9 Slaying Of The Eight Headed Serpent

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What Does It Take… To Move Forward?

The blade tore everything before it apart, deceptively flowing like water and crushing like a waterfall. The demon retreated over and over, hurling insults and vitriol as it tried to leave.

So she prayed. Even as she did her best to wrap her and her fathers wounds, she prayed. For him to be safe. For his health. For the old heartache that bled from his scent. For her sister. For her father. For her mother. She prayed…

..to the fire god.

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'He was so tired…'

The demon met him in the center of the clearing they'd gouged into the surrounding forest.

'Tired of not being good enough…'

He could not take a step backwards; the three he'd placed under his guard could not be allowed any closer to the battle or they would not survive.

'Of only being able to pick up the shattered shards of the lives ruined by this war…'

He would not allow anyone else to die because of his own incompetence.

'But most of all…'

This is what Sabito had asked of him; his very best and he would give it until his body gave out beneath him.

He was tired of being fake. Of shambling his way through life as a corpse. It was time to change that.'

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He raced forward to meet the living corpse, his blade flashing dozens of times in impunity, severing everything accept the neck as the from moved his body just far back enough to almost avoid it; only losing half of its neck before it could teleport itself in front of the small shelter its prey had hidden inside. In the next heartbeat, it was whole and reaching for the wide eyed human girl who sat frozen. Another beat and the demon slayer was between them once more, the situation repeating itself again and again to the praying young woman and the shivering mess of her father.

Again and again, the demon made to take the fight ever closer to the helpless family only to be rebuffed time and time again. The silent guardian refused to allow the abomination passage to consume her father and now changed sister.

Time seemed to pause with every beat of her heart, offering her a chance to see the man and demented artist battle only to pass and for them both to return to being blurs across the battlefield. She cradled her sister closer to their resting father, his strange breathing finally approaching its normal tempo.

She felt helpless. Every time the blade raced to save their lives. Every time the twisted freak of nature appeared before them with its demented laughter. The monster who had ruined their home and ended their lives with such glee was psychotic and focused on delivering death and torment unto her family.

Tears fell from her eyes as she continued to repeat the only prayer she knew, hoping some kami or another heard her desperate cries for salvation. Alas all she heard were more distorted curses and taunts from the monster who tore through her past and the warrior who fought for their future.

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His blade screamed as it sliced through claws, scales, tendons, and bones yet again. Another arm sacrificed in order to buy his enemy a fraction of a second, all the time it needed to appear beside the only pot left intact in the clearing. He let out a single breathe unclenching every muscle in his body until the demon made his reappearance, and drew in another as his heart picked up it's now steady rhythm, the echo traveled through his body alongside the excess of oxygen he'd forced through his bloodstream.

The family he'd decided to protect would not last any longer without his help, their wounds were too severe and the newborn demon wouldn't be capable of holding herself back from devouring her father and sister after they were both unconscious…

'… This ends now.'

He sprang forward, shattering the ground beneath him, not racing towards his opponent…

'Water is the element of change, Giyuu.', fath-... his sensei had said early on in his training with Sabito. 'Pour water into any container and it will take its shape, pour enough and eventually will shatter it.', he'd explained in his calm croaky voice seated with them both next to the waterfall he'd force both his students to meditate under. 'With enough time it can carve through all of nature; the earth, the trees, even steel will fail to halt its progress forever. It is the least taxing of the breathing styles simply because we are not using a blade and our bodies to become one with a force of nature. We simply allow it to guide our blades along the correct path to reach our chosen destination.'

"Water breathing…", Giyuu whispered softly, throwing himself into a series of complicated steps that resembled the third form yet more, and his blade twisted and turned as if he was performing all of the forms at once.

"Esoteric Art…", Dead Calm had been his first addition to the forms he'd presented to his sensei rather than a simple alteration… it had not been the last.

Winds converged around the aquatic demon as it raced after him, only to be met with insurmountable opposition as it was torn to shreds with the trees being uprooted with every swing until it returned to where it began, caught in the eye of the storm as it appeared to the two girls outside of the battle.

To the eyes of the demonic artist, however, those same winds were nothing less than the rapids of a mighty whirlpool at the center of a divine storm. Lightning cracked across the sky as his many eyes locked onto the floating form of Giyuu, both frozen in a moment of time as inspiration struck the demon and with a gleeful smile that split his cheeks and skull open, his flesh transformed yet again. Growing and distorting into a great serpent head that split from his body to surround the airborne demon slayer who finally allowed his eyes to close for but one heartbeat.

This form was meant to embody all of the principles of water breathing, to bring forward every iota of experience that he'd collected in his time as the Water Hashira. A single cut meant to sever the earth from heaven, however he'd been at a roadblock in its execution for nearly a year now. After all, how could one man cut apart a storm?

"Twelfth Form…", blue eyes snapped open to the roar of the demonic(d̵̢̠̐͝ḯ̷͕v̶͇͐ȉ̷̫̮͜ň̸͖̹̣͗e̴̢͂̆̍) serpent(d̷̗͐̎ͅr̷̛̥a̶̝͎͕͂̽g̷̣͑̄͝ô̴̟͓͘n̶̛̻) as the Hashira(S̸͈̒̾͌û̷̖̩s̵̼͑̒a̶̤̽͊̊n̵̳̻̊o̶͕̾̚w̷͖̪̋̚͘ŏ̷̻̗̹̋͘) met its might with flaming steel.

He'd finally come to understand how a man could reach towards the horizon and grasp the sky. How he could sever the space between heaven and earth.

The beat of his heart was no longer just his own.

The air he breathed was no longer just his own.

The hand that guided his blade was no longer just his own.

'̸͎͗L̷̜͋e̶͇̓t̸͔̒'̷̠̃s̷̬͒ ̵̥̍g̸̹͠ò̵͕,̵̨̔ ̴͎̔G̷̝̈́i̶͕͝ẙ̶̗u̴̘͊u̷̬̍.̵̙̕'̶̳̃

The only way a man could do the impossible is with others to support him, as Sabito had. As his sister had. As all the demon slayers who had come before him.

This strike and everything that brought it into existence, all belonged to them as much as it did him.

"Kyōryoku.", with the word he uttered with the last of his breath, destruction rained down upon the now eight headed demonic serpent.

A storm of force shredded it way through the body of the Upper Moon again and again, evaporating any hint of scale or muscle as the ground was torn asunder for a final time.

Air exploded outwards into a concussive force, sending debri flying away from the two enemies, and as the artificial body of Upper Moon fiv-... of Gyokko melted away to reveal his true head in its center, a macabre caricature of a heart, Giyuu's blade met the stretched neck and severed its head for a final time.

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She didn't know what had happened, the guardian had split the storm of snow and ice. Carved his blade into the earth and erased the monster that had tried to erase her family. The blow had blown away their shelter as well as all the snow that had covered her home. The air was still and serene as the warrior stood atop a crater spanning over a quarter of what had been his battlefield.

She managed to snap out of her daze and catch her sister as she fell against the ground, slowly shrinking to a fraction of her true size in her elder sister's arms, now peacefully resting. SHe clenched the now smaller pink eyed girl against her heart as she reached out to hold her father's hand, the shaking of his limbs gone with what remained of the beast that had ruined their home. She bowed her head and offered the only prayer that she knew once more, no longer as desperate hopes for salvation, but of thanks for their lives.

She cradled her sister against herself with shaky limbs as she stood uncertainly, gazing between her now peacefully resting father and their savior. Eventually finding the courage to stumble closer, step by step. She stood just behind the man as the dust covering the crater began to clear. It was only then that she heard it. A sound that terrified her as she stumbled back and fell to the ground once more.

A wordless snarl of rage that set her heart alight through fear, words of vitriol aimed at the swordsman as a mere portion of one of the monster's mouths was revealed to be all that remained of the demonic artisan. Relief brought more tears to her eyes, wordless sobs of relief all that she could let out as she watched the disfigured remains begin to slowly turn to smoke as it died.

A flick of the dark haired swordsman's blade was all that it took to silence the beast's desperate calls, shredding it into oblivion as the two now stood in the eye of a storm of ice and snow. No longer did the storm impede her vision of the stars or moonlight, and no longer did the storm grow to cover the mountain peak. It remained in place leaving them standing together as small snowflakes gently carried by soft winds surrounded the two.

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Within the clearing, the grave site of a great demon, there were four people. And on the edge of the cratered space, were but two crows, each there for the same purpose; to report back to their partners, and with a glance between the two they flapped their wings and separated. One of the birds, En made her way to her partner traveling with a strong comrade to the mountain. The other, Nejimaru, reported back to the human who had raised them both.

Both flew towards different targets, yet carried the same message, heard by others of their people who quickly spread word towards their own partners:

Upper Moon Five Slain By Water Hashira, Giyuu Tomioka.