I'm so glad the major holidays I celebrate are over. Sure, there's still New Years, but that one doesn't require a ton of planning on my part, since I don't do much other than pop some champagne at midnight. This year was a bit of a struggle - since Thanksgiving in the USA came so late this year, it was December before most of us got our seasonal start, and I know a lot of other people who were slow to get up decorations, purchase gifts, and generally settle into the spirit of things. There's been almost a collective sigh of relief that we're on the other side of Christmas now.
I know I'm at least a bit more relaxed.
Maybe y'all should have tried to figure out what his angle might have been BEFORE blindly entering into an agreement with him? Just a thought.
The owner of that massive eye tells Naraku it's too late for his plans anyway, because she and Abi no longer have any use for HIM. A giant feathery wing bursts out from the side of the mountain, fairly obliterating it, and Naraku just hovers there and smiles. Clearly he doesn't give a fuck, and that should probably worry Abi and Mommy Dearest. But I guess they're much more focused on their theatrics than any warning signs.
Huh. I guess Abi must take after her father?
As the rest of the mountain crumbles away, Abi's mom opens her beak and spits a stream of flames at Naraku. Again, he's just... hovering there. He doesn't even twitch a muscle as the flames surround his barrier, and as they subside, he smarms that the meager fire isn't enough to break his barrier.
Due to her illogical lack of concern, Abi's bird mom closes her beak and swallows down Naraku, bubble and all. She looks rather pleased with herself when she says she finished him in a single gulp. I'm not TOUCHING the naughty joke THAT line could easily produce. Abi, hovering a distance above the scene, looks on in silence at first, then scoffs and says it didn't take long. Good gracious, you both are so PAINFULLY stupid.
Meanwhile, Inuyasha's group is still rushing in their direction, and apparently Inuyasha only JUST informed the rest of the team that he smells Naraku at their destination, because Miroku exclaims in disbelief from Kirara's back that Naraku is already at the nest. Inuyasha confirms that he's certain it's Naraku's smell.
Suddenly, someone else addresses Inuyasha, right from the tip of his own nose. Inuyasha hums in question, and is answered by the squeaking of Myouga drawing blood from where he's clinging on Inuyasha's mug, overseen by Inuyasha's cross-eyed glare.
Imagine having to facepalm this hard just to flatten a little parasite.
Myouga doesn't complain, either. He just rights himself and asks for yet MORE confirmation of Naraku being at Tekkei's nest. Inuyasha questions the name and Myouga explains that it's Abi's mom. Wow, she had a NAME this whole time! This is RT pulling a YT move, it seems. Inuyasha asks about this mother, because, now that I think of it, it does occur to me that he hasn't really heard about. However Kagome seems to have already drawn some conclusions, trailing in them so that Myouga can fill in the blanks and inform them that Tekkei is related to the birds that live in Hell, and is therefore connected to the next world. Inuyasha is struck by this phrasing, and he's starting to catch the drift here too.
Myouga tells Inuyasha that Tekkei is ferocious and that he should be careful, and as Inuyasha peers silently at him out of the corner of his eye, Myouga gives his farewell so he can begin to take his leave. Inuyasha is impressively quick at catching him in a fist, though, commanding him to wait in irritation. He squishes Myouga in between his fingers, glowering at him, demanding to know how they're supposed to get to the world on "that" side. There IS a pretty wide gap between Myouga showing up at the mention of Naraku being at Tekkei's nest and the generalized advice to just be careful...
Whatever Myouga's answer may have been, we skip to where Miroku is bidding Inuyasha to look ahead at a massive bird-like shape silhouetted in the mist. As they get closer, a burst of fire issues from it.
Abi is awfully smug for someone who hasn't done much in a minute. She asks if Inuyasha and his crew came to die here as well, and after a moment of stunned silence, Inuyasha demands to know what happened to Naraku, clearly not seeing him at the scene. Abi scoffs again, saying that small-fry has already croaked, and when Inuyasha makes a noise of disbelief, Tekkei chuckles that Naraku is in her belly.
But suddenly, a large swelling protrudes from the top of her head.
Certainly not in her belly anymore.
Inuyasha and company gape up at the giant bird as she topples over in her screaming demise, Abi stuttering at her mother in horror. Naraku emerges from the wound in Tekkei's head, limbs all transformed into a tangle of writhing tentacles, and rises to meet Abi's height in the sky. Inuyasha exclaims Naraku's name, not that any of this is a surprise to anyone, and Naraku smiles down in patronizing glee at him as he accuses him of taking his sweet time getting there.
Abi lunges at him, the halberd he gave her extended toward him; she's giving the old "how dare you" shtick, but he just sardonically thanks her for all her hard work. The halberd glows, something the gaping audience below trails in their commentary on.
Naraku mocks her, offering her oblivion without suffering as a reward for all that hard work she did for him. His arm tentacles extend toward her in a rapid blur, only allowing Abi a moment to stutter a curse before she's impaled in like four or five different places with them. From the ground, Inuyasha and Kagome are in open-mouthed shock at Abi's fate.
I don't know if I believe that she's not suffering in this shot, but at least it's brief.
Below, Sango looks pretty irritated when she utters that Abi and her mother were used like tools, and Miroku follows up with the statement that while those youkai deserved no mercy, that was just cruel. I'd like to know what the difference is between showing no mercy and cruelty is, but Miroku doesn't exactly have time to define his terms. Inuyasha is already scoffing up at Naraku that he's the same as always, and tells him that his methods make him sick. Naraku lets out a scoff of his own again, expressing his willingness to bet that Inuyasha and company were planning on killing Abi themselves, thereby implying that they don't really have room to talk.
Thankfully, the argument about which of their violences is more legitimate. Naraku changes the subject to how the Inuyasha group should be grateful, because this next part is thanks to HIM. His tentacled arm whips out at speed once more, tracing a jagged line in the air on its way toward Tekkei's neck from where he's come to stand on her corpse's upper wing, all conveniently undissolved in contrast to her daughter's body. He tells him that they all get to go to the boundary between worlds now as they keep staring in a gaping stupor.
I'd rather be going to Disney World, and I'm not even a fan of Disney anymore.
So, what did I think of this chapter overall? Disappointing in a similar vein to the confrontation between Bankotsu and Renkotsu - this fight should have been far bigger and more epic. At the same time, my disappointment was much reduced by the fact that this whole arc had taught me not to expect much from Abi and her mother. They rarely ever did anything clever or that made sense for their position in their deal with Naraku, because the plot obviously required them to be overly gullible. You get the sense that we were in a bit of a hush to get to the border between the worlds, and so were speedrunning making the pathway there. If Abi and Tekkei had any sense whatsoever, this arc would have taken at least twice as long, I think.
Come to think of it, perhaps I should be grateful for that. XD
Myouga showing up again right now strikes me as interesting. If I recall correctly, he and Toutousai scoffed at the notion that a Shikon shard could be found at the border between worlds, and then was shown first-hand how far Naraku and his ilk were willing to go to get to that border in order to grab the jewel fragment that was there. Being made aware that there is actually a shard on the other side of that door had to have given him an incentive to go and research OTHER ways to get to the border, and his knowledge regarding Tekkei and the concern regarding the fact that Naraku was already there with Tekkei points firmly in that direction. But his attempt to leave Inuyasha with the generic advice to be careful, and Inuyasha having to expressly DEMAND the information on how Tekkei opens that path is a little odd to me. Perhaps he figured Naraku was already well on his way to making it happen himself and was essentially telling Inuyasha he should stand back and wait to hitch a ride? But then why not just say THAT? He's giving me sus vibes right now.
Not that he's ever NOT giving me sus vibes, the literal parasite...
Hope everyone had/continues to have a lovely holiday, whichever one is celebrated!
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