The sunlight fell gently across the hospital rooftop, warm and deceptively peaceful. Itadori Yuji stood alone, hands patting his body, checking for anything unusual after his consciousness had returned.
His last memory was of Kamo Itsuki's voice, calm and certain, sending him out of Sukuna's Innate Domain. "You go out first. I'll handle him."
Typical Mr. Kamo. Always acting like everything was under control.
Then he felt it.
Something in his throat. Small at first—just a tickle, like a crumb gone wrong. He coughed lightly, expecting it to clear.
It didn't.
The sensation grew. Expanded. Became an undeniable presence pressing upward from within, as if something alive was trying to force its way out. His face paled. Sweat beaded on his forehead. His hands went to his throat instinctively.
What the—
He tried to swallow. The thing refused to go down. Instead, it grew more restless, more urgent—pushing, demanding release. His airway constricted. Panic flickered at the edges of his mind.
'Sukuna. Mr. Kamo. This has to be them.'
The thought steadied him. Mr. Kamo was inside him. Whatever was happening, it was part of the plan. It had to be.
Yuji stopped fighting. He took a deep breath—as deep as he could manage with his throat half-blocked—focused every fiber of his being, and coughed.
The object that flew from his mouth hit the rooftop with a heavy thud that vibrated through his feet and echoed off the hospital walls.
Yuji doubled over, gasping, hands on his knees. His throat felt raw but clear. Whatever had been inside him was gone.
He straightened slowly, turned—
And froze.
An egg sat on the rooftop. Massive. Dinosaur-sized. Its surface was covered in intricate, pulsating patterns that glowed with an inner light—the same patterns he'd seen on Sukuna's tattoos, on the fingers, on everything touched by the King of Curses.
Yuji looked at the egg. Then at his own mouth. Back at the egg. He held up his hands, measuring.
"An egg this big..." His voice came out strangled. "Came out of my mouth?"
The egg didn't answer. Its patterns flashed brighter, faster, the rhythm accelerating like a heartbeat approaching climax. The air around it grew heavy, charged, thick with cursed energy.
Yuji stumbled backward. "No, no, no, wait—"
CRACK.
The first fissure appeared. Then another. Light poured through the cracks, blinding white tinged with crimson. The shell shattered outward in an explosion of fragments that dissolved into nothing before they touched the ground.
From within, a figure rose.
A boy at first—slender, pale, eyes closed, skin almost translucent in the morning light. He couldn't have been more than ten, his body slight, his features delicate. He stood in the ruins of the egg as if waking from a long sleep.
Then the wind touched him.
And he grew.
It wasn't gradual. It was violent—bones lengthening with audible cracks, muscles swelling and rippling, skin stretching to accommodate the sudden expansion. In seconds, the boy became a man. In moments, the man became a monument.
When the transformation finished, a being stood on the hospital rooftop that made Yuji's soul want to flee.
Four arms. Massive, corded with muscle like ancient tree roots, each one capable of crushing steel. A broad chest, a powerful frame—every inch of him radiating raw, primal power. His face was sharp, angular, handsome in a terrifying way. His eyes remained closed, but even without seeing them, Yuji knew what color they would be.
Crimson. Like Sukuna's.
The being breathed—his first breath in this new world. The air itself seemed to tremble.
Yuji couldn't move. Couldn't speak. Could only stare at the impossible thing that had come from inside him, from the egg that had come from his throat, from the power of the King of Curses.
'Mr. Kamo,' he thought desperately. 'What did you do?'
The four-armed being's eyes slowly opened.
And the world shifted on its axis.
Most striking, however, was his face.
Or rather, his faces.
Two of them, layered one upon the other like a two-faced deity from ancient myth. The primary face dominated—sharp, angular, handsome in a way that was almost painful to behold. But behind it, visible at certain angles, a second visage lurked, its expression twisted into something far more malevolent.
His eyes—all four of them—gleamed with crimson light, deep and sharp, radiating an arrogance so absolute it seemed to bend the air around him. Mysterious patterns covered his forehead, ancient curses etched into flesh, and those same markings cascaded down his cheeks, his chin, his neck, his entire body. A living testament to the King of Curses' true form.
And on his abdomen—a mouth.
Wide. Hungry. When it opened, it seemed capable of devouring not just flesh, but light, sound, even the fabric of space itself. Reality flickered at its edges.
His fingernails were black blades, curved and sharp enough that a casual gesture might slice through the void.
He stood motionless, yet the air around him solidified. Oppression rolled off him in waves—not as an attack, but as a natural byproduct of his existence. He was a walking disaster. A calamity given form.
Itadori Yuji stared, mouth agape, mind struggling to process what his eyes were seeing.
"That..." he finally managed, voice cracking. "That's not my son, is it?"
Sukuna—now fully incarnated in a body untouched by tricks or limitations—glanced back at the boy who had housed him. His expression was unreadable.
He could kill him. Should kill him. The brat had resisted him, fought him, annoyed him.
But he couldn't.
A Binding Vow with Kamo Itsuki. Sukuna would receive a perfect vessel, free of contamination. In exchange, Yuji Itadori would be left unharmed.
Even the King of Curses respected a Binding Vow.
He turned and walked away without another word, leaving Yuji alone on the rooftop with nothing but confusion and the lingering echo of that terrible presence.
Sukuna ascended to the highest point within sight—a water tower, a rooftop, something elevated enough to survey this new world. He wanted to see. To understand. A thousand years of dormancy demanded context.
The city sprawled below him. Strange structures. Moving boxes on wheels. Lights that flickered without flame.
'Interesting. But ultimately, still just humans playing at progress.'
He barely had time to form the thought before a figure blocked his view.
White hair. Dark glasses. A lean frame floating effortlessly in the air, radiating confidence like a second skin.
"Well, well." The newcomer struck a pose, one hand on his hip, the other raised in casual greeting. "Hello there, Sukuna. I'm Gojo Satoru. Here specifically to exorcise you."
Sukuna regarded him with all four eyes. "Are modern youngsters all this rude? The times have regressed. None of the good traditions from before have been inherited."
His arms crossed—two over his chest, two extended to the sides in an exaggerated gesture of disappointment. A performance, but one layered with genuine contempt.
"You'll feel whether the times have progressed or not." Gojo's grin was sharp, confident, utterly unafraid. "With your own body."
But even as he spoke, part of his mind was elsewhere.
'Itsuki. You arranged this. You put me here, told me Sukuna might resurrect at this node. You had to know about the barrier. You had to know Kenjaku would try something.'
The pieces weren't fitting. If Kamo Itsuki could predict Sukuna's resurrection, he surely could have predicted the super barrier's corruption. Which meant...
'The barrier wasn't your real plan, was it? It was bait. A trap. But for who?'
He filed the questions away. Sukuna deserved his full attention.
"Let's dance, King of Curses." Gojo lowered into a fighting stance, cursed energy flaring around him. "I've been waiting for a real challenge."
Sukuna's four arms spread wide, all four eyes gleaming with predatory anticipation.
"Then don't disappoint me."
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