Arm is still healing (broken during a Judo comp) and I am still moving out of my apartment, but the chapter is done, so I won't let it wait. Don't worry, though, the song will drop January 7th.

Chapter 4 - 悪魔廃墟ソノラ

"That listless face of yours seems well practiced," Kiteiki said as the two took a break, during one of their training sessions.

"Perhaps all this training is boring you?"

"Well, I guess that's one way of putting it," Yoshimi said. "We've been following this routine for weeks now, and I appreciate what you're trying to do… But is this it? Work out, meditate, eat, sleep, and repeat until we die and hope we end up in Gensokyo in the next life?"

"That is one method," Kiteiki said, a little amused. "But it is not what we are aiming for, no."

"Then what's next?"

"Without realizing it you have gained strength. Mostly raw physical strength, but also the beginnings of mental and spiritual fortitude. The next step is refining that, and just as a sword needs a whetstone to be sharpened, you too will need a tool to turn the potential you've accumulated into the magic that will let you come to Gensokyo."

"Ooh, and what is this tool?"

"I do not know what it is, but I do know where it is. At the site where seven wise men will die lies the ruins of a place once known as Sonora, a place I once called home."

Sonora was once a community of aspiring magicians who originated from the Outside World. They too found that they could not consciously enter Gensokyo, so they stayed in Sosatsukyo. Slowly over time, doubt in the ability to achieve their goal took the hearts of these people, and as such they left the place, one by one. Kiteiki saw off the final member, the leader of Sonora, herself. According to her, they could only mutter the words 'I do believe' over and over as they left this place, hobbling away dejectedly.

Of course, at this point all that was left was the dilapidated remains of where these magicians had once lived. The varied architecture of each building now lay in diverse piles of debris, the articles that once gave hint to the multitude identities that once lived here now but refuse. In all, it was a dreary place, and Yoshimi felt the off nature of it before she had even laid eyes on it.

It hadn't occurred to Yoshimi before that there might have been even more people like her, beyond just Kiteiki. And given the state of things, how long exactly had Kiteiki even been here? Surely if she has had all this time, she would just be in Gensokyo already?

As these thoughts raced through her mind Yoshimi began to lose focus on her actual task of searching for anything useful. Eventually she mindlessly wandered into an unassuming stone building, its interior obscured in shadow, save for one spot in its center which pulled Yoshimi's attention. Reflected in a shallow puddle of still rainwater was a stone lectern with a simple looking red book. At this point it was clear even to Yoshimi that she had not just found this spot by accident. Everything in her head told her something wasn't right, but in her heart she knew that this was what she was looking for.

She walked up to the lectern, and opened the book. In it were written the same words over and over: I do believe.

"Huh," Yoshimi said aloud, relieving her tension, "I guess Kiteiki wasn't kidding about what happened here. But what even is this book?"

"You opened that book without even knowing what it is?"

Startled, Yoshimi looked to the source of the second voice. Leaning against the frame of the entrance was a girl. It was her horns that Yoshimi noticed first. They were curled, like a ram's horns, perched on her head with her red hair that matched her red dress. She was the perfect image of a devil, in Yoshimi's mind.

"W-well," Yoshimi stammered out, "how else am I supposed to know what is?"

"Hmm," she approached Yoshimi, who shrunk back. "You don't sound brave, so I guess you're just stupid."

"Hey! That's not true!"

"That you're here at all means you're here for something. That you don't even realize what you have in your hands means you must be stupid."

"... Just who are you anyway!?"

"I," she said with a sort of twisted grin, "am the shadow of doubt cast upon the self, the disbelief that weighs the heart. I have had many names, and will have many more."

"Ah great, someone else who talks in cryptic metaphors. Maybe once I return to Gensokyo I'll be a poet of some sort."

The red girl laughed uncomfortably loudly for Yoshimi.

"You think you really believe that?" she said. "Look around you! Isn't this enough? All these people just like you, so-called believers, where are they now? What hope do you really have, other than the lies you tell?"

"I'm no liar," Yoshimi said, making her way to the exit. "And I don't have to prove that to you."

"You'll have to prove it to someone eventually."

Yoshimi left the stone building, the strange girl, and Sonora behind her, holding the red book in her arms.

When Yoshimi returned to Kiteiki, it was already twilight, and Kiteiki had started a fire for tea.

"So," Kiteiki said as Yoshimi sat down next to her, "how did it go?"

"To be entirely honest, I don't know what I found. Or what found me, anyway."

"Something found you? Interesting."

Yoshimi took a cup of tea that Kiteiki made for her, exchanging it for the red book.

"What was Sonora, really?" Yoshimi said.

"You saw it yourself. That ought to be enough, right?" Kiteiki opened the book and chuckled a bit.

"That's not what I meant. What was Sonora to you?"

Kiteiki hadn't expected a question like that, and found herself paused in thought.

"Sonora was," she said, "a dream of sorts. It was the dream of a civilization of magic, and we dreamt it in real time."

"Did you believe in it?"

"At the time, yes. Of course, it was only a dream, so I had to stop believing in it eventually."

"Wait, if you don't believe in it any more, how come you didn't leave?"

"There is a great deal of difference in the belief I had in Sonora, and my faith in Gensokyo. Everyone that was there -and I mean absolutely everyone- believed in Sonora, but few even had the capacity for the faith required to protect them from self doubt, including myself. This is a result of the world we come from. People who have been utterly demoralized have little chance of recovery by themselves, so Sonora's fate was sealed long before even I was here."

"Hmm…"

Yoshimi began to slip into deep thought, but was interrupted by the sound of tearing paper. Sure enough, Kiteiki had torn a small section from the red book, and was soon leaving her hand for the fire.

"Why'd you do that!?" Yoshimi said.

"A book is a tool that brings the thoughts of its author into some form of reality. It is the most direct means for performing Sosatsu. The words were a fiction given form, and the fiction was made to deflect from fundamental truth."

Kiteiki stood up, and extended her hand and the book to Yoshimi.

"However," Kiteiki continued, "it is not fate that all things written be as such. You have something that none of the people of Sonora had: the wisdom that comes with hindsight. As such, this book is now yours, your tool that will bring you to Gensokyo."