After the meal.
Takagi Saya completely ignored the gazes of the others, hugging one of Su Yan's arms and pressing herself tightly against him.
Using a soft, sweet tone, she asked, "Brother, what did you see behind that strange door this time? Can you tell us?"
However, the other women didn't find Takagi Saya's behavior strange at all; it seemed they were already used to it.
That was just how tsunderes were.
Once she completely let go of her pride, only her sweet side remained.
She would turn into an absolute sweetheart.
Of course, transforming into her current state had been a gradual process.
From initially being too proud to join in.
To later feeling uncomfortable watching the others act affectionately toward Su Yan.
And finally, to being unable to hold back anymore and forcing herself to act spoiled with him.
Now, Takagi Saya could even ignore everyone else's stares, cuddling with Su Yan as if no one else was in the room.
As for Su Yan's other side, Marikawa Shizuka was lounging lazily.
She had claimed the best spot beside him early on, lying languidly on the sofa with the back of her head resting on his thigh.
She grabbed Su Yan's hands and placed them on her head, her eyes half-closed, seemingly uninterested in their conversation.
Su Yan understood Marikawa Shizuka's silent request. His fingers began to move, gently massaging her scalp.
This caused the beautiful, blonde airhead to occasionally let out soft hums that could easily spark one's imagination.
Hearing Takagi Saya's question by his ear, Su Yan kept his hands moving steadily while looking up to sweep his gaze across the women's faces.
He noticed that, aside from Marikawa Shizuka resting on his lap, everyone else seemed quite interested in the question.
So, Su Yan cleared his throat and said, "You guessed right. Behind that door is indeed a new world—a world without zombies."
As his words fell, expressions of amazement appeared on the women's faces.
Even though they had harbored suspicions about the existence of other worlds ever since being teleported into this pocket dimension called Greed Island.
Hearing Su Yan's confirmation still made it impossible to suppress their astonishment.
"Then, could you tell us about it, Su Yan?"
Busujima Saeko was the first to recover, asking curiously, "What kind of world is it? Is it a so-called parallel universe? Could there be another version of us living there?"
"Stepping through that door, you'll find an island nation set in the Taisho era."
Su Yan shook his head and slowly explained, "Although it's an island nation, it's not the one we know. Even though, on the surface, the history of human society's development seems no different from what we are familiar with."
"Only on the surface?"
Takagi Yuriko sharply caught the implication in Su Yan's words.
"Exactly."
Su Yan nodded and continued, "This world is equally unsafe, even though it lacks those mindless zombies that act purely on instinct."
"On the surface, everything seems perfectly normal, but in the shadows, there are two opposing factions that have been entangled in conflict for over a thousand years."
"One side is the demon faction, led by the Demon King, Muzan Kibutsuji, who has lived for over a millennium."
"Lived for over a millennium?"
Hearing this, the women couldn't help but gape in shock.
Even the lazy, blonde airhead resting on Su Yan's thigh couldn't help but shudder, opening her half-closed eyes.
"Yes, over a millennium."
Su Yan wasn't surprised by their reaction and provided the answer, "However, while these creatures known as demons can live for at least a thousand years, they have two fatal flaws: they die if exposed to sunlight, and they must feed on human flesh."
Although Su Yan also envied a lifespan that could easily span hundreds or thousands of years.
If given a choice, he would absolutely never want to become such a lifeform.
The inability to endure sunlight was manageable, as there were things like the Blue Spider Lily that could overcome it.
But eating human flesh was a hard line he wouldn't cross.
Even if he could forcefully suppress the appetite like the anime heroine Nezuko.
Su Yan still couldn't stomach the idea of harboring a desire to eat people.
Therefore, his primary goal in acquiring Muzan's demon blood was for experimentation.
Whether it was creating demons to harvest interesting Blood Demon Arts, or using it to improve his Transmutation Nen ability, Undead Overture.
Only as an absolute last resort would he choose to use demon blood to extend his and the women's lifespans.
Thus, this option was kept strictly as the final backup plan.
Su Yan paused before continuing his explanation, "For a thousand years, the Demon King Muzan has been searching for a plant called the Blue Spider Lily to rid himself of his weakness to sunlight. To achieve this, he has continuously used his blood to transform humans into man-eating demons."
"In the process, the humans harmed by these demons slowly gathered together, forming a faction dedicated to exacting revenge on them—the Demon Slayer Corps."
"These two factions have been locked in conflict for a millennium."
"This is the dark side of that world."
Having finished, Su Yan quietly looked at the women.
He waited for them to digest the information he had just shared.
Only then did Su Yan turn to a thoughtful Minami Rika and ask, "Rika, have you ever considered going back to your old profession?"
"My old profession?"
Minami Rika blinked her purple eyes and said with keen interest, "Let's hear it."
"Hidden away in some deep mountain forest in this new world is a family with the surname Kamado. For generations, they have passed down the Sun Breathing technique, created over four hundred years ago during the Sengoku period by the strongest swordsman who nearly killed the Demon King Muzan."
Su Yan said, "I'm quite interested in this. Could I trouble you to help me find them, Rika?"
As the most powerful swordsmanship in Demon Slayer, Su Yan held a certain level of interest in Sun Breathing.
After all, he had previously heard about the lore behind the breathing techniques, which stated that the elemental effects produced during their execution were actually just visual effects.
In other words, it might be a relatively pure swordsmanship technique.
However, the anime's protagonist, Tanjiro, was somehow able to slice a massive boulder taller than himself in half with a sword after learning Water Breathing.
This was undoubtedly an incredible feat for an ordinary person.
Of course, the more important factor was the Demon King, Muzan Kibutsuji. If Su Yan remembered correctly...
The tragedy of the Kamado family was personally orchestrated by Muzan, and Nezuko was also turned into a demon by him.
This meant that as long as he found the Kamado family ahead of time and lay in wait, he could track down Muzan in the shortest amount of time.
"Tell me everything you know. You can't expect me to run around blind trying to find a needle in a haystack, right?"
Minami Rika shook her head, looking at him with an expression that said she really couldn't do anything about him.
Seeing that Minami Rika had agreed, Su Yan decisively shared all the information he knew about the Kamado family with her.
He then turned to look at Busujima Saeko. "Under the Demon King Muzan, there is a swordsman who has lived for over four hundred years. He is the older brother of that strongest swordsman from the Sengoku period who nearly killed Muzan."
"I imagine you'd be interested in an opponent like that, Saeko?"
"Oh?"
Busujima Saeko paused in surprise.
Soon after, a fiery fighting spirit erupted in her eyes.
A swordsman who had honed his skills for over four hundred years?
He would surely make for a perfect test for her blade, wouldn't he?
With a burning gaze, Busujima Saeko said, "Please, you must let me fight him."
"Naturally."
Su Yan replied as if it were a given.
Aside from Minami Rika and Busujima Saeko, he hadn't made any arrangements for the others, so he had finished explaining everything that needed to be done.
Next up was the highly anticipated activity segment.
So the question was, which female hero would step up to challenge the Great Demon Lord Su Yan tonight?
Or perhaps?
All of them?
[Reviews - Power St0nes - Comments are highly appreciated to keep me going.....(+50 chapters) patre0n.c0m/talecrafter]