*WARNING: Sit back and relax because it is going to be a looooong story to read if you haven't seen the words counts yet*
'What a bore. ...Sigh... Boring. Boring. Boring. Such a dull now. It's so dull to me right now.' Kagome thought to herself as she is sitting on a stool inside of a bar and her glass of alcohol-free drink with her chin resting on her right hand for support while her arm leaned against on top of the bar. She was just idly listening to a friend and coworker of hers at work talking to her, but she didn't hear a single word coming out of what she was talking about as she lacked the interest, lacking the interest to focused and listen the conversation going on in front of her with only nodding and bobbing her head once in a while when she needed to answer... until she let out a depressed sigh as she lifted her arm off of the counter before she then told her coworker. "I have to go. Sorry I have to cut our conversation short, but I need to go now."
"W-wait, can't you stayed a bit longer? Just a little...?"
"No. Thank you for that offer, but it's late." Kagome said as she got up from her spot on the stool and was about to leave the bar they were in.
"C-could you give me your opinion at least? Or..."
"Sorry, but i'm just not interested right now." Kagome answered before she left toward the entrace and exited out of the bar.
Kagome was now walking down the streets of Tokyo as people walked passed by her and multiple kind of automobiles and motorcycle that were driving by the street she was on with the stores themselves that she walked by showing off of what they have in stocks while there were only a few clouds in the clear night sky right now and the darkness of the clear night skies itself at midnight were now showing itself at this time. It was early November and it was cold enough to be chilly at least on some days, the weather being cold enough to warrant anyone to wear a warm jacket but it wasn't that bad enough to allow for some people to go around without one since the temperature were good enough for now. Kagome continued to walking down the street that she was on alone in silence before she sighed in melancholy and thought to herself.
'I don't just understand or get of why some people of wanted immortality or why they want to live forever so badly. Look at me and Inuyasha. I've been living for more than about 500 years now with Inuyasha. And we saw and experience the complete and utter total horrors of humanity from the many ages in history we lived in that I have been told and read in my history textbook back when I was still in highschool... except for actually being there to experiencing and feeling of what it is like and living in those ages and part of history itself from there to now together. From all the ages that me and Inuyasha have lived in so far, this one is one of the more calmer and peaceful ages we experience if you exclude the tedium that we're experience to this day for now at least. ..."We should have no patience with those unthinking persons who rant that man in his present cruelties is reverting to primitive nature - to the so-called law of the jungle. No greater falsehood could be spoken. Nature knows no such horrors." A comparison remark to show the true greyness of the world. Keh. Oh yes, how true that is.' Kagome thought bitterly to herself at those words in her mind when she gave a empty and bitter smile on her face at the mere idea of immortality and living forever, as she remember those same words back when she and Inuyasha had met some American scientist called Fairfield Osborn (with a first name that she can't seem to really remember) who she and Inuyasha think was a paleontologist back between somewhere around the 1920s to the 1940s when they were taking a trip in the USA before he have spoken those same words to them when he had said it to them that would appear in a book years laters, something that they agree with, before her expression turn back to sullen yet stoic frown when she dropped that bitter and joyless smile of hers off of her face as she continue walked down the street in silence at that thought of hers before she closed her eyes and let out a bored yet sad sigh at this. 'What a melancholia this is.'
"It is most definitely a melancholy, alright." Kagome said, to nobody in particular but herself, when she had reach the entrance of a metro station...
500 years ago in the past... Sengoku jidai of the Feudal Era...
It have been now almost over a year since Kagome's, albeit permanent, return to the Feudal Era from her own timeline though the Bone-Eater Well for one last time to stay in the past with Inuyasha for good despite knowing of what this mean before the time portal of the Bone-Eater Well finally closed for good. It took Inuyasha and Kagome quite a while, a couple of weeks at most, to getting to know each other again after being separated from each other for three years, but they didn't mind that, as there was no hurry since they have all the time in the world with each other, so it was better for them to take bady steps one at a time and they wanted to take it slow anyway after being separated for so long, all as the pair slowly became inseparable once they got know each other again and married once after when they expressed their love for each other.
It was a fine day today, with only a few white clouds floating in the clear blue sky, the many birds living in Inuyasha's forest were chipping their calls, and the unseen winds themselves blowing across in a gentle breeze of silence. Inuyasha was currently reclining on the sturdy tree limb of his favorite tree that was near to their hut the pair lived in, near to where the Bone-Eater Well and Goskinboku are, while Kagome, having already finished of carrying out the set of her routine Shinto practices, was now cooking, making tea and boiling the white rice to make cooked rice bowls over their home's irori for their lunch until she see that it was finally done. Seeing with her eyes and smelling the tasty scene from it that it was now done, the Shinto miko came out of their hut when she moved the noren made out of straws out of the way and called out to her inu hanyo husband resting on the branch of the tree nearby with a happy smile on her face. "Inuyasha! Lunch!"
"Alright, Kagome! I'm coming!" Inuyasha shouted back from the limb of the tree he was on with his answer to his wife. The inu hanyo instantly right jumped down from the branch and landed on the grassy ground on his own two bare feets before he then immediately headed forward toward to their hut with a few leaps of his jump through the air until he came to the front of the pair's hut and moved the noren out of the way to enter and get inside. When he came right into the hut, Inuyasha saw Kagome is already sitting on the floor by their home's irori as she was already putting the white rice into their two respective bowls after she had already poured the hot green tea into their respective yunomis from the pot as he walked over right to her side before sitting down beside his wife as she give him his bowl of white rice in her hand and put the first chump of rice out of the bowl with a pair of chopstick in his hand right into his mouth and at it as the married hanyo-human couple start eating their lunch together in their hut.
Once the pair were finished with eating their lunch and drinking their respective yunomis of green tea, Inuyasha and Kagome then nestle and cuddle right up with each other into a comfortable sitting position around the irori when they've decide to take a break and rest, while the inu hanyo then put his arms around her and pulled her into a hug before nuzzling up to her as he embraced and hugged his wife in his arms, hugging his Shinto miko wife as he embrace Kagome deeply within his own arms around her, all while they just conversed, both talking and gossiping, with each other about the memories of the past and fondly remembering them, specifically the ones during their adventure of finding shards of the Shikon No Tama and their fights against Naraku with each other from when Kagome fell down into the Bone-Eater Well into the Feudal Era in the past to Kagome going back to her time after the Shikon No Tama ceased to exist when Kagome wished a selfish wish before 3 years later when she return for good, just conversing and reminiscing with each other about the past with nothing that was going to interrupted them but a good time with each other and having no care in the world but each other right now as they closed their eyes and start reminiscing the past, reminiscing the past in the calm and peaceful quiet of their hut.
Of course, while their hut was located near to both the Bone-Eater Wells and Goskinboku are, it was still close enough to the village for either Miroku or Kaede to sense the auras of their energy and get them when there will be a time of need.
And such a time had just arose.
Kirara landed in front of the hanyo-human pair's hut in her full-grown youkai form after she have flew from the village carrying Miroku and Kohaku on her back before the monk then instantly jumped off of the Nekomata's back and immediately rushed over to Inuyasha and Kagome's hut before he enter into their hut as he came inside.
"Inuyasha! Kagome! We got something of a weird problem right now!" Miroku called to the pair when he've suddenly enter inside and came into their hut.
"Correction, monk. You have a problem." Inuyasha retorted to him, gruffly replying right back to the Buddist monk of their friend himself.
"No! We! Definitely we, Inuyasha!" The couple then slowly peeling open one of their eyes and peered at Miroku where they look and saw the monk himself standing in the entryway of their home. They give a puzzled frowns at agitated and alarming look on his face. As it was not a frequent and rather rare expression on the usual serene face of their old friend.
"What's wrong, Miroku?" Kagome asked, showing concern for their friend's sudden agitation and alarm while also wondering of what is causing him to be like this and what is making him fuss about it in the first place.
"Kohaku came back to the village!"
"So what's give? What of it that would make you so alarmed in the first place? " Inuyasha said as he shrug his shoulders, thinking that Kohaku haven't visit them and their children at their house longer than usual or something like that were the first thoughts that came to his mind. "He visited you guys once in a while. So it's no big deal. So I don't get of what's making you so fussy about it in the first place."
"Yes! But this time, Kohaku said he and Kirara saw something when they were coming back over that he couldn't describe with his words alone but you have to see for yourself with your own eyes!"
Immediately understanding what's causing the troubled and alarm of his agitation, the hanyo instantly picked his wife into his arms right up from the floor of their hut in a single swoop before Inuyasha then leaped and spring forward through the noren in a single jump, causing Miroku himself o quickly jumped and swiftly duck out of the way of the Inu hanyo's path when he was startled by that, as the pair swiftly exit right out of their hut and passing by both Kohaku and Kirara after they have greeted them when they've darted out of their home before the inu hanyo sprung forward toward to the village in the direction they were heading in.
Inuyasha was leaping and springing his legs and feets over forward, crossing through the air in the forest, in a great and powerful bolt of speed with Kagome being held protectively in his arms into the direction right toward to the village by the trees of the same forest that was named after him all as he easily clear one patch of the forest to the next while the air were rushing right by them with their hair blowing among the winds until, at his wife's suggestion of leaping above the forest's treelines, he jumped up high into the air above the treelines of Inuyasha's forest in a single bound of his bounce with his powerful and leaping legs alone, allowing them to see the very awe-inspiring beauty of the landscape when they were so high above the forest in the clear blue sky as they flew through the air for a short distance, before they've look down and saw the village down below yet still ahead of them while they were still right above the treeline and were so high up in the air of blue sky with them feeling the wind of it was blowing against them.
There, it was right there in the air at that moment, of where they saw of what the fuss and commotion was about with their own eyes when they have saw of what Kohaku had saw with his own eyes when he was coming to the village to visit his older sister and her family on Kirara's back, while the various villagers in the village, temporarily stopping in the middle of what they were doing, were looking with perturbed and alarmed expression on their faces in confusion at the sight of a relatively reasonable and decent size moving group of about a couple of dozen or so villagers with all of them being men that had travel and journey from another village that is located miles away from here were walking through the middle of the village toward Kaede's hut, which would be unusual enough on its own... if it weren't for at least some or so various types of youkai, including a relatively mildly large Oni who look similar to Goshinki except his own skin was a Goldenrod Yellow, that were travelling along with them, with a few of humans and youkai in the group sporting various sort of wounds and injuries on their bodies that look rather recent if they were attacked by something while all of them were looking desperate, making all of the villagers in Kaede's village who have saw this worried and concerns of what have cause these injuries would make a group of human and a dozen or so Youkai to travel together as a group. This is what made Kaede concerns and troubled by this sight when she came out of her hut near the stairwell to the shrine after she already had sense several aura of energy coming toward her hut and became both bemused and perturb upon seeing the group of several men and youkais walking toward her with Rin looking at this from hut and having a similar expression like everyone else to this as well until they finally stop in front of the old miko herself when they notice and look at her. At that moment, Inuyasha came down from the sky after leaping up from the forest and landing right near to Kaede's hut all while holding his wife in his arms before letting Kagome get off of his arms on her own when she got off and stood up on her own from her husband's arms, shortly before Kirara carrying Miroku and Kohaku on her back landed near the hanyo-human couple as Shippo and Sango along her and Miroku's three children have quickly came to see of what is going on before she saw of what her younger brother saw, causing Kaede to slowly turned her head around to behind due to her advanced age and saw that the pair and the rest of the Inu Tachi had now already came before she spoke to the younger but more powerful Shinto miko when she came over to her with her hanyo husband following her behind. "Ah, Kagome. I didn't expect ye and Inuyasha to be here so soon and so quickly as well."
"Well, it's thanks to Miroku that we knew about it this soon, Kaede. We heard from him that Kohaku and Kirara have saw something while they were flying toward the village for a visit that we needed to see for ourselves. We knew that something was up and it had sounded urgent too, so we got here to the village as fast as we could." Kagome answered, telling the older Shinto miko about it, before turned to focus her attention on the group of the several men and youkais that were standing still in front of them and were looking at them as they waited patiencely. "Now that we're here and have already saw it beforehand in the air, we could see the reason why."
"Do you know the reason of why and what is going on?" Inuyasha asked.
"No, I do not know yet. As I haven't ask them any questions yet." Kaede said when she closed her only remaining eye and shook her head to the pair.
That was when the apparently leader who was in front and leading the group of the several men and youkais that came to the village, a old man and elder with a crane used to assist him in order to walk who was old and is the same age as Kaede or even older than her, slowly came and walked up to the two mikos when he move first out of the group he was leading before he spoke to them. "So you are two the mikos living in the area by the name of Lady Kaede and Kagome I assume?"
"Yes. Yes, we are. Why do ye ask?" Kaede query, wondering the reason behind his question in her mind and was still perturb by this situation that is happening.
"We need help from the youkai slayers who are living in this village. Both our village and the local youkai that are living around in the forest that is near to our village are having a serious and grave situtation on our hands that we're dealing with. Please, I beg of you, we need your help and expertise to deal with this problem."
The Inu Tachi and Kaede were troubled by this of what they heard from him with the distress tone of his voice, both worried and concerned of what this problem would cause this, as they looked toward the group of the several men and youkais in fretful concerned at this and made them wonder, wondering in their minds of what is this the problem exactly that to cause both humans and youkais enough to travel to this village together to ask for help...
500 years later... back in the present day...
Kagome turned the key around to unlocking and opening the door to her and Inuyasha's apartment that served as her and Inuyasha's home after she reach the apartment building and going up the floor of where her home is at from the metro station that she walked off at and getting the key for the door from her purse to putting it in and unlocking the door before she enter into her and Inuyasha's apartment as she closed the door behind her and slowly took her shoes off in the genkan part of her and Inuyasha's home before, not even bothering nor feeling like hanging her brown jacket up on the coat rack by her in the genkan, she closed her eyes shut and let out a calm sigh that she exhaled from her mouth.
"I'm home." Kagome sighed melancholy. The miko then heard a mew sound of its sole other occupant in her and the Inu hanyo's apartment bounce off the walls before Kirara, the everso faithfully loyal and supportive Nekomata companion and company to Kagome and Inuyasha wearing a bell around her neck, appeared in her kitten form when she walked out from the living room and came into genkan before the two-tailed nekomata then rub her head right against Kagome's leg and then greeting her with a happy high-pitch mew to the girl standing in the genkan of the apartment. Kagome looked down to see Kirira was sitting down and was looking up at her with her usual expression and give a tired yet kind smile to her long friend, the oldest of her and Inuyasha's long-time friends. "Happy to see you too, Kirara. Did you have fun while we were gone?"
Kirara reply to that question with another high-pitch mew.
Kagome smiled at the Nekomata before she then walk out of the genkan and walked through the living room toward her bedroom to get undress from her clothing that she was wearing, with Kirara following her behind. Once she have gotten undress after taking her brown jacket off and put the clothings that she wore and used for today into the laundry basket along with her sarashi that was wrapped around her chest, the Shinto miko decide to take a long nice and warm shower, as it help her to relax her brain and allow her to clear her thoughts and let her head to meditating into a calm state of mentality so she can muse and brood her pondering thoughts in her mind more clearly.
As she took warm and nice shower with the nice warm waters cascading out the showering droplets fulled of it onto her body, Kagome was thinking the pondering thoughts in her mind in the shower with her hands against the wall of the shower, vaporing mist of steam covering and obscuring the view of her back from the back side of her, as she was reflecting about the recent bout of unhappiness and depression she was having and was experiencing currently in silence. While it was not the first one that she experience and felt before, it was certainly the most recent one yet that she was now having. When she thought back to the conversation from her coworker in the bar that she didn't listen nor hear to the miko's ears, she knows that this was only one part of the depression that she was having right now over several days now. She knew the reason behind it; She was bored. She was bored and dulled, which she knew would make someone to lose complete focused on whatever they were doing when they are distracted by something else and cause them to unable to concentrate on what is going on around them due to the lack of interest when either lacking the interest in focusing on something or weren't unoccupied with an activity or something else, which the weariness of her boredom and dullness were filled the lack of enthusiasm fitting this quite well, before her thoughts then strayed her to her memories, reminiscing and thinking back about the past, remembering the memories of the past in her mind and body, leading to remembering something that not only the cause of her boredom, but her depression as well.
Kagome stood still with her hands still against the wall of the shower in complete silence as warm waters coming from the shower continue to fall and landed on her as she thought and reminisce about the memories of the past, before she let out a calm sigh as she put her hand on the valve and turn it off, turning off shower and finishing it as she slide open the door of the shower and got out.
Once she had completely dried herself and her body up with her towel after getting out of the shower and finishing with brushing her teeths at the sink, she decide to retired and go to her bed after putting on her unisex brief before jumping into bed, covering herself with the white sheet of her blanket as she lay down on her bed and laying her head on her pillow. Kagome continue to think and ponder about the thoughts that were still thinking in her mind, unable to sleep just yet, for quite a while as she laid in her bed and still remembering the past, reminiscing the memories of the past in her mind, before she slowly closed her eyes and went to sleep...
"A youkai?"
The village elder, now sitting inside of Kaede's hut with the Inu Tachi and Kaede when he need to speak them while along with them a couple of men and a few youkai from his group there were along with him inside of the hut after he introduce himself as Konosuke Fujima (Fujima Konosuke) to them, from the other village who came with group of the several men and youkais that have travel from their home in order to ask the Inu Tachi for their help and expertise as they were utterly desperate due to how grave and serious the problem they have was, nodded his head in an yes toward them which he answered before he spoke, managing to speak once more albeit slowly due to his advanced and old age. "Yes. Indeed of what we believe could be and think it is that might be it. A youkai, or something, that is in the forest that are our village is near located to is attacking. Through we're not entirely sure of that. Even I have doubts about that idea and don't think that it was youkai of some sort, only a monster of... something... in my opinion." He said, telling them of what the problem could be basically and potentially be, before he begun to tell and explain them, giving an explanation of and providing them with greater amounts of details from his words alone, right from the beginning of when the problem started. "It begun over a month ago at least to a few months earlier at most when one of our villagers, a boy of nearing adult age that have dreamt to travel the land as an merchant of sorts, had suddenly disappear into the forest and, when a search party made up of our best men from our own village was set up have went looking for him, have found his body lying on the forest when they have manage to find him but only to find that he was dead now with his body parts and limbs lying every where in part of the forest they found him in, as his body had been twisted and mutilating into pieces while his weapon he was carrying was destroyed into small pieces when he was attacked and slaughtered by something."
"Oh my kami..." Kagome grasp, grasping in shock of what she heard from his description.
"Oh yes, indeed it is. But this was only the beginning of the attacks: Soon, it have begun and started after this as not only some of our villagers were attacked and killed, but also restless travelers, wandering monks and priestesses who practice and believe in different religions, travelling merchants, roaming samurais, drifting people who have lost their homes in the war that were around aimlessly, and people who were simply journeying to settle down at were also being attacked and killed in the forest by whatever is doing this and where we have often find and found the mutilated parts of their body being scattered and lying around in one part of the forest at one day to the next for tomorrow after they were cut and hack up into pieces when they suddenly disappear and go missing before finding them dead in the forest, making them the most amount of the victims and causalities with the villagers being some of the fatalities that were attacked and killed in the forest, with them ranging from children that were just only born to elders that are just old as you or I. Not only that, but the frequency of the attacks and the people going missing before finding them dead and their corpse scattered in pieces across in the forest had only slowly increase over time, with one person going missing before turning up dead becoming two to two people going missing before turning up dead becoming four to four people going missing before turning up dead becoming eight as of this recently. One of the causalities and fatalities of the attacks and kills was my own daughter. Yes. One of my several children that, one of my daughters who have given birth to a healthy baby, was a part of the causalities and fatalities of the attacks and kills by whatever was doing this, when she came back to the village from the forest heavily injured and bleeding as she carried her child in her arms by this monster when she protected her child with her life as she manage to ran back to the village despite her injuries and give her child to one of her sisters so they could rise him before she died from her bleeding wounds." The village elder of that particular village that is near the same forest that was being use by something to attack people that were passing through the forest then begun to cried tearfully and sorrowfully as he spoken about it. "One of my own children were mostly those who have died by these attacks. I have now outlived one of my own children that I fathered, a parent's worse fears. Now one of my grandchildren will never grow up with nor fully know about his own mother."
The Inu Tachi and Kaede give a knowing expression and sympathy look to him, giving the sorrowful crying village elder from the other village their pity and sympathy to him about the death of one of his own children and having outliving one of them as they knew all too well of loosing someone that you cared about and the thought of now outliving them when they died while you are still alive was something that often bring up feeling of woeful sadness and glooming unhappiness, before the Buddist monk, after letting him cried in gloom for the death of one of his daughter, then spoke and continue to speak to him and his companions with him inside of the hut.
"So you think and suspect that whatever is doing and is responsibility for these attacks, thus is the most likey the one that is behind these attacks and are causing these attacks and killings from the start and beginning in the first place, is some sort of youkai?" Miroku asked, wanting to be sure that there is truth their answer of what is causing this problem they were having exactly, just wanting to know the honest truth from them of what they know at best and needed to know as much detail as they could.
"Yes. Or, at least what we have first thought and assume when the attacks have started on that day at first. Since there were plenty of youkai living in the forest, of course." One of the villagers sitting inside beside the elder said, speaking in pace for his village's elder Konosuke since he knew that he was still emotional over his daughter's sudden death, as he then spoke to them and explain them in place of his village's elder. "However, as the attacks continued and the number of people being attacked and killed when travelling through the forest have slowly increase over the month, we doubt and now don't think that it was a youkai of some sort doing this and behind these attacks that are happening in the forest near our village as all of the attacks were too aggressive and savage, too brutal and vicious, and too quickly and swiftly to be the work of a youkai. Not only that, since we didn't about it at that time but the local youkais that were living in forest were being attacked and killed as well by the same thing doing and was responsibility for this."
"What? The youkais in that forest near you guys' village are being attacked and killed by the same thing as well?" Inuyasha said in shocked and baffled at what he heard, shocked in sheer disbelief and bafflement at what he heard from one of the men.
"Yes, it is hard to believe at first, but the local youkais living in the forest were being attacked and killed by it even through the amount of youkais that were being slaugther and killed by it were smaller than the amount of peoples that were being slaugther and killed by it yet it still happening."
"He's right! What like he basically said to you guys!" One of the few youkais that were inside of Kaede's hut said, deciding to speak up as she now take over speaking and talking to them from him since they got to part of where the youkai in the forest were being also killed and it would be much more useful to them if there was a youkai who can could the perspective of these same attacks but on the youkais this time from a youkai who could to describe it quite well enough to them, before she then spoke and told them about it. "As you all have know, us youkais living in the forest are also being attacked and slaughtered by whatever it is that is also attacking and killing the humans." The youkai then turn her head to the humans that she have travelled with to Kaede's village. "No offence."
"Some taken."
"And in which some of us find the body pieces of either the youkais or the humans that were killed by whatever is doing these attacks lying around and scattered across in one part of the forest. What I find that make it much more worse is that despite the difference in shapes and sizes between youkais of every types and species that are living in the forest, they were all slaughtered and killed in the exact same manners. To make matters more worse, most of the strongest youkais in the forest, a few of which were all Onis, were killed and slaughtered by this thing with ease when it have fought and killed them without much of a struggle at all nor have cause that much damage to the surround area in their fights when some of us youkais have found most of their body parts laying in the areas that it have fought and easily killed them in respectively. However, despite what I have mostly said up to this point, there are a few youkais that have manage to survived the attacks from it and live to tell the tales along with a couple of humans, including that oni who was one of the strongest youkais that I had mention that you humans of this village have saw."
"Yes. The last part of what she mention is true. There are a couple of people and youkais who have encountered the thing that was doing all of this when they were attacked by it and have manage to survived to tell the experience of what happen in the forest after they have did just that."
"Well, did ye asked them of what this thing that are behind these attack look like exactly?" Kaede inquired, needing to more informations on it to know more about it of what it is that they were dealing with exactly.
"Unfortunately, they were far too traumatized from surviving the terrifying experience of the odeal with the encounter of it that was causing all of this to say anything at all about it, let alone a description of what it look like basically, when we asked them of what did the thing that was doing these attack look like."
"I see. So basically, you saying is that you don't think that it was a youkai's work and doing of behind all these attacks and think that is something else from what you have told us about it, yet you don't actually disclosed the possibilites and idea of it being a unknown youkai of some kind. Am I correct, I assume? Am I correct of what I have said, yes?" Miroku said.
"Yes."
"... Well, I'm a big enough man of a monk to admit it: I'm stumped by this. Given the details of what you have told us, it doesn't sound any particular kind or sort of youkai that I know or heard about, even with my or Kaede's vast knowledge of every Youkai types and species. As I am not exactly 100% sure of what we are dealing with exactly since we actually don't know if it is actually a youkai or something else different that we don't really know about. The best assumpation is it exactly of what we got about it are the ones that we have here right now."
"Glee, isn't that just great." Inuyasha snarked, causing Kagome to elbow her husband.
"Did you try of hiring a Youkai taijiya or a monk or a priestress at least?" Sango asked.
"We did." The village elder answered, answering her question. "However, each time a Youkai taijiya or a monk or a priestess that we hired went into the forest to search and look for what is doing these attacks in the first place, they just ended getting attacked and killed by the cause behind these attacks before we found their dead bodies in pieces across an area of the forest while their own respective weapons and armors of choice were broken and destroyed with them either been smashed to bits, slashed in halves, or crushed into pieces when we've found them. Along with that, there were a few nights that were apart from each other of where we suddenly hear a horrific sound in the middle of the night that not either one of us could describe it as. The situation around this problem has became so grave and serious that the villagers of our village had came together to discuss of what to do and were desperate for answers. This is where we heard the rumors of this village having four experience youkai slayers living there, particularly two that were certainly powerful with one being the hanyo son of a powerful daiyoukai and the other especially powerful and gifted miko. That is when the youkais living in the forest where all of the attacks were occuring in have decide to reveal themselves to us in their full form and reveal that they too have the same problem as we do, showing that this problem was much more grave and serious than we have originally thought. After much discussion with each other, we came to an agreement to formed an group mostly made up of men with a few youkai which include myself to travel to the village where those two experience youkai slayers live before we begun our travel toward that village in order to get their assistance and expertise to deal with this problem and this is where you know the rest."
There was silence for a moment inside of Kaede's hut at what the Inu Tachi have heard from him as they digested the information in all of their mind with all of them being shocked and were trouble, Sango in particularly, by the fact that the weapons of the several Youkai taijiya that they used and made of the bones of Youkais were easily destroyed by something that is causing these attacks... before Kaede then spoke to them when she manage to recollect her own wits. "So ye saying that ya want to have Inuyasha and Kagome to deal with this problem due to how grave and serious it is since not even a Youkai taijiya or a monk or a priestess could stop this... thing... that is behind these attack and ye were desperate for any sort of answer?"
"Yes, unfortunately so. So please, we beg of you, we desperately need your assistance and expertise to deal with this problem." The village elder bow his head to the Inu hanyo and the Shinto miko.
Inuyasha and Kagome were silence of this, not sure of what to do exactly, before the hanyo-human pair then looked at each other in their respective eyes in silence, looking at each other with their own beautiful set of eyes, until Kagome spoke to her husband. "Inuyasha?"
"... Keh. You know what? Screw it. I was wanting to do some youkai slayings with my wife for some time now anyway." Inuyasha said as he cross his arm into his slevees. This have made Kagome smiled at his answer.
"Then it is settled." Kagome said before she told them. "Me and Inuyasha will go together to your village to deal with this problem of your as fast as possible."
"Oh! Oh thank you, thank you so much for that! We don't know of how to repay you two for your services!"
"Don't worry, we just doing of what we're suppose to be doing. Isn't that right, Inuyasha?"
"Feh. I don't care nor mind of what the challenge is or what it is exactly, as long as my wife is with me, we'll fix this problem of your in no time."
"Yep! Because no matter how hard or how long the path goes, me and Inuyasha will faced the dark storm together and be together forever, no matter what happened to us!"
...As morning of the rising sun came with a new day while the sun itself in its morning form was rising from the east to reveal the new day that it have came with it, the sunlights of the morning peer right into the blinds that was covering the window of Inuyasha and Kagome's apartment's bedroom like the sun was a massive eye and shine its lights like a observing and scanning eye through them upon the Inuyasha and Kagome's bed in their apartment, causing whoever that was sleeping in the bed and have cover themselves with the white blank to roll and turn on the soft feeling of the bed due to the brightness of the sun in its morning form's sunlight shining right through the window blinds... all before Inuyasha, revealing that he was somehow the only one laying in the bed with his wife no where in sight, suddenly rose up from hiding beneath the blankets from shines of the sun through the window blinds and sat in an sitting position on the bed like how a normal person would do it as he then let out a loud yawn from his mouth behind his teeths and fangs while he stretched his arms out to get himself fully awaked after being awoken by the sudden brightness from the rising light of the morning form of the sun before he dropped his arms on top of the blanks and sat still in silence like a statue on the bed rather drowsily with his eyes still groggily closed and his dog-like ears flicker for a few times to get used to the sounds he was hearing currently happening right now in the morning as his mind was still asleep for just a short while more and was dozy when it was slowly fully awaking up from its sleep until it was now fully awake. "Good morning..." Inuyasha murmur, to no one in particular but himself, once his brain was now fully awake from its deep sleep and was now working properly when he was now thinking and pondering in his thoughts in silence.
The Inu hanyo then heard the familiar high-pitch miaow from a certain nekotama roommate and friend before Kirara came into the bedroom and jumped onto the bed as she walked over to Inuyasha and sat down to the right side of him where she lifted her head to look up at him with her usual expression and then let out another mew to him. The hanyo looked at the two-tailed feline-type youkai herself who was sitting beside him in silence before he give a friendly and companionable smile to her as he rise his right hand and begun petting her.
"Good morning, Kirara. Did you have a good night sleeping?" Inuyasha asked his old friend as he petted her from her head to her back. Kirara replied with another happy high-pitch meow, being satisfied with the petting as she purred, until the Inu hanyo then took his hand off of her head once she give a mew to let him know that she's done now as he pulled the blanket off of himself, revealing his unisex brief laying underneath it, and got out of bed after he had stretch his legs before he stood up on his two legs and walked to the bathroom to brush his teeths, with Kirara following the Inu hanyo behind, as he pass by a vase of Higanbana on the table...
After accepting and agreeing to help the villagers living in the village near the forest and the youkais living in the forest to deal of whatever is doing these attacks and killings, Inuyasha carried Kagome along with her quiver of her sacred arrows and the sacred longbow of Mount Azusa on his back as the pair immediately left Kaede's village to head Konosuka's village and headed toward the village in the direction they were travelling in with the hanyo carrying his wife on his back running and leaping across with graceful strides of his steps and taking a break to rest for the night before then resuming their journey and travel once more once the morning has came to reveal the new day to them for a long time until they finally came and arrived to the village that is located in the afternoon that is somewhat nearing evening to the near forest where all of these attacks by whatever was doing this were happening. When they have manage to arrived to the village, Inuyasha and Kagome saw of what have happened recently when they see a rather big crowd of both people living in the village and an assortment of youkais standing at the mouth of the forest while one of the men was pulling a cart loaded with the butched remains of both people and youkais back with a few other men and a youkai by the cart until they slow to a stop once they've came out of the forest. The inu hanyo-miko human couple looked in silence at what they were seeing with their own eyes, becoming nauseous at the sight of the state of the killed bodies were in they were seeing, before one of them then notice the two standing far from the crowd at the mouth of the forest and alerted everyone. "LOOK!"
Immediately, everyone, both humans and youkais alike, turned their head to look when they were alerted and saw Inuyasha and Kagome standing at where they were before one of them spoke to the married couple. "Are you two the hanyo and miko that we've heard about?"
"Tsk. Yeah. why else do you think of why me and my wife are right here in the first place?" Inuyasha said.
This have cause them to murmer with each other, mumble and gossip between each others about this, wondering if the rumors about the couple were true about them, for a while until Kagome then came forward from beside Inuyasha and spoke to all of them.
"Don't worry, everyone. We are the ones that you heard about and were send to dealing with this problem all of you are having, which is why we are here in this village in the first place like my husband if he didn't put it in so rudely. So don't worry, me and Inuyasha will deal with whatever is behind these attack and fix this problem in no time." Kagome said with a smile on her face, telling all of them and reassuring everyone about it. This have everyone, both humans and youkais alike, to exhaled a breath of relief and gladness at what they heard.
"Oh, thank for that reassurement of yours. We wished we could say the same thing for all of the most recent murders and butchering that have happen before you two came."
"You welcome, we're just doing our duties and suppose to be doing, so all of you don't need to worry about that while we'll deal with it."
"Be careful through, we don't know of what is causing these attacks and those sounds that we heard in those few nights that we hear while we sleep."
"We will. We'll take it slowy and carefully while dealing with this problem of yours." Kagome told them as she adjusted her quiver on her back and lifted her sacred longbow of Mount Azusa up in her hands before she turn to her hanyo husband standing beside her and ask him. "Ready, Inuyasha?"
"Ready when you are, Kagome." Inuyasha said as Tessaiga transformed into its Transformed State form when he've pulled it out of its sheath before then supporting and leaning its fang-like blade against his shoulder.
And with that, Inuyasha and Kagome went and walked into the forest where all of the attacks and kills were occurring in, sensing strange energy and power coming from it as they went into the green forest amongst the darkness of its shadow...
Tama, a young girl who has black hair in an Odanago twin-tails style and was wearing winter clothing with a runny nose, was watching in silence her mother talking to someone, probably either a friend or coworker of hers, when she suddenly met them while they were walking through the suburban street and her mother started talking to her. She quickly got bored of this like any child of her age would when she sniffed her nose and start looking around to occupy her while her before she see a cat napping on the street near the roads catch her short attention. Wanting to pet the cute kitty cat and touch its tail, Tama walked over to the white cat with a cheerful smile just as the cat got up after waking up and let out a yawn while it was stretching its back before she extended one of her hands out in an attempt to reach and touch the tail of the cat, but the white cat suddenly moved forward, causing the young girl's hand to miss its swinging and flickering tail. Tama followed and chased after the white feline with her stubby legs that was appropriate for her young age in order to petting it as the cat itself that she was following strode rather quickly across the asphalt road. Tama was about to cross the road to chased after the kitty before a hand and arm was suddenly wrapped right around her and her body and have pulled her off of the asphalt road and back onto the safety of the street close to the body of a stranger that did it before she then hear a mischievous yet soft and gentle male voice in an deep and bass baritone voice behind her as she turned her brown eyes to see a warm smile on his face. "Woah there, little one! You don't wanna cross the street if I were you."
Before Tama could speak, a loaded truck suddenly driving right by too close for comfort to them of where they were standing at, freezing the young girl herself still in fear and causing her to let out a loud 'eep!' like a squeaking mouse from her mouth at how close they were to it and how close it was to them when it have drove and passed by them, before she turned herself around to the left to see the stranger who saved her and saw her savior is a man with a brown-auburn colored hair wrapped in a simple single low ponytail behind his head tie with a white hair tie who is wearing a beret hat, a long yellow-colored scarf wrapped around his neck, a black leather jacket with a thick fleece collar, and a pair of blue jeans pant with a belt around it squatting and crouching his legs down to met at her level and spoke to Tama.
"Are you okay, kid?" Her savior, the stranger who have saved her life, asking Tama with a soft smile and gentle tone of voice as he told and lecture her. "Don't go crossing without checking if there's any car that are going to come through, okay?"
Tama was quiet at this for a few second before she finally spoke to her savior crouching down in front of her. "Mister Stranger, sir. You're hair look soft like a cat." She said in her young voice before the stranger, still smiling at the young girl, pull his ponytail around and let her touch his hair with her relative tiny fitting for her age hand to feel the texture and feeling of his brown-auburn hair. "Your hair... your hair is really silky and soft, it's soft like it is a fox's fur..."
The stranger who haved saved her life just her give a kind smile to Tama before she suddenly heard footsteps coming in the same direction that she came from and turned her head to see her own mother walking toward them.
"Tama!" Tama's mother called out to her as she came over to where her daughter is before she then spoke to her in a anxious voice with a worried look on her face. "How many times do I have to tell you? Don't go walking off on your own out of my sight."
"Don't worry, mama! A strange man has saved me from a truck!" Tama said to her mom as she hold her mother's hand when she turned her head to where the stranger is to thanks him, but she immediately that he was no longer there like if he had vanished out of thin air, making the 4-years old girl confused by this. "Huh? Where did he..."
Not sure of where he did go and gone to, making her think that he was some sort of guardian angel or spirit or something just like that in her still young mind, Tama start walking down the street as she hold her mother's hand to go back home.
Unknown to Tama, however, that her savior, the same stranger that have saved her, was hiding right behind the corner of the street and leaning against the wall when Tama and her mother left as he continue give a warm smile on his face to her before he lift up his head to looked up at the blue clear sky with his eyes, revealing his green eyes, and stared at it in silence while the fluffy clouds above were travelling across the heaven slowly with no care in the world before he then spoke to himself with a bittersweet smile on his face.
"Remember this, kid. Keep on enjoying the most in life despite the harshness of it and keep on smiling with that smile of yours on your face as one day, you might died in whatever way you'll died in when that day come to you." He said to himself with an soft smile on his face and a bittersweet chuckle as he transformed himself and shapeshifting into Sango with her loosely ribbon-tied hair except for the difference of wearing his clothings in an puff of misty smoke before "she" then put on a pair of sunglasses on "her" face as "she" walked away and start walking down the street in the opposite direction "she" was heading, without anyone noticing nor knowing about it. He walked down the street as Sango in calm silence, walking by people that were passing right by him in his disguise form and the multiple types of automobiles driving down the road as they drove beside and pass the streets he was walking on, for quite a long time by himself through the streets he was on before he came into a street with a large apartment on it that he was walking through before he suddenly stopped in mid-steps and looked his head up to the right when he notice the apartment building standing on the right side of him before he then give a mischievous grinning look on his face in his current form as he adjusted his sunglasses and then spoke to himself in Sango's own voice with an equally mischievous tone of mischief in her voice. "Well, well, now... let's pay some old friends a little visit, shall we?"
Inyasha and Kagome were slowly yet steadily breathing in and out in the exhaustion and the weariness of their exhausting and sapping fatigue to the point of fainting in tiredness at any given moments from overtaxing their own respective bodies against the opponent they were currently battling while the couple themselves were both seriously injured and wounded and were both heavily bleeding from the various and numerous wounds and injuries they've received that were all over their bodies, with Kagome clutching her left arm tightly with her right hand on top of a large and bleeding gash on her left arm and her sacred longbow of Mount Azusa was no where in sight after the miko was then immediately attacked by their opponent once her quiver has ran out of sacred arrows for her to use when it have took the advantage of this opportunity as Inuyasha hold and hugged his wife close right to him protectively with his left arm while he lean against Tessaiga with its blade lodge into the ground for support due to the amount of damage that they both took during the battle against this enemy they were fighting and were battling against in the forest where all of the attacks and killings have all occurred and took place in.
This enemy they were facing, this enemy they were facing and fighting against, was the same one that is responsible of doing and the cause behind all of these attacks and killing as they have expected in the first place when the hanyo-miko couple start looking and searching for it in the forest, but they didn't find it. It found them.
Inyasha and Kagome instantly start their fight and battle as they fought and battle against it in the forest itself when it have suddenly came and appear to them right out of no where like it came out from thin air from the countless blooming trees of the forest they were in, with it attacking them aggressively and relentlessly, not giving them the opportunity nor the chance to combine both of their attacks techniques into one powerful attack against it. The pair have manage fought and hold their own for a long time against it in the forest with the sounds of Inuyasha used Tessaiga's numerous forms and attack techniques as Kagome used her sacred bow to shooting and firing many of her sacred arrows that she have brought with her in her quiver until they were now in the state that they were currently in, yet for some reason or another, none of their attacks manage to damage it when they stuck its body, like Kagome's sacred arrow or either Tessaiga's Diamond form or Dragon-scaled form, or hit their target when it have swiftly dodge all of their most powerful attacks they could use, like the Meidō Zangetsuha technique or their combination attacks together, in their battle with it. But the pair do knew now one thing for certain about this... thing... they were fighting and battling against: Whatever that it is exactly that was standing in front of them, was certainly no youkai for sure. As its appearance and behavior alone that they've seen so far they could able to make out and observed from it in the shadow of the darkness coming from the forest that it was hiding itself in was far too different to be a youkai or anything else that they seen before with their experience and knowledge.
Inyasha and Kagome just continue to glared at the... whatever that the thing is exactly... that is standing just right in front of the hanyo-human couple themselves in silence with having no damage on its body that it have received from them with their attacks when some of them struck upon its body as they were slowly and steadily breathing the air around them in and out of their lungs with the numerous injuries and wounds on their bodies continue to still bleeding, bleeding their blood out through those same injuries and wounds on their bodies, in their bodies' current states in their battle with it.
All before the same thing that the married Inu hanyo and Shinto miko pair were fighting and battling against and was standing in their sight have suddenly took them completely off-guard by it when the thing covering itself of what it actually is and truly looked like in the shadow of the forest's darkness did something that was completely and utterly unexpected, something that they didn't expected, as both Inyasha and Kagome's eyes were suddenly filled with a sudden bright flash of white light in their vision that blinded them with the feeling the burning sensation of agonizing and tormenting pain suddenly rushing through their bodies while they felt like the world around them was spinning around them faster and faster before everything have finally became black as darkness for them...
Inuyasha, now wearing a white long-sleeves shirt and a pair of black long pants long after he had woke up from his sleep and was finished with brushing his teeths in the bathroom, was now currently making instant cup ramen noodles hours after he have finishing up with his shower and putting his clothings on him and then finishing with having breakfast when he brought out two cup of the Nissan Noodle Cup brands from a box with two chopsticks on top of the two instant ramen noodle cups' lids in both of his two hands to the chabudai/kotatsu table in the living room of his and Kagome's apartment before putting the instant noodle cups down on the chabudai/kotatsu and then he put a kettle filled with water onto the electric tabletop burner that he have on the chabudai/kotatsu table in order to boil the water before the Inu hanyo himself then sat down at table as he put his legs underneath the table and cross them together as he then begun waiting, waiting for the water in the metal kettle to begin boiling and steaming with hot waters inside, as he stared at the boiling waters in the kettle with a passive look in his piercing yellow eyes and a neutral frown made from his mouth. The hanyo himself continue to stared at the boiling kettle with the steaming hot water beginning to form inside of the metal kettle patiencely in silence before laying his head down on the table with his eyes remaining fixated right on the boiling kettle as Kirara then came over to the chabudai/kotatsu table and sitting down beside the table to Inuyasha's right as the nekomata lifted her head up and looked at the half Inu youkai himself in silence with her normal expression as her two tails flicker back and forth patiently at this, before the half youkai then spoke to himself and Kirara about it with his expression remaining the same, deciding to strike up a conversation with the two-tailed cat youkai when he had thought of it in his mind as his glared remain fixated on the boiling kettle on electric tabletop burner. "You know Kirara, I would have been annoyed and probably get agitated by this if I had to waited for this long. But If I have to tolerantly wait patiently for cup noodle to be invented for about over four centuries until it was finally created decades ago, then it means that I can wait for it to be done. Beside, ramen noodle soup itself as a cup noodle I think is still the greatest thing that I have ever tasted." Kirara response with a high-pitch mew from her. That was when the metal kettle have finally start to steaming and begun whistling with steam from inside, catching both Inuyasha and Kirara's attention. "Ah, there is. Now it is done." Inuyasha said to himself as he turned off the electric tabletop burner as he ripped open two of the Nissan Noodle Cup brands and grab the kettle by its handle with his right hand before lifting the metal-made kettle up and pouring hot water from the relatively hot kettle into the two cups with instant ramen noodles that were inside of them on the table.
Once that was done, all they needed to do now was to wait a little more for them to cool down quite a bit, which allow Inuyasha to take advantage to let him think calmly in his mind with his arms crossed together as he let his thoughts drift around in the mental landscape that was his mental subconscious. However, he didn't mused about his thoughts for long before he was snapped out of it when he suddenly felt a cold breeze in the air and the temperature have dropped inside of the apartment coming from his left side with his ears snapping and jerking at this before a shadow have suddenly appeared over him in the same direction from his spot at the table and the Nekomata lifting her head up at it, causing him to turn his head to the left and look up to see, before he see someone who looked like Sango wearing a beret hat, a yellow scarf, a black leather jacket with an thick fleece collar, a pair of blue jeans, and a pair of sunglasses on her face and obscuring her eyes standing over him at his spot at his table as she lean down to the Inu hanyo from her position with a smirking grin on her face when she suddenly extended out her arms up into the air while she have said one word to him. "Hey!" There was an moment of silence at this between them that and now in the living room of Inuyasha and Kagome's apartment when it pass right over them just like a mocking bird flying right over the cuckoo bird's nest, before Inuyasha finally reacted with his own immediate surprised and startled reaction and response to this.
"GGGAAAHHHH! HOLY FUCKING SHIT!" Inuyasha flipped and cursed at this as he reeled and rolled his arms around like crazy due to his startled reaction, scaring the absolute crap out of him and nearly having a heart attack from this, with a utterly priceless expression written on own his face while Kirara just remained calm and maintain her normal expression when it happen as the loyal nekomata continue to look at the person who look exactly like Sango excluding the choice in clothings that she is wearing standing in the room next to the hanyo's left with her usual impression on her face when she have suddenly appeared right inside of the apartment right over Inuyasha at his spot while flicking her two tail back and forth at this, having already figuring of who it is exactly on her own, before "Sango" suddenly then giggled at what happen that she cause in the first place and sport a cocky smirk on her face when she spoke.
"Hey, Inuyasha. Long time no see. It's been a while, huh?"
"Wait a minute... SHIPPO?! What the F- SHIPPO?!" Inuyasha shouted with his eyes going bug-eyed wide as dinner plates and nearly popping out of their sockets on a table in a mixture of both jolting and staggering shocked, flabbergast dumbfoundment, and vexing piss-off anger all when he have realized this before he spoke with the same expression and emotion he was projecting from his face as he just narrowed his eyes and glared at now other individual standing the apartment in vexation with a cross-shaped vein twitching on his head when it have popped right on it.
"Yep! The one and only!" "Sango", revealing herself to be actually Shippo himself in disguise of Sango's form except for the clothing she was wearing, said when he posed himself in a V-sign with his right hand over his forehead and stick his tongue out as he spoke to Inuyasha in Sango's voice in a mischievous and trollful tone of voice. "I've got you real good right there. Huh, Inuyasha?"
"What the hell, Shippo!?" Inuyasha shouted at him in sheer irritation of his bad-tempered and grumpiness due to Shippo's own prank had scared the crap out of him when he thought in his mind that he was seeing a terrifying ghost of one of his old friend as he immediately jumped off of the floor onto both of his legs before he then asked the kitsune-in-disguise who one of the couple long-time friends that he and Kagome have a rather important question to him. "And how the hell did you get in our apartment anyway?!"
"Oh, I just let myself in your apartment." Shippo answered.
"But the front door of our apartment is locked!" Inuyasha pointed it out.
"Oh, I knew that. So I just used the back door to enter."
"But we don't have a backdoor and that's where the balcony is!"
"Oh, I just climbed right over it."
"BUT THERE'S RAILING ON BALCONY AND WE'RE ON THE 10TH FLOOR!"
"Oh, don't worry, I knew where you live on. So I have just jumped up in order reach it and then climb over it."
"BUT FROM AT THE BOTTOM GROUND OF THE APARTMENT BUILDING?! IN THE MIDDLE OF THE DAY?! WHERE PEOPLE COULD SEE YOU IN PLAIN SIGHT?!"
"Oh, don't worry about that: I had already turn myself invisible to make sure nobody actually see me of what I am doing before I did my jump right over the balcony. And beside, even if anyone did have actually see me jumping up to your apartment room, I still would be rarely warrented more than just a second glance since you two lived in Furinkan anyways!"
"... Shippo. Do you have every reasonable excuses hiding up your sleeves?" Inuyasha asked in irritation and snarked him in a deadpan tone all at the same time at this, after one of his and Kagome's few long-living old friends laughed without a care in the world, as he just narrowed his eyes and continue to glared right at the diguised kitsune himself with his vein continue to twitching in utter vexation at him, thinking about punching him on the head like how he did when Shippo was younger.
"Yes. Yes, in matter of fact." Shippo retorted snarkily and sarcastically, throwing the hanyo's insult to him right back at him, with a smug smirk on his face in Sango's form.
"Rrrrrrrriiiight, Shippo. Rrrrrrrriiiight... Also, could you please transform something else that is more... I don't know... what's the word i'm searching for again? Oh yeah! Something else that is more comfortable for us?! It's freaking us out!"
"Aaawww, come on Inuyasha. It's can't be that bad." Shippo teasingly while giving a pouting expression.
"Seriously, Shippo. It's freaking us out when we look at you when you are in that form alone. I mean, it's like looking at a ghost of a old friend from a long time that you knew who have suddenly came back from beyond the grave and the after life to haunt you and your home! It's seriously creepy when you speak in her voice too! You're making us feel creep out by you talking and looking like Sango herself! AND IT'S ALSO NOT EVEN FREAKING HALLOWEEN ANYMORE EITHER!"
"Oh come on now, I really do like Sango's looks since it's remind me of her. But if you insisted on this, then i'm going to have to transform and shapeshift into for you guys... it'd be nicer to be my normal and usual old self and speaking to you guys in my normal form anyways." Shippo said, giving his calm yet trusting smile on Sango's face to them, long after giving the hanyo his teasing with a pouting expression before having his fun and amusement when Inuyasha went on his mini-panicking rant in his fright (which he's not probably going to admit) by the form that he was using, before he then transformed and shapeshift in a puff of smoke around his current form before the puff of smoke that was covering him quickly clear up and go away to finally reveal his true form, finally revealing his normal true form; Instead of looking like the small young and cute kitsune boy with only one short and stumpy fluffy tail who was the formerly weakest member of the Inu Tachi from five centuries ago that he once was, Shippo was now a six foot and one inch (two meters/186 centimeters) tall and handsome daiyoukai kitsune who now look so handsome and pretty that it would make almost every men and women utterly envious of his own looks and is now a daiyoukai who is as equally powerful as Sesshomaru himself, maybe even a tad bit more powerful than him, along with now being a powerfully experienced and accomplished master who is not only proficient and skillful as a vigorous powerful user of Kitsune Yōjutsu (Fox Magic) but is also now an adepted and skilled expert in Raijū Yōjutsu (Thunder Magic) and other types of Yōjutsu as well as he wored only a pair of black-colored long-sleeves shirt and blue long pants covering only his upper and lower body except for both his human hands and fox feets with a physical appearance similar to a 18 years old adult, a lean yet surprisingly muscular attractive body frame, a low ponytail that was hold in place just by a simple turquoise-colored hair tie around it, a flamboyantish yet sexy and attractive-looking physical appearance... and having 10 fox tails, having one more tail than the rest of his species' usual yet iconic nine fox tails that made them iconic in the first place, standing right behind him and flickering once in a while to show that they were real and alive and to show that they weren't either fake or illusions made by him.
Inuyasha and Kagome, having already known about this as long as Shippo have for a long time now, knew the reason why; As it turns out when they've first became aware of it, Shippo was a special subtype of kitsune, and nine-tails foxes in general, that is even exceedly rare among the kitsune species, the rarest subtype of the multiple of nine-tails foxes species in fact: The legendary 18-Tailed Fox Spirit, or the legendary 18-Tailed Kitsune in Shippo's case. This is all thanks to a incredible rare mutation in a 18-tailed kitsune's genes and DNA that happen and occur, at a strand of a hair stroke of a chance to say the least, during a kitsune's development cycle in their mother's wombs that resulted in the creation of a 18-tailed kitsune but you can't actually tell that detail at such a young age since they are still technically kitsune (and nine-tails foxes in general... again) and are still therefore born and grow much in the same way like any normal ones before they would begun developing their another tails by either splitting off from the first tail or just growing new on. And thanks to that mutation, this easily make a 18-tailed kitsune way more powerful than your normal and average kitsune (which is saying a lot) since all of their tails basically act as a sort of power and energy multipliers to greatly enhanced and increased their powers and abilities, thus would easily make them especially powerful daiyoukais on their own... if they can live long enough that is, since they're often target at a young age as they are the most vulnerable by many that feel threaten by them, if they find and know about them, that is due to the sheer potential of their powers and abilities alone and the few that who do have manage to survived of being targeted and attacked by them for their lives thanks to that when they were powerful enough to fend themselves for their own are most often than not either solitary and cynical loner who care about no one and nothing at all but themselves or power hungry conquerors who wanted make the world pay the same way they have felt due to the experiences of what they felt and lived through in their sorrowful past, which Shippo is (rather thankfully) not. Even through you can't tell if a kit is going to be either a 18-tailed fox spirit or just a normal nine-tailed fox spirit at such a young age, you could able to tell it somewhat if they're potentially one is by looking for the subtle differences like able to learn and use far more advance technique far more quicker than their peers than normal to their species, immense magical talent for their species, and the last but the important part that would confirm that a kit is going to grow up to be a 18-tailed kitsune is when they have begun developing their second tail off by about 50 years at most and develop new tail once every that timespan until they grow their 10th tail. This is the last part of how to tell which kits exactly is going to be either a 18-tailed fox spirit or a normal nine-tailed fox spirit at such a young age is how Inuyasha and Kagome were able to tell that Shippo is a 18-tailed kitsune was when he suddenly grew his second tail after he have reach and became 49 years old in human years... along with the sex drive that he have too. The pair are still grateful to this day that Shippo wasn't like the other 18-tailed fox spirit nor haven't became like them thanks to several factors that include giving him the love and care for him with their support, since Inuyasha knew all far too well of what's like to be different.
All before Shippo spoke in his normal true form, revealing the ten-tailed kitsune's deep and bass baritone voice, when he resume speaking to the hanyo in his and Kagome's apartment. "Through I can easily understand a part of the reason of why Miroku loved Sango, but that's just only one of them. But you do have to admit, Sango is goddamn heart-breaker that shall obliterate your heart to the after life, both figurative and literally, when you take a single look at her. I mean, you have any ideas of how many men and women have easily fell for this form when I am using it?"
"Hm-hmm. Is it because you're a flirtatious and lecherous idiot like Miroku?"
"Yes. Of course, I don't care of who or what I date and bed with since I am attracted to every genders with no prefence for anything as I don't care of who they are or what species that they are, no matter who, what, or why."
"... You're just saying that it is because you're technically pansexual, right? Since nobody but myself, our family and friends, and your vassals can't comprehend your sexual preferences, right?"
"Oh, you have no idea! Since I AM THE MOST PAN-EEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSTTTTTTTTT!"
"Uh-huh." Inuyasha remarked in a deadpan tone, making a mental note to himself in his mind that if he and Kagome are going to died one day by something and go to the after life to meet their old friends either he or Kagome will probably going to throttle Miroku for causing Shippo to picking up his lecher habit except on a much more flexible and adaptable scale, before then asking his old currently ten-tailed kitsune friend a rather important question to him. "Why are you here anyway, Shippo?"
"Hmm? Oh, I just want to spend time with you guys since you two have a whole week off to yourselves."
"Just to annoyed and tease me with your jokes to no ends for your fun and amusement?" Inuyasha said as his eyebrow and veins on his forehead were twitching in annoyance at the idea while he glared at the 10-tailed kitsune that was standing in front of him.
"That is just a part of the reason of why!" Shippo laughed cheerfully and rather trollfully.
"... You know that you are an annoyance that is every deserving of his species' reputation to me that I absolutely loath and hate, right?"
"Oh, I know! And that is why it is so much fun to messing with you by just provoking you with rather minor things to you and getting a reaction out of you!"
Inuyasha continue glared and narrowed both of his eyes at Shippo in irritating vexation while the ten-tailed kitsune was just casually laughing at this. Before the Inu hanyo could response, they suddenly heard a slurping sound from the right side of the table where Inuyasha himself was previously sat at, causing the two men standing to turned their heads and immediately saw with their eyes there was now a rather cute and adorable-looking girl that would easily make you go "kawaii!" with a equally adorable Ivoryish/Creamish/Beigish(?) white-colored hair, tan skin, two red eyes, wearing a kimono and a long skirt mo-bakama that are same color as her hair, a bell around her neck, and two fluffy tails that flicker once in a while, basically a catgirl for all intent and purposes, that was sitting at the table and is currently now eating and enjoying the instant cup ramen noodle soup by slurping the noodles up from the cup with the chopsticks while there was now one more instant ramen noodle cup at the table as the two men in the room were talking. Inuyasha and Shippo, however, didn't react to nor were they fazed by the sight of a what is basically the youkai equivalent of a catgirl since both of them already knew of who it is exactly. Before she finished slurping the noodle she was eating and then spoke to the 10-tailed kitsune. "Hey, Shippo."
"Oh hey, Kirara." Shippo said, revealing the girl to be none other than Kirara herself and also reveal that she have a previously unknown catgirl-like human form that she have, in a casual and friendly manner and tone of voice to her who was his old friend as he spoke. "So tell me. How are you doing?"
"Oh, i'm fine. Even through it does get boring in Inuyasha and Kagome's apartment since there is not much random Youkai attacks as it used to be in the past, do I let myself out by sliding open the door to their apartment's balcony and going somewhere else in my full-sized youkai form to see and do since there are plenty of fun that happen around here a lot. So I never really get bored that often anyways as there are plenty of entertaining things that happen to see and do. You know. The usual."
"Right, right. That is good, that is good for you, my old friend... anything else?"
"Nope. Nothing else."
"Okay, good, good... Man, five centuries. It's been nearly five centuries now, huh Kirara? Remember the time when me, Inuyasha, Kagome, Miroku, Sango, Kohaku, and everyone else excluding a few that do know didn't actually know that you have a human form since you didn't want anyone to petting you except for a few who are allow to do that as it was annoying for you and you forgot most of the time that you have this form at all since you need your bells to access your daiyoukai powers including that form with the use of your bells along with the fact that you're in fact Inuyasha's and Sesshomaru's father's first girlfriend? Our reactions, even Sesshomaru himself, were just priceless at what we heard when Sesshomaru's mother have told us about yourself. Ah, old good times."
"Yeah, I most definitely do, Shippo. It is a fond memory to remember about. A fond memory of the past to remember about. Like the times when you decide to date both Satzuki, Koume, Mizuku, and Soten all at once?"
"Oh yeah, that one I remember fondly. Hehehe. Yeah. It is."
"Also, I've decide to get out another cup noodles for you since you're here, so you can go ahead and gorge yourself in."
"Neat." Shippo said to himself as he then sat down on the floor at the table on the opposite side of where Inuyasha is, who already sat back down in his spot after the ten-tailed kitsune have went to talk another of his old friend and was now eating his instant cup ramen noodle soup, and the right side of Kirara, his old friend who was now eating her instant cup ramen noodle soup, before he pick up both the chopsticks in his right hand and the cup with the ramen noodle soup in his left hand and begun eating and gorging himself on the food that his friend brought out for him. "Hm. This stuff is good as ever."
"I know, right?"
After a little while later, the three were now finished with eating their respective cup ramen noodle soup. Once they were finished as all the 3 empty cups were laying on top of the table, the three of them still sat around the four-sides of the table and taking a temporary break for about a moment as Inuyasha laid his hands down the floor and lean against them for support, Kirara resting her head on the table and just exhalating like the human-form nekomata that she is, and Shippo decide to lay down on the floor with his hands behind the back of his head in a moment of silence before it pass when the ten-tailed kitsune spoke to his two-tailed cat youkai friend. "It maybe not much of a meal, but it's taste make it worth to eat anyway. Right, Kirara?"
"Yep."
"Shippo. Are you here just to talk?" Inuyasha asked as he narrowed his eyes right at the ten-tailed kitsune himself.
"Maybe, but if that is a part of the reason, then yes!" Shippo answered cheerfully with a light-hearted and carefree laughter at this to the Inu hanyo, causing Inuyasha to glare right at the 10-tailed kitsune in complete annoyance and utter irritation with his eyes at this while Kirara just sighed and sweatdropped at the sights and antics between both the ten-tailed fox spirit and the Half Inu Youkai in sheer exasperation and looked with utter deadpanness of this with her sweat clinging to the side of her forehead at being the only one who is calm and sane one in the room right now at the moment currently, before the ten-tailed kitsune dropped the carefree laughter and suddenly spoke to him in a far more calmer and restaint manner, which Inuyasha snapped out of his vexing and caught his attention when he listen to the younger but more powerful youkai who was his friend, as he ask him with a important question that he want Inuyasha to answer in concern. "Not exactly the main reason, but I do want to talk to you guys: Are you and Kagome both alright at least?"
Inuyasha went silence at Shippo's deep question for the hanyo himself to answer, Shippo and Kirara were waiting patiently for the answer from him and were calmly letting him think of what to say to him and giving him to thought out the answer to said, before he turned himself around to his right and still remained silence at this, not actually knowing for sure of what to say or answered exactly in his mind, before finally answering his question. "... Unfortunately... No, no we're not. Me and Kagome still can't find it and haven't found it yet, not even a lead of where it is."
There was an beating pause of silence that loomed over the room with its aura of soundless quiet between the three in the apartment at what Inuyasha said to the two youkai that were with him in the room... before Shippo decided to say something random.
"... Did you or Kagome ever thought of having an triang number 8 threeway relationship with another person?" Shippo asked. Inuyasha instantly start comedically twitching in utter absurd amount of anger at what he just heard with a couple of red cross veins suddenly popping up and comically twitching on his head before he immediately pulled out Tessaiga right out of its sheath in its full-powered Transformed State and swung the blade right at him, which the 10-tailed kitsune dodge by ducking right under it with a sly smile and smart grin that was just filled with mischief in them written right on his amused face as the fang blade of Tessaiga in its Transformed State embed itself into the wall of Inuyasha and Kagome's apartment.
"CAN GET YOUR OWN LECHEROUS MIND OUT OF THE DAMN GUTTER ABOUT SEX, YOU LECHER SMARTASS FOX!" Inuyasha yelled angrily at him in absurd amount of comedically anger and comically rage at him for Takahashi Rumiko-style. Shippo start mischievously and playfully cackling at the Inu hanyo at this while Kirara just sighed at this and give a deadpanned expression on her face to the both of them at the antic they were in with a few drop of sweat clinging onto her head.
Everything was filled with nothing but the pitch black darkness around Inuyasha, seeing and felt nothing but the pitch blackness of the darkness around him, unable to feel with all five of his senses in the scentless and silence pitch blackness of the darkness around him, all before a bright shining light suddenly appear in far distance of the total darkness around him like it was the glowing and shimmering shine of a light at the end of a long tunnel before it coming toward him closer and closer until he suddenly heard voices from it when the orb of shining light has came close enough to him to close the distance between the hanyo himself and it as he heard the familiar voices coming from it.
"Hey! Look! He's waking up! Inuyasha is finally waking up!"
Inuyasha slowly open his eyes, after they twitches for a while, opening his eyes to show his piercing and sharp demonically yellow eyes to the world once more, yet revealing them to be now weary and worned out from the pain with the fatigue of exhaustion and tiredness in his yellow eyes, to see of what is going on and saw nothing but blur in the sight and vision of his eyes temporary for a moment, unable to let out not even a single whispering sound from his mouth, until it begun to slowly clearing up as he blinked his eyes a few times and let out a groan of both pain and tiredness from his mouth before, once he finally could see again from the fogginess of the blur within his sight, he wearingly see the ceiling above him as he felt a comforting warmness around his body and saw the familiar faces of Shippo, Kirara, Miroku, Sango, Miroku and Sango's children, Kohaku, and Rin gather around him within his vision and were looking at him with a mixture of both worried looks and concern expression when he was waking up from his blackout unconscious before all of them immediately smiled at the Inu hanyo in joy and happiness when he's now fully awake and relief that he was alright now.
"Inuyasha! You're awake!" Shippo said happily at this.
"Welcome back to the living, Inuyasha." Miroku said with a calm smile at this.
"Glad that you're awake now, Inuyasha." Sango said in a similar expression to her husband. "You has us worry when you were unconscious for a few days now."
Inuyasha was silence at this, not sure of where he is or what is going on with his memories of what happen before still being all but a pure white blank in his mind all for a moment, until he turned his head and look around to figure out of where he is before he see and saw that he was laying on a bed when he looked down and saw that he was now currently inside of a hut when he notice it, meaning that he was probably back in Kaede's village now. The hanyo remained silence of this, still unable to remember the event that have transpired in his mind, with a blank expression on his face as he continue to stare at the ceiling in his silence with his blank-looking eyes being filled with nothing, wondering in the mental landscape of his mind and still not sure of what is going on, for a moment... before he slowly sat up from the bed he was laying in to sit up straight with his arms as he let out a weary grunt of the aching pain that he was now suddenly feeling throughout his body, quickly seeing the multitude of bandages covering the wounds and injuries he received on his body with a misable look of pain across his face. "Uuuuuuugggggghhhhhhhh..."
"Woah! Be careful, Inuyasha. You've just only woke up now." Sango said in concern with a mixture of both worriment and care in the tone toward the hanyo when she notice some of the wounds and injuries he received might have reopen due to the dark stain of blood beneath them.
"Sango is right, Inuyasha. You should take it slowly and don't need to force and push yourself to move." Miroku said, knewing Inuyasha wanted to figure out of what is going on right now judging by his blank expression.
"Miroku. Sango. Where I am?" Inuyasha asked, his voice sounding weak before he cough for a few second, deciding to ask one question at a time to take it slow, as he was out of it and wanting filled in the blank of the void in his mind, feeling like he was in a deep slumber against Goskinboku all over again.
"We're inside of Kaede's hut right now. We've brought you back to village on Kirara's back. Since we figure you would more protected and guarded that way than at your home due to being unconscious at that time and heavily wounded with the amount of the many injuries that you have on your body." Miroku said.
"I see..." Inuyasha said to the buddist monk before he lifted up his left hand and putting it on his forehead when he suddenly felt a throbbing headache suddenly start to slowly coming right on before he start rubbing it with two of his fingers in attempt calm and quell down the beating and pulsing headache that he was feeling in his head. "Uuuggghhh... What happen? I can't remember a thing of what happen, anything at all right now..."
"Ah, well... I was afraid you were going to say that sentence, Inuyasha. Well, don't worry. I got you somewhat covered the best I could do it for that. Since I figure you would ask that question and want the answers to it from the best information that I could gathered as fast as possible sooner or later, right from the very start of the beginning. But the question of how to explain and proceed it to you this to jog your memory a bit is what I am not sure actually about." Miroku said, thinking of how to explain it to Inuyasha about this exactly and proceed with this in his mind, until he calmly sighed at this and decide to make do of what he have got at the moment before he told and begun explaining the inu hanyo with a friendly smile on his face, figuring out that he would immediately agree to this without a single hesitantion of this since he want the answers sooner than laster. "Alright. So let's obviously start from the very beginning of this, shall we...?"
And so, Miroku begun his explanation as he explain to Inuyasha to the best of his knowledge from the details that he got: It all started back a few days ago when it have happened...
A few days ago...
It been almost a day now, now almost nearly a entire day at most, after Inuyasha and Kagome had already left the village the day prior as Sesshomaru was in the village doing one of his visit to Rin today after he have came to Kaede's village while the morning sun was rising from the east before Kouga suddenly came to the rest of Inu Tachi in Kaede's village when he've appear coming straight to Kaede's village in his trademark high-speed whirlwind that he have envelope himself in thanks to the results of just simply developing it from his sheer speed alone and was particularly known for, something of which that made the rest of Inu Tachi and Kohaku instantly knew of who it was that it have belong to exactly when they've immediately recongize his trademark whirlwind coming right toward the village of where they are, before the current Northern-Eastern wolf youaki leader reveal himself to them once he've disperse his high-speed tornado that he have envelope himself in when he stopped in front of them and greeted them, moments before his wife Ayame appear right beside her husband's and were soon followed by Ginta and Hakkuku along with a pack of several wolves running after the married wolf youkai pair.
It turns out, the reason of why Kouga came to the village when he told the rest of Inu Tachi that were here, along with Kohaku and Sesshomaru who were listing in on the conversation in silence, was because the young wolf youkai was been informed and have been told by the leaders of a wolf youkai tribe who live in the south-east called the South-Eastern Tribe when they have spoken to him and told the wolf youkai leader who was the current leader of the Northern-Eastern Tribe about it that the members of their clan were being currently attacked and killed by something in the forest near where the South-Eastern Tribe's dens are located and is the cause behind all of these attacks in the first place, with the most of their clan members that are either alone or in groups when it had attacked and killed them were brutally slaughtered in pieces and viciously killed by it but the few that have did manage to survived the attacks were heavily wounded and injured while also were traumized by these attacks. This was the main reason why Kouga have come to Kaede's village as the young North-East Yōrō Tribe leader himself have gotting the gut feeling that he might need Inu Tachi's help, especially Kagome and (much to his own displeasure at this) Inuyasha, to deal with whatever is behind these attacks... before he told them and reveal the name of the forest, Kurasanrin, to them when he offhandingly mention about a village that was located near the forest as well were having the same problem as the South-Eastern Tribe were from what the leaders of that tribe living near that forest have heard, the same forest that Inuyasha and Kagome have went into.
When he was immediately told of this by the rest of Inu Tachi, Kouga said why they didn't say about this sooner when he got here before the young wolf youkai leader immediately took off and quickly envelope himself in his trademark high-speed tornado-like whirlwind before he start speeding off toward Kurasanrin where Inuyasha and Kagome have headed and went to help the people and youkai near or in the forest in the same direction in the fastest speed that he could manage on his own in a instant before either one of them could actually stop him from rushing and heading off on his own, causing Ayame to start running after him while Kirara carried Miroku, Sango, and Kohaku on her back when they immediately got right on her in order to head to the same village near forest that Inuyasha and Kagome have went to after she immediately transformed in her full-grown Youkai form and instantly took off into the air of the blue sky before the two Youkais then start chasing right after the young wolf youkai leader into the same direction of where the married couple have left and went into toward the forest, with Sesshomaru deciding to following them behind on his admission as the Inu daiyoukai suddenly have got the sinking feelings that he couldn't easily shake off in his heart that something bad was going to happen sooner or later if they don't make it in time whether he was with them or not.
It took the group made up of four different Youkais and three related human heading toward the forest of Kurasanrin several hours without stopping for a rest until they have manage to finally the reach the village that is near the aforemention forest at just before it was about to become evening soon. When they've arrived at the village near the forest of Kurasanrin, the group came to the village near to the mouth of the forest on foot until they've saw and see the same crowd made up of both the villagers that are living in the village and the youkai that are living near or in the forest of Kurasanrin standing near the mouth of the forest around the villagers and youkais that were sorting out and reassembling the body parts and pieces of the many murdered corpses and slaughtered bodies of those who were attacked and killed by the thing that was behind these attacks in the forest in the first place into their correct position and places. That is when one of the assortment of youkais who was watching at the outer most part of the crowd, a human-like wolf youkai like Kouga and Ayame, turned his head around when his nose had smelled their scents along with their companions' scents and saw the group standing far from both the human and youkai crowd around of what is going on, instantly recognizing Kouga and Ayame from memories alone due to the detail of their descriptions and have met once them at one of the Wolf Youkai tribes leaders annual meetings at one point or another, before he came up to the group when he split off from the crowd and immediately spoke to them after he walked up to them. "Kouga and Ayame, leaders of the North-East tribe! I didn't expect that you two would be here nor so soon."
"When we heard that a wolf youkai tribe was having a problem they're unable to deal with or get rid of, I just couldn't say no to your tribe's request for help and helping them with this problem they're having due to how grave the situation was." Kouga said before the member of the South-Eastern Wolf Youkai Tribe begun lead both him and the rest of group behind and walked them toward the crowd since he probably know of what is going on in the village right now as the young wolf youkai leader the asked South-Eastern clan member.
"So tell us, why are you doing here in a human village?" Ayame asked, speaking before her husband could say anything else.
"It's simple, really. A few of our clan members have recently went missing without a trace. I was send here to the village to confirmed at least one of them if they were killed by whatever this thing is and bring their chopped up remain back to the clan since we knew the recent series of these attacks must have happen by now and I have more experience of human village than the rest of my pack mates does. So far, that are only one of the youkais' remains that have been brought out of the forest I could confirmed to be one of our missing members."
"But what about the ones that were also killed and murdered by this? Can you confirmed of what they are?" Miroku query, wanting more details and needing more informations to know about the most recent attacks so far from, as he figure out it would be ab good idea to find answers for this, since they answers for this sitatut.
"Well... there are about at least a dozen or so humans, most of which were travellers, and several youkais that belong to a few types and species that were killed. It would be better if you look at the corpses for yourselves. But I'm gonna warn about this; It is NOT for the faint of heart to see."
They took his warning about it seriously since they knew he is most probably serious of this due to the group of human and youkai who came to Kaede's village do not want to provide the precise description of what happened to the bodies of those who were killed.
This cause the crowds around of what is happening to turned their heads when they heard their coming footsteps and saw and seeing the group of 4 youkais and 3 humans were walking toward them after the young youkai wolf leader was done speaking to the sole member of the South-East Tribe in the village currently at the moment.
They continue to walked forward toward the crowds of both humans and youkais who were looking and watching them walking on foot before the crowd then split away right and left in order to let them to walking through to take a look at it and see the corpses for their own themselves. When the group of seven have finally came over to the body parts of the dead bodies that have been manage to be rearranged back of where they originally were, they instantly became horrififed and sicken by the sight of the states of the corpses to the point that even Sesshomaru was appalled and troubled at what he was looking at alone and they immediately knew the reason of why upon seeing the sight for their own: The dead bodies belonging to those of who are killed were all randomly yet cleanly cut and hacked up into pieces with ease by whatever that are causing these attacks when they were attacked by it as the pieces of the dead bodies were just far too random in multiple of pieces in various shapes and sizes to be done by specifically either a human or a youkai that attacked them.
Whatever this... thing... was exactly, one thing is for certain about it: Whatever is behind and causing these attacks and kills, it is certainly something completely different than anything they've faced before.
Now the group of seven immediately understand the reason why behind it and understood of how serious and grave the extent of the situation itself was exactly, they didn't want to waste any more time as soon as they knew about this before Miroku then instantly ask the crowd for one of them to answer a important question about it. "Could one of you please tell us of when Inuyasha and Kagome went into the forest?"
"You mean the pair that we heard about and spoke to when they came a while before you guys came?" One of the villagers asked. Miroku nodded his head at that answer. "They went into the forest of Kurasanrin about a few hours ago before you seven lot shows up and came. We heard the sounds of fightings, like hearing the trees of the forest being broken or tore up into pieces and the ground suddenly shaking or exploding, coming from within the forest, but we didn't dare to investigate it since all of us were far too scared and terrified out of our wits to go and check it out into the forest for ourselves. As all of us don't really know for sure of what to expect and don't want to know of what the sources of those sounds are."
"Don't worry, we can understand the reason behind it of why all of you don't want to do it." Miroku said politely and calmly with an soft tone of voice to them, since they knew that they were distress enough by this situation alone and don't want to make it any more stressful for them since they have a enough stress to deal with this, causing Kouga just grumble at this in sheer irritation and annoyance about being coward about then not checking out, which cause Ayame to nudge her husband.
"Do you know of how long those sounds you heard lasted for through?" Kohaku asked them before his older sister could, wondering the same thing in his mind like Sango.
"Yes. We heard the sounds for about over a few hours until they have stopped, just moments before you lots came."
"What?! Then what are we waiting for?! Let's go into the forest before something happen to the-" Kouga said.
Before Kouga could actually fully finished his sentence of what he was about to say or either his wife, Miroku, or Sango could stop him from what he is planning and going to do next, a shrieking bellow of a unearthly origin and sounding like the winds suddenly filled the air. Everyone immediately frozen in fear and terror at what they heard and what they stopped of what they were doing upon hearing the unearthly shrieking bellow of the haunting and nightmarish quality echoing from the forest of Kurasanrin before turned all of their heads toward the treeline of the forest and to stared at the forest in silence with expressions that is a mixture of both shocked and dread at what they have just heard from it with all of the villagers and youkai looking in complete fear and utter horror at it, causing the three youkais and three humans excluding Sesshomaru to catch cold feets from this with even Kouga looking unnerved of what they heard as they were now worrying and fearing the worst of it, as the sound that they heard coming from the forest of what it belong to wasn't like anything they hear before and does not match of any type or species of youkai that all the seven know about, especially to the three humans and the Inu Daiyoukai himself since they have the best knowledge about Youkais, but one thing certain about it is that, whatever it is, does not belong to this earth. Everyone continue to stared in shocked and terrified silence at the forest of Kurasanrin before Sesshomaru, being only the one who is remaining calm and stoic at light of hearing the shrieking bellow that echo from forest, immediately response to this is to break the rest of the group out of their shock by making a dry comment.
"Hmph. Now I can see why you're so terrified of it now." Sesshomaru said, allowing the rest of the others to get out of their shock at they heard once they have manage to get a grip on this and overcome their shocks before the older of the two youkai taijiyas spoke.
"Is that the sound that some of you mention and spoke about?" Sango asked, worryingly.
"Yes. That is the same sound that we hear on those few nights!"
The group just stood still as they stared in silence at the forest of Kurasanrin of what the echo of the sound itself they just hear came from, sensing nothing, nothing all but the strange energy and power coming from it that they are unfamiliar with and was completely different from the other that they know and are familiar with, with the inu daiyoukai staring at the dark forest in calmness and was only perplex by the sound as it wasn't like anything that he heard before yet he still couldn't shake off the feeling that something bad was going to happen to Inuyasha and Kagome as he couldn't be sure, all before Tesseiga suddenly start pulsating to him and rattling rapidly in its sheath, causing Sesshomaru to looked down at Tesseiga in its sheath while the three youkai and humans turn their head as the daiyoukai spoke. "Tesseiga?"
The four youkais wondered of why Tesseiga is suddenly start to acting up right now, with Sesshomaru fearing the worst possibilities of what happen to the couple despite still looking calm on the outside when he realized the probably reason of why it is now rattling and shaking in its sheath, until their noses have suddenly caught the wind of something that was drifting along in the air amongst the wind coming from the forest and smelled the scent in the air. They immediately recognized of what the scent was exactly. It was smell of blood in the air. The smell of Inuyasha and Kagome's blood drifting in the air. Their eyes instantly widen in fear at the mere implication behind it of what this meant, which Miroku, Sango, and Kohaku saw when they notice the looks of their faces and quickly knew of what is going on from the expressions alones, knowing that whatever it is does not bode well and begun fearing the worst in all of their minds. The group didn't waste any time upon knowing about it now when they now know as Miroku, Sango, and Kohaku swiftly got back right on Kirara's back before the 4 youkais themselves of the group instantly speeded forward and dashed in a great burst of their speed with a intense acceleration when they as they've immediately headed and went right into the dark forest of Kurasanrin. Using the scent of blood in the air as their guide to lead them the way through the rather dense forest to where the hanyo-miko pair are, the group of seven rushed through the forest without heed nor care until they came upon a trail of destruction with multiple of broken trees in pieces and crater of various sizes in the ground laying around in the area and they instantly used it too as a guide to lead to the pair's location while they continue to run and passing by the trees of the forest as fast as possible, running right through the forest of Kurasanrin in order to get there of where the pair are quickly fast with a quick pace of their nimble speed as they hoped that Inuyasha and Kagome were still alive before their worst fears of what happen in the back of their minds would come true by the time they get there, until they manage to reach the location of where the scent itself have leaded them to. When the group came to the location where the scent of Inuyasha and Kagome's blood is coming from and lead them to, both the three humans and four youkais became shocked when all the seven instantly see the... thing... with their own eyes as it was standing and loomed over Inuyasha, still standing in front of it on his legs in defiance against the thing he was facing and bleeding heavily from the wounds and injuries of the damage he was inflicted with from it as hanyo use Tessaiga to lean against for support with his yellow eyes dull and having no sign of life in them and his face completely blank and unreadable to know of what he is feeling and look he was about to lose consciousness and collapse at any moments from the combination of both blood loss, the fatigue of his exhaustion, the shocking trauma that he have endured, and the amount of damages that his body have took against it, with Kagome no where to be seen in sight except for only the pieces of her clothing and the sacred longbow of Mount Azusa laying around the ground before it was about to attack him yet they couldn't make out nor tell of what the thing standing and looming in front of the Inu hanyo himself look like as the darkness and the mist of the forest of Kurasanrin that it is hiding itself in was covering and obscuring its appearance with them could only see and tell a vague shadow of... something... hiding itself in the darkness of the forest, all as it was about to attack Inuyasha.
Sesshomaru and Kouga, upon seeing the... thing... that was behind all of these attacks in the first place within the sights of their eyes despite not able to tell of what it is in the shadow of the forest looming in front of Inuyasha just as it was about to attack the hanyo, swiftly pulled out their weapons Bakusaiga and Goraishi respectively and immediately send and unleashed blasts of green yoki and lightning energy from them at it, causing the thing to instantly dodge their attacks by jumping away from the inu hanyo himself backward with astonishing speed of its quickness and agility before Bakusaiga's Bakushūnami (Explosive Corrosion Wave) and Goraishi's Raikyūha (Lightning Ball Blast) struck the point where the thing was previously was and causing the ground to explode upon impact, stopping the thing from attempting to attack the heavily-injured and wounded hanyo. Inuyasha finally lose consciousness and fainted that cause him to finally all but collapse from the blood loss, exhaustion, trauma, and damage that he endured against as Tessaiga itself then reverted back to its normal state right before his right hand let go of its handle he was holding when he became motionless and dead to the world while his heavily-wounded body start falling down backward toward the ground, but Ayame instantly reacted to this before others could when she rushed straight forward to him and caught the inu hanyo from behind with her arms protectively before he could hit the ground on his back, just as both the blacked out inu daiyoukai and her husband then jumped and landed in front of her in order to protect the shewolf youkai and the injured and out cold form of Inuyasha she is holding in her arms and to face the thing that have hidden itself from their eyes by the shadows and mist standing in front of them while Kirara landed behind her with Miroku, Sango, and Kohaku on her back.
As they stood their grounds and stared at the thing standing in front of them with their eyes in silence while holding their respective weapons out, with Ayame still holding Inuyasha from behind his back with her arms wrapped under his arms as the three humans got off of the nekomata and hold out their own weapons, they sense nothing familiar from it, no yoki, no jaki, not even a haku at all, nothing but the same strange energy and power surrounding them from it, just pure strange energy and power coming from it. Making them knew that one for certain is that, whatever this... thing... is exactly; it is something else completely different from what they used to facing. The thing, whatever it is precisely, hidden itself in the shadow and mist of the forest that was covering and hiding its true appearance of what its truly look like just stood absolutely still in front of the group of seven like it was an monument made purely out of stone as it watched the seven with the unconscious hanyo in one of their arms in total silence, making the seven wonder to themselves in their minds of what is it planning and going to do next, in the soundless silence in the forest of Kurasanrin between them and the thing in front of them that stood in the shadow amongst the trees in the forest... until it have then abruptly begun to suddenly moving backward away from them as it start slowly disappearing and vanishing from their sight into the thickness of the fog and the darkness of the shadow in the forest of Kurasanrin.
Sesshomaru and Kouga immediately unleashed another of their Bakushūnami and Raikyūha attacks from Bakusaiga and Goraishi at the thing just as it was about to vanish from their sight in attempt to stop it from trying to disappear or at least damage it before both of their attacks strike the mere outline of the thing, causing the mist to be completely dispersed and the trees around it to be utterly destroyed in the forest of Kurasanrin by both the sheer blast and energy of their weapons' respective attacks when they saw both Bakushūnami and Raikyūha struck the creature, resulting in a intense shining and blinding light from the colliding energy of their attacks striking the thing all at once, which blinded the seven in the process as they hear it unleashing its shrieking bellow with their ears into the air, until the intense blinding light have finally died down before they reopen their eyes to see... only to see that the thing that they were facing have now vanish without a trace of its existance except for the damages around in the forest when they can see since they could no longer sense the strange energy and power lingering in the forest anymore and the 4 youkais themselves didn't smell a drop of blood in the air, as if it have teleported itself to somewhere else.
Kouga immediately growl in complete anger at this as Sesshomaru just stared of where they last see it with their eyes before it have then vanished in the utter calmness of his sheer rage at this, all while Miroku and Kohaku wonder in their confusion of this at what that thing was exactly as Sango was busy helping Ayame to lifting up Inuyasha's unconscious form right onto Kirara's back in order to take the comatose inu hanyo back to Kaede's village before Myouga, who have soon came into the area when he came, told them (once the inu daiyoukai squeeze him when he used the flea youkai as a sort of stress-reliever and then threaten Myouga of being crushed till he'll died if he didn't reveal what's wrong with Inuyasha when he slipped it passed his mouth) the main reason of why he is in a coma was due to his body taking way too much damage since the amount of damage he took and severely of those same wounds and injures he received from fighting it was faster than he could recovered from, overtaxing his own accelerated healing to the point of overwhelming it, along with amount of the blood loss, exhaustion, and trauma that he experienced, before forcing him into a coma since his body needed to conserving his energy to healing and repairing all of the numerous severe wounds and injuries all over his body, through he doesn't know of how long the coma will be. Kirara immediately took Inuyasha's unconscious form back to Kaede's village with Ayame and flew right into the air toward the village with the shewolf following the nekomata after the flea youkai was done with explaining it before they arrived back at the village and once she was back with the unconscious inu hanyo on her, Inuyasha's comatose body was quickly taken off of the feline youkai's back by the villagers and right into Kaede's hut before he was laid down onto a bed on the floor that have been quickly set up by Kaede with the help of Shippo and Miroku and Sango's children. Inuyasha have remained in bed with a peaceful look on his face as he continue and remained to be in a deep coma for over a few days...
Three days laters...
"And so after three days of being in a coma, you woke up from your three days coma." Miroku said, finishing his explanation, finishing explaining to Inuyasha, of what happen three days ago that cause him to be in a coma for that long.
"I see." Inuyasha became silence at what he have heard from Miroku, after laying back down in the bed he have been unconscious for three day in when Sango had told him to laid back down since he still haven't completely recovered from his wounds and injuries of the damage that he received yet, as he turned his piercing yellow eyes and focused them toward the ceiling of the hut and stared at it in silence while he laid down in the bed as he thought to himself, letting his mind stray and wonder through of what he heard from him. He continue to stared at the ceiling in his silence and he wonder amd thought about the lechous buddist monk's words of what he said in his mind while the inu hanyo and tried to remember of what happen in his and Kagome's battle with the thing before he fainted and went unconscious into his three days coma that by looking into his memories, but his mind was nothing but blank and his own memories came up with nothing but gaps in them, before he decide to ask them a question. "So where's Sesshomaru, Kouga, and Ayame anyway?"
"They're searching and looking for it back in the forest. The tribe of wolf youkai living nearby the are helping them of searching by scouring the forest in order to trying to find it and where it is, but they still don't have any luck of finding it as it maybe already gone by now." Sango answered.
"... I see..." Inuyasha sighed at this and became silence just for a moment... before he notice something off and felt like there was something missing... until he realized that Kagome wasn't here, not anywhere in sight, and immediately ask them in concerned for the safety of his wife. "Where's Kagome? Where is she? What happen Is she okay? Please tell me..."
Miroku, Sango, and Kohaku immediately give a look of pain on their look toward the hanyo before the two Youkai taijiyas turn both of their head away from him as the Buddhist monk then told him.
"...That's the thing, Inuyasha: We don't know. But that is what we wanted to ask you that same question too, Inuyasha: What happen did to Kagome? Do you know what happen to her? Or least, see of what happened to her? Don't pressure yourself and just take your time to answer that question."
Inuyasha was silence at this as he thought to himself before he start searching his memories in his mind in order to remember and know of what happened back there... until a numbing yet throbbing pain have suddenly came rushing into his head when the memories of what happen in the forest start and came rushing right back into his mind and memory. This cause him to widen his eyes in panicking fear at this, when he begun to remember and relieving every single moment of what happen in the forest during his and Kagome's battle against it, causing his mind to be fill up with the same panicking fear he was feeling that was coursing through his body as he jolted up from the bed that he was in when he work out and realized of what the implication behind this meant, causing all of the others sitting around him in Kaede's hut to instantly look in concern for the inu hanyo when they saw the looks in his eyes and suddenly begun hyperventilating, before he immediately got out of the bed when he jumped up onto his feets and rushed out of the hut as he ran straight into the forest named after him as the shoutings of their voices fall deaf on his ears.
'Kagome! Kagome! KAGOME!' These were the only thoughts that Inuyasha was thinking of as he run and rushed through the forest was called after his name when he was sealed against Goskinboku for 50 years with the speed of his legs, ignoring everything around him as he ran passed the trees that was standing tall in the forest and causing any animals to flee in startled fear while subconsciously dodging any obstacles that are standing in his way like fallen trees or immobile rocks, all while he was still hyperventilating with overreacting panic and fear in both his mind and body as he felt those same emotions he was feeling coursing and running through his entire body. He continue to run through the forest in his panic and fears as he let out a single teardrop from his left eye in the panicking fright and fears of his mind and body until he finally stopped at Goskinboku and reach his right hand over to touch its bark's texture of its tree trunk he have felt through it and lean his hand against it in order to support himself on his legs when he have reach and came to the sacred tree as he start hyperventilating in exhaustion against Goskinboku that was near to the hanyo and Kagome's home from running through the forest and feeling the panicking of his fear that have overtaking both his body and mind... before he begun to cry. Crying tears, crying the tears of his sadness and pain he was feeling, in his eyes as his tears that were fulled of his grief and regrets start falling down from his eyes to the ground all while the glowing sun that was sailing across in the clear blue sky was shining its light over the tree as he hid underneath the shadow of the Goskinboku in silence.
Inuyasha rise his head up to look at Goskinboku with his now dull eyes filled with the tears of his grief and pain and slowly moved his right hand toward the center of the tree off of where he have previously placed it at to touch the mark of its scar in the center of the sacred tree, feeling the texture of its woody bark and trunk that his right hand moved over to the mark of the scar that exposed the inside of its wood before the inu hanyo then felt the texture of its scar in the center of it, as the half youkai begun to remember. All as he begun to remember and thinking back those memories of his in his mind. Remembering those memories that belong to him. Remembering those memories that belong to him of the past. Remembering of how he was sealed and put to eternal sleep against the tree of Goskinboku with a single shot of her holy arrow into his body through his heart by Kikyo for 50 years due to Naraku's manipulation that kept him from aging. Remembering of how he first met Kagome when she have came into the past along with the Shikon No Tama unknowingly in her body through the Bone-Eater Well by the Mistress Centipede when the Ōmukade have suddenly pulled the then 15-year old girl right into and through the well before the reincarnation of Kikyo finally pulled the arrow out of his chest to defeat the centipede youkai. Remembering of how he, Kagome, and the other manage to defeat Naraku for good. Remembering of how Kagome wished Shikon No Tama out of existence when she made a selfish wish on it that crease its existance that it granted. Remembering of how he saw Kagome was hugging her family in joy and happiness when they saw that she was safe once she was back to her own time before being forced to separate and were forced to go back to their own time period when the time portal through the Bone-Eater Well was closed. Remembering of how much that he missed her for three years after the time portal closed when he visited the Bone-Eater Well for three days and nights. And he remember of how Kagome came back to the Feudal Era through the Bone-Eater Well when the time portal of the Bone-Eater Well reactivated for the last time to let Kagome go back to be with Inuyasha for good before the time portal closed for the last time. He remember of just how happy he was of Kagome coming back to the Feudal Era despite knowing that she will never see her family again all in order to be with him before they soon married each other... before he remember their battle against the one, the one that was causing the attacks in the forest of Kurasanrin, with the Inu hanyo himself unable to remember of what it look like when he got in close to fight it at close-range several times with Tessaiga, until everything became white as both his body and mind suddenly felt burning sensation of the pain that course and flown through the entirety of his body and mind like it was an rushing flash flood of burning hot lava with every moments that he remember from his memories after feeling the pain was nothing but a mere blur to him in his memories before he finally loose conscious and fainted when he collapse from the amount of damage, blood loss, exhaustion, and mental trauma that he took and experience into a total blackout of his mind before he fell into deep coma for three days.
Inuyasha was in silence with his eyes that are hidden under the bang of his white hair as he kept his right hand in the same place on Goskinboku's scar right in the center of where he was shot into his heart by Kikyo with that same sacred holy arrow that shot into his heart and have him sealed into Goskinboku all those same years ago with his tears of his grief and pain continue to rolling down his face in his silence... before he shot his head straight up and howled. 'KAGOME...!' He let out a howl, letting out a howl of sorrow and misery that was heard across the land when it travel far and wide from the closest being Kaede's village where everyone in the village heard it when the rest of Inu Tachi were about to go looking for the inu hanyo himself in the forest to the farthest being Sesshomaru and some of the North-East Tribe members including Kouga and Ayame who are just coming back from searching for it before the inu daiyoukai himself and the wolf youkais heard the howl when they pick the sorrowful howl up with their ears, all as Inuyasha continue to woefully howl the despairing pain of his sorrow and misery...
"But in all seriousiness..." Shippo said as his voice and expression became serious now when he sat right back in his spot at the table, after Inuyasha transformed Tessaiga and sheathe the transforming sword back into its scabbard, before the 10-tailed kitsune told the hanyo. "The main reason of why I am here is that I heard that you two were currently in a deep funk. So I came here to check it out to confirm the rumors for myself, since I was concern for you guys' mental and emotional health. I want you to answer a question to me honestly about it: Are you two are really feeling okay and alright?"
Inuyasha was silence at that question... before his eyes and face became dull and depress at the thoughts as he hid his eyes underneath the bang of his hair when he looked down toward the floor and let out a sadden sigh at this before he ultimately answer his friend's question about what they are feeling right now in a calm yet melancholia voice that was full of despair and melancholic. "...No. No we're not, Shippo: No matter of how much informations that we could gather from multiple of reliable sources or how hard that we tried to find in where we are looking for it in of where that the thing is might be located at, we still can't find it. Even 500 years later, we still haven't found it yet nor discovery of where it is currently at right now, not even a single lead of where it is even at, which is just discouraging. The fact it's been almost 500 years now is not helping the matter. This is just discouraging to the both of us since we have been trying hard to find it yet we still haven't even manage to find a lead of where it is exactly right now at this time." The hanyo then raise his head to look at the 10-tailed fox, inevitably showing his eyes were now dull to reflect the state of depression he was in with a single teardrop rolling down his face from his right eye when he explained to Shippo. "It's been almost 500 years now, 500 years Shippo, and not only that we still don't know and have zero clue of where it is in the world now, but we're still not close and haven't made much progress to our goal of breaking the curse inflicted on us. What it is worse, we're not even sure if it actually is still here the world now. Which is just discourage and dishearten us to know it's been that long and we are still on the same level on reaching our dream from being free of this curse. So no, Shippo. We're not okay. We're not alright in our mind or emotions, not at all..."
Inuyasha then raise his right hand up and using it to wipe and rubbing the teardrop off of his face with the back of his right hand after making that calm yet at the same time emotional response and confession to him and his answer before dropping his right hand back down as he looked back down toward the floor with his dull eyes and dejected face that are fulled of dispiriting depression and crushing despair at this. Shippo give the inu hanyo a sympathy and understanding look on his face as he knew and understand of what he is getting at, since it is the main root and cause of their bout and periods of funk and depression but it still doesn't make it any less emotional and depressing for the couple, before the 10-tailed kitsune then talk to him after letting Inuyasha get his emotion under check once he have got it back under his control.
"So you and Kagome spoke to each other in your mind?"
"Yes. Yes, we did."
"Did you two talked to each other about the past?"
"... How did you know that when I didn't even actually say it?"
"Because I know of how you two are feeling, right now. Trust me, I know of how painful it is to remembering the memories of the past. Remember how my father was killed by Hiten and Manten before I met you and Kagome back then? It was painful for me back then and it's still painful for me now." Shippo said with a sympathy yet sadden tone in his voice as he give a bitter and sadden smile on his face when he remember that particular memory of so long ago in his mind with that same bitter and sadden smile of his expression on his face. "It'll never get easy with those types of memories when you remember them, especially for the first time, even after such a long time when they already happened and you have already accept of what have happened in the past had happened in the past now, yet it doesn't make it any less emotional and depressing when you remember them. So I can understand and know not only you and Kagome's pain but how you two are feeling too right now, Inuyasha. I know and can understand it too well."
"...Even that doesn't make me and Kagome feel any better, I can at least thank you on our behalf for your consideration and honesty, Shippo..."
"You don't need to thanks me for that. Speaking about remembering the memories of the past and you two spoke to each other about the past... did you and Kagome talked to each other about how you two became first aware of your curse when you became bored and lead your mind to remembering it when it happened for the first time? Since I figured that it is one of most likely the main reason of your most recent bout of depression right now."
Inuyasha became silence as he didn't give a immediate answer to the 10-tailed kitsune, but that was enough of an answer for Shippo to know, before he slowly turn his head up to look at the ceiling of his and Kagome's apartment and remember, remembering it, remembering of how he and Kagome became first aware of their curse when it had happened for the first time to them 500 years ago...
It's been a few hours after Inuyasha have awoken up from his deep three days coma, rushing out of Kaede's hut and into the forest, and letting out the howl of his sadness and pain. The inu hanyo sat inside of his and Kagome's hut with his yellow eyes, whose eyes once sharp and was filled and shine with reflecting life, were now dull and lifeless with the lack of pupils in them that are completely bare and utterly void of the life in them, baring no life in them, having no shine and reflection of life in them as his once sharp and now monotonous yellow eyes were completely void and utterly empty of that same reflecting life, not any hint of that shining and reflecting natural life of the hanyo himself in them at all, and his face was just barren and void, empty and devoid of emotion, with a blank expression on his face that he wored and wearing having zero signs of emotion and was equally with life, without any kind of emotions and sort of life in his expression and on his face of his with a stare of a thousand yard into the empty space, like it was just a mask that is covering his real face and emotion on the inside of his grieving heart that was broken by the grief and misery of his sorrow he felt and experiencing with the teardrops of those same feelings continue to fall and drop from his dull and monotonous lifeless eyes as it expressed and reflected nothing on his face but the great pain of his sadness, as he hold and clench the Sacred Longbow of Mount Azura, one of the few things that he have left of Kagome, tightly around in his arms and close to his chest and body, all while Kirara is in her full-grown Youkai form and laying down on the floor of the hut on her side and she was just curled around behind his back with her body against his back for him just in case if he wanted to laid down to rest on her body, provided if he actually wanted to rest and sleep, in order to comfort and support the hanyo through the misery and sorrow that he was feeling in this state of his emotions, but he didn't greet the nekomata youkai herself nor acknowledge the existence of her presence behind his back and didn't show any signs of life in his eyes nor sorts of the emotions on his face.
Inuyasha wasn't even emotionally alive. He wasn't even emotionally alive in his emotional state of his depression, misery, and despair emotions and mood he was in at this time. He didn't reacted nor responded to anything happening around in his surrounding like any of his friends tried to talking and speaking to him, which he didn't hear a word of what they are saying, nor their attempts to snap him of it in a more physical means like shaking him, which just shook his body limply, or a punch across his face, which he just ignored, in order to get a reaction out of him and snap him out of his current emotional state of his heart and soul, the same despairing misery and grief that overtook his heart and soul in his body, he was in. Not even Shippo throwing multiple of his Spinning Acorns right at his face nor his begging and crying him to snap out of his state could get a reaction out of the inu hanyo, all as he continue to hold and clutch the Sacred Longbow of Mount Azura close to his body.
Miroku, Sango, Kohaku, Rin, and Kaede were standing outside at the enterance of Inuyasha and Kagome's house as they look and watch with a look of worried concern and pitiful sympathy for what the hanyo himself is feeling at the sight of him sitting frightly still like a stone statue on the floor of his and his wife's now seemingly empty and lonely hut without Kagome and not reacting nor responding with dull yellow eyes that were lifeless and a face void of his emotions except for the grief and misery of the sadness he was feeling, having retreated in his, retreating so far in his mind that he may as well be dead, while Shippo was crying tears of helplessness with the same look of helplessness as his emotion on his face that was the same expression back when Miroku, Sango, and Kagome were both poisoned by Mukotsu's poison, as he beg Inuyasha to break and snap out of his depression, the state of the miserable depression of his sadness and grief, that he was in as he continue to cradling the Sacred Longbow of Mount Azura in his arms close to his chest.
Sesshomaru and the two wolf youkais, just minutes after they have arrived back from looking and searching in the forest of Kurasanrin for it when the search have proven itself to be now fruitless, came to the hut and walked over to the group of five who were standing outside at the entrance of the hut before the four humans turned their heads when they heard footsteps behind them with some of them sensing the aura of their yoki and saw the three youkai when they came over to them at the entrance of the hut with Rin ran over up to the inu daiyoukai to hug him, just as Miroku spoke. "Ah. Sesshomaru. Kouga and Ayame. Hello."
"Hey." The wolf youkai leader said to the buddhist monk. "How are you doing.
"Most of us are doing fine. Most of us. I see that you three have came here rather soon, since I didn't expect you here to have come so soon. Did your search go well?"
"No. Whatever the thing that was is now gone. We can't even get a scent of where it is now, since it's scent just suddenly disappear from the entire forest. Which meant that, whatever that thing is exactly, it is gone from the forest for good without a trace for us to lead on." Kouga said as he then growl angrily at the last sentence while he put his fist in the palm of his other hand. "Which have just fucking piss me off to no end at the thought of it!"
"Hmph. Although I don't like of how you have phase it. But what the wolf youkai have said about our search is, unfortunately, true." Sesshomaru said, telling them this, confirming the truth of Kouga's words, since he couldn't smell the scent of the thing in the forest too.
"Oh..." Sango said.
"What about Inuyasha? How is he taking? Is he...?" Ayame quickly asked worryingly, worried and concern for the hanyo's mental and emotional health of how he is taking it.
Miroku and Sango give a unsure and sad look with a pained expression on their faces to the three before they look each other and look back to the inside of the hut when the female youkai taijiyas told them with a sad expression on her face. "See for yourself, through he's still reeling in from the shock."
Sesshomaru, Kouga, and Ayame then looked and saw Inuyasha sitting silently inside of the hut with the Sacred Longbow of Mount Azura close to his body and adopt a look of their condolence sympathy, adopting the same look as the five humans' expression, with Sesshomaru being the least obvious out of them due to his calm expression and demeanour still remaining the same and there were only hints of it since he was able to kept himself calm and collected with a clear head and control and restaint his emotions but he still was and felt sympathy to his younger hanyo half-brother's blight beneath that stoic and calm demeanour of his, for the inu hanyo of what he was feeling and dealing with right now. All before Kouga asked Miroku in concerned.
"Hey. Is Inuyasha alright right now?" Kouga asked in concern for the hanyo.
"No. He's not. Inuyasha is not alright. Not right now at least." Miroku answered.
"Is he going to be okay? Do you think he's going to be okay?" Ayame asked. "I mean, do all of you really think that he is going to be okay?"
"We don't know. Is he going to be okay? Maybe. Maybe in time? Yes. In time, yes. But soon? No. No, of course not. Inuyasha had retreated into his own world in his mind that he may as well be dead. He'll come out of it eventually in time. How soon? How soon exactly? How soon he'll come out of this exactly? We don't know. While Inuyasha will come out of this in time, but he won't be the same he was before. That we know about. But how much? We don't know. We don't know for sure. That much we know. That much we know about these questions and the answers to them."
"...I see..." Kouga said, being unusual quiet of this, something of which that everyone present have easily notice from him, as he give a frustrated scrowl at the thought of being helpless at this, something that he absolutely hate with an fine passion, and shifted his shoulders a bit to make himself more comfortable.
"You know, Miroku. Do you remember the time? Remember the time back when Inuyasha and Kagome were separated for three years?" Sango asked her husband, which he nodded his head in confirmation as he still remember that particular memory as of even now, as she spoke and told Miroku. "That's how Inuyasha was and acted when he came back through the Bone-Eater Well after Kagome was placed back to her time period before the time portal closed. He couldn't take the pain of being separate from her and her gone from his life so he shut himself off at the Bone-Eater Well, as he is now."
"Ah yes, I remember that. I still do remember that well, Sango." Miroku noted and remarked on it with his right hand under his chin and thought about it. "Back when he have came back in the Bone-Eater Well, Inuyasha had shut himself off from the world from the mere thought of being separated from Kagome and her gone from his life have cause him to retreat back into his own world of his mind when he acted just like this right now for a while as he stood over the Bone-Eater Well for about a few days, like how he is acting right now."
"Will he ever get better?" Rin asked, sadly, as she spare a glance back toward Inuyasha.
"I-I don't know honestly. Maybe?" Kohaku said awkwardly and unsure to Rin, wasn't sure of his own answer to this, since he knew all too well of the loss of someone close to you like a family member and friends but he can't explain it well since- well, you know -was the one who have killed his own family and friends against his own will via a mind control and mind manipulation by Naraku and thus is not confidence in himself of his ability of explaining it well. "I-I think he will maybe him better but it might take Inuyasha long time for him to get better."
"It's not that simple, kid." Kouga said, causing everyone present to look and stared at the male wolf youkai in surprised when he suddenly spoke to Kohaku, as the wolf youkai knew of the pain that Inu hanyo have right now and thus can understand his pain quite well on his own, before he told them. "Kagome is his wife and married her since they both loved each other. I could see for why they loved each other as they loved each other for who they are and they don't care for what they are. Inuyasha and Kagome's relationship with each other are like that of a pair of wolves who are willing to live with each other for life as they're faithful and loyal to each other and stay by each other's sides for the rest of their life if they loved each other that much. This is the reason of why Inuyasha and Kagome loved and married each other for that reason, they're willing to remain with each other and stay by each other's sides for the rest of their life for that long as they're faithful and loyal to each other since they are in loved with each other that much. If one of them died, the other then would sink into depression that is fueled by their pain and grief when their mate died to the point of emotionally dying and cause them to no longer react to anything in their surrounding for a while, this is what Inuyasha is feeling now as he have lost the person that he loved the most, that is the reason why that he's in this state now and is not responding to any of us right now as he it will take a long time before he'll slowly come out of it..."
"...Hmph. Impressive. I'm quite impressive that you could understand one of the main reasons why Inuyasha is in this state in one way, but that is not only the main reason and not only way of looking at it why he is in this state and feeling right now, as there is more to it than that..." Sesshomaru said, causing everyone to look at him, as he spoke when he told them. "Ever heard about Yin and Yang? I assume that one of you must have heard about it."
"You mean both the concept and the symbol from Taoism? Because I do. I have heard about it before." Miroku said, knowing from his experience as a Buddhist monk, before he explained it in greater amount of details. "It is a philosophy concept from Taoism that describe the seemingly opposite forces that are interconnected and interrelated to each other, with the symbol of Yin and Yang being two interlocking spiral of opposite different colors to symbolize the forces that they represent with two black-and-white dots superimposed on them respectively that form a circle together called a Taijitu that symbolize the dualities that present the dual nature of those opposite forces. Is that what you're talking about?"
"Yes. You are correct, monk. That is what I am precisely talking about." Sesshomaru said as he then resume and continue to explained them. "One way you could look at their relationship is that Inuyasha and Kagome's relationship are like Yin and Yang themselves, with Kagome being the Yin as she is calm and peaceful and Inuyasha being the Yang as he is harsh and aggressive. Basically, Kagome being the Yin to Inuyasha's Yang and vice visa of Inuyasha being the Yang to Kagome's Yin. Without either the Yang or the Yin, the other cannot live without the other. After all, what is either the Yang or the Yin without either the Yin or the Yang? This is what Inuyasha is feeling as he not only lost the one that he loved the most, but who is also the Yin to his Yang. This is only one of the main reasons and way to look at of what he is feeling right now. And this is not the first time I seen him like this too, he was like this when his mother suddenly died back when he was young. He was like this after his mother's death back when he was still a child back then and was still recovering from the shock of her sudden death and passing with his own eyes when he running for his life through a forest that he ran while he was being chased by the many youkais living in the forest lead by a severely-impaired daiyoukai, whose name I can't really nor bother to remember anyways, who wanted revenge on our father for making him impaired in the first place by cutting and chopping Inuyasha up into pieces slowly when he is still a young child and at his most vulerable, so naturally I had to step in before he could do it to Inuyasha despite my own disstain for hanyos like any youkai back then when I was just passing through before I dispatch and killed both the severely-impaired daiyoukai and the youkais that were following him with ease... Of course, I only did it and the only reason of why I did it at all despite my disdain for hanyo back then was because I find killing hanyo of when they are young and at their most weakest and vulnerable to be distasteful to me and a insult to my pride as I was too prideful and proud but still honorable in a way of my pride, so my pride wouldn't dare allow it to happen at what he was trying to do since I consider him trying to kill Inuyasha when he was that young a indirect insult to me and killed him for it. The point is that Inuyasha cannot live without Kagome since she is the one that he loved the most and who is the Yin to his Yang, and would take him a long time to recover from the despair of his grieving pain and sadness, but my main concern for my younger half-brother is that he'll either end up never go through a day without crying and mourning for Kagome's sudden disappearance and possible death in the sorrow of his sadness or the anger of his grief and pain will be such that it will cause him transformed into a full-fledge demon and he'll have to be restaint in order for him to calm himself down and get himself and his emotions under control in order to prevent him from destroying everything in sight before his body could gave out or he could be killed by a stronger opponent once he have recovered from his shock and depression."
"Oh." Rin said as everyone turned to looked back at Inuyasha still sitting and cradling the Sacred Longbow of Mount Azura in the now seemingly alonely hut with Kirara still behind him and give him a sympathetic and pitied look for him not only for his loss of Kagome and the pain and sadness that he felt of losing Kagome, but the end results of when he recovered from his shock and depression, yet the inu hanyo will never be the same as he was before either ways. All as Inuyasha to cradle Sacred Longbow of Mount Azura which belong to his wife in his arms close to his chest in the despair and depression of his sadness and pain at his loss of Kagome.
All before Kouga begun cursing, letting out general profanity and expletives, from his mouth to himself at being unable to get there sooner and faster before Kagome is gone and he felt being unable to help, which he hate the most of with all of his passion, as he can't help but to mostly blame himself for it. "Damnit! Damnit! Goddamnit! God fucking damnit! God fucking damnit all of this! If only we have got there sooner before he lost Kagome, then Kagome would have been still alive and Inuyasha wouldn't be suffering in this state like this!"
Nobody could blame the wolf youkai for what he was feeling right now as they felt all the same way as well...
Hours later into the night...
It have been now hours later after the five humans and the four youkais have left Inuyasha and Kagome's hut, with Kirara staying behind and inside of the hut in order help Inuyasha and give comfort to the still grieving and suffering hanyo. It was now dusk at this time of the night, with the moon and the millions of stars having now appear in the darkness of the night sky as the sun was nearly finished setting below the horizon. Inuyasha was still mourning and grieving in his pain and sadness for Kagome, still out of it in his mourning and grieving of his pain and sadness at his wife Kagome now possible died and gone from his life once more, with his dull eyes and monotonus face remaining nothing that reflect his lifeless and emotionless state he was and remaining silence as he continue to cradle the Sacred Longbow of Mount Azura in his arms close to his chest, sitting on the spot that he never moved from like a stone statue sitting outside in the falling droplets of the rain from the grey storm above, and was still no longer reacting nor responding to his surrounding, not even Kirara comforting him with her while sitting behind his back could even get a response or reaction out from the hanyo, in the silence of his emotional state of his depression at the mere loss of Kagome in his life and couldn't do nothing when it happened. The inu hanyo continue to remain silence at this and holding and cradling the Sacred Longbow of Mount Azura around in his arms tightly close to his chest where his heart was in with his face still blank of nothing but the lifeless and emotionless state, which unnerved Kirara by the lack of anything from him since it wasn't normal for him to be lifeless and emotionless for this long but she manage to kept herself calm and continue to watch him in silence just in case when he ever need comfort if he ever get out of this state, as he look out through the window of his and Kagome's hut at the blue moon now hanging in the night sky and the sun nearly finishing disappearing below the horizon with his dull eyes and his wife's bow still being cradle tightly in his arms before he said one word when he manage to finally speak again.
"...Kagome..." Inuyasha said in his broken voice that were bare of life or emotion that he had in his voice, remembering all the memories and the good times that he and Kagome have shared together from the time they first meet to when Kagome return to the Feudal era to be with him foor goodeven if it meant that she'll separated from her family she loved for good and the hanyo will unfortunately outlived her due to his longer lifespan, with his eyes tearing up and the tears begun to fall from his eyes as he begun to cried the tears of his grief and sorrow at this all before the sun finally fully gone down right below of the horizon in the west as dusk itself have now fully became night.
When the sun finally have finished and fully went down below horizon, Inuyasha immediately felt a burning sensation in his body when he have begun to feel it without warning in just a mere instant just after the sun went down, causing him to instantly jolt and snapped him right out of the emotional state of his depression and breaking him from crying the tears of his misery and regrets while also have immediately causing him to become emotionally alive once more and his life to instantly return to both his eyes and face when he abruptly felt the burning sensation with the pulsating and throbbing pain and sheer intensity of it this that have came with it throughout in his entire body that cause him to let go and dropped the Sacred Longbow of Mount Azura from his arms down to the floor of the hut to wrap his arms around himself, taking Kirara by complete shock and surprised at what was just happening before her, before he crouch and fell down to the floor of his and Kagome's hut on his knees with his arms immediately wrapped right around his torso in his pain and agony, the pain and agony that he was feeling and felt in his entire body he was suffering from and tortured by, as his entire body then start spasming and shuddering severely and violently out of control all in matters of seconds as he immediately let and cried out a scream of pain and agony at what he was feeling from this burning sensation.
"GGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
Back at Kaede's village, the group were now currently at Kaede's hut of where Miroku, Sango, Kohaku, Kouga, Ayame, and Sesshomaru were discussing with each other of what to do next since- whatever that thing was -is gone from the forest of Kurasanin now while Shippo and Rin were playing with each other in order to distract themselves from what is going on for the time being... before they stopped of what they were doing when a scream, a crying and wailing scream that was rather quite familiar to them, fulled of pain and agony that pierce through the night sky to filled the peaceful air and broke the peace and calmness of the night with the pain and agony of what it was feeling and tormenting it from the forest with the same name as Inuyasha.
The group were silence for a moment at what they have just heard now as a small gust of wind blew by the village with some leaves across the ground... before all of them recongize of who that scream belong to when Shippo start shouting in a panicking voice upon recongizing it of who it belong to and immediately became scared at the mere thoughts of what is happening to him now. "Inuyasha! It's Inuyasha! That scream is Inuyasha!"
Sesshomaru was, out all of them, the one who is keeping himself calm the most as he thought about it calmly and carefully with a clear mind as he notice that something was off and the painful sound of his younger half-brother's scream was somehow familiar to his ears until he
remember from his memories that he long knew about and immediately realized of what this was before he lifted his head up and spoke to Miroku. "So tell me, monk. About tonight..."
"Why are you asking that?" Miroku raise a eyebrow at that, the buddhist monk wondering of why he is asking that question at a time like this.
"Because what is for tonight on a clear night like this?"
Everyone present suddenly understood of what Sesshomaru is saying to them and now knew of what the Inu daiyoukai himself is getting at exactly...
"W-What is h-happening to m-me?" Inuyasha painfully groaned and agonizingly moaned in pain and agony to himself at the tormenting pain that he was feeling now in his body, wondering in his mind of what this pain that is torturing him was or where did it came from but his thoughts in the mental landscape of his mind were all but becoming a misty haze, as his body start and was now trembling and shuddering violently and uncontrollably at the flaming sensation of the pain and agony that have its grip tightly around over the hanyo and his body like an snake whose body that was made up of still burning and blistering embers and ashes that have coiled itself around him and his body in order to strangle and suffocating him from asphyxiate in part to the lack of air in his lungs and making him suffer at metaphorical hands of the aching feelings that he was racked with and was hurting him from the inside of his own body but yet at the same time, the feelings of this sensations that he was feeling have felt somewhat familiar to him in his mind that made him remember his own memories like back when he was still a young child before he had reach his teenage years and back when his mother was still alive before her death back then from somewhere in those memories of his, like that one time until he remember from the memories of his younger days that it was the feeling and sensation back when it was during the process that he have first transformed into a human on the night of a new moon on that mouth for the first time in his life, making him ponder to himself if that is the case once his mind was at least still clear enough for him to think clearly and distinctly while both he and his body were still trembling and shuddering uncontrollably from the intense and extreme feelings of the raging sensation in his body that he felt was hurting him from within his own body before he lifted his head up and look through the window at the moon of the night... Only to see that it was a full moon hanging along with the millions of twinkling and shining stars in the beautiful night sky. The inu hanyo became confused by this with his face expressing his bemused reaction and confusion to this when he notice the current phase of the moon and wonder about this in the thoughts of his mind when they were still clear but were not hazy yet at the moment of what is going and wrong with himself exactly all before the hanyo suddenly felt burning sensation of the pain and agony that he have felt in his entire body suddenly and abruptly came back into his entire body and spread throughout his body in full force like an rushing wave of flaming and burning lava from a exploding volcano toward him with intensified strength and redouble force of its tormenting and torturing power that it have over him with a vengeance of its tormenting pain and torturing agony back into his body that made him feel like he was being burn from the inside out of his own body and turning his thoughts into nothing than a misty haze in his mind, causing him to let out a crying and howling scream at the extreme amount of both his pain and agony at this burning sensation he was feeling that was making him suffer and feeling like as if his body was on fire by the roaring flames and burning inferno from that same burning sensation that was making him suffer by giving the pain and agony of what it like to be engulfed by a fiery and burning inferno of fire, letting out a loud crying and howling scream at the intense amount of the burning sensation of the pain and agony he felt.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
Inuyasha immediately fell his head back down to face back toward the floor with his arms still wrapped around himself as his body continue trembling and shuddering uncontrollably from the extreme feelings of the burning sensation all over his body, and let out a growl of his pain that he was suffering from the burning sensation of this pain and agony throughout his entire body from his throat. This what snapped Kirara out of her shock after a moment of being took by the stunned shock at what was happening just now and the nekomata reacted to this with quick swiftness of what is happening right by going to the hanyo's side and wrapped her body around him in order to comfort him from the burning sensation of the suffering pain that he is feeling and was tormenting him and to check and see of what is causing this, wondering if remembering his loss of Kagome back at the forest of Kurasanin was the cause of this, all before the hanyo manage to speak through the pain. "W-W-What is this feeling and w-what is wrong with me right now?!" Inuyasha spoke and growled those words out through intense amount of agony and misery that is torturing him, only for him to notice that his voice have became more high pitch than normal and made him sound more... feminine, making him shocked and confused by this and wonder what is going on with himself and his body until he suddenly sense and felt another presence in his mind and its... its presence in his mind was, somehow, familiar to the inu hanyo that was comforting to him to the point of it being rather relaxing and calming him down from the intense sensation of the pain that made him misery as he express a dazed smile on his face at the calmness of this presence... all before the burning sensation of the pain in every muscles and bones of his body return back with a vengeance like the scorching heat and flaming fire of a utterly ancient dragon that was far more hotter than even the temperature of a lightning bolt itself breathing down onto him multiple of times, causing the hanyo to yelp in pain like a dog... in a two different dual voices, with one being his normal voice and the other being a female voice, which have took Kirara by surprised when she heard it, at once. "AH!" Inuyasha begun to groan, moan, and growl in not only the severe amounts of complete pain and utter agony from this, but he was also scared at this, scared at what is happening to himself while the burning sensation of the pain and agony themselves in every muscles and bones in his body was slowly changing and rearranging his body and it was making him scared like the little boy that he once was back when his mother died on that day, wishing for the burning sensation of those pain and agony in his body in his mind to stop and tell it go away but he's unable to come up with words to speak nor unable to think the thoughts inside of the mental landscape, with his eyes shut closed tightly and his body continue to tremble and shake in a mixture of the burning pain and the traumatic fear he was feeling in both his body and his heart with the crying tears of his painful and scared feelings of what is happening to him as he felt both of his fangs and claws shrinking and pulling back in, his ears changing shape and moving downwards when they have disappear from the top and reappear to the sides of his head, his body slowly shrinking in height, his shoulders were becoming more narrow and thinning out, his arms and legs becoming much more slender and feminine in shape, and his facial features changing with his face becoming thin and slender and his closed sharp and keen eyes were becoming more rounded and feminine while Kirara saw with her eyes the thick mane of the inu hanyo's waist-length silver white hair start darkening until it'd became completely black like his human form and the tone of his skin was becoming more lighter in color with his voice slowly turning more and more high-pitch by the seconds as Inuyasha continue to groan in scared pain and traumatic fear.
Kouga instantly arrived at Inuyasha and Kagome's hut when he was envelope in the whirlwinds of his cyclone that is created by his own sheer speed alone just moments before Miroku, Sango, Sesshomaru, and Ayame have immediately arrived, with the two humans riding on A-Un since Kirara was still at the hut and the Inu daiyoukai decide to allow them to ride on the two-headed herbivorous dragon in order to come to the house before the Buddhist Monk-Youkai Taijiya couple got off of the said two-headed herbivorous dragon and quickly thanking the youkai for giving them a ride to quickly to get the hut. Once they have got off of A-Un, Miroku and Sango quickly ran toward the hut before going into the hut by going through the noren and enter it, where they saw Inuyasha, or at least who they assumed is Inuyasha due to his hair being black like his human form and his back facing toward them while the shadow of the hut was covering his head with only the gleaming moonlight providing the light by the moon into the hut to see for themselves and saw the droplets of the tears falling down onto the floor, crouching down on the floor and leaning his body forward on his knees with his arms still wrapped right around him and his body continue to tremble and shudder in pain and fear even after the burning sensation of the pain and agony that he felt was now long gone with Kirara curled up against in order to give him comfort before Miroku calmly spoke to the inu hanyo, or what at least he assume to be him, in concern for him. "Inuyasha, are you okay? Please tell us. We need to know. To know of how you are feeling. Since we're here now. Are you feeling alright, Inuyasha?"
"Miroku is right, Inuyasha. We're here now. So don't worry, Inuyasha. We're here for you. Your friends, Inuyasha. Here to support you through your time of needs. All of us are." Sango said softly, softly to the hanyo as she knew all too well of the feeling of losing someone who is close to you, taking each of her steps slowly as she told Inuyasha in the soft and comforting tone of her voice. "So please tell us, Inuyasha. Are you alright? Don't worry about it, we're all here for you."
The person that Kirara curled and wrapped around herself in order to give them comfort from what they have felt continue to tremble and shudder for a while longer until their body slowly and finally stop trembling and shuddering in pain and fear once the trauma they felt from the burning sensation of its pain and agony that they have felt in their entire body was now finally over...
...Only for Kagome to suddenly reveal herself when she suddenly turn her head to face Miroku and Sango with the crying tears of both the pain, the misery, and the trauma that she cried were now staining her cheeks and her face from her now dull and lifeless brown eyes that were once full of shining emotions and reflecting life, taking both Miroku and Sango by surprised and were in shock of this, before she finally spoke to them and ask them in her scared and stained voice that was fulled of dull pain, miserable sadness, and traumatic fears that she was feeling right now and she was scared and traumized by not only the transformation but the memories of what happen to her and Inuyasha, by all of this, when she asked Miroku and Sango. "Miroku... Sango... What is happening to us...?"
Inuyasha remained silence as both he and Kagome, in their shared mental landscape with each other, remember and look back at their memories of the past when they remember and thought back to those memories, remembering and thinking on those same memories of the past, of how they became first aware of their curse in their shared mental landscape with each other for a moment with his dull and monotone eyes that were fulled of unhappiness and woe at this that are staring at the ceiling of his and Kagome's apartment before he let out a calm sigh when he dropped his head back down and spoke to Shippo. "... Yes. We did, Shippo. And you're right about remembering the past, it is painful to remember those sort of memories. Especially how painful and traumatic it was on that night for us when we became aware of the curse inflicted on us."
"Yeah. The ones that are the most painful and the most traumatic for you are sometimes the ones that are first to come to mind. That I can understand." Shippo said.
"Feh. How true it is of what you said, indeed." Inuyasha said before his eyes fall right onto the table of his and Kagome's apartment while Kirara was back in her kitten form as he continue to speak to the ten-tailed kitsune. "But yeah, what you said is true. Me and Kagome talked and discuss in our mind about the past when we remember of how we became cursed, and how became aware of it and how it work for the first time. That same curse placed on us that cause me and Kagome to shared and occupied the same body with the both of us keeping our traits, but with only one of us being present at a time and can be only present during either the day or the night since we switch place depending on the time of the day, with me present during the day from the morning and Kagome present during the night from evening without the use of a jewel called Hi-In Jewel, a special magical jewel that have the power of the day and night that can allow us freely switch places as we pleased but the only downside to it is that it would take a far longer time to make along with acquiring the skills in order to create a single one of them than the making and creation of a single Black Pearl, which appear to be true since the one that we ordered from Housenki is still being made as of this time now and it would still years for it to be complete. This is the information of what we got from another flea youkai who is also Myouga's drinking buddy who knows about the Hi-In Jewel after getting out some informations from that damn flea before both of them ran away when we weren't looking. Keh. Damn coward as always." Inuyasha said to himself with his arms crossing together while his eyebrow was twitching and rubbing his forehead in irritated annoyance, all while Kagome just mentally rolled her eyes at all of this. "I mean, I am not surprised that Kagome is even no longer surprised by Myouga's constant disappearance by that point."
"Hehehe. Could have fool me if it weren't for the fact that I know when I am fooled or not. But I understand." Shippo chuckled before he took a sip from a glass of his drinkable yogurt drink.
"Anyways..." Inuyasha wearily sighed at this before he resume speaking to the 10-tailed kitsune. "We did talk and discuss with each other about it. Since me and Kagome are just so... frustrated with this, both our current predicament thanks to our curse and how it is taking to make that Hi-In Jewel I... we guess I needed to let it out to you about it, since we are just so frustrated by all of this. Thank for being a friend, Shippo."
"Hey, that's what friends are for, Inuyasha. So you're welcome."
"...Mmh..." Inuyasha mumbled and sighed in acknowledgement before he then slowly got up from the floor as he stood right up on his two feets while scratching his head with his left hand. "I'm going to the bathroom..." Inuyasha said to himself before the inu hanyo walked over to his and Kagome's bathroom of their apartment...
The moment that the hanyo-miko couple became aware of each other's presence in their mind and their shared body that both their souls were occupying, and were both unknowingly sharing their body at that time as Inuyasha didn't actually know about this when the hanyo first woke up from his deep three-days coma since Kagome was still sealed and dormanting inside of his mind- or rather their minds -before his body suddenly begun transforming into his wife's body upon the sun itself disappearing below the horizon and thus becoming aware of the curse that was placed on them and each other's presence in the middle of Inuyasha's transformation into Kagome and so upon realizing of whose presences respectively after sensing the familiarity of their presence and what is going on after their body they were sharing its transformation into Kagome's body was now finished and completed, they immediately spoke to each other.
'K-Kagome?' Inuyasha mentally spoke to his wife from inside of their shared head.
"Inuyasha?" Kagome asked upon hearing her husband's voice coming from their shared head.
"What is happening to us?"
Soon after Miroku and Sango have arrived and quickly enter into the hut when they came, the two instantly gotting over their shock upon seeing Kagome inside the hut with Kirara curled around her instead of Inuyasha and both the Buddhist Monk and the semi-retired Youkai Taijiya immediately start comforting and calming down the miko from the pain and the trauma of the transformation that the miko and her hanyo husband have felt and experience in the body they were sharing along with the two-tailed feline youkai in her full-grown youkai form, with Sango was comforting and soothing the crying form of Kagome in her arms in order to soothe and ease the pain and trauma that she was feeling right now and give the crying miko in her arm words of gentle comfort and helping reassurance along with Kirara helping Sango comforting Kagome by curling and wrapping her body around them and gently licking her face as she cried with her tears stain onto her face while Miroku was currently assessing the situation and determinating of why Inuyasha isn't here but Kagome is for what reason in silence, letting his mind drift and stray in thoughts while analyzing the informations that he got and letting it forming a idea of what is going and the situation is, all as the young miko continue to cried in one of their friend's arms for a long time until she stopped crying a hour later and she finally fell calmly asleep when she laid her head against Kirara's fur on her side and the inu hanyo-human couple in one body slept peacefully on the nekomata's body.
They've manage to sleep rather peacefully through the rest of the night until the morning came when the couple abruptly woke up with an jolting start of pain when the same burning sensation during their transformation from before suddenly came back into their shared body and Kagome begun to transform into Inuyasha, but this time being that it was seen by everyone who have saw this. Once their body's transformation was completed and having been comforted by Sango from reliving the painful experience, Inuyasha was now back wearing his Robe of the Fire Rat and was sitting on the floor of his hut with both his arms and legs crossed together after his and Kagome's shared body's transformation into himself and have an look of distress on his face at the situation that he and his miko wife were in and wondering what is happening to them when he ask Miroku about this after mentally discussing with Kagome of what to do next. "Miroku... I need ask you: Do you know of what is happening to me and Kagome? Since you're not only just my friend that we trust, but also a friend of ours that knows of what is going on and have the knowledge to tell of what we are dealing with. Can you at least tell me of what it is? If you do, then tell me. Tell me of you what know. Please tell me of what is happening to both me and Kagome. So that me and Kagome could fix of whatever is happening to us as fast as possible and soon as we can. Just tell and give it to me and we'll take it of what you know. Just please tell us, Miroku... What is happening to us?"
"... I think it's appear- after letting myself think and debate with myself to determine of what we are dealing with in my head for some times with the information of what we have got-to be some sort of curse placed on you two."
"A curse?"
"Yes. It seems to be one at least." Miroku said. "Do you remember back when we first met and have told you two about the origin of the Kazaana back when I was still cursed with it?"
"You mean back where you have told me, Kagome, and Shippo about the Kazaana of how your family got the cursed when your grandfather have fought against Naraku many times for years before he received the Kazaana curse from that bastard when he was cursed by him in their last encounter with each other?"
"Yes, precisely what I am talking about, Inuyasha. That is just one example of a curse inflicted either by a full youkai or even a hanyo. But with this curse, however, it is unlike any curse that I have seen or none of us have seen before as it doesn't seem to be inflicted by either a powerful youkai or someone with a high enough Reiryokai power."
"Huh? What you do mean, Miroku?"
"I'm saying that you could able to tell the differences between curses if they were used by either a powerful youkai with a large amount of either youki or jaki or someone with a high enough Reiryokai power like either a priest or a monk is by sensing for the aura of the energy that was emitted from the curse and used for it in order to inflicted a target of their own choosing, yet with this inflicted curse, you and Kagome's curse that placed on you two... I can't sense any of them on this curse. I can only sense nothing but a strange aura of strange energy being emitted and coming from the curse placed on you two with my abilities. This strange energy that was used in order to inflict you two with this curse and being emitted by it... is utterly unlike anything that we have seen or have sense before, even with the Shikon No Tama, as the aura of this energy that it have given off and was used and inflict this curse by the thing that also given both you and Kagome's curse is just too far bizarre or alien for me or Kaede to get a idea of what it is that we don't know of what this bizarre energy is or how to handle it. As if the thing that you two faced in the forest and the unusual energy it create is not from this world at all, since the information we do have is scarce other than its method of how it kill and the aura of its unusual energy that its body give off."
"...So you're saying to us is that... the aura of this energy that this thing me and Kagome faced used and have inflicted this curse right on us is something completely and utterly different from what we know and used to since it doesn't use either youki nor reiryokai, so it therefore is not either created from a youki nor reiryokai in origin, and that you nor Kaede don't know and have no ideas of what is this energy is and how it work because it is something else that we haven't seen before to the point that it actually might not be from this earth since it is just that different from what we know of? Is that what you are saying?"
"Yes. That's correct. But one thing is for certain: Whatever this unusual energy and the thing that it have came from is, it and the aura of this bizarre and alien energy created by its body are like it came from completely different world from ours except it is certainly not a being from the Netherworld like Gozu and Mezu, one of the few things and details that we know for certain about it and we have on that thing. Although..." Miroku said to himself at that last word of his sentence before he then cocked his head and ponder when he spoke to himself outloud as he start rubbing underneath his chin with his right hand in the thoughtfulness of his mind when he remember something from his memories that came up to him. "Come to think of it, now that I think about it... Mushin told me a few times during under his tutelage and training to become a monk like my father in order to find and kill Naraku to break the curse of the Kazaana that during his own training and tutoring to become a monk under my grandfather's tutelage and teachings after my grandfather receive the Kanaaza curse from Naraku years ago along side with my father long before I was born, there was one event and experience in particular from this time that have stuck out to him the most: Mushin said that during his training under my grandfather, Mushin and my grandfather decide to travel to a village on Hachi while my father was forced to stay behind due to him being sick with a minor flu at that time when my grandfather have gotting a request from that same village that requested the assistance of his expertise and ask him to come to the village as soon as he could, which he said have made my grandfather think that it was something urgent due to how serious it had sound in the letter he read that the request came in and got the feeling that Naraku is behind it depending if this is him at all. Not only that, but they also heard rumors that something had happen to the daughter and her husband but nobody could actually verified of what it was. When he and my grandfather arrived at the village where the letter have came from and were lead to the manor of a feudal lord who have lived there at that time and was the one made his request to my grandfather by one of the villagers, the reason for a request of such urgency by a feudal lord soon became apparent to the both of them as it turns out to Mushin and my grandfather when the feudal lord that have requested my grandfather's expertise have immediately told and explained to both him and my grandfather of what the situation is, after they shortly arrived at the manor of that particular feudal lord, that one of his daughters and her husband, one of the samurais who is serving under him before he've became the feudal lord's son-in-law when he married his lord's daughter, were under a curse of sharing a only single body between them and only one of them can be present one at a time depending on the time of the day with his daughter appearing only during the daytime and his son-in-law appearing only during the nighttime, but he doesn't know of how they've became curse in the first place after they made their travel through the edge of the forest from their destination when he was asked about it as both his daughter and son-in-law were too far traumatized to give the details of what happen that lead up to receiving their curse and he want my grandfather to figure out a way of how to break the curse on them. Now understanding the situation and how serious it was for it to be that urgent, my grandfather understood how urgency that it was and what he needed to do before he heard him told the feudal lord he understood the situation and that he'll tried to break the curse as fast as he can once he figure out of what is this curse is and how to break it, which the feudal lord accepted and was grateful for his assistance. Mushin told me however that after a while, my grandfather became stumped by this as the curse itself puzzled him to no ends since it was neither youki nor reiryokai in origin and he couldn't sense either of them with his abilities, nothing but an aura of strange energy that he didn't recognized and this unusual energy that he sensed alone is unlike any energy that my grandfather have ever seen before even with his own lifetime experiences. Unfortunately, my grandfather wasn't able to finished in time as the daughter and son-in-law who were cursed of that particular feudal lord along with the rest of their clan were all but killed when a rival clan attacked and killed them by surprised since there was a war going on in that time, taking the curse itself with them to the afterlife to be lost forever for good before anyone could figure out what the curse is and the only thing that was left of the curse's existence to show that it existed were the scrolls made by my grandfather of what little details that he have collected on this curse that are still kept in the temple Mushin is living in. It was this experience that have stuck out to Mushin the most from during his training under my grandfather as he could remember it clearly as the sky on a nice day when he told me this story since it was the most mysterious and puzzling curse that he ever known in his life and remain a complete puzzling mystery to him ever since then."
"Hmph. That's funny. I heard something that was somewhat quite similar to the story that your teacher have told you. Back when our father is still alive." Sesshomaru noted calmly about this, who was standing and leaning the frame of the doorway, causing everyone who were inside of the hut to look at the inu daiyoukai, before he told them. "Our father told me once that he heard rumors of two people sharing a single body due to a curse that was placed on them before they were killed in an accident, but he couldn't confirmed those rumors if they were actually true or not since they were just rumors after all."
"Wait a minute, hold up, hold up. So you two are saying that..." Inuyasha said calmly when he've took a deep breath to calm himself down, after hearing of what the two that were his monk friend and his full youkai half-brother respectively, as he sum up the entirely of what they said that he heard from them. "That these three different incidents that happen in possibly three different places set at different times period with vast amount of time distance that are between them that could very well and might potentially be connected with each other?"
"Considering that the curses between are similar in description, so yes that might be a possibity. However, since they already happened separately at different places in different times like what Inuyasha have said and we have little to no informations on them due to the vast amount of time that happen, so we don't know. All we have right now are only guess now. Which means that it will be impossible to find it in order to break the curse." Miroku said before he look at Inuyasha and ask the hanyo. "Inuyasha: What are you and Kagome going to do? Just take your time and answer with the best that you could."
"Miroku is right, Inuyasha. What are you and Kagome going to do now? As there's no lead for you two to track of where it is now. So what you are two going to do?" Sango asked, wondering of what their reaction will be and worried in concerned for them that they'll do something seriously reckless that would cost them their lives.
"..." Inuyasha remained silence at what he heard as he and Kagome thought about this question in their mind they were sharing. Miroku and Sango are right about that question to them: What are they going to do? With no potential leads to lean on right now, the hanyo-miko couple can't track it down right now in order to break the curse it placed on them with Inuyasha's nose and its expectational sense of smell if they don't know of where it is at as it might take times for them to find it. And without any key source of informations and details on where its location, how are they supposed to find of where located it is if they can't be sure for certain if either it is actually going to be there or not. This have cause Inuyasha and Kagome to mentally spoke and discussed about this with each other about it.
'Miroku and Sango are right about it, Inuyasha: What are we going to do? How are we suppose to find it if we don't know of where it is at for certain? So we can't go looking for it right now.' Kagome mentally said to her husband.
'Yeah, I know that. But I don't want to sit around and do nothing.' Inuyasha mentally said as he told his wife. 'I do understand what of you're trying to say, Kagome. I am just... so frustrated and angry by this. At being cursed of sharing a body with each other until the dah that we die unless we find it and killed it. Being unable to do the things that we enjoy when we still have our own bodies. I hate being helpless. I hate being unable to do anything. I hate this curse placed on us, Kagome. Look Kagome, I do understand of what you are trying but I don't want to sit around and do nothing. I just hate what is now happening to us. I just hate this curse, Kagome. I just hate it so much. I just hate this so much. I just... hate this, Kagome.'
Kagome suddenly felt like she is in mixture of both a deep sorrow of the misery and sadness and the frustration at the thought of being helpless and unable to do anything as if they were her own and felt like doing it if she did had her own body before she immediately recognized them as Inuyasha's emotions and what he was feeling. Apparently, strong emotions also carried over between them she realized. The miko was in silence at this, wondering of before she decide to mentally wrapped her arms around him in a warm embrace tightly in order to comfort him, taking him by surprised, and then spoke calmly to her hanyo husband with a kind smile on her face she projected and gentle voice in understandment and sympathy at what he felt about this whole mess they were in. 'Inuyasha... I know how you are feelings about the predicament we are in since you want break this curse so that things can get back to normal like the way they were as fast as possible and I can understand that feeling since I want to get rid of this curse too. But you have to understand about this, some curses that we've faced sometimes take times before we could break them. Remember the curse on Miroku's family for example? It took about three generations of Miroku's family before Kazaana curse finally broke when Naraku finally died. So we have to patience about it and can't rushed it. I do understand your feelings about this, but right now, don't stress yourself over it and worry too much about it, Inuyasha. So it just take slow and be patience about it. As we will find that thing and break the curse placed on ourselves, since we can planned for the future...'
'Kagome...'
'But for right now, we need to focus on the present. We first need to get ourselves used to our curse before we then need to gather info and leads of where it is exactly before we could finally go right after it and kill it in order to break our curse once we manage find it. Because no matter of what we'll be facing, we'll be facing it together, even if it is a tad more literal in the normal sense, as we will eventually find that thing and we will eventually break the curse. I love you, Inuyasha. I really do. I loved you of who you are and I don't care of what you are. I loved you with my heart. As we will face it together, no matter what happen to us or how long that it take for us...'
'...Kagome... You are the best wife and woman that I could ever ask for. And the best wife and woman that any man could ever ask for.' Inuyasha said before he mentally hugged back his wife tightly as he begun to mentally cried tears of happiness at this. 'I loved you, Kagome! I loved you with all of my heart, Kagome!'
'I loved you I loved you with all of my heart too, Inuyasha...' There was a moment of silence as the hanyo-miko hugged each other tightly for a while... before Kagome then resume speaking. 'Speaking about getting ourselves used to our curse and our current body, we need something that can get rid or at least make us more tolerable of the painful part of the transformation that came with this curse. As we don't want to end up like Izumo, now do we?'
'No. So you have an idea?'
'Well... there is one idea I got in mind...'
After discussing about the idea for a while, both Inuyasha and Kagome agreed that this idea is probably the best, fastest, and safest way to do about the issue of the pain and grief resulted by the curse's transformation before Inuyasha finally spoke and answered Miroku's question to this. "Alright, here's what me and Kagome are going to do: We're first go to Yakurōdokusen to ask him for a potion that can get rid or at least make us more tolerate of the pain during the painful part of the curse's transformation and get ourselves used of sharing a single body for a while before we could go out and gather as much info as we can to find of where that thing we faced before is. This is the best that we could come up with."
"Yes, that does sound like a good idea at the moment." Miroku commented. "But whatever the choices are you make on this matter, remember that we will support you on it."
"Yeah. Me, Miroku, Shippo, Kirara, our children, and everyone else will support you. Just... just don't be too reckless that you'll die, okay?"
"We can't make a promise on that one."
"That's what i'm afraid of." Sango reply dryly at what Inuyasha have said.
Inuyasha washed his hands under the water pouring from the faucet in the sink of the bathroom and splash some water onto his face with his wet hands before he reach over to the faucet and turn it off. The hanyou then dried his hands under the towel and rub his face on it... before he slowly put the towel back on the bar in place as he then rested his hands on the side of the sink and stared at his and Kagome's bathroom's mirror with his sharp yet tired yellow eyes in silence, staring at the bathroom's mirror in the sadness of their grief and depression with his sharp and piercing yet dull and blank yellow eyes filled with woe and misery in silence while his reflection was looking back at him. He continue stared at the mirror of the bathroom in the melancholia sadness of the grief and depression he was feeling under with the monotonous look of his sharp and piercing yet lifeless and emotionless yellow eyes that were dull and blank that make him appear to be soulless due to the misery of the sorrow they felt and they lack the gleaming shine of his life or emotions as they were filled with nothing but the grief and sadness of what he and Kagome were feeling right now in those keen yellow eyes of his, barely noticing the slight weary bags under his eyes, in silence while his reflection of himself in the mirror was looking and staring back at him with the same expression as his face for a long time before he dropped his head down to the sink that cause his dull and depressed eyes that lack those reflecting lights of their life and emotions in them to hide underneath the bangs of his silverly white hairs as he slowly let out a depressed sigh at this from his mouth. That was when he and Kagome decide to talk to each other mentally about the current state of their predicament and condition.
'500 years... 500 years... It's been 500 years now. It' is been that long since we were cursed... I can't believe it, I can't just believe it, I can't believe it's actually been that long since we were cursed on that day.' Inuyasha mentally said as he comment on it. 'It is actually been that long for us when you just stopped and think about it for a moment. I can't believe it is actually been that long for us?'
'Yes. It definitely is, Inuyasha. I know and can understand that feeling too, Inuyasha. I can understand that feeling all too well, Inuyasha. When you compared it to a normal youkai, it is like a mere blur in time to a youkai when you compare it to a normal human since they have a far longer lifespan compared to a normal human and their lifespan. It is just heartbreaking to think about if you're able to lived that long enough since that meant you manage outlived all of your loved ones and friends who were normal humans. What make this worse is that if you already know about it, then it would make even far more heartbreaking and saddening for you since you already know that you can't do anything about it and have to forced yourself to accept that it is ultimately just a part of the life we lived in. Taking all of that into account, a human who have manage to live that through unnatural means (whether unintentional or not) would ultimately break you down and be broken by the years that they have manage to lived through as time itself is a opponent you cannot defeat and resist forever at all no matter what you do.' Kagome mentally said about this. 'Take me for example, Inuyasha. I would have died a long time ago and wouldn't still here with you if it weren't for the curse. That's right. The only reason why I am still around and be here with you today is thanked to the curse placed on us. It's ironic. It's really ironic. It's quite ironic, really. It's so ironic when you think about it. It is the only reason why I was able to remain alive and able to be still here with you together for all of these centuries we have endured is because of this curse we have. Such a irony. It's such a irony. It's cruel irony that we were able to still remain together for this long is solely because of this curse alone...'
'... Yeah... It is, Kagome. It is...'
Inuyasha just give a bitter and empty smile on his face as they thought bitterly at the irony of the curse. Ironic. A irony. Such a irony. Oh, what a irony. A irony by all definition. A cruel irony. A cruel irony at that. The reason of why Kagome is still around here today, be able to lived this long, still living and not died at this point of time despite going back to the Feudal Era for good to be with Inuyasha, and to remain with Inuyasha for all these centuries that they have lived and endured through is, ironically, thanks to their curse. It is the sole and only reason of why the hanyo-miko couple themselves are still around here today is, to be able to be alive together despite Kagome traveling through the time portal in the Bone-Eater Well for the last time to go back to the last part of the Feudal Era for good to be with the inu hanyo, and able to remain still together is only and solely ironically thanks to the couple's curse of sharing a single body with them switching depending on the time placed by the thing they have faced in the past and the one who cursed with this curse in the first place. A bitter irony. A irony, indeed. Truly. The universe itself truly have a sense of irony, indeed. All as a single tear of their melancholia, the melancholia of what they were feeling under, the melancholia of their sadness and sorrow, have already formed from one of his eyes and begun to sliding down the side of his face before letting the tear itself finally fall off of his face into the bowl of the sink in their melancholy.
Inuyasha suddenly heard a loud "hmph" sound from the doorway of the bathroom and turned his head around to see Shippo standing right at the doorway of the bathroom and leaning his shoulder against the door frame of his and Kagome's apartment's bathroom's door with his arms folded together and have already shapeshift into a different form that was similar to his normal true form except for the lack of his signature 10 fox tails that he was hiding in this form in order to walk in and out of doorway without attracting any sort of attention or being seen by anyone easier while staring at the hanyo standing in front of his bathroom's sink from where he was standing with a serious yet caring and solicitious expression with a slight hint of thoughtful in it written and edge on his face in silence before the inu hanyo reacted and asked the 10-tailed kitsune.
"... Why are you standing at the doorway? And how long have you been standing there for?" Inuyasha asked.
"Long enough for me to figure out and wonder of what you and Kagome were thinking about for the latter. As for the former, I got up to check up on you because something was off when I've notice that you were just standing still in front of your bathroom's mirror with that empty sort of look full of that bitterness and misery on your face." Shippo said calmly to the hanyo. "And don't go bother lying to me to tell me that you two are either okay or fine as I could see through that those kinds of lies easily. Because I know damn well for a fact that you two are not. Please, Inuyasha. Please tell me, Inuyasha so I can help and comfort you two. So please tell me of what you and Kagome have talked about."
Inuyasha didn't reply at what Shippo have said to him from those words of his as he just look down at the before he turned his head around back to the bathroom's mirror with an dull yet sad look on his face and let out a calm yet sorrowful sigh. "... Me and Kagome talk when we've realized it have been almost 500 years now since we were curse on that day." Inuyasha sighed as he told Shippo this. "It's been 500 years now since we were curse on that day, right? We realized it meant that we have also outlived almost everyone that we have knew and care about due to a youkai's and a hanyo's lifespan being far longer than theirs since they're still humans who are like mayflys when we compared their lifespans together. It's really heartbreaking to know and think about it..."
There was a momentary pause of its silent aura between the two of them for a moment at what Inuyasha have said... before Shippo decided to distracted him and Kagome from their depressive thoughts that they were thinking by saying and remarking on something random casually. "... So do you two ever want to have a threesome or a BSDM session with me?"
This cause Inuyasha to immediately snapped him and Kagome out of their funk and fell down forward when Inuyasha instantly face fault on the sink anime-style and smacked his face right against it before the hanyo whipped his head around toward Shippo with a embarrassed red blush in a deep shade of red that was so red that it is even more redder than his Rode of the Fire Rat and shouted in an mixture of disbelief and embarrassment at him. "WHAT AND WHY THE HELL WOULD WE EVER WANT TO DO THAT, SHIPPO?!"
"It was just a suggestion and thought to you two, so there's no harm to it in that. But then again, I do always like to add people that do catch my eyes to my harem and have relationship with them once after I do got to known them better with whatever relationships they want with me and then have either having sex or a BSDM session with them they're the most comfortable with and probably have a orgy with them, including my wives, if I'm particularly feeling like i'm in the mood for it. Of course, i'm willing to have a relationship and even have sex or a BSDM session with you two depending if you and Kagome really want to since I am a guy who willing to help and support his friends no matter what sort of problem they're having. So I don't really actually mind of having a threesome sex or a BSDM with both you and Kagome." Shippo shrugged his shoulders as he told Inuyasha. "And beside, I was just merely diverting both you and Kagome's attention away from the depressive and sad thoughts that were depressing you two."
"... We appreciate your help and support, Shippo. But it is not that simple." Inuyasha sighed in sadness and exhaustion after he have became silence for a moment and let out a exhausted and woeful sigh at this as he told the 10-tailed fox youkai, showing him with those sharp yellow eyes of the hanyo that are full of life and emotion were now dull and lifeless when he told him, told Shippo with sorrow and misery in his voice. "It's been almost 500 years now. 500 years since me and Kagome were inflicted with this curse on that day. 500 years, Shippo. And we're still not any close to our goal of find the thing that cursed us in the first place and breaking this curse placed on us by it. The sad part about it is that we have outlived almost all of our friends that we have knew and care about due to our lifespan being far longer than theirs since they are still humans who are like mayflies when compared to youkai or a hanyo. And just like mayflies, humans have short lifespan and could only lived for a short amount of time when compared to the long lifespan of either a youkai or a hanyo since they have a longer lifespan and can lived far more longer than a human can. Miroku, Sango, Kohaku, Kaede, almost everyone that we knew and cared about are now long dead and gone because we have outlived all of them due to our longer lifespan. What's make things worse for us, we can't enjoy the things that we have enjoy together when we still were still separated and still had our own bodies before we were cursed on that day: We can't hold our hands together. We can't lay our heads on our shoulders or legs. We can't hug and hold each other with our arms. We can't kiss each other together. We can't touch and feel each other's skins with our hands. We can't have sex together. And we can't able support and comfort each other through the physical contract that we needed the most when we're down at our most vulnerable and weakest. We could only able to do and enjoy those things for only once a month for three days. And the other sad part about it is that I can't no longer become a human during the night on a new moon. I missed during the nights on a new moon where I become a human, during those same nights of the new moon where I become a human during for those same nights. I missed during those nights on a new moon of where I become a human during for those same nights where I feel so weak and so vulnerable and so useless when I am a human during those nights on a new moon that make me want to hate that form of mine due to those same reason yet I don't hate it and wasn't able to hate it since my human form often reminded me the memories of my mother and reminding me of how she care and comfort me during those nights on a new moon when I am human before she died, I missed during those nights on a new moon of where it allow me to feel so weak and so vulnerable and so useless when I am a human during for those same nights so I can show Kagome of what I truly felt like on the inside so she can comfort and cared me while reassuring me that I am always the hanyo that she loved no matter what form I am in and that she loved me no matter of what I am exactly, like a important part of me that make up me of who I am is gone when it was taking from me on that day we were cursed. But you know what's the most worst part about it? The irony. The irony of it. The irony of the curse placed on us. The reason that Kagome is still alive today with me is because of our curse. Yes... that is right. That is absolutely correct. Kagome would have died a long time ago and wouldn't be still here around with us today if it weren't for the curse placed on us. The only and sole reason of why Kagome have manage to live this long with me and stay by my side for all of these years was because of the curse. It's ironic. It is ironic. It is so ironic. It is ironic that the only reason Kagome is still alive is thanks to the curse. It is ironic that the curse is the reason of why me and Kagome are still together despite us living so long compared to the other human. It is ironic that the sole reason that we're still together despite outliving almost everyone we knew and care about is due to the curse. It's ironic that it is the main reason of why we were able to remain alive together for this long. It is truly ironic. It is truly ironic that it is the sole and only reason why Kagome is still alive and remaining together by my side in order to be with me. Ironic, isn't it? It is just ironic. It is irony to its fullest definition. A cruel irony. A cruel and bitter irony. The irony of it. It is just... the irony. The irony. ...Keh... It is definitely heartbreaking to know about. Something that can most definitely break your heart if you do know about it." Inuyasha then give Shippo a bitter and broken smile that was fulled of despair and hopelessness on his expression after giving his grief-stricken apparent ramble to the 10-tailed fox youkai with his dog ear drooping down before he told him in a tone of despair. "I'm sorry, Shippo. But we can't seem to find that thing no matter what we do. And this is what we are feeling about this right now. As we're just... we're just tired. We're just tired of this. Me and Kagome are just so tired by all of this. We're just so tired and exhausted of trying to find that thing. We tried. We tried to find it, but no matter of what we do, no matter of how hard and long we tried where we're looking in, we still can't find of where that thing is. Even after centuries of collecting information and searching for where that thing is, wherever it is in the world, we're still unable to find it. For almost 500 years now, we have been searching for that thing or any info on it about what it is, but we still aren't able to find of where that thing is or anything about it to this day. All while almost all of our friends, almost all of the people, that me and Kagome knew and cared about slowly pass away one by one from either old age, disease, injuries, and others, you named it. Which is depressing... it is sad and depressing if you think about it. This is discouraging, just discouraging us about it. The longer we continue searching for that thing, the more seemingly farther away from us and our desire of breaking this curse it is. It is heartbreaking, it is just heartbreaking to think if you think about it after you give it a mere thought. Me and Kagome are just exhausted by this of trying to find that thing. No, Shippo. We're not alright. We're not alright at all. We're not alright mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. As me and Kagome are broken, broken and shattered by the years themselves that we have experienced and endured, that we have seen, smelled, and heard, since time itself is something that you cannot defeat and endured against forever even for the most determinated of people no matter what you do or tried as it will just continuously wear you down bit by bit and it will be waiting patiencely about it until you finally break. I'm sorry, but we don't know if we could keep going or not. As our hope of finding that thing and breaking this curse on us is getting far from us year by year and we're slowly losing our hope of breaking this curse. The chance of breaking this curse is getting farther and father away from us as me and Kagome continue to searching and trying to find for that thing. Me and Kagome are slowly losing hope that we'll ever find that thing in order to finally break this curse on us and we don't know if we could keep going and continue to moving forward, Shippo. We're on our breaking point, Shippo. We're becoming hopeless of ever finding that thing. Breaking until we become hopeless and despair at unable to find that thing and breaking our curse. Me and Kagome don't know if we could actually keep going and continue to moving forward as we're on our breaking point of crossing our despair, the despair of not able to find it and break this curse. Shippo... Me and Kagome don't know if we'll ever could find that thing and breaking the curse placed on us at all. Me and Kagome don't know if we'll might reach our despair or will died one day before we could find it and break our curse at all. Will we-" Before the hanyo himself could actually say it and say anymore of his and Kagome's predicament and despair, Shippo suddenly interrupted him, right in the middle of his ramble and stopping him of what he was about to say, when he immediately walked right over to him and instantly wrapped his arms around him and pulled him close to his body into a comforting embrace and hug, embracing and hugging him tightly enough that he couldn't escape his arms' grasps yet gentle and comforting enough to warmly comfort him in his arms with him holding and hugging half youkai against his body to comfort while soothing and easing the pain of the despair him and Kagome were feeling. This have took Inuyasha and his wife by shock and surprise, in dumbfounded shock and bewilderment by this, with his dog ears now sticking up as he stood in silence for a moment with the gleaming and shining glint of life and emotions return to his eyes when his sharp yellow eyes were still widen before the hanyo manage to find his voice and spoke to him in shock. "S-Shippo...?"
"Sssshhhh, Inuyasha. Just sssshhhh..." Shippo shushed gently and softly to him in a tender and reassuring tone of voice with am soft expression on his face as he put his right hand right behind his head and let his head to rest on top of his shoulder to ease and sooth the pain of the sadness and depression they were feeling under, surprising the hanyo by this before he then slowly calm down with the sparking flames of his life and emotions now return to his eyes and gave the ten-tailed kitsune a still confused yet peaceful and serene expression with his eyes still wide in shock at what he did as he leaned his head against his old friend's shoulder. They just stood inside of the apartment's bathroom in silence as Shippo hugged for a while before he told him in a calm and cool yet understanding and reassuring tone of voice. "Inuyasha. I understand of what you and Kagome are feeling right now. The despair, the complete despair and the utter hopelessness of feeling like you cannot reach the desire of your dream to the point of breaking your heart and to be filled with the grief of your despair with the path toward it that you're walking on getting longer and longer and harder and harder it get each times at each turns no matter what you do. I know and understand that feeling all too well, you two. But you and Kagome must understand and remember: Even if the path you're walking on is long and hard, even if it become longer and harder with time, even if the going itself get tough at each turns, you have to keep moving yourself forward and pushing yourself forward even if it become painful and unbearable at times. If you are determine, if you have the resolve and determination, to reach that goal of your dreams no matter of how long, hard, and tough the path and road toward your dream you're walking on is going to be, then you have to keep moving yourself forward. Through the resolve of your determination. Even if all of your friends slowly pass away one by one around you, they will still live on and remain by your side through your memories while their spirit from the memories that you have of them will support and help you two through those memories of them despite them being long dead already and no here longer of this earth. Their spirits will continue to help and support you two from through those same memories from beyond the grave despite them no longer being alive anymore, even at the most lowest points of your life. Otherwise, your efforts will be all for nothing if you just give up and stop moving forward. I can understand of what you and Kagome are feeling, Inuyasha. I can understand the pain and grief of the despair you and Kagome are feeling right now, but you two must not give up the hope and faith of finding that thing and breaking your curse one day or else your efforts and the effort of the many people who have helped you two over this path will be proven in vain and all for nothing. So you and Kagome cannot give up on the hope of finding that thing and breaking your curse one day no matter how long, hard, and tough the path and road toward it as both you and Kagome are going find that thing and break that curse of yours one day..."
Inuyasha just stood there still in silence with his eyes still wide from before while his arms was still wrapped around him at what he heard from Shippo... before he suddenly begun to cry, begun to cry the tears from his eyes uncontrollable. Crying the tears, crying the tears that were sliding and trickling down his face uncontrollable for no reason because he wasn't actually doing it himself and his crying wasn't actually in his doing since the strong emotions he suddenly felt and was feeling right now from the back of their shared mind that was causing his tearful crying didn't belong to the hanyo and wasn't actually his own but was in fact Kagome's due to the sheer strength of his miko wife's strong emotions being carried over right to him and channel through to him in order for her to react and express her own emotion of what she was feeling at Shippo's deep and heartfelt words to them when she heard it as it is only way that she can express her emotion and what she was feeling physically to through her husband during the day, crying the tears that were full of the mixtures of both joy and sadness and other emotions that cannot nor couldn't be explained in great details all at once from his piercing yellow eyes that are full of both life and emotions at this right now all as the falling streaks of those same tears made of those same emotions themselves the hanyo was feeling were sliding down across his face. The cursed hanyo-miko couple realized at this point that no matter what despite having Miroku's wisdom and lecherous habit, Inuyasha's hot-headed temper, Sango's knowledge and toughness, Kagome's heroic sense of justice, Shippo is still Shippo in heart. He is still Shippo in heart. He'll always be the young knowledgeable and brave kitsune with a pure spirit and strong will of soul and heart that the hanyo and miko have first met on that day at heart. The Shippo that the hanyo and the miko knew and loved. Shippo will always be Shippo at heart. Inuyasha remain still and silence at what he heard from Shippo... all before he then slowly raise his arms to wrap them around the 10-tailed fox youkai himself to hug and embrace as he closed both of his eyes and finally embrace and hugged him back, embracing and hugging Shippo back in gratefulness, grateful toward Shippo for caring and supporting both him and Kagome and sticking right by their sides along with Kirara despite having the option of actually doing it when they were at their lowest point of their cursed life, as he hugged back him in silence...
In a forest of great trees that is sometimes covered in the shadow of the darkness by the cluster of several clouds that were hanging and drifting aimlessly in the night sky and was loomed over by a bare mountain made of the stone from the earth all as the glowing white full moon along with the countless gleaming and twinkling stars sailing and drifting the night sky was shining its shining lights upon the great forest.
A relatively old yet wise and acute horned owl of a unknown species was perching on a branch of a tree to look for any good prey items that were scurrying around in the darkness of the forest's shadow during the night its eyes will easily catch into the darkness of the forest's shadow itself and hooted among the countless other trees of the forest as it quietly watch Kagome and Kirara sitting by the burning camp fire and taking a temporary rest for the night before they could resume heading to Yakurōdokusen in the morning with the cursed miko staring and looking at the flickering flame of the fire absentmindedly and solemnly thinking in thoughtful silence while sitting against the two-tailed feline youkai's curled up body in her Youkai form laying down on the ground on her side behind her with Tessaiga and the Sacred Bow of Mount Azura laying right beside her since she was too absorbed and engrossed in the thinking and pondering thoughts of hers and Inuyasha that strayed their wondering minds to somewhere else to be aware and alert of her surrounding right now before the owl let out a paticularly loud yet deep and low-pitch hoot for a owl that is fitting of its size when she heard it, startling Kagome and snapping both her and Inuyasha out of the thoughts they were thinking about in their minds and causing her muscles to tense when they became tense of what it was as she grabbed the Sacred Bow of Mount Azura in her right hand and whipped her head around of where she have heard it came from to see of what it was only to see that it was only the same owl perching on the branch watching and staring her from its spot of the branch it was perching and resting on. Kagome was quiet until the Shinto miko relaxed her anxious and edged nerves and calm down from this with her muscle relaxing after being tense for a moment before she rest and lay herself down on Kirara's sides as she spoke to herself and, by extension, Inuyasha. "What on earth... how come I'm so scared right now? I have never been this nervious and scared before..."
Kagome was silence as she watch the white moon itself above in the night sky sailing across the darkness of the night with the countless numbers of the glowing and twinkling stars that dotted the sky like a whale traveling and migrating from the warmth waters of its winter home to the feeling grounds of its summer home up north or south before she sat straight up from Kirara as she thought and spoke in her mind with Inuyasha. 'Alone... That's right. I haven't done this before in quite a while now. Camping with someone else without you, Inuyasha. Except this time, you're not really here nor at the village waiting for me. For the first time in my life, you are not here with me allow my hand to grasp around your own hand to touch and feeling skin of your rough but warm hand or you are back at the village waiting for me to come back soon from a extermination job so you can run from the village as soon as when you smell my scene from a distance that tell you me and either Miroku or Sango have completed the job before you embrace me within your arms and hugging me deeply. Now, i'm starting to miss them. I'm already starting to miss the nights, those same nights where I can just lean beside against your shoulder and your body for both warmth and comfort now during the cold nights. I'm already beginning to miss those things when we still had our own separate bodies right now, Inuyasha...'
'I can understand. I can understand what you meant by that. I've also realized about the same thing as you did when I've begun noticing it myself, Kagome. I wished I could actually do those same thing just as you what have said. But don't worry, we will break this curse as soon as we possible can.' Inuyasha mentally said in the shared space inside of their mind as he spoke to his miko wife. 'But yeah. Alone... Without you standing by my side, I haven't felt this alone in a long time. Being by myself for long periods of time. Except now, with you being cursed with me of sharing a single body now. Come to think of it now, i've never been alone at all for a long time thanks to you guys. Or actually felt completely alone in this world for a long time now when you, Shippo, Miroku, Kirara, and Sango came into my life and slowly change the perspective of my life and this world when I was alone by myself and where I was force to survive since every day for me was a survival and matter of living or dying back then until I feel like I was no longer alone in this world now and I felt like that I truly have friends who actually and truly care about me now due to my own nature as a hanyo and my past experience before. I forgot how dark, cold, and lonely the night can be, where I didn't feel safe or calm back when I was alone by myself. I also forgot... how deep and vast the night is... back when I was still alone and surviving every day by my self, I never thought about of how deep and vast yet calm and beautiful night can be at times like these... kinda reminding me like you, Kagome...'
The same old yet wise and acute owl perching on the same branch it is watching the miko from hooted once more as Kagome put and wrapped her arms around her legs when she continue to mentally speak to her husband in their shared mind and thought sadly about the entirely of the whole situation and predicament. '...This situation sucks. This whole situation sucks. This whole situation and entire predicament we are in sucks. This whole cursed situation, predicament, and things sucks for us. We were only married after I return to be with you for little less than a year and what we do get? Getting cursed. It's not fair. It's not fair for us. After being separate from you for over three years before I was able to return to the past to be with you and married you, what happened after we're only married little less than under a year? Getting cursed of sharing a single body with each other till the day we died. It's unfair. It's unfair for us. Sigh... but I guess it shows that's life for you sometimes. As life has never been fair... right, Inuyasha?'
'Keh... Yeah, just what you said is basically true. It's never fair. It's never been fair. Life is not fair. It never will be and has never been, Kagome.' Inuyasha mentally answered upon knowing what his wife was talking about, knowing this from his experience when he was alone for most of his life. 'Life itself doesn't care about me, you, or anyone else for that matter. It'll throw things at you, no matter if they'll be either easy or hard for you, constantly to see if you could survived those obstacles or not in order for you to live and keep on surviving. And it will repeat that process over and over again, no matter what you do, until you breath your last breaths. So no, Kagome. Life is never fair. It was never fair long before we were born and long after we have died. From the beginning of time to the end of it. Life never been and never will be fair.'
Kagome was in solemn silence at this as she continue to stared at the burning fire that she made in her thoughtful thinking with deep and solemn silence as she and her husband thought about the future that lied ahead of them... until she (and Inuyasha by extension) heard suddenly a voice, heard a voice that was rather strangely familiar to her and have heard it from somewhere, beside her on the miko's right side when the cursed miko and her husband heard it. "You know; you should really consider looking on the bright and optimistic side of life right now. As dwelling on the past and thinking about the fear of the future too much can be not really good for you since it isn't really good for not only your health both mentally and emotionally speaking, but distract from what you are focused on too."
Kagome immediately whipped her head around to where the source of the voice came from... only for the miko (and Inuyasha again) to see of what appear to be that can be only describe as a reflection of herself wearing an white traditional priest outfit sitting right beside both her and Kirara and was looking and staring right back at her with a laid-back and easy-going expression on its face, all before the reflection of Kagome spoke in her voice.
"'Sup."
There was silence for a moment with the miko herself staring in stupefied and speechless shock with a expression of wide and goggle-eyed shock at this. Before Kagome (and Inuyasha again) then naturally let out a freaked out yelp and scream, scream loudly in a mixture of both fear and terror in startling shock, while flailing her arms around like crazy Takahashi Rumiko-style without changing her expression once at what she was seeing.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!"
"Oh, relax. Will you? I ain't here to trick you to conquer her fear with my illusions like the last time. Or scared both of you two into thinking that Kikyo is suddenly haunting you two from the afterlife by having interest in both you and Inuyasha, which would be out of character for her." The reflection of Kagome lookalike sitting beside her suddenly said and commented to her in a different male kami-like voice like it was a spirit taking on her appearance and the answer to that impression became obivious rather quickly. "Then again, I do like creating illusions to mess with people for my amusement since it does get kinda lonely on my job."
"Wait a minute..." Kagome said when she recognized that voice and then immediately shouted in shock. "THE SPIRIT OF MOUNT AZUSA?!"
"Yep. The one and only."
"Why are you doing here?!"
"Well, I could detect and sense your emotions from Mount Azusa over a great distance that you and your husband are distressing greatly over something. Of course, I already figure out of what you are distressing about since Tessaiga has already informed me and filled me in on what happened to you two when I have didn't detect neither your emotions nor your Reiryoku energy for three days through the sacred bow that is imbue with my power."
"Wait, Tessaiga filled you in on what happened to me and Inuyasha? How...?"
"Me and Tessaiga have became well acquainted with each other during your adventures against Naraku and shortly after you have return. Since we're technically both protect our respective wielder's with our respective powers and barriers. So in a way, we've became good friends with each other."
"Oh, okay. I see..."
The camp fire continue to burn the woods it was fed as the Spirit of Mount Azusa told Kagome while both of them were looking at the fire in a calm and understanding voice. "I could detect and sense from your emotions that you and your husband are not only greatly distressed but also depressed. Tessaiga has already told me the rest of you and your husband's situation that is the exact source of what is causing your distress and depression."
"...Yes, we are. We are depress: Alone... how lonely it is without either of us standing by each other's side due to us sharing a single body thanks to our curse. We're beginning to miss those things that we used to do together with our own bodies. How life is unfair at times. We don't really know what lied ahead for me and Inuyasha in the future, some of which I do know will happen but can't do anything to stop them from happening. And what is worse; We don't even know of how long it will take to find that thing and break the curse on us. We don't know, we just don't know..."
The Spirit of Mount Azusa just stared at Kagome of what she said in silence with her continue to looking at the burning fire... until the kami then smirk and smiled kindly to the miko who have came from the future before the guardian spirit spoke to her while looking up at the night sky by giving her and her husband some words of encouragement and movation in order to lift their heart and spirits up. "You know, you cannot have Yin without Yang or Yang without Yin. As one cannot simply exist without the other. You cannot have the beautiful shine of the moon without the light of the sun reflecting off or otherwise it would be just a dark orb sailing across the night sky that is filled with countless of shining stars as a example for instant. We cried sadly yet we laugh happily. Afterall, like Yin and Yang, one cannot live without the other." Kagome turn to look at the Spirit of Mount Azusa as the guardian spirit himself continue to tell her (and Inuyasha for the third again). "Thinking and fretting over of how lonesome it is going to be without the other and what the little things that future might have store in you might help you think about the path you're taking and walking on along with the choices that you might need to make if you going to have face those options and choices one day, it is not good for your health if you two think about it for too long. But for you and Inuyasha, you and Inuyasha must always remember one thing: Both you two are not alone together. Miroku, Sango, Shippo, Kirara, Kohaku, Rin, Kouga, Ayame, and even Sesshomaru, along with all of the other people that you two know and care about are there for you. And they will help and support on this journey of yours. The path you and Inuyasha are walking on is going to be a long and hard one, and it is going to be filled with many challenges and obstacles that you will have to inevitable faced against no doubt, one that will test and break your spirits multiple times by just merely waiting and being patience about it, but that is the reason why you have friends and people in first place; To help and support you, even at the lowest points of your life, along the way. So you must always remember this, Kagome and Inuyasha: You two are not alone together on the path you two are walking on. You have friends and family who cared about you are there to help and support both you two as you're walking on that path you're taking, even at the lowest points of your lives. They will help and support you two no matter what happen or how hard it is. I can see the path you and Inuyasha are taking and walking on is going to be a long and hard one in order to find the one who cursed you two and break that curse. But you two are not going to be alone together on this path you're walking on as you and Inuyasha are never alone. With your friends and family helping and supporting you two, you and Inuyasha are never alone. Will you two able to find of what you are looking for sooner or later? Maybe. But you will never be truly alone. You should always remember and not forget one thing: You and Inuyasha are never going to be alone..."
And with that, just like that, the Spirit of Mount Azusa vanish and disappear like a either fog or a mist clearing up without a trace of his existence being there upon parting his final words of wisdom and encouragement to Kagome and Inuyasha.
The Shinto miko just stared silently and wonder about the words of what the Spirit of Mount Azusa said until she return staring at the burning flames of the fire as she and Inuyasha took what he said to their heart in silence as they fully knew of what the kami was trying to say to them: They are not alone. Miroku, Sango, Shippo, Kirara, Kohaku, Rin, Kouga, Ayame, and even Sesshomaru were there for them to support and guide on the right path. They had friends and family who are willing help and support them on this path they were taking, some of whom who they have help during their adventure of searching for the Shikon No Tama shards and stopping Naruku.
Kagome just smiled in comfort at that thought and those words of what the spirit have told them alone since they were the words to motivative them and life their spirits up before she finally closed her eyes when she have laid her head on Kirara and fell alseep for tonight...
After the hanyo had let out the emotions of what the hanyo-miko couple were feeling in their heart during their emotional meltdown when it gone off like the explosion of a bomb or the eruption of a volcano caused by their recent bout of depression and the subsequent soft and comforting embrace given to them by Shippo, Inuyasha and Kagome were now feeling much more better making them than before and the hanyo was now sitting back in the living room with Shippo and Kirara after letting out their emotions when the metaphorical dam that was holding it back finally burst upon giving out and came flooding out the pain and grief of the sadness they were feeling from their heart before Shippo have comforted them of the pain and grief they have felt.
"Shippo..."
"Yeah?"
"Thanks for being a friend to us. We really appreciate and thankful for your support and your loyalty to us since you stick by our side. For you sticking by our side even through our nervous breakdown. Me and Kagome are really thankful for that."
"...Heh, you don't need to mention it. Beside, i'm just doing what I do best. Doing like what a real true loyal friend for you would do in this case." Shippo said humbly to him.
Inuyasha and Shippo were now back around the table in the living room and now sitting at their previous spots after the couple sharing a single body's breakdown in the bathroom of their own apartment and while they still felt depress, they now felt better than they were before... until the ten-tailed fox ask Inuyasha when something have suddenly came up to his mind and have caused him to thought about it for a moment in puzzle bemusement at this as he cocked his head in wonderment about it before he ask him about in. "Hey, Inuyasha."
"Yeah, Shippo?"
"I got a quick question."
"Sure, fire away."
"If your boredom caused your depression and melancholia this time, then wouldn't that mean that both you two are not having any fun and excitement in your lives to spice up the experience right now... right?"
"...As I said before, it is not that simple: Due to our curse, we're only able to do and enjoy those things once a month for only three days." Inuyasha said when he sighed. "Unless we're able to find and kill that thing in order for the curse to break, we're unable to do all the things that we're loved and enjoyed we wanted to do on those 3 days alone. We wish we could do all of them, but we can't. We can't because of our curse since we can't enjoy them. We wish we could do all of them in 3 days, but we can't."
Shippo was in silence with a blank and unreadable expression on his face at what he heard as he look and stared at Inuyasha, who was looking down at the floor in deep thoughts with a gloom look written across on his face, for a moment... before a sly smirk then appeared and curved across his face before the ten-tailed kitsune talk to him when he spoke to the hanyo. "Heh. Who said that you can't actually have fun without the one that you loved the most standing by your side physically speaking?" This cause Inuyasha to turn his head around and look at Shippo when he spoke. "Because afterall... as IT DOESN'T MEAN YOU CAN'T ENJOY THE EXPERIENCE!" The ten-tailed fox youkai then suddenly shot straight up from the floor when he suddenly yelled and shouted, startling both Inuyasha and Kirara at this with their eyes widen in surprised and shocked, before he then point his finger at the hanyo with a highly spirited and energetic wicked smile on his face that was full of spirit and energy like the young kitsune he once was almost five centuries ago when he first met the two of them and told him in a playful and cheerful tone of voice. "What make you think that you can't actually have fun and enjoyed the experience of it if you don't have Kagome standing by your side physically speaking and holding her hand or enjoy the things that you two loved? Even if you don't have her standing by your side or enjoy the things you loved as much as you used to, it doesn't mean that you shouldn't enjoy the thrill and excitement of the experience! What is the point of having fun and enjoy the experience if you just denied yourself of it because you don't have the person that you loved the most standing by your side? You shouldn't denied yourselves the experience of it due to that, afterall! BECAUSE YOU SHOULD STILL HAVE FUN OF THE EXCITEMENT IN LIFE AND ENJOYING THE EXHILARATING THRILL AND INTENSE EXCITEMENT OF THE EXPERIENCE TO THE FULLEST OF THE EXCITEMENT AND THE FUN IN LIFE WITH... A... BIG BANG!"
"...Umm... What's your point exactly?" Inuyasha asked dumbly to him, still momentary confused by what Shippo have just said to with his unnecessarily complicated encouraging speech to the hanyo and his miko wife with many repeating, interconnecting, and rather confusing uses of words in said speech, looking like he was lost of what he was talking about 10 paragraph ago, as before he quickly added and remarked on in a bashful tone of voice. "...Beside having another deep existential talk or something quite like that with each other."
"The point is, of what I am trying to say and getting at -Well, trying to say and getting at into that thick head of yours that you called a brain- to you Inuyasha, is that you shouldn't denied yourself of enjoying the fun experience and excitement of the enjoyment in life and keeping yourself and your body searching for it with whatever info you got on hand until you finally have a emotional breakdown when you finally reach your breaking point from the depression and misery of the sadness you're feeling caused by your boredom because not having Kagome being physically there with you and can't enjoy the things you loved doesn't necessarily mean you can't have fun and enjoy the experience without her because she is not there physically with you as you should have fun in the excitement and enjoying the excitement and thrill of the experience in life to the fullest. And beside, the search for the thing that cursed you and Kagome isn't going anywhere. So lighten up, just relax and loosing up a bit." Shippo said with an light-heartingly humorous and impishingly ludic smile on his face. "Denying yourself of having fun and enjoying the experience and working and exhausting yourself to death isn't obviously good for one's health, afterall. You should consider of taking a rest and break from searching for the thing once in a while so you can take time off in order to loosing and relaxing yourself up along with lightening up your mood while not needing to stressing over anything. 'How?' You may ask? By probably going somewhere in Tokyo, of course! So let's go somewhere! So you can relax and loosing up! As the sunlight of the day is high in the sky in its prime!"
"...Me and Kagome appreciate and thank you for trying to help us, but there's one problem with that..." Inuyasha pointed out to him as the inu hanyo pointed his finger to himself. "We have no idea or clue of where to actually go in Tokyo to exactly. And don't shout your voice and be loud too! My ears are especially sensitive to hearing something that is so loud like your shouting! And people will heard you when you're shouting your voice like that!"
"Yeah, so! The day's still so young right now! The sunlight of the day is still so young and high in the sky with the sun still being high in the afternoon in all of their prime right as we speak! And don't worry! I'm here because I know a couple of places with my own experience and knowledge from my own memories that you two would absolutely loved and enjoyed!"
"But we're not even dressed, Shippo!"
"Who cared about that?! Shut up and let's go!" Shippo said and told the hanyo as the next thing he did was to suddenly wrapped with his left arm around Inuyasha's right arm. "Let's go and get ready for a crazy adventure in right about-"
"-Now!"
"What are you talking about- Wait a minute..." Inuyasha suddenly notice and questioned in confusion that they were now suddenly standing outside and were now somehow standing somewhere else in a part of Tokyo now. "Where are we? How did we get here?" He then notice he was suddenly wearing Kagome's brown jacket along with a off-whitish shirt underneath it, a green scarf wrap around his neck, a black long pant, a pair of brown winter boots, and Kagome's favorite backpack on his back which was style after her old backpack that she used during when she was still in junior high school before she travel to the last part of the Feudal Era through the Bone-Eater Well and met Inuyasha. "Why I am suddenly now wearing my wife's jacket?" He then notice Kirara sitting right next to him in her youkai form with her usual expression. "Why Kirara is suddenly now in her youkai form?" And then he finally took notice of what Shippo is wearing as the ten-tailed kitsune himself was now dress out in a set and attire consisting of flamboyance-looking clothings that just scream "I'M FABULOUS" and/or "FLAMBOYANTLY" by just merely looking at of what he was seeing accompany by a shield-type sunglasses he was wearing on his face, causing him to immediately go red on his face and start blushing in embarrassment at this when he reacted. "AND WHAT ARE YOU EVEN WEARING?!"
"I assumed that you wouldn't rock the city in your last attire in you and Kagome's apartment, much less naked!" Shippo said casually, ignoring Inuyasha's last question directed toward him, before remarking when he decide to remark on the last part of what he just said. "Through, that would have been a interesting sight for sure!"
"So you've change me and..." Inuyasha said his sentence slowly in disbelief when he realizing Shippo manage to change him from the clothing he was previously wearing, flabbergasted and dumbfounded disbelief at what he have did when he and Kagome fully register in their minds that Shippo had somehow manage to change Inuyasha into the attire and clothing he is currently wearing right now from the clothings of what he was previously wearing inside of both his and Kagome's apartment without them seeing or knowing about it and realized the implication of what this meant as the inu hanyo pointed his finger to pointed to himself upon realizing it and blurted out both incoherently and incomprehensible in bafflement. "H-Have you seen...?!"
"That was like sooooo five minutes ago!" Shippo answered rather casually and offhandly without a care in the world with no shame in his voice and having no shame of what he did, causing Inuyasha to twitch his eyebrow and shook his clenched fist in both exasperated annoyance and irritated anger at his shameless reaction to this, before he then begun to walk forward with Inuyasha and Kirara following him as he told the inu hanyo. "What's more important now, is that i'm inviting and taking you two to a special place! A special place you and Kagome are sure gonna love for sure!" The disguised ten-tailed kitsune said. "The many people who lived in the area where it is wouldn't shut up of how awesome it is! Some of them went as far as calling it... L..." He said the last words slowly and emphasizingly in a completely over-the-top, absolute dramatically, downright actorly, and utterly exaggerated tone of voice in an equally completely outright over-the-top and utterly overdone exaggerated hammy and campy manner to emphasis it of what he was saying, causing Inuyasha to let out a exasperating sigh and Kirara just giving a deadpanned expression at him, until they stop walking and came to a stop when they have came to a small two-storied restaurant that appear to served Chūka (Japanese Chinese cuisine) called Nekohanten and they enter right into the inside of the restaurant, all while Inuyasha spoke to his oldest friend he knew by chronological order as they came in.
"You know, it was kind of sexual assault...?" Inuyasha said and pointed out to Shippo as they've came into Nekohanten.
"Oh chill, Inuyasha. You're a tougher cookie than that!" Shippo said with a relaxed and laid-back tone of voice before he immediately took a spot at a empty table and sat down on the seat as he told Inuyasha cheerfully and light-heartedly. "Sit down, relaxed, and let's see what the Maestros here will fix for us of whatever that we will order! The many people that came and eaten here have said that this restaurant's employees here knows exactly of what someone is going to order!"
"Oh. If you think you can resolve the issue by stuffing my mouth-" Inuyasha said.
However, before the hanyo finished his sentence and what he was going about to say to Shippo when they suddenly caught something, Inuyasha and Kirara suddenly stopped and paused for a moment when they've caught the sight and smell of something delicious within their vision and scent with their eyes and noses before they saw and smell the sight and scent of what it is that have made their mouths watered and they drool waterfalls from their mouths with their eyes widen and glistening while their nostrils flaring up in a mixture of both awe and enthusiasm upon seeing the sights and smelling the scents with their own eyes and nostrils of what they're seeing and smelling alone. Whatever they were seeing and smelling, one thing is certain about it is clear: IT. LOOK AND SMELL. DELICIOUS.
After having finished the food they ordered and served by a boy with thick glasses and a white Chinese-style rodes, Inuyasha and Shippo were laughing loudly in from what the ten-tailed kitsune told the hanyo at the table they were sitting in with the empty plates set aside in front of them beside the one with the fortune cookies (Shippo had already paid the meal with his own money) while Kirara herself was happily gorging and lapping herself with a dish of multiple types of seafoods that are on it like fishes, shrimps, crabs, and many other sorts of seafoods kind that were put on her plate enthusiastically in her kitten form on the table. "...And then one of my daughters suddenly show up out of no where and asks 'DAAAAAADD, is that... YOU?!' I'm telling ya, her friend have been washing that hand of his for a week when the Kitsune yōjutsu exam was over! He must've had his last bath since the Edo period!"
Inuyasha was laughing himself hard to death at what he heard with his ears of Shippo told him. "HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHHHAAAAAAAA!"
"Anyways- hehehaha *breath* heh- that's how he failed his test in a rather epic and spectacular fashion this year." Shippo chuckled with another chuckle of that as he begun to calm down from laughing of what he remember that he told Inuyasha until the both of them had calm down to stop laughing from laughing at what the kitsune have told the inu hanyo so hard before he took a deep breath and breathe out the air he inhaled coolly as he look over the two fortune cookies with his sharp and keen green eyes. "Phewww. That was a freaking good meal! I'm quite full, but who'd say no to a fortune cookies? And my curious foxy heart can't wait to see what's in store for me!" He said as he pick up one of the fortune with his hands, causing the hanyo to rolled his eyes at his kitsune friend in a deadpanned manner while he picked up the other fortune cookie, before the ten-tailed kitsune snapped the fortune cookie into two and took out the piece of paper inside to read of what it is written as he tossed the opened fortune cookie into his mouth and begun to chew them. He took one look of what it said exactly on the piece of paper as he ate the fortune cookie he picked in silence and begun laughing his ass off when he bang his head against the table at what he just read. He stop to take one moment to see of what it is written on the other side and then laugh even harder and smacked his head against the table again at what he just read on the other side of the paper. Before he lift his head up and asked the hanyo sitting in the seat beside him in a childlike and cheerful voice. "Sooo, what about yours?"
Inuyasha just rolled his eyes at Shippo's childish side and shook his head at this after staring with a deadpanned expression on his face at the ten-tailed fox youkai as he snapped open his own fortune cookie and pulled out the piece of paper out of the opened fortune cookie with his hand before he put them into his mouth to eat them before he looked down when he was finished with the fortune cookie down his throat to read of what is written his fortune on and stop to paused when he did, which read this: "Love can sometimes transcend time and space. As you are not alone." The inu hanyo just look fixedly and remained silence at what he read with his sharp-looking eyes and a empty blank expression... before a small smile then appear across his face. He give a small yet warm smile on his face when he saw of what is written on his fortune. A warm smile of gratitude and comfort at what he read...
But when Inuyasha turn the piece of paper around to see the other side of what is written, however, it immediately cause him to froze and became rigidly still like a stone white statue with a blank yet priceless expression on his face when he read of what it said on the other side of the paper he was holding in both of his hands, which said this: "The one sitting next to you want to have a threesome relationship with you." The hanyo remained both silence and silently still with his expression still not changing and remaining the same as he stared blankly at the paper he was holding for a moment... before it cause him to immediately go a deep shade of red on his face that was redder than even the Rode of the Fire Rat or a part of his own human step grandfather's name who raise the inu hanyo's own father as he start blushing furiously in both panickingly embarrassment and arousingly fluster caused by a mixture of both his and Kagome's feelings at what they have just read.
And that was all before Shippo then slide in.
"Hey, show me show meeee!" Shippo said teasingly and childishly with a curious and childish yet sly and teasing smile on his face as he attempt to grab it. "I wanna know!"
Inuyasha, however, quickly yank it away from him before he could grab it, causing Shippo to give a blank look, as he stared back at him in a blank and incredulous yet embarrassed expression Takahashi Rumiko-style with a deep red blush still on his face and, not wanting him to read of what it is, shredded the fortune into pieces with his claws faster than Miroku could touch and rub Sango's behind with his perverted-possessed right hand. Shippo just continue to stared and remained rigid and silence with that same blank yet priceless expression still on his face at what did happened before the hanyo turn his head around to face and spoke to which he assumed to be some sort of the Chinese-looking prehistoric old ghoul mummy that travel on a staff like a jumping pogo stick who was standing right next to him by the table. "Thank for the food, old mummy ghoul!" Then he got whacked on his head by said Chinese-looking prehistoric old ghoul mummy's staff for his trouble.
WHACK!
"Ow."
Inuyasha, Shippo, and Kirara (now in her adult youkai form) were now walking down the street after they have left Nekohanten. All as the hanyo-miko couple themselves were talking to each other on about the fortune written on the paper in their shared mind, with Shippo temporary looking curious of what they were thinking for a moment when he notice he was now distracted with something before focusing his eyes on where they were walking in, as he mentally spoke to his wife. 'But in all seriousness, who came up with these sort of bullshit fortunes?!'
'I don't really know, but what I actually do know is that they were supposed to be vague and applicable to almost everyone Inuyasha.' Kagome mentally said. 'But for that one, however, we have just read. That one... that one was just way too specific! Far too specific for us!'
'And plain stupid.'
'Dumb!'
"Ridiculous..." Inuyasha muttered absently to himself under his breath as another person passed by.
"Oi! Watch where you're going!"
'Moronic.'
'Dim.'
'And utterly idiotic too.'
'Which it is like saying that a boy delivering newspapers is running and trying to deliver them on time while avoiding invading space aliens, sea fish peoples, and the government who are trying to kill him! No, wait. That is way too specific too. Umm... like a unlucky and attempt womanizing boy who won the love of a space alien princess of an alien race by beating her in a race. No, that one is too specific too. ...Like a girl whose fiancé is a martial artist with a curse that change him into a girl every time when he is splash with cold water? No, not that one either. A girl who can see ghosts meet a male classmate of hers who is a shinigami with a quarter human heritage? No. A girl meet a guy who is from the Heian period who are both cursed by a youkai? ...I give up, but you know what I mean.'
Inuyasha, Shippo, and Kirara continue to walk down the street for a while until the three made a stop at somewhere else, probably (what I assume to be) a park of some sorts, as the inu hanyo-Shinto miko couple just continue talking to each other about the fortune they've read in their shared mind with the ten-tailed kitsune and the two-tailed nekomata then suddenly look and gaze at something else that is happening right now before Shippo's expression became serious while the couple were mentally talking to each other.
'Yeah. And then there's whole discrimination and discernment came out of it. Like giving a piece of cooked meat from a flesh kill is the best gift and reward for a dog. Because of how delicious it is to eat it and-' Inuyasha mentally said at this before their mental conversation was cut short when they glanced back to their two companion and suddenly notice Shippo taking a few steps forward with a far more serious look on his face as the hanyo immediately asked the ten-tailed kitsune in his current form of where he's going. "Where are you going, Shippo?"
"To them. That girl doesn't seem to keen on their company." Shippo answered to his question calmly without changing his current expression yet nor turning his head as he continue to walk and take several more steps straight forward. Inuyasha looked down to where he was looking in by following his gaze and, already, he immediately understood of what the 10-tailed fox himself was getting at when the inu hanyo himself see and saw a gang of at least about 3 to 5 Oni of each various different looks and weapons across each one of them gang up and surrounded a terrified and distressed young woman, probably either a human or a hanyo having a power loss at this time judging by the scent he smelled and tested in the air with his nostrils, that they were currently bullying and harassing right now with their looming heights and imposing appearance alone before the ten-tailed fox spirit then called out to them. "OI, BOYS!" The gang of Oni then stopped of what they were doing as they then turned to look and saw the 10-tailed kitsune himself standing in front of them before Shippo then spoke and talk to them with throwing a rather subtle insult or two. "You're looking for a lady for tonight, huh? How about all of you go look for another lady that fit either your own looks or your own personality. That lady you're all ganging up on there doesn't seem to be keen or interested on your company."
"What is it with you, ya damn bloody stupid fox?!" One of the Oni shouted and insulted angrily, causing the others to growled and grunted in agreement with him.
"Yeah, you canine maggot!"
"What he said!"
"Fagola!"
"Screw off, ya freaking faggot!"
"Oh! Well, i'm an attractive guy myself." Shippo said and taunted them with sarcasm in his voice behind that cheerful sound of that tone before he insulted and taunted them even more in a cocky and sarcastic voice that sounded like it was just filled to the brim with even more sarcasm dipping and throwing even more subtle and sharp taunts and insults in the sharp tone of his voice behind the apparent cheerfulness right at them yet is remained surprising calm and chill by this and not rising his voice at all when the ten-tailed kitsune then told them with a bold yet mischievous and vicious yet smug look on his face. "And you guys, with that... macho-nacho attitudes and... um... faces like that..."
"Yeah, that's our mama's faces, that everyone in family has!" The leader Oni shouted angrily at him, with the other a part of his gang agreeing with their boss as they growled and grunted.
"Our pride!"
"What he said!"
"YEAH!"
"That's my point exactly!" Shippo said in a passive aggressive tone of voice with a vicious and savage wicked smile of his that is fulled of pure mischief and enjoying of what he is doing right now at this he wore on his face as he told and taunting them with some even more savage and ferocious insults including the subtle "Your Mom" joke he just did with that very sharp and trollish tongue of his he threw and fired at them. "Even a blind girl, probably even one that is a part of your own species, wouldn't go out with any of ya in a million years! So... that's the best you'll ever get!" He said as he then grabbed the shirt he was wearing with his bare hand before he promptly rip it right off of his body, showing off the slender and lean yet powerfully muscular and well built figure and frame of his flamboyantish yet sexy, handsome, and attractive-looking borderline bishonen body as he shouted cheerfully to them with a shit-eating grin that appeared and adorned across his face. "ENJOY!"
Inuyasha just blankly stared - a bewildered and stupefying confusing blank stare - in silence yet incredulous disbelief Takahashi Rumiko-style at what he is looking at while he was having a nosebleed upon the sight (mainly due to the sheer feelings of shock, confusion, and lust Kagome was giving off), Kirara giving a strangely pleased smile on her face at this, and cause the gang of Oni to widen their eyes and easily quite nearly popped them right out of their socket as they all gasp in unison and made them all but completely forget of what they were doing previously in dumbfounded shock that was enough to cause the gang of Oni to drop their species' famous tough attitude and behavior at what they were seeing with their own widen eyes.
GASP!
"Thank you, my prince!" The woman called out and thanking Shippo for saving her with a blush on her face as she ran for it.
"N-NOBODY INSULTS US AND OUR MOMMA!" The Oni leader of this gang of Oni yelled and growled in outraging and tempest fury at him for making that "Your Mom" joke and taunt that quite easily burned them and trolling them before he ragefully ordered and wrathfully roared to his gang with two words.
"GET HIM!"
"HYIAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHH!"
Cue to Inuyasha running for his life like his own life actually really depended on it when he grab and took Shippo by his legs to make a run for it and carrying him on his shoulders while he was dangling from it after he wickedly hollered out "SO LONG SUCKEEERS!" at them with that same shit-eating grin still on his face and started laughing hard loudly at this with Kirara running right beside them and easily keeping pace along with them, all while dodging the various kinds of weapons that were being thrown right at them, before the inu hanyo shouted in exasperating and vexing anger he ran down the street all while the ten-tailed kitsune was just maniacally laughing at this. "ARE YOU COMPLETELY OUT OF YOUR MIND?!"
After one being chase by a bunch of oni scene later, Inuyasha was taking a breather and panted as he breathe the air in and out of his lungs when they finally stop running and sitting down on the pavement of the sidewalk after losing their pursers chasing after them and making sure that they have lost them for sure while Shippo (already having and wearing a new shirt on himself) was still laughing at what have just happen with a smile adorn on his face, albeit not as loudly as before and was reduced now to a more manageable level, as he was too panting and breathing the air in and out due to laughing so hard with Kirara sitting down right beside two of them still in her adult Youkai form and now sporting and giving a deadpan and snarky expression on her face at them, an especially deadpanned snarky one toward Shippo, before the hanyo then glared Takahashi Rumiko-style at him and told the ten-tailed kitsune himself when he turned his head and spoke to him while still breathing and panting comically.
"You really are crazy." Inuyasha panted in between his breaths as he glared at Shippo.
"Don't be angry with me! I was just listening to my fortunes!" Shippo said casually yet teasingly both at the same time in a friendly and teasing with a casually and friendly yet teasing smile and smirk to Inuyasha, after the hanyo is now finished of wheezing and panting his breath while still glaring straight at him Takahashi Rumiko-style, before he then told him. "For the first fortune, it said that; 'That if I show my heart for someone tonight, then they will be grateful for what I did.' But when I turned to see the second fortune, it said that; 'You can be a jerk toward to only those who pretty much deserve it.' Also, I think we've lost them now."
"... But did you really have to do it... in a literal way?" Inuyasha questioned with narrowed eyes, after giving a deadpanned expression in silence, before he added and remark under his breath. "Why not rip the heart literally out of your chest while you're at it..."
"OF COURSE NOT!" Shippo said cheerfully with a sly and playful smirk on his face that is most definitely a fox belonging to his own species before he quickly added when he turned to him in a normal tone. "And I don't want to die. You have stupid ideas!" Then he turned right back and return shouting to himself as Inuyasha slowly stand up from the sidewalk and stretching himself out. "I'M NOT CRAZY AS I SEEM!" He shouted and laughed to himself before he suddenly spun himself around to face him and suddenly pointed his finger toward the hanyo with - this time - a gentle and kind smile like that of Kagome's own smile on his face before the ten-tailed kitsune then suddenly spoke in a much more normal yet calmer and kinder tone of his voice that was rather more softer and gentle in a understanding tone and told him with honesty and sincerity in his voice. "It's just that, I could tell that something was on your mind and was bothering you." Inuyasha was took off guard and made him surprised by not just what he heard him say and the truthful sincerity in his voice but how he act due to how he could suddenly and abruptly change from acting like the inu hanyo himself to suddenly acting like Kagome - something of which he and his wife have notice every now and then - in a split second and vice visa when he stood up from the sidewalk. Apparently, Shippo has imprinted on them and the personalities traits from Inuyasha and Kagome themselves when he was still growing up in his youth after he first met the hanyo-miko couple.
"But it was rubbish, nothing important." Inuyasha told him offhandingly as he waved his right hand dismissively about it.
"Aaand, i've heard from a reliable source that good ol' confusion strategy is the best way to stop from moping!" Shippo said, continuing on without a pause, even when he made that comment, before he then told Inuyasha with a kind and cool smile, that same kind and cool smile, adorned on his face in that same calm and soothing voice. "You two are my friends and I care about you guys. Even through I am not related either to you or Kagome by blood, I personally consider both of you two my family and I care about you guys." The ten-tailed kitsune then put his hands on the hanyo's shoulders as he continued. "Even about the little thing that makes you guys feel down..." He then lifted one of his hands up off from his shoulder and place it behind the back of Inuyasha's head before the ten-tailed fox youkai then gently nudge both of their own foreheads together and hugged the inu hanyo as he finally told Inuyasha this with that smile still across his face. "I want you two to be happy. No matter what is on your mind bothering and making you moping about it, even if your heart is breaking and in sorrow, I want you and Kagome both to be happy in life. Because both of you are my friends and my family. So I want you two to be happy. I want you and Kagome to be happy."
Inuyasha was completely silence with a blank look on his face for a split second before a smile, a peaceful and happy smile, a happy and joyful smile that was fulled of calmness and serenity, slowly crept and have curved right onto his face when it appear as he then smiled in complete and utter silent high-spirited happiness at what he heard him say before the kitsune pulled his forehead away from his, smiling even after pulling his forehead, smiling in complete and utter silent high-spirited happiness at what he have heard Shippo say to him.
Shippo patted him on his head with his hand while Inuyasha was coving his face with one of his hands in exasperation at him being childish as he just continue to smile with Kirara sitting by their side with her usual and normal expression on her face for a moment... until he abruptly stopped when the ten-tailed kitsune himself have suddenly realized something before Shippo asked the hanyo. "Wait, Inuyasha, did... did I actually put the mini-skirt and legging in there for Kagome, right?" There was a pause of awkward silence between Shippo and Inuyasha, causing the both of them to immediately go rigid and just standing absolutely still in silence, with their eyes going wide as dinner plates comedically Takahashi Rumiko-style as they realized upon the mere implication of what this meant for a moment before made an freaked out "oh shit" face with their eyes widen even more than they were before comedically Takahashi Rumiko-style upon realizing...
After one awkward and embarrassing realization and heading back to Inuyasha and Kagome's apartment later...
Inuyasha, Shippo, and Kirara (still in her full-grown Youkai Form and following the two behind) were now walking down the street with a slight red blush still on the hanyo's face due to the overwhelming feeling of utter embarrassment Kagome was feeling right now and was giving off through her husband as he felt of what emotion his wife was feeling too at the same time, which was not helped with the inu hanyo still feeling a little embarrassed by what happened, while Shippo and Kirara were quiet now and they didn't dare to say a word with blank looks on both of their faces as the both of them have decide that the hanyo-miko were already embarrassed and confused enough as it is already now.
The three just continue to walking forward down the street that they were walking on in silence for a while longer until they came to a stop somewhere else in a secret part of the red-light district they were in at that most people wouldn't know that it existed unless you are one of the few humans that do know about it since it is mostly for youkais (and might be hidden beneath underground, depending on who you asked) when Shipp have suddenly stopped. The ten-tailed kitsune continue to look and stare straight where his gaze was pointing at toward before he then slightly lifted his head up to looked and see with his own eyes before then dropping his head back down to where he was gazing at previously for a moment with a calm and stoic expression on his face in silence before a calm and subtle smirk then appear right across his face with his gaze as he then spoke and said one line to the hanyo beside him.
"Ah, look like we're here." Shippo said calmly and remarked equally as calm and chill with a laid-back tone in his voice. Inuyasha glanced at the ten-tailed fox youkai himself, questioning him and wondering to himself of what he's talking about exactly, with a raised eyebrow in confusion, when he look at him before he followed his gaze to where he was looking at and already, he immediately understood the reason, when it have became rather apparent to the hanyo upon seeing it, when he gazed over to reveal that it was a relatively large semi-hosts and hostesses-mixed club with multiple of features that the other types of clubs have that Shippo owned called The Kitsune Nine (Kitsune Kyuu). The hanyo was silence at this for a moment before he turned his head to look at Shippo with a flat look on his face at him as he then spoke to him.
"You brought me and Kagome... to your club that you owned? So let me get this straight, Shippo: You brought me and Kagome to your club? The same one that you own and running?" Inuyasha questioned slowly yet flatly.
"Yep."
"...Why...?"
"Because it is a good place to kick back, loosen up, and relax. I do want you and Kagome to enjoy the experience and having fun of the thrill itself at the happiness of your delight and enjoyment in your lives with the energy and spirit in that happiness being filled in your bodies and souls without a worry in the world, afterall." Shippo said with a casual shrug of his shoulders. "Afterall, I am your friend, but i'm also a friend with benefits. Since you two are welcome to visit my host and hostess club at any time at a discount excluding the price for the services of both my hosts and my hostesses working here, depending on if my employees ever need a increase in payment for one reason or another. And beside, I do also owned a series of love hotels you and Kagome can and are quite welcome to visit and still for a night at any time that you want to with the same token of discount as well if you two want some private time together. Of course, I did invited a few guests over that you two know to the club..."
"Huh...?"
Shippo then immediately start stepping forward and walked straight toward The Kitsune Nine club without saying anymore before Inuyasha could ask him anymore questions, forcing the inu hanyo to follow after the ten-tailed kitsune and decide to see for both himself and Kagome of what he was talking to them about if he suggested they should see with their own eyes from the implied tone in his voice with Kirara walking right beside them and transformed into her kitten form when they have reach it for the ease of navigation before she jumped onto Inuyasha's left shoulder which the hanyo didn't mind or pay attention to. The three went into The Kitsune Nine club after Shippo told the bouncer Oni, who was a yellow beastly-looking oni hired as a bouncer, the same yellow beastly-looking oni that have came along with those several villagers and few youkai to Kaede's village due to that... thing... all those centuries ago, standing guard at the door of The Kitsune Nine club that they were with him and he already understood since he've already recognize Inuyasha. Once they enter inside and came into the club, Shippo lead the inu hanyo and walked through the club itself as they see and saw the patrons who are here at this time, a few of which are humans that do know about this place, and are being entertain and amused by the hostesses or the hosts whose attention were purchase by the patron that they are serving their service to with some of them dancing on the dance floor to the chosen music that is being played right now while they walked pass by them through the club. Inuyasha continue to follow right behind Shippo through The Kitsune Nine club for a while in silence, pondering to himself and Kagome in their minds of what he exactly meant by that before he poke his head up for one moment, as he kept on walking with Kirara still on his left shoulder in her kitten form until the ten-tailed fox youkai finally lead and brought the hanyo to where one of the club's table with a two or three bench seatings was at, where he finally see that the guests Shippo mention about and he saw with his own eyes when it is reveal to him and Kagome that they were Kouga, Ayame, Sesshomaru... and Rin herself, now Sesshomaru's wife and somehow still alive for 500 years yet she still look like the beautiful 20 year old woman (albeit now with a removable head) she was when she married Sesshomaru and is wearing a purple-colored with a red rose patterns kimono with a cheerful smile on her face, that same cheerful smile of hers that she give after these centuries.
Inuyasha and Kagome remember the reason why Rin is still alive. You see...; Rin has became a special type of Shibito (or youkai or shinigami or whatever) when she've died upon her third death when her head was cut off from her neck called a Kubi-Nashi Ryōshi. A Kubi-Nashi Ryōshi are a rare and special type of Shibito that used to be youkai taijiya once in life who act like sort of gate keepers between the world of the living and the afterlife on the transport of their choosing and liking (like Rin's own giant black three-headed hellhound for example) as they come to those who are about to died and ferrying their souls to the afterlife while wielding the weapon that they've used in their life as a youkai taijiya, but they are rarely seen because they often take their jobs rather seriously and it is almost impossible to stop them when they're doing their job. How a youkai taijiya is transformed into a Kubi-Nashi Ryōshi is when a youkai taijiya suddenly died when their head is suddenly cut clean off from their necks by something like a youkai's attack for example before they're transformed into a Kubi-Nashi Ryōshi after upon their death (through the means of how a youkai taijiya could transformed into Kubi-Nashi Ryōshi are unknown) but the chances for a youkai taijiya transforming into a Kubi-Nashi Ryōshi are pretty much one in 500... but Rin is a rather special case since she was resurrected two times already and especially powerful Kubi-Nashi Ryōshi even by Kubi-Nashi Ryōshi standard.
So basically speaking... they're basically the youkai or shinigami equivalent to the Irish Dullahan more or less.
Oh, and also, she and Sesshomaru apparently brought their hanyo daughter Kakaze, who is their first child with dog ears on top of her head like her favorite uncle, a long flowing silver mane like her father and said uncle, and red eyes (which make her look like quite a bit like Kagura now the hanyo-miko couple think about it) and she was born long before Rin was transformed into Kubi-Nashi Ryōshi upon her third death when she was only a teenager at the time, since Inuyasha saw one of his favorite nieces waving cheerfully to her parent while the undead woman herself just waved back to her inu hanyo daughter with her right hand and that same cheerful smile still on her face before she went back to dancing to the music that was being played right now. She is defintiely cheerful and nice like her mother, but she also definitely does have a fierce short temper like her father and uncle.
So back to the three youkai. Kouga, Ayame, Sesshomaru were wearing more modern clothings now, since (for obvious reason) they have to blend in right into the crowd without attracting any sort of attention to themselves. This have often made Inuyasha snickered toward Kouga and Sesshomaru, but especially to Kouga (for the fact that the wolf youkai was wearing a pink shirt that said "FRUIT PUNCH" in kanji on the back), since the hanyo have already knew more about the modern era than them despite the fact that he took the long way of getting to the current era of today too. All before Shippo then interrupt when he spoke and told Inuyasha.
"Yes, Inuyasha. I did invited Kouga, Ayame, Sesshomaru, and Rin, along with Kakaze, over to the club. But there's a reason for it: Because they're here to keep you two company while you are having fun and enjoying the thrill of the experience since it is good for you two. Due to you two overworking yourselves to the blink of having a mental breakdown in your search of trying your curse on you two, I thought that you two should not only have fun and enjoy the experience but should also socialized and interacting with people more by talking to some of our friends and your relatives, thus giving more emotional and mental support and care for you and Kagome. So I have decide - with a promise of giving drinks on a small discount - to invited them over. Since it would make it a more enjoyable and fun experience for the both of you two anyways. Oh, and yes, i'm going to leave you with them, since they're excellent companion you can talk to and will be sure to keep you comfortable. Now if you don't mind me and excuse me, I'm needed to be somewhere. So... ta-ta!" Shippo said, before he then suddenly left Inuyasha at the table with Kouga, Ayame, Sesshomaru, and Rin and the ten-tailed kitsune went to the dancing floor of his club to dance to the music that were being played.
Inuyasha just stood by the table where the other in silence with a look of disbelief on his face before he took a particular deep breath and let out an exasperated sigh in just mild annoyance at Shippo's own antic of this and having to be the straight man to the while the four sitting at the table, the four youkai and the technically undead woman, give various different sort of blank looks across their faces at this all for a moment all before Rin then greeted and said hello to the hanyo (who is her half-brother-in-law) politely and calmly yet kindly and cheerfully at the same time while waving hi to him with her right hand and that same cheerful smile of hers. "Hi, Inuyasha."
"Hey, Rin." Inuyasha said as he sighed, responding to his technially undead half-sister-in-law, while he waved hi back at the Kubi-Nashi Ryōshi woman herself sitting at the table before he then looked over to Kouga, Ayame, and Sesshomaru and he greeted the three youkais sitting at the table. "Hey, Kouga. Hey, Ayame. And hey, Sesshomaru."
"Hey, Inuyasha." Kouga said.
"Hi, Inuyasha." Ayame said as she waved hi back to him.
"Hello, Inuyasha." Sesshomaru said, with his usual stoic expression on his face still the same and still remaining unchanged, before he took a sip of his genmaicha from his glass cup.
Inuyasha took off his wife's brown jacket and put it down right beside him as the hanyo then sat down on the cushion bench that was empty at the table when he took the spot.
"What's up?" Kouga asked curiously when he lean his back against the cushion of the benchs. As Shippo and Kakaze were now currently dancing to the song that is now being played on the speakers right now.
"Oh, you know. Still searching and hunting for the thing - whatever that... thing... is exactly - that cursed me and Kagome into sharing a single body. And constantly looking and seeking any sort of informations and martials from whatever sources we could find on the whereabout of that said thing in the world while exploring the world at the same time. You know, the usual for me and Kagome." Inuyasha answered, just after he finally sat down on the cushion bench and made himself, as he was given a glass of melon soda that is brought to him by a hostess when Shippo told one of them of what the hanyo wanted and then he pay her a couple of ¥100 yens out from his own wallet. With Kirara jumping off of his shoulder and onto the bench.
"Ah, the same thing that you two been doing." Kouga said before he then took a drink out of his alcohol-free beer from his glass. Rin was petting Kirara along the top of her head to the tip of her tail before scratching under her chin, much to the feline youkai's enjoyment of this.
"It's been a quite while since we've last seen you or Kagome, Inuyasha. Hasn't it?" Ayame said as she stirred the ice in her own glass of melon soda with her straw when that thought came up in her mind.
"Yeah. It have been a while, Ayame. It's actually been quite a while when me and Kagome last saw you and Kouga now that I think about it." Inuyasha said to himself as he then crossed his arms together and cocking his head to the right in his thoughts.
"Yes, it have been that long. Like about several weeks to a few months since we last seen each other, I think. Which I might believe that how long it have been?"
"Yeah. I think it might have been somewhat around there."
"So how you and Kagome have been doing exactly lately, Inuyasha?" Rin asked her half brother-in-law kindly and politely. While an ancient perverted gnome was chasing after a few hostesses that were running away from him passed by before he was finally caught by one of the bouncers working here and was quite literally thrown out of the club when the bouncer that caught him threw him out through the ceiling of the club, making a hole in it in the process.
"Other than what I've just mention and we have been doing for almost the past 500 years now, we didn't have anything else much to do anyways since there is not much problems caused by youkai as they have in the past and our boredom (well, my specifically) is already killing us." Inuyasha said with a comedically bored look Takahashi Rumiko-style on his face as he lifted his head up to look right at the ceiling of the club when he made that expression. He remember, remembering how his and Kagome's boredom have lead them to be depressed and apathic by this and send them into a period of depression, sending them into another bout of sadden and dejected depression, from the mere thoughts of unable to breaking this curse placed on them as he continue to stare at the ceiling with his sharp yellow eyes in silence. He stared at it for a while until he let out a depressive sigh and shook his head a few times to clear his and Kagome minds to get the sad and equally depressive thoughts of their respective minds before he rather quickly decide to change the subject and asked. "So how and why Shippo invited you guys - beside the promise of discounted drinks since that doesn't actually count - over to his club anyways in the first place?"
"Hmm? Oh, how and why Shippo invited us... we were invited when he have called the four of us separately on the phone when we had picked up it before we - well, technically both me and Ayame respectively - answered his call when we got it and why he invited us over to his club was because he told us that he was taking you to the club he owned in order to enjoy the experience and having fun, after saying something mentally apparently happen to you and Kagome and said you're going to tell us of what had transpired, and he ask us - when he invited us over to his club with a promise of discounted drinks of course - to make your experiences much more enjoyable and entertaining to you by talking and socializing with you since he wanted us to give both you and Kagome some company and giving you a good time together with us while we get to spend time with you and making our experience much more enjoyable and entertaining for us as well all at the same time. Killing two or more birds with one stone, so it's pretty much a win-win for all of us. Through, what he did said about both you and Kagome overworking yourselves to the point of having a mental breakdown?" Rin explained to Inuyasha, after she had took a drink and sip out of her amazake in her cup that she was having, before she then asked him in concern from what she apparently heard Shippo said to him.
"Ah, I see. Heh. I'm not really surprised by that. Shippo always does cared and be concerned for me and Kagome of what we are doing as he cherish us, despite his seemingly weird and constantly (and often unpredictable) shifting yet complex personality that change and shift from one moment to the next seem to tell you, since he's a loyal and supportive friend who care for you, being supportive to you, and stick by your side no matter what happen to you, as me and Kagome are the closet thing to who he has being his parent after his own died separately, with his father being killed by the Raijū Kyōdai for a shard of the Shikon No Tama and we don't know anything about his mother and what cause her death since he couldn't remember anything of what have happened to her or what the cause of her death when she've died as he was far too young to remember anything about her... even supporting you and sticking by your side through the sadness and the depression caused by your own boredom when you are having a mental breakdown at the thought of unable to find that thing and break the curse, the realization that you have pretty much all but outlive everyone you knew and cared about, the things we are only able to enjoy for only 3 days once a mouth, and the most worse part is just the irony of the curse itself, deep within your sadness and depression..." Inuyasha said in a monotonously voice at last parts of his sentence with a hint of the woe and misery that he and Kagome were feeling under in the tone of his voice alone and give a bitter smile, a smile full of the bitterness and the sadness at the irony of the whole curse itself, on his face as he just stared into his own glass of melon soda with a dejected and monotone look across his face with his eyes temporary losing the reflection of their shine and being dull and lifeless for a moment. Before he looked up and saw the various troubled and worried looks of perturbating apphensiveness and alarmed concerns across Kouga, Ayame, Rin, and Sesshomaru, with even Sesshomaru, who just remain calm of this and didn't his own emotions get the better of him with his expression still remaining unchanged with that stoic and seemingly impassive face of his yet despite this, his eyes showing an solicitous uneasiness in them, before the inu hanyo calmly let out a depressive dysthymia and passive resigned sigh out from behind his dog-like fangs and his mouth when his sharp yellow eyes regained the reflecting shine of life in them and said in a uncharacteristic docile and forbearing voice when he decide to tell them of what have happened to himself and Kagome. "I guess here's no point into hiding it and keeping the truth from you guys anyway..." He said in a calm and somber voice before he then took a drink of his melon soda. And so, he begun to tell and explained them their mental meltdown and collapse from the woeful sorrow and suffering misery of their own sadness and depression caused by their boredom that had send them into another bout and period of depression in the first place to their friends and relatives. He told and explained them about his and Kagome's mental meltdown and collapse from the woeful sorrow and suffering misery of their own sadness and depression caused by their boredom that have send them spiraling down into another bout and period of depression in the first place, telling the three youkais and the single Shibito woman from how their boredom lead them to thought of unable to breaking this curse inflicted on them and may died before they are able to find of where that thing is when they are looking for any sort of information of that thing's whereabout in the world and caused them to spiraling down out of control into another bout and period of depression when they realize that they might not able to find where that thing is at all, hiding the true emotions of what they were actually feeling of their sadness and depression in order to not show of how miserable they were and allowing the emotions and feelings of what they have felt to slowly yet steadily build up inside of their grief-stricken heart until they are no longer able to hide their true feelings and emotion anymore when it finally burst and collapse, the realization that they have outlived everyone that were human they knew with their longer lifespan, realizing the irony of the curse inflicted on them, and how they have became numb to everything in the sadness and despair of their depression for a while until all of the emotions and feelings that were building up in their heart finally burst in their despair, letting the hanyo-miko couple's feelings all out to them, letting it all out their emotions and what the hanyo-miko couple were feelings under to their friends and relatives, for a while until Inuyasha was now finally finished after what have seem to be to him and Kagome a entire eternity to the inu hanyo-Shito miko couple. "And we're quite grateful to Shippo for comforting and supporting me and Kagome when we are in at the lowest point of our lives in our despair and depression while knocking some sense back right into us at that time since he stood by our side despite not needing to and giving us the comfort and reassurance that we're really needed. So... that how it's all happen."
Kouga, Ayame, Rin, and Sesshomaru just looked and stared at him in silence of what they have heard from him as the hanyo looked down at his drink of melon soda with no other word to said and took a gulp from it, the couple now feeling the weight of the depression now lifted off their shoulders and heart after telling them from their heart, before the Kubi-Nashi Ryōshi woman then spoke and ask Inuyasha in concern. "So that's what happen? Are you and Kagome doing okay now?"
"Yeah, we're feeling much better now than we were before, but me and Kagome still feel like fucking shit still. Still thinking about the possibility of us not able to find where that thing is even right now as we can't just stop thinking about it. The idea of that possibility is making me and Kagome depressed about this." Inuyasha said in sadness and misery as he stared into his glass. Rin give a comforting and kind expression to him, understanding what the hanyo-miko couple themselves are dealing with and going through, before she put her left hand on his shoulder in sympathy of what is happening to them. All as Shippo and Kakaze were now bickering with each other, right after the ten-tailed fox begun to teasing her playfully after the music was finished and which provoke and enrage her in irking annoyance when one of her button is pressed, while they both fired and threw snarky insults and taunts at each other.
"I can't blame you for being depress and feeling like shit right now along with Kagome if I was in that predicament." Kouga said with honest in the tone of his own voice. All while Shippo and Kakaze were continue to argue and bicker with each other, with a completely amused smirk on the ten-tailed kitsune's face and a utterly annoyed angry look right across the inu hanyo girl's face toward him.
"Have you at least got closer, or tried getting closer, to your goal of finding where that thing is? Did you and Kagome tried to use every source of informations you have found and got to know anything even a single clue to know where it is at least?" Ayame asked in worriment for them, worrying about the couple's own well-beings, all while Shippo then teased Kakaze playfully, which easily set off her temper in the process, before the ten-tailed kitsune then instantly ran for it while cackling mischieviously, causing Sesshomaru and Rin's eldest child to chase after him as she pulled out her traditional-style dance fan.
"No. No, Ayame. We're still not. We're still not any closer, not even a bit, to our goal. And yes. We did. We did, Ayame. We're tried to use every source of informations to find even a clue where that thing is exactly, but even then we still seem to can't find where that thing is even with those info we got. We don't have a clue or a idea of where it is right now or what to do anymore. We don't know. We no longer don't know. We just... don't know." Inuyasha said in the bitter tone of misery and sadness in his voice as he stared into the reflection of himself in the melon soda of his drink in silence while Kakaze was still chasing after Shippo through the club he owned.
The two wolf youkais looked with unsettled perturbation and uneasiness while Sesshomaru and Rin watch their child still chasing after the ten-tailed kitsune through his own club in an attempt to brutally murder him as the fox youkai himself was just laughing maniacally at this... before the inu daiyoukai then spoke to his hanyo half-brother, with his stoic and calm expression still not changing and remaining the same when he spoke to Inuyasha in a calm yet understanding tone in his voice.
"...You know; For you to know and understand why life is unfair, you must first understand that life is like a path of flowing river with many countless and unknown paths diverged from it, with the water flowing into any of the paths into future it will take and not knowing of what is laying ahead of you. To know and understand the feelings of a emotion, you must know of what it feel like by experiencing it. To feel sadness, you must first experience pain and suffering. To feel happiness, you must first experience pleasure and delight. There will always be a opposite to the other one way or the other. It is like Yang and Yin. Yang without Yin. Yin without Yang. One cannot live without the other. Like the moon without the sun. Something of which that you and Kagome know and understand all too well due to the current predictment you two are in." Sesshomaru said to his youngest half sibling, causing Inuyasha and the other three sitting at the table to look and stared right at the inu daiyoukai himself, looking at him in confusion of what he was talking about, as he continue to speak to his hanyo brother with his stoic expression still remained fixated on his face. "That is what our father have said to me. One of the many things of what he said to me during when he came to see me and my mother. Back when he was still alive at that time when he told me those words to me, when I was a far much more younger and inexperience youkai back then. I often wonder to myself what he meant by those words of his, since I was a much more younger and arrogant youkai who despise humans with a low option of them as I used think of them as mere lower beings that are beneath me and I looked down upon them for that reason back then. Before I lost my left arm when you cut it off of me with Tessaiga and manage to defeat me at our father's final resting place, resulting in me not only losing my left arm and losing to you for Tessaiga but dealing a blow to my pride. I was calmly enraged by this development after losing to you due to the apparent favoritism from our father toward you that didn't actually exist when he've bequeath Tessaiga to you back then, but this resulted in me going into a secret test from our father and thus begin the test for me that I didn't know exist at that time placed by our father to allow me to get stronger than I was back then at that time and surpassed him in power but in order for me to learning compassion, accepting you for what you are, and understanding that even my own vast powers have limits from when you have truely mastered the Wind Scar and use it to defeat me yet not killing me at the same time to meeting Rin for the first time that begun my path of learning compassion and becoming a better person to Kagura's death that lead me unlocking and earn the right to use the Meidō Zangetsuha sealed inside of Tenseiga when it was reforged into a weapon in order for me to use it to Rin's second death in my training of completing Meidō Zangetsuha at its full power and strengthen Tesseiga when she was taken into the netherworld by a hellhound and I storm into the neitherworld to get her back yet I was unable to revived her with Tenseiga due to Tenseiga could revive a person only once to battling Shishinki where I have learn the truth about Tenseiga from our father's old enemy to fighting against you to see if you were now worthy of wielding the Meidō Zangetsuha before I decide that you are truely worthy now and intentionally broke Tenseiga's blade against Tessaiga's to pass the Meidō Zangetsuha to fighting in a hopeless battle against Magatsuhi until I finally received Bakusaiga, the sword that is not anyone else's but my own and is born from my own strength, when I have threw everything else away including my own pride and desire for Tessaiga. After I have acquired Bakusaiga, I have finally understood not only our father's reason for wanting me to be a source of support and guidance to you, which I accepted at that point, but also the meaning behind those words of his, and I was humble by the experience of it. Now. After I finally understood the meaning and wisdom behind those cryptic words of his, it was replaced by a new question when it enter my mind and lead a new question for me. Now I often wonder and thought to myself for all of these years... about our father's past." Sesshomaru then turned to look at Inuyasha, who is just staring blankly and flatly back at him when he was taking a drink out of his melon soda, with his usual stoical and impressive still haven't changing and remaining the same like always, which is most of the time, as the music then change.
"Our pop's past?"
"Yes... If you want to have the wisdom for yourself, you must first experiencing it first so you can learn from past experiences. That's what he have also told me too. But that's what made me often wonder and thought to myself for all of these years: What is our father's past? Afterall, in order to have wisdom, you have to first experiencing it in order to get the source of it. That is what he basically meant by that from what I understand. And also because everyone has some sort of past one way or another. That's what mainly made me wonder about his past. What is his past? Why he never tell anyone about his past? Was he born a youkai? Or was he a normal dog once and later became a youkai later in his life? If so, why he never tell anyone, including me, about his past? When I had ask my mother about that, she simply told me that our father was never the one who really want to talk about his past. So no one seem to knows about his past. Not even the people who were the closest to him who knew him when he was still alive back then actually knows about his mysterious past. If that's the case, then why? We may never know. Probably the reason why he never wanted to talk to anyone about his past to anyone must be because it will just bring up memories that are painful for him to remember, which is quite... a understandable reason for someone whose past is fulled of hurt and unhappiness but as I said we don't know." Sesshomaru said as he remained focused on his younger hanyo half-brother sitting on the other side of the table with his own sharp yellow eyes that he shared with him. "Whatever the reason, it is his own choice anyway not to talk about his past. But what we do know about our father is that his personality is actually quite similar to yours but only older and wiser. So he must have faced and experience somewhat similar experiences and hardships to what you faced. He already knew and understood the vulnerabilities of being a hanyo all too well due to the many hardships they will have to faced everyday just because of what they are exactly, which is one of the reason why he wanted me to be source of support and guidance to you through those secret tests so that you don't take a wrong step in your life and something much more worse would happen to you. As I said before, I somehow understood the reasons of his desires and I accepted it. Whatever his past is exactly, it's clear to me that it is probably most definitely one that is fulled of pain and sadness that he have experience in order for him to get the wisdom for him to have the forethought and awareness to know about ourselves better than even we do, Inuyasha. That is what I have thought about him." The inu daiyoukai explained, explaining about their father's past and the conclusion that he came up with on his own about their father's rather mysterious and unknown past based on his personality traits that he know of back when he was still alive alone, to his perplexed younger half-brother and told him after letting out a stoic sigh at seeing his brother's confusion. "What is the point I am trying to get at to you is that: Our father knew that life is unfair through the wisdoms of his experience and he has the forethought of setting those secrets tests of characters for us that aren't learned easily and attached with harsh truths in order to get along with each other since while he knew that I am able to fend for myself and how powerful that I will become one day when I awaken my true strength, he also knew for a fact that you need every bit of help you can get due to the dangers that comes with being a hanyo, a hanyo son of one of the most powerful youkais to have ever lived particularly. It is the reason why he wanted me to get along with you and become a source of support and guidance to you. And I will do that regardless, as I have already gotting over my jealously and issues, including those with you, a long time ago. Our father knew and understood quite well that life is unfair due to his own experience, and I know for a fact that the path you and Kagome have chosen in order to find the thing - whatever it is - that have cursed you two of sharing a single body and killed it to break it is completely unknown and mysterious to you and may take a long time to find that thing, but our father also knew and understood the reason of why we have relationships in the first place: To support and guide each other. To be a source of support and guide like what our father said. To supporting each other so that you and Kagome are not alone in the difficulties that you two are currently facing in your lives right now and to guiding each other so that you and Kagome don't take a wrong step in your lives and stray right into the wrong path you took and that would lead something worse to happen and fall upon you two. Even at the lowest point of your life, you and Kagome are not alone together on this path you are taking and walking on toward your desire as we, your family members and friends, will help and support you two through the difficulties you two are facing and the challenges that are awaiting for you that you will have to face one day in the future of the path you are walking on while guiding you in order to keep you going on the right course of the path you're taking so that you don't take a wrong step in your lives. While our father might have not expected you to have married a woman who time-traveled from this era to be your wife, and he most certainly didn't expect you to be cursed into a sharing a single body with your wife, he knew and understood the reason why we have such relationship in the first place. I know and understand that the path of the future you are walking on is already going to be a long and hard one. One that will break you. One that will break your heart and will make you feel the sadness, the hopelessness, and the pains of your despair multiple of times no matter what you want it to stop. One that will test your patience by pushing to the limits. One that will test you by pushing you to the brink of your limits. But even right at the lowest point of your lives, you have to keep walking. You have to keep moving and pushing yourself forward. Keep moving and pushing yourself forward even if become painful and difficult at times. You have to just keep on walking by moving and pushing yourself forward down the path. Right down into the unknown future of the path you are taking, not knowing and having no idea of what is going to happen next. As you cannot forget that all of us, your family and friends, will helped and supported both you and Kagome while guiding you and Kagome along the way on your journey of searching and finding that thing to break your curse, even those who have long since passed away. I don't know how long your search for that thing is going to be and will take. It may take more years. Decades. Maybe even centuries. And where it is. It might be still in Japan. It might be in a remote place like the south pole or the deep oceans. It might not be even on this world anymore. But you will find that thing that have cursed you two one day. You just have keep walking by moving and pushing yourself forward everyday. It gets easier. Everyday it gets a little easier. But you have to do it everyday. That's the hard part. But it does get easier, Inuyasha." Sesshomaru said, finishing his speech to him, as he continue looking and remaining fixated at his younger hanyo half-brother. While a giant ground lizard-sloth was suffering a writer's block on the story he was trying to make and finished right on his deadline.
"Sesshomaru's right, Inuyasha." Rin said with a cheerful smile on her face, in agreement with what her husband said to him, as he told the hanyo. "Like what Sesshomaru said, we're all here for you. Me, Sesshomaru, our daughter Kakaze, Shippo, Kouga, Ayame, and everyone that you know about, we are all here for you and Kagome. All of us, your family and friends, are here to help and support you and Kagome. We're all here for you and Kagome."
"That's right, Inuyasha. What she said I agree with. Beside, we got your back." Kouga said with a fanged smile on his face and Ayame nodding in agreement. All while the same gang of oni from before tried to get into the Kitsune Nine club, but they were stop from entering by the bouncer Oni guarding the front door who quickly give them a beatdown and thrashing of their lives easily despite being outnumbered due to his sheer strength and greater experience alone compare to the gang of oni before he then immediately threw all of them out of the club.
Inuyasha was silence at what he heard, letting their words of what they said to him slowly sink into his and Kagome's minds, before he took a deep breath and spoke to them with a cool and calm breath of air exhaled from his lungs. "...Thanks. Thank you guys. Thanks a lot, you guys. Me and Kagome thank you guys for saying that to both of us. That's... That's means a lot to me and Kagome. We feel... much more better now than we were before. I guess we... I guess me and Kagome really needed to hear that. We appreciate it. You don't know of how much me and Kagome really needed that. We thank you guys for that." Inuyasha said to the four, especially to his own older half-brother, after a moment of silence, and thanking him for giving that speech to him and Kagome with a slight but noticeable enough smirk appear across his face. Sure, Sesshomaru's speech to them did sound a lot like a combination of both Shippo's and the Spirit of Mount Azusa's speech to them, but it equally as powerful as them and it was one of the things that they needed the most, right when they needed to hear something to help the spirit of their souls up the most, as they were starting to feel far more better than they have ever felt before, with the heaviness of the bitter sadness and depression from the gloomy dark and miserable clouds of their depressive thoughts that is haunting them in the back of their minds suddenly being lifted right off of their shoulders and the spirits of their hearts were now rising up to new heights that they never have felt in quite a long time now, plus they knew that every words he said he meant truthfully was a nice bonus. While the weight of reality and the despair of their dark thoughts still hung from his limbs like shackles and whispering their words in the back of their minds, but at least the hanyo and the miko felt like reassure that they have someone who would be helping and supporting them and have their back. All while Kakaze was still chasing after Shippo through his own club as she then threw several crescent-shaped blades made of wind right at him, causing the ten-tailed kitsune to dodge them with ease as he was still laughing rather maniacally and mischievously at her of this.
"Please, don't thank me and give me credit. All I actually did was simply nothing but just giving you and Kagome a speech." Sesshomaru said calmly as he looked away from Inuyasha.
"No, me and Kagome actually appreciate of what you have said to us. You just don't really know and have no idea of how much me and Kagome needed to hear that and felt after hearing that speech. We thank you for givng out that speech to me and Kagome... nii-san." Inuyasha said. Sesshomaru turned to looked at Inuyasha in surprised at what he heard from him temporary for a moment before he quickly recollected himself and he return to being calm and aloof, being calm and aloof about it.
"Please, I don't know and have no idea of what you are talking about." Sesshomaru said with his usual calm and aloof attitude.
"Oh shut up and just take the compliment, Sesshomaru." Inuyasha said. All while Kakaze had manage to catch Shippo and was now trying to kill the ten-tailed himself kitsune by strangling him to death with her bare hands.
Kagome stood still in a field full of tall grasses on the edge of a forest with Kirara sitting right beside the cursed miko on her right side after she wake up from her sleep after she have slept through the dark night as she stared at the beginning and rising lights of dawn, marking the end of the dark night, with the night sky is no longer completely dark when it begun to slowly lighten and the fainter stars begun slowly to disappear one by one under ray lights of the rising dawn, and hear the whispering winds making the blades of the tall grasses sweep and sway against it with her long beautiful black hair was just waving and swaying along with the breeze of the wind in silence. She only have woken up from her slumbering sleep about minutes ago after she have quietly and peacefully slept through most of the dark night on Kirara's fur, long after she and Inuyasha had visited Yakurōdokusenyesterday, they have came to and visited Yakurōdokusen at his place and (after the inu hanyo pull him right out from one of his many jars of course) asking him for a potion that could nullified pains and explained to the potion master himself of their current predicament which (once the potion sage confirmed it for himself by licking the hanyo with his tongue, much to Inuyasha's own disgust and irritation at this) Yakurōdokusen agreed and give them the potion that would at least nullified the pain of their transformation before they drank it (resulted in them experiencing the effect of the potion and to suffer a hangover from this) and they no longer felt the pain of their curse's transformation when Inuyasha's body transformed into Kagome's body and his control of the body was switch with her, as she stared at the dawn she is looking at, the dawn of a new day, with the sunrise of dawn itself now rising from the east with its ray of light illuminating the sky. She and her husband may not have any ideas or any leads of where the thing that cursed them is, but they know for a fact that they will look and search for the thing no matter what even if the road toward that goal is not going to be easy. They knew, sure like the rising sun of dawn itself, they would find that thing again one day eventually.
All before she begun to transform when her black hair started to begun whitening and turning to white and her ears shifting into more dog-like forms with her body starting to change and shifting, becoming more masculine in build and taller in height, her brown eyes have turned into sharp golden eyes, and certain parts of her body have disappear and been replace by different parts, until Kagome's transformation into Inuyasha by their curse was now finished and the hanyo now stood in place of his wife, all as he watch the morning sun of dawn making its appearance known and rising up with its shining light upon them on a new day from below the line of the horizon...
It is now evening at this time. Kagome, Shippo, and Kirara (in her youkai form) were walking down the streets of Odaiba, Minato, Tokyo with the ten-tailed kitsune disguising himself in Sango's form and appearance that he had transformed into while the drifting grey clouds above them looking like snows are about to fall at any moment now as the ten-tailed fox youkai spoke to the miko in Sango's voice. "Whew! Now that is what I can called a productive day, Kagome!"
"Yes. Today was quite a productive day for me and Inuyasha, Shippo." Kagome said, wearing mini-skirt and legging in place of her husband's black long pant after taking her husband's place by their curse's transformation, in agreement with a smile on her face before she then turned her head to look at the ten-tailed kitsune with that same kind and gentle smile of hers on her face. "Thank you for helping us to dealing with our most recent period of depression, Shippo."
"Nah, it's nothing really, Kagome." Shippo said rather casually in a laidback yet humble voice, still speaking to her with Sango's voice, as he then told Kagome while waving his hand around dismissively. "I'm just only doing what a loyal friend like me would do. And beside, I just did it because I was concern for you and Inuyasha since, well, often overworked yourselves to death and get way too focus on what you are doing to notice anything else around you two. So really, it's nothing."
Kagome just continue to give him a kind smile to him before she told Shippo. "We're really glad that you're a loyal friend to us when we needed support the most."
"Please, Kagome. I don't need the praise." Shippo said. "I am just normally a mischievious and perverted pansexual kitsune with a massively powerful sex drive who is being a good friend to you- ...Why hello there... what do we have here?" He said to himself in a seductive voice after he suddenly pause in mid-sentence, suddenly pausing in mid-sentence, of what he was about to say to Kagome while he was looking around, with a smirk as he caught and saw something that have brought and caught both his eyes and attention. "Look like my interest has been... stirred up from its sleep."
Kagome saw the sudden change of attitude in Shippo and she immediately knew of what it is as she and Inuyasha knew all too well. She glanced at the ten-tailed kitsune himself, saw the smirk on his face, and followed his gaze to what he was looking and ogling at exactly. Eventually, she see of what he was looking exactly at when she see three people in particular that have caught his eyes; a trio of young male teenagers specimens. Namely speaking; a random yet normal-looking browned-haired teenage boy who both look and could act like a lecher and a idiot at the same time, a pig-tailed teenage boy wearing Chinese-looking clothing with a red shirt and a pair of blue pant, and a red-haired teenage boy with a mostly white haori to be precise. Who Shippo was ogling at. Before cold waters (that's somehow dropped from the sky) splashed themselves upon the pig-tailed boy and cause him to transformed and turned him into a red-headed girl, causing the browned-haired to latched onto her and wrapped around her waist and rubbing his head in his perverted happiness and shouted with equal perverted happiness, much to now pig-tailed girl's annoyance and shouts as she tried to get him off of her, while the red-haired boy just stared at the food he was holding in his hands in silent exquisite at it. This cause the cursed miko to then sighed and begun to rubbing her forehead with her two fingers in utter exasperation at Shippo.
"Really, Shippo?" Kagome sighed and asked the ten-tailed kitsune in exasperation with a rather deadpanned expression at him as she knew of where this was going. "Do you have seriously to have sex with anyone that catch the eye of your attention and then add them to your harem once you have sex with them?"
"Hey, it's not really my fault that I have and was born with such a massive and powerful sex drive. Since I or you or Inuyasha or everybody else didn't know that I have a powerful sex drive when I was born with until I have became a teenager when puberty had hit me and, suddenly completely out of no where, I got a enormously massive and powerful sex drive that came with it." Shippo said in his normal voice while still taking the appearance of Sango before he shrug his shoulder in his current form casually. "Now if you excuse me, I have some prey within my sight or in another words..." The ten-tailed kitsune said. "I got some guys to catch and plan to laid with. So... bye, Kagome and Inuyasha! See you two later and I'll come by to visit again!" With that, he took off.
Kagome sighed and shooked her head in exasperating vexation at him, knowing Shippo all too well, as she watched the ten-tailed kitsune approach his three targets. While Kagome couldn't hear what he was saying to the three boys like Inuyasha would due to the distance and ambient noises without her husband's hearing, but judging from the expressions on their faces they're making (including the normal-looking one), they could easily guess. However, they were quickly joined by a girl with two oni-like horns on top of her head, a tomboy-looking girl, a purple-haired Chinese girl from Nekohanten, a girl with a giant spatula on her back, and a girl with twintails and have many angry expressions all across their faces.
'Must be their girlfriends.' Kagome thought.
'Probably.' Inuyasha mentally said.
Shippo wasn't discouraged by this; He simply switch targets, repeating his earlier targets with the newcomers. The five girls soon lost their previous expressions and they all begun blushing furiously. After a few moment, Shippo swiftly took one in each arms and lead all of them away. The cursed Shinto miko just stared in disbelief and bafflement of what she saw.
'How does he do that?' Inuyasha mentally asked in bemusement, not for the first time.
'I honestly don't know.' Kagome mentally answered in bewilderment, all as she watch Shippo lead the three boys and five girls away. She continue to watch idly in silence for a few more moments until she have got herself out of her daze when she shook her head and once she have recollected her wits. Before she then turned to Kirara and spoke to the two-tailed feline youkai. "You could head back to the apartment without us, Kirara? Me and Inuyasha want to walk alone with our thoughts in peace."
Kirara nodded in understand toward Kagome before, once her unearthly flames emerge from her feets and tails, she took right to the air in her flight and start flying back toward to Inuyasha and Kagome's apartment. The cursed Shinto miko watch her flew through in silence until she have disappear from her sight above the city's skyline. Then she started to walk away and begun walking down the street in silence.
Kagome walked down the street of Odaiba as she and Inuyasha think about their thoughts alone in silence with the twilight itself nearing its end and becoming dusk before she momentary stop walking down the street to look at the sky of twilight and how beautiful it was to see it while last parts of the red sun and sunset of twilight was still disappearing below the line of the horizon, reminding them like it was the red color of the Higanbana (Red Spider Lily) flower.
'Look like a Higanbana with its colors, doesn't it?' Kagome mentally said.
'...Huh... it kinda does to be honest.' Inuyasha mentally noted.
'The sunset is so beautiful to look at with those colors, Inuyasha. Like those of a Higanbana.'
'Yeah. It is, Kagome...'
Kagome continue to walking down the street of Odaiba alone with her and Inuyasha's thoughts with many people and vehicles passing by her. Until snow start to fall down when she stopped upon seeing the snows falling down, causing her to stopped completely as it start to snow and looked up to see the snowflakes starting to fall and snowing down, falling and snowing down the snowflakes, from the grey clouds sailing across the sky of dusk above Tokyo. It is now snowing. Snowing down the many white snowflakes themselves that are descending and snowing from the grey clouds that dotted across the skies of the coming night above the city skyline of Tokyo itself. All as the cursed miko herself stared at the snow in silence for a moment.
'Snow... It's starting to snow now.'
'Yeah, look like it's snowing now. It's quite beautiful, especially at this time.'
'Yes, it look so beautiful.'
'Yeah, it is beautiful sight to behold. But not as beautiful as you are, Kagome.'
'Oh, shush you. You're embarrassing me...'
Kagome resume and kept on walking down the street of Odaiba alone with her and Inuyasha's thoughts in their silent peace as it is snowing with the snows falling down around them gently and the many people and vehicles were passing by her unnoticed. She keep on walking down the street of Odaiba alone as it snows around them with the white snowflakes snowing down onto the pavement of the city's many streets before the cursed miko herself stopped and lifted her head up to see the Daikanransha itself.
'The Daikanransha... Let's go ride the Daikanransha, Inuyasha. It would be good for us...'
'Keh, yeah... that's sound like a good idea, Kagome...'
Inuyasha stood alone right in the middle of a empty yet beautiful field of countless Higanbana (Red Spider Lily) flowers with the dark clouds blanketing and covering the blue skies of day itself, reminding him and Kagome the meanings behind them in the fine art of Hanakotoba...
Kagome was now riding on one of the blue passenger cars and she watch the beauty of the snows itself snowing down from her view with her favorite backpack on her side as the Daikanransha rotate around, all while she and Inuyasha mentally talk and conversating to each other.
'Life itself is like a spinning wheel like the Daikanransha, as it will keep going around and around without stopping, no matter what you do...'
'Yeah... pretty much true...'
Inuyasha kneel right in front of Miroku's, Sango's, Kohaku's, and Kaede's graves, having already passed away from old age, and pray, praying to show his respect to them, before he then open his sharp golden eyes and ponder in thoughts as he was reminded, reminding him and his wife, the fact that they will inevitable outlived almost everyone they knew and loved toward the goal of their dream of finding that thing and breaking their curse...
Kagome was walking forward along through the flowing river in a forest and took one step at a time forward through its flowing waters before she stopped for a moment before she could took another step forward and went silence at this as she and Inuyasha thought before she let out a sigh and took one step forward, resuming walking along through the flowing waters of the river, as she knew she need to keep to moving, she and Inuyasha needing to keep to moving forward, on the path leading toward a unknown future they don't know about for their sakes in order to reach the goal of their dream, like the flowing river itself they are walking in...
It continue to snow as different patterns of neon lights flashes across the Daikanransha after it have turn and became now night. All while Kagome and Inuyasha continue to talk and speak to each other mentally.
'Life will continue on and just keep going and spinning round and round without ever stopping no matter will you do, like the Daikanransha. '
'Keh, yeah... Life is never fair. It will throw obstacles, any kind and thing, right at you in order to see if you could survive it and live or don't and died trying.'
'Yes, that is true... but love, on the other hand, is like Yin and Yang. As one cannot live without the other if it doesn't exist. Love could transcend time and space. Love cannot be taken apart until death, like what the Higanbana represent.'
'Keh. Yeah, that's true. Love is like Yin and Yang...'
Inuyasha was riding on the back of a cart that was passing by Buddist stones before he look up and wondered, wondering what the future have in store for him and Kagome...
Kagome touch the flower of the Higanbana with her hand and hoping that one day, she and Inuyasha will experience true inner peace one day if after they manage to break their curse...
Kagome was now riding and thinking to herself and Inuyasha alone in silent peace on a subway train heading toward to their next destination all as it continue to snow through the peaceful darkness of the night itself...
Kagome walked out the entrance of a metro station after she got off of the subway she was on when it arrived at her destination before she then stopped and look up when she lifted her head up to see it was now dawn that marked the beginning of twilight and the sun beginning to rise from the east from beneath the line of the horizon.
"The future for us of the path we're walking on toward our dream of finding it and breaking this curse seems so lonely..." Kagome said as she spoke to himself.
'...Keh, please Kagome. Like we're truly alone at all. But we're not.' Inuyasha mentally said and pointed out to his wife in a deadpan tone.
"Hmph, I guess not. We aren't alone after all." Kagome said with an amused 'hmph' and smirk on her face before she took one step and begun walking forward down the street. "After all, we have each other. So we'll never be alone at all."
'Keh. Yeah, that's sum it up perfectly.'
Kagome then transformed and switching place before Inuyasha then leaped right up into the air and the hanyo begun jumping across the rooftops and the city skyline from rooftops to rooftops of the skyscrapers while he spoke to himself. "Ah, it feel great to be out in the open again."
'Inuyasha! What will happen if someone see suddenly you wearing my clothing?'
"Keh. We're jumping on the rooftops, so nobody will see me Kagome. And beside, this isn't the first time that I am suddenly in your clothings or you're suddenly in my clothings at the wrong time."
'Oh kami, please don't remind me of those incidents. I am still mortified by them when they have happen right at the wrong time.'
"Oh, just relax will you? It wasn't that bad, Kagome. After all..." Inuyasha said with a nonchalant shrug before a smile then appear across his face and jumped straight forward as he told Kagome. "Our journey toward our dream is going to be hard and we still don't know how it will take of finding that thing and breaking our curse along with life keep going around without stopping like a wheel. But we're not alone in this after all, as we are in this together and we got each other with our family and friends helping and supporting us along the way. Love is like Yin and Yang afterall...!"
A/N: I am sorry for the delay of this story and taking too long on making this story, but I had suffer a severe case of multiple writer's blocks and burnouts from making, but it posted now, right? With that out of the way, let's begin...
The story was inspired by the 1st anime ending of Inuyasha My Will and MLBY Inuyasha Doujinshi by Lenbarboza (which I haven't really honestly read yet other than just a couple of pages due to my lack of drive and interest, but from looking at those pages alone it's freaking good along with Lenbarboza's other stuff, Tiny Miracle especially since it is my most favorite of her works, since she is such a great artist). I don't know of how I got the idea of Inuyasha and Kagome to be cursed of sharing a single body with Inuyasha during the day and Kagome during the night exactly, but I think I may have got it when I was watching Inuyasha 1st anime ending My Will on Youtube when the idea suddenly pop into my head when I got one idea of Kagome making to the present time was when I suddenly thought Inuyasha and Kagome are sharing a body in the ending for some reason or maybe inspired by the appearance of the Yin and Yang symbol in the ending due its dual symbolism or from the Switcher section of the Fusion Dance trope and the Romantic Fusion trope or maybe all of the above with some influence from Maze Megaburst Space and Birdy the Mighty and might have been influenced by MLBY but I don't really know since I can't remember. All I do know is that its based on MLBY and My Will, which I think is the inspiration behind its name.
The story is set in the manga continuity with some of the anime episodes in it if I like them.
The 1st part is inspired and based on the first two pages of MLBY.
The 2nd part is inspired by and based on one of the manga of 時子 on Pixiv.
The 9th part of the chapter is partly based on the humorous scenes of where Ling got into the room from Chapter 37 & 45 of Fullmetal Alchemist and where Saitama got into King's room on the 22th floor in One-Punch Man when Shippo got into and the Death Scythe and Dr. Stein meeting each other again scene from Episode 7 of Soul Eater, because I find them so freaking hilarious.
The 10th part is partly based on the ending part of 89th (103th) and some of 90th (104th) chapters of Berserk.
The 12th part is partly based on several parts of the first chapter of Second Chance by Lord Achieve on FF. And the 15th part is based Acceptance by Anklebones also on FF.
The 16th part is partly based on the 37th (51th) chapter of Berserk.
Part 17th to 19th is based on RWBY Bumbleby - Fortune cookie (which I think is also one of the inspiration for this story) from 1 to 2 by CherryInTheSun on Tumblr and Pixiv. The 22th part is based on the beginning of chapter of A Slightly Different Team by Gyrmloq (which is also another inspiration for this story).
And the last parts of the story is based on the the first anime ending My Will with the final part of this story based on the ending of Birdy The Mighty Decode Episode 13.
So why did I made Shippo a 18-tailed kitsune exactly? Because I really liked the idea of him from being the weakest member of Inu-Tachi to becoming more powerful as a daiyoukai who is equal to Sesshomaru.
The reason why I created Kubi-Nashi Ryōshi is because I wanted a excuse of why Rin is still alive in the present and also because I really like the idea of a youkai equivalent to the Irish Dullahan. Also, Kakaze mean "Divine Wind" like Kamikaze (hint hint).