Marisa made a swift landing before Rinnosuke's storefront and residents, her heels skating on the dirt before coming to a stand still.

"You there Kourin?" she called out untying her stock of scrap metal rods near the front entrance.

Poking his head out, Rinnosuke pushed his glasses into place as he examined Marisa's haul.

"Come to hawk more of your junk my way?" Rinnosuke asked.

She simply chuckled retorting, "junk or not you always pay, and as Gensokyo's number one junk collector, I always have my day. Now," she rubbed her fingers, bending over towards Rinnosuke with a smug grin upon her face. "I believe that's worth a pretty sum, hawk it up, Kourin." With a roll of his eyes he disappeared into his shop, yet before Marisa could forget, she added, "oh and could you see if you have any wood working tools?"

"I can check," he called back as he rummaged around "Though it's unlikely to be new and lightly used."

Lost and neglected things that tended to appear in Gensokyo by nature rarely ever were in good condition.

"More than fine, anything is good!" she insisted. "Now hurry! I'm in a rush!"

Rinnosuke was hardly fond of how brazen and pushy Marisa could be, helped in most part by the fact she was his most frequent procurer of oddities and scrap. Though, that was also offset by the fact Marisa often grabbed and made off with whatever she liked without paying, which was exactly why Rinnosuke often low balled the blond magician on his appraisals, factoring the money he saved not paying her as a forward expense to the next oddity she'd brazenly steal.

Scrap metal was quite valuable in Gensokyo even if much of what appeared in the land was rusted to the core. There was always a buyer where that was concerned, whether it be the Kappa, the Tengu, the odd Youkai here and there, or the humans from the village. Still there wasn't a hard and fast method when it came to appraising Marisa's junk, usually it simply depended on how generous Rinnosuke was feeling at the moment.

As he retrieved the coin and checked his stock, Marisa stood by the entrance, hand on her hips as her eyes scanned his inventory for anything she might like. However, what caught her attention wasn't resting in the shop, but upon the wall just outside it. Stepping from the threshold to get a closer look at the oddity, she found herself standing before a strange rectangular box that was a bit taller than her. The bottom half was completely black with faded flakes of paint so worn the design that was once there was no longer distinguishable. However, the top half was made entirely of glass showing the hollow interior with a contraption hanging at the top that sported three black ivory talion-like claws as it hung over a collection of an assortment of items below.

Stepping out of the shop to see Marisa's fixation on his latest peculiarity, Rinnosuke asked, "interested?"

"What is it?" she inquired, gawking at the items within.

"It's a claw machine," he explained. "You pay money to have a chance to win the prizes inside. It took a bit of work, had to replace the claws with something I had on hand but with the help from a kappa I got it running."

"Whoa really? How much does it cost to play?"

"Two hundred yen," he answered. "But as Gensokyo's number one junk procurer-"

"That's me~" she winked.

"-I can give you One! -free game…" Handing Marisa her handful of coins, he withdrew two one hundred yen coins from his person before inserting it into the machine. As the machinery whirred to life, lights began to flash and an odd electric tune began to play, Rinnosuke pointed and said, "use that nub to control the claw, press that button when you want to try and grab something."

Marisa quickly tried her hand taking hold of the joystick and watching as that claw darted upon the tracks above following her command. As her eyes darted around the prizes below she hastily and excitedly pressed the button before watching the black ivory claws descend from the top. As she excitedly observed, one of the claws tipped another prize, causing it to fall slightly off kilter, yet the one she had aimed for was squarely at the center. As the claws slowly closed down upon it, unfortunately, the prize she'd aimed for slipped between the narrow points as the claws rose again and dispensed with nothing.

She began jiggling the handle, trying to get the thing under control, even repeatedly pressing the grab button but no matter what she did the thing simply wouldn't listen as it returned to the corner and the machine shut off.

"Kourin!" she cried out. "Your claw thing is broken! It's not doing the thing I want!"

Poking his head out the shop entrance to see what he was badgering him about, he answered, "that's because you lost. You get one chance per game and that's it."

"Well this damn thing didn't even work right, Kourin," she insisted, hitting the glass with the back of her fist. "It let my prize slip right between its claws! Honestly, what kinda scam are you hawking here?"

"Scam!?" Rinnosuke barked, marching out of his shop to properly confront Marisa. As he leaned over looking down upon her, he asserted, "it's a game of skill! If you had the skill you would've won a prize."

"Wha- I…" she choked on her words hearing someone imply that she's lacked skill in any aspect whatsoever. "I have the skill! Just Watch!" Withdrawing two one hundred yen coins from her coin bag, she insisted, "I'll be Gensokyo's Number One Claw Game Winner for sure."

As Rinnosuke stood by to observe Marisa's second attempt, the blond magician took a moment to glance over all the prizes, making sure to pick something she really wanted before beginning. Off to the side however, something familiar caught her eye. It was octagon shaped with the Eight Taoist Trigrams carved into the top and she couldn't help but point and make a rather apparent observation.

"That looks like my Hakkero!"

Waving his hand with a shake of his head, he muttered, "it's nothing so special. It's just a wooden prize box that holds something extra special."

Given the size and shape of the octagon prize box, it seemed like something that would've been far more difficult to grab, lift and win.

"More special than the other prizes?" Marisa asked.

"If you want to know, you're going to have to win it for yourself."

Seeing as Rinnosuke was being rather crudely opaque on the matter, Marisa simply offered a pompous, "hmmph, I'll show you…"

Larin nearly finished getting all the soil out of the guest bedroom, well largely the big clumps. Getting all the dirt out of the wooden grooves was going to be next to impossible without serious deep cleaning. However, there stood to be much that he could at least sweep. While he wouldn't get everything, getting most of it would prove to be good enough.

"Does Marisa have an extra broom laying around?" Larin asked as Reimu sat by sipping a cup of tea with both hands in such a dignified manner if she wasn't skipping out on helping.

"Aside from the one Marisa rides, I don't think so," she then stood up before saying. "I do have a spare at the shrine. Give me a few minutes and I'll return with it."

As Reimu flew off, Larin patted his large metal hat against the outside wall of Marisa's house trying to get whatever dirt residue that remained off.

"Larin!" Marisa loudly barked, coming to a speedy halt just before his window, causing the boy to spring back falling on his rear. "It's an emergency! Help load up more scrap to sell!"

"Don't SCARE Me Like That!" -he gasped while picking himself up.

"This is Serious Larin!" Marisa insisted, darting off to her front yard, leaving Larin to follow after as he gradually descended the rope ladder. Placing his hat on his head, once Larin circled around the house he found Marisa frantically tugging at junk piles for any bit of metal they might've had as she explained, "so I went to Rinnosuke's shop to sell all that stuff like I said, right? Well, just outside he happened to have this prize box that looked like my Hakkero-"

"What's a Hakkero?"

"-and Kourin said that it had an extra special prize…"

"Whose Kourin?"

Marisa only continued to tug harder, her shoes slipping in the dirt as she continued "he said the prize box held something more special than the other prizes in the claw machine!"

"What's a claw machine?"

"So I used the yen we got selling all that scrap to try and win it, but I kept… on… losing… gaaah!" she slipped and fell flat on her back just as the hunk of scrap she was tugging on suddenly came free.

"I understood that part at least."

Still, even as Marisa laid there sprawled out, she swiftly insisted, "we gotta sell more scrap so I can get the money to try again."

"What about those woodworking tools?" he asked, kneeling down at her side, the brim of his hat turned up to her.

Only then did Marisa pause in her frantic state and murmur, "oh yeah… you're right. Well don't mind that! Whatever is in that prize box has got to be more valuable!"

"Well, I know everything here is yours to sell and do what you want with, but with those tools I could repair more than just the guest bedroom, even do some light renovation to other parts of your house."

Sitting beneath the shade of Larin's hat, Marisa began to consider.

"Hmm, you are right… that would be very useful." Unfortunately, Marisa began to consider things a bit more. "With the money I spent trying to win that thing however, I can't stop now, otherwise it'd be a waste. A total wash even. I just need a couple more tries and that prize box is as good as mine. It's gotta be more worthwhile than a couple of old woodworking tools, right? Otherwise it wouldn't be in such a fancy box locked within a claw machine that requires nothing less than pure skill."

"Well, I can't really stop you," he conceded to the matter. "Though I've been meaning to ask. Do you have an extra broom? There's still a bunch of dirt left in the guest bedroom that the rusty shovel can't get."

"In fact I do! Through the front door and to your right at the veeeeery back corner. Don't get too excited though, it's just a normal broom."

"Right! I'll take care of that after we load you up with more scrap."

With a bit of help they had Marisa's broom loaded up in no time and it wasn't long before she was speeding off over the treetops ready to make her next sum to waste on that claw game. Now that he was alone however, Larin briefly set his hat aside as he stepped through the front door of Marisa's house to get that broom. Peering to his right however, he could faintly make out the wooden broom in question, the issue of course was the pile of junk between Larin and it. Surely Marisa wouldn't mind if he stepped over most of the junk, so long as he didn't break something important. Climbing up upon the mound, he was careful where he placed his steps, picking spots where nothing seemed too fragile or prone to slip. Soon enough, he retrieved that broom and made his exit without much of a hitch.

The only issue however was the large metal hat he left at the entrance was no longer there. Larin had to do a double check, rubbing his eyes to make sure he wasn't seeing anything funny. He could've sworn it was just next to the door, and that there was no way he simply misplaced it elsewhere. He scanned the grounds around her house, even the piles of junk but no matter how many times he checked and double checked, by all rights it seemed to have vanished into thin air.

"I paid good money for that thing…" he whimpered, somewhat frozen in place wondering how he'd get on without it. "Well… I guess out here there's not many people to run into."

"Kekekek," a gentle voice seemed to snicker, yet before Larin could pinpoint its location he heard something crash down just next to him with a winded, "gaaah." His head snapped around just in time to get struck by a falling shingle that shattered easily over his skull with little injury. As Larin was left rubbing his head, his eyes fixated on a single winged fairy with six curls of yellow hair surrounding her head. "That hat was heavier than expected, guuuh~"

She seemed totally dazed by the fall she'd just taken, and fortunately for Larin, that fairy held his large metal hat in her tiny hands.

"Geeze," Larin simmered, marching up to the fairy. Snagging his hat from her paw, he muttered, "you miscreant should know better than to steal, honestly."

"Steal!?"

A second voice piped up from above, drawing his eyes to trace up Marisa's house only to find two more fairies looking back down at him positioned on either side of the gap in the roof's shingles.

It was then the fairy with the long raven black hair shouted with a stiff pointed finger, "you're the one burglarizing Marisa's house!"

"Yeah! -pervert!" the third and final fairy with the braided red hair shouted with an accusatory tone. "Just what are ya tryin' snag anyways? Her bloomers!?"

Fortunately, before they could rattle off any more accusations, the shingles they were sitting upon slipped and fell sending the remaining pair tumbling after the first. Larin was moments away from being pummeled by the falling clay shingles, fortunately his metal hat was in hand allowing him to swiftly place it over his head and braced just as the fairies landed on either side of him. With all three fairies laying dazed and defeated via their own undoing Larin let out a simple sigh.

"I've heard rumors that fairies were kinda stupid but I didn't think you were this dumb."

With the broom in hand, he began to march away intent on leaving the fairies to their own devices. However, it seemed that remark struck a cord as one of their little voices squeaked out.

"Stupid!? You have any idea who you're talking to, pervert!?" Turning around with a peeved look on his face, he was just in time to witness the curly yellow haired fairy strike a pose as she declared herself to be, "strengthened by the sun, my influence of light shall drive all our foes to run; Sunny Milk!"

"To mask our violence, for as the moon is bright so shall I bring silence! Luna Child!"

The third and last with the long black hair then finished off their display announcing, "those who live and breathe shall cower in fright for as long as I see, no living being escapes my sight! Star Sapphire! Now, return Marisa's magic broom or face our might!"

"It's an ordinary broom," Larin insisted. "I was just using it to clean up around here."

"We may not have a power that can detect lies," Sunny Milk interjected. "But we know a thief when we see one!"

"Wouldn't you be better off confronting Marisa then?" Larin had heard most fairies could be scared off if you simply acted tough, so grabbing at the edge of his metal hat, he lowered the brim to obscure his eyes as he flashed a devilish grin. "As Prince of Gohannissen and the emissary of the god of war, I, Larin Isazigred, accept your trifling challenge to battle. With three fairies against one human, it may just be a fair fight."

He gazed upon the trio eager to see their reactions and be sent running quaking in their shoes, yet they each dropped their pose as Sunny Milk cried out, "not a single part about that introduction even rhymed!"

"Honestly," the Sapphire tut with arms folded. "After we worked so hard to come up with such poetic introes."

Finally, Luna finished with, "the least you could do is reciprocate with the same effort."

All together they *tisk tisk tisk*ed him while shaking their heads in utter disappointment.

Dumbfounded by how they could be so hung up on it, Larin defensively shot, "you sprang it on me! How could I be expected to come up with something that rhymes on the spot!?"

"No matter!" they confidently declared. "Emissary of the god of war, you say?"

Sunny asserted, "you should know it was us, the Three Fairies of Light that won the great fairy war and led the charge into what would forever be known as the Infamous Hakurei Shrine Massacre~"

"Yeah," Sapphire barked. "We know the strife of conflict and with our martial expertise not even that pestering Shrine Maiden will stand in our way before long."

Slamming a balled fist in her hand, Luna confidently declared, "soon enough all of Gensokyo will fall to our dominion as we create a realm of fairies for fairies."

"Our rule will know no end…"

"The subjugation of humans and the human village ever present."

"With nay a shrine maiden to exterminate the likes of us!"

Larin was beginning to think he made a terrible decision playing into pompous desire to fight, yet before anything could get too serious an ominous shadow descended over the four of them.

"Sounds to me like a declaration of war." It was Reimu with a gratuitously peeved look upon her face, with words laced in such ire and contempt it scared the three fairies pale white in the face as their heads slowly panned up to meet the crimson shrine maiden's visage above them. "Come," she beckoned, slinging her Gohei over one shoulder, letting the white streamers catch in the wind as she rested the bamboo broom she had retrieved over the other. "As the Shrine Maiden and Guardian of Paradise, Hakurei Reimu, I'll exterminate you once and for all."

"RETREAT!"

At once, the three fairies of light made a swift escape darting into the foliage of the magical forest as swiftly as their stubby little legs could carry them. That didn't save one of them, Luna Child, from being swiftly struck in the head by the bamboo broom Reimu threw before vanishing as the shrine maiden descended next to Larin.

"They didn't give you too much trouble did they?"

Lowering the brim of his metal, he answered, "they nearly stole my hat, and thought I was a pervert stooping on Marisa's bloomers…"

"Were you?" Reimu inquired with a raised eyebrow!

"No!" he barked. "I was just grabbing the extra broom she said I could get!" He then drew in a deep breath before sighing. "I didn't think they'd actually wanna fight. I thought I could spook them off by making up a bunch of stuff."

"You should really be careful around youkai, Larin," she advised. "Outside the human village, it is sort of a might makes right type of world. Get on a youkai's bad side and there's no telling what sort of underhanded, devious tricks they'll use to put you down."

"Tsk, I don't intend to get on a youkai's bad side, much less bother anyone or anything regardless."

"That didn't stop those three from picking a fight, and with many types of Youkai come many types of egos. One of them isn't bound to mix with you and because of that you'll need to learn how to fight for yourself eventually."

"Hmmm," he mused, knowing ultimately Reimu was correct. Back in the village while magic wasn't unheard of, with the busy life a villager usually led it left little time for cultivation of magical skills of any variety. Not to mention magical resources were rare. "Maybe later when I'm not so busy cleaning up Marisa's mess. Say, did they really do all those things they said? The great war and massacre of your shrine?"

"Heh, the great fairy war is spoken of as a joke. As for the Massacre," she grinned. "Only if you count their swift defeat at the hands of yours truly a Massacre."

Perhaps Larin wasn't in all that much danger to begin with.

With that matter out of the way however, the boy asked, "you wanna help sweep up my new bedroom?"

"Eeeeeh," she hesitated scratching at her chin for a decent excuse to skimp out. "I got chores around the shrine I gotta take care of, a festival to plan that's coming up, and maybe a couple youkai in need of extermination."

"Just a couple minutes," he pleaded, foregoing mentioning the fact she was happy to sit around watching him shovel dirt earlier that day. "You already got the extra broom."

Not wanting to be a prude, she sighed. "Fine, until Marisa gets back at least."

As the days passed on, Marisa's cluttered and filthy house slowly began to be emptied of all the useless junk she'd stored up inside. Not because Larin or Reimu had convinced her to do so, or because Marisa had turned a new leaf, but because she needed to scrounge every last yen she could in hopes to win the prize box she now earnestly coveted, not resting until she knew the special reward that lay inside. Of course, it only left her penniless, but at the very least Rinnosuke more than broke even on all that she had stolen prior to that day.

So much for being Gensokyo's number one claw game winner.