"An entrance test? I thought you invited me to enroll."
"That's right! But the principal has his own standards for judging students. Though I'm sure it'll be the same old question again."
"..."
"Come on, come on, hurry up! Your teacher still has another new student to pick up in a bit!"
He probably meant Yuta Okkotsu, right?
It was best not to take too long, then, lest he hold up the schedule.
Aikawa Kaze nodded without objection and decided to get this over with quickly.
Even if Satoru Gojo hadn't brought it up, he would have found a way to enroll at Jujutsu High. After all, much of his plan revolved around this place, and enrolling would make his goals easier to achieve.
Although Aikawa Kaze had resolved to grow stronger through his own efforts, the real world wasn't an RPG.
In a game, the boss would wait for the hero to grind their way from level-one mobs to higher levels before appearing. In real life, running into the final boss right after leaving the starting village was entirely possible.
Under those circumstances, Aikawa Kaze wasn't stupid enough to refuse help.
Setting Satoru Gojo's personality aside, he more or less qualified as a reliable teacher. If Aikawa Kaze became a Jujutsu High student, at least someone would make a serious effort to rescue him if he ran into danger.
Aikawa Kaze naturally knew who Jujutsu High's principal was and had prepared himself mentally.
Even so, opening the principal's office door and seeing a burly man embroidering a doll still gave him a little shock.
Fortunately, he controlled his expression perfectly, disappointing Satoru Gojo, who had been eagerly waiting to enjoy the new student's stunned reaction.
"Aw, to think there's someone in this world who can stay that calm the first time he sees an eight-foot-tall brute embroidering dolls."
"How do you know this is my first time seeing it, Mr. Gojo?"
"No way, no way! Don't tell me there's another guy in this world besides Masamichi Yaga who likes dolls?"
Satoru Gojo had only been making an offhand remark, but that response genuinely piqued his interest.
"There really is someone like that? Where did you see him?"
"In The Legend of Lu Xiaofeng: Embroidered Shoes," Aikawa Kaze answered earnestly. "The big guy in it didn't just like embroidery. He also liked wearing red embroidered shoes, the kind with owls stitched on them."
With that, Aikawa Kaze couldn't help glancing down at Masamichi Yaga's feet.
He wore ordinary black leather shoes.
"Ahem. Enough nonsense."
As their conversation grew increasingly strange, Masamichi Yaga coughed twice and put on a stern expression.
"Aikawa Kaze, why have you come to Jujutsu High?"
"I knew it. That question again."
Satoru Gojo complained as if he were bored, but in truth, he was listening closely.
Masamichi Yaga glared at Satoru Gojo, silencing the noisy white cat, then fixed his gaze on Aikawa Kaze.
He was a responsible teacher with genuine professional integrity, so he wanted students to enroll with a clear understanding of what being a jujutsu sorcerer meant, rather than on a momentary impulse.
Aikawa Kaze wasn't surprised by the question at all. He thought for a moment, then spoke with complete seriousness.
"Mostly, I got tired of a peaceful, ordinary life and wanted a little excitement."
"..."
"Judging by your expression, you practically have 'I can't accept such a flippant, brainless reason' written all over your face! Please hear me out, Principal Yaga."
"I'm just an ordinary person who happened to gain a few special abilities through various circumstances. That's all. I've always lived a fairly plain, ordinary life, and I don't think there's anything wrong with that."
Aikawa Kaze had no intention of concealing his circumstances. He would selectively hide things he couldn't conveniently discuss, but he also knew that communication between people required sincerity.
He needed Principal Yaga's help and Satoru Gojo's support, which meant he had to be honest.
"Then a cursed spirit threatened my life recently... How should I put it? I'd always understood the idea that only the strong have the right to choose, but that was the first time I truly felt it."
Aikawa Kaze drew a deep breath and got to the heart of the matter.
"I want to unleash a new storm upon this world-or rather, my very existence has already made that storm inevitable."
"That's some big talk, kid."
"I'm merely stating the facts. You've already received information about my ability, haven't you?"
Only after Masamichi Yaga nodded did Aikawa Kaze continue.
"My ability is a little complicated. Put simply, you can think of it as Heroic Spirit Summoning-I can summon heroic spirits and ask them to lend me their power. Of course, who answers me and whether they're willing to lend me that power are separate questions."
Aikawa Kaze paused there and glanced at Satoru Gojo, whose expression said he had expected as much, and the equally composed Masamichi Yaga. He couldn't help feeling puzzled.
Had neither of them realized what that meant?
"Your ability could be very powerful, but its weaknesses are obvious. If you think that ability alone will let you stir up a storm, you're seriously underestimating Jujutsu Society!"
"..."
No, had they really not realized what was wrong with his ability?
For a moment, Aikawa Kaze even wondered whether this world held some secret he knew nothing about. Or perhaps... had these two genuinely lost their intelligence, or were they pretending not to know just to mess with him?
Seeing Aikawa Kaze's undisguised look of disbelief, as though he were staring at a pair of idiots, Masamichi Yaga also felt that something was off. But if asked to explain what, he couldn't have said.
When neither of them showed any intention of speaking, Aikawa Kaze had no choice but to repeat himself.
"Although I'm not sure of the odds, I can summon heroic spirits-heroic spirits, not cursed spirits!"
After thinking it over, Aikawa Kaze decided they might not understand what a heroic spirit was, so he added an explanation.
"Heroic spirits are beings formed from heroes whose great deeds became legends after their deaths, making them objects of faith. Besides them, heroes who never actually existed, such as those from myths and legends, can also come into being through accumulated faith."
This time, both Masamichi Yaga's and Satoru Gojo's expressions abruptly changed.
Even Satoru Gojo, who had already seen Aikawa Kaze use his ability, suddenly understood.
When he had summoned a heroic spirit back then, Red Archer had possessed Aikawa Kaze.
Satoru Gojo hadn't known what a heroic spirit was. In his eyes, Aikawa Kaze had summoned a cursed spirit with some unknown ability and allowed it to possess him, thereby gaining its powers.
As for the term "heroic spirit," they had mistaken it for another name people in the East used for "cursed spirit."
Suguru Geto had already demonstrated the ability to subdue cursed spirits and use them for himself, so both Satoru Gojo and Masamichi Yaga had assumed Aikawa Kaze was probably a version of a Cursed Spirit Manipulator who could let cursed spirits possess him.
However, once Aikawa Kaze explained the definition of a heroic spirit, everything changed.
As everyone knew, human beings' negative emotions produced cursed spirits, while jujutsu sorcerers were people who could turn negative emotions into cursed energy and use jujutsu.
If what Aikawa Kaze summoned wasn't a cursed spirit, then the world would gain a new "category," or even a new "species."
Seeing their rapidly shifting expressions, Aikawa Kaze felt reassured.
So the earlier problem had simply been a misunderstanding over terminology.
"Cursed energy comes from negative emotions, but what about people's positive emotions? Surely they don't produce nothing at all? That would completely violate the law of conservation of energy."
This was a question Aikawa Kaze had already wondered about while watching the anime. At the time, he had even speculated that it might be some hidden setting the author intended to reveal much later.
Of course, he had already confirmed the answer during his earlier conversation with the Jujutsu Kaisen World Consciousness.
That scummy world consciousness had used all the energy and faith generated by people's positive emotions to upgrade and strengthen itself.
That was why this world was full of cursed spirits born from negative emotions and jujutsu sorcerers who used cursed energy, yet had no divine spirits or anything similar born from positive emotions.
Still, there was no need to mention that.
Whatever had happened in the past, from now on...
With a sincere demeanor and a perfectly straight face, Aikawa Kaze began spinning his tale.
"People's negative emotions produce cursed spirits, while their positive emotions produce heroic spirits. It's just that cursed spirits can form anywhere and be seen, whereas heroic spirits aren't so easily born. And even when they do appear, it happens on the Throne of Heroes, which is why no one knows about them."
"Incidentally, the more widely celebrated and highly regarded someone is, and the greater the achievements they leave behind, the more powerful they become upon ascending after death. Doesn't that sound a lot like cursed spirits? Essentially, they're the same."
Exactly. Cursed spirits grew stronger through people's negative emotions, while heroic spirits needed positive emotions such as faith, admiration, and approval to take shape. There was nothing wrong with that. The logic was perfectly consistent!
Just what you'd expect from me.
Aikawa Kaze mentally endorsed his own fabrication and gave himself a thumbs-up.
Since this world had no Throne of Heroes, he would build one himself!
Before you continue