I Spy

Chapter 58: Questions and Answers

Date: December 22, 2024
Time: 8:25 AM
Location: Butterfly Mansion
Weather: Snowy and Windy

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The temperature for the day was way below freezing, and it began to snow overnight. The frost from yesterday has somewhat stopped and was beginning to be salted in order to allow people to get out of their houses and resume their daily tasks.

But it was a different story for a young man who sat in the basement of a house and was still fast asleep while on a bed.

He was shirtless and had bandages wrapped around his abdomen and band-aids to cover the scratches he received from yesterday's unfortunate encounter. 

Next to him was the short, little butterfly who was sitting right next to him with a clipboard and a pen while she wrote some things down. She still had a smile on her face as usual, but it was a bit bland and emotionless as it carried some concern and worry for the man in front of her. 

Though the man didn't suffer severe injuries, he still had some that were going to take multiple days to heal, especially the bruises on his abdomen where it was hit the most. "It seems like that man definitely knows where the weak points of others are, by the frequency of bruises on Tomioka-san's abdomen I can tell that this man has been doing this type of activity for years..." Shinobu thought while running her hand along his body.

The touch felt hard, but yet it felt soft, even though she knew the slayers were to train hard every day in order to keep their skills to peak and therefore were very well built and strong, something about the man's body surprised her...

She continued to run her hand along his body without even her knowing, it was like something attracted her about the way he was built. But she quickly snapped out of it and removed her hand from Tomioka's body, "Wh-what was that?!" She thought with a furious blush on her face.

"I don't even like him! Why am I acting like this?!" She thought while looking at the face of the sleeping man, "He's just a loner that nobody will ever like! That's it! He's never going to change!" She thought again and again in order to redirect her mind to the correct place.

Just as she was doing so, Kanae burst in through the door and down the stairs to tell Shinobu about something, "Shinobu? Yohoo! You there?" Kanae asked while walking down the stairs, "Yes, Kanae-nee san?" Shinobu replied as she turned around to meet her sister, "How is he?" Kanae questioned while walking toward the patient.

Shinobu exhaled a bit before speaking, "He's doing fine, he should wake up in half an hour, but he may have to stop attending missions for a few days to let the bruises and other injuries heal, we're lucky that the man spared him yesterday and only left him with these injuries..." Shinobu stated while showing her sister the clipboard. 

"I'm glad he's doing okay for now, but what I'm mostly concerned about is the true power of that man." Shinbou added, "If he was able to beat a Hashira this badly, not to even mention the fact that he left barely any injuries on any part of his body, apart from the lower abdomen, meaning he probably disposed of him rather quickly. Then I'm concerned about what would happen if any of us were to meet him." Shinobu stated.

"That's what I am thinking..." Kanae replied while looking through the clipboard, "Well get him to wake up soon because we're going to have visitors soon..." Kanae added, "Why?" Shinobu asked. "Well the news about what happened yesterday got around pretty quickly, and now the others are coming to visit and ask Giyu-kun about what happened." Kanae answered, "Oh..." Shinbou replied.

"When are they coming?" Shinobu said, "They should be in another hour or two, so make sure you get him up before then..." Kanae answered, "Ok..." Shinobu answered with a bit of a dead tone as she turned around to look at Tomioka's body.

Her smile kind of drooped a bit as she laid her eyes on the Water Hashira's unconscious body, "Oh?" Kanae stated with a bit of a smug face as she saw her sister's mood change all of a sudden, "Is it perhaps that my little sister is concerned for the person she always calls a 'loner'?" Kanae teased.

"NO!" Shinobu immediately replied back with a blush, "Awww...are you sure?" Kanae continued which fueled her sister's embarrassment, "STOP! NEE-SAN! PLEASE!" Shinobu exclaimed as she began to play-fight with her sister, "WHY CAN'T YOU GO TEASE KANAO ABOUT HER CRUSH?!" Shinobu asked, "Are you saying that you have a crush on Giyu-kun?" Kanae asked with a deceiving smile.

"I-N-STOP!" Shinobu shouted as she turned around in embarrassment and tried to hide herself from her sister, "Don't be embarrassed Shinobu! Having a crush is totally fine! It's a normal part of life, everyone experiences it!" Kanae stated.

As soon as she said that, Shinobu got an idea, "So does that mean you have a crush?" Shinobu asked with a teasing smile, "Uhh-I-uhh..." Kanae said with a little blush on her face, "Crap! She got me!" Kanae thought while sweating a bit out of nervousness.

"Come on, nee-san! If you said that everyone had once had a crush, why don't you tell me yours?" Shinobu asked as she turned the tables of the conversation. Kanae continued to sweat a bit more as the blush on her face got a bit bigger.

*Ding Dong*

The doorbell was rung from upstairs, "I'll get it!" Aoi shouted from upstairs as she ran to the door to open it.

"L-looks like they are here!" Kanae quickly said while immediately getting up and running up the stairs to greet the guests, Shinbou was initially caught by surprise at how fast she left the basement but quickly smiled with malicious intent. "So that's her weakness..." She thought before something popped up in her mind. 

"Wait! If she has a crush, then who is it?!" She thought before looking visibly alarmed. 

Before she could think any further, she saw the sleeping body of the depressed man twitch a bit before slowly opening his eyes.

"Ugh...where am I? What happened?..." He said before rubbing his temple with his hand and looking around with hazy vision, "Ara ara, so you decided to finally wake up Tomioka-san?" Shinobu said while looking at Tomioka who was focusing his vision on Shinobu, "Wh-what happened?" He asked.

"Well...you got beaten up pretty badly last night, and I found you on the ground knocked out, so I decided to take you in and give you some treatment." Shinobu stated with a smile, "Oh...I see..." Giyu stated while sitting up and rubbing his eyes to fully focus his vision. 

He looked down on his body to see bandages wrapped around his lower abdomen and band-aids on some parts of his body, "I got beaten up pretty badly...huh?" Giyu said, "Yep! And I thought you were a Hashira!" Shinobu teased while giving Giyu a soft punch to the back, Giyu looked back at Shinobu with a stoic expression before turning to the sound of the basement door opening.

"Shinobu! Is Giyu-kun up?!" Kanae yelled from the top of the stairs, "Yes!" Shinobu replied. 

Kanae then came down the stairs with some of the other Hashira following behind. 

She took the last step down and went into the middle of the room to allow the other Hashira to fit in. The majority of the Hashira came, apart from Gyomei and Muichrio.

Sanemi along with Tengen were there to question Giyu about what happened last night. Mitsuri and Rengoku were there to make sure Giyu was okay, and Iguro (who had no interest in visiting, but was pressured into coming after constant bickering and temptation by Mitsuri, but since he was there, decided to ask some questions while he was at it).

"Oi, water dork, over here." Sanemi sarcastically waved to get Giyu's attention, "Ara ara Sanemi-kun, why don't we be more polite about it, Giyu-kun over here was brave enough to face off the man alone!" Kanae stated with a polite and innocent tone, "Tch...fine..." Sanemi reluctantly agreed.

"Oh my god! Giyu-kun, are you ok?!" Mitsuri immediately went to Giyu and started to embrace him into her chest, which pissed off Iguro.

"That brat!" Iguro thought with several tick marks on his face, Shinobu was also feeling a bit different, her face darkened a bit, and a tick mark slowly formed on her face. 

Giyu started to flail around in panic due to a lack of oxygen from not being able to breathe because of Mitsuri's embrace. "Mitsuri! You're choking him out!" Tengen stated before Mitsuri let go of it and began bowing in apology, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" She kept continuously saying.

Giyu exhaled, "It's fine..." He said while rubbing his face. He soon turned to the other Hashira to meet them.

"So Giyu-san, what happened last night?" Sanemi asked with a stern tone, "I-I don't know...it was all a blur..." He replied, "It shows! It seems that man flamboyantly beat you up last night!" Tengen stated while striking a pose, everybody looked at Tengen with weirded-out faces, except for Mitsuri and Rengoku who were just confused.

"What? I'm saying facts, that's all." Tengen stated as he huffed at them, "Anyway...do you recall anything that happened?" Sanemi continued to question, "The only thing I remember from last night was the fight...and the casual commentary that man gave, which kind of got me annoyed." Giyu replied, "And...?" Sanemi asked with an eyebrow raised, "Well...in the first few moments of the fight, I thought I was doing something...I managed to beat him down a few times...but after a while, it seemed like he was just tanking the damage and wasn't even trying the whole time..." Giyu said, "And then after that...he immediately started to put me down, and it didn't even last a whole 5 minutes, and I was beaten in no time..." Giyu added.

"Tch...this is not good...and tell me, how did you meet him?" Sanemi then asked, "Well...it was in the same area of my mission that I was assigned yesterday..." Giyu replied.

A few seconds passed by before something clicked in all of their brains, "Ok...it's either just by coincidence that he was there, or he definitely knows something..." Tengen stated, "First time you actually said something useful..." Iguro sarcastically replied which offended Tengen.

"I don't know...he did say he was just passing by and he had somewhere to go...but maybe that 'somewhere' was the place my mission was in, and if so...why else would he be there? It's just a plain forest without the demon problem..." Giyu stated while stroking his chin, "If your epiphany is right, then we could tell that this man now knows about demons..." Sanemi replied while also stroking his chin.

"So if he was there because of the demons...then is he really a government agent...or something else...because the government believes that demons were eradicated years ago, and that's why they are hunting us..." Iguro said, "And if he is also hunting demons, it means that he is not a direct threat to us, it may seem that he is playing both sides here..." Giyu responded. "Also, Kocho, do you remember the last time we met the man, and how he said he wanted to know us better?" Giyu questioned which caused Shinobu to nod.

"Maybe...just maybe...he may be a neutral player in this war, and he is probably misunderstood..." Mitsuri stated with a little bit of a nervous tone because she had not seen the three men bond this much before. "You may be correct Mitsuri, but in the meantime, we might need to send Hashira in squads of two from now on, just in case we meet the man ever again. If he managed to beat one of our strongest Hashira, then we may be in a lot of trouble..." Iguro stated.

"But didn't we say that last time? Or at least suspect it after Tomioka and Shinobu-san met the man for the first time?" Sanemi asked, "We did, but it really wasn't a fully-fledged fight because he ran away in the middle." Giyu replied.

The three just kept on talking as the entire room fell silent as they listened to the things these three had to say, never before had they seen these three actually get along with one of the others, so it was a pretty big surprise seeing them actually have a conversation without screaming or hurling insults at Giyu.

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"Do do do do do do." Tanjiro hummed while on another call with the BOYS, "Inspector Gadget!" Minato replied.

The other guys on the call were talking about some random shit while Tanjiro and Minato were singing the Inspector Gadget theme. "Andrew, did you see the poster about the upcoming field trip in a few days?" Edmund asked, "Yeah, it seems fine, I've wanted to see Tokyo in its beauty, without you know...mercilessly getting rid of gang members and criminals and discarding their corpses 6 feet under the ground." Andrew stated with the last part being said in a dark tone.

"Also, there was a permission slip that you and your guardian or parents had to sign..." Edmund said with a soon-to-be confused look on his face, "Wait...what the f*ck? My parents are retired, they live across the entire world in Canada...how am I supposed to contact them and get them to sign a permission slip..." Edmund said to himself, "At least you have someone to sign it, my parents are f*cking dead..." Andrew replied.

"Oh yeah...wait...I think it says that if you don't have a parent or guardian to sign, you can make one of the teachers sign it..." Edmund said, "Oddly suspicious that they suspect that you don't have parents and that you are fatherless and motherless...hmmm..." Edmund added while stroking his chin with a dumb face.

"You could say that's pretty 'sus'." Johan joked.

"Shut up." Everybody said as they quickly turned their attention to Johan, "It's a dead joke...it's f*cking 2024..." Tanjiro said, "Dam..." Johan said with a snort since he wasn't expecting everyone to target him.

"The way we all said 'shut up' at Johan," Edmund stated as he started to laugh, the rest of the others started to laugh too for a while.

"Ahaha...also...Johan...how are you guys doing back at base?" Tanjiro stated after trying to calm down, "Ehh...we're doing fine..." Johan replied, "You guys training?" Tanjiro asked, "Yes..." Johan said with a sigh.

"Wait hold up, Andrew, do you hear that?" Edmund said while looking around the room, "Yeah...police sirens...and they are getting closer..." Andrew replied while also looking around the apartment room.

 "God dammit...which one of you committed war crimes again?" Minato asked, "It was me...I'm sowwy...I may have destroyed an entire truck full of refugees with a Javelin in Somalia...it seems that the intrusive thoughts won this time..." Edmund replied with an apologetic face.

"Only one truck? I gassed an entire village in f*cking Yugoslavia." Johan replied, "Of course, you decided to gas them, you f*cking German kraut." Lorenzo stated, "Studies have proven that gassing people is the most effective way of killing, apart from using a flamethrower...or...cluster bombs or some shit." Johan replied with a confident huff.

"Oi, Tanjiro, you seem like you're pretty occupied with something there, care to share it with us?" Lorenzo asked as he saw Tanjiro looking down and murmuring to himself (They had face cam on by the way), "Oh, I'm just reading something from my Dad's diary..." Tanjiro replied while still reading.

"Kewl, I want to hear." Johan stated with genuine interest, "Uhh...ok...I guess..." Tanjiro replied as he brought the book close to the screen and fixed his posture.

"What the..." Andrew said as he looked up from the screen, "Yo, Andrew, I heard a knock at your door." Edmund stated, "God dammit...did they find out what happened on February 10, 1993..." Andrew joked before getting up, "What did you do on February 10, 1993?" Edmund asked.

"Stuff..." Andrew replied before fully leaving the screen to answer the door. 

"Well...let's ignore Andrew's possible violations against humanity for now, and let's tune in for some story time!" Tanjiro said.

"Yay! Story time!" Edmund said with a childish tone. 

Everybody decided to tune in to what Tanjiro had to say because they were bored and didn't know what to do right now.

"Ahem..." Tanjiro stated as he cleared his throat before starting the diary entry.



Book POV



Day 156,


Today was the final day tried to teach the other Hashira my breathing style but to no avail...they weren't able to match the precise and accurate movements of Sun breathing, which was a shame because if all of the Corps were able to learn Sun breathing, then we would be able to rid the demon threat once and for all in no time. 

Though they couldn't learn Sun breathing, they were able to adapt Sun breathing to other techniques that suited their combat styles, which greatly impressed me. Urokodaki managed to create a technique called Water breathing, Rengoku created Flame Breathing, Jigoro called his Thunder Breathing, etc.

It all ma-



"Water...earth...fire...air...long ago...the 4 nations lived in harmony...but it all changed when the fire nation attacked..." Minato stated as he said the intro to Avatar.

The others were laughing, as well as Tanjiro who chuckled a bit. "I mean yeah...you do have a point there...there are a few more breathing styles listed here...it says....water, flame, thunder, wind, flower, stone, and moon..." 

"Yes! Flame, water, wind, and stone! The 4 nations! Wooo!" Minato cheered. "Alright alright...you got it correct...now shut the f*ck up and let me read the entire thing." Tanjiro quickly changed from a light-hearted tone to a more serious and demanding voice.



Book POV


It all made sense at the time since Urokodaki-san fights like a smooth turbulent flowing through the waves, Rengoku-san fights with a heart of pure dedication and courage, almost as if his heart was on fire, you could feel his fighting spirit resonation from him, with all of the heat created from his noble attributes. Jirogo approaches silently from behind an enemy, and when he attacks, he strikes like a lightning bolt and can kill a demon in one slice.

I was beyond happy knowing that there was a new hope for the Corps against the demon threat, I felt like we had entered a golden age of slayers as soon as the first breathing styles were introduced due to the fact that as soon as the Hashira soon learned their breathing styles, they quickly began to teach them to other slayers, which greatly brightens my heart. 

But...there is still some sliver of cautiousness...and of course, it had to do with my dear brother...he managed to develop his own Breathing Style, which he called Moon breathing. He managed to create sixteen forms of Moon breathing which I constantly compliment him for because Sun breathing only has thirteen forms. But no matter how many times I keep talking to him positively, he keeps pushing me away and acting cold toward me.

I couldn't help but feel a little concerned for him every time I see him, he works all day to become stronger and rarely spends time with the other Hashira. I have also noticed a little hint of jealousy coming from him every time he looks at me.

I'm going to have to talk to him about that...I don't want him to do something he'll regret in the future.



"Wait... your Dad had a brother?" Johan asked, "Yeah...I never bothered telling you because I never met him before...and judging from these entries...it seems that he isn't a pretty swell guy..." Tanjiro replied before closing the book.

"What's his name?" Minato questioned, "Michikatsu I believe...and it also said he had a family, which means somewhere out there in the world, is a person who is related to me..." Tanjiro stated which greatly lifted his hopes, "Yes! I finally don't have to be the only one to carry on the Tsugikuni legacy!" Tanjiro said with a proud smile.

"I thought you like having that responsibility...?" Lorenzo asked, "I do...just sharing it with someone is nice once in a while..." Tanjiro replied. "Alright guys...I'm back..." Andrew replied as he sat down back in his chair.

"Me too..." Edmund also said before sitting back down in front of his screen, "Wait...where did you go?" Tanjiro asked, "After the police knocked on Andrew's door, they came to knock on mine and ask me some questions regarding some sort of robbery in the area..." Edmund answered, "Dam...seems like you booked the worst part of the city." Minato joked, "Japanese ghetto." Edmund replied while also joking.

"Nah...but deada*s, I thought they were here to take me in or some shit, they even stepped a foot inside my house." Edmund stated, "Man's getting flashbacks from the last visit to Japan." Tanjiro replied while laughing.

The others laughed at his comment and soon began to talk about other things that were happening in their lives as well as joking around.

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DODODODODODODO, "Kimetsu Gossip" time!

Tanjiro: *nom* *nom*, oh wait, we're on?

Tanjiro: Hold...on...I'm eating some cheese...

Tanjiro: Ok...that's better...

Tanjiro: Anyway, welcome back to another segment of "Kimetsu Gossip"! Today, we're going to go over the permission slip for the field trip in a few days.

Tanjiro: *Ahem*, so...as it says here...the field trip will be happening on Christmas Eve, students are to arrive early in the morning, as stated in the last segment...they are to stick with their respective assigned groups, I am leading a group, so this really doesn't apply to me. 

Tanjiro: Also...if we turn the back of the page...we have some signing lines here, here, and here...do do do...and...wait..."If any injuries or serious trauma happen during the duration trip, we are not responsible for any accusations that are provided against us. By signing this, you are hereby giving up your ability to take any legal action against us if any serious injuries or unrecognizable markings appear on your child after the trip."

Tanjiro:...what the f*ck? Knowing that some of these students are probably Demon Slayers, this is very concerning knowing that this is in the actual field trip form. So what they are saying is that there will probably be some injuries caused during the trip, and maybe even death...

Tanjiro: WHAT THE HELL? I THOUGHT WE ARE GOING TO TOKYO, NOT F*CKING DETROIT OR FALLUJAH OR SOME SHIT!

*Technical Difficulties*

Tanjiro: Woo! Apologies for my outrage, join us next time in the chapter, "Mysterious Mansion Part 1", where I get assigned a mission by my crow to go to a very old and abandoned mansion in the middle of the forest. I also get to meet the others, my regular school friends, not the BOYS. 

Tanjiro: I feel like the author could've just put the original title of the chapter or episode, which was "Tsuzumi Mansion"...but it seems that the author wants to be a little creative with the chapter naming.

Tanjiro: Also, this chapter is probably going to be a mega-chapter, since after this chapter, the "Field Trip to Tokyo" arc is next, which is probably going to be a 5 part arc or maybe more...so yeah...next chapter is going to take awhile, so your patience is greatly appreciated.

Stop doing my job...

Tanjiro: Suck my d-