Compared to a sword he had never wielded before, the hatchet that had accompanied him through years of labor felt infinitely more natural in his grip.
“Your reflexes are sharp, but if you rely solely on a standard hatchet, you won’t even be able to get within arm’s reach of the Ugly Demon,” Shiro observed, keeping his eyes anchored to the unfolding skirmish and occasionally tossing out a brief critique.
Having missed its initial strike, the Ugly Demon dug its toes into the soil.
Within a few fleeting seconds, it materialized directly in front of Tanjiro.
Its limbs splayed open instantly like a massive, suffocating net, driving a vicious assault straight toward the boy.
Tanjiro’s frame swayed and jerked erratically, barely managing to deploy the blunt edge of his hatchet to deflect the demon’s continuous blows.
He resembled a fragile leaf caught in a violent sandstorm, on the absolute precipice of structure collapse at any given second.
For a baseline Tanjiro who had yet to receive any formal martial conditioning, attempting to conquer a demon–even one stripped of its intellect and operating purely on residual instinct–was nothing short of a statistical fantasy.
*I need to breathe…
I have to maintain the breathing style…*
Tanjiro’s consciousness frantically recalled the core fundamentals Shiro had broken down regarding Sun Breathing.
Parting his lips, he meticulously mirrored the precise posture and cadence his father utilized during the ritual Kagura dance, bringing a structured, rhythmic frequency to his respiratory pattern.
Instantly, Tanjiro felt a surge of vitality flood his system, far beyond anything he had ever experienced.
The hand anchoring his hatchet tightened with unprecedented leverage.
In a fraction of a second, the iron blade cleaved through the air with absolute trajectory.
“Hinokami Kagura: Dance!”
Accompanied by a sharp, piercing whistle, the hatchet traced a perfect arc, slicing directly toward the Ugly Demon’s cranium.
“Gah–!”
Just as the edge was about to bite into the puppet’s flesh, Tanjiro’s eyes suddenly bugged out.
The sound tearing from his throat was instantly choked off, making him sound precisely like a duck being strangled by the neck.
Shiro shook his head at the sight, commanding the Ugly Demon puppet to hoist Tanjiro and bring him over.
Attempting to forcefully execute a high-tier breathing style before one’s physical constitution met the baseline operational requirements would inevitably trigger severe altitude-sickness-like respiratory failure at best.
At worst, it resulted in exactly what Tanjiro was experiencing right now: acute pulmonary hemorrhaging.
Without immediate intervention, a practitioner could easily suffocate to death within minutes.
Because the trauma Tanjiro sustained this time was exceptionally severe, the Kaidō Shiro deployed was an order of magnitude more potent than his previous minor applications.
The pure spiritual energy saturated Tanjiro’s entire silhouette in a vibrant, emerald green luminescence.
Slowly, the boy’s face shifted from a choked, purple flush back to a healthy, natural complexion.
An application of Kaidō at Shiro’s current tier would comfortably place him among the absolute elite within the Fourth Division.
It was precisely this exceptional medical aptitude that had caught the discerning eye of Captain Retsu Unohana, prompting her to bypass standard protocol and elevate him directly from a generic unseated officer to the prestigious position of Eighth Seat.
“Cough…
wheeze…
cough!”
Following Shiro’s full-scale therapeutic intervention, Tanjiro finally stirred from his unconscious state.
“Shiro…
I…
I remember now.
I failed.”
Given the terrifying parameters of physical strength the Ugly Demon had displayed, a conventional human being stood absolutely no statistical chance of survival against it.
And yet, according to Shiro, this creature didn’t even rank among the formidable tiers within the wider demonic hierarchy.
Recalling the dangerous journey Shiro was about to undertake, Tanjiro couldn’t help but wash with intense anxiety.
“I never expected you to secure a victory today in the first place.
If anything, the fact that you successfully manifested the breathing style during those final seconds was an incredibly pleasant surprise,” Shiro noted, refusing to downplay the boy’s natural aptitude.
Offering a definitive nod of affirmation, he continued, “With the continuous assistance of my Kaidō, I can guarantee you’ll be wielding the breathing style fluidly within a single year.”
An ordinary human baseline would inevitably succumb to fatigue and physical degradation; anyone attempting to build strength through extreme training had to constantly balance their efforts against biological limits.
In stark contrast, demons possessed a massive structural advantage: they never experienced exhaustion, their physical injuries mended near-instantly, and they could easily log countless hours of training indoors during the daylight hours.
Even within the ranks of the Demon Slayer Corps, there were always individuals with compromised conviction who chose to defect to the enemy’s side.
Backed by a foundational breathing style, a swordsman transformed into a demon could scale their power at an explosive rate.
In the original timeline, Zenitsu Agatsuma’s senior disciple had capitulated to the threat of death and joined the demonic faction; within less than a year, he had successfully replaced the fallen Upper Moon Six siblings, ascending to the upper echelons of the hierarchy.
But Tanjiro now possessed a cellular recovery rate that comfortably rivaled a demon’s, paired with the absolute strongest breathing style in existence.
Shiro was intensely curious to see exactly how far this original protagonist could go under the influence of this unique combination.
Thus, over the course of the following half-month, Tanjiro was plunged into an unyielding, cyclical loop.
His mornings were entirely consumed by grueling physical conditioning, while his afternoons were reserved for brutal, live-combat drills against the Ugly Demon.
If nothing else, his hatchet play had grown profoundly fierce and precise; he was now capable of holding his own against the purely instinctual puppet for dozens of exchanges without ceding an inch of high ground.
“So…
what exactly have you and big brother been training for?
It always looks so terrifying.”
Because Nezuko had taken over the responsibility of delivering their midday meals today, she had personally witnessed the savage clash between Tanjiro and the Ugly Demon.
Scrambling up the massive boulder where Shiro habitually sat, she voiced her panic.
She had always known her brother stepped out with Shiro every morning to train, but she had never imagined they were playing with their lives.
That grotesque monster looked completely unhuman as it continuously struck at Tanjiro, and every time her brother swung his hatchet, he aimed directly for the creature’s neck.
Every single exchange was explicitly designed to claim a life.
“Ah, I completely lost track of the schedule.
I forgot it was your turn to bring the food today, Nezuko.
If I’d remembered, I would have had Tanjiro take an extended break,” Shiro said, swatting a hand against his forehead in a thoroughly superficial display of sudden realization.
“Don’t try to brush it off!
No matter how you look at it, what’s happening over there is incredibly dangerous!” Nezuko cried out anxiously, pointing a trembling finger toward Tanjiro.
The battle between her brother and the puppet had entered a white-hot phase, and Tanjiro’s frame was inevitably sustaining a few shallow cuts and bruises.
Looking at her frantic expression, Shiro knew that if he didn’t offer a transparent explanation immediately, she would throw herself into the fray without a second thought to “rescue” her brother.
“Calm down.
Tanjiro began successfully acclimating to this high-intensity combat three days ago.
There is absolutely zero probability of him encountering a life-threatening complication,” Shiro said gently, wrapping his hand around Nezuko’s small wrist to anchor her momentum and keep her from charging into the crossfire.
“But…
is it truly alright?
Why on earth is big brother subjecting himself to such a terrifying ordeal?” Nezuko inquired, her posture gradually settling as she looked at Shiro’s perfectly tranquil countenance.
Kneeling by his side, her heart ached deeply as she watched Tanjiro trade blows.
“The blunt reality is that your entire family has been targeted by a creature structurally similar to the one down there.
Except, his individual strength comfortably dwarfs that ugly thing by an astronomical margin,” Shiro explained, gesturing toward the Ugly Demon puppet, which was currently hoisting a thoroughly exhausted Tanjiro back toward the boulder.
“Your brother’s singular objective is to secure the necessary martial strength to ensure his cherished family never encounters harm.”
Nezuko fell into a heavy, contemplative silence as she watched Shiro channel his healing energies into Tanjiro.
Her head rotated slightly, her eyes locking onto the horrific, distorted features of the stationary Ugly Demon.
A violent shiver rippled through her small frame, and she instinctively shifted her weight, pressing herself tightly against Shiro’s side.
At her core, she was still just a young girl; facing a grotesque demon at such close proximity naturally triggered a baseline sensory terror.
Sensing the trembling silhouette tucked behind his back, Shiro immediately dissolved the puppet, recalling it back into the spiritual matrix of his Zanpakutō.
After a long, drawn-out silence, Nezuko’s voice–barely louder than the buzz of a mosquito–drifted into Shiro’s ears.
“Shiro…
I don’t want to spend the rest of my life hiding behind you and big brother.
If a day comes where danger finds us, I want to stand right alongside you both and face it together.” Her tone carried a soft, desperate note of pleading.
Upon hearing her words, Shiro turned his head in genuine surprise, his gaze locking directly into Nezuko’s fiercely determined eyes.
[Total Bonus Chapters Achieved: 0]
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