Anonymous 2013/01/23 (Wed) 04:57 No. 15955 ▼ File 135891703512.jpg - (1.81MB, 1058x2200 , soewcast.jpg)
I thought some important stuff was missing from the original version of this update, so I've revised it.
[x] Ask about:
-[x] Mima, Marisa, and Marisa's angels
-[x] Gensokyo and Reimaden
-[x] Reimu
-[x] How did Mima and YuugenMagan meet?
--
The newcomer, clad in pleated clothing, stared at Mima.
Mima stared at the newcomer.
YuugenMagan also stared at the newcomer.
Only a moment passed, but it seemed like a very long moment.
Mima broke the silence. "Meira...did you say that she is maintaining the Hakurei Border?"
"Yes," the newcomer, whose name Rika now knew was Meira, replied. "Furthermore, she is the last person in Gensokyo who is able to maintain that barrier. She is planning a training trip into the mountains right now."
"Excellent," Mima said. "Then our time is soon. Now, sit down, dinner will be along momentarily."
Meira sat down, and at the same time glanced at Rika and YuugenMagan. Especially at YuugenMagan. "And who are these? An outsider and..." Meira put a hand to her head, as if trying to think of what YuugenMagan could possibly be.
Mima interrupted her thoughts. "He's YuugenMagan, a demon of Makai, and my friend of several years. The outsider is Rika, our new defense engineer."
"What is a defense engineer?" Meira asked, a look of befuddlement on her face.
"In her own words, she likes tanks," Mima replied. "She builds machines that will defend Reimaden."
"Hm." She looked at Rika. "Pardon my ignorance, but what is a tank?"
Considering that Rika's enthusiasm for tanks should be well-known among the audience, the scene that followed does not need to be narrated.
--
There was a flutter of wings. Into the room rushed a pair of blue blurs. The table was set with a long, black cloth, and three table places were set, before Rika, Marisa, and Meira: bowls, plates, spoons. The bowls were full of soup; there was a roll of some sort of bread on each plate. Mima and YuugenMagan's chessboard was reset to a starting configuration. Their duty served, they returned to hovering behind Marisa's shoulders.
Meira, who by this time knew far more about tanks and their operational history than she would have liked, took this opportunity to very quickly move to the other side of Mima.
Having had her attention diverted by the angels, Rika proceeded to question their presence. "Hey, Marisa," she asked. "Those two angels. What are they?"
"Oh, haha," Marisa replied. "They're familiars. Summons." At Rika's continued look of befuddlement, she continued. "They have a magically binding contract to serve me. You know, draw a magic circle, call something into it, make a contract..."
"...But what are they?" Rika asked.
The angel on the right answered. "We are messengers of the LORD most high! We have come to this world to spread the Good News of forgiveness--"
Marisa turned to face the angels. "Why don't you two go rustle up a map of this place. Or if there isn't one, make one." Both nodded in sync, and fled the room once more.
The angels sped off once again. Marisa turned back to Rika. "Yeah...they're angels. They're from some outsider religion, I think, or more likely from a break-off sect of it. They're way safer and more reliable than devils or most anything else, and they're more affiliated with love, to boot. Trouble is that they tend to proselytize at the slightest opportunity and they're immune to silence-type spells."
"Hey, that reminds me," Rika said. "You said to get a map of this place? What is this place?"
Marisa chuckled again. "Ha, this is Reimaden," she replied. "It's a ghost fortress, the echo of some fortress in another world long since forgotten. I dunno if it was even built, or if it was just an empty dream...I found it, and Mima named it. We've only got part of it habitable so far, but I know my way around most of it. It's kind of threadbare so far, except for what Meira and I brought with us and what I've roped in from around the Dream World. There's a big pile of stuff up on the roof that I've fished for. Dunno what a lot of it is, though."
"CHECKMATE," YuugenMagan said. "THAT SEQUENCE IS CALLED 'FOOL'S MATE'. IT IS FROM SOME FORMS OF CHESS FOUND IN THE OUTSIDE WORLD, THOUGH IT WORKS AS WELL IN MAKAIAN CHESS."
"Hey, eyeballs," Marisa said. "How is it that you know my master?"
"[b]FOR MOST OF MY EXISTENCE, I SERVED AS A GATE GUARD IN MAKAI," YuugenMagan replied. "I HAVE STOOD IN A SINGLE SPOT FOR MOST OF MY EXISTENCE, GUARDING THE BORDER BETWEEN MAKAI AND THE DREAM WORLD."
"I found him standing there, and told him, essentially, to get a life," Mima said.
"THAT IS TO SAY, PRIOR TO THAT INCIDENT I HAD LITTLE CONSIDERATION FOR WHAT MIGHT BE BEYOND MY POST. MIMA CONVINCED ME TO LOOK AT OTHER THINGS. ONLY THEREAFTER DID THE CONCEPT OF 'BOREDOM' EXIST FOR ME."
"And so to alleviate that boredom, I took to sending him letters by courier sprite, netting myself an eye in Makai for any major events that might occur there. For instance, Sariel's death."
"ALTHOUGH OF COURSE SARIEL'S DEATH IS SOMETHING I HAVE ONLY TOLD YOU OF SINCE MY ARRIVAL."
"Of course. Who did him in, anyway?"
The expression in every single one of YuugenMagan's eyes became darker. "I BELIEVE IT WAS THE ONE AND SAME SHRINE MAIDEN WHO ATTACKED ME NOT LONG BEFOREHAND, REIMU HAKUREI."
Rika interrupted the pause. "Um...If I can ask..."
"What?" Mima responded.
"Who is...Reimu Hakurei? Why is she important?"
All eyes were on her.
"Reimu..." Mima started, "Reimu...is a shrine maiden. A very powerful, and very dangerous shrine maiden." She held up her bandaged arm. "She beat me to within an inch of my unlife, down in the depths of Hell; even now, I have not fully recovered."
"I ALSO HAVE BEEN BEATEN NEARLY TO DEATH BY THAT SHRINE MAIDEN, BUT MY HEALING CAPABILITY IS GREATER THAN MIMA'S, AND WAS UNINHIBITED BY THE SUPPRESSIVE EFFECTS OF HELL," YuugenMagan said.
"She's still not much older than Marisa, but she has power beyond her own, drawing from the legendary artifact of the Hakurei, the Hakurei Yin-Yang Orb," Meira said.
"Furthermore, as the Hakurei shrine maiden, she ritually weakens those mythical creatures who live in Gensokyo, and bars them from attacking the outside world," Mima continued. "Including myself."
"She is my second cousin, once removed," Meira said. "By blood; but I was unjustly cast out from the Hakurei family. Had I not been, her prestigious position, and her prodigious power, would be mine."
"She is one of my blood relations; though I know not which one. She is both a target of, and a terrible inhibition to, my sought revenge," Mima said. "Revenge upon all humans, as is my wont."
"THEN, WHEN YOU SAID 'OUR TIME', YOU MEANT WHEN YOU PLANNED TO ATTACK THE SHRINE?"
"Yes, of course," Mima replied. "To render Gensokyo no longer a seal, but instead a base, for youkai to strike from rather than to be trapped in."
"Uhm, what is 'Gensokyo'?" Rika asked. "I keep hearing it, and I don't know what it is."
"Gensokyo, that's fairyland, the land of fantasies, things humans don't believe in on the outside," Marisa said. "It's my and Meira's homeland, too. It used to be part of the outside."
"It is at once a refuge for beings weakened to nonexistence by the lack of faith in the outside, and a prison for those of them who would seek to attack humans," Mima said. "It was established in Meiji 17, by a joint coalition of humans and fearful youkai."
"The people of Gensokyo are the descendents of the exorcists that sealed it off," Marisa said. "Kirisame, Hieda, Kamishirasawa..."
"And most especially, Hakurei," Mima said. "The Hakurei family maintains the border by their own existence. As long as one of them serves the Hakurei shrine, one cannot easily pass between Gensokyo and the outside without their permit. But once we take it over, it will be our permit they would need. Oh, yes, we shall turn their human barrier back on them. We will reverse it and from inside, we shall begin launching our wide-level attacks on their world. We will reestablish their belief in the fantastic by our undeniable attacks and the destruction we leave behind. And then...Ha...haha...AHAHAHA!" Mima's voice became a laugh, a dark and chilling laugh that reverberated into the depths of the ghostly fortress.
Rika was taken aback. She had not entirely signed up for a head-first descent into reawakening fantastic beings that attacked humans. "Mima...what are you?" she asked, her voice little above a whisper, not sure she would like the response.
"Haha...I? I am an evil spirit, a revengeful ghost, driven from the peace of death by a mixture of a natural aptitude for magic and an unquenched desire for vengeance, wrought by some terrible wrong set upon me in the prime of life!" That dreadful bloody knife flashed into her hand, and a cold, cruel chill ran over Rika's body. "This. Alas, I do not know the details. My body is lost in some long-forgotten place, and this, this weapon of murder, remains with it." She held up the knife again; once more it vanished.
"She's a youkai," Marisa said. "So she feeds on human belief, especially fear."
"Although, truly," Mima added, "Any type of faith is fine with me."
Rika thought. This Mima, whom she had signed up to help, seemed to be an enemy of humanity as a whole.
"Mima," she asked. "What are your long-term plans? For Gensokyo, and for humanity?"
"Hm. I plan to make Gensokyo more of a refuge for youkai and other monsters than it is so far." She put a finger to her lips. "As for all humanity? Well, I couldn't exist without them; but I really have no plans other than putting the fear of the dark back into them that they have all but lost."
The fear of the dark? Hm. Mima's plans could bring world peace; or, at the same time, they could hurl the outside into a dark age.
Well, that was a question for a different time, Rika thought.
Rika brought her spoon to her lips, and found it devoid of soup. She had finished it without really thinking about it.
There was one figure in the room who was altogether incongruous with the rest. "...What about Marisa?" Rika asked. "Why is she here?"
"I WOULDN'T HAVE THOUGHT YOU THE TYPE TO TAKE ON AN APPRENTICE," YuugenMagan added.
"Marisa?" Mima responded. "Oh, yes, Marisa is a very brave child. Marisa?"
"My parents had resolved to marry me off," Marisa said. "I met the guy. He wasn't a bad guy, but I didn't--couldn't--love him. I'm a Love Magician, see? So love is pretty important to me. So I ran away. I knew some magic already, and I figured I could hold my own in the forest."
"She was wrong, dreadfully so. Who do you think she ran into but me in all my terrible, soul-stealing glory?"
"But I didn't run away."
"She didn't run away, or faint, or cower, no, of course not,"
"I tried shooting her."
"But her power could not harm me."
"But I didn't back down. If I went down I wanted to go down fighting."
"I was impressed, and I needed an apprentice anyway."
"So she took me under her wing."
"And taught her the art of astrological magic."
"And I guess it paid off in the end, huh?"
"I owe my current freedom and fortress to her."
"No, she's far more than made up for it in her teachings."
"Well, that's Marisa."
"That's me."
"That's why she's here."
"That's why I'm here."
"HM," YuugenMagan said. "SO, COURAGE, IN THE FACE OF FEAR, IS WHAT MADE YOU CHOOSE HER AS AN APPRENTICE?"
"Well, that," Mima replied, "And that she was able to resist my natural fear aura."
"See, I'm a love magician," Marisa said. "Love, that's a lot of things: it's bonds between people, but it's more than that. It's also hope, and life itself. It's about overcoming limitations, about pushing against the inevitable and growing to surpass the impossible, you see? So, something like fear, that isn't something I can let get to me."
Rika nodded.
"Her powers are very different from mine," Mima said. "As such, she makes a good complement to me. With fortune, things my powers of death cannot vanquish will be overwhelmed by her power of love."
Rika nodded again. Yes, there was hope here, as well as despair.
And tiredness. Or, perhaps, that was just Rika's body complaining after a very long day.
Mima dug a timepiece which looked like, and probably was, an old-fashioned pocketwatch, out of a pocket in her skirt. "Anyway," she said. "I must retire now, if I am to heal. Marisa, will you show the guests to their rooms?"
"Yes, Master," Marisa replied. Mima nodded, and drifted off through a door; not literally, as one might expect a ghost to, but in a more normal way involving actually opening the door.
Rika looked around and saw that Meira had also long since left.
"Well," said Marisa, "Where to?"
Rika decided...
[ ] That it had been a long day, and she needed sleep now.
[ ] That a hot bath would be nice after such a day, before bed.
--
Apologies for the delay. Hopefully this post is long and info-filled enough to make up for it.