Honoured and the Damned

Chapter 2: Starting Up

Ieiri Shoko was tired, exhausted even.

As a sixteen-year-old it should've been illegal to be this tired, there should be laws that mandated rest. She was having an already annoying day before the bloodied black-haired girl fell from the sky. Their whole three-man class of first years in Tokyo Metropolitan Jujutsu Technical High School had been on a mission a few days earlier and it had taken them days to exorcise the curse, not because of the lack of trying but simply because Satoru refused to find the exact location of the curse for them.

When they finally did finish their mission Yaga Masamichi kicked them out of their dorms for some 'extra training'— Shoko doubted that her classmates needed any extra training and determined that their teacher wanted them to work together a little and hence threw them out in the guise of training.

The session began with the usual routine of practising their cursed energy control and techniques. With Yaga sensei supervising them they had to at least act like they were busy training but as the day progressed, they began to loosen up and relax a bit.

As soon as their teacher left though, Gojo started fooling around. Ieiri, with her calm and reserved personality, would occasionally join in on the fun, adding her little cents.

Their third and final classmate Geto, although serious and focused on his work most of the time, would also join in on the fun with his best friend. Geto had his own brand of humour that usually made the second years wary but it just made them crack up like hyenas.

"Oii! Why not come with us for a guy's night out?"

"Never."

"Aww why not? You know that we are the best right? Right? Right?"

"Leave our senpai alone Satoru, they are just scared that they will become cool after hanging out with us."

Gojo made a disgusted face, sticking out his tongue and rolling his eyes while Geto continued to watch as their upperclassmen got ticked off.

With Gojo and Geto, there was never a dull day for Ieiri but the day was catching up to her and she had to wake up early tomorrow for her extra lessons. She was just about to leave them be when she suddenly heard the sound of lightning, followed by a loud crack of thunder. The feeling that came over her was heavy and ominous, and she knew something was about to happen. They froze for a second in succession, as if transfixed before Ieiri quickly looked around, trying to see what was causing such a disturbing sound. She found the rest of her classmates and seniors also trying to find what had made that noise. The sky was partly cloudy with no signs of rain or thunder but the sound had been close enough to shake the entire training ground.

"What was th—" Shoko turned to Geto when the latter cut off mid-sentence, she followed his stare to find herself looking at Gojo.

"There's something in the sky." He announced before running off and jumping across the roofs to find out about it. The rest of the students turned to look up at where Gojo previously pointed and realised that there really was a small dot that seemed to be falling towards them.

Alarms rang across the students' minds as they questioned how anything was able to cross Jujutsu High's barrier. Tengen's barrier was the best in the world, nothing should have been able to come to their school without being accepted by the barriers. With the same thought running through most of their minds, they readied their stance waiting for the moment they had to fight. But it was all for nought when Gojo caught the figure in his arms instead of destroying it. It took a few more moments for them to realise that Gojo was holding the figure of a human being, not a curse.

And that's when things started becoming exhausting for Shoko. The figure turned out to be a girl their age. She lay motionless in Satoru's arms, her breathing shallow and irregular. She was barely conscious and appeared to be struggling to breathe. After rushing her to the small clinic that they had on the school grounds, Shoko diagnosed her with a broken arm, leg, and spine, as well as a concussion, liver laceration, and a traumatic brain injury. The hours that followed saw Shoko along with a non-sorcerer doctor use her Reversed Curse Technique, multiple surgeries and everything else in their disposal to save the girl's life.