note from baneofshadow: This idea has been stuck in my head ever since I caught a glimpse of a doujinshi called Natsu Uguisu, and I hope you enjoy it as much as I do! ^^

UPDATE: The Feudal Association gave Tall Tails 3rd place Best In-Character for June 2011!

Thank you for your votes; I really can't say how much this means to me.

*sniffs*

It was an ordinary day. In a nondescript and normal forest, a boar was rooting in the grass for food. The boar lifted its head as the bushes behind it rustled. Its flimsy ears flicked slightly as its beady eyes scanned the bushes surrounding it for signs of predators. When it saw nothing, it gave a relieved snort and turned away.

The bushes seemed to explode as a shadowy figure leaped at the boar. The wild pig squealed and tried to make a break for it. Too late-a clawed hand descended on the boar's neck and with one deft blow, snapped its spine in two. It collapsed to the ground, dead as a stone.

"All right!" InuYasha stood up, grabbing the dead boar by the scruff of its neck and looking at it with pride in his golden eyes. "Yeah, this'll do! We won't be hungry tonight!" Slinging the carcass over his shoulder, InuYasha started off in the direction of the camp that his group had made before he had gone off to hunt. Still feeling cheerful about the success of the hunt, the hanyou didn't notice the golden glitter underneath his feet until he heard a great CRUNCH.

"YOUKAI! What have you done?"

InuYasha turned about, his good mood instantly gone as an irate-looking houshi approached him, a look of horrified anger on his face as he dived to the ground beneath the hanyou's feet and seized something. "Uh...you gotta problem with me?" InuYasha growled. He didn't like houshi much. He had the perverted Miroku to deal with, not to mention the overly spiritual followers who believed that anyone with even a scrap of youkai blood in them was an evil spirit who had to be slain. 'Figure's I'd have to deal with one after a hunt,' he grumbled to himself.

"My precious dokko!" the houshi wailed, holding a rather mangled-looking object in his hands. "The heirloom that my master gave me before his passing! IT'S RUINED!" The houshi turned on him, his eyes blazing with anger. "YOU! YOU DID THIS, YOUKAI!"

InuYasha scowled. "So what? It's just a fuckin' golden rod. Get a new one somewhere else."

The houshi's face went bright red. "You shall pay, youkai!" The houshi removed something from his robe and threw it at the ground by InuYasha's feet.

InuYasha smirked. "Where d'you think you're-"

Without warning, what seemed to be a great burst of lightning erupted from the ofuda on the ground, arching over the hanyou's body like vines. With a snarl of pain, InuYasha was brought to his hands and knees, the lightning binding him as surely as the sealing arrow had bound him to the tree fifty-two years ago. 'Dammit, I can't move!' he cursed, gritting his teeth as the boar rolled away into the underbrush. If he could only get his hand over to that damn ofuda, he might be able to escape...

"Now I have you, youkai, and I shall render you harmless!" The houshi removed something from his robes. It looked like a small metal circle with a six-pointed star captured inside of it. The houshi lifted his hand out in front of him, holding out his first two fingers as he held the circle with his other hand. InuYasha glared at him, daring him to continue.

The houshi glared right back and began chanting slowly. The circle pulsed with power and began to glow a bright blue color. The hanyou's insides twisted horribly, and if he had not been paralyzed, he would have cried out with pain. 'Wha...wha...what the hell?' he cursed. The houshi continued his chant, and the twisting sensation spread through his body, ripping through him in agonizing waves. 'Dammit...' InuYasha cursed. He'd never felt anything like this before. His eyes were blinded with pain, and he could barely hear anything over the beat of his pounding heart. 'What's happening to me?'

The houshi's chant reached its climax, and the hanyou finally let out a yowl of pain as his body convulsed painfully. There came a feeling like he was being wound so tightly that he would surely break, and then...

He fell to the ground, dazed and trembling with shock. The houshi strode over to him and ripped the ofuda off from the ground.

"Dammit, what did you do to me?" InuYasha asked.

The houshi didn't answer as he tucked the ofuda back into his robe. He turned back and glared down at InuYasha. "You were lucky, youkai," he said scornfully. "I went easy on you."

"You call that easy, you fuckin' houshi?" he snapped back. Why wasn't this houshi paying attention to him?

"Yes, I merely transformed your body into something less harmful, rather than slaying you outright." The houshi turned away and began to walk into the forest. "May we never meet again, and I hope you enjoy your new life as an animal," he called back.

InuYasha blinked after him. "Animal...transformed...hey, what the fuck do you mean by that?" He tried to sit up, but his arms didn't seem to be working right. "Fuck, what did you do to me?" he roared after the houshi. However, instead of hearing his own voice echoing back to him from the surrounding trees, there came the sound of a dog's bark.

'Oh, fuck no...not this...' The hanyou tried to shout again. It came out of his mouth as a sharp bark.

'Oh, shitshitshitshitshit!' He couldn't believe it. The nerve...the sheer nerve of that fucking houshi! InuYasha could only hope that he was either: one, dreaming, or two, just in a trance that would break shortly.

He tried to get up again, but fell back onto his hands. 'Fuck no...' he thought again. Slowly, unwillingly, he looked down.

Two silvery-white paws rested on the bracken-strewn ground beneath him.

The hanyou twitched his left hand.

The paw on the left moved.

He lifted his hand off the ground.

The paw lifted off of the ground.

'Oh, when I get my hands on that houshi, he's gonna wish he hadn't been born!' the hanyou shouted in his head.

InuYasha couldn't believe that this had happened to him because of a stupid dokko and one stupid houshi's temper. How the fuck could this have happened to him?

Why in the name of the seven hells was he now a dog?

Update 01/12/2012: In celebration of Tall Tails and A Picture is Worth One Thousand Words' anniversaries, I am doing some heavy editing and fixing mistakes that I have noticed over the months. Thank you for continuously loving these pieces for a full year; I greatly appreciate it!