Demon Slayer: Is Inosuke a Hashira? Will He Ever Become One?

Inosuke Hashibara is one of the most intriguing Demon Slayer characters. Not only is he a self-taught Demon Slayer, but he also has a very quirky personality. Despite his unrefined behavior, he is also one of the most beloved characters in the series. Inosuke has several trademarks that make him stand out among other Demon Slayer characters, and his mask is one of the most striking. And while this article is not going to focus on these aspects, it is still going to be dedicated to Inosuke and one aspect of his story. Namely, in this article, we have decided to tell you a bit about his skills and his evolution as a character. In our text, you will find out whether Inosuke Hashibara eventually became a Hashira of the Demon Slayer Corps in the future.

Although Inosuke eventually becomes as powerful as the Hashira and completes the majority of the training, and meets all the conditions to become one, he never actually becomes a Hashira himself. The reason for that is simple: when Inosuke actually reached the required level, the final fight against Muzan had already begun, and when Muzan was defeated, the Demon Slayer Corps simply disbanded as there were no demons to fight against.

The rest of this article will provide you with more information about Inosuke Hashibara, his powers, and his story within the Demon Slayer series. We will explain how his powers evolved and when and how he reached the power level that could have made him a Hashira. We will also expand on the story of why he did not become a Hashira.

Inosuke worked hard to reach the required level to become a Hashira

Inosuke has one of the strangest stories in the series, but this story shows us how hard he had to work to become himself and why his effort is all the more laudable. Namely, Inosuke’s mother, Kotoha Hashibara, was the young wife of an unnamed, vile man who was Inosuke’s father. She was a beautiful young woman, a very caring and loving person as well, and she was a kind and loving mother to Inosuke, whom she had when she was just 17 or 18 years old.

But Kotoha Hashibara had the misfortune of being married to an abusive husband. He abused her, along with his mother, Kotoha’s mother-in-law, and she was beaten daily. Of course, she had to balance between being a wife and being a mother, but once she realized that she could not be a good mother to Inosuke while being beaten by her husband and molested by her mother-in-law, she decided to risk it all and run for it.

Taking Insouke, the barefooted Kotoha ran away from home and, incidentally, encountered a demon. She did not know who the Upper Moon Doma was nor just how dangerous Dōma was. Dōma was a killer, but he was also someone obsessed with beauty, and since Kotoha was beautiful, Dōma decided to spare her and invited her to her Paradise Faith cult; he would soon kill her husband and his mother when they came looking for her and Kotoha, and Inosuke lived happily with the cult for a while.

At one point, Kotoha realized that Dōma was eating his followers. She could not take it and ran away, but she only managed to reach a cliff. Apologizing to Inosuke for being unable to protect him, she threw him off the cliff into the river, only to be killed by Dōma later. Inosuke survived and was found by some boars, which would raise him as their own.

While being raised by the boars, Inosuke also trained hard so he could be able to defend himself and his family, becoming an unlicensed Demon Slayer along the way. Inosuke is an extremely skillful and brilliant swordsman since he was able to master Total Concentration Breathing on his own and create Beast Breathing, his own special breathing technique based on instinct, and his upbringing by wild boars in the mountains. Inosuke has no trouble killing the Horned Demon, proving that he is more than capable of slaying Demons on his own, even without any formal training.

He has demonstrated numerous times that he can compete with the Upper-Rank Demons of the Twelve Kizuki, including the far more powerful Upper Rank Two demon Dōma and the Upper-Rank Six demons Gyūtarō and Daki; along with Kanao and Shinobu, he was able to kill Dōma, and with Zenitsu’s help, he was able to decapitate Daki. He is also extraordinarily gifted, with superhuman flexibility, inhuman senses, and a natural flair for battle. Inosuke and his allies most impressively defeated the demon king Muzan during the series’ final epic battle. He shares Hashira’s combat prowess as the most powerful swordsman among all Demon Slayers.

Over the years, he has worked hard to become a Hashira; he even asked Kanao what his Hashira title would be during their fight against Dōma. As we are going to see in the next section, Inosuke has met all the requirements to become a Hashira of the Demon Slayer Corps, as he was certainly powerful enough to become one. But, due to a specific set of circumstances and events, he never actually became one, and we are going to tell you why that never happened in our next section.

Still, he never became a Hashira, just like the rest of the protagonists

As we have established above, Inosuke Hashibara reached the necessary power level to become a Hashira, but he never became one. We can only confirm that after defeating Dōma with the help of Kanao and Shinobu, Inosuke met all the necessary conditions to become a Hashira. He had his own Breathing Style – and Beast Breathing was, nonetheless, his own original creation, something he developed without any prior training – and he managed to defeat an Upper Rank, which was more than enough.

Just a quick reminder, there are two ways of becoming a Hashira: having a demon kill count of at least 50 as a Kinoe-ranked Demon Slayer, or killing a member of the Twelve Kizuki, or becoming the Tsuguko of a Hashira, i.e., their designated successor.

Now, since Inosuke met the first condition, there was no reason for him to become a Tsuguko of any of the current Hashira. But although he was ready for it, he never actually became a Hashira. Namely, Inosuke had to face the same sad fact as Tanjirō, Zenitsu, and Kanao, all of whom reached the necessary level to become a Hashira, and that is the following: after Muzan’s defeat, Demons ceased to exist, and the Demon Slayer Corps were simply disbanded, meaning that there were no Hashira anymore.

And this is the principal reason why none of the protagonists, Zenitsu included, ever became Hashira. Before Muzan’s defeat, it was simply too early, as they were not ready, and after his defeat, it was not necessary anymore, as the Demon Slayer Corps had nothing to do in a demon-free world. And that is why Inosuke never became a Hashira.