The coming storm

Itadori walked into a hospital room carrying flowers he had bought on the way.

The soft light of the setting sun spilled over the spotless white bedsheets. A little old man lay with his hands folded over his stomach, quietly watching the sun sink.

At the sound of footsteps, he slowly turned his head, his eyes filled with an indescribable sternness.

The old man was always like this...

"Yuji...?"

He squinted at the boy before him for a while. Once he was sure it was his grandson, he immediately folded his arms and shouted with surprising vigor.

"What are you doing here? Didn't I tell you to go to your club activities?!"

"What's that in your hands? Didn't I tell you not to buy that flashy, useless stuff?!"

Yuji Itadori was used to his grandfather making a fuss over every little thing. He set the flowers on the bedside table, answering him as he opened the bag around them.

"Same as always, isn't it? Besides, these aren't for you. They're for the nurse..."

"Doesn't that make them even more unnecessary? Your club! I'm talking about your club!"

"You're such a nag. Club activities ended at five."

Once he heard that Yuji Itadori had indeed followed his instructions and attended his club activities, Wasuke Itadori's tone softened considerably.

"In that case... listen to what this old man with nothing to do has to say."

"Not interested." Yuji Itadori's reply was merciless, without a trace of extra respect for someone nearing death.

He acted just as he always did, as though his grandfather weren't sick, as though he still had plenty of time.

He picked up the vase on the table and went to the sink to fill it halfway. All the while, the old man kept rambling about things he didn't need to hear.

"You little brat, listen! It's about your parents..."

"I said I'm not interested. Stop losing your temper all the time, Grandpa."

Yuji Itadori returned to the table and placed the unwrapped flowers in the vase. Now he was the one who seemed like an old man unable to muster any interest in anything.

He muttered, "Just keep things normal. Same as always..."

As long as things stayed normal, surely Grandpa would keep living as he always had.

At least he shouldn't still be angry when he passed away.

The old man fell silent. He knew his grandson's temperament well enough. Like an idiot, the boy spent every day cheerfully playing the nice guy...

He rolled over in bed and grumbled helplessly under his breath, "Tch... this damned soft generation..."

Perhaps he was tired. Wasuke slowly closed his eyes.

In a dull voice, almost like someone talking in his sleep, he gave his grandson one last reminder:

"Yuji... you're strong, so save others whenever you can."

"It's all right to feel lost. Don't worry if they don't thank you."

"Die surrounded by people."

Don't end up like me.

Having accomplished nothing...

Yuji Itadori was a little surprised. Why had his grandfather suddenly said something so... unlike him?

It was almost as though...

He were giving his final instructions, as though entrusting the last thing on his mind to the boy would let him lay something to rest.

"Grandpa?"

Yuji Itadori softly called out to the old man whose back was turned to him. He had even braced himself for a scolding...

Goodbyes came so suddenly. One moment, they were chatting as usual, and he was busying himself while listening to the old man's reprimands.

The next, death had separated them forever...

Itadori... there was no other Itadori now.

With reddened eyes, the boy watched the nurse wheel away his loved one's prepared body, unable to collect himself for a long time.

Only when he remembered that he still had to pack up his grandfather's belongings and fill out various forms did he begin moving mechanically.

Night had come. By the time everything was finished, it was utterly dark outside.

The lights of countless homes drove back much of the darkness beyond the window. Itadori stared through the glass at those starlike lights, his thoughts unreadable.

Perhaps he was wondering whether any of those lights still shone for him.

Fortunately, someone approached him just then. "You're... Yuji Itadori, right?"

The newcomer's black hair stuck up like a hedgehog's spines. His face was handsome and clean-cut, yet somehow he gave off the air of someone trying far too hard to look cool.

Who's this guy?

That was what Itadori thought.

"I'm Megumi Fushiguro from Jujutsu High. I need to speak with you."

"A cursed object? What's that?"

Yuji Itadori questioned the guy before him, who looked about his age, privately labeling him a charlatan.

But when Megumi Fushiguro pulled a phone from his pocket and showed Itadori a picture, he realized that someone really was keeping records of these strange things.

The picture showed an oval object. It seemed to be wrapped in bandages, but there were characters written on them like ancient inscriptions.

To Itadori, though, they were just vaguely convincing scribbles. Having never seen a curse, he naturally thought little of it.

Honestly, although he belonged to the Paranormal Research Club, he didn't actually believe in gods or ghosts. Those things were too far removed from him to feel real.

"This is a finger of Ryomen Sukuna. If its power leaks out, it'll be a problem. You can hand it over to me now."

As he spoke, Megumi Fushiguro pocketed his phone and held out his hand, asking Yuji Itadori for the curse.

"Ah... I gave that thing to my upperclassmen. You'll have to go to school and ask them for it."

"Oh, come to think of it, they said they were going to unwrap it tonight and see what it was."

Megumi Fushiguro: !

Fucking idiots! Why did people always want to open up creepy crap like that when it looked so obviously disgusting?!

Itadori still had no idea what was wrong with the guy in front of him, so he asked curiously what had happened.

"Uh, is this bad?"

"More than bad... they could die!"

"Hey, what do you mean, they could die?!" Itadori still didn't understand Megumi Fushiguro's words, but his expression gave him some idea. The situation was clearly terrible.

"Was that thing easy to open?"

Fushiguro shook his head. "No. Ordinary people without cursed energy can't possibly remove that talisman... normally."

"This way! It's a shortcut!"

The two raced down the streets beneath the night sky, heading straight for the technical high school Itadori currently attended. To keep the special grade cursed object from breaking its seal and causing all sorts of unnecessary trouble, they had to hurry back to the scene at full speed.

But when they reached the school...

"This is bad..." A bead of cold sweat rolled down Megumi Fushiguro's face as he saw cursed energy spilling out in quantities visible to the naked eye.

The worst had happened. The talisman sealing the curse had been peeled off, and its cursed energy was leaking out!

He had to retrieve it quickly. If the seal had only just been broken, there might still be time to save the two people Itadori had mentioned!

He had to hurry!

"Stay here." Megumi Fushiguro pulled Yuji Itadori out of his way and vaulted over the school fence.

"Wait, I'm coming too!" Itadori called after Megumi Fushiguro. His gaze was earnest, carrying a guileless stupidity as he said, "We've only just met, but they're my friends. I can't leave them to die!"

"Stay here!" Megumi Fushiguro had no interest in listening to him. Cleaning up this mess was the immediate priority.

With that, he wasted no more time and entered the campus from the side.

Tap... tap... tap...

"Ah~ What... good luck."

A man in a trench coat happened to wander over. He had initially sensed what seemed to be a grade 2 cursed spirit inside the school, but he hadn't expected a bonus...

Such a powerful curse... there was definitely something big in there!

Lucky. He was so lucky!

He could break cursed spirits' bones bit by bit again, tear off their limbs, grind their flesh to pulp, and listen to their wails!

It was Kamo Xu. Over the past year, he had constantly hunted cursed spirits and drawn curses from them, growing ever stronger.

But the drawbacks were just as obvious. After accepting these curses born of curses, his injured brain inevitably grew more volatile. His urge to kill was magnified without limit, and his desires became like a beast waiting to devour someone. The slightest lapse could send him to extremes.

Fortunately, Kamo Xu only targeted cursed spirits, so he hadn't gone on a spree of slaughtering innocents.

"Heh heh... hahahahaha!" He laughed loudly, the terrifying sound echoing through the deep, pitch-black night. A single crimson eye gleamed with a horrifying light in the impenetrable darkness.

Suppressing the tremor in his heart, he walked slowly into the campus...

He could hardly wait to slaughter every monster here, then bear the curses they placed on him and grow even stronger!

Tap... tap... tap...

Let's play a little game of escape and slaughter, cursed spirits~

Kamo Xu entered through the main gate, just missing Megumi Fushiguro and Yuji Itadori.

As a result, he had no idea this incident was the one in which the original story's protagonist made his debut.

He only wanted to torture the cursed spirits here, squeeze out every last bit of their worth, and then...

Kill them slowly and cruelly~