The corps grounds were quiet. Too quiet.
Yoriichi arrived after weeks of demon hunting—his blade newly sharpened, his breathing deeper than before. But something was missing.
Someone was missing.
He looked around. No sign of Michikatsu.
Then came Enjuro Rengoku, shoulders low, his usual blazing spirit dimmed.
"Yoriichi… I'm sorry. Your brother is gone."
Yoriichi's expression did not shift. He waited, stone still, his silence asking for more.
Rengoku sighed, voice strained with sadness.
"He… left. But not as your brother. He's changed. Transformed. Taken by the demon who calls himself Muzan."
The words struck like thunder.
"No," Yoriichi whispered. "He wouldn't."
But deep inside, he knew. The subtle signs. The jealousy. The silence. The late-night disappearances.
He turned away, unable to speak.
That night, by a quiet mountain lake, the stars reflected like a shattered sky. Yoriichi knelt, eyes shut, blade across his knees.
"Uta… now him too?"
The sorrow was quiet. Controlled. But deep as the lake itself.
The wind shifted.
A presence behind him.
"Still meditating like a monk?"
Yoriichi stood slowly.
Kokushibo.
His brother's body—warped. Horns twisted from his temple. A demonic third eye opened in his forehead. But the voice… still bore traces of Michikatsu.
"Why?" Yoriichi asked, barely above a whisper.
"Because I refuse to live in your shadow," Kokushibo replied coldly. "As a man, I could never surpass you. But as a demon…"
He drew his sword—twisted, veined, alive with pulsing blood.
"I will."
Steel clashed under moonlight.
Sun and Moon collided in the silent woods.
Each breath, each strike, carved the night open.
But Yoriichi was faster.
Stronger.
Calmer.
He parried each of Kokushibo's demonic strikes with grace. He pushed him back. Not with rage—but with grief.
"You were my brother."
"Then prove it now."
They clashed again—until the sky blushed with the first kiss of dawn.
Sunlight peeked through the trees.
Kokushibo hissed, retreating into the forest shadows, eyes glowing.
"This isn't over…"
And he vanished.
Yoriichi collapsed to his knees, sword plunged into the earth.
He didn't scream.
He didn't shout.
He simply wept.
"Uta… Michikatsu… I will stop him. I swear it."
The sun rose behind him, bathing him in light—his breathing silent, but burning with purpose.
His goal was clear: Hunt down Muzan Kibutsuji.