Almost as soon as the diary was updated tonight, the girls in the group began to search for who had held an art exhibition in the country over the past two days.
At the same time, they subconsciously tagged the great painter in the group who usually didn't like to talk much.
Shiina Mashiro was, after all, a genius painter in the art world. She should have some impression of this seemingly very individualistic painter mentioned by the mysterious person in the diary.
As for Shiina Mashiro, who had already colluded with Miyauchi Hikage, she posted a few paintings in the group after about ten minutes.
The content and background of the paintings varied, but the main subject was always a beautiful woman in a purple kimono.
These paintings all shared a common name, "Tamayo," which should be the name of his beloved.
After that, Shiina Mashiro also posted the news that he was holding an art exhibition in Kyoto these few days, thus confirming his identity.
"Yamamoto Yushiro... he looks so young."
He appeared to be less than 20 years old, but according to the information they found, he was already close to 30, and he seemed to have a rather bad temper. There had even been news in the past of him threatening reporters with a shotgun.
But considering his true identity, threatening someone with a shotgun didn't seem like a big deal.
They didn't know how long this Yamamoto Yushiro had lived, but according to the mysterious person, he had lived for at least over a hundred years.
And considering that the mysterious person mentioned in the diary that he had already evolved into a "perfect demon," this appearance did indeed match the girls' speculations about these long-lived beings.
After more than half a month, the mysterious person finally mentioned the "Demon Slayer Corps" from a hundred years ago again in the diary and gave details about their enemies, which made all the girls very curious.
"Kibutsuji Muzan, a demon king who can transform others into vampire-like beings, possesses supernatural-like Blood Demon Arts, and eked out an existence in the world for over a thousand years searching for a way to overcome his weakness, was annihilated by the Demon Slayer Corps a hundred years ago..."
Although this kind of boss setting was indeed quite intimidating, when combined with the mysterious person's description, it felt like this demon king who had lived for a thousand years was actually quite tragic.
According to the mysterious person, it was because of Muzan's appearance that the world gave birth to an existence specifically meant to counter him, namely that Tsugikuni Yoriichi.
The mysterious person had mentioned the Transparent World and the Mark in previous diaries. The Mark was described as an ability that traded lifespan for power, and the mysterious person didn't elaborate much on it. The Transparent World, however, was described by the mysterious person as the pinnacle of martial arts in that work.
It was a power that made the entire world appear transparent to one's senses, requiring the user's breathing method and movements to reach the pinnacle of precision to have a chance of reaching that state.
At the time, they had even wondered how long it would take for them to reach this state with the help of the diary. In the end, they had to shelve the idea because they couldn't find a way to even begin.
And now, looking at this Tsugikuni Yoriichi, who was born with the Mark, mastered the Transparent World, created the Breathing Styles and passed them down, and developed corresponding sword techniques targeting Muzan's abilities the very first time he saw him, almost instantly killing the demon king.
This ancient man who lived hundreds of years ago was indeed sent by heaven specifically to deal with that demon king, Muzan.
"1500 slashes in an instant..."
Because their physical fitness was quite good, Shinomiya Kaguya and Yotsuya Miko, who were currently training in martial arts with their second-year senior Zenin Maki at the Jujutsu High, could more intuitively realize the power of that Tsugikuni Yoriichi.
At least, neither Zenin Maki, whose martial arts were comparable to a grade 2 sorcerer, nor their teacher at school, Kusakabe, who practiced the New Shadow Style, could achieve such a feat.
"It should be said that to be able to survive against such an opponent, that demon king's life-preserving abilities were indeed quite strong. In modern times, he would definitely be at the special-grade level," Shinomiya Kaguya analyzed, thinking to herself at the same time.
The fact that the Demon Slayer Corps chose to launch the final decisive battle against the demon king a hundred years ago, apart from the influence of the plot, the period of supernatural decline must have also played a role in weakening that demon king Muzan's power, right?
Although Shinomiya Kaguya hadn't felt any impact from the decline and resurgence of the supernatural on her life before, through the past records she saw and the explanations from the school teachers while she was taking remedial classes at the Jujutsu High during the holidays, she could still clearly feel the difference.
During the period of supernatural decline, supernatural powers could still be used.
But in terms of both recovery speed and the intensity of the power, it was far inferior to the present.
You had to be meticulous when using your power, yet the intensity of the completed techniques couldn't even compare to ten or twenty percent of their current power.
According to Gojo Satoru, from the beginning of the spiritual resurgence more than twenty years ago until the beginning of this year, the resurgence had increased the overall strength of sorcerers in the Jujutsu world by about 200%.
The techniques he used ten years ago would have at least doubled in power if used now.
"But this year, the speed of the spiritual resurgence has become even faster. Almost every one or two weeks, you can clearly feel your strength increasing."
While saying this, Gojo Satoru even made a helpless gesture of spreading his hands.
He said that many sorcerers with no self-awareness mistook this overall increase in the inner world's strength for their own personal breakthroughs and had been proactively challenging him, which put him in a rather difficult position.
He also narcissistically stated that even the him from ten years ago, if placed in this era, would still be the strongest jujutsu sorcerer of the era.
Thinking of this, Shinomiya Kaguya and Yotsuya Miko looked at what was mentioned in the diary about the thousand-year-old strongest King of Curses in history, Sukuna, who was Gojo Satoru's fated enemy, and for the time being, they ignored Gojo's boasting.
After becoming Gojo Satoru's students, they could understand why almost no one mourned for this guy after his death; he was simply too arrogant.
In short, the founder of the Breathing Styles, that Tsugikuni Yoriichi, proved the upper limit of his set of abilities, and the members of the Demon Slayer Corps who annihilated Muzan a hundred years ago also proved that this set of abilities performed well even in the modern era of supernatural decline.
Previously, she had wanted to learn the New Shadow Style of swordsmanship, but because of Miwa Kasumi's hesitation, and when she went to find that teacher Kusakabe, he also told her to first learn the basic martial arts well and to make a decision after she became more familiar with the situation of jujutsu sorcerers.
The fact that these two practitioners of the New Shadow Style both gave her hints to consider carefully made Shinomiya Kaguya have to consider what kind of unspeakable price that so-called Binding Vow had.
However, the New Shadow Style was originally just a substitute in her mind for the Demon Slayer Corps' swordsmanship, for which she could never find any trace.
Now that there was news related to the Demon Slayer Corps again, Shinomiya Kaguya naturally intended to go and meet that Yamamoto Yushiro in person to see if she could obtain more detailed information about the Demon Slayer Corps.
Originally, after the group finished discussing the parts of the mysterious person's diary entry for today about the Breathing Styles and that Tsugikuni Yoriichi from hundreds of years ago, the conversation shifted to the "Distillery" that the mysterious person talked about at the end of the diary.
The mysterious person had complained about this criminal organization, "the Distillery," in his diary in the past.
The girls in the group still kept some distance from this multinational criminal organization filled with undercover agents.
After all, they were still just underage girls with a little bit of supernatural power. The threat of firearms to them was probably much higher than that of third or fourth-grade vengeful spirits.
If it weren't for Miyano Shiho, who was in the organization and also had a diary, proactively joining the group chat to ask for their help, they probably wouldn't have remembered the situation of this criminal organization, which was destined to be wiped out by the protagonist team over there, for a long time.
What they were focusing on now was not the point that the protagonist team's strength was too overwhelming, making the organization seem completely non-threatening, but rather on the words "got shrunk."
"A certain protagonist team member who almost got shrunk" received a diary.
"@Miyano Shiho, isn't the mysterious person talking about you?" In a work where at most only one person currently had a diary, the only person related to the Distillery was Miyano Shiho, right?
Miyano Shiho also frowned after seeing tonight's diary.
For the past few days, she had been quietly monitoring her sister's situation, hoping that the chat group could bring her some good news.
Unexpectedly, before she got any news about her sister, she first learned about her own situation.
In the original story, she, like that high school detective, shrunk after taking the Drug A she developed?
Why would she take Drug A, and why would her body shrink?
After thinking for a long while, Miyano Shiho could only think of the worst possibility—
Her sister was probably eliminated by the organization in the original story, and she was going to be next.
In order to die a quicker death, the her in the original plot chose to secretly take Drug A, but unexpectedly triggered that one-in-a-million chance, causing her body to shrink along with it, and then she used the effect of her shrunken body to find a way to escape the organization.
However, because her surroundings were filled with surveillance, even with the diary's shielding effect, for safety's sake, she temporarily did not speak in the group.
A while later, when the girls in the group didn't get a response from Miyano Shiho and were about to continue talking about Tsugikuni Yoriichi, Shiina Mashiro, who had just made her presence felt in the group, sent another photo that caught the girls' attention.
This time, it wasn't one of that Yamamoto Yushiro's.
It was of the "ghost stories" recorded by Miyauchi Hikage's ancestors, which documented their contact with the Demon Slayer Corps.
"This is a photo Hikage sent me two days ago. I thought about it, and what's recorded on it should be about the Demon Slayer Corps."
Miyauchi Hikage?
The Demon Slayer Corps?
The girls were quite familiar with Miyauchi Hikage, a male supporting character who was quite famous in the group.
After all, he was the genius male supporting character of a cute-girls-doing-cute-things manga. A considerable portion of the popular videos on YouTube now came from this supporting character's creative mind.
Not long after the school year started, he pulled people together to form a new team and started the currently popular supernatural exploration videos. It was said that even people in the Jujutsu world had noticed these videos.
Many girls in the group were also following this channel.
Of course, the main reason was that this male supporting character, because of his sister, had come into contact with the female protagonists of many other works, and the mysterious person had specifically designated him as someone to keep an eye on, so he wouldn't succeed in starting a harem in a school-life series, despite not even showing his face in his own original manga.
So how did this Miyauchi Hikage get involved with the Demon Slayer Corps?
As this curiosity arose among the girls in the group, Kasumigaoka Utaha was the most nervous.
After all, Miyauchi Hikage was also involved in her long-term commission.
She looked carefully at the photo sent by Shiina Mashiro.
The story was simple. It was just that a hundred years ago, Asahigaoka was just a small village in a mountain valley. Then, in a certain year, the village was attacked by a human-like monster, and many people died. In the end, they survived the crisis with the help of a few passing swordsmen.
Later, the Miyauchi ancestor wanted to ask those swordsmen to be his masters and warmly hosted and thanked them at home. But they only taught some methods for physical training and breathing, and then said that perhaps they would let their comrades come here to recuperate when injured in the future, and asked the Miyauchi family to help keep this secret.
Before leaving, the swordsman also said that they would send someone later with a token that his comrades could recognize.
But the Miyauchi ancestor waited in Asahigaoka for decades without them ever visiting again. In his later years, he could only record these events and store them in the family's warehouse, hoping that future generations could extend a helping hand to repay the life-saving grace if they encountered the descendants of those people seeking help.
"So, that Miyauchi Hikage's ancestor was saved by the Demon Slayer Corps a hundred years ago and might have almost become a member of the Demon Slayer Corps. But why did the Demon Slayer Corps member who saved his ancestor never contact the Miyauchi family again?"
Looking at this story, Umaru asked in confusion.
"Perhaps that swordsman unfortunately passed away in the final battle against that Muzan. And from what the mysterious person mentioned, that Demon Slayer Corps was an organization established from the very beginning to subjugate Muzan. After achieving their organization's final goal a hundred years ago, they probably chose to disband," Kasumigaoka Utaha guessed, and the more she thought about it, the more something felt wrong.
As the only male heir of the Miyauchi family, it was quite normal for Miyauchi Hikage to know about his family's past.
But why would he send these photos to Shiina Mashiro?
After thinking for a long while, she suddenly had a realization and then asked Shiina Mashiro in the group: "So, did Miyauchi Hikage mistake you for a descendant of the Demon Slayer Corps?!"
After all, according to the mysterious person, the Demon Slayer Corps' Breathing Styles were a power created by that manga artist by borrowing from the concept of Hamon. Although there were significant differences between the two, Miyauchi Hikage only had the story and last wish left by his ancestor.
How could he distinguish between the Hamon shared by the mysterious person and the Breathing Styles passed down for generations in this world?
Thinking of Miyauchi Hikage's care for Shiina Mashiro, it must have been under some coincidence that Miyauchi Hikage took Shiina Mashiro for a successor of the Breathing Styles, which is why he was so proactive in helping her!
Perhaps Miyauchi Hikage's sudden idea to film supernatural videos was also influenced by Shiina Mashiro, this descendant of a Breathing Style user?
Faced with Kasumigaoka Utaha's question, Shiina Mashiro, following Miyauchi Hikage's remote guidance, "candidly" stated in the group that Miyauchi Hikage's sister had accidentally seen her teaching her own sister Hamon.
After that, Miyauchi Hikage proactively became her manga assistant, saying that he wanted to help her become the greatest manga artist of this century.
After saying this, Shiina Mashiro, as if with "delayed realization," asked in the group: "No wonder Hikage sent me this photo after he went home two days ago. So he thinks I'm his family's benefactor?"