Secret of the Spider Lily

Chapter 38 - No Mercy for the Cruel

Yuki was running at full speed through the winding halls of the Infinity Castle, Kanao and Inosuke following closely behind as she ran. Kanao and Inosuke were having a hard time keeping up with Yuki's demonic speed, and tried to call out to stop her, or at least slow her down.

"Yuki! Slow down! We can't keep up with you if you keep going at this speed!" Kanao yelled, hoping her words would get to Yuki.

"I can't Kanao!" she called back, not even turning around to look at the two of them, "I can't let them fight Kibutsuji on their own!"

"They can keep that demon lord occupied!" Inosuke shouted, getting irritated with Yuki's insistence of getting there so soon, "We don't need to be rushing at a full sprint!"

"Yes we do! I've already lost my entire family to Kibutsuji, I can't lose Kyojuro too! He's all I have left!"

Kanao was worried that Yuki was letting her worry control her actions, but she knew that they wouldn't be able to convince her otherwise, "Hurry ahead then! We'll catch up with you soon!"

"Are you insane Flower Girl?! We'll get lost within these walls if we lose track of Snowcone!"

"Don't worry about that! I'll leave a trail for you guys to follow!" Yuki called, before dropping a small piece of her torn up haori, before sprinting further into the castle.

Yuki knew that the only way she'd be able to find Kibutsuji in this maze of a castle would be to use her powers to sense their auras. She focused her power, watching as everything went into X-Ray vision. She didn't see any auras at first, which she thought was strange, but she soon saw a single black outline up on the surface within her line of sight.

She knew it was Kibutsuji. She had seen his outline once before, on that day she woke up restrained in the Infinity Castle.

Yuki channeled more of her power, running as fast as she could while also remembering to leave the trail behind for Kanao and Inosuke. She channeled as much power as she could without overexerting herself and surpassing her limit. She could feel the adrenaline coursing through her veins, the fear and anger filling her body as she got closer and closer to the surface. She was praying that Giyuu, Tanjiro, and Kyojuro were ok.

She took a deep breath to calm herself, recentering her mind as she continued to run through the halls. Even though she was running extremely fast, she felt like everything was moving at a snail's pace. It felt like an eternity for her to reach where they were all fighting.

As she got closer, she ended up picking up a scent that she never liked. The smell of blood...

"Damnit... Why the hell can't I find them?! They're injured, I can tell!" she thought to herself, before she could finally hear the sounds of fighting getting closer and closer.

Almost there...

Yuki knew where they were, finding herself no longer in the Infinity Castle and up on the surface in a small village, watching as Kibutsuji was fighting Tanjiro. Only Tanjiro...

Where were Giyuu and Kyojuro...?

"Yuki!" she heard a voice call out, looking back to see Kyojuro waving for her to come over, putting pressure on a deep wound on Giyuu's abdomen.

Yuki saw this and immediately ran over, feeling that intense worry washing over her, "Giyuu! Are you alright!?"

"Don't worry about me..." he said, coughing up a bit of blood, "Help Tanjiro... I-I'll be fine..."

"No... That's what Shinobu said before she died! I'm not letting you die too, you hear me?!" Yuki screamed, before creating a wall of ice around them to protect them from any sort of harm from Kibutsuji. She looked up at Kyojuro, her eyes glowing slightly, "Stand back"