"There we go, that ought to keep it going for a while," said Miroku after he threw the final log on their campfire. Then he sat down next to Sango. "So this target of yours, it's from an incident that goes way back doesn't it? Far before we ever met."

Sango would not have even considered starting a campfire while alone in such a hostile, untamed land. But now with Miroku and Kirara present, she felt it was an acceptable risk. Kirara's demon-enhanced animal senses and Miroku's ability to detect demonic aura probably would be able to alert them of any approaching threats, while any wandering demons or bandit groups would be hard pressed to overcome Miroku's wind tunnel alone, much less the combined force of all three of them.

Now sitting by Miroku in front of the blazing fire under the moonlight with Kirara curled up and asleep in her lap, Sango couldn't help but appreciate the irony of the setting. Under normal circumstances, most people would find this situation quite peaceful and romantic. But there was nothing peaceful or romantic involved in the story she was about to reveal. On the contrary, she was about to reveal one of her darkest and most unpleasant memories. An event that she had never talked about with anyone outside her immediate family since then, even after so many years.

"Yes it certainly does. It actually happened during my early years as a demon slayer. Remember what I told you about our culture and its warrior training traditions?"

Miroku thought for a moment. "A little. You said your village trained everyone in the art of demon slaying from as soon as they were able to wield a weapon and sent them on missions at a very young age."

"Age 11," Sango clarified. "That was a strict standard. But everything else from that point on was based on pure merit. Any further advancement had to be earned, and the next major right of passage was usually many years away."

"Next right of passage? What could that be?" Asked Miroku. He had always had a hard time comprehending Sango's culture and found their use of child soldiers generally disturbing, though he would be the first to admit he was hardly in a position to claim moral superiority in comparison.

"Your first command assignment." Sango smiled as she recalled the ultimate goal of her youth and how hard she worked for it. "Getting to lead a demon slaying expedition was the goal of every young slayer from the moment they put a weapon in our hands. It represented true mastery of the Taijiya lifestyle in every regard, not just in fighting, but also strategy, tactics, discipline, and personal responsibility."

"Yes I could see how that would be a worthy goal. But I take it that typically wasn't done around age 11."

"Absolutely not," Sango confirmed. "It generally took many years. Usually my people were in their late teens or early 20's by the time they earned it. But I was determined to do it faster. Being the daughter of the village chief had put a lot of pressure on me to excel, and I was dedicated to proving I could handle it. I wanted to make my father proud and set a good example for Kohaku to follow when his time came."

"That certainly sounds like the Sango I know," said Miroku happily. "I take it you completed this task quite effectively."

"That I did. I earned my first command assignment at age 14. I can't event begin to tell you the feeling of pride and accomplishment I was experiencing at the time. Hardly any of our oldest veterans could ever remember anyone getting command responsibly at such a young age. It wasn't universally accepted by everyone, though. I heard a few people grumbling that my father's status as a chief unfairly influenced my selection. But I knew I earned the title properly, and I was going to do everything I could to prove it."

"Great accomplishments always provoke jealousy. It's an unfortunate fact of life. But I have no doubt you put all the skeptics in their proper place."

In an instant, the tone of pride and nostalgia in Sango's voice was gone. She turned away and stared straight ahead at the blazing campfire. "Miroku...I..I'm flattered by your confidence, but, well...this time it didn't quite turn out so well."

Suddenly Miroku was hit with a tremendous feeling of guilt. He could tell Sango was about to reveal a horrible experience and his false assumption had only made it worse. "Oh Sango...I'm sorry. You don't have to tell me about it if you don't want too. I said I would be with you no matter what this journey involves and I meant it. Just point me in the right direction and I'll do whatever is needed of me. I don't need to know about who you're after. Knowing that he's your mortal enemy is enough."

This simple statement seemed to cheer Sango up a bit. "Thank you Miroku. That means a lot to me. But I'm not going to let you risk your life without knowing the reason why. Besides, this has been haunting me for a long time now. I need to talk about it with someone, and there is no person I'd rather share it with then you."

Miroku was somewhat surprised at this response. Sango was rarely so open about her affection for him and this he could tell this was a very significant event she was recalling. Doing his best to react with restraint, he simply replied "I'm honored you feel that way, Sango. If you are truly comfortable with revealing this tale, then please begin."

"Naturally my first command mission was a simple one, and I was well supported," Sango continued without missing a beat. "My culture may have been harsh, but we weren't so brutal as to throw our new leaders to the wolves. After all, with command responsibility, it wouldn't just be their life on the line. For their first assignment, new commanders would be given a low-risk hunt. And they would be leading seasoned veterans, usually several years their senior. The veteran warriors would provide valuable advice and support to the first-time leader, ensuring he would always have a good pool of knowledge and experience to draw on if he found himself overwhelmed in his task. However, he would still be in command of his troops from start to finish, and they were not authorized to disobey any order except in the most extreme cases."

"A reasonable system with a good deal of safeguards," Miroku commented. "So what was your task?"

"I was to lead four other slayers and Kirara to investigate reports of demon attacks in a nearby town," Sango explained. "The place had experienced a string of demon attacks on unguarded caravans and travelers near the woods. The few who survived the attacks reported a giant plant youkai that would ambush them when they approached heavily wooded areas. When the attacks were reported to the town guards, they would return to the site to find the demon had left no trace behind. Even the bodies of its victims were gone."

"Ah, so it was the same beast who put us through such misery in the woodlands," Miroku realized. "No wonder you were so dedicated to finding it. It eluded you in the past and you felt it was your duty to take it out now."

"Not exactly. I'm afraid it's a lot more complicated then that. You see, this one looked the same as the one we found last week, but it wasn't. It didn't have anywhere near the intellect or battlefield capabilities as our recent adversary. It was a simple roving demon picking on soft targets. It never attacked any well guarded caravans or well armed traveling groups. The town guards probably could have handled it on their own if they had enough men to send on a mission outside the walls. But since they didn't, we were hired for the job, and I was selected to lead it. It seemed simple enough task for a new young commander like me."

"But it didn't turn out that way did it?"

Sango looked back and Miroku and laughed a bit. "Actually at first the main problem was that it was too easy! After stopping by the town for information, we found the youkai after only a few hours of searching. And as soon as I sent my troops into battle, they killed it in less then a minute. I didn't even get to raise my own weapon. It was almost embarrassing. My first command mission was supposed to be a great milestone in my life, and it was completed with less effort then it takes to cut down a tree or plow a field. I didn't get to participate in the battle, make a single command decision of any real significance, or learn anything valuable that would help me on future assignments. My presence on the team had served no purpose whatsoever, and I simply could not return home feeling so woefully un-needed."

"Yes knowing you I could see how that would be upsetting. But the mission was over, so what else could you do? Start a bar fight?"

"That's pretty much what the others told me. Just pack up and go home to celebrate a win, albeit a simple one. But I told them it was worthwhile to do a bit more investigating first. The monstrous plant youkai, we had never seen anything like it before. And the fact that we never found any remains of its victims was something I thought deserved a bit more scrutiny. At the very least, I wanted to find out where it came from and what happened to those it killed. My subordinate troops were against it. They thought I should merely report this back to my village elders and let them decide what to do. But since we were already in the area and had not yet been seriously challenged, I decided we should check it out on our own. Like it or not, the warriors on the team did not have the authority to overrule me."

Sango paused for a bit as she reflected on the bitter argument she had with her team members. "They questioned my judgment and implied it was based on nothing but youthful impulsiveness and desire for glory, but in doing so they only made me more determined to stay on the path I had chosen. It was the first time I had to make a difficult command decision, and in doing so I changed all our lives in a way I couldn't possibly imagine."

"You were only 14, Sango," said Miroku, doing his best to console her. "And whatever the results, I'm sure you were doing what you felt was right."

"Thanks Miroku, but you're not the first one to tell me that," she replied. "I've heard and thought of every possible excuse and explanation for the choice I made over the years, but even after all this time, I still don't know what to think. Maybe they were right."

Then Sango continued. "Through further investigation back in town, we learned of a reclusive hermit living nearby named Zanshin. He had been living in a large fenced off mansion a few miles outside of town for as long as most people could remember, and had a strange obsession with alchemy and science. He rarely showed up in town, except to go shopping for exotic potions or herbs brought in from foreign traders, and ever since the plant demon attacks started, he hadn't been seen at all. Furthermore, many travelers going by his abode reported hearing terrifying sounds coming out of the mansion, especially at night. It seemed certain that he was responsible, so after a brief period of rest, we set out to pay him a visit. As soon as we got there, I could tell we had found our target. The place was surrounded with demonic aura. No one answered our knocks at the door or demands for entry, so we readied ourselves for battle and charged in."

Sango paused for a minute as memories of the horrible day flooded back to her. The clash of weapons, the fury of battle, and shouts of her companions. "Any disappointment I had been feeling about the lack of challenge in my first command mission was quickly put to rest. As soon as we stepped in, we were immediately engulfed in a furious storm of demons. They were unlike any we had ever encountered before. That had all sorts of devastating powers and seemed as if they specifically designed for killing, and as we fought our way deeper into the mansion, we soon learned that actually was the case."

"Really, how so?" Miroku asked while leaning closer to her. It seemed he was getting so immersed in the story that he had forgotten it was real.

"We discovered the place contained some sort of demon laboratory. Zanshin had found a way to create his own demons, and the plant youkai had been his prototype. We never found out how, but it was through some dark methods of science and sorcery, and it involved a lot of exotic ingredients, including one particularly disturbing one: Humans. That's why we never found the victims of his plant youkai. The process of artificially creating demons involved harvesting humans. Miroku...the things I saw in that laboratory have haunted me to this day. As a demon slayer, I'd already seen my share of death, but nothing like this. Carved up, charred, and mutilated bodies everywhere. It felt like I had truly stepped into a living nightmare."

Miroku listened and tried to take it all in. Sango's experience seemed worse then anything he could possibly imagine and he couldn't even think of appropriate response to it. "So what did you do from there?"

"The only thing we could do. We kept fighting. From that point it we knew Zanshin had to be terminated to put an end to his hellish creations once and for all. My warriors congratulated me for uncovering the horrible plot and told me I had made the right decision. Then we fought our way deeper into the mansion until we finally made it to Zanshin's lair. By that time I had already lost two of my men, but it seemed like our victory was at hand. I could see why the villagers never realized Zanshin was a demon. He looked as human as any demon I had ever seen. Even more so then Kouga or Sesshomaru. He seemed to be in his late 30's. though being a demon it was impossible to know his true age, and was well built and strong, but other then that didn't seem particularly formidable. As far as I could tell, he didn't have any special powers like Inuyasha's blades of blood or Kagura's wind control. He wasn't even armed when we first found him, and the fact that he had been creating demons to do his fighting for him seemed to imply he couldn't handle it on his own. We were battered and exhausted from our long battle, but felt sure that we could take him. However, he had a hidden prowess none of us had counted on."

"And what was that? More demon creations?

"No. It was simply the most amazing combination of fighting skill, speed, and endurance I had ever seen, and it remains so to this day," Sango explained. "I had never seen anything like it. I'm not sure even Inuyasha or Seshomaru could match him on those three aspects. It was unreal. No matter how much we hacked him up or beat him down, he just kept coming, fighting the whole time as if injury and battle fatigue was a mere inconvenience. I also soon discovered why he wasn't armed when we found him. He didn't need weapons. He just took the ones we attacked him with. In addition to his other skills, he was a master of hand to hand combat and disarming his opponents. And so the fight raged on, from one part of the structure to the next. I swear we must have gone through every single inch of that accursed mansion, and left a bloody trail along the whole way. Eventually we ended up outside in the courtyard, and by that time there was only me and Kirara left. Just the two of us, slashing and pounding him with everything we had, while he gave us plenty in return. Despite his slashed and beaten body, Zanshin was still hitting us hard as ever. And...then, well... it all just came to an end."

"Came to an end? What are you talking about? What happened?" Asked Miroku.

Sango sighed and looked down at Kirara on her lap. "I...don't really know. Everything just faded away, and the next thing I knew, I woke up on Kirara being flown back to my village. I must have passed out from fatigue, blood loss, or a hard hit. It could have been anything. I was in pretty bad shape, with more wounds then I had received from all my prior demon hunts combined."

Sango paused to pet Kirara a bit and scratch her head, causing the demon cat stretch out and start purring, though she remained asleep. Then Sango continued.

"Either way, Kirara must have seen me fall and flown me to safety. I don't know how she did it with Zanshin present. Maybe he was down too. It could have been any number of things, but there was no way to know. Though Kirara has been blessed with a number of wonderful talents, the ability to speak isn't one of them. So she was in no position to tell how the event came to a close. All she could do was take me back to my village, where I told everyone of the horrors we had encountered. While I recovered from my wounds, they immediately sent an attack force to Zanshin's lair to discover what had happened. But they found nothing. Zanshin was gone, as well as most of the ingredients from his lab. Hunting parties were sent all over the country to try and find him, but we never did. We assumed he left for far off lands or crawled into some lonely corner of the earth and died. We also never found any trace of the slayers on my team either. Not even their bodies..."

Sango suddenly stood up and turned away, causing a surprised Kirara to awaken as she was dumped on the ground. "It was my first command mission and...I...lost everyone. Their families didn't even get the consolation of a proper burial."

Miroku immediately got up to comfort her, leaving Kirara on the ground hissing at them both for being ignored. "You couldn't have known what was going to happen to them, Sango. They were all warriors and willing to fight for a cause along side you, as I am now. You said they even supported your decision once they realized what Zanshin had done."

"That's what my father told me," replied Sango while doing her best to hold back tears. "That and the fact that by driving away Zanshin and destroying his laboratory, I had saved the inhabitants of the region from a horrible fate. We had wiped out his creations before they could overwhelm the town or do any further damage. If I had gone back after defeating the plant youkai, it's possible Zanshin's forces would have grown significantly more powerful and carried out more attacks before our slayers returned for further investigation. My mission was considered a success, and I was praised for my initiative and courage by almost everyone in the village. Everyone that is, except the families of my fallen warriors. They never said anything to me about it, but every time they looked at me, I saw nothing but outrage and blame."

Then Sango turned back to face Miroku. "But I suppose it didn't really matter in the end, did it? After all, if they had survived, it would have only given them a few more years. Then they would have suffered the fate of everyone else: My father, the villagers...Kohaku." Finally she couldn't hold back tears any longer. The strain of the painful memories was too much.

Miroku took her hand in his and spoke in a soothing voice. "Sango, it's alright. I know nothing can replace what you've lost, but you've still got us. Inuyusha, Shippo, Kagome, and both of us. And we we're not going anywhere. The story you've told me hasn't changed my commitment to you or your task one bit. I can't tell you what we're about to go through, but I promise I'll be with you till the end."

Sango pulled away and dried her tears before responding with a tone of burning determination. "I know, and I'm grateful for it. I can't let the past interfere with what we're facing now. The recent attacks by that plant youkai prove that Zanshin is alive and he's returned, so I'm going to finish what I started all those years ago. His minions have gotten a lot more powerful and he's infusing them with jewel shards, but they won't stop me. Nothing will. Now let's get some sleep. We've got a long day ahead of us. Tomorrow is the start of a journey that will only end when Zanshin no longer walks the earth."