The Inumaki Clan Prodigy [Jujutsu Kaisen]

Black shards of cursed energy fell to the ground as they slowly began to fade. Isamu's knees buckled and collapsed, his eyes focused on the disintegrating corpse in front of him. He hadn't expected a black flash, not that he was complaining.

The attack, infused with a solid 10% of his total cursed energy, had blow off its head. That combined with all the other damage would've killed just about anyone so Isamu wasn't really surprised it had exorcised it. He was just surprised he'd actually landed it.

With how long Isamu's been pushing himself day after day, despite for strength, he figured he would've landed one by now if he was ever going to. But I seemed he hadn't been pushing himself enough.

Or rather, his enemies weren't pushing him enough. It was always just grade one curses, maybe the rare low level special grade.

Now that Isamu thought about it, he only really progressed when he was pushed to near death. Like on the Parade of Hundred Demons, his fight with the tree themed curse, and now. And he got the feeling he would be making rapid progress in the near future.

He'd landed his first black flash. It truly opened his eyes to cursed energy at its very core. Even kneeling there, extremely exhausted and damage, manipulating the shreds of cursed energy he still possessed was as easy and intuitive as breathing.

Unfortunately, Isamu couldn't experience the sensation for much longer, the blood loss soon catching up to him. He fell forward into the mud. On his way down, his rapidly closing eyes caught a figure in the uniform of a jujutsu high students approaching his location. No, it wasn't a student, it was a teacher.

——

Maki loved her beauty sleep as honestly, she didn't get much of it. Especially not in her early days when she was still a member of the Zenin clan. So as you can imagine, she was not a happy camper when Megumi burst into her room in the middle of the night.

"Maki! Wake up!" He yelled into her dark dormitory, his voice carrying through the thick door blocking the portal to her bedroom.

Maki groaned as she slowly got up, yelling back as she did.

"What is it! If it's not important I'm kicking your ass!"

"It's Isamu!" He said directly to her, having opened her bedroom door moments before. As soon as Maki heard the name, she was up and out of her bedroom, shoving Megumi out of the way.

"Where?!"

——

"About 238 puncture marks varying in depth with the most extreme being around 2 inch's deep. Several broken bones as well. Besides that there's the obvious blood loss and general cursed energy exhaustion. Overall, he's in a bad state but I have no doubt he'll survive without permanent damage. Maybe a scar or three but nothing seriously disfiguring." Shoko informed the room. A room occupied by Panda, Toga, Maki, Megumi, Yuji, Nobara, Gojo, and principal Yaga.

"What happened, Saturo?" Yaga asked his student, his arms crossed and his face hard as stone. But Shoko knew he was putting on a bit of an act. In truth, he was worried. Not overly so, but every dead sorcerer was a sorcerer mourned by Yaga.

"I don't know. I got there near the end of it I guess. All I saw was Isamu passing out and a disintegrating cursed spirit nearby. No one else was alive in the clan. From what I can tell, the same special grade that attacked the goodwill event attacked the clan with an ally. An ally Isamu exorcised." Gojo explained, wishing he'd gotten there sooner.

He'd been overseas when it'd happened. When members of the Inumaki clan called for help, he'd been informed. He wasn't the only one of course, but he was the fastest to arrive. The fact he was overseas every time one of his students was about to die wasn't lost on him.

A vain bulged near his thumb as he clenched his fist in anger. Even with all his power, the people around him still needed strength. How pathetic.

"Why'd they attack? Where was the other one?" Yuji asked the room, peeved as well. He didn't know Isamu well enough to say they were close but he still considered him a friend.

"My best guess is they were weakening our side. The Inumaki clan, especially their elders, are powerful enough. They'd lose in a clan war with one of the three major families but it wouldn't be an easy fight. But considering Isamu was able to take one of theirs, it's not all bad. If the curse he exorcised was of similar power to the one who attacked the goodwill event, I'd say we broke about even." Gojo said in a long winded speech.

"As for where the other one went, I don't know. That one is very good at infiltration and extraction. Probably why it was the one who attacked the event and not the one Isamu took care of or the one Yuji and Nanami encountered." Gojo continued.

"Wait. Are you saying one of those curse is on the same level as an entire clan? And Isamu killed one?" Nobara said, amazed.

"Well, it's tough to say. Battles between sorcerers and curses or sorcerers and sorcerers aren't as simple as who punches harder or who moves faster. But from what I know, the one who attacked the event had a domain expansion. Assuming the slain one had one as well, I'd say they were about equal. And no, I wouldn't say Isamu is on the same level as a clan or even the curse he exorcised. My guess is he had to take extreme risks and get insanely lucky just to barely win." Gojo explained further.

"So there's only three Inumaki now? Isamu, Toga, and the higher up? What was his name again? Botan or something." Maki asked. She wasn't very sad about the turn of events apart from Isamu being so hurt. The Inumaki clan had it coming in her eyes.

"That's the other thing." Yaga said, breaking into the conversation. "Botan Inumaki was killed last night as well. He was found in a similar state as the two guards killed during the goodwill event. Leading me to believe it was done by the same curse or cursed user belonging to this group."

"They really have it out for the Inumaki huh? Maybe something to do with the Inumaki's title as the bane of cursed spirits?" Panda interjected.

"It's possible. As Saturo said, it could just be a power thing, weakening the other side. But I don't think it's that." Yaga said, drawing the attention of all the occupants towards him, if he didn't have it already.

"Ohh? Why's that?" Yuji asked.

"Because of Saturo. It's pointless to chip away at the clans when Saturo is an instant win. There's no point to wearing a bulletproof vest when your enemy can drop a nuke on you, so to speak. It's just pointless." Yaga explained.

They all took a moment to process the words and think on the matter before Shoko spoke for the first time since the start of their little meeting.

"A personal vendetta then? Judging from the barrier around the goodwill event, the curses are working with a cursed user, a powerful one at that. It's possible that cursed user hates the Inumaki for some reason and wanted to get revenge." Maki said, finally contributing to the conversation with some theories of her own.

"That's also a possibility. But if I had to say, I'd say it's neither. I don't know why or what the alternative would be. But something in my gut says it's something we wouldn't be able to guess." Gojo said, looking through the window attached to Isamu's hospital room at his bandaged and broken student.

——

"Zen'in, I'm heading out for the night. Stay as long as you want. If you leave, lock up on your way out." Shoko said, now dressed in her casual clothes rather than her nurse/doctor uniform, as she walked out of the hospital room containing Isamu and Maki.

Maki was too preoccupied to respond or even correct Shoko referring to her by her last name. She was too busy watching over Isamu, holding his hand as he slept. It kind of pissed her off.

How every time Isamu was hurt, she felt this way. She hated it. Hated how Isamu made her feel at times. But she loved how he made her feel other times. Their entire relationship was a roller coaster and despite hating the parts such as this, she loved the good parts infinitely more.

He was just so… Maki couldn't even call him stupid. Sure, the Inumaki weren't worth the grime on Maki's boot but Maki couldn't blame Isamu for trying to save them. He wasn't stupid, he was just compassionate. That was his flaw.

No matter what the Inumaki clan did to him, he still saw them as humans. Human beings with life's, loved ones, feelings, interests, entire lives. He just couldn't bring himself to abandon them due to his own "selfish" emotions and grudges. He always put himself last. Or at least not first.

Maki figured it was her duty as his loved one to put him first, before her. So, in that moment, staring at Isamu's sleeping, bandaged form, she decided she would dedicate herself to his selfishness. Maki would spend as long as she needed to make him more selfish. Cause she'll be damned if he was killed because he was trying to protect some lowlife undeserving of even his minor attention.

——

Toga, as someone with no feelings one way or the other for their clan, was not very moved by their nearly complete eradication. But he was worried, for two reasons. He was worried for Isamu. As a fellow clan member and a friend besides, Toga found himself quite invested in his wellbeing.

Isamu had many more ties to the clan, so Toga knew he'd be much more affected. Toga was determined to be there for his only blood relation left stand. While they were barely friends before, Toga felt more connected to him, now that they were the only family they had left.

The second thing he was worried about was his own safety. Someone was after the Inumaki clan. Perhaps the attack on the clan itself could be explained away as an attack on a powerful enemy clan and not a personal attack on the Inumaki.

But the attack on the Inumaki higher up could not be explained way so easily. The fact no one around him nor any of the other higher ups were attacked was quite telling. It wasn't a logical, strategic attack on an enemy, but a personal attack on the Inumaki specifically. At least, that's what Toga figured.

So, as a member of the Inumaki clan, he was most likely in the scope as well. Toga had always seen his technique as a curse, something to get rid of. But now that his life was put in jeopardy by a powerful cursed user, he would need to cultivate his own strength for once. For himself, and for Isamu.

——

Megumi swung his black scimitar through the air again and again as his breath grew heavy and sweat streamed down his face. A frown married his face as he trained his arms to exhaustion and then some. After a while his arms finally gave up on him and refused to swing even a single additional time.

Megumi collapsed on his ass before you laying on the grass of the track and field, staring up at the crescent moon above. He was sick of being weak. So sick he wanted to barf. If not even Isamu could withstand their new enemy, what could the current Megumi do? Jack shit.

If the Zenin clan, or even jujutsu high in general, was next, what could Megumi do? Kill himself? Get his insides ripped to shreds like last time? He felt kinda useless. First it was Yuji, then almost himself, then Isamu. If he was more skilled with a sword, if he subjugated more shikigami, if he knew better barrier techniques, if he had any of that he might have been able to prevent some of the harm.

He was Isamu's first student, officially or not. He wouldn't disappoint him. Soon, he would subjugated a new shikigami, the 7th one. One basically designed to protect others. The Round Deer.

——

Isamu only disliked a hand full of things in life. Waking up with nearly every muscle in your body aching while barely having enough energy to open your eyes was definitely one of them. Luckily, he didn't have to suffer on his own. He rarely did nowadays.

Opening his eyes just barely, he rolled them over in his skull until he found the source of the pressure being applied to his right hand. As expected, it was the apple of his eye, Maki. She was gripping his hand with both of hers as she looked down, seemingly ready to dose off while slumped over his hospital bed.

Isamu, through no small amount of effort, managed to squeeze one of her hands with enough force to draw her attention. Her head whipped up so fast Isamu figured she was at risk of whiplash if she did it again.

"Are you ok? Does anything hurt?" She asked, a little panicked but more worried than anything. Isamu's eyes, formerly weary due to the pain, softened at her actions.

Maki was always so… solid. Always there for him, like a lighthouse bearing the storm to guide him home. Isamu's appreciation of her efforts grew with every passing second.

"Blink twice if you want some water." Maki said, reminding him he was thirsty, something he hadn't realized until she pointed it out. That was another thing, she always knew what he needed, like she was a mind reader.

Isamu blinked twice, leading Maki to rush to the other side of the room towards the water cooler. Isamu missed the warm pressure on his hand and was glad when it reappeared the second Maki was in arms reach, a coffee cup full of cool water in her hand.

"Open." She commanded as she placed the rim near his lips. He did and was delighted by the icy liquid rehydrating him, his cracked lips finally moistened.

"You've been asleep about a full day, it's a bit before midnight now so actually a little over a day. Shoko says you'll be good to go in a few days with a few scars but nothing permanently crippling." Maki informed, wanting to put his mind at ease as soon as possible. Worry did little in the way of recovery after all.

Isamu wanted to thank her but honestly, he didn't have the energy to even lift his arms. Good thing Maki was such a mind reader.

"You probably can't even move your arms so let's play a round of blink twice. Blink twice if yes, blink once if not. Alright, do you need anything else?" Maki smiled softly as she sat back down next to him.

Isamu blinked once.

"Do you want me to stay with you tonight?"

Isamu blinked twice.

"Do you want me to hold your hand while you drift off to sleep?"

Isamu blinked twice.

"Good to hear." Maki said softly, like she was the owner of an asmr channel. She squeezed his hand has her other hand reached up to stroke his cheek. At least being heavily injured on the field of battle had some up sides.

Isamu had much to think about as a lot had happened. But he realized now wasn't the time. He didn't want to ruin such a lovely moment for himself by overthinking things like he always did. No, he just wanted to rest for a bit. Hopefully everyone else at jujutsu high was getting plenty of rest too. Halloween was only a few weeks away after all.