But that just brings up more questions about why this is a standard that gods would be required to try and meet. Or why my speculation has drowned in the deep-end of ridiculousness at this point.
Sango and Miroku run up, asking Kagome if she's okay while Miroku holds up carefully cupped hands with a little glowing person nestled in them. Kagome gasps at what he's holding. The next panel switches to below the surface of the lake, where fake!Suijin is still holding a struggling Inuyasha. However, fake!Suijin notes that Inuyasha has weakened considerably, chuckling deviously. Back above, the Suijin in Miroku's hands demands to be put down and Miroku complies, lowering his fingers to the dock so she can step off of the edge of them as Kagome gapes at her, because I'm guessing SHE didn't expect the god to be that small either.
Suijin doesn't give a shit, taking off one of her earrings, which appear to be clusters of miniature pearls? Or grapes. Not sure. She says this is the "parting of the waters" as she throws the earring in the lake below, just as fake!Suijin is about to jab the holy weapon into the drowning Inuyasha, promising him that this is the end. Fake!Suijin pauses when he sees the tiny earring descending through the water above, prompting me to wonder how he managed to notice that. Seems like that might be difficult if you're wrestling around beneath the waves with someone anyway.
Kagome and friends gape down into the canyon between the walls of water, Miroku marveling at how the water actually parted. Kagome doesn't care, panicking about where Inuyasha might be. Instead of an answer, fake!Suijin thrusts the holy weapon at the walkway they're kneeling on. Kagome snatches up Suijin again, shouting to look out for that halberd's point as she scrambles out of its way. When the holy weapon makes contact with the creaking wood, it gives off a strange pulse or something that looks like rippling water, then the wood dissolves just as it did before. Miroku dumbly states that the walkway turned into foam as stares in alarm.
Fake!Suijin laughs, promising that this lot who has been interfering with him a ton tonight are gonna get it now. Miroku calls this nonsense, followed up by Sango informing fake!Suijin that they have the real one. Presumably Sango was going to talk about how Suijin is going to stop him, but is stopped short herself when Kagome shouts that Suijin is in fact ASLEEP in her hands. She's curled up, slumbering away against Kagome's fingers, despite all the chaos around her. Talk about things that seem difficult to do in the thick of a conflict. Who does she think she is anyway? Joji?
Miroku peers down at her, hand on his chin contemplatively as Kagome says that it looks like Suijin has used all her power. Sango is exasperated by how quickly that happened, but given Miroku's more sympathetic face, I'd say his power doesn't last much longer, if you get my drift. HEY-O!
He and Sango leap into action, weapons raised and intentions all synced up, along with their speech with Miroku starting and Sango ending a statement that in the case of the god being passed out, they'll have to exterminate the spirit. Fake!Suijin is unconvinced, lurching toward them with the holy weapon in his hands, comforted by the fact that he still has it. Not for long though. He suddenly drops in altitude and glares below him at what caused this.
Kagome calls out Inuyasha's name, happy he's still alive. Shippou points out that he can breathe again with a leap for joy, unnecessary as this comment was. Fake!Suijin insists that no matter how much Inuyasha tears up his body, it doesn't even hurt. Then he shoots up into the air again, alarming Inuyasha before he latches onto fake!Suijin's scaly hide and insists the snake won't get away, spitting up water along the way. Fake!Suijin says he's not even trying to get away, though, while Sango calls for Kirara to join her in charging at the retreating snake. Kirara transforms into a big kitty, and Sango straddles her back.
They pull up level with Inuyasha clinging to the scales of the fake!Suijin so Sango can tell him to back off, because he's already failed to kill the bugger. She says it's her turn, which flabbergasts Inuyasha. Sango elaborates that to kill of the long types like this one, you have to cut off the head. To demonstrate, she and Kirara fly higher toward fake!Suijin's front, and Sango lets loose her Hiraikotsu, aiming for his neck, no doubt. He swiftly turns to knock the boomerang away with the holy weapon, complaining that her whole group is such a nosy bunch to keep coming after him one by one. Sango curses as she catches a slightly foaming Hiraikotsu, though it seems in one piece.
Fake!Suijin halts his rise into the sky to order the fools below to watch him unleash the true power of the weapon he carries. He thrusts the halberd in the sky among rumbles of thunder.
He's interrupted in them, however, when Sango's boomerang comes whizzing at him again. He swings the halberd back around toward her again, this time with a lot more power behind it. He calls her efforts at killing him futile and Sango's eyes widen at the power coming toward her. She calls the whirlpools of water approaching water spouts before they hit her in the chest, knocking her from Kirara's back. Kagome and Shippou freak out and Sango's unseating, Kagome nearly squeezing the little goddess in her hands until her eyes pop from her skull.
Fake!Suijin is keeping pace with the falling Sango, trying to skewer her with the holy weapon while she's going down head first, which kind of makes for an awkward pose of Sango straining to keep sight of the blade over/under her tits. It's bizarre, so I'm not gonna talk about it anymore.
Kirara catches Sango, who hangs on despite being half distracted by how Inuyasha came to her rescue. Inuyasha still has a firm grip on fake!Suijin's arm and tells him to give it up, but fake!Suijin just calls him an asshole. Sango and Kirara come up level with Inuyasha once again, Sango asking where the hell Inuyasha came from. He informs her that he slowly made his way up fake!Suijin's body as she was playing decoy, a term which gets Sango a bit miffed. That's not really Inuyasha's main concern right now, though.
So, what did I think of this chapter overall? Well, I guess every arc has to have a weaker chapter, even good ones, and this was it for this particular arc. Granted the weaknesses were somewhat minor compared to some early ones I covered during Sesshoumaru's first appearance, but they were glaring given the quality of the rest of the arc.
In particular, there's the issue of the goddess being so worn out by throwing an earring into the lake. A freaking EARRING. It's not a terrible joke on its own, though the context does beg a few practical questions. First, is this meant to explain how fake!Suijin managed to trick her and steal the halberd in the first place? Is this weakness or mere laziness on her part? If she has to take a nap after throwing an earring into a lake, how did she ever wield a powerful weapon like fake!Suijin is doing? Had she been a goddess for very long before she was usurped? Because I can't imagine her being on the job a DAY before this guy decided he's had enough of her constant laying around.
Then there's the fact that the fake!Suijin is sensitive enough to feel this earring falling through the water near him, but NOT sensitive enough to feel Inuyasha clawing his way up his body. He even claims that Inuyasha's claws don't sting or itch, which would have been a fair setup for Inuyasha being free to climb without fake!Suijin noticing... if the earring thing hadn't given him pause before. He can't be super perceptive of every little thing in his vicinity one moment, and then oblivious the next. Continuity, RT. Continuity.
That's not to say that there aren't admirable parts of this chapter. I enjoyed the fact that Inuyasha and Sango are practically racing each other to get at fake!Suijin first. There seems to be a genuine competition between them to see who can wrap this case up, and you rarely ever get to see something like that between a male and female character very often.
At least not without the woman getting a crush on the man because he out-badassed her in the field. I'm grateful THAT piece of unsavory bullshit isn't clogging up this story.
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