To Be a Hashira

Genya Shinazugawa relives his childhood, where his frail mother, Shizu, was beaten by his father along with the children. One night she fails to return even after Sanemi goes looking, and Genya settles the frightened children and urges them to go back to bed. A knock comes at the door, and despite his warning the younger children open it and are cut down at once. Genya is slashed across the cheek and stares up at a shape clinging to the ceiling in the dark before Sanemi tackles it through the window, shouting at Genya to run.

Terrified, Genya tries to bind his siblings' wounds though their bodies are already cold, then runs for a doctor and finds Sanemi standing over the corpse of their mother, who had become a demon. Genya cradles her body, weeping, and calls his brother a killer.

In hindsight, Genya silently apologizes to Sanemi for branding him a murderer in his shock, despite the burden Sanemi carried in protecting him. He recalls a happier moment when the brothers vowed to guard their mother and siblings together after their abusive father died. As Sekido aims for his neck, Genya dwells on his regrets, remembering Sanemi as a Hashira coldly denying he had a brother, and laments that he never reached the rank needed to earn the right to apologize.

Just as Sekido's staff grazes his throat, Tanjiro Kamado drops in and cuts the demon's neck, urging Genya not to give up and to focus only on beheading Hantengu. Aizetsu then strikes from behind with the Blood Demon Art Weeping Spears, but Genya throws himself in the way and is impaled in many places. He tells Tanjiro to be the one to finish Hantengu, and Tanjiro accepts, rushing the demon and striking it with his flaming sword as Hantengu screams.

This Swordsmith Village Arc chapter appeared in Weekly Shonen Jump issue 30 of 2018, dated June 25th, and is collected in Volume 13. It was adapted across Episodes 50 and 51 of the anime. The installment delivers the central backstory of the Shinazugawa brothers, explaining the rift between Genya and Sanemi and the demonic death of their mother.