"How does it feel, Inuyasha?"
"To have someone you cherish aim an arrow at you again, as though repeating the same fate you suffered fifty years ago, when Kikyo sealed you with an arrow of hatred!"
"Heh heh heh, savor the taste of suffering, Inuyasha..."
Inside a dim wooden hut, Naraku's Wooden Puppet chuckled under his breath.
He also happily savored a sense of pleasure that was the exact opposite of what Inuyasha felt.
Fifty years ago, he had schemed to turn Kikyo and Inuyasha against each other.
Now, through Kagome, he had restaged a scene strikingly similar to the one back then.
The same place, a similar arrow.
Everything was like a cycle repeating itself.
Kaede's Village.
The purple radiance faded from the Sealing Arrow lodged in the Sacred Tree's trunk.
Inuyasha struggled to raise his hand, trying to grasp something, but suddenly, as though all his strength had been drained away, it dropped limply and moved no more.
"I've actually been sealed again? And in the very same place..."
How ironic.
Two similar people, two similar arrows, both striking straight through the heart.
And this time, his heart had shattered to pieces.
"Inuyasha..."
"Master Inuyasha!"
Kaede, Shippo, Aba, and Grandpa Myoga cried out together.
Their calls seemed to awaken Kagome's awareness as well.
A trace of guilt flashed through the girl's eyes.
She turned to look at Kaede and the others, and a voice abruptly rose in her mind, ordering her to hurt these companions too! It filled her with fear unlike anything she had ever known!
She had already been forced to seal Inuyasha. How could she hurt anyone else?
"Run... away..."
Kagome forced those words from her throat in a hoarse voice.
She was already fighting as hard as she possibly could against the cursed