Kagura



Name: Kagura

Age: 17 (In Human years)

Gender: Female

Seiyu: [|Izumi Izumi Oogami]

Voice Actor (English): [|Janyse Janyse Jaud]

Species: Naraku's detatchement

Kagura (神楽) is a creation of Naraku's, his second "detachment" although she is introduced before her "elder sister" Kanna. A wind sorceress, Kagura uses a fan to enhance her powers; she can create a blade-like tornado or use wind to animate dead bodies. She can also use her feather hair-ornaments as transportation, enlarging them to ride in the wind. Kagura hates Naraku and wishes to be free from him, covertly opposing him to the point of offering aid to both InuYasha and Sesshomaru in hopes that they can kill him

After Kohaku's memories return, Kagura becomes increasingly protective of the boy: she shares information with him about Naraku's weaknesses; she thwarts her fellow "detachment" Hakudōshi from taking the Shikon shard that keeps Kohaku alive; finally, she openly defies Naraku by helping Kohaku escape. Naraku mockingly returns her heart before fatally wounding her and leaving her to die. While tracking Naraku, Sesshomaru finds her dying; she seems happy to see him, although his sword Tenseiga cannot save her. InuYasha's group also arrives, helplessly watching her body dissolve into the wind. Afterwards, InuYasha asks if she suffered; Sesshomaru replies that she was smiling when she died. In the anime adaptation, she dies the very same way.

Biography
She is one of many of Naraku's detachments, and as such he holds her heart in his hands, she is bound to his service, and her betrayal would mean certain death.

Despite such impediments, she resents Naraku and covertly works toward his death, mostly by manipulating the two camps opposed to Naraku, those of InuYasha and Sesshomaru, She has an older sister, who appears younger, named Kanna who is loyal to Naraku. She also has other younger siblings: Juromaru, Kageromaru, Goshinki, Muso and Hakudoshi.

In the manga, Naraku charges her with her final job, which is to guard Goryomaru at a prison. Hakudoshi convinces her to release him secretly, because he is secretly plotting with Akago to destroy Naraku. Suspiciously, Naraku offers to give her freedom instead, but it has a fatal catch. Naraku returns Kagura's heart, granting her freedom, but pierces her chest and poisons her with his miasma. Though she is found by Sesshomaru, whom she has been hinted to have romantic interests, he is unable to use Tenseiga to save her life and she succumbs to the poison.

At the moment of her death, Kagura's body disintegrates and becomes a gust of wind. Her last thoughts are that she was happy she could see Sesshomaru before she died and that she was "free as the wind."

Kagura's Outfit
Kagura wears the traditional kimono of the Kagura dancers. She initially wore a blue robe with a floral pattern, but after her first bout against InuYasha she changed it to a white and crimson-violet pattern robe. During times of battle, Kagura would usually remove the right side and sleeve of her kimono to utilize her fan with greater ease. Beneath the top robe, her second layer consists of a robe worn over her kosode. Her initial design was a bright red kosode, but after her first fight with InuYasha, she changed it to a blue floral pattern.
 * Dancer's Kimono

Underneath both layers of her dancer kimono, Kagura wears a basic kosode. In both versions of her outfit, she wears a green kosode.
 * Kosode


 * Bare Feet

InuYasha and Rin aside, Kagura is one of the very few non-minor characters, and one of only two female character to spend her entire time completely barefoot throughout the series, contrary to her namesake dancers who wear some sort of foot protection.

Kagura wears a stylized obi sash over her kimono. Unlike most obi found at this time, her obi is much slimmer and is tied by the front instead of back. Her obi is in a yellow patterned style, with both versions of her outfit.
 * Obi

Kagura wears a pair of bright green beaded earrings, each bearing five beads each.
 * Earrings

Kagura's Weapon
Kagura does battle with a traditional fan both offensively and defensively, although her fighting style and powers border more so on the upfront-attacks. With her fan, she is able to call down a variety of wind-related powers, including and not limited to: summoning a large tornado, shooting out wind-blades, and resurrecting corpses as her personal puppets.

Abilities
Waves her fan directly at the enemy, firing away a plethora of crescent-shaped wind blades that can pierce skin, among other things.This is her most common attack.
 * Dance of Wind Blades (Dance of Blades) (Fujin no Mai)

Summons several tornadoes to distract and attack her enemies. They can pick up and throw opponents into the air as well as slam them into other objects. It is a bit stronger than Dance of Blades and seems to be a bit weaker than Inuyasha's Wind Scar, although much weaker than his Backlash Wave, and was deflected by it on one or more occasions.
 * Dance of Dragon Serpents (Dance of the Dragon) (Ryujia no Mai)

Can control corpses as if they were puppets, to either attack or distract enemies, or protect her from harm by utilizing them as shields. Since her victims are already dead, they are practically invincible, there being few ways to destroy them: slicing them into many small pieces, burning (although this is never actually witnessed) and of course distracting or injuring Kagura as she would then flee and the Dance of the Dead would end.
 * Dance of the Dead (Shikabane Mai) 

Using a feather ornament she wears in her hair, she can enlarge it to become large enough for her to climb on and fly off, it is her main form of transportation as she does not have the power to teleport like Naraku or Kanna. From this feather she can observe and follow both friend and foe, as well as attack and defend if need be. (Kagura does have two feather hair ornaments but it is unknown whether both have this capability) Although Kagura herself never demonstrates this, it is possible to fall off of the feather, as proven by Kohaku when he regains his memories and in despair, falls off.
 * Feathers (Kagura's Feathers)

Kanna
Though never stated, it is possible that Kagura and Kanna are very close. As Kagura never had any ill thought about Kanna (though she once thought of her as "creepy") and in the second movie, the two are almost always seen together. It is also possible that Kagura's death caused Kanna to question her existance and her destiny, as well as betray Naraku.

Sesshomaru
When they initally met, the two were bitter enemies, with one trying to kill the other. But as time went on, Kagura believed that Sesshomaru might free her from Naraku's grasp due to his great power, therefore, she would search for Sesshomaru many a time and try to convince him to help her kill Naraku, but would always refuse. Over time, she even developed feelings for Sesshomaru, as stated by Rin, she believes that Kagura may be in love with Sesshomaru, but it's never clearly stated. They were the same, both loyal to only themselves (even though Kagura was forced to work for Naraku she is often brooding about how to kill him) and cold towards almost all others, including some if not all of their family. And when she was dying, Sesshomaru stopped his fight with Moryomaru to find Kagura in a field of flowers and he wanted to save her with the Tenseiga, but stated that it was too late for her to be saved. She even states that she was happy she got to see him one last time before she died.

Inuyasha
Kagura generally views Inuyasha as a pest and is always relucant in helping them in any way. And when she has to face Inuyasha, she never holds back, but she does toy with him and wants to make sure he's in pain. Nonetheless, she does try to aid Inuyasha and his friends whenever she can't contact Sesshomaru, and Inuyasha tends to worry about Kagura and her fate, as seen in "The Final Act", he warns Kagura not to die before they kill Naraku. And in Secret of the Cursed Mask, she states that after Naraku is killed, they go back to being enemies.

Trivia

 * Kagura is also the name of a Shinto dance