Satoru Gojō

Satoru Gojō had his eyes closed behind his black tinted glasses. His right leg bounced as he sat upright in an uncomfortable chair.

He tuned out the lecture from his principal. The man wouldn't be a principal for much longer anyway. His teacher, Masamichi, would be replacing him soon enough.

"—Grade 1 or not, you cannot just ignore orders!"

It wasn't like the lecture was directed at Satoru anyway.

After Satoru had saved the Jujutsu Sorcerer from the—from the—Curse? Satoru was hesitant to use that word. Its energy was too inhuman to be a Curse User, and it definitely wasn't a familiar face so it wasn't a Jujutsu Sorcerer—he and the Sorcerer were immediately pulled into the principal's office for lecturing.

It wasn't directed at Satoru—he was a child so he didn't "know better" according to the principal—so he didn't care to listen.

He had more pressing matters to think about.

First, and most importantly, was how exactly a Curse managed to touch him with his Limitless active. It shouldn't be possible. The only way around the Limitless Technique was to nullify Curse energy entirely, or...?

Or something. Satoru was certain the Curse hadn't negated his Cursed energy. His Limitless was still up, just... ignored.

Somehow.

Satoru knew his technique wasn't flawless–yet–it was still effective. Especially in areas Satoru was actively guarding like his face.

He didn't like not having an answer. Satoru Gojo was powerful. So powerful he was tipping the scales in the Jujutsu Society with his presence alone. He wasn't the epitome of strength–not yet–but he was damn close.

Finding a Special Grade Curse that was (seemingly) immune to his technique was unnerving.

It should be unnerving. Right? It would be common sense to be unsettled. Right?

He wasn't.

Anxious wasn't the right word Satoru felt.

Excited?

Maybe. Something closer to trepidation. Like he found something huge was coming and he had to wait for it.

A new puzzle, a new toy, a new prize.

He couldn't stop bouncing his leg.

"Toujours et toujours," the Curse whispered. It traced a thumb along his cheek.

His cheek tingled from where it had touched him.

It sounded like French, he thought. Toujour et toujour... what does that mean?

"—The Gojō Clan was very clear that he wasn't to leave without their permission—"

Toujour, toujour, toujour. Satoru shifted his weight in the chair. Did it originate from France? There was that huge massacre not too long ago. They never found the Curse responsible, only that—

Satoru froze.

Only that it left a very powerful signature—one that was hot to touch.

Like the Curse Satoru had encountered.

"—Already too few Special Grades and you jeopardized a promising Sorcerer for the next generation—"

A Curse strong enough to kill thousands within seconds. It would make sense, then, why it was able to touch Satoru despite him using his Infinite ability.

But then why did it leave? Why didn't it try to attack us when I showed up?

If it was so strong—

"Toujours et toujours," the Curse whispered. It traced a thumb along his cheek.

Satoru's brow creased. The memory replayed again and again in his mind.

Why... was it so gentle?

Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ

2005, Lilly

Lilly kept to herself the next couple of years, not wanting to accidentally harm anyone else.

There was a hidden society based in Japan. They hunted things called Curses—personifications of spiritual pressure—and called themselves Jujutsu Sorcerers.

From their perspective, because Lilly's natural aura felt inhuman they could only conclude she was a Curse. Her body was human, but her soul wasn't, which caused the contradiction.

Any time I return to the physical plane, I'll have to completely hide my signature, concluded Lilly.

To be on the safe side, she also limited the times she left. The Sorcerers weren't bad people, and she was reluctant to murder anyone on his side.

Her adopted son, Yūta, had a higher-than-average spiritual pressure which made Lilly think he was meant to be a Jujutsu Sorcerer. He was clearly a protagonist—or antagonist—and the only thing special about that world was the presence of Curses and Sorcerers.

His power was growing nicely. Lilly had been encouraging more growth by mixing in her raw spiritual energy into his food. It was slow, but it would help increase his overall power.

I'll have to train him for combat, too.

Not for a while—and only so long as he wanted to learn. For now, Lilly wanted him to enjoy a peaceful, warm, and loving childhood. Children in Japan normally began pre-school education around three, but Lilly was perfectly capable of homeschooling him. She'd start sending him to public school next year—the normal age in Japan for children to begin their elementary education—that way he could learn to socialize with his peers.

He was already bright for his age—Protagonist Standard™—which made teaching him all the easier. Lilly began an early introduction into multiple languages, knowing he'd have a better time becoming multilingual if she started early. She mostly stuck to Japanese for him, but she would use ASL while she talked to him a lot. She would switch to either French, English, and Mandarin every other day.

It was cute when he started fusing the languages—speak half in Japanese and the other half in French. The way he pronounced his rs was adorable because he rolled them like a drum beat.

Lilly made sure to take ample videos of it.

A good portion of her attention was dedicated to Yūta, but she did not neglect other things that caught her interest.

The café would always be a delight when a visitor showed up. She loved listening to new stories and making friends.

But what really ate up the rest of her time was an experiment she started.

Curses were personifications of spiritual pressure. The more power it had, the more refined its form became. Lilly hadn't encountered any beings that were capable of speech, but she figured that could be rectified.

From what she had gathered from that Sorcerer's memories, he had encountered one powerful Curse that was able to utter a single word: Die.

She theorized that power could correlate to intelligence and stability.

That was pretty standard—a lot like leveling up pet monsters, really.

Lilly had power. She had a lot of power.

And even better, she knew how to transfer that power.

According to the memories of the Sorcerer, the Jujutsu Society ranked Curses from Grade 4 to Special Grade.

Grade 4 - The weakest; a tire iron was plenty to deal with it.

Grade 3 - Slightly harder than Grade 4; handgun or something of similar power was recommended.

Semi-Grade 2

Grade 2 - An average Sorcerer would not come out unscathed.

Semi-Grade 1

Grade 1 - Even a tank might be insufficient.

Special Grade 1

Special Grade - Every Sorcerer who was not Special Grade would be SOL (shit outta luck).

It took several brief outings until Lilly found the first two subjects for her experiment.

One, a nekomata.

Two, a tsukumogami possessing a wagasa.

She captured them in special cages built to restrain demons—courtesy of Madam Merlin many lifetimes ago—and kept them in her living room. The two creatures Lilly had captured were both Grade 2; which meant they were reasonably dangerous for the average Sorcerer.

Wonder if I can get them to Special Grade? Lilly pondered as she pushed bits of her energy into the food she was preparing.

She was taking a risk trying to power level an unstable creature.

But hey, what was the point of living if she couldn't tango with Death?

Maybe she'd get to stay dead long enough to wipe her memories clean when she resurrected. That'd be neat.

The nekomata was about the size of a pitbull, had dark fur, three eyes, and constantly snarled. Every time Lilly approached the creature it yowled and tried to swipe at her. It still ate the food she prepared for it, but it did so with a vicious vigor.

The tsukumogami was trickier to feed. It had no mouth, so Lilly had to hold out her hand in the cage until it started to absorb some of her power. It kept trying to cut off her hand when she did that—and succeeded a few times when she was distracted—which made it irksome.

Let's see how far you can go.

Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ

Yūta, to her delight, started to approach the caged creatures all on his own after the first month.

"Why are we keeping them?" he asked her.

"To see if we can befriend them," she answered.

"Pourquoi?" Yūta asked, accidentally slipping into French.

"Why? Because it's always nice to make friends, dear."

Yūta hugged her. He barely came up to her waist, he was so tiny and precious. "They don't seem very nice."

"not now," she admitted. "But we won't know if it's possible unless we try."

"Okay. Do I have to be friends with them?"

"That's up to you, sweetheart. Do you want to?"

"Si."

"Okay. Why don't we both start feeding them together then?"

"Mn, oui." He squinted when the nekomata snarled at him. "And if they don't want to be friends?"

"Then I'll get rid of them," she answered.

"Why?"

"Because," she said, memories of red and pain hovered in the back of her mind. It made her stumble, a hiccup in her thought process, "it would be us or them. And I'll always choose us."

"Us or them," the small boy echoed, too young to understand the meaning.

Too innocent.

Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ

2006

"Why?"

Its voice was garbled, distorted.

The nekomata's fur had lightened in color since Lilly started to feed it her own energy. It had doubled in size the past year, and it looked like it was in the middle of growing a fourth eye.

"Why what?" Lilly asked, not looking up from the couch where she was knitting. She was preparing another sweater for Yūta. He hadn't gotten out of his wanting-to-match phase with her (yet) so any time Lilly made a sweater for herself she had to make the exact same one for him.

"Why... feed? Why... keep?" it growled, its two tails lashing. "Will kill... will kill..."

"Why do you want to kill us?" Lilly asked instead. "Wouldn't it be better if we got along? I can take care of you, you know."

The nekomata hissed in response.

"We'll see," she mused, her ruby eyes narrowed as she looked at it. Its spiritual energy had grown considerably, but she wouldn't call it a Special Grade yet.

It was nice to know that they could learn how to speak if given enough power, though! That was progress.

"Mommy, I'm home," Yūta called out, rushing inside. "Look, I painted at school today!"

"Oh did you sweetie?" Lilly set down her knitting supplies to look at the picture Yūta was holding out to her. "This is so lovely! May I hang this on the fridge?"

"Uh-huh! Can you take me to a park this weekend? Je veux peindre des fleurs."

He wants to paint flowers? Aw, that is so precious.

Lilly cooed, "Of course, sweet pea."

"Oh wait—" Yūta grabbed the picture and hurried to show it to the caged creatures. "Look guys! The leaves are turning colors now."

"Will kill," spat the nekomata, the wagasa whirled angrily in its own cage.

"Eso no es agradable," said Yūta. Lilly would agree that it was not nice indeed. "I thought first words were supposed to be stuff like Mom or Dad."

"Everyone's a bit different, darling."

"I guess so."

Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ

A month later

Lilly washed dishes in the kitchen. She glanced up every so often to watch Yūta. Her son had taken a seat outside the nekomata cage.

Yūta held out a plate of halibut. "Dinner time."

"Hate you," hissed the nekomata.

Yūta frowned. "I wish we could be friends."

"Why?" demanded the nekomata. "Will kill you. Will kill you!"

"Mm-hmm." Yūta cocked his head. "If you stopped saying that, Momma said I could take you out for walks and stuff."

The nekomata grew very quiet. "... Walks? Outside? Outside?"

"Oui."

The nekomata slowly laid down. "Out... want... out...?"

Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ

Another month later

"Mommy, can we take them outside?"

"Well they have gone an entire month without trying to cut off my hand, and haven't said anything about killing us," Lilly mused. "Sure, why not?"

Yūta's dark eyes glimmered. "Really? Can I let them out?"

Lilly shook her head. "No. Better safe than sorry, please stand back while I do so, okay?"

"Oui."

As soon as Lilly opened the cage, the nekomata dashed out. She grabbed it by the collar, slammed it down on the ground, and pushed its nose into the carpet. It grumbled something incoherent. She leaned down to whisper in its ear.

"See here," said Lilly. "You think you're stronger? Remember I'm stronger. You think you can hurt my son before I cut off your limbs? Try it. Behave yourself, little Curse, and you won't have to return to that cage."

It hissed out slowly. "Will... be good. Be good."

"Good little Curse," she cooed, releasing her grip. "Oh, my dear umbrella, you don't need me to threaten you, do you?"

It twirled.

"Fantastic," she said cheerfully, taking it out of its cage and resting it over her shoulder. As soon as she touched the Curse she noticed that its spiritual energy was drastically different from the nekomata.

Both curses had noticeable malice to them when she took them in. As they had grown stronger, that malice had diminished. It wasn't on the same level as the beginning, but it was still noticeable when she touched them.

The nekomata's malevolence had dulled, yet still present enough that Lilly didn't feel comfortable completely trusting it yet. From a sharp knife to a dull knife—still a knife!

The tsukumogami that possessed the wagasa, on the other hand, had almost no malice left. As if it transformed from a knife to a spoon.

Lilly wondered what made them so different. Was it the type of Curse—the type of creature—or something else?

She didn't know. She figured it'd be interesting to find out.

Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ

For the first week since being freed the nekomata stalked them in the shadows, only coming out to eat.

Second week it started to sit upside down on the ceiling and watched them unblinkingly. Yūta and Lilly would speak with it, but it never responded which made for some one-sided conversations.

The third week in and it started to give one-worded responses.

It took another two months after being let out of its cage, consistently fed Lilly's spiritual energy, and socialized, but the nekomata finally started to positively engage with Yūta and Lilly.

The tsukumogami possessing the wagasa, thankfully, was not nearly so difficult to deal with.

The tsukumogami was a red wagasa. When Lilly first picked it up, it was red and black, but over time its black handle lightened to white and it developed a white floral pattern on its oiled paper. It liked to hover around Lilly, and every time Lilly stepped outside it rushed to her hand.

It behaved more like a cute puppy rather than a scary Curse.

It even started to project a small, feminine voice. No one would have suspected that not too long ago it had been responsible for several murders and had regularly tried to chop off Lilly's hand when she went to feed it.

Its malice was entirely gone after a month of being out of the cage. Lilly felt completely comfortable letting it roam around unsupervised. In fact, she had even become fond of it.

"Would you like a name?" she asked it.

"Yes," it said.

"Would you like a gender?" she asked it.

"Yes," it said.

"Do you've a preference?"

The wagasa quivered. "I don't know."

"For now," Lilly gently said, "May I call you Ame?"

"Ame," it repeated, a hint of joy in its tone. "I'm Ame."

"Yes you are. Would you like to interact with the human world?"

"Is that possible?"

"It is. You are a being of pure spiritual energy—a curse, this world would call—and you need physical energy—otherwise known as vitality or life—to be seen by humans here. There's plenty of that in the human world. I can show you how to harness it for yourself and create a form to be seen."

"Please," it said.

"Me, too," came the nekomata, the large two-tailed cat stepping out of the shadows. It had been listening to their conversation since the start.

Lilly smiled faintly at the cat-Curse. Two long, thin, tails flicked side by side. It had grown to be roughly the size of a full-grown tiger, had four red eyes, and its once black fur lightened to a soft dandelion color. Its malice was not entirely gone, but it was restrained.

Controlled.

"Okay," she agreed.

Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ

Lilly confirmed curses could be more than mindless blobs of energy. The stronger they were, the more intelligent they became. They were capable of learning, and most importantly, capable of forming friendships.

She wasn't certain if it was something exclusive due to her spiritual energy, or if anyone with enough spiritual could upgrade and "tame" them.

She figured the next step in her experiment would be to see if Yūta could do the same.

Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ

Bonus:

The barrier Lilly had placed shattered. She reflexively gasped.

Her red eyes shot up to meet the gaze of a–

–I know you–

–a shiver ran down her spine. Her stomach dropped, a warm snake constricted around her heart. A tsunami of raw emotions slammed into her with the chaos of an off-track train. Grief and love intermingled like reunited soulmates; so suffocatingly close it was hard to differentiate.

She took a step back, a step away from him, from that soul inside I know so very well–

"I'm going to die," She said after a long moment, these words ringing painfully true. "And when I wake up again, I won't get to see you again."

"You will," he told me.

"How can you be so sure?" She asked him.

"Because I'll follow you. When you wake up again, I'll be there."

"Do you promise?" her voice trembled, a curdle of hope rising inside of her.

He turned to her , smiling with his eyes as he held up his pinky. "Always."

She hooked her pinky through his. "Always and always?"

"Always and always," he promised her.

Another life. Another love. Another death.

She was a mess, a jumbled up entanglement of emotions too strong for one soul to carry. Her thoughts raced from one memory to another, a single thread combining them.

That soul.

"What?" she whispered. "Why?"

"Because," he said quietly, "you're my weakness."

A soul she knew as intimately as she knew her own.

What, oh what, are you doing here?

He was in the body of a boy older than her, that old soul, with familiar white hair and pretty blue eyes behind glasses. He was almost as pretty as when he was Snow White and she was D–

Is he why I am here? Is he why I woke up?

She swallowed roughly, painfully. A sliver of hope, of please, please, please, please–

Do you–?

Would you please–?

Please, just once, please, please remem–

The boy grinned. "Hi there. Wanna play?"

A blanket of exhaustion was placed upon her shoulders. She did not react. She did not move, did not think, did not breathe as the needles of pain dug into her.

How silly of her to hope for such a thing.

Lilly smiled behind her mask, neatly brushing aside the bitterness.

It was fine.

She would remember enough for the both of them.

Always and always.

She stepped to him, and then felt something strange. There was a resistance around him, spiritual energy interwoven in the air. It was an invisible force that pushed her away. It wasn't a familiar sensation, and it took her a second longer than she would have liked to realize what it was doing.

He was, amazingly, manipulating space itself.

She wondered if perhaps that transcended to time as well? Was her old companion on his way to being a small god?

Would he live forever if he did?

She Paused time, and reached out a hand to cup his face before she Resumed.

The movement she made as time was paused granted her some immunity to the space manipulation. Not entirely–she could feel it wanting to push her away–and she suspected if he was focusing hard enough he could blast her away.

But in that moment he was flustered–surprised?–by her sudden proximity and the aura around him fluctuated.

"What?" he breathed out in surprise.

"Toujours et toujours," she whispered.

It's okay you don't remember. As long as you're happy, my dearest friend.

Ƹ̵̡Ӝ̵̨̄Ʒ

Next chapter is the Star Plasma arc.

Answer: Cursed Techniques with gun as a backup.

Question: Curses can take the form of mythical creatures—most commonly Japanese given their origin—so what kind of curse would you want as a pet (if you could tame it)?

Reviews are love!