The Tokyo Jujutsu High administrative wing was nearly silent—save for the soft scratching of pen against paper, and the occasional, exhausted sigh.

It was well past curfew. The sorcerers had gone home, the students had turned in, and even Gojo had vanished into the ether (likely after committing some HR violation). But in one of the side offices, the light still burned. A lone figure hunched over a stack of reports and mission logs, sleeves rolled up, tie loosened, glasses slipping down his nose.

Kiyotaka Ijichi looked like the very picture of bureaucratic burnout—but he didn’t stop working. He never did.

A knock at the door startled him slightly. He blinked up, eyes bleary behind his lenses.

“Sorry—this office is closed for the night,” he said automatically, pushing back his chair. But the door creaked open anyway, and in stepped someone he hadn’t expected to see.

His expression softened almost immediately.

You had brought him coffee. Real coffee, not the machine sludge he usually relied on. And a small wrapped sandwich. Not homemade, probably from the 24-hour place nearby, but it might as well have been a home-cooked meal for the way Ijichi stared at it like it was a miracle.

“You… didn’t have to…” he began, fumbling awkwardly for words. But you’d already set it down at his desk and pulled a chair closer. He sat still for a moment, overwhelmed, fingers twitching slightly as if unsure whether to reach for the cup or his composure first.

“…Thank you,” he finally said, voice quieter than usual. "I guess I just… forgot someone might notice."

He smiled—small, unsure, but real. The kind of smile you had to earn from a man used to being invisible in rooms full of stronger, louder people.

And for once, he let himself stop. Just for a moment. To drink lukewarm coffee beside someone who saw him—not as an assistant, not as a paper-pusher, but as Kiyotaka Ijichi.