Chapter Text
Rain poured down from the sky that evening, each drop resonating as it hit the ground, eager to return to the sky one day.
The rhythmic melody of rain, each drop hitting the ground with a different note, created music to the ear; the air carried a gentle breeze that rustled his hair and clothing, and the trees close by shifted in motion, adding a serene quality to his never-ending pain.
This should have calmed him down; usually, it did, but tonight, nothing seemed to stop the pain.
The streetlights struggled to illuminate the dark training ground of the school, their glow barely making it through the darkness. Small creatures scurried to escape the relentless downpour.
An ache spread across his forehead, from between his eyes to his temples. To his dismay, he squeezed his eyes shut, seeking relief from the throbbing behind them.
He felt as if a few veins might burst under the pressure. He pushed his black, round glasses up to the crown of his head, but some strands of hair had tangled, tugging painfully at his scalp. He groaned in annoyance.
Nights like this seemed to never end.
nights when he couldn’t take a single breath without feeling every cell in his body aflame.
Nights when his senses were overwhelmed by the sheer energy around him, making him acutely sensitive to every wisp of cursed energy nearby.
Nights when he became hyper-aware of all his organs, almost feeling as if his eyeballs were turning inward.
Shoko had once told him that becoming aware of the eyes’ existence could lead to blindness. He wasn’t sure if that was a fact or if Shoko was just teasing him, but it seemed to fit his current situation perfectly.
On nights like these, he ran from everyone, especially his best friend. Not that Suguru was the cause of his pain, absolutely not. However, Geto Suguru, the curse manipulator, was the strongest sorcerer he knew (aside from Satoru Gojo, of course), which meant he possessed an overwhelming amount of cursed energy.
Simply standing beside him would send his headache spiraling into even more intense pain. Satoru, the strongest, had never disclosed this information to his friends.
As a “Heaven’s Blessing,” he was expected to always be at his best, never to fail or feel pain, and to never, ever show weakness. That was the first lesson he learned as a child. Back at his “home” all his needs were met, but he never received what he truly wanted. He had the best of everything, clothes, food, and education, but lacked comfort and understanding.
He sighed heavily.
Telling Suguru would do him no good. There was no point. Suguru couldn’t ease the pain or make it disappear as if it didn’t exist. He couldn’t offer him anything, so what was the purpose?
It would only burden Suguru.
He opened his eyes once more, taking in the scenery. At least the view was nice. He forced himself to shift his thoughts away from everything that plagued him and toward something calmer. A smile crept onto his face at the memory.
Second year
“Can you pass me the syrup?” Satoru asked Shoko, who was sitting across from him as they ate breakfast in the dorm’s kitchen.
Like every morning, Suguru had been up first, already awake at the brutal hour of six a.m, an impressive feat for any teenager living at a boarding school.
Suguru, lost in thought, cooked scrambled eggs, occasionally stirring them as they sizzled. Spread out on the table, as usual, was a stack of pancakes, orange juice, milk, and reserved solely for Satoru—syrup and caramel.
Neither Suguru nor Ieri liked either topping. Suguru preferred savory food, while Shoko adored anything bitter or sour. In their own way, the trio balanced each other out. Still, both of them were consistently horrified by the sheer amount of sugar Satoru consumed daily.
Ieri wordlessly passed the syrup bottle while sipping her morning coffee.
“Satoru, don’t put too much syrup on the pancakes,” Suguru warned. He had added his own special touch to the food, and the thought of his mother’s treasured recipe being drowned in syrup made his eye twitch.
“Don’t worry, I won’t,” Satoru mumbled. Ignoring Suguru’s warning, he squeezed the bottle and completely covered his breakfast in syrup. The fluffy breakfast was compeletly drowned under the sticky content of the bottle.
Shoko watched in absolute disappointment. She pushed her hair out of her face and clicked her fork against the plate.
“Just seeing you eat kills my appetite,” she groaned, setting her fork down entirely.
“Satoru!” Suguru shouted, smacking the top of Satoru’s head with a wooden skillet.
Satoru yelped, his hands flying up to cradle his head as he scowled like an offended child.
“Stop acting like my mother!” he yelled back. In protest, he took an exaggerated bite of the syrup-soaked pancake.
Suguru’s expression darkened, one that suggested he was ready to unleash his hell.
Shoko immediately grabbed her coffee and scooted back as far as she could, the chair scraping loudly against the floor before colliding with the counter.
In the blink of an eye, one of Suguru’s curses launched itself toward Satoru’s head. It closed the distance in less than a second, only to crash into an invisible barrier just before impact.
Satoru grinned.
Snarling, Suguru launched attack after attack, but Satoru dodged and weaved around them effortlessly.
“What’s wrong, Suguru?” Satoru teased, sidestepping another strike. “Can’t hit me?”
Suguru groaned, growing increasingly irritated. Satoru, the cocky brat that he was, continued taunting him. Curses flew back and forth until the kitchen was left in ruins.
Shoko, ever nonchalant, simply stood there and watched while sipping her coffee and occasionally taking a bite from her own breakfast.
Satoru didn’t know when it happened. He was so immersed in cursed energy that he barely registered Shoko moving. One second, Suguru’s curses were flooding his sight, and the next, Suguru had vanished from his line of sight.
Then, suddenly, two strong arms wrapped around him from behind, locking him in place. The curses dissipated into thin air.
His eyes widened as he turned his head sharply and found Suguru’s face right beside his ear. He hadn’t even noticed when Suguru disappeared from his radar, just a few seconds, but that was enough.
He also didn’t know when his heart started pounding so violently against his ribs, which he chalked up to adrenaline.
“Don’t move, Satoru,” Suguru whispered.
A shiver threatened to crawl down Satoru’s spine, and he had to fight the urge to react to Suguru’s breath against his neck.
“Now, Ieri!” Suguru shouted.
In an instant, Shoko appeared in front of him, holding a cup of freshly brewed coffee. Satoru’s eyes widened in horror as he predicted his fate. He clamped his mouth shut, teeth pressed together, twisting his head away while leaning back into Suguru.
There was no way in hell he was drinking coffee.
Shoko pinched his nose, cutting off his air supply. Satoru struggled violently, but eventually his lungs burned too much to resist.
The moment he gasped, Shoko poured the coffee straight into his mouth. The hot liquid burned its way down his throat, bitterness flooding his senses.
His face twisted in a grimace as he shook his head, trying to spit it out, but Suguru covered his mouth, sealing his fate.
With no choice, Satoru swallowed. His stomach churned in protest.
Suguru finally released him, and Shoko stepped back. Satoru collapsed to the floor, coughing violently.
Shoko laughed, while Suguru looked down at him with a satisfied smile.
“You monsters! How do you drink this stuff?” Satoru yelled once he recovered. His heart was still racing, and his back was warm from the lingering memory of Suguru’s body pressed against his. Electricity sparked through his nerves, leaving him unsettled.
Shoko and Suguru burst into hysterical laughter.
“That’s—hah—that’s what you get,” Suguru managed between laughs, “for messing with my mom’s recipe.”
Satoru lunged at him, tackling Suguru to the floor in one swift motion. They hit the ground with a heavy thud.
“Satoru!” Suguru shouted, grabbing his shoulders and pinning him down. “Hold his legs!”
Shoko joined in, gripping Satoru’s ankles as he struggled wildly. His hair was a fluffy mess, uniformly wrinkled and half-unbuttoned. Suguru’s bun had come undone, loose strands framing his face, with his shirt pulled free from his pants.
Meanwhile, Shoko was barely affected; only her sleeves were stained with coffee.
“Hands off, you animals!” Satoru yelled, squirming uselessly.
He was the strongest, yes, but Suguru was better at hand-to-hand combat. He didn’t stand a chance.
Suguru settled his weight, knees pressing into Satoru’s thighs as his hands slid up to grip Satoru’s wrists firmly. Everything within Satoru spiked.
His breathing became shallow, his heart raced, and a heat curled deep in his stomach. He wasn’t sure if it was the coffee he had on an empty stomach or something else entirely. Shoko stepped back, giving them space, watching with a knowing smirk.
Satoru, however, couldn’t look away from Suguru. His chest felt tight and full, almost painfully so. Must be the coffee, he told himself.
“Admit defeat,” Suguru murmured, pride shining in his eyes. Heat rushed to Satoru’s face.
“Never,” he replied, his voice unsteady. Did they poison that damn drink? He wondered. What the hell is happening to me?
What felt like decades passed in a single heartbeat. His chest swelled with something unfamiliar, something unnamed. Something he had always wanted.
As he looked up at his two best friends, grinning down at him, it finally clicked: this was home.
On nights like this, Satoru couldn’t get Suguru out of his head.
Exercise.
Absorb.
Consume.
The curse hovered before him like a black marble, oily and faintly pulsing. Its shape was obscene, alive in a way that made it seem like it still wanted to bite.
He brought it to his lips with steady hands, after all, he did this often, but the practiced motion didn’t make it any less unbearable.
The taste was always a shock; there was no way to prepare for it. Acrid, metallic, biting like rust scraping against the tongue. Then came the burn, hot and immediately spreading from his throat to his gut.
He forced it down, jaw locked tight, feeling every scrape as if he were swallowing broken glass.
He’d done this a hundred times, maybe a thousand, but his body never learned to accept it.
The curse was poison, and his body treated it like poison, trying to reject, expel, and purge. His throat convulsed, the gag reflex seizing violently. His stomach twisted into a knot so tight he thought it might tear him apart from the inside.
Acid clawed up, matching the burn of the curse itself.
For a moment, he felt as if the thing were biting back inside him. He bent over the toilet, shaking, hands clamped over his mouth. Tears blurred his vision, causing the edges of the room to dissolve into pale white and ceramic blue.
His heart hammered hard enough to hurt. Somewhere in the corner of his mind, he prayed, though to what, he didn’t know, to get through the next few seconds without throwing up the thing he had sacrificed so much to contain.
Even through the blur, he noticed details: the toothpaste cap left open, a small towel folded neatly on the counter, the faint citrus smell of cleaning spray.
It was almost insulting that the world could be so normal while he ate curses for a living.
He had never realized before how quiet a place could sound while someone was suffering inside it. The gentle hum of the mini refrigerator, the muted dripping of the faucet, each noise a whisper of life.
After what felt like an eternity of struggling not to vomit, he managed to swallow the curse fully. It sank, heavy like a stone in his stomach, displacing everything else. His knees gave out, and he slumped back against the cold bathtub, half-sitting, half-collapsed.
Long, ragged breaths tore out of him. His chest rose and fell too unevenly for comfort. The air felt thick, tainted, as if he could taste the darkness he had just ingested lingering around the edges of the room.
His eyes drifted to the ceiling. Empty. Hollow. Wide and glassy, nothing left to reflect but exhaustion.
He should have been used to this by now, the pain, the burn, but pain never softened with repetition. It lingered faithfully, like a devoted spectator to his slow decay.
He could feel the curse dissolving now, its essence slick and corrosive, seeping into his veins. It merged with him too easily, as if it belonged there, as if his body had long since accepted being a vessel for toxins. He could almost map its spread, starting in his stomach, radiating outward, thin streams of black fire lacing through his bloodstream.
Every curse carried something distinct:
rage, envy, guilt, grief, and he could feel them as they joined him, mixing, colliding, festering.
They didn’t whisper words; they whispered feelings.
And Suguru listened. That was the worst part, how familiar it all felt now.
The hatred hummed beneath his ribs, despair trickled through his chest, and the faint trace of jealousy was something he didn’t even own. He didn’t just sense them; he housed them.
Each emotion was another drop of poison, another stain seeping into the essence of his soul.
Decay masquerading as strength. More curses equal more power, right?
He pressed the heel of his palm against his sternum, as if he might hold the poison in place, preventing it from leaking further. His skin was clammy, his breathing shallow, but he made no sound.
Pain was his constant companion; the silence around him was the only mercy the world ever offered.
The quiet space felt tender around his suffering, like the walls themselves pitied him but could do nothing.
Perhaps that was the cruelest part of all: that he could live surrounded by small comforts, familiar routines, and soft noises and still be rotting slowly from the inside out.
He thought alone felt like a permission, the despair of the curses mixed with his own despair, his own cursed energy.
The process was always the same, slow, spreading, like ink diffusing through water, but tonight it felt more violent, like acid etching directly into his veins.
Each curse was its own toxin, a distinct flavor of corruption: hatred sharp as iron, envy sour on the tongue, grief thick and cloying, pride burning like liquor.
The emotions settled inside him with grotesque intimacy, as if the world’s ugliness wanted to be understood by him alone.
And maybe that was his tragedy: he did understand it.
They filled him up like fumes in a sealed room. Every breath he took was heavier, every heartbeat more sluggish. The accumulation had become unbearable, layers and layers of emotional residue compacted into his system, coating the inside of his spirit the way soot builds against a chimney wall.
He could almost picture his soul’s interior: dim, sticky, filled with black, impossible to clean.
He knew it was killing him slowly. With every curse he consumed, his heart eroded in microscopic ways, not with grand, dramatic destruction, but A slow poisoning that even he had learned to mistake for endurance.
Maybe that was the most horrifying part: he didn’t feel infected anymore; he felt adapted.
The poison had become part of him, absorbed into his blood. He could taste it even when he pressed his tongue to the roof of his mouth. a faint bitterness that wouldn’t leave, no matter how much water he drank or how many times he brushed his teeth.
Somewhere between swallowing curses and scrubbing the taste of them away,
He realized he could hardly remember what real purity felt like.
With every curse he consumed, he drifted farther from the boy he once was in his village, the gentle boy who smiled easily, wished only for others' joy, and carried warmth in his small hands.
Those memories were fading now, like light filtering through distant fog. He had become the opposite of what he was meant to be: not a guardian but a receptacle.
He wondered, distantly, if his mother would even recognize him if he ever came home. Would she see the pure, radiant boy she raised or the stranger whose body carried enough venom to darken a whole village?
Hatred, sharp and venomous, coiled again in his gut as if answering the thought. His blood seemed to boil with that fire. He squeezed his eyes shut, pressing a hand against his chest as the phantom pain flared and then settled back into its usual ache.
He tried to remember the world’s gentleness. the warmth of shared laughter, the smell of rice cooking, the quiet innocence of a child’s voice, but the memory slipped further away each time he reached for it, smothered beneath the weight of all the curses inside him.
It had been so long since happiness felt real that he feared he wouldn’t recognize it even if it touched him again.
Maybe this was what it meant to be chosen: to absorb poison until nothing remained untainted, to love so deeply that you agreed to drown in hatred just to keep others clean.
“Isn’t that what happened with Riko-chan? You tried to keep the rot away from her?” The thought intrusively entered his mind.
“No. No, he can’t think about that.”
He stared at the bathroom light, a faint yellow glow humming above him, steady and indifferent. For a fleeting second, he imagined it pulsed with the same rhythm as his pain. Then the illusion faded, leaving him alone, quiet, breathing in his own decay.
.
.
.
“Suguru, you look pale. Are you okay?” Satoru asked as they strolled down the narrow street toward the mission site.
The rain had softened into a steady drizzle, thin and cold, falling from the gray November sky.
Their feet splashed through shallow puddles that had nowhere else to go.
Suguru hadn’t slept at all the night before. The nausea and ache in his stomach refused to ease, and even thinking about food made bile rise in his throat. He forced a half-smile and glanced toward Satoru.
“Yeah, just a little tired,” he lied.
His throat still burned with acid, and the taste settled somewhere deep in his chest. Every inhale scratched at his lungs. Still, Satoru didn’t ask again. He just hummed softly, almost in tune with the rain. For that small mercy alone, Suguru was thankful.
The mission wasn’t anything special:
Two special-grade curses hidden in an abandoned factory. It was routine work, something they could finish quickly to get back to the dorms before midnight.
The idea of finally sleeping, just a few hours without pain, brought a faint grin to his lips, but it wouldn’t last.
Satoru shoved his hands into his pockets and fought a shiver. The air had grown colder with each passing day.
Autumn was fading into winter, dragging its damp wind through the old streets of Tokyo. The rain hadn’t stopped for days.
That morning, he had considered using his Infinity to stay dry but decided against it. Protecting himself from the weather felt like a waste, and he feared it would only worsen his headache.
So now, they shared one umbrella, the same one Suguru held above them, because, as Satoru always said, “I never had to carry my own umbrellas back home.”
“I have to hold one anyway. Who cares if the brat shares it with me?” he muttered under his breath before they left.
Now, the two of them walked shoulder to shoulder down the quiet street, their coats brushing against each other with every step.
For some reason, Satoru was far too committed to keeping close, pressing into the small space beneath the umbrella until there was almost no gap between them.
Suguru could feel the warmth of him, the faint static hum of cursed energy blending with his own in every brush of fabric.
“Remind me again,” Suguru teased, breaking the heavy silence, “how are you any different from a spoiled kid if you really lived like a princess?”
Satoru grinned, dramatic and carefree.
“I tolerated those old geezers and their abuse for years,” he began, waving his hands like a stage actor. “Never do wrong, never laugh too loud, never cry, don’t care about people, but always be ready to die for them. Don’t obey others, but never disappoint the clan.”
He gestured as if cracking a whip.
The words came out half-playful, half-bitter, each wrapped in a guise of fake joy. Suguru smiled faintly but saw through it. Beneath all the teasing and flair was a sharp edge of truthm loneliness, constant pressure, and quiet cruelty dressed up as honor.
He’d only known Satoru for 2 years now, but somehow he understood him better than anyone.
In a twisted way, he found pieces of himself in Satoru's story.
He could picture it, Satoru trapped inside that enormous mansion, surrounded by luxury yet starved of comfort. A child caged inside a shining box, too powerful for anyone to touch but bound all the same.
“…That’s… I’m sorry,” Suguru murmured, his voice low, disappointed with how quickly he had ruined the light mood.
Satoru only shrugged. “It was what it was. Now I can do whatever I want, and no one can stop me.”
He casually slung one arm around Suguru’s shoulders, pulling him close in an easy side hug. For a brief moment, Suguru forgot the sickness in his stomach. The rain kept tapping against the umbrella, soft, rhythmic, endless, but inside that fragile shelter, warmth filled his chest. He smiled at Satoru quietly.
“No wonder he acts like such a child,” Suguru thought. “He never got the chance to be one.”
Rain struck the umbrella faster now. The sky above looked thick and bruised, bleeding gray into gray. The streets were empty except for the two of them, and Suguru couldn’t help but think that the world itself seemed to mourn, something distant, something they couldn’t name yet.
“Hey, Suguru?” Satoru’s voice fell softer, barely clearing the sound of rain.
“Mmm?” Suguru hummed, too tired to use full words.
“Do you think…” Satoru hesitated, “…this is our punishment?”
The question hung in the air between droplets.
Their boots splashed through mud, sending ripples outward. Suguru didn’t answer right away.
He’d been told since day one that shamans weren’t heroes. They weren’t pure or evil, they were just people. Yaga-Sensei had made that painfully clear. They bore the weight of their choices. They protected the weak, yes, but every kindness came with a price.
He wanted to believe he was doing the best he could.
He wanted to believe being kind still mattered.
But every curse he consumed reminded him of something terrible: that no matter how gentle he tried to be, corruption had already taken root inside him.
He wasn’t untouched.
He wasn’t clean.
He was capable of hate just as much as he was capable of love.
There was a saying, one every shaman knew: sorcerers don’t go to heaven or hell; they roam purgatory when it’s all over. Suguru never decided if he believed it, but the idea fit too easily.
There was no happy ending for them. No sunset waiting on the horizon. Just eternal gray.
Every sorcerer was a weapon, and every weapon eventually broke.
He thought about all the names he’d heard; none of them died peacefully. Not one drifted off to sleep after years of service. They all fell in battle, their bodies claimed by the same curses they once exorcised.
A thought flickered, dark and quiet: I wonder if Satoru will die in a fight, too.
He couldn’t picture it. Satoru always stood above it all, untouchable, unreachable, as though fate itself couldn’t lay a hand on him. Still, Suguru knew power only grew heavier with time, and one day, no matter how strong Satoru became, someone might catch up.
He swallowed the thought, his lips dry and his tongue sticking to the roof of his mouth. He adjusted his grip on the umbrella handle, shoving his other sweaty hand into his pocket to hide the small tremor in his fingers.
There was a comfortable, heavy silence between them again. He wasn’t sure what Satoru meant by punishment, but somehow, they understood each other. Their suffering mirrored in ways neither could explain.
“…Maybe,” Suguru whispered at last, not confident, not certain.
Satoru didn’t answer. He simply stared at the wet pavement, breathing slowly. The tension around his shoulders shifted, as if something invisible had settled there, too heavy for him to lift. His temples pulsed, and the curse energy in the air thickened, fogging his vision with static.
The closer they got to the crowd, the more overwhelming it became—like walking through radiation. Satoru tilted slightly, feeling lightheaded, and leaned closer under the umbrella, shifting some of the pressure onto Suguru’s presence. He hid it well, but each slow breath was carefully measured.
Maybe he needed someone beside him to remind him that he was still human.
The rest of the walk passed quietly.
Once in a while, Satoru broke the silence to talk about a new sweet shop he’d found just a few streets away from their mission site. He begged, again and again, for Suguru to stop by before they started their work.
This ended with a firm smack to the back of his head as Suguru dragged him away from the store sign.
“When we’re done with the mission, I’ll treat you,” Suguru muttered, his teeth clenched. “Just let’s go already.”
Satoru rubbed his head and looked up at him with eyes too bright for the weather.
“Really?” he asked, excitement creeping in like sunlight through clouds.
Suguru sighed and rolled his eyes, pretending to be annoyed, though his chest warmed a little.
“If we finish early, then yes, really.”
Satoru’s grin spread across his face, brighter than daylight. For a moment, Suguru swore that smile alone was enough to chase the rain from the sky.
“Then I’ll swear on my honor,” Satoru declared with mock seriousness, striking a heroic pose under the umbrella. “I’ll finish this mission as fast as possible!”
Suguru covered his mouth to suppress a laugh.
“Good grief,” he murmured. “It’s like taking care of a child I never asked for.”
Still, as they walked together through the soft rain, sharing one small shelter and a thread of warmth, Suguru couldn’t help but think he wouldn’t have it any other way.
.
.
.
This was not how it was supposed to go.
Suguru dodged brutal blows one after another, his feet light and quick on the cracked concrete floor. He kicked and punched, his fists connecting with the grotesque forms of the curses. But for every one he brought down, two more rose in its place. The numbers were impossibly skewed, a tidal wave of horror that exceeded their initial estimate.
Four Special Grades, six Semi-Grade Ones, and at least fifteen Third Grades, a small army of twisted malevolence. What was supposed to be a quick job had exploded into a full-scale battle.
They were deep within the derelict internment department, a place haunted by the pain and hatred of overworked employees. The building had been abandoned after one worker jumped from the twelfth floor, leaving behind stories of despair that had festered and called to the darkness.
Now, this once-ordinary office block had become a nest for curses, right in the heart of Tokyo.
Amidst the chaos, Suguru searched frantically for Satoru. He scanned the crumbling room, but his friend was nowhere in sight. He forced himself to take down the curses one after another, his movements precise and desperate.
Despite his deep reluctance, he knew he had to use his own acquired curses. He bent over, stomach churning, and violently expelled a curse orb he had consumed days ago.
The slimy black mass hit the floor, and with a surge of his own energy, he forced the creature to yield to his will.
His curses surged forward like a wave, consuming their opponents.
Fifteen Third Grades vanished, leaving a smoking void in their wake. He didn’t waste another second; he ran toward the stairwell, taking the steps two at a time, his breath burning in his lungs. They had been on the eleventh floor when the ambush had separated them, and every step upward felt like a gamble.
He looked around wildly, heart racing, searching for any sign of another attack.
The ceiling had collapsed in places, with wires and rusted pipes hanging like severed veins. Dust and debris coated everything, thickening the air. “Fucking hell,” he cursed under his breath, leaning against the cold railing, his chest heaving.
His heart pounded against his ribs, a frantic drum echoing through the silence of the empty stairwell.
A thunderous crash echoed through the air, vibrating through the floor beneath him. Out of pure instinct, he sidestepped, watching a heavy office table fly past where his head had moments before, smashing into the opposite wall.
He looked up, and there, amidst the swirling dust and crumbling concrete, was Satoru. His friend was fighting all of the remaining curses at once.
The Special Grades were nightmares made real: ashen white skin stretched over bony frames, hundreds of eyes scattered across their grotesque bodies, twitching and blinking randomly.
Eight spider-like legs propelled them forward with disturbing speed, and their mouths, long and cavernous, dragged all the way down to their bellies, black tongues lolling and whipping like weapons.
An uncontrollable wave of nausea washed over Suguru. He could almost taste the acrid, rotten essence of those curses in his throat, a bitter premonition of their consumption. His stomach churned violently, threatening to betray him. His gaze fell to the floor, where human bodies, civilians, stupid enough to ignore the warning signs, lay twisted and broken beneath the crushing weight of the larger curses.
Satoru moved like a blur, a white flash of destruction.
Punches flew left and right, each imbued with raw power, the impact shaking the very foundations of the building. His movements were too fast to follow; it was a chaotic dance of devastation.
He looked mostly fine, a few cuts here and there, blood streaking his cheek, but nothing deep, nothing he couldn’t brush off.
Three cursed corpses lay scattered on the floor, still intact.
Small, black particles rose from their decaying forms, swirling like smoke and slowly forming faint, reanimating silhouettes.
Satoru hadn’t exorcised them yet, Suguru realized, and another wave of despair washed over him. He hated this; he hated what was coming next.
Satoru glanced across the ruined room, his bright blue eyes finding Suguru at the stairwell. A wide, almost childish grin split his face.
“Suguru~!” he called out, his voice echoing in the cavernous space. “I left those three for you!”
Suguru’s gaze shifted from Satoru’s beaming face to the curses that were slowly regenerating. A surge of pure, unadulterated hatred coursed through him. He despised Satoru for this, for bestowing this pain upon him, for making him relive the nausea, the corrosion, the slow, bitter rot.
He let out a heavy sigh, trying to push down the burning bile in his throat. Focusing on the cursed corpses, he sensed the malevolent energy still clinging to them.
Exorcise. Consume.
He gulped down the single, condensed ball formed from the three Semi-Grade One curses. It burned going down, leaving him coughing and gagging, tears stinging his eyes. Driven by a cold fury, he stumbled forward and slammed his fist into the back of one of the Special Grades as hard as he could.
“AHHHH, MAMA!” one of the curses shrieked, its voice unnervingly human, raw with pain.
“Hate! Hate! Hate!” another screamed, rushing toward Suguru with unnatural speed, its many eyes glowing red.
Satoru and Suguru were now fully engaged, moving together like two parts of a single, destructive machine. Suguru’s face was flushed, not just from exertion but also from the ripples of negative energy surging through his body like an invisible tide. He fought against the sickness with all his might, but deep down, he knew the only real cure was to empty his stomach, to purge the poison that clung to his insides.
One of the Special Grades wrapped its long, black tongue around Satoru, coiling him tightly and trapping him in its suffocating grasp.
Pain, blinding, unbearable agony, crashed through Satoru’s skull. His headache had intensified into a roar, making breathing difficult and focusing impossible.
The sheer volume of cursed energy in the building was suffocating and overwhelming. He tore off his sunglasses and threw them blindly across the room, where they shattered against the still-regenerating curse corpses.
Each corpse pulsed with raw negative energy, capable of spawning new horrors if not properly handled. The air itself seemed to hum with malice.
His eyes burned, and his forehead throbbed as if it were a single, aching mass. The pain felt like needles stabbing deep into his bones, cutting through his skin. Moving was a struggle; dodging felt like a desperate act of will. And once Suguru arrived, the pain became utterly excruciating.
In his daze, Satoru’s vision blurred. Shapes and forms dissolved into shimmering blurs of raw energy. Everything became a blinding haze of cursed power. Then, a crushing blow struck his abdomen, followed by another to his back, and a vicious kick to his leg. Suddenly, he was sent flying across the room, crashing into a crumbling wall.
He felt a heavy impact across his torso, a searing pain, but nothing compared to the throbbing in his head. Groaning, he pressed his palm to the right side of his skull, feeling a sharp sting. When he pulled his hand away, a blur of red stained his fingers.
Shit, he thought, the word echoing in the static of his mind. Despite the agony, he pushed himself up. Better now than never.
He extended his hand, fingers splayed, and focused on the chaotic energy swirling around him. Taking a few deep, ragged breaths, he drew the cursed power inward, concentrating it at the tip of his finger.
“Cursed Technique: Blue,” he rasped.
A ball of pure blue energy pulsed and swelled around his fingertip, growing larger until it formed a massive, distorted orb, a wormhole of destructive force.
Suguru watched Satoru, his friend’s face flushed red, eyes glowing with an unsettling, primal madness. “SATORU!?” he screamed, but Satoru showed no reaction. The blue orb shot from his hand, a roaring torrent of power that began to tear the entire building apart.
The walls evaporated, concrete crumbling into dust, steel twisting into nothingness. Suguru immediately summoned his flatfish curse and leaped onto its back. In the blink of an eye, the entire building vanished beneath their feet, consumed by Satoru's devastating technique.
Suguru looked down at the empty space where the factory had stood. Satoru was floating there, suspended in mid-air, his head hanging low. All the curses were gone, utterly annihilated.
But Satoru remained unmoving in the sky.
Something was wrong, very wrong.
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