Beast transformation.
For daiyōkai whose true forms were beasts, this was, without question, a state even stronger than their humanoid forms. It was the abandonment of reason in exchange for instinct. A more thorough, crushing domination executed through the deepest power of the bloodline.
As stated before, for most daiyōkai, only in this form could the surging, terrifying demonic power within their bodies be fully unleashed. No matter how powerful a daiyōkai, so long as its true body was not human, the humanoid form gained through transformation always restricted the release of demonic energy.
For most daiyōkai, the humanoid form was more akin to a limiter upon their power. It was a form that traded strength for rationality. Of course, this was on the premise that the daiyōkai in question lacked the means or the artifact to fully unleash their demonic energy even in humanoid form.
If a daiyōkai possessed such means, such an artifact, then the relatively agile and rational humanoid form, though perhaps unable to surpass in pure numerical strength, was absolutely more efficient. More capable of piercing through a broad surface with a single point!
To some extent, this was also why Sesshōmaru had always pursued Tessaiga. Not merely because it was the peerless demon artifact left behind by his father, Tōga. Not merely because it was the acknowledgment of the greatest daiyōkai of the Western Lands. But because, in Sesshōmaru's eyes, only a demon blade of such devastating power was worthy of bearing the demonic energy of the strongest bloodline of the dog-demon clan!
Yet at present, he possessed no such demon blade. What followed immediately after, was the first strike of the beast-form daiyōkai. No longer the whip of light from his fingertips. No longer the slash of the Poison-Claw. It was the dense miasma surging from the depths of his throat.
Violet-black poison mist poured from between his fangs, spreading in a fan across the entire abdominal space. Demonic energy, laden with corrosive venom, seared blackened trenches into the bone floor.
It was utterly different from the Poison-Claw of his humanoid form. The miasma of the beast form was raw and majestic. Its area of coverage was enough to swallow an entire mountain. A vast domain. Qi had already become "Phenomenon." But what alerted Shinji even more, was another layer hidden within that miasma.
Weight.
In this world, fused from multiple worldviews, daiyōkai were no longer merely powerful demons. They had crossed the threshold of Vaporization. They had achieved Phenomenon.
Each one carried their own "Truth", the embodiment of their fundamental understanding of heaven and earth. What Sesshōmaru's Phenomenon was, Shinji could not yet see clearly. But judging from this miasma, the mere release of demonic energy from the beast-transformed eldest son of the dog-demon clan already carried the suppression belonging to a daiyōkai.
Like the intrinsic bounded field of Kidōmaru's Rashōmon, but more primal. More savage. And more powerful!
The entire abdominal space became Sesshōmaru's territory. The air grew heavy. The Shura Form's skeletal frame creaked faintly beneath this pressure. The thunder leaping between the gaps of its bones was perceptibly disturbed.
The beast-form daiyōkai's front paw stepped forward. One step. The abdominal cavity shuddered. A second step. The bone floor beneath the Shura Form's feet cracked. A third step... The giant dog's upper jaw opened wide. Its fangs, like white swords of a broken cliff, drove directly toward the Shura Form's torso.
If the humanoid Sesshōmaru was like a blade, sharp, cold, and deadly, then the beast-transformed Sesshōmaru was a city crashing down. No technique required. Simple crush through.
The four arms of the Shura Form moved simultaneously. Upper-left arm, Vajra Indestructible. The Shura Form was, in its very essence, the external projection of every ability Shinji possessed.
Upon this foundation, the Guardian Spirit abilities of the Twelfth Transformation Māra state could, of course, also be overlaid upon the Shura Form. Golden radiance surged from the positions of the Guardian Spirit fragments, spreading along the white bone arm.
The entire limb, from shoulder to fingertip, transformed into a gleaming golden bulwark. This arm was thrust directly between the giant dog's fangs and the Shura Form's chest.
The force of the bite crashed against the golden bone arm. Shockwaves radiated outward from the point of contact in every direction. The bone floor was carved with radial cracks. But the golden bone arm did not shatter. The teeth could not bite through.
The giant dog's crimson pupils contracted. This was an unexpected reaction that should never have appeared in the instinct-driven beast form of Sesshōmaru.
Then.... upper-right arm—Leopard-Tail Speed. Gray-white light patterns surfaced upon the bones of this arm. Its speed surged so violently that the air between the joints was compressed into white mist.
A fist lashed out from the side. No flashy wind-up. Just a straight-line punch along the shortest possible distance.
It struck the giant dog's lower jaw.
The canine skull was knocked sideways by nearly two meters. The fangs slid free of the golden bone arm. The miasma surging from its mouth broke off for a single instant as its jaw was knocked askew.
The lower-left arm of the Shura Form had already drawn Banryū from its back. The power of the Earth Dragon was channeled into the blade. The power of the earth applied even here, upon the bone floor of the underworld, because the earth here was, in itself, the bones of Tōga.
The pale greatsword, carrying the weight to crush mountains, slashed upward from below, aimed at the base of the giant dog's neck.
BOOM!
Banryū's edge cut into the skin beneath the white fur of the beast-form daiyōkai's neck. It sank 2mm deep. The silver-white fur was incredibly tough. 2mm was the limit.
But 2mm was enough to wrench a hissing cry from Sesshōmaru. The giant dog's hind legs kicked off the ground, springing backward to create distance. The space trembled.
The Shura Form stood where it was. Its four arms returned to position. The 60 meter tall Bone Thunder colossus, within the gray-violet luminescence, stood like a four-armed demon god.
At its core, within the chest cavity, crimson demon eyes stared coldly through the gaps of the skeletal frame at the retreating giant dog. The giant white dog's throat once more emitted a low growl, but compared to before, there was less savagery. More gravity.
Though the beast-transformed daiyōkai was driven primarily by instinct, it had not entirely lost its judgment. Beasts possessed a sense of self. Just not much.
And Sesshōmaru's battle intuition in beast form was, in fact, even sharper than in humanoid form. He could feel it, this bone-thunder colossus was utterly different from any ordinary demon.
The four arms each carried a different quality of power, as though four separate beings had been embedded into a single shell. As though a single person was simultaneously wielding four completely different weapons.
This kind of multi-pronged manipulation had already surpassed the framework of most beast-transformed daiyōkai, who relied on overwhelming force to break through all techniques.
It was more like… the Tsuchigumo? Yes. Shinji's Shura Form had originally been born and transformed beneath the oppression of the Tsuchigumo. Its current form, to a greater or lesser degree, truly carried the intent of imitating the Tsuchigumo.
Sesshōmaru had once crossed blades with that ancient daiyōkai, who had slumbered for so many years that its condition was clearly poor. Though he had not lost, he had not won either. So… The result was already very clear.
Shinji had suppressed Sesshōmaru. Beast transformation had indeed caused the eldest son of the dog-demon clan's strength to skyrocket to a terrifying degree.
In terms of pure demonic energy density and physical body strength alone, the beast-form Sesshōmaru far surpassed the Shura Form. However, the Shura Form had four arms. It had the support of technique and weaponry. Its four arms could simultaneously switch between three Guardian Spirit enhancements, five Five Elements attributes, and three blades of different characteristics.
The multitude of methods was sufficient, in direct confrontation, to bridge the gap in raw power. The beast-transformed Sesshōmaru, on the other hand, had only power. No technique!
"…Enough." The deep voice ground out from the giant dog's throat. The fact that it could speak in beast form was, in itself, proof that Sesshōmaru was actively suppressing his bestial nature. Reclaiming his reason. What followed next, was only to be expected.
The silver-white fur began to retract. The giant dog's body shrank at a furious pace, from over dozen meters back to nearly human size. Yes... nearly. He did not fully return to humanoid form.
Sesshōmaru's body stopped at an intermediate state. He stood over thirty meter tall. His legs were upright. His skeleton was humanoid. But his four limbs were covered in short silver-white fur. His fingers had transformed into the claws of a dog, translucent venom dripping from each fingertip.
His face had regained its human contours, the crescent moon of deep purple upon his brow. The golden slit-pupils. The exquisitely handsome features, but his dog ears still stood erect atop his head.
The line of his jaw was sharper than in humanoid form. Fangs jutted from the corners of his lips. The furred tail behind him had swollen to at least ten times its humanoid size, dancing behind him like a streamer.
His overall stature was half a head taller than his humanoid form. This was, unmistakably, a half-beast, humanoid transformation, never once displayed in the original story. It was similar to the skeletal form of Tōga.
It seemed to simultaneously combine the strength of the beast form with the agility of the humanoid form. It could not achieve perfection, demonic power could not be fully unleashed, intelligence could not be fully expressed, but it could take the middle value between the two.
"It seems you truly have grown stronger." Sesshōmaru's voice emerged from his half-beast throat. It was much deeper than in humanoid form, yet far clearer than the roars of the beast form.
The golden slit-pupils of the dog-demon stared at the bone-thunder colossus before him. "But.... you are still one step short." His dog claws clenched and unclenched. Venom stretched into threads between his fingers.
"You are not yet a daiyōkai." Those words were, in truth, not wrong. Shinji, at the core of the Shura Form, listened to Sesshōmaru's assessment. His crimson demon eyes stirred. He himself was aware of this. After the Twelfth Transformation's Return to One, he approached the threshold of a daiyōkai.
He could trade blows with a daiyōkai whose demonic energy was drawn in. The Māra Body stacked with the Shura Form could even, through a multitude of methods, suppress the beast-transformed Sesshōmaru.
But that was because he had many methods. Because he had many artifacts. Because the coordination of the Three Souls and Five Viscera far surpassed that of ordinary demons.
And also because Sesshōmaru, among daiyōkai, was, in truth, not of a high tier. Not at the very bottom, at least somewhat stronger than those daiyōkai who lay dormant year-round, spending eight hundred of every thousand years asleep.
But no matter how one looked at it, he could not be called strong. His methods were too few. His combat experience against daiyōkai of his own level was exceedingly lacking. Otherwise, in the original story, he would never have been so gravely wounded by Inuyasha, who had only just obtained Tessaiga, while in beast form.
Of course, that was the original story. The Sesshōmaru before him now had revealed a half-beast form never seen in the original. That was another matter entirely.
Though the second round of battle had not yet begun, Shinji could feel the demonic energy within the other's body, equally fully erupted. Not as wanton and unrestrained as the beast form, yet far more surging than the humanoid form. But no matter how one looked at it...
In terms of tier, Shinji was, indeed, still considerably short of a true daiyōkai. The Phenomenon of a daiyōkai, that power which embedded one's very existence into heaven and earth, causing the surrounding space to automatically submit to one's being, he could not yet achieve it.
Especially… when faced with a Sesshōmaru who could half-beast transform, without question, far stronger than in the original story! However.
"So what if I'm one step short?" Shinji spoke. The thunder leaping upon the Shura Form's skeletal frame fell completely still in that instant, like the stillness before a storm. "How do you know this is my full strength?"
Sesshōmaru's golden slit-pupils narrowed faintly.
In the next instant, the upper-right arm of the Shura Form raised Onikiri high. Dark crimson blood-fire surged from the Shura-Heart and poured into the blade.
The upper-left arm held Yomi-giri. Ghostly violet mist-light erupted from the Shura-Lungs. The lower-right arm gripped Banryū. The pale greatsword carried the Earth-element power of the Shura-Spleen. Three blades. Three points. Corresponding to Fire, Metal, and Earth. Three of the Five Elements.
The instant the three blades were raised, the demonic energy spreading from their bodies began to extend along the bone floor. Dark crimson. Ghostly violet. Pale white. Three colors of light-patterns spread outward from the three anchor points, weaving a complex web of lines visible even to the naked eye.
The light-patterns intersected. Fire generated Earth. Earth generated Metal. A cycle of three elements, though incomplete, lacking Water and Wood, had already begun to spin on its own.
The brightness of the light-patterns continued to intensify. The concentration of demonic energy within the triangular range continued to climb. It was no longer a one-way flow, outputted from within the Shura Form.
Instead, the three blades themselves were absorbing the surrounding demonic energy, processing it through the circuits projected by the Five Viscera, then outputting it once more. Then absorbed by another blade. Processed again. Outputted again.
A cycle.
Self-sustaining. Endless.
This was, unmistakably, what Shinji had been planning all along, the externalization of the Five Viscera and Five Elements within his body through the demon blades, to form a domain.
Though at present, only three demon blades existed, capable of externalizing only three elements. It could only be called the embryonic form of a domain. Yet it was, in the end, still a domain! A finite "Phenomenon", similar to Kidōmaru's Rashōmon.
Sesshōmaru felt the change beneath his feet. The texture of the air within the range of those three blades was altering. It was becoming heavier. Denser. More… belonging to Shinji.
He, a daiyōkai, had actually stepped into another's territory.
"As they say... diligence compensates for lack of talent." The crimson demon eyes at the core of the Shura Form blazed to life.
"No Phenomenon? Then forge one with artifacts. No Truth? Then write one with blades. You say I'm one step short, but that step, I've been making up for it all along."
Even without Tessaiga, the "demon artifact" that Sesshōmaru lacked, Shinji had long since possessed it! Had it not been so, he would never have dared, knowing full well that Sesshōmaru would certainly come, to enter this place alone, to take Tessaiga!