Previous thread hit sage limit, but I also forgot to post the update to a new thread, so an accidental double post it is.

[x] Cirno the ice fairy

“… Cirno the ice fairy,” Patchouli answers.

“Alright, then let’s train her up to fight Meira,” I continue naturally for a moment. My brain does a double take and I realize what was just said, pondering, “Wait… what do you mean Cirno won?”

“It was rather startling, but yes, she won,” Meiling confirms. “Shameimaru didn’t seem to put in much effort, and underestimated Cirno.”

I cajole with a wave of my hands, “I still don’t think I understand how that’s supposed to happen. I see it everywhere that fairies are supposed to be the bottom rung of Gensokyo, but she won against a tengu?”

“Nominally, you would be correct,” Patchouli notes, seated lamely waiting for her next chance to read. “Cirno is an odd fairy, however. You studied her, I imagined you would understand her potential better than I.”

“Don’t be a bastard,” I spew. “I knew she was strong, but I thought Shameimaru was some kind of famous tengu?”

Links to other sites:
Archive of our Own: https://archiveofourown.org/works/55260253
Fanfiction.net: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/14347730/1/I-Have-the-Right-to-be-Happy

---

Reimu frowned at the liquid in her cup. Others would have tipped it back without complaint, but five-sixths full wasn’t full to her. She looked up at Yukari. “Hey, Mom! Get some—!” She slapped a hand over her mouth in realization.

“Oho?”

“Ohohoho?!”

“‘Mom?!’” everyone said in unison.

Thread 1: >>41094
Thread 2: >>41628
Thread 3: >>42837

[x] Apologize to Suwako, explain, pull Byakuren aside.
　[x] ...to talk about the booze.

Tragically, perfect, refined solutions would need to wait until all crises were under control. In fact, what I needed now was a… ‘solution’ that, frankly, disgusted me. I nudged Byakuren aside, took a deep breath, and I…

I bowed to Suwako. I bowed deep and firm, like a subordinate apologizing for a screw-up. And worse, my speech followed suit. “My deepest apologies, dear goddess. The mastermind of a kidnapping kerfuffle had sought to ensnare your shrine maiden in her schemes. I have chased that scoundrel down and confined her within my domain, but when Sanae wished to contribute to her punishment, I could not in good conscience deny her.”

Byakuren huffed, annoyed further that I had pushed her away. But Suwako hummed, her desires shifting from protection to confirmation. “And this mastermind was…?”

Reading the faintest ebb in Suwako’s tension, I rose to a far shallower bow. “Lady Futatsuiwa, I’m afraid.”

Somewhere in the southwestern district of a city, derisively called the Human Village by its less-than-human visitors and inhabitants, where willows grew along the canal, there lived a terrifying youkai. She stalked the canal's banks, her long neck's grip breaking not one bone, her many heads not letting anyone she met escape her nightmare-inducing gaze!

She was...! She was... bored out of her mind.

"What a waste of time... Where is everyone?" Sekibanki said, irritated, to no one in particular, leaning on a tree, arms crossed.

This week was truly the worst she had in her recent memory. It started, like always, with the worst torture ever created - part-time work in the service sector. Well, alright, it wasn't usually that bad. The cafe was in a nice neighborhood, the family that owned the place were nice enough not to bother her with pleasantries, and the pay was good for a waitress.

But it seemed that everyone was out to get her that week. Whiny brats that kept spilling tea on her work clothes, nagging grandmas that would talk all nine of her brains out, meatheaded ronin that kept trying to add her to their bodycount one way or the other, barely disguised hick youkai that kept breaking dishes with their totally well-hidden tails and tentacles, barely sane hick humans that kept unnerving the customers with their nonsense about the staff at Yagokoro Clinic injecting the newborn with tiny metal bugs that only they could see, dorky wolf-women trying to get her into their secret sewing club or whatever, and so on! Made her blood boil just thinking about it.

As she wasted every last mon of her hard-earned pay drowning her sorrows in food and drink, she got an idea. She would end this week on a good note, and do so in a way that was proper for the Rokurokubi Horror - going all out in her horrifying glory! Sure, it would be a few weeks ahead of schedule, but Sekibanki has done this before and rarely got into trouble for it.

So, when the Rat's hour came, she got to her favourite spot under a large willow tree, just some forty ken to the north from her house, and waited. And waited. And waited...

Nearly two hours passed since

Moving on to the next thread from >>43483

By the dragon himself, how has it been over a year already?
Thanks for sticking around, folks! Hopefully I can make this chapter 3 congeal into something good soon enough.

---

[x] Just ask the god that’s always around there for help.

“So what’s the first thing you’re going to say when we get up there, Tanner?” Mokou asks me as the dirt road fades into a set of stone steps.

I’ve gotten used to walking enough that I’m not overly winded, but there is a slight shortness to my breath in conversation when climbing up the steps.

“Well, isn’t it enough to just ask for help finding the frog god?” I reply.

“She is not a god of frogs, Tanner,” Ran notes.

The veil had fallen.

Someone was bound to pick it up.

He apologized first to the girl. “Sorry,” Kigaku mouthed to Kyouko.

“Sorry,” she echoed as the prophet bowed in shame.

“No—um. It’s alright. Really.” The book-girl shrugged in resignation. “I’ve memorized the contents, more or less. And it was only a matter of time until something like that would burst into flames, so it was only inevitable.”

“And why would that be the case?”

“Because,” she said, her orange eyes falling onto the yamabiko. The girl was half a word into her next sentence until she cut herself short, instead muttering to herself. She hunched over, and, as if the prophet and his companion didn’t even exist, she circled around, mumbling non-words all the while.

“Um. Hello?” Kyouko took a nervous step back and retreated to behind the prophet. “I’m not liking this, Ametsuchi.”

The man silently agreed. It was not just her demeanor, either: Both the prophet and the youkai sensed malintent. And though the book-girl seemed innocuous at first glance, a spell of malevolence took to the air around her.

Kigaku nodded to his assistant. “Excuse me. Miss?”

I open the blank scroll, pick up a brush, and begin writing.
"Today, on the 6th August, another outsider got killed." I stop at that single line, and sigh. I really want to add more, but I must stick to what I know, and maintain the archive perfectly. I want to add that he was extremely incoherent, and got killed by the militia after he snatched a sword and threatened to kill them if they got closer.
I put the brush down, carefully, and I stretch. Trying to forget the sight of his mangled body is an exercise in itself, but keeping notes is sadly all I can do. Speaking of which, let's see just how many outsiders are still alive by now.
"Five outsiders got in Gensokyo after their bus got lost..." Five, right. Three of them died before they could reach the village, and the fourth one died yesterday in the evening. Meaning there's only one left, and that poor sap probably doesn't feel all right.

I pick up my cane, and slowly walk to the window. At least today is relatively quiet.
"You got a new dead outsider? Can I eat him?"
And there she goes.
"They already cremated him. And by the way, I didn't give you my keys, how did you come in?"
"I made a spare."
I can't help but smile, and she does the same. Youkais are a troublesome lot, but I don't mind that one.
"Why visit me today? Are you bored again?"
"I finished my book. Got another one?"
Her eyes land on my weak leg, and her smile briefly disappear while her eyes grow enraged. She opens her mouth, but closes it after a while.
"I just might. As long as you tell me why you're really here."

Have you ever thought what makes someone human? I know that’s quite cliché for where I am, but that doesn’t stifle my wonder. That seems to be a lot of what I’m doing right now. Wondering. Or maybe wandering? Sitting in bed, or rather futon, at the early hour of a morning is always like this. Just a constant stream of random nonsense for which some piece of coherent thought may stay to be what I think of for the rest of the day. If it can get attention next to its neighbor, the hangover. This one is light but no less annoying, like a small buzz somewhere in the farthest corner of my head.

A call from another room, “food’s about ready! You should be up by now!”

Ah the dilemma, to trudge out of the comfort of sheets and start the day or to remain in comfort with a lighter belly. Not a choice for me, as the footsteps approaching the door forecast the next few seconds.

“I’m not your mother, so stop making me get you out of bed and start your day already,” she announces with an authority enough to vibrate the room. I follow the command to suit with no haste in the slightest. Bidding farewell to my light conscious and greeting my now painfully aware of fuzz in the back of my head self. That won’t make today fun. Seeing that I’m following orders, my host gives a quick harumph and returns to the kitchen. Leaving me to lift my body off the ground.

Enough dramatics, though. I get up with that little extra effort needed for a futon instead of a standing bedside and change into my usual day clothes. This is no more than a simple white folded sleeve button up shirt and some old brown khakis with amounts of pencil lead staining the upper legs. It sounds simple, but I think it looks good for any occasion. The look is only really completed by the shoes, but I need to leave them off inside due to tradition in Japan. Maybe I should wear a tie to recover the lost professionalism.

Thoughts for another time, my benefactor will kill me if the food goes cold before I’ve had it. A quick bathroom run to wash my face and I’m at the kitchen in ample time. Just a moment late, as the kind lady has already set out the plates and is now sitting down at the low table.

Thread 1: >>41094
Thread 2: >>41628

[x] A stroll somewhere exotic. We could compare our philosophies and spells.

“Perhaps a trip to some dark, mysterious forest?”

“A dark forest, really?”

I pulled away from her. Clasping my hands behind my back, I strolled toward the gate. “Why? Are you afraid I’ll do anything… inappropriate?”

“What? Why would I even think that?”

Still clasping my hands, I shrugged. “Why, indeed?”