Chapter Text
Kenjaku kept a passive smile as he heard Sukuna’s question. The man tilted his head slightly, “…pardon?”
The teenager sighed and repeated his question. “How do I become a monk? I want to change, be a better person,” he said, hands in his pockets. Sukuna wondered why he was doing this in the first place.
“…You’re a kind soul at heart, Sukuna.”
He steeled his resolve, grinding his foot into the ground awkwardly as he waited for the Abbot’s answer. A warm hand grabbed his shoulder, Sukuna found himself being forced down into a bow.
“I’m so sorry for my brother! Ignore everything he said, sir!” Jin ushered Sukuna way in a rush, the teen grabbed his brother’s face as he growled. “What do you think you’re doing?! I know you hate all this religion crap but don’t go to the head honcho about it!!” He added in hushed whispers.
Sukuna frowned, okay, rude but not too inaccurate of an assumption for Jin to make. Still, that did not mean Sukuna couldn’t get a little offended. He wasn’t even picking a fight, just asking about how to become a monk. As he opened his mouth to clarify, a smooth and oddly feminine voice broke the tension between the twins.
“It’s quite alright, dear. Your brother was merely asking a question,” the Abbot said, he strode leisurely towards the pair and faced Sukuna once more. “You asked of the process one requires to become a monk. As joyful as we are to accept another brother amongst our ranks, it’s not possible for someone to immediately become a monk.”
Abbot Kenjaku smiled warmly, “you can stay in the monastery for a month and see if our lifestyle is suitable for you. Even if it isn’t, you are welcome to continue praying without the search for enlightenment.”
Jin gaped and turned to Sukuna, dumbfounded by the words Abbot Kenjaku uttered.
Sukuna, monastery, praying, and enlightenment were four words that should never belong together! This violent, impatient, extremely tattooed, free thinking man?!
The violent man in question merely nods, a look of consideration in his eyes.
“When can I start?”
His brother’s going insane, who was this man and what did he do to Sukuna?!
Returning to their rundown home, Jin decides to spar with Sukuna in the backyard to let off some steam. The other teen agreed swiftly, fighting was never seen as a bad thing per se in the Itadori household. If you fought, you fought. If you got in trouble or made a mistake because of it, you make up for it. Sometimes, a punch in the face was what someone needed to get their act together and figure things out.
At least that was how it went for the boys within the household. They were naturally hot-blooded, even if some of them acted calm on the surface.
Sukuna stretched his limbs, not ready to deal with a sprained limb because of this spar. Jin cracked his knuckles and neck before letting out a loud sigh. Then, without a moment’s hesitation, Jin struck first with Sukuna swiftly bringing his arm up to block the kick.
Using this opportunity, he strikes Jin on the shoulder. The younger twin grabbed Sukuna’s hand and pinned him to the ground. The latter showing no resistance as he was defeated.
The older twin would have been frustrated at the quick ‘defeat’ but he hadn’t taken the fight seriously. They knew each other best, and Sukuna knew his little brother had been slowly building up frustration.
Dad refusing to heed their advice to use the college fund for cancer treatment, the anxiety of waiting for his final year test results that would determine his future school, the dwindling funds from Dad’s savings, his part-time job.
It was about time one of them snapped and picked a fight with each other.
“What do you think you’re doing, huh?” Jin snarled, pushing Sukuna into the ground with more force. “Have you even thought anything through?!”
The latter remained pinned to the ground, still putting up no resistance. Sukuna laid there, listening to Jin rant. Calling him stupid, asking Sukuna if he even used his brain, grumbling about Father being stubborn. The topics were all connected but the way Jin had rambled on and on made it difficult for Sukuna to keep track but he continued patiently listening to his twin’s complaints as his arm went numb from how long it was pinned behind him.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity, Jin let go and sat on the ground. His head in his hands with his back hunched forward, to his left were his glasses that eere hastily discarded. “I don’t understand. I don’t know what the two of you are thinking. What’s going on in your damn minds?” Jin croaked, taking a shaky breath before he sniffled once more.
Sukuna could count the number of times he and his twin have cried on one hand. The pink-haired twin adjusted himself, dusting his shirt to the best of his ability. His right hand was still numb.
“It’s so fucking stupid. I’m stupid. I don’t understand anymore. Why am I even mad at you?” Jin sobbed, wiping his face of seemingly endless tears as Sukuna watched the scene in silence.
He brought a hand to his neck, scratching the area slowly. “It is stupid. And you’re a moron for bottling it up,” he stood up and then left.
Jin sighed, the teen wiped the last of his tears away. He let out a shaky breath mixed with a soft chuckle. Yeah, I am a moron.
Gathering himself together, the teen searched for his glasses on the ground. Why did he have to take them off when he cried? That was a dumb decision. Jin squinted his eyes, trying to find the black glasses on the ground. This would have been so much easier if it wasn’t nighttime already…
After what felt like an eternity, the pink-haired teen finally found his glasses. He stood up to take a good look at his clothes. Eh, dirty but not too bad. At least laundry wouldn’t be difficult that week.
With that, he entered the house again. Sukuna must have finished showering since his clothes were in the laundry basket. Jin let out a tired sigh before turning to the fridge, preferably to get something sweet. Though he doubted there was anything sweet left, Sukuna probably drank the last fruit milk.
To Jin’s surprise, the last bottle of fruit milk was still in the fridge. Next to it was a note, “I don’t like the melon one.” Jin let out a snort, what the hell was Sukuna saying? He always drank the milk even if it was his least favourite flavour. The pink-haired teen took the last bottle and the note out of the fridge.
He found the note had more written on the back. “Too sweet, you’re lame for liking it.”
Jin snickered at the note, his brother always did the strangest things. Once upon a time, he did not understand these gestures. But now, he knew it was his twin’s own shy way of expressing care.
He crumpled the note and tossed it into the bin before opening the bottle. The lid cracked open with a satisfying twist, the sweet smell of melon flooded the air as Jin tossed the lid away. He swiftly gulped the bottle down before throwing it all away.
“Tastes just fine to me,” Jin chortled, it was time for him to take a shower now.
Sukuna glared at his reflection. Hmm… bald. He was very bald right now. Maybe he should have thought more about the whole ‘becoming a monk’ thing, huh?
Oh well, no turning back now. He already dealt with Jin calling him an egg last night when he first shaved his head, what could be worse?
Actually yeah, he could think of many things that were worse. Such as the delinquents seeing him like this and challenging him to a fight. A fight he would not be able to handle since he had to abstain from violence.
Huh. Didn’t that make him a sitting duck? Wait, isn’t this an incredibly bad idea?
Whatever, it was too early in the morning to be thinking about this. Sukuna finished washing his face before picking up his school bag. Time to do some post-exam activities, yay…
Unsurprisingly, Sukuna’s new hairstyle attracts the attention of every single person in his high school. Words began to spread like wildfire, attracting unwanted attention towards The King.
The King himself rolled his eyes and ignored the crowd, his eyes caught sight of a group of delinquents who pick fights with him often. Tsk, troublesome.
Other than the initial shock the school had to his new look, the rest of the school day was as average as it could have been. They were hosting a class vote to decide on what theme their class should go for the culture festival.
Almost a quarter of the class was either in the photography club or art club so it was almost a unanimous vote for the class to do an art gallery. Sukuna huffed, as if teenagers could make art people would pay for. Well, he’ll have to wait before he judges. Who knows, maybe his classmates could surprise him.
Ugh, did he really have to sit through this? All they were doing now is planning and stuff. He already knew his class wasn’t going to risk the dangers of forcing him to do anything, he could totally just slack off…
No, he promised to change. Yes. So… he should wait in class and be assigned a role just like everyone else.
…
…
…
The class committee seemed to quake in their boots as Sukuna frowned, waiting for them to assign him a role. The duo exchanged glances, a silent conversation between them. It was clear they were deciding who should risk assigning Sukuna a roll. Sugawara, the vice president, shook her head and shot the president with her pleading eyes.
Tanaka sighed, clearing his throat before shakily speaking. “I-itadori-kun… c-c-can you b-be a p-p-part o-of the ae-aesthetics team…?”
Sukuna nodded, at which the class committee sighed in relief as if some catastrophe level threat had been diffused. He was slightly ticked off by that reaction but the teen figured if he had shown displeasure they would have probably gone back to quaking in their shoes.
With that, everyone split into their different groups. The aesthetics team consisted of mostly girls and a few guys. Luckily, because of that, Sukuna didn’t have to involve himself with chatter since once the girls got into the flow they started making demands absentmindedly.
He could ignore the shocked gasps and trembling speech from his male classmates.
Another interesting thing is Uraume, Sukuna knew he found his classmate familiar. There was a monk at the temple with a similar face. Lo and behold, it was his classmate.
What a small world, huh?
Well, Sukuna was never one for conversation so he never interacted with Uraume outside of the purchase list for the decor they needed for the gallery. They haven’t interacted much but Sukuna likes to believe the monk is a chill guy, only because Uraume is the only person in the group who does not outrightly fear him.
So with this rather dysfunctional team where 90% of the group members are scared of him, Sukuna begins helping his class prepare for the culture festival for the first time.
A week goes by and the preparations run smoothly. They’ve begun to build the entrance-arch-sign thing, tables to display other works of art, and the partitions to hang paintings and photos at.
Sukuna rushed back from the store, they were short on paint, somehow. He purchased a stupid amount of white paint on the first trip and yet it was all magically used up. Oh well, everything was being painted white so it made a tiny bit of sense.
“Come on, you’re cute. Nobody needs to know, just let me take care of you,” Sukuna heard a familiar voice. It was mr. Pervert, also known as Watanabe, the local harasser amongst the students of the high school. The teen sighed, he leaves the punks alone for a week and they go straight back to bullying and harassing people out in the daylight.
Sukuna cracks his knuckles, ready to knock some sense into that hooligan, until he remembers his vow. Refrain from violence.
Ah.
…
Well this wasn’t good. Unlike the other harassers in the school, Watanabe was actually a decent fighter. Perhaps he could get away with just scaring him off? No, that prick was more than happy to get an opportunity to punch his face… Sukuna grumbled, struggling to think of a way to approach the situation.
“Watanabe-san, although I appreciate that you think I am attractive, I must repeat that this is a matter of religion,” he heard a familiar voice answer. A little high pitched for a boy but undoubtedly a boy either way… wasn’t that Uraume? Stupidly, Sukuna turned towards the corner wherein he could hear the voices from.
Watanabe runs a hand through his long hair, Sukuna imagines that the questionable style is because Watanabe thinks he looks cool but in reality it just made him look a little like he forgot to ask for a haircut. Disheveled, essentially.
“C’mon, we’re both boys here. And you’ve got a face as pretty as a girl’s. I wouldn’t mind doing you a favour here~” Watanabe insisted, his hand reaching up to trace Uraume’s jaw but the latter swiftly pushed his hand away. They sighed and backed up even further against the wall.
“Like I said, I’m not interested…” Uraume grumbled, glaring at Watanabe as if the other teen cared about such an act. Sukuna huffed, he knows exactly where this is going and boy did he not like it.
“Oi,” Sukuna threw an empty bottle from the floor at Watanabe’s head. “They said no. So leave. Or I’ll give you more where that came from.”
Watanabe turns towards look at Sukuna with a sly grin, “what~? But isn’t the might King resigning and becoming a wittle monk like this pretty boy? Are you gonna break your precious vows for little old me?”
Sukuna grumbled, of course he caught the lie. “Just let them go,” he stepped forward, closing the distance between him and Watanabe.
The long-haired teen snickered, wagging his finger at Sukuna. He crossed his arms and grinned, “How many times have you beat me up? Let’s see…” he threw a left jab at the pink-haired teen.
Unable to resist, Sukuna grit his teeth and did his best to dodge and duck. If he played his cards well, maybe he could pin the idiot down. That didn’t count as violence, right?
Seeing that punches were not working, Watanabe moved to kick Sukuna’s shin, catching the latter off guard and dropping to the ground.
“Here’s the deal, I get to beat you up and in exchange, pretty boy here gets to leave,” Watanabe demanded, stepping on Sukuna’s stomach and grinding his feet into the teen’s shirt.
Sukuna glanced between Uraume and Watanabe, “Fine.”
The long-haired delinquent giggled with satisfaction before venting his frustrations on Sukuna.
Uraume helped Sukuna clean his injuries, dabbing the alcohol coated cotton ball across his busted lip. Honestly, this was pretty mild among the list of injuries Sukuna has had.
“Are you alright?” Uraume frowned with worry, they turned away to toss the bloody cotton ball. Luckily, aside from the busted lip, Sukuna was relatively uninjured. Sure, a bruise would form, but aside from that he was fine.
“Yeah. I could have fought him but I didn’t,” the pink-haired teen replied, glaring at the ground. Uraume nodded, impressed by the former’s ability to hold back despite the rumours of him being a bloodthirsty psychopath. The psychopath bit was quite an exaggeration.
Uraume chuckled, “feisty, aren’t you?” They began to pack away the disinfectants and bandages. The pair sat in awkward silence, prompting Uraume to fill the uncomfortable silence.
“Uh, I’ve seen you doodle in class. You’re pretty good,” they say as they went to fill two paper cups with water, offering one to Sukuna.
“It’s not that good. It’s just a dumb doodle,” Sukuna gratefully took the cup and took a sip, still sporting a nasty scowl.
“Well if those were dumb doodles then I must be drawing trash,” they joke lightheartedly. The atmosphere between them lightened significantly. “You know, I’m only a monk because I was raised in the temple. Tell me, what’s it feel like to punch someone? I’ve always wanted to try~”
Sukuna smirked, oh yeah, he could definitely get along with them.