Chapter 3
Face of the Lake's Demon
"A dangerous demon living in Fishermen's Lake?" Reimu curiously said after hearing what Keine told her.
Keine nodded and then said, "Yes… Three people went missing after going there since yesterday, and then there were reports of what was believed to be a larger than usual fish in that lake. The Daishi Brothers, who are the best fishermen in the village, went there to catch that fish. When someone went there later, he found pieces of their boat floating on the water, and there were no signs of those three, too…"
"So… you're basically saying that all those people were killed by this… fish demon, and you want me to go and exterminate it, right?" Reimu asked.
"Why else do you think I came to you? After all, exterminating demons is one of your jobs," Keine said. "However, considering that the culprit resides underwater, I was wondering if this would be tougher than usual for you to handle…"
"Won't know until I try…" Reimu told her. "I was hoping to spend the winter peacefully… It's hard to get worked up when there is snow out there… Anyway, I'll go and take a look at things in a short while. In the meantime, tell people not to go to that lake."
"I'm glad that you're willing to help!" Keine said. "I'll do what you say and tell everyone to refrain from going there."
Back at the Myouren Temple, Minamitsu told everyone else about what she witnessed at the lake. "But I didn't see anything underwater at all… There was nothing that was the same size as the one that devoured that man and the bug…" said Minamitsu, concluding her report.
The others had their mouths wide open after hearing everything Minamitsu said. "Such a demon resides in that lake…?" Byakuren said. "I never knew that…"
"I've never heard of a demon like that residing in Fisherman's Lake…" Shou said. "Humans go there often to catch fish, so if what you said is true, then reports of that demon should've existed long ago…"
"Maybe that demon only reached maturity recently and thus decided to make itself known now?" Nazrin said.
"Should we do something about this, Mistress Hijiri?" Minamitsu asked Byakuren. "Letting such a dangerous demon like that living in that lake… Lots of lives are going to be lost if more people go there…"
"You're right… We cannot allow that demon to do as it pleases," Byakuren said. "I'm sure the Hakurei shrine maiden must've heard about this already, so she will surely do something about it. Even so, I believe we should do something about this as well. We wish to strengthen the bond between humans and demons, and letting a demon like that on the loose can worsen such a bond. Since none of us here are humans, I believe we can strengthen the bond even more if we contribute to the fall of that dangerous demon. Of course, if it possible to reason with that demon and learn why it does that, we can try to convince it to stop eating humans and seek a better diet!"
Everyone gave her a weird look after hearing the last phrase, and Ichirin eventually broke the silence. "If only things can be that easy…"
Like she said she would, Reimu arrived at Fishermen's Lake, despite not feeling in the mood to go outside and do things. Standing at the edge of the lake, she looked around the surface to find whatever was peculiar, and the only thing that could be considered like that were the pieces of the boat used by the Daishi Bros.
She then walked alongside the edge of the lake, continuing to scan for other peculiar things, not to mention hoping to see the "fish demon" swimming close to the surface. After walking for a bit, she stopped and placed her hand underneath her chin. "How am I going to deal with something that lives underwater and refuses to show itself?" she said in her head. "It's not like I can hold my breath and go down there to look for it… Plus, my amulets won't be of use when underwater. At least they can't be thrown around like when in the air…"
Thinking that flying to the center of the lake was a better idea if she wanted to make more progress in finding something, Reimu did just that. Once in the air above the center of the lake, she looked down to once again to scan for anything big underwater.
While she was doing so, she heard someone calling out to her, so she turned to the side and saw Minamitsu flying over to her. "What are you doing?" the ship ghost asked her.
"I'd ask you the same thing…" Reimu said to her. "I thought I told Keine to tell everyone in the village not to come here."
"My temple isn't situated in the village, you know…" Minamitsu reminded her. "Anyway, I'm here to look for a… demon of some kind. I assume that you heard about it and thus came here to see if you can do anything about it?"
"So you know about this fish demon too?" Reimu asked her. "Yeah, Keine came and told me about it. Apparently, everyone in the village was scared after hearing that the best fishermen there were supposedly killed by it…"
"I know that at least one of them was devoured by it…" Minamitsu told her. "I saw it with my own eyes when I was here…"
Surprised, Reimu asked her, "You were here when you saw it?!"
"Yes," Minamitsu replied with a nod. "You see… We were… Um… Chasing a dangerous insect demon in order to keep it from causing harm to people… I found it attacking a fisherman here, but when I was going to do something about it, that demon in the water jumped out and swallowed them both…"
"Hold on a second… An insect demon?" Reimu asked.
"They do exist, you know…" Minamitsu told her, not wanting to reveal the truth about where that dragonfly-like creature came from. The shrine maiden nodded when she remembered that insect demons do exist, so she stopped thinking about it. "Anyway, I went back and told the others about it, and Mistress Hijiri thinks that this demon living in the water is too dangerous for its own good and that something should be done about it. Since I'm the only one in the group who can travel around freely and breathe under water, I volunteered to look into this." Then she pointed to the side.
Reimu looked at where she was pointing at and saw that the rest of the residents of the Myouren Temple except Kyouko were standing at the edge of the lake. "So they're all standing by for the demon's app…" Before she could finish speaking, a dark blue tentacle shot out of the water and caught her left leg. "What the?!"
The tentacle quickly pulled her towards the water, but the shrine maiden flew up with all her strength to prevent that from happening. Seeing this, Minamitsu quickly flew at the tentacle and swung her anchor at it as hard as she could to make it let go of Reimu.
"Thanks…" Reimu said while breathing heavily and recovering from the shock of being caught.
"It must be that demon!" Minamitsu said. "I didn't see tentacles when it devoured that fisherman and the insect demon, however. In fact, I didn't even see the demon in its entirety…"
"How am I supposed to deal with something that is in somewhere I can't get to?!" Reimu asked in frustration.
"I'll go underwater to check it out," Minamitsu said. "Since I'm a ghost and have an intangible body, I have no fear of being attacked by it." After saying that, she dived underwater.
At the edge, the residents of the temple saw what happened just now. "There goes Minamitsu…" Byakuren said. "Let's hope she'll be all right…"
"She'll definitely be all right," Shou assured her. "After all, she's a ghost, so she can't die a second time."
"We'll have to be ready for that demon's reappearance," Byakuren told her followers. "When it shows up again, we'll head over to it and give it all we've got!"
"Yes, Mistress Hijiri!" said Shou, Nue, and Ichirin.
Underwater, Minamitsu looked in all directions for where the demon was, but there was nothing at all. "It's just like that time…" she said to herself. "It's nowhere in sight at all!"
While still looking around, a gaping mouth lined with massive, sharp teeth appeared behind her. The ship ghost felt the presence of something behind her, so when she turned around and found herself looking into the mouth, she quickly moved back just before the mouth closed with her inside it. When the mouth closed, it disappeared.
"It… It disappeared?!" she said in her head.
Suddenly, the gaping mouth reappeared in front of her. The ship ghost quickly swam to the side before it closed down on her again and then quickly turned to see the demon, but before she could get a clear look at it, it disappeared the moment the mouth closed. "It disappeared again?! Does it have the ability to turn invisible?!"
Suddenly, she felt something grabbing her leg and was then pulled forward. "Whoa!" The gaping mouth appeared for the third time, and at the same time, she could see her leg being caught and pulled towards it by a tentacle. Acting quick, Minamitsu turned herself into water to slip away from the tentacle's grasp before she was thrown into the mouth. Like before, the demon disappeared when the mouth closed.
Minamitsu quickly flew back out of the water and met with Reimu. "What happened down there?" Reimu asked her. "I kept on seeing something big appearing and then disappearing shortly afterwards!"
"Looks like that demon is capable of turning invisible…" Minamitsu said. "I almost got eaten by it thrice…"
"Turn invisible? Great… As if living out of my reach isn't bad enough…" Reimu grumbled.
All of a sudden, a large gush of water shot out from the surface and hit the girls, dousing them and pushing them higher up into the air. "HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT!" Reimu screamed as she got pushed up. When the gush of water disappeared, the girls fell back down and eventually came to a stop. Their bodies were reddish and in pain all over. "What was that hot water just now?!"
Another gush of water was fired at them, but they managed to avoid it this time. Drops of water rained back down on them, and though they were small, their boiling temperature was more than enough to make the girls cry in pain.
"Is this the demon's doing?!" Minamitsu asked.
"Ugh… My whole body is in pain… Ow…" Reimu cried. "Even during a cold weather, this temperature is way too much!"
Yet another gush of water was fired, this time in a diagonal trajectory. The girls got out of its way, and then Minamitsu turned to the direction the water was fired to see that it was heading in the temple residents' direction. "EVERYONE! WATCH OUT!" she shouted at them.
Seeing the water falling towards them, Byakuren and her followers quickly flew into the air to avoid it. When the water hit the snow on the ground, the latter immediately melted and filled the place with steam. "Whoa! That water must be really hot!" Nue commented.
"Good thing we didn't get hit by it…" Mamizou said. "It looks like it can boil meat!"
Minamitsu and Reimu flew to where they were, and the former asked, "Is everyone all right?"
"Everyone is all right. What about the both of you?" Byakuren asked them.
"Scorched all over by hot water…" Reimu replied.
"There's something approaching us!" said Nazrin, pointing at a massive figure that could be seen moving towards the land from underwater. Everyone turned to look at what she was pointing at, and then the massive figure stopped and sank underwater a bit. Shortly after that, a massive gush of water was shot in their direction, but they dodged it. Like before, the snow melted when the water fell on it.
"What is this demon?!" Shou asked.
"I don't know, but we're about to find out!" Byakuren said. "It may be underwater, but we can still fire projectiles into it to hurt it! Shou! Use your pagoda against it!"
"As you say, Mistress Hijiri!" Shou said as she took out her miniature pagoda. The pagoda glowed brightly for a few seconds, and then a rather large beam was fired into the water and struck the demon that was down there. Sparks could be seen flying out from the creature when the beam came in contact with it, and it seemed to shook in pain as well.
"It appears to be working!" Byakuren said. "Fire again, Shou!"
"The pagoda cannot fire a beam that size for another thirty seconds, but I'll fire smaller ones in a large quantity at it instead!" Shou said. She was going to fire, but then they saw the demon turning around and swimming away.
"It's getting away! After it!" Byakuren said, and she went after it with her followers.
"Wait! Don't be so reckless!" Reimu called out to them.
The temple residents followed the demon to the center of the lake, where it dived deeper into the lake until it was no longer visible. Looking at the spot where the demon "disappeared", Byakuren told Nazrin to try to catch it with her pendulum.
"Are you kidding me?! Something the size of that is going to pull me down right away if I catch it!" the mouse demon told her.
"Don't worry; I'll help you pull it up using my strength-enhancing magic!" Byakuren told her as she took out her scroll used for the purpose she mentioned.
"You better be sure that it's a good idea…" Nazrin said before taking out a crystal pendulum. She was about to throw it into the water when they all noticed something coming to the surface.
With its mouth wide open, the demon leaped out of the water in an attempt to catch all of the temple residents with it, but they all got out of the way in time. When they turned to see the creature, it fell back into the water before they could get a clear look at it. The only thing they saw clearly was a fish tail.
"Nazrin! Now!" Byakuren shouted at the mouse demon, and the latter quickly threw her pendulum that was attached to a chain at where the demon fell into. Shortly after the pendulum went underwater, it caught something, which resulted in Nazrin being pulled downwards. Byakuren quickly rushed over to the chain, caught it, and pulled it with all her might. "Everyone! Fire at it!"
"Yes!" everyone else except for Nazrin and Minamitsu shouted. Shou used her pagoda to fire several laser beams that moved in curvy paths, Ichirin swung both her rings multiples times to fire several energy rings, Unzan attacked with a pair of eye beams, Nue fired several beams from the tip of her wings, and Mamizou created and sent forth frogs made of blue energy lines.
While the demon was getting hit, the chain that Nazrin and Byakuren were holding onto kept on moving, as the demon was struggling to break free from it.
"I'll go down there to deal with it!" Minamitsu said to her superior before flying headfirst into the water.
When she turned to look at the demon down there, she didn't see anything at all, but she did see the projectiles hitting something invisible. Also, Nazrin's pendulum could be seen binding the part that was likely its tail. "Looks like this creature really can turn invisible!" she thought. "But with a size like this, hitting it shouldn't be a problem!"
Raising her anchor over her head, the ship ghost shouted, "Capsize: Sinking Anchor!" Then she threw it with all her might at the invisible demon. When the demon was hit, it opened its mouth to let out a cry of pain, and it was at this moment did it become visible, long enough for Minamitsu to get a clear look at what it looked like.
It was a monstrous-looking fish without visible eyes. A pair of bull-like horns pointing forward was growing out of its head, and there were five pairs of spikes curving inwards lined alongside the dorsal fin. Its pectoral fins were large and somewhat resembled hands. Perhaps the most bizarre thing about it was that it had four pairs of tentacles longer than itself arranged next to each other on both sides of its body.
"What… What kind of demon is this?!" the ship ghost said in shock.
TO BE CONTINUED
A picture of the "fish demon" has been posted on my Twitter account, so please head over there via my profile to see how it looks like and how big it is.