Just as Akemi Aki believed Akira was not lying, Akira believed her as well. Eight years together were not fake, and Gardevoir's sensitivity to human hearts was equally real.
"But Mom," Akira continued, "if that's the case, you'll suffer one day in the future."
"Why do you say that?" she asked, confused.
"Do you remember what Noritoshi said when you left home?" Akira asked. "That one day, he would come and take you back."
His words made her eyes waver. A scene buried deep in her memories surfaced clearly, as if it had never faded.
It was the season of falling leaves, a long sloping path, and a boy about Akira's age. His eyes were red from crying, one hand clutching her clothes while the other wiped away tears as he asked in a choked voice, "Why? Why does Mother have to leave?"
She cried as well and bent down to hold her biological son tightly, with all her strength, for the last time. "If I stay here, I will become an obstacle for Noritoshi."
At the final moment before she left him, she heard his hoarse yet firm voice. "I'll become stronger. One day, I'll bring Mother back. Please wait for me."
To put him at ease, she nodded, but she did not look back. Dragging her suitcase, she walked along the long path and out through the ancient mountain gate.
Outside the gate stood another child, expressionless, like a wooden doll being pushed along. She looked at this child, unable to hide the complexity on her face, anger, resentment, and a shared sense of misfortune, until at last it softened into gentleness.
She took the boy's hand and said softly, "From now on, we'll live together."
The boy answered with a quiet sound and left with her, departing from that ancient family with its thousand-year history. That boy was Akira, who had lived with Akemi Aki for eight years, even changing his surname from Kamo to Akemi.
The two of them, cast out, were forbidden from using the Kamo name again. Even the traces of their existence were wiped away.
The turbulent sea of memories settled. Akemi Aki sighed softly. "That was a long time ago. Noritoshi was just a child."
"Mom, children remember very well," Akira said, disagreeing. "Some things, once remembered, are never forgotten for a lifetime. Don't underestimate children."
"I've never underestimated either of you," she replied. "Not Noritoshi, and not you."
There was one thing Akemi Aki had never forgotten, even after eight years. Her removal from the Kamo Clan was set in stone, but Akira, once known as Noritsuna Kamo, did not have to leave. He simply could no longer remain as the legitimate heir.
Akira's departure had been his own request to his father, the clan head, and to his mother, the official wife of that head. He had said that his existence would bring them shame, and that leaving forever was the best choice.
He said that even if they claimed publicly that he was not the legitimate son, no one could guarantee rumors would not spread, and that in the end, they would be the ones to suffer. He said that Aunt Hayami had lost a son and deserved to have one returned to her, and that he quite liked her.
He said that without inheriting a technique, he would gain nothing in that household, and asked to be let go. Akemi Aki had been standing outside the door at the time and heard every word clearly.
In that instant, she felt she was not listening to an eight-year-old child. She felt she was listening to someone more thoughtful and colder than herself.
What she did not know was that her feeling was correct. Though Akira's body was small, his mind was not, because within him lived the soul of an adult.
The former Noritsuna Kamo, now known as Akira, hid an ultimate profession within himself. He was a transmigrator.
He understood this world better than anyone else, even better than those born into it. This world was one he had known in another life, a world once called Jujutsu Kaisen.
If one word had to describe Akira's life, it would be a roller coaster. Huge rises and brutal drops came one after another, with nothing mild in between. He won the lottery and thought life would finally be easy, only to get hit by a car right after.
He thought he was dead for sure, yet woke up having crossed into another world with what looked like a perfect start. His new identity was Noritsuna Kamo. In Japan, where family status mattered more than anything, he was born as the young master of the Kamo Clan, one of the oldest members of the Three Great Clans.
To be clear, the clan was old enough to still keep a system of one wife and multiple concubines. Under normal circumstances, he would have been the future clan head without question. It was the kind of start where you could lie down and win.
Then he realized something was wrong. The Three Great Clans, the Kamo name, this was clearly the setting of Jujutsu Kaisen. Understanding the world he had entered should have been good news, but the legitimate son of the Kamo Clan was a complete failure in the original story, so insignificant he did not even have a name.
The Kamo Clan was a family that controlled supernatural power, namely Jujutsu, and they believed only in its supremacy. Anyone who inherited a technique was treated as heaven itself, while those who did not were no different from dust. Whether you were a legitimate son did not matter.
In fact, being legitimate only made things worse. The higher you were raised, the harder you fell. Because aptitude for Jujutsu was judged not at birth but around the ages of six to eight, Noritsuna Kamo was allowed to enjoy his status for a few years.
Once that window passed, he would fall straight from heaven into hell, which was far harder to accept than being born in hell. Without hope, you never truly understand despair. When it became clear that Noritsuna Kamo had no talent as a Jujutsu sorcerer, his biological parents, the Kamo clan head and his legal wife, made a decision that was cold to the point of cruelty.
They swapped identities. The child born to the concubine, Noritoshi Kamo, son of Hayami Kamo, became the legitimate heir, while Noritsuna Kamo was declared a useless concubine-born child. Since all evaluations before aptitude testing were confidential, manipulating the records was easy.
The reason was simple. The legal wife's son lacked talent, while the concubine had given birth to someone worthy of inheriting the clan, which threatened her position. To protect her status and the so-called stability of the family, they did not just act, they acted thoroughly.
Public announcements were released while rumors were spread inside the clan to smear the concubine's reputation. At the same time, they persuaded her with soft words, saying that only by leaving could the family be stable and her child have a brighter future. As for the cruelty of taking a child from his mother, or the thoughts of the concubine and Noritoshi Kamo, no one cared.
She was just a low-born concubine who could not cause trouble, and neither could the two children. In the end, things went exactly as the legal wife hoped. The concubine made the so-called wise choice, left the Kamo Clan completely, and even convinced Noritoshi Kamo to accept reality.