Chapter 8: Upper Rank |
The scent of blood hung heavy in the village alleyway.
To the right, the courtyard wall had been smashed open, and the house's facade lay in complete ruin, reduced to nothing but debris.
Blood spatter coated every surface, and bits of shredded human flesh were scattered here and there.
In the center of the carnage stood a figure. It was devouring a large chunk of flesh, splattering even more blood in every direction.
Tucked away in a cupboard of the crumbling house, a deathly pale boy was curled into a ball. His eyes were wide with terror, and his trembling hands clamped firmly over his mouth to stifle any accidental scream.
But how could an ordinary human—let alone a child—remain perfectly silent in the face of such unspeakable horror?
"Ugh, fresh humans really are the tastiest!" the demon sneered frighteningly, continuing to gorge on the corpse like a wild beast.
It went without saying that he had long since sensed the presence of another human, but he was in no hurry to kill. He already considered the child his next meal.
"A-a-ah!" That was the breaking point. The child let out a terrified wail and scrambled out of his hiding spot, desperately trying to bolt.
The child's heart hammered frantically against his ribs. His limbs went limp, and the world before his eyes began to fade into darkness.
But right at that moment.
Whoosh!
A translucent crescent sliced through the night sky.
The demon froze instantly. Thin lines of blood traced across the arms he had extended toward the terrified boy, and a second later, they shattered into pieces.
Makomo appeared in the courtyard, a lapis-lazuli sword gripped in her right hand. She watched the bloodthirsty monster and the absolute carnage surrounding him with a wary, slightly frightened gaze.
"What... what are you?" she asked, her voice cold as she fought back her mounting dread.
The creature looked human enough, but its horrifying cannibalism and alien aura left no doubt that it was anything but.
"Such swordsmanship... Are you one of the Demon Slayers?" the cannibal asked, turning his head. His crazed eyes lingered on the blade in Makomo's hand.
"No!"
"Was I wrong? Ah, that's right... You don't have a Nichirin Sword!" The initial attack had genuinely spooked the demon, even triggering an instinctive urge to flee. But realizing the girl held only an ordinary blade—not the sun-steel meant for slaying his kind—his face contorted into a malicious, twisted expression of delight.
Zip!
The arms that had been sliced into ribbons moments ago grew back in the blink of an eye, and the demon lunged straight at Makomo.
His fear had evaporated; no matter how skilled the swordsman, they could never hope to defeat him without a Nichirin Sword.
"..." Makomo tensed at the sight of her opponent's inhuman regeneration, but she didn't panic. Her slender hand tightened around the hilt as she moved to meet his charge.
One moment, one swing of the blade.
It was as if cherry blossoms had suddenly bloomed under the pale moonlight.
The demon came to a dead halt just a yard away from her.
In the deathly silence, a myriad of thin red lines crisscrossed his body. A heartbeat later, he fell apart, his remains dropping onto the blood-soaked ground piece by piece.
But...
Even then, the demon did not die. The girl's delicate hands did not hold a Nichirin Sword.
The severed chunks of flesh pulled back together instantly. Within seconds, the demon stood before her again as if nothing had happened.
"What incredible skill! I've never seen a Demon Slayer as strong as you. If you had a sun-steel blade, this truly would have been the end... but fate had other plans!"
"I wonder how much stronger I'll get once I devour you. Maybe I'll finally get noticed and promoted to the Twelve Kizuki..." The demon's face twisted with excitement, and a manic laugh escaped his throat as he lunged at Makomo once more.
Whoosh!
In response, she nimbly dodged the strike, leaping onto the courtyard wall like a swift fox in the night.
Today was the first time Makomo had engaged in a real battle since becoming Yeruashi's disciple. In other words, she had never truly fought a life-and-death struggle until now.
Her swordsmanship was now being tested and refined in the crucible of actual combat.
Swish!
Makomo swung her lapis-lazuli sword once more.
A translucent blue light flared, forming a dense web that swept across the courtyard. The ground—and the demon along with it—was instantly shredded into tiny fragments without the slightest resistance.
"Useless!"
"You can't kill me like this! You're destined to be my dinner!"
Regenerating rapidly once again, the demon roared with malice and charged at the girl standing atop the remaining section of the wall.
But...
In response, Makomo, having fully recovered from her initial shock, swung her blade again—with even greater finesse than before.
'There is nothing that cannot be cut down with a sword; you simply need more practice.' Makomo recalled Yeruashi's words, and the memory calmed her mind, clearing away all distractions.
The demon was torn to pieces again and again. With every strike, her movements became steadier, more fluid and relaxed.
Without even realizing it, she was using the monster as a perfect whetstone to sharpen her skills, made possible only by its relentless regeneration.
Her swordsmanship was subtly shifting and evolving, beginning to take on characteristics unique to her alone.
"It's no use... You lack the power to kill me!"
"Just wait until you're exhausted, he-he-he..."
No matter how many times the lapis-lazuli blade carved through the demon's body, he continued to howl maliciously, hoping to break her will.
At first, she offered no reply. Then, she finally uttered a few brief words: "Isn't your 'breath' growing weak?"
It was a rhetorical question.
"What breath?" the demon retorted, confused by her choice of words. He didn't understand the true meaning of "breath" in this context—but he was about to find out.
As Makomo continued to methodically hack away at his flesh, a strange heaviness began to settle over him.
He was still regenerating, of course, but the process was becoming significantly more difficult. It felt as though every cell in his body had doubled in weight.
The demons of this world were mutants, products of an incomplete or failed evolution. No matter how incredible their recovery seemed, it was not truly infinite.
While it was true that a mortal blow was impossible without a Nichirin Sword, one could still disrupt the cellular regeneration by forcing the body to absorb a staggering amount of physical trauma.
"Damn it... Damn it all..."
"You brat!"
"I've taken so many hits that my regeneration is slowing down, even without a sun-steel blade... I could actually die if I run out of energy before the sun rises!" Sensing his recovery stalling, the demon finally began to panic.
He had never experienced anything like this before!
Usually, things went one of two ways. Either a Demon Slayer was strong enough to decapitate the demon in a single stroke, or the demon was resilient enough to weather the slayer's attacks and triumph through sheer attrition.
Typically, it was the demon who exhausted the human to death—not the other way around!
Was this girl simply too powerful? Was she so overwhelming that she could completely crush a demon without giving him even a sliver of an opening to strike back?
'If this keeps up, I really will die!' Terrified by his own helplessness, the demon decided it was time to tuck tail and run.
But with such a staggering gap in power between them, escape was nothing more than a naive pipe dream.
A hopeless fantasy in the face of absolute despair!
Forget escaping...
He could barely manage to take a single step to the side!
At this point, the demon had been reduced to a literal training dummy for her swordsmanship.
The moment he managed even a semblance of recovery, his flesh was immediately torn asunder by a flurry of blue crescents.
One, two, three...
As she continued her assault, her movements grew even more fluid. Her slashes became so precise that they focused entirely on the demon, leaving the surroundings completely untouched.
Soon, the demon's body stopped regenerating altogether. The once-deadly predator was now just a slab of meat on a butcher's block!
Makomo could feel it; the demon's "breath" was fading away.
And finally...
She finally lowered her lapis-lazuli sword. In her perception, the demon's "breath" had been completely extinguished.
The dense storm of blue crescents dissipated, leaving behind nothing but a pathetic, lifeless puddle of black blood.
Every trace of life had been utterly erased by her blade!
"So the man-eating demons from the legends really do exist..." Makomo whispered in shock, staring at the puddle of blood at her feet.
She had heard stories of terrible monsters as a child, but she had always dismissed them as mere fairy tales. Even during her training in the ravine, her teacher had never mentioned the state of the world.
Today, she had seen one with her own eyes!
"And those Demon Slayers he mentioned..."
"Ugh, I should have interrogated him!"
Makomo stood frozen, annoyed by the realization that she should have asked a few questions before mincing the creature—like who these Demon Slayers were and what a Nichirin Sword was.
'Teacher definitely knew all about this but kept quiet. Now I'll have to wait until tomorrow,' she thought, mentally facepalming.
By the way...
She sheathed her sword and surveyed the area.
Their noisy "battle" had certainly disturbed the neighbors, yet not a single light flickered on. Clearly, the villagers were hiding in their homes, paralyzed by fear.
Her gaze swept across the ruined courtyard and settled on the unconscious boy inside the house. What was she supposed to do now?
Then, out of nowhere...
Makomo suddenly tensed. She narrowed her eyes and slowly turned her head into the silence.
A human-like figure had appeared at the end of the dark alleyway, though she hadn't sensed him arrive.
He was a young man with an athletic build, sporting pink hair and pale skin covered in intricate blue markings.
His eyes glowed with a soft golden light, with kanji etched into his irises as a symbol of his rank.
Upper Rank Three!
The Twelve Kizuki were the most powerful demons under Muzan's command. They were divided into the six Upper Ranks and the six Lower Ranks.
Over the centuries, the members of the Lower Ranks had been replaced countless times as they fell to the blades of the Demon Slayers. But the Upper Ranks... they had never changed.
Such was the power of Muzan's elite.
And now, one of them stood before Makomo: Upper Rank Three—Akaza!
"What exquisite swordsmanship! This is the first time I've seen a demon destroyed in such a manner... I never expected to stumble upon such a treasure. My hands are practically itching to move!" The demon seemed to be in high spirits.
For him, there was no greater pleasure in his long life than fighting a worthy opponent. Yet, among humans, such adversaries were exceedingly rare, let alone those capable of truly challenging him.
"Weren't you bored, fighting against such trash?"
"Come on... Let's fight!"