2)
Fleeing Hares (Grade 4, individual)
Max Elephant (Grade 1)
He had also noticed that his shikigami were much larger than what Megumi Fushiguro had been able to accomplish—much closer to Ryomen Sukuna's when he reincarnated in Megumi. He came to a simple conclusion: his cursed energy levels must be higher than Fushiguro's. He didn't know by how much, but he felt relieved.
Honestly, he had considered taming all nine shikigami, but he postponed it until he fought a Grade 2 or higher curse. The book on the Ten Shadows Technique had been very helpful in this regard. However, there was something strange about it—he could tell it had cursed energy infused within it. Some sort of cursed tool, perhaps? He didn't know.
He knew what he must do. He even had an outline of a plan on how to prevent the two planes from crashing.
Using shadow manipulation—an aspect of the Ten Shadows Technique—the bearer could move objects, people, or themselves in and out of shadows, merge shadows to gain tactical advantages, and most importantly, instantly teleport between them. The user could hide within shadows or emerge from any shadow to launch surprise attacks. They could also travel through their shikigami, as those were extensions of their shadows.
This was the key to the anti–9/11 operation, which he had aptly named himself.
He summoned Nue, a winged shikigami armed with great speed and electrically charged wings. It could support its master by carrying them while flying, increasing mobility, and could attack with heavy wings charged with electricity—shocking anyone it hit and leaving them temporarily paralyzed, or even killing non-sorcerers.
Nue was especially effective against opponents stationed in high places or when used in combination attacks with other shikigami. In addition to its offensive applications, its speed and wings could also be used defensively, shielding its master from harm and protecting him from anything short of a high-ordnance warhead.
The Nue summoned by Ethan was far larger than Megumi's, but smaller than Sukuna's. It wasn't that he couldn't summon a larger one—he simply needed mobility rather than raw attack power for this operation.
He gave Nue a simple command: notify him as soon as it saw any plane in the sky. Right now, there were still eight hours until the official attack time that he remembered from his previous life, but he wouldn't rely solely on that information.
He shared a mental link with all his shikigami, which often helped with reconnaissance when he sneaked out of the orphanage to go curse hunting.
He still remembered how Miss Andler had scolded him when she didn't find him in his room. He had explained that he went sightseeing—which was, admittedly, a poor excuse.
That was the day he learned about Barrier Techniques.
He could deploy simple curtains created from cursed energy to conceal, trap, or protect. There were various types of barrier techniques, the most complex being Domain Expansion—the pinnacle of jujutsu sorcery.
He was shocked by how versatile barrier techniques could be. At the moment, however, the most advanced barrier he could deploy functioned as a simple "do-not-notice-me" field, which he always used in his room or whenever he went out curse hunting.
----------------------------------------------------------
If you enjoy it, please leave a Review and Power stones
----------------------------------------------------------