Tojiko eventually relented in the face of Futo's constant prodding and it was agreed that we would be allowed to see the crown prince as soon as he awakened. She remained adamant, however, that we not see him in any way until his awakening was completed and thus we were forbidden from entering the inner courtyard for the moment in no uncertain terms. Instead, we were all escorted to a room on an upper floor, several levels above the mausoleum to wait. Tojiko lead us there and sent Futo away, saying "go keep an eye out for anyone suspicious." Futo left excitedly but I expected that the task she had been charged with was simply an attempt by Tojiko to get her out of the way for the time being.

As Renko and I seated ourselves on the room's bare and dingy tatami floor, she whispered to me. "What do you think prince Shotoku looks like? Do you think it'll be anything like his portrait on old paper money?"

"That portrait was just an artist's guess anyway, wasn't it? I don't think there were any contemporary portraits of him that survived."

"Does that even matter though? Gensokyo is a world of perception and I bet more people think of him looking that portrait than anything else."

I thought about that for a moment, but before I could reply Tojiko came back into the room, bowing slightly. "My apologies for my poor hospitality but we have nothing to offer you. Everyone here hasn't needed any food or drink in a long time."

Renko waved her hand dismissively, saying "don't worry about it," but Genji seemed disappointed.

"I'll just sleep then," he said morosely, and drew his head and limbs back into his shell as he settled onto the floor beside us.

Tojiko looked at him for a moment with slightly guilty expression then sighed and turned to Renko. "...So, now that we have a moment to ourselves, how about you explain your purpose in coming here? You mentioned you were asked to investigate by a nun from that Buddhist temple." Her eyes narrowed as she spoke.

I could hardly blame her for being suspicious. Finding a way to explain that we had been hired by the Myouren temple without making us look like we were on their side was a needle I had no interest in trying to thread myself, so I just shut my mouth and let Renko do the talking.

"As I said before, we were indeed hired by the head nun and founder of the Myouren temple, with the request that we investigate and identity the powerful spiritual presence that she had detected beneath the ground. Originally, my intention was only to discover the entrance to this tomb and see if it could be opened. I did that easily enough and would have returned at that point, but my partner and I were captured by that hermit who delivered us here. From the way she attacked our bodyguard it seemed her invitation was the sort that we couldn't really refuse and so here we are."

Tojiko clicked her tongue and sighed, looking away. "Of course. This is her doing." Her eyes then turned back to us, her expression hard and cold. "I bear you no ill will, but if you're in the employ of that temple, I can't let you leave here and report back to them. I'm afraid you'll have to stay now until the crown prince can decide what to do with you. If you make any attempt to escape, or if the prince wills it, then you will die."

It was a grim pronouncement that left me with a sinking feeling of dread in my stomach, but as usual Renko was completely unfazed.

"I understand that you have to be conscious of security concerns, but I assure you we certainly don't mean you or the crown prince any harm. My partners and I were hired by the Myouren temple, but our association with them extends only as far as our commission, which entails locating the entrance to this underground mausoleum and nothing more. I consider myself to be a neutral negotiator in the affairs of youkai and have been employed as such on several occasions. In fact, if I may be so bold as to recommend my services, I think you'd be well advised to hire me to negotiate with the people of the temple on your behalf. It seems there's some expectation of animosity on both sides here, even though you've never met eachother. I'd be happy to help you both negotiate an amenable truce.

"A truce, with a Buddhist temple? Unthinkable."

"Oh, why do you say that? I'm familiar with the Myouren temple's point of view, but what are your circumstances here and why do you expect an antagonistic response from a Buddhist temple? For that matter how did the legendary crown prince come to be buried in this land, far from any imperial palace? Perhaps if I understood your position, I could work to get the temple to agree to make some concessions for you."

"That's impossible. A Buddhist temple would never accept us."

"I don't know why you'd say that. Whatever opinion you're expecting the temple to hold of you, it's been 1400 years and a lot of things can change in that amount of time. Just look at you, not only are you a ghost now, but Futo introduced you as 'Tojiko of the Soga.' It used to be Tojiko of the Iratsume though, didn't it?"

Tojiko's eyes went wide at that question. She looked away as she replied. "...That's a name that I gave up long ago. I'm a member of the Soga clan now, just a disciple of the crown prince."

Tojiko no Iratsume. It was a connection that I had guessed at as well, but her response confirmed it. That name had belonged to one of prince Shotoku's four wives, this one the daughter of nobility from both the Soga and Mononobe clans. She was said to have been the mother of prince Yamashiro, himself a nearly-legendary figure in Japanese history. Many of the records concerning Tojiko were sparse or even contradictory, but it seemed the ghost in front of us was the woman in question herself. A living, or un-living I supposed, historical record. Keine would have been jealous.

"The fact you know my previous name suggests that the crown prince's exploits must still be talked of at this point in time, correct?" Tojiko continued, "I suppose for a great man like him, that's to be expected. Tell me, what does the world think of the crown prince in this day and age?"

"Well, let's see," Renko replied, looking up as she rattled off the facts. "He was the son of emperor Yomei and the father of prince Yamashiro. Supposedly he was born in front of a stable and originally given the name 'Umayado.' Even as a child he was said to be so intelligent that he could follow and participate in ten conversations at once. As a youth he became a Buddhist pilgrim and was so loved by the Buddha that he was said to have been given another name by Bodhidharma himself. Later, he's credited for spreading Buddhism across Japan and defeating the Mononobe clan who had opposed him in the name of Shinto. He dispatched envoys to China and formulated a 12-rank system for managing the imperial courts and drafted Japan's original 17-article constitution. As a devout Buddhist, he founded two major temples - Shitenno and Horyu as well as numerous smaller ones. He also is said to be the author of several treatises on law and philosophy that are thought to be among the first books ever written in Japanese and..." Renko continued to speak smoothly, listing off the crown prince's many storied accomplishments. Her expertise and familiarity sounded like something taken directly from a textbook, likely because it mostly was. For years we had taught alongside Keine in the temple school and such lectures on important historical figures were the foundations of her teaching method. Having Renko deliver the same speeches we had heard enough times to memorize them didn't make the content any less sleep-inducing.

"Well," Tojiko said once Renko had finished. "I see the crown prince is still quite well known. I wonder if Seiga was lying to me about that as well..."

"I don't know all that much," Renko said with a chuckle. "Some of that I picked up from a friend who's a historian, but the rest is just something every kid in school gets taught. There are a lot of people arguing that he should be enshrined as a god and deified."

Given the time period we found ourselves in, Renko was likely right about that, though it wasn't the compliment it might sound to be. Around this time in the Outside world it was coming to be a belief commonly held by historians that 'prince Shotoku' as he is described in the Nihon Shoki, probably never existed. There likely was a historical prince Umayado at one point, but most of the great deeds and accomplishments attributed to him were first spoken of in writings that hadn't been composed until a century or two after his death. Deifying the legendary figure of prince Shotoku was a way of differentiating him from the historical record, making him a figure more in line with the other gods and monsters to be found in writings of that age, which were generally understood to blend folklore and history together in a way that the rationalists of the modern Outside world would surely reject. Although some of the accomplishments Renko had listed off might have been carried out by prince Umayado, in all likelihood many of them were either awarded to him posthumously or simply fabricated.

Tojiko, herself a figure from such a questionable historical record and now apparently a ghost, nodded as she listened. "Well it seems that history has mostly remembered his greatness. There's one fact you have quite wrong though."

Renko's eyes sparkled with excitement. "Oh? What would that be? Was he not really born outside of a stable? Or the bit about being able to listen to ten conversations at once? Oh, or maybe the bit about his time in China?"

"It's about his faith," Tojiko answered plainly. "The crown prince was never a Buddhist."

"Wait, what? What about all of those temples he's said to have founded though? Many of them have artifacts supposedly written by him on display."

"Well if you understood that, you'd understand why the crown prince is interred here in this mausoleum, awaiting his resurrection. The truth is more nuanced, of course, but to put it simply, the crown prince helped established Buddhism in this country, but he was never a Buddhist himself. He was a Taoist."