I come here sometimes, to where it ended. The land has healed, was healed by the gods of the mountain, but... sometimes I still feel something. Some remnant of what happened here, of what we were fighting. Or maybe I don't. Maybe what I feel isn't actually there. It's hard to tell, sometimes.

The battle here was the culmination of a series of events, of an incident more dangerous and more meaningful than any that came before it. It was something that, looking back, we of Gensokyo both should have seen coming and couldn't possibly have seen coming. Because we didn't know. Most still don't.

I learned the truth, and... it changed me. It's not the sort of thing you can learn and walk away unchanged. I understand why it was kept a secret; it's... not pleasant to know. But it had to be known, had to be learned. There was a danger, a threat to all of Gensokyo, and this truth was at its center.

None of us in Gensokyo saw the threat coming, with one exception. There was one who realized the danger, but even she didn't understand it. She saw what she expected to see. And yet, we still owe her much, for without her efforts, we would not have been able to meet the threat. But even she didn't truly realize what that threat actually was. Nobody did.

We were all simply going about our lives, unaware of the coming danger. Sure, there had always been periodic incidents, and some, such as the endless winter, had been potentially very dangerous. But others – the flying ship, for example – were harmless, and even the dangerous ones were resolved before they could cause any real harm. So we became used to this, used to the idea that we didn't have to worry.

We all got used to things as they were. We weren't ready for what came; it caught us by surprise. All of us. The magicians of the Forest of Magic.

The young magician youkai Liri focused, feeling the essence of the staff she held in her hands, and commanded it to change. She added to it the essence of flame, and felt the head radiating from it. She touched it to the ground, to a patch of grass. The grass caught fire, and she pulled her staff away and again commanded its essence to change. She removed fire and added water. She pressed it against the burning grass, extinguishing the flames.

The fairies, too childish in mind to worry even if they had realized they should.

"Too slow!" Cirno called out as she dodged around Daiyousei and flew off... only for Daiyousei to pop up in front of her and tag her before she could react. "Gah!"

"Tag! You're it!"

"Not for long!" Cirno lunged at Daiyousei, but her target wasn't there, having vanished and reappeared about twenty feet away. "Dammit!"

Daiyousei laughed. "You always forget I can do that."

"It doesn't matter. You're mine, Dai!"

"Then catch me if you can!" Dai flew off with Cirno in pursuit.

The humans, the 'youkai hunters' who target those youkai less willing to follow the rules.

The man moved forward carefully, well aware he was being stalked. Eventually, the youkai attacked, and despite his quick reaction, it quickly caught and overpowered him. But he wasn't alone, and his companion was an expert at stealth. The youkai had never noticed her, and her arrow struck it in the neck. Which didn't really harm the youkai, but it did distract the youkai for an instant, and the man had known it was coming. And he took his dagger and plunged it into the youkai's chest. Then an enchanted arrow struck it and delivered a blast of energy, and then the man stabbed the youkai again, and then a third and a fourth time, and it fell to the ground.

"Good work," the man said to his companion.

"Not a problem. The two of us are more than enough to handle a weaker youkai like this."

"Indeed, but you still did well. All right, come on. Let's get back to the village."

All of us, human and youkai alike. We all just lived our lives as normal. We didn't recognize the coming danger, and even the one among us who did see it coming didn't understand its significance, what it truly meant. But she would learn, as would I and others. We would learn far more than we ever cared to, and we were not prepared for it. I don't think anyone could be prepared for such a truth.

The sensation came again, and Rumia put her hand up to the ribbon in her hair. She knew what it meant, that brief pulse of energy, the flash . She knew what would soon happen to her. She didn't want it, but she knew there was nothing she could do about it. But it wasn't time quite yet, as she was reminded when her hand touched the ribbon and it pulsed again, giving her a clear message even without using words: Not yet. But soon.

Rumia knew it was coming. She only hoped that, once it was over, she would be able to return to who she was now.

But you don't understand. I know you don't. You can't. A truth such as this, it changes you. But you don't understand, because you don't know it. You haven't had your preconceptions stripped away, haven't had cause to question not just every decision you've ever made but also that you made them at all. You see what you expect to see. You already think you know, don't you? Who the enemy was, what danger we faced. It is with certainty, then, that I tell you:

You are wrong.

Well, it's certainly been a while, hasn't it?

Yeah, so for those who don't know, a while ago I put my current story, End Fantasy, on hiatus after its fifth chapter, intending to resume it after a revision/rewrite. This hiatus ended up being far longer than expected, mainly because I ended up getting distracted by the other story I was writing at the time over on Spacebattles, a Touhou/Familiar of Zero cross called The Third Eye Staring Into the Void. But I did slowly make progress with the revisions, and now they're complete. Rather than simply restart End Fantasy, however, I decided to relaunch it. This, obviously, is that story.

Now, this was a partial rewrite, not a complete one. As such, much of the first five chapters is still the same. In case any returning readers want to skip anything that's unchanged, I will be providing a list of changes for each chapter. This list will be at the end of the chapter in order to avoid spoiling anything for new readers, so just scroll down if you want to see what the changes are.

Now, this may seem like a change of topic, but there's something I'd like to talk about regarding this story, and it involves one of the most common complains I got regarding End Fantasy, that being the number of original characters. Though many canon characters are involved (most prominently Sanae), EF had a substantial number of OCs, and though I've trimmed their numbers a bit, there's still a fairly large number. The thing is, though, that only some of them are major characters. Liri, who appeared in the prologue here, is one of them, and she has a few friends who play roles in the story as well. There's also a couple kappa OCs who are important, and a couple residents of the Human Village are major characters as well. But there are far more OCs in the story than them, which brings me to the point I'm trying to make.

There's an idea in writing known as 'nominal importance'. Basically, this is the idea that only characters important to the story are given names, with everyone else remaining nameless or being referred to only by titles or whatever. The thing is, I often find that this doesn't really work. For example, there's a bit in chapter five involving a kappa, Hikari, who's a shift leader at the Underground Nuclear Plant. Her subordinates are not important to the story, and as such would remain nameless under nominal importance. But not using names for the subordinates is weird, because as shift leader, Hikari would know their names. In this instance, the scene includes Hikari giving instructions to each of them in turn, and she uses their names while doing so. It would be weird for her not to, not to mention how awkward it would be to write that scene without using names. There are many instances in EF where unimportant characters are referred to by name. Another example is Nitori and a colleague discussing who they're going to hire to manufacture parts they need. After all, if you're recommending someone to a colleague, you generally use that person's name.

As I said, the number of OCs in EF was one of the main complaints. And, yes, there were some unnecessary characters, who I've removed. But many of them are just 'hey, this guy told me something' or 'we should have this person make the thing for us' or 'hey, you, do this' kind of things. So I just wanted to make sure you all understood that just because there are a bunch of OCs with names, that doesn't mean they're all major characters.

Anyways, I'll be posting the revised versions of the first five chapters over the next couple weeks or so, then it'll be fully new content from then on. To those who enjoyed EF, I hope you find this version better, and to those who didn't, I encourage you to give this new version a try. And to everyone who reads it, please don't hesitate to let me know what you think.