Akago
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Akago (赤子, あかご, lit. "baby"), also referred to as Akanbo ("baby boy"), is a character in the anime and manga series InuYasha. NOTE: The status of Akago as this character's actual name is contested, since akago is standard modern Japanese for baby (whereas all the other characters' names have obscure and / or archaic meanings). In the official English translation, he is called "the infant".
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The birth of Akago
A yōkai (demon), he is Naraku's seventh detachment, taking the form of a young baby that serves as Naraku's physical heart (心臓, しんぞう, shinzō). By doing this, Naraku can have his body entirely destroyed, but still regenerate completely — rendering him effectively immortal unless Akago is killed.
After he was almost destroyed by Sesshōmaru and InuYasha, Naraku needed a way to make himself virtually invulnerable and this was the only way for him to do it. Before Naraku had previously attempted to get rid of all traces of humanity in him, and thus transforms from a han'yō (half-demon) into a full yōkai. This act resulted in the creation of Musō; however, after realizing that it was too soon for him to be rid of his human components, Naraku reabsorbed Musō. When he gave birth to Akago, however, he successfully purged himself of all remnants of Onigumo.
Akago by many people can be considered to be evolution of Onigumo. If Onigumo was truly expelled as a yōkai then it would be expected for him to be a han'yō since Onigumo originally was a human. However Naraku discarded all traces of humanity from himself, and thus all feelings for Kikyō inside the countless lumps of fleshy remains within Hakurei-Zan. Thus Akago can be considered to be Onigumo in a now full yōkai form. After all his ultimate wish as he sacrificed his soul to countless yōkai, was for him to gain access to a new body and in a way his wish was granted as ironically he is now in an infant form. Whether he has memories from his past life and whether he can be considered to be the same person as Onigumo is still up for debate.
Akago's powers and the birth of Hakudōshi
He is unusual in that he can also speak and read a person's mind. He has the power to latch on to the darkness in a person's heart and twist them to his will. He can also create a barrier with which he can manipulate attacks of yōki (yōkai energy) sent at him, and then use it to attack his opponents. He was split in half by a priest who managed to attack him as he lay dying (revealing a brief image of the boundary to the afterlife). The split worked to his advantage, creating Hakudōshi from Kagura's half and he surviving as Kan'na's half. He was placed under the care of a daimyō's wife (who was led to believe he was hers). Later, Abi-Hime's birds attack and Kohaku kills the daimyō's wife as Kan'na took Akago into hiding again.
Unlike Naraku's other detachments, Akago was created in the sacred land that was Hakurei-Zan. Even though he was never exposed directly to the holy barrier created around the mountain, the purity of this place is reflected in his creation. This is reflected in his pale skin tone, white hair and primarily white clothing which strongly contrasts Naraku's long dark hair and grotesque demonic appearance. Akago's holy origins give him a much stronger immunity to holy powers than most yōkai, which is why he was able to survive the priest's attack and reform into two separate beings rather than being destroyed. In the manga this purity was also represented in the pure white barrier he was able to create, although in the anime the barrier retained the same purple glow as those created by Naraku.
Akago as part of Mōryōmaru
To protect Akago, Naraku sends Kan'na to incorporate Akago into Mōryōmaru, a previously soulless yōkai created from the bodies of various other yōkai and fuelled by haku, life-force. Akago is also given the stolen Fuyōheki (yōki-erasing stone) in order to conceal him from those who would destroy him. (This also masks Mōryōmaru's own yōki beyond a certain radius.) However, Akago and his brother Hakudōshi soon grow tired of taking orders from Naraku, and rebel.
Like Naraku, Mōryōmaru has the ability to absorb other yōkai and gain their powers. Making use of this ability, Akago continues to strengthen Mōryōmaru until he is strong enough to challenge Naraku. For the same purpose, he and Hakudōshi also try to collect shards of the Shikon no Tama, or Shikon Jewel, and are successful in ultimately collecting two of them — though Hakudōshi is killed in the process. They also attempt to recruit Kagura for their cause, as she too desires her freedomn, but she rejects them when they attempt to take Kohaku's Shikon fragment.
The death of Akago
Following the death of Kagura in the manga, Naraku becomes largely absent from the series, and the focus shifts to Akago's and Mōryōmaru's quest to absorb yōkai and Shikon shards. Naraku finally reappears, reviving a tree yōkai known as Yōmeiju, a tree which devoured humans and yōkai alike. But this time, as InuYasha and his group watched, as Naraku devoured the tree. Shortly thereafter, he and Mōryōmaru squared off for the first time in an open battle. Naraku then reveals that the reason he created Akago as an infant and purposely made him so weak, while providing him with a powerful barrier that he had the power to disable, was because he always knew his heart would turn against him. Taunting Mōryōmaru about his shell, referring to it as a castle and to Akago as a king who has grown fat in said castle, Naraku at first appeared to be trying to reabsorb him. But this clash ended with a shocking twist; Mōryōmaru absorbed his maker, supposedly defeating him for good. Naraku soon revealed that he was in fact alive, having allowed Mōryōmaru to absorb him in a Trojan Horse-style ploy in order to then devour Mōryōmaru from the inside. He then used the Yōmeiju's barrier dissolving abilities to reclaim Akago and then fully assimilated Mōryōmaru into his being.