Chapter 168: Cutting Melons and Chopping Cabbage

At this moment, the girl at his feet and the other two Demon Slayers had already fainted from pain.

Lin Yu first used his red hand to heal their wounds, then switched to his blue hand to soothe the girl’s tormented spirit.

After this, the girl’s furrowed brows slowly relaxed, her erratic breathing steadied, and she sank into a quiet, peaceful sleep.

Afterwards, Lin Yu repeated the same process to treat the other two Demon Slayers.

During this time, Tanjiro and the boar-headed boy, Inosuke, did not idle; Tanjiro picked up a Nichirin Blade from the ground and, together with Inosuke, kept watch for any possible attacks.

Lin Yu, multitasking, tended to the wounded while asking casually, “Boy, I’m curious—when those three kids begged to die just now, why didn’t you kill them?”

“…”

Tanjiro froze at the question, then fell silent for a moment before whispering, “Because not wanting to live doesn’t mean they can’t live.”

“Humans are fickle creatures; their thoughts change every moment. I believe that when they said those words, they truly prepared to die—but what if they change their minds later?”

Lin Yu glanced at him, intrigued. “Just because of that?”

Tanjiro hesitated, then said reluctantly, “It’s not just that—I’m bad with words, I can’t explain it well. I only know that if I had to do it again, I’d make the same choice.”

“Because only by surviving do they get a chance to change their minds!”

By the end, Tanjiro’s expression hardened with resolve.

Seeing this, Lin Yu couldn’t help but smile inwardly—this kid was truly the protagonist of a shonen manga; such gentle yet unwavering character naturally won others’ favor.

Thinking this, he stood up and said with a smile, “Boy, I admire your kindness, but as a Demon Slayer, being too soft isn’t a good thing.”

“This time, with me here, your choice was right.”

“I hope next time, when I’m not around, you’ll still manage to do both well…”

Saying this, he stepped forward, Nichirin Blade in hand, heading into the depths of the forest.

Tanjiro stared, startled, and called out urgently, “Where are you going?”

Lin Yu didn’t turn back. “Those three are fine—they just need to sleep. If you don’t want to leave them behind, hurry and carry them out.”

“As for the rest, leave it to a reliable adult.”

Before he finished speaking, golden light erupted from Lin Yu’s body, blocking the incoming spikes.

A two-meter-tall headless body descended from above, controlled by silk, its two powerful arms transforming into horn-like spikes, launching a storm of attacks upon Lin Yu.

“Clang! Clang! Clang!”

Sharp, hardened spikes clashed violently against amber-gold light.

Just from the sparks and shrieking winds, one could imagine the sheer power behind the assault.

But no matter how much the silk squeezed the body’s strength, Lin Yu’s golden aura remained utterly still—not a ripple, not a tremor.

“Hss—”

The next instant, brilliant blade-light bloomed like falling petals.

Lin Yu swung his longsword, letting it hang at his side, and walked past the headless body as if strolling through a garden.

In the instant they passed, the headless body erupted in a spray of blood, its surface cracking like a spiderweb into hundreds of severed pieces.

Blood and limbs rained down; Tanjiro and Inosuke stood frozen.

Inosuke snapped back to reality, his eyes blazing with fervor as he stared at Lin Yu’s back.

“So strong!”

“…”

Tanjiro also came to his senses, glancing at Lin Yu’s retreating figure, then at the three sleeping comrades beside him. He gritted his teeth, lifted one of them, and turned to Inosuke.

“Hurry, carry the others—we’re following him!”

Inosuke’s eyes widened. “Huh?”

Meanwhile, Lin Yu moved with deceptive slowness, each step covering ten meters.

In the blink of an eye, he vanished from their sight and stood before the demon controlling the corpses.

Seeing the spider demon before him—a pale-skinned girl with red spots, her face resembling a young maiden—Lin Yu paused, recalling the relevant plot.

If he remembered correctly, the spider demons of Mount Rengoku were all under the rule of Lower Moon Five, Lei, one of the Twelve Kizuki.

They had no blood ties; they possessed spider-based blood techniques only because they’d received Lei’s blood.

This spider demon had once been a girl demon herself. Though she played the role of mother, she held no status in the family, and due to her timid nature and failure to obey Lei’s orders, she was frequently beaten by the so-called “father,” living in constant fear.

At this moment, the spider mother in girl’s form had not noticed Lin Yu’s arrival.

She trembled violently, staring in terror at the broken silk strands at her fingertips.

“He’s dead… he’s dead!”

“He was the fastest, the strongest—how could this happen? Honestly, it’s all Lei’s fault for threatening me—if he hadn’t, I wouldn’t have panicked…”

Here, the spider mother suddenly fell silent, then jerked her head up, eyes wide with horror as she stared at Lin Yu ahead.

“You—when did you—?!”

At this moment, Lin Yu grew stronger every second; his body swelled slightly from the sheer volume of Qi surging within him, his height increasing by at least three or four centimeters.

Of course, these physical changes were merely side effects of overflowing energy.

In terms of fundamental life cultivation, Lin Yu had long surpassed the Old Celestial Master, especially in spiritual cultivation—he had reached the point where his spirit could influence matter, even faintly perceiving the spider mother’s thoughts.

Perhaps triggered by her fear, Lin Yu saw flashes of her abuse by her so-called “family.”

Beatings, eye-gouging, severed arms—gruesome scenes flashed through her mind, making Lin Yu’s expression soften with pity as he sighed softly.

“How pitiful. Living like this… must be unbearable.”

“…”

The spider mother, in girl’s form, blinked in surprise—she hadn’t expected this monster, who had just slaughtered her strongest puppet, to speak so gently.

Lin Yu held his Nichirin Blade and stepped forward, speaking softly, “Don’t worry—you’ll be freed soon.”

The spider mother froze again.

The next second, a radiant full moon rose from the forest ahead, filling her entire field of vision…

“Plos—”

Blood burst open; the spider mother’s body was instantly crushed by the moon-like blade-light.

No matter how pitiful she was, she had still murdered countless humans. Lin Yu could not let her live—his only mercy was to make her death swift.

“Shhh—”

Lin Yu swung his longsword, leaving a trail of blood on the ground, then glanced at the exploding blood mist beside him. He opened his fingers, drawing forth thin streams of blood from the mist, coalescing them into a single drop in his palm.

“So this is the blood of the Twelve Kizuki?”

Lin Yu examined the blooddrop in his palm, disdainful. “Too weak.”

Still, he didn’t discard it. After all, this blood could transform humans into immortal demons—it held some research value.

But compared to Lei’s blood, he was far more interested in the final boss, Kibutsuji Muzan.

Thinking this, he closed his eyes and, following the blood’s connection, sensed the other spider demons scattered through the forest.

The strongest among them was clearly Lei himself; the other three were too weak for Lin Yu to distinguish their relative strengths.

“Then let’s wipe them all out.”

Lin Yu opened his eyes calmly. His black hair turned white, his skin became translucent as jade, as if his body had shifted from solid to liquid, rippling with milky-white waves.

Reverse Life Triple!

In mere seconds, Lin Yu’s entire body transformed into Qi, his feet lifting off the ground as he floated into the air.

He scanned the area, locking onto the positions of the spider brother, spider sister, and spider father. With a light swing of his Nichirin Blade, he unleashed three white Qi blades, each dozens of meters long, roaring toward the three demons.

Meanwhile, Inosuke’s future brother-in-law, Agatsuma Zenitsu, was sprinting forward in terror.

Above him, on the treetops, the spider brother—a human head fused with a spider’s body—grinned wickedly, spewing corrosive purple venom that forced the fleeing human into desperate flight.

“Whoosh—”

Suddenly, a terrifying whistle came from above.

The spider brother, hanging upside down, turned his head instinctively—and saw a monstrous Qi blade slicing through the air, cutting effortlessly through the canopy and trunk, growing larger in his vision…

“Boom!”

The explosion startled Zenitsu, who instinctively turned back.

Behind him, the forest erupted in dust; over a dozen thick trees shattered, their severed trunks sliced cleanly like broccoli cut diagonally by a chef, forming a smooth, slanted surface from high to low.

Looking down the cut, one could see a terrifying trench, ten meters deep and a hundred meters long.

Everything within the trench—trees, houses suspended by silk—had been utterly obliterated, reduced to dust and mud.

The spider brother who had been chasing him was gone.

If someone now jumped into the trench and turned over the soil, they might find tiny, fading specks of flesh—no larger than ants—dissolving into the dirt.

Zenitsu stared, utterly bewildered, unable to comprehend what had just happened.

In contrast, Tanjiro and Inosuke were far more accustomed to such things.

After deciding to follow Lin Yu, the two boys encountered the spider father and spider sister blocking their path. They set down the unconscious three and each took on one opponent.

Before they could even strike, the terrifying Qi blades descended from above, crushing both demons instantly.

(End of Chapter)