I hate my life.
Imagine: you just finished reading a manga, your favorite character is split into two parts to stretch the season, the villain is the strongest being at that moment, and you watch one by one your characters fighting an epic battle against the final boss. The manga ends, everyone gets married and has kids, happy ending. You say it was perfect. You sleep... and wake up in that same world.
How do I know this?
"Yuji, did you know your mom is a man?"
"What are you talking about, Rya? You going crazy?" — said the future host of Sukuna.
Yes, the boy sitting next to me is the protagonist of this world, Yuji Itadori. When I woke up, I had a memory surge of this body. When I stood up again, I was in the occult club room.
I don't know why I appeared here. I didn't talk to any god, I didn't answer any random list of questions, but I'm here. And I don't know what to do.
Right now I'm just another high school student, one of Yuji Itadori's best friends.
"I hate my life."
"Stop that, you've said that like five times today."
"And Yawara-san, you're being boring today, why don't you help us solve the mystery of the girls' missing pens?" — said Yuji's friend. I think her name is Setsuko Sasaki. We're not very close, unlike Yuji, so I use her last name.
"Call me Rya, and it's definitely some pervert doing it."
"What?"
"It could be Yuji, he likes… I couldn't think of anything to finish my insult." — she said, having nothing to add.
"Don't put that on me, Rya."
"Take this seriously, it could be a ghost." — Sasaki said.
"A ghost stealing pens... yeah, that's the most plausible explanation." — I said seriously.
"See, even you agree, Yamada." — she said with a smile.
"I don't think that's what he meant." — said Itadori awkwardly.
That was the conversation, words coming out of my mouth like it was just another ordinary day.
Except it wasn't. He wasn't supposed to be here, those people weren't supposed to exist, I wasn't supposed to be in this body. But... I'm here, those people exist, and I'm in this body, like you were me.
My eyes go to the window, lost in thought, to a place that in less than a year will be almost destroyed in the fight of the strongest.
"Hmm. Hey, take your hand off my chest, you perverted girl." — I say.
"What are you talking about, you lunatic? I didn't touch you." — Sasaki replied.
"Then it was you, right Yuji, you pervert? I knew it was you stealing those pens." — she said, putting her hand on her face and looking to the side, as if he disgusted her.
"Stop it, Rya, nobody touched you, and I'm not a pervert."
"Sure, sure."
"No one touched your chest, Yamada-san." — said Takeshi Iguchi.
"Really?" — I asked confused, and everyone shook their heads. I put my hand where I thought they had touched. Because... I felt a strong squeeze on my chest, not an accidental touch.
"I think being around you is making me crazy." — I said with a thoughtful expression.
"Go to..." before Setsuko could say anything, the door bursts open. The door slams. Who enters is the student council president.
"President." — the three say.
"The guy whose name I forgot." — I muttered.
"Yamada, what are you doing here? You skipped all your classes." — the president said.
"...I skipped?"
"YES, YOU SKIPPED. WHAT'S YOUR EXCUSE?"
"I... got lost on the path of life."
Awkward silence. The president looked at me for five seconds and then turned his attention to Yuji, saving me from embarrassment.
"And you, Yuji, what are you doing here? Shouldn't you be in the athletics club room? That club has three people, not four." — said the president.
We all looked at Itadori, who quickly became confused.
"What do you mean? I enrolled in that club."
"That's not what your registration says." — he said, showing that he was listed in another group.
I have to say I watch this scene with more than a spectator's eyes. It's different when a teacher proudly says they changed a student's registration, when we go out for some competition and I'm the one running laps.
"Hmm... where are you going, Rya?" — Yuji asked.
"I'm going home, I'm not feeling well." — I said, turning and looking at him with a smile.
"The club classes aren't over yet." — the president said.
"You talk like you could catch me in a race." — I said already running.
A curiosity about me... this body is very fast at running. Not as fast as Yuji, but no one has beaten him yet in the 100 meters. The only reason I — this body — am not in the athletics club is because of Yuji.
"All right then, get better, okay." — Yuji shouted with a smile.
"..yeah, sure." — I shouted back, heading home. There was a lot to think about. I needed time alone.
I went through the back of the school to avoid running into any teacher.
When I was about to leave through the back of the school, I heard a sound. It wasn't loud. It was... eerie. Like someone trying to scream with a torn throat, an unnatural noise. I turned to see what it was. And then I saw it.
Red. Not bright red — dark red, almost black, pulsing like exposed flesh. The thing had no defined shape. It was like a heap of poorly made limbs sewn onto its body, many hands and legs, with something like a sunken face in the middle. The eyes were glowing holes.
It was coming toward me, very slowly, as if savoring my fear. As if it knew I wouldn't be able to run. My heart raced. It wasn't like reading a manga. It wasn't like watching on a phone screen at dawn. There was no soundtrack. No nice framing. No protagonist protecting me because the script says so.
I wasn't behind a screen. I was there. And I was weak, afraid to move. My body simply froze. My instinct screamed to run, but my body didn't obey. I fell to my knees, staring at it.
The red filled my field of vision. Closer. Closer — and then — it sank into the ground. As if it were the most normal thing in the world. The grotesque body sank into the ground without a sound. It made no noise. No impact. It just... sank. And disappeared. Gone. No smoke. No residue. Nothing.
Silence returned. And I was there on my knees, staring at nothing.
"What was I thinking, being a protagonist? Fighting Sukuna like I was something?" I tell myself.
"What was that curse? Grade 4? 3 at most? Why am I still on my knees?"
I stood up carefully, my knees aching from the fall. I looked one last time at the spot where the curse had been. Cold sweat running down my forehead. When I was sure it wouldn't rise from the ground again, I turned to go home, lost all the way, trying to see when I started seeing cursed spirits in my memory — and nothing. This was the first time I'd seen a curse.
"Was it because I transmigrated? Does that mean I have cursed energy?"
I looked around, seeing people living their lives, unaware of the supernatural around them.
I passed a bald man sitting on a bench with a curse like an imp on his head. I stood for a while looking at it, lost in thought.
I didn't see a truck coming toward me.
"You brat, get out of the way!"
When I turned, I could only see the truck almost in my face. The fear I felt at that moment... when I was about to die — boom — a crash and people screaming. When I finally opened my eyes, I saw a wrecked truck, pieces of metal around me. But between me and the truck, there was some kind of wall of dark matter. Before I could think of anything, that thing shrank and quickly returned into my clothes. And when it went back inside my clothes, I felt the same sensation I'd felt in the occult club.
When I stopped to think, I was already running home, following the path by pure instinct, without looking back.