"It's been a long time since I drank. Drinking messes things up, and I'm afraid I'll just vomit it all back up."
Honestly, after experiencing all this, Asaki felt helpless, lost, despairing, in pain, in despair…
If not for being able to feel his family's souls watching him, if not for Tanjiro still weighing on Asaki's mind, if not for the great vengeance yet unpaid…
Then the greatest likelihood for Asaki would be to walk into the sun, feel the warmth of sunlight one last time, and kill himself.
Right now, he really wanted to get drunk and be done with it, but demons can't eat anything else, and drinking—most likely, he'd just drink and then puke it out.
"Black Fang, I'll borrow your family's wine. Let me see if I can forget my troubles for a while."
Asaki wasn't satisfied with the little hole poked in the wine jar. He reached out and ripped, tearing off all the sealing paper. The rich, mellow aroma of wine filled Asaki's nose.
Black Fang had lived as a demon for so many years, and after he became a demon, his family's wine cellar had never been opened.
Asaki was this wine cellar's first guest in decades.
And wine sealed and brewed for decades surely had a flavor ordinary wine couldn't match.
"Come to think of it, this is the first time in this life I've drunk."
"Father, you always said wine is a drink only adults can understand. I wasn't of age and couldn't drink, but today I'm going to go against your advice."
"Besides, you weren't right. It's not that adults can understand wine—it's that people who've been through a lot can understand wine."
"Father, you might not know but...I'm not of this world… counting my previous life's age, I'm already over forty. By that reckoning, it's fine if I drink a little, right?"
Memories of the previous life hadn't affected Asaki much, because those memories awakened gradually. In his new life's childhood, those memories seemed to be sealed away, and only after his teens passed did they awaken, and even that was slowly, not like those transmigrators who get all of their memories in one go.
But apart from letting him understand a few things, those memories held little to no use at all.
Asaki had a poor memory, and he was bad at studying; he didn't understand math, physics, or chemistry.
Nor could he, like other transmigrators, know astronomy, geography above and petty trifles below, able by his own power to push civilization forward or directly change the world.
Asaki couldn't. He felt that he wasn't that outstanding.
He had originally wanted, in this world, only to be an ordinary person with a warm family.
Also, he liked the people of this world very much—they were all very pure.
Unlike the previous world, which made him feel very strange, with far too many laughable parts…
With a wry smile, Asaki stopped thinking about his former world. That had no use to him.
"This first jar of wine, to you, Father, for your instruction. Even though you've passed away, you're still helping me…"
Asaki lifted the jar by the rim with one hand, tipped his head back, and raised the jar.
Wine poured along the rim in great streams. Asaki opened his mouth; the wine flowed straight down his throat into his stomach.
The wine was mellow and fragrant. This was good wine.
But Asaki tasted only heat and bitterness, exactly like his mood at this moment.
Without any pause, Asaki finished this jar of wine.
But what surprised him was that the queasy urge to vomit didn't arrive as expected.
"Could it be that demons can drink wine? That's fucking weird."
"Whatever."
Asaki had drunk in his previous life, too. His alcohol tolerance was truly moving—in the bad way. Never mind high-proof baijiu, but even ordinary beer, just one glass down, and his face had turned crimson, his steps went unsteady, his body a bit out of control.
Feeling his head a bit dizzy, Asaki said helplessly, "After becoming a demon, I wanted to rely on a demon's strong body to drink hard, but I didn't expect to get drunk this easily…"
"Then get drunk!"
"This second jar, to you, Mother, for your meticulous care and concern. It's a warmth I'd never felt."
Asaki tore open another jar and drained it in an instant. His vision was already going dark.
"This third jar, to you, Tanjiro and the rest, for your trust and admiration for me as your big brother. Only, I've let you down…"
With another jar down, Asaki's body swayed, and he was about to tumble off the big base vat.
He forced himself under control to keep from hitting the floor, reached out, scooped up, and opened yet another jar.
"This fourth jar—I'll drink to myself. To me, who never gave up hope. In this endless darkness, so long as there's the tiniest light, I'll throw myself after her…"
With a thud, Asaki still fell onto the icy floor and began to sleep with loud, steady breaths.
Maybe it wasn't the wine that made him drunk, but that his spirit truly needed a good, solid rest…
......
After circling Blue Mountain for a full round, Shinobu still didn't find any man-eating demon that might be hiding.
"Maybe it already left. But maybe it's just too good at hiding himself? I'll stay a few more days, search for a few more days. If I can't find it, I'll have to leave first."
"Hmph. I'll bring members of the Demon Slayer Corps over. I refuse to believe I can't find you, you demon!"
Shinobu had seen Black Fang. At the time, she'd just slit another demon's neck with the Nichirin Blade, and that demon had mocked her, saying that her strength wasn't enough, that she couldn't chop through a neck.
In the next second, wisteria poison flared. The demon died in agonized struggle.
And while crossing hands with the demon, Shinobu noticed Black Fang, but she couldn't spare a hand. When she had time, Black Fang had already slipped away, and Shinobu had no way.
But Black Fang's scar-covered face left a deep impression on her. Shinobu's intuition told her this demon wouldn't easily leave here.
"Hunting demons in the middle of the night is so boring. My beauty sleep is busted yet again…"
Demons come out at night, and people normally rest at night. Scouring the mountains for demons is indeed hard.
Shinobu felt a little moodiness; she planned to head back first, then sleep until five or six in the afternoon before coming out again.
Before long, Shinobu ran back to Shiqiao Town. Passing by Old Nagatani's door, she wondered whether to go check on Asaki.
"Forget it. It's so late—he's probably already asleep. Tomorrow I'll go find him and ask whether he actually wants to join the Demon Slayer Corps."
Shinobu never would have imagined that Asaki was already hiding elsewhere in the same town, and was drunk, sleeping like a pig, snoring away.
This town wasn't small, and Black Fang's household had already fallen into ruin decades ago. Few remembered it, and as for those who knew the cellar existed? They were nowhere to be found.
At least, Shinobu wouldn't be able to find that wine cellar.
Passing Old Nagatani's door, Shinobu went to a room the town chief had vacated for her. She took off her haori and outerwear one by one, leaving only her inner clothes as she lay down on the bed, and in just a short while, she entered her dreamland.
But still, her hand was gripping the Nichirin Blade's tilt tightly in her hand, not loosening even an ounce of her guard, even while she slept.
At this time, the two sleeping people still hadn't realized that a massive danger was already on the way…
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