Syaoran opened the door to the guest room with his sword drawn out. He had checked the bindings and wards left on Reimu thrice before leaving her, but it didn't hurt to be too safe.

Reimu was staring at the TV with a peaceful smile on her face, and took several seconds to notice there were other people on the room.

Oh, hello again. This moving pictures box of yours is really amusing!-greeted them Reimu when they entered the room, before turning her head back to the TV. She didn't seem to mind one bit by still being binded.

Hmm, really sorry for having you trapped like that, but it's just so that we can have a peaceful talk... You like tea and cookies?-asked Sakura, presenting the tray with the leftovers while adjusting the pillows behind Reimu's head.

Love them, but afraid it'll be a bit hard to eat with my hands like this-shrugged of Reimu, looking at her arms tied together against her belly.

I could give you the food directly into the mouth...-innocently suggested Sakura.

Tomoyo instantly stepped on front of Reimu and undid some of the knots, allowing Reimu some use of her hands.

There, now you can eat by yourself.-said the blue-haired girl.

Hmm, thanks?-Reimu replied, wondering why this Tomoyo was suddenly glaring at her with a diabolical look on her eyes. Envy? Hatred? Frustration? A combination of the previous? Meh, nothing that she hadn't seen before. Although it usually came from people Reimu had personally screwed over.

Of course, the diabolical look on Tomoyo's eyes was gone when she turned back to Sakura

Here, let me put this on our guest's lap, Sakura-chan.

Ah, allright, Tomoyo-chan...

Syaoran was confused. The menacing aura from Reimu during the battle. seemed to be competely gone.

Don't think you can make us drop our guard just by acting like that. We know you're just waiting an opportunity to attack us...-warned him.

Why would I want to attack you now? Like, you defeated me, I was expecting you to just leave me there at best or take me as a sacrifice for some unholy ritual at worst. Instead when I woke up I'm in a cozy warm room in a big soft bed, and you even have that talking box showing funny pictures all the time. And now I even get room service! I don't mind this penalty game for losing one bit.

Reimu paused to take a sip of her tea and munch some of the cookies.

You even have glasses in your windows, people! And there's been not even one youkai trying to get inside! And this is some damn good tea and cookies. I can't even taste the mud on the water, and there's no bugs inside the filling! Can't remember the last time I was somewhere this luxurious!

Ok, being tied up sucks a bit, but any excuse for not needing to do any work around here is a good excuse.

The card captor gang all sweatdropped simultaneously as Reimu kept drinking, eating and watching TV.

Well, can you explain me what are those?-asked Syaoran, flashing Fantasy Heaven and Super Duplex Barrier to Reimu.

Oh, those? They're spellcards. You sure you never heard of them? Your girl seems to have quite the collection.

And what exactly are spellcards?-asked Sakura this time.

A system of magic developed by me to give normal humans a fighting chance against Youkai. In a first step you create cards that represent certain aspect of your personality or life experiences or beliefs. Elemental forces, items, abstract concepts or memories work too. Anything that could remotely be useful in combat. Then you channel your inner energy into them to unleash beautiful and powerful attacks. They have some degree of sentience to make them easier to use. They'll grow and evolve with the user's own growth and evolution. Not that it seems to have done a lot of good for the original objective. Like, there's countless youkai running rampart with spellcards nowadays, but just two or three other humans besides me that can stand up to youkai in a spellcard battle. Sakura there would be a new addition to the list. Maybe Syaoran too, now that you have actual spellcards instead of just cheap chinese papers (even if those are some pretty good seals you put on me).

Hoooee-let out Sakura, her eyes starting to spin in confusion.

Reimu's answer was raising many more questions, so Syaoran continued the interrogation:

You say you designed the spellcard system yourself? You never really heard of Clow?

This time Reimu's face changed to a serious expression, and she seemed to focus as if searching her mind for something.

Yeah... Now that you mention it, I can't claim to have all the credit for creating the spellcard system (not that you'll ever hear me admit it outside this room). I was inspired by some old scripts I found during one of my extermination missions. About combining Eastern and Western magic into special, sentient cards that would deeply bound with the wielder. The author of the scripts was "Clow Reed". It was his work that I used as the basis of my own. Since I believed this Clow would've been dead and gone long ago, I decided to take all the credit for myself.-finished Reimu with a look of pride on her face.

You say there's many others besides you with spellcards... So why haven't we heard anything about them? We searched far and wide for the Clow Cards, but never really found much other signs of magic.-asked Sakura, now with a serious look on her face.

Reimu stared back at her, changing her expression to an annoyed one.

Damn... You're really from the outside world, aren't you? This sucks. Guess somebody pulled a big prank on me. But since you're magic users yourselves, I guess I may as well reveal it to you.

I come from an hidden land called Gensokyo. It's not very clear when or why it was founded, whatever scriptures are left aout that are murky at best.

Long story short, there was this infernal youkai-infested wasteland in Japan that terrorized its surroundings. Heroic humans flocked in to exorcise and exterminate the youkai, even if many of them died on the attempts.

But the rest of the world was changing. Increasingly scientific and skeptical. Magic was fading from the world, being sealed and forgotten, and with it the youkai and heroic humans were disappearing as well. My clan... Made a pact with the Youkai to seal Gensokyo from the rest of the world. Isolated and hid us from the rest of the world. The Great Hakurei border they called it. Since then it kinda became a refuge for other youkai and magicians from the rest of the world that flocked to us. We created our little paradise where whatever magic was left on the world could survive... But it seems like there's still some pretty strong magic out there after all. Funny that. The border isn't perfect however. Sometimes cracks appear and somebody gets in or out.

Kero, you know something about that?-asked Sakura, her face filled with curious fascination about this whole hidden fantasy world tale.

Hmm, I think I rememer Clow telling a history about a magic sealed area in Japan, but the part where it was dominated by female youkai that liked to all disguise themselves as humanoid girls and ladies made me think he was just making stuff up.

There's some similar records on the Li family-added Syaoran-However since there was no clear evidence of its existence, it was never investigated further.

So, what do you intend to do now that you got your ass kicked?-asked Meiling.

Dunno.-replied Reimu back to her emotionless tone-Original plan was to drag Sakura back to Gensokyo, kicking and screaming if needed. But since you defeated me, and I don't feel like returning home empty-handed, I may as well go sightseeing around a bit.

Will you try to don't raise any more ruckus?-asked Syaoran, more suspicious of this whole tale at every passing second.

Can't make any promises on that. This is a strange world you have here, don't really know your customs and laws. Who would've thought that throwing needles at people is a crime around here? It wasn't like I was aiming at their vitals or anything!

Syaoran sighed. What were they gonna do with this Shrine Maiden? Returning her to this Gensokyo place felt like the correct thing to do, but they had no idea where it was in Japan, and Reimu certainly wouldn't tell them.

I know! We're on vacation, so we can show Reimu around Tomoeda, and this way make sure she doesn't get into trouble!-exclaimed Sakura.

Don't expect me to pay any money for a guided tour. I have none.-commented Reimu, nibbling another cookie.

Oh, don't worry, we'll do it for fun! Won't we, Syaoran-kun, Tomoyo-chan, Meiling-chan?-Sakura had her "let's all get along" smiling face now.

Ah, fine, escorting the demonic shrine maiden it is...-conceded Syaoran, sighing.

As long as I can record Sakura-chan!-replied Tomoyo.

I'll tag along as well to help!-added Meiling

We'll buy lots of cake!-said Kero.

Great, can you untie me now? I really want to scratch my back.-stated Reimu.

Tomoyo, please? I really feel like Reimu won't try to do any more bad stuff to us.

With the request from Sakura, Tomoyo bent down and skilfully undid the biddings on Reimu. True to her word, the shrine maiden started scratching her back while remaining laying down.

If you would like to to refresh yourself, the main bathroom's clear now. I can mend your robes while you wash yourself.-added Tomoyo.

I'll take that offer. How long will you take to heat up the water?

Reimu exited the Li's apartment main bathroom wrapped up in a towel and with a look of satisfaction on her face. Ceramic tiles. A working toilet. Constant clean water, warm or cold at her preference. This world was looking better and better. That Syaoran had covered her remaining spellcards with sealing jufus and said he would remove them when and if she proved she could be trusted that didn't worry her too much. They really seemed like nice kids. She didn't even feel annoyed that she had lost some of her spellcards that night. Victor takes the spoils they want, it was one of the very rules Reimu enforced as a shrine maiden in Gensokyo.

Please teach me your family's martial arts! Teach me how to use those needles of yours!-suddenly asked a voice behind her.

Reimu turned and found herself staring back a girl with black hair, parted in the middle, into two buns on either side of her head and the rest hanging down.

Your name was Meiling, right kid?

Yes!

You're chinese?

Yes!

You're a normal person that loves martial arts that don't involve inner magic ability and wants to use them to guard something very important to you without actually expecting any significant reward in the future?

H-How did you know that?

I'm good at hunches. But you already looked pretty good at martial arts tonight.

I'm not good enough! I wanted to help and ended squirming on the ground right after starting to fight!

You hit one of my barriers with your bare hands and were still standing. That alone is reason for pride in your martial ability, Meiling.

...What?

My borders are both offense and defense. Anybody but me touching them directly will be inflicted with great disabling pain. But you not only resisted it, you also managed to make it budge a bit. I only remember one other person who could do so. She may make a good teacher for you. Not me however, you're asking the wrong person. I kinda fight on instinct. Not something I can easily pass to another...

I'll pay you!-Meiling pulled a large stack of bills, each with multiple zeros, from her blouse. Her allowance from the Li family for the week, a last desesperate gamble. Even if Reimu looked like a piss-poor person, there was no guarantee whatsoever she would sell off her clan's secrets for material gain.

The shrine maiden's eyes flashed at the sight of so much money. She wouldn't need to plunder for food and drink for quite some time with that, in this world or the other. Sure, they usually used old coins in Gensokyo, but Korindou was always willing to trade in other forms of currency.

So, when do we start?-asked Reimu, picking the bills from Meiling's hand.

Now. The night's still young. There's a training room at the end of this hall. Go grab your clothes from Tomoyo and meet me there.