Chapter 5: An Ultimatum

 Jujutsu High- Cape Town

The garden was too still.

Cyan hated stillness.

Her boots sank into gravel as she followed Elle along a stone path lined with Sakura trees that refused to bloom.

Even the branches seemed cautious, like they knew something she didn’t.

Cyan’s stomach tightened the moment the spires of the school came into view.

“This place…” she whispered.

Memories pressed like bruises at the edge of her mind—half-forgotten nights, steel doors, men in black coats, the faint smell of incense and blood.

A bell rang in the distance.

Students emerged from the main hall, laughing, jostling, stretching their hands in mock-fights. 

They couldn’t have been much older than Cyan—fifteen, sixteen maybe—but each carried that same pressure in their aura: cursed energy flickering like unseen fire.

She froze, watching them.

They belonged here.

And she was… what, exactly?

One of the boys shot her a look—sharp, suspicious, the kind of stare that weighed and measured. Cyan instinctively reached for the knife strapped beneath her sleeve before forcing her hand away. Elle noticed, but said nothing.

“Keep walking,” Elle murmured.

The path narrowed as they left the main courtyard and entered a garden separated from the rest of the school grounds.

It was quieter here—no bells, no students, only the faint whisper of wind and the scent of roses.

The garden was mostly green: carefully trimmed hedges, soft patches of grass, and scattered stone lanterns. Pink roses bloomed in neat rows between them, their colour almost too bright in the stillness.

Cyan slowed her steps when she spotted him.

Megumi Honda, sitting cross-legged in the center of the garden, eyes closed, breathing steady.

Meditation, but also vigilance—he was never the type to let his guard down.

Elle smirked, crouched, and plucked a pebble from the ground. “Watch this.”

Before Cyan could stop her, Elle flicked the stone with a sharp snap of her wrist.

Megumi’s hand shot out without opening his eyes, catching the pebble in midair.

His voice was calm, but tinged with annoyance.
“Not funny, Elle.”

Cyan and Elle stepped closer. Megumi opened his eyes, irritation giving way to something sharper. His pupils narrowed, and for the briefest moment, his composure cracked.

“…Cyan?”

She froze under his stare.

The weight of recognition, of disbelief, made her chest tighten.

He whispered, almost to himself.
“You’re… still alive.”

Elle folded her arms and tilted her head with a smirk.
“Relax. Your girlfriend is safe.”

Both Cyan and Megumi shouted at the same time:

“Hey, don’t make it like that!”

The outburst only made the air heavier. Silence fell, awkward and stifling. Cyan shifted her weight, eyes darting away before finally meeting his again.

“…Megumi.” Her voice trembled.

Megumi’s gaze softened, and in that moment he saw not the reckless, brash girl who used to charge into fights just to prove herself—but someone more battered, worn down, and tired.

“Thank you…” Cyan murmured, fiddling with her fingers.

“For saving me.”

Megumi looked away, jaw tightening, as if the words unsettled him. After a pause, he muttered:

“I’m glad you’re safe.”

Elle clapped her hands together, breaking the fragile moment.

“Well, if you two are done kissing and making up—”

“Elle!” Megumi and Cyan barked at once.

Elle only grinned for a second longer, but her expression quickly shifted.

The playful spark vanished from her face, replaced by something harder.

“We don’t have time for this. We have to go see the Chairman of Jujutsu HQ.”

Megumi’s smile faded too.

He straightened, studying Elle with sharp eyes. He understood immediately—her tone wasn’t a joke.

 Whatever was waiting for them at HQ, it wasn’t going to be light.

Toward the Chairman

The streets of Cape Town’s CBD were crowded, but the towering building of Jujutsu HQ stood like a blade of steel among glass towers.

Its structure didn’t match the rest of the city—too old, too heavy, too intentional. Layers of wards shimmered faintly over the walls, invisible to most but pressing on Cyan’s skin like static.

The three of them walked side by side—Elle at the front, Cyan and Megumi trailing a step behind.

Inside, the air was colder.

Wide halls stretched upward, lined with banners and stone pillars etched with wards. Sorcerers in dark uniforms moved about their duties, but one by one, their eyes shifted.

To Elle.

Conversations halted.

Backs straightened.

Some lowered their heads slightly as she passed, while others couldn’t help but stare—half in awe, half in fear.

Elle’s expression never changed. She walked as though the weight of the entire building meant nothing to her.

Cyan noticed. She noticed everything.
“…Why are they all staring at her?” she whispered.

Megumi’s voice was low. 

“Because that’s Elle. She’s the most powerful sorcerer in the world.”

The words hit harder than Cyan expected.

She looked at Elle’s calm figure, walking ahead like she owned the ground beneath her feet. Sorcerers twice her age stepped aside. No one dared meet her eyes for long.

Cyan’s heart thudded in her chest.

She’s what I want to become.

The silence was broken only by the echo of their footsteps against marble.

Ahead, the great doors of the Chairman’s chamber loomed, carved with runes that pulsed faintly with cursed energy.

Guards stood on either side, their hands resting on their weapons—but when Elle approached, they bowed and pulled the doors open without a word.

The weight of expectation pressed down harder than ever.

Cyan swallowed, her hands tightening at her sides, as they stepped inside.

 

The Chairman

The boardroom smelled of varnished wood and cold air-conditioning.

Light from the tall, narrow windows carved pale rectangles across the long table; the runes etched into its surface caught the light and swallowed it.

Portraits of Lieberts and other notable sorcerers watched from the walls, their painted eyes sharper than any guard’s.

Dean Liebert sat at the head of the table like an accusation.

He was thirty, all angles and measured calm — a face that had been trained not to betray feeling.

The Liebert crest embroidered on his cuff was small, exact, a quiet reminder that his name carried weight. He folded his hands in front of him and regarded the three of them like a man studying a specimen.

Elle, Megumi, and Cyan took the seats across from him.

Elle sat straight, a coiled thing pretending not to be.

Megumi’s posture was loose but wary; Cyan felt the chair under her like a landing strip she didn’t trust.

Around them, the room seemed to contract; even the air felt ranked and official.

Dean’s fingers tapped once on the table — slow, deliberate. Cyan’s skin prickled. Elle’s jaw tightened in the tiny way Cyan had learned to read as irritation.

 I hate when he does that, Elle thought, though her face betrayed nothing.

Dean’s voice was logical, dry. “So, this is the vessel to Jaden Ryumen. The reincarnation of Sukuna of Ryumen.”

Elle answered simply. “Yes.”

Dean’s eyes flicked to her and lingered as if searching for a crack.

Elle showed no emotion.

The pause between them was a conversation both of them had rehearsed in their heads long before either had spoken.

“And you want me to enrol her into Jujutsu High?” he asked.

Elle’s tone was level. “Yes.”

Dean looked down at the table and tapped it again, a sound like a metronome cutting through the room.

Pressure gathered in the air — not a curse, not yet, but the kind of authority that made people forget how to argue.

“She’s a dangerous case,” Dean said, and the words were meticulous.

“A vessel to civilization’s greatest threat. She ingested a Special-Grade cursed object. She’s the Mowbray girl who has been rebelling against her own family.”

He shifted his gaze to Cyan. “Someone who doesn’t know her place.”

Cyan felt the sentence as though it were a hand on her shoulder, familiar and unwelcome.

Her throat tightened; the last few months — the fights with her clan, the slammed doors, the running away — unspooled behind her eyes like a film she couldn’t stop.

The memory of the night she left, of the Mowbray compound shrinking behind her, made her palms clammy.

Elle intercepted the accusation smoothly. “She could be a valuable asset to the Jujutsu Order.”

Dean’s eyebrow rose. “Expand on your point.”

Elle’s voice gained the confident edge Cyan had always envied.

“Like me, she awakened an inherited technique. The Mowbrays’ infamous Shadow Garden technique.”

Dean’s eyes snapped up. “The technique said to appear once in every three hundred years. Like the Gojo clan’s Six Eyes and Limitless — or your family’s Prism Eyes, correct?”

Elle nodded, a small, controlled motion.

Dean stood abruptly, the motion sharpening the air.

He moved to the window and looked out over the city as if drawing strength from the view.

When he turned back, the Liebert smile — polite, cutting — rested on his face.

“I won’t make this easy for you, girl.” His tone hardened the moment he allowed himself to.

“Your family, my family, and half of the Jujutsu world wants you dead.”

He mimed a smirk, a blade hidden in civility. “Let’s make this practical. You and I will have a sparring match. Show me your technique in action. If I’m impressed, I’ll consider enrolling you — as a student, under supervision.”

Cyan (cutting in, sharp): “No.”

 The room silenced by her rebellion.

Dean raised an eyebrow. “…No?”

 Cyan straightened in her seat, her voice tight but steady.

 “If you want to test me, at least have the decency to introduce yourself first. I don’t fight for someone else’s amusement.”

 For a heartbeat, silence. Then a low chuckle rolls from Dean’s chest.

Dean: “You’ve got a tongue after all. Good. I was worried Elle kept you on a leash.”

 He leans forward, his presence pressing down on her like a mountain.

Dean: “But understand this—when I say fight, you fight. Otherwise, you don’t leave this room alive.”

 Cyan holds his gaze, refusing to bow her head. Her fists tighten under the table, nails digging into her palms.

Cyan’s head snapped to Elle.

 Her pulse hammered against her ribs.

  You can’t just— flooded her, but Elle’s expression was a decision written in stone.

Elle’s response was immediate. “She accepts.”

Megumi bristled. “You can’t—” he began.

“Quiet boy,” Dean said lightly, and there was a quiet that followed like a physical thing.

He raised one hand in a small gesture and leaned his head to the side — as if tuning a radio.

The sound of voices in Cyan’s ears dimmed, not from distance but from focus; the edges of protest blurred like ink in water.

“Please,” Dean added, softer still. “The grown-ups are talking.”

Megumi’s mouth shut the instant the words landed; Cyan felt her own words get trapped at the back of her throat.

It was as if his presence reordered the room’s priorities, and for a moment she hated him for it.

Then Dean let the silence run long enough to be noticed, and the implication in it settled over Cyan like frost.

 Elle’s eyes met his without flinching.

There was a negotiation being spoken without sound — a ledger written in glances.

Cyan’s anxiety flared into something hot and immediate.

The thought arrived like a spark: I have to fight this guy.

Dean turned back to face Cyan, fingers steeple.

“Tomorrow at dawn. Demonstrate your technique. If you fail to convince me, the Jujutsu Order will decide your fate without your input.”

He let the words hang. The boardroom seemed to inhale.

Elle’s lips curved, almost a smile. “Then She’ll have to make sure you’re impressed.”

Megumi glanced between them, worry and something like resignation on his face.

Cyan closed her hand into a fist under the table and felt the old knife’s edge of determination sharpen.

The game had started.