ᴛʜᴇ ᴛʀᴀɪᴛᴏʀ ᴀᴍᴏɴɢ ᴜꜱ [Among Muichiro]

(13) Madness Into Death

Nothing was seen for a while.

Just the same empty, dull feeling and scenery.

Soon enough though, Muichiro regains consciousness, and immediately recognises the soft mattress under him without opening his eyes.

"Looks like they've found me." He thinks.

He mentally prepares what lie he's gonna spill before opening his eyelids.

The first thing he sees is Kanae, towering over him. Her previous worried expression turned to shock and relief. "He's awake!" She states.

When Muichiro moves his hands to sit up, a sudden soreness emerges from his back. Kanae extends her hands out to help him.
Inosuke stands strong next to the bed, with his arms crossed, his gaze piercing onto Muichiro, while Gyomei stands the opposite way.

At that moment, the realisation sets on how much havoc he's caused. To the point where there's only two hashiras alive.

"We found you passed out in a grave pit. Do you remember what happened?" Kanae slightly interrogates.

Muichiro gets ready to pull a scenario out of his ass again. "Well... I remember Hinatsuru piggyback riding me to the hashira graves. But then someone appeared, I don't remember who. I think it was the traitor."

Kanae's eyes widen and Inosuke turns his head back to Muichiro in shock. "Yeah, keep going." Kanae assures.

"Alright. And then I think me and her were fighting or getting ready to fight them, I'm not sure. But I don't remember anything after that." Muichiro finishes his story.

Just in that second, he thinks of another thing to do to make him seem more innocent.

"Hinatsuru!" He gasps. "Is she okay?" He asks Kanae, to come across as though he doesn't know anything.

Kanae and Inosuke both revert their eyes to the ground, unwilling to tell him the 'bad news'.

The last remaining butterfly girl gently holds Muichiro's hands. "I'm sorry..." She looks at him deeply. "She-" "Oh." He interrupts, slowly dropping his head.

With his hair covering his face, the two can't see his blank expression, as he begins to realistically fake-sob.

Kanae wraps her arms around him into a hug. "She's in a better place now. It'll be okay." She pleads not only for everyone, but herself.

A few seconds later, Muichiro vaguely lifts up his head, to see Inosuke heading towards the exit door. The grief got to him too. But he's one to let out his emotions where no one can see.

He didn't even have the time to properly cry for his friends' death. But now, it seems the situation is allowing him to. Alone.

After five minutes, Muichiro 'calms down'. Kanae decides to give him some time to himself to process the whole thing.

Luckily enough, she also gave him a pen and small book to 'distract' him.

The only thing he needs is the pen.

He tests it out, it's swift and dark. It must be new. The others that didn't have their name put down before are surely recognised now. And crossed out.

"Finally, I'm alone." Muichiro says in his mind.

After all, they were annoying him. Pretending that they care when they have their own problems.

They shouldn't care, especially for all the things he's done.

But they don't know.

Soon thinking about it too much, the bed he's sitting on gets uncomfortable. He drags his heavy legs onto the wooden plank floor, producing a hefty sound.

Muichiro stares blankly at his list.

It seems that much harder to decide who to come for next.

In his mind, he has two options.
Make one kill and wait it out and act innocent,
or go on a full-on rampage, killing everyone standing in the hashira headquarters.

*SLAM*

The sliding door opens forcefully, and Inosuke enters.

"Oi!" He shouts out. He looks down at Muichiro, pen in one hand, notepad in the other. "Whatchu got there?!"

With the teal-highlighted boy's head still in the clouds, Inosuke snatches the notepad. There, all the killed people, in order, crossed out one by one.

Obanai
Mitsuri
Giyu
Shinobu
Kanao
Aoi
Rengoku
Uzui
Zenitsu
Tanjiro
Nezuko
Sanemi
Hinatsuru

Inosuke goes completely silent from shock for a moment. "W-what is this?!?!" His grasp on the paper grows. After a few seconds, he rapidly throws it to the side.

"What is all this shit?!?!?!? YOU KILLED THEM, RIGHT?!?!?" He brings his fist up while shouting.

Muichiro looks at him with the familiar vacant look. "Yes."

"H-... you're not getting away with it that easily!!! FIGHT ME! RIGHT HERE RIGHT NOW! If I win, you have to tell me WHY THE FUCK YOU WOULD KILL EVERYONE!!!!!!!" Inosuke's veins from his fists become visible.

But to no avail, Muichiro knows it can be that easy. If it wasn't, then why wasn't he caught out as soon as the first kill happened?

That's because everyone trusts him. Too much.

In a split second, Muichiro grabs his katana and...

"Mist Breathing Second Form : Eight-Layered Mist"

*SWING* *SWING*
*SWING* *SWING*

With great precision and speed, he deeply slices the other's stomach four times.

Blood splatters around the room. The clear glass windows recolour to a dark, red tone. It was just fate.

Muichiro sits there, bloody katana in hand. But just as he begins to catch his breath, another figure enters the room.
Long black hair, two butterfly pins, those innocent pale violet eyes.

Kanae quickly processes the situation. Her eyes slightly widen, that's the only thing that changes from her resting face.

Muichiro, upon spotting her, points his katana at her.

Despite all the obvious hints on what's about to happen to her because she's stumbled upon a scene, she just smiles.

Weird.

No one should smile.

Her feet move, she steps a bit closer each time, to the real traitor. Muichiro stays in his pose, unaware of what she wants to do.

Closer, closer to the blade she gets.

Until no more. Her stomach gets slowly impaled, the fresh blood stains her uniform. Still, she doesn't stop an inch.
Kanae reaches out her arms and embraces Muichiro into a hug.

Muichiro gets caught off by this sudden act, but doesn't move. His mouth opens moderately and his eyes dilate.

Kanae coughs up a bit of blood, still keeping the one she took care of tight in her arms.

The one who turned out to have betrayed her and her people.

Soon enough, it becomes too long that she should be alive. Muichiro places his shaking hand onto hers. It's ice cold.

He takes his right hand and rips out the blade from her lifeless body, proceeding to push her onto the floor.

It's now gone too far to stop.

Guess option 2 is the decision.

There's only one major threat left now.

He slowly stands up and walks over to the butterfly mansion exit.

made by gayd0tc0m