Gensokyo my Beloved

by Fonzi the Survivalist

It's late spring, year 125 in Gensokyo when a mass spiriting-away of outsiders takes place. The Hakurei shrine maiden thinks this is just a minor incident, easy to resolve. But is it...?

36. The House of Eternity

Chapter 36 – The House of Eternity

The heaviness of the hot summer air… The muffled sounds of footsteps that echoed in the distance, breaking the otherwise perfect, tranquil silence… The darkness that lasted long enough to seem natural… The taste of nothing but wet dust… The smell of bamboo and medicine… The uncomfortable ache of lying in the same position for God-knows-how-long…

Those were some of the feelings he woke up to. Feeling some sense of touch coming back into his limbs, Kyouichi lightly stirred inside his bed. To be exact, he didn't know where he was lying. He still had a hard time trying to figure out who he was in the first place. As he tried opening his eyes, he noticed that his sight was blocked by something… something he had wrapped around his face. He slowly brought his hands to his face to identify the rough texture of a bandage. His memory was still hazy, but a little flashback made him recall being hit in the head really hard. With his fingertips he gently moved a piece of bandage away from his eyes, making himself a narrow visor. The first idea that crossed his mind as he saw the wooden interior of the room was a guess that he was at the Hakurei Shrnie, but as he looked left and right, that thought was quickly dismissed. He still had no idea of his new whereabouts, so he tried to gather enough strength to his limbs so he'd be able to stand up.

After something over a minute of mental preparation for this outstanding feat, he managed to lift himself into a sitting position. His head hurt really bad, but so did over 70 percent of his whole body. Just as he sat up, his bed made a loud creaking sound which didn't go unnoticed.

"Oh~! What do you know? Another one's waking up, huh?" sounded a slightly hoarse male voice from somewhere further in the room.

Kyouichi cleared his throat, which hasn't been used for some time, in an attempt to react to the voice. "Wh-… Who's there? Uh…. Damn it… Where am I?"

"That voice… Ishimaru, is that you?"

He found it really surprising that somebody could identify him just by hearing his voice, even when Kyouichi himself had close to no clue about who does the other voice belong to. His mind had a really hard time trying to think straight. It was almost as if he was drunk, but somewhat different.

"Who's there?" he repeated his first question, holding onto his bed with both hands, while taking small, unsteady steps to see what's behind the folding screen standing next to his bed.

As he could finally peek around the folding screen, he saw a remotely familiar face of a young man with semi-long black hair as he was sitting on another bed further in the room. Even though Kyouichi was certain that he has seen this guy before, his confused mind could barely put two and two together.

"Aha!" exclaimed the young male, pointing his finger at Kyouichi. "I knew it was you, club prez!" he said with a teethy smile. "Man, you should see yourself in a mirror…"

Even stranger was the fact that the man could identify him despite the fact that Kyouichi's entire face was bandaged. The way he addressed him almost immediately rang Kyouichi's bell. "Club prez? Wait a second… No way… you're…"

"Ha! It's no wonder you're having trouble remembering my name after such a hit in the head…" remarked the young man who could be two or three years older than Kyouichi. "Well… not that I've seen that incident, but I've been told what happened to you…"

"…Asakura-san…?"

"Whoa! Cool! You remember!" smiled the man. "Yeah, it's me, Soudai Asakura… To be honest, I never thought I'd meet you here, hehe~!"

"Soudai…" Kyouichi muttered the man's first name, already knowing that he's one of the Transfer Students' Club members and that he worked with the local woodcutters.

"That means I'm now in…"

"Intensive Care Ward, third floor, Eientei in the Bamboo Forest of the Lost…" Asakura answered quickly, before Kyouichi would hurt his head with excessive thinking.

"Eientei, huh…?"

He really wondered about the "intensive care", though, since besides the few patients lying in beds, there was nobody else in the room right now.

"Yeah… It's a really big house… By the way, how do you feel, man? They told me you got a really unlucky hit in the head. Eirin-sensei was even worried you'd end up with lasting brain damage."

Even the name of Eirin sounded familiar to Kyouichi's ears, but he knew that he hasn't met her before. After a little while of logical association, he remembered that Eirin Yagokoro was supposedly a Lunarian who lived at Eientei, providing medical services to everyone without discrimination. And that she was really good at it too. He worked on transcribing some of her manuscripts after all…

"Say, Soudai…" mumbled Kyouichi through the bandage on his face. "How long have I been out cold?"

"You should probably ask someone else… I don't even remember when they brought you in."

"Uhhh… God damn it… I feel like I was eaten by something and vomited out…"

"It must be the all those weird drugs they use here." explained the other outsider. "I myself don't feel like dancing right now…"

Soudai rubbed his own head in a pained expression and curiously looked up at Kyouichi, who was now unsteadily heading towards the door. "Hey… Hey, dude, where do you think you're going?"

With his hand already on the door, he slowly turned back and with a bit of embarrassment, he asked: "Do you know where I can find toilets here?"

Soudai chuckled amusedly. "I'm not too sure about this floor, but there most certainly is a restroom on the first one."

"M-kay… Thanks." he replied groggily, sliding the door open and dragging his feet out of the room.

"Yeah… Good luck trying not to break your leg!"

---

By now, the freshly woken outsider was already headed down the corridor, supporting his body by bracing one hand against the wall as he went. Several Moon rabbits who were passing along the same corridor just confusedly stared at him, but still minded mostly their own business. Kyouichi trusted only his instinct to follow the rabbits until, with a bit of luck, he found a staircase leading both up and down. He wasn't even that much surprised to see the busy Earth and Moon rabbits running all over the place. His only thought now was to successfully climb down the stairs to the first floor and find the restroom. After more than two minutes of carefully stepping down each stair, he finally made it to the ground level.

"Uhh… Finally… Now… Which of these doors leads to the restroom?" he asked himself after a while of scouting both sides of the incredibly long corridor. As he saw the doors which all those rabbits used to come and go through, he figured that they probably weren't taking food or medical supplies out of the restroom… No. The most often used doors must have led to some other facilities of this immensely large building. Therefore, Kyouichi tried opening one of the doors that weren't used by any of the rabbits for a longer while. He immediately noticed that the room he peeked into was an office of some sort, but there was nobody there… Nobody with the exception of a short girl with white rabbit ears, short black hair and a pinkish dress. She looked just like one of the other rabbits, only somewhat larger, though that still made her size small enough to be comparable to a pre-teen child. She was sitting on a chair and building a house out of empty medicine boxes. She certainly didn't look like an employee.

"Uhh… Hello?" Kyouichi sounded timidly, immediately getting the rabbit girl's attention.

The girl looked back with a very curious, almost freaked-out look in her eyes. No wonder after seeing some stranger in a patient's robe with his face completely covered by bandage.

"I just wanted to ask… Where can I find men's restroom around here?"

The girl continued to stare in silence for a while, but after a moment her expression changed into a smile. A very mischievous smile at that... However, since Kyouichi didn't have his glasses on, he didn't really notice.

"The eleventh door to the right from here~." replied the rabbit, rubbing her hands under the table.

"Oh… Okay… Thank you very much…" Kyouichi mumbled a few thankful words, bowing down once before closing the office's door. Right after that, the rabbit girl began giggling for reasons known only to her…

---

Walking slowly and counting the doors he passed by, the outsider finally reached the count of eleven.

"Restroom at last…" he exhaled heavily as he grabbed the door by its depression and slid it open.

A cloud of warm steam welcomed him as soon as he opened the door to a room that most certainly wasn't a men's restroom. There was a large ofuro, lots of aromatic candles and flasks with bathing oils and salts. And just at the edge of the bathing tub, standing with her back turned at the door, was a single tall and slender female figure with milky-pale skin and a veil of glossy straight black hair that reached below her waist. She was just discarding the last piece of garment that covered her body, before she was about to step into the warm water. Kyouichi didn't know who she was, but he couldn't take his eyes off her. It was a truly a beautiful sight. Her figure was sheer perfection. Other words attempting to describe the flawlessness of her body would be meaningless here. Just when Kyouichi thought that the most beautiful girl he met was the ghost of Yuyuko Saigyouji, now he started to have some doubts. He began to wonder why does Gensokyo have such an abundance of beautiful girls. He nearly forgot that he wasn't invisible and that if the girl he was glaring at for almost half a minute now turned around, she'd spot him right away. Almost as if reading his thoughts, the beautiful girl really did turn around… It took a while for her to even process the fact that she wasn't alone in there. Her instinctive reaction was to use her arms to cover her most intimate parts. However, it was just a little too late. Kyouichi had seen EVERYTHING… She was even more beautiful from the front. Still looking puzzled, she stared at the intruder silently with her dark-brown eyes and raised eyebrows.

"Sorry, wrong room…" muttered Kyouichi in a phlegmatic voice before taking a step backwards and closing the room's door. A couple of seconds after he did so, he heard a terrified scream coming from the bathhouse.

"KYAAAAAAAH~!"

The girl screamed so loudly that any birds that were roosting near Eientei immediately took flight.

Not a second later, a huge barrage of multi-colored danmaku riddled the bathing room's door with numerous holes. Fortunately for the outsider, he had already moved on from the door, further searching the corridor for a men's restroom. However, since he knew that this attack was meant for him, he tried to hurry and get away from that place as quickly as possible.

"I'VE BEEN SEEN~!" echoed the unknown girl's voice all over the Eientei's main corridor. "EIRIIIIIN~! HEEEELP~! THERE'S SOME PERVERT ON THE LOOSE~!"

"Uh-oh… This won't end well if I stay here…" thought Kyouichi as he hurried to open the nearest door to hide himself. He just hoped, he wouldn't enter any similar room and get himself into even bigger trouble.

He slammed the door shut behind him, figuring out that he ended up in some sort of storeroom or pantry, where large bags of various staples were taking up most of the room's area. He flattened himself against the wall, waiting until his rapid, shallow breathing would settle down a bit. He could hear the sounds of rushing footsteps on the corridor and some unfamiliar woman's voice calling: "My lady, are you alright? What happened here? Why is that door full of holes? Were you attacked? Was it Mokou?"

"FAR WORSE~! SOME MASKED PERVERT WAS SPYING ON ME WHILE I WAS GOING TO TAKE A BATH~! THIS IS SO EMBARRASSING~!"

"Man… With body like that, I don't know what does she have to be embarrassed about…" said Kyouichi under his nose as he eavesdropped on the conversation.

"A pervert? Could you describe that person a bit better?" asked the other woman.

"Like I said, he was masked, so I don't know what he looked like. But I think he was one of your patients, Eirin. Why can't you just keep them under control?"

"I apologize, my mistress, but… wasn't it also partly your fault for not locking the door, or at least hiding it with magic?"

"Uuu~… But it was your idea to turn this place into some pseudo-hospital…" replied the black-haired girl.

"Pseudo…? I'm trying my best here. Only thanks to our hard work has this place become the largest and most well-equipped medical facility in the entire Gensokyo. Besides… you always complained to me about feeling lonely, mistress. You even used to get excited every time we had a new visitor…"

"Maybe so, but this is just too much… What is with all these people anyway? We've never used to have so many sick and injured ever since we took shelter here to hide from the lunar emissaries."

"I know… But please bear with it. We're all experiencing breaking events, but it shouldn't be long before I manage to get all of our patients recovered. Then things will be back to normal again."

"Bear with it, you say? How can I just sit around and "bear with it" when there are so many patients that they're starting to invade my privacy?!"

"Princess…"

"I've just about had it with being useless… If it means that this place will once again become peaceful and quiet, and that no masked perverts are going to sneak up on me anymore, I'll do whatever necessary to help you, Eirin!"

"Are you really certain, my lady?"

"Haven't I said it clearly enough? I want you to accept my help… That is an order."

"But mistress… You barely have any knowledge or experience with medicines and treatment."

"Uuuu~…"

"However, I could always use another nurse."

"I'll do it!"

"But you'd basically be doing tasks that the other rabbits do around here… Such work is way below your status, princess…"

"You think I can't do the work?"

"No, I didn't say that; it's just… unexpected of you."

"That's YOUR opinion, Eirin. Now… get me a uniform and tell me what should I help you with!"

The woman that was addressed as Eirin giggled. "Okay, mistress, follow me then. And know that you can quit whenever you feel like it…"

Sounds of distancing footsteps indicated that the two females were heading down the corridor. Kyouichi still didn't dare to leave his hiding spot until he was certain that the coast was clear.

He didn't even want to think about what would happen to him if the two ladies would catch him. Leaving the pantry and closing its door, he resumed his search for the toilets which he needed to use really soon. The method he used was the same trial and error one. After about fifth attempt, however, he finally found it.

"Bingo!" he rejoiced after finding the right facility.

---

After using the toilet and washing his hands, he again carefully peeked out around the corridor to make sure he wouldn't run into that black-haired girl he saw earlier.

"Damn… Would it really kill the folks living here if they marked the doors with signs or at least some numbers?" he muttered to himself as he headed to the stairway. "Didn't that bunny girl say it was supposed to be the eleventh door? I mean… she missed by at least seven doors… Unless…" only now did Kyouichi begin to wonder if the girl didn't misguide him on purpose. "But even so… that sight was well worth it, hehe~…"

After quite a while, Kyouichi returned back to the third floor, but now he forgot which room was the Intensive Care Ward.

"Ah… god damn it… why didn't I memorize how many doors I passed by before I went downstairs?" he blamed himself as he walked onward, guided only by his rough guess. Fortunately, he saw Soudai's head peeking out from one of the rooms. He probably wanted to go somewhere as well.

"I'm back…" Kyouichi nodded to him as he returned back to the ward. "Hope nobody's been looking for me while I was gone."

"Nope. I've been watching the corridor for a while and nobody even stopped here to take a look… For being placed in the Intensive Care Ward, the staff sure does a good job at not giving a damn about us."

"Maybe they're too busy." reasoned Kyouichi as he slowly walked back to his bed. Since he overheard the conversation from a while ago, he had a good reason to assume so. "Besides, this may not be the only Intensive Care Ward in the entire building."

Soudai made a quiet and slightly pained chuckle. "Well… I see you're still perfectly in possession of your faculties. Even after such a strong blow."

"Oh, am I? You still haven't asked me my full name yet… I'm having trouble to recall." jested Kyouichi as he was halfway to his bed.

"Hehe… it's written on the card on your bed in case you've forgotten it."

"Ah… I see the card, but I can barely read the sign… Where the hell are my glasses, man?"

"I'd check that night table near your bed if I were you." Soudai gave a little advice.

"Damn! You're right. They're on the night table."

"See?"

"Yes. NOW I see." nodded Kyouichi once he put the glasses on. "Wish I had these on when I saw that beauty…" he thought to himself with a bit of regret.

"Hey, have you seen your face yet?"

"Uhh… No."

"Then take a look. The mirror's over there." Soudai gestured towards the corner of the room where a round mirror was affixed to a wall.

Kyouichi was curious to see how much bandage he had on himself, so without further ado, he proceeded to the mentioned mirror. After a while of silent observation he nodded to his reflection.

"My entire face… and upper torso too, huh?" he whispered to himself. "Cool…" he stated with sarcasm and assumed a mock fighting stance while still looking in the mirror. "Vengeance of the White Shinobi~! Haiii~yah!"

Soudai let out another amused chuckle. "More like The Mummy Returns…"

This time it was Kyouichi who couldn't hold back his laughter. "Phahahaha~! Yeah… except that mummies don't wear glasses… At least I haven't ever seen one wearing them, hahaha…"

"Oh, you're laughing now, but will you still be laughing when they put those bandages down from your face?" asked the other outsider in a suddenly much more serious tone. "From what I've heard, your face was peppered with wooden splinters. I hope you're ready to live with the fact that your face might not look the same again."

Soudai was just teasing a bit, since he also knew about the fact that Eirin managed to treat Kyouichi's facial wounds so well that he won't even have any scars left. Nevertheless, he wanted to see what would be his reaction to this false news which would surely unsettle any normal, healthy person. To his surprise, Kyouichi's response was rather unexpected.

"Meh… So what if my face now looks like as if someone ran over it with a cheese grater? Even ugly people get eaten by youkai. They don't discriminate… And if you meet one of them man-eating ones, your beauty won't help you much."

"That's… true." nodded Soudai agreeingly. "But you can relax, friend. I'm just pulling your leg. I've heard Eirin-sensei earlier that at least your face should make a full recovery. She wasn't too sure about your brain, though…"

"So you were just kidding?" asked the younger outsider and for a moment he turned away from his peer. "Hmm… I wonder how long…."

Before he even got to finish his sentence, the door of the ward suddenly opened and inside rushed a tall girl with long purple hair and a pair of rabbit ears. The expression she made immediately after seeing the two patients standing and casually talking was just as surprised as Kyouichi's who has seen her for the first time. But of course, due to the bandages he had all over his face, only he knew what face was he making right now.

"Oh my! You woke up!" called out the girl and eyed both patients carefully head to toe.

"Uhh… Yeah, I guess so…" mumbled Kyouichi through the bandages while bowing slowly. "Name's Ishimaru… Nice to meet you, Yagokoro-sensei."

"Eh?" the surprised rabbit girl blinked a few times before denyingly shaking her head. "No, no, no… I'm not Yagokoro-sama."

Soudai quietly chuckled behind Kyouichi's back. "That's Reisen, dude. She's a Moon rabbit."

"How should I know? I just woke up… I've never even met the person yet."

"Yes, my name's Reisen…" nodded the Moon rabbit instead of bowing. "Reisen Udongein Inaba… It's a mouthful, I know…"

"Are you a doctor, Inaba-san?"

The rabbit girl still had a bit of panicked look in her eyes. "No… No, I'm just a nurse… In training, that is… I-I don't even know what I should do now… I better call Eirin-sama. Please wait here, okay?"

Without waiting for any reply from either of the two humans, she left the ward to inform Eirin about the new situation.

"Oh, you don't need to worry, Inaba-san…" said Kyouichi as if Reisen was still in the room. "I'm not leaving the safety and comfort of this room."

"It was about time someone took notice of us, eh?" asked Soudai as he turned away from the door. "Well… Better get back to my bed."

It wasn't long before the ward's door opened again, but instead of Eirin, Reisen returned alone.

"I'm sorry, but Eirin-sama is currently busy with a surgery, so I guess I'll be the one tending to you two for now."

"Hey, no sweat, Reisen… I'm feeling quite well today." replied Soudai as he waved his hand. "But I'm not too sure about my pal here… He still looks a bit groggy."

"Very well." nodded Reisen and proceeded to take a better look at Kyouichi first. "So… Ishimaru-san…"

"Yes?"

"How are you feeling?"

"Could be better; could be worse…" the outsider gave another one of his uncertain replies. "Say, Inaba-san…"

"Could you please just call me Reisen?" requested the Moon rabbit as she walked up to Kyouichi's bed.

"Okay then… Reisen… May I ask a few questions first?"

"S-sure. Go ahead." she stuttered for a moment, but agreed to answer.

"How long have I been here? Unconscious, I mean…"

"Today would be the third day of your hospitalization. When they brought you in with that Ryuuken warrior you were in pretty bad shape. Eirin-sama worked her entire night shift stitching the wounds on your face. She joked that at least you didn't need any anesthetics…"

"So Eirin-sama has a good sense of humor, huh? But… did you say I was brought in with a Ryuuken?" wondered the young outsider, trying hard to recall the moment before he woke up in Eientei. "Was it possibly Takamori-san?"

"Yes. Lieutenant Akiyoshi Takamori was brought in along with you by a small group of other Ryuuken… They were saying something about an ambushed caravan en-route to Human Village from Kazemura, if I recall correctly."

A flashback in Kyouichi's memory replayed a scene where Takamori was fighting a Spell Card duel against a youkai known as Otoya. Judging by the fact that the young Ryuuken lieutenant also ended up in Eientei, Kyouichi figured that he had lost that duel. "Is… he okay?" he asked after a while of thinking.

"He woke up on the same day he was brought in here with minor injuries. He's currently recovering at the Rehabilitation Ward and should be discharged shortly…"

"So he's fine… That's good to hear." exhaled Kyouichi with relief.

"Now it will be me who's going to ask questions." said Reisen, taking a moment to read the notes on Kyouichi's patient card. "Are you felling alright? Any pain or feelings of nausea?"

"You've guessed that quite well, Reisen… Oh… and I'm also really, really thirsty and hungry."

"I understand. It's no wonder after three days… I'll have food sent to the ward right away. Don't you also need to use the toilet?"

Kyouichi silently blinked a few times at the Moon rabbit nurse. "Where have you been ten minutes ago, Reisen? No, I already found the toilets on my own, thank you…"

"I'm sorry, Ishimaru-san…" apologized the Moon rabbit. "Normally, Eientei isn't always this busy, but we've had a massive influx of patients in the last few days… Eirin-sama will take care of you as soon as she's done with the surgery. In the meantime, I'll go send you something to eat… And don't worry about your face." she gave a comforting smile as she was leaving the room. "A couple of more days and you'll be as good as new."

"Whoa, whoa, wait a second~!" Kyouichi shouted at the leaving Moon rabbit. "How long exactly do I have to do this mummy cosplay? And how am I even supposed to eat?"

Reisen covered her lips with her hand as she giggled. "No worries. You can remove a patch of the bandage from your mouth just like you did around your eyes… As for your first question, Eirin-sama said that she'll remove the bandages in three to four days from today."

As the Moon rabbit was about to close the door, Kyouichi halted her one more time. "Reisen-san!"

"What is it?"

"Please… Tell Eirin-sensei that I thank her for taking care of me."

Another smile came from the lunar rabbit as a reply. "Oh, you'll have plenty of opportunities to tell her that yourself, Ishimaru-san. Now if you'll excuse me, I'll go downstairs to order you some lunch… Oh, and don't be surprised if somebody else will come here to take a look at you later… Other than me and Eirin-sama, I mean… Well, I better get going already. Stay in your beds, you two, okay?"

The next second after saying that, she was already gone. Again, she didn't even wait for the two patients to say anything.

"Well, at least we get the bed-and-breakfast service." murmured Soudai with a hint of sarcasm. "Better than living in the Ryuuken barracks, don't you think?"

Kyouichi was concerned with his own problems. He moved a piece of the bandage away from his mouth so his words could be more audible. "So… three to four days, huh…?" he repeated what Reisen told him.

"Hey, Kyouichi, are you listening?"

"Huh, what?" the younger outsider turned his face at his older friend and stared at him confusedly.

"I said that it's better here than living with the Ryuuken."

"Uh… yeah… So you're also living in the barracks, huh? I haven't heard much praises on living conditions there… But… I assure you… You won't have to put up with living in the barracks for much longer."

"You're talking about your plan to leave Gensokyo through the Hakurei Shrine, right?" asked the older outsider.

"Yes… I remember you were absent when we were discussing the date marking the beginning of our journey… the first of Kannazuki… We're saving up money to buy us all the necessary food and equipment… Actually, that's the part of the reason why I ended up here."

"You rode with the trading caravan to earn some extra yen, right?"

"Yeah… I rode with the caravan to… Oh, damn it!" he exclaimed upon sudden recollection of his business in Kazemura.

"What's wrong? A sudden pain surge?"

Kyouichi shook his bandaged head. "No… I just remembered something."

"Like what?" inquired Soudai.

"I… I need to send my report to the Scarlet Devil Mansion about my little snooping around in Kazemura." murmured Kyouichi to himself, but Soudai heard him anyway.

Soudai already heard about that place from school and several other sources and knew that it was considered quite a dangerous place to be. "Scarlet Devil Mansion?!" he repeated with disbelief. "So you're trying to tell me you've had some deal with the local vampires?"

"Yeah… I got this offer to look for anything suspicious in the mining village… I didn't really find anything, but I had fulfilled my role and now I need to send a report as soon as possible."

"Did they threaten you or something?"

"Not directly… But I certainly don't want to get on Remilia's bad side. Besides, the money she promised in return will greatly help our cause. Damn… I hope the postal fairies visit this place too…"

"I'm afraid any activities of the First Fairy Post Office in Human Village will be temporarily shut down until further notice…" sounded Reisen who just entered the ward, carrying two bowls with food on a platter.

"Reisen-san?"

"Due to the recent fairy incident, the Ryuuken militia decided to close the post office and put all the postal fairies under quarantine here in Eientei."

Kyouichi was already confused enough as he was, let alone now when he's heard of some recent incident. "What exactly happened?"

Reisen took a deep breath and sighed. "I really don't know the details myself… It's been nearly two weeks since I last left Eientei, but I've heard this: Supposedly there's something in Gensokyo that's driving the fairies insane…"

Kyouichi gasped just as he heard Reisen say that. "Just what I've been sent to investigate…" he thought.

Reisen ignored his reaction and kept on explaining. "A couple of days ago, several postal fairies returned to the Human Village that were under the same spell as the other insane fairies and caused some serious chaos in the post office. Even its owner, Kurohana-san ended up here…" she gestured to the bed standing right next to Kyouichi's, separated by a folding screen.

"Huh? Ai-chan?" asked Kyouichi as he tried to stand up from his bed to take a look, but Reisen gently pushed him back down.

"Please, don't strain yourself, Ishimaru-san. Besides… Kurohana-san is sleeping now, so we shouldn't disturb her." she added while lowering her voice a little. "Here." she said as she passed him a bowl of soup. "You have to eat something to regain your strength faster…"

"Thank you, Reisen-san…" Kyouichi happily accepted the bowl and began hungrily sipping its content.

"And one for you, Asakura-san…" said Reisen as she walked up to the other patient's bed, serving him some fresh soup.

"Thanks, Reisen."

"What… what about my things?" asked Kyouichi after he finished his soup. He recalled visiting a certain youkai alchemist and buying several healing potions which he was now tempted to use. "Where are my clothes and my backpack?"

"Oh, you mean the big brown leather one with a bento box, a bunch of notebooks and wine bottles inside?" asked Reisen to make sure she had the same backpack on her mind.

Kyouichi's heart started beating a bit faster. "Ehh… yes, yes. That's the one."

"It's safely stored in our deposit just behind the reception office." replied the Moon rabbit reassuringly. "Your clothes too, of course… Don't worry, they'll be returned to you as soon as you get discharged."

"But… there's something I need to look at."

"I'm sure it can wait for those three to four days, Ishimaru-san. We've got some regulations here, you know, and one of those regulations says that any patients' belongings should be returned to them only when they get discharged."

"Damn…" cursed the young man in his mind. "Well… Guess I have no other choice but to wait."

"Is there something troubling you?"

The outsider sighed and shook his head. "No… Not really…" he lied and resignedly buried his head in the pillow.

"No need to worry, Ishimaru-san." said Reisen as she took the empty soup bowl from his hands. "We've had patients with much more serious injuries and we've managed to get them back up on their feet. You should be glad that you'll recover in just a few days. And who knows? Maybe you'll even grow to like it in Eientei."

Kyouichi waited until Reisen did a quick check-up of the other patients and left the ward. When she was gone, he got back up on his feet and walked slowly towards the door.

"Where are you off to now, King Ramses?" inquired Soudai as he saw Kyouichi leaving the room without saying anything.

"Just going to take what belongs to me. If all goes well, it may even benefit you… a bit."

"Huh? Just what exactly are you up to, Kyou?" asked the older of the two with a wry smile.

"You'll see." replied Kyouichi as he opened the door and peeked out of the room.

"Don't get yourself into any trouble, okay?" Soudai gave a warning. "If you do, don't expect me to defend you."

Kyouichi's response was a short chuckle. "Wish me luck."

After that, he snuck out of the ward and closed the door behind him.

"Hehe… Not the one to care much about authority issues, are you, Ishimaru?"

It's not like Kyouichi was rebellious by nature, but given his current situation and state of mind, the darker side of his ego has won the internal conflict this time and so, the young outsider resorted to this solution…

---

"So… the first floor reception office, huh?" he murmured to himself as he went to the staircase, feeling that the numbness in his limbs is slowly but certainly going away.

Half of the way he at least looked like he knew where he was going, but once on the first floor, he hopelessly turned his head left and right, trying to figure where the reception office was. Fortunately, somebody just opened a door at the very end of the corridor, letting a beam of faint daylight enter the building.

"Okay, so there's the entrance… Logically, the reception office should be right next to it… Or nearby…" he thought and headed towards the end of the corridor. The busy Moon and Earth rabbits that were running and flying all over Eientei paid him almost no mind. Kyouichi just hoped he wouldn't run into any of the doctors here, because they would get suspicious. Pretending like he was just looking for a restroom like a while ago, he inconspicuously made his way to Eientei's main entrance. From behind one of the doors, he heard some voices… One of them was Reisen's, the other one Kyouichi didn't recognize.

"Ah, welcome Kurohana-san… I'm sorry about what happened to your daughter, but you needn't worry. Eirin-sensei has informed me that she'll make a full recovery by the end of this week…"

"So… can I at least take a look at her?" asked the other female voice.

"Why of course you can. Just hold on a bit… I'll take you there right away…" answered Reisen and after that, Kyouichi could hear footsteps nearing the door.

"Oh crap!" he uttered in panic. He needed to hide and quickly. The first idea he got was to go outside and wait until the coast is clear. Taking no chances, he darted for the exit, opened the door and closed it quickly, but silently. He did so just in time before Reisen, who just left the reception office, noticed anything strange.

"That was close…" sighed the outsider and as he turned around, he spotted the familiar rabbit girl in pink dress. She was apparently playing outside – juggling a bunch of cotton sacks filled with rice. She was a terrible juggler, but it seemed she was having fun. Then her and Kyouichi's eyes met…

"A..." the rabbit girl uttered a single vowel sound as she saw him. One of the rice sacks she forgot to catch landed on her head. Her expression was tinted with a bit of panic, a hint of guilt and a speck of mischievousness. Now that Kyouichi got a better look at her, he noticed she was wearing some sort of carrot-shaped pendant around her neck. She was definitely the one who misled him to walk into the bathhouse when someone was just about to take a bath.

"YOU!" he exclaimed, pointing his finger at her. She must have taken it as a sign of aggression or something, because she immediately started running into the deep, dense bamboo forest.

"Hey~! Wait a second~!" Kyouichi gave out a futile shout as he tried to follow her. The rabbit girl was a bit too fast for him to catch. "I said WAAAAAIT~!"

By now the frightened rabbit girl was already gone, and Kyouichi out of his breath.

"I *huff, huff* wanted to… *huff* thank you…" he wheezed, but nobody could hear him. His real intention was truly to thank this mischievous little rabbit for letting him see what he certainly couldn't see every day.

"Drat… she runs too fast… ahh never mind… But… where the hell am I now?"

Only now when he stopped to look around did Kyouichi notice his surroundings – bamboo, bamboo and more bamboo. Luckily for him, he didn't run off too far from Eientei, so he had no problem returning there after simply turning around.

"So this is the fabled bamboo forest where people get lost… Heh… and smack in the middle of it – this…" he gestured at the huge mansion of Eientei as he was getting closer to its entrance. Why would anyone build this huge mansion right here, isolated from any settlements was a question which the outsider was pondering all the way back. Besides being a former ninja hideout or something, its location didn't make much sense to him. Once he was at the main entrance he slid the door just enough to allow him a peek inside. Besides a few youkai rabbits, there wasn't anyone else in the corridor. He didn't wait long and took his chance. Just upon entering the building again, he tried opening the door to the room where he heard Reisen's voice from… It opened up without much effort. Inside the room was a tall counter with a paper plaque with a single word "reception" written on it. A bunch of notepads and writing brushes were lying atop this counter along with a few houseplants in vases for decoration. Another doorway in the back indicated another room behind the counter and that's where Kyouichi went. The back room was a bit larger than the reception office itself, its walls lined with wooden lockers numbered from 1 to 200.

He exhaled heavily as he confusedly stared at all the lockers. "Now… which one of these lockers holds my stuff?"

He tried opening a random locker just to see what's inside, but the sturdy wooden container was apparently locked.

"Damn!" he cursed and tried his luck with several other randomly picked lockers, but ended up with the same result.

With the time running out, he became more nervous and desperate. Reisen could be back any moment now. If she has taken Mrs. Kurohana to see her daughter, she has surely found out that Kyouichi was missing. The young outsider only hoped that his older friend will think of some clever excuse as to why he isn't in his bed.

"Keys… Where are the keys?" he asked himself, hurrying back to the reception office to take a better look. It didn't take much effort to find a board with several rows of numbered keys hanging on wooden pins, as it was just behind the reception counter.

"Alright… here are the keys. Now just to figure out which number I'm looking for… Think, think, think!" he urged himself as he was running out of time.

Then his look fell on one of the notepads on the counter. "Hmm… let's see…"

The notepad was a chart filled with dates, names and numbers. Kyouichi raced through it while looking for his name and after a brief moment he found it.

"Oh, here I am… Date – Minazuki 27… Number – 370…" he blinked a few times at the number to make sure he sees it well. "370? What does that number stand for? There's only 200 lockers here, so it has to be… Hmm… I'd say it's the number of the room I was placed in…"

His guess was confirmed when he found the same number next to the names Asakura and Kurohana.

"Heh… guess they DO mark their doors… but I wonder how…"

There were no more notes in the chart that would indicate which locker holds any of the patients' items. Kyouichi desperately looked all over the counter and grabbed another of the notepads. He slapped his forehead right after he read the title – deposit room logbook.

It was another simple chart with names and numbers of the locker in which their belongings were stored. His name was associated with the locker number 62. Without any hesitation, he took the right key and hurried to unlock the locker with the same number on it.

"Yes!" a single word of rejoice escaped his lips as he saw the familiarly looking backpack resting on top of his folded black-white kimono. He grabbed the backpack and opened it up to look inside. Everything was still intact and in its place. Kyouichi took out the notes he made during his time in Kazemura. He took just a while to check if he got all of them out of the bag. He then decided to try out one of those healing potions he bought from Xeng. If what the old immortal youkai alchemist said was true, just one of these bloody-red potions should be enough to restore any light injuries on his body. That would mean that even his facial wounds would disappear in a matter of seconds and Kyouichi would no longer need to have his face bandaged. However, since his instinct told him not to linger any longer, he just took one of the smaller bottles out of the bag, closed and locked the locker's door and returned the key to its place.

With rolled notes under his arm and the potion bottle in his hand, he walked out of the reception office in a very nonchalant manner. He was even slightly surprised that he didn't see Reisen returning to the office yet, which was quite fortunate. After no more than two minutes he was already standing at the door of the Intensive Care Ward and peeking in to see if there wasn't anyone else in the room besides the patients. He did see some unknown person in the room standing at one of the beds, but he only saw her back. Not knowing what to think and do, he hesitated to walk right in.

---

"Oi, Kyouichi~! Is that you?" called Soudai who noticed somebody peeking into the room. "It's okay, just come in…" he gestured with his hand. The person standing at the bed curiously turned around and Kyouichi could see that she was a lady, probably 30 years old with long crimson hair, dressed in a dark western-style dress. The young outsider shyly opened the door and walked in, bowing to the lady who he assumed to be Kurohana-san. Her daughter Ai definitely took after her.

"Good afternoon." he greeted and immediately threw a questioning glance at Soudai. "Wasn't Reisen-san here a while ago?"

"That she was." confirmed the older of the outsiders. "I told her that you got a diarrhea from the food and that you needed to use the toilet again… She seemed too busy to even process what I told her, though, because just as soon as she led this young lady here, she disappeared somewhere again."

"Oh…" Kyouichi exhaled with relief. "I see… Thanks, Soudai."

"Don't mention it…" smiled the other outsider and shifted his look at the bottle Kyouichi was holding. "More importantly… what did you bring? Wine? Are we going to throw a little party or what? You know that you shouldn't combine medicine with alcohol, right?"

"This IS the medicine." Kyouichi corrected him while stretching out his arm with the bottle. "I bought this from a certain alchemist as part of the supplies we need for our journey back home. But I suppose now would be a good time to see if this healing potion even works…"

Soudai raised a suspicious eyebrow as he leaned a little closer. "Mmm… well I don't know… It still looks like red wine to me."

"Well… you'll see in just a moment that I'm not kidding you." said Kyouichi with a strong belief that the healing potion is going to work, but just a moment later, doubt began settling inside his mind.

He removed the cork seal on the bottle with the help of his teeth and the bottle made a distinctive popping sound. Both Soudai and Kurohana-san were curiously staring at him, waiting until he takes a sip of the bottle's content. Suspicious like with everything new, Kyouichi first took a few whiffs of the potion. Then he shrugged his shoulders and took a modest gulp of the red liquid.

Savoring the taste and trying to find something to compare it to, the young outsider was silently thinking for a moment.

"So… feel any difference?" inquired Soudai.

"…This really does taste like wine…" muttered Kyouichi to himself. "Hope I haven't been swindled…" he didn't really feel any change when he swallowed the potion.

Soudai was trying to hold back his laughter. "I can't believe you're such a sucker, Ishimaru! Getting tricked like that… that's something I'd expect from an elementary school kid; not you. Buying stuff from some charlatan alchemist… You should have demanded to see the potion's effects on spot. Ask him to cut his wrist and then let him drink that stuff…"

"You don't understand." Kyouichi defended himself. "That guy's immortal, dude! He cut off his own head, damn it, and in just a few seconds, he grew a new one! Even if these so-called healing potions would work, I'm afraid they would have no effect on him. But I really didn't expect him to deceive me like… Urrgh!" he exclaimed with a sudden sensation of heat spreading over his face.

"What's going on?" asked Soudai upon seeing Kyouichi's reaction.

"…my face…!"

"What about it?"

"It feels like it's on fire!"

"Oh my, should I call the doctor?" asked the worried-looking Kurohana-san.

Kyouichi resolutely shook his head. "No… no, there's no need to… hyaaaaaa! Aaargh… damn it..!" he fell on his back and started clawing at his face through the bandages.

Even Asakura now looked shocked to see a friend rolling on the floor in agony while furiously scratching his face.

"Oh no! This looks serious!" he uttered as he shifted his look to Kurohana-san – the only non-patient in the room. "I've seen something similar in Higurashi… and it didn't end well… You better call Eirin-sensei right away!"

The young Mrs. Kurohana didn't quite get Soudai's reference, but she nodded and hurried out of the room, calling for any doctor within earshot. "Doctor~! Doctor~! We need a doctor~!"

Then, all of a sudden, Kyouichi stopped thrashing about, because the sudden heat began to go away and was followed by a strange tingling feeling and numbness spreading all over his body.

"Oh my god, he DIED!" panicked the older outsider, clumsily standing up from his bed and hurrying to offer his help.

By the time he made it to Kyouichi's motionless body, all the tingling, pain and numbness were gone and the younger outsider casually stood up and dusted off his patient's robe as if nothing happened.

With his mouth opened wide, Soudai glared at him, having trouble to process his thoughts into words. "W-what?! When?! You were… But then you… You feel alright, pal?"

"Never felt better~!" replied Kyouichi rather cheerfully.

Even Kurohana-san could sigh with relief that no doctor was needed after all. Kyouichi reached behind his head and slowly began unwinding the bandage…

"It's kind of hard to breathe with this thing on… seriously…"

"Wait!" Soudai tired to halt him. "You heard Reisen, didn't you? You're not supposed to remove that bandage until 3 to 4 days…"

However, Kyouichi turned a deaf ear to Soudai's words and continued unwinding the white bandage from his head, slowly revealing his forehead, then his eyes and nose…

"Whoa… I guess… you really didn't need to wear that thing after all…" remarked Soudai as he saw Kyouichi's unscratched face.

Once all the bandages were removed from his body, he hurried to take a good look at himself in a mirror.

"…" he stood in silent awe, seeing that his body was perfectly healed up. Well… almost perfectly, because as he checked his left forearm where he got bitten by Rumia a couple of weeks ago, the scars were still there. As for any of his more recent injuries, they were gone without a trace.

"I told you this stuff was gonna work." he said to his older acquaintance, gesturing at the potion bottle standing next to his bed.

"But Eirin-sensei had her bit of work with your face too, you know…" Soudai reminded him, still being skeptical about the effects of the potion.

"I know she had." Kyouichi acknowledged with a nod as his steps headed back to his bed. "And I am most thankful to her for that… The potion only speeded things up a bit. And it's good to know that it works the way it's supposed to…"

Soudai raised both his eyebrows in disbelief. "Are you kidding me?! What about those strong side effects? I was thinking that you got the last stage of Hinamizawa Syndrome a while ago."

"You watch too much anime, Doctor Asakura." Kyouichi jokingly retorted as he closed the potion bottle and hid it under his bed. "So what if it hurts a bit? No pain, no gain… It's the same as with disinfection… Would you like a sip?"

"Uhh… no, thanks… I'm glad my injuries are almost all haled up. I don't need any suspicious potions."

Kyouichi shrugged. "Well, suit yourself… By the way, I think I forgot to ask you how you even ended up here."

"Me? Hehe~! You could say it was goddamn luck how I got here. Otherwise we wouldn't be having this lovely conversation."

"I'm a curious person, Soudai. Saying something like "it was goddamn luck" is hardly going to satisfy my curiosity."

"Alright, alright…" Soudai chuckled weakly. "So there I was, working with the woodcutters in the bamboo forest – a day like any other… We even had a pair of those Ryuuken fellows to watch over us in case things would get dangerous."

"If the forest's so dangerous, why don't the woodcutters gather bamboo wood only from the edge of that forest?"

"Yeah, a smart person would say the same thing." nodded the older outsider and continued retelling his story. "But some of the more speculative woodcutters say that the bamboo from deeper within the forest has much better quality. They even claim it has magic properties. That's basically why the woodcutters prefer to venture a bit deeper into the forest, thinking that no harm can come to them when under protection of the Ryuuken… Just relax, they said. If any youkai would show up, the warriors will drive them away. Ha! What a load of crap…"

"So, I'm guessing that some youkai did show up…" assumed Kyouichi.

"You bet… Well, actually, it didn't, because this particular youkai or spirit or whatever it was, was invisible."

"Invisible? Oh damn, that sounds dangerous."

"Damn right, it was!" confirmed Soudai, taking a quick look at his stomach and rubbing it with one hand. "Ever heard of Betobeto-san?"

"You mean the sounds of footsteps without any visible source?"

"Yeah… I've heard something like footsteps just a while before we got attacked. I thought it was just one of the woodcutters or Ryuuken, but then one of the men suddenly collapsed, holding his shoulder that was cut by something sharp. The Ryuuken were quick to react, but not quick enough to protect me from getting the next hit, or should I say, a whole combo. Blood just sprayed out of me and I passed out from shock. The next thing I remember was waking up, being carried by some mysterious girl with very long light-violet hair and red eyes… I only caught a glimpse of her face before passing out again."

"Long light-violet hair and red eyes?" Kyouichi repeated thoughtfully. "You mean Reisen-san?"

"No. It wasn't Reisen… Her hair had a much lighter shade of violet and she had no rabbit ears… Whoever she was, I doubt she was a human. After all she carried my unconscious body alone and I weigh over 75 kilos… Anyway, I later woke up here. Met Reisen and Yagokoro-sensei. The first few days were the worst. They had to keep me drugged constantly so I used to pass in and out of consciousness a couple of times a day… I had completely lost my track of time. Fortunately, now I feel much better and sometimes, I'm allowed to take a little walk outside every once in a while. It won't be long before they'll send me back to the village… Hey, maybe I'll get discharged on the same day as you will."

"But I'm completely fine now." objected Kyouichi, pointing a thumb at his face. "I might as well start packing up. There's no need for me to be here any…" his sentence got cut off just as somebody entered the ward. It was a tall young-looking woman with long silver hair and a peculiar red-blue outfit that remotely resembled a nurse uniform.

"Oh… a good afternoon to you, Kurohana-san." she greeted casually, since Mrs. Kurohana was the first person she noticed.

"Yagokoro-sensei." replied the mother of one of the patients. "Good day to you as well."

"Hello, Eirin-sensei…" sounded Soudai from his bed, nodding to greet the Lunarian doctor.

"Ah, Soudai-kun… Are you feeling well today?"

As Kyouichi silently measured up the woman, he thought to himself: "So this is the famous Yagokoro Eirin… For someone who's several millennia old, she looks too pretty… Ugh… What am I thinking? I better greet her politely too…"

"Umm… Good afternoon, Yagokoro-sama…" he greeted shyly, just like every time he met someone new.

Eirin turned her surprised face to him and blinked, as if to make sure she was't seeing a mirage.

"Ishimaru-san? I heard from Reisen that you woke up, but why did you put the bandages down?" then she shook her head as if to gesture she takes back her last question. "More importantly, how come you recovered so fast?"

"Uhh… thanks to your umm… expert treatment?" shrugged the outsider as he told a little lie.

"It… can't be…" objected Eirin as she took steps to Kyouichi's bed and scanned his face. "My herbal regenerating balm works great, but not that fast… Did Reisen give you any medicine recently?"

The outsider decided to play dumb. "Maybe… I don't know…"

"This is really strange…" the doctor scratched her head thoughtfully.

"I'd really like to thank you for taking care of me, Yagokoro-sensei…" thanked the outsider. "After reading some of your manuscripts and transcribing them, I've always wondered what you looked like in person. It is a real pleasure to meet you." he bowed deeply even when he was sitting in his bed. "How much do I owe you for treatment and when can I go back to the village?"

The silver-haired doctor giggled weakly. "Take it easy now… First off, I'm fine with being called by my first name. Secondly… what manuscripts are you talking about? And finally, even despite your miraculously quick recovery, I'd like to keep you here a bit longer for observation… As for the money, you don't need to concern yourself with that right now…"

"But, but… I'm already healthy…" protested Kyouichi who wanted to be out of this place as soon as possible.

"The strong occipitofrontal trauma caused by a direct hit of a danmaku projectile might have triggered an endorphin rush, resulting in a sudden pain relief…"

Kyouichi confusedly stared at Eirin with his mouth ajar, barely understanding half of what she just said. "I… I'm sorry, Eirin-sensei, but I don't speak Lunarian…"

"In other words…" continued the doctor after another giggle, "…you may still not be as fit and healthy as you might think. And even if you are, I'm going to find out how is it possible. Don't worry, though, a couple of more days and we'll send you back home… or to the place where you currently reside. We'll move you to rehabilitation ward along with Asakura-san. Take your time to relax and recover properly…"

"You don't understand… Time is a luxury I don't have." objected the outsider, looking pleadingly into the Lunarian's gray eyes.

His serious expression only managed to elicit another amused giggle from Eirin. "Ah~. You're so funny, Kyouichi-san." she patted him on the head like mother pats a child who said something too mature for his age. "Why are you in such a hurry?"

"I… I need to send or deliver these papers…" he reached for his notes from Kazemura and waved them gently, "…to the Scarlet Devil Mansion."

"What's this?" asked the Lunarian, taking the notes from Kyouichi's hand and briefly racing through them. "Are you some sort of archeologist or surveyor?"

"No… Just a hired man sent out on an investigation. And I'm already late with my report for Remilia-sama."

Eirin's face turned to serious again as she returned the notes to their owner. "What would the vampire hire somebody else for? Especially somebody from outside the border?"

"Haven't you just read my notes? It's all there… I was to take a look into a certain matter involving fairy attacks."

"That incident?" asked Eirin with a little raised voice. "As far as I've heard, Kazemura is currently among the most dangerous places in Gensokyo. The source of the fairy madness is said to be somewhere near that area… Furthermore, while you've been lying unconscious, there have been several simultaneous fairy attacks on random locations, reaching as far as the forest near the Hakurei Shrine. The resulting forest fires could have caused catastrophic damage, if it weren't for the initiative of several brave humans and youkai."

The news of the recent forest fires left Kyouichi flabbergasted for a good moment, allowing Eirin to make a quick check-up of the other patients in the ward, especially Ai, who needed to have her bandages replaced again. Poor girl has suffered some bad burns that must have been painful to bear even with anesthetics. Kyouichi felt sorry for her, even when he met her only once and spoke with her just briefly. The same pity he felt for her worried mother, even when Eirin was persuading her that everything will turn out well for Ai-chan. Then he returned to his previous thoughts and timidly asked: "Umm… Eirin-sensei?"

"What is it, Kyouichi-san?"

"I know you're busy, but… could you please send some of your rabbits to deliver these notes to the Scarlet Devil Mansion? I couldn't care less about the fairy incident, but this is really important both to me and Remilia-sama…"

The Lunarian froze in motion for a moment as she glanced at him, then she compassionately nodded. "Very well… I suppose I could employ one of the rabbits with this task. But I have my doubts about this… If your notes are so important, shouldn't they be sent to the Hakurei miko instead?"

"Perhaps they should, but the shrine maiden is not going to pay me for it. Besides, I'm not too confident to say she'd be able to make heads or tails out of these notes… But somebody more knowledgeable, like Remilia-sama or Patchouli-sama would be more likely to know how to use these findings to make further progress…"

"Aah~. Patchouli-san." said Eirin, as if she had recalled or realized something. "Well, that solves our problems…"

"What do you mean?"

"You're in luck, Kyouichi-san. Patchouli-san is right here, in Eientei. Should I call her?"

"She's here?!" repeated the surprised outsider, thinking that something bad happened to the youkai sorceress.

"That's right." confirmed Eirin with a smile as she was leaving the room. "Please wait a minute while I go find her."

---

It took her but a short while before she returned to the ward in tandem with a short girl with purple hair adorned by various colorful ribbons. She had pale skin and a sleepy expression. Even if Kyouichi had seen her only once, there was no mistake that this was Patchouli. What surprised him, however, was the fact that she wasn't wearing her usual clothes. Instead, he saw her dressed up in a white doctor's uniform with a stethoscope hanging from her neck.

"Patchouli-sama?" he asked in disbelief. "I had no idea you actually worked here."

The sorceress curiously eyed him, then she read the card on his bed. "So… you finally woke up, Kyouichi-san…" she stated as she walked up closer. "I don't really work here… Not full-time, at least. But since Eientei is having a staff shortage, or should I say, an excessive amount of patients, I temporarily decided to offer my help."

"I see…"

"Eirin-sama told me that you needed to deliver something to Remilia, right?"

"Why yes." nodded the outsider, passing his notes to Patchouli. "My report from Kazemura… It's all I could find during my short stay, but I hope this will be enough…"

"You actually made the report…" she muttered as she glanced at the first page. She actually made it sound as if Kyouichi didn't have to do that report after all.

"Hmmm…." she hummed as she flipped a page and continued reading. Then she paused for a moment, thoughtfully tapping a certain word or sentence in the notes with her fingertip before she went on. When she finally got to the sketches of the ruins in the Kazemura quarry and the penciled-out imprints of the symbols, her eyes widened and her lips parted.

"Is something wrong, Patchouli-sama?" Kyouichi asked when he noticed her change of expression.

"These symbols…" she whispered, still absentmindedly looking at the notes. "I know I've seen them somewhere…"

"Have you?"

For a moment, Patchouli was trying to recall where she saw these markings. Then she finally realized it. She drew out her own notepad from the pocket of her uniform, flipped a couple of pages. She carefully looked from left to right at both her notepad and Kyouichi's loosely written report, as if she was comparing something.

"Some of these markings are identical to what Komeiji-san has written while she was looking into the mind of one of the possessed fairies. So it really is a language after all…"

Kyouichi didn't have a clue what was Patchouli talking about just now, but he did find the name she mentioned somehow familiar.

"Komeiji-san? Oh, you mean Satori-satori? The one who was supposed to look at that amulet you gave me earlier?"

"Yes." confirmed the elemental sorceress. "We managed to capture some of those enraged fairies and had Komeiji-san look into their minds in order to identify the source of their madness. Unfortunately, all we got was some riddle-like rambling while she was in her trance… This is what she wrote down." she showed Kyouichi the notepad where she copied Satori's strange writing in some unfamiliar language.

"So you're saying that some of these weird symbols are actually the same as those on the ruins in the quarry?"

"There's no mistake… The language is the same. Even when I don't understand it yet, this will greatly help me in my research and deciphering these symbols. This is an invaluable find…"

Kyouichi surprisingly blinked at her, still unable to believe that his negative result on finding the culprit behind the fairy attacks turned out to be of some value.

"It is?" he raised a doubtful eyebrow.

"Indeed." nodded Patchouli, mustering a very faint smile as she folded all the notes and put them away in her pocket. Kyouichi could tell that she was tired and Patchouli's heavy sigh didn't help him shake away that guess.

"I'll let Remilia know that you fulfilled your investigation… I'm grateful for your effort, even if it means more work for me."

"Uh… no problem, Patchouli-sama…" uttered the outsider shyly.

"If there was no problem, Kyouichi-san," sounded Eirin suddenly while she was still changing Ai's bandages, "you wouldn't have ended up here…"

"Oh… Yeah, that's right." acknowledged Kyouichi with a weak chuckle.

"By the way, Patchouli-san…" continued Eirin, "Since you're already here, would you please take Ishimaru-san and Asakura-san to the Rehabilitation Ward? I'm a little busy at the moment, as you can see."

"Of course." nodded the temporary doctor, stretching out a hand towards Kyouichi to help him stand up. He accepted the hand and tried to get on his feet. Since he knew that Patchouli was a youkai, he expected her to be strong enough to be able to hold him without a problem. But he was wrong…

"Mukyu~!" uttered Patchouli as she lost her balance.

*thud*

Putting too much trust into Patchouli's hand as he was trying to stand up, Kyouichi managed to pull her down instead. Now the youkai librarian found herself in a very awkward position, lying atop Kyouichi, still holding his right hand. Their faces were dangerously close to each other. They just silently stared into each other's eyes for a moment before they realized what just happened. Kyouichi could feel a warm, soft sensation pressing against his chest and his own heart rate almost doubled its pace in an instant.

"P-Patchouli-sama…" the outsider wanted to apologize, but he only managed to utter the girl's name.

Patchouli's response wasn't exactly rich in words either. "Umm…"

Her face slightly reddened and she immediately tried to stand up before anyone could notice her in this suggestive position. But it was too late…

"Oooh~! Patchouli-san~!" sounded somewhat cheerful Eirin's voice from behind Patchouli's back.

The librarian's face again changed from blushing to milky-pale from shock and chill ran down her spine. Too embarrassed to even think straight, all that the poor Patchouli could manage was to utter her usual: "Mukyuuu~."

Eirin smiled brightly. "It was about time you finally managed to find someone you like, Patchouli-san. Congratulations~!" she clapped her hands in a light applause. "But why an outsider, I wonder…"

"IT WAS AN ACCIDENT!" exclaimed both Kyouichi and Patchouli at the same time. The elemental sorceress was already back on her feet and trying to convince Eirin that it's not the way it looked like.

"Well, if you say so~…" said the Lunarian teasingly. "Anyway… you should at least wait until your duty ends before you engage in your affairs."

"I said it was an accident!" retorted Patchouli angrily. "Ishimaru-san, Asakura-san, come with me please! I'll take you to the Rehabilitation Ward."

"S-Sure." nodded Kyouichi as he stood up, ready to follow Patchouli's lead. He even completely forgot about the potion bottle he hid under his bed.

---

Soudai was a bit reluctant to be moved to another room, but he obliged Patchouli's request and together with Kyouichi, he followed her all the way to the mentioned Rehabilitation Ward.

"Once again, I'm sorry, Patchouli-sama. I didn't mean to pull you down like that…"

"It's… okay…" replied the librarian without even turning her face to the outsider.

"What did you do to her anyway?" inquired Soudai pryingly.

"I won't speak without my lawyer…" Kyouichi jestingly refused to say anything about the accident.

"Well then I'll ask Patchouli-sensei…" said the older outsider in hope of getting an answer from the temporary doctor.

Patchouli turned around and with a menacing expression, she gave Soudai a piercing glare. "It was an accident!" she repeated what she told Eirin. Even though she was much shorter than him, she could be quite intimidating.

Soudai made a frightened smile and nodded affirmatively. "Alright, alright… I'll shut up already…"

"By the way, Patchouli-sama…" said Kyouichi again as he was curious to hear an answer to one of his questions. "How does one translate a language that is completely unknown?"

"I have a lot of unread books relating to other languages that yet await translation. With Koakuma's help I may find a book that is written in the same language as the glyphs on the Kazemura ruins. It would probably help me even more if the Kazemurans uncovered more of these ruins and probably even found some artifacts that would help me better understand the meaning and context of not just the individual symbols, but the words themselves."

"Do you think that the discovery of these ruins is causing the fairies to go crazy?"

"There is a doubtless connection between the fairy incident and the ruins… But as you have already stated in your report, your magic scan didn't show a single trace of magic around the quarry area, meaning the ruins themselves are most likely not the source of our troubles. I'd suspect some elder being… someone who's lived for a long enough time to know this language and the civilization that used it. A very old youkai with mind-control abilities perhaps…"

"…like Yukari?"

"Yakumo-san doesn't have any direct mind-controlling ability, but… Since she can manipulate borders of just about anything in existence, I bet she could even mind-control other beings, if she so desired…"

"What would she achieve by dragging a train full of unsuspecting Tokyo citizens into an illusionary realm and then making random fairies go crazy, all the while effectively staying out of the scene?" wondered Kyouichi aloud, assuming that Patchouli's suspicion in Yukari is correct. "And what do the ruins in Kazemura have to do with all this?"

"I don't know…" replied Patchouli while thoughtfully looking down. "I'm not even sure if Yakumo-san is to blame this time… Perhaps that Xeng person you mentioned in your report is more suspicious than he lets on. However, an unfounded theory is just that – a theory. Right now I really can't say anything more… But I will find out… it may take weeks, it may take months, but I WILL find out the truth…"

"By that time we may no longer be here." thought the young outsider to himself. Whether or not is Reimu, or the Ryuuken or anyone competent going to solve the incident behind the crazy fairies before autumn was not Kyouichi's problem He and the rest of the outsiders would be out of Gensokyo by that time, and whatever would happen to it afterwards didn't concern him. However, that was true only if any of the factors of this on-going incident wouldn't somehow jeopardize his plans or directly endanger his life. In that case it would be also his concern…

"Well, here we are…" announced Patchouli's voice as she stopped in front of one of the myriad doors, all of which looked the same to the untrained eye. "The Rehabilitation Ward…"

"I see… Well, thanks for showing us the way…"

"I'll be working here in Eientei for yet a couple of days. Only then can I actually start working on deciphering the symbols of the ruins… Maybe I should go to Kazemura too to take a better look…"

"Hey, hey, Patchouli-sama…" sounded Kyouichi suddenly as he just remembered something, although completely unrelated. "Are you going to go to the Hakurei Shrine for the Tanabata festival?"

This question was something Patchouli didn't expect and she wasn't even sure what answer to give. She knew that she had tons of work to do, but on the other hand, she did want to enjoy at least one festival this year.

"I… I really don't know yet, Kyouichi-san… You know how much work I need to do?"

"Come on. It's just one day that comes once a year." he tried to convince her. "Your work won't run away from you."

"I'll see in a few days maybe… Right now I feel kind of tired and my shift is far from over. Never used to stand on my feet for so long…" she murmured a complaint. "Now if you have no more questions for me, I have to get back to work."

"Just one." replied the outsider after a brief moment to think what to ask.

"Yes?"

"…What on Earth is a "mukyuu~"?"

"Mukyuu~…" Patchouli's face reddened again in embarrassment. "It's… nothing…" she refused to give a direct answer and turned on her heel, walking away from the two outsiders.

"Hey, wait! Why are you mad at me all of a sudden? Whatever I insulted you with, I didn't mean it!" he called at her, but the sorceress continued in her way without stopping or turning her face back. "Waaaait~! When and how is Remilia going to pay me for my report~? Ugh… she's gone…" he shrugged hopelessly as Patchouli's figure disappeared into one of the further rooms on the 3rd floor corridor or Eientei.

"I have to admit, though, she's really cute…" muttered Kyouichi, still looking at the other end of the corridor.

"Well, why are we still standing here?" asked Soudai as he opened the door he was standing at.

"Yeah… Time to make some new friends…" said the younger outsider, following his older friend into the room, but stopping dead in his tracks as soon as he saw a bunch of fairies flying around in there…

"What's wrong?" wondered Soudai why Kyouichi wasn't entering the room.

He silently pointed at the fairies with a horrified look and shook his head slowly. "…They can't seriously mean that…"

"What?"

"Fairies…"

"Oh, you're right." nodded Soudai as he also noticed the fairies playing their games. "It seems we have some fairy roommates too… Awww~… How cute. Come on, Kyouichi…" he made a "follow me" gesture and nonchalantly greeted everyone in the ward. It was considerably larger than the Intensive Care Ward and had both human and youkai patients. Most of them were recovering from light injuries or diseases and were waiting to be discharged. It was also quite a lot noisier than the peaceful Intensive Care.

"You don't get it. I hate those creatures and they hate me back… There's no way in hell I'm entering this room…" declared the younger outsider, still standing outside and staring at the little youkai, which he was quite afraid of.

Soudai disbelievingly glanced at him, then at the fairies and again back at Kyouichi, unable to hold back his chuckling.

"Dude, don't even tell me that you're afraid of those cute little fairies."

Kyouichi swallowed his saliva and tilted his head to the side. "Well…"

"Oh, I get it… It must be the trauma from your last encounter with a youkai… Now you're afraid of all of them." deduced the older outsider. "But don't you worry, my friend." he theatrically raised a finger into the air. "Soudai is here to help you overcome this fear~!"

"Hey! What the hell are you doing?! Put me down!" protested Kyouichi after Soudai grabbed him by his arm, lifted him up and carried him on his back like a sack of potatoes. "As a president of the Transfer Students' Club, I demand you to put me down~!"

"Umf… come on… Cooperate a bit! You're really heavy, you know…"

"Eirin-samaaaa~! Heeelp~!"

Kyouichi's desperate call went unheeded and Soudai dragged him all the way to one of the vacant beds in the room.

---

"Greetings everyone… This here's my friend, Kyouichi… He's a little shy, you see…"

"I ain't that shy… It's just…"

"Oh, hey Kyouichi! Good to see that you're still kicking." sounded a very familiar man's voice from behind him.

"Lieutenant Takamori?!"

The young Ryuuken lieutenant was peacefully resting on his bed, reading the latest issue of Bunbunmaru. At first, Kyouichi found it surprising to see him there, but he quickly remembered that Reisen already told him about the fact that the Ryuuken warrior was brought into Eientei along with him.

"It's a little crowded in here, isn't it?"

"Well, what do you know?" murmured Soudai, sounding somewhat impressed or surprised. "You already have some friends among the Ryuuken, eh, Kyouichi?"

He paid no attention to Soudai's remark and gave Takamori a questioning look. "Why do they put humans and youkai together in the same room?" he wondered after taking another look around.

"That's because this is Eientei… A place where both humans and youkai are treated equally."

"By the way, Takamori-san, who was that youkai you were fighting against back then?"

"Oh, you mean Otoya Hidekawa – an old friend of mine. Still, I think he went a bit too far this time…"

"A friend?!" repeated Kyouichi in disbelief. "Are you serious? To me he looked like a vicious evil youkai who held some grudge against you…"

"A friend, a rival and a regular duel partner is what Otoya means to me. He may have a bit harsh demeanor, but that's just a facade. We've known each other since childhood… well, MY childhood that is… He's a youkai, so he looked the same back then as he does now. It was him who had trained me in combat since I was little. He's also the reason why I'm now in the militia… He said that way we can duel each other like true warriors…"

"The battle you two had seemed like some sort of personal vendetta, rather than an innocent Spell Card match."

Akiyoshi let out a soft chuckle as he nodded. "Exactly what I'm talking about. Otoya only pretends to be the "evil and merciless" type. He doesn't really eat humans. He just always looks for an excuse to battle. Especially when it's against me…"

"But it looks like he got you this time."

"Well, like they say: you win some, you lose some." shrugged the young Ryuuken indifferently. "The same goes for Otoya. He's a strong and very skilled fighter who always wants to know everyone by fighting them and comparing them to himself. But even he has his bad days and so, he's lost to even much weaker opponents on many occasions. He always deceives his opponents by telling them he's fighting them to death, but when he wins, he just leaves the scene… If he loses, he escapes. The most interesting fight I saw him in was when he challenged the Scarlet Devil Mansion's gate guard. After a whole ten minutes of intense fighting, the battle ended as a draw and Otoya just bowed and casually walked away…"

"He fought Meiling?"

"Yeah. For ten minutes. No Spell Cards, no danmaku. Just plain and beautiful hand-to-hand fighting. Otoya may not look like it, but he's a man… I mean a youkai of honor. He knows when to fight and when to admit defeat and makes no fuss about being beaten. His magic is decent too, but he's not too fond of danmaku battles. I also believe he's one of those youkai in Gensokyo who hasn't yet had a battle against the Hakurei shrine maiden. He just avoids her, and the whole Hakurei clan altogether… When he fought Hong-san, he just decided to call it a draw. The gate guard was quite freaked out, but had no objections."

"So… you're saying he's not really that dangerous?"

"Depends on what you call dangerous." replied Akiyoshi with a faint smile. "He can knock you unconscious, maim you, break half of your bones, but he doesn't kill his beaten opponents. There are much stronger and more dangerous youkai around than him. Some that even he won't dare to approach."

"Yeah…" whispered Kyouichi and tentatively turned his face back to check if the fairies in the room aren't planning to ambush him while he's not looking. "I really don't feel too safe to be here…"

Akiyoshi raised a curious eyebrow. "What are you afraid of? There aren't any particularly dangerous youkai in this room… Just a few fairies, a firefly and… that girl over there looks like a karakasa…" he gestured towards the bed at the very end of the room.

Kyouichi curiously gazed at both the youkai firefly and the karakasa. The former was almost unrecognizable from the fairies. She was short, had short teal hair, blue eyes and a pair of bug-like antennae. She wore a simple white shirt with short sleeves, a pair of short blue baggy pants and a black cape with dark-red inner side. She was cheerfully playing together with the fairies who were about her size and age. The karakasa girl was further in the room, so Kyouichi didn't see her all that well. All he could make out was that she was taller than the firefly, had turquoise hair, a turquoise vest on top of a white shirt and a light-blue skirt. Next to her bed there was a folded purple umbrella that apparently looked just like Kyouichi had imagined the karakasa – one large red eye and a long tongue hanging from its large mouth. It even had a mini-sandal on its handle. To tell the truth, Kyouichi first thought that only the umbrella was the karakasa, so he turned again to Takamori-san.

"And who's that girl in the corner bed? A human?"

"No, that's the karakasa."

"And that umbrella…?"

"That's a part of her, of course…"

"Oh, now I see… So both the girl and the umbrella are the one karakasa…"

"Pretty much…"

Soudai also curiously watched the girl in question, not yet sure what to think. "I wonder if the karakasa are human-friendly…"

Akiyoshi thoughtfully scratched his chin. "Not too sure about that… They live to scare the humans in order to feed on their emotions or something like that…"

"Scare? Really?" asked Soudai. "The one over there looks kind of… I don't know…" he snapped his fingers repeatedly as he tried to think of the right word.

"Moe?" sounded Kyouichi again.

"Yeah, that's the word I was looking for…" nodded Soudai while making an amused grin.

Akiyoshi just confusedly stared at the two outsiders, having no idea what were they talking about. Then suddenly one of the fairies turned around.

"Huh? Did somebody call my name?"

The fairy that asked the question had light-pink hair, white dress with pink flowery pattern a pair of butterfly-like wings and a diadem on her head. Kyouichi now had a strong feeling of déjà vu.

"Oh… Moe remembers you~!" exclaimed the fairy joyfully as she saw Kyouichi.

"Huh?"

"You're Kyouichi-san~."

The outsider just confusedly glared back at her, then as if hit by a brick in the head, he remembered where he saw this particular fairy. "…You're Ai-chan's friend."

"Yes~! I'm Moe~!" nodded the little fairy with a sweet smile. "Nice to see you again~."

It appeared that Moe greeted everyone she knew with a hug, because that was the next thing she did to Kyouichi.

"They all hate you, right?" asked Soudai sarcastically in response to Kyouichi's earlier remark about the fairies.

"Well… this is just the exception that confirms a rule." he replied and very tentatively patted the fairy on her head, as if he was afraid of getting bitten. Once the fairy released the embrace she threw a questioning look at Kyouichi.

"Do you know where Ai-chan is right now? Eirin-san, the lady in red-blue dress told me that she's somewhere in this big house, but also told me that I couldn't leave this room. But Moe is really worried about Ai-chan~."

"I've seen her."

"Really~? Is she okay? When can we play together again? Moe's been a good fairy… will Ai-chan give me a cookie~?"

Kyouichi knew the critical condition that Ai was currently in, but the last thing that he wanted was to unsettle her beloved fairy, who cared deeply about her well-being. If he told her the truth, Moe could get depressed. But at the same time, he didn't want to lie to her, so he chose a neutral answer to her question.

"She's… sleeping right now… She should be okay in a couple of days, but I'm afraid you won't be able to see her until then."

"Moe understands…" muttered the fairy sadly. "You said almost the same thing that Eirin-san did… I will wait patiently then... I've even prayed for Ai-chan to get better soon…"

"Ha! What an idiot~!" exclaimed another fairy while pointing an index finger at her. She was a blue fairy with ice-shard wings, and for some reason, she seemed awfully familiar to Kyouichi as well.

"Wasn't it you who shot that human girl with your own danmaku? Even if you look like a wimp, I have to say you've got some guts!" said the ice fairy with a sly grin. "That ought to teach those foolish humans to enslave our kind and use them to carry stuff around!"

Upon hearing those mean words, Moe lowered her head in despair, covered her face with her palms and started sobbing.

"M-Moe would… never do anything… so horrible to my… my dear Ai-chan~!"

The ice fairy just amusedly laughed at Moe's lament. "Ahahaha~! You don't even remember that~! You really are an idiot! But don't worry~! If you join me to fight against humans for the rights of fairies, I'll teach you all sorts of awesome things, so that you can be almost as brilliant as I am~! We'll be the strongest fairy army in all of Gensokyo~! Even if I could easily take on all the humans by myself, it's good to have some trusty sidekicks…"

"So you're the one behind the crazy fairy incident?" asked Soudai with a raised eyebrow.

"Are you an idiot?" retorted the agitated ice fairy. "I'm not that weak-willed to let myself be mind-controlled by some puny magic like those other crazy fairies~! I am Cirno and I am the strongest!"

Only now Kyouichi finally remembered why this rather rowdy fairy seemed so familiar to him. "Hey, I know you. You're the one who sank my boat! Well… it wasn't really mine, but you sank it while I was on it!"

"Huh?" uttered the blue-haired fairy while confusedly staring back at Kyouichi. "Is Eientei full of idiots? I don't remember you at all. What are you even talking about?"

"You don't remember, huh?" Kyouichi stood up and raised his voice, as if he had completely forgotten about his fairy-phobia and took a bold step towards the ice fairy who introduced herself as Cirno. "Let me remind you then… Thursday, the 20th of Minazuki, sometime around noon, location – Misty Lake. Does that ring the bell?"

Cirno confusedly blinked her sky-blue eyes, her mouth making the shape of the letter "o".

"Ehehehe~. When was that?"

Kyouichi slapped his own forehead as he realized that fairies probably don't keep a track of days or passing time like humans do. He therefore chose an alternative approach.

"Don't you remember? You had a danmaku battle against…" he paused himself, because in this very room he saw another fairy who was Cirno's opponent on that day when they accidentally sank the boat he borrowed. "You fought against HER!" he pointed at the golden-haired fairy in red and white dress, who questioningly tilted her little head to the side.

"Oh~!" exclaimed the ice fairy as she snapped her fingers. "Now I remember~! We had a fight above the lake on that day. But it was a misunderstanding… Now me, Sunny, Luna and Star are friends again."

"So you do remember after all."

"No I don't. I never saw you or any stupid boat!"

"Then you should have paid more attention!" argued the outsider.

"Oh yeah?! Well so should you~! Idiot…"

They both angrily gritted their teeth at each other and growled like dogs ready to bite. That's when the ice fairy was grabbed from behind and dragged away by the other fairies and Kyouichi was pacified by Soudai in similar fashion.

"Just calm down, pal! I don't know what happened between you two, but I'm sure there's a non-violent way to resolve your dispute…"

"See? I told you that fairies hate me." muttered Kyouichi once he was dragged back to his bed.

"Let-me-go~!" yelled the ice fairy as she struggled hopelessly against the other three fairies who were holding her back. "If you're so worked-up about me sinking your stupid boat, why don't you try and challenge me?!" she proposed the challenge to the outsider.

"Don't do something that could get you into more trouble, Cirno-chan~!" the fairy in red and white dress tried to make her see reason. "Eirin-sama will think you've been possessed by that evil curse if you'll act violently~!"

Only those words were able to calm Cirno down and make her reconsider her behavior.

"Hmm… You're right…" she muttered with disappointment and stopped struggling. "Those crazy ones give us normal fairies a bad name… Perhaps that's why people look down on us…"

"But it's also true that we had our danmaku fight above the Misty Lake back then…" remarked the other fairy as she released her grip on her icy friend. "And we were all fully sane back then…"

"But unlike you, Sunny-chan, I have never fallen under that spell." declared Cirno with a hint of pride in her tone. "I'd understand why Eirin is keeping you here, but… Why is she keeping ME here? I'm healthy and full of energy!"

"Yeah, me too…" Kyouichi spoke up again, wondering why he had to spend more days in Eientei even when he no longer had any health problems.

"I want to go out and play with Dai-chan and Rumi-chan and Mysti-chan and not be locked up here~." continued the ice fairy with complaints.

"Well, if Eirin-sensei had a bit more time on her hands, we probably wouldn't have to wait for so long, Cirno-san…" reasoned Lieutenant Takamori and leisurely flipped another page of Bunbunmaru.

"I don't understand why you are in such a hurry to get out of here, Kyouichi…" said Soudai. "You said yourself that you already had all of your business taken care of when you gave Patchouli-sensei those notes or whatever…"

"Well… It's not like I'm in that much of a hurry to start going to school and work again…" replied the younger outsider with a low voice. "It's just that… I don't want to miss the festival at the shrine…"

"Aaah… so that's the reason." responded Soudai with an understanding nod and smile. "But you needn't worry. Eirin-sensei said she'll keep us here only for a couple of days. We'll still have plenty of time until the 7th of Fuzuki (July)."

"So you're coming too, Soudai-san?"

"Sure, why not?" asked Soudai as he stretched himself on his new bed. "It's not like you get spirited away to a supernatural world every day. I want to enjoy the time I spend here before I return back home. Since we already have a plan that is likely to work, I'm not worried about our journey to Tokyo. I want to have fun too, join a party or two and meet many interesting people."

"Yeah… Just make sure you won't end up here again when we'll be leaving this place." replied Kyouichi with a joking tone.

"Hahaha… I'll do my best, club prez. But the same goes for you."

"I know, Soudai… I know."

"I want to be at the festival too~!" sounded Cirno's childish voice again. "Have you heard? The shrine maiden will arrange a danmaku tournament. This will be my chance to prove I'm the strongest~! And Mystia-chan will sing there too… I can't wait to be out of here already."

"I'm basically healthy too…" the karakasa girl suddenly joined the conversation after she got bored of staring outside the window. She stood up, grabbed her purple umbrella and started walking around the room as if to relieve the numbness in her legs. As she walked past the outsiders, both of them took a closer look at her and noticed that the girl's eyes were not of the same color. One of them was turquoise like her hair, and the other one was red like the one on her umbrella.

"She really is very… moe~…" commented Soudai as he watched the youkai girl stroll about the room.

"No~! I'm Moe~!" called the pink-haired fairy as she wiped tears from her eyes. "That girl is Kogasa-chan."

Soudai turned his look to the fairy and after a moment of silent staring he nodded. "Well… yes. You're moe too, Moe-san."

In the meantime, Kogasa kept walking around the room and muttering her thoughts to herself. "I wonder if it would surprise anyone if I just left this place without saying anything… No, no, no… That's no good… If I can't see the people who get surprised by me, it will be useless…"

"What are you talking about, Kogasa-san?" Soudai dared to ask her.

The karakasa seemed a bit startled by being suddenly addressed by a complete stranger, but she gave an answer anyway.

"Well… Umm… I usually fly around in the sky and surprise random humans who happen to be passing by… This gives me energy to use for spells and danmaku."

"Danmaku? Isn't that a type of shoot-em-up games?"

"Well, yes." nodded Kyouichi who had a little bit more insight about this matter than his older peer. "Danmaku is basically a term which Gensokyo's inhabitants use to refer to all the offensive magical projectiles."

"Oh… I see." muttered Soudai and made an understanding nod. "So basically, you need to absorb the people's emotion of fear in order to draw some magical energy, huh?"

"No, not fear. I said surprise~." Kogasa corrected him while making a pouting face. "But lately it's kind of hard to surprise people… They just have no respect for youkai these days… Boo!"

Soudai chuckled lightly. "Well, I can understand what you mean, Kogasa-san. If you perhaps fed on emotions like "aaaw she's just so cute~!" when people saw you, you would never have to worry about lack of magic essence."

Kogasa lowered her head and shook it in self-disappointment. "Just like I said… It's getting harder and harder to surprise the humans…"

"Aww… Don't worry, Kogasa-san." he cheered her up, or at least, attempted to. "Maybe I'll help you come up with some new way how you could make people surprised…"

"Hey, hey, Soudai…" Kyouichi interrupted as he put his palm on his friend's shoulder. "Take it slow… From my point of view, it seems like you're trying to hit on her."

"Like you're the one to talk!" retorted the older outsider with an amused grin. "After what you did to Patchouli-sensei just a while ago… You old Casanova…"

"Haaa?!" exclaimed Kyouichi in disbelief. "What happened back in the Intense Care Ward was just an accident. There's nothing between me and Patchouli-sama, but a vague, semi-professional relationship."

"I heard you mutter that she's really cute just before we got here. What's wrong if I'm trying to be friendly with Kogasa-san here?"

Kyouichi just shrugged with an innocent smile and shook his head. "Nothing really… Kogasa-san is very cute too…"

"You don't have to point out the obvious." replied Soudai matter-of-factly and turned his face away again to admire Kogasa some more. "Oh, Kogasa-chan… You're sooo cute. Can I take you home?"

While Kogasa was struck with shock and confusion, Kyouichi couldn't hold back his laughter at Soudai's straightforwardness.

"Well… I'm not sure if Reimu would allow any youkai to go outside the barrier along with us… With the exception of Yukari, of course… But I'm sure if she could, she'd most likely restrict even her of that freedom."

"Oh… Now that you mention it, that's another reason why I want to go to the Tanabata festival… To meet this shrine maiden you've mentioned more than once during our club meetings."

"Reimu…" Kyouichi quietly muttered the shrine maiden's name. "If it wasn't for her, all our hope to return would be long lost… It's true that the major part of our plan depends on our own abilities, but we'll be forever indebted to that girl for being able and willing to take us back to the outside world."

"That's why I'd like to meet the person at least once before we go home. I'm also curious to see that tournament that she's planned for the festival…"

"Me too~!" exclaimed Cirno joyfully while flying up and almost hitting the ceiling with her head. "And I'm going to win~! You'll see…"

"Looks like Cirno-san is all fired-up for dueling." commented Lt. Takamori from his bed. Those words immediately managed to elicit a shocked cry from the ice fairy.

"Yaaah~! I'm on fire?! Waaaaah~! Get it off me, get it off~!" she cried and rapidly flew in circles inside the Rehabilitation Ward. The other fairies gave chase as they tried to calm her down.

"Cirno-chan~! Waaaait~! Don't break something expensive~!" called a black-haired fairy after she failed to catch Cirno in flight.

"You're not really on fire, Cirno~!" exclaimed the golden-haired fairy as she also attempted to catch Cirno before she hurts herself.

"Hehe~! I wanna play this game too~!" said the firefly youkai and joined the fairies in their circular flight around the room while giggling mirthfully.

"Moe doesn't understand this game at all…" commented the pink-haired fairy while confusedly scratching her head. "What are the rules to play?"

"…I don't want to be on fire~!" cried the panicked ice fairy without paying any heed to what her friends were trying to tell her. Her flight was becoming faster and more erratic as she was getting more frightened. Kogasa just barely managed to duck before Cirno would crash into her.

"Hey~! Watch it~!" she raised her voice warningly. "You almost crashed into…"

*bang*

Before Kogasa managed to finish her sentence Cirno was lying on the ground along with the other fairy she addressed as Sunny. Both were rubbing their aching heads with dizzy expressions on their faces.

"Uwaaaa~! The whole world is spinning before my eyes~…"

"Hey… Cirno-chan… I had no idea you had a twin sister~." muttered the other fairy dizzily as she experienced a temporary double vision due to the unpleasant impact to her head.

"Oh my, are you alright?" asked the fairy with long black hair, slowly descending down to check on those two.

"Ehehehe~!" Cirno made a weak chuckle. "I'm no longer on fire… What a relief…"

"That… was nasty…" commented Soudai while grimacing, as if he could feel the pain of the fairies himself.

"Oh, good grief…" grumbled Akiyoshi, putting away the newspaper on the night table next to his bed. "This is going to be a long day…"

"Well…" spoke the youngest outsider in the room. "At least it's not so damn hot in this room anymore…"

Truly, after Cirno's misguided flight, the ice fairy really managed to lower the temperature in the room from hot to pleasantly cool.

"Wait a second…" sounded the firefly girl with a confused face. "Does this mean I won the game, or…?"

Kogasa just planted her palm on her forehead, sighed and shook her head disapprovingly.

"Now you understand why I want to be discharged as soon as possible?" Kyouichi asked Soudai while pointing a thumb backwards over his shoulder at the two stunned fairies.

"I think I can now sympathize with that thought…" replied the older outsider with acknowledgement.

---

And that is how the two young outsiders met with their new roommates. Their stay in Eientei was still a few days early from being over, so they both tried their best to get used to the other patients that shared the same ward. The human and the youkai groups each minded mostly their own business with only scarce interactions between their members. Even when Soudai still tried to establish a more friendly relationship with Kogasa, the other two humans weren't as outgoing towards their youkai roommates. The only one Kyouichi dared to talk to was Moe and even then their conversations were brief and rather formal. It took more than a day before the humans and the youkai on the ward became more accustomed to each other. Since everyone got easily bored of the long waiting, they began telling each other stories to help them pass the time. Among a couple of fictional tales, Kyouichi and Soudai learned quite a bit of information concerning the recent happenings in Gensokyo. The younger outsider had even overcome his fear of the fairies a bit and asked them about what they thought of the incident that has driven thousands of their kind mad. That way he became acquainted not only with Cirno, but also the trio of her fairy friends – Sunny Milk, Luna Child and Star Sapphire, who were more commonly known as the three mischievous fairies by the locals. From their stories, he learned that those fairies that were driven to insanity didn't remember anything during their craze and returned back to normal only once they were "killed". In similar fashion he made his acquaintance with the firefly youkai girl who introduced herself as Wriggle Nightbug. She also ended up in Eientei because of an unpleasant encounter with a flock of possessed fairies that apparently didn't abide the Spell Card Rules. The strange thing was, that Wriggle described her savior as a girl surprisingly similar to the one described by Soudai.

Last, but not least, Kogasa Tatara, as the karakasa girl introduced herself, had quite a heroic tale to tell. She supposedly helped extinguish a huge forest fire with the earlier assistance of Marisa and Patchouli. However, she gave all of her power to drive her spell for as long as possible and exhausted herself to the point of losing consciousness. How she got to Eientei was therefore left only to her speculation, but she assumed that one of the two mentioned girls took her there.

Slowly and gradually, both the human and youkai patients on the Rehabilitation Ward were becoming more openhearted towards each other. Kyouichi could hardly believe that he could have a friendly idle conversation with the other fairies. He was slowly starting to form a different opinion about this race of youkai. While he no longer felt the fear and reverence he used to, he still slept with one eye open just to make sure.