Chapter 5: Nature vs Fantasy

Reimu Hakurei P.O.V

Urk, can't I just sit and relax in my shrine in the morning without any interruption for once? However, knowing Gensokyo, I was half expecting youkai to be causing trouble in some way or another in my peaceful morning, but a human, much less an outsider, causing trouble? I wasn't expecting that in the slightest. Neither did I expect Aya, the obnoxious tengu reporter, to come and annoy me to answer her questions in the morning so that she can cover a news story.

If it wasn't for Aya coincidentally coming across this potential minor incident on one of her scouts and notifying me about it, I wouldn't even be here. But even if I don't want to go investigate it and rather sleep, I will still do it out of necessity anyway as it would be a problem if the population of either youkai or humans were to go down, even if it is just slightly. And good thing that I'm here since the cause of the potential minor incident in question had already killed someone in cold blood by cleanly cutting them in half. I'm a bit angry at first of course, but maybe because youkai had killed people all the time, and had done something even worse, that I had gone numb to it? But anyhow, I think he is currently fuming, I don't know why though.

"How dare you say that I'm annoying! And you, red and white, too! How dare you say in front of me that you'd rather not talk to me, and rather beat me up instead!? Not talking to others despite them talking to you shows a lack of respect for them and their opinions. Everyone has a right to be talked to and listened to, and when we violate that right, we are disrespecting them as individuals. And there's about attacking me too! Wanting to attack my person is like you are trying to put me down and making me feel inferior! How dare you! Don't you think that—."

Ah, that's why. I don't know whether I should be exasperated or frustrated at this as I don't know what is the deal with him, but as I said earlier, talking to him seems like a waste of time as it only makes things worse. And so after getting tired of hearing him speak, I decided to just attack him while he is talking, following Gensokyo rule #1, attack first then ask questions later, with my ofuda(or in Regulus words, a paper with strange writing on it), Marisa also seems to follow my attack with her wide array of star base attacks and lasers, while saying something like "Finally some action-ze!" and "I don't want to hear this Rinnosuke doppelganger speak another word-ze!". Eh, Rinnosuke? Oh right, he does look like him.

But back to the situation at hand, everything seems to not be affecting the outsider at all. I don't know how that works, but I will try to figure it out so that I can put this guy back in his place.

"You you you! Not only did you lower me as a person, but you also decided to cut me off when I was talking! Don't you know that when people are talking, they have a right to speak without being interrupted? Cutting me off when I was talking is a violation of my right to speak, you should know that it was a common courtesy to not cut people off after all as it is both rude and disrespectful! It also is frustrating for me who is trying to communicate without wanting to be interrupted! Cutting me off is also sending a message that you are not interested in what I was saying. It was like you were saying that I wasn't worth your time! Just how low do you think I am, huh? Just how high do you think you are to look down on me!"

Geez, he's still going? While he was still speaking, my hands didn't stop moving at all and is still throwing stuff at him in any way I could think of, like aiming at his head, his torso, and other parts of his body specifically as he has to have some weakness, right? Maybe there is some condition that needs to be fulfilled to have his invincibility to work? But that seems the more unlikely the more I throw stuff at him. Marisa also seems to be relentless with her attack, as she seems so determined to break his invincibility spell or whatever it is.

But no matter what Marisa and I throw at him, he is completely undamaged, his cloth is not even one bit disheveled, and not even a speck of dust is on him even though dust is all over the place from all the explosion.

Maybe this is his ability?

Ability is something that is uncommonly manifested in people and is entirely unique to them. Maybe he has something similar to that? But that is something that I hadn't already dealt with as things like that are everywhere in Gensokyo, like Sakuya's unfathomable ability to manipulate time and Yuyuko's uncanny ability to manipulate death.

"And the fact that you are throwing stuff at me and expecting it to do something to me shows just how condescending you are! This is an act of disrespect and a way of putting me in a lower position than yourself, so just how dare you look down on me, me, me!? This is an infringement upon my rights, it clearly is! Do you even know who I am!? Hey, do you even listen to me?"

"... Huh? You said something?" That is my reply. With that reply, I could hear a snicker behind my back, and could see the man's visible anger.

"... You, you! Tch, you know what? I'm not even going to be surprised. Oh right, we haven't even been properly introduced yet, have we? I suppose it is to be expected to some extent, given the circumstances, but it seems manners have been foregone nonetheless. Even if you are rude and being disrespectful to my rights, I can't allow myself to stoop that low, so allow me to make up for this. I am the Sin Archbishop of the Witch's Cult, representing greed, Regulus Corneas. Now, remember the name of someone who will crush you! This wasn't out of arrogance, it was out of fact!"

After he said that, he crouched down and used both of his hands to plow down the earth, seemingly trying to flip up the dirt toward me. This simple action caused the ground to shatter, digging dirt up into the air, and making it come toward me like a great tidal wave, seemingly becoming a preeminent wave of destruction that is moving up toward me without a single change to its speed like the law of rhythm had been completely violated.

Every grain of dirt seemingly turned deadly, judging by how it can pass through houses like it wasn't even there, turning them to powder. Luckily that the destructive wave of destruction didn't go into the village and was facing the outskirts of the village instead, or otherwise, it would cause a great deal of destruction.

"Now he's done it!" After saying that, I stop throwing my ofuda and ready my yin-yang orb, materializing a couple of it behind me.

"Oh, he made Reimu angry-ze! Ain't like I'm blamin' her, really, since I'm also startin' to get angry myself!" While Marisa said that, she stops shooting her magic and readying her weapon.

While I and Marisa were readying for the incoming wave of destruction, the wave was ever closer to our current location. With that couple seconds between life and death, Marisa attached her weapon, the mini-hakkero, to the back of her bloom, then blasted off a giant beam that is smaller than her Master Spark, but big nonetheless, from it, repelling her to a safe distance as expected from one of the fastest in Gensokyo. The big laser beam that is being blasted off from her mini-hakkero is also shooting toward Regulus, but it was completely reduced into practically nothing by the dirt particle before him.

As for me, I simply stay in place, close my eyes and isolate myself from reality by using my innate ability to make myself 'floating' away from everything. And so when those dirt particles that seemingly didn't follow any of the natural laws finally reached me, it was completely, harmlessly, phase through me, as I had ceased to exist in that reality, or you can say, ceased to exist in that plane of existence, making myself completely immune to any and all things. And when it completely passed through me, I opened my eyes and let several yin-yang orbs behind me fade back into existence, 7 of them to be exact, and swung them toward Regulus with my gohei in a way that would push him outside of the village.

"Grr, you bitch!" That is the only sound that could be heard of him before he got pushed back past the wall of the village, going outside of it. And immediately after that, I 'floated' after Regulus' disappearing body in the distance.

When he was a great distance away from the village, however, he just skidded to a stop mid-air. His velocity seemingly just stopped like it never had one to begin with. He is now just floating there, stucking there, denying the universal law of gravitation. The yin-yang orbs that had been pushing him were also stopped, and simply got rejected from his body like it wasn't meant to be able to interact with him, and it just simply broke apart and some part was even completely disintegrated before they could return to me like a boomerang.

"Now that's different…" I trailed off while getting out a couple of my sealing needles.

After that I heard the voice of someone so condescending, "Do you see now? Don't you just see your incompetence of not even making a scratch on my person? You can never hope to injure me, nothing will especially now, so just stop trying, will you? You are so ridiculously inadequate that it's not even funny! And now, what will you do? On that note, don't you think that you should take responsibility for what you have done to me?"

With that voice filled with unpleasantness washed over me, the man that seemingly is violating several of the natural laws had disappeared. He just vanished, it wasn't a matter of how fast, he just simply disappeared.

With his sudden disappearance, I reflectively tried to look around me to see where he went and I found him to be on the ground, and in the next moment, the land simply just shattered then he vanished again and is lurking over me condescendingly with many particles of dirt on his hand that can be used as a weapon of mass destruction. With my intuition telling me to dodge, I listened, and 'floated' along with the wind to dodge it. The position where I was before is where the particle of dirt on Regulus' hand had gone to.

After that, I heard the annoying voice of the man once more as he was descending down to the ground, "Obnoxious! Why can't you stay still and receive the reciprocation of your own action for once? It's like you are indirectly stating that you are above the rules that everyone else has to follow, which is not a good message to send! Don't you think that you are being a little bit too greedy? Change your priority and just don't just only care about yourself!"

"What? Ummm… Acting on your own desire is a way of life, you know?" I retorted.

But it seemed that Regulus wasn't satisfied with my answer, as he raised one of his hands up after I muttered those words, which caused the place where his arm previously was to shatter. At that moment, an attack that no one could see was let loose.

However, in the instant that it had left his hand and my gut instinct warned me to dodge, the invisible force of wind that I cannot see just swerved to avoid me judging by the whoosh sound I heard passing my body. When that happened, Regulus' face was also twisted into pure outrage when he saw that in front of his eyes.

"This, this! Just how miserably irritating, bitterly frustrating, and maddeningly irksome! Dodging my attack like that, are you trying to mock me?!"

"What? Is that what it seems like? I didn't do anything though." Showing my genuine confusion, Regulus' face turned red, and was again moving his arm to create another unstoppable blade of wind.

And again, my premonition rang out, then something that I couldn't see swerved passed by me. Or to the casual observer, if they could see Regulus' invisible attack, they would see that I had dodged the wind so fast, so natural, that it seemed to me like wind had swerved to avoid me instead of the other way around.

"You're definitely mocking me! How dare—."

Before he could finish his piece, however, a couple of black objects had just dropped on his head and were literally rejected from his body, making them drop down right under his crotch and they exploded with a burst of blue-ish flame. Those explosions were big, bigger than a two-story house, and had an extreme force that leveled the surrounding area evidenced by the big crater and how debris is flying everywhere.

After that display of explosions, Marisa swooped down with her bloom while saying, "I hope that's work-ze. That is the most powerful explosive in my arsenal!"

"It probably isn't going to work Marisa."

"Hey! Don't dash my hopes like that!"

I looked deadpannedly at Marisa for a moment and decided to completely ignore Marisa's playful remark and tell her what she missed when she was preparing her bombs earlier, "... Nothing can hurt him, or that is what he said anyway, so it'll be useless."

Hearing my words, Marisa pouted a little and left pondering, "That… that is not possible-ze. Everything has a weakness, even Sakuya herself has a weakness of being unable to rewind time, so there is definitely a way to hurt him."

"Keep thinking I guess? I want to get this over with." I responded while manifesting a couple of yin-yang orbs behind me, which seemed to be a good idea as when the smoke of the earlier explosion was cleared away, the man in white was standing there free of injury and free of contamination. It even makes me wonder if this state of unchangedness is his ability.

"How dare you do this to me, me, me and then go happily talking afterward? Don't you think that it was rude, and downright disrespectful to do that when I was here standing? How dare you think of me as nothing but a pebble on the road, like I didn't matter, like I wasn't worth acknowledging? Get off your high horse you shit and don't look down on me!"

Sweatdropped, I said, "You really are saying what you want, huh?"

"What is that laughable inferiority? Me, the most satisfying existence in the world that without a doubt not lacking in any aspect, wanting something? Don't mess with me! I don't want anything and will never need anything!" After he exclaimed that, he crouched down and began to grab a fist full of dirt again. However, since I'm there to see that all familiar action, I swung my yin-yang orbs at him before he could do anything, but he didn't seem to care as my action didn't deter him at all evidenced by how when the yin-yang orbs hit him square to the face, it didn't seem to do anything to him at all. All the previous times I threw stuff at him, he seemed to be at least staggering from my attack a bit from the force, but now, it seems that it's impossible to do that again.

And seeing that my Yin-yang orbs did nothing to stop him, I picked Marisa up by the brim of her dress and flew to the place I felt like it was safe, which seems to be the right call of action as the previous location I and Marisa were at got punctured by many tiny particles of dirt.

Regulus, who saw me and Marisa dodged his attack again, is apparently losing it as he again tries to annihilate me with his who-the-heck-know ability. But since in all likelihood this has been going on for a while now, someone has to be taking notice of all the commotion we cause, which someone really did as at the moment Regulus was about to grab a fist full of dirt again, a voice of a woman rang out, "Ending Sign "Phantasmal Emperor"."

And with that, Regulus, the man in white, is being flooded by divine light.

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A/N: Reimu is Touhou's equivalent to Reinhard from re:zero in terms of bullshitness scale and is practically Jesus in her universe, and what I mean by that is that she can walk on water without getting wet by unknowingly stepping on fishes that happen to swim right underneath her. Also, if you don't already know, Reimu has an ability to 'float'. She usually 'floats' through life, giving her great intuition and luck, and so that is where that sometime future danger prediction came from. And if I got anything wrong about Reimu's ability and personality, please tell me.

And also, it would be appreciated if you can tell me whether or not I did a good job portraying Regulus' as a character.