Amare Flos (Demon Slayer)

Kaze's body was tense, the mountain stayed motionless as the three stayed silent, the tall grey trees as still as statues. Not even the wind dared to intervene in the silence. Eira's heart beat slowly, cold shivers jolted across her body occasionally feeling danger. Her mind raced trying to locate where the danger was sprouting from. Kaze turned his body again, his back facing the two girls.

"Are you alright?" Asumi whispered to Eira tapping her shoulder. Eira just looked at Asumi, Eira felt a cold sweat break over her face, the cold atmosphere sending chills down her entire body. She put a single finger over her lips, and slowly closed her eyes to focus, she breathed in a deep breath of the cold dry air. Eira's mind burst into imagination, she could feel the auras vividly, they were all around the mountain. All squirming, all struggling, but why?

Then Eira's mind grasped it, the outstanding auras that overpowered the others. There were three figures, all in different places on the mountain, a deep crimson associated with each of them. Eira's eyes opened suddenly when she heard a violent gasping for air. In front of them, a girl in the Demon Slayer Corps uniform grabbing at her stomach, stumbling forwards. She fell forwards, and was caught in the arms of Kaze.

"Please… No… Spiders…" The girl's face was pale and her eyes were almost closed, Eira rushed to her assistance, her heart pounding seeing the horrid sight of the frightened girl.

"Are you okay? What happened?" Eira asked quickly. The girl struggled to get back to her feet, relying on Kaze's support.

"20 Mizunoto… and 2 Kanoe… That's all they sent… This mission is for Hashiras… I…" The girl said through vicious gasps, her voice got soft as her head tilted back and she seemingly passed out. Eira covered her mouth, 20 Mizunoto and 2 Kanoe?

The girl had stated that this mission was for Hashiras just how bad were the demons?

"What are we waiting for? There are people to save." Asumi clenched her sword, putting up a fake facade of confidence. The fake facade of confidence was created because of a certain insecurity Asumi had developed. She had been thinking about it ever since the incident with Ali. She has been thinking about the first mission, and in the fight with Upper 3. She had been useless. She had barely done anything in comparison to Eira or Ali. She hated that thought that she weighed down the team. She wanted to contribute just as much as they did, instead of standing around out of fear. She looked at Eira and Kaze and started walking. Kaze laid the girl's body sitting upright on the trunk of a tree and followed Eira.

Kaze and Asumi had already started walking in the direction the girl had appeared from. Eira reluctantly followed, the strong crimson in addition to the doubt she felt after the terrified girl appeared throbbed at her head, a mission that was meant for Hashira, that line repeated in Eira's head.

As they pushed through the thick bushes that populated the path, after a couple of minutes of walking, they were met with a horrific sight. All across the tall trees, tied to branches, silk white cocoons hung from the branches.

They all stood in shock as they saw a mass number of cocoons in the shapes of human bodies hanging from trees, for every branch there, a human shaped cocoon hung, squirming with desperation. Every single one of them screaming for help.

The three stared at the sheer number of cocoons stretching til as far as they could see, the girl's number was inaccurate, there were definitely much more than 20 people assigned to this mission. There had to be at least 50 people in these cocoons alone.

Eira tilted her head downwards, looking at the trees, she squinted. The overwhelming amount of auras in the air was distracting her from the obvious aura that stood 20 metres infront. One particular tree felt weird to her, someone was there. Hiding. Before she could even react, in the corner of her eye, the green sword that Kaze held gleamed as he swung it.

Shadow Breathing, First form. Blunt Darkness. Kaze's arm swung the sword so viciously that Eira could have sworn she saw air itself getting torn apart by the sword. As his arm halted, wind blew, the force of the swing so strong a dark crescent shape flew through the air right towards the tree Eira had been eyeing. The screeching sound of wood being split into thorns creaked as the tree roared, some cocoons fell to the floor. From the trunk of the tree, it tilted backwards, a small girl with white skin and an unusual red dot pattern going across her face jumped out from behind it. As the tree came crashing down, Asumi dashed forward, her sword shone as she jumped upwards. Eira held her sword tightly, and leaned forward ready to assist Asumi. Kaze stretched his arm in front of Eira, stopping her from going forward .

"Don't waste your energy. This demon isn't that strong, we don't need to gang up on it." Kaze held back Eira slightly, Eira loosened her grip on her sword. Kaze was right. It was pointless to waste their energy as well. Eira closedher eyes for a brief moment, trying to visualise and locate the crimson auras, while Asumi handled this demon, they could take care of the others. Eira pinpointed where the demons were.

"To your left… There's a demon. You take that one." Eira told Kaze, the crimson auras pulsed stronger than ever, they were close, Eira could locate one to her left and to her right. Kaze and her eyes met, he gave her a soft smile and he turned and started to walk to his left. Eira turned the other way, she knew Asumi would be able to handle the demon with ease, she had no worry.

Kaze examined the dark path walking quite slowly for an urgent mission, cocoons still hung on the branches, they shouted for help. As Kaze went, he sent as many slashes towards the cocoons as he could, letting them drop to the floor, usually the cocoon would break open and a green goop would spill out, not too much later, the victim would burst out the cocoon, they coughed and gasped for air. Kaze barely had any focus, his mind was filled with thoughts of the past that dwelled on his mind for so long. He woke up when his foot bumped into something. Kaze's gaze went downwards.

A human head, purple to the point veins popped out the scalp, red eyes popping out of the face, staring at Kaze. The head was on top of the body of a spider. Kaze's body jumped backwards as his heart dropped.

"What the hell is…" Kaze's eyes were glued to the grotesque miserable human-insect mutant. Kaze held up his sword, ready to swing when the piercing sound of numerous plucks harmonised above him. Kaze's gaze now shot upwards, a horde of those ghastly human-insect mutants crawled on a shiny spider web that formed a canopy across the trees. They all started to drop and climb down trees, all crawling towards him. Kaze cursed under his breath and dashed away from the horrid sight. The mutant creatures chased after Kaze, their tiny claws digging into the soft soil of the mountain. The grey trees passed like blurs as Kaze sprinted away, he clenched his jaw and turned around. Met with the sight of a group of those terrifying creatures.

"This mountain is a horror show." Kaze's palms tightened around the sword, as he faced the pack of disgusting pale purple heads attached to spider bodies all charging at him. Kaze took a deep breath and ran straight at the monsters. He grunted as he swung his sword at the monster-infested ground, able to slice almost 6 of the insects with each swing, the close density of the monsters made it simple. Kaze launched himself into the air, his legs pushed off the ground, he propelled forward. He held the sword high above his head pointed at the ground. He shouted and threw the sword into the pile of monsters. The sword impaled several of the monster's heads, then struck the ground, it lay on the floor with multiple spider monsters lined up on it like a skewer. He had jumped a considerable distance before he landed 5 metres away from the dense horde of monsters. Kaze dropped onto the ground and tightened his fists and tensed his legs. He drew his right leg back, digging into the soft soil. As a singular monster led the stream of insects, Kaze unleashed his foot into a straight kick, the singular insect punted backwards, it took many other insects with it as it catapulted from Kaze's strong kick. He dashed forward and took advantage of the scattered groups of insects. As the insects hissed and jumped in an attempt to bite Kaze, he flowed like a water stream and hit the bugs with such force they exploded on impact. Some flew into trees and burst, some crashed onto the floor. As he moved through the hyperactive horde of insects he struck them with punches, elbows and kicks. One after another, the insects would charge towards him. The grey trees idly watched the multitude of small monsters being pummelled by a singular human. In less than 5 minutes, the once hyperactive army of insects now lay as a graveyard on the soil of the mountain. Every single gruesome head monster lifeless on the ground. The weakness and low intellect of the mindless monsters made it easy for Kaze to predict their movements, he looked at his hands and cringed as he saw his knuckles covered with green blood. Finally, Kaze was able to make his way back to the emerald green sword on the floor, which had pierced through 3 heads, their purple tongues out the mouths. He gripped the sword's handle, he swung the sword, the heads flew off the blade. The soil was saturated with the disgusting blood of the insects. Kaze's veins flowed with blood, his whole body pulsing with energy, it had been so long since he had properly used it against an opponent. The Motion of the Shadow.

Kaze's 'Shadow Breathing' wasn't really Shadow Breathing, it wasn't an actual breathing style meant for swordsmanship. From a young age, Kaze's father had taught him the martial art, the Motion of the Shadow. It was created hundreds of years ago, it was meant to be as smooth as a shadow, as quick as a shadow, as bold as a shadow. A shadow never loses in speed, never loses in speed, a shadow copies. The Motion of the Shadow was created so the martial artist could always match the opponent in strength, it was a complex martial art. It consisted of all types of attacks, fists, elbows, knees and kicks,and it took years of practice, it focused on speed, strength and strategy all at once. Kaze was one of the few who was able to utilise the martial art, however, he couldn't defeat demons using the martial art, therefore he had to adapt the martial art into a sword style. It was different with the spider insects, they weren't demons.

Kaze's body pumped with adrenaline, he continued in the direction Eira had pointed to. As he stepped against the high slope of the mountain, he met a flat surface. In the centre of the arena-like area, surrounded by tall trees. A small wooden hut, held up by a multitude of silvery web strings attached to trees, it was suspended in mid air as if frozen in time. If one focused on the wooden hut enough, it was like the webs holding it up weren't even there.

"You…" Kaze heard a booming voice, laughing as it appeared from the top of the hut. A demon. A boy's head attached on top of a gigantic spider body.

"I'll kill you…" The demon grinned as it stared into Kaze's soul.