At nine years old, I could cross the western training yard before the first leaf touched the ground.
I still could not escape Shihan’s cane.
It struck the back of my ankle the instant I completed the turn.
My foot shifted half an inch.
The wooden practice post survived because I stopped my blade before impact. The force of the halted cut sent dust rolling away from my sandals.
“You raised your heel,” Shihan said.
“I adjusted for the stone.”
“You noticed the stone before you moved.”
“I thought I could clear it.”
“You thought incorrectly.”
He stood several paces away, leaning against his cane as though he had not just crossed the distance quickly enough to strike me during a Thunder Breathing technique.
The years had placed more grey in his hair. They had done nothing for his patience.
I lowered my sword. “Was the rest acceptable?”
“No.”
I waited.
His mouth tightened.
“The rest was good.”
A grin reached my face before I could stop it.
Shihan pointed the cane at me. “Do not look so pleased. Good is where people become satisfied and die.”
“You could simply say you are proud of me.”
“I could also throw myself into the pond. Neither would improve your training.”
From the veranda, Tanjiro laughed loudly enough to betray that he had been listening.
Shihan turned toward him.
“You have enough breath to laugh, Kamado?”
Tanjiro straightened immediately. “Yes, Kuwajima-sama.”
“Then Rengoku has trained you poorly. Go run another circuit.”
Kyojuro rose beside him with the enthusiasm of someone who considered punishment a group activity.
“An excellent suggestion! We shall improve our stamina together!”
Tanjiro stared at him. “You already finished your circuits.”
“Then this one shall be performed in support of yours!”
Shihan looked at me. “There. That is what excessive encouragement creates.”
“I think Tanjiro likes it.”
Tanjiro had already started running. He looked over his shoulder.
“I have mixed feelings!”
Kyojuro followed him, laughing.
The training grounds had become louder after the Kamado family settled near headquarters.
Their first months had been spent in one of the guest residences. By the end of that year, Father arranged a permanent home for them beyond the eastern wisteria grove. Kie helped manage food stores and prepared charcoal for physicians, smiths, and estate workers. Nezuko often assisted Mother and the attendants, while the younger children treated the headquarters as a much larger version of their mountain.
My sisters encouraged this.
The combination produced noise in places that had once been quiet.
I had grown to like it.
Tanjiro began formal sword training soon after arriving. His body understood the Hinokami Kagura, but understanding a dance passed through family memory did not teach him distance, defense, or how to face a moving blade.
Sun Breathing also placed a heavy demand on him. He could perform the movements slowly for far longer than I could when we first met, yet using them with speed exhausted him quickly.
Flame Breathing became the bridge.
Its committed movements, powerful breath, and direct sword paths helped him build strength without forcing him to rely on an incomplete Sun Breathing foundation. Shinjuro supervised the early instruction. Kyojuro soon joined nearly every session, whether anyone requested his help or not.
The Rengoku estate had become a second home to Tanjiro.
Ruka was still alive.
Her health required care, but treatment had given her years the original future had stolen. She watched her sons and Tanjiro train from the veranda, sometimes calling corrections before Shinjuro noticed them.
He pretended to dislike that.
No one believed him.
Tanjiro returned from his additional circuit breathing hard, with Kyojuro beside him looking as though they had gone for a pleasant walk.
He bent forward and rested his hands against his knees.
“You knew he would hear you,” I said.
“I forgot how old men hear when they are waiting for an excuse.”
Shihan’s cane struck the ground behind him.
Tanjiro became upright with impressive speed.
Kyojuro nodded approvingly. “Your recovery has improved!”
I laughed.
It came easily now.
Three years earlier, I had still measured every expression before allowing it to escape. I had worried that speaking too much would inconvenience someone, that laughing too loudly might draw attention I had not earned.
My family had worn those fears down through repetition.
Mother asking for my opinion even when she knew I might be wrong.
Father listening without making me prove every thought deserved to exist.
My sisters entering my room without permission, borrowing my things, ruining my drawings, and expecting me to join them afterward.
The Kamados bringing their own warmth close enough to mix with ours.
I was still serious. I still planned too much, watched doors, counted people, and prepared for losses that had not happened.
Now I also teased Tanjiro when he became embarrassed around guests. I helped Shigeru hide sweets from Takeo, then betrayed him when Kie asked directly. I sometimes sat beside Father without needing a reason.
The estate no longer felt like somewhere I had been allowed to remain.
It was home.
My appearance had changed with the years.
My black hair had grown past my neck and was usually tied behind my head during training. My golden eyes remained the first thing strangers noticed, though the faint branching discoloration near my left temple had begun attracting attention too.
The curse appeared shortly after my eighth birthday.
The first mark had been small enough to hide beneath my hair. Mother noticed before breakfast.
She had touched it once, very gently, then held me for a long time without speaking.
My premonition had been correct. The curse had waited until I was eight.
That knowledge had not made its arrival easier.
It had slowed my physical growth over the following year. My body continued to strengthen, though each increase demanded more work than the last. Age limited how much muscle and force I could build safely. The curse interfered with recovery. My chosen training focused more on control, technique, and endurance than raw size.
By the time my physical stats passed eighty, progress nearly stopped.
My skills did not.
They grew through refinement, new teachers, changing environments, difficult records, and mistakes Shihan made me repeat until I understood them.
After training, I opened my status while Tanjiro and Kyojuro began sparring.
Status
Name: Ubuyashiki Haruya
Title: Ubuyashiki Heir
Race: Human
Age: 9 Years
Level: 12
Special Condition: Ubuyashiki Curse, Early Stage
HP: 820/820 (-5%) [780/780]
Unspent Stat Points: 60
Strength: 81 (-5%) [77]
Agility: 85 (-5%) [81]
Endurance: 82 (-5%) [78]
Intelligence: 98
Wisdom: 97
Charisma: 67
Luck: 52
Core Skills
Gamer Body MAX
Gamer Mind MAX
Memory Retention MAX
Language Comprehension MAX
Inventory MAX
World Travel MAX, Unlocked
General Skills
Body Control Lv. 79, Master
Observe Lv. 76, Master
Speech Lv. 64, Master
Reading Lv. 71, Master
Foresight Lv. 14, Intermediate
Drawing Lv. 38, Advanced
Meditation Lv. 56, Advanced
Administration Lv. 42, Advanced
Leadership Lv. 40, Advanced
First Aid Lv. 35, Advanced
Survival Lv. 31, Advanced
Stealth Lv. 33, Advanced
Training Skills
Physical Conditioning Lv. 74, Master
Breath Control Lv. 78, Master
Swordsmanship Lv. 66, Master
Footwork Lv. 70, Master
Thunder Breathing Lv. 64, Master
Sun Breathing Lv. 42, Advanced
Education Skills
Etiquette Lv. 49, Advanced
Calligraphy Lv. 53, Advanced
Arithmetic Lv. 50, Advanced
The numbers no longer rose every week.
Strength had remained at eighty-one for almost four months. Endurance sometimes improved by a fraction before settling back when the curse interfered with recovery.
I had considered using my saved points.
I decided against it.
My condition was stable. The curse had not reached my eyes, lungs, or limbs. Spending points simply to make the screen move felt wasteful when I might need them in another world.
The thought of another world no longer felt imaginary.
World Travel had unlocked one year earlier.
It happened after Tanjiro began training with the Rengoku family.
The idea had come during a conversation between Father, Shinjuro, Tanjiro, and me. Tanjiro needed a style that strengthened the same traits Sun Breathing demanded without requiring him to force the inherited dance into combat before his body was ready.
Flame Breathing was the closest available foundation.
Shinjuro had been reluctant.
“The boy already carries one breathing method he barely understands,” he said. “Adding another may create confusion.”
Tanjiro sat straight across from him. “Then I will work until I understand both.”
“That is an answer built from determination rather than sense.”
Kyojuro, seated beside his father, nodded firmly. “Determination is an excellent foundation!”
Shinjuro closed his eyes. “You are not helping.”
I leaned toward Tanjiro. “He says that often.”
“I have noticed.”
Father hid a smile behind his sleeve.
We eventually agreed that Tanjiro would learn Flame Breathing as a complete discipline while keeping the Kagura separate until he could compare the principles without blending the forms carelessly.
That night, the system appeared.
World Anchor Established
Anchor: Home World
Anchor Stability: Permanent
Requirement 4 of 5 Fulfilled
Description:A World Anchor is created when the user forms lasting bonds and produces meaningful consequences within a world. An anchored world may be returned at any moment.
A second notification followed.
Level Requirement Confirmed
Current Level: 10
Requirement 5 of 5 Fulfilled
Then the lock I had carried since birth disappeared.
World Travel Unlocked
Initial Destination: Random
Home World State During Travel: Frozen
Traveler Aging: Active
Return: At will
Inventory Transfer: Enabled
Destination Selection: Unavailable for initial travel
I could have left that night.
I did not.
Unlocking a door did not mean I was ready to walk through it.
The glimpses from Foresight made that clear.
The skill reached Intermediate several weeks after my eighth birthday.
Foresight Lv. 9 → Lv. 10
Tier Advancement
Beginner → Intermediate
Tier Trait Unlocked: Directed Glimpse
Description:Foresight allows the user to receive incomplete impressions of possible events, dangers, people, places, or information connected to the future. Clarity and relevance depend on skill level, context, proximity, personal connection, and the stability of the future being observed.
Intermediate Tier Effect: Weekly Glimpse
Effect:Once every seven days, the user may attempt to receive a single premonition.
The user may focus on a subject, question, person, or intended action before activating the effect. This increases the chance that the glimpse will relate to the chosen focus, but does not guarantee relevance.
Premonitions may be symbolic, incomplete, misleading without context, or entirely mundane.
Cooldown:Seven Days
The first deliberate glimpse showed me Hinaki hiding a box of colored beads beneath a loose floorboard.
I had spent the entire week preparing questions about Muzan.
Hinaki was furious when I found the box.
“You used your strange intuition to spy on me?”
“I did not choose to see the beads.”
“You still looked under the floor.”
“I needed to confirm whether the vision was accurate.”
“You could have confirmed it by asking.”
“You would have lied.”
She crossed her arms. “That is unrelated.”
The second useful glimpse came five weeks later.
I focused on Muzan and saw several faces reflected across broken mirrors.
A pale man in a white suit.
A woman with carefully arranged hair.
A child standing beside an unfamiliar family.
The faces carried the same red eyes.
The understanding remained after the images vanished.
Muzan could alter his body, age, and sex.
That information changed how Father organized searches for him. The Corps stopped assuming the Demon King would always appear as the same man.
Other glimpses were less useful.
A fallen bowl.
Rain arriving before a planned journey.
Nichika cutting her own hair and blaming Kuina.
A crow landing on Father’s shoulder during a meeting.
The skill offered possibility, not obedience.
Still, the glimpses gave me pieces of what I might need beyond my world.
Over the following year, I changed my training.
Shihan taught me to adapt Thunder Breathing over uneven terrain, through narrow spaces, and while carrying weight. Tanjiro helped me continue Sun Breathing without letting its continuous rhythm interfere with Thunder’s explosive focus.
Kanae taught me how injuries changed movement.
Shinobu taught me first aid after discovering I had been copying medical diagrams from the archives.
Mother taught me how to identify remedies, prepare clothing for travel, and recognize when someone was concealing illness.
She believed I had become unusually interested in emergency preparation.
That was true.
I began slipping supplies into Inventory.
Rice balls disappeared one at a time after meals. Dried meat, preserved vegetables, salt, wrapped sweets, and sealed water followed. Nothing spoiled inside the space.
I stored summer clothing, winter layers, two plain robes, sandals, boots acquired through foreign traders, blankets, rope, needles, thread, bandages, disinfecting alcohol, fever remedies, pain medicine, and the basic tools required to maintain a sword.
My sisters blamed Tanjiro for the missing sweets.
Tanjiro blamed his nose for failing him.
I said nothing.
The sword came last.
Shihan refused for months.
“A real blade does not make you a swordsman.”
“I know.”
“Then stop asking for one.”
“I need experience maintaining and carrying it.”
“You have experience carrying wood.”
“Wood rarely cuts the person cleaning it.”
“That is one of its better qualities.”
He finally agreed after I demonstrated the First Form of Thunder Breathing across the river stones behind the estate.
Thunderclap and Flash.
One breath.
One draw.
The wooden target separated along the line marked by Shihan before the sound of my step reached the observers.
I had performed the technique hundreds of times with wood.
That was the first time he believed I could stop it.
My Nichirin sword arrived several weeks later.
The blade turned black in my hands.
Shihan stared at it for long enough that I became uncomfortable.
“Is that bad?”
“It is rare.”
“That did not answer me.”
“It means no one knows enough to answer you.”
The blade was simple, with a dark circular guard and a grip wrapped for smaller hands. It would need replacing as I grew, assuming the curse allowed me to grow much further.
I carried it every day after that.
A week before my ninth birthday, Foresight showed me a dark path beneath unfamiliar stars.
A house stood at the end.
The feeling attached to the glimpse was clear.
Opportunity.
Danger too, though less immediate than the sense that waiting would close something valuable.
I chose that week for my departure.
Then I waited until its final night.
The Weekly Glimpse would refresh at midnight. Wherever I arrived, I wanted the ability available.
I spent the day normally.
I trained with Shihan.
I ate dinner with my family.
Nichika tried to steal food from my bowl, and I moved it before her chopsticks arrived.
“You saw that coming,” she accused.
“I watched your hand.”
“That is unfair.”
“Using your eyes?”
“Using them against family.”
Hinaki agreed with her. Kuina did not, because she had been planning to take Nichika’s food while we argued.
Kanata looked at me across the table.
She watched me longer than usual.
“What?” I asked.
“You are quiet.”
“I have been talking.”
“You are talking carefully.”
Mother glanced toward us.
For one uncomfortable moment, I wondered whether Foresight had somehow passed to Kanata.
Then Father asked Hinaki about her lessons, and the conversation moved on.
I laughed with them.
I listened to Kuina complain about arithmetic.
Home would freeze while I was gone. No one would experience my absence. From their perspective, I might vanish and return in the same breath.
I would remember every day between.
That thought followed me long after the estate became quiet.
I visited Father and Mother’s room first.
They were asleep beside one another. The curse had spread farther across Father’s face over the past three years. His breathing remained soft and even.
I bowed from the doorway.
Then I went to my sisters.
Hinaki had pushed her blanket away. Nichika had somehow taken Kuina’s pillow. Kanata slept facing the entrance.
I covered Hinaki, recovered half of Kuina’s pillow, and stood there longer than necessary.
The old version of me might have left without looking.
He would have called it discipline.
Now I allowed myself to feel afraid.
I was leaving the safest place I had ever known.
I was also carrying everything it had given me.
I returned to my room and changed into plain travel clothing. My black Nichirin blade rested at my waist in its sheath. Every visible bag was nearly empty. The real supplies waited inside my Inventory.
The weekly cooldown ended.
Foresight: Weekly Glimpse Available
I did not use it.
I closed my eyes.
“World Travel.”
The response appeared immediately.
World Travel Initiated
Initial Destination Selection: Random
Home World Anchor Confirmed
Home World State: Frozen
Emergency Recall: Available
Beginning Travel
There was no light.
No tunnel.
One instant, my room surrounded me.
The next, cold night air struck my face.
My sandals rested on a dirt path beneath a sky filled with unfamiliar stars. Trees crowded both sides of the road, their shapes black against the moonlight.
A house stood ahead of me.
Warm light escaped through the edges of its shuttered windows. Smoke rose from a narrow chimney. The roof was steep, built for weather harsher than the spring night around me.
Somewhere inside, wood creaked.
Then came the sound of footsteps.
I placed one hand near my sword.
The door began to open.
Author note:
Here we go! Try and guess the first world ;)
I have chosen this world as the first due to it's ease of access, foundational strength, and lasting impact on Haruya journey. Hint: it's magic, with strict rules, and no mana.