"Ugghhh..."

Lady stared down at her comrade, small statics jumping on his clothing, he closed his eyes and writhed in pain.

The shrine maiden landed near the fallen hunter. "I'm sorry if it was too much for you, you're the one who demanded me to go all out."

What Lady has seen is something that makes her awed; a flurry of colorful balls of lights coming out from the maiden bombarded Nero with those lights and instantly knocked him out.

"My body... feel numb..." He groaned. "... pain."

Lady put her hands on her hip, glaring at the shrine maiden. "That was a one-sided battle. You were hovering all over the place while throwing those papers and occasionally whacking his head with that stick." Her frown turned into a smile. "But it's also amusing for him to swing his sword around and throw energy waves towards you like a kid trying to smack a fly."

Reimu shrugged. "That's a battle style I've been using since when I was a kid. If you can beat someone from a far, why not take that chance?" Reimu tapping her palm with the gohei. "I know a thing or two in close combat, but my physical strength doesn't go well with it. I can inflict damage to my opponent, but not enough to knock them out."

The two women are distracted by the sound of moving fabric, Nero trying to get up with his sword supporting him. Amused by his struggle, Lady decided to cheer him up. "I'm imagining if Dante is able to fly around you with a shit-eating grin on his face while you're trying to hit him."

Once Nero fully stands, all he can do is give her a middle finger.

Reimu chuckled. "We should go inside. We can discuss what we should do next while taking a break." Reimu walks ahead then gestures to them to follow her. The hunters look at each other before they follow the shrine maiden.

They walked to the back of the shrine where the entrance was located. Lady whistled while looking at the scenery. "Is that a dead tree?" She pointed at a big tree with no leaves on its branch, the tree being taller than the shrine.

Reimu turned to her. "That's a cherry blossom tree, the flowers only bloom during Spring, in Fall they look like dead trees."

Lady nodded at her explanation. "It must be beautiful during Spring."

"It is, I always host a flower viewing party, drinking and partying with my friends."

Nero is already sitting at the porch while the girls are talking. 'Life must be enjoyable here, just taking it easy all day long.' He exhaled. 'And there I am, in the Human World, hacking and slashing demons like there's no tomorrow.'

Lady caught Nero daydreaming, she grinned. "Awww, looks like the grumpy Nero's enjoying the view~"

Nero stared back at her. "While it's enjoyable to see this kind of scenery once in a while, we can't waste more time here."

Reimu sighed. "Alright. But before you enter the shrine, take off your boots first."

Nero and Lady do it without questioning her. Once in the shrine Reimu ushered them to the living room.

"Please, take a seat at that table and warm yourself up, I'll prepare the drink." She disappeared into another part of the shrine.

Lady and Nero stare at a piece of furniture before them; a low, wooden table frame covered by what looks like a blanket, on top of which sits a table top.

Nero stared at it in confusion. "I know we are looking at a table, but... a table covered in a blanket? Is this some kind of joke to make yourself comfortable?"

"That's called kotatsu." Reimu answered while carrying a tray with a tea pot and three glasses on it. She sits down and places the refreshments on top of the kotatsu. "This is a piece of furniture that helps you warm up during the cold season. Please have a seat."

Nero and Lady stared at each other before they sat down. Both of them sit at the other side of the table cross-legged.

"You should straighten your legs so you can feel warm."

Lady did as Reimu said. Her eyes widened when she felt the warmness through her legs.

"Oh damn, this… feels toasty under the table. Nero you should try it!"

Nero complied. "What the…? How the hell can a table with a blanket be this warm?"

Reimu smiled at Nero's confusion. "There's an enchanted steel plate under the table that lets out ambient heat. Once you return to your home island you should try to make one."

During Reimu's explanation, Lady already took a sip from her glass. "Aahh~. Drinking this delicious tea while sitting under this heated table, this is hea~ven."

Nero took a sip from his glass. "I wish that you served us a beer or something, but this is fine too, though I'm more a coffee person."

After minutes of silence and numerous sipping, Reimu decided to speak. "Well then, shall we discuss the matter at hands?"

Surprisingly, Nero answered. "We should talk about the escaped demon first, I don't have time to listen to the history of your home island."

Lady turned her head at him. "Eh? Why? Getting to know this island, country, city - whatever it is - first is important so we can form an alliance with this place to help us in the future, in case the Demon World decides to invade our world again."

"Politics later, Lady. You don't want that demon causing more problems back in our city, right?"

She lowered her head and let out a sigh. "You're right." She raised her head, giving a sad smile to the shrine maiden. "Sorry Reimu, I love to hear more about this place, but the boss talks, I obey."

Reimu shrugged, "It's okay. There is a lot to learn about Gensokyo, we can do it later." Reimu takes a sip before she continues to talk. "The only way we can track this demon is talk with witnesses. My intuition says that we should investigate around the Misty Lake first, there's a small chance that the fairies in vicinity met or at least took a quick glance of it."

Interested in the word 'fairies', Nero asked. "Fairies? Those small creatures exist here?"

"Yes, they are, and no they're not as small as you might think, they're the size of an eight years old child. They are maybe a bunch of airheads, but when they're in big numbers it's troublesome to kill them all."

Lady's eyes widened hearing the last words. "You kill them?! But they're still children, that's horrible."

Reimu sighed at her outburst. "Fairies are immortal, they're the embodiment of nature, as long as nature exists, they will keep coming back. Also, most of them are more than sixty years old, this one fairy we may see later has been living for that long."

Satisfied with the answer Lady let out a sigh.

"If you're refreshed enough, we must depart now." Reimu stood up then walked back to the shrine entrance. "I'll be waiting outside if you two need time to discuss." Reimu closed the door behind her.

After being silent for seconds, Nero broke the ice. "I don't know where she'll take us, but I hope she can find a clue, if we have to travel around this island." He stood up. Before he walked away, he picked his mug then drank the tea bottoms up. "Uugghh, green tea."

In the front yard, Reimu's standing in the middle of the walkway while staring at the sky, she turned around when the hunters behind her. "So, are you guys ready? Always stay close to me, you'll never know what we will encounter out there."

They walked and stopped before climbing down a flight of stone stairs, the only access to enter shrine ground for those who can't fly.

"That's a lo~ng way down." Lady commented on the stairs. "Don't you think this is too much for visitors? They will get exhausted first before they can enter the ground."

"The shrine is located at the top of Hakurei hill, and it's a high hill too, no other options other than climbing up these stairs." Reimu looked up to Lady. "Unless you can fly."

Nero scoffs at Reimu's remark. "Why climb if you can just jump the whole of it?" Nero turned around to gain some distance, after making sure he was far enough he immediately started running as fast as he could, when he reached where the girls stood before he launched himself with his right foot.

"WHOOOOOOO!" He hollered loudly. Despite adrenaline pumping to his heart he has a big smile on his face. When he reached the bottom of the hill, he rolled on the ground to make his landing safer. After doing so he suddenly stood up then pumping his fist to the air. "YEEAAAHHH! That's awesome!"

Back at the top of the hill, Reimu scoffed. "Show off."

Lady giggled. "That's Nero for you. We should go down as well."

Reimu took a glance at her. "Will you perform a long jump like him? You're welcome to try."

"Nah, I prefer to take it easy while enjoying the scenery."

Reimu sighed. "That's your choice." She floated down the stairs. "But I won't stop to let you catch up. I want to end this mission quickly."

Once the two women reached the bottom of the stairs, the trio proceeded walking through the Hakurei Path. While Lady was enjoying the view, Nero kept focus of his surroundings, in case someone stupid decided to jump on them.

"It's so rare for me to be surrounded with this much greenery, I really feel at peace right now." Lady let out a light sigh.

"I've been wondering about something," Nero stared at the shrine maiden. "The air is heavy with ambient energy, I feel energized, a little. I didn't have the same feeling before I ended up here."

Lady put her finger to her lips, thinking. "I agree, even though I'm just a human I can feel a magical energy building up in my body. I feel like I can do simple magic right here, right now."

Reimu glanced at him from her shoulder, before looking back in front of her. "Before humanity advanced further to technology, mana and magical energy were still abundant and people still believed about supernatural energy. But now humanity stops believing in such things and starts embracing the modern era, like industrial evolution, engineering, anything humanity tries to forget old stories."

Lady nodded. "I see. Imagine if humans were stuck in the old time, maybe we're still living in a cave, and all of those magical elements you mentioned still exist."

After the conversation died out, they arrived at an open area. A lake lies in front of them, and several fairies can be seen playing above the body of water.

"Wow, this is a beautiful lake! And the water is clean too, it's like a giant mirror." Lady complimented the lake while observing the image of clouds and the sky on the lake.

Nero took a glance at the shrine maiden, with a small smile on her face. He cleared his throat to grab attention from both of the girls. "So, who's this fairy girl we're supposed to meet?"

Reimu pointed at a small girl in blue. "There, the one with the girl with green hair."

Before Reimu is able to call them, both girls can be seen approaching the trio. When they finally get close to them, both demon hunters observe the winged creatures.

'So, these are fairies, and like the shrine maiden said they look like small girls,' Nero turned his head to the blue-haired one. 'Are those icicles? How could that girl be able to fly with those wings?'

The blue-haired girl put her hands on her hips. "Reimu! I've been waiting for you all day, you said yesterday that we will have a Spell Card battle today! Have you forgotten that promise?"

Reimu sighed at being lectured by a fairy. "Sorry, I was about to head out to the Misty Lake after relaxing a bit," Reimu gestured to her two companions. "But suddenly these two persons appeared out of nowhere and were lying down in the front yard. Maybe next time."

Cirno frowned listening to her reason, she let out a sigh and decided to battle her next time.

Lady stepped forward with a smile on her face. "Sup guys! We should probably introduce ourselves. My name is Lady, and this is my partner, Nero. We are looking for a demon that escaped from us when we chased after him in Fortuna, have you seen any demon running around here?"

Cirno raised her brows. "Demon? I don't know if we met any demon before, but we met a scary looking Oni at the other side of the lake that kept saying he is a demon. Even though he has horns on his forehead, what a stupid Oni."

Daiyousei dropped a sweat, she chuckled nervously. "Uhhh Cirno, oni and demon are the same thing, it's just we use different names to call them."

Lady turned her head to Reimu. "Is what that green-haired girl said true?"

Reimu let out a heavy breath. "Oni is one of the youkai species. Sometimes people called youkai demon because some of them are evil supernatural creatures, but some demons or... "youkais" are friendly. I have some youkai friends that sometimes help me resolve an incident."

Nero nodded. "The legendary Sparda is a demon knight that protects humanity from other demons, he also sealed the gate to the Demon World, that means he counts as a friendly demon. Because of his action many demons saw him as a traitor."

Reimu rubbed her chin. 'Yukari once told me about Sparda when I was a little, she even said that she met him before he died. Does that mean he knows the existence of Dragon God?'

Lady cleared her throat. "So, it's confirmed that you girls have met a demon recently.

Can you tell us the direction he ran off to?"

Daiyousei nodded. "He ran into the forest over there," She pointed to the location where she and Cirno met him before. "Cirno and I chased after him but we lost him because he was too fast." She took a glance at the ice fairy before turning her sight to the trio. "If you want, we can take you there."

Reimu waved her hand in dismissal. "No need, we can go there by ourselves. You girls can go back to your business. Thanks for the info."

Cirno floated down near the shrine maiden, she stared at her menacingly. "We will have a battle when you finish with whatever business you have, promise?"

Reimu was perplexed by the ice fairy's remark. Cirno may not be the brightest fairy but she respects her fighting spirit, even though in the end she always loses the battle. She closed her eyes while massaging the bridge of her nose. "Okay okay, I will fight you later." She walked away from her, heading to the general location Daiyousei pointed.

Lady waved at the fairies before catching up to Reimu. "See you later guys!"

Daiyousei waved at her. "See you later, Miss Lady!"

When the trio had gone far enough, Daiyousei turned around. "Those Outsiders are friendly, I wonder if we can meet them again."

Cirno smirked as she crossed her arms. "I want to have a fight with that Nero guy, he seems strong. The strong must fight with the strongest!"

Back at the diner, we once again find our fellow, this time surrounded by a scene of first responders and onlookers showing awe to the recent display of sudden destruction. The fellow himself managed to hide for a bit outside of the diner and out of sight from privy authority, before setting his sights on someone matching Nero's description, albeit plenty older. Finally finding someone that he felt would hear his story at face-value without sentencing him to an asylum, he made his way over to who must have been the person that the lady from earlier alluded to and that Nero once mentioned: Dante.

"Into a wormhole?" Dante asked. With white hair on his head and a large sword on his back, the main differentiations he held were: having two firearms at each side, red attire, and older features. By all accounts, he at least appeared much more experienced than the brash devil hunter seen by the fellow earlier.

"Yeah, it was floating right here!" the fellow from earlier exclaimed, frantically pointing to an empty space above the road as if he were trying to convince the world that a small city could be found if everyone squint hard enough. "Then she and the younger guy jumped right in and disappeared with it!

"Hm..."

"Come on, you believe me, right? The cops would never buy this, but you look just like that other guy; white hair, freakish sword, and all!"

"Not an issue of belief, my friend, more like a lack of direction." Dante mulled over the predicament to himself for a few seconds, before turning around and starting at a walk.

"Got an idea where they might've gone?" asked the fellow, catching up.

"I've got a fallback I tend to rely on when stuff like this pops up."

"Damn, don't tell me this stuff is common..."

"Another day in life. Everyone's got their own crazy trade, this one's mine. Anyway, you should take off, in the other direction. Maybe go see a therapist."

"Pft, I'd need more therapy once I got the bill for taking therapy."

"Heh… Alright, I'll let you tag along if you can keep up. See that thing back at the diner?"

"...Not really…" The fellow turned around, but couldn't spot any special items or persons. "What thi - What the hell?!" Once he turned back around, the new devil hunter was nowhere to be seen.

"Rooftops never fail." Dante said, glaring down at the fellow before continuing onward for his shop: Devil May Cry. "Don't have much info besides the fact that I'm working with a shapeshifter and personal transporter, but I'll deal with that if it ever comes back up. Should see about getting Lady and Nero back for now. One month with his keepsake and he's already living up to the asshole, getting stuck in realms where he doesn't belong... Better make my way before the apple lands next to the tree."

"Damn humans...! Damn fairies! Damn everything!" Our familiar demon, now within the safer confines of the demonic world, proceeded in venting his frustration at failing his prior conflicts; punching, kicking, and breaking down the slimy walls that surrounded him within this corridor. "At every turn, squandered! How could I be forced to retreat by stupid fairies! And humans!" Nearing the peak of his anger, he pounded the wall to his right, fracturing it and sparking a new portal to form out of the cracks. The demon then looked to his fist, "I'm letting them get the best of me... What kind of grand demon loses control of his ability after conflict with humans and magical creatures, of all things..."

"An ugly yokai... that's my guess. And I spy with my little eye…"

Startled, the demon quickly turned and confirmed his unlikely fear: Marisa had followed him into this demon world as well! "How?!" Now seething with rage, the demon casts aside his caution and begins a march towards his vendetta, "I saw to it that the portal was -" the realization came crashing down, much like his hopes of surviving a second encounter like this; in his haste to escape from that toxic world of witches, he hadn't closed the portal. He now stood, his mouth ajar at the foolish action, his brain spinning to find a successful outing.

"Aw, you are a coward after all. I'd almost feel sorry for finishing you off, but no one will miss a phony youkai like you. And besides, you're the one that started it!"

Sweat beading down his face, our star enemy realized the end of his rope when one last idea struck him... "You're right... And I concede to you."

"What? You can't just give up! First you run, lose, run again and now give in! It would be a better idea to finish off such a worthless youkai, ze?"

"Of course not!" pleaded the demon, now backing away as Marisa pushed forward. "A human, a fairy like you is supposed to be of good heart, right? Shouldn't heroes show mercy even to their enemies?"

"Well... I can show mercy to my enemy. I've done this before throughout my career as incident resolver, but a youkai like you should be taught a lesson!" Marisa pointed her finger to the demon.

"Hmph, as you wish, maggot..." Though his tone implied elsewise, the demon raised his arms as though to confirm his intentions to surrender.

Just then, an audible *CRUNCH* occurred just behind Marisa. "What the..." Jumping forward a bit from the scare, she then immediately noticed a blade impaled near the tip of the broom she held, as well as the small portal hovering a few feet behind her which must have been another projection of the demon and the source of the projectile. "A sneak attack! You are a sly one after all! But now you are a dead one!" She pulled out her mini-Hakkero, channeling her mana to the octagonal-shaped device. "And just in case you get any sneakier ideas…! Orreries Sun!" She now outstretched both arms to her sides, creating four orbs colored blue, red, yellow and green around her person, the orbs began circling her with random patterns of movement. "Now, let me exterminate you!"

The attacks came fast, almost too quick for the demon to react. A plethora of small pellets broke off from the four orbs and proceeded to their only target. Thinking quickly, the demon summoned a portal in front of him, allowing the pellets to miss their target and be sent elsewhere entirely. Seeing this, Marisa modified her trajectory so that the pellets would dive under and around the portal to hit the demon directly. Every impact caused searing pain, that only compounded as attack followed attack.

With no other way out, the demon curled as tightly as he could into a fetal position before scarecrow spikes jutted out of every free bit of surface area on his body to act as shields. Though a nice display of quick thinking and a winning means to save him from more severe harm, the blades fractured and broke off easily after being hit by Marisa's power, meaning our familiar demon was now living on borrowed time.

As blade after blade of the demon met its end, the demon replenished his protective covering with more blades, and even attempted firing off bullets from its person as retaliation. Bullets however, just like the portal, proved useless once Marisa's danmaku incinerated them well before they reached their target. And though he could continue replenishing his armor, the total bombardment, as well as futility of the situation, began to hit him almost as strongly as his oppressor. In what seemed to be his possible final moments of life, a new sound could be heard as something crashed into the portal he created earlier onto the wall of the corridor.

"Huh?" Marisa, even though her onslaught, noticed the crash as well and stopped her attacks to view the now protruding figure from the portal. What looked to be a mound of mulch held together in a burlap sack, continued prying its way through the portal until it completely fell through the portal onto the floor in front of Marisa. "So, what's this, buddy? Youkais have their own guardian angels now, ze?"

"Oh, woah!" The sack cried as it attempted to stand and regain its composure. It had a mask for what seemed to be its head, stood on two peg legs, with one wooden hand, and the other limp having a giant blade attached instead of a more complete arm. Unbeknownst to her, Marisa was seeing a scarecrow in person, the original source to her enemy's bladed technique. "Heh?" Now completely re-oriented, it looked to Marisa. Though it had no visible eyes or facial features to speak of, it seemed confused as it merely stood there looking to Marisa, swaying side to side while trying to remain balanced.

"Are you a youkai too, come to help your friend?" Marisa asked the scarecrow while pointing to the clearly defeated demon ahead of her.

"Eh?" The scarecrow teetered and tottered on its legs until it rotated enough to see the downed demon, battered and broken from the damage he sustained. His newest portal now gone, with his body now laying down on the ground, the only sign of life he gave was the glare that persisted in his eyes as he looked to his victor with clear exhaustion. "Aaaahahahahaha!" Suddenly, the scarecrow broke into a wild laugh, jumping up and down on its peg legs, and swinging its arms to and fro.

"So, you're not with him? You're not a youkai too...?"

"Eeeeehehehehehehahahaha!" the scarecrow continued to laugh, inciting a smile from Marisa for its playful if seemingly lunatic behavior, while inviting a harsh look from the demon that lay across from him...

"You... fodder demon trash… dare to look down on me?!" The demon outstretched its arm as quickly as it could, which of course was slow in its current state. "If I would die today... the least I'll accomplish is your repentance forever looking down on your devil superior!" From the tips of its claws, the demon sent out four bullet rounds aimed directly for the scarecrow.

In a flash, all four rounds were annihilated at once, struck with another of Marisa's pellets. "You are the only one that will die here today. Maybe if you had the speed of light, you could have at least redeemed your tough figure with a trophy on your deathbed."

Just then, the scarecrow's laugh was silenced, much to Marisa's and the demon's surprise. The unfortunate lesser demon now lay sprawled onto the wall adjacent to the portal-stricken wall, covered by what appeared to be a much larger creature clad in armor and many long claws protruding from its form. This creature pinned the scarecrow to the wall, hurriedly picking away at its insides.

"Man, there are youkai everywhere!" Marisa exclaimed, shooting an array of lasers towards the new devil, though the chances of saving her new scarecrow friend already seemed gone. The creature was surrounded by its own barrier of light, more specifically surging electricity, though Marisa's attacks were still doing damage and the creature retreated in the blink of an eye. "Where'd it go?"

"That's… with this… I can finally turn my chances around...!" though battered, the downed devil strainfully picked himself up to grasp for this new chance at victory.

"Oh no you don't!" Marisa noticed the old demon picking himself up and shot him back to his knees. What she didn't notice, however, was the new creature reappearing behind her in a flash of light and slowly stalked its way towards her.

"WAIT!" the demon pleaded, "That creature, it's quicker than even you! We're both in trouble if-"

"Your lies are terrible! I'll do just fine on my own with you in the ground, hurry up and die, ze!"

"HAVE IT YOUR WAY! Shoot me into the ground! Pound me to DUST! So long as you can get through this new demon too, then it doesn't even ma-" Quicker than a blink, this new creature followed the loud battle cries before leaping onto the demon faster than either he or Marisa realized, pinning him against the wall as it had done with the scarecrow. With Marisa's attacks still ongoing however, it soon found itself continually pelted by an array of light attacks. Its shield could visibly be seen to take substantial damage from this, arcing radically before even changing color from yellow to red before finally dissipating and leaving the creature stunned on its side as it fell to the floor once Marisa at last stopped.

"This is... kind of boring." Marisa noted as she walked closer to the new creature and demon that had just fallen once again to his knees and then on his face. "Youkai in this world are the strangest I've seen... some can be funny, but no youkai put up a fight, no matter what you all say about your villainous status and power. Which isn't very powerful."

"Hah... haha... At least, you're right for the moment." Scoffed the demon, laying a hand upon this new creature. In the next instant, the demon's body smelted together into the dark, formless shape that he was originally found as by Nero, before encompassing the new creature entirely. As the dark outer layer began to smelt down, it was clear that these two demons were merging together and the dark devil began to take form once again. Similar to the new creature, he now sported outer armor coverings, with incredibly large claws from his feet that seemed to be a new variant to the scarecrow blades he fancied before. Additionally, he now had a large horn protruding from the peak of his forehead, and most frighteningly lightning began coursing itself around him.

"Oh look, you got a makeover… so are you going to die anytime soon, ze?" Marisa folded her arms, clearly annoyed and not finding the fun nor challenge that she expected when making the journey here.

"That... is out of the question for me. Big plans and all." the new creature said with a cocky grin. In an instant, the creature was next to Marisa, just out of range from her surrounding balls of light. "I suppose a thanks is in order. And a congrats on style; this couldn't have possibly been cut closer, but then I'd be remiss to give you all credit. But I've talked enough, you seem to be a girl of action, and round 2 is in order before I kill you and finally move on."