[Location: City Streets – Evacuation Zone]
A few blocks away, the Kakushi rescue workers were rushing around.
"Move! The ground is falling apart! Get the people out!"
One Kakushi paused, his ears catching a faint sound under a pile of rubbles.
Meow.
He dug into the rocks and pulled out a small cat wearing a special backpack. It was Chachamaru. The cat hissed, scratched the worker's hand, and ran straight toward the explosions. It carried a backpack full of Tamayo's medicine.
---
"You won't last until sunrise. I will make sure of it."
Muzan's eyes narrowed. "Do not presume to decide my fate. You exist because I allow it. And when I'm done with you… you will beg for a sunrise that will never come."
The Demon King launched twelve bladed whips which struck at once.
[Extrasensory Perception]
Manjiro was dodging by pure instinct alone. The power behind each whip was unbelievable—one hit, and he would die.
Suddenly, Muzan's movement hitched.
"What's wrong, old man?" Manjiro joked. "Is your age finally catching up to you? Hmm? That pause wasn't part of your plan, was it? You know… when monsters pause, it usually means they are scared."
Muzan realized the truth with horror. His strength was fading.
Tamayo's medicine was destroying him from the inside. It forced him to turn human, age quickly, prevented him from splitting apart, and destroyed his cells.
"Now," Manjiro whispered.
Why did Manjiro Asakura wait until this exact moment to use his full power? With his [Accelerated Adaptation], he had been reading Muzan's attack patterns for the last couple of hours, making sure when the time to strike arise he wouldn't leave room for this coward to flee.
[Demon Slayer Mark]
[Selfless State]
[Transparent World]
To Muzan, the man in front of him simply ceased to exist.
One second, he was there. The next, it felt like he was erased. There was no killing intent. There was no battle spirit. Muzan could not even hear his heartbeat.
'From the very beginning... he didn't have any killing intent,' Muzan realized, 'All I could sense from him was battle spirit and a heartbeat, but now... nothing.'
It was just like a hundred years ago.
Yoriichi Tsugikuni.
In Muzan's memory, the swordsman had looked weak. He could not detect any ambition, willpower, hatred, or killing intent. Because of that, he had underestimated him. And because of that, he had been humiliated, decapitated, and scarred forever.
The face of Manjiro overlaid perfectly with the face of the monster who nearly killed him in the past.
"IT'S NOT GOING TO HAPPEN AGAIN!" Muzan screamed in anger, his attacks becoming wild and desperate.
Manjiro looked through the Transparent World. He saw Muzan's seven hearts and five brains. This proved the knowledge he had from the anime and manga was real. He knew simply cutting off Muzan's head wouldn't cut it.
Manjiro took a deep breath as Hamon flowed into the bandages, then into the sword. The blade ignited, turning Bright Red.
He held the sword out to his side, point angled down, a stance radiating immense pressure. [Ichigo Bankai Stance]
[TECHNIQUE: MARK OVERDRIVE x3]
The synergy of the [Demon Slayer Mark] and the solar energy of [Hamon] acts precisely like a Kaio-ken. It forces the heart to beat at a lethal rate, instantly tripling the user's physical parameters. For exactly ten seconds, Manjiro Asakura was the strongest being on the planet. After that... his body would begin to eat itself.
[Timer: 10 Seconds]
Muzan panicked. His torso morphed into a gigantic, beastly mouth, his jaws opening wide
"Shockwave Energy Blast!"
[Timer: 9 Seconds]
Muzan let out a massive scream in all directions, buildings folded in on themselves from the force.
Manjiro leaned into the blast.
"Metal Silver Overdrive: Conductive Link."
He combined every form of Moon Breathing (Wide range slashes) and Thunder Breathing (Explosive speed) into a single, continuous, circular attack.
"Thunder-Moon Breathing"
[Timer: 7 Seconds]
He was the thunder, and his slashes were the moon. In one breath, he unleashed all sixteen forms of Moon Breathing and all seven forms of Thunder Breathing simultaneously.
A golden dragon wrapped in silver crescents spiraled around Muzan.
Slice. Slice. Slice.
The Hamon-infused blade hit all twelve of Muzan's vital organs.
Muzan fell to his knees. His regeneration stalled. The solar-like heat of the Hamon was burning his cells, faster than he could knit them back together.
His head began to slide off his shoulders. He tried to hold it on with his hands, but the seared flesh wouldn't connect.
Manjiro stopped, standing over him. He looked down with cold, empty eyes, his breath leaving his mouth as white steam come out of it.
[Timer: 5 Seconds]
"What is the value of a life to you, Muzan?" Manjiro asked.
Muzan stared at him and remained silent. His face swelled dark red with rage. The memory of Yoriichi asking the exact same question, mocking him across a century.
"Silent to the end. Huh."
Muzan's body suddenly swelled up like a grotesque balloon. He was going to explode, split into 1,800 tiny pieces of flesh to escape in every direction and regenerate later. It was the cheap trick that had saved him from Yoriichi.
A hundred years ago, the strongest swordsman in history made a single mistake. He let three hundred pieces escape. Manjiro Asakura does not make mistakes.
"Not this time." Manjiro said.
Time seemed to stop as he perceived every single fragment before it even separated.
[Timer: 2 Seconds]
"Hamon Overdrive: Thunder-Moon Breathing."
In a single breath, he used all sixteen forms of Moon Breathing and all seven forms of Thunder Breathing again. Unleashing 3,700 cuts in one second.
He didn't miss a single one.
Where Yoriichi had let a few pieces escape, Manjiro brought Muzan to an end so absolute that no trace of him survived the coming sunrise.
[Timer: 0 Seconds]
---
The sun began to rise. Its warm light hit the street of what remains, illuminating the battlefield.
Tamayo, who had climbed down from the roof, collapsed on the floor. Her body, now fully regenerated from the earlier absorption attempt, shook violently.
"He's dead! He's finally dead! He should have died a long time ago!"
Manjiro sheathed his sword, the golden glow of Hamon faded from his body, and the moment it did, the toll of the Mark Overdrive x3 hit him all at once.
When the Mark Overdrive x3 wears off, the body realizes what has been done to it. Manjiro's vision flashed white.
He stumbled slightly, coughing up a mouthful of blood, but he forced his legs to keep moving. He walked over to Tamayo. He didn't say anything heroic. He just knelt down and sat next to her.
She looked at him, tears streaming down her face, trembling. She started rambling, telling him everything about her life, her sins, how she killed her family centuries ago.
"Manjiro!"