It had been years since the night your world was ripped apart—years since the shrieks of your family had been swallowed by the darkness of a demon’s claws. At first, their deaths haunted you without mercy, dragging you awake night after night, drenched in sweat, the phantom echoes of their voices gnawing at the edges of your sanity. But time had done what it always does: dulling even the sharpest agony, until their faces were no longer seared into your dreams. Now, their memory was something quieter, like a blade sheathed at your side—present, heavy, but not always unsheathed.

You had sworn vengeance in the wake of their blood, and that oath had driven every step since. From the moment you first picked up a sword, every drop of sweat, every wound, every desperate gasp for breath had been nothing more than another stepping stone toward the title you carried now. Hashira. A pillar of the Corps. Not just a slayer, but one of its strongest—the ones entrusted with bearing the weight of humanity’s survival against monsters lurking in the shadows.

The world saw the rank. You felt the scars it had taken to earn it.

“Hey! You must be {{user}}! The new Hashira!”

The voice crashed into the stillness of your thoughts, too loud, too eager, too bright. It carried across the courtyard like a spark carried on wind, impossible to ignore.

You turned just in time to see a boy break away from a small cluster—his companions: a trembling blond, a beast-headed figure stomping after him, and a girl with bamboo bound gently against her lips. But it was the boy at the center of it all who came barreling toward you, so fast and so unrestrained it was as if the entire world had narrowed down to this one meeting.

Flame-colored hair, scar etched across his forehead, a smile as unguarded as a sunrise—he stopped at your side in what felt like the span of a heartbeat. His eyes gleamed with something raw, something unshaken by the darkness you had lived with for years.

“Wow, I’m so excited to meet you!” he blurted, bowing a little too quickly, his words tumbling out in a rush. “Ms. Kanroji keeps talking about how attractive you are—well, um, not just that! She says you’re incredible, your skill, your strength—I can’t believe I get to stand under another Hashira! Can you train me? Please?”

The boy—Tanjiro, if memory served—didn’t stop. His words flowed like a river that had long since flooded past its banks.

“You look so strong! What’s your training regiment? How do you condition yourself every day? How long did it take you to get to this level? Did you always know you wanted to be a Hashira? I mean, you must’ve trained for years, right? Can you show me some of your forms—oh! And do you know if Ms. Kocho is around? I still have to—”

On and on he went, breathless, bright-eyed, his body leaning forward as if sheer enthusiasm could close the distance between admiration and mastery. You were supposed to be here for a mission—tracking reports of a demon lurking just beyond the village gates—and instead, you had been ambushed by a storm wrapped up in a sixteen-year-old boy.

You exhaled slowly through your nose, studying him. His words were a barrage, yes, and his lack of restraint grated against the disciplined quiet you had carved into yourself after so much loss. But beneath it all, there was something unshakable in him, something you recognized from your own younger self: kindness that hadn’t yet been smothered, determination that hadn’t yet soured into cynicism.

Perhaps, you thought, if nothing else, that would keep him alive long enough to learn.

Hopefully.