(Pov 3rd)
It was a day like most others in the middle of Tokyo when a strange-looking man entered a cafe. He was a rather young man with a lean figure and hair pulled back into a short ponytail. His clothing was the standard for the average office worker, a rather plain-looking blue suit with a black tie; he wouldn't stand out if not for a singular feature across his forehead. Across his forehead was a line of stitches like his head had been sewn shut.
This man was, in fact, the sorcerer Kenjaku, who had taken the body of an office worker who had committed suicide. He had been in hiding since his battle with Satoshi and Yuta, as the information they had relayed exposed him to the wider world of Jujutsu. Kenjaku wasn't worried, though his plans were intricate, and a setback such as this wouldn't be enough to stop him, not with his new allies.
As Kenjaku took a seat, unknown to the other patrons, he had guests three of them currently. The first one was a rather short body wearing a strange wrap and having a red squid-like appearance. The second was a medium-sized body with bluish skin, a single eye, and a head shaped like a volcano, and lastly was the tallest of them, a white being with streaks of black coloring and their left arm in a large sling. These three were the disaster curses, each representing the negative emotions relating to a type of natural disaster. The first one, named Dagon, was related to the tsunamis that struck Japan; the second, Jogo, was related to volcanoes and their destructive magma, and the third was Hanami, related to the forests and nature.
These three curses felt that they were, in fact, the true humans and wanted to wipe out all of humanity and create a world of only curses. Kenjaku was willing to go along with them so long as the three proved useful for his plans, though he knew it was likely only a matter of time before they were killed one way or another. They had gathered here to discuss the plan for removing certain threats to his plan, namely the two Gojo brothers, Satoshi and Satoru.
Gojo Satoru was undoubtedly the strongest sorcerer alive, and should it come to a confrontation, Kenjaku would be dead very quickly. Gojo Satoshi, on the other hand, had no ability with Jujutsu, but his strength left him second only to his brother, and while Kenjaku had managed to stop him once before, that had been the result of extensive planning and more than one binding vow, and yet it hadn't been enough to kill Satoshi. If Kenjaku wanted his plan to succeed, he knew that taking both of them out of play would be necessary.
Satoru's case, he had acquired a cursed object known as the Prison Realm, which could be used to seal any being as long as they remained within its radius for a minute in their mind, after which they would be sealed within until the front was opened. For Satoshi, though, things got a bit more complicated, as the prison realm could only hold one being at a time, so that they couldn't use it for both of them. Kenjaku also knew the moment he sealed Satoru that Satoshi would be hunting him down. His plan to deal with Satoshi would be more of a delaying action designed to keep him as far from the prison realm as possible until Kenjaku could leave with it. As such, he had been making alliances not just with cursed spirits but with curse users as well. He even had a particular spirit who had a grudge against Satoshi from years ago, something about a broken neck.
Though some of the present curses were less cautious. "Why don't we just go and kill him since he doesn't have any cursed energy? How could he beat us?" Jogo asked after sitting down. He had always been rash and prone to taking action, given his nature.
"That wouldn't be a good idea; he'd beat you easily." Kenjaku responded calmly, causing Jogo's head to erupt in anger.
"What do you mean, how could he?!" Jogo shouted as the temperature began rising enough that even the normal humans around them began to notice something was off.
"I mean, he's incredibly strong, even using my max strength, I wasn't able to kill him," Kenjaku responded, sipping his water. "But if you were to try, then I'd suggest bringing your full force from the start."
"Hmph, I'll show you, and that dammed Gojo Satoshi the strength of us true humans." Jogo finally lets out his heat, burning much of the cafe instantly and incinerating all of the humans inside in an instant.
(Pov Satoshi)
I was heading back to the school after a chat with the higher-ups. Well, it was more like a yelling match, both because I had to make it seem like I was upset Yuji was dead, and a few years of built-up anger at these guys. I never understood how they acted so high and mighty all the time, even when talking to Satoru or me. I had decided to take the more scenic route back, though, and as I made my way back, I stopped near a large lake.
'This place seems familiar.' I thought it was odd that the lake the forest near the road. It was an odd sense of Deja vu until I heard something nearby and a whooshing sound from above. Looking up, I saw a shadow over the moon, and it seemed to be getting closer.
'Oh, that's why it was familiar.' I realized suddenly that this was when Jogo tried to ambush Satoru and kill him. Satoru wasn't here, though, so why was he attacking me?
As Jogo came crashing down towards me, I jumped back before pulling out my inventory curse, allowing it to wrap around my body as usual. Before the dust from his landing could clear, though, Jogo charged at me, his fist blazing with his cursed technique. His technique was called Disaster Flames, and it allowed him to create and manipulate fire with his cursed energy, along with summoning miniature volcanoes and a strange kind of burning bug. He also had a domain expansion, but I wasn't worried due to my restriction.
I dodged the attack before landing a counter on his left side. I had expanded my arsenal a bit recently, including options to allow for brief hand-to-hand combat. I had acquired a pair of brass knuckles, and with Satoru's help, they had also been made a cursed tool, though the process had been rushed, so they were a bit weak. Still, it was a good opening move, and it meant I had options in more cramped spaces.
As Jogo staggered back from the blow, I stashed the knuckles and pulled out Playful Cloud, as it had quickly become my favorite weapon given its unique trait, allowing its power to increase based on the strength of the wielder. I readied the staff as Jogo once again made to charge at me, but I noticed his eye flicked to a spot behind me, and I got a sudden feeling that if I didn't move, I'd suffer. I jumped to the right and just in time as a volcano had formed behind me and shot lava out where I had been standing. Using his confusion, I sped forward and slammed the staff into his side, sending him flying towards the lake.
He slammed into the water, creating a large cloud of steam around him. I made to follow when I felt another presence nearby. Looking over, I could just barely see the form of Hanami hiding in the forest, no doubt waiting to assist should Jogo lose. The two of them were too far apart to reliably fight both at the moment, so I would need to draw Hanami out further, and to do that, I just had to beat on Jogo some more. I finally made my way down towards the lake. The water wasn't too deep, but it still came up to my thigh, which would mean I'd have to dry out these pants later, and they couldn't go in a dryer.
As I got closer, the amount of steam increased, creating a thick cloud across the lake's surface. He was clearly trying to hide his presence, assuming I wouldn't be able to find him without cursed energy. I could still hear him, though, and when he tried to come at me from the left, I countered, wrapping the middle bar around his arm and breaking before using the other side to beat him. I pummeled his head repeatedly with the bars before two-handing one end and smashing him like a baseball. He wasn't looking too good with purple blood pouring from his body, and his breathing had gotten heavy. I moved to finish him when I saw his hands forming together.
"Domain Expansion: Coffin of the Iron Mountain"
The world around me warped the lake, vanishing into a craggy ground with fissures running through it. The surroundings had also formed into rocky walls with magma running into pools. The temperature began to increase rapidly, going from a cool night to feeling like I was inside a furnace. That could be a problem, as while his sure hit wouldn't work if the heat kept rising, it would leave me incapacitated, though I had never tested my heat tolerance before, so who knows, maybe this would be a good way to check.
While I was contemplating this, Jogo began to speak. "I must say, for a mere human to have pushed me this far, he was right about you." His voice was rough, though he seemed certain of his victory. I wasn't going to wait for him to try and hit me with something that would work, though, so I moved using the walls themselves to propel myself faster, reaching him near instantly and stabbing Playful Cloud right into his eye. He screamed as the force of my attack pushed him backward, right into the edge of his domain, and I could see the wall cracking under the pressure.
Just as I was about to deliver the killing blow, I felt something to my side and jumped off of him just as a combined blast of water and cursed energy shot past me. As the barrier broke, I looked over and saw that both Hanami and Dagon had intervened. Their presence within the domain had been unnoticed by me, and my best guess was that with the amount of cursed energy Jogo was using in his domain, my senses couldn't pick up on their more muted signatures until they attacked.
I prepared to fight them all when a door opened in mid-air, and through it I could see a beach. It was Dagon's domain and the hiding spot they used. I couldn't let them escape yet, though, and so using all my speed, I blitzed over and drew the Soul Split Katana, and using it, I cut off Jogo's head. His body exploded into a cloud of dust, which blocked my sight, and by the time it had cleared, the other two were already gone, but at least I had gotten one of them. Now, the likelihood of Satoru being sealed had dropped significantly.
I couldn't get too complacent, though, as with Jogo dead, the others would get much more serious from now on, but this was a victory, and one major problem had been crossed off the list. The next major curse would be Mahito, and if I could kill him, then things would be much easier from then on, and Kenjaku's defeat would only be a matter of time.