Disclaimer: Demon Slayer is not mine. This fanfic is a translation.
Enjoy Reading!
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-Location: The Kamado residence-
The deserted mountaintop was utterly silent, the cold moonlight filtering through the trees.
Not long after the Kakushi left, an eerie biwa sound echoed through unknown channel.
A sudden, incongruous Japanese-style door slid open in midair, spilling out a warm, amber light.
A flustered figure in a black Western-style suit dropped down from within.
With a soft thud, his feet touched the ground.
The figure hunched over, moving furtively and cautiously as he scanned his surroundings.
His two crimson eyes darted nervously left and right, glaringly conspicuous in the pitch-black night.
"…Not here."
A sheen of sweat covered Muzan's pale forehead as he finally seemed to relax, letting out a long sigh as he straightened up.
His hand kept pressing against his chest, where his seven wildly throbbing hearts were pounding erratically.
His crimson eyes narrowed.
It was just as he had thought.
That man was busy dealing with Doma and couldn't concern himself with this place.
'Well done, Doma.'
"Now for the next step!"
Muzan's demeanor shifted back to that of the Demon King. His expression turned cold as he whipped his head toward the location Nakime's Blood Demon Art had shown him.
The cluster of blue-green flower buds!
He nearly shouted his excitement.
"The Blue Spider Li—"
But.
"?"
As Muzan's eager gaze darted back and forth, finally confirming that this was indeed the same spot as the cluster of blue flowers he had seen before,
His excited expression gradually twisted into one of bewilderment.
His brow furrowed deeply as he hesitantly stepped forward.
He slowly approached the patch of blackened, withered, rotting vegetation.
His face ashen, he bent down and picked up a shriveled bud between two fingers.
The cluster of buds, from which one had been taken by the Kakushi, had completely withered for some reason.
Not a trace of their previous brilliant blue remained.
They had become nothing more than damp, rotting sludge.
The withered stem Muzan held between his fingers swayed briefly under his crimson gaze before snapping with a soft crack.
It fell to the ground.
His gaze followed the bud down, gradually growing vacant.
"Ah…"
Muzan's eyes went blank, his mouth hanging half-open in a meaningless moan.
His pupils quaked. He clutched his head, collapsing to his knees as if all strength had left him, paying no heed to the mud soiling his suit.
He let out a cry of despair.
"—Aaaahhhh!!?"
The bright moon hung high overhead, its light slanting down upon Muzan.
"Why?!"
His pale expression verged on madness.
Bam!
He slammed his fist into the ground before him.
"A thousand years of searching, and it withered?? Right in front of ME!!
Muzan's eyes strained wide, riddled with blood vessels.
He clenched his fist around the withered buds, squeezing so hard that black mud oozed between his fingers.
"Aaaahhh!!"
Trembling, he opened his hand. He collapsed forward, arms encircling the patch of muck before him, his eyes filled with disbelief.
A fleeting thought even crossed his mind. "Would eating this mud have any effect?"
He opened his mouth slightly, scooping up the mud in his hands, his gaze vacant, bringing it toward his lips.
"When that human found it, it was still lush!"
Muzan's eyes went wide. Something seemed to flash across his five brains.
His movements halted.
That human.
If he remembered correctly, he had taken one of the blue spider lilies.
The buds here had all turned to sludge, but what about the one he took…
His mind couldn't even process why the buds had withered or whether the one taken would also wither.
He didn't dare think about it.
At that moment, only one thought echoed in his mind.
There was still one left!
He took a deep breath.
"Nakime!!"
The Demon King's roar reverberated through the mountain forest. Birds startled awake from their sleep and burst from the trees.
Whoosh!
Muzan's prone figure vanished instantly.
Another wooden door slid open in midair. A hand with jet-black nails reached out.
It grabbed a fistful of the mud on the ground.
The door slammed shut with force again.
…
An old window slowly slid open.
"…Again?" Saburo poked his head out, his expression tense as he looked toward the mountaintop.
That cry.
His brow furrowed slightly, his eyes filled with gravity.
In his hands, Saburo tightly gripped a firearm that looked crude but appeared meticulously maintained.
As an old man who had lived in the mountains for years, it was only natural to keep a hunting rifle for protection.
His aged hands clenched until they were white and trembling, his finger hovering shakily over the trigger.
Saburo slowly exhaled.
He slung the rifle over his back and stepped out of the house.
After that time, after he had met those people who called themselves the Demon Slayer Corps,
It seemed because that polite, stoic young man held a high rank.
A swordsmith who muttered, "I shall usher in a new era for the Demon Slayer Corps," had come to his door.
The man had grumbled, "Those old fossils in the Swordsmith Village are so inflexible," and pressed this gun into his hands.
Along with three specially made bullets.
---
"Caw! I understand! Caw!"
The kasugai crow preened its feathers, its yellow eyes twitching.
"Yes! I'm counting on you!"
The Kakushi who had just collected the bud smiled gently, carefully handing the box containing it to the crow. "Please make sure this package reaches Shinobu-sama!"
The crow gave a curt nod, let out a loud "Caw!", and took to the sky.
After watching the crow fly off into the distance, the Kakushi focused back on the road.
As a frequent traveler, whenever he made a discovery, he would hand it off to the Butterfly Mansion via kasugai crow.
He himself would press on to his next find without delay.
"Time to go," he murmured to himself, tightening the straps of his backpack.
---
The kasugai crow held the wooden box in its beak, flapping its wings as it soared through the pitch-black night sky. Its eyes watched the faint clouds below.
The familiar-shaped building came into view.
The Butterfly Mansion.
"Whoa! That's a serious wound!"
"Over here! This swordsman needs help stopping the bleeding!"
"Wait!"
"Hey! I'm dying here!"
Several Kakushis scrambled about frantically.
The night at the Butterfly Mansion was far from quiet.
With Shinobu and the others away, things were especially chaotic.
"Everyone…"
Tanjiro stood helplessly outside the ward, a tray laden with medicine in his hands, watching the flurry of activity.
Just then.
"Caw!! Tanjiro!!"
A voice called out from the sky behind him. "Catch!"
Tanjiro instinctively turned his head.
A long, narrow box was rapidly growing larger in his vision.
His pupils contracted slightly.
He stumbled to free one hand from beneath his tray.
He shot his hand up!
Smack!
And caught the falling box cleanly.
"Caught it!" Tanjiro held his... awkward stance, steadying himself as a cold sweat dripped from his brow.
"Caw!" The crow landed on Tanjiro's shoulder, chest puffed out with pride. "As expected of Tanjiro!"
"That's nothing to be proud of, you know."
Tanjiro glanced at the unharmed box in his hands and let out a small sigh of relief, shaking his head as he gently scolded.
"This is something important, isn't it? What if it had gotten damaged?"
"Don't do that again."
"Caw! Understood, caw!"
The crow seemed unconcerned and lowered its head to preen its feathers.
"What's wrong, Tanjiro?"
Kie wiped the sweat from her brow with a towel. She had been helping an injured swordsman stop his bleeding and looked over curiously. "I heard a loud noise."
"Nii-chan!"
Hanako quickly looked over as well.
"Ah…" Tanjiro paused, then shook his head with a smile. "Don't worry, it's nothing."
Takeo stood nearby, watching Tanjiro with a distant look. "Nii-san."
Tanjiro noticed Takeo's gaze and tilted his head in question.
"The way you speak… no." Takeo murmured absently.
In his eyes, Tanjiro's figure overlapped with someone familiar.
His appearance, his silhouette, his tone of voice, everything.
"It's just like Father." Takeo gazed blankly, murmuring.
"I think so too!" Shigeru chimed in.
"Because we're family," Kie said with a gentle smile, ruffling Shigeru's hair.
"Caw!" The crow let out a sudden caw.
"Whoa!" Startled by the crow, Tanjiro snapped back to attention.
He casually placed the wooden box on his tray and looked at the others. "Got so caught up chatting that I forgot to help!"
Inside the ward,
Zenitsu, who had been struck by lightning for the second time while practicing, weakly raised his charred arm.
But in a place none of them noticed, deep within the crow's feathers, a tiny eyeball slowly opened.
The eye's pupil darted around rapidly, as if possessed by an insatiable curiosity!
It took in everything around it, its gaze moving with increasing speed.
The smiling Tanjiro, the flustered Kakushi, Kie, Takeo, Shigeru, and Hanako nearby...
Everything was reflected in the eye's pupil.