Guided by his bizarre Kasugai Crow, Hajime pressed onward.
To ensure maximum efficiency, he traveled from sunrise to sunset.
If he passed a town, he rented a cheap room.
If night caught him in the wilderness, he simply built a campfire and slept against a tree.
After several grueling days, he finally reached the designated meet-up coordinates.
He paused, glancing up at the sky.
Heavy black clouds blanketed the horizon.
A torrential storm was rapidly gathering.
Fierce winds whipped across the barren trail, throwing stinging grit into his eyes.
The pigeon abandoned the turbulent sky, diving down to huddle safely inside the collar of his haori.
Hajime pushed through the gale until he spotted a dilapidated shack sitting in the wasteland.
A faint, flickering orange light glowed through the cracked timber, looking as though the wind might snuff it out at any moment.
Whoever sat by that fire had to be his assigned partners for the mission.
Shielding his face, he approached the structure, mildly curious about who Headquarters had sent.
He shoved the rotting door open.
The interior was completely barren, stripped of all furniture.
A modest campfire crackled directly on the hard dirt floor.
A petite figure in a dark Corps uniform crouched by the flames.
Hearing the hinges groan, she instinctively grabbed Nichirin blade resting at her hip and spun around.
The next second, Hajime and the girl both shouted in unison.
“Why is it you?!”
Hajime forced the door shut against the wind and stared at the girl.
“What are you doing way out here, little Shinobu?”
“I should be asking you that!
What is a bottom-tier rookie doing on this assignment?” Shinobu Kocho swung her fist angrily.
“And do not call me little Shinobu!”
“Alright, Big Shinobu.”
“Also denied!
I outrank you and I am older than you.
You will respectfully address me as Senpai.” Shinobu puffed out her chest proudly.
Hajime’s gaze dropped slightly.
“Well, they’re trying their best, but compared to your sister, you’re definitely lacking in certain areas.” He made a cruel pinching gesture with his fingers to emphasize the point.
“You pervert!” Shinobu gripped the distinct four-leaf tsuba of her blade, ready to draw.
Hajime immediately plastered on an innocent expression.
“What is your dirty mind imagining?
I was obviously talking about the brass buttons on your uniform.”
After a chaotic bout of physical bickering, they finally separated.
Shinobu crouched by the fire, covered in sweat and panting heavily from the exertion.
Hajime was out of breath as well, though his stamina easily outclassed hers.
“Ready for round two?”
Shinobu glared daggers at him.
“Forget it.
I am acting as the bigger person here.
Your insolence is forgiven.”
“Wow, thank you so much, Big Shinobu.”
“Stop calling me that!
Call me Senpai!”
“Understood, Shinobu-senpai.”
Thick veins throbbed on her temple.
She squeezed her fists tight, but since he had finally used the correct honorific, she forcibly swallowed her temper.
Shinobu drew her weapon.
Unlike a standard katana, the steel had been forged into a slender, needle-like rapier.
“My blade is perpetually coated in lethal poison,” she bragged, sliding it back into the scabbard.
“I only need to pierce a demon’s flesh to inject the wisteria toxin.
It dies instantly.
So do not get in my way.”
“You’re the one who shouldn’t get in my way,” Hajime fired back.
“Hah?!
A bottom-tier rookie talking back to me!
I am Hinoe rank!
Do you even comprehend what that means?
It is the third-highest rank in the entire Corps!
A lowly Mizunoto has no right to lecture me!”
“Just make sure you don’t slow me down.”
“Slow you down?!” she flared up, her words firing like a Gatling gun.
“You’re a bottom-tier recruit!
You’re the dead weight!
Dead weight, dead weight, dead weight!”
Hajime raised both hands in mock surrender.
“Alright, fine.
You’re actually kind of adorable when you’re throwing a tantrum.”
Shinobu looked intensely smug at her victory, but a second later, the actual words registered in her brain.
Her face flushed violently red.
“You bastard!”
The cramped cabin instantly descended into violent chaos all over again.
Outside, the torrential storm finally broke.
The fierce gale rattled the rotting wooden planks, threatening to collapse the roof entirely.
Deep puddles formed rapidly in the muddy earth.
Between the dark sky and the flooded ground, visibility was reduced to a swirling gray expanse.
With the bickering finally exhausted, the two sat around the fire to review the intel.
“A few months ago, mass disappearances began plaguing this specific region,” Shinobu explained softly.
“Merchants, travelers, and locals vanished.
Headquarters dispatched several investigators here, but they all vanished without a trace.
Even their Kasugai Crows went missing.”
Hajime frowned.
“If multiple slayers went missing, why not mobilize a larger squad?
Or just dispatch a Hashira?”
Shinobu sighed, looking torn between annoyance and exhaustion.
“Even counting the Kakushi cleanup crews, our entire organization only has a few hundred members.
Do you have any idea how many demon rumors surface across Japan every single day?
We simply don’t have the manpower.”
Hajime fell silent.
The sheer lack of scale was a massive strategic bottleneck.
With only a few hundred total members, the active combat roster numbered less than half of that.
Worse, the actual combat prowess of anyone below the Hashira rank was notoriously inconsistent.
As an ancient shadow organization, the Corps had always maintained this severely limited roster.
For a standard private group, a few hundred members was respectable.
But for an army fighting a literal nationwide war against immortal monsters, it was woefully inadequate.
Hajime understood the grim politics.
Kagaya was incredibly intelligent.
The limitation wasn’t a lack of ambition, it was survival.
The Demon Slayer Corps was an illegal, unsanctioned militia carrying deadly weapons in public.
With only a few hundred heads, the national government could easily turn a blind eye.
If the Ubuyashiki family suddenly commanded an army of ten thousand swordsmen, the military would perceive them as a domestic threat and crush them.
This current size was the absolute threshold.
Large enough to hunt demons, yet small enough to avoid being hunted by the police.
As for cooperating with the federal government…
Kagaya had undoubtedly tried.
More than likely, previous generations had attempted to secure official backing, but the negotiations had always catastrophically failed.
Anyone who studied the nation’s political history knew the two defining traits of its ruling class: unparalleled arrogance masking deep incompetence, and the sheer fact that the higher the rank, the more stubbornly ignorant the official.
State cooperation was an impossible pipe dream.
Once the heavy downpour finally weakened into a steady drizzle, they abandoned the shelter and hiked up the muddy mountain trail.
*Ta-boom!*
Bright lightning violently illuminated the dark sky.
The gale lashed the dense pines, forcing the massive branches into a ceaseless, groaning sway.
“I’ll take the vanguard,” Hajime instructed over the wind.
“You watch the rear.
Stay alert, wild beasts usually hunt during storms.”
“I am perfectly capable of protecting myself!”
“I know,” he replied smoothly.
“Which is exactly why I need you guarding my blind spots.”
Shinobu’s slender rapier lacked the physical mass to decapitate a demon, relying entirely on the fatal wisteria toxin injected into the bloodstream.
However, wisteria was exclusively toxic to demonic biology.
Against a massive, thick-skinned mountain bear or an enraged boar, a poisoned sewing needle was functionally useless.
Placing her in the rear ensured Hajime would tahnk any initial ambush.
Naturally, he phrased it as a compliment to her skills, avoiding another explosive tantrum.
Appeased by the blatant flattery, Shinobu gave him an approving nod and obediently fell into step behind him.
Hajime just shook his head.
‘Such a child.’
As they trekked single file up the steep incline, Hajime voiced a nagging concern.
“Are you entirely certain the previous investigators went missing on this specific mountain?”
Shinobu nodded confidently.
“Positive.”
“How do you know?”
“Because while I was waiting for you to arrive, I rigorously scouted the surrounding valley and the lower foothills.
This peak is the literal only place left to check.”
Hajime stopped dead in his tracks and turned to stare at her, utterly bewildered.
“What is with that face?
Are you actually worried about me?”
“You knew full well that multiple trained swordsmen vanished without a trace, and you decided to go wandering the perimeter alone?” he demanded.
“What are you implying?!” she bristled.
She immediately fired off a rapid barrage of defensive insults, calling him a cowardly wimp while loudly declaring her own bravery.
Realizing it was impossible to reason with her bruised ego, Hajime simply sighed and gave up the argument.
‘If she died how would I explain it to Kanae?’
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