Muzan Kibutsuji (鬼き舞ぶ辻つじ 無む惨ざん Kibutsuji Muzan?

) is the
main antagonist of Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba. He is the Demon
King, the first of his kind, and the progenitor of all other demons in
existence. [8] Muzan is also the leader of the Twelve Kizuki, an
organization of the twelve strongest demons in existence that serve
directly under him.[9]

A millennium ago, during the Heian Era, Muzan was turned into a demon
during an experimental treatment trying to cure his terminal illness,[1]
and his goal since then was to live without the fear of death and become
truly eternal.[10] He plans to accomplish this in two ways: finding the Blue
Spider Lily or creating more demons in hopes that one day one would be
able to conquer their weakness of sunlight.[11][12]

As the Demon King, Muzan can control all those who have assimilated his
blood to become demons, with Nezuko Kamado, Tamayo, Yushiro, and
Chachamaru being the only exceptions.[13] It is later revealed that Muzan
is of the same bloodline as the Ubuyashiki Family.[14]

Muzan is a tall and muscular man, with an unnaturally pale skin

complexion that can be easily confused as being unhealthy and sickly. He
has curly black hair, and sharp, almond-shaped eyes. His irises are cat-like
in appearance and colored plum red. He also possesses sharp, blue nails
on his hands. He appears to be in his twenties.

In his first appearance, Muzan was shown wearing a white fedora with a
red ribbon and a somewhat extravagant outfit. The outfit consisted of an
embroidered black tuxedo and a white tie over a black dress shirt and
white dress pants. He also wore black loafers. As seen in Rui's flashbacks
of meeting Muzan, the Demon King sported a slightly different hairstyle
and outfit in the past than he did in his first appearance. When he met
Rui, Muzan's hair was straighter and parted down the middle. He also
wore a loose-fitting tuxedo and a white half-cloak over it.
During his meeting with the Lower Rank demons, he arrived disguised as
an elegant woman wearing a long black yukata, causing the Lower Ranks
to not initially recognize him.[15] Later, he transforms himself into his
latest cover identity - the adopted sickly son to an old couple - taking the
form of a young child with pale, white skin and black, silky smooth, neatly
combed black hair. His main outfit in this disguise is a plain white button-
up shirt and black cargo shorts with long tube socks and loafers.

After he neutralizes Tamayo's poison and emerges from his flesh cocoon,
Muzan's hair grows in length and turns white due to Shinobu's poison
accelerating his age. He also grows numerous mouths all over his limbs,
each one lined with a set of incredibly sharp fangs. His skin also appears to
have a dark-red mass growing from the ends of his limbs and branching
onto his body.[16] It is later revealed that Muzan has an array of scars
across all his body from the wounds inflicted during his first battle against
Yoriichi, which had burned down into him to a cellular level and never fully
healed despite hundreds of years. These wounds are not visible in plain
sight and come to light as he weakens.

During his final struggle, and as a way to slow down the effects of the
sunlight, Muzan adopts an enlarged demonic infant form, approximately
as tall as a 3 story building when standing up. In this form he has very
pronounced blood vessels across his body, small claws in his hands and
fanged teeth in his mouth.

Muzan is cold-hearted, ruthless, intimidating, and exceptionally

intelligent. He sees no value in any humans he has encountered and
shows little value in his own subordinates. Rarely ever visually upset or
happy, he appears completely monotone and detached on most
occasions, even when he callously murders his own subordinates. The only
times he ever shows emotion are when his vision of perfection is moving
forward or when he has subordinates completely submit to his will. The
manga shows him to be more expressive, particularly when enraged and
his facial features are exaggerated to demonstrate as such (possibly as a
way to display his normally unreadable emotions). In the anime, his
expressions change slightly and his tone of voice tends to be consistent at
nearly all times, accentuating his monotonous demeanor. His cruel and
imposing nature has gained him the great admiration and fear of many
demons.

His inflated ego and delusional sense of self worth are so large that he
cannot stand being mocked or corrected in any fashion, believing that
others only exist to serve him. It also means he rarely ever takes any
opponent or threat seriously. He brutally killed a pair of drunk men simply
for being rude to him, and killed their female companion when she had
done nothing, all while proclaiming his own perfection and superiority
over them, displaying his pettiness as he won't settle for any mockery and
will do anything he pleases until the humiliation is remedied. This event
also hints that Muzan has unpleasant memories of his weaker, human
past, and is very self-conscious of his unnaturally sickly appearance,
immediately following with a lengthy denial that he is unhealthy, sick and
much less on the verge of death, in all likelihood a bitter reminder that he
is still imperfect. When he confronts Kagaya Ubuyashiki, the man
responded to Muzan in a tone of pity and sadness for the life he had led.
However, Muzan only interpreted it as insults and threats, which further
accentuates his hatred for humanity and the Demon Slayers. He also
believes that Heaven has let him off the hook for murdering thousands as
he has never seen a God or Buddha.

The most prominent trait Muzan possesses is extreme narcissism,

pettiness and an obsession with becoming the perfect being. As he has
had over 1000 years to live and observe, along with hardly any real
challenges, his extreme egocentrism is almost expected. He considers
almost nothing to be his concern except overcoming his inability to walk in
the sun, which is his primary drive. His long life and obsessions have
caused him to want every plan he concocts to be absolutely perfect, and
his god complex prevents him from seeing his own failures. His belief that
he is the closest thing to a perfect being causes him to have zero tolerance
for any failure, brutally punishing those who fail him or those he considers
weak, even if the failures are minor.
Furthermore, his delusional sense of omnipotence is such that he
compares himself to natural disasters, namely something that is far
beyond what humans can compare to and fight against. As a result of this,
he believes the Demon Slayers to be a group of deviants who cannot
accept the natural order of things and resume their lives as normal when
other people simply move ahead following a tragedy. His analogy
evidences his complete inability to feel sympathy or remorse for his
actions, given none of the murders he ever committed (directly or
indirectly) were the result of an accident but carefully orchestrated acts of
pure evil.

Being the obsessive perfectionist he is, Muzan loathes the very concept of
change; be it change of circumstances, physical, emotional or change of
any kind. He equates change to decay, and thus evidence of imperfection.
In his own words, he loves things that remain unchanging, constant and in
a state of permanence. At the same time he views one's own humanity as
a sign of weakness, believing Gyutaro had lost because he was still
attached to his sister Daki, even deriding the Upper Moons, stating they
were now ranked in order of how much humanity they had left. Gyutaro's
defeat at the hand of the Demon Slayers deeply angered Muzan, as they
had undone a status quo that lasted for 113 years, causing him to lash and
demand more self-sacrifice out of the remaining Upper Moons. This could
also help explain his brutal execution of the Lower Moons as their
membership was in a constant state of change, and he grew tired of
managing them. Conversely he is pleased whenever he sees progress,
being joyful over Nakime's growth after being turned into the Upper
Moon Four Demon.

Behind the myriad of façades Muzan displays, and completely offsetting

his insatiable ego and lust for perfection, Muzan is unbelievably cowardly.
He always avoids conflict whenever possible as evident in his encounter
with Giyu Tomioka and Tanjiro Kamado. He states that the duo managing
to survive should already be sufficient and that they should just live to
earn their wages and put a halt to the cycle of revenge. This trait also
complements his manipulative nature, bending many demons to his will to
do his bidding while he doesn't get his hands dirty. In the final
confrontation between him and the Demon Slayers, Muzan attempted
numerous times to escape, either by splitting himself or merely running
away, even demanding multiple times for the remaining Demon Slayers to
just die and give up fighting, once again cementing his cowardly nature.

He has shown to be very manipulative and cunning, being able to blend in

human society normally, even having a family of his own to add. A long life
and continued practice has allowed him to take on many roles in society
and play them capably, including children and women should he choose
to. This life has also given him great intelligence and ability to think
tactically. Muzan is a quick-thinker and strategist who is able to deal with
unfavorable situations rapidly and quite well, though this may also be
because the loss of his subordinates means nothing to him in the long run.

Because of his perceived superiority and his double-faced nature, he feels

little attachment to his henchmen, using them and discarding them as
disposable pawns whenever he sees fit. He does not allow his
subordinates to question him, regularly enacting brutal and ruthless
punishments should they do so. Many of his subordinates, in turn, are
deeply afraid of him, and measure their words and thoughts carefully for
fear of saying anything to displease him. He is able to sway many demons
to his side with promises of power, revenge, and grandeur so long as they
serve him. His intelligence and manipulation shine here, since many find
the promises appealing, as he encounters many of his subordinates at
their lowest point, when their emotions are easy fodder for him. Alas, all
of these promises are ultimately false, given that Muzan only cares about
himself and has no qualms about killing his own subordinates to protect
his own safety.

When not hiding behind a façade, his sheer malice and overflowing violent
intent are so incredibly malignant, they can be perceived by others. Most
notably, Yoriichi Tsugikuni described him as being like boiling magma
erupting from a volcano, ready to consume everything. In the anime, the
extent of his rage is visible during the Upper Moon meeting, where the
many glasses and flasks he was working with, all broke apart and exploded
in thousands of pieces in reaction to Muzan's boiling frustration over
being unable to achieve his goals, his fury greatly intimidating the Upper
Moons.

Beyond his egocentric demeanor lies a sense of self-preservation that

easily overrides his megalomania, most notably shown by his act of
cursing his subordinates in a terrifying manner so that none of them
would even utter his name, or else be killed instantly in a ruthless manner.
When pushed into a corner, Muzan's typically calm, arrogant and superior
stance collapses, paving the way for panic and fear to take root as he
desperately fights for his life, adopting more drastic measures to protect
himself. This obsession with survival could well explain Muzan's brutal
homicide of three civilians after his first encounter with Tanjiro. Both
times he was reminded of two major events where he nearly lost his life,
namely his life coming close to ending before his treatment took effect
and when Yoriichi overpowered and nearly killed him.