[Lord Demon Slayer: Hiiragi of Kuhara]

==============================

The paper lanterns on the street are like a sea hanging in mid-air, the sound of taiko drums and performances can be heard in my ears, and there are endless pedestrians on the road.

"A lot of people."

"After all, it is an annual festival."

Said Sato, pressing down the fox mask on his face.

Originally, the disciples under Lintaki's sect would carefully put away the masks given by the master before the assessment, but he and Zhenmo always liked to wear them, so later, Master Lintaki specially made masks for them that fit better.

"You didn't come here just to wear it?"

"...it's tradition."

Kuhara Hiiragi glanced at him suspiciously, but quickly stopped thinking about it, and turned to look at the people who were carrying ornately decorated sedan chairs on the noisy street aside.

"What are they doing?"

"It's a parade that symbolizes the gods," Saitu explained. "The statues of gods are placed in the sedan chair. It was originally an event to pray for the elimination of the plague, but now it has almost become a pure festival performance."

Kuhara Hiiragi nodded, "This is the first time I've heard of it."

"Should be very famous." Said Usagi, his tone became a little puzzled, "Haven't you participated in the summer festival or similar festivals?"

"Are you talking about a garden party?"

No, it sounds so old, it should be something different.

Could it be that……

"You don't know these traditions?" Saito looked at him, "What about the way of worshiping at the shrine? There are also the traditions of Boy's Day and Girl's Day? Carp streamers?"

The young man in the dark clothes didn't answer, and walked as usual, only avoiding his eyes intentionally.

The air between the two became silent for a while, and after a while, Satu lowered his head, looking thoughtful.

"What are you thinking?"

Sato replied: "I was thinking about the risk of taking the opportunity to tease you on the street."

"The conclusion is?"

"Worth a try."

Kuhara Hiiragi smiled, and was about to say something, but his eyes were suddenly attracted by something beside the street.

Sato followed his line of sight and saw a small stall on the side of the road, with a person wrapped in a black robe sitting behind him, who should be a woman, and there were several pictures on the table in front of her. Cards with intricate patterns, and a sign that says 'Free Divination'.

"Is this also a tradition?"

"…No, that's probably 'culture invasion'."

"Speaking of which, Inosuke and the others seem to have met before." Hiiragi suddenly remembered something, "He said that my wife Zenitsu was once frightened by a fortune-teller's ambiguous predictions, so she didn't think about eating and drinking all day, and finally bought it at a huge price. Zhang Fu."

Sato was speechless.

"The two over there, do you want to come to do a fortune-telling?" Seemingly noticing the gaze of the two, the fortune-teller said suddenly, "Let's think of it as adding a little festive atmosphere. I'm only talking about good things today."

Maybe the divination stalls on the street always remind people of some bad rumors, so there are no people at her stall.

"It's very simple, please choose one of these cards in my hand."

The fortune teller's voice sounded very young and kind, at least he wasn't the kind of chattering guy my wife Shanyi and the others had met before to swindle money.

Sato thought that nothing would happen afterwards, so he stepped forward and drew a card.

"Okay, then..." She looked at the card Satu chose, and answered after a short while, "You will have an unexpected encounter recently."

"Meet?"

"Yes, it will leave a deep memory."

"...That's it."

Sato didn't take it seriously either, and only showed a helpless expression, thinking that the so-called divination was just a casual talk for the festive atmosphere.Then he turned his head and saw Kuhara Hiiragi next to him looking at him with a subtle expression.

"What are you thinking?" Satoshi's face under the mask couldn't laugh or cry, "Deep memories are not necessarily good things."

The fortune teller was noncommittal, and looked at Kuhara Hiiragi again.

He hesitated, and also drew a card.

"Hmm... You will be involved in a very lively matter after a while, and you will find what you are looking for smoothly."

After the ambiguous divination was over, the two left the stall.

An unexpected encounter might just mean running into an acquaintance at a festival, while getting involved might just be about watching a show, finding something or finding a stall you want to go to - all of which are likely to happen at summer festivals It's not like predicting the future at all.

Neither of them took this episode to heart.

As the night darkened, the surroundings became more and more lively.

"Want something to eat?"

Kuhara Hiiragi didn't have much interest in eating, and just about to shake his head, something red suddenly appeared in front of his eyes.

He froze for a moment, only to realize that it was Satoshi who was holding a candy apple and wanted to hand it to him.

"Why this?"

The people he saw eating this on the street were either children or women.

"I just bought it," Satoshi also came to his senses, but it was hard to take it back, "Just accept it, this is also a tradition."

What about tradition, you obviously don’t want to eat it yourself?

Hiiragi sighed inwardly, and was about to reach out to pick it up, when suddenly, out of the corner of his eye, he saw a black shadow flashing past the bushes next to him.

"what happened?"

"I'll go take a look."

"Ah? Wait...!"

If you get lost in a place like this, it's hard to find it again.

But before he finished speaking, Kuhara Hiiragi had already chased after him, and his figure disappeared into the surging crowd, there was no time to stop him.

Satoshi sighed, although he could use the nearby buildings to move quickly, he couldn't make too much noise at the festival, so he finally decided to come and find it honestly and practically.

He didn't feel anything bad just now, maybe A Hiiragi just discovered a thief or something, so he didn't have too many needless worries.

...although that's how it should be.

When Sato came back to his senses, he found that he had unknowingly reached the foot of the mountain, and the lively sounds of the festival behind him sounded like another world.

"Am I distracted?"

Just as he was about to walk back, he suddenly saw a moss-covered stele deep in the woods.

Is it a tombstone?Or something to support the land god?

Perhaps out of curiosity, but also as if he was inexplicably attracted, he walked over.

The handwriting on the stele was blurred, and Sato touched it with his hand, but a puff of blue smoke suddenly rose in front of his eyes.

"how……?"

Turning around again, the surrounding scenery changed.

The sound of the ceremony also disappeared, and everything was eerily quiet.

………………

The boy walks alone.

This place is located in a remote place, where the sight is surrounded by green smoke and cliffs.There is no life in the withered vegetation, only the jackdaws fly silently across the cold sky.

The blue-gray mountains are connected to each other and stretch into the distance, and he is walking in a corner of this desolate mountain.

Normally, there would be no pedestrians passing by this kind of place except himself, but he still saw a strange person by accident today.

It was a man with a fox mask on his face, tied behind his head with a red rope, a head of rare-colored mid-length hair hanging slightly messy on his shoulders, and a long knife at his waist.

He also held something that looked like a candy in his hand.

"..."

He was about to go around as if he didn't see it, when the man turned his head and looked at him.

Then he almost blurted out: "A Hiiragi?"

Taiwu Hiiragi stopped in his tracks.

After becoming Taiwu, it is not that there are no people looking for him, but they all call him "Taiwu" or "Taiwu". There are very few people who can call him by his name, so I searched my memory carefully, but I still can't find it. Can think of this person.

He stopped and responded with a cold face: "What's the matter?"

As if he didn't expect his attitude to be so indifferent, the young man froze, then raised his hand, as if he wanted to take off the mask on his face.

"Don't do that." Taiwu Hiiragi reminded, "Without the protection of the mask, you will be wiped out."

"What do you mean?"

"Even Taiwu can't transcend the soul. If you want to transcend life, go to Huainan. My master once built the reincarnation platform there."

He spoke lightly, with almost no emotion, and regarded the person in front of him as a lonely soul who had strayed into this place.

But upon hearing this, something flashed through Satu's mind like lightning, he was silent for a while, and finally figured out the current situation.

"where is this place?"

Taiwu Hiiragi didn't answer, but looked at the stele next to Sato.

The young man wearing a mask looked over and saw that the moss-covered stele had become much newer, and the writing on it was clearly visible——

【Boundary Green Cliff】

"..."

He seemed to have come at a time that shouldn't have come.

Now is probably the time when Ah Hiiragi becomes Taiwu, but he has not yet met Shi An.

For some reason, Sabito didn't feel flustered or nervous.

"Thank you, but forget about superbirth."

Hearing this, the heart of the young man who resembled Kuhara Hiiragi half-heartedly sank.

He even started to secretly think about whether he would come to trouble him again, just like the people he met countless times after becoming Taiwu.

Then, he saw the strange man handing the candy apple to him.

"Don't worry about these, do you want to eat?"

"what?"

………………

At this moment, the divination booth at the festival——

"I don't smoke! I won't do divination in my life anymore." My wife Shanyi was very shadowed and shook her head vigorously.

"That's it," Kamado Tanjiro didn't force it, and looked at another companion, "Will Inosuke come to try?"

"Cut, isn't it just the gossip that you can guess right and the gossip that you can't guess right? I don't play games."

"You actually know this..." The blond boy's eyes widened, his expression shocked as if he was meeting him for the first time.

"Hmph, of course, without looking at who I am," he folded his arms and raised his head, and said to the fortune-teller, "If you have the ability, you can guess what I am thinking without looking at those cards!"

And the fortune teller didn't mean to be offended, he just smiled lightly and said:

"Okay, then the conclusion is: You are an easy-going person who doesn't like divination."

"Huh!? What did you say, mother-in-law?"

"Don't make trouble at the festival!" My wife Shan Yi held him tightly, "Ah, no, who can stop this guy!"

"Are you there too?"

A familiar voice came from behind.

My wife Zenitsu turned around: "Mr. Kuhara! Stop Inosuke, or we will be sent to the police force!"

"Inosuke, calm down." Kuhara Hiiragi said, "There is a stall selling fried rice cakes next to it, and it seems that the stall is about to be closed."

The boy in the boar hood finally diverted his attention.

"Hmph, I don't have the same knowledge as you!"

As he said that, he ran away with my wife Shanyi who was still holding him, leaving only the screams of the blond boy in the air.

"Mr. Kuhara came to the festival alone?" Already accustomed to the way of getting along with two companions, Kamado Tanjiro's expression became calm.

"No," he recalled his original intention of finding these people, "Have you seen Sato?"

...............

After confirming that the soul in front of him was not malicious, Taiwu Hiiragi finally put down his guard temporarily.

"Maybe there is something wrong with the reincarnation station, it will be fine after a while."

"How long is a burst?"

"It may be the next moment, or it may be a few seasons later." The boy replied, "If you are worried, you can go to the Ranshan School."

"I see, thank you." Sabito, who is the soul, seemed unhurried, "What about you? Where are you going next?"

"..."

"If you don't know, go to... Baihua Valley, it should be called this name."

"why?"

"Someone is waiting for you there."

After finishing speaking, Satu gave the apple candy that he couldn't hand out just now to Taiwu Hiiragi who was still expressionless, and then rubbed his head.

"It seems that I am lucky, and I will go back soon." His figure gradually faded, "Goodbye."

Hiiragi stretched out his hand subconsciously, but he didn't touch anything, and the man just disappeared in front of his eyes.

The young man looked at the apple candy in his hand, and there was a hint of puzzlement in his indifferent expression.

"baffling."

…………

The sound of the ceremony came to his ears again, and Sato looked around and found that the smoke from Jieqingya had disappeared.

It seems that he has returned.

He breathed a sigh of relief, then took off his mask, and just as he was about to find a way to go back, he heard someone calling himself.

"Sakura? How did you get to a place like this?"

"I was looking for you, and then..."

Then, what to say?

Seeing Kuhara Hiiragi, Sato thought for a while, but instead of telling what happened just now, he asked, "What did you do just now?"

"Someone pretended to be a ghost and wanted to create a disturbance so that his accomplices could take advantage of the water and rob people of their money. I sent him to the police force."

...That really got involved in a very lively matter.

Kuhara Hiiragi suddenly noticed something.

"Where's the candy apple?"

"Uh……"

"Did you give it to someone else?"

"No, not to anyone but you."

It's just you in the past.

Sato said without any guilt.

Kuhara Hiiragi looked at him suspiciously for a while, and finally took the lead on the road leading to the town.

"Forget it, let's go back, anyway..."

Fireworks go up into the sky, and light burning clouds fly across the night like shimmering rain.

Satoshi couldn't hear clearly.

But through the light of the fireworks, he saw the gentle expression on the man's face when he turned around.

The brightly lit earth sleeps,

The sky glowed with fireworks.

The glistening raindrops make such a noise,

From ear to heart,

wandering around.

The author has something to say:

Note: The story of Shanyi being deceived by a fortune teller happened in the Ghost Slayer novel "Flower of Happiness".

Inosuke's evaluation of divination, "the gossip that guesses correctly and the gossip that fails to guess" is also written in the rumored novel, which is very shocking.

That's the end of it.

It's officially over, thank you very much for seeing here.

It took so long for a special episode... I'm very sorry, this period of time is really busy, and it will be better by the end of the year.

The next article will focus on the characters that have not been written much, and try a new story mode.

I also try to conceive original texts, there are many things I want to write, and there are also many things I want to learn.

See you again.

【bow】

---------------