The Water Tsuguko

Chapter 8

Takeo didn’t know when the night sleep took him, but he did know that it was the best sleep he has gotten in days. Sleeping on the bare mountain ground during the day wasn’t the most comfortable thing in the world, and he could never take the comfort of his futon for granted again.

He woke up, feeling a presence, and as soon as he opened his eyes, all he saw were the dull blue eyes that belonged to the water hashira. He had gotten used to this on days that they were not training, so he wasn’t too surprised, but it still gave him a small shock.

“You have got to find a better way of waking me up,” Takeo sighed, pushing the blankets off of his small frame, and sitting up.

“We have to go see Kocho,” he said, ignoring what Takeo had just said. “She can correctly check your wounds and make sure none of them are infected.”

“Okay, okay,” Takeo grunted, still feeling the dull pain in his chest from the day before. He got into his normal yakuta and hakama pants with his checkered scarf and teal haori before leaving with Giyuu to go to the Butterfly Mansion.

The journey was longer than it normally would have been due to the extent of Takeo’s injuries and Giyuu having to carry the boy on his back for the majority of the way. They arrived around noon, and the mansion seemed to buzz a little more than usual.

As Takeo began to walk on his own through the halls, followed by Giyuu, there were patients who were walking around with all different kinds of injuries, and it was much louder than it had been on previous occasions.

When Takeo finally got to the hospital wing, the first thing he noticed was Aoi wearing her new blue-tinted slayer uniform with a nurse apron put neatly over it.

“Well, look who it is,” she said, her blue eyes sparkling. “You couldn’t have chosen a worse time, but I suppose it can’t be helped. Allow me to go get Lady Shinobu to come check your wounds.”

“Thanks, Aoi-chan,” Takeo said, looking around at most of the full beds with different slayers laying down.

“What on earth is going on here,” he asked Giyuu when Aoi left, thinking that if anyone were to know, it would be one of the nine hashira.

“I’m not too sure about the specifics, but a bunch of mizunotos were sent on a mission, and they left a blood bath,” Giyuu said. “I think it could have been a lower moon.”

Takeo grimaced. He had learned all about the different kinds of demons from Giyuu, including the twelve kizuki. They were the twelve strongest ‘henchmen’ of Muzan Kibusuji, and they were a force to be reckoned with. Except if you were a hashira- then the lower moons were simple to defeat for them.

If a lower moon did this, then the strength of an upper moon scared Takeo in a way. Not necessarily of fighting them, but the damage they could do to people, and the countless number of families they could destroy- like how Muzan destroyed his family.

“My oh my,” Takeo turned around, accidentally letting out a small squeak of surprise. Kocho was one of those who were impossible to predict due to her light footing and petite frame. “Why, hello, Takeo-kun.”

“I’ve told you before, Miss Kocho,” Takeo said. “You don’t have to use honorifics. They don’t matter to me.”

“I will try to remember,” the insect hashira’s smile never faltered as she led Takeo to one of the open beds away from the other slayers. “Take your shirt off please,” she instructed.

Takeo pulled the scarf and yakuta, showing his bare chest and abdomen to the older woman. There were small fresh cuts and bruises that littered his skin along with the much older scars from training and before he ever even knew about the demon slayer corps.