GCN: Here is the continuation from the chappie 3. I hope you like it; I've really started to get this story moving. I appologise for waiting so long to update. (This as well as all my other stories...:::sigh:::) I tried to make this chapter about halfway between the lengths of the other chapters. Also, the plot thickens, as I am adding a couple other characters from the series, where they are needed. I know, I know...I spelled Tenseiga as TeTseiga, gomen nasi..., gomen nasi.... (Sorry)
I love all a-you who reviewed! Keep reading! Though, Bri, you kinda scared me. You wouldn't stick me through with a katana, now would you???? Daughter of the Demon, Sano99, Kenshin's Chick, and IceAngelBMW, and Ladystar (gomen, cuts out the asterics...) —you have read and reviewed up to the last chapter! Arigato ugoza-i, masu! (Thank you very much!) I really appreciate dedicated readers, I really, really do. Ganheim, If you ever read the rest of this, thank you also for the help. I needed that. (As you may have noticed.) Sorry for the question marks floating above your head. :) If you abandoned this story with out reading it all, I'll kick some ass... :
Disclaimer: If Rumiko Takahashi-san had written this, she would have been tied to the railroad tracks by screaming fan-girls for killing Sesshy. It wasn't her, just me, who doesn't own any of the characters or whatnot related to Inuyasha. So it's just me on these tracks...all alone. .
NEW GOAL IS PAYBACK --- CHAPTER 4
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------(Now we go to INUYASHA'S GANG'S P.O.V., about ONE YEAR LATER)-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"HIRAIKOTSU!"
Sango's giant boomerang tore through the air at what seemed like a thousand miles an hour, cutting a hideous green worm in half, spraying orange and red blood everywhere.
A flock of ghostly white, featherless birds were busy pestering Shippo, chasing him around in little circles. Miroku saved his tail from getting eaten by spinning his staff around swiftly, knocking them out of the air like so many baseballs.
Inuyasha was not too far away from his friends. He was halfheartedly slicing a giant centipede into bits, using both his Sankontessou (Iron Reaver Soul Stealer) attack and the Tetsusaiga. The centipede tried to retaliate again by rising up the upper third of it's body and crushing the hanyou, but Inuyasha was too fast. All the centipede managed to accomplish was dig its face into the dirt.
Kagome stood behind Inuyasha, allowing him to protect her. She was down to one remaining arrow left, and she was waiting for something really important to use it on. Kirara backed her up from behind, not really feeling that the weak mass of demons that attacked them needed her direct attention at the moment.
As always, Naraku was undoubtedly behind this. Hordes of dozens of demons of different species didn't normally travel as one group, let alone attack suddenly. And as usual, the attacking demons were far too weak to be any match for Inuyasha and his friends. They were only a prequel to Naraku's real plan.
The last three youkai, three more worm demons with one gaping eye, were finished off easily enough by getting sucked into Miroku's Kazaana. After that, all was beginning to settle down again.
"Was that it?" Sango asked doubtingly.
"That's never it," Inuyasha muttered. "Naraku always has some bigger scheme planned."
"True," Kagome nodded. "But the question is, should we wait around for his attack, or run away and try a counterattack!"
They didn't have time to make a decision, for at that moment, the ground began to shake. The motion started out slow, like a ripple, but grew into tremendous quakes that made little pebbles and twigs bounce into the air.
A bulge started to appear in the middle of the earthquake. It was as if some giant was under the soil and punching upward. Actually...that's just about exactly what was happening....
The bulge grew until it exploded outward, showering everyone and everything around it with clods of dirt and rocks. Kagome sneezed, whipping the grit out of her eyes, trying to register this new development.
"Holy shit!" Inuyasha muttered, shielding his eyes from the dust. The sun was now almost entirely blocked by a huge, beyond huge, ...rock. At a first glance that's all it was. Only at a closer look did you realize that this rock had features...a head, four arms, two squatting legs, a back full of horns, and two red Jell-o looking blobs for eyes.
"A...a rock youkai??" Miroku mused. Sango, Shippo and the hoshi had gathered around the other three, attempting to make some sort of stronghold. They had no clues what powers this new monster held.
"Hoshi-sama, do you think we can take it?" Sango lifted the Hiraikotsu over her shoulder.
"Not with the Kazaana. There's no telling what all the rock would do to me hand. I don't particularly wish to have the hole repaired again." Miroku flexed his right hand, the one with the Kazaana. The monk was now in his early twenties, and already the curse in his hand had grown, ever so slightly.
"Keh! You may not be able to suck it up, but I can certainly slice and dice that bastard with my Kaze no Kizu!"
Kagome opened her mouth as if she were about to comment, but was interrupted by a loud, sinister, all-too-familiar voice.
"Heh heh heh, that may be true, young miko wench. The golem before you could be torn apart by the Wind Scar, let alone the Bakuryuuha. The question is, who else would you massacre in doing so?"
"Naraku!" Inuyasha hissed, recognizing both the voice and the stench at the same time. Looking closely he noticed the fluffy white baboon coat that was Naraku. No, not the true Naraku, just another one of his damn puppets.
"Nani? What do you mean?" Kagome looked around, searching for any civilians that Naraku might be holding hostage. Naraku had a knack for endangering innocent lives.
Kirara, who had also been looking around and sniffing the air, suddenly turned toward the golem and hissed, her fur all standing on end.
"Kirara! What is it?" Sango asked, following the directions of her neko-youkai's gaze. The demon slayer gasped, and slowly felt rage begin to build up in her.
There, tied to the thick neck of the golem by simple rope, was a young human, wearing the fighting armor of the demon slayers, with black nylon fabric and yellow armor made of demon hides. He had to be a least sixteen by now, and he looked older, taller. His hair was longer, with the topknot being more of a true ponytail rather than a little puff.
Naraku's hostage this time, but not for the first time by a long shot, was Sango's younger brother, Kohaku. And it was evident that Naraku still had some amount of control over the boy, because his eyes were lacking in spark and fell sort of half-open in kind of an 'I'm stoned' expression.
"KOHAKU!" Sango cried. "Naraku, you bastard..." she grated, reading the Hiraikotsu to attack, with or without the others.
"Up to the same old tricks as usual, eh Naraku?" Inuyasha swung the Tetsusaiga over his shoulder, allowing the gray and blue stripes of wind power to dance along the blade.
"Go ahead and attack me, hanyou." Naraku's voice was cunning and irritating all at once. "Go ahead and cold-bloodedly slay a human youth."
Inuyasha grated his teeth, growling as he did so. He was SO SICK of people always manipulating him like this. Sango jumped onto Kirara's back, allowing her pet to take her up, closer to the golem.
"Don't you dare think that you can continue using my brother against me!!" Sango swung the Hiraikotsu in a low arch, aiming at the golem's legs. The crook in the boomerang sunk into the golem's knee with a sharp crack followed by a sloshing sound. But the leg did not break, and the Hiraikotsu did not come free.
The golem, not being an entirely bright creation, looked down at the wound only like it was a minor inconvenience. When it raised its head back up, it made a sound like a giggling waterfall, clapping its hands together.
"What the fuck??" Inuyasha stood frozen for a moment, taking in the bizarre spectacle. Miroku and Kagome stood by, unsure of what to do, with Shippo squeaking out his own comments about the golem.
Sango piloted Kirara down to get her weapon. As she flew by, ready to grab the boomerang, a shadow passed by over her head, falling quickly. Dodging to the left, Sango avoided being hit on the head by whatever was falling.
She followed the object with her gaze and got a complete shock. It was Naraku's demon puppet, falling, falling, falling, with a gaping hole in its back. As soon as the lifeless thing crashed into the ground, it burst into a puff of ashes, sending the wooden control device flying.
Sango regained her balance on her neko-youkai. It wasn't like the real Naraku had been damaged at all by the loss of his puppet self, (he could always make a dozen more), the only thing that changed was that he could no longer taunt them during the battle.
But still....
Who had struck down the puppet?
It hadn't been herself or Kirara, Sango was sure of that. The blade hole in the puppet's back was made by a sword thinner then the Tetsusaiga, and besides that, Inuyasha was still on the ground, along with Shippo, Kagome and Miroku. The golem still just stood, swaying back and forth like a drunk, awaiting its programmed instructions. Kohaku still was strapped, emotionless to the beast's neck.
Looking closer at the other's expressions, Sango saw the same confusion she felt. Inuyasha had these great big eyes and his mouth was open slightly. Kagome was cowering behind him, looking just as confused.
With a sort of tingling sensation at her back, Sango slowly turned to face the golem. A tall tree she hadn't registered before stood about shoulder height to the monster. And in one of the branches was a figure that Sango had a creeping sensation that she had met before.
"Inuyasha look, its...its..." Kagome searched for the right words.
The figure was a girl, who appeared no older than 13 or 14, but who seemed unnaturally tall. Her raven hair was long and let free, spare one little sprig that shot out of the side of her head in a ponytail.
The girl's clothes indicated her as a noblewoman, with a dark purple sleeveless gi and matching haori pants, which were tired on with a heavy golden tie. Her shoes were high heeled, and made of black leather like material. She had two swords, one still in the sheath, the other held out forward, menacingly, in her clawed hand. The Tokijin and Tenseiga.
"Inuyasha..." Kagome had it dawn on her, about the same time that Shippo did.
"Its that girl!!" the young kitsune squeaked.
"What frickin' girl?" Inuyasha demanded. His thin storehouse of patience was wearing down quickly. Not only had he been pissed at Naraku manipulating him AGAIN, but also now the appearance of this new character was sending him over the edge.
"The orphan...that traveled with Sesshomaru...remember Inuyasha? A year ago...." Kagome whispered voicelessly into one of his ears. Both of the little dog-ears pulled back in shock when he registered what she was saying.
"You mean that's..." he dwindled in mid sentence. He had noticed something...a bit...odd.
In addition her new clothes, weapons and height, Rin had some oddly familiar markings on her face and arms. Two pinkish stripes adorned her wrists, along with similar twin stripes along each side of her face, and pinkish lines above each of her eyes. Most familiar, however, was the dark blue crescent moon that lay covered behind her thick bangs.
They were demon markings. Markings that used to belong to Sesshomaru.
"What the hell?!?! This is unchi no kajuu!" Inuyasha managed to squeak out.
Youkai Rin adjusted her footing on the branch, paying no head to the stupid golem. She held the Tokijin out ahead of her, blade pointing down, one hand on the hilt, the other to the edge of the blade as if to guide it.
She spoke very softly, but sternness emitted from every word. "Shinei, Inuyasha. Vengeance will be mine, along with your head." Her eyes glowed pale red as she told him to shinei, meaning 'die.'
Inuyasha didn't have a moment to brace himself before she attacked...
GCN: AND the plot thickens. Ta-Dah!!! Another chapter finished. Please review for me now. I find them encouraging. I love knowing what you think! And this chapter WAS longer than the previous two. I'm so happy.
By the way unchi no kajuu literally means: Load of Bullshit. I was too amused by the phrase to pass it up. (Ahhhh, the wonders of Internet and too much anime.)
ARGH! ANOTHER annoyance for me: School has began. Gomen, but getting up early just to go to the Hellhole at 8:05 Reeeally pisses me off. That, and the homework. ACK! KEH! ETC....
Here is a quick Japanese-English dictionary. I sincerely apologize for any confusion that I may have caused. Or any "floating question marks" above any heads. So, for your reference:
[1] – hoshi (houshi) (hoshi-sama)—monk/lord monk, like Miroku
[2] – miko—priestess
[3] – nani—what?
[4] – shinei—DIE!
[5] – unchi no kajuu—load of bull shit
[6] – Kuso—shit!
[7] – gi/haori—clothing, shirts and pants, BASICALLY
[8] – Kazaana—Miroku's Wind Tunnel
If there are any words you still don't know (I'm scatterbrained, I may have forgotten some) please, just ask. I'll tell you in the next chappie, k?
Until next time: Sayonara!
---GCN-anime-dragon