The Upper Rank Two's arrival was far too sudden.
Kocho Kanae had just been about to head home when several icicles, glinting cold in the dark, forced her path shut.
To avoid trouble, she hadn't taken the usual wilderness trails; she'd strolled openly through the town instead. True, at midnight the difference between town and countryside was slim, both nearly silent, but a town still had scattered lamplight here and there, and in any era demons showed up in cities far less often than in the mountains and forests.
What she hadn't expected was that this one had come for her specifically.
An unremarkable alley on the edge of town. A few lonely branches poked over the courtyard wall. The rain a few days back had knocked every petal loose, and they lay scattered across the bluestone paving, vivid as fire.
By the dim light of the last-quarter moon, Kocho Kanae could make out her opponent's face. She didn't need to care how unlike an ordinary person he looked; all she needed to note were the characters written in his pupils.
Upper Rank Two.
She was a Flower Hashira; he was an Upper Rank demon of the Twelve Kizuki. A fight between them needed no reason at all. Kanae felt no fear, though she also knew that being marked by a demon of this caliber meant there was no walking away in one piece. Fortunately, time was on her side.
Anxious to get back and see Kocho Shinobu, she'd been quietly keeping count of the hour in her head. She knew dawn was a little over two hours off.
She knew, too, that as a young Hashira she was no match for him in raw strength.
But a battle wasn't a simple contest. The point of a contest was merely to defeat; the point of a battle was to kill. She didn't need to be stronger than Doma. She only needed to find a way to end this demon.
Kanae drew her blade and met him, opening with her Flower Breathing swordsmanship. But Doma only held that folding fan of his and defended passively, in no hurry to strike.
That baffled her, because dragging things out favored her.
Unless this Upper Rank Two had gotten hold of some of Inori's blood and overcome sunlight the way she had... if that were really the case, it would be too hopeless to bear.
Another exchange. When Doma flicked her blade-wind aside with ease, Kanae stopped attacking and simply watched him.
He was smiling. But that smile didn't seem mocking or contemptuous. He just seemed genuinely happy about something.
"What are you smiling about?"
She asked it out of curiosity.
She hadn't taken a stance, but she stayed on guard every second against a sudden strike.
"I remembered something happy."
Doma didn't stay silent this time. He answered plainly.
"What happy thing?"
Kanae pressed.
"I have someone I like now."
Doma steered the conversation off in a bizarre direction.
This man really was strange, utterly baffling. He'd come charging out like he meant to cut down a Hashira, then spent half the fight refusing to hit back, and now he was saying something this out of nowhere. You like someone, so you came here to kill me? What kind of logic is that?
Kanae's brow tightened. She thought it over and couldn't recall having any special blood feud with any particular demon.
"Is that so? Congratulations."
She didn't understand, but she still answered with a frank smile.
"But I have someone I like too. Everyone lives in this world because of the bonds they hold. I won't pity you just for that."
As she said it, the person in her mind needed no explaining. Those who knew, knew.
And clever as she was, watching that rapt look on his face, putting it together with the rumor that Inori had killed Muzan and become the new Demon King, in that instant she seemed to understand something.
—The person they're talking about has to be the same one.
"For the sake of the person I like, I'd like you to lay down your resistance and be good. But humans are creatures who cling to life and fear death, so even if I ask you this way, you won't listen, will you?"
Doma nodded in approval.
"..."
Hearing that, Kanae shook her head, thoroughly exasperated, and let out a soft sigh. Then she widened her bright purple eyes, lifted a hand to tap her own temple, and jeered.
"You seem to have a bit of a problem up here."
—Her snark really was second to none.
"Why should I go and die for you? Hm?"
"Because people are always going to bear all kinds of suffering while they're alive, whereas death is release, an end to it all. No more worries, no more sorrow. Isn't that right?" Doma laid out his life philosophy and his understanding of existence as though it were the most natural thing in the world. "And everyone dies eventually. What difference does sooner or later make?"
"Haah."
Kanae wasn't angered by it.
If the one he'd blocked had been another Hashira instead of her, a single line like that would have been enough to send them into righteous fury. But she was a woman, her thoughts far more delicate than those hot-blooded young men. She'd sensed this demon was different from the others; this absurdly guileless airheadedness reminded her, for a moment, of Tsuyuri Kanao when she'd first come to the Butterfly Mansion.
That was it. Like a child. Simple, slow on the uptake.
This didn't seem like something Muzan's blood would cause. Perhaps he'd been born this way.
"How pitiful. You must not have any friends. Even the one you like has probably never once looked you in the eye. How pitiful indeed~"
Kanae heaved sigh after sigh, shaking her head without pause.
Anyone else, human or demon, would never be able to stand such naked mockery.
But Doma could, because he didn't yet know what anger was. Even "like," his one and only emotion, was still at the sprouting stage, freshly born. He just didn't care for the way this woman spoke.
"Say any more nonsense and I'll get angry, you know."
Doma suddenly spread the folding fan in his hand, and a wave of frigid air bore down invisibly on Kocho Kanae's face.
"Hm?"
The man who a moment ago had looked so confident and at ease abruptly changed expression.
That scent... there was no mistaking it.
During their earlier exchange his attention had stayed fixed on the two lovely hairpins in Kanae's hair. He'd been imagining how they'd have to sit in Inori's hair to make her even more beautiful, and what words he'd say when he offered them up to win that person's favor.
Only after he'd worked all that out had he finally turned his mind to this opponent. Not bad, some real skill, but still too green. Doma was a hundred percent certain he could take her down. Yet just as he'd voiced a few of those feelings and readied his move, he'd caught a familiar smell.
It was the scent that had once clung to Inori. That sweet, fragrant scent of a young human girl.
"You... you know Inori?"
Doma's movements froze.
He'd apparently just put his foot right in it.
"Haha."
Seeing that idiotic look on his face, Kanae couldn't help laughing again.
"So it really is what I thought. The person you like, that's Inori-chan, isn't it?"
Inori... -chan?
That intimate way of saying it left Doma bewildered, and for a moment his breathing came hard, choked, as though someone had reached in and seized his heart in a cruel grip. Another strange new emotion, born of disliking one person because of loving another.
Oh. This seemed to be the thing called "jealousy."
"Inori-sama is mine. I'll obtain all of her. I'll live alongside her forever."
Doma declared it with utter seriousness.
"Oh?"
Kanae's slender brows arched gently, and a meaningful smile spread, the corners of her mouth climbing higher and higher.
It wasn't part of any plan, but she was more than happy to see what this fellow looked like when he lost his composure. So she deliberately told a half-true, half-false lie.
"Oni-san, though I don't know your name, I still have to offer you my deepest sympathies."
"Surely you aren't still unaware that Inori-san is actually my lover, are you?"