Their Tale [Kimetsu No Yaiba Oneshots]

Pretend

His breath got caught in his throat as she stepped out of the house. Clad in a shiromuku [1], she looked absolutely ethereal, like a goddess descended from heavens if there were one, violet eyes peeked at him behind long eyelashes.

Her hand moved, and she flicked him on the arm. He winced.

Pursing her crimson lips, which somehow incited a desire he couldn't quite name in his chest, she said, "Come on, Tomioka-san. Don't just stand there. We've got a mission to do."

... Ah, right. This was only a farce to draw out a demon.

.

.

.

"The recent disappearance of newlyweds?"

The tone of the old lady they decided to interrogate was that of a surprise, probably because she wondered how they could know about that despite being outsiders. And he was right, because she immediately asked, "How did you know about that?"

Giyuu was ready to answer, that he was a demon hunter and he heard the news from the organisation's head, but the Insect Pillar beside him placed her small hand on his arm and pinched him lightly, a signal for him to keep quiet. "We heard it from a villager that happened to visit our village last week. Investigating disappearance like this is within our job scope, so we will be grateful if you can provide any information for us."

The lady eyed them skeptically for a while, before sighing and told them the story. Apparently as a part of wedding ceremony in the village, couples on their wedding night had to stay in the shrine up the hill nearby to pray for God's blessing for their marriage, and there were two couples who were nowhere to be found after their wedding night.

"We thought they ran away, but that just doesn't make sense. Why would they run away without bringing anything with them? Sure, they are naughty kids and like to fool around, but they are still good kids. Police has looked for them in the forest nearby, but they found nothing."

"Could it be there's... something... in the shrine?" Kochou asked.

The old woman shook her head. "Police have stayed there overnight several times, but nothing happened. Also there were other couple who were married between the disappearance, but they went back to the village in the morning."

His fellow Pillar gave him a sideway glance with a bemused expression on her face, and he felt the same way. There seemed like a pattern in this demon's behaviour, but what was it? Oyakata-sama had hypothesised the demon had a particular fancy in eating couples, but there's a couple who survived the whole ceremony.

"There's no other disappearance in the village?" This time Giyuu was the one who's asking, to which the lady shook her head again. Damn, this turned out to be a troublesome mission. It feasted on only certain couples, which they didn't know what particularly differentiated them from the others. How could they deal with this? Was it even a demon?

"How about the shrine's condition? Is there anything unusual?" Another question came from Kochou. Oh. If they found a bloodstain, then it would confirm the demon being the culprit behind these incidents.

Placing her hand on her chin, the old lady said, "Well, we found... Youji-kun's and Takuma-kun's haori, Ayame-chan's wataboshi [2], and Mika-chan's uchikake [3]."

... Clothes?

"Just clothes?" he tried to confirm. The woman nodded, and he resisted the urge to groan.

"Now that's... troublesome," Kochou murmured after a huff, taking the words right out of his mouth. "I guess that's all. Thank you for the information. Oh, do you have any rare herbal remedies? I would like to buy some, if possible."