Chapter Text
It goes like this: Yuuta Okkotsu is a small child, he gets sick pretty often and cries easily but he also has good parents and a sweet younger sister so everything is fine. Things only start to get complicated when he turns ten years old and claims to start seeing strange little things, like too many owls, a flying motorbike and a cat transforming into a human. At first his parents would laugh, then they would get worried, so worried in fact that that would get him his first examination with a child psychiatrist.
Later Yuuta would reminisce and think about how he should´d just shut up about the flying motorbike, but he was ten so in the first appointment he tells the truth about what he sees. After that he sees the psychiatrist talking to his parents with a very serious expression on their face, the young child doesn’t understand much at the time but schizophrenia seems like a bad word by the look on his parents’s faces so, not wanting to cause any more trouble, he does what seems the only plausible solution and stars lying.
No more flying vehicles for me, thanks for asking Mrs Riko!
It last for a while, his parents are happy, there is no more psychiatrist, things are under control but then the strange occurrences start to happen because of him. He gets an ugly haircut at the salon and gets so sad about it his hair simply grows back again, he is running away from bullies at school when they suddenly disappear, only later being found trapped in a random classroom. Yuuta swears he is getting paranoid, anxiety spiraling, when he mets her.
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It goes like this: Yuuta is in the hospital because of a bad case pneumonia when he first sees Rika Orimoto, the most beautiful girl in the entire world. To him, at least. She is kind, funny and doesn’t make fun of Yuuta like most of his classmates at school do, so they begin a friendship. They play in the garden and tell each other secrets because thats what best friends do or so Rika likes to say.
“I don’t really like my grandmother. She is always complaining, I swear I can’t do one thing right by her standards!” Rika makes a funny face of disgust to illustrate her discontent and Yuuta can’t help but laugh. “And now you got tell something! Come on, can be anything I will never judge you”.
And Yuuta could see that, no matter what he did Rika was good to him and is only because of that fact that he resolved to tell her all. When finished speaking he looks at her face felling afraid of what he might see but in her eyes there is a sort of exciment he never saw before. “I knew it”, she whispered “I knew you were like me” then she opened her hand and willed a ball of light to dance between her fingers.
Everything changed after that. Rika told him how she always had that magic inside of her, how she felt alone like nobody could understand until she met Yuuta and could sense the same power within him. At first he didn’t know how to react but like she always did when he got too nervous she took his hand and everything was great, it really was.
“It's a promise. When we grow up we'll get married. That's means we'll be together forever, right?”
Right. So it goes like this: Yuuta sees Rika getting killed by a car accident. He’s in panic, refuses to accept what just happened and something changes then, with Rika’s and Yuuta’s magic but he will only realize this weeks later when he’s alone and there is dark figure standing in a corner of his room.
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Yuuta looks down fingers trembiling over the railing, it’s a big height, he knows because he made his research before coming here. There is a familiar voice trying to stop him but he refused to listen to “it”. It has to be an “it” because otherwise that would mean his beloved Rika had turned into something darker than he would like to believe.
Six years has passed since Rika’s death and he had been hunted by some mockery of what was left of her soul. Every second after her passing had been filed with anxiety and Yuuta knew that had took a toll on him, everyone could see this, especially his parents and that had led him again to the psychiatrist’s office. This time he knew what was happening when they gave him a diagnosis that detailed his chronical depression but the series of appointments that occured afterwards did not help escape the immense grief he felt. In school the bullying didn’t stop making the “Rika” who was with him now hurt his colleagues enough to hospitalize them. Wherever he look everything was crumbling, no one could see his ghost or the scary magic that surrounded him which led him to this bridge.
Maybe he was being a little dramatic but this felt like the only option left or so he told himself as he was getting ready to stand over the railing.
“Yo kiddo, what are you thinking standing there?” And that’s how Yuuta almost jumps to his fall if weren’t for the hand of the stranger securing his shirt and making him stumble to the safe heaven of the ground. “Sorry I didn’t mean to frighten you, are you okay?”
With that last question, Yuuta finally looks up to his supposedly saviour: a very tall man with snow-white hair and bandages over his eyes, he was also wearing very strange robes. Maybe he is homeless?
“Hi! Thanks for saving me I guess… I will get going, please have a nice day sir!” The teenager was ready to turn around and leave hoping to forget the whole ordeal if it wasn’t for the hand once again grapping his shirt.
“Hey, I came down here to speak specially to you kid. Yuuta Okkotsu, right? I’m Gojo Satoru but you must know that already.” The now named man had a obnoxious smile on his face. “Anyway aren’t you going to introduce me to your little ghost friend?”
“W-what? You can see Rika!?” Yuuta felt a shiver run down his spine. Until now nobody had pointed out Rika’s ghostly form before.
“Of course I can! Any person who consider themself a wizard can see ghosts.” Gojo says with laughter.
“I’m sorry, what?”
The man takes a moment to remove the bandages of his head revealing the most vibrant pair of blue eyes Yuuta has ever seen. “Did I not meation it before? You’re a wizard, Yuuta.”
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Yuuta is guided to a coffe shop at the end of the street after Gojo claimed he needed some sugar to handle the conversation. There this strange man explained about the world of magic, wizards and mystical creatures all while eating as many cupcakes as humanly possible, which was a lot apparently.
“I’m sorry you got unnotice by the system, I would like to say this is a mistake that happens rarely within our school but that would be a lie”, the blue eyed man had a sardonic smile on his face. “Anyway I’m here to fix that mistake! We have been able to detect a spike in dark magic in this area which had lead us to you! You are very lucky I stepped up to this mission.”
Yuuta didn’t felt lucky, in fact after the shock had past he could only feel anger. Anger for Rika, the sweet girl who felt misunderstood and had to die before knowing that they weren’t the crazy ones, that there was a world out there that could belong to them. Feeling his eyes getting blurry he realised maybe he was also feeling anger for himself.
Sensing the change in the atmosfere Gojo dropped the smile. “I’m sorry for what you had to go through alone. I know it must have not been easy, it’s no wonder why you’re an obscurial.”
“I’m sorry, a what?” the boy suddenly felt Rika moving closer to him.
“An obscurial,” he sighed. “An obscurial is usually a young wizard or witch who develops a dark parasitical magical force, known as an obscurus, as a result of their magic being suppressed through psychological or physical abuse. Most of the children usually die pretty young, you must have a tremendous power to have survive this long.” He says that in a form of compliment but it all just feels wrong to Yuuta.
“What are you trying to say? Is Rika my obscurus? How? She died in a car accident years ago.” Yuuta holds his engagement ring tighter towards his chest.
“Well I don’t know much about obcurius but my thesis is that in your case this stong emotion of distress started the moment your childhood fiance died causing your magic to fuse with her spirit.” Gojo started playing with the napkins. “Your obscurus must be extremely connect to your grief keeping her ghost here but don’t worry, if there is someone powerful and intelligent enough to heal an obscurial is me!”
Yuuta felt himself growing more anxious. “And how I’m going to heal? How do I became capable of freeing Rika?”
At that Gojo standed up, a broad smile on his face. “Well my future dear student, I’m glad you asked. To heal an obscurial we will need to replace this feelings of alienation of yours with a great sense of belonging which is why I came all this way to give you this letter!”
With a trembling hand Yuuta held the offered envelope, it was made with yellowish parchment with a purple wax seal bearing a coat of arms; a lion, an eagle, a badger and a snake surrounding a large letter “H”.
HOGWARTS SCHOOL OF WITCHCRAFT AND WIZARDRY
Headmaster: Masamichi Yaga
(Order of Merlin, First class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confed of Wizards)
Dear Mr Okkotsu,
We are pleased to inform you that you have a place at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment.
Term begins on 1 September. We await your owl by no later than 31 July.
Yours sincerely,
Gojo Saturo
Deputy Headmaster
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“Are you sure you don’t wanna be part of this conversation?” Gojo asked while holding the door.
After paying the bill for the cupcakes at the coffe shop, Yuuta and Saturo walked all the way to the young boy’s house to explain the situation to his parents. There was a part of Yuuta who wishes to lie, say that he was invited to a boarding school for problematic kids but Saturo explained that it was always better for the parents of a muggleborn wizard to know the truth. Muggleborn, it was what he and Rika were yet it felt strange to assimilate that information.
“I’m sure. I don’t want to take part in that. If I explained something it’ll probably be worse for them to take it seriously.” It had been already difficulty enough to convince his mom and dad to let inside this weird stranger into their home, claiming that he had a important thing to talk about his son. Yuuta would rather wait outside.
Saturo nodded seeming accostumed by the procedure, the teenager hopped he was. Waiting outside the living room, only being able to hear muffled voices, almost made Yuuta regret his choice. It seemed hours had past when it probably only had been half, when the door opened again revealing the conflicted faces of his parents.
“Hey Yuuta,” his mother whispered “we heard what the gentleman said. At first we did not believed him but-”.
“Then he turned our armchair into a pig” his dad grumbled.
Seeing the anxious look on his face, his mother tries to appease him. “Look we did not understood before but we do now, okay? We are sorry for not believing you before.” She tries to smile. Looking at her now, Yuuta notices that he got his dark blue eyes from her.
“T-thank you, really. I don’t know what to say”, the tears are already streaming down his face when he hugs his parents. They hug him back and Yuuta can feel his mother brush his hair and his father pat his back.
“We’ll let you go to this school… Hogwarts isn’t it? Well we will let you go there if it will help you get better but you’ll have to keep contact with us, alright?” His mother mutters.
“Yes, of course! We still have some time before the school year begins so I think it’ll be alright. I’ll send messages and call you then.”
Satoru appears in the doorway with a satisfied look on his face. “I’m sorry kid, you will find that Hogwarts signal is shit. You can send letter through owl post thought.”
“I’m sure we’ll figure it out by then,” his father says with a force laughter. “We’ll give you the money nedeed to buy the materials.”
“We decided not tell your sister the truth yet, just when she is older… I hope you understand that, she is just too young for all this.” There is distress in his mother face and Yuuta’s smile drops at that. They always kept a close look on his sister, worried she would became like Yuuta. Luckliy she always been a angel, easy to take care of and to maintain happy, everything Yuuta ever wanted to be for his parents.
“It’s okay, I agree,” he knows that after Rika’s death he tried to create a distance from his family, to try protect them. It had been six years, far too many to fix the fracture relationship that they now have. But maybe, if he succeed in freeing Rika’s ghost he can come back later, a better Yuuta, a more easy to love Yuuta.
“We’ll say you got accepted into a special boarding school, make a normal farewell party then” his father says with a confident smile.
“Alright, this was all very nice to watch but I got others errands to run. I’ll come back to get Yuuta when it’s time to buy the materials.” At that Satoru puts a strange powder in fireplace of the family’s living room. “Goodbye everybody!” And he jumps into the fire before Yuuta can shriek.