𝐀𝐟𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐅𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭

Part 49: Scentless Flower

| Source: zerochan
© entry by BloodyForYou |

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.

______________________________

BUTTERFLY ESTATE
22:00

Toward midnight the faint voices in her mind began to subside, the sound of frogs croaking became distant, the full moon began to show from behind the shady trees in the forest, a fresh white dewy mist began to rise, and stillness reigned over the outside of the abandoned house.

That once house, who she acknowledged to have warmth and comfort.

But now, only sadness and coldness, left behind. Its damaged walls and torn tatami mats still had dried traces of blood.

A person in brown cloak stopped at the entrance door, gawking at the scene with a face that held no quirk at all.

Everything resided there was stone-still, like the moon and its light and the shadows.

"Onii-san."

The sole son of Hamada recognised the call from behind him, calculating the seconds passed once he set his eyes on a family photo frame that was left crooked and pierced on the wall. He held a breath back.

Her hazel eyes expanded in horror, filled with tears of grief and guilt— she extended a hand ahead, attempting to catch the person's shoulder who was in fact metres away from her.

"What are you doing here... at this hour?" Aishito asked in a hitched tone.

She could barely hear a foot shifting from her older brother, those identical pair of hazel-tinted eyes met at once.

From the way Minato stares at her, she could take a hint of what would the usual him say to her at the moment. Her little hunches help her to survive this, she trusts them to support her beyond reasonable doubts.

"I—! I didn't mean to follow you without a permission, I was just worried about you." Aishito lowered her hands, gripping the sides of her yukata.

"Sanemi-sensei said that... you've been sneaking out to go here almost every night after that night... I tried to stab you..." stammering, she held her gaze down to the point that she could only see her white socks, they were smudged with dirt since she came there bare-foot and desperate.

Minato saw her disheleved condition, and somehow the tiniest of frown settled on his stone demeanour.

"I- I'm truly sorry for what I've done to you, none of these are your fault! None of these nightmares would've happened if I'm not stupid enough to shove all the responsibilities to you alone!" Aishito took an advanced step ahead, her bottom lip trembled as she tried to speak.

"I was... terribly ignorant of your feelings, Onii-san." She added, a sob escaped quickly after that.

The sudden gust of wind had dragged the brown cloak around his shoulders to flap around, and Minato effortlessly tugged at the knots at his neck to secure it more neatly. His face was veiled in dark shadows the second Aishito shouted those words at him, he parted his lips to heave an air out.

"Is there anything... any single thing that I could do for you— so that you'd start talking to me, to everyone again?" Aishito asked, peering at Minato's blank expression over her lashes.

Futile.

True, to everybody's knowledge and notice in the Demon Slayer corps, Minato has stopped talking for almost 3 weeks. Even after he took a hellish slap and unnerving serials of warning from his stern master, Shinazugawa Sanemi, the efforts made for him were all for nothing.