The Wake of Power – Chapter 71
The curtain fell.
The silence was sharp. Too sharp.
A breathless moment stretched out as the veil between worlds lifted… and Gojo Satoru stepped forward.
His blindfold-covered eyes scanned the battlefield.
Then his steps stopped.
The ceiling?
Nowhere.
The upper level of the building had collapsed entirely, gone as if erased by a god's fist. In its place was a crater of metal and earth—a twisted mass of shattered rods, ruptured concrete, torn wires, and scorched mud. Iron jutted from the ground in chaotic spirals, like a battlefield frozen mid-destruction.
Even Gojo had to pause.
"…The hell…?" he whispered.
He wasn't easily surprised.
But this—this was not just a mess. It was war.
On the far side of the rubble, Maki sat against a chunk of wall, panting.
She looked mostly intact—alive—but a large nail had punctured her right hand, driven clean through flesh and knuckle. Blood dripped from her wrist. Her eyes were glassy with exhaustion, her face pale with lingering shock.
Gojo appeared beside her in a flash.
"Maki—"
"I'm fine," she muttered, grimacing. "Help him."
She pointed across the crater.
That's when Gojo saw him.
Ren.
Half-buried in the dirt. His clothes shredded. Blood soaked into the mud around him. His breathing was shallow—barely audible. His thigh was pierced. His fingers twitched weakly. But he was still alive.
Gojo's stomach twisted.
"…Shit."
He didn't wait.
In one smooth motion, Gojo swept Ren into his arms and vanished.
Jujutsu Tokyo Campus – Medical Wing
Shoko's gloves were stained red.
She stood over Ren's body, expression unreadable. Monitors blinked beside her, cursed instruments whispering stats. The wounds were deep. But it wasn't the bleeding that troubled her.
It was the inside.
Shoko turned to Gojo.
"You didn't tell me he was suicidal."
Gojo raised an eyebrow. "What?"
She pointed to the cursed energy scans. "His body's damage is internal. Microscopic tears in his muscle fiber collapse, energy backlash. You name it."
She leaned forward.
"It's like he was using a technique that wasn't complete. Or… he was pushing himself way beyond what his body was made for. If your story is true—"
She looked back at Ren, unconscious on the bed, still breathing shallowly.
"—then this kid is lucky to come out with just stab wounds."
Gojo exhaled.
Earlier, when he'd asked Maki what happened inside the curtain… he hadn't expected that story.
She told him everything.
The curse's obsession. The iron rain. The scream of "DIE" echoing again and again. Rika shielding her. Ren falling. The hand sign. The chant. The explosion of threads.
Maki's voice had trembled once—but only once—when she described the moment everything stopped.
When the curse was ripped from the sky by red threads, like it was caught in a net spun by hell.
When Ren screamed something stupid like "Love Cannon."
And Rika—calm, monstrous Rika—fired.
Gojo had stood there in silence the whole time.
He knew curses. He knew techniques. He had seen people die, cities fall, and monsters evolve.
But he had never heard of a cursed technique like that. Never.
And the way Maki described it…
"If what she's saying is the truth," Gojo murmured, standing beside the hospital bed, "then that curse wasn't just some semi-grade curse that ren had fought before…"
He crossed his arms.
"That curse had to be special grade. No way around it."
And Ren?
He didn't just survive.
He fought it.
He protected others.
And he won.
Gojo stared at the unconscious boy.
He'd already known Ren had potential. Saw something in the kid. A sharp mind. Weird energy. Hunger.
But this…
This wasn't potential.
This was power.
"Rika was always special grade," Gojo whispered, almost to himself. "But Ren himself…"
He trailed off.
Special grade.
And a strong one at that...
Or that's at least what Gojo thought...
The next day, Gojo had to write the mission report.
He sat at his desk, chewing the end of a pen.
What the hell am I even supposed to write?
He tapped the page.
Curtain deployed
Students enter
Encounter with unknown special grade curse
Rika deployed
Ren fought with full cursed energy
Curse destroyed
Rika consumed cursed remains
Gojo sighed.
"This sounds like a joke…"
He stared at the line again.
'Ren lets the cursed spirit Rika get out, and Rika kills the special grade curse.'
Technically true.
But truth was dangerous.
If the higher-ups realized that Ren was the one holding the leash on a special grade cursed spirit like Rika…
If they realized that he could activate techniques like Binding of Izanami...
They wouldn't see a hero.
They'd see a threat.
And Gojo knew all too well what happened to threats.
Not because they were hated.
But because they were feared.
He sighed and scribbled out the last line.
Instead, he wrote:
"Rika neutralized the special grade with overwhelming force."
He left Ren's name out of the fight summary entirely.
Better that Rika looked unstoppable than Ren looked uncontrollable.
But still, as he closed the folder, Gojo found himself smiling.
This kid.
This stubborn, reckless, brilliant idiot…
He reminded him of someone.
Not Geto.
Not even himself.
Because Ren had done something Gojo had failed to do when he was young.
He saved people...
That night, the report landed in the hands of the higher-ups.
The elders read it once. Then again. Some squinted. Others whispered.
One of them slammed the table.
"This child. He must be controlled. If he can use Rika, he's a danger to—"
"—To whom?" another cut in.
"He saved four civilians. And Maki."
"Gojo was there too!"
"Exactly," someone else said. "Gojo's the one backing him. We can't act."
They sat in silence.
Tension buzzed like static.
No one dared admit it aloud.
But they were afraid.
And they should be.
Far away, in the shadows of a quiet temple, a man in robes drank bitter tea.
He listened as a whisper reached him.
A report.
A cursed spirit. A battlefield of red thread. Rika unleashed. A boy who smiled before death.
Geto Suguru smirked.
"Ok," he said softly, "now things are getting spicy…"
He set the cup down.
And the storm began to stir.