Wisteria Water Dragon: Tenth Form ★ Constant Flux

The Hand Demon's roar slowly died away, followed by an eerie, wet swallowing sound.

The eyes embedded among its mass of arms stared fixedly at Giyu, their pupils contracting and dilating strangely, as if it had seen something it couldn't believe.

"You..."

The Hand Demon's voice had changed from its earlier fury to a hoarse rasp, both greedy and confused.

"Your scent... is different..."

Giyu stood without a word, his Nichirin Blade angled toward the ground.

Moonlight shone on his red haori, illuminating the fox mask at his waist as well.

"A fox mask... another one of Urokodaki's disciples!!!"

The Hand Demon's voice shot up, filled with a twisted excitement.

"But... you're different! Your flesh and blood... I can smell it!!!"

"More than all the others before... more..."

Its arms began to writhe and intertwine uncontrollably, like a starving beast that had spotted the finest prey, its reason being swallowed by instinct bit by bit.

"Such a pure scent... such a tempting smell~~~"

Drool dripped from the corners of the Hand Demon's mouth.

"If I eat you... if I eat you, I'll definitely become stronger! I'll definitely break out of this Wisteria cage!!!"

Giyu still said nothing.

He merely adjusted his grip on the sword slightly and raised his Nichirin Blade a little.

His blue eyes watched the Hand Demon calmly from the shadows, without fear or anger, not even any obvious hostility... only an almost ruthless focus.

"Say something! Brat!!!"

The silence was wearing away the last of the Hand Demon's patience.

"Are you too scared to speak?"

"Just like those other brats I crushed before you?"

"Beg for mercy! Scream!!!"

Giyu drew a quiet breath, then slowly let it out.

The rhythm of his breathing changed, becoming deeper and longer, his chest rising and falling slightly with it.

The moisture in the air seemed to gather around him, and the water-blue pattern on the Nichirin Blade in his hand glimmered faintly in the moonlight.

"What's with that look in your eyes?!?!"

The Hand Demon had an inexplicable feeling that something was wrong.

The boy's gaze was too calm. He didn't look at all like someone about to die, nor like an avenger full of hatred.

"Are all the ones Urokodaki trained mute?"

The Hand Demon began piling on more taunts to hide the unease in its heart.

"Look at his sword! It broke! How long will yours last?"

"You brats in fox masks come to your deaths one after another. You're so stupid it's laughable!"

Behind Giyu, Sabito gripped the bare hilt, his knuckles white.

He tried to stand, but Giyu turned slightly and stopped him with a glance.

The look was mild, but it brooked no argument.

Meanwhile, the Hand Demon's patience finally ran out.

"If you won't speak—then die!!!"

Countless arms surged toward him like a tsunami.

This attack was wilder and denser than the one it had used against Sabito, the writhing arms of flesh seemingly filling the entire clearing.

Every arm had swollen several times over, its nails frighteningly black, sharp and long, the sounds of them tearing through the air joining into a piercing screech.

Sabito's heart leaped into his throat.

Even at his best, he would have found it hard to escape an attack like that unscathed!

But in the next second, he saw a sight he would never forget.

Giyu moved!!!

His movements didn't look fast, but they were frighteningly precise.

His body moved like water, tilting, turning and retreating naturally, each movement just enough to avoid an arm's attack.

The frenzied arms seemed to block every path, but Giyu always slipped through where there appeared to be no gap at all.

"Water Breathing, Fourth Form: Striking Tide."

His cold voice rang out for the first time.

Giyu's figure suddenly "flowed" forward like a tide, tracing a wave-like curve as he charged straight into the torrent of arms.

His Nichirin Blade traced arcs of light in his hand, the flat or the back of the blade striking the arms squarely at their joints and points of exertion.

Smack! Smack! Smack!

A series of crisp impacts rang out.

The aggressive arms seemed to lose their strength in an instant. Their paths all went astray, and some even collided and tangled with one another.

Giyu had already passed through the chaos and drawn closer to the Hand Demon's main body.

"How is that possible?!?!"

Shocked and furious, the Hand Demon sent more arms striking at him from behind and from the sides.

Giyu tapped the ground lightly with his toes, drifting backward like a falling leaf while his long sword traced several circles before him.

"Seventh Form: Drop Ripple Thrust Stab."

The sword tip became a single cold star, trailing a slender streak of watery light beneath the moon.

The move was so fast the blade was almost invisible. All that could be seen was a flash of blue light, and three arms reaching for him from different directions were pierced at once!

The Hand Demon roared in pain, its attack slowing for a moment.

And at that moment, Giyu felt something very strange as well.

As the battle continued, he found that his control over his body and his understanding of Water Breathing were deepening and evolving at a speed even he hadn't expected.

With every breath, it was as if a cool current washed through his body, not only easing the pain in his shoulder but also sharpening his senses.

How his muscles moved, how his bones bore force, how his blood flowed... all this information about his body, once so vague, had now become perfectly clear and entirely within his control.

What... is happening?

Giyu didn't dwell on it. He simply applied the feeling to the fight on instinct.

His body moved faster than his mind, as if this were how he was meant to fight all along.

"Sixth Form: Twisting Whirlpool."

Giyu began to spin, the long sword in his hand tracing an ever-widening spiral.

Any arm that tried to approach him and entered this "whirlpool" was either knocked aside or deeply cut by the wind raised by his blade.

The image of flowing water around him grew more and more real, forming a spinning whirlpool. Moonlight shone on it, refracting into a dreamlike blue glow.

The longer the Hand Demon fought, the more alarmed it became.

The boy in the red haori was like real water.

A sword couldn't cut him apart, a fist couldn't scatter him, and no matter how wild the attack, he could neutralize it in the most economical and skillful way.

What was more, his movements were becoming smoother and smoother, more and more... impossible to understand.

"Damn it! Damn it!!!"

The Hand Demon began to panic, its attacks growing more and more chaotic.

"You think you're strong?! You think you can win?!"

The Hand Demon attacked madly, trying to disrupt Giyu with its words.

"I've eaten more people than you've ever seen! Especially you brats in fox masks!"

Giyu still said nothing. His blade traced an elegant arc, his defensive stance unhurried.

"There was a little girl! That's right, a little girl!"

The Hand Demon's voice grew shrill. It had sensed something hidden beneath Giyu's icy calm.

"She wore a fox mask too! She was tiny, but her swordsmanship was nimble, like a butterfly... oh, no, like a goldfish? Anyway, she was hopping all over the place!"

Giyu's pupils contracted ever so slightly.

Behind him, Sabito jerked his head up, his face turning pale. He knew who the Hand Demon was talking about.

"Her mask had a flower-card pattern on it! Cute, wasn't it?"

Catching that momentary change in Giyu's breathing, the Hand Demon grinned viciously.

"I caught her! Just as she jumped up to cut me! Her sword was too light to cut through my neck at all!"

"Then I squeezed her! Crack! The sound of her bones breaking was so lovely!"

"Before she died, she was still calling out, 'Master Urokodaki,' 'Sabito,' 'Giyu'... that's right! She called for Giyu!"

"Was that you? Are you the Giyu she called for?!"

Every arm on the Hand Demon's body trembled with excitement.

"Do you know? She didn't cry even at the very end! She just opened her eyes wide, as if she couldn't believe she was going to die... that look! I'll remember it forever!"

"And you—"

All its arms suddenly swelled at once, veins bulging, and lunged at Giyu from every direction—above, below, left and right—in a frenzy bordering on self-destruction, leaving no blind spot!

"—will end up just like her!!!"

Faced with this deadly blow, Giyu closed his eyes instead.

In his mind, all his insights into Water Breathing, all the information he had sensed in battle, all his longing for the dead, his protection of the living, and his killing intent toward the demon before him... all came together, settled and transformed.

A great volume of oxygen filled his lungs, and his blood surged through his body with unprecedented energy.

The Nichirin Blade in his hand trembled slightly, as if breathing with him.

Giyu opened his eyes.

Deep within those blue eyes, a whirlpool seemed to turn in the depths of the sea.

"Water Breathing, Tenth Form: Constant Flux."

He murmured the name of a move he had never formally learned, but had naturally grasped at this moment, even surpassing its original form.

His long sword rose.

With him at the center, an immense image of flowing water burst outward with a boom!

A curtain of blue light shot into the sky, tinting even the moonlight the color of water.

All the Hand Demon's arms seemed to have fallen into a quagmire within that curtain of water, their speed abruptly slowing.

Giyu began to turn.

The long sword left solid blue trails of light in its wake, its blade humming.

Giyu spun faster and faster, and the image of flowing water around him accelerated and swelled with him!

With every revolution, the sword's momentum grew stronger, and the flow of water doubled in size!

It was as though a giant dragon of water had truly appeared in the clearing, spiraling up into the sky!

Wisteria flowers were swept into the air by the force, and the moonlight refracted into countless points of light on the water dragon.

The intact blade traced flawless circles as it spun, each one drawing closer to the perfect "flow."

For the first time, pure terror appeared in the Hand Demon's eyes.

It wanted to pull back its arms, wanted to run, but it was already too late.

The water dragon unleashed an immense suction, pulling all its attacks—and even the demon itself—relentlessly toward the center of the whirlpool!

"No... impossible... this is... a Hashira's sword technique?! Are you a Hashira?!?!"

The sword's momentum reached its peak.

The water dragon let out a soundless roar.

It was the thunderous boom of air exploding after being compressed to its limit!

The spinning stopped abruptly.

Giyu appeared directly in front of the Hand Demon's neck, motionless as if he had never moved at all.

The long sword in his hand thrust forward at a speed that looked slow but was actually so fast it surpassed one's sense of time.

The Nichirin Blade skimmed the frighteningly hard skin of its neck, the edge deftly avoiding the hardest spots and cutting through the gaps and weak points, its intact blade ensuring a perfect transfer of force.

The Hand Demon's expression froze.

It felt a chill at its neck, and the world before its eyes began to spin.

It saw its own headless body, the Wisteria flowers flying through the air, the back of the boy in the red haori as he sheathed his sword and turned away, and the disbelieving expression of the boy in the yellow-orange haori behind him.

Finally, it saw many faces.

The faces of the children in fox masks it had eaten.

Ah... so... I ate so many people...??

Makomo... that little girl... at the end, she seemed to... smile?

Why... was I here... eating people...?

The last scene in its memory was the gentle smile of a human man from many years ago:

"Little brother, here's some candy."

That was... my older brother... when I was still human...

So... tasty...

The head fell to the ground.

The body began to crumble, turning to ash.

The clearing fell silent.

Only the moonlight remained, as Wisteria flowers slowly drifted down.

Sabito sat on the ground in a daze, looking from Giyu's retreating figure to the spot where the Hand Demon had disappeared.

That last strike... was that really Water Breathing?

Was that really Giyu?

That presence, that power... he had only faintly sensed anything like it when Master Urokodaki demonstrated it.

Giyu stood quietly for a few seconds, then turned and walked over to Sabito.

His breathing had steadied, and the water that had appeared around him was long gone.

Apart from the tiny beads of sweat on his forehead and the slightly hurried rise and fall of his chest, he looked much the same as he had before the fight.

Only his eyes seemed deeper than before, as though many things had settled within them.

He deftly slid the Nichirin Blade back into its scabbard, the guard striking the mouth with a crisp click.

"Can you walk?"

Giyu crouched in front of Sabito, his voice as flat as ever.

Sabito opened his mouth, his gaze falling on the undamaged Nichirin Blade at Giyu's waist before he looked at the bare hilt in his own hand.

A thousand words lodged in his throat, but in the end, all he said was:

"...Your arm."

A large patch of the haori over Giyu's left shoulder was soaked with blood.

...His old wound had split open during that extreme burst of exertion.

But he only glanced down at it and shook his head.

"I'm fine."

He reached out, draped one of Sabito's arms over his shoulder, and helped him steadily to his feet.

Only then did Sabito notice how strong Giyu's arm was, how steady his steps were.

At some point, this junior brother who had always needed him to look after him had grown enough to carry someone else forward on his back.

Giyu rested his other hand naturally on his sword hilt, the intact scabbard swaying gently with each step.

The two walked silently down the mountain. Moonlight stretched their shadows long.

"Giyu,"

Sabito finally spoke, unable to hold back, his gaze drifting to the undamaged Nichirin Blade again.

"That strike just now... and your sword..."

"I don't know."

Giyu cut him off, paused, then added another sentence.

"I just felt... that's how a sword should be used."

Sabito fell silent.

He looked at Giyu's profile. There was no pride or excitement on his face, only a trace of weariness and something deeper.

He understood that Giyu had heard every word the Hand Demon had said about Makomo and had carved them into his heart.

And this junior brother of his, who spoke so little, had buried everything in his heart and turned it into a sword for slaying demons... a sword that could remain intact even in a fight at its limits.

"I'm sorry," Sabito said in a low voice.

Giyu's steps faltered for a moment.

"I promised Master Urokodaki I'd protect everyone,"

Sabito's voice was a little hoarse.

"But I almost... even my sword broke."

"The sword broke, but you're still here."

Giyu spoke softly, but firmly.

"That's enough."

His fingers unconsciously rubbed the hilt of his sword.

An intact weapon, an intact life—perhaps that was all he could protect now.

The two said no more, simply supporting each other as they passed through one sea of Wisteria blossoms after another.

Giyu's Nichirin Blade occasionally reflected the moonlight as he walked, while Sabito clutched the broken hilt tightly, as though holding some kind of vow.

In the distant sky, the first light of dawn was beginning to gather, and the Wisteria blossoms softened in color as the sky slowly brightened.

The seven days on Mount Fujikasane were finally coming to an end.