Genya Shinazugawa

He cuts a tall, menacing figure, fair-skinned and powerfully muscled, with dark purple eyes set under a furrowed brow and a jagged scar running over his right cheek. His black hair is worn as a mohawk. Once he eats demon flesh his looks shift toward the inhuman: fangs grow in, his nails lengthen into claws, yellow seeps through his hair, and his eyes go gold over black sclera.

In the beginning he is short-tempered and combative, a solitary figure who refuses help and carries the brutal streak of an abusive father much as his brother does. Time, and a deepening friendship with Tanjiro, soften him into someone far warmer and more thoughtful. As a boy he protected his younger siblings fiercely, and his wish to repair things with the brother who keeps driving him off drives much of his arc.

One of the few to survive Final Selection, he manages without any Breathing Style by pairing two weapons that cover both range and close quarters: a shortened twin-barrel shotgun firing Nichirin rounds, plus a stubby Nichirin wakizashi. Gyomei Himejima teaches him Repetitive Action, which stands in where Total Concentration Breathing would be, using spoken chants to lock in focus and dull pain.

What truly distinguishes him is the ability to consume demons. Abnormally strong jaws and a unique digestive system let him eat their flesh without harm, temporarily lending him demonic features, heightened power, and regeneration that grows with what he eats. He can recover from wounds that would kill an ordinary man, but his head cannot regrow, making it his deadly vulnerability, and while transformed he is also at risk from Nezuko's fire technique.

During the clash with Kokushibo, he eats both the Upper Rank's hair and a fragment of the demon's flesh sword, which sharpens his healing and allows him to fashion a unique Blood Demon Art he names Vampiric Trees. His altered shotgun fires flesh rounds that sprout into towering rooted trunks, ensnaring even Kokushibo and draining blood to suppress the demon's own techniques.

Pinning the Upper Rank in place proves decisive in bringing the demon down, yet Genya himself is sliced in half during the fight. As he crumbles to ash, his final wish is for Sanemi to live a long and happy life, calling him the kindest person alive. Among all the survivors of Final Selection, his death within the Castle is unique, and he never encounters Muzan face to face.