Haruto woke up at the Butterfly Mansion.
Shinobu Kocho sat beside his bed, leafing through a medical book, while Genya and Giyu leaned against the wall outside, neither saying a word.
Seeing him wake, Shinobu reached out to feel his forehead and sighed in relief. "Your fever's gone."
Genya and Giyu came into the room. The former let out a long breath of relief, but the latter looked grim.
"I took them to Mount Sagiri. My teacher and Makomo are looking after them now.
Tanjiro wasn't badly hurt, but Nezuko..."
Giyu Tomioka stopped and glanced at Shinobu Kocho beside him. "...She's not doing well."
Haruto fell silent, too.
Nezuko had been infected with Muzan Kibutsuji's blood and turned into a demon, so Giyu hadn't even dared bring them to the Butterfly Mansion.
He knew that almost all the swordsmen who came to the Butterfly Mansion had been injured fighting demons. They would never spare a newly transformed demon.
Nezuko's only possible fate there would have been to be hacked into mincemeat by a crowd of swordsmen at the gates.
Tanjiro would probably have lost his mind then...
But if Nezuko began eating people, Haruto would draw his sword and cut off her head himself, even if it drove Tanjiro mad.
And in an era like this, he might be ordered to take his own life over it as her teacher.
They had to send her to Tamayo as soon as possible. That woman had spent centuries studying demons; perhaps she would have a solution.
After explaining everything, Giyu wanted to stay and say something else, but Genya grabbed his sleeve and dragged him out.
Giyu looked at him in confusion. "Your teacher is lying there seriously injured. Don't you need to stay with him?"
"..." His expression was so sincere