Kokushibo's six eyes widened simultaneously.
The moment the blades crossed, he felt an overwhelming and terrifying force. Immediately after, a violent high-voltage current surged through the blade and into his arms.
"Ugh..."
Kokushibo let out a muffled groan as the muscles in his arms stiffened under the paralysis of the lightning.
His usually calm mind was thrown into a state of shock. He tapped his feet rapidly, retreating over a dozen meters to dissipate the force.
"Just... who are you?"
Kokushibo stared at his slightly trembling hands.
For hundreds of years, besides his younger brother Yoriichi, no one had ever made him fall into a disadvantage in a direct clash of swordsmanship.
"As for who I am, you bunch of garbage that can't stand the light don't have the right to know."
Yamada flicked away the purple electrical arcs on his Kusanagi Sword and looked up at Muzan, who had been hiding in the back.
By now, Muzan's expression had become incredibly ugly. He had originally thought that by Kokushibo and Akaza teaming up, they could at least force out this young man's trump cards. He never expected that in just one brief encounter, Upper Moon One and Upper Moon Three would be easily repelled like children.
Furthermore, that life-draining Demon Slayer Mark hadn't even appeared on Yamada's body.
"A bunch of useless trash!"
Muzan could finally no longer suppress the fear and killing intent in his heart.
The flesh on his back suddenly tore open, and nine dark red whips covered in barbs lashed out toward Yamada's vital points at terrifying, supersonic speeds.
These whips not only carried Muzan's highly toxic blood, but they were also so fast that even a Hashira would be unable to see them clearly.
But Yamada saw them clearly. Not only did he see them, but even the tiny fluctuations in the air caused by those whips were fully captured by his eyes.
Within his pitch-black pupils, the hexagram pattern of the Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan instantly locked into place.
The ocular power of his right eye focused.
Amaterasu!
Nine clumps of bizarre pitch-black flames ignited out of thin air on the nine whips Muzan had lashed out.
"What is this?!"
Muzan's pupils shrank, and he immediately activated rapid cellular regeneration, attempting to shed the burning portions of the tube whips. But he underestimated the speed at which Amaterasu spread.
The black flames followed the whips, closing in on Muzan's main body on his back with incredible speed.
The intense burning sensation acted directly upon the depths of his soul.
"Cut them off!" Muzan let out a shrill roar.
Standing to the side, Kokushibo endured the numbness in his arms and swung his flesh sword.
Moon Breathing: Fifth Form, Moon Spirit Calamitous Eddy!
Slashes crisscrossed, severing the nine whips on Muzan's back that had been ignited by the black flames at their base. The severed appendages fell to the ground and were completely incinerated into nothingness by Amaterasu in just a few seconds.
Muzan panted heavily, looking with uncertainty and fear at the patch of black flames on the ground that was even burning the soil. Cold sweat slid down his pale forehead.
If Kokushibo had been a second slower just now, and those flames had spread to his torso... he truly would have died.
This was simply not a power that a human could possess!
Those scarlet eyes and that complex pattern were even more despair-inducing than Yoriichi's Sun Breathing back then.
"Scared already?"
Yamada looked at the shaken Demon King, a cruel smile curling on his lips.
He didn't immediately summon Susanoo, nor did he use a large-scale clearing skill like Kirin.
Facing these culprits who had tormented humanity for over a thousand years, simply crushing them to death would be too merciful. He wanted to strip away all their pride and hope, bit by bit.
"I haven't even warmed up yet, Muzan."
Yamada walked forward step by step, holding the lightning-wrapped Kusanagi Sword.
"Use all the Blood Demon Arts and life-saving measures you've accumulated over the past thousand years."
"Let me see how long you, a cockroach claiming to be a perfect being, can struggle when faced with true despair."
Hearing this insulting provocation, Muzan's reason was replaced by tyranny.
"Kill him! At any cost! Kill him!!!"
The skin all over Muzan's body began to crack, pale bone spurs grew from his joints, and a large amount of dark red blood transformed into a poisonous blood mist around him.
Kokushibo took a deep breath, and the flesh sword in his hand suddenly grew in size, with countless chaotic branches sprouting from the blade. He liberated his full power, his six eyes dead-locked on Yamada.
Akaza climbed back out from the bottom of the crater, his Fighting Spirit burning to the absolute limit as the Destructive Death array expanded once more.
Three demonic pressures powerful enough to change the very atmosphere converged over the wilderness.
Yamada stopped his pace and casually placed his left hand on the back of his neck, cracking it.
"Finally, it's getting a bit interesting. Come, amuse me to your heart's content."
Muzan stood at the back, his pale face covered in bulging veins due to fury. His arms had mutated into dark red whips, their surfaces covered in sharp barbs and emitting a sickening smell of blood.
Akaza and Kokushibo guarded his left and right—the two strongest Upper Ranks of the Twelve Kizuki were now releasing the murderous aura they had accumulated over hundreds of years without reservation.
"Do it. Don't give him any room to breathe."
Akaza was the first to attack.
The snowflake pattern beneath his feet expanded several times in an instant, and a pale blue light illuminated the sand and stones below.
Destructive Death: Annihilation Type!
There was no testing, the move was an all-out killing blow.
Akaza's right fist concentrated all the Fighting Spirit in his body. Before the fist even arrived, the top layer of earth in a fan-shaped area ten meters ahead was scraped away out of thin air.
The speed of this punch broke the sound barrier, leaving a series of deafening sonic booms in mid-air as it aimed straight for Yamada's heart.