“Swordsmith Village Arc”, the fourth part of Anime Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba is finally starting. If you haven’t seen all the previous stories yet, it is not too late. This article will guide you to the world of Demon Slayer.
> want to warm up for Swordsmith Village Arc by learning the key facts of Demon Slayer.
> have seen the Movie Mugen Train and want to know the background of the story.
Story
The story starts with Tanjiro Kamado Unwavering Resolve Arc. In the Taisho period, Tainjiro Kamado was living a modest but happy life in the mountains with his family. One day, Tanjiro went down to the town to sell charcoals. When he comes back, he finds his family in pools of blood. He notices that only his younger sister Nezuko is alive and rushes down the mountain with Nezuko on his back to take her to a doctor. On the way, Nezuko starts snarling and turns against Tanjiro. Nezuko, the sole surviver, has become a demon.
Giyu Tomioka, who later turns out to be the Water Hashira of the Demon Slayer Corps, shows up and settles the situation. He helps Tanjiro to meet Sakonji Urokodaki, the trainer of demon slayers. Tanjiro stands up from the despair and resolves to become a demon slayer to find out the way to turn Nezuko back to a human. After 2 years of hard exercises Tanjiro manages to join the Demon Slayers Corp and starts fighting with different kinds of demons.
I was on an ANA flight and hadn’t seen Demon Slayer yet. I thought “let’s take a look” as it was so popular and watched Episode 1. Then I got hooked on Demon Slayer. The opening was devastating and I wanted to know what would happen next, and the picture was so beautiful. The animation technology is impressive nowadays. I felt like walking in snowy mountains myself.
Main Characters
Tanjiro Kamado (竈門 炭治郎)
Personal data
Date of birth: July 14
Place of birth: Kumotori Mountain, Nishi-Tama, Tokyo
Height and weight: 165 cm 61 kg (when he joined Demon Slayer Corp)
Acquired technique: Water breathing, Hinokami Kagura
Hobby: head-butt
Tanjiro Kamado, the main character of Demon Slayer, is the boy in black-green checkered pattern “Ichimatsu (市松)“. He was born as the first child of a charcoal burner. A child born with reddish eyes and hair like Tanjiro is called a “Child of Burning Crimson” (Kakushaku no ko）and if such a child was born in a family that makes their livelihood from fire-related work, it was considered to bring good fortune. In the beginning of the story Tanjiro is 13 years old. By the time he joins the Demon Slayer Corps, he becomes 15 years old.
Tanjiro is described as a person who is kind-hearted and devoted to his family. His special skill is a sharp sense of smell. In the crowd in Asakusa, Tokyo, Tanjiro manages to locate his sworn enemy, Muzan Kibutsuji, who massacred his family from the smell that was remaining in his house. In addition to the physical smell, Tanjiro also senses the unguarded spot of demons as well as the personality and emotion of people by smelling.
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For more information on the patterns of clothes including Ichimatsu, see the following page:
Tanjiro is sharp-nosed as a dog.
Nezuko Kamado (竈門 禰豆子)
Personal data
Date of birth: December 28
Place of Birth: Kumotori Mountain, Nishi-Tama, Tokyo
Height and weight: 153cm 45kg
Acquired technique: Blood Demon Art Exploding Blood
Hobby: Sewing
Tanjiro’s sister, 1 year younger than Tanjiro. Nezuko was transformed into a demon but did not lose the human heart completely and fights against demons to protect people. She was born as the eldest daughter and took care of her younger brothers and sister when she was a human. Her caring personality and hypnotic suggestion by Sakonji Urokodaki probably helped Nezuko to maintain reason. She obtained the skill to make herself larger and smaller as well as the Blood Demon Art “Exploding Blood” which burns demons. She learned to recover from injuries by sleeping, instead of by devouring blood and meat.
Zenitsu Agatsuma (吾妻 善逸)
Personal data
Date of birth: September 3
Place of Birth: Ushigome, Shinjuku-ward, Tokyo
Height and weight: 164.5cm 58kg
Acquired technique: Thunder Breathing
Hobby: Eating sweets
Zenitsu joined the Demon Slayer Corps at the same time as Tanjiro. He was cheated by a woman who he was in love with and run into a debt. He was helped by Jigoro Kuwajima, the trainer of demon slayers, and started training under him. When he climbed a tree to escape from the exercises to become a demon slayer, the thunder hit the tree and his hair turned from black to yellow. His special skill is a sense of pitch. He distinguishes demons by their sound and can sense the personality of people by listening to their sound. He is a coward, but if he faints from fear, he becomes a strong swordsman. He fell in love with Nezuko at first sight. Zenitsu is 15 years old, the same age as Tanjiro.
Inosuke Hashibira (嘴平 伊之助)
Personal data
Date of birth: April 22
Place of birth: Odake Mountain, Oku-Tama, Tokyo
Height and weight: 164cm 63kg
Acquired technique: Beast Breathing
Hobby: Playing “Tokoro Tokoro“, a Japanese version of tag
Inosuke also joined Demon Slayer Corp at the same time as Tanjiro. Inosuke was raised by wild boars. Even so he speaks language, as he was visiting a nearby house to get food from an old man there. His special skill is a sharp wild intuition. He feels enemies’ eyes and danger with his skin. He matched a demon slayer in his mountain and got to know the existence of demons and final selection to become a demon slayer. He found it interesting and passed the final selection without dedicated training. At one glance, Inosuke looks as if he has nothing to do with demons, but his unexpected relation to a demon is revealed in the final arc!
Manga Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba
The original story on Weekly Jump
When the anime adoption was announced
The original story of Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba is written and illustrated by Koyoharu Gotouge, a female manga writer, born in Fukuoka, Japan. “Kimetsu no Yaiba (鬼滅の刃)” literally means demon destroying blade. The story was serialized in Weekly Jump (週刊 少年ジャンプ), a weekly manga magazine of Shueisha targeting mainly teenagers of junior and senior high school students, from February 2016 to May 2020. This was later published as manga comics. It consists of five arcs in the table below.
| Arc | Comics | Animation |
|---|---|---|
| Tanjiro Unwavering Arc | 1-6 | Streaming* |
| Mugen Train Arc | 7-8 | Streaming* |
| Entertainment District Arc | 8-11 | Streaming* |
| Swordsmith Village Arc | 12-15 | Streaming* |
| Hashira Training Arc | 15-16 | Works in progress |
| Mugen Castle Arc | 16-23 | To be decided |
Anime Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba
When Demon Slayer was serialized in Weekly Jump, it received mixed reviews. Some liked dark fantasy and others not. The real break came in 2019 when the story was adapted into an animation (Studio Ufotable). Not to mention the beautiful pictures, the story of the battle between good and evil was easy for primary school students to understand as well.
The Movie: Mugen Train
Mugen Train Arc which is the sequel to Tanjiro Unwavering Arc was made into a movie in 2020 (Director: Haruo Sotozaki) and its box office sales have passed 40 billion Japanese yen, making it the highest grossing anime movie ever in Japan. (The second place is “Spirited Away” by Studio Ghibli and the third place is “Frozen” by Walt Disney Pictures). The hero of The Movie Mugen Train, the Flame Hashira Kyojuro Rengoku, is named a man of 40 billion yen among Japanese people.
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Now you know the key facts of Damon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba. Do you want to know which one is more interesting: manga or anime? Both! Enjoy!
