Their Tale [Kimetsu No Yaiba Oneshots]

13. Love

Everything was normal between them after that particular afternoon in front of the restaurant near her manor.

Well, she had to make sure everything stayed normal, or else it would hinder their missions as demon hunters. Shinobu decided to act the same, although she just realised her actions toward him actually fell between being flirty and being mischievous. However, he didn't dismiss her at all, even started to be more friendly and approachable. It took her so long to make him like this, so there's no way she let her growing affection ruin their relationship. Besides, the increasing heartrate when she's with him was quite enjoyable, a little piece of heaven in this cruel hell of a world, so why should she stop?

But being in love also meant it's easier to get unnecessarily emotional, she realised.

It was after the emergency meeting after the incident in the Swordsmith Village, where Himejima proposed a training for the entirety of demon hunters led by the Pillars. She probably spent too much time being at his good side, that she forgot he's actually a very irritable man. Like it's none of his business, he decided to not participate in the training, despite the taunts of Shinazugawa and Iguro. Even with her urging to make him talk, he just said he wasn't like the others, which of course rubbed the Wind and Snake Pillars in the wrong way. Under a different situation, she would find his abysmal communication skills hilarious, but this was a crucial time and not a time for a carefree joke.

"Tomioka. Shinobu," Himejima said, stopping them from leaving after discussing the details of the training. "Stay here for a while. I need to talk to you two."

When she was waiting for her turn to talk with the Rock Pillar, Shinobi thought about his words about being different from other pillars. From the tone of his voice and the downward gaze of his eyes, she could tell they were not meant to sound haughty, but rather they hid a scar that was still bleeding until now. While she was furious at his attitude when he was gifted with such enviable physique, Shinobu found herself more curious about the cause of it and wondered if she could somehow help mending that wound.

Just as she wondered about that, Tomioka slid the door and emerged from the room. His gaze lingered for a while on her, before turned around and walked away from her.

God, she had to do everything herself.

"Tomioka-san," she called, holding his haori to stop him from leaving. He did. "Won't you tell me what do you mean by your words?"

She hoped their warming relationship would incite him to talk, but not even once he turned to see at her direction. Instead, he murmured, "I meant what I said," and didn't offer her anything else.

Okay. That's it. If that's all he's going to say even after she asked for an explanation, there's nothing more she could do. She had enough on her plate to deal with his difficult ways of communication.

Letting go of his mismatched haori, Shinobu let her hand hung on her side, nails dug into her palm as she clenched it. "Fine. I see you don't want to talk about it," she spat through gritted teeth, unable to hold her anger from seething out of her mouth. She spun on her heels and entered the room where Himejima was waiting, not noticing his eyes on her as she walked away.

---

They didn't meet at all until one week later.

Not that she could, anyway. Even though she didn't participate in the Pillar Training, she was busy researching components of wisteria poison and meeting with the female demon who had successfully escaped the clutch of Muzan, Tamayo. Oyakata-sama told her his premonition through Himejima; she's going to face Upper Moon Two in the upcoming battle, the same demon who had killed Kanae, and proposed to her to conduct a joint research with Tamayo so she could attain a poison that was strong enough to kill the demon. Shinobu was sceptical toward the woman at first-she's a demon after all, and even ended up asking questions that were quite insensitive, now that she thought about it. However, unlike the demon she had met in Natagumo Mountain, Tamayo didn't try to shift the blame of her sins to anyone else and looked directly in her eyes when she answered her questions, so she decided to trust her, just like Oyakata-sama did. While she still couldn't create a poison powerful enough to kill Upper Moons, it was still a right decision, since Tamayo took her poison one step further by adding the delay effect on her poison to throw off the infected.