Jujutsu Kaisen: Tickless

"When the water rises, you drown in seconds you never lived."

Timeframe: Concurrent with Jogo Tokyo attackLocation: Kyoto Jujutsu High 

The first sign wasn't a scream.It was a fish.

Still alive — flopping out of a dry stone basin in the Kyoto inner courtyard.

Miwa stared, wooden sword resting across her shoulder. Kamo paused mid-practice swing, confused.

Inomaki Renji pointed at it.

"Weird."His cursed mark faintly glowed.

The koi twisted once more, gasped — then stilled.

Then the ground beneath it started to bleed water.Not from pipes. Not from rain.From nowhere.

30 minutes earlier

Kyoto's students trained lightly near the north field. Kamo Nobara wiped blood from his fingertips, drawing fresh lines across his forearm.

Inomaki Renji — taller and lankier than Toge, but with the same branded throat — fired off short command bursts, sparring with Miwa.

"Pin."She locked up, legs refusing to move.

"Relax, relax! It's just sparring," Miwa said, laughing nervously, even as her muscles twitched under the effect.

They were comfortable. Not safe — that didn't exist anymore — but comfortable.

Then…the sky bent.Not darkened. Not thundered.

Bent.

Like light was being pulled toward something behind the clouds.

Kamo stopped mid-attack. "...You feel that?"

Inomaki's mouth opened.

"...Rotten."His curse mark glowed on its own — reacting to an aura even he couldn't shape into speech.

Gakuganji's quarters

The old man sat stiff, eyes narrowed toward the southwest corner of the school grounds.

"Barrier's warping."

A droplet landed on his desk.He looked up.The ceiling didn't leak.

The breach

It started with a ripple.

Like sound underwater — muffled, heavy, and far too close.

Then the gate at the training field split like paper. A cursed rift poured forth black seawater and a figure too large to be real.

Dagon.

Scales of ocean rot. Tentacles dragging coral and bone. Teeth lined in human eyes, each one twitching in agony.He didn't announce himself.He slithered across the gravel like a dead god returning home.

"Soaked in potential," he muttered."These grounds remember the sea."

Miwa's hand locked around her blade.

"Kamo…!"

Kamo stepped forward, blood already blooming in precise script across his arms.

"Get Renji to safety. I'll stall it."

"Too late," Renji said quietly.

His throat glowed bright.

"Freeze."

Dagon didn't.The command failed.

Water surged from the puddles beneath them.Reflections danced — showing impossible deaths.

— Miwa drowned, her lungs full of blood— Kamo torn apart by coral spears— Renji, his mouth sewn shut, choking on his own voice

Miwa trembled. "Those aren't real."

"They are," Dagon said."You just haven't reached them yet."

Domain Bloom (Partial)

Not a full expansion — but enough to overlay Kyoto's campus with Dagon's cursed terrain.

Saltwater flooded corridors.Seaweed grew from the floorboards.Distant screams echoed through bubbles rising from empty air.

Fish swam through shadows.Students began vanishing — not with a scream, but with a gurgle.

Miwa gritted her teeth.Kamo's blood arcs surged toward Dagon — and evaporated before contact.Dagon didn't even look.

"You are young," he said."You haven't earned your deaths yet."

...

A figure — wet, glassy-eyed — stumbled out of the infirmary.Not a student.A teacher.Eyes hollow. Hands blistered.

He fell forward. Water poured from his mouth like a broken faucet. His skin peeled in real time — a timeline of drowning unraveling out of sync.

Miwa turned away, heart racing.

Kamo whispered, "He drowned… five seconds ago."

But they were still on dry land.