"Don't call me brother in law!" Tanjiro stressed every syllable with genuine venom. "I still have plenty of energy to carry my own sister..."
"You shouldn't look at it that way," Marcus's smile widened, resembling the Cheshire Cat. "Carrying Nezuko is something I do wholeheartedly, I do it out of pure selfishness... Think of it as a vacation for your poor back."
"My back is in perfect condition!" Tanjiro ground his teeth. "Just keep your dirty hands away from my sister!"
"Aw, someone's feisty. Loosen up a little, in the future we might be family..."
"I'LL TURN YOU INTO FERTILIZER FOR THE WISTERIA FIRST!"
Right when both of them started wrestling, tugging the basket like two little kids...
"Mmh?"
Nezuko, who had been holding onto the edge of the basket watching them the whole time, tilted her head with confusion.
Meanwhile, Urokodaki observed the pair of idiots from the doorframe, arms firmly crossed.
He didn't even bother sighing anymore.
He knew that with Marcus around, there would be no peace.
"You two," he said in a voice from beyond the grave, "go kill each other in the yard. Leave the girl alone."
Rolling his eyes, Marcus let go of the basket and raised his hands.
"Fine, fine, I give up. But let's make a deal. Let her choose. Let's see who she prefers to travel with."
Tanjiro processed the idea. "Let her decide?"
"Exactly..." Marcus nodded, putting on his best face of a one hundred percent impartial referee. "Even though she's a demon now, she still has her own will and her head works perfectly fine, right? Let's let her vote. It'll be a super democratic and fair process."
"..."
Tanjiro narrowed his eyes. His sixth sense was blaring like an alarm, warning him about dirty tricks.
But the idea of letting Nezuko take control was tempting. He had blind faith in his little sister!
He was absolutely sure she would run toward him, her big brother!
"Deal!" He nodded with conviction. "Let Nezuko choose!"
Marcus's lips stretched into a smile of imminent victory. "Let the game begin!"
Both of them took their distance, moving about five meters from ground zero.
Immediately Tanjiro crouched down, fixing a gaze full of hope on his sister.
His face radiated a saccharine tenderness, worthy of a children's toy commercial.
"Nezuko, it's me, your little brother..." He extended his hand, begging for her attention. "Come here to your dear big brother. Let's go for a walk together."
Nezuko's little eyes lit up like two lanterns and an expression of affection flooded her face. Her tiny hands gripped the edge of the basket, pushing her body to jump into her brother's arms.
Seeing her, Tanjiro swelled with pride. The sibling bond was unbeatable!
However, another voice interrupted the touching family scene.
"Nezuko-chan..."
Marcus also crouched down on the other side of the basket. He kept his hands resting on his knees and simply gave her a radiant smile.
But between his lips, a subtle essence of pale pink began to materialize almost invisibly, and he guided it with mastery, making it dance gently through the air until it wrapped around the space surrounding Nezuko.
"Mmh?"
Nezuko's little nose perked up immediately.
She stopped dead in her tracks on her way to Tanjiro and fixed her enormous eyes on Marcus, blinking with curiosity.
It smells so good…
Along with the appetizing aroma of his blood, the pink mist carried a wave of comfort and safety.
It was a call that awakened a natural and irresistible desire to curl up right there.
Her most primitive instincts celebrated that immensely pleasurable sensation, pushing her toward the source of the fragrance.
Her tiny hands let go of the edge. She shifted her weight to the bottom, tipped the bamboo basket over completely, and crawled out at full speed like a hypnotized puppy.
Having returned to her child size, she barely stood taller than a calf, and her pink kimono dragged along the floor like a giant cape, making her stumble with adorable clumsiness.
Every little step she took seemed to make a cute little "pitter patter" sound against the wood.
Seeing that tiny little thing approaching him, Marcus felt an arrow shoot straight through his heart.
That much concentrated cuteness threatened to make him collapse.
Meanwhile, Tanjiro's triumphant smile froze on his face and panic completely took over as he watched the scene.
"Nezuko! Come here to your brother!"
The little girl stopped dead when she heard her name.
She turned her head toward Tanjiro, sniffed the air, and tilted her face with obvious indecision.
She tried to bring a tiny hand to her mouth to bite her finger, but smacked right into the bamboo. Completely dazed, she ended up poking the tube with her index finger, looking at both boys as if she were watching a tennis match.
To her left, the pleading gaze of her beloved brother. To her right, that hypnotic and delicious pink mist Marcus was giving off.
"Ne... Nezuko?"
Even Tanjiro's soul was trembling.
"I'm your big brother!"
The poor boy forced his voice to the max to radiate an immense protective aura, sounding so ridiculously sweet it would melt a glacier.
'Tanjiro's voice...' Nezuko's little eyes filled with deep affection as she recognized that familiar warmth.
Her little foot stepped forward in his direction.
Tanjiro's heart leaped in victory.
But at that precise moment, Marcus cranked up the intensity of his Breath of Desire.
A dense pink cloud enveloped the air and Nezuko turned her head immediately, hypnotized by the fragrance.
She inhaled deeply, sinking into that pillowy and pleasurable sensation. Her little eyes half closed, lost in an absolute trance, and her little feet planted themselves firmly on the ground, slamming the brakes on her trip toward her brother.
"!"
Tanjiro nearly got whiplash turning his head and glared at Marcus, who looked like a human bellows, blowing air desperately.
"THAT'S CHEATING!" he accused, pointing at him with outrage. "You're using that weird pink air technique to manipulate her!"
As slow as he was about certain things, you didn't need to be a genius to see that Nezuko was under the effects of that walking "incense."
Marcus stopped blowing for a moment and put on an innocent face. "Cheating? What cheating? I'm just breathing, Tanjiro. It's not my fault if my natural charisma is irresistible to Nezuko-chan, you know?"
"What kind of stinking charisma is that?!"
Watching his poor sister with her gaze lost, her head swaying from side to side like steam was coming out of her ears from thinking so hard, Tanjiro's heart broke.
The anxiety got the better of him.
Breathing deeply, he prepared himself for his final move: Emotional Flashback, Nostalgia Attack!
"Nezuko, do you remember? Those winters... when we all gathered around the stove, and mom would roast those really sweet potatoes for us..."
Nezuko blinked.
"And in the summer," he continued, raising the sentimental tone, "you always pulled me by the hand, insisting we go play at the creek, remember?"
A little tear started to peek out from the corner of Tanjiro's eye as he released the memories, drop by drop.
"The first time you learned to weave a flower crown... and you ran to put it on me..."
Nezuko's little eyes started to sparkle, getting watery. Those fragments of memory were blurry, but the feeling of warmth and home was branded into her soul.
Brother... yes. My brother comes first!
To fight that tempting smell, she made a drastic decision: she used both tiny hands to squeeze her nose shut with all her might, plugging it completely.
Holding her breath and moving her little legs at full speed, she launched into a wobbly but determined sprint toward Tanjiro.
One step, two steps!
She was inches away from jumping into her brother's open arms.
And on Tanjiro's face appeared a radiant smile. He even took the luxury of throwing a sidelong glance at Marcus that screamed: "Suck on that."
Watching Nezuko run with her nose pinched in that adorably ridiculous way because of the sentimental speech, and then seeing Tanjiro's smug face, Marcus felt a vein start to throb dangerously.
'Very well, legendary level siscon. So we're playing the tearjerker flashback card, huh?'
'You asked for it.'
Hiding his right hand behind his back and with a slight thought, he concentrated a thread of pink essence on the tip of his thumb. And with a quick motion, he pricked the pad of his index finger with his nail.
Instantly, a small drop of blood appeared.
________
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