Yesterday Once More

"Yes, it's already been almost a month..." Makomo gazed into the distance. Besides their usual gentleness, her jade-like, deep green eyes seemed to hold a hint of something different, something even she had not noticed.

"What, don't want me to leave?" Kanzaki Kumo leaned a little closer.

"A little, but only a little."

Makomo turned her head to meet Kanzaki Kumo's eyes. Looking at his handsome face, which still retained a trace of boyishness, and the confident, sunny smile that almost always rested on it, she became momentarily distracted.

"Will you... come back to Mount Sagiri?"

"Of course. After all, Urokodaki taught me, and I get along pretty well with Sabito and Giyu." Seemingly oblivious to the unusual note in Makomo's voice, Kanzaki Kumo nodded quite naturally, yet made no mention of the girl before him.

"And?" After waiting a while and finding that he had nothing more to say, Makomo finally could not help asking.

"And Urokodaki's cooking is better than my little old man's. Coming over now and then for a better meal would be nice, especially since the two places aren't that far apart." Kanzaki Kumo still did not say what the girl wanted to hear about herself, and those deep green eyes seemed to dim for a moment.

Only when Makomo was secretly feeling a little disappointed and annoyed did Kanzaki Kumo slowly speak again.

"Of course, more importantly, you're here on Mount Sagiri."

With that, he winked at Makomo.

"Oh, so you dare tease me! Take this!"

"Hehe~ Can't hit me, can't hit me~"

"Stop running!"

Makomo had made it so obvious that even Kanzaki Kumo, whose romantic experience across both lifetimes amounted to zero, could sense that budding, innocent affection unique to a young girl.

But at present, both of them were a little too young for this to be legal.

Even though this world was different from his previous one, Kanzaki Kumo still could not get past that barrier in his heart. For now, they should just remain friends.

Still, now that this affection had sprouted, it would naturally deepen with time.

Two days later, Mount Momiji.

Bang!

"Little old man, I'm back!"

Thud!

Kanzaki Kumo kicked the door open and shouted, then heard a dull thud. Lowering his head slightly, he saw a little old man clutching his forehead and glaring angrily at him.

Kanzaki Kumo: Why does this scene look so familiar?

By the time his brain worked out what was familiar about the scene before him, Kanzaki Kumo's body had already moved.

"Teacher! Are you all right? Does it hurt?" Kanzaki Kumo asked with concern as he helped Jigoro Kuwajima up.

"You brat... Hmph!" Kuwajima raised a fist and shook it in front of Kanzaki Kumo's eyes, but in the end, he only tapped him lightly on the head.

Only then did Kanzaki Kumo finally remember why the scene before him felt familiar.

He had gone on two long trips in total, and both times, he had knocked Jigoro Kuwajima over when he returned at noon.

Kanzaki Kumo secretly resolved that next time, he definitely would not come home at noon.

Kuwajima: slowly produced a "?"

"How's your Water Breathing coming along?"

Jigoro Kuwajima turned and headed toward the kitchen, preparing to add a little more food to that day's lunch.

"I've learned all the moves and fundamentals. All that's left is to fully integrate them and incorporate some of their characteristics into Thunder Breathing to create new moves. I already have an idea for that, but I haven't succeeded yet."

Kanzaki Kumo answered as he deftly unfastened the Nichirin Blade at his waist and set it on a nearby table.

"Mm... Kanzaki, you're very talented, and you've always had ideas of your own. These old bones don't have much left to teach you. You'll have to walk the road ahead yourself."

"Though I don't know why, you seem to feel an urgency to grow stronger. You're still so young, yet you already have enough strength to rival Kinoe Swordsmen, or even some of the relatively weaker Hashira from past years, and you're still not satisfied. But remember, if you ever feel tired, you can come back to Mount Momiji and rest anytime."

"Teacher..." Kanzaki Kumo turned back, looking at Jigoro Kuwajima's not particularly tall figure standing in the kitchen doorway, and his eyes grew a little moist.

"All right, all right. Once you get old, you start liking these sentimental speeches. As long as you understand what I mean. Go get cleaned up and ready to eat." Without looking back, Kuwajima waved a hand at Kanzaki Kumo, then walked into the kitchen.

Across his two lifetimes, spanning thirty-odd years, Kanzaki Kumo had spent nearly half that time struggling on his own. Only Kanzaki Keizan in the past and Jigoro Kuwajima now had given him a sense of home.

Kanzaki Kumo's reason for constantly growing stronger had long since changed from simply protecting himself and trying to prevent certain regrets to protecting these lovely people.

Whether it was Kuwajima before him or Urokodaki and his students on Mount Sagiri, they were all truly, truly good people.

Four days had passed since Kanzaki Kumo returned to Mount Momiji.

In the clearing outside the little courtyard on Mount Momiji, the sound of something cutting through the air rang out frequently.

Over the past few days, Kanzaki Kumo had been pondering how to develop a new move.

His current idea was to combine Flowing Dance's footwork techniques and Constant Flux's power-stacking techniques with the explosive bursts of successive Thunderclap and Flash strikes, developing a move that offered speed, flexibility, and damaging power across multiple strikes.

It was a classic case of wanting this, that, and everything else too.

Kanzaki Kumo was just that greedy.

Moreover, with his memories of his previous life, he understood the terror of Muzan and the Upper Rank Demons under it better than anyone currently in the Demon Slayer Corps.

So he knew that even if he successfully created this move, it still would not be enough.

To change the original story's devastatingly costly victory and protect the lovely people he had already met and those he might meet in the future, he needed even greater strength.

Over the past few days, he had been practicing these three moves constantly, turning those eyes of his, which could only be called outrageously gifted, upon himself.

He observed every movement when drawing his blade, every detail of his muscles exerting force as he stepped, every shift and turn as his body changed position, and even every breath, every beat of his pulse, and the contraction and dilation of his blood vessels.

Again and again, he went from the movements alone to incorporating each move's Breathing Style, then to trying to find common ground between the Breathing Styles and moves and fuse them...

After just four days, although he was still a long way from successfully developing a new sword form, Kanzaki Kumo had already found that feeling-the feeling of combining the characteristics of the three major sword forms.

He had even begun to work out a suitable breathing rhythm.

Even Jigoro Kuwajima was stunned by the speed of his progress.

But now, Kanzaki Kumo had to interrupt his development of the sword form.

Because Ink Shadow had brought him a new mission.