Romancing Kurama
From the pen of
The Fan-Girl From Hell
There once was a young man known as Suichi Minamino. He was the finest student in his school and seemed to be the perfect boy. What no one knew, however, was that there was a 2500-year-old demon named Youko Kurama living inside him. Youko Kurama was a name well known to the denizens of Spirit World and Makai. He was a Fox demon of an unusual Silver color. He was also extremely capable of stealth and undoing puzzles, traps and locks. Two of his most common nicknames were "King of Thieves" and "Spirit Fox".
Then, about 12 years after his human birth, he started running into old acquaintance and became involved with what could only be referred to as The Wrong Element. The first of these, and, in fact, the initiator of nearly all the others, was a fellow demon named Hiei, who wanted him, now that his demonic powers were starting to re-develop and become usable, to become his partner in a variety of objectionable activities.
Since his previous experiences as a demon had rendered him very efficient at these activities and he was bored with being the perfect boy, he agreed with the proviso that he had to maintain his human cover until his powers completely returned. He would help Hiei, but it could not interfere with his schoolwork, nor could any member of his human family become aware of any oddity around their son.
Hiei agreed and the Unholy Alliance was begun. After a particularly bold and daring bit of burglary from the vaults of King Yama himself, they met a newly created Spirit Detective, Yusuke Urameshi and his friend, Keiko. After Yusuke defeated Hiei - granted, with the help of "Kurama," as he was being called now, - Koenma, ruler of Spirit World and son of King Yama, sentenced them to help Yusuke in his duties as Spirit Detective.
After a great number of adventures together, the three, along with Yusuke's human partner, Kazuma Kuabara and his sensei, Genkai, were forced to compete in the Dark Tournament. During this Tournament, Kurama was introduced to a substance that released the pure, demonic form of Youko Kurama, the Spirit Fox and King of Thieves from within him in all his historic power and glory. It was a heady experience for the boy, just on the threshold of manhood to recall his time of Power. It also set forth notice throughout the worlds that Youko Kurama was not only alive, but back as well. Alive and living in the newly maturing form of Suichi Minamino. An interesting combination.
Many people took notice. The leaders of Spirit World and Makai. The female demons who had known the old Youko Kurama. The ones who hadn't. And two who had and wanted to meet him again and find out just how profound the changes had been.
The first was a young demoness named Kiki, whose main power was her "cuteness." She could charm nearly anything in pants into doing almost anything for her. She had met Youko when she was too young to know what was what, but decided then and there that when she was old enough, she would seek him out and they would live happily ever after. Together. She never quite believed the reports of his death, but the new version was definitely different. And young.
The second was an old "S" level demoness named Kharistahl. She bore the title "Queen of the Nightmare Realm" and was sometimes worshiped as the "Goddess of Nightmares and Torment." She had the power to read and infiltrate human and demon dreams and nightmares and therefore knew a great deal more about the world than other demons. She had "known" Youko Kurama when he was at the heights of his power and had briefly shared a few encounters with him. She had been genuinely attracted to him, but found his sense of honesty and honor to be an annoyance. Certainly she was not troubled by these things. She was taken aback by the reports of his death, but since she found no other signs of him, accepted it. And now he was not only back, but apparently trapped in the body of an adolescent human, just reaching maturity. How utterly delicious. An ancient and powerful demon held in confinement inside an impressionable young man. And soon to be all hers.
Hiei was also attracted to the strange dichotomy of the "Coldest Mind in All of Makai" being inside a young, handsome, human body, and, as such, susceptible to all the foibles of teenage human hormones. It would be hard to say what Hiei admired more. The face and form, or the mind controlling them. As a combination, Hiei wanted no one to get closer than himself. And he would do whatever he had to in order to ensure that nothing like that happened.
Shortly after their return from the Dark Tournament, there was a new student in Suichi's school. Kiki Wakamaru. She had lots of fluffy, curly blond hair and big purple eyes that seemed to have a strange affect on both the male students and the faculty of the school. Everyone was willing to do anything for her. Somehow, Suichi got assigned to help tutor her in some of the subjects she was lacking in. He didn't really mind, though. She was rather endearing, in an odd sort of way.
Hiei, however was not amused. He found that this Kiki girl was cutting into the time he could spend with Kurama. The tutoring had to come to a stop when another situation requiring them to work with Yusuke again arose. When they returned, things returned to normal and Kiki still needed Suichi to help her with her schoolwork. And he kept doing it to keep up his cover as a normal student.
Suichi had to say his farewells to Kiki when he received a challenge from Youmi, one of the leaders of Makai. He had to return to Makai and find out what was going on. It turned out that his friend, Yusuke, was the genetic offspring of Raisen, current ruler of one of the three major kingdoms of Makai. Yusuke had traveled to Makai to meet his "father" and study his genetic heritage. Hiei also went to Makai, though on a mission of his own.
After Yusuke threw the crown of Makai into the ring as the prize for a tournament and went on to get his ass handed to him, Suichi returned to the human world to lead something of a normal life. Yusuke stayed in Makai to spend a year or two exploring. Hiei remained in Makai as a sort of "Border Guard" to prevent humans from stumbling over the line between worlds. Or at least prevent the ones that do stumble in from being hurt.
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