As the children explore the new house and you show Uraume where everything is, Sukuna wanders around, finding himself in the hall leading to your shared bedchambers.
On either side of the hall are doorways. As he passes them, he peers in.
A painting room. A small library of ancient jujutsu scrolls. A small armoury of some of his favourite weapons. A nursery.
He pauses there, staring at the crib sitting innocently in the middle. Something inside his chest clenches, and he just barely is able to make his feet continue moving.
The fusuma doors slide open, and he peers into the bedroom you'd prepared for him.
It is near the spitting image of their old one, just more modern and a little bigger. The bed is practically identical, still covered in layers of blankets and furs.
He turns his head, looking at an open room on his right.
It looks like a modern office. Desk and chair bathed in sunlight, towering shelves filled with books– journals.
He lumbers in, pulled towards them.
Pulling one out at random, he flips open a page.
He freezes, realising what these are.
With a heavy swallow, Sukuna begins to read. He flips through pages, eyes darting across their surface. He pulls more off the shelf, words blurring together as something heavy settles on him.
... is the new year. The fireworks are beautiful. I think you would've loved them, Kuna.
I visited an aquarium today. It's a building filled with giant glass tanks of water. There were so many fish! I think you might've gotten hungry if you were here...
... missing him every night...
... hard without him or the others. It's like I'm not complete...
... so many things I'm excited to show you! I think you'll love the different dishes I've learned to make...
Sometimes I speak to your finger. Is that weird? I swear I feel it pulse in response...
Over and over. Page after page. Book after book. Hundreds of them, all containing your thoughts and feelings from the last one thousand years.
Sukuna stares vacantly, energy erratic as his second maw grits its teeth. He–
Slowly, he put them all back in their places, treating your journals with utmost respect. As he slides the last one back into place, he steps back, head tilted back as he sighs, heavy and deep.
Grunting, he pinches the bridge of his nose, shaking his head. He wasn't– you'd agreed– it wasn't like he planned to take so long!
Deep breaths. His shoulders shook, tensed, rolling back as Sukuna tried to contain his tumultuous emotions.
He needed to hit something. Needed to break something, to sink his teeth and claws into–
"Sukuna? I felt your energy spike... what's wrong?"
Turning towards you, Sukuna's eyes shone with tears.
You just stare at each other, not moving, just... staring.
He swallowed around that lump in his throat, slowly walking towards you. His top hands cradled your face like porcelain, thumbs stroking beneath your eyes.
"I left you... for a thousand. Years." He grit his teeth, fighting the overwhelming emotions because he didn't know how to– how to let them out without destroying everything. "What kind of husband am I? Huh?! How can you– you did all this, waiting for me to return! What if I didn't?! Would you still wait for me?"
"Yes, of course! I love you, Sukuna, I'd wait a million years for you!"
"Yeah, well, you shouldn't!"
His retort makes you flinch.
"... wife. Oh, my wife..."
And this giant of a man, the most deadly and dangerous curse user, the most powerful sorcerer alive, fell to his knees before you.
"I left my wife. You, who have always been beside me. Who's always chosen me... and I left you."
Regret is an unfamiliar feeling to one Ryoumen Sukuna. The taste bitter and foreign as he struggles to make room for it. It weighs on his heart unlike anything else ever has, because how could he?
You were his friend, the only one who looked at a monster and saw a hungry little boy instead and said: "Here," while holding out an apple for him to take.
Where before he'd only been given scraps just to survive, you'd handed him a succulent sweet fruit that's taste he's never forgotten.
Friend. Wife. Mother of his children. His queen, the only reason he accepted the stupid title people gave him just so you could be more than some poor, malformed bastard's wife.
He'd never expected it to take a thousand years. When Kenjaku had suggested the idea... Sukuna had just been so bored...
And he'd chosen the chance to be reborn in an era of powerful opponents over being with his family.
Truly, there was nobody as pathetic as him.
You'd given his life meaning, and he'd chosen his selfish bloodlust over... what? Centuries spent by your side? You hadn't aged a day, so clearly, if he hadn't been sealed, he could've waited out those centuries, immortal and with you.
A tear splattered against the floor, Sukuna glaring down at it.
Weak, he thought, pathetic!
As he wrapped his arms around you, face pressed into your belly, you just held him, running your fingers through his hair.
"Oh, Sukuna..." You whispered, tearing up yourself. "My love, please. Tell me, would you have waited a thousand years for me?"
He didn't even need to think about it.
You smiled, stroking his face. "Then why blame yourself? I knew what we were getting into, husband. I didn't mind. I missed you, but... I know the man I married. And I never held your choice against you, not once."
Slowly, you knelt as well, the both of you holding each other.
"My beautiful, beautiful husband," you whispered, resting your forehead against his. "It doesn't matter. Not now that we're together again. But if it truly matters to you...