Shiomiya Shiori was the first to alight the train as its doors opened to let in the air of Suwa into its car, and she, shy as always, took refuge beside a pillar in the station to wait in fidgety stillness for her friends to come. The wind entering the station blew at her hair, and the knowledge that some stray strand could get in her eyes made her uncomfortable. Shiori didn't like the discomfort that would have brought, so she brushed them aside. It would have been pretty embarrassing if the others had come to find her in distress from a single piece of hair in her eye.

The holidays had never seen her go out that much. She would always come to the school library to read and rearrange their catalogue, instead, because that was how she had always spent her holidays. Her family rarely moved around, preferring to enjoy themselves in the avenues of entertainment in Maijima, such as the beach, or the city life- both far from what she would prefer- or, in the rare occasions, the insides of her house, and so the thoughts of exploring the world outside her library never came to quite this level of excitement, for Shiori. How her heart would beat with each passing station made her nerves wrack with fright as she began to dread the possibilities of an illness, and, even when her Goddess Minerva assured her of her safety, she couldn't help but continue fearing.

On the issue of why she was alone, well, that was due to the fact that, in the ensuing rush into the train that would take them to the far lands of the Nagano Prefecture, the six girls had separated, the crowd too much for them to handle. Shiori found herself alone, stranded. She did not bring herself to tears or panic, however, for she, and Minerva as well, reassured themselves that the others would not suddenly disappear into another place, and that they knew when to exit.

She felt how tired her arms were, and placed her bag down. It wasn't particularly heavy, because she'd never traveled before and forgotten to consider many necessities, and besides, she only had one day to pack. They only had a week to find Keima and bring him home- there would be no delays stopping them from doing so. The Goddesses and their hosts had to make sure of that. Her Goddess had to make sure she wouldn't get hurt. She just hoped nothing would come and break those promises.

A call from the distance turned her attention towards it. The other five had convened, and, having looked and found their last member, they were rushing with their luggage towards her. She opted to stay put, for the crowd between them still looked threateningly expansive, and before long they reached her, beckoning her to follow them to safety, but firstly an excursion in the city. She followed with few words spoken.

First, a hotel or inn before they go to find Chihiro. There were a few debates, but Shiori managed to slip in rather promising suggestions during the kerfuffle they had walking the streets. Having read about Suwa's many features in the library, and reminding herself what they were with a repeat of the readings- geographical, tourism, flora and fauna, etc.- she was well-versed with what affordable lodgings were around. They could have gone for Chihiro's place, but they had been booked out, with her and Keima's room being the last for the holiday.

In the end, they followed Yui's choice: a pricey place, close to where Chihiro had been staying. The wad of cash she pulled out was spectacular. Well, it was more like a wad of numbers and a credit card, but words can make vivid images, and it certainly did in Shiori's mind. They settled down, and set out to find Chihiro.

The matter concerning Keima's disappearance affected her deeply, even if she had lost much of her interest in him on account of how much he and his significant other worked together, as a couple: a study in semantics, a thematic ballad, a… a really romantic outcome, better than some of the romance novels she had read. Still she cared for him as he did for her and her problems, and so, alongside her Goddess, willingly obliged to the case.

Was it, perhaps, time for detective Shiori? Oh, she didn't know. She and Minerva could pull that out later.

"There's Chihiro!" Shiori heard Ayumi call, before the forward rush of the party got her moving. She tailed behind, a meek little shadow scuttling to catch up with the body.

She watched, quiet as always, as they spoke. Ayumi, Yui and Kanon were the loudest. She supposed it was to be expected: they were close friends through music. The first two had a band with Chihiro, and Kanon was there to support them, or so she inferred. The second one. She… inferred that. Not the former. Tenri gave her greetings, naturally, and Tsukiyo did her's as well, though she seemed much less inclined to speak, even if her self-confidence far exceeded Tenri's. Chihiro took both greetings warmly, and then noticed her, Shiori. She bowed as she greeted. She hoped it would curry her interest and not make antagonistic her intentions; because she was scared her shyness would be interpreted as anti-social tendencies, she had to exert herself. Also, who even remembers the librarian?

"Ah, you're the librarian, right? Haven't seen you in a while, huh."

Well, she supposed some people had good memory; but, other than that, she was happy that someone recognized her. With welcoming hand, she and her shook it off.

"So this is where you guys stayed," Ayumi remarked as she took off her shoes, jumping onto the raised floor and scanning the modestly-sized room even before any of the other six could take off theirs. Two beds, a television, a rice cooker on one corner, and windows the size of entire walls. The bathroom door was beside her, and at the scent of shampoo, she blushed, for the thought of the two sharing one single room together embarrassed her.

Yui was the second to let her feet touch the carpet. Her legs instinctively rubbed her soles on the fabric as she herself took in the sights. "Two beds?" she asked, noting the indents in both, and the careless tossing of the blanket on one, perhaps remnants of a panicking girl digging into the bed to catch her boyfriend from getting pulled into a dream, or something.

"Y'know, Chihiro," Yui began as she turned to the group entering with their footwear at the door, "You're taking this better than I, or any of us, would've thought. I mean, didn't you say he was sudden whisked away by some 'hole' from nowhere, right here, in this room?"

The girl in question chuckled nervously, and the group turned suspicious gazes towards her. "W-well, something happened. Once I explain it to you, then you'd understand, I guess."

Eyebrows raised. Tsukiyo interjected with a simple, "What happened?"

Then, to the Goddess-less girl's surprise, Tsukiyo's doll began to speak, her sullen voice booming in the room. She had known of the Goddesses, from fragments of her memories and such, but the experience was still far-flung from the real, and into the realm of the surreal, for her.

"Wait," Luna the doll, or, more precisely, Vulcan the Goddess, spoke to her sister Goddesses, a hint of shifting concern in her voice, "Do you notice that? The lack of something in the air of this room?"

Shiori, perhaps swayed by Minerva, frantically took out a small mirror from her pocket- just in the case of these situations- and let her little Goddess project on the screen. She, sheepishly, answered Vulcan's question with doubtful eagerness, "W-well, there's no magic in the room."

"Magic?" noted Chihiro, though her question fell to deaf ears as the others began their discussions.

Mars found herself using the television screen to speak her thoughts. "So what? Isn't that conflicting with the theory that magic was used to scoop Katsuragi away?"

"No, silly," Mercury drawled, appearing on the same surface as her sister just so she could knock her in the head- the hosts had rarely ever seen them on one place together, even when they have manifested in their host's bodies in the same room, multiple times before, "Oh, Mars, your magical affinity is still so much weaker than ours."

"T-then, what is it?"

"I can answer that~!" Apollo's voice echoed from the bathroom, specifically the mirror within, "As a medium, I can sense magic the strongest, so let's think about it: there's no magic in here, and, outside, there IS. You all felt it, right? Vulcan, Minerva, Mars, Mercury, Diana?"

Diana, whose name sounded to be the sole focus of her sister Apollo's listing, popped up on Tenri's reflection in the window. Rather relieved that she had the opportunity to speak to someone other than her host, she cleared her throat, and answered Apollo's rather specific inquiry. "There's a high concentration of magical residue in this city. My senses are pointing to-"

"That big lake in the center~" Apollo finished for her, much to her irritation, "So why won't this place have magic, at all? Could it have never gotten here, or could it have gone somewhere? Like that big hole that sucked Keima in?"

"Impossible," Mars mouthed, dumbstruck by the idea that had popped into her head, "Wouldn't that mean that his significant other would have been sucked in, as well?"

Chihiro added in the din of their discussions, "I… I didn't feel anything pulling me in. He just fell into it. It opened on the mattress, he fell in, and it closed…"

"So that may not be the answer…" Vulcan sighed.

Immediately, before they could continue on, Minerva spoke up in a hurry, "W-wait, w-what if the magic did get absorbed into the hole? L-like diffusion, or something. I-I read it in the library: how substances like g-gas move to places without it."

"Ah," Apollo's volume rose at the notion, "That could be true, true~ Residual magic usually flows everywhere, but it does rush into places devoid of it."

"So what you're telling us," one of the hosts, Tsukiyo, began, "Is that whatever this 'hole' Keima fell into has no magic?"

"Totally empty of it. If what we've been feeling walking around this place's the average level of residual magic, then sucking a room as big as this totally dry would mean someplace HUGE."

"Well, then, whatever else Chihiro has that she's not telling us may flesh things out."

Eyes turned towards her. Chihiro gulped at the graveness their eyes tossed to her. "W-well, I got this letter." She went to the side of the bed, where the cabinet was, and took it out. The moment she pulled it out was also the moment the entire room went quiet.

It was no simple letter. It was a scroll. An real, clearly ornamental ancient scroll. And on it, a retied ribbon.

"It came with this, too," she slid a seal out, and showed it.

The Goddesses- save for Apollo- gave a start at the sight.

"Is that…"

"Yes. The Seal of the Four Realms."

"What!? Let me see, let me see! I've never seen the Seal of the Four Realms before!"

"The mystery thickens. From faint memory, I presumed that the seal hasn't been used for three centuries."

"W-why, though? Why would Katsuragi be employed by a coalition between them? I-is this some Doomsday plot, l-like in the books!"

"Open the letter," Diana insisted, her voice silencing her sisters, and her gaze cold and sharp. The seven girls gulped, grimaced and swapped looks of doubt amongst each other.

What happened to Katsuragi Keima?

"Show us."

The scroll was passed around the hosts, and each one of them crinkled their brows together at the sight of its contents. It was gibberish, through and through. Strange symbols barely mimicking some sort of tangible alphabetical system stared back at them, and no one but the Goddesses could understand their message. Ayumi squinted and gave up in the span of a few seconds. Tenri cocked her head, but waited patiently for Diana to fully comprehend it. Kanon made the gibberish into some fantastical language. Shiori held on it the longest, as she tried to recall whatever fictional language could fit with the words she was looking at, but in the end, she came up empty, and passed the scroll to the next viewer. Tsukiyo tossed the thing aside, appalled by the sight, and Luna had to snatch it from the air and act as Vulcan's eyes to read the thing. And Yui…

"Oh, what is this?!" It wasn't Yui, but Mars, who exclaimed in rage at the thing. Suddenly, without warning, her host's arm threw the scroll to the wall, smacking it so hard that part of the paint bruised.

"O-oi, don't do that without warning, Mars!"

"Ah, s-sorry, but that doesn't matter in the face of this! This 'letter' of yours," she pointed a finger powerful enough to break swords at the limp thing on the floor, "Is just a simple cease and desist letter, a perfectly basic template New Hell sends to rebel Devils! There must be hundreds of copies of the same thing in their warehouses, or whatever they use to keep them!"

"Calm, sister Mars," pleaded Mercury in her droning voice, before her hands landed on her shoulders and shook her roughly out of the anger. "Did you even read the entire thing? Look at the signature."

As the sisters spoke, Shiori scuttled forward to take the scroll off the floor. When Mercury's last sentence entered her ears, she, presuming it to be the right course of action, unfurled it to show the room.

And, there, on the signature:

'The boy will return.'

"W-well," Ayumi was the first to speak, glancing at Chihiro as she did so, "I guess you being okay with it makes sense, now."

"That doesn't answer who took him." Eyes turned to Luna. "New Hell is brimming with magic, so Vintage or Satyr wouldn't fit; Heaven as well, and they usually like to do things their way, and the mortal realm is saturated with a small layer in every crevice. Nowhere in the realms is there a pocket empty of magic that could have done what Apollo proposed has happened in this room."

"Uh…" Now eyes turned to Ayumi, who was pointing up. "The… the moon?"

Everyone blinked.

"Er… how would the moon work, Ayumi?"

"Yeah, Keima can't breath up there!"

"U-um, m-maybe a space… suit?"

"Are you supposing that they also took a space suit? Wait, who would take him to the moon in the first place?!"

"Space…"

"Tenri, why do you sound so mesmerized by that?"

"No, no," Diana's voice intervened the commotion, "The Lunatic Kingdom would have no use for him, and they would definitely never send a letter written by Hell…"

"Besides, magic is still abundantly used, the last time I had any contact with them."

"Wait," Chihiro muttered, her eyes veering to the ground, "There's the concept of Hell and Heaven, Devils and Goddesses, and Ninjas and Ninja Magic, but now they're Moon People!?"

"Whoa, whoa, slow down, Keima's lover," chided Apollo, "Those guys are out of the equation. They've got a good alibi, a reason not to get involved and all."

"Could it be that 'fourth realm' on the seal," Yui suggested.

"Oh," Tsukiyo agreed, "You all did miss that one."

"No way," shrugged Apollo, looking the least bit convinced, "That Witch of the Gap would never have any use of him."

"Now there are Witches, too?"

"Calm down, Kosaka. We understand that you are learning much, but please: we are in a deep discussion, here."

Chihiro sighed, and nodded solemnly. Being the only one without any connection to Divinity was starting to make her envious.

"Now, who else-"

"Wait!" Minerva spoke up, "W-what if the Gap Witch has a use for him?"

"And what would that use be?" Mars questioned back, curious leer growing on her countenance.

"Yes, she would never let anyone, much less Katsuragi, into her abode. Do you remember when we tried to ask her for help all those years back? If so, then you must understand the kind of creature she is, Minerva."

"W-well, Diana, t-there's never been reports of how her 'Eastern Wonderland' works. W-what if-?"

Much to the group's surprise, the sudden ringing of the doorbell broke their conference in twine. And they were getting somewhere, as well! The Goddesses conveyed varying degrees of annoyance at the furnishing, much to the embarrassment of their hosts, and Chihiro, made further uncomfortable by their slowly-increasing wrath, quickly answered the door.

Feet tapped on the floor. Hands scratched the back of necks. Bodies swayed in the wait. None of them followed human nerves and muscle.

Ayumi's lips fluctuated around, rising and lowering as it reacted to the unsung thoughts swimming in her mind.

Kanon hid beneath the sheets. The reaction of any ordinary superstar having come back from a short tour overseas.

Yui frowned and glanced at the spaces between the beds.

Tsukiyo held onto Luna, and rested her chin on its head.

Shiori turned her mirror, and looked at the eager Minerva, wondering as to what she wanted to say. Without a second thought, she stored the mirror away, afraid that someone may enter.

Tenri waited patiently.

The sound of the door closing signaled them to prepare their brainstorming, but, before they could confirm that no one was entering, Chihiro's voice echoed through:

"I… I think they sent us another letter."

The entire room stopped moving.

"They said it was from some foreigner-looking woman. I don't really know anyone like that, so… I'll open it."

"Does it have the Seal?" Vulcan questioned with frantic breath, her suddenness making the other Goddesses hold their tongues. Their hosts, on the other hand, crowded round her to peek into the new letter.

"N-no. It's not a scroll, this time, though. It's a real letter. Let me…" She plucked the thing open. "Okay, I'll read it aloud."

"If it's Hellian, then you might now-"

"Wait… This is Japanese. But there's only a few lines!"

Eyes widened.

"Say it."

Diana beckoned, her body shivering for some reason unknown to them.

"Read what's inside."

Chihiro grimaced at what she hoped was not bad news, and promptly began, the eyes of six others vying for the same piece of paper that she held.

"We… of Hell,"

That sounded familiar to the Goddesses. Too familiar.

"They of Heaven,"

Someone gasped. No one checked who it was.

"Them of Humanity,"

"Well, wake me up when you guys need me."

"And I, of the Gap…"

Chihiro gulped at the last stanza.

"Is that enough for you Goddesses to start looking?"

O - O - O - O

The Ministry of Right and Wrong found itself in a dense, tar-like slog of a work flow, as always. Those who aged beyond a century- centennials and the mythical kind, mostly- were allocated for the judging systems of the Enma, as not only were New Hell's systems straining under the weight of the cruel world above, they also could not make fair and accurate judgements to those with long histories- in essence, long lives. Knowing the rarity of humans that decrepit, and the even rarer chance of many passing away in one flip of the coin, each passing day was filled with nothing but report writing and breakroom talks for the Enma. That was the downward trend most of the Enma experienced for the past three hundred years, their bodies morphing into lazy balls of meat and judging prowess gone stale, almost losing the lustre and replacing it with disinterest with the cases of yesteryear, and the changing times looked to have forgotten them and their massive undertakings before the rise of Almage-Machina: how they would judge hundreds of thousands, how the Sanzu would be alive with ships, and how the docks would be packed with the grieving, the accepting, or the protesting.

That all eluded Shiki Eiki, the little Enma walking down the stairs to her courtroom, whom, throughout that span of time, made herself busy with a little location erased off the maps of the world, called Gensokyo. Everyone who lost their lives within the barrier would, without fail, come to the Sanzu, and meet her in her vocational space. And today, like any day in the Ministry of Right and Wrong, she was finding herself swamped with the rush of souls to be judged. Where so many came from, she did not know, and she was suspecting her ferryman to have gone lazy during one period of time- one which, much to her annoyance, she had problem remembering. But that was no excuse for her to slack off. She had to rush, rush, rush, and complete what she was set out to do. It was her duty, after all.

Someone was waiting for her by her courtroom as she finished climbing the stairs. With a frown, and an angry snort to boot, she came upon the stranger with discipline.

"Moternaster, I would have expected a Chair Devil-turned ferryman like you to be taking your responsibilities outside, ferrying more souls into Higan," she greeted in her usual callousness, and as expected it gained the amused look of the Devil with the rose-gold head of hair.

"Ah, there you are," the abnormally thin Moternaster (was she like this, before?) replied, a friendly nonchalance in her smile, "Just making sure you're okay, Eiki."

Shiki gave a friendly scoff in acknowledgement of her appreciation, but she nonetheless found herself peeved: the ferryman had a job to do, and that job was not to come here and make the souls wait. She prepared to shoo her away with polite words of wisdom, but before she could do so, the ferryman asked her:

"So… It's been a few days since I've been working with you. You miss your old ferryman, yet?"

Eiki cocked her head to the side. It was an innocent question, something to be expected between two old friends, and yet it silenced the Enma and made her consider her answer.

"I… suppose I do…" she muttered in reply, a hand propping her chin. "But what does that have to do with work?"

"W-well," Moternaster scratched a nervous itch on her own chin, "I'd have presumed a ferryman and Emma's relationship is... how should I say it, stronger than the usual duo?"

She flinched upon feeling the jab of the little Eiki's glare. The judging, however, came and went, and Eiki turned away to contemplate the newfound context she had been presented. "She is a precious friend of mine- no matter how lazy she is…" the latter half she whispered with spite, "But I have a remedy for that."

"Oh," emitted the ferryman, a look of great interest in her face, "And what would that be?"

"Tea."

"Oh…"

"And…" Shiki added before she looked away, seeming strained to reminisce something in her mind, "And what? Hmm, I can't remember-"

"M-maybe a visit every once in a while?!" Moternaster cut her off, excited and rushed for words. Eiki drew a cautious leer at her friend, her occupation asking for no mercy from her when it came to dealing with her subordinates, but, after a moment of silence and meeting eyes, she sighed, and shook her head in disagreement.

"I'm a bit tired of seeing my ferrymen all the time. Perhaps a nap during my break is the right answer."

And with that, the two nodded their condolences and departed to their own paths. Shiki, with a smile on her face, longed for the courtroom. Why she felt this 'longing', she did not know, but that was not going to stop her from doing her duty.

"Let the trial be in session. I will be your Enma in this passing, Mister… Katsu…"

She couldn't bear the redness of her face. Eiki called for a break.

O - O - O - O

Moternaster, upon returning to her boat, pushed it out to the Sanzu, boarded it, and began to sail back to where she was posted in. It was a simple process, a habitual repetition that she would have to do every day for the next few weeks or so, until all was done, and the pair in the Runaway Spirit Squad was done with their tasks. This time, though, she added one last step to it. Pulling at a piece of her hagoromo, which she had brought with her for good measure and reason, she formed what looked to be a phone-like device, and began speaking into it.

"Hey, Onozuka, it's me, Moternaster," she said, her voice loud and clear for the other end to hear, "Got a report to give to Katsuragi."

Onozuka Komachi, the ferryman replaced by Moternaster, pouted as the news funneled into her side of the hagoromo. She squinted and pushed the receiver end of the hagoromo deeper into her ear just to hear it properly above the wind, its whipping contesting the transmission. A grumble escaped her throat.

"Why can't you just relay it to me?! I'm the one carrying the guy out of the Sanzu!" she protested, but then felt her hagoromo get pulled to the side. Katsuragi Keima, hanging on to her two arms, with the wind whipping his face, breasts pushing down his hair, and body parallel to the scythe right beneath him, put the screen-like hagoromo on the side of his face, and began his series of questions.

"So, how is she?"

"Shouldn't I be asking that-"

"Quiet, do you want us to crash or something, Shinigami who couldn't even prepare a bottle-!"

"Hey, guys, chill," interrupted Moternaster before she answered his question. "Shiki's fine. She's getting back on the workflow, and she… well, looks like she doesn't care about Komachi not being here, anymore."

"She's forgotten everything?"

"Yeah. Can't even remember whether or not she was in bed or in the courtroom throughout whatever you guys were doing."

"And… well, what about the Runaway Spirit?"

Moternaster chuckled into the receiver, before the sound of wood beaching on the dirt reached his ears. "I'll keep an eye on it. Runaway Spirits don't really travel too far once they're out. They're too weak to do much."

Keima and Komachi both sighed in relief at the news, before the Ferryman's voice interjected their moment of respite:

"Don't concern yourselves with the Sanzu anymore, both of you," Moternaster continued, pausing to bicker with one of her passengers-to-be, "I, uh, ain't exactly a pushover when it comes to ferrying and catching Runaway Spirits."

"Okay. That'll be all," the blunt Keima rescinded his part in the conversation, and Komachi, noticing his silence, popped a smirk before she did the same.

"Take care of Eiki, Tsubakikins."

"Don't have to tell me twice. See you guys." And thus, the broadcast ended.

Keima had absolutely no idea as to why the Chair Devil would even forgive them for confining, and forgetting, her in a Detention bottle for such a prolonged period of time, but for now he was relieved that Shiki was fine, and that they weren't going to be penalized for anything. Komachi shared the same thoughts, though hers were a bit more personal, seeing how she was the one doing all the kidnapping, and such. In any case, the fact that they were leaving unscathed made for all the more convenience and time-save. All that they had to focus on now was the next step in this wild, nonsensical ride.

"Takes a while," she began to speak to the sack of meat in her arms, "For us to get to Gensokyo, especially since you're weighing me down."

"Okay," Keima replied with little fanfare. As they ascended through the gloom that was the fog of Hell's surface, he began to brace himself for the blinding sunlight and the coming freshness of oxygen. The Sanzu had been a very musty place, save for the Ministry, and he was afraid the overwhelming dissonance stemming from his body's adaption to the Underworld would cause him to go rather numb. Muscles tensed, and his eyes shrunk with his closing eyelids.

"So… Katsuragi?"

"Y-yeah?"

Why was she talking at a time like this?

"You've never failed a romance before, r-right?"

"Are you questioning God?"

Komachi blew hot air at the riposting question, "Tell that to the actual Gods~ But seriously, if you're that good, do you have, like, an actual girlfriend, or something?"

After a short period of silence, it was Komachi herself who answered, perhaps rather ashamed of asking the question, or too intolerant to the thickening awkwardness forming between them. "N-never mind, I'm sorry I-"

"Yeah. I do."

Komachi looked down, to see his face half-covered by her chest and clothes. Her eyes, sure with surprise, never met his own pair.

"R-really?"

"Kosaka. Kosaka Chihiro. That's her name."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, don't just say her name all lackadaisical, like that, 'specially to a Shinigami! You don't wanna curse her to meet me when she dies, would ya?!"

Keima pushed his glasses up, and stared forward, past her eyes, and into what was a growing illuminance in the distance. "Well, let's just say that I think, with your kind of character, knowing that there's a named person waiting for me might make you work a bit harder."

Komachi, caught off-guard by the reason, stared back at him for a moment, stunned. She swore she felt hot in the cheeks when the compliment waltzed out of his tongue. Still, that didn't stop her from appreciating the snark, and she snickered, before the rising air in her lungs grew too much and she had to laugh. The wizened centuries-old Shinigami, having lived long enough to at least infer from the dialogue of youngsters, found his speech absolutely comedic, yet doubly charming. To think that someone who would woo and kiss girls left and right had some tact and dedication in him to move on from each one, and yet hunker down with the special girl.

Once the harrumph of her laughter died down, she asked, with genuine curiosity in her voice, "She one of your 'captures'?" It was the last question, she promised, and she shot him a grin to prove it; for no one would want to wipe a smirk of this value off her face, not even herself.

Keima nodded as he answered, "Yeah."

"What got you interested in her~?" Ah, look what she did. Forgetting her promise and all~ But it was so tempting.

"She… surprises me."

"What? And all the other girls don't?"

"A conquest's surprises, twists and turns and the events that a girl gives you in a real relationship are two very different things."

"Yeah, sure. See if I'll believe you, playboy."

"Don't just think I don't actually love Chihiro, you old hag!"

"Want me to drop you?" she asked with her grin still in place.

That was the actual last question, for when she brought up the threat, he drew back into his usual, meditative-like silence, ending whatever they had conversation-wise. Komachi sighed, rolled her eyes, and looked up. The bright star in the sky grew into a great lamp as it bathed every inch of their body facing it with illuminating incandescence, of colors of all gradients.

A part of her still lurked undecided on the issue she had with the boy touching lips with her Enma, but, guaranteed that she was fine and forgotten, the thoughts did not disturb her as much as she had once thought. In fact, it had become but a distance, one-day old memory, now, for she, wise as ever, had pushed past that contingency in her job, and veered her eyes to the positives. Her post was manned by a capable Devil, Eiki was fine- she, embarrassing to say, was not 'missing' Komachi to death- and this boy she had right here, this husk that, to the blind, resembled too much a thing lacking empathy, sympathy, or even a little bit of libido- owing to his inaction upon being touched so much (she chocked that up to all that freezing from the bodily contact, because come on, he hated her touching him before, why not now?)- was getting her slightly excited. What else was to come, she did not know, but, knowing that it would not involve her actually ferrying people like she did before, she was sure it was going to be a strangely unique, and rather idle, experience. For all those people going to get their hearts stolen, she was going to watch it all in deep fascination and hope she wasn't lobbing heads out of obligation. Well, fascination in that she would be in raging disbelief from the coming facts an eighteen-year old was able to basically get a thousand-year old youkai to, at that point, marry him. Because youkai do not look for, or accept lovers, so quickly.

Keima, on the other hand, after some inner evaluation of his situation, grimaced. He had already burnt through a few days capturing Eiki's heart: the concerns of the world he had left began to sink in, at a time when he could do nothing but idly feel the wind in his face and the pillows, which he felt no sensation for, on the top of his head. How was Chihiro, now? Was there a way for him to send her something, anything? What was his family thinking about his disappearance. Knowing them, they would never attribute Chihiro for it. The Goddesses? He was sure that Chihiro would have called them to investigate. The thought that so many people would worry for him turned him miserable with dismay. Funny. Just two years ago, if he had realized that, he wouldn't have cared.

His first detour in life, with those ninjas in Tokyo, made him miss Chihiro. This time, though, Eiki made him realize how much he should have missed her then and now.

He stopped thinking, for the bright of the outside was starting to shine. Komachi crested over the hole, and, to his surprise, in front of them laid a road of stalls, bustling with a life even he couldn't expect. Humanoid people mixed with strange beings and floating spirits, in some strange harmony amongst each other.

"The Road of Liminality!"

Komachi announced to him as she flew higher, and higher, till the air grew noticeably cold and the clouds seemed almost reachable by way of ladder. It was only by his gaze turning up towards her that he noticed the great mass she was climbing. A vast stone, higher than he had ever seen, towered beside them. As the stalls disappeared into little specks, she crested over the mountain.

And there it was, greeting him with the light and the marvel of 3D, its air a gift for having come into its untouched wilderness.

"Like the view?" Komachi asked, herself scanning the horizon with him, proud of herself for showing some outsider his first glimpse of a Paradise beyond. She felt his hair rub on her chest as he nodded.

"Yeah. It's pretty interesting, for 3D."

Gensokyo caressed his breath on its arms.

O - O - O - O

None who resided in Gensokyo would forget a little store somewhere in the outskirts of the Forest of Magic, housing not only wares but also its owners. Kourindou was the name, and one would recognize it almost immediately the moment they spot it in between the trees; whether in Spring or Winter, clear or covered with blankets of snow, the store was unlike what anyone in the Human Village had ever seen. Underneath the layers laid the foundation of a normal wooden building, like any in the Village some distance away, but covering it, like the armor of great men in centuries past, were strange, towering ornaments and devices considered alien by the denizens of Gensokyo. Kourindou was no store for the ordinary. Its shopkeeper was a scrounger for Outside World items, of any kind, of all varieties, and of all trades and uses. Of course, that was if Morichika Rinnosuke could ever learn to use them. He never liked considering his business to be a failure. Not many came, threatened by his strange heritage of half-man, half-youkai, and by the equally threatening oddities he had surrounded himself with. A silly fear, but he supposed it was harmless, in its own way. He liked it quiet, in some days, where he would be allowed the time to ponder of those strange inventions that passed through the Hakurei Border and into his sights. Vast quantities of the stuff laid strewn in neat, yet labyrinthian order around him, that it would not be an unfair judgement if someone came and called him a hoarder. Would he consider himself a hoarder, though? No, not really. He would have liked it if he was considered a shopkeeper first, and a man with an eye for curiosities second, but a 'hoarder'? It was… how should he say, a bit strong for him.

Rinnosuke scratched an itch hidden beneath his silver hair. Today's traffic had been, to his non-surprise, the usual fare: the ordinary magician passed by to say hello, twice; the tengu dumped her new issue of papers for the day; the maid of the Scarlet Devil bought a case of ornate wine glasses, and a young man with glasses- rare for Gensokyo- was now browsing his storeroom for whatever he had insisted he wanted.

Wait, that wasn't what usually happened every day. Well, the Grand Prix he hosted, and won last year, was also pretty unusual for his schedule, but this? The boy, looking to be almost twenty, but gave off the air of a wizened adult, a strange, confident attribute in a land where Humans would never dare don in front of Youkai. He had been at the back, scanning round his storeroom for quite a while now, and Rinnosuke, slowly sinking into doubt, was still stationed at the counter, hands ready for the barcode scanner he'd salvaged a few years back and had begun using- a good way of showing people which of his products were on sale were if he'd even placed a barcode sticker on them. What this stranger- no, new customer- was looking for vexed him greatly, for the only thing he demanded was that he browsed his wares at the back of the store. He had allowed it, at first, but now he was rather suspicious.

Could he be stealing his wares behind his back? Did he break a hole in the wall just so he could pass the smaller trinkets he kept behind the store to some thieves he had collogued with? It was… possible. He'd heard of many a Youkai from his acquaintances, with the one spooking his shopkeeper spirit the most being the Hermit who could create holes through any surface.

The suspicions did not leave him easily, and, when the trees rustled from the afternoon wind, he stood up from his seat as a result. Rushing to the door of his storeroom, he pushed it opened, and shouted, into the musty, dusty place:

"Hey, if I find you stealing anything, I'll-!"

Katsuragi Keima paused his game, and gave him a pout in response.

Invisible Onozuka Komachi scooted away to places much less cluttered.

Rinnosuke's indignation slipped away.

"Oi, I was gonna finish up on Mai's route, Mister Shopkeep. Shoo, shoo."

O - O - O -O

"It's pretty rare for an outsider to actually be here, buying things from me," Rinnosuke explained as he received the money from Keima, before pushing the strange disk and cartridge cases towards his customer, "Usually, outsiders keep to themselves. And, honestly, I'd keep most of my wares for myself, but, seeing how you have the tools to use these, I'm fine with selling them away. I'll be sure to keep an eye out for these…"

He squinted his eyes into focus. "Physical game copies, in the future, Mister…"

"Katsuragi," was the reply as his customer took the products into his arms.

"Mister Katsuragi. Pleasure doing business with you."

"No, no, no: thank you. I would've died without these~"

Rinnosuke scoffed at the youngster's energy and strange priorities. The Outside World really did make strange and eccentric fellows. Honestly, he'd already have his hands full of another, so this sudden appearance was much of a surprise to him. Before he could sit back down and meditate the day away, though, someone called his name. He couldn't answer, as a flying coin gave him a great start, and he had no choice but to catch it as it flew to him.

"I'll be taking the newspaper, too."

He looked at the coin in his hand, and then the door, watching it close as the boy finally left his world. The little newspaper stand, a nice Outside World antique which he'd found, had a missing paper.

Rinnosuke, sighing, followed up with a deadpanned expression. "Maybe I should've told him to keep the door open."

O - O - O - O

"Did we seriously visit Kourindou just to look for games?"

Komachi grumbled as she strolled beside the game-centric character, her hagoromo having found refuge around the propped handle of her scythe. The two had just touched down on Gensokyo when the boy collapsed out of fatigue. She had thought that it was just his body being too accustomed to the realm of the dead, but, after a bit more inquiry and pained screaming from the boy, she realized that he was… much more than meets the eye.

This damn guy's an addict!

He was suffering from withdrawal. Yes, withdrawal from not having laid hands on a single noteworthy game in close to a week. She couldn't really doubt him much or lose faith in him, seeing as to how he at least was an experienced buddy with proof of his implied record, but she had hoped that he would have enforced his priorities, rather than toss them aside for some meagre plaything. If she were Eiki, then she would have grilled him dry. Right now, in this very moment, she was already considering throwing his console away just to snap him out of his infatuation.

"Oh hohoho~" Keima chuckled to himself, earning a look of disgust from the Shinigami that did little to faze him, "How nice for that guy to have found the PFP remake of 'Treasured Hearts'! Oh, it brings me so much nostalgia! I played the original almost six years ago, and the quality of it was great! But the remake's even better!"

"I don't care…" Komachi simply said. Suddenly, spurred by the agony of boredom and progress, she rushed to his front, stopping him in his tracks, and confronted him with a frown on her face, "Shouldn't we be focusing on other things, other than a silly game?"

"Oi," Keima rebuked, "My old Devil Partners would never stop me from playing a game, so don't you dare!"

"Don't you wanna go back to the Outside world?!" she jolted forward in retaliation, startling the gamer. "To go back to Kosaka, your 'one true love'? So how about you stop playing your games and-!"

Keima's outrage quickly expired at her concerns. He sighed, unimpressed by her vehemence, before he bopped her head with the rolled up newspaper.

"Stop panicking." He pushed his weapon onto her, much to her discombobulated bafflement. "Read the papers, then come back to me with leads for the next Spirit." As he geared himself to continue on with his digital conquest, his mind began to think.

Gensokyo is pretty big, surprising enough- though, then again, the games don't really go the distance when it comes to portraying the place on a one-one ratio- and that presents us with a pretty big problem. I can't just visit everyone and check whether or not they have a Spirit: that'll take too much time, and who knows whose Spirit's has more progress in taking over their victims.

Gah, if that Gap Hag had given me a nice, neat list, then I wouldn't have to worry about all this!

I could go and find the very Shrine Maiden who keeps the peace, Hakurei Reimu (that is, if she does exist, and she wasn't some original character put into the games), but, if Gensokyo is a mix of the fanon and canon, then she wouldn't even be much help. There would be nothing that would interest her, and, knowing how crude she can be, she wouldn't be helping anyone. I guess she'd help for a donation, but even then, she'd be an obstacle to my capturing methods.

I considered Hakugyokurou, because I assumed that Yuyuko and, or, Youmu could help us detect them, but what if they can't? There's also that chance that they wouldn't even accept my plea for help, in the first place.

Now, though? Well, if I, a foreigner in this world, can't find out who's the highest priority target…

He snuck a glance at the reading shinigami. More specifically, at the unfurled newspaper.

His thoughts escaped out his tongue with a whisper.

"Then that damn Crow Tengu would."

Tengu on Alert as Negotiations

Between Moriya Continue:

Goddess Turning Desperate?

"The headline…" Komachi looked up from the papers, "You're not thinking that there's a Runaway Spirit up in the Moriya Shine?"

"Where is that?" Keima inquired before she could continue. Of course, he knew the answer, but he might as well continue with the façade.

Komachi gulped, audible enough for him to hear, before she answered in a mutter, "It's up Youkai Mountain- which is stupid enough, cos what's where we just came out of. But that wouldn't make sense: the shrine has two Gods, how wouldn't they have noticed?"

Keima brandished his PFP as he rolled his shoulders and wrist. Something interesting had just been uttered. Perhaps Gensokyo's Gods weren't sensitive to Runaway Spirits, or something of the sorts. Well, that wouldn't hinder him in anything.

He had a job to do, and he was going to do it.

"Then we'll just go up," he paused to look away from his game.

"And notice it for them."

O - O - O - O

And the second capture begins! Let's go, boys and girls on another great adventure. I'm so happy that this story's first arc is getting such a great welcome, and I hope to keep satisfying all of you. Thank you for reading this new chapter, I hope you stay tuned for the next!