Years Ago
Furusato was a small village resting at the foot of Mt. Gozenyama, snug between the lush mountain of birds and trees and the vast waters of the crystal blue Lake Okutama.
"I still remember the beach I looked over that day..."
Its people relied mostly on fish and port work to make a living, and the residents' most contact with the outside world was the rivers that sprouted off of its great lake. The wide streams and gushing rivers allowed them to journey from their little bubble at the foot of a large mountain to the vast cities near the western edge of Tokyo prefecture.
"Words carved in the sand, your back view..."
It also allowed some adventurous city dwellers to venture towards the small village in the middle of nowhere. One young man, hungry for his merchant business to take off, came to the town. He arrived on the small boats with the other adventurers and spent a few days meeting the locals, talking about business ventures, and learning about life so far out inland. He came a few times with grand ventures of the wealth and prosperity to be found in the bustling cities that these villagers had never seen and probably never would see.
"The returning waves wash over my feet and snatch something away..."
On one such occasion, he met a poor girl who worked as a village seamstress to help keep food on the table for her and her little brother. She had a fair complexion and rough hands from work. Always eager to learn, she never let her needs go before her little brother's. She was the pride and joy of the village, not just for her beauty but for her kind heart that held no faults.
"In the evening calm, only sunset passes by..."
This man from the city fell in love, and in pursuing this girl who had lived in poverty her entire life, he swept her off her feet with tales of bustling cities of lights and opportunity. As if drawn by the promise of fairy tales and daydreams, the man's visits became longer, and the girl's nights became shorter as she stayed up to write the man letters whenever he was away.
"I was watching fireworks flash and bloom..."
On one such visit, after a few months of this long yet fruitful back-and-forth, he proposed under the moonlit lake with a ring he fashioned in the city. She accepted readily, and in a few months, her trajectory in life went from working enough to earn scraps for her and her little brother to a bride-to-be who would soon live in the city.
"I'm sure the summer won't end yet..."
She had found the dream. It was like the world was smiling on her, so much so that even now, as she waited by the lake and kicked her feet back and forth in the water, there was a smile on her face as she sang a sweet song to herself. Every interval between her lovestruck singing was filled with a wistful glance at the horizon and the promise of a better life hidden beneath it.
"I solved my ambiguous heart and connected it..."
In just a day, she would be married, and in a week, she would head to the city with the two most important people in her life.
"I wanted this night to last..."
She would start a new life with her husband, who swept her off her feet in the grandest and most endearing ways. Not the letters or the dates or the secret outings of flirty tales of faraway places; no, he won her heart the second he promised one thing. A promise he kept the night he proposed and would keep once they were married tomorrow.
"How many more times can I see the same fireworks as you?"
He promised he would never make her choose between him and her brother, so he won her over. She would bring her little brother with her to start a new life, which was the greatest gift she could ever ask for. She loved her brother, who was too young to remember when their parents got sick and passed, leaving them with their names and a small hut to survive on. She had done her best to make it feel big enough for her younger brother, but she knew he would enjoy the city more than this small, narrow village.
"What can you do-"
"Tsu-nee!"
He always was an eccentric little boy.
"With a smiling face," Tsutako finished her song with a wistful sigh as she turned from her view of the lake and back to see a little boy with deep blue eyes and short black hair running towards her. His smile was wide, and his arms were full of flowers as he brought them over to her place on the lakeshore, kicking off his sandals and placing them next to her. "I brought you flowers for your wedding tomorrow, Tsu-nee."
"Why thank you," Tsutako said with a small smile, plucking the violets and daises with careful fingers before glancing at her wayward brother, who was looking at her with silently prodding eyes. The constant undertone of his childish nervousness earned her a chuckle as she took a few flowers and started curling them around each other. "I'll make sure to wear them happily."
Tsutako's heart nearly melted as she saw her little brother nod excitedly, his eyes turning towards the lake. She watched him walk towards it and dip his toes in the cool water. His cheerful expression lit up the dusk sky as she molded a small flower crown to place on her head not to let her little brother's hard work go to waste.
"What do you think, Otouto? Think he'll like it?"
Tsutako called out with a playful tone as she saw her little brother turn from his spot, now a foot deep in the water, and give a quick and slightly aggressive nod, "Of course he will! I'll make sure he does!"
"Oh? How will you do that?"
"I'll... uh..."
Tsutako stifled her laughter as her little brother got lost in his own thoughts. The confusion that crossed his face ended as he looked at the surface of the water and smiled. He kicked the water a small time before shouting triumphantly, "I'll splash him!"
"Really?"
Tsutako's little brother nodded confidently, standing with his arms crossed like a tiny little guardian. He glanced at her cheeky expression before huffing and looking away. The little boy mumbled under his breath, almost begrudgingly, "Although he already thinks you're beautiful, so it won't come to that."
"Eh?"
Tsutako said in surprise, her eyes wide and cheeks flushing slightly. She glanced at her hands and chuckled slightly embarrassedly.
"Now, where did you get that idea..."
"He told me."
"Oh..."
Well, now her face was as red as a tomato, her eyes down on her rough hands and small scars from stitchings she'd messed up as she curled into her legs. She glanced at the reflective water surface as she saw her little brother walk past her, his soaked feet shifting softly in the sand as he stood behind her and moved her hair back before asking gently and quietly. She rarely saw.
"Can I braid your hair Tsu-nee?"
Her little brother was usually energetic, so it was rare for him to be so calm. It was rare, but not unheard of, there were sometimes when he got quiet.
"...of course, Otouto."
It was usually when he thought she needed quiet.
"Thank you."
He must have thought now was one of these times because he moved his fingers through her hair with practiced grace. He did not say a word and just hummed slightly, letting her mind wander because he was right. Tsutako wanted a little quiet.
My fiancé thinks I'm beautiful...
It was a common thing; any bride-to-be would have these thoughts before they got married.
What if he doesn't think so tomorrow...
The small insecurities she had forgotten about in her bliss came to the forefront, and it was hard to quiet them down. They swirled and festered until it was impossible to look at her hands and not count the small little scars on them from her earlier attempts to handle a needle correctly.
What if he regrets marrying me...
It was hard for her not to count her blessings and feel she didn't deserve them. She had gotten too lucky, and it would all come crashing down.
What if he calls it off...
It was so hard for her, whose parents died before being able to provide for her, to find some way to make these worries vanish.
What if he doesn't show up-
"I'm done, Tsu-nee."
With a splash, Tsutako's raging insecurities and worries fell from her mind as her little brother pointed towards the reflective water.
"Look, Tsu-nee, I'm sure he'll think it's pretty tomorrow."
Her brother's tiny hand gently guided her eyes to nature's mirror as she saw herself looking back, with a clean braid in her black hair and a small flower crown atop her down-tilted head.
"Don't you think?"
She saw her brother looking at her with all the love in the world, and it made her unbelievably happy. His hands gently tugged on her deep red haori as if to try and get her out of her head.
"...Tsu-nee? Are you okay? You're crying..."
Tsutako's life hasn't been easy; it was hard learning to provide for herself and her brother so early on. She lost count of the meals she'd skipped or the hours she'd spent working to assure he wouldn't have to, but through all the pain, she had never once regretted being the one to take care of him.
"Tsu-"
"Sorry Otouto... I'm fine..."
He never stopped trying to go out of his way to help her, even if he thought she didn't notice. She knew he asked around the village for braiding tips so he could do her hair in the morning. She knew he stopped asking for bedtime stories when he learned of her midnight letters.
"I just love it so much... thank you."
She had never once been the one to ask for any help, yet he had tried and continued to try, and every time, it made her more sure of the promise she made herself the day their parents died and left her with her little brother and the deep red haori she wore as a constant source of comfort and warmth.
"Thank you, Giyuu."
She would do anything for that wide smile and bright blue eyes that reminded her of a few pure things left in the cruel world.
Present Day
In the middle of the night, under the moonlight on a mountain near central Japan, bathed in dampness from a rainstorm just a day prior, a young man with long, messy black hair, deep blue eyes, pale skin, and a haori of green-yellow triangles and deep red split down the middle, sprinted up its trails. In a blur, he traversed up the mountainside, making it halfway before he smelled the telltale sign of blood and seamlessly unsheathed a deep blue katana.
They're close...
He came upon an old wagon tipped over with its collection of chopped wood scattered on the blood-stained grass. After that, it was a quick search, following the blood splatters and the disheveled clothes that had been left in tatters by the roadside. His footsteps were nearly silent as he ran faster than most humans could ever dream of, his lungs expanding rhythmically and powerfully as he reached a secluded outcropping of the mountainside.
There they are.
It was a horrible sight but not an uncommon one. A demon feasting on the slaughtered remains of a traveling merchant and his family. Its gnarled skin and sharp fangs were bare as it ate like a starving animal, the blood on its fingernails glistening in the moonlight as the demon looked up in surprise. Its head whipped around at the smell of a new human, new prey, to hunt and feast upon as was its natural-
'Click'
Design?
"What's happening..."
The demon uttered, its eyes wide as its head slid off its body and dissipated like ashes in the wind. The demon's last moments were spent futilely watching as the young man flicked demon blood off of a deep blue katana, as cold as the ocean and as ruthless as the young man's dead blue eyes, which turned to glance at the disintegrating demon before heading towards the human remains—leaving the dying demon with a final view of the young man's katana glinting in the moonlight and the haori he wore of yellow-green triangles and deep stoic red.
Ah...
At the very least, the demon knew how he died. It was one of the few things shared by all demons, regardless of whether they were in a nest.
Demon Slayers.
When the kanji 'destroy' is etched on a human's blade, it is solely reserved for them.
"Bastards," the demon whispered as a final curse as he disintegrated. The ashes of the body flowed in the air as the silent man gazed at the defeated before moving his gaze towards the carnage such a demon left behind.
Ah...
It had been long since Giyuu picked up his blade for the first time.
I was too late...
The process of burying the bodies of the people he failed never got any easier. It was quick work after the demon died, using some of the wood from the torn wagon as a marker on the side of the road, but it was never easy, just familiar enough to be bearable. It didn't even take a minute for him to complete.
I am sorry.
Giyuu bowed his head under the moonlight, shamefully gazing down at his feet because they hadn't been fast enough. He hadn't been fast enough to save the small family; it wasn't the first time, nor would it be the last, but that never softened the blow. He was reminded of his past failures with every wandering couple or traveling family.
If I hadn't survived...
He was reminded of the weight on his shoulders, the cold reminder draped over his body from his two-toned Haori, and it never got any lighter.
You would have.
He willingly wore it as a constant reminder that he didn't deserve to be here or deserve the position he had been given.
"CAW! Two Letters for Tomioka Giyuu! CAW!"
Giyuu never deserved to be called a demon slayer.
"CAW! Two Letters for the Water Pillar! CAW!
Giyuu's downtrodden thoughts were ever so slowly forgotten as he turned his head dully toward the sky. The slightest hint of an upward curl took its place on his lips as he held his arm out, and his old crow, Kanzaburo, landed on it with a slight ruffle of his black feathers. Two rolled-up pieces of parchment were tied to his belly via string and a small vial of bamboo.
"Thank you," Giyuu said plainly, reaching over and scratching Kanzaburo's head before opening the bamboo containers. Receiving the two letters quickly, he set the vials in his pocket and read the first one, his eyes lowering slightly as he read its contents.
The pillar meeting...
The pillar meeting was held twice a year at Ubayishiki estate to keep track of all the hashira and the demon activity in their respective patrol zones. Giyuu had to go because he was technically a hashira but didn't want to. Sitting among his peers, the true hashira, made him feel like a sheep in wolf's clothing; the only thing he brought to the meetings was a sense of shame because he didn't belong there.
"Thank you Kanzaburo..."
He never had.
"CAW! You're welcome, Giyuu! CAW!"
Giyuu sighed at his crow's oblivious response to his downtrodden mumbling, slightly shaking his head as he pocketed the note and opened the other. He would send a reply after he read...
Dear Giyuu.
The next letter...
I am dying.
The last letter...
Sakonji Urokodaki
The final letter dropped from Giyuu's slack hands as he sprinted towards Mt. Sagiri, leaving his reply and a confused crow in his wake.