Wraith found himself beside a lake. Mists gathered all around him, but it was somehow much brighter than when he was at that forest from before, the moon glowed so brightly he could see it through the fog. He supposed that the extreme darkness from before was due to that creature.

He remembered what that creature—Rumia, that's her name—told him after helping her out of the tree.

"Gensokyo?"

"Yup! That's right! There's lots of youkai here."

"So, that magic you used…"

"Oh, you mean danmaku? We used that in spell card duels! It's kind of the rule here, you're supposed to fight in a way that no one will die."

"Wait, but you were trying to eat me!"

"Ah, Uhm…"

"Whatever… It's a good thing I won, then."

"Boo… Anyway, you're weird, Mister, you're an Outsider, but you seem quite familiar with magic."

"I have friends that have talent. They taught me about magic."

"Is that so~?"

Gensokyo… he really did get into something troublesome. After a short conversation and giving her a snack—she was surprisingly well-behaved, given that she wanted to eat him—he asked Rumia where the nearest settlement was. He just hoped that the people there were friendlier.

Rumia hummed happily as she flew through the forest. The memories of the previous fight are not in the front of her mind. Sure, she was a bit sad she could not eat a human this time, but her mood lightened up a bit when the weird outsider gave her some food—protein bars, he called it. It did not tasted anythinglike she ate before, but it still satiated her hunger nonetheless. He asked her where he can find a place where people are found, so she pointed him towards the Scarlet… Devil… Mansion…

"Ah," Rumia took a pause in her flight, "I made an oopsie… he was probably trying to find a place filled with humans, not one filled with youkai. Hmm…

Oh well! He'll be fine!" Rumia resumed her flight, not caring that she sent the outsider who saved her into a den of youkai. She didn't really have the time to think more about it as she collided into a tree again.

Wraith checked his ammunition. His spirit wavered a bit when he found out that the fight in the forest and in the UAC before that burned through most of his ammo stores. He now regretted firing randomly in the dark. He still has his grenade launcher, but he didn't want to waste those grenades for small fries like the fairies. He surmised that the pistol is more than enough for most of the fairies he would encounter.

Rumia said that they were weaker than even humans, but they were also functionally immortal—a fact that put Wraith's mind at ease.

He walked towards the lakeside, and he stood there agape, again—this would be a common theme in this place. There was just a whole bundle of ammunition just conveniently lying there. Boxes that contained 7.62mm, .50AE, and 12 gauge buckshot—and even some rocket grenades—were just on the ground.

"How—Who—you know what? I'm not even going to ask." Wraith said to himself as he thought that pondering on such a question would just drive him insane. He did not even know how Rumia survived from being subject to enough ordinance that would have turned a Hell Baron into Swiss cheese. He just chalked that up to the strangeness of Gensokyo and the spell card system he heard about.

Seeing that expecting any kind of solid logic in this place is futile, he turned his eyes toward the lake. He saw that there were large sheets of ice floating around the lake. That right there gave Wraith suspicion. The air temperature told him that it's not yet winter and the place was probably experiencing late spring, yet there were still large chunks of ice in the lake.

There was only one explanation for this, "Magic, someone is using some kind of ice magic to make all this ice," Wraith concluded. It wasn't too far-fetched of an observation—he once saw Balthazar turn an entire room to ice because it was, "TOO HOT!". A mage of a high enough caliber probably can freeze an entire lake.

Seeing as he had replenished his ammo thanks to some unknown benefactor—he really hoped that would not come to bite him back in the ass—he decided to cut through the lake using the ice as platforms. While taking the long path around the lake would be safer, that would take too long.

He hoped that his next encounter would go more smoothly.

"I'll freeze you along with English Beef!" the blue fairy in front of him exclaimed angrily.

It didn't.

After fighting his way through groups of fairies—there was also one fairy that was tougher than the rest—as he crossed the lake, hopping over tiny islands on the lake using the ice sheets, he found himself at an alcove surrounded by ice. It seemed that this alcove, along with the floating ice sheets earlier, were made by the fairy before him.

Her name was Cirno, the self-proclaimed strongest fairy. She didn't take it well when Wraith refused to fight her, threatening him that she would not show him the way out of the lake if he did not accept.

HAIL SIGN "Hailstorm"

And so, here he was, trying to survive from what he could describe as a localized hailstorm targeted at him. The frigid air that was biting through his armor made him occasionally flinch mid-fight, causing him to get hit by Cirno's danmaku. There are no covers at the arena, so he was concentrating hard to dodge all of the bullets.

"Hahah!" Cirno laughed haughtily, "are you ready to be crushed by the strongest?!" she strongly boasted. She then unleashed a ton of bullets in multiple directions.

"'Strongest', my ass. You're just annoying!" Wraith snapped back as he took out his grenade launcher. He had enough of this. He fired a grenade directly at her.

FREEZE SIGN: "Perfect Freeze"

By some magic mechanism, the grenade along with all the bullets flying about just 'froze', as in, they just completely stopped in mid-air.

"What the…?" Wraith stared at the esoteric magic he was seeing. He quickly drew his pistol with his off-hand and fired a few shots at her.

And then the bullets also froze half-way.

Cirno grinned maniacally. "This is the power of the strongest!" she declared right before activating the second part of her spell card, "take this!"

All of the frozen bullets started to move again, but all in different directions than from before they were frozen.

And the grenade was heading right into him.

"Oh shi—" Wraith tried to jump out of the way, but he was caught in the blast. He flew off from the explosive force, causing him to hit his back on the icy walls. He felt the air forced out of his lungs before getting hit from the wandering bullets.

"Are you now going to recognize I as the strongest?" Cirno boasted. She started to prepare to fire a barrage of bullets again, likely to repeat the process.

Wraith could only cough back. His right arm numbed down from getting hit by the ice fairy's freezing bullets, his grenade launcher now lying on the floor. He has his pistol on his left hand, but that wouldn't do much if she did that trick again.

And at this moment, Wraith's mind wracked for a solution. It was obvious that Cirno's abilities did not follow the laws of physics—which is pretty much the case for magic in general, much to the chagrin of the Academy-trained starfighter pilot. He knew that she could somehow stop bullets mid-air by 'freezing' them. The grenade stopped immediately, but the pistol rounds managed to fly halfway before stopping. If what he was thinking is correct, then maybe if he used something 'hot' enough, then she wouldn't be able to 'freeze' it.

He now had an idea.

Wraith reloaded his grenade launcher, and rushed off to meet the ice fairy head-on. He fired a grenade which prompted Cirno to use her spell card again.

"That wouldn't work! Are you stupid?" Cirno taunted. Wraith just continued to get closer to her before sliding feet first on the icy ground. The fairy looked at him confused.

"Hmm? Did you just slip and fall, human?" she began to chuckle, "Did your brain mushed up with my attacks? Hah! You became stupid!" she began to mock him with childish insults.

This was the perfect moment, Wraith though. She was now too distracted to notice that his right heel was beginning to glow a bright green color.

"Let's see who's the stupid one, you damn fairy," after his quip, a green laser began to shoot out of his heel. The fairy finally noticed the bright glow, but it was a moment too late.

"Eh?" was the only sound that came out of Cirno right before her vision was filled with light.

A microsecond later, an explosion occurred.