The night was deep when Yorichi reached the cedar hills.
The road curved gently upward until it ended at a tall wooden gate. Beyond it, lanterns glowed in the darkness — a large estate, quiet but alive.
Two Kakushi stood guard at the entrance. When they saw Yorichi's tall silhouette approach, they straightened instantly.
The first guard spoke, polite but firm.
"Halt. State your business."
Yorichi stopped a few steps from the gate. His calm gaze lingered on the compound, then returned to the masked men.
"I have come to meet your Master," he said simply.
The two exchanged glances. Even under their masks, there was hesitation.
"You are…?"
Yorichi said nothing at first. He simply stood there, moonlight catching in his red hair, the faint mark visible on his brow, the sword at his side.
Something about the way he stood made neither guard able to demand more from him.
"I am a swordsman," he said quietly. "That is enough."
The second Kakushi shifted, his voice a little less steady.
"You… look like one of the Hashira, sir. But we have not seen you before."
"Then you have now."
The words were not prideful, only stated as fact.
After a moment's pause, the first Kakushi bowed slightly.
"Please wait here."
He slipped inside the gate, hurrying down the lantern-lit path.
The other remained at his post, but stood straighter than before, glancing occasionally at Yorichi as though in quiet awe.
Moments later, the sound of heavy, steady steps reached the gate.
The man who emerged was huge — towering, broad-shouldered, his eyes covered with a cloth. The air itself seemed to quiet around him.
Gyomei Himejima stopped just beyond the gate, his prayer beads clicking softly in his hands.
"…Who stands before us?" His voice was calm, deep.
Yorichi inclined his head slightly. "I am here to meet your Master."
There was a silence between them. Gyomei tilted his head slightly, as though listening not to Yorichi's words, but to his presence.
"You carry a Nichirin blade," Gyomei said after a moment. "And yet I have never heard your voice among the Hashira."
"I am no Hashira," Yorichi said.
Gyomei's grip on his beads stilled. "…Then who are you?"
Yorichi's gaze remained steady. "A man who has hunted demons longer than most have drawn breath. That is all that matters."
For a long moment, Gyomei said nothing. Then, slowly, he stepped aside.
"Very well. The Master will decide."
The Kakushi opened the gate. Yorichi stepped through without hurry, his posture straight, his steps silent on the stone path.
As he walked toward the inner house, he could hear faint activity — Kakushi moving quietly, someone sweeping the veranda. From somewhere nearby, a wild whoop echoed — unmistakably Inosuke, causing some poor Kakushi to shout in frustration.
But Yorichi's attention was fixed ahead.
Soon, another Kakushi appeared, bowing low.
"The Master has been informed. Please wait — he wishes to meet you."
Yorichi gave the smallest of nods, coming to stand in the courtyard under the moonlight.
And in the main house, Ubuyashiki Kagaya — frail, pale, but smiling softly — was told that a man had come.
A man who carried a Nichirin blade.
Who wore the haori of a Hashira.
Who bore a mark.
After some while-
The sliding doors opened with a soft wooden hiss.
Yorichi stepped into the room.
Lantern-light painted the tatami floor in gold. At the far end, sitting upright despite his frail body, was a pale man in a white kimono. His face was calm, his smile gentle — but the air in the room was heavy, as if everything had stilled to listen.
Ubuyashiki Kagaya.
The man who led the Corps.
"Welcome," Kagaya said softly. "I am Kagaya Ubuyashiki. You wished to meet me?"
Yorichi bowed, low and precise. "I did."
When he straightened, Kagaya's eyes lingered on him — the red hair, the haori that seemed older than any style worn today, the Nichirin blade at his hip. And then the mark.
The room grew stiller.
Kagaya's breath caught, barely audible. His ever-gentle expression shifted — not fear, but something like awe.
"…It cannot be," Kagaya murmured.
Gyomei, kneeling silently at the corner of the room, turned his head slightly. "Master?"
Kagaya did not look away from Yorichi. His voice was quiet, reverent, as though speaking to the air itself.
"Your face… your bearing… you match the description exactly. The records speak of a man who walked like the sun itself. A man who faced Muzan Kibutsuji and made him flee."
Yorichi's expression did not change, but something in his stillness seemed to deepen.
"You know my name," he said softly.
Kagaya closed his eyes, exhaling as if releasing a prayer. "Yorichi Tsugikuni."
Gyomei's hands tightened around his prayer beads.
The name hung in the air like thunder.
"The first swordsman," Kagaya said. "The one who created the breathing techniques… the one whose mark became the symbol of our Corps."
Yorichi inclined his head slightly, neither confirming nor denying.
"I had heard," he said quietly, "that Muzan still lives."
Kagaya opened his eyes again, and for the first time in months, there was something fierce in them — not just gentleness, but fire.
"He does. And we are preparing for the final battle."
Yorichi's hand brushed the hilt of his blade.
"Then I am in the right place."
For a moment, there was silence. The weight of centuries seemed to settle on the room — all the Corps' sacrifices, all the lives lost, leading to this night.
Gyomei bowed his head low, his massive frame trembling ever so slightly.
"To think…" he whispered. "…that I would live to stand in the presence of the one who nearly destroyed Muzan."
Kagaya smiled faintly, the expression soft but filled with a rare, quiet hope.
"Your arrival," he said, "may change the course of this war."
Yorichi said nothing, but the moonlight that fell through the shoji screens glinted against his Nichirin blade like the first light of dawn.
Kagaya sat quietly across from Yorichi, his hands folded in his lap.
"There is much to tell you," Kagaya said softly.
"I am listening," Yorichi replied.
And so Kagaya spoke — of Muzan's evasion through the centuries, of the endless cycle of death and suffering, of the Upper Moons who had slaughtered generation after generation of slayers.
He named them, one by one.
When Kagaya spoke of Upper Moon One — Kokushibo — Yorichi's eyes closed for a moment, his long lashes shadowing his face.
"…So," Yorichi said quietly. "He chose that path, even after all this time."
Kagaya's voice softened further. "You knew him."
Yorichi's reply was calm, but there was a sorrow in it that filled the room.
"He was my brother."
Kagaya bowed his head in silent respect.
The rest of the briefing continued in hushed tones — Kagaya explained the existence of the Hashira, the Corps' current strength, their training regimen, and their plan to lure Muzan into a final confrontation.
When he finished, the room fell silent.
Yorichi sat perfectly still, his face unreadable.
Finally, he spoke.
"You have fought this war for centuries," he said. "And still he lives. That is not failure. That is perseverance."
Kagaya smiled faintly at that, his pale face lit by candlelight.
"Every generation has carried this burden. And every generation has died carrying it. We exist so that, one day, Muzan will not."
Yorichi inclined his head slightly, his calm presence somehow filling the room with quiet strength.
"Then let this be that generation."
For a moment, Kagaya just looked at him — this man out of time, who had faced Muzan and nearly ended it all eight hundred years ago — and for the first time in his life, Kagaya felt a fragile but unmistakable certainty:
This war could be won.
"I will send word to the Hashira," Kagaya said softly. "They are in training, but they must return for a council. You will remain here until then?"
"Yes."
"Then please," Kagaya said with quiet warmth, "consider this estate your home."
Yorichi gave a small nod.
Outside, the wind shifted, stirring the garden leaves. Somewhere far away, a crow cried into the night — as if carrying word to the world that the sun had returned.