Chapter Text
“Kibutsuji Muzan is dead!”
What a curious statement…
For over hundreds of years he'd stood next to that person, Kokushibo had never thought one day he would hear that sentence.
He couldn't help but let out a bitter laugh.
If his lordship were to witness, he would remark that it was a bizarre demeanour, one he never expected to see from him.
He blamed it on the peculiar state he was in—stranded in an endless stretch of darkness, floating in non-existent air. Surely, that was the cause of such a reaction he had thought to be impossible.
But so many impossible things had already happened tonight.
So is this truly the end of the strongest Upper Moon?
Kokushibo had never thought this day would come.
Pathetic.
He recalled his hands around his sword. But when looking back through the thick nothingness, the memories were twisted and ugly, unlike they had ever been, that he had to turn away with dread.
His swordsmanship—once unrivaled, second to none—was now a vague memory, shifted back and forth and kaleidoscopic, until he wasn’t sure who was who anymore.
He could have been the one who danced with the inhumanly long sword. Or the other person, small as a child, who threw himself fearlessly at the horrifying demon despite the split-second tremble. Or even the hulking man not far behind.
Crimson blood dripped from his hairline into his eyes, dark as ink bleeding on paper. It soaked his hand, drenched them entirely, but he couldn’t even remember. Whose blood was it? How many?
He couldn’t remember.
And what was this place?
There was only empty darkness, not even a fracture of light. He could, somehow, still see, but he knew it stretched on even farther. The air was thick; his breaths came shallow.
He was awake and conscious, yet it fellt as if he was asleep, floating in a dream, watching someone’s memories rewind again and again in front of him.
The memories of this man in purple, with ink-dark long hair and terrifying grace.
He though he had met this man before.
A sharp chill crept slowly into his heart. It spreaded, making his entire body start to shiver. Then, in the next second, it burned; starting from deep within, scorching him from inside out.
In those moments when all his senses began to blur—maybe because of the pool on the rim of his eyes, or this peculiar world suddenly started to waver—he couldn’t really tell. One thing was clear to him…
So this is death.
His heartbeat echoed in his ears.
Was he…scared?
Well, he supposed it was whatever it was.
He tried to take in another difficult breath.
His eyelids felt heavy.
The rhythm inside his chest became slower.
Slower.
And slower.
Until all the sounds dimmed into silence.
Until his own heart faded to stillness.