Kaya's Story (An InuYasha Fanfic)

Chapter 86: Saint Hijiri

It wasn't long before InuYasha and I caught the scent of the birds again. When we caught up to the scent, the birds were about to attack a group of travelers, so we sprang into action. InuYasha attacked first with his claws followed by the rest of us. I used sacred arrows to keep the birds as far away from the villagers as possible. Soon, Kagura and Hakudoshi appeared. The birds began to act strangely and all of us came to the same conclusion, Kagura and Hakudoshi were a distraction meant to slow us down. We were informed that Princess Abi and her main force were already attacking the village of "The Holy One". The longer it took to protect the villagers we were with, the less time we would have to save the one at "The Holy One's" village. InuYasha attacked with his wind scar, but it was deflected by Hakudoshi's barrier. He then tried again with the red Tetsusaiga but got the same effect. I was about to fire a sacred arrow when someone beat me to it, dispelling the barrier and giving InuYasha an open opportunity. Hakudoshi was hit head-on with the wind scar but still managed to escape with Kagura and Entei's help. Entei began to attack InuYasha, so he sent us and the villagers ahead while he dealt with Entei. When Hakudoshi left the birds had left too, so we had a clear shot to "The Holy One's" village. Miroku led the villagers on, while we stayed behind, just in case. When InuYasha had Kirara go into a nearby cave and Entei followed, I knew that would be the end of the demon horse, Entei. Shortly after that InuYasha and Kirara returned, followed shortly after by Miroku. Miroku had returned when InuYasha went up the mountain to retrieve the mysterious arrow from earlier. After examining the arrow for a moment, InuYasha concluded it wasn't Lady Kikyo's arrow. Which I'm pretty sure is what everyone was thinking, including me. Miroku and I agreed that Lady Kikyo's spiritual power was nowhere around, and the scent on the arrow didn't belong to Lady Kikyo either. One thing was for sure, whoever fired it wasn't an ally or an enemy, so we had bigger worries. Especially if the person who fired the arrow was this Saint Hijiri because their spiritual power was quite strong. Regardless, there was a village that needed our help, so we left towards the village of "Saint Hijiri: The Holy One".

When we reached the top of the mountain where the village was located, I caught the scent of the birds again. This time though, there was a residual scent of fire. The part that confused me was that the scent didn't come from the village below, but the mountain just beyond. We followed the scent and it brought us to a cave where all of the villagers were. They explained that Saint Hijiri had destroyed the birds with a single arrow, causing the bird woman to flee before the Saint left, as well. Things weren't adding up. There aren't that many spiritual people that could take out that many demons with one arrow. Kagome must've come to the same conclusion because she asked InuYasha if we should go after Saint Hijiri. She suggested that there was a chance Saint Hijiri was Lady Kikyo and honestly I had come to that same conclusion. InuYasha didn't respond, he just walked away. If it is Lady Kikyo, I hope Kagome isn't there when we find out. I don't want to see her with that much pain in her eyes, again. As much as she tries to hide it, she loves InuYasha. Anyone with eyes could see that. I went to go stand next to Kagome and she gave me a look that I had seen many times before. I gave her a slight nod before turning toward Sango and Miroku, "Hey, guys, why don't' we go find somewhere to camp for the night. It is getting late." Miroku and Sango nodded, so I turned back toward Kagome. I grabbed her hand and squeezed it, reassuringly before letting go and following the others to find a place to set up camp for the night.

As the sun got lower in the sky, Miroku started a fire and we began to talk about the events that had taken place earlier. I was more worried about Kagome than InuYasha, right now. I feel bad for her, she puts up with so much and yet she still loves him. I didn't really pay full attention to Sango and Miroku's conversation until Kirara jumped up off of Sango's lap. I have never been more terrified of a human in my life. I need to remember to never get her to that level of anger because wow. Shortly after that, InuYasha and Kagome returned in silence and we retired for the night.

The next morning, we continued our search for Saint Hijiri, only to come across some of Naraku's demons. That meant he had come to the same conclusion we had and was also on the search for Saint Hijiri. When the demons started getting closer to the mountain, we saw a sacred arrow come from that direction. The demons began to form a hoard heading in the direction of the arrow, so InuYasha decided to take out the demons before they could get any farther. He sent us on ahead and we ran into another hoard of demons. Some time into the battle, Kagome took off supposedly following soul collectors. We ran after her only to lose her at a barrier, on that I intended to break down. I needed to help the others with the demons first, though. When Sango slew the last demon, I ran back in the direction of the barrier. I drew my bow and fired a sacred arrow at the barrier, but when it struck the arrow just disintegrated. When that happened, I put my bow away and drew my sword. I waited for the blade to turn pink and swung my sword only to have the attack erased. I decided to return to the others and found them talking to InuYasha. They apparently had just explained what had happened to Kagome because he looked pretty upset. A moment later, we raced back to the barrier hoping to get to Kagome.