Maki doesn 't show up the next time they 're supposed to meet.

Or the time after that. Or the time after that.

Toji knows, because he waits for her all day -- and he means

all

day. He rejects jobs on those days even though he really needs the money, because if she somehow changes her mind and decides to roll in at 10 PM rather than 10 AM,

dammit,

he 'll be there. It 's so pathetic that all he seems to be capable of is just showing up.

He tries to analyze what he could 've possibly done wrong, but he doesn 't even know where to begin to look. Maybe he just fucked up so many times she decided she was finally done with him. Toji couldn 't really blame her for that, but it still feels like his life force has been sucked out through his ribcage.

He may be able to see curses using his five heightened senses, but sensing the actual cursed energy of a person from this far away is beyond him. He couldn 't find her even if he wanted to. And

damn,

does he want to.

He twirls the item made of lenses and red plastic around his fingers absently. It took him forever to pick out a new pair that looked anything like Maki 's old glasses; these ones are a bit more of a pink-red than her others had been, with square eye-frames that lack a rim across the top. They might be a little big for her now, but she 'll grow into them. At least that 's what the salesperson said.

He 's not sure how Yuki imbued them with the power to see curses, and he didn 't ask. All she said was that he owed her a favor now -- as if he wasn 't

already

in her eternal debt for saving his life -- but she ended up cashing it in to carry her shopping bags for her during a day at the mall, and he had to sit through her very vaguely complaining about a nearby group of sorcerers that

apparently,

disagreed with her ingenious methods of eliminating curses. Toji had smiled and nodded and pretended like he understood, because he 's buttered up enough women to know what they want to hear, but Yuki saw right through him and smacked him upside the head. He knew there was a reason they get along so well. Any and all banter is totally genuine.

Toji sighs as he checks his watch again. It 's only then he recalls that he broke the stupid thing against some fucker 's face a week ago, so he checks the clock on his phone instead.

9:58 AM.

He hates himself for the swell of hope that still rises in his chest when the clock hasn 't yet hit 10.

He flops onto the ground and splays out like a starfish. Maybe the ceiling will give him the answers he needs.

He lays there for what feels like hours, but is probably only a few minutes. He 's about to resign himself to yet another day of drowning in his own stupid thoughts, until the faint creak of the old door comes from somewhere beside him.

So Toji springs onto his feet and whips around to face it. Maki is standing hesitantly at the door, not making eye contact.

'Maki! ' he says, for lack of a better greeting.

'Uh...hi, ' she mumbles, shuffling into the room. She stops a meter or two in front of him before turning to face the mirror, striking a ready stance that looks as tense as she does.

Toji scrubs his hands down his face. For all that brooding, you 'd really think he would 've bothered to think of something to say to her if she actually showed up. But nope. Not a word comes to mind, and his brain draws a blank, like a whiteboard wiped down before he 'd even had a chance to look.

'Hey, uh ' ' he begins intelligently, 'I 'm sorry. '

Cautiously, Maki glances at his eyes in their reflections. 'What for? '

God, he 's so stupid. 'I don 't really know. '

'It 's fine, ' she breathes, after a few seconds of silence that drag on far too long. 'You didn 't do anything wrong. '

Toji doesn 't know if he believes that, but he doesn 't press further. There 's a weird distance between them that goes beyond just physical, and it feels like they've taken a step back. But at least she 's

here.

Part of his energy returns just by being beside her, and he thinks distantly that the phrase

'absence makes the heart grow fonder '

is real fuckin ' dumb, because he would 've rather had her never leave in the first place.

They begin to spar without really saying anything, but they reached the point where they didn 't need words anymore quite a while ago. Their time together is a little longer than usual, and Toji wonders if she 's trying to make up for it, if she 'd practice during their time apart. It seems like she had. He feels a little proud of that.

When she tires herself out and gets ready to leave, Toji shuffles around in his bag before she can dart out the door.

'Oh, I almost forgot, ' he says, and no, for once in his life he actually didn 't forget, but the last thing he wants to do is overwhelm her right now. 'Uh, here. Got you some new glasses. They should be able to do the same shit your old ones did. ' He swallows thickly. 'Sorry they don 't look totally the same as those. I-- '

'That 's alright. ' Maki interrupts, something streaking across her expression that he can 't quite name. Sadness? Hope? 'They 're--they 're

perfect. '

'No problem, kid, ' he replies as he ruffles her hair, and she lets him. 'I told ya I 'd figure something out, right? '

Nodding slowly, Maki blinks away the moisture in her eyes that well with unshed tears. Shit, did he mess up

again?

'Um-- ' she begins with uncertainty. 'Sorry I didn 't come these past few times. Can you-- '

She cuts herself off, looking oddly shy. What the hell?

'Can I what? '

'Can you crouch down? ' she asks, finally meeting his eyes for the first time that day.

'Er...alright. ' Toji complies, sinking down onto his knees. He 's about to get punched by a seven year old girl, isn 't he?

But he 's not even close to being right. She takes a deep breath, squeezes her eyes shut, and throws her arms around him.

'Thank you, ' she whispers.

Toji can feel his brain walk out the door with his ability to speak, good fuckin ' riddance. 'Th-they 're just glasses, ' he finally chokes out. 'It 's no big deal. '

Maki just tightens her tiny grip around him in response. 'Not

just

the glasses. '

Oh, mother of christ. Toji 's not gonna make it.

In lieu of a reply, Toji hoists her up into his arms, balancing her in the crook of an elbow. She gives a little squeal of delight that turns Toji 's heart into jelly.

'C 'mon, kiddo, ' he chuckles. 'You wanna go get ice cream? '

Even from the corners of his eyes, he can see the huge smile that spreads across her face like a sunrise, and she nods fervently. 'Guess my favorite flavor! '

Toji taps his chin with the arm his kid isn 't balanced in. 'Hmm. Well, chocolate 's your favorite cake '.but I 'm gonna guess with ice cream it 's somethin ' different. I bet it 's somethin ' weird, like pistachio or peanut butter. '

'No way! ' she giggles. 'It 's green tea! '

'Hey, I was kinda right. That 's still a

little

weird. '

'No it isn't! ' she defends with a snicker. 'What 's

your

favorite flavor? '

Rum. 'Uh...vanilla. '

She squints her eyes at him in concentration, a smile still tugging at the corners of her lips. 'You 're lying, ' she says deviously.

Pfft.

Toji snorts. 'How 'd ya know? '

She beams back at him with a smile that puts the sun, moon, and stars to shame. 'I just did. ' With that, they head off into the afternoon.

Things go back to normal after that, or rather, better than normal -- if they 'd taken a step back before, now they 've taken a giant leap forward. She actually comes over to his place a couple of times so they can work through the stack of action movies he got for her birthday, and they have loads of fun picking apart the terrible fighting form of the actors. Sometimes he 'll pause it and act like a half-decent teacher and ask her to tell him exactly what they 're doing wrong and how to fix it, and other times he 'll pause it just so they can point and laugh at them.

Before he knows it, six months pass. He and Maki often do something fun together after their training, like go to a park or play board games with missing pieces that they scrounge up in alleyways. They make up their own directions, and he wishes he could say he 's letting her win, but most of the time she absolutely decimates him with no help of his own. Toji 's never been a fan of losing, but

this

he 'll do with a thousand-watt grin.

One day after training, they 're kicking back at his place, feasting on leftovers he 'd gotten from the night before. There 's a little ring from her pocket, and she whips out -- a

phone?!

'How am I

just now

finding out that you have a

phone?! '

he interjects.

Maki looks up. 'Because I always turn it off during training! '

Seriously? Toji face-palms. 'Man, kids are getting 'em earlier and earlier these days. ' He jabs at it with his fingers. 'The hell

is

that thing? There aren 't even any buttons. '

'It 's a smartphone, genius, ' she giggles. 'It 's pretty new, but you 've really never seen one? '

'I totally have, ' he lies through his teeth. 'You 're just a kid, why do you even have a phone? '

Maki 's face falls just a little. 'It 's so my family can make demands while I 'm out running errands. '

Fuck, he wishes he hadn 't asked. Toji 's stomach churns.

'Hey, gimme your number, ' he says.

She pauses for a moment. 'Well, okay. ' She hands him her device so he can punch his own digits into her contacts list, and Toji prays he can figure this stupid thing out before he makes a bigger fool of himself than he already does on a daily basis. He flicks his own out of his pocket and tosses it to her without looking up. Where the hell are the

keys

on this -- oh, there they are. Damn, that 's just ridiculous.

Maki cracks up a second later. Toji quirks an eyebrow through the black fringe of hair dusting his forehead.

'Oh my god, your phone is so lame! ' she cackles.

Yeah, why

is

his phone so lame? Yuki could 've afforded a

way

better one. He makes a mental note to whine to her about it later. 'Oi, watch it. It does what it needs to, y 'know. '

Maki just shakes her head and laughs again. 'Okay, I 'm done. '

'Yeah, me too, ' Toji replies, and thank hell, he was just barely able to put his number in her contacts in time. Success, he 's finally mastered technology. 'Call me if you ever need me, or something. '

'As if, ' she snorts.

'I mean it, ' he insists. 'I promise I 'll pick up. '

In response, Maki smiles back at him, then checks the time on her screen. Her eyes widen owlishly. 'Oh, shit. I 've gotta go. '

Toji 's jaw drops to the floor so fast he swears he can hear it dent the fake hardwood. 'Holy shit, did you just

swear?! '

He smacks a hand over his mouth. 'Are my bad habits rubbin ' off on ya? '

'Yeah, I guess they have. I can 't help it! They just roll off the tongue, ' she chuckles, and he 's about to be real proud of himself because hell yeah, he 's a hilariously terrible influence already, but then she adds, 'It 's totally worth every whip. '

Her words cut into him like a knife made of ice, razor-sharp and deathly cold. A gruesome fragment of a memory of laying on cracked ground with his guts spilled out slams forth into his consciousness, but only because it 's exactly how he feels right now.

'Move in with me, ' he blurts out, before he even has a chance to think twice about it.

Maki blinks at him. 'Huh? '

'Don 't go back, ' he demands, and holy shit, he 's never even raised his voice at Maki before and now he feels like he 's about to scream. 'Those fucking low-lives don 't have the right to call themselves your family. You don 't have to go back there. You can just stay here with me. '

But Maki frowns. 'Don 't look now, but I think a rat just crawled under your fridge. '

'I can

move, '

he wavers, and

dammit,

he 's trying to keep the desperation out of his voice and it 's not working very well. 'Throw a dart at a map with your eyes closed, I don 't care. Anywhere you want, we can just

go. '

Maki swallows hard, and begins fidgeting with the hem of her sleeve until it frays into a tassel of threads. 'I don't think I can, ' she says eventually, and it looks like it genuinely hurts her to tell him that. He can see it in her eyes that this isn 't the answer she wants to be giving, but she also must feel like she doesn 't have a choice. 'I 'm sorry. ' '

And at the end of the day, she still goes back to them. Toji 's always known that he 's a shitty parent, but he 's never been more certain about that until right now.

His daughter is being physically and mentally abused by the people she calls her family, and he can 't do a goddamn thing. He 's never felt so powerless in his life, and even fighting the white-haired brat pales in comparison. Being the strongest man alive is utterly useless if he can 't protect the one thing that matters to him.

He downs two bottles of whiskey, calls Yuki and shouts his feelings at her for a solid half an hour, she sends him every cat video she 's ever seen in her life, and he finally passes out around 4 AM.

-----------------------

Maki trudges home feeling dejected after her conversation with Toji. She could tell he was disappointed, from the way his face had contorted as if hit by a metric ton of bricks. She 'd almost wanted to tell him that the answer hurt as much for her to say as it did for him to hear, but she 's pretty sure that would 've just made both of them feel even worse.

She feels trapped enough as it is. She 's not sure if leaving the Zen 'in clan is even possible. She 's always wanted to get stronger, prove her worth, and become the head of the clan; but no one ever said she had to do that while

living

with them. Maybe if she were older, she

might

have a chance. But she 's a child, a girl, and lacks an innate technique; each of which alone is a fatal flaw in the Zen 'in family, and Maki checks off every box. All three strikes and she 's out in one shot.

She stops by a department store, a grocer, and a butcher 's shop to gather the list of items she was tasked with retrieving by her father. She lugs home three massive bags of merchandise, wondering with every step how the heck her father thought a seven year old could carry all of this junk -- he probably thought she couldn 't, which is why he must 've told her to do it in the first place -- but her second-favorite way to spend her time is proving Zen 'ins wrong.

Dammit. Maki sighs. Her first-favorite way to spend her time is probably moping on his couch right now. She tries not to think about it and isn 't particularly successful.

Maki removes her glasses from her face and slips them into the pocket of her skirt, the way she always does when she arrives back at the Zen 'in family compound. Naoya never found out that she got another pair, and she 'd really like to keep it that way.

'You 're late, ' her father spits as she walks in the door. Oh great, she 's somehow messed up already. 'Where were you today? Why are you disappearing so often these days? '

She 's not surprised it took him this long to even notice. 'Does it matter? I thought you 'd be happy I was out of your sight so much. '

Ogi scoffs, but thankfully he doesn 't press further. It 's almost funny how little he cares about her. 'Never mind that. Did you bring the items I asked you to? '

'Yes, ' Maki replies, handing him the bags of groceries and supplies. She drinks in the slight surprise on his face like an oasis in a desert. 'But who even eats

ox

meat? '

Her father looks at her as if she 's lower than dirt for even asking such a question. 'It is a crucial part of a customary meal in this family, ' he glowers. 'We are feasting tonight. Tomorrow is an important day. '

It is? Maki didn 't get the memo, but that isn 't surprising, either. She 's about to open her mouth to ask, until someone else answers the question before it leaves her tongue.

'You hadn 't heard? ' Naoya taunts, teetering out from behind the door frame like a drunken dancer. Maki wonders how much force it would take to knock him off balance. 'I 'm going on a solo mission tomorrow to exorcise a grade one curse to cement my promotion to grade one sorcerer. '

Maki slants an eyebrow and crosses her arms. 'So they 're just making anyone grade one these days, huh? '

Unsurprisingly, Naoya clicks his tongue in irritation. Her father holds up a hand to placate him and turns back to Maki. 'Silence, you insolent girl. Show respect to your cousin. '

Maki sticks her tongue out at him. Naoya flips her off.

'It 's at some private high school not too far from here, ' Naoya continues, because Maki 's convinced he 's in love with the sound of his own voice. 'The thing only ate a

handful

of kids, and the principal came running to us in tears. ' He rolls his eyes just for show. 'What a pathetic monkey. Though I bet

you

can relate. '

'You 're wasting your time, my boy, ' calls Naobito 's voice from inside the room. He approaches the doorway and joins his son in looking down on Maki. 'This one will

never

learn. '

Something painful and desperate surges through her like a flash flood, drowning her lungs until she can barely breathe. She squeezes her fists in resolution and clamps down hard on her tongue until she can taste copper. 'I want to come! ' she declares. 'I 've gotten stronger! Just give me a chance! '

It takes a second for the words to register with the three men surrounding her. When it finally does, their faces each twist into their own ugly brands of derision, and they burst out into a chorus of cruel laughter.

Maki 's expression falters, and she wilts like cardboard in a rainstorm.

'A

chance?! '

Naobito bellows through the laughter wracking his chest. 'You won 't even be able to

see

the damned curse! '

The hidden glasses in Maki 's skirt pocket feel heavier now.

Yes I would,

she seethes to herself. But she can 't risk them being broken again. It was hard enough to watch the first time. She 's not sure if she could handle a second.

'Come to think of it, there

is

a way you could be helpful, ' Naoya cackles. 'I bet you 'd make great bait. While it 's busy gobbling you up, I 'll barely even have to get my hands dirty. '

'Yeah, you 'll need all the help you can get, ' Maki snaps, but Naoya just snickers in response.

'Talk back all you want, but I know you 're just jealous of me. '

The worst part is that he 's right. She 'd sooner die than admit it, but she

is

jealous of him. If she 'd just been born with a cursed technique, then

maybe

she could--

Maki blinks, and her gloomy feelings dissipate all at once when the realization hits her.

Her old knee-jerk reaction fades away as new emotions settle in her chest. She 's not sure when she stopped wishing things were different, but even if she can 't quite place the moment the change occurred on a timeline, at least she knows

why.

Because if she had a cursed technique, that would mean she wouldn 't be like

Toji.

He could rip them all to shreds like tissue paper into a wood chipper. It 's comforting, in a twisted sort of way. So she tries to think of what he would do, if it were him instead of her standing here right now; that nonchalant confidence that makes him larger than life, the way he carries himself so sturdy that he could stomp on the chest of all the world 's evils and they could writhe and kick and scream from beneath his steel-toed boots, and he wouldn 't even

blink.

She thinks of movements swift as wind whistling between a mountain range but immovable as the peaks beneath, with punches like firing artillery and kicks like the blast of a cannon. He 's a far cry from the heroes she 's read about in comic books, tongue too foul and humor too crude, but Maki never liked those characters anyway. She always found herself rooting for the vigilante who did what both the heroes and the villains never could.

So she shifts her stance, tries to emulate his own. She sets her jaw the same way he does when he 's about to laugh, and narrows her eyes with the same fearlessness that he had when he 'd leapt after her in the wake of her falling from the tree.

The old men are too busy cackling to even look at her.

The only one that notices is Naoya.

His eye twitches, and he immediately stops laughing. Without another word, he pivots on his heels and marches back into the main room, and her father and his soon follow.

Maki doesn 't need to ask to know she 's not invited to his stupid party -- not that she 'd want to go. His father sometimes lets him drink at these sorts of events, and Naoya is a dreadful lightweight. He 's a pathetic and sloppy drunk, and even Maki 's iron stomach can 't handle that level of secondhand embarrassment. She spins around and flits back down the hallway to her room.

And doesn 't bother sleeping. When it 's just before 4 AM and she knows everyone will be sleeping, she tiptoes out of her room and navigates through the maze of wooden corridors leading to the heavy mahogany doorway of the Zen 'in family archives. She opens the door with a muffled creak and slips inside.

The file is still sitting out on the table closest to the entrance, just ahead of towering rows of bookcases filled with old scrolls that smell of aging ink and overturned earth. She hoists herself up onto the cushioned wooden bench and begins to read.

Not much is known about the curse Naoya is supposed to be fighting. Due to its deadliness, its power level is listed as

'most likely '

grade one, so basically it 's just a guess. There 's also a useless description of

'a large and scary gray thing '

supplied by the principal. But the file has the address of the school, and that 's all that counts.

If she can defeat this curse before Naoya does, it 's not just her they 'll be forced to acknowledge. They 'll have to acknowledge

Toji,

too. Saying she 's had enough of this scornful treatment would be the understatement of the century. She 'll prove herself. She

has

to. She 'll claw it out of their throats if she must, with nothing but grit and her bare fingernails.

She leaves the file in its original position and makes her way to the weapons closet. She selects a spear that glints at the tip when the dim light of the room ricochets off the metal, and she doesn 't look back. The early morning bus has an unnecessary amount of stops, but it can still get her there in just under an hour.

It 'll be alright.

She 's totally got this.

-----------------------

Toji wakes up stupidly early for no good reason at all.

The old digital alarm clock with blocky red numbers that glitch into pixels reads just after 5 AM, which is ridiculous, since he only went to bed an hour ago. His breath still tastes bitter with alcohol and his head feels like it 's been run over by a tractor. His sheets scratch at his skin from where his shirt rides up onto his back, and he groans into the emptiness of his room, pawing at his nightstand where his phone is charging. Maybe watching another one of those kitten videos Yuki sent him that Toji would never admit he likes will lull him back to sleep.

He glances at his phone with bleary eyes and blinks the world back into focus, and when he can finally make out the notification on his screen, his heart completely stops. His hangover slips away in an instant, along with every other feeling in his body.

He has a missed call from Maki. Just one, no voicemail. It 's from barely five minutes ago.

Call me if you need me,

he 'd said, and he promised he 'd pick up. Fuck, he 's so worthless. He flips open his phone and frantically checks his text messages.

He has a single text from her, sent two minutes after the phone call. An address. Halfway across the city.

As far as they've come, Toji knows that Maki would never call him unless she truly needed him. She 's just too stubborn to do anything else. Toji almost cracks his screen from how hard he presses the button to call her back.

It rings ten times before eventually redirecting him to her voice messages. He doesn 't try again after that.

He actually has a job today, but screw that. His daughter

needs

him. Nothing else in the universe could ever matter more than that.

He doesn 't know

what

she needs, though, so he 's gotta be prepared for anything. He grabs the bag he uses for missions and throws in a bunch of junk food because it 's all he has in his cabinets, an old bottle of water, and the first-aid kit Yuki bought him as a joke. He throws weapons into it at random and tosses it over his shoulder without zipping it up.

He really wishes he had a more convenient way to carry his supplies than this.

Toji tugs on his boots without bothering to lace them and pulls on a dark long-sleeved shirt over his old white tee. He 'll be fine no matter what the temperature, but Maki might need it. He leaves the belt of his combat pants unbuckled because he usually does that half the time already.

He 's on the fifth floor, and the stairway is narrow and overly convoluted. The elevator goes at the speed of a child pulling up a bucket from a well. Both are useless. Both are too slow.

So, Toji does what any normal person would do, and jumps out his fucking window.

He lands onto the concrete alleyway behind his building with a resounding crack, the pavement splintering under his feet as if it were plastic. He dashes out to the street, ready to motor off to her location, before his idiot brain realizes that he doesn 't have a goddamn car.

It goes without saying that public transportation is out. Even a cab wouldn 't be nearly quick enough to satisfy him. Toji knows he 's fast, but straight-up running halfway across the city couldn 't sustain the same velocity that a motor could.

He doesn 't have time for this. He withdraws a pistol from his bag, points it right between a motorcycle rider 's eyes when they pull up to the stoplight beside him, orders

'Off, '

and the driver complies.

Toji 's pretty sure he breaks every traffic law ever written as he speeds through the labyrinth of the streets. He 's lucky that the address is close to one of that of an old job, which is how he knows it 's in a real swanky part of town, where the city tapers off into the suburbs. He can 't even begin to guess what the hell she 's doing there.

It 's a school for a bunch of snobby rich kids,

he recalls as he races towards the twin iron gates that stand majestically between polished marble pillars at either side of the entrance to the campus, at the end of his lawbreaking journey.

And that 's when he sees it.

Toji 's encountered curses before, but none of them were even

close

to this. He 's a mercenary. He doesn 't do exorcisms. He 's fought sorcerers before, but he has yet to fight the monsters that the sorcerers fight themselves.

Because fighting sorcerers is

different;

for even in all their arcane glory, sorcerers are still

human,

tamed beasts made of flesh and blood and bone, with movements he can read like lines in a play and weak spots he can target like a master sniper. Toji can 't explain it; it 's like he was made for it. Going toe-to-toe with them in combat is more second-nature to him than the beating of his own heart.

But this, this

thing

-- it can only be described as a

thing.

Even if it weren 't for the sheer size of it, he would know it was a special grade. Noxious sludge in shades of heliotrope drips from the rows of fangs lining its open maw. Endless tails curl into its mouth in the twisted sense of an ouroboros, as if so ravenous for carnage it cannot resist devouring even itself. An exposed skeleton clings to its ashen skin like half-buried fossils, its ribcage raw and decaying with rot. Countless appendages stomp radial cracks into the ground and dig into the concrete walls of the main school building, pulverizing it into shrapnel and particulate dust.

Even so, there are parts of it that could almost seem human -- its eyes, even if there are far too many of them, are bloodshot and bleary as if tortured and in pain. Its claws are more like fingernails bitten by an obsessive child, tattered at the cuticles and scraggly at the tips. Its tongue doesn 't seem capable of withstanding its own teeth, and hangs in mangled shreds at the side of its mouth. Altogether, it 's an

abomination,

a being that haunts the nightmares of nightmares. And in one of its hands----

----is Maki.

Ah.

It clicks in that moment; something shifts inside him. Instincts unlike those he relies on when fighting low-lives and sorcerers activate like the flip of a one-way switch, instant yet irreversible, simple yet unbreakable.

That 's your child,

a voice whispers, from somewhere far beyond, or maybe deep inside him.

That 's your child it 's holding.

Toji takes a deep breath, and the feeling overtakes him.

'Put down my daughter! '

And Toji slams his foot into the pavement with the force of an earthquake, a web of fractures spiraling out from the impact 's epicenter. He streaks across the campus like a crack of lightning, charging towards the curse at breakneck speed. The curse must possess some sort of danger sense, because it rears its ugly head towards him and it

roars,

so powerful that it 's a physical force. It drops Maki like a forgotten toy and Toji swoops forward to catch her, but one of the curse 's disfigured arms knocks him back across the campus before he can reach her.

Toji whams into the iron fence encircling the campus and half of his breath abandons his body -- it 's only a conditioned recoil in his chest that keeps him from being left gasping for air. Bricks crumble and the metal warps against the force of him shoving back towards the monster, and he realizes that he might actually need to think about this for once.

You can 't exorcise a curse without cursed energy.

He doesn 't know how he knows that, but he just does. In his entire arsenal of weapons, he has exactly one cursed tool. A broadsword, maybe second grade at best. Yuki gave it to him.

For emergencies,

she said.

Don 't use it against anything unless you absolutely have to.

He 's lucky that he brought it. If Maki brought a cursed tool with her, it 's long gone now, most likely eaten. There 's a cut on its tongue too clean to have been made by its serrated teeth, openly oozing the curse 's putrid excuse for blood.

Unmoving, Maki lies limp in the fragments beside the curse. That tiny light of hers is flickering, like a candle about to blow out. Toji 's always been a risk-taker, but now the stakes are too high. He 's lived his whole life jumping from one mistake to the next. Here, he can 't afford to make even

one.

The curse writhes around in a cacophony of unholy shrieks, as if merely existing causes it excruciating pain. In a fraction of a second Toji is right before it again, brandishing his weapon, and he brings it down with all his strength to chop off the beast 's nearest limb.

The blade hits. It does absolutely nothing.

Toji barely has a chance to register the shock before what

might

be a tail bashes into his chest full-force and sends him flying. This time, though, he 's ready for it, and he rights himself mid-air, driving his heels against one of the gate 's stone pillars that collapses the moment he launches off of it. He slings the sword across his back as he racks his brain.

He 's not sure if the sword 's curse power just wasn 't strong enough to breach the skin of a special grade, or if he did something wrong that prevented him from doing so. That exoskeleton is unlike anything he 's ever fathomed. The kickback from the blow sent tremors deep into his marrow, vibrations echoing throughout the chasms of his bones until they felt ready to explode. If he were anyone less, he surely would 've died from the recoil alone.

It turns its focus back towards Maki like a shark with the smell of blood on its nose. Alright, thinking will have to come later.

'Hey, ugly! ' Toji hollers. 'Over here! '

He can barely even distract it, or at least, not well enough. Not when it has enough hands to catch his afterimages and eyes to track his every cell. But he has its attention captured, if only for a moment, and he 's going to make the best damn use out of it that he possibly can.

Toji surges forward and grasps his hands around its tail, and it squeals like a pig on a butcher 's block. He digs his heels into the ground, draws back his shoulders, and bends his knees the way he 's always taught Maki to do.

He doesn 't fucking care how many tons this thing is. He picks it up, and he

throws

it.

It slams into a nearby window and it

shatters,

shards of glass streaking across the dawn like a meteor shower. It rakes its claws desperately into the main building 's front facade as the rubble collapses onto its hideous face, dust clouding into its eyes. Toji ambushes it again and takes a wild swing at its back with an iron fist, but dozens of pairs of eyes lock onto him the moment he makes contact, then it flips back to try to crush him under its behemoth weight.

But that doesn 't even come close to working. Toji jets out from under it and lets it fall with a scream of agony. It clambors back up onto its many feet and hoofs at the ground like a bull at a rodeo.

The fucking thing has powers, because of course it does.

He 's not sure which of his senses picks up on it first; the tangible rumbling from the ground as rubble rises seemingly on its own, the smell of freshly-ground dust choking back in his nostrils, or maybe the ear-splitting clack of stone against stone.

Toji turns around, and kind of wishes that he hadn 't.

Behind him stands an immortal army clattering forth like a horde of zombies, a march of the living dead for creatures that were never even alive to begin with. Its innate technique has somehow breathed life into the wreckage, as faceless golems stomp towards him in a mismatched jumble of materials, a glass arm here, an iron head there. Toji almost chuckles.

For someone who relies solely on physical fighting and is trying to minimize any and all collateral damage, this is truly a worst-case scenario. He needs to contain the fight, and contain it

here,

and that 's without even taking the terrifying monster who created them into account.

Cracking his back, Toji smirks.

Guess it 's time to get started.

The concrete corpses lumber towards him from every direction. He stabs the sword into the ground like an anchor and swings himself around its handle, bashing his boots through their lifeless bodies and taking half of them out in one swift motion. He pulverizes the rubble into hail, stifling the air with gray stormclouds.

The rest continue towards him like ants eager to get stomped on. Toji 's always been a nice guy, so he gladly obliges. He slams fists through solid rock and drives his knees into wrought iron. He wrenches up the sword from where it cleaves the earth and lances it through three creatures at once, and they disintegrate into nothing when he yanks the sword back out through their breathless chests.

He rockets towards his next batch of victims, only for the curse itself to wrap an appendage around one of his ankles and fling him into the school 's olympic-sized pool, plunging him deep into the frigid water.

Toji feels his body waver for just a moment before launching off the floor of the pool and up onto the deck. His hair drips with chlorine and he shreds off his sopping wet sweater, leaving behind only the old white tee he slept in.

He sails back towards the curse and its troops, breaking the ground behind him as if it were ice.

A patchwork creature made mostly of concrete with a street sign for a spine gallops towards him, but that 's just what Toji needs. He rips out its spine and windmills it around to destroy the next wave of the cavalry, and the metal whines and distorts under his grip.

It 's a stop sign. Heh.

The curse hasn 't moved very far, which means it might need to be in close proximity to control its soldiers. It turns its head towards the gateway to the campus, and the metal from the fence contorts into a regiment of iron dolls, which tear towards him at the speed of sound.

The speed of sound is fast. The speed of

light

is faster.

Toji pole-vaults with the sign to land atop a hissing pipe that spews unidentified sludge onto his attackers below the moment his feet touch it. In the fray, he retrieves his sword and lunges at the onslaught in front of him and launches his greatest assault.

He must look fucking deranged, double-wielding a cursed sword and a stop sign, but Toji almost revels in it. He gets one last whack out of the sign before the pole snaps, and he lets it clatter to the ground beside him.

He 's never done this before. It 's not a memory, he can feel it in his soul. He 's never been in a fight where he had to protect more than just himself.

And he can 't decide if it 's making him a better or worse fighter. He 's taking hits he shouldn 't be taking, dodging blows he should 've parried. He 's paying far more attention to Maki than either the curse and its army or himself. Cuts and bruises mar his body like paint spatter, and the red from his wounds mixed with the water from the pool has decorated his white shirt with washed-out crimson splotches.

But the sheer increase in

strength.

He 's split equally between hacking through appendages with the sword and ripping off limbs with his bare hands. He can 't even feel his muscles; they expand and contract without his volition, as asphalt turns to dust from the wind force of his kicks alone. This isn 't talent. This isn 't practice. This is determination, stripped down to its raw bones.

These aren 't the instincts of a mercenary on a mission to kill. These are the instincts of a father trying to protect his child.

He wonders how the hell she was pushed so far, why she felt like she needed to go on a suicide mission just to prove that she deserves to live. Toji has no idea how to tell her that she already does. But he has to get the

chance

to tell her first.

He reduces the last of the curse 's warriors back to ruins. With its makeshift army decimated, the curse writhes against the detritus, tripping over its own limbs as it tries to get away.

'Come! '

Toji thunders, smearing his own blood across his face like war paint and licking the rest off his butchered fingers.

'I 'll show you what a monster

really

is! '

The beast screeches with an eldritch cry, and Toji tips back his head and cackles.

It dawns on him then. If most of its armor is on the outside, the inside must be where it 's the most vulnerable. He 's not sure if the inside of its stomach counts as a weak spot, but Toji will take what he can get.

It makes a last dive for Maki. This is the end.

Toji makes the decision before it 's even a coherent thought. Right as it 's about to swallow her up, Toji shoves her aside, leaps towards the gaping jaws of the monster, and lets himself be devoured instead.

The world goes dark as he 's consumed by the curse 's slimy entrails. He 's not much of a strategizer, but this is part of the plan. Not a bad idea for the curse to have an impenetrable skeleton on the outside, but he was right in assuming that its guts are totally bare. Bet the stupid fucker wasn 't banking on anyone being crazy enough to be swallowed whole, but Toji would almost be insulted if someone called him sane. He hacks at the soft flesh of its insides, and feels its body start to crumple.

Its horrible screams are even worse from the inside. The vibrations pulse throughout his veins until it feels like his blood is boiling. Acid burns his eyes, and his tongue tastes of gunpowder as smoke starts to fill the cavity in its core. Determination surges through him with dust and thunder, and with one last violent cleave of Toji 's sword, the curse lets out a final bloodcurdling caterwaul, then it dissipates into the morning.

It 's gone. The curse has been exorcised.

Toji blinks rapidly as the sunrise blinds his vision, but he doesn 't have the time to catch his breath. There 's only one thing on his mind anymore.

Maki.

Her body lies limp on the ruined pavement, blood smeared beneath her like a sacrificial offer. Toji bolts over to her and pulls her into his arms.

'Maki? ' he croaks. Water from his hair drips onto her cheeks, and she makes no movements to indicate that she felt it. 'Maki, I 'm right here. Can you hear me? '

For a few terrifying moments, Maki doesn 't respond. Desperation claws at whatever 's left of his worthless soul, praying to gods he doesn 't even believe in to please,

please,

just let her be alive. Finally, her eyes drag themselves open, heavy-lidded as she blinks away the debris.

'Toji? ' she breathes.

'Maki! ' He drops his forehead against hers, relief flooding him in a tsunami. 'Maki. Oh,

god.

You 're alive. '

'Toji! ' she chokes, frantically surveying his bloody and battered form, and then the waterworks start. 'Toji,

I 'm so sorry! '

'Sorry? ' he wavers. 'What the hell for? '

But Maki doesn 't reply. For once, she doesn 't try to put up a front and just lets herself cry, her sobs coming in wet little hiccups. She clutches his shirt with a tiny fist, repeating over and over

I 'm sorry, I 'm sorry,

and Toji tells her

it 's alright

just as many times. It takes a while for him to even realize that he 's crying too, his tears coming in salty waterfalls that cut clean tracks through the grime on his face.

'You got hurt because of me, ' she whimpers.

Toji can 't even feel the lacerations on his body. He could 've lost limbs and he wouldn 't have cared. 'It 's fine, ' he tells her. 'They 're not that bad. I 'll be good as new before ya know it. '

Doubtful, Maki knits her brows in concern and sniffles. 'Are you mad at me? '

'Mad

at you? ' Toji repeats. He wipes away the hair stuck to her face made tacky with blood, sweat, and tears. 'Of course I 'm not mad at you. '

Maki trembles. 'Why? '

'Why? ' Toji falters.

Because you 're everything to me.

Before that fateful day at the weapons shop, he went through life as if he were a drone. He had no concept of anything like

meaning,

and he avoided any fleeting thoughts about his past like the plague. He remembers how utterly foolish he 'd been, believing that he never wanted to remember his family. Maki is what gives his sorry existence meaning, and he 's never going to let her go again.

Because I 'd do anything for you.

He heard an old saying once that said,

'a hero would give you the world, while a villain would ruin the world for you, '

but he thinks that being a parent is the willingness to do both. He could 've died again without Yuki there to save him and it truly wouldn 't have mattered, as long as Maki had survived.

Because you 're my daughter.

Maki deserves a far better father than him, he knows she does. But he just can 't help that burning desire for

him

to be the one that protects her, for

him

to stay by her side, until she 's old enough to rush ahead of him and he can watch her grow up for the rest of his life.

And if there 's one thing he 's learned since meeting Maki, it 's that there 's a difference between

not wanting to die,

and wanting to

live

.

There 's really only one way to put it. Toji takes a deep breath.

'Because I love you. '

Maki 's breath hitches. Her grasp on his shirt tightens.

'You do? ' Her eyes gleam with some heart-wrenching mix of shock and hope, and more teardrops spill in little creeks onto her face. 'N-No one 's ever ' '

She cuts herself off, and Toji is almost thankful for it. If she 'd finished that sentence, told him that no one 's ever said they loved her before, that would be it. Toji would never be able to forgive himself for leaving her behind.

'Come with me, ' Toji breathes, clutching her shoulders tighter. He doesn 't care if it sounds like he 's begging. He is.

'Please. '

After a few long seconds, Maki nods against him, and it 's the most wonderful thing he 's ever felt in his life. She nuzzles into his chest and he feels her breathing slow into a steady rhythm, her tiny palm pressing against his thudding heart.

It takes a little while, but she finally calms down; and eventually, she falls asleep in his arms. So Toji lifts her up, walks through what 's left of the iron gates, and carries her home.

-----------------------

'Report: Zen 'in Clan Archives, Case Number 20163. Topic: Curse located at Nishimiya Private High School. Informational update, addendum 3.

The curse was found exorcised at 9:16 in the morning. Examined residuals have determined that the initial assignment as a grade one was in error. Forensic reports have concluded that the curse was undeniably a special grade. The only additional residual of cursed energy belonged to Maki Zen 'in. However, there were two distinct sets of footprints, one belonging to Maki Zen 'in and another to an unidentified individual, most likely a man. No further information about the mysterious person was obtained. Theories include effects of the special grade 's unknown innate technique, or a sorcerer with the ability to mask their cursed energy signature. Subsequent developments are not expected.

Case closed. '

Naoya clutches the report until his hands are shaking, the paper crumpling beyond recognition beneath his smoldering fingers.

'It 's not possible, ' he says to his wall. 'It 's not possible. Toji Zen 'in is dead. '

It didn 't even occur to the clan heads at their debriefing, but Naoya can think of no other explanation. There 's just no way Maki could have exorcised a special grade alone, and there 's only one person in the history of the world who could 've possibly helped her without leaving a trace. Naoya doesn 't believe in ghosts, and ghosts don 't leave any footprints. Maki 's been acting too suspicious lately, and now he finally knows why. Bringing it up to his father would be totally pointless.

This,

he will keep to himself.

He drops the mangled piece of paper at his feet, stomping disgracefully on its idiotic words as he shoves through his doorway.

If you 're out there, Toji Zen 'in '

...I will stop at

nothing

to find you.