The blade sliced effortlessly through the skin, then swept through with unstoppable force, severing Rui's head.
The immense pressure gathered around him froze for an instant, then collapsed with a crash.
Rui's head hit the ground with a thud and rolled twice before coming to rest facing the retreating Kamado siblings. He let out a soft sigh.
Haruto glanced sideways. Even after Rui had been beheaded, his body did not immediately fall.
He staggered and stumbled forward, his hands groping as though trying to grasp something in front of him.
But all that stood before him were the brother and sister locked in an embrace.
Nezuko's brows were knitted, veins bulging across her face. Her demonization was unmistakable.
Tanjiro held his sister tightly, gazing with heartache at the cuts the spider threads had left on her arms as he patted her shoulder. "It's all right. It's all right. There, there, Nezuko..."
Faced with such a tender bond, Rui finally fell.
His headless body crashed to the ground before the very bond he had longed for.
"I'm so envious..." his crumbling head murmured. "To be cherished... to be protected..."
Haruto turned around and silently watched everything unfolding before him.
Tanjiro's nostrils twitched a few times. Suddenly, glistening tears welled up in his red eyes.
"So much sadness..." he whispered. "Such overwhelming sadness... it's almost suffocating..."
Under Haruto's uncomprehending gaze, he placed his hand on the foul demon's dissolving body and patted it gently, just as he had patted Nezuko.
"No matter how miserable your life was, now that you're dead... go and be reborn... don't hurt anyone in your next life."
A short distance away, Rui's head stared blankly at him, then dissolved in the faint breeze stirred by the White-Haired Swordsman walking past.
Haruto walked up to Tanjiro and looked