Chapter 3

Bandits

Kagome woke up early the next day; she wasn't going to stay any longer. If she was right he came here through the well. So if she just jumped back in than he should be taken home and can forget all of this craziness.

She had been walking for about an hour now through the forest, trying to find the dry well.

She had already done the hard part by getting past Inuyasha, who had been sleeping on the fence with Yugi on his shoulder.

Meanwhile…

"Kagome-sama!"

"Kagome-sama!"

"Not a sign of her in the village" a villager said to Kaede.

"Surely she would not have gone off by herself?" Kaede muttered as Inuyasha watched the commotion from the rooftop.

"I found her, Inuyasha" Yugi said, flying onto him.

"Well, where is she?" Inuyasha asked.

"She was on the path heading towards the Dry well" Yugi said as Inuyasha shot off towards the forest.

For what felt almost hours Kagome walked through the forest before she finally saw the well and smiled.

But before she could run to it, she was captured by some bandits and taken away to their hideout. The bandits held onto Kagome tight so that she couldn't get away.

"Hey boss! We got the girl you wanted!" One of the bandits said.

Then a huge guy with sickly pale skin came out of the shadows. He calmly said "give me the jewel and you'll live."

"And if I don't give you the jewel?" Kagome asked.

"Then I'll kill you." The man calmly said

Kagome smirked as she said "yeah right! Like you could kill me! You don't have the guts to kill me! Just let me go and I'll pretend like I never met you." But the man didn't listen to Kagome and tried to cut her in half.

But the guy missed and hit one of his own men. Kagome was free and punched the other guy in the face. The man kept saying "give me the jewel!" So Kagome grabbed the jewel and tossed it out the window saying "YOU WANT IT! THAN GO GET IT!"

The man was about to cut Kagome. Inuyasha closed her eyes thinking 'ok, I'll admit... I'm dead! I'm going to die and the last thing I did was throw a stupid jewel out the window!'

But the attack never came. When Kagome opened his eyes he saw that Inuyasha had came through the wall and the sword had broken in half n his kimono sleeve.

Kagome was in a little bit of shock. Inuyasha punched the man with both fists than kicked him right in the face, which of course caused him to be knocked down. Kagome stared at Inuyasha as he asked "is the jewel alright?"

"Huh?" Kagome said as she gave a blank look.

"Please just tell me you didn't just say "huh?" Inuyasha groaned as he said. Then Kagome covered her nose as "ugh! What is that smell! It smells like death!" he said with disgust.

Than the top part of the armour fell off. The only thing that you could see was a hole where his heart should be, but a crow with three red eyes came out of the hole. "well... it looks like this demon ripped out this guy's living beating heart and made a nest out of him. Well might as well as take care of it" Inuyasha smirked as she said.

With that Inuyasha jabbed his hand right through the hole and the crow demon just came right out of the guys back. But what they didn't know is that the crow picked up the jewel and swallowed it. Inuyasha and Kagome both ran out to see the demon. And of course the demon had gotten bigger. Inuyasha growled till he saw some arrows, he placed Kagome on his back and chased after the demon.

"Kikyo was a master archer! I'm pretty sure you can stop the demon." Inuyasha said.

"But I'm not Kikyo!" Kagome stated.

Inuyasha snorted as he said "I know this, but still it's the only plan we got!"

Kagome sighed, got the bow and arrow ready than let it fly! The arrow was going, going, going! Fail... It failed!

Inuyasha landed on the ground, with his face in the dirt saying "that... was pathetic..."

"I told you that I wasn't Kikyo! I never used a bow in my life!" Kagome yelled in his ear.

Inuyasha got up, and got Inuyasha off of her back screaming "FINE! YOU I'M GETTING THAT YOUKAI CROW AND TAKING ITHE JEWEL FOR MYSELF!" With that Inuyasha was gone.

"Well... I can tell that I really got him mad... Might as well see if there's anything I can do to help though..." Kagome sighed as she got up and ran back to the village.

The bird youkai flew into the village. It swooped in and grabbed a little boy and flew off. The mother of the boy screamed for her child. The demon was flying high up. Inuyasha of course saw this and was running on top of the trees.

He thought with a smirk 'trying to get a new host huh? I don't think so! With that, Inuyasha jumped from his spot and cut the youkai bird into pieces.

The little boy too fell into the river. Inuyasha landed on the rock that was in the river, trying to find the jewel. Not really caring if the little boy needed help. Kagome had arrived and saw the little boy in the river. So she took off her shoes and socks and jumped into the river. She swam to the little boy hoping that she could make it.

A villager screamed "she's a kappa! Only a kappa could swim like that!" Kagome grabbed the boy and started to swim on her back.

The same villager screamed "now it's on her back! What a girl! What a kappa!" Kagome could only think of one thing 'jeez... their acting if they haven't seen anyone swim before... But hey I'm glad I took lessons.'

Once Kagome was on the sore the villagers were all screaming with joy at how Kagome had saved the little boy. Inuyasha growled at Kagome as he said "get back to the jewel girl!"

Kagome glared at Inuyasha as she said "I don't care about the jewel! A life was in danger and a life is more important!"

Than the youkai bird was starting to form again, and it took flight. But that wasn't the only thing. Something kept trying to lift the boy from the ground. Kagome saw the bird's foot and had an idea on what to do.

So she grabbed a bow and arrow, tied the foot to the arrow and lunched the arrow at the bird. Inuyasha stared at the arrow knowing that for once the girl had a good idea.

The foot can't be helped but be drawn to the jewel. With the foot attached to the arrow it's bound to make a hit Kagome thought.

When the arrow hit the bird there was a bright burst of pink light. No one was sure what it was but then something split into millions of lights that lit up the sky. Kaede saw this and said "this... this can't be good..."

The sun was close to setting. Kagome and Inuyasha were searching for the jewel.

"You sure it fell around here?" Inuyasha asked as he followed Kagome.

Kagome nodded as she said "I'm pretty sure it did."

Both of them sighed. This was taking a long time. Kagome couldn't sense the jewel at all and Inuyasha was getting impenitent.

And they've been searching for hours! But then there was a sound, the sound of an incoming bird. Kagome yelped with surprise as Inuyasha cut the youkai crow head in half.

But there was something on the ground; it was a shard of some kind. But they weren't sure what it was.

"What's that?" Inuyasha asked as Kagome picked it up.

"I think it's a shard of the Shikon Jewel." Kagome answered.

Inuyasha's eyes widened with shock as he asked "what... did you just say?"

Kagome turned her head to the half demon as she said "it's a shard of the jewel."