東方プロジェクト二次小説・オリジナル小説サイト
Chapter 10: The Embodiment of Scarlet Devil

Ten

𝘖𝘯𝘦 𝘭𝘪𝘵𝘵𝘭𝘦 𝘴𝘰𝘭𝘥𝘪𝘦𝘳 𝘣𝘰𝘺 𝘭𝘦𝘧𝘵 𝘢𝘭𝘭 𝘢𝘭𝘰𝘯𝘦;
𝘏𝘦 𝘸𝘦𝘯𝘵 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘩𝘢𝘯𝘨𝘦𝘥 𝘩𝘪𝘮𝘴𝘦𝘭𝘧
𝘈𝘯𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘸𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘯𝘰𝘯𝘦.


—29—


"Why are you flying so fast? You have two passengers!" Reimu screamed as we shot past her. My eyes were screwed tightly shut, both to avoid seeing and as protection against the air currents whipping past us.

"See you there, Reimu!" Marisa cried in response. Carrying the three of us relentlessly forward, the broom charged heedlessly into the thunderstorm and dropped into a steep, fast dive, plunging toward the Scarlet Devil Mansion.

As we plummeted out of the clouds and toward the gate, there was no sign of Meiling. I could think of only one thing we had seen that would make her abandon her duties as a gatekeeper, and if this thunderstorm had also been called up to trap something, then the cause seemed all too clear.

Our speed had dropped significantly from the blistering race over the lake, but we were still going plenty fast when we collided with the broad double doors at the front of the house, throwing them aside with a jarring impact and hurtling down several dozen meters of silent hallway before we slowed to a more reasonable pace. "Well well, what have we here?" Marisa asked as she slowed further still, eventually gliding to a halt in mid-air. "You two had better hop off, you wouldn't wanna get caught in a barrage."

Further down the hall, luminous in the murky dimness, Patchouli was floating. The expression on her face was beyond unhappy and became decidedly disgusted when she caught sight of Marisa. Needing no further encouragement, Renko and I slipped off of the broom and darted for cover behind the nearest pillar while Marisa repositioned herself more comfortably.
"You again." Patchouli said by way of greeting, her voice dripping with contempt.

"Yup, me again," chirped Marisa, confidently. "Is that rain out there yours?"

"I don't have time for this now. First the little sister and now you. Begone, rat." Without another word, Patchouli opened the book she was carrying and flipped to a predetermined page. In less than a second an intricate circle made of pure light constructed itself at her feet and several pillars of pale, solid-looking luminescence rose up all around her. The light was a brilliant silver, like that of the moon and each pillar made a hushed whooshing noise as they all sliced through the air like blades.

Marisa reacted just as quickly, snatching something from her pocket and holding it up. It was a small octagonal container, something like a jewelry box set with inlaid metal on top of lacquered wood. Rather than anything you might expect however, this container appeared to contain a tremendous source of fiery heat, as the moment its doors opened a narrow but blinding torrent of scorching light poured out toward Patchouli.

The battle between the wizards was dazzling, and it quickly became clear that despite any embellishment she might have added to her tale, Marisa was clearly on equal footing with the other magician. As the two circled each other in the air, wave after wave of beams and projectiles darted between them, cutting into each other's paths. As I watched their colorful exchange from behind the pillar, Renko was muttering beside me. "I guess that's what it's all about..."

"What was that, Renko?"

"Ah, don't worry about it for now. Let's just watch and see how this plays out first, shall we?"

I looked back at her from my position at the side of the pillar and sighed. Renko's dedication to the role of a pompous detective was unfazed. As soon as I did so a burning ember soared past Marisa, trailing a long tail of orange fire and grazing just past my ear before coming to a smoldering halt on the carpet behind me. A chill ran down my spine.

"How's this?" Patchouli shouted, as another magic circle bloomed and a kaleidoscope of bullets tumbled down like rain.

"Not bad! I'm gonna have to go all out!" Marisa replied as she piloted her broom toward the center of the ring. Rushing forward, she ignored the sea of bullets churning around her and the numerous burning tracers arcing toward her from behind. As the swarm of bullets converged she leapt from her broom, hurtling herself through the air, on a collision course with the other magician. Patchouli's eyes went wide as Marisa reached the peak of the arc she had hurled herself on just centimeters away from Patchouli's chest. As she soared through the air, streaks of light were coalescing into the octagon in her hand...

"MASTER SPAAAARK!!"

Marisa cried out, and her shrill voice was at once swallowed by an all-encompassing roar as the same overwhelmingly thick beam of light we had seen her use against Remilia ripped forth from the box she was holding to fill every inch of the hallway. There was nowhere for Patchouli to dodge away, no room for her to run.

When the light and the roar faded away, Marisa was standing astride her broom, blowing a thin coil of smoke from the seam between the doors at the front of the octagon in her hand. The smoke was matched by a thin cloud of ashy purple haze and the smell of burnt hair that hovered over Patchouli, who lay spread-eagled and soot-stained some half-dozen meters further along the hall than she had been a moment ago. She coughed once weakly and muttered something like "mukyuu..."

Marisa floated down low enough to check that Patchouli was still breathing, then winked at her. "I'll just be moving on ahead then," she said with a smile. "What about you two?" she called back to us, from down the hall.

"We have business with Miss Patchouli here," Renko called back, rising from her spot behind the pillar and stepping into the hall.

"OK then, I'm gonna see what I can find." With that, Marisa was gone, racing down the hall on a trail of stardust as outside the thunder rolled and grumbled.

By the time we had walked over to where Patchouli had fallen, she was sitting up, brushing the dust from her pajama-like robes and collecting her fallen books between wheezy coughs.

"Hello, and thank you for having us the other day," Renko began. "I'm sorry we left without getting a chance to say goodbye."

Patchouli squinted at us, seeming to notice us for the first time. "You two again. Have you come to steal books now too?"

"I assure you we have no such intentions! We just hadn't had a chance to thank you properly and wanted to come by to do so."

"I don't care about that. You should both get out of here as quickly as possible. If you stay, I can't guarantee your safety." Patchouli's glare was grim and cold, but my partner didn't hesitate for a moment, answering back with that same troublesome grin as always.

"Because the mistress' little sister has escaped, right?"

Patchouli rose to her feet, then off of them, floating a few centimeters in the air to hover eye-to-eye with Renko. She drew in close.

"And how did you know that?"
"The rain." Renko said with nonchalance, gesturing vaguely back the way we had come. "Vampires can't cross running water, right? The young mistress mentioned as much earlier. I'm guessing you called up this storm so Miss Flandre couldn't go outside to play."

"Go outside to play? Oh, so it was you!" Patchouli backed away from us and rose slightly higher in the air to look down on us. "Someone has been filling Flandre's head with nonsense about the world outside her room and now for the first time in a century she's decided she needs to go out to play. She completely destroyed the barrier on her room. Do you have any idea how much of a nuisance this is for us?"

I cowered in horror under the glare of the magician but Renko stood firm.

"Are you sure it's a nuisance? Isn't it exactly what you wanted all along?"

Patchouli's eyebrows shot up "What are you talking about?"

"Well it's all exactly as you planned isn't it? Miss Flandre wanting to leave and you setting up a rainstorm to stop her."

"What is this nonsense? Explain yourself." Patchouli's voice was hard and threatening, but Renko responded with a grin, poking the brim of her hat back on her head with one finger before answering.

"It's just an idea I had. The idle fantasy of this humble visitor to fantasyland. The musings of a human who just happened to wander in, take note of all the incoherent and mysterious happenings in this mansion and put together a little story, to amuse themselves. The great secret of the terrifying Scarlet Devil Mansion, and the impetus behind the recent incident."

"What 'secret of the mansion'? What 'impetus'? You're the one who put the idea of spreading the mist into Remi's head, aren't you?"

"Perhaps I did, but that was only an excuse. If I hadn't come along, there would have been an incident sooner or later anyway. The ostensible reasoning for it could have been anything—because Miss Remilia was bored, or because she wanted to make her mark on the world in some way, or any reason at all. You were just waiting for a good opportunity to stir up trouble again."

"What's your point?"
"It didn't matter what she did or why she did it, sooner or later you knew Miss Remilia was going to cause an incident—she had to, in fact! All so that in the end you could make sure she got exterminated by the Hakurei shrine maiden. Am I wrong?"

Patchouli's glare was cold, but appraising. She said nothing while continuing to stare Renko down.

Renko took off her hat and spun it idly around her upraised finger. Pacing a few steps back and forth beside me as she did so. "Of course, this is just some Outsider's fantasy. If there's no truth to it, you could just laugh it off. But if I'm right....."

Renko turned to face Patchouli and popped the hat back on her head.

"Then you and I should probably have a little talk to see just how much of this story I should keep to myself and how much I should reveal. After all, it's one thing if people were to find out about the truth of the Scarlet Mist Incident or the origins of the Scarlet Devil Mansion, but it would be quite another if people began to suspect that Remilia and Flandre aren't vampires at all, wouldn't it?" From Patchouli there was only silence, and tension so thick you could cut it with a knife.
"Especially if people realized they were actually demons, both summoned by you, right?"


—30—


"What an interesting delusion you're spouting. I'll let you say your piece." Patchouli replied with an utterly expressionless face, Her tone carefully even. Renko bowed and began to speak fluidly.

"The key to my discovery was the inconsistency in the time lapses around the mansion. The time spent in Flandre's room all but disappeared, but one night staying here became a week in the village. I wonder if that was your doing or the skillful employment of Sakuya's ability on your behalf? Either way though it begs a more pressing question—why do it at all?"

Renko began to pace again as she collected her thoughts, striding back and forth with her hands clasped behind her back. "The next key was that the young mistress, who claims to be over 500 years old, said she was a descendant of count Dracula. If you assume she's talking about Vlad III of Wallachia and you do the math, that doesn't make sense—so either the bloodline is a fiction, or the age is. Or maybe both. That claim of bloodline is absolutely key though, you see. Without it, Remilia's claim of being a vampire starts to look groundless. There are a number of oddities—enough so that if you hadn't heard she was related to Dracula, you probably wouldn't think she was a vampire at all!" Renko raised her right hand and began to count off each point on her fingers, one by one.

"First, vampires are terrifying monsters not only because they drink human blood, but because they corrupt those they prey on, turning them into more vampires. But there are neither many other vampires nor any human thralls in the process of becoming vampires to be found here in the Scarlet Devil Mansion. Isn't it strange if, as she claims, she tried to conquer all of Gensokyo six months ago, but not a single thrall or vampire soldier is left at her command now? I'll admit, my suspicion was a bit shaken when I met Flandre, thinking that perhaps she might have been a vampire turned by Remilia, but she herself claimed a different relationship, and one that went back much further than six months ago."

"Second, just before watching Meiling's fight from the terrace, Remilia told us she was a light eater, and that she preferred not to feed from humans because doing so would ruin her clothes—a plausible enough story to be sure, and a suiting origin for a moniker like 'the Scarlet Devil' but ultimately too improbable to be believed. What kind of vampire can't suck a lot of blood? Sucking blood is what makes vampires vampires. If she couldn't do that, she'd be a failure of a vampire wouldn't she? Weak and powerless. But she wasn't. We saw from her fight that she's quite dangerous despite that. So she had to be some sort of creature that didn't need to suck blood to live. That's when I remembered what she had called herself—the 'Scarlet Devil'. She seemed to like that name, probably because that's what she had been known as before, I'm guessing, a red devil of some kind. I still wasn't sure though, it could just have been my imagination."

"But there were still more hints. The third was during her fight with Reimu. Her final attack in that bout was an enormous cruciform of light. A rather strange choice for a vampire living in a western mansion who's supposed to hate such things."

"Fourth was earlier today, when we watched Remilia enter Reimu's home with impunity. Vampires aren't supposed to be able to enter a home without being invited, and Reimu's home is a shrine! Holy ground! Reimu even said 'she comes around all the time even if I tell her not to!' Moreover, she was coming over in the middle of the day in the middle of summer, with only a flimsy parasol as a fig leaf to protect her. That's a vampire with quite a bit of resistance to sunlight, especially considering she lives in a mansion with no windows, wouldn't you say?"

"Speaking of which, there's the mansion itself. This place is located on the shore of a large lake—the biggest body of water I've been able to see in Gensokyo, in fact. Even if you say a lake is still water despite the convection currents and wind moving it around, we saw it has rivers flowing in and out of it. The water there is moving all the time. Why would a vampire choose to live by the site of one of their biggest weaknesses, especially on the far shore from the human village, where she'd have to cross or go around to find anyone to feed on?"

"You might say, perhaps, that some of these traits are not common to all vampires, or even that some are just superstition while others are real, however there are just too many—every weakness you could think of has a hole in it. Remilia even claimed Sakuya came after her as a vampire hunter with a silver knife, but I'm pretty sure silver is supposed to be for werewolves, not vampires. Or maybe even for demons. All of it raises doubt, and meanwhile we haven't seen the mistress do anything vampiric at all. But with all that said, she's clearly not a human. So if she's not a vampire, and not human, what is she and where did she come from?"

"Your little devil told us that answer. A magician can summon demons from Makai, and a powerful magician can summon many at once. When she does, she takes their names, keeping them for herself and forcing the demons to be known by some other moniker. Often something simple like 'little devil', or maybe 'scarlet devil' perhaps. Once I realized that Remilia wasn't a vampire, everything else began to make more sense. The so-called 'Vampire Incident' six months ago was just a part of the whole sham—a ruse to set up the fiction of this mansion itself as the home of a vampire."

Renko was talking faster now, fiddling with the brim of her hat and smiling as she worked out the finer points.

"Let me tell you another story I've come up with now. It goes like this: once upon a time there was a magician, studying magic in the Outside World. She was a diabolist, beginning her study of the art of summoning and binding demons. Normally she could rely on the fact that if she tried to summon a demon too powerful for her to control, it would probably just ignore her summon anyway and reject her. But one day, that didn't happen. Whether out of curiosity or frustration or whatever other reason, a powerful demon answered her call. But the demon was far too powerful for her to control. It was a demon of destruction, and when she couldn't bind it, it went on a rampage, destroying everything it could. So in order to keep the demon from burning up the whole world, the magician triggered a trap she had set up in case of such an emergency and transported herself and the demon to another world, a world with an inescapable barrier to hold the demon in check. Once she had transported it there, or here, rather—to Gensokyo, much to her surprise, the demon didn't calm down at all, and went right on rampaging in this new world. The magician was troubled, and thought perhaps she could fight fire with fire, and so she summoned another powerful demon. This time though, rather than trying to bind the demon she summoned, she made a most unusual offer—she offered to work with this new devil as a partner, allowing it freedom to do as it pleased in this world if it would help her suppress the first demon she had summoned."

I gasped. I could see Renko's story coming together. If she was right, then that terrible destructive demon that had been beyond Patchouli's ability to control must be...

"The new devil accepted the terms and a contract of equal cooperation was forged between devil and sorcerer. That was six months ago, I'm guessing. That powerful, uncontrollable demon was brought to heel by another demon, the one the magician made a contract with. Since the magician in this story was you, Patchouli, you took the names of both of the devils once they were bound. You let the one you had bound as an equal pick her own name, something that suited her bloody tastes. When she did, you got an idea. You still couldn't bind the first demon you summoned to a contract, even if Remilia could keep it from rampaging, so you thought up a plan to make it more compliant. When Remilia had renamed herself, it was a re-invention of sorts, a changing of the way she was perceived. If you could force something like that onto your first demon, you might eventually be able to bind her."

"After the battle, you had the original demon sealed away in a stone tomb lined with powerful wards. The purpose of these wards was not just to contain the demon, but to steal her memories, and erase all record of her demonic past from her mind. You had Remilia give this demon a name too, one that would mark her as bound to Remilia, but subservient. An innocent younger sister who looked up to her big sister with awe and admiration was the fiction you both chose. Nevermind the fact that the two were never related—that's why Flandre's wings look completely different from Remilia's, right? The two might not even have been the same species to start with. But the wards didn't work, not completely, and not all the time. Sometimes, the demon could still remember it was a demon, right? The fictional new identity you had both built for her was 'unstable.'"

"You had done that much, but you were almost at your limit already. The strain of sustaining the two demons you had called up was beginning to weaken your body. You began studying feverishly to try and find some means of making a stronger seal, or a better spell for rewriting memories, but there were simply too many possibilities. It would require the creation of a whole new kind of magic, and one that wasn't your specialty. You'd need extensive research, and an assistant to help you organize your findings and synthesize this new school you were creating. You were weak already, but you summoned one more demon. A small one, just to help out around the library, since you couldn't force the demon you had bound as a partner to do so and you didn't have enough power left for a strong one. It was a bit of a tell that the wings of Koakuma and Remilia were so similar while the wings of Flandre, who was supposed to be Remilia's sister, were so different but you made do with what you had."

Renko paused for a moment, seeming to expect a reaction out of Patchouli, but her poker face remained undisturbed, her eyes half-lidded with fatigue, her features pale and placid. "This is quite the elaborate delusion you've whipped up. Do Sakuya or Meiling appear in this story?" She asked.

"I'm guessing that the both of them were people you were already acquainted with in the Outside world. You probably brought them here when you brought the mansion across the border. Judging by the fact that your magic uses the eastern five elements theory as a core to expand outward from, I'd say you probably weren't a western magician to begin with, maybe studying somewhere in China before you came here."

"You brought Sakuya over because you needed her ability to manipulate time in the tomb you dropped the mansion on top of. You had her make it so that the six months Flandre had been imprisoned down there would seem like hundreds of years to her. That would give your memory-modifying spells more time to work on her. But just the other day you had to change the time compression, didn't you? Remilia had ordered you to make the fog spread quickly, so you had Sakuya change the flow of time here in the mansion to build up enough mist to cover the whole of Gensokyo while the mistress was still awake. To those outside the mansion, that took a week, but for us it was only a night."

Renko's theory explained the anomalies I had noted in the barriers surrounding the mansion. The barrier on the gate acted as a seal for the first time-lock and the barrier on Flandre's room acted as a second, keeping the two layers of time spinning separately from each other, and at different speeds. The complex nature of the barriers must be to define a boundary for Sakuya's time manipulation ability, locking it into affecting an area small enough for her to manipulate to the extent needed. The fact that the ward around the mansion was much larger than the ward around the room must account for the fact that the time acceleration affecting the mist had not been as pronounced as that affecting Flandre—covering Gensokyo had still taken all evening from our perspective, rather than just a few minutes. That made me wonder what the impact of my interference with the barrier around Flandre's room had been. Had I brought her into the same speed of time as the rest of the mansion inadvertently?

Thinking about the mechanics of it, I had to wonder. Was the distortion of time around the mansion the reason we had ended up in the Gensokyo of 80 years before our own time rather than just traversing the boundary as is? Or could it perhaps be some interaction between my powers, the amber stone and the telescoping time around this place? It was enough to make my head spin. I couldn't imagine how confusing it must all be to a Super-unified Physics major like Renko, for whom things like time and space were supposed to not just be concepts, but mathematical models with predictable rules. As I pondered such things, Renko's reasoning continued.

"Despite Sakuya's impact though, it was Meiling who played the most important role. Because this whole mansion belongs to her. No, that's not quite right. Let me rephrase that. Because in a way, Meiling IS this place. She's the youkai of the Scarlet Devil Mansion, isn't she?"

Patchouli took a small breath, gasping ever so slightly. Renko noticed. She snapped her fingers triumphantly and continued.

"Ha! I had been wondering why Meiling, who has the Chinese character for 'Red' in her name, would occupy such a lowly position in this mansion, but still be kept on and moreover seem perfectly content with her role as gatekeeper. The answer to both is because she exists to protect this mansion; it's her very nature. She doesn't mind as long as she can be here, keeping the place safe."

"Why would this mansion even need a gatekeeper when you, Sakuya and Remilia are all more than strong enough to deal with any normal intruders? The answer is obvious. Meiling isn't tasked with keeping people out, she's a watchdog here to keep a powerful demon from escaping. She's the seal on Pandora's box, as it were. That's why it's her job to see to Flandre's needs and not Sakuya's. And when you gave her that job, that's when the mansion was remade into its current form. It's not a building made for Remilia or anyone else to live in, really. The whole thing is one big seal for holding in Flandre! The sheer size of it, far bigger and more maze-like than it needs to be is all part of the trap. We couldn't figure out why the shape of the place seems different on the inside than the outside, but it's because the whole thing is coiled in on itself and just taking the shape of a mansion. Like a labyrinth, or the body of a sleeping dragon, all wound round itself over and over."

"That's why you all treat Meiling the way you do. You had to keep anyone from realizing the truth of the matter, that this mansion belongs to her—IS her. She didn't mind it as long as she got to stay and keep the place intact and belittling her helped to soothe the proud ego of the demon you're bound to. Making Remilia the master of the mansion was probably more of the same. That's the secret behind all of this, every single oddity was all just an elaborate ruse to protect the secret that the true master of the Scarlet Devil Mansion is Meiling!"

Renko had finished her speech with a dramatic flourish, pulling up the collar on the trenchcoat she had donned before we pierced through the thunderstorm, and thrusting out her arm, one accusatory finger outstretched toward Patchouli. As she concluded, silence fell over the halls, still except for the soft rumble of thunder beyond the walls.

The silence was broken by the wheeze of Patchouli suddenly bursting into laughter. The outburst quickly devolved into a fit of hoarse coughs, but after a minute or so, the magician was able to suppress the spasms and rose again to face us. "A very funny story," she said to us. "But it doesn't explain this most recent incident at all. If I'm the mastermind pulling all the strings, and this mansion exists to seal Remi's sister, what goal could I possibly have accomplished by luring a priestess and a witch here to knock everything over and cause trouble?"

Renko answered immediately. "Because you needed the story to be told. To establish fiction as fact."

Patchouli's expression suddenly changed, her complexion growing even paler, fading to a sickly grey.

"You had Flandre trapped in her tomb, but you didn't know how long you could hold her there. Sakuya is a mortal, and your own seals could be vulnerable to interference. Sooner or later, Flandre was bound to escape. When she did, you needed her to be manageable—after all, developing a whole new school of magic so that you could learn to actually control her might take you centuries. You needed to be prepared for disruptions in the meantime. The easiest way to make her controllable was to make her believe she could be controlled. Make her think the outside world was too dangerous to interact with. For that, you needed her to be a vampire, one with plenty of easy-to-exploit weaknesses for a magician like you who can manipulate water, clouds and sunlight. A vampire, even if she broke out of the mansion, wouldn't be able to get far. The lake would contain her, rainstorms could be used to herd her, and she'd have to hide from the sun. The fact that you got a demon as proud as Remilia to play along with the role shows just how much you both fear Flandre's power. Even then though, your story would only be told as far as the confines of this mansion. If Flandre escaped and met someone outside of these walls, they might say something that could remind her of her true nature. Then all your work would be for naught! How could you prevent this?" Renko posed in mock fear, her hands pressed to her cheeks.

"The answer is simple. Make the story bigger. Make it something everyone in this world would know." She spread her hands out illustratively as she spoke.

"You just had to make sure Remilia was available to get your version of the story out when it was needed. Let it be known that the master of the Scarlet Devil Mansion is a vampire named Remilia Scarlet. That a human named Izayoi Sakuya, a gate youkai named Meiling Hong and a magician named Patchouli Knowledge dwell in her house. Most importantly, get the story out that Remilia's sister Flandre is imprisoned within the mansion because she's crazy. In order to make the story solid enough to reinforce your control, you had to make sure it was told just that way. How better to manage that than to start an Incident and have the official powers of Gensokyo resolve it, thereby guaranteeing that the story would get recorded in the 𝘎𝘦𝘯𝘴𝘰𝘬𝘺𝘰 𝘊𝘩𝘳𝘰𝘯𝘪𝘤𝘭𝘦, and become common knowledge for everyone."

"So to get it the way you wanted it, you used the Hakurei shrine maiden. You used the Child of Miare to record your chosen history. You used the machine called Gensokyo, which takes subjective perception and belief and turns them into facts and living creatures which embody those facts to change the nature of the terrible mistake you had made into something you could control. You're hacking the program underlying this whole world to hijack it for your own ends!"

A peal of thunder resounded through the hall, and Renko let out a breath and pressed her hat back down on her head.

"You might have been planning to wait a bit longer before letting Flandre interact with the rest of Gensokyo, but since she got out now, you needed to make sure she got noticed by Reimu and Marisa, and anyone else who can make a big splash and spread the story. So you made a big, loud thunderstorm to draw attention to her presence, even though a simple drizzle would have worked just as well. You also wanted to use this opportunity to test whether the vampire story had really sunk in or not, so when Flandre broke out, you told Meiling and Sakuya to let her roam free so you could see if she's really bound by the weaknesses the story placed on her or not. Even better for you, if Marisa and Reimu are able to put Flandre back in the basement for you, the mistress doesn't have to, so you avoid the risk of her remembering something during their confrontation. Three birds with one stone, not a bad plan, if I do say so myself."

"You might even have been using us as part of your plan," Renko continued. "Letting us roam about the house, leaving us in Flandre's room to get her interested in the outside world and see if she'd attack us, making sure we could witness and corroborate the accounts of Remilia and Reimu's exhibition match. Even the hints Remilia dropped for us might have been intentional, if they weren't just her pride showing through. She might have been having fun playing the role of a vampire and, consciously or not, let out a few obvious inconsistencies just to taunt us."

Renko sighed, then took her hat off again and bowed graciously. "Well that's my wild little story. I hope you enjoyed it."

Patchouli stared for a moment, and then laughed again. With genuine warmth in her voice this time, though still with a wheezy rasp as well. "Well, that was quite an interesting tale, I must admit." She began to float off as she said this, lowering herself down to a few centimeters above the carpet. She motioned for us to follow behind her as she did. "I'm something of a collector of stories as it turns out, so allow me to repay your contribution to my trove by giving your tale a little backstory, to make it more interesting. Of course, this is all still just a bit of speculative fiction. An utter fantasy." As we began to follow behind her she asked "How much do you know about the Vampire Incident?"

"Only what we've heard from others—that vampires were running amok and a youkai sage appeared and laid down the law."

"Ah, that's more or less correct. But a question for you then, Usami Renko. How do you account for the fact that your story doesn't include any such sage?"

"Hmm, that's a good point. Maybe the youkai sage gave you the idea to use the Hakurei shrine maiden to get your story out? You did say you had only just got here, and what's more the rules for danmaku didn't exist at the time, so the youkai sage would have had to get Reimu to create them so that this whole incident could then be setup, enacted to get the Hakurei shrine maiden's attention, and then get resolved in order to get your story in the 𝘊𝘩𝘳𝘰𝘯𝘪𝘤𝘭𝘦. That does sound like the work of someone who knows the rules of Gensokyo very well, now that you mention it."

"Precisely—you've hit the nail on the head. Now there's just one fact that you're still missing."

Patchouli whirled around to face us as she continued to float down the hall, and opened the book she was carrying in her hand.

"Meiling is that sage."


—31—


"Meiling!?"

Renko's mouth dropped open with a stupefied look on her face. I don't imagine my face looked much better.

"Well, I suppose that's oversimplifying it," Patchouli continued. "It's accurate to say that Meiling's true identity is the youkai of this mansion. But if we had had this mansion already in place in the Outside World, don't you think we would have tried to contain the demon there? As you yourself said, this place is an excellent trap for containing such a creature."

Renko closed her mouth and buried her chin in her hand, thinking intently.

"You proposed that the Vampire Incident was caused by one demon running amok and another being summoned to keep her in check. I'm sad to say you're overestimating me there. If I couldn't control the first demon, I wouldn't have been able to bind one powerful enough to subdue it either. Rather, the two of them came as a pair, Remi and her younger sister. They both went berserk when they realized I couldn't bind them. The one who resolved the incident by exterminating the both of them at once was Hong Meiling, or rather the being who would later become Hong Meiling. Gensokyo's ultimate protector, the great Dragon god."

"The Dragon god!?" Renko's jaw was on the floor again.

"Flandre, in her demon form, had been the scourge of Makai for some time, causing no end of chaos. When I foolishly summoned her, Remi tagged along for the ride, knowing I wouldn't be able to control her and thinking she'd have a chance to cut loose too. When I brought them both to Gensokyo, the Dragon god realized the threat they posed and descended to smash them both. First Remilia, then Flandre. Watching over Remilia was to be my punishment, and watching over Flandre was to be hers. We were all bound into contracts, Remilia and I as equals and Flandre as a subordinate. Once the contracts were bound and a prison for Flandre had been constructed, the Dragon god created this mansion from a shed skin and gave it to us to help keep Flandre sealed before ascending back to the heavens. Shortly after we started living here, Meiling appeared. I don't know if that's something the Dragon god planned or just a consequence of the nature of this place, but she's as much a part of it as the walls or ceilings, and about as sturdy. THAT's the truth of the Vampire Incident six months ago, if you still want to call it that."

Renko was still stunned into silence.

"As for Sakuya, she and I were living here in Gensokyo from the beginning. She was my servant. I had been studying her ability to manipulate time. When I summoned those two, then lost control of them, she fought to protect me, with no care for herself. They crushed her almost instantly. When the Dragon god descended, he saw what she had done, and rewarded her loyalty by reviving her. I don't know if she can remember her past life or not anymore, but when this mansion was created, she was given authority over it by divine proclamation, to keep it orderly and well maintained for the rest of her days. That's why she'll come the moment you call her, she knows everything that happens in this mansion instantly."

"After my disastrous failure at binding a demon, I retreated into hermitage here in the library. I dismissed Sakuya as my servant, as I couldn't bear to face her after what she had done for me, so she became Remi's servant instead. Now she maintains the mansion and has come to truly love Remi. She's an excellent servant, and more than either of us deserves."

"So that's why Sakuya always seemed so concerned for you!" I interjected. Patchouli had been her true master all along, or at least she had been in the past.

"Yes," the magician continued. "That's also why Meiling tends to Flandre's needs. I may be the one maintaining the wards that seal her, but it's Meiling's power that fuels them and keeps them strong. She's also the one who goes in to reinforce the story for Flandre, educating her about her sister and reinforcing her perceptions to keep her trapped in the fantasy we've constructed for her. That's Meiling's real job. I'm sure you noticed the seven-colored jewels bound to Flandre's back? Those are Meiling's, a part of the seal that keeps her in her current form. She grafted them to where the demon's wings were torn off. I'm sure you saw Meiling's seven-colored magic when she fought the shrine maiden? The seven colors of the rainbow are the symbol of the Dragon god who watches over us from the skies. I've directed my own studies ever since then toward understanding and mastering this power so that I can better reinforce the seals. That's how my five elements magic became the seven-day style it is now."

"If the mansion never came across the barrier from the Outside world, then how did we get here? Why would a hole in the barrier from the Outside lead to this place?" Renko seemed to have recovered somewhat.

"You're correct that there was never a hole in the barrier created by the mansion's arrival, but I wouldn't be surprised to find that there were imperfections in the barrier caused by interference between the multiple barriers within the mansion. The overlapping barriers within barriers might have resonated with something on your side of the boundary, if you were in some sort of similar situation there."

Renko retreated into silent consideration again, mulling the facts over.

"And that's how the story ends." Patchouli said, with a thin smile. She closed the book in her hand with a snap. "Of course all of it is only a make-believe. A fairy tale told by a fool. The real story, as always, can be found in the 𝘎𝘦𝘯𝘴𝘰𝘬𝘺𝘰 𝘊𝘩𝘳𝘰𝘯𝘪𝘤𝘭𝘦—Remi and her sister are vampires, Sakuya is Remi's servant and Meiling is a lowly gatekeeper."

Renko remained lost in thought as Patchouli continued to gloat. "I hope you've had your fill of the truth, detective. I'm afraid that it isn't worth much in this world. In this land of fantasy, it's the story, not the facts that are true, even when it isn't."

"I appreciate that advice," Renko said slowly, placing her hat carefully back on her head.

I wished I could say something to comfort Renko. She had gone to all that effort risking her life several times and spending countless hours pondering the details only to find that in the end the truth didn't matter. In such a world as this, what purpose could our prized Hifuu Club serve?

"Well, let's go check on the young miss then, shall we?" Patchouli asked idly. "I wonder if that witch is still alive." She began to float up and around a corner. I was just about to follow when a voice called out behind us, accompanied by the sound of hurried footsteps.

"Heeey! We've got trouble, Lady Patchouli, ma'am." It was Meiling, walking toward us with a worried look on her face.

"Well if it isn't the great Dragon God's aspect herself," said Patchouli wryly. "Do you have an excuse as to how that black rat was able to get in so easily?"

"What? I'm not an aspect of the Dragon God, I'm Meiling. Please ignore her jokes, you two. They can be really hard to understand sometimes. As for Marisa, wasn't it you who said intruders are allowed inside for now?"

"Oh, had I? Well, not to worry then. Where's Sakuya gotten to?"

"She's in the foyer, greeting the Hakurei shrine maiden."

"Oh, so they've both come. That's great." Patchouli chuckled silently to herself and smirked.

Meiling tilted her head incredulously, then looked at the two of us "Oh! Merry, I have something for you. I found it lying in the hall."

"Eh? For me?"

"Yeah, here." saying that, she handed me the hardcover first edition of 𝘈𝘯𝘥 𝘛𝘩𝘦𝘯 𝘛𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘞𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘕𝘰𝘯𝘦.

"When the little miss woke up, she made a big fuss about you being gone. I told her I would read the book for her, but I'm not so good with English. She said she wanted you to read it and started breaking through the walls. I managed to hold her back for a week or so, but eventually she got out. Patchouli's rain has kept her from going outside so far, but she's hiding somewhere in the mansion. You two might want to get somewhere safe until we get her back down."

"Oh, that's... I, well... I'm so sorry, Miss Meiling." I bowed my head apologetically. I felt bad for Meiling, but the one I really wanted to apologize to was Flandre. If she truly had had no memory of the world outside her room until we came in and told her about it, it may be that I had done something very cruel to her without intending to.

"No need to apologize, it was bound to happen sooner or later." Meiling smiled and pressed the book into my hands. "Please take good care of the little miss."

I understood. I would have to take responsibility for the consequences of my actions, however unintended. I swallowed my anxiety and accepted the book.



When we found Flandre, Marisa was helping her up off of the ground. She was battered and her clothes seemed badly singed, but rather than her injuries keeping her from rising, it seemed she was paralyzed by paroxysms of girlish giggles that kept her doubled over. It took her a few minutes for her to regain enough control of herself to sit up or speak. When she had recovered herself enough to string a sentence together instead of simply devolving into more giggles, the first thing she said to Marisa was "Don't go home yet! That was so fun!"

Marisa returned her grin "Why? You gonna get lonely and hang yourself if I go? '𝑆ℎ𝑒 𝑤𝑒𝑛𝑡 𝑎𝑛𝑑 ℎ𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑒𝑑 ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑠𝑒𝑙𝑓 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑤𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑛𝑜𝑛𝑒.' right?" Marisa's English was thickly accented, but passable.

"Where did you hear that?"

"It's a famous rhyme. And I saw that book you were holdin' when you first came out." Marisa was right—it was the same nursery rhyme that featured heavily in 𝘈𝘯𝘥 𝘛𝘩𝘦𝘯 𝘛𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘞𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘕𝘰𝘯𝘦 but the version in Christie's book was her own alteration, created to fit the story.

"I expected you to be the last little soldier boy."

"Well it came pretty close when that last Spell Card made you invisible."

"It was supposed to be '𝑆ℎ𝑒 𝑑𝑖𝑒𝑑 𝑏𝑦 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑏𝑢𝑙𝑙𝑒𝑡 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑤𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑛𝑜𝑛𝑒.'" Flandre giggled again.

"Welp, sorry to ruin your plans, but I'm pretty good at dodging bullets."

"You really are! I wouldn't die even if I hanged myself though."

"Well don't do it anyway, a hanged corpse is ugly. You should do like the original rhyme says instead."

"The original?"

"Oh, you don't know? It's supposed to go '𝑆ℎ𝑒 𝑤𝑒𝑛𝑡 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑔𝑜𝑡 𝑚𝑎𝑟𝑟𝑖𝑒𝑑 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑤𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑛𝑜𝑛𝑒.'"

"Married to who?"

"Hmmm, I know an eligible maiden at the shrine I could introduce you to."

"Hey, don't introduce me to anyone! Her sister is already at the shrine every day, and she's bad enough!" This was from Reimu, who had just flown in at speed from the other end of the hall. "Though, I might not mind if I get to live in a house like this. I saw the whole fight, are you Remilia's sister?"

"Yeah. Where is she? I couldn't find her."

"She's at the shrine. You should go home to bed."

"I am home. This is my house."

"Well then I guess that's one naughty child taken care of. Now I just have to deal with the one at the shrine."

"What? Who's been naughty?"

"You! And your sister too! Ugh!" Reimu stomped off, too frustrated to speak any further.

Patchouli called out to Flandre and she whirled around with a hostile look distorting her features, but her face lit back up like a candle when she saw the two of us.

"Oh! Merry and Renko! And that book! Read me the ending!" Her innocent smile was heartwarming, though I wonder if I would have thought the same if I had arrived a few minutes earlier and seen her and Marisa exchanging danmaku. "I haven't finished it yet, and Meiling was getting it all wrong, and there are already none but I haven't heard the ending yet!" She rattled off the plea, nearly tripping over her words.

"Ah, that's right," Patchouli smirked. "The young miss still doesn't know who the mastermind behind it all is."

Looking at the innocent joy in the round face staring up at me, I couldn't help but laugh. I looked over at Renko and she chuckled too.

"Yeah, and I wanna know so come on and read it already!"

There was not even a sound as Sakuya appeared beside us. As usual she was perfectly poised and polished, showing no sign whatsoever of having just come from a danmaku battle with the shrine maiden. "I'll prepare tea and some cake and we can have a reading session and tea party. Meiling, if you would prepare a room?"

"Yes ma'am, right away!" Meiling snapped to attention then turned on a heel to scurry off.

"Hey, Meiling!"

Meiling halted and was just about to turn around when Flandre pounced on her, latching onto her back with all four limbs. Meiling stumbled and reeled, making Flandre squeal in delight, then settled the child into a piggyback position and darted down the hallway with her. The image of the two could only be seen as a child playing with her favorite babysitter, even if the truth of the situation was known. The story, it seemed, had indeed overwritten the fact, for in our subjective perception no trace of a sealed demon or a hidden Dragon God could be seen.

"Are you all just going to forget about the owner of this mansion and leave her at my place?" Reimu asked, with an unimpressed expression.

Sakuya clapped her hands together in surprise and bowed politely. "Ah, forgive me, I forgot. Please go and fetch her for us." She waved a dismissive hand at the shrine maiden.

"Which one of us is the servant here!?" Reimu yelled and stormed out of the room. As soon as she was out of sight of the doors, laughter burst out. First a demure titter from Sakuya, but eventually a hearty guffaw from Marisa and even a snort from the dour Patchouli. Even Renko and I couldn't help but relax in the joyous atmosphere. Amidst that laughter, the true story of the incident went untold. Maybe Patchouli was right and truth didn't count for much in a world made of fantasies.

But maybe, if that world could contain such happiness, that was alright.