Anime: Fight Sukuna at the beginning?.

Chapter 164: Will You See Through?
Rather than using an extremely precise time to describe the brief time when Fang Yi 'luckily' defeated Liao Lin and then met one of the Upper Moons, Kokushibo, on the road, it would be better to summarize it directly with a simple and clear sentence.

"Without even a moment's mourning for Liao Lin, the one who immediately arrived on the battlefield was Kokushibo, one of the Upper Moons."

Of course, this Upper Moon, Kokushibo, was not prepared for a round-robin battle. He just stood at the edge of the battlefield and watched Fang Yi kill Liao Lin, and then jumped out impatiently.

It gave Fang Yi some time to rest. He could even say some sarcastic words to Liao Lin's corpse which was still in his sight, such as.

"You can teleport? Then can you be resurrected?

"Do you know how I killed you? I used [Binding], [Preemptive Strike], and [Resurrection].

"Be proud of yourself. You are very strong and have forced me to reveal so many of my hidden cards."

But Fang Yi did not do so, simply because he did not like to do useless work, or to explain his killing methods to the dead, and he was also a cautious person in battle.

What if Liao Lin has a soul box like a lich, or can be resurrected, or what if he has a bound life plate that collects video information before dying, like the people from the sects who travel outside the immortal world?
Who knows, there might be someone who can use divination to restore the scenes and sounds of the short period of time after the other person's death. Wouldn't it be very stupid to reveal all your cards?

The trump card can be called a trump card because the enemy cannot guess it, so it will not be easily targeted.

[The enemy's death is the highest recognition of my 'trump card'. I prefer to let the enemy be confused.]

Putting aside such boring thoughts, Fang Yi looked at Kokushibo, one of the Upper Moons in front of him, and then looked at the direction the two were heading. He roughly understood that the two were "fellow travelers".

The "fellow travelers" here are literally fellow travelers, without any other strange meaning. Fang Yi's encounter with this Upper Rank One is like the encounter between two people on the road when all the students rush to the cafeteria like zombies out of a cage after lunch get out of class.

This man and this ghost were both looking for Muzan Kibutsuji.

The former is like Pan Jinlian sitting at the head of the bed with the intention of killing someone, looking at Wu Dalang who had just drunk the poison and was foaming at the mouth, and preparing to kill the Ghost King while the Ghost King has not yet digested the poison and the [Human Transformation Drug].

This upper-ranked demon king seemed to have obtained the [Guardian] character card, and was to protect the Demon King from the siege of the Demon Slayer Corps and help him get through his weakest period.

Muzan Kibutsuji is able to observe the enemy and transmit his own orders through the blood distributed to his subordinate demons and Muzan Kibutsuji's cells in these demons.

Therefore, Fang Yi inferred that after Liao Lin's death, Mingnu, who had escaped from his control, decisively chose to destroy this cage that no one could control after Muzan Kibutsuji discovered that he could not control his subordinate and the steward of the Infinite City, and prepared to rush out of the ground to prey on humans to speed up the digestion of the poison.

At the same time, through the cells placed on the subordinates, he conveyed the instructions not to get entangled with the Demon Slayer Corps and to protect them quickly.

Looking at Kokushibo, one of the Upper Moons, who released several crescent-shaped sword auras of [Breath of the Moon] and seemed to have something on his mind and was not prepared to get entangled with him, Fang Yi felt that he could try to kill this Upper Moon.

Because he is now in the 'strong period' of using his 'trump card'.
-
Fang Yi's "trump card" should not actually be called a "trump card". To be more precise, he just learned the "core technology" of Lord Sukuna - using [binding] loans.

Of course, Fang Yi used a more gentle method, not like Sukuna used a once-in-a-lifetime instant space slash to kill people, or some kind of mechanical deification method.

He just used ordinary restraints like adding weights to the two ends of a scale, exchanging some abilities for equivalent value, just like how Nanami Kento used 80% of his strength during working hours and 120% of his strength during overtime.

In the battle against Upper Moon Two, Douma, the battle against Muzan Kibutsuji at the Demon Slayer Corps base, and the early battle against Liao Lin, Fang Yi's maximum strength was 80%.

In exchange for reducing his strength in these battles, the longer he maintains this 80% strength, the longer he can maintain 120% strength after he chooses to end paying the price.

After Liao Lin forced him into a desperate situation for the second time and Fang Yi didn't want to use the [Resurrection] trump card of the [Five Emperors' Coins] too early, he had no choice but to interrupt the payment stage of maintaining 80% of his strength and enter the stage of obtaining [Restraint] benefits.

In exchange, his current condition is better than ever, almost 130% of his normal attributes, so Fang Yi decided to make a bold attempt.

He was going to duel swords with Kokushibo, one of the Upper Moons. In this short battle, he would kill this Upper Moon and continue to improve his "frivolous" swordsmanship.

The prefix of [Sword] superimposed with the buff of [Join Midway], combined with [Mastery of Sword Skills], has made Fang Yi's swordsmanship a qualitative leap in this mission. He has transformed from a person who knows nothing about swordsmanship to a swordsman with quite "solid" swordsmanship.

He needed a swordsman who was strong enough and had honed his swordsmanship to the highest level, to serve as his [final assignment] for his swordsmanship and to bring this mission to a perfect conclusion.

This ghost who has the skill of [Transparent World] and can see the human body as if through X-ray vision, can observe the movements of his own muscles and blood vessels in advance, and has practiced swordsmanship for four hundred years, is the best opponent.

Having a brief fight with it and then killing it will definitely allow me to make a breakthrough.

Looking at the several holes on the opponent's body that had not yet recovered and were obviously caused by the Rock Pillar's meteor hammer, Fang Yi realized that the sneak attack plan he had designed for the Rock Pillar, Gyoumei Sorrow Island, had worked.

In this world line without [Stripes], Fang Yi found a substitute for [Stripes] to improve the panel attributes - [Restraint].

The [Binding] I learned from Sukuna has a legendary branch bonus attached to me. One of the effects is:
"Can help others establish [bindings], and can even take the initiative to pay the price for others to initiate [bindings]. "

After Fang Yi used [Muzan Kibutsuji's blood] and [Human Transformation Potion] to restore the sight of the completely blind Rock Pillar, he set the following [binds] for him:

"Closing your eyes during battle will give you higher panel attributes."

As we all know, this Rock Pillar has skills like [Mind's Eye·False] that allow him to sense attacks without using his eyes, so being completely blind does not affect his normal combat.

The [Binding] that Fang Yi set for him was enough to be included in the textbook of spells as an example of the use of binding. It can be said that it cleverly exploited the loopholes in the contract and increased the combat power of the Rock Pillar in this difficult battle.

The other 'pillars' Fang Yi also read from the script, giving full play to his talent for exploiting loopholes in the rules, and set up different [constraints] for them to increase some panel attributes.

Otherwise, referring to the performance of one of the Upper Moons, Kokushibo, who opened the [Marking] Mist Pillar with one sword in the first stage, Fang Yi arranged these "Pillars" to fight Kokushibo, which was almost equivalent to sending them to their deaths.

Fang Yi looked at Kokushibo, one of the Upper Moons, who no longer looked like a human, and knew that although the enemy had entered the third stage, he could release sword energy that filled the entire screen at once.

But it was obvious that this Upper Rank One was in a bad and injured state, and his expression was a little dazed, while his own condition was better than ever.

After evaluating the opponent's combat effectiveness, Fang Yi thought.

"So, let me see what level you, the sword of the Upper Rank, have reached."

Just a moment later, Fang Yi felt a little disappointed when he saw the other party using [Breath of the Moon·Form 14·Ferocious Transformation·Sky Full of Slender Moon], coupled with the overwhelming, intertwined and overlapping vortex-shaped slashes released by the blades stuck in the ghost's body, as if a dark cloud was pressing down.

The opponent's extremely ferocious sword technique combined with his own blood ghost technique can release several sword energies at the same time to cause damage to enemies in a large range, but there will always be some gaps in actual combat.

Especially when one has the [First Immediate Defeat], this flaw will become more obvious.

The gaps between these crisscrossing sword auras are as eye-catching as a cat that thinks it is a horse.

In his eyes, the opponent's sword was a bit slow. With his current panel attributes, he should be able to dodge the opponent's sword technique easily.

However, relying entirely on the [Preemptive Strike] cheat would not help improve his swordsmanship. Fang Yi planned to think about how to control the switch of this skill in the next battle.

Just a moment later, Fang Yi suddenly realized that he was like a ticket buyer who had swapped the departure and destination stations. He had misunderstood the current situation and made a serious mistake in assessing the enemy's strength in this battle.

Because he just realized that his [Preemptive Strike] skill had not actually been activated.

In other words, in his normal eyes, Kokushibo's sword was just that slow, as slow as an old lady crossing the street with a cane. At the same time, relying on his mastery of [Breath of the Moon], he had already anticipated the direction of the opponent's sword energy as if he had memorized the reference answers in advance.

This Upper Rank One's sword drawing speed is slower than his own, and his understanding of [Breath of the Moon] seems to be inferior to his own.

After going through several tough battles, Fang Yi's swordsmanship has unknowingly come a long way, so far that he has left one of the Upper Moons, Kokushibo, far behind and entered a world that the other party cannot see.

Fang Yi looked at the other party's ferocious face, the ugly body covered with blades, and the several crescent-shaped sword auras that seemed gorgeous but were actually empty and vulgar, and he couldn't help but feel a trace of pity.

How pathetic! You became a ghost, wasted four hundred years, and this is all you got from swordsmanship?

He looked at the crescent-shaped sword energy in the sky and swung his sword casually.

"Well, let me show you the Moon Breathing that I've been practicing for two days."
-
One of the Upper Moons, Kokushibo, looked at the enemy that appeared before him and finally felt that something had come true. He had been so angry for a long time that he just wanted to kill the legendary swordsman quickly.

He stared at the swordsman and confirmed that he was a swordsman who did not have the [Transparent World] and [Stripes], and was the kind of person who could not threaten him without sneak attacks.

Therefore, Kokushibo immediately used his largest range of sword skills, preparing to first inflict a few wounds on the enemy that would be enough to affect the opponent's movements, and then use a few sword skills to kill the opponent.

Because his life has been a little unhappy recently, and the unhappiness here is literal unhappiness, not the kind of unhappiness that is caused by being labeled.

Upon receiving intelligence on the Demon Slayer Corps' base from Liao Lin, this Upper Moon demon master had made every effort to repay the losses of several Upper Moon demons by killing several of the Demon Slayer Corps' pillars, thereby restoring Muzan-sama's shaky trust. After Liao Lin, a despicable human, formed the Minor Demon Corps and slaughtered the Demon Slayer Corps' swordsmen, along with several of the Corps' pillars, Kokushibo began to sense that his status as Muzan-sama's top fighter was facing an unprecedented challenge.

Then, it launched a surprise attack on the Demon Slayer Corps' base, was blown up, and fled back in a panic. At the same time, Liao Lin killed two "pillars", and Muzan Kibutsuji trusted Liao Lin even more.

In this decisive battle, when it was ready to show its skills, it encountered some strange enemies.

The strange thing was that these people seemed to be very familiar with the sword energy released by his [Breath of the Moon], as if they had practiced it countless times in advance, and they easily dodged his sword energy.

It even heard the enemy's 'loud conspiracy' during the battle, "Its sword-drawing speed and sword-energy speed are not as good as Lord Fang Yi's. We can postpone using that 'trump card' for the time being."

Listening to the Flame Pillar with the representative yellow hair speaking words to encourage the morale of the Demon Slayer Corps swordsmen, Kokushibo just found it very funny.

"What a joke! I killed all the users and recorders of [Sun Breathing]."

"Without [Breath of the Sun], is there any sword skill in the world stronger than my [Breath of the Moon]?

"I have lived four hundred years longer than others, and I possess the [Stripes] and [World Transparency], yet none of you have acquired these two skills.

"How can there be a swordsman stronger than me in this world if I can't unleash my [Moon Breath]?"

Kokushibo got serious and was ready to show off his strength to these "pillars" of the Demon Slayer Corps, but then he was shot by the "Ghost Eater" Buzuigawa Genya as if his imagination had been blown away.

The enemy's bullet exceeded its expectations of the speed of bullets in this era, so this bullet with a strange color and a more beautiful shape successfully embedded in one of its six eyes, bringing a sense of disharmony.

The bullet entering the flesh was accompanied by unprecedented pain. The pain caused by this strange bullet was like a needle piercing through the toes and piercing the heart, causing Kokushibo's body to twitch subconsciously.

After only encountering the enemy for a few seconds and before he could officially use [Breath of the Moon], he was humiliated like this. In such an embarrassing situation, Kokushibo could not help but roar in anger.

"You have succeeded in angering me, you all must die!"

[Breathing of the Moon·Land Type·Always a Lone Moon at Night·Infinity]

Along with Kokushibo's angry words, countless vertical arc slashes followed. In its anger, it was not prepared to start with the first form of [Breath of the Moon]. It wanted to completely destroy everything around it, including these weak "pillars".

Then, it saw the Pillars showing off their abilities and a swordsman with a gun who was looking for death.

The Rock Pillar, Gyoumei Wu of Sorrow, wielded the meteor hammer in his hand. This heavy weapon was quite agile in his hand. The chain and the hammer head covered with spikes turned into an impenetrable iron wall, which firmly blocked all of his circular slashes.

Not a drop of sweat fell on the Rock Pillar's forehead. Instead, he closed his eyes, brandished the deadly meteor hammer in his hand, and took the initiative to attack himself.

The Wind Pillar, Mushikawa Miyabi, moved his scarred face, and his body turned into a gust of wind, dodging his several circular slashes with ease.

The Flame Pillar, Rengoku Kyojuro, moved his body, and his whole body seemed to be burning. He and his sword turned into a flame to form a flaming tiger, which passed through his several circular slashes with ease.

As for Genya Busuigawa, this [Ghost Eater] was even more ruthless. He just turned his body to the side to avoid being cut into pieces. Then, the [Ghost Eater] who was cut in half by Kokushibo's sword energy put his body together by himself and fired at Kokushibo with the double-barreled pistol in his hand.

Looking at the arc slash that returned in vain, Kokushibo realized that there was something wrong with these 'pillars', but it still didn't think that these people could kill it.

Because it has the [Transparent World], the bodies of these swordsmen are transparent to it. Before the opponent makes any actual move, the movement of their muscle fibers and the activity of their lungs have already betrayed them.

It easily dodged the meteor hammer wielded by the Rock Pillar, and swung its sword to perform [Breath of the Moon·Seventh Form·Evil Mirror·Moon Reflection]. With itself as the center, it released several radial high-speed cutting attacks, plowing several sword marks on the ground and forcing back the attacks of the Flame Pillar and the Wind Pillar.

Looking at the double-barreled pistol covered with flesh and blood of Buzugawa Genya, which fired bullets slowly, Kokushibo simply raised his sword and easily blocked two bullets that the opponent had high hopes for.

Before it could speak, the two bullets turned automatically as if they had life and embedded themselves into its chest.

There was no intense pain, but something even more terrifying appeared in Kokushibo's dream.

Because he saw Yoriichi Tsugikuni, his younger brother in his human period, the one and only sun, who had aged to the point of being on his last breath under the red moon.

The people it hates and fears the most.
-
In the dream, under the red moon, Kokushibo looked at the nightmare that was so familiar that it couldn't be more familiar, Tsugikuni Yoriichi, but was surprised to find that the other party did not hold the knife tightly and swing at him.

The godlike swordsman simply lowered his blade and attempted to pass an object towards him, one that felt vaguely familiar.

Looking at the dream that was inconsistent with its impression, Kokushibo couldn't help but feel confused, but what it was thinking in its heart was.

What does my brother want to do?

In the eyes of Kokushibo, who hadn't yet turned into a demon, Yoriichi Tsugikoku was just a younger brother. This statement was not meant to be insulting, but simply a statement of fact.

At the same time, Kokushibo also understood that the other party was a person with amazing talent, and he could never catch up with him even if he tried his best.

The difference in talent can be seen at a glance. No one else can learn the other party's [Breathing of the Sun], so he tailors a breathing method based on [Breathing of the Sun] for these people.

The [Breath of the Moon] that he had developed with his help was just a crude imitation, and on the surface it looked like the sun and the moon were in harmony.

In fact, Kokushibo knew one thing clearly, that is, there was an insurmountable gap between everyone and his younger brother.

My younger brother was completely unaware of this situation. When I asked him, "No one can inherit the [Breath of the Sun] and [Breath of the Moon], what should I do?"

He said nonchalantly, "We are nothing special. There will always be people who are more intelligent than us."

Although he had no expression on his face at the time, Kokushibo still felt his heart burning with the flame of jealousy.

How could there be another person like you? Do you know how much I want to be you and see the world you see?

Afterwards, because of the fear brought by the curse of [Mark] that he would not live past the age of 25, he became a demon, betrayed the Demon Slayer Corps, killed, ate people, and honed his swordsmanship.

In the end, his brother, who was about to die of old age under the red moon, showed mercy to him and did not kill him after he turned into a ghost. Instead, he chopped up his body after his death.

And now, in the dream, looking at his brother who did not swing the knife at him, Kokushibo, although he was so frightened that he could not move, still stared at the item handed to him by the other party.

It was a flute, a complete flute, the shape and style of which were very familiar to it.

That was the flute he made for his younger brother, Tsugakuni Yoriichi, when he was called Tsugakuni Iwakatsu. It was an item that symbolized the bond between the two brothers.

After he turned into a demon and caused his brother to leave the Demon Slayer Corps, he carried the flute with him before he died.

It was this broken flute that he had cut into pieces along with his brother's body after his death, and had been carrying with him for the next three hundred years.

When the flute that he had cut into pieces was handed to him again by his younger brother, who was so old that he was only breathing his last breath, Kokushibo couldn't help but feel some human emotions.

It’s too late, brother. It’s too late.

In the dream, Yoriichi Tsugikoku did not swing the sword, but Kokushibo looked at his brother who was so old but still smiled at him and handed him the intact flute.

The immobilizing pressure it felt from the swordsman disappeared in an instant. Looking at its brother smiling at it, it no longer hesitated and simply swung the knife in its hand to chop off its own head.

It committed suicide in its dream.
-
Back to reality, Kokushibo looked at these "pillars" with some boredom, and it didn't want to fight anymore.

[Anyway, without [Breath of the Sun], these swordsmen can't kill Muzan Kibutsuji.]

Just as Kokushibo was thinking about this, he suddenly discovered that the Rock Pillar's meteor hammer suddenly accelerated and emitted a scorching breath and attacked him.

After dodging the attack at the cost of several holes being made in his body by the meteor hammer's spikes, the enraged Kokushibo's murderous intent, which had previously dissipated, condensed again.

Just as it was about to use [Breath of the Moon] to kill the swordsman, the collapsed Infinite Castle and Muzan Kibutsuji's order interrupted everything. After receiving Muzan Kibutsuji's order, it had to turn around and leave. Of course, these swordsmen were tactful enough not to chase it.

Then, it met Fang Yi on the way to protect Muzan Kibutsuji.

It confidently swung its blade at the legendary swordsman.

(End of this chapter)