Icy Flames- Rengoku Kyojuro-Demon Slayer/ Kimetsu no Yaiba

45

Something didn't make sense. I knew he was telling the truth but all the events all the way up until now...still didn't add up. He was here confessing to me...something I wanted but yet...something was bothering me.

"Are you sure you and the love Hashira aren't something?" I questioned, my eyes cutting to him, gold catching fire, "You both do seem quite close."

"Well, before I became a Hashira she trained with me worked with me and assisted me in battle with battling a Lower-Ranked Demon...during the time I was a Kinoe," Rengoku explained, "Recently, I had asked her for some advice about my feelings...around the time I met you in the final selection, again during our joint mission together, and every time I saw you after. She heard from Shinobu that you would be delivering Negi in the morning one day, the same day I was recuperating from one of my fights, and instructed me to train with my shirt off to get your attention."

"It did work..." I thought as my gaze pierced his and sighed. I pulled out of his hold and took a set at the edge of the pagoda roof. My expression didn't change, but a veneer of frost settled over my face, my eyes shifted to the darkness of the garden beyond what was reflected in the moonlight.

"Y/N?" Rengoku questioned. He looked concerned and a bit sad. Little did he know was that I was trying to fight the butterflies in my stomach.

"Since Final Selection...hm?" The usual calm impassivity in my face. I looked down at my hands which have curled into a loose fist atop my knee. "Why me? I have been nothing but stoic and aloof-from the way you stated your statement prior, you think highly of your mother...I don't think your mother would have loved to meet me-maybe a girl like Kanroji or Kocho. A girl like me was trained to only breed before my father left the clan. When he left, I was trained to be calm and stoic to the point where I can be unfazed by any sort of event that happens. You seem like a man who likes someone who is simple; elegant, kind, gentle-traits that I do not have."

He turned to me, a sheepish grin plastered on his face as he sat beside me, "I know my mother would have loved you because your personality-you may seem apathetic but you have that sense of justice to protect humans from demons."

"The same ideal we all share in the Demon Slayer Corps," I shot back.

He chuckled softly, sighing as he looked out towards the stillness of the waters below as well. "But you are different. For you to not report on killing over 300 demons alone and your meetings with Upper Rank 1 or Muzan Kibutsuji because of your bird's ailment making him a target of the crows tells more of who you are aside from the Demon Slayer Corps ideology as well as the stories Uzui shared of his childhood with you."

My rich amber eyes looked at him. Seeing how that fiery blond hair pooled down his broad shoulder, how his red-tipped hair framed his face, how those fiery eyes looked onwards with a hint of something I wasn't sure what it could be.

A moment of silence passed between us, just enjoying the scenery, whether it be each other's faces or the stars and moon.

"Tell me, we're you eager to spar with me as a means to get closer to me?"

He laughed nervously, "yes, that was my way of trying to get close to you. I ask Kanroji tips on how I can get you to notice me a bit more than you have and she suggested that I do some chivalrous things to get your attention."

"To make the trek to the wisteria mansion is quite the journey considering the distance from your residence."

"I don't regret any of it," Rengoku boastfully stated, "because I can see a bright future with you in it."

Honestly, I am really thinking that I don't deserve this man. I wish I had the right mind set to reciprocate his feelings but with the information I received today and the long journey ahead of me tomorrow...would it be right for me to accept his feelings today and not know if I will come back to see him or what if he decides to move on because we will be far away. Even our districts were far away considering his district was around Tokyo and mine was Hokkaido, both at different ends of the country.

"Y/N." His tone changed from that loud boisterous voice to a more serious, tactical, and direct tone, "do you feel the same way?"

Of course I do! Of course I feel the same way about you but this was such awful timing! And what if he asks me to kiss him or ask me about my first kiss that I lost to that demon...would he think the same way he does now or find me disgusting. Not even Uzui knew about that encounter with the demon ...

"I do..."