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The Blue Anshan
By Alesyira
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Sequel to Shippo and the Magic Wand.
Canon Universe, Continuation, Crossover.
(Action, Adventure, Drama, Mystery, Romance, Angst ...maaaybe hentai.)
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Summary: Connections on more than one level...
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Chapter Rating: G...PG? Somewhere between the two. :) Basic mention of war/violence...
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Disclaimer: Inuyasha is owned by Rumiko Takahashi, and Yu Yu Hakusho is owned by Togashi Yoshihiro. I make no profit from this piece of fiction, although I would appreciate if other people respected my work as being my own... Please no reposts or anything silly. :)
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Brief History
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There was a time of peace and prosperity after Kagome returned home through the well.
Sango and Miroku did indeed marry and build their home in the mountains far to the east of the taijiya village ruins. Together, they created a new family and trained their offspring in the old ways, so that the legacy of the demon exterminators would not end with their passing. Their children eventually had families of their own, and the taijiya spread quietly across the lands. They remained a secretive group in constant touch with one another; but they had learned their most important lesson of survival after near-destruction at the hands of Naraku: by spreading their kind across the country, no single attack would be able to threaten their kind again.
Many young children with spiritual awareness traveled to meet and study with Kikyo and her aging sister Kaede. For nearly a decade, the sisters warmly told the tale of a mysterious girl who'd given years of her youth to a quest that she had no true obligation towards, and people would visit from near and far to hear the legend. The village prospered and grew in those peaceful times, and those who remembered the great things she and her friends had done laid the foundations for what would become Higurashi Shrine.
One quiet morning shortly after her sister's peaceful death, Kikyo left without a word, never to be seen or heard from again. Some whispered that she had finally returned to the grave from whence she'd come, but when the hanyou, Inuyasha, vanished as well, the story grew into a fanciful tale of his timeless love and eternal vigil over her final resting place. The keeper of the shrine, one of Kikyo and Kaede's brightest students, continued to pass on the knowledge and experience she'd gained and kept careful watch over the village as it prospered and grew.
For several generations, people rebuilt their homes and settled back into calm routine. Eventually, though, all good things must come to an end. It was approximately one hundred years after the sealing of the Shikon no Tama that wars began anew. Youkai had grown in strength once more; they had replenished their numbers that had diminished so greatly during the time of Naraku. Skirmishes over small plots of land exploded into full-blown battles. The humans also grew in number and created new, more efficient methods of killing, causing the youkai to amass great armies to match and overcome the mortals.
The battles grew in intensity and many thousands of people -youkai and human alike- died. After fifty years of war, the gods finally decided to interfere and put a stop to the mindless conquest for power by forcing the two races apart.
One rainy afternoon, massive armies of humans and youkai met upon their final battleground. It could be said that the outcome of this fight would have been the turning point of the war, but as the thousands of beings raced toward one another, a flash of light streaked across the sky. The unnatural illumination temporarily blinded all present, and when the humans were able to see once again, not a single youkai remained. They had been left on the battlefield without an opponent, and the humans rejoiced as one. The leaders of the armies and those with royal lineage had extensive gatherings and negotiations to redraw the boundaries across the country, and the humans moved and resettled their lives wherever they saw fit, without fear of death or the necessity to pay homage to the youkai who may have previously held claim to the lands they now freely inhabited.
The world of the living had been split into two, forming mirror images of one another. The sky, a pale blue in the human realm, became a red that reminded the youkai of their fighting spirit and love of conquest. The creatures that had gathered for battle on that rainy countryside were shocked into stillness when the humans were no longer anywhere to be found, but the lords and ladies that had gathered their troops took this as an advantage. If the humans were not present to contest ownership of the lands, then the fight could continue between the youkai.
That first battle for control between the youkai lasted ten terrible years, during which many more lives were lost and the lands gained new boundaries and leaders. The massive battles for dominance left the countryside torn asunder and reshaped the terrain into a violent, harsh landscape, perfect for the ageless creatures that thrived on the hunt.
The realm of demons eventually became known as the Makai; the human realm as the Ningenkai. The third realm, the Reikai, had existed for so long that there was no memory of its creation. It was the land of the deceased and home to the gods. The immortal beings of the Reikai watched from afar, vowing to no longer meddle in the affairs of the other realms, but remaining eternally vigilant to ensure that the realms remained separate.
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After the realms divided, the archaic professions of the taijiya and miko evolved to meet the needs of the people. The taijiya refined their methods of battle to become highly specialized in missions requiring stealth, espionage, or assassinations. The taijiya became legendary to a degree -- impossible to find and even harder to hire.
The miko became less of a defense against the evils in the world and more of a comfort to the soul, providing spiritual guidance to the lost. Through generations of non-practice, the ability to purify the taint of evil thinned and eventually -in most cases- went out like the dying flame of an old candle.
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Every boundary -no matter the strength or size- has weaknesses to protect... In areas where the separation between the demon and human realms grew thin, creatures could slip through - sometimes intentionally - to the other side. The gods that ruled over the Reikai assigned powerful beings to guard the weaknesses in the barriers, employing both human and demon alike to prevent any violent encounters between the two races...
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The Legend...
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-a short time ago-
As the sun dipped below the peak of the great mountain, a young man - his skin bronzed from a life spent outside in the sun, stepped from his hut. He held aloft a lit torch as he approached the village center, where throngs of children sat huddled around an aging man. All focus was on that single blaze drifting slowly toward the crowd. The children made a short sound of awe as the torch ignited a careful arrangement of kindling, sending a plume of colored smoke and dancing sparks into the darkening sky.
A small girl shifted impatiently on her small mat of woven grass. "Grandfather, which story are you going to tell us tonight?"
"Patience, young one," the old man smiled. He folded his hands in his lap and tilted his head back to gaze peacefully up at the night sky. When he finally turned his attention on the hushed audience, he discovered half of his young audience was now staring intently at the sky. "When our island was still very young, there lived two children: one of the forest, and the other of fire..."
Just outside the ring of the firelight, a slim figure perched carefully near the top of an ancient tree. The only motion was the slight twitch in the tip of a bushy red tail that draped below the thick branch, but the villagers were completely unaware of the presence. Thin fingers tapped once against a knee in slight impatience as the listener waited for the elderly human to continue speaking.
The children gave him their full attention as he spoke, but a few occasionally glanced at the stars to see what had been so interesting to the Elder. "The boy was the only son of the fire clan, who thrived in the lava that bubbled up and gave birth to new land." The elder's hands drifted together and upwards as he spoke, animating his words with flowing motion. "They were the people of the mountain and slept within the great rivers of fire, emerging only for short spans of time during their long lives. They could call upon the liquid rock to form and reshape our island as they saw fit, and it is believed that it was through their wise influence that our island first came to be."
"The girl was the daughter of the forest people, who nurtured the flowers and trees from shore to shore." His fingers twirled and the youngest children gasped in surprise as a flowering vine seemingly appeared out of thin air. "The people of the forest were a beautiful people, full of life and love and the desire to grow, not only as a people, but also by creating and guiding the plant life around them.
"The two children were ignorant of an uneasy relationship between their families. The first time they met upon a grassy slope, they played and laughed until it came time to return home for the eve. The little boy kept his new friend a secret from his aging parents, but the little girl twirled and danced with her mother that night and spoke endlessly about the handsome boy she'd met." A few of the older girls sitting in a small group giggled amongst themselves for a brief moment.
"It was rare that the children chanced upon each other, for the son of the fire clan slept for long lengths of time within the burning peak of our mountain. Months turned into years, and the children grew. On a morning warmer than most, the young man woke from his fiery rest and sought out his secret friend from the forest. In hushed whispers, both confessed their growing affections for one another and agreed to meet again in two days' time."
He lifted his hand so that the fiery glow illuminated a thin braid of the flowering vine and red ribbon held carefully between his fingertips. "But, their fate is mysteriously tragic: The day the two young lovers had chosen to meet, both of the great families vanished without a trace." He held the braid over the flickering fire, allowing the tip to smolder.
"In remembrance of the love they held for one another and respect of the ancestors that helped shape our island, this story is told once a year as a symbol of their intended unity is engulfed in the flames. May their souls rest in peace." The braided length burned quickly after he spoke, as though it had waited for the short prayer to be spoken aloud.
The bright flare of light reflected in the silent creature's bright green eyes, drawing the sharp gaze of the Elder to his carefully concealed position. A single leaf falling to the dirt below was the only sign of the being's departure as the Elder quietly concluded the evening's story with a reminder of the next morning's duties, and he watched over the flickering firelight as each child carefully sought out his or her home in the darkness.
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Author's Notes: Okay! There is much, much more to this that I haven't even gotten to scratch the surface of. ;) I'm not sure how soon I'll be able to post the first chapter, because a lot more of this story needs to be fleshed out before I end up digging myself into a very deep, terrible plot hole.
Questions? Comments? Fire away! Either leave me a review or send me an email. No one really writes me anyways. :P Alesyira-at-gmail-dot-com