Chapter 4: Lilith
After all her hard work, and over 120 years of gradually stockpiling souls (her earliest specimens predating even the Hakurei Border), Lilith found herself with nothing. The poltergeist had seen to that much. She would never be able to show her face in Gensokyo again. Reimu and the others would want to see her killed for her betrayal. If she even lived that long. Rumia knew where she had been living for the last century, and Lilith feared that the bitch could return at any time. She vacated her previous home, at least, in favor of a much deeper cavern hidden away far beneath Youkai Mountain. In truth, she was now closer to the Ancient City beneath the Earth than she was to Gensokyo. She had done her best to ward this new hideaway with the most powerful spells she could manage, in a desperate attempt to conceal herself from Rumia's sight. It made her feel like a rat, scurrying deeper into the dark to avoid being stepped on.
Her new situation was almost worse than simply being dead. At least then she wouldn't have to live with the knowledge of how stupid and arrogant she'd been, and how much it had cost her. And the absolute embarrassment of it all, that was the worst part. Yet, was pride not her very inclination? Lilith supposed she had Evelyn to blame for that much. She would always have that. After calling Rumia the imitation, nothing more than a fake, it was pitifully ironic that Lilith was the actual fake, while Rumia truly was Garnet Ferre reborn, as The Voidborn had said.
"No more than a cheap reproduction of the great Evelyn Maestra," Lilith said to herself, as she sat alone in her room. "She's long dead, and I've still never stepped out of that woman's shadow. Not even after all these years."
She'd demanded solitude from her 'siblings', the only living allies she still had or would ever have. They didn't need to see their great, magnanimous older sister in such a sorry state of self-pity; their respect and fear of her was about all she had left, after all, and she was prepared to cling to that.
Lilith's attention fell toward the glass orb, now empty, which had once contained all of the souls she'd amassed over the many decades since Evelyn's death. The only ones left to her now were the dozen or so that she always carried on-hand. These were so old that their former owners were all long dead and forgotten. In a fit of rage, Lilith swatted the orb to the ground, where it shattered to a thousand pieces with a crash that echoed through the twisting corridors of her new home.
How could I have been so stupid!? Lilith thought to herself. Her own voice reverberated through her mind in an almost painful way. I never would have entrusted everything to Alan and Melony by themselves! Why wouldn't I have taken the souls with me to Makai!? Lilith knew the answer to that already, without even having to think about it. The Voidborn saw fit to mock her efforts, because otherwise, the results would have been the same. Even in the altered history that The Voidborn had created, if she had taken her stockpile of souls to Makai, Rumia would have cloaked the world in darkness just as she had done in the original version of events. The Voidborn would have entered the physical world, just as before, and she would have lost. The Voidborn had told the truth. There was no outcome that would have resulted in Lilith's victory over Rumia.
Her memories, those of the altered history, told a different story altogether. In her mind, things had seemingly gone exactly as she'd hoped; with Reimu and her allies victorious over Rumia. Lilith had gotten cocky, and had gone to Makai alone. She had not taken her entire collection of souls, she did not think she would need them (a lie no doubt put into her mind by The Voidborn), and she had left Alan and Melony to keep watch over them while she clinched her victory by taking Rumia's soul for herself. And yet, all of it had been a deception. And she had fallen for it.
Lilith would now have to live with the memory of not just one loss at Rumia's hands, but two.
- o - o - o - o - o - o - o - o - o - o -
"I would hardly call it thievery, Rumia, when the humans were never yours to take," Lilith replied to the darkness youkai, who was now held at the mercy of the maid and the green-haired child. Lilith's eyes took a quick survey of Makai's throne room, taking note of all those present, and those that were absent. She was pleased to see that quite a few of them looked as though they could collapse at any second. Rumia's soul alone would be sufficient to deal with any of those that tried to resist.
Lilith had been pleasantly surprised to learn that Rumia's dark barrier in front of Makai's entrance had fallen that day. She hadn't counted on being able to enter Makai at all, to be able to claim the spoils of whichever side claimed victory. The souls of the losers (either side would have made a great prize) would have otherwise been out of her reach, locked away in Makai and out of Lilith's hands for good. She was not about to miss out on the opportunity of a lifetime, especially since it was Rumia who had become the loser of this battle.
Lilith smiled sweetly at the warriors of Gensokyo, and she began to approach them slowly. "I'm pleased to see that the majority of you are unharmed. But weren't there supposed to be two more with you?" Lilith asked, but she wasn't truly interested in their answer. Whether they were here or not made little difference.
"You mean Sanae and Youmu?" Marisa asked. Lilith noted that she was the only thing holding the doll-maker, Alice, upright at this point. That was good as well. She wouldn't be of much use in a fight if she had to hold her friend steady the whole time. "They're down on one of the lower levels, fightin' it out with Kana. I gotta say, I was hopin' it'd be them walkin' through those doors. But I'm at least glad it was you and not Kana."
"I bet you are, you stupid whore," Rumia grunted out at Marisa. This earned Rumia another punch to the gut by Miasma. "Will you fucking stop that!?"
"Keep your mouth shut, Rumia. You're lucky I don't snap your head off for what you did to my mom," Miasma said. How amusing it would have been to watch Miasma beat the woman to death. It would be a fitting end to such a troublesome creature.
"What brought you all the way to Makai, Lilith?" Sakuya asked, her knife still pressed to Rumia's neck.
"Well, I arrived at the shrine not long ago, hoping to wish you all luck in your endeavor, but you had already departed," Lilith said, smiling as she did. "It seems that it was not necessary, as I see you've already defeated Rumia. But when I found that the barrier at Makai's entrance had fallen, I just had to check for myself what became of you all."
"You came to gloat, that's all," Rumia spoke again, but Miasma did not silence her this time. "Because you think you won, is that it? The one thing standing in your way, me that is, has been defeated. And now you've won, and you're free to go about your schemes."
"What are you ranting on about now, Rumia?" Alice fixed the evil youkai with a glare, which was only met by a smug sneer from Rumia. Alice turned her eyes toward Lilith, faintly curious by Rumia's words, but not distrustful.
"I haven't the faintest clue what the woman is referring to. I can only assume that she's angry that my actions to defend the humans of the village were what drew her into this losing confrontation," Lilith's smile never faltered. Rumia was in a losing position, and she would say anything to throw attention away from herself. But with no proof, and with no way to obtain it, who would believe the words of a soon to be dead murderer? "What do you say we finish Rumia off, and put an end to this nasty business?"
It seemed that everyone was in agreement with Lilith's words. Her victory was all but assured at that very moment; and yet a single sentence was enough to wipe the smile from Lilith's lips. "I want to hear what Rumia has to say for herself."
It was Reimu who had spoken up, Lilith realized. Her muscles twitched ever so slightly, as though the words had stung her like an insect's bite. She turned to face the shrine maiden, and was faced with a sullen glare from the young woman's eyes. This wasn't, Lilith realized, a gaze that had been meant for Rumia, either. Lilith donned her smile once again, and bowed slightly at the shrine maiden, to implore her cooperation. "Surely, Miss Hakurei, you cannot seriously wish to give any consideration to Rumia's final protests? I can't imagine she'll have anything of value to say, unless you desire for her to insult you and your friends even more than she already has."
"Come on Reimu, Lilith's right," Marisa said, but Lilith could tell that she had begun to sound uncertain. "What if Kana comes back, and she manages to free Rumia while we're all just standing here?"
"If she isn't going to tell us where my mother is hidden, then good riddance to her," Alice finished. Oh how Lilith could only hope that Reimu would listen to her friend's advice.
"Kana isn't going to show up. Not until Rumia tells her to, isn't that right?" Rumia's grin widened, revealing her jagged rows of blood-stained teeth. Reimu, likewise, smirked in return. "I thought it seemed odd that Rumia would allow Kana to stay behind all this time, when she could have easily abandoned Sanae and Youmu deep within Pandaemonium somewhere. When she lost, she seemed like she knew that you would show up, Lilith. Why would she know something like that?"
"I... what could you possibly be trying to accuse me of, Reimu?" Lilith took a step away from the young shrine maiden. Her voice faltered as she spoke, and she cursed Reimu in her mind.
"I never said I was accusing you of anything, Lilith. But now I think you are hiding something." Reimu mercifully cast her eyes away from Lilith (that young woman's intuition was almost frightening to see in them), and instead fell back upon Rumia. "Say what you want to say, Rumia."
"It would be easier without a knife to my fucking neck," Rumia spat out to Sakuya, who made no move to remove the blade. "Lilith has been lying to you all this whole time. She's been living in Gensokyo for years already, harvesting souls for her own gain. She wants to become a god she says." Rumia laughed at this, seemingly finding it to be a pitiful notion.
"You can't be believing a word that this woman says, Reimu," Lilith said, interrupting Rumia before she could continue, though she found herself addressing not just Reimu, but everyone in the room. She could sense the doubt that had wormed its way into their minds, and could feel their accusing stares. "Rumia only wants to divert attention away from herself so that you'll let your guards down, so she can escape."
"I'm not going anywhere. I know I've lost. Slit my throat now, for all I care! You'll be following close behind me to Hell, Lilith, I just know it." Rumia began to laugh, uncaring that Sakuya's knife still pressed against her vulnerable neck, drawing a thin line of blood across its length. "You were just so stupid Lilith, I could hardly believe it."
"I will not be insulted by the likes of you!" Lilith no longer cared what Reimu or her companions thought now. With Rumia dead, finishing the rest off would be child's play. Lilith called upon one of the several souls she always carried on her person to her hand, immediately modifying it into the shape of a long spear. She would finish Rumia herself if the others wouldn't do it.
"Now, Kana!" Rumia shouted, just as the ethereal spear left Lilith's hand, flung through the air toward the dark youkai.
"Kana to the rescue~!" the poltergeist said, her voice echoing through the throne room. The crystalline floor rose up in the form of a thin wall, shielding Rumia from Lilith's spear. It clattered to the floor, before it reverted back to its amorphous natural state and drifted back to the succubus.
Sakuya, confused by this sudden turn of events, was unsure of how to proceed, and hesitated for but a moment. It was that hesitation that allowed for Kana to send one of her soul birds into Sakuya's knife, and wrench it from the maid's grip, freeing Rumia from any immediate danger. Miasma might have tried to finish the job in Sakuya's place, had Kana not emerged from the floor directly between the young half-doll and Rumia herself, acting as the woman's shield with her arms outstretched.
Lilith gritted her teeth in irritation, and began to call upon several more of the souls that she had on hand, before she was stopped by a direct address from Rumia. "You'll want to put those away, Lilith," the youkai said, and how Lilith despised that smugness in her voice, "unless you want to lose more than just that little stockpile of yours."
On Rumia's cue, two things both happened at once, each of which horrified Lilith to no end; and how much she hated those two just then, she would never be able to put into words. Conjured up from the darkness in Rumia's palm, sat the glass orb full of souls that Lilith had kept safe for all those years. Behind Rumia, Kana opened a portal from the Void. Out from it stepped the two that had been missing from Reimu's group, Sanae and Youmu, who were leading along Alan and Melony respectively. Melony, at least, struggled against Youmu's hold as best she could, but the sword that was held to her neck prevented her from making a real effort of it. Alan was merely being led along by Sanae, rather complacently as well, as if he'd given up without even a fight (and he probably had).
Reimu's group seemed to have been just as surprised about the arrival of their two remaining companions as they had about seeing Kana for the first time (no doubt thinking them dead, if Kana was still alive). As though to answer the question that had yet been unvoiced, Sanae spoke out on their behalf. "Almost immediately after the rest of you left, Kana just sort of... gave up. She explained everything about Lilith, saying that she wanted to let us kill Rumia, so she could wipe the rest of us out and steal our souls."
"Not that we believed a word of it," Youmu said next, "but before we could try and argue, she dragged us off through one of those Void portals into Lilith's home. This one here," Youmu indicated Melony, who once more struggled against the half-phantom girl's blade, "was guarding that glass orb Rumia has, and she tried to kill us the moment she saw us."
"Alan here confessed to everything the second we cornered him. It's all true." It was no wonder Alan had gone along so easily. All Sanae had done was probably just ask him nicely to come along.
"You worthless traitor!" Melony shouted, writhing with hatred in Youmu's grip. "You'd better hope they do kill me, because you don't want to find out what I'm going to do if I ever get my hands on your sorry ass again!"
A million thoughts raced through Lilith's mind at once. She needed to come up with something, anything she could do to salvage this situation. She hadn't survived for billions of years on nothing but luck. Her eyes fell upon the glass orb on Rumia's palm. It was close, maybe even close enough to take advantage of its contents without needing to have it in her grasp.
"Don't be getting any funny ideas, now," Rumia said, as the orb was once again lost to the darkness, whisked away to some unknown location. "You'll be getting that little glass ball of yours back, but it'll be considerably lighter. Maybe if you cooperate, you and your pathetic excuses of siblings might live to see another day."
All eyes were on Lilith. Although Sakuya and Miasma had not strayed far from Rumia, and still seemed ready to strike against her if given the chance, their attention was more closely fixed upon Lilith herself. Nothing she could say would convince them that Rumia was lying, or that Alan had made everything up. Lilith realized then what should have been obvious from the start: Rumia wanted Lilith to confront her in Makai. That was why she'd let the barrier down. She didn't care who reigned victorious in her battle against Reimu and her companions, because Kana would be her ace in the hole. If only she'd at least taken Alan and Melony with her to Makai, and the souls as well. Why hadn't she? Because Rumia had been right about another thing. She had wanted to gloat about her victory. Her own pride had been her downfall from the start, and she'd written Rumia off as nothing more than a deranged murderer.
Lilith realized she had no chance of escape (not without losing both Alan and Melony, and all of her collected souls), and no way of turning the tables on her enemies. She was outnumbered, and with no more than a couple dozen souls at her disposal; not enough to deal with that many opponents at one time. "... What do you want me to do, Rumia?" Lilith asked, as she finally admitted defeat to herself.
"Simple, really." Rumia licked her lips. "Return all of the souls you have in that orb of yours. Particularly the humans from the village, but I have no doubt that Reimu and her friends would be very grateful if you were to return the others as well."
Reimu narrowed her eyes and tucked a hand into one of her sleeves. Lilith could see the bases of several sealing charms clasped between the tips of her fingers. "What others is she talking about, Lilith?"
Lilith said nothing. It wouldn't have mattered. As bad as everything was, it was somehow worse just having to admit it all in such a vulnerable manner. It would have been different if she were revealing her plots during her moment of victory, to see the stunned looks on their faces when they realized how long Lilith's plan had been in motion for. To admit everything at Rumia's command would make her sick to her stomach.
"She's been hoarding souls since before the Hakurei Border was even created.~" Kana spoke in Lilith's place, when it became clear that she wasn't going to admit to her actions. "Most of them she stole every sixty years, during the sexagenary cycle years, when Gensokyo would become full of souls waiting to pass through Higan. She thought no one would notice if a few just happened to go missing. I think the Enma would probably be very eager to hear just what happened to them, and to see them finally returned.~"
"Is that right?" Reimu asked, though it was directed as more of an accusation toward Lilith, than as a question in response to Kana. "And is that all you've been hiding?"
"Not quite," Rumia said, and at that moment, conjured up several more objects from the darkness. This time, to the disgust of nearly everyone present, they were simply more corpses of the youkai's earlier victims. Rumia tossed these bodies to the floor, the corpses of the younger Yakumo shikigami, Chen, the winter spirit, Letty Whiterock, and the two autumn goddesses, Shizuha and Minoriko Aki. "Our good friend has been quite busy, snatching up my leftovers when I wasn't looking. Perhaps if you ask ever so nicely, just maybe she might be able to restore these pathetic things back to life."
Miasma flinched at that moment, and turned her eyes back to the body of her mother, which had been lying on the floor near Rumia's twisted throne since before Lilith arrived. "Does that... mean my mom's soul, too...? Lilith could bring her back?"
"I didn't touch your mother's soul, you stupid girl," Lilith replied, fully dropping her kind act. She realized at once that it had been a terrible way of saying it, when she saw the anger in Miasma's eyes. She had an idea of just what that girl might be capable of, if she were angry enough to retaliate. "What makes you think I'd go so far as to do all of that for you?"
"Because right now, it seems to be the only thing keeping us from letting you live," Reimu stated plainly. The shrine maiden turned back to Rumia, however, with a look of curiosity. "Why would you help us, Rumia? Why didn't you just have Kana help you kill us, and then deal with Lilith afterward?"
Rumia's blood-stained grin faded into an expression of utter disinterest. "You said it yourself, Reimu. It would've been boring if I didn't fight you myself. I went all out on you, with my strength at its peak, and I lost." Rumia followed this statement with little more than a shrug of her shoulders, and a quiet sigh. "You won, Reimu. My so-called rampage is over. Another incident solved, right?"
"J... just like that!?" Marisa gawked, utterly shocked. She couldn't tell if Rumia was being sarcastic (her tone certainly would've suggested so), or if she was actually sincere.
"And you think we're just going to forgive you for everything you've done!?" Miasma added on, speaking through clenched teeth.
"I don't care if you forgive me or not. Do I look like someone who gives a fuck about your forgiveness?" Rumia replied flatly. She placed a hand to her chest, the spot where her shattered rib had originally broken through the skin, and winced. "You might all be able to beat me on my own, when acting as group. But you wouldn't stand a chance if both of us decided to take you lot seriously." Miasma had nothing to say to this, because she knew Rumia was right. Or at least, even if they did defeat both Rumia and Kana, what would such a victory cost?
"It's not so simple to raise the dead," Lilith said, finally, now that an uneasy understanding had been established with Rumia. "I may have the souls of a few of Rumia's victims, yes. That does not mean I can undo everything that she has done."
"Oh... I'm sure you'll find a way." Rumia seemed to smile in a way that was a cruel mockery of Lilith's own. "Someone as crafty as you? Why, it shouldn't be a problem at all.~"
- o - o - o - o - o - o - o - o - o - o -
As Lilith reminisced over these events, ones that she knew had really only been put in place by The Voidborn (her grasp on the concepts of the Void and its workings was much better than the likes of Reimu or her friends), she wondered just how much of it had been complete absurdity. With all of her resources, Lilith didn't believe she could really revive a deceased goddess, such as the likes of the Aki sisters. Yet her memory suggested that she had done so. It struck Lilith that it had been merely an act of actual laziness on the part of The Voidborn, as an excuse to revive all those whose souls Lilith had taken in recent days.
Losing to Rumia had been bad enough, but it seemed that the forces of creation itself conspired against her. The Void itself saw fit to make a mockery of all her efforts. The Voidborn had rewritten history in a way that made Lilith sick with her own actions, ones her rational mind insisted that she never would have taken.
But Lilith was nothing if not resourceful. She could rebuild from the ground up. In truth, she doubted Rumia would keep to her word. If the opportunity to wipe Reimu, Rumia, Kana, and all of the others off the face of the Earth ever presented itself, she would be there to take it.
"Lilith," a voice called out tentatively from the doorway, clearly mindful of interrupting the solitude Lilith had ordered. "I've finished moving everything from our old home."
"It's about time, Melony," Lilith nearly snapped back, not even turning her head to meet her 'sister's' gaze. "Where's your brother?"
"I locked him up in one of the smaller caverns, somewhere," Melony said, with notable distaste in her voice. "The little traitor can rot in there for all I care. It's all his fault we're in this situation to begin with."
"Enough, Melony."
"He's outlived his usefulness anyway! If it were up to me, I would be wringing the little bastard's thr-"
A heavy-handed slap sent Melony crashing to the floor, cutting her off in mid-rant. Lilith had moved so quickly that Melony hadn't even noticed her get up from her chair. "It's as much your fault as it is his. You were the one who attacked those three the moment you saw them, without even trying to reason with them." Lilith stood over the younger succubus, and her stern expression send a tremble of fear through Melony. "Those two cohorts of Reimu's never would have believed a word Kana said if you hadn't attacked without provocation. There was no evidence that there was anything more than the souls of the human villagers in our possession. Alan wouldn't have said anything if he hadn't been backed into a corner because of your stupidity."
Melony didn't say a word. She merely clutched her hand to the reddening mark on her cheek. It would no doubt become a dark bruise by day's end. Lilith reached down and seized Melony's arm, pulling the girl back to her feet. "You're going out into Gensokyo on reconnaissance. I haven't given up just yet."
"They'll kill me if they see me, Lilith," Melony said. There was defiance in the girl's eyes. Melony had always been loyal, and it had been a long time since Lilith had last been forced to discipline her so harshly. "Or if they don't, they'll wait until I come back here and lead them to you."
"Then if someone sees you, you'd better hope they do kill you." Lilith's tone was almost devoid of emotion, and she donned that faux smile of hers once more, and flashed it at Melony. "Because I guarantee that death is preferable to what I will do to you if you fail me again. Now go." Melony was out of Lilith's sight in seconds, without another word.
History had been cruel to Lilith, a woman who often felt like no more than the shadow of her creator. For many centuries, she sought the power to change her fate; the power to become more than what she was. The new God of this universe. I'll show all of them that I'm more than just Evelyn's fake, Lilith thought to herself. Not even The Voidborn herself will be able to stop me.
If conviction could kill, Lilith's would have slain the world twice over.