Jujutsu Kaisen — Chapter 41 - Toward the Darkness — Whispers and a New Mission

Suguru Geto's heart skipped a beat.

Completely... wipe out Cursed Spirits?

No more having to eat those reeking black spheres every single day?

The words hit like a blinding bolt of lightning, splitting open the fog that had clouded his mind for days.

He jerked his head up, eyes locked onto Yuki Tsukumo, and pressed forward with barely contained urgency.

"How?"

Yuki Tsukumo raised two fingers.

"The source of Cursed Spirits is the Cursed Energy leaked by non-sorcerers."

"So there are two solutions."

She lowered the first finger.

"First, make all of humanity's Cursed Energy disappear."

"Just like the Heavenly Restriction user standing next to you."

She gestured toward Toji.

Toji leaned against the wall, not even lifting his eyelids, utterly indifferent to the whole boring theoretical exercise.

"Unfortunately, that can't be replicated."

Yuki Tsukumo lowered the second finger. Her gaze turned fervent.

"So that leaves only the second path."

"Make all of humanity become Jujutsu Sorcerers."

"As long as everyone can control their Cursed Energy, no new Cursed Spirits will ever be born."

Suguru Geto's breathing went ragged.

All of humanity... become Jujutsu Sorcerers?

Countless hideous faces flashed through his mind.

The believers at Time Vessel Association headquarters, applauding like madmen over Riko Amanai's cloned corpse.

Ordinary people who did nothing but scream when Cursed Spirits attacked, then turned around and blamed the sorcerers for arriving too late.

Protect them?

Why waste strength on garbage like that?

If only... if only those stench-ridden non-sorcerers didn't exist at all.

A terrifying, extreme thought rose up from somewhere dark. Like a poisonous mushroom that had been quietly rotting in a shadowed corner, it punched through the soil of reason and ran wild through his mind.

He didn't think. Almost without control, he let the words slip out in a low voice.

"Then... if we just killed all the non-sorcerers, wouldn't that solve everything?"

Dead silence.

The air in the locker room froze solid.

Suguru Geto was startled by his own words. He snapped his mouth shut. Cold sweat soaked through his back in an instant.

What am I saying?

I actually said that out loud?

He looked instinctively toward Yuki Tsukumo, bracing for the Special Grade Jujutsu Sorcerer's rebuke. Her correction. Something to slap him back to his senses.

He needed it.

But Yuki Tsukumo wasn't angry. She wasn't even surprised.

The smile faded from her face. What replaced it was something extreme and ice-cold. Pure, ruthless rationality.

"It's viable."

She nodded, her tone as calm as if she were discussing tomorrow's weather.

"Theoretically speaking, it's the fastest and most efficient path."

"If you truly commit to it, it would create a world without Cursed Spirits."

Suguru Geto's mind went completely blank.

Vi... able?

That dark thought, the one that had been pressing against his chest for weeks, making him feel sick and guilty and yet impossible to stop thinking about, had just been casually rubber-stamped by another Special Grade Jujutsu Sorcerer.

To create a world without Cursed Spirits. A righteous cause.

Those monkeys' sacrifices would be worth it.

Just kill them all...

Suguru Geto's breathing was coming faster and faster. His whole body swayed at the edge, teetering, about to slide into the dark —

A broad, dry hand landed hard on his shoulder.

The force wasn't great. But it drove into him like an iron stake, pinning him in place.

"Hey. Bun-headed brat."

Toji had moved behind him without a sound. The usual mockery in his voice was gone. What was left was something heavy and solid.

"Those kinds of dangerous thoughts aren't very youthful, you know."

He let go of Suguru Geto, turned, and faced Yuki Tsukumo directly.

He didn't speak. He just watched her with those utterly pure eyes. The raw physical pressure radiating from the Heavenly Restriction user dropped the temperature of the room by several degrees.

"I don't care what kind of damn Special Grade you are. I don't care what grand ideals you've got."

Toji pointed back at Suguru Geto, each word landing separately.

"If you ever shove that garbage ideology into my student's head again..."

"Even if you're a woman, you'll still get hit."

Yuki Tsukumo stared at that fist, the size of a clay pot, for two full seconds. Then she raised both hands.

"Looks like today isn't a good day for a chat."

"Since Satoru Gojo, the strongest, isn't around, I'll take my leave."

She gave Suguru Geto one long, searching look. Her expression was unreadable.

"Kill all the non-sorcerers... Suguru Geto, you really do dare to think big."

She turned and walked to the door, swinging a leg over the heavy motorcycle that had been sitting in the corridor the whole time.

The engine roared. The woman rode off without looking back.

Suguru Geto stood alone in the wrecked locker room, fists clenched tight at his sides.

Both hands soaked in cold sweat.

...

3 days later.

Nagano Prefecture. Old Water Village.

The sky hung low like a waterlogged gray rag, pressing down with dead weight.

The air was thick enough to wring, saturated with the smell of mud and rotting vegetation, crawling into Suguru Geto's nostrils.

The moment he crossed the village entrance, his steps slowed on their own.

Something's wrong.

Everything here was rotten to the core.

The wooden houses lining the road had their doors and windows sealed shut. Behind every crack, behind every curtain, there were eyes.

Pairs of murky, wary eyes, naked with hostility, crawling over him like maggots.

A few filthy kids rolling in the mud looked up and saw him. They screamed like they'd seen a ghost, dropped their mud clods, and scrambled away on all fours, not even stopping for the shoe that flew off one of their feet.

"You're sure this is the place?" Suguru Geto turned his head. His voice was cold.

The Auxiliary Supervisor behind him was a middle-aged man. His face had gone ghostly pale, cold sweat soaking through his bangs. He stared fixedly at his watch as if running some private calculation, his eyes sliding away, unable to meet Suguru Geto's gaze.

"Y-yes! Geto-sama, the Jujutsu Headquarters' coordinates... it's right here!"

This guy's hiding something.

Suguru Geto couldn't be bothered to call him out.

This village had no trace of a Cursed Spirit's stench. Not the faintest hint.

Only a different kind of stench, far more nauseating.

The sour reek of long-term isolation and ignorance and festering malice, seeping up from the gutters of human nature.

The village chief was an old man so gaunt he looked like he'd been wrung out, the wrinkles on his face deep enough to trap flies. He emerged from the entrance of the village's only shrine to meet them, face plastered with a greasy, fawning smile that reeked of calculation.

"Aiyo! You must be the master from Tokyo! We've been praying you'd come!"

He rubbed his hands together and dropped his voice, conspiratorial and cagey. "Master, the hauntings have been getting worse! Look at our crops, all turned yellow overnight! Those two evil spirits are behind it. If this keeps up, everyone in this village will starve before the year's out!"

Suguru Geto almost laughed.

Crops turned yellow, and they blame ghosts.

"Specific victims?" he asked, businesslike.

"Oh, there are! Plenty!" The village chief slapped his thigh, his voice jumping up a pitch. "The old man at the east end stepped outside and broke his leg! The widow next door lost seven or eight chickens!"

A broken leg. Some dead chickens.

This was the "Grade 2 Cursed Energy reaction" in the Jujutsu Headquarters' report?

"So what exactly are these 'evil spirits'?" Suguru Geto's gaze was like a blade, driving straight into the old man's eyes.

The old man flinched, his eyes skittering sideways. "They're — they're just two sources of calamity! Wretched creatures who brought death to their own parents! Our village is kind-hearted, gave them food and shelter. Who knew they'd turn around and bite the hand that fed them? Now they're cutting off the whole village's livelihood!"

Suguru Geto caught the flash of greed that moved through the old man's eyes.

Kind-hearted.

They'd used some pretext to swallow two orphans' family property whole. These stupid villagers needed a scapegoat, something to blame for their own poverty and incompetence.

This was who he was supposed to protect.

The buzzing in his head started up again.

He forced the nausea down. His face showed nothing. "Take me to them."

"Yes, yes, of course, master, right this way!"

All along the road, the eyes behind the door cracks multiplied. Deliberately hushed voices drilled clearly into his ears.

"Look at those weird clothes... like some kind of freak."

"Get this monster to deal with the mountain problem and then get him out of here, before he drags us all down with him..."

➤ Next: Shattered Conviction — Tears Unshed