"Not only monsters… but also men, who are sometimes worse."
Kagome pulled out the Shikon jewel hanging around her neck to show. "This is what you're really after, right?" she said grimly, swinging the jewel on the string for emphasis. "The Shikon no Tama, so you can fulfill one of your foul ambitions?" She dropped the jewel back into her cleavage where it belonged. "Too bad, because you'll have to take it from me by force…" She allowed an arrogant grin to spread across her face. "And I find that possibility particularly hilarious, my friend," she said confidently, thoroughly enjoying the role.
This seemed to anger the rest of the bandit gang. The assorted men (and I do use the term loosely) began to find their unsteady, drunken way to their feet, murmuring discontentedly. "Watch your mouth, girl! You address Gorogoro the Great, fearless lord of bandits in this area!" snapped one, probably the leader's right-hand man, "Grovel at his feet at once, and he may let you live!"
Kagome snorted. "Don't make me laugh! I'd make a better bandit leader than this filthy dog!" she bellowed, pointing a finger at Gorogoro the Great. Kagome decided talking trash is fun.
The bandits were now even more enraged. Not only was this girl barging in here like she owned the place and started ragging on their boss, but she also alluded that she could run this fine rough-and-tumble group. "Y-You've just wasted your life with this insult!" the right-hand man sputtered in fury.
As he stood, however, he was intercepted by a sword solidly embedding in the floor before him. Gorogoro the Great used this solid support to help him onto his unsteady feet. The message was clear: let Gorogoro the Great handle this upstart. Gorogoro the Great stood to his full towering height, tall by any standard, and big by any standard. He yanked the sword out of the wooden floor and hobbled over to Kagome. The robot-girl simply drew her own filched sword. Raising his sword clumsily, Gorogoro the Great charged Kagome. "You… DIE!!" Kagome prepared to dodge or block any move that would come to harm her…
…only to find she didn't need to activate a single contractile fiber in her body to avoid being hit, as the big oaf's clumsy swipe would not come within an inch of her. She did, however, hear a surprised yelp, and the distinctive chunk of sword slicing flesh and bone. Kagome looked at the victim of this strike and asked, "Where are you aiming, fool?"
The leader belched as the former bandit hit the floor, dead. "huh… made a… mistake," he slurred out, apparently drunk with… drink. He stuck out his tongue and scratched the back of his balled head in a flimsy and disgusting attempt to be coquettish. He raised the bloody sword again. "This time… your neck…" he burbled.
"Not with the way you're aiming!" murmured Kagome, deciding this oaf was more a danger to his compatriots than her. This time when the sword came down, Kagome's own sword was in the way, saving two hapless bandits who were in the path of the sword.
"The… the master has some madness," murmured one of the bandits.
"But the girl defends us!" commented another.
This realization quickly spread through the gang, and their attitudes started to change.
For a few minutes, as Kagome got used to using a sword to defend herself, Kagome stopped yielding ground to the big oaf and started pushing him back in turn. The loser was so drunk and disoriented that there was no way he could win this match now except by freakish luck. Such a stroke of freakish luck almost occurred when the drunk fell on her, but Kagome's strength quickly put things to right. Kagome started pounding on the bandit leader in ernest after that.
The combination of her obvious strength and her show of concern for the other bandits quickly brought them to her side, as they started cheering on the foreign girl when they once cheered on their master.
*CRASH!* *KLANG!*
Part of Gorogoro the Great's blade went flying. Someone had made a grand entrance, coming through the wall a la Shampoo. His arms were in a guarding position, and the blade had snapped as it impacted onto the fire-rat armor he wore. That ended Kagome's fight right then.
Guess who?
Inuyasha!
Yep!
Kagome proved she was not Akane by not getting upset when Inuyasha interrupted the fight. Indeed, although she looked forward to giving these fools a thorough thrashing, it showed that Inuyasha cared enough to look after her welfare. It was kind of sweet!
*THU-THUMP!*
Kagome felt her maiden circuit pulse and get hot. A light blush spread across her face. "You… You came here to help—"
"Where's the Shikon jewel?"
Kagome's blush disappeared, taking some friends with it as her face grew a bit pale. "…to help… me?" she finished, trying not to believe what she just heard.
"THE JEWEL!!" the dog-boy insisted.
*newwww…*
Kagome's maiden circuit cooled off at those words. A weight settled onto her chest as she sighed. "Right… should have known you don't care for anything but that silly jewel…" she said in an icy voice, disappointed. "Well, don't worry. It's right here down my… Hey! Where'd it go?" Kagome said, searching down her blouse. Then she realized something. "HEY! You must have snookered it when you fell on top of me!"
Inuyasha turned to Gorogoro the Great. "Ah, so you have it now," he said, growling at the disgusting apparition towering before him. He covered his nose. "What a vile scent. The scent… of a half-decayed corpse!" Bearing his claws, Inuyasha lunged. "Show yourself, carrion-crow!" He swiped at the large man, tearing his armor apart in front. The armor fell away, revealing a hole in the man's chest, and a three-eyed crow with teeth in its beak peeked out. It squealed as it was revealed.
The bandits screamed in fear. Kagome, too, was overcome by her squeamishness, "EWWWWWWWWWW!!! EW! EW! EWWWWWWWWW!!!!" She could never handle blood-n'-guts horror movies, and this was a scene right out of one!
"So, been eating chest all night to make yourself a cosy little nest, huh?" asked Inuyasha.
Tongues wagged in the bandit gang:
"The master… he's dead…"
"I thought he was acting a might strange…"
"Methinks we must go with the girl after all…"
"The white-haired demon seems strong."
"The white-haired demon seems though he'd sooner eat us than lead us…"
"That's sick…" murmured Kagome, feeling queasy.
"Too weak to fight your own battles," Inuyasha said to the carrion-crow with contempt, "or even manipulate the living…" The carrion-crow appeared to do nothing in response, but the body leaned down unsteadily to pick up and draw a new sword. "Come out of that putrid mess!" roared Inuyasha as he lunged to answer this challenge. He slammed his claws into the hole eaten by the crow, but the little necromancer escaped out the door he'd et in the late Gorogoro's back.
Within its teeth was a glowing bead. The Shikon jewel.
The carrion-crow apparently decided to make good on his escape, as he beat his wings to take himself out the whole Inuyasha had made in the temple wall. "I won't let you go!" growled Inuyasha, lifting a spear and heaving it out the hole after the crow. It missed, though. "STOP, YOU COWARD!!!"
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(Posted Mon, 20 Dec 2004 18:17)
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らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
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