Infinite Exsistance

Yuichiro Tokito bled out on this very spot. And yet.

And yet.

Dead, long grown to resemble that of a fish, now alight with life, cat like slits lit his gaze. Though dulled by his demonic nature. Just like that demon girl Muichiro had come to befriend through Tanjiro. He should be dead.

He died three years ago and yet, though changed, it was Yuichiro who stood over Muichiro. Brandishing a blade he’d honed his skill much like the Hashira had done. Lady Amane had done a proper burial for Yuichiro, of course she had. But there was one mistake. One gaping hole in her rights, a small unimportant detail she buried with the boy she failed to save.

His casket was buried empty.

She never recovered a body.

Pain clenched Muichiros heart, while despair threatened to swallow the demon whole.

Struck him dumb, unable to continue to attack, unable to touch the slayer before him. While somewhere deep in the base of his skull screamed at him to strike. To tear. To slash the flesh from the body of the one who dare to intrude on his piece of heaven.

His safe haven.

His…

“GO!!”

It’s screamed, whites of his fangs glint in the moonlight’s embrace.

Yet the boy moved so quick.

In one second sat before him, the next towering above. A blur of motion, while his instinct reeled, one heel slid backward as Muichiros arms caught him in an embrace. And he screamed, he screamed and thrashed, but the blade fell from his grasp. Claws burying themselves in flesh, but though he struggled, he could feel a deep spring of warmth welling from deep within his chest.

Flooding the void that had been resting at the core of his being.

Muichiro was a Hashira.

He knew that demons were creatures born of painful tragedies. Their forms were flooded with Muzans cells and replaced. Their humanity struck down with nothing but a blood thirsty demon in its place. And yet.

And yet the little demon before him could not stand the taste of human flesh. When he tried, when he tried to satisfy his ancestor, upper moon one, by feasting on human flesh, he recoiled in disgust. Gagging and dry heaving on nothing but the lingering scent of decay regardless of the saccharine sweet weight on his tongue. When in the depths of starvation, it was not human flesh he hunted but that of raw animals. When he was not laid out across wooden floorboards, scarred by buried painful memories.

But it was this boys blood.

Screams of anguish of two familiar figures, the cries of another form properly mirrored to his own.

Broken pleas for him to stop fell on deaf ears.

The broken face of heartache burrowed deep within the demons dead eyes. But it was as his teeth sank into supple flesh, as his smaller frame gets shoved. Crimson sweetness explode across his tastebuds, and the demons whole frame filled with the shock of shame? Despair?

Icy touches clutch his being, the images of that boy. Sky blue yukata with cyan mist print, a smile of brilliant sunshine, sickening stifle of silence. Dulled, hollow eyes widen in disgust and horror as those cries struck him. His frame came crashing against the ground, breaking through the blanket of mist coiling from the small boy.

‘Stop! Yuichiro! Please-!’

Who….? He knew that voice.

But why did he know that voice.

Why?

H-how…

Another scream. Born from memories he knew not where they came from. Stifling silence. Warmth sapped from his cooling corpse, a screaming berating, and disgusting silence.

Broken silence.

Sheen of new tears coat over his eyes, terror and guilt filled gaze lock onto the slayer as his form shook like a leaf. Clawed fingertips shot to his own arms, racking down into pale demonic flesh hard enough to break the skin. Pushing deeper, deeper, until his fingertips touched ghostly ivory.

“No-….”

“N-no…nononononononono—- bad…bad…t-twin…ch….”

This mirrored image was far too old. His features, though soft compared to the usual peers, were too sharp. Too angular for the younglings mind to connect to his own. But the gaze. Widen in terror, wreaking his little heart in a bone shattering guilt. His anger drowned out by that soul wrenching despair from a time he could not remember. His chest heaves with every breath he took.

Demonic eyes met Muichiro’s own as the smaller stood over the seated human. All that fury suddenly far too heavy left the ghost paralyzed in his place.

This human. His voice. It made his limbs heavy, and flashes of images that he just could not hold onto long enough for him to understand what they were. However, slowly, ever so slowly, his blade lowers to the ground.

Yet remains in his grasp. His only physical thread to reality.

Yuichiro Tokito bled out on this very spot. And yet.

And yet.

Dead, long grown to resemble that of a fish, now alight with life, cat like slits lit his gaze. Though dulled by his demonic nature. Just like that demon girl Muichiro had come to befriend through Tanjiro. He should be dead.

He died three years ago and yet, though changed, it was Yuichiro who stood over Muichiro. Brandishing a blade he’d honed his skill much like the Hashira had done. Lady Amane had done a proper burial for Yuichiro, of course she had. But there was one mistake. One gaping hole in her rights, a small unimportant detail she buried with the boy she failed to save.

His casket was buried empty.

She never recovered a body.

Pain clenched Muichiros heart, while despair threatened to swallow the demon whole.

Struck him dumb, unable to continue to attack, unable to touch the slayer before him. While somewhere deep in the base of his skull screamed at him to strike. To tear. To slash the flesh from the body of the one who dare to intrude on his piece of heaven.

His safe haven.

His…

“GO!!”

It’s screamed, whites of his fangs glint in the moonlight’s embrace.

Yet the boy moved so quick.

In one second sat before him, the next towering above. A blur of motion, while his instinct reeled, one heel slid backward as Muichiros arms caught him in an embrace. And he screamed, he screamed and thrashed, but the blade fell from his grasp. Claws burying themselves in flesh, but though he struggled, he could feel a deep spring of warmth welling from deep within his chest.

Flooding the void that had been resting at the core of his being.

His body and blade flows through the forms with every breath the demon did not need to take.

Three sets of eyes perceptive in their perfection, wove the motions into his body’s memory. Even if the demonkin had escaped that hell? Where were he to go? An orphan, with no home to go to, no one to run to. Once the demon had slipped away, he was so focused on the present. On the impossible of escape, where he would go never came to his mind. So. He went to the only place the blank void of his mind knew peace.

Home.

Where he slept, curled in dusty futons, slept on dark stained floorboards soaked in the iron rot he hated so.

For months he’d slept, for other long nights the child would go out to chop wood. Or gather herbs or mushrooms, only to place them in messy piles out by the back door. In what could only be called laughable piles, left to rot away in disuse. And yet the demon still worked his chores, ones he had done during his time as a human. But now, under the brilliant moon light, he continued to mold himself the way the only significant being left in existence taught him.

Moon breathing.

Locks flow as rivers around the boys body, pooling at his feet as his form moved flawlessly from each stance. It is not until the creaking of wood reached his pointed ear that he froze. Mist gaze snapping to the small abandoned hovel that he’d come to call his home. Panic pinging in his chest, his training forgotten, the demon ran to his home. Ready to protect his sanctuary.

In his rush, he did not notice the demon slayers face before aiming his blade to bury itself in his belly. Scent of iron hitting his nose snapped him from his frenzy. One step back, a face too familiar, too round, too soft, yet unmistakably Yuichiro’s rose into view. Demonic silt pupils, an arm made of tainted ink present on his right side to replace the one he had lost that night.

His body is conflicted. The strangers face made his heart ache and twist in a sickening pit of confusion as the child screams his demand.

This mirrored image was far too old. His features, though soft compared to the usual peers, were too sharp. Too angular for the younglings mind to connect to his own. But the gaze. Widen in terror, wreaking his little heart in a bone shattering guilt. His anger drowned out by that soul wrenching despair from a time he could not remember. His chest heaves with every breath he took.

Demonic eyes met Muichiro’s own as the smaller stood over the seated human. All that fury suddenly far too heavy left the ghost paralyzed in his place.

This human. His voice. It made his limbs heavy, and flashes of images that he just could not hold onto long enough for him to understand what they were. However, slowly, ever so slowly, his blade lowers to the ground.

Yet remains in his grasp. His only physical thread to reality.

Besides, before he can even go, he'll have to actually catch the snakes he'd let inside in the first place.

First things first, they needed to catch the snakes safely. Afterall, it was fine if inosuke got a deserved beating, but no harm would come to the poor creatures.

Recovery from the fight against the demons that had attacked the swordsmiths' village was slow, but Muichiro wasn't going to stay still, despite orders from the medical team. He had dealt with much worse injuries and these would not keep him bedridden. He had something important to do.

He hadn't asked for permission to leave, had told no one when he'd left, leaving only a message with his crow that he would be back in a week's time. That had been two days ago and he was only now reaching his destination - it had taken him some time to find familiar paths, to follow them to the one place he felt he needed to be.

Home.

It was as he'd left it. He stepped cautious towards the open door. Abandoned, left to rot, home only to cobwebs and skittering critters, what had been his home still bore scars from the night Muichiro amd his brother had been attacked. Dark stains in the wood showed where he and his brother had laid bleeding for hours, days, until they'd been found.

Muichiro stepped forward into the house and moved to sit right where he'd collapsed, holding Yuichiro's hand until darkness had taken him. Memories, long buried, nudged at the edge of his mind.

His body and blade flows through the forms with every breath the demon did not need to take.

Three sets of eyes perceptive in their perfection, wove the motions into his body’s memory. Even if the demonkin had escaped that hell? Where were he to go? An orphan, with no home to go to, no one to run to. Once the demon had slipped away, he was so focused on the present. On the impossible of escape, where he would go never came to his mind. So. He went to the only place the blank void of his mind knew peace.

Home.

Where he slept, curled in dusty futons, slept on dark stained floorboards soaked in the iron rot he hated so.

For months he’d slept, for other long nights the child would go out to chop wood. Or gather herbs or mushrooms, only to place them in messy piles out by the back door. In what could only be called laughable piles, left to rot away in disuse. And yet the demon still worked his chores, ones he had done during his time as a human. But now, under the brilliant moon light, he continued to mold himself the way the only significant being left in existence taught him.

Moon breathing.

Locks flow as rivers around the boys body, pooling at his feet as his form moved flawlessly from each stance. It is not until the creaking of wood reached his pointed ear that he froze. Mist gaze snapping to the small abandoned hovel that he’d come to call his home. Panic pinging in his chest, his training forgotten, the demon ran to his home. Ready to protect his sanctuary.

In his rush, he did not notice the demon slayers face before aiming his blade to bury itself in his belly. Scent of iron hitting his nose snapped him from his frenzy. One step back, a face too familiar, too round, too soft, yet unmistakably Yuichiro’s rose into view. Demonic silt pupils, an arm made of tainted ink present on his right side to replace the one he had lost that night.

His body is conflicted. The strangers face made his heart ache and twist in a sickening pit of confusion as the child screams his demand.

He can be bothered. Or. Or…..

He can be part of the problem.

He can be bothered. Or. Or…..

He can be part of the problem.