The closer they got, the more ordinary the mansion looked.
No demonic aura rolled off it in waves. No grotesque decorations. No bloodstained walls. From the outside, it was simply a large, old house standing alone in the mountains, silent beneath the dim light.
And yet the mont Tanjiro drew near, his expression changed.
"There's blood inside," he murmured, his nose twitching. "But... this is the first ti I've slled blood like this."
It was hard to describe.
The scent was human, but not entirely. Richer. Stranger. Sharper. It left an odd impression he could not quite put into words.
Unable to make sense of it, Tanjiro quietly asked in his mind, "Asuramaru, do you think there's a demon inside this mansion?"
From within the blade, Alex answered at his own pace.
"There is a demon in there. And it's quite a bit stronger than the female demon from last night."
Tanjiro's expression imdiately sharpened.
That female demon had already been troubleso enough. If the one waiting inside was even stronger, then he could not afford to make a single careless move.
"Thanks," he replied inwardly. "I'll be careful."
Beside him, Zenitsu pricked up his ears and asked uneasily, "Tanjiro... did you hear sothing just now?"
The two of them had barely exchanged a few words when Tanjiro turned and noticed movent in the bushes nearby.
Two children were hiding there.
They looked terrified.
The mont they realized they had been seen, both of them shrank back instinctively, their bodies trembling so hard it looked like they might collapse.
"Children?" Tanjiro blinked.
Zenitsu followed his gaze and also looked over.
Tanjiro imdiately walked toward them and lowered his voice, making it as gentle as possible.
"What are you two doing out here all alone?"
The children only stared at him with pale faces, fear still written all over them.
Seeing that they were in no state to speak, Tanjiro crouched down and patiently tried to calm them. It took so ti, but eventually the older boy managed to steady himself enough to answer.
"We ca... we ca to save our older brother," he said, his voice shaking. "A monster took him away. He was hurt and left a trail of blood, so we followed it all the way here..."
His eyes lifted toward the mansion.
"This has to be where that monster lives."
Tanjiro listened without interrupting. Then he gave the boy a reassuring look.
"Don't worry," he said firmly. "I'll save your brother."
The boy looked at him uncertainly.
"Really?"
Before Tanjiro could answer, Zenitsu suddenly spoke from behind him, his expression unusually grim.
"Tanjiro... do you hear that?"
Tanjiro went still.
A mont later, he heard it too.
A drum.
The sound was faint, but unmistakable.
And just as the drumming beca clearer—
Crash!
A figure suddenly burst out through a second-floor window and plumted to the ground outside, hitting hard enough to splash blood across the dirt.
Tanjiro did not waste even a second.
He rushed over, knelt down, and quickly gathered the young man into his arms.
"Stay with !" he said. "You'll be all right!"
But the mont he saw the wounds clearly, his face tightened.
The young man's body was slashed so deeply in places that bone nearly showed through. He was bleeding badly—far too badly.
Tanjiro's thoughts moved at once.
"Asuramaru," he asked inwardly, "can you heal him?"
Alex's calm voice answered imdiately.
"I can. And I don't object. But think about what you're asking."
His tone stayed cool, almost lazy, but the aning beneath it was sharp.
"My power isn't unlimited. If I spend a large amount of energy saving him, then when you fight the demon inside, I may not be able to help you much. And if that happens, you could lose."
A simple statent of facts.
Nothing more.
At that exact mont, the wounded young man coughed up a mouthful of blood. His eyes grew more and more unfocused as he lay there, barely clinging to consciousness.
At the edge of death, he murmured weakly to the empty sky above him.
"So... I escaped... only to... die anyway..."
Tanjiro's answer ca instantly.
"I'll manage, Asuramaru. Please save him first."
There was no hesitation in his voice.
Not even a trace.
Alex went quiet for a heartbeat.
Then he sighed inwardly.
"Since you're the Sword Master, do as you like."
The answer sounded helpless, but he still acted.
Black mist seeped from the blade and turned into countless thin threads, coiling around the wounded man's body. A large amount of Demon Power flowed into him at once.
The effect was imdiate.
The bleeding slowed.
Then stopped.
The torn flesh began nding itself right before everyone's eyes.
It happened so quickly it felt unreal. In only a few monts, the young man who had been half-dead looked as though he had never been injured at all.
Only the blood-soaked kimono he wore remained as proof of how close he had co to dying.
The young man stared down at his restored body in utter disbelief.
Then, overco, he dropped to his knees, tears streaming down his face.
"Thank you... thank you so much..."
Tanjiro imdiately reached out to help him back up.
"There's no need to thank ," he said with a warm smile. "The one who saved you wasn't really . You should be thanking soone else."
His words were vague enough to confuse the young man, but the man was far too overwheld to think about it too deeply.
Off to the side, Zenitsu looked like his soul had just left his body.
His eyes were wide.
His mouth hung open.
His worldview, already fragile, had just taken a direct blow.
Tanjiro stood and turned back to the two children.
"Is he your older brother?"
The children shook their heads.
Tanjiro nodded, then turned to the young man he had just saved.
"Could I ask you for a favor?"
"Of course!" the young man answered at once, still full of emotion.
Tanjiro pointed toward the two children.
"Please look after them for ."
The young man imdiately thumped a hand against his chest.
"Leave it to ! I'll protect them!"
With that, he hurried over to the two trembling children.
Tanjiro let out a small breath of relief. Then he turned back to Zenitsu.
"All right," he said. "Let's go. There are still people inside who need help."
This ti, surprisingly, Zenitsu did not imdiately try to flee.
He hurried after Tanjiro instead, sticking close enough that their sleeves nearly brushed.
"T-Tanjiro..." he said, voice shaking with excitent and terror in equal asure. "What was that just now?"
Tanjiro did not bother hiding it.
"That was the power of the sword I'm carrying," he said. "Asuramaru. It can heal injuries."
Zenitsu nearly tripped over his own feet.
"What?!"
He stared at the blade as if it might suddenly sprout fangs.
"Is that sword secretly a demon or sothing? But it's under the sun, so that doesn't make sense..."
Then, after a brief mont of confusion, his expression transford.
His eyes shone.
"Wait... then doesn't that an if I stay with you, I won't die?!"
Tanjiro gave him a flat look.
"If you're already dead, Asuramaru probably won't be able to save you."
Zenitsu's expression did not dim even a little.
"That's still good enough!"
While they spoke, the two of them climbed the steps and reached the entrance. Tanjiro pushed open the door, and they stepped inside.
A dim corridor stretched out before them.
The air inside the mansion was heavy, oppressive, and wrong.
As Tanjiro advanced, his sense of sll seed strangely dulled by the atmosphere inside. The scent was there, but it did not flow naturally. It was as if the entire house itself was interfering with his senses.
So once again, he turned inward.
"Asuramaru, can you tell where the demon is?"
Alex's answer ca with open sarcasm.
"What do you think?"
Before Tanjiro could respond, he continued.
"Go straight. Then turn left."
"All right."
Tanjiro followed the instructions without hesitation and led the way.
Behind him, Zenitsu shuffled along in near-panic, his face already turning pale again.
"T-Tanjiro," he whispered, looking around at the dim corridor with naked dread, "this place is way too creepy. A demon isn't going to pop out all of a sudden, shove its tongue into my ear, and suck out my brain, right...?"
.....
[If you don't want to wait for the next update, read 50 chapters ahead on P@treon.]
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