Well, people — or, well, Jogo wasn't human, but the principle still held.
When it came to breaking rules, once was all it took. First time, second time, third time, fourth time — they all followed in a chain.
The same went for going soft.
Once was all it took, and the rest came naturally. So the moment Mahiko heard that the whole small-stage trip had started because Lil' Dagon had begged Jogo to come with her, she already understood — the same trick could work a second time.
If it didn't work, that just meant the effort wasn't strong enough. Dial it up, and try again.
So for the past ten minutes of hushed whispering, Mahiko had essentially been coaching Lil' Dagon on how to cry more convincingly — what to say, how to say it, what words would hit Jogo right in the chest.
And as it turned out, it worked beautifully.
In a situation like this, lies were useless. Truth was the sharpest blade.
Lil' Dagon wiped her tears in front of Jogo.
Jogo was visibly flustered, the drink in her hand completely forgotten.
"I really feel... that being born into this world was such a lucky thing. And meeting all of you — that feels like the luckiest thing of all..."
Lil' Dagon hiccupped between sobs. "But whenever I think about how all that luck could be cut short by something unexpected, it makes me so sad... That's why I always want to collect more precious moments with you. That's why I wanted to get on that stage and perform together with you..."
The girl's voice trembled with sorrow as she cried and spoke.
Behind her, Mahiko played her supporting role with full commitment — dabbing at her own eyes in pitch-perfect time with the atmosphere. Clearly putting in serious effort to sell it.
"So I really, really want to... just this once, get up on that stage with you. To sing together, to dance together, to shine together..." The girl slowly lifted her tearful gaze to Jogo. "Is that really not okay? Jogo-nee...?"
When those words landed, Jogo's eyes flickered — just slightly, just once, involuntarily.
Yeah.
What Lil' Dagon was saying... was true.
She was half-exasperated, half-amused by Mahiko's shameless scheming — but she couldn't deny that what Lil' Dagon was expressing was real, and the logic behind it was sound.
She — and Hanami — had probably made peace with dying the day they chose this path.
...But Lil' Dagon was just a child. A cursed womb, barely new to the world.
To be swept up into a blood-soaked battlefield the moment you were born — that was simply too cruel.
...And then, unbidden, Jogo thought of Mahiko. Mahiko was a cursed womb too.
She'd just reshaped herself with her Jujutsu Technique into the form of something fully realized — but at her core, she was a cursed womb. Among Cursed Spirits, she was still a child.
This world was actually pretty brutal to Mahiko.
Mahiko had just never let it show.
So much so that Jogo had forgotten — that a cursed womb was still, at heart, just a kid.
"...Haah."
In that moment, Jogo felt something she wasn't used to feeling: sadness. And a reluctance to refuse.
If she could, she actually wanted to let Lil' Dagon smile more.
Even if it was just for a little while — hopping and bouncing around on a stage.
She drew a slow breath, lifted her gaze toward the distance, toward Mahiko — who was over there sobbing along with Lil' Dagon in perfect solidarity...
Then, quietly inhaled.
"Every single word of that was written by YOU, wasn't it!!" Jogo jabbed a finger straight at Mahiko's face. "What are you doing, egging Lil' Dagon on into this nonsense?! You enjoying the show that much?!"
Damn it all.
There was no way Lil' Dagon could have come up with lines that heart-wrenching on her own. That was absolutely Mahiko's handiwork.
Those two had been over there whispering for the past ten minutes — they were rehearsing, weren't they. Rehearsing how to get her.
Mahiko stuck out her tongue and knocked the side of her own head with a knuckle. "Hm~?"
"Don't 'hm~' me!" Jogo shouted. "It's because of you going along with Lil' Dagon's little scheme that I'm — I'm actually starting to feel bad about saying no!"
"Then just go up on stage with her." Mahiko shrugged, both hands open, completely unbothered. "You're a gorgeous girl. You're popular. Keep Lil' Dagon company for a bit — it's not like it'll cost you an arm and a leg."
Jogo looked like she was about to lose her mind. "Do you even understand what the actual problem is here?!"
Mahiko blinked, all wide-eyed innocence. "The actual problem?"
"The actual problem is — if you want me to go up there and sing and dance with her, then I need to actually know how to sing and dance! Do you get that?!" Jogo's voice cracked almost to a screech. "Hanami and I can't sing, we can't dance — what do you expect us to do up there in front of all those people?! Stand at the side and clap along as Lil' Dagon's backup decoration?! That's embarrassing as hell!"
Hanami tilted her head nearby, appearing to give the "clap along and keep the beat" proposal genuine, sincere consideration.
And Mahiko blinked.
Oh.
That was... actually a fair point.
Even someone completely immune to embarrassment would still feel embarrassed standing frozen on a stage with nothing to do.
"You could just bite the thing again..." the talent scout ventured carefully.
"I might as well just breathe fire up there!" Jogo bared her teeth. "Don't think I didn't hear people talking earlier — biting a lighter is not idol behavior!"
"What — you can breathe fire too?!" The talent scout's eyes went wide, latching onto entirely the wrong detail.
"That works too," Hanami said softly, pressing her palms together, smiling in gentle approval. "And I can make flowers bloom."
"Nobody's making any flowers bloom!" Jogo planted her hands on her hips and stamped her foot in frustration. "I was being sarcastic! Obviously!"
Jogo was nearly at her wit's end. Do I have a single normal companion around here?!
Mahiko listened to all of this, stroked her chin, and thought it over seriously. "Okay, you're right. If you go up on stage and genuinely have no idea what you're doing, that would be pretty awkward."
"'Pretty awkward'?" Jogo stared. "That would be the single most excruciating thing to ever happen in my entire existence!"
But then Mahiko's eyes slid sideways, and she snapped her fingers — a clean, bright crack — and smiled.
That smile sent a vague, uneasy chill through Jogo for no reason she could name.
"But what if I told you — I have a way to fix that problem?"
Jogo blinked, caught off guard. "...What kind of way?"
She couldn't imagine what on earth could solve something like this. What, was Mahiko going to carve choreography into her body with that engraving Technique of hers?
That sounded absurd. It felt like a bluff.
"Tell me first." Jogo watched Mahiko with wary eyes. Her instincts were screaming that the blue-haired girl was sitting on something deeply suspicious.
Mahiko's expression shifted into something faint, and just slightly wicked.
"You'll see soon enough."
...
Somewhere in the mountains near Tokyo.
A hidden underground chamber, concealed within the hills.
The surrounding walls were plastered floor-to-ceiling with ofuda, their dense rows of talismans casting wavering shadows across the damp stone under dim, guttering light. The air was thick with something ancient — the stale, unmistakable scent of old Jujutsu.
"Then our contract is sealed."
Kenjaku smiled, rising slowly from his chair. "Thank you for your willingness to lend us your assistance. And in return, we will do everything in our power to ensure your resurrection."
Rime stood behind him.
Before him, a cloaked figure sat on the cold stone floor, face completely obscured, head bowed — and laughing. A low, hoarse laugh. Not ordinary hoarseness: more like vocal cords that had never grown properly.
"Heh... you're just using me. No point dressing it up so nicely."
"Not at all — this isn't exploitation, and it isn't coercion." Kenjaku's tone was relaxed. "A second life is an extraordinarily precious thing. To obtain something that precious, naturally one must put in a commensurate amount of effort."
He rose and moved to leave.
The cloaked figure tilted its head up. "But the contract you made with me a thousand years ago said something rather different."
"Oh, that one." Kenjaku laughed without looking back. "Those contracts were voided when I changed bodies. Contracts, after all, must defer to the newest version."
He waved a hand and walked out of the room.
"Your incarnation will complete itself automatically over the next few hours. Simply wait."
Rime quietly pulled the door shut behind her.
The latch clicked into place.
In the corridor, the two of them walked side by side.
"Is this enough?" Rime asked.
"Yes."
"These ancient sorcerers... will they be adequate for what comes next?"
"They look weak to you now, but they haven't finished incarnating yet." Kenjaku said. "I needed to finalize the new contracts before I could safely complete their incarnation — naturally."
"Is that so?" Rime gave a short, skeptical hum. "I recognize one of them. She's from our era..."
"You think she's weak? She's only weak compared to Sukuna. Excluding Gojo and Sukuna, every single one of them is formidable." Kenjaku answered, offhand. "They're excellent pieces to play with — and considerably easier to control than those Cursed Spirits."
He paused, tilting his head toward the light at the far end of the corridor.
"Honestly, those Cursed Spirits should have been sufficient on their own. But... given the current situation, I've been forced to start preparing more contingencies."
Because Mahiko had gone and done things on her own initiative.
Because Mahiko had unilaterally given those disaster-class Cursed Spirits bodies capable of communicating with humans. That had introduced unstable variables into what had been Kenjaku's hundred-percent-controlled operation.
It wasn't that Jogo and the others had become disobedient. If Kenjaku assigned them tasks right now, they'd still go carry them out dutifully. But the variable existed, and Kenjaku had to be prepared.
"Even so... how fascinating."
The thought of that blue-haired girl surfaced in his mind. Kenjaku tapped two fingers lightly against the stitching across his forehead, and something surfaced in his eyes — an expression that was, remarkably, something close to genuine delight.
"The longer you live, the more you get to see. That such an interesting Cursed Spirit could emerge in this world — what extraordinary luck."
Kenjaku maintained his vigilance toward the variable. But he did not dislike it.
If anything, he found it genuinely entertaining.
In the long sweep of a thousand years, there were precious few things left that still felt new to him.
If not for the fact that he still had longer, deeper plans to execute — honestly, he would have loved nothing more than to sit down with Mahiko for a long, genuine, heart-to-heart conversation that lasted through the night.
"So you've already decided — that the Cursed Spirit with Idle Transfiguration has slipped beyond your control?" Rime asked.
"Unknown," Kenjaku said. "But I need to be prepared for the possibility that she already has... Heh. What you and I are preparing for right now could already be considered a preemptive strike."
There was no shortage of headaches lately: that Black-Robed Figure who had appeared out of nowhere from some forgotten corner of the world; the destruction of the Kamo family's covert unit; the loss of that puppet. And now, on top of everything else, the mandatory task of incarnating these ancient sorcerers and binding them with new contracts.
He was nearly buried under it all.
But even so, he had already identified the single most dangerous factor among all of it.
———Mahiko.
The matter of Mahiko would have to be dealt with. Even if it meant making Jujutsu High suspect that someone had tampered with Suguru Geto's corpse — dealing with Mahiko came first.
...Wait a little longer.
He still needed to wait.
The timing wasn't quite right yet.
Kenjaku activated his surveillance Cursed Spirits.
He didn't monitor the surveillance Cursed Spirit stationed near Mahiko around the clock. Not because the spy was inadequate — simply because Kenjaku had other things to attend to.
But right now, he was curious. What was Mahiko up to?
"It seems Mahiko has rendezvoused with the other three Cursed Spirits," Rime said from beside him. "Not sure what they're doing."
"Oh? Is that right?"
Those three Special Grade Cursed Spirits had said nothing about going to meet Mahiko. So why were they with her now?
Had they deliberately concealed it from him? Or was it a simple coincidence?
If it was coincidence, fine. But if the three Special Grades had intentionally hidden the truth — if they'd lied to him and said they were only going out for a stroll, while actually planning to meet Mahiko — then the situation was potentially quite bad.
Because that would mean those Special Grade Cursed Spirits had begun making plans behind his back. Plans that could only be carried out precisely because they were kept from him.
Kenjaku narrowed his eyes, fingers idly stroking his chin. His expression grew, almost imperceptibly, a shade more serious.
Then the feed from the surveillance Cursed Spirit finally came through.
He saw Mahiko.
"giligili ai..."
Hm? Was that... singing mixed into the ambient noise?
Mahiko appeared to be inside a large venue, watching some kind of performance.
The stage music was loud. It sounded like someone was singing and dancing.
Hm...?
Hadn't all four of them converged in the same place?
Then why was only Mahiko visible in the feed?
"Did you personally observe them meet up?" Kenjaku asked.
"Not directly," Rime said. "But they all went to the same location. You called for me before I could keep following."
"The same location..."
If they'd all gone to the same place, there was no logical reason they wouldn't have found each other — they could all sense one another's presence. And Tokyo was a big city; four people ending up in the exact same spot was hardly a trivial coincidence.
But the feed only showed Mahiko. The other three were nowhere in sight.
Had they hidden themselves?
Perhaps he should briefly activate the detection Technique on the surveillance Cursed Spirit and locate the other three Special Grades.
With that thought, Kenjaku engaged the detection Technique embedded in the spy.
After Mahiko had remodeled their bodies, the three Special Grade Cursed Spirits had become quite capable of suppressing their Cursed Energy signatures. But Kenjaku had already catalogued their individual signatures — scent, aura, and other identifying characteristics — well in advance. He could locate them without relying on Cursed Energy detection at all.
And indeed, he did.
The moment the Technique activated, the three auras surfaced clearly in his mind. Three arrows appeared in his perception, each pointing to one of the Cursed Spirits.
All three arrows pointed to the same place.
And that place was not far from Mahiko.
Kenjaku let out a quiet, soft laugh.
Hiding, were they. All in the same spot, at that... This didn't look anything like a chance encounter.
He directed the surveillance Cursed Spirit, following the direction of the arrows.
The feed panned.
A brilliantly lit stage filled his vision.
On that stage, three girls stood beneath the spotlights, dressed in dazzling idol costumes. They appeared to have just finished a song — breathing hard, beads of sweat on their faces — but their smiles blazed brighter than the lights overhead.
Jogo, especially.
Facing the audience, she stood on the tips of her toes, blowing kisses with a radiant smile, calling out, "Minna-san, daisuki~!"
...
Pop.
A faint sound.
In the corridor, Rime saw Kenjaku's footsteps stop dead.
She turned back, confused — and then startled, retreating a full step. Because she noticed that the stitching across Kenjaku's forehead had snapped.
Kenjaku stood exactly where he was. His expression had gone completely and utterly rigid. Mouth hanging open. Eyes wide as saucers.
Kenjaku was genuinely, thoroughly dumbstruck.
Those — those three up there — who on earth are they?
Am I hallucinating from a Jujutsu attack?!
____
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