"Shuya, I'm so tired…"
Shizuka Marikawa dropped to the ground and looked up at him with big, pitiful eyes. She rubbed and patted her thick thighs like she was proving a point.
She pouted. "You can just summon Rika's motorcycle with your Nen, right? Can't you make one so I don't have to walk anymore?"
Shuya stopped walking. He turned around, walked back to her, and pinched the soft flesh at her waist. He rolled his eyes. "Shizuka-nee, maybe take a look at the extra weight you've been carrying. You've been lying around the house for a whole year. It's about time you moved a little."
Shizuka blinked at him, completely serious. "But… you said last night that my body feels really nice to hold while you sleep."
Shuya went quiet for a second. She wasn't wrong. He had said that. More than once. Usually while his hands were already on her stomach.
Shizuka immediately went full drama queen. She clutched her chest and put on the fakest sad face imaginable. "You don't love me anymore, do you? I knew it. You finally got bored of my body… Waaah—"
"Alright, enough acting."
Shuya flicked her forehead with his knuckle, cutting off the performance. Then he crouched down in front of her and patted his own back. "I give up. Get on."
Shizuka's fake tears vanished instantly. She bounced up, jumped onto his back, and wrapped her soft, thick thighs around his waist like a koala. She leaned in and planted a loud kiss on his cheek.
"I love you the most, Shuya~"
"GO! GO! GO!"
She threw both arms up like an excited kid, all her earlier laziness gone in a flash.
Shuya adjusted his grip on her thighs, feeling the warm, plush weight against him. He touched the spot on his cheek where she kissed him and shook his head with a helpless smile.
This lazy woman really was impossible to deal with.
He sighed and kept walking toward their destination—Tamayo's location in Asakusa.
In the original story, Tamayo needed three main things to develop the drug that could turn demons back into humans. First, she worked with Tanjiro, who brought her blood from the demons he killed. Second, she collaborated with Shinobu on medical knowledge. Third, she studied Nezuko's unique demon body.
Shuya had a small vial of Muzan's blood left over from when he turned the Kamado family, so that covered the first part. For the second, he brought Shizuka instead of Shinobu. Shizuka was a doctor, and her modern medical knowledge was decades ahead of this world's. She had also helped develop the zombie virus into a Transmutation ability back in the other world.
The third part was trickier. He couldn't exactly turn Nezuko into a demon again just for research. But he still had the Kamado family members locked up near the Butterfly Mansion. Without the protagonist's plot armor, he wasn't sure how useful they would be.
And once he got his hands on the Blue Spider Lily from Yoriichi's wife's grave, that might work as a substitute anyway.
"We're here. Get down, Shizuka-nee."
After carrying her for a while, they reached an empty clearing. According to the crow's message, this was the meeting spot Tamayo had chosen.
Shizuka blinked and slid off his back, looking disappointed. "Already? I was hoping you'd carry me a little longer…"
Shuya looked around. The moon was bright overhead, but the clearing was completely empty.
Shizuka tilted her head. "Shuya, did you get the wrong place? There's nothing here."
"No. This is it."
Shuya shook his head. The location was correct. So the sudden appearance of a building had to be the work of that demon's Blood Demon Art—the one hiding nearby.
Just as he thought that, the air in front of them rippled and distorted. A luxurious Western-style mansion suddenly materialized out of nowhere.
Shizuka grabbed his arm, eyes wide. "Whoa! The house just appeared! That's so cool!"
A beautiful woman with the refined air of a noble lady stood in front of the mansion. She clasped her hands in front of her and greeted them gracefully.
"Lord Shuya, I presume? I am Tamayo. Welcome to my home."
Shuya nodded. "That's me. Good to meet you, Miss Tamayo."
He was about to continue when his expression sharpened. His gaze flicked toward the shadows nearby.
"Before we talk more… there's a little rat hiding in the corner that needs to be dealt with first."
A faint, pitiful sobbing sound drifted out from the darkness.
Shuya glanced at Shizuka, then suddenly pulled her close and kissed her on the lips without warning.
Turns out there really was something to that whole "natural airhead gets blessed by the world" thing.
He had only been carrying Shizuka through this world for a short while, and he had already stumbled across something he hadn't found in all his time here—a demon with a Blood Demon Art.
And not just any demon.
Upper Rank Four. Hantengu.
The one whose abilities he was most interested in.
Even better, the guy was a notorious coward.
Which meant the success rate for using Equivalent Exchange to trade the demon's life for his Blood Demon Art was extremely high.
Shuya's eyes gleamed with anticipation as he kept kissing Shizuka.