Soon it had been six months since we had started to train under Urokodaki and Nezuko had yet to wake up even once. Urokodaki summoned a doctor and had him examine her but he had found nothing wrong. I could tell that there was nothing wrong with Nezuko because her aura was just as bright as before and wasn't fading like someone who was dying. I tried to comfort Tanjiro with this information which led to Urokodaki knowing about how I could see people's auras. It was no longer just aura's of emotions either, I had realised with all the training in the mountains that my eyesight had gotten better and I could now see a distinct colour around each person. Urokodaki had a blue-silver colour while Tanjiro had a dark red colour and Nezuko had a pink aura that was clouded by black because of her being a demon. Another thing I realised is that if they touched something such as Urokodaki setting up the traps they were lit up with the colour I now associated with him, like it was marked by him. I was lucky that I was finding different ways to see the traps since Urokodaki was sending us higher and higher into the mountains meaning that we were in even more danger then before but we kept on fighting and training, we had to unless we wanted to die.
"I have nothing more to teach you,'' Urokodaki said one day after we had descended the mountain. It had been a year since we had begun training under him.
"The rest is up to the both of you, whether or not you can improve to the next level" Urokodaki said.
"Come with me" He instructed and led us into a clearing as it started to snow. In that clearing was a giant boulder with a thick piece of rope around it with pieces of paper attached to it.
"Tanjiro, if you can slice this boulder, I will allow you to enter the final selection. Hikaru you will have a boulder to slice as well. It is this way" said Urokodaki.
"Urokodaki-san, please wait" Tanjiro called out but I just looked at him with a smile before following him to another clearing that held just as giant a boulder as the other one.
Once there Urokodaki left me as well as I stared at the boulder and walked up to it placing my hand on it. Grabbing my normal lengthened sword out I tried to hit the boulder to break it but all that happened was pain through my whole body from being bounced back.
"That won't do, that won't do at all. His skin is tougher than this boulder" I whispered tracing the scars that now decorated my face. Just like the large scar on my chest, the wounds on my face had scared me pretty badly as well from all the times I had busted them open but I didn't care about that. Running my hands through my hair I closed my eyes so that the pain I was feeling wouldn't show in my eyes, even after a year my hair was barely touching my shoulders reminding me of the disgrace that I had brought on myself.
"If I want to be able to kill the demon I am after, cutting this boulder won't help me..... So instead I'll cut the boulder without touching it" I swore to myself.
Days passed and I continued to train. I would ask Urokodaki to continue to set up traps in the mountain for me but instead of going straight down the mountain I would zigzag down it. I meditated under the waterfall and continued to swim in the lake that it connected to while holding my breath for as long as I could. I would also continue to swing my sword but this time I swung it for 2,000 swings for each sword and finally I worked on my flexibility and strength. Unlike most of the people that I had been around I could bend my body in ways that seemed impossible but that didn't stop me. It also didn't stop me from doing sit-ups, pull ups and doing one handed push ups with my body in the air instead of on the ground. After I finished my normal workout I would then stand in front of the boulder and swing my sword repeatedly like I was striking the boulder but without actually touching it. I was determined that the strength behind my sword would be enough to break the boulder without me having to touch it.
Six months passed and even with all the training that I was doing I hadn't managed to break the boulder, I had left marks but that was it. Tanjiro wasn't doing much better either so we both continued to push ourselves to the limit trying to break the boulder. At the end of one of these days I sensed a presence making me look up to see a boy around my age sitting on the boulder that I was to cut. He had light orange shoulder length hair, a fox mask on that had a large scar like mark on the right side of it and finally a familiar checkered patterned kimono under a white hiori. I knew who he was, Tanjiro had mentioned to me about how yesterday he had an encounter with a boy who he was told was named Sabito and a girl who was called Makoma.
"So are you here to beat me up as well and lecture me while I am at it?" I asked, looking at him.
"So that pathetic excuse of a man told you about me" said Sabito and I could tell that he wasn't being mean or anything, he was simply stating what he believed to be true about Tanjiro.
"Yes he told me about you, though he never told me that I would be talking to a spirit or ghost or whatever you want to call it" I said and I could tell from the flare of his aura that I caught him by surprise.
"How do you know? Not even your friend realized with his sense of smell" Sabito said.
"Because all living beings had aura's of emotions and a colour that belongs to only them. You don't have a colour that belongs to you and your aura of emotion is dull, like it is fading away which it is seeing as you are already dead" I said.
"So you know.....Tell me why are you wasting time? You could easily break this boulder unlike the other one yet you refuse to even place your blade on it" Sabito said jumping down from the boulder.
"Simple, I know how tough demons' skin can be," I said once more, tracing the scars on my face.
"Just cutting this boulder will not make me strong enough to cut through the demon's neck that I'm after so if I can cut through the boulder without touching it and then I continue to grow stronger. The next time I meet him I will be able to take his head" I said and I could tell he was smiling.
"Very well, in that case I will help you train since Makamo is training the idiot," Sabito said.
"Be prepared because I am not going to let up even if you are crying" Sabito gleefully announced.
What he said was true, day after day he would help with my training and wouldn't let me stop until I physically couldn't stand anymore. There was even a day when my muscles were so sore that Tanjiro had to unclench the blade in my hand since my fingers wouldn't let it go. It was also around this time I asked Urokodaki to be able to set up a small space for me to make a make-shift blacksmith shop that I continued to make trinkets and small swords at that I would be able to sell if we ever passed Urokodaki's test and then the Final Selection. I also dug out my charcoal and paper and made a picture of Tanjiro's family and gave it to him so that he would always remember them.
Another six months passed with Sabito training me and me continuing on not only being a blacksmith but also mixing up different elixirs that I had read about when Urokodaki gave me a book about them when I told him of my interest in medicine.
"Hikaru" said Sabito as I approached the boulder.
"I know" I said before I breathed in deep to use total concentration breathing before I swung my sword. The strength of my blade and power behind it sent a strike straight to the boulder and cut straight threw it and the ground below it as well. The crack in the ground stretched towards the trees behind the boulder making my eyes widened a little, I didn't think that I had that much strength but I guess I did.
"Hikaru" Sabito called and I turned to see that he didn't have his mask on this time. His purple-grey eyes shone sadly and I saw a scar on his face that was as bad as mine were, the scar that was on his mask.
"It's time for you to go isn't it?" I asked him and got a nod in return.
"You know even if you now have scars, even if your hair was cut, you still have a right to the Akatsuki name" Sabito said before disappearing, probably to challenge Tanjiro to their monthly fight. Reaching up to my hair I smiled sadly, it was passed my shoulders now by a few inches pulled back in a messy ponytail and as much as I wanted to believe Sabito's words I still could not bare the Akatsuki name even if I wanted to.
Chapter 3: Sabito and Makamo
Start from the beginning
