Tsubaki (InuYasha)



Tsubaki (&#26943; Tsubaki) is a character in the anime and manga series InuYasha.

Tsubaki was a young miko in training like Kikyo (Kiky&#333;) when she was alive. She studied under a priest at a Shinto shrine as an apprentice and she and Kikyo were rivals, sometimes battling side-by-side to defeat y&#333;kai, Tsubaki always attempting to "best" Kikyo using her own holy power. While Kikyo and Kaede were traveling the countryside to visit small villages and help slay y&#333;kai, Tsubaki laid a curse on Kikyo, telling her that as a miko she must abandon her heart for if she ever fell in love with a man she would lose her holy powers and suffer an untimely death.

When the Jewel of Four Souls (Shikon no Tama) a.k.a. the Shikon Jewel was found by the taijiya, they delivered it to Tsubaki's sensei who in turn directed them to Kikyo, as he felt she was best suited to purify it. Tsubaki, feeling betrayed by her sensei because she thought deserved to possess the Jewel of Four Souls and not Kikyo, left to become a kuro miko (dark priestess) and prepare an assault on Kikyo in the hope she would be able to take it from her and use it to make herself eternally young and beautiful.

Tsubaki lured Kikyo to a field and confronted Kikyo about her feelings. Tsubaki knew Kikyo had weakened considerably due to her feelings for InuYasha and the curse, and she demanded the Shikon Jewel so she could purify it in Kikyo's place. Kikyo refused and Tsubaki, enraged, cast her shikigami serpent at Kikyo. Kikyo deflected it and it struck Tsubaki in her right eye, badly scarring her face. Not long after this, Tsubaki starts to asborb weaker y&#333;kai into her scarred eye an attempt to regain her beauty and maintain her youth.

Much of this back-story does not appear in the manga, but is revealed in a special one-hour episode of the anime titled The Love Song From Before We First Met. Some of the following also differs or does not appear at all in the manga.

Fifty years later, Naraku approached Tsubaki (now with white hair instead of black) and offered her the almost-complete Shikon Jewel in return for her help in killing InuYasha and Kagome. Using her serpent shikigami, she collects a small sample of Kagome's blood and uses it to corrupt the part of the Shikon Jewel Naraku had given her and, because of their innate link, the three shards that Kagome possessed were corrupted as well and entered her body, poisoning her. Tsubaki used the shards to control Kagome's body and, while Miroku, Sango, Shippo (Shipp&#333;) and Kaede were away searching for the cause, Tsubaki (at the request of Naraku) forced Kagome to aim and fire an arrow at InuYasha, reminiscent of when Kikyo sealed him to the Goshinboku (Time Tree). Kagome manages to regain some control and misses, so they set out together to find the source of the curse and eradicate it.

Meanwhile, Kikyo finds Tsubaki's lair, easily passing through the barrier she had erected. Kikyo threatened Tsubaki, telling her that she cared not what happened to Kagome but not to touch InuYasha. It may have been due to this distraction that Kagome was not only able to overcome Tsubaki's control on her body temporarily but destroy the barrier with a hamaya (holy arrow).

The group found Tsubaki, though they were unable to destroy her due to the curse on Kagome, which had pushed her into unconsciousness. Releasing a large white dog-like y&#333;kai from her scarred eye, she promised Kagome's death if InuYasha drew the Tessaiga. InuYasha destroyed both the y&#333;kai and the shikigami when it nearly kills Kagome. Tsubaki releases hundreds of y&#333;kai from her eye, presumably a gift from Naraku, distracting the others long enough for the shikigami to regenerate and fly at Kagome. Reminiscent of Kikyo's battle with Tsubaki fifty years ago, Kagome deflects the shikigami back at Tsubaki where it struck her right eye once more. Defeated, she retreated as all her Youkai were killed off. She now only had the jewel to maintain her youth.

Kagura appears to ask Tsubaki for the Shikon Jewel back but she claims she is not done with it yet. She returns to the shrine she studied at as a youth, breaking the seals on and within a tower that holds an oni sealed there long ago by the old keepers of the shrine. Using the Shikon no Tama, she absorbs the oni. InuYasha and his group are ambushed by the massive red-skinned oni Tsubaki became. After a long battle, InuYasha finally manages to destroy it with the Bakury&#363;ha, and Tsubaki falls to the ground as she was.

Tsubaki, injured, promises revenge and intends to flee with the jewel. However, one of Naraku's Saimy&#333;sh&#333; emerges from her eye, carrying the Shikon Jewel away as she began to age at a fast pace. Proclaiming to the sky that she is the best, most beautiful miko of all, she turns into dust.

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