I've got quite a bit planned for this Book; more than one plot thread will be brought to conclusion here… Note that while it starts with Touhou stuff, it will move on into original territory.

…As a fair warning, I believe I should confess something: I've never actually played Touhou. I've read plot and character synopses on Wikipedia and TV-Tropes, I've read some fanfics and some dōjinshi, but I haven't actually seen the source material. So, if I get any details or characterizations or abilities wrong, please don't be too horribly angry at me.

THE FOLLOWING THINGS ARE THE PROPERTIES OF THEIR RESPECTIVE OWNERS; I DO NOT OWN THEM AND MAKE NO MONEY OFF OF THIS STORY

Mahō Shōjo Lyrical Nanoha (Teana, various other characters) – 7Arcs

Higurashi no Naku Koro Ni (Shion and friends/family) – 07th Expansion and Studio Deen

Shuffle! (Kaede Fuyō and associated characters) – Navel and Asread

Erika's New Perfume (Marie, Sarah, Erika, Timmy, Veronica) – DeviantArtist 'Lance the Young'

Mai-chan's Daily Life (Mai, Kizuna) – Waita Uziga

Star Wars (Ahsoka, Cody, Rex, Force Unleashed cast) – George Lucas, Lucasfilm

Halo (Forerunners, UNSC, Sangheili Alliance) – Bungie, 343 Industries

StarCraft (multiple characters, events, and devices) – Blizzard Entertainment

Naruto (characters, techniques, abilities) – Masashi Kishimoto

Mahō Sensei Negima (characters, spells, abilities) – Ken Akamatsu

Kingdom Hearts (characters, weapons, enemies, concepts) – Square-Enix

Neon Genesis Evangelion (characters, concepts, tech) – Studio Gainax

Elfen Lied (Kaede K., others) – Lynn Okamoto, Arms

Red vs. Blue (The Blood-Gulch Crew, the ex-Freelancers) – Rooster Teeth

My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic – Hasbro, Lauren Faust

Transformers Film Series – Hasbro, Michael Bay

Transformers: Beast Wars – Hasbro, Mainframe Entertainment

Yu-Gi-Oh! – Kazuki Takahashi, Viz Media

Sonic the Hedgehog – SEGA

Gears of War – Epic Games

Roughnecks: Starship Troopers Chronicles – Columbia Tristar (I think)

Mass Effect – Bioware

Metroid – Nintendo

Puella Magi Madoka Magica – Gen Urobuchi, SHAFT

The Legend of Zelda – Nintendo

Tōhō – ZUN

RWBY – Rooster Teeth

Pretty Cure / PreCure – Toei Animation

Kill La Kill – Trigger

PLEASE READ & REVIEW, AND TEND TO THE TROPE PAGES

-BOOK 30 START-

Realm ZT4-b

Amidst a quiet forest of bamboo, there was an echoing chime-like noise as a magic rune-circle appeared on the ground. In a flash of light, multiple people appeared standing atop it: Teana, Marie, Naruto, Sasuke, Reisen, Sunset, and Itachi.

"So this is your world, eh Reisen?" Sunset asked.

"Yeah" the rabbit-girl replied. "And… I know this place. We aren't too far from where I used to live, and from… her."

"Where are we, exactly?" Marie asked.

"Mayoi no Chikurin {迷いの竹林}" Reisen replied. "The 'Bamboo Forest of the Lost'. Eientei – the mansion where I was her trodden-upon servant – is deep in the heart of this forest."

"So where do we go from here?" Teana asked.

"That's an awfully good question."

The group turned at the new voice, seeing someone emerging from the bamboo. She looked somewhat young, perhaps a little older than Teana and those in her age group, with a slightly petite build, and very long white hair that reached nearly to her ankles with two side-tails starting halfway down and tied by three red-tipped white ribbons each, and a similar large white ribbon with red markings on it atop her head. She was wearing a loose buttoned off-white shirt over her small chest, along with a pair of red trousers with suspender straps that went up and over her shoulders. The red irises of her eyes seemed to smolder with an inner fire, gazing at the DDF group with suspicion and cautious curiosity. Upon seeing Reisen, she gave a slight nod of recognition, which the rabbit-girl returned.

"Mokō-san," Reisen said to the newcomer, "this group is part of the 'Dimensional Defense Force' I am now a member of; this is my teammate and… 'friend' Sunset Shimmer, our sensei Uchiha Itachi, Itachi-sensei's younger brother Sasuke and their cousin Teana, Teana-san's teammate Marie Swanson, and Sasuke-kun's teammate Uzumaki Naruto. Guys, this is this is Fujiwara Mokō. I believe I mentioned her a few times."

"Yes," Itachi replied, "a Hōrai-class immortal like your two former… 'owners'. And the nemesis of one of them."

"Of the other one besides my target, yes. Fujiwara-san is the sworn enemy of Hōraisan Kaguya, while my former master and now enemy is her direct subordinate and partner, Yagokoro Eirin."

"So the rumor was true…" Mokō said. "I heard you had gone against Yagokoro and struck out on your own."

"That's part of the story" Reisen replied. "Have a seat; we'll explain things with some more detail."

The explanations in question took nearly an hour, partly because a fair few concepts and terms had to be explained to Mokō, with the immortal in turn explaining her own grievances with the Eientei leaders.

"So," Mokō sighed, "we've both been wronged by those two… Reisen… wanna team up? We can fight them together. I can heal you mid-fight if need be so you can keep up with me. I have a special fire that can 'burn away' a person's injuries, restoring them."

"Eh? …Um… sure. I'll take all the help I can get!" She nodded, her expression hardening. "We can both make the people who've made us suffer pay for it."

"Careful not to slip too far, Reisen" Itachi warned her. "I'd hate to lose you to the darkness."

"R-Right…"

"All the same," Marie spoke up, "do you two really think you can pull this off? I mean, Reisen's been training a lot, but from what I hear those two are powerhouses. Plus, with how many times Mokō's fought them they probably know her moves by now…"

"Well, do we have a way to fix that?" Sunset asked. "If any of the locals sensed our incursion, we might not have much time to prepare for anything."

"Actually…" Teana replied, pulling a Capsule-Corp capsule out of her jacket pocket.

-SCENE BREAK-

Eientei Mansion

Several Hours Later

The sun was starting to set over the realm of Gensokyō. Within a mansion deep in the heart of the bamboo forest, a sigh was let out by a woman apparently of young-middle age, but actually much, much older. She was clad in a red and blue dress (red on the upper right and lower left, blue on the upper left and lower right), and her long silver hair was in a braid that reached down past her hips, crowned by a blue hat with a large red cross and six surrounding white dots.

Eirin Yagokoro's thoughts were distracting her from her work. It had been months now since life at this house suffered a fairly large change. She had severely misjudged Reisen's feelings about… well, pretty much everything; though apparently grateful and docile on the surface, over the years her bottled-up resentment and anger had grown and grown, made worse by Tewi's pranks targeting her and fairly often getting her blamed for any resultant damage. Tewi was, of course, in huge trouble after Eirin learned all that (via Reisen pinning Tewi up against a wall by the throat and chewing her out for it, right after she punched Eirin through a few walls); in addition to a hard and thorough spanking the night after Reisen left (augmented by an experimental new 'endorphin inhibitor' that prevented Tewi's backside from compensating for or becoming adjusted to or numbed by the pain, so that each strike hurt just as much as, if not a little more than, the last one), Eirin was now working the little bunny-girl like a dog, and taking a zero-tolerance approach to any mischief or sass. She'd cost Eirin her number-one assistant, after all.

Eirin wondered what had ever happened to Reisen. She hadn't been seen nor heard from by anyone since the day she left Eientei. Had she found someplace out-of-the-way to settle down? Had she left Gensokyō altogether, ventured out into the human world? …Or was she dead, killed by a stronger, hostile Yōkai? Or maybe captured by Lunarian hunters…?

Suddenly, she was pulled out of her thoughts as she sensed a brief flare of magical energy practically right outside the mansion, and the way it 'felt' it was most certainly deliberate – a call for her and/or Kaguya-sama's attention. As she headed down the mansion's entrance hallway toward the front door, she was joined by Kaguya-sama – a girl who looked to be in her late teens or early 20s by human standards but was – like Eirin – considerably older, slightly petite with long straight black hair, wearing a pink blouse and long red skirt. Tewi – a little girl with rounded bunny-ears sprouting from the top of her head and a fluffy white tail, wearing a pale-pink dress – followed behind them.

When they stepped outside, they saw a group of several people standing just outside the mansion boundary, some of them hidden from the trio's view behind the others. The two at the head of the group – a girl with long reddish-orange hair and a boy with spiky blond hair – stepped forward.

"Hōraisan Kaguya and Yagokoro Eirin?" the girl asked.

Eirin nodded as she and Kaguya stepped forward. "What business do you have here?" she asked.

"We are members of a multi-Realm coalition titled the Dimensional Defense Force," the young man with short black hair and wearing a black cloak with red flames replied from his place near the back, "a group of individuals and sovereign powers committed to protecting the Realms' inhabitants from various threats. My name is Itachi. As for why we are here, well… two of my three students have come to challenge you."

The group members at the front parted, revealing three girls who stepped forward. Sunset Shimmer, hanging back a little with her arms folded, had let her gold-streaked red hair grow down to her upper back over the past couple months, and was wearing an open black jacket over a dark-purple shirt, black jeans and black boots, as well as the pendant that was her dormant Storage Device hanging from her neck. Reisen was wearing a light-grey shirt, made loose but worn tight due to the size of her breasts, with a navy-blue open jacket, and a knee-length pink skirt over black shoes with armor plates over the toes, as well as a thin belt with the hilts of her single-prong plasma blades clipped to it; she stood with fists clenched low by her sides. Lastly, Mokō was now wearing a loose dull-red top and matching pants along with what could only be described as armored sandals, and had one hand on her hip as she joined Reisen in glaring at the group before her.

"Reisen…?" Eirin gasped softly.

"Mokō?" Kaguya said curiously. "And Inab… Reisen-chan, too? …Wait, 'students'?"

"The day I left this place," Reisen replied, "Itachi-sensei rescued me from Lunarian Hunters. He brought me with him back to DDF space, took me under his wing as a student in the shinobi arts and other forms of learning and training, and I've learned a great deal. A few months ago, he also took Sunset here as a second student. Not too long ago, we finally came back here to Gensokyō, and Mokō-san found us right away. We explained things to her, she came with us for a little extra training, and she and Itachi-sensei chose to have her become his third student."

"He may be only 22 years old," Mokō spoke up, "but he's wise, and he's very powerful and skilled. When we had a sparring match so he could measure my abilities, he won rather easily; he was so strong, and fast, and skilled, and so adept at reading and predicting my movements and actions… After I'd recovered, he offered to take me on as a third student, and seeing how handily he defeated me, I accepted, so that maybe I could learn how to fight like that."

"Nii-san has never lost a serious fight" Sasuke remarked with a small smile. "During the four-way free-for-all sparring fights he and I have with Teana and her brother, those two and I have to team up 3-on-1 to overcome him, and even then sometimes he manages a draw or a narrow win."

"Of course," Itachi chimed in, "I am neither the strongest nor the most skilled fighter in the Dimensional Defense Force; there are quite a few who could defeat me even if I fought at full power – Goku-san, Jiraiya-sama, the stronger alicorns…"

"In any case," Naruto spoke up, "these two have scores to settle with you. Of course, if we fought here, we might destroy this place, so…"

The DDF group bunched together, making physical contact with Naruto or with someone who was doing so. Eirin, Kaguya, and Tewi were then caught by surprise as three of Naruto's Shadow Clones snuck up behind them and laid a hand on each of them. Then, the entire group vanished.

Everyone experienced brief flashes of other locales as a rapid series of 'jumps' was made. After four such jumps, they finally stopped, finding themselves in a mountainous rocky area considerably far from where they started, and from any signs of habitation. There were a couple more Shadow Clones here.

"W… What the heck was that?" Tewi asked, looking around.

"That was my Hiraishin no Jutsu" Naruto replied. "The user, and anyone in contact with them, can teleport to anything or anyone marked with a special seal. My father was famous because of his mastery of it, and recently I finally managed to nail it down using the notes he left behind. Though, there is a range limit, but to get around that I sent out Shadow Clones – each marked with the seal – to different points all over this region. I had them find a suitably empty place to hold a big battle, and then used the ones between this area and the place where we started as 'beacons' for a Hiraishin relay-point network. …Heh. Dad never thought to do that to extend his range with it! …Of course, he could 'jump' greater distances than I currently can, so he didn't really need to…"

"Now then," Reisen said as she and Mokō stepped forward, "shall we begin?"

"I'll be sitting this out," Sunset said, "but if someone joins in on you people's side I'll join in to support my team."

"If they are sufficiently powerful," Itachi chimed in, "I will be intervening."

"Reisen, please…" Eirin said, softly and imploringly. "Do we really have to do this?"

"Do you really have to ask that?" the rabbit Yōkai snarled to her former master. "You treated me like a slave! You used me as a guinea pig for all those stupid medicines you cooked up! And you punished me for things that little brat did!" she pointed at Tewi.

"Um…" Kaguya spoke up. "If it's any consolation, later the day you left Eirin punished Tewi quite a bit once she figured out what had really happened…"

The little bunny-girl's hand drifted unconsciously to her backside at the memory.

"That doesn't make up for everything that happened! For the way you treated me, for the things you did to me! I'm not here for apologies or excuses! I'm here for revenge!"

"And as for me," Mokō said, "all the times I've tried to get revenge against you," she glared at Kaguya, "it hasn't worked well; we keep drawing instead of having any clear victor most of the time, and when one of us does win it's more often than not you, and we both regenerate afterward anyway. …Maybe this time, with an ally at my side, things will be different."

Tewi and the others of the DDF group were teleported away to a waiting Shadow Clone a few hundred meters away, overlooking the battleground but with a safe distance from it. The two pairs squared off, staring each other down. Soon they floated up into the air, preparing for an aerial battle.

"I've been waiting for this for a long time…" Reisen said in a low, threatening tone.

"Inaba… Reisen, please" Kaguya tried. "Can't we talk this out? And Mokō, can we just… let things drop, at least for now?"

(FIGHT MUSIC: Breaking Point – "Falling Down")

In response, Reisen's and Mokō's auras flared up, ki and magic flowing through and around them. The wind almost seemed to coalesce and swirl around Reisen's body, while Mokō's hands became wreathed in flame.

"No more talking" Mokō snarled. "No letting go! This is what we've been training for – what we've yearned for!"

"As Mokō says," Reisen said, "the time for talking is past! Now shut up and fight!-!"

Mokō made the first move, launching a fireball nearly twice as big as herself at Kaguya. A half-second later, Reisen had formed hand-seals and cast Fūton: Shinkūgyoku, launching a barrage of high-velocity compressed-air 'bullets' at Eirin. Both Lunarians raised Shield spells to block the attacks, and were surprised that the Shields took noticeable damage. They didn't have much time to get over their surprise, though, as the moment they dropped the Shields, Reisen and Mokō were in their faces, lashing out with fast and crushingly powerful blows. The Lunarian duo was forced to give ground (er, air) in the face of the dual assault; Reisen had so much power packed into her rapid blows that Eirin's arms hurt from blocking them even with how much physical reinforcement magic she was channeling, while steam flew from Kaguya's hands – surrounded by quickly-conjured Water magic – as she struggled to block Mokō's furious fiery fists.

The Lunarian pair finally managed to land a few attacks after several seconds on the defensive – Eirin spun around a swing and lashed out with a straight kick to the midsection while Kaguya managed a counter-backhand, both of them sending Reisen and Mokō back about a dozen meters. They followed that with a wave of danmaku – small white bolts of magical energy – sent at the revenge-seeking duo, but the other pair got in close together, and Reisen conjured a swirling Wind-magic barrier around them both, deflecting the bolts.

Upon dispelling the Wind barrier, Reisen pulled from her belt the hilts of her two plasma blades, activating them with a flourish. Mokō followed suit by summoning a sort of polearm called a guan dao – a staff of enchanted wood and steel tipped by an elegantly curved dark-red metal blade. They rushed in at Eirin and Kaguya again, and the Lunarian duo had to move fast to dodge the swings and stabs. Eventually, they got through; Kaguya let out a strangled cry as the blade of Mokō's guan dao pierced through her chest right next to her heart, while Reisen speared her two plasma blades through Eirin's lower chest and then sliced outward, almost bisecting her except for an inch-wide section of flesh and bone between the two blades' impalement points. The blade-wielding du followed with matching kicks that broke a few ribs on top of the blade damage, sending Eirin and Kaguya hurtling back.

The two immortals quickly regenerated, though the memory of the heavy pain was still there, as was the shock that Reisen had actually gone for a fatal blow (they expected it from Mokō by this point). Gathering themselves, they summoned their own weapons; Eirin now wore a pair of small forearm-mounted shields, each with a single blade/spike that stuck out over and past the tops of her hands (a traditional Lunarian melee weapon), while Kaguya conjured a naginata (a polearm similar to Mokō's). Steeling their resolve, they charged at their attackers. The sound of clashing metal and (enchanted, nigh-indestructible) wood rang out as Kaguya and Mokō exchanged strikes, while Reisen found her attempts to slice and stab Eirin stopped by the enchanted metal of her paired shields. Soon, Mokō and Reisen abruptly flash-stepped back, weaving hand-seals and taking deep breaths.

"Katon: Gōkakyū!"

"Fūton: Shinkū Taigyoku!"

A sizable fireball and a large 'cannonball' of compressed air and concussive force were exhaled out toward the Lunarian duo at high speed. Kaguya countered with a barrage of danmaku that just barely managed to cancel out the fireball, while Eirin 'braced' herself in her midair spot, channeled defensive magic through her upper body and crossed her forearm shields out front, wincing as the concussive wind blast shoved her back a few meters and made her arms ache and sting. After a second's recovery, Eirin went on the offensive, charging toward Reisen. However, just before she reached the rabbit Yōkai, Mokō intercepted her, catching her blow and striking with a kick that sent her rocketing backward. Next, Mokō flashed towards Kaguya, whose eyes widened as she brought her naginata up to block Mokō's guan-dao, straining to push back against the fire-user's enhanced strength. In this position and distracted state, she failed to notice Reisen appearing behind her until it was too late, and she let out a strangled gasp as one of the bunny-girl's plasma blades pierced her chest from behind. Reisen followed the stab with a palm-strike that sent Kaguya forward, and Mokō grabbed her by the ankle and swung & threw her at the rapidly-approaching Eirin as hard as she could, knocking her back even as she caught her wounded and regenerating mistress. Stunned by the sudden impact, Eirin looked up just in time to see Reisen and Mokō weaving hand-seals together, synchronizing their energies.

"Katon: Zukokku!"

"Fūton: Atsugai!"

The wave of flames released by Mokō was followed immediately by a large and tightly-focused vortex of wind from Reisen. When the wind technique caught up to the fire one from behind, it merged with and magnified it, creating a massive whirling firestorm that completely engulfed Eirin and Kaguya, the roaring inferno drowning out all other sound. Reisen and Mokō caught their breath as they watched.

"That wasn't enough, was it?" Reisen asked.

"Not likely, no" Mokō replied.

They kept their guards up, and sure enough the flames parted and died away to reveal Eirin and Kaguya hovering beside each other, their wounds regenerated.

"You're really going to make us do this, Reisen…" Eirin spoke softly, head down so that her frown could be seen but her eyes were hidden by her bangs. "You never told me how much you had come to hate it with us… though, I suppose I might not have believed you if you had… Even though I wronged you, and misjudged your feelings… I still cared for you, as my precious number-one student. But now… if you truly hate me so much… if you're so intent on severing that bond that you would strike lethal blows against both me and Kaguya-sama… then I don't have any other choice. If you're going to throw all your hatred and resentment at me and Kaguya-sama, then I'll show you what a Lunarian Sage can do!"

"Bring it, you manipulative bitch" Reisen snarled. "I'll kill you 10,000 times if that's what it takes! I don't care what lies you try to tell about 'caring' for me, when all you and Kaguya saw me as was a servant, a guinea pig, and a pet!"

They flew towards each other, with Mokō and Kaguya splitting off to fight each other at the same time. Reisen sent out a wave of mana bolts that curved and juked through the air in random patterns, more difficult to track or predict, but Eirin simply formed a Shield spell that blocked them all. The older woman then formed a three-dimensional circular 'column' of danmaku with a rounded 'tip' [AN: picture from The Grimoire of Marisa, also seen in Eirin's entry on en-dot-touhouwiki-dot-net] and fired them as if they were a single large missile-shaped projectile. With the speed of the compound-blast, Reisen couldn't dodge in time, and even though she raised a Shield spell she cried out as part of the barrage managed to break through and strike her. Panting a little, she growled and her eyes flashed red. Eirin was then facing a dozen Reisens, the illusions so masterfully crafted that even she couldn't discern the real one yet, and each one of them sent a wave of wind blades at her.

Meanwhile, Kaguya and Mokō continued their clash, their weapons a blur as they struck and parried.

"Why are you so completely obsessed with revenge against me, Fujiwara?" Kaguya said as she strained to push back against Mokō's weapon.

"You know damn well why" the other immortal growled. "After what you did to my father…!"

"He cheated! All I did was call him out for that in front of the others!"

"You know nothing about how our system of the time worked! Our family was disgraced! We lost our standing, our money, our honor! My father was branded as scum and tormented until he took his own life! My mother slit her own throat to prevent being taken as a slave by another clan! I was almost sold into prostitution to keep food on the table, and I only avoided that by running away, and finding and consuming what was left of that damned Elixir of yours! I spent over 1,000 long, miserable years as an outcast and pariah because of my immortality; for 300 years I was violently insane and killed anything in sight, and for 300 after that I lay in a cave and did nothing, constantly dying of starvation or dehydration only to revive and go through it all over again! You, little pampered princess, can never understand the hell I've been through! You sullied my honor! You destroyed my family!-! You ruined my life!-!"

By the end, Mokō's aura was surging like an inferno, and she sent Kaguya hurtling back with a rib-shattering, organ-rupturing kick. As Kaguya came to a halt several meters away, groaning as she let her internal damage regenerate, she sensed a sudden massive flare of ki/chakra building up in Mokō. The white-haired girl began concentrating her power and her visual focus, preparing to cast her newest 'ultimate' technique – the pinnacle of her flame-manipulation powers, something she'd been working on for years, finally helped to finish by Itachi-sensei, the embodiment of her pitch-black burning rage:

"Katon: Amaterasu!-!"

At the last instant, Kaguya felt an instinctual flash of panic and terror without knowing why, and she began to move to the side. This was all that saved her from having her head set ablaze. As it was, she cried out in shocked pain as a burst of jet-black flames erupted halfway up her arm, and began to spread up and down it. Panicking as she realized what it was, she immediately used the blade of her naginata to lop her burning arm off just below the shoulder. As it plummeted, the flames rapidly consumed it, working to burn it to ashes. She turned her gaze back to Mokō (who was panting slightly, the blood vessels of her eyes standing out), with a shocked expression as her arm re-grew.

"Black hellfire…" she whispered with shock and horror.

Kaguya's shock was for two reasons. First was finding out just how badly Mokō's life had been because of what had happened 1,500 years ago. Second was that Mokō could wield what she did. In the entire Universe, all the Realms, the number of things that could cancel out or overcome a Hōrai Immortal's regeneration and immortality and actually kill them could be counted on one hand. Black hellfire was one of them. There was nothing it could not burn – water, other fire, legend had it that it could even burn immaterial Concepts… Flames from the absolute center of the deepest level of Hell, supposedly used against only the blackest-hearted of evil souls consigned to that realm after death, so dangerous that even the lord of Hell himself dared not touch it… And Mokō could summon it. Ancient rumors spoke of beings of another realm who bore a special bloodline that enabled them to summon it at will. But for someone without that bloodline to conjure it forth would only be possible with one other prerequisite…

"Mokō…" Kaguya whispered. "All this time… I thought you took our feud as a game… You… You truly hate me that much? You can actually summon black hellfire… because of how strong your hatred of me is?"

Though they could use it freely after 'awakening' it even if their Hearts were later cleansed of darkness, outside of the mysterious rumored other-realmers only those with mastery over Fire who were subsumed in the deepest, blackest depths of vile hatred of something or someone could awaken the ability to call forth this power.

"About time you got it through your thick skull…" Mokō replied with a snarl, the irises of her eyes now visibly gold in color. "The torments you have directly and indirectly put me through… can never, ever be forgiven…"

Mokō then charged Kaguya, closing into melee range again and beginning another lightning-fast exchange of blows and close-range danmaku. And now, even as she fought for her life, Kaguya was crying; unnoticed by Mokō, tears intermittently fell from the moon princess' eyes – from guilt over how much pain and suffering her casual-to-her act long ago had caused the other girl, and heartbreak that the girl whom she had thought was a trusted friend instead hated her more than anything else in the world.

"Sagitta Magica: Series Lucis!"

A barrage of Light-type magical arrows came at Eirin from the multiple Reisens she was facing. She grunted as she raised a powerful Shield to block the blows, and then finally made her counterattack. Having memorized and tracked all the bunny-girls shooting at her as best she could, she quickly conjured several precision mana bolts and fired them at each one. …And she gasped in surprise as all the Reisens vanished as illusions.

'Where's the real one?-!' she thought.

The answer came in the form of a kick to the back of her head, followed by something spherical and glowing blue being slammed into and adhered to her mid-back as Reisen then flash-stepped back for safety. The detonation of the plasma grenade almost-completely blew Eirin in half, but even as she fell from the sky while slowly regenerating she conjured and fired a tightly focused wave of danmaku up at Reisen, dealing some damage. Reisen growled as she used what little healing magic she knew to repair some of it, and then she dove down at Eirin with blades ready, while Eirin finished regenerating and shot upward to meet her. The clash when they met sent out a shockwave audible over a mile away.

-Break-

The battle continued well through the night. With Mokō using her special fire to heal any serious injuries Reisen took and partially recharge her, all four of the combatants continued beating each other senseless into the wee hours of the morning. Finally, the glow that preceded sunrise became visible on the eastern horizon. Mokō and Kaguya were on the ground several meters away from each other; it could not be told if they were conscious or not, but it was clear that neither had any energy left to continue their fight for now.

Reisen and Eirin stood facing each other, hunched over as they panted for breath, both of them exhausted. Reisen gritted her teeth as she struggled up to standing straight, glaring at her enemy.

"If I can't overcome you," she panted out, "then I'll at least make… you experience torment equivalent to what you've put me through! Genjutsu: Tsukuyomi!"

Reisen's eyes flashed bright red, and Eirin's eyes went wide and blank as the technique took effect. After a few seconds, her eyes rolled up, and she collapsed unconscious. Reisen allowed herself a tiny grin, before she finally succumbed to exhaustion and fell backwards. As the long-watching DDF group finally began moving in to gather the four battered and unconscious combatants, the top 'edge' of the sun peeked out over the horizon, beginning its rise over Gensokyō.

-CHAPTER END-

Next Time: a specter of the past emerges – a new comrade of old foes, looking for some fun and some payback