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"ugh, shit! if she dies on me and I don't get this damn bracelet off, I'm sending you to hell and back", sukuna snarled as even though he had snatched the blue demon's arm, it had quickly regenerated and charged towards its king.
the demon twitched as it still had willpower to fight, to which sukuna had muttered a string of curses as he couldn't activate his domain with the bracelet on.
"fucking hell", sukuna spat as he quickly ended it by cutting the demon into pieces, hastily gouging the bead out its chest so that it couldn't regenerate.
sukuna then hid the jaded bead in his white kimono, dirtying it in the process with some blood as he sighed, trudging over to the unconscious priestess.
"oi, wake up", sukuna commanded, to which the male had clicked his tongue when he received no response.
kneeling down beside the heavily panting priestess, sukuna flipped the girl around so that her nose was pointing up towards the sky.
sukuna watched for a moment as he observed how ragged kiyo's breathing was. sweat was oozing down the girl's forehead as her lips paled along with her eyes shut.
"hey, are you actually dead?", sukuna asked, moving the back of his hand onto the girl's forehead as it was burning up.
"...po..poi...son...", kiyo weakly muttered out, to which sukuna had strained to hear the girl's words as he had suddenly remembered how fragile humans were.
"ah~ well, if I save you right now, remember to take my bracelet off when you heal", sukuna hummed, to which even though the priestess was terribly ill, her mind still held some clearness to it.
"no", kiyo coughed out, to which sukuna had made a displeased expression.
"no? you're literally dying right now and you think you're in the position to decline?", sukuna scoffed.
"...even...if I..die...I will...not...set...you...free...", kiyo huffed, turning her head sideways as she gave up on fighting the pain.
the girl's abilities were quite flexible when it came to combat, however, her healing powers were quite average — maybe even below.
kiyo couldn't heal herself if her hands could not reach the body part — her back as of currently — hence the girl was unable to cleanse out the poison and bandage herself.
sukuna just deeply chuckled as he leaned against a nearby tree, resting as he awaited for the priestess to give up.
"oi, it's afternoon already. just how fucking stubborn are you?", the male growled, to which sukuna could barely hear kiyo's breathing anymore, making him click his tongue in irritation.
sukuna could either let the girl die right now or let her live, to which she might loosen his bracelet a bit so that he'd be able to expand his domain.
'what a pain in the ass'.
with one smooth motion, the pink-haired demon had swooped the girl up like a sack of potatoes as he headed towards the village, knocking on the chief's door as the old man stumbled around.
"o-oh my...what happened to lady kiyo?"
"shut the fuck up and fix her. if she's dead by tonight then I'll massacre this entire village by morning", sukuna grunted, shoving the old man as he entered his shabby little hut.
"h-h-honey, w-we've got g-guests", the old man stuttered as his wife had frantically ran out of the kitchen, wiping her hands on her apron as she covered her mouth.
"oh goodness! please place her down with her chest on the futon", the woman instructed as sukuna did as told, observing as the woman had raised a brow.
"I'm about to unsheathe her, please step out", the old woman stated, to which sukuna had hesitated as he left nevertheless.
the old man brought a bowl of steaming hot water and a dry towel as he too left his wife to take care of the wounded priestess.
"is lady kiyo a friend of yours or..."
"did I give permission for you to speak to me?", sukuna rudely scowled, crossing his arms as he stood outside, expecting this to be over in a moment's worth of time.
"s-sorry", the old man apologized, to which sukuna had only scoffed.
it wasn't until thirty minutes in that the sun had already set and there was still no news about the girl.
"the hell is taking so long?", sukuna muttered, making the old man softly chuckle.
"huh? and what are you laughing at, old man?"
the chief only swatted his hand as he sighed. "young man, you just reminded me of when I was younger. I too was quite impatient when my wife was giving birth. I paced around while muttering curses as I awaited for the birthing maid to bring me my first child".
sukuna raised a brow, wondering what was so exciting about a birth of another pathetic human.
"was it really worth the wait?", sukuna asked, to which the old man had nodded.
"seeing your firstborn with the woman that you've decided to spend eternity with is simply a blessing", the old man chuckled, stroking his grayish-whitish beard as he reminisced on the past.
"woman? only one?", sukuna asked, actually in shock as he's heard that there were humans that had multiple wives.
the old man hummed. "well yes...only daimyos and higher ups could afford to have more than one wife, but I'm happy with my one and only. I need no others", the chief explained, giving the demon a wrinkly smile.
"isn't that quite boring though; sticking with only one woman throughout your entire life?"
'well I suppose humans don't live that long anyways', sukuna internally monologued.
"when you find the right one, you'll realize that other women can't even compare", the old man said, to which his wife had swiftly exited after nonstop working.
"I've successfully extracted the poison from her body, applied some medical herbs, and bandaged her back. it'll take a while for her to wake up though", the woman informed, to which sukuna had only grunted, walking away as the old couple glanced at each other, sharing a slight chuckle.
"young love", the two said at the same time, causing them to laugh even more as the old man escorted his wife into their shared hut.
kiyo's breathing finally stabilized as her eyes struggled to open.
the priestess tried sitting up only to feel the pain spread like wildfire from her back, to which she had gotten a better look at her surroundings as she propped herself up on her elbows.
recognizing this as someone's home, the girl mustered all of her strength as she noticed all the bandages around her upper body, to which she had draped a thin fabric — that she found nearby — over her shoulders as she roamed around the cozy hut.
recognizing the chief from earlier today, the girl smiled as she internally thanked the couple for saving her, which made her then question where sukuna was.
quietly stepping out of the straw house with the dark blue fabric, the moon greeted the girl as she squinted her eyes, taking a few steps towards the entrance of the village as a presence had suddenly appeared behind her.
"I see you didn't die. pity", sukuna smirked, to which kiyo had swiftly turned around, meeting the ruby eyes of the demon king as his face darkened with the moon shining behind him.
"how could I when you threatened to massacre the entire village by morning if I did?", kiyo smiled, to which sukuna's brows had furrowed.
"you were conscious".
"not exactly. I heard bits and pieces", kiyo weakly chuckled as she coughed a bit, shielding her mouth with the see-through sleeve as sukuna scoffed.
"go inside. you're going to infect me", sukuna snarled, to which kiyo just smiled.
"close your eyes first", kiyo said.
"huh? what are you gonna do, sneeze on me?"
"just do it", kiyo huffed, to which the demon had hesitantly complied as he felt a warm fabric slip across his neck.
worried that the priestess was about to choke him, his eyes had immediately shot open as he felt kiyo's thin fingers graze his neck.
"consider it as thanks for saving me today", kiyo smiled as she turned around and left, leaving sukuna alone with the moon and his newfound scarf.
sukuna snapped out of his trance as he gently touched the fabric, to with it was quite soft considering it was made of cotton, handpicked by the women of this village.
he brought the ocean blue scarf up to his nose, covering the lower half of his face.
"you're welcome".