Thunderous sound of explosion spread across the wilderness, in the middle of the turbulent dust— one person, one demon almost touched each other, before they launched another continuous attack in seemingly tacit agreement. Both were determined to gain the upperhand and finished the battle in one go.
"Not bad! Not bad at all! You should be this generation's 'flame pillar', right? As a human, your battle aura is truly strong!"
Seeing the "flame pillar" in front of him who was still able to counterattack under his own attacks, Akaza was also excited to be able to fight against strong adversaries, his attack movement became more severe, seemingly trying to measure Kyojuro's limit.
However, unfortunately, Kyojuro, who had a clear objective "this time round" , did not push himself beyond the limit.
"2nd form – rising scorching sun!"
"3rd form – blazing universe!"
"5th form – flame tiger!"
"7th form – immortal phoenix!"
Along with Rengoku's explosion that seemed to "ignore the cost", the terrifying flaming slashes were like endless waves, which immediately covered Akaza's figure.
"Destructive death – air type!"
From the turbulent sea of flames, six punches to the void forcefully dissipated the flames produced from the flame breathing technique. However, because of this unexpected burst of attack by Kyojuro, when Akaza pulled back again, he noticed that one of his hands had been cut off.
"This human…what is he planning?"
However, Akaza was not angry, instead he became suspicious, logically speaking, according to this "flame pillar's" standard, he should have known that wasting so much energy just to cut off his hand was a huge waste.
For a demon, losing a hand was just a light injury, but for humans, who had limited energy, this "exchange" had the possibility to become the indication for final defeat.
"Flame pillar, have you seen it? This is the power of demons, as long as you also become a demon, the endless power would definitely allow you to improve your capability and even reach 'the highest level'!"
Ignoring the demon hand that had fallen, Akaza raised his cut wrist towards Kyojuro and showed that…
In a matter of seconds, Akaza had regrown a new hand, demons' regenerative power was truly one of a kind.
"Strong human, become a demon! Could it be that you are willing to grow old after a period of time?"
"Become a sad creature like you? I'm sorry, but I'm not interested."
Seeing Kyojuro's golden red eyes that were flashing with some kind of aura, Akaza was slightly irritated in his heart, and no longer tried to persuade this idiotic human, and just got into another fight with Kyojuro.
"Sad? Haha, weak strong-man, then allow me to collect your life."
It's just that, for Akaza, who had keen battle sense, was still helpless against Maple's [transparent world] who had fully activated his stealth.
Even when Maple had collected the hand not far away from them, Akaza, who was fully focused using [compass needle] also did not feel anything. This was because his five senses had been mostly disrupted by the flame slashes, not to mention Maple had also used [soul mist lock] as the last "insurance".
"Done with this, all preparation has been completed."
Maple, who had returned to the train compartment, placed Akaza's demon hand and Enmu's demon eye at the center of the ritual, next would be the moment to verify his conjecture.
"Tanjiro, bring Nezuko and retreat a bit, do not enter the range of the ritual."
"Ok."
Hearing Maple's reminder, Tanjiro also pulled back his curious eyes from the old mysterious writing, and brought the wooden box where Nezuko slept away from the table that released some kind of strange "smell".
"Infinite death, everything returns to ruins…"
Spiritual wall enclosed the surroundings, Maple once again chanted the three-part-honorific, but he had also changed the direction of the prayer.
"I pray for your attention,
Pray for you favor,
Pray that you bless me for the strength required to complete the ritual.
"々"
Feeling his spirituality touched, Maple once again repeated the procedure for making the talisman, the picture symbolizing essence was once again shone with spirituality.
"Hiss…has it reached the limit?"
Maple, who had returned to the material world, rubbed his forehead, he knew that no longer had sufficient spirituality to perform this above-sequence ritual magic again for a short while.
"There is only one chance."
Maple murmured, however he also did not panic, but rather communicated with the higher-leveled spiritual power in an orderly manner, and activated the ritual magic that he had previously carved.
"Blood that originates from the same source, the demon king,
Follow the [pull] and come,
Manifest the spirit of the blood contract."
Along with Maple's word for word chanting of the mysterious spirit language, the blood on the demon eye was separated by a spiritual wind along with Akaza's demon hand and became a pool of blood which floated in the air.
Two pools of blood rolled in the air, before finally forming two strips of opposing blackish blood lines.
Seeing the two long lines of blood, Maple knew it was the embodiment of the demon contract that the demon king, Muzan, used to separately control Akaza and Enmu.
"High spirituality originating from the long river,
Follow the power of [bond],
Make this a secret place."
Finished speaking, darkish gray spirituality started to spin, with Maple's [danger sense] temporarily turned up, activated the corresponding carved [bond] symbol, and released an obscuring mist, which obstructed Muzan's judgment on the current situation.
"In this hidden area,
I, Maple Dumbledore,
Induced [cut] and [pass on],
Using Enmu's blood contract as a base,
Bringing Akaza under the demon king,
Bringing Hakuji under me."
Along with Maple's last chant, spiritual wind blew within the spiritual wall, the blood line symbolizing the blood contract between Enmu and the demon king immediately ignited on one end.
The line of blood was not immediately burnt out by the spiritual flame, but was like a candle who had just been lit, as if giving Maple a time limit for what he was about to do next.
Maple was not confused with the current scenery, after all, it was just like what was said in the ritual, wanting Akaza, whose true name was Hakuji, to change the direction of contract through the ritual, then he should first allow "Hakuji" spirit to recover.
When Akaza had recollected his memory of when he was a human, would the moment the ritual was successfully activated.
As for how to let the memory of Hakuji return, Maple had a set of perfect "physical treatment".
"Senior Rengoku, let's switch."
Maple's words were heard by Kyojuro, which allowed him, whose breathing had become slightly rough, to become excited again. Kyojuro, who knew of the plan, understood. The ritual had reached the final step, it would soon succeed.
"Hahaha! Mr. Feng, well done!"
Kyojuro laughed loudly while forcefully blocking the blue air fist, and counterattacked with a ferocious flame slash, and immediately distanced himself from Akaza.
"Mr. Feng, didn't you say that if possible…"
Seeing Maple, who was now beside him, Kyojuro worriedly asked, after all, he did not truly understand the effect of the "ritual".
"No problem, Muzan can no longer 'see' the situation here. Just leave the rest to me."
"Ok, then if you would, Mr. Feng!"
Keenly aware of Maple's confident aura, Kyojuro was finally completely relieved.
He clapped Maple shoulder while sheathing his nichirin blade, and immediately left the battle area, and returned to the train compartment to take over Maple's responsibility, leaving behind Maple and Akaza's confrontation.
"And who are you?"
Akaza, whose battle was interrupted, could be said to be very unhappy, he never thought that in that short train, there was still another "pillar" with strong combat aura, and was completely hidden until now.
Frankly speaking, Akaza had a feeling that he had been conspired against, this was also why he did not make a move just now.
Akaza's ferocious gaze locked onto the young man wearing a silver patterned haori, and saw the somewhat familiar green eyes, Akaza suddenly recalled.
"Wait a minute, this eye…you are the one who scried me just now, right?!"
Shouting angrily, Akaza, who had an extremely keen battle sense, immediately had a bad feeling…
It seemed that he was considered a prey?!
This thought appeared in Akaza's mind, but following closely with the insecurity, was anger at being looked at with contempt.
From the beginning, it had always been him hunting humans, where can there be a human who dared to hunt him?!
"Strong human! You are too arrogant!"
Akaza shouted while unleashing a full-powered attack, he did not know, it was because of this that he had lost the opportunity to escape.
After all, even if [transparent world] was not activated, "a slippery and cunning" Maple would not easily show his own "battle intent", and for Akaza who determined his opponents strength based on battle intent, once again kicked an iron board.
"Destructive death – eight-layered demon core!"
Eight consecutive ferocious punches were launched, amidst the ear-shattering exploding sound, what Akaza finally saw clearly was a red slash that cut apart the clouds of dust…
That was the silently activated [1st chapter].
"Are you looking for me? Akaza."
Suddenly, an extremely calm voice asking Akaza was heard from behind him, seemingly having bypassed the sense of [compass needle], which made Akaza hair stand on end.
"You…"
Almost in an instant, Akaza immediately prepared to use backward kicking [crown splitter], but [compass needle] immediately sent out an extreme alarm.
"Wrong! It's here!"
At the same time he noticed something was wrong, the long battle experience allowed Akaza's body to react, the backward kicking [crown splitter] was immediately changed into the leg sweeping attack to his left side.
[Leg form – explosive flurry!]
The moment the terrifying bursting flash of kick was unleashed, it seemed to collide with that person's kind of attack. The completely inhuman strength only allowed Akaza to use "his body" to receive and disburse the attack, and retreated a few steps.
"What's going on! Was it an illusion?"
The strange slash caused him to regain his senses from his anger and enter a battle-ready state.
"Wrong, it was not an illusion, I never heard of an illusion being able to twist [compass needle] like this!"
Akaza looked down at his own feet, towards the [compass needle] art that only he could see, while breaking out in a cold sweat.
The technique, which was originally a neat twelve-pointed azure blue colored ice snowflake, was now like a reflection on a lake that was being disturbed, twisted and chaotic. As a result, Akaza could only barely feel the invisible attack that came from the air.
However, although Akaza was already in such a desperate situation, for Maple who was in a rush, he no longer planned to "waste" more time.
"Tsk, what an annoying combat specialization, it seems that I still need to use [transparent world]."
Voice that came from everywhere echoed in the wilderness, the voice that was sometimes near and sometimes far seemed to bring some kind of contamination, which made Akaza slightly annoyed.
However, what Akaza was going to face next was not just a "headache" anymore.
[extreme sense of oppression]
This was the state that Maple wanted Akaza to enter, only when Akaza had entered this type of feeling in between life and death, his twisted and chaotic spirit could unleash a stress response, release all of its defense, and allow Maple to modify and sort, allowing "Hakuji" spirit to awaken.
Although after considering the next plan, Maple had no desire to use the last for sword art from the soul breathing. In that case, he could only completely waste Akaza.
But he had also thought of a way, that was to use a method similar to Zoro from One Piece's [great shock] sword art's momentum to oppress Akaza.
[Transparent world] activated, with [soul blade] which was based on a bright red sword allowed the nichirin blade to release ice cold killing intent. The [soul breathing] was also operated to the maximum.
At this moment, Maple battle power was equivalent to the standard for [sequence 6].
[Immortal's death has arrived; heaven's music will naturally disappear.]
"Soul breathing 3rd chapter – inaudible music"
Along with the floating declaration, Maple's figure suddenly appeared in front of Akaza, without any sign, not even the slightest breath.
"Wha…"
Akaza's word had even been spoken out, he only saw a silvery gray slash had come towards him.
"!"
In the next moment, without even waiting for Akaza to raise his hand to block, he had "heard" a terrifying thunder-like sound from his soul's "ear".
That's right, even though Akaza had no knowledge about soul, but along with the roar of "thunder", Akaza truly felt his own "soul" become temporarily deaf.
"Aaaaaaaaaa!!!"