Shinobu stood in a long, pensive silence, her mind replaying the horrific speed with which the demon had perished. She looked down at the toxic residue clinging to the edge of her Nichirin sword, lost in thought.
Should I really change my title from the Insect Hashira to the Poison Hashira?
The question wasn't entirely a joke anymore. This new Wisteria toxin had performed with a level of efficacy that bordered on the miraculous—and the terrifying.
At that moment, Kanao—whose travel speed was still a far cry from that of Horitake and Shinobu—arrived at the scene with a light trot. Seeing the two of them standing in silent contemplation, she didn't dare break the atmosphere. Instead, she took her place beside them, waiting quietly like a loyal shadow.
Finally, Shinobu looked up, her gaze meeting Horitake's.
"The toxicity of this new formula has far exceeded my expectations," she admitted. "With the old Wisteria poison, even a standard demon would struggle for ten, maybe twenty seconds before the toxins finally shut down their systems. But this one... it was mere seconds. There was nothing left but ash before I could even blink."
Horitake nodded solemnly. "It's clear as day. The potency hasn't just increased—it's multiplied."
Shinobu shook her head, her expression growing even more serious. "It's more than that. Usually, when I kill a demon, I have to drive the blade deep into their body to ensure a sufficient dose. But for this test, I only gave him the lightest of pricks on his back. I barely broke the skin."
Horitake paused, his eyes widening as he processed the implications.
"I see... so the required dosage has changed too. In the past, a heavy dose took nearly twenty seconds to kill. Now, a microscopic amount kills in less than ten. If we're talking about the sheer concentration of the poison, we aren't looking at a five-fold increase anymore. We're looking at ten times, maybe dozens of times the lethality."
As he spoke, a sudden thought struck Horitake. His expression shifted from analytical to one of pure shock. He stared at Shinobu as if seeing her for the first time.
"Wait a minute... Shinobu-nee, does this mean you're now the most lethal member of the entire Demon Slayer Corps?"
The question caught Shinobu off guard. She blinked, her mind automatically running through the logistics of his claim.
Me? The most lethal?
It sounded absurd. She had always been the one at the bottom of the Hashira rankings in terms of raw physical power. She was the only one who lacked the arm strength to decapitate a demon. And yet, looking at it through the lens of efficiency... it wasn't impossible.
In fact, it was highly probable.
Every other Hashira, no matter how powerful or skilled, shared a single, non-negotiable requirement: they had to sever the demon's head. If they missed the neck, the demon could regenerate. But Shinobu was different.
With a poison this volatile, she no longer needed to aim for the throat. A scratch on the arm, a prick on the leg, a graze across the torso—any contact that allowed the toxin to enter the bloodstream was now a death sentence. With a high enough dosage, even a Upper Rank demon would likely face catastrophic systemic failure.
She didn't need to overpower them; she only needed to touch them.
In terms of pure killing capacity, she had vaulted from the bottom of the ranks to the very top, standing alongside Horitake himself. Horitake's Thunder Breathing allowed him to inflict wounds that could never heal, a terrifying ability in its own right. But Shinobu's new power was even more binary: one hit, one kill.
The realization sent a surge of quiet joy through Shinobu's heart.
She was a girl who hid a mountain of pride behind her gentle smiles. She had long made peace with her position as the "weakest" Hashira, carving out her niche through medicine and logistics to justify her standing. But the sting of her physical limitations had always been there, a dull ache of inadequacy.
To suddenly find herself possessed of such overwhelming lethality was a dizzying, intoxicating feeling.
However, Shinobu quickly reined in her emotions. She wasn't the type to be blinded by a single success. She shook her head, looking at Horitake with a calm, level gaze.
"Calling me the 'most lethal' might be a stretch, though it's safe to say my combat effectiveness has reached the upper tiers of the Corps. But an increase in lethality isn't the same as an increase in fundamental skill. My physical strength and speed remain the same. This is a powerful tool, yes, but it isn't a reason to become arrogant."
Horitake watched her, his admiration for her mental fortitude growing. He gave her a thumbs-up. "Your self-awareness is as sharp as your blade, Shinobu-nee. That's why you're amazing."
With a practiced, fluid motion, Shinobu sheathed her sword. "Let's keep moving. A single test on a low-level demon isn't enough to build a reliable dataset. We need more subjects."
"Agreed," Horitake said, falling into step beside her. "If a micro-dose can kill in seven seconds, we still haven't found the 'minimum lethal dose.' We need to know exactly how little we can use while still ensuring a kill. Precision is everything in the field."
Kanao, ever the silent pupil, followed closely behind them.
Over the next several nights, the trio became a nightmare for the demons of that region. They hunted relentlessly, performing test after test, strike after strike. By the time they were finished, the local demon population had been effectively purged.
Shinobu, in her own dry way, noted that she was "grateful" for the demons' sacrifice. Their "contributions" to science had provided her with a wealth of invaluable data—a service she promised to remember, right before she turned them into ash.
Through these dozens of "experiments," Horitake and Shinobu finally arrived at a definitive conclusion: the new Wisteria toxin was approximately fifty times more potent than the previous version.
The lethality was, frankly, absurd.
Against standard demons, Shinobu didn't even need to thrust her sword anymore. A mere flick of the wrist, allowing the tip of her blade to graze the demon's skin, was enough. The moment the steel broke the surface, the poison flooded the system, turning the demon's internal organs into a necrotic soup within seconds. It was the ultimate "touch of death."
In addition to their primary targets, the group encountered several bands of marauding bandits. Horitake and Shinobu took the opportunity to test the toxin's effect on humans—with non-lethal doses, of course.
The results confirmed their hypothesis: while the poison was still dangerous to humans, it was specifically engineered to exploit demon physiology. Against a human, the toxicity was significantly reduced, proving that their "scientific" approach had successfully created a weapon tailored for the enemies of humanity.
-------------------------------
I've already uploaded 40 chapters of this story on Patreon!
If you enjoy it, come check out the latest chapters in advance.
Here's the link:
[email protected]/DaoistRoeoNQ
Thank you so much for your support!!!
"And If you're enjoying it, drop a Power Stone for me!"