Chapter 43: Kochou, the Naming-Impaired
After leaving the squalid town behind, Akira took Kanao to a more reputable one nearby. His first order of business was to pay a kind woman at an inn to give the little girl a thorough, gentle bath. Afterward, he bought her several sets of new, well-fitting clothes. Seeing her dressed in a simple but clean kimono, no longer drowning in rags, he nodded in quiet satisfaction.
Next, he treated her to a warm, nourishing meal at a small restaurant before finally making his way back to the Butterfly Mansion.
The Kochou family and Makomo—who had just had her final bandages removed that very day—all turned as he entered. Their welcoming smiles froze, replaced by expressions of collective shock as they laid eyes on the small child in his arms.
Her large, dark eyes, which should have been the picture of youthful innocence, were utterly lifeless. They stared out from a face so gaunt it was little more than skin stretched over bone.
"Akira-kun, she is…?" Kanae was the first to recover, her voice soft. She directed the question to Akira, but her gaze, filled with a deep and immediate ache, kept drifting back to the little girl.
Akira felt the tiny body in his arms tense as the group instinctively stepped closer. "Let's go inside first," he said, his voice low and soothing. "We can talk there. Kanao isn't quite used to being around so many people."
He looked past Kanae to her mother. "Aunt Hanako, I'll have to trouble you to examine her later. Her body is still very weak; she'll need a special medicinal diet to help her recover."
"Of course," the older woman replied without hesitation, her expression a mixture of concern and resolve.
Once they were settled inside, Akira gave them a brief but unsparing account of the conditions in which he had found Kanao. He also shared what little he had managed to learn about the couple who claimed to be her parents—a pair of creatures that only vaguely resembled human beings.
As he spoke, a evident and righteous indignation settled over the room.
"But, Akira, what happened to those… those scumbags afterward?" Makomo's voice was tight with worry. "You didn't kill them, did you? I'm not saying they didn't deserve it, but the Demon Slayer Corps has strict rules against killing ordinary humans." She watched him closely, afraid he might face punishment for dealing with such human trash.
"Them?" Akira's expression was placid. "Of course I didn't kill them. I didn't even draw my sword. They demanded money, you see. Said I had to pay if I wanted to take Kanao."
He paused, his face the very picture of solemnity. "Naturally, I obliged. After all, they did manage to keep her alive all these years. One could say they put in some hard work."
A heavy silence filled the room. Every pair of eyes fixed on him was screaming the same thing: We don't believe a single word you're saying.
They knew Akira's nature. He was many things, but a benevolent saint was not one of them. If he were, Makomo wouldn't have immediately jumped to the conclusion that he'd already sent the wretches to their graves.
As expected, his tone shifted, a subtle, chilling edge creeping into his voice.
"It was just a pity, really. When I handed over the money, the ground was rather slick from the winter frost. They seemed to lose their footing… both of them. A terrible accident. They 'slipped' and broke all four of their limbs. Their spines snapped, too. The pain must have been so great they fainted on the spot."
He let the image hang in the air. "In this bitter cold, I do worry they might catch a chill. But I was in such a hurry to get Kanao a hot bath and some clean clothes, so I just left the money beside them and went on my way."
He added, as if it were an afterthought, "Oh, and I thoughtfully locked the courtyard gate for them on my way out. Wouldn't want someone to sneak in and steal the money before they woke up."
A deep stillness followed his words. The others simply stared, their expressions unreadable. It was no longer a question of whether the couple would catch a cold. It was a certainty that they were already stone cold.
"I really didn't kill anyone," Akira insisted, turning to Ink Shadow, who was perched by the hearth to keep warm. He fixed his crow with a look of pure innocence. "Ink Shadow can testify, right?"
The crow, startled by the sudden attention, flinched and began nodding its head frantically.
"Ah, yes, yes, yes!" it squawked.
Ink Shadow had, in fact, been about to protest when it witnessed Akira's handiwork. But a single, sharp glare from its master—a look that clearly promised 'one more word and you're soup'—had been enough to silence it. It could only pretend it hadn't seen a thing.
Besides, Akira wasn't technically wrong. He hadn't killed anyone. He hadn't even unsheathed his Nichirin Sword. Firstly, it was debatable whether those two could even be classified as human. Secondly, they would have clearly frozen to death. How could that possibly be Akira's fault?
And most, Akira was faster than it could fly. He absolutely had the ability to catch it and turn it into a stew.
'Life is not easy,' Ink Shadow lamented internally. 'A crow can only sigh.'
"Speaking of which," Kanae said, gently steering the conversation away from such dark territory, "why did you name her Kanao, Akira-kun?"
She shot a subtle glance towards her younger sister. 'I should have sent Shinobu to help Mother with the examination. She's too young to be exposed to this kind of talk.'
"Because her eyes are quite similar to yours, Kanae," Akira replied, turning his head slightly to meet her gaze.
"Eh?" Kanae tilted her head, a flicker of confusion in her soft eyes.
"He's right!" Makomo exclaimed, looking from Kanae's gentle, pink-purple eyes to the little girl's large, dark ones. "They really are similar."
The others murmured in agreement. It was true. Kanae's eyes were a lighter, more pinkish hue, while Kanao's leaned toward a deeper, more solemn purple. But the underlying color was unmistakably the same. In their initial shock, they had all been so captivated by the emptiness in the child's gaze that they had missed the subtle resemblance.
"Be that as it may… that's a very you-style of reasoning, Akira…" Makomo and Kanae exchanged a look, both sighing with a hint of fond exasperation.
The two girls, both possessing thoughtful and delicate natures, had imagined some deeper meaning behind the name. Perhaps 'Kanao' was a play on words, a homophone for 'smiling face,' symbolizing a hope that the little girl would one day find her joy.
"So, have you thought of a surname for her?" Kanae asked, not dwelling on Akira's simplistic naming process and instead focusing on the more practical matter.
"I haven't," Akira admitted with a shrug. "That's why I came to ask for your opinions."
'That figures,' Makomo thought. 'This is the man who named his crow 'Coal Ball.' Coming up with 'Kanao' was probably a once-in-a-lifetime burst of inspiration.' She had been about to say it aloud, but then she remembered that her injuries had only just healed. She was about to begin her rehabilitation training under Akira's guidance, and provoking him now seemed like a spectacularly bad idea. The joke could wait.
"My idea is this," Akira said, noticing the odd flicker in Makomo's eyes but choosing not to press the issue. "Everyone thinks of a few surnames—no more than three each. Then, we'll let Kanao choose for herself. What do you think?"
The idea of letting Kanao have a personal say in her own identity was met with unanimous approval. They all gathered around the table, picking up brushes and paper to jot down their thoughts.
Makomo was the first to finish, offering three distinct options: 'Shiori,' 'Hanada,' and 'Kurihara'—one elegant, one natural, and one cute.
She then peered at the others' papers. After a long moment of deep contemplation, Kochou Sawaki, the family patriarch, had written down a single surname: 'Kochou.'
Next to him, Kanae had written 'Motomiya' and 'Kuze.' She had likely intended to write 'Kochou' as well, but seeing her father had already claimed it, she changed her third option to 'Tsuyuri.'
Beside them, Kochou Shinobu seemed to have perfectly inherited her father's talent for being naming-impaired. The three surnames she had written down were 'Suzume' (Sparrow), 'Kamasu' (Barracuda), and 'Tobiko' (Flying Fish Roe).
Makomo stared at the list. 'You,' she thought, aiming a mental jab at Shinobu, 'should sit at the same table as the guy who named his crow Coal Ball.'
Finally, her gaze fell upon the paper in front of Akira, who seemed to be lost in thought. Unsurprisingly, there was only one name written on it: 'Kanzaki.'
At that moment, a strange and subtle feeling washed over Akira.
If he remembered correctly, in the story he knew, 'Kanzaki' had indeed been one of the surnames offered to Kanao. However, the person who had proposed it was, at this point in time, most likely still practicing her Breathing Techniques under some distant Cultivator, or perhaps even still living in a wisteria-crested safe house.
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