Yaga watched from the side and said nothing.

From what he could sense, it was a slightly specialized but otherwise ordinary Cursed Corpse. Nothing like Panda, the fully autonomous, self-aware Abrupt Mutated Cursed Corpse whose existence had to be kept from the higher-ups.

If Touma wanted to give away something he built in his spare time to make connections, that was his business.

But out of everyone present, only one understood what the doll really meant.

Only the miniature Panda, carrying memories that did not belong to this reality, knew the weight behind it.

While Yaga and Kusakabe talked, Panda climbed up Touma’s pant leg and onto his shoulder.

It pressed its fuzzy head close to Touma’s ear and whispered so softly only Touma could hear.

"Touma... that one. You made it for Takeru, didn’t you?"

Touma did not turn his head. He gave the smallest nod.

"Yeah. I just didn’t expect the sparring partner Mei Mei found to be Kusakabe himself. The timing lined up on its own. I’d been trying to figure out a natural excuse to get this thing into his hands without making it suspicious."

Worry flickered across Panda’s little black-and-white face. Its stubby paws twisted together.

"But... is that enough? What if history changes and it doesn’t reach Takeru? What if..."

Touma looked past the training ground walls and up at the faintly overcast sky above Tokyo Jujutsu High.

He let out a quiet sigh.

"It should be fine."

His voice carried exhaustion and conviction in equal parts.

"Kusakabe acts like everything is too much trouble, but I know what he’s really like better than anyone. With his personality, and with how much he cares about his family, a defensive doll like that will definitely end up with his sister. Intact."

He paused.

Something buried deep flickered in his eyes.

"Whether it actually activates when the time comes, whether it can really change Takeru’s fate... that, I can’t guarantee. Because..."

A faint, self-mocking smile tugged at his mouth.

"I’m not an all-knowing god. I’m just a person. I can’t hold every thread of every life and force things to turn out right. Once one small change starts moving, there’s no promise reality will follow the script I remember."

His voice dropped.

"And I can’t abandon the bigger picture to stand guard over Takeru all day, every day."

Panda had those brutal simulated memories too.

It understood.

It understood the helplessness pressing on Touma’s chest. He was flesh and blood. No matter how ridiculous his Cursed Technique was, he still had limits. Time, energy, attention. He could not seal off every tragedy waiting for every person in the world.

And Panda understood the size of Touma’s wish.

It was too big. Almost insane.

Panda could not find the right human words to comfort the boy who kept trying to carry everything alone. So it reached out one soft little paw and gently patted Touma’s messy black hair.

If saving everything was Touma’s wish, then Panda decided it was its wish too.

It wanted to see that world.

The world Touma was fighting for.

Feeling the soft touch on his head, Touma murmured.

The words were barely there, half aimed at the small creature on his shoulder and half aimed at himself.

"If I had absolute power... if I became a god... could I guide everything toward a better ending?"

In the jujutsu world, the moment the word god appeared, Touma’s mind supplied one image.

Blinding white hair.

The strongest sorcerer of the modern era.

Satoru Gojo.

But even Gojo, powerful and absurd as he was, had not been able to stop the losses in the original fate. Tragedies had still come one after another.

Strength alone did not fix everything.

And yet, the instant Gojo’s face appeared in Touma’s thoughts...

Whoosh!

The air twisted violently aside.

Gojo’s tall figure blinked into existence in the middle of the training ground without warning. Instant teleportation.

Only the divine prodigy, who usually cared very much about looking cool, looked ridiculous right now.

"I figured it out! I figured it out! I finally figured it out!"

Those bright blue eyes pierced through his sunglasses and locked onto Touma.

Gojo crossed the field like a white tornado.

Thud.

Both hands clamped onto Touma’s shoulders. Gojo shook him with pure excitement, his handsome face practically screaming, Praise me. Praise me right now.

"Touma! I cracked it! Besides that dusty old New Shadow Style, the Big Three Sorcerer Families’ secret archives had something way cooler and way more advanced for anti-domain def..."

Touma stared at the man vibrating in front of him like a child who had just gotten a limited-edition toy.

One eyelid twitched.

Without the slightest mercy, he cut straight through Gojo’s grand reveal.

"You’re talking about Falling Blossom Emotion, aren’t you?"

Gojo’s wild grin froze.

His eyes widened. He even dragged his round sunglasses down his nose, revealing a pair of stunned pale blue irises.

"Hah?! How do you know that name? I didn’t even say it yet!"

Touma’s face did not change.

He looked at Gojo with the calm, almost pitying expression one might use for someone who had proudly announced that water was wet.

"Because I came across it while researching barrier techniques in the library. You ran home specifically to look into New Shadow Style, so of course you’d search for a higher-tier alternative in the same category."

He continued, utterly natural.

"New Shadow Style’s Simple Domain and the Big Three Sorcerer Families’ Falling Blossom Emotion are both defensive measures against a domain’s guaranteed-hit effect. In the reference texts, they’re listed almost next to each other. Was it really that hard to guess?"

"Tch... the theory doesn’t matter!"

Gojo was annoyed that his thunder had been stolen, but that irritation lasted about half a second. He tossed it away like trash and puffed out his chest.

"What matters is that I have now completely and totally mastered Falling Blossom Emotion!"

Silence sat over the training ground for several seconds.

Gojo barely managed to stop himself from saying anything else.

But Touma could see it clearly through the sunglasses sliding down Gojo’s nose.

Those eyes were burning with hints.

Loud, desperate, painfully obvious hints.

It was exactly like a kindergartener who had scored a perfect hundred on a test and was now holding the paper up in front of a parent, silently begging for candy.

There was no mystery about what Gojo wanted.

He was waiting. Practically vibrating. All Touma had to do was lower his head and say the line Gojo was dreaming of.

Wow, that’s incredible. I want to learn it. Please teach me.

Unfortunately, for anti-domain defenses, Touma was currently leaning toward the New Shadow Style Simple Domain he had just acquired.

He had only forced the technique into existence a short while ago. The barrier was still unstable. His immediate plan was to use his passive skill to grind Simple Domain’s proficiency to the limit.

Trying to chew too much at once was how people mastered nothing.

He truly had no plan to learn both New Shadow Style and Falling Blossom Emotion at the same time.

And yet...

Touma looked at Gojo’s face, pink with anticipation, and got the distinct feeling that if he answered honestly right now...

Sorry, but I’m not planning to learn Falling Blossom Emotion at the moment.

...the bristling white-haired menace in front of him might suffer a complete emotional collapse on the spot.

Possibly one destructive enough to erase the entire training ground, Touma included, with a Hollow Purple.

A small ache stirred in Touma’s chest.

If only Gojo could be a little more mature. A little more grounded.

The thought faded almost as soon as it came.

Because Touma knew better than anyone what "maturity" meant for Satoru Gojo.

Suguru Geto’s defection.

The Star Plasma Vessel’s death.

Loss after loss, each one ugly enough to tear a person apart from the inside.

Growth was never free. Gain always came with a bill.

In the end, Touma surrendered with a silent sigh.

He adjusted his expression, looked up at Gojo with earnest, humble admiration, and carefully soothed the man’s ego.

"In that case... could I ask Mr. Gojo to teach me Falling Blossom Emotion?"

The effect was instant.

The moment "Mr. Gojo" left Touma’s mouth, Gojo’s entire mood shifted.

The smugness on his face hit critical mass. He looked weightless, almost floating, while the air around him practically filled with pink bubbles.

"Heh heh heh... Ahahahahaha!"

One hand flew up to cover his face, and he let out a laugh so gleefully villainous it could have been used in a final boss cutscene.

"When it comes down to it, you still need me to teach you! Since my idiot student is asking so sincerely, I, the strongest teacher alive, will graciously bestow my wisdom upon you!"

Then the laughter stopped.

Gojo shoved his face inches from Touma’s, eyes sparkling with the shameless energy of someone pushing his luck while he had the chance.

"So... could you say it again? ’Mr. Gojo,’ in that same worshipful tone from just now. One more time?"

Touma could feel the stares drilling into the side of his head.

Yaga and Kusakabe were both watching with the blank horror of people witnessing a psychiatric episode in real time.

Exhaustion settled over Touma like a physical weight.

His lashes drooped. With the boneless patience of a veteran caretaker coaxing a difficult toddler through dinner, he stretched out the syllables in a flat, dead monotone.

"Yes, yes. I’m counting on you then, Mis... ter... Go... jo..."

---

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