Killing the Body, Crushing the Soul

Yan Si did not care in the slightest what Satoru Gojo thought.

After using Satoru Gojo as a cat tree, he jumped down from his shoulders and brushed off the nonexistent dust and very real dried blood on his hands.

Yan Si did not stick around to see Satoru Gojo's reaction.

There was no fun in that.

No need.

He had enjoyed himself and was in a good mood. That was enough.

As for whether Satoru Gojo's dignity needed patching up or his feelings had been hurt, that was Satoru Gojo's problem.

Something this trivial should not affect Gojo.

If it did.

Well.

What a loser.

He rounded the corner of the corridor in high spirits and ran straight into Shoko.

Shoko had just taken a lollipop from her pocket. She held the plastic wrapper between her fingertips, about to tear it open.

It was lemon-flavored, its translucent yellow wrapper gleaming faintly in the corridor's natural light.

Her movements were unhurried.

Unwrapping candy was one of the few moments in her day that carried a sense of ritual.

So was peeling the clear plastic off a cigarette pack.

When she was thinking.

Then a hand reached over from beside her, pinched the lollipop stick between two fingers, and pulled. The sound of tearing plastic rang especially crisp in the quiet corridor.

Shoko's fingers still held the pose of pinching the wrapper, but there was nothing between them.

She looked down at her empty hand, then slowly raised her head.

Yan Si had already popped the candy into his mouth. He crumpled the wrapper into a little ball and casually stuffed it into his pocket.

His exquisitely beautiful eyes curved with his smile, the afternoon sunlight spilling through the corridor windows pooling in his purple irises, bright enough to dazzle.

As he tilted his head, his long black hair slipped off his shoulder, the ends brushing Shoko's fingers.

Soft and cool, still slightly damp from the moisture it had picked up while he was fooling around with Satoru Gojo.

"Thanks for the candy~"

The lilt of his Kansai dialect rose at the end, drawn out sweet and soft. "You're the best, Shoko~"

Shoko looked down at her fingers.

That fleeting sensation still lingered on her fingertips.

Cool and featherlight, so light she could barely tell whether his hair had actually touched her.

She made a quick assessment: her candy had been stolen, and the culprit was already gone.

Yan Si had started backing away as he spoke that last sentence. By the time the final syllable fell, he had reached the end of the corridor. His black hair flashed around the corner, then vanished completely.

"Scumbag."

She said it to the empty corridor.

Then she fished another lollipop out of her pocket. This one was mint-flavored.

Yan Si did not consider the afternoon classes important.

He stood before the bathroom mirror and splashed a handful of cold water onto his face.

Droplets trickled down his jawline, dampening his uniform collar. The face in the mirror glistened with water, droplets clung to his lashes, and the red mole between his brows had deepened slightly in color after the cold splash.

He combed the wet hair clinging to his cheeks back with his fingers, exposing his entire forehead, then winked at his reflection to confirm that he looked good.

"So pretty~"

Yan Si blew himself a kiss, smiling brightly and happily.

He changed out of his uniform jacket in a stall and put on his own clothes.

A black waterproof outdoor jacket.

The fabric had grown especially soft after countless washes.

He folded his uniform and tucked it into his bag. Before closing the zipper, he even patted the bag, as though settling a prop he did not need for the moment.

Taking a mission was quick.

The assistant supervisor sent over information on several Grade 2 cursed spirits awaiting disposal. He skimmed the locations and times,

then chose one on the outskirts of the city.

It was easy to get to, with a good ramen shop nearby.

The mission sheet listed a Grade 2 cursed spirit. With his current fighting strength, one of those amounted to a warm-up.

Outside the gates of Jujutsu High, sunlight blanketed the entire mountain road. The early April wind swept down from the mountains, carrying the scent of fresh greenery mingled with exhaust from the distant city.

A black sedan stood by the roadside. It bore no obvious markings, but the short antenna on its roof and the young man sitting far too straight in the driver's seat were enough to identify it.

An assistant supervisor's car, dedicated to ferrying jujutsu sorcerers around.

Yan Si opened the rear door and climbed in, bringing a gust of wind with him.

Henshita Tsugina, twenty-four years old, assistant supervisor.

At his age, he was a bottom-rung newcomer in Japan's workforce. In Jujutsu Society, he was at the very end of the food chain.

When he graduated from university, he had become involved in a cursed spirit incident and survived.

Later, he had been assigned to Tokyo Jujutsu High.

He had originally thought he would be joining some sort of serious, respectable civil service system.

Instead, on his first day, a senior colleague had told him, "An assistant supervisor's job is to babysit jujutsu sorcerers. Sometimes you're their chauffeur, sometimes their punching bag."

A miserable lot in life.

He had not believed it then. He did now.

What a miserable lot.

In 2005, Japan's economy was still crawling through the long shadow of the burst bubble, and the job market's friendliness toward university graduates was approximately zero.

Henshita Tsugina treasured this job.

Even if it required him to drive a boy who looked years younger than him around to fight all sorts of monsters, he had no complaints.

It paid a salary, offered insurance, and provided regular days off. That was far better than working at a convenience store.

Provided that...

The royal pain in the back seat did not keep talking to him.

"Mr. Henshita~"

Here we go. A look of despair crossed Henshita Tsugina's face.

He had driven Suguru Geto and Yan Si before, and he had seen Yan Si torment Suguru Geto with his nonsense.

He had driven that good-tempered student to keep his fists clenched the entire ride.

"How old were you again? Twenty-four? Do you have a girlfriend?"

"No." Henshita Tsugina kept both hands on the wheel and his eyes straight ahead, wiping the despair off his face before that became something to tease him about too.

"Have you ever dated anyone, then?" Yan Si rested his elbow on the console between the driver's and passenger's seats, leaned forward, and poked his head between the two front seats.

His stunningly beautiful face wore a gentle, even kindly smile.

Henshita Tsugina could feel breath beside his ear. Light, carrying the scent of lemon candy. He stared hard at the road ahead.

"...No."

"Not even once?"

"Not even once."

"Anyone you've had a thing going with?"

"..."

Henshita Tsugina did not answer.

His silence was not because Yan Si had touched on some painful memory, but because he was trying to figure out how to end this conversation without offending a jujutsu sorcerer.

This problem had never come up in the "workplace communication skills" he had repeatedly practiced with his career counselor before graduating from university.

Yan Si leaned back against the seat and crossed his legs, his sympathetic tone carrying a distinct hint of glee. "How tragic~ No money, no house, no girlfriend~ You poor thing~"

Henshita Tsugina tightened his grip on the steering wheel.

His professionalism came through at that moment.

An assistant supervisor must not lose his temper with a jujutsu sorcerer, roll his eyes at a jujutsu sorcerer, or hold a jujutsu sorcerer's gaze in the rearview mirror for more than two seconds.

He managed all three.

"But that's okay." Yan Si leaned forward again, his voice taking on a comforting tone.

Beneath that comfort lurked even more malice. "You don't have a girlfriend, but you'll have a mortgage and car payments someday, which means you need to spend more time working. Look, you're working right now. Isn't that great?"

What kind of nonsense is that...

A look of despair crossed Henshita Tsugina's face.