Not interested, Chapter. I'm disenchanted with math in fiction ever since I picked up a book at the store expecting math to factor into the plot when it was mentioned on the jacket that the protagonist was a math genius, and it had nothing to do with anything whatsoever. So disappointing. Besides, I don't come to Inuyasha for MATH. I come to Inuyasha because I am incredibly easy to entertain. Always have been, ever since I was a baby and could keep myself occupied for hours with a set of plastic keys.
In case anyone wanted the simplest explanation as to why my tastes are like this.
If they're going to lock up youkai like that, maybe the priests should figure out a more permanent solution than a seal that will just dissolve when they kick the bucket.
Anyway, the wreckage of this place has a swirling vortex of sus energy behind it, and Inuyasha notes that he can smell them - or as the translator put it: he can "feel" the scent of nothing but a few small fry youkai. An odd way to phrase that, but okay. Miroku says these youkai are hiding, but almost immediately a rumble issues from the wrecked shrine and three giant serpentine heads with hair down the length of them burst out from it, hissing at Inuyasha, who has drawn Tessaiga.
A narrow sky transition panel leads us into the gang crowded into a wide doorway, Miroku sitting and talking to what looks like your typical headman, given how many of them we've seen before, and a couple of village men loitering behind him. Miroku asks about the similar occurrences to this shrine decimation rumored to be happening elsewhere in the area, and the headman says that everyone is talking about how priests and monks are being murdered everywhere. Miroku begins to ask who in the world could do such a thing, and the headman interrupts him to say that's the weird thing - people say it's the work of a woman and a baby, of all things. Kagome, Inuyasha, and Sango look alert at this, alarmed but not shocked by any means. Kagome in particular is thinking of the baby, and immediately fills in the gaps with Shnooky. Inuyasha also automatically deduces that the woman in this scenario has to be Kagura. That one was a gimme.
Presumably that very night, we cut to another temple out in the woods. Inside, two disciples are kneeling on the floor worriedly asking another old priest standing with his back to them in the middle of the room whether this place will also be attacked in time. The priest answers that it won't be "in time" at all.
A voice from outside among the trees hums that this priest seems to have a few more abilities going for him than the other ones before him. A bit more of a spiritual sense, so to speak. Then there's a volley of blades tearing through the open doorway, and the disciples yelp in fear, but the priest whips out a loop of beads as he acknowledges the youkai's presence. The beads appear to project a dome barrier around him that disperse the blades.
The priest scoffs that this must be the woman and baby he's heard so much about, adding silently that his spidey senses are telling him the baby is WAY worse than the woman. I generally find babies to be worse than damn near everything than most people. Except crying. They're experts at that. Shnooky chuckles, speculating that the priest might just know something about the border between this life and the next, at which the priest is quite alarmed, and his disciples cry out that the infant spoke.
Kagura waves her fan a little, asking the priest if he'll be able to handle her next attack. She doesn't give him time to respond, just throwing out a "Dance of the Dragon Serpent" as she draws a wide circle with the fan in front of her. This produces a few whirling spirals of wind, the points of which aim straight for the priest. He raises the beads again to put up his personal barrier, but this and his groans of effort last a surprisingly short amount of time.
As he goes down, the disciples peek out from behind a statue with their mouths agape at the fate that befell their priest. In the shadows just beyond his bleeding body, the sound effects indicate that Kagura steps forward, but dude's not dead yet. He grunts in the effort it takes him to reach up and under the collar of his robe.
Shnooky informs the priest that he's going to take a teensy peek into his soul while Kagura holds him out and lowers him down onto the priest's gushing chest. It only takes Shnooky a moment to grimace at the revelation that something bad is about to happen to him, but it's also a moment too late; he's blasted right the FUCK off the priest's chest with an oddly vertical-looking slash through his little body, much to Kagura's alarm.
The priest holds up the weapon with which he dispatched Shnooky, a relic much like the butsugu on Hijiri Island, but with three prongs on each end instead of a single point. Then the priest gives out all at once, his arm falling as he dies. The cowardly disciples shiver from behind the statue, fretting over their honored priest, but not daring to go over and see if he can be at all helped by this point. It's probz because badass Kagura is still there, resting her fan on her shoulder as she regards the two halves of baby lying on the floor critically. She is clearly annoyed.
Narrow sky transition panel with bonus trees! Inuyasha and crew are racing through the forest, Shippou, Sango, and Miroku on Kirara and Kagome on Inuyasha's back. Miroku asks about the blood smell Inuyasha is detecting, and Inuyasha tells him it's fresh. He adds that he also smells incense, so he's betting there's another tragedy at a temple. Not a half-bad deduction there, Sherlock.
They show up at the temple where the two disciples are at last kneeling next to their murdered priest, and recoil at MORE youkai coming in there. Miroku steps forward to declare them totes not suspicious people. Says the most suspicious of all of them. One look at the priest lying dead in a pool of his blood is enough for Sango to suggest that this is Kagura's doing while she comes into the building behind Inuyasha, and he confirms that he can smell her in here too. Or "feel" her smell in here, as the translator has put it again.
Miroku is interrogating the disciples, asking if they're absolutely sure that the ones who did the priest in were a woman and a baby. As if there's anyone who could be mistaken about something so ludicrous. One of the disciples affirms their story, and spoke to how bravely the priest took on the weird duo. They brag on him for SOMEHOW managing to destroy the youkai's infant companion, because infants are notoriously difficult to kill. Inuyasha and Kagome both seem to perk up at this news.
The disciples insist that they are not mistaken, and the little baby was cut clean in half by their master's spiritual powers. Calm down, bros, I believe you. Of course, that doesn't mean the Inuyasha gang isn't still a little skeptical, as they're about to explain. Sango turns to Miroku, asking what he thinks, and Miroku slowly states that the baby was the monster heart of Naraku birthed in Mt. Hakurei, a part of him that he went out of his way to help escape when Mt. Hakurei was crumbling. Sango picks up what he's putting down, and says that this probz means the baby is vital to Naraku's plans, to which statement Miroku agrees. Kagome is also thinking that it's like this kid died WAY too quickly.
Well, we ARE almost 300 chapters into this story with nary a sign of the plot ramping up to a climax, so I can see where she's coming from on that one.
Meanwhile, Kagura is flying on her giant feather, a bundle still in her arms. I suppose leaving the infant corpse behind would have been a tactical disaster - don't want the enemy to reverse-engineer that baby! She notices the Saimyoushou hovering around her, and indicate a path to the ground where it looks like little Kanna is standing with her mirror all stoic-like. Landing in a kneel in front of Kanna, Kagura greets her and asks if Naraku told her to come here. Kanna nods in silent response.
Kagura flings two separate bundles to the ground, each showing just a peek of half a baby face. Kagura drawls that this is just how it ended up, and asks if the reason Kanna was sent here was to scold her or something. Kanna kneels down to pick up one half of a baby, then starts to walk away. Kagura has picked up the other half again, demanding to know where Kanna is going, indicating the half she's dangling from her fingers to indicate that she's left it behind. Kanna pauses and turns to tell Kagura she should protect the half she's holding.
The little guy would have wanted it this way: retirement in the most violent manner possible.
So, what did I think of this chapter overall? I'm kind of amused, because this chapter felt like one big ol' lampshade. Between everyone having to be skeptical that a priest managed to kill a BABY, to Kagome admitting that it seemed a little too soon for a major cog in Naraku's new machine to eat it, to Kanna speculating that this could actually all be for the BEST really - it's like a giant signpost declaring that RT was already getting super bored with this kid. I mean, how many times can you reasonably write a baby being placed on a dying man's chest in a shounen comic? Shnooky was NOT a sustainable character, and it's just funny that RT had to actually put him in the story for a couple of chapters before she realized that a LITERAL INFANT wasn't going to rivet readers.
Also, Kagura's flippancy in how she treated the bisected corpse of Shnooky made me laugh out loud at the end there. She's just flinging it around like she's living in a "dead baby joke" and it brings out the lulz. Kagura saving the content once again with her unique charm, we love to see it.
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