The plaza outside Harajuku Station was packed with noise. Loud pop music mixed with the crush of conversation, and the air carried a strange blend of perfume and sweets.
Kaede stood quietly in the middle of the crowded street, his deep blue uniform coat standing out sharply among the splash of bright colors around him.
He remained still, hands hanging naturally at his sides, his tall frame straight and calm.
Electronic screens flashed in the reflection of his dark red eyes while people streamed past in every direction. A few strands of black hair lifted lightly in the wind tunneling through the street.
Now and then, girls passing in groups slowed down, blushing and sneaking repeated glances his way, some even stopping outright. But he simply held his posture and ignored the impressed stares circling around him.
"So this is Harajuku? It definitely feels lively... though it also seems like the sort of place you'd get tired of if you stayed too long.
Crowded city scenes aren't exactly rare..." Kaede thought to himself.
Less than two steps away, Yuji Itadori had already thrown himself completely into the excitement of the big city.
In his left hand he held a bucket of popcorn covered in colorful candy bits, and in his right he clutched a freshly made crepe, his eyes shining as they darted from shop to shop.
"Oh man. So this is Harajuku. Even the air smells sweet!"
Yuji's amazement was completely genuine. He crunched popcorn like a full-blown tourist, taking everything in with total delight.
Gojo Satoru was doing much the same, holding an absurdly oversized strawberry cream crepe. With his tall frame, casual stance, and that unmistakable black blindfold, he stood out in the crowd like a lighthouse, drawing even more strange and curious looks than Kaede.
He bit into the whipped cream with absolutely no concern for dignity or professionalism and cheerfully agreed with his student.
"Right? This crepe place always has a line for a reason.
Yuji, there's also a shop over there that sells giant cotton candy. After we pick her up, should we stop there too?"
Megumi Fushiguro stood off to the side, both hands jammed deep into his pockets, a vein already faintly pulsing at his forehead.
He had very deliberately kept his distance from the two "tourists," and his entire body radiated exhausted resistance.
Surrounded by Harajuku's brightly dressed trendsetters, his cold expression somehow looked even more out of place than usual.
"...Could you two at least try to remember why we're here?"
Megumi drew in a slow breath, forcibly dragging his sanity back into place. His green eyes, edged with irritation, swept down the street, trying to steer the situation back onto the rails.
"Where's the last first-year? If we can't find her, I'm going back to campus."
Gojo swallowed his mouthful of cream and casually pointed with his free hand toward a bank of coin lockers not far away, a grin curling at his mouth like he was already enjoying the show.
"Ah, she's over there. Looks like our new classmate has already blended perfectly into the atmosphere here."
Following the direction of his finger, near the lockers stood a short-haired girl in a modified Jujutsu High uniform, her orange hair impossible to miss.
With one hand, she had a man dressed like a talent scout by the collar and was shaking him hard while demanding something at full volume. Even in a place as loud as Harajuku, the aggressive scene stood out.
The city wind swept down the street, carrying the buzz of Tokyo with it.
Kaede stayed where he was, dark red eyes reflecting the vaguely violent scene by the lockers, his expression turning faintly helpless.
"How is that blending in? That guy looks like he's about to black out."
The comment carried clearly to the three people beside him.
The moment Megumi heard it, it was like he had finally found a sane person.
He closed his eyes in deep agreement and rubbed a hand irritably through his sea-urchin hair.
"If we go talk to her now, we're absolutely going to get treated like accomplices... Can we just pretend we didn't see this and head back?"
There was deep fatigue in Megumi's voice, and he even looked half ready to take a step backward.
For someone who preferred to keep things low-key, a public scene like this was a nightmare.
Kaede nodded lightly. He fully agreed.
Yuji, on the other hand, clearly did not care at all about whether something was embarrassing.
Stretching his neck, he shoved another fistful of colorful popcorn into his mouth, cheeks puffed full as he stared at the scene and mumbled through it.
"She's crazy strong. Hey, hey, that guy's eyes are rolling back. If she keeps shaking him like that, he's seriously gonna die. Shouldn't we go save him?"
As the teacher responsible for this field trip in the first place, Gojo felt not even the slightest flicker of duty.
He polished off the last bite of strawberry cream, licked a smear of whipped cream from the corner of his mouth, and watched the one-sided assault with cheerful interest through his black blindfold.
"Ah, youth really is full of energy. But Yuji's right. If she keeps going like that, the cops are going to show up."
Gojo pulled a white handkerchief from his pocket and wiped off his fingers, then crumpled the wrapper from his crepe into a ball.
With a casual flick, he sent it flying in a perfect arc, dropping it cleanly into a recycling bin ten feet away.
Then he clapped his hands together once, sharp and bright, and strode forward on those impossible legs toward the "crime scene."
"Come on, everybody. Let's go welcome the fiery red jewel of our first-year class!"
"Wouldn't that be a red jewel?" Kaede muttered, continuing his role as the straight man.
The moment Gojo approached the locker area with the three boys in tow, the orange-haired girl, still balanced on the edge of full-blown fury, seemed to notice the attention drawing closer.
She let out a sharp snort and abruptly released her grip.
The poor talent scout collapsed to the pavement like a sack of wet laundry, clutching his throat and coughing violently.
The girl turned around. One hand planted itself on her hip while the other held several heavy shopping bags, and her eyes swept across the four of them with open judgment.
Gojo ignored the stares from the surrounding crowd and raised one hand casually, the grin on his face bright enough to be ridiculous.
"Hey there. You must be Nobara Kugisaki. Sorry, sorry, kept you waiting. We're here to pick you up."
The girl called Nobara Kugisaki brushed dust off her hands like she had just discarded something contaminated.
Then she straightened, lifted the shopping bags again, and gave the four of them a sweeping look from head to toe, her light brown eyes full of unconcealed criticism.
Her gaze landed first on Gojo, with his black blindfold and flippant smile, and her brows instantly locked together.
That one barely even needs commentary, Kaede thought.
Then her eyes shifted to Yuji Itadori, who was still stuffing popcorn into his mouth with an idiotically cheerful expression.
"...A country bumpkin eating popcorn."
Nobara delivered her first judgment without mercy.
Next her attention moved to Megumi, who looked like he wanted to go home and radiated pure low-pressure misery.
"A gloomy, stuck-up nerd."
Finally, her gaze skipped over the first three and landed squarely on Kaede, who had been standing quietly in the back.
Her eyes paused on his face for exactly one second.
She narrowed them slightly, giving him a quick once-over, taking in the neat deep blue uniform and the calm, silent way he had just followed the others.
"One good-looking face, but honestly he looks like a decorative model somebody dragged in to fill out the numbers."
Nobara sighed, pressed a hand dramatically to her forehead, and threw her voice toward the sky above Harajuku Station, loud enough that passersby turned to look.
"You've got to be kidding me. I came to Tokyo full of excitement, and these are my future classmates? This random collection of weirdos?
My Tokyo life was over before it even started!"
Yuji swallowed the popcorn in his mouth and looked deeply offended by the country bumpkin remark, pointing straight at himself.
"Hey. Who are you calling a bumpkin? I know about Harajuku crepes, okay?"
Megumi closed his eyes and chose selective deafness, one hand still in his pocket as he spoke in a flat voice.
Kaede was visibly starting to feel awkward, lowering his head slightly and taking on the general energy of please don't involve me.
"Now that we've found her, can we just go back? There are too many people here."
Gojo watched the "warm" first interaction among his students and burst out laughing.
He clapped once to pull everyone's attention back toward him.
"All right, all right. Now that all four first-years are finally together, in honor of this historic occasion..."
He deliberately stretched out the sentence, the gaze hidden behind his blindfold seeming to pass across each of them in turn before he raised a finger and pointed toward the direction of Roppongi.
"Your teacher has decided to treat you all to an exciting Tokyo sightseeing experience. And while we're at it, we'll do a little field test too."
"Where exactly is the sightseeing part?"