Chapter 235: Hypocritical Justice

Marcus stopped Nezuko, who had already shifted into her demon form and was about to lunge. Indifferently, he pulled the little fish off his head and tossed it to the ground.

The fish rolled to a stop in front of the one eye Gyokko had left.

His body was dissolving after taking a stomp from Marcus that had crushed his head.

That eye brimmed with confusion, resentment, and absolute terror.

... He didn’t understand it.

Seconds earlier, taking advantage of Marcus being distracted by Muzan-sama’s plan, he had appeared behind him.

He’d used his Godlike Hands to blow the man’s head apart and turn it into a handful of fish.

He’d been on the verge of laughing in ecstasy, but before he could get out a single taunt, a red flash sliced through his neck.

The burning of the cut turned his jubilation into terror.

He wanted to regenerate the way Akaza had, but something at the severed edge of his neck desperately prevented it.

His body refused to obey, and his head rolled across the ground.

As his vision blurred, he watched Marcus’s head rapidly rebuild itself, wearing a mocking smile.

The plum-blossom mark on his forehead had gone from a pinkish hue to a red as vivid as blood... similar to Kokushibo’s mark.

Then he heard a few final words: "Who gave you so much courage that you’d approach me...? Muzan? Do you see even him getting this close to me?"

The next second, a sole as black as night descended from above, crushing his head with a single stomp.

He didn’t understand.... Why?

Why was he dying like this — he, Upper Rank Five... Muzan-sama’s most capable servant?

He still had abilities to show, vessels to summon, fish to unleash... he hadn’t done anything yet.

Dragging an infinite despair behind him, he crumbled to ash.

Marcus shook the blood from his katana and looked up.

Across from him, Zohakuten stood petrified.

The calm on his face shifted into bewilderment, then into absolute hatred.

He stared at the dispersing ashes and gritted his teeth: "How dare you abuse someone weaker than yourself?!"

"Pfft—"

Marcus almost laughed in indignation.

That a devourer of humans would accuse him of "abuse" for killing a monster was absurd.

But Zohakuten’s expression was dead serious and his indignation genuine; he was judging Marcus like a true agent of justice.

’What a hypocritical creature...’

Marcus sighed.

He realized it was pointless to reason with that level of madness. He wasn’t Tanjiro, after all.

To Zohakuten, however, his silence stood for guilt.

!

The ground trembled.

Four enormous wooden dragons emerged behind him, their colossal heads looming over Marcus’s figure.

"Speak! Or do you not dare answer for your crimes?!"

His face contorted with self-righteous indignation, Zohakuten furiously struck the drum on his right shoulder.

Dong!

One of the dragons opened its jaws and a golden light glowed deep in its throat, but Marcus had already moved.

BOOM!

The sound wave tore across the ground, carving out a deep trench and hurling rocks several yards into the air.

Dong! Dong!

The second dragon spat out a bolt of thunder that came plunging down toward Marcus, streaking through the air, while the third unleashed a ferocious gust of wind that ravaged the earth and tore up trees.

A blue glow flared to life around Marcus’s body as a dense pink aura poured out from his Breathing.

The lightning couldn’t reach him, the wind pressure couldn’t push him back, and the sound waves couldn’t catch him; he slipped between the attacks like a nimble fox.

Zohakuten’s rhythm turned frantic and his expression grew more distorted. "Is running all you know how to do?! You piece-of-shit criminal!"

Marcus ignored him.

He was gathering energy.

The pink mist around him took on the look of a burning flame as he calculated the distance to Zohakuten.

Zohakuten’s drumming grew more intense, and the dragons swept across the area out of control. "Fight me! Rat!"

"Fine."

Suddenly, Marcus stopped with a faint smile. "Sorry for the wait~. Since you’re too big and cutting off your head does nothing, hacking you apart piece by piece was a pain. So I needed to store up energy."

He crouched and drove his blades into the earth, channeling the pink torrent straight into the ground. "This technique’s no good for battles on the move, but it’s perfect for big, stationary lugs like you."

Seeing what he was doing, Zohakuten suddenly went on alert, but sensing no immediate threat, he grew enraged.

"Fraud!"

And just as he was about to strike the drums again...

Crack

A subterranean crunch shook the area.

The ground beneath his feet fractured, and dozens of pink petals with edges sharp as razors sprouted in layers, expanding into a colossal flower with him at its center.

Anything wooden that touched the petals was sliced apart instantly.

Zohakuten tried to escape, but the speed of the blooming outpaced him. The outer petals closed like a bud, trapping him along with his dragons.

"Breath of Desire, Tenth Form..."

As Marcus murmured under his breath, the flower bud began to spin wildly.

Each layer rotated in the opposite direction from the one before it, working like a destructive mill.

At the slightest contact, the wood was reduced to shavings and dust. And as the rotation speed increased, the bud shrank, compressing the space inside.

"Equinox Flower Wheel."

This was another of the rewards he’d owbtained from Kanae.

A move of reverse growth, from full bloom to nothing.

An area-of-effect attack whose power and volume increased the longer it was charged.

The flower bud kept shrinking, from thirty-odd feet down to just a few, releasing a fine pollen-like mist until it shrank to the size of a fist.

The petals dispersed and fell like snow over the area, leaving behind a layer of sawdust mixed with biological remains.

Having dealt with two Upper Ranks, Marcus shook off the dust, ready to switch positions. However, a sound emerged from the ruins, stopping him.

"Y-You thought.. you could kill me...?!"

That voice, soaked in hatred and rage, made Marcus narrow his eyes.

In the middle of the dust, a head full of fury was regenerating and assembling itself at full speed.

Genya, standing at the entrance of the hut, nearly dropped his shotgun.

"How is this possible...?"

He’d seen, killed, and eaten demons, but he’d never witnessed one survive destruction like that.

It was impossible... even if it were Muzan, being reduced to dust meant death.

Genya didn’t understand it, but Marcus did.

In this situation there was only one possible explanation: Hantengu’s real body wasn’t there.

Being merely a clone... Zohakuten was immortal.

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Throw your stones, drop them ALL! 💎

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