There were two hours left until dawn.
Uchiha Bing leaned against a tree trunk, closing his eyes to regulate his breath.
Water Breathing circulated silently within his body.
Total Concentration Breathing was merely the most basic application of a Breathing Style, and the next stage was Total Concentration: Constant—training the Breathing Style into a passive state, turning it into an instinct, and maintaining it twenty-four hours a day.
Besides, Water Breathing might not necessarily suit him.
If given the opportunity, he should try other Breathing Styles more and thereby derive a Breathing Style uniquely his own.
Only what suited oneself was the best.
His stamina had almost recovered.
Uchiha Bing opened his eyes.
Moonlight filtered through the branches and leaves, spilling onto his blood-stained clothes.
After killing the Hand Demon, he had rapidly traversed the forest all the way, successively slaying seven more evil ghosts, which had taken a bit of effort.
He laid the nichirin blade horizontally across his knees, tore off a piece of his sleeve, and wiped the blade by the moonlight.
After killing numerous evil ghosts, the blade of this nichirin blade had acquired a few tiny notches, and it was unknown when it might snap.
Anyway, it was something he had picked up, so he would just make do with it.
The eastern sky gradually took on a fish-belly white.
In the next two hours, Uchiha Bing gained nothing.
During this period close to dawn, the evil ghosts had hidden away in advance.
There were still several days left until the end of the Final Selection.
Now that the Hand Demon was dead, the rest were just ordinary evil ghosts.
To him, the remaining time had only one meaning.
Influence Value.
As the system’s sole currency, the more of this stuff, the better.
Over the next few nights, the evil ghosts of Fujikasane Mountain encountered an existence far more terrifying than ghosts.
He did not roar, nor did he bellow, nor would he make any unnecessary sounds during battle, and he wouldn’t even give ghosts the chance to see his face clearly.
He silently approached in the shadows, sliced off necks with a single blade, and then vanished into the darkness before the bodies turned to ash.
Displaying the assassination techniques taught by the Ninja Academy, Uchiha Bing somehow looked even more like a ghost than the evil ghosts themselves for a time.
On the third night, he found two evil ghosts curled up together in a cave beneath a withered tree.
They hid here during the day and only dared to go out to forage at night.
Uchiha Bing stood at the edge of the cave, the moonlight shining in from behind him, casting his shadow on the bottom of the cave.
Both ghosts raised their heads simultaneously, vertical pupils flickering in the dark.
Before they even had time to stand up, a flash of blade light passed, and two heads simultaneously hit the ground.
[ Influence Value + 20 ]
In the early morning of the fourth day, a huge evil ghost launched a sneak attack on him from behind.
He sheathed his blade and continued walking forward without looking back.
The moonlight shone behind him, and the evil ghost’s corpse turned to ash, blown away by the night wind.
[ Influence Value + 10 ]
On the evening of the fifth day, the setting sun had not yet completely set, and the light in the dense forest was dim.
When Uchiha Bing passed through a patch of woods, he heard cries for help.
A boy had been pounced to the ground by an evil ghost, and the nichirin blade in his hand had flown three steps away out of his grasp.
The evil ghost’s mouth was already close to the boy’s neck, and the boy was desperately pushing against the ghost’s chin, his arms trembling.
Uchiha Bing leaped down from the tree, landing silently.
The moment the nichirin blade was drawn, the evil ghost turned its head, its pupils reflecting a flash of blade light that grew closer and closer.
The blade swept across the ghost’s neck cleanly and neatly, splashing the boy’s face with blood.
“Th-Thank you—”
Before the boy could finish his words, Uchiha Bing had already vanished into the bamboo grove.
Later, when talking about this incident with others, that boy said he had encountered a “ghost of the Demon Slayer Corps”, who left no name, had no expression, and left right after killing ghosts.
By the night of the sixth day, the ghost wails on Fujikasane Mountain had noticeably thinned out.
Squatting on an ancient tree, Uchiha Bing opened the system interface and took a look.
[ Current Influence Value: 1370 ]
Three hundred points came from the Hand Demon, and the remaining thousand-plus points came from the subsequent days of hunting.
An ordinary evil ghost was worth ten points of Influence Value.
Viewed this way, Uchiha Bing had already accomplished the feat of a hundred-man slash, or rather, a hundred-ghost slash.
Nearly most of the ghosts on Fujikasane Mountain had died at his hands alone.
Uchiha Bing closed the interface and continued wiping his blade.
The previous blade had already broken, and the nichirin blade currently in his hand was the third one he had picked up.
The pitted notches on this blade were also quite large, and it would probably snap after cutting down a few more ghosts.
Once the Final Selection ended, he would have to find a way to get a new one.
On the morning of the seventh day, the sound of a bell tolling came from the top of Fujikasane Mountain, reverberating through the morning mist.
The Final Selection was over.
Uchiha Bing walked out along the mountain path.
Water Breathing circulated steadily within his body.
A Ninja’s physique was inherently stronger than an ordinary person’s, and coupled with the physical enhancement brought by the Breathing Style, climbing the mountain cost him almost no stamina.
“Bing, we meet again.”
Tanjiro ran out from the woods on the side.
The boy’s face was full of fatigue, but his eyes were very bright.
His dark-green haori was covered in mud and scratches, though it wasn’t particularly torn.
Uchiha Bing nodded slightly in response.
Tanjiro caught up and walked alongside him, his nostrils twitching slightly before he smiled.
“The scent on your body has changed a bit; there’s no killing intent anymore.”
“Yeah, I’ve killed almost all of them.”
Tanjiro exclaimed, “You’ve made quite a huge commotion on Fujikasane Mountain during this time.
Who knows how many ghosts you’ve killed back and forth—the scent of evil ghosts on Fujikasane Mountain is almost dissipating.”
Uchiha Bing did not deny it and nodded.
“It’s alright.
I hate ghosts, so I want to exterminate them all.”
“Just how many ghosts did you kill by yourself?”
“Around a hundred or so?
Didn’t count.”
Tanjiro let out a chuckle and didn’t ask anymore.
The two walked side by side, encountering several other survivors along the way.
The road here led to the finish line, and those who survived would basically all come here to gather.
The first sound heard came from the roadside with a crying tone.
“I actually survived, wuwuwu— I’ll never participate in this kind of selection again wuwuwu—”
A yellow-haired boy was hugging a tree by the roadside and crying bitterly.
His clothes had several holes torn in them, and there was a shallow scratch on his face.
His nichirin blade hung crookedly at his waist, looking as if it had never been drawn from start to finish.
Agatsuma Zenitsu.
Uchiha Bing recognized this little blondie at a glance.
This person, together with Tanjiro and the Boar-headed Boy, was known as The Trio, and they were the most outstanding swordsmen in this generation of the Demon Slayer Corps.
Agatsuma Zenitsu suddenly raised his head while crying, his gaze falling onto Uchiha Bing.
His crying choked off instantly.
He hiccuped, and his entire body quickly shrunk behind the tree, his face turning somewhat pale with fright.
“Th-Th-This person is so terrifying.”
A crybaby, he didn’t really want to interact with him.
Uchiha Bing withdrew his gaze and continued walking toward the mountain top.
“Tsk, the scent of disdain.”
Tanjiro followed by his side, still saying something.
Zenitsu followed far behind, softly muttering words like “monster”.
The morning mist gradually dissipated, and the plaza at the top of the mountain became faintly visible.