Chapter Text
“My nose feels so stuffy lately!”
Turning around Hanako suppressed an eye roll at Takeo’s antics. Sighing she hauled the shaul of black berries over her shoulders.
“And that won’t get you out of wood cutting duty so get back to work.” Sliding past him she purposely bumped into his shoulders.
Pouting Takeo reeled back the worn down axe over the years once again. “Worth a shot…”
Humming Hanako carefully dropped the half full shaul on the cart. Picking up the personal wooden house bowl before moving back to the designated fruit bushels.
Ever since it had been discovered by Hanako’s own devotion and Shigeru’s equally big appetite, berry picking had been offhandedly added to both the chore list and things the family sold in the village.
Berries, while small, were all rounders. Mashed into jams, baked in pastries, or even sold by the pop they went for good spending money. Any amount of money was good spent for this family.
Looking over the growing variety both siblings tensed feeling the brittle cold air swipe over them again. That was another reason Hanako found herself so smitten with the fruit.
Nothing ever stopped growing on this part of the mountain. It was so weird and just as fascinating to the young girl. All year round while the apples fell during winter the berries stayed intact. Still juicy and ripe despite the inches of snow falling on the little things.
Takeo teased her when she pleaded for the set of botany books in the shop window. The routine of selling the stock and going home flying out the window once they heard the owner giving away things for cheap. Something about a getaway he needed saving up for.
The teasing quickly died down when Nezuko threatened not to get him something from the shop. And that’s how the two Irish twins found themselves wearing ear to ear grins coming home.
She nearly regretted telling mama of the hobby, quickly turning into a dream job when she came back inside to the jars of herbs and seedlings one afternoon.
It was only a little after the second book had been fully read over for the fourth time that Tanjiro sheepishly came to her for rash treatments. That soon turned to Nezuko dropping off the occasional herbs from town. And THAT turned to her getting silently named the future doctor of the family.
A snort left her in the memory of the tea shop owner, Mrs. M asking for skin treatment advice.
“Ok I chopped the last of it! That should be more than enough for us to sell today.” Spinning the axe around his hand, Takeo slid it back inside its handmade holster on his pants.
Picking up the now wood filled basket and setting it next to the one prepackaged with charcoal.
“That’s good because it’s snowing more heavily…let’s hurry into town before mom changes her mind on letting us help out.”
Swiping snow from her hair, Hanako covered the filled Wooden bowl of raspberries with a kitchen cloth. Handing it over to Takeo who set it down with extra softness in the back of the cart.
“You think with the money we make today and the amount we’ve been saving we’ll be able to buy a chicken in a few weeks?”
Coming up beside his sister Takeo took the left cart handle as she grunted. Now pulling forward far more easily with his help. “I don’t know…probably? Even if we have enough I don’t think mom will be too fond of us bringing back an animal. Besides, I kinda wanted to wait until Tanjiro’s leg healed.”
Humming back in semi agreement they jogged pulling the cart behind them down the mountain. Well if the two were both being honest it was more of Takeo pulling the cart…that was his “specialty” as everyone called the family’s own weird set of skills.
Tanjiro and mama both had insanely hard and big foreheads. Nezuko and papa both had their ridiculously strong legs able to crack jaws with enough force. Hanako being a damn prodigy in the art of healing and botanical study…Takeo also had his inherited traits.
Those being his unashamedly admitted strong body. Just like his mom and dads head and legs, his body was always tough. Able to push boulders out the way with ease, swim longer and faster than all his siblings, and from when he was alive he’d be the only one besides Tanjiro to pick up father on days he was too sick.
He was sure seeing fathers tall stature seated comfortably on Takeo’s tiny in comparison shoulders was deserving of mom’s scream when she came to discover his gift.
The man’s startled, happy laughter at him shuffling him around the house for the day would forever be locked in his memory.
The snow had stopped late afternoon, just when the rays of light were minutes away from being sunken in black. Inside Kie stirred a pot of miso soup, humming as the scent of broth and seaweed filled the tiny home.
Occasionally purple eyes flicked to the door for any sign. Frowning nezuko moved away from the briskly window, wrapping arms tighter inside her yukata sleeves.
“Why aren’t they back inside yet?” Tanjiro turned to her before returning his gaze back on Rokuta’s sleeping form bundled on his lap.
“They always get carried away with the sales, give it another half hour or so and they’ll be back they know better.” His half rough voice was met with a smile.
The sound of a pot being set on the wooden table melted most of Nezuko’s concerns away. Stepping up and helping the duties of setting the table.
Shigeru snickering when a bowl almost slipped out of his older sister's hands, quickly silenced by a pouty eye sneer. Kei’s laughter fully burned worry away when Rokuta shot up at the implication of dinner.
They sat down together, huddled near the fire as dusk fell. Kie passed out chopsticks, squeezing her eldest daughter's hand when she took hers. Even in their poverty, there was warmth here. Real lived in warmth no amount years of love would always feed into.
The snow had started falling again, slow and fine, by the time the sun dipped behind the trees.
Hanako tugged her scarf tighter as the path turned steeper, the trail home just visible in the fading light. Takeo trudged behind her, red-faced and breathing hard.
“Almost there..” He groaned.
But then a familiar voice boomed from the trees.
“You two!”
Old Man Saburo stood in the path above them, hunched and bundled in covering too big for his frame. His lantern glowed like a ghost in the darkening woods.
“You shouldn’t go up there,” he said. “Come back. Stay here tonight.”
Takeo frowned. “We’re fine, really. We just—”
“I wasn’t asking,” Saburo snapped. He looked nervous, eyes darting over their shoulders like he expected something to be there. “It’s too late. You won’t make it before full dark.”
Hanako hesitated. “But our family—”
Saburo’s face softened, but only a little. “They’ll understand. And if they don’t... better they’re angry than digging your graves.”
So they stayed.
Saburo’s home was small and crooked, tucked under a shelf of stone. It smelled of old cedar, pipe smoke, and cooked radish. A fire crackled in the hearth, warming their stiff fingers.
They ate quietly while Saburo watched the windows.
“You believe in demons?” he asked suddenly, without looking at them.
Takeo stopped chewing. “You mean like… the stories?”
“They’re not stories,” Saburo said, voice low. “They’re warnings. People just forgot to be afraid.”
Hanako glanced at her brother.
Saburo leaned forward, elbows on the table, shadows curling around his face. “There are things that come out at night. Things that smell your blood from miles away. That walk like men, but aren’t.”
“Have you seen one?” Hanako whispered.
He didn’t answer.
Not directly.
Instead, he said, “My wife, saw red eyes in the trees once. They didn’t blink. Didn’t leave. I left instead.”
The wind picked up outside. The fire hissed.
Takeo swallowed hard. “That’s just a story.”
Saburo shook his head. “Maybe. But you’re still alive because you stayed here.”
Later, the fire burned low. The siblings curled in borrowed blankets. Outside, the wind fell silent—sudden and total, like the forest itself had stopped breathing.
And something passed by.
No footsteps.
No voice.
Just a coldness behind the door. A pressure, like the air had thickened into syrup. The lanterns flickered. The old boards creaked softly, like in recognition—or fear.
Behind the door stood a figure, pale and perfect and starving.
He paused for just a moment. Breathed.
Then moved on.
Because this door was closed. The house was sealed. No invitation. No blood scent. Only the faint echo of life behind cedar walls.
Inside, Hanako stirred in her sleep.
Takeo dreamed of red snow.
And death kept walking.
Hours passed.
The wind howled once, then quieted just as it came.
Tanjiro felt it first.
Not a sound, more like the absence of it. A stillness way too perfect. He immediately woke up to silence. The kind of silence that pulls the breath from your lungs. Not the gentle hush of snow falling outside or the steady breaths of his family asleep around him. This silence was wrong. Thick. Suffocating.
Like the forest itself had stopped breathing.
He sat up in the dark. Heart beating too fast. Breath misted in the freezing air of the cabin, but something felt unnatural. Wet. Like breath against the back of his neck.
Nezuko stirred from her futon across the room. “Tanjiro,” she whispered, voice tight. “Do you feel that too?”
He did. A pressure. Something approaching wrong and slow. Like it had all the time in the world and nothing but hate to carry it forward.
“Stay here.” He whispered back just as quietly. Though he himself didn’t know what to do. He got up reaching for the small hatchet across the room. Hands trembling with every second passing by he didn’t have something, anything to defend himself from what leeches.
They were not alone on this mountain.
Outside, the wind doesn't blow. The snow did not fall. Even the trees seemed to crouch in fear. Then the scents came. Faint but choking. Blood already had been spilled. The sharpness of iron and the sick sweet rot of something pretending to be human.
Wrapping the hatchet handle firmly in shaking hands, Tanjiro backed himself against the wooden wall. Shigeru’s eyes opened as tears spilled from them. “Where‘s Hanako and Takeo?!” He seethed shivering under the heavy futon blanket.
Nezuko’s eyes widened and wasted no time picking up an equally tearful Rokuta. “In town, they’re safe…” she chided, barely audible to the breaths they emitted.
But the rest of them?
A creek echoed from the porch.
Then footsteps, bare, soft, too slow to be human. Too certain to be anything else. Tanjiro couldn’t move. His body locked up as a shadow leaned just outside the paper door. The figure wasn’t that large, not hulking or monstrous. But something about it pushed against the world like it did not belong. Like it had stepped out of a different kind of night.
Then Kie sat up.
She showed no signs of fear but concerns dwarfed her frame completely. Rubbing sleep from her eyes she stood up, stumbling towards the door regarding each of her children's reactions thoughtfully.
“Is someone there?” She asked, voice cutting through the atmosphere like a pin hitting a brick.
“No-mom, stop!” Nezuko hissed but her voice came out like a breath against glass. Fragile and useless.
She shushed the house not just with her own motherly hushes but by sliding the front door open.
A man stood there. Tall and pale, dressed like he’d just stepped out of a city dream. His hat cast shadows across his face but his eyes…his eyes glowed red as burning coals. And just as cold as the snow around him.
He smiled.
It was a smile that had no kindness. A smile that remembered hunger and bites at pain.
“Good evening.” He said.
And the night cracked open.
The snow crunches under small footsteps.
Hanako rubbed her arms and walked ahead of Takeo, her breath puffing in steady clouds. The morning sun was pale behind thin gray clouds, doing little to warm the cold that clung to the trees. They hadn’t meant to stay the night, but the storm had come down fast, and Old Man Saburo insisted.
“Too dangerous in the dark,” he’d said. “Demons come out when the sun’s gone.”He said. Those words rang around inside both of their ears like a never ending bell.
Now, the mountain was quiet. Too quiet.
“I can’t hear the birds,” Takeo said, squinting into the trees. “It’s usually louder than this.”
Hanako nodded, unsettled. The forest felt... still. Like everything was holding its breath. The air was thick, even in the daylight, like it hadn’t shaken off whatever crept through it the night before.
They reached the last ridge where you could just barely see the family cabin.
Hanako stopped. So did Takeo.
“Why’s the door open?” she whispered.
Takeo didn’t answer.
The path down to the cabin was covered in drag marks through the snow—long, erratic gouges like something had been dragged out, or in. There were no footprints. Just wide, dark stains beneath the frost.
And then came the smell.
It hit them like a wall. Rot. Blood. Smoke.
“Ma?” Hanako called out, voice cracking. “Tanjiro!? Nee-Chan?!”
No answer.
They ran the last few feet to the cabin.
Takeo got there first.
He screamed.
The inside was red.
Not all at once, just little patches at first. Smears on the walls, pools soaked into the floorboards, small handprints where Rokuta must have tried to crawl away. Dishes lay shattered. Blankets shredded. A trail of something that looked like it had been burned from the inside out led toward the back wall.
“Where are they?” Hanako gasped, stumbling through the home. “Where is everyone?”
But they already knew.
The bodies were still there. Or parts of them.
Ma. Shigeru. Roku…oh gods, little Rokuta.
And Tanjiro and Nezuko?
Gone.
Only two blood trails led away from the carnage, slashed into the snow, disappearing into the forest beyond like some dying thing had crawled its way into the trees.
Hanako fell to her knees, her scream lost in the cold.
Takeo stood frozen, staring at the footprints they now realized weren’t from boots or shoes—but bare feet, slender and deep. Too deep.
A man’s. But inhuman.
And next to them claw marks.
Something had come in the middle of the night while they were away.
And It had taken their Brother and Sister with them.