A/N: And I'm back! Missed me and my story?!
Anyways, like I've put in the AN on the previous chapter, I've decided to begin my uploads once again, though I won't promise to upload every Sunday. But considering the times we're in (Corona and the likes), I wanted to help out the only way I know that I could for certain. So, here's a whole new chapter.
But first, I'd like to thank you all for your patience and to the newcomers: BlancHibue, Dgwren, foxwolf101, Larien Telrunya 1992, WindbornesWord, Pandora's little Box, ChilynxisCloud, EclipseNightClub, Tiniii25, FloraFaveXNara-Wire, IsaBellaSwan1901, YuzukiC, Forestfirekid, Shiroiookami1999, MiaSlytherin, TimeLord Say0, wolfgirl232323, Ritzyblue, AngelElmarlienHenning, Shane Ishler, SkylanderZilla, DesertMortician, Yurasen, Pokechan123, jpbrat10, LeakyCherry, narutauzu1213, Serena Elsa Snape, tatysantannag, DarkFlameBear98, Ivory-Bones, Ibag18, Nightbird755, Takara Rose Oizumi, shadowkat86, DragonWolf25, Kazumikit, BoneCruncherFarcade, Yokoxsi Siyoko, flowermanga, acetwolf94, Arianna Le Fay, Inger-berlissa910, , EkiNana, ImmortaleMorte, RinaYa, IkutoTsukiyomi'sGirl, MaryFruit, , sayaadja, 22wolfgirl, wolviegurl, ImperfectionPerfection, Le pettit Charlotte, shadow spirit55, HarleyKitty, WhiteRaven75, a song on the pond, JediGemini, colorguardgirl87, and Mercidexister for favoriting my story – a warm, warm welcome to the fave-fam. Damn, I'm just gonna say that I'm so surprised and happy with seeing all of you favoriting my story even though no new chapters have been uploaded in something like six months. My heart is about to burst with how happy I am with this notion.
Also, a big thanks to Infernoinside, Kagz419, Yakitori-Chan, Dgwren, TimeLord Say0, flowermanga, Guest, IkutoTsukiyomi'sGirl, and wolviegurl for your lovely reviews. Though many of you wrote them a long time ago, I still read them when they pinged in on my e-mail and felt so wholeheartedly happy with every positive feedback to my story. I'm so sorry that I haven't responded to any of them before now but know that they made my heart soar on gentle wings of love and happiness. I really appreciate the time you guys take to post up your thoughts on my story. Note that I don't mind any critique there may be, if any of you guys may have. Without progressive critique, my writing can't evolve to something better without me knowing about it. :)
Lastly, thanks to all of you for taking the time to read my story and for your immense patience on my return. I hope I don't disappoint any of you with this new chapter.
Warnings: Detailed description of blood and gore in this chapter. You have been warned
Disclaimer: I don't own InuYasha: this series and all of its wonderful (and gruesome) characters belong to Rumiko Takahashi. I do, however, own Aiko and her background story, and plausible other OCs that may appear throughout this series (I've not completed writing this story as of yet).
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Chapter 24 – Taijiya
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"What! A woman walked off with the Shikon shard?!" InuYasha hollered at a poor man.
We had reached a small village with a giant centipede yōkai lying dead on the ground. The villagers were in the progress of removing the remains when we reached them and had asked about what had happened. I kept myself as far away as I could from the dead centipede, using Kagome like a human shield against the dead yōkai. Her attention was on InuYasha while he kept yelling at the poor villager.
He had a hold of the man's osode when he yelled: "When?!"
The man was confused and looked flustered and confused with what was happening, and the other villagers stopped working on disposing the centipede. Some of them were whispering among themselves, but my focus was more on trying not to freak out at the sight of the dead centipede. Even though it was dead, it made my skin crawl with fear and disgust.
InuYasha let go of the man and sneered loudly: "Answer me, curse you!"
My focus was on the dead giant bug until I heard Miroku speaking in a calm and deep voice: "Be at peace. This fellow is my apprentice monk."
When he said 'be at peace' I could feel myself be slightly calmer, yet not completely rid of the fear. I turned my attention to Miroku and saw him standing next to InuYasha.
"Who are you calling a servant?!" InuYasha said in a serious tone, his attention on Miroku.
Miroku shifted his attention to InuYasha, seeming as serious as InuYasha sounded like: "Restrain yourself! Trust me, you can only make matters worse!"
The villagers seemed more acceptable with talking with Miroku when three of the men indicated for us to follow them. We moved away from the dead centipede and over to a barren spot with a felled tree. The tension I felt when I was close to the dead yōkai reduced as we moved away, and I sighed with relief at getting away from the dread-inducing yōkai.
The three men from the village stopped up with one of them sitting down on a smooth-looking stone while the others stood a bit behind the man. Miroku joined him and sat down on an opposing smooth-looking stone, with InuYasha standing beside him. Kagome and Shippō sat down on the tree with their backs toward the group of men, but I was interested in hearing what they had to tell, so I sat down on the tree facing the group of men.
The man that was sitting down began to tell about what had happened before we arrived.
He told Miroku how the village had been terrorized by the now-dead centipede yōkai for a few weeks, until a single young woman from the village of yōkai taijiya arrived. She decimated the yōkai with ease, only using a giant boomerang as a weapon. When they had tried to pay her, she didn't accept any payment. Except for the Shikon shard that had been embedded in the centipede.
"A 'yōkai taijiya'?" Miroku asked the man to confirm what the man had told us.
The man answered with a simple "Aye."
So, there literally existed people who slew yōkai for a living. The thought kind of scared me, since I was now considered to be one of them, though I wasn't a pureblooded one. Were they the type that killed any yōkai?
Chills ran up my spine with the thought of meeting one who would just kill me without taking into consideration that I hadn't ever killed an innocent person.
"And where is the 'taijiya's' village?" Miroku asked the man.
I tuned back into the conversation between them.
"We don't know. They always come to see about us, so…" the man said.
Kagome made a comment to Shippō: "So there are people who make a living out of it, huh?"
I heard her open a can and shifted my gaze over to her; she was sitting with a can of juice in her hand.
"So, these … taijiya have been collecting shards of the Shikon no Tama…?" Miroku asked the man and I shifted my attention back to Miroku.
"Aye…" the man answered again but continued speaking: "That's what they've been calling it. She said it came from her village, in the beginning…"
I was surprised by that statement and immediately looked at Kagome who looked over at me with a surprised look. Then we both shifted our gazes back to the group. I looked at InuYasha since he had prior knowledge with the Shikon no Tama from when he dated Kikyō.
"InuYasha… Did you know about this?" Miroku asked him.
InuYasha gave a simple "No…" but he seemed to reflect on the question.
~oOo~
"How vexing! Not a single person know the location of the taijiya village!" Miroku said.
Nighttime had already fallen over us while we traversed the wooded area of the mountainside.
Kagome walked beside Miroku and continued where Miroku had left the conversation: "'Somewhere in the mountains' isn't much to go on…"
"Shut up and search!" InuYasha then responded in a slightly harsh tone.
He sounded desperate in a way, which I could relate to. Knowing that there were Shikon shards in the taijiya village, I couldn't help but feel desperate as well. With those shards, we would be closer to complete our mission of collecting them all and make the Shikon no Tama whole once again.
"So, what's the plan exactly, when we get there?" I asked in a light manner, wondering how we would approach the village once we had located it.
I was walking a little behind Miroku and Kagome, with InuYasha taking the lead a few feet ahead. Shippō was hanging on InuYasha's right shoulder.
"Are you planning to steal the Shikon shard from the taijiya village?" Shippō asked InuYasha in a berating manner.
"What else?" InuYasha replied back to the curious kitsune.
That seemed like a bad plan. For all we knew, the taijiya could be really efficient and kill us all in the blink of an eye.
"With luck, he won't be exterminated himself, instead," Miroku said with a sigh.
Kagome butted in with: "They are professional yōkai slayers after all."
"We really should think of a way to approach them," I added in, "For all we know, they will kill us as soon as they see us!"
"Tch, they won't be able to stop me from getting the shards!" InuYasha added with a scoff.
I stopped up and raised a brow at him, clearly not liking his train of thought.
"They're people, so we shouldn't kill them just because we want the shards!" I responded in a slightly harsh tone.
InuYasha stopped up and glanced at me, obviously showing his irritation of my reply.
"Why do you care?! You're not a human! Besides, we need those shards! Otherwise Naraku is gonna get them all!" he bit at me, his eyes narrowing with annoyance.
I narrowed my eyes as well, crossing my arms over my chest. My lips was spread thin in a peeved manner. His saying that I wasn't human felt like a blow to my guts.
"Thank you very much for pointing out my blood status! Like I haven't found out just a few weeks ago that I'm not human! Thank you, InuYasha!"
My words were scathing and showed the disappointment and the hurt his words caused. I could feel Kagome's hand land on my right shoulder. Trying to comfort me from my distress. I didn't look at her. My focus was only on InuYasha.
"But I can't just wash away my past! I've lived my entire life as a human, and thus I relate more to them than I relate to yōkai! It's not like I've had someone to show me how to live like a mononoke!"
His eyes hardened with my words, but he didn't interrupt me, nor did he seem angry at my response.
"But no matter! That's not the point for me not wanting to harm them for us to get the shards. Yes, I know that we need them and make sure that Naraku doesn't get more than he probably already has. Yet that doesn't mean that we should resort to violence in order to get them."
The only sounds that could be heard was the gently rustling of leaves where the wind blew and the sound of cicadas chirping. InuYasha and I stared into each other's eyes, his golden ones reminding me of Sesshōmaru. Yet InuYasha's showed a certain understanding for my words and weren't anyway like Sesshōmaru's cold golden gaze. At the same time, we shifted our eyes away from each other. I felt a pang in my heart with the reminder of Sesshōmaru. It hurt to think about him, and I tried to my best attempt to push him out of my mind.
Miroku chose this moment to interrupt the light tension that InuYasha and I had created: "We should figure out how to approach them."
Kagome hummed in agreement to Miroku's statement. My eyes shifted over to Kagome, who still had her hand on my shoulder. She was looking at Miroku.
"Any ideas?" she asked him.
But before he had a chance of answering her question, I tensed up with the sudden assault on my senses. I could feel a large amount of yōki approaching us. And it felt like there were hundreds of different yōki heading towards us. Once more, tension spread amongst us, though this time it wasn't caused by any of us. It was because of the ominousness of the air.
"An ominous wind… What could it be…?" Miroku asked.
I glanced over at him and saw that his body had become rigid.
"Yōkai, and it feels like there are hundreds of them!" I bit out, trying to shake the pressure in my body off of me.
I looked up to the sky, searching it for the presence I felt. When my eyes saw the black cloud-like form move over the crescent moon, I gasped. I couldn't see them as more than a black shape, but I could feel the large amount of different yōki from the black cloud.
"YEE~!" Kagome exclaimed in horror, followed shortly by the gasps of surprise from Miroku and InuYasha, as well as the horrific cry from Shippō when they spotted the ominous black cloud.
"There's a whole pack of them!" InuYasha exclaimed in an angry manner.
I could feel Kagome remove her hand from my shoulder and could almost feel the air vibrate with her fear of seeing so many yōkai. I glanced over at her and saw her body shake.
"What is this?!" Kagome asked, her voice shaking with terror.
I placed a calming hand on her left shoulder, trying to give her some of my strength to overcome her fear. Though, in reality, I was horrified with the yōki that swirled off of the massive amount of mononoke that rolled over the sky. Her body shook less with the presence of my hand on her shoulder, though I could still feel her body tremble slightly.
"It's not your usual yōki…" she whispered in a breathy manner.
My eyes swept over the rest of our group and I saw Miroku becoming aggressive in his stance, while InuYasha seemed confounded. Shippō had jumped off of InuYasha's shoulder, which I only registered when he jumped up on my left shoulder, clinging desperately to my black osode. His whole body was shaking with horror and fear. I lifted my left hand up and placed it on top of his head, trying to soothe him with a friendly aura. He seemed to calm down a bit, yet his body still shook tremendously.
"They roil…" Miroku bit out between slightly clenched teeth, "and writhe… chaotically…"
He seemed more than troubled with the appearance of that many yōkai.
Then suddenly InuYasha burst out, like he had figured something out: "It's bloodlust!"
"They are about to attack something!" he exclaimed.
I grinded my teeth against each other in an angry manner. My brows narrowing over my green eyes. This was definitely not good!
"Let's follow them!" Miroku shouted.
And we all sat off into a run, with Shippō clinging desperately onto my osode so that he didn't fall off. I looked up to the sky and saw that the dark mass of mononoke rolled faster over the sky than we could run.
"Damnit! They're faster than us!" I yelled with annoyance, aggravated with seeing them get away from us.
"Just keep moving!" InuYasha responded in the same manner.
~oOo~
The yōki diminished as we neared the location where they had descended, declining quicker than I would have anticipated. Dawn had just cracked when we finally stopped. InuYasha had taken the lead, following his incredible sense of smell. I was right behind him with Shippō still clinging to my osode. Miroku and Kagome had taken the rear. We were standing on a small ravine with only three feet down to the grassy area on our right. About twenty feet in front of us stood what looked like some kind of fort, with wooden palisades and two visible wooden watchtowers.
"That's…" I began to utter at the view in front of us.
But InuYasha finished my sentence: "A fort…"
Kagome walked past me and stopped up right beside InuYasha.
"Then the yōkai's target…" she began demurely, but again InuYasha finished the sentence: "…was this."
He sniffed the air and made an angry grimace, then ran towards the broken entrance while he yelled: "Everywhere… The scent of fresh blood…"
Kagome followed right after him, with the rest of us following right behind them. InuYasha ran right inside, but Kagome stopped in the entrance and gasped with horror. My heart jolted with her gasp and I ran faster to reach her. When I entered the entrance, and Kagome, I stopped up immediately.
Everywhere. Everywhere there was bodies, blood, and gore. The ground was literally painted red and black with blood. There lied dismembered limbs of both human and yōkai alike scattered over the ruined village. Likewise, guts and intestines flowed from the ruined bodies of humans and monsters alike. And there were many different kinds of weapons burrowed deep into the mauled mononoke. It was simply a nightmare to watch.
"My… My kami…" Kagome whispered, horrified with the view.
Miroku walked over and stood beside InuYasha, completely struck by disbelief with the carnage in front of us. I felt speechless. Shippō moved up over my shoulders and clutched himself to my front. I couldn't pull my eyes away from the massacre in front of me, but I instinctively moved my arms up to wrap them gently around Shippō's small frame.
"They fought back courageously…" Miroku said in a low voice.
"Nearly everyone took a mononoke down with him," InuYasha added in a muted tone, "No doubt about it… this is the place…"
He didn't finish his sentence, but we could all conclude that this had been the taijiya village. The village where the Shikon shards we had sought out after were.
Suddenly I felt a yōki, which I knew I should have registered sooner. But who would have been able to register it when they were met with such a slaughter as this?
I turned around and glanced in the direction from where I felt the yōki while I pushed Shippō up to rest on my right shoulder.
My hand sought my ōdachi out, just as Kagome hurriedly ushered: "S-something's moving!"
A few feet away from us, stood a yōkai that looked like a big cat that was bigger than a tiger. It had cream colored fur with black stripes on its two tails, black socks, and black ears. On its head there was a slightly jagged black marking in the shape of a diamond. Fire seemed to surround its feet, tails, and flanks.
I stared right into its red eyes, only catching a glimpse of the severed yōkai head that dangled from its mouth. My rand rested on the tsuka of my blade, ready to draw it if the yōkai in front of us made a wrong move.
Deep down I could feel that this yōkai wasn't our enemy. It growled at us in warning just when InuYasha drew his Tessaiga. I could feel his yōki infuse with the yōkai blade.
"One last yōkai!" InuYasha yelled aggressively, readying himself for a battle.
But then something surprising happened: "InuYasha-sama…"
It was an old man's voice and seemed awfully familiar.
"That voice…" I said slowly, trying to remember from where I had heard that voice before.
"Huh…?!" InuYasha said in surprise, with Kagome pipping in in the same manner: "It spoke…?"
"Calm yourself, Kirara, these aren't enemies," the voice then said.
The yōkai, Kirara…? dropped the head it had held in its mouth, revealing its long fangs that looked like a pair of saber-tooth would have. Then it closed its eyes and I could feel its yōki shift. Flames engulfed it for a second or two, to then reveal itself in a miniature form of its former self. It was now the size of a common house cat. In this form, it was immensely cute, and I could barely hold a squeal in; it was simply to adorable.
But I couldn't contain the squeal, which came out from between my lips like a little choked squeak.
"Oh… How cute!" Kagome said in a much lighter tone than she normally spoke in, apparently affected by the yōkai's cuteness.
InuYasha harrumphed, obviously displeased with the turn of event. The yōkai then used its left hind leg to scratch itself behind the ear. Just as it began to scratch itself, a tiny black dot sprung from in between its creamy fur. That's when I registered the tiny amount of yōki that came from the black spot. A yōki I knew from months ago.
"As I was about to say…" the tiny black spot said, "Long time no see!"
I followed the path of the black spot and saw it land on InuYasha's nose tip.
*CLAP*
InuYasha clapped his hand against his nose, then removed his hand from his nose, leaving a red imprint from his slap on his nose.
Both InuYasha and Kagome glanced at InuYasha's hand, and I found myself moving closer as well.
"Myōga-jīji… you old…" InuYasha said in an annoyed manner and I found myself become rigid with fear.
Kami, how I hated that I was afraid of bugs. Shippō seemed to notice my sudden reaction and I could feel his eyes look at me incredulously.
"What are you doing here?" Kagome asked Myōga, who was jumping up and down on InuYasha's hand.
Miroku walked up beside me and looked at Myōga: "You know this flea…?"
"A retainer of InuYasha's," Shippō said to Miroku.
He stood on my right shoulder, keeping his balance with his left hand in my hair: "Or a passenger more like it…"
I kept my eyes on Myōga, trying to rid myself of my fear for the tiny yōkai.
~oOo~
We decided to give the villagers a proper burial. While Miroku had searched for some shovels, I saw the dead yōkai turn to dust while we were figuring out where to bury them. Once again, I couldn't help but wonder if that was the fate of all yōkai and mononoke – to end up becoming nothing but dust, with the wind blowing away any trace of them ever existing.
When Miroku came back, he had found two shovels. I reached out for one of them, which he gave me. Then we began to dig some graves, close to the palisades inside the fort. While Miroku and I dug the graves, InuYasha carried the corpses of the taijiya villagers and lied them gently on bamboo mats.
Myōga resided on InuYasha's shoulder while we worked.
"Ah, yes, this is the taijiya's home fort…" Myōga said.
I had to concentrate on what the flea yōkai was saying. Which was hard, considering that I had to concentrate on digging as well. But I managed…
"These folks have made a career of this nasty job for many a generation!"
"Which makes it no surprise that yōkai would hold a grudge against them," InuYasha said in response to Myōga's statement.
"True, true… But as for why they struck now…" Myōga said thoughtfully.
This caught my attention and I stopped up to look at the tiny black speck – that was Myōga – on InuYasha's right shoulder.
"Their best fighters were called away to some castle or other, so the defense back home was pretty thin…" Myōga continued.
This statement made me think that it wasn't a coincidence.
"There's something wrong with the whole deal…" Myōga said, putting my thoughts into words, "… it makes me wonder how the ones who got called away are doing…"
I felt grim thinking about what may have happened to the ones that got called away. The attack on this village now felt on purpose, orchestrated by someone… but who…?
I began to dig once more; I couldn't let the others do all the work.
"Sounds to me like this was a planned attack…" I contributed to Myōga's and InuYasha's conversation.
Miroku then stated: "I agree. With how the mononoke were deliberately targeting this fort and with how many there were in the attack… Someone's clearly behind it."
InuYasha yelled: "Well, whoever it was, we're gonna find them!"
I didn't comment on his declaration. But I couldn't help but try to figure out who it could be. Kagome had stated that there was no sign of the Shikon shards that was supposed to be here. So, either they weren't here in the first place or someone had taken them. Maybe it was because of the Shikon shards that the taijiya were attacked. Maybe there were some of the attackers that survived and ran away with the shards. If it really was orchestrated like we had theorized, then I could only think of one person who could be behind it…
~oOo~
We worked tirelessly on burying the dead taijiya, which seemed to take its toll on me. Amongst the corpses, there were both women and children. It tore at my heartstrings to see innocent blood have been spilt over the Shikon shards. It simply was too sad to reminisce about. I needed a break, needed to get away from the death that hung in the air.
"Excuse me," I said demurely.
I dug the shovel I was using into the earth and walked away. Tears gathered at the corners of my eyes, begging to be released. But I held them back. I didn't want to cry in front of InuYasha or Miroku.
I exited the village and walked down the rocky path that we had walked on hours ago. I glanced to my left and saw a meadow filled with yellow flowers. When we had passed by it on our arrival, I had only thought that it was a grassy plane since that's what grew closest to the pathway. Amongst the yellow flowers, I spotted Kagome and Shippō gathering some of the flowers. When I looked at them, Kagome turned around and saw me. I wanted to smile at her, but I couldn't find the energy to lift my lips up in a greeting. Instead, I turned my eyes back to the road and shook my head from side to side. The first tears began to flow from my eyes, feeling overwhelmed with sadness. I didn't want to cry. Closing my eyes, I held back a sob. Then I turned from walking into a sprint, trying to physically run away from my emotions.
"Aiko-chan?!" Kagome yelled after me, but I didn't stop running.
I could hear her holler my name again, yet her voice quickly disappeared when I ran into the forest, the trees shielding me from her voice. I kept running but soon stopped up. My body felt exhausted and fatigued. Breathing heavily, I leaned forward and rested my left hand on my slightly bend left knee while my right hand rested against the tree to my right. The tears were flowing freely now, nothing in me could hold them back. My face contorted into an expression of grief and I sniffled with the crushing feeling of grief and sadness. I felt awful with how grim this world seemed. So many people killed just so someone could get their hands on those damnable shards. Where was the justice in that?
Wrath and fury replaced my grief and sadness; there was simply no justice in eradicating a village of people. In my infuriated condition, I clenched my right hand into a fist. I withdrew my hand from the tree and turned my attention to said tree. Then I tore my fist through the air towards the tree. I felt my yōki spike up from deep within me while my fist flew through the air and I roared out in anger. My yōki concentrated around my fist. And when my fist finally met the tree, I could feel my yōki tear through the bark and wood of the tree before my knuckles connected with the shattered bark.
The tree couldn't withstand the force behind my yōki-fueled fist, and I saw how my fist alone broke the thick trunk of the tree. The sheer force alone made the trunk shatter where my fist made impact. My yōki cut right through the trunk. The top of the tree fell away from me, while the momentum of my fist made the tree groan in protest. I even managed to uproot the tree partially with that single blow. Then the sound of the top half of the tree falling to ground echoed around me. I panted heavily still feeling absurdly angry about the unfairness of this whole happenstance.
I growled uncharacteristically and unintelligible before my lips finally formed words to my anger: "WHERE'S THE JUSTICE IN THAT?!"
I grounded my teeth against each other, still growling. My left hand formed into a fist as well, my nails digging sharply into the palm of my hand, and my right hand fell to my side, still forming a fist. I could still feel my yōki swirl in and around my right fist. The wish to punch something to smithereens was yet strong in me.
"Kew?"
I turned immediately around to face the unexpected sound. My yōki spiked, ready to punch at the newcomer, and I could feel my face morph into a wrathful expression.
But when my eyes landed on the small form of Kirara sitting a few feet away from me, I felt my wrath and anger leave my body in an instance. My yōki withdrew into the depths of my person, but my fisted hand still hovered in the air. I could feel my muscles in my right arm tremble with exhaustion and let it slump down to my side. Forcing myself to relax, my fisted hands unfurled.
I stared into Kirara's red eyes and saw the uncertainty in them.
"Kirara…?" I then said timidly.
I hadn't at all sensed her yōki, but now that I was beginning to relax, I easily registered it.
"Kew," she gently cried once more and slowly walked closer to me.
Suddenly my legs felt like jelly and I fell down to my knees in front of the small yōkai. She stopped up right in front of my knees and glanced up at me with her red eyes.
I dried my cheeks for tears, but more kept falling from my eyes. A choked laugh rung in my throat, wheezing out from my slightly parted lips.
"Look at me; I'm pathetic!" I said in a gruff voice.
Kirara twisted her head to the side, still looking at me with her red eyes while her tails swished gently against the earthy ground we were sitting on.
"If I'm feeling like this, you must feel more than awful seeing your whole village being killed," I then whispered to her.
While looking into her eyes, I saw her understand my words and saw the sadness those words invoked in her. With trembling muscles, I moved my right hand to her, letting it hover in front of her. She sniffed at my hand for only a second before she closed her eyes and bumped her head into my hand. Gently I let my fingers mingle in between her extremely soft fur, tenderly scratching her head in a comforting way.
"I'm sorry for your losses," I whispered down to her and felt more tears leak down my cheeks.
"Kew," she cried out gently.
Then she jumped up unto my lap and curled herself into a soft ball, purring gently.
I couldn't help the small scoff that I made.
"You shouldn't be comforting me, when it's you who've lost your friends and family."
Still purring, she looked up at me, her eyes shining with disagreement for my words. My lips lifted up at the corners.
She has a gentle soul, just like Kagome, I thought.
I let myself pet her soft fur, comforting her just as she was comforting me.
A/N: So, here's the knew chapter. We've finally met Kirara. Seriously, I just love that little yōkai. She's simply too cute for it to be legal. Especially those small little 'kew's' she make. Gosh, heart attack over here!
What do you think about this chapter? What about Aiko's reaction to the destruction of the village and her little sad/anger outburst her in the end? Let me know in a review, I really love to hear your thoughts.
Until next time, stay safe and I'm crossing my fingers that any of you or anyone that you love and cherish gets infected by Corona.
