Junpei had infiltrated the Jujutsu Headquarters.
After knocking out every jujutsushi guarding the entrance and corridors, he reached this place in a single push and came face-to-face with Okkotsu.
"So that’s why I couldn’t sense anyone around..."
No matter how old and rotten they were, the upper echelon was still the upper echelon. It was a group made up of sorcerers who had once been something special in their youth—clan heads, elders, and the like.
He had subdued that upper echelon without a single scratch, without killing any of them.
Junpei drew closer and closer to Okkotsu, who seemed to be weighing whether to fight or not.
"Calm down, senpai. I’m not here to fight."
Unlike what Okkotsu had expected, Junpei raised both hands once he stepped into range, signaling that he had no intention of fighting.
Looking into his eyes, it didn’t seem like a lie.
At the moment, he couldn’t guarantee victory in a fight. Okkotsu wasn’t reckless enough to gamble blindly.
Besides, he didn’t exactly like the old men in the upper echelon either.
"...Got it."
Still on guard, Okkotsu sheathed the Japanese sword he had been holding.
Junpei nodded as if that was the right call, then took a seat nearby and casually perched himself on a table.
One furious old man shouted at him for sitting on a table he clearly used all the time.
"Do you even know how much that costs, you—"
"I already know that senpai was chosen as the executioner for me and Yuji."
Ignoring him, Junpei started talking to Okkotsu.
"Knowing that, what exactly were you thinking, doing something like this?"
"I’ll be blunt. Tokyo Metropolitan Jujutsu Technical High School has decided not to follow the Jujutsu Headquarters’ orders."
"So you’re rebelling?"
"If possible, please use the more dignified word: revolution."
-For reference, this was already discussed with Principal Yaga as well.
Junpei’s eyes flashed.
----------------------------------
To understand why things had come to this, we have to go back a week.
After the Shibuya Incident ended, the jujutsushi dispatched from Jujutsu High began arriving one by one.
The Kyoto High students led by Utahime arrived after receiving Mechamaru’s message, and Kusakabe and Panda followed after them.
"Brotherrrr! Wake up!"
"Who the hell are you calling brother? Yuji is my little brother!"
"Huh? And who the hell are you? I can’t accept some pale little punk like you being my brother’s brother!"
There was a brief commotion when Choso and Todo started bickering, but it settled quickly enough.
"Explain. What happened?"
"Well..."
Junpei and Nobara explained what had happened, mixing in hand gestures as they went.
Mechamaru had already relayed the situation up to the point where Gojo had been sealed, so the explanation ended faster than expected.
"...This is insane."
"What the hell kind of ridiculous bastard is that...?"
The sorcerers’ reactions to the story varied.
They were all stunned by the scale of it, which far exceeded expectations, but cleanup came first.
"For now, all of you head back."
The sorcerers who had fought actively in the Shibuya Incident returned to camp together.
They did not forget to recover the bodies of their fallen comrades.
They also took care of Megumi, who had been found near the avenue, and after a short rest and treatment, everyone returned to their respective posts.
Mai and Maki were transported back to the Zenin clan along with Naobito’s body.
Apparently, since it was the head of the clan’s funeral, everyone had to attend.
Junpei also slipped in on the first day, offered incense, and quietly left.
"Ghhh... ngh..."
Nanami Kento’s funeral was presided over by Ino Takuma, the assistant who had spent the longest time with him.
At a place where everyone was trying hard to hold back tears, he seemed unable to endure his grief and let out a choked sob.
That wasn’t all.
Nanami had been active on the front lines for a long time and was mature enough to be a model for everyone.
The assistant supervisors who respected him and had relied on him all burst into tears.
"Ijichi..."
Next to that, the funeral for Ijichi Kiyotaka, who had died the same day, was being held.
Junpei had already guessed as much when he fought Uraume, but...
Seeing his smiling face in the framed memorial photo in person made Junpei’s emotions surge.
Ijichi had always supported so many people sincerely, even while looking exhausted.
He hadn’t done anything flashy, but he was the kind of man who quietly did his job no matter what. Junpei had, in fact, relied on him many times.
No matter who he went on missions with in the future, he would think of Ijichi.
He would never forget that timid man with his warm heart.
And there were others too: the assistant supervisors, window staff, rescue personnel, and more who had died in the field...
There were so many casualties that the funerals felt packed to the brim, and Junpei went from one to the next, offering his condolences from the bottom of his heart.
The problem started after that.
"Yuji, are you in there?"
"....."
Ever since that day, Yuji had been disappearing somewhere early in the morning and returning late at night, then locking the door behind him.
No matter how much Junpei and Nobara called, he always turned his back and refused to face them.
"Megumi."
"Sorry. I need some time alone right now..."
Megumi was in a similar state.
It was better in the sense that he didn’t ignore them outright, but he still refused all communication.
Junpei had a rough idea why.
The deaths of their comrades.
The helplessness they had felt before overwhelming strength.
And the trauma born from variables they couldn’t control.
Yuji and Megumi’s hearts were more unsettled than ever.
He also knew that Yuji had been going out every morning with Choso to hunt curses.
He knew that Megumi came into the living room every night to stare at old family photos from his childhood, wearing a troubled expression.
Even so, he couldn’t be the first to poke at such sensitive wounds.
The repeated lack of communication. The colorless routine.
Nobara had even exploded once, unable to take it anymore.
"You’re the only ones having a hard time?! You think the rest of us are fine or something?"
"Nobara, stop..."
"You bastards! If something’s bothering you, say it! Don’t rot by yourselves and make everyone else uncomfortable! Weren’t we friends?! Answer me!! Answer me!!!"
After shouting for a long time at a door that never opened, Nobara cried herself out and collapsed.
Junpei carried the tear-streaked Nobara to bed and covered her with a blanket, then squeezed his eyes shut.
"I can’t do this alone."
What should he do?
"I should check on Maki senpai too... maybe I should go see Principal Yaga."
Principal Yaga had definitely been Gojo-sensei and Nanami’s teacher back in their school days.
If he went to see him, he would surely have something useful to say. He had also been firmly on the side of protecting them.
After getting some sleep, Junpei woke Nobara early the next morning.
"Junpei, about yesterday..."
"You don’t have to say anything."
"Sorry. I made a pathetic scene."
"I think we’re probably not enough on our own, so I want to go around and ask for help. Want to come with me?"
"Where to?"
"First the Zenin clan... then I’m planning to see Principal Yaga. I also want to check on Maki senpai."
"O-okay!"
So they went to the Zenin clan together, but they weren’t let in.
"Due to the current chaos within the clan after the head’s death, entry for outsiders is strictly prohibited."
"I just want to see Maki senpai for a moment. Could you call her out?"
"Maki is still unconscious. Please go back."
The guard’s expression looked a little suspicious.
Like someone trying to hide something they absolutely couldn’t let be discovered.
"That’s kind of suspicious."
"Can’t be helped."
"If I’d done better, maybe Maki senpai would be awake by now too."
Nobara’s usual fire had dimmed over the past few days.
Junpei felt sorry for her drooping shoulders and tried to comfort her.
"No. At that moment, nobody could have done better than you."
"....."
He kept trying to soothe her as she nodded, then headed to Jujutsu High.
When they reached the principal’s office where Yaga lived, they knocked on the door.
knock, knock
"Principal Yaga, are you in there?"
There was no response.
"Maybe he’s not here?"
"Not again... I’m seriously drained."
Nobara let out a long sigh, her head drooping so low it looked like it might touch the floor.
Junpei stared bitterly at the closed door, then made up his mind and went behind Nobara to hug her.
"What are you doing all of a sudden?"
"H-how about it? Do you feel a little b-better?"
It was a line so embarrassing he could barely say it himself.
Junpei’s face turned bright red, and Nobara burst out laughing.
"Pffft—hahahahahaha!!"
"D-don’t laugh! I worked up the courage to say that!"
"Then you’ve got to commit to it all the way. Seriously, you can tell you’ve never done this before. Heh heh."
After laughing and squirming for a while, Nobara wiped away the tears in her eyes and turned around with a grin.
"I’ll let you off because you’re cute."
"...Glad to hear it."
"Tch. Since we’re already out, want to go on a date before heading back in?"
Junpei was about to say that the social atmosphere was a little wrong for a date, but he shut his mouth.
So what if it was? It wasn’t like a full-blown disaster had happened again yet.
Nobara probably wasn’t seriously asking for some textbook date either. She probably just wanted to walk around and talk.
It was enough that her mood had lifted.
"Then..."
Just as he was about to agree, he sensed multiple sources of cursed energy nearby.
"Wait a second."
"Huh? Why... oh."
Footsteps were approaching quickly, with no attempt to hide themselves.
Before long, several jujutsushi in black masks appeared and surrounded Junpei and Nobara.
"...!"
"You two, what is this?"
"Are you Yoshino Junpei?"
"Yeah."
"Orders have come down from the upper echelon."
-Yoshino Junpei is hereby designated special-grade and sentenced to death on charges of colluding with curses and curse users.
"What?"
"Principal Yaga has already been arrested as well. Comply quietly."
The sorcerers kept closing in.
Among them were the Zenin clan guards they had seen earlier.
There was no doubt they had been the ones tailing them too.
"You bastards..."
"Sorry, but we’re the type to follow policy."
"There are more than eight first-grade sorcerers here alone. And at least twice that waiting outside. Even if you’re special-grade, do you really think you can break through this many and escape?"
As it turned out, they had come fully prepared, each one armed with high-grade cursed tools at first-grade level or above.
The moment they delivered the order, the upper echelon requested cooperation from the Zenin clan and released all the stored cursed tools in Jujutsu High, outfitting a fully armed force.
Even while appointing Okkotsu Yuta as the executioner, they had still made their own countermeasures.
Even with the binding vow in place, the relationship between Gojo Satoru and Okkotsu Yuta was not something they could ignore. And they had also confirmed that he could use reversed technique on others.
If resistance was too strong, they could simply kill him and use Okkotsu Yuta as a disposable pawn, tossing him aside together with the risk of the binding vow.
"You sons of bitches."
But they had made their biggest mistake.
There was a huge gap between the Junpei the upper echelon had reported and the Junpei who actually existed.
Only one person, Nobara, had been told about the true nature of his awakened technique.
Their countermeasures had been built entirely around the Junpei who existed before [Sea God art] was brought out.
"You thought eight people would be enough?"
"What?"
They felt their cursed energy being sucked out of their bodies.
Before they knew it, the tentacles of [Sea God art] had been floating above Junpei’s head, parting open to reveal a mouth.
[Vortex]
He wouldn’t kill them carelessly. He needed to interrogate them and find out how the situation had unfolded.
The beam, stripped of any caster or ritualist, scattered in all directions and swept them away.
KWAANG!
"Kraaaah!"
A few lucky ones outside managed to pull back, but more than half were rendered unable to fight by that one attack.
Nobara swung her hammer at the heads of the stunned sorcerers.
clang! clang!
In the blink of an eye, she smashed the skulls of two first-grade sorcerers.
Nails dropped into the hands of a sorcerer who had been pretending to be unconscious and trying to attack her from behind.
thunk!
"Agh!"
People grow stronger by surviving near-death.
Junpei and Nobara had thrown themselves into the thick of the Shibuya Incident and fought on the front lines.
The dark operatives who had been acting as the upper echelon’s dogs, staying behind the scenes and doing nothing but dirty work.
There was a gap between them that could not be closed.
"Ready?"
"Of course."
Only then did they realize it.
"You rotten old bastards! That’s not what the report said!"
The upper echelon had made a spectacular mess of things.
Even if they regretted it, nothing would change.
"So... we’re the ones getting executed?"
Bathed in helplessness, they were deluged by merciless violence.
Five minutes and forty-three seconds.
That was how long it took special-grade sorcerer Yoshino Junpei and grade 3 sorcerer Kugisaki Nobara to finish off twelve first-grade sorcerers, eight semi-first-grade sorcerers, and seven second-grade sorcerers.
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