Chapter 45 — Reverse Cursed Technique
"Do you two need some private time?"
The upright, human-speaking panda grinned shamelessly.
"Salmon!"
The silver-haired cursed speech user, Toge Inumaki, chimed in—apparently in agreement.
"Both of you shut up too!"
Maki Zen'in was on the verge of exploding.
"So this is what they mean by 'inter-school exchange'—looks like you've exchanged more than techniques!" Nobara Kugisaki teased, slinging an arm over someone's shoulder.
Megumi Fushiguro and the mysteriously resurrected Yuji Itadori nodded vigorously.
…
After the crowd finally dispersed, only Utahime and the physician, Shoko Ieiri, remained in the infirmary.
"By the way," Shoko said as she pulled on a pair of medical gloves, glancing at Ren, "the reason you survived—besides Gojo arriving in time—was your absurd reserves of cursed energy and vitality."
"If it were anyone else, they'd have been drained dry long before help came."
She narrowed her eyes thoughtfully.
"Seriously… what are you?"
She looked at Ren, then at Utahime.
"I've never seen anyone with physical strength and cursed energy output like this."
"All your biological metrics are over ten times that of a normal person."
"It practically violates biology."
Utahime gently touched Ren's dried, weakened arm on the bed. She didn't answer immediately. Instead, she lifted her head and asked quietly:
"Shoko… is this really the best you can do?"
Shoko sensed something odd in the question but understood the concern of a teacher worried about her student.
She nodded.
"My Reverse Cursed Technique can be applied externally. But healing others is fundamentally less efficient and less precise than healing myself."
"With my current level, this is the limit."
"But don't worry. His condition has stabilized. What he needs now is rest and gradual recovery."
"I see." Utahime nodded once.
"Then may I ask you for a favor, Shoko?"
"What is it?"
"I want you to teach him Reverse Cursed Technique."
"…What?"
Shoko blinked in surprise and glanced back at the boy lying in bed.
"He wants to learn Reverse Cursed Technique? That's fine."
"But you should be prepared—it requires serious talent."
"I don't personally find it that hard, but even Gojo Satoru took quite some time to master it."
"And in his current state, intense mental strain isn't ideal. It would be better to wait until he—"
"No," Utahime interrupted softly.
"Now."
"I want you to start teaching him Reverse Cursed Technique immediately."
Shoko stared at her.
"Are you serious?"
"Don't worry about his learning ability," Utahime said with a small, confident smile.
"It's not just his physical metrics."
"Ren's learning capacity is also more than ten times that of an ordinary person."
Silence filled the room for a moment.
Shoko looked at the frail-looking boy on the bed—
And her eyes slowly sharpened.
"…Well then," she said, flicking ash from her cigarette into a tray.
"Let's see just how monstrous he really is."
"What exactly is Reverse Cursed Technique?"
Ren's head tilted left, then right, as he looked at the two women talking over his bed, completely puzzled.
Shoko turned toward him and began explaining.
"The cursed energy we normally use comes from human negative emotions. In other words, it's a form of negative energy."
"Did you take middle school math? A negative times a negative equals a positive."
"Jujutsu works the same way. Multiply two streams of negative energy together, and you generate positive energy."
"That positive energy is Reverse Cursed Technique."
"Unlike negative energy, which is highly destructive, positive energy has restorative effects on living beings. It can nourish and repair damaged tissue."
"So once you master Reverse Cursed Technique, you gain the ability to use cursed energy for healing."
"I see…" Ren nodded thoughtfully. "But how exactly do you multiply two negative energies into one positive energy?"
"Well…" Shoko paused, raised her left hand, extended a finger, and waved it vaguely in the air.
"You go 'whoosh' and then 'fwip.' Like—whoosh… fwip…"
She looked at the boy, who stared back blankly.
"Don't get it?"
Utahime broke into a cold sweat.
"Shoko… it's been years. Has your teaching ability not improved at all?"
"What's wrong with that?" Shoko replied matter-of-factly. "That's how Gojo learned it."
Utahime's forehead twitched.
"Wasn't that more like he unlocked it under life-or-death pressure rather than because of your explanation?"
Back then, Gojo Satoru had indeed asked Shoko for guidance on Reverse Cursed Technique. He hadn't understood a thing from her explanation—unsurprisingly—and only managed to grasp it when he was pushed to the brink of death and awakened his potential.
Utahime did not consider that Shoko's teaching success.
And Shoko clearly did not consider Utahime's opinion relevant.
"I told you," Shoko sighed, glancing at Ren's still-confused expression. "Reverse Cursed Technique requires talent."
"Then at least try teaching properly!" Utahime nearly lost it.
But just as the two began bickering—
Ren's voice drifted over, laced with confusion… and delight.
"Oh. So that's how it works?"
"I think… I get it?"
Both women turned sharply.
On the hospital bed, the blanket covering Ren's withered body began rising visibly.
His shriveled, waxen complexion shifted before their eyes—yellow to pale, pale to white, white to luminous, then flushing faintly with healthy color. His sunken cheeks filled out. His body, moments ago like dried timber, now seemed to regain vitality.
It was like rain falling on cracked, dying soil—withered plants springing upright in renewed green life.
In mere seconds, Ren's body transformed from near-death to brimming with energy.
He threw off the blanket, swung his legs over the side of the bed, and stood up barefoot, inspecting himself in his striped hospital gown.
"Something like this, right?" he asked, looking at the two stunned women for confirmation.
Plop.
The cigarette fell from Shoko's lips onto the polished floor, its ember flickering.
"You… learned it?"
"How did you do that?!" Utahime demanded, disbelief etched across her face. She trusted Ren's learning ability—but given Shoko's utterly abstract teaching—
"Well…" Ren lifted a finger and mimicked the motion in the air. "You just go 'whoosh… fwip…' like that."
"What do you mean 'like that'?!" Utahime cried in despair.
But Shoko suddenly broke into a radiant smile.
She slung an arm around Ren's shoulders.
"See? I told you my teaching method wasn't the problem."
"Ren, you're just like me."
"A genuine, no-questions-asked genius."