Y/N's Pov

After making sure that I had done everything I had to do on my mother's grave. From showing my respects, to telling her everything I had to. I prepared to leave, just making sure that everything was in place one last time, and then walked out of my house.

As I went towards the town, I also realized just how much had the plants changed since the first time I came. Not only had the flowers changed a lot since then, but the arrangement had changed by itself, and the simple trails that were once arranged as a path towards the house, were now a bunch of combined shapes of multiple sizes, and despite having no real consensus, they were all in a beautiful shape. Mother deserved nothing less for her resting place.

As I passed through the town, I considered going to talk with Mr. Takashi for a while, but nightfall was only about one or two hours away, so I had to get going already. I did pass by his house to say goodbye, and after hearing my reasoning to leave quickly, Mr. Takashi was comprehensible, and left me to go on way.

With a quick calculation, I assumed that I would get just right before night if I ran, so I immediately got to it. Despite having just come out of the final selection, I was feeling pretty well after a night at butterfly mansion, and a bit of time with Kocho, so with my pace, I would be able to arrive in time.

The trail was already starting to get familiar, since I had walked it quite sometimes already, but I didn't get tired of it. The looks were quite frankly amazing, more now that we were transitioning to autumn and the trees were becoming of that characteristic orange, yellow-ish tone. A beautiful view that Mother always enjoyed, and that I would like to show someone else at some point.

As I got into the town near Master's house, I was relieved to see that my predictions were right, and that it was around half an hour before night. I was just in route to get on time when someone took notice of my presence. "Hey, Y/N. Fancy seeing you again. How much has it been? Five days? Six?" Asked Mrs. Korei, a nice old lady who I met shortly after arriving here.

I chuckled lightly at her comment, and then said to her. "Eight days, to be precise. I've been quite busy." She chuckled back at my comment, and then continued talking.

"I can see that, though you look pretty well. A bit buffier than last time as well. You've been eating well." This made me laugh a bit more than before, and she did a bit as well, and then she continued talking. "By the way, I don't think you've ever taken the time to look at the girls of the town. You and your 'Master' are always to busy training. None of them caught your eye?" This got a bit nervous, and I also got to scratch the back of my neck with embarrassment.

It took me a bit of time to formulate my answer, and in the end, I simply said. "Not really. There's one that kind off got my eye, but I'm not entirely sure if that'll build up to anything. She doesn't really live close either, so it something that's growing slow on top of that." My expression probably also showed that I was quite concerned about this, and she seemed to notice this, because she next said to me.

"Hmm, alright, if you say so, but you should always keep your mind open. I'm pretty sure that my granddaughter has been eyeing you a bit." And then she delivered a wink towards me. This also got a chuckle out of me, but this one was a bit more awkward to be honest, however, I didn't want to be rude, so I just said.

"A-Anyway, I should get going already. It's been quite a while since I last saw Master." And as I waved slightly at her, I started walking away, but that's when she said.

"Oh, silly me, sorry for keeping you for so long." I was about to say that it wasn't that big of a deal, but she wasn't quite done yet. "Sorry for asking this, but would you mind helping me take this to my house? I bought a couple groceries, but they turned out to be way heavier than I expected." Looking at the stuff she was referring, it was quite a lot of stuff, but nothing I couldn't handle.

I did have a concern with the fact that she lives at pretty much the opposite side of town from where Master was. It wasn't really that long of a walk. At much a 10-minute walk, or maybe 3 or 4 minutes if I run, but it still made me feel uneasy.

Either way, she was still a nice lady, and I assumed that I would still have time to get back with Master early, so I didn't complain, and instead said. "Very well. I can help with that." She was very thankful about this, and while she apologized she kept bowing at me. I insisted that it wasn't that big of a deal, but she had none of it, and as soon as we got to her house, she wrapped me up to eat for a bit.

I tried to finish as fast as possible, but she was so sweet that it was hard not to slow down to chat at least for a bit. The time slowly accumulated, up to the point where it was ten minutes past nightfall. "Thanks for the dinner, Mrs. Korei, but I've really gotta go now." She thanked me for the help and for staying to eat, and after a minute of goodbyes, I was finally able to leave.

I wanted to get back with Master as soon as possible, but I also didn't want to just run back at full speed, so I simply walked at a relatively slow pace. This meant that I would still take a bit over ten minutes to arrive.

As I went back, I kept getting recognized and recognizing some other acquaintances that I had made during my years here. During all the waving and greetings, I realized that maybe I didn't know as much people as I thought from the town. It wasn't that much of a bother to me, but still would prefer to feel a bit closer to them.

At one point, I noticed someone running in my direction. I squinted my eyes to see who it was, and then I realized that it was Tsurub, a boy a couple years younger than myself. I was confused as to why he was running, since I really doubted that it was for me, but either way, I just started waving at him and calling out his name as a greeting.

I just kept waving at him, when a couple of seconds after, I realized that his expression wasn't of relief or anything like that, but rather one of fear, and once he noticed me, he started running even faster. "Y/N! Y/N!!!" He started screaming towards me, confusing me even more.

"What happened?!" I lightly exclaimed once he got closer. As he basically tripped on his feet, while falling onto my arms from going so fast, he took a moment to catch his breath. "Alright, calm down and tell me what happened." I said to him, and after another second for him, he finally said.

"A-A MONSTER! A MONSTER IS ATTACKING!!!" I now realized just how serious this was, and after a quick second of shock, I nodded, but just as I was about to tell him that I got this, he finished with. "MR. KITE OS FIGHTING THAT THING!!!" Now my shock was way more intense, and without even saying anything, I just set him down, and ran all the way towards Master's place.

The closer I got, the worse the situation looked, as the fear seemed even more evident, and everyone was panicking. 'Master is too old to fight off a Demon by himself, and he doesn't even have his weapon! I took it!!!' I just kept dreading how bad it looked, and the closer I got, the more scared everyone looked.

It didn't take me long to get to the path that lead directly towards Master's house, however, that's when I heard a loud roar through the entire place. "RRRWWWAAARRR!!!" It was so loud that it was almost as if I felt it inside my chest, and immediately knew where to go.

"MASTER!!!" I exclaimed as I ran all the way towards him, making my way across a couple of scared towns people. It didn't take me long to find out what all the ruckus was about, and while it was pretty much exactly what I expected, it still managed to shock me quite a lot.

There were a couple of victims that weren't able to escape the area on time, while also being a lot escaping, as Master took care of the Demon, and that thing, not even I could describe it. Unlike every other Demon I had seen so far, this one didn't resemble a human at all, more like some kind of bear, lion, combined with a lot more things. So many, that it was hard to describe at all.

Master's technique with a large metal rod seemed to be keeping the Demon at bay, however, none of the attacks did damage at all, and actually, the Demon seemed to be growing in size and power with every movement, making it harder for him to fight that thing. "Master!" I exclaimed in disbelief, getting his attention for a split of a second.

"Y/N!" He exclaimed back, but doing so took so much of his time, which combined with his already injured hands, left him wide open, as what seemed to be a spurt of pain suddenly got to him, making him release the metal rod, which was then followed by a hit from the Demon. A hit that sent him flying towards a near building.

I stared in disbelief at what I saw. At what I caused. But rather than feeling guilty about this, my blood simply started boiling, and as I readied both my flail an axe, I simply said at that thing. "Oh...You. Are. So. Death..." And then immediately lunged towards that beast. Then, in a similar manner, the beast roared at me and came right at me.

Right at the moment we were about to impact with each other, I jumped upwards, avoiding the beast for a bit, and letting it run off for a bit, allowing me to go with Master. "Y-Y/N?" He weakly asked as I got closer.

"Master! Are you alright?" I asked, and as I took him in my arms, I started looking around to see how deep his wounds were. None seemed something too serious, but there were quite a lot of little cuts and medium injuries, that combined with his age were probably going to be lethal for him.

I didn't know what to do or even say, and once I was about to try to do so, a scream of desperation was heard a bit far in the distance. Both Master and I turned to look at what it was, seeing some of the people having to escape the beast. I turned to look back at Master, and with no words in my mind, Master simply said. "G- Go...F-Fulfill y-your duty...Demon...Demon Slayer." It was hard to agree with him on this, as I wasn't sure if I would be able to get back in time, but even if I couldn't, almost as a last goodbye to him, I said.

"Yes...Master..." And after carefully leaving him down on the floor, and bowing at him, hoping that it wouldn't be the last time I got to do that, and then left.

As I ran towards the beast, which was trying to attack some civilians over there, I screamed at it. "Hey, Demon!" This didn't seem to get its attention, as the beast simply kept looking at what he assumed were its preys, but not like I complained. It was dangerous for them, but favorable for me.

Just right before it lunged at the civilians, I did a front flip towards it, raising first my flail, which I sent flying all the way, impacting right on its skull, and then was followed by the axe that I also had thrown, and while it didn't do much damage due to the flail, the impact seemed to stagger the beast, and once it regained its stability, it got angrier, but also turned to face me, which was what I wanted.

I signaled for the civilians to escape, which they quickly did, and right after looked directly at the beast, while trying to taunt it a bit. "Come at me, stinky pig." I said. Honestly, I was really angry right now. The only other time I felt this angry was during the night Mother died, and for that very same reason, I felt some clarity, or rather a violent focus.

Instead of having mixed feelings and confusing thoughts, all that chaos focused on one simply thing. One singular task. Killing that being that not even I could classify as human, even if it was in the past.

The beast roared at me, and then came running directly at me. I gave it a bit of a starting run, and after a quick roar from myself, I started running as well. It would seem as if I was going to tackle the beast out of anger, but I wasn't that dumb, and instead had a plan.

Once I was sure the Demon was running too fast to slow down instantly, I jumped as high as I could, while also leaving my flail down close to the floor, and as the Demon got closer to the flail, I used my arms to make the hit even harder, staggering it once again, and as I fell down to the ground, before it got the time to regain its balance, I swung my axe at it, making a big gash on its back.

The beast obviously let out a groan of pain, as it turned around to look at me, but not like I was going to stay down right now. Even before that thing got the chance to register what I just did, I lunged right at it, regaining both my flail and axe almost immediately, and taking it head on.

Fortunately, the mutations this Demon had gone through also seemed to hinder its ability to think thoroughly. As I got closer, the first thing it did was throw its claws right at me, but it was really predictable, allowing me to duck down to the side, and leave another big cut on the side of its neck. Nothing that would kill it instantly, but at the same time it seemed to take it some time to recover from.

I kept jumping around the beast, leaving as much cuts as I could and making sure they were on critical spots, mostly to throw it off balance, but after just a bit of time, I realized that it was enough. This thing couldn't really differentiate down from up, meaning I had the right opportunity to kill it off.

As I kept jumping and moving, I looked for a spot that would throw off the best the most, and I realized that when I deliver a cut to its right back side, it turns around almost immediately to try to attack me, unlike with the left side, where it only turns to look, but unless I stay in place, it doesn't do anything really.

With this in mind, I threw my last cut to the back, and just when it turned to attack, I jumped to the spot where I knew that its claw wouldn't reach, but also left me in a pretty good position to get to the neck.

Once everything felt in place, I used my flail to get one last on the side, staggering the beast, which was then followed by me tangling the chain with its feet, making it fall to the ground, and that's when I used my axe. I grabbed a spot just a bit below the axe, spun it for a brief moment to get momentum, and then stroke its neck with the sharp edge.

It was at this very exact moment when the beast let out its greatest roar, as a scream of pain, anger, and maybe even some fear, but anyway, I simply pushed deeper, as I grabbed the handle just below my axe, and as I positioned all my body weight onto it, I pushed even deeper down.

The beast of course tried to retaliate, but it couldn't, as I was holding its limbs tight with the chain. I felt like this was going to be it. The axe was way too deep already, and it didn't seem to stop at any moment soon, but the beast hadn't given up yet.

With some spurt of power, the beast managed to break free from the chain, with some burns due to the metal, but still free, and then went to rip my chest with its claw. I was only able to avoid this thanks to my chain, which blocked most of the impact, and threw me back quite a bit.

As I got up from the spot I had fallen to, I looked at the beast, slowly approaching me as it tried to heal off its wounds, but pretty much unable of doing anything about the axe, which still lied inside of its neck.

Now I was even angrier that this foul beast dared to destroy Master's weapon, so I immediately went to grab the side of the chain that still held to the axe, and as the Demon started closing in faster on me, I waved it with enough sheer strength, that the shock sent through it moved the axe enough that it torn off the last bit of neck that it had, finally killing the beast, and as the body fell on top of me, it also started disappearing and turning into ash, I felt relieved that it was over.

As I got to recatch my breath, and slowly get up, I realized what I had done. Not like I felt bad from killing the Demon. It had to be done for the safety of the people of this town, and it had injured Master quite a lot, but at the same time, I felt bad that I had done it so coldly. That my anger made so effortless to kill it, but there was something bigger on my mind that suddenly appeared.

"MASTER!!!"

Chapter End

Taisho Era Rumors

Ever since Y/N arrived at Kite's house, he's changed quite a lot, becoming more friendly with everyone. The towns people noticed this quite a lot, as before Y/N arrived, he would barely go out of his house, but afterwards, Y/N would almost drag him out of the house every once in a while.

Here it is for you all, a brand-new chapter! I hope you like where it is going. Did any of you expected this outcome? Because I sure didn't.

Now, something I forgot to told you guys last week. So, I'm planning to start a couple one shots and other short stories based on both of my books, so if any of you have a suggestion for a story, I encourage you to leave it down here for me.

Alright, you know that your feedback is very appreciated, and if you have any other comments or funny thoughts, please leave them down as well.

See you on my next chapter, SET YOUR HEART ABLAZE!!!