A/N: (Note/Disclaimer) All recognizable objects and characters belong to their respective owners. Mainly Team Shanghai Alice for Touhou Project or, as per usual, my own characters belonging to me.

Note 2:

("Common Language [Japanese in this case]/Speech")

(‘Foreign Languages’)

(" Thoughts (In their own native tongue)" )

(Attacks/Weapon names)

(Other/Foreign/ Speech & Text/Written, Titles)

(Actions/POV)

(Titles / Flashback/Time/Dates/Place)

(Narration & Everything else)

(“Demonic Speech”)

(‘Demonic Thoughts’)

A Retired Officer’s Shop In The Eastern Wonderland Chapter 9

Gensyoko: Universal Board

August 19th, 2003: 0800

Third Person: Omni

“I will go as the second player.” She thought for only a second before giving him the decision, an extra card was something quite nice for her type of deck. Desmond nods at that before looking at his hand in order to see what he could do.

“I will be playing Future Walker Casandra for my basic summon. And activate her ability. I am able to rearrange the first 3 cards of my deck once per turn.” He quickly took a look at the first three and did so, making something better for himself.

“I activate the card History Keeper from my hand, by sacrificing a character card featuring any affiliation containing the word time, I can summon a Past character from the extra deck of the same story level. Since Cassandra has the affiliation of Time Keeper, I will be sacrificing her.” Desmond smiled lightly while making a move to do as he said. Placing the card depicting a young woman reading a large tome into the magic play area.

“I activate the Trigger card: Forbidden Puppet Making: Necromancy from my hand, when the other player sacrifices a monster through a card effect, I take control of the monster that is sacrificed, change its element to dark, and add an alignment to the Grave Walkers,” Alice said while placing a card holding the image of a cloaked figure inside of a graveyard with a shovel in one hand and a grimoire in the other, waiting for a second to see if he would do an action off of her, with a shake of his head, their cards resolve.

“I summon the character Past Balancer and you get my Future Walker Cassandra,” Desmond said, allowing the entire thing to finish up. She nods while looking at her screen, reading his own card’s effects after they both put their respective non-character cards to the grave and shift Desmond’s card over to her side.

“I set a pair of cards and end the turn, you are up my lady.” The banter is one thing that he quite enjoyed out of all the time playing Summoners Story, it gave something refreshing to players when compared to other popular card games at the time of its release, and it had might shoes to fill as well.

“Alright then, I draw.” Something that not even a card effect could deal with, the first phase of any turn, the draw phase, of course, she could just deny the phase, but it would be foolish with a majority of deck styles.

“I activate the effect of Future Walker Cassandra.” She quickly mirrored his first moves without a thought, she would already be starting with a monster on her side as well.

“I summon the character card, The Courier, and activate their ability.” She states while placing the card of a person of indeterminate gender in a postal service uniform, they have a mask on their face.

“Once per every instance that The Courier is played, I discard a card from my hand or playfield to draw another card. I discard The Courier.” Another card used to thin the deck a bit in place of using the normal summoning of a term.

“I end my turn.” She leaves the turn simple and sweet. Demond nods in response with a smile. He takes a glance at the live audience of two, enjoying the fact that they found this particular game interesting enough for them to watch. Of course, none of this was the complex attack patterns or even the Story Crafters game rules.

“Why thank you, I draw.” Desmond looked at his hand with a smile, to the outside observer who knew nothing about the game, it was cut and dry considering that there hadn’t even been any attacks. Mokou and Alice were reading all the cards they saw, considering just how new they are to the game, it did make sense.

“I summon Time’s Police Force from my hand.” Depicted in the card was a set of people in uniform standing in line and salute. The men and women had the motif based on clocks, with all of them having a pocket watch or wristwatch on them.

“I attack Future Walker Cassandra with my Past Balancer, destroying it and dealing 5 damage after calculation if you do not object,” Desmond said while holding the card in question and tapping the card that turned against him. Cassandra had 10 defense compared to Balancer, who had 15 offence.

“I don’t counter with any of my cards.” She said with an even tone, having Desmond take his card back and placing it within his own graveyard, the standard place was taken monsters to go to when destroyed unless there was a specific card effect to bypass the rule.

“I activate the Trigger Card: Keeper’s Legacy, when a character card with the Keeper Affiliation is destroyed or tributed, I may summon another Keeper associated card from my hand or extra deck without the character card cost.” Desmond smiled slightly as he decided to go with a flair for the dramatics, while more serious games barely had any of the summoning calls, he enjoyed doing it, much to the enjoyment of viewers.

“With Cassandra’s Legacy paving the path, come forth and take thy mantle, Police Captain D.” The high rarity card was summoned from his extra deck. A young man stood in a similar uniform of the Magias Police Department, just different enough to not suffer from the impersonation of an officer or the wrath of the interstellar service. His left hand activating the comlink in his ear while he crouches behind cover.

“Due to summoner contracting, I can not declare an attack on the turn a character was summoned.” Desmond could see the amused sparkle in Alice’s eyes, though her face was still set into a stoic mask. He could tell that Mokou just sighed in the corner of his eye… though he got the feeling that she would enjoy it later.

“With no available actions, I end my turn.” Desmond gestured for her to take the next turn with the hand holding a single card. The doll was reading the description of the character card Desmond summoned, being far more autonomous and thoughtful than even some older officers he had ordered around.

“I draw then. First up, I summon Small Town Puppeteer before using the active card Love of the Unliving , if I have a maker card, I am allowed to summon a character card based on a creation related to the profession of a character card on my field from my hand. I only have Small Town Puppeteer on the field, meaning I summon a puppet character card.”

“May I explain why there is such a fluid ruling on this Alice?” Desmond said, stopping the game from progressing a little bit. While it is a demonstration match to show the rules of classic mode, it was still a match, so both sides would have to agree to the pause.

“Of course.” Alice quickly gave her permission, also interested in his explanation of the mechanic that governed this card. Mokou looked on with interest, it was not something that she had heard of before after all… though she never really had the chance to interact with human culture for a sustained period of time in the last few centuries. Mutch less play the more modern games.

“While the original ruleset is much more strict when compared to other rules, there is still an element of fluidity. The purpose of the game is to weave a story, classic mode just handles it by making it a linear path. The card Alice used is based on this concept. The in relation to the profession portion is largely undefined for this reason.”

“This card is a bit more on the logical side, a maker and a creation. When summoning her next monster card, I can either dispute with the card summoned or agree to its validity. By saying or doing nothing, I am saying that it is a legal move in our story, setting a precedent if another card needs to relate a card to another.”

“If I dispute it, however, we stop the game for a second. She has an option of stopping and revoking the move or asking for a judge or common sense to rule on it. Both of these would rule that it would be allowed when it comes to puppeteer and puppet.”

“If she were to try summoning a sentient sword instead of a puppet, for example, the judge would rule it a misplay, setting a precedent. Depending on the formality of the game and detailed rules, the punishment for it can range from undoing the move and replaying, to destroying the active card that caused the dispute and reducing her health points.”

“On the opposite end, if I were to lose the dispute, either nothing would happen to me, or I lose health points in proportion to the formality and detailed rules.” All the other room inhabitants nodded in understanding at this explanation, in losing hard rules, they gained a bit more room for creativity.

“There is also a game mode with a full stricter rule set, Railroad. It outright bans ambiguous cards like these altogether. So make sure your deck complies with these regulations when deciding a game or entering a tournament.” Desmond finishes up the final bit with a clap of his hands. This flexibility in rules and rulesets was the main reason why it got so popular, it could range from an old school card game to a tabletop RPG in flexibility.

“Who is the judge of this game?” Alice asked while placing a hand to her chin. Desmond just smiled lightly, he wondered how far along AI was in the outside world for a brief second. Technically it would be considered a poltergeist or spirit.

“Meet Eve, a poltergeist friend of mine who is presiding over the game,” Desmond said while waving to the cameras much to the confusion of all the others in the room when the AI did not respond for a few seconds. They all looked back and forth from the capture devices and the shop owner.

“Please don’t pick on my master.” He could already imagine her in a familiar maid dress and bowing… or to be truthful, she was literally projecting that image into his mind at the moment… the perks of having her as a partner were numerous…. But sometimes he wished he was never picked by her.

“Eve… we both know what our relationship is.” Desmond almost sighs while absentmindedly rubbing the bridge of his nose. All the girls in the room were still staring at him… though it was far more confused than before, they already interacted with rich people in Gensyoko after all. So they could understand the master part. Deciding to digress and keep the footage of the game short enough.

“Alrighty then, back to the game. I agree that a puppeteer’s creation is a puppet.” Desmond picks up his card once more while scratching the back of his head with the dominant hand. He just knew that they would be questioning him later.

“Right, I summon the puppet character card Vee I.” The image depicts the character as a wooden puppet with hair that was made of yarn. While being crude and simple in structure, you could tell that it was made with quite a bit of care.

“I now set three cards and end my turn.” Alice returns to reading the cards on her own screen, thinking about what he would have up his sleeve, she was already at a slight disadvantage with only two characters and chipped health. He would be on his second curated card now.

“Alright then, I draw.” Desmond already knew that he would have to end it soon, he already was burring through options to get a combo while she had a bunch of options open to her at the moment.

“First up, I activate one of my set cards, the active card: Truth Seeker , it allows me to attack the opponent with a character card with the affiliation peacekeepers. I have two such cards on my field, but I will use Time’s Force Captain to attack.”

“I activate my trigger card, Wire Trap in response. When a character card declares an attack on me or my own cards, the attacking card is destroyed, but I take 5 points of damage.” She already knew that she would last another turn, with the Police Captain D having 25 attack and Past Balancer having 20, she would have been in a far worse situation since the card she destroyed having 15 attack.

“Alright then, I attack Vee I with Past Balancer.” Desmond states with a calm expression, he expected it to happen when it was one of the cards in the starter deck that he gave her.

“But Vee has 25 attack points…” Mokou said while rubbing her chin, filling the role of the new player… which she was when it comes to this particular game. To which Desmond had an answer.

“Which is why I activate one of my own set cards. Final Sacrifice, when a character card I am attacking with would be destroyed by a monster due to an effect or battle damage, destroy both cards and deal 10 damage to myself.” The card showcases a person stopping an attack with another person running on past with tears in their eyes.

“I activate my Trigger card: Counter Spelling. Activated when another person plays an active card, I may nullify its effects and destroy the card in question.” An image of two magicians facing one another with mirrored spell circles coming together and slowly fading.

“I activate one of Time’s Police Force’s effect from the grave, once per a character card with this name in a game, I may reverse an action taken by my opponent and prevent the same action from taking place for the turn by banishing this card.” In his mental eye, he imagined the revealed card go backward in action.

“Now, go through with the attack for 20 damage,” Desmond said when she placed the card face down and did not play another card in place of it. With 70 health left, Alice measured whether or not it would be worth risking that final face-down card of his.

“I… Take the 25 damage.” Alice knew that it would not end well if she were to attack now, all of her instincts were screaming to her about the reason… yet her conscious mind could not connect it just yet.

“I end my turn with that.” He brought his hand to the screen beside him and started typing some stuff into the console, setting up the program to give a win and loss record to the individuals playing.

“I draw.” Alice took a look at the situation, she is in dire straights right now, another 45 damage could be incoming if she did not do anything.

Number of Words: ~2500 words

Date Completed: 5/3/2021

Note: And an end on a cliffhanger… but I will be focusing on this fic here for a while. On another note… Touhou 18 full released today… and Lost Word gets er global release on the 15th… so it is a good month for Touhou.

On another note, thank you all for enjoying the fic… I recently had a tragedy last month and only recently started to go full focus on my writing after having march off.