Chapter 135:Human Faces 2.

I regret what I said earlier, what a bad day... How is it possible that we all have such a bad sense of direction. 

It sounds like a joke, but it's not. I can only say that we were until sunset walking between the ravines, following the river and once or twice we got lost, making everything more difficult. 

"Look over the crag there's more!"

Raising my head to see where the little raccoon is pointing, I am forced to raise my head even more and finally managed to notice something at the top of it all. 

It was a rather large tree, but what is most striking are the fruits hanging from its branches. Yes the ones seen in the river were shriveled like a raisin, the heads hanging from the branches were in perfect condition, making the whole thing look even more eerie. 

"It's huge..."

"Indeed, Miss Kagome. It is one of the largest I have seen so far."

"A lot of humans will have been used as nutrients, won't they, Miroku?"

"Indeed, Shippo. It's impossible for one to grow that big normally, even more so in this arid place."

Much blablabla and little boom boom boom, it's time to do this, I don't want to spend the night in this cold and damp place. 

"Inuyasha…"

"Asahiko..."

"Let 's do it!"

Shaking hands in a hearty handshake of these same hands, both Inuyasha and I shared a smile and started climbing upwards. 

"Where do you two think you're going!"

Damn, what kind of lung capacity do you have to let out those screams, Kagome?"

"Asahiko and I are going to take care of this, if we wait for them we'll stay the night here."

"The albino is right, I don't plan to sleep on this hard and wet floor, imagine if it makes me bad for my body or something, then who would pay me for the psychological damages?"

Leaving that stupidity floating in the air, I make my tails appear and start using them to climb up the boulder. Kagome's screams continued under there, but after a few seconds they were silenced. 

It's not that I can't hear her anymore, with my super senses that's impossible, but Miroku explains to her why Inuyasha is in such a hurry to finish this before nightfall. 

Basically last night was the night of the waning moon, meaning that today is the night of the new moon, a time where Inuyasha loses his powers and is completely left as just another human in the bunch. 

"Hey, Inuyasha, can you feel anything up there?"

Reaching up to his left side, I ask him if he can sense anything up there, as I am bad at this sensing energy thing. 

"I can't, the tree masks any small negative energies and the fog has all the smells."

"That's good, we're blind!"

It doesn't really matter if we're blind, we've already taken out a super powerful dragon, I don't think there's anything like that around here. 

"Are you afraid of a tree, where the great demon named Asahiko went?"

"Tsk, you don't know how dangerous they can be... Damn yokai plants, one of these days I'm going to take care of them all."

Hating an entire species for a bad encounter, yeah, that's how mean I am and I'm going to stay that way. With such a conversation as background noise, the two of us continued climbing and finally made it to the top with one last push. 

Clearly at the top was the tree, around it pots of various sizes and from what I smell, there's fresh blood in there. Another thing is a chubby... Wait, a chubby?. 

"Inuyasha..."

"Yeah, I can't sense his presence either, though he gives off a horrendous corpse stench."

The chubby boy has pale skin, with dark green hair that almost covers his eyes from how long it is. He wears a blue kosode with short sleeves, over that a straw vest and blue short shorts.

"What do you think you guys are doing here?"

"Ha, what do you care, I'm going to cut down that tree and yes you get in the way."

Strangely, the chubby boy remains calm even after hearing Inuyasha's tone, making it clear that he has her confidence. 

"What will you do?"

"I'll eliminate you along with him!"

Removing Steel Fang from the scabbard with a swift movement, Inuyasha stomps down and advances with a diagonal slash towards the fatty's belly.

It bounced... Inuyasha's sword, one of the three legendary, earth-dominating Steel Fang, bounced off the chubby boy's belly. 

"Hahaha, hahaha, hahaha, hahaha... Me, me, me, I'm dying, hahaha."

"Asahiko!"

"Sorry, sorry, sorry, it's just that I just... Now I remember Sesshōmaru and his metaphor of a log, are you sure you don't want one, I'm sure it's better than that sword!"

Finishing rolling around on the floor in a very undisguised way, I brush away the fictitious tears rolling down my eyes and speak seriously to Inuyasha.

Of course it's a joke about the log, but that seems to make Inuyasha angry and he looks at the chubby guy with a lot of hatred. Poor him, what has he done to you, he's just a poor human body farmer. 

"I'm going to kill you, but first him, now try my cutting wind!"

Watching as Inuyasha leaps into the air, I take a few steps back and cover myself with the tree trunk. I can taunt Inuyasha all I want, but I recognize his power and even more so that of his broken abilities.

The wind from the surrounding area whipped sideways, while the fruits of the tree fell down, but all that matters little in the face of the wave of energy unleashed by Steel Fang. 

The surprise was not only Inuyasha's, but mine as well, as he chubby boy doesn't dodge the attack, but instead lifts the wooden staff in his hand and from there a bunch of yellow flowers emerge. 

"That doesn't work either?"

"I give you a hand, Inuyasha. That chubby one looks hard to carry."

"Shut up and just watch, I've already got him where I wanted him."

Grunting more than talking, Inuyasha lifts Steel Fang again and positions it in a lunge form. It's obvious he's going to prick the balloon. 

"You're a monster, but a dumb one, how do you even think you can beat a hermit?"

"Oh, the fatty's got a battle class and everything!"

"I guess you are too, that's why you're with him... Never mind, you'll both be useful."

Moving his hand at incredible speed to his waist, the fatty grabs a strange canteen, though it's made of a dried brown gourd.

A strange energy spreads from that canteen, making my alertness level rise like a rocket to the sky. But that doesn't seem to be the situation for Inuyasha, who stands there transfixed.

"Now be defeated by Tokajin!"

"He, he's getting bigger!"

It wasn't Tokajin who was getting bigger, it was Inuyasha who was shrinking rapidly and without realizing it. Of course that was a big no, so with a flick of my wrist I pulled out my ever reliable fan. 

"Moon shape:Full moon."

With just a single brief wave of my fan, dozens of flaming hoops shoot out towards the chubby guy, but he hits the ground with his wooden staff and a pillar of flowers shoots upwards. 

*Boooooom!*

The fire and yellow flowers covered my field of vision, but so did his and taking advantage of that he quickly tossed little Inuyasha to the side. 

"Ah, ah, ah... I'm back to my normal size?"

"Congratulations, I guess."

Not giving much importance to Inuyasha's words, I keep my gaze fixed forward and slowly feel the surge of energy in the air.

"Tsk,I'm going to chop that hermit or whatever into pieces."

"Hahaha, good luck, take cover!"

It was huge what was coming at full speed towards us, it was a wave of yellow flowers that easily filled the entire field of vision. 

My words were fast, but that thing was even faster and when it hit us head on, it easily sent us flying down the boulder. 

"We're flying~ we're flying~ you, you, you."

"Asahiko, do something!"

Hey what do you want me to do, I'm not a solver of... Oh, I got it. 

"Okay...there you go!"

Doing a super spin in mid-air, I kicked Inuyasha and sent him straight towards the direction of the river. With him already on his way, I twisted my body again and launched myself into a dive towards the river. 

"Asahiko, you fucking idiot!"

"Don't be noisy, it's the best place to land, what are you doing?"

"I'm going back upstairs, I'm not going to let it end like this."

"I like your revengeful will, but if you forget we'll leave Kagome and Miroku here alone."

Swimming down the moderately deep river, he pointed his finger towards the surroundings and easily Inuyasha noticed the lack of those two. 

"They're not here, we didn't tell you they were staying here!"

"Good grief, Inuyasha, you think the three of them were going to stay here waiting while you were up there fighting."

"Tsk, it was unnecessary, now we're going to have to look for them."

"Hahaha, you blushed and everything!"

Teasing Inuyasha, we finally made it all the way to the shore and with a wave of his hand he dried us both off with ease. 

"Ehh, where are we going?"

"Don't look at me, I'm worse at directions than Shippo."

"Shall we try our luck?"

"Yeah, that's the only thing we can do."

Affirming between us, we grabbed a branch from the ground and let it hang in the air for a few seconds, until it fell to the right side. 

"Good, we've got a direction now."

"Come on, we have to find them fast before something happens to them."