The Blacksmith's daugther was a witch (Tomioka Giyuu x reader)

Chapter 17: Opposite sides

Previously:

Giyuu knew this technique, he himself has mastered it over the years. But the thing was... he was the creator of this move. So how come there was someone he has never heard of who could use it, without a demon slayer uniform to call his own and just being there for no apparent reason? Who was this person? And why did he know the eleventh technique of the Breath of Water?

She wasn't going to use it, she was supposed to use the Breath of Fire... But when she heard those light footsteps rushing to aid her and Tanjiro in their fight, a memory of him arose in her mind. The day when they were conversing in her garden and he was practicing his skills so he could get back in action as soon as Shinobu was good to go. Of course the hashira wouldn't know of her knowlege on the breath style and certainly couldn't expect her to remember his signature move after only seeing it once.

But she remembered it clear as day. The way everything went silent and the spider lilies around him stopped moving in the wind. And when one of them bent, it was torn into a hundred of scarlet leaves. At that moment his blue eyes were calm and empty, as if she was staring into a deep well full of water that had no end. So dark but so beautiful, she rembered the feeling in her chest when she stared at the man standing in her garden, unmoving like a mountain but running like a river at the same time.

After they left she kept on using it during her trainings even when she didn't want to. She tried to forget him or at least push the memories away but when they wouldn't listen, she embraced it. For her, that move was the memory of him. It was everything he was: calm, graceful as well as cold and sharp to the touch.

And when he ran out of the forest towards them, the fire raging in her chest burned out and was replaced by water full of tranquility and understanding. She was so quick that no one noticed that she moved before she appeared at Rui's side and sent his head flying through the air, once again severed from the body. But this time... he had no ace up his sleeve.

The body remained standing but the smell of ash started filling the air. (Y/N) gazed at headless body sadly. He looked so lost, so young, so sad and broken... She wondered just what in his life made him become this way. But it was too late for him, the little demon was going to die. But maybe it was for the better, maybe he would finally regain the memories of his human times and then he would pass on to meet his loved ones again.

Rui made painfully slow steps towards Tanjiro who was shielding Nezuko with his own body, his arms outstretched towards the siblings as if he just wanted to reach out to them... to feel the same love they did. But he was the one who burned down the bridges leading towards that kind of bond. The body tripped on a stone, no longer having the strength to keep itself standing anyway. The witch would expect the siblings to be disgusted by it, but this... this was Tanjiro she was looking at. And so she wasn't even that suprised when he put his arm around the demon as if to show him at least a little bit of the affection he so desperately craved. At that moment the redhead also looked full of sorrow.

***

Giyuu looked at the boy on the ground. He looked so sad about the demon dying... that wasn't right. Forget the strange rounin, the man would wait, he had to tell him.

"Don't feel sorry for a man eating demon. No matter if he looked like a child, he was still just a bloodthirsty monster and he has lived for a long enough time."

The boy looked at him angrily and spat: "It is a fact that I will relentlessly slay them to dispel the regrets of those killed... But never overlook the pain of being a demon or those who regret their own actions. Because demons were humans... they were humans just like you and me."

Giyuu just frowned at him.

"Please, get your foot off of him." oh, he was standing on the empty kimono, "He isn't just some unsightly monster!"