"Gross can't scare me."

"Probably for the best, considering!" Huff. "Is all the magic... stuff... associated with. Horrible stuff too??"

"It varies? Uh, the curses themselves are all pretty bad, some are just back aches but they get worse, but cursed techniques vary a lot. I have a friend who can summon shadow shikigami, I mentioned, and another one has a sympathy-based technique that lets her do—kind of voodoo but more? She connects one thing to a similar thing and then does something to one thing to do it to another. And my Sensei's technique is ridiculous, he can teleport and nothing can touch him and he can bring things to him or push them away."

"Huh. But what do you do with it, once you've got it? Mahito made it sound like it was mostly... hunting curses? But it's magic, right, you do other things with it too??"

"There are people who don't hunt curses, yeah. The problem is there's not really a lot of freeform stuff, other than some specific things that everyone can do you can't learn other people's techniques, and then it depends on what you have. Generic shikigami are useful though.

"But you don't need to hunt curses if you don't want to."

"..... But I could totally do magic for the rest of my life?" asks Junpei, sounding the most hopeful he's literally ever been.

"...yeah, absolutely. Did Mahito suggest you couldn't?"

"No, just, I mean. It wasn't clear how to, to. Make any kind of living with it without... Doing the constant fighting thing? And I think I'd just. Be the absolute worst at, at. Fighting curses or whatever. But if I could be magic and not go running off to fight the evil horrors that lurk among us, then. That'd just be the best thing?"

"Oh! Yeah. Akiho's mum—Akiho's the one with the sympathy technique—she's got cursed energy but she's not a sorcerer at all and she wasn't gonna get involved. Until Akiho did, because Akiho-chan is—very herself." He has a fond smile on his lips. "When I'm allowed to stop pretending I'm dead I want you to meet her and Inori-kun. But you can just have magic, if you want."

"And can do useful things with it? I don't know a lot of ways poison can be useful, but, um. Anesthetic what I thought of?"

"That would be good! And I bet your shikigami can just carry things for you, move them around. Non-sorcerers would think you have telekinesis. There are other specialised shikigami. And there's some direct cursed energy manipulation but that's harder. Oh also there's barriers, all sorts, and some people have jobs in keeping an eye out for curses and summoning a barrier to keep them contained while waiting for the sorcerers to come deal with them. We call those people 'windows', I think most people with cursed energy who aren't sorcerers or curse users end up doing that."

"Oh. That... all sounds nice, actually. Though I really don't know what Orizuki could pick up at this size, I guess I'm covered if I drop a pencil?"

Wow. A solid vision of the future that isn't filled with dread. That's kind of wild??

"You can probably make Orizuki bigger. Practising using your technique and cursed energy control will make you more powerful and versatile."

"Yeah. It just, um. Changes things if it's a... thing I do as a hobby versus. A thing I could do with the rest of my life?" Then he smiles a little, shy and self conscious. "But uh, you wanted to watch Earthworm 2, so. I can practice while we do that?"

"Sure! That'll bring me back, I also had to practise cursed energy control while watching this movie. I had this cursed plush toy that would punch me if I changed my cursed energy output for any reason, like a jumpscare or tension in the movie or whatever." His face grows steadily less cheerful as he recounts the anecdote, ending with him rubbing one of his cheeks. "Little hateful bastard."

"... It would punch you??? Why?????"

"To give me appropriate incentive to learn how to control my cursed energy as quickly as possible! Also because Sensei is a sadist. ...and maybe because that was the only cursed doll he could pilfer from Gakuchou-sensei without being noticed."

"I... see. Being a sorcerer sounds hard."

"But it's fun! ...and other people don't need to be punched. I never explained, did I? I don't have any cursed energy of my own. I'm a normie. Except for the super-strength, which I dunno where it comes from. Then one day my friends accidentally released the seal on a cursed object which attracted a bunch of curses and I ate the cursed object which made the evil curse that was trapped in it possess me but then it turns out I am the first vessel in a thousand years who can completely contain him."

"You're very full of yourself, aren't you."

Tōkan slaps his cheek where that mouth showed up. "Except sometimes he shows up like this to undermine me."

"And anyway most sorcerers have a much easier time controlling their cursed energy."

"... You have a curse in you?? Is he there... always...? Like even when you go to the bathroom...??"

"Yeah."

"As if I'd pay attention to anything as mundane as that."