"You're here, Tanjiro. No need to change shoes, come on in."
At the apartment entrance, Kanae—who had been waiting for some time—opened the door and smiled at the three boys standing properly outside.
"Yes! Sorry for the intrusion!"
It was the first time in their lives they had entered a girl's home. The three of them immediately bowed deeply, then straightened their backs and marched in with formal steps.
Looking back at this scene, even Kanae couldn't help but laugh.
"No need to be so exaggerated. Just find somewhere to sit... By the way, have you had lunch?"
"Yes! We ate on the way here!"
Pulling Zenitsu and Genya to sit on the living room sofa, Tanjiro's nose suddenly twitched.
"Hashira Kocho, is there someone else in your home?"
In this apartment, he had detected three completely different scents.
"Yes, my two younger sisters also live here, but they're both out at the moment, so don't worry...
Also, there's no need to call me Hashira. If you don't mind, just call me by my name."
"Understood, Kanae-senpai..."
Bringing over three cups of tea, Kanae looked at the still somewhat restrained trio before her and asked with a smile:
"How did the mission at Mount Natagumo feel? Did it go smoothly?"
"It felt quite easy."
Accepting the teacup, Tanjiro replied seriously.
"Although that demon called Rui was also one of the Twelve Kizuki, I feel like his strength wasn't really that high. I defeated him in just a few slashes..."
"It's not that he was too weak, but that you're now far stronger than him, Tanjiro."
As she spoke, Kanae's gaze fell upon the mark on Tanjiro's left forehead, and she murmured:
"The power of the Demon Slayer Mark truly is incredible. To think that a swordsman who only recently passed the Final Selection could possess the power to defeat a Lower Rank demon..."
Hearing this, Tanjiro fell into silence.
Indeed, as the only Demon Slayer currently awakened to the Mark, he was the only one who could truly understand this amplification from personal experience.
This wasn't merely a simple strengthening of power. For a Demon Slayer, the Mark's amplification was comprehensive!
Muscle strength, blood flow velocity, heart rate, breathing frequency...
After awakening the Mark, all of these aspects of him far exceeded his former self!
One could even say that the current Tanjiro with the awakened Mark could completely dominate the version of himself who had gone to participate in the Final Selection not long ago!
However... however...
This immense power—he had actually needed guidance from a demon to unlock it?
This fact made Tanjiro feel especially distressed.
He hadn't forgotten the scenes that had unfolded on Mount Fujikasane.
As a Demon Slayer, he actually needed to rely on a demon's charity to enhance his own strength.
It was as if two samurai were about to engage in a life-or-death duel, when one of them suddenly said to the other—
"Your equipment is too poor. Let me give you a better set."
And then, she truly took out a better set of equipment and gave it to her enemy.
She even encouraged her enemy to adapt well to it, and once fully prepared, to come wearing that equipment to duel with her...
On Mount Fujikasane, that Upper Rank One's pity that seemed like charity, and that Blood Demon Art ability she displayed at the end—comparable to divine power—had both dealt considerable blows to Tanjiro's psyche.
That demon could actually make the dead come back to life... How could such a thing be possible...
During the time since leaving Mount Fujikasane, Tanjiro would often find himself back at that mountaintop in his dreams at midnight.
He would dream that under the coercion of that Upper Rank One who treated human lives as child's play, he accompanied her in playing that bloody killing game again and again.
And again and again, he would lose the lives of all his relatives and friends to her.
Again and again, he could only watch helplessly as she killed the important people around him one by one before his eyes...
Every time he woke from such dreams, Tanjiro's heart would be filled with a strong sense of unreality.
Did he really survive that night in the hands of that terrifying Upper Rank One?
Was Zenitsu beside him really still alive?
Was everything he was experiencing now truly not a dying hallucination?
Was the being they were supposed to exterminate really a demon, and not some deity incarnate in the mortal world?
All these questions in his mind clung to him like a nightmare, entangling him relentlessly.
And Tanjiro understood this quite clearly. He knew that all the fear in his heart stemmed from one point—
His fear of that Upper Rank One.
Yes, he was afraid of her. Her strength made his heart tremble with terror, and her Blood Demon Art made him feel deep despair.
In his subconscious, he completely didn't believe he had any possibility of defeating this demon.
Therefore, even just thinking of her in his mind would make his body tremble uncontrollably.
"Tanjiro, what are you thinking about?"
Before him, Kanae's gentle voice pulled Tanjiro's wandering consciousness back.
"Sorry, Kanae-senpai. I was just thinking about what happened on Mount Fujikasane again..."
Tanjiro, who couldn't lie, poured out everything in his heart.
As soon as his words fell, he saw Zenitsu beside him suddenly change expression, subconsciously raising his hand to touch his own neck, while Genya's face darkened as he touched his abdomen.
Clearly, these three before her had all suffered severe psychological trauma inflicted by a certain demon.
"Right! Kanae-senpai! I want to know why you believe Upper Rank One is hiding in Tokyo?"
Shaking his head forcefully to dispel the fear within, as if to drive away the increasingly heavy atmosphere between them, Tanjiro quickly changed the subject.
Regarding this point, he had actually been curious for a long time.
When their special investigation team targeting Upper Rank One was formed, Kanae had notified them to come to Tokyo as soon as possible to assemble. Their primary investigation location was Tokyo.
"Intuition."
Facing Tanjiro's confusion, Kanae smiled and gave her answer.
"Over the past half-century, the Twelve Kizuki have consistently shown a trend of gathering in cities.
Apart from that Lower Rank Five you killed this time, the more powerful the demon, the more they hide in large cities with dense populations.
Following this direction of speculation, as the leader of the Twelve Kizuki, that Upper Rank One is either hiding in Osaka in the Kansai region or in Tokyo in the Kanto region.
Therefore, to investigate her whereabouts, starting the investigation from one of these two cities is also the most reasonable."
Of course, Kanae wouldn't say that this was because she had already come into contact with Miss Mitsuba in Tokyo, so she knew Mitsuba was in Tokyo.
Similarly, because this fact had already been recorded by causality and known by the gods.
Therefore, as a "Demon Slayer," she had no way to guide Tanjiro and the others to the wrong place no matter what.
She had to bring them to Tokyo.
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This story has ended in chapter 315, you can read on patreon.com/dzeref887 for faster access or wait until August to read on WebNovel until the story ends.