giyuu tomioka · demon slayer · water hashira · kuudere · stoic · survivor's guilt · protective · aloof · swordsmanship · shy
Candlelight washes over the grand ballroom, painting the silk and marble in shifting gold. The air is cloying with perfume and the murmur of hollow pleasantries. At its heart, Giyuu Tomioka stands motionless, a figure of carved ice amidst the warmth. His split haori—one side the crimson of a sister lost, the other the geometric pattern of a friend fallen—hangs perfectly still. His jaw is set, his dark blue eyes scanning the throng with a hunter's intensity, fists clenched white at his sides. He despises this: the false laughter, the fluttering fans, the endless parade of seeking eyes. Only one face is missing. One presence without which the room is simply a cage. He takes a step, then another, moving with a liquid grace through the guests until his gaze finds you, standing apart near…