Demon Slayer: Why Does Obanai Wear a Mask?

When one decides to talk about Demon Slayer, one usually talks about the demon slayers themselves or the demons. And while the series has offered us a variety of other intriguing characters, we are going to talk about one specific Demon Slayer – Obanai Iguro, the Serpent Hashira – in this particular article. Obanai is a very interesting character because of numerous reasons, one of which is his traumatic past. Building on that fact, we have decided, in this article, to tell you why Obanai Iguro wears a bandage mask on the lower part of his face; prepare to find out about one of the most interesting characters from the Demon Slayer series.

Obanai Iguro wore bandages over the lower part of his face to hide the hideous scars inflicted on him when he was 12 years old. Namely, his family had been serving an unnamed Snake Demon and planned to sacrifice Obanai to it; not wanting to eat him until he got bigger, the Demon demanded that his family cut his mouth to make it bigger, like the Demon’s, so they cut it from one ear to the other, which left a horrible scar he wants to hide.

This article will be the most informative guide on Obanai Iguro’s past you’ll need. We will give you a full introduction to his story and some other related aspects of Obanai’s personality. You’ll get many answers related to Obanai Iguro, as we plan to provide you with everything you need related to the question. We have to warn you, though, that the article will contain some spoilers, so be careful how you approach it.

Obanai Iguro wears the bandages to hide his scar

Obanai Iguro was introduced to the plot as the current Serpent Hashira. He is always accompanied by a snake twisted around him, a bandage conceals his mouth, and he has two different eyes. He is sarcastic and does not hesitate to tell his four truths (even if it means hurting), and his language is acerbic. He doesn’t really like Tanjirō. He was raised in a house where only women are born; according to him, his family is abject because it serves a snake demon and recovers the riches of the latter’s victims.

The demon was supposed to eat him, but he escaped, was caught, and was luckily saved by the then Flame Hashira. And this is the story we will tell you about here, as it explains why Iguro actually wears his bandages.

Obanai Iguro was born into a family of bandits as the first boy in 370 years, which made him quite special. On top of that, he had heterochromia, which made him all that more interesting. Obanai’s family served an unnamed Demon that resembled a snake, which is why it is called the Snake Demon. They worshiped it, and once the Demon would kill off a family, Obanai’s family would steal their riches and live off of that.

When he was a child, Obanai was locked inside a room he was not allowed to leave until he was 12 years old. His family spoiled him with good food, which he would eventually grow to hate because of the smell and the horrible ventilation in his cage, a combination that eventually made him sick. At night, he would also hear the Snake Demon, who also liked him, slither around his cage, which frightened him so much that he could not sleep until the hissing and slithering stopped.

When he was 12, he was finally released from his cage and taken to a separate, shrine-like room, where he was introduced to the Snake Demon. He then realized it was the source of the hissing and became horrified, but the Snake Demon refused to eat him because he was still too small. Still, it demanded from the family that they cut Obanai’s mouth from one ear to the other so that it would look more like the Demon’s mouth. They, of course, obeyed and disfigured the young Obanai; the Demon later drank the blood that was produced by the cutting while Obanai’s lower face was bandaged.

Knowing what awaited him, Obanai Iguro stole a hairpin from one of his relatives and began digging his way out of the room. His only friend at the time was a baby serpent, Kaburamaru, who accidentally slithered into his cage at some point. Obanai Iguro was afraid for his life, and one night, he actually managed to escape. The Snake Demon, furious, ran after him, but the two of them were, by chance, found by Shinjurō Rengoku, the then-Flame Hashira. The Serpent Demon was easily defeated by the powerful Hashira, which meant that Obanai was saved.

But, before going after Obanai, the Serpent Demon had slaughtered almost his whole family (almost fifty of them), save for one of his older cousins, who Rengoku also saved. But instead of showing gratitude, the cousin lashed out at Obanai and attacked him, blaming him for what had happened. This, ultimately, traumatized Iguro even more. With the trauma he had been subjected to since his birth, he now had to bear the burden of his family’s deaths and their loathing, which decreased his sense of self-worth to an absolute minimum. Kaburamaru remained with him as his only friend, and Obanai would soon join the Demon Slayer Corps to cope with the tragedy and the trauma.

And this is the story of Obanai Iguro, his scars, and his bandage mask. The scars are truly hideous and result from his family being absolutely vile. It makes sense that Obanai wanted to hide these scars, both from an aesthetic and psychological point of view, as they were the strongest reminder of the traumas and the tragedy he had experienced as a child. He would lose the bandages at one point in the future, but this is the whole story related to them.