(y/n)'s POV
Whoa...
I'm simply at a loss for words. This district is bustling with activity. I've never seen an atmosphere like this before.
"Now listen up." Uzui says. "This place is big, and you can easily get lost. So stick with me and don't get distracted."
"Bit too late for that." I say.
"What?" Uzui replies, looking back at me.
Zenitsu and Inosuke have already been engulfed by the activity of the district. Separated from us.
Uzui wastes no time and quickly tracks them down, wrangling them like sheep.
When the group is back together, Uzui leads us to a hotel of sorts. And into a room, where he begins to talk about our mission.
To summarize our debriefing, Uzui has 3 wives (Zenitsu didn't like that), and they've been gathering and feeding intel to the Corps about a strong demon in this area. Uzui explained that this demon is most likely a member of the Twelve Kizuki.
He then brings us to our mission. He says that his wives haven't been sending their regularly scheduled intel, and he worries that they've been caught. So we're supposed to infiltrate the 3 main courtesan houses that Uzui sent his wives to, and to find clues about their whereabouts.
"So, you three." Uzui says, pointing to Tanjiro, Zenitsu and Inosuke. "You'll be disguised and 'sold' to these houses to gather clues."
"Wait, what about me?" I ask, realizing he never pointed to me.
"I don't need more than one person at each house, it would be a waste of manpower and time. You'll be searching the entire district with me." Uzui says.
Later...
Uzui finally is done, having sneaked Tanjiro, Zenitsu and Inosuke into their respective courtesan houses, he discards the clothes he's been using to disguise himself in and jumps onto a roof in his signature battle attire.
"So, (y/n), I've heard about your battle on that train, you know, that one." Uzui says, surveying the district.
"Oh... what about it?" I say, not wanting to remember to ordeal I went through.
"A few days ago, Shinobu told all the Hashira about a time you told her of your ability to clone yourself. Is that true?" Uzui says. "If it is, it'd be helpful for surveying a large area right about now."
"Oh, that." I reply. "Lady Shinobu does know about that technique, but I can't use it right now."
"Why not?" Uzui asks. "Using it would exponentially decrease our search time."
"Well, Shinobu told me that using the technique doesn't technically 'create' a clone of me, it just speeds up my own cells' ability to duplicate and uses all those extra cells to form another version of me." I explain.
"Okay. But that doesn't explain why you can't use it." Uzui says.
"I was getting to that." I reply. "You see, because some cells in the body are not meant to duplicate, either at all or at the rate the technique forces it to, it ultimately could just destroy the cells' energy supply and the cell itself."
I pause and take a deep breath, and Uzui seems to get where I'm going.
"Take my spinal cord cells for example, they're never meant to duplicate again after finishing growing, but since I forced them to, now the energy of that cell has been decreased to critical levels. So now I risk losing that cell, and risk being paralyzed."
"I see, so you only use it as a last resort." Uzui says.
I nod.
"Well, then looks like we're going to do this the not-so-flashy way." Uzui says. "I can scout every sector besides the central area. It's super dense and populated, I'd stand out. Think you can handle it?"
"You bet!" I reply.
"Good. Meet me later, exactly 8 hours from now." Uzui says, before instantly jumping away at an incredibly high speed.
Following Uzui's orders, I survey the center of the district. And Uzui was not joking, this area alone had at least twenty times more people than my entire village. Even though it was the dead of night, the area still bustled like it was noon.
"How am I going to look for a wife whose appearance I don't know or for a demon who can easily blend in with a crowd like this?" I ask myself.
A couple hours later...
"This is hopeless!" I say in frustration.
I've probably searched every handful of dirt at this point. The sun as already risen. Not a single thing was out of the ordinary.
I decide to head back to Uzui, but as I'm on the rooftops, I see 2 familiar figures on the roof adjacent to me.
"Is that Tanjiro and Inosuke?" I ask myself, deciding to go over.
"There was this demon! Inside the walls! It was slithering and twisting all over the place!" Inosuke says. "Like this!"
Inosuke twists and flails his arms wildly as an example, but Tanjiro doesn't follow.
"(y/n), do you understand what kind of demon that is?" Tanjiro asks me.
"Don't ask me. I just arrived here." I reply.
Suddenly, Uzui arrives on the rooftop, but something's off about him. Did he realize his wives' fate?
"Zenitsu won't be arriving." Uzui says.
"What? What do you mean?!" All three of us ask in shock, almost unable to comprehend what we just heard.
"I'm sorry I dragged you all into this. My want to see my wives, fearful that a tragedy had occurred, had only lead to more tragedy." Uzui says. "You're incapable of fighting against an Upper Moon. You are dismissed from the mission, you may head back home. There's no shame in it."
Uzui leaves right after. Leaving us three in shock.
"Zenitsu? Not coming back? What kind of sick joke is this?" I ask in complete disbelief.
"There's no way I'm leaving from a mission! I'm going to retrieve Monitsu and kill that demon myself!" Inosuke says.
"Wait." Tanjiro says. "Maybe he's right. Our ranks are the lowest, too low for such a powerful demon."
"Lowest? What do you mean?" Inosuke says. "We've ranked up, look."
Inosuke holds out his hand and flexes his arm, stating his name clearly while doing so.
A rank appears on the backside of his hand: Kanoe.
"See? We're not the lowest!" Inosuke says, igniting the sparks of hope within us.
One plan discussion later...
"You both head back to your respective houses, and I'll try to find Uzui and try to convince him to let us stay."
We all simultaneously nod in agreement, and split up. I go off to search for Uzui, jumping roof to roof.
"Surely looking for a tall, 6 and 1/2 foot (~198 cm) man in broad daylight won't be that hard right?" I say to myself.
Hours later...
"How is he so hard to find?!" I say aloud.
I continue running on the rooftops, but at this point I'm too tired, and soon I sit down. The sun had set a while ago, so if looking for Uzui during broad daylight was impossible, why even try nighttime?
As I'm catching my breath, I suddenly see the wall of the house in front of me burst open, jolting me up to my feet. Tanjiro flies through the wall and into the house I'm currently ontop of.
"Tanjiro! Are you okay?!" I say to him.
I then look at his attacker, I see a demon. A woman, a beautiful one at that. But it's not her body that my eyes are drawn to, it's her eyes. On them, are engraved the words "Upper 6"
A.N - Burnout is real guys. Can't believe it took me this long to finish 1 chapter. I'll be slowing down my schedule, but hopefully I can recover soon.