Kouga has a spectacular entrance, but not a loveable one. When he first shows up, his wolves are killing villagers for their meal and he is killing another demon who stole one of his shikon shards. When Kagome and her team show up, they attack the wolves. Kouga confronts them and demands to know why they are killing his wolf friends.

Those actions may seem odd, but Kouga is a wolf demon, not a human. Just as humans think of all other variaties of life on the planet as fair game, so do the demons. To Kouga, humans were lesser life forms. Intelligent perhaps, but not much different than a deer or cat. The other action that may seem odd is that he was upset when Inuyasha killed some of his wolves after they had killed villagers. Well, his wolves were his companions, and the villagers were just sources of protien. If you have a hunting dog that kills a deer, and then another deer kills your dog, you are going to want to take down that deer that killed your dog, and you will see it as unfair that your dog was killed. The same goes for Kouga and his wolves. Later on, Kagome is touched by how kindly and playfully Kouga treats his wolves.

Kouga is intelligent. He's not a genius, but neither is he the dimwit many others make him out to be. He's impulsive, but he isn't stupid. He is the leader of the Western Yorozoku, after all, and a good one. He shows his intelligence in the fight that follows his confrontation with Inuyasha concerning his wolves, and Sango even comments on that intelligence. As he's fighting Inuyasha Kagome yells to Inuyasha to be careful, that Kouga has Shikon shards in his legs. Immediately Kouga glances over his shoulder at her. That shows his intelligence right there. He observes Kagome, a person who is not even participating in the fight. He picks up the meaning from her yell directed at Inuyasha that she can see Shikon shards. He understands very well what that means, and he stores that information for later use. If he were dimwitted, he would be too absorbed in fighting for Kagome's words to even sink in. They would go in one ear and out the other without him ever realizing the implications.

It is during this first fight that Kouga comes up with his infamous word he uses to describe Inuyasha: inukkoro. There are a few schools of thought about what exactly this word means. Inu means dog, that is certain. Inukkoro all together is negative, but really it could mean anything you want that is negative and involves dogs.
*Some fansubs use dogface. I like this translation. It's a very direct insult, but doesn't give me crude images.
*Many people in fandom like the translation dog-turd. Yuck, yuck, and yuck. That's my opinion. However, the translation is good. One of the first complaints Kouga has about Inuyasha is that he smells bad. And, well...dog-turd goes right along with that.
*The Viz translation, and some other fansubs use puppy as the translation. Puppy is a good (and cute) translation when applied to Inuyasha. I'm sure he would object strongly to being called a puppy. ^_^ It also emphasizes the status differences between Kouga and Inuyasha. Kouga a wolf, and the leader of the western yorozoku. Inuyasha is a dog, and leader of no one. One of the peculiar things about dogs is that they have been selected over time by humans to be commanded, and to maintain puppy-like characteristics. They may have once been mature wolves, but now they display the puppy characteristics much more strongly. So, it's unsurprising Kouga would see Inuyasha as a puppy, and it makes an effective insult since Inuyasha would certainly not see it that way!

It's interesting how Kouga chooses to insult him. Demons across the board have insulted him for being a hanyou- half demon. Kouga completely ignores this aspect of him. Inuyasha killed his wolves, he has enough reason to insult the hanyou. Any other demon would pick out that he is a hanyou and use that! Kouga, on the other hand, says that he hates the smell of dogs, and calls Inuyasha inukkoro!

Kouga and Inuyasha's first fight ends when Inuyasha starts using his sword to make a very strong attack called Wound of the Wind. Kouga doesn't know that, but he does suddenly sense that there is something coming up that will probably destroy him. He suddenly shouts "Danger!" and urges his wolves to escape. Then he leaves as quickly as he came. The group is left utterly dumbfounded. Leaving suddenly in the middle of a fight is not typical demon behavior. Most demons blindly fight to the death, but Kouga holds a responsibility for his wolves, his tribe, and himself. Fighting to the death was not the answer in that case, and he understood it.

Kouga's next course of action is to put the talants that he observed in Kagome to good use - good use for him, that is. The problem is, of course, that Inuyasha is too powerful to fight effectively. He sets a trap for the gang. Inuyasha is bent on trying to finish the fight with Kouga, and follows Kouga's scent back to his mountain...and right into a trap. At this point Inuyasha is right by a cliff above a river. Kouga's wolves are the first to attack. Some jump onto Inuyasha before he has time to react, and knock him right over the edge of the cliff down into the river. As Inuyasha falls Kouga speeds up the cliff past him, with a few arrogant words directed at the dog for good measure. Once Inuyasha is thoroughly wet and out of the way, and the rest of Kouga's wolves are keeping Sango, Miroku, and Kirara busy, Kouga grabs Kagome and books it out of there. (Dimwitted indeed.)

When Kouga gets Kagome back to his cave, he informs Kagome of her job, and uses a surprisingly civil tone to do so. Kouga is still a full-blooded demon, and Kagome is a mere human, so he certainly has license to order her around with a more unforgiving tone. He has two reasons to use Kagome's talants. One, to get back at the Gokurakuchou tribe. The Gokurakuchou are the yoruzoku's bitter enemies, and about 20 wolves have been killed by them. Two, to get the shard from the leader of the Gokurakuchou. Kagome agrees to help, deciding that she -and Shippo- will stay alive longer if she does so.

Shippo happened to be clinging to Kagome when Kouga grabbed her, and so he found himself in the wolf den, also. Somehow he ended up clinging to Kouga's tail. Kouga's reaction was to remove Shippo, and tossed him to his wolves for a snack. (Poor Shippo ^^) Kagome objected and told Kouga she'd never help him if Shippo was eaten. So Kouga told his wolves to stop, and a really cute scene follows. He picked up one of his wolves, commented on the wolf's weight, and gently released it to the side. Kagome was very surprised, and wondered if Kouga wasn't all bad. Kouga treats anyone he likes very gently. He makes most of his feelings blatantly clear. He has two close friends in his tribe, Ginta and Hakkaku.

Kagome's chance to escape came when Kouga left the cave for a while. Shippo pulled off a nearly perfect shape-shift into Kouga, and they attempted to escape. Unfortunately, the wolves weren't fooled, and Kagome and Shippo were cornered at a cliff edge just outside the cave fairly quickly. Kouga arrived just in time to see Kagome punt Shippo off the cliff to escape (he can float with his shape-shifting abilities) and then turn to face possible death at the hands of some of the yorozoku. Kouga called off his tribe, and jumped down in front of Kagome having made a rather unbelievable decision. He pronounced Kagome "his woman." Various members of his tribe were astonished, and commented on their understanding that they were going to get to eat Kagome after the upcoming fight with the Gokurakuchou. Kouga explained that keeping Kagome by his side meant he could gather Shikon shards from all across the land, and their tribe would become very powerful indeed. Kagome, naturally, slapped him. The rest of the Yorozoku backed away in fear of Kouga's potential reaction to being slapped, but he was only very surprised. Kagome explained she had a boyfriend already, and it was that inukkoro; and he had a name - Inuyasha. Kouga took this in a stride. He would kill Inuyasha and then problem would be solved. ^_^; Ah, well.

When Inuyasha shows up he hears Kagome refer to Kouga and Kouga-kun, and gets very jealous! Then Kouga gets injured badly by the Gokurakuchou. Kagome responds by holding him, which certainly raises Inuyasha's hackles. He decides that it's time to duel and kill Kouga, and Kagome if forced to sit him to keep him from killing Kouga, since Kouga was in no condition to fight. Inuyasha sees this as proof that Kagome likes the bad wolf demon, and...they fight.

Kouga hasn't gotten very far in the whole kill Inuyasha deal, so he probably realizes that it wouldn't have the effect he wants. He doesn't even try. In this case, he is probably just boasting, which is something Kouga is very prone to. The only time Kouga tries to kill Inuyasha is under different circumstances. Kagura slaughters many members of Kouga's tribe, and frames Inuyasha. Kouga comes upon the scene to see Inuyasha standing in the middle of many dead Yorozoku, covered in blood. He gets furious, attacks Inuyasha, and indeed, very nearly kills him. Kagura eventually showed that it was she who killed the Yorozoku, and now Kouga's vengeance is directed towards her and Naraku. Kouga's attentions for Inuyasha have since returned to taunting him and using Inuyasha's head for a landing.

Kouga does a lot of boasting, but inside he seems to be much more down-to-earth. When things happen that make him drop all masks, such as when Kagura framed Inuyasha, he suddenly and completely drops all arrogance. He doesn't boast at all, his feelings are pure. Also, when the viewer hears Kouga's thoughts, his tone contains none of the arrogance it contains in what he says out loud. Perhaps he boasts and keeps an arrogant tone to keep the fear and respect required to be a leader in a fairly wild society.