Curse Reply: After choosing Nawa, the cursed spirit cursed me for being cruel.

Chapter 120 Don't overthink it

boom!

A heavy sound rang out.

Without warning, Duanmu Yan raised his hand and punched Xia Youjie on the shoulder!

The blow caused Xia Youjie to grunt and stagger back several steps, a look of astonishment on his face.

Duanmu Yan withdrew his fist, shook his wrist, and looked at Xia Youjie, who was completely bewildered, with an undisguised annoyance in his tone.

"Huh? You're here because of this? Just because of these scumbags in prison who deserve to die, you're doubting yourself, torturing yourself, feeling tired? Feeling that your sense of righteousness is wavering?"

Xia Youjie froze, staring blankly at him, unable to react for a moment.

Duanmu Yan took a step forward, closing in on Xia Youjie, his gaze sharp as a knife, and his voice rose slightly: "Jie, wake up! You risked your life to swallow those disgusting cursed spirits, was it to save that bunch of trash?! Who the hell are you doing this for?!"

He pointed towards the training ground, towards the higher vocational college, towards a wider world:

"It's for Haibara, Nanami, Shoko, and Yagami-sensei; it's for those annoying but not inherently bad guys! It's for the ordinary people on the streets, just like your and my parents, who know nothing but try their best to live! It's for those who are threatened by cursed spirits, innocent victims, and whose eyes are filled with hope and gratitude when they ask you for help!"

"You are saving the part of this world that deserves to be saved! Those kind, ordinary people who will smile at you and say thank you!"

"Those scum from prison? Do they even deserve to be saved? They were just polluting the air while they were alive; only their deaths could purify the environment! If I had been there..."

Duanmu Yan's tone suddenly turned cold, and a chilling killing intent flashed in his eyes that Xia Youjie had never seen before.

“I won’t wait for the cursed spirits to make a move. I will personally kill them all, leaving no one alive, and clean house.”

These words were spoken with absolute certainty, without the slightest hesitation.

Xia Youjie was so shocked by these words that he couldn't speak, and just stared blankly at Duanmu Yan.

"You think you're suffering? How many pieces of trash have you even seen? You should know that I killed hundreds of people in the Panxing Sect back then, and I didn't spare a single one."

Duanmu Yan looked at Xia Youjie's suddenly contracted pupils and said calmly, "If I were like you, doubting and torturing myself over killing a few people who deserve to die, I would have gone crazy long ago. There are so many innocent people in the world who need help, why would I waste my emotions on those scumbags?"

"Jay, listen carefully."

Duanmu Yan stepped forward again, patted Xia Youjie's shoulder forcefully, and looked directly into his confused eyes.

"In this world, not everyone deserves to be saved or to be called human. Those madmen of the Panxing Cult, those hardened criminals in prison, have long since given up their right to be human and chosen to associate with curses and darkness. Protecting them is not righteous, it is foolish, it is condoning evil."

"We sorcerers toil with blood and sweat, swallow filth, and wield swords—all that we do..."

"It is to uphold the justice in my heart. It is to protect the smiles and light that we believe are worth protecting. It is to ensure that those who reach out to you with hope in their eyes will not let their arms fall in disappointment."

"Stop obsessing over trivial matters, Jay. Don't let the filth of that bunch of trash tarnish the original intention of your chosen path, and don't let them trap you in a dead end of self-doubt."

He gave Xia Youjie's shoulder one last pat, then withdrew his hand, turned around, and walked towards the group on the training field.

After taking a few steps, he stopped, turned around and said, "Try... looking to the side. Don't let that narrow path in front of you, which is supposed to save everyone, limit your options."

"Think of the ordinary people you saved from the clutches of cursed spirits, who were given a new life and sincerely thanked you; think of the adoring looks in Haibara and Nanami's eyes when they looked at you; think of us."

"The power of us sorcerers should be a blade to cut through the darkness and a fire to light the way forward, not... a shackle that binds and crushes us."

After saying that, Duanmu Yan stopped and walked towards his companions who were playing under the shade of a tree in the distance.

Xia Youjie remained standing in the same spot, motionless.

Duanmu Yan's words were like a thunderclap, exploding in the chaotic and muddy lake of his heart, stirring up towering waves, and like a gust of wind, dispersing some of the thick fog.

It's not to save those scumbags...

It's to protect what's worth protecting...

A sense of justice within oneself... rather than being bound by conventional wisdom...

There is more than one road...

He slowly raised his hand and touched the shoulder socket where Duanmu Yan's fist had just hit him; it still ached slightly.

But what's even clearer is the unwavering, burning will in Duanmu Yan's words, and... the understanding of his pain.

He looked at Duanmu Yan's retreating figure as he walked towards his companions, and then at his own trembling hand, the hand that had once swallowed countless cursed spirits without hesitation.

The wind in the woods seemed to have picked up, ruffling his clothes and bangs. The intense pain and confusion in his eyes hadn't completely dissipated, but something within them seemed to be loosening, beginning to... shift.

He stood there, silent for a long time.

Then he gently exhaled a breath of stale air, and his tightly pursed lips relaxed a little.

"The justice in my heart...?"

"My justice... doesn't need to protect everyone, it only needs to protect everything I care about."

……

At the other end, under the shade of a tree.

Seeing Duanmu Yan walking back alone, Ieiri Shoko asked, "Finished talking?"

"Hmm." Duanmu Yan found a clean rock next to her and sat down.

Shoko didn't press for details about what they talked about; her gaze remained fixed on Xia Youjie's direction.

"Xia You... he cares too much about everyone. He puts an unreasonably heavy burden on his shoulders, as if the safety of all non-magicians in the world should rest on his shoulders alone, and if he fails to save even one person, it is his sin."

"This kind of thinking... goes to extremes and can easily lead to problems. It will either break you down or... one day it will snap and you'll become more terrifying than anyone else. Sometimes I even think that if he could be like that bastard Gotiao, carefree and only care about his own pleasure, he might have an easier life."

Thinking of Gojo Satoru's awful appearance, she sighed. If only the two of them could complement each other, Duanmu's personality would be the best.

She has three friends: one is a scumbag, another is also a scumbag, and the last one is half a scumbag.

Shoko Ieiri, seventeen years old, a second-year student at Tokyo Jujutsu High School, a rare user of Reversal Techniques, is making a precise assessment of her interpersonal network at this moment.

Duanmu Yan was naturally unaware that he had already been labeled as half-scum in Xiaozi's mind.

"Yes, Jay... he takes the lives of other people too seriously, especially those who are unrelated or even unworthy. He carries too heavy a burden, so he walks slowly and is more likely to stumble."

"So I advised him not to think so much and to learn from me."

Upon hearing this, Xiaozi turned her head and looked quietly at Duanmu Yan with her deep brown eyes.

"Oh, well... hopefully he'll listen."

After all, in this college full of oddballs, it would be nice to have one more human being...

Chapter 121 Xia Youjie's Confession

(The following is Xia Youjie's confession)

I've known since I was a child that I'm different from the other kids around me.

I can see things they can't see, those beings of various shapes and exuding an ominous aura.

But soon, I discovered that I could touch and even control them. It was a wonderful feeling, as if I had mastered a power that belonged only to me.

In the world of ordinary people, I have always been the "other people's child." My parents are proud of me, my teachers praise me highly, and my classmates either envy me or distance themselves from me.

Perhaps it's a bit narcissistic, but the voices around him confirm it: good-looking, excellent grades, athletic, and gentle and polite in his interactions with others.

I enjoy the attention that comes with being excellent, and I habitually maintain a perfect image. I know how to make people feel comfortable and how to make the right choices.

It's not difficult; it just requires a little observation and patience.

When I was sixteen, a man named Masamichi Yamo, who claimed to be a teacher at a high-level sorcery school, came to my door and showed me the reality of another world.

Cursed spirits, spells, sorcerers... So what I saw were curses, and my ability is the "Cursed Spirit Manipulation Technique," a skill that appears only once every thousand years.

I accepted the invitation with almost no hesitation.

That makes perfect sense. My abilities mean I'm not meant for the ordinary life of a typical person. There's a wider world there, and heavier responsibilities, which is perfect for me.

As it turns out, my choice still seems to have been correct. After entering the vocational college, I adapted quickly and reached the standard of a first-level mage in the shortest possible time.

Even more fortunately, I met three classmates: Gojo Satoru, the Gojo family's god-child with the legendary six eyes and limitless techniques; Ieiri Shoko, a rare talent who was born with a precious reversal technique; and Duanmu Yan, a companion with a powerful armor technique.

The four of us were called the strongest class in the hundreds of years of our college by our teacher, Night Moth.

In particular, Wu, Duanmu, and I were known as the "strongest trio" because of our outstanding mission completion ability and powerful strength.

We worked side by side and solved many difficult problems. Although that time was busy, it was filled with a sense of fulfillment from moving forward together.

We are the strongest; we can change many things and protect many people.

Teacher Moth's expectations, the gaze of the sorcery world, the safety of ordinary people... at the time, we felt that these were burdens we should bear.

It is only natural for the strong to protect the weak.

But I don't know when it started, maybe last year, things started to change.

The frequency and intensity of the cursed spirits appearing seem to be increasing, making the task exceptionally arduous.

I often find myself embarking on a new journey as soon as one task ends. Transportation has become my second place of rest, and task reports are piling up everywhere.

Rest has become a luxury.

What I find even more difficult to talk about is that I gradually realized that I seemed to have been left behind.

Wu's six eyes and limitless techniques, along with his growth, are evolving in a kind of inhuman direction. His power is becoming more and more unreasonable and more and more unattainable.

Duanmu's armor techniques also showed amazing potential and growth. His control over power and combat intuition became increasingly terrifying through repeated battles.

Their pace quickened and their strength increased, and they could wield both inversion techniques and domains with ease.

I can sense that the lines that were originally parallel between us have begun to deviate.

I'm still trying to catch up, but they've already seen a much farther view.

This sense of disparity, though silent, constantly erodes a corner of one's heart.

Ms. Kuroi once comforted me, telling me not to put too much pressure on myself and to try to let go of some of it.

I tried numbing myself with even more demanding tasks.

Remove, absorb; remove again, absorb again... and so on.

The smell of the cursed spirits was as nauseating as ever. But what was even more terrifying was that I found myself starting to feel... aversion to human voices.

Hearing these voices, what welled up in my heart was not a desire to protect, but irritation, or even... indifference.

Their voices, and the excited roars of the cursed spirits as they devoured life... the boundaries began to blur in my ears.