Chapter: The Inner Vortex
'His explanation is almost perfect,' Gojo thought, watching Ren intently. 'Why is his theory so flawless while his execution is so... coarse? It's like he understands the concept perfectly in his mind, but his actual control is lacking the fine-tuning it needs.'
Gojo folded his arms across his chest, his expression becoming weirdly serious. "You're right. But you're also wrong. In theory, you've perfectly explained how to control cursed energy in its simplest form. But let me ask you one simple question: whenever you use cursed energy, how does it move?"
Gojo's tone was unnervingly calm. Ren blinked, his mind immediately shifting into high gear.
'What? What kind of question is that? How does it move when I use it? It moves where I want it to, doesn't it? It seems so simple... but is it?'
Ren began to search his memories, trying to reconcile his meta-knowledge with the physical sensation of his power, and began to analyse his own internal flow.
'Cursed energy starts in the gut. Normally, you let it flow through the body. But I know Reverse Cursed Energy is created in the brain, so you would have to flow that down, right? So regular energy moves up? But those are just assumptions. I don't actually know. I don't understand the question.'
Ren looked at Gojo, trying to sound certain. "What do you mean by 'how does it move?' Cursed energy moves in whatever way I want it to. But if we're being specific, technically it moves up from the gut throughout the rest of the body... right?"
Gojo's lips curled into a small smile. 'Hmm, I get it. That's how he thinks about it. Theoretically, he's almost on par with me... but he's missing the practical reality… He still has a long way to reach me.'
Gojo shook his head. "No, that's not how it works at all! You're somewhat right, but... here, try to block this."
Gojo held out his hand, his fingers curling slightly, his voice dropping to a whisper. "Cursed Technique Lapse: Blue".
WOOSSH!!!!
A small, concentrated blue vortex snapped into existence in front of Gojo. The pull was instantaneous and violent. Ren reacted in a heartbeat; red threads burst from his wrists, lashing out like webs! holding him down to the wooden floor.
'What the hell is he doing?! Is he mad?! ' Ren thought, his eyes wide. 'Using Blue in an enclosed space... wait... he's controlling the output perfectly.'
The glowing blue vortex rotated violently just a few feet from Ren's face. The light was dazzling, an ethereal sapphire glow that seemed to suck the very air out of the room. It was rotating inwards, trying to collapse everything into its centre. Then, as quickly as it appeared, it shrank into a pinprick and vanished.
Wosh…
Gojo stood there, hands in his pockets, looking entirely relaxed. "Did you get it?"
'Get what? That you try to kill me? Fucking hell… his way of teaching is really goofy!
Ugh, but… I just noticed Gojo's Lapse Blue. It doesn't just pull things in; it actually rotates while pulling things in…
Hmm, wait, is that how cursed energy moves? No way, right?' Ren's frustration flared for a second, but then the image of the vortex replayed in his mind…
"Does cursed energy rotate inward?" Ren asked out loud, his voice filled with a sudden realisation. "Is that how it moves?"
Gojo's eyes widened behind his sunglasses... 'Oh my god, he actually got it just by seeing it once! I was just messing with him... that's actually scary. To understand the way cursed energy moves with being controlled just by watching a technique...'
Gojo flashed a thumbs-up and grinned. "YA! Good job! You did it. Whenever you use cursed energy, it first rotates inward. That is its natural motion. Whenever you activate a technique, that's what your energy does before it manifests. You didn't know that's how it flowed when you tried to control it, did you?"
Gojo leaned back, looking satisfied. "There is a different state for cursed energy when you aren't trying to control it. And even I don't even know how it stays in a state of no motion, but I know this much for sure: the moment you try to control cursed energy, it will rotate inward."
Ren sat frozen, his face twisted into a mask of pure confusion and self-reflection.
'What? That HUH? How... I mean, how do I not know this? I've read the JJK manga three times! How do I not know something as important as how the cursed energy moves when I try to control it? I miss something so core to the essence of control? I knew I should have memorised the Data Books, too!'
He began connecting the dots in his head. 'It makes sense. So many things make sense now. When I summon Rika, she appears from a black spot, but that spot rotates inward very lightly before she emerges. It's a tiny detail, but it's there. How did I never figure this out?'
He looked at his own hands, his thoughts spiralling. 'Even Gojo's techniques spin, which makes sense weirdly, and I mean, wait a second, even domain expansions actually rotate a little, don't they? Actually the more I think about this, the more this makes sense. Back when I first got Red Stitch, I tried to coil it once around my arm, but it was weird.
Unstable…
Now it makes sense why that was happening; my red stitch back then was just a red stitch, and one of the first traits of my red stitch was a little affinity to transfer cursed energy, and that's how I made my perfected red cursed circuit, first by using my red stitch's trait, but wait, now that I think about…
When I tried to wrap the red threads around my arm, they probably didn't work because my red stitch was probably working like an amplifier, but my tests back then were much more idiotic. Now that I think about it, I only tested binding vows and things like my red stitch, which I already knew would work to some extent.
If I found out something worked, I would just go along with it. I never questioned anything… That's weirdly a backwards way of thinking. What the hell? Did I stop questioning things? because I just assumed I knew everything?'
Ren was completely lost in his own head…
Gojo waved a hand in front of Ren's face, giggling. "Hey, wake up, Ren-kun! The special training is over. It's nighttime, and I am going home."