Chapter 161: Dead
Gyūtarō’s gaze went from Tengen to Marcus, and from Marcus to Hakuji.
"It was you... you’re the one who gave them our information."
Hakuji finally turned and spared him a look.
An ice-cold look.
The way you’d look at a corpse.
Gyūtarō gripped his sickles tight.
Hakuji didn’t say a single word, but that contempt hurt more than any insult.
It was inevitable: Hakuji had never liked Upper Rank Six.
First, because Doma was the one who had brought them in, and anything connected to that man disgusted him. Second... because one of them devours beautiful women and the other fights with poison, and both of those things struck a nerve.
If blood battles over rank could be started from a higher rank down to a lower one, he would have finished them off a very long time ago.
Though it still wasn’t too late.
Turning around, he asked respectfully, "Sir, do you need me to finish them off?"
!!
Daki’s breath caught.
Gyūtarō tensed up too.
"..."
Kill them?
That wasn’t Marcus’s intention. He had already decided what to do with the two of them.
It went without saying that Daki possessed Upper Rank strength and was the number one beauty in Demon Slayer, no matter how much she spent all day baring her teeth like a lioness.
Keeping her close increased his strength and was entertaining, so he was definitely keeping her.
Gyūtarō was another matter.
Strong, but with Daki out of the picture there was no loyalty worth anything: lazy, eccentric, and tyrannical.
A ticking time bomb of a demon like that was one he would never keep at his side.
But!
With Daki as the key, the story changed completely.
One hundred percent loyalty. Two hundred percent power.
Morals, limits, and conscience: zero.
And most important of all... impossible to kill!
A guy like that was practically born for dirty work.
Hakuji was effective too, but in recovering his memories he had recovered along with them the goodness at the bottom of his being.
Add the whole business with Koyuki to that, and his head must be full of ideas about atoning for his sins by now.
Even if he were willing to dirty his hands out of gratitude, in time he would end up building up resentment.
But Gyūtarō wouldn’t have that problem!
He would do anything. No matter how filthy, exhausting, or despicable it turned out to be, he wouldn’t raise a single objection.
Because the only thing he cared about was his sister.
And Marcus wanted to turn the entire country into his home.
’The nice way? Playing politics, weaving connections, amassing a fortune? Decades or centuries infiltrating little by little?’
’Impossible. I don’t have that kind of patience.’
When the time came, his methods weren’t going to be clean.
That was why he urgently needed someone who specialized in the dark corners, capable of striking silently from the shadows on his behalf.
A black sickle: silent, unscrupulous, without moral limits and, above all, without ambitions of its own.
Hakuji would be in the light, handling all the matters that required suppression and brute force in public.
Gyūtarō would be in the shadows, handling everything that... couldn’t see the light of day: every time a problem couldn’t be solved on the surface, it would be passed to him, and the problem, or whoever caused it, would disappear.
One in the light and the other in the dark.
That was why, faced with a Hakuji eager to get to work, Marcus just waved a hand with a smile.
"No rush."
Then he looked at the three boys.
Zenitsu was shaking so hard he looked like he was dancing, not daring to take his eyes off Gyūtarō.
"Zenitsu."
"P-Present!" Zenitsu jumped, almost dropping his sword.
"Having the courage to throw yourself into the fight shows how far you’ve come."
Zenitsu was stunned, and blushed a little.
"I... it’s just..."
He opened his mouth, but nothing came out.
Marcus moved on to Inosuke.
"Little Piggy."
"Who are you calling Little Piggy?! You’re the piggy!"
"That charge just now was pretty ferocious."
Inosuke snorted. "Of course it was! I’m the most ferocious man alive!"
Last... Tanjiro.
Just as the boy was expecting his praise, Marcus sighed.
"I asked you to go see Nezuko and you brought me this whole entourage."
Tanjiro’s face fell and he turned his head away sadly.
"Senpai, this really isn’t my fault..."
!!!
He was halfway through when a familiar smell, a scent he could never forget, hit his nose all at once.
His face changed completely.
And not only his: Marcus felt it too.
The smell seemed to have sprung out of nowhere!
The instant he sensed it, the thing was already behind him.
Too sudden!!!
So sudden he didn’t even manage to turn around.
Swish!
A pale flash streaked through the air.
Marcus only felt a coolness at his neck, and even before he registered any pain, the world before his eyes began to spin.
The sky, the ground, the ruins, all blended together in a whirlwind.
And then he saw himself.
That body in light-colored clothes, holding its two swords, planted there like a statue.
A body without a head.
Blood was gushing from the neck in spurts.
He also saw the panic on the faces around him.
Hakuji’s blood-red eyes!
Tanjiro contorted with rage!
Tengen’s disbelieving stare!
Zenitsu dropping his sword, and Inosuke completely frozen.
And last of all, he saw the figure standing behind him.
A black suit, crimson reptilian pupils, and a blade of bone, born from his own flesh, fastened to his forearm.
And at the corner of his lips, a faint mocking smile.
MUZAN KIBUTSUJI!
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Throw your stones, drop them ALL! 💎
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