The Kasugai Crows sounded the alarm first.
Not just one. The crows at every nearby outpost erupted at once, their cries crashing together from east to west, shattering the predawn stillness.
Kyojuro Rengoku was the first to rush into the courtyard.
He had no coat on, his flame-colored hair whipping in the night wind. His sword was already two inches out of its sheath. When his eyes met the dozen or so dark-purple rifts above the Butterfly Mansion, he stopped at the edge of the veranda.
Mitsuri ran in through the side gate with only one straw sandal on, her other foot bare against the ground. She was halfway through a sentence when she looked up and saw the rifts. Some of the color drained from her face, and she swallowed the rest of her words.
Giyu stepped around a veranda pillar. He was the only one fully dressed, his sword sheathed and secured at his waist. He glanced upward without a word.
Tanjiro, Zenitsu, and Inosuke rushed into the courtyard one after another. Zenitsu slipped on the gravel and fell. He did not get up, curling on the ground as he stared at the rifts in the sky, a low, hoarse wail rising from his throat.
"We were supposed to have three days to prepare-" Tanjiro's voice was hoarse, the bandages around the web of his thumb already soaked through. "How long has it even been?"
No one answered.
More figures trickled into the courtyard: members of the Hidden Corps, ordinary slayers. A dozen or so people stood beneath the veranda, looking up with the same expression-not knowing where to look or what to do, their eyes wandering, meeting one another's, then darting away.
A young slayer's hand began to tremble. He did not notice. The person beside him