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When the barrier—woven from torii gates, shimenawa ropes, paper talismans, and Nichirin blades—blazed with golden light in the darkness, every suspended talisman in the air burned to ash in perfect unison.
"What have you done!!"
Muzan stood at the threshold of the main hall, glaring at the countless Nichirin blades dangling from the shimenawa outside, gleaming like accusations.
"This is the barrier I prepared in advance."
Kaito's body drifted lightly into the courtyard, smiling at Muzan.
At the same moment, several whooshing sounds cut the air. Swordsmen flashed in from every direction and took positions behind him.
"Hey! Where is Lord Ubuyashiki?!" Sanemi seized Kaito's arm.
"No need to worry. Lord Ubuyashiki has been placed in absolute safety by my arrangements."
Kaito's arm suddenly thinned like paper and slipped from Sanemi's grip.
He leisurely straightened his sleeve, then lifted his eyes to Muzan.
"It would be best for everyone to focus on the enemy before us."
"Tch."
The hot-tempered Sanemi did not press further. He drew his Nichirin blade and leveled it at Muzan.
"So this is Muzan!" His voice trembled with barely contained excitement. "I'm going to hack this bastard trash into pieces right now!"
Shing!
A chorus of blades rang out as the other swordsmen unsheathed their Nichirin swords.
"Demon Slayer Corps!"
Muzan stepped out of the hall onto the veranda, looking down at them with imperial disdain.
"So this is your trap for me! With you pathetic insects!" He vanished and reappeared directly in front of Kaito, eyes locking.
"Endless petty tricks!"
His hands tore Kaito's body into shreds.
"Do you know who I am!!" The figure on the veranda dissolved into afterimage.
"Such speed."
The shredded flesh turned to paper scraps and fluttered down.
"Unfortunately, you still haven't found me." Kaito's voice echoed from all directions. "I told you—the blue spider lily is in my hands. Come take it if you want it, Muzan."
"No one toys with me like this!!"
His arms morphed into thorned whip-vines, lashing forward and backward at speeds beyond sight.
The building behind him was sliced neatly into sections and collapsed in a roar.
At the same instant, a black Nichirin blade flashed in front of the forward whip before anyone else could react.
Clang!
Blade met whip; the whip recoiled, and its wielder—Kamado Tanjuro—slid backward from the impact.
"You!!" Muzan's eyes widened at the man who had leaped ahead of the others.
"Those earrings… Who are you!! Three hundred years ago, Kokushibo and I eradicated every last person connected to Sun Breathing!!"
"Kamado Tanjuro."
Kamado Tanjuro gripped his Nichirin blade with both hands, his expression as gentle as ever, his gaze calm as still water.
"I apologize. Though I was fortunate enough to inherit Sun Breathing from Tsugikuni Yoriichi, my family has only ever been ordinary charcoal sellers in the mountains, generation after generation."
'Ordinary my ass!' The Hashira behind him wore complicated expressions.
Muzan's attack had been too fast. Only Tanjuro and Gyomei had reacted in time.
The others had sensed it, but their bodies lagged half a beat behind those two.
And Tanjuro had been a fraction faster and more precise than even Gyomei.
Had he not stepped in, someone would have been wounded the instant they faced Muzan.
Everyone reached the same conclusion and felt the yawning chasm between their strength and the Demon King's.
Even after the intensive training before the battle, even with their Marks awakened, even with Gyomei having grasped the Transparent World under Tanjuro's guidance—the gap remained starkly perceptible.
It was a despair-inducing difference.
Yet no one retreated.
Every swordsman held their breathing steady, without the slightest disruption.
"So you were hiding in the mountains?"
Muzan's face darkened to pitch.
"Tsugikuni Yoriichi—that man always found another path! Did he truly expect a weakling like you, a hidden inheritor, to defeat me?!"
"No."
Tanjuro's aura remained as mild as foliage.
"Lately, in dreams, I have seen ancestral memories from my bloodline. The breathing method was passed down without permission by my ancestor, Yoriichi's friend, after witnessing his demonstration.
Yoriichi himself never intended this, because he once said…"
In Muzan's eyes, Tanjuro's silhouette gradually overlapped with the memory of Yoriichi.
"Those who exhaust the Path will arrive at the same destination. Though eras change and roads diverge, we will all reach the same place in the end."
"I believe Yoriichi…" Tanjuro lunged, blade flashing. "…believed in the transmission of human conviction and in the strength of every succeeding generation of the Demon Slayer Corps!"
A crimson arc slashed toward the thorned whip of Muzan's arm.
"Sun Breathing – Third Form – Raging Sun!"
At the same moment, the Hashira moved.
"Rock Breathing – Second Form: Upper Smashr!"
Gyomei swung his chained flail; the massive spiked ball fell like a meteor toward Muzan's skull.
He called out, "Everyone, be careful—this man has five brains and seven hearts!"
"Wind Breathing – Fifth Form: Cold Mountain Wind!"
"Flame Breathing – Fourth Form: Blooming Flame Undulation!"
Wind Hashira Sanemi and Flame Hashira Rengoku struck together. Emerald wind spirals slashed downward while crimson flame vortices spiraled upward, intertwining into a colossal wind-fire helix that engulfed Muzan.
"Water Breathing – First Form: Water Surface Slash!"
"Sound Breathing – First Form – Roar!"
Giyu and Tengen unleashed the fastest forms of their styles.
"Serpent Breathing – Fifth Form: Slithering Serpent!"
Obanai flowed with his blade; white blade-light snaked through gaps in the onslaught, forming a massive serpent that coiled and struck at Muzan's nape.