Chapter 50: It's Me and the Thing Seller Again (Patreon)

Chapter 50: It's Me Again, and Selling That Thing

...

Satoru Anjouin stared, at something of a loss, at the little tyrannosaur.

How to put it...

Small as she was, she was undeniably adorable — but seriously, ridiculously aggressive.

He could only hope Arisu Sakayanagi genuinely had 3000 attack power, rather than turning out like her original-story self — barely any record of external victories, but throwing haymakers internally, a veritable god of infighting.

"My turn now?"

Seeing that Satoru Anjouin had finished his report, Arisu Sakayanagi, seated around the low table in the middle of the room, began recounting her own day.

Nothing more than stirring up trouble between Class C and Class D...

After all, Class D had Haruki Yamauchi, who'd awakened the Ten Shadows Technique. A little flattery from the right person, a nudge to go provoke Class C, and off he trotted, tail wagging.

Satoru Anjouin hadn't spoiled anything about the May special exam, but Arisu Sakayanagi's moves were clearly laying groundwork for it all the same.

At the very least, with Class C and Class D unable to cooperate, they'd be at a serious disadvantage against a cooperating Class 1-A and Class B.

"Careless? Or on purpose?"

"Deliberately careless, naturally."

Arisu Sakayanagi saw no reason not to admit it.

Keep pressuring Class D long enough, and maybe the false genius she wanted to bury would finally show itself.

"Fine. Katsuragi's turn, then."

...

Kohei Katsuragi gave the two of them a long, weary look.

Do you two seriously have no idea what I do all day?

Under Katsuragi's gaze, Arisu Sakayanagi sipped her orange juice with elegant poise, somehow making dirt-cheap convenience-store juice look like royal afternoon tea in a castle.

Graceful, delicate, pitiable — every bit the adorable little princess stepped straight out of a fairy tale.

"Anjouin, the logistics team's expenses have been running high."

"Understood. In that case, the share I transferred you can serve as class funds for now."

The first month's expenses really had been steep.

Even with some students joining clubs and making the starting lineup — earning ten to twenty thousand Private Points a month — it was still a drop in the bucket.

He wanted to launch Class 1-A into the stratosphere, to raise them into genuine jujutsu sorcerers.

He obviously wanted every one of them to awaken a technique. Satoru Anjouin thought this school should really have a dedicated facility for awakening techniques.

Something like the 'Secret Library' or the 'Gate of Trials.'

Likewise, given that the 'Gate of Trials' seemed connected to Black Flash, a sorcerer who'd experienced Black Flash and one who hadn't were practically different species. He definitely wanted every Class 1-A student to have felt Black Flash for themselves.

Satoru Anjouin transferred five million Private Points to Kohei Katsuragi.

Katsuragi would of course record the sum.

"Mm, not bad."

Arisu Sakayanagi paid none of that any mind, too busy savoring the chicken wings Satoru Anjouin had made.

"Did you make these yourself?"

"They're store-bought."

Satoru Anjouin certainly hadn't forgotten the wings he'd promised Ai Morishita — over on the other side, she and Masumi Kamuro were eating with their mouths shiny with oil.

Maybe sensing eyes on her, Masumi Kamuro flustered and grabbed a napkin to wipe her mouth.

Out of curiosity, Arisu Sakayanagi had used Human Manipulation on Masumi Kamuro to try a bite herself — tasting the flavor secondhand, through Kamuro's tongue.

After all, her weak heart had barred her from countless things since childhood — a table full of forbidden foods, mountains of medication she had to take on schedule.

Now, finally, she didn't have to hold back so much.

A splash of cola turned them into cola wings — the kind both kids and adults loved.

"I bet being your girlfriend would be pretty great, Anjouin. Want me to introduce you to some girls?"

Arisu Sakayanagi said with a bright smile, the taste seemingly still lingering on her tongue.

"Pfft—"

Somehow, her comment set Ai Morishita off laughing.

"I'm not really thinking about that right now."

Satoru Anjouin turned her down without even pausing to think.

If anything, right now his eyes were entirely fixed on cursed energy — this supernatural power.

He hadn't quite gone obsessive about it, but after reading so many web novels, how could his heart not stir at the thought?

Raging hormones, suppressed fantasies, the freedom of escaping his family, a loneliness nobody could understand — and the notion burning inside him now was, unmistakably, power.

Much like how stories written for female readers tended to revolve around romancing a prince, a general, a scholar, stories for male readers tended to revolve around conquering this and conquering that.

It wasn't that male-oriented fiction lacked romance — it was just that romance was usually a byproduct of power.

Power could mean authority.

Power could mean wealth.

Power could also mean violence.

Self-cultivation? Accumulated depth? Charm enough to draw others in?

Ai Morishita had really seen through him — power and confidence were equivalent; power and self-worth were linked.

His past-life self had, without question, failed to understand that fact.

And in a modern society packed with rules, the essence of power was status — the authority to mobilize violence. That was why Satoru Anjouin had spent so much effort building up his academic ability.

In island-nation society, a commoner who hadn't graduated from the University of Tokyo was nothing but a mud-legged peasant, not even qualified to sit at the table.

Even a University of Tokyo graduate, so long as they were a commoner, only earned the right to crouch beside the table and eat.

Even when the Intel System told him about the 'Marriage Binding,' the first thing on his mind wasn't rushing to have sex — it was how many people he could actually bind. Could shared techniques be used together?

Could he sign it with a man? If so, would it work against a curse like Ryomen Sukuna?

If not, could the shared technique still be used simultaneously?

Satoru Anjouin thought a screen packed with six pages of skills would look seriously cool.

Since his own technique wasn't one that automatically generated new techniques, working the angle with Marriage Binding wasn't entirely out of the question.

"Pfft..." Ai Morishita glanced over and nearly choked on a laugh.

Arisu Sakayanagi couldn't quite figure out Ai Morishita's reaction.

Still, she'd only been teasing — there was no way she'd actually go introduce random girls to him.

If she ever did, she'd probably have to look within the Sakayanagi main house — whether a side branch or a lesser line, it would have to be a woman with Sakayanagi backing.

By the time the meeting wrapped up and they'd all left, it was already past nine at night.

Satoru Anjouin had planned to set a few Bindings while he had the chance.

Ever since he'd awakened his Binding technique, he'd set two or three hundred Binding rules nearly every night.

By now, the growth-type Bindings on him numbered over two thousand. They hadn't yet touched on the early-maturity version of the loan, but those two thousand-odd Binding rules had genuinely accelerated his growth.

The average height for island-nation men was around 168cm.

In the original story, Rokusuke Kouenji stood 181cm, Kiyotaka Ayanokouji stood 176cm, and Kakeru Ryuen stood 173cm.

Right now he was somewhere between Ayanokoji and Ryuen, but with the Bindings he'd set, his build would head toward something like Toji Fushiguro's — with height expected to break past 180cm.

"Right, might as well take care of that thing while I'm at it."

Satoru Anjouin pulled out his phone and called up a familiar contact again.

"Hey, it's me again."

...

On the other end, Kento Nanami suddenly couldn't even be bothered to comment on Satoru Anjouin.

"Why is it you again — oh right, I told Satoru Gojo about that thing. Your precaution was spot on."

"I thought you were a pure jujutsu sorcerer, that you'd think like one — I didn't expect you to have a normal-person side too."

After all, the jujutsu world and the Cabinet Secretariat had genuinely never gotten along.

On top of that, the Reverse Cursed Technique was an extraordinarily advanced skill — even among sorcerers who'd mastered it, not everyone could project it outward, using positive energy to heal others.

Satoru Gojo could do it — but would the Cabinet Secretariat dare come at Satoru Gojo?

A born Reverse-Technique user, on the other hand, was undeniably an easy target — an unaggressive technique, and no powerful backing to speak of either.

"Still, you really don't have an ounce of trust in the Cabinet Secretariat, do you?"

Hearing that, Satoru Anjouin was at a total loss for words.

"Mr. Nanami, why don't you go ask the residents of Fukushima. By the way, the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant's major meltdown started in March 2011, and there was also a high-concentration contaminated water tank leak in August 2013..."

"And the Cabinet Secretariat just declared everything in the Fukushima area fine. Whatever the media says is fine or not fine doesn't mean a damn thing."

Not to mention that back in his previous life's era, the island nation had gone ahead and dumped nuclear-contaminated water straight into the ocean.

Trust?

Where was it?

When Satoru Anjouin first arrived, he hadn't recognized which crossover anime world, or which two-dimensional world this was — and part of him had still assumed the two-dimensional world would be somewhat nicer.

But every time he turned on the news, it was nothing but politicians spouting endless nonsense and bowing out their oh-so-sincere apologies.

If he hadn't received the acceptance letter from Advanced Nurturing High School — no, if the school hadn't recommended him to Advanced Nurturing — he'd have simply gone along and enrolled in a local high school.

Then after school he'd have gone to cram classes, aiming straight for the University of Tokyo entrance exam — probably failing it once or twice before getting in, but that had genuinely been his original goal.

All he could say was: an island nation would be an island nation.

"If the Cabinet Secretariat were really trustworthy, why would I go to so much trouble putting together a Gojo Faction? Or push Manabu Horikita to become Advanced Nurturing's representative?"

State-certified jujutsu sorcerer?

Sure, whatever you say.

Felt about as reliable as a State Alchemist.

"Geez, seriously, one mention of the Cabinet Secretariat's credibility and the whole topic goes off the rails."

"So, what is it this time?"

"Two days ago I had some Class 1-A students dig a few used condoms with s●men in them out of the trash. I'm not sure if there was spermicide in there, or whether the lubricant would've damaged the sp●rm, and it's already been several days — even kept in a cold storage box now, there's no guarantee any sp●rm survived."

"??"

Kento Nanami felt like he'd just heard a whole lot of content that needed bleeping out.

"Wait, no — why would you have people dig up something like that, no matter how you slice it, that's..."

"The s●men belongs to Nagumo Miyabi, second-year Class 1-A, who awakened Blood Manipulation."

Hearing that, Kento Nanami went silent on the other end of the line.

As a jujutsu sorcerer, it might take him a moment to catch up — but he'd also spent time as a corporate drone once, and he actually knew a thing or two about the way society worked.

He quickly worked out what Satoru Anjouin was after.

"You're planning to sell it to the Kamo family?"

"Yeah, let the Kamo family gamble on it — see if they can extract something useful from it. If newborns who awaken Blood Manipulation could be produced in bulk, that'd be a good thing for the jujutsu world too."

Satoru Anjouin said it with the airy tone of a man acting purely for the good of the jujutsu world.

"And then, once the Kamo family has more Blood Manipulation users, they won't need to keep investing in Nagumo Miyabi anymore?"

This was also Kento Nanami's first time teaching at a school built entirely on the principle of meritocracy.

He'd heard a fair bit about the power games between classes, between students.

He still didn't fully understand what sort of talent the school was trying to cultivate, but he doubted the school would produce a second scheme quite like this one — going straight after someone's backing.

If it failed, at least some money could be scammed out of it.

If it succeeded, Nagumo Miyabi lost his backing.

"Do you have some grudge against this Nagumo Miyabi?"

"Not really? I mean, I'm personally not a big fan of the guy, but I don't have any grudge against him. If anything, he's the one with a grudge against me."

Thinking of Nagumo Miyabi, who'd swindled him out of quite a few points, Satoru Anjouin looked utterly untroubled.

"Got it. Where'd you put the item?"

"In my mailbox. You can just come by the dorm and pick it up directly."

"I've got an eleven o'clock departure slot booked, as it happens."

As one of the top names among Grade 1 sorcerers, plenty of exorcism assignments specifically requested him.

Kento Nanami was pulled in two directions as it was.

He just hadn't expected he'd also need to make a detour on the way — to go sell that thing to the Kamo family.

———

[Author's Note: PS: Satoru Anjouin — If it works, may Senior Nagumo be blessed with many children~]