Chapter Text
It all began with a wish.
Now that she was thinking about it, nothing was truly innocent that came with that wish.
It was a selfish wish.
It was a greedy wish.
So truly, whatever she wished that placed her in this very moment, she had it coming .
She stares in horror at the childish creature that makes a face at her in some mockery of a smile.
She pales - still not as pale as the one standing in front of her - she tries to scream, to put her hands out to push the creature away, to run , for god’s sake.
But she’s just standing there, rooted to the place as she looks at that, that thing that mirror’s her everything, like a reflection, if not for the fact that the creature, that creature , has damning holes for its eyes.
It has pitch-black eyes. Like someone drilled-punched a big hole in its face instead of eyes.
Its mouth. Its mouth has no teeth. She can’t even see a tongue. Like a dreamful of horrors. She can see the grotesque way its cheeks upturn like it’s trying to smile, but it only succeeds at creeping her out further.
Then, it fucking speaks.
“Hi…na...”
She blanches further when a hand reaches out alongside that voice. The voice that grits her ear as if it’s scratching at a chalkboard.
And then, finally, her body moves. Her child-body moves - but only to take a step back. Still frozen, staring at the, at the curse .
—
She always thought about the question, “Is this it?” ever since she learned about reading stories.
From simple fairy tales when she was a child, which ascended to various fiction books when she was a pre-teen and forbidden to spend time in front of the television, until her teens, of which she finally ascended to watching anything fiction.
Movies, series, and the one thing she truly loved, anime.
Maybe because she got addicted. To that purpose . They want to protect their friend, they want to become Hokage, they want to become the Wizard King, to fulfill the prophecy, they want to be the freest. Their lives on the screens serve a purpose. Or striving towards a purpose.
What is hers?
To finish high school? Then what?
Get higher education? Then what?
Get a nice, stable job? After that, what?
Get married? Produce kids? And rinse and repeat?
Is that it?
She used to ask that a lot.
Maybe she just has delusions of grandeur .
She tried to look for that purpose - she even established her very own club of nerds. You’re passionate about Harry Potter? You’re invited! About LotR? Welcome! Anime? Even better!!
She tried to be happy. She tried to tell herself, “I’m content.”
And for years - it worked.
Sure, she knows that it truly didn’t go away. When her clubmates are discussing, “What do you wanna take on in college”, “What work do you wanna do”, “What kind of partner do you dream of”.
Her thoughts of, “Is that it?” slowly but surely peeking a look back at her.
It’s maddening .
She tried to explain this once - to her best friends, at the time - and to her disappointment, it never worked.
“You should think about it seriously, you know. College is only around the corner.”
She was crushed. Her friends. She always thought that they of all people would understand. Then she finds out that they’ve already been taking schedules to take entrance exams while she was enjoying the last of her high school days.
She knew she was smart. She was accelerated in her schooling. Graduating high school at only 14 years of age. That’s gotta be some kind of record, somewhere. Maybe she’s not the genii type that won music competitions (because she’s absolutely crap at it) at age 4 or something, but she was smart enough that she stood out.
In her country where speaking the English language is rare, she was already fluent at age five. She’s absolutely pants at mathematics but she can tell you the history of the world through stories. She knows of their dates, she knows of their names. It comes easily to her.
She always lies when she first introduces herself to her friends telling them to, “Forgive me, I’m terrible at remembering names,”. Up to now, she can name you every character in every show, in every book she got her hands on. She tells everyone that because she will keep forgetting you until you have done something that catches her interest. Until then you’re inconsequential. She says that so that she has an excuse.
Her family isn’t poor. They’re a middle-class family that afforded her ballet lessons when she decided on a whim that it looks cool back when she was seven. She attended halfway through a year when she just dropped it, not interested when she’s one of the older ones taking the class.
Her parents weren’t even mad when she told them. Both parents were too busy for the family, she was raised by different nannies, and when she got old enough, they had a housekeeper who keeps the house clean and cooks their meals. The housekeeper arrives early enough to cook them breakfast, and leaves early enough that she’s alone at their house until her parents arrive just in time for dinner.
She only sees the both of them at dinner, ever since she can remember. Sometimes her mother doesn’t even make it. Stuck in traffic or stuck at work. Her father is a strict man who has tight control over her studies. He tells her grades should never go down to a certain point, in this case, it was 90. 90% was her lowest grade.
Except for mathematics. She never did get a grade higher than 90% in math. It pissed her father off something fierce. And she would tremble at his presence every time it happened.
Her mother did not care. At all. She doesn’t know that woman at all. Except for small talk happening at the dinner table when both of them talked over her and she didn’t speak at all except when prompted, she doesn’t know the woman.
Her parents aren’t cruel. Whether or not they want her, let alone love her, is up for debate.
Her death was, some can say, violent. She would tell otherwise, it was normal enough. Especially regarding the crime rate of the area she was in.
Because she never prepared for her entrance exams, she just went along with her friends, testing where she could, and just hanging out. At the time, she thinks she's the only one who thought of it as just hanging out . Not with their futures on the line.
Thinking about it now, she wonders if her friends had been pissed at her for being so cavalier. Probably. She went with them at the last minute so she never did study for the exams. And the fees were an insignificant amount to her, unlike some of her friends who came from low-income families and had to save just to take the exam.
She still passed all of them.
She finally picked a college, away from her ‘friends’, and with her father’s approval, she was now looking at dorms.
She was brilliant at directions so she thoroughly explores the area. And maybe she wants, for once in her life, (she graduated high school now for goodness’ sake) she wants to stay out late.
It was a mistake.
She only heard a loud grunt, and she turned to look behind her before all she felt was pain.
Immediately, she fell over, clutching at her side. Wondering what the hell happened. She looks upon a man who stood over her before she coughs out. Blood . She tastes nothing but iron in her mouth.
Dazedly, she realizes that the man pushes her over roughly to lie down face up. She coughs out some more blood , realizing that the man was patting her down. Unsuccessfully, she knows he won’t find anything, for she doesn’t own a phone, unlike her peers. For her father deemed them a distraction.
“Fucking slut,” he heard the man mumbling, immediately running after snatching her branded shoulder-bag off her body and ignoring her grunt of pain.
She feels hot.
She chokes on the blood flowing in her mouth.
In the alleyway she was laying on, she hears the blaring of an incoming train. The train she would’ve ridden had she gone home a little earlier.
She reaches out towards the sound, maybe for help. Maybe she just doesn’t wanna die in an alleyway. But she can’t move.
Where the hell did the man hit her? Was it a stab? Probably. She didn’t hear a gun.
She can’t feel anything, anymore, her hand lands with a thud next to her.
“Is this it,” she murmurs.
She hates this life.
She feels cold.
“Is this really it?”
She hates everything about this life.
She can’t see anything, anymore.
“I wish…”
The emptiness, the loneliness, the hopelessness.
She feels really cold.
“I wish for an exceptional life.”
She hates herself, most of all.
Everything sounds far away, she can’t hear anything, anymore.
“I wish for a purposeful life.”
A different life, a different her, a different world.
And then, before she fully fades, she hears, clear as a day, she sees, as if it's right in front of her face, a creature blinks its eyeless eyes and grins its pitch-black mouth at her.
“‘kay.”
—
June 1996
She was reborn, in a minor noble Japanese family.
Well, correction. She was born in an old Japanese family that was once considered nobility.
Now, they are a minor family in the world of jujutsu.
That’s right.
The world of curses and sorcerers.
Now, she’s three years old, and her cursed energy training has begun.
That’s how she met it .
—
She remembered it. Back when she was dying, she remembered seeing its face.
And suddenly it all comes to her mind.
Her last words.
Her last wish .
Its response with, “‘kay.”
She stares at the thing, eyes wide with realization.
—
They called her the heiress of the Kira Clan. The last generation that was born in the Kira Clan.
And her ‘Clan’ was her and her parents. Her father, in this world, is hanging onto what prestige is left of the Clan. Her mother, in this world, trains her as if it's going out of style.
According to her maniacal and malicious ways, she’s the Clan’s hope. At their time of desperation, her parents experimented with all sorts of cursed energy hoping to have a child as her mother was deemed barren.
And when she was born, they were graced with a torrent of cursed energy felt for miles. They then hysterically yelled their accomplishment for the heavens to hear.
She can only guess that the ‘torrent of cursed energy’ was her being reborn with the creature inside her.
In the first place, she has never heard of the Kira Clan. At the same time, not all clans were introduced if she remembers correctly. The three main clans: Gojo, Zenin, and Kamo. And the one minor clan introduced was the Inumaki.
Her parent’s cursed techniques weren’t anything special either. Her father only uses different types of ofuda and a cursed nodachi, although he is pretty powerful, being a first-grade sorcerer. Her mother, interestingly enough, uses a cursed noh mask in which she imbues her own cursed energy and a second-grade sorcerer.
—
June 1996
“Nanika?” She asks hesitantly.
“Hi…na...” The thing , no, Nanika replies.
And then, she gasps awake from her meditation, her mother in front of her.
“Well?” She snaps out, “Did you find your cursed energy?”
She’s all of three. In this body, at least. And she found it, yes. If Nanika is considered as such.
Why the hell is Nanika here?
This is the world of jujutsu.
Or is the question why am I born in this world when it was Nanika from Hunter x Hunter who transported me?
Shouldn’t I be in the world of Hunters instead?
Is it because of what I wished?
Before she can think of a reasonable answer, she blinks back in tears in her eyes when her mother hits her in the face and she flies right through the shoji doors of the dojo.
“Answer when I’m talking to you, daughter!”
—
March 2009
“Another assignment?” Gojo whines, his voice grating to his ears.
“I’ve just gone back late last night,” Ieiri voices her own complaints.
Yaga Masamichi heaves a deep sigh. He pats down one of his cursed corpses and lets them complain until all he can hear is silence. He glances between them, who being the brightest if not the most annoying of his students, recognizes his tired stature.
Ever since Geto’s betrayal a year and a half ago, he feels like he’s only tired these days. Even if most of the time he’s just irritated at Gojo and Ieiri’s antics, there are always days like these. He looks at his two students through sunglasses and thinks of the report that he has to convey to them.
“This isn’t an assignment for a cursed spirit,” he begins, “this is an order from the jujutsu higher-ups.” He pauses to give the folder in his table a glance. Or a glare.
“Retrieve and execute the cursed user named Kira Hinagiku.”
“Wait, wait, a cursed user?”
—
The two of them were quiet in the car, contemplating. Well, Shoko is. She knows that Gojo is seething. She can feel the roll of his cursed energy. Probably because she is sitting close beside him. Even if she can’t, his silence is enough. She contemplates getting a cigarette. She has a headache. She hears a big sigh from him then a thump from where he lands his head in the headrest.
By the time they get on the plane, Shoko knows that Gojo is restless.
“Maybe Suguru has a point and I should just kill the higher-ups,” he says, indifferent.
“But you won’t.” She replies with a surety in the same indifferent tone.
“No, I won’t.”
“But still,” she begins to rummage her purse for a smoke, hoping that even if it's just playing with the cigarette stick would satisfy her craving, “a wish granter, huh?”
“Maybe I should just wish for every single one of them to die,” Gojo sticks a lolly right in her face, “or maybe you should wish to stop smoking already, they’re disgusting.”
“You wish,” she scoffs, they both huff a laugh at the pun, and snatches the candy from Gojo, it’s better than anything.
“How does it go again?” She sighs at him, looking unimpressed. “Humor me.”
“Kira Hinagiku. She’s from a minor jujutsu clan, though it was proven that they were a family descended from Emperor Seiwa. They never possessed important domains and never represented a real power, but they were considered as kōke.”
“That long ago, huh? Any connections in the jujutsu world at that time?”
“Who knows, but unlike the rest of the jujutsu families, the Kira Clan isn’t really anything special, as far as we know. They don’t have an inherited cursed technique, they don’t have anything special. Their talents, if we can say that, rely mostly on cursed weapons. Those they pass down.”
“Insignificant bunch, huh?”
“Yeah. I think the only remarkable thing about them is they are mostly born with a monstrous amount of cursed energy. Five times bigger than normal newborns with cursed energy. I read it was a novelty.”
“That’s the first time I’m hearing about that,” Gojo turns his head to look at her through his round glasses.
“It’s a fairly unremarkable thing. Compared to other families’ cursed techniques at least.”
“That’s true. Still, never has one been born with unique abilities, for the amount of cursed energy you suspect?”
“I don’t suspect,” Shoko scoffs at him again, “it’s already been studied. And no, there were a few here and there, but the Clan is mostly called the breeding stock.”
“What, what the hell.” She shrugs at his tone of disbelief.
“I’m sure you already figured it out. The amount of cursed energy within their clan makes them great for arranged marriages. That’s why they’re the most scattered clan. Each and every one of the families, if we can trace it, has a drop of Kira Clan’s bloodline.”
“Not this past few generations though.”
“No, their numbers started to dwindle for the past 50 years or so.”
“So this Kira Hinagiku is the first of the Clan to have unique cursed techniques. Why approve her execution then?”
“We still don’t know if the Clan themselves approve of it. Besides,” she bites down hard on the lolly that it cracks in between, “her unique cursed technique has already killed no less than ten people.”
“Hmmm,” both of them stay quiet all the way to Oita.
—
The first time they both meet Kira Hinagiku’s father, they look at each other in silent conversation and agree that they’re dealing with a nutcase.
“Look! As I’ve already told the higher-ups at Kyoto branch, I’m perfectly capable of controlling that, that thing !” He gesticulates wildly from where he led them to what looks like a control room.
The room is very wide and big with lots of space in the center. At the far-end was a cluster of monitors looking from one angle to another and showing a girl.
This man has been telling them about how he educates that thing as far as he is able since it's tenth birthday. That he trains it, see, we follow a schedule . As if he isn't talking about his own daughter.
Both of them tune out the disgusting rambles of the man and concentrate on her.
She was about their age, which they weren’t told, maybe three to four years younger. She was sitting down primly in seiza, a brush held in one hand while the other holds the end of her kimono sleeves to not touch the washi.
Shoko thinks she’s a beauty, with short, wavy, black hair curled to a bob cut, and pale skin. She can’t see the color of her eyes from the camera angles but she can see the way it’s upturned. Shoko also sees that she has a mole on the left side of her mouth.
“We still need to look at her in person though,” Gojo suddenly cuts the man off, snapping Shoko out of her staring.
“You - you want to get closer at that thing ?! It’s a monster I tell you! I don’t care if you have your Six Eyes, Gojo! Ten eyes and that thing will still kill you!”
“Right,” Shoko drawls, interrupting the man’s tirade and hopefully distracting Gojo from where one of his eyebrows were twitching, clearly irritated, “As Gojo said, we still need to see her.”
The man visibly turns red in anger, veins popping at his forehead, and for a moment, Shoko worries he might die. Then decides that she doesn’t care.
“Fine!” The man grits out, Shoko forgot his name already, “Fine! Don’t come for me when that thing kills you!” He shouts at them then proceeds to shout for a servant.
“Escort them to the entrance of the Cage!” Both her and Gojo raise an eyebrow at the term, then the servant bows low at both of them and turns pale at the command.
“But-,” the servant stutters before she catches sight of the anger then turns to them with a timid voice, “follow me, please.”
—
They’ve been walking for fifteen minutes, and Satoru is slowly but surely getting pissed off.
The servant that led them walks so slowly and obviously doesn’t wanna go anywhere near ‘the Cage’ and Satoru just from that term, can already feel his jaw tighten in response.
“Look.” He starts, getting more irritated at the servant’s flinch, “you don't need to go inside with us. Stay outside and dry for all I care, so can you hurry the fuck up?”
The servant stammers out an apology and to her defense, does hurry up after an audible sigh of relief.
“What a weak ass,” Satoru snorts, not quite silently as the servant tenses up again.
“That- that thing ,” the servant spits out with a tremble, “has killed many people .”
“So did pretty much anyone,” Shoko interrupts from beside him, “she’s not special.”
“Pfft,” Satoru’s snorts turn into loud guffaws, “true, true.”
The servant turns red, whether in anger or embarrassment, Satoru doesn’t care. They stop walking at a bunker-like structure that looked like it was carved deep within the mountain. The servant bows low at them again then proceeds to walk-run away from the place.
After she’d gone, a camera whirls around to inspect them then with another whirl, the heavy doors slide open.
Satoru turns to look at Shoko beside him to find her already looking. And with a silent nod, they go in.
Not even ten meters in, another large, heavy door welcomes them. Satoru thinks they’re a tad bit paranoid.
With another camera inspection, the door slid open with a whirl, and when they stepped in, dark stairways led down a long way. Satoru whistles, an impressed tune.
“This leads quite a long way down, Shoko,” he pushes his dark glasses down, “and another heavy door.”
“They fortified it quite a bit, huh,” Shoko says, sarcasm dripping in her tone.
“Oh yeah.” He agrees as they both descend.
Walking down the stairway, Satoru thinks about the girl’s cursed technique. A wish-granter. With the ability to grant just about any wish, the extent of which is speculated by the higher-ups to be infinite, you’d think that the old geezers would want to take advantage of it. Wish for each and every cursed spirit to die? Probably not. The consequence of that will probably be staggering.
When they stopped at the very last step, the camera once again inspects them, then, a radio buzz sounds.
“This is your last chance to turn around,” the voice of Kira Hinagiku’s father mocks, tone infuriating Satoru.
“Just get on with it,” Satoru gruffly says.
It was a little comical how large the heavy doors seemed to be, but when these last doors slid open, there was only a carved-out hallway that was only taller than Satoru by a head compared to the hulking, heavy doors.
“Well,” he grins then starts walking ahead, “this is cozy," his voice echoes at the tunnel.
In the tunnel, there was a bunch of ofuda stuck right next to each other like a horror movie set. He hears Shoko click her tongue next to him.
“I don’t know if we’re way too offhand about this or they’re just way too paranoid,” she explains when he turns a questioning look at her.
“Probably a bit of both,” he acknowledges that seeing everyone around the Kira Household, paranoid and scared of every nook and cranny, with a nutcase for a Master of the House, he let his guard down a little.
He’s angry at the treatment of a girl younger than him, born with a cursed technique more powerful than ever, and everyone around her runs around like headless chickens.
And if he were to believe that asshole of a man, she’s been living in what has been dubbed ‘the Cage’ since she was ten. Crazy ass, old geezer.
They both stopped when the cavern widens. A wooden, brute of a bridge is the first thing they see. And when Satoru peers down, at the sides of the bridge, he sees an extremely long way down, and when you hit bottom, stalagmites will greet you on the way to death’s door.
And there, on the far end of the caves, is a huge towering torii gate. Its pillars are wooden and rotting, with papers and ofudas taped everywhere you look at the torii.
At the center of the torii, up above what looks like a carved indentation on the whole wall, is a shrine. Too tiny for the size of the torii, and the same as the gate, not been taken care of for what looks like years.
However, what took Satoru’s and Shoko’s eyes is right in the center of the cavernous space is a cage.
And for a second, he hears Shoko gasp in disbelief at the same time Satoru grits his teeth.
This wasn’t shown on cameras. The cameras were angled enough that you can see the cage in the background, but not the overlapping gigantic cages.
The outer cage is big. In square jail-like patterns, it’s almost the same floor size as the cave, unlike the torii and the shrine, this one is made of metal, and also covered in ofudas.
The second cage, inside of the outer one, is a little bit smaller. Enough to fit a couple of cameras in between the two cages and not reachable through the inner cage even if you have very long arms to reach for it.
The cage was very dark. There were lights scattered across the cavern that you can see everything, but inside the cage, there’s only one source to light up the whole thing.
Satoru’s Six Eyes immediately perceives everything inside the cage. There was a futon bed on the upper-right most corner, and a toilet and a shower stall on the lower-left most corner. Somewhat in the middle of it is a chabudai with few washis on top of it being held down by paperweights and sitting on a zabuton in seiza is Kira Hinagiku.
The moment their eyes meet, even through the two cages, Satoru instantly knew that she has a very powerful curse.
Fascinating , he thinks as he beheld the curse his Six Eyes see , it overlaps with the image of her, but he can see that it’s mostly Kira Hinagiku in control.
What would happen if it flipped though?
Heh, so, so fascinating.
He grins maniacally and starts to walk through a wooden bridge, he continues to stare at the girl whose eyes widen upon seeing him.
Does she recognize him perhaps? That can’t be it.
Is it the shock of seeing another person going inside her cage?
Or is that he and Shoko are the only people she has seen in a long time?
He stops walking right in front of the gates of the cage and eyes the camera that was there.
They can practically hear the reluctance through the camera. And then, the outer cage opens.
Shoko was walking slightly behind him to his left, and even from where he was standing, he could feel how tense she was the moment the outer cage gates closed shut behind them.
He subtly turns a look at her that makes her stand a little more closely as he protects the two of them with his Infinity, just in time for the inner cage to open.
Then, he faces them .
—
The moment the both of them enter the inner cages, Kira Hinagiku adjusts in her seat to face them, then bows at a perfect, forty-five-degree angle.
“How do you do,” she greets them both formally, “You will have to excuse me if I don’t stand up.”
“Oh?” He raises an eyebrow, knowing the reason why, yet still provoking her, “Why is that?”
“I’m a little chained-up,” she deadpans, looking at him unimpressed.
“Chained-up?” Shoko asks.
She moves her foot to the side to show the both of them an inflamed, bright, red ankle, chained to the floor.
“Shit,” Shoko grits her teeth, her cigarette squashed in between them, “how the hell do you do everything around here, then?”
“It’s on schedule,” she casually straightens her foot to neaten her kimono, “if I’m a second late at doing things, it’ll drag me.”
“Right,” Satoru’s fist tightens in his pockets, his jaw clicking tight.
“My name is Kira Hinagiku. Though I surmise that both of you know it already, so to whom shall I thank the pleasure of visiting me in my humble cell?”
“Doesn’t it get tiring talking like that?” Satoru gets tired just listening to it.
Kira Hinagiku shrugs, the posture very unlike the formal way she presented herself, “It irritates people.”
And Satoru barks out a laugh, when he realizes, oh still fighting then , good.
“I’m Gojo Satoru, a jujutsu sorcerer from Tokyo Metropolitan Curse Technical College.”
“From the same college, Ieiri Shoko.”
“From Tokyo?” the girl asks, her head tilted. “You’re a long way from home. What about the Kyoto Branch?”
“Pfft,” Satoru snorts unattractively, “they’re all weak in there.”
“Oh, so you do need someone strong.” She looks at both of them with an unwavering gaze, “You’re here to kill me, aren’t you?”
Shoko turns to look at him so he does the same. From her eyes alone, Satoru knows that Shoko doesn’t want to. She’s a healer.
Why did Yaga send her with him to execute someone in the first place? Satoru already knows why from the moment Yaga handed him the report.
He tilts his head in a semblance of a nod, and that’s enough for Shoko to relax her shoulders.
Eugh, they really did know each other too well. By her grimace, she agrees.
“Never mind that,” he dismisses with a wave of his hand, then throws himself into the soft, not unlike a tatami floor, sitting criss-cross, but still carefully has Infinity raised up.
Shoko sighs next to him and sits down to his left, close to him.
“For now,” he grins, a hand on his chin, “tell me about the two of you!”
He takes pleasure in the way her eyes widen, but he doesn’t enjoy the way her hand trembles next, her lips wobble, and large teardrops suddenly fall in her eyes.
“Wh-wha-, Wait! Did I say something?!” He flails, not enjoying the feeling.
“I apologize,” she hiccups silently, “It’s been a while since I’ve talked to anyone. Let alone about myself.”
Satoru sombers, “Talk to us, then.”
“I-,” she sniffles lightly, “I call it Nanika .”
“Something?” Satoru tilts his head at Shoko’s clarification.
“Nanika,” she agrees, “I’ve never truly known about Nanika before I was already seven.”
“Her powers, you mean?” Satoru waylays her, noticing her statement that is truly known .
“Sharp,” she smiles at him, “but yes. I noticed her originally when I was three, I think. Through meditation, I’m placed inside a mindset with Nanika in the mirror, reflecting me. It scared the crap out of me, it is a curse, after all, it looks scary for a child.”
“Did you tell anyone about it?” Shoko asks.
“No,” she vehemently denies, “I think you’ve met the man who sired me. If you could believe it, my dam was even worse.”
Both of them wince.
“No, even as a child, I was scared at what they would do to me more than I was scared of the curse. But it's true that I discovered it's powers when I turned seven."
Well, that’s great, Satoru thought sarcastically. Another A+ Parenting from the jujutsu sorcerers.
“Tell me about Nanika,” Satoru blurts out, “the higher-ups believe that Nanika’s wish-granting abilities are infinite. What do you think?”
“Nanika’s powers,” she smiles wryly, “infinite, huh? That’s actually highly possible. However, Gojo-san, Nanika’s powers are of equivalent exchange, did they not tell you that?”
“I expected as much, even though they never did tell me how.”
“If you could enlighten us, that would be great,” Shoko adds, “it’s your power after all.”
Hinagiku is silent for a long minute. Satoru suspects that she shares an empathic link with this Nanika.
“Alright,” she breathes deeply, “may I trust you?”
Satoru and Shoko blinked in shock. And when they didn’t immediately reply Hinagiku added, “I’ve never really explained the extent of my powers to anyone else ever.”
“But you do know how it works?” Satoru asks his face for once, devoid of expression.
“I know all of its rules.”
“Why trust the two of us, then?” Shoko asks back before Satoru can say anything.
Satoru wanted to know as well, because even if she asked if she can trust them, Satoru, deep in him, from her gaze alone, knows that this girl already trusts the two of them.
She’s asking, to let them know the extent or rather, the heaviness of the trust she extended to them.
“Because you didn’t say no,” she laughs tearily, “You didn’t say no if you were here to kill me or not. So. Either you’re here to take me away to be free, or you’re here to end my life. Either way, I’m free.”
Satoru watches as tears roll down her cheeks, and down at the chabudai staining the few calligraphy pieces she had done.
“You can trust us then,” Satoru decides then and there, even if he felt a pinch at his side from Shoko.
“I’ll tell you-,”
“Wait,” Satoru interrupts, and with concentration and his crossed fingers, he extends his Infinity, concentrating to filter out the sounds. There are no cameras facing in her face the way she’s sitting so whoever is watching won’t hear a thing or read her lips.
He nods at Hinagiku as a go-ahead.
“I think it’ll be best if you leave the questions after I finish. And I’ll do my best to explain my powers and abilities.
“As I said earlier, I named it Nanika. And it’s its powers that grant wishes. However, to do that, a person must first grant me three of whatever I request.” She indicates the three with holding up three fingers on the one hand and the other hand pointing at herself.
“After those conditions are met, Nanika will assume control over my body,” she stops them with a hand after that sentence alarms them, “Nanika’s control over my body doesn’t make my body automatically fit to fight, and this ability of mine and Nanika can't be used to fulfill my wish or Nanika’s wish.
“No, this wish-granting ability of ours can only grant the wishes of another party. On which, the wish does not have to come from the one who fulfilled my requests, as even an extra party, who spoke of their wish nonchalantly can have their wish granted as long as it was said during Nanika's appearance.
“However, the greater the wish made to Nanika is, the harder the next three requests will become. It is not something I can control. The one that must bear the burden of the next three requests is not the one that Nanika granted the wish to; it is the next person that I make requests to.”
Satoru and Shoko sit in stunned silence. The magnitude of a wish-granting ability hasn’t quite hit them yet, the possibility of it is there.
“Talking about it now, if a person fails to fulfill my requests four times, at least two people will die with an increasing amount of casualties correlated to the scale of the previous wish. These deaths will occur instantly and simultaneously. It is not something I can control either.” Hinagiku sighs heavily.
“Firstly, the request recipient and their most loved one will die from being crushed by an invisible force, and secondly, any additional deaths are chosen based on persons who spent the most time with the request recipient, regardless of their relationship to them. Unlike the recipient, they are wrung to death instead of crushed.”
“You can’t control their deaths?” Shoko asks.
“No, I really cannot.”
“It’s because of the equivalent exchange, isn’t it?” Satoru clarifies.
“Yes.”
“Are those the only rules, then?”
“No, there are a bunch more,” Hinagiku shakes her head, “but those are the basics.”
“So then,” Satoru claps his hands, “to summarize; 1, to make a wish, you, Hinagiku-chan, must first request three things,” he held up a finger.
“2, the one who Hinagiku-chan requests from doesn’t have to be the one who asks for a wish, any extra party can as long as Nanika is present,” he held up two fingers in a peace sign.
“and 3, if a person Hinagiku-chan requests to, fails to accomplish your requests four times, not only will that person die, but also their loved one. But if the wish granted previously was on a big scale, there will be additional deaths that are chosen based on persons who spent the most time with the request recipient.” He held up three fingers.
“Anything Gojo missed?” Shoko drawls.
“No, that’s about it,” Hinagiku takes a hand with her kimono to cover her mouth, “there are some other ones, but we can discuss them later.”
“And you haven’t requested anything from anyone?” Satoru asks, curious.
“No,” she shakes her head again, “a lot of times I make requests unconsciously, but I can make a request consciously. I just can’t control what I will be requesting, since it correlates to how heavy the last wish had been.”
“Hmmm,” Satoru takes his chin in his hand, thinking.
“What is it, Gojo?” Satoru takes a moment to look at his friend, taking a peek at her from his glasses.
Shoko’s eyes widen, and it’s a singular gesture that says, ‘You’re about to do something stupid, aren’t you?’
Satoru feels his mouth widen in a big grin.
“Hey, Hina-chan,” he says in a sing-song voice.
“Hina-chan?” She replies with a furrow on her brows.
“You should make a request to me!” He finishes in the same tone.
He feels his grin widen some more when he sees her eyes widen.
“Gojo! You!” Shoko’s hissed words at him halt when they both see Hinagiku’s eyes go daze.
She remains like that for a moment or two. Until -
“Satoru,” she says in a dazed tone, and Satoru’s eyebrows raise at the familiarity of the address.
“Satoru,” she repeats, then finally her eyes clear, and turn to look at him, “die, now.”
Both Shoko and Satoru freeze, Satoru with his big grin still on his face.
He observes the curse energy that was once just overlapping, now it's coalescing inside her, then he looks at her as she raises her right hand in finger guns to point at him.
Then, she notices her eyes. Her eyes are clear, though still have that dazed quality in them, with someone else behind her eyes, as if looking out to see what’s happening.
Though, he thinks, still smiling, that means, this request is done consciously.
“All right, Hina-chan!” He says in what he knows is an obnoxious tone, a big grin still on his face.
“Gojo!” Shoko hissed. But he knows she won’t interfere. They trust each other so much in that sense.
But still, he waves his hand at her, making her subtly see that he still has his fingers crossed, Infinity active.
He turns his attention back to Hina-chan. She has her hand raised in a finger gun, directed at him. Then, 1, 2, 3 -
“Bang!” She says in a very happy tone.
It’s not difficult for Satoru to pretend to be shot, just timed right, and he falls on his back, body obnoxiously placed; legs still crisscrossed, arms flopped to his side.
Then, 1, 2, 3-
“Haii~! Gojo Satoru is alive!” He sits back up with a flourish. Opening his arms wide to an imaginary audience.
Hina-chan claps at him, entertained.
“Satoru,” she says in a dazed voice again, “let’s play shiritori!”
“Sure~!”
They play like that for five minutes or so, until Hina-chan says a wrong word.
“Ohh, I lost,” she stated, and then, “Satoru!”
“What is it?” Satoru looks on as she spreads both her arms wide.
“Give me a hug?”
What to do? He thinks. Going in there and actually giving her a hug would mean he needs to take his Infinity down, even for a short while.
And while the requests, until now, haven’t actually hurt them, he remembers rule number 1. It states that Hina-chan has to have three requests accomplished for Nanika to appear.
And this is her third request.
If Satoru was to go in there, take down his Infinity, and give Hina-chan a hug, he’ll be within the arms of Nanika as it surfaces.
“Satoru?” She sees her tilt his head at him, confused, the monster behind her eyes more prevalent than ever, “Give me a hug?”
What to do , he thinks, grinning.
“Sure!” Satoru stands up, ignoring Shoko’s hissed protests, and goes to stand up, walks towards Hina-chan, lowers himself to his knees, and gives her a hug.
A few seconds beat.
Then, Satoru feels it.
It feels like hugging a monstrous amount of cursed energy, he feels it roll in the small shoulders he's touching, feels it in the way the very air around Hina-chan seems to darken, feels the way the body he’s hugging suddenly stops breathing, the way its joints seem to mechanically move.
Satoru feels like he’s hugging a dark, heavy, cloud of horrors.
And since he took down Infinity, he finally hears what’s been happening.
“-jo! Gojo! What the fuck do you think you’re both doing??!! Fu-,” And on, and on, the speakers say.
Satoru tunes it out.
He can’t really concentrate on anything else right now.
Slowly, slowly, he pulls his arms away, slowly, lowers it to sit from when Hina-chan knelt to hug him, and then finally, finally, Satoru sees it .
He hears Shoko gasp loudly behind him, finally seeing it from where Satoru was blocking her view before, and he really can’t look at her right now.
Beneath his glasses, he can see Hina-chan’s cute face from before, however, instead of plump lips and a small smile, there was pitch-black in its place.
Instead of big, indigo eyes, this one has a void for eyes.
It’s black and all-swallowing.
As if because you’re looking and looking, the monster finally looked back.
Ah , Satoru thinks, sweating in his temples despite his grin still on his face, I finally remember what its eyes remind me of.
He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster.
Satoru pushes his glasses down to finally be able to see it , not giving himself time to hesitate.
And if you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss also gazes into you.
He cracks a more hysterical smirk, his palms, which he did not know could feel this way, is cold with sweat.
He thinks he actually stopped breathing for a while there, but focusing on himself, he makes his body, his thumping heart, actually calm the fuck down .
He knows the way Shoko sees it was how he perceived it earlier, but, thankfully for her, and unfortunately for Satoru, she won’t see it as his Six Eyes does.
Nanika.
And wow, Hina-chan is totally on point with that name.
Satoru doesn’t know if he can even clarify that as a cursed spirit.
His Six Eyes agree, it's something worse .
Physically, it’s like a gaseous blob of black cursed energy vibrating with each other so much that the air around it distorts.
It has limb-like appendages that trace Hina-chan’s own.
But it can’t control the appendages smoothly, so it moves mechanically.
Like a doll controlling Hina-chan’s body.
Truthfully, its physical appearance is deceiving.
It looks like one good blow of air would dissipate it.
It looks as if the best it can do is suck you up into itself.
However-
However, what it feels like is a different story.
It feels like what would happen if the sky itself fell down upon you.
It doesn’t feel like curses do - the human being’s negative emotions, the grief, anger, fear, insecurities, hate.
No.
This feels…blank.
This is probably what it feels like when you stand in a glass room with nothing to do, and nowhere to go.
A glass room where you can see everything and everyone but they can’t see you .
What they see is their reflections on the glass room.
Nobody sees you .
Satoru takes a deep breath.
He realizes that the speaker themselves quietens.
Looks like their host realizes that Satoru has poked the hornets’ nest. He pushes his glasses to rest more closely in his eyes.
Then he smiles.
“Nanika,” he begins, looking at it.
“Sa…to…ru,” he withholds a shiver as it says his name, its head tilting mechanically, creepily.
He smirks instead, and with no Infinity shielding the speakers, he knows what he will say will be fully hearable in the control room.
“If we’re not out of this compound in an hour,” his smirk widens, “kill everyone that lives in here.” He watches as the cursed energy vibrates faster than ever.
“But if we’re out of this compound in an hour, give me a hug.” The vibration reaches its peak, darkening the air around it even more until he hears an imaginary ‘click’, then -
“‘kay,” the creature acknowledges.
“Gojo you-!” He grins at the stuttering and anger that’s broadcasted even more at the speakers.
“Whatever shall you do, Kira-san?” He questions in a sing-song voice, “If we’re not out of here in an hour, you’re gonna die~!”
He emphasizes that with finger guns directed at the camera.
He turns his head slightly to look at Shoko, not fully able to turn his back on Nanika and finds her pale and forehead sweaty.
“Shoko,” he says, serious for once, “trust me.”
“You better know what you’re doing, Gojo.”
Satoru waits patiently for three minutes, Nanika still as a statue, from where she sits, which is when his patience has run out.
“Oyyyy! It’s been three minutes, Kira-san! You should have told me you wanna die that badly!” He provokes, “Otherwise, tick-tock, the clock’s a-goin'!”
Then, a heavy clamp of metal snaps open, and he looks at Hina-chan’s feet to see that the chains were opened, then a whirring sound before it snaps to wound tight in a roll of chain at the back of the cage.
That, and Hina-chan’s ankles, from when the chain hit it when it snapped open, is bleeding sluggishly, only reminding Satoru why he was so pissed off.
Still, he breathes out again, stands to walk up to Nanika, and slowly, he begins to position her in his arms.
Taking a moment to get used to the feeling of heavy, dark, blank , cursed energy beneath his palms.
“Let’s go,” he announces to the cavern at large when he carries Hina-chan’s body.
He walks to the gates of the cage head straight but eying the girl and the curse in his arms.
Nanika is still out, docile and unmoving. Her body itself isn’t heavy, and he can’t feel any musculature even when he hugged her earlier. He remembers what Hina-chan said a while ago, that Nanika’s control over her body doesn’t make it automatically fit to fight. If that’s the case, subduing her would actually be pretty easy.
The curse, Nanika, and the user, Hinagiku aren’t capable of fighting. Even if it has a huge amount of cursed energy, it's being used for a wish. How does that work anyway?
Moreover, Hina-chan said that her wish-granting ability can’t be used to fulfill her own wish or Nanika’s wish.
It means that even with their ability, both of them can’t fight back.
Otherwise, Satoru has no doubt that Hina-chan would’ve already wished her way out of here.
An overpowered, wish-granting cursed technique that can’t be used by the user themself.
Dangerous.
And she also said that the request recipient themself doesn’t have to be the wisher.
It means that whoever got their hands on her, just has to have servants, or people to sacrifice, to fulfill Hina-chan’s requests, then the Master can fully make a wish without much consequence.
Her very existence is dangerous .
However, just to execute someone with this kind of rare ability is all sorts of stupid.