1993.
Time passed swiftly, and the Six Eyes twins of the Gojo clan continued to grow.
Just as had been agreed all those years ago, when Kaito turned four, he was officially separated from his mother’s embrace and sent to live at the First Elder’s estate.
Otome loved both of her sons equally, but deep down, she always had a special protective instinct toward Kaito.
The memory of the blade pressed against her infant son’s neck that year remained a scar that had never healed.
As for Gojo Sei—their father—after that fateful night, he buried himself in clan affairs as a way of escaping his guilt.
Although he continued to provide adequately for both children, an invisible wall still existed between him and Otome.
Both Satoru and Kaito possessed the Six Eyes.
An unobstructed field of vision and the ability to perceive all things were gifts bestowed by heaven.
But within this clan, only Satoru was praised.
Kaito did not possess even a trace of Cursed Energy.
In the eyes of the conservative elders, he was a “flaw” of creation.
He often cried when he was young, causing everyone to believe that he was weak both physically and mentally.
But only Otome, through a mother’s love, recognized the truth.
Once, in the flower garden, Kaito suddenly burst into tears for no apparent reason.
While the servants were still confused, Otome discovered a nest of venomous insects hiding behind the bush where Satoru was standing.
Another time, when Satoru secretly ate a pastry, Kaito suddenly began sobbing.
Everyone thought he was simply jealous of his older brother.
But as it turned out, the pastry had gone bad, and Satoru had to be hospitalized that very evening.
Kaito did not cry because he was afraid.
He cried because his “sense” was warning him.
Otome could only speculate, recording her observations in the pages of her diary.
The day of their final separation finally arrived.
“Kaito, will you come with Mother to the First Elder’s estate today?” Otome asked gently, trying to hide the sadness in her eyes.
“Yes.”
Kaito answered briefly.
He was only four years old, yet there was an unusually calm quality in his eyes.
Satoru suddenly blocked their way.
“What?
Why isn’t Kaito staying with us?
He should stay here with us!”
Otome forced a smile and stroked her eldest son’s hair.
“Kaito is going to receive personal instruction from the First Elder so that he can keep up with you.
Besides, he’ll come home to visit at the end of every month.”
She could not bear to tell Satoru that the higher-ups feared Kaito’s “weakness” would taint the talent of the “chosen child.”
And the monthly visits were a promise she had forced those conservative old men to make beforehand.
But would they actually keep their word?
“Hmph!
Then I’m coming too!
I’m the strongest, after all!”
Satoru snorted arrogantly.
“Mother heard that someone skipped school yesterday.”
Otome pinched Satoru’s cheek, making the boy yelp.
Despite his arrogance, Satoru loved his younger brother dearly.
He ran off, then came back holding a small flute.
“Here!
Take this!
Whenever someone bullies you, or you miss me too much, just blow into it.
I’ll come right away!”
The flute was a toy Satoru had made himself.
He knew that whenever he was absent, Kaito was often looked down upon and bullied by both the children and adults of the clan.
Kaito looked at the flute and smiled faintly—a rare smile.
He tried blowing into it.
The sound that came out was rather strange.
Pffft…
“Sorry.
Looks like I messed something up.”
Satoru scratched his head awkwardly.
“It’s okay.
I really like it.
I’ll treasure it as though you were always by my side.”
Kaito’s words made Otome’s heart ache.
It seemed that this child already understood that their separation was not as simple as she had made it sound.
She was already afraid that those old men would not keep their promise about allowing him to visit every month.
The mother and son began walking away.
As usual, Kaito stayed on her left side.
She had never understood why before.
But now she realized:
That was the side where she usually felt the most tired.
This child had been quietly supporting her with his own body for a very long time.
She had only recently begun to notice that something was wrong with her health.
But this child…
had already been supporting her body long before that.
“Mother, when I’m not here, please take good care of yourself.
I hope that when we meet again, I’ll still be able to see you smiling.”
Otome could no longer hold back her tears.
She hugged Kaito tightly.
Her health really had been deteriorating recently, but she had never told anyone.
Yet Kaito…
What exactly had this child “seen”?
He was not weak at all.
On the contrary, he possessed a spirit so strong that it was almost frightening.
The mother and son parted ways, and Kaito was led away by one of the First Elder’s servants.
…
At the First Elder’s estate, life was actually quite comfortable for Kaito.
No one looked down on him for possessing Heavenly Restriction.
The First Elder also recognized his natural potential and keen observational abilities, and therefore focused heavily on his training.
From swordsmanship and martial arts to firearms…
The old man brought out all kinds of Cursed Tools and taught Kaito how to use them.
The First Elder was a master of Cursed Tools.
He had steadily risen to the rank of Grade 1 sorcerer.
Even Zenin Naobito—known as the fastest sorcerer—had once come to pay his respects and ask to become his disciple.
Kaito quickly displayed exceptional talent and mastered every method of using these weapons, turning them into extensions of his own body.
The Six Eyes allowed him to observe everything.
His body, meanwhile, became the means through which he sensed and controlled everything.
After witnessing him fight against several sorcerers his age, the First Elder sighed.
“What a shame.
With talent like this, if you possessed even the amount of Cursed Energy equivalent to Grade 2—no, even Grade 3—you could have gone incredibly far.”
But perhaps it was precisely because Kaito possessed no Cursed Energy whatsoever that his Heavenly Restriction had been completed.
Many times, the First Elder wanted to help Kaito break his Heavenly Restriction.
But every attempt failed.
Furthermore, many people who knew about the matter tried to stop him.
What if something went wrong and Kaito somehow absorbed Satoru’s talent in return?
The First Elder could only sigh helplessly.
As for Kaito, despite having experience with many different weapons, he developed an endless fascination with swords.
He felt that whenever he touched a sword, it activated some part of his strange sense.
That strange sense had guided Kaito ever since he was a child.
There were many sword-type Cursed Tools in the First Elder’s estate.
The Split Soul Katana and Inverted Spear of Heaven seemed to have been stored here at some point as well.
Beside the Cursed Tool storage was also a weapons-forging workshop.
Looking at the swords being forged, Kaito began to wonder:
Should he consider forging a sword-type Cursed Tool for himself?
Meanwhile, nearly a year had passed since Kaito left.
And just as Otome had feared, the promise of one visit every month had been a lie.
She tried many times to write letters and call Kaito.
But every means of communication was blocked.
If she had not sent trusted people to check on Kaito’s condition at the First Elder’s estate, she would have suspected that those people had already killed her son.
Satoru missed Kaito terribly as well, asking Otome and Sei about him many times.
She could only offer words of comfort and tell Satoru to train hard.
“Only when you become truly strong, when no one can restrain you, will you be able to freely do whatever you want.”
This was not empty reassurance.
She knew that breaking those harsh rules required tremendous strength.
Satoru had enough potential to accomplish it.
Her husband, Sei, although also praised as a prodigy, could only submit when standing before the higher-ups.
Otome quietly wrote her thoughts into her diary, secretly aching over her physical condition.
Her health was gradually approaching its limit.
Kaito had also written many letters to his family, but they were quickly returned.
Some even had the words “Useless waste” written across them.
It seemed that someone was intercepting his letters.
The First Elder sympathized with him, but all he could do was give Kaito overwhelming strength so that he could one day seize his own freedom.
…
1994.
When Kaito turned five, he asked the First Elder for permission to learn weaponsmithing.
Ordinary swords could no longer withstand the force of his hands, and they were useless against Cursed Spirits.
Most sword-type Cursed Tools were already being rented out for use, and Kaito also disliked the unpleasant looks sorcerers gave him.
After all, Cursed Tools were essentially their livelihoods.
After arranging a teacher to instruct Kaito in Cursed Tool forging and providing him with a forge, Kaito immediately got to work.
The basic principle behind a Cursed Tool was to first create a weapon core, then carve channels for Cursed Energy within it, and finally infuse it with external Cursed Energy.
Once the Cursed Energy had been infused, the weapon needed to be reinforced so that the energy would not dissipate.
This could be done through talismans, cursed techniques, or other methods.
Kaito was naturally intelligent.
Having inherited knowledge from the three great geniuses of the Soul Society, he immediately mastered the techniques of forging.
Even his teacher was amazed by how quickly he learned.
Within six months, Kaito was capable of forging a series of Cursed Tools capable of killing Grade 1 Cursed Spirits.
This changed the way the servants at the First Elder’s estate viewed him.
Some even began requesting Cursed Tools forged by Kaito, which made their Cursed Spirit exorcism missions much easier.
Even so, Kaito was still not satisfied.
Not mentally— or rather, not spiritually.
He felt that his weapons were still incomplete.
A Cursed Tool was an object containing Cursed Energy.
But what he was looking for was something resembling a companion.
A living object.
Could a Cursed Spirit be turned into a weapon?
He began to ponder the idea.
It sounded absurd.
But what if Cursed Spirits were used as raw materials?
After thinking it through, he immediately began to act.
After living with the First Elder for so long, Kaito had acquired a certain degree of authority.
He wanted to hunt Cursed Spirits.
The First Elder initially refused because it was too dangerous.
But after Kaito showed him several special tools, such as nets and containment vessels, the old man reluctantly agreed.
On the condition that he would accompany Kaito himself.
The First Elder conveniently took on several Grade 2 and Grade 3 Cursed Spirit extermination missions.
He believed they would pose no problem for Kaito, and if anything went wrong, he could intervene immediately.
After one trip involving three missions, Kaito returned with roughly ten captured Cursed Spirits and had conveniently exorcised thirty others.
Capturing Cursed Spirits was more difficult than exorcising them.
Furthermore, his nets had limited capacity.
If there were some kind of technique capable of subjugating and storing Cursed Spirits, perhaps the task would have been much easier.
After returning to the estate following a long day, Kaito’s shoulders were already aching.
Yet he went straight to the forge.
In the darkness of the underground workshop, flickering flames reflected in his blue Six Eyes.
He was experimenting with a process that no sorcerer in history had ever attempted.
The materials lying on the anvil were lifeless sword blanks and a group of Cursed Spirits screaming inside their seals.
The problem emerged immediately.
Weak Cursed Spirits lacked sufficient density to form a stable structure.
Powerful Cursed Spirits, on the other hand, were too violent and were liable to explode the moment they were compressed.
Kaito visualized the structure of a sword like that of an atom.
It needed a stable nucleus and protective layers surrounding it.
“If a powerful Cursed Spirit is the nucleus, then the weaker ones can act as electrons surrounding it and stabilizing the structure.”
He began the process.
Kaito forced a Grade 2 Cursed Spirit—the one possessing an ice-based technique that he and the First Elder had just captured—into the core of a Katana mold.
The moment the monster struggled to escape, Kaito immediately employed a condensation technique.
He compressed dozens of other Grade 2 and Grade 3 Cursed Spirits together, transforming them into an extremely tough yet flexible substance that wrapped around the icy core.
When the sword was plunged into a basin of cold water, an extreme wave of frost erupted, freezing an entire corner of the workshop.
The product was complete.
Kaito picked up the sword.
How strange.
It did not feel cold like metal.
Nor was it as heavy as an ordinary Cursed Tool.
When he swung it lightly, the sword glided through the air without making a sound, almost as if it were clearing a path for itself.
The sensation was not that of holding a weapon.
It was more like holding the hand of a friend— a living entity whose heartbeat and breath were synchronized with his soul.
The First Elder watched from behind, secretly amazed.
With his experience using Cursed Tools, he could also sense the strength of this sword.
Although it was a Katana, it felt completely different from other weapons.
“What will you call it?” he asked.
“Asauchi.”
A name flashed through Kaito’s mind.
He was fairly certain that his “sense” had suggested it.
“‘Weak Strike’ is quite a humble name for it.”
The First Elder could already tell that this was an excellent weapon, a proper Grade 1 Cursed Tool.
Yet the boy before him had given it such a modest name.
Almost excessively modest.
“No,” Kaito replied.
“It really is only an Asauchi for now.
It’s weak, but it has tremendous potential for the future.”
“Besides, it’s only a child right now.”
“I need to help it grow.”
Kaito thought silently.
The First Elder nodded thoughtfully.
But it seemed that the two of them were imagining completely different things.
The First Elder thought Kaito was using the sword as a metaphor for himself.
But Kaito was talking about the sword itself.
He could feel that this sword would continue to transform.
It would not stop at its current level.
This was no longer intuition.
It was deduction.
The Cursed Spirit at the sword’s core possessed an ability to generate cold.
But Kaito still could not sense that ability.
He believed it needed to absorb energy before it could unleash its full potential.