Inuyasha Manga: 120 The Kodoku's Location

I thought that kodoku was in the cave, being slowly built by that "fuko" spell and the countless consecutive rounds of battles with those who would eventually be incorporated into its body. Miroku's constant reiterations were enough to pound the fact of what the thing was and why it was where it happened to be right into my skull. Of course, it IS changing locations now. It's in transit to a "mysterious" destination (I would say dramatic irony, but Sango seems to have an idea regardless), so maybe we're not so much talking about where it is as where it will be.

Not that it matters. The journey is the destination, maaaaaaaan.

And you thought YOU were the one who sucked, Miroku.

As the massive tornado of youkai parts bursts from the top of the mountain, Inuyasha grunts, probably not feeling so well. Kagome reaches for him, being carried in a tangle just below him, calling out his name. He's alarmed initially, straining to reach her and call HER name as well. That's right, folks. It's a classic "INUYASHA! KAGOME!" moment. Hold onto your hats. If you haven't already lost them to a tornado of youkai parts, of course.

Inuyasha manages to grab hold of her wrist and pull her to him, asking if she's okay. She doesn't really answer, eyes still squeezed shut and mouth in shouting mode. Still, he looks around, wondering in a panic where Kikyou got to. He sees her hanging upside-down some distance below him, unconscious and likely sporting a broken ankle, because I can't see how else she could be hanging on the outside of this mass of garbage without falling off entirely. Now Inuyasha shouts Kikyou's name, because we gotta switch it up from time to time. Obvi.

The top of the youkai-piece tornado curves back down toward the Earth. So much for Inuyasha, Kikyou and Kagome being the first astronauts. Inuyasha and Kagome stare in shock at the shadowed figure on the ground, a direct target of the big ogre spearheading the spiraling mass of youkai parts.

"You see this face? It's the face of a guy who's pissed at you for blowing up his body."

Inuyasha and Kagome continue to be shocked by his appearance, primarily by the fact that his body seems to have regrown since Kagome made it disappear with her rage magic trick. Kagome remembers the event pretty well, and so does the panel showing Naraku's look of pure horror when Kagome's arrow shot everything below his shoulders to pieces.

As the big ogre from before approaches Naraku, he's pretty angry himself, identifying Naraku as the douchebag who sealed him and his opponents in the cave. He reaches out with a gigantic hand and proceeds to do just what he threatens - tear right through Naraku's newly reformed abdomen, turning it into little more than blood-mist. It would be cheer-worthy if it weren't so futile.

Inuyasha realizes the body is actually a puppet, just before one of its puppet tendrils wraps around the big ogre's head. They squeeze so hard that the bones in his skull crack and crunch while power stirs within Naraku's glare. Inuyasha manages to detach himself and Kagome from the mass of youkai flesh and hover beside it instead when the funnel of youkai parts begins to be pulled in by Naraku at an accelerated rate.

With a series of creaks, cracks and crunches, the body parts amalgamate into Naraku, assimilating into his human shape. A clawed hand reverts back into that of a well-manicured man, and an array of deadly spikes, tails, tentacles and spines sink into Naraku's back and shoulders. His hair flies out every which way.

Kagome clings to Inuyasha in horror, noting that the youkai parts are being sucked into Naraku's body. Inuyasha makes a noise of disgust, then draws Tessaiga with a shout of Naraku's name. All he's saying today is everyone's name. He usually has more complaining associated with those names. Anyway, Inuyasha swings Tessaiga down on Naraku, or at least that's his intent. The strike stops short of Naraku's curled and crouched form, crackles of energy spitting from the spot. Inuyasha knows a barrier when he sees one, at least.

Before you start talking about "holes" and seals inside them, could you maybe put some pants on?

Kagome looks ready to cry while Inuyasha sports a severely disturbed face, maybe from the fact that this whole kodoku was made to create a new body for Naraku, and maybe because they have to see Naraku naked. Maybe both. Naraku and Inuyasha look off to the side, where Kikyou is laying in a pile of youkai guts that I guess Naraku decided weren't GOOD enough for his new sexy form, Inuyasha with alarm. Kikyou is still unconscious, and Inuyasha decides to scream her name, in case it wakes her up.

Sleeping Beauty over here doesn't seem much interested in opening her eyes. As he gathers up the fur he discarded when eating the winning ogre, Naraku says she's the one who broke the seal from the inside, and it's thanks to her that he was able to get his puppet hands on a new body. Inuyasha is pissed by the insinuation that Kikyou was HELPING Naraku, but Kagome is the first to articulate this anger. She says Naraku is a wrong idiot, because Kikyou fired the arrow to avoid Inuyasha getting killed by the ogre, and fusing with it. It was all to protect Inuyasha.

Hmm, not sure what that note has to do with the TRANSLATION, but good job getting to do my blog before I did, my dude.

Inuyasha gets all kinds of ticked off and yells at that bastard Naraku to keep his filthy hands off Kikyou. Naraku's response is to blast Inuyasha with a massive cloud of miasma, which Kagome is proud to identify as such, I'm sure. As Naraku rides his deadly fart-cloud into the sky, he talks about what a shame it is that Inuyasha can't get Kikyou's power for himself. I think he doesn't quite understand Inuyasha's objection to Kikyou being touched.

Inuyasha yells Kikyou's name up at the retreating miasma cloud, and her head lolls in her uninterrupted sleep. She is TIRED. Kagome thinks Inuyasha's name, standing small and sad off to the side of an otherwise empty frame.

Meanwhile, Naraku propels himself through the sky, wondering about Kikyou's motivations. If she really wanted to help Inuyasha, instead of breaking the seal on the mountain and letting the kodoku loose, she should have been able to use a "more reliable" method. What this method is, Naraku doesn't say, but he does ask himself if she wasn't worried about giving him a new body.

I don't know about that, but I can tell she doesn't mind pretending to be asleep.

So, what did I think of this chapter overall? My mind certainly wasn't where the translator's was, if I'm being honest, though it probably should have been. It's not a bad question, why Inuyasha didn't rush to Kikyou's side when he saw Naraku was headed over there too. In fact, he didn't really make much of a move to help Kikyou at any point in the chapter, even though his somewhat impulsive characterization might warrant that kind of wasted effort. What's really going on here?

First, we should note that Inuyasha actually ISN'T stupid. I know, we've all been kind of fed this idea that he's an idiot who is not above using a losing strategy more than once. But here's the thing: I'm hard-pressed to think of a moment in the series so far when Inuyasha didn't immediately abandon a course of action that he knew wasn't working, or wasn't able to identify an action as such. During the Hell Painter arc, he knew that slicing up the ink-youkai would incapacitate him, and HE was the one to formulate the strategy of defeating that particular enemy himself. The only time he's gone ahead with actions that aren't effective is when he's had to fight humans that are being controlled and had no way of plowing through them like he would a normal enemy, having to stall for time.

So, with that being said, Inuyasha had reason to believe in the moment Naraku went for Kikyou that it was useless to counter his move, because of that barrier he came up against earlier. There's no way it didn't enter Inuyasha's mind that anything he did to try and keep Naraku away from Kikyou would have been repelled immediately, and yes, it would have left Kagome open for attack as well. Attacking Naraku at that point would have been at best useless, and at worst, result in injury to Kagome as well.

It's a risk assessment that brings us to the fact that, for all that Inuyasha cares about Kikyou and her safety, he knows from experience that for all intents and purposes she's a serious threat. The last time he met her, he tied up Kagome, made her invisible, and tried to drag him into hell. He's going to be cautious in approaching her again, ESPECIALLY when Kagome is near, because he has no reason to believe that she won't try to hurt her again. He's not even aware that Kagome told Kikyou about Naraku yet, so for all he knows, she still thinks that he's her enemy and the cause of her death. Aside from the fact that she might try to kill him again (which for him is probably not even close to his biggest concern), she is more than likely to reject all help from him. If you have someone you care about deeply but they have done everything to push you away and make you believe that they hate you and want you to suffer, not to mention will not accept that you are trying to help them out of some seriously destructive behavior, you might hesitate to approach them too.

Now, all that aside, this can only be speculation, because RT didn't bother to make it clear how Naraku even got to Kikyou's side in order to pick her up. The way the scene is laid out, Naraku just kind of SHOWS UP right next to Kikyou, despite how he and Inuyasha were an equal distance from her the last time we were shown him moving. How Naraku moved and when would have been really important information to include for the audience to understand why Inuyasha reacted in the way he did, but I guess she wasn't really interested in helping us out in that respect.

I do appreciate the loving attention RT gave to depicting Naraku's sweet abs and titillating nudity in this chapter though. That gets two thumbs-up from me.