Is it weird that this title sounds DELICIOUS to me? Springtime is here, the sun is coming out more often, the weather is getting warmer, and I've been having a little hankering for ice cream cones lately. It's still just a tad too cold for me to partake without getting the shivers, but I can't help it, my mouth is watering at the thought of a chocolate and vanilla swirl cup, or maybe strawberry... I'll tell you, the moment I can go a whole day without putting on a sweater, I'm heading into town and getting ALL the ice cream.
Naraku scoffs and holds up his arm, from which one of his bone spike armor thingies grows into an even bigger bone spike armor thingy. I'm bringing the technical terms today, as you can see. He slashes his arm at the oncoming blast, and it bounces back from his barrier bubble. Inuyasha is in horrified disbelief that it seems Naraku has knocked his signature attack back.
Kaze no Kizu's jagged path carves through the tentacles restraining Miroku and Sango, who can only yell in terrified alarm. A couple of branches of the attack saw across the one holding Kagome and Shippou too, the latter calling out to the former in distress. Inuyasha hears this and yells for Kagome too.
He's able to snatch her (and presumably Shippou too) from danger just in time with a grunt, but he notices that Kaze no Kizu doesn't seem to be dissipating at all like it normally would. Kagome says Inuyasha's name, and he asks her if she's hurt - little Shippou is just kind of staring up at Inuyasha, nothing of his own to say. Sango and Miroku fend off the ricocheting blasts by Sango's use of Hiraikotsu as a shield, but she's already starting to consider it too damaged to keep up the task for much longer. All Miroku can do is ask what in the actual HELL is going on right now.
Somehow, through the cacophony, Naraku's nefarious chuckle carries to Inuyasha, who glares as he's told that his Kaze no Kizu got itself all caught in the flow of Naraku youki. Naraku says that it will continue to circle around in here until Inuyasha and company are cut to ribbons. Dude, the only thing that's getting all ribbonized here is you, in case you haven't noticed. Although, his ability to play it cool when he's essentially got knives stabbing at every inch of him from the INSIDE is kind of impressive in a weird way. Total Black Knight energy.
Outside, Kikyou looks up at the mountain critically.
Oooh, so close to getting the spoken title accolades again! Missed it by a hair though.
Up over a jagged rock outcrop, Kikyou spots something flying, peering at it with even more concentration. She's able to make out "Naraku's offspring Kagura" atop her giant feather, and that she's carrying something wrapped in a furry little bundle after further squinting. Kikyou nocks an arrow and aims it at Kagura, shooting without any deliberation.
Turns out poor Kikyou is missing a LOT of things by a hair, huh? How's she picking up Inuyasha's bad aim when they haven't even hung out all that much this arc?
Kagura notes that it's Kikyou while she starts to open her fan for a fight, but a voice from the bundle she's holding tells her to stop, that Kikyou isn't hers to finish off. Kagura is a little stunned by how whatever is in there can talk, but doesn't ask questions. She just speeds off beyond the reach of Kikyou's arrows, much to Kikyou's irritation, given her glare after the fleeing enemy. She wonders furiously just what it is that Naraku is letting escape.
A narrow mist transition panel with a rumble sound effect over it later, we see Naraku glaring into his periphery, thinking on Kikyou. Just a coincidence, I'm sure. Meanwhile, Inuyasha is guarding Kagome from the continually ricocheting Kaze no Kizu by keeping her behind his back while he and Tessaiga act as shields against the bombardment. He shouts over his should a question about if she's okay, and she stutters an affirmative, but she knows they've got to DO something about this, since it just keeps relentlessly returning. You'd think that would be the person with a BOOMERANG'S deal, but Naraku made sure to keep his ripoff legally distinct.
And who could make it out of this deathtrap to take him to court over it anyway? He's free and clear.
All right, so his thoughts are just A LITTLE different than I joked above. He's convinced that Inuyasha and company will die here in his mountain gut, and he's got a new body for himself, so there's just ONE fairly obvious thing left to take care of. Naraku's bubble starts to float upwards, something Inuyasha notices right off the bat despite the utter chaos of Kaze no Kizu bouncing off the walls all around him. He yells at Naraku, accusing him of trying to escape, but Naraku likely can't hear him over the sheer NOISE in the place.
Kagome encourages Inuyasha to go after Naraku from over his shoulder, causing Inuyasha some shock. Recalling what Naraku said about Inuyasha's Kaze no Kizu getting caught in the flow of his youki, Kagome suggests that she may be able to extinguish the flow that Naraku was talking about, since it's his evil energy, after all. She also tells Inuyasha that she can see something at Naraku's feet, two Shikon shards glowing there. Inuyasha takes no time at all to pick up what she's implying - this might very well be Kouga. Kagome agrees that this is most likely, given that Kouga is a full youkai and Naraku would have no compunctions about absorbing him. She declares that they have to save him, and Inuyasha scoffs that this only applies if the guy is still alive, of course.
Still, in the next panel, Naraku perceives out of his periphery the shape of Inuyasha leaping up toward him with Kagome on his back. At first Naraku thinks Inuyasha's lost it, to jump right into the middle of his own ricocheting attack like that.
Well, what do you expect when you put someone in a position where they've got nothing to lose?
Kagome fires a purifying arrow that arcs upward in a wide arc, dissipating the bouncing wind attack on its way. Miroku and Sango are able to lower the Hiraikotsu when they note that the Kaze no Kizu is finally quitting. The arrow makes landing right where Kagome indicated before, making the portion of Naraku's bubble at his feet ripple with the impact. Kagome seems... surprised that she hit it, even though it was a fairly broad target.
... Gross.
Kagome shouts to the unresponsive Kouga as Inuyasha makes a beeline for the descending, ahem, sac that he's be put in. Naraku chuckles about them being worried about their friends, even at a time like this, raising his hand. This seems to be some sort of self-destruct command, because suddenly lumps of the fleshy interior of the mountain start falling, chunks of innards collapsing on top of the Inuyasha gang. Kagome states this fact aloud in a panic, while Sango and Miroku cringe up on their ledge at another observation of miasma gushing from the sloughing walls of the cavern.
So, what did I think of this chapter overall? Frankly, I'm not sure how much of the implications and statement that Mt. Hakurei is part of Naraku's body I should really trust. He is reacting shockingly little to it getting torn to pieces by his own mechanism in this chapter, and his interaction with Inuyasha and company is happening mainly from a conventional form. It's also worth noting that he starts making off with Kouga fully UNassimilated, even though the walls of the cave absorbed Kouga into it a couple of chapters ago. I don't know why he wouldn't just take in Kouga from there, unless he's already separated himself completely from the flesh around him and was leaving it behind as a decoy - but he still has plenty of control over it, so he's not WHOLLY separate? It's a little confusing, but no matter to what degree Naraku IS the mountain now, I have to conclude that it's only a superficial one.
Because Naraku, and more importantly RT, HAS to remember that Kagome has more than enough power to fuck his shit up, right? She's totally owned his ass before, and no matter how much mass he accumulates, he has to realize that Kagome is always going to have the ability to purify his youki. It would be SUPREMELY dumb for him not to take this into account while planning for Inuyasha's crew to be trapped inside his mountain body, especially when the trick he's relying on would just be using his purifiable aura to move around/redirect Inuyasha's attack. It does seem a little like this consideration went by the wayside, and now there's a contradictory effort to indicate heavily that Naraku actually ISN'T attached to Mt. Hakurei that much, because otherwise it doesn't make sense that he's not in bigger pain, OR that his plan didn't include a contingency for Kagome doing what Kagome does.
Also, did RT start getting some criticism for Kagome's ability to shoot a bow? To be honest, I always thought it was just a LITTLE convenient that she learned how to shoot so well so fast, but I always chalked it up to necessity, combined with her past life being a bit of an expert and some that talent passing between lifetimes. But now it appears there's some attention being drawn to her shots actually HITTING, like this is something new. Is this another lampshade or something?
We getting a tad uncomfortable that the reincarnate-girls' aim has been consistently better than our titular hero's?
No comments:
Post a Comment