Chapter Text
Unhurried were the steps Sukuna took to the west wing of his palace. At least, that was what he told himself but he was not in the right headspace to actually tell. He had just received word of the upcoming childbirth from his newest wife – husband actually, but that stubborn omega could not really expect him to keep saying his preferred (legally binding) title when he was about to push their child out of his womb – and with faked calmness and serenity he took his time going from one wing of his enormous estate to the other.
Everyone in the palace knew though that he was just a shaking bundle of nerves right now and that he only bothered with his nonchalant front because of his pride and because he had learned during the countless births of his other children that being anything other than his calmest self would lead to negative outcomes during the birthing process.
Negative outcomes during the birth of his children had been the one defining feature of his life since reincarnating not twenty years ago. Killing the most powerful sorcerers of this time, taking control of the Japanese government with nothing but a clasp of his hands and invading the neighbouring nation-states, China first and foremost, wasn’t half as crucial to his being as putting his own blood and flesh into this world. Sukuna was a King, he was always destined to conquer the known world, which consisted of the actual world in this day and age, and that was never in dispute.
But finally becoming a father… that was something the universe conspired against him to prevent from ever coming true.
In his first life, he couldn’t sire any children even though he had been a male alpha who literally defined the caste of his gender for generations to come. The reason for that was as simple as it was cruel as he had suffered several periods of severe starvation in his childhood and adolescence. Even though he grew strong enough to get himself all the food he needed and wanted and even though he learned the most advanced forms of the healing techniques known to men and used them on himself, his body had already been permanently damaged in its fertility and that fact could not be changed.
He became strong and his scent and pheromones were otherworldly as everyone could attest to and his presence as that of a high-level alpha let everyone cower before him just as much as his cursed technique did. But children he was denied, regardless of his status or his primal urges.
When he became a curse himself, all of that ceased to matter as those creatures did not know any kind of gender but a thousand years later he was reborn in a body that had its fertility not ripped away. Knowing that now he would finally have what his body and soul had craved for so long made his reincarnation sweeter than he would have thought possible. Now he could have it all.
But he did not.
He definitely impregnated plenty of willing and unwilling omegas while killing sorcerers and destroying the police and military units send after him and he was the happiest man alive when he was listening to the heartbeats of his little ones through the stomach of their mothers.
But he never got anything more than that… because the stillbirths kept happening…
And if it were not the stillbirths, it were the premature births before the infants were able to live on their own and if not that then the deformities and illnesses none of his children could escape from. Not even his mates, only some of them became his wives if he bothered with any kind of marriage at all, were spared from his – his curse that killed and maimed them regularly. Sukuna was cursed; cursed to never have his own offspring, an heir to his name nor descendants who would carry his blood to the future.
At this moment, he marched through the halls of his palace towards the ward that housed the birthing chambers – or delivery room as they said in this century – and when he entered the first set of doors, two of his oldest wives greeted him with news about Tōji and the unborn baby’s condition.
“He is still refusing to use the cardiotocograph, saying that he hears your child’s heartbeat just fine.”
Of fucking course would this stubborn mule refuse even the simplest measures to ensure the baby’s safety while he was in labour. The only reason Sukuna didn’t march inside the chamber right now and forcefully put those transducers on him was the fact that Tōji was able to hear the heart of their child perfectly. Nevertheless, he took a deep breath and let it out slowly to reign his frustrations and anxieties in. Yes, he was anxious like every time one of his children was coming to greet this earth.
At the start of all of this, none of them had survived more than eight hours if they weren’t already dead before they left the womb. Sukuna tried everything to change that fate when he realized that something was going on but he was still of the opinion that he just needed better mothers for his children. He started only mating with high-level omegas regardless if they were male or female but without success; then with those who were physically strong and had already birthed a healthy child but there was still no change in his misfortune and his children’s miserable deaths.
He took female betas to his bed, then female alphas but still no change. He started experimenting, which was easy to do being the male in this situation. He took sorcerers and non-sorcerers, young and old, mated and unmated… nothing worked, even with his extraordinary healing abilities.
Then, Sukuna looked for answers in modern medicine while Japan was ruled by him. He had his sperm counted and analysed but everything was normal and healthy – there should be no problems from his end – he had his new mates examined as well and they were healthy omegas or females, too. Everything was as it should be between the mating pairs; he was fertile, they were fertile and they didn’t have any underlying conditions that would endanger the pregnancy or the child. He made sure that they had their every vitamin and nutritional needs met and they dutifully or forcefully kept up with every other requirement for a healthy pregnancy to birth his children.
And still, nothing went right.
Uraume went so far as to offer their own body to still his primal desire as an alpha and bear him a child but even they, as one of the strongest sorcerers alive and a female beta at the core of their body – even though they took the utmost care of themselves and the baby and had daily healing sessions on their womb – even they could not birth him a healthy and living child.
Three years after his reincarnation and in the middle of a war against India, he sat down on a hill and fully realized, fully accepted, that the universe would not allow him to be a father as he had wanted to be since being a hungry and dirty kid eating rotten peaches and fantasizing about giving his own children all the fresh ones they ever wanted.
Ironically, his cursed energy was the carrier of the deadly curse that befell his offspring and his mates. It travelled with his sperm, it was coded right into his DNA even, and every time a new being with his blood was supposed to grow out of it, the cursed energy acted like poison and attacked the cells of the foetuses as well as those of the mother. He was the strongest being alive and no one could match him… not even for the process needed to fuse two halves of a human being into one.
That was why his healing techniques showed barely any effect; how should they if his blessed energy had to fight against his own cursed one? Uraume’s and Kenjaku’s healings were too weak and failed as well. Sukuna was strong in every fibre of his being…
…and that was why he would have to live without a pack made of his flesh for the rest of his life. An alpha without children. Alone.
“If the cosmos is so afraid of your might and power…” Uraume said after sitting down carefully beside him. They still had not fully recovered from the stillbirth four months ago. “…that it punishes and kills all of your attempts at procreation with a suitable mate…” They were looking down on a battlefield, the skirmish won last week, with a beautiful mountain range at their back. “…then maybe you, King Sukuna, could try to bargain with the cosmos for that which you desire.”
Those words slowly penetrated the depression that had claimed Sukuna at this moment but had festered on him for a long time now. But bit by bit, he understood what Uraume was trying to tell him. “A bargain with the universe itself…” It was an interesting if not ludicrous proposal… but what would the cosmos, the universe in its entirety, want from him that Sukuna could give?
Why was the cosmos punishing him in the first place? What was it trying to achieve? It was obvious in its implementation, was it not? Sukuna was not supposed to become a father, an ancestor to anyone but what exactly should be prevented by that? That Sukuna could become immortal through his blood? Or that his blood would populate the earth in a few hundred generations?
“What could I give the cosmos in exchange for the life of my children?” It could not be anything trivial; it had to be something that the universe prevented from happening by killing his descendants in their first generation. Sukuna could not think with a small mind about this; the universe consisted of more than just the existing matter of the now; it was also comprised of the afterlife, the past and the future.
Uraume straightened up to talk their mind but they never opened their mouth to give him an answer to his question. So it was that kind of response, huh, one which they could not give without talking out of turn and undermining his authority and pride as a King. Sukuna had to think of this one himself then and so he did. With his eyes on the dead and rotting bodies strewn around on the giant battlefield, he concluded on what was expected of him in exchange for his deepest desires.
“My tyranny.”
Years later, he opened another set of doors to enter the actual delivery room, which was stacked with every kind of device to help his wives (and husband) with their childbirth. The walls were painted in warm colours and if it was day, like right now, then copious amounts of sunlight could stream inside through tinted windows. Most prominent was the circular bed at one end of the room so the birthing mothers had enough space to turn around and take every position they liked. There was also a giant tub filled with warm water for a water birth and handrails and rope hung from the ceiling for a standing birth. Everything one could potentially use to help with the delivery from every corner of the world was gathered and neatly organized in this room and one would just need to utter a word or point with a finger and several midwives would come to you and give you everything you wanted.
(Sukuna himself was also a trained midwife at this point, which led to hilarious headlines all around the world when he helped deliver a baby on an overseas diplomatic trip to South America. He gave the babe his blessings and from what he heard five years later, the Brazilian child developed a cursed technique despite being from a non-sorcerer family in a mostly non-sorcerer country. Someone was probably going to assassinate the child and its family but Sukuna did not care.)
Medically, his delivery ward was also up to the newest standards. He had an operating room prepared behind this one for planned or emergency caesareans and five doctors and a dozen nurses at the ready to intervene if anything was going sideways, either during the birth or afterwards with the baby or the mother.
Everything was perfectly prepared for any possible scenario.
And Sukuna had seen nearly every scenario that could go wrong during childbirth.
When he entered the delivery room, his eyes instantly sought out Tōji to see how he was doing. Being someone with absolutely no cursed energy, Sukuna could not keep a virtual eye on him through his senses, which was one fucked up situation he found himself in because that man could sneak up on him as no one else could. After the marriage, it was not as dangerous to him anymore but before the marriage, and more importantly before their contract, Tōji had nearly killed him in their penultimate battle multiple times aided by his ghostly presence (and his son).
He couldn’t find his husband immediately though because his vision was obstructed by others who had gathered inside the room. Sukuna had given up his tyranny and so much more of his conduct and ambitions to be finally able to raise his very own children, and right now, he was greeted by an annoying, bothersome and sometimes ungrateful gaggle of teenagers, all of whom were oh so beautiful.
“Father,” was the first word spoken to him by his second living child and first daughter, Maki. “It hasn’t fully begun yet and before you get all hysterical, no, Lord Tōji hasn’t demanded that we leave either.” Sukuna could be excused for why he thinks of most of his children as annoying when that was the way they spoke with him daily. He had to threaten most of them with being grounded to their rooms or their wing of the palace so they would not call him dad constantly or worse, daddy. It was a ridiculous punishment and his self who first reincarnated two decades ago would’ve baulked at anything less than thirty leashes without healing but Sukuna had knowingly given up on that…
…so that he could go into this birth with the confidence of someone who could reasonably be sure that both his unborn child and his mate would survive this process. Maki would not know it and he would not tell but her calling him father during this ordeal soothed his aching and anxious heart enormously.
“Surely, Lord Fushiguro Tōji’s unique physique is going to be of much help during the birthing process. I would not expect him to be in labour for more than twenty-four hours, maybe not even twelve,” said his fourth living child and second son, the prince of this bunch. He just came from the direction of the circular bed on the other side of the room and sure enough, Tōji, with his omega son Megumi at his side, was leaning against said bed. Normally, an omega during labour would give off a special mix of pheromones meant to relax and pacify any alpha around them, especially their mate and any other offspring they had.
But Tōji’s Heavenly Restriction, which had modified his body to peak physical heights, had also shut off his scent glands all over his body. In a sense, he was a defective omega and he did not give off any pheromones at all, neither the soothing nor the distressing or warning kinds. The only regular omega scent in the entire room came from Megumi, Sukuna’s fiancé whom he contractually was not allowed to marry any time in the near future.
When Sukuna looked at the body posture of the mother father-son pair and analysed Megumi’s scent as well, he could tell that Tōji was the one in control of his emotions with Megumi being slightly panicked about what was to come. No wonder Sukuna’s second son came from that direction. He probably tried to be of help to Megumi in his months-long quest to woo the omega to be his fiancé instead. Not that Megumi had the choice of deciding that, not per their contract.
Sukuna looked back towards his children, most of whom were older teenagers, and at the ever-growing number of other teenagers he definitely wasn’t related to who somehow found their way into his palace. He wasn’t too annoyed with the additions because their presence was only possible due to the survival of his blood.
What did it mean to give up his tyranny?
It meant that Sukuna would treat his prisoners of war less like rats and more like human beings. Better food, better shelter, no torture, no eating them. It also meant that he needed to reform his judiciary, his prison sentencing and the laws he enacted to curb dissent. It meant scaling down the death sentences, lowering prison time, and releasing those who didn’t fit these new criteria anymore. It meant giving back some of the freedoms he took from the nations he conquered and it meant reigning in his subordinates from taking, killing and raping everyone they wanted.
Not being a tyrant meant that he would treat his mates with respect and that he wouldn’t subject them to things they didn’t want. No one would be forced to have sex with him again and everyone who didn’t want to stay by his side could leave as long as they were not pregnant already. Those who stayed he would officially marry and grant them rights and status fitting for the wives of a King. His children he would treat even better than that. Everything they wanted he would give as long as it was within reason. He would never let them be harmed and as long as they didn’t show any abhorrent behaviour, he would never harm them himself either.
These were all Binding Vows he made with the cosmos. His word for the survival of his children.
Soon, he was called back to Japan for a premature birth from one of the betas he left there. He had already been to a point where he started ignoring those calls and just waited a few days for the message of another death to arrive. But this time he secretly departed for his home country and left the war behind. He did not fear being late because the actual birthing process outside of a caesarean, from the first contraction to the placenta coming out, took always more than fifty hours of labour every single time, but only if the mother didn’t die first.
Still, he arrived only a few hours before the infant was born and at first, he had been full of hope that his bargain would have broken his curse. The immense cursed energy he felt from the babe, which was certainly unusual for an unborn child, was a good omen he thought. The child that came out though, was missing limbs and couldn’t move his lower body at all. Its cries were weak, its skin so frail that it came off at the slightest touch and without medical assistance it could barely breathe.
Sukuna was devastated by this outcome. For a short time, he had his hopes raised. For a short time, he believed that he was finally going to be the one thing he could not become in his previous life. A father. But it was all for nought. Could the cosmos be punished for breaking a Vow?
He sat down beside the infant, desolate and just waiting for the next death to greet him. His newest son could not be touched but he did not want to do that anyway. He did not even care what happened to the body after the heart gave out; Uraume had started to take care of that after Sukuna threw his fourteenth dead child through a room. He had not stepped foot in the little cemetery he had made for his children for one year now.
But the infant did not die. The dreaded eight hours came and went but the baby stayed. One day passed, and then another and another. The condition of the child did not necessarily get better but it stayed stable. Sukuna could not believe what he was witnessing; his child was surviving. For the first time in his life, he spent time in the neonatal intensive care unit of the hospitals where his children were born.
Now he wanted to take this babe into his arms more than anything else in the world… but he did not because the Vow prevented him from harming his children and the small infant was so fragile. Even if that Vow had not existed, he still would not have dared to harm his child. It was his, his firstborn, his blood, his future. The mother survived and Sukuna was a changed man now, was he not? He gave her the choice to leave and she did (the infant could not feed from the breast anyway) and he even gave her some of his riches and gave members of her family high-ranking positions in his Japan. Before seeing her son for the last time, she asked if she could name him and Sukuna agreed. She chose a name and left together with Sukuna’s other mates who also wanted to go.
Surnames were common in this day and age and because Sukuna did not have one of his own he decided that the last name of the mother was good enough and so the full name of his first living child and first son became Muta Kōkichi.
He still had two other mates who were currently pregnant; a low-level female omega sorcerer from the Zenin he took as his after nearly annihilating that clan for disgracing their agreement on gifting him a high-level omega (fucking Tōji) and an actual high-level male omega Kenjaku had given him. Itadori Jin had never been in contact with the Jujutsu Society until Sukuna’s conquest of Japan and his pregnancy and that of his Zenin wife were going well until now.
And it would go even better from now on.
Sukuna honoured his Vows and brought significant change to his rule over his Empire. Now he made it his goal to bring prosperity to his subjects, even if his definition of that differed slightly from what these modern people and his enemies from overseas thought of it. He became gracious in a way and a kind ruler in specific circumstances. Of course, he did not stop his wars and his conquests; that was who he was at his core, he could not give up that part of himself just like could not give up being a father. But there was still a significant change in his conduct that had everyone around the world turn their heads towards Japan on why that curse was showing mercy to people where there had only been sadistic glee at the tragedies he had caused.
Several months later, his Zenin mate was in labour and Sukuna was eagerly awaiting the birth of his twins with so much hope in his heart. The time she was in labour stayed the same as his previous mates from before his Vows, more than forty-eight hours, but the outcome could not be more different. Sukuna got to hold two healthy babies in his hands, both female, and both of them like diamonds in his eyes. He was not about to neglect his first child though, so he had him brought to their room as well.
But Sukuna felt something off about his twins; their cursed energy was flowing unnaturally. Normal sorcerers would not have felt it but Sukuna was experienced, had an immaculate control of his cursed energy and was half a curse as well. So, even though infants had barely any cursed energy flowing through their bodies, the King was able to tell that something was going on. He determined that the babies shared their energy with each other, which was not something uncommon for identical twins, a fact that was already known one thousand years ago.
What really stood out though was the energy disappearing, or maybe it was suppressed, when it was inside the older sister. He asked the mother if she knew what this was about.
“Normally we wouldn’t have been able to tell until they were older… It’s Heavenly Restriction and it’s the unwanted and untalked-about “cursed technique” if you will, that has been passed down the Zenin clan for centuries.” Sukuna had heard about that, in his previous life but also –
“I was told that Zenin Tōji was born with that binding vow as well.”
“…yes.” His mate was not keen on talking about that escaped omega, seeing as he was the reason why Sukuna had killed Zenin Asa’s husband and more of her clan. Sukuna had made a deal with the Zenin after killing their clan head and many of their best fighters. They would give him, among other things, an unmated omega who was extraordinarily physically gifted, good for all the sex Sukuna would ever want, and the King would, in turn, make the Zenin part of his allegiance.
That deal went up in flames like nothing else Sukuna had seen before.
“I’m sorry, my King, for not birthing you better children.” Was Asa’s saddened statement on the condition the twins were born with but Sukuna did not care. This was not something that was ever in the hands of any of his mates anyway.
“These two are wonderful. What are their names going to be?”
“…Maki and Mai.” And so King Sukuna’s second child and first daughter was named Zenin Maki and his third child and second daughter was named Zenin Mai. Sukuna was happier than he ever was in his entire life and nothing seemed to be able to take that away from him anytime soon. Unlike his other mates, Zenin Asa did not want to leave his side after the births. She would stay and care for all three of Sukuna’s children, she only wished for Sukuna to stop his slow killing of the rest of her former clan and Sukuna obliged. Having an actual mother stay with her infants was also in his interest as well.
Now he waited for the child that Itadori Jin would bear him in a few months. 