Chapter Text
Tanjiro smelled the disturbance in the butterfly mansion’s courtyard before he heard it. He had awoken to the acrid, iron-rich, stingingly-floral scent, one that could only belong to one man… one scent that Tanjiro could never… ever… forget.
Muzan.
Tanjiro was quietly up and out of bed before he knew what he was doing. Scenting that evil despicable man like a fox-hunting hound. As he got closer, the smell began to differentiate, he smelled Muzan’s main scent, that smell like silver and copper rubbed on hands covered by perfume… but… beneath it, 2 others. One was immediately discernible, he had memorized it from all of his time with Zenitsu: Panic-sweat. Why would the king of demons come to their medical powerhouse smelling of fear, it made no damn sense.
And… that other smell… it smelled minty… like lilies… true lilies, not spider lilies.
Tanjiro heard the banging now… fists on wood… and he then realized that he was being followed…. By Zenitsu of all people. Of course. Zenitsu likely heard the demon king’s approach with his freakish super-hearing before Tanjiro even awoke.
Zenitsu’s disposition was anxious… as it usually was. Zenitsu whispered to Tanjiro “You felt it too, right? There’s something… someone… outside… he’s crying out for asylum… saying we need to lock down the place, no one goes in, no one goes out… He’s trying to explain, but all that he seems to be able to manage is to sob “Monstrous” and something about him being scared.”
The last part seemed to give Tanjiro Pause “Zenitsu… You don’t know who’s outside, do you?”
“No, I— I just heard him! It’s cold outside tonight, it would be cruel— awful to just leave him outside…”
“That’s— Zenitsu, that’s literally Muzan Kibutsuji out there… either this is a very elaborate scheme to destroy us… or the king of demons saw something that scared him shitless…”
Zenitsu stared for a moment, and shifted his weight awkwardly “wow… your nose is really that good? You can tell the exact person just by how they smell..?”
Tanjiro Huffed “That’s not that important right now… what I’m more interested in is.. wait, you can hear the heartbeat of everyone in the building, you told me, shortly after we first met, that you could hear for miles, and something about their heartbeat and their natural rhythms could tell you about them… can you tell how many Hashira are in the mansion and surrounding properties? The ones close enough to matter if we must get into a violent confrontation?”
Zenitsu stopped talking a moment, “there are… 3… maybe 4, depends on how far “close enough to matter in a fight” is…”
“Which ones are they?”
“Kanroji, Tokito, and Kocho… kocho’s obvious though… I overheard that that Uzui fellow is coming in for a checkup in the morning… he could probably be here by 3:00 am at the earliest, apparently he has Horses… rich Bastard” Zenitsu elaborated, as he pulled out a pocket-watch, the one he keeps because its ticking it grounding, and he tends to lost track of time “it’s… what, 12:46?”
There was another round of banging of fists against the Shoji frame, and yelling unintelligible to Tanjiro.
Zenitsu flinched “He’s crying… I can hear his tears hitting the veranda… he’s begging to be let inside… that… there’s something out there that he was running from, and he saw it… do something to a human…? I think he said absorb… but that can’t be right.”
They were beginning to approach the Shoji door, they could see it rattle as he banged on it… it was strange, why wasn’t he just breaking through or opening it himself… Tanjiro could now hear the heaving sobs, the cries of “It followed me here— it’s staring at me— I can see it through the Wisteria! It wants to fucking eat me! Let me inside! PLEASE!” And then a breakdown of sobs, the thud of a living body hitting the Veranda. Muzan’s smell was overpowering now, the salt of tears and sweat heavy upon the air. Tanjiro approached the screen, and slid it open, just enough to peek through, not enough to allow entry… not yet… Muzan was a known manipulator…
What Tanjiro saw was Muzan Kibutsuji, in his typical form, unchanged by his shapeshifting, which… made no sense. If he wanted to gain entry, surely he would not come with his true self laid bare. Tanjiro could see his rolling, shuddering sobs racking Muzan’s form as he lay on the Veranda, face-down into the polished wood, hitching sobs resounding.
Tanjiro was initially conflicted. This was genuine fear, anguish; you couldn’t fake this… if Kibutsuji were faking, he would simply not allow himself to be so undignified for a ruse.but this man killed his family. It was hard to show empathy to the man that slaughtered his entire bloodline and turned his sister into a demon. Now that he thought about Nezuko, she was back in his recovery room, right? She had a tendency to wander the mansion at night; that would be awful in this situation. Tanjiro set the thought aside, and cracked the door open, to speak tentatively “Hello?”
At the sound of a voice, Muzan jerked upright, breathing heavily, almost panting, like a dog under the sun. “You…” muzan murmured, staring up, as if bewildered “Fucking damnit— just let me in. It’s fucking out there… waiting for me—“