BANG!!
Gyokko who's hiding among the pile of monsters, was stunned, its excited expression frozen on its deformed face.
Its divine hand, which had never failed before and could transform any object it touched into living fish, was now firmly gripped by a hand with black claws.
The crimson right eye burst with a flash of light and a powerful aura soared skyward, creating a vacuum zone of four or five meters in the monster pile.
"What!?"
Gyokko's eyes on its mouth and forehead widened in disbelief, the pupils inscribed with the characters for "Five" and "Upper Rank" trembling constantly.
It looked at the young man in front of it who had grabbed its arms and was baring his fangs.
There was not a trace of humanity left in him.
What stood here was clearly an extremely powerful demon!
A demon comparable to an Upper Rank!
"How is this possible!? You're actually a demon? This can't be!" Gyokko's two mouths opened and closed, both shocked and angry.
Its tone was full of disbelief and resentment.
Why resentment?
Gyokko itself didn't know, it was just an instinctive feeling that appeared after sensing the demonic aura on Shinichi.
At this point, Gyokko was no longer hiding in its vase, but had shed its skin and entered its full combat form.
In this state, Gyokko's lower body became a slippery, elongated fish tail like a long snake.
The disgusting little hands beside its head had disappeared, replaced by two arms covered in hard scales.
The forearms were blue - this was Gyokko's proud "divine hand".
Hiss~
A faint steam rose from Shinichi's mouth.
In his demonized and raging blood state, Shinichi didn't want to waste a single word arguing with Gyokko.
He had only one thought now: to smash Gyokko's ugly head with his fists.
The claws gripping Gyokko's hands suddenly exerted force.
Shinichi roared and then flung Gyokko's enormous demon body into the air.
After tracing a not-so-graceful arc in the sky, it crashed heavily to the ground.
BOOM!!
Then, boom! Boom! Boom! ...
A continuous series of collision sounds rang out as Gyokko's body was smashed back and forth by Shinichi like a rag doll, creating multiple huge craters in the ground.
"Enough!! I don't care who you are! You've gotten yourself into big trouble now, Gyokko-sama is very very very angry! Angry to the point of explosion!!" Gyokko's frenzied scream of unbearable rage rang out.
In an instant Gyokko's slippery body twisted in an unbelievable manner, not only breaking free from Shinichi's claws but also lunging forward and wrapping around Shinichi instead.
Whoosh!
Claws flashing with blue light turned into blurred shadows striking directly at Shinichi's face.
'Perfect timing'
Shinichi didn't back down and raised his own blazing claws to meet Gyokko's attack head-on.
For some reason, whenever he entered his demon form, especially in his raging blood state, Shinichi always felt an extremely powerful desire to fight.
This desire made Shinichi more inclined to end battles with his claws and fists rather than the more convenient Nichirin Sword.
Sure enough, although Shinichi had his Nichirin Sword hanging at his waist, he himself was engaged in a frenzied battle with Gyokko, clashing violently.
Rip! Slash! Bang!!
The sound of metal clashing was incessant.
Shinichi's jet-black claws, capable of tearing apart huge rocks and piercing steel plates, now only produced a shower of sparks when they scratched against the fish scales on Gyokko's body.
Similarly, Gyokko's terrifying hands were equally ineffective against Shinichi, only gradually damaging or turning parts of Shinichi's upper body uniform and haori into small fish.
"Such strength! Brat, I absolutely cannot let you live, nor can I allow you to threaten my position! Only I! Only I can perform art for Muzan-sama, and only Muzan-sama is worthy of my art. Anyone who stands in my way must! Die!" Gyokko let out a shrill cry, its long fish tail suddenly contracting like a spring compressed to its limit.
The next second, Gyokko's body sprang up at a speed too fast to see clearly.
One could only vaguely make out flashes of blood-red afterimages.
"Blood Demon Art: Killer Fish Scales!"
The faint, flickering blood-colored afterimages were actually Gyokko's countless terrifying attacks, surrounding Shinichi in the center like a tight net.
A sneer appeared on Shinichi's slightly fierce face.
"You're as ugly as your vase and just as useless. Such a disgusting thing can only be used as a shitting vase. As for Muzan, sure enough, flies only stay with shit. Now, go to hell! Muzan will join you there!"
As soon as the words fell, an astonishing heat burst forth from Shinichi's body again.
"Blood Demon Art: Raging Blood - Third Stage!"
Boom!!
The surging aura that rose to the sky seemed to pierce through the night.
Swollen blood vessels formed a pattern of blood-colored lines on the surface of Shinichi's body.
The shocking heat completely shattered the already tattered uniform on his body, revealing Shinichi's physique that could be called the gold standard.
Meanwhile, because the battlefield aura between Shinichi and Gyokko was too powerful, all those scattered deep-sea monsters turned their attention to another Demon Slayer - Tanjiro.
Suddenly, the pressure on Tanjiro increased dramatically.
Although he had figured out in battle that the weak point of these monster piles was the pot on their bodies, there were simply too many monsters.
Tanjiro's body was already reaching its limit.
But Shinichi's warning kept echoing in Tanjiro's ears, 'Forward! Tanjiro! Forward! Don't look back! Keep going forward!'
"Forward! Forward!"
The sound coming from Tanjiro's throat no longer sounded very human.
The skin between his thumbs and index fingers had split open and the hilt of his Nichirin Sword was completely soaked with fresh blood, but the monsters before him still seemed endless.
ROOOAARRR!!
A big-headed fish monster with hands and feet seized the opportunity, leaping up from behind Tanjiro, opening its mouth as big as a pot bottom to swallow him.
At this critical moment, BANG!!
A long, beautiful white leg suddenly kicked out, shattering the head of the fish monster along with the vase on top of it.
It was Nezuko!
"Tch! What a constant nuisance!" Yushiro gritted his teeth while exerting all his effort to control a huge octopus monster beneath him, it eyes were covered with talismans.
It successfully extended its tentacles to crush several monsters around Tanjiro into pulp.
As for Tanjiro, he seemed to have lost his soul as he only know to move forward.
"Tanjiro! Slash!"
Shinichi's sudden roar brought Tanjiro back to his senses.
Almost instinctively, he swung his black Nichirin Sword with all his might.
Bang!!
It was hard, very hard! Harder than Tanjiro had imagined.
This was the hardest demon neck he had ever cut.
The moment he made eye contact with those two pupils, one above and one below, inscribed with the characters for "Five" and "Upper Rank", Tanjiro's entire body stiffened for a moment.
The Nichirin Sword in his hand, which had cut halfway through Gyokko's neck, felt as heavy as a mountain as he was unable to advance any further.
"No! Can't stop! Cut through it! Must cut through it! I MUST CUT THROUGH IT!!"
The last roar erupted from Tanjiro's throat, veins bulging on the back of his hand.
Gyokko's head also let out a roar of extreme fury.
"How is this possible! You filthy brat! Keep dreaming! How could Gyokko-sama neck possibly be cut by a weakling like you?! Absolutely impossible!"
"Cut through it!!"
"Dream on!!"
"That's enough disgusting creature! go to hell!!" Shinichi's voice suddenly rang out, and a deerskin boot appeared out of nowhere, kicking hard on the hilt of Tanjiro's sword.
In an instant, whoosh!
Splat!
Gyokko's grotesque head flew towards the sky.
"IMPOSSIBLEEEE!"