Faced with such a straightforward attack, Kanao easily predicted the demon's movements with her exceptional eyesight. She leaped nimbly forward and drew the sword at her waist.
"Flower Breathing, Fifth Form: Fruitless Peony."
In an instant, Kanao unleashed nine consecutive strikes from four directions, all aimed at the same spot on the demon. As she executed the technique, peony petals seemed to drift through the air, beautifully graceful.
Kanao landed lightly, while the demon struck by her attack had already crumbled into fragments and vanished into the air.
Kanao calmly sheathed her sword. Suddenly, she turned to look toward an empty spot in the distance without saying a word.
Ten seconds.
Twenty seconds.
Thirty seconds...
In the end, Chinatsu lost patience first. She stepped out from behind a large tree. Kanao was not surprised; she had noticed Chinatsu long ago. But because of her childhood trauma, she was still very much a "silent girl."
When she saw Chinatsu emerge, Kanao gave her a practiced smile, then turned to leave. Chinatsu had wanted to greet her, but after thinking it over, she decided against it.
Now wasn't the time. Just becoming a familiar face was good enough. As for warming this silent girl's heart, I'd leave that to Tanjiro. He was better suited to it, and besides, she was his romantic pairing.
With that thought, Chinatsu turned and headed back the way she had come. Just as she turned to leave, Kanao, who had already taken a few steps in another direction, glanced back at her.
"Constant... she's amazing..."
Those few words left Kanao's lips, an exceedingly rare occurrence. Then she turned and continued strolling around Mount Fujikasane.
Chinatsu ran swiftly and soon returned to where she had started. Before leaving, she had asked Tanjiro to check whether there were any demons nearby, and he had said he could not smell any. Yet whether it was the protagonist's plot armor or the convergence of the timeline, Tanjiro had still ended up encountering this vicious demon. Now he was shielding another examinee, his gaze grave as he watched it.
"There shouldn't be any demons here that have lived this long. The demons here should only have eaten two or three people, and they fight and kill each other, too..."
"But I survived. I ate all the demons that opposed me. About fifty of them, I think? I've eaten plenty of humans, too. Counting you, that makes fourteen of Urokodaki's students..."
A Demon Slayer Corps swordsman could earn the title of "Pillar" by killing fifty demons. Yet the demon before them had not only eaten fifty demons but also devoured a great many humans, reigning supreme over this part of Mount Fujikasane.
Its words kept needling Tanjiro. He gritted his teeth, his eyes burning with fury. Just as he was about to charge, a flurry of hurried footsteps rang out, followed by a shout.
"What are you waiting for? Get it!"
At that instant, a streak of brilliant red fire entered Tanjiro's field of vision. Scorching flames flashed past, cleaving the vicious demon's body in two.
[Hinokami Kagura: Dance]!
The demon let out a piercing roar. The blow was not fatal, since it had missed its neck, but the pain briefly made it wish its head had been cut off instead.
The pain demons felt when struck by sword techniques differed depending on the Breathing Style used.
Water Breathing: gentle, with clean, crisp slashes. In particular, Blessed Rain After the Drought could allow a demon to die without any pain.
Hinokami Kagura: wounds could not heal immediately, and the pain was excruciating. Even someone as powerful as Muzan, the Demon King, would tense up in displeasure.
Water Breathing was more than enough to deal with this vicious demon, but that felt like letting it off too easily.
Send it to hell with a clean, painless strike?
Hell was fine. Painless wasn't.
Chinatsu had cleaved the demon in two with a single Hinokami Kagura: Dance. Because of the technique's special properties, the severed parts could not join back together and heal, no matter how hard it tried.
"Damn it! Damn it! Damn it!!!"
As it struggled, the demon unleashed countless arms at Tanjiro. Chinatsu merely swung her blade a few times with ease. The rippling flames only had to graze the demon's outstretched arms to send its screams rising another pitch.
Beside Chinatsu, Tanjiro drew a deep breath. He had his own views on killing demons. He would not hesitate to kill those that ate humans, but whenever possible, he preferred to finish them with a single stroke and give them a quick death.
Even now, Tanjiro still felt that this vicious demon deserved some pain. Faced with such a thoroughly evil creature, he too thought killing it with Water Breathing would be letting it off too easily.
Tanjiro took a deep breath, switching from Water Breathing's Constant state to Hinokami Kagura.
He pushed off the ground and charged toward the demon at high speed. Fire flashed, and its head fell from its shoulders. Wracked with pain, the vicious demon crumbled into fragments and disappeared into the air.
"Whew!"
Tanjiro let out a long breath and immediately switched back to Water Breathing's Total Concentration state.
The Demon Slayer Corps examinee whom Tanjiro had been shielding stared at the pair in stunned disbelief. After a moment of shock, all the things he wanted to say dwindled into one stammered sentence.
"S-so strong..."
If it had only been a low-level demon, he believed he could have won after a fight. After all, he too had completed his training under a cultivator.
His cultivator would never have let him leave if he lacked the ability to defeat a low-level demon. But against that hideous creature just now, victory had been out of the question. He had not even possessed the courage to muster the will to fight.
With my strength, there's no way I could beat that demon!
Driven by the fear welling up from deep within him, he had chosen to flee. Yet these two had disposed of that terrifyingly powerful demon as though it were nothing.
Are they really newcomers just like me?
He gulped, his legs still trembling slightly. Beside him, Chinatsu calmly sheathed her sword, turned toward him, and held out a hand.
"How are you feeling? Can you stand?"
"O-of course!"
He hurriedly scrambled up from the ground on trembling legs. After taking a little time to calm down, he felt more and more certain that the two before him were extraordinary.
As everyone knew, the Demon Slayer Corps ranks, from lowest to highest, were Kinoe, Kinoto, Hinoe, Hinoto, Tsuchinoe, Tsuchinoto, Kanoe, Kanoto, Mizunoe, and Mizunoto. Above those ten ranks stood the strongest title of all: "Pillar."
Perhaps these two could become Pillars someday!
Before you continue