#and they’re not going to disclose anything that happens in the privacy of their clan and their traditions to fucking gojo of all people

[polysyndetonaddictsupportgroup]

i see you are a fan of megumi angst. as you should. i love my son ofc. i was there when gojo pushed that sea urchin out of his womb. i tried (& failed) to hold gojo back from blasting a hollow purple at everyone when they wanted to hold megumi. bro would not let him go. BUT. i love seeing my favs suffer.

SO — the zenin having more of an involvement with megumi? the higher ups fucking up megumi life without even lifting a finger or like talking to megs? GOJO putting his trust in yaga only to get fucked sideways by the fates themselves & starting a whole rebellion? YUUTA & MEGUMI MEETING RIGHT AFTER SATOSUGU divorce causing problems for the students? yeah. this is my jujutsu kaisen. gege could never compare to you.

i do have a few questions though like who tf was tsumiki texting & calling? how is kamo so down bad for megumi that even gojo cringes a little when he brings him up? is yuuta whole obsession thing be linked to rika coming back? MAKI. will we get to see maki & megumi bitching about naoya ?

but a more serious question is: why would the zenin fuck around & traumatize the adopted kid of the strongest, the ten shadows user, when they know it will come with consequences? do they think that there higher ups will put a leash on gojo or some shit like when they was younger? or did they do this out of some sick way of showing their care for megumi bc like they’re trying to show him that gojo is making him weak (which is so not true idc) & they decided to push his limits to showcase his weakness? like as a big fuck you to gojo & an eye opener to megumi?

Tsumiki Calling & Texting:

You'll see.

Kamo:

it's basically canon to me that he is. Kamo was straight up trying to have this big climactic confession with Megumi where he bared his heart and soul and told them they were the same and should find allies in the other and megumi was like "the hell we are" and had to say it twice so he would have no doubt. meanwhile his internal monologue was "why the hell is this guy acting like we're friends or something" megumi you have canonically known him for three years now. he's baring his soul to you. oh my god he wants to be your friend.

in actuality, Kamo is very lonely and isolated in his clan and sees Megumi as, canonically, the same as him. They were both born outside of their clan. Both clans brought them in (or tried to in the Zenin's case) because of their inherited techniques. they both have family that doesn't fit in with the rest of their clan. Kamo is constantly pressured to perform as the perfect heir and sees megumi as the only person in the world who has a chance of understanding him.

Yuuta:

No it's something else.

Maki & Megumi:

You'll see.

The Zenin:

Honestly it was a huge amount of entitlement and the fact that they just were not at all smart and never actually thought they'd face consequences for their actions.

First off, they never thought of Gojo as Megumi's adoptive father who loved him. They were the ones who loved Megumi. Gojo did this as a power play, and to keep the Ten Shadows from reaching his full potential. In their mind, he never loved Megumi as his son and didn't warrant the same levels of concern. They weren't going to exactly erect a billboard about his mistreatment, but they weren't all that worried either. They didn't think Gojo would do what he did and cut them off completely--they were more worried with Gojo trying to use it to make them lose leverage when they were getting a better custody deal. It was absolutely obvious to them that gojo was not doing this out of love and didn't actually care what happened to megumi.

They also didn't personally view what they were doing to megumi as abuse.

Most of the time that they beat him, it was during "training," which he did for a ludicrous amount of time during the day. He needed to be trained in combat. In zenin training, that includes feeling the pain of the blow according to Maki. He needed to learn how to handle pain. that meant hitting him for real.

Except his training was run by an insecure psychopath obsessed with his dead dad and a revolving cast of lunatics obsessed with megumi's progress because that was meant to herald the return of the zenin clan to its former glory. they went way too far way too many times.

The rest was just what Naoya called Zenin-typical discipline, but dialed up because he's fucking crazy. Like. The Zenin weren't strangers to corporal punishment, but naoya always liked hitting megumi. he looked for excuses to do it.

It's the Zenin way, at the end of the day. They all went through the same and turned out just fine. And they wanted Megumi to be raised Zenin.

They also just didn't think of him as, you know. a person.

He was their hopes and dreams personified. They'd waited centuries for him to return to them. Only for him to be tainted by their greatest enemy and taken from them.

So much of Megumi wasn't real to them. It was all just--Gojo's corruption and mockery. Wanting to wear his own clothes? spiting their traditional dress with the ways of the non-jujutsu world. Obviously Gojo's doing. Wanting to be called his own name? It's an honor to be the ten shadows. They waited five hundred years for him. Gojo would not be allowed to diminish that.

The entire clan was not aware that Megumi was being beaten. Only a very, very select few were given time with him, and they usually hit him behind closed doors. Which is what Maki remembers--she can't remember why, but she felt bad for him, and it was hard to figure out why, because he was the ten shadows and was supposed to be beloved. And then she realized that it was because he never had any time to play. And she always saw him being lugged unconscious from the training room.

She didn't see the bits leading up to it. how bad it got. she only got a glimpse, that most of the clan was more than happy to explain away. the ten shadows was training to grow strong for them, after all.

The people abusing him were entitled assholes who just thought they were above consequences. There's an old world mindset around kids in the jujutsu world--they're basically the property of their clan. There's no CPS. No one's doing a wellness check here. They normally would have been allowed to do whatever the fuck they wanted to megumi with impunity--the fact that Gojo's breathing down their neck is a slap in the face and a continued humiliation. They weren't going to add insult to injury and just. tiptoe around how they trained their ten shadows in the privacy of their own compound based on what gojo satoru might think. Megumi would be raised as Zenin are raised when they had him, and Gojo satoru wouldn't have a say in it.

Of course, this was a classic case of fuck around and find out. They didn't think gojo would care; they were wrong and he cut them off from megumi entirely. They never once thought about megumi's autonomous desires and boundaries; now they are cut off permanently from him. They were stupid and felt entitled to do with Megumi as they pleased, and they lost him as a result.