Episode 28 (Hanyō no Yashahime)

The Barrier of Mount Musubi is the twenty-eighth episode of Hanyō no Yashahime, and the fourth episode of the second season titled "The Second Act."

Synopsis

 * 1) The Half-Demon Princesses reach Mount Musubi, but Towa and Setsuna are lost in its barrier. Moroha is not, and she meets a girl named Rion.
 * 2) Setsuna learns from the Spirit of the Tree of Ages how her mother Rin has been sealed, and vows to free her.
 * 3) Towa and Setsuna free themselves from the barrier, and Rion gives them the Kyūyōkon Root.

Summary
Outside Mount Musubi, which contains vast amounts of both demonic and spiritual energy, Jaken and Sesshōmaru wait. Jaken tells his lord and master that it is where the fawn-eared teenage demon girl Rion has been sealed away for six long centuries. The Half-Demon Princesses become separated but Moroha is capable of entering through the incredibly strong demonic/spiritual energy shield due to possessing spiritual powers. Rion finally awakens and tells Moroha that she can find Towa and Setsuna, but only if she is willing to let go of what she holds most precious. The quarter-dog demon girl breaks through with her sacred arrow and enters the border between the mortal world and that of the Afterlife, where is confused at seeing the gigantic skeletal corpse, unaware it is her paternal grandfather. Nearby, Inuyasha tells his human miko wife Kagome that the fang of his mighty Tessaiga is stirring because it is trying to tell him something important. As the spirit of Moroha continues to hover throughout the graveyard, her scared arrows suddenly become restless and becomes emotional upon glimpsing Inuyasha and Kagome, whom she recognizes from the picture that her Uncle Sōta had shown her all those months ago. Kagome is excited upon seeing her firstborn child as a teenager, to which Inuyasha expresses how glad he is that his own child has been living fine without their parental guidance and love.

Meanwhile, Towa is being tested by the voice of none other her middle school teacher Osamu Kirin, who informs her that she must let go of the modern era, so is taken to a facsimile of Tokyo. However, Setsuna is taken to the Sacred Tree of Ages and finally meets the sleeping eighteen-year-old Rin within the unparalleled time-based entity very core. Setsuna then recalls how the song she plays on her violin was a memory that only her body could recall, realizing that she must have learned it from the woman she now sees. The Sacred Tree of Ages asks the half-dog demon girl how she feels getting to meet her mother again; explaining how her young human mother has not aged since being hidden within it for fourteen years since she gave birth to Setsuna and her elder twin sister.

Both Kirinmaru and the Tree of Ages are delighted to hear of the girls' morals and are appointed Guardians for Rion, who gives them a Kyūyōkon Root. Osamu Kirin continues to vouch for Towa's absences in exchange for unlimited access to the Shintō shrine from within the Bone-Eater's Well once was, his place of birth.

Trivia

 * The flashback shows Tōkotsu's full body before the red skeletons in "Jakotsumaru of the Red Bone Palace" but he is only seen from the back.
 * Tōtetsu is also present, but only part of his leg is seen onscreen, so this marks the first time all four members of the Shikyo have been seen together.
 * The scene of Sōta showing the photo album to Towa from the "The Gateway to the Past" was reconnected with Moroha having seen it earlier as well, so she would recognize her parents if she ever found them.
 * It's stated again that Rin was supposedly 18 and hasn't aged in 14 years; chronologically making her 32.
 * Inuyasha and Kagome Higurashi make their actual debut here; albeit still trapped in the Demon Graveyard. The two have not appeared to have aged at all since their imprisonment 14 years ago, appearing exactly the same as they had on that day.
 * It is revealed that, like Riku, Kirin is an autonomous and sentient embodiment of Kirinmaru's own physical self, from the Beast King's right arm that was cut off by the Beast King Tōga of the West. As such, it was thrown into the Bone-Eater's Well and from there manifested as a human-looking man who was then absorbed into the modern era. His centuries-long presence, however, is gradually starting to cause rifts in the infinite space-time continuum.
 * It's been revealed that Kirinmaru's severed right arm was the first to be sent into the Bone-Eater's Well. Afterwards was the pure demon-spirit Saya within the autonomous demon spirit Sō'unga of Hell, then ninth grade middle-schooler Kagome Higurashi, who had consistently traveled backward and forwards between the five century-long timelines since her fifteen birthday.
 * The scene in which Moroha encounters Rion is reminiscent of that of the original anime's premiere, in which fifteen-year-old Kagome Higurashi had discovered the deeply sleeping Inuyasha on the trunk of the ancient and infinitely powerful Sacred Tree of Ages.
 * It's been revealed that Towa had only attended Saint Gabriel Academy for a week prior to returning to the Fuedal Era.
 * In the english dub when Inuyasha says his sword's name, he pronounces it as it was originally meant to be "Tessaiga". In the previuos series the sword was called "Tetsusaiga" due to a translation mistake.

Errors

 * Tōga was erroneously carrying both Tessaiga and Tenseiga six centuries ago; further contradicting the knowledge of their origins (Tessaiga was created to protect Tōga's human wife, Izayoi, who was alive during the . And that Tenseiga was a cast-off of Tessaiga to maintain the unwanted and deathly powerful Meidō Zangetsuha attack/technique).
 * The Sacred Tree of Ages was stated to be one thousand years old and it was said that its spiritual and mystical wood was used to make the Bone-Eater's Well. Therefore, the Bone-Eater's well shouldn't have existed when Riku disposed of Kirinmaru's right arm and gave created Osami Kirin.
 * In the Demon Graveyard, the subtitles showed "my father's fang is trying to tell me something" which no longer holds true since Episode 44 of the original anime, in which Tōtōsai had used one of Inuyasha's fangs to fully make the repaired Tessaiga Inuyasha's alone.
 * Towa mentions that she had seen the young, pretty woman deeply sleeping within the Sacred Tree of Ages twice before in dreams alone (directly referring to "The Dream Gazing Trap" and "The Secret of the Rainbow Pearl"), but she seemed not come to the realization that she was indeed her biological mother back then.