Chapter 3

"Keine-sensei why is there a metal house on wheels next to our school?"

"Why is there a guy sleeping it in?"

"Is he a hobo?"

"Let's kick it!"

I was trying to sleep, it's very early in the morning, that sounds like students who are up to no good, and I can understand that; Keine wasn't lying about learning Japanese overnight then.

BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP

The idiots kicked my CR-V. The car alarm went off, I woke up, the village woke up, the soldiers woke up, and I can hear the entire village walking out to search for the source of the sound.

"WHY DID YOU DO THAT?!"

"SO LOUD"

"MY EARS ARE RINGING!"

"Youkai attack?!" A samurai yelled to deaf ears.

I crawled out of my sleeping bag, look at my key fob, and realized the awful truth; I forgot how to turn off the alarm, fuck.

I checked the doors; locked. I look at my key fob, pressed the lock button; nothing. I press the unlock button and the doors unlocked. I put on my shoes, and climbed over to the driver side and got out from the door. Next I shut the door and used my key to lock the door; the alarm stopped. Everyone was looking at me, but you know what? Who cares? Someone kicked my CR-V and that's more important.

Keine walked out and asked, "Nelson was that you?"

I ignored her and tensed up, "There better not be a dent." I thought.

"Nelson?"

I relaxed my shoulders and said, "Great, no dents."

I look back and saw Keine, "Oh, good morning! Did you need something?"

The school teacher sighed, "Was that loud noise from you?"

I nodded, "My car has an alarm, it'll go off whenever someone..." I look around at the students, "do something stupid to her."

"Alright, no lollygagging, get back to school!" A samurai yelled, he walked up to me and said, "Congratulations outsider, you just woke up the entire village. I bet, the shrine maiden heard that noise and is probably on her way down." The samurai nodded to Keine and walked away; the rest of the villagers left to continue their business.

I did a classic head tilt, "Thanks, I guess?"

Keine walked back towards the entrance of the school, she turn around and said, "Nelson, once you're ready, I'll get someone to do a quick tour of the village. Once the tour ends, come to my office, it'll be recess for the students and you can ask all the questions you want."

She turned around and was about to leave. I tapped her shoulder, "Keine wait," she turned around and I pulled out my phone, "Picture?"

Keine stood next to the doorway and smiled.

Click, beep!

My phone camera went off, I showed her the picture. Her eyes widen a bit, "Wow, the picture looks pretty." She commented before entering the schoolhouse.

BONK!

I swear I just heard the sound of two heads colliding in there. I gathered my clothes and head off the public bathhouse, I walked into the men's area. "Shit, there's people in here."

I'm used to my own private bathroom because there were no naked men in there, but here? At least there is just enough steam to cover my embarrassed blushing face. "Hopefully I won't drop my soap." I thought.

40 minutes later and I'm out. It wasn't as bad as I thought because everyone seem to mind their own business. I walked towards my car and there were two people standing next to it. One girl had purple hair and eyes, she wore a green vest with yellow patterned sleeves, and a red skirt. The woman next to her was something else; she had black hair and red eyes, she wore a white blouse, a short black skirt that shows off a pair of beautiful looking legs, and a tokin on her head. She also has a camera, so she's probably a reporter.

The girl with purple hair looked at the woman with black hair, "Keine asked me to give the tour, Aya you don't have to be here."

Aya aimed her camera at the girl, "Akyuu, he's a new outsider, as a reporter, it is my duty to do interviews and learn the true at all costs!"

Akyuu shook her head and sighed. She noticed me getting closer and asked, "Are you Nelson Tristan Ryugu?"

I nodded and she continued, "Great! Keine told me about you," she shook my hand, "I'm Hieda no Akyuu, just call me Akyuu. Follow me, I'll show you around."

A second later, the tour stopped. Aya got in between me and Akyuu, "Aya Shameimaru here! Reporter of the Bunbunmaru Newspaper." The reporter got her arm around my neck, it was as if she was like my best friend or something, "Now how about an interview? I'm sure everyone in Gensokyo wants to know you about and how you survived your first day here."

"Does she know anything about personal space?" I thought.

Immediately, I felt a pair of hands pulling me by my arms; it was a pouting Akyuu, "Aya, let go, Keine told me to show him around!"

Aya pulled back, "B-b-but interview!"

"It can wait!"

"No it can't!"

"Yes it can!"

"No it can't!"

"Ayayaya, wait what am I doing? I'm a youkai." Aya decided to pull both me and Akyuu with her towards a restaurant.

"STOP RIGHT THERE!" A familiar voice yelled out, causing Aya to stop and let go of me. A shrine maiden landed next to us, she looks younger than Akyuu, probably in her teens. She wore a modified red and white miko outfit; it has detachable sleeves and it exposes her armpits and sarashi. She has a big red ribbon that tied her ponytail, and a red skirt.

Instantly I recognized the voice; it's her, the girl I accidentally groped because of Yukari, and that secret will be carried to my grave. Upon closer look, her eyes were red as if she was recently crying. "God damn it Yukari, you went too far." I thought.

Pasha! Pasha!

A camera was heard taking pictures, Aya smiled, "Reimu, this is interesting, it's much better then that other groping incident because you and Nelson look alike!"

Reimu gave an annoyed look, "Huh?"

I opened my mouth, "Well duh, that's because all Asians loo-"

Reimu covered my mouth and whispered, "Don't even say it, she'll ruin you."

The shrine maiden glared at Aya, "He's only been here for a day, at least give him some time to get use to Gensokyo!"

Aya nodded in thought, "Yes, yes, that's a good idea, can't have him going crazy. Well tootles!" She flew off into the sky, a boom was here.

"There is no way she just went supersonic..." I muttered in awe.

"Normally, I would make outsiders stay at my shrine, but you look like you're in good hands." Reimu looks around, "Now who was making that loud beeping noise earlier?"

"That was my car" I stated and pointed at the CR-V, "The alarm will make that noise every time someone tries to damage it."

Reimu walks over to it, raised her leg, and...

BONK!

Fell to the ground, I gave Keine a thumbs up, she smiled and walked back into the school. I looked over to Akyuu, "I guess you can show me around now, don't worry I'll carry her."

"When she wakes up." Akyuu pointed to Reimu, "If Aya sees you carrying Reimu, it'll spell the end of you."

"I guess reporters will never change..." I muttered.

Reimu rose up and rubbed her head, "Ugh, what happened? It felt like I got hit by a schoolteacher."

"Pretty much what happened." I stated and I held out my hand, "Nelson Tristan Ryugu, just call me Nelson."

Reimu grabbed my hand and pulled herself up, "Reimu Hakurei, I'm the shrine maiden of the Hakurai shrine, if you visit, please donate."

I sweat-dropped and thought, "How shameless. Wait, Hakurai... I guess that last name is probably a common last name."

"Reimu, since you're here," Akyuu handed the shine maiden a list, "Can you fetch these people to my mansion?"

Reimu glanced at the list, "These are the annoying youkai from that last incident on the moon. Lemme guess, you're going to record them in that book of yours?" Akyuu nodded and Reimu flew off without question.

"Wait damn it, I forgot to ask Aya and Reimu for a picture." I grumbled.

"You take pictures? Like Aya?"

"Not exactly like Aya, I take them to keep as memories." I stated and pulled out my phone, "Speaking of which, can I take a picture of you?"

Akyuu nodded and smile, then I captured her beauty into my phone. The results are what I expected, the 20 megapixel camera did a terrific job, I think it made everyone in these photo look better than in real life. She looked over and saw her picture, "Wow, the picture looks a lot more vibrant than in real life."

"Before we go on the tour, I need to fetch a few things in my car." I said while pressing the unlock button on my key fob. The two turn signal lights in the front and rear flashed twice to let me know that the doors are unlocked. I grabbed out my backpack, inside is a laptop and usb cable for my phone. I pressed the lock button and the lights flashed once.

Akyuu took me on her personal tour, it lasted 3 hours. We took a break at a restaurant and I pulled out my laptop and phone cable. I learned that the village is 20 miles in diameter with walls surrounding the border. 20 miles is huge for a village, but in reality, the majority of the people live 12 miles inside the village; the 8 miles between the village and walls is all mostly farmland. Most of the water comes from a river the flows between the village and this river connects to the Misty Lake. The village is nothing special, it's a very traditional Meiji period village. This means that there is some evidence of industrialization and westernization, such as a bank with yen as the main currency, gas street lights that look like they came from London or New York City, and some of the villagers rode on bicycles. The samurai, police, and foot soldiers were armed with a mixture of Dreyse needle guns, Starr carbines, katanas, yari spears and the naginata pole-arms. It is also worth noting that the foot soldiers and samurais are all wearing either the European influenced Nanban dō armor or the kusari tatami(chainmail) armor and not western uniforms, it is probably because armor provided some protection against youkai.

Being the person that I am, I stopped a few soldiers, cops, and samurais for pictures; most didn't really mind and were glad to. I'm not one of those Japanese tourists; I took these photos to study their armor and weapons. Now the villagers I've met so far are pretty much very welcoming, but the relationship between humans and youkai of any kind is very tense because the majority of youkai do eat humans except for a select few.

I finished up typing all the things I saw in the tour as well as copying the pictures from my phone. Akyuu looked over to my laptop screen with curiosity, "This is one of those computers from the outside world right?"

I nodded and she continued, "I heard of these from another shrine maiden, but I never saw one in person."

I raised an eyebrow, "There are other people like me here?"

"Well yes, most outsiders we get are humans, but the ones that do survive from the youkai usually leave. The only two human outsiders I know of is Sanae Kochiya of the Moriya Shrine and Sumireko Usami, a high school student from Japan that comes and goes as she pleases."

A waiter bought us royal milk tea in a glass cup and I thought, "This isn't Meiji era drinks at all! These appeared in Japan in the 1960s!"

Suddenly Keine's message flashed in my head, "It's best if you not think about it." and I obeyed. Then I asked, "So this Sumireko Usami, how does she enter and leave whenever she pleases?"

"Sleeping."

I slammed my head against the table in response to Akyuu's answer, "That's got to be one of the most stupidest thing I ever heard and it's probably the truth!" I thought.

"Nelson, are you okay?"

I look up and saw Akyuu's worried face and I answered, "It's nothing."

Our conversation went on for a few hours, the sun is now setting. I spoke about my life in the outside world while she spoke about herself. I learned that Akyuu is physically 21 years old, over 1000 years old mentally, and that she doesn't live past the age of thirty. At this point I would mutter something like "How tragic" or break down and cry, but then she told me that she can reincarnate.

Akyuu looked at the clock on the wall, "We only have 50 minutes left before Keine finishes with her class." she look back at me, "Before I let you go, I have two questions."

"Alright, shoot."

Akyuu looked at me with a confused look, "I don't know how to fight with danmaku you know."

"What's that?" I thought and then corrected myself, "No, that's not what I mean. I'm telling you to go ahead."

Her eyes widen a bit and she blushed in embarrassment. She took a deep breath and said, "How long are you going to stay in Gensokyo? Long term, short term, or permanent?"

I paused for bit, Gensokyo so far seems like a very backwards place, no cell phone signals, no internet connections, public bathhouses, etc. Those very things actually made me want to go back, but then again this place has magic and fantasy. After much thought, I said what is suppose to be one of my smartest answers ever, "I don't know, it's only been nearly two days."

"You're right, but I only asked you this question because most outsiders would want to leave immediately." She stated and then continued, "Next question, I understand that your surname is Ryugu and that's from your father's side, but what is your mother's surname? I'm sorry, I'm just curious."

"What a strange thing to be curious of." I thought before answering, "Well it's Hak-"

A voice rang out nearby, "ara-ara~ Nelson, I can't let you answer that yet." all the customers went quiet.

"Oh look it's Yukari, gee, thanks for dropping me into a lake and nearly drowning me." I said in a sarcastic voice.

"You were suppose to be youkai food, but you're lucky that Wakasagihime was there."

Akyuu nodded in agreement, "So that's how you survive, Yukari's right; you are extremely lucky to run into a mermaid." then she asked, "Wait, why is he not allowed to answer that question?"

Yukari ran over to Akyuu and gave her a hug that made her feel uneasy, "It's a secret for now."

I stood up from my chair, "Wait, what about the outside world? Why are you here? What happened to transforming into 'me' and stuff?"

"Oh right, I gapped here when I was in the boys bathroom, I have to go now." She gave out a mischievous look, "But before I go..."

I felt her hands removing my glasses, I caught blurry sight of her sinking into the ground, "Nelson, your eyes will heal faster in Gensokyo without your glasses, but the question is how long will it take?"

I shouted, "W-w-wait! I need those, I can't see anything!" Yukari is now gone, "Noooooo!"

I can't see anything, but I do hear people gasping because they are looking at my lifeless eyes.

"Are you... youkai?" A terrified villager asked.

"Jiāngshī?!" Another one yelled and made me think, "What the flying fuck? That's a totally uneducated answer!"

I'm getting tired of this nonsense, so I decided to play along, "You know what? Fine, I am a youkai! I am an American, I eat anything! Fear me!"

"Definitely human." Another villager muttered and everyone went back to normal.

"American? So America is real? That one fairy wasn't lying then." Said another villager.

"Nelson?" Akyuu called out and held out an unknown amount of fingers, "How many fingers do I have out?"

I answered to the best of my sights, "1 and you're using it to flip me off right?"

I can hear her laughing, "No, I had four fingers out." she held my hand, "Since you're practically blind now, I will walk you back to Keine."

I can hear her pulling out money, I can smell the money, "Akyuu wait, I can-" I felt my pocket and my wallet is missing, it must have fell out when I fell in the Misty Lake.

"Hmm?" She looked at me or at least I think she's looking at me, "Oh don't worry, your money is no good here."

Akyuu helped me put my laptop back in my backpack and we slowly walked out. As we're walking together, hand in hand, I can feel the villagers' glare and hear their whispers.

"Did Akyuu got a boyfriend?"

"Wow, it's been a long time since I seen this!"

"What's with his eyes? Is he blind? Akyuu must be really caring for choosing a blind man as her boyfriend!"

I look around and saw pixelated forms of people or something looking at me. I frowned in annoyance and thought, "Great, it doesn't matter if I'm in another universe or something because Asians are always nosy regardless."

Akyuu whispered in my ear, "Don't worry about the rumors, just hang in there Nelson."

The walk took longer than usual thanks to my stumbling on the uneven streets. We walked past some high pitched chatter, I can only assume that those were students, and that meant that we're almost there. "Akyuu"

"Yes?"

"Can you see my car? Anything happened to it?"

"That metal thing on wheels? Keine is standing next it with a Kappa tied up."

"Kappa?" I asked

Akyuu explained, "Yes Kappa. They are a type of water-dwelling youkai, but they eat people by drowning them. However if you give them a cucumber, the kappa will spare you, and accept you as a friend. That means that human villagers are never eaten by the kappa because of the cucumber offerings every year, but outsiders are fair game."

"Duty noted, remind me to shove a cucumber into one's mouth when I meet one." I remarked.

Akyuu responded to my statement, "Nelson, I believe things are fine the way they are now, it's an uneasy peace, but it's still peace. This is something both humans and youkai want in Gensokyo."

"Really?"

"Yes really, the youkai needs to feed off of human fear and imagination to survive. If we are killed off, the youkai will die off, if we rise up, everyone will die off because of war."

I countered back, "But it feels like humans are cattle that can be killed off on their whim."

Akyuu held my hand tighter, "There are good and bad youkai, and the youkai of today are very different than the myths you heard in the outside world. We also have Reimu Hakurei and her spell card rules to keep everyone in their places."

"What an odd place" I thought, "My world would have killed these youkai on sight if they existed there."

We got close enough that I can make out my Honda CR-V. I can barely make out the kappa's features, I can see a blue blurry box on her back, probably a big backpack, a green blob that's probably a hat of some sort, and it appeared that she is wearing a blue dress.

Akyuu asked, "What happened?"

Keine answered, "Nitori was going to tear Nelson's car apart just to see how it works and if she could reverse-engineer it. Thankfully, I caught her, we ended up in a spell card battle and I won." she ran back into the school, "I'll be back, I can't have a guy staring at me with the way I'm dress."

I was confused, "What?"

Akyuu leaned towards my ear, "Nelson, if you had your glasses then you would have seen something very pleasing. You see, spell cards are the main way humans and youkai deal with each other and it's harmless, except it destroys their clothes." Thanks to my active imagination, I just pictured Keine with torn up clothing which revealed her awe-inspiring form, as a result, my face turned red.

Nitori mumbled, "Pervert..."

Keine came out and saw me and Akyuu doing something, "What are you doing?"

"Oh Keine, Yukari stole his glasses and he's blind now." Akyuu gave an angelic smile, "I was describing the state of your clothes to him!"

Keine said in a threatening matter, "You're lucky that you're from the Hieda family."

I felt Akyuu releasing me from her hold, "Yep! Well anyways, I'll be leaving." I can hear her footsteps and her shouting, "I'm heading back to my mansion, Reimu probably finished gathering everyone from that last incident on the moon. Bye Keine and Nelson!" With that, I heard her footsteps fading away.

I heard the sound of Keine untying a rope, I look at the direction of the sound, and saw a blue blurry thing flying off. I heard Keine's voice, "I better not see you try to steal this car again, Nitori!"

A faint voice was heard from the kappa, "I'm not Marisa!"

Keine grabbed my hand, "I'll take you to my office, we can ask questions there."

We arrived at her office and she shut the door, "Before we can start with the questions, I need to give these back."

The teacher handed me my wallet and a stone. I asked, "How did you got my wallet back? And I don't even have a stone, it probably belongs to someone else."

Keine answered, "While you were on that tour with Akyuu, a mermaid and her friend, a werewolf, dropped by to visit. The wallet was in the lake and-"

"Wakasagihime is friends with a werewolf?!" I exclaimed.

"Yes, but don't worry, she's harmless. She goes out of her way to avoid transforming into a werewolf because she dislikes getting hairy." Then Keine had a very skeptic look on her face, "Both of them are part of a grassroots youkai movement that promotes youkai into becoming vegetarians. Just don't take my info on this movement for granted because I don't even know if that's the truth; it's just a silly rumor."

I sweat-dropped, "I see..."

"Yes, I know, a vegan werewolf sounds extremely weird." Keine continued, "As I was saying, the wallet was found at the bottom of the lake, Wakasagihime looked in it and saw a card with a bunch of numbers and your birthday." She pointed at the stone, "That stone is a sapphire."

My head moved closer to the stone until it was less than an inch from my eye. I examine it, the stone is indeed a cut sapphire, it's a very purplish blue gemstone, and that meant that this sapphire is very valuable. The sapphire is also an round shape that's 14mm or a little over .5 inches. I whispered, "This must have been very expensive, I should give it back to her."

"Actually, mermaids collect pretty gemstones all the time, I'm sure she has plenty." Keine answered.

"Well, if you say so." I said while wrapping the gemstone in a napkin and then storing it in my backpack.

Keine placed her arms on her desk and asked, "I'll go first, how is everything in the human village so far?"

I zipped up my backpack and answered, "Well, I'll admit this; I never a lady hold my hand for that long."

The school teacher laughed softy and said, "Don't mind Akyuu, it's been awhile since she ever went out with a guy, after all, over one thousand years of reincarnation does get boring."

I looked at Keine, normally with my glasses, I would look away, but I can't even her face, so there was no reason to be shy, "Alright, next question. How was this place made?"

"Oh this is going to be a long story." Keine put on her glasses and start to explain, "Yukari once told me that she gapped her way back to the days of the Meiji Era in Japan."

"That's the time when Japan was modernizing and the entire country was in a civil war right?" I continued on, "It was in response to Western imperialism, after Britain and the rest of the Europe powers divided up parts of China, and when America came along to demand Japan to open up for trade or else."

The teacher nodded, "That's right, but during the Boshin War, there were elements of the Japanese Imperial Army that were assigned for youkai hunting. They believed that with Western cannons, repeating rifles and gatling guns, they can finally eliminate all of the youkai in Japan." Keine gave a depressed expression, "The problem with this is that they were killing every single youkai, it didn't matter if they were good or harmless, then Yukari came along and dragged as many people as she can into this... dimension and called it Gensokyo."

Keine went on and talked about how the Imperial Army went around and slaughtered youkai and humans that were helping the youkai escape. It definitely looked like she was trying her best to keep herself together because she was retelling the stories on how she lost her some of her friends.

I was shocked and thought, "Yikes, that's genocide. I don't know who's wrong or right in this one, but this brings Yukari into a new light." my mouth opened up and nothing came out.

Keine then asked, "Now I'm curious, how do you know about the Meiji Era?"

I scratched the back of my head, "I attended a university and I'm majoring in both computer science and history."

There is a pregnant pause before Keine opened up, "History major?"

"Yep, that's one of my majors."

The school teacher got up and walked towards something that I can't see because I'm blind, then I hear a click like a record player or something, and saucy sounding smooth jazz. I can feel my face turning red as a tomato, "Oh shit" I thought and said, "Umm, Keine? What are you trying to do?"

I can hear her giggling in a very seductive matter and then I see her blurry figure sitting down in front of me, in the same place as before, "My Nelson, you have a dirty mind. I listen to smooth jazz because" there was a brief pause, "it's very enjoyable at nights like this."

She's giggling again and I replied, "You're enjoying this." and thought, "She's definitely toying with me."

I heard her body shifting closer on the table and then she was close enough for me to see her face. I can now admire her pretty brown eyes, make out the blue highlights on her silver hair, and make out glyphs on her hat. She smiled as I look deep into her eyes because I'm avoiding at looking at her chest, my heart is pounding very fast, it was the fastest I ever felt my heart pounded.

It was just me, her, heavy breathing, and the saucy smooth jazz. I observed her pupils transforming into hearts and then into stars, then I heard her speak, "I never meet anyone from Gensokyo or the outside world that's a fan of history." she shifted back to her chair, "So, why don't you and me make history right now?" then she said in a seductive voice, "both of us. Alone. In this office," she ended her speech with a wink.

"Ohhh boy." I thought.

To Be Continued

Notes

I don't know why I turn a grassroots youkai movement into a vegan movement; I guess I took the name way too seriously. Notice how Keine stated that the grassroots youkai movement is a vegan movement, but she considers it a silly rumor. That gives me room to correct it in the future just in case of ZUN ever does reveal what exactly the movement is.

I don't think there's going to be fanservice in this fanfic, but that doesn't mean I can make things look suggestive. I still don't know why and how I turned history into something like that; might be either just my way to getting out all the stress from finals or the fact that one of my professors was playing smooth jazz on the speakers during the finals and turning everyone on. Anyways, this chapter marks the end of my finals and the start of my summer course which is just two classes.

I felt very uncomfortable writing the last bit, definitely not used to reading or writing things like that. Don't expect things like that from me.