To The Stars | Tokito Muichiro x OC

45 • The Search for Tamayo

Inori banged her head against the table until the cup of tea rattled. Her sigh was loud enough to tilt a few heads, not that she cared when she was too busy drowning in exhaustion. Kagaya may have given her a mission to find Tamayo, but a demon that has been hiding from Muzan for centuries clearly has experience. She felt like she was navigating a maze blind, running in circles and using the fact that she had been killing normal demons as a justification for her impasse.

The only silver lining she got was the small information that the demon was working as a doctor that saved humans. Inori surprisingly didn't find any news about her patients dying in any unnatural way, solidifying her hypothesis that Tamayo was a demon that didn't harm humans.

She lifted her head upon feeling an unpleasant presence that could only be carried by a demon. Inori wanted to click her tongue. Caster demons that could easily kidnap people were troublesome. Standing on her feet, Inori made quick work to slash the wall next to a child's head.

"Please don't scream too much." She didn't know whether she was directing that statement to the restaurant customers or the demon that was slowly crawling out of the wall, but her head was pounding with sleep deprivation. "Children have been disappearing every night, even right under their parent's noses. What did you do to them?"

The demon bared its teeth, gritting them loudly. "Don't get in my way, you shitty woman!" Inori didn't let it escape, swiftly stabbing its shoulder in place to the wall. She was tired and sleep-deprived, but she would do her job perfectly.

"These people gathered here because they thought no one would be taken in such a large group." Inori hissed, twisting her blade deeper. "Obviously, to a demon like you, large groups are advantageous." She drew her other sword. "But it means nothing to me, not when faced with a weakling like you. What happened to the children you took?"

She knew the answer, of course, but there may be a chance that the demon decided to store its 'food' rather than eat it immediately. Some demons were like that, so if there was even a one-in-a-million chance of the children being alive, she needed to save them.

"Isn't it obvious?" It cackled, deafening and annoying. "I ate them! Brats are small, but their meat is fresh and soft. You're too late, demon slayer! Just how many brats do you think I've—"

"I know I'm too late." Inori glared, decapitating the demon in one slash. "That's the burden of being a demon slayer. That's why I wish worthless filth like you would just burn in the sun and in hell already."

Inori rubbed her eyes, muting the desperate last babbles of a dying demon. I should rest somewhere tonight, or I'll end up passing out mid-mission. She wiped her swords before sheathing them back. Ignoring the looks the other customers were giving her, she stepped out of the restaurant.

Kanamaru perched himself on her head somewhen along the way, back from the task Inori gave him. "Caw! Nothing here! Nothing here! No Tamayo! No Tamayo! Head to the next town! Next town!"

"Yeah, I figured." Inori transferred Kanamaru to her shoulder, letting the crow nuzzle into the crook of her neck. "That's four days wasted. Please continue to search through different houses and crowds in the next town too, Kanamaru."

"Caw! Next town has a haunted house! A haunted house! People are disappearing there! Used to be a hospital! Haunted house!"

"Right." Inori sighed, feeling the exhaustion piling up on her shoulders. "Another demon. Fantastic."

·̩̩̥͙＊*•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙*˚☆.｡.☆.｡.:*☆ ˚*•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙*˚＊·̩̩̥͙

It was night by the time Inori reached the next town, and she immediately headed towards the haunted house to deal with the demon while Kanamaru circled the town looking for Tamayo.