My vision was fading in and out but I still continued to glaze at Nezuko hoping that she could resist, praying that something would stop this madness.
"What's the matter, demon? You know you want it" Sanemi said.
"Tanjiro....Nezuko. Protect, protect. I promise I'll protect you, it's okay" I whispered, reaching my hand out as I noticed Tanjiro was standing on the veranda. Letting out a scream like noise Nezuko turned and ran towards me and grabbed me holding me close to her while tears streamed down her face hitting my face.
"It's okay, I'm here, I'll protect you I promise. I won't let anything happen to you ever again, even if, even if" I whispered my vision starting to go black.
"HIKARU!" Tanjiro screamed before turning and grabbing my box and racing towards me and throwing the box open.
"What just happened?" Master asked.
"The demon girl left Sanemi to help the injured boy and it seems the injured boy is dying" The girl answered.
"Dying?" Uzui yelled, jumping up, shocking everyone.
"Come on, come on, one of these will help but which one?" Tanjiro panicked.
"Third bottle, second row" I whispered out and Tanjiro grabbed the bottle and took the cork out and shoved it into my mouth forcing me to swallow the elixir.
"That will...will," I tried but my head was still fuzzy as the elixir got to work. The elixir was to help me regain some of the blood that I had lost but I had lost a lot of blood and only doing the breathing techniques were keeping me alive right now.
"So now, it's been proven that Nezuko won't attack humans," Master said, taking the attention off us which I was grateful for.
"What do you think you're doing, Tomioka?" Oburo asked.
"Tanjiro, Hikaru, nevertheless some may still view Nezuko unfavorably. You must prove it to them starting now that you and Nezuko can fight as demon slayers. That you can be useful" Master said and both of us bowed while Nezuko was still hugging one of my arms so she came down with us.
"Go out and defeat one of the Twelve Kizuki. Do that and you'll be accepted by all and your words will carry more weight" Master said.
"I don't care about the twelve Kizuki. Me, Tanjiro and Nezuko will defeat Kibutsuji Muzan" I declared unknowingly my eyes were once more glowing making everyone stare at them.
"As you're not ready for that yet Hikaru, let's start by defeating one of the Twelve Kizuki all right?" Master asked amused and I blushed bright scarlet red to match my hair as I noticed that the Hashira were all amused, either laughing or trying to stop themselves from laughing.
"It goes without saying that the hashira of the demon slayer corps have phenomenal skills. After training themselves to death, they have defied it and they've also defeated members of the twelve kizuki" Master said.
"Mm a good attitude to have!" Rengoku complimented.
"That is why the Hashira have received respect and are welcomed by others so Tanjiro, Hikaru, mind your manners when you speak" Master said.
"Mm" I said, I didn't respect anyone unless they respected me as well and I could tell half of these people didn't respect me.
"Yes sir" Tanjiro said, shooting me a look but I ignored it.
"One more thing. Sanemi, Obanai, don't torment the younger ones too much" Master smiled.
"As you wish" Obanai said.
"As you wish" Sanemi said while bowing as I helped Nezuko back into her box.
"Tanjiro, Hikaru we have concluded our business with you. You may step back" Master said.
"In that case please allow Kamado and Akatsuki to stay in my mansion" Shinobu offered.
"All right then, take them away please" Shinobu said. A girl in the demon corps uniform from before carefully picked up Nezuko in her box while another headed for Tanjiro who had stepped off the veranda and another headed to me.
"Pardon me for cutting in front of you" said the one getting Tanjiro and then bowed to the Master and the Hashira before taking off with Tanjiro.
"I can walk by myself" I said with a glare to the guy that was heading for me. Carefully I stepped off the veranda with my box on my back hissing in pain but I didn't show it as I continued to walk away.
"Now then, let us begin the hashira meeting" Master started.
"Just a moment Master, you Akatsuki Hikaru" Uzui said, making me pause in my slow leave and turn to him. All the other hashira were looking at him curiously since they wanted to know what he wanted with me, even Sanemi was looking at him with a furious curiosity. After getting a nod from the Master, Uzui turned to me fully.
"You are from the Akatsuki family are you not?" Uzui asked and I looked at the ground clenching my fists.
"No," I said, making him look shocked.
"Not anymore at least, I dishonored my family and have no right to ever call myself Akatsuki anymore. Instead I call myself Akatsuki as that is the name that my Sensei Urokodaki gave me after I completed the test to become a demon slayer" I explained.
"I see, may I ask a question of you?" Uzui asked shocked the hashira and Master since Uzui only normally was polite to the master.
"Who dared to cut your hair? Tell me who it was and I will put their head on a platter for you for daring to commit such a crime and not killing themselves" Uzui snarled, his aura overflowing with anger and fury. The aura though wasn't towards me but instead it was towards the one that had cut my hair making me shocked.
"If you want to know the one that cut it, then that would be me but if you want to know the reason it got cut it was because of Kibutsuji Muzan" I said before I did a half hearted bow and left.
"May I ask why you wished to know about Hikaru?" Master asked.
"Yes sir, I have known members of the Akatsuki family before they were driven to the brink of extinction and I believed that Hikaru was one of the few Akatsuki that have survived and I wished to know if that was true or not," Uzui said.
"What's so important about his hair?" Sanemi demanded.
"An Akatsuki is forbidden from ever cutting their hair unless it is to trim the dead ends off, to cut their hair makes them a disgrace to the family and means they have dishonored their family so they no longer bear the name Akatsuki" Uzui explained.
"What happens to someone that has cut their hair?" Giyu asked.
"Normally the person that cut the Akatsuki's hair is killed by the Akatsuki and then the Akatsuki commits senpuku" Uzui said with a growl making them all go silent at least until the Master started the meeting.
"Hello, pardon the intrusion," called the girl who was carrying Nezuko as we got to a large mansion and entered the grounds. It hadn't taken long for me to catch up with them once I left the Hashira's and Tanjiro had kept looking at me over and over.
"No one's coming to the door huh?" the man holding Tanjiro asked.
"Let's check around the garden" The girl suggested.
"Can't you walk on your own?" The boy asked Tanjiro.
"I'm sorry, it's just that my whole body is aching like crazy" Tanjiro apologised, the battle had finally caught up with him.
"The headquarters were pretty good but this mansion's something else" I said looking around and seeing all the butterflies.
"Hey there's someone, someones here" The boy said and I looked to see the girl that had knocked out Tanjiro and I had fought in the forest. Come to think about it, she was also the girl that was at the final selection as well.
"That would be. Oh right! The Tsuguko her name is" The girl said trying to think of the girls name.
"That's Lady Tsuyuri Kanao" The boy said.
"It's the girl from the final selection," Tanjiro noted.
"Hey, somebody's forgotten how they got stomped on by Lady Kanao last night" the man said.
"Someone has forgotten that I fought her to a stand still" I said with a raised eyebrow.
"A tsuguko is a swordsman being trained by a hashira, only the most talented and highly skilled get selected and she's a girl, impressive huh?" The boy said and I just glanced at him, he was obviously embarrassed about how he had forgotten that I had stopped Kanao but I would forget it this time.
"Please forgive us, Lady Tsuyuri. We come on orders from Lady Kocho. May we enter the mansion?" the girl asked. An awkward silence appeared when Kanao didn't reply.
"May we?" The girl asked again but Kanao just smiled.
"If it's all right?" The girl tried again.
"And who are you?" A voice asked from behind us making all of them jump but I had already seen her emotions plus it would hurt too much to jump in fright right now.
"We were ordered by Lady Kocho," The girl explained.
"I see, you're a Kakushi. You've brought an injured person correct? Please come this way" The new girl asked before we followed along with her.
"Five times?! I gotta take this five times? A day? And I have to keep taking this medicine for three months. If I take this, I can't eat anything! I mean it's really bitter! It's such an ordeal! So you mean my arms and legs will heal just by taking medicine? For real? Listen, are they really going to heal? Tell me how they're going to get healed!" I heard yelled, it was a familiar yell.
"Would you please stop shouting?" I heard a quieter voice.
"So this guy is still going on" the girl leading us said as we got to the door and sure enough looking in there was Zenitsu screaming and crying while sitting on a hospital bed.
"Please calm down. Didn't we already explain it to you numerous times? If you don't stop this nonsense now, we'll tie you down" The girl yelled.
"Zenitsu" Tanjiro smiled, making Zenitsu yell.
"Are you okay? Did you hurt yourself? So you did come up the mountain after all" Tanjiro said.
"T-Tanjiro, Hikaru" Zenitsu stuttered.
"Listen to me, will you? I got stung by this stinky spider and the poison hurt like crazy and that girl's been yelling at me all this time! I hate my life!" Zenitsu said crying onto the front of the Kakushi making me hold my laughter in.
"Wait a moment, Zenitsu, did you get smaller or something? I was sure you were bigger before" I said.
"I almost got turned into a spider, my arms and legs are really short right now" Zenitsu explained and I was kind of disgusted by the snot he left on the kakushi that was still connected to him.
"So that's what happened. Where's Inosuke? Have you seen Murata?" Tanjiro questioned.
"I don't know about anyone named Murata but Inosuke's right next to me," Zenitsu said.
"Thank goodness he is alright" I whispered to myself, seeing the boar mask wearing boy there. The last time I had seen him he was going up against that spider faced freak and I got taken by Rui. Suddenly Tanjiro lent too far to the side, falling to the ground, making me blink and look down at him.
"Inosuke, I'm so glad that you're alright. I'm so sorry I couldn't come help you" Tanjiro cried.
"Me too, I'm sorry I left you all alone Inosuke" I said.
"It's okay don't worry about it" Inosuke said but his voice was way deeper than before, his throat probably got damaged. Hearing the kakushi freak out about getting some paper to clean his shirt I reached into my box and pulled out some tissues making him bow his head before beginning to clean himself up.
"Apparently his throat got crushed, I don't have all the details but I heard he was like snatched by the neck and when he yelled at the top of his lungs at the end that finished it off. And now his throat is in really bad shape" Zenitsu explained. Remembering back when Inosuke screamed out to me I looked at the ground knowing that didn't help his throat any.
"Maybe he's depressed now so he's been mellow which is really funny" He continued before starting to laugh, making me reach over and slap the back of his head.
"It's not funny at all" I scowled, making Zenitsu stop.
"I'm sorry for being so weak" Inosuke apologised.
"Hang in there Inosuke it's not like you to get depressed" Tanjiro tried to encourage.
"Come on, you did good, you're awesome," Zenitsu said.
"You were strong Inosuke because you survived against that giant demon that would have killed any of us if we went against it," I smiled.
"Ah did I take my morning meds? Did you see me take them? Somebody? Did you see?" Zenitsu started to freak out.
"We will see to your wounds now" A person called out and the kakushi finally got to leave while Tanjiro and I followed the girl from before.
"I can see to my own wounds if you would point me in the direction of a room I may borrow" I said.
"We can-" She started.
"I would prefer to see to my own wounds" I said with a hard glare that had her backing down before showing me to a room that I could borrow.
Once the curtains were drawn, the door shut and the lights turned on I opened up my box and grabbed out the different elixirs I would need and got ready. Taking my clothes off until I was down to boxers was painful as I felt my wounds twist, stretch and rip but I just hissed and continued. Next was taking off the makeshift bandages that I had to use on the go along with the tattered pieces of my haori. Now that everything was out of the way I could focus on the wounds, first I had to deal with the wounds that I needed to put stitches in so quickly I threaded my medical needle and disinfected it before getting to work after numbing the skin around the wounds.
"Hikaru-san I heard that you did not wish to have help with your wounds" A voice called before the door was opened. Looking up from the cut that I was stitching shut I saw Shinobu and Giyu standing there with wide eyes.
"I am in the middle finishing up stitching the last of my wounds up so unless you want to watch could you let me finish" I said before turning towards my arm again and continuing to finish that wound.
"Actually now that you are here, could you assess me?" I questioned.
"Of course, what do you need help with?" Shinobu asked.
"I need to stitch the two wounds on my back closed but obviously I can't reach so could you do it for me? If you can't, I can just get Tanjiro to do it" I said.
"No it's fine" Shinobu said before walking towards and helping me out. Giyu on the other hand decided to wait outside the room until I was finished seeing to my wounds. It took me a total of three hours after Shinobu left to see Tanjiro's wounds once she had stitched my wounds up to finally finish disinfecting, stitching and bandaging up all of my wounds. Opening the door and leaving the door after having cleaned it up and putting my box on my back I looked to see Giyu was still standing there leaning against the door.
"You didn't have to wait for me, you know?" I said with a raised eyebrow wondering why he was here.
"Your wounds" He said before stopping himself.
"They are fine and I will make a full recovery in a few days other than scars and of course my broken collar bone will take a bit longer to heal" I said.
"I see," Giyu said.
"Hey Giyu," I said as we continued to walk down the hallway towards where the others were resting since that is where I would be sleeping while staying in the Butterfly Mansion.
"Do you think, if I send a letter to Urokodaki-sensei. Do you think he would make me another warding mask and Haori, mine got destroyed while I was battling" I said looking down. I was surprised when a hand patted my hair.
"I am sure he will make them for you and send them straight away if you contact him about them" He reassured me before leaving without a word, making me smile a little before entering the room.
Zenitsu and Inosuke were asleep and Tanjiro was laying down and resting while looking up at the ceiling.
"Hey Hikaru, how are you?" Tanjiro asked.
"My wounds have all been seen to now and it will heal in time, I'm just glad all of us are alive" I said with a small smile.
"That was mostly thanks to you, the amount of wounds you got protecting me and Nezuko and then fighting for us again today as well" Tanjiro said.
"I told you before, I will never let anything happen to you and Nezuko so long as I am here to stop it. I guess that goes for Zenitsu and Inosuke as well now" I said.
"Hey Hikaru" Tanjiro called and I turned towards him only to be surprised when he reached over and connected our lips in a sweet and gentle kiss.
"Thank you" Tanjiro said before rolling over to rest. Reaching my hand up I traced my lips before smiling and grabbing my supplies out of my box and got to work. A few hours later when the sun was starting to set Tanjiro left with Nezuko's box since Shinobu had offered her a room so she didn't have to stay cramped in the box. On my lap was a larger picture then I normally did but it was just as breathtaking as always. There staring up at me from the paper with giant smiles on their faces were Rui and his family. Maybe they weren't happy in real life but I preferred to remember everyone with a smile on their faces. After putting that picture away I got started on another one which was a picture of the Hashira and Master but before I finished I drifted off to sleep not seeing someone enter the room.
"Hmm, so he is the one that I thought he was. He still has such beautiful pictures" The person whispered, brushing a hand over the scars on my face before laying something on the bedside table before leaving the room like he was never there.