The next day.
At 11:32 p.m., Jujutsu Headquarters received intelligence relayed by Naoya Zenin. Yuji Itadori was confirmed dead.
The silence behind the paper doors seemed weighed down by something. For a long time, no one spoke.
Tokyo.
9 p.m.
Firelight danced among the ruins, staining half the night sky red. Yuta Okkotsu sat on a broken stone slab, his hands resting on his knees, his gaze fixed on the campfire before him. Flames licked the splintered wood with faint crackles.
Across the campfire, Yuji Itadori lay motionless on the ground, his chest neither rising nor falling.
Suddenly, Itadori's eyes snapped open. He gasped for breath like someone surfacing from deep underwater, his chest heaving violently.
Instinctively, he felt his chest. There was a hole in his school uniform, its edges crusted with dried blood, but the skin beneath was intact. There wasn't even a scar.
"What?" His voice was hoarse and bewildered. "Didn't I die?"
He turned his head and saw Okkotsu across the campfire.
Okkotsu had his head lowered, his shoulders giving a slight tremble. Then he looked up and smiled. It was a small smile, even a tired one, but the light in his eyes was warm.
"Thank... thank goodness." He rubbed his eyes, brushing a fingertip against one corner, then lowered his arms and let out a long breath. "I'm really sorry. It was probably back in July... Gojo-sensei came to ask me to look after you."
Itadori stared at him blankly.
"But I also made a binding vow with the higher-ups to kill you," Okkotsu said quietly. "That's why I put on this act."
Itadori looked down at the blood on his chest, pressing his fingers against the hole in the fabric.
"Then I..."
"Reverse Cursed Technique," Okkotsu answered calmly. "Mine is the kind