With the mission announcement, the atmosphere in the room turned heavy in an instant, and Marcus's expression transformed completely.
Knitting his brow harshly and with a terribly deep gaze, he stared fixedly at the crow.
"Rengoku… how many days ago did he leave? Tell me exactly which station he's at."
The crow shrunk back a little under that gaze.
"Caaw!… He left two days ago… By now he should already have reached Akamine station—"
Swish!
He had barely finished speaking when a gust of wind swept through the place.
Zenitsu covered his face from the draft.
When he uncovered himself, Marcus was already gone. And, along with him, the two swords that rested on the weapons stand in the room had also disappeared.
While they were trying to process what had just happened, a powerful shout came from the direction of the gate.
"Carry on with what you were doing! I have to step out for a moment!"
And then, another gust of wind hit the place.
The flowers and plants in the garden bent chaotically, shaken by an invisible force. When the air finally settled, there wasn't a trace of Marcus left.
On the ground, on the courtyard tiles, all that remained were two deep cracks: the marks of footsteps that had erupted with superhuman force.
"…"
"…"
"…"
Zenitsu was left staring at the empty spot on the couch with his eyes wide open.
"He… he left?"
Tanjiro stood still, completely thrown off.
"What could have happened?"
Kanao slowly shook her head, with a trace of doubt and unease in her gaze.
Pearl, who still had her hand stretched out as if she were going to clean an ear that was no longer there, commented with an expression of pure bewilderment: "…He's still wearing his pajamas…"
The bewilderment was total.
Silence took hold of the room as they tried to process Marcus's sudden disappearance.
However, the peace didn't last long.
Suddenly, a figure appeared running from the outer gatehouse, dashing into the mansion at full speed.
"FREEDOOOOM!!!"
On the outskirts of Asakusa.
A pink streak shot across the sky at dizzying speed.
To the human eye, its passing was an imperceptible phenomenon, barely a hiss in the wind. However, to Marcus, this pace was still frustratingly slow.
He gritted his teeth as his mind worked at a thousand revolutions. A month earlier, he had made a special trip to the Headquarters with a single purpose. He had given precise instructions to both Kanao and Tanjiro: if a mission involving a Hashira came up, they had to let him know immediately.
His intention was to calculate the timing down to the millimeter and arrive at the station before the Mugen Train departed.
He thought it was foolproof.
And what was the result?
Kanao had come along with Shinobu to his house.
Tanjiro's injuries had healed sooner than expected and he was already chaining missions one after another instead of recovering at the Butterfly Mansion.
With the two of them off the map, WHO THE FUCK WAS GOING TO LET HIM KNOW?!
Luckily, Tanjiro's crow had shown up, but Rengoku had a two-day head start.
TWO DAYS!
What could happen in that amount of time?
He knew the Mugen Train hadn't left the station yet. However, before boarding the convoy, Rengoku had to spend a day and a half dealing with a minor demon as a warm-up.
And that minor demon was precisely his target!
Three months ago, the night he ambushed Tamayo, his analysis rate on her had reached 100%.
As for how exactly he had done it… it was pretty obvious. He had made her forget Muzan for the entire night.
And he already had the reward that came with it: an opportunity to devour a Blood Demon Art.
However, during these three months he hadn't come across an ability that he found ideal, so he had decided to keep the prize on hold.
Going back over the plot of Kimetsu no Yaiba in his head, he knew that, as the story progressed, the generic demons would disappear to give way to the Twelve Kizuki, and the best abilities were in their hands, but, unfortunately, he couldn't strip their techniques from them.
However, right at this moment, there was an ability in a minor demon that he found extremely attractive.
The "Slasher" Demon and his Speed Enhancement technique.
An ability that, at first glance, didn't seem like much, but that was enough for a common demon to be able to match a Hashira in terms of speed and even slightly surpass one.
At the beginning of the Mugen Train arc, Rengoku was hunting precisely this demon.
If it hadn't been for the cocky bastard who, while running away, insisted on killing two more people, the truth was he doubted Rengoku would have managed to catch him.
That ability was something comparable to A-Train's; though it wasn't as sophisticated or versatile as his arrows, its advantage lay in being simple, direct, and practical.
In short, it was summed up in a single word: fast!
Fast to the extreme!
To top it off, the vast majority of his moves, except for the First Form, required above all agility and speed.
[Fox Walk] and [Flower Crossing] were obvious moves: they relied exclusively on speed.
In the same way, [Thread Field] unfolded more effectively the faster the user was, while the [Crimson Curtain] achieved its defensive capability through cuts executed at the speed of lightning.
His entire arsenal needed his personal speed as its main engine.
For that reason, even though the "Slasher" demon's ability wasn't aesthetically flashy, its compatibility with his combat style was absolute.
It was the missing piece to make him take off!
An ability that allowed a common demon to surpass the speed of a Hashira… If he applied it to his own body, how fast could he be?
Teleportation?
At what level of power would his Forms turn out to be after the change?
He already had a thousand ideas on how to exploit that power, but the lack of informants had left him in a critical situation. And to make things worse, the station was at the southern end of the country.
It was light-years away from Asakusa!
Marcus prayed as he devoured the miles:
Slasher, you have to hold out until I get there! DON'T YOU DARE DIE BEFORE I CAN DEVOUR YOU!!
….
Far south, railway maintenance station.
Night was falling with a suffocating weight.
Rengoku stood at the entrance to the facility. His golden hair, vibrant and wild, resembled a torch lit in the middle of the gloom. He kept his eyes fixed on the darkness that swallowed the end of the tracks, never losing that impassive smile that was so characteristic of him.
"You're pretty fast!"
In the depths of the tracks, a figure was fleeing with frantic desperation.
It was a bald demon, with bluish, dark skin, dressed in minimal, tight-fitting clothing that aided his aerodynamics. The most unsettling thing was his body, covered by a network of dark blue tattoos that glowed with an electric shine.
His speed was extreme.
He moved like a bolt of lightning, devouring hundreds of meters in barely the blink of an eye. However, his face was a mask of pure dread.
"Damn it! Damn it, damn it, damn it!"
He had lived for more than a decade and had taken out somewhere around thirty or fifty humans, and the strongest opponents he had ever come across were a handful of arrogant members of the Demon Slayer Corps.
So he had always been very sure of himself.
Until now.
The moment that radiant man showed up at the station, hauling a mountain of bento boxes, he knew it.
It was enough to witness a single cut. A SINGLE MOVE! To understand that he didn't have the slightest chance at victory.
"Damn it! Why did someone like that have to set his sights on me?!"
He ran with everything he had, making the railway ties rattle under his feet with sharp, violent thuds.
But head-on confrontation had never been his thing. His thing was speed, a swiftness no one could match.
"You think you can ruin my plans?" Slasher gritted his teeth, consumed by resentment. "When I murder the person who matters most to you, we'll see if you still feel like smiling!"
In that instant, he took the opportunity to glance back.
He discovered that that man had transformed into a living trail of fire, chasing him relentlessly at a terrifying speed.
"Hmph!"
He scoffed in disdain. The blue glow of his tattoos intensified, vibrating with energy, and his speed picked up a little more.
"Your swiftness is admirable! But I'm a demon and you're only a human!"
Rengoku watched as the figure pulled farther and farther away, but far from being discouraged, his eyes shone with renewed enthusiasm.
"Truly impressive!"
"If you were given enough time to grow, I have no doubt you could turn into a Lower Moon!"
Right after, he inhaled a deep breath of air, filling his lungs with strength.
"BUT!" His feet struck the ground with seismic force. "I WILL NOT ALLOW THAT TIME TO COME!"
One red, the other blue.
The hunter and the prey.
The two figures transformed into beams of light that sliced through the gloom over the rails. Relentlessly, they gave themselves over to a frantic chase that would stretch on throughout the entire night.
__________
Throw your stones, drop them ALL! 💎
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