The Demon Progenitor

"As long as you die, all the demons will die too, right?"

The night wind blew.

It stirred the hair of the first demon.

A thousand years had passed since the distant Heian era. Kibutsuji Muzan had used his blood to turn people into immortal demons, beginning a long war between humans and demons.

Tonight marked the first meeting between the leaders of the two sides.

Inside an old-fashioned Japanese house,

Dressed in a sharp suit and carefully groomed, Muzan finally met the leader of the Demon Slayer Corps who had always thwarted him: Ubuyashiki Kagaya.

Muzan, a demon, was handsome and tall. Kagaya, a human, had ugly scars showing between his bandages, and his eyes were sightless.

Beneath the handsome, flawless skin was a rotten heart.

Beneath the rotting flesh was a resilient, beautiful heart.

This was no clash between equals in the traditional sense.

The difference in their strength was as obvious as that between a tyrannosaurus and a chick.

The man lying on the bed spoke slowly. His voice was calm and gentle, the kind that could soothe anyone who heard it.

"The wind's picking up. I was right, wasn't I?"

"Shut up."

Muzan's voice was the opposite: cold and merciless, utterly devoid of warmth.

"Let me say one last thing."

"Though I said earlier that my existence doesn't matter much, my death won't be meaningless."

"I was fortunate enough to earn the admiration of those children. That means... if I die..."

"The Demon Slayer Corps' morale will soar to unprecedented heights."

"Are you finished?"

Muzan stretched out his hand. A strange, deep-red energy surged beneath his skin, and his fingers were as sharp as drawn daggers.

"Mm... I'm finished."

"I didn't expect you to listen to me for so long. Thank you, Muzan."

Kagaya, content, leaned against his wife. His daughters, who had been playing ball outside, stopped and quietly watched from the doorway.

Just before Muzan struck, Kagaya pulled the fuse on the explosives.

Flames raced beneath the floorboards. The fireball from the explosion was about to erupt.

It was a trap.

He had deliberately revealed the Demon Slayer Corps headquarters' location to lure Muzan there.

To keep Muzan from growing suspicious, he had his wife and daughters stay with him and face death.

All of this was simply to increase the chances of destroying Muzan.

Was a sacrifice that defied human understanding worth it?

Yes.

Demons survived by eating people. Muzan posed too great a threat to humanity, and over the past thousand years, he had caused countless tragedies.

Muzan had been born into the Ubuyashiki clan.

Because of their connection to him, the Ubuyashiki clan had been cursed. Its members were frail from birth and rarely lived past thirty.

Over a thousand years, the current clan head was the ninety-sixth generation.

Kagaya was a kind and righteous man. Even without the family curse, he would have been willing to pay any price to kill Muzan, the monster behind countless tragedies!

Any price!!

And yet...

In the final moments of his life, Kagaya felt the warmth of his wife and heard his daughters breathing outside...

I'm sorry...

The Ubuyashiki clan's thousand-year wish had come at the cost of your lives...

Gods...

If you truly exist, I hope you'll protect them...

I hope... we can be together again...

--

--

BOOM!!

The explosion tore through the silent night. Blinding flames roared like a beast devouring everything!

Amid the flames,

a boy stepped out, muttering to himself.

"I don't get it. Isn't this supposed to be the kind of setup where they give me a mission?"

"Who am I supposed to save..."

"Forget it. I'll save everyone."

The boy clapped his hands together. A violent gust burst from his palms, scattering the oncoming flames and carving out a vacuum in the sea of fire!

Wind Release: Gale Palm!

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!!!

The explosions roared in his ears. Kagaya had gone blind and couldn't see what was happening before him.

What was going on?

Whose voice had that been just now?

After the explosions,

the sound of footsteps on wooden boards came to Kagaya's ears.

"I'd hate for you to die before paying off your loan."

"Who were you trying to save again? It's my first job, so I didn't catch that."

This was Uchiha Sora's first time in another world, and he hadn't deactivated his Sharingan once.

He had no idea how he had traveled between worlds. It felt a little like reverse summoning, but not quite.

The Sharingan could observe the flow of chakra. With its powerful insight, it could copy Taijutsu and ninjutsu that weren't Kekkei Genkai.

Chakra was a special energy formed by combining spiritual and physical energy. If he could see chakra, then energy on a lower level was even easier to perceive.

Uchiha Sora didn't recognize anyone there. He could only tell that Kagaya was the person who had taken out the loan.

Among those present, only the one with the pale face and suit had much physical energy. The rest were almost indistinguishable from ordinary people.

The borrower in particular looked close to death.

"Are you... a god?"

After a brief moment of stunned silence, Kagaya replied.

Only a god could hear the thoughts in his heart at the very end.

Uchiha Sora quickly realized something.

This man didn't have a loan platform in his head like he did.

Am I special...

Well, obviously.

"A god... not quite. I'm just here to lend money."

Uchiha Sora met those pale eyes. "This back-and-forth is a hassle. Excuse me, there's something I need to confirm."

Kagaya's body stiffened. He felt something enter his mind and rummage through his memories.

He was powerless to resist.

Hypnotizing a shinobi of equal rank required eye contact as a prerequisite. For an ordinary, sickly man... he could simply pour his ocular power straight in.

Before long, Uchiha Sora had picked out some key information.

He turned to look Muzan up and down, as though he were some rare species.

"You... have lived for a thousand years?"

His energy was at most that of a Special Jōnin, yet he had lived this long!

How had he managed it?

Only then did Muzan snap out of his confusion.

He sneered. "I overestimated you, Ubuyashiki Kagaya."

"I thought you had the resolve to fight me even if it meant killing your wife and daughters. But when the moment came, you couldn't go through with it."

"Is this one of the Hashira you've been secretly raising? That trick just now was pretty interesting."

"But calling this brat a god..."

"How ridiculous!"

Kagaya suddenly realized that not only was he unharmed, but Muzan was too!

Ignoring his frail body, he shouted with all his strength, "Run! He's the progenitor of demons!!"

Uchiha Sora turned around. He was only eight years old. Even with children in the Shinobi World growing up fast, he was barely about five feet tall.

He walked right up to Muzan, stopping less than two feet away, and looked up at him.

"What's so funny? What's so interesting?"

Uh...

Muzan's pupils suddenly contracted. Those familiar words...

A powerful sense of déjà vu surged through his mind. The wounds left by that man suddenly throbbed.

Uchiha Sora's lips curled up slightly. His words brimmed with absolute arrogance.

"To a lowly demon like you..."

"I'm no different from a god."

Bam!!

His fist tore through the air and slammed into Muzan's jaw.

The crack of bone mixed with a muffled grunt!

Before Muzan could react, the fist that had just smashed his jaw shifted into an open palm. Flames swirled around it as it whipped out!

Whoosh—

The back of the hand cut through the air and cracked hard against Muzan's cheek.

The immense force sent Muzan flying like a rag doll. His head spun seventeen or eighteen times before separating from his body midair.

Thud—

His body crashed into the burning wreckage of the wooden house and twitched a few times.