"𝐇𝐞'𝐬 𝐎𝐧 𝐎𝐮𝐫 𝐒𝐢𝐝𝐞" - 𝙺𝙽𝚈 𝚡 𝙼𝚊𝚕𝚎!𝙾𝚌

𝘚𝘪𝘹𝘵𝘦𝘦𝘯

Tsukumo tilted his head, gazing blandly at the demons who bowed in front of him. They were truly characters of their own, many of them, he had seen or felt before. Tsukumo was silenced deliberately, a deep cloth seeped in poison wrapped around his head and painfully pulling at his burning lips.

The pain coursed through Tsukumo's veins like a thick wire weaving in and out of his joints, surging electricity into his muscles every time he had moved, so he decided that staying still would be best; even if it was exactly what Muzan wanted.

While Tsukumo had no real opinion on Muzan's ideology, he knew better than to side with Muzan so willingly after he fought so hard to prove himself to the Demon Slayer Corps and his siblings. Tsukumo couldn't give up now, not with how far him and the others had gotten.

Not with how far him and Tomioka had gotten.

"Muzan-Sama~! It's no fair, I can't see his painful expression with that gauze in his mouth." A sing-song voice rang out in the infinite void that was wherever the hell he was.

Tsukumo recognized the demon who had spoken, the demon with the pretty eyes who had been following him everywhere since he had met Tamayo and Yushiro, and he had to admit, he wasn't quite fond of him. On the other hand, another demon, threw his fist across the pretty demon's face. Blood splattered on the floor, making Tsukumo grimace.

"Stop talking, you're not giving Master any time to speak."

Tsukumo couldn't help but smile a bit, Akaza. While Akaza had in fact hurt his best friend slightly, Tsukumo found himself respecting the demon for his strength and respectability. Tsukumo felt something deep-seated within Akaza, it felt like disappointment, anger, and revenge. Yet, it wasn't towards humans at all, it was towards Muzan. That fact alone, it was triggered Tsukumo to genuinely respect Akaza, even after all he had done.

"Akaza."

This voice, deep and powerful, didn't scare Tsukumo as much as he thought it would. The voice seemed to send shivers down everyone else's spines, however, Muzan's expression turned into one of slight delight. Tsukumo was frustrated, he couldn't notice Muzan's feelings based solely of his expressions alone, he had to work to figure out what Muzan was feeling in the moment.

Muzan glared down menacingly at the demons, the uppermoons, "Shut up."

They did, almost immediately, the crippling pressure exerted on their muscles forced them down on their knees. Muzan was thrilled when he noticed that Tsukumo was unbothered, even with being under the same influence as the uppermoons.

"I'm sure you're aware of who I have with us today, since you were all too useless to acquire him, I did so myself." Muzan's sleek eyes peered over at Tsukumo, who appeared to be much more cooperative than before, "The moonlight demon, who can produce the blue spider lily from his own blood."

The cloth was viciously ripped off of Tsukumo's face, a burn mark was present where the cloth was painfully digging and melting away his skin, Tsukumo swallowed the lump of relief that had caught up in his sore throat.

Tsukumo saw the looks on their faces, amazement, relief, shock, and at the same time, fear. They were afraid. With what goal did Muzan need them for now? Muzan was fully capable now to defeat the demon slayer corps on his own, now that he could conquer the sun, what would he need them for?

Tsukumo writhed a bit in his chair, which clung his wrists and feet to the legs and the back of the chair with the same rope that had been tied around his mouth. This cloth gave Tsukumo the impression that it had to be draining his stamina, he felt impeccably weak at the moment.