The Strongest | ɢᴏᴊᴏ ꜱᴀᴛᴏʀᴜ

Chapter 31

"It's Wednesday already." I know Shoko is only saying this to me at breakfast because she wants to make me believe that the weekend will come sooner than expected, hopefully bringing Gojo with it. I haven't told her about our phone call last night; mainly because it was nothing worth mentioning, but also because I haven't heard from him since. He's probably on another very important mission while I'm stuck here teaching students who would rather be anywhere else in the world.

A sigh is the only response I can give her, but I force a smile, too, and start to eat. My plan for today so far is two hours with the second-years and one hour private training with one of them again. She came up to me just before breakfast and asked if I could squeeze her in, and I told her I could. It dawns on me suddenly that my life is way less exciting than Gojo's, even though I'm a sorcerer, too.

Class is sometimes less exhausting than other times, especially when my students are focused and interested in what I have to tell them. As a Jujutsu sorcerer, you mainly rely on practical experience than sitting in a classroom all day, listening to someone explaining what curses are and how to fight them. But today, we're talking about the former Jujutsu sorcerer Ryomen Sukuna, whose fingers are being collected and stored at the school.

The three students in my class are actively listening and participating, and for once, they seem genuinely curious. It makes me smile when they start to discuss amongst themselves, and I wonder if they're like this all the time with Gojo. He's usually responsible for the first-years, and the second-years are mine to teach, but last week, we had to switch because of his busy schedule. I'm glad to have my class back, though, because the first-years are less nice and less focused.

"So," I say loudly, clapping my hands together to get their attention and make them stop discussing. When every eye is on me, I smile. "If you had to find one of these fingers, how would you go about that?"

The question triggers another round of debating, and I even have to cut them short when the lesson ends. I promise that we'll resume in two days and send them on their way. I'm still smiling when I get to the cafeteria to have lunch. Shoko is already sitting at one of the tables, and I'm excited to see that Utahime is here, too.

"Hey!" I grin when I get to their table with my food. Utahime beams at me, and I sit down next to her. The three of us fall into effortless conversation while we enjoy our food together. I almost don't think of Gojo, but when Utahime mentions that she saw him leave early this morning while it was still dark, I listen up.

"Gakuganji is really hard on him, I think," Utahime mumbles.

"For good reason," Shoko says, and I nod. "Satoru is a pain in the ass, especially to him."

I laugh and nod even more. "Gojo should be glad Gakuganji even lets him stay. If it were me, I'd have told Yaga to forget about it."

Utahime grins. "If you can afford to forgo his strength, I'm sure you'd do that. To be fair, you'd probably do that either way."

My laugh dies down a little when I see the look on Shoko's face. She has her eyebrows raised, and this knowing smile as if she's telling me she can read every thought in my head and knows that I would not do that. But I like to think that I still would. Just because we got along this weekend doesn't mean that he didn't still annoy me.

"Anyways, what else is new on your side?" I ask, changing the topic.

"Gakuganji mentioned something about 'suspicious activity', but no one knows what exactly he meant by that or what's going on," Utahime reports, keeping her voice down so no one can overhear us.

Shoko and I look at each other and nod. "Yaga was behaving weirdly this morning, too," she tells Utahime while I nod along.

Just before breakfast, Shoko and I ran into him, but he completely ignored us because he was busy typing away on his phone. Even when he's busy, the principal at least acknowledges us with a nod or something. But not today. When we were past him, we stopped and turned around to look after him and found him massaging his neck with one hand. He was sighing a lot more than usual, too.

"Did something happen to sorcerers on your side?" Utahime asks.

I shake my head. "Not that I know of. Nanami came back from his mission just before my class, and when I asked him how it was, he seemed normal. Maybe he knows more, but I seriously doubt it."

Shoko agrees with me. "I'm sure if he knew, Yaga would tell us, too. Or at least Satoru would know something."

"Are you sure about that? Wouldn't the elders want to keep this from him until they absolutely needed him?"

I nod. "I think so, too."

We speculate a little longer until I look at my watch and realize I'm almost late. Utahime promises to stay for dinner, and I scramble to the door. My student is already waiting in front of the training room, and I open the door for her. We go through the basics again before I ask her to attack me. It's always the same process: I tell her to fight against me, and she's too shy to do so until I attack her first. We go back and forth for a while, and it always gives me a small sense of accomplishment when she's out of breath and I'm not. Since I'm her teacher still, I give her tips on improvement, and she immediately uses them.

"Good job today," I praise her when we're done, and she's wiping her face with a towel. She grins at me and thanks me for doing this again with her. "Anytime," I reply.

I don't even have time to take a shower before Ijichi tells me Yaga has a mission for me, so I head to his office. Whatever the suspicious activity is that has the principals so occupied, it doesn't stop my boss from sending me on a mission on my own. Curses have been reported in an abandoned house near here, and it's been confirmed that only lower-grade curses are present, so it should be fine for me to go alone.

Since I don't see myself having any other choice and because this is a punishment, I agree and assure him I'll leave right away. So my friends will have to wait for me with dinner, I guess. Although... I check my watch. Almost four. If I hurry, I can make it back in time.

"And look out for other sorcerers," Yaga calls after me before I close the door behind myself.

The request makes me freeze, the door halfway closed, but I only nod and leave. What would other sorcerers want from me? I only shrug it off and head outside, ready to take on another job.