The Pure Evilness of Muzan Kibutsuji in Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba

Demon Slayer is making waves in the anime sphere with its fantastic animation, top-notch CGI, and characters that will leave you rooting for them throughout the seasons. However, one thing that makes Demon Slayer more interesting is its egoistical, immortality-seeking Demon King, Muzan Kibutsuji.

Muzan Kibutsuji is the main antagonist of the Kimetsu no Yaiba verse. He is pure evil, with a ruthless mission of eradicating humanity and turning humans into demons that will worship him for eternity. With the announcement of a new movie releasing in March which will bridge the gap between the Entertainment District and the Swordsmith Village arcs, the demon lord will return to our screen with his narcissistic and purely evil personality.

Let’s dive deep into understanding Muzan Kibutsuji and why he is one of the best and cruelest antagonists in the horror-fantasy anime genre.

Master of Disguise

The most interesting and unique feature of Muzan’s character is his way of maintaining his disguises with his shapeshifting abilities. The demon lord can turn himself into multiple forms, such male, female, and a son of an old couple.

This alteration between multiple forms has allowed Kibutsuji Muzan to go undetected among humans and create hundreds of demons. The demon progenitor never stays in the same form for too long. This makes it possible for him to stay alive among humans for over 1000 years.

Apart from this, Muzan can make random relations with humans with the help of his telepathic abilities. He makes them think he is a part of their lives. He can become an important family member, a father, a son, or even a colleague.
In the manga, Kibutsuji Muzan married six times and killed five of his wives by traumatizing them. In the first season of Demon Slayer, the demon king with his family, including a wife and a daughter. This indicates us how powerful he is and the lengths he can go to blend well among humans.

Extremely Narcissistic & Egoistic

Muzan Kibutsuji’s persona demonstrates an igniting sense of superiority and narcissism. This particular behavior can be easily understood by his name, which loosely means miserable, pitiful, and merciless.
Since he transformed into a demon, Muzan put himself above all. Other humans, their lives, career, families, and dreams or aspirations are meaningless to him.

His quest for immortality is, above all, his struggle to maintain power is dearest to him. His demons are nothing but pawns to search for the blue spider lily and to conquer the sun.
He uses humans, turns them into demons, and slaughters them when he feels defeated by Hashiras.

“I haven’t got any punishments. I’ve been freed of the murder of hundreds of thousands of people. I haven’t seen God or Buddha for a thousand years.”

Kibutsuji Muzan

Remarkable Manipulator

Muzan is, unsurprisingly, the greatest manipulator in the Demon Slayer Verse. No other character equals his deception and strategies in convincing ordinary people to transform into flesh-eating demons. We saw demons offering to turn ordinary humans into monsters in exchange for eternity and immortality.

But their demon king peneterated these delusional concepts in them during the most sensitive and troublesome phases of their human lives. He tricked them into believing that demon life is superior to human life and that demons are not slaves of mortality.

However, the truth is that demons have a pitiful existence without any freedom. Muzan manipulates, controls, and kills them. He treats them like they are unworthy of existence. Not to forget that many other broken characters possess the same ability to manipulate people around them, but Muzan is no Anti-Hero, and his goals are far eviler than others.

Petrifying Appearance

Apart from the “Muzan Jackson” memes among Otakus, Koyoharu Gotouge did a great job giving Muzan a unique and petrifying aura. It is rare for an anime to make its antagonist so attractive and fashionable, however, the striking resemblance of Muzan’s character with Micheal Jackson in “Smooth Criminal” has a deeper meaning.

With this resemblance, the creators of Demon Slayer portrayed a popular trend in Japan during the early 1900s. Muzan’s initial appearance depicts a time when ordinary Japanese people used to resist modernization and technology, claiming that it would corrupt humans.

And Muzan pretty much does the same thing in the anime; he corrupts, kills, and lives without any remorse or guilt. Once the charm of his visual’s fades, you see the real monster inside him, the one who only lives to satisfy himself. Furthermore, Muzan’s actual appearance is quite horrifying, with multiple hearts and brains and his ability to have tentacle-like arms to fight his foes.

Wicked Beyond Redemption

“Only feelings are eternal and undying. That is true. I have no recollection of killing a single human being.”

Muzan Kibutsuji

To some Otakus, Muzan’s character might seem cliche. However, one must understand that Muzan’s ultimate selfishness differentiates him from all other shonen villains. He has no family to devote his life to, no past that is terrible enough to become an antagonist, and no sincere feelings toward anyone. He uses people to gain immortality. To him, humans, demons, and almost anyone can die but not him. He must remain alive, superior to “cheapstake flies.“

He lacks compassion and empathy and lives in a delusional state where he believes he is the “God” and “Saviour.” He preys on people’s insecurities, people far weaker than him, people fighting for their lives, and people desperate to gain power.

We saw how he was able to manipulate Rui, Akaza, and others. Not to forget how he made Tamayo murder her own family. Demons who support him recruit more desperate and broken people to become his demons. We saw how Doma could “help” Daki and Gyutaro.”

Muzan is the one who causes all the deaths in Demon Slayer and holds no guilt, no remorse for the people he killed. He doesn’t even care about the lives he has taken in his entire 1000 years of life. The worst part is, he doesn’t remember the people he killed for his hunger and ego, he only gets glances of their so-called memories, all thanks to their blood cells being a part of Muzan’s body.