Chapter 3

The Village

Alex, wandering his way towards the mountain, comes upon a small village. He immediately noticed that nothing in the village indicated any electrical capabilities of any sort. No power lines, telephone poles, streetlights, transformers or generators anywhere to be seen. Welp, guess I'm not calling anyone, Alex thinks with disappointment. Then he realizes that if there is a village, it probably means that there aren't any steel-bodied cannibals there. Well, either that or I'm about to become the main course he thinks, heading towards it.

Despite them all being quite polite, Alex can tell that the villagers don't particularly want him there. They only talk if he says something first, and all quickly come up with a reason why they need to be somewhere else. Then Alex notices a woman sitting on the ground by a building. She has silver hair, a strange hat, and a blue dress. Her knees are drawn up to her chest, her arms wrapped around them, and she is looking down.

"Um… excuse me, miss, but are you alright?" Alex says, approaching the woman.
"Yeah, it's just that no one showed up for class again today." the woman says.
"Class? Are you a teacher then?" Alex says.
The woman looks up at Alex, and says "Yes." She pauses. "Are you from outside?" she says.
"Apparently. At least, that's what everyone who hasn't attacked me has said so far." Alex says, not mentioning his failed attempts at making friends in the village. Hoping to be able to call at least one person in this crazy place a friend, he says "So, what is it that you teach?" He makes sure to use proper grammar, just in case she teaches English.
"I teach about the history of Gensokyo." the woman said.

"Is, uh… is Gensokyo this… place?" Alex says, trying to find the right word for a piece of land for which he has no idea of the size. The woman nods. "It sounds Japanese, but, we're speaking English, aren't we?"
The woman raises an eyebrow, saying "No, we're speaking Japanese. What is Engurishi?" her mouth having trouble forming the foreign word. She looks at him curiously. "How did you get here, anyway?" she says, growing suspicious of the man who made up languages.

"Oh, uh… A terrifying woman named Yukari, I think, said I was dangerous to her home or something." Alex says. The woman starts glaring at him. "H-hey! A-all I did was make a wooden sword float! I don't see how that could threaten that woman." Alex says, confused by her look.
"I guess you weren't trying to hurt us then. I suppose you can stay in the school for a while. And since you know nothing about Gensokyo's history, part of the conditions of your living here at the school involve attending my classes. I am Ms. Kamashirasawa." Ms. Kamashirasawa says.
"I don't want to stay here… I just want to go back home. Please help me get out of here, Ms. Kamashirasawa." Alex says.
"I'm sorry, but if Yukari says you're a threat to Gensokyo while in the outside world, I'll have to believe her. She may be a liar and a trickster, but the good of Gensokyo is always first and foremost in her mind." Ms. Kamashirasawa says.


"This just in: It appears there are more strange events surrounding the case of the suicide of Alexander Johnson. Despite all of the victim's genetic markers matching Mr. Johnson's, the victim lacks a scar below his right knee that Mr. Johnson apparently acquired by falling off of a ladder when young. Experts are puzzled by the genetic evidence, but believe that someone used the victim in an attempt to cover up a kidnapping. Police have found no fingerprints belonging to anyone outside the Johnson household, and both parents have alibis." *click*


Edit: Ugh, suddenly switching from present tense to past tense, then back again in the same paragraph. How do I used tense? . . . somebody remind me to never upload something right after writing it again. That was embarrassing. Meh, it's fixed now, so no harm done, I guess.