A Morning Drenched in Ash
Tragedy never arrives with a grand entrance. It seeps in through the cracks of routine, creeping into headlines and television screens, staining coffee cups with unease.
The morning news carried whispers of something catastrophic, but it wasn't the words that unsettled Japan—it was the silence between them. The kind that stretched too long, like the pause before a death sentence.
Satellite images flickered across the screen, broadcasting devastation in high definition. What was once a thriving expanse of green, a forest brimming with life, had been reduced to a graveyard of cinders. No rustling leaves. No signs of wildlife. Just a vast, scorched wasteland—blackened earth, skeletal remains of trees, and a restless sea of ash swirling in the wind.
"Another tragedy unfolds," the newscaster's voice droned, its cold detachment more unsettling than sorrow. "Less than a month after an entire village was wiped off the map, a similar catastrophe has struck the border of Saitama Prefecture. Experts are currently investigating potential causes, with initial theories pointing to undetected volcanic activity."
The footage shifted. The aftermath gave way to suits and solemn faces—government officials, high-ranking sorcerers, and bureaucrats standing amid the wreckage, their expressions carefully composed, their postures stiff with unreadable tension.
The world would nod along. They would listen, speculate, then move on. But those who understood? They knew. This wasn't nature's cruelty. This was something far worse.
───⭑⭒⚊奈落の顎⚊⭒⭑───
Tokyo Jujutsu High.
It felt different.
The buildings stood the same, the hallways stretched as they always had, and yet—something fundamental had shifted, as if the very bones of the academy had cracked under a weight too heavy to bear.
No one spoke of it directly. But it was there.
Like an unseen hand gripping their throats, an invisible force pressing down on their chests—a suffocating, unspoken truth that curled through the air like smoke from a dying fire.
Reika.
Confirmed dead.
No body. No tangible proof.
Just the testimony of two sorcerers who had been there when it happened. And somehow, that was enough. Swallowed whole in Jogo's inferno—that was all they needed to know.
Jujutsu High Conference Room. The air inside was thick. Not just with tension, but with something heavier. Something that made every breath feel like dragging lungs through tar.
They sat in their usual places, the higher-ups arranged in their stiff, orderly fashion, their expressions carved from stone. A gathering of authority, power, and cold calculation.
At the head of the table, Yuuji Itadori sat motionless.
His hands rested on the table, fingers curled just slightly, as if resisting the urge to clench. His eyes—dull, unfocused—stared at the polished wood beneath him, as if searching for something in the grains. He had not spoken since the meeting began.
No jokes. No forced smiles.
Nothing.
Just silence. A silence darker than any shadow.
Two nights without sleep. Two nights spent replaying every second of that moment. Two nights of feeling that same, unbearable weight pressing against his ribs.
His mind whispered the same sentence over and over, like a curse he could never break.
"I failed."
"I failed to protect her."
"I failed as a teacher."
One of the higher-ups finally spoke.
"We understand the situation, Itadori," he said, his tone too flat to be considered sympathetic. "But we need to discuss our next course of action. Losing a student is a tragedy, of course, but the world does not stop turning because of it."
Slowly, Yuuji's eyes shifted toward the man. The look he gave him—it wasn't the look of a teacher. Not the look of a student. Not the Yuuji Itadori everyone thought they knew.
It was the gaze of someone who had lost everything once—And was losing it all over again. Silence crashed over the room like a wave. The official who had spoken swallowed hard, his throat tightening involuntarily.
Because for the first time—Itadori Yuuji didn't feel like just a man anymore. He felt like a threat.
Cigarette smoke clung to the air, a ghostly veil hovering beneath the grand chandelier's glow. Shadows stretched across the old wooden table—an ancient witness to countless discussions of the same grim nature. Discussions about death.
At the far end of the table, the higher-ups sat in rigid silence. Their faces were unreadable—not grief, not anger. Just the practiced neutrality of those who had seen too many corpses to be moved by another. The decision had already been made before this meeting even began.
"Her death will be ruled an accident."
The voice that delivered the verdict was old, rough, and edged with finality. The head of the meeting spoke in a tone that allowed no debate.
A few nodded in agreement. "The academy cannot afford to appear weak."
"If word spreads, there will be consequences. Not just for us, but for the other students."
"We'll say she died in training."
The words left their mouths as if on autopilot. No hesitation. No weight. No sense of loss—only bureaucratic procedure. But at the opposite end of the table, Yuuji Itadori did not nod.
He barely even heard them. Their voices were distant, muffled, like echoes trapped behind thick glass. His mind was somewhere else, circling one singular truth:
Reika is dead.
His fingers curled into a fist against the table. How many times? How many times had he sat in rooms like this, listening to people speak about the dead as if they were statistics?
No—how many times had he failed to save them?
His unfocused gaze locked onto the table, but his thoughts were dragged back to that burning forest—The fire swallowing that small figure whole—The look in Reika's eyes before the meteor fell—
Fear.
For the first time, he had seen fear in her eyes. That girl—Too quiet. Too strange. Too unreadable. But in her final moments… She had looked like a lost child with nowhere left to run.
Yuuji bit the inside of his cheek. Damn it. They weren't close. Reika was his student, yes, but she had never been someone who opened up to others.
Even among her peers, she had always been a shadow. There, but never truly present. Never truly connected. And now, that shadow was gone. And he hated it.
"I should've saved her."
"I should've been faster."
"I should've been stronger."
The higher-ups were still talking. Discussing how to break the news. How to control the narrative. How to ensure this tragedy didn't disrupt the system.
They spoke of politics. Of stability. Of maintaining balance in the jujutsu world. But not one of them spoke of Reika. As if she wasn't a person.
As if she had never been real to them at all. A slow, simmering heat began to spread in Yuuji's chest. His gaze lifted. They didn't care. And that disgusted him. But he said nothing.
Not yet.
Because right now, one question still lingered in his mind: Is Reika really dead?
The meeting room faded into meaningless background noise, their voices reduced to distant hums. Yuuji's mind remained stuck—
Trapped in the memory of fire consuming her.
His right hand remained clenched against the table. His left, however, curled around something cold. Something hard.
Something that shouldn't be in his grasp. Reika's bracelet. That old, worn relic. It should have been on her wrist. It should have been incinerated along with her. And yet, here it was. Cold as death itself.
Ash.
Yuuji lowered his gaze. Not to the table, but to the memory burned behind his eyes—
The dust left behind after that explosion.
The embers scattering into the wind, erasing all trace of her existence.
He wanted to deny it. Wanted to believe this was just an illusion, some cruel trick his mind played to cope with the loss.
But the bracelet was real. The only thing left of Reika. And the longer Yuuji stared at it, the deeper the guilt sank its claws into him.
"I let her die."
"I should've protected her."
"But I wasn't fast enough. I wasn't strong enough."
His throat was dry. His voice was buried beneath the weight in his chest. All around him, the higher-ups continued their discussion.
How will this affect the academy's reputation?
How should we inform the students?
How do we ensure the outside world doesn't see this as a sign of weakness?
How...
How...
How...
Yuuji pressed his lips together. Not one of them spoke of Reika as if she had mattered. She was just another case. Another problem to be solved.
Just like they had done with Nobara. Just like they had done with Gojo. And now—Reika.
Damn it all.
Something was stirring inside him. Not just anger. But disappointment.
In himself.
In them.
In the jujutsu world that never truly changed.
But for now, he stayed silent. Because there was no point in speaking in a room like this. These people would never understand.
So instead, he tightened his grip on that old, worn bracelet—And made himself a promise.
I won't forget this.
I won't let Reika disappear.