Insect Breathing is the poison-focused style tied to Shinobu Kocho, and in Project Slayers 2 it sits behind a trainer, a material check, and six training trials. Getting there means a clean leveling route through Windy Peak, a weapon that can actually hold a combo, and a trip out to the Butterfly Estate with the right drops in your bag.
Quick answer: Bring Demon Horns and three Beast Cores to Insect Trainer Shinora near the Butterfly Estate, clear her six trials, then defeat the Insect Trainee to fully unlock Insect Breathing.
Roll the Kocho clan and build the Shinobu look
The Kocho clan is a Legendary (4%) roll, and it is the one that matches the Insect Breathing fantasy. You spend clan spins in the clan menu until it lands, and the clan’s stat page shows the Poison Draw Mode buff attached to it. Poison Draw Mode later appears as a node you pay for in the Skill Tree, so the clan roll and the skill point spend work together.
The character creator handles the rest. Hair, face, and clothing colors are all editable, which is enough to approximate Shinobu’s black-to-purple hair and purple eyes before you ever touch a katana. None of this affects the unlock, but the haori and hair clip you pick up later only read correctly against the right base.
Leveling route to the trainer: bandits, Zuko, and Kaiden
Farm the training materials: Demon Horns and Beast Cores
Shinora will not start training until you hand over materials. Demon Horns come from the demons in the lower caverns, including Hoyuzo’s subordinates in the cave behind the Bamboo Grove waterfall. Hoyuzo himself is a sickle-wielding boss and a reliable material source if other players are already fighting him.
Beast Cores are separate. Beast Born Demons roam outside the settlements near Bamboo Grove and Mistfall Harbor, and Insect Breathing training calls for three Beast Cores. They are not a guaranteed drop, so expect several kills per core.
Farm both materials in one trip. The cave demons and the Beast Born Demons sit close enough on the map that you can bounce between them rather than making two runs.
Where to find Insect Trainer Shinora
Travel through Mistfall Harbor and continue toward the Butterfly Estate. Insect Trainer Shinora stands near the estate grounds, and interacting with her once you have the materials starts Insect Breathing Training. The training hall and the practice area attached to the estate are where most of the trials take place, so you do not need to travel far once training begins.
Shinora doubles as a boss later, which matters for the cosmetic drops. For now, the interaction you want is the training dialogue, not the fight.
The six Insect Breathing trials
Training is split into six tasks. Five are mini-games, and the last is a straight fight.
| Trial | What it asks for |
|---|---|
| Meditation | Timing clicks on the blue mat inside the training hall |
| Target Shooting | Hitting moving targets on the wooden wall |
| Cup Training | Tracking the correct cup through a shuffle |
| Pushups | Prompt-based clicks on the floor mats |
| Boulder Split | Cutting the boulder while dodging incoming spheres |
| Insect Trainee | Defeating the trainee mini-boss in combat |
Boulder Split is the one that trips people up, because it layers dodging on top of timing. You have to keep landing strikes on the rock while the spheres are still coming at you, and taking hits eats into the window.
The Insect Trainee fight is the final gate. Beat it and Insect Breathing is fully unlocked, which you can confirm immediately: the Insect Breathing branch becomes selectable in the Skill Tree and the first skill node opens for purchase.
Insect Breathing skills and mastery order
Skills unlock through mastery, which you build by using the style in combat. They come in a fixed order, and you buy each one in the Skill Tree once the mastery requirement is met.
| Skill | Unlock point | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Compound Eye Hexagon | First Insect node | Multi-hit thrust barrage with butterfly effects |
| True Flutter | Higher mastery | Dash-stab that extends aerial combos |
| Hundred-Legged Zigzag | Higher mastery | Zig-zag dash into an impale |
| Illusory Light | Top mastery | Shinobu’s ultimate ability |
The fastest way to grind mastery is to keep fighting whatever you were already fighting. Trainees around the estate, including Water Trainee Sabito, work as live targets for testing combo routes, and the Kaiden and Hoyuzo loops still pay EXP while you build toward Illusory Light.
Farming Shinora for the Insect Haori and Insect Katana
Shinora as a boss is the source of the cosmetic half of the build. She is a group fight in practice, and the drops are rare enough that most players run her repeatedly.
- Insect Haori — the butterfly-pattern outer layer
- Butterfly Hair Clip — the accessory that completes the silhouette
- Insect Katana — Shinobu’s weapon
Drops land in your inventory after the kill, and equipping all three is the point where the build visually finishes. Nothing here is required to use Insect Breathing, so treat it as an optional farm rather than a blocker.
Final Selection: Lost Slayer, dungeon parkour, and the Hand Demon
Final Selection sits west of the Butterfly Estate and becomes available at level 50. It is the exam that turns your character into a Slayer, and it also unlocks the repeatable Kasugai Crow missions you will use to keep leveling afterward.
Once the Hand Demon goes down, the chests in the arena open and the exam registers as complete. From there, Insect Breathing is on your character permanently, the Kocho clan skills stack with it, and the Crow missions give you a steady loop to push mastery the rest of the way.
