It was a quiet morning. Too quiet.
In the church's cracked courtyard, Father Asher was meditating upside-down on a stack of hymnals. Juno was hanging dreamcatchers laced with old grocery receipts, whispering, "These catch inner turmoil." Spillglass was asleep face-down in a birdbath. Thorne was sharpening therapy batons. Flint was trying to cook an egg on the hood of their van. The air smelled like incense, expired paprika, and unresolved trauma.
And that's when he arrived.
He didn't walk. He drifted.
Mahito appeared like a glitch in space — one step too smooth, one smile too wide, too perfectly imperfect. He wandered onto church grounds looking half-curious, half-bored. His mismatched stitches shimmered in the sun. A trail of cursed flies followed behind him.
He was here to observe. Maybe plant a seed of chaos. Maybe toy with these "off-grid weirdos" who didn't show up on his radar until now.
But then—he was spotted.
"Yo, who's the emo intern?" Flint asked, flipping the egg with a cursed spoon.
Mahito blinked.
"...I am Mahito. Avatar of human malice. Sculptor of souls."
Juno gasped. "Oh my god," she whispered. "He's a performance artist."
Mahito tilted his head. "Excuse me?"
Spillglass climbed out of the birdbath, soaked and inspired. "You're giving... second-year visual arts major. Conceptual necro-modernism."
"Your outfit screams emotional installation piece," Marrow added, sipping cursed coffee. "You on grant money?"
Mahito frowned. "I literally mold human flesh."
Juno clapped. "Body art. I knew it!"
He opened his hand, shifting his fingers into jagged, spider-like claws. "I can shape life. Warp the soul. Twist—"
"Ahh, so you're into immersive sculpture," Asher nodded. "Bold."
Spillglass started sketching him.
Mahito, caught between ego and confusion, decided to roll with it.
They sat him down.
Made him tea. Asked him about his "medium."
Mahito, now weirdly invested, spoke about "human fear" and "transformation" and "the elasticity of the body" like he was on a damn TED Talk. Juno took notes. Asher nodded like a proud professor. Flint offered him grilled mushrooms (cursed, obviously), which Mahito accepted out of sheer bafflement.
Yuji, Megumi, and Nobara showed up halfway through, stopping dead when they saw the guy responsible for multiple murders sipping jasmine tea with a cult.
Yuji panicked. "THAT'S MAHITO—HE'S DANGEROUS—"
Thorne raised a hand. "Shhh. The artist is speaking."
Mahito made eye contact with Yuji.
He winked.
Yuji exploded off the ground. Megumi grabbed his arm. Nobara started yelling. The Communion... was still taking notes.
Mahito stood.
He summoned a small cursed blob from his palm — it morphed into a crying face, screaming, twisting in agony.
"This," he whispered, "is how your souls sound."
Juno leaned in. "Hmm… too obvious."
Marrow sniffed. "Suffering is cliché now. Got anything subtle?"
"Add some color," Spillglass muttered. "That's just beige pain."
Mahito blinked, genuinely stunned. "…You people are insane."
Father Asher beamed. "No. We are free."
Mahito stared at them. For the first time in his twisted little life, he didn't know what to say.
Suddenly, a cursed pulse rippled through the air — faint, but real.Gojo appeared five rooftops away, watching the scene with a slurpee in hand and a deeply confused expression.
"Is… is Mahito being gaslit into thinking he's not scary?"
He blinked. "Why is he holding a fucking scone?!"
Before he could intervene, Mahito turned, face blank, voice low.
"…This was a mistake."
He vanished into thin air, more emotionally disoriented than when he arrived.
Yuji stood there shaking, halfway between trauma and confusion.
"He just left…"
"Probably realized he wasn't ready for the critique circle," Thorne shrugged.
Nobara paced. "Do y'all even realize what just happened?! He kills people!"
"Art kills too," Father Asher intoned.
Megumi sat down and sighed. "I think my brain is melting."
Far away, back in a sewer hideout, Mahito stared into a cracked mirror.
"What the hell just happened?"
He frowned.
"…Was I not edgy enough?"
He summoned a tiny cursed blob.
"Do I need… glitter?"