While the subway paused at another station, Satoru let out a loud yawn of boredom. He leaned back against the train wall, fingers lazily swiping across his phone. It was still a while before he'd reach the station near Tokyo Jujutsu High. The evening had already come—he’d just wrapped up a series of special-grade tasks across the city.

His gaze flicked up from the screen, idly watching passengers come and go. Among them was a tall man, hand locked with a much smaller one—or maybe it was the child holding his. Didn’t matter. Satoru watched as the man tugged the child along, hurried and firm. Could’ve been a father rushing his daughter through the crowd. Or not. Either way, Satoru didn’t care enough to find out.

The doors closed with a mechanical thud. Conversations floated through the car. Then, something tugged at his sleeve.

His eyes shifted to the fingers gripping his uniform. It was the girl. She stared up at him with an intense gaze. Satoru blinked, thrown off for just a second. Her guardian stood close behind, but before he could speak, his Six Eyes caught a flicker.

The girl lowered her hand, palm turning toward him.

Help.

One word, scrawled in black ink—hurried, messy, and terrifyingly quiet on her small palm.

“Stop staring at people like that. You're making them uncomfortable,” the man snapped at her, voice tight. He wrapped an arm around her, pulling her close, away from Satoru’s reach. Then he looked at Satoru and nodded—a polite gesture, but too perfect. Forced.

Satoru didn’t move.

His phone still glowed in his hand, but he no longer saw it. That one word—Help—slid beneath his indifference, anchoring something cold in his chest. A stillness settled into him.

He'd seen horrors. Curses. Twisted hearts. But a child begging for help without a voice? That was different. That kind of desperation didn’t come from nowhere.

His glowing eyes turned to the man, scanning him: posture, grip, tension. Something was off.

“Sorry about that,” the man said, “She has a habit of being too curious.”