An evil aura shrouded Hitomi Castle. Countless Soul Collectors carried souls toward the inner keep, only to be kept outside by its barrier.
Kikyo lay still among the bedding on the tatami, her eyes closed, as though she had lost consciousness.
"There's a barrier here. Those Soul Collectors can't get in." For the first time, Naraku stood before Kikyo, looking down at the motionless priestess with expressionless eyes. Without the souls of the dead, Kikyo could not move. He had never expected the once-powerful priestess to fall so far. Without souls to sustain her, she could not take a single step...
Kikyo slowly opened her eyes and met Naraku's dark, lightless gaze. Even she could no longer see through him.
"Without dead souls, it seems your body can't move." Naraku sat beside Kikyo, watching the priestess he had once wanted so desperately lie helpless and unguarded before him, within arm's reach. "Kikyo, what were you thinking?"
He meant what had happened in the mountain where he had performed Witchcraft. He had sealed countless monsters inside to create his new body, and the evil aura within had drawn Inuyasha in as well. Kikyo had appeared while Inuyasha was fighting the monster that would become the poisonous vessel. Her arrow had easily shattered the seal on the mountain. If she had meant to protect Inuyasha and prevent him from merging with the monster, she could simply have shot the monster instead. That would have destroyed it, broken the Witchcraft, and prevented Naraku from obtaining a new body.
"Did you want to find out who was summoning the poisonous vessel?" Naraku asked softly.
"So it was you," Kikyo said coldly. "You've changed quite a bit, Onigumo."
"Hmph. Onigumo? What a nostalgic name." Naraku looked into Kikyo's eyes. "Fifty years ago, you saved a