Amare Flos (Demon Slayer)

Kaze cringed at the sight of the horrid demon, a boy's head on a spider's body, flawlessly attached as if he was born like that. Unlike the mutant monsters he had just fought, the spider body was much bigger, and the head didn't look as if it was choked and struggling to breathe. The 8 legs hung down as he hung upside down from the base of a wooden hut. A disgusting pale white skin colour creased on his face as a grimacing smile stretched from ear to ear. A look of insanity and amusement sparked on his face as his eyes widened, still locked onto Kaze's face. One of his eyes seemed to be blood red, with a light cyan dot in the middle, the other was normal yet glowed the same cyan iris colour. His body flaunted a gruelling purple colour with dirty orange stripes, circling around his legs.

"I saw what you did to my creations… My spiders… But it's ok. I'll avenge their deaths with yours!" The demon cackled cruelly, as his body squirmed, the legs contracting and stretching as he twitched with excitement. The demon stared at Kaze, an indescribable hunger for human blood arose in the demon's body, the tall body of Kaze would make an excellent meal for the demon. He drooled at the thought of it.

"Blood Demon Art… Poison Manipulation!" The demon's loud voice shouted. The demon's saliva was quickly replaced with purple venom, thick gooey like fluid in his mouth. It circled around the filthy mouth. The demon slightly swung back on the web that was stuck to the bottom of the small wooden hut. His mouth was full of poisonous venom, as he swung forward, he sprayed the venom out his mouth with a powerful force. The purple substance came straight for Kaze's face, who hadn't moved a single centimetre the entire time. He ducked under the gooey poison, he let it fly above his head. The poison came into contact with a tree that was behind Kaze. Kaze observed how the venom acted, vapour released from the tree as the purple venom tore through the tree, it looked as if it was burning through the bark.

Kaze turned towards the demon again, who still had a malicious grin pasted on his white face. Kaze took a deep breath, he looked unusually calm, with little expression on his face. The demon found this annoying, he enjoyed the infliction of pain on others. He found thrill in seeing people cower in fear, and how they would cry and scream when in fear. He had developed this obsession and enjoyment with others pain seeing his Brother and Father verbally and physically abuse his Mother. He found it amusing and enjoyable, slowly he found an insatiable pleasure in causing pain to others, whoever and whatever it be, small bugs, his younger siblings, his mother, but never his Father or Brother. They were simply too strong for him to hurt or cause pain to. He hated that fact. He hated people stronger than him, people who he couldn't inflict pain to, couldn't make them wail and cry.

For that reason, the twisted demon had developed hate against his younger brother Rui. Even being the youngest brother, he was the most powerful, he ran the family. No, he created the family. He took people who lost their way into Mount Natagumo and made them demons, forcing them to be a part of his 'family'. Rui had made the spider demon into the eldest brother, replacing his human body with a large spider's body when he was turned into a demon. The brother demon still had an undeniable amount of loyalty to Rui despite his hate. The demon's skin crawled with rage at the sight of Kaze, his legs curled and tensed, his eyes wide as they glared at Kaze. There was no trace of fear on Kaze's face, the demon's blood boiled and his brain ached with the red-hot anger that flowed through his body. He was desperate to see pain plastered across Kaze's face.

Kaze stared back at the demon.

"Is that it?" Kaze asked with a stone-cold expression. The demon felt his entire body go cold, taken aback with disbelief. Out of every human he had faced, every human he had turned into spiders, this was the only time a human had reacted to his attack this way. It sent shivers through every single speck of his being.

"You…" His eyes twitched, his grin turned upside down and he clenched his jaw. His mouth filled up again, and with increased pressure, he shot the venom out of his mouth with small bursts. The small pellets of venom flew at Kaze like bullets, in response Kaze dashed to the right. The demon twisted the single string of web that attached him to the bottom of the suspended wooden hut to turn his body. Kaze kept turning to the right, the spider demon's leg constantly twisted the web to match Kaze's direction. Patches of grass fumed with vapour as the demon's venom disintegrated whatever it touched. The demon's mind grew more and more frustrated with every step Kaze took. The venom bullets stopped shooting, just as the spider demon stopped to produce more in his mouth, Kaze stopped in his tracks. The spider demon glared at Kaze, who had a slight smile on his face for some reason.

"Are you finding this amusing?!" The demon shouted, annoyance increased throughout his body, his hatred towards Kaze grew with every second. Kaze smiled even more at the fact that the demon hadn't seen his motive all along. The demon felt a strange tug at his body. His eyes darted upwards, the thick web string that held him to the bottom of the wooden hut all mangled and twisted from all the spin that the demon had inflicted on the string. The string had a certain tension to it. The spider demon took his legs off the string in fear of it snapping. Instead, as soon as the spider demon let it go, the string released its tension and started to spin back into the original position. In turn, the spider demon attached to the string started to spin at a fast speed as well. His scream went in every direction as it spun around.

Kaze held his sword tightly, he pushed his feet into the ground, tightened every muscle in his body and rotated his waist a little. He unleashed a powerful swing after a moment of breathing. A dark crescent slash flew through the air directly at the spider demon's head. The flying slash and demon clashed.

Kaze took another deep breath in as the demon's head fell to the ground, its spider body still spinning in the air. Slowly as the demon's head disintegrated he screamed. Even in the afterlife, he would remember the face of Kaze, the stone-cold expression that only brought him fear. Soon, the screams were gone.

Without a second to spare, another scream replaced the demons. A high-pitched scream.

"Father!" The voice pierced all those in the vicinity. Kaze flinched at the sudden scream. He looked back at the wooden hut, suspended in the air, and started to walk towards the scream.

Asumi covered her ears, the small demon girl, white skin with red dots as a pattern and pale white eyes tied to a tree by her own webs. She was no challenge for Asumi, there was a difference in almost all aspects of combat. Asumi was taller, stronger, faster and of course more experienced in combat. The girl hadn't seen a day of real combat, her powers primarily focused on silk manipulation, she formed silk cocoons in mere seconds from her palms and fired them at enemies, in an attempt to capture them. Her fighting style depended on the distance between her and the enemy, at close range she had no chance. Asumi learnt this fact quickly in their fight. She was able to close the distance that the girl tried to create in a short time, able to evade the silk cocoons that the girl shot. However, Asumi didn't want to kill the demon, she needed the girl to get information about the mountain if there were any more demons. She had tied the demon to a tree with the use of the demon's own silk. Asumi's original plan was to just leave the girl after she had got the information. To let the sunlight take her life. But after the scream…

"My Father… and Brother will kill you! They'll both kill you and all the disgusting demon slayers on our mountain!" The demon struggled in the tightly tied ropes of silk against the tree trunk. Asumi's expression soured and with a quick slash, she decapitated the demon. Her head rolled on the dark ground, tears flowed out of her eyes as her head slowly turned to ash.

Asumi sighed and sheathed her sword again. She had no idea where Kaze or Eira were, the forest was silent, the only sounds heard were the rustling leaves and rough wind. She at least knew there were two more demons that were considered strong. Asumi leaned down to wipe mud off her shoes.

"It was a mistake getting white shoes… They stayed white for a good 5 seconds…" Asumi sighed.

"Hey!" Kaze screamed. Asumi looked up quickly to see Kaze sprinting in her direction. His expression was weird, a worried expression. As if he had just seen a dead body. Asumi got chills down her spine as she felt a hulking presence behind her. She was unable to even turn around before a gigantic fist slammed into the side of her body, she felt the blunt force smash into her ribs and pain surge through her body. Asumi was blasted to the side, her body thudded against a tree. Her whole body erupted in stings, aches and throbs. She groaned in pain, tears flooded in her eyes. Through her blurry vision she saw the monster like a demon. A behemoth of a demon, a vulgar brown skin, with the same red dot pattern as the demon she had just killed. White hair sprouted from the head of the demon, instead of a human head, the demon had a monstrous spider head attached to its thick neck. It was anything but a human or demon. It was a monster. The colossal demon turned its body to Asumi again, taking slow steps, yet every time its feet hit the ground, a slight tremor was felt.

"Stay away from my family!" The demon roared loudly. It started to sprint towards Asumi, Asumi tried to push herself up, she was too slow. The demon steps shaking the Earth as he jumped into the air. The demon roared mid air, ready to smash its fist down onto Asumi's body. Asumi watched as the enormous demon got closer to her. Death lingered on her as she struggled to get up. The demon metres away from landing it's mighty fist onto Asumi was disturbed in its path. Kaze body slammed the demon mid air to push it away. The demon wasn't propelled too far, it only fell a couple metres away from the two Demon Slayers.

"It's alright. Stay down, I'm here." Kaze kneeled down next to Asumi. Helping her sit up. He glanced back up at the demon, who smashed the ground with its fist, its beady spider eyes glaring at Kaze full of rage. "After I defeat this demon, we'll get some help for you"

"No! I'm… I'm done with staying put!" Asumi pushed her body off the ground painfully. In her mind both Ali and Eira's fights tormented her, replaying in her mind. How did they just get back up so effortlessly? How were they so strong? Why couldn't she get back up? Asumi coughed and blood flew out her mouth. Her whole body stung and ached. She grunted and looked back up at Kaze. Who had stood back up ready to face the demon.

"Suit yourself." Kaze dashed forward as the demon fully stood up as well. Asumi's fists pushed on the ground, as she slowly got up, her entire body felt swollen and bruised. She coughed again.

"Breathe… Breathe… Breathe!" Asumi forced herself to recall all the lessons she learnt in the Butterfly Mansion, all the different breathing techniques they had learnt. To stop bleeding, to stop swelling, to gain energy. She took a deep breath and reiterated what she had learnt. She breathed in and out. Every breath hurt but it was assisting in movement. She took a small step, she had a small limp. She reached for her sword and gripped the handle. She looked forward where Kaze and the behemoth demon exchanged blows. Kaze evaded the demon's fists as much as he could, the reach of the demon proved to be extremely advantageous. Kaze couldn't even get a shot on the demon. He couldn't risk attempting a flying slash like he did to cut down the tree. It would take too long, by the time he would be ready he would've already got his face smashed in. The demon was furiously swinging at Kaze, it was slow, but a single hit could be detrimental if hit. Kaze had already seen the impact of the demon's attacks on Asumi. A single punch had done serious damage to her. Kaze's mind was reminded about Asumi and her serious condition, he quickly glanced to the left, shocked when he saw Asumi limping towards them.

"Wh-!" Kaze attempted to say something but before he even got the first word out the demon fist slammed into Kaze's chest. The immense force had felt as if a whole train had smashed into him. Asumi's eyes widened as Kaze's body was launched backwards. A loud booming sound as Kaze's body hit the trunk of a tree. He grunted and fell to the ground, wasting little time he pushed himself up.

His vision was blurry and his ears rung, the impact had messed his whole body up. He could feel the pain reaching his fingertips. Kaze wasn't sure if he could take a step without passing out. He closed his eyes tightly and opened them again. He held his sword tightly.

Kaze sprinted forward, and without a second thought, he launched the sword right at the demon, the sword travelled like a spear, the demon was too slow to dodge it. The sword pierced right through the left eye of the demon. The demon roared as the sharp pain jolted across its face. While the demon roared in pain, Kaze increased his pace and jumped off the ground towards the demon. The demon removed the sword from its eye only for Kaze to slam his knee onto the demon's face. Followed by a nasty right hook right to the demon's jaw. As Kaze dropped back to the floor, he swept the demon's legs, putting great force into toppling the demon. The demon screeched loudly as it fell on its back. Kaze continued to ravage the demon with constant attacks. Asumi watched as Kaze and the demon both fought, she was in shock at how well Kaze was fighting with his bare hands, faced with a strong sense of deja vu from her first mission. Asumi knew the demon wouldn't die from Kaze's attacks with his fists. She pushed herself with all her willpower, limping forwards. The demon roared and flailed its arms, one arm directly struck Kaze's face, as he got hit, blood flew out his mouth, his body fell to the side from the force of the hit.

The demon dug its rough hands into the ground and thrusted itself upward. Kaze's vision went blurry again, even if the strike was accidental, the natural strength that came from the sheer size and weight of the demon was no joke. It took a while for Kaze to come back to his senses, when he did, he had no time to think before the demon's hand clasped around Kaze's ankle. Kaze grunted as he felt the tight grasp on his feet, he glanced around for anything to grab onto to prevent the demon from throwing his body around like a ragdoll. Kaze spotted the emerald green sword on the ground, it shone like a diamond in the rough. He leapt forward to grab it but before he could even lay a finger on the weapon he felt his whole body pulled backwards. The ginormous demon breathed right into Kaze's face as he held Kaze upside down by the ankle, Kaze dangled like a keychain as the demon slowly pulled its fist back. Kaze tensed his entire body.

"I can't take a punch like that… It's going to break my entire skeleton." Kaze tried to escape the iron grip of the demon's hand.

The demon roared as its hand tightened and propelled forward, the whole forest silent, it anticipated the deafening crack sound the punch would make. Kaze closed his eyes tightly.

"First form! Rose Thorns!" Asumi screamed out, her voice raspy with pain.

Kaze felt the fist of the demon touch him softly. As if there was no power to the attack at all. Just a small tap, like it was a fist bump. Kaze opened his eyes. The demon's head absent from its hulking body. Suddenly, the entire body collapsed, and the grip on Kaze loosened immediately. As Kaze recovered and stood up, Asumi stood there, she loosely held her sword. She made eye contact with Kaze before she fell forwards on her face. The behemoth of a demon slowly burnt away. Kaze reached out his arms to catch Asumi but his body throbbed with an agonising bruise. Kaze held his own body but slowly moved towards Asumi.

"Help… We need…" Kaze's voice was soft. His vision turned blurry again. He too fell forwards. The cold ground was like an ice pack on both their bodies, it relaxed them, but Kaze knew if he didn't get help fast Asumi would be in serious trouble. He couldn't fight the immense exhaustion, someone dropped down next to them.

"Don't worry… We're here." A soft voice spoke, Kaze couldn't see much through the blur. He only saw two figures, one who wore green and red clothing, and another who was wearing a butterfly-like pattern.

"Xia…" Kaze whispered under his breath before his vision went black.