Hotaru Haganezuka

* Anime
* Manga

**Hotaru Haganezuka** (鋼鐵 (はがね) 塚 (づか)  螢 (ほたる) , *Haganezuka Hotaru*?) is a supporting character of *Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba*. He is a swordsmith affiliated with the Demon Slayer Corps.

## Appearance

Hotaru wears a sunflower-patterned haori and has his head wrapped in a spotted head scarf. Like the rest of the swordsmiths, his face is concealed by a hyottoko mask (wooden festival mask) to conceal his identity. When traveling he wears a large, woven hat with hanging floral wind chimes on top of the head scarf.

During the Swordsmith Village Arc, he is seen with a more muscular build compared to his initial appearance after he had been training in the mountains.

Unmasked, Hotaru is revealed to have long, black hair coupled with sharp eyes and distinctly-shaped thick eyebrows. However upon being attacked by Upper Rank Five, Gyokko, Hotaru now possesses several deep scars and cuts from the demon all over his body, including an X-shaped one on his face, and has now lost the use of his left eye.

## Personality

Hotaru is a rather hot-blooded individual. He seems to show very little care, if any, about anything besides the swords he creates. His passion for swords is so strong that he would be able to speak about them for long periods of time, a trait unique even among other swordsmiths.

The same passion that gives him the enthusiasm and extreme dedication in creating swords is also the reason why he is easily enraged (usually in a comical fashion) towards swordsmen that break his creations, especially Tanjirō, no matter the circumstance. When angry, he usually calms himself down by eating mitarashi dango. Bystanders can subdue him by either pinning him down or tickling his sides, as demonstrated by Kōzō, after which he will fall limp.

As Hotaru is socially inept in dealing with people, he is still unmarried. His intense and asocial behavior also causes other swordsmen to hate him and he lost a lot of clients because of this. Although he won't be honest about it, he is actually happy that Tanjirō still trusts him in making his swords.

His concentration on sword making is so immense that it prevents him from paying any attention to his surroundings when forging a blade, even when a demon is attacking him and inflicting severe injuries on him. When the process of forging or refining is interrupted by taking the sword away, he feels the need to restart the whole process from scratch again. As a perfectionist, any small scratch on a blade that is irremovable hurts him immensely.

## Abilities

**Overall Abilities:** Being a swordsmith, Hotaru has shown to have no indication of any superhuman abilities similar to Demon Slayers. Though after Tanjirō broke his Nichirin Sword multiple times against members of the Upper and Lower Ranks, he underwent a special training in the mountains so he could forge a stronger blade for Tanjirō. Due to the training, he gained a lot of muscles which made him looking much stronger than post-training Tanjirō.

**Enhanced Stamina:** Mostly used as comic relief, Hotaru has absurd amounts of stamina, evidenced by relentlessly pursuing Tanjirō for hours from evening to morning, and even made another attempt the following day. In both instances Tanjirō was left exhausted.

**Enhanced Strength:** After training in the mountains, his increased strength apparently exceeded that of even Tanjirō.

**Master Swordsmith:** Hotaru is a skilled swordsmith, able to forge Nichirin Swords and repair it multiple times each time it broke in battles against demons. After Tanjirō chipped his sword in his battle against Upper Rank Six, Hotaru trained more to make a stronger sword. Hotaru demonstrated his professionalism and expertise when he polished and sharpened the 300-year-old blade left in Yoriichi Type Zero while completely ignoring the wounds he received from Gyokko. The polishing techniques he used has been passed down the Hotaru line for many generations. His method is so severe that other swordsmiths have died from them.

## Fighting Style

**Tantōjutsu:** Hotaru is an expert in using a tantō, though he practices the combat style with his razor-sharp knives. He usually shows his skills by attacking Tanjirō after he damages his swords.

## Trivia

* Hotaru's surname contains the kanji for "steel" (鋼 (はがね) , *hagane*?), a reference to his occupation, and his first name means "firefly" (螢 (ほたる) , *hotaru*?).
	+ He hates his first name due to how "cute" it is.
* Hotaru's favourite food is mitarashi dango, and he goes out to buy some whenever he loses his temper.
* Hotaru has wind-chimes attached to his hat because he's liked them since he was a child. Whenever he would throw a tantrum, the adults would use the chimes to calm him down.
* Tickling his sides is the only way to break his concentration, after which he humorously goes limp for several minutes.
* In an omake, Hotaru is depicted as having a wife, but during the Swordsmith Village Arc he is said to be single.
* The knives that Hotaru uses to try to stab Tanjirō in his temper tantrums were actually made by Hotaru himself. These knives are noted to be extremely sharp and should never be used for cooking.