Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha.
WARNINGS: While this story may not contain too many adult scenes, there will be a few dark and sadistic adult scenes that some of you may find offensive. Sorry and thank you!
Rated M for the reasons described above, and many deaths.
Sesshomaru stood on the overhang of a steep hill looking down at the farming village below in his most usual inanimate fashion, a fashion that would render him to be mistaken for an ice statue if it wasn't for the stirring of his kimono causing the fabric to make the rustling sounds as it flapped obediently by the will of the wind. The same wind carried strands of his snow colored hair to wave gracefully in the flow of its direction. And while at it, the wind flirted with every cell of his being and subtly crept into his heart a chilling effect, as if his already frosty heart had anymore need of such effect.
Perhaps, there was a time he would have had noticed and appreciated that nature's element when it used to brush its cool fingers against his skin. Perhaps, there was a gentler season in an earlier time of his life that he used to be - as it being part of a gentler time - a much gentler being than he was at the moment.
But nobody knew or remembered that there was such a time when he was more gentle but himself because he was nomadic by nature and a reclusive one at that. He trod the many terrains of the earth with his own carefree strides searching for his own cause. Everywhere he came to, he left it as it was to its own natural course of life, untouched. Even the smallest insect did not fear him - not that he was a loving being who took careful consideration for his fellow dwellers of the earth, nor was he a savior of every needful things he came across. No, just as the case was, the fact that he didn't meddle into their business of daily living was enough of a reason why they had felt safe even in his presence.
During those times, his eyes remained emotionless as his very nature endowed. He was a creature of neutrality who neither interfered nor interacted. He neither loved nor hated. And never, in those gentler times, did he feel the pleasure in destruction.
His youki might have radiated a more brilliant and purer light on the creatures who was bathed in it as he passed by. And all the living things in his path, even with lesser beauty they might have had, greeted him with a vivacious sentiment and kept the same vibrancy at the moment of his farewell.
He might have been a tad bit on the arrogant side and had considered himself above and beyond the grasp of the more mundane creatures whether they'd be youkais, humans, or the sorts that were half this half that. Even though, he did not find such mundane things annoying enough for him to exterminate, but that might have explained why he chose to be elusive and uninterested in a more sociable lifestyle.
Being as arrogant in his pride as he was, there might have been a few reasons that allowed thus, because he was elegant in his beauty, powerful in his physical stamina, and the sole heir of the majestic bloodline of the great demon Kings of the West. Yet, he was humble enough to take in a careful view of the earth's gentility and reveled in the magnificent energy forces nurturing it; the world in which he was a part of.
For a practical purpose, he was just a part of the vast and curious earth. All he did was observing, studying, searching, finding, and understanding just what life meant as he might as well since he was living it. For all other purpose, he wasn't interested at all.
But at least, during those gentler days, he didn't kill for a mere pleasure or a sadistic thrill - like himself at that present moment - to satisfy a seething anger. And, perhaps somewhere in the back of his mind, he had justified that specific joy with his own name, Sesshomaru, and the implication of that very name as the killing perfection.
He didn't know that he could have that emotion.
Whether it was in his nature to feel that emotion, or was it a learned response through the more painful season of his life, he didn't know, nor did he care to know. But undoubtedly, the emotion was persistent and clinging onto him relentlessly. It was hard for him to admit that he couldn't control his own emotion, but he couldn't discard it even if he wanted to. He could hide it well, but he couldn't shake it off from the very core of his heart.
Anger!
Yet, why should he run from it?
He was not a coward. He was not a weakling. If anything, he was one of the most powerful beings ever lived, and a very brave one.
Those mundane humans!
How dare had the humans of all creatures, the weak pathetic humans, managed to destroy his father? Albeit, it was through a deceitful act that they did it. His father's human mistress had human friends who she trusted. But for a large amount of award money from the astray adviser of the Western Kingdom, Naraku, the friends betrayed his father's mistress and held her hostage while she was pregnant to demand for his father's submission. His father gave his life to save the mistress and their unborn hanyou.
And those vile demons!
How dare had they denied his blood right to the throne as the Western King? Not that Sesshomaru ever cared to inherit that title from his father during his more gentle days, but that decision was his own to relinquish. The adviser of the Western Kingdom, Naraku, had conspired to rile up a rebel force while his father was too busy pursuing the human mistress. After Naraku's murderous scheme to kill his father had succeeded, Naraku had used the reason of lack of respect - that the former King was destroyed by a mere mortal - to degrade Sesshomaru's father and to persuade for his usurping cause.
The demons of the West, half of who was jealous of his father's power, the other half had never met their prince, Sesshomaru, and had believed Naraku that Sesshomaru was an imbecile, who became so elusive to hide that very shameful fact. Some even thought Sesshomaru was a hideous monster who possessed the unimaginable thirst for blood that would eventually lead him to kill all the demons for the savage nature that a monster would possess. And the rest was just afraid for their lives if they didn't conform.
All of those reasons had convinced them that their prince was unfit to guide the West; so, they all agreed to hail Naraku as their new king. They even signed a decree as their law to exile Sesshomaru and all of the Inu descendants from then on, forbidding any of them to come back for the throne of the West.
When all of that happened, Sesshomaru was away as he always traveled and never really visited the West that often - if he visited at all; that was partly the reason why not many demons of the West knew him or knew of him. When his father's faithful servants, Totosai and Myoga, searched him out and delivered the news of his father's death and the usurpation of the throne, the indifferent prince became emotional - with RAGE!
Those mundane humans and those vile demons!
They would all pay for it!
Once benign and much gentler, the Western Heir, Sesshomaru, had been provoked!
And he left catastrophic evidence to attest to that provocation as he swept across the land with his destructive army of demon outcasts and outlaws. He was heading back to the West to see to it that the cockroach Naraku would be crushed under his feet. And everything that stood in his path never got to see the sun of the next day if they had the misfortune to pass by him.
Both armies of humans and demons, he viciously destroyed. The only thing that survived was the weak mundane villagers that he might have spared so to enslave them later after he was done with his ruthless conquest.
And he would leave the trees and the animals with all of their relatives untouched because he loved how they adorned nature, because he loved nature and all of its untamed wilderness.
At the moment, he fixed his unfathomable gaze at the farming village below. Frowning, obviously in confusion, albeit people had seen his frown just as often as they had seen his smile, but the showing of such weakness was rare for him. Though, he was confused, and he took the liberty to show it since the only thing that could catch a glance of that was nothing except for a few stern cliffs facing him.
He was looking for something in that farming village.
Or some body.
Possibly, he was looking for a person who would supposedly defeat him - a woman from a farming village. Not a supreme miko, not a well-trained monk, not the most formidable demon slayer! Even though, all of those would present enough of a challenge for him if they should all one day gather on one battlefield. But no, none of those.
The woman who would defeat him - as he understood it - would just be an ordinary female, a simple gardener, and a human at that. Not that he believed the prophet, but it was made for a curious distraction sometimes to wonder if there was a human female with a greater power than his.
Because that was exactly how it was put when the prophecy was revealed to him.
Some time back, Sesshomaru brought his wrath upon the land of Isler. Despite them being humans, their king was brave and strong, and their army men were well disciplined. They had put up a good fight, but even the strength of Isler fell defenseless against Sesshomaru.
When Sesshomaru walked toward the Islerian King, who was injured on the ground, to wrap up the victorious battle with a murderous joy, an old man stepped in front to disallow Sesshomaru's access to the King's body.
"I'll not allow you to kill my King!" The old fool had said bravely.
Sesshomaru was surprised. He felt pity for the old fool, who was courageous against the wrong foe, and loyal to the wrong King.
"Old blind fool! Step aside!" Sesshomaru commanded for the old man to step aside because he planned to spare the old man's life. It was a wonderful fortune for the old man because Sesshomaru respected deeply the two characteristics of courage and loyalty.
"Lord Sesshomaru," the old man chuckled at his command, "how pitiful to think that you will be defeated by a very simple gardener, a female human at that."
It was, of course, nothing to say to a seething demon lord who didn't care much about listening to unasked prophecies. But for the courageous loyalty of that old fool, Sesshomaru found it amusing enough to entertain a short conversation before he killed them all.
He opened his palm to reveal his claws as he told the man, "Do not be a fool! No human will have enough power to defeat me."
"But you will find that she will have a far greater power than yours!" The blind prophet spoke clearly like he knew exactly what he was talking about, without even a slight stir in his tone.
'A brave fool!' Sesshomaru thought before he sheathed his sword. "Very well, I am feeling magnanimous today. I'll give you my words, old and blind prophet. I'll leave the land of Isler untouched for now. Place a blue crescent mark on your children's right shoulder as your family crest. Going by that, I'll protect the descendants of your family if I ever come across them when they are in distress. But keep it a secret between me and Isler. I cannot afford for my enemies to hold your children hostages against me because I have vowed to protect them; nor will you hold that vow against me for your own advantage. Because I can change my mind anytime."
Leaning closer to the old prophet, Sesshomaru hissed into the former's ears the rest of his magnanimous message, with the thrill of a hunter toying with his game, "Then when time comes, I'll kill all of your children in the most tormenting ways possible if your prophecy does not come true."
Sesshomaru turned around to order his army to retreat as he promised them, "Don't be hasty, My Warriors. We'll flatten the land of Isler to the ground eventually."
When Sesshomaru had left, the old man came by his King's side to help him up and to gather the injured back to their castle.
It was probably a strategy written on some lost scroll because the war generals who had read it probably thought it was nonsense and shoved it up somewhere out of the way for good. Or it might have been by his own bravery attempting the last shot to save their land.
The old man just foolishly made up that prophecy.
Why not tried something? They were all going to die either way. But strangely, the strategy had worked - for the time being.
When the Islerian King questioned him, the old man simply said, "Your majesty, that was to buy time. We must hurry to think up a plot to assassinate that evil and exterminate him from the earth."
For Sesshomaru, he had been searching for some decades since the prophecy. He had gazed at the women, either directly, or from a hill cliff, every chance he got at every time he passed by a farming village; but he had found no one. At least, he had found no one that he could sense a greater power than his to have even an inkling of braveness in them to stand up to him, let alone defeating him.
No one! Man or Woman!
Yet, that didn't mean she didn't exist.