Chapter 20

(Seikichi's POV)

I ran forward towards the demon hoping to set the flow of this fight. I slashed horizontally towards the demon's neck, but he ducked and my blade barely glazed his hair.

In his crouched position he dashed forward I saw him curl his right hand into a fist before launching it towards my ribs.

Seeing this, I jumped back slightly so he missed his punch, but he flipped forward causing me to move back even more.

He dashed towards me going for a right hook to my face, but I used the side of my sword and redirected it away from me.

I noticed his left fist preparing to be shot forward and prepared to block that as well, but I noticed too late that it was a feint.

He grabbed me by my collar and lifted me off the ground before smashing his right fist into my face. My body slammed into the ground and I felt the air stalling in my chest.

My grip on my Katana was gone and I felt ringing in my ears along with immense pain in my head.

'One attack…'

As I was on my back I noticed the demon preparing to stomp on my chest and so I grit my teeth and rolled to the left.

I tried to get up but before I could I felt a pain in my chest followed by my body flying through the forest.

*BOOM*

I slammed into a boulder and coughed up whatever air I had left in my lungs. My breathing was completely messed up, I couldn't even use my Sound Breathing to ease the pain.

I saw a shadow falling towards me and tried to move, but even the slightest movement made the pain in my chest increase.

'Damn it, is my sternum fractured?' I asked myself.

The demon landed in front of me as I tried to get up, pushing through the pain and using the boulder to lean on.

'I need some time.'

"D-damn it. What kind of demon are you? You damn monster." I asked the demon.

"Oh, I never mentioned it. I'm one of the Twelve Kizuki, Lower Moon, Rank 1." The demon answered.

I started to get some air back flowing through my lungs as I held my chest. I felt the pain going away in my back as well.

"So I'm fighting one of you guys. Then if I die I guess that'll be a good story." I said.

"How so? You'll die knowing you didn't even put up a fight and to a lower moon. Plus you look pretty young, how old are you?" The demon asked.

Slowly I was able to start back using my Sound Breathing and I was back in good health. Although I had no sword at the moment, I'll have to rely on my shinobi training.

"Does it matter?" I asked.

I whipped out my right leg at his chin and seeing the surprise on his face was extremely satisfying. I grinned as I started to get into my rhythm.

I clenched my left hand into a fist and with all my strength, I smashed it into his stomach. He curled over and slid back a bit, but I wasn't done.

I nailed him in the jaw with a right hook and prepared a left to finish the combo, but failed as he grabbed my wrist and pulled me off the ground.

'Fucking tall people.' I cursed.

He nailed his left hand into my stomach. The pain sent a shiver throughout my body, but he wasn't done. He swung my body over his head and smashed my body into the ground again.

This time I was more or less prepared. I flexed my back muscles to reduce the damage and grit my teeth while maintaining my breathing.

He went to do it again, but I dug into my haori and pulled out a tanto before slitting his wrist. His grip on me was released and I twisted my body midair and threw out multiple kunai as I landed on the ground.

I saw the cut on his hand heal instantly as he turned to look at me.

"You're very abnormal, you know that. Healing so fast mid battle and not using your sword even though you're a swordsman. What's your name kid?" The demon asked.

"You think I'm telling fodder like you my name. You're not even one of the real Kizuki." I said.

"What makes you say that?"

"There isn't a kanji on your eye for your rank. That's how I know you're a liar." I answered.

"Oh, hold up." The demon said. I watched as both if it's eyes rotated in his head.

On the right, there was the kanji for lower moon and on the left, there was the kanji for one.

'How disgusting.'

His eyes reverted back to normal and he looked at me as if nothing happened.

"Now that I've answered one of your questions, answer mine. How about becoming a demon."

"…what?"

'Did this bastard really…?'

"I said, how about becoming a demon. You're quite strong and from the looks of it, you seem pretty young. Why not become a demon and-?"

"Shut up. Why would I ever want to become something as disgusting as you?" I asked.

I decided to stop trying to get information from this one and went all out.

I charged at him with my tanto in a reverse grip. I slashed at his face to blind him, but he moved his head back slightly before kicking me in the stomach.

I flexed my abs to reduce damage, but was pushed back. The demon then appeared in front of me and went for a right hook, but I ducked and stabbed him in the waist with the tanto before pulling it out and circling behind him.

I then stabbed it into his spinal cord and grabbed him around the waist before leaning back and picking him up with all my strength.

Before I could slam him i to the ground I felt a hand wrap around my right ankle and it pulled my feet. Making me loose balance and fall on my back onto the ground.

The demon jumped up and yanked the tanto from his spine before tossing it away. I got up just as fast, but again I felt felt something pulling on me and this time it was on the back of my haori.

As I was sent rolling on the ground I did a backflip and stood up on my feet. Then I noticed a shadow getting bigger and jumped to the side with a roll away from the demon that landed at my previous position.

Before it could stand up again I flash stepped towards it and kicked the demon in the face, but it blocked with its forearm and grabbed my leg before throwing me again.

I rolled a bit before recovering, but just as I pushed myself up, the air in my lungs escaped my mouth as pain settled in all over my body.

I slammed into a tree and immediately tried to get back up. I knew the only reason I was still able to move was because of my RC cells were healing me.

Still though, I didn't have the same regeneration as a demon.

I wiped the blood from my mouth and I stood back up. Before I realized it, the demon was back in front if me. He grabbed me by the throat and pinned me against the tree.

I used his arm and pulled my legs up as I used all my strength and kicked him in the chest. One kick after the other, it didn't even seem to faze him. I felt his grip on my neck tighten as it became hard to breath.

"You see this situation you're in? If you became a demon you know how easily you could just turn your hand into a stake and shove it into somebody's heart?" He asked as he put his transformed hand at my heart.

"You're blind as well, do you know how fast you can heal your eyes? The new strength you get as a demon. Literally eternal life as long as you get stronger."

"Think about it, us demons are better than humans in everything. We're faster, stronger, depending on how much we eat or how old we are, we're smarter than you. Our brains or biology is better than yours."

At this point I couldn't even kick and I resorted to using Sound Breathing with as little air as possible.

"Wait a minute." The demon said as he reached for my blindfold and took it off.

"How interesting. You look just as young as Kyoshi." The demon said with a chuckle.

I felt my breathing hitch and my eyes widen while my heart start pumping like crazy.

"W-who…?"

….

—Koga Village—

(Third POV)

"So basically, you're a half-demon that's been allowed to stay in this village as long as you're useful and the must protect the chiefs daughter and fight for the village?"

"Yes."

"And they feed you prisoners or people who've been captured as spies from other shinobi villages?"

"Correct."

"So basically they have you under a servant contract and the chief will kill you at any moment if you're not useful to the village?"

"You make it sound like I'm being treated poorly. I still have wonderful food to eat, a magnificent place to sleep and all I gotta do is guard a village and the chiefs daughter. It's a deal I'm willing to make." Masako said.

"Well whatever. What'd you want to talk about here?" Kyoshi asked.

"Well mainly I wanted to talk about giving you the same offer as the chief gave me. You'll have a place to sleep, some food to eat and a steady flow of income. All you have to do is protect Lady Yui and teach them your-"

"Nope."

"Why?"

"Having a place to eat and sleep is all fine, but I already got money and I'm cool with traveling from place to place, I also don't want to teach other what I know."

"That's quite stingy of you." Masako

"I know, but I do have a few questions that might seay my decision depending on the answer."

"Then let's hear em."

"The Demon Slayer Corps. What're they about exactly?"

"Well it's just as the name implies. They're a big organization that's all about killing demons especially Muzan Kibutsuji."

"What'd he do?"

"Well, he's just pure evil. He's killed who knows how many people over the time he became a demon about a thousand years ago. He's the progenitor of demons all around the country." Masako answered.

"I see. So the DSC is about wiping away with evil huh?"

"Basically."

"Then I'm assuming they aren't in conjunction with this village?"

"It's actually the opposite. We're Supai branch of the DSC. We gather intel and deliver it to them. Like the whereabouts of other demons, weird situations in other places and more. We aren't the only shinobi village that works with them."

"Then that means they don't know that you yourself is a demon right?"

"They do."

"Eh, so they're working with demons to kill demons? Well actually I can see them doing that. Throughout history humans work with each other to kill other humans, so why wouldn't they put demons against each other?"

"…"

"Anyways, doesn't that mean they'll have to kill you later on as well?"

"Well actually, the insect Hashira says she's working on something that could turn demons back into humans. She says all the demons working together with the corps will be turned back into humans when it's done."

"So they're allowing you to keep eating and killing humans till they get some antidote done, but wants to kill other demons? How does that work? Isn't that just being hypocritical?"

"I guess it is, but think about it. They're just repaying kindness. If I help them, they help me revert back to being a human."

"If I remember correctly you told me you've been here for around 50 years. I can assume the only thing keeping you from aging regularly is your RC cells stopping your old cells from dying. If you get rid of them, you'll immediately age to 50 and die before you could even be happy you're a human again."

"I don't care, at least I'll die a human!!"

"What point is dying as a human before you even realize you're a human. It looks to me like you just want to die."

"You know what, I don't even care about recruiting you, get your sword and get the hell outta here. You're leaving tomorrow." She said.

"Gladly, I don't want to work with somebody as braindead as you." Kyoshi said as he got up and was following out of the chiefs house.

…

(Kyoshi POV)

After leaving that meeting I came back to the inn and went upstairs to my room. I got out my journal and prepared to send the message.

Everything was going just as I planned and I got a good amount of information from that Masako girl. Apparently this village works with the DSC and is in charge of intel.

I may or may not have ended on a bad note with this village's military leader, but meh. Who need them?

To make this quick I'll summarize what I learned.

1. This village is a Shinobi Village that's been here for more than 50 years.

2. Like I said already, it's a intel village that sends info to the DSC.

3. The military leader, Masako is a half demon.

4. The DSC allows her to work with them as ling as she doesn't betray them and is useful.

5. Lastly, apparently the Insect Hashira is preparing some type of antidote to turn demons into humans, but I suspect there'll be more to it.

After I finished writing that, I attached it to the notes I took about Tanjiro and that demon Named Nezuko. It was about a 5 page packet which I rolled up and put into a plastic bag.

I went over to the window and whistled out.

After a few minutes a falcon came diving down before stopping in front of my window and landing on the seal.

"How you been Blitz?" I asked it as I rubbed its head. It nestled it's head into my hands and shook it's feathers.

"Good, I need you to send this to uncle Muzan ok? Make sure to keep it in good condition." I said.

It flew off my window seal and grabbed the bag with its talons before flying off at incredible speeds. Blitz was a falcon I took a liking to about a year ago and demonized it by giving it some of my flesh when it was hungry.

Anyways, my objective was complete and tomorrow I planned on leaving this damn village.

*sniff sniff*

"Seems like the storm might be letting up over there."

I then hopped in my bed and decided to take a nap and just wake up whenever.

*******************************************

Sadly I was like 200 words off from where I wanted to end this chapter, but meh.

I think I've decided on what I'll do for Kyoshi and his Kagune.