Cute, gentle, her most precious child.
That figure was the last thing she could remember.
A back carrying many things, gradually growing into the shape of an adult.
“Being able to give birth to you was truly wonderful.”
“Ahh… what a pain.” Outside the woman’s sight, Gintoki finally found a chance to hide in a corner and check his body.
Though it was not fatal, the Curse was like it was taking a field trip inside him, wandering around again and again after the fight ended.
His bones felt like they were broken, his nerves felt like they were about to fall apart, and his muscles were groaning too.
It hurt too much.
It hurt so much that he was kind of numb instead.
After confirming it was not fatal, Gintoki lay flat in this corner.
He had been sleeping on the roof for the past several months, so there was nothing he could do if he ended up with a little rheumatism, right?
Speaking of which, if he could get that kind of illness, he should have gotten it back when he was training as a baby.
Never mind.
Maybe this production team was just like this.
Gintoki suddenly felt deep respect for Jujutsu Kaisen.
Everyone living here, you’ve all worked hard.
“Brat, are you about to die?”
“You actually said it like a statement! Who talks like that? How can someone with your personality so confidently live off women? What, because when you were Shortsugi, girls would choose you? Fine, then no problem. Gin-san will curse you even after death!!!”
“Aren’t you still full of life?”
Zenin Toji grabbed him by the collar, just like several months ago.
“Hey, hey, what are you doing? I thought you were just following along to watch the show. Just when I thought you probably wouldn’t come out, why are you suddenly coming to bestow kindness? I won’t remember the favor, you know! You don’t do losing deals, right!”
“What, you really noticed.”
In the eyes of Jujutsu Sorcerers, Zenin Toji, who had no Cursed Energy, was basically on the same level as an inorganic object.
Not only could he freely enter and leave all kinds of Barriers, but as long as he wanted to, most Jujutsu Sorcerers could not even notice his existence.
This was a fatal weak point that Jujutsu Sorcerers, who were used to judging the world through Cursed Energy, could not avoid.
In other words, it was a blind spot.
But Gintoki had met his eyes.
While nestled in his mother’s arms, his beast-like scarlet eyes had sharply threatened him.
As if saying, don’t come near.
That is the existence he protected.
“When I saw a man with bad intentions following behind my young and beautiful Okaa-san, I couldn’t help wondering if she had kicked away her irresponsible weak-chicken old dad and found a new next guy. Not bad, not bad, he’s got potential, but he’s already grown crooked into this state, so aside from his face and body, what else is worth looking at? Change him, Okaa-san. That kind of feeling just came up.” This story is hosted at novelping.com.
“Do you really have any awareness that you’re in someone else’s hand? You can’t move, right?”
As a physical combat expert, Zenin Toji threatened him simply and clearly.
Gintoki immediately slid to his knees.
“I’m sorry. I was wrong.”
He had no principles at all, and Zenin Toji felt a little annoyed again.
Compared with this slippery little brat who apologized cleanly and neatly, leaving no opening for anyone to catch him pushing his luck, Zenin Toji was more willing to target brats whose pride was high up in the sky but who got crushed under his feet.
“Uwah, what’s with that face? Help, Okaa-san, someone here has a broken brain.”
Gintoki twisted with difficulty in Zenin Toji’s hand.
Zenin Toji could finally press him against the wall without any hesitation.
“My hand slipped.”
“You broke character, right! That was definitely on purpose!”
Right now, Zenin Toji still needed to find a lousy excuse.
Later on, he might be able to beat him whenever he wanted without any mental burden.
But this kind of evolution was probably not the future Gintoki wanted to see.
“Don’t joke around. I’m an injured person, okay? I’m different from a genius-sama with Heavenly Restriction. I don’t have an auto-heal buff. I’m an ordinary person who has to honestly lie down for a long time after getting hurt.”
“Genius? Heh, do you really think that?” Zenin Toji sneered without mercy, even though the words were aimed at himself.
The amount of Cursed Energy a person had was already decided from the moment they were born.
So Zenin Toji, who had Heavenly Restriction, did not even have a 6-year buffer period like Gintoki.
No hugs, no words.
From the moment he was born, he was treated as trash, ignored by adults like garbage, and kicked around by children like a ball.
Where was there any family love in the Zenin Clan?
It was twisted from the root, so everything was twisted too.
Talent was more important than blood ties.
Status was more important than feelings.
That was how it was from the start.
Zenin Toji understood this from the starting point of his life, and because of it, he felt despair.
Even if he reached both hands out to his birth mother, that woman would not respond to him.
“Isn’t that great? If you join the Olympics, you can make a fortune, sir. People are born with things they’re good at and things they’re bad at. You’re good at physical combat, just like Gin-san is good at eating sweets. Even if this world gets twisted by that pitiful Hijikata-kun into everyone competing over drinking mayonnaise, Gin-san still can’t eat that kind of dog food.”
“No matter how other people look at me, I’ll still straighten my back and live while eating the things I like.”
The Zenin Clan had no family love.
Then why did this kind of mother, the kind he wanted to protect with everything he had, exist?
Why did this dirty, soft, lifeless sun exist?
“You’re really naïve.”
Zenin Toji interrupted Gintoki with words that were not honest at all.
Since he could still say so much with so much energy after taking such serious injuries, his injuries probably were not that bad, right?
Zenin Toji used the same way he handled his own wounds on Gintoki.
“Aaaaah! Are you trying to kill me? It hurts! No matter how you look at it, I look like I’m dying from pain, right!”
“Endure it.” Someone picking him up and treating his wounds was a treatment far better than Zenin Toji had gotten as a child, when he could only lie on the ground and wait to die.
Pain was proof that life existed.
“That doesn’t mean you can just make other people hurt however you want! I’m dying, dying, already dead. Just let me die already—!!!”
After the treatment was done, Gintoki lay there and spat out his soul.
He could not speak.
With every breath, Cursed Energy tore through his body.
With every scream, Zenin Toji did not lighten his hand at all.
So under attacks from both inside and outside, Gintoki felt that the pain he suffered was not just 1 + 1 = 2, but 5 times more on top of that.
Jump-sama, where exactly did Gin-san offend you?
Zenin Toji had no mental burden at all.
He felt that he had done a grand deed that did not match his usual style, but absolutely counted as being a great good person.
When the matter was done, he brushed off his sleeves and left, hiding both himself and his name.
So in the end, only Gintoki was left.
He had become alone.
Or rather, he had completely fallen into being a lonely, isolated person.
But even so, Gintoki did not feel it was a pity.
‘Thank goodness.
My value can let Okaa-san smoothly leave the Zenin Clan, have the funds to start over in the outside world, and live on as an ordinary person.
That’s really great.’
‘I hope this time, she doesn’t meet that kind of awful husband and useless child again.’
‘All I can do is pray that Zenin Ogi’s neglect all this time, and Gintoki’s terrible attitude at the end, can have some effect.’
‘Even if it can’t leave a psychological shadow, at least don’t step into the same pit twice.’
Happy reading!