28. Liar

(A/N: sorry Geto, I gotta do what I gotta do.)

_________________

A few days later, Geto came to the village to visit the young child. It was supposed to be a day off, as Makima said, to reward them for their hard work. He recalled the conversation with Makima-sensei.

"If I recall correctly, you reported that you saved a young sorcerer from that suburb village? You should go and visit that child you, Geto-kun." She whispered to his ears, causing a shiver down his spine as she did that. It was too much for him to deal with as she appeared to have no restraint. 

He came up to the village as she told him to but somehow, the atmosphere was strangely awful compared to the last time Geto visited here.

Geto could feel the residents' animosity toward him. Their eyes glared at him every now and then, a hint of anger and fear directed at him. 

"Why is this…" Before Geto could finish his murmur, a sudden hurling sound aimed toward him. He dodged it easily and the object that was thrown at him was a sickle?

"You are not welcome here!! You monster!!" A middle-aged man shouted at him. This whole ordeal made him even more confused as he didn't even know why they showed such hostility toward him.

"Please, let's talk about what happened first." He tried to defuse this somewhat stiff circumstance he found himself in. 

"How can you be so shameless?! You still talk like that after what you did?!" The man shouted in anger and wanted to rush at him to give him a few punches. Luckily, there were many other people there to stop him but even so, their faces were tinted with clear hatred and disgust.

"You let that demon in a human skin out, you bastard."

"You should go to Mrs.Yashida's house to confirm." A passerby advised him. It was the name of the old lady he had visited a couple of days ago. 

Geto nodded and quickly made his way toward the house. On the way there, he was glanced at by many people, and their faces all showed the same hatred of the people earlier. 

Geto didn't even know what was going on.

When he saw the silhouette from afar, he waved at her to greet but oddly enough, she did not respond. 

But that was when he realized it.

Mrs.Yashida and her grandson were dead. 

The old lady had several cuts on her body, she had been tortured before getting killed. The boy on the other hand was much worse. Blood still dripped from the wound on his chest, his face was pure terror. Yet, strangely enough, the wound on his chest had been meticulously carved out a single word.

[Liar.]

"What the hell?..." Geto murmured in disbelief. Or rather, he didn't want to believe what was unfolding in front of his eyes. 

Clutching his head, he could feel the nausea coming up and felt like he could throw up at any time. Fortunately or unfortunately, he covered his mouth to calm down a little bit. Yet the disgusting feeling never waned but instead multiplied by several folds. It was more disgusting than when he consumed all those Curses combined. 

Despite being a Jujutsu Sorcerer, he couldn't handle this gruesome and hideous scene before him. After all, he was only a teenager with little experience in this line of work where deaths followed them every corner. 

'Don't worry, I will save you.' 

Geto still remembered the face of the young boy when he said those words. Why did he say that?

Now, those words were like an invisible Curse that haunted him. A Curse with no corporeal form, nor did it have the capabilities to harm him physically. 

But it was there. Like a slow and insidious killer, it silently looked at him whilst hurling those words in the back of his mind. Guilt and remorse swelled up in his heart, rotting away his ideology about saving those who were unable to protect themselves. 

He quickly found a place where everyone couldn't see him and vomited. Or at least he tried to do so. 

Geto could only make some gagged sounds as the murder scene quickly replayed itself in the back of his mind.

He gazed at his trembling hands with difficulty and for a flash of moment, he could see his hands tainted by blood. It was gone the next second but he felt it more realistic than ever.

'Save whom?' 

He chose this path of being a Sorcerer to help those powerless humans but what did he do exactly…?

A seed of doubt had been planted successfully.

Near there, a crow with yellow-ringed eyes stared at him silently, wondering what Geto was doing. Soon, it cawed a few times and flew away in the next second. 

Hearing that sound, Geto finally got out of his daze.

"What happened to Mrs.Yashida?" He caught a passerby and shook him vehemently, demanding a clear answer to this. The man seemed to recognize Geto due to his disheveled look and began to explain to him. 

"Her house has been Cursed to birth such a devilish child." The man shook his head and sighed.

"Yesterday, there was a scream at her house and when we came, the child had already killed Mrs.Yashida. Hahhh… She was a respected elder in our village." The man expressed his sorrow and continued to narrate the situation to Geto. But to him, it became muffled noises that slowly plagued his mind.

After a while, perhaps seeing the unresponsive lad's shocked face, the man shook his shoulders and managed to catch his attention again. He continued the story.

"He looked terrified when we came, frantically denying that it was not him. We have no choice but to lock him up and call the police." 

"By the time we checked him at dawn, he had already suicide with a last will letter beside him to prove his innocence. But who would believe that when we saw the child kill their grandmother with their own hands? Truly ridiculous." He scoffed at the child's last will. Geto stared blankly at the void and couldn't utter a word at how the event happened in just a couple of days.

In other words, Geto had indirectly killed their whole family because he set the child free?!

"You must be new here, listen to my advice, and don't come to her house, young lad. You could be Cursed the moment you set foot there." With that, the man left, leaving the baffled Geto standing there with so much doubt clouding his mind.

"'Cursed' you say?" Geto muttered as if the strength he had now was nothing but an illusion. 

_______

"We have reported this as an unfortunate incident so the Higher Ups won't hold you accountable, Geto-kun." Makima patted his shoulders as she passed by. She smiled sweetly at him but Geto couldn't help but feel a little horror looking at that ever-present smile that lingered on her face.

However, he still felt the need to compensate for what he did. His morals didn't allow for him to turn away like that. 

"Is there anything I can do?" He uttered those words with difficulty. His voice was hoarse as if he was being sunken to the depth of the abyss.

Geto felt like he had thought about being a Sorcerer too lightly and now, he regretted it. It felt like reality had mercilessly shown him what this shitty world really is. 

Seeing him in this terrible state, Makima reassured him with that usual everlasting smile. "You don't need to do anything, Geto-kun. The matter has been already dealt with." 

"That's wh-" Geto was infuriated by her response but he shut up upon seeing her eyes that seemed gleaming for a moment.

Makima leaned slightly near his ear and whispered with a hint of amusement in her voice. "It's rare to see people like you nowadays, Geto-kun. You have a heart of gold, don't be disheartened by what happened." 

"As the saying goes, let bygones be bygones." He could tell that she was laughing while telling him this. This further made him realize how much of a human worth is in the eyes of the Jujutsu Sorcerer.

With that, Makima left to do her paperwork, leaving Geto behind with his swirl of chaotic thoughts that constantly plagued his mind. He felt like a lost lamb in this strange world of Jujutsu.

"Did I really need to do this?" Geto questioned himself. 

Amid self-doubt, he felt an arm hanging over his shoulder. He turned back to look at Gojo and his shenanigans. 

"Are you alright, dude?" His best friend asked smugly as he handed him a soda.

"It's just the weather has become a little hot these days." Geto opened the can but he didn't drink it. He was still having a hard time here and he wasn't in the mood of Gojo's shenanigans.

"Now you talk about it, it does feel that way. Wanna go grab ice cream?" Gojo pondered and asked.

Dealing with Gojo was always a hassle but it helped him ease the stress that was bottling up in his mind. This made Geto chuckle a bit.

"Yeah, sure."