Final Selection

The fourth episode of the anime adapts chapters 6 and 7. After Tanjiro finally splits the great boulder by sensing the Opening Thread, Sakonji Urokodaki reveals he never wished to send him onward, having lost too many students. He nonetheless gives the boy a fox mask and a protective charm before the trial. Tanjiro arrives at Mount Fujikasane, where applicants must endure seven days among demons imprisoned by encircling wisteria. There he cuts down ordinary demons with ease, but an immense, ancient creature made of grasping hands soon emerges and changes everything.

Leaving Urokodaki

Sakonji explains that a demon's power grows with the number of humans it devours and that a sharpened sense of smell can reveal that count. Before parting, Tanjiro mentions Sabito and Makomo by name, stunning his trainer, who knew them as children long dead.

The Hand Demon

On the first night Tanjiro slays two squabbling demons with Striking Tide, then encounters the Hand Demon, which drops a captive into its mouth and swells with strength. The creature reveals Sakonji imprisoned it 47 years earlier and that it has consumed thirteen of his students, including the powerful blue-haired boy and the agile girl.

Avenging the fallen

Realizing Sabito and Makomo were among its victims, Tanjiro attacks in a fury but is battered for his recklessness. A vision of his brother Shigeru rouses him in time. Steadying his breathing, he severs the demon's regrowing arms and decapitates it with Water Surface Slash.

The second eyecatcher recreates chapter 7's cover. The anime depicts the two early demons appearing one after another rather than already fighting over Tanjiro, and it shows the Hand Demon swallowing an applicant whole where the manga only shows him held. The trial demon's question about the era is reworded slightly, and Makomo's death is altered to be both partly censored and more graphic, depicting a bleeding white silhouette. Sabito's death is also shown more directly than in the source.