東方プロジェクト二次小説・オリジナル小説サイト
Chapter 9:Ten Desires

—25—


And so, riding on Genji's back with Sanae flying alongside us, we once again made our way to the cemetery near the Myouren Temple.

"Since the Great Spirit Mausoleum has been relocated now there's not really any reason for Yoshika to still be guarding this place, is there?" I asked, turning to Renko.

"That may be the case but this is our best guess as to where we might find her."

When we landed in the cemetery, I almost immediately spotted a familiar, eggplant-colored shape just barely poking out from behind a tombstone ahead of us. I was just opening my mouth to say something when Kogasa suddenly leapt high into the air, descending toward us while yelling "Boo!"

Without an instant's delay Sanae swept her wand in front of her, calling up a powerful gale that stormed across our path, sweeping both the umbrella and the girl holding it out of the sky and dashing them against the clustered headstones nearby. Once again, the way Kogasa collided head-first with the monument looked quite painful.

"Owie, ow, owww," she moaned as she collapsed. "I thought you were just a regular human, not the wind maiden."

"Oh, it’s just you. What were you trying to do?" Sanae asked innocently.

"Why am I always the one with terrible luck? Are all shrine maidens just sadistic?"

"I defeated that jiangshi for you though."

"Oh! That's right, you did. Um, thanks for that."

"Ah, so she really isn't here anymore then?" Renko asked. "You haven't seen her come back since?"

"Nope! She's gone and this cemetery is mine now! I'm going to scare the pants off the next human I see and eat like a king for once!" Saying this, Kogasa leapt to her feet and began another of her strange little dances, hopping from one sandaled foot to the other and twirling her umbrella, waving it at us so that the umbrella's tongue lolled and shook menacingly while the pupil of the its eye followed us disconcertingly. It seemed Sanae and Kogasa had become acquainted during the incident, when Kogasa had warned the incident resolvers about Yoshika and asked them to deal with her.

"Well, I guess there's no point in looking for her here."

"It seems that way."

"I wonder if we can find another way to get back to the Great Spirit Mausoleum. Would going down into that cave still work?" She asked, scratching at her head.

"I doubt it. They said they were going to relocate away from the Myouren Temple."

"Didn't the Crown Prince say that they can connect it to anywhere in Gensokyo now?"

Thinking back, I think she had said something to that effect. "Well if that's the case then couldn't we have gotten there by just looking underneath the floors of the temple school?"

"Don't be silly, Merry. If we did that our clothes would get all dirty," Renko said with a smirk. Saying that she turned and began walking deeper into the graveyard. I couldn't imagine what she was thinking but what could we do but follow? Oh well. At least with Yoshika gone there shouldn't be anything dangerous here. I moved to follow her with a shrug while Sanae and Genji fell into step alongside me.

"Hey Miss Merry, did they still have jiangshi movies in your time?" Sanae asked as Renko led the way.

"I'd heard of them as a sort of pop-culture Chinese monster, but I can't remember the last time there was a whole movie about them."

"Aww, that's a shame. Tian Tian was so cute in 𝐻𝑒𝑙𝑙𝑜 𝐷𝑟𝑎𝑐𝑢𝑙𝑎!"

"What? Was she a jiangshi?"

"No, she was the heroine. She works in this funeral parlor and a whole bunch of jiangshi wander in..."

Sanae proceeded to describe the plot of the film to me until Renko suddenly stopped walking ahead of us while staring intently at a headstone. We turned to look in the same direction that she was and noticed an unexpected but familiar eboshi hat poking up from behind a headstone.

"Miss Futo, is that you?" Renko called.

"Who calls me? Show thyself, villain! Know that thou art in the presence of— Oh, it is but thee again. Hello!" All of this had come out in a torrent as Futo turned and poked her head out from behind a tombstone to look at us. Just like that we had found Renko's second target.

"Hello there, Miss Futo. What are you doing here?"

"Hath thou no eyes? I'm here to observe the Buddhists in yon temple! The Crown Prince herself hath bade me to keep watch for any signs of treachery." She said, standing proudly with her chest thrust out.

"She asked you to watch the Myouren Temple? But the Divine Spirit Mausoleum has already been relocated, right?"

"Oh, thou hast heard then? Yes, our training grounds have been set aside in a senkai. I would deign to invite thee accompany me to see them and train with us for a time—"

Saying that, Futo cast her eyes past Renko, noticing Sanae for the first time. As soon as she did, she leapt up and assumed a fighting stance. "Ho! 'Tis thee, invader! Cometh thou again to bare thy fangs against the Crown Prince? I shall defeat you!"

"Who, me?" Sanae asked, looking perplexed. "I'm just accompanying Miss Renko today"

"Ah, I see then," Futo said, relaxing. "Thou art a Shinto priestess, art thou not? The Mononobe were once also priests of the indigenous gods of this land, to wit, we were the very forefathers of your faith."

"Really?" Sanae asked, tilting her head in consideration.

"I don't think the Mononobe clan had much to do with the native faith of the Suwa region though" I added with a shrug.

"Well, be that as it may, you should all come and see our training grounds!" Futo seemed oddly determined to show off whatever they had done with the Hall of Dreams.

"Well I appreciate the invitation but aren't you supposed to stay here to watch the temple?" Renko asked.

"Ah! 'Tis true! Is your intent to pull me from my post? I shan't be swayed, I tell you!"

"No, not at all!" I said, shaking my head from side to side.

"Well there's no room for half-measures." Futo said "I'll just dart forth and burn the temple down and then there shall be nothing more to watch. Wait here a moment."

Now that I think about it, if I was remembering my history correctly, the Mononobe clan had famously opposed Buddhism not just as a political force, but as a foreign religion. In the battle between their clan and the Soga, any Buddhist temples, statues or icons seized by the Mononobe had been burned to the ground. I wonder if part of the reason that Futo had originally joined forces with the Crown Prince had been so that she could use the religion she hated as a cog in their schemes.

"Whoa, hold on!" Renko said, moving to cut Futo off. "Was that something the Crown Prince asked you to do?"

"I was told only to monitor the Buddhists' movements."

"Don't you think she'd be a little mad if you were to burn their temple down without her permission?"

"Hmm… Perhaps I ought confer with her before roasting the heathens." She crossed her arms, pondering with a look of concern on her face. Was she actually serious about wanting to burn down the temple?

"Rather than rush things, why not stick to observation for now? I'd like to ask you a few questions if that's alright."

"What wouldst thou know? If you have questions about Taoism, I can show you to our training grounds right now!"

"I'm not interested in becoming a hermit myself just yet, but I would like to know a bit about how the process works. You died once before, right?"

"Aye, that's the art of it. In the moments before my death, my soul was transferred into a timeless vessel, as was Tojiko's. The Crown Prince's noble soul was similarly embedded within her sword."

"So there's a plate somewhere that you transferred your soul into?"

"Aye. It is safe within the mausoleum, with the Crown Prince's sword."

"What would happen to you if that plate were to break?"

"Well I have already transferred my soul into this ageless body now, so I think if that were to happen it would be of no consequence."

"Really? But I thought the reason Tojiko is a ghost now was because her vessel broke."

"Ah, that is because Tojiko's vessel was broken before she could be resurrected, leaving nowhere for her soul to reside. Mine own soul is already here," she said, thumping her chest, "so I have nothing to fear."

"Ah, I see. What was Tojiko like when she was alive? Was she by any chance missing a leg or did she perhaps have some manner of disability?"

"I don't recall anything like that."

"You knew her though, didn't you? What exactly is your relationship to her?"

"She is one of the Crown Prince's disciples, as am I."

"No, I mean in the past, before you became an immortal hermit. What was your relationship with her back then?"

Futo blinked in surprise. "Before I became a hermit?"

"Yes. I heard that back then you worked with the Crown Prince to destroy the Mononobe clan."

Futo crossed her arms and tilted her head to the side, frowning. "Forgive me, but I find I have but little memory of the times before mine own resurrection."

Neither the prince nor Tojiko had complained of any difficulty recalling the past. I wondered why Futo should be any different. Was a lack of memory the reason why her personality seemed to have regressed? If so, what could be the root cause?

"Well it has been 1,400 years," Renko said without missing a beat.

"Indeed, it hath been a long while."

"You and the Crown Prince we're sleeping for that whole time, right?"

"In a manner of speaking. Perhaps 'asleep' is not quite the right word."

"Oh? what was it like?"

"I recall that while my soul was residing in the plate I would still occasionally hear voices speaking all about me. I have little recollection of those times but I imagine it must needs have been either Tojiko or Seiga who was speaking."

"I see. The Crown Prince must have experienced something similar, I imagine. That might explain why she seems to know about some of the things that happened before her resurrection."

"I do not doubt it. The Crown Prince has never neglected to learn all that she can of the world around her."

That explained why the Prince was both more aware of the situation as soon as she resurrected and didn't speak in the same archaic manner as Futo did. Seiga must have been talking to her the whole time that the Hall of Dreams was being moved to Gensokyo.

"Going back to you, how does it feel to be a shikaisen?"

"Oh, quite comfortable. Just look at me, I'm hearty and inexhaustible! I highly recommend it."

"It's tempting, but for now I'm fine with dealing with an inconvenient mortal body. Besides, looking at Tojiko, it seems like it would be easy to have the process go wrong. Oh, speaking of Tojiko, she seems to be able to produce lighting now. Is that something she could always do? Or is that a hermit technique?"

"A hermit's techniques would never be so barbaric. That is simply a part of her nature as a vengeful spirit."

"Hmm, that makes sense. Vengeful spirits calling down lighting is something you see a lot in old ghost stories. What about you, has becoming a hermit granted you any new abilities?"

"Would you like me to show you what I can do? Let's be away then and I'll demonstrate mine abilities by burning that temple down."

"No, no, no, let's not do that," Renko said, again extending her arms to bar Futo's path.

"Bah, why impede me so?"

"The Myouren Temple happens to be a customer of mine."

"How vexing."

Futo really seemed to intend to down the Myouren Temple. Despite not being able to remember the details of her life before becoming a shikaisen, the Mononobe clan’s hatred of Buddhism still seemed to be the sort of thing that couldn’t be so easily forgotten.

"Alright Futo, last question."

"Ask away."

"Why did you sabotage Tojiko's resurrection?"

Futo blinked at that, turning her eyes from the Myouren Temple to Renko. "Sabotage? I know not what thou meanst."

"Perhaps I'm operating on bad information then. Seiga had told me that the reason that Tojiko failed to become a shikaisen like you was because you had swapped the clay vessel used to house her spirit with an unfired vase, causing it to decay and crumble."

"Had I done such a thing? I wonder..." Futo mused, crossing her arms. Her reaction was odd. She seemed neither surprised nor insulted by the accusation, merely unsure. While she tried to recall Renko turned her head and shot me a significant look.

"Speakest thou truly? Was I the one who so doomed her to wander as a ghost? Why would I switch her jar?"

"That's what I'm asking you,"

"If Seiga told thee as much, then I suppose it must be so. As for myself, I cannot say why I might have done such a thing. I have no such recollection."

I supposed that made sense. If Futo couldn't remember any of the events before her death, that would necessarily have included anything she had done to sabotage Tojiko's resurrection. But why would Futo's memories be the only ones to be lost? While I was pondering this, my attention was caught by another, quieter conversation happening behind me.

"It's hard, isn't it, Mister Turtle?" Sanae was saying. "They forget I'm here all the time too."

"I'm used to it."

I turned around to find Sanae squatting on the ground beside Genji, completely neglected by Renko, who had been absorbed with talking with Futo. I looked back to Renko. With Futo still deep in thought, she seemed like she might still be wrapped up in that conversation for a while. I gave her a significant look but she only responded with a shrug before we were suddenly interrupted by a new voice.

"Oh! Miss Renko and Miss Merry. What are you both doing here in the graveyard?"

We looked in the direction of the voice to see Kumoi Ichirin walking towards us from the direction of the temple.

"Hello Ichirin! What brings you here?" Renko asked with a wave.

"I heard voices in the cemetery as I was passing by so I decided to come have a look. Who's that little guy?"

Futo, who had still been deep in thought raised her head at that. "'Little guy?' Speakest thou to me, knave?" Futo took a moment to look Ichirin over, her gaze running from head to toe then back again, seeming to linger on the sight of Ichirin’s vestments. "Hold, art thou from the temple?"

"That's right."

"Villain! Thou seekst to impede me! I knew Buddhism was our truest enemy! You'll not keep me from burning down yon temple!"

"What? What's this all of a sudden? Wait! You're one of those people who was sealed underground, aren't you?"

"I am Mononobe no Futo, a shikaisen and the disciple of her majesty the Crown Prince!" Futo declared. "Prepare thyself, thou witless Buddhist pawn!"

"I have no idea what you're on about but I won't let you harm the temple or anyone in it." Ichirin replied. "Unzan!" Ichirin raised her right hand above her head and instantly wisps of pink smoke began to coalesce, forming into the familiar shape of Unzan's glowering face and fists.

"You're a nyuudo sorcerer! How interesting!" Futo said, leaping into the air and hovering in place. "The power of the Tao will not be turned aside by a mere monster. My techniques will see to that."

"The light of the Buddha dispels both evil and deception. Namusan."

And with that, a terrific and spirited danmaku match began above the cemetery.

"Ooh, they're really going at it!"

"Renko! Let’s get out of there, it's dangerous!"

Sanae then turned to me. "Want me to go up there and shoot them both down?"

"Nah," Renko said, still gazing upward admiringly. "I'm sure Byakuren or Shou will notice them before too long and come put an end to this."

"Do you think it's alright to just let them fight?"

"Well I already heard what I wanted to hear, and I'm sure that this would have happened sooner or later whether or not we were here. Let's head back to the office for now. Genji, if you would?."

"Oh now you remember that I exist."

And with that we made our way out of the cemetery and back toward the village. From what I heard later, Ichirin won the match and chased Futo off without anyone else having to get involved. The situation was resolved without any complaints, other than those from Kogasa, whose umbrella was singed by a stray bullet.


—26—


As the sun began to set we parted ways with Sanae, and returned home.

"So did today's investigations crack the case for you, o great detective?"

"Maybe. It was enough for me to come up with a pretty plausible hypothesis, anyway."

"Oh, already?"

"The problem is I haven't come up with a way to disprove it yet. It could explain most of the mysteries you listed out earlier in one go, but it's not falsifiable, so we'd never know if it's true or not."

Renko threw herself down on the tatami mats with a sigh. To be honest it was a bit surprising to hear she had managed to come up with any kind of theory so quickly. From where I stood, Futo's answers had only deepened the mysteries confronting us.

"Well, truth be told, I don't like my current theory much," Renko said, rolling over and sitting up with a dissatisfied expression on her face. "It doesn't sit right with me. It explains things, but I can't help but feel that I'm still missing something important." She sat for a moment, pondering with a furrowed brow, then groaned and flopped backward once more.

I couldn't begin to guess what her theory might be but...

"Maybe your initial premise is wrong then."

"I wonder... I don't think it is, but..." She continued to groan and mumble to herself for a bit then sat up cross-legged and turned to look at me while scratching her head uncertainly. "Merry, who do we know who would have a lot of experience with love and relationships?"

"What? Where's this coming from, Renko?"

"I'm a physicist, Merry. The wiles of the human heart isn’t my area of expertise. It's made more complicated by the fact that we're talking about relationships from 1,400 years ago when societal standards were different. People were still people then though, and I would think there are certain basics to human mating practices that probably haven't changed..."

"I have no idea what you're going on about, Renko."

"Well you should. You were studying psychology after all, Merry."

"You know I wasn't. Relativistic Noology is different."

"Well, whatever. Let me ask you this though: If my soul were to leave my body and take up residence in Genji, would you still recognize me as me? Which one would you call Renko, the empty body without a soul or the old turtle with my soul inside?"

"You're talking about something like Descartes' mind-body dualism. In this situation would your soul still be able to use Genji's body to say 'I am Renko?'"

"Let's assume so."

"And your body wouldn't have changed at all?"

"That's right. If the empty version of me and the Genji version of me were standing right beside each other, which one of us would you say 'Hey, Renko' to?"

"Well I think if I were able to have a conversation with you both, it would be to Genji-Renko, but it would still be hard to know. If the soulless version of your body was right in front of me with Genji right beside it saying 'I’m Renko', I’d definitely be confused at the very least. In the view of Relativistic Noology, there’s no way that as an outside observer I could ever really know that it was your soul inhabiting Genji’s body. "

"And if you were in a situation where both the soulless version of my body and Genji-Renko were in danger and you could only save one of us, which one would you rescue?"

"That's a very unlikely situation, Renko. What sort of circumstance could lead to something like that?"

"It's just a thought experiment."

"Well, again, if I believed at the time that your soul was in Genji, then that's the one I'd save, but I think if that ever happened and your body was lost afterward, I'd have a hard time ever being sure if I had done the right thing from then on. The Renko I know is the one that lives in this body," I said, grabbing at her cheek and pinching.

"Ow! ow! Quit that!" I let go of her cheek and Renko cleared her throat before continuing. "So what if I were to become a ghost then? Would you believe it was the real me?"

"I think I'd be able to believe that. Humans' visual organs are deeply tied into their brains. It's very difficult for us to separate what we see from what we think. If I showed you a fried shrimp and said 'this is a hamburger' it'd be pretty difficult for you to accept, right?"

"Now I'm the one who doesn't understand what you're going on about."

Renko shrugged her shoulders at me, but I was just as clueless about what she might be trying to get at. I thought for a moment, tilting my head as I looked back at her. If the question was actually whether it was possible to believe that someone's soul had come to inhabit a body that looked completely different than their original one…

"You're wondering, I assume, if Tojiko and Futo still recognize the Crown Prince as being the same person before and after her resurrection, right?"

"Well that's part of the question, Merry." Renko said with a nod.

I think I could see what Renko was getting at now. This wasn't so much a question of whether or not the person that gone into the Great Spirit Mausoleum looked much like the person who had come out of it 1,400 years later, as it was a question about whether someone like Tojiko, who had been married to Prince Shotoku during her time alive could really see the woman calling herself Toyosatomimi no MIko as being the same person.

If the Crown Prince had declared before beginning the process of becoming a shikaisen that he would be reborn as a woman, then that might explain why Tojiko and Futo hadn’t seemed surprised by the Crown Prince’s appearance or hesitated to recognize her at all.

I suppose it might be possible that the history we knew was wrong and Prince Shotoku had always been a woman, but given that Prince Shotoku had had four wives while he was alive with whom he had produced numerous offspring, that didn't seem likely.

"Well if you're expecting your soul to end up in a different body any time soon, don't use Genji's. Go for Ran's, that way I can spend all of the time we waste hanging out in the office every day buried in her tails."

"Merry, did you just let one of your lewd desires slip?" She seemed like she might have been about to say something more to tease me when suddenly her face went slack as she stared right through me and into the distance. "No way..." she muttered. "That would make sense, but if you look at it that way..."

She was lost in another world. I shook my head and stood up to start preparing dinner. It was getting to be evening after all, and I was hungry. I had just started the preparations when a knock sounded at our front door.

I looked over to Renko, but she was still sitting on the floor, staring into space and lost in thought. With a sigh I put down what I was doing and walked over to the door, wondering who could be visiting us at this time of day.

"Yes, who is it—oh! Hello Miss Keine."

"Hello. Good evening. I see you're not wandering around outside of the village tonight. Have you had dinner yet? It's been a while since we ate together so I brought some side dishes if you don't mind company."

Saying this Keine smiled and held up a neatly tied bag full of food.


—27—


In short, Keine joined us for dinner, though it was impossible to say that she wasn't here at least partially to make sure we weren't out getting into trouble. Although having Byakuren explain that our being confined in the Hall of Dreams had been a result of her having hired us had spared us from a scolding, it was clear that Keine was still worried about us suddenly disappearing somewhere again.

As we sat down to eat Renko seemed to still be lost in thought, barely saying a word and moving mechanically. As such I spent the meal talking with Keine instead.

"What's wrong, Renko?" Keine had eventually asked. "Is there something you're worried about?"

"No, no, it's nothing..." Renko muttered in reply.

"You're not planning on getting into trouble again, are you?"

"No, no, it's nothing like that..."

I'm not sure if that was actually true. I’m sure once Renko finishes formulating whatever grand delusion is taking shape in her head, she’d waste no time in charging off to confront Tojiko, or Seiga, or maybe even the Crown Prince herself.

"So I've done a little research on Prince Shotoku..." Keine began, looking over in Renko's direction. Instantly, Renko's head popped up. "I couldn't find anyone with the name 'Yoshika' anywhere in the prince's orbit. The closest I could find was a ‘Prince Itoshiko’, one of Prince Shotoku's sons by his fourth wife."

Personally I didn't think 'Itoshika' was very close to 'Yoshika.'

"His fourth wife... which one was that again?"

"That would be the lady Kashiwade no Iratsume, who came after Uji no Kaitako, Tachibana no Oiratsume and Tojiko no Iratsume. His first wife, Uji no Kaitako, bore him no children and is generally believed to have died very young. Tachibana no Oiratsume is famous for having created an elaborate tapestry mourning Prince Shotoku's death. Tojiko no Iratsume is of course the one you claim to have met in that tomb and the mother of the equally famous prince Yamashiro."

"Alright, I think I can keep that straight. What about his fourth wife, this Kashiwade no Iratsume?"

"She was the mother of princess Tsukishine, who would later marry her half- brother Prince Yamashiro as he attempted to secure the imperial throne. She was the daughter of a powerful merchant family, making her the only one of Prince Shotoku's wives who wasn't born into nobility. She also bore him eight children - four sons and four daughters, so she's generally believed to be his favorite.

"He preferred her to Tojiko then?"

"Well, I can't really say, being as these were people who died 1,400 years ago. Prince Shotoku's fourth wife bore twice as many children for him as Tojiko though, and was said to have died at the same time that the Crown Prince did."

"Really?" Renko asked, blinking in surprise.

"Yes. She fell ill around the same time the Crown Prince did and apparently died just one day before him. She was buried along with the prince in the Isonaga Tomb where the prince's mother was also buried."

Hearing that, Renko suddenly stood up, still holding her cup of tea.

"Renko? What's wrong?"

"Oh um, nothing. Nevermind. Sorry," Renko said, sitting back down, but looking distracted. After a moment of thought she asked another question.

"Miss Keine, do you know when Tojiko no Iratsume died?"

"There's no dates for that in the 𝑁𝑖ℎ𝑜𝑛 𝑆ℎ𝑜𝑘𝑖, but it must have been after the Crown Prince's death as she's recorded as the founder of Zenko Temple in Nagano and that was thought to have been built in the seventh century—well after Prince Shotoku's time. Of course, there's no way of knowing if that's correct or not. It could easily have been a story someone made up later to add to Prince Shotoku’s legacy."

If the Tojiko we had met really was the same Tojiko no Iratsume whose life had been recorded in the 𝑁𝑖ℎ𝑜𝑛 𝑆ℎ𝑜𝑘𝑖 then there was no way that the story of the founding of Zenko Temple could be accurate. Tojiko would have been sealed in the tomb with the Crown Prince at the time, awaiting her doomed attempt at resurrection. One of the two stories had to be false.

"All right," Renko said, continuing with her questioning, "what about Futo? Or Futohime, rather. Do you know when she's supposed to have died?"

"She's not even written about in the Nihon Shoki, other than to say that Soga no Umako used his wife's plan to destroy the Mononobe clan. There are other historical records that suggest that that wife must have been Futohime, but none of them mention the date of her death." Keine replied, while taking a bite of her pickled vegetables.

"Now you can see why I was confused. If all of those people who you met are who they say they are, then for them to have been buried under the Hall of Dreams at Horyu Temple contradicts all of the archeological research that's been done at Isonaga. The Crown Prince seemed very knowledgeable about all sorts of historical facts, but we need to consider which is more believable: her stories or all of the historical research that's been done to date—"

Keine let her sentence drift off as Renko suddenly began shoveling the contents of her bowl into her mouth with frightening speed. Cramming the last bit of rice into place with her chopsticks, she grabbed her bowl of miso soup and pounded it back, thumping her chest to get it all down before exhaling. "So that's it..." she said with a resigned sigh. "That explains everything..."

[𝐀 𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐧𝐠𝐞 𝐓𝐨 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫]

So. With that, it's once again time, dear reader. The mystery that confronted Renko now stands before you along with all of the information that Renko used to come to her conclusion.

You won't need a detailed knowledge of history to solve this case. Using the clues found in the preceding chapters, you should, theoretically, be able to reach the same delusional conclusions as our great detective has.

With that said, I will say that the megalomaniacal delusion that Renko concocted on this occasion was astonishingly complex, even for Renko, with multiple moving parts and interwoven motivations. Unravelling everything that happened, even in Renko's telling of the story, would require an act of true genius.

Ultimately, there is no single mastermind in this case responsible for pulling all of the strings.

The Crown Prince has her own motives and was working toward a goal of her own.

Tojiko also had a goal she had waited ages to achieve and had carefully schemed to enact.

Seiga of course had her plans as well, with motivations entirely alien to those of the others.

The intertwining of these complex and strange human relationships resulted in the confusing situation that we bore witness to at the Divine Spirit Mausoleum.

If my words so far have not dissuaded you and you still wish to pit your deductive skills against those of my partner then I present the following questions to you to act as your guide:

• Why is Tojiko's ghostly form missing her legs?
• Why does Futo have no memory of her life before being resurrected?
• Why did Seiga go to the trouble of moving the mausoleum to Gensokyo and doing everything in her power to ensure the Crown Prince's resurrection?
• Why does Tojiko hate Seiga more than she hates Futo?

If you can answer these questions, then you will no doubt begin to see the shape of my partner's delusions. Once again, I’ll remind you, the elusive truth which you seek is hiding right before your eyes.