Just as the four were trapped in the Barrier, Miss Tayama, who was outside, was nearly dying of anxiety. It had already been five minutes since the Barrier expanded and Shoko disappeared. One had to know that these four were currently the precious treasures of Jujutsu High.
Just as Miss Tayama decided to wait no longer and took out her phone to call for support, she suddenly noticed a ghostly blue flame appearing in a room on the sixth floor of the top level.
"Genji classmate?" Immediately, the flames covered the entire room.
...
"What on earth is wrong with you today?" Hayashi Rin asked Genji:
"You've been absent-minded this whole time."
"Nothing, it's just like I've forgotten something." Genji replied.
"I feel like there's something important that I've forgotten, but I just can't remember what it is."
"You're acting all mysterious." Hayashi Rin dismissed Genji's words with disdain. At this moment, she suddenly noticed a bracelet on Genji's wrist.
"When did you buy this?" Hayashi Rin leaned in curiously to observe.
"Wait, this looks handmade." A slightly mischievous smile appeared on Hayashi Rin's face.
"Could it be that that little classmate Ieiri made it for you? Have you two made it official?"
"What kind of nonsense are you babbling? I don't even know when I got this." Genji curled his lip and pushed Hayashi Rin's head away with a look of disgust.
"By the way, who is this Ieiri you mentioned?"
"Eh, did I say that? You're really weird today."
Hayashi Rin paused strangely, then looked at Genji with a weird expression. Looking at the bracelet with flame patterns on her own wrist, the feeling of strangeness that she had buried deep in her heart and ignored surged up again.
"What is going on?"
At this moment, Genji realized tears were streaming down from the corners of his eyes. Vague memories appeared in his mind: himself, a tall, thin boy with white hair, a black-haired boy with a strange fringe hairstyle, and a tea-haired girl with a bright smile. The girl was standing in front of him, holding his hand, seemingly saying something to him. But every time Genji tried hard to hear clearly, a strange noise would inexplicably appear in his heart.
"Hello Auntie, we're here to find Genji-kun to go out and play."
At this moment, several voices came from the doorway.
"Little Genji, your classmates are here to see you." On Yukirin's voice came from the door.
"Coming." After this interruption, the slight sense of incongruity in Genji's heart was set aside again.
"Let's go, we're going to have a blast today." A girl with long golden hair said excitedly to Genji.
"No problem, I've already made a plan in advance." Genji responded with a forced smile.
...
"Today was so much fun." The girl stretched, revealing beautiful body curves. Then she said to Genji;
"By the way, Genji-kun, who gave you this bracelet?"
The young girl looked at the bracelet, which was clearly handmade, and said with a hint of jealousy.
"Honestly, I don't know either. It's like it just appeared after I slept. But it doesn't matter, I'll just wear it for now."
Seeing that Genji didn't care about the bracelet, the girl sighed inwardly. Then she mustered her courage and said to Genji:
"Um, Genji-kun, there seem to be several couples in our class now, eh."
"Yeah, that's what they call the colorful high school days, right." Genji sighed.
"It's just that I'm a little envious of them." The girl looked directly into Genji's eyes and continued: "I have always... towards you..."
"It's getting late, I'm worried my family will be anxious, so I'll be going first." After speaking, Genji turned and left, leaving the girl alone in the wind.
On the way home, Genji didn't understand his reaction just now. A girl confessing to him should have been a very happy thing, but at that moment, his heart was suddenly filled with guilt, as if he had betrayed something.
Looking at the bracelet on his wrist, the figure of the tea-haired girl appeared before his eyes again.
"Shoko..." Genji called out the name unconsciously, "Wait, who is Shoko?"
After returning home, Hayashi Rin came up.
"How was it, how was it (o ≖ ◡ ≖), did you confess?"
"Sorry, Older Sister, I'm not in the mood right now." Genji said to Hayashi Rin, looking listless.
Noticing that Genji's state was off, Hayashi Rin put her arm around Genji's shoulder.
"It's okay if the confession failed, we are always by your side, you are not alone."
"You are not alone!" This familiar sentence instantly unlocked Genji's memory.
"Gojo, Geto, Principal Yaga, Senior Utahime, Miss Tayama, Miss Mei Mei...", and the girl who had silently occupied the softest place in his heart.
"Shoko," Genji softly whispered Shoko's name. Their first meeting, their first mission, the battle to suppress The Gun Cursed Spirit, all the memories became clear at this moment. Cursed Energy began to surge on Genji again.
"Sister, if you found out that your current happy life was all fake, but at the same time, real life was even crueler, yet there were some things you didn't want to abandon, what would you do?" Genji lowered his head, his hair covering his eyes, and asked Hayashi Rin.
"Why are you suddenly asking such a philosophical question? But let me think. In the end, I would still choose reality. After all, no matter how beautiful a fake is, isn't it just like an anime or a movie? It will end sooner or later, and one day we will have to face reality again." Hayashi Rin gave her answer.
"Is that so? I know now, thank you for your answer." Ghostly blue flames ignited on Genji's body, and the environment at home began to gradually dissolve and dissipate.
"Isn't this what you've always dreamed of? Why leave? Stay here, and you will live a happy and joyful life forever, get married, have children, and spend an ordinary and happy life. Isn't this what you craved?"
Behind Genji, his parents and sister stood in a row, their eyes losing their luster, and they spoke simultaneously in a voice without temperature.
"Yeah, it really is beautiful, so beautiful that I almost voluntarily sank into it. But fake is ultimately just fake, isn't it?"
Genji raised his head, his eyes filled with tears. He looked reluctantly at the faces of his family members, wanting to imprint their faces firmly in his heart. This was an age and appearance that the few of them could never reach again.
"Goodbye, Mom and Dad, Older Sister. Although it was short, it was truly happy to be family with you in this life." As the words fell, the flames on Genji's body suddenly erupted, and Genji's tears finally flowed down.
On the other side, Gojo Satoru, who was trapped in the illusion, tried various methods but could not find a way out, and the Six Eyes had no reaction at this time.
Just as Gojo Satoru was anxious, he suddenly noticed ghostly blue flames starting to ignite in the surrounding environment.
"Well done, Genji." Seeing this, Gojo Satoru was overjoyed, knowing that Genji had successfully broken free from the illusion.
"Then I'll step it up too!" Saying this, Gojo Satoru dispersed the Blue in his hand, and instead began to infinitely expand his Infinity, covering the entire Barrier until the Barrier could no longer bear it.
"Crack," finally, under the dual offensive of Genji and Gojo Satoru, the Barrier could not bear the load and began to gradually collapse. And Geto Suguru and Shoko, who had been sunken in the illusion, also woke up.
"Genji!" "Gojo!"
"Crack, crack." The Barrier finally collapsed completely, and the illusion dissipated. When the group came to their senses, they found themselves in a rudimentary room. There was only a table in the room, and on the table was a strange statue, emitting an eerie aura.
"Look over here," Gojo Satoru pointed behind the table.
Everyone looked, only to see a Cursed Spirit covered in eyes lying motionless on the ground.
"It looks like it was sucked dry by something." Looking at the Cursed Spirit in front of him, Geto Suguru speculated:
"Could it be this Cursed Tool on the table?"
"Regardless, there shouldn't be any danger here now. Contact Miss Tayama to clear the scene."
...
"This statue seems to be a Cursed Tool left over from the golden age of Jujutsu. It possesses the ability to draw out the things that people desire or fear in their hearts." Miss Tayama said to the group. Behind her, a dozen Assistant Supervisors were busy cleaning up the battlefield and sending the residents in the building and the missing Jujutsu Sorcerers for treatment.
"No wonder we were trapped." Gojo Satoru followed up on Miss Tayama's analysis.
"The Cursed Technique of that Cursed Spirit is to pull people into the illusions it creates after they make eye contact with the eyes on its body. It must have been attracted by that Cursed Tool, but instead, it was swallowed by the curse inside the Cursed Tool. The abilities of the two had a strange reaction, enhancing each other, which is why—"
Gojo Satoru said, glanced at the reactions of the group, and continued.
"—which is why it created an illusion almost no different from reality, trapping us."
Silence~. Genji looked at the group, even Gojo Satoru, who was usually the most noisy, was speechless. He understood that what everyone experienced in the illusion was definitely not a good experience, at least not like his own, where most of the experience was quite good.
"Let's go back to Jujutsu High first. I'll cook tonight."
Suddenly, Genji said to the group, trying to ease the atmosphere.
"Oh, then I want to eat Buddha Jumps Over the Wall." Gojo Satoru also responded to Genji immediately.
After eliminating The Gun Cursed Spirit before, Genji had cooked for everyone once. That delicacy made Gojo Satoru, who was used to eating good things, praise it non-stop. It was just a pity that Genji was too lazy to cook afterwards, only occasionally making one or two dishes for Shoko.
"Get lost. If you want to eat Buddha Jumps Over the Wall, you might as well stew yourself, Gojo." Genji said with annoyance.
"Haha."
Shoko and Geto Suguru couldn't help but laugh when hearing the conversation between the two. The atmosphere finally eased up at this moment.
"Alright, if you want to eat a big meal, come with me to buy groceries first."
Just like that, the figures of the group walked away in the afterglow of the sunset.