There was a time when Thorne wasn't armed with sorrow.No therapy batons. No spiritual Kevlar.Just a black hoodie, a chipped tooth, and a smile that tried way too hard to hide the shaking underneath.
He was fifteen.Fresh from a failed exorcism mission. Fresh from losing the one person who told him he could be more than just a walking punchline in someone else's tragedy.
Her name was Claire.The only person who ever pulled him out of a curse tunnel with nothing but a lunchbox and a slap to the face.
She died in front of him.Not in battle.Not as a hero.
But while shielding Thorne during a panic attack.He froze. She didn't.The curse went for him—she stepped in. No hesitation.
She bled out with her hand on his wrist.
"Run," she whispered. "And don't waste this."
He didn't run.
He stood there. Screaming.
But when it was over, there was nothing left of her but blood, a scorched charm, and the sound of her name in his throat like glass.
Back in the present—his boots echoed through Mahito's sewer domain, each step dragging like iron through tar.
Alone. Cut off. No backup.
Thorne didn't care.
With every breath, the air grew heavier — thick with grief, cursed residue, and something colder: the memory of what he didn't save.
The barrier behind him had sealed tight.Even Juno's usual "don't-die-on-me" chants were gone.
And then the whispers began.
The walls... they talked. Not in words. In voices pulled from his own past.Claire's voice.The last one that ever believed in him before she was erased.
"Run," she'd said.
He didn't.
He never ran again.
Thorne reached under his hoodie — not for a weapon, but for the sealed shard stitched into the inside hem. A black sliver no bigger than a coin. Etched with a name he never said out loud.
Claire.
As his fingers touched the shard, his cursed energy twisted. The air cracked like frozen glass. His eyes went blank. Not dead — dialed in.
The sewer domain responded instantly — like Mahito himself felt the emotional spike.
Thorne gritted his teeth.
"Griefsmith."
Cursed energy burst from his body — not like Gojo's blinding pressure or Yuji's raw intensity.This was slow.Dense.Like watching a storm cloud compress into a sword.
Metal seeped from his shadow, dripping upward.
His voice cracked. "Let me tell you how this works, Mahito."
There was no reply. Just breathing walls and flickering lights. But he kept talking. For himself.
"Every time I lost someone, it left a hole. Everyone talks about 'moving on' — but what they really mean is bury it. Pretend. Heal. Forgive."
The weapon forming in front of him laughed. Not sound — but pressure. Memory vibrating through steel.
"I don't forgive. I remember. Every ugly part."
The shard in his hand pulsed and exploded outward — forming a cleaver, jagged and chipped, glowing with a sick-purple tint. Floating fragments of words flickered on its edge. Names. Faces.
"And when the pain's too much to carry… I forge it into something I can swing."
The aura thickened — warping the cursed space around him. Even Mahito's domain trembled.
"Griefsmith's not flashy. It ain't fast. It's not kind to me. It eats me from the inside every time I use it. But I don't need it to last long."
He gripped the cleaver as it solidified — sharp, brutal, and humming like a heart about to burst.
"I just need one swing."
That was when the cursed space shivered.
Mahito finally stepped out of the walls — his voice low, amused.
"You're not a sorcerer," he said. "You're a mausoleum with legs."
Thorne raised the cleaver.
"And you're about to find out what kind of corpses I keep in here."
He stepped forward, ready to strike—
And the blade cracked mid-swing.
His heart dropped.
The weapon flickered. The grief—wavered.
Claire's memory slipped.
"What...?"
And Mahito smiled wide.
"Oh, that's the problem with your little blacksmith act," he whispered, stepping closer. "If you heal—just a little—it all falls apart."