Chapter Text
In an abandoned building in the woods of Osaka, a sorcerer and villain could be found trying to fight off a supposed semi-grade two curse, which was starting to feel more like a semi-grade one. Maki groaned in frustration as she got slammed into a concrete wall.
“Dammit this curse is too fast and you’re too slow!!” Maki shouted over at Kurogiri, who was growing more irritated as he let out some huffs of breath.
“You aren’t giving me much time to think, Miss Maki!” He shouted back in irritation.
“Curses don’t give recovery time! We gotta act fast–Shit!!” She let out a hiss as the curse manifested out of the ground and grabbed her by the ankle. It tried to drag her further back in the abandoned building, but she swiftly used her naginata to try and stab at its tail, but the thing dove back into the ground.
She suddenly felt herself falling and landing on a different part of the ground. She looked around and realized Kurogiri had warped her back over to him. Carefully, she pushed herself up and gripped her cursed staff tightly.
“Alright, look, this thing is tricky, and it’s trying to separate and attack that way. We have got to stick together and come up with a plan and fast!” She snapped.
“And from the looks of it, the only way to exorcise that thing is by stabbing its eye,” Kurogiri noted with furrowed brows.
Suddenly, they felt the ground rumbling and readied for an attack. The cursed worm-like beast jumped out of the concrete to their left with its maw of a mouth wide open. On instinct, Kurogiri warped behind Maki and grabbed her by her shoulders and yanked her back. Maki clenched her jaw as she held out her naginata and managed to cut across the curse’s back.
It dove back into the ground and remerged in seconds, catching the pair off guard. It caused them to stumble, and the curse took this opportunity to redirect itself and weave in between the two. Each tripped over the sudden movement, and Maki ended up crashing forward. She tried to steady herself with her weapon, but it was too late.
“Maki, look out!!” Kurogiri overheard his shout but wasn’t swift enough to protect herself.
The curse came at her with unimaginable speeds and tried to use its mouth to bite at her head, but she somehow managed to block. Unfortunately for her, the curse managed to knock her glasses off mid-motion, and she witnessed her glasses being dragged into the concrete by what she presumed to be a curse.
“Aw, great! Now I can’t even see the damn thing!” She shouted in frustration but let out a yelp when another warpgate opened under her, causing her to fall and land into Kurogiri’s arms. He managed to warp the pair across the building.
“Ugh, let me down!” She snapped before shoving at the villain’s chest and stumbling out of his grip. “Just great! I can’t even attack the damn thing!”
“Calm down, you may not be able to see the curse, but I can.” Kurogiri warned as he handed her back the cursed tool, “And I believe if we work together, we can figure this out.”
“How?! I can’t see and you don’t know how to attack anything, it seems!”
“You can see my warpgates, can’t you?” Kurogiri asked skeptically while summoning a warpgate. Maki frowned and furrowed her brows at the gate. “Perhaps we can do this a different way.”
“Fine, but you’ve got to step up your game, old man.” Maki snapped, wiping the blood off her cheek, “Can you create multiple warpgates at once?”
“Yes, I can.”
“Then we can try to lure the thing out. Weirdly, it doesn’t seem to be attacking you, so I’ll be the bait, but you need to be my eyes.”
“I have an idea that we could try, but you must trust me.”
They heard the sound of rumbling again, and Maki yelped when she heard the sound of wooshing followed by purple mist engulfing her. She looked around in confusion, realizing they were on a second-level platform now.
“If you’re the bait, then I’m going to try and get that thing out of the ground. Which seems to be working because it’s rising from the concrete now, be ready.”
Maki readied herself to attack, but was startled again when she felt that mist engulf her again. She let out a noise of frustration again when they were back on the first floor.
“Hey, what the hell do you think you’re doing?! I was ready!!” Maki snapped but let out a yelp when she felt herself fall again and reappear on the opposite side of the building.
“Like I said, you must trust me, Miss Maki! The curse is coming at you now!”
“I would say I see that, but I can’t! Where is it coming from?!” She asked, grounded out as she turned in a circle, only to feel a rumbling from the ground coming to her left.
“You're left! You must jump into my portals!” Kurogiri shouted as a portal manifested to her right.
“This better not be another damn trick!” Maki shouted before begrudgingly jumping through the portal.
To her surprise, another portal to her left manifested, and she plunged through it. She watched as the portals continued to appear, causing her to jump through each one.
Left, right, left, right, left, right…
Maki smirked and tightened her grip on the naginata as she continued to hop through the portals.
‘Well I’ll be damned, he’s making a latter essentially leading the curse up here! Hah!’
She was at least five stories in the air now when she felt herself start to fall.
“Aim the naginata down! Now, Maki!” With that statement and a twist of her naginata, Maki maneuvered midair to aim down. She couldn’t see it, but she could feel the phantom of curse blood spluttering up and hitting her face, naginata, and clothing as her weapon racked through the curse's eyeball and down its body. She turned her face away and clutched it tightly as it glided right down the curse’s worm-like body.
She then let out a yelp as the concrete came closer. She skidded across the concrete before stumbling over her feet and hitting Kurogiri’s chest, causing him to nearly fall back. The two stood there trying to regain their breath.
Maki carefully pushed back against the villain and blinked up at him in shock. “Wha–What the hell was that about?! Since when could you do that?!”
Kurogiri chuckled nervously, “Ah– it’s a trick I used to do with Tomura. He made me play Portal with him when he was younger, and I picked up different ways to use my warpgates. Normally, I don’t use those techniques in battles against heroes, but I figured it’d be a good idea to try them against these seemingly mindless curses.”
“Well, that worked,” Maki grinned playfully, hitting his arm. “So keep doing that type of stuff, but next time you have got to warn me before you warp me around like that. I feel a little dizzy from that back and forth between portals and new platforms.”
“My apologies, I will consider that.” He walked past her and pulled a pair of cracked glasses from the remains of the curse's stomach. He held them out to the sorcerer, “Though I suppose if there’s going to be a next time, you’ll need these.”
“Thanks,” Maki reached out to grab them. She used her uniform to try and clean them off of the possible remnants of cursed blood.
“You are very good at what you do, Miss Maki. You are quite the admirable sorcerer.”
Maki couldn’t help but feel a pride tug at her. It felt good to be acknowledged as a sorcerer despite their rough start together, she was growing fond of this guy.
“Thanks, I appreciate it.” She smiled back before readjusting her glasses. “Now then, let’s get out of here. Ijichi is probably worried sick.”
The villain couldn’t help but hum before opening a warpgate. “He does seem like the anxious type.”
Maki agreed and then swiftly stepped through the portal, but was surprised to find them still in the woods. She blinked in confusion, noticing they were outside the curtain, and that was when she felt water start to fall and hit her head. She blinked up at the sky and realized it was raining, and they weren’t near the road where Ijichi's car lay.
She glanced back to ask Kurogiri why they were here, but paused. She stared in horror as what looked like Kurogiri’s body melted right in front of her.
She let out a scream and jumped back, gripping her naginata tightly. “What the hell—?! Are you alright?!!”
“My…A̵̰͒p̴̐ͅo̴͖̕ĺ̴͈ò̷̗g̸̝̕ï̶̤ẽ̴͙s̸͚͌…̶̨͊” Came an almost glitched-out static voice in response. It sounded almost like two voices in one with an overlay effect.
Maki’s grip on her weapon grew tighter as she witnessed him grab at the metal collar around his neck and tug it off. In an instant, all the mist flared out.
‘What is wrong with him?! He was fine just a second ago! Did that curse hit him and I not notice?!’
She witnessed lightning flash across the dark sky, followed by a loud crack of thunder. In a flash, she saw something…different.
Standing where Kurogiri once stood was a…man?
His skin was a sickly pale color, which reminded her of a corpse. His hair floated up aside from two side pieces, and it was white with hints of light blue, and he had three jagged scars down his right eye. His eyes, in general, looked odd. They were yellow momentarily before completely fading to blue with faint yellow streaks coming off of them, and across his nose was a nose strip. His face…It looked weirdly youthful, but his eyes had no shine, no life.
‘He looks like a walking corpse.’
She watched the villain shake his head to collect himself before blinking down at her.
“Ah…As I said earlier, my apologies. I cannot keep the mist up in such weather,” He motioned to the rain. “I did not mean to frighten you. It’s just that when I’m around humidity and water like this, it is difficult to keep the mist together, so it disperses and my body reforms.”
His voice was different. No longer deep and threatening, but it was weird and glitchy, a mix of something deep but also something youthful, like a teenager.
With his imposing height, white-blue hair, and blue eyes, he almost looked like a weird, off-putting version of Gojo. Well, if Gojo were some sort of walking dead man...
“What the hell…? How—? Your appearance?! Is this some kind of sick trick? Your voice is different! Did that curse cut you? Come on, we gotta get you to Shoko!”
Kurogiri frowned—actually frowned, and she witnessed it. He glanced down at the metal brace he held before sighing.
“Again, I apologize, Miss Maki, there is something I have not informed you sorcerers of because I did not think it was vital information at the time.” He glanced at the sky, “Given our circumstances, I seem to be wrong.”
“Whatever it is, you better start talking,” Maki said through narrowed eyes. “Otherwise, we’re going straight to Shoko.”
“I am something known as a nomu,” Kurogiri answered calmly, “Back home, nomus are created by a man known as Dr. Ujiko. At least, that is what I am programmed to address him as.”
“Programmed?” Maki blinked in confusion. “What?”
“Yes. A nomu was once a living person but perished in a freak accident. If the doctor deemed the body salvageable, he would take it and use one of All for One’s, my boss’s, quirks to reanimate the body. He would then reprogram the brain of a person to follow direct orders. As for me, I am considered one of the highest-end nomu ever created because of my intelligence and ability to blend in among people back home. My goal and programming is to protect Tomura Shigaraki and any of his allies.”
Maki stared at him with wide eyes as the rain only began pouring down harder. The air around them was quiet, save for the little dink sounds the water made hitting his metal brace he held.
He tilted his head like a dog and stared down at her. “I know it is a lot to take in, but everything I said earlier was genuine admiration and concern.”
Maki did not like the way he stared at her unblinking, like some sort of creepy zombie. It wasn’t that of a predator's gaze but something…inhumane. Unnerving. He was seriously reminding her of a curse.
“So let me get this straight…You’re like a cursed corpse zombie thing? And you malfuction when you come in contact with rain?”
“Correct.”
“And you’re like, what, okay with that?” Maki asked through furrowed brows as the rainfall grew heavier.
“I wouldn’t necessarily say I am ‘okay with it’, but I have grown to accept it. After all, I cannot change what happened to me.” Kurogiri answered simply, “I am not the same person I once was.”
“Oh, so you really are just a zombie… That’s just…great.” Maki grimaced, trying not to make a face.
“Does knowing this frighten you?”
“No…I uh, deal with Panda who’s a cursed corpse,” She ran her hand through her bangs, “Just..next time tell me. Oh, and you’ll want to tell that dumb blindfolded guy and Principal Yaga.”
“Of course,” He answered, giving her a simple bow before the rain only picked up harder.
Maki was growing irritated as the rain picked up around them, but to her surprise, she no longer felt it hit her. She looked up and was greeted by a warpgate swirling overhead.
“What the… Hey, wait a minute, I thought you said you had difficulty keeping up the mist?”
“I have difficulty keeping it up around my body, but I can keep up regular warpgates in the rain. It is no trouble, plus I wouldn’t want you catching a cold.”
She stared at him skeptically. This guy was so strange…
“So you’re literally designed to protect? And are basically a zombie creature thing, but look weirdly human without that mist…Can you keep the mist down even when the rain stops?”
“I can, yes, but many find my body to be unsightly. I do not look alive because I am not.”
Her frown deepened. “...As weird as you look without the mist, I think you pass for something more... normal around here. If you keep that mist up, sorcerers are going to automatically assume you’re a special grade curse and might attack. Hell, it seems like that curse back there assumed you were a curse."
“...I will keep that in mind,” Kurogiri answered before making his way over to her. “Would you like to continue this conversation as we walk to the road?”
“Can’t you just warp us?”
“Ah, well, I tried earlier, but it seems I was a bit off with the coordinates.” He smiled sheepishly, “Again, my apologies.”
“It’s…fine.” Maki agreed as the two started to walk down the steep hill, weaving in between trees. She noticed the wargate above them followed and grew longer to accompany Kurogiri as well.
For a while, they were quiet as they walked, just the sound of desolate rain and scattered frogs croaking in the nearby river. One thing Maki noticed up close was a deep jagged scar around Kurogiri’s neck with discoloration, and how it seemed to match the jagged scars down his right eye.
“Can I ask you something?”
“You may.”
“Do you remember anything from your past? Like those scars? Your family?”
He paused for a moment to think before smiling. “Truthfully, I don’t remember much. All I remember is a scream followed by a building collapsing on me. I know I hit my head on something, and I believe my neck got snapped by something. As for my family, no, I do not remember any of them. I don’t remember much of my friends either.”
“Must be nice, my family calls me a disgrace.”
“For what reason? To me, you seem rather skilled and talented. After all, you killed a curse without even seeing it, I merely assisted you.”
She gave him a sideways glance. “And you’re sure you’re not like programmed to say that nice shit too?”
“As I stated earlier, all my comments are genuine. I may be a nomu and come with reprogramming, but I do have some of my own thoughts and opinions.” He mused with a fanged smile. “Still, I don’t understand why your family would call you a disgrace.”
She gave a deep sigh and used her naginata to slice at a nearby tree. “It’s because I practically have no cursed energy. It’s why I wasn’t able to see that curse earlier, which is the base level to be considered a sorcerer in this world. See, I’ve got something called a heavenly restriction, and it’s looked down upon in Jujutsu society. What I lack in sight, I make up for in my senses and strength. The Zen’in clan, though, my supposed ‘family,’ still thinks it’s a disgraceful gift. Plus, they don’t like the fact that I’m a woman instead of a man.”
“Sounds quite sexist and outdated if you’d ask me. It almost reminds me of quirk marriages back home,” Kurogiri thought aloud with a frown. “To me, your heavenly restriction sounds like a unique quirk that can easily be improved upon and outrank others.”
“I’ll do just that one day,” Maki agreed with a grin, “And once I’m strong enough, I’ll slaughter the entire Zen’in clan and take it over for myself!”
“That’s quite the goal.” He answered flatly.
“What, think I can’t reach it?” She questioned with a raised brow.
“Oh no, I never said that. I believe you’ll be able to achieve your goal in due time. Perhaps even I could assist or watch.”
“Hah! We’ll see,” She snickered as she slid down a steep cliffside, “You know, for a nomu guy, you’re not all bad.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.” Kurogiri grinned before sliding down after her. "And I must say, for someone who can't see curses, you do a good job at exorcising them."
Maki's grin only brightened.
Up ahead, the two spotted Ijichi’s car and their amused chatter only continued…
Despite their differences and rough start, they were becoming quite good friends.