A/N: Woot. Here's the next Between the Lines chapter. Hopefully it doesn't disappoint.
And here, we have reviews. Thanks for these yet again.
erickkarver: Thanks for the compliment, hehe. I'm glad you liked my interpretation of the SDM residents, and like I said last chapter in another reader's review, I'll deal with the grammar errors...at some point. As for things like that one favorite character of yours and how Eirin stacks up versus Heaven Canceller, well, who knows? Maybe you'll find out next arc.
Masterx01: I can somewhat understand why you would think of that situation as forced, however I opted to make Sakuya at least a tiny bit merciful. I put that reasonable and merciful part of her in there and that's how the scene ended up playing out with the way I wrote it. I did have the thought originally of having Touma try to 'catch' Gungnir as it blew past him and redirect it from hitting Koakuma, but when it came to that point I had troublesome mental block that wouldn't let me develop the situation in that direction.
Deep Sea Diver Man: I didn't think the situation warranted the Dragons coming out, so I kept it at the Invisible Thing. I'm sure if they were released freely upon Gensoukyou the damage would be immeasurable. As for the next place Touma is thrown into...well, you'll find that out when next arc starts.
Formboy1: I'm glad you liked the arc. Going onto the games...well, good luck and fight hard! You may not be very good now, but with practice anyone can be great. Glad to see you're having fun with them though.
Guest: I'll look over it and see if I can't add a little more to the kissing scene though. I don't know. As for the questions I forgot to address last chapter...
1) Oh, so Remilia had started to piggyback on Patchouli saying that they didn't have time for Marisa and Flandre to attack them, but then Remilia got cut off by Flandre starting up Taboo "Forbidden Games". That's what Sakuya was referring to when she said that Remilia was trying to say that they didn't have time.
2) Touma pinched Meiling's butt.
Server lock: My understanding of what you're saying may be skewed, but the Dragons are a whole separate entity to the Invisible Thing. It's not so much the Dragon's presence than it is...well, just an unknown, invisible, and immensely powerful force.
As for Sakuya's characterization during the whole scene, specifically her fear, I will admit that she was out of character there, but that was my intention. At the end of the day, Sakuya is just a human with a special power, and she can feel fear just like the rest of us. I wanted to show that in that scene. Faced with a force of that magnitude, it would be more surprising if Sakuya wasn't totally terrified. Also, what Sakuya was before she became Remilia's maid is still speculation, and I tend to stay away from past Sakuya because I'm afraid I won't write something worthy of her general awesomeness.
When I wrote that chapter, though, I knew it would betray some expectations. Sorry I couldn't write a fight scene like you and some others may have expected for ending an arc, but when faced with with the IT or the Dragons there aren't many beings that can stand against it or even put up a fight, both in the Touhou Project and in A Certain Magical Index. I'd be hard-pressed to find a way Sakuya could resist.
Excuse me if my reply sounded too serious or came off negatively in some way.
And with all oft that out of the way, may you all enjoy this short chapter.
Between the Lines 2
The Imaginary Number District—Five Elements Institution.
The City of Shimmers.
Both of these are names for the mysterious realm that exists in the same location as Academy City.
It was formed by the AIM diffusion fields—unconscious releases of weak energy emitted from an esper's body, of all 2.3 million espers living in that city of science.
And in this strange realm lies a strange being, formed of these same fields and given consciousness through a fear of death by Kamijou Touma's Imagine Breaker.
Kazakiri Hyouka stood in the middle of a road, thinking about the recent disappearance of the boy holding that threatening power.
4 days, huh…
Ninety-six hours have passed since the boy seemed to vanish from the face of the earth, and ninety-six hours of investigation by the city's authorities have turned up fruitless.
It's quite troublesome.
She sighs as she thinks of Kamijou's companion and her first friend, Index. The boy is someone very important to her, and Kazakiri wonders if the grimoire library is doing fine without him.
She wants to go see her in her time of need, and be there for her while she waits for him to return. If there's one thing she knows about him other than the fact that even being around him is toxic to her, it's that he always comes back, no matter what, so the least she can do is be there with her friend as she waits.
Her surroundings shift to fill with people, and her eyes widen in surprise at the sudden scenery shift.
It seems she's manifested in Academy City yet again.
Upon realizing this, she moves to find the Index Librorum Prohibitorum.
It all started with one sentence.
"I bet I can drink more than you!"
From there, it dissolved into chaos.
"Hah! You wish! You'll never be able to drink more than the strongest!"
"Bring it on! I can take way more than you, be it humans or alcohol!"
The voices of Mystia Lorelei, Cirno, and Rumia all echo through the forest as they argue over who can drink the most. Meanwhile, the more level-headed (though not by much) Wriggle Nightbug and Daiyousei trudge on behind them, dreading what's to come.
None of them look like they're any older than twelve, yet they're talking about drinking. Why is that?
Well, that's because none of them are human. Cirno and Daiyousei are both fairies and have been around for at least sixty years, Wriggle and Mystia are both young youkai just out of their newborn phases (think anywhere between fifty and a hundred years), and Rumia is a youkai that acts like one just out of their newborn phases…though she couldn't really tell you her age even if she wanted to.
"Fine then! Let's have ourselves a drinking competition!"
"Yeah!"
Mystia proposes this and Cirno and Rumia yell their agreement simultaneously, taking off into flight toward the village.
"Wawawa, Cirno-chan, wait up!" Daiyousei flies off after the three of them, if only to avoid being separated from her fellow younger ice fairy.
Wriggle, on the other hand, sighs and looks up at the noontime sun and fiddles with her cape. She knew the sudden return of the more seasonal winter cold would be telling of something bad to come.
As the boyish insect youkai flies after her group—Team Nineball, as they're called, she complains out loud to no one in particular. "Honestly, talking about having a drinking competition in broad daylight…we're all going to get day-drunk, I can feel it."
The Human Village is not as hostile to youkai as one would originally think. In fact, as long as they're not causing any trouble, they're generally left alone.
There are shops that only cater to youkai, some only humans, and some that don't discriminate and serve both.
Of the two types that their group can attend, they chose a youkai-only one this time.
And now…
The three rowdy non-humans are being their own levels of drunk, with Rumia being groggy and speaking with slurred speech with her head down on the bar, Mystia singing songs and totally botching the lyrics (though it still sounds very pretty regardless of that), and Cirno…is just less articulate than before.
At some point they had forgotten about the competition and just drank for the sake of it, but Wriggle decided to count for them to pass the time. Rumia went down first with five dishes of sake, Mystia came next at eight, and Cirno is still going on her ninth. Keep in mind these are not your small traditional-sized ones, rather they're comparable in size to the oni Hoshiguma Yuugi's sake dish. That thing is almost as big around as her head.
Wriggle sighs and takes a sip from her own dish. Around the time Rumia reached the point of no return, Wriggle and Daiyousei decided to take a few drinks of their own, but not so much that they can't guide their friends back home when they decide to leave.
"Hey, Dai-chan."
The green-haired fairy hiccups and looks dazedly at Wriggle. "Y-yes?"
"Don't you think we should go home now?" The firefly looks to the wasted trio of their fivesome. "If we stay any longer I feel like Cirno's gonna find a way to burn the place down. And she's an ice fairy."
Daiyousei doesn't answer, only looks quizzically at her with a hazy expression.
"Hey, now, Dai-chan…"
"Ehehe, I'm sorry, did you say somethin'?"
Wriggle slams her head down on the counter. It hurts a lot more than usual since her antennae got smashed, too, and it startled the bartender.
Dammit, Dai, why are you such a lightweight? You only had one dish! One!
Picking her head up off the counter, she looks over to the group's leader and opens her mouth to speak.
"Cirn—"
"Hey, hey, everyone, I know somewhere where we can get never-ending sake!"
She resists the urge to yank at her own antennae as she hears this. "I really, really don't think any of you need any more alcohol in your system."
She's ignored, not unexpectedly.
"Oh~!" Mystia expresses her pleasant surprise in her singing voice as she stumbles over to Cirno.
"Uuu…where, where?" Rumia groans and slinks out of her seat to approach the ice fairy.
"Tell us, Cirno-chan!" Even Daiyousei gets up from her seat and floats to her friend.
Not wanting to be left out, Wriggle downs the rest of her dish and approaches as well.
"Well, well, I heard that a certain oni came down from heaven and is staying at the Hakurei Shrine today!"
Rumia, Mystia, and Daiyousei nod attentively, waiting for their leader to go on.
Wriggle, on the other hand, pales at what she just said.
'A certain oni', she says…there's only one oni that I know stays up in heaven.
"And—hic, and Reimu's out with Marisa today picking 'shrooms in the Forest of Magic, and you know that oni always sleeps through most of the day, so I say we go nab her gourd and sample the sake in there!"
"No. No, no, no." Wriggle voices her disapproval. "We are not going to go steal from that oni."
Cirno looks sadly at her. "Aww~, but why not? I've thought up a good plan and everything!"
"Because she's way stronger than all of us combined, you idiot! There's no way we can pull that off!"
"Yes we can!" Cirno puts her hands on her hips and floats up so she's on eye level with Wriggle. "I have it all planned out! Rumia can make the room darker so it seems like night time, Mystia can sing some lullabies to help keep her asleep, you can use some of your bugs to sting her with some paral…paryl…some poison that makes it so she can't move, and then Dai and me, the strongest, will swoop in to take her gourd from her and then we can all escape!"
"Ohh~!"
The three onlooking members of the team say this in unison, and even Wriggle has to admit that that's a pretty good plan, especially coming from Cirno.
I've always wondered what the sake inside that infinite gourd tastes like…
She shakes her head despite this thought.
"As good of a plan as that is, Cirno, it's too risky! I happen to like living, thank you very much!"
Cirno moves closer to Wriggle so that they're almost face-to-face, causing the firefly youkai to move backwards until she hits the bar. Cirno stops just before their noses meet.
They lock eyes and stare at each other for almost a full minute, and finally Cirno opens her mouth to speak with alcohol-scented breath.
"You haven't had enough sake!"
"Eh?!"
She backs up from Wriggle, giving her much needed space as she turns her back on her to face the other three members of Team Nineball. "If you would've drank more, we wouldn't be disagreeing! Everyone, hold her down! And Bartender-san, give me the strongest stuff you got!"
Oh, this is bad!
Wriggle dashes toward the door, but before she can escape she feels a pull on her legs, tripping her sending her face-first to the ground.
"Ghk—!"
She kicks her legs to try and dislodge the person restraining her, but they hold on stubbornly and actually begin to drag her back to the center of the room.
"HEY! LET ME GO!"
She continues to thrash about and manages to free one leg from their grasp, but not even a second later another body seizes her other leg.
"Dammit!" Wriggle uses her arms to pull herself back toward the door to escape the tragedy to come, but then she feels a sudden weight on her back and two small hands grab her wrists with an ungodly strength, yanking them back and bending her backwards.
"Owowowow, get off me!" She doesn't even have to look to know this is Rumia, what with this insane strength.
But then the blue-haired, icicle-winged fairy comes into her vision, with a mischievous smile and a sake dish in her hand.
"Open wide, Wriggle!"
"Noo—ulp!"
The ice fairy grabs her nose and forces open her mouth, then pours the sweet liquid into her mouth and down her throat.
And wow, when Cirno asked for the strongest the bartender had, he did not disappoint.
A/N: And that wraps that up. I bet you didn't expect to see Team Nineball, especially in a Between the Lines which essentially set the stage for the next arc. I wonder how many of you know who that oni is, and if you do I wonder if you can figure out how things are going to start off in the next chapter, the beginning of the second arc.
But before I go—did you guys know that Kasen has Sage privileges? Now I understand why she was able to break open the Hakurei Barrier in Urban Legend in Limbo to go attack Sumireko. I guess that means Kasen is on the same level as Yukari, as those privileges mean she was one of the people that helped create the barrier.
But let me stop talking and start working on the next chapter. Leave a review, if you don't mind, and I'll see you all next chapter.