Yuji blinked, his grief-stricken expression shifting into mild confusion. "A detour? We have to go find that Junpei guy."
"I know, and we will. I won't be long," Ren promised, shoving his hands into his pockets. "I just have a... friend here at the school. She's been pretty worried since Satoru dumped me into this whole mess. I'd like to drop in and give her a surprise visit, just to let her know I'm not dead yet."
The mention of a worried friend seemed to break through the heavy gloom hanging over Yuji. The golden retriever energy flickered back to life just a fraction. He offered a small, understanding smile.
"Oh! Yeah, of course," Yuji nodded emphatically. "That makes sense. Go let her know you're okay! I'll go find Ijichi and wait for you by the cars. Take your time, Ren!"
"Thanks. See you in a few," Ren replied.
Yuji pushed through the heavy double doors, letting them swing shut with a loud, echoing clack that sealed the morgue off from the rest of the campus.
The silence rushed back in, broken only by the hum of the overhead fluorescent lights and the faint crackle of burning tobacco.
"So. You're Ren."
Ren turned. Shoko Ieiri was leaning against the stainless steel counter, exhaling a long, thin plume of gray smoke toward the ventilation grate.
Her brown eyes lazily scanned him from head to toe, dissecting him with the clinical, entirely unfiltered gaze of a woman who had seen literally everything.
"That's me," Ren replied smoothly.
"Fascinating," Shoko murmured, tapping some ash into a small metal tray. "Satoru didn't leave out any of the weird details. You're the kid who somehow managed to contract a Heavenly Restriction like it was a venereal disease."
Ren didn't flinch. He let out a soft, amused exhale. He knew Satoru Gojo had absolutely zero filter, and considering Shoko was the school's primary physician and foremost expert on Reverse Cursed Technique, of course Gojo would have briefed her on a physiological anomaly as insane as Ren's.
"Gojo talks a lot, doesn't he?" Ren replied, a slow, easy smile spreading across his face. "But yes... it's kind of like that."
Shoko took another drag of her cigarette, her eyes narrowing just a fraction as the smoke curled around her face. Her gaze lingered on his features, taking in the sharp jawline, the effortless posture, and the intense, magnetic pull of his Preternaturally Handsome trait.
"Well, I can certainly see how you pulled it off," Shoko commented casually, her tone completely deadpan. "You're ridiculously pretty. Satoru was actually pouting about it in the staff room yesterday. Complained that his title of 'Most Handsome' was under serious threat."
Ren let out a genuine chuckle, shaking his head.
"Honestly, though," Shoko continued, tilting her head. "I'm less surprised by the impossible biological transfer and more surprised by the logistics. How on earth did a normal guy like you manage to tame Maki Zen'in? That girl is basically a walking cactus."
Instead of answering immediately, Ren casually walked over to an empty metal examination table—making sure to pick one that didn't currently have a mutated corpse on it. He hopped up, sitting on the cold steel edge with his legs dangling, perfectly relaxed in the presence of the veteran sorcerer.
He looked directly at her, his dark eyes studying her face.
"You've got terrible dark circles, Doctor," Ren pointed out seamlessly, completely pivoting the conversation.
Shoko blinked, temporarily thrown off by the sudden shift. Then, a dry, cynical smirk pulled at the corner of her lips. She brought the cigarette back up to her mouth.
"Occupational hazard," Shoko replied, her voice dripping with the laid-back, bone-deep exhaustion of someone who hadn't slept a full eight hours in a decade.
"Idiots keep getting themselves chopped up, exploded, and cursed. I have to stay awake to put them all back together. Caffeine, nicotine, and stress are basically my primary food groups at this point."
"You should let me buy you a decent coffee sometime," Ren offered effortlessly, offering a lazy smirk. "A peace offering for the extra paperwork my existence is probably causing you."
Shoko snorted, shaking her head as she crushed the end of her cigarette into the ashtray.
"Careful, kid. Flirting with the school doctor is a dangerous game when your girlfriend carries a naginata. Go see Maki before she assumes you got eaten by a curse."
Ren chuckled softly, slipping off the cold metal table. The soles of his boots barely made a sound against the linoleum floor.
He turned toward the heavy double doors, shoving his hands casually back into his jacket pockets.
"I wasn't flirting, Doctor," Ren said, his tone losing that lazy, teasing edge, dropping into something much more grounded and sincere.
He paused with his hand resting on the metal push-bar of the door, looking back over his shoulder.
The harsh, fluorescent lighting of the morgue should have washed him out, but it only seemed to highlight the sharp, magnetic pull of his features.
His dark eyes met hers, completely stripping away the usual chaotic banter of the Jujutsu world.
"Satoru is Satoru, and the students are just kids," Ren said softly. "They're all so used to you miraculously putting them back together that they forget you're human too. They just expect you to always be here, awake and ready."
Ren offered a small, genuinely warm smile. It wasn't the arrogant smirk of a confident guy; it was the quiet, understanding look of someone who actually paid attention.
"Someone needs to look out for the person holding everyone else together," he added quietly.
"The coffee offer stands. Try to get some actual sleep, Shoko."
With that, he pushed the heavy door open and slipped out into the hallway. The door swung shut behind him with a solid clack, leaving the morgue in complete silence once again.
Shoko stood entirely still by the stainless steel counter.
She stared at the closed door, the faint smell of burnt tobacco hanging in the air. For a long, quiet moment, she didn't move to light another cigarette. She didn't move to process the paperwork for the two mutated bodies on her tables.
She just blinked, a strange, unfamiliar tightness gripping her chest.
For the first time in years, the bone-deep, cynical exhaustion that usually shielded her felt completely bypassed.
It wasn't just his absurdly good looks or the smooth delivery—it was the fact that he had looked right past the 'Reverse Cursed Technique dispenser' label that literally everyone else in this society slapped onto her.
A slow, sudden warmth bloomed in her stomach, rising up to paint a very faint, uncharacteristic flush across her cheeks. She reached up, her cool fingers lightly brushing the dark circles under her eyes that he had pointed out.
A quiet, helpless exhale escaped her lips, morphing into a soft laugh that echoed in the empty room.
"Damn," Shoko murmured, shaking her head as she looked down at the crushed cigarette in the ashtray. Her heart was actually beating just a fraction faster. "No wonder Maki is guarding that one. He really is lethal."