On one condition... room and board

Yang Jian.

Satoru Gojo had never heard that name. Neither had Suguru Geto.

But they both remembered it now.

Because the man who had given that name stood in the corridor where a Grade 1 Cursed Spirit had vanished, without a mark on him, his breathing perfectly steady.

"You're not a jujutsu sorcerer." Suguru Geto's tone had shifted from wariness to scrutiny. "You know who we are, you know about the Six Eyes, and you can exorcise a Grade 1 Cursed Spirit on your own. Just who are you?"

Yang Jian didn't answer.

Not because he didn't want to, but because he couldn't.

I can't exactly tell them I transmigrated here, can I? Besides, he was almost out of trump cards-the trial card had less than four minutes left. Although he had closed the Ghost Eye, once the time ran out, he really would be nothing more than an ordinary person.

The smartest move now was to finish putting on a show for these two, then get out of there fast.

"Who I am doesn't matter." Yang Jian tilted his head, looking toward the shredded fire door at the end of the corridor. "What matters is that your intel at Jujutsu High is wrong."

"Oh?" Satoru Gojo pushed his sunglasses back up, but didn't let his guard down.

"That cursed spirit didn't form naturally," Yang Jian said. "There were signs of human interference on it. Someone was feeding it."

He wasn't making that up. While the trial card was active, the Ghost Eye could see information far beyond the ordinary.

Inside that cursed spirit had been a trace of cursed energy that didn't belong to it. Faint, but very orderly in structure.

A naturally formed cursed spirit wouldn't have anything like that.

Suguru Geto's expression shifted slightly.

He was an expert at controlling cursed spirits. He understood the weight of those words better than anyone.

Deliberately feeding a cursed spirit meant a sorcerer was secretly cultivating a fighting force. That was a serious crime in Jujutsu Society.

"Where's your evidence?" Suguru Geto asked.

"I erased the body. Nothing left." Yang Jian spread his hands.

"..."

Fine, then. Satoru Gojo rolled his eyes. Might as well have said nothing.

But the Six Eyes really had picked up something unusual-the way that cursed spirit's cursed energy broke apart in the final instant before it vanished hadn't been right. When a cursed spirit was exorcised normally, its cursed energy scattered and dissolved. This one, however, had seemed to be uprooted by some force, its entire existence scraped out of the world.

Not exorcism. Erasure.

Those were two very different things.

"Where do you live?" Satoru Gojo suddenly asked, seemingly out of nowhere.

"I just got to Tokyo. Haven't found a place yet."

"Huh?" Satoru Gojo raised an eyebrow. "So you're a hobo."

"A traveler," Yang Jian corrected.

"Oh-a distinguished traveler whose very first stop was a haunted hospital?"

"I came here to see a doctor. The registration slip's still in my pocket. Want to check?"

Satoru Gojo was momentarily stumped.

Suguru Geto coughed. He didn't often get to see Satoru Gojo lose an exchange. Today had been an eye-opener.

"All right." Satoru Gojo tossed his hair. "You're coming with us."

Yang Jian didn't move. "Where?"

"Jujutsu High. Since you survived inside the Veil and exorcised a cursed spirit, regulations require you to come to Jujutsu High for documentation and assessment," Suguru Geto explained more formally.

In plain language: We have no idea where you came from, so we're taking you back to grill you.

Yang Jian quickly weighed his options.

If he refused, given Satoru Gojo's personality, he would most likely take him by force. The trial card was still active, so a fight wasn't out of the question, but it was about to expire. If they really went head-to-head, he wouldn't last long.

Besides, going to Jujutsu High wasn't all bad.

He had only just transmigrated here. He had no money, no identity, and nowhere to stay. Jujutsu High could at least give him some breathing room. More importantly, he needed information. About this world's timeline, about the situation before Yuji Itadori appeared, and about what trial card the system would give him next.

"Fine." Yang Jian nodded. "But I have a condition."

"You have a condition?" Satoru Gojo laughed.

"Give me a place to stay and feed me."

"You think Jujutsu High's a hotel?"

"A shelter," Yang Jian replied without missing a beat. "After all, I nearly got killed by a cursed spirit in your jurisdiction. You ought to take some responsibility, right?"

Satoru Gojo stared at him for two seconds, then smiled. Not politely, but with genuine amusement.

"Sure."

By the time the three left the hospital, the Veil had been lifted. A black van waited outside. The driver was an assistant supervisor from Jujutsu High, who looked as though he wanted to say something when he saw Satoru Gojo bringing out a stranger, but held back.

"Get in." Satoru Gojo opened the rear door.

Yang Jian ducked inside. The cool air from the air conditioner washed over his face, and for the first time, surviving felt real.

In his mind, the system's countdown reached zero.

[Trial card has expired.]

[Current host status: ordinary person.]

[Next card draw unlocks in 24 hours.]

Yang Jian closed his eyes.

An ordinary person.

Those words weighed heavily on his chest. He understood his situation better than anyone-no cursed energy, no martial arts skills, not even basic combat ability. Once the trial card expired, he couldn't beat even a Grade 3 Cursed Spirit.

And he had just said something like that to Satoru Gojo.

"You're on far too low a level."

I've talked a big game. How am I supposed to back it up now?

Yang Jian rubbed his temples, his mind racing.

The van started moving. Suguru Geto sat in the front passenger seat, while Satoru Gojo sat beside Yang Jian in the back. The Six Eyes were still scanning him discreetly. Yang Jian could feel the discomfort of being examined under a magnifying glass.

"How much longer are you going to keep staring?" Yang Jian turned his head.

"Until I'm satisfied." Satoru Gojo chewed on a freshly unwrapped lollipop, his feet propped on the back of the seat in front.

"Found anything?"

"Nothing at all." Satoru Gojo pulled the lollipop out of his mouth and pointed it at Yang Jian. "That's the strangest part. You're like a blank sheet of paper. No cursed energy, no cursed technique-you're not even on an ordinary person's level. Ordinary people at least have some fluctuations in negative energy. You don't even have that."

"So?"

"So either you were born with some unusual constitution, or-" Satoru Gojo paused for a beat. "You're hiding something."

Yang Jian said nothing.

Not answering was an answer in itself.

Satoru Gojo put the lollipop back in his mouth and leaned against the seat, asking no more questions. But Yang Jian knew he had thoroughly hooked the man's curiosity.

That was dangerous, but useful too.

The van traveled along the Metropolitan Expressway for forty minutes, Tokyo's nighttime scenery flowing past the windows. Yang Jian used the time to quietly organize the information in his head.

Satoru Gojo and Suguru Geto were still carrying out missions together, which meant they hadn't fallen out yet. Suguru Geto seemed normal, without that fanatical look in his eyes. So the timeline should be before the Star Plasma Vessel Incident.

But he needed more clues to work out exactly when.

The van finally stopped in front of a wooded area.

Yang Jian got out and looked up. A stone-paved path stretched ahead, lined on either side with towering camphor trees. Moonlight filtered through the gaps in their branches and leaves. At the end of the path, a cluster of traditional Japanese buildings was faintly visible.

Tokyo Metropolitan Jujutsu High School.

It was Yang Jian's first time seeing the place with his own eyes.

"Keep up." Satoru Gojo headed inside first.

Suguru Geto walked beside Yang Jian, staying half a step away. On the surface, he was guiding him. In reality, he was keeping watch.

Yang Jian didn't mind at all. He studied the school as they walked. Faint traces of cursed energy lingered in the air, left behind by sorcerers' prolonged activity. The campus was quiet. It was late at night, after all.

But one window was still lit.

"Who's still awake at this hour?" Yang Jian asked casually.

"Shoko," Suguru Geto answered. "She's in our year and uses Reverse Cursed Technique. Basically, our medic. Someone's always getting hurt, so she's always got work to do."

Shoko Ieiri. In the future, practically the only source of healing in Jujutsu Society.

Yang Jian quietly filed that information away.

They didn't go straight to see the principal. Suguru Geto led him to an empty dorm room and pushed the door open. It was simple inside-a bed, a desk, and a wardrobe.

"Stay here tonight. Mr. Yaga will talk to you tomorrow." Standing in the doorway, Suguru Geto pointed toward the end of the corridor. "The bathroom's over there. If you need anything... preferably don't."

"Thanks."

Suguru Geto turned to leave, then stopped.

"I'll ask you one more time." He didn't turn around. "Are you really an ordinary person?"

Sitting on the edge of the bed, Yang Jian flicked some dust off the blanket. "What do you think?"

"An ordinary person wouldn't look at Satoru Gojo like that."

"Like what?"

Only then did Suguru Geto turn his head, looking at Yang Jian's profile.

"Like an equal."

Yang Jian didn't respond.

Suguru Geto watched him for two seconds, then went out through the door. His footsteps gradually faded down the corridor.

Yang Jian flopped onto the bed and stared at the ceiling.

Like an equal?

He smiled faintly.

Only fear beyond human understanding was true fear.

Cursed energy? In the end, it's just a product of human negative emotions coming together. Ultimately, it's still within the human realm.

But ghosts are different.

Ghosts are rules made manifest.

"The next card draw in twenty-four hours..." Yang Jian murmured.

He rolled over.

A thin wash of moonlight fell through the window onto a small patch of floor.

He would have to come up with a plausible identity before facing Masamichi Yaga tomorrow.

It couldn't be too ordinary-if it was, Jujutsu High would have no reason to keep him.

Nor could it be too outlandish-that would attract unnecessary attention.

Yang Jian thought it over and settled on the simplest explanation: he had an unusual constitution that let him see cursed spirits despite having no cursed energy, and he had come from China to Japan seeking help.

Half truth, half fiction. The best kind of lie.

Insects chirped outside the window. Yang Jian closed his eyes.

In this world that devoured people, he had given himself just one day of breathing room.

After that day, if the new trial card wasn't enough, he would have to play someone he wasn't right under Satoru Gojo's nose.

The pressure was immense.

But the corner of Yang Jian's mouth still lifted.

Because he remembered Satoru Gojo's expression when he had shut him down.

The man hailed as the strongest had actually been stunned into silence for half a second by an "ordinary person." For that half second alone, nearly dying in the hospital today didn't seem like such a bad deal after all.