The morgue was freezing. Shoko liked it that way.
She took a slow sip from her mug. Dark, bitter, perfect. Ren's espresso machine was the best thing to hit the medical wing in a decade.
The heavy metal door slammed against the rubber wall stop.
Satoru Gojo strolled in, blindfold on, hands stuffed in his pockets.
"You're paying for those hinges," Shoko muttered, not looking up.
Gojo ignored her, hopping onto an empty autopsy table. "I looked into our favorite anomaly."
"Ren."
"Squeaky clean," Gojo complained, leaning back on his hands. "Records, background checks, the coffee shop. I dug to the bottom. He's agonizingly boring."
"So he's a late bloomer. Leave it."
"Late bloomers hummmmmmmm, Shoko." Gojo tilted his head toward the ceiling. "late bloomer don't pull unregistered Special Grade katanas out of thin air ykk?."
"You're just mad the weapon rejected you."
Shoko spun a pen on her desk. "Did it hurt?"
"My feelings, mostly."
Shoko let out a sudden, raspy bark of laughter. She brought a hand to her mouth, shaking her head as the chuckle evolved into a full-blown, wheezing laugh that echoed off the cold tiles of the morgue.
"You," she gasped, pointing her pen at him. "The strongest sorcerer alive. Swatted away by a sword."
Gojo crossed his arms, puffing out his cheeks in an exaggerated pout behind his blindfold. "It was highly disrespectful, Shoko. I went to pick it up, and it threw a kinetic shockwave at me. Me! It didn't even have the decency to let Infinity filter it properly. It is like a mad dog."
"I'm giving Ren a discount on his next physical," Shoko smirked, taking another long drink of her espresso. "Anyone who can bruise your ego without throwing a single punch is exactly my kind of anomaly."
"You're cruel. I'm leaving." Gojo hopped off the autopsy table, dramatically dusting off his uniform. "I've got a class to teach anyway. Try not to freeze to death."
The heavy metal door clanged shut again, leaving Shoko alone with the quiet hum of the refrigerators and a lingering, highly amused smile.
...
The Roof of the Jujutsu High Dorms
October 21st — 10 Days to Shibuya
The wind howling across the roof was freezing, but Ren didn't feel it. He sat on the concrete edge, his legs dangling over the side, staring blindly at the Tokyo skyline in the distance. The city was a glittering sea of lights, entirely ignorant of the slaughterhouse it was about to become.
Ten days.
Ren rubbed the bridge of his nose, the dull ache of the morning's training session entirely eclipsed by the massive, ticking clock in his head.
And Maki was right at the center of his anxiety.
If she stayed in Tokyo on Halloween, she would march straight into Jogo's flames again. He couldn't let that happen. He needed her gone.
Completely off the board. But Maki was too sharp to fall for a flimsy excuse, and if she caught even a whisper that Gojo was in trouble, she would hijack a car and drive straight into hell herself.
He pulled out his phone, the screen illuminating his face in the dark. He opened his encrypted notes app and started mapping out the logistics.
The Criteria for Exile:
Zero Cell Reception: She can't know Shibuya is happening until it's already over.
Geographical Isolation: No bullet trains, no commercial airports nearby. Even if she finds out, the travel time must be a minimum of 24 to 48 hours.
Irresistible Bait: It has to be a mission she demands to take.
Ren swiped to a fresh page and quickly drafted a mental comparison of potential locations.
Kyoto was rejected first. The city had too much Jujutsu activity, and even though it was quiet enough to hide for a while, it sat only a few hours from Tokyo by Shinkansen. If she changed her mind, she could return before anyone even noticed she was gone.
Okinawa looked better on paper. The islands were far enough to feel separate from the mainland, but not far enough to disappear completely. The higher-ups could still send a private flight, track her down, and drag her back within the same day.
Only Shiretoko National Park felt truly unreachable. Deep in the wilderness of Hokkaido, cut off by mountains, forests, and dead zones with no signal, it offered the kind of isolation no sorcerer wanted to deal with. Reaching Tokyo again would take days of hiking, trains, and flights. That was exactly why it was perfect.
"Shiretoko it is," Ren muttered to the empty roof.
Now he just needed the bait.
Maki wouldn't go to the freezing northern tip of Japan to exorcise some low-level forest spirits. But she would go for a weapon. Specifically, a weapon that would piss off the Zen'in clan.
Ren typed rapidly, piecing together the breadcrumbs of a rumor he was going to leak into the Jujutsu High dispatch network.
The Fake Intel:
The Target: The Hachi-no-Ken (Eight-Fanged Sword), a Grade 1 cursed tool lost during a botched Zen'in clan expedition in the 1970s.
The Location: A sealed, naturally occurring domain in the deep caves of the Shiretoko Peninsula.
The Hook: The domain only allows entry to individuals with very low cursed energy. Sorcerers are violently rejected by the barrier.
With this the higher-ups couldn't send standard sorcerers because of the barrier. The Zen'in clan wouldn't want to admit they lost it, but they'd want it back. And Maki? The second she heard there was a Grade 1 Zen'in heirloom sitting in a cave that only she could enter, she would pack her bags immediately just to spite her family.
Ren leaned back, resting his head against the cold chain-link fence.
He'd forge the anonymous tip tonight and route it through a secure server so it landed on the mission dispatcher's desk by tomorrow morning. They would categorize it, verify the historical loss of the sword, and officially assign it to Maki by the 25th.
She'd be on a train north by the 28th. By the time Halloween night fell over Shibuya, Maki would be hiking through knee-deep snow, entirely cut off from the world, hunting a ghost sword that didn't exist. She'd be furious when she figured it out. She'd probably break his jaw the second she got back to Tokyo.
Ren locked his phone and pocketed it, a bitter, exhausted smile crossing his face in the dark.
"Break my nose, crack my ribs, do whatever you want, boss," he whispered to the wind. "As long as you're alive to do it."
October 26th — 5 Days to Shibuya
The departure chime for the northbound Shinkansen was scheduled to ring in exactly four minutes.
Instead of standing on the crowded platform, Ren and Maki were tucked away in a dimly lit, out-of-order maintenance alcove just past the ticketing gates.
The heavy ambient noise of Ueno Station was muffled here, replaced by the harsh, ragged sound of their breathing.