Chapter 3: Revelation of the Millennium Ring and the Spies of a Vengeful Shadow
He was motionless, still in the darkness. It was a figure that struck certain destruction to whoever got on his bad side. The shadows that surrounded him were bent, daring not to touch him in fear of such a dark power he possessed. He sat upon a thrown of cast-iron, precious metals, and the finest lumbar in all the land. Nothing was too good for him. He was a collector of sorts, collecting powerful weapons of war, priceless pieces of art, as well as some others that perked his interest.
But in his mind, a new collection was forming. In the shadows, the figure contemplated the idea; and smiled. To combat the foolish rulers of the three other lands, the figure in the shadows would begin a collection of elite fighters to serve him. But there would be no time to waste on combat training or weapon schooling, he needed candidates who were already well into the art of war.
And he wouldn't have to do any of the searching himself. Laying on the right armrest of the elaborate thrown was a small, simple mirror. The round piece of glass was framed by a sheet of metal with a dragon, molded into the back. He picked up the mirror by the sides and gazed into the grey swirling clouds where his reflection should have been, had it been a normal mirror.
"The creature, Naraku, has spawned a girl from his own flesh. This girl, Kanna was her name, possessed a mirror of great power: able to steal souls and see things no other being could see. Finally, such a mirror she has is now in my possession. Mirror:" he commanded, the grey clouds in the mirror began to swirl around, before collecting on the sides of the mirror. "Show me people, whose power is strong enough to become a warrior for me."
The clouds in the mirror dissipated fully before an image could form. It was fuzzy at first, but it focused into a picture of a man, he was garbed in a red kimono of fine furs, and threads. The man had golden eyes, the sign of a demon. The shadow was beginning to become interested in who the figure in the still focusing mirror was. The more it cleared up, the more he could make out how long the man's pearly white hair was, it fell down to his waist.
The shadow growled in unbridled hatred as the image was now finally clear. There in the mirror was that worthless half-demon, Inuyasha. That half- breed was probably the bane of his life and not even worth his time. The mirror seemed to sense his anger and disapproval before quickly changing the image.
The mirror silently hoped that it's now master would be happy with what it showed. The requirement for the people it found where tough to come by and only two people had fit the description. The first was obviously disapproved by its' master, so hopefully, the second one would change the master's attitude and not decide to destroy it.
The image in the mirror blurred out again while it formed a second image. The figure gazed into the mirror to see who else it had found. The image was that of, what he could currently make out, a young boy. Much like the image if Inuyasha, this child had white hair but it only passed his shoulders. The boy was garbed in a kimono of blue and white. The child had pale tan skin and eyes a vibrant clay, almost mud, brown.
But the image dared not stop there, for there was another person in the picture. Though the second person was hardly in the image at all.
"Interesting. Very interesting." The child was strong. Not strong enough to be a demon, but stronger then any normal human, and he knew why. There was some unknown force that gave the child strength. He could barely sense it, even with his highly acute senses, so he doubted that anyone else would pick up on it. "He's perfect. Strong, and undetectable to anyone else. Mirror:" he commanded again.
The image in them mirror froze, waiting for its master to give it another order. "Where is this child?" The image in the mirror zoomed out to display a large over view of the entire country of Japan. One section glowed a red color, while a small blue dot near the bottom bar of the red glow blinked.
"So, this boy resides near these Western Lands. Mirror: I am finished." The image in the mirror disappeared into the grey swirl of clouds. The figure set the mirror back down on the armrest of the thrown before standing up. "Servant!"
Small footfalls could be heard in the shadow filled chamber. "Your servant is here, mi lord. What is your bidding?"
"There is a certain human near the borders of the Western Lands, send forth my best spies to retrieve him. This mirror," The figure grabbed the mirror from the thrown armrest. "Shall show them the way."
There were no small footfalls of the servant running to do its bidding, the small creature just stood there in the shadows as it held the mirror. The master had wanted the capture of a human? Why of all reasons a weakly human?
The figure in the shadows growled at the smaller servant. "Make haste to your duty before I decide to rip you in half with my bare hands." The figure always liked giving death threats to his servants to make them work harder.
But we all must remember, this figure was a collector. And a good collector never gave up on his prize and this child was defiantly a prize in the eyes of Lord Sesshomaru of the Western Lands.
"We now move into Round: 2 of this bizarre fight between the white haired boy: Ryou and the infamous monk: Miroku." Shippo the fox announced from the sidelines of the current fight. Kagome stood over the boy with a small first aid kit, wrapping the kitsune's head in a bandage. No one said hiding in Ryou's pocket was a good idea. "The beginning of the fight was a head- splitter as the white haired boy had Miroku pinned to the ground while dishing out a lot of punches but now that the boy's been thrown off Miroku, we now move into free-lance fighting."
The four remaining travelers watched the painful, but a bit humorous sight of Ryou and Miroku in an all out fist fight. Ryou was constantly on the attack while Miroku leaned more to the defense, only attacking when he got an opening, which wasn't very often.
Inuyasha and Shippo seemed to be really into the fight, Inuyasha cheering on Ryou rather then Miroku, while Shippo started to announce the fight like it was a sporting event. Kagome just sighed. 'What is it with guys and fights?' She'd ask herself mentally.
All the while, Sango had been walking around the battlefield, picking up bits of things that fell out of their kimono's when they were hit. The demon slayer had already picked up 10,000 yen, some other strange currency, some of Miroku's talismans, a clear red tube with liquid inside it, a metal bracelet that made noises when you listened close, two pieces of dark glass with a strange metal that acted as a frame, a few bracelets of prayer beads, the list went on and on.
It was only when the white haired boy kicked Miroku into a tree that she picked up a strange package; it was wrapped in about a dozen talismans. Sango also needed to smack Inuyasha with her boomerang for cheering so loud. The demon slayer easily removed the talismans, not caring about the other items, if there were anymore, that fell to the ground.
Inside the cloth was a pure gold pendant. It was a ring with a triangle in the center with an eye decorating it. Five gold points dangled freely from perfectly aligned places along the ring. The entire piece of jewelry hung from a leather strap that was tightly wrapped around a hoop at the top of the ring. Where could Miroku have gotten such a beautiful pendant of gold?
Sango strutted over to the two boys and Kagome, her eyes never leaving the mesmeric gaze of the eye on the gold pendant. "Kagome," she interrupted her friend's viewing of the fight. "Do you know what this is?" She showed the futuristic girl the gold amulet.
"Wow! Is that pure gold?"
Ryou's ear's perked at the words: 'pure gold'. But that fraction of a second he lost his focus, Miroku delivered a punch to his forehead. But it didn't seem like any ordinary punch. As soon as Ryou opened his eyes, his vision was blocked by a piece of white paper. He soon felt a sickening feeling in his gut. Ryou broke the fight and ran to the nearest bush where the boy gratefully emptied out the contents of his suddenly sick stomach.
Whatever got him sick was worse then eating Yami's pancake breakfast, much less his grandfather, Solomon's, breakfasts.
"With Ryou out because of a talisman's spell overpowering him: Miroku is the winner! But since this was a fist fight, is Miroku's victory a shallow one? We-" WHAP "-Hey! Kagome, Miroku hit me!"
Miroku slumped against the tree he was kicked against while the white haired boy continued to thrown up behind a bush. He sighed, catching his breath
"Hey Miroku," Inuyasha just loved ruining peoples time of peace didn't he? "What the hell is this?" Inuyasha held the gold pendant in front of Miroku's face.
"That? I found it in the well after we fished out Ryou." Miroku replied.
Kagome was the one to speak this time. "Yea? Well if you hadn't noticed, during you two's entire fight he kept asking for you to give back his Millennium Ring, or whatever it was called. You think by some chance THIS was what he meant?" Miroku sweat-dropped as Inuyasha, Kagome, Sango, and Shippo stared at him.
WHAP
"Idiot." Inuyasha muttered before leaping into a nearby tree to take a small nap while Ryou and Miroku tended to their burses.
Kagome walked over to where Ryou was throwing up, and as quick to remove the talisman on his face. Ryou collapsed on the ground, ready at any moment to fall asleep and wake back up under the psychotic, yet strangely safe, watch of his yami. But that didn't happen. Kagome knelt by him and tapped him on the shoulder. "Is this yours?"
She held up the Millennium Ring for Ryou to see. The boy greatly too back his pendant, wrapping the leather strap back around his neck. "Thanks."
Sango sighed. "With enough of the wounds these two have, I think we've gone as far as we can today." It was the truth. The fight between the two had lasted a good half an hour and had robbed the day of all good traveling hours. The sun was low in the sky, it would be dark soon and everyone would be too tired to go on then.
Inuyasha had silently agreed to Sango's thought as it was now apparent he was asleep. Shippo was already curling up next to Kagome's sleeping bad while Ryou had just fallen asleep about a good yard from where he had been vomiting a few moments ago.
No one had to worry about if Miroku was asleep or not. The punch he had gotten from Inuyasha was enough to knock him out till tomorrow anyway. Sango was already getting ready for bed while Kilala had quickly returned from its quest to find and light some firewood. With Kilala being a pyromaniac's dream pet, lighting fires wasn't too hard.
Following suit, Kagome unrolled her sleeping bag and climbed inside. She zipped the sides up to keep her and Shippo warm for the night. And just as quickly as everyone else seemed to fall asleep, so did she.
But by then, it was already too late. Deep within the shadows of the night it waited. It waited for the opportune moment to strike. This being would be the misery of the white haired one until it submitted to its new master's wishes. There was no escape now.
Dark shadows crawled along the ground and penetrated the light of the fire. There, in a pool near the flames was pure darkness. The dark entity shifted from its globules form into the shape of a clawed hand. It reached gown and grabbed the fire in a strange grip, choking it as if the flames were nothing more threatening then a harmless firefly.
With the fire diminished, it moved from its waiting spot into the clearing that was the traveler's camping spot. It was a humanoid, garbed in the darkest of black robes, its face unseen. Dark red eyes pierced the darkness and brought fear to whoever dared to gaze into them. Now was its time to hunt.
Xero: Alright! Goodbye writer's block and hello Chapter 3 with creepy people. Just one note: I got a review 'correcting' me in that Kagome's family temple is called the Higurashi Shrine. That is true, but only in the cartoon. In the Manga it is called the Higura Shrine, just to let you guys know. Ja Ne!