Inuyasha Manga: 004 Corpse Dancing Crow

Garage sales are the worst, guys. Not BUYING from them, mind you, because people are often trying to get rid of some very fascinating things at their sales and looking around is always a treat. Getting the permit and actually being on the seller's side of things is a nightmare, though. They're always trying to get the whole collection of items for a dollar, trying to tell YOU about how much your belongings are worth, and I must have caught at least three people trying to steal things that we wanted a little more than a buck for.

But at least I wasn't carried away WITH that coveted item myself. Unlike Kagome, who wasn't even having a sale.

Wait, does she even HAVE the jewel? It doesn't look like it's hanging around her neck. But when Mr. Unclean here lifts Kagome up by her collar and then throws her to the side, he appears to have taken it from somewhere. Okay then. Kagome sees that Mr. Unclean has swiped the Shikon no Tama off of her with shock and remembers what Kaede said about men with evil hearts wanting the jewel as well as demons. She reaches up to try and grab it, while begging for Mr. Unclean to give it back to her. A sword is embedded in the floor boards right in front of her face, the blade nearly slicing it right down the center of her nose.

Kagome scrambles back on her backside and scoots away from Mr. Unclean as he kneels beside his sword to retrieve it. He tells his lackeys to restrain her, and they look a little perturbed at his behavior as they agree and grab Kagome by her arms. Mr. Unclean holds up his sword while the rest of his crew are lamenting what a waste it is to kill Kagome. You have no idea, dudes. The sword swings down and blood splatters.

He and Inuyasha should bond over their lacks of adequate aim. Mr. Unclean watches his badly misused underling collapse on the floor bleeding, then scratches the back of his head and sticks out his tongue as he says he made a little mistake. Whoopsie daisy! He advances on her again with the sword, claiming this time he'll hack at her neck for sure. Kagome, completely free now because I guess the other guy holding onto her other arm noped right the fuck out of there, is wondering what the hell is wrong with Mr. Unclean.

Well, he's either SUUUUUUUPER wasted, or he's not really himself. I'm guessing the corpse dancing crow of the title has something to do with this.

Mr. Unclean lunges at Kagome, telling her to die, but she's disinclined to acquiesce his request.

While she's running away, Mr. Unclean straight up slices through the necks of two of his lackeys. Well, at least he got SOMEONE'S neck. As one of the heads tumbles off to the side, other lackeys question what the hell is going on with their leader. Mr. Unclean doesn't answer, just continues to stumble toward a tripped and fallen Kagome with blood dripping from his raised sword. She grabs spear lying on the floor next to her and jumps to her feet again, stuttering for Mr. Unclean to stay back. She says that her new weapon has a greater range than his sword, so the moment he tries something, she'll stick him good.

Mr. Unclean responds to this logic by slicing the end of the spear off with his sword as Kagome stares with mouth agape. Mr. Unclean's sword swipes down again, and Kagome holds the spear handle up crosswise to try and guard herself, but she still thinks she's done for.

Just in time! Kagome gets to live! And all because that sleeve was strong enough to break a sword in half. If the sleeves can stop a blade, why can't the breast stop an arrow?

Oh well, the lackeys have armed themselves much like Kagome, and are now wondering who the guy who crashed their party is. Shouldn't you be grateful? He did after all stop your deranged leader's rampage that was killing an awful lot of you.

Kagome starts to say something about Inuyasha coming to help her when he interrupts her with a question about the location of that jewel he really wants. She finishes her statement by turning it into a question about whether or not helping her was even on his mind, and he again asks where the hell the Shikon no Tama is.

Kagome, sweetie, try to remember that you're in a SHOUNEN manga, not a SHOUJO. While Shounens can contain romance, it's unlikely that he's going to take a fancy to you right away.

Mr. Unclean catches Inuyasha's attention with how much he stinks. Inuyasha raises his armor sleeve up to his nose to guard against the stench of a rotting corpse Mr. Unclean is emitting. Kagome looks confused.

It's that douchebag crow from the previous chapter!

Macabre. Kagome and the remaining lackeys shriek at this grisly image. Inuyasha surmises that sometime after he shot pebbles at it, the douchebag crow ate into the dead man's chest and made a nest. It even rhymes. One of the lackeys tries to wrap his head around Mr. Unclean already being dead while another whispers that he THOUGHT Mr. Unclean was acting a bit weird. Kagome is just disturbed by the level of cruelty this bird possesses.

Said bird caws at Inuyasha, who explains that since it's not all that strong, it uses a corpse as a puppet to fight for it. That's actually pretty impressive, to be honest, because he was even making Mr. Unclean's body TALK in human language. Crows have always been ridiculously smart, though, so it makes sense to me that a demon one would understand and be able to recreate human language through a human larynx.

Mr. Unclean's body reaches for another sword, conveniently lying at his feet now. Do these brigands and thieves not keep their damn weapons ON them at all times?? Seriously, I don't know why it would take a situation like this to learn not to leave your weapons lying around! The sheath is whipped off the blade as Mr. Unclean's body raises it over his head and launches at Inuyasha. Inuyasha, not intimidated in the slightest, lunges to meet the corpse, yelling at the crow to get out of its nest and face him.

He plunges his fist into the bloody hole made by the crow to grab at it, and everyone watching flinches, disgusted. The crow, rather than being captured by Inuyasha's claws, bursts from the back of the corpse, carrying the Shikon no Tama in its jaws. Inuyasha grits his teeth at the sight of the bird carrying it as it flies away, and curses, yelling at it to get back there. Inuyasha looks around to see a bow and a quiver of arrows lying by a remote pillar of the building. COME ON REALLY?? Why are they all just discarding their weapons everywhere?? Can we get Elinor from Brave in here to tell them what's what?

Inuyasha grabs the bow along with Kagome's arm, dragging them both out of the building.

Piggyback rides!! Inuyasha asks her what she's waiting for and tells Kagome to just shoot the damn crow out of the sky. Kagome thinks this is an absurd request, and I agree with her. Dude, have YOU ever shot a bow and arrow before? That shit ain't easy to pull off when shooting at a still target, let alone a moving one!

Kagome begins to tell Inuyasha that she has no experience with a bow and arrow, but he interrupts her with the fun fact that this crow will only feed on humans, and asks her if she REALLY wants it to become even more powerful.The crow gulps down the jewel, leaving a visible lump in its throat, and Kagome reiterates this fact in her head. Useless thought is useless. She decides out loud that she'll give it the old college try and Inuyasha gives her a word of encouragement. However, in his mind, he's already planning to drop her from their great height the moment she succeeds, splattering her all over the ground. Well, at least he believes she's able to pull it off. That's nice, I guess.

Grinning from his sinister thoughts, Inuyasha calls to Kagome that she can do it in one shot because Kikyou was a master of the bow. Kagome reminds him that she's Kagome once more, but hopes that Kikyou will lend her her power anyway as she pulls back on the bowstring.

She at looks pretty damn awesome in that pose, though. Kagome prays for the arrow to strike as it goes flying, but her prayers go unanswered. The arrow arcs and falls to the ground, missing the crow by a mile. Kagome looks a little twitchy at her lack of skill and Inuyasha looks exasperated. She asks if he lied when he said Kikyou was a master, and he yells that Kagome's the one who's clumsy. So is she Kikyou or isn't she, Inuyasha?

Uh, guys... that doesn't look good...

So, what did I think of this chapter overall? Aside from a few unnecessary lines from Kagome, Inuyasha's exposition on the crow could have been done just a tad better, in my opinion. With his personality, I felt that Inuyasha was talking to Kagome and the lackeys when he was explaining that the crow's weakness made it manipulate bodies, when he should have been talking condescendingly and mockingly to the crow itself. His dialogue there felt too much like he had an audience to convey the information to, when he shouldn't have cared one way or another whether or not Kagome or the others knew what was going on.

That aside, though, his explaining to Kagome later that the crow only eats humans was very excellently set up, and the scene carried a great deal of tension. The chapter was non-stop action, which everyone familiar with my reviews should know is one of the things I love most when I'm reading these chapters. The tension is driven first by Kagome being chased around by a bumbling moron with a sword, and then changes seamlessly into the tension around trying to catch up with and defeat the crow. It has great flow.

That thing with random weapons just lying around really bugged me, though. It was a little too convenient that there seemed to be just what was needed right there every single time. Maybe have Inuyasha wrestle a bow and quiver from one of the lackeys? It's not like it would have been difficult.