Battle of the big eaters

"Young man? Young man!"

Haruto jolted awake, unable to stop a pained groan as the lingering agony of his bones being chewed to pieces before his death swept over him.

In front of him, the owner of the Late Sea Inn, who had woken him, looked troubled. "Are you having some kind of attack? Angina?"

It took a while for Haruto to recover from the pain still lingering in his nerves. His face was as pale as his hair.

He realized he was back to when he had first arrived in Hirano, so he steadied his breathing and asked, "Wh-what happened?"

"I should be asking you that!"

Relieved to see he was all right, the owner grumbled, "You walked in and collapsed before you even said a word. If I hadn't caught you in time, you might've smashed your face open!"

Haruto pushed himself up from the floor and shook his head.

Time had rewound again...

Did time across this entire plane rewind to before his death every time he died?

He walked out of the hot spring inn and frowned at the inn across the street corner, beneath its "Hot Steam House" sign.

Two demons.

One was in the Hot Steam House: Nure-onna, a female demon whose Blood Demon Art used her hair.

The other was an Ox Demon, though he didn't know its exact location. It had an ox's head and an octopus's body, with a nerve-paralyzing toxin in the suckers on its tentacles. Its Blood Demon Art was also unknown.

What was the connection between the two demons? Why hadn't the Ox Demon appeared at first, only to leap out immediately after Nure-onna was killed?

Haruto stopped puzzling over all that and simply returned to the Late Sea Inn.

"Sir?"

"What food are you serving right now?" He pointed at the assorted seafood displayed in the cabinet. "Sea bream? Snow crab?"

Forget Nure-onna and the Ox Demon for now. First, he needed to fill his stomach.

Giyu Tomioka arrived in Hirano a little later. Kansaburo, his Kasugai Crow, told him that another member of the Demon Slayer Corps had arrived before him.

As for who it was or where they were, Kansaburo could only shake his head helplessly. "Giyu, I'm very old."

So Giyu wandered the streets until a hot spring inn with a crowd packed around its entrance caught his eye.

"What's going on?"

"Would you believe it? Apparently some kid from out of town is taking on Yato Kazuma!"

"Yato? Isn't he Hirano's famous big eater?"

"That's right. The guy who ate two hundred pieces of sea bream sushi in one sitting a while back."

"Doesn't he claim he can out-eat every sumo wrestler in Tokyo? How'd he find a rival here in Hirano?"

"That boy from out of town has a full head of white hair. He's really handsome!"

White hair, handsome, big eater.

The words rearranged themselves in Giyu Tomioka's mind, but no matter how he put them together, they could only spell one name: Haruto Takanashi.

Giyu held his sword against his chest and slipped through the crowd like a fish, making his way into the inn.

The first thing he saw was an enormous fat man sitting at a table. His hair was tied in a sumo wrestler's topknot, and sweat covered his head as he frantically stuffed sushi into his mouth.

The sushi chefs beside him were equally drenched in sweat. Their hands moved so fast they had almost forgotten all about "craftsmanship," yet they could barely keep up with the speed at which he ate.

Across from the enormous fat man sat a boy with long white hair hanging loose.

Compared with the sweat-soaked Yato Kazuma, the boy ate with effortless ease, swallowing each piece of sushi in a single bite with barely any chewing.

Giyu Tomioka stood beside the table and looked at Yato with pity.

How did you even dare challenge him?

How could you possibly out-eat him?

Even setting aside the twenty-odd boxes packed full of eel rice on Mount Fujikasane, the twenty-four arm-length salted fish he had eaten on Mount Sagiri-a feat that had left Makomo stunned for an entire year-were astonishing enough.

What was more, after finishing those twenty-four salted fish and several large bowls of hot pot, Haruto had still picked up his sword and breezed through a sequence of Flame Breathing techniques.

Someone like that... probably had another world inside his stomach.

Despite the enormous difference in their builds, anyone with eyes could see that Yato Kazuma had reached his limit, while the boy from out of town...

Looked as though he could still eat another hundred pieces of sushi.

"Stop eating, Yato! Admit defeat before you eat yourself to death!"

Someone in the crowd shouted.

Yato Kazuma, who had already been considering backing down, suddenly lost his head. He slapped his thick palm on the table, then grabbed a rice paddle and began shoveling sushi rice straight from the tub into his mouth.

Haruto jumped in surprise. He was wondering whether he should do the same when the man opposite him suddenly stopped moving.

"He's choking!"

Someone in the crowd cried out in panic.

"He's done for! He's blocked up all the way from his stomach to his throat!"

Haruto looked up. Yato Kazuma's eyes had gone blank, and his pale, pudgy face was flushed bright red. He looked moments away from suffocating.

Seriously, if you can't eat any more, fucking stop!

Haruto was about to go around the table and give him first aid when a stern-faced boy stepped forward beside him.

First, he picked up a water jug and poured water into Yato's mouth. When the big man looked about to give out, he reversed his sword and struck Yato hard in the stomach and torso with its hilt.

After several blows, Yato finally retched, spewing sushi rice mixed with water all over the floor.

He slumped to the ground, utterly drained, and gasped for breath. At least his life had been saved.

The surrounding spectators erupted into an uproar. They had never expected watching an eating contest to nearly cost someone his life.

"Giyu?" Haruto's eyes lit up. "You're the one assigned to this mission? Have you eaten?"

As he spoke, he pushed the sushi beside him toward Giyu.

Giyu Tomioka's gaze passed over the mess on the floor, and he shook his head slowly but firmly. "I'm not hungry... What's going on here?"

Haruto chuckled. "Don't ask. This guy came out of nowhere. I was getting something to eat, and he suddenly ran up and challenged me to an eating contest. He said the loser would pay the winner's bill..."

But judging by his current state, Yato had lost a good chunk of his life and probably couldn't get up to pay.

The farce came to an abrupt end.

Haruto offered the owner of the Late Sea Inn payment for his meal, but the kindhearted owner waved him off and said quietly:

"It's all thanks to you. Look how busy my inn is now!"

Haruto chuckled at the packed hot spring inn, then counted out some coins again. "Please prepare some food for me to take away, and a box of Baby Rice Flour too."

He still remembered Saori, who had lost her husband. Without this food, she and her child, Rika, would go hungry tonight.

He took a thoroughly confused Giyu to visit the Asai Family. Saori was just as wary as before.

Already knowing that Nure-onna was in the Hot Steam House, Haruto did not stay long before leaving with Giyu.

"When did you arrive?" Giyu Tomioka asked.

"Around noon."

They had not seen each other for half a month, and Giyu's hair seemed to have grown a little longer.

"Why didn't you answer my letters?" Haruto complained. "I thought you hadn't received them, so I sent several."

"Makomo took all your letters to read," Giyu said, pursing his lips. "Besides, the contents were all over the place. All you wrote were stories about the past."

"Makomo?"

"That girl found out from Sabito that you saved him. She's determined to make you the goal she works toward."

Giyu looked at the darkening sky and brought the conversation back on track. "What's going on with the missing fishermen?"

"Hmm..." Haruto recalled the clues he had gathered at the Late Sea Inn.

"That's another story.

Have you heard the legend of Nure-onna and the Ox Demon?"