Genya Shinazugawa is a major supporting character of Demon Slayer, a Demon Slayer of the Demon Slayer Corps, and the younger brother of current Wind Hashira Sanemi Shinazugawa. He is known for his permanent scowl, stylized mohawk haircut, a large scar that runs across most of his face, and a foul personality. He is a lone wolf who chooses to hunt demons as quickly and brutally as possible to wipe them from the face of the world. Genya is a middling Demon Slayer, yet his capabilities stand closer to a hashish’s levels. This power comes from his ability to devour demon flesh and he gains the ability to take on a fraction of their power when he does. With the increased strength, durability, healing factor, and blood arts, teamed with his nichirin double-barrel and sword, Genya chooses to fight fire with fire. The stronger the demon he fights the greater his potential power becomes to defeat them.
Genya Shinazugawa Stats
Str 11 Dex 14 Con 14 Int 13 Wis 13 Cha 8 (27 point buy)
Str 11 Dex 16 Con 14 Int 13 Wis 13 Cha 8 (after racial and feat mod)
Class Blood Hunter 6 (Order of the Lycan)
The three things that I wanted to achieve in this build are:
- Transformational Ferocity.
- Blood-Powered Fury
- Double Barreled Destruction.
Background
For Background, I chose Haunted One for Genya. He gains the Skill Proficiencies of Survival, Arcana, the languages of Undercommon and Abyssal, and the Background Feature of Heart of Darkness. This represents his tragic past after his older brother left him behind.
Race
For Race, I chose Custom Lineage but Variant Human would also work as well. With this race, he gains +2 to Dex, Feat: Firearm Specialist, and Variable Trait: Proficiency-Perception. The Key feature is the Feat: Firearm Specialist since it is a vital part of his fighting style. If you can’t use firearms the crossbow expert feat will also work as well.
Class
Genya’s class breakdown is a pretty straightforward build of Blood Hunter Fighter 6 (Order of the Lycan). It is with this class that he gains access to Blood Curses, Crimson Rites for extra damage, Heightened Senses, transformational forms and powers, and powerful tracking abilities. Meanwhile, with choice feats such as Sharpshooter and skills such as Athletics, he is able to dominate the battlefield at all ranges and with a variety of damage types. If you cannot use Blood Hunter at your table you could use a combination of Warlock 5(The Undead)/Fighter 1 with a focus on ranged for the fighting style and a focus on crossbow expert. This will give you the ability to transform, cast spells such as hold person and deal strong damage on a foe from all ranges of combat. Either way, this combination of class and feats is the best attempt to consolidate his abilities and talents at this level.
Blood Hunter 1 is the starting class for Genya. This gives him the skills of Athletics, Insight, and Investigation, Hunter’s Bane: Wisdom, Blood Maledict, and Blood Curse: Binding. The key part of this level is Blood Curse: Binding since this replicates his Wooden Flesh Bullets, holding his foe in place.
Blood Hunter 2 is where he picks up Fighting Style: Archery and Crimson Rite: Rite of the Flame. With Rite of the Flame, Genya can empower his gun with the ability to deal an extra bit of flame damage.
Blood Hunter 3 grants him access to the Blood Hunter Order of the Lycan. With this order, he gains Heightened Senses, Hybrid Transformation, and tons of features that follow from it, This gives him the benefits of increased advantage on Str checks and Str saves with a +1 to melee damage, resistance to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage from nonmagic attacks, +1 to AC, unarmed strikes that count as a weapon with increased damage ability and the chance to add his flame rite to the damage. Bloodlust is the drawback where if you are lower than half of your hit points you have to succeed on a DC 8 Wisdom save or you attack the nearest creature.
Blood Hunter 4 is the next step in Genya’s progression with the mastery of his shotgun using the Feat Sharpshooter. This allows him to fire his gun at long range without a penalty, he can ignore half to three-quarters cover and can make a powerful shot at the cost of accuracy.
Blood Hunter 5 gives him the feature of Extra Attack. This gives him more opportunities to deal damage to his demonic foes.
Blood Hunter 6 is the final level for Genya with access to Brand of Castigation and Blood Curse of Bloated Agony. Now he cast a brand onto a foe that allows him to track his quarry as well as cause damage to them should they hit him or a creature within five feet of himself. Meanwhile, Blood Curse of Bloated Agony acts like Genya’s Blood Roots Demon Art causing the creature selected to have a disadvantage on Str and Dex checks while taking necrotic damage if they make more than one attack in a round.
With full use of Genya’s powers he can perform the following techniques via job features and abilities:
Demonic Transformation
- Upper-Rank Four and Rank One Empowerment- Hybrid Transformation Features
- Flesh Gun- Crimson Rite: Rite of the Flame
- Blood Demon Art
- Wooden Flesh Bullets- Blood Curse of Binding
- Blood Roots- Blood Curse of Bloated Agony
This combination of feats, stats, and spells makes this DND build of Genya a gun-toting firebrand who fights fire with fire against any demon in his path in Six levels or Less.
Spells
None
Equipment
Standard Blood Hunter equipment with Scimitar, Blunderbuss, a light crossbow, studded leather armor
Shout out to https://kimetsu-no-yaiba.fandom.com/wiki/Kimetsu_no_Yaiba_Wiki for their amazing information in making this amazing character as well as DNDBeyond for its character creation platform. This concludes my character builds for Demon Slayer for now. Until next week Tale-Tellers!
