Demon Slayer: Does Yoriichi Have a Son? His Family Explored!

When one decides to talk about Demon Slayer, one usually talks about the demon slayers themselves or the demons, despite the fact the series has offered us a variety of other intriguing characters. In light of that fact, we are, of course, going to talk about one of the more important characters in the series, namely, Yoriichi Tsugikuni, the first and most powerful Demon Slayer in history. Yoriichi is responsible for creating the Sun Breathing Style, with which he almost killed Muzan, but the rest of his story is also impressive. In this article, we are going to focus on his private life and his story before his fateful duels with Muzan and Kokushibo, as you are going to find out whether Yoriichi Tsugikuni had any children or not.
Yoriichi Tsugikuni had a wife, Uta, whom he met after his departure from his family following his mother’s death. They lived together for ten years before marrying, and Uta became pregnant. Before the child’s birth, Yoriichi went to summon a midwife, but by the time he came back, he found his wife and unborn child slaughtered by a Demon. He then decided to become a Demon Slayer.
The remainder of this article will give you a detailed overview of Yoriichi Tsugikuni’s story, as it happened on the pages of the Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba manga. You already know what happened and how it happened, so we will just bring you the details so you know the whole context. Be careful, though, as the article will contain many spoilers, so if you don’t know all the details, be careful how you approach the text.
Yoriichi was supposed to have a child, but it was never born
The story of Yoriichi’s family actually begins with his birth because his relationship with his parents and his brother directly led to him meeting Uta. So, we’re going to start his story with a recap of these events, which will lead to the events surrounding Uta. So, twins were regarded as a particularly bad omen during the Sengoku period when Yoriichi and his twin brother Michikatsu were born into the Tsugikuni clan. Yoriichi’s father threatened to kill him because of a peculiar birthmark on his son’s forehead, but their mother, Akeno, became enraged and detained him. It was ultimately decided that Yoriichi would be sent to a temple at the age of ten to become a monk.
When their mother passed away when Yoriichi was ten years old, Yoriichi visited Michikatsu and told him that he was leaving the family as was arranged. He thanked his brother, told him that he would always keep thinking of him, and took a small wooden flute Michikatsu had given him earlier as a memory. He then left; Michikatsu would later find out, through his mother’s diary, that Yoriichi knew all about their mother’s illness and that he helped her, but also that he knew that their father planned on making Yoriichi his heir and sending Michikatsu to a temple, which is why he ran away to spare him. Despite these acts of kindness, Michikatsu still hated and envied Yoriichi, and that would prove to be a stepping stone in their relationship later on. But what happened when Yoriichi left?
Yoriichi left the house after their mother passed away and didn’t stop. In the mountains, Yoriichi had been running nonstop for a day and a night without showing any signs of tiredness when he came upon Uta, a young woman his own age whose entire family had perished. Uta was roughly Yoriichi’s age, and as the two got to know each other, he decided to live with her and not go to the temple. The two of them lived happily for ten years before eventually marrying. Not long after that, Uta got pregnant with their child.
By all means, it was a very happy marriage, but such marriages are bound to end in tragedy in Demon Slayer, and that is exactly what happened in this instance as well. Namely, just before the baby was about to be born, Yoriichi left the house to summon a midwife just before the expected arrival time, assuring his wife that he would return before sundown. Yoriichi decided to return home and make a midwife appointment the next day after helping an elderly man along the route and losing so much time.
When he eventually returned home, he discovered that Uta and the unborn child had been murdered by a demon by the time the sun had set. Yoriichi was so horrified by the catastrophe that he kept her body in his arms for ten days straight before finally burying them at a Demon Slayer’s urging. As a result, Yoriichi decided to reclaim his sword and begin his training to slay demons.
We all know what happened later. Yoriichi developed the Sun Breathing style and became the most powerful Demon Slayer in history. Yoriichi soon came into contact with Muzan Kibutsuji, the Slayers’ mortal foe, and ancestral demon, and made the decision to murder him. Yoriichi discovered that Muzan had five moving brains and seven moving hearts inside of him. When he realized his good fortune, he united all of his forms into a single attack, cutting them all off and thoroughly outclassing Muzan.
Muzan would ultimately succeed in escaping, but the conflict left him deeply traumatized and terrified of Yoriichi. After failing to kill Muzan, he met Tamayo, another demon, and believed her story about wanting to end Muzan, which is why he let her go free. Upon his return to the Corps, he found out that his brother, Michikatsu, had betrayed the Corps, killed the Oyakata, and deflected.
Being blamed by the other Hashira, Yoriichi was initially sentenced to death for his failures, but the new Oyakata converted the death sentence to banishment. And so, Yoriichi was stripped of his Hashira rank and banished from the Corps. After his banishment, Yoriichi went to Sumiyoshi’s to enjoy their company and because he needed someone to talk to. Yoriichi got unhappy as he reflected on the misfortunes that had befallen him and expressed remorse for having left Muzan alive when they first met, as well as the countless deaths that would occur. He would leave his friend’s house soon and would live in solitude and isolation as an independent Demon Slayer for decades.
Well into his 80s and blind, he finally faced his brother, now the demon Kokushibo, and died of old age before being able to kill him. Yoriichi’s life has been marred by tragedy, and while he did die a warrior’s death, a noble death, he was a lonely man at the time of his death. He lost his mother to illness. He lost his brother to Muzan, he lost his position as Hashira due to Muzan’s trickery, and on top of that, he lost his wife and unborn child to an unknown Demon. Yoriichi, thus, never had a child, nor a family at that, but he was supposed to have one. We never found out the child’s gender, as it was killed before being born. And that is the tragedy of Yoriichi Tsugikuni, the most powerful character in the Demon Slayer manga.