Disclaimer: I don't own Inuyasha, only my oc
"Did she just say she was the daughter of a shinigami?" asked a confused Shippo. He was hanging on Miroku's shoulder.
Shiori had just revealed her origin of species and was observing their reactions. Kagome didn't know how to react. Her grandfather mentioned shinigami before, but she never paid any attention to his stories or legends. She looked at Miroku's stunned expression before speaking.
"Shinigami? You mean like a grim reaper that takes dead souls to the underworld?" she asked.
Shiori shook her head, "Not exactly. The ones responsible for taking newly departed souls to the underworld are the soul pallbearers. They're technically shinigami, just lower forms. They take care of all the dirty work."
"Then, what kind of shinigami are you?" Kagome asked becoming more interested in her story than Inuyasha and Sesshomaru's battle.
"I'm not a shinigami, just the daughter of one. But, my father was a high ranking shinigami. He was responsible for vanquishing rouge spirits and other supernatural beings."
"That's impossible," said Miroku. "Why would a tennin mate with a shinigami?"
Shiori pointed to Inuyasha, "why would a demon mate with a human?"
"Okay, I see your point," he said a little flustered. "But it's just a little strange. I've never heard of anything like that before."
"My mother was a very well known tennin. Though, she wasn't high in rank, she was very well liked among her community. One day, she became fatally wounded by a demon. Because she wasn't a lowly demon or human, the soul pallbearers weren't sent to retrieve her soul. They sent a higher ranking shinigami, my father. For reasons I'll never understand, he made deal with her. He would let him live, if she bore him a child. She was afraid to succumb to death, so she accepted."
"I can't believe he asked her to bear him a child. Sounds like a certain monk I know," said Kagome flatly.
"Amazing, what happened to your parents? Where were you born?" asked Miroku not even realizing Kagome's reference.
"Perhaps I'll tell you my entire story one day. In the meantime, you should probably stop fraternizing with the enemy and….." Shiori motioned for them to pay attention to the fight.
"Inuyasha!" gasped Kagome as she realized Sesshomaru was beating him to a pulp. In truth, they'd all forgotten about the fight. They were just so fascinated about the story of Shiori's parents.
Even though the arrow Kagome fired earlier reverted tessaiga to its original form, Sesshomaru transformed it partially with his own energy. It wasn't transformed completely, but tessaiga was still very powerful in Sesshomaru's grasp. Kagome quickly ran over to some nearby rocks and aimed her bow at Sesshomaru. Shiori watched as Kagome fired her arrow, striking Sesshomaru's armor. Shippo was amazed by her growing skills. Sesshomaru stared at Kagome with contempt as he felt his armor shatter.
"That girl is annoying," he thought.
"You broke his armor Kagome!" he exclaimed.
"Your arrows can't purify Lord Sesshomaru either," Shiori flatly stated.
"I'm not trying to purify him, or whatever, I'm aiming at the jewel shard in his left arm," Said Kagome as she lined another arrow on her bow.
"What? How did she know about the jewel shard?" Shiori thought to herself.
"Inuyasha, make her stop," Sesshomaru calmly demanded. "Even though you're just a half demon, the blood of a demon flows through you. Be proud of that. Don't accept human aid even in death."
Inuyasha turn towards Kagome, "Don't try anything Kagome. Sesshomaru's ruthless."
"I can handle it," she said stubbornly, "I'll hit him!"
She fired her arrow at Sesshomaru, but he caught it and melted it with his poison.
"You've had your warning girl, now die!" he said as he fired an attack at Kagome with Tessaiga.
Kagome froze in fear at the oncoming attack. Inuyasha instantly ran towards Kagome and shielded her body. Both of them went flying back and hit the ground with a huge force. Inuyasha, who was slightly weakened, got up and checked Kagome. She was badly bruised and unconscious.
"Kagome!" cried Inuyasha as he scooped her body up.
Inuyasha gently place Kagome back on the ground and stared at Sesshomaru in anger. He'd crossed the line this time.
"This is as far as you go," Sesshomaru declared.
"You'll regret that Sesshomaru!"
"I can't let this go on any longer," said Miroku standing to his feet. "I must do something."
Shiori glanced at Miroku, "And just what do you plan on doing, monk?"
"I'm going to suck him into my wind tunnel," he explained. "If you stand in my way, you'll be sucked in as well. Though I hope she doesn't."
He went to join Inuyasha on the front line in the battle.
"I must warn Lord Sesshomaru!" said Jaken.
"Don't bother. If he knows what's good for him, won't use his wind tunnel," she said. "They're still here, the poisonous insects. I can feel them lurking on the battlefield."
Inuyasha knew the insects were still around as well. He could smell their scent and advised Miroku not the open the wind tunnel. He threw a pebble at a nearby crater, and sure enough, more insects came swarming out. It was useless.
"Miroku, take Kagome and leave this place. Guard her with your life," he ordered.
"I won't let you get away," Sesshomaru called out. "With one swing, every one of you will die!"
"Then I won't let you swing!" Inuyasha charged toward Sesshomaru and grabbed onto his left arm. He desperately turned to Miroku and ordered him to run away.
"He's holding the blade back to allow his friends to escape, interesting," Shiori thought.
"Exposing your back to the enemy?" Sesshomaru jeered. "Your mistake."
With that, Sesshomaru impaled his brother's back with his own claw. His hand ripped out through Inuyasha's chest as Inuyasha howled in pain. Miroku, Shippo, and Kagome who'd woken up, were all staring from a distance in disbelief. Even Jaken was a little disturbed. Shiori, however, was completely unmoved. Her attention was on Sesshomaru's left hand.
"Any last words before you die, Inuyasha?" Sesshomaru mocked.
"I can't believe you haven't noticed yet," said Inuyasha with a grin, "that tessaiga is back in my hands!" He grabbed tessaiga, jumped back, and removed the human hand that was still gripped to the handle.
He purposely allowed Sesshomaru to impale is back in order to rip off Sesshomaru's hand. Sesshomaru didn't feel pain because it wasn't his true arm, just a replacement. Inuyasha was a lot smarter than his brother gave him credit for.
"Oh no!" Jaken cried. "Sesshomaru's arm has been ripped off! Now he won't be able to touch the tessaiga."
Shiori felt a familiar presence on the barren wasteland. It was them—the tennin. They were watching her once again. But this time, their presence felt different. They were angry. There were several of them. Shiori had a feeling they were waiting to get her alone.
Inuyasha now had tessaiga back in his possession, but he was losing consciousness from his wound. He knelt down and held tessaiga over his shoulder. Shiori and Jaken casually went over to where Sesshomaru.
"He's losing consciousness," said Jaken moving closer to Inuyasha.
"Don't go any closer," Sesshomaru ordered.
"Huh?" tessaiga instantly sent out an energy strike. Jaken ran back for cover. "But how? He didn't even swing the sword!"
"He's losing consciousness, but the sword is acting on its own will. If I try and attack him now, the sword would surely strike me down," said Sesshomaru in his mind.
"Shiori, Jaken, we're leaving," he commanded. "It's useless to stay, as I can't even touch the tessaiga."
"Coming my lord!" said Jaken.
Sesshomaru took flight as Jaken clung to his fury pelt. Shiori also took flight, but not before taking a final glance at the battered Inuyasha. She also scanned the area for the tennin.
Once they were in the air, they noticed that the poisonous insects were still following after them. They seemed to be waiting around for the Jewel shard in Sesshomaru's human arm. Jaken pointed out that the arm was burring away at Sesshomaru's shoulder.
"At this point, I'll be burned alive by the arm," He removed the arm and dropped it. One of the insects caught onto the arm and they all flew back to Naraku.
Naraku was waiting on a nearby hillside and grabbed hold of the arm they brought him. He examined it to make sure the jewel was still inside.
"That fool failed me," he said darkly.
Sesshomaru, who followed the insects, appeared behind Naraku. When he realized this, Naraku quickly bowed before him. As if Sesshomaru didn't hear what he said.
"Lord Sesshomaru," he said slowly. "What a pleasant surprise."
"You wretch!" shrieked Jaken. "You intended to have Lord Sesshomaru burned alive by that arm!"
"You are mistaken," Naraku said calmly. "I merely set up this device so that I may retrieve my jewel shard."
"I suppose that makes sense," said Sesshomaru before striking down Naraku.
The baboon head went flying from the body and landed at Shiori's feet.
"Serves you right!" said Jaken.
Sesshomaru looked up at the sky, "he's escaped."
"Lord Sesshomaru," Naraku's voice boomed from the trees. "Please suppress your anger. We'll meet again when I set up a scheme to kill Inuyasha! Perhaps I'll visit you soon!"
"A crafty character," Sesshomaru noted. "Let's go."
Sesshomaru and Jaken began travelling along, but Shiori didn't move. She was staring at the thicket. She knew she'd been followed here. She was surrounded. Jaken, noticed she wasn't coming and called out to her.
"What are you doing? Lord Sesshomaru said to go,"
"We'll meet up later," she said without looking.
"hmph," said Sesshomaru, "as you wish."
When they were well out of sight, Shiori could hear the thickets rustling. Suddenly, 8 tennin emerged from all around Shiori. Each one was armed with a sword. Each one of them wore their hair down. Shiori's attention was on the tennin right in front of her—Emi. Though her eyes were full of anger, her heart was full of sadness.
"Where's Reika?" Shiori asked.
"There's no need for you to concern yourself with her. I'd hoped it wouldn't come to this," said Emi. "You gave us no choice."
"What exactly have I done to deserve this?" asked Shiori.
"You've committed the murder of humans, aligned yourself with evil demons, and caused pain and great suffering!" responded Emi.
"Besides all of that….."
Emi stared at Shiori in complete disbelief, "this is no time to joke Shiori! You're becoming too dangerous and reckless. So you must be vanquished."
"Who says I'm joking? I've never killed in cold blooded murder. That human you watched me kill was attacking me."
"But you didn't have to kill him. You chose to."
Shiori folded her arms across her chest, "yes I did choose to. I wanted to."
"And that's what makes you so dangerous. You can feel the suffering of your victims. You try and pretend you're an emotional void, but you have your own feelings. You understand morals, yet you choose to be evil," Emi sounded as if she were on the verge of tears. "We have no idea what you'll do next."
"Hmph, you act as though I'm some kind of mass murder slaughtering the innocent. You've been brainwashed by Reika haven't you?" Shiori said as she stood her ground.
"Forgive me, my sister," said a tearful Emi.
All of the tennin, excluding Emi, emitted an electrical energy from their hands. They zapped Shiori, who was trapped in the middle, in an attempt to kill her. Shiori could feel her energy leaving her body—fast! Even so, she refused to die. Emi watched helplessly as Shiori was brought to her knees. She thought the end was coming and her sister was going to die. Shiori, with all her might, crossed her arms in front of her face and threw to the side. Once again a purplish light manifested around her body. Emi took note of this, but it was too late for her to warn anyone.
"Curse deflect!" Shiori shouted out.
A purple energy blast emitted from Shiori's body and reflected the energy back at the tennin. All of them, but Emi, were knocked backwards. Emi stared in shock and watched Shiori stand back to her feet.
"You wanna see some emotion from me so bad, huh Emi?" said an enraged Shiori as she slowly unsheathed her sword.
All the tennin began scrambling back to their feet and moved into attack. Shiori leapt into the air to block an oncoming attack and dodged another one. 2 tennin accidently crossed blades. She blocked another tennin's blade and kicked him in the stomach. He flew back and hit the tennin behind him. Another one tried to sneak up behind her, but Shiori ducked down and spun to trip him. Emi continued to watch from the sidelines.
"What's with them? I'm not using my full strength, but it doesn't seem like they are either…"
It was much harder for her to fight without actually trying to kill. Her intention wasn't to kill any of the tennin because that would just give Reika a reason to send more after her. She would never leave her alone. As much as she wanted to kill them, she couldn't afford to.
"Stay down!" she ordered as she flung one against a tree.
They were beginning to grow anxious that their extermination mission would fail. They tried zapping her again, but this time she was prepared. Shiori moved with such agility, that she got to get them to strike their own teammates. Eventually, they just stayed down.
"Looks like it's just the 2 of us, eh?" she motioned Emi to come toward her.
Emi turned to find that all of her comrades were still alive. Not one of them was slain.
"She hasn't killed them? Only knocked them unconscious?" She thought. "Maybe she's not so dangerous after all."
"Well Emi? Do you want your chance at me as well?" asked Shiori interrupting Emi's thoughts.
Emi shook her head, "No, we'll leave you now."
"I thought you were coming to exterminate me. This was surprisingly easy…..and you didn't join in at all. "
"We know when we've been beaten, we'll go now," She said as she and the rest of the tennin suddenly disappeared in a ray of light.
"They're gone," said Shiori with relief. "That wasn't hard at all. I thought they'd be more of a challenge, and I was holding back my power. Something is going on here…."
….
Emi and the rest of her crew arrived at a large mountain side. They slowly approached a hidden cavern and entered it. As they walked, they casted 8 elongated dark shadows across the walls. They seemed to be walking for ages when they finally reached a dead end. Emi walked up to the cave wall and placed both her hands on it while uttering something. Suddenly, the wall began to shimmer with a silver light, and all of them passed through. On the other side of a wall, was a whole other world. The air was crisp and pure, the sky was a pinkish color and the grass was a blueish green. These were the sacred lands. Emi and her group walked pass other tennin that were casually walking by. She ordered them not to greet anyone. In fact, she ordered them to keep their heads down at all costs. They made their way to a large stone court yard, where they met with their leader Reika.
Reika was sitting in a large throne high above everyone else. Yet her long white hair still managed to hit the floor. She looked down on the incoming group, expecting some news. She casually looked at Emi, who was the only one with her head up.
"Emi has returned," she announced.
"Yes my lady, unfortunately we failed to kill her. She proved too powerful for my group and I,"
"You fool!" Reika spat. "Did you think I wasn't watching? You defied me!"
"No my lady," said a terrified Emi. She was beginning to tremble.
"You didn't even lay a finger on her. You had plenty of opportunities to strike her down. After all, you are among the strongest of your group." She glanced at all of the tennin behind Emi. All of their heads were hung low. She pointed to a random one. "You there, let me see your face."
Emi began to panic, "my lady I-"
Reika instantly zoomed down for her thrown and slapped Emi across the face. She went flying halfway across the courtyard. Reika then gripped one of the tennin by the collar.
"I said, let me see your face!" she demanded.
She shoved the hair off the woman's face and examined her. In a fit of rage, she threw the woman down. Reika charged over to Emi and lifted her off the ground by her neck.
"You little wench! How dare you try and trick your queen like this. Those are not the high ranking tennin warriors I asked you to gather. Did you think just because they wore their hair down and over their faces, I wouldn't notice they were low ranks?" She slapped Emi again and dropped her to the ground. "You were trying to protect your sister, weren't you? Like when you tried to get her to come home? Have you learned nothing from the last time?"
Emi lay motionless on the ground as Reika continued to beat her. Her group helplessly watched. She didn't care what happened to her, as long as Shiori was safe. She would continue to save her.
"It was my mistake to trust you again. You've been bewitched by that girl!" Reika shouted. "She's nothing but trouble!"
"You're wrong," said Emi weakly. "She's not. She didn't kill anyone of them. She could have easily done so if she wanted, but she chose not to. She could have easily slain Inuyasha's friends as well. But she didn't. I know not she doesn't always make the right choices, but she chose the right one this time."
"Feh," scoffed Reika. "That girl doesn't care about anything or anyone. Not even you."
"You're wrong; she's just putting up a front. Shiori may pretend not to have feelings or emotions, but I know deep down inside she has a heart. She didn't kill any of us, although she could have."
"Were you intending to lead these lowly tennin to their doom?" Reika questioned. "They were fortunate this time, but what if she hadn't spared them? Were you prepared to sacrifice them for the sake of Shiori?"
Emi was speechless, she hadn't even thought about it that way. She was so concerned about keeping Shiori safe, she didn't even think of the others. What if Shiori had killed them?
"I knew I should have dealt with that brat a long time ago. Looks like I'm going to have to take care of her personally. She's finally getting what she's asked for." Said Reika.
"No! You can't!" screamed Emi.
"Silence!" shouted Reika as she dealt her another blow. "Guards, take them all away. They shall be punished for trying to fool their queen."
"No! Shiori! I won't let you kill her!" screamed Emi as she and the rest were dragged away. "Shiori! Shiori!"
…
"Where have you been?" asked Sesshomaru when Shiori finally caught up to them.
"Just taking care of some family affairs," she responded. She climbed on top of Ah-Un's saddle and rested her head on the back of one of Ah's neck.
"What? Family affairs? What are you talking about! Give us answers!" demanded Jaken.
"That scent…." Thought Sesshomaru.
Shiori was exhausted, as usual from dealing with tennin. For some reason, they always had some sort of lasting effect on her. Perhaps she was tired from the tennin purification attempts—so why was she so exhausted when she and Emi met a little while ago? Emi hadn't attempted to purify her. There was just…..something about them.
"Hey, wherever we're going, don't wake me until we get there," she said and with that she fell asleep.
"What? How dare you! You wake up right now or I'll-"
"Jaken," Sesshomaru cut in. "Leave her be."
"Uh….yes Lord Sesshomaru," said Jaken hanging his head. "Why is he always so much nicer to her? It's not fair!"
"We're going," Sesshomaru ordered. Jaken took Ah-Un's reigns and they made their way.
"Sleep while you can, Shiori," said Reika as she watched the entire scene through her mirror. "I'll be coming for you soon. And this time, you won't escape me…."