Hello again, readers. Today I begin my translation of the ninth book of Asakihara Shinobu's こちら秘封探偵事務所 or 'This is the Hifuu Detective Agency.' This story, like the rest of the series was first published at longnovel dot com /touhou and can still be read there in the original Japanese and accompanied with a series of illustrations. The site also contains links to videos, music, merchandise, character profiles and more related to this story and the circle's other stories. I encourage you to check it out.

This book contains the story of Touhou Seirensen ~ Undefined Fantastic Object. There's little in the way of objectionable content this time around, but we're going to touching on two topics that may not be common knowledge for most western Touhou fans - PC-98 era Touhou lore and Buddhism.

I'm not particularly well versed on either of those topics myself, so I wouldn't be surprised if I missed a reference here or there. I'll give a brief overview of the relevant materials for those who don't want to go browsing wikis on their own below. In both cases, this is only the most cursory possible examination, but it should give you what you need to understand the events in the story. I encourage you to go wiki-diving for more if you're interested.

First off, the PC-98 Touhou era. In particular, we're going to be seeing a lot of references to the events of Mystic Square here, a traditional Touhou vertical danmaku shmup that revolves around four playable protagonists setting out to the world of Makai to investigate why demons are pouring out of that world and into Gensokyo. In the end, the answer appears to be 'tourism.' Makai had been letting demons come to visit without thinking that maybe they should have told someone about that first. Your player character (your choice of Reimu, Marisa, Yuuka or Mima) confronts the so-called god of Makai, a six-winged demon named Shinki who claims to have created everything and everyone in Makai, and bullies her into submission. In so doing, they manage to set an entire city ablaze. Spell Card rules were an invention of the Windows era of Touhou, but the storylines and interactions of the PC-98 era were generally more silly and lighthearted, so fans are divided on just big of a deal this was. Depending on your interpretation, Reimu and Marisa might well be silly girls who had a flashy magic battle and yelling match above a town square, or teenage war criminals with a body count in the thousands. The ambiguity is part of what makes Touhou Touhou.

Next onto Buddhism. I am not a Buddhist, nor am I a religious scholar. If I am getting any key details of the following overview incorrect, I welcome corrections from anyone more knowledgeable on the topic. This is, of course, WAY too broad a topic to be covered here, but the very, very, VERY surface level bits you need to know of are this: Buddhism consists of the teachings of the Buddha, which are collectively known as the Dharma and constitute a religion that focuses on the goal of teaching people the way to avoid suffering or Dukkha. The path to achieve this, according to the Dharma, is neither through strict asceticism nor wanton hedonism, but instead a mindful life of moderation infused with the understanding of one's place and duty in the world combined with a conscious effort to avoid becoming too attached to worldly things and ways of being. Buddhism holds that souls are reincarnated after death in a cycle called Samsara, and that the ultimate goal of a life well-lived should be to refine one's soul in pursuit of enlightenment or Nirvana which would ultimately lead to an escape from this cycle.

Exactly HOW one is supposed to escape Samsara and achieve Nirvana is a topic of much debate that has lead to most of the schisms responsible for creating different sects within Buddhism. Myouren temple, which this story revolves around, is a temple of the Shingon sect, which is a very old form of Japanese Buddhism, closely related to Indian Buddhist practices that were later outlawed and exterminated in China. Shingon Buddhism is a particularly esoteric style of Buddhism, and holds as one of it's main beliefs the idea that Nirvana can be achieved in a single lifetime, rather than being a project of countless reincarnations as many other Buddhist sects believe. According to Shingon, this quicker route to enlightenment can be achieved though the practice of Tantra, a series of rituals and meditative practices which invoke various divine beings such as Devas and Wisdom Kings to assist the practitioner in realizing the truths of existence. Many of these ritual practices are secrets shared only with the initiated, making Shingon something like a mystery religion.

Of particular interest to this story are two specific classes of divine entities within Shingon. The first are Devas, many of which are syncretic with the concept of kami and revered as such in Japan. These are gods or divine spirits who assist Buddhists in their daily lives in hope of shepherding them toward their own self-enlightenment. Myouren temple in particular is devoted to one of these Devas, Lord Bishamonten, a deity seen both as a fearsome protector figure and as a benevolent and philanthropic god of fortune. Devas in general are the same class of divine beings that includes beings like the Yama -servants of the heavenly bureaucracy with specific but wide-ranging roles to play. Three steps above Devas in the divine hierarchy are Bodhisattvas. These are beings, often humans, and usually still living humans, which are variously seen as either Buddhas-in-training or beings who could become Buddhas and achieve Nirvana, but have chosen not to so that they may remain and help others to reach their level first. The specific nature of their path and proximity to Buddhahood is a detail that varies from sect to sect. Byakuren Hijiri's disciples see her as being a being of this sort - worthy of enlightenment, transcendent of mortality, but voluntarily deferring her eternal reward until such time as all humanity (and all youkai, in her case) have achieved enlightenment. The idea of a Bodhisattva is similar to the Christian concept of a saint, in that it's someone who can receive your prayers and intercede with the divine on your behalf, but different in that Bodhisatvas are not redemptive in and of themselves, but more like teachers, capable of imparting the knowledge through which an individual can achieve their own redemption. Despite the nuances and various interpretations wrapped up in the concept of a Bodhisattva, the words are often translated interchangeably. As such, various characters will refer to Hijiri as 'Saint Byakuren' in this story.

With that information laid out, I will now step back and let the narrator guide you through the rest of our tale. I thank you for reading, and I hope that you enjoy the story to come.