Unexpected Encounter Part 1

Beep Beep Beep 

An alarm clock beeped as if it was a bomb on a timer.

Immediately, Ken's eyes shot open and he got up from the bed, his hand on his beating chest.

"I'm alive. I'm alive-" He gasped for air as if he had forgotten how to breathe.

"I'm alive!" 

Ken was overjoyed, he had died and met a god after all. 

Then, his face slowly hardened with a tint of red blush.

'What if it was a dream?'

If so, then he just made a fool out of himself.

The room he woke up in was basic, plain walls, a single bed, a table and a shelf.

A lone window illuminated the window.

It took a second for Ken to realize that it was his room, just without the posters and the figurines.

'Does that mean… it was real?'

As if on cue, information rushed to his brain.

People with an innate technique will become aware of it within four or six years after they are born.

Ken, who was sixteen by the time of his death, was ten years due.

Hence, he became lightheaded as a result of the information rushing to his brain at breathtaking speeds.

A second passed then another.

Eventually, a gasp came out of his mouth as his eyes widened.

"This is it?

You call this a cursed technique?

What the actual fuck? I am supposed to fight against Kenjaku and Sukuna with this?

Don't fuck me with me, how, how am I going to save Gojo like this?"

Ken jumped out of his bed and threw a fit, he pulled his shelf down, flipped his table, and banged on the floor.

"What the fuck!?

The world went on with no regard for the sudden intruder.

Eventually, he calmed down. He deemed he needed a snack so he got out of his room.

'Huh?'

Instead of being greeted by the sight of the now familiar living room and the kitchen attached to it, he was met with a long hallway with doors.

Each door was carved with a number.

'This is an apartment?'

It seems only his room was transported along with his sorry bum.

He closed the door and went back to his room to gather himself.

'Alright, let's formulate a plan.'

As he sat down and thought, Ken learned that there was a lot he didn't know.

He was stuck in an unknown area, on an unknown date with a third-rate cursed technique.

The second question can be answered easily enough.

He reached out on the pile of mess he had just created and pulled out his phone.

There was no wifi, as the wifi remote used to be in the living room which he unfortunately didn't have.

Thankfully, the date on it was visible.

[14/3/2018]

'If I remember correctly, Itadori ate the first finger somewhere in June. Today is March, so I have around 3 months to prepare.'

Now, where was he? 

There wasn't any internet so he couldn't access Google Maps.

'The only answer is to go out and ask people.'

He wore a light orange baggy sweatshirt, tight-fitted sports pants, and black shoes.

He also found 10,000 Japanese Yen in the pocket of his pants for some reason. The only explanation was Loki was doing him a favor.

 Ken left the room, half excited and half full of dread. He locked the door with a key that appeared the same way the money did.

After stumbling around the apartment complex for some time, time he won't specify to preserve his remaining dignity.

'There's a lot of kanji around here. Fuck, should I have asked for an auto-translate ability?'

He found out that he could somewhat understand the conversation happening between people but couldn't read written words.

If he had to describe it in words, it was like whenever a person spoke, a subtitle was also being transmitted to his brain.

People still spoke Japanese, but he understood them in his native language.

The streets were bustling with people, so many people. Ken found it a bit overwhelming.

BZZZ

'Is that- Is that what I think it is?'

He was correct. He had seen his first curse.

A flyhead, ugly little bastard. A curse so weak that it isn't even qualified as a grade 4 curse.

However, how weak a curse might be, it needs cursed energy to be harmed which Ken has no control of.

He had to leave it alone with the man it had chosen to curse.

'On the bright side, I doubt a flyhead can affect a person's life that much so he should be fine.

If he is lucky, he will meet a full-fledged sorcerer who can take care of it.

But I shouldn't worry about other people when I'm in a difficult spot myself.'

Ken walked along the stream of people in a street as he wondered, will the translation go both ways? before stopping behind a girl.

He mustered enough courage and said:

"Hey, do you know what city is this?"

"Get lost"

"..."

Some people are just rude.

He reached out to other people only to be greeted with similar answers.

"What stupid crap are you spewing?"

"What are you on?"

"What kind of an idiot doesn't know what city he is in."

It took a couple of tries until he realized he had to target a different group instead of asking people who looked his age.

Teenagers were a bit impulsive after all. A grown-up or elderly might give a real answer.

"Hey, do you what city is this?"

"..."

He was flat-out ignored by a middle-aged man.

He wanted to attach a small lie he thought of after his question but everyone looked to be in a hurry and he felt a bit guilty by stopping them.

On top of that, the stares people give him itself is enough to scare Ken away.

He sat on a bench on a bench on a sidewalk and sighed.

'Damn it.'

His anti-social behavior naturally made it hard for him to talk to people, his fear of the translator feature stops working and people hear the gibberish, and the fact that seldom curse sightings scare him shitless.

All those combine and make communication hard.

One might say, what's to be afraid of curses?

It is easy to say that when the curses themselves are drawn. They look good on manga panels and TV for sure but imagine a live-action curse?

What can one do except be afraid of a breathing and moving Lovecraftian horror? The eerie sound they emit is always heard and not cut out for viewer pleasure nor do they ignore Ken.

They seem to have like a sixth sense as they always stare at Ken whenever he stares at them. Or maybe they have their eyes on him because of his cursed energy.

Either way, Ken felt nauseous out of fear.

'I'm pathetic. Most curses out in daylight are weak ones, grade 4 or 3 at most yet I'm already this scared.

What would happen if I met a first-grade curse? Special grade? How will I even survive seeing Sukuna?'

"Are you feeling well, young man?"

A rough calloused hand touched his shoulder, causing him to flinch.

Next to him, was an elderly-looking woman with grey hair and a thin physique.

"Ah, I'm… well I'm not fine I guess. 

This might sound stupid… but I forgot where I am. So I was wondering if you could tell me."

"That is certainly troublesome." The elderly woman massaged her temple as she frowned.

"Seriously, those social media are destroying your mind." She says after a long wait of consideration.

"Haha,"

"Well, if it makes you feel better, we are in Kyoto, The city of 10,000 shrines."

"That indeed makes me feel better, thank you." 

Energized, Ken got up from the bench and dusted his shirt.

"Take care." He said to the elderly woman before walking again.

For a while, he walked with no clear destination.

'Kyoto… The sacred grounds of Jujutsu.

I need to go to Tokyo though, that's where Sukuna is. If I can go to Itadori's school and grab the cursed finger before he takes it, I can prevent the future.

Not to mention, I can go to Jujutsu High and learn actual jujutsu.

Man, I wanna land a black flash. I wanna become high.'

The grumbling of his stomach broke him out of his daze, making him aware of how hungry he was.

'I will encounter a restaurant as long as I keep walking right? I don't have to necessarily know where I'm going.

Although it would be ideal if I knew the way back.'

In the end, he ended up going to a stall and having some sushi for 2,500 yen.

'That was nice. I do need to go back home, though.

I also need to get a job so I can get money to afford a trip to Tokyo. This is frustrating.'

What was even more frustrating was that Ken didn't know which way he came from.

He dug up his memory and tried to retrace his steps.

He had the thought of using landmarks to get back on track but he was so scared of cursed spirits and people that he wasn't aware of the environment.

It was possible to ask people, but he didn't know where the house was.

"Looks like I'm gonna become homeless," he said as he watched the sun dip below the horizon.

'I wonder if there are internet cafes that I can spend the night in. I should ask somebody.'

Now that he had done it before, talking to people seemed less scary. Or maybe the thought of spending the cold night outside in a world where cursed spirits roam free was overpowering it.

Either way, he had grown some spine.

'But where are all the people?' 

Indeed, it was weird.

'Oh! There!'

He spotted a figure of a man not too far away and jogged up to him.

"Hello! Do you know any internet cafes around here? I'm… kinda…., huff, uhh... lost? Haha?"

'Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, why is he here?'

Now that he was closer to the man, he could see some details about him.

A decently tall stature, long charismatic hair, a monk outfit, and a stitch across the forehead.

This was the man, the mastermind, Kenjaku.