Disclaimer: I do not own Inuyasha, Goblin: the Lonely and Great God, or Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard by Thomas Gray (the poem).
Chapter Twenty-One
The pain was unbearable. Sesshomaru could no longer bear it. The final lot had been pulled in regards to this new curse. He hated it. Loathed it. The blood in his body boiled as it coursed through him, the foreign sense of who he now was and who he had lost branding him. Shippo cried out as he stormed from the Western Palace, the damn strands of lilac incense twirling around him as he traveled. It had been two centuries since the deities had placed their punishment upon him—but still he did not know to what extent he had lost his demonic person. The powers themselves often confused and miffed him.
At times he lacked the ability to control the newfound stipulations of the curse.
It disgusted him.
He felt like a pup, not capable of reining in himself in.
There was no beastial instinct to guide him. The part that made him youkai was silent. Silent because he was gone. There was no youkai.
As he roared, his surroundings exploded into a conflagration of purple hues. The smoke twisting and twirling around him erratically. The tendrils threaded through his hair and his limbs, his entire body tangled in the web of his own making. He gasped when the smoke disappeared, leaving him behind in an open meadow.
The air nipped at his skin, his light kimono not suited for the chilled weather. His breath escaped his lips in puffs of frosted air. As he turned slowly, the tall field grass bent and waved around his legs, his white hakama like pillars of snow against the golden stalks. The sky glittered, bright baby blue. The air was fresh, almost icy—it tickled his dulled senses. A pang of nostalgia hit him, and wished he was still Inu. He would have been able to sort through each scent, identify the small nuances that made the smells unique. Each detail would have been able to figure out exactly where he was too.
"Hey, trespasser, who are you?"
The Chinese surprised him, taking but a moment for him to recognize the language as something closer to a western province's dialect from Goryeo. Spinning around, Sesshomaru had not anticipated a intruder on his thoughts. Or this new place he had discovered. Before him was a man, perhaps just as tall if not a few inches shy of himself. The man's black robes fluttered over his calves as he sauntered closer, his hands fisted at his sides. He did not answer the man.
"Hey," the man grunted, his brown eyes narrowing. "Answer me. I do not take kindly upon those who intrude."
Sesshomaru scoffed and began to talk away, not interested in bickering with a mortal human. He was still above that.
A surge of power pushed past him, and the air behind him burst into blue flame. He stiffened as the aura pushed against his curse, forcing it backwards. Growling, he turned on his heel and released his power—it gushing in streams of his lilac smoke. The auras whipped around each other, causing the man's black hair to swirl wildly, just as his own silver hair twisted and span about.
Then, in an instant, the man's power disappeared. He gave Sesshomaru a glance of disbelief. He stepped closer, his hands hiding clasped behind his back.
"You...are you a dokkaebi as well?"
In an instant, Sesshomaru's power dissipated. He found it difficult to form the words to a language he was unfamiliar nevertheless, he was able to form his own question.
"What is a dokkaebi?"
The man's eyebrows raised and he took in his opponent's state of dress and the heavy accent to the Goryeo language. So he tried Chinese, it was a wider known language on the mainland. It would be easier to communicate with, he believed.
"A Goblin."
Sesshomaru tilted his head to the side, attention caught.
Humming, the man's bright flames flared around his feet before climbing up, creating a halo of might around him. His right hand very slowly pointed to the center of his chest, just below his sternum. Another flow of aura rushed forward, it was gentler and laced with pain. A sword appeared, buried within the man's flesh.
"When God is displeased," he stated, standing toe to toe with the newcomer. "He curses those who have scorned his most precious creation—life."
Sesshomaru's eyes widened as the man's power spread to him, lighting up around him as well. The blue flames jumped to his own chest, provoking his lilac smoke to appear, causing Bakusaiga to become visible. It was sunk in the same place as the man's, deep within his chest.
"My name is Kim Shin," the man lowered his hand, the fire flickering out of existence along with the sights of the two swords. "Would you like some tea? There seems to be a lot of explaining needed, for the both of us."
Nodding slowly, Sesshomaru followed the Goblin as he led him away.
There was a small village not far from where they were. Although Kim Shin did not lead him there. He brought him to a small hut on the village outskirts, taking him inside. The inside was not as modest as the outside. There were various treasures from the mainland—small statues, painted pictures, and other assorted things to decorate the home. An older man greeted them, pulling out a few chairs for them while he peddled around.
"Welcome home, my lord. Who is this?"
"A visitor. Could you fetch some of the tea that had been imported earlier today? The merchant said we could pick it up today."
The man left without another word, closing to the door to the hut silently behind him.
"Were you human, before?" Kim Shin questioned, sitting down while gesturing for his guest to join him.
"No," came the clipped response from Sesshomaru as he sat down in the opposite chair.
The man's eyes widened a bit before he re-inspected his visitor. "I had presumed you had been cursed for a long time, given the color of your hair, but perhaps I was mistaken."
Sesshomaru did not answer.
"How long have you been cursed?"
The white haired male furrowed his brow, still not trusting of his host. "How long have you yourself been cursed?"
Huffing, Kim Shin crossed his arms. "You're quite a stick in the mud aren't you? Very well. At this current moment, I've come close to four centuries by now."
Humming Sesshomaru copied the Goblin's movement, his arms folded neatly over his chest. "Were you human?"
"Yes."
"You've lived far longer than you were supposed to."
"I'll take that as an insult," sighed the Goblin. "I want nothing more than to die."
Rolling his eyes, Sesshomaru tilted his head back. "Two centuries thus far."
"I'm your senior, then," Kim Shin stated in surprise. "I presumed you to be far older than myself."
"Don't be foolish, I far exceed your current age."
"So what are you?"
There was a darkness that stormed over his brow when he thought about it. He had lost everything in regards to his identity of a daiyoukai. Everything that had once made him, gone. Snarling he refused to look at the man.
"I am Sesshomaru. Nothing more, nothing less."
o
A week had passed in his observance of Kim Shin. The Goblin moved about in silence most of the time. He would disappear in and out of the doorway, a trail of his Goblin's fire in a quick flick of sight before traveling elsewhere. Other times the man would go down to the village. Helping the people down there, he would often use his abilities to aid them in some shape or form. Other times, he would bring about justice, inflicting pain and punishment upon those who wronged the innocent.
How self righteous did this man think he was?
But Sesshomaru watched. Intrigue always piqued when it came in concern to the Goblin. The way his powers worked, the once daiyoukai was more than sure that he was what Kim Shin was. Together they shared this mysterious curse.
"How does this one break the curse?" Sesshomaru demanded one night, sitting in the corner, glaring at the Goblin.
Kim Shin raised his head in surprise, his hand stopped in mid-motion over a journal. "The curse?" Ink splattered from the quill in his hand to the page beneath it.
"Yes, there must be some way to rid this Sesshomaru of the deities' curse."
"If you find it let me know," the Goblin shook his head, returning his attention to writing.
Sesshomaru demanded. "You have not found such a way? You in all your supposed might? You waste your resources in helping the stupid humans of this village instead of trying to free yourself of the gods' hatred."
"There is a way to break the curse, but I have yet to find it in all this centuries. I doubt I will ever find it." Kim Shin slammed his fist down at the table, the quill snapping at the impact between the hard service and the tightened vice of his grasp. "So I do not waste my time searching for a fairytale. Instead, I make amends for the wrongs that I am paying for. I please the people who I deem worthy. Granting them help. Granting them their wishes. Because for my lack of that in my human life, I ended up the way I am now."
Gold eyes narrowed and speculated. Without a word, Sesshomaru stood up and exited through the front door, his lilac smoke gasping behind him as he disappeared.
o
Sesshomaru did not return.
o
When Kim Shin woke a month from the incident, Sesshomaru was once again in the corner of his house.
"What is this impossible cure?" He asked, voice quiet.
The Goblin groaned in disbelief, rubbing his eyes and begging the question of why he had to deal with this so early. "Why do you wish to know so bad?"
Eyes cast upwards at the roof, the silver haired male drew in a small intake of breath. "Before this, I was not human. This Sesshomaru was a daiyoukai, something translatable as a great demon."
The other said nothing.
"I was cursed because this one had been cast into a pocket of nothingness. A envelope of hell. When this Sesshomaru emerged, I emerged as a Goblin. This one wishes to return to the form of his previous identity. His true self."
There was silence before a quiet uttering: "You will not gain your form back, Sesshomaru."
The former Inu leapt to his feet in an instant, his hand grabbing and clenching the collar of the man's tunic.
"Explain," he snarled through clenched teeth.
"If your curse is ever broken, if you are anything like me," Kim Shin growled through gritted teeth. "Then your curse can only be broken by a Goblin's Bride. Only she can pull the sword from your chest. And if she does, that is when you are freed—and returned to the deity's side."
There was no answer. Only a space where Sesshomaru had stood.
o
"Shin."
Sesshomaru's voice was sudden, causing the Goblin to look up in shock. He had been trying to plow a field with several of the villagers. Trying to find a way to break through the permafrost to grow some sort of grain—anything that would survive the cold winters. If they couldn't figure out how to cultivate something, they would require livestock. Bartering and trading goods for food from the far south would no longer be an option.
"Yes, trespasser?" Kim Shin was in no mood for the silver-haired Goblin's temper. And judging by his human companions' reactions, they were frozen with fear of the intimidating demeanor of the cold faced being. He sat back on his heels, resting his muddied hands on his thighs.
There was a quirk of a delicate eyebrow, before Sesshomaru pulled back the sleeves of kimono and tied them. He rotated his arm slowly, stretching the muscles until they loosened. With a nod of satisfaction, he stalked over to a villager. The man quaked, his hands trembling when the tall, silver haired male yanked a plow from his grasp. Sesshomaru shot the man a harsh look before setting the tool in the ground and pushed it forward. He began making trenches—much to Kim Shin's and the villagers' surprise. He did so wordlessly. And he did so with nothing but a blank expression.
But there was a light in his eyes, Kim Shin noticed. There was a light in the other Goblin's eyes that had not been there before.
o
"I'll be leaving soon."
Sesshomaru gave a quick raise of his brows before disregarding the statement. He licked the corner of his thumb and turned the page to the article he was reading. It was a poem brought by an English traveler:
The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,
The lowing herd wind slowly o'er the lea,
The plowman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.
Now fades the glimm'ring landscape on the sight,
And all the air a solemn stillness holds,
Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight,
And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds;
Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tow'r
The moping owl does to the moon complain
Of such, as wand'ring near her secret bow'r,
Molest her ancient solitary reign.
Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a mould'ring heap,
Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,
The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.
The breezy call of incense-breathing Morn,
The swallow twitt'ring from the straw-built shed,
The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn,
No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed...
"Will you watch them for me Sesshomaru?" Kim Shin's eyes were sad, burdened and broken. "I will return in two decades time."
"Why must you leave in the first place?" Sesshomaru demanded, never taking his eyes from the page.
Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,
Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;
Nor Grandeur hear with a disdainful smile
The short and simple annals of the poor.
The boast of heraldry, the pomp of pow'r,
And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave,
Awaits alike th' inevitable hour.
The paths of glory lead but to the grave.
"I was but a human," His gaze rested on the floor between his feet, and his arms hung limply by his sides. His shoulder length hair was wry and a mess, the shadows of his bangs obscuring the dark circles under his eyes. "I am no longer. It hurts me to see them, the ones I have helped and nourish, pass on. So I leave, every twenty years. And when I return, there is new ones. My old memories gone. I do not wish to see them go."
"Coward."
"Perhaps so. But this is my choice. Besides, we do not age Sesshomaru. The times of superstition has passed. There is war in the south—they call them the Colonies. With technology that I have faced before. Face it. They will become suspicious of me, at least. You have only been here a year. They will not suspect you. When I return, claim me as your cousin."
Kim Shin reached forward and clasped Sesshomaru's shoulder. "I have claimed you as my heir. What you earn in my time gone, it is yours to keep. Build up a fortune. I have a feeling it will come in handy."
"Don't leave." He wasn't begging. He was demanding.
But the black haired Goblin was unfazed. A small amused smirk plastered on his jaw. He opened his mouth—
And screamed.
He fell to the ground. His body convulsed. Kim Shin's eyes poured tears as his body ignited in pain. In the fuzzy glimpses of his vision, he could see his sword glowing eerily, lighting the home with blue fire.
"Shin!"
Sesshomaru knelt beside the Goblin, trying to hold him still. He reached his hands forward and pressed the man's shoulders to the ground, trying to keep his spasms contained. Kim Shin gasped out in pain. A loud crackle of sound broke through the air, and the apparition of the sword in the Goblin's chest vanished. It left them in the dark, the candles blown out because of the sweep of power that had gusted through the hut.
Chest heaving, Kim Shin closed his eyes, trying to ignore the tears that laced his eyelashes and trickled onto his skin. "Find your Bride, Sesshomaru, otherwise this will happen to you as well."
o
The next morning, Sesshomaru was left alone, with nothing but his poem to read.
For thee, who mindful of th' unhonour'd Dead
Dost in these lines their artless tale relate;
If chance, by lonely contemplation led,
Some kindred spirit shall inquire thy fate,
Haply some hoary-headed swain may say,
"Oft have we seen him at the peep of dawn
Brushing with hasty steps the dews away
To meet the sun upon the upland lawn.
"There at the foot of yonder nodding beech
That wreathes its old fantastic roots so high,
His listless length at noontide would he stretch,
And pore upon the brook that babbles by.
"Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn,
Mutt'ring his wayward fancies he would rove,
Now drooping, woeful wan, like one forlorn,
Or craz'd with care, or cross'd in hopeless love...
o
Sesshomaru wiped the sweat from his brow, watching carefully as another villager tacked on more shingles to a hut. When the villager had finished, he waved down to Sesshomaru, giving the signal. Nodding, with the help of two men—although he really didn't need it—Sesshomaru hefted a large beam against the side of the hut, having it standing beneath the roof and against the wall like a pillar. Extra support.
"Sesshomaru, there's a stranger here saying he's looking for you!" A boy shouted from the hill, his little arms and legs pumping as he ran down the way. "He's dressed funny! Like you!"
"Can you take care of this well enough?" Sesshomaru questioned the two men, straightening out the ties on his hakama and pulling his kimono back onto his shoulders.
The men gave affirmation and gestures of good luck before returning to their work.
Following the directions that the boy had given him, the once-Inu found his way back to his temporary home. A man with pulled-back black hair stood there, his hands in the pockets of a green long-tailed coat, his white trousers tucked into his leather boots. Somehow though, his profile seemed familiar.
"May this one help you?" He questioned, crossing his arms over his chest.
"Yes," the voice rumbled, turning around to reveal a smug smile and tired eyes. "My name is Kim Shin, and I am looking for my cousin."
Rolling his eyes, Sesshomaru clasped arms with the other Goblin, his gold eyes alight with mischief. "This one is sorry to say that I was not expecting any family. Certainly no one as ugly as you."
"Absolutely disrespectful to a senior," Kim Shin shook Sesshomaru's hand before pulling away, his semi-playful tone dropping. Reaching down, he picked a parcel off the ground and handed it over.
Sesshomaru took the gift with an hesitant reach. Opening the cloth folds, he looked inside to see a red hakama. It was old and faded. The cloth was torn as well. It looked as if it had been recently washed.
"I bought this at an auction in an island across the sea from China. Japan." Kim Shin scratched the side of his head slowly. "There is a war there, with looters roaming almost unchecked. When I heard the legend of the owner to clothing, I wondered if it was you. They said this cover belonged to a man that killed his brother, a powerful demon who wanted to rule the world."
Shakily, he drew out the robe of the firerat.
"Go home, Sesshomaru." Kim Shin hummed thoughtfully. "Go to the home that needs you. Go home, go find your Bride. It's your turn to leave."
Looking down at the mistreated haori, Sesshomaru wondered what had become of Tessaiga and Tenseiga. He had left everything with Shippo.
o
The sound of beeping awoke the resting Goblin. He hummed deeply in his chest before his eyes fluttered open. Pale couches and a large frame tv greeted his sight. That's right.
He had fallen asleep while he was waiting to pick up Kagome from school. Reaching over and silencing his phone, he stretched out. It had been a long time since he had thought of his fellow Goblin. In a vague fancy, he wondered if Kim Shin was alive and doing well, or if he had finally found his own Bride and had passed on. Checking his clock, he grabbed his coat resting on the armrest next to him and began to leave.
It was strange to think, that perhaps Shin's love for humans had rubbed off on him.
That was why he continued to pursue after the young miko afterall. That and the hope that he too might find the end to his curse.
a/n: Oiii, minna! I live! I have provided a super long chapter today (albeit it's not my greatest work) but i am trying to get back into the groove of this story. This chapter was to make up for my lack of updates as well as to indulge my curiosity of what would happen in Kim Shin (the Goblin that this fic is based off of) and Sesshomaru met. I hope you all enjoyed it and see you next time!
Arigato!