Just another Tuesday.
Jin followed Logan through the hallway, still trying to convince himself that none of this was a dream.
It wasn't working.
Every few steps, he caught another glimpse of the school through the tall windows or passed another piece of furniture that looked ridiculously expensive. Xavier's school was exactly the kind of place he'd imagined when reading about it, except he'd never imagined actually standing inside it.
His bare feet made almost no sound against the polished floor.
"So," Jin said after a while, "you said the gym's on the third floor?"
"Yeah."
"How long does it stay open?"
Logan glanced back at him. "You planning to work out?"
"Eventually."
"You just woke up."
"I noticed."
"After three weeks."
"I noticed that too."
Logan grunted. "Get some sleep first."
Jin looked down at himself.
"Sleep isn't going to fix this."
He pinched the loose skin around his arm.
"This body is pathetic."
Logan looked at him for a second before continuing down the hallway.
"You're alive."
"That's a pretty low bar."
"It's an important one."
Jin couldn't argue with that.
They eventually stopped in front of a bedroom. Logan opened the door and stepped aside.
"Here."
Jin looked inside.
A simple room. Bed, desk, wardrobe, bookshelf, and a window overlooking the grounds.
Not bad.
He walked in and looked around, but his attention soon landed on the mirror.
His feet carried him toward it.
His reflection still looked just as strange as it had when he first opened his eyes.
White hair.
Pale skin.
Those impossible blue eyes.
Satoru Gojo.
Jin slowly raised his hand and touched his reflection.
The glass was cold beneath his fingertips, but the face staring back at him remained completely unfamiliar. It was a face he had seen countless times in fiction, a face associated with impossible confidence, overwhelming power, and a world that should have remained safely inside a screen.
"Why you?"
He already knew he probably wasn't going to get an answer.
He didn't.
The silence offered nothing except the faint hum of the building around him.
Logan was still standing in the doorway.
"Who?"
Jin looked over his shoulder.
"...Nobody."
"Right."
Logan gave him the kind of look that made it clear he didn't believe a word of that.
"Get some rest, kid."
The door closed.
Jin waited until he heard Logan's footsteps fade away.
Only then did he sit down.
The room got painfully quiet.
He leaned back against the headboard and stared at the ceiling.
Three weeks unconscious.
A different body.
A different universe.
Xavier.
Wolverine.
Jean Grey.
And a system that had conveniently decided to show up at the worst possible time.
Jin rubbed his eyes.
"Okay."
He took a slow breath, forcing himself to focus on the immediate problem instead of the impossible circumstances surrounding him.
"Let's see what I've got."
The translucent screen appeared in front of him.
[ TEMPLATE SYSTEM ]
[ HOST: YOSHINOBU JIN ]
[ CURRENT TEMPLATE ]
[SATORU GOJO]
[ VARIANT: TAINTED ]
[ SYNCHRONIZATION: 21% ]
Jin's eyebrows rose.
"Tainted?"
The word lingered in his mind. It sounded less like a harmless variation and more like a warning. Whatever had happened during his transfer, the system clearly didn't consider this a perfect copy of Gojo's template.
The next section appeared.
[ TEMPLATE ORIGIN: JUJUTSU KAISEN ]
[ TEMPLATE STATUS: PARTIALLY SYNCHRONIZED ]
[ AVAILABLE ABILITIES ]
[ CURSED ENERGY: 21% ]
Everything beneath it was covered by locks.
Jin stared at the screen.
"That's it?"
He scrolled.
Nothing.
He tried again.
Still nothing.
"Seriously?"
The screen didn't change.
Jin leaned closer.
"Six Eyes?"
[LOCKED]
His expression twitched.
"Reverse Cursed Technique?"
[LOCKED]
"Blue?"
[LOCKED]
"Red?"
[LOCKED]
"Hollow Purple?"
[LOCKED]
"Unlimited Void?"
[LOCKED]
He stared at the list for a few seconds.
Then sighed.
"Of course."
The abilities he had expected to receive were all sealed away. The name, the appearance, and the potential were there, but the power itself remained just beyond his reach. It was almost insulting. The system had given him enough information to understand what he was missing, but not enough power to use any of it.
It felt like being handed the blueprint to a weapon while being denied the materials needed to build it. Worse, the system had made the locked abilities visible, ensuring that he understood exactly how far away he was from becoming the person whose body he now wore.
Jin looked back at the remaining information.
"Twenty-one percent cursed energy."
He closed his eyes and tried to feel whatever had changed inside him.
At first, there was nothing.
Then he felt it.
Something huge.
Dense.
It wasn't quite energy the way he'd imagined it.
It felt more like an ocean trapped inside his body.
The sensation pressed against every part of him, vast and restless. It wasn't moving through his veins like blood, nor did it feel like electricity beneath his skin. Instead, it seemed to exist behind everything else, waiting for him to acknowledge it.
The ocean was not calm. It shifted whenever he breathed, sending distant waves through his awareness. He could sense pressure gathering in places he had never known existed, as though his body had gained an entirely new system hidden beneath his nerves and muscles.
Jin opened his eyes.
He stared at his hand.
"So that's cursed energy."
He concentrated.
A faint pressure gathered around his fingers.
The air warped.
For a moment, the edges of his hand seemed to blur. The room's silence tightened around him, and the hairs on his arm rose as if something invisible had brushed past them.
The sensation was weak, barely more than a tremor, but it was unmistakably real. The space around his fingers seemed to resist his presence, bending without actually moving.
Jin immediately stopped.
His heart pounded.
"Okay."
He looked toward the door.
Nobody came.
Good.
He tried again.
This time, he reached toward the edge of the desk.
Nothing happened.
His finger touched the surface.
Jin frowned.
"So I can't use the techniques yet."
He pulled his hand back and stared at the system.
At twenty-one percent synchronization, the template had given him cursed energy but none of Gojo's techniques. If he wanted to survive until the locks opened, he would have to create his own cursed techniques.
That thought was both encouraging and terrifying. He had no idea whether cursed energy could be shaped without an inherited technique, much less whether he could learn to control it before something dangerous forced him to try.
The possibility of creating something new was tempting, but it also meant there were no instructions waiting for him. Gojo's abilities were locked, and the system had not provided even a basic tutorial. Every mistake would be his own, and every failure could reveal his secret to people who already had enough reasons to distrust him.
Jin sat back down.
"Fine."
He stretched and stood.
"One thing at a time."
His stomach growled.
Jin looked down.
"...Food."
He opened the door and stepped into the hallway.
The school was quieter now, but not silent. Somewhere in the distance, a door slammed, followed by muffled laughter and the faint echo of footsteps. The mansion felt less like an empty building and more like a living place, full of people who already knew where they belonged.
Jin wasn't one of them yet.
He made it about ten steps before voices reached him from around the corner.
"You're annoying."
"I'm literally just walking."
"You're walking behind me."
"Because we're going the same way."
"Then walk faster."
"Why should I?"
Jin stopped.
He recognized that voice.
A girl's voice.
Young.
Irritated.
Another voice laughed.
"You're seriously getting mad over this?"
"Shut up."
Jin smiled.
He had a pretty good idea who they were.
He kept walking.
His stomach growled again.
Jin sighed.
"Food first."
He started walking.
Whatever problems waited for him could wait.
Probably.
At least until tomorrow.
Hopefully.