"Jotaro-san! Jotaro-san!"
Kamado Nezuko, a cute young girl dressed in a pink kimono, was tiptoeing at this moment, stretching her slender and fair arms, waving them in front of Jotaro.
Jotaro snapped back to his senses, glanced at her, and asked, "Where's Rokuta? I remember he always clings to you."
"He's with Hanako and Shigeru." Nezuko pouted her cute little lips, her bright pink apricot eyes carrying a bit of blame, "Jotaro-san, you're spacing out again. I called you so many times and you didn't respond."
But then, she immediately asked with concern, "Jotaro-san, could it be that you're homesick? I remember you said your hometown is in a very faraway place."
"Yare yare… maybe…"
Jotaro turned around, leaving Nezuko behind, and walked straight toward the Kamado family's wooden house.
Nezuko stomped her foot, somewhat angrily saying, "Really! Jotaro-san is always like this."
Beside the Kamado family's wooden house were some firewood piles. Jotaro pulled out a few sticks from them, then took a hatchet from the side and sharpened the tips of the wooden sticks until they were extremely sharp.
By now, Tanjiro had already finished tidying up the chopped firewood and was walking over together with Takeo.
Hearing the approaching footsteps behind, Jotaro turned his head and glanced at them, calmly saying, "Tanjiro, I'm going hunting next. Come with me."
Upon hearing this, Tanjiro's face lit up with excitement, and he nodded heavily.
"I understand, Jotaro-san!"
"Eh? Hunting?" Nezuko, who had walked over, also heard Jotaro's words. Then she looked at him with hopeful eyes, "Jotaro-san, I want to go too!"
"I want to go too, I want to go too!"
At some point, Hanako and Shigeru had also poked their heads out from the house. Clearly, they also wanted to join.
"Yare yare…" Jotaro didn't agree, explaining, "There are wild beasts in the mountains. I can't take care of so many people. Taking two is already my limit."
"Yay!" Takeo waved his hands, smiling ear to ear, "Great! I can go hunting with big brother again!"
Just as he finished speaking, Takeo felt a cold gaze from behind. He shivered and slowly turned his head, "Big sister?"
Nezuko, with her soft and flawless little hand, grabbed his ear and scolded, "Takeo, you've gone too far. You cling to big brother every day. Do you even care about Rokuta, your little brother?"
Takeo covered his ear and argued, "When did I…"
Nezuko displayed the dignity of an older sister, saying without room for argument, "I don't care. From now on, you're not allowed to go anywhere. You must stay home and accompany Rokuta."
"I don't want to! Rokuta can't even talk yet. It's so boring being with him."
Takeo was extremely unwilling, but seeing Nezuko's face darken, he drooped his head like a wilted radish.
"I got it…" He muttered reluctantly.
When he came back to his senses, Nezuko had already caught up to Jotaro, happily following him to go hunting.
"Big sister, you're so sneaky!" Takeo jumped up angrily.
"Jotaro-san!"
Jotaro glanced at Nezuko, who had followed behind him, signaling her not to speak. Directly ahead in his line of sight, a snow-white little rabbit was foraging.
Without a doubt, this rabbit was Jotaro's hunting target.
The rabbit was about thirty meters away from Jotaro. At such a close distance, even without using a Stand, with Jotaro's physical strength, he could catch it.
However! The Stand, Star Platinum, still emerged from behind him.
From those future memories, he had learned that his spirit was a Stand called Star Platinum. This Stand is a powerful image sustained by the user's life energy, based on the soul of the individual.
Everyone's Stand has a different style, and their fighting methods also vary.
For example, his Star Platinum possesses fierce strength and speed, as well as unparalleled precision. Except for the short attack range, it could be said to be an extremely perfect Stand.
Although he knew this and understood some characteristics of his Stand, without real combat experience, he still couldn't fully utilize Star Platinum's abilities.
Currently, whether in speed, strength, or precision, Star Platinum was far from as strong as what he had seen in his future memories.
Not to mention Star Platinum's most terrifying ability, time stop.
Having Star Platinum help him wasn't redundant, it was to help him better master using it. After all, this was currently his only weapon to fight demons.
Jotaro raised the sharpened wooden stick, and Star Platinum's arm overlapped with his. At the same time, Star Platinum's eyes locked tightly on the rabbit's heart.
At that moment, Tanjiro and Nezuko also unconsciously held their breath and focused.
This was Nezuko's first time hunting with Jotaro, so she was inevitably a little nervous. Plus, she felt a little unwilling to witness what was about to happen. So, she unknowingly took two steps back, and stepped on a broken twig.
A crisp snapping sound echoed harshly in this quiet environment.
The rabbit, which had been still, was startled instantly. It kicked off with strong hind legs and quickly fled several meters away, and it didn't look like it was going to stop.
Tanjiro felt a bit regretful. That had been a great opportunity just now. Since the rabbit noticed them, it would be more cautious from now on.
Sure enough, the rabbit looked around nervously and soon hid behind a large rock, disappearing from sight.
"Jotaro-san, let's wait for another chance." Tanjiro raised his head and said.
"ORA!"
But at that moment, the sharpened wood in Jotaro's hand was thrown instantly.
Tanjiro's eyes couldn't even catch a blur, only the sound of something slicing through the air could be heard by his ears.
A muffled sound followed, and a neat hole appeared in the large rock.
Tanjiro had good eyesight, so he naturally saw that a small hole had suddenly appeared in the giant rock not far away.
The rock was pitch black, and the white snow behind it was glaring through the hole.
Tanjiro was stunned, muttering to himself. "The wood Jotaro-san used is firewood. These sticks were sun-dried, and the moisture evaporated, making them very brittle. Even a five-year-old child could easily break them with force, and yet this wood pierced through solid rock!"
"If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, I wouldn't believe it."
At that moment, Nezuko walked over, lowering her head, with an apologetic expression on her face. "Jotaro-san, I'm sorry. I made a noise and let the rabbit escape."
Nezuko really blamed herself, feeling she had caused trouble for Jotaro.
Before Jotaro arrived, their family rarely ate meat, because the oldest male in the family was only thirteen. Tanjiro didn't yet have the ability to hunt deep in the mountains where wild wolves and bears, which he couldn't fight, lived.
Moreover, there were very few animals near their home, mostly rabbits and other small creatures with little meat, so they seldom had the chance to eat meat.
But after Jotaro came, their family's dinner table gradually became richer. All the prey had been brought back by Jotaro.
At first, Nezuko thought Jotaro simply couldn't stand them eating pickles every day, so he went out hunting on his own.
But soon she discovered, every time Jotaro brought back meat, he wouldn't eat a bite, he gave it all to her younger siblings. And Jotaro himself still ate the pickles like before.
At that moment, she realized that Jotaro had done all this for them.
She not only didn't help him, but instead caused him trouble.
Thinking this, Nezuko bit her lip tightly, and big teardrops fell down her cheeks, landing on the white snow.
"Yare yare daze~"
Jotaro closed his eyes and turned his head aside, but his broad palm rested on Nezuko's little head.
"No need to apologize. The rabbit didn't get away. Not only that, it even helped us find its companions."
Nezuko looked up, her tear-blurred eyes staring at him without blinking. 'As expected, Jotaro-san is so gentle. Even now, he's still comforting me…'
"Tanjiro, bring the prey over."
"Eh?" Tanjiro was shocked, looking up at the tall man in disbelief.
'Could it be that Jotaro-san hit the rabbit through the rock?'
To confirm the thought in his heart, Tanjiro quickly ran behind the rock, only to see that the wooden stick had pierced through two rabbits, skewering them together.
"Amazing!"
Tanjiro picked up the dead rabbits and discovered they were both wounded in the exact same spot.
'Was it a coincidence, or did Jotaro do it on purpose?'
He turned his head to the side and saw that the rock was at least one meter thick. Not only that, the hole through the rock was extremely neat.
'How fast and how powerful must the attack have been to achieve this?'
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