東方プロジェクト二次小説・オリジナル小説サイト
Chapter 2:Undefined Fantastic Object

—4—


And so, with our journey to Makai on hold for the moment, Murasa took the helm once more and we set out, flying slowly above Gensokyo, peering over the sides of the ship for any trace of the broken fragments of the mast that had been carried away by fairies.

"How are we going to find a bunch of chunks of wood scattered all over?"

"This whole ship was originally the legendary flying storehouse, so even broken, the fragments should all be able to float on their own using the same power that's currently keeping us aloft. All we have to do is look for floating pieces of wood."

That would at least make it obvious once we find a piece. Chunks of wood don't normally levitate on their own, after all.

"What should we do about Nue, Murasa?"

"What can we do? I'd like to catch her but we don't know where she is, and finding the missing pieces of the flying storehouse is more important.

"That's true." Ichirin sighed softly as she and Murasa discussed the situation.

"A nue?" Renko asked, "That's a youkai with the head of a monkey, the body of a tiger and the tail of a snake, right? A sort of chimera? We had heard that there was an unidentified youkai who was known to hang around your ship in the Underworld and prank people. She even got me and Yamame at one point. Is that who you're thinking sabotaged the mast?"

"An 'unidentified youkai' is a good way to describe her." Ichirin replied. "She's been harassing us ever since we started repairing this ship. I should have expected that she wouldn't be able to resist doing something in the middle of a big gathering like this."

Murasa shook her head, burying her face in her hands. "When I find her, I'm gonna...." She paused for a moment, letting out another breath before looking up at us. "You two ought to be careful too. We don't know what she's up to, but now that she knows you're helping us, she might target you too."

"Really?"

It was all well and good to warn us to be careful, but being as the only thing we knew about this nue was that she was 'unidentified', it was hard to know how we might protect ourselves.

At any rate, the purpose of the 𝐻𝑜𝑙𝑦 𝑃𝑎𝑙𝑎𝑛𝑞𝑢𝑖𝑛'𝑠 voyage had now changed, at least for the time being, meaning that Renko and I had no reason to be here.

"We need to keep looking for those fragments. That could take a few days or maybe even longer. We should let you two off in the meantime, I suppose. We'll let you know once we're ready to set out again."

"Yeah, I guess our visit to Makai will have to be postponed for now." Just like that our journey had come to an end midway. It wasn't the sort of thing that would make for a good adventure story at all.

"Now that I think about it though..." Renko said, fiddling with the brim of her hat. "I might have an idea on how I could help you out. Maybe there's a way we can speed up your search."

"Anything you can think of would be greatly appreciated," Murasa said with a bow.

Renko laughed. "Really I'm just doing this because I'm curious to see Makai. I'm sure to the captain and Ichirin that line sounded like the sort of modesty that might befit a saint, but in Renko's case it was absolutely the truth. That didn't stop the both of them from grabbing Renko’s hand and bowing repeatedly in thanks to her though.

And so, Unzan carried us down to the ground and deposited us on the shores of Misty Lake before returning with Ichirin to the ship to continue the search for the missing pieces of the mast. Renko and I waved as we watched them depart, but as they rose out of sight, Renko began fiddling with the brim of her hat and grumbling.

"I hope those two will be alright..."

"What are you worried about? This is a setback, but they and the captain aren't really in any danger, are they?"

"A ship floating in the sky kind of sticks out like a sore thumb, Merry. What do you think will happen if someone sees it flying around over Gensokyo?"

"Well it would be surprising, but there's probably nobody still alive who knows what it really is. Except for the Yama, I guess."

From what we had heard it had been the same Yama we knew who had been responsible for sealing Saint Byakuren away in Makai a thousand years ago. It was a bit surprising to hear that she had the help of the Hakurei shrine maiden of the time in doing so. Who knew there had even been a Hakurei Shrine at that time. Even if there had been though, certainly Reimu wouldn't know about the ship or that one of her predecessors had once exterminated its inhabitants. She wasn't the Child of Miare, after all.

"It's not really the Yama that I'm worried about finding out," Renko grumbled. "It's Sanae."

"Sanae? What's she got to... oh... yeah, I see."

"Suwako and Kanako still haven't told her about any of this, and we promised not to either." She sighed and pulled the brim of her hat down over her eyes.

Although the plan to lift the 𝐻𝑜𝑙𝑦 𝑃𝑎𝑙𝑎𝑛𝑞𝑢𝑖𝑛 from the underworld had been carried out with the assistance of Moriya Suwako, Sanae had not been informed about any of it, despite the fact that she was a part-time member of our detective agency. The reason for this was simple: if we involved her then there was absolutely no way that the already complex plan wouldn't become instantly more complicated. When it comes to unexpectedly upending situation, Sanae had a genius-level talent, so involving her in something with so many delicately balanced moving parts was a sure recipe for disaster.

What would happen if Sanae found out about the flying ship without knowing of our involvement with it, I wondered. It wouldn't be anything good, I was sure, but exactly how that might play out was hard to predict.

"That's not even the worst of it though," Renko continued.

"No?"

"Can you imagine what would happen if the ship gets too close to the village and Keine sees it?"

As soon as Renko mentioned the possibility, I felt the pit of my stomach dropping. "Don't say things like that, Renko. It's too scary to think about."

I tried to imagine what would happen if Keine found out that the two of us were involved in another incident, not as bystanders this time, but as masterminds. In my mind I could see the image of horns growing out of Keine's head as her face contorted in growing anger.

"Alright then. We need to do our best to ensure that the pieces of the mast can be found as quickly as possible. Any ideas?"

"We could go talk to Cirno, she lives nearby."

Since the pieces of the mast had been taken by fairies, asking a fairy made a certain amount of sense, but if the fairy in question was Cirno… Well, I suppose there was no harm in asking, at least.

"She doesn't really seem like the type to grab a piece of wood just because it was floating to me though." Cirno lived in a simple igloo made of ice near the edge of the lake. As far as I was aware she didn't own a single possession. "But when you mention the idea of collecting strange items, there are some other fairies who come to mind."

"Oh, you mean those three? Do you think we can find them?"

"We may as well try. To the Hakurei Shrine, Merry!"

—

I say 'those three' as there could be no question about who I might be referring to in my mind, but it occurs to me that there has been no mention of these particular fairies in these records so far. The trio in question is a group of fairies who live somewhere near the Hakurei Shrine. We had gotten to know them shortly before the beginning of the Vengeful Spirit Incident when they started making regular appearances at the Hakurei Shrine, but I'd never had the opportunity to write about them, as their antics never rose to the level that might be considered relevant to an incident.

At any rate, we walked to the Hakurei Shrine. We climbed the stone steps up the hill and passed through the torii toward the shrine. As we looked over toward the still new-looking main building, we heard the sound of a drunken voice calling out to us. I looked up in time to see Ibuki Suika leap down from her usual sleeping spot on the crossbeam of the torii and land with a clatter. The stumbling way in which she arrested her fall somehow seemed both agile and reckless.

"Good afternoon, Little Miss Melon," Renko said with a smile. "Just enjoying the scenery up there?"

"It's still too early for cherry blossom viewing but Gensokyo's pretty anyway. If you're looking for Reimu she's probably around back drinking tea."

"Actually," Renko said, clapping her fist into her palm as if she had just come up with a brilliant idea, I have a question for you today, Miss Melon, if you don't mind."

"Oh, what's that?"

"It's about your ability to gather up objects. Could you use that ability to gather physical things?"

"Sure, I use it to help Reimu clean things up, sometimes."

"Are there any restrictions on what you can gather that way?"

"Restrictions? What do you mean? I could gather pretty much anything I wanted to."

"I meant more in terms of finding things. For example if I took a pot and smashed it on the stairs, could you gather together all the different pieces of it?"

"If I had a piece of it to look at, sure. I don't know why you'd want to bother though, even if you had all the pieces you couldn't put a pot back together. If I didn't have even one piece, there's no way I could find them though."

"Ah, so you need a sample to work with. That makes sense. I should have thought to get you one, shoot."

Renko scratched at her head. I was impressed. If that had worked, it would have been a good way to solve the problem.

"Was there something you wanted me to find?"

"Hmmm, not directly. An acquaintance of ours is in a spot of trouble. Actually, Suika, you might know them. You used to live in Old Hell, right?"

"I heard you guys had been down there recently. What's that place have to do with anything though?"

"Did you ever see a big sailing ship that had been buried near the Hell of Blood Pools, by chance?"

"The one with the ship phantom and the nyuudo sorcerer living on it? Yuugi talked about them sometimes. She was the sort to get concerned with other people’s problems like that."

"You've heard of them though, that's good. Well don't tell Reimu, but Yuugi and I and some others have been working on a plan for a few months now to try to lift that ship of theirs out of the Underworld and back to the surface. We mostly succeeded, but on the way up the mast broke apart. That's what we're looking for now."

"You went ahead and did something like that? That’s pretty wild." Suika took a quick pull from her gourd, then lowered it, exhaling out a strong cloud of vapor as she did so. "So now you want me to collect up the missing pieces of that ship, is that it? Meh, I'm not really interested."

"What? Would you be willing to do it for my sake Miss Melon?"

"Yuugi was interested in their story, but I never cared much. I certainly don't owe them anything. I won't tell Reimu about it but I think I'll pass." With that, Suika faded into a mist and began to flow away. As I looked around to try to see where she had gone, her voice called down from the top of the torii. "Good luck though, or whatever" she said as she closed her eyes and lifted her gourd to her lips.

"That's cold, Little Miss Melon."

"Honestly it's surprising that it doesn't happen more often, Renko. It was a stroke of luck that you were able to get Lady Moriya and Miss Yuugi to help you. You can't just assume that everyone will drop everything to help you out whenever it's convenient for you."

"I must have used up all my mojo bringing together oni, gods and youkai on the same project. I guess I need to do some good deeds to recharge my virtuous karma."

I have trouble believing that Renko's ability to get along with monsters of all sorts was a result of good karma.

"Well anyway, that idea's a bust. I don't have any sort of leverage I can use to make Suika help if she doesn't want to. Let's continue on and do what we came here to do."

Showing no signs of being discouraged, Renko marched forth, walking steadily into the woods surrounding the shrine.


—5—


"Oh, it's right there!"

We had only been exploring the forest surrounding the shrine for a little while. Our first stop had been an enormous tree situated behind the shrine that had been struck by lightning years ago. It had then, over the course of a few mere months, surged back to life and regrown itself larger and healthier than ever. Reimu had made a token effort of enshrining it by wrapping it round with a shimenawa, but she seemed to have since forgotten about it.

"What is it, Merry, do you see something?" Renko asked, looking around.

"Well, that quite clearly looks like a home."

I looked up at the tree. Renko didn’t seem to be able to see it, but to my eyes, there was clearly a door that had been fit to a seam near the base of the trunk, and small glass windows shielded by peaked roofs poked out of the tree here and there. Peering into one of the windows, I could also see movement from the inside

Renko cleared her throat, then called out to the tree. "Hello, three fairies of light. Would any of you happen to be home at the moment?"

There was a moment's silence, then a loud thunk from inside the tree followed by the sound of chairs scraping and feet scrambling. A moment later a door and several windows near the top of the tree opened and three small figures, each suspended by fluttering, transparent wings swooped down toward us. They landed in a ring around us, keeping their distance but regarding us curiously.

"Two humans?" asked the one whose golden hair hung in spiraling ringlets. That one called herself Luna Child. "How did they find our home?"

"Sunny must have forgotten to hide it." The one in the blue dress said brightly. She called herself Star Sapphire.

"It wasn't me!" Said the fiery-haired one, who went by the name Sunny Milk. "Luna must have screwed up."

"Did not!" Luna protested.

"Well now that they’ve found us, it doesn't really matter if it was hidden or not, does it?"

Having these three fairies together in one place always felt like trying to teach some of the more rambunctious students at the school. If you should ever happen to see the three of them while visiting the Hakurei Shrine, they're safer than most sorts of non-humans to play with and are generally quite friendly.

"So now that you've found us, what do you want?" Luna asked, looking up at Renko with a slightly pouty expression.

"Well, I'm guessing from the fact that the three of you are still hanging around at home you didn't hear about the commotion earlier today?"

"What commotion?" Luna asked.

"Did something happen?"

"Sunny spilled her tea all over Luna's newspaper this morning," Star commented. "Is that what you mean?"

"...So it 𝑤𝑎𝑠 Sunny!"

"You didn't need to tell them that, Star!"

a cacophony of chatter broke out as all three of the fairies started talking over each other at once.

"Hold on, hold on, there's no reason to fight. I was just coming by to ask if any of you three had any interest in discovering a lost treasure."

"Treasure!?" they all said as one, whirling to face Renko, eyes sparkling with interest.

"Yes. As luck would have it, there's a great airship which belongs to a famous saint flying over Gensokyo right now. It got in a crash though, and shattered its mast into a whole bunch of pieces."

The girls nodded in unison, raptly attentive.

"Those pieces of the mast hold the saint's power and can fly even after having been shattered. The captain of the ship is looking for all of them now. If you find them first, I bet there's a juicy reward in it for you."

"Oooooh!" they all cooed, leaning forward.

"A bunch of the pieces have already been grabbed by clueless fairies, so you three will have to get it back from them for me."

"What kind of reward is it?" asked Star.

"I don't know. You'll have to gather them all to find out."

"Where do we bring the pieces when we find them?" asked Luna.

"If you bring the pieces to our house in the human village, just behind the temple school, I'll give 'em all to the captain for you and you can claim your prize. What do you think?" Renko asked with a grin, "will you do it?"

"I'm gonna find them all first!" Sunny declared, raising her fist in the air.

Upon hearing that, the three of them immediately started arguing again.

"Alright, then go! The three fairies of light will collect the flying pieces of wood and earn their reward! Move out!"

The three fairies raised their fists alongside Renko and cheered as one before taking off and all flitting away to the west.

I watched them go for a moment before turning to Renko. "Hey, Renko was that wise? Captain Murasa didn't promise any sort of reward..."

"I’m sure they’ll be happy if she gave them her bottomless ladle."

Despite her assurances, I couldn't help but feel uneasy. Renko looked off after the fairies with a sense of accomplishment, but I felt nothing but a looming anxiety.

—

"What are you two doing here?" Reimu asked as we emerged from the woods and onto the shrine grounds. She had been busily sweeping the courtyard as we came out of the trees, but had now stopped to look up from her work and cast a suspicious glance at the both of us.

"Hey, Reimu. We're just here to visit, nothing suspicious."

"I'm not serving you tea this time. I just drank the last of mine. What were you doing in the forest?"

"Oh nothing, just running some errands."

"Errands? In the forest? You two better not be planning something weird again."

"Of course not, we’d never dream of it."

Is that so? My intuition is telling me you're involved in something.

As usual, her intuition was right on the money. Or close, at any rate. In this case we had 𝑎𝑙𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑑𝑦 been involved in something.

Murasa and Ichrin’s plans shouldn’t cause any problems for Reimu, I figured. Their intention was simply to travel directly to Makai after all, so as long as they didn’t run into Reimu on the way there and get in a fight with her, there shouldn’t be any issues. Reimu herself wasn’t the sort to make a big deal over the whole affair unless it affected her directly and we had already warned Murasa and Ichirin to stay away from the shrine, so as far as I could see, there was no cause for concern.

"Honestly Reimu, I promise we're not about to get caught up in an incident." Renko said with a grin.

"It’s not so much that you get ‘caught up’ in them as you force your way into them, isn’t it?"

"Guilty as charged, I suppose."

She glared at us a moment longer, then let out a sigh. "Well as long as you don’t get in my way when I’m resolving an incident I guess it doesn’t matter. Now that I think about it, where's that green girl who's usually with you?"

"Sanae? The Moriya Shrine's been really busy lately, we don't see her all that often any more."

"You don't say. I bet they're up to something too." Reimu crossed her arms and grumbled. I suppose her suspicion, however uncharitable, was warranted. The Moriya Shrine had been the instigators of the Vengeful Spirit Incident, even if they hadn't had a direct hand in the events that ended up compelling Reimu to get involved.

"Oh, on that topic, how's your hot spring working out, Reimu?"

"Ugh, don't remind me. I put in all that work making Suika dig it out for me and now the only people who ever go there are youkai. What a disaster."

"Youkai? Like who?"

"Yukari, her fox, Suika, Aya, and that cat from the Underworld. A bunch of stray youkai wander in sometimes too."

I was surprised to hear that Orin was regularly visiting the surface. What had become of the non-aggression pact between the Underworld and the surface, I wondered. Had the restrictions on travel loosened to the point where that sort of travel wasn’t a problem?

"Hey Merry, as long as we're here, why don't we take a dip in the hot springs?"

"What? We can't just do that on a whim. I don't have a change of clothes or a towel."

"Don't worry about it. I'm sure Reimu will lend you a towel and some soap."

"I'm not lending you anything."

"You see Reimu, poor service like that is why you don't have any customers."

"Shut up. If you’re going to use the hot spring, leave a donation. A big one," she said, gesturing pointedly at the offertory box. Since the twin collapses of the Hakurei shrine last summer, Reimu had had to replace numerous housewares and articles of clothing. For someone like her, that had to be a very significant expense. It's a sad and worldly story to think of a shrine maiden so troubled by material concerns.

"Reimu if you want to attract more visitors you're going to have to start treating this shrine like a business. Why not throw some sort of festival here? You could charge fees to anyone who wanted to open a stall."

"Stall fees?"

"Think of it like short-term rent. You could allow people to set up food stalls or storefronts on the shrine grounds, and they could profit from the crowds while you charge them fees. Having stalls on the ground would also attract worshippers who would be drawn in by all of the excitement. Since you own land, you don't even need to expend any capital to get started. Turning a profit should be easy for landowners like you."

Reimu paused for a moment, staring hard at Renko. "That sounds too good to be true. Have you been working with that fraudster rabbit from the bamboo forest? Is this some kind of scam?"

"It's just free-market economics. You can't sell a product there's no demand for, but if you give the people what they want, profit is sure to follow."

It appeared that Reimu didn’t have much knowledge of the concepts of markets or economic growth. The glare that Reimu directed at her was withering, but Renko's smile was unshaken.


—6—


Renko was able to successfully negotiate her way into borrowing two towels and some soap, on the condition that the towels be promptly laundered and returned. With her prizes in hand we set out for the hot spring, making our way down the partially cleared trail which led into the forest. Soon we began to see steam rising in the distance.

"...Is that a dressing room?" I asked looking around at the facilities as we arrived.

"Rustic, isn't it?"

The 'dressing room' in question was nothing more than four wooden posts that had been driven into the ground with a cord wound around them and a bunch of old woven mats hung from the cord to divide the space into a few small sections. It was completely open to the sky, which is a concern in a place like Gensokyo where so many people could fly and it would have been utterly useless in the event that it were to rain. I suppose not many people would come to a hot spring in the rain though.

I pulled the edge of one of the hanging mats aside and peered at the area beyond. A few woven bamboo baskets had been placed on the ground for storing clothes. There was so little care put into the facilities here that it was almost sort of charming.

"Come on, Merry. Let's enjoy this, it's nice to get back to nature sometimes, you know? Go wild."

"I'm not a beast, Renko. I'm a human. I'd prefer to bathe like one if given the chance. Oh, it looks like someone is already here," I added, noticing that two of the baskets were already filled, both with wads of balled-up clothes and petticoats in black and white.

"I wonder if it's Marisa?" Renko said, glancing over my shoulder before pushing aside the mat to enter the stall beside mine.

"Renko, you came here in the hopes of seeing the Youkai Sage, didn't you?" I asked as I stepped beyond the partition and let the mat fall closed behind me.

"Good question, Merry. Who knew that the secret to finding the elusive Youkai Sage might be as simple as visiting an onsen? Now hurry up and take off your clothes!" she said as she thrust an arm past the mat dividing our stalls.

"I can do that myself!" I shouted as I slapped at her arm.

I hastily turned away as I began undressing, carefully folding my clothes and placing them into the empty basket I had grabbed as I did so. I wrapped a towel around myself before exiting the change room through the opposite side I had entered on.

"Oh wow, and here you thought the change rooms were rustic!"

Calling the bathing area an 'onsen' was definitely a stretch. What awaited beyond the change room was a pond surrounded by bare rocks. Hot water from the geyser flowed down a series of wooden troughs to splash into the pool, with the overflow emptying over the lip of a stone on the opposite side and running out into the woods. Renko was squatting down by the edge of the pool with her hand extended, dipping a finger into the water.

"This is just right, not too hot for a human at all," she said while dipping a bucket into the spring. Scooping up a load of hot water, she poured it over her head, then shook her hair, flinging water droplets about in every direction. Smiling excitedly she folded up her towel without hesitation, and placed it on her head before hopping into the spring. "Oh, that's nice. A little on the hot side, but it feels good. Come on in, Merry."

I followed Renko's example, drawing up some water and splashing it over my head before gathering my hair up and tying it in place with my towel. I carefully eased myself into the pool. The water was quite pleasantly warm, but the gravel-strewn floor of the rocky pool made it hard to find a comfortable place to stand. Eventually I was able to find a flat spot to lean with my back up against a rock. Sinking into the water up to my shoulders, I let out a contented sigh.

"Oh, I think this is paradise, Merry."

"I admit, it's quite nice..." I said lazily, closing my eyes as I rested against the rocks.

Once we settled in place we could hear other sounds coming from the far side of the pool. With the steam rising off of the water, it was hard to make out any details of who the previous visitor to the spring might be, but we could hear the sounds of someone splashing about childishly.

I peered through the steam for a moment, trying to discern who might be on the far side of the pool when a momentary breeze partially cleared the clouds away, revealing the person standing across the way, peering into the mists in the same pose as me.

"Oh, I thought I heard someone else come in. Hey, you two."

"Hi, Marisa. Is that Rumia with you back there?" Renko asked, raising an arm to gesture at the figure further toward the back of the pool. It was this person who we had heard splashing. I had thought that the area around the baths seemed strangely dim, and Rumia's presence would explain it. I smiled as I watched her golden hair bob, still bound up with a red ribbon as she splashed about. Rumia was a stray youkai who lived somewhere in these woods, on the side closer to Misty Lake. We had seen her a few times since initially meeting her at a party at the Scarlet Devil Mansion, usually in Marisa's company, as she seemed quite fond of the young witch.

"Yep," Marisa answered. "I ran into her on the way to the shrine. She smelled like she's been sleepin' inside of a dead cow, so I brought her here and threw her in."

"I don't like bathing when it's cold." Rumia said as she floated over beside Marisa.

"Well then come by my house once in a while or somethin'. I could at least heat you up a bath."

"Hmph."

Like most children, Rumia didn’t seem to like baths much. Not that she was actually a child, but seeing her pout reminded me of the kids from the temple school.

"Hey Marisa, can I get out now?"

"You could stand to enjoy the bath a little longer."

"Why don’t you get in the water up to your shoulders and count to 100?" Renko suggested.

"Huh?" Rumia frowned at the suggestion, then turned to Marisa questioningly. "Hey Marisa, is Renko the kind of person I can eat?"

"Nope, she's a villager."

"Renko wouldn't be any good to eat, she's low in fat and very bony," I volunteered.

"Hey wait, what do you mean 'low in fat?'" Renko protested.

Ignoring Renko, I turned my attention instead to the ribbon decorating Rumia's hair.

"Marisa, why didn't you take that ribbon off of Rumia's head? Won't it get ruined in here?"

"That thing? I couldn't take it off if I tried."

"Why not?" Renko asked. "Is it stuck?"

"I asked Reimu about it once and she said it's some kind of ofuda. Rumia can’t even take it off herself and neither of us know who put it there or why."

"An ofuda?" Renko asked as she waded over toward them. "Does that mean it’s sealing something?"

Renko delicately reached out, pinching the end of the ribbon between her fingers.

"Ah! Yowch!" she cried, retracting her hand and shaking it out. "It's like a static shock! Hey Merry, come take a look at this. Is it some kind of barrier?"

"I've never heard of a barrier being placed on a person before," I said as I moved to join them. I strained my senses, trying to notice anything unusual about the ribbon, but it looked entirely normal to me. I tried to think of what a boundary placed on a person would even look like, but all I could think of was the sutras written all over the body of Hoichi the Earless.

"I wonder who put that seal there. Do you think it could be sealing away her true power?"

"On this kid?" Marisa asked. "All she does is make stuff darker."

"Well that could be quite strong. If she blocked out all the light of the sun she could freeze the world, for example. Or what if she teamed up with a vampire?"

"You mean like Remilia or something? I guess that could be a pain."

While Marisa and Renko continued to discuss Rumia without including her in the conversation she looked up at them both, swinging her gaze from one to the other, before suddenly declaring "I'm getting out now!" She shot up out of the water between the two of them and began floating out toward the entrance.

"Hey, wait! If you're getting out, you gotta dry off first! Don't go outside like that!" Marisa said, climbing out of the water and grabbing a towel hanging off a nearby rock as she chased after the floating girl. The two of them disappeared into the drifting steam.

After watching them go, Renko leaned back up against the rocks and ruffled her hair. "Sometimes interesting secrets pop up in the strangest places, don’t they, Merry?" Renko asked as a big smile played across her face.

"Who was it that sealed Rumia? What were they trying to lock away? It's fascinating stuff."

"Maybe if you break the seal she'll become the strongest youkai in Gensokyo." That sounded like the sort of thing that might happen in one of the Moriya Shrine's manga.

"Appearances have no relation to strength in Gensokyo. Look at Flandre. Or Remilia for that matter. Or Suika. It wouldn't be all that surprising if she turned out to be incredibly powerful."

"So you think it's the same sort of story as with Flandre? She was so dangerous she had to be sealed away?"

"Well there had to be some reason for someone to want to seal her. Maybe she's more like the Earth Spirits, who got sealed away not because they're powerful but because they're hard to control. Or maybe..." Renko trailed off, mid-sentence.

I looked over at her. "Renko? What's wrong?"

She lowered her head, cupping her chin with her hand as she hunched up, descending until the water was up to her chin.

"I was just thinking, Merry. The captain never told us why Byakuren had to be sealed away, and the Yama didn't seem to want to let us know either. What do you think a saint possibly could have done that would warrant sealing her up in Makai for a thousand years?"

In reaction to a question like that, I could only blink in surprise.