Darkness.
It wasn't the comforting kind that came with closed eyes under a blanket. It felt like being dropped into an ocean and left there to drift. It felt like she was sinking deeper… until everything went blank.
Gasping, Gwen bolted upright in her bed, drenched in sweat. The window was closed, and the curtains were drawn. Sunlight filtered through just enough to outline her room—her guitar case leaned against the wall, a sketchpad sat on the desk, and clothes were piled in the corner.
It was just a nightmare.
Swinging her legs off the bed, she went to the bathroom to wash up and turned on the lights. The fluorescent white light filled the space. In the mirror, she saw a cute blonde girl with soft, wavy hair that spilled down past her shoulders.
Because she had just woken up, her hair was a bit messy—some of it stuck up at odd angles, as if she'd been electrocuted. Her pale blue eyes blinked slowly, still hazy from sleep.
Then she noticed something odd in the reflection—two faint, dark lines just below her eyes.
She leaned in.
The cracks widened.
Two new eyes opened beneath hers, then a mouth stretched open on her cheek, sharp-toothed and smirking.
"Such a pretty little thing," the mouth said, voice amused and low. "Makes me hungry... Ah, no, wait—I'm not that kind of monster."
Gwen blinked, too stunned to speak.
The voice sighed. "But I still can't move, huh. Ooh...it's not my body."
The eyes blinked lazily, and the mouth smiled wider.
"Still... It's not a bad view from here."
"Huh?".
She instinctively took a step back,
"Looks like I'm sealed... But to seal someone like Sukuna inside and still be fine, little girl, who are you?"
The mouth kept talking, saying things she couldn't understand, chattering away and making her a bit annoyed... No, that's not the main point.
"Huh? Why aren't you saying anything?" Noticing that the young girl froze without responding, Ren locked eyes with her through the mirror.
Gwen Stacy raised a trembling hand and touched the mouth that was on her cheek.
The texture of smooth, cold skin came from her fingertips - the mouth moved to her other cheek, "Don't move your hand, talk properly."
"AHHHHH!!!"
This time, Gwen finally couldn't hold it together and let out a scream of horror; it was probably a good thing that she was alone(?) at the moment.
"Okay, that's a bit of an overreaction. But to be fair, I'd freak out too if I suddenly became prettier."
The mouth on her face grinned wider. "By the way, don't cause a commotion, not unless you want someone to find out about your situation, which I assure you might end badly for both of us, well, mostly you to be honest ."
Ren, who shared her senses with the girl, just looked at her silently through the mirror with the second pair of eyes.
The atmosphere was a bit awkward for a while.
"What the hell are you?" The young girl who forced herself to calm down asked in a low voice, her voice was a bit shaky, and her hands gripped the edge of the sink hard.
"Hmm? You weren't the one who sealed me inside yourself?" As Ren spoke suspiciously, the voice came from an extra mouth on Gwen's cheek, which looked very oozy as it opened and closed.
"I don't understand what you're saying."
Ren could see the confusion and fear on the girl's face were real, and she wasn't lying.
But this only raised more questions.
"You didn't know? Could it be someone else did it?"
Ren thought for a moment, then decided to stop thinking about it, adopting a laid-back attitude.
"Forget it, even if we knew who did it, it wouldn't help."
"Um, could you please explain properly?"
Seeing that mouth start talking to itself again and seemingly not planning to do anything to her, Gwen gathered her remaining courage and spoke up again,
"Alright, my name is Ren, but you can also call me Ryoumen Sukuna(?) I'm over a thousand years old (not really ), unmarried, and my job is a curse master. I kill and burn without distinction between day and night, committing all sorts of evil. I don't smoke, I like drinking, I eat when I'm hungry, sleep when I'm tired, and before bed I eat a young, beautiful woman regularly and destroy a few villages as a warm-up, I also like to conduct sacrificial rituals in my own name by killing hundreds of people from time to time…oh and I am a very kind hearted person. Hm... that's about it."
With each sentence Ren spoke, the girl's face grew paler, and her body began to tremble.
"In short, you're sort of,possessed. But I'm a nice person(?)So you don't have to worry about anything. You can call me Ren. Pleased to meet you?"
His words were sincere, but it seemed his host didn't believe him.
"Then, why are you inside of me?"
Gwen asked, her voice trembling.
"I don't know. When I woke up, I found myself sealed inside you."
Ren wanted to shrug, but couldn't, so he blinked to show his helplessness.
"Unfortunately, I don't know what the reason is, but I can neither directly hurt you nor forcefully take over and replace you, so I can only talk to you like I'm doing now.So, you don't have to be afraid, at least I can't do anything to you right now."
Besides, how could someone like me, an ordinary university student who has just arrived in this world, kill someone? I am not a Ryoumen Sukuna.
However, maybe because his memories had merged with Sukuna's, he vaguely noticed that his personality had also changed a bit. Perhaps as his memories with Sukuna merged more deeply, the personality change would become more significant. He might even turn into another Ryoumen Sukuna under the influence of Sukuna's memories and cursed energy.Fortunately, it seems the synchronization of his memories has stopped.
It seems like as long as I don't willingly dive into Sukuna's memories, nothing like that will happen.
Gwen was speechless, her smart mind going blank in the face of this beyond comprehension situation.
But with Ren's words as a guide, Gwen's blank mind started to think.
Is what he said true?
If it is true, can you really trust the words of a so-called "kind-hearted-thousand-year-old demon"?
And how did he end up with her? If he was really sealed inside her, who sealed such a dangerous being inside an ordinary high school girl?
Countless questions popped up one after another, but Gwen's questions were destined to remain unanswered.
"Can I really trust you?" Gwen said, biting her pale lips.
"Do you have any other choice?" Ren said casually.
"..." The girl was left speechless, unable to say anything for a long time.
"Just do what you should do, pretend you have a split personality, and there's someone in your head to chat with."
"That's easy for you to say."
Gwen sighed helplessly, looking at the mirror where her face now had extra eyes and a mouth.
"Can you get off my face? I can't go out like this."
"No, the view is best here~"
Actually, Ren could share her senses without this method, but he refused. Staying in the realm of life was way better than staying in the void, but if you can get gold, why settle for silver?Besides, it'll probably be fun to tease her from time to time.
This guy is definitely doing it on purpose!
Hearing the playful tone in Ren's words, Gwen bit her lip, feeling a wave of despair for her future.
Just thinking about the possibility of having a thousand-year-old demon inside her who might actually hurt someone close to her made her consider dying.
"You can certainly try it. Even if you die, I can revive you."
Sensing her thoughts, Ren chuckled,
"You can try if you don't mind the pain."
"..."
"Alright, stop thinking about nonsense. Finish washing up and find something to eat, I'm hungry."
"Demons need to eat too?" Gwen asked, feeling a bit resigned.
"I'm talking about you, idiot."
As if to agree with Ren's words, the girl's stomach growled in protest.
Feeling a strong sense of defeat, Gwen finished brushing her teeth and washing her face, then went to open the kitchen to make breakfast.
....
...
..
.
"You can cook?"
Ren's voice came again, making the frying pan in the girl's hand tremble, almost spilling the fried egg.
"Can you not talk to me suddenly?"
"No, I'm bored. The realm of life is either blood or bones, I'm tired of it."
"..."
Although she didn't know what the realm of life was, from how Ren described it, it definitely sounded like the place a demon would stay.
"btw, you're handling this better than I thought you would. I thought there would be more Freakout, denial, anger, ... We would be hitting all the classic stages of mental breakdown."
Gwen paused for a second. "I've had worse mornings."
"Oh really, enlighten me."
She resumed her cooking. "Once I woke up to my dad arresting my prom date. So yeah. That sucked."
"…Damn. Okay, fair."
She almost let out a big sigh.
"By the way, I still don't know what your name is, little girl?"
"..."
He asked again,
"I've answered all the questions you asked me truthfully."
"haa... It's Gwen Stacy."
Hm…no wonder she looked familiar. Is this the Spider-Man universe?
Well,it's not that surprising considering I reincarnated as Sukuna. Still, i was a bit surprised just a tiny bit. I thought I would end up in JJK, considering I became Sukuna.
"Why is no one else here? Don't you have parents?"
"...they aren't at home"
"Why?"
"My father had to stay overnight at the police station for a case, and her mother had to return to her hometown town Brooklyn, to help a college friend through a divorce. She would be back this weekend."
"Hmm…I see"
*Sigh*
Gwen sighed as if finally accepting her situation, then brought the prepared breakfast to the table: fried egg with toast, and some bacon.
After finishing breakfast, it was almost time for class. Normally, she would already be in the classroom reading a book by now.
*Sigh*, let's take a day off today.
She sighed more this morning than she did in a whole week.
"Dad, I need to take a day off today... No, nothing happened, it's just a cold, don't worry. No, you don't have to come back, yeah, I already took some medicine, okay, I'll rest. Could you apply for leave? hm..Thank you."
After calling the her dad to take a apply for a leave, Gwen started to enjoy her breakfast.
Ren watched her eat. Even though it wasn't his mouth, he could still taste what Gwen was eating, eventhough he Wasn't eating anything, he could still taste it, and it felt strange.
"Give me some too."
"Don't joke around, you don't even have a body."
"But I have a mouth."
"You want me to stuff food into my face?"
"You can use your hand, too."
The next second, Gwen saw a mouth open on the palm of her hand. It was her hand, but the mouth seemed to lead to a deep esophagus, looking both strange and gross.
"...Okay. That's gross. That's so gross."
She refused with a frown.
"I'm going to lick you if you don't."
To make his words more convincing, Ren opened his mouth and stuck out his tongue, and started.
"reoreoreoreo".
Ren's voice came from the palm of Gwen's left hand.
Was this really the king of curses, he seems more like a king of rascals.
The girl made a disgusted face, hesitated then picked up a piece of bacon, placing it on the palm of her left hand. However, the expected feeling of it touching her skin came instead The small piece of saury was quickly eaten by Ren.
"He really did eat it."
"It's good," Ren praised, after all he had been stuck in the void for quite a while. Eating anything after such a long time was bound to taste delicious.
"Of course it's good…."
Gwen, looking at her hand,then realised something crucial.
"Umm…if you don't mind me asking, where will the food you ate go?"
"In your stomach, of course."
Gwen looked at her half-eaten breakfast. She suddenly lost her appetite and even felt a bit nauseous.
Sometimes knowing the truth doesn't bring happiness. Now, thinking about the bacon that had been in someone else's saliva ending up in her stomach, she didn't want to eat anything for the rest of the day.
*Ring ring!*
At this moment, her phone rang. Gwen glanced at the caller's name-Mary Jane Watson, and her already darkened face became even more displeased.
She sighed and answered the call,
"Hello, Mj...No, it's just a cold. No! You don't need to come over after school, I'm fine! It's nothing,I'll catch up on it later.yeah,I'm hanging up."
After hanging up, the mentally exhausted Gwen cleaned up the table. She took a book from the bookshelf in the living room and sat on the sofa to read.
"Please, don't bother me while I'm reading."
"Okay."
However, even though Ren quieted down, Gwen, with her mind in turmoil, couldn't focus on her book.
(To be continued?)