After The Divorce || Nanami Kento || JJK

The Devil You Know

CHAPTER 17

NANAMI POV

"When we say 'Y/N might explode' what exactly do we mean," I asked, slowly, the bitter taste of the words leaving my lips making me afraid to swallow this bitter pill; this information. This entire situation was a mess.

The office was silent. The only sound was the whirring of the fan above and the shaky breaths leaving my lips. Gojo stood by the window, his expression unreadable as he stared at the campus. Tokyo Prefectural Jujutsu High School stood, beautifully adorned with greenery and artfully designed buildings, with the occasional person walking to and fro on their way. It was the very picture of serene grace. The complete opposite of the air within this room.

Shoko reached into her pocket, the sound of a wrapper thundering through the silent room.

Sticking the gum into her mouth the sighed before speaking. "With the love curse in her system, she's basically a ticking time bomb, while we know the effects of The Love Curse from previous cases, the records are very vague. Plus with her unique constitution, we're not sure how her emotions will react with the mountains of cursed energy within her body. We don't even know if it's possible to extract the curse from her system, or even what causes it. The whole point of the curse is to essentially flip her emotional scale, trust to mistrust, love to hate, and sometimes even mistrust to trust. There's no way to predict things like this. Even if we did manage to get through to her we'd also have to deal with the fact that she wont trust a word coming out of our mouths. She already doesn't."

"So, we're sitting ducks, is what your saying. All of us have deep personal relationships with Y/N and so showing up unexpectedly to have any type of conversation can be disastrous." My eyes travel between Gojo and Shoko as I spoke.

"We just have to wait and hope she comes to us. What else can we do? Risk going to her? We have no other choice unless you think it's a good idea to go to the higher-ups with-"

"Fuck no." Gojo interrupts through clenched teeth. "They're the reason we're in this mess, to begin with."

Both Shoko and I go silent at his outburst. We knew exactly how Gojo felt about the higher-ups. I shared his feelings. But there was simply the fact there was nothing we could do against them. Shoko, well honestly, Shoko didn't care enough to get herself embroiled in messy relationships with them. Smart.

He turns around running a hand through his hair which, unlike usual where it stood with some semblance of order was messy and out of place. It was impossible to read his thoughts with the blindfold blocking his eyes and by extension masking most of his thoughts. Even then I could tell that this whole situation was taking a toll on him.

Ever since the situation that happened that year...

"I'll go find Gran." He says after a moment of thought. "He knows far more than us about this entire situation he should be able to help.

"No. It's dangerous." I interrupt shaking my head. Places, where Gran was sent to was never a place to wantonly go, plus with Gojo's situation he was under tight scrutiny, any moves he made were watched like a hawk. That was the price he had to pay. "Plus they'd never let you go, especially if they knew why."

"Then they can try to stop me. Even the clans can't."

Shoko steps in, "Nanami's right. You should stay, we can figure everything out here. The place where Gran's gone sends back dozens of sorcerers daily with various types of injuries. We're stretched thin taking care of those we already have plus the climbing numbers every day."

"That's precisely the reason I should go." A smile climbs unto the man's face and I already realized we've lost this battle with him. He always acted like this when he made up his mind. My guess is confirmed as soon as he reopens his mouth. "I'm the strongest after all."

Y/N POV

You sat and replayed your conversation with Getou in your mind as you stared at your house from across the street. By this time a crowd had already formed around your house. Your stomach turned as you watched in mute horror.

Your neighbors trampled on the corpse of the monster as they examined the fence, tracking blood all over them. Blood that they couldn't see from a world their senses couldn't perceive. These people that you had known for years, yet never had you felt so disconnected from their world. Standing in the shadows as you watched them under the streetlights, blood-soaked as they looked on in confusion at the hole in your house, in concern, unaware of their own state.

You couldn't go back. Go over there and pretend everything was normal. So you stood, wine in one hand, a plant with the face of a screaming human, and in the other Pandora's box, Bandaids littering your face like freckles. It was almost comical.

You thought for a moment before doing the only thing you could think of.

You walked, still clad in your outfit for the night, to a pay phone, borrowing money from a man who looked at you like you were an escapee from a psych ward. He trembled like a leaf as he lent you the money you needed before vanishing into the night. Poor dude.

Doot. Doot. Doot.

"Hello?"

"Shoko... It's Y/N."

It's always better to trust the devil you knew than the unknown.  Inside you prayed you were making the right decision even as your instincts screamed the opposite.  Either way, there was no going back.

A/N

Hello everyone!  Tysm for sticking around on this journey with me.  Im happy to see all the turnout on my return to posting,  I love you guys so much <3

Don't forget to comment and vote!  I'd love to hear your thoughts and comments, especially with my writing style having undergone such a huge change... it isn't jarring is it?  

There's also going to be a lot more information especially plotwise with the upcoming season two coming out in July (I THINK).  I've always tried my best to keep the manga spoilers to the bare minimum but now with my source material (the animated version) moving forward in the overall jjk plot, I can now add more characters.   Unfortunately, characters from the canon present (like Yuji , Megumi, Nobara etc) will not be added to this story because then I'd have to deal with working Sukuna and all he entails into the mix (I love jjk and all the brainrots that come with it but I'm not ready for the level of thought I'd have to put into that) as this story takes place in a time period before all of the events pertaining to them occurs, but most of the cannon past remains unchanged unless indicated :)