The Kyoto students

At the vending machine, Kugisaki bent down to retrieve several cans of drinks she had bought for the upperclassmen, including Madara.

Looking at the limited selection inside, she couldn't help complaining, "Hmm... is this all there is? I'm sick of all of these. Can't they bring in machines with more flavors? This school is so stingy."

Standing beside her with his hands in his pockets, Megumi Fushiguro dashed her hopes without expression. "Impossible. Only certain products that have passed rigorous screening can be sold inside Jujutsu High."

Jujutsu High's rules outside of combat were sometimes so strict that they left people speechless.

Just then, unhurried footsteps sounded behind them.

Kugisaki and Fushiguro turned around warily at almost the same time.

A man and a woman were walking toward them.

The man was extraordinarily tall and burly, his bulging muscles threatening to burst through his black student uniform, his expression defiant.

The woman had a slender figure, short black hair, and pretty features, but her eyes held aloofness and a hint of mockery. There was something alluring yet cold about her.

Mai Zenin and Aoi Todo.

Students from Kyoto Jujutsu High.

Fushiguro recognized one of them and frowned almost imperceptibly, but spoke out of courtesy. "Zenin-senpai?"

He was addressing Mai Zenin, whose face resembled that of Maki Zenin from Tokyo Jujutsu High.

"Wait, what? She's related to Maki-senpai?" Kugisaki studied Mai curiously, comparing her with her memory of Maki.

"They do look pretty alike! Sisters?"

"Twins," Fushiguro explained simply.

Hearing Fushiguro address her by her surname, Mai Zenin's lips curved into a faint, unreadable smile. Her voice was airy. "Don't call me that~ Doesn't that make it impossible to tell me apart from my sister?"

She seemed less than fond of the Zenin surname and her connection to Maki, even somewhat averse to them.

Aoi Todo had no interest in pleasantries. He cut in gruffly, his large, round eyes sweeping over Fushiguro and Kugisaki in appraisal.

"Oh-so you're the two. The 'substitutes' replacing Yuta Okkotsu and those third-years?"

Mai Zenin picked up the conversation, a falsely concerned smile on her face but little warmth in her voice.

"We were so worried about how things were going at Tokyo Jujutsu High that we came along with Principal Gakuganji to have a look." She deliberately stressed the word "worried."

Then she changed tack, her gaze moving between Fushiguro's and Kugisaki's faces as she delivered a jarring remark in a seemingly casual tone.

"One of your 'friends'... someone in your first year died, didn't he? The one called Yuji Itadori."

Fushiguro's and Kugisaki's expressions darkened instantly.

As though she hadn't noticed the change, Mai continued her inquiry in that infuriating tone. "How do you feel? Really sad? Or... do you actually not feel much of anything?"

Megumi Fushiguro's eyes turned utterly cold. He looked straight at Mai, his voice calm but icy. "What are you getting at?"

"Oh, don't be so tense." Mai covered her mouth and chuckled, undisguised mockery in her smile.

"Some things really wouldn't look good coming from his former friends. So I'll be kind and say them for you."

She tilted her head slightly, her sneer downright malicious.

"'Vessel'... heh, that does sound nice, doesn't it? Makes him sound special." Her voice abruptly chilled, every word a blade.

"But really, wasn't he just a half-human, half-curse monster? With something that filthy inside him..."

Her gaze swept over their instantly clenched fists and livid faces, her tone growing ever more flippant.

"Being around a 'thing' like that, neither human nor ghost, must have felt disgusting and awful, right? Now that he's 'dead,' deep down... you're thrilled, aren't you? You're finally free, right?"

Bang! The drink can in Nobara Kugisaki's hand crumpled under her sudden grip, spraying juice.

She raised her head, fury blazing in her eyes and veins bulging at her temples. Her voice squeezed out between clenched teeth. "Fushiguro... can I punch this woman now?"

Megumi Fushiguro took a deep breath and forcibly suppressed his surging anger, but his gaze was already sharp as a blade.

He shifted slightly, placing himself between Kugisaki and Mai. His cold reply to Kugisaki also served as a warning to Mai. "Since she's our 'senpai'... if we're doing this, it'd be safer for both of us to go at her together, wouldn't it?"

"Oh." Nobara Kugisaki rolled her wrists, her knuckles cracking crisply as a dangerous smile spread across her face.

"Just what I had in mind."

Just as the tension reached breaking point, Aoi Todo, who had barely spoken, seemed unable to watch any longer.

Or rather, he had completely lost interest in this war of words.

That wasn't what he had come for in the first place.

"Hey, Mai," Todo interrupted gruffly. He stepped forward, his massive frame radiating an intense pressure.

"Enough with the off-topic crap. All this yapping is annoying." He spoke bluntly to Mai, then turned to Fushiguro and Kugisaki.

"I didn't come here for petty nonsense like this." As he spoke, Todo abruptly yanked off his black uniform jacket and tossed it aside.

It revealed a powerful physique beneath, its sharply defined muscles like blocks of stone.

He took an imposing step forward, and the ground seemed to tremble slightly.

His large, round eyes locked onto Megumi Fushiguro, and his mouth stretched into a wild grin brimming with fighting spirit.

"I came here to test your strength myself! To see whether you're actually qualified to stand in for Yuta Okkotsu at the Goodwill Event!"

He paused, then asked a question that left Fushiguro and Kugisaki frozen, their brains nearly grinding to a halt.

Aoi Todo thrust out his chest and asked loudly and unabashedly in his booming voice.

"You! Your name's Megumi Fushiguro, right?! I'll ask you straight!"

"What kind of woman is your type?!"

Megumi Fushiguro: "...Huh?"

Nobara Kugisaki: "...Huh?!"

Both voiced their disbelief at once.

One moment, they had been discussing a friend's death and the insults against him, and the next, it had suddenly jumped to "your type of woman"?

Wasn't that shift far too abrupt and inexplicable?!

Aoi Todo paid no attention to their shock-or rather, this was exactly the reaction he had expected.

As he spoke, he grabbed the collar of his shirt with both hands, then tore it clean in half with a ripping sound.

He casually tossed it aside, leaving his knotted, muscular upper body completely bare and displaying his intensely imposing physique.

"Listen up!" Todo assumed a standard fighting stance, his eyes fixed fiercely on Fushiguro.

As though Fushiguro's next answer would decide a duel to the death, he said, "If your answer doesn't satisfy me..."

He gave a savage grin, clenching his fists until they creaked.

"I'll beat you half to death! Then I'll drag at least Yuta Okkotsu or the third-years into the Goodwill Event by force! I mean it!"

He didn't forget to add his own criteria, his voice loud and utterly unashamed.

"Just so we're clear! I-like tall women with big asses best!! That's the kind of taste a real man should have!"

Aoi Todo held his fighting stance, every muscle taut, like a tiger ready to spring, waiting for Megumi Fushiguro's answer.

As though "your type of woman" were the ultimate question concerning the very nature of the soul.

Megumi Fushiguro recovered from his initial shock and looked at the burly, bare-chested upperclassman behaving so bizarrely before him.

He felt only a profound sense of helplessness and absurdity welling up inside.

He rubbed his aching temples, his voice carrying suppressed impatience and confusion.

"We... only just met, didn't we?" He truly couldn't understand how this man's mind worked.

"Why should I talk to you about... my preferences in women? What does that have to do with the Goodwill Event?"

Beside him, Nobara Kugisaki also recovered from her petrified state. She glanced at Fushiguro and abruptly chimed in, whether to "help" or simply out of an urge to make a snide remark.

"Besides, Fushiguro's the secretly pervy type. Ask him something like that and he'll never give you an honest answer."

"Shut up!" Fushiguro immediately glared at Kugisaki and snapped under his breath.

"This is already confusing enough. Don't make it worse!" His head was already about to explode.

Aoi Todo turned a deaf ear to Fushiguro's resistance and Kugisaki's snide remark.

Wearing a matter-of-fact expression that said, "I've already explained everything clearly," he began introducing himself.

"Aoi Todo! Third year, Kyoto Jujutsu High!" He announced his name in a booming voice, then nodded as though completing some important ceremony.

"Introductions done! Now we're friends, right?!"

Following this extremely self-centered logic, without any regard for whether the other party accepted it, Todo persisted with his questioning.

"Hurry up and answer, Megumi Fushiguro!" He even thoughtfully added, "It's fine if you like men, too! No problem!"

"A person's sexual preferences are the most direct reflection of their essential character! Boring, mediocre preferences with no passion mean the person himself is just as utterly boring! An irredeemable mediocrity!"

On this subject, Aoi Todo was like an ignited barrel of gasoline. His blood boiled, and an almost fanatical fire burned in his eyes.

He waved his thick arms, his voice making the corridor hum.

"What I hate most-is boring men!!"

"The Goodwill Event, where your blood boils and you put everything on the line, is one of the few stages where I can set my soul completely ablaze!" he roared, spittle nearly spraying Fushiguro's face.

"If everyone standing against me is some small fry with boring sexual preferences and a dull personality who can't get me fired up... then this Goodwill Event is doomed to be utterly boring!!"

He suddenly took another step forward, nearly pressing up against Fushiguro. His enormous shadow engulfed him, the terrifying pressure almost tangible.

"If my final Kyoto Sister-School Goodwill Event ends on such a boring note..." Aoi Todo bared his white teeth in a dangerous, crazed grin.

"Who knows what outrageous thing I might do that'll give everyone a headache!!!"

"So-" he bellowed like an ultimatum, aiming his fist at Fushiguro.

"Answer me already!! Megumi Fushiguro!!!"

The air seemed to freeze.

The vending machine's hum sounded especially grating.

Nobara Kugisaki gaped, looking from Aoi Todo, who radiated menace, to the deeply frowning Megumi Fushiguro, momentarily at a loss for how to react.