Inuyasha Manga: 018 Memento

No more jokes, guys, this is the real thing. From someone who's really dead. For real. That sword has been waiting there in Inuyasha's eye for him to pull out for years, so his dad has even been out of commission for a long while by this point. But if jokes about mementos of live people are still on the table, Inuyasha would surely take something to remember Sesshoumaru by after this battle's all done, right? What do you think he'd take? A claw? A tooth? That big fuzzy thing on his shoulder?

It looks stuck on there pretty good, though, even in dog form. Probably need a good razor to get it off.

Kagome has her priorities all out of wack as she ruminates on how Inuyasha said he would protect her. She thinks that he may be violent, but he's somehow different from Sesshoumaru. Yeah, he doesn't turn into a dinosaur-sized pooch at will. Pay attention, girl, and put off considering how dreamy Inuyasha is when you're NOT in imminent danger.

Jaken yells a suggestion at Sesshoumaru to just eat Inuyasha whole, but is squashed flat with a chunk of the melted bone that must have hardened by now. Otherwise, Kagome just burned her fingers good and is ignoring the pain to declare confidently that Inuyasha won't lose. She still looks somewhat unsure when she encourages Inuyasha to go for it in her head though.

Inuyasha is more mystified than unsure, staring at the sword with mouth agape and thinking that the feeling of it is entirely different from before. He decides to take that leap toward Sesshoumaru, shouting that his brother can eat it.

All the way up the length of his arm! That's gotta sting. Sesshoumaru's jaws are open in a howl as Inuyasha ends the cut at his shoulder and leaps out of the way. Unable to support himself on his bisected leg anymore, Sesshoumaru collapses on the bed of bones below.

I guess that KIND OF looks like a dog's fang.

A little...

Someone should tell Sesshoumaru that he's not a cat, because he's kind of hissing as he pushes himself to his remaining three legs. Glaring at Inuyasha with his fang/sword slung jauntily over his shoulder, he opens his jaws again and lunges. Inuyasha responds with a lunge of his own, though with grinding teeth instead. He tells Sesshoumaru that this is the end for him.

Ouch. Notice also that that now useless half-paw is still hanging off Sesshoumaru's shoulder in the back there.

Deserved pain, but still cringe-worthy.

Shit, dude! Inuyasha knocked him right through his dad's ribs and armor!! True, that armor hasn't been kept up for more than fifty years by this point, but that still has to be quite a feat of strength.

Or maybe Sesshoumaru's weight as a giant dog was what pushed him through. Gotta lay off the Kibble, boy.

Jaken leaps out the Sesshoumaru-shaped hole, begging for Sesshoumaru to wait for him. Whether he wants to follow Sesshoumaru in death or just help him remove the rest of that bisected arm if he's still alive is unclear. Kagome runs toward Inuyasha, congratulating him on kicking his brother's ass. Inuyasha is strangely quiet when he collapses to one knee next to the sword he's impaled in the mountain of bones next to him, one of his hands curled around the blade. That seems a little dangerous, but I guess his uncuttable sleeve is between his fingers and the edge, so whatever.

Kagome calls out to him with worry this time as she runs up behind him, kneeling down next to him and asking if he's alright. He chuckles, lifting his bowed head to reveal a grin, and thanking his father for leaving him something so useful. Myouga hops onto his shoulder, praising him for a brother well-slain and lying that he believed in him the whole time. Inuyasha squishes him with a thumb while reminding Myouga that he didn't believe so much when he ran away.

That... was abrupt.

Kaede asks how Kagome was able to pull out Tessaiga when she should be asking how she and Inuyasha managed to get BACK to the world of the living. She wonders if Kagome's ability to pull the Tessaiga from the dais is an indication that Kagome does have some power in her. Kagome doesn't look too sure about this, and Myouga offers an alternative explanation that it was just because she's human.

That's a fair guess. What's not fair is that it's posed as a guess to begin with. Myouga should know for SURE. He's the only one who could have set up this whole situation. Don't act like you're not fully aware of what happened and HOW it happened, Myouga. I'm on to you...

Kagome, remembering when Inuyasha said he would protect her, thinks Myouga's (deceptively hypothetical) explanation does help her understand why the sword only reacted to that moment in an effective way. She also thinks about how Sesshoumaru, who hates humans, would never be able to make the sword work. This thought will become a joke in later chapters.

Kagome takes a walk outside to find Inuyasha sitting in his tree again, swinging Tessaiga up and down carelessly, and glaring at it because it became an old rusty piece of crap again. Why is that a problem? What the fuck do you need it to be a working sword for now, son? Kagome calls up to him through cupped hands around her mouth, and Inuyasha looks down at her curiously. She asks him if he wants her to tell him how to use Tessaiga, and he jumps down from the tree immediately, looking a little annoyed. Why he's not asking how the hell she would know anything about it I couldn't say.

Holding up a finger, Kagome asks if he'll protect her with the sword from now on, and Inuyasha looks half-exasperated, half-disgusted by the notion. He knocks on her head with his knuckles, wondering what kind of crazy fever-talk she's spouting. She yells that she had thought he said he would always protect her, but he yells back that he never said the word "always". He tells her that if he's going to become a full youkai one day, and the sword gives him the extra strength needed to collect all the shards of the Shikon no Tama, so he's not going to waste one iota of that strength on protecting her.

Kagome tells him to sit.

To be fair, Kagome should probably do something to rein in her girlish fantasies about having a personal knight always willing to protect her too.

So, what did I think of this chapter overall? I find myself just fixated on the question of how Inuyasha and Kagome got back from the grave. They had the pearl at the end of the chapter, so they were able to find it right where it was left, suggesting that they managed to come back approximately where they entered. After all, who would travel to a place just to look for a tiny little pearl? Not anyone I know, and certainly not the impatient Inuyasha. I'm guessing the portal stayed open, despite Myouga's fears that it might close before they were able to get in to begin with.

But if it didn't close on its own, how did Inuyasha and Kagome close it? Did they just leave it there irresponsibly? How did they take the pearl without taking down the portal? Did Sesshoumaru and Jaken leave before they did? If so, why didn't they close the portal on Inuyasha and Kagome? If they left after, I'm still not sure how the portal could still be open after the pearl was taken...

The cut to when they're already back and talking to Kaede isn't satisfying because the set up of GETTING to the grave was so specific. Sesshoumaru had to open the portal with a special tool, and that made it so much more difficult for me to understand how they could just come back willy-nilly. It smacks of laziness and RT wanting to just wrap up the arc without having to think of a plausible way for her characters to get out of the situation she put them in.

You can't just enter an entirely different world with an elaborate set of steps and leave it again without an equally elaborate set of steps. It breaks immersion. Word to the wise.