For the new thread's first vote, let's have:

[x] Kurodani Yamame
[x] Kicchou Yachie
[x] Iizunamaru Megumu

While we were talking about Reimu and the lost qilin, Marisa decided to run off on an adventure without warning, but she should come back to us eventually...
By the way, it has to be asked: which voting format do you prefer, based on the previous thread - cycling through groups of three in voted order or gradually replacing characters as they are voted for?

[x] Iizunamaru Megumu
[x] cycling through groups of three in voted order

Nooo Marisa come back...
I might need a Megumu discussion for reasons.

[x] Iizunamaru Megumu
Yamame has been experiencing a fandom renaissance lately, and I haven't researched any of these 2hus, but I'll have to choose the 10gu.
Here's a picture of her relative(?) for reference.

[x] Kurodani Yamame
ze spaider

[X] Kicchou Yachie

I like the dragon lady.

[x] Iizunamaru Megumu

I kinda like the fanon building up around Megumu.

[x] Iizunamaru Megumu

I prefer the gradual replacement.

[x] Kicchou Yachie

Starting anew with Iizunamaru Megumu.
Quite a robust, reference-heavy character. There is a lot to look into with her, but also a lot to expand upon. In many ways, she's great for modern-era fanworks, don't you think? By the way, her name is (a very weird nanori reading of the kanji for) "Dragon". What does that have to do with anything? I wonder...

>>18694
I feel like Megumu is a relatively popular modern era windows character. I think this is in part due to how well she contrasts with Aya. Megumu is lazy with her articles, single-mindedly attempts to concentrate wealth and power to the tengu, proud and boisterous, is second only to the Tenma, and despite her underhandedness works within the bounds of what's considered acceptable in Gensokyo. While Aya is a lower ranked, proud but more reserved journalist who despite consonantly chaffing against the social order and politics of Genskyo, earnestly tries her best to succeed by her society's standards despite her own politics being rather old fashioned and conservative by the standards of Gensokyo.
Despite all of that, she can be surprising gentle and kind to those she considers friends. She even seems to be entirely fooled by Tsukasa's act and seems to think the fox is a loyal, trustworthy, and straightforward steward. So despite her underhandedness, there's an earnest cute side to her, and considering her fortune slip I think that carries into her views of romance as well.
Due to how much she contrasts to Aya, I like to imagine she's actually the younger of the two, which would make her a young energetic relative given the position of Great Tengu due to nepotism. In this case she'd probably be niece or something like that to her mythological inspiration Izuna Gongen. In addition to that point, I'd probably cast her as someone more liberal, or perhaps just falling in line with the progressive liberal sensibilities of the current political climate in Gensokyo.
I'd love to see a total combat maniac like her in a fighting game.

>>18695
>I'd love to see a total combat maniac like her in a fighting game.

While we're on the topic, how do you think Megumu would work in a fighting game? We know she uses her tripod to bludgeon subordinates and she's got a whole dragon and stars theme going on with her. I image she throws stars and lasers at opponents to zone them out before rushing them down to beat them down with her tripod.
I also don't think we see a lot of Megumu's supposed battle maniac side in canon. I've read fanon doujins where she throws down with Momoyo and earns her respect that way, but I'd like to see her actively seek out conflicts to get involved in and fight people.
What I'm trying to say is that she should totally show up in CDS and beat the ectoplasm out of Mizuchi.

>>18699
Probably something like Shiki's knife from MBAACC with melee moves if it's not thrown yet. It doesn't have to be super complicated to get the point across.

Like a boomerang!

The character, as well as tengu in Touhou as a whole, seem to me to be inspired by the ‘men in black’, shadow government, state apparatus type stuff. In one of Unconnected Marketeer’s endings she’s plotting with Kanako right after using another kami for her own devices (UM Sanae endings), her tube fox subordinate establishes some kind of relationship with their shrine maiden Sanae (UM ending and Sanae and Tsukasa’s stage dialogue in UdoaLG) , and in her appearance in Lotus Eaters she claims that the Tengu completely control the flow of information in Gensokyo, and that Tengu wouldn’t sell out their own (https://mangadex.org/chapter/115ecc06-f7b2-4d50-a05f-fbe9400a403e/22). A bit on the nose there ZUN.

I see a lot of potential for her and her vulpine subordinate in Youkai Mountain intrigue plots.

Anyway, I was trying to search for materials on her inspiration, Izuna Gongen, and just kept hitting brick walls. The only source in English I could find on them was this article from the encyclopedia of Shinto (https://d-museum.kokugakuin.ac.jp/eos/detail/?id=9932).

The Japanese sources I tried to search for from their Japanese Wikipedia page weren’t uploaded online, so I can’t access them, which is a damn shame. If anyone has any scholarly / historic articles they could share on the character, They would be extremely well appreciated.

>>18699
For a combat maniac, I think rushdown could also be good. But imagine she's strike a pose each time she makes an attack she also strikes a pose, while her tripod would be a short, but annoying, disjointed hitbox.
To use picrel for what I imagine, at about the same distance to Reimu, Megumu would freeze up for a moment then attack with her tripod, hitting Reimu. So if someone tired to rush her down, if you got the timing right, Megumu would hit them with her tripod before they hit you. Of course if you do it too late or too early then Megumu is the one getting a face full of fist.

>>18701
Yeah, sadly there don't seem to be a lot of readily available sources on that, I do remember a doujin series where it's mentioned that Megumu was worshipped as a god once.
https://danbooru.donmai.us/pools/20436
So there's that angle to work with, although I don't view Megumu as someone as somber and calm as she's presented in this series. Even if Megumu looks like an grown woman she's pretty energetic and naive.
It's a cute contrast between that and her position as a daitengu.
More about tengu generally, I remember some myths I heard once about how the origin of japanese steel fan martial arts is from tengu.
I did also find this wordpress blog, which shines some light on why Megumu might have a stars theme due to Ilzuna Gongen having a connection to a deity of the cosmos. https://asceticsandpilgrims.wordpress.com/2012/11/24/takaosan/img_1914/
I don't know the truth of it, but seeing the merging of mythologies and how dim the lines between buddha, god, and youkai can be is fun. It's been mentioned that there are probably hermits among the tengu, it'd be kind of funny is there are some tengu-buddhists who are interested in properly playing their role as testers of faith instead of just slandering people in newspapers.

Izuna Gongen having connections to a star deity reminds me of the afterword of the Doujin Izunary Friend where the author says that Megumu's ability to manipulate the starry sky could be connected to the Youkai constellations named by Yukari as well as the Big Dipper and Tengu connections having ties to Okina.

>>18706
Oh yeah, I remember that doujin now! Megumu was really charismatic in that. Although reading the afterward again, it mentions a descent of Izuna Gongan, which makes me think of the word descendant. That makes me wonder, are Megumu and Ran relatives? Ah, Tengu and Amanojakuu might also be related, youkai families sure are weird.
Ex-punk mother and her blue Daitengu grandmother, an adoptive cat daughter, with a lazy Yukari in there for good measure. Of course if you put Megumu as a relative of Izuna instead of the tengu/god itself, then I guess they could be cousins, with Megumu being that one annoying ambiguously related family member.
Either way, despite her demeanor, might Megumu actually be surprisingly qualified for her position as a Daitengu? That's a scary thing to imagine, a stage 5 boss like her with such a gullible personality being really strong. Although she's also ended up alongside Shou in the, 'Snubbed from being playable by your subordinate.'
So sad, although that makes me think that Shou and Megumu might me a seriously amusing pair, someone as serious and harsh as Shou paired with someone as excitable and fight happy like Megumu. Not to mention they're both drunks considering touhou I think my assumption here about Megumu is correct, one a tengu, the other's a buddhist idol, and both of them are martial types.
Although I wonder who we'll see first, the other Daitengu or the Tenma. I wonder there's a white wolf Daiteng.

Ah, Megumu. Weird character for me. Have plenty to say and plenty of fondness for Tengu as a whole, but not much about her specifically. Like to headcanon her as a female version of J. Jonah Jameson when she isn't being a sinister mastermind.

Really, biggest question I have of Tengu as a whole is when we are going to see the other castes and who Tenma actually is. Did some research to actually figure out who it is but I'm still not entirely sure. Emperor Tenma is a pretty likely candidate but outside of Suika, ZUN mostly tends to stay away from the Great Youkai terrors of Japan.

Also, is it true that Lotus Eater implies that Tengu are NOT a caste based society?

>>18709
It's hard to imagine JJJ without spiderman, although I've seen him portrayed both as a coward and as respectable. Either way I can't imagine who her Spiderman would be, maybe Cirno? Since Aya and the ice fairy are friends.
I can't remember anything in Lotus Eaters that would imply Tengu aren't caste based, but I like to imagine the castes are racial with some positions like Daitengu being special in that each racial caste has a Daitengu they report to. Who in turn report to the Tenma, an individual chosen from among the Daitengu.
So Tengu can rise within their own caste, maybe even with the chance of becoming a Daitengu. But I like to imagine that who becomes the Daitengu is more decided by who you're related and your abillity for politics. Rather than the merits the of things like newspaper competition.
In general I think that despite the importance placed on them, newspaper competitions are actually a pretty bad way to raise your rank. As all of the higher up Tengus we've met have notably worse newspapers than Aya, but still have a higher rank within Tengu society.

>>18709
>Emperor Tenma
You seem to have confused Tenma with some other mythological figure? Tenma is equated with Mara, but I can't find any equations with emperors.

>who Tenma actually is.
As recently as three months ago I would've said that we will never get any more details on such background figures, but then ZUN went and made Iwanagahime into Ariya. Now, it seems, bets are off and Tenma may appear in person someday. Other than that, association with Mara is clearly useless - Mara is too major and powerful presence in Buddhism to be just chief of tengus in some refuge - so we can hardly say anything at all and can only hope for ZUN's interpretation.

>>18711
Sorry, Emperor Sutoku. One of the three great Youkai terrors of japan.

>Mara
Agree. Though he is a huge SMT fan, I don't think he'll include Mara.

>>18710
I could see her talking shit about Reimu. Also Chimata, I guess.

>but I like to imagine the castes are racial with some positions like Daitengu being special in that each racial caste has a Daitengu they report to
That makes sense. I'm not 100% sure if the Daitengu position was ever implied to be another type of Tengu. More so than that, Megumu is obviously a crow Tengu.

Maybe tengu who hold offices are given new, cooler names based on other mythological figures when they take that office, like some samurai? It'd avoid having to have explicit connections to the figures they're named after, like Izuna and Tenma/Mara. Maybe one of the reasons Megumu keeps Tsukasa around is so she can be more like Izuna? Do you think she mounts her?

>>18712
>I'm not 100% sure if the Daitengu position was ever implied to be another type of Tengu.
PMiSS article on tengu does imply that with listing Tenma and daitengu alongside crows and white wolves. After consultations about Japanese — in this case translation seems to be correct, and 種類 carries even stronger connotations of "biological" (however much that applies to youkai) categories than English term "type".

By the way, some other interesting tidbits from that article:

>Deified youkai who live on the mountain.
What exactly Akyuu means by "deified"? How whatever divine nature tengu acquired manifests itself? However much that entire article stinks of tengu propaganda, there must be some basis to such a claim. Could it describe "taking the mantle" of gods like >>18713 proposes?
(Awesome and very fitting idea btw, novel ideas like this is probably the best thing about character discussion threads)

>大体、姿は人間と変わらないが、大天狗みたいに極端に大きい天狗や、鼻高天狗の様に鼻の高い天狗がいたりする。
My attempt at translation:
>Generally they don't look different from humans, but there are extremely large tengu resembling daitengu, or tengu with long noses* like the Hanataka tengu.
*鼻の高い means "proud" ("nose in the air" works as English equivalent), but it seems in this context it also should be taken literally as a physical description.
Here, translation at wiki is incorrect — original text doesn't say that daitengu are extremely large, only that extremely large tengu exist and they are compared to daitengu. It could be just a wordplay (daitengu-big tengu), or perhaps some of daitengu are indeed large. In any case, concept of giant women among tengu is funny, even though it's extremely likely ZUN would either ignore that old bit of lore or turn it to be metaphorical. Doubly so with literal long-nosed tengu — he doesn't like anything close to deformities on 2hus (see e.g. his thought process on Utsuho).

>>18712
Reimu is a good choice, she says
>Megumu: As if I could let you deal with her, of all people! (Addressing Tsukasa)
>Megumu: Our opponent is the eminent Hakurei Shrine Maiden, who has buried countless innocent youkai until this day.
>Megumu: 'll deal with her. You get back!
That about her. She also made up with Chimata in chapter 38 of Lotus Eaters where she causes a minor incident to make up with Chimata, and also mogs Aya. I guess Marisa is an option but Aya already has dibs on hers. Anyways on there being other Daitengu, Megumu is mentioned as being one of the Daitengu in her profile as well as the chief of the crow Tengu, which is where I get the idea from. Although there could be a situation where Daitengu is just a special rank any race of Tengu can rise to, with chief being the leader of their racial caste. Although for simplicity's sake I think being a Tengu chief is synonyms with being a Daitengu.

>>18711
Well, we did have Suika as Ibuki-douji, but for what that's all about we'll have to wait for her week.

>>18713
In canon. . . Well Megumu seems to think that Tsukasa is relatively harmless, at least she's someone Megumu wants to protect. At the same time I feel like Chimata has more textual evidence with Megumu going out of her way to make up with her, which can be seen as romantic. Although I've also seen some depictions of Megumu who whores out Tsukasa to Momoyo while having a physical relationship with both.

>>18714
There's some conflation between Tengus and Buddhist gods. Although I'm not sure how that translates into Touhou. . .
Other than that I remember there being some correlation between Tengu and Amanozako, but I can't remember what exactly. My headcanon is that Tengu and Amanojaku were once the same species but evolved divergent traits over time and seperated.
Other than that they have the same anti-social rabble rousing personality that loves to stir up trouble with them both causing chaos. One by direct action and disguising themselves as humans, the other one through misinformation. One evolved to be more communal, the other more solitary.
But I think that's all pretty unfounded.
Aside from that I guess you could work with Tengu as the descendant of the same god as Amanojakus, with some optional relation to Sagume thrown in. But its unclear if Amanozako exists in Touhou.

Might Megumu have been inspired by Meg from Family guy? they have similar names and philosophies. Ponder it. Touhou Funny Moments.

As you can gather, votes will now be held on fridays, as it's a bit more convienient to start on weekends.
By the way, you can still continue the discussion while the vote is ongoing, but once a new character is selected, any further comments on previously selected characters can be made in >>17770 The Irregular Character Discussions Thread. Let's vote for the next discussion subject now.

[x] Kurodani Yamame
[x] Kicchou Yachie
[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

Since there were only two comments on the format, and each was in favour of a different option, I guess I can do whatever I want? Lol.

[x] Kicchou Yachie
I vote for the dragon turtle, she may have been cucked in the past but this time she'll have her chance.
Surely!

[x] Kurodani Yamame
ze spaider.

[x] Kicchou Yachie

doragon

[x] Kurodani Yamame
Spiderman

[x] Kicchou Yachie

dragoon

[x] Kicchou Yachie

Drag-On Dragoon

This week, it's Kicchou Yachie, the tortoise-dragon. Quite an unusual creature, right? She's quite an important figure in the Beast Realm, the Kiketsu Family's matriarch, actually. Her otter spirits are often thought of as scheming cowards, but is she like that herself? And let's not forget her ability - it's really quite powerful and terrifying, what do you think of it?

>>18730
For the otters personality wise I think it's hard to tell, the beast spirts don't have very distinct dialogue in WBaWC. However I see Yachie herself as someone polite but conceited, and like the other beast matriarchs she whole heartedly believes in her own ideology which she explains in ending no.8 of WBaWC.
There she says that all beast spirits, including herself, are resources meant to be used up. Which is where her disagreement lies with Keiki, as explained in Youmu's Otter ending. Keiki refuses to look at spirits, especially human spirits, in such a utilitarian way and would prefer to put an end to the endless struggle of the beast realm so she can work with the Matriarchs.
In a sense I think her ideology is the most pathetic as she just wholeheartedly believes in the current status quo of the animal realm. So I agree with Biten here, Yachie does seem a bit pathetic and I think that reflects on how people view her otter subordinates.
Aside from that, I think her ability plays a role in how people view her and the otters. There's the common sense that says,
>"of course the otters are pathetic and have weak personalities, a person like that would be most vulnerable to her ability,'
alongside the common sense that, says
>"of course someone with an ability like that would have a pathetic personality. They always get their way!"
There is also the fact we see an otter defector in chapter 48 Lotus Eaters, true he didn't leave of his own volition. But it says something to Yachie's leadership that he didn't even try to return and joined the Kappa. That and her secretly condescending personality comes across as the least charismatic, not to mention how in WBaWC its mentioned her plan was partly a failure in all routes and how in UDoaLG she gets outsmarted by Aunn on accident, she really does come across as someone pathetic carried by her strong ability. While the Wolves and Eagles seem to have some real loyalty to their matriarchs.

Aside from that, I've been a bit surprised to see both Risui and Fuuzasa do the idea of Yachie thinking Meiling is her sister. It's a bit of an odd pair, but it's played for comedy in both occasions and despite its mythological basing it doesn't feel as trite as its contemporary tropes that exist in the same vein. Although given how little time it has to become trite, unlike certain other tropes in touhou doujin, we'll just have to wait and see how it develops.

For Yachie, I feel she's been mismanaged by Zun in th19. She was supposed to be this super mastermind in th17 and just fails miserably.

>>18733
Femdom (domination loss) is now and will forever be a core part of her appeal.

To be fair to Yachie on that front, it’s a fairly recurring trend for Zun to downplay a schemer’s competence the next time they appear. See “Reimu takes her grandma to the hospital” for a classic example. And all three of the animal realm gangs took their lumps in th19 - Yachie just had the hardest time coping with it.

I find her the most flexible matriarch to work with. Saki is a bit of a meathead, and reconciling her nature with her past with Miko tends to result in fairly narrow paths she can tread character wise, while Yuuma is more of a force-of-nature villain whose influenceable personality makes whats truly ‘her’ harder to pin down.

Yachie feels the most fleshed out despite being simultaneously the most rootless. And the way she’s fleshed out is really interesting; characterising her as having few reliable minions and having to do much of it herself, Yuuma via Chiyari claiming she’s weak because she’s still at least somewhat kind and just faking her frosty demeanour, thw fact her organisation holds par with ones lead by an extra stage and a supposedly invincible taotie, there’s a lot of interesting ways she can be interpreted. I guess I’d say I feel like a longer story starring Yuuma or Saki would require leaning on their other connections, while Yachie could star in a story all by herself.

To be fair, of course, there’s a reason I’ve attached my name to all this.

>>18735
That is a big benefit of more solitary characters, they don't have much connections and are thus freer. Although I think it's worth noting, as a fandom we tend to play up the masterminds even when the games call them failure like Yachie in WBaWC or Zanmu is UDoALG.
Her having a frosty demeanor driving people away while secretly being nice in contrast to professed ideology is a really cute trait. That kind of contrast is pretty good and I think could provide some good contrast especially i she's put in a situation that tests that.
Although I think her lack of connections does also provide some narrowness, we only really have dragon turtle mythology to go off of there. As well as her friendship with Keiki, it's be nice to see these two together again.
I wonder if they could pull off a buddy cop duo...?

>>18739
> As well as her friendship with Keiki, it's be nice to see these two together again.
Friendship?.. Could you expand on it further? Is this ending thing I've missed?

>>18740
They're on good term in Youmu's Otter ending, although Yachie says friendship doesn't exist in the animal realm.
Honestly I think she protests too much, if a dimwit like Youmu can tell they get along well then she's hiding it pretty badly. That and Keiki considers them friends.

Alright, it's about time to vote for the next character. And time for your friendly reminder to make use of >>17770 The Irregular Character Discussions Thread, if you are so inclined. Well, not that it's been forgotten or anything.

[x] Kurodani Yamame
[x] Kotohime
[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

>>18744
[x] Kurodani Yamame
Spider wife, spider wife, wronged by Reimu who won't give her the credit she deserves.

[x] Kotohime

[x] Kotohime

POLICE!

Ack! I've ran out of time to effortpoast... Well, I have been quite busy this week.
I think I'll abstain from voitng this time, though, because I might not be able to post this week either. Really I'm just posting to kick myself in the ass to get something done for the character I voted for in the irregular thread... DAMN IT!

>>18748
You can still Yachie post until Monday UTC.

[x] Kurodani Yamame

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

>>18744
[X] Kurodani Yamame
Spider love OK!

It seems that Kurodani Yamame won this week. It's an often-ignored trait of hers, but she's actually quite strong, and appears to be good at construction work. She also has a pretty fun ability. Makes you wonder about things like... What kind of diseases does she like to manipulate the most? And what for?
By the way, looking into the history of the word "tsuchigumo" might be interesting to some.

>>18756
>tsuchigumo (土蜘蛛)
I won't be the first person to point out the possible word origin in tuchigomori (土隠) with the tsuchigumo being some sort of mythologization of peoples that existed at the edge of society or predated the japanese. It's not hard to see how those marginalized people, conflated with spiders, would become youkai–if that is the origin of the tsuchigumo people–or the Jomon–native peoples of Japan–could have been more Youkai-like or lived alongside the tsuchigumo before the modern japanese invaded the island. Interestingly enough another Jomon god, Keiki, now lives in hell.
The next thing I can think of is the connection with Suika/Shuten-doji. With both the tsuchigumo and Shuten-douji being targeted by Minamoto no Mitsunaka. Apparently there's a theory about how he was targeted by and in turn targeting the two is that his father formed an alliance with them, but betrayed them in order to save his own skin when the rebellion against the Fujiwara failed.
Although it's not like I have a copy of Truth in Fantasy–the japanese book where this theory comes from–on me so I'm only going by secondary sources here. Although I do feel like that makes an interesting premise for a story set pre-gensokyo.
For her depictions in canon, I like how she's gotten some recent appearances in CDS, with her having secret passages to the surface only she (and now others) know about. I like how she and Parsee are. Parsee is kind of her superior or a border patrol officer, but they still get along and even though Parsee chastises her it doesn't stop them for looking for exits from the underground. It's cute how she and Parsse try their hardest to hit Reimu only for them to get beaten effortlessly.
With all of the destruction Okuu and Reimu caused I'm sure the tsuchigumo won't be short of work soon.
Also sorry for being late, I was a bit busy with other things as well.

There was this Yamame story that was posted on 4chan a while back that I feel obligated to link here in its ao3 form:https://archiveofourown.org/series/4269622
It's called the Kirisame Magic Shop or KMS, but that's because the setup was Marisa's matchmaking service with Yamame being the character that was chosen by the Anon's in the thread. (Also it's a bit funny, in CDS Parsee tries the same trick she does in KMS, make Reimu sick using a scratch, only for Reimu to be completely unaffected in CDS)

>>18756
I've been trying and failing to find the time to post here, but I'm going to do it now.

I'm a big Yamame fan. I really like her personality in SA and everything she's been in since. I'm not sure if ZUN was trying to do a little subversion by having the first boss in the big bad underground be a pretty nice person, but it worked on me. I had a misconception for a while based on poor recollection that Yamame did try to attack and eat Reimu or Marisa in one route, but when I went back and actually read the dialogue again, I realised that she never actually tried to attack anyone and only retaliated - Even to the point where she said that there was a big party going on in the Ancient Capital and told either protagonist to feel free to join. Her profile mentions as well that she's bright and cheerful and doesn't spread disease unnecessarily, so she's not really much of a jerk either.

Nothing really indicates that she can spread anything other than some sort of influenza-like illness, but because I have to have my cake and eat it too, I always imagine her ability as complete manipulation of diseases and illness, so she could give you all sorts of other illnesses if she felt like it. She rarely does feel like it, though. I wish we had a little more information on what illnesses feel like to her. We know in SoPM that she describes mentally ill humans as 'spicy,' so I wonder if different mental illnesses or other neurological conditions affect tastes. Maybe humans with epilepsy taste sweet? Who knows.

I'm a big fan of her design. The big poofy dress to represent a spider's abdomen is lovely, and I never really noticed how her eyes are segmented until recently. I loved the SFW 'legs' and I espectially loved the CDS bow with the spidery look to it. I like that she has that hair bun, but mostly because I like thinking about hairstyles in general. She's clearly got a lot of hair to work with, so I wonder what other styles she could pull off.

And speaking of CDS, I was a big fan of her involvement. The interactions with Parsee were a joy to see when you consider how rarely some stage neighbours interact with each other. I liked how they had this frienship, although I didn't expect Yamame to be so out of touch with the Ancient Capital. (Side note: still mad about the CDS translator putting 'to the inch' when Yamame was rebuilding the Hakurei Shrine when the JP script had her use a significantly more accurate measurement) I wish I could have more to say as a result of WOoHS, but it was kind of nothing in the end. It did give good fortunes for childbirth though, so that's something.

A lot of what I think about is probably just headcanons. I like the fanon of her having plenty of troublesome sisters who all work construction (as opposed to CDS canon saying that she just directs the vengeful spirits), and I like the idea of her being a seamstress because of her skill with silk.

The KMS has already been mentioned, so I'll mention what I personally consider to be the best Yamame story: https://www.touhou-project.com/underground/res/14818.html
This story is the one that really kickstarted my spider appreciation phase, so I'll always be thankful for that. I loved how Yamame was written in this story so much, and I even really enjoyed the OC characters. The whole thing definitely had an influence on my own writing.

>>18762
>With all of the distruction Okuu and Reimu caused I'm sure the tsuchigume won't be short of work soon.
I'm actually surprised this hasn't been mentioned at all in CDS in either of the last two chapters. Yamame personally went to rebuild the shrine, so fair enough, but the sheer scale of the destruction in the underground was immense and it never even got a proper mention. Ah, well, at least I can still headcanon that the rest of the tsuchigumo worked on that.

>>18773
I didn't think of it at first, but that is weird. I wonder if ZUN specified they rebuilt the shrine or if the mangaka just used them due to not wanting to draw a bunch of spiders.
Although I suppose the vengeful spirits could just be the unpaid, slave labor, or near slave labor, of the shitty third world resort town that is the former capital of hell and the underground.

>>18774

Might also have been to not draw a bunch of Spider OCs. which is truly a tragedy if so.

Yamame's fun. It's interesting to have a world where ze spaiders are the construction experts, a very working-class sort of profession; they're usually associated more with silk and finery through their literal spider-silk. That lends them to this sort of 'savage noble' sort of idea, much like a vampire. see silksong for a classic example of that.

>>18775
I'd agree that it's just because ZUN/Akimaki Yuu didn't want to draw a bunch of spider OCs...if they hadn't already drawn a bunch of kappa OCs earlier in the story.

I totally agree on the funny juxtaposition between thei usually refined idea of silk and spiders and the rougher, working class construction vibe. I find it a really enjoyable place to explore, which is why I like writing and drawing spider OCs a lot. It means Yamame can simulatenously be portrayed as this hard working physical worker, and also as this delicate seamstress web-weaver.

Alright, let's start voting for next week's character now, as usual.
Please remember the >>17770 The Irregular Character Discussions Thread... Er, should it really be mentioned every time like that?

[x] Nagae Iku
[x] Kotohime
[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

A little later this week... Really sorry for not drawing much anymore, have an uninspired Yamame image...

>>18796
[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

[x] Nagae Iku

[x] Kotohime

[x] Kotohime

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

[X] Kotohime

It's Kotohime! Phantasmagoria of Dim.Dream certainly has an eclectic and eccentric cast, and Kotohime here is quite the character. I mean, what the hell was going through her head when she chose THAT as a civillian disguise? Hey, come to think of it, why does the Eastern Country have a police force at all? Is she really a police officer?

The great thing about PC-98 characters is that they're much more blank slates, so you can really go wild with them without much resistance.

Question for the crowd: Do you prefer 100% straight police force kotohime, slightly quirky but earnest princess doing her best kotohime, or straight-up looney-tunes kotohime? Personally, I enjoy them all, which is why K/Kotohime has bits of all three.

I have to say this - the commonly used translation of th3's endings is a bit inaccurate, so I'm just going to post my own translation of Kotohime's ending here, since it's relevant when it comes to interpreting and utilizing her character. I've excluded the common part of every ending where Yumemi threatens to blow up a four-dimensional positron bomb for brevity's sake.
The original text can be compared here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zj5RAM0tfg4 (starting at 12:14)
Or here: https://oosiro.nomaki.jp/th/ed/th03ed.htm (but this transcript is a bit faulty)

Yumemi: Anyway, I made a promise. I'll grant your wish.
Kotohime: No need.
Yumemi: Eh? Why's that?
Kotohime: It seems that you two really came from another world...
Yumemi: What do you mean?
Kotohime: See, I'm this world's police. I dressed up as a regular normal person and came to investigate you.
Yumemi: You don't look very normal 💦
Kotohime: ...There were many suspicious people here anyway.
Yumemi: And who would that be? 💦
Kotohime: People from other worlds are outside my jurisdiction.
Yumemi: Uh, I suppose.
Kotohime: Anyhow, it's best for you to leave this world immediately.
Yumemi: What's with this attitude 💢 I'm telling you I can grant your wish!
Kotohime: I don't think you'd be able to do much either way.
Yumemi: Don't underestimate the power of our science 💢 I can even blow up the entire Earth!
Kotohime: Well, do it ♥️
Yumemi: No, er, that was jut an example...
Kotohime: I was joking. But, if you insist, I'll let you grant my wish.
Kotohime: Basically, I'd like to see that shrine maiden I met on the way here again.
Yumemi: Hm? Well, that's a very easy task... But are you really a police officer?
Kotohime: Uh, I suppose.
Yumemi: Alright, we're going to bring you the shrine maiden.
Yumemi: Well, let's meet again some other day.
Later.....
Kotohime: I was just saying, but...
Reimu: Hey, you! Why did you wish for that?! 💢 I haven't done anything!
Kotohime: Well, there are hardly any criminals around, and we've got all these cages, so why not put you there...
Reimu: Hey, hey, hey, let me go this instant! 💢
Kotohime: Mm, when I get enough of it ♥️
Reimu: What did I dooooooo... 💦

The wiki seems to describe her as if she's primarily a princess (well, an お姫様, a young noblewoman), but in her ending (>>18805), she says in pretty clear terms that it's her idea of an unassuming disguise for going undercover to investigate the ruins. Of course, considering her omake profile (available on the wiki), it could have been a lie, maybe she's a noblewoman, but it's still something to consider.
I'm inclined to believe that it's true, and that she really is a police officer, originally from... er, the outside world, or something like that. I like to imagine that she was quite a nuisance due to her eccentricities, so her higher-ups transferred her to an extremely remote area to get rid of the trouble of keeping her around, and eventually, because no crime happened there and she had nothing to do, she was forgotten and got spirited away to the Eastern Country without noticing it. I think it's a pretty funny idea. In >>18804's terms, I guess that's somehow all three as well, in its own way?

But however you see her, she's probably the easiest old work character to integrate into modern-style Touhou, isn't she? She can be pretty much just a specific brand of strange person from the humans' village, so if you don't want to make up an original character for such a role, you can introduce her quite comfortably.

I like to imagine that Kotohime is more of a LARPer than a legitimate police officer. Like a kooky noblewoman who decided to appoint herself the role, and nobody could tell her no. I didn't know that she was supposed to be in disguise during PoDD though, that's interesting. I always figured she got bored after PoDD and found some other random thing to do, but maybe she was more serious about it than I thought.

Well, that wasn't much, but it's not really a problem. I imagine it's the contest (our congratulations to the winners!). But if it's Kotohime's fault, I'll have to see her about her behaviour.
Let's vote for the next week's discussion subject.

[x] Nagae Iku
[x] Yomotsu Hisami
[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

[x] Nagae Iku

Also, Didn't Hisami already got discussions in the previous threads?

[X] - Nagae Iku
Funny oarfish lady

[x] Nagae Iku

[x] Nagae Iku

>>18844
>Also, Didn't Hisami already got discussions in the previous threads?
Nope

[x] Nagae Iku

Flamenco!

[x] Yomotsu Hisami

Iku surely wins, but I'll simply register my vote for the sex creature

[x] Yomotsu Hisami

Grape.

Well, it seems that Nagae Iku is the discussion subject this week. Good with weather, good with people - at least that's what her ability of reading the atmosphere seems to imply. But maybe it's just meteorology? She's doesn't seem to be the only messenger of the Dragon Palace... Do you think they're all oarfish, or is she the only ryuuguunotsukai that's a ryuuguunotsukai?

Iku isn't a 2hu I think a lot about, but I'll try my best. She doesn't appear a lot, probably due to how lazy and content she is, as her profile in SWR states. Usually I see her paired with Tenshi due to the Hinawai family being her superiors.
I get the impression that she lives a very relaxed life above the clouds, communing with the Dragon God and not doing much else, but according to her appearance in Grimoire of Usami she's actually quite busy, I imagine it's due to the trouble Tenshi causes.
I like the fact that despite being an elegant woman, one of her techniques is infusing her body with lightning and just throwing herself at you. That mix of elegance and barbarism is always nice, despite the fact her feet never touch the ground. I get the impression she's a skilled hand-to-hand combatant when she goes all out.
Other than that I think the reason her species, Oarfish, are used as messengers is due to their adaptability. Perhaps the dragon god is a creature that is physically and/or spiritually hard to communicate with, instead of just reclusive, so the adaptable Oarfish take on physiological traits that allow them to better serve and understand their master.. Something ZUN brought up in her WOotHS comment. Of course this has a double meaning with her ability to read the atmosphere, not only can she read literal atmospherics, but she has a good read of people and the attitude of the room, allowing her to act accordingly.

>>18852
>Perhaps the dragon god is a creature that is physically and/or spiritually hard to communicate with, instead of just reclusive, so the adaptable Oarfish take on physiological traits that allow them to better serve and understand their master..
That's a pretty evocative idea, I wonder if there are any fanworks focused on the Dragon God. It's basically uncharted territory as far as I know.
I wonder what other oarfish youkai are like, too. Iku can't be the only one of her kind, so it would be pretty interesting to explore the species.

Unrelated, but I like how she's frequently depicted soaring through a vast blue sky in fanart. It's so romantic...

>>18853
I like the idea of the Dragon God being something hard to communicate with because then he/it can still be active in the story, but at the same time distant, only able to communicate through his direct servants who themselves are merely better suited to interpret what he says.
I'm a big fan of her being present against the sky as well. Combined with Iku's ability and her service to the Dragon God, it gives me the idea of him being hard to communicate with because he became something akin to the environment of Gensokyo, so the Oarfish have to determine what he's trying to communicate by reading the weather. Then, when people talk about the dragon palace, they're more referring to the Dragon God's estate, which he can't physically be at anymore due to physically being the environment of Gensokyo.

>>18851
But to answer the question of the week, yes I think all the messengers are Oar fish, but that's because I like the idea of the Oar fish having some specialty that's needed by the palace.

Iku is one of those characters who often exists to facilitate another character. In this case, she's around to prove that Tenshi's antics aren't going unnoticed, and are often quite foolish.

With that said, there's some fun things there, though I would say Iku has some of the most 'anti-canon' common fanons. The whole 'spouse-hunting veils' thing was something iku disparaged, but it's lead to her being seen as a husband-hunter herself. And likewise, it's often taken that despite having the ability to read the weather, she's actually terrible at reading the mood. Like, there's a fifty-percent chance whatever canon details are given about her get 100% reversed on her, and I just think that's funny.

That aside, I think she works great as a foil to Tenshi. She very much has this perfect 'the boss's daughter is trouble but she's not a problem I can fix so just gotta knuckle under' vibe. And I wonder at times if they'd be happier in each other's positions; tenshi being able to roam the world with less restrictions, and iku not having to chase after dumb celestial brats.

>>18854
I suspect that the reason oar fish are seen as messengers is because of japanese mythology. Oarfish live extremely deep in the ocean, and only come to the surface when they're going to die. And they swim vertically, of all things.

They're often seen as harbingers of doom in japan. Because I mean, come on, silvery serpentine creature rises to the surface, hangs straight-up like on an invisible fishing hook underwater, and then dies not long after? if you're an ancient japanese fisherman and see that shit, you're officially moving careers to ancient japanese farmer from then on. Likewise we can see Iku trying to warn people about the incoming earthquakes.

I feel like Iku being the ever-aggrieved babysitter of Tenshi is her lot for the moment...but also, if she and Tenshi were to suddenly separate, Iku would be happier... for a time.

I think she'd start to feel like Squidward in the "Squidville" episode. Where at first she's pretty happy, but then her life slowly drains out to nothing but a dull, repetitive tedium.

Because Tenshi, for all the trouble she causes, definitely livens up her life. Iku may never have even gone to Gensokyo if Tenshi hadn't caused trouble, and even if she did... Iku wouldn't have stuck around and actually interacted with people.

All at the whims of this spoiled Celestial daughter...

>>18857
That makes sense, Oarfish are also scaleless which certainly gives them a mythological feel.
Although funnily enough, the dragon palace isn't on the sea floor but the moon. So the Oarfish going to the surface probably weren't coming from the dragon palace, but going towards it. I guess they ones that died are the ones who proved unworthy or unable to adapt to the position they aspired to be as the Dragon God's servants.
Either way there's some irony there where Oarfish still warn people about earthquakes, just not the Oarfish humans normally expect. That thought gives me the image of human-form Oarfish like Iku who act and deliver messages on their master's behalf in the outside world.
But on her personality, even when she disparages people in SRW, she disparages them for their shitty personalities and things that are their fault. Yuyuko being vague and hard to understand, Yukari threatening people even in defeat, Suika who doesn't take other people into account, how Remilia is too self centered. and how Reimu never acknowledges how much other people worry about her.
So she highly values respect and manners, she even says so herself in her versus script dialogue.

Week's up and it's votes... How about...

[x] Hoshiguma Yuugi
[x] Yomotsu Hisami
[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

[x] Hoshiguma Yuugi
Oni love, Oni life.

[x] Yomotsu Hisami

[x] Yomotsu Hisami

[x] Yomotsu Hisami

[x] Hoshiguma Yuugi

This is my oni chance (this week, at least...)

[x] Yomotsu Hisami

[x] Yomotsu Hisami

Grape

The people have chosen Yomotsu Hisami!
She's surprisingly beautiful for a yomotsu-shikome - unless that flower-veil is covering something up. Seems to do her job pretty well, unless she doesn't want to do it well. But why do people need to be lured into Hell in the first place?
By the way, there are grapes, but no bamboo shoots...

>>18870
Ah, Hisami. What a sense of deja vu this is.Two years ago, UDoALG had just launched and the previous character discussion thread landed on her via dice roll. My post in that thread essentially said that I had nothing to say about her because she had little character of her own and what was there essentially just revolved around Zanmu. Any stories I could find featuring her at the time were yuri (and usually just smut light on character work), and what little else there was didn't particularly inspire any feelings in me.

In my own words:
>So, yeah. Not much to say on that front. She's the weakest of the UDoALG cast because she's a character who entirely revolves around another. I'd have rather talked about any of the others.

Here we are, two years later, and...Nope, nothing's really changed. She never got a manga cameo and the only thing she's shown up in since is WOoHS, which doesn't really provide much except for mentioning that she's easy to distract with food like grapes or bamboo shoots to make a quick getaway. That'd be good for a quick gag, I guess. Still not much to build a character around. Biten got a manga chapter at least (Enoko and Chiyari didn't get much either though). I still feel that any story that substantially features her would have to be a story that substantially features Zanmu, and at that point it'd probably be more of a Zanmu story than a Hisami story, because the majority of Hisami's actions would inevitably be to inspire some particular feelings in Zanmu.

>>18871
I guess there is that mythological connection with Izanami and dosojins in general, so I guess you might be able to do something with, Nareko and Chimata, but yeah she's very Zanmu-centric and unlike a lot of other characters like that she doesn't have the benefit of two decades worth of material, she's very new and like the fandom ZUN has his preferred set of 2hus he likes to have reappear so it's unclear when she'll appear again.
But I feel like that's all there really is to say on the matter.

There's not alot of stuff I have to say about Hisami, but the most I have is the concept of her ability to never let things escape her grasp emphasizes how her relationships are parasitic.
Aside from that, I don't know how I'd use Hisami in a story. Yes There's Zamnu but there's so little about Hisami that I feel like the most that can be said about her is her servitude to Zamnu. Its kinda ironic cause I've seen more fanworks involving Ariya and Yuiman, characters that debuted 3 months ago than a character who existed for 2 years.

>>18871
>Two years ago, UDoALG had just launched and the previous character discussion thread landed on her via dice roll.
Damn, I should have checked more thoroughly, since I didn't want to repeat previous characters, but she never got a header post and was rerolled after a bunch of people wrote that they have nothing to say about her, so I guess it's fine.

Not to be trife, but if people are still saying that they don't have much to say about her, does that mean she has to get rerolled again?

>>18875
Well four people voted for her, presumably they have something to say about her.
I didn't vote for her but I still gave my thoughts, no matter how little they are.

HISAMI...

First of all, what a funny design. Grapes, of all things. Apparently its linked to how Izanagi threw his headdress down and it became grapes, which stopped the pursuing Yomotsu-Shikome? Somehow? Anyway, did you know that they've been growing grapes in Japan since around 700 AD? I thought they were like, a European exclusive thing. Apparantly Japanese grape varieties are quite delicious, too! They're super big, and they're normally eaten after peeling the skin off (which with their varieties is easy to do).

Anyways, uh, the Touhou character. I have to admit that they're not the most inspiring to me personally. I suppose you could have her be some kind of 'hell employment/immigration manager', where she 'drags' people/yokai/gods/whatever to hell by promising them employment there? or you could have her be some kind of recurring, terminator type antagonist that keeps coming back. That'd be funny, I think.

Anyway, her origin as a Yomotsu-shikome... They're mentioned as inhabitants of Yomi, which IIRC was the Shinto land of the dead before Buddhist ideas of the afterlife were accepted. Are they a specific subspecies of youkai hag or is it a role one can be trained or selected for? Is the reason that she's beautiful because they couldn't find any ugly hags for the job anymore?

To finish, here's an interesting paper on Yomi. I couldn't find any specific studies or folklore tales about Yomotsu-Shikome, sadly.

https://dl.ndl.go.jp/view/prepareDownload?contentNo=1&itemId=info%3Andljp%2Fpid%2F9591326

Well, there are some girls there ultimately isn't much to say about! (Though she does seem to have a fair bit of fans... Maybe they just like her for her appearance.)
Either way, let's vote for the upcoming week's character.

[x] Hochiguma Yuugi
[x] Letty Whiterock
[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

[x] Hochiguma Yuugi

whoops i typoed

>>18896
That's fine. We all make mistakes!

Tenkijin Chiyari

>Maybe they just like her for her appearance.
(You) are not that shallow, are you? Maybe I shouldn't throw stones from a glass house...

[x] Hochiguma Yuugi
New fumbo just dropped.

[x] Letty Whiterock

[x] Letty Whiterock

[x] Hochiguma Yuugi

[X] Letty Whiterock

Let's give the often-overlooked snow lady some love!

[X] Letty Whiterock

Let's discuss Letty Whiterock this week. Winter's just begun, so it's only appropriate.
You know, for a yuki-onna, she's surprisingly western-styled. I really wonder why... She's also apparently much stronger than she appears in Perfect Cherry Blossom - that's what ZUN said anyway, that her full power could cause an incident. That might be a fun premise for a fanwork. Though, regardless of her strength, would she even want to do that?

>>18905
Yeah, I wonder how strong she is, she also alludes to herself being strong when Aya interviews her during the events of PCB, later published in BAiJR.
>https://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Bohemian_Archive_in_Japanese_Red/Letty
>Oh, that's a good idea. Well, that's what I'd like to say, but I manipulate the cold. Don't confuse it with manipulating cold air like a certain fairy.
>Those fairies are just minor anomalies of nature. I, on the other hand, am a great youkai that lives in nature. When it's chilly out, making it even chillier is my greatest joy.
This actually is a pretty notable comment, since before this and POFV (released 3 day apart,) what Cirno was was kept more ambiguous. In PCB she's an ice youkai and in EoSD she's an icy fairy of the lake. Of course the lore around fairies back then wasn't very developed either, but now-a-days it looks like they might have more in common with gods, and youkai-like fairies like Luna and maybe Cirno are the exception or anomalies.
Although in that same vain, the part where she downplays Cirno in the interviews is funny in a post-HSiFS and fairy-manga world. Despite her dismissal of Cirno, the 9 herself does apparently have something special about her.
Unlike the mundane Letty who despite ZUN's claim way back that she's actually pretty strong. It sort of gives me an image of Letty as this stuck up person who's already made it, looking down at an up and coming youth who has more potential than her.

For fanwork Letty's the only one that's notable off the top of my head is the mysterious and reliable big sister from Advent Cirno. Although for what motive I she could have for an incident, I'm drawing blanks. She doesn't have much on her as a character and she seems pretty sedate, non-confrontational, calm even if a bit proud. Although I'm sure some particular motive could be given to her, I guess the most trite one would be romance.
But off the top of my head I know they Yuuki-ona also have a similar type of icicle woman youkai they're related to. But in general, I think a lot of the stronger versions of her, have a lot of overlap with the more calm Yuuka's, down to an antagonistic relationship to Cirno. At the same time, Yuuka feels more versatile since the garden of the sun and her house feel like they could easily tie into other things.
Compared to Letty who's just a Cirno character, even then Cirno has a way stronger supporting cast now. Letty didn't make it that much in the team 9 days, but now they Cirno has actual friends and team 9 isn't needed to be her supporting cast, it feels like Letty is left even more by the way side.

>>18906
>But off the top of my head I know they Yuuki-ona also have a similar type of icicle woman youkai they're related to.
Ah, tsurara-onna! Though it's really more of a folk tale than any actual fully realised youkai. In bishoujo works about folk tale creatures, she does get treated as a separate species sometimes, but from reading about her, I don't get the impression that it was anything more than a series of similar folk tales. Maybe variations of the yuki-onna myth or something.

>>18907
Yep, that's what I was thinking of. It gives her someone else to be proud towards.
>I manipulate the cold, not ice. Don't confuse it with manipulating cold air like a certain icicle woman.
Sort of like the Kappa-Yamawaro conflict but it literally consists of two women who are very similar. Although it's nothing more than a bit piece.

A character that's based on a very popular yokai, and yet only achieves middling popularity.

Being a 'seasonal' character, she embodies aspects of her season, Winter. Mostly she seems to embody snow and snowstorms: while in the moment, snow cn severely hinder movement and even trap people in places, once it gets warm enough it all just melt away. As well as this, Winter snowstorms and cold snaps can come suddenly and are very deadly... but obviously only happen in Winter.

She's actually been seen active outside of winter, namely in Hopeless Masquerade. Makes you wonder what she does in her downtiem other than hibernate. I wonder if she's acquainted with the Grassroots Network? Maybe she's not interested in them because she's already 'made'... She's seen in the Mausoleum in Hopeless Masquerade with Cirno, the Three Fairies, Medicine and Yuuka, but just as background extras.

As other people have said, there's some potential with something between Cirno and her. Maybe where she realises that the little upstart Cirno isn't actually all talk? Or maybe some kind of horror story, where she ambushes some traveller, stalking them as they try to escape her snowstorm, or maybe a story using the romantic aspects of the Yuki-Onna? Who knows, maybe she's surprisingly warm.

As an aside, what body type do you think she has? She seems to be adult sized (or at least Yuuka sized) in Hopeless Masquerade, and I've only seen one instance of loli Letty where her powerlevel and size were directly linked to how cold she was. There's a surprising amount of plump Letty stuff, which doesn't make much sense considering the original legend focused on teh Yuki-Onna snow woman appearing to be unsuitably prepared for the winter cold... having a thick layer of blubber is like being prepared fro the cold, right?... Me personally, I imagine her as beautiful and calm, but also very distant ("cold", get it? She's "cold". Maybe even to the point of being an "Ice Queen"!) a bit spindly, and ready to strike out given an opportunity. She's also apparently based on an Agatha Christie character, so you could take some inspiration from there. Letty in a murder mystery!?

Letty sure is a character that exists in Touhou. She leaves last impressions to the fandom, giving her notable personality traits such as: fat

and cold

I find the most notable thing about her the near complete void of memorability she is. Stage 1 boss are often forgettable but she's used in almost nothing for fan works. The reasoning I've had to think of for this is her lack of any connections to any other character; and than the one she does is Cirno, who you'd probably use in a similar story role if you want a ice power person.

>>18909
>Murder mystery
Cirno is better for this as well since she doesn't die when she is killed.

It still hasn't started snowing, I hate that. Okay, voting time.

[x] Hoshiguma Yuugi
[x] Kumoi Ichirin (feat. Unzan)
[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

[x] Hoshiguma Yuugi
Finally, it's her time to shine.

[x] Kumoi Ichirin (feat. Unzan)
grandpa complex perchance

[x] Hoshiguma Yuugi

Yakuza DOG Tenkaijin Chiyari gave FALSE TESTIMONY UNDER OATH (YES FALSE) so the YAKUZA CRIMINAL COURTS could DEFRAUD ME of MY RIGHTFUL INHERITANCE, so I have NO QUALMS letting her ROT, UNLOVED AND UNVOTED FOR.

[x] Hoshiguma Yuugi

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

>>18915
Dear Anonymous No. 18915,

I am writing to bring to your attention certain actions of yours that are causing serious harm to my client, Tenkajin Chiyari, personal and professional standing. I have learned that you have made numerous false and defamatory statements about my client on 2025/12/07 Sunday 02:39 on Touhou-Project.com, thread "Touhou Character Discussions - 4", post number 18915, where you claimed that my client defrauded you and gave false testimony under oath in court.

Your allegations are not only unfounded but constitute defamation. Since Tenkajin is a law-abiding youkai, such baseless claims can have a severe impact on my client's career and standing within the community.

Defamation is an offence and is defined as the act of making untrue statements about another which damages his or her reputation. Making false assertions about someone else, whether in writing or orally, is unlawful and may leave the perpetrator liable for damages.

In order to protect Tenkajin's reputation and to prevent further harm, I hereby demand that you immediately cease and desist from making any more false and damaging statements about me on any platform or via any medium. Further, I demand that you remove or retract all false and damaging statements that you have published so far.

Additionally, I insist that you issue a full and public apology for these false statements, and acknowledge that your previous allegations were indeed baseless. This apology should be given the same level of prominence as your initial defamatory statements, and it should explicitly state that your previous allegations were false and unfounded.

Please understand that this letter serves as a final warning and is not an exhaustive or complete statement of Tenkajin Chiyari's legal rights, remedies, claims, or defenses, all of which are expressly reserved. Failure to comply with these demands could lead us to pursue legal action against you, where we will seek damages for defamation.

I expect your immediate action to address this issue, with a response no later than 2025/12/09 00:00.

Yours sincerely,
Anonymous No. 18920

Chiyari can never win in life, huh.

(Whoops, Letty was number 54, actually.)
Despite everything, it's Hoshiguma Yuugi.
A rough, rambunctious and oni-like oni, the so-called unexplainable phenomenon. Though, really, she's quite straightforward, so this title seems off... Does she have a mystery to her? Maybe it has something to do with her involvement with the Big Four. Though, considering the origin of the particular phrasing of her ability... Should this power of hers be taken so literally?

Yuugi, Yuugi, Yuugi. She's probably my favorite 2hu, which is odd since I haven't written anything about her.
I like the other Onis as well, but my love for them is entirely overshadowed by my love for Yuugi.
Writing wise, although she's typically confined to the underground it feels like although she has less of a mythological basis, she also has a lot less baggage compared to the other Onis. I think the less baggage thing is also true from the in universe point of view as well, especially now that Suika has the whole Mizuchi thing going on. Even before that, unlike her sisters, Yuugi wasn't a hobo or a weirdo hermit.
In fact, despite how laid back and oni-like she can be, Yuugi really is responsible and takes her job seriously as the manager of Former Hell's hot spring district.
I really liked seeing her in CDS as well, and honestly it's a shame she didn't appear in WaHH, I want to see what her and Kasen's relationship is like. I hope she and Suika show up again. Actually, she had a decent appearance in whale tits as well. I think those appearances also respectively highlight her oni-like qualities, agreeing with Mizuchi's grudge and her responsibility in how she dealt with Reimu and whale tits. Although in whale tits she did still try to get into a fight, she *is* an Oni after all. And I imagine she's occasionally annoyed by their antics, Kasen hardly holds herself in a straightforward matter and Suika's a bit of a bum, unlike Yuugi who has a job and responsibilities to other people that keep her busy in Former hell. So I like to think Yuugi resents Kasen and Suika for their choices, but also respects them for it so she can hold a conversation with them but at the same time they can annoy her. Especially since they get to hang out on the surface all the time, it is a bit of a running theme of characters in Former Hell resenting their position, and how people feel about them.
For the history of her character, it's a bit amazing to me that her being the manager of the hot springs district, and thus probably some type of official employed by Satori and/or an important leader amongst the Oni, is so recent a development. Although considering she was a member of the big 4, her being important to the Oni isn't that surprising.
In SA it's only mentioned she's an Oni who moved down alongside the rest of them when new hell was made.
For clothes, I think the kimono is her work uniform and the gym-like clothes are her casual wear. On the topic of Yuugi, there's also the question of what flavor of Yuugi do you like best? Zun clothes, Kimono, an actual gym uniform? What personality do you like best? Yuugi's almost always a big sister but there's so many flavors of big sister to go around, but I'm partial to her being surprisingly pure.

>>18923
Considering that her ability's name is a reference to Confucianism my preference is that it's not actually describing things she has supernatural control over. Rather the unexplainable phenomenon of "anomalies, strength, disorder, or spirits," she's good at inspiring courage, devious rebellion, has a fierce spirit, and is a person who thrives among disorder and spirits, being why she's granted authority over them as a manager of the Old Capital's Hotsprings District and the Oni who moved into the Capital's old market district. And as part of that, I think unlike Suika and Kasen, she's probably very charismatic, a real leader who can bind a rag tag group like the Oni underneath her. Compared to Suika and Kasen who left the first chance they got when it looked like she had things handeled.
Although funnily enough, considering how Confucius was in his youth, I think Yuugi would have a grudging respect for him even if he's not very Oni-like.

>>18925
>On the topic of Yuugi, there's also the question of what flavor of Yuugi do you like best? Zun clothes, Kimono, an actual gym uniform?
It's got to be her original ZUN outfit. It's the most balanced option, and the reddish-purple contrasts well with the white of her shirt. Now, kimonos are great, they're beautiful, comfortable, versatile and elegantly constructed, but I'm too much of a pedant to enjoy the way hers is drawn in Goyoki Ibun. The colour suits her, though. A gym outfit is ridiculous, since she's not a schoolgirl, and doesn't even really look much like one. It's only good for fetish fanart, which would have different priorities anyway.

>Considering that her ability's name is a reference to Confucianism my preference is that it's not actually describing things she has supernatural control over. Rather the unexplainable phenomenon of "anomalies, strength, disorder, or spirits," she's good at inspiring courage, devious rebellion, has a fierce spirit, and is a person who thrives among disorder and spirits
That's more or less how I interpret it too - it looks more like a description of her as a person than anything else. The phrasings of Touhou abilities generally aren't literal, and Yuugi's is certainly one of the more metaphorical ones.
By the way, the "wield" in her ability is 持つ in the original text. The translation isn't particularly wrong in this context, but the word means something closer to "have" or "possess", and "[trait]を持つ" seems to be a somewhat common way to describe dispositions, which is why I'm inclined to interpret it this way.

I drew her accidentally urm sorry... I prefer her to look more youthful, cute and androgynous, but that's just my taste. I haven't really seen such depictions, but I've never looked for them either.

>>18926
Her kimono is probably my favorite, but I like to imagine she has a pretty big wardrobe. I like your depiction of her, she's pretty cute even if a bit broad shouldered. For depictions, although all touhous tend to look pretty cute and short in Zunstyle Yuugi usually ends up as the tall one between the three Onis. Suika's first appearance solidified her as the shortest of the group, while WaHH has Kasen being taller than Reimu, but Yuugi tends to look pretty massive even while sitting down. Massive in more ways than one, despite not being the lewd pink herself, I feel like Yuugi tends to be given bigger proportions. I like to imagine her and Kasen as the same height, but with Yuugi being all around larger that Kasen, but without making Yuugi a gorilla.
Speaking of gorilla's, pic rel is a pretty funny depiction. Although bear yuugi is, in my experience even, rarer than fox Junko.

She's also a pretty good expy.

>>18928
I have no idea who that is but I'm going to assume she's gacha slop.

>>18929
I don't want to reply to any post with the word "slop" in it, but that character's called "Hoshiguma", looks really similar to Yuugi and has a really similar character to her.

>>18930
I don't want to reply to any post that isn't touhou character, but thank you for explaining who your slop girl is.

>>18931
Anyway, the point is that this character is famous enough to be copied by other settings, so it's pretty good.

>>18932
It might be a case of both characters referencing the same traits of their mythological inspiration, but I haven't done enough research on Hoshiguma-douji to confirm or deny that.

>>18933
Cute Suika-sized Yuugi, but I don't know much about Hoshiguma-douji myth wise, aside from the mythological name being made up of the characters for star and bear. Other than that most of the stuff I look for involving Hoshiguma usually involves Shuten-doji taking center stage and Hoshiguma being an offhand mention. So, although I don't know the property that's being referenced, that game might actually be referencing touhou in some form.
That or their pulling from a greater pool of oni folklore to fill in a character that's essentially a blank space.

Speaking about greater Oni myths, Akyuu offhandedly mentions Buddhism being a popular religion among the Oni. There is also some relation between Hermits and Oni, at least going by Zanmu so that made me curious on why the Oni have those connotations.
Eventually I stumbled upon this book: Japanese Demon Lore, https://muse.jhu.edu/book/1077/pdf/download
In it, it mentions the usual regard Oni, them being a metaphor of seditious groups or peoples outside of the Emperors control, their association with cannibalism and shapeshifting, but also some things which I think explain the above correlations in Touhou.
The book mentions a myth about a mountain hermit turned Oni, who did so in order to take a consort of the emperor away from him and have sex with her right in front of the emperor. There is also a mention of the founder of Shugendō, an esoteric buddhist school having two Oni students who were orphans and were taken in by him. It goes on to mention how children suspected of being Oni were thrown out or killed, and that a life as a Buddhist monk was often their only alternative aside from death.
There are also stories of men who prey on women and are identified as Oni in the stories, although since Oni in touhou canon are said to be straightforward and the only Oni we know of to be pure-blodded, Yuugi, is currently very forthright, I wonder if those predators would be Oni in Touhou? Maybe they'd be Amanojaku or Jinyou like Seija, Mizuchi, or the Fortune Teller. Oni certainly have depictions that have them not being rapists, but rather easily manipulated by the target of their affections, with one story where a wife tells an Oni she'll leave her husband for him in exchange for his three treasures, tricking him into handing the miracle mallet over alongside an invisibility hat and a cloak of rain. Indeed the miracle mallet, and wish granting devices in general seemed to have become a common treasure among Oni.
It's certainly an interesting connection since the Miracle Mallet is also a creation of Daikoku, a god who was dethroned by the Lunarians, who the Japanese royal family descend from. Interesting thing there, Oni, people outside of the Emperor's (Lunarian descendant) power use wish granting items associated with an enemy of the Lunarians. While also being the target of people's hatred, that's not to imply I think the myths are only a smear campaign, I don't doubt there were some truly evil Oni, but there's certainly else there aside from bad Oni and good humans.
Daikokuten also has Oni-like depictions, black skinned with six arms, but that's more Indian, with the Japanese Daikoku having an Oni servant, Dakini (one of my last member of the big 4 candidates personally). There are also Oni who do act straightforward, but they aren't described in great detail.
Anyways I recommend the book, it's a great read for Oni lore.

I guess I've already drawn Yuugi, so...
Let's vote again as usual.

[x] Yuki & Mai
[x] Kumoi Ichirin (feat. Unzan)
[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

She’s waited long enough, people. Let’s go ahead and give Chiyari her time to shine!

>>18937

Not on my watch.

[x] Kumoi Ichirin (feat. Unzan)

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

[X] Yuki & Mai

[X] Yuki & Mai

The funny witch coworkers!!!

[X] Yuki & Mai

[X] Tenkajin Chiyari

[X] Kumoi Ichirin (feat. Unzan)
As much as i love chiyari im not feeling to talk about her this week

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari
time for stinky

[x] Kumoi Ichirin (feat. Unzan)

[x] Kumoi Ichirin (feat. Unzan)
not one person likes Chiyari

>>18941 here
Changing my vote from Yuki and Mai to Ichirin and Unzan.

[-] Yuki & Mai
[X] Kumoi Ichirin (feat. Unzan)

Hurray! Yay! Hurray!
It's going to be the stylish lady, Kumoi Ichirin (and the old man, Unzan) this week. A brave girl who wasn't scared of youkai at all, to the point of becoming one, and an imposing but shy cloud-man - they're often not given as much attention as other Myouren trainees, but what do you think of them? Do you have any ideas for them?

I see Ichirin as a straightman more often than not, often being paired with Futo as a dysfunctional tom-and-jerry-esque dustcloud brawl incident resolving duo.

She's such a straightman that it might even be too much. She's a bit limited as a character. However there could be some interesting non-comedy stuff with her being a devout Byakuren follower, maybe something like being chosen for a shady mission because of her loyalty, which ironically causes her to question her loyalty? Of course there's also her backstory, being a former human who became a youkai, and whatever she and the Myouren crew got up to in the interim with Byakuren being sealed.

As for Unzan, I haven't got much. Maybe he'd be good working at a forge or refinery, since he can control wind? That'd be a cool thing with either Kogasa or Momoyo.

For some reason I feel like Ichirin would have been better suited to be a male character. It's not that I think gender necessarily matters in stories that aren't about it, but she seems more like a guy to me. And not even a manly man or anything, just a brave young boy who tamed a cloud-monster, sort of like in folktales.
Maybe it's her hairstyle, it's kind of bishounen-like... Uuuhhhh...

I dont have much for her unfortunately but I interpret her as someone who likes combat and while she can get tenacious, she's isnt malignant or hellbent on wanting to beat the shit out of anyone she sees but I do think she can get annoyed easily. Other than that, thats all I have for her.

I do really like her design though I feel like her kesa should be either blue or purple because I think darker and lighter blues and purples looks better on Ichirin than the Orange.

>>18951
>male Ichirin
>female Unzan

>>18949
I was a bit busy so it's taken me longer to respond, but Ichirin and Unzan aren't 2hus I think about a lot, despite that I like them. Ichirin is nice and energetic without being overboard, by 2hu standards, and I like her backstory. It's a very ironic one, she goes out to vanquish a man eating youkai but Uunzan ends up deciding to become her ally in his defeat, causing the same humans who asked for Ichirin's help to now fear her. Then after a lot of trouble it seems like she blundered into becoming a youkai accidentally, at least that last part is how I see it. It also highlights how separation, conflict, and fear between humans and youkai isn't really a solution, fear of youkai ends up turning even humans into youkai as they turn on their own.
I guess it's easy to see why Byakuren's creed of holding humans and youkai as equal would be so appealing to Ichirin, I think it would be easy for Ichirin to come to the conclusion:
> If humans and youkai weren't enemies, then none of this wouldn't have happened in the first place.
Or maybe.
> If humans and youkai were judged equally under the law, I wouldn't have been cast as wrong for Unzan deciding he wanted to serve me.
Although maybe someone dull like Unzan is said to be isn't actually very opinionated on the matter. I like to imagine he's a bit free-flowing, he doesn't matter where life takes him as long as he has good friends and can live his life comfortably. Maybe he wasn't much help to making the situation better, being a muscle head, but I like to think in those hard days where she lost her humanity, Ichirin never hated humans and Unzan was able to be there to comfort her. Even if they drove her away even if she continued to vanquish youkai, and even if they ended up underground eventually. Of course, Ichirin has a quiet rage meter for a reason, so she could has bursts of fierceness that terrified people despite her normally seeming calm.
I guess that just blend into the rest of the Myouren Temple cast, Ichirin herself is nice but compared Shou, Byakuren, and Nue. Despite that I don't think she's underrepresented in official works, she shows up decently enough I think, even if like a lot of other characters she could use more manga appearances. Although with these two I'm more interested in stories involving their pasts rather than what they're currently doing in Gensokyo, still I feel like the Myouren temple is underserved.
I don't like them as much as most, but I always enjoy them when I do see them and I hope to see more of them.

I wonder who it will be. It was quite heated last time.

[x] Yuki & Mai
[x] Doremy Sweet
[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

[x] Yuki & Mai (they are more cute after all)

[x] Yuki & Mai

Yuki and Mai are from the PC98 era of Touhou................. they are so OLD!!!!!!!!!!!!

>>18955
> I like to imagine he's a bit free-flowing, he doesn't matter where life takes him as long as he has good friends and can live his life comfortably.

You're just saying that 'cause he's a cloud youkai, aren't you? 'free flowing', yeah, yeah.

[X] Tenkajin Chiyari

C’mon, just pick her so we can get it over with.

Seriously, avoiding her for this long…does she, like, owe one of you money, or did she kill your Grandma, or something? What’s up with all that?

[X] Yuki & Mai

[x] Doremy Sweet

Since it's starting to look like Chiyari will never be picked just for the meme, can we have a fourth option in the vote? At the moment we're just voting between two characters because Chiyari won't get picked, so the third slot is just wasted.

>>18963

Y’know what? I honestly second this.

If you guys are gonna keep ignoring Chiyari, at least give us a fourth character to choose from.

>>18963
I don't do it as a meme, I just think of Chiyari the least of every option we've been given so far.
At the same time I don't mind being given another option.

I too think there should a fourth option in the votes. Even outside of Chiyari, I think 3 options feels a bit too limiting in choices

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

Time for her to shine

As funny as her always losing is to me (just being honest, okay? makes me chuckle at the start of every week), I can just force-pick Chiyari to get her over with if anyone wants that. It's sorta true that the third slot is wasted this way, but she will likely get picked eventually - there are less remarkable Touhous out there, right?
>>18965
>I don't do it as a meme, I just think of Chiyari the least of every option we've been given so far.
I feel pretty much the same way, and I'm probably not the only one. Which means that maybe someday she might be the best option after all. If everyone else is very boring (lol).

I don't mind including a fourth slot either way if enough people ask for it.

While we are talking about votes, I'm asking out of curiosity, Do you prefer suggesting characters to discuss or votes? Because While I dont entirely mind voting for a random character, There are characters, not exclusively Chiyari, that I and others want to discuss but aren't always in the votes.

Suggesting would be a little hard to organize, wouldn't it?

Yeah, I can agree it would be harder than voting. Just asking.

Well, in the end, I've decided to just abide by the votes like normal. But I have something in mind, so stay tuned...

It's Yuki and her good friend Mai. Well, you'd assume they're friends, but if Yuki's the first to go down, Mai gets a little cocky behind her back, famously so, and her theme's title is a little suspicious, isn't it? But should it really be taken seriously? After all, Makai people might have slightly different ideas of friendship, and who knows what the stakes of the fight actually were for them.
...But, but, it's more dramatic if it's for real, right?!

>>18972
Yuki and Mai, the mystic square girls. I'm going to be honest, I didn't even know they existed before they won this poll and you posted this picture of them. I think my eyes just glazed over and read Mai & Sotono, who I guess would have been part of the Okina week. Anyways I don't think Mai actually has any connection to Judas or is a betrayer, these girls are from the PC-98 era, Touhou was more derivative and less thought out then and a lot of the characters who don't reappear just come across as prototypes of character we'd get in Windows Touhou.
Yuki has a very Marisa feel while Mai, alongside most of the LLS cast, gives me proto-EoSD vibes. Mai is mute at first but without her friend becoming a bit Cirno-like, they do both come across as children to me. Somehow notably younger than Reimu or Marisa in how they act. Apparently Mai has an SMT reference in her but I've never played the games so I don't know what that reference is.
They're both called Witches, but I guess in their case their just members of the witch species, they don't really give off scholarly vibes. I guess if I wanted to use a witch in a story if I used these two it'd have to be in a Makai-centric context exclusively since Gensokyo is already so saturated with them and from every angle as well. But I didn't vote for these two and I don't think much of Makai in the first place, although like a lot of Makai I think it's vagueness and the lack of details make it easier for authors to expand on the few details there are and feel more free to twist.
So they have that to their advantage, but currently I imagine the pair as the Makai equivalent of the three fairies.

>So they have that to their advantage, but currently I imagine the pair as the Makai equivalent of the three fairies.
That's an interesting way to view them, because to me, they never really seemed like childish troublemakers. Maybe more mature troublemakers...
My interpretation of their personalities is pretty much the same as the artist Rin Elica's, outlined here. It's a pretty good analysis as far as old work interpretation goes.
https://rinelica.tumblr.com/post/716704061979852800/

If I had a nickel for every time Mai gets confused for the other Mai, I'd have a lot of nickels.

>>18974
Ah that was a really nice read, I guess it's true, even the most obscure characters will have their dedicated superfans.
Although I have a hard time seeing them as mature troublemakers personally. Maybe it's due to how I view PC-98 as just a predecessor to the windows era, or maybe how their sprites look, but I have a hard time imagining the pair as adults. That and their plan reminds me of the three fairies and their schemes, although I think the three fairies are more canny, at least they get more time to be clever.
>>18975
Well they are both called Mai, are half of a duo, and both rather forgettable, so they have that in common.

Dear Mai confusers of the Touhou fandom! May I introduce you to...
<-

>>18976
>Maybe it's due to how I view PC-98 as just a predecessor to the windows era, or maybe how their sprites look, but I have a hard time imagining the pair as adults.
Interesting. I've always dismissed the childish looks of Touhou characters as, like, an art style thing.
Besides, they just seem more serious somehow, but maybe I'm just too used to their common portrayals.

Damn I'm late! sorry, Christmas took a lot out of me.

Anyway, Yuki and Mai! I'll start off talking about their danmaku since no-one else mentioned it. When they're both active, their patterns are quite simple and easy - they don't complement each other as a team at all! But when you defeat one of tehm, their patterns become a whole lot more complicated and interesting.

If Mai's the one left, her patterns are quite complex (for PC98 at least), attacking with a lot of icy blue projectile - lazers, knives, generic blue orbs. One of her pattern's is even similar to CIrno's infamous Icicle Fall, down to ebing able to dodge it by just waiting in the space in front of her! All of this, plus her snowy color scheme, seems to have led a lot of fan artists to present her as an ice witch. also, as someone who's played the first two smt games, I don't see anything smt about Mai, unless its some reference to some demon I glazed over and just shotgun blasted TO HELL. Her whole 'deadweight' thing she goes on about seems to be backed up by her danmaku patterns becoming more complex after Yuki's gone, though.

If Yuki's left, then her patterns become super fast and spammy, relying a lot on reaction speed. You get the sense that she's really upset about you PC98ing Mai. If you compare her reaction to Mai's, isn't she a bit tragic? I hope they made up. Doens't Yuki also look a lot like a 17th century puritan, with that tall hat? wouldn't that be a funny trait to flanderize.

One of the many things that i keep thinking about with Makains is 'what do they do all day'? do they need to eat like humans or gather fear/faith like gods or youkai? Do they not have those base needs, and so can just pursue whatever interest they fancy with no holding back? do they have any weird mental compulsions like other supernatural beings? WHat are their origins!?!?!?!?

This time, you can freely vote for any Touhou character that wasn't discussed before. The winner will be the discussion subject of the next week, and the first three forerunners will form the character pool for the following week. If there are any ties (which is likely), the pool will probably get temporarily expanded.
Attached is a table of characters, with those who have previously been discussed highlighted for your convenience. You are free to vote for Touhou characters not listed here, if you are so inclined. Koakuma and the like are pretty popular, after all.

What will happen to Chiyari?!

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari
Please human I need this, my girl is kinda homeless.

>>18979
I did notice her Cirno-like patterns, it's partly why I thought of her as a proto-fairy. Cirno herself, as mentioned in the Letty week did go through a lot of 'phases' like being an Ice Youkai, since fairies weren't established as a thing at the time.
Although honestly I imagine Makai as just being Japan, except Christianity is the dominant religion instead of Buddhism for some reason. I just find it funny for Hell to be Buddhist while Makai is Christian, a sort of inversion of IRL. Other than that I don't think of the Makaians much, and for where they come from?
Well I guess Shinki has to have some hobbies, right? Maybe making Makaians is one of them?

>>18980
[X] Junko

Hmmm…since anything goes, and it’s unlikely Chiyari's gonna get picked anyways…

Cowgirl? Chinese Girl? Cowgirl? Chinese Girl?

[X] Hong Meiling

[X] Reisen Udongein Inaba

I mentioned in the irregular posts about Rabbits and the ocean, so I want to elaborate on that with Reisen

[X] Junko

I'm still completely burnt out and unable to write anything meaningful, so I won't vote for characters I actually like or "adjacent" ones.
Meiling is a nice choice though, I'll get to complain about Manchus a bit.
[X] Hong Meiling

>>18983
Good choice, of the EoSD cast she's probably the one I like the most, I don't know if I have the most to say about her but I have topics for the entire SDM.

>>18984
I have something similar, something that airs on the more conspiratorial or speculative side, but with Junko.

[X] Hong Meiling
Shangai calling...

It's 1884!
Hong Meiling is from th6, which is the most popular Touhou game, so naturally, she receives a lot of attention in fanworks. But do you like her common portrayal? She tends to be reduced to a gag character a lot, right? That's bound to be irksome if you're looking for depth. She's also often associated with dragons. There's a lot to say about that, isn't there?
Any of you read Shanghai Genya perhaps maybe perchance?

You know I used to not think much of Meiling being WOotHS released, she was just another member of the SDM, only really notable by how normal she was compared to everyone else there. Someone you can say is a bit of a typical youkai, while at the same time not really acting like one, or even having a confirmed species beyond 'youkai'. Sure there's that whole shipping with Sakuya and big-sister angle with Flan, but I never really liked those that much. Sakuya being in any sort of a relationship felt weird and while having Flan be very childish is cute I don't find it compelling, it's just another one of the two extremes her character tends to gravitate towards in fanworks.
I was technically aware of her appearance in the fighting games, but hadn't read any stage dialogue, but ZUN's comment of:
>Why did the vampires even choose her as their gatekeeper? The Scarlet Devil Mansion doesn’t really seem like the kind of place that needs one. Rather than being chosen, it feels more like she just moved in on her own.
>Being a gatekeeper at a place that doesn’t really need one might be the perfect relaxed job for someone like her who just wants to take it easy.
Combined with her fortunes, which all give me the image of somebody without a lot of prospects one way or the other, and who always has their head in the clouds, made me like her a lot more.

>>18989
That is to say I don't particularly mind her common characterizations either way. But I do like her, to me, although she's lazy she's also incredibly self-confident and comfortable in her current role. She's reasonably headstrong and has a good enough read on people as well, she's sort of normal in that she's just trying to live a comfortable life within her means and takes reasonable risks to increase her means.
Also I think her being a shounentard is cute.
I think she works best in slice of life type works, but I think she could also work in something more serious or action focused if she's used to contrast another character. But I don't find her that appealing for horror or mystery type stories for some reason. Either way I'd like to write her eventually.

I don’t usually participate in these character discussions…

But Meiling is my favorite from EoSD, if not my favorite Touhou character overall! So I might as well throw in my two cents. Let’s get the obvious out of the way…

> Do you like her common portrayal? She tends to be reduced to a gag character a lot.

No. If there’s one way to turn me off from a Touhou fan work, it’s reducing Meiling to being the butt of a joke and nothing more. Honestly? I don’t even know where the notion of Meiling being lazy came from. I don’t think it shows up anywhere in EoSD or IaMP. I have heard that the Japanese…don’t exactly have the best relationship with the Chinese; even so, I don’t wanna say that prejudice has anything to do with Meiling’s most common portrayal, but…

Anyways, enough of that. Time to actually discuss Meiling.

Where to start…

There’s not much to her canonically. She’s a Chinese youkai who's laidback, friendly, occasionally naps, and seems to take pride in China's 4000 year history. Even so, I do think it at least makes her a pretty flexible character to use in fan works, especially compared to some of the other members of Touhou's overall cast. I really like that about her. You could make her the comedic relief of the SDM (as much as I detest such portrayals), a master martial artist on par with Gensokyo's oni, the naïve newcomer of the SDM, a seasoned veteran whose been with Remilia since the very beginning, the everygirl, the underdog, just another man-eating youkai, a youkai who notably doesn’t hunt or eat humans, the token good teammate, a big sister figure for the more child-like characters (including Flandre), the heart/emotional support of the mansion's crew, just some ordinary youkai, a secret dragon under the guise of a regular youkai…I feel like you could place Meiling into any of these roles, and she’d fit so neatly!

I really like that about her, and from what I’ve seen, a lot of stories on THP seem to take advantage of this and helped to create some very unique portrayals of her. Like “A Fairy's Tale”, for example; it’s one of my favorite takes I’ve seen of the character so far. There's "A Fairy on Scarlet Lake” which also fits the bill, I suppose

I do wish fan works try and utilize Meiling beyond just being comic relief; we already know it can be done. Though, given her position as the SDM's gatekeeper, I am aware it'd be hard to give her a meaningful appearance without having to involve the rest of the mansion's cast in some way.

> She's also often associated with dragons. There's a lot to say about that, isn't there?

I would say so. While it’s unknown what species of youkai Meiling is exactly, she does share a lot of motifs with dragons, specifically the Chinese Hong (e.g. the the inscription on her star translates to "dragon" in Chinese). I feel like even if you don’t think she’s exactly a dragon, she does have at least some connection to them; Heck, even the latest canon work WOotHS seems to tease this connection, in Meiling's artwork, at the very least. I feel like at this point, the question is “What’s the extent of this connection?” Like, is it just that she likes the motif, or is she hiding something deeper? Even if the answer to the question is the former (not saying it is, but...it's Touhou. That could very well end up being it), it’s still very fun to think about and explore in fan works!

>>18990
> There’s that whole shipping with Sakuya and big-sister angle with Flan, but I never really liked those that much.

While I don’t personally ship Meiling and Sakuya together, I don’t mind the big-sister thing she has going on with Flandre. Can it be a bit too sickeningly sweet at times? Yeah, I’ll admit it, especially considering what Touhou canon seems to be doing with the latter nowadays. But darn it, I still like the idea! Plus, I don't think it's impossible to make the dynamic work without gravitating to either extreme Flan’s known for in fanon.

I always imagined Meiling as someone who appreciates leisure time while also being passionate towards Martial Arts. Its canon that she reads Manga distributed by the Tengu, so I imagined that she has a whole stockpile of Action Heavy Manga. As for fanworks, there's only 3 fanworks Ive seen with Meiling as a main protagonist. One of them is Ladies of the Scarlet Devil Mansion. I really love how Meiling looks here. I also love the headcanon that Meiling has a collection of Chinese Weapons despite not actually using them. The second doujin work is this comic where Kaguya tells Meiling to take Reisen out for some lunch to help her with her PTSD only to have a Violent brawl with her after Reisen got triggered from these 2 customers arguing and went "I have to kill everyone and then myself". Nobody died in the end but there were lots of collateral damage and Meiling's broken bones. The 3rd one is Burning Meiling. I don't think I have the words to describe how much I Love the fight choreography of the mmds. My personal favorite is the dual between Meiling and Youmu. Its nice seeing Meiling fight with a Sword, even if its not as clean as Youmu's swordsmanship. I also love the montages of her training with the Myouren Crew. Super smooth.

For Design, Meiling has one of my favorites. I always prefer her with the white pants than the skirt alone cause it feels more... practical? To me, her design looks like a mix of comfy and professional which I think is suitable for someone like her. I love the balance of Red and Green and White. While I like her hair open, I think Meiling with ponytails and buns looks great. I almost forgot to mention that I love how Meiling looks in Koumajou Densetsu. So badass.

Overall, I think she's neat. Not exactly one of my top 10 touhou characters but I enjoy seeing her.

>>18991
Although for the dragon connection, there's this one Meiling and Yachie(? I'm assuming this I don't actually remember who the other Touhou was) doujin but I can't remember it's name where the explanation is she got brain damage and started larping as a human martial artist accidentally so she just stuck with it.
I think that one's a bit nice.

>>18992
I'm sorry but no pants no pan Meiling is the best.

>>18993
Are you talking about Dregs of Admiration by Fuuzasa? I’ve actually read that one.

> I'm sorry but no pants no pan Meiling is the best.
I don’t really care either way. Though I do like to imagine whether or not she wears pants usually depends on how hot or cold it is outside.

(e.g. She usually wears pants in the winter, and a skirt in the summer)

>>18994
No, I distinctly remember the doujin I'm thinking of having a bigger focus on Meiling's backstory, although I've certainly confused it with Dregs of Admiration in my memory. Which only makes it harder to find.
> Though I do like to imagine whether or not she wears pants usually depends on how hot or cold it is outside.
>(e.g. She usually wears pants in the winter, and a skirt in the summer)
You're probably right, but 2hus being no pan is a huge increase in their favorability factor.

As per agreement, the voting pool is composed of the characters that were suggested last week. Let's choose between them!

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari
[x] Reisen Udongein Inaba
[x] Junko

Nobody's read Shanghai Genya, huh... Whatever... Meiling doesn't actually take much inspiration from the novel, despite being chinese.

[X] Reisen Udongein Inaba

[X] Junko

I'm going to say
[x] Tenkajin Chiyari
Because at this point I want to know what people have to say about her

[X] Junko

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

C’mon guys. Let’s just get her over with.

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari
YES, YES, FINALLY, FINALLYYYY

>>18996
[X] Junko

>>18996
(x) Junko

(x) Junko

THE PERFIDIOUS 'TENKAIJIN' ATTEMPTS TO USE UP HER WEEK BEFORE I HAVE FINISHED FULLY COMPILING HER CRIMES. I THINK NOT, MISS CHUPACABRA

It's Junko, a pure and hateful divine spirit. Characters driven by a single impulse, by a single emotion like her are always interesting to work with, right? Or do you see her as overly one-sided instead?

Looks like that CRIMINAL got too cocky! Ah Junko, there's so many different flavours of you, and the only one I slightly dislike is the Reisen-sexual one!~
One thing I really like about her is the idea of inhuman purity, particularly an inhumanly pure personality. Humans are made up of a lot of things, they aren't rocks and they aren't uniform, and to a lesser degree I feel like this holds true for other living things. So a person like Junko, who is so pure, so strongly one thing, it makes her very unnatural. So even if she's heroic or on the side of justice she comes off as odd or disturbing, as even when you take a normally laudable or heroic trait if you extend it too far, if it takes up too much of a person, they end up seeming disturbing.
Still those laudable traits aren't diminished because of her purity, despite how unnatural it is to be that much one thing.
Despite, or because of that, I really like Junko acting heroically, or as she perceives as heroically, acting straightforward and trying to achieve her goals in ways that are completely logical but also seem like nonsense to everyone else, except maybe Heca.

Now, onto the theory I mentioned up thread. Junko is Chang'e, hear me out.
Eirin says that the person Junko detests is the wife of Junko's husband, Reisen points out that isn't the wife of her husband herself but Eirin ignore the comment. Instead she explains that Junko's husband killed her son, then says.
>"She was naturally talented as a bad wife to her husband. And the wife is none other than Chang'e."
Once again confusing the role of Junko and Chang'e, not differentiating them. Of course the question then is how is Junko Chang'e? I'm not exactly sure, maybe they split into two people before she drank the Hourai elixir, maybe it was the conflict over her son's death. Maybe those events are one and the same?
It may sound a bit hard to use in a story, but I read something a while ago that did a similar idea quite strongly. With two characters being the same and different person.

>>19007
>Characters driven by a single impulse, by a single emotion like her are always interesting to work with, right? Or do you see her as overly one-sided instead?
I don't think it's really important if it's one sided, as Junko herself doesn't seem to care. Although a more Yandere Junko who wants Chang'e to more openly acknowledge her does sound funny.

>>19006
Why do you still have internet access?!

When it comes to characters whose stories revolve around a particular goal, I tend to be more interested in who they were before they were motivated by said goal or in the scenario they do accomplish it.

Who was Junko before she became the Furious Lunarian-hating Spirit? Was she an unassuming person who dearly loved her child? Or was she always hotheaded and spiteful towards those she doesn't trust? Also, I wonder why why does Junko target All Lunarians, especially Chang'e for something her Ex Spouse did. I'm not sure it was stated in canon (I forgot but I will correct myself if I do get stuff wrong) but Is it because the Lunarians ordered Houyi to shoot down the Suns which is why Junko is extremely hateful towards them? If Im not mistaken, Houyi was also in a relationship with Chang'e so and the act of Shooting down one of the suns - who happens to be Junko's child - can be seen as an act of Betrayal.

It is said that Junko resides in Senkai. Would she know or have talked to figures like Miko or Kasen who too reside there? What does she live a mundane life there? Also, has she always been a Resident of Senkai? How did she meet Houyi?

I do enjoy her relationship with Hecatia and it got me wondering: If one of the suns that got shot down belonged to Hecatia, does that mean Hecatia is also the Mother of Junko's child or is she distantly related to them? (Again If I get things wrong I'll correct them). I do like the idea of the two bonding over their hatred for the Lunarians.

As with Reisen, I don't think these two would have an actual relationship with each other and even if they did, it'd be one-sided at best. I do think that Junko would at least attempt to get contact with Reisen but fails most of the time due to the fact Reisen to me is the type to avoid socializing with others unless its necessary and Reisen doesn't seem to be interested in Assasinating Chang'e. Ive seen people say the two would bond over their hatred towards the Moon but I cant really see it. If the Lunar Apollo landing wasn't interpreted as a War, Reisen wouldve still been serving the Lunar Capital and Junko would see her as a Threat. Though I think the idea of Reisen being terrified of Junko isn't entirely far fetched when you remember what prompted 60s Reisen to flee. I dont think Junko would want to team up or bond with someone who only thinks of themselves and isn't interested in their goals; She's hellbent on killing Lunarians to avenge their child's death, not for sadistic pleasure.

Her design is one of my favorites in the series. I love the use of Oranges, Yellows and Reds.

I do have a bit more to say about her but I'll save it for tomorrow.

>"I don't think it's really important if it's one sided, as Junko herself doesn't seem to care. Although a more Yandere Junko who wants Chang'e to more openly acknowledge her does sound funny"

I wonder if Chang'e not acknowledging Junko is done intentionally, cause if thats the case, then it's a funny scenario to think about, but if not, Then it makes me think that Junko attacking the Lunar Capital in the hopes of getting Chang'e attentions has become her only purpose, I mean, she literally became the embodiment of her own purified fury. I dont think Junko would ponder what actually happens After she assasinates Chang'e, but given that Lolk wasnt the first time Junko terrorized a civilization (and failing), I don't think a day where Junko kills Chang'e would actually come.

>>19010
I like to believe she was an unassuming person, but it's a common misconception she targets all Lunarians. She just ends up fighting all of them due to them not wanting to turn over Chang'e. This is unlike Hecatia who disagrees with them philosophically as well as having a personal grudge. And while I don't believe it's directly stated I have the same assumption about one of the other nine suns being Junko's child with Chang'e being the one who ordered the death of the other nine suns.
I don't think that's too much of an assumption, much of the Lunarian history we know of is the history of them consolidating their power and removing people and things they perceive as threats.

>I do enjoy her relationship with Hecatia and it got me wondering: If one of the suns that got shot down belonged to Hecatia, does that mean Hecatia is also the Mother of Junko's child or is she distantly related to them? (Again If I get things wrong I'll correct them). I do like the idea of the two bonding over their hatred for the Lunarians.
The questions of who the suns were is interesting, in Chinese myth the ten suns were the children of the Jade Emperor but when taking Japanese myth into account there's Amaterasu and her avatar Yatagarasu we probably have to take into account as well.
For one thing, as Touhou is a more Japanese based work I have the feeling the Lunarians and the Moon are supposed to represent the Chinese heavenly bureaucracy. So the remaining sun would probably be Amatarasu as she's the sister Lord Tsukuyomi, the Lunar Capital's Founder. And now that I think of it she's kind of like Okuu's grandma by virtue of Yatagarasu being one of her Avatars.
But I don't think all the Suns belonged the Heca, she says
>And the wife of the guy who killed one of my stars!
When talking about Houyi. She could mean another planet, since 星 can also mean a non-earth non-the-sun celestial body, but In context of a myth she's probably talking about one of the other nine suns. Either way it's likely only one of them belonged to her, or who knows maybe he shot down a celestial body that belonged to Heca. But before they joined forces to fight the Lunarians, I think they were only vaguely aware of each other. To Junko, Heca was the mother or owner of one of her son's coworkers, who happened to wear wore freaky t-shirts.

>>19011
I got the idea for a more yandere Junko because some of her dialogue in LoLK sounds romantic, before it's revealed she's talking about killing someone. It's a bit funny to me, but yeah like most obessessive I think a yandere Junko would be more interested in the hunt, although no matter the type of Junko I don't think she's the type of person to give any thought to what comes after.

Ah, the Touhou's daemon prince of Khorne, how have I failed you by getting myself together to post only now

>>19008
I always thought it obvious that Chang'e somehow manipulated her husband into killing Junko's son and that's why she is "naturally talented as a bad wife" in classic harem intrigue fashion, and also why she's the real criminal in Junko's eyes while her husband was just a hapless executor (and also she already killed him). But your theory is an interesting and novel idea as well! Indeed, why is Reisen surprised about "wife of her husband" — is it because polygamy became less common at Moon in Reisen's times or because it never had been usual? I wouldn't take it as a primary version, but one may get some use out of it in a story.

>>19010
>Shooting down one of the suns - who happens to be Junko's child
Never stated anywhere, those are most certainly two different things.
By the way, as I looked through available information, I realized that name Houyi/后羿 is actually mentioned nowhere in Touhou. Granted, "Chang'e's husband who shot down the suns" is heavy enough hint that people immediately assumed that the name is canon as well, but, still. (I wonder now if that can be connected to that idea that lunarians don't care about names...)

>It is said that Junko resides in Senkai.
Never would have thought tbh, but there's that trivia from SCoOW indeed. There are many Senkais, individual for each hermit, as I understand? Did Junko create her own or who she shares her residence with, then?

Speaking of random trivia, there's also that Eirin quote from her dialogue with Reimu about how youkai, who are completely impure (in original it's 穢れに満ちた妖怪 — full of kegare-impurity, unrelated to Junko's purification) can't see and therefore defeat Junko. It, er, raises questions, including about interaction of kegare and Junko's purity concept in fact I don't like this assertion, it doesn't fit my view of Touhou world and I want it gone, but it's there.

There's also a chronological point. Kaguya's and then Eirin's exile due to Hourai Elixir happened around 700 AD (from Mokou's and Toyohime's CiLR chapters). We don't get any clues from Touhou itself about Houyi and Chang'e's stories, but the myth, at least the ten suns and shooting down all of them but one, as I understand, belongs to the most archaic, almost erased out of existence pre-"ideological" layer of Chinese mythology — of course accretions about Xia dynasty, Jade emperors and other Classical period inventions came much later (by the way see the point above about not mentioning "Houyi" name — perhaps it's too just a Zhangguo invention in Touhou?) — and it makes sense to accept that the myth came no earlier than some "actual" event reflected in it. So there's at least one-and-a-half millennium gap between two of the three notorious Chang'e's deeds. There's no contradiction, of course, but, I guess, something to keep in mind in discussion?

And what exactly was "shooting down the suns"? It simply cannot be taken literally for many reasons — for one, I refuse to accept any one local mythology, be it archaic Chinese or Kojiki-Shoki-Japanese or ancient Greek or whatever as literally true because that will mean that all other mythologies and variations are false, and that one single ethnicity is therefore somehow privileged. But if we accept that myths in Touhou generally reflect something — what was that something then?

>>19012
>She could mean another planet, since 星 can also mean a non-earth non-the-sun celestial body,
Hecatia's profile says:
>太陽（アポロ）を撃ち落とした
Not 星, specifically 太陽, sun, first, and second, Apollo? I can't remember any myth where Apollo was shot down from sky, am I wrong?

Sorry for not posting earlier, was busy. Very good discussion this week though - lots of information. I can't comment on it though because I'm not as well versed in Junko's lore as others, sadly.

>>19008
>even when you take a normally laudable or heroic trait if you extend it too far, if it takes up too much of a person, they end up seeming disturbing.

I can vaguely envision what you mean... like, someone who's 'purely' charitable would seem to be gullible? or maybe someone who's 'purely' logical would go about life in a way that's totally different to the average person. Some of her actions would be seen as wise, but other might be irreverent or even cruel.

>>19010
>Junko is Chang'e

But that's just a theory... A GAME THEORY

Anyhoo, this is quite an interesting character origin story, although her magicking herself into a divine spirit is also interesting, even more so IMO if she had to learn the purification magic beforehand. As you said it'd be interesting to see what kind of person she was before Chang'e's husband murdered her son, her transformation into a divine spirit and the potential contrast and tragedy between the two. It isn't like she'd be anything like the person she was before, right?

>>19011
> I dont think Junko would ponder what actually happens After she assasinates Chang'e

either turn to dust like a revenant or try to kill the next cloesest person to Change's husband, I'd imagine. It depends on how much of a stretch it is for Junko to be going after Chang'e - was she just Chang'e's husband's wife, or was she an accomplice in the murder of Junko's son by Chang'e's husband?

>>19038
>I can vaguely envision what you mean... like, someone who's 'purely' charitable would seem to be gullible? or maybe someone who's 'purely' logical would go about life in a way that's totally different to the average person. Some of her actions would be seen as wise, but other might be irreverent or even cruel.
Yep, I find it hard to articulate but maybe that's the lightheartedness. Junko's single minded pursuit of vengeance can be heroic, if anything strength of personality is what people look for in a hero and the Lunarians and Chang'e have done a lot of evil for the sake of consolidating their power. At the same time, Junko's actions ended up inadvertently involving other people and she's willing to kill all the Lunarians just to kill Chang'e.
>Anyhoo, this is quite an interesting character origin story, although her magicking herself into a divine spirit is also interesting
Well she is also a type of hermit as well, being a Senrei. I presume she used some form of hermit art to ascend. If Junko was one of the mortal descendants among the Lunarians or alternatively she could be a god who became a hermit, becoming a Senrei using hermit arts.

>There are many Senkais, individual for each hermit, as I understand? Did Junko create her own or who she shares her residence with, then?

I feel like she lives an almost solitary life in Senkai, but Im more curious about when did she start living there. Did she came to Senkai after agreeing to not attack the Moon for Eirin or has she always lived there?

>>19029
My assumption is that the ten suns were a collection of sun gods. Not that there were ever ten actual suns in the sky at the same time but as for mythology, well Touhou is an eastern series so I tend to presume japanese and chinese mythology take precedence. Besides there's all sorts of conflicts between different mythological histories and these conflicts have to sort themselves out somehow.
Of course in Touhou there's all sorts of things, like Lucifer's conflation with Amano-kagaseo no Mikoto with is 19th century.
It was talked about on the discord server a while back but all it really points to is a cultural name for a phenomenon caused by the planet venus, and that multiple cultures have observed the same phenomenon where if venus rises before the sun youkai gets stronger. Use of the name Lucifer isn't really proof of anything, except that it's a name European cultures gave this hypothetical phenomenon that's not even observed in the chapter. So it's still hard to say if the conflation means anything.
The series is written but ZUN at the end of the day.
But my desire to combine the events is more so I just like tidyness, just have Junko get married earlier. Later myths are just describing earlier historical events while some myths would be closer to the historical event or contemporaneous.

>>19040
I've only ever seen Zonouse depict it so I just imagine a tranquil place with a lot of greek pavalons. But I think she's more or less had it since she became a hermit, having a secure base to plot out of would be useful.

>>19043
>My assumption is that the ten suns were a collection of sun gods.
An interesting idea which never occurred to me! Something like nine other gods which were revered in other cultures got shot — including Apollo (or perhaps Helios? Both? Apollo but only in his capacity as sun god?) — Amaterasu remained? This isn't the only place where this kind of "textual conflict resolution" can be applied, I think...

She came back.

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari
[x] Reisen Udongein Inaba
[x] Kirisame Marisa

[x] Kirisame Marisa

I think with ~30 posts to bump limit there's place left for two characters, so this is only the second-to-last vote here. After such... impassioned Reimu discussion, surely Marisa wouldn't settle for anything less than closing or opening a thread?! Fellow Marisa fans, hold your votes, don't vote Marisa yet!

[x] Reisen Udongein Inaba
(The rabbit is fine with being second-to-last after all, right?)

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari
It's her week.

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

…please?

[x] Reisen Udongein Inaba

I'm busy as hell next week, and this is the only character choice here which I wouldn't have much to say about. I'd like to save the other two choices for later.

[X] Reisen Udongein Inaba

Let it be bunny week

[X] Reisen Udongein Inaba

funny bunny

[x] Reisen Udongein Inaba

The cute witch deserves to open a thread unlike that stinky chupacabra!

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

i have no hopes left but whatever

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

[x] Reisen Udongein Inaba

Bnuuy

[X] Tenkajin Chiyari

Reisen Udongein Inaba is a hapless moon rabbit who escaped the Moon. It's interesting to examine the differences between moon rabbits and earth rabbits, isn't it? Also makes you wonder how common her denpa-madness powers are among her kin.

Great week for the stupid bunny only good for her sex appeal! Springboarding off of what was said here >>19029 and it's said that normal youkai can't perceive Junko due to how pure she is, but interestingly enough Reisen can see Junko. It's said in LoLK that Youkai are nothing but impurities, and that pure beings like the Lunar Capital can block themselves being perceived by youkai if they actively chose to do so, Eirin mentions Junko doing something similar and how she was an enemy neither youkai or gods could normally oppose.
So the obvious question remains, why did Eirin go out of her way to request Reisen go on the anti-Junko mission? Something Reisen's profile points out in LoLK. Furthermore the other Moon Rabbits didn't seem to be able to do much if anything against Junko, even if as Rino says in Reimu's endings, Impurity isn't a big problem for the lower classes.
My question is why? Reisen a half-human like Sanae? Does her ability to manipulate wavelengths play into it? Or is there something else? Is her ability to manipulate wavelengths even anything special or can all Lunar Rabbits do it due to being psychic and it's just another occasion of a species trait being listed as a special ability for some reason.

>>19058
On that same note, how do you guys feel about the sharingan I mean the Lunatic Red Eyes. Not Reisen's spell card but rather Fanfiction and Doujin works treating Reisen's eyes as something special and the source of her, in that case, unique wavelength manipulating abilities. ZUN author comment on her spell cards says she's being a chuuni but I'm rather fond of Reisen being a psychic like Sumirenko, there's something ironic with a rabbit having a supernatural traits like that which would normally be very noticeable due to how it would turn a human's eyes red. Since rabbits normally have red eyes, that I do just like some chuuni things.
Aside from that, well we only really have Tewi for earth rabbits and so we don't really have many good points for comparison. Although according to her the difference is that the earth rabbits evolved to be more suitable for earth after leaving the moon. I think someone else said that had something to say on this matter.

For her sex appeal, I feel like she's a strong first place among the rabbits, hence her nickname, with only Seiran trailing behind her. Although I have to admit, ditching the suit was a bad look for her.

>>19054
Hopefully Chiyari gets her chance two weeks from now. I don't see anyone else but Marisa opening next thread and I really want a chill week.

>>19058

>>19060
No wonder the Chiyari posting has been persistent, it's Remi's ability to manipulate fate.
Although her failure just prove's Flandre's point about how much of a fraud she is.

Essentially, My interpretation of Reisen is that she's Denpa, someone (or something I'll explain later) who is incredibly idiosyncratic, disconnected from Reality and has strong belief systems and wild fantasies. Denpas are described as those who feel as if their thoughts, feelings and emotions were transmitted to them through Electromagnetic Raditation. Many Moon Rabbits in Touhou are to Radios much like How Shikigamis are to Computers and Reisen's Skillset revolves around the Manipulation of Wavelengths. Radios use Electromagnetic waves to Function.

I find her abilities the most interesting amongst the Touhou cast precisely because its so versatile. According to her SWR profile: "It's common knowledge that light is made of waves, but there's more to sight than just that. Space itself is waves, and the creatures, things, and of course, light in it are also all made of waves." so technically, Reisen can manipulate the waves of almost Everything. But I ask: Reisen's abilities are very versatile but Why is it out of everything she chose to manipulate, She Chose to manipulate *Insanity*? Also, If Everything is made out of Waves, Does that mean That Reisen can Technically counter and / or Manipulate Yukari's Abilities, given that Yukari's gaps must too consists of Waves.

Speaking of Yukari, I find it interesting how amongst the Windows Era cast, 2 of them are given Red Eye Imagery. The Countless Red Eyes in Yukari's gaps gives me the Impression that Yukari is all seeing and all knowing; Even when Yukari isn't physically there, her "eyes" are. It reminds me alot of the nature of Reisen's abilities. As I said, they're very versatile. If you think about it, Reisen's abilities can function similarly to Yukari's. Sure she's not creating portals like her, but she can manipulate the psyche almost entirely, much like how Yukari can manipulate the Boundaries of something, which can include the Border of Concepts, physical and psychological. She can see things that others can see, for example, Reissn being able to See Koishi invisible and bypassing the Three Fairies of Light's abilities and the aforementioned post bringing up how Reisen can see Junko despite Impure beings like Youkai normally cant see her.

I think Reisen's ability to manipulate All Wavelengths is Unique to her. I Love the Concept of Reisen being Psychic (Udonge can be used to refer to the eggs of a Lacewing Bug which are used in East Asian Fortune Telling). For fanworks, There's Orbital Rabbit. I feel like most Doujins that feature or center around Reisen tend to portray her abilities as something every Moon rabbit has, but here, The Manipulation of the Senses is Unique to Her. On the topic of Orbital Rabbit, One detail I love is how Reisen is constantly avoiding Eye contact with others. Its mostly due to her trust issues but I also like to see this as Reisen avoiding turning anyone insane. There's also a Hentai (yes a Hentai.) where Reisen uses her abilities to phase a human's clothes out of their body. Just bringing it up cause I think its a neat use of her ability despite it being in a Hentai of all things.

>My question is why? Reisen a half-human like Sanae?

I like to imagine that Reisen is a fucked up hybrid of a Humanoid and Rabbit which is why she has 4 ears and Her abilities go beyond just communicating with other Rabbits telepathically. I say fucked up because She looks like an alien, mostly because of her Extremely Long Ears with Weird Buttons Attached to her head. I know In Ssib All the Rabbit soldiers have them but I think its less something all rabbits have and moreso Aki Eda's interpretation of Moon Rabbits. Maybe When Reisen was Younger her Rabbit Ears were falling off and she had to get surgery to stitch them back to her head? Maybe those Buttons are hearing aids because she was born with a Hearing disability?

Circling back to my point about Reisen being a Denpa, one thing I must bring up is that Reisen wasn't always like this. I stopped believing in the common fanon portrayal of Reisen being a War Veteran with PTSD because I realize there's so many things wrong with it. Firstly, there was no war. I refuse to believe there was a War. What Eiki said to Reisen will NEVER make me believe that she was a War Veteran. The idea of there being an actual war in the Lunar Capital only makes sense to me within the context of a Youkai Invasion Yukari orchestrated, but I highly doubt American Astronauts came to the Moon with the intention of declaring war on the Lunar Capital (I highly doubt they knew about the Lunar Capital.) Secondly, Reisen loves combat. The first time we met Reisen was her telling Reimu and Yukari how much she's been waiting to beat the shit out of someone. Then there's the thing with her Dream World Self from Antimony of Common flowers where she took delight in attacking people. Im aware that ScoOW brought up how Reisen came to dislike fighting hence her departure from the Moon, but It gives me the same energy as an Artist thinking that they Hate drawing only to fall in love with the hobby again.(Coming from personal experience.) I should've mentioned this in the Irregular threads but There's this Heavy Misconception that the Watatsuki's are Extremely Unforgiven and Abusive people, especially towards Rabbit soldiers like Reisen, but We are talking about the Watatsuki's who were strongly against having to kill a Fisherman they befriended and were so hospitable to Reimu when she was in their palace. If we are talking about Lunarians who wouldn't hesitate to kill Rabbits, then the topic would shift to Eirin though she do it strictly out of Pragmatism. Toyohime says in Cilr that Reisen being selfish and cowardly were traits very poor for a soldier but neither she or Yorihime could do anything about it so they just left her be. Reisen is the type to only form connections with people soley to make her look Superior. Reisen's whole thing in the early years of Touhou is that she's incredibly Malignant and Egocentric. Rabbits of the Moon are known to be anything but Loyal, but I think Reisen's Loyalty back then came from a place of Exploitation: Seeing Kaguya and Eirin as Catalysts to empower her and having a reason to stay at Eientei. I like to imagine that not too long after arriving at Earth, she found out that there never was a War on the moon and she left for nothing so when she met the fugitive Lunarians, she had to lie saying she's a Deserter so she isnt homeless. Reisen's loyalty to Her masters now comes from a place of Fear. Be it karma or bullying, Reisen went from Superlicious to Superstitious, believing that if she makes a mistake, big or small, she's going to get karma, punishment or death. One of her endings in Lolk is Reisen being So Terrified over the prospect of getting Scolded by Eirin that she literally went "Nope. I'm sleeping outside." Its funny to me that most people I see say That Reisen is living a better life on Earth while Simultaneously agreeing that she's living a Troublesome life on earth. I highly doubt Reisen was an Actual War Veteran - I'm more interested in the Concept of Reisen questioning whether or not She is Traumatized and Mentally Ill or she's Being Overly Sensitive and Overreactive of her stimuli.

In the irregular discussions threads I brought up Rabbits and the Ocean. I think The Lunarians are Aquatic Gods / Celestials that Metaphysically flooded the Moon with Purity so now the Moon is a Sea of Purity. Rabbits are land animals and get extremely stressed when submerged in Water; None of the them could live a proper life in the Sea of Purity because they aren't built to live in it. Perhaps the Reason why The Rabbits are so loyal to Chang'e is because she's the reason why Rabbits can survive on the Moon following the Creation of the Lunar Capital but Probably after her imprisonment, they were treated as Second class citizens who exist for the Lunarian's sake.
Reisen Technically has Themes of Water in her Skillset. One of the uses of the term "Lunatic" is people thinking the Moon's effects on the Water made their brains moist which lead to them developing Schizophrenia or Psychosis. The Moon's gravitational Pull on the Earth's Oceans causes the Tides and Waves to Rise which sounds similar to what Reisen's abilities do: The Moon Elevating Tides much like Reisen elevates Brain Waves to turn those insane.

(This is the second half of >19062 because I exceeded the word count)

There's another reason why I link Reisen to Water but its a little complicated to explain. Bare with me. Personality wise, Not only is My version of Reisen a Denpa, but she's a character who I think struggles with Identity. Her internal conflict is that her old self has shattered into a million pieces due to karma and punishment, but she can only put herself back together in a way that is completely different from her old self; The problem is that she doesn't know Who or what she wants to be. I call her Something because unlike Other Moon Rabbits, Reisen Wants to be a Tool, but wants to be something superior than a Tool, but she afraid of showing any sort of superiority otherwise she'll get punished as her Confidence as often seen as Pure Selfishness (Sometimes it is). Reisen behaves like an Individual but simultaneously a System, but nobody within this system wants to be referred to as a System, but feel as if they cannot exist as a Unit of their own. Marine Biologists have struggled to figure out whether or not a Siphonophore is an Individual or a Colony, because they function as both and Neither at the same time; They're existence is Paradoxical. I link Reisen to a Siphonophore because of how She feels as if she's both and neither and individual or colony but can't decide if she wants to either. Does she want to be a Tool or a Person or Both Simultaneously? There's a very interesting thread going more in depth about Reisen's conflict with Identity:

https://xcancel.com/sbbrbanrelpse/status/1764870700614201832#m

I want to add that is that Reisen's Dream World self could probably be the DW version of the Reisen from Imperishable Night, not the Reisen in AoCF. Reisen calling herself an Earth Rabbit and ditching the Blazer is her trying to become equal with the Earth Rabbits so that she isn't ostracized or taken for granted by them not her "Cutting ties with the Lunarians" (which I find stupid because if Reisen wanted to burn the bridges between her and the Lunarians she would NOT be serving Eirin who actively supports them and literally used her as a Radio to keep tabs on Lunarian politics.) Additionally, Reisen having Dissociative Identity Disorder is imo the Only Plausible explanation to "She can change her personality to better match the circumstances. Both care and crazed and is a completely different person in battle."

As I said earlier, Reisen's Loyalty came from a Place of Wanting to be seen as Superior as Her masters, but there was a time she wanted to be superior than them too. Referencing the Inaba 4koma is a bit wish washy but I do think Reisen saying "I'm the REAL power of Eientei. I've already surpassed my master~" is very on brand with Reisen, Especially when you remember what Reisen was doing in Forbidden Scrollery. She went behind Her masters backs to create a Rat Repellant business and was forced to shut it down after she was caught and scolded. Why would Eirin force Reisen to shut down a business that was successful? I understand she was mad at her for doing it without permission but why shut it down? Is it because Reisen integrated her abilities into the Devices that not only repelled Rabbits but also entice Customers' minds to Buy the Product and Treat it like a Charm of Good luck or was Eirin upset that Reisen thought of her as Lesser than enough to start a business without her knowledge and consent? I knew Reisen wasn't doing the business "for the Humans Same" as she said when she kept the whole thing a secret from Eirin.

The names of her spell cards are interesting and I like to think that they describe how Reisen feels emotionally, more specifically "Scars of an Empty Heart". Given that the use of her abilities is centered around the Perception of Dreams and Reality, I portray Reisen as someone who questions whether or not the scars in her heart are actually real or if her heart had always been empty?

As for the name Udongein, is very interesting because its derived from the Sanskrit word Udumbara which is interpreted in multiple ways in Buddhist text. Udonge is the Japanese word for Udumbara and its used to describe the Mind to Mind transmission between a Teacher and Student in Japanese Buddism. The Udumbara flower is also believed to be a cure for diseases in Medieval Japan. Udumbara means Auspicious flowers from Heaven which leads to it becoming a symbol of Rarity and Auspicious Signs. Kaguya wonders if the reason why Eirin named Reisen "Udongein" is because she thinks of her as a Lunar Udonge that when touched by the earth will become something beautiful. I think this is one of the the many interpretations of Udonge that exist in Touhou. Interestingly, Udumbaras can be used to symbolize Parasitism as the Trees are known to be Strangler trees. The seeds of the Udumbara fruit are dropped inside of a Tree (usually from animals) and the Tree grows from within the tree, its roots and branches literally wrap itself tightly around the host tree, effectively killing it in the process. I like to imagine that when Eirin learned about Reisen's secret Rat repellant business, it felt as if Reisen were a Strangler tree trying to take her place, so she decided to cut the roots and branches before it can strangle her. (Should've mentioned this earlier but The Colorful Jewels on the Lunar Udonge resemble the Udumbara Fruits)

There's more I want to say about her, but for now I want to ask if any of you have Voice Hcs for Reisen. (For curiosity).

She looks better with a blazer than without.

>>19062
>>19063
>Essentially, my interpretation of Reisen is that she's Denpa, someone (or something I'll explain later) who is incredibly idiosyncratic, disconnected from Reality and has strong belief systems and wild fantasies.
>It gives me the same energy as an Artist thinking that they Hate drawing only to fall in love with the hobby again.
That's more or less my interpretation of her character, although I didn't know about the denpa thing, that's interesting. I also like other people having a warped view of her due to her odd behavior as well. She can come across as heroic or very dangerous, when in reality she's more of a pathetic sadist. Still a dangerous personality type with her ability, especially if she had bad intentions, but she's not much of a planner and isn't too ambitious which keeps her in check. Not to mention I think she can be a bit anxious and worrisome over things that don't really matter, like hiding her identity as a moon rabbit, which no one seems to really give a shit about. Seiran and Ringo practically advertise themselves as youkai and no one gives a shit while Tewi somehow manages to be outgoing, secretive, and a schemer. Surpassing Reisen in all aspects except for power.
In essence, she's sort of scummy and unreliable. I imagine this plays into why Eirin lightly scolded her and stopped her rat catching business as from Eirin's point of view Reisen was going to get herself in trouble anyways. Not to mention the cat statues used Lunarian technology.

I do think this plays into her contrast with Tewi. While the white rabbit might seem more obvious and unreliable the truth is she's the more mysterious and secretive one compared to Reisen. But with Reisen and Eirin, I don't think Eirin is too loyal to the Lunarians. As Reisen says if the Lunarians would want to destroy gensokyo she'd try to stop them. At the same time the Lunar Capital constantly draws Gensokyo into it's schemes so she more or less ends up burdened as the inbetween having to secretly make sure things work out best for both sides.

>Waves. Why insanity
I think it's an ease of use thing, insanity is both easy to manipulate while also being very useful. Maybe it's easy because she's also a lunatic, but I imagine the more something is observable and physical the harder it is for her to manipulate.
The Lunarians do seem to manipulate moonlight to cause insanity and instigate the creation of youkai, so Reisen being from the moon, might think of those sorts of thing as the most natural use of her ability.

>Still a dangerous personality type with her ability, especially if she had bad intentions, but she's not much of a planner and isn't too ambitious which keeps her in check

I think another thing that holds, Reisen back is the Spell card system. I feel like Reisen is one of those characters in Touhou that are robbed of their full potential abilities due to the Spell Card System. I've seen people say she's incredibly easy and weak for a stage 5 boss, I like to think that Reisen was inexperienced at using Spell cards hence why many of her bullets are harmless. Im assuming her intention was to make the bullets invisible so that that her targets cannot predict or protect themselves from the Bullets, but she ended making them phase out of their bodies.

>"She can come across as heroic or very dangerous, when in reality she's more of a pathetic sadist".

Reisen reminds me of Gogo Yubari in the sense that they think they are Superior, especially in combat and the fact they were bodyguards to Powerful Women, but are too focused on the thrill of combat that they ignored the thing that led to their downfall. (In Gogo's case, it was a table leg with nails on it. For Reisen, she forgot to close the door leading to Kaguya and at the time was an amateur in the use of spell cards) I wouldn't say they're the same character cause Reisen isn't the most trustworthy person to get a specific job done perfectly and she only acted as a bodyguard once during the Eternal Night Incident (even though I find it a bit weird cause why was there more effort put into Protecting Kaguya when the entire reason why the Incident happened was because the Emissaries wanted Reisen to return to the LDC? Why would Kaguya need a Bodyguard? From what I can remember the Lunarians want nothing to do with her anymore. Its even stated in her profile.)

I do think that overtime she would become more skilled in using her abilities. At that point, she'd know how to mimic Star Sapphire's ability to detect things from afar and know how to use Spell Cards properly and effectively.

Kinda related(?) but I find it very interesting that Reisen's theme, Invisible Full Moon, is literally just another way to refer to the Eternal Night Incident. In some routes, Eirin refers to the Spell she casted as the "Moon Erasing Spell" instead of the "Earth Sealing Spell". It gives me the impression that this Spell was used with Reisen's abilities. The Moon was never stolen, it was just obscured with a counterfeit. I like to think this was the reason why Reisen called it Eirin's "most powerful" spell only for Eirin to disagree. Reisen's egocentric after all; She would absolutely think that a Spell created by Eirin with her abilities would be incredibly powerful.

>>19066
Maybe the bodyguard thing was to just keep Reisen next to Kaguya and make her feel like she's doing something important so she doesn't run off and get herself captured if she's the real target. Kaguya's ability does manage the internal defenses of Eientei, like how Reisen and Tewi can manage the external defenses, so if someone did breach Eientei the safest place to be would be right next to Kaguya.
And for her abilities, she did pretty easily bypass the fairies attempts to hide themselves in the manga but yeah I think she could eventually learn how to copy all of them. Yukari does imply that at least Luna's ability has hidden depths and manipulating star, sun, and moon light doesn't sound too far off from what Reisen currently does.
>Kinda related(?) but I find it very interesting that Reisen's theme, Invisible Full Moon, is literally just another way to refer to the Eternal Night Incident.
Huh? I didn't know that, it's pretty neat. But yeah it's pretty funny how she assumes that the spell would have to be powerful since it uses her abillity. This makes me wonder how'd she would act around someone like Seija, who's more pathetic personalty and strength-wise. Someone she can really feel justified about looking down on.

>And for her abilities, she did pretty easily bypass the fairies attempts to hide themselves in the manga but yeah I think she could eventually learn how to copy all of them

I kept thinking about how many characters in Touhou can Reisen counter and / or replicate their abilities. When I looked into what others can do, it made me realize that Reisen can hypothetically replicate and counter *Most* of the characters' abilities, such as replicating Satori with Mind Reading, Rumia and Mystia with manipulating Sound and Sight and counter the characters with elemental abilities as she could manipulate its waves to make them useless. That's not to say she's Automatically the Strongest character in touhou (Powerscaling is already a wish washy topic within Touhou) but I'm saying is that Reisen's abilities are broad enough for her to do what other characters can do and counter it, but much like with Star Sapphire, I dont know she'd know how to manipulate it perfectly. My previous question was that if everything consists of waves, would Reisen be able to manipulate Yukari's Gaps. It reminded of another question I forgot to ask: Why exactly does Reisen call her the most dangerous Youkai in the Dream World? I know it's because of her Abilities, Are the Baku generally seen as Threats to all Moon Rabbits or is Doremy only considered Dangerous by Reisen? Also, would Reisen always think of Doremy as a Threat because she surmises Doremy can counter her abilities within the Dream World?

>>19068
That's the upside of having an overpowered ability like Reisen's, good thing she's useless otherwise she might be dangerous. I think it's a combination of being able to counter her ability in the dream world and the fact that Doremy can gain a lot of information from her ability while you're asleep and thus unaware of her.
Really, despite her depiction in the fandom sometimes, Doremy and Baku by extension seem rather chill and uninterested in the real world for the most part. That's probably for the best.

Ever since Fossilized Wonders came out, I wondered what kind of interaction would Reisen have with Yuiman and Nina if she was a playable character in FW.

You have a Rabbit whose Specialty revolves around the manipulation of the psyche (and in my eyes is a Denpa), A God-Human who became overwhelmed by AI from the outside world enough to get Memory Loss and something akin to Schizophrenia - especially when she's placed within an Environment where most if not all the information poured in it is false - and a Shellfish Youkai who was born with the belief that AI is the "truth" that people have yet to be awakened from. Nina's profile also gives me the impression that Nina has no true identity of her own none of the truths she knows are not only false but not *her* knowledge. I looked back on the Dialogue in Reimu's Imperishable Moon and Nina brings up a "famous lunar conspiracy" which likely implies she's referring to the Apollo moon landing conspiracy.

I ask, what do you think?

>>19070
I think they'd all get on like a house on fire, Nina in her extra endings decides she wants to find the real truth. But that'll likely still flame her conspire theories tendencies, while Reisen is very much something that would be the subject of conspiracy theories. And some of her actions in the past like with the anti-mouse devices could be linked to things like 5g conspiracy theories.
Then of course there's Yuiman, perhaps believing what Nina is saying and being suckered in. Either way I think it would end up embarrassing for all of them as they get up to mischief and eventually prove themselves fools.

I always seem to only find time to post on Thursday... Maybe its something with my schedule? idk. anyway!

>Is her ability to manipulate wavelengths even anything special or can all Lunar Rabbits do it due to being psychic and it's just another occasion of a species trait being listed as a special ability for some reason.

This is a very interesting interpretation. Moon rabbits (Maybe not as a whole, but some specialists maybe?) them being a powerful force! Imagine the tactical fuckery such an ability could allow...

>how do you guys feel about the sharingan I mean the Lunatic Red Eyes

You know how in the Harry Potter, movies they shout the name of the spell and stab the wand in the air a bit? I think people just expect magic actions to be telegraphed. It helps comprehension, so I think it's a good thing. If you want people to cast spells without any flashy moves go ahead though! Whatever gets you the result you want.

>No wonder the Chiyari posting has been persistent, it's Remi's ability to manipulate fate.
>Although her failure just prove's Flandre's point about how much of a fraud she is.

I knew those bloodsucking mosquitoes were arm-in-arm.

>I like to imagine that Reisen is a fucked up hybrid of a Humanoid and Rabbit

Not quoting the whole post but some very interesting stuff here. the hybrid angle works well with the four ears / alien angle, because you'd have to have some extra room in the skull for the rabbit-ear canals, leading to an elongated alien looking head, right? and the buttons being prosthetics is cool too. I think them being hearing aids is more plausible than them being staples though. Maybe the buttons are an enhancing prosthetics rather than remedial ones? Like they could be range extenders for rabbit radio communications?

>Firstly, there was no war. I refuse to believe there was a War.

THIS USER claims Reisen Udongein Inaba IS THE FRAUDSTER.
Maybe it could have been something like a civil war between the lunarians? But as you said later in your post about Reisen being a cowardly liar sounds like a more interesting character interpretation than the generic shy, quiet, long-suffering ex-soldier.

Uh, don't have much else to say because I'm not knowledgable in this, but this is a super good post.

By the way, what do you guys think of the interpretation of moon rabbits being GMO and vat-born / manufactured?

>By the way, what do you guys think of the interpretation of moon rabbits being GMO and vat-born / manufactured?

Given Lunarian's obsessions with Purity, I wouldn't put it pass them to artificially create Moon Rabbits because I feel like they'd see Sex and Childbirth as "Impure". (Since I link the Lunarians to Aquatic Life, The idea of them reproducing Asexually doesn't sound far fetched to me, especially if it means it'll maintain purity. Also I forgot to mention this but with My theory that the Moon is a Sea of Purity, the Lunar Mares make more sense now because they are like the Moon's equivalent to Brine pools on Earth - and much like how nothing lives inside the Lunar Oceans, nothing lives inside Brine Pools.) I also think that they would try to alter the appearance of Rabbits so that they have the bodies to compete their jobs more effectively but something tells me that Reisen wasn't born in a lab and was found in the corner of the streets and was seen as an ugly deformed rabbit and was only able to get shelter by manipulating others waves to let her stay with them which could be where she got the idea to manipulate brain waves came from but hey thats just me :p. (On a similar note, I love the detail that Reisen's ears get crinkly when Stressed)

>Reisen is very much something that would be the subject of conspiracy theories

The concept of Reisen being the subject of conspiracy theories is very interesting and fitting. Aside from the 5g conspiracy as you mentioned, I wonder what other kind of conspiracy would be ultimately become the subject to. I think it would be funny. I entertain a scenario in my head that Yuiman went out Hunting one night and Mistook Reisen for a Deer and almost ate her, but Reisen used her abilities on her which effectively worsened Yuiman's already deteriorating mind.

On the topic of other characters, Right after I talked about Udumbara symbolism, I mentioned that Eirin saw Reisen as a strangler fig trying to replace her during Forbidden Scrollery, but I should've said that Reisen's superiority complex (and in essence the way she uses her abilities) can be considered Parasitic like a Strangler Fig Tree. Reisen and Tewi are a common pairing and its likewise common to see them as Tewi being the comedian and Reisen the Straight man but the way I see it, It feels like the Other way around. My interpretation of their relationship is that Reisen wanted to replace Tewi as leader of the Earth Rabbits because she feels like all Tewi does is slack off and have fun and is more powerful than her (especially when she has combat training. Still not a War Veteran though.) The way Tewi humbles Reisen is by pranking her and overall making a fool out of her to tell her in bold: "I AM the Leader here. Who gave you the right to control me? You're not even from Earth!" Even if Reisen manages to take over Tewi's leadership, None of the Rabbits listen to her or take her seriously and I dont think they ever will.

Actually, I dont think anyone will take Reisen seriously, not even when she's in Pain. Maybe its just that the Story centering around her has a heavy melancholic vibe, but I think Reisen would reach a point where she realizes that her suffering is what makes others feel content because in their eyes, they've humbled an asshole or defeated a villain. Even when they are moments when Reisen performs Good deeds, people will still think of her as a Lunatic Moon Rabbit. I look at Reisen's Love Fortune from Woohs which tells her that her Flaws are apparent so its Impossible. I can't help but think that Forming healthy, intimate Bonds with people is almost impossible for Reisen, especially when she's a Denpa and her Superiorty Complex would get in the way. Reisen does things based on how Empowering it feels for her and when its not done out of a need for empowerment, its done out of Fear or Obligation. (ZUN states that Eirin sometimes pretends to be a Rabbit Hunter, maybe she does this to Scare Reisen hence why she's scared of being scolded by her in particular?)

Its very common for Fanworks to portray Reisen as the Buttmonkey of Eientei to the point where calling Reisen a Ryona protagonist isn't entirely inaccurate. (Especially if you look at 18+ works with her). I find it funny how people say that "Reisen's life is so much better on Earth! She's a Happy Earth Bnnuy!" While simultaneously agreeing that she's abused by the Eientei crew (especially by Eirin).

On the topic of Fanworks, Are there any Doujins / Fanworks that feature or Center Reisen that stand out to you?

For me, Its Reisen Adjacent by Sunshowersy on A03. Its essentially a collection of stories centering around Humans who've met or encountered Reisen and lets just say none of them were Entirely pleasent. Im actually surprised how little Fanworks they are that portray Reisen as Otherworldly and Alien from everyone else and how she's a polarizing figure because of it. There's also Hour of the Rabbit written by the Same Author. Im still not too keen on the whole War Veteran thing, but it was a pleasant read.

>>19072
>Hybrid angle
I didn't mention this earlier, but as for her ears and the buttons she has on them. I think they're just earing, same thing for Seiran's. Reisen's earings only really look like buttons in AoCF anyways, and that was done bu a guest artist. In contrast she wasn't wearing any earing during the events in LoLK.
Although I do really like the idea of Reisen having human heritage, it's kind of cute even with her being oblivious to something everyone else finds obvious. But at the same time it's too awkward to broach and it wouldn't really change anything and just make Reisen even more Chuuni so Tewi and Eirin let it go without comment.
>By the way, what do you guys think of the interpretation of moon rabbits being GMO and vat-born / manufactured?
I think it's cool. Reisen being some sort of artificial half-human half-rabbit that was grown in a vat reminds me of the theory of Kaguya being a clone of Ariya and her sister. It makes the Lunarians out as real mad scientists, and instead o just resting on their laurels after solidifying their power base they've been actively trying to make useful tools like Kaguya and Reisen would have been intended to be, under this theory.

>>19073
> Moon's equivalent to Brine pools on Earth
That is pretty cool, and impurity being a traditional Shinto concept does come from birth. Traditionally it's more like filth, something you can literally wash away, while in Touhou it gets merged together with Buddhist concepts of karma, as well as negative spirits like youkai, and things like curses and grudges which are made from the remains of dead things. With things like oil and other pollutants being physical remnants/manifestation of that impurity. It makes me think of how ironically, humanist thought and a humancentric perspective on the world that rejects the supernatural is superstitious and ignorant in the outside world.
It's kind of ironic in a way, and really goes to show why the outside world in Touhou is so like it is. It's built on a foundation of fundamental ignorance on how the world really works.
> I wonder what other kind of conspiracy would be ultimately become the subject to.
Well I know it's politics, but in AFiEU, Aya tries to peddle conspiracy theories about what Eientei is up to with the Lunarians (nothing mainly, lol. Except for Eirin acting as an inbetween and Tewi vague posting about taking them down.)
>Tewi and Reisen
I always saw their relationship as more of distant relatives. Tewi doesn't actually prank her, but when she has other things going on she tends to be kind of annoying and dump work, like leading the earth rabbits onto Reisen. She also sees Reisen as a kind of unreliable, over emotional, and egotistical child because of how sadistic she acts, and her superiority complex. At the same time, she doesn't consider it a big issue, Tewi is probably thousands of years old and from her point of view, the fifty year old child that is Reisen will eventually grow out of her current shitty personality.
Reisen more or less accepts this because she has a vague idea of how important Tewi is and she has a degree of respect for her, but is still annoyance. Especially since leading the earth rabbits is the one job Reisen would never want since they only respect Tewi and don't listen to Reisen, who's barred from using her abillity on them. Something they know and take advantage of to get a rise out of her. At the same time, Reisen is sort of distant from Tewi, but mainly by choice. Although she doesn't fully understand what Tewi has going on, she's egotistical enough to consider it unimportant and uninterested enough to dismiss it. While at the same time although Tewi is willing, perhaps egar to talk candidly with Reisen, she knows Reisen doesn't really care.
>Reisen and others
I don't think people have a blind ear to Reisen, but it's just that Reisen is mostly annoying and makes mountains out of mole hills due to a combination of anxiety and superiority complex. So there's a but of the boy who cried wolf going on. But if a real problem ever arose, I think Eirin who earnestly think of Reisen as some sort of daughter, would try her best to help her and assuage her fears.
Although ryona Reisen is pretty hot.

Woops, forgot this.

>It makes me think of how ironically, humanist thought and a humancentric perspective on the world that rejects the supernatural is superstitious and ignorant in the outside world.

It reminds me of another thought that came up regarding Moon Rabbits. Reisen in Forbidden Scrollery calls them Slaves and with the reasons why Reirei (Reisen 2) left the Moon in Bougetsuhou and Seiran's overall behavior towards the Moon, its easy to believe that life for the Moon Rabbits is All doom and gloom. But then I look back on Ssib and see that Moon Rabbits Do have towns of their own and seem to be chilling. I don't think All Moon Rabbits are slaves, yes they're considered second class especially based on their professional, but contrary to what others in-universe believe, Moon rabbits are capable of living a normal life. In my eyes, Moon Rabbit Societies co-existing with the Lunarians' is almost like how in Countries like The US there's plenty of Immigrants living there and while they are many of them able to live a Sustainable, airy life, they're still considered lesser than because they aren't born with the same genes as everyone else and suffer Prejudice because of it.

Reisen calling the Moon Rabbits slaves at first feels like truth, especially with the information supporting the idea, but I'm starting to believe that Reisen calling them Slaves is just her Superiorty Complex leaking through. She says she's not a Lunarian, but seems to have similar traits as them, Rejecting impurity, obscuring themselves from Humans and having an overpowered ability. In a way, that too is an irony because She says she isn't Lunarian, but what actually makes you different from them?

It also reminds me of Seiran where She praises Earth - Her title is literally "Earth-Loving Moon Rabbit" - for its excitement and impurity while simultaneously having a fear of Impurity that comes from Death but at the same time, Seiran's fear of impurity to me comes off as a Fear implanted to her by Lunar Society and insecurity in contrast to Reisen who doesn't exactly fear impurity but isn't fully accepting of it.

>impurity being a traditional Shinto concept does come from birth.

It makes me wonder what is Reisen's relationship with Medicine and the Medical Field.

Similarly, Ive talked about the Symbolism with Udonge and Udumbara but I dont think I brought up how Reisen Herself interprets the name. I think within the context of Medicine, Reisen interprets Udonge As Eirin thinking of her as something that aids in the mental state of Patients: Reisen can manipulate brain waves to achieve a feeling akin to Tranquility. There's also the aforementioned Parasitism symbolism that I compare Reisen's Superiorty complex too.

>ryona Reisen is pretty hot
Reisen Ryona sure is interesting.

>>19076
I thought of the Lunarian-Moon Rabbit relationship more like the proles. Rabbits are simple and easy to placate, they breed fast, can be used as tools, and unlike the Lunarian nobles are not concerned with Impurity. All while presenting relatively little threat to the Lunarians, so there is no need to exterminate them.
I'm sure they are oppressed, but at the same time not actively, at least anymore and most of them have empty heads giving it no mind. Although for Seiran, as her jewel is a simple air cleaning device in comparison to a proper purification device, I think she's just a germaphobe. It plays into her whole tourist thing, she lives on earth but only interacts with earth as an outsider, despite her attempts to fit in. In contrast to Ringo who fits in more, despite being more open about being an alien.
>>19077
Reisen (victim of ryona) is inevitable, as sure as Yachie (victim of domination loss), or Alice (victim of hypnosis). There are just some things you can't change about the world.

>Rabbits are simple and easy to placate, they breed fast, can be used as tools, and unlike the Lunarian nobles are not concerned with Impurity.

There was this whole thing where Earth Rabbits Crashed a Shrine Dinner Party, I wonder if Moon Rabbits have tried something similar or they just don't comment about or protest against Lunarian politics because they feel as if they don't have any right to comment about it. Do they strike? Would they strike?

>She also sees Reisen as a kind of unreliable, over emotional, and egotistical child because of how sadistic she acts, and her superiority complex

If Reisen is generally seen as Unreliable and Capricious to the Eientei crew, why do they bother having her around? Is it just that her abilities are that useful that cant simply kick her out or is Reisen using her abilities to ensure she never gets kicked out of Eientei even when people can't deal with her shit? I feel like the Earth Rabbits would complain about Reisen and question how isnt she kicked out. She was put on House Arrest one time but it was for something her Dream Self Caused.

>Reisen (victim of ryona) is inevitable

It sure is inevitable to not torture the red eyed bnnuy. Does she deserve it? I dont know, but its Reisen Ryona-In Inaba.

(Seems like I have so much to say about Reisen that I forgot about the other things)

Reisen reminds me of the fact that Ruby Eyed Rabbits get a bad reputation amongst Humans for their appearance and are more often than not abandoned, mistreated and even euthanized. I did say:

>something tells me that Reisen wasn't born in a lab and was found in the corner of the streets and was seen as an ugly deformed rabbit

>>19079
I think they keep Reisen around because she's family. Eirin thinks of her as a daughter, Tewi a grandchild, Kaguya probably as some sort of little sister or pet. That and Kaguya did sort of give her the last name Inaba and shove her into the Inaba family anyways so why not adopt her, Reisen is sort of pitiable in an annoying sort of way.
But aside from Tewi the earth rabbits mainly seem relaxed and to not get up to much, very complacent and I don't think they mind Reisen given that she can't do much to them.
>Reisen origin
That's sad, but I could see the princesses pitying her and taking her in if that was her origin.

>I think they keep Reisen around because she's family.

I don't portray the Eientei casts as Family but I can see where you're coming from. I do see Eirin as being a Mother like figure to Reisen but not in an extremely loving way but in a "She isn't hostile or abusive but its best to not say anything that'll make it seem like she's going to hurt you" way.

Personally I see the Earth Rabbits as being found family; They were abandoned by their owners and given a chance to live in Eientei by Tewi where they get to know what having a Family is like. Even the Moon Rabbits have companionship that we see multiple times in canon material. Reisen has multiple Masters and Business partners, but from my perspective, I don't think she'd have Friends or Family nor would I think she'd have the commitment to sustain them. If many people reported that having a normal conversation with Reisen is difficult, then I doubt Reisen has any true companions. I think the closest she had to a "friend" was Seiran, but the term "Friend" starts to feel like a synonym for "Co worker". Its like schoolmates greet you everyday but they don't engage in full conversations with you or would sit by you for anything. (Again coming from personal experience :p)

>Reisen origin

I can't decide on whether Reisen's backstory should be that she was abused or abandoned as a Child, but either way I do think the way she was treated back then is similar to how some people treat Ruby Eyed Rabbits.

>ryona Reisen is pretty hot

Huh, it's already bump limit.
I must say I liked the last thread's ending better. A healthy discussion, unlike... whatever predominated this. Maybe, er, someone else is up to say anything in remaining time, preferably without random capitalizations? Anyone?

>>19081
Yeah I can't really see Eirin as a bad mom to Reisen, or even a bad teacher to the Wata sisters. Although I certainly see.
>She isn't hostile or abusive but its best to not say anything that'll make it seem like she's going to hurt you"
As something Reisen would think, but considering this is Reisen I just think she's being overly anxious. Eirin's never hurt her and always heard out her problems. Although now that you mention it, Seiran and the moon rabbits probably do mainly see Reisen as some coworker. But I don't think Tewi would view her entirely like that, even if she says so. When Tewi talks about the Inaba being a found family I think she extends that to Reisen and does care about her as family

>>19083
Just two chill guys talking about their love for Reisen.
Which is more or less what happened last thread as well with Reimu.

>>19083
Yeh same basically.
>Maybe, er, someone else is up to say anything in remaining time
I have to say that Reisen has a pretty unusual outfit, for that era of Touhou, at least. I used to think it was more like a blazer-style school uniform, and I still believe that was ZUN's intention, but we were talking about it with Summerfield ages ago, and he said that it actually reminds him of frumpy Cold War-era men's suits, the really bulky and unstylish ones, the kind you could easily conceal a ballistic vest under. Which made me think about her in that direction, I guess. I would believe that she used to wear a ballistic vest under her suit, at least until before settling into Gensokyo a bit. Paranoiac-like. But I don't actually know much about the character, I haven't read any Moon books, so whatever...

>>19074
>Although ryona Reisen is pretty hot.
As a ryona guy (just being honest, okay? nothing wrong with a bit of sex violence), not really, but that's a matter of taste

>>19085
True, there are better ryona candidates like Seija.

>I have to say that Reisen has a pretty unusual outfit, for that era of Touhou

That's why I love her design imo. Literally my first thoughts on her was "She Looks so out of place compared to everyone else!" Which ended up being my main characterization of her. Obviously she isn't the only one wearing a blazer and tie, but I think it's the way that it's styled is what makes it look out of place, Especially when I headcanon her as a Fucked up Moon Rabbit Hybrid.

>But I don't think Tewi would view her entirely like that, even if she says so. When Tewi talks about the Inaba being a found family I think she extends that to Reisen and does care about her as family.

I do think their relationship would ease up overtime, but I don't think Reisen in particular would see her as family (at least not entirely so), but I think Tewi would.

>someone else is up to say anything in remaining time

Even if the limit exceeded there's always the Irregular Threads.

>she's being overly anxious.

On the topic of Anxiety, Reisen's anxiety speaks to me as her having OCD instead of her only having Generalized Anxiety. The thing with OCD is that it's a condition that revolves around Fear, usually a fear of consequence and Reisen is a character who fears consequences. The thing is these fears sound absolutely ridiculous when you word them out (eg. I fear that if I listen to a song about a racist I'm gonna become racist) but realizing that the fears are irrational and that there's no reason to become paranoid over them doesn't make them go away immediately. The way I see it, Reisen has OCD but due to a mix of her Superority Complex and General attitude towards others, people just think she's born an asshole. Also, Generalized Anxiety does start looking like OCD the longer you have it.

Its easy to see Reisen as being overly rigid or diligent, but in reality it's just that Reisen fears doing something that will fuck her up long term but due to her occupation on Earth and the day to day events of Gensokyo, she can't easily avoid conflict. Being exposed to conflict doesn't make you used to conflict, it makes you used to feeling stressed.

We've just reached bump limit again, so the next discussion will happen in a new thread, but it would make sense to still vote for the next character here. Let's do it!

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari
[x] Kirisame Marisa

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari
I want a nice calm week for 30+ posts about Marisa

>>19090
It's the hour of the witch! And also I don't really care much about Chiyari.
[x] Kirisame Marisa

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

Honestly Marisa probably gonna win but I DONT CARE, THAT WITCH CAN BURN IN HELL RAHHHH

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

This poll might as well be rigged out of Chiyari's favor, but y'know what? I don't care! Chiyari EFF TEE DUBS!

[X] Kirisame Marisa

Not much to say on her but I have far less to say about Chiyari

[X] Kirisame Marisa

The time has come, be it closing or opening!

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

[x] Tenkajin Chiyari

[X] Kirisame Marisa

Alright, voting is closed. Thank you for participating again. The new thread will be set up in a few hours. How much is "a few" exactly? I don't know. Please watch warmly until it is ready.

El chupa finally won

I-I can't believe it, out of all characters, we managed to beat Marisa? In a 1v1 nonetheless...

WE ARE SO BACK

>>19104 okey i made it