Chapter 54

Using his transparent world skill, Yoriichi could see that Ginryu's muscles had tensed up, indicating that he was ready to make a move.

Swish!!

Ginryu's body moved in a blur as he executed a slashing attack with his claws at Yoriichi.

Yoriichi knew he couldn't afford to take a direct blow from Ginryu, so he evaded and countered with a slash at Ginryu's hand.

It was only a spar, so he was being careful.

Ting!!

Both Yoriichi's sword and Ginryu's claws clashed, but Yoriichi quickly moved his sword away as he sensed that he was going to be overpowered.

Glancing at the area where his sword hit Ginryu's claw, he could see that his attack didn't make a single dent despite exerting a decent amount of force.

He knew that fighting Ginryu wasn't going to be easy, as there were many factors at play.

Unlike demons, Ginryu was hard for him to read. He always appeared to be in a state similar to that of his selfless state.

Another important factor was that his blade was no different from a piece of iron to Ginryu.

A significant part of a demon slayer's power came from the Nichirin blade.

This blade could enable the demon slayer to slice through a demon's flesh and provided a means to counter a demon's blood arts as it weakened the cells of the demons when cutting through.

It was also a combination of his red blade, which was highly attuned to sunlight, along with his breathing style, special abilities, and sword talent that gave him the upper hand against Muzan easily.

But Ginryu was different; with Ginryu, he could see that he walked under the sun, meaning a Nichirin blade didn't have any special effect against him or his abilities.

A normal demon's skin was already hard enough to cut with a regular blade, much less Ginryu's flesh.

"You should take this more seriously or you will lose without putting up much of a fight," Ginryu taunted but received no reaction from Yoriichi.

He knew the advantages he had and that he could take Yoriichi on without transforming.

It wasn't that he was immensely skilled or arrogant; he judged his current state skills in combat to be equal or at worst slightly inferior to Yoriichi's skill with a sword.

What made him confident in a win against Yoriichi without transforming was simple.

He wasn't weak against a Nichirin blade, and his base stats were just that much higher.

Yoriichi was undoubtedly strong and skilled for a human; he could make up for some of the stats difference with his special abilities, but that only made them barely equal.

They were both aware of this from their first clash, which was why Yoriichi took Ginryu's threat seriously.

Yoriichi renewed his focus and prepared for another clash. He didn't want his children to witness him losing even to Ginryu.

Ginryu smiled, he could feel the air around Yoriichi had shifted, Yoriichi was now serious.

Yoriichi, shifted his stance and gripped his katana tightly, his eyes narrowed as he scanned his opponent.

"Inuchiyo, Goemon, Hikaru, Hikari. You all should move further back," Ginryu instructed the onlookers.

"I am going to come at you as if aiming for your life so you should do the same," Ginryu said to Yoriichi.

Yoriichi didn't respond, instead focusing all his attention on Ginryu's movement.

He could see the flow of blood pulsing through Ginryu's veins and the contractions of his muscles as he prepared to attack.

Ginryu suddenly disintegrated his hardened claws made of blood, which perplexed Yoriichi for a moment.

"Not much of a talker are you?" Ginryu said, raising his hand. With a flick of his wrist, a long crimson blade erupted from his palm, dripping with fresh blood.

"Let's see how you handle this!" Ginryu taunted with a feral grin on his face.

Normally, he wouldn't talk too much during a fight, but with Yoriichi, it was different.

There weren't many people that could match him in the current world.

He judged that only Muzan and Yoriichi were the only people that currently existed who could put up a fight against him.

With Muzan, it was a fight to devour, but with Yoriichi, it would be a fight of skill.

Ginryu lunged forward, his blade slicing through the air leaving a bloody red streak.

But Yoriichi in his element was ready; he caught sight of the subtle shift in Ginryu's weight, the minuscule tightening of his shoulder muscles.

Effortlessly, he sidestepped the attack, his own Katana whipping to counter in a graceful arc, executing the third form of the sun breathing technique, which was two horizontal slashes that could be used for both attack and defense.

Ginryu twisted to parry the blow and deal a surprise attack to counter.

He liquefied his hardened blood, letting Yoriichi's katana pass midway through his blade before hardening it again.

The resulting blood spill from the clash was linked up with thin blood threads that flew in Yoriichi's direction like liquid needles.

It was a really unpredictable attack, as Yoriichi barely dodged the hardened blood spikes that grazed his skin; otherwise, he might have ended up like a porcupine.

After evading the attack, Yoriichi pulled his katana backwards, the blade slipping through the opening left on Ginryu's blade.

"Impressive, how will you handle this now," Ginryu said as he clenched his fist while pulling away from Yoriichi.

The warped blade suddenly turned into a whip, the crimson strands lashing out towards Yoriichi.

Yoriichi's eyes widened as he observed the shift in Ginryu's body, the way the tendons in his arm bunched and flexed.

With lightning-fast reflexes, he raised his Katana, batting away the whip strikes.

The two of them clashed, their blades ringing out in a melodic symphony.

Yoriichi's movements were fluid and precise, anticipating most of Ginryu's attacks as he executed his sun breathing forms.

Ginryu, on the other hand, adopted a different strategy; he knew that his attacks were being predicted, so he kept morphing his weapons from spikes to daggers, even a mace.

Their fight became a game of Ginryu creating weird attacks and Yoriichi trying to adapt.

"You can't keep this up forever, Yoriichi," Ginryu taunted as he switched up the speed of his attack to throw Yoriichi off.

He alternated between lightning-fast attacks and slow heavy attacks at unexpected moments.

Swish!!

Ginryu lunged for Yoriichi's neck with his chained sickle, but Yoriichi caught the minuscule tensing of Ginryu's fingers.

With a twist of his wrists, he deflected the attack and countered with the sun breathing 8th form, sunflower thrust.

This was an extremely powerful stabbing attack meant to impale an opponent.

Ginryu easily sidestepped this attack with his fast reflexes, but Yoriichi wasn't done, he knew that the thrust force from the sunflower thrust would leave him open, so he transitioned his attack into the second sun breathing form, Raging Sun.

A 360-degree slashing attack, forcing Ginryu to give some distance for him to recover.

"Ha, ha, ha," Ginryu laughed, noticing a tiny cut on his chest. He was elated; he hadn't had a battle like this in a long time.

Blood suddenly started spilling from his body, forming extremely thin threads that were barely visible. Ginryu was fully revved up now.

"Don't die on me now, Yoriichi," Ginryu yelled as he unleashed a barrage of blood pellets connected to extremely thin threads of blood.

Just before Ginryu's attack was launched, Yoriichi had sheathed his katana, ready to unleash his Sun Breathing style 9th form to counter Ginryu's attack because there was no way to dodge it.

A fight that had just begun as a normal spar had suddenly escalated into something unpredictable, Inuchiyo and Goemon who were watching were now a bit worried as they didn't know how to stop them.

Hikaru and Hikari just cheered from the side even though they both stopped being able to visibly follow the fight for a while now.

Swish! Clang!!

Yoriichi swung his sword...