To the Flames of the Sun

Chapter Eleven

Isn't Mui-chan simply beautiful?

Midori's POV

I didn't even bother waiting for the rain to let up. All I did was tell the Kasugai crow to do me a favor by informing the Butterfly Mansion that I was probably not going to be returning home tonight, after which Giyu had grabbed me and raced in the direction of the Ubuyashiki Mansion. To be fair, I knew how to run fast too but Giyu had the knowledge of running fast as well as the knowledge of where the Master's residence was located; information exclusively reserved for the Hashiras and the Kakushi. Kanae nee-san had told me a while after she had adopted me that the Master back in the Sengoku Era, the one who had taken up the position after my guardians had vanished, had felt some kind of instinct to change the entire residential rules of the Hashiras and the Butterfly Mansion and the Ubuyashiki estate. I hadn't understood why, because I personally didn't see any reason by which the information of these crucial locations could be dangerous being in the hands of the missing Hashiras, but the Master back then had insisted that the estates of the Hashiras were no longer going to be in the same neighbourhood as they used to when I was a kid. Everyone lived separately now, and the locations of the Master's estate as well as the Swordsmith Village were still closely-guarded secrets.

But Giyu got me to the main garden of the Master's estate anyhow, where I found the Master already waiting on the engawa from where he initiated meetings with the Hashiras.

"Oh my, the both of you are soaked to the bone."

The Master remarked, and I glanced at Giyu. Yeah, he was as soaked to the bone as I was but he was the only one who managed to look hot when soaked to the bone. Then I remembered what I was really here for and returned my focus to the Master, shoving any other distracting thoughts to the back of my mind. Which wasn't exactly easy when I returned my gaze to the Master considering he was quite handsome too. With a strong and muscled body that stood tall at an impressive height, accompanied by a sculpted face and an unrealistically lilting voice, nobody could deny how lucky Lady Amane was. He was apt to be called the leader of the Demon Slayer Corps; a more powerful and more accomplished slayer than even the Hashiras. (And now you can wonder just what went wrong in the timeline! Haha!)

"Oyakata-sama."

I huffed softly, somewhat breathless from the run here, and fell to my knee in a bow, sensing Giyu do the same next to me.

"The message your Kasugai crow sent me. Is it-"

"Absolutely. It is absolutely true."

Forgetting all manners, I snapped my head up to look right into the solemn purple eyes of the Master, to which he simply produced a soft smile. I had met this man only once when I had been sent to this era five years ago, since the rule of meeting the Master being exclusive only for the Hashiras or only for extremely uncanny events had remained unchanged since three hundred years ago. Not only did he remain quite busy with his duties of running an organization as widespread as the Demon Slayer Corps but also because he was one soldier we could not afford to lose at any cost. And yet, he had kept writing letters to me even when we never received the chance to meet during the last five years.

And now that he had finally made the time to summon me, it was to deliver a news to me that had basically turned my entire life upside down in a matter of only a few minutes. To think that even when I had practically been exiled to an era three hundred years away from my own, I had still been told that I had a living blood relative left...A descendant?

"Think very clearly, Midori."

The Master spoke gently in that unrealistically lilting voice of his.

"Recall as much as you can of your life back in the Sengoku Era. Did you truly not have any siblings? Any half siblings? Perhaps even cousins?"