Sango was not remotely prepared for what she saw when Kirara swooped into the clearing. Inuyasha was fighting someone who was clearly not Naraku. The man, incongruously, was chained at each wrist, the shackles connected by a long length of chain that did nothing to hinder his movement. The lower half of the stranger's face was covered with a metal mask that superficially resembled those used by the people of Sango's village. She felt a chill as she saw it. Had Naraku taken to toying with the inventions of her village and handing them out to his offspring?
But upon closer look she realized this mask was solid metal. It wasn't built for filtering air. It wasn't built for airflow at all. It looked like it was meant to seal the man's mouth shut.
Inuyasha and his opponent broke apart as a familiar figure stepped out of the gloom. The newcomer was covered head to toe in a white pelt, his face obscured by a baboon-mask, but Sango would know that person anywhere: this was Naraku. Their enemy really was here.
"You're here at last, Inuyasha," Naraku said. His voice sent an uncomfortable shiver down Sango's spine. She wanted nothing more than to destroy him with a single well-aimed throw of her hiraikotsu, but she wasn't ready to risk that just yet, not after what had happened with Goshinki. Still, it might be worth the risk to her weapon if it meant putting an end to Naraku and his evil schemes.
"What's the deal, Naraku?" Inuyasha demanded.
"Kouga realized it was hopeless and ran off, huh? Guess he's smarter than I thought."
Inuyasha stood his ground… but also seemed perfectly willing to let his temper get the better of him. If he would just move, Sango knew she would have a clear shot, but of course he had no thought for the rest of his group, only for his own bruised pride. He demanded, "Are you comparing me to that mangy wolf?"
Naraku's only response was to laugh. Beside him, the strange man crouched with unnatural stillness.
By this time Miroku and Kagome had come to join Sango. The three of them stayed well back from where Inuyasha was staring down Naraku and his companion.
"Is that a fourth youkai?" Miroku asked.
It looked much more human than Goshinki had, but Sango supposed it could be another of Naraku's offspring. At the very least, they had every reason to assume this might be another of his monsters.
"Then why is it wearing that weird mask and those chains?" Kagome murmured.
Sango wished she knew. If Naraku was here in person, it meant there was going to be trouble. The only question left was how bad it would be. She and the others had survived facing all the previous incarnations, but it had been a close thing every time. There was no guarantee they would make it through whatever else Naraku had planned.
She did not have to wonder for long.
"Juuroumaru, I will release you from the seals," Naraku said. So the thing had a name, at least. "Against these fools, you may fight to your heart's content."
The bonds must have been sealed with powerful magic, for they suddenly opened and fell free without Naraku making a single move. Juuroumaru audibly sucked in air as the mask fell from his face. The next instant, moving with almost unbelievable speed, he whirled to attack Naraku. A single strike was enough to knock his master's head off.
As the white pelt collapsed to the ground, empty, Sango realized it had been futile to hope that Naraku would really come in the flesh to taunt them. Of course it had only been a puppet all along. What reason did he have to risk himself?
It was too much, too, to hope that Juuroumaru would be satisfied with killing Naraku's puppet. The puppet's remains had barely hit the ground before Juuroumaru turned to Inuyasha. The youkai's face was one of youthful beauty, but there was a strange hunger there, too. Sango did not like the look of that hunger, especially not after experiencing what the other incarnations could do.
"So this one was willing to slay his own ally," Miroku observed from his place beside her. "That must mean…"
"He's an indiscriminate killer," Sango concluded, though the possibility remained that Juuroumaru saw Naraku as an unwanted master rather than as an ally. The fact remained that Juuroumaru seemed all too happy to kill. "That must be why he was all chained up at first—so Naraku could control him until he could be unleashed on the real target."
This was not a pleasant thought, especially not when Juuroumaru threw himself toward Inuyasha. He was practically drooling in his eagerness for the fight.
By this point, Sango was not surprised to find that this newest incarnation was a skilled fighter. He matched Inuyasha blow for blow, not allowing him to gain any ground. What did surprise her was that Inuyasha was making no attempt to use the Tessaiga in this fight.
With each strike exchanged, Juuroumaru seemed to get a better sense of what Inuyasha was capable of, and he used that knowledge with each counterattack. Soon, Inuyasha was not only failing to gain ground, he was giving it up rapidly. If he didn't take charge of the situation, Juuroumaru was going to push him all the way back to where Sango and the others were watching, and then they would all be in serious danger.
At the last possible moment, Inuyasha changed course and went on the offensive. He leaped forward, punching Juuroumaru in the face as he went past. The incarnation took the hit full on and plummeted to the earth. This must be a ruse, Sango thought. Surely one of Naraku's incarnations would not be so slow to react. It was almost as if Juuroumaru had wanted Inuyasha to strike him. But why? She couldn't imagine what might be gained from such a strategy.
Juuroumaru slowly picked himself up, looking as expressionless as ever, and this time Inuyasha attacked him with blades of blood. By now it was painfully obvious that he was doing everything he could to avoid using the Tessaiga. If he continued like this, it wouldn't be long before even Naraku knew the sword was too heavy for him.
The more immediate concern, however, was the way Juuroumaru perfectly countered Inuyasha'as attack. It shouldn't have been possible. No one was that fast, and he shouldn't have had the reach for it. But not only did he block the attack, he immediately went on the counterattack. Inuyasha reacted quickly, throwing himself backward to what should have been a safe distance, but by the time he landed he was clearly bleeding. Juuroumaru had no visible weapon, so how had it happened?
"Inuyasha!" Kagome cried, but it was too late.
Juuroumaru was blindingly fast, attacking from the front and then circling behind Inuyasha before he could react. Sango watched in horror as the youkai's arms changed before her eyes, growing longer and reshaping until each arm ended not in a hand but in a long and wicked looking blade. It happened so fast she could hardly believe it, and Juuroumaru followed it up with a series of rapid thrusts and slashes at Inuyasha that left the hanyou bleeding from ever more cuts. No wonder Juuroumaru did not have a weapon: he was a weapon.
At last Inuyasha resorted to the Tessaiga, and this appeared to give him an advantage. His opponent had not expected such a move, and a piece of Juuroumaru went flying as the blade came down, disappearing into the brush.
Yet as the two fighters disengaged, Sango could plainly see that Juuroumaru still had two arms and both were definitely still attached. So what was it that had appeared to be severed by Inuyasha's attack? Or rather, what might have detached on its own? She did not think she had only imagined that, no matter how strange it seemed.
She got an answer a moment later. A spear that looked to be made from the same material as Juuroumaru's flesh erupted out of the ground, surging forward to stab through Inuyasha's abdomen until the dripping tip emerged just below his ribs. And it all happened so quickly that the hanyou didn't even have time to turn or see what had struck him before it was over.
Kagome screamed Inuyasha's name, but had enough sense not to approach just yet. The spear withdrew, leaving Inuyasha to fall to his knees, bleeding heavily from the wound in his gut. Sango felt frozen in horror, knowing that someone needed to do something, but knowing with just as much certainty that throwing herself into the fight with no idea of what her opponent even was would merely result in her death. If Juuroumaru could detach parts of himself, which could act independently, this fight would be a brand new type of horrible even compared to Naraku's other incarnations.
Yet it was not merely a part of Juuroumaru that was responsible for this. As the dust settled, the second youkai was revealed where it crouched beside Juuroumaru.
This was no detachment, but a second incarnation in its own right, smaller than Juuroumaru and less human, though this one's face was almost identical to Juuroumaru's. The two youkai were alike in their perfect expressionlessness. But that was where the similarities ended. From the neck down, this new youkai's body was more serpentine than human, with long spidery limbs in place of arms. Each arm ended not in a hand, but in a sharpened blade—blades that dripped with Inuyasha's blood.
The new youkai hopped onto Juuroumaru's shoulder, laughing and muttering words that made Sango's blood run cold. "That guys guts are really tasty, Juuroumaru."