With the power of Friendship!

At an abandoned building, four people were there. 3 of them wore the standard uniform and 1 of them was an middle-aged man wearing suit. "For this mission, we expect for you 3 to face two semi-grade 2 curse spirits. Though it is possible that 1 of them has evolved into a grade 2 curse spirit."

The old man's attention turned to the building. "One of them is confirmed to be a grade 2 curse spirit. This is a test for your abilities but also your state of mind. If you can't kill these spirits than you'd have failed this test. No questions?" No answer was heard. "Good. I'll put up a veil for you sorcerers."

[Emerge from the darkness, blacker than darkness. Purify that which is impure.]

A black curtain appeared from the sky slowly enwrapping the area.

"It's a curtain specialized in blocking civilians from entering this place. The outside world won't interfere here. Good luck to you all." The man bowed.

"We got this from here. Right guys?" Haibara seemed excited as ever as he wrapped his arms around his classmates.

"Please don't ever do that. Ever." Nanami said as he brushed off his hand and walked in the building.

"Ouch... that's cold but he's right. Let's not waste time here and go exorcise those curse spirits. We don't want them to wander off now do we." Arai sighed as he followed him.

They walked in where the building was abandoned. There were scraps and garbage on the floor. The smell was unpleasant and dirty drops of water was everywhere. It was truly not a place for someone to live in. Nanami stopped as he turned around to the two.

"You two should stick together. Isao, you're the weakest here so you'll need as much help as possible. Haibara, your curse technique takes time to prepare to unleash its full potential. That's why Isao will buy you as much time as possible until you're ready. I'll go by myself since I'm the most well rounded one here. Take the second floor and I'll take the third floor." Nanami laid out a plan and left.

Both looked at each other and shrugged. "Well... he won against us so I guess he's the leader, right?" Haibara commented.

Aira sighed in defeat. "I guess so. No point complaining. Let's finish this and get out."

" How about we go out for food!" Haibara suggested. "Gojo and Geto will already be going so why don't we? I think we're supposed to go right back to school after this... but I'm sure Principal Yaga will be fine with this! It's our first mission after all."

Arai hearing this, shook his head in disapproval. "Haibara. Focus on the mission, we can joke around later but when it's a mission, we take it seriously. People die like this because of recklessness."

Hearing this made Haibara feel guilty. "Sorry."

Just then, a stinger of sorts came out of the shadows and striked at Haibara. "Fight." Aira pushed him out of the way and pulled out his daggers blocking the blow.

The appearance of the cursed spirit was now visible to him. It was a wasp. A blue and red wasp that looked like it just came out of a tropical jungle. On its hand were two spikes. It's stingers was dropping green liquid and its eyes were as black as it can be.

"Haibara." Aira calmly said. "Take care of the one behind us." Yu Haibara looked behind him to see another curse spirit hiding behind a wall.

It had grey pale skin with no teeth. Its body was gigantic sizing up to be at least 4 meters long. It had 4 red eyes and 2 arms that were quite short for its body.

'These two should be the semi-second grade curse spirits. Arai should be able to handle it. I'll need to exorcise mine as fast as possible. Dragging this fight for long is bad for my technique since I can't travel with too much clay on me.' Haibara thought.

Arai didn't have to wait long as the curse charged at him. Its speed was much faster than it should be as it flew. But in an enclosed space like this, it was very limited. Arai blocked its blows quite easily as it didn't have that much impact.

But the problem was its speed. Counterattacking it didn't work as it flew away quite easily. Which meant he had to immobilize it. 'And I've developed just the perfect technique for this.'

"Haibara. Can you hold off my curse spirit for a sec? Just make it so that it won't hit me with anything and it'll be fine." Arai said this while dodging its attacks.

Haibara put up a thumbs up. "You got it!" He threw a couple of clay balls that turned into the spiky dome he was familiar with.

Arai began gathering the curse energy necessary but he could feel the dome shaking. Cracks began appearing. 'Must be that other curse spirit. The one I fought definitely doesn't have that much power. Well it doesn't matter.'

At this time, the dome broke down as the curse opened its mouth ready to devour him. A paper of sorts appeared in front of him as words were beginning to appear on the paper. As the monster was just one foot from biting his face off. The paper disappeared and Arai opened his mouth.

"Stay down, dog." With these words, the curse spirit instantly felt like complying to the command as it did what it was told. It didn't move. Seeing this, Arai brought out his daggers and slashed its head multiple times killing it.

He puffed a bit as blood spurted out of his ear. There was a ringing sound in his ear which annoyed him greatly. 'Seems like using this should be a last resort. With my amount of curse energy, I can barely use it. What a pain. I doubt girls will like a guy bleeding from his ears. Guess I won't go out today.' Arai thought.

"Seems like you're done with yours. Man! Here I thought I was going to finish mine sooner." Arai turned around to see Haibara smiling at him. Behind him was a crushed curse spirit within two slabs of clay.

'It seems like he was able to catch it and crush it. Although his rank is semi-second grade, he's more like a second grade right now. Maybe a bit lacking in experience.' Arai analyzed.

At this time, dust began falling from the roof. It began cracking as both Arai and Haibara jumped out of the way. The roof collapsed as dust clouded their vision but when it dissipated. What they saw was Nanami sitting on a giant curse.

"Wow. You're beginning to resemble Gojo in a way, Nanami. Always trying to look like a badass. Of course, you actually do but its kind of annoying when you spend so much time with Gojo that you feel normal about it. No offence." Haibara said with a smile.

Nanami pulled his weapon back and slammed it at the curse splitting its head in two. "Let's get out of here. Job's done." He walked away as if it was nothing.

'Why do we always have to catch up to him? He always walks away when we're having a conversation. Can you just not avoid me for like one time.' Arai sighed in defeat.

"Hey, Arai. I wanted to ask you this."

He turned behind him to see that Haibara stopped walking. "What's up."

"How did you stop your curse spirit with just words? I thought that your technique was something to do with pacts."

Arai nodded. "Well it is. I just forcibly placed a pact on it. The pact was simply that when I said the sentence once then he'd stop moving. Took some inspiration from the 'Inumaki' clan.

They have a hereditary technique that can affect people and curse with words called 'Curse Speech'. I just did something similar to them."

"Placing a pact forcibly is something only I can do. But its not easy. I suffer feedback if my opponent is too strong." He pointed to his ears that were bleeding.

Arai began explaining his technique. "You see. When I place a pact on someone, I enter their Innate Domain. In layman's term, I enter their mind. To which I then place the pact I choose on them. Whether it works depends on how strong minded my opponent is."

He showed the blood in his hands. "And if you're strong enough, you can even attack me since I'm the one who went into your mind. I'm the invader and you've got a fortress that you've spent your entire life building. Who do you think would win?"

"The fortress would." Haibara answered.

"Exactly. You know about pacts, don't you? It has to be based on mutual interests. But my ability lets me play around that. I can forcibly place a pact without consent but its better if I don't.

Just like when I stopped that monster. I could of just said stay or stop but making the incantation longer will give me more of a weakness making it more effective. Like all sorcerers say: 'If you purse selfish gain beyond your means, you'll earn retribution.' And I am no exception to that.

So to put it simply, the Inumakis are better than me in this regards. Their technique is better than mine. I'm not as great as them in combat." His technique was only an imitation of the real thing. It wasn't on par with it at all. Knowing this just made him even sadder.

"I get it now. There's a lot of restrictions in your technique."

"Just like with pacts."

"Still that's pretty impressive. And you detected the curse faster than I did. What's up with that?" Seeing Arai a bit depressed, Haibara tried to cheer him up.

"Yeah, my senses to curse energy is much higher. So is my control. Since I don't have much curse energy, I have to focus on other things that'll make me stronger. Even you can tell, my curse energy level should be at third grade. That's what happens when you train from such a young age by yourself. You make do with what you have." Arai walked away to the exit.

"'Make do with what you have' huh." That line made him remember his sister who was at home. No parents and no relatives. He was the only who could take care of his little sister and he had to do everything to scrap by.

"I guess we're one and the same. You... and I." He chuckled before catching up to his friends.