Saiyuki not mine, etcetera and so on.

The Sanzo-ikkou failed. But it didn't matter if they failed. The gods always had munitions in reserve when their primary plan back-fired.

This was not what he wanted. He wanted to free his mother, he wanted to free himself and his followers from the grip of a madwoman - a grip in which he had to remain if he expected to be able to hear his mother's voice again. That was all, just those two things, but getting one required dealing with the other, and Kougaiji had never thought he'd get so close only to be slapped back down.

He'd gone through this once before - the silent, timeless infinity of a seal. He'd spent five hundred years sealed inside this castle, ignorant of the passage of time, until Gyokumen Kyoshu had freed (enslaved) him. Five hundred years in which the entire world moved on and died and lived and died and lived again without him. It didn't effect Lirin so much. She'd still been quite young and, as she'd told him, she'd slept the whole time.

He'd slept the whole time with his eyes open.

And this time, just like the time before, after the Sanzo-ikkou had failed and died and the gods had stepped back in as they always did, Kougaiji was stuck facing yet another five hundred years of timelessness. They'd killed Gyokumen Kyosho; there was no one left who could undo this seal. Now he was back to watching the world live and die and crumble around him.

It wasn't so bad for Lirin, or for Dokugakuji. They had both died. They wouldn't have to deal with this endless second caught in a flash for the first time or the second.

Yaone... Yaone was asleep. Just outside his touch. Just that inch too far, just that centimeter of distance in which he could feel her warmth but not her skin.

He wanted to say, 'I'm sorry.' That he had waited too long, that he had chosen the wrong side. But it was too late now. She wouldn't wake up again until someone released the seal. If anyone ever did. And Kougaiji, he couldn't sleep if he wanted to. For all his strength and talent in summoning the demons of beyond, there was nothing he could do but watch.

Watch Yaone sleep for eternity, and damn himself for his mistakes.