InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ The Years Pass On ❯ Chapter 1 ( Chapter 2 )

Chapter One

Here I was again. Though I'd traveled the world many, many times over, I always found myself back here, somehow, watching over the development of the largest city in the world - Tokyo, Japan. It was home, of a sort - the only one I had. It housed the Goshinboku, and the Well within its metaphorical walls. Both hold a strong sense of meaning for me, though I don't know exactly why. But there is so much that I don't know, don't understand. The Tree and the Well, as well as parts of an ancient shrine are the only things left from the original Tokyo - a small village during the Sengoku Jidai - the Era of the Warring States. There isn't a soul in Tokyo who knows that, I'd bet, but you see I'm not like other people - you see, I remember that era, in vivid, living color, because I was there. But though I lived through that era, and so many after it, I still had not the slightest clue why I was so different. Why had I remained twenty or so for the last five hundred years? I'd learned early to avoid creating close relationships with others, because I don't age. I move around a lot - it always seemed to be second nature to me, as if I'd been a wanderer long before I became stuck in time and lost my memories.

As soon as I'd been able, I'd left Japan, on a ship bound for China. From there, I reached the rest of the world, and came into my fortune. In the beginning I was something between a trader and a mercenary. I fight with a fierceness that is rare, even in those barbaric times, and I've always had a tolerance for injury and pain that far outdoes the rest. But I'm not immortal either. I don't age, but I've come very close to dying many times. I had been gone for decades when I finally realized that the emptiness I felt was really homesickness for the place of my birth, Japan. By that time, I'd already amassed the beginnings of the wealth I now have. There's a good-sized fortune stowed away for me in the banks of several countries should I feel the need to collect it, each under a different name. One might think finessing the ways of the business world, and playing several different roles and disguising the fact that I don't age might be hard, but I've had a lot of practice in hiding my identity. I move the money around every few decades, and pretend to be some sort of recluse millionaire. You wouldn't believe how common they are.

A few years ago - or was it decades? Well, some time ago, I found that the Goshinboku and the Well were in danger. It gave me a jolt unlike anything I've ever felt, then or since. They were my only clue to my identity - I couldn't lose them. So I pulled some strings, and got the old shrine protected as an ancient religious relic - and under my jurisdiction. The Goshinboku, the Well, and the rest of the old shrine are in the hands of the Higurashi family. The name seemed familiar somehow, but to tell the truth, old Higurashi only got the shrine because he didn't irritate me by treating me like a child. Most businessmen do, by the way. After all, I look like some kid who just got out of high school. Of course, I'm not, but people do it nonetheless. Old Higurashi recognized that I wasn't some greenhorn and showed me some respect. He's still around, but I've heard that he's grown somewhat senile in his old age.

I've never been able to find even the slightest clue as to why the hell I'm still alive. That old delinquent Houshi Miroku knew what it was, and so did Sango, the Taiga. But they refused to tell me my past, though they so obviously knew it. Those two didn't even bother to try to hide that they knew everything, which only angered me further. But when I threatened them, they tended to look at me with an expression that clearly said, `and?' as if I'd threatened with a bloodletting countless times before. If I persisted, Sango would threaten to bonk me with the Hiragotsu, and being hit with a boomerang bigger than an average man and just as heavy isn't something you submit to lightly, even though she usual didn't hit me as hard as she could have. They seemed sad, somehow, sad for themselves, but even more sad for me. There was someone missing from their - well, our lives, and sometimes I'd catch them out by the old Bone-Eaters Well, sitting on the edge and looking inside, as if they expected to see something in there. They never did though. Sango and Miroku never responded when I questioned them about it. Whoever they were waiting for never returned.

But even more than Miroku and Sango, that little Kitsune Shippou missed that mysterious person. Shippou was the only one who ever let anything slip, because he was still a child when I first knew him. The one they missed was a woman, I'm almost positive, who had acted as a sort of mother for the orphaned kit. He's still around, of course, since he's a full youkai. I believe he's some big business lord in Kyoto. Lots of demons are, you know. Most haven't survived this long, but most of the ones that have did so by blending into the human world. Like me, they eventually made some money for themselves through the endless practice they got over the centuries. Becoming a billionaire might be difficult for an ordinary mortal, but it isn't too hard when you have a few centuries and many identities in which to do so. I'd had plenty of time to waste on corporate games, and I've managed to reap the rewards that come to the proficient. I haven't seen Shippou in a while. I should look him up, while I'm in Japan.

My past is confused, the future even more so, because there is a feeling lying beneath all the rest. I'm waiting for something, though I know not what. I've been waiting for it for over 500 years. The only thing I'm sure about regarding my past- or really anything, is my name. It's strange; I've seen it in history books, though by now, that story has been lost in the midst of time. A strange old myth, about a hanyou and a magic jewel that used to be housed in old Tokyo, the one I first knew, during the same time I first was aware of my existence. Maybe I'm named after him. My name is Inuyasha - The Dog Demon.