A day in Gensokyo is shorter than the days we had been used to in the Scientific Century.
A day here begins when the sun rises and ends when it sets. Back in Kyoto, bathed in the glow of electric lights, the border between night and day was much weaker. Many businesses operated 24 hours a day and those that didn't were mostly the sort that operated only at night, seeing the darkness not as a sign that it was time to retire for the evening but as the opening of their workday. Here in Gensokyo, just as the lands outside of the village were the domain of youkai where humans tread only at their own risk, so to was the night the time of the youkai, when only the most powerful or eccentric humans would dare to be out and about.
It was of course, not unheard for the humans of Gensokyo to do their best to light up the night. The light of the magical moon glowed overhead on nights that it shone and villagers used oil lanterns, candles or, rarely, magical lamps and flames to illuminate the darkness. A few pubs and restaurants kept their doors open well into the night and the neighborhood watch patrolled the walls of the village with lanterns. Even if every light in Gensokyo were combined, however, they wouldn't have held a candle to the blinding illumination of Kyoto, which had been just one metropolis among hundreds in the Scientific Century. Back in that world, the night had been illuminated in both senses of that word: not only had the dark itself been pushed back from anywhere that humans lived or travelled, but even what dark remained held little mystery. The fear that humankind had once possessed of the vast sea of unknowns that blanketed the world every evening had been reduced to a predictable risk, a mere hazard to be negotiated. Darkness in the Scientific Century was something to be managed, mitigated and contained. Only children who had not yet learned the ways of the world feared it.
In other words, the advancement of scientific civilization in the time Renko and I had come from had operated toward the goal of prolonging the day, to the point where night was nearly non-existent. One ongoing, eternal now of commerce and industry, the sleepless and consumptive inheritance left to us by the great empires of yesteryear. Thinking back on that world from our perspective here in Gensokyo, it almost seems like the past two decades of my life had been lived as one continuous, restless day. One slept, in the Scientific Century, thinking of all of the things they had not yet done and all the things left for them to do tomorrow.
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I mention all of this to make just one point: It may seem like it has been a long time since I last wrote one of these records. Indeed, looking at the calendar I see that it had been two years since the last Incident, the Sixty Year Cycle Great Barrier Incident. You may ask how I could have let these records sit for this long without addendum. The answer to that question has two parts. The first is that days are short in Gensokyo, as I mentioned above, and the two years that had past us by since that incident sped by in a blur. The second is that is was an extremely peaceful two years, a period of calm and prosperity that seemed remarkable even to the people of this world, who commented that the gods must be pleased. After all the commotion of our first two years here, the next two passed without anyone trying to abscond with an abstract concept, fill the world with a new element, or perform any other such radically disruptive nonsense. Gensokyo's 119th year, which saw three separate Incidents over its course, seemed to be a major anomaly.
That is, of course, not to say that nothing happened at all in those two years. There were various small happenings, some of which even involved the Hifuu Detective Agency in that period, but they were brief excitements, unworthy of their own record. Perhaps someday I'll combine them into a collection. For now though, I would like to tell you about something bigger. I would like to relate the story of the events that took place in the autumn of Gensokyo's 122nd year.
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I should mention right off of the bat that this will not be the record of an Incident. This is the story of how a new power appeared in Gensokyo, and the impact that their presence had on the world. In some respects it is similar to the Night Parade of One Hundred Demons Every Three Days Incident or even the Eternal Night Incident in that this new power established their existence and declared their presence with a disruptive action that compelled the realm's Incident-resolvers to confront them, but unlike those Incidents, this time the newcomers did so merely by the consequence of their existence, not through any intentional action to either make waves or change the nature of the world.
So you may ask then, what exactly did these newcomers, the priestess and goddesses of the Moriya Shrine do to cause such disruption?
To put it simply, they invaded. Forcing their way into this world from the Outside, they made a place for themselves by laying claim to territory and defending their holdings. The first victim of this aggression was the Hakurei Shrine and its sole resident, Reimu Hakurei. This is the story of Gensokyo's first religious war, a contest for dominance between two shrines of the same animistic faith. Of course, this is also a story of the great detective, Renko Usami, and the secrets she uncovered.
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In the autumn of Gensokyo's 122nd year, a shrine and a lake appeared without warning atop of Youkai Mountain. With it came Sanae Kochiya, the priestess of the shrine and Kanako Yasaka and Suwako Moriya, the two goddesses enshrined there. In this record I will relate the story of how our Hifuu Detective Agency came to meet these women, to understand the mysteries surrounding them and to invent once more the sorts of delusions my partner has become known for concerning them.
Why did the Moriya Shrine abandon the Outside world and force its way into Gensokyo?
Just who is Sanae Kochiya, and what are the intentions of the gods she brought to this world?
And what is it they came to Gensokyo in search of?
Let us begin the sixth record of the Hifuu Detective Agency, and in so doing unravel the tale of the girl who works miracles, standing atop of Youkai Mountain as it was enrobed in the glory of autumn leaves.
