After the fight was over, Junpei finally explained the main point to the real Hakari and Kirara.
They had plenty of time, so he didn’t need to give some misleading summary like before, and once they heard the details, the two of them were thrown into shock.
"Seriously? Gojo-sensei got sealed?"
"It’s true."
"Kraaah!"
Hakari clawed at his own hair and let out a wild scream at a reality he couldn’t accept, and Kirara stopped him.
Junpei looked over the two of them with a troubled expression and, somehow, felt like he could understand him.
Come to think of it, when he first heard the news from Mechamaru, he hadn’t believed it either. Who would believe that a man who seemed like he’d never lose to anyone had been sealed inside a tiny little box?
They’d probably need a little time to sort out their thoughts.
"Anyway, that’s why you came to ask me for help, right?"
"But Jun-chan, aren’t you insanely strong? At that level, it feels like you could handle the situation on your own."
When Kirara pushed back, Hakari remembered his fight with Junpei from moments ago and shuddered.
Even after being held back from start to finish, he still hadn’t landed a single proper hit, and in the end he’d nearly died.
Why would someone with that kind of power come asking him for help?
He himself had accepted the proposal after getting all fired up over strength and resolve, but he still couldn’t make sense of it.
"Yeah. Didn’t you say you were special-grade?"
How nice it would be if he really could settle everything by himself.
But that wasn’t the case. He was short on both conditions and manpower.
Since he had to play as a participant himself, there were limits to what he could do alone.
"I got dragged into this too, so... Kogane?"
Junpei let out a sigh and called out, and Kogane popped out of the air.
"Here!"
"Whoa, what is that?"
"It’s like a window attached to each [Culling Game] player."
"Why is that thing attached to you when you haven’t even entered the barrier yet? Did you go in once and come back out?"
"It latched onto me as soon as the [Culling Game] started. I don’t really know why, but maybe it’s because I’m a prototype for awakened-type players. I used to be a non-sorcerer."
Hakari and Kirara’s expressions grew even stranger.
"When did you first step into the jujutsu world?"
"Early September."
"You didn’t say which September."
"Th...this year."
Hakari and Kirara had awakened their techniques and become jujutsushi in middle school.
Being overwhelmed by a junior who had only awakened two months ago made it feel like more than three years of effort had been denied outright.
It was only natural that their mouths would twist at that absurd talent.
"No way...."
"What a blessed body. Not very cute for a first-year, though."
"Haha...."
He still couldn’t get used to those jealous, admiring looks.
A hikikomori loser who used to refuse to go to school was actually the strongest shikigami user? If a web novel wrote the story like that, it would get trashed and canceled within two months, no question.
He had plenty to say about his mother’s death and the hellish string of battles in Shibuya, but wisely, he knew that in times like this, he should keep his mouth shut and stay humble.
Junpei gave an awkward smile and quickly changed the subject.
"I’ll collect 1,000 points on my own, so Hakari-senpai, please team up with Professor Kusakabe and Todo and focus on searching for Tsukumo Yuki."
"It’s been a while since I’ve seen the faces of people who helped me out."
"According to Todo, Hakari-senpai is a good matchup against Tsukumo."
"If that brat, my student, says so, then I guess it must be true."
After thinking for a moment, Hakari nodded readily.
"Got it. I’ll cooperate with settling the [Culling Game]."
"Uh... thanks?"
"Don’t get it twisted. This is a deal. Once this is over, you’ll cooperate with me too, got it?"
What Hakari wanted was a revision of jujutsu regulations and the expansion of the fight club.
The latter might be difficult because of Yaga, but the former was entirely possible.
He had the Three Great Families in his hands now, and the conservatives who had stood against Hakari had long since been put in coffins.
"Sure, I can do that much."
"Then we’re good."
Hakari in everyday life was a cooler guy than Junpei had expected.
That is, unless something displeased him and the switch flipped on with all that "heat" nonsense.
Normally, when a sorcerer asks another sorcerer for a favor, there’s usually an unspoken premise of, "Please bet your life with me." And yet he had accepted the moment the conditions were met, without hesitation.
"You’re really okay with that?"
"It was a bet, wasn’t it? I’m the type to accept the result cleanly."
"....You could die, you know."
"Well? Then I guess my luck ends there."
Kirara, who was hugging Hakari from behind as he shrugged, laughed brightly.
"Ufufu, I’ll finally get to see the hottest Kinn-chan in a while."
"Quit saying useless stuff."
"You can say that, but isn’t it true that the hottest you’ve ever been was when you were saving people back at Jujutsu High?"
At her affectionate tone and embrace, Hakari’s face turned red and he looked away.
It was a plainly embarrassed expression.
"Uh...."
Junpei didn’t really want to watch a rough-looking man blush, so he cleared his throat and looked away.
He knew Kirara was openly showing how much she liked Hakari, but seeing Hakari react like that too made it obvious they were more than just friends.
"What’s your relationship?"
"We’re a couple, aren’t we?"
"No, I mean, Kirara-senpai is a guy."
"I was born male, but I think of myself as a woman."
"If you treat a man like a woman, then a woman will...."
He didn’t know how far the two of them had gone, but it seemed like he didn’t need to know any more than this.
Junpei didn’t want to ask something he didn’t need to ask and end up looking like some uncouth ape, so he neatly erased all stray thoughts about their relationship from his head.
Without knowing what Junpei was thinking, Hakari held out his hand for a handshake.
"Anyway, I’m counting on you."
"Let’s do our best together."
"If you’re around, I don’t think this’ll be a [Hama-ri] or whatever."
Hakari’s teeth flashed white like noodles as he clasped Junpei’s hand.
"But am I being left out?"
"You heard me earlier. The moment we go in, we have to kill at least one person. It’s better to keep the team small and elite."
"Tch."
Junpei firmly ignored Kirara, who puffed out their cheeks cutely.
No matter what, some things just weren’t possible.
He couldn’t muddy the lineup he’d already fixed with clear criteria.
"It’s late today, so we’ll start tomorrow. That makes it exactly the fifth day since it began."
"Yeah. Come here in the morning. I’ve got some things to sort out too."
November 5th.
That would be the day he entered the barrier with Hakari.
------------------------------------
The Zenin clan after Megumi and Mai had left.
Though half-destroyed, the clan had somehow managed to clean up the mess and recover a little of its original shape.
Because the treatment of servants and women had improved a great deal, some people even welcomed the changed atmosphere despite the tragedy.
And yet, even in that atmosphere, there was one person who couldn’t smile.
Imprisoned in the deepest room of the inner quarters, she had now finished preparing to end her life.
"Mai, Maki. Your father is calling for you."
The memory of that day remained in her like a bone-deep regret.
She had thought she could refuse, but in truth she had no choice.
She had lived that way for decades after marrying into this family.
"Waaah...."
"Ubb...."
When she gave birth to her two children, she still remembered the warmth of those tiny lives as they were held against her chest.
Those red, ugly babies who couldn’t even open their eyes had looked so lovable to her.
But that happiness lasted only a moment before, after giving birth, she had to have the babies torn from her arms.
"Twins are an ill omen."
What the hell was wrong with those precious sorcerer rules?
Just born, and not even allowed the chance to be blessed, the men of the clan were all busy cursing the babies’ future.
She had never wanted to die more than in that moment, when the hopeful looks in their eyes turned into icy contempt.
As the years passed and the children grew up, her married life turned into hell.
Once it became clear that Mai and Maki couldn’t become proper sorcerers, even the branch families started treating her, the main wife of the direct line, like a parasite and whispering behind her back.
"You gave birth to a halfwit!"
Worst of all was the hate-filled violence from the husband who should have been her support.
When he failed to become clan head and the gossip started, her husband took that misery out on her and the children.
At first she resisted and tried to protect them, but at some point she let go of everything.
She had realized there was nothing she could do in this family.
Perhaps around that same time, her attitude toward the children changed too.
It felt like this miserable, powerless life was the children’s fault. They were the only ones weaker than her.
Once that thought took root, affection turned to neglect in an instant.
"Mai, Maki."
That was why.
Even knowing her husband was trying to kill the children, she had followed along without a word.
It was simply an extension of the life she had lived, the limit of a woman whose heart had been broken down over many long years.
What hurt her most was that she hadn’t even been able to think of resisting.
-Mom, why did you do that?
Mai, asking that with tears in her eyes, had gone away without being able to kill her.
She remembered the moment when, in those complicated eyes, a flicker of understanding had briefly appeared.
It was a bond she had no choice but to sever like that.
They probably wouldn’t see each other again.
"I’m sorry...."
As she tried to write a suicide note with trembling hands, she soon stopped.
She wasn’t even qualified to beg her children for forgiveness. The pain of all those years had gone too deep for that.
Rather than burdening them with more guilt, it was better to remain an irresponsible parent to the end, so they could hate her in peace.
All she could do now was offer up this shabby life the children had been unable to finish themselves.
After preparing the rope and stepping onto the chair, she closed her eyes.
Now it was time to set out on a journey.
To a place where neither wounds nor oppression existed.
-Thud!
She kicked the chair away, and her body immediately dropped as a crushing pressure washed over her.
It should have been agonizing, but even as her breath tightened, she only hung there motionless like a corpse, swaying slightly.
If that was her own form of atonement, then perhaps it could be seen that way.
"Ah...."
As her consciousness blurred, she dreamed.
She dreamed of long ago, of a picnic under cherry blossoms with her two young twins.
In that dream, she wore a gentle, motherly smile, and the children played joyfully without a single worry.
It was a scene that might once have come true.
"I’m glad I gave birth to them...."
I’m sorry. I’m sorry.
Please don’t forgive this worthless mother.
And in the next life, please, something better......
-Creak...
That was her end.
It didn’t take long for the news of Lady Zenin’s death to spread throughout the entire estate.
A servant who had gone to bring her meal as usual found her body hanging by the neck.
On the table sat a half-finished suicide note, covered in tear stains.
"Damn it, how are we supposed to tell the clan head?"
"If we just cover it up like usual..."
"You idiot! Didn’t you see what happened because we always do things that way?"
"Maybe it’d be better to just tell him honestly...?"
Everyone in the estate fell into confusion.
Because the last person on the kill list Mai had uniquely left alive had now taken her own life with her own hands, and they feared the fallout.
The few remaining leaders began preparing countermeasures, and in the gap, the surveillance on someone in a similar position slackened.
"Heh-heh, so she ended up killing herself after all?"
A man who would spend the rest of his life crawling because both his legs had been cut off.
As Lady Zenin’s regret deepened, his thirst for revenge burned hotter and hotter in return.
Just as he was wondering how he could get his revenge, the news he heard gave him a new idea.
"I’ll be following soon enough. What’s the rush?"
Sorcerers become postmortem curses when they die.
That’s why they have to be killed with an attack imbued with cursed energy.
But did that concept apply to suicide too?
There was only one way to find out.
The man, smiling grimly in an empty room, opened his mouth wide and stuck out his tongue.
"Even if it’s a little humiliating.... I can’t live like this."
-Crunch!
The moment his teeth snapped shut, his tongue was severed and blood sprayed everywhere.
As his consciousness drifted away, he confirmed that his hypothesis had been right and smiled in satisfaction.
"Mai, I’ve come over here too."
An unregistered special-grade vengeful spirit.
Zenin Naoya is born.
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