Human Adjacent - Megumi Fushiguro x READER

Chapter 6

When I had made it a. good three or four steps down, I heard the old wooden stairs creak under my classmate's weight behind me. He followed closely, but didn't once ask me to hurry up, the same patience he always had, no matter how annoyed he got with me, he was always patient. It was almost unsettling at times like these, nobody should be able to stay this calm.

I reach the bottom of the staircase faster than I meant to. I try the light switch in a last ditch effort to get rid of some of the shaking in my fingertips, but Fushiguro cups a hand over the switch before I can reach it. When I look back it him to ask what he's doing, he just shakes his head firmly and cocks it in the direction the dog had gone.

I roll my eyes, but step down off the stairs, a chill washing over me the second I do, a moment later, the sorcerer behind me inhales sharply, which almost effectively convinces me that I'm not going crazy. He lays a hand on my shoulder and I stop moving, clinging the baseball bat in my palms until my knuckles turn white, ready to swing at any moment. I refuse to even turn and face him out of fear of turning my back to that darkness.

"There's more cursed energy here than there should be. Can you feel it?" I still don't turn to face him, but my eyes widen significantly. "How am I supposed to know what that feels like?" His hand releases from my shoulder and he steps in line with me, I could barely even see him, the vague figure of his side profile and his dark hair were all I could really make out in the lighting. "It might feel cold, maybe hot. But the air will feel thicker, like there's an invisible pressure fighting every move you make. Can you feel that?"

Now that he's said it, I notice why it felt so off to step down here, my shoulders had gotten significantly heaver, and my movements a little more difficult. Not enough to slow me down, but enough to annoy me if I focus on it for too long. So that's what that is.

I roll my shoulders back and straighten my spine, nodding sharply, once. "I can feel it."

"Good, then you'll be able to tell when we get close. I don't know where demon dog white went, so we might be on our own." I try to even out my breathing against the fear that runs down my skeleton, and through every inch of my blood. Why couldn't he just let me turn a light on?

I brace my cursed weapon out in front of me, begging my eyes to adjust to the darkness quicker, but it doesn't work.

The temperature of the room drops for a split second before rising back to where it had been. I stop dead in my tracks, and the boy next to me does the same, probably recognizing the same thing I did.

It isn't in front of us anymore.

I try not to look at Fushiguro next to me. If he has any resemblance of fear on his face, there is no hope for me to not panic. "Should we call Gojo?" I whisper, eyes glued to the ground. "You can try, see how it works out for you."

I turn as slowly as possible, not waiting for him to follow suit, the only thing worse than seeing a curse in front of you, is feeling one behind you.

Though it doesn't feel like that when I see it. I almost have that same urge to vomit as I did the first time I saw one of these things, but I refuse to give in to that weakness. Behind me, my partner starts to quietly pant, sharp shallow breaths.

I plant my feet firmly against the floor. Why is this idiot's back still turned?

It's disgusting, a rotten smell is rolling off of it in waves. It resembles some kind of giant, grotesquely deformed lizard, arms sticking out of it in all directions, no semblance of symmetry on it. It is made of chaos. I can't even tell what color it is in this light. But there is one thing I can see, a head. Spattered with eyes like a spider's would be, but with no pattern, none were the same size, the pupils were shaped strangely, some reptilian and sharp, some square like a sheep, and some... some looked human. Some looked afraid, or angry, or pooling with tears.