His Descendant

Chapter 4 - Where did you go?

Kyojuro's POV

I came back from my mission, and right now I've just arrived home. Something's a bit... off. Senjuro would usually be outside training, and if he's inside he would always run out to greet me. Now it's like he's gone, and the estate is lifeless. Where could he have gone?

~

"Senjuro? Senjuro, where are you?" Kyojuro was very worried, he had never been ignored for this long. "Senjuro, this isn't funny. Where are you?" Kyojuro decided he was going to ask his father. 

"Chichiue, have you seen Senjuro?" Kyojuro asked through the door after knocking. "No, I haven't, and it's not like I care. Now leave me alone." He plainly responded. Kyojuro was used to this kind of response, and he leaves him be like he always does. He went to the dining room and found a small note on the hazoken. He recognized Senjuro's tidy handwriting on it.

'To whoever reads this, If this is still in the same spot I've left it, that means I'm not at home yet. I went to the village to do some errands.' That is what the letter read. Kyojuro was confused. He would never leave near lunchtime and would always leave early morning so that he could come back at lunchtime. What was taking him so long? 

Kyojuro decided to wait for him to come back. He waited... and waited... and waited... and waited.

Before he had realized it's been an hour and he was getting restless. He decided to go to the village to go get Senjuro. He tried his best to hide the hint of worriedness. "Chichiue, I'm going to the village to find Senjuro." He said while knocking on the shoji to his father's room. No response, as per usual. Not like he was expecting one anyway.

Kyojuro arrived at the village to see that it was really crowded. The bustling life of the townspeople. Still though, no trace of Senjuro. He wasn't usually one to lose track of time, which worried him even more. He decided to go around and ask shop owners about Senjuro's whereabouts. He knows Senjuro wouldn't wander off alone, especially if he isn't familiar with the surroundings.

To his disappointment, the only responses he'd ever get were "Oh, of course! He was here just a couple hours ago", or "The last thing I saw from him, he was walking into a crowd". Apparently, he had traced Senjuro's tracks, but after that, he just disappeared without a trace. He started feeling uneasy and his gut was telling him that something was terribly wrong. His suspicion peaked when he saw multiple separated people wearing hoods, wandering the streets. They looked very secretive and mysterious, and they appeared to have sheathed swords in their belts. It looked like nichirin blades.

He saw one of them, just a couple of feet away from him. They slipped through an alleyway and Kyojuro immediately went after them. As expected, he easily caught up and held them to the wall by their neck while asking, "Who are you? What did you do to my brother?" His eyebrows narrowed while he glared at them. They responded with a weak "I don't know," in which he shot back, "You know. I can tell you know." The person then seemed to bite into something in their mouth, in which their mouth was filled with a white foam-ish substance. Their consciousness immediately slipped and their heartbeat weakened. 'They had killed themself so they didn't have to tell me,' Kyojuro thought. He sighed and moved through the alleyway, back into the crowd. All the other hooded people were now silently walking away or gone. He hesitated on following them, but before he made the decision, he looked up and saw a crow, his crow.

"Caw! Caw! Urgent! Caw! Hashira meeting! Your presence is requested by the Master! Caw!" It announced. 'A hashira meeting?' Kyojuro thought. The previous hashira meeting was before his encounter with Uppermoon 3, during Tanjiro, his tsuguko's trial. His stress was piling up, and it was never like this before. He still hadn't got any information on Senjuro's whereabouts, but the meeting couldn't wait.

Once he arrived at HQ, most of his fellow hashira were already there, and soon after he arrived the meeting started. "Good morning, my lovely swordsmen. Wonderful day today, isn't it?" It started as always. "It relieves me to see you in good health, Oyakata-sama," chirped Shinobu. "Arigato, Kocho-san." He continued, "I have called you in for a meeting today about something not about any demon, however regarding the sighting of a clan. It isn't clear whether it is on our side or not, so it is either we are not alone on our demon slaying trip or we have another opponent other than the demons." 

Kyojuro tensed up slightly. His mind immediately went to Muzan or the hooded people he saw back in the village. What other reason would they have nichirin blades? But then, if they were really on their side, they wouldn't have done something to Senjuro. That also doesn't explain why one that he tried to talk to committed suicide as if they were keeping something they didn't want him to know. Whatever it was, he knew that something wasn't a good something. "Regarding this I will put Iguro and Kocho on a mission to sneak in and investigate the clan. I am only asking you to find as much information of the clan as possible. The only information we have right now is that their uniforms are black, like ours, with a hood and green masks with a yellow stripe on the top." Kyojuro tensed up even more. That directly fit the description of the hooded people he saw earlier in the village.

However, he wasn't aware that his expressions and worried aura wasn't going unnoticed. He was being monitored by his adopted brother, the snake pillar, Iguro Obanai, and his current girlfriend of a year, Kanroji Mitsuri, the love pillar. Both were wondering why he was so anxious when he was usually smiling as bright as the rays of the sun. Once the meeting ended, everyone was doing their separate thing. Tengen was talking to Kagaya-sama, Shinobu was 'chatting' with Giyuu, and Sanemi was with Gyomei and Obanai. Muichiro had already left. What Kyojuro didn't notice, was that one of the two who noticed decided to confront him about it. Mitsuri.

"Kyojuro? May I ask you something?" She timidly approached him. "Sure, what is it you need Kanroji?" He smiled. "Are you okay? Is something bothering you?" 

Kyojuro's smile faded. He didn't want to have to tell anyone, he doesn't need any more problems at the moment. Especially someone like Mitsuri, who will definitely get worried. "No, I'm alright. Thank you for asking." He forced another smile onto his face. Mitsuri knew him too well for this. "No, no you're not okay. Tell me what's wrong, tell me what's bothering you. I want to help, please?" "I'm fine, Kanroji. Really. You don't have to worry!" She was getting on his last nerve, and apparently, she wasn't done yet. "Rengoku-san-" That's when something snapped in him. "I SAID I'M FINE!" It was like his ears rang as he realized what he had said. He yelled, too.

'Uh oh, there it goes. I said too much, it overflowed. Why do I always spill?'

Mitsuri was in horror. He looked around and everyone was staring right at him, even Oyakata-sama.

'What have I done?'

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A/N

ANNNDDDD CUT! I don't need to say 'juicy stuff' for you guys to know. You know. But dang, this chapter was the longest chapter of all with over 1200 words! It has more than 2x the length of the previous chapter. Thank you guys for all the support, I had a lot of fun writing this! Sorry if it took so long. 

Anyways, the story is getting more intense, and more problems are arising. I would once again like to sincerely apologize to not you guys, but to our poor flame angel Kyojuro 😭 I made you suffer so much in this AU. But hey, soon his family will get an equal amount (😏😏)

The next chapter will be about more Senjuro getting kidnapped stuff, Kyojuro dealing with his... issue at the headquarters going on right now, and uh yeah. Also, the end of S2, episode 11 (which is going to be 46 minutes 😏) Is right around the corner! I'm sooo excited, but I just don't want season 2 to end yet 😔. Let's just hope we don't have to wait that long for season 3 aaanddd that they will give me at least 1 second of Rengoku content/reference this episode (totally not my wish every episode). I hope you guys enjoyed and are excited for the next one! Peace out!