Name: Pathological Love
Author: Chaori Yan

Synopsis

You're the good kid all the teachers and parents love: excellent grades, good manners, and a beautiful face. Your willingness to help others has made you popular among the students, and you were voted school belle by a landslide.

Your classmate Yuta Okkotsu couldn't be more different. He's gloomy and withdrawn, always avoiding other people's eyes. His classmates pick on him so often that he's frequently covered in bruises.

You're too kind to sit by and do nothing. Even if you found a stray dog abandoned on the roadside, you'd feel sorry for it and take it home. By now, you've taken in enough to fill a whole room.

Whenever someone bullies him, you step in and scold them. They're big fans of you, the school belle, so they smile, apologize, and leave.

You look at Yuta Okkotsu huddled in the corner and still can't stop worrying. You help him to the nurse's office and tend to his injuries.

Seeing Yuta Okkotsu all bandaged up makes you feel so satisfied.

His schoolbag is always getting thrown away, bugs are stuffed into his lunch, and his desk is covered in curses.

Poor thing... I want so badly to take care of him.

So on stormy days, you run all over campus to find his schoolbag. You get into the habit of bringing an extra lunch, and you carry a cleaning cloth so you can wipe his desk clean before he arrives each day.

He always thanks you so gently.

You think his voice sounds so lovely.

It's only natural that you become good friends. He still keeps getting into trouble, waiting for you to come to his rescue.

Suddenly, you find yourself hoping he'll always need your help.

You're a good kid. Helping people genuinely makes you happy.

A horrific incident at school leaves many dead and wounded. Yuta Okkotsu is identified as the culprit, and then he vanishes from your life.

You transfer schools as well and become classmates with a boy named Yuji Itadori.

You wonder how Yuta Okkotsu is doing. Is he being bullied? If he gets hurt, is there anyone to bandage him up?

You're worried. You really want to do something to help him.

Six months later, an unexpected turn of events leads to you and Yuji being recruited by a strange white-haired teacher in a blindfold. You enroll at an institution called Tokyo Jujutsu High.

There, you meet Yuta Okkotsu again.

You're happy, but you also worry about whether he's doing all right here, whether curses have hurt him, and whether his classmates are picking on him again.

You want to help him. You really do.

But... it seems he doesn't need you.

Everyone here treats him well. He's become incredibly strong, a special-grade sorcerer whom the younger students all respect.

Suddenly, you feel... so bored.

So very bored.

You withdraw your passionate gaze from him and turn away, no longer looking at him.

Just then, you find out that Yuji Itadori has inexplicably been sentenced to death. People flippantly call him a "vessel," the higher-ups want him dead every day, and he's forced to fight.

P-Poor thing... I want so badly to help him.

Disowned by his parents and bullied at school, Yuta was afraid to get too close to anyone. He returned to an empty home, living like a rat in the gutter.

He thought this was how he would spend his whole life.

He could never have normal relationships or warm bonds. Family, friendship, love: none of them would ever be part of his life.

But then the girl barged into his world. She took care of him tenderly, sharing her kindness and warmth with him.

For the first time in so long, he felt... love.

The kind of love he never got from his family, his classmates, or strangers.

He wanted it.

He wanted more and more.

He wanted to be loved.

To be loved deeply.

To love someone else.

He would deliberately hit his head, or throw away the rice in his lunch, hoping she would take care of him and gaze at him with love in her eyes.

After they were separated, he never thought they'd meet again. He was so happy.