author's note - special thanks to Panda-chan13 and yuki san1 for reviewing; SugarHighSpaz and yuki san1 for favoriting; and yuki san1 for story-alerting! And another round of thanks to everyone who stopped by to read! :D Well, here's another crazy chapter and things heat up big time for Kikume! Enjoy and if you've got the time, please review! It is much appreciated! Thank you! :D
Chapter 4: the Forest of Fools
Five months later…
Kikume entered the Ferry Lounge massaging her sore shoulders. Man, she really needed to stop pulling all-nighters in the archives. She was going to end up all bent and hunched-back from the hours of sitting and reading scrolls after scrolls. But damn it all, she never anticipated how many babies would be born every day in Human World. Dear Kami! The list went on and on and on!
Kikume paused in the doorway and surveyed the room. The tension in the air was so thick she could cut it with a seven foot sword and it made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. She glanced at her fellow reapers to see Botan, Hikari, and Ayame all wearing grim expressions on their faces as they sat in silence around the table. She'd never seen them look that solemn before.
"Hey, what's going on?" asked Kikume as she casually took her seat.
Botan sighed. The Chief Pilot of the River Styx had dark bags under her amethyst eyes and her usually neat blue ponytail was an utter mess. Something big must be going on for her to look that stressed out, thought Kikume. Usually, Botan took great care in how she looked while Kikume just left her hair in a messy braid unless she absolutely had to untie it and wash the damn thing – now that was a nightmare. Why was her hair this long again? Oh yeah, because King Enma had a terrible sense of style and no sense of practicality.
"Okay girls, listen up," said Botan, bringing Kikume out of her thoughts. "We have a serious situation here. Someone is opening a portal between the Human and Demon World."
Hikari eyes were the size of dinner plates as she gaped at Botan's words.
Kikume whistled, seriously impressed by the severity of the situation. "Whoa! Really? No way."
"I'm afraid so, Kikume-chan. Ayame, would you care to fill these two in on the details?"
Ayame nodded and pulled out her white notebook. "From what my department has gathered, the portal is currently almost 1.5 km in diameter. That means that the portal is now close to stage three of the completion process. And according to our calculations, it will reach stage four – a stable 2 km wide portal – in approximately one week."
"OMG!" exclaimed Hikari – she'd picked up a strange habit of talking in acronyms ever since she'd been reassigned to the west coast of the United States. "TDLMT!" [That doesn't leave much time!]
Kikume nodded. "I'll say. What took Koenma so long to realize this? What was he doing for the last two stages, getting potty-trained?"
"Now, Kikume-chan. Koenma-sama has been very busy since the closing of the Dark Tournament. There was a lot of paperwork he needed to do and the mastermind behind this scheme was obviously waiting for a time when Spirit World was at its busiest to act," explained Botan.
"So who did Koenma send to prevent this disaster?" asked Kikume.
"Koenma-sama assigned this mission to the Spirit Detective. He and his team are already investigating the center point of the hole. If anyone can solve this case, it'll be Yusuke," said Botan, confidently.
"Then why are we here? This doesn't have anything to do with us reapers," said Kikume.
"Well, Koenma-sama said that while Yusuke is taking care of the psychic who's opening the hole, he wants you to keep an eye on things in Demon World. That means you must stay in Demon World from now until this whole situation is resolved. Koenma-sama stresses that you need to be extra careful and to never let your guard down."
"Oh, great, as if I didn't have enough to do already," muttered Kikume and sighed. "And here I thought I'd get reassigned to Human World to help out or something…"
"That is actually my job. As the Spirit Detective's assistant, I'll be joining his team in locating the culprit behind the portal. Hikari, I'm sorry but you'll have to take over as Chief Pilot of the River Styx while I'm gone."
"NP, Botan. YCCOM," Hikari saluted. [No problem, Botan. You can count on me.]
"Thank you, Hikari. Ayame, Koenma-sama's orders are for you to keep him updated on the portal's status. Inform him immediately if anything changes, especially the ETA."
Ayame nodded and stood up. "I'll get on it right away." She bowed and promptly walked through the wall behind her, wasting no time with meaningless doors. And now that Kikume thought about it, why did they have doors anyways? All of the reapers could walk through walls, so having doors was pretty pointless actually...
She was still musing over this small detail when Hikari also got up and wished Botan luck.
"TTYL, GFs! BB!" she waved and quickly left to pick up on Botan's workload. [Talk to you later, girl friends! Bye Bye!]
Botan then turned to Kikume, who was still trying to work out what the heck Hikari just said.
"TTYL… that's a new one…"muttered Kikume to herself. "What the heck does that stand for?"
"It means 'talk to you later'," explained Botan as she stood up. "Come on, Kikume-chan, shouldn't you get going too? I'm sure there are a lot of demon souls who'll need ferrying," she said, trying to shoo Kikume to her feet.
Kikume sighed. "This is so lame," she complained. "Everyone gets to do something new while all I do is 'keep an eye out' for stuff in Demon World and ferry annoying demon souls. And the fact that I have to stay in Demon World for Kami knows how long just really makes my day. Did you know that at least five of them try to eat me every day, and another ten don't even know they're dead?"
Kikume snorted with derision. "Honestly, those demons are so dumb I don't think they'll be a threat to humanity at all. They're so stupid they'll probably kill each other over one human instead of just going after another one. So I say let the damn portal open. Fewer demons in Demon World will mean less souls and less work for me –"
Suddenly Kikume was slapped so hard across her right cheek that she tasted blood. Her face stung and her eyes began tearing up from the pain but it was the shock that really got to her. Kikume could only gape up at Botan as the reaper glared angrily down at her.
"I don't want to ever hear you say that again!" shouted Botan. "How can you be so selfish? To condemn the whole human race just because you're too lazy to ferry demon souls to Spirit World? It's disgusting!"
"Well maybe I would see things differently if I wasn't the only fucking reaper in all of Demon World!" retorted Kikume angrily, jumping to her feet too to face Botan head-on.
"Koenma-sama picked you as the Chief Pilot of the River Acheron because you're the only one that can do it! Don't you think he'd assign more reapers to pilot the Acheron if there were any more capable candidates? But there aren't so you're just going to have to deal with it! The Acheron is your responsibility and so are the demon souls from Demon World!" shouted Botan, stabbing her index finger into Kikume's chest for emphasis.
Kikume swatted her hand away. "Fuck the Demon World! I don't give a damn about it and I never did! I hate this job! I hate Spirit World! I hate my life! And you know what? I hate Koenma even more because he's the one that let that fucking Spirit Fox take my body and did nothing about it! And instead of compensating me by giving me a new body, Koenma decides to make me one of his lackeys while that fucking asshole-demon prances around in my body! I'm stuck taking care of assholes just like that Spirit Fox while he lives the life I should have had. How is that fair?" shouted Kikume, smashing her fist into the nearby wall angrily.
"This isn't about you, Kikume! This is about the entire human race! What's the point in getting your body back if there is no Human World to live it in?" countered Botan.
Kikume snarled with frustration since she had no comeback for that one. Instead, she just punched the wall again, causing cracks to form in the white paint.
Damn you, Botan!
"Don't you see the important role you play in Spirit World?" asked Botan, lowering her voice a little. "Without you, Demon World would be overrun with malevolent ghosts and soon that world will become uninhabitable. The demons will try to enter the Human World and, if they succeed, then everything you've ever wanted will be destroyed."
Kikume huffed and crossed her arms, her anger slowly ebbing away. It was now just simmering at the back of her mind as irritation and frustration took over.
"Feh. So you're saying I have to do the job I hate because it protects my dream, even though I'll never get to share in that dream? It'll always just be dangling there in front of me, forever out of my reach?"
Botan hesitated and looked away, unable to meet Kikume's eyes. She fidgeted as she tried to come up with an acceptable response but Kikume didn't need to hear anymore. She already knew the answer to that question all too well.
"Whatever." She turned and stormed across the room, heading for the door.
"Kikume –"
"Just forget it, alright Botan. Go back to your stupid Spirit Detective and save the Human World," snapped Kikume.
"But –"
"Stop worrying, I'll still do my job," she grumbled.
"Kikume!"
She paused and looked back at her fellow reaper.
Botan watched her with sympathy and worry in her eyes. Kikume knew Botan had only said those things because she cared. And though Kikume's cheek still stung from Botan's slap, she supposed she did deserve it. Kikume was being a jerk and selfish brat. Botan had every right to slap her – hell, thinking back right now, Kikume wanted to slap herself.
She should really say thank you to Botan one of these days, she thought to herself. The reaper was forever pulling Kikume's head out of her ass – scolding her when she was being stupid and praising her when she did something right. Botan was probably the closest thing Kikume had to a mother. Hell, it was a miracle Botan could put up with Kikume's crap, but she did and that was what Kikume loved most about her.
"Don't get killed, okay?" said Kikume softly.
Botan blinked in surprise at Kikume's sudden change in temperament.
"Hm?"
"If I come back from Demon World and find out you're a ghost I swear I'll find a way to bring you back to life and then kill you myself." Kikume pointed her left index finger at Botan like a gun. "Just like this, bang."
Botan smiled and chuckled. "It's a date."
oo00oo000oo00oo
The next two days were some of Demon World's quietest. Kikume wondered if it was a coincidence or was this phenomenon linked to the hole to Human World. It was very troubling either way. Kikume had never seen her black notebook this empty before. Usually, each day the notebook would fill up with the names of all the demons who were scheduled to die that day. The information was sent directly from Spirit World's Intelligence Department to her. The notebook could also relay messages or orders from Spirit World if she was still in Demon World since Kikume's earpiece didn't work here.
Kikume continued to leaf through her notebook, bored, as pages after empty pages flipped across her lap. Honestly, where were all the demon souls? Normally she'd be celebrating over this lightened workload, but the reports from Spirit World were growing grimmer and grimmer. The ETA for the opening of the portal kept getting pushed up. According to Ayame's latest calculations, it was going to open within the next day or two. And though Spirit World was making a huge fuss over the portal, Kikume had yet to see any signs of demons preparing to swarm Human World. Hell, she hadn't even spotted this so-called two kilometer portal – and you'd think that'd be kind of hard to miss. But, then again, Demon World was so huge it sometimes took her a couple of hours to reach the location of a departed spirit.
"Everything's so quiet… I wonder if the Spirit Detective solved the case already," she muttered.
Growing bored, she decided to check in with Ayame and see if anything interesting was happening on her end.
Kikume had just unpinned her feather clip and turned it into a quill when suddenly words began appearing on the blank pages of her notebook. The message was hastily written, like the author was trying to cram all the information on the page as fast as possible. It was a little difficult to read but Kikume was able to recognize Ayame's dainty handwriting.
"Fly immediately to Sector VII and head south to the Forest of Fools. That is the location of the portal. C and B-class demons are waiting on the edge of the incomplete tunnel. Protect the entrance at all cost. Koenma-sama has authorized you to use any means necessary to defend the tunnel – including delivering premature death. In addition, you are to put all ferry duties on hold until further instructed. You're only responsibility is to make sure no demon crosses over to the Human World."
Kikume gaped at the words. She couldn't believe this. Koenma was ordering her to stop ferrying souls and start killing demons?
The situation must be pretty bad, thought Kikume grimly.
She quickly scribbled, "Understood" and was about to shut her book when Ayame scribbled back, "Please be careful."
Though it was just three simple words, Kikume could feel Ayame's concern for her, even when they were worlds apart. The reaper was probably busy gathering information and organizing the forces back in Spirit World but she still found the time to write a small message of concern for her.
Kikume smiled and wrote back. "Don't worry. I'll be fine."
She closed the black notebook and tucked it securely into her kimono before zooming off towards the Forest of Fools.
oo00oo000oo00oo
The Forest of Fools was a very luscious place with a wide variety of vegetation. Kikume had only been here once in her entire fifteen years as Chief Pilot of the River Acheron. She'd heard from the demon she ferried that the Forest of Fools was a relatively peaceful area where the demons weren't as active or bloodthirsty as the demons that populated in the upper regions of Demon World. However, things were very different today.
Near the center of the forest was the largest gathering of demons Kikume had ever seen. There were so many demons that they literally piled on top of one another to form some sort of grotesque ladder well over thirty feet tall. The demons were scrambling to reach the crackling black portal hanging high in the red sky, just above the black thunderclouds that was common all throughout Demon World.
Kikume gaped in shock at how huge the tunnel to the Human World was.
Holy crap! That's gotta be almost two kilometers wide!
Which meant that the Spirit Detective had either failed his mission or was still trying to stop the tunnel's creator…
If it's the latter than he's sure cutting it close. The portal must be close to stable by now.
As Kikume approached the portal she discovered that the demons were piling on each other even faster as their ladder grew and grew at an increasing rate. All of them were C-class demons who had little in their head except the urge to feast on human flesh and shed blood.
Kikume scowled. Stupid animals…
Normally, Kikume ferried demons from the C-class and below since they were always the ones that picked fights and ended up getting themselves killed. Every few months or so she would ferry a handful of B-class demons – they were twice as strong as C-class demons but not that much smarter.
Kikume sensed a good number of B-class demons wisely hanging back in the shadows, watching the C-class demons mindlessly pile on one another to reach the portal. Kikume decided to revise her view of the B-class demons… slightly.
"Guess they do have some brains in those thick skulls of theirs," she muttered to herself. They were likely keeping their distance because they were waiting for the tunnel to completely stabilized and become safe to pass through.
"Not on my watch…" she muttered. Kikume wasn't worried about the demons in the immediate vicinity. She could handle them.
The ladder of C-class demons was about ten feet away from reaching the portal when Kikume cut in front of them, blocking their path.
"All right you lot, anyone who doesn't want to die has ten seconds to get their sorry ass off this wacked-up ladder and go home. One –"
"Eh?" The demons grumbled in confusion, obviously not understanding her.
Too bad… brainless idiots.
"Two –"
"She's the grim reaper from Spirit World!" One of the demons pointed.
Well, what do you know? One out of a million has a brain…
"Three –"
"A reaper huh? Then she can't do anything to us, right?"
Fools.
"Four –"
"Yeah, reapers are supposed to be those nice, pretty girls who take souls to Spirit World."
In the words of the white-washed Hikari, L.O.L.
"Five –"
"Then what's her deal? She can't kill us."
Oh I beg to differ…
"Six –"
"Just ignore her. Keep climbing!"
"Seven… Eight… Nine –"
The demons kept building their ladder, steadily closing the distance between them. The first demon was about an arm's length away from Kikume's feet when she finished counting.
"Ten." She pointed her left index finger at the closest demon's head – her finger was like the barrel of a gun and the demon's head was the target.
"By order of Spirit World, you are all sentenced to death. And though I'm going to hate cleaning up this mess after all this crap is over with, I'm still going to enjoy killing you brainless idiots."
Her finger began to glow with a bright yellow light as brilliant as the Human World sun. Light extended from within her left palm, forming a crackling, glowing yellow bow. Kikume placed her right index and middle finger on her left wrist and pulled back, creating a thin yellow string. A yellow arrow appeared along the length of her arm with her left index finger as the arrow's tip.
The demon's beady black eyes widen in surprise and fear as the ladder pushed his forehead right into Kikume's glowing index finger. His flesh began to smoke and sizzle from her energy and the demon trembled in fear.
"Spirit Arrow."
She released the arrow and it shot straight through the demon, incinerating him and the twenty demons directly behind him in an instant. The arrow blast travelled half way down the ladder of demons and exploded, causing the other half to topple off and land in a heap on the forest floor.
"Hmphf. Piece of cake," Kikume smirked. "They better not be dumb enough to try that again."
Though if the B-class demons joined in the fray she might actually have to keep her guard up, mused Kikume. The B-class demons were tricky and a lot tougher than the Cs. Her Spirit Arrow could incinerate a crowd of C-class demons in one shot but she could only take out maybe three B-class demons at most with the same arrow. And if an A-class demon decided to show up…
Kikume shivered. Oh, she would be so screwed if that happened. Though she never actually went up against an A-class demon, she suspected she might be able to blow a hole in its arm – heavy emphasis on the 'might'. If an A-class – or Kami forbid, S-class – demon tried to go through the portal, Kikume would be a fool to try and stop it.
Well, at least there's still the Kekkai Barrier…
But no sooner had she thought that then she suddenly sensed a huge burst of energy coming from the tunnel. Kikume turned to see four figures appear in the depths of the portal, glowing like tiny stars in the night sky – and each of them were a hundred times stronger than the strongest demon Kikume had ever faced!
They must be at least in the A-class range!
She quickly pulled back, away from the portal as the four figures shot out of the tunnel. Four males – two demons and two humans. But how did they get here? The Kekkai Barrier was supposed to prevent anything stronger than a B-class demon from squeezing through.
How did they –? Unless…
Kikume froze, the blood suddenly draining from her face and her cheeks grew cold with dread.
Unless the Kekkai Barrier had been severed!
Oh, crap. This was bad! This was bad! This was really, really, REALLY bad! She needed to alert Spirit World right away!
But wait, she paused just as she was about to fly off. Koenma said he was already doing everything he could to stop the tunnel's creator. If that was the case then there was nothing more Spirit World could do except fix the Kekkai Barrier and close the hole. And until they do that, any demon could pass through the tunnel…
Kikume quickly checked her notebook but found that no further orders had been issued from Spirit World. There wasn't even an update on what was happening on their side of the tunnel.
What happened to the SDF? They should have been mobilized for a situation like this! Had they been defeated? Am I the last line of defense for the Human World?
Kikume bit her lip, uncertainly.
The four guys who'd just entered Demon World had miraculously landed safely on a nearby plateau – the Beheaded Hill, if Kikume's memory was still working properly. Upon landing they had promptly begun to fight three-on-one. She would have seen the team of three as cowardly bastards if the single human fighter hadn't suddenly released more energy than the three fighters' combined. The two demons and human had nothing on this guy. They were going to be obliterated!
I'm going to assume that the supped-up human is the bad guy but man, he's really packing some firepower! No wonder the Spirit Detective wasn't able to stop him…
Which reminded Kikume, where was the guy? Botan had showed her a picture of the famous Yusuke Urameshi and none of the males fighting were him. Had he been killed while trying to stop the bad guy? And who were the three guys trying in vain to beat the bad guy? Don't they know they had no chance?
She watched as one of them – a short, black-haired-tinted-blue demon released some sort of demonic flame shaped like a black dragon from his arm. The dragon flew straight at the lone human but the man simply swatted it away like it was a fly. The human stood calmly as the other three surrounded him. The man had slicked-back black hair and was wearing a loose black shirt with matching black slacks and shiny black pointed shoes. He was regarding the other three with a posture of amusement and confidence.
Suddenly the three of them charged but before they could even lay a finger on him, the man released his energy, knocking his opponents off their feet. His energy was so powerful it even threatened to throw Kikume off her oar – and she was several hundred feet above them!
Kikume gripped the handle of her oar tightly as she pulled back, putting more distance between her and the fighters.
How could a single human have this much power? He was even stronger than all the members of the Special Defense Squad combined! And here she'd been led to believe they had been the best of the best. Like Shunjun always said, "Even the A-class demons are afraid of us – we're their boogiemen."
Hate to burst your bubble, Shunjun but this guy can hand you your ass on a silver platter in less than a heartbeat.
As Kikume watched, the human's energy surrounded its owner, forming a yellow armor. She had never seen spirit energy do that before.
"What is this guy?" she breathed in amazement.
The two demons leaped forward – the black haired one summoned a fiery sword that resembled his dragon while the taller, silver-haired demon grew some sort of plant that twisted into a blade around his hand. They attacked in unison. However, their opponent's armor was too thick for their weapons to penetrate.
The human created a giant tornado with his energy that swallowed the silver-haired demon, slicing his body in multiple places. The black haired demon called out to his comrade and the human took advantage of the demon's momentary distraction to deliver a painful punch to his gut, sending the little guy skidding halfway across the plateau.
Suddenly, the other human – who had bright orange hair – attacked from behind. He had a glowing, yellow-based iridescent sword in his hand, made from his spirit energy. This sword also had a very peculiar energy signature. From what Kikume could sense, it was both spirit energy and not. How strange… the energy felt like it didn't quite belong here, where ever this 'here' feeling was…
The other human dodged the sword's blade at the last second and sent the orange-haired human flying with a roundhouse kick to his lower back. All three fighters were on the ground and it only took the lone human maybe eight seconds to do it.
It was obvious how this fight was going to end but the three warriors kept at it – trying in vain to land a solid blow on the powerful human. Kikume watched from above, wondering what was driving them to fight a battle they knew they couldn't win. Was it out of duty to Spirit World? Or was it some other reason?
Well, whatever it was, they were going to die soon because of it. It only took about ten minutes for them to become completely exhausted while their opponent stood with his arms crossed casually. The guy looked like he was watching a TV show or something just as amusing – not slowly killing people.
This was just wrong, thought Kikume. Where was Koenma? Where were the SDF? Surely they could at least come and distract the human long enough to rescue these guys. They were obviously on Spirit World's side so why wasn't there anyone here to back them up?
Kikume glanced back at the portal. The C-class demons had started rebuilding their ladder of bodies again but they were nowhere near the event horizon of portal to be a threat to Human World. The passage should be clear for Koenma and the SDF to pass through so why weren't they coming?
Growing impatient with waiting, Kikume pulled out her notebook and unclipped her feather hairpin. She was going to tell Ayame to have King Enma or Koenma to send back up. Kikume may not give a damn about a lot of things but she still had a good sense of right and wrong; and helping people who are on her side was definitely something she needed to do. And even though two them were demons, they were fighting to protect the Human World so that was good enough in her book.
"Ayame, send backup. Four guys just showed up in Demon World through the tunnel – two human and two demons. It's a three-on-one battle and the team of three is losing. I think they're on our side so send the SDF already! They can really use some help down here!"
Thirty seconds later, a reply came in from Spirit World but it wasn't from Ayame. The handwriting was bigger – more masculine – and she didn't recognize it at all. It was probably one of the ogres from Ayame's department, thought Kikume.
"Spirit World is well aware of this. Prince Koenma has already gone to Human World to try and stop the portal from opening but he was unsuccessful. The SDF has been deployed and are currently working on sealing the tunnel. No orders have been issued for them to enter Demon World."
"But what about the two demons and human? Is Spirit World going to abandon them here? At least save the human!" scribbled Kikume.
"Hiei and Kurama were originally from Demon World and are now A-class demons. They will not be allowed to return to Human World regardless if they survive or not. As for Kazuma Kuwabara, it is an unfortunate sacrifice that must be made in order to protect the greater good."
"What kind of bullshit reason is that to leave a human behind?"
"Kazuma Kuwabara made his decision when he cut down the Kekkai Barrier. This is his punishment. As for your orders, they still stand as is. Protect the tunnel entrance at all cost. That is all."
Kikume snarled in irritation and slammed her notebook shut. "What utter bullshit!"
She roughly stuffed the stupid book back into her kimono and turned her attention back on the fight. The three warriors were still trying with everything they had to defeat the human. The human was just toying with them now, she could tell. He was letting them "fight" him but really the human was using about the same amount of effort it took to tie his shoes.
She had to do something – Spirit World orders be damned. But what?
Maybe I can swoop in and snatch them away, thought Kikume. Once she was in the air, the human couldn't stop her, right? It's not like he can fly or anything…
Oh, but then there was the fact that he fell several hundred feet through the air and landed unscathed without even a parachute to slow his descent. Hmm… okay maybe the guy could fly after all – or at least levitate.
Kikume massaged her brow in frustration.
Crap… there's got to be something I can do…
Kuwabara, the human with orange hair, was the one that had cut down the Kekkai Barrier…Yes, she knew that was bad, but Kikume had already handled the first wave of C-class demons so it's not like the human did anything damaging yet. And he obviously did it so his two demon comrades could enter Demon World to come after their enemy, so Kikume wouldn't say he deserved to be trapped in Demon World just for that. Maybe he deserved a good smack over the head for doing something that stupid but not a lifetime sentence in this hell-full-of-shit world.
Then there were the demons… Hiei and Kurama. Well there wasn't much redeeming she could say about them, except for the fact that they were fighting to defend Human World. But for some reason the last demon's name rang a bell… like she'd heard it before somewhere…
Kikume couldn't quite place the feeling. It was really bothering her the more she thought about it. Why did the name seem so familiar? Had she met him before?
No, that couldn't be. All the demons she met were dead. The only one she ever "met" – if you can call it a meeting – was the Spirit Fox and he was –
Hold on a second! It couldn't be – could it?
Kikume watched the silver haired demon attack with a whip made of vines. His opponent easily caught it in his hands and used the weapon against the demon – pulling the demon forward and delivering a bone-crunching kick in the gut, making the demon cough up blood as he flew backwards. He landed in a heap on the ground, gasping for air.
Kikume drifted closer, not daring to believe her eyes. Long silver hair… silver ears… golden yellow eyes… and a silver tail… He was just like how Shunjun described him!
Yoko Kurama.
Fury consumed Kikume at the sight of her sworn nemesis. Her hands twitched uncontrollably and she started to see red. She wanted to get her hands on him and wring his neck, beat him to a bloody pulp, claw out his eyes, and inflict all manners of pain on that body-snatching thief! She wanted him to suffer, to bleed!
That damn bastard… Kikume couldn't believe he was here and in that form! Even from a distance, she could sense the fox's spirit being contained within a body, which meant that the fox wasn't just a spirit right now. Despite his demon exterior, the Spirit Fox was still attached to his human body – her human body. And how dare he bring her body to such a dangerous place like Demon World? He may not care if he lives or dies but she did! That was her body and it was going to be hers again someday. And when that day came, she was going to be the one that sent Yoko Kurama to Spirit World.
No one was going to destroy her body and take away her revenge.
No one.