The Demon Queen

The Culprit

TW: grotesque injury

We walked halfway across the bridge, our arms linked together. Muzan had a haughty smile on his face as we stopped in the middle of the bridge and locked our eyes on our new prey.

The bloodied young man turned onto the bridge and spotted us. He stopped for a moment and stared, not uttering a word.

"My, my, what a mess you've made here. It was you, wasn't it?" Muzan said to the young man. "Such a pity to find a mere human behind all of this. I was anticipating to find one of my rogue demons gone berserk and was looking forward to an execution."

Muzan, you really don't need to make a show of this, but fine, I thought.

Still staring at us, the young man opened his mouth. "Move out of my way," he said. "Or you're --"

Holding a tad firmer onto my arm, Muzan jolted us forward so that we stood directly in front of the bloodied young man.

"Dead," the young man finished his sentence.

Muzan stabbed his hand through the young man's right eye. His hand penetrated the young man's entire head and his fingers were left poking through past his short black hair.

Muzan looked at me. "Sakura, do you remember how we were talking about putting together a group of 12 strong demons?"

He had mentioned it several times over the decades, deciding that we needed a collection of sort of bodyguards to protect us against the Demon Slayer Corps. I agreed with him, believing it to be a good strategy. I also didn't want to have contact with the Demon Slayer Corps and found the bodyguards to also be useful to hunt down the slayers and kill them.

"Yeah, I remember," I answered him.

Muzan looked to the young man, who barely remained alive from the incredible wound inflicted in his skull. "Shall we take on this little man if he survives the transformation?"

"Sure."

It really didn't matter to me. This guy was as good as any.

"Let's see how much of my blood you can bear," Muzan said to the young man. "What do you think? Do you think you can become one of our strongest demons?"

A raspy breath slipped past the young man's mouth. "I don't ... care anymore ..." he said in a breathy voice.

He can still talk? I thought in surprise. This guy really is a weird human.

Muzan smirked. "You don't care?" he asked, a bit mockingly. "You'll have to fix your attitude to be our servant." He twisted his hand in the young man's skull, causing blood to ooze out of the wound.

He doesn't even flinch in pain.

"I want to become strong ..." the young man said. "That's all."

A moment of silence passed. Muzan looked intentionally at the young man.

"I believe we will understand each other," he said. "Now, hang on before you die. And clear your mind of all those things you don't care about."

He flooded the young man's body with his blood.