#le-ask

[tempenensis]

Hi Lele. For now seems that Gojo's character is finished, what thoughts do you have about him? I saw different opinions about it and from different extremes, people who believe that "his character arc was ruined and he never had growth", or "he's a very complicated and contradictory character", or "everything he was, did, didn't, motivated him, his whole character basically revolved around Geto", and people who believe "there is a possibility that he will return", etc.

I think he's a pretty complex character, and multi-faceted at that. Although Sensei commented that he "doesn't have personality", Gege accidentally actually makes Gojou more complex than what he actually seems lol.

I would disagree with "he never had a growth" actually. Gojou had a growth phase - that is the whole Hidden Inventory arc is about. He matured during that arc to be the Gojou that we know in the current storyline. So it's not that he never had a growth, he already did and what we get more is adult Gojou who had finished his growth.

I would agree actually with Nanami's comment, that Gojou is "a pervert who uses jujutsu for his own sake" (yes, he straight up called Gojou hentai in the jpn text lol). Since he's the strongest in jujutsu society, his ego would center on using jujutsu for his own satisfaction. But that's not all of him; he is also a teacher who cares for his students because he wants to see them grow strong, despite his motivation for them growing strong is rather egoistical too. And you can see here, that his character is a mixed of egoistical but also caring -- simply said, pretty human for one called to be strongest.

In jjk, to be strongest means to be alone. To stand on the peak that no other ever see, that no other ever feel. The only people who understand the feeling is the one who also reach that peak. For beings like Sukuna and Gojou, seeing others is like them standing alone on top of the tallest mountain, looking down at people who don't even have the motivation to even glance at the peak - because noone would ever want to try to compete to be the strongest while those two are around. This is the flowers metaphors that appears on the latest chapter; that you can grow the flowers but you can't ask them to understand. Gojou will help his students, people around him, caring and making them stronger, but he can't never ask them to try to reach for that highest peak, to that loneliness of being the strongest. They can't never understand how it feels to be a beings like him or Sukuna.

"his whole character basically revolved around Geto" - well, just no. Yeah, he holds Geto in high regard, but if he really does anything for Getou's sake, then he'd join Getou's case in destroying jujutsu society. But as we see, he doesn't. He becomes a teacher because he wanted to change jujutsu society so no one would become another Getou, not because of Getou's sake, but rather the sake of younger generation. So that he can prevent another youth being wasted by the jujutsu society tradition; which is why he picks up the most "troublesome" students that jujutsu society least cares for; from Maki, Yuta, Inumaki, even Yuuji.

"there is a possibility that he will return" -- this is oddly specific, but did their brain can still move the feet? Did they get a flashback-kinda chapter? If the answer is no and yes, then I'm sorry; they most likely won't come back.

[tempenensis]

Can you do a break down of the meaning of Gojo's chants?

The left image is the chant for Red, while the right is for Blue/Azure.

位相 (isou) means "phase" just like in the official translation. This indicates the start of his chant, 'opening' certain technique.

波羅蜜 (haramitsu), meaning "paramita". From the Buddhist root, it refers to the culmination of certain virtues. It also refers to the practice of one bodhisattva to reach enlightenment.

光の柱 (hikari no hashira), "pillar of light". Probably refers to the sun pillar phenomenon, which appears because sunrays is reflected by miniscule ice crystal in the atmosphere. The light is reflected back to earth by the crystal, causing the phenomenon.

黄昏 (tasogare) means "dusk" or "twilight".

智慧の瞳 (chie no hitomi), "eyes of prajna". Prajna or wisdom in Buddhism is the ability to discern things and there are several types of it. There is also 智慧光 (chiekou), which is one of twelve lights of Amitabha Buddha that destroy the darkness of ignorance of living things. It is interesting to pair tasogare with chie no hitomi since the root for tasogare means a time when others can't discern the face of other people. So, from unclear to become clear.

I have done a breakdown for the chant of Purple/Murasaki, which you can read here

[tempenensis]

Hi lele! I would like to ask, how do you interpret Shoko’s thought ‘i was in love with one of you, it’s something that would’ve never happened even if the world was turned upside down’ ? At first I thought Shoko will never love neither of her idiot teammates, but the more I read I het the gist of ‘I would not admit that I like you’ or ‘It would never be reality’ (as in maybe Suguru’s dead or Satoru’s captured). What do you think?

Hi there, you two! This is the original panel

I would translate this as "Actually I was in love with either of you. But nothing will ever happen even if the sky and the earth are turned over."

To give better context we need the next panel though:

"I was there, (you know?), who said you were alone, idiot?"

I think the nuance for her feelings is that she feels the two of them overlook her. She was willing to hear them if they ever cared - but the two of them were too focused on their own selves.

[tempenensis]

Hi! May I ask what do you think the butterfly cocoon imagery in the Shibuya OP song mean? And is there any easter eggs in the OP that you found interesting that you can share with us? Thank you!

I was gonna make a separate post, but let's just do it here and answer this ask too. Heed for manga spoilers

1. Pretty sure the butterfly hatching from its cocoon refers to Mahito. He transforms during his fight with Yuuji to what he called "spirit body". Not to mention this panel of butterfly drawn before his transformation

2. The general inspiration for the 2nd OP is probably Hyakki Yakou (Night of a Hundred Demons). Not the vol 0 thing, but the original lore. In the legend, Hyakki yakou refers to when numerous youkai and oni takes to the street, like a parade, from the walking scene to the literal chaos. These ukiyo-e style of cursed spirits illustration is also a nod to this (which I really love)

3. Nobara. Eyes and chairs. You know what happened sobs

4. The consecutive hand seals scene, in order of its appearance:

Sukuna's domain expansion seal; Mahito's domain expansion; Dagon's Death swarm technique; Jogo's Maximum; Choso's Piercing blood technique; Todo's Boogie Woogie; Megumi summoning Mahoraga; and of cource Gojou's domain expansion.

5. The only characters who move in this scene are Nanami and Nobara. You know what happened to them in Shibuya

6. And lastly, Itadori walking away alone, as if to tell how he doesn't come back with the others to school but "running away" to exorcise remnant cursed spirits in Shibuya, until Megumi and Yuuta fetch him back

[tempenensis]

I know you don't usually weigh in on non-canon content, but I've seen a lot of people say 236 was a bad ending, or like gege joked, that things are moving too fast or he's missed a chapter (or 20, I'm personally annoyed that we jumped from Nov to Dec 24, I know gege wants the manga to end for some reason, but those three weeks of training/preparation would have been a great time to let us get re-invested in the student characters since the culling game arc felt like it was missing so much)

Do you have any feeling for what could have been a better way to end things, if indeed things are ended, for Gojou Satoru? Or do you agree that things have been moving too fast?

Sorry for this and please feel free not to answer if this is not the kind of question you want to entertain, I am just curious if you have an opinion you're willing to share since I feel you have a very good grasp of the jjk's plot and themes! I trained as a literature major, so my interest is always in whether character consistency is maintained and what a story is saying and whether that message is carried successfully or not and what that might mean for us as readers. I'm personally still on the fence about this particular twist because I'm trying to withhold judgement of the piece until we actually see it as a whole, but I am starting to feel that the narrative started to unravel a bit after Shibuya, like somehow we didn't see a lot of the characters to their full potential (like Nobara T.T my baby Nobara). Maybe this is just part of gege's notorious fast pace.

Some of this I believe is due to JJK's titular meaning of the issue of curses and what they represent being an "endless battle" but there's only so many times one can show hopelessness and loss I think before it becomes almost redundant. We actually haven't seen that many on-screen sorcerer deaths, but somehow it's been two of the most popular adult characters so far, and only direct mentors, which is a frequent trope of the hero's journey in western literature. I think that even though I really wish it hadn't happened, Nanami's ending made a lot of sense. Power-wise, Gojo's current death also makes sense, and he's not the kind of character who instantly changes his mind or learns something in his heart from a single experience, but I think it feels somewhat frustrating from my point of view because despite the bodhisattva imagery, he had more to learn as a living person, rather than continuing to believe he was like a flower and maybe no one had the right to ask him to understand. I don't know, it's just a bit frustrating for me because I think it feels character consistent (which I think gege tends to be pretty good at) but somehow incomplete too.

Again my apologies for the long ask, you're always the one I wish I could sit down and have a conversation about these things with!

-raindrop anon

Hi, raindrop anon,. Good to see you again.

First of all, I don't really think Gojou's death is particularly bad, but yeah, as you said, there might be something leaves to be desired in the plot - if jjk is a traditional shonen manga, that is. But jjk is different, which is also the reason for its popularity. I feel that jjk storytelling has always been fast-paced, and one thing that Akutami-sensei does really well is to stick to the main points that he wants to tell with his manga. The last time we have a non-serious non-battle chapter was probably chapter 64 lol - but at the same time, this also shows how jjk departs from the traditional shonen jump manga custom where the mangaka tends to drag the story to make the manga runs longer. Gege on the other hand, seems adamant to want to end the story sooner than later (if his last estimation is to be believed, only a few months left for jjk).

I don't actually have a strong feeling of how gege should end thing with Gojou, but it's been a habit of him to get to the.. shocking side of things; we see this with Gojou getting sealed back in Shibuya. Nanami's death. Then we see the Culling game, and Tengen getting killed. And lastly for Gojou to die. The longstanding status quo is going to be changed eventually. And the next one with status quo is already targeted; Sukuna himself.

As I follow this manga, "things moving too fast" has always been the opinion I saw a lot discussed here in my askbox for many, many developments in the manga. And this is more of a personal preference, but I actually like the fast-get-to-the-point-storytelling that Gege uses with jjk, exactly because how it breaks away from traditional jump manga. I feel that this fast pace is just how gege do his storytelling since the beginning lol

tldr is all I can say is jjk has always been different and fast-paced, gege is unpredictable, and I'm in the opinion that Gojou's death does make sense, unfortunately :')

[tempenensis]

How are the jp fans taking the news? They also inhaling copium? with the "as long as his head is still fine..." logic

Ah yes. From topmost, hashtag is "magazine jjk", akutami-sensei, and gg-sensei. Mostly i saw aktm-sensei 人の心なかった (hito no kokoro nakatta, does not have a heart), not to mention his weekly comment :")

[tempenensis]

If you have time, do you mind helping me with some character analysis? Gojo is very hard to write because he's a very internalized person who doesn't actually show his inner thoughts very often. The times we get them, he is much more serious and analytical than his frivolous personality is meant to show.

Gojo is popular for the same reason that people hate him: truthfully we don't know much about *him* when it comes to the kinds of details which can be used to figure out where someone's personality came from. He comes from a privileged background, so there's lots of people who assume that he never really went through any troubles - that he never had moments of self-doubt or needed to find his place in the world, that his powers likely came easy to him because he's a prodigy, that his family "spoiling" him meant that he was never subjected to the cruel or intense training we know some of the nobles have set up in their family homes. He's also always been special, and it's unlikely that he ever had a desire to be a total non-sorcerer. He could walk away any time he wanted, like Yuki, and it's not like anyone could stop him either.

And Gege never truly refutes this. Gojo's personality is also so good at pretending nothing ever touches him (thematic!) that from the surface it could seem true. He is not the kind of person to be filled with self-pity so we never get panels of him hashing out his situation with the other characters (not that he can because no one is his equal enough to do this...). He's so busy he literally doesn't have time to dwell. He has been shown spending time with his friends, but no one wants to talk about the shit job they all do during down time, they unwind and talk about regular stuff, like regular people, and simply enjoy the company.

But deduction also tells us that people who grew up normal and well adjusted don't behave the way he's behaving. (Nobara and Yuuji had the most normal sounding childhoods of all the students and it shows, even behind the typical shonen characterization).

Clearly, the flashback arc is shown because in a way that is the origin story of the current conflict, and the origin of Gojo's current personality (Geto had a lot of positive influence on him).

Gojo turns against the sorcerer system because it cost him Geto, not because of anything that may or may not have happened to him. He was doing every mission the higher-ups could possibly have sent him on after Riko died. He wasn't rebelling against the system, he was trying to solve it by becoming the single solution all on his own. Again, not the response of a well-adjusted person.

He was not originally the kind of person to take revenge or turn against a system for personal issues, although he later becomes a little like this when he starts taking young sorcerer's under his wing.

There's a lot of fandom speculation that has hints that these things could to be true:

He was spoiled by his family, but they were emotionally distant in the way of all sorcerer families, praising the technique and seeing the technique instead of the child who was wielding it. It's possible he doesn't associate closely with his clan apart from very structured social patterns because he realizes that being "special" never meant he didn't deserve being treated like a child or taught how to behave. He's perfectly aware he has a "bad personality" and knows that this is in part because of how he was raised.

He projects emotionally onto the students in his care, and acknowledges that something about the way he was treated (mostly as a fine commodity) was deeply unfair, but he hasn't actually found another way except to acknowledge at the end of the day that this job gives you trauma and it's usually not worth dying for unless that's your thing (I mean how he throws the students into situations where they think they're going to die and his concession is to place himself as the safety net), and that you shouldn't miss age-appropriate events just because some grown up tells you to become a better little cog.

A lot of the fandom likes to assume that using Six-Eyes is overstimulating or possibly painful for him right away because at least then there's a cost to his using his power, and once again the sorcerer system doesn't care about the cost to its workers (I'm not sure about the right away part. we know that if he doesn't cover his eyes he gets tired, but Gege doesn't want to give gojo any weaknesses so who knows how long it takes).

Gojo is maybe not "afraid" of getting truly close to people but he keeps people at arm's length. No one at this point could bear the burden he does, and that's what he believes it means to be his equal. It's possible but unlikely that if someone reached out to him first, he would let him. We know touching Infinity can feel like you're touching him from the first vs.Jogo fight, and it's likely he truly does keep it on all the time, leaving him physically and psychologically prepared to keep anyone from touching him at all times, even if they don't realize it...

(Overall, it's very funny to me that Gege's friends apparently think his personality is like Gojo's. It makes it more understandable why he wouldn't want to talk about his character, or be annoyed that the person who is a secondary became too popular, but also the cat is a troll and is the kind of person to laugh and walk away if you try to ask them a question -_-. However, if you take the answers we do have literally, it sounds like Gege accidentally made a character with a lot of depth, but he doesn't want to deal with it…)

But we have no answers to the truth of these presumptions in a lot of cases, and I could keep going but I'm running out of steam and I'm already sorry to put so much in your inbox….

I know you don't give headcanons because your blog is more textual analysis blog, so I won't ask for them! Part of me is not even sure what to ask, because we simply have no answers, and I don't think anyone is going to give them to us. That's fine because fandom wants and needs space to do its own interpretations of the character, but when you want an answer that isn't there, it can truly feel like diving off a cliff to make that choice all on your own and run with it (cries because that means there are literally infinite choices to make and each of them alters the story a little).

Maybe what I'm really asking is, if you have time, would you pick apart my characterization of Gojo above? I'm a bit curious about what you agree with and what you disagree with because you're so good with finding the text evidence! I already appreciate you reading if you've gotten this far, and I appreciate all the work you do in the fandom. I won't feel bad if you refuse (not that you will, but I just want to make it clear I have no expectations!!) Thank you again so much for all you do and for letting us play in the space with you!

Hi, anon!

If you're asking about my opinion, I must say, this is pretty solid read. I agree with almost everything that you said, and can't really add much to this. Gege had said before that he "has no personality", I think that means he doesn't think too much about Gojou's character, unlike for example Yuuji or Nanami. This makes us learns more about him by crumbles dropped here and then - and not a lot actually told explicitly in the manga. ((it sounds like Gege accidentally made a character with a lot of depth, but he doesn't want to deal with it)) is actually a good point lol, fans' interest in Gojou is definitely deeper than Gege himself.

One of the most interesting thing about him is that despite his vocal opposing of the current jujutsu system, he still does his duty to this very system that he opposes. Even if he messes around sometimes, Gojou is the only special-grade sorcerer who actually goes to missions assigned to him and has been mentioned to clean other sorcerers' messes - which is why he is so busy all the time. This speaks more about him knowing that his priority lies in saving other's lives. I think for him, he is an actual proper jujutsushi who has lived as one since he was born because of the techniques he inherited - maybe the point of being a jujutsu sorcerer and what he has to do has been driven to him since he can handle his own technique. So all he knows is to be a jujutsushi first - and his desire to change the system only comes later, after he saw what this system does to people around him, especially Riko and Getou. Even then, he tries to change it from inside, as jujutsushi who is one under the very system he want to change. All he knows is how to live as a jujutsushi and he doesn't seem to want to stop being one, even if it means he can destroy the system from outside. He wants jujutsushi to continue, but with a better system, not to stop or destroy all of them entirely.

[tempenensis]

why did Gojo go crazy for a bit after toji killed him?

Speaking from the perspective of a biologist, Touji stabbed his frontal lobes. The frontal lobes are the center of cognition and manage memory, planning, decision-making, emotions, personality, and more. Basically, it manages actions and the thought process that causes it. He might have healed it up, but nerve cells are mightly difficult to grow back rightly because of how sensitive they are. So the process of healing up his nerve cells might be causing change in his behavior

[tempenensis]

i'm still a bit conflicted about yuuji agreeing with maki over killing sukuna while he's in megumi's body so quickly, it's probably because of how fast the manga is going but it's such a big inconsistency since itafushi have almost come to blows over trying to protect each other 😭 maybe yuuji will have a bigger internal turmoil over it later but it would be ooc if he didn't even feel conflicted over killing someone who asked to save him and he even tried to keep away from sukuna knowing the risks

Actually I think it's pretty canon even if Yuuji's reaction is pretty "cold" :'). If you remember this in the earliest chapter

Megumi is ready to exorcise Yuuji once he swallows the finger and this before he realized that Yuuji was able to suppress Sukuna. So Yuuji's reaction to quickly kill Sukuna is not irrational, it just shows that he had truly embodied a jujutsu sorcerer's mindset (this is what his idea of "being a cog" is about). In comparison, Yuuji at the beginning would be much more hesitant to kill Sukuna.

After all, for them, it's better to die as a human than to live as a curse. I think Fushiguro would also think like this too :')

[tempenensis]

Is it true that the Japanese side of the fandom is really annoyed with the international/English side? I keep seeing that the Jpn fans don’t like the Eng fans interpretations.

Here's something that happened a while back, I think around the chapter for Gojou getting unsealed. So the leaks were particularly very, very bad for that chapter, I literally could not go anywhere without seeing it. And the jpn fans hate leaks.

After the chapter released, someone from jpn fandom made a twitter account with the purpose to spread awareness of the M account who spread leaks, including report and commenting under official tweets. You know what did the western fans did? They reported this fan account back and got it suspended. There's no help for the western side who support leaks it seems, they've lost all the common sense

Also, weekly leaks always trending on twitter so I always know when it comes out. Like, it's literally illegal, please be more low-key about it

[tempenensis]

do you know if there is a translation of the new juju sanpo anywhere? the yokohama one?

Ah, from the recent Jujufest? It's paid content and is still available for demand. I think it'll be a while until we see something from this front circulating :")

[tempenensis]

Good luck in your games! I don't tend to have much luck with the pulls haha, so I'm sending you all good vibes to get some nice event items ^^.

When you have time, I was wondering if you had hints for translation on Gojo's incantation! I loved it a lot, but don't know if it means anything in particular.

As far as I can tell the words are sort of showing the things that surround a space? Kyū tsuna (the translators i've seen either say nine points or ropes) makes me think of the ropes tied at temples, and temples can be both boundary and gateway but I don't have much context for this one...

Henkō I've seen as "polarized light" which seems to reference the blue+red requirements of purple maybe? But also is this image of a wave pulling in two directions, the word making it both divided and still referring to both possible "directions" at once, so it's a concept like his technique rather than a decision of direction.

The crow and shomyo could refer to the voice/message from heaven and the chant to heaven, which is another "conceptual" gap. Also Gojo is sort of answering a prayer while performing a chant, so he is both the messenger and supplicant maybe?

I don't really get "表裏の間" at all. I've seen it translated as "head and tail" "gap between within and without" and "chasm of front and back", google just says "front and back" but the last character translates to something like "interval". It evokes the concept of the end and the beginning being both as far apart from one another as possible, but also as close to on another as possible which seems close to the concept of purple but it feels like reading into it too much...

Either way, I hope that you rest well this weekend anyways!

raindrop anon

Lol, thank you, raindrop anon. I actually pulled FGO's newest servant, who coincidentally shares the same seiyuu as Nobara QuQd. Now I only need to somehow get Enojun into fgo lol

This is the original panel of Gojou's chanting, btw

九綱 (kukou) means "nine ropes". Nine is sort of sacred number here, might be taken from nine virtues of Shakyamuni (whom Gojou have a lot of reference to). And the ropes, just like you said, act as a boundary like in temple to mark sacred place. It could also refer to the state of intertwining as he does to Red and Blue to create Purple 偏光 (henkou), means "light polarization". I agree with your idea here, that it's most likely referring to Red and Blue and the joining of two techniques. 烏と声明 (karasu to shoumyou). means "crow and shoumyou". In opposite to their reputation in the west, crow in Japanese lore is actually thought as the harbinger of good omen. So messenger is right. The 声明 though, it'll read generally as seimei and does mean message. But here, it's read as shoumyou, which actually refer to a style of chanting in Buddhism. It is a style of chanting Buddhist scripture with music. So not ordinary message, but rather special one?? 表裏の間 (hyouri no hazama), translated literally would be "between the front and back". This could be taken literally but also could refer to one's face shown in public and private. So it might means the space between reality and imaginary, as his technique realizes "infinity" from imaginary concept

Hope this helps! Also, sending much luck to you too!

[tempenensis]

reading jjk 223 and uta's ct reveal, it made me realize how utahime being able to increase other CE and her own is actually something HUGE...jjk lore has established so far that a way for sorcerers to only even increase their CE or CT power is only through "binding vows" which usually comes with compromise (nanamin overtiming, mei mei killing her birds) but now looking so far that Uta's CT allows increasing CE without the need of compromise seems very GROUND BREAKING....but idk idk maybe im missing something here, just wondering what you think??

Tbh I agree with you. Most jujutsushi are focused to do damage than utilities since the basic of their work is to exterminate cursed spirits, so strengths are so valuable. Shoko is precious in the term that she can recover - and she's so valuable that she rarely comes out to the frontline. Maybe it's the same with Utahime. Since her "value" lies on buffing teammates, she's a rare talent that doesn't go out to the frontline unless the situation calls for it.

[tempenensis]

Hi. You stated in an old post that Megumi‘s mother passed away soon after Megumi was born. Is there any canon source that you could use as a reference or is it just a headcanon that was widely accepted? 

Touji's profile, extra page of tankobon vol 9

[tempenensis]

Hello Lele-san. In the JJK-0 spin-off, in which Yuuta and group work at the store, and Utahime arrives, I want to know how Panda refers to her as simply 'Utahime'? Like, even if she is not their teacher, she is still a teacher, so shouldn't she be referred with 'sensei'? Also, I wonder why she accepts it? Like, her continuous 'respect your elders' to Gojo, shouldn't she say the same to Panda?

lol yeah, he calls her "Utahime"

Panda calls her like that because actually Panda is more like Yuuji in that regards. He speaks to everyone casually, sometimes too casually like in this case. In the case of Utahime, I think she understands that Panda is just unruly child, not like Gojou who calls her like that to tease her.

[tempenensis]

hi Lele-san, im interested in your interpretation of Geto’s downfall.

so obviously, he was traumatized, but what I find interesting is his and Gojo’s rivalry and what part it played in his life. the way i see it, before purple, Gojo and Geto, on a surface level were similar in stats (but Gojo seemed more capable even then) and I guess you could call them rivals. though Gojo is leading, I think. but sure, rivals. and after Toji, that all changed really fast. suddenly the difference in Gojo’s and Geto’s powers was significant and very visible.

so what I understand happened is that Geto suddenly became aware of just how much they weren’t rivals(?) i think that is emphasized by: Gojo demonstrating Limitless to Geto and Shoko; Nanami saying that the jujutsu world could just send Gojo to do everything; Geto’s famous parting words to Gojo. and after that he felt utterly useless, and decided to go his own way, try to complete a task he knew was impossible, and gather followers- which made him feel powerful and capable. of course, there is the morality point: how unneeded and unnecessary the regular people are and yada yada. you get the main gist.

if I’m correct, Geto’s feelings were: desperation, sadness and jealousy- but then, the popular interpretation of the whole manga is that Geto did it all for Gojo? like, because the jujutsu society used Gojo for everything, Geto wanted to make Gojo’s life easier? i don’t get that. am I wrong? did I interpret the whole arc incorrectly?

Hi, hello, anon. This is interesting question.

Firstly, I wouldn't actually call them rivals, as they didn't try to compete with each other. In the flashback arc, they are introduced more like two sides of a coin; similar in strength but with contrasting views. While Gojou thought of being a jujutsushi is like a troublesome job, protecting the weak, Getou thought of it as a duty - "with great power comes great responsibility" actually painted his view well during this time.

"survival of the weak", that's how an ideal society should be. helping the weak and keeping the strong in check. listen, Satoru, jujutsushi exists to protect non-jujutsushi

Rather than Getou realizing how much of NOT rivals they were, I think the situation is more complex. But it boils down to the unfairness of jujutsushi system. Riko was very important to them and they protected her risking their life; her death was brushed aside when Tengen can be stabilized even without her. Haibara was a close friend, and his death just meant that he wasn't strong enough, he can be replaced by other jujutsushi - hence Nanami said that Gojou should and can handle everything by his own. As he realized this unfairness, Gojou growing stronger feeds into his insecurity - that only the strong is needed in the jujutsu society. It is the opposite of what he believed, that the strong must protect the weak. However, all he saw is that their death, at the end of it, were meaningless for the jujutsu society.

And then when he met Yuki, he learned that cursed spirits exist only because of non-jujutsushi who jujutsushi supposed to protect with their lives. And this means that the cursed spirits are infinity compared to jujutsushi that sacrificed their lives. Everything that they did, doing, will be done, is just meaningless in front of such unending force. This is why he keeps insisting on "meaning".

And all this is what drove Getou to finally go his own way, with the aim to reshape the society.

And to reduce this... complex idea that shape the core of Getou's character to just "for Gojou".... I'm sorry, I can't accept that, as Getou is one of the more complex characters in the series, with one of the best character developments.