Chapter 309

Kagura smiled and raised one hand, a soft breeze curling around her fingertips.

"All I did was completely abandon my old body."

"Before, even though I was called the Wind Sorceress, I was still bound by a physical form."

"That body was given to me by Naraku. His mark had been carved into it from the moment I was born."

"So I let that body disperse completely and used Nen to merge my soul and consciousness into the wind."

Kagura’s smile deepened.

"Now, I am the wind."

"Free wind."

Haruto more or less understood what her Nen ability had done.

Kagura had always been able to manipulate wind and was known as the Wind Sorceress, but she had still fundamentally been a physical yōkai. The wind had merely been her weapon.

Now, although she could still gather the wind into a tangible body, her true nature had changed completely.

She could almost be called a wind spirit now—or, by the standards of this world, a true wind yōkai.

Kagura had become one with the wind.

The wind was her.

And she was the wind.

By completely discarding the body Naraku had created for her, she had naturally severed every remaining connection between them.

The heart Naraku held was now meaningless.

Still...

Could an Emitter really accomplish something this extreme?

Haruto found it difficult to believe.

Emitters could project their aura away from their bodies and maintain it in various forms, but Kagura had gone far beyond anything an ordinary Emitter should be capable of.

She had fused her soul and consciousness with the wind itself, fundamentally changing the very form of her existence.

Even more surprising was what Haruto sensed inside her.

Kagura’s Nen had completely merged with her yōki, forming an entirely new type of energy.

It possessed the adaptability and malleability of Nen while retaining the destructive power of yōki.

The resulting force was far stronger than either her old yōki or Nen alone.

"Let’s test your Nen affinity again."

Haruto took out a glass filled with water, placed a fresh green leaf on the surface, and handed it to Kagura.

Inuyasha and the others watched curiously, having no idea what he intended to do.

Kagura, however, had already performed Water Divination once and immediately understood.

She took the glass, placed both hands around it, and began channeling Nen.

Under everyone’s watchful eyes, the water slowly started to spin.

At first, it was only a tiny whirlpool.

As Kagura poured more aura into the glass, the rotation grew faster and stronger until a miniature tornado formed inside the cup.

A cool, damp breeze drifted outward.

The leaf that had been floating on the surface was lifted into the air and spun up and down inside the tiny vortex.

A few seconds later, Kagura withdrew her Nen.

The miniature tornado vanished.

The water became calm again, and the leaf gently settled back onto the surface.

"So you became a Specialist."

Haruto looked genuinely surprised, though not entirely shocked.

He had suspected something like this might happen, which was why he had asked her to test again.

Even so, actually changing Nen categories was extremely rare.

A person’s natural affinity was normally determined from birth by their personality and constitution. Changing it later was extraordinarily difficult.

But after thinking about it, Haruto realized Kagura’s case was anything but normal.

She had effectively transformed into the wind itself.

Her very form of existence had changed, and her Nen had completely fused with her yōki.

Under circumstances like these, developing into a Specialist was not unreasonable.

"All right, can somebody explain what just happened?"

Inuyasha looked between Haruto and Kagura.

Even after Kagura’s earlier explanation, he and the others were still struggling to understand exactly what she had become.

Haruto thought for a moment before putting it in terms they would understand.

"Basically, Kagura is now something like a gust of wind that developed a soul and consciousness and became a yōkai."

"It’s similar to a tree becoming a yōkai, or a stone becoming one."

That explanation made much more sense.

Inuyasha and the others had encountered yōkai born from combs, trees bearing human-faced fruit, and all kinds of other objects and natural phenomena.

"Whoa! That’s amazing!"

Shippō stared at Kagura with wide eyes.

"So does that mean you can turn into wind now and go anywhere you want?"

"Yes."

Kagura nodded.

"As long as there’s wind, I can reach it."

"And now I can sense the movement of all the wind around me as well."

Inuyasha scratched his head, his expression somewhat complicated.

His nose had already confirmed the change beyond any doubt.

That nauseating trace of Naraku had vanished completely from Kagura’s scent.

She really had escaped his control.

At this point, Kagura could truly be considered an independent yōkai rather than one of Naraku’s incarnations.

"Well, this is good for us too."

Kagome smiled, genuinely happy for her.

Kagura had always longed for freedom while being forced to live under Naraku’s control.

Now she had finally obtained what she wanted.

And from their perspective, Kagura no longer being an enemy was also excellent news.

They had fought her several times and knew just how troublesome she could be.

Now they had one fewer enemy, while Naraku had lost one of his most capable allies.

That alone improved their odds against him.

Miroku stroked his chin, a suspicious gleam appearing in his eyes.

He looked at Inuyasha.

Then at Kagura.

And quietly muttered,

"You know... maybe a yōkai woman wouldn’t be so bad after all."

Back when Kagura had been an enemy, Miroku had naturally remained extremely wary of her.

Now that they were no longer on opposing sides, however, there was no reason to maintain the same level of caution.

And looking at Kagura again...

Miroku suddenly realized she was an exceptionally beautiful yōkai.

Her delicate features combined with that naturally alluring confidence gave her an undeniable charm.

If he were not worried about being sliced into pieces by her wind blades, he genuinely would have liked to step forward and sincerely ask whether she would bear his child.

"Perverted monk!"

Shippō rolled his eyes at Miroku’s lovestruck expression and called him out without mercy.

Sango had heard him too.

Her expression darkened.

Hiraikotsu shifted slightly in her hands.

"Miroku."

"What did you just say?"

"Huh? Nothing! I didn’t say anything!"

Miroku jolted and immediately put on an expression of absolute seriousness.

"What I said was that it’s wonderful Kagura has finally gained her freedom! We should celebrate!"

"Hmph."

Sango snorted.

She said nothing more, but Hiraikotsu remained firmly in her hands.

Kagura had also heard him.

One finger twitched.

A tiny wind blade flickered at her fingertip as she regarded Miroku with an amused, dangerous smile.

"If you keep saying stupid things, I wouldn’t mind helping you shut up."

"I won’t! I absolutely won’t!"

Miroku hastily waved both hands and took a step backward.

"Tch."

Koga looked at Kagura with obvious irritation before turning his attention toward the Shikon Jewel shards in Kagome’s hand.

Being without them felt deeply uncomfortable.

Unfortunately, Kagome had them now, and Koga hesitated over how to ask for them back.

Snatching them by force was obviously out of the question.

While everyone else was still celebrating Kagura’s newfound freedom, hundreds of miles away, beneath a sinister castle, a very different scene was unfolding.

The underground chamber was packed with grotesque yōkai bodies fused together in every direction.

The air reeked of blood and foul, oppressive yōki.

These creatures were all parts of Naraku.

At the very center of the chamber hung Naraku’s head.

His eyes were closed, his expression completely blank as he continued reorganizing and reconstructing his body.

Then, at the exact moment Kagura became wind—

Naraku’s eyes snapped open.

"Kagura... died?"

At his thought, a black tentacle extended from the mass of flesh.

A heart rested upon it.

Kagura’s heart.

From the moment of her birth, Naraku had kept it in his possession as the ultimate means of controlling her.

But now the heart that had once beaten steadily was cold and rigid.

It had stopped completely.

Naraku stared at it, his expression turning unusually grave.

From his perspective, Kagura truly had died.

Every connection between them had vanished in an instant, as though Kagura had never existed at all.

And yet...

Something about it felt wrong.

Naraku frowned deeply, confusion filling his eyes.

"Kanna."

His cold, hoarse voice echoed through the empty underground chamber.

A small girl dressed entirely in white appeared silently before him.

She held a mirror in her hands.

There was no expression on her face, and her vacant eyes resembled those of a soulless doll.