Chapter Text
Shinobu had never once considered the existence of spirits.
In all her years, the notion had seemed too fantastical, too distant, a mere fantasy for those whose grasp on reality lacked the rigor of reason. Spirits were a whimsy, a figment of imagination for those who had nothing more substantial to hold on to.
But Kanae... Kanae was different. She believed in them with a depth that made her seem almost otherworldly, her faith a radiant force that emanated from her like an ethereal glow. There was a quiet, unshakable conviction in Kanae that made her seem as though her very spirit shimmered, an unseen light that needed no proof or justification.
To Kanae, belief wasn’t a matter for questioning; it was an inherent truth that bloomed from the heart, as natural as breathing.
"If oni exist, why not spirits?" Kanae had asked one evening, her voice soft yet firm, the words imbued with a gentle, undeniable certainty. Her pale violet eyes gleamed with a curiosity that sparkled like stardust, and the energy in her gaze was so contagious that Shinobu felt her own skepticism begin to unravel. A playful, knowing smile curved Kanae’s pink lips, and in that fleeting moment, the world seemed to fade away, leaving only the quiet warmth of Kanae’s gaze—inviting, hopeful, and full of an intangible promise.
"There's no harm in believing," Kanae had continued, her tone light and playful, yet carrying an undercurrent of something deeper, something sacred, as though she were sharing a secret truth with Shinobu. "Besides, I think I'd like to end up in heaven..." Her words trailed off into a wistful sigh, and her gaze lifted, soft and distant, as she stared up at the heavens with an expression that was at once serene and sorrowful. Her smile softened further, taking on a fragile tenderness, as though she were speaking to the sky itself.
The evening breeze stirred gently around them, the cool air wrapping them in a soothing embrace, and for a moment, the world held its breath, suspended in the quiet reverence of the moment.
"Don’t you?" Kanae’s voice had become a soft whisper, almost shy but so earnest, her eyes wide and unguarded as they locked onto Shinobu’s. It was as if she were waiting for an answer to a question only Shinobu could resolve, a truth that only Shinobu could give.
No. She didn’t believe in spirits. She didn’t believe in a heaven, or in anything beyond the world she could see and touch. But Kanae did. And when Kanae died, Shinobu chose to pretend she did too. She pretended because the world had stolen Kanae’s future—the same bright future full of warmth, faith, and kindness that Kanae had dreamed of. The world had taken Kanae too soon, and in doing so, it left an aching void in Shinobu’s soul that no belief could fill.
Shinobu wore Kanae’s haori, the butterfly wings of her sister’s legacy fluttering with every step, just as Kanae had once done. She wore Kanae’s smile, the same soft curve that concealed the seething anger festering within her—a fury that while oni existed, spirits did not; a fury that her prayers, unanswered by either gods or demons, fell into a vast, indifferent void.
And so, Shinobu told the girls tales of Momotaro—stories of a boy born from a peach, tales that sparked laughter and joy, the sound of their bright giggles filling the air. When she wore Kanae’s smile, it was as though she could become her, even if just for a fleeting second. In those moments, she could hide the rage, the grief, the crushing sense of betrayal that the world had thrust upon her.
Because while oni deserved to die, the true monster wasn’t the demons. It was the silence that swallowed her prayers. The real monster was the godless world that had stolen Kanae away before she could see her dreams realized. And so, Shinobu, in her quiet torment, wore the mask of belief, of hope, of light. She wore it all, pretending she believed in things she couldn’t fathom, even as the weight of it burned her from the inside out.
But if there was one person who could shatter the delicate world she had constructed—where oni were real, but gods were not—it was Giyuu Tomioka.
To Shinobu’s eyes, Giyuu Tomioka was a man of few words, his silence a fortress that kept the world at bay. There was little about him that invited conversation or connection, but there was something about his eyes that lingered in her mind long after their brief encounters.
His eyes, a striking shade of lapis blue, seemed almost too vivid to belong to any one person—an unnatural intensity that bordered on unreal. The blue rimmed his navy pupils like the edges of a storm brewing on the horizon. They were not just eyes; they were an enigma, an ocean so deep that one could almost lose themselves in it. Solid, almost impenetrable, and yet strangely empty, as though there was nothing but an infinite void behind them.
In those eyes, there was a coldness, a chilling emptiness that had nothing to do with malice, but everything to do with a profound isolation. It was as if the warmth of human emotion had long since been drained from him, leaving only the stark, relentless expanse of blue, pulling and pulling like the current of a frigid sea. No comfort, no compassion—just the cold, unyielding depth of a man who had been swallowed by something far greater than himself.
Shinobu could see it clearly—the way his gaze seemed to swallow the light around him, consuming everything in its path, leaving nothing behind but the cold void. There was no warmth in him, no glimmer of the man he might have been, just the unsettling, hollow silence that surrounded him.
She couldn’t help but wonder what had hardened him so, what had turned his soul so frigid and unreachable. What had happened to Giyuu Tomioka that had stolen his warmth and left only the remnants of a man who seemed to exist in perpetual frost? It was a mystery that gnawed at her, the answer just beyond her reach, but in the depths of his eyes, she could see only the coldness that now defined him.
And then there were the spirits he raised—the yūrei that seemed to manifest wherever he walked, drawn to the cold, hollow space that clung to him like a shroud. They swirled around him, ethereal and restless, as if feeding off the very emptiness he wore like armor. Each of them—silent, twisted, and sorrowful—danced in the cold air, their forms barely visible, but unmistakably present, lingering on the edges of perception. They reveled in the void he had created, feeding off the darkness that enveloped him, their spectral forms flickering like the last remnants of fading light in an eternal night.
Shinobu knew this was no accident. The spirits followed him, not by chance, but because they were drawn to something deep within him—a sorrow so profound it gave birth to them, summoned them from the shadows of his own grief. It was as if the weight of his unresolved pain had opened a door to the other side, a door he likely didn’t even realize was wide open. They were a reflection of him, these ghosts—lost, wandering souls adrift in a sea of nothingness, unable to find peace, just as he himself seemed unable to.
She didn’t think Giyuu noticed them—not really. He walked through life with his eyes fixed forward, detached, as though his surroundings were nothing but a blur. He seemed unaware, or perhaps indifferent, to the spirits that gathered in his wake, clinging to his sorrow like moths to a flame. It was only through the presence of these yūrei that Shinobu truly understood the depth of the man before her. The spirits didn’t simply appear around him by chance—they emerged because he had become a vessel for their misery, a well that never ran dry.
Shinobu could see it clearly now. The coldness, the emptiness he carried wasn’t just something he bore alone—it was a weight that pulled things into his orbit. His sorrow and despair had a gravity of their own, one that tugged at the very fabric of reality, creating a void so powerful that the spirits thrived in it.
And she couldn’t help but wonder if Giyuu even realized the price he had paid to raise them—the lingering spirits that were drawn to him, not only because of the grief he drowned himself in, but because his soul had become an anchor to the forgotten, the lost, the broken. The ghosts didn’t simply appear—they clung to him, as though he were their only tether to the world they had left behind. And he, in his coldness, seemed so utterly unaware of them, of how his silence and sorrow rippled outward, creating an endless chain of misery that would not break.
But Shinobu noticed. She always noticed. She had learned, the hard way, to see the things that others ignored—the things that defied the rules of nature and reality. Ever since Kanae's death, the veil between the living and the dead had felt thinner, more fragile to her. She had learned that there was more to the world than what she had once believed to be fact. And in the presence of Giyuu Tomioka, she saw the spirits—the yūrei—swirling around him, an unspoken testament to the grief that defined him. And though he might never acknowledge them, those ghosts were as much a part of him as the very air he breathed.
They were drawn to his sorrow, a sorrow so vast, so all-encompassing, that it seemed to warp the world around him. It wasn’t that the spirits were his to command—they were his prison, a consequence of his unresolved past, his isolation, his unrelenting grief. Each ghost was a fragment of the man he had become, and Shinobu couldn’t help but wonder if, one day, they would be the only company he would ever know.
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Tsutako hadn’t seen her little brother in years.
Not since the day before her wedding. Not since the day she died.
The memory of him was sharp in her mind—his face as it was that day, pale cheeks flushed with excitement, still rounded with the remnants of baby fat despite being eleven years old. His wide blue eyes, bright and filled with the boundless enthusiasm that only a child could have, were always the first thing she remembered. How they sparkled when he looked up at her, full of love and admiration, as though she were the center of his world. His raven-black hair, choppy and untamed, was always falling into his eyes, a few strands stubbornly pulled back into a low ponytail that only half-contained the mess of it. She had laughed then, thinking he looked like a wild animal, but it was a smile filled with warmth and tenderness, as though his very presence could chase away any darkness.
It had been so long since she had seen him smile.
Now, here she was—no longer flesh, no longer bound to the living world—but a reikon, a spirit laid to rest, though she was far from at peace. There was no rest for her, only endless wandering, caught in a liminal space between realms. Restlessly waiting. The concept of time had become foreign, a blur that shifted and bent in the place she now found herself.
In heaven—or what she now knew to be the afterlife—time had no true form. It had no weight, no steady rhythm. In the world of the living, years could pass in the blink of an eye, while a single moment in the spirit world could stretch on for what felt like an eternity. She had lost track of how long it had been since her death. Days, weeks, months? Or was it centuries?
It didn’t matter. Time had ceased to have meaning here. She existed outside its reach, in a place where it could no longer hurt her, but where it could no longer heal her, either.
Her brother… had he moved on with his life? Did he still remember her? Did he feel the weight of her absence as she did his? The thought of him, all grown up, was almost more than she could bear. She had missed so much of his life, and she couldn’t even begin to fathom what had become of him without her. Had he kept his warmth, his optimism? Or had the years turned him as cold and distant as the world she now inhabited?
She could feel it—an ache deep within her, like a hollow space that nothing could fill.
The ache of longing.
Of loss.
Tsutako didn’t know how long it had been since she’d seen him, but the wound never healed. Every second in this place was another cut, another reminder of the life she had lost, of the family she had left behind. And the pain was eternal, always there, always sharp, and never fading.
The fleeting nature of time in the material world had created an unbearable distance between them, as if it had swept him so far from her that she could no longer reach him. And yet, she waited. For what, she wasn’t sure.
Perhaps, she hoped, one day, their paths would cross again. Maybe, one day, she would see him again—Giyuu, her little brother, the boy with eyes too big for his face, the boy who had once looked at her with such trust, his small hands clutching hers as though she could protect him from the world. She could still remember the way he smiled up at her—so full of life, even when their life had been so hard.
The thought of him, even now, brought a wave of warmth, followed by a crushing ache. How long had it been? Decades? Time no longer moved in the way it did when she was alive, not for spirits like her. She floated in an endless, empty space, where days and years didn’t exist in the way they once had. Only the ache of missing him remained.
She could see his face so clearly in her mind—the same round cheeks flushed with excitement, his bright blue eyes filled with the hope of a child who hadn't yet been taught how cold the world could be. Even at four years old, he had already seen his share of hardships. Their parents had passed away when she was twelve, leaving her with the responsibility of raising Giyuu, a heavy burden for a girl her age. They had struggled, always short on food, warmth, and comfort. But Giyuu had never seemed to notice. He had pressed against her during those long winters, warm and trusting, never questioning her when she did her best to keep him fed and safe.
Now, as a reikon—spirit laid to rest—she had no way of knowing what had become of him. Was he living a better life now, without the crushing weight of poverty pressing down on him? Was he happy? Had he forgotten her? Or did he still remember the way she had held him in the cold, whispered promises that she would always be there, even when the world had felt like it was falling apart?
But that was the cruel part of being dead. As a spirit, she could see things, but she couldn’t reach them. She could sense Giyuu out there in the living world, and she longed for nothing more than to touch him again, to hold him, to tell him everything she never had the chance to say. But she was a spirit, suspended in the afterlife, unable to cross the divide that separated her from him.
She had met her parents in the afterlife. Otousan and Okaasan. For a brief moment, it had felt like things were right again. They had been gone for so long, and her grief had weighed so heavily on her that it almost felt like a dream when they appeared before her. But the reunion had been bittersweet. They were spirits, just like her, and though their presence had warmed her heart, it hadn't lasted long.
Her parents had been reincarnated. After they met her, after they crossed the threshold of the afterlife and greeted her with soft smiles, they faded away. Not in the way a spirit vanishes, but in a way that still left her feeling empty. They were alive again, in other bodies, in other lives. They had moved on, and she could no longer be a part of their journey.
She had watched them slip away, fading like mist into the world of the living, and it had broken something inside her. She had only wanted them back, to feel their warmth, to know they were okay. But reincarnation had claimed them, and she was left behind, a spirit adrift in the vast, unchanging afterlife.
And so now, only Giyuu remained in her heart. She had clung to the memory of his face, his small hands in hers, the way he had looked up at her with such trust. She could feel the love she had for him in every corner of her soul, but the pain of knowing she couldn’t reach him, couldn’t protect him anymore, was suffocating.
She wanted to see him again, wanted to know if he was okay, if he had found peace in a world that had once been so harsh to them. But as a reikon, she was trapped in the spaces between time and the living world. She couldn’t cross that boundary. She could only watch from afar, unable to make herself known to him, unable to tell him how much she missed him, how much she still loved him.
She was never summoned back to the world of the living. Never given a glimpse of the world that had continued on without her, a world that had moved forward in ways she could never touch, never truly know. She wondered, sometimes, what had changed, what had become of everything she had left behind—of Giyuu, of their small, fragile life together. Had he grown into the man she feared he might be? Had he found peace, or had he too been lost, consumed by the years that had passed in her absence?
But then, like a shadow creeping into her mind, a small, dark thought slithered into her consciousness, cold and bitter. It whispered accusingly, digging its claws into her heart: Giyuu never loved you. He never needed you. You could never keep him safe because you died, because you were never worth remembering, never worth honoring by the living. Your memory is nothing more than a fleeting echo in the wind.
The words burned in the hollow of her chest. And even though she knew they were cruel, she couldn’t silence them. They were the part of her that never stopped questioning, never stopped doubting. They were the poison that seeped into her thoughts when she found herself drifting aimlessly in the afterlife, adrift with no sense of direction, no connection to anything solid or real.
How useless I truly was, she wondered, her spirit heavy with the weight of that question. How utterly pointless her sacrifice had been.
She had died so young—so full of the hope that she could protect her little brother from the harshness of their world. But in the end, she couldn’t even protect herself. She had been swallowed by death, leaving Giyuu behind to face the world without her, and for what? For nothing. She hadn’t been enough for him to remember, had she? Her love, her promise to him, it had all faded with the years. She had given him everything she had, but was it ever really enough?
The emptiness of the afterlife stretched before her, a vast, infinite void where only her regrets lingered, echoing back at her like the endless stillness of a forgotten dream.
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Sabito Tenko was a yūrei.
A wandering spirit, lost between the world of the living and the afterlife, forever suspended in the emptiness that stretched before him. He would never again feel the warmth of his mother’s presence, never again look into her cat-like lavender eyes, gentle yet full of life, smiling down at him as she praised his efforts, as she told him he was such a kind gentleman. Those were the moments when he had promised himself that no harm would ever come to her—or to Otousan or his siblings. He would protect them. He would keep them safe, even if it meant sacrificing everything.
But that promise was a hollow echo now.
He would never see Hikari again, his dark eyes mirroring their father's quiet, unspoken strength, his fair skin glowing under the soft light of their modest home. He had a gentleness that Sabito couldn’t match, a kindness that seemed to fill every corner of his being. Sabito would never see Chinatsu, her peach-colored hair soft like his own, her wide, innocent eyes full of the pure wonder that only a six-year-old could hold. Her laughter, once the sweetest sound in their home, was silenced forever.
And Otousan—his father—he would never see him again. Otousan, whose spiky dark hair and sharp, thin eyes carried the weight of quiet wisdom, whose low, rumbling voice had always spoken in soft words of encouragement. The memory of his father’s smile, gentle and full of warmth, should have been something Sabito could carry with him for the rest of his life, but it was lost, slipping through his fingers like sand.
It should have lasted forever. Should’ve.
But it didn’t. Because Sabito had failed them.
He had failed to protect them. His cowardice, his weakness had cost him everything. He had been an idiot—too slow, too soft, too afraid. A real crybaby, just like Chinatsu and Hikari, who would never cry again. The thought of their innocent faces, now gone from the world, crushed him. He hadn’t been strong enough. He hadn’t been brave enough. He hadn’t been the man he swore he would be.
Instead, he was just a failure. A spirit lost in a sea of regret, unable to even find peace, unable to see the faces of those he had promised to protect.
And he couldn’t even see them. Not once. Not even in death. A fitting punishment, perhaps, for the man he had become. A man who had failed not just his family, but Urokodaki-sensei as well.
Sensei.
Urokodaki-sensei, who had been both strict and kind, who had guided him with tough love and gentle encouragement. A man whose hands were like stone, carving the future of so many with the strength of his resolve, wielding his katana like a true warrior for the sake of peace. A man whose touch had been as gentle as it was strong, ruffling Sabito’s peach-colored hair with pride as he praised his skill, his potential. A skill that had once felt so vital, so powerful, but now seemed so useless.
A skill that Sabito could never use, because in the end, he hadn’t been strong enough to protect what mattered most.
Never come back with his best friend. Never see Giyuu Tomioka’s smile again. The world’s brightest, most sincere smile, the kind of smile that could light up the darkest days. The smile that always seemed to make everything feel like it might be okay, no matter how much the world tried to crush them. That smile—pure, unguarded, full of warmth—would never be aimed at him again. Never.
Sabito could still picture it clearly in his mind, Giyuu’s smile, wide and radiant, as if he carried some secret joy that was meant for only a few to witness. A smile that had, in so many ways, kept Sabito going. It had been the light in the moments when everything else seemed dim, the thing he had always clung to. The smile that belonged to his one and only best friend. The one person he had always trusted with his heart.
But now, because he wasn’t strong enough—because he had failed—he would never see it again. Never feel the warmth of Giyuu’s presence beside him. It wasn’t just a loss of a friend; it was the loss of something sacred, something irreplaceable. Giyuu had given him that smile, that rare, bright thing, without hesitation. And he had promised himself that he would never let Giyuu face the darkness alone.
But he had. The demon was still out there. Not defeated, only driven back, waiting for the next victim, the next challenge. They had been tested. Sabito and all the others who stood beside Urokodaki-sensei. They were supposed to defeat it, to prove they were strong enough, worthy enough of the lessons they had learned. But none of them had passed. None of them had returned victorious.
And so they came back to Mount Sagiri—the place where their teacher lived, where he had taught them everything. But it wasn’t the same anymore. It had become a place of haunting. A place where those who failed were left to linger, to become shadows of their former selves. The mountain that had once been a sanctuary now felt like a cage. A prison for broken spirits. And Sabito was one of them now. A ghost, trapped forever with the bitter taste of failure clinging to his every breath.
He had failed his teacher, who had watched over them all with patience and wisdom. Sensei had warned them—told them the stories of students who failed before them, of those who never returned because they were lost to death, to the demon, to their own shortcomings. Sabito had believed he could do it. He had believed that together, he and Giyuu would be strong enough to overcome any challenge. But he had been wrong. And now, he would never be able to fix it.
Giyuu would never know the depth of Sabito’s regret. He would never know how much that smile—his smile—had meant, how it had been the one thing Sabito had fought for, the thing he had wanted to protect above all else. But he couldn’t. And now, all he had left was the haunting image of Giyuu’s smile, now lost to him forever.
The worst part? Giyuu would continue on, alone. Alone, without him. And Sabito could do nothing but remain here, on this mountain, watching the world move on without him.
He wondered how Giyuu was. The thought clung to him like a persistent ache, an almost unbearable pull that gnawed at his insides. There was an unspoken, haunting urge to break through the walls he was trapped forever in and search for his best friend. To find Giyuu, to see him again after so many years—yet with the fear that he wouldn’t recognize him anymore. Would he still be the boy Sabito had once known, or had time, grief, and the weight of the world shaped him into something else entirely?
Was he still like Chinatsu, the trembling, tearful wreck who couldn't look past the shadows, too fragile to even face the daylight without flinching? Or had he become even more like Hikari, soft-hearted and patient, giving everyone his kindness while never once asking for anything in return? Had he held onto that smile, the one Giyuu had so freely given Sabito, always so eager to encourage him, to race beside him even when he struggled to keep up? Or was he something more distant, a stranger whose face was marked by all the years apart, a person whose very presence might feel like a reminder of the innocence lost, the boy who had once been Sabito’s anchor, his one and only?
Sabito had seen Urokodaki-sensei not too long ago, but Giyuu… he had only glimpsed him once—one single, fleeting moment, and that brief exchange was burned into his memory with a clarity that bordered on cruel. It felt so sharp, like a blade cutting through everything he had worked so hard to forget. It was the last time he had seen Giyuu, and the weight of that final look haunted him still. Giyuu had been standing there, eyes distant, cold and empty, as if he had already left the person he used to be behind, as if he had already become someone Sabito could no longer reach.
Sabito had returned to Urokodaki, the place that had once been his sanctuary. He could almost hear the sounds of his younger self—the boy who had been so eager, so full of naïve dreams, and so desperate to survive. But now, all that remained was a hollow space, a painful reminder of what had been and could never be again. He could feel the weight of Urokodaki’s presence—silent, constant, like a stone upon his chest. The sensei’s meditation, his solitude, was something Sabito envied with an intensity that burned deep. He longed for that peace, that escape from the crushing weight of what he couldn’t change, but it was just out of reach, like everything else he desired, like the life he could never return to.
And yet, despite it all, despite the years, despite the distance, Giyuu’s absence was the thing Sabito felt most acutely. He had left without a word about Sabito, and perhaps that had been for the best—but the ache of not knowing, of not seeing his best friend grow, change, or suffer, was something Sabito couldn’t silence. There was a part of him that needed to know, that needed to see with his own eyes just what had become of the boy who had once shared everything with him. Was Giyuu still out there, living, breathing, and holding onto the remnants of their bond? Or had he too been swallowed by the unforgiving tide of time? Sabito wasn’t sure which would break him more—the hope that his friend was still out there, or the fear that he wasn’t.
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Sakonji Urokodaki hadn’t seen Giyuu Tomioka, his last surviving student—aside from Tanjiro Kamado—in eight long years. The passage of time had done little to ease the quiet ache of that absence. Though he never spoke of it aloud, deep down, Sakonji had harbored a quiet, almost forbidden hope that Giyuu would one day return. But he was not a man who acted on fleeting whims or selfish desires. The bond he shared with his student was not one for indulgence or personal satisfaction. He would not visit Giyuu if the boy had not expressed the wish himself.
In the two years—too short, far too short—that he had spent training Giyuu, Sakonji had come to know a boy full of emotion. Giyuu had worn his heart on his sleeve, driven by deep passions and a fierce desire to protect. Whether in sorrow or joy, his feelings were raw and intense. Sakonji had watched the boy struggle with his emotions, the weight of his grief and his unspoken fears. Giyuu had cried often in those days—cried for his family, for the life he had lost, and especially for his older sister, who had raised him after their parents were gone. She had been the center of his world, and even though Giyuu rarely spoke of her, it was clear she had shaped him in ways Sakonji couldn’t fully understand.
Sakonji had never met Giyuu’s sister, but he had always known that she had been a force in the boy’s life. The rare, fleeting mentions of her were enough for Sakonji to recognize the depth of Giyuu’s love for her. She had raised him with a fierce sense of responsibility, teaching him to be strong, but also to temper his actions with wisdom. Sakonji could see how deeply her loss had cut Giyuu—how the boy had cried for her long after her passing. That raw emotion, that burning sorrow, had always been a part of him.
Then there was Sabito. Sabito Tenko. By far one of the most gifted students Sakonji had ever taught during his years of instructing the ways of Water Breathing. Sabito was a force of nature, a determined and headstrong boy who attacked every challenge Sakonji threw at him with a relentless drive and a fierce attitude that seemed to dominate every obstacle in his path. When Sakonji first took him in, Sabito was a shadow of his current self—meek and hollow-eyed, a boy broken by the sudden loss of his family. But under Sakonji’s careful guidance, he transformed, growing stronger and more determined with each passing day. He became a beacon of strength, not just for himself, but for everyone who knew him. Especially for Giyuu.
In those early days, Sakonji could see the deep bond between the two boys, the quiet camaraderie they shared. After the oil lamp had been extinguished and the room was bathed in the peaceful darkness of the night, they would whisper excitedly to each other, sharing secrets and dreams under the covers. They would trade onigiri, laughing joyously together, their friendship growing stronger with each moment. During their sparring sessions, even when Sabito's skill and tenacity often left Giyuu in defeat, their bond remained unbroken. They fought fiercely, but with respect, their shared journey of growth and learning a testament to their unwavering trust in one another.
But death, as it always does, came for Sabito.
It was swift, like a cruel inevitability. Death took him just as it had taken so many others before him—coming with cold certainty, stealing away his vitality, leaving behind only an empty shell. When Sabito's life was cut short, it shattered Giyuu in ways that words could not describe, leaving him hollow, like a vessel stripped of all its contents. Death had claimed not only Sabito, but also Makomo and the rest of the young students Sakonji had mentored with such love and care. They had all been bright-eyed, full of potential, eager to take on the world with the same optimism and energy as fledgling birds preparing for their first flight. And yet, the harsh reality of life had claimed them before they could fully spread their wings.
Death was the inevitable conclusion to every journey. The final destination, the one certainty that every living being would eventually face. No matter how bright their light shone in the world, it was bound to flicker out in the end. And for Sakonji, it was a bitter, unyielding truth that would stay with him forever.
So it was that when Tanjiro Kamado finally returned from Mount Fujikasane—bruised, battered, but still carrying that unmistakable light in his eyes—Sakonji felt a rare, bittersweet sense of peace wash over him. The Hand Demon, the vile creature from the underworld, had been vanquished at last. The terror that had haunted the land for so long was no more. And with it, the lives of countless others—whether lost or spared—could now find the rest they so desperately deserved.
Sakonji stood there, cradling Tanjiro and Nezuko Kamado in his arms. In that moment, they were no longer just the children of a once-innocent world, but two souls he had come to consider as his own. They had endured so much—suffered the same tragedies that had scarred him, and yet here they were, alive. Against all odds. And he held them tightly, as though afraid that if he let go for even a moment, they might slip away, like so many others before them.
As he looked down at them, a fleeting thought passed through his mind—one that had lingered in the darkest corners of his heart for far too long. He wondered, and silently hoped, if Giyuu had finally found peace. Had his old student, his friend, laid to rest the ghosts that had tormented him so relentlessly? Had Giyuu, too, found the release that came with defeating the demons inside, as well as the ones that lurked in the world?
Sakonji's thoughts drifted back to his own demons—the memories of those he had lost, the sacrifices made in the name of duty. But in that moment, with Tanjiro and Nezuko safe in his embrace, he allowed himself a fleeting moment of peace, knowing that some battles, at least, had been won.