The Demon Slayer timeline, from the Heian era to the present day

Demon Slayer reads like the story of a boy chasing after his sister for three years. But behind this tight narrative, the author built a timeline of more than a thousand years: a family curse, a secret army, a legendary first demon slayer, demons who cross the centuries. This past surfaces in pieces, in the characters’ memories, and you only really grasp what is at stake in the last battle by putting these pieces back in order.

Here is the complete Demon Slayer timeline, from the Heian era to the modern epilogue, then Tanjiro’s year arc by arc. Our page on all the Demon Slayer arcs tells each arc in detail, and our article on the Taisho era, the period of Demon Slayer describes the Japan Tanjiro lives in.

A thousand years of history at a glance

The table sums up the main stages of the Demon Slayer story, from Muzan’s origins to the last chapter. The dates are those of the major Japanese periods, as the series almost never gives a precise year.

The Heian era: the birth of the first demon

It all begins more than a thousand years ago, in the Heian era, when the imperial court sat in Kyoto. A young nobleman, sick from birth and doomed to die before twenty, receives an experimental treatment from a doctor. Impatient, convinced the remedy is not working, he kills the doctor. But the treatment takes effect: the young man becomes stronger than any human, stops ageing, and feeds on human flesh. He can no longer go out in the sun. This is Muzan Kibutsuji, the first of the demons.

Muzan then spends centuries searching for the flower that was part of the remedy, the blue spider lily, to overcome the sun. He creates other demons by giving them his blood. To fight him, a family founds a secret army in the same period: the Ubuyashiki, a lineage related to Muzan, struck by a curse that condemns all its sons to die before thirty. They will lead the Demon Slayer Corps for a thousand years. To make up for their fragile health, the heads of the family have a gift of foresight that allows them to make a fortune and fund the Corps without anyone’s help. Generation after generation, they recruit, train and send demon slayers after a demon no one has ever seen. Our article on Muzan Kibutsuji, the first demon tells his origin, and the one on the blue spider lily explains the flower he is looking for.

Our 30 cm Muzan figure, in his blood-red transformed form, shows the demon as he finally appears in the last battle, in the Muzan Kibutsuji collection.

The Sengoku era: Yoriichi and the first breathing style

For centuries, the Corps kills demons without ever reaching Muzan. Everything changes in the Sengoku era, the age of wars between lords, about four hundred years ago. An exceptional swordsman, Yoriichi Tsugikuni, joins the Corps after a demon kills his wife, Uta, and the child she was carrying. He was born with a mark on his forehead and an extraordinary gift: he sees through his opponents’ bodies.

Yoriichi teaches the demon slayers the breathing that multiplies their strength. He practises Sun Breathing, the first of all, and the others derive their own breathing styles from it, Water, Flame, Wind, Stone and Thunder. One evening, he comes across Muzan and cuts him to pieces. Muzan only survives by bursting into more than a thousand fragments that flee. Tamayo, who was then with Muzan, takes the opportunity to escape his control. Our article on Yoriichi Tsugikuni, the first demon slayer tells his life.

The backlash is terrible. Yoriichi’s twin brother, Michikatsu, jealous of his genius, accepts Muzan’s blood and becomes Kokushibo. Yoriichi is driven out of the Corps for letting Tamayo go and for his brother’s betrayal. He entrusts his earrings and his movements to a family of charcoal burners, the Kamado, with whom he found a little peace. Sumiyoshi Kamado and his wife turn these movements into a ritual dance, performed every New Year for the Fire God, and pass it on to their children. Three centuries later, Tanjiro will learn it from his father without knowing what it is. Muzan, terrified, then has almost all the users of Sun Breathing hunted down and killed. Our article on Kokushibo and Yoriichi tells the break between the two twins, and our 30 cm Yoriichi figure, red haori over his shoulders, keeps the first demon slayer in the Yoriichi Tsugikuni collection.

Centuries of demons: the Moons take shape

Between the Sengoku era and Tanjiro’s time, Muzan gradually builds up his inner guard, the Twelve Kizuki. Kokushibo, Upper Moon One, is the oldest. The others come much later, during the Edo era and the nineteenth century. Akaza, Upper Moon Three, was Hakuji, a young man whose fiancée was poisoned. Doma, Upper Moon Two, was the leader of a cult. Daki and Gyutaro, Upper Moon Six, were a brother and sister born into the poverty of Tokyo’s pleasure district.

For more than a hundred years before Tanjiro’s arrival, no Upper Moon is killed. Successive Hashira die facing them. Doma kills Kanae Kocho, the Flower Hashira, a few years before the story begins. Our article on the Twelve Kizuki presents the whole hierarchy, and our page on Muzan and the demon Moons tells the story of each.

In the nineteenth century, the Meiji era transforms Japan. In 1876 the government bans carrying swords in the street. The Demon Slayer Corps, which has never been recognised by the State, carries on its fight in the shadows: its members hide their blades and hunt at night. When Tanjiro joins the Corps, the State does not even know it exists. Demon slayers travel in plain clothes when they can, sleep in the wisteria houses of families they have saved, and get treated at the Butterfly Mansion. The swordsmiths of their hidden village keep making Nichirin blades, banned by law, for fighters the country ignores. Our article on the Demon Slayer Corps explains how it works.

Tanjiro’s year, arc by arc

The main story takes place under the Taisho era, between 1912 and 1926, without the series giving an exact year. Tanjiro is 13 in the first chapter, on a winter day. He trains for two years with Sakonji Urokodaki, passes the Final Selection at 15, then takes on mission after mission. The rest takes place in a little over a year, until the last night. The table follows the main arcs in order.

Each arc is told in our dedicated articles, from Tanjiro’s first mission to the Infinity Castle.

The last night

The timeline speeds up at the end. After the Swordsmith Village, Nezuko withstands the sun, and Muzan has only one idea left: to devour her to obtain this power. The Hashira organise a great training programme to prepare the Corps. Kagaya Ubuyashiki, dying, waits for Muzan in his mansion and blows it up with himself inside. The whole Corps is immediately drawn into the Infinity Castle, Muzan’s lair.

Everything is decided in a single night, the longest of the series. Shinobu dies facing Doma, whom Kanao and Inosuke finish off. Tanjiro and Giyu kill Akaza. Kokushibo falls to Gyomei, Sanemi, Muichiro and Genya, and the last two die. Zenitsu kills Kaigaku. Then all the survivors face Muzan in the streets of Tokyo, until the sun rises and reduces him to ashes. Our article on Tanjiro’s fight against Muzan tells these last hours.

At the very last moment, Muzan passes his blood to Tanjiro, who becomes a demon in turn. Kanao injects him with the cure prepared by Shinobu, and his friends bring him back among humans. Chapter 204 shows the survivors a few months later: life goes on, those who bear the mark know they have only a few years left, and the graves of the dead are covered in flowers.

The last chapter, a century later

Chapter 205, the last, jumps about a century ahead, to present-day Japan. We follow the descendants and reincarnations of the characters: the great-great-grandchildren of Tanjiro and Kanao, those of Zenitsu and Nezuko, a botanist descended from Inosuke, twins who look like the Tokito brothers, a couple who run a restaurant and recall Mitsuri and Obanai. Yushiro, the only surviving demon, has become a painter and still paints Tamayo.

This leap in time gives the whole timeline its meaning. A thousand years of war were for this: a normal youth, at high school, in a modern Tokyo where no one knows demons ever existed. Our article on the ending of Demon Slayer explained details this last chapter, and the one on Tanjiro’s ending tells what becomes of the hero.

In what order should you discover the story?

The series does not tell this timeline in order: it begins in the Taisho era and reveals the past through flashbacks, at the moment it sheds light on the present. It is better to discover it that way, in publication order, rather than reading the timeline first: the revelations about Yoriichi, Kokushibo or Muzan would lose their impact. Keep this article for later, when you want to put the pieces back in place. The manga has 23 volumes and 205 chapters, published in Japan from 2016 to 2020: Yoriichi’s past only arrives in volume 21, almost at the end, and that is deliberate. Our article on the number of Demon Slayer volumes details how the manga is divided.

For the anime, the seasons and films follow one another in story order, from the first episode to the Infinity Castle. Our page on the order to watch Demon Slayer gives the complete list, and the collection devoted to Kokushibo gathers the products of the demon who spans this whole timeline. The other Moons have their figures in the demon figure collection.