The mountaintop was a mess. The shrine and giant trees had collapsed into ruins. Everywhere, the cries of monks trapped under the rubble could be heard.
The marks on Giyu's face had faded. He knelt on one knee, gasping heavily, feeling completely drained.
In contrast, Taka not only seemed unaffected, but even his previous injuries had healed. He stood there as if nothing had happened.
'That sword...' Giyu was somewhat concerned, but ultimately didn't pry.
As long as it could kill demons, anything was acceptable.
Taka shook Tonan, flicking off the last remnants of undevoured demon blood, watching it revert to a colorless Nichirin Sword.
"Swordsman, what is your name?" Hakuji adjusted his boar mask, dusting it off. "Your power has advanced again. It seems you've entered the supreme realm...."
"Hey! You demon! Give my mask back!!" Inosuke, recklessly, charged to snatch it back, but Hakuji slightly sidestepped, easily avoiding his stumbling lunge.
"Haha, not now, kid! I'll use it for a few more days!"
Watching his familiar demeanor, Taka felt a sense of unreality.
He couldn't understand why an Upper Moon demon would betray Muzan and help the Demon Slayer Corps kill its own kind.
The only thing he was certain of was that the Reiatsu emanating from this guy held no malice. That was why Taka hadn't attacked.
He sheathed Tonan and sized up this 'Fist Hashira': "My name is Taka."
Hakuji looked at Taka through the eyeholes of his boar mask, raising his hands to show his fists covered in deep blue tattoos: "I am a disciple of the Soryu Dojo. Fist Hashira of Fist Breathing, Hakuji. Pleased to meet you."
"Are you joking.... What exactly are you plotting?"
"Of course not. Honestly, I've been through a position exchange blood battle. I should be qualified to be a Hashira, right?"
"Answer my question." Taka's gaze was cold, pressing the Kizuki before him rather rudely.
Hakuji let out a light laugh.
This laugh no longer held his former arrogance, but instead carried a trace of resolution.
"Plotting? It's simple.... Every cell in my body, every shred of flesh and blood reminds me… I am a demon, my hands stained with blood."
"This kind of evil, even if I killed ten thousand pieces of trash like Doma, can never be washed away...."
He stopped five paces from Taka. That was his social distance for those he deemed strong. "I just suddenly understood one thing: Since I'm destined for hell, I have to do something before that, to comfort my disappointed teacher, my beloved, and my father."
Hakuji looked up at the night sky, obscured by thick, dark clouds: "When I send that man to hell, I will naturally follow behind, atoning for my sins for eternity."
Taka fell silent.
In Rukongai, he had seen countless wandering souls who would stop at nothing to survive, and those vermin who struggled amidst their sins.
At this moment, he sensed a kind of deathly stillness in the other party… a resolve that sought nothing but revenge and self-destruction.
"....I'll temporarily accept your words. But you must act with me." Taka said in a deep voice.
He couldn't fully trust a former Upper Moon Kizuki. If the other party's Reiatsu Fluctuations showed any sign of losing control, he would immediately strike and kill him.
"Hey! Are you done talking?!" Inosuke jumped up again irritably, pointing at Hakuji. "Mask! Give it back! It's my family!"
Like a beast whose territory had been stolen, Inosuke angrily pawed the ground and prepared to charge again.
"Hahaha, kid, train more and come back!" Hakuji laughed, teasing Inosuke in imitation of his master Keizo, making him howl in frustration.
This let Hakuji briefly experience the beauty of being human.
Soon after, Kanao's figure also arrived at the mountaintop with a group of Demon Slayer Corps' members: "Taka! Sensei is safe!"
At the same time, in Tokyo, thousands of miles away.
Crack—!!
A crisp sound of shattering glass was especially piercing in the dead of night.
Muzan, in the form of a child, stood in a room piled with books. His red vertical pupils fixedly stared at his right hand.
Just moments ago, he had felt an intense throbbing, originating from the depths of his bloodline.
It was the death knell of a Twelve Kizuki's soul fading.
"Doma.... Doma's aura has vanished? How is this possible!!"
Muzan's voice was low and ferocious. He couldn't believe what he had sensed.
That Doma, whose personality was vile but whose strength was absolutely secure among the Upper Moons, could be erased?
"Ahhh—!!"
He punched a bookshelf in anger, knocking it over with a roar, irritably raging around the room.
"How is this possible! How is this possible! Who was it? The Crimson Blade swordsman? Kamado Tanjiro?!"
What angered him most was that when he tried to sense any memory images left in the bloodline connection between Doma and himself, even just fragmentary scenes...
There was nothing. What responded to him was only a chaotic blackness and a piercing cold.
What was going on?! This was insane!
But before he could recover from the shock of Doma's death, a second wave of intense pain swept through his nerves!
It was sensed from the direction of the pleasure quarters.
"Daki..... Gyutaro too?!"
The veins on Muzan's sickly pale face abruptly bulged.
Under the sleeves of his elegant shirt, his skin began to writhe irregularly, betraying the extreme shock and anger within him.
In the flashbacks of his sea of consciousness, he saw the sky-filling flames of the pleasure quarters.
A garish man covered in jewels, wielding twin swords.... and a bandaged swordsman with a snake, attacking Gyutaro together!
Blade light flew, snakes hissed.
Even though Gyutaro's poison was potent to the extreme, it couldn't directly take down that damn twin-sword swordsman! He found an opening, and the two combined to cut into his neck!
'Daki.... that stupid woman Daki!'
'Clearly an Upper Moon demon! Why couldn't she even handle that Kamado Tanjiro with the sun-shaped earrings!'
"Crimson Blade... another Crimson Blade!"
Tanjiro's blade burned with cherry-red flames, and together with that ugly 'woman' using Thunder Breathing, they decapitated that fool Daki—
"Useless! A bunch of useless good-for-nothings!"
Muzan overturned the desk before him.
Countless precious drugs, costing months to formulate, spilled on the ground, emitting a pungent smell. The painstakingly collected data was scattered into chaos.
One hundred and thirteen years.
For one hundred and thirteen years, the ranking of the Upper Moons had never changed.
This absolute dominance was Muzan's confidence as a god. But tonight, two pillars had successively collapsed!
He forced himself to calm down, closed his eyes, and tried to enter the spiritual network of the Upper Moons.
He would reclaim his ground. He would make those reckless Demon Slayers pay!!
'Akaza! Hantengu! Where are you?!'
He began madly searching for their locations in his sea of consciousness.
According to the original plan, Akaza and Hantengu should be monitoring the Demon Slayer Corps' movements, or searching for clues to the Blue Spider Lily.
But now, in his extreme anger, Muzan just wanted the nearest Kizuki to act immediately!
"Akaza.... Where are you? Kill them! Kill that boy with the earrings, kill that black-haired swordsman!"
However, when his consciousness finally touched the demon blood signal belonging to Upper Rank Three—
The scene he saw made this millennium-old demon king feel, for the first time in his life, an emotion approaching absurdity.
Muzan's consciousness crossed thousands of miles.
He saw the ruins of Myoko Mountain, the rubble of Doma's makeshift shrine.
And then, he saw Akaza.
But it was no longer the familiar, faithful dog who always bowed and listened, seeking nothing but to grow stronger.
In the image, Akaza was bare-chested, and on his head was a filthy, utterly ridiculous boar mask!
He stood there calmly, and beside him stood the Hashira-level swordsmen of the Demon Slayer Corps!
As if sensing something, he suddenly looked towards the void: "Yo… boss."