amizô looked at me for a moment as if to consider the reason for the conviction in my voice, as she took a puff from her pipe. She breathed out the smoke quietly and finally closed her eyes, sighing. When she opened them again, they showed the usual windows to her inscrutable soul, an ever-present sparkle of amusement in her brown irises.

"Thee wishes to see the Hakurei Miko, huh? Very well, 'tis still early in the day and few Yôkai roam the roads," The Bake-danuki remarked, approving of my request. "We shall depart right away."

We said our farewells to Byakuren and the other members of the temple, and quickly departed towards the bridge in the center of the village. Mamizô explained to me that it was the one of the only three man-made crossings over this river that flowed through the exact middle of Gensôkyô and separated the almost perfectly circular, closed-off world in two pieces in a gigantic S-shape. Seen from above, Gensôkyô would resemble a Yin-Yang symbol, with the Yôkai Mountain visible in the north-west and the Misty Lake in the south-east acting as the two counterweights to each other.

Our path brought us through the rice fields surrounding the village, as we walked towards the east. The plains continued on for a few hours, until we finally came upon a large forest to our right, the Forest of Magic, as my guide explained to me. Luckily, we would take the road that led around it, which meandered through the opening between the Forest of Magic on the right and a regular forest on the left. Even for somebody who never studied the classification of tree species, such as myself, the difference between the two sides were apparent. It was obvious that the name "Forest of Magic" was derived from the clearly magical properties of its rampant vegetation, which appeared to further encroach upon the road we were walking with every passing step.

Soon, we came upon a stretch where the shadow of the trees were hanging over the road. There, we encountered two men with tools, including axes and saws, sitting on a pile of chopped trees and talking to each other. As we approached, their casual exchange became audible.

"Man, I don't see the sense in keeping this road clean," One of the men said and looked in the direction opposite from the one we were approaching from. "There's only that Yôkai shrine on top of the mountain over there. Nobody even goes there."

"When the very Miko you ask to exterminate Yôkai houses some of them in her shrine, you have to question her motives," The other agreed. However, they appeared to have a reason for standing up and continuing, which they promptly voiced. "We can't help it, mayor's orders. Let's just get this over with quickly."

"Hello there, strong men," Mamizô announced our approach and the addressed two turned around in unison at her voice. Before I had realized, my companion had transformed herself into a normal-looking human with no animal ears, wearing a wide Kimono under which I assumed she hid her fluffy tail. "Is the road ahead safe? We are on a visit to the Hakurei Shrine..." The two men seemed entranced by her changed appearance, and even I had to admit that she emitted a mature woman's charm - even if I would have never dared to say it out loud. However, she hopelessly crushed any and all hopes of the two when she continued. "... to pray to the Kami for good conception."

I registered her words only a few moments later, when the men had already completely buried their thoughts of trying to woo her and were eyeing me with a mixture of envy and disbelief, but the situation demanded of me to keep a straight face. I even managed a shy smile as the final nail in the coffins of their unfounded expectations.

"Yeah, we're only clearing the road. Forest's been coming closer again. Never thought people from the village still visit that Yôkai shrine. Careful when you reach it, there's no telling what kind of monsters live there," One of the men, wearing a knotted white bandanna, responded to Mamizô's initial question.

"The world has become such a dangerous place... first the shrine begins to house Yôkai, and now there is even a temple in the middle of the human village that invites Yôkai from all over Gensôkyô," The other, wearing a straw hat to shield his bald head from the sun, added. "And the shrine on Yôkai Mountain is too dangerous for humans to go to and ask for assistance." I realized that the general public was still fearful of Yôkai in this world. Shameimaru Aya flying through the skies above the village and distributing her papers, seemed to be accepted, but the Myôren Temple seemed to cause mixed feelings. Maybe these two were just the more fearful type, but I would not have been surprised to find that sentiment among many other villagers.

"Maybe you can try and find the Taoist hermits. I heard they are very eager to help humans against Yôkai," The man with the bandanna said to his colleague. At the mention of Taoist hermits, my right eyebrow twitched once; however, I did not say anything and looked to Mamizô, hoping that we could continue on our journey soon. "But they only do things for the right price," He added and laughed.

"Thou have my gratitude. We shall be on our way then," Mamizô thanked the men for the information, and displayed what was nothing but a fake smile. With this, we rounded the felled trees and continued down the road towards the Hakurei Shrine. I looked back once more to see the two men staring after us, then noticing my gaze and returned to their work. As I turned to my companion, I noticed that she had changed back to her usual appearance.

"Natural is best," She proclaimed and took a puff from her pipe. I was wondering what she meant, before she continued. "I prefer showing off my tail, as any other powerful Tanuki should." I understood what she meant and smiled.

The sun had reached its zenith and we had left the forests on both sides behind us when Mamizô finally notified me of the fact that we were approaching our destination. Judging by the position of the sun, our journey had taken almost four hours. On the way we had taken a few small breaks and sat down to talk about the nature that surrounded us, or drank some Sake to quench our thirst - as I had not considered that it would take that long and did not bring provisions. My companion pointed towards a mountain that stuck out from the mountain range behind it, signaling that the shrine was located there. The road took us over a hilly plains, as we finally approached the Torii denoting the entrance to the shrine.

A long set of stairs lead up the mountain in a direct line, to another Torii in the far distance above. The stairs were framed by a forest that encompassed the whole mountain, but the atmosphere was the complete opposite of the Forest of Magic; there was a feeling of serenity and divinity hanging in the air. Mamizô did not seem to care, but I felt refreshed as I stepped through the first gate towards this sacred ground.

At least one thousand steps later I did not feel as refreshed anymore and was gasping for air, not caring whether it was divine or not. My companion appeared to be completely unfazed by the physical activity, as she looked down at me disapprovingly from half a dozen steps further up. She was a Yôkai, so I assumed that she was physically stronger than humans through some supernatural means; I experienced another aspect of where the fear and loathing for those strange and unfamiliar beings came from. It was not only that they were so otherworldly in their nature, but also because even if they looked human, they surpassed humans in many regards just by being born differently. In the end, a lot of the fear was based on petty jealousy, I realized.

"Just a little more. Thou can do it," My companion cheered me on with a slightly sarcastic tone in her voice and walked ahead swiftly. As I looked behind me, I felt like I had accomplished something great, but the path before me was just as long, if not longer than the one I had already overcome. Unbelieving, I looked back once more and compared the distances, to resign at the fact that I still had a long way in front of me.

What felt like an eternity later, I had finally reached the top of the stairs, where Mamizô was sitting, smoking her pipe and looking down at me with a gleeful expression. I sat down next to her and decided to rest for a moment before meeting the Hakurei Miko.

"I'm very sorry to tell thee, Kyôma-dono..." The Bake-danuki started, before she paused dramatically. My mind instantly conjured up several possibilities of what she was apologizing for with her mischievous expression, of which none caused me any comfort. "But it appears that the Hakurei Miko is not home." I looked at her with a tired expression before collapsing backwards and lying sprawled on the graveled path leading up to the shrine, with both eyes closed.

"You could have told me ear-" I began to complain and opened my one functioning eye, but stopped as I saw an upside down figure standing above me. For a moment I was stunned at this comedic situation, as the figure was wearing a skirt, which I was looking up into unintentionally. But then I realized that underneath the skirt was a blankness that belittled all shades of white. It was like a fine mist, wavering in ways disregarding the wind that played with the hem of the skirt over it ever so lightly.

I jumped up in surprise and almost fell back down the long flight of stairs to a certain death, if Mamizô had not caught me and pulled me back into an upright position. Only now could I properly see the person who had come to stand over me without making a single sound. In fact, she was not standing, but rather floating a distance above the ground, dispelling all doubts as to her nature. She was a ghost, her legs invisible as her existence was anchored neither in this world nor in the afterlife; something was certainly holding her back from moving on into the circle of reincarnation. The ghost sported dark green hair and wore a night blue magician's hat which featured a golden sun. A capelet covered her blue shirt, which was tucked into the knee-length skirt - if she had knees. Her piercing dark green eyes examined me the same way I did her, but there was an inherent coldness in her gaze.

"Heh... we met a troublesome one," Mamizô commented as she stood up. "How art thou, vengeful spirit?"

"I feel sleepy. I only woke up a few days ago..." The ghost answered, her eyes still fixated on me. "Surely, you, too, can tell that this one is the cause for all this?" She was clearly referring to me, but in a tone that made me think I was regarded as a mere object. However, I did not dare speak up against this ghost, whose very presence seemed to lower the temperature of her surroundings by several degrees.

"I was not sure, but if thou can tell with a single look, it must be true," My companion stated, anxiety on her face as she did not avert her gaze from the ghost. Their conversation had completely lost me, as I attempted to piece their words together to make sense of them. Even if I did not understood what they were talking about, I instinctively felt that it was not a good topic.

"To think the Hakurei Miko would be out when he comes here. Such fortunate timing!" The ghost proclaimed, and a horrible grin crept onto her face, sending a shiver down my spine. Out of thin air, a staff appeared in her hand, a scythe-like protrusion formed out of light on its tip, before the glow slowly faded to reveal a sickle moon.

"Run!" Mamizô yelled and pulled my collar, almost throwing me down the stairs behind her.

"You cannot!" The vengeful spirit stated and pointed the sickle moon staff, which was crackling with what appeared to be high voltage static, at Mamizô, who now stood between the ghost and me. Heeding my companion's words, I spun around to run down the stairs we had so painstakingly climbed only minutes earlier. Taking several steps at once, I practically jumped down, risking tripping and breaking my neck; however, the danger behind me seemed much more real than being unable to watch my own step.

Upon the first step down, a feeling of unease appeared in my chest. With the second step, it grew into an uncertain emotion of impending disaster. The third step solidified the feeling into a premonition. At the fourth step an urge to turn back formed in my mind. And when I reached the fifth step, there was a feeling of dread in my heart. I had turned my back on a companion and abandoned her, and even if I had no means to help her, I had run away.

Just as I reached the first short flat area of the stairs with a final jump of several steps I felt static run over my body and nearly paralyze my muscles. Not even a split second later, just as I wanted to turn around to see what caused it, a gigantic beam of black light, surrounded by lightning of many colors, shot past me above my head with a deafening roar. I looked up at the top of the stairs and was unable to see Mamizô's back, even if I should have been able to. Then, something floating on the wind came into my attention, as it approached me, as if fate had willed it to. I reflexively brought my hands up and caught it, realization hitting me only a moment later, when the sound of bells played in the silence that followed the beam of light's noise.

It was Mamizô's leaf-like hat, or rather the singed remains of it.

Just before I could engage in the foolishness of running back up the stairs, the shadow of the vengeful ghost appeared before the sun between the uppermost Torii of the shrine. I stopped, my legs nearly shaking at the cold eyes that looked down on me without a shred of mercy. Pointing her staff at me, the ghost appeared to be ready to shoot another beam to annihilate me, just as she had done with Mamizô.

"Come up," She said in an imperative tone that left no room for argument; I would be killed if I did not comply immediately. Gripping the remains of the leaf hat tightly, causing the bells to jingle, I walked up the stairs with unsteady feet. There was no doubt as to my companion's fate, but my mind had not yet caught up to the fact; she was gone, and I had left her alone.

As I reached the top, I was greeted with a crater from the beam, reaching from where the vengeful ghost had been standing to where Mamizô had come to stand to protect me only moments earlier. There was not a trace of her left. Certainty hit me like a truck, and I nearly stumbled, but caught myself, to keep the semblance of countenance in this moment of despair.

Looking past the perpetrator of these signs of destruction, I saw somebody standing before the shrine. It was a woman in the getup of an Oiran - a high-grade traditional prostitute - wearing a wide, multi-layered and mostly red-colored Kimono with the shoulders exposed. The large black geta with three teeth were almost as tall as those attributed to Tengu, but they appeared to be made of massive metal. Her black hair was put up and adorned with a whole array of golden pins and jewelry, making her head look bigger than it was. The woman was carrying a richly ornamented and exceedingly long bronze and wooden pipe. She brought the bronze mouthpiece to her lips, which were covered in a rich, crimson lipstick. The gesture was completely unlike Mamizô's, refined to the point of being a form of art.

"Welcome, Kagami Kyôma," She spoke and looked at me with sharp eyes that were framed by exceptionally long, purple-colored eyelashes. Her irises were multicolored, and appeared to swirl in a kaleidoscope motif with every slight movement. She exuded a presence of majesty, despite her revealing clothes, and there was an almost tangible aura of power beyond anything I have been able to feel before. Even then, the vengeful spirit did not appear to be perturbed and spoke to her in anything but a respectful manner.

"You need this boy so badly that you would risk breaking the Spellcard Rules. Just what do you wish to accomplish using him?" She asked with a firm expression. Judging by her nature, killing people was nothing special to her, and her face did not show any emotions after the fact that she had just done so. My mind was, even though not easily perturbed, not numbed to the point where I could shrug off the demise of a friend. Cold sweat formed on my forehead as I faced the two women.

"Wha..." I started but noticed that my voice was cracking. Swallowing, I felt desert-like dryness in my mouth, and my tongue was like parchment as I licked my lips. "What do you want with me?" It was all I could muster to ask, my eye moving between the murderous spirit and the woman in an Oiran getup.

"My name is O-hakuka. Your arrival in Gensôkyô has triggered our emergence," She stated, her voice alluring and poisonous at the same time. "It would appear that we, in our true forms, have been forgotten in the outside world, when you left it behind." I did not understand what she meant, but I tried to not let it show. "Maybe you do not know yet, but some things that are forgotten in the outside world will come to Gensôkyô. Oftentimes it is by pure chance that they can arrive here, but in some cases there are those who have the power to choose." Her piercing eyes met mine. "You chose for yourself, but it forced others like me to make a choice as well. And who would willingly disappear due to such an unreasonable decision, rather than try to start anew?"

By now I understood that this supernatural being before me had come to Gensôkyô because apparently I had been the last person in the world to know of her true form. I could not believe that throughout my studies, I had reached a state in which my knowledge was greater or more profound than that of scholars who had been studying the subject for decades. Even then, there was the possible explanation that, by pure chance, my image of certain Yôkai had hit the truth, without knowing that it differed from the understanding of those who were much more knowledgeable than I. Maybe through a perception different from that of the majority, I had been the sole person to keep the existences of those Yôkai anchored in the outside world. It was a farfetched, but logical explanation.

"That's... that's an unreasonable accusation," I managed to say.

"Whoever accused you of anything, Kagami Kyôma?" O-hakuka responded with a sharp expression that silenced me, even as her lips were still curled up in a smile. "We actually have to thank you. In this world, we have much more freedom than in the outside one. Just like Kami, we traditional Yôkai are nourished and strengthened by humans. The only difference is that Kami need faith... and we need fear." Her lips cracked into an abysmally sinister smile at those words, sending a shiver down my spine like nothing had ever before.

"Then why do you still need me?" I asked, gripping the leaf hat tightly. "My role must be over."

"No, it is not. There are some things you do not know, but all in due time. You shall come with us for now," The Oiran stated and smiled. As if this had been a signal, a giant wooden wheel dropped out of the sky and crashed into the ground of the Hakurei Shrine. The dust settled to reveal the girl with the broken wheel embedded in her left shoulder, the one I had seen in the human village the previous day. She bowed before O-hakuka and spun the wheel around her, which burst out in flames, and surrounded herself with it. As the fire disappeared, a traditional oxcart missing the eponymous draft animal stood there, with the girl sitting on the driver's seat. "Get on," O-hakuka ordered.

"Are you sure you can do that? If the Hakurei Miko finds out that you abducted a human from the outside world, she will not sit still," The vengeful spirit spoke up and looked at the Oiran with cold, disrespectful eyes. Despite appearing to be in collaboration, they were not on good terms.

"Don'cha talk to O-hakuka-sama like that!" The oxcart driver shouted, but was silenced by a gesture from the person she was speaking for.

"She will not find out, so what is your concern, Mima?"

"Surely, you must have noticed... there is somebody else here." With these words, she spun the staff with the crescent moon tip around, leaving behind balls of energy in its wake, which shot forward, past O-hakuka and directly into the shrine building. A gigantic explosion rocked the sacred grounds and the Hakurei Shrine collapsed in a raging inferno. From within, a small figure emerged, engulfed by flames and smoke.

"Uh-oh, Reimu will kill us all when she comes back..." The figure spoke, the voice giving the impression of belonging to a young tomboyish girl with a mischievous streak. Upon closer inspection, it indeed belonged to a girl around thirteen years old. However, there were remarkable features testament to her inhuman nature; two large, tree branch-like horns, almost as thick as her lower arms, and just as long, emerged from her head horizontally. She sported orange-blonde long hair, tied loosely on the left side in the front, and the rest of her hair in the back, each using a shimenawa - Kami-binding paper ropes. Her white shirt, with its sleeves torn off, was slightly singed from the fire, and her purple skirt had a jagged rim. Her red eyes showed a level of strength I had not seen ever before.

"An Oni," Mima stated with a cold gaze.

"And you must be the vengeful spirit that was sealed behind the shrine. I hear you were supposed to stay there forever, what brought about this turn of events?" The girl named Suika responded with an aloof expression. She did not seem overly concerned by the presence of the other two Yôkai and focused on Mima. "Destroying the Hakurei Shrine is a no-go. This will not end well for all of us, you know..."

"Let 'er come!" The oxcart driver announced and jumped off, causing the cart to burst out in flames and turn back into the giant wooden wheel from before. "Aye, Kurara-sama, will deal with 'er."

"Hoh, you sure are confident," Suika responded and walked forward with definite steps. "Then let me test your strength right here." She walked past O-hakuka wordlessly, only giving her a sidelong glance, and approached Kurara; a battle was about to begin.

From high above the Hakurei Shrine, a pair of red eyes were observing the occurrences intently. Shameimaru Aya, at the first signs of an incident, was already on scene to cover the story in her paper. At the sight of the various beings present, especially the ghost and the Oni, she was too scared to get closer and take photos with her reflex camera. She was watching the spectacle below, keeping her distance as to not get drawn into it.

"Ayaya, this is certainly a scoop. An ancient vengeful spirit breaking out of her seal, the Hakurei Shrine getting destroyed, an Oni fighting with this group of newcomers... And as always, the sincere and honorable Shameimaru Aya is first on the scene!" She proclaimed quietly and looked on, when something in the corner of her eye caught her attention. Turning around towards it, she forgot everything that went on below and focused on the distance.

"Ayayaya... this will become nasty," Was all she said, when the pressure of this new challenger's aura reached her long before its owner became visible.

Just when I thought that maybe it was an opportune moment to try and run away, considering that Mamizô had sacrificed herself to give me a chance to flee, an unprecedented pressure assaulted the whole area. Just as Suika and Kurara were about to clash, it reached them as well, and the former looked up at its source, a resigning smile appearing on her face. "I guess there is no room for me to fight here," She just said and relaxed.

Kurara grabbed the wheel in her hand firmly and looked up with a hostile expression. "Wha'cha doin' 'ere so soon?" She spat out. "Ya were suppos'd to be out all day."

The person in question, a girl appearing to be in her late teens, floated down from the skies above, surrounded by two basketball-sized Yin-Yang orbs orbiting her at arm-length distance. A red bow with a white trim adorned her shoulder-length black hair, with red and white hair-tubes on each side of her face. A yellow ascot tied her white collar together and she wore a red Miko top with white detached sleeves, sporting a red dotted line at their rims. The cutouts of the outfit were deep enough to reveal that she was wearing a sarashi - bandages covering her chest. Her red hakama reached down to her ankles and had a white dotted line at its rim, the cutouts at the hips revealing her bare skin underneath. Black sandals with red bands dangled from her feet. A gohei, a stick carved of ancient wood, with two folded strips of paper attached to its tip, was gripped tightly as if it was a weapon, completing the image of a miko exterminating evil spirits.

"I felt that something was wrong at my shrine... and I return to see it in flames. So you are the ones responsible," The girl proclaimed, effectively confirming her identity as that of the Hakurei Miko. "How will you pay for this?" Her expression was filled with anger. Her unfathomable dark brown eyes were of a different nature from those of the supernatural beings living in Gensôkyô; they were human, but there was something in them that put them apart from all the ones I had seen so far. "Or rather, how will I make you pay?"

"We have no quarrel with you, Miko of Hakurei. We will withdraw for now," O-hakuka stated, the second line delivered in an imperative tone, most likely directed at Kurara and Mima. The former complied immediately, shooting a glare at Suika and the miko alternately, while the latter looked up at the miko with an expression I could not judge. An angry stare was all she earned that way, at which she shook her head with a resigned smile and approached O-hakuka. "We will have you, Kagami Kyôma," The Oiran said and the abyss that was her smile cracked open again, before black shadows swirled around her.

"You're not getting away!" The miko shouted and sent her Yin-Yang balls crashing down towards the three of them. However, before they reached their targets, they disappeared in a swirl of black mist. Only silence remained, occasionally broken by crackling of the burning shrine.

"Suika... you were supposed to watch the house. How could you let this happen?" The Hakurei Miko said as she came down from the sky. The two Yin-Yang orbs shrank down to the size of marbles and dropped into her hands, upon which she stored them in her sleeves. Then she turned her attention towards me. "And who are you?"

I was startled when she suddenly addressed me. "His name is Kagami Kyôma. It appears that he is the root of this incident," Suika answered in my stead. "At least that's what Mima said."

"Mima..." The miko repeated the name and fell silent for a moment; it appeared to invoke complex feelings within her. "I can see that that is the case..." She commented on my identity, as her eyes looked me all over, stopping at the hat in my hands for a little longer than anywhere else, before she spoke again. "I am Hakurei Reimu, the miko of this..." She looked at the burning remains of the haiden, the front build of the shrine complex, and sighed. "... shrine. How long until it's rebuilt this time, huh?" Even though her workplace and most likely the place she lived in had been destroyed, she remained far less perturbed than people should normally be in such a situation. It made me wonder if this had happened many times before. "The owner of that hat... it was the Bake-danuki, right?"

"You... know her?" Then I remembered that Mamizô had been willing to guide me, most likely due to the fact that she had some form of connection to the Hakurei Miko. "It's my fault..."

"No, don't blame yourself. Nobody could have thought that Mima would break the Spellcard Rules so easily. The other two I have not seen before, either," Reimu stated with a sympathetic expression, mixed with concern. "I can't be everywhere at once, so if people start to break rules left and right, things will get out of hand... Aya!" She yelled the name up into the sky, upon which a strong gust of wind spun around us before settling down in an instant. The crow Tengu emerged from it, notebook and pen in hand, the camera dangling from her neck. "I'm sure you have information on them. Tell me what you know."

"Oya? That will cost yo- I'm sorry, I will tell you everything," Aya started, but at Suika's expression, she instantly yielded and opened her notebook, wearing a rushed expression on her face. It appeared that the Tengu feared the little horned girl.

However, the following conversation passed through my ears and mind unnoticed, as I looked down at Mamizô's burned hat in my hands. My psyche had overcome the initial shock, and the feeling of loss finally settled in; even though I had known her for only a few days, the Bake-danuki had been my closest friend here in Gensôkyô. I looked up into the sky, my surroundings disappearing as before my mind's eye the time I spent at the Myôren Temple turned into pictures to paint the nothingness around me. Even then, the current state of my mind would not allow too many emotions. Mamizô had brought me to the Hakurei Shrine due to my request to learn how to defend myself and she had given her life to protect me, showing me the urgency of my situation; to prevent such things from happening again, I could not live on the way I had before.

"I believe that there are at least three more. They attacked the Myôren Temple yesterday," I said, interrupting Aya's report. I earned a surprised expression from the Tengu reporter and the miko, but they did not dispute my statement. "And there may be another two. I saw two suspicious people entering the temple when I left it in the evening of the same day." Then again, those were unfounded accusations; surely, at this point, all hostile supernatural beings I had encountered were suspicious to me.

"The Yôkai temple sure attracts all sorts of bad customers," Aya commented. "Yes, I heard of the trouble at the temple, too. What makes you think they are related to this O-hakuka?" I explained that one of the Yôkai was one Hieda no Akyû had never heard of before, and that their timings of emergence apparently coincided with me coming to Gensôkyô. Maybe some of them were unrelated individuals, but as long as there was a possibility, I could not rule out their involvement with each other. Reimu remained silent throughout as she considered my words. "But tell me more about what happened here before the shrine was destroyed. Even I cannot be everywhere at once, so I missed the beginning of all this," The crow Tengu asked of me.

I explained the circumstances leading up to the destruction of the shrine and the words that were exchanged. Suika explained regarding Mima's actions before our arrival. It appeared that the vengeful spirit had been laying low the previous two days, although at the time of her awakening, three days earlier, Reimu had been out of the shrine on a job for the village. The vengeful spirit had left the shrine on that day and returned a little before the Hakurei Miko had, disappearing back into the space she had been sealed in. Reimu's expression grew increasingly displeased at Suika's words.

"And why didn't you tell me earlier about Mima's reawakening? If you observed her so much, why wouldn't you say anything while I was here?" She snapped at the young girl, who just shrugged. "I didn't think it was important," Was the simple response.

"That means it really all started with my arrival..." I whispered. "If it hadn't been for my selfishness, Mamizô would..." Then, I caught myself before spiraling deeper into the abyss of self-accusation and despair; there was something I had to do. "Please, teach me about the Spellcard Rules and how to defend myself against Yôkai. That's the reason why I came here with Mamizô in the first place!"

Reimu, Aya and Suika looked at each other at my words, as if conferring with each other wordlessly. The miko was the first to speak. "I can teach you the concept behind the rules, but it all depends on your aptitude for the spiritual... but when looking at you, I can see that you have it. You have already set a foot into the supernatural, so, surely it will come to you easily."

"But to learn fighting with Danmaku, you will need to learn how to fly, too," Aya stated and looked at me curiously. I was still bound by the thought that humanoid shapes were not aerodynamic, had too heavy bodies and limbs with too little surface area for lift to achieve flight, and the fact that humans had no special powers that allowed them to fly in any other way than by following the laws of physics. Reimu had been flying earlier, and so had Aya; I had even witnessed the existence of a ghost with no legs, floating in midair, and seen beams of energy causing widespread destruction. I hammered into my own mind that I should unfetter myself from the shackles of the common sense from the outside world. The rules were different in Gensôkyô, and I would need to learn them.

"And to fly, you need to be fit," Suika added, pumping her fist into the air. I looked down at the small girl with the horns and only now realized that the little arms sticking out of the shirt with the torn off sleeves were toned. Around her wrists she wore shackles, which appeared to be made of a dark metal, much like those seen in medieval prisoners.

"Why, aren't you a lucky one, Kagami-san. You have the Hakurei Miko to teach you Spellcard Rules, the Tengu claiming to be the fastest in Gensôkyô -" earning a protesting look from Aya; maybe because she was sure that the title of the fastest belonged to her without a doubt "- as your flight instructor, and an Oni to train your body."

"Let's begin with training your body, first," The Oni said with a grin.

"Wait wait, slow down. Our living situation has just changed. We need to do something about that first," Reimu interjected and pointed at the smoldering pile of rubble that was once her home. "Let me ask our Kappa engineers-" Aya began, but was interrupted by the miko. "No, last time they built something for me, there was a ton of unnecessary gimmicks. It actually made my job harder. Marisa might like those, but I prefer normal and traditional." Sighing, she looked up into the sky as if making up her mind. "I'll have to ask the Celestial then, I guess..."

"Then where will we live until the shrine is rebuilt?" Suika asked, earning a chastising glare from the miko.

"You are just a freeloader, so go back to where you usually live until then. No wait, actually, go back for good. You're drinking away all the ceremonial Sake!"

"But it's just too tasty!" The little Oni objected, invoking a deadly look. "There is something inherently wrong about an Oni drinking purified Sake, which is used to chase away evil!" Reimu argued and stood tall before Suika.

"It's not my fault that your purified Sake and other evil banishing tools don't recognize me as evil, hah!" The latter responded with a victorious grin. It instantly turned into horror when the miko pulled out an ofuda and slapped it onto the Oni's forehead. Suika looked as if she had just been electrocuted as she shook violently, before almost falling over; Reimu removed it in time for the little girl to catch herself. "You were saying?" The former asked in a rhetorical tone with a superior expression. Suika grumbled, but did not say anything further.

Watching that exchange, with Aya looking on curiously from the sidelines, I found myself relaxing slightly. The danger was over and only now did I feel how tense my body had been, exhaustion washing over me. I was able to breathe normally again and my mind began to wander. Still, I could not forget Mamizô, and thought that I had to report the matter to the Myôren Temple as soon as possible.