First Words:
b-wolf95 - To be honest, so many inconsistencies are just casually thrown around within the Touhou parts that I'm actually surprised people are only finding it confusing now; I wrote that thinking people were already aware. Feel free to come up with theories behind this ^^ Actually, Hotland has a total of four chapters, seeing as it starts from Chapter 9; Hotland takes up Chapters 9-12. If it still doesn't seem like a lot, Chapter 12 has around 22000 words (and this one has around 15000) so don't worry; it's a lot (of blood, sweat and tears ;_;). Hmmm... Depending on what exactly would one consider to be the final battle, I'd say that the probable thing to happen is it lasting a single very long chapter dedicated to it; either that, or I'd divide it in two. I'd say it depends on the word count. Hopefully this clears stuff up and thank you for reviewing, as always!
James Birdsong - And thank you again! Nice knowing people are still sticking around despite the time I took getting this chapter out ^^' I'm equally glad that you thought it was a nice chapter! Hopefully this one, and the next ones will answer expectations!
Did I ever tell you how much I love guest reviews? Reviews in general? Uh, wanna talk about how many favorites and followers the story got since the last chapter? It got 9 favorites 16 followers, by the way, which is pretty awesome and stuff. Surely it's something anybody would love more than talking about my huge delay, hahaha... I blame Mettaton for this. The plan was to upload on November 8th since that's this fic's one year anniversary, but I failed the deadline in my timezone. Hey, at least it's still November 8th in the US and people from the US read this! So yeah, this upload time has nothing to do with the elections ^^'
Mini-Eight-Trigam Reactor = Mini-Hakkero; I got it translated for consistency's sake.
Chapter 11: The Hopeful Hotland Broadcast
"... And, cut," the spider monster mutters as she watches Reimu sighing. "Ahuhuhu..." Reimu and the monster both know that the cameras are no longer recording their movements, and that the live footage from this moment on is going to focus on Mettaton and Alphys's attempt to catch up to Reimu. Naturally, they will fail to find her so that her fight with the monster comes to a proper close, but that is something to think about after the break, Reimu notes. Seeing as the spider monster is walking towards her, Reimu shifts her attention to her with a neutral gaze. "So you're the human playing the villain for Mettaton's show," she amusedly remarks, "You really do look the part, dearie~. But, your acting needs some work."
Reimu crosses her arms, admittedly offended at the spider monster's words. "It's believable enough, so don't complain!" she protests despite being aware of her own acting skills. "It's not like anyone can really believe a show as lame as this one, anyway. Everyone just wants to be entertained; it's as fake as it gets." To begin with, any sensible human looking to escape the Underground would destroy the cameras pursuing them, though Reimu has also been portrayed as someone who wishes to have a rematch with Mettaton: the fact that she has been running away so often under the overwhelming strength of Alphys and Mettaton is only one out of the many signs of how complex and deep the show isn't supposed to be.
Using one of her many tiny hands to cover her mouth, she giggles at Reimu's seemingly bold statements. "True~," she responds as she looks over Reimu's remarkably easygoing stance. Reimu was offended at the monster's remarks before, but it seems as though she forgave her very quickly in the middle of describing what she feels Mettaton's show to be like. Her demeanor is fairly interesting in the monster's eyes, considering her position. "Though, for a human trapped in the Underground, you're in a very lucky position right now. Normally, monsters should be trying to get your soul, not watching you beat me~."
"Not all monsters here knew what a human looked like, as far as I could tell," Reimu says, reminding herself of the times she traversed Snowdin without any fear or wariness from its residents. While some monsters had an idea of what a human looked like, such as Papyrus or Undyne, many other monsters bothered Reimu for entirely different reasons, unaware of Reimu's identity; few monsters actually had Reimu's soul in mind when fighting. However, figuring there is a point to the spider monster's words, Reimu quickly dismisses that train of thought. "Besides, what about you? If you're part of this, you probably don't care that much about getting my soul."
"Of course. Rather than breaking the barrier, I'm much more worried about getting the spiders in the Ruins to cross Snowdin's deadly cold~." The spider monster's voice evidences a tinge of an exaggerated dramatic tone, though her statement and concern seem genuine. Even despite that, her expression does not show signs of imminent worry more than a mere hint of seriousness behind her smile. "The barrier can come later."
Reimu processes the spider monster's words, unable to remember whether the Ruins truly have spiders or not. Even then, that isn't the most doubtful part for Reimu. "Then, what are you doing here? Shouldn't you be helping out the spiders or whatever?" At least, it would only make sense to be by the Ruins instead of a strange, purple place in Hotland playing the part of a fodder for the villain that Reimu happens to be within the story.
"Good question, dearie~." The slightly more energetic tone in the monster's voice suggests that Reimu said something she wanted to hear, surprisingly enough. Why is she calling me 'dearie', though? "You see, we spiders have been trying to gather enough funds to do just that, and Mettaton, well~... He gave me A LOT of money to be on this show. It's apparently a really big deal to him." She then giggles as a tiny spider starts walking towards her, holding what seems to be a sweet of sorts, though Reimu hasn't seen one like it in her life. Its shape is round, but it has a hole in its middle, making it more akin to a ring than anything. "Speaking of that, would you like a donut~? All proceeds go to real spiders."
Reimu skeptically stares while the spider monster takes the donut from the tiny spider and watches it go. "You're selling that to me?" She frowns, clearly displeased at the prospect of buying something. "I don't have any money." Unfortunately, as much as Sans advised her to get food, Reimu spent all of her money on her bag; the rest of the food she received was offered by Sans.
Though slightly suspicious of Reimu's answer, the spider monster is also greatly curious from it: how has the human fared in the Underground? Humans are supposed to be strong, but a completely different environment should put anyone in unease or fear. However, Reimu does not seem to be feeling any of these things; at least, not anymore as far as the monster can tell. "Not even a single coin?" she asks, wondering how one can even survive without money. She giggles. "No wonder you accepted this job~. You must have been desperate~."
As a human, it made sense in the monster's mind. However, Reimu takes offense to the statement. "Hey! If I'm desperate, then what about you? You're not even a main character!" Reimu then indignantly huffs. "I have my reasons for participating in this, but they aren't money. I don't think I could buy anything from my home with your currency anyway, so it's practically worthless to me." Reimu crosses her arms and looks towards the side with a thoughtful frown. "Is it even real gold? Then wait, it might just not be worthless...?"
The spider monster finds herself giggling once more at Reimu's antics, which she finds amusing. "There's gold in the Underground, dearie~. Otherwise, why would the currency be 'G'?" The fact that the monster seems confident with such words, as if she knows of the subject better than anyone, made Reimu immediately focus on her. "You know, if you wanted money, you could've just taken it from the monsters you beat up. I mean, you did beat up monsters along the way, right? I've had spiders tell me about it~." Reimu blinks twice, perplexed.
... Then, she realizes that she had fought Tsunderplane without collecting money from it. She brings a fist to the air in pure frustration. "Damn it!" Reimu suddenly shouts, leaving the monster to snicker at the sight with one of her tiny hands covering her mouth. "It's all Papyrus's fault! He distracted me!" At an unbelievable speed, Reimu's hand reaches out for the bag and grabs hold of her cellphone.
"Are you going to call him?" the spider monster asks, admittedly curious at such an action. "Make sure you don't take too long, dearie~."
Reimu dismissively waves her hand as she neutrally frowns. "Sure, sure," she absent-mindedly utters as she focuses completely on the tiny screen of her phone. "Now let's see, uh... Contacts, contacts..." Reimu is squinting as she lightly touches the icon she faintly remembers from Papyrus's explanation to be where the contacts are. Much like the names of the monsters she's fought so far, Reimu hasn't retained the complete extent of all that Papyrus told her about cellphones.
"Ahuhuhu~..." The spider monster would have offered her help, if Reimu happened to have any money. However, seeing as she doesn't, the monster decides it's much more hilarious observing the human clumsily fumbling with the cellphone as if it were super advanced technology. Thankfully, Reimu is too concentrated on the cellphone to notice the spider monster practically laughing at her expense, so she has not warranted Reimu's anger yet.
Finally, it seems as though Reimu succeeded in calling Papyrus, since she now has a proud smile on her face as holds the cellphone to her ear, waiting for a prompt greeting from the skeleton. "HELLO, HUMAN!" Papyrus's voice is so loud even the spider monster can hear it from afar; she notes that he seems way too excited for a simple call. "I KNOW IT'S YOU BECAUSE YOUR NAME SHOWS UP ON THE PHONE WHEN YOU CALL ME! CONVENIENT, RIGHT?"
"I know that much," Reimu retorts with a frown, feeling underestimated. "Your name showed up when you called me." She knows that he meant well and assumed that she didn't know or had forgotten, but she couldn't avoid feeling as though she had been considered inferior from it. Wanting to move from that due to this, Reimu says, "Well, anyway, you owe me G."
"WHAT?!" Papyrus immediately questions in shock. "I DO?" His voice takes up a tone of pure confusion, as though he cannot fathom Reimu's words. "THIS IS THE FIRST I'VE HEARD OF IT, HUMAN!" The fact that he so seriously considered her statement surprises Reimu somewhat since she thought he would promptly deny it or express anger towards her.
"Well, I beat you, didn't I? Besides, you totally got in my way when I beat up that flying monster." Reimu then smirks. "I've been learning a whole lot about Underground customs lately, and I'm pretty sure one of them was that the loser gives out money." The spider monster could easily see her letting out a malice-filled chuckle, though Reimu herself refrains from such an action.
... Papyrus is silent for a good few seconds. "HUMAN! I, UH." He awkwardly pauses. "I AM VERY PROUD OF YOU! I SEE YOU'VE TRULY BEEN LEARNING WHILE ON YOUR JOURNEY! PERHAPS YOU WILL EVENTUALLY REACH A STEP CLOSER TO MY LEVEL OF GREATNESS AT THIS RATE! JUST AS I EXPECTED FROM YOU!" Papyrus's voice was loud, seemingly positive, and yet ever so slightly higher-pitched than usual.
Reimu's intuition quickly deducts it to be Papyrus attempting to hide the fact that he is nervous over the topic she brought up. "Don't avoid the subject with your weird speeches," Reimu demands, "Just come over to Hotland and give me the money. I'm expecting a really good amount of G from the boss character that you are." Reimu is already tapping her foot impatiently as she removes the cellphone from her ear, intending to break up the call with Papyrus preemptively.
"BOSS CHARACTER?! NO OFFENSE, HUMAN, BUT I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, AM CLEARLY THE PROTAGONIS—"
Realizing she wasn't very specific with her request and reminding herself that she is in the middle of Mettaton's show, Reimu cuts off Papyrus, saying, "Just drop it over at the lab or something, got it? Make it at least 100 G!" She shouts over the phone, wondering if her distance from it makes her harder to hear. Then, she clumsily disconnects her call with Papyrus by pressing onto the phone with too much force. At the very least, Reimu manages to make sure it doesn't fall from her hands, so she casually puts it back in her bag.
The spider monster can't help but amusedly giggle at the scene she has witnessed. "You could've asked for more, you know~? A hundred G is not nearly enough to afford my pastries." Reimu shifts her attention to the monster with a confused expression, as if almost all information from the monster has been completely forgotten while talking to Papyrus.
However, it all occurs to her shortly afterwards. "As if I'd use it to buy pastries," Reimu retorted, "Especially if they're that expensive." I'm gonna strike it rich in Gensokyo instead! Gold is gold, after all. I shouldn't have let Sans cloud my judgment when I talked to him. Reimu's frown deepens, as if mulling over something unacceptable. "Wouldn't he also owe me money...?"
"Trust me, deary," the spider monster says, "My pastries are baked with the noblest of causes in mind, so they're worth millions~." She giggles. "If you get that money, you should definitely go buy them." The monster sips from the tea she has in one of her many hands and, almost as if to compensate for that, pours more tea into the cup from the teapot on another of her hands.
Reimu absent-mindedly stares at that action before thoughtfully stating, "No way. I could go for some tea right about now, though." She recalls her own shrine, and herself drinking tea within it. Then, the fact that Shinmyoumaru has been taking up temporary residence there occurs to her for once in the entire adventure and frowns. As she looks back at the last time she saw Shinmyoumaru, she wondered if she isn't doing anything to the shrine while Reimu is gone; more importantly, Reimu worryingly wonders about her safety afterwards.
"Oh, this tea isn't for sale~," the monster replies, choosing to ignore Reimu's suddenly serious expression. She assumes that Reimu is in deep thought about something, but it doesn't seem to be anything that concerns her or her business. "But I would've considered it if you had any money."
Suddenly, Reimu's phone starts ringing. Reimu hadn't processed the monster's words at all, as she was busy wondering about the state of Shinmyoumaru and her shrine, but the somewhat obnoxious sound of the phone served to make her focus on her surroundings once more. With a troubled expression, she grabbed her phone out of her bag and tried to quickly answer the phone while squinting. She puts the phone over her ears and impatiently asks, "What is it?"
"HUMAN, YOU REALLY MUST STOP HANGING UP WHILE I'M TALKING!" Reimu has irritated Papyrus, she notes in an easygoing manner. "TO BEGIN WITH, YOU'RE FORGETTING THAT YOU CAN ONLY TAKE MONEY FROM BEATEN MONSTERS THAT HAVE IT! AND, UNFORTUNATELY FOR YOU, I WAS COMPLETELY BROKE AT THE TIME!" The fact that he had no hesitation in admitting it means that money isn't even something Papyrus has any pride in possessing, which momentarily perplexes Reimu.
However, she doesn't really care about other people's perspectives, so she is instead focusing on how Papyrus apparently has no money. "Don't lie to me," Reimu immediately counters, "How could you have no money around here? Do you youkai just fight each other whenever you need it or something?" Somehow, Reimu is regarding that with slight jealously, though Papyrus does not notice it.
"OF COURSE NOT!" Papyrus exclaims as though the very prospect is preposterous. Seeing as the monsters have so far only approached Reimu for the strangest of reasons, perhaps it does happen to be a preposterous notion. Either way, Reimu doesn't see any worth in dwelling on that. "IT JUST SO HAPPENS THAT THOSE MATTERS ARE LEFT TO SANS! AS SUCH, I AM ONLY GIVEN MONEY FROM TIME TO TIME! I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, HAVE MUCH MORE PRESSING ISSUES TO DEAL WITH IN MY DAILY LIFE, SUCH AS DEVISING PUZZLES AND SEEING TO IT I BECOME PART OF THE ROYAL GUARD!"
"If Sans was the one with money all along, you should've just told me!" Reimu recalls having almost fought Sans, only for him to escape easily; the mental image started to frustrate her. Even then, at the time, she wouldn't have known to take his money, but it was still upsetting that she had let the chance to majorly earn some form of gold to perhaps sell slip away from her so easily. Reimu huffs in frustration. "Whatever. Basically, I've got no business with you so I'm hanging up."
"GOOD TO SEE YOU'VE EVEN WARNED ME, HUMAN! SEE YOU ON TV!" Papyrus excitedly says without regard for his previous (understandably) irritated demeanor, in the same way Reimu threw aside her idea because she started to feel it would lead her to more trouble than she'd want to bother with when she simply wants to leave the Underground. The fact that she is participating in this show is already troublesome to begin with, so she wouldn't like to be faced with other matters, seeing as she is determined to return to her homeland.
Papyrus spared Reimu the trouble of hanging up by doing it himself, so Reimu merely stuffs the phone inside her bag and looks towards the spider monster. "So, I guess we should start making this place looking all ruined because of our fight?" Reimu nonchalantly asks, having perceivably forgot all about money. The spider monster is admittedly disappointed at the notion, but amused at the same time; Reimu is a strange person, she notes.
Before speaking, the spider monster giggles. "Our set is already ready for us, dearie. We just have to go there," she responded, wondering how much knowledge Reimu truly had about the show she has been inserted into. Reimu has a semblance of an idea of the script, but other details were instantly forgotten the moment she read past them, so she is merely acting upon assumptions of how to go about doing any sort of show. In her mind, it seems to be a play, but broadcast. "Follow me."
Reimu does not say anything and merely walks behind the spider monster with a pensive expression on her face, as if still processing what she had been told. She knows, from what she remembers of the script, that she is to eventually arrive at the MTT Resort, a location she had heard about from the ghost she interrogated. Then, she is to reach the Core, whatever the place happens to be, and the show would end in an 'epic climax'. She is unsure as to how anyone would derive enjoyment from Mettaton's show, but perhaps the monsters in the Underground are simply that bored with their own lives. As she thought about it, living underground surely is not pleasant and has little to offer. However, seeing as many aspects of the Underground mimicked the surface in an almost too accurate manner, it doesn't seem to a severe problem.
The name of the spider monster was on the script, but Reimu found herself easily forgetting about something so trivial. The monster seems to only be here to demonstrate that Reimu, the villain, is, in fact, a force to be reckoned with despite having lost against Mettaton multiple times; a side character, Reimu noted at the time. Her role, to Reimu, was easily shrugged off until she finally met the spider monster and now, she has to scramble for what exactly she is supposed to say according to the script she was already scarcely following.
To Reimu's confusion, the floor she sees stretched out before her is broken into many squares scattered about, all with at least one strange platform displaying an arrow. Noticing Reimu's curious expression, the spider monsters giggles before saying, "Don't worry~. The puzzles here are all deactivated so you only have to cross." Without hesitation, the monster steps towards the platform right in front of her towards one of the squares in a graceful, effortless hop.
Reimu curiously stares at the monster as she hops forward through the bizarre maze of squares and only starts flying in her direction after processing the troublesome nature of a path such as this one. Just imagining herself having to do what the spider monster is doing just to leave her shrine, for example, immediately upsets Reimu so she reaches the other side of the squares with a displeased frown. "Don't you youkai get sick of this path at all? It's not like you can fly."
"We get used to it," is Muffet's simple answer, conveyed with a slight hint of amusement. "But now that you mention it, I didn't know humans could fly~." The spider monster had spotted Reimu flying towards this floor while the cameras were still on her, but she had decided against commenting on it at the time. However, now that there is nothing in her way, she is more than curious at the fact that somehow, humans can magically fly.
Reimu crosses her arms. "Not every human can fly," Reimu neutrally states as she looks forward, towards the path she and the spider monster supposedly need to follow to get to the 'set'. To Reimu, actually asking about insignificant things like how the show works is an endeavor too troublesome for her, so her mind is instead focused on the monster's words. "But youkai should, since they all have the spiritual power for it. Somehow, you all can't." She shrugs, not particularly worrying about this fact. These monsters are not part of Gensokyo, which means that their circumstances are mostly out of her jurisdiction. It was definitely strange that the youkai of this area could not fly, and it made her slightly curious, but there was nothing more to it.
"I think you're misunderstanding something important, dearie~," the spider monster points out, still amused at Reimu's perspective on things. If all humans on the surface are like Reimu, humans surely are quirky creatures. "Monsters aren't any of those 'youkai' things, so we just don't work like they probably do. I wonder where you get your ideas from~." The spider monster softly giggles as she starts walking, knowing Reimu will follow suit as they cannot be late to the set.
Reimu does follow her, but with an irritated expression on her face. The fact that she is walking along with the spider monster is not what she is currently focusing on, and her pace is strangely fast, albeit not quite enough to completely surpass the monster. She is instead considering something that she has experienced for a while in the Underground: none of the youkai here consider themselves youkai. They either ignore the term, or point out their unfamiliarity with it and it confuses Reimu: how would one not know their own identity? "I'm a shrine maiden, so I know these things!" she confidently claims, "Any supernatural being is a youkai, and you're no different."
"If you say so~," the spider monster responds, as though she isn't up for an argument over the topic. To her, what Reimu perceives as the reality of her species is of no actual importance, so conflict is needless. If anything, her insistent ignorance is amusing, so the monster giggles while Reimu's frown deepens; she figures the monster isn't convinced. However, seeing as attempting to enlighten a monster on her actual species is not in any way part of her duties or responsibilities, Reimu merely shrugs the issue off as she gazes upon the building in sight.
The path is still of a darker color than the usual Hotland orange, instead resembling the spider monster's color scheme. The building, too, is no different in color from the path Reimu is traversing; she finds herself glancing at the spider monster. "Is this your turf or something?" she asks, though her expression indicates she isn't that interested in the topic.
"The whole floor isn't technically mine but it matches my parlor beautifully, doesn't it?" The monster herself appears to be in an essentially carefree demeanor as she stares at her parlor and sips from her tea. Reimu can understand the feeling, but only partly, since it isn't pleasant being reminded of the scarce lack of visitors to her supposedly youkai-ridden (or so others say; Reimu vehemently denies this) shrine at times. Even then, as she looks at the spider monster's parlor, Reimu finds herself curious about its appearance.
She gives the spider monster an uneasy smile. "It looks kind of run-down though," Reimu bluntly remarks, feeling sorry for the partially destroyed state of the monster's parlor. As someone who has had her shrine and home destroyed before, Reimu is well aware of the genuine sadness.
The monster's response, however, is a thoroughly amused giggle. "It's supposed to~," she explains, "It's our scene's set, after all." Soon enough, Reimu and the spider monster find themselves face to face with the purple parlor in its purposefully destroyed state. The monster points at its door, which is currently opened as though to invite Reimu, with one of her free hands. "Go on~. I'm sure there are people waiting for us."
"People?" Reimu immediately questions, confused at the statement. From what she remembers of the script, she isn't supposed to meet anyone as she defeats the monster. However, Reimu does see silhouettes of different monsters from afar. One of them even waves at her, though they don't seem particularly eager to see Reimu (rather, they appear uneasy). She awkwardly stares at them, wondering why she hadn't been told this by Mettaton.
Noticing Reimu's confusion completely, the spider monster covers her mouth with the hand she used to urge Reimu inside. "Ahuhuhuhu~!" Reimu frowns, feeling as though she is being made fun of. However, before she could say anything, the spider monster enters her parlor without hesitation. "Well, don't worry, deary~," she says, "I'll give you the details." Despite her words, she narrows her eyes at the monsters lying in wait, clearly focused on them. "But first..." While initially, Reimu wonders why she'd be like that, she then sees the creature that was crawling near Muffet before her break had started: it had swiftly been out of sight through the break, but it is now slowly descending from the parlor's ceiling, its mouth dangerously agape. "I'll go see if any of them is up for some spider pastries! It's lunchtime for my pet, so I'm sure I'll see some delightful results~."
Even though the spider monster appears excited, she still doesn't dash towards the monsters and instead walks at a clearly faster pace as a few spiders, all holding a single box of what Reimu assumes to be pastries, make their way towards her and her potential customers. Feeling left behind, and not particularly sympathetic for those monsters, Reimu runs towards the monster as she exclaims, "Hey, you better hurry up with that and tell me everything, you hear me?!"
. . .
The new mountain in Gensokyo stood proudly on its new, illusionary soil, for all to see. It left humans and youkai alike with fear and anxiety, or even pure curiosity. However, the actual amount of youkai and humans that have visited the mountain are few and far in between: only those of considerable power, among them hermits, a few youkai, a small group of Tengu and the gods of the Moriya shrine have truly seen what lurks in the mountain. Now, the kappa from the Youkai Mountain have figured it best to scope out the new population themselves, as they have read fascinating information from Tengu newspapers. Apparently, the mountain abounds with technology.
A small group of kappa was sent to visit the mountain, one which includes a certain Nitori Kawashiro. Mountain climbing is a tough job even for youkai, especially for kappa far from perceivable water; as such, they are currently flying over the mountain. Of the group, only a few are truly bothering to search for the entrance to the rumored civilization, while the others are vaguely gazing at the sky, seemingly carefree. Either way, there is supposedly nothing to fear with the new youkai population, so, as long as the entrance to their hideout is found, they can inquire about their technology to their liking. The prospect has the group internally eager, but flying over a mountain continues being a more or less tedious endeavor for these kappa.
Nitori sighs frustratingly. "Man, just where is the entrance to the underground area? And even though there's this whole mountain surface to occupy, these monsters go underground of all places," she complains as she looks down and spots nothing more than the occasional tree and steep land. "It doesn't make sense at all, right?" Nitori hears three grunts of approval, which makes up the entire reconnaissance group. "According to the Tengu newspapers, these youkai aren't scary, and they don't even feel like youkai. I wonder how that works?" Nitori shrugs and, in the midst of her boredom, looks towards the sky instead.
Her eyes widen in surprise at the sight she takes in, and she stops her flight. "Woah woah, what's going on over there?" She points towards it as her kappa companions stop and stare in that direction; they all assume a facial expression similar to Nitori's.
"It's moving, I think?" a kappa suggests in a clearly uneasy manner.
"I dunno about you, but it just looks like trouble to me," another remarks with a troubled frown.
"But still, something big's gotta be happening. Doesn't it get you curious?" At the third kappa's question, the other two find themselves humming in deep thought, while Nitori curiously stares at figures she finds familiar, far into the sky.
"Either way, it's none of our business. We're supposed to check the mountain, remember?" The second kappa crosses her arms impatiently. She is much more interested in what lies within the mountain than anything else right now, especially after having heard the rumors. It's with that reason that she has been the one looking down at the mountain's ground in search of the exit for the greatest amount of time, especially eager to have her hands on the existent technology.
Nitori smiles. "Yeah, I guess the mountain's first. It's not like it'd be a good idea putting ourselves in the middle of that anyway." Though she is also greatly curious about the youkai technology, she is most of all not feeling up to seeing the familiar figures she is spotting in the sky, knowing it would do her no good. "Let's just go." She turns around, preparing to move, but notices the others in the group aren't doing the same. "Hey, did you listen to anything I said?"
"W-whatever, I'm curious! I'm gonna check it out!" the third kappa immediately says as she quickly takes off towards the disturbing sight Nitori had spotted, effectively leaving her group behind.
"Hey!" the second kappa shouts, "Get back here, we're supposed to be going for the mountain!" Despite that, the third kappa does not even look back, seemingly more focused on her own interests than her group's.
The first kappa fidgets in place for a few seconds, only to fly in the third kappa's direction at a fast speed, surprising Nitori and the second kappa. "I'm sorry!" she exclaims as she moves, and those words only faintly reach the remaining two kappa who are incredulously looking towards the first.
"What the heck?!" The second kappa is the first to voice her anger at the turn of events, only to huff indignantly and turn to Nitori. Unlike the second kappa, Nitori seems more troubled than angry as she continues staring out to the sky. "Well, fine, it's not like we needed them anyway. I'm fine just checking out the youkai's technology."
Nitori shifts her attention to the second kappa and shrugs. "They'll probably come back when they get bored," she states before pointing to the mountain and smiling cheerfully. "And when they do, they'll regret not getting their hands on those youkai's gadgets like we did. We'll rake in more cash than they could ever imagine and they won't get a single yen!"
The second youkai snickers, and both exchange devious smiles before resuming their search for a way underground.
. . .
While Marisa is currently frowning, her eyes focused on making sure to dodge any projectile coming from Aya at her amazing speeds, she faintly sees Aya smirking as she flies right past her and towards Futo, who, unlike Alice who has her dolls and Sakuya who has her own abilities, is mostly without any defenses towards any attack from Aya. "Look out!" Marisa shouts as she sees Futo's eyes widening in shock at the Tengu's speed. Out of all the opponents, the one least familiar with Aya is Futo, and Aya herself is aware of this: currently, Futo happens to be the weakest link, especially as Aya is a formidable foe when opposed.
Knowing she has no time to dodge, Futo assumes a defensive position and braces herself for the direct hit. She winces at the strong kick, but at least finds solace in having only her arm taking its brunt rather than her stomach. Using the momentum of her own kick, Aya propels herself backwards and conjures a strong gust of wind with her fan, which serves as another means to fly back, farther and farther from the opponent she has just attacked. As expected, Futo immediately flies to the side and avoids the small tornado with relative ease before exclaiming, "Blaze Sign!" As she speaks, balls of flame surround her. "Blazing Winds of Haibutsu!" Hurt, in pride and on her arm, Futo has unleashed a spellcard, which brings her a step closer towards her defeat according to the rules. However, seeing as Aya's opponents are more than Futo, there is still no perceivable end to this fight.
Aya sighs, though with a small smile on her face. Meanwhile, Marisa glances towards Sakuya, who decisively nods and then confidently smiles. Right away, knives appear close to the flames Futo has conjured and they fly through them at fast speeds. The heat isn't enough to make the knives melt, but they are still hot and unpleasant to touch, which is the intention. However, with a wave of her fan, Aya creates a gust of wind strong enough to stop the knives' course and put out a few of Futo's projectiles. "Ayayaya, how dangerous..." she lightly remarks while swiftly moving out of the flames' way and readying her fan. "Wind Sign: Opening Wind of the Tengu Realm!" A cyclone of a much stronger caliber, occupying a size sufficient to hit Marisa, Alice and Futo, is almost effortlessly created with a slightly stronger swing of her fan, and it flies towards them with considerable speed.
"Oh no you don't! Love Sign: Master Spark!" The needlessly wide beam of light coming from Marisa's prized possession, the Mini-Eight-Trigram Reactor, pierces through the cyclone, but does no damage to Aya in return. Scowling at the frustrating tie this battle currently has, Marisa shouts, "Alice!" She glances towards her while shooting the many stars that are part of her spellcard, which Aya almost effortlessly moves away from.
"I was going to do it even without you telling me, Marisa!" Immediately after the protest, a few dolls are made to surround Aya; Alice smiles. "War Sign," she utters, "Little Legion!" Condescendingly enough, Aya merely glances at the dolls closest to her and doesn't run from her future predicament, even as the dolls begin moving and rotating towards her. The blades the dolls hold spin with them, and they appear as saws ready to cut through Aya's resilient youkai body.
Not intimidated in the slightest, Aya flies upwards so as to avoid the dolls, only to suddenly find Sakuya in her path. "Illusion Existence," Sakuya mutters, "Clock Corpse." The diagonal rows of knives are placed precisely below her, in Aya's direction. Their sudden appearance leaves Aya with the necessity to swiftly improvise, as she cannot go back down and take the dolls' slash attacks.
She decides to simply dodge the knives above her, as their pattern isn't too difficult to decipher. At her success, Aya charges towards Sakuya to see if she can land a direct hit on her, but she is gone before she can notice it as a result of her power. Instead, Aya can see Futo reaching a position above her with a proud smirk on her face. "Prepare thyself, Tengu Reporter!" Aya curiously looks at her, wondering what it is she is planning. However, she looks down at the dolls and notices that they are slowly flying upwards, towards her. With a single glance at Marisa, Aya notes that she is more than prepared for something. "Blaze Sign," Futo declares, "Taiyi True Fire!" Futo vertically spins three times as though to show off before she dispenses a flame of considerable size with a swing of both of her arms downwards. The fire flies towards Aya, but Aya immediately moves to the side.
However, the fire scatters to both right and left in grand gushes, which momentarily surprises Aya. The moving dolls reach the flames just in time and force Aya to fly backwards at the quickest speed she can muster while taking in the various explosions in the area. Alice would have smirked, if the gunpowder-filled dolls had managed to take Aya down. Seeing as this isn't the case, Alice grimaces as she mentally curses Aya's agility. Then, she looks towards Marisa, who nods at her in return. Aya curiously stares at this exchange, knowing that there is some semblance of cooperation being executed in this battle, but it isn't being fully explored yet. She glances around in case of a sudden attack from Sakuya, but instead spots a figure in the horizon flying in the fight's direction. Aya can recognize this figure, so her smirk widens. "Well then, that was a fun change of pace from these busy days," she remarks as she then locks eyes with Marisa, "However, I really must turn down your offer. My job as a reporter is of a much higher priority, you see. Since I can't waste more time playing around like this, I'll get going."
"No way, you're backing out in the middle of the battle?" Marisa incredulously questions before frowning at Aya. "That's unfair, Aya!" Marisa points at Aya accusingly, but Aya merely chuckles.
She then shakes her head in denial. "No, no," she says with a chipper smile on her face, "I'm forfeiting the match and escaping from your arrangement; you are simply too strong for me to handle." Something tells me she's makin' fun of us, Marisa begrudgingly thinks with a blank gaze: when it comes to Aya, she would never know, or so she dryly concludes. "Besides, I've made no actual promises to you." With her free hand, Aya casually waves at the people she has just faced off with and starts flying off. "Good luck with finding the shrine maiden! I'm rooting for you!" The last part of her shout was only faintly audible as her amazing speeds leave the search party unable to catch up with her. Even Sakuya, who can simply stop time, finds herself bewildered at the much faster speed Aya used to escape them.
"What farce is this...?!" Futo protests as her mind finally registered Aya's sudden escape from the battle. She glares at the sky, even though Aya is no longer at the area Futo is so vehemently focusing on.
Meanwhile, Alice frowns cynically and comments, "How unfair. She gets to run away and I couldn't?" She crosses her arms indignantly and glances at Marisa, having known she is being blankly stared at by her.
"Were you really not that up for finding Reimu?" Marisa sourly asks, sharing the same mood as everyone in her party. Everyone enjoys a good battle, and Marisa enjoys spellcards especially: it irritates her that Aya so simply forfeited and ran away from a perfectly enjoyable, tactical battle where the powers of the party were being combined in an effort to beat a Tengu in a supposed fighting mood (rather than Aya's usual non-serious stances when being inadvertently attacked by the people she interviews). The fact that perhaps, Aya wasn't fighting so seriously begins sinking in for her.
Beyond Reimu's disappearance, this is the gloomiest occurrence of the day for Marisa. "I was busy," Alice retorts, "I had to miss my plans because of you. Of course I was not in the mood today." She then sighs. "But still, we were being toyed with; how frustrating."
"I'll have to teach that Tengu a lesson the next time I find her," Sakuya says as she stores a few knives she has recovered from the fight. No one saw how she got them, since she stopped time to retrieve them.
"Me too," Alice interjects.
"So do I," Futo adds.
"Yup." Marisa assertively nods to herself and looks around, only to have her eyes widen in curiosity at the person she sees before her. "Oh, hey there, Miko. Didn't think I'd see ya here."
Futo immediately turns to the side in shock. "Crown Prince?!" She rushes to Marisa's side so as to be directly in front of Miko, who ominously glances to the side, specifically where Aya had flown towards, before smiling amusedly. Futo respectfully bows at Miko with a serious expression, but her agitated demeanor quickly returns. "Wert not you on your way to investigate Lady Reimu's whereabouts?" However, her Crown Prince being her Crown Prince, Futo smiled in a prideful manner. "I suppose one such as you wouldst have so quickly solved this case in comparison to us." At that, Miko lets out a sigh, which serves to startle Futo. "C-Crown Prince? Is something amiss?"
"My investigation was mostly fruitless," Miko states with a troubled frown. Futo vacantly blinks once and twice, processing such words and that they did, in fact, come from Miko's mouth. Noting her demeanor as uncharacteristic, Marisa regards her with confusion. Alice and Sakuya, who only faintly remember seeing Miko fight in a previous incident as a religious leader, wonder what exactly Futo means with calling her 'Crown Prince'. "The only fact that I've asserted from it is that the new mountain has no ties with Reimu's disappearance, which was what we theorized in the first place. Though it is beneficial to narrow down a possibility, I was admittedly expecting more information out of the mountain..."
Futo frowns dejectedly as she lays eyes on a clearly displeased Miko. To others, she may seem only slightly disappointed, but Futo can tell that the unexpectedly bad results of her Crown Prince's plans have somewhat frustrated her, as she has never been fond of unexpected occurrences. Marisa can tell Miko isn't in high spirits from being reminded of her progress either, so she gives her a more or less casual smile. "Yeah, Alice confirmed that to us already, too, so it's not like we didn't know that either..."
"Lady Marisa!" Futo reprimands with an especially displeased frown, "Thou art currently speaking with the Crown Prince! Watch thy tongue!" However, as she looks towards Miko again, she sees her curiously staring behind Marisa, where Sakuya and Alice are mumbling to each other in an almost suspicious manner. While Alice is deviously smirking, Sakuya's smile displays as much elegance as it does unease to others.
A smile surfaces on Miko's face once more, one very characteristic of her. Futo regards this with the utmost curiosity as she turns around to observe Alice and Sakuya. "By Alice, you mean this fellow remarking about Reimu's pitiful loss against me during the religious wars?" Though Reimu had also beaten Miko at the time, Miko does not choose to comment on this fact for obvious reasons. Miko points at Alice, who shifts her attention to Miko in slight surprise at the quick guess and sharp hearing.
So as to appear unaffected by this, however, Alice decisively nods. "That would be me, yes," she responds, "I've visited the mountain much earlier on and arrived to the exact same conclusion so, naturally, I told Marisa about it. Since I got forcefully dragged into this mess, that is." Alice defiantly glances at Marisa, who's crossing her arms in slight annoyance at what she perceives to be her denial of the great time she's had so far (consisting of being beaten twice and beating Sakuya).
"Do excuse the magician beside me," Sakuya says with a smile as she gracefully points at Alice, "she appears to still be sulking."
Alice snaps her head towards Sakuya and grimaces. "S-sulking? I'm rightfully complaining," she protests, seemingly flustered as much as she tries to hide it. "Not that you would understand the meaning of rebellion, judging by how you're such a loyal dog to your mistress." Alice rolls her eyes condescendingly, only for Sakuya's smile to slowly and subtly dissipate.
"Rebels are usually executed," Sakuya remarks, "Did you know that?" Clearly, Alice's retort negatively affected Sakuya, who seems at least somewhat annoyed. Even then, Sakuya vaguely comes off as elegant despite the fact that she is clearly quarreling with Alice, who she is supposed to cooperate with in search for Reimu.
At this, Miko chuckles, amused. "I see that even your new members get along wonderfully in your party." The dignified presence exuding from Miko's smile almost makes her seem as though she is shining, which momentarily makes Marisa flinch at the sheer brightness.
Even then, knowing that Miko means no harm or negative implication with her words, Marisa casually retorts, "I wouldn't bother makin' an inconsistent search party; who do you take me for?" She then shrugs, admittedly not up to stopping Alice and Sakuya if they do decide to fight each other. Futo stares at them in unease, wondering if it really is alright to let them be. "Anyway, if you came all this way for us, you probably had more to say, right?" Hoping to hear something more useful from Miko, Marisa's expression grows slightly serious as she crosses her arms.
"Well, my main purpose for appearing was to check on you, but I do have a few more topics to tell you about," Miko responds, her smile not faltering despite having to remind herself of her failed plan; she has decided to move past that by this point. "Firstly, you have no need to search the Youkai Mountain: you are being kindly helped on that end." She then playfully winks, though even that manages to appear dignified. The gesture makes Marisa's frown deepen as she wonders what exactly Miko means with her words. "And lastly, you have visited the Hakurei Shrine, haven't you?"
Marisa finds herself slightly surprised at the question, especially since the answer should be obvious. Besides, she didn't expect that Miko had come to speak about this rather than to give any more information on Reimu's disappearance: even if Marisa's plan is to search over Gensokyo by collecting a considerable number of people, a lead on Reimu's whereabouts would have been greatly convenient to her. Unfortunately, Miko seems to have no such thing, which can be especially noted by her question. "Well, yeah, of course I went to the shrine. Reimu wasn't there." She glances to the side, not particularly cheery about the topic.
"As expected." She pensively crosses her arms. With a more or less serious expression, originated from the rightfully serious topic, she assertively says, "Describe the location. Was there nothing different about the shrine?"
Confused, Marisa utters, "Huh?" That admittedly isn't a question Marisa thought Miko would ask. "I didn't really look around the place in detail, but it seemed just fine to me. Why would the shrine be any different?" The more she thinks about it, the more confused she grows so she ends up grimacing in the midst of her thoughts.
"Reimu is missing, isn't she? The only location we know Reimu has been in is the shrine, so it's imperative to look through it in case something happened in there," Miko explains her reasoning with full confidence in her words, finding it stranger that Marisa herself hadn't reached her conclusion beforehand.
"Oh..." Marisa mutters as she absent-mindedly nods to herself. "Well, I talked to someone who's been living in the shrine and she saw Reimu before she left so I didn't think about looking through the place." Marisa refrained from directly referring to Shinmyoumaru as she assumed Miko has never met her, seeing as she had no involvement in the incident Shinmyoumaru was a part of.
Proving her unawareness of Shinmyoumaru's existence, Miko's eyes widen in surprise at the implications of Marisa's words. "Someone who has been living in the shrine? You mean that someone has actually seen Reimu before her disappearance?" Miko's surprised expression fades into a more convicted one, though with the slightest tinge of urgency. "This may just be promising," Miko mutters as she casts her eyes downwards in deep thought. Then, she shifts her attention back to Marisa. "Marisa, is there any chance that the person living at the shrine would leave it today?"
"Not that I'd know of," Marisa confusedly responds, wondering what exactly Miko is planning. "She's got her circumstances, so I don't think she'd leave the shrine like that. What about it?"
"I need to speak to her immediately." The clear, direct way that Miko phrased that statement, combined with the convicted and serious expression from her makes Marisa look at her in slight awe of her naturally commanding presence. However, conscious of the fact that she has perhaps seemed too intimidating, Miko calmly smiles so as to soothe any doubts out of Marisa: it's a charming smile, but Marisa remains unchanged. "Depending on the results of that, we may just meet again." Afterwards, as she almost looks through Marisa, Miko's smile widens in a devious manner. "And I can only hope your party members will be intact at the time."
Marisa immediately turns around, only to find Sakuya and Alice having a spellcard duel, with Futo wholeheartedly cheering for both of them, depending on who overturns the other's chances of winning. Marisa's focus on Miko's words led her not to notice Futo's loud voice, but it's undoubtable that they have been fighting for a while now; the victor is uncertain so far. Marisa sighs as she blankly stares at Alice and Sakuya; Miko snickers. "Since your search party seems rather lively, I trust you'll progress swiftly," Miko remarks, "So there is nothing to worry about here." Satisfied, Miko floats backwards, intent on leaving. "This is farewell for now. Hopefully we shall see each other again." She waves at Marisa as she goes, and then lets her gaze momentarily linger on Futo's excited cheering. When she turns around to take off at full speed, she does so with a proud smile on her face.
Marisa watches Miko go for a while, asking herself what exactly Miko would find from talking to Shinmyoumaru that Marisa didn't. But then again, it's been implied that Marisa's investigation wasn't thorough enough, which she can understand but not be particularly satisfied with, since she happens to be serious about finding Reimu. Finally, Marisa decides to focus on Alice and Sakuya; she swiftly approaches them. "What're you all slackin' off for, huh? I might be getting the credit for finding Reimu, but you're supposed to be doin' something useful," Marisa remarks with a casual stance, as though she isn't actually that bothered by the occurrence she is witnessing, which she isn't. In fact, a spellcard duel is far from something Marisa doesn't condone, and the only reason she is stopping it is because she's seen this matchup already in one day, and doesn't feel as though there is a need to see it again. Instead, she's more up to seeing a fight with the other people.
Sakuya, Alice and Futo simultaneously stop what they're doing and look towards Marisa in slight surprise for being interrupted. Then, Futo, noticing the lack of Miko's presence in the area, scans the surroundings in shock. "Halt, Lady Marisa, what of the Crown Prince?" she immediately asks in an agitated fashion, still glancing about the sky with no signs of Miko appearing. Processing her absence once and for all, Futo helplessly exclaims, "To think I've distracted myself to the point of paying no mind to the Crown Prince's words...! I've said not even any parting words to her! I must apologize!"
"Hold it, Futo. If Miko were all bothered about that, she would've probably told you off," Marisa counters, "Don't just leave on me." Despite those words, Futo seems unconvinced, which has Marisa frown in a troubled manner. "Didn't she tell you to help me out? You wouldn't be helpin' me out by going off to look for Miko."
... Only then does Futo find herself in deep thought over Marisa's words. Her head tilts to the side as she hums pensively, her expression notably focused. Meanwhile, Alice is grimacing. "Marisa, don't just interrupt us. I would've immediately won if not for you," Alice bitterly states before glancing at Sakuya, whose subtly devious expression suggests that her opinion does not match Alice's.
"Truly, you should have patiently waited for the duel to end. Now it'll be impossible to have her gain any awareness of her inferiority by way of knives. Don't you find that pitiful?" Sakuya smiles after making such a comment, as though she were confident Alice has no better comeback to it. It's clear both are still willing to continue fighting.
However, Futo suddenly positions herself between Alice and Sakuya: her strangely self-righteous stance warrants confused expressions from the people she is blocking. "Let's stop this conflict! Our priority is to find Lady Reimu as quickly as possible. Should not we be deliberating on who to recruit into our ranks next? To be distracted from our goals is to abandon Lady Reimu!" Despite the dramatic words, Futo sounds confident and proud, and her expression displays nothing than strange, sudden conviction. "And to abandon Lady Reimu is to insult the Crown Prince's efforts!"
"If that's the case, your 'Crown Prince' must be feeling sorely offended by you," Sakuya immediately retorted without hesitation or mercy, wearing a remarkably apathetic, yet strangely absent-minded-looking expression. Even while completely crushing Futo's determination, Sakuya's demeanor remains elegant.
Alice nods in agreement with Sakuya. "Who are you to talk, really? You were the one loudly shouting whenever the tides would turn in the duel all excitedly." The clearly condescending look from Alice is enough to shoot Futo down completely, who utters a pained sound in her despair, as though she were wincing. Her eyes are cast downwards as if she has no right to meet anyone's gaze while she gloomily ponders on whether Miko has indeed looked down on Futo's behavior previously, or simply found it so acceptable she left.
"You guys are scary," Marisa remarks with a disturbed expression, though she herself doesn't feel that disturbed at this point. She has gotten to know Sakuya and Alice well enough to expect this sort of behavior from them. Besides, even if she weren't used to them, Marisa would still remain surprisingly casual at the sight. "Don't just crush her motivation like that. I need it for the search party."
"That's what she gets for calling me weaker than Sakuya," Alice responds with a smirk, "If she thought I'd forget, she's greatly mistaken." Alice almost seems proud of her own memory and, while she's aware that Futo told that to Alice on purpose to incite conflict, she is actually having her vengeance for that rather than the insult.
"Though, again, she wasn't lying," Sakuya adds almost out of reflex, which makes Alice's focus shift back to Sakuya. This time, it wasn't even as though Sakuya wanted to invite conflict, but she felt the need to counter negative implications on her end which makes her almost absent-mindedly make such a statement.
Meanwhile, Marisa is patting Futo's back with a wry smile on her face. "C'mon, we've been through this: Miko's not mad at all. Totally." The unconvincing words from Marisa bring Futo back to reality and out of her thoughts, but not because they've improved her mood. Instead, reminding herself of what she has been tasked to do, Futo recomposes herself, though she still seems slightly saddened at her supposed mistake.
"... Regardless, I may only give mine apologies to the Crown Prince when I return from this task, so I must continue my cooperation at all costs." As she further considers this, Futo slowly nods to herself in a decisive manner, almost as if confirming her flawless logic in her mind with an overly serious expression for the situation: in Futo's perspective, anything involving Miko is beyond serious business, after all.
Futo's recovery snaps Alice from her bickering with Sakuya, making her retort, "So that's your motive in the end?" She's staring at Futo blankly, but this time, Futo seems unaffected.
"Well, you were forced and Sakuya's been ordered by Remilia because she feels like takin' on Reimu and the perpetrator, so it's not like that's any worse." Marisa shrugs before deviously smiling. "As you can see, I like my parties consistent."
"Putting everything back on track, however," Sakuya pensively says before anyone can contribute to the conversation with more witty remarks, "how about we visit someone who can search for Reimu in the Bamboo Forest of the Lost? It would admittedly be troublesome to send any of us out on such grounds since we would easily be lost. In my opinion, it would be wiser to find someone knowledgeable in the area and leave them with searching there." This is purely for her own convenience as Sakuya imagines herself lost in the Bamboo Forest of the Lost and feels the need to avoid such a fate as much as possible.
Normally, it would make sense to complain about the very sudden change of topic, but since the topic brought up was the topic the search party needs and wants to address to begin with, everyone else has no room to protest and are forced to go along with Sakuya. "That would be wise, yes," Alice vaguely states, being too deep in thought to give more input.
"But who would ever fit this criteria?" Futo questions, unfamiliar with the Bamboo Forest of the Lost to begin with. What she does know, which she heard from people of the Human Village, is that it's normally impossible not to be lost in the forest, and that traversing through it is only possible due to someone who can guide them through it. Immediately, that statement comes to mind for Futo, but since it doesn't provide any leads for who to ask, she refrains from saying it, as it would cause confusion.
However, Marisa, by hearing Futo's question, suddenly smiles brightly, as though she thought of something amazing at that very moment. "I know just the person! If we ask her, she's just gotta help us." Seeing Marisa so cheerful attracts the attention of everyone else, who curiously look towards her. Then, Sakuya and Alice smile knowingly; Futo remains confused.
"I've a feeling I know exactly who you're talking about," Alice confidently remarks, "And I definitely think asking her will be a good idea."
"I see you were quick to be on the same page as me on this matter," Sakuya responds to Marisa's suggestion, "It really would only make sense to request her help in this situation."
Futo glances at Alice, Sakuya and Marisa repeatedly in utter confusion. "Halt, halt, halt," Futo interjects, "This time, I shall get a grasp of your implications! To whom are you referring to?"
"You'll see," Marisa immediately responds in a purposefully vague manner, smirking at Futo for her ignorance.
"It'll be clear to you when the time comes," Sakuya adds, but the statement is equally vague on purpose; Sakuya smiles.
"If you want to know, you'd better get moving," Alice says before the three begin flying towards a set destination Futo has no knowledge of, leaving her to momentarily stare in bewilderment as they are farther and farther away from her.
... Then, in her agitation, Futo proceeds to fly after them at maximum speed while shouting, "That's beyond unreasonable! You shan't be able to act this way after I catch up to you, I guarantee!"
. . .
In the end, the one standing after the mysterious battle is the human shrine maiden. Her gaze is cold, as though uncaring of the writhing form in front of her, sprawled on the floor of her own parlor, but she does not deal the finishing blow. She closes her eyes. "This is what you get for challenging me." With only those words, Reimu smoothly walks over the spider monster she has supposedly beaten while fiercely attempting to keep a cool, stern expression that's completely uncharacteristic of her. Usually, Reimu looks neutral, angry or satisfied after beating something up, so it's simply unfamiliar to her to be like this.
According to the screens that were briefly displayed during the broadcast moment of the fight, the monster's name is Muffet. Before the end of the break, she mentioned having an interesting ability in combat, but the script apparently did not allow for it because it's strong enough to rival Reimu's chances of victory. That aggravated Reimu at first, since it was as though she was being underestimated, but at the same time, she now wonders what exactly that move is. Afterwards, in an attempt not to break her character, Reimu decides to think upon its nuances.
... To Reimu, her character makes no sense. Infuriated over her loss against Mettaton, she longs for a rematch... while simultaneously running away from Mettaton to escape to the surface? Reimu herself would simply try to take down Mettaton as many times as necessary before actually going somewhere; one thing at the time. Not only that, but she seems murderous towards everyone in general, but hasn't actually been seen killing a single soul in the show: she has outright spared Muffet just now. In the midst of figuring out her own character, Reimu's expression distorts itself slightly to show some sort of confusion within her. Even as she reminds herself of the script, Reimu doesn't see how a sad story that justifies her motivations makes her any more concise.
However, those are spoilers. Knowing that ahead of her, something else awaits, something in the form of a rectangle, Reimu steels herself again for Mettaton's appearance as she walks forward. Exiting Muffet's parlor, Reimu sees a path with walls at each side in a purple color. Wind of unseen origin is blowing on Reimu, making her hair sway with it. The walls are littered with promotional posters about all sorts of Mettaton-centered shows, each one cornier than the next.
In the horizon, a single spotlight shines downwards, and reveals the show's hero, Mettaton, in all his glory. The artificial wind ceases to blow. "I SAW THAT, DARLING." The tacky name-calling makes it especially obvious that Mettaton is right in front of her, but rather than calling out the fact that there was no need for the spotlight, Reimu finds that she needs to say something different for the sake of fulfilling her end of their deal.
"What are you talking about?" she asks in a supposedly reserved manner, frowning at him as though he were trying to find out all of her secrets. The actual performance simply makes her seem displeased, but that emotion is enough to carry the line decently.
"OH, YOU KNOW EXACTLY WHAT I'M TALKING ABOUT. THANKS TO THE SURVEILLANCE CAMERAS INSTALLED BY THE BRILLIANT DOCTOR ALPHYS, I'VE BEEN ABLE TO SEE THAT FIGHT FROM A DISTANCE. IN THE END, YOU COULDN'T BRING YOURSELF TO KILL HER, COULD YOU?" There is some supposed weight to those words, but Reimu herself wouldn't have felt it in her character's position. However, she notes, this is apparently a big deal to this character. "I'M ALWAYS RIGHT SO YOU DON'T NEED TO DENY IT." Despite the scene also focusing on Reimu, the spotlight remains on Mettaton. If anything, even more spotlights shine on him afterwards.
"Huuuh?" Reimu attempts to resentfully scowl by thinking of an array of troublesome things, like her lack of visitors to her shrine and the rumors about her being a supporter of youkai. She manages to succeed, and, noticing that, finds herself realizing that perhaps, this is the secret to acting. Proud of herself, she thinks, Now you can bet I'll be a pro at this acting business! Mettaton'll tell me how to leave in no time! However, she immediately forces her thoughts to go back to bad things, such as her lack of an income. "I just don't feel like wasting time on anyone other than you. And speaking of that, you better prepare yourself, Mettaton! This time, you're going down for sure!" These really tend to be this character's last words...
Reimu is admittedly unhappy by thinking of negative things, so she deems the idea worthless even if for the sake of a believable expression since her mind automatically reverts Reimu to neutrality. "NOW NOW, DARLING. HOW MANY TIMES HAVE WE BEEN THROUGH THIS? BY THIS POINT, YOU'RE BORING THE AUDIENCE." It annoys Reimu that Mettaton himself is pointing out the flaws of the script, especially as it does not amuse her to be acting as a character so objectively boring.
"I couldn't care less about your audience," Reimu venomously spouts before turning her head towards a nearby camera. With her right hand, she takes out a single needle. "This...!" The needle swiftly flies towards the camera's lens and mercilessly pierces through it. "Is what I'd do to your audience if it were around to get in my way." Another camera is conveniently filming this ruthless attack, broadcasting to the Underground the dramatic fall of the broken camera. It lands a meter next to Reimu, who makes sure to coldly gaze at the unrecognizable machine (she can at least deduct it connects Mettaton's audience to Mettaton's location). "It's what you monsters would do to the humans anyway. Isn't that your plan? You'll take my soul, break the barrier and destroy humanity." Not that the surface youkai would ever let that happen. Reimu faces Mettaton, who seems unfazed, though that may just be because his mechanic body makes him appear that way without hassle. "Destroying humanity would be just fine too, but your sick act proves how much you also deserve to die." Accusingly, as though she is about to attack, Reimu points her Purification Rod at Mettaton. "Get ready, Mettaton!"
'*The epic re-re-rematch commences.'
Even at that, Mettaton doesn't seem preoccupied. Reimu is expecting this, and she charges without hesitation at his mechanical body. "Dream Sign: Illusionary Assault!" The double meanings are evident, but Reimu doesn't care much for subtlety with her spellcards at this point, especially since they aren't made to be challenging. Reimu stops dashing precisely when the tip of her Purification Rod barely reaches Mettaton, a slight wind forming from the abrupt pause that carries a group of ying-yang orbs along. Reimu then jumps back and successively throws three semi-circular rows of red amulets.
As Reimu closes her eyes, as though concentrating. Then, Reimu charges yet again while Mettaton manages to slip by the three rows Reimu has created. In the nick of time, he is able to roll away from Reimu, who stops and brings more ying-yang orbs forward along with the momentum of the dash. Like before, she then jumps back and throws the three rows of amulets, which are truly the only obstacle worth worrying about. The ying-yang orbs are purposefully keeping to the corners of the rows, and the amulets themselves slowly scatter away from each other, creating obvious gaps. As much as the purpose of spellcards is, effectively, not to be impossible to dodge, it also isn't very entertaining to easily dodge them: it's the balance between something challenging, but not deadly that one has to achieve to have a fair spellcard battle occur. Beauty and grace are also factors, and the a few of the things Reimu is currently vaguely adhering to while making such easy spellcards.
The strange poses Mettaton makes after dodging the pattern serve to actually annoy Reimu, which ends up helping her acting. "Tch..." That sound is part of Reimu's deliberate improvisation, something she is currently regarding with a lot of pride. If she is already minding the small details of her bland character's thought process, then she surely must be very convincing. "What are you trying to prove anyway? Instead of pulling this whole show, you could've just tried to get my soul already. I can tell you're holding back, Mettaton, and I don't like that one bit!" The irony in Reimu's words have her frown seem even more bitter, and she starts wondering if Mettaton meant for Reimu to feel negatively about the script so she can come off just as negatively as necessary in the actual show. She then dismisses the hypothesis on the grounds that Mettaton wouldn't possibly be that conniving. Or so she believes.
Even though Mettaton himself hasn't attacked yet, Reimu's character claims Mettaton is going easy on her. Reimu can't find the logical thread for this beyond the fact that he so easily lets her run away every time they fight, but she still thinks that's rather farfetched. "HOLDING BACK? OF COURSE I'M HOLDING BACK. THE ONLY TIME YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO SHOW OFF YOUR ULTIMATE POWERS IS AT THE GRAND FINALE! WE HAVEN'T GOTTEN THERE YET, BEAUTIFUL. AND IF YOU DON'T START THINKING ABOUT YOUR ACTIONS UP TO THIS POINT, WE MIGHT NEVER GET THERE AT ALL."
Reimu huffs. "My actions? They're the logical result of how terrible this world is!" she claims, as though emotionally affected by what seems to be Mettaton's taunt; to Reimu, it's hard to comprehend. "Everyone acts for themselves, and themselves only! Even when it just looks like they're being nice, when things get tough, you end up abandoned! Betrayed! You think I can stand living like that? I came to this mountain for a reason!" The escapist mentality has Reimu actually grimace: any problem should just be faced head on; it's simply easier that way. "But in the end, monsters are just as bad! I mean, just look at you: you don't actually care about anything but your attention-grabbing charade! You just want people to fawn over how great you are, and nothing else!" The irony, Reimu notes, is that this is probably the truth. "You're the epitome of selfishness!"
At first, Reimu didn't really care about her character's actions. However, the more she acts out her role, the more she is growing to put consideration into it, and she is verifying that the Reimu she's playing is a fairly troublesome person; the type Reimu just exterminates and hopes she's learned her lesson afterwards. She had no choice in the matter: Reimu needs to think of her character's thought process to get the acting right (granted, her acting is still at a lacking level despite now thinking a bit more about her mentality). "D-d-don't say that about Mettaton!" Alphys suddenly protests, which is part of the script, but makes Reimu wonder where exactly her voice is coming from. Some sort of device she has never seen, perhaps? Looking at Mettaton, she figures something might be stuck behind him which connects Alphys's voice with this location, something he may have implemented while she was talking to Muffet. After all, Mettaton has not shown his back side at all to Reimu or the cameras: Reimu assumes he's hiding something there. "H-he's—!"
"DON'T WORRY, DOCTOR ALPHYS," Mettaton says, cutting Alphys off. Meanwhile, Reimu wonders when the fight is going to resume. Supposedly, turns are skipped with distraction, but since both are distracted, it's likely that turns are being successively skipped at the moment. "IN COMPARISON TO HER AT LEAST, I'M PERFECTLY FINE. BUT STILL, I CAN'T LET THOSE WORDS SLIP BY, DARLING. AFTER ALL, THEY CHALLENGE MY INTEGRITY AS THE UNDERGROUND'S STAR."
Reimu glances to the side out of not feeling up to rolling her eyes without meaning it. "Of course they do," she bitterly mutters. From what she remembers of the script, it isn't as though there will be much else before the show's climax; it's close. That thought serves to fuel her motivation, since Reimu would admittedly like to be doing something else. Unfortunately, she has agreed to acting, and can't presently escape the position she is in.
"AND IT ISN'T BECAUSE YOU'RE RIGHT, IF THAT'S WHAT YOU'RE THINKING," Mettaton sharply counters while his screens turn red. "I CERTAINLY WON'T DENY THAT I LOVE THE ATTENTION MY WONDERFUL FANS GIVE ME. BUT, DARLING. IF A SHOW WAS ALL ABOUT THE PERFORMER, THERE WOULDN'T EVEN BE A PERFORMER IN THE FIRST PLACE. ALL PEOPLE WANT BRIGHT AND HOPEFUL LIVES. WHAT ENTERTAINMENT PROVIDES IS EXACTLY THAT: IT MAKES YOU FORGET HARDSHIPS AND BRIGHTENS YOUR DAY. IS THAT REALLY SUCH A BAD THING?" The question is posed in an awfully serious manner, and to Reimu, the answer is obvious. Unfortunately, she isn't in a position where she can respond to Mettaton, or else, she would've agreed with him: if the nature of entertainment is indeed that, then Reimu can't fault its presence; instead, she can only consider it a necessary existence. "IT'S THE CORE OF SHOW BUSINESS, AND SHOW BUSINESS IS WHAT I LIVE FOR. I COULD'VE JUST TAKEN YOUR SOUL, BUT WHAT GOOD WOULD THAT HAVE DONE FOR OUR AUDIENCE? THIS BROADCAST IS A BROADCAST OF HOPE FOR EVERY SINGLE ONE OF OUR TEN VIEWERS!" Only ten people are watching? Reimu thought Mettaton was popular. "BY TAKING YOUR SOUL LIVE, I'LL BRIGHTEN THEIR LIVES LIKE NEVER BEFORE! THEY'LL FINALLY GET TO LEAVE THIS CRAMPED UNDERGROUND AND SEE THE SURFACE IN ALL ITS GLORY! THAT'S WHY I'M THE UNDERGROUND'S STAR, DARLING! THIS MOMENT'S MY CALLING!"
Reimu blinks, jealously noting how gripping Mettaton sounded despite the fact that he was shamelessly spouting propaganda about himself in a completely fabricated show: if she had such charisma, she would've had visitors in no time. Maybe I should invest my time in acting, Reimu thinks in a rather easygoing manner. Mettaton has been acting, but he could sound genuinely invested in what he was doing in comparison to Reimu, who doesn't particularly know how to distinctively express the genuine emotions of someone who isn't herself. However, reminding herself of the fact that she was actually supposed to have been looking clearly distressed and agitated from Mettaton's speech rather than in slight awe and jealousy, Reimu attempts to flinch before frowning in a saddened manner while keeping her head low. "That's what they all say..." Reimu pauses as she realizes she has no idea of what follows after that line; not even a hunch (which tends to be what Reimu actually follows). However, she decides to use her intuition and take liberties, which isn't so different from what she has been doing so far. "What... a bunch of excuses! I hate everyone and they should all die for all I... care!"
Unable to find any more worth in making up more lines to replace the ones she forgot, Reimu follows the script by making a quick and panicked escape from Mettaton, who is supposedly emotionally affecting her from his speech, as it's closely related to the character's tragic past of betrayal and darkness; to Reimu, it still seems like propaganda. Despite the fact that she flies forward, towards Mettaton, Mettaton himself only turns around and seemingly doesn't have the reaction time to follow after Reimu so suddenly. Reimu wonders how it's even possible not to stop someone running in one's own direction as she flies at great speeds, with the entrance to the MTT Resort as her apparent goal. Reimu herself isn't actually clearly aware of how to get there, but the directions are apparently straightforward, according to Muffet.
At her break, Reimu actually took the time to look through and attempt to memorize her script again, which is why she has some memory of it at the moment (otherwise, she would've painfully forgotten the majority of her lines): even then, she still willfully changes words from the script at her own discretion and doesn't bother fixating the majority of gestures she is supposed to make. She is regarding the show as a priority to leave the Underground and get to Gensokyo, and that is immensely aiding her motivation to remember the script in general.
She can already spot the orange rock forming the normal paths of Hotland in the horizon, but so can she also see a variety of paths. This doesn't look straightforward at all... she mentally remarks before she recalls that she has to still speak while on the move. "Everyone's the same, the exact same...! Vile, self-centered, arrogant..." she says, "And yet..." As she reaches the middle of the multiple paths she had seen before, Reimu briefly looks around and, by intuition alone, guesses that the resort must be up the stairs to her left. She turns in that direction and struggles to bitterly frown while flying up the stairs. "Why don't I just kill them?" When Reimu finds herself face to face with the resort, she lands. "Why can't I just do it...? Even Mettaton, I can't..." She shakes her head. "Nonsense. Why am I like this? The answer's so simple: deliver the finishing blow on one, and you'll get them all." Reimu grips her Purification Rod harder and smirks.
Is this the time? Is it finally the time for the promised bloodshed? A storm of questions and expectations should supposedly rush through the minds of the audience as they gaze at Reimu's expression, which takes the form of something unassuming, inhumane. Her mouth is but a thin, monotone, somber line, and her line of sight is directed only at the building's entrance; from the glass lit by the lamps, she can spot moving, living figures. With the determined gaze of a predator, conveying a twisted sort of steely lack of emotionality, Reimu rushes forward, towards the resort. Towards what all can assume to be her future victims...
Author's Notes:
Dat cliffhanger though. I tried really hard with my descriptions on this last paragraph, if you didn't notice. Listening to ominous Diao Ze Yong tracks also helps. What will become of the monsters of the resort under the relentless iron fist of the shrine maiden? Well, technically nothing ^^' The original plan, to be perfectly honest, was to split this whole Hotland show into 2 parts: Chapter 10, which would be until Muffet's appearance, and Chapter 11, which would be until the end of the Core. However, I noticed that this chapter was getting really, really full of content and that putting so much stuff after a relatively short (in this story's standards) chapter like Chapter 10 would make for a lack of balance in how the chapters work. Chapter 9 got away with its word count because it was all necessary to the chapter, but it's obvious that the rest of Hotland can be put in another chapter just fine and it'll make 13000 words like this one. So, uh, there you go, now there's another chapter left until New Home, hahaha.
I really wanted to make the start follow up after the cliffhanger because I know people will want to know what happens next, and they're either assuming they'll see Touhou first or maybe some semblance of a fight between Muffet and Reimu... or not. I think that by this point, everyone knows how rare an actual narrated fight is here. Besides, I reeeeeaaally wanted to have Reimu talk with Muffet. And so she did, and it worked out much better than I thought. Really, when I was just starting my plans on the Hotland part of the story, the one obstacle that stood in the way of Reimu getting through things was Muffet. Muffet is a hard boss. I mean, you can beat her, but it's a huge challenge. With that in mind, Reimu would struggle a lot with Muffet to the point where I wouldn't be sure if Reimu could really win against her in one try. Fortunately, the whole show thing happened, which rendered Muffet an ally of Reimu's instead of an enemy, so they don't actually battle. It's cool how, because of circumstances alone, Reimu and Muffet actually got along. If they weren't working together, I don't think it would've quite gone like this.
Muffet is a bit difficult to write, since you have to perfectly time her chuckles and tildes, along with not actually making Muffet too graceful. Muffet is more cute-graceful than elegant-graceful, so she comes off as a more adorable character than she does composed. Besides, she doesn't speak very fancy, and instead just seems like a very easily-amused character. Describing the stuff her hands are doing is actually really neat. Muffet doesn't seem like the type to care that much about the human souls, especially since the sole reason she tries to get your soul is because she got hired to do so. Similarly, Muffet was hired to be on the show, and she complied seeing as it involves those sweet Gs. So, Muffet doesn't really care that she's talking to a human and has the spiders' freedom as the higher priority. Muffet still seems like she's naturally greedy though, and those poor monsters were basically bullied into buying her pastries ^^' Reimu and Muffet somehow work alright together when it comes to interactions.
I'm starting to feel bad for Papyrus when it comes to calls because Reimu just calls him over the most pointless or terrible things and is really rude XD On one hand, it's like I'm repeating a dead joke, but on the other hand, wouldn't Reimu bother calling Papyrus over money? Personally, last chapter's conversation was better, but we'll see more Papyrus soon enough. Speaking of Papyrus, even he got annoyed at Reimu's rudeness, which is definitely something that can happen. I've seen in many fics Papyrus apparently being so nice that he can't even get mad at people, but you actually see him getting angry a lot in the game, particularly at Sans (pfft, siblings, am I right? ;D). Papyrus is nice, but he's not an angel, geez. Even then, I imagine he's quick to forgive like Reimu, so in a way, Reimu has a few things in common with Papyrus 0.o Like, Sans is the one that actually makes money (this is canonically stated; Sans pays the house's rent), so it's easy to imagine Papyrus actually just gets money from Sans. Besides, you don't get money from beating him (well, you don't really get it from other bosses, but I have to justify my taken liberties somewhere). Anyway, plz don't hurt me for the interpretations ;_; By the way, Reimu's fourth wall breaking though. I've had her do these jokes about three times now XD They happened in the games, and I do like that sort of stuff, too.
The thing about Reimu is that she can be really silly while also pointing out other silly things depending on the circumstance, so, unlike fanfictions that portray Reimu as the grumpy straight-man, she doesn't actually tend to be the straight-man (especially to Marisa) most of the time; if anything, Marisa tends to be the straight-man a lot! Though, Marisa is more of a witty straight-man. Either way, Reimu can be hilarious, and Marisa is actually supposed to be the relatable character of Touhou. Putting that aside, surprised at the Nitori scene, huh? I wanted a scene with kappa, so I figured that since I'm writing kappa, Nitori should be there. Things I've researched about kappa in Touhou is that they apparently suck at teamwork, but work really well when it comes to things they're individually interested in. That was perfect for the scene I was writing, since I could have a few kappa slip away from the group because they're more interested in other things. Kappa show up a good amount in Wild and Horned Hermit, so sshhh, let's pretend the kappa there are kappa from that series and not random OCs! ^^' Nitori seems kind of shy in Mountain of Faith, but that was probably because she didn't know Reimu or Marisa at the time and wanted to stop them from coming to the mountain. Any other occasion, Nitori's really blunt and actually has a really dynamic demeanor; it's said she's more cheerful around friends. All around, Nitori's actually the kind of character that can display a lot of emotions, like frustration and annoyance and excitement and embarrassment, really easily and naturally. A lot of Touhou characters are that way, but Nitori is especially like that. I'm hoping you can actually get what I mean: someone with such expressive capability, I tend to refer to as 'dynamic'. Anyway, the scene itself serves a few purposes, but I'll need one or two more scenes to accompany this one so it'll have an actual effect.
And then... woah! A part of a narrated spellcard battle...! Thought you'd never see something like that in this story, huh? I also thought I'd never write it, but I felt the need to have Aya go away, and I couldn't just have her go away all of a sudden, so I had to write part of the battle as build up for Aya seeing Miko from a distance and buggering off. Spellcard battles as seen in the games are probably not how they actually are in the world of Touhou, and instead, I think it's actually closer to the fighting games, which is still close enough. I read through the one manga that supposedly had battles in it, which was Silent Sinner in Blue (aka "How to Masterfully Troll the Lunarians Featuring Yukari Yakumo"), but that manga didn't actually give me much reference when it came to spellcard battles. People uh, announce the spellcard...? Then they shoot things and you can apparently parry them and destroy them however you want. Basically, it's like the fighting games. So I did it like the fighting games. You might be wondering if 4 vs 1 is against the rules, and I think it technically is, but there have been at least two battles that were one opponent against many, like in Touhou 13.5, so it's absolutely within the realm of possibility for Touhou to do this sort of stuff. Aya herself was fighting in a half-serious, half-I-wanna-find-a-chance-to-bugger-off manner, so it was all cool.
I imagine the way you can lose a spellcard battle in the protagonist's side is by having so many rematches that you eventually have no more motivation to go through with them and just give it up while carrying your bruised self back home. Just imagining the combined powers of Marisa, Alice, Sakuya and Futo into a spellcard, though 0.0 Those are all Stage 5-tier bosses. Even then, Aya is like, Extra Stage-tier; she accidentally wins battles omg! Anyway, in comes Miko! Miko wasn't actually meant to appear this many times within the story, but the more I think about it, the more Miko is actually a really important character now ^^' Either way, I gave some thought to how Miko treats Futo in general: I recalled some translation notes over a Victory Quote from Miko that Miko was very harshly referring to Futo and that Miko doesn't seem to treat her very well, but I can't imagine that actually being a thing (not only does omae seem to be the way she refers to most people, but the quote itself does not only infer a harsh or rude tone; the wording may instead imply familiarity and is probably more of a remark on an attitude Miko has known Futo to have; I mean, ffs, I've literally played a match against Futo using Miko to confirm that she's SMILING when she says that quote so it's obviously not something said with ill intent so why is it translated as 'damn trite' that's too harsh aaaah— Sorry, I just had to let it out, no offense to the translator, of course, since I'm sure they're doing their best). Whatever the case, Touhou 13.5 has Miko blankly wonder what Futo's doing in Futo's ending, but that's because Futo brought all the villagers' prized possessions instead of what she actually wanted (XD), so it makes sense, and Miko doesn't get mad at her or responds in a harsh manner. Not only that, but Touhou 14.5 has Miko tease Futo about her wish in Futo's ending because Futo naively thought she could make her wishes come true by collecting the Occult Balls, and Miko doesn't seem to be doing it with ill intent either; she appeared amused at Futo's behavior.
In other words, Miko is not harsh on Futo! Canon sources actually show otherwise! Hahaha, omg, I think I'm turning into Miko's number 1 defender ^^' With that in mind, Miko was actually more amused at Futo's absent-minded behavior in that scene and didn't say anything precisely because she didn't care that much; she'd probably only care if Futo were screwing up something important, which she wasn't. That reminds me of Miko's storyline in Touhou 14.5, in which the first stage where she fights Futo is named 'Domestic Violence' omg XDD Even in there, where Futo was borderline disobeying Miko, Miko didn't seem especially angry or rude towards her. She was just assertive like she usually is with serious affairs. Yes, I may just have constant rants for every time I write Miko. She's misunderstood! I was even almost gonna prepare another rant for more OOC portrayals I've seen of Miko, but I don't wanna ramble on (though omg, it's haunting my mind!). Putting that aside, Alice and Sakuya are amazing XD They bicker so beautifully.
I didn't want to have Sakuya portrayed as too elegant to be mad, because there are actually a lot of instances where Sakuya gets annoyed at things, so it was nice Alice making that one remark and actually annoying Sakuya. Besides, woah, Sakuya is savage, did you see what she said to Futo? Well, everyone in Touhou is kinda savage. Alice actually seems to have enough pride to go into denial, or so I can verify from Touhou 8, and it's nice exploring that part of Alice. Overall, Alice is so relaxing to write: you're just at ease writing Alice because her personality isn't particularly complicated and she can display so many emotions in response to other people; I love Alice. I also like how mean-spirited everyone is: Sakuya and Alice were bickering, but then they get together to recall Reimu losing to Miko once in Touhou 13.5 (Futo's part proves that Reimu lost against Miko) even though Reimu also won against her another time XD Alice does like to do these kinds of things to Reimu (dat feel when Touhou 7). They talk about getting back at Aya, and you'd think they actually can't according to this chapter, but they can beat Aya. Everyone beats each other in Touhou, so they will actually beat Aya by themselves the next time they see her. Oh, and Aya is so standoffish, hahaha. Dat Tengu pride is strong.
Oh man, dat feel when Marisa realizes how much she sucks as a detective. Miko is like, the actual detective in this series and it makes me laugh; now I wanna see Miko in a detective outfit (you know what outfit I'm talking about) SOOO badly XD Miko immediately thinks of investigating the Hakurei Shrine to see if there are any leads towards Reimu's absence, and while Marisa just sort of tells Shinmyoumaru that Reimu's missing and only gets out that Reimu left the shrine from her, Miko straight up wants to interrogate her for any and all clues to Reimu's whereabouts, it's just beautiful. That feel when Miko's surprised like "holy shit you had a witness all along?!" XD I just feel bad for Futo who not only didn't get to say goodbye to Miko, but also doesn't get any information on who the hell everyone wants to consult about the Bamboo Forest of the Lost (hahaha she was cheering on the fight XD). Ironically, a lot of people end up going there in the games, but it seems the place is like, literally cursed to make you lost so I imagine everyone just miraculously gets saved. In Touhou 14.5, Mokou just led you out and the same happened in Touhou 9 with Tewi, so maybe that's what usually happens. Either way, Sakuya thought it was too troublesome to ever go to that place and the party's planning on having someone else do it! Who would that be...? ;D
Anyway, I do love cutting into the middle of the show instead of right when it starts. It's just great making you figure out that Reimu's acting right now and you're right in the show because yes. I don't want to bore you with scenes about Reimu (barely) memorizing scripts ^^' I comment a lot on Reimu's character, but it's just because I feel as though Reimu can't relate with her at all, and that's more or less the point of poking fun at the character to begin with. In a way, when you think about it, Mettaton says a lot of satirical stuff in the middle of his shows: I know that's the joke, you know, making fun of television and entertainment, but doesn't that somewhat give people leeway into thinking that perhaps Mettaton himself is into writing meta shows (badum-tss?)? Even putting that aside, the propaganda is strong. And even still, Mettaton is astoundingly hard to write. Also, Alphys hasn't been showing up a lot because the times where she is actually doing something is usually when Reimu is away; those are mostly the times when Alphys is prominently speaking to Mettaton. She'll appear more, though, don't worry.
But still, ugh, Mettaton. Muffet was nice, but Mettaton gives me constant insecurity. If Mettaton were easier to write, I'm sure I'd be more confident about this Hotland section, but I'm not because Mettaton is so difficult to nail! Maybe I'm just overthinking it. There's just something about the way Mettaton speaks that leaves me unable to know how exactly his nuances work. Besides, the fact that he's a rectangle doesn't give me much freedom when it comes to descriptions. It's ironic that the entertainment robot ends up being the character that's hardest to write ^^' Anyway, the fights are more there to make Mettaton look good than anything, so you won't see actual fighting between these two. Besides, even if you want bloodshed, monsters don't have blood so the irony in Mettaton's words is great... So, Mettaton's lines are propaganda and Reimu's character is built around advertising Mettaton's greatness. It's beautiful like that. Reimu is trying to get into this acting thing, but it's difficult! She seems like the kind of person who'd suck at acting, but could pull it off if she practiced it enough, though Reimu doesn't really put any effort into stuff like that; she barely even trains her own powers.
Whatever the case, look forward to the last part of Hotland? To be honest, this last part will mess up the order of my Touhou scenes a bit, but I think I can manage.