Dying to Live
Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha.
Instinctively Miroku's hand parted the folds of his vestments and withdrew a fistful of the cleansing sutras he had been penning for such an occasion. Grunting, the monk released a burst of his inner ki so that the little paper strips flew from his hand a like a small swarm of angry bees straight into the mass of dark, demonic wolf bodies.
The screams of the beasts filled his ears as the sutras struck their flesh. The stench of the purifying burns hit Miroku's nose has he boosted himself into the air and leapt in front of a knot of the wolves that had stumbled back from the wooden wall of the main hall when the sutras hit them.
Time was moving in slow motion for Miroku as he pivoted on his left foot, which contacted the ground first. He landed in a low crouch, his staff still jingling as he grasped it firmly in a block before him. The wolves around this side of the building were clearly still stunned from the sutras' effect, and he had a moment to get his bearings. Mixed with the incensed, confused whining of the momentarily hindered wolves, Miroku could now clearly hear the tortured, shuttering cries of the villagers on the other side of the thin wooden wall. The monk's alarm was immediate and guttural as he now saw, looking down and under his left arm, that the base of the wall had been torn away by the beasts' fangs the whole length of the wall at least half a hand high. A sudden heightening in the pitch of the villagers' anguish, punctuated by the shouts of a few old men and the cries of a baby, tore at Miroku's heart as he realized the wolves' damage had to be continuing on the other side of the hall. He couldn't see Kirara or Hachi, but maybe they could not hold the beasts – the monk just didn't know. But he did know this – if they did not get these creatures back from the hall, tonight would be the night they would tear through the wood and kill everyone inside.
Not if I have anything to do with it! He told himself. "What are you?!" he shouted, empowered by the adrenaline and fear pumping through his veins, as he drew another fistful of sutras from his vestments. Now that he was here right in front of the wolves he could see them a bit better, even on this moonless night, as he stared into their now-recovered snarling faces. He knew he had stolen this group's attention for the moment as he gazed into their gaunt, corpse-like faces, bloodied and dripping from wounds littered with large splinters of the wood they had been gnawing away. Their growls, unified, loudly filled the air as they began to draw forward toward Miroku and the broken hall wall. Their eyes glittered an evil unnatural shade of glowing violet in the only dim light seeping between the cracks in the building's wall. "If you are at all intelligent, you will get back," he spat angrily, readying the sutras splayed between his fingers. It was pointless though: the beasts were clearly dumb and possessed, as they did not even flinch at the sight of the holy papers he brandished- Miroku would have no choice but to fight. He reached deep within himself for his inner ki, and in a flash, more sutras flew from his hand like daggers into the faces of the advancing beasts.
Miroku's head echoed with the riot of crazed bestial screams, as the sutras scorched the flesh right off the wolves' cheeks and hackles, only deterring but not fully purifying them. The grip on them had to be extremely dark and powerful, the conscious part of Miroku's mind told him. But the instinctual, physical portion of his brain that was in control now, was already pulling the cover off the base end of his staff. On Inuyasha's request, the old demonic smith of legend, Totosai, had agreed to install a blade of steel, almost four hands in length, coated with pure silver in the end of Miroku's staff. Blinded with the intensity of the moment, he began slashing into the bodies of the wolves and blasting others back with more sutras. With a deep, barely controlled breath, he released another burst of the ki energy he had been working to hone since he had lost the Kazaana.
On the opposite side of the village hall, Kirara and Hachi had similarly taken to barreling almost without abandon into the throngs of wolves. Hachi had at first managed to clear an area for Kirara as he had done for Miroku, by flying around and crashing long way along the side of the building's wall. Kirara had begun charging and doing her best to push back the wolves that were several hands shorter than her muscled saber-toothed body. On top of which, they seemed to fear the ethereal flames raging at her paws. Hachi noticed this too, and leapt on to Kirara's back, terrified but unwilling to flee when his master so clearly needed the help. So Hachi rode on Kirara's back as she darted back and forth, charging the demonic beasts and batting them away with her strong, burning paws. Hachi threw smoke bombs left and right to cause distraction; when he had none left, he withdrew the dagger Mushin had gifted him when Hachi had come into the old monk's service and swung it about hoping to hit anything, though his eyes kept clamping shut involuntarily with fear.
Nothing seemed to be helping now, as Hachi felt Kirara panting with exhaustion under his own rapidly tiring body. The monsters were still getting through to the building. Soon enough they would have access to the stables, which Kirara had been forced to guard less in the interest of driving the wolves back from where she and Hachi knew that the villagers huddled. Worse yet, with the way the horses were crying and rearing against the inside walls of the stable, those walls would give way one way or another.
"Kirara!" Hachi panicked, as one of the wolves leapt at her throat, and she barely managed to shoulder check it aside; they both knew well from serving their masters that in fighting unknown demons like this, it was better to avoid being bitten or even biting the enemy. Who knew what poisons possibly coursed through their broken looking bodies?
Hachi was considering shouting out to regroup with Miroku, when a sound in the distance caught his keen hearing. His flattened ears flitted up to catch the sound. Despite everything, hope somehow kindled within the raccoon dog demon.
"Kirara- Kirara! It's Kohaku and Shippou, they're calling out to us from the treeline, out thattaway!" Hachi cried.
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Since running across Ginta and Hakkaku, Kouga's left and right-hand wolves in the forest, Shippou had transformed and led them back to rejoin Kohaku, who had not had as much luck in finding anything with his demonic aura sensor. Ginta and Hakkaku, who had already been frightened and alone running through the woods when they collided with Shippou, were obviously very relieved to be reunited with some friendly faces. Shippou had introduced Kohaku, and together they caught each other up on what they were doing wandering in the forest.
"So you are actually here to investigate the situation with the possessed wolves?" Ginta asked urgently.
"Yes, but I don't think we realized that they are possessed – are you just saying that, or do you know that to be true?" Kohaku asked, as he checked a compass to find the way back to Harumura Village.
"No, they're definitely possessed!" Hakkaku exclaimed.
"Yes, they used to be our pack!" Ginta lamented loudly.
"Then what happened to them?" Shippou replied anxiously.
"That's the thing, we don't know for sure!" Ginta answered. "We started losing pack members one by one as we went out for hunts."
"At first Kouga thought they were just leaving on their own," Hakkaku explained. "He suspected there was a rival pack leader in the area we just hadn't met yet, but we couldn't figure out who was stealing our pack members-"
"Well then, where is Kouga now?" Shippou interrupted with worry while Kohaku just listened, having found the direction they needed to follow.
"That's the thing!" Ginta cried. "One day, after about a month of losing pack members, Kouga thought he had tracked the new rival leader to a cave about a half-hour's run from here. So with the last of the pack, and me and Hakkaku, Kouga led us to the place, not far up from the base of some cliffs."
Hakkaku continued, "All of us in wolf form, we followed Kouga in to find the rival leader – Kouga intended to do battle right then and there if we found him."
"But instead, we found an Inu-Daiyoukai," Ginta added.
"An Inu-Daiyoukai?" Kohaku couldn't help but blurt out. There were not many Inuyokai around let alone, Inu-Daiyoukai, beside Sesshomaru and Inuyasha. Who could this have been?
"Yes, we know what you're thinking," Hakkaku said automatically, as if they were reading Kohaku's mind.
"But for once, we are not blaming Sesshomaru," Ginta answered.
"How come?" Kohaku said, puzzled and without really thinking. He could catch them up on Sesshomaru's predicament later. It was seemed like they did not know, and he wanted to know what they believed this to be without telling them too much first.
"This Inu-Daiyokai had pitch black fur. We know what Sesshomaru looks like, and based on what happened next, there's no way it was him," Hakkaku replied.
"Most of our wolves were getting slaughtered by this thing," Ginta spat, clearly referring with disgust to the unknown Inu-Daiyoukai. "That's when Kouga transformed into his glamourized form, and we flanked him as he lifted his right arm to use the five-clawed Goraishi."
"He was going to use it avenge all our wolves who had just been slaughtered before our eyes," Hakkaku teared up. "It glowed with such power like we haven't seen before."
"That was when the dog demon charged and bit Kouga hard, taking in his whole right arm, right up to the shoulder!" Ginta described desperately.
"Goraishi and all!" Hakkaku added.
"Poor Kouga, he must have been in so much pain!" Ginta was crying now. "There was s-so much blood coming from his shoulder!"
Hakkaku's eyes were welling up as he went to comfort his brother. "Ginta and me were the last ones – we would have died for Kouga! But then Kouga issued one last order, as the pack leader, so that we couldn't disobey."
"He ordered us to run and not come back," Ginta wept.
Kohaku and Shippou had drawn nearer to the two wolf brothers where they both knelt down holding each other. They were overcome with fierce tears. Kohaku placed a steadying hand on Hakkaku's shoulder. "Do you know what happened to Kouga after that?" he asked softly trying to pass some calm on to the wolves.
"Yes, we've actually seen him since then – roaming the woods on occasion, but he's not himself. Something is wrong," Hakkaku responded through his tears.
"We now realize that he's probably been possessed like our surviving pack members by whatever that Inu-Daiyoukai really is," Ginta bit out, bitterly. "We know that monster must be doing something to him, because Kouga goes back to that cave where he was attacked after he's done roaming, even though we can see he is still plainly injured."
Kohaku's brow furrowed. "It sounds like Kouga is not in control of himself like you said. What does he do when he 'roams', like you described?"
Hakkaku answered, "That's just it, we've had to give up following him so many times – he always gets away from us too fast using his Cyclone ability, we can't keep up well enough to find out."
"So we've just had to lie in wait for him to return to the cave each time. At least then we know Kouga's still alive," Ginta finished sadly.
"This might sound strange at the moment, but something about this sounds suspiciously like it might be related to the mystery we are trying to solve at the moment ourselves," Shippou replied, looking meaningfully at Kohaku.
"It does," Kohaku confirmed. "Before we can explain more though, can you guys come with us back to Harumura Village, over that way?" Kohaku asked, motioning in the direction of the village.
Ginta and Hakkuku looked at each other for agreement, before they both nodded seriously that, yes, they would.
"Okay, let's hurry then," Kohaku said taking the lead as he began cutting a fast path through the forest underbrush. "I hope my brother-in-law is doing alright."
But when they emerged at the edge of the treeline Shippou ran up beside Kohaku, and the fox's expression said anything but: "Kohaku, even in my humanoid appearance... I can smell fear, and now I'm beginning to hear the screams of the horses and villagers-" The kitsune cut off, his beautiful face filled with abject fright at what he was obviously sensing.
"We can feel it too!" Ginta added.
"Ginta, I can smell our wolves too!" Hakkaku elaborated. "But I know it's not them- they have that wrong smell, the smell of that Inu-Daiyoukai!"
Without thinking, Kohaku reflexively pulled his kusarigama chained-sickle and broke into a full on run into the village.
"Miroku, we're coming!" he shouted, closely followed by the others.
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Note: Hi there! "Guest" - thank you for revisiting my story "just because" even now - seriously so touched! I totally agree the universe is funny and amazing for sure.
Not to mention, it was crazy - I was literally working on editing this fic to resume it in September when someone told me about Yashahime coming out. Seriously so psyched and wanna see how the episodes are gonna play out.
"New Reader" - I appreciate the read as well. What a compliment that it's binge-worthy! :D
Thanks to others stopping in to read as well. Reviews and follows are ever appreciated.
Peace, Origamikungfu.