Chapter 33 — Thirty-Three Punch
Five days had passed since the decision was made to participate in the exchange event.
During those five days, nothing major had happened. At the same time, there were still no afternoon classes or assignments. So every afternoon, Saitama and Genos sat at the edge of the training field like substitute players, reading manga or spacing out.
But on the sixth day, Satoru Gojo suddenly burst into the classroom, clapping his hands enthusiastically.
"Alright, everyone, look over here—" Gojo said as he clapped and walked up to the podium. "Even though class time is technically over, I'm going to take a little bit of your time—"
"Huh? What is it this time…" Nobara Kugisaki muttered lazily, resting her chin on her hand.
"That's an excellent question!" Gojo declared, as if he hadn't noticed Nobara's complete lack of enthusiasm. Still brimming with excitement, he dragged out his words dramatically. "The reason I asked everyone to stay is because—"
"Tokyo Metropolitan Jujutsu Technical High School is about to welcome its sixth first-year student!" he announced loudly. "Everyone, give a warm welcome—"
"Huh?"
This immediately caught everyone's attention. Even Nobara, who had just been lounging around, widened her eyes. "There are still people enrolling at this time?"
Yuji Itadori suddenly thought of something. "Could it be…?"
Gojo dashed to the classroom door in a single stride, slid it open, and pushed a nervous-looking boy inside.
"Ta-da! Let's welcome our new member—Junpei Yoshino!"
Junpei Yoshino stumbled slightly as he tried to keep up with Gojo's long strides before managing to step into the classroom. Nervously, he introduced himself:
"I'm Junpei Yoshino. I transferred here from Satōzakura High School in Kanagawa. Please take care of me…"
"Oh, it is you, Junpei!"
Yuji Itadori leapt out of his seat at once and called out excitedly, "You passed the interview, right? Congrats! Starting today, we're officially classmates!"
Junpei instinctively looked toward him. When his gaze fell on Yuji, his tense expression softened, and he let out a small sigh of relief before smiling.
"Yeah!"
"Huh?" Gojo bent down slightly and asked Junpei, "You two know each other?"
"Yes. When I came for the interview, Itadori showed me the way…"
Junpei answered shyly. As he looked at the cheerful pink-haired boy in front of him, the corner of his eye suddenly caught sight of a shiny bald head behind him—
"Ah!"
Junpei's eyes flew open as he cried out in surprise, startling everyone in the room.
"What?" Nobara exclaimed.
The previously nervous Junpei suddenly moved with unexpected urgency. He hurried past the desks and stopped right in front of Saitama.
"Saitama-san! So you really are here!" A flush of excitement spread across Junpei's pale face. "Thank you so much for what you did that day. Because of your help, my life has changed!"
Saitama looked up at him blankly, a bead of sweat forming on his dull expression.
"…Huh?"
"Before you left that day, you told me to come to Tokyo Jujutsu High!" Junpei continued loudly. "You even taught me the method to become as strong as you!"
In that instant, it was as if lightning had struck their minds. Yuji Itadori, Megumi Fushiguro, and Nobara Kugisaki all turned their heads at the same time, staring intently at Saitama and Junpei.
All three of them had the exact same thought.
Just what do you have to do to become as strong as Saitama? …We want to know!
Under the hungry, glowing stares of the trio, and faced with Saitama's awkward expression, Junpei continued speaking.
"…One hundred sit-ups, one hundred push-ups, one hundred squats, and a ten-kilometer run every day. I've been doing all of it!"
…Huh? That's just something you tell little kids as a joke, right? He actually believed it?
While Yuji, Megumi, and Nobara stood frozen in disbelief, Junpei kept talking.
"It's been about a month since that day. You must have been waiting for me all this time. I'm very sorry it took me so long to enroll!"
"…"
"Ah, well, you see…"
Saitama's gaze shifted away guiltily. "Um… who are you, exactly?"
Junpei froze, his excitement draining from his face. "Huh?"
"I'm really sorry. That training method you mentioned is indeed how I got stronger, but I don't remember where I met you," Saitama said, scratching his head quietly.
"You… don't remember? That day in the alley, you helped me…" Junpei asked blankly.
"It's not that," Saitama said awkwardly. "It's just that no one keeps track of every single person they've helped."
"Are you trying to become Sensei's disciple?" Genos suddenly spoke up from the side, his expression serious. "Sensei is very busy right now and doesn't have the time to take on another student."
Junpei fell silent for several seconds, a disappointed expression appearing on his face.
"I… see…" he said reluctantly. "I only managed to pass the entrance interview and become an official student here because of you…"
Saitama, who was still just a trainee: "…"
Under mounting pressure, Saitama's simple facial features suddenly warped into trembling wavy lines, the whites of his eyes filling with red veins as he spoke stiffly:
"O-oh… so you became an official student… congratulations… ha… ha…"
Junpei blinked. "Huh?"
Gojo stared at Saitama's distorted expression for a moment before bursting out laughing.
"Pfft."
When he noticed everyone turning to glare at him accusingly, he immediately raised both hands in surrender.
"Anyway, now that the sixth student has enrolled—and Junpei has applied for the dorms too, right? You're moving in today?"
Gojo clapped his hands together enthusiastically. "Then tonight, let's all have dinner together in the dorms!"
"Alright!" Yuji's eyes lit up instantly. "Let's have chicken hot pot! I can make chicken meatballs!"
"Oh, that's a great idea!" Gojo pointed at Yuji at once. "Then tonight we're having chicken hot pot at school! It'll be Junpei's welcome party!"
"I couldn't possibly…"
Junpei's face turned slightly red as he tried to decline awkwardly, but Gojo didn't give him the chance and immediately started assigning tasks.
"Genos-kun, please go to the storage room and find the cookware. Megumi and Nobara, head to the supermarket and buy ingredients. As for Saitama-kun and Yuji, go help Junpei move his things. You already know each other anyway."
"Once everyone's done with their tasks, meet on the first floor of the dorms and we'll all happily prepare the hot pot ingredients together!" Gojo declared decisively.
Genos immediately stood up, looking displeased.
"Do not order Sensei around!"
"It's fine, Genos," Saitama said from the side. At some point, his stress-warped wavy features had already returned to normal.
"And besides…"
Saitama gave Genos a thumbs-up and smiled slightly. "I also really want to eat chicken hot pot."
…
Junpei Yoshino's home was located on the border between Kanagawa and Tokyo, and the distance to Jujutsu High wasn't exactly short. That was why he had applied to live in the school dormitories.
Saitama and Yuji Itadori followed Junpei to visit his home. Under Yoshino Nagi's warm hospitality, they even had some snacks before finally packing up Junpei's luggage.
Although he would normally live at Jujutsu High, Junpei had considered that if he chose to stay in the dorms, his mother would be left home alone. So he decided that he would return home during holidays to keep her company. Because of that, he didn't have much to bring to the dormitory. The three of them each carried a cardboard box—this was all of Junpei Yoshino's luggage.
"Do you really not remember me?"
On the way to Jujutsu High, Junpei still couldn't help asking.
"Yeah… I kind of feel sorry about that," Saitama said, staring at the road ahead.
"No, it's fine." Junpei shook his head and sighed. "You must have saved a lot of people already, Saitama-san. That's why you can't remember everyone's name."
"…"
"Oh right, Junpei!" Yuji suddenly thought of something and asked, "Since you passed the entrance interview, that means you've got the potential to become a jujutsu sorcerer, right? Do you have a cursed technique?"
"Not yet. Right now, I can only use cursed energy. But Miss Ieiri examined me and said I probably have a latent technique. However, because my brain structure is that of a non-sorcerer, the technique hasn't been awakened yet," Junpei replied. "So after enrolling, one of my tasks will be to practice using cursed energy and try different methods to awaken my technique."
"Speaking of which…" he asked curiously, "What do students usually study at Jujutsu High?"
"We study all sorts of things related to jujutsu, but compared to sitting in classrooms, there's actually a lot more field practice." Yuji raised a hand and began listing things as he recalled them. "Oh, right! In a couple of days, the exchange event between the Tokyo and Kyoto schools will start. Too bad, Junpei—you already missed the registration deadline…"
Yuji enthusiastically shared his experiences at the Tokyo school, while Junpei listened attentively. However, this entire scene was being watched by a pair of eyes hidden in the shadows.
Standing across the street, a blue-haired young man in a loose black off-shoulder T-shirt and black pants tilted his head slightly, letting the shifting light and shadows slide across his pale skin marked with black stitch-like seams.
His heterochromatic eyes reflected the figures of Yuji Itadori and Junpei Yoshino talking together, and the corners of his lips slowly curled upward.
The special-grade curse Mahito recalled his earlier conversation with Suguru Geto. That scene remained vivid in his mind, and the fake monk's words—"Can I leave the rest to you, Mahito?"—still echoed in his ears. Thinking of that, Mahito stuck out his tongue and licked his lips with satisfaction.
He recognized him—the pink-haired boy carrying the box was Sukuna's vessel.
After lying in wait around Jujutsu High for some time, he had finally found an opportunity today, when Sukuna's vessel had gone out.
Yuji Itadori seemed to recall some amusing memory, gesturing animatedly as he described it to the black-haired boy beside him, laughing brightly as he spoke. Under normal circumstances, that somewhat delicate-looking and introverted black-haired boy would have made a fine target for Mahito. But with Yuji Itadori—the vessel—present, the boy became nothing more than decoration.
No—rather, with Yuji Itadori around, all humans became mere decoration, just blurry patches of color in the background.
How perfect, Mahito thought, almost intoxicated. A bright and cheerful boy like Yuji Itadori seemed as if he had never worried about the troubles of the world. But once everything he had believed in for over a decade was completely shattered, his soul would twist and collapse, bringing Mahito supreme pleasure.
And with Sukuna dwelling inside him—two souls in one body—it was like winning two prizes in a row at a shopping district lottery. A double delight.
If bliss could be granted twice, it wouldn't lose its value—it would become something greater than twice the pleasure. At that thought, Mahito's fingers twitched slightly, itching to act.
The blue-haired special-grade curse raised a hand and adjusted the beret on his head, which he wore to imitate a trendy human fashion. Then he stepped forward, heading straight toward Yuji Itadori across the street.
Traffic bustled along the road, cars coming and going in a steady flow. But Mahito, being a curse, paid it no mind as he walked through them. At the same time, the traffic remained perfectly orderly. The drivers' pupils faintly reflected Mahito's shadow, but that figure could not be captured by ordinary human eyes—it slipped past like raindrops across a smooth surface, leaving no trace behind.
Step by step, the special-grade curse drew closer to Yuji Itadori, until he was close enough to hear the boy's laughter drifting into his ears.
In the blink of an eye, Mahito's lips curled into an innocent yet cruel smile as he suddenly quickened his pace.
From a walk to a brisk step, from a brisk step to a jog, and finally into an unrestrained sprint. The beret on Mahito's head had long since fallen to the ground, and his blue hair, braided into three strands, streamed behind him. The smile on his face grew ever more twisted and excited, and together with the rough seams stretching across his face, it became downright grotesque.
—Wasn't Suguru Geto asking him to test Sukuna's strength? Then he couldn't help doing things this way, right?
By the same logic, if Sukuna ended up being killed outright by his "test," that couldn't be helped either, right?
If that happened, it would only mean Sukuna was too weak. And a Sukuna that weak wouldn't be worth recruiting anyway.
No matter how he looked at it, his actions could be justified with perfectly sound Mahito-style reasoning. After all, curses were meant to be…
Unrestrained, self-indulgent beings.
"…Huh?"
Sensing something off in his peripheral vision, Yuji instinctively turned his head. Junpei turned as well. The two of them saw Mahito charging toward them, and shock appeared on both their faces.
But it was already too late.
Mahito pushed off with his toes, leaping high into the air as he lunged at the stunned Yuji Itadori. The grin on his face could no longer be concealed. Both hands reached for Yuji, cursed energy swirling in his palms.
"Idle Transfigura—"
Thud!
Saitama—who Mahito had treated as nothing more than a blurry background color—kept both hands on his box and kicked the charging Mahito in the waist, sending him flying in a single blow.
Mahito's body shot backward like a kite with its string cut, smashing into the wall of an alley with a loud boom and leaving behind a human-shaped hole.
Dust billowed into the air before slowly settling. Bits of broken stone crumbled from the wall, pattering down. Inside the hole, there was no sound at all.
Yuji Itadori and Junpei Yoshino were both dumbfounded.
"Who was that guy?" Saitama asked, standing in front of the Mahito-shaped hole with a puzzled look as he turned back toward them. "Why'd he suddenly run over and attack you? Is he someone you know?"
Yuji Itadori immediately shook his head. "Don't know him."
"I don't know him either. Maybe he mistook us for someone else," Junpei Yoshino said.
"Oh, then he's probably just some punk with too much free time who wants to make the front page of the local crime news," Saitama said, withdrawing his gaze and continuing toward Jujutsu High. He muttered to himself, "That guy didn't look like anything decent anyway."
"Public safety's really gotten bad lately."
Saitama's expression grew serious. He figured that was probably why people were needed to maintain public order—people like jujutsu sorcerers.
As a hero (for fun), he couldn't just do nothing in the face of this kind of situation.
Yuji Itadori and Junpei Yoshino, both looking confused, hurried a couple of steps to catch up with Saitama. Before long, they had completely forgotten about the random punk who had attacked them—and the human-shaped hole in the wall.
---
Night fell, and warm yellow light shone from the windows on the first floor of the dormitory.
The chicken hot pot on the table steamed with white vapor, the bubbling broth going gurgle gurgle as it boiled. Napa cabbage, tofu, shiitake mushrooms, and green onions soaked up the rich broth, looking especially appetizing under the light.
But the real highlight of the pot wasn't the vegetables—it was the chicken meatballs neatly arranged in the center.
Each meatball was bite-sized, garnished with bright green scallions and pale yellow ginger. Just from their appearance alone, they looked delicious.
Everyone seated around the table had their eyes fixed on the chicken meatballs in the center of the pot. Meanwhile, Yuji Itadori remained completely unaware and scratched the back of his head shyly.
"This is everyone's first time trying my chicken meatballs, so I'm kind of nervous…"
At that moment, a sharp-fanged mouth suddenly appeared on Yuji's cheek.
Ryomen Sukuna opened his crimson eyes and stared at the food in the pot, speaking bluntly. "Brat, give me a meatball later. And two pieces of tofu too."
"…" Yuji stopped his speech and said expressionlessly, "No. Besides, since we share the same body, you can taste whatever I eat anyway, right?"
"Tch." Sukuna's gaze darkened. "How unpleasant."
Yuji kept a blank face and smacked his cheek like he was swatting a fly. Then he composed himself and continued, "After everyone eats, feel free to tell me what you think…"
But no one was listening to Yuji's cooking speech.
The chicken meatballs bobbed as bubbles rose from the bottom of the pot. Their color gradually turned whiter, then took on the brown tint of the broth.
The meat was done.
Yuji kept talking—and in that instant, everyone else unconsciously raised their chopsticks.
Several pairs of chopsticks reached toward the pot at the same time, all aiming for the meatballs in the center. But in the very next moment, the meatballs that had been sitting there suddenly vanished.
"Ah! Don't tell me—"
Megumi Fushiguro was the first to react and spoke up. The missing meatballs were now floating in front of Satoru Gojo, suspended in midair by his Limitless technique.
"You used Blue to pull the meatballs toward you, didn't you, Gojo-sensei?!" Megumi said darkly, exposing the truth in one sentence. "Using precise cursed technique control for something like this…"
"Shameless teacher!" Nobara Kugisaki pointed her chopsticks at the white-haired man and shouted.
"The dinner table is also a classroom for practicing jujutsu. This is a test from your teacher." Gojo curled his lips into a smug grin. "So? Want some meatballs? If you do, try taking them from me with jujutsu~"
Yuji was already dropping a second batch of meatballs into the pot as he said, "There's no need to fight, there are plenty of meatballs." But once again, nobody listened.
Suddenly, a purple blur flashed past, snatching one of the meatballs floating in front of Gojo.
"Oh… Megumi's shikigami, huh…"
Gojo raised an eyebrow beneath his blindfold and turned to look, only to see a meatball now sitting in Megumi's bowl. Behind him, the Toad shikigami bounced around triumphantly, its purple tongue still sticking out.
"But are you really going to eat a meatball that a toad's tongue touched?" Gojo asked, pointing at the meatball in Megumi's bowl.
"…" Megumi's expression stiffened for a moment, but he forced himself to say, "Of course. Shikigami are made of cursed energy—it's not a real toad. If anything, it's just been touched by my cursed energy."
"Ugh, that's gross. And who knows, maybe that tongue touched the other meatballs too." Nobara, who had been eager to grab one herself, shuddered and pulled back her chopsticks in disgust. "I think I'll just eat vegetables first."
Megumi: "…"
But before things could settle down, another voice rang out from Gojo's other side.
"What are you doing, taking all the meat for yourself?" Genos pointed his chopsticks at the stunned Saitama. "Sensei Saitama hasn't even gotten any yet!"
"Genos, don't forget I count as your teacher too," Gojo said.
"The only one I acknowledge as my teacher from the bottom of my heart is Sensei Saitama," Genos replied. "If you don't hand over the meat, I'll burn—"
(At that moment, Yuji leaned forward and shouted, "The second batch of meatballs is almost ready! Who wants some?")
"Don't do it, Genos!" Saitama snapped back to his senses. "You'll burn the house down!"
"Damn it…" Genos slammed his fist onto the table. "I failed to get meat for Sensei Saitama!"
Yuji carefully watched the second batch of meatballs in the pot and said, "It's fine, because the second batch is already cooked…"
At that very moment—before Yuji even finished speaking—Saitama's vacant expression instantly turned serious. He thrust his chopsticks toward the pot at lightning speed, his arm turning into a flesh-colored blur.
This time—he was definitely going to grab the meatballs before Gojo could use his technique!
As Saitama's chopsticks plunged down, the broth splashed upward from the force of the air pressure. The neatly arranged vegetables and tofu were thrown into the air, hanging for a brief moment before falling back down into the pot.
The airborne broth cast irregular shadows across the table under the overhead light. In that instant, everyone looked up with slightly widened eyes, like worshippers gazing upon holy light.
Then a splash of broth landed on Junpei Yoshino, who had been quietly holding his bowl and waiting patiently.
"Ah! Hot!"
"Ah—" Saitama froze, instantly panicking. "Sorry!"
"Junpei!" Yuji cried out. "Your arm's all red! Someone get some ice!"
"…Um, I'm really sorry…"