Nakime

Nakime is a supporting antagonist in the Infinity Castle Arc of Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba. Initally, she was merely a demon who served to summon other demons into the Infinity Castle on Muzan Kibutsuji's command, but after Hantengu's death, she became the new Upper Rank Four (の) of the Twelve Kizuki.

Appearance
Nakime is a pale woman with a grayish complexion, who had sharp, blue-stained nails and notably red lips which sharply contrasted the tone of her skin. She had shiny, waist-length hair of a dark brown color, which she wore falling down her back in slight waves that cut off sharply at the ends, with two chin-length strands left to frame her face and long bangs that obscured her large eye set in between them, swept to either side of her nose.

Nakime wore a plain black kimono with a white lining, secured with a striped pale brown-striped obi, white socks and no shoes. She was always seen holding a four-stringed wooden biwa with a large bachi pick.

Since becoming an Upper Rank, Nakime took to wearing her bangs as to not obscure her face, showing that she only possessed a single large, pink-colored eye with the kanji for "Four" etched onto its iris. The upper portion of her face was also revealed, and appeared to be a darker gray color than the rest of her skin with prominent veins surrounding her one eye.

Personality
Nakime was a mysterious yet cold biwa player who displayed little emotion. She didn't speak unless necessary and, when she did, she was always straightforward and blunt, making her responses as short as possible.

History
In the past, Nakime was an obscure amateur biwa musician struggling to make ends meet. But the man she married to was hopelessly addicted to gambling who squandered her earnings and savings while contributing nothing to improve their lives.

One night, she was scheduled to go to play her biwa at a particular stage but discovered that her husband stole her performing dress and gambled it away. Enraged, Nakime murdered her husband using a hammer. Shortly after she killed her husband, Nakime realized that the appointed time to play was fast approaching, and she was forced wore to wear a worn-out, ragged dress as she left to her stage in a haste. However, the crowd did not appreciate her shabby looks, and with the traumatic sensation of committing the murder for the first time still fresh in her mind, her hands shook in nervousness as she played her biwa.

But surprisingly, the sound coming from biwa as Nakime played with utmost tension, was so beautiful that her audience loved her performance and shouted for encore. Both her customers and the stage owner were pleased with the unexpected outcome and Nakime was paid handsomely. Since then, Nakime developed a disturbing habit of killing people before performing for large audiences. Strangely, every time she played her biwa in the aftermath of committing murders, her performance received extraordinarily positive feedbacks from customers and stage managers.

During a fateful day, she had a routine appointment to perform at another stage, so chose someone to kill, but the target was none other than Muzan Kibutsuji. Muzan was impressed with Nakime's searching skills, so he spared her life and offered to make her a demon. Nakime accepted his offer, became a demon and climbed the ranks and became one of Muzan's top servants.

Rehabilitation Training Arc
Nakime makes her debut within the Infinity Castle playing her biwa, summoning the Lower Ranks for a meeting following Rui's death. She does not utter a word.

Entertainment District Arc
Nakime once again plays her biwa to summon the Upper Ranks to a meeting after Daki and Gyutaro's deaths.

When Akaza asks her where Muzan is, she replies straightforwardly that he has not yet arrived. She is also questioned as to where Upper Rank One is to which she replies (after Akaza's and Doma's bout) that he has always been there; he was the first to arrive.

At the end of the meeting, Nakime plays her biwa again to separate the Upper Ranks and bluntly refuses Doma's offer, cutting him off by sending him back to his temple.

Hashira Training Arc
Nakime, now the new Upper Rank 4 replacing Hantengu, is shown to be with Muzan. Using small eyeball familiars, she has been tracking down the Demon Slayers and determining their locations and hideout. Expressing her honor at Muzan's compliment for her rapid growth, she uses her technique to locate Kagaya Ubuyashiki.

Infinity Castle Arc
When the Demon Slayer Corps arrive at the Ubuyashiki mansion to try and stop Muzan, they are all transported into the Infinity Castle and separated from one another by Nakime.

Obanai Iguro and Mitsuri Kanroji are the first to encounter her, but find it extremely difficult to land blows on her due to her control over the environment.

After Kokushibo's death in Chapter 176, Nakime is the only remaining Upper Rank and the final member of the Twelve Kizuki.

Later, during the beginning of Tanjiro and Giyu's fight with Muzan, the latter reveals that Nakime has successfully "defeated" both Obanai and Mitsuri by crushing them both to death using the rooms of her castle. However, she is taken by surprise when the supposedly dead duo launch a surprise attack on her, still very much alive, and angrily asks Nakime what she's doing. Muzan is shocked upon learning that Yushiro has completely taken control over Nakime's vision, and with it, the Infinity Castle, which he begins to use against the Demon King as revenge for his killing of Tamayo.

Muzan immediately begins countering Yushiro, using his own mental powers in order to take back his final Upper Rank, which kicks off a fierce battle of wills between the two demons. This mental fight causes the castle to completely spiral out of control as both wrestle for dominance, and, just as Muzan appears to have taken the upper hand, Obanai and Giyu launch an attack on the Demon lord. He has no choice but to counter, which causes his hold on Nakime to slip as he tries to defend himself and ward the Hashiras off with his own attacks.

Soon realizing that he can't take back Nakime and fight the Demon Slayers at the same time, Muzan uses his powers to kill his final Upper Rank by crushing her head, which prevents Yushiro from using the castle against him and allows him to fully focus on killing the remaining Hashiras and Tanjiro. As Nakime doesn't immediately disintegrate, Yushiro manages to use her body to push the castle above ground in an attempt to protect the Demon Slayers.

Abilities
Overall Abilities: Despite not displaying much in terms of fighting ability, as the holder of the fourth highest position in the Twelve Kizuki, Nakime is an extremely powerful demon. She was capable of using unorthodox Blood Demon Art to thrwart the efforts of Obanai and Mitsuri at beheading her and stall the two Hashira for most of the Infinity Castle Arc, with neither of the two skilled combatants being able to so much as scratch her.

Eye Detachment: Later, upon obtaining the rank of Upper Rank Four and presumably receiving more blood from Muzan, she displayed the new ability to create and detach several eyeballs from her body. This allowed her to spy on others from a long range. With this new ability, she was able to successfully find and locate the positions of nearly all members of the Demon Slayer Corps as well as the hidden mansion of Kagaya Ubuyashiki, who had gone to extreme lengths to hide its location from even the highest-ranking members of the Demon Slayer Corps.

Talented Biwa Player: Nakime was an expert at playing the Biwa, garnering attention from others when she performed while she was still a human.

Blood Demon Art
Infinity Castle: Nakime's Blood Demon Art takes the form of an extra-dimensional space that houses a fortress of infinite scale. As the owner of this infinite fortress, Nakime also possesses dominion over the space, being able to manipulate and alter it at will by simply strumming her Biwa. In her fortress, there are countless rooms with seemingly endless variety, like an open room filled with giant pillars where the fight against Kokushibo took place; a small garden where the fight against Doma took place; a corridor leading to several other rooms where the fight against Akaza took place. Nakime herself sits at the center of the Infinity Castle, with the entire space being distorted around her.

Nakime has also displayed the ability to use her unorthodoz Blood Demon Art for offensive purposes. She achieves this by shaping rooms into gigantic pillars and ramming it into her enemies to crush them. By binding and rooting her hair to a nearby wall inside the castle, she could control the castle's positioning as she likes: shifting and changing the positioning of various rooms and walls as if they were her own limbs. However, doing so presumably renders her immobile.
 * Portal Creation: Nakime can also spawn portals at any location to transport people outside her fortress or to anywhere within it in the form of tatami sliding doors. She can use her portals for offensive and defensive purposes as well, displayed when she created a portal to negate Mitsuri Kanroji's attack. One of her main duties was to act as a mode of transport for the other Upper Ranks when they are sent on missions and presumably assist Muzan in moving around the country undetected.

Equipment
Biwa: Nakime is always seen carrying a Biwa on her lap. A Biwa is a short-necked lute which Nakime used in performances when she was a human, being particularly talented in playing it as well. Her Biwa is used as a medium for her Blood Demon Art, as she is required to strum to instrument using a single Bachi to use it. As a demon, its possible that her Biwa and Bachi are fashioned from her flesh and blood, similar to other tools and weapons used by demons.

Trivia

 * The name "Nakime" contains the kanji for " to call, to cry" (鳴) and "woman, female" (女).
 * Nakime has many similarities to the former Lower Rank 6, Kyogai. They both use Blood Demon Arts that allow them to freely manipulate a specific structure at will, have a musical instrument to use their individual techniques, and have been given their epithets based on these instruments.
 * She was one of Muzan's favorite Upper Ranks, since he believes her ability is useful.
 * Nakime's name was mistakenly translated as "Nasume" in the official English release of Volume 12.

Quotes

 * (To Doma) "I decline."

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