A/N: Welcome to my latest story: Potential Man. Here we go with this one. Next three chapters are up on patreon(https://www.patreon.com/c/Oghenevwogaga) already if you want to see them early.
"Where am I?" I tilted my head at him as he looked around the space.
"In our soul," I said, offering the explanation easily. I'd been here for long enough that I had more than enough time to think things through.
"Our soul?"
"Well, it's more your soul. But I've been here for so long that I feel some ownership to the space, you know?" I said. He shook his head, looking around the massive void that I had called home for years now.
"Who are you?" he asked.
"Who are you?" I turned the question back at him. I watched as he held a hand to his chin and began to think.
"Are you trying to say you are me from a past life or something?" he asked.
"In a certain manner of speaking, I guess you could say that."
"I could say that, hmm. And if you had to say something, what would it be?" he asked.
"Oh. I am me, and you are you. I am not you, and you are not me," I said.
"And that answers none of the questions I asked," he deadpanned.
"You're one stoic fellow, aren't you? I'd expect to have gotten some rise out of you by now," I said.
"Why should I get angry at myself? This is just a dream, of course," he said.
"Oh, that is where you get things wrong, Megumi Fushiguro. This is no dream. Not even in the slightest. Shall I tell you what happened?" I asked him, stepping closer. I said nothing about the strength I could feel flowing into my body—the power now flooding my every cell.
"You might as well. I've tried biting myself something fierce but I still find myself here."
"Of course you do. Because like I said, this is no dream," I said. He said nothing, just watching me with cold black eyes. At least the face I would be wearing in this world would be a handsome one. Small wins.
"This is your soul, like I said earlier. What happened was that when you summoned Mahoraga in your state of desperation and were summarily knocked unconscious, you got close enough to death that all I had to do was pull from this side to drag me here."
"And if I believe this nonsense is even slightly real, can you explain how you, a complete stranger, made your way inside my soul of all places?"
"No idea. All I know is that I've been here since the day you were born, Megumi," I said in reply.
"Since… the day I was born?"
"Indeed. I have existed here for just as long as you have. This is as much my body as it is yours, you know?"
"That's nonsense."
"So you say, but can you come up with any other reason for you to be here with me right now?" I asked.
"This could all still be some sort of dream. Or a curse. Maybe I've been cursed."
"Maybe you have. But tell me, Megumi Fushiguro, does this feel anything less than real to you?" I asked.
"And why would my subjective experience matter in that case? Even if it weren't real and I was under some sort of curse, then it would be in the curse's nature to convince me of its reality, so nothing I feel in this case is even close to credible," he said. I chuckled. That was a good counterargument even.
"Can you see the sun over there?" I asked, pointing at the setting sun to the side.
"I can."
"Once it finishes setting, if the two of us remain alive, then you will never wake up," I said.
"And if one of us dies?"
"Whoever dies remains dead. Whichever one of us remains at the end of today will return to your body."
"So you want to steal my body," he said.
"I do."
"And if I choose not to participate in this nonsense?"
"Then you never wake, and what happens to your sister then? You might not know this, but Kenjaku has involved her in the nonsense he's getting up to, and if you do nothing about it, she becomes one of his playthings to kill and let die for his amusement," I said, watching the rage build in his body before he released it with a breath.
"You need me to willingly declare participation," he said.
"Yes, I do," I admitted.
"Else, you would have just attacked me as soon as I arrived. Now the only question remains: why? Because you cannot take over my body without my consent?"
"No. Incorrect. I could take over your body, but I don't want that. I want us to fuse," I said.
"What?"
"Taking over your body means I would receive the Ten Shadows as you have them now, but I would lose access to my own cursed technique and my reserves of cursed energy which I have been developing inside your soul from the very beginning."
"I see what's in it for you, but what's in it for me?" he asked.
"If you win, things go the other way. You receive my cursed energy, and my cursed technique," I said.
"Which is?"
"Nah-uh, you can figure it out yourself," I said, and warning given, I took my stance.
"Do we have a deal?" I asked, watching the way Megumi looked around the void we stood in. The only light coming from the rapidly setting sun.
"Deal," he said, and formed a seal with his hands. Almost instantly, the elephant shikigami rose from his shadows, blasting a torrent of water in my direction. Thankfully, I was not there when the water arrived. I dodged to the side, moving as quickly as I ever had.
The bird shikigami, Nue, was next. I watched as it formed bolts of lightning in its wings before striking me with them. I banked sharply, turning left and managing to avoid the whole attack in short order.
Megumi himself was in my face next. He punched out. I ducked to the side, allowing the punch to sail past me before I grabbed a hold of his shoulder and slammed him straight into the ground. He landed, formed a seal with only one hand, and a flood of rabbits appeared between us, pushing me backwards. And then from the shadows erupted the Divine Dog Totality, perfectly poised to rip me to shreds.
I mapped out their positions in my mind. The dog was to my back left. It was going to rip into me in two point three four seconds if I did nothing about that. The elephant was straight ahead, preparing another torrent of water to tear through my body. Nue was flying above, arcs of electrical current building across its wings. The rabbits were many and varied along the floor. I ignored them. They weren't the threat.
Megumi himself was to the side of the elephant, crouched within its shadow and preparing his next move, no doubt.
So I pulled for my own shadow, the place where light did not exist, where only I reigned supreme, and I knitted it. The Divine Dog Totality jumped at me, but only managed to cover half the distance. It was zero point seven seconds away from me when it froze in its steps.
"Shadow Possession: Complete," I said with a smirk, somewhat excited to have managed to get my cursed technique to work so quickly under pressure. I'd never gotten to fight anyone before, stuck here alone for all those years, but on the flip side, it meant I had so much time to work on my cursed technique. So much time to refine it to the level where I was confident that with it alone, I could take on and defeat its parent technique. Because I had no doubt that Cursed Shadow Manipulation was an offshoot of the Ten Shadows.
"What?" Megumi asked, shocked to see his shikigami frozen still.
"Shall I be petty now and tell you what my technique does?" I could see him running the calculations in his mind. Revealing One's Hand was an interesting form of Binding Vow because it could both advantage and disadvantage you depending on the technique. Of course, trying to deceive with Revealing One's Hand sometimes led to penalties if one wasn't very careful with how they worded things, but that was not the only downside. Even with 110% efficacy, some techniques were just too useless without the element of surprise for them to be all that useful.
People like Kirara, or the curse user with Inverse, or even Naoya and Naobito with their weird rules were better off keeping their techniques secret because losing the element of surprise for a boost was not just worth it in their case. And I could see Megumi wondering whether I was one who fell into that camp.
"My cursed technique is Cursed Shadow Manipulation. With it, I can knead cursed energy into my shadow and essentially knit it to do one of three things—one is possess the shadow of another and allow me to fully control their movements with my mind," I started, smirking as I saw Nue fly towards my blindspot. The Divine Dog Totality sprung from the ground, hitting the bird mid-air, biting into the space between its neck and its wing.
"The second ability of my technique is for me to make my shadows corporeal and use them for physical attacks," I said next, and then the ground around the Max Elephant and the rabbits darkened. The shadows rose as tiny needles that stabbed through each and every one of the rabbits while the elephant fell to a thousand pricks.
"And the third? Well, that is something you won't get to see today," I said, and the shadows around him erupted from the ground, holding him still.
"Megumi Fushiguro. Wielder of the Ten Shadows technique. I won't lie and say I expected better—" I began, but he interrupted me with words that made my heart chill.
"With this treasure I—"
Oh, fucking hell no. My shadow reached up for his neck, choking the voice out of him.
"Really, man? Can't take a loss in good faith? Going to just ruin everything by bringing that fucker in here?" I cursed at him as I closed the distance between us.
"Well, sorry man. You lose. I win. Now stay still and be consumed," I said, smashing my head into his. He fell back to the ground and I climbed atop him.
"I'm sorry, man. This is going to hurt, but on the bright side, when you wake up, you'll be me and I'll be you, and we'll be awesome," I said, before I hardened my fists with cursed energy and began to swing.
"Left, right, goodnight," I whispered as I wailed on him.
XXXXXX
"Oh good, you're awake," her voice washed over my position. Even without opening my eyes, I could tell that she was to my left and about four meters away. I could feel her cursed energy from there, and it itched at my skin.
"How'd you know?" I asked as I pushed myself up from my lying position on the bed. The body—my new body—felt incredibly light. Not light in that it was lacking in heft or anything. Just light in that I felt strong enough to move it as I willed. It was an interesting feeling.
"I can sense the disturbance in cursed energy that implies wakefulness. Speaking of which, that must have been some dream, huh," she said. I looked over at her for the first time: black hair that fell down to her back. Lab coat. Body practically sprawled over the chair as she smoked enough to put down seven people twice her size in one sitting.
"Dreamt I lost everything and everyone. Dreamt Gojo-sensei was gone," I said.
"I don't know about that first bit. Itadori is still around. So are Inumaki and Panda and Maki—you're close to them, are you not?"
"But Gojo-sensei?" I asked like I did not already know the answer to that question.
"Sealed. No idea how we'll get him out but we will," she said. When she said those words, there was something in it. Something in her voice other than the affected boredom she placed into every other word. She cared about him… Gojo.
"He used to say that I had the potential to be stronger than him, you know?" I asked, laying back down and staring at the ceiling.
"Gojo was never as proud of anything as he was the three of you. You, Kugisaki, and Itadori."
"Is Kugisaki…?" I asked.
"She lives. She might wake. She might never. Even if she does, recovery will be difficult. She will never see out of that eye again. But she lives."
"That's something at least." I sighed.
"How does it feel?"
"The cigarette? To be honest, I actually stopped being able to taste or feel them or anything a while ago. I just do it because I have nothing better to do with my hands," she said.
"Thanks for the heads up. But I meant being the last of your team. Geto is… And Gojo-sensei is sealed. So how does it feel?" I asked.
"It feels like you should get out of my hospital and stop being a nuisance," she said. I smirked.
"Okay then. But before I go, one question."
"I've answered enough of your questions," she said.
"How does Reverse Cursed Technique work?" I asked.
She looked over at me. Really looked at me, and then she scoffed.
"You don't have the talent or the control. If you had either, maybe you'd have a chance. But you don't. I won't waste my time explaining something you will never manage," she said.
"That's hurtful, you know?" I said.
"I get paid to fix your bodies, not cater to egos. Now get out. I have a good cigarette to get back to," she said, shooing me off.
I scoffed and pushed myself to the side of the bed before returning to my feet. She probably did have a point. I could feel the cursed energy within this body, and while Megumi had done a good job of refining his control and getting the most he could out of it, he hadn't done an excellent job. There was waste. I could feel it even now.
I stepped out of the med bay, not bothering to say anything else to Shoko. If she wanted to be an unhelpful bitch, then who was I to stop her? I'd just rub her face in it when the time came. Besides, Reverse Cursed Technique was the least of my worries. If I wanted it, I just had to tame Round Deer. And she was the next one in order, even.
I considered what I knew about canon. Around this time, Yuuta would probably either be making his way back to Japan or already swearing his Binding Vow with the higher-ups. Naobito was probably dying already. Maki had been in the med bay, but she was unconscious so that didn't give me any information. My understanding of canon told me that Megumi would head to Tokyo now, looking for Itadori himself.
Naoya, Choso, Itadori, Yuuta, all of them would be in Tokyo in the next few days. It was the place to be. I was beginning to come up with a plan, but I had one thing I needed to do first.
This was a simple world. For all of Gege Akutami's famed complexity and desire for elaborate systems, he had created an impressively simple world all things considered. Only one thing mattered here—strength. Megumi Fushiguro was said to have the potential to stand on equal footing with Gojo Satoru himself one day. He didn't have the mentality for it in the end. For all the advantages his cursed technique and breeding gave him, he just lacked that je ne sais quoi. That IT factor that separated sorcerers like Gojo and Sukuna from the rest of the sorcery world.
I felt I had it. I knew I had it. I just had to prove it to myself. That was why my feet led me here even before I made up my mind.
The training ground the first years had used many a time.
I formed a sign with my hands, forming the shadow of a deer with my fingers.
"With the sacred treasure of the Ten Shadows, I summon and challenge Round Deer," I said, and I felt my cursed energy flow out of me unhindered.
The shadow coalesced in front of me into a towering beast. It was a deer in name and only the vaguest of similarities. It was a massive monster, half again my height at the very least, with antlers that spread out to the left and right, coming together to be about my height. Instead of the thin frame that most deer had, it was muscular and burly. It looked like it could tear me in two if it wanted to.
It was going to be a challenge. My lips had spread into a smile of their own accord.
"Come at me," I snarled as my fingers moved to form the shape of a dog. I moved to summon the Divine Dog Totality but the second I tried to shape my cursed energy, it slipped from my fingers. Oh right, positive energy counters cursed technique. I didn't think this through, did I? The Deer just stared at me with its four eyes dancing with mirth. And then it started to charge. Fuck.
A/N: Here We Go! Next three chapters up on patreon(https://www.patreon.com/c/Oghenevwogaga) (same username as here and link in bio), support me there and read them early.