Kikyo, Do You Deserve to?

She actually bore some responsibility for her younger sister Kaede losing her right eye.

During her miko training, when she traveled through various lands slaying demons, Black Miko Tsubaki, who traveled with her, had placed a powerful curse on her! She could never fall in love with a man like an ordinary woman; if she did, she would lose her power and die an unnatural death!

At the time, she had paid little heed to the black miko's curse.

But later, she met Inuyasha. Without either of them realizing it, their chance encounters became a growing acquaintance, then a quiet, gradual understanding. Their initial sympathy as fellow outcasts developed into mutual support, until her heart stirred and she truly fell in love.

And that was precisely when the black miko's curse took effect.

The deeper her love grew, the more spiritual power she lost, until she would become an ordinary human woman. Just then, a horde of demons scheming to seize the Shikon Jewel launched a massive attack. As the miko protecting the village, she naturally fought on the front lines.

Yet because she had fallen in love, her strength had plummeted!

Not only had she lost her once-overwhelming spiritual power, but all six of her attributes, including spiritual perception and reflexes, had dropped sharply!

And fighting on the front lines naturally made her the demons' first target!

During the battle, a moment's distraction nearly allowed a demon to ambush her. Fortunately, her younger sister Kaede bravely shot a fledgling Sacred Arrow at the attacker, drawing its attention and allowing her to turn and destroy it with an arrow of her own. But her spiritual power had already declined too much. Her Sacred Arrow was far weaker than before and failed to purify the demon completely. Fragments of its shattered corpse became blades that wounded Kaede's right eye.

It was one of her greatest regrets.

Another thorn lodged in her heart.

Only then had she realized how vicious the black miko's curse was.

By recklessly falling in love, she had hurt both herself and others.

"Kaede, if you're my sister, why are you siding with Inuyasha?"

Kikyo embraced her younger sister in anguish.

Then, while Kaede's heart churned with a bitter mixture of emotions, she snatched the longbow from the old woman's hands and the arrows from her back. Immediately, she aimed at Inuyasha, who had only just caught his breath and struggled to his feet. She bent the bow, drew the string, and released. An arrow shot forth-a Sacred Arrow, fired in one seamless motion.

This was a Sacred Arrow!

Not a Sealing Arrow!

And Kikyo's spiritual power was almost fully intact, unlike fifty years ago, when she had been mortally wounded and left near death by Naraku's ambush!

Whoosh...!

The arrow skimmed past Li Xia's cheek.

It made every hair on a certain seemingly tough man's body stand on end.

True, a Sacred Arrow posed the greatest threat to demons, but that hardly meant its sharp iron head couldn't kill a human. Had Kikyo's arrow strayed even slightly, people would be attending his funeral the next day.

Gulp...

Being a good person sure wasn't easy these days.

Yet despite knowing that Kikyo was dangerous right now, Li Xia charged straight toward her without hesitation!

Behind him, Inuyasha had no choice but to draw Tessaiga to block the sudden arrow.

Tessaiga flashed gold in its transformed demonic form, looking majestic. But the moment it met Kikyo's Sacred Arrow, its transformation was dispelled, and it reverted to a rusty blade.

Kaede's heart lurched at the sight. "Inuyasha, run!"

She turned, not forgetting to plead with Kikyo:

"Sister, Inuyasha isn't our enemy!"

Inuyasha was naturally shocked, his pupils contracting sharply.

This is Tessaiga, the sword Dad left me!

Not far away, Grandpa Myoga, who was hiding in the shadows, could scarcely believe his eyes. "How is this possible? That human miko's arrow dispelled my lord's Tessaiga transformation so easily?"

"Inuyasha, look out! Dodge!"

Everyone cried out inwardly at that moment.

Neither Li Xia nor Kaede and the others wanted anything to happen to Inuyasha.

Kikyo alone seethed with unwavering murderous intent!

"Kikyo, do you hate me that much? What did I ever do wrong?"

Inuyasha murmured.

An indescribable fury flared in his heart.

With no time to think, he instinctively let go of Tessaiga and used the force of the impact traveling through its hilt to leap diagonally backward.

Fortunately, the transformed Tessaiga had already bought him enough time to brace himself. Then it had taken the Sacred Arrow head-on, giving him a little force to push off from.

That dodge should have worked, right?

In front of Inuyasha.

Li Xia, who had darted forward in a flash, met the miko's icy gaze.

He was utterly fearless... yeah, right.

As Li Xia strode toward her, his heart was pounding with terror.

But he still steeled himself and faced the dangerous woman head-on.

The forceful rebuke that followed shocked everyone present:

"Enough, Kikyo! What kind of guardian miko are you?

"It's already perfectly clear. A demon wanted the Shikon Jewel you guarded and used a simple scheme to turn you and Inuyasha against each other! Since you chose to take on the task of Shikon Jewel Purification, since you chose to protect a jewel that brought misfortune to those around it, you should have understood the risks involved! You should have been prepared for someone to plot against you!"

"What right do you have to complain about dying?

"Wasn't this your own choice from the very beginning?"

"Hmph! Even putting that aside, blame belongs with the person responsible. If your resentment won't fade, you should go after the real culprit! Lashing out helplessly here, using Inuyasha-another victim-as an outlet for your anger, is nothing but running away..."

This verbal barrage worked surprisingly well. Kikyo's gaze faltered.

Seeing that, Li Xia drew a deep breath and decided to keep going, hoping to pull off another miracle.

He continued his verbal assault while edging closer, ready to coordinate with Kaede:

"Kikyo, don't you think your love is too heavy a burden?

"Inuyasha's original dream was to become a great demon, to win acceptance and stop being rejected by everyone! But for you, he was willing to make an enormous change and become human! And what about you? You wanted to put him on a leash!

"Shouldn't love mean accepting each other, understanding each other, and helping each other find fulfillment as you walk together to the end?

"Why does it become restraints and shackles with you?

"Are those Subjugation Beads, that thing that looks like a dog leash, supposed to embody your love for him?

"What kind of love is that?!"

Those soul-searching questions somehow calmed the furious soul within Kikyo considerably.

Sometimes, words could save someone too.

And the Kikyo of this moment was nowhere near as flawless as she would become later.

"Miss Kikyo, since Inuyasha wasn't the one who killed you, he doesn't owe you anything. Instead, what right do you, with all that resentment, have to hate him?

"As you are now... do you deserve to?"

Did she deserve to?!

At least before Inuyasha's two-timing boat sprang a leak, there was nothing hateful about him. On the contrary, he was adorable!

At least this Kikyo, filled with resentment and without the slightest compassion, had no right to hate him!

At that moment, taking advantage of the powerful miko's brief wavering after those words, Li Xia and Kaede acted in perfect unison, one reclaiming the longbow while the other slipped away with the arrows!

But before either could breathe a sigh of relief, a tearing sound came from behind them.

Inuyasha's scream of pain followed.

What had happened now?

At the sound, Li Xia whipped his head around, his expression changing abruptly.

More than thirty meters away, the Demon-Breaking Arrow Kikyo had fired earlier was still pursuing the fleeing Inuyasha! Although Tessaiga had weakened most of its force, it still had power left and was driving toward their companion's chest! And this damned Sacred Arrow actually had a homing property-it could turn in midair.

"A homing arrow that won't stop until its locked-on target is dead?!"

Li Xia sucked in a sharp breath.

This had never happened in the original timeline.

Only in the middle-to-late stages, when they fought the ultimate boss Naraku, had the Demon-Breaking Arrow belonging exclusively to Kikyo, fired by Kagome from the demon graveyard, displayed such a powerful property.

He had never expected that Kikyo now hated Inuyasha so deeply over one careless remark that she would unleash even her deadliest move.

Inuyasha's crisis wasn't over!

He looked at Inuyasha again.

If not for the few Enhancement Talismans Li Xia had given him during the Spiderhead incident, granting him magical power that did not conflict with spiritual power!

If not for his greater agility allowing him, at the brink of death, to react swiftly and seize the Sacred Arrow's shaft tightly with both hands!

If not for those things, the arrowhead would surely have pierced Two-Dog's chest by now, turning him into a dead dog!

Even so, Inuyasha was in terrible shape.

"Inuyasha..."

P.S. (Does a miko's spiritual power decline when she falls in love? Of course not. In the original story, Kagome fell in love with Inuyasha without her spiritual power plummeting, which is proof enough.)