[X] "Okay, okay, keep your skirt on."
[X] Make a show of going into your desk drawer for the money, then pull the gun on him.

Inb4 "You waggle your keys at the thug ineffectually".

>It's coming! I swear! :D
>:D
Not recommended.

[X] "Okay, okay, keep your skirt on."
[X] Make a show of going into your desk drawer for the money, then pull the gun on him.

Well, when a problem shows itself, most statisticians would agree, 90% of the time, violence solves it.

At least the threat of violence.

Not really much else you can do, given the circumstances. But the only other option that you can think of is to jump out the window, and hope that today they replaced the streets with Jell-o.

“Okay, okay, keep your skirt on.”

Gotta be condescending. Can't be losing your cool. I mean man, you're hardboiled. Can't let anything else get in the way of that.

As you slowly swivel around in the chair, you take a surreptitious look out the window, down 22 stories. Nope. No Jell-o. Fuck. Plan B, then.

You gaze across the desk at Johnny Two-lips. Stupidest goddamn name anyone ever thought of. Of course he's got two lips. Maybe it's supposed to sound like “Tulips.” Flowery son of a bitch.

“I got your money right here in the drawer, for sure this time.”

Johnny Two-lips grunts.

You look at him, keeping one hand above the table, and slowly pull open the drawer. As you reach into the drawer, your other hand takes a hold of the small stack of Post-its that happen to be on your desktop. Of course he doesn't notice that, the thick-headed son of a bitch. Your left hand goes into the drawer, and closes around the trustworthy grip of your .44 Magnum.

In one swift move, you simultaneously throw the Post-its at Johnny Two-lips' face, while pulling the revolver on him.

As though to add to the glacial slowness of Johnny, the Post-its actually stick to his forehead. He hasn't had the presence of mind to even pull out his weapon from the holster. Dumbass actually thought he'd intimidate you.

“Now, far as I see it, I've got two choices here. I either blow your brains out, and solve the problem that way. Or, I let you go, and you tell your boss that you ain't found me, that my office is closed.”

“Ummm...”

Jesus Christ, this mook is dumb as a rock. You don't think your words even got through his thick skull.

[ ] I'm sure a .44 will make it through his skull.
[ ] Hit him upside the head and hope that makes him realize the gravity of the situation.
[ ] Sit there and say nothing, and just hope he leaves.
-[ ] Followed by you shooting him on his way out. Dumbass.
-[ ] Or you could just let him leave. Shooting people in the back is too underhanded for you.

>It's coming! I swear! :D
>:D
>Not recommended.

Duly noted.

[x] Hit him upside the head and hope that makes him realize the gravity of the situation.

What I said.

[x] I'm sure a .44 will make it through his skull.

[x] Hit him upside the head and hope that makes him realize the gravity of the situation.
-[x]Let him leave. Shooting people in the back is too underhanded for you.
--[x]Buuut make sure he leaves his trousers behind.
Welp, we're done in this town. It doesn't really matter to anything but our conscience if we shoot this mook or not, but we'll need to skip out before the mob gets here.

[x] Hit him upside the head and hope that makes him realize the gravity of the situation.
-[x]Let him leave. Shooting people in the back is too underhanded for you.

[x] Hit him upside the head and hope that makes him realize the gravity of the situation.
-[x]Let him leave. Shooting people in the back is too underhanded for you.
--[x]Buuut make sure he leaves his trousers behind.
---[x]Get the fuck out of Dodge.

You sigh to yourself. Someone's a complete dipshit. You decide to smack Johnny upside the head with your .44. Shooting him would be like shooting Old Yeller- you're not even sure if he'd see it coming.

“Ow!”

“Johnny! Focus. Here's what you're going to do. You are going to stand up. You are going to walk out the door. You are going to tell your bosses whatever it is you have to tell them.”

“Umm... But my boss will be really mad at me!”

For fuck's sake, Johnny. Really? You facepalm.

“Alright, Johnny. You got held up at gunpoint by me, and robbed. To that end, I'll be needing your pants and everything in them.”

“M- my pants? Why?”

“Because, Johnny, you're such a dumb mook that this way you won't have forgotten to give me all your valuables. Because I'm robbing you.”

“O-oh.”

Johnny removes his trousers and starts to walk towards the door. You line up a shot on his head... but you don't have the heart.

“Johnny!”

“Yeah, boss?”

“...Try not to get killed when you get back.”

Johnny walks out.

After he's left, you open up your revolver. Of course. No bullets. You dumb bastard. Should really keep that thing loaded.

...Probably should have gotten the gun off of Johnny as well. Oh well. You're sure you've got ammo in the desk. Now to rifle through Johnny's trousers for cash, sweet, glorious cash. And a fake ID of sorts, I suppose.

What else did Johnny have in his pants?
[ ]Knife
[ ]Camera
[ ]Car keys
[ ]Phone
(Pick two.)

Now what? We've got to get the fuck out of Dodge.
[ ]Throw desk through plate glass window, and jump
[ ]Calmly walk out front door
[ ]Go down fire escape
[ ]Go to roof
[ ]Find back door
[ ]Write-in.

>>124149
I was thinking he had his gun on his holster attached to his belt, but oh well~
[x]Phone
[x]Car keys

[x]Back door

[x]And don't forget the ammo this time.

[X] Phone
[X] Car Keys
Maybe we can call 911 to save us... but then again, we have our car just incase.

[X] Backdoor.

No one expects a backdoor escape! Right?

[x]Phone
[x]You are boxed in. Jump out the window

[x]Phone
[x]Car keys

[x]Back door in a hard boiled manner.

[x]And don't forget the ammo this time.

[x]Phone
[x]Car keys

[x]Back door in a hard boiled manner.

[x]And don't forget the ammo this time.

[x]Phone
[x]Car keys

[x]Back door in a hard boiled manner.

[x]And don't forget the ammo this time.
Time to GTFO
[x]And don't forget the ammo this time.

[x]Phone
[x]Car keys

[x]Back door in a hard boiled manner.

[x]And don't forget the ammo this time.

[x]Phone
[x]Car keys

[x]Back door in a hard boiled manner.
[x]You are boxed in. Jump out the window

[x]And don't forget the ammo this time.

Jumping out the window. Man that'd be so badass. But apparently they still haven't replaced the streets with Jell-o.

Well, you know what? It never hurt to experiment. Besides, a coupla' mobsters are showing up at the front door. Trial by gravity!

You pick up the desk with the strength known only to the desperate, and hurl it at the window as hard as you can.

Meaning, of course, you kinda try to push the desk at the window. Man that shit's heavy. You push it up against the window... and now you remember it's closed. Goddamnit. Okay, this is bullshit. It's violence-o'clock. You take aim at the window with your trusty .44, and... click. Seriously, what were you thinking, you lunk-headed dimwit? You open the drawer to your desk and pull out a couple of speedloaders, load one into your .44, and finally, FINALLY aim and pull the trigger.

BLAM.

And after you're done cringing from the sound (in a very hardboiled manner, mind you) you look to see what destruction you hath wrought on the poor window.

...Congratulations, there's a hole in it. What, you expected it to shatter like in the movies? Lunkhead. This is enough of the bullshit. You give up and simply open the window, and finish pushing the desk out. You watch as the very heavy, very expensive mahogany desk tumbles towards the ground. Yeah, mahogany. You're kind of a big deal. Compensation, is, in fact, adequate. Aaaaaaaand... Bam. The desk impacts on a mobster in a spectacular fashion. Both him, and the desk are annihilated. Well, you won't be jumping out anytime soon. Plan A fails once again! And now the mobsters are starting to get angry. Yeah, leaving time. You grab what is important- your certification off the wall (what kind of private eye isn't certified? Not you, that's who,) and the dial to your safe. With Johnny's phone and car keys in your pocket with a wad o' cash, you hurry down the side stairs, avoiding the elevators, and hoping to whoever there is that'll ensure that everyone took the elevator.

You hurry down the stairs after falling down the first flight, and hardboiled that you are, you only cry a little. Finally, you come to the aptly named “Backdoor.” So here you have two options- open it slowly, or kick it in like a hardass.

Your leg still kinda hurts from falling down the stairs, and nobody's watching to see how awesome you are, so you decide to just open it. And lo and behold, there is a car parked there with the vanity plate of “Tulips”.

Lady Luck, you are my goddamn hero. You hop into the car, pray that Johnny's keys work, and amazingly, it starts! Yeah, bitches. That's how shit gets done.

Gunning the engine, you drive past the entrance to the building, and see a mobster hustling across the street. Oh, perfect. You drive near him, not quite AT him, and as you pass, you open the driver's side door... and nail him. That dent? Totally worth it. As the mobster crashes to the street, you pull out Johnny's phone, and dial who looks like “Two-Eye Tatum” from the phone's memory. Even more awesomely, the phone that rings? Belongs to the guy you just nailed. He answers it with a groan.

“Ha ha, bitch! Got you good!”

Tatum groans again, and mentions something about George of the Jungle.

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“George, George, George of the Jungle, watch out for that tree!”

...fuck.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

*wham.*

When you come to, you find yourself...

[ ]in a field, with car wrapped around a tree
[ ]in a temple, with car wrapped around main load-bearing support
[ ]in a mansion's hedge maze, with a car having made an amazing shortcut
[ ]in the same field, with car wrapped around a stone well
[ ]Write-in

[ ]in a temple, with car wrapped around main load-bearing support

[X] In the middle of a big clearing, with car wrapped around a (miraculously unharmed) dragon statue

Human village doesn't get enough love.

>>124258

For the record, if it SHOULD hit the statue, that statue is fucked. Miraculously unharmed would be the MC. Somehow. Through the power of plot.

[X]in a temple, with car wrapped around main load-bearing su- Wait... sounds familiar.

[X] In the middle of a big clearing, with car wrapped around a (horribly destroyed) dragon statue.

Yes, let's mess up our reputation with the Human Village already.

[X] In the middle of a big clearing, with car wrapped around a (miraculously unharmed) dragon statue

You know what? Since you asked so nicely, and I'll have other opportunities to destroy what you hold dear, I'll leave the statue unharmed. For now.


As you awaken, you realize that you're staring right at the gas pedal of a car. Strange. Why would you be looking at the gas pedal? As you move your head, it becomes obvious. Oh, so I fell out of the seat and somehow fell into- what DO you call it there anyway- where you put your feet where you drive. You resolve that you will do your best to find out just what that is called.

So, first order of business! Where am I?

A car.

Success! First order of business, crossed off of the list.

Second order of business! Ensure you have your certification.

In pocket, next to wallet.

Success! Second order of business, crossed off of the list.

Third order of business! Determine where all of this mahogany has come from.

…Dammit, I'm going to have to get up now.

As you get up, back behind the wheel of the car, a few things spring to mind:

1.Apparently, you have hit a statue instead of a tree. George apparently missed the jungle.
2.Also, somehow, your desk has landed on the front... well, part of the car that's wrapped around said statue. Weird.
3.Finally, you seem to have hit a ketchup factory. A remarkably warm ketchup factory, and it's everywhere, but no factory to be seen.

Right then! Can't let this ketchup go to waste, now can we? Of course not. You stick out a finger, put it in the ketchup, and sample it.

Blood?

Ah, blood-flavored ketchup. Mr. Heinz, you have done it again, 57 varieties and you never told anyone that one of them was blood! You magnificent bastard.

So! Now that we've established where we are, time to find the proprietor of this joint, and ask if he's seen any shifty mafioso types.

With a course of action determined, you step out of the car... and land straight on your face. Legs aren't quite working as intended. But this won't stop a private eye and his sidekick!

Wait, sidekick? Who is that, anyway, in the giant pile of ketchup? Your sidekick has a strange way of dressing. Purple eyes (obviously tinted contacts. Harlot.), purple hair (obviously a dye job. Strumpet.), some sort of green-yellow Japanese robe-thingy (Also add to list of things to find out the name of,) and a flower in her hair.

Wait.

Sidekick? No, you wouldn't keep a dame for that. Dames are too much trouble.

Blood-flavored ketchup? Hmm.

In a single moment, it all clicks.

Aw, shit, you killed a hooker. Shiiiiiiiiiiiit. Luckily for you, this isn't the first time you've had to dispose of a body. You just can't seem to shake the fact that something seems to be off. Oh well. Let's get her to the quarry. She can sleep by Two-Toes Jimbo, Left-Eye Skeeve, and Jackie Chainsaw.

And then you figure out what's “off.”

How are you going to GET her to the quarry? Your car's right smashed, and... wait... not your car. Johnny Two-Lips' car. Now you've got a patsy. Hmm. What to do?

[ ] Try and pin it on Johnny Two-Lips by arranging his belongings in his car as “evidence.”
[ ] Let the fuzz know.
[ ] Nah, the fuzz can find the body themselves.
[ ] Pinning it on Johnny won't work. We'll need to find some transportation. There's gotta be some dumb mook that left his car out around here... and it is the middle of the night anyways. Perfect timing.
[ ] Wait, wasn't it daylight when you crashed? You've been out a while.
[ ] No, you dumb magee, it's still the same night.

Additionally, you can:

[ ] Search the body.
[ ] See what's in Johnny Two-Lips' car boot.

But you think to yourself, doing your best Cagney impression, I gots to get out of here fast, see? The longer we waits, the more chance we gets caught. So it might be in our best interest to skip out of town again, see? Finally, you stop and think to yourself. Any better ideas?

[ ] Write-in.

[X] Try and pin it on Johnny Two-Lips by arranging his belongings in his car as “evidence.”
-[X] Search the Body

Wow, we've just messed up badly! Let's just hope no news reporters come in and take some incriminating evidence against us.

Whoa, hold on. Did we just kill...Akyu?

[x]Pin it on Two-Lips.
-[x]Search body AND boot.

>Jackie Chainsaw
Aw, they broke the theme naming.

[X] Try and pin it on Johnny Two-Lips by arranging his belongings in his car as “evidence.”
- [X] On second thought, never mind the complicated stuff; just wipe the prints off the steering wheel and skedaddle.
- [X] We'll need to find some transportation. There's gotta be some dumb mook that left his car out around here...

>>124305
Dead as a doornail.
>>124309
Someone had to make Two-Toes Jimbo have two toes.

[X] Try and pin it on Johnny Two-Lips by arranging his belongings in his car as “evidence.”
- [X] On second thought, never mind the complicated stuff; just wipe the prints off the steering wheel and skedaddle.
- [X] We'll need to find some transportation. There's gotta be some dumb mook that left his car out around here...
-[x]Search body AND boot.

Light. Ow. Pain. Morning. Ow. Hangover. Ow. Should NOT have drunk that much. Ow. You slowly, experimentally, open your eyes. And there's the empty bottle of gin. Found that in the boot. And now you have some... money? With some strange moonspeak written all over it. Whatever. It's money. Probably. She sure had... a lot? You're not even sure how much money you HAVE. You'll have to find someone dim enough to not suspect you, but bright enough to count. Christ. If only Johnny was here. In any case. To search the body correctly, you remember you had to put the body up on the statue, make it easier for yourself. Decided to leave it there, there was already a massive “bloodsplosion” all over the statue. And washed yourself off in the fountain nearby. That fountain's water has a kinda... red tinge to it now.

Next, you couldn't find a goddamn car. Not a single goddamn one. What the fuck back-asswards town did you crash into? At least they had a couple of dark alleys you could hide in. You're not entirely sure that anyone's even noticed the dame's dead, but you're sure they will.

“Extra! Extra! Read all about it! Akyu mysteriously murdered! Only in the Bunbunmaru!”

Okay, now they all will.

You stumble up, straighten your clothes and trenchcoat, find your trilby hat (what kind of private eye doesn't have a Trilby hat? Not you, that's who,) and decide to grab a newspaper. The Bunbunmaru isn't one you've ever heard of, though. It's fine, though, you wiped your prints and tossed Johnny's phone into the seat. That should throw the fuzz off.

Now, you're way too hardboiled to be stumbling out into the street, so you steady yourself with one last shot of gin. Here we go.

As you stumble into the street (it's not even paved! Shit, WHEN am I?), you see a large group of people clustered around the now bloody, probably desecrated statue of a dragon. (Shit, I didn't even notice it was a dragon? Man, I was messed up last night.) And nearby, there's this dame, couldn't be older than a teenager, selling newspapers. Weird red hat, too. Black hair. Always liked black hair. Not sure why. Has a white blouse, black skirt... at least this dame has some fashion sense. As opposed to the hooker that died last night.

“Say, toots, could you get me a paper?”

“Sure thing!”

She looks so overjoyed that someone actually asked for a paper that you don't even get asked to pay.

'Course, it doesn't matter anyways. It's written in the same moonspeak as the friggin' money. Dammit.

“You wouldn't happen to have a version in English, would you?”

And now she looks even more excited. Seriously, what? She kind of bounces up and down happily as she explains to you:

“This is a new version of the newspaper! See that button down there? Press it! Press it press it press it!”

Wait, button on the newspaper? Whatever. Okay then. You press the button, and lo and behold, it's in English like some kinda... technological... marvel... thing. Dammit with the names! These things should be labeled!

Alrighty then, let's see. “Hieda no Akyu dead, work of the SDM?” “Theories suggest Flandre Scarlet, crazy and out of her mind, stole a car... from somewhere... and rammed it into poor Akyu. And then she threw a mahogany tree at her! Yeah, that's right!”

Real professional writing there. Now I see why nobody buys the newspaper here. There's a picture of “Mysterious person seen fleeing the scene of the crime!”

Well, it's not me. Unless I had... teal hair? Holy hell how many people dye their hair here? And... are those antennae? Well, she looks scared... I hope for her sake she didn't see anything. Because if she did... I'm not going back. I'm not going to jail again. Even if the first time was only a couple of days because of a “drunk in public.”

“What's your name, toots?”

“I'm Aya Shameimaru.”

Damn that's a long last name. Forget it. Nobody cares. Just call her Aya.

“There is no way I'm going to remember all that so I'll just call you Aya.”

“Hey, it's not that hard! Sha-mei-”

“Don't care. Won't remember. Now, Aya, who do you think is in th-”

As you finish that sentence, you get bumped into from behind.

[ ] Whirl around and deck the bastard! Nobody bumps into you!
[ ] Turn around and GLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARE.
[ ] Turn around, and if it's a pretty dame, take your hat off and politely introduce yourself.
[ ] Ignore it.

The person that bumped into you is...

[ ] Write-in.

The person in the picture who probably saw you is...

[ ] Too dangerous to let run around and live. Time to think of a plan to end them.
[ ] What's one witness? It can't possibly doom me. Nope, not at all.
[ ] Write-in.

[X] Whirl around and deck the bastard! Nobody bumps into you!

[X]Kotohime

So, basically,

>Deck the fuzz

[x] Whirl around and deck the bastard! Nobody bumps into you!

[x] The 5 Magic Stones
[x] Sariel
[x] Ruukoto

Let me dream a dream of obscurity, goddammit!

[X] Whirl around and deck the bastard! Nobody bumps into you!
[X] Evil Eye Sigma
[X] What's one witness? It can't possibly doom me. Nope, not at all.

Yeah, okay.

[X] Whirl around and deck the bastard! Nobody bumps into you!
[X] Kotohime

[X] What's one witness? It can't possibly doom me. Nope, not at all.

Wow... Good job, we've just ended a long running bloodline in Gensokyo.

>>124435
Eh, they'll get by. Japanese noble houses are full of inbred branch families anyway, so the bloodline's probably still intact. (Not that killing Akyu isn't sad, mind you; just not sad enough to go to the pokey over.)

>>124435
Now you're just jumping to conclusions. Sure, she's a bloody pile... wait, shit.

[X] Whirl around and deck the bastard! Nobody bumps into you!
[X] Kotohime

[X] What's one witness? It can't possibly doom me. Nope, not at all.
Seems you guys are more for the “impulsive” violence rather than “premeditated.” That’s totally fine! I mean, it’s the difference between first and second degree murder, right?

Someone bumps into you from behind.

Bumps into YOU.

OH HELL NO.

As one, everything seems to slow down to a crawl. Aya slowly turns to look at the person who bumped into you. Her mouth seems to be moving. A greeting, perhaps?

YOU’VE GOT YOUR OWN GODDAMN GREETING.

You feel your tendons and muscles clench the bones of your fingers into that most brutal of weapons- the human fist. Yurusenai zo. Unfamiliar words. But they spring into your consciousness unbidden- but they just feel right.

Left foot out. Spin the torso, gain speed in the arm. Extend straight out from the elbow, but not too far. We’re going for a jaw-destroying hook, not an straight jab. In slow motion, you realize that your fist is going towards an attractive redheaded dame.

Oh god not a redhead. Those are even more trouble than they’re worth. With that thought firmly entrenched in your mind, you focus even more on squeezing every last drop of power you can get from your punch. You have one objective now- annihilation.

Your fist smashes into her cheekbone, right below her left eye, but enough of your meaty fist on her nose to probably break it. Now THAT is a satisfying crunch. You see a bit of her blood mix with her red hair in the air, and time returns quickly to normal speed.

Kotohime drops like a sack of bricks.

Aya stands there, openmouthed, disbelieving. But enough of her journalistic instincts remain- she’s going for her camera. With your other hand, you place it on your camera, and shake your head. No, you think at her. It will go badly for you if you do that. She seems to get the message (it may have been the sheer amount of RAGE you were exuding, or perhaps the comically distended forehead vein. Whatever.)

Then it clicks. Again.


Aw, shit, you just knocked out a hooker. Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit.

“Aya.”

“W-what?”

“Do you have a place nearby? We can take her there to rest…. I kind of feel bad about nailing her in the face like that. I… kind of want to be able to explain this to her when she wakes up. And hopefully… I hit her hard enough that she won’t remember.” You look at Aya, the camera, and then Aya again. “And that she won’t be reminded.”

The poor girl is utterly flustered. She doesn’t know what to do.

“Aya. Listen to me very carefully. I am a private investigator. She… kind of spooked me. And I want to help solve that… mess… over there by the statue. And I can’t be going around ruining any goodwill I might somehow be able to wangle.”

“I… don’t know…”

She still seems uncertain.

“Aya. This is a perfect time for some hard-hitting investigative journalism. You’ll sell newspapers like hotcakes. Rice cakes. Whatever cakes. Cake.”

At the mention of “investigative journalism,” Aya’s eyes light up. “An exclusive?”

“You bet, toots. But a great investigator needs help- and I think you’re just the person to do it. I’m sure you know everything about everyone here, right? That can be amazingly useful!”

“Yeah, I do know a lot about a lot of people here!”

Excellent. With control over the media, you don’t need to worry about one crazed-sounding witness. Ranting and raving, and accusing the guy in charge of the investigation! That’s madness, and it simply won’t work. Because you’ll have a patsy. And who better than the “mysterious person seen fleeing from the scene of the crime?”

Who, indeed.

“Alright, Aya, we need to go, before anyone notices. They’re still too busy staring at the crime scene, and I’d kind of not like to be seen out here with a bloody, beaten hooker.”

“Wha- hooker?! Kotohime isn’t a hooker!”

“I’ve seen a lot of things, toots, and she is most definitely a woman of the night.”

Aya frowns at you in disbelief, and shakes her head.

“Alright. Pick her up, and I’ll take you back to my place.”

You lift Kotohime up in your best fireman’s carry, and get set to go.

“Now grab my hand.”

Grab her hand? Meh, whatev- OH FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK THAT IS THE GROUND DOWN THERE BELOW WHERE YOU ARE FUCK YOU’RE IN THE SKY FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK

One hand holding Kotohime, and the other holding onto Aya, you now have only two desires in the entire world:
1. You pray that you don’t soil yourself. That’s your best suit!
2. You pray that your hat stays on. Where are we going to find another good Trilby hat?

You pass out during the ride, and we bypass the obligatory dream sequence and flashback.

[ ] Unless, of course, you want some kind of dream sequence/flashback.

And now you have a couple of things to decide-

[ ] That “mysterious person” would make a great patsy.
[ ] No, you’ve got to find someone less obvious. (This one can either be a write-in, you can suggest a patsy or just suggest someone to show up in the story, and we can decide the patsy further down the line.)

And what to do about Aya and Kotohime?

[ ] Well, you did kind of punch Kotohime in the face, so it would be ungentlemanly to not be there for her…
[ ] Forget her! We must pursue JUSTICE and the person who brutally murdered that hooker! As long as it’s not you.
[ ] Write-in.

Welcome to: Compensation: Adequate. A Touhou Murder Mystery!

The game, Watson, is afoot.

>Seems you guys are more for the “impulsive” violence rather than “premeditated.”
Ordinarily I wouldn't be, but we are drunk on gin (plus "deck the fuzz" just plain sounds funny).

[X] That “mysterious person” would make a great patsy.
[X] Well, you did kind of punch Kotohime in the face, so it would be ungentlemanly to not be there for her…

[X] That “mysterious person” would make a great patsy.

[X] Well, you did kind of punch Kotohime in the face, so it would be ungentlemanly to not be there for her…

I want to see the MC's reaction when he realizes who he just punched out. So, a murder mystery where WE are the murderer, trying to cover our tracks? Delightful.

[X] That “mysterious person” would make a great patsy.

[X] Well, you did kind of punch Kotohime in the face, so it would be ungentlemanly to not be there for her… to punch her again once she wakes up.

Brutalizing 'hookers' seems to be this guy's thing. Not going to deny him his thing.

Update should be coming shortly. I'm still trying to think of if I should give you guys the "Moral Event Horizon" options.

Which would probably involve more hooker brutalization.

Anon, I need three things from you.

Specifically, three different touhous-
1. A touhou that cannot fly.
2. A touhou that would make an excellent witness.
3. A touhou that would be most suited to investigate any murders (barring Aya and Kotohime.)

I would prefer these three be different touhous.

Don't read too much into the questions. Suggesting one and having it selected is not a guarantee of death, et cetera, et cetera. I will dismiss any of your theories as epileptic trees (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/EpilepticTrees) and they probably will be, because you're probably wrong.

Or perhaps I'm trying too hard to discourage that thought?

Meta story fu fu fu fu fu fu fu~

Thanks in advance, Anon.

>>124591
What's his name? Frank Miller?

>>124705

Pretty much every touhou that exists can fly. Easily. You'll have to adjust accordingly.

[x]>>124591
If the voting is still open.
As for the three touhous questions.
1.Reimu
2.Star Sapphire
3.Genji
Reimu is the only touhou I can think of that can't fly. Star is a great witness because her power allows her to notice damn near everything, and lastly, Genji is our sidekick. I mean, who better to help our investigation than a hardboiled turtle who's seen to much in his time.

>>124737
Mind, only PC-98 Reimu couldn't fly. So it will have to involve time travel.

I would say Akyu for #1, but Akyu is currently a bloody splotch. Rika?

>1. A touhou that cannot fly.

Didn't Rikako use a jetpack in PoDD?

>>124750
Only because she hates using magic and likes to rely on SCIENCE instead.

1. ????"
2. Star Sapphire
3. Genjii

I guess an update is too much to hope for?

>>130438

Maybe. Honestly, I'm not too sure where to go with this. The plan I had in mind was for a hell of a Xanatos Gambit.

Tell you what. I'll give you an update later tonight.

UPDATE OH MY GOD

[X] That “mysterious person” would make a great patsy.
[X] Well, you did kind of punch Kotohime in the face, so it would be ungentlemanly to not be there for her…

Pain. Lots of pain. Not sure how this kind of pain came about.

Maybe if I keep my eyes closed the pain will go away? Maybe. Let's go back to sleep.

“How long has it been?”

A voice. Not one I recognize. Sounds kind of deep. Weird. Let's think of all the people with deep voices~

“Couple hours or so? You really laid her out.”

Laid her out? What? That makes no sense. I went to sleep.

“I did no such thing and you'll be telling her no such thing, toots. Lying is bad.”

He's right. Lying is bad. Lying is the worst thing ever. In fact, lying makes me angry. I don't like liars.

“H-hey, put that down! I promise I won't tell her!”

Tell her what?

“Promise you won't tell her what?”

“Tell her how you-”

Something sounds like it's cracking~

“-totally had absolutely nothing to do with anything at all!”

“Perfect. I knew a smart dame like you would come around eventually.”

Okay, time to wake up~! And let's make it convincing for them~!

Kotohime experimentally tries to open her eyes. Only one opens all the way, the other one huuuuuuuuuuuurts... Oh hey, it's some guy! I don't recognize him! That's a funny looking hat though. Why doesn't he have a normal looking one like he-

Aya.

That... lying tengu scum. Ever since she did those series of outright slanderous articles on “Kotohime has lost her marbles, and not metaphorically either! She's crazy!”

She's also terrible at thinking up titles for her articles. Really should get an editor. Would probably bring up the standard of quality for the entire newspaper.

You manage your best timid smile.

“Aya... where am I? Why does my face hurt so much?”

“Um... uh...”

Stalling for time to think up a lie. I knew it.

“I'll tell you.”

The serious-looking man looks at you, with his honest face and earnest eyes. I like him~

“It's really simple, see? You merely had an accident- and it wasn't entirely your fault. This girl here, Aya Shameisomething, was enthusiastically waving her paper around and shouting to get people to buy it- when, I'm sorry to say, you accidentally blundered into her fist flailing around, and you fell over. I, being the gallant gentleman I am, would not stand to see a dame collapse in the street. So I demanded that Aya bring you home, and make sure that everything is set right between you and her. So, Aya, I think now is the perfect time for your apology?”

Such a gentleman~!

Aya glares at him. “I'm. Sorry. Really.” Biting off all her words.

You sweetly smile at her. swear to god you'll get yours back in kind “I accept your apology, Aya. You're so nice to take me back and make sure I'm okay.”

Aya looks a bit taken aback from your acceptance of her horrid apology. “I'll... just put some tea on for us, won't I? It'll only be a bit. I'll be right back.”

She leaves with another glare at the interesting man, leaving you two alone.

So many questions to ask~!

[ ] Who are you?
[ ] Those are silly clothes! Why do you wear them?
[ ] What do you do?
[ ] Are you new here?
[ ] Hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii~!
[ ] Write-in (questions, actions, whatnot)

And:

[ ] Be the MC.
[ ] Continue being Kotohime.
[ ] [s]Be that horrid Aya[/i] You can't be Aya! And you wouldn't want to be even if you could!

[ ] Who are you?
[ ] Are you new here?
[ ] You smell funny...
[ ] Are you a good guy or a criminal?
[ ]Who is that behind you? She looks scary.

[X] Hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii~!
[X] Continue being Kotohime.

I don't even know who Kotohime is despite a scan of her wiki, and I'm still lawling super hard. This is too glorious for words.

also

>>Hazama

WHAT COULD GO WRONG.

[x] Who are you?
[x] Those are silly clothes! Why do you wear them?
[x] What do you do?
[x]Be the MC

Glad to see this back.

>>130553

JAYOKU HOUTENJIN!

>>oh god that would be terrible

[x] Continue being Kotohime.

[x] Have been punched in the snout to establish inferiority
[x] Hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii~!
[x] Are you a good guy or a criminal?
I normally don't approve of violence against the police, but as >>130553 said, far too glorious.

[X] Hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii~!
[X] Continue being Kotohime.

[x] Continue being Kotohime.

[x] Hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii~!
[x] Who are you?
[x] Those are silly clothes! Why do you wear them?
[x] What do you do?
[x] You smell funny...

Continue being Kotohime? That's silly. You always have been, and always will be Kotohime. Frankly, the notion that you could switch between characters strikes you as more than slightly silly.

“Hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii~”

He looks a bit flustered. But that's cute!

“Um. Hi. Nice to meet you.”

“Who are you why are you wearing those clothes they look kinda silly what do you do hey you kinda smell like an oni why?”

“Um. What the hell are you talking about?”

Stupid, stupid, you don't want to scare him off, calm down, try it again.

Deep breath.

“Who are you? What do you do?”

“Ah, that's simple enough, toots, I'm a private investigator. A private dick, you might call it.”

“Oh. Then why are you wearing that?”

“That?”

“You know, the silly coat and hat! With the pants with the fold in the middle of them, and the shoes, they're black but all shiny!”

“Heh. This, toots, is a coat old Abe Bernstein gave me last year for “finding” the “evidence” that sprang one of his boys last year. He was obviously setup, and of course the jury sprang him. It was a fix, and all I did was show the jurors that it was so.”

“Ohhhhhhhhhhhh, so you're the kind of guy who solves crimes! That's perfect! I'm Gensokyo's number one police officer!”

He visibly swallows. “You mean you're the fuzz?”

“Fuzz?” This guy sure knows a lot of strange words.

“You know, the 5-0, the po-po, the fuzz, constable, the law, whatever you call it?”

“Yep!” You're very proud of the invaluable service you provide for the inhabitants of Gensokyo. They definitely appreciate what you do! Unless you count that time with Marisa, and your attempts to arrest her for theft (that ended in a visit to Eirin,) or that time you went into the SDM to find out where people were disappearing to and met Flandre (lucky you got blown through the wall right in the direction of Eirin's clinic,) or... a lot of times, actually. But they appreciate it! You know it! Hey... if he's an investigator...

“Heyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy. You know what you should do? You should help me find out who killed Akyu!”

“Akyu? Dame with purple eyes, purple hair?”

“Yes! Do you know something about what happened?”

“Nope. Nothing at all. Absolutely nothing. Never saw her. Don't even know what she looks like. Not at all.”

You sniff the air a bit.

“I was right, you do smell a bit like an oni. Are you an oni? Your hair color's weird for an oni, though...”

His hand goes up to his hair, and takes off his hat to run his hand through it.

“But... brown is a perfectly normal color! It's you crazies that have the strange hair color!”

Oooooh, this could be fun. I think I'll play with him a bit, see what I can get him to do~

You snatch the hat. You see his fist clench and the vein on his forehead distend a bit. Hohohohoho, so funny~

He'd never hit a woman! He's obviously too much of a gentleman~

He takes a deep breath, and relaxes.

At that moment, Aya comes in with the tea, and seems to be in a much brighter mood. if you couldn't fly I'd push you down the side of the mountain, it'd be glorious

Aya smiles tentatively at you. “Well, I brought tea, and it did make me feel a bit better. I thought of a few ways that our new friend here can help me out with the paper and his investigation!” She flashes him her biggest shit-eating grin, the one that flat out says “Ooooh, gotcha now sucker” without the obviousness of coming right out and saying it.

It's only slightly less obvious than that.

You jam his hat on your head. Now I look all hardboiled like him~!

“But,” you thrust your finger at him, “we're going to need to do something about your hair color. It stands out far too much here! I was thinking a nice shade of green, myself!”

“What. Can't we go look for clues or something? Preferably in a bar where there's a stiff drink? There are always lots of clues at the bottom of bottles.”

I never knew that~! Maybe that's why the oni never have trouble solving their crimes~!

[ ] Go dye his hair green. It's not like we don't have plenty of time.
[ ] Go try out his style of investigation- we'll empty out ALL of the bottles!
[ ] No, we need to actually investigate and ask people what they saw- shoe leather is the most reliable way to solve crimes.
[ ] Write-in

Also:

[ ] Continue being Kotohime
[ ] Be the MC
[ ] Be Aya I am NOT being that harpy! Er, tengu. Whatever.
[ ] Be the hat that's on Kotohime's head What. No.

[x] Go try out his style of investigation- we'll empty out ALL of the bottles!
[x] Continue being Kotohime

No matter how this is interpreted, it will be awesome.

[x] Go dye his hair green. It's not like we don't have plenty of time.

[x] Continue being Kotohime

Kotohime is too awesome to not be the MC.

[x] Go try out his style of investigation- we'll empty out ALL of the bottles!
[x]MC

[greeeeen] Go dye his hair green. It's not like we don't have plenty of time.
[Kotohimeeeee] Continue being Kotohime.

For now, at least. We'll be the other guy again. Eventually.

[greeeeen] Go dye his hair green. It's not like we don't have plenty of time.
[Kotohimeeeee] Continue being Kotohime.
[x] Go try out his style of investigation- we'll empty out ALL of the bottles!

“There is no way you're going to get me to dye my hair green.”

In the grim, dark future of Gensokyo, there is only war...

Kotohime is lounging in a chair, spread across three seats with her head on Aya's lap. yes lull her into a false sense of complacency crippling isn't murder right

“Aya, remind me again how we managed to get him to dye his hair green?”

“Simple. The poor sob doesn't know how to avoid the classic Gilligan Cut.”

“The what now?”

“Let me explain. You know, how sometimes in stories the character will say “There's no way you're going to get me into a boat!” and the next scene he's on a boat? Our friend here unfortunately apparently blundered right into it, and from his point of view, the next thing he'll be doing is standing out here, in front of us saying 'I can't believe you got me to dye my hair green.' That also explains why in the last scene we were in my house on Youkai Mountain, and how we're lounging outside a salon now in the Human Village.”

What. She's really confusing sometimes~

“I can't believe you got me to dye my hair green.”

Aya laughs. “Consider it your payment for my services rendered. At least now you're far less conspicuous.”

“Sir! You forgot to pay!” A girl with deep-red eyes, pink hair and... bunny ears bounds out the door after the Investigator for payment.

Reisen! Yayness! I haven't talked to her in a while!

“Reiiiiiiiiisen~! Long time no see!”

She perks up a bit. “Kotohime? Good to see you! Are you paying for your friend here?”

You raise your head off Aya's lap and wave dismissively at him. “A lady paying for a gentleman? Never!”

Behind Reisen, you see your Investigator friend put his palm up to his face. That's a silly gesture. He roots around in his pockets for something, and pulls out a wad of bills with an expression of grim triumph on his face.

“How... many of these will it cost?” He seems to be struggling to figure out how much money he has.

“Let me help you with that. It'll cost you two of these, and a couple of those coins.” Reisen plucks a couple 2000-yen notes out of his hand with a couple 500 yen coins on top. “Thank yooooooou! Come again!”

You smile. “Since your hair's all gucky and whatnot from getting it dyed, I'm keeping your hat~!”

“For now.”

“For now~”

---

Found him for you.
Excellent. Tail him, and report where he stops.
Yes.

---

The Investigator sighs. “Now I really need a stiff drink. I'm going to go find a bar. Aya, you coming with me?”

“Sure, why not. Got nothing better to do. Might get some pictures of barfights for the sports page.”

“Good enough for me. Kotohime, how about you?”

[ ] Go with them. CLUES DEMAND TO BE FOUND and I am not leaving him with that harpy
[ ] I haven't talked to Reisen in so long! I'll catch up later~
[ ] Oooh shiny! (write-in)

And

[ ] Continue being Kotohime.
[ ] Be the Investigator.
[ ] Be Aya as much as I hate that harpy whore
[ ] Be Reisen
[ ] Be the hat
[ ] ???

[X] Go with them. CLUES DEMAND TO BE FOUND and I am not leaving him with that harpy
[X] Be the hat

IN SOVIET RUSSIA, HAT IS YOU!

>>130661

You can't be the hat!

[X] Go with them. CLUES DEMAND TO BE FOUND and I am not leaving him with that harpy
[X] Be the hat

[x] Go with them. CLUES DEMAND TO BE FOUND and I am not leaving him with that harpy
[x]Be the MC

Where did we previously see Reisen?

>>130669

We didn't. I just created a pre-existing relationship due to the demands of plot. And besides, it's not really that much of a stretch that they know each other in Gensokyo's small world.

(also Kotohime means little rabbit princess or something like that)

[x] Go with them. CLUES DEMAND TO BE FOUND and I am not leaving him with that harpy
[x]Be the MC
So as not to derail TOO much and permanently be stuck as Kotohime (not that that would be a terrible thing but probably not the direction Lunes wants to go in)
Also I want to know what our ace detective thinks of Kotohime!

look I'm not going to lie

I -giggle- like a Japanese schoolgirl faced with an entire dimension of tentacles every time I see an update from Kotohime's perspective.

I know jack all about the character or whatever touHOEs game she was in but goddamn this is A+++ comedy gold. Entire fic is, really. I don't doubt an update from the perspective of the hat would be equally lolful.

If writefag doesn't get tired of it, and/or plot doesn't tear Koto away from us, I for one certainly wouldn't mind if the rest of the story traded off between MC and Kotohime - they're both completely awesome.

>>130676
>-giggle-
>No knowledge about the characters
>touHOES
>lolful

What the fuck are you doing. Knock it off.

[x] Go with them. CLUES DEMAND TO BE FOUND and I am not leaving him with that harpy
[x] Be the MC

Green hair.

What the hell.

Green fucking hair. If there weren't so many people around, you'd knock this redhead bird right out, and straight up leave her, gentlemanlyship... or whatever the hell it's called be damned.

And she's got my fucking hat. Unforgivable.

At least it's close on enough to 7-8 in the evening (your watch never worked quite right after you nailed that tree/statue/hooker with the car- really should get that looked at,) and apparently you got a decent wad of bills off of the hooker- the bunny... girl... thing... only took a few of them for your goddamn hair dying.

Green fucking hair.

So you're walking down a damned dirt road in a village in the middle of bum fuck NOWHERE and you swear to GOD if they don't have a decent gin you're going to find out just how many .44 rounds the proprietor can survive. To top it all off, the damned redheaded dame has just straight up LATCHED onto your arm like an incontinent puppy who just can't stop looking at you. If she wasn't the fuzz you'd have pushed her down a mountain a LONG time ago. At least the other one seems to have a grain of sense- mind, it's only a single grain, but it looks to be more than pretty much ANYONE ELSE in this godforsaken shithole of a town.

“and so I had to get patched up because she shot pretty good with her danmaku but I'm getting better~”

And she will not shut up. This day gets better and better. My kingdom for some alcohol.

You finally arrive at the bar. It's a small affair, and a pretty cheap-looking one too. At least the stools seem to be made of sturdy, solid oak, with a couple of booths on the side. But everybody knows that no self-respecting hard-boiled investigator goes to a booth unless you're meeting a contact here.

Bar, then.

Honestly, you'd rather not meet anyone else here. Ever. And just leave. Failing that, drunken stupor is the best kind of stupor.

Aya takes the stool to your left, leaving you with Red here to your right. The bartender moseys on over to the bar directly across from you. He's got horns, but honestly, you've seen enough shit that you don't care if it's the Fairy Queen of the Lake or whatever as long as they have some good alcohol.

“Name's Jimbo. What'll you be having?”

“Gin tonic for me. Whatever the dames want for them, start me a tab.”

Aya pipes up. “Whiskey sour for me. Been a bit of a day. Entertaining, though.”

Kotohime looks to the bartender, smiles, and has a gleam in her eye. “I waaaaaaant... that!”

She points to the largest bottle of sake that the bar has on its walls.

God, I hope she drinks all of that. I could definitely deal with having her pass out for a while.

“Just a mo'. I'll have your drinks in a sec.”

Okay, gotta keep Red happy, she is the fuzz after all. You look over to her

“but then she said some asshole threw a log through her front door and stole her books and I said I'd look into it~”

Still talking. Great. Aya then.

“Aya, you got any idea who the person was that was running away in that picture?”

“Yeah, I have my suspicions. I looked a bit closer, and there might have been antennae in the hair. That really narrows it down to just Wriggle Nightbug.”

“What. Who names their kid Wriggle Nightbug? Someone really wanted their kid to be picked on.”

Aya graces you with a blank look, and continues on.

“In any case, I think that in the morning, we should head over and see if we can either find Wriggle or check Wriggle's place for evidence.”

“Casing the joint while they're away. Brilliant.”

“I thought so.”

Jimbo returns with the drinks. “Gin tonic for the gentleman, whiskey sour for Aya, and sake for Kotohime.”

Kotohime? Was that her name? Huh. Never noticed. Don't care. I'm going to make an effort to forget it.

He sets your drink before you, and you down it in one gulp. Glorious. “Second please.”

“Coming right up.”

In the meantime, Kotohime has managed to work the stopper out of the bottle of sake and is pouring it out over the grate in the floor.

“Kotohime...” goddamnit now I'm gonna have to remember her name “what the hell are you doing?”

“What's it look like, silly? Getting all the alcohol out of the way so I can look in the bottom of the bottle for clues!”

You reach out a hand, and tip the bottle back above horizontal.

“It was a figure of speech, Red. You have to drink it to figure out the clues.”

“But there's so muuuuuuuuuch~”

“I know, but that just means the clue at the end will be that much bigger! You've got to do it for the investigation!”

She gives you her most determined look.

“Right! I will drink all of this sake in the name of justice!”

...and then proceeds to try to drink it out of the bottle.

You shake your head and look at Aya, who is trying to stifle a giggle.

–

Hours pass...

–

Aya seems to be asleep across the bar, Red is passed out on the floor with the bottle of sake cradled in her arms like a baby holding its teddy, and it's raining outside.

“Jimbo, I'll be right back. Keep an eye on the dames, would you?”

“Aye.”

You step outside for a smoke. Pulling out a coffin nail from your inside breast pocket, you cup your hand around the flame of your lighter and step off the covered patio in vain hopes that it's not too late for the rain to wash out the green from your hair.

You sigh, and exhale smoke while looking down. Suddenly, two familiar sensations become apparent.

First, there is a knife pressed to your neck, and someone behind you.

“Move, and die painfully. We know what you did, and you can either make this go easy, or go hard.”

You chuckle in your best hard-boiled manner. “Lady, do you know who I am?”

“No, don't care. Now, your choice?”

Right, that. Oh, and the second familiar sensation? You would appear to have wet yourself from fear. You're so glad it's raining now.
–

[ ] Be the Investigator
[ ] Be Aya
[ ] Be Kotohime
[ ] Be the hat that's currently on Kotohime's head
[ ] Be Reisen
[ ] Be the mysterious voice

–

Also, select an action for your selected character:

[ ] Write-in.

Please note that any character actions will take place in the morning after they wake up, and probably with a banging hangover.

[x] Be Kotohime
[x] Attempt to locate mysterious hardboiled sleuth in order to properly hire him to investigate the vile murder of Akyuu.
[x] Failing that, throw up. Attempt to locate hangover cure.

>>130682
No knowledge about Kotohime besides the wiki entry. I'm not like Touhou retarded in general. Thought I said her specifically at some point?

[X] Be Kotohime
[X] Wander outside, still drunk
[X] Projectile vomit to distract MC's kidnapper!

>>130682
Yeah, just checked. I did specify Kotohime as the one I didn't know much about. As in, learn to read before you go off halfcocked.

[x] Be Kotohime
[x] Attempt to locate mysterious hardboiled sleuth in order to properly hire him to investigate the vile murder of Akyuu.

>>130709
>>130711
I am aware of what you said. My quoted sections are still valid, and you are still fucking stupid.

Man. I am bad at thinking up write-ins. What happened to all that creativity I used to have?

[x] Be Kotohime
[x] Attempt to locate mysterious hardboiled sleuth in order to properly hire him to investigate the vile murder of Akyuu.
[x] Failing that, throw up. Attempt to locate hangover cure.

Remember that pain when Aya punched you in the face? Yeah, that. Remember it?

oh god I want to go back to that kind of pain that kind of pain was nice and comforting and not as though someone had released a bunch of angry weasels shredding some death metal in my head

You open your eyes, and you're in the back room of the bar tucked into a bed with Aya. It seems to be where the proprietor lives, a small room with a light atop a nightstand, with books in a semi-organized fashion- that being a large pile. Jimbo's asleep in the chair in the corner with a book in his lap, as it looks like he's probably the one that took you back here when you passed out.

...wait, passed out?

Oh no, where'd he go?! I don't even know his name!

Calm down. Spazzing out now would do nothing but wake them both up. I kind of want to avoid that. Well, at least want to avoid waking Aya.

You slowly get up, and put your feet on the floor. At least you're still fully dressed, but you'll have to change out of these soon enough- you've had them on for a decent bit of time and you're beginning to smell unladylike. But that can wait until after you've found the Investigator.

Quick look around the room- alright, nobody seems to have awakened.

You step out the door into the dusty main part of the bar, and find your sake bottle. Empty, no clues in it. aww I must have dropped them somewhere, I should find those

At least the rain has stopped. But with the rain stopping and the coming of the morning also includes the coming of morning sunlight.

You have never hated the sun more in your life.

But obviously your intrepid Investigator is nowhere to be found in the bar. His drink still stands half-finished atop the bar- a bad sign indeed. He's not the type to leave alcohol unfinished if your experience last night is anything to go by. Now you're really worried.

I hope nothing happened to him that'd be pretty terrible

As you're about to look outside, a thought more horrifying than any of the last hits you.

Oh god where's the hat?!

You rush back into the small bedroom to look for it. Nothing. No hat. You're about to break down into tears.

Calm down calm down calm down it might be outside
How? That doesn't make any sense?
I don't care shut up shut up shut up~

You rush outside to look for the hat and hopefully an Investigator under it. No such luck, but you see embedded into the wall a bloodied knife.

A clue~! Yayifications~!

You pull out one of the plastic evidence bags you carry around for occasions such as this, pluck the knife from the wall, and drop it into the bag.

...which it promptly cuts through and lands point-first directly between your big toe and your second toe.

That could have been really bad~

Looking down at the knife, you see a small brass cylinder on the floor next to it. It's empty, strangely enough. You pull out two more evidence bags, and gingerly place the knife in one, and the small brass cylinder in the other.

Curiouser and curiouser. I wonder what this is~ but it seems important~

You pull out a third, final evidence bag, and harf into the bag.

At least you feel kind of better.

–

So, crazy chick with a knife to your throat, you're scared half to death, at least slightly tipsy, AND it's raining? Bitch apparently doesn't know who she's dealing with. Let's fucking do this.

“Hard way,” you growl.

A voice whispers in your ear: “Oh, I really had hoped you'd choose the hard way.”

The knife is pulled from your throat, and you're kicked hard in the back. You skid a good foot across the ground. What now?

[ ] Full out offense!
[ ] Wait and observe, we don't even know what we're fighting!
[ ] Run away! Oh hell NAW. Bitch called down the thunder. Now she's going to reap the whirlwind.
[ ] I have a different idea... (write-in)

–

[ ] Be the Investigator.
[ ] Be the psycho knife-chick. You can't be the psycho knife-chick! And if your experiences are anything to go by, you won't have to try to be her- you'll just end up being her for added dramatic effect.

[X] Bitch called down the thunder. Now she's going to reap the whirlwind.
[X] Be the Investigator.

[x]Strife
[X]Oh hell naw. Bitch called down the thunder. Now she's going to reap the whirlwind.
-[x]Continue being the MC forever.

An encounter with a sultry female who uses knives, right outside the bar? As someone said, this guys thing is brutalizing hookers. We can't lose.

Would update now. However, pretty shitfaced drunk. Drunk is good for a Kotohime update, however not so much for an actual fight scene update. I'm going to sleep, going to wake up hungover, and turn that hungover rage into best fight scene ever.

Also I probably will not remember this post and will be something along the lines of "oh god why did I post this"

[X]Oh hell naw. Bitch called down the thunder. Now she's going to reap the whirlwind.

Alright, face down in the dirt. She’s obviously… hopefully waiting for me to make the first move. Which allows me time to think up a quick plan. Alright, still got the .44. Five out of the six chambers are filled, the sixth is empty from when I shot that window. Not sure which cylinder that is, though. It’s been a while. Really wish I had thought to check that in between bouts of alcoholism and wanton liver abuse. Don’t want to use that as the opening move, at the moment I think it’s still an unknown- haven’t seen anyone else with guns here.

Might be able to get a knife off her. I’ll work on that, it’ll give me some kind of weapon to work with.

Let me get this straight. Our plan is to get a knife off of her.

Yep.

I am so boned.

Alright, I think I’ve stalled enough. Gotta get a decent look at our attacker.

You roll dramatically to avoid any impending attack to your knees, and look up at her.

Nice legs. Thigh strap. Obviously a hooker, but definitely a ninja assassin hooker, judging by the number of knives she has in that strap. Dressed in a maid outfit. Seriously, can’t any of these damn dames have any self-respect? Bored yawn. Cocky bitch. Red eyes. That ain’t natural. Silver hair. Even though she looks something like 19. And-

That.

IS.

MY.

HAT.

It is ON NOW. You’re drunk, scared half to death, and THOROUGHLY PISSED OFF.

Aw, hooker bitch, now you fucked up.

“You done yet? Or are you going to be boring? I
was really hoping to have some fun with you~”

You rise slowly to your feet, and pat the dirt out of your coat and pants, straighten your tie, and fix her with a glare of pure hatred.

“Oh, bitch, you don’t even know what you’ve done. You have fucked up now.”

“Right, then.”

Quick as a flash, so fast you didn’t even see her move, there’s a knife flying straight at your head.

“Fffffu-“

A desperate dive to the left saves your head from being impaled on a flying chunk of steel- you land and roll to your knees as suddenly she’s in front of you with a vicious snap kick to the jaw that sends you sprawling onto your back.

Fuck, she’s fast. Gotta play it off. Gotta get into her head. She’s just toying with me. I can use this.

You slowly raise yourself to your feet, crack your neck, and fix her with your best steely glare.

“That all you got? Here I was thinking you were going to kill me.”

“Not until you beg for it.”

You smile, and step towards her, closing the gap a bit. Two steps away.

“Your heart just doesn’t seem into killing me. I’ve seen two-bit mobsters with more panache than you.”

“And I’ve seen incontinent weasels hide their fear better.”

Well fuck. Lying to yourself is all you’ve got.

Another step. Close enough, you think.
Hate to do this to a lady, but she’s a hooker, so it doesn’t count. Sucker punch right in the stomach- leaves people bent over and gasping for breath, and then you bring the knee to the face. And- now!

Your swing connects with empty air. How did she-

“Too slow, Investigator.”

She kicks you in the back of the knee, and while you stumble, she deftly swings herself around you and drives a knife into your right upper arm.

“Gaaaaaaah~”

Oh god, that hurts. Hurts so goddamn much. In other news, now we have a knife.

“Aww, did that hurt? Poor puppy. Ahahahahaha!”

She’s obviously enjoying this way too much. You groan, and pull the bloody knife out of your arm and brandish it at her.

“Let’s dance.”

Suddenly, the knife is gone from your hands, and she’s now three steps in front of you, with a mocking expression on her face.

“Oh, were you looking for this? It’s so kind of you to give it back to me.”

She has the bloody knife balanced on the tip of her finger. But you just had it! Where did she get the time-

…where did she get the time to steal your hat?

…the time.

Oh you have got to be kidding me. No wonder she looks so fast- she isn’t. But she just takes no time to do anything she does. This is absolute BULLSHIT.

But she doesn’t have superhuman reflexes. Oh, no no no no. She’s merely human. And you just have to take her by surprise once. The thought brings a smile to your face. She just needs to fuck up once…

“Hey! What are you smiling about?!”

Oooh, she doesn’t like to lose control.

“Nothing. I just figured out your particular brand of bullshit. And tell you what, psycho-hooker, you really need to cut down on the corn, because that doesn’t quite digest right and just kind of ends up being highly visible in the end.”

“What.”

And now she’s confused. This is the moment~!

You reach into your coat for your .44. But as your hand goes into your coat, two knives are again speeding at your head. One’s the bloody one from your arm, and the other’s nice and shiny. Psycho-hooker is nowhere to be found. The bloody one is off target, and digs into the wooden building of the bar with a nice fat CHUNK. The other one, however, is right at your face. Too late to dodge. Only one thing to do. Channel your inner Mr. Miyagi, and pluck the fly out of the air with your chopsticks.

SHUT UP AND CATCH IT ALREADY

Eyes squeezed tightly closed, arm flailing wildly, you make a desperate grab for the knife.
And-

somehow grab it by the handle-

Holy shit. You didn’t actually expect that to work.

.44 in one hand, knife in the other, it’s go-time.

She’s in the tree.

How did you know that?

Simple- the crazed battlecry as she leapt out of it at you, with hundreds of knives flying at you might have tipped you off.

Now is the moment.

Breathe in.

Line up the shot.

Breathe out.

Cock the hammer.

Breathe in.

Pull the trigger.

Breathe out.

The torrent of knives fall all around you as her head is jerked back by two hundred and forty grains propelled at fifteen hundred feet per second deliver a blow of sixteen hundred joules of force directly between her eyes. The force blows your hat off her head into the air, as she lands ten feet in front of you.

Calmly, you walk up, catch your hat out of the air, holster your .44, and draw a cigarette. Flame flickers from your lighter as the end ignites.

Breathe in.

Breathe out.

After a long drag on your cigarette, you flick it onto her corpse, and pick up one of the knives between your feet. You pocket the two knives, and walk over to a tree, and slump down onto it.

I just killed another hooker. And now I’m going to have to get rid of the body. Shiiiiiiiiiiit.

---

[ ] Be the Investigator
[ ] Be Kotohime
[ ] Be Aya

---

[ ] Find the Investigator.
[ ] Write-in

[X] Be Kotohime
[X] Find the Investigator.

Awesome update. Looking forwards to seeing how this al lturns out. MC has a tendency to leave a stream of corpses behind, doesn't he? All of them hookers. Ninja assassin hookers, sometimes, but always hookers.

[X] Be Kotohime
[X] Find the Investigator.

Well, I don't really think MC is going to be making any other friends at this rate, what with all of them looking like hookers. Also, damn nice job on being able to do the character transitions while making it look nice and easy.

>>130829
>>but always hookers.

He wouldn't be killing hookers if they had any shred of decency!

Then he would be killing people.

[X] Be Kotohime
[X] Find the Investigator.

[x]Be Aya
-[x]Find the Investigator

Do you guys realize what you are voting for? Kotohime is an officer of the law. You are voting for her to walk into our murder scene.

That will never end well for the MC. We need Aya to be the one to discover us, so that we might spin this off as another series of murders in our investigative case.

>>130843
>>You are voting for her to walk into our murder scene.

Not quite. There's still going to be one more of the prior-to-the-girls-waking-up scenes. He's still got a couple hours to get rid of the body, you know.

>>130843
We can blame the train. Damn things just run wild these days. Really a pity the hooker got hit by one, but them's the breaks.

>>130851
Well, in that case we are all set.

>>130853
I somehow don't think that will fly. What with their being no trains in Gensokyo.

>>130854
Yukari?

>>130868
Metajoke. MC doesn't know there are no trains in Gensokyo, but then again...

[X] Yukari is fooling around again.

>>130843

This, gentlemen, is someone who knows what the fuck he's talking about.

[x]Be Aya
-[x]Find the Investigator

>>130874
HOW YOU KNOW PLOT.

>>130900

Magic
Eirin's shady new drug
>Yukari is fooling around again
It's a Moriya Shrine conspiracy

PICK ONE OF THE ABOVE. ALL CORRECT ANSWERS COME FROM THIS LIST.

[X] Be Kotohime
[X] Find the Investigator.

Im pretty sure we could convinve Kotohime it was an act of self-defense. Woman tried to puncture us with a shit load of knives afterall.
She strikes me as a bit of the gullible type anyways.

[X] Be Kotohime
[X] Find the Investigator.

Idon'tknowwhereheisandthehat'sgonehe'sgoingtobemadhetrustedmewiththehatandbawwwwwwwww

You are Kotohime. Or, more accurately, you are a crying wreck on the back porch of the bar. Your one hope lay on this knight in shining armor- or rather, kind of angry, quiet guy who wears a trenchcoat and the singularly most badass hat in the entirety of Gensokyo.

And you've seen some pretty badass hats here.

But now he and his hat are gone, and you don't know how.

Someone steps out onto the porch, and sits down next to you, and puts an arm comfortingly around you.

“Ayaaaaaaaaaaaaa! He'sgoneandso'sthehatwhatdoIdobawwwwwwww”

You can feel her wince.

“Please. One word at a time. Quietly, too, it feels like a bunch of fairies came and hammered on my head for hours. Seriously, it's like they brought in a whole construction team and built a temple to hungover headache pain in my head. Or something like that.”

You sniffle.

“But he's gone now!”

“So? Gensokyo's not too big, we'll find him.”

“But Aya, what if we don't? We'll never solve the murder of Akyu! I'm a terrible... terrible fuzz!”

Aya chuckles.

“You're not a terrible fuzz.”

“Yes I am! He left me!”

“I doubt he left you. Probably just went for a morning walk. Watching him drink... well, it was like watching a master. He probably drank twice as much as us combined, and it didn't even seem to affect him. He'll be back soon enough.”

You sniffle again. “O-okay.”

You can't even muster up the normal vitriolic hatred you have for Aya. She's... actually acting... nice.

“On a different subject, what have you got there?”

“O-oh, right!”

You had nearly forgotten about the evidence you found!

“This bloody knife, and some weird... cylinder... thing.”

“Hum. Wonder what the cylinder thing is. Of course, the bloody knife is weird. Wonder where it came from? Looks kind of familiar, though.”

Aya screws up her face in thought. “I could swear I've seen it before. I'll have to go over some photos, I'm sure I've got pictures of it somewhere.”

“We're not going anywhere until we find him!”

“Him? Do you even know his name, Kotohime?”

“N-no... but! I'll make him tell me first thing when he gets back~! What, do you know?!”

“Yep.”

Ah, there's the familiar vitriolic hatred coming back. Missed you, hatred~

“Tell me~!”

“Nnnnope!”

“Tell meeeeeeeee~!” or I'll rip out your eyeballs and feed them to your family, you glorified carrion crow bastards

“Nah. He'll tell you.”

–

“The girls are out back looking for ya, Mac. Kotohime seems to be crying up a storm. Think she misses you.”

You sigh.

“I'll let them be for a bit, I think Aya might be able to calm Red down a bit.”

Jimbo chews thoughtfully on a bit of tobacco.

“She might. Though I think Kotohime's grown quite attached to you.”

“Don't you put that on me, Jimbo.”

He chuckles.

“Just calling them as I see them, Mac.”

You take another long drag on your cigarette, and lean back in the chair in the booth in the back of the bar.

“In any case, Jimbo, thanks for your help with cleaning me up and binding the cut closed.”

“Aye, that was a pretty deep gash. But I think you did the right thing in your position.”

An ash drops down from the end of your cigarette.

“I ain't never felt so powerless. She just had some kind of crazy... I don't even know what to call it. I don't think I could have gotten away without her letting me.”

“Eh, you done all us oni and humans a favor, I say. Shit, I bet she was probably the one who killed Akyu in the first place. Wouldn't be surprised, she could have orchestrated that without much effort.”

You grimace a little.

“Definitely a possibility,” you lie through your teeth. “I'll have to take her into consideration for the investigation. Of course, officially you didn't see anything last night. Red's the law around here after all, and you know I did what I had to. I don't want this to be holding up the investigation into finding Akyu's murderer. Even if it is posthumous.”

“'Course, Mac. Akyu was a friend of mine, like the daughter I never had. Whatever I can do to help, just ask.”

When it rains, it pours.

At that point, the back door opens, and Aya walks in, consoling a still-sniffling Kotohime. Aya looks towards the back, sees you, and smiles.

Oh god, here it comes.

–

“Look up. In the back there.”

You do. And freeze.

He's baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaack! Yayness~!

You fly at him and execute a perfect glomp maneuver.

“OhmygodI'msogladtoseeyoubackandthehatIwassoworriedaboutyou”

He winces a little under your iron grip.

“Not so hard, alright? I'm a little sore.”

Aya walks over and chuckles.

“I see the Tactical Kotohime Missile found its target, then. Out of curiosity, where were you this morning anyways? We found a couple of odd things.”

I don't care, he's baaaaaaaaack~

–

Aya seems to be rather quick on the uptake. You think back to this morning, after your encounter- and subsequent murder- of psycho-hooker-knife-chick.

You remember that you...

[ ] Dug her a shallow grave.
[ ] Tossed her in the lake.
[ ] Threw her body to the wolves.
[ ] Mounted her body where Akyu's was found.
[ ] Shoved her body in a trash can somewhere.
[ ] Put her body in someone's house quietly to try and frame someone
[ ] Put her body through the wood-chipping machine Oh come on now.
[ ] Write-in.

And that you...

[ ] Were seen by nobody.
[ ] Ran into somebody.
[ ] Who?

–

[ ] Be the Investigator.

[x]Ditched the cadaver in some strange forest.
-[x]Were seen
[x]Contiue being the MC forever.

We need to ditch the popo. We can't have her following our bloody trail. Even if we somehow manage to keep hiding the corpses we leave behind, she'll find out eventually.

[X] Tossed her in the lake.
[X] Ran into somebody. (Lily White)

[X] Be the Investigator, or whatever. This whole dynamic perspective thing is fine.

[x]Ditched the cadaver in some strange forest.
-[x]Had a close call with a couple of brats
[x]Be the investigator

I'm referring to rumia, wriggle, cirno etc. in this vote, whoever you feel most comfortable writing, really.

[x]Ditched the cadaver in some strange forest.
-[x]Had a close call with a couple of brats
[x]Be the investigator

>>131028
>>I'm referring to rumia, wriggle, cirno etc. in this vote, whoever you feel most comfortable writing, really.

You... you do realize that the Investigator knows that the most likely person to have seen the original murder is Wriggle, right?

And having Wriggle see body #2 does not help her case any.

I think I'll use this vote.

>>131073

I don't intend to sabotage your story, but votes like this that cause trouble really seem to be the most entertaining, so that's what I'm going for.

>>131151
Oh believe you me, you're not sabotaging it. This is going to be a fun update to write. Having a bit of trouble getting it to work quite as I want, I've tried multiple different perspectives for it. I do try to update daily, so please pardon the lateness of this one.

In case you're wondering why it took me so long to write this update, this is why.

http://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/381042

--

[x]Ditched the cadaver in some strange forest.
-[x]Had a close call with a couple of brats
[x]Be the investigator

Okay, that's enough sitting around in the rain with a dead hooker, dramatically smoking a cigarette. Gotta get rid of the body. Can't get caught by the fuzz.

You heft Sakuya's light frame across your shoulder, and start wandering away from the village towards the forest.

I don't know any good places to get rid of bodies here... Really should have scoped that out ahead of time. Sure there's something in the woods that will help.

–

“I'm boooooooooooooored!”

“So go find something to do.”

“But Mystia, nobody's been in the forest in daaaaaaaaaaays~! Let's go find someone!”

You facepalm. And of course she expects you to entertain her.

“Why don't you go find Wriggle and go bother someone in the Human Village?”

please go please go please go

“Okay! That sounds like fun! You should come too, Mystia!”

“But I'm busy writing a new song!”

Rumia gives you her best pout.

“But it's no fun if you don't come! It's so funny to watch them panic from being all confused!”

“I'm busy!”

“Forget that! You're coming with me!”

Rumia grabs your arm and starts dragging you.

It's not like I wanted to accomplish anything today, oh no, not at all...

–

A deep forest. Just the kind of place you'd get lost in. Might even starve to death. Or get eaten by bears.

I tells you, a bear would help so much- just toss crazy knife-whore's body at it and run. Shame there probably aren't any bears out with this rain. Maybe you can find one of their caves around here in the forest.

–

“Wriiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiggle~!”

You run to the clearing where Wriggle is sleeping under a tree wrapped in her cape, Mystia in tow.

“'m sleepy. Go 'way.”

Mystia takes advantage of this to try and dissuade you. “See? She's sleeping. Now let's go back so I can get back to work.”

As if you'd let something like this get in the way of fun!

“Hey, Mystia, stand over there real quick.”

Mystia goes and stands between a tree and the sleeping Wriggle. “Like here?”

“Perfect.”

You run back to get some distance, and line up Wriggle, Mystia, and the tree.

“Time for a... WRIGGLE... KICK!”

You launch yourself at Wriggle, and deliver a kick to her midsection that lifts her right off the ground, flying at Mystia. The kicked Wriggle hits Mystia straight in the chest, and the momentum manages to carry them into a tree, which they hit with a solid THUNK.

“Ha ha ha ha ha ha! Now you're awake!”

Wriggle groans and rolls over on her side, holding her stomach where you kicked her. Mystia looks a bit dazed from the force with which she hit the tree.

–

THUNK!

You hear a loud noise a short distance away in the forest. Could be interesting. Could be a bear. Could solve all of your problems. Right then. We're heading over there.

–

Goddamnit Rumia, that hurt!

Of course, that's what you want to say.

You manage to say: “Owwwwwwwwwww.”

Rumia stands triumphantly in the middle of the clearing she launched you from.

“Rumia... you do know that a Wriggle Kick is when I kick something, not you kicking me.”

“Wriggle kick, kick Wriggle, same thing.”

“Well, now I'm awake.” And in pain.

“Good! Now we've got almost everybody! I'm going to go and grab Cirno, and bring her back here! And then we start our reign of TERROR! Mua hahahahahaha!”

“So why didn't you go and grab her first and THEN wake me up?”

“Because I... um... uh... DO NOT QUESTION YOUR EVIL OVERLORD!”

I am totally going to go to sleep after she leaves. I'll have to make sure it's somewhere she can't find me.

“Well? Let's go!”

Rumia grabs Mystia again, and starts to grab for you.

“Wait! No! I'll be here, I just need to wake up a bit.”

Rumia gives you a questioning look. She obviously does not believe you.

You give her your most innocent smile.

Rumia smiles back. “Okaaaaaay!~ But if you go back to sleep, I'm kicking you again!”

Or maybe she does believe you. Whatever.

Rumia dashes towards the lake, Mystia in tow.

Totally going back to sleep.

–

You're walking through the woods, when you see a bit of starlight start to creep in between the trees. The forest seems to be thinning. There's a clearing with a single tree in the middle of it. Ahead of you, across the clearing, you hear something crashing through the brush. Finally! Found the bear. You start to dash across the clearing when you hear a gasp behind you.

Oh goddamnit.

–

Some guy in a dark coat with green hair and a badass hat runs right in front of you as you had laid down by the tree again to sleep. He seems to be carrying someone... is that... Sakuya!"

You gasp.

He stops.

He turns on you with an expression of surprise on his face. No, that's not quite right. If his expression were words, those words would be “Oh, shit.”

–

Oh, shit.

Exactly what you did not want to have happen. She's obviously seen the body. And- are those antennae?!

Oh, double shit.

She's the one you saw in the picture in Aya's newspaper, the one “fleeing from the scene of the crime.”

The one who probably saw you kill the first hooker accidentally.

Calm down, you got this. Calm down.

–

He looks kind of familiar...

Realization hits you. He's the guy you saw stumbling drunkenly through the streets.

Probably just another drunk Oni. But then why does he have Sakuya...?

–

You finger the knife inside your coat pocket. Taking a deep breath, you set knife-chick down and start to stroll confidently towards the girl.

“Good evening.”

“Um... hi?”

Few more steps.

She's looking at you apprehensively.

“Who are you?”

“Oh, nobody much...” You pull your knife and dash at her in one fluid motion and swing around her, pressing the knife to her neck.

Please don't be stupid. I don't want to just kill some random girl. Please, please don't be stupid.

She lets out a muted scream as you get into position- cut off, of course, by your hand over her mouth.

You lean over to her ear and whisper, “Say nothing and we'll both be fine. You never saw me. You never saw her. We never talked. I don't want to hurt you, but I will.”

She swallows and nods assent.

“Good girl.” You release her, and put the knife back into your coat. “Tell me, what is your name?”

“W-wriggle Nightbug.”

Fffffffffuuuuuu- she's the one Aya was talking about!

You hide your surprise. “Well, Miss Nightbug, please be more careful this late at night. It can be dangerous out here.”

You pick up Sakuya's body and sling it across your shoulder.

“And remember- you didn't see anything. It's better that way.”

–

As he strides into the forest, you fall to your knees and start crying. That man scared you more than even Flandre and Remilia on their bad days.

–

Kotohime looks up at you.

“So where were you last night?”

She gives you her best puppy-dog eyes.

“Oh, nowhere in particular, just needed to take a walk to clear my mind.”

–

[ ] Take Aya's suggestion of checking out Wriggle's place.
[ ] See if you can find out anything about crazy knife-chick.
[ ] See if Kotohime or Aya have figured anything out.
[ ] Write-in.

–

[ ] Be the Investigator.
[ ] Be Kotohime.
[ ] Be Aya.
[ ] Be Wriggle
[ ] Be the Hat

[x] Take your suggestion of checking out Wriggle's place.
-[x] Be Aya.

I have zero knowledge of music composition or whatever, but it sounded okay to me. Keep up the good work.

[x] Take Aya's suggestion of checking out Wriggle's place.
-[x] Be that fucking tengu whore.

Making Wriggle was certainly not part of the plan. Oh well.

>>131297
Derp. Forgot my noun there, it was supposed to be cry. This is why I refrain from posting as much as possible. Sage for nothing useful to contribute.

You mean verb.

[x] Take your suggestion of checking out Wriggle's place.
-[x] Be Aya.

[x] Take Aya's suggestion of checking out Wriggle's place.
-[x] Be that fucking tengu whore.

What do you mean, “that fucking tengu whore?” I'll have you know that I am a lady of the highest moral caliber running the top-rated newspaper in all of Gensokyo!

Just because it's the only newspaper in Gensokyo doesn't stop it from being the top rated. Seriously, it's like you guys have been spending too much time with Kotohime or something...

–

“Oh, nowhere in particular, just needed to take a walk to clear my mind.”

“A walk. Right.” You manage to put as much sarcasm into your voice as you can.

He holds up his hands in protest. “Seriously! These last few days have been hectic, I just needed a bit of time to cope!”

“You seemed to be coping fine, with your friends Gin and Tonic.”

Kotohime glares at you. “That's a low blow even for you!”

You feign outrage. “Low blow for me? Well I never!” And then as Kotohime's giving you her “serious face”, you can't manage to keep your face straight and break down laughing. Kotohime sticks her tongue out at you, as she protectively holds onto the Investigator's arm.

The Investigator looks at Kotohime's face, and is obviously stifling a laugh.

“We... should probably... be more serious about this,” while he's having trouble not breaking down in front of Kotohime laughing. “What... what about the Wiggle Bug person you were talking about?”

“Ah yeah, Wriggle Nightbug. She was the one I got the picture of running away from the scene of the crime.”

“So, where does she live? We could hop over to her place, make sure she's not there, and jimmy the door open, and have a look-through.”

“But that's breaking and entering, and an affront to my journalistic integrity!”

…

You break down laughing again. The Investigator does as well. Kotohime just seems confused.

“I don't understaaaaaaaand~!”

–

The three of you are walking through the forest, towards the lake. Kotohime hasn't been talking much, just glaring at you occasionally.

“So, where does this 'Wriggle Nightbug' live, anyways?”

You scratch your head.

“Honestly? All I know is 'in this forest somewhere.' Not very helpful, I know, but I was figuring we could go to the lake and bother the fairies there. They might know.”

“Worth a sh- wait, fairies?”

“Yeah? So?”

“You're shitting me. Fairies.”

“You say that like you've never seen fairies before.”

“Um- uh... of course I have! I just don't see them often.”

Interesting...

“Out of curiosity, Mr. Investigator, where are you from?”

“Um, you know that... thing... like a statue...”

“What statue?”

“You know, the one that's shaped like... um... a statue...”

“It wouldn't happen to be near a shrine, would it?”

“Yeah! Yeah, that's it. I live near the shrine.”

“Ho ho ho ho ho. Okay then.”

Kotohime looks up at him. “You should take me there sometime~!”

He swallows visibly. “Um... sure, yeah, I'll do that. Just remember to remind me.”

You pass out of the foliage to the edge of the lake. It's about a mile across- not huge, but large enough to actually be a landmark here.

“In any case, Mr. Investigator, we are here at the lake.”

“Phew.” He looks visibly relieved at the possible change of subject. Oh ho ho ho ho ho. This'll be fun later. “What now?”

“Well, I suppose we can go find Cirno. Or ask these other fairies about.” You gesture to the lake, which has a couple fairies screwing around near it, much like dragonflies.

You never did much like fairies. And you're sure they never really liked you after your “investigative report” on “just what the hell the fairies do all day.” It's not your fault they're not too bright. You just calls them as you sees them. You just kind of hope they're not angry enough to try something.

Well, maybe you do hope they try something. You're in the mood for a warm-up fairy stomping.

[ ] DANMAKU HERRO
[ ] Normal hello (to fairies)
[ ] Go look for Cirno
[ ] Write-in

–

[ ] Be Aya
[ ] Be Kotohime
[ ] Be the Investigator
[ ] Be the hat

[x]We better find that green-haired level-headed fairy.
-[x]Be Aya

Fuck Kotohime; Aya and the Investigator have some chemistry going on.

>>131500
>>[x]We better find that green-haired level-headed fairy.

Who, specifically, is this green-haired fairy?

[x] Normal hello (to fairies)
[x] Be Kotohime

>>131543
Are you kidding? Did you not look at the picture? I specifically put it there so you would know exactly who I was talking about.

>>131552
Herp a derp. Totally didn't click the picture.

Though I'm normally used to Cirno having blue hair.

Derp. Seriously, derp.

>>131553

Not the same guy, but he's referring to Daiyousei, a friend of Cirno. She's generally the most rational of the group, although she doesn't show up too often, what with being a mid-stage boss and all. I'd head over to maybe the touhou wikia's page for Daiyousei, see what it says about her there.

I'm assuming you haven't really heard of her yet, or you're just being silly and it slipped your mind. If you don't really know how to characterize her, just ignore the votes for her. It's better than shitting up the story with bad characterization.

Update should be up soon.

That said, I'll likely have to go on an extended hiatus in the relatively near future.

>>131604
>wikia
Please use the new site instead. See >>/gensokyo/6150

Back from China.

Updates to come, hopefully in a couple hours' time.

>>134220

China, huh? Good to see you again.

Yeah, China was good times, and enlightening. Though it's nice to be back in Japan.

--

[x] Normal hello (you pansies)
[x] Be Aya

Right, then. Time to whomp on some fairies.

You crack your knuckles and your neck as you prepare to surprise annihilate one of the fairies, and therefore intimidate them into not trying to pull any shit. Can't be too careful with fairies, they're always trying to start trouble. And the best way to stop trouble is with a pre-emptive strike.

Right?

Right.

You launch yourself at the nearest fairy, when suddenly someone calls out your name.

“Aya!”

Oh dammit.

It's Daiyousei. Starting crap with her would actually take effort to finish. Not much, mind you, but this is a new dress! And God forbid someone else wanting to get in on the party.

Below you you hear a bit of grumbling.

“Wish I could fly.”
“Oh? I'd be more than willing to throw you.”
“Really? You're the greatest guy I ever met, Mr. Investigator!”

You stop in mid-air looking at Daiyousei. “Whaaaaaaaaaaat.”

You try and put as much distaste and dislike into the word without being overtly hostile in hopes that Daiyousei will get the hint and go away.

“It's been so long! I'm glad to see you again!”

Hint: not received. Of course.

“I'm absolutely thrilled as well.” Your deadpan delivery again goes right over the fairy's head. But then again you weren't expecting much.

“Oh! You brought friends! Kotohime... and... um... who is he?”

She gestures to the Investigator.

Kotohime waves energetically at Daiyousei.

“Him? Nobody special.”

“Hey!” The Investigator apparently does not like the marginalization he's getting. I'm the main character, dammit!

“Nobody special, eh?” Daiyousei edges around beside you and lowers her voice. “Reeeeeeeeeally.”

Oh God is she really implying what I think she's implying “Really.”

Daiyousei gives you a look, and a smug grin. “Oh, I'm sure he's nobody special.”

Congratulations! You've grasped the basic tenets of sarcasm! Now go away!

The Investigator shouts from below, “Hey, now that you're here, I actually have a few questions from you. Mind coming down to talk to us? I mean, I can see up both you dames' skirts.”

Wha-

You come down to the ground as fast as you can, holding your skirt down, blushing furiously and refusing to make eye contact with the Investigator. He laughs, as does Kotohime. Daiyousei lands a moment afterward.

“So, um, where are we?”

“I'd imagine Aya could have probably told you.”

You shrug. “Wasn't paying all that much attention. We kinda got distracted.”

“Oh. In any case, you're at the lake. Obviously.”

The Investigator deadpans, “No, really. Which one?”

“Oh! Ohhhhh. I understand now. You're at the lake by the Scarlet Devil Mansion.”

“The Scarlet Devil what now?”

Oh, balls.

“You know, the Scarlet Devil Mansion, with the scaaaaaaary vampires that'll suck your blood and eat you?”

“Yeah, right, toots, and I'm the Queen of England.”

“I've never heard of England. It must be an interesting place to have a man as its Queen.”

Kotohime decides to chime in now as well. “What kind of place is England? How'd you become Queen?”

The Investigator facepalms. “It's- it's just a figure of speech. Seriously. God, I'm regretting this conversation so much already.”

You try and stifle your laughter as Daiyousei quizzically tilts her head at him. “Why's that? We haven't even been introduced!”

“Yeah, I'm kind of hoping to avoid that now. Could you just point us towards that Red Devil House or whatever it's called? I think I'll ask them what's going on.”

Oh no. Oh hell no. Remilia would tear your head off if she saw you. This is bad. This is very bad. Gotta stop them somehow.

You interject before Daiyousei can answer, “Oh, no, we don't need to go there at all! Not at all! Daiyousei could answer those questions!”

The Investigator looks at you and says, “Really. Come on. Really.”

Kotohime finally catches up to the conversation, and something in her mind clicks. And it's not very good that it clicked. At least judging from the smile she has. Scary smile, that. Kind of like the smile a serial killer has before they stab their victim. Very, very unnervingly happy.

“Oh, no, Aya, I think we should go and ask Remilia. I'm sure it'll be enlightening.”

The Investigator goggles at Kotohime's command of words over three syllables, and the fact that for once he's agreeing with her.

Oh, this could be bad...

–

[ ] Go to the Scarlet Devil Mansion.
[ ] Ask Daiyousei the questions.
[ ] Write-in.

–

[ ] Be Aya.
[ ] Be Kotohime.
[ ] Be the Investigator.
[ ] Be the hat

[X] Go to the Scarlet Devil Mansion
[X] Be the Investigator

Investigation.

[x] Go to the Scarlet Devil Mansion.
[x] Be Aya.

Its been some time. I'll have to ease back into this one.

[X] Go to the Scarlet Devil Mansion
[X] Be the Investigator

>>134229

You're not the only one. God, I could feel the rusty creaking when I re-read this and started writing the newest part.

[X] Go to the Scarlet Devil Mansion.
Because while we're wandering around meeting the locals, we should tell them that we killed Sakuy-HAVE NO IDEA WHAT HAPPENED TO HER. IF THEY ASK.

Seriously. We just KILLED SAKUYA. I see absolutely nothing that could possibly go wrong. "Wrong," in this scenario, being "not funny."

[X] Be Aya
...'s hat

[X] Go to the Scarlet Devil Mansion.
[X] Be the hat. BE THE HAT.

[X] Go to the Scarlet Devil Mansion
[X] Be the Investigator

[X] Go to the Scarlet Devil Mansion
[X] Be the Investigator

Holy shit, I thought this story was dead. That last update was a bit awkward, but it's not a big deal considering how long you were gone for.

I did say I was going on hiatus!

[X] Be the hat. BE THE HAT.
[X] Go to the Scarlet Devil Mansion
[X] Be the Investigator

You are now the hat!

...Not very exciting, is it? Just a bit of fabric on some asshole guy's head. Seriously, what were you expecting? You're so dumb. Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb. Since you wanted to be the hat so badly, and it's not very interesting, I'll let you be someone else interesting for a little bit. Kay? Kay.

You are now Wriggle Nightbug!

“Andthenheputaknifetomythroatandtoldmetoforgetaboutthisbuthewascarryingsakuya'sbodyandIdon'tknowwhattodonowandI'mscaredandbawwwwwwwwwww!”

“Shh, shh. It's fine. Really, it's all fine. I won't let you be hurt by anyone, I promise.”

Hong Meiling's hand caresses your hair comfortingly as you bawl into her chest.

“Come on. I'll make you a sandwich. Would that help?”

–

Seriously, talking to this broad is like talking to Red. That is, mentally painful.

“Right. Okay, could you tell us where this mansion is?”

Aya is shaking her head frantically trying to indicate that she REALLY DOES NOT WANT TO GO. Well, that'll teach you for your style of journalism. Kotohime is smiling, but it's possibly one of the creepiest smiles you've ever seen.

“Oh, that's simple! All you have to do is follow that path over there!”

She points out a path about a half-mile away.

“Alright, awesome. Thanks. We'll be leaving now.”

“Aren't we going to do introductions? I'm Da-”

“Don't care. Leaving now.”

Aya chuckles at that last bit. Apparently she does not like Dawhoever this fairy is either. And on that note, you walk off, leaving the fairy behind. Kotohime waves good-bye at her.

“I still say that going to the Scarlet Devil Mansion is a bad idea.”

“What, Aya, you going to get some comeuppance for your mud-slinging?”

Well shit. Red's got some backbone.

“N-no! ...Maybe. Probably. Yeah, definitely. Remilia really doesn't like me. But that's beside the point! She might... do... things... to our Investigator friend here! It's dangerous!”

Kotohime has not considered this.

“Things? What things?” She looks at Aya plaintively and clutches your arm tighter.

Aya smiles. “You know, they're vampires! The kind that vant to suck your blood! Blah, blah!”

“Oh, come on. You know there's no such thing. And I'm sure I can defend myself pretty well.” Not entirely arrogance on your part, for once you're actually sure of it. You kicked the ass of Miss Bullshit Timehax. Kicked it pretty damn hard. You smile to yourself at the thought of that.

You chatter on idly with Aya and Kotohime as you walk down the path. The path widens out into a garden, with fountains and over in the distance, a hedge maze. You always thought hedge mazes were pretty cool. Kotohime squeals in delight, releases your arm, and runs over to a rose bush.

Oh God let her not be doing what I think she's doing please God please

She plucks a single rose expertly from the bush... somehow. You didn't actually see how she managed to do it so quickly. And then she turns, looks at you, smiles broadly, and runs back to you.

Goddammit.

“This one's for youuuuuuuuu!” She puts the rose in your hat, like one would put a feather in it.

“Oh come on! You've got to be kidding me!”

“Nnnnooope! And you're not allowed to take it out either!”

By the time you manage to get to the gate, it's mid-afternoon. The guard, or at least what probably is the guard, is sleeping. It's some dame with a green dress and red hair. Goddamnit. Just what you need. More redheads.

“Aya. You think we should wake her up?”

“Nooooooope. In fact, I think we should turn around and not go in at all.”

“Seriously, stop panicking. I doubt they'll kill you immediately.”

“Says you. And even then I think it would be worse if they waited. I might have to play with Flandre.”

An involuntary shudder passes over Aya.

“Stop worrying so much. We're going in.”

“Your funeral.”

You chuckle at that one. “Hey, Red, could you go wake up the guard and tell her we're here to investigate the murder of Akyu?”

“Sure!”

–

“No, Sakuya, not there... hee hee hee...”

“Hi, Meiling!”

Aww. Just as the dream was getting good.

You groggily open your eyes to seeing a smiling face. Kotohime. You yawn. “Hi, Kotohime. What's up?”

“You were sleeping again!”

“...crap.”

“Don't worry. I won't tell anyone. But hey, could you do me a favor?”

“Sure.”

“Could you let me and my friends into the mansion? We're investigating the murder of Akyu, and I need to ask Remi and Sakura some questions- I think they could be helpful.”

You rub the sleep from your eyes, stand up, and look at her friends. Some random guy with green hair, and...

“No. Not a chance.”

“Aww, whyyyyyyy?”

“Because that slanderous tengu “journalist”” -and you do the air quotes with your fingers- “isn't welcome here. Ever since last time.”

Aya takes this moment to interject. “Oh well. Too bad. I guess we'll have to leave.”

Oh, she doesn't want to come in, then. I bet Kotohime's making her. In that case...

“You know what, Kotohime? I think I'll make an exception this time. Go right in.”

“Yayifications!”

Aya, once so happy at being rejected entry, now looks rather glum.

“Oh, Meiling, one more question!”

“Sure, go ahead.”

“Have you seen Sakuya recently? I found a couple of her knives.”

–

Oh. Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck fuckity fuck shit BALLS.

Psycho-hooker timehax knife-chick lived/worked here. Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit. You killed someone's special hooker.

–

You think to yourself.

“Nope, haven't seen her all day today. Which is kind of odd, now that I think about it. Ask Remilia. I'm sure she'll know.”

“Oh well. Thanks a lot though, Meiling~”

“Yeah, no problem, anytime, Kotohime.”

Kotohime latches back onto that green-haired guy, he looks so familiar. But you can't place it. In any case, she drags him with her inside, and Aya follows reluctantly.

They disappear inside the main door to the mansion.

I'll remember who he is eventually, I'm sure. For now, I need to finish my nap...

–

This is bad. This is really bad. This is pretty much horribad. Did I mention bad?

Kotohime drags you into the mansion, and the door shuts behind you. You're now in the foyer of the Scarlet Devil Mansion.

[ ] Go upstairs
[ ] Go to the library
[ ] Go to the courtyard
[ ] Go to the Servants' Quarters
[ ] Wait here

–

[ ] Be Aya
[ ] Be Kotohime
[ ] Be the Investigator
[ ] Be the hat

[x] Go to the library
[x] Be Kotohime

This continues to get more and more amusing.

[X] Be Kotohime

>>...Not very exciting, is it? Just a bit of fabric on some asshole guy's head. Seriously, what were you expecting? You're so dumb. Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb. Since you wanted to be the hat so badly, and it's not very interesting, I'll let you be someone else interesting for a little bit. Kay? Kay.

I applaud you, good sir.

[X] Go to the library.
[X] Be Aya.

[x] Go to the courtyard
[x]Aya

I cannot wait until Kotohime learns the truth about MC, and we are forced to kill her.

>>134316

Just how certain are you that you'll have to kill her? Love makes people do stupid things. :D

>>134335
>Love makes people do stupid things
> :D
>namefag
You, on the other hand, need no help at all doing stupid things.

>>134340

Bluh. I need to stop doing that. Though do note:

>namefag

No, writefag. Do ho ho ho ho ho.

>>134341
That doesn't make any difference.
even writefags posts without name in other people's story.

>>134346
Most of them. Sometimes, they forget about it, like this guy.

>>134341
But boasting about being a writefag isn't a good attitude, just for your information. It makes you look like an attention whore.

[x] Go to the library
[x] Be Aya

>>134346
You are now realizing that this is his story. You are probably feeling a bit stupid.

>>134340
>>134347

Well, this is a first: Seeing a writefag getting called out in his own thread.

[X] Go to the Library
[X] Be a paparazzi spewing whore Aya

What? Aya isn't exactly the best person in the world...

Okay she's not exactly... meh.

>>134362
>Well, this is a first: Seeing a writefag getting called out in his own thread.

Got to keep those fucking content creators in their place. Can't let them think the whole site's about them, or anything, right?

[X] Be Aya
[X] Go to the Servants' Quarters

(Fairy maids + Aya == fun times.)

Writefag, I made u sumting

>>134379
Holy shit, you're right!

[x] Changing a library vote to servant's quarters

>>134379
That is awesome and you are awesome and now I'm calling it for your vote because you're awesome.

[X] Be Aya
[X] Go to the Servants' Quarters

Well this is kind of odd.

Every time you somehow ended up in this godforsaken mansion, Sakuya was always right there to kick you out. Stupid timehax bullshit and everything.

I guess she never got the memo that we were here.

Well this is just perfect. Now you can snoop around without worrying about Sakuya ruining everything. You're relatively sure that you and the Investigator can sneak around away from Remilia and Flandre, though Kotohime not so much.

“Well, Mr. Investigator, what we have here is a perfect opportunity.”

“Opportunity? For what?”

“Simple enough. We haven't been accosted by that bullshit timehax maid Sakuya. Which means that we can snoop around. And investigate.”

Well, investigate for dirt on the SDM. That's always valuable. And if you come across clues for the murder, bonus.

“That's... not actually a half-bad idea. You have any ideas on how to go about this?”

“Yeah, actually. Pretty simple. We just need someone to run interference for us on Remilia.”

“Who's Remilia?”

“And that's exactly why you're not doing it.”

Kotohime notices which direction this conversation is going in, and she does not like it. An accusing finger points at you.

“H-hey! You're just trying to keep him for yourself~!”

“No, I'm not. I promise.”

“You're lying!”

“Nope. Look, we need to come up with a plan quickly so that we can find a few things, like clues, and... other stuff... so we can find out if Remilia or Flandre had anything to do with the murder of Akyu. Which I'm almost completely certain they did. To that end, we need to play to our skills and strengths.”

Kotohime doesn't like it, but at least she's listening now. “Which are?”

“Well, mine is obviously finding out clues and other things. Interviewing too, I'd like to... talk... to the fairies that work here, and find out if Patchouli noticed anything. Our friend here is an Investigator... so he investigates. He doesn't know the layout of the mansion like I do, so I'll be taking him with me.”

Kotohime grumbles at that last bit, but the logic is amazingly not lost on her. “And what about me?”

“You're the most important of all. We need someone to cover for us and make sure we're not discovered. To that end, we need you to go and talk to Remilia. Distract her. For as long as you can. Who knows? You might even find something out.”

“I don't think that's going to work. Remilia's scary.”

“Ah, but you're the law! She can't do anything to you.”

“...Really?”

“Really.”

She looks at the Investigator for confirmation. He nods his head. “You'll be fine. I have faith in you.”

“...Okay...”

She doesn't seem too thrilled with her role, but she's going to do it.

“I don't know where Remilia is. But it's getting close to dinnertime, so you might have luck finding her in the dining room on the second floor, you know, the small private one. It's got a chandelier system so elaborate that it could hide a person in there for hours... not that I would know from personal experience or anything, of course. Because that would be breaking and entering and spying. And that's just wrong.”

please don't laugh please don't laugh please don't laugh

“Fine. But you better come get me soon!”

She leaves, going upstairs.

“That was impressive. You lie like a professional.”

“I am a journalist, after all. I am a professional. Besides, it's not all lies. We DO need someone to distract Remilia. If she finds us while we're rooting around in here, shit might get real bad, real fast.”

“Is she going to be okay?”

“Probably not. Especially not if Flandre finds her instead of Remilia. That would just end in bloody chunks of Kotohime.”

“That might be bad.”

“Might be.”

“Well, clock's ticking. After you, madam.”

You chuckle. “Thank you, good sir. First stop is the Servants' Quarters. I'd like to have a look through Sakuya's stuff. And I might get to kick the crap out of some fairies.”

–

Better now than after they discover she's not coming back, I suppose.

–

You lead the Investigator to the Servants Quarters near the kitchens, feeling extremely pleased with yourself. No Sakuya, no Kotohime, AND free roam throughout the Scarlet Devil Mansion! Life is good. Now to go and root through Sakuya's things.

You walk down seemingly endless mazelike corridors, and stop at a nondescript door

“Here we are. Sakuya's room.”

“There is absolutely no way I am going to find my way out after that.”

“Well then, Mr. Investigator, you had best stay close.”

“Oh come on now. You're just trying to be mean to Red.”

“Maybe. Heh. In any case, it would be impolite to go in unannounced.” You open the door without knocking. “But announcing yourself is just stupid.”

You step through the door with the Investigator following closely behind. Sakuya's room is as you remember it from last time you got kicked out- meticulously neat, with her bed way in the back, next to one of the few windows in the mansion, looking out over the gardens. Her closet is open, and contrary to popular belief, she actually owns clothes other than a maid outfit. Including a skimpy bikini. Interesting.

You snap a few pictures for posterity, and open a small box on her nightstand. It turns out to be a music box, and a slow, haunting tune plays quietly.

As you're rooting through more of Sakuya's things, the Investigator pipes up.

“Where's the nearest bathroom?”

“Right out into the corridor, the door just across from Sakuya's.”

“Right then. I'll be right back.”

You absent-mindedly wave him off, and continue pawing through Sakuya's belongings and taking pictures.

–

Stupid tengu harpy just trying to keep him for herself I know it

Images of Aya throwing down the Investigator onto a bed run through your mind. You grumble as you head towards the private dining room.

I'll strangle her with her own wings if she tries something, and I'll shove that hat of hers where the sun don't shine, I will

You walk right past a fairy and pay it no attention. The fairy is almost physically stunned by the amount of frustration coming from you.

I guess I'm doing this for him if Remilia found him it would be beyond bad he has to know that and realize what I'm doing for him

You come to the door, take a deep breath, and knock.

“Enter.”

You turn the knob and walk into the dining room, where Remilia is entertaining a guest.

“Well, hello, Kotohime. Such a pleasant surprise. Come, sit, have dinner with Wriggle and I.”

At least she's in a good mood.

–

Oh man I've really got to think of a way to get out of this one. If Aya finds out that psycho-hooker knife-bitch had been looking for me...

You take a deep breath. Can't panic now.

You open the door to the washroom, and lock the door behind you. It's a relatively expansive washroom, with a sink and large mirror partitioned off from a toilet and a pathway to a large bath.

You root through your pockets, and pull out your safe dial.

I should probably hide the evidence that I have on me.

You place the safe dial on the wall, spin your combination in, and open a chunk of the wall into your personal safe. You place the knives you got off of Sakuya into the safe, and reload your .44.

There. No knives, no tell-tale lack of bullets. Should be safe. And the bartender fixed up my arm something nice- no blood, no nothing, the dames didn't even notice. The only way one of them would know is if I took off my shirt, and it's almost scary how much Red seems to want to.

You change your line of thought before that one ends badly.

Don't know too much about that Aya chick. At least she's not a dim bulb. I can at least respect a smart broad. As long as she's not too smart for her own good. Would feel pretty bad if I had to off her.

You close your safe, put the dial back in your pocket and let out a deep breath.

And how do I explain the disappearance of their special maid-hooker? Simple. I don't. Because I don't know anything about her. Gotta play dumb. Stick to that story.

You run the water from the faucet, and rub your hands in it.

Finally, there's the matter of the first chick. I don't think anyone suspects me of it, except that little Wriggle brat, but I don't think she'll talk. Think I scared her straight.

You splash water on your face. You're feeling much better, and you inspect yourself in the mirror. Something in the corner of your vision catches your eye in the mirror. You turn around-

and find yourself looking at psycho-hooker knife-bitch leaning against the wall, looking at you.

“Problem, Mr. Investigator?”

ffffffffffffffffffuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu-

–

[ ]Be Aya.
[ ]Be Kotohime.
[ ]Be the Investigator.
[ ]Be the Hat.

–

Actions:

[ ]Write-in. (At this moment, Kotohime is just entering the room with Remilia/Wriggle, and Aya is still rooting through Sakuya's stuff. She's obviously distracted, with good reason. She won't be looking for the Investigator anytime soon. Also, Flan/Patchy's whereabouts are still as yet unknown.)

Note that there will be both an Aya post and a Kotohime post. The votes only decide which will happen first, and of course the write-ins decide the actions.

[x] Be Wriggle
[x] Wonder why running to one of the scariest people in Gensokyo for comfort seemed like a good idea.

>>134413

Actually, she just ran to Meiling. The rest you can probably blame on Meiling as well.

>>134414
Meiling is horrible at comforting people.

[X] Be the Investigator.
-[X] Keep it cool.
--[X] "You do know that everything I've done was in self defense, however killing you was an accident."
--[X] "Of course, seeing as you're not dead, that means I didn't kill you."
---[X] "Now I presume you're going to try and kill me again? Because that went so well for you last time."

[x]Be Aya.
-[x]Find incriminating evidence

Psst, guys. Hey, guys. When options have strikethrough that means they can't be picked. Just letting you know, in case you wanted to do something retarded like vote for them anyways.

[x] Be Aya
[x] Find evidence and commit petty, yet subtle, vandalism.

>>134423
Stealing this.

[x] Be Aya
[x] Find evidence and commit petty, yet subtle, vandalism.

[x] Be a libeling making bitch Aya
[x] Find evidence and commit arson petty, yet subtle, vandalism.

What?
Are the two really that different?

[x] Be Aya's hat.
[x] Find evidence and commit petty, yet subtle, vandalism.

>>134379

[X] Be Kotohime.
[X] Ask Remilia for romantic advice.

This can only end well!

Also, I predict the Investigator's first reaction will be to hurl salt upon Sakuya, suspecting her for a ghost.

>>134496
Don't forget to ask Wriggle why she's here. Then Kotohime can have a lovely little epiphany. Or fail to connect the dots completely. Whichever.

[x] Be Aya’s hat.
[x] Find evidence and commit arson petty, yet subtle, vandalism.

You sigh in combination exasperation and frustration. Sakuya’s room is just too clean. You don’t think she left anything around that you could use against her or those goddamn shitty vampires. She’s even got a framed picture of herself with Patchy, Meiling, and those shitty vampires hanging on the wall. At least she’s smiling in that picture. Normally when she sees you she’s not in the best of moods.

Well, she can just take that and shove it. I’ve got something for her.

You take out a black sharpie, and start drawing on the picture. Sakuya gets a monocle and a villain mustache, Meiling gets funny buck teeth, Patchy… seems genuinely disinterested in the picture. I don’t think she liked getting dragged into the garden for just a picture. While you’re drawing devil horns and fangs on Remilia, you start to wonder.

Why did they take this picture anyway?

You shrug to yourself as you put the final touches on Flandre’s new swirly nerd glasses. Once that’s finished, you step back for a moment to appreciate your handiwork. Still not entirely sure what to draw on Patchy. I mean, you already used the nerd glasses.

I know! Time for some modern art!

You step back, and hold your sharpie like a dart, with Patchy’s face being your bullseye. Line up the shot- and release!

Aw, crap.

You threw it entirely too hard and it lodged in Patchouli’s silly hat.

In retrospect, I suppose that works. I could draw a tricorne hat with a feather in it for Patchy.

So decided, you pull your sharpie out of the picture, and accidentally pull the frame off to reveal…

a wall. What were you expecting? Some evidence? You’re so stupid. Stupid stupid dumb. You hang up the picture and start drawing in the hat.

Putting your finishing touches on the feather, you look around for other things you could root through. Under the bed? Nope, nothing there. Dresser? Just some underwear and suchlike. Bluh. Sakuya is so boring. She does have a little bookshelf. Titles like “How to remove bloodstains from clothes and other surfaces”, “Knives and You: Perforating your enemies”, “50 Time-Saving tips for cleaning around the house”, “Irony: A perspective on not allowing it to go over your head”, and a bunch of sappy romance novels.

You grab one and leaf through it. Boooooooooring. You set that one aside and grab “Beefy McGrumblebeard and The Seventh Maiden’s Choice”, which you largely acknowledge as making absolutely NO SENSE AT ALL, and open it. Something clicks, and it opens into a little cutaway secret hiding place.

A single piece of paper flutters out.

Oooh. Found something.

As you reach down for the piece of paper, the book you were holding starts to smolder and catch aflame. You instinctively throw the book down, pocket the piece of paper (because no good journalist lets good stuff like that get forgotten about!) and start looking for something to put out the fire. While you would so dearly love to see the look on Remilia’s face when the Scarlet Devil Mansion burns down, something rational in your mind screams BAD IDEA BAD END YOU GONNA DIE if you let it burn down.

You grab one of Sakuya’s pillows and try to use it to smother the fire.

It then promptly bursts into flames.

“WHAT THE HELL.”

You grab the other pillow and check the tag: “Phoenix Feather pillow. Soft, and luxurious! EXTREMELY FLAMMABLE. KEEP AWAY FROM SOURCES OF HEAT. MACHINE WASH OKAY. DO NOT MACHINE DRY.”

Goddamnit, Sakuya.

--

Be still, my beating heart. I’d like to not be parted from you violently.

Gotta say something hard-boiled. Can’t let her see you shaken.

“…Um.”

ohgodI’msoboned

“Um, Mr. Investigator? I thought you were more eloquent than that.”

“Um, hi? …crazy broad.”

“Better. I guess.”

“How the hell are you still alive?”

She smiles.

“Maybe I’m actually dead. Maybe I’m a figment of your imagination. You do seem to be under quite a lot of stress, Mr. Investigator. What with murdering someone and all. And then simply waltzing into the house of her employer. Who, I might add, is a vampire.”

“I didn’t murder shit! It was in self-defense!”

She smiles slowly. “Come on, Mr. Investigator. You don’t believe that any more than I do. We both saw you aim right for the head. And you looked like you’ve done that before. Maybe I’m just your mental personification of your regrets for all the people you killed. Or, I’m still alive, standing in front of you, and then you have to wonder, just what did you shoot if it wasn’t me?”

“I-“ don’t know.

A short laugh. She steps closer to you. “Whatever it was, you enjoyed it. You can’t lie to me. I’m either inside your head or I watched you try to kill me. Either way, I know the kind of person you are. You’re a natural. Remilia’s too bound up in formalities, politeness, and politics. Flandre’s closer to the ideal, but she’s just batshit insane, and not able to focus on the task at hand. You, however, are the perfect killer- you’ve been doing what you can to hide it, but when it comes down to it, you’ve enjoyed it.”

The images of all the people you’ve knocked off in mob wars flashes through your head. You never had the luxury of blacking out and then waking up with blood on your hands in front of a body. Well, except that one time with that hooker, but that was actually an accident. The rest… well, you wouldn’t call it “premeditated” as such, but you certainly knew what you were doing. Didn’t try to stop it either.

She steps right in front of you. She’s about six inches shorter than you, but it almost seems like she’s towering over you. She leans in and whispers in your ear, “You coming to Gensokyo and Akyu’s murder, unfortunately for you, is too conveniently timed. You know this. You know someone else had to figure it out.”

You stutter “But I didn’t-“

She puts a finger to your lips. “Shh. Who am I going to tell? And if I’m just a figment of your imagination, how would I tell anyone?” Her hand slides gracefully across your face to the back of your neck.

“But-“

Her voice drops to a whisper. “Who are you going to tell? ‘Oh, I came face to face with a girl I thought I had killed, who had suspected me –rightfully, I think I should add- of a murder –accidental though it may be- that I committed earlier, or I might be crazy and just be hallucinating her appearance.” Her smile is now showing her teeth. “Oh dear me, they might find out about me. I’m so frightened.”

“What do you want from me?”

“What do I want? Nothing at all. I am merely suggesting to you that you start fixing some loose ends, and quickly. I might even just want to help you in covering your tracks. Finally, go back to your safe, and take my knives back out. You’ll need them soon enough.”

She leans in, and kisses you slowly on the mouth.

After breaking off, she smiles at you, and looks you in the eyes. “I am sure we will talk again. Until then, Mr. Investigator.”

She vanishes in the space of a heartbeat, leaving you dumbfounded.

What the hell just happened?
--

[ ]Be Kotohime
[ ]Be Aya
[ ]Be the Investigator
[ ]Be Remilia
[ ]Be the Hat

--

[ ]Kotohime: Ask Remilia for romantic advice.
[ ]Kotohime: Be all business-like and police-like.
[ ]Kotohime: Write-in.
[ ]Remilia: Be your normal cryptic huge bitch bluh bluh self.
[ ]Remilia: Troll the shit out of Kotohime.
[ ]Remilia: Write-in.
[X]Wriggle: Be a loose end. Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiit.
[ ]

Oh my god I love this Sakuya-troll-figment so much.

[X]Be Kotohime
[X]Kotohime: Ask Remilia for romantic advice.

It's just on her mind, it might... come out.

[X]Remilia: Troll the shit out of Kotohime.
okay seriously she's asking for romantic advice, what the shit do you think Remi is going to do?
[X]Wriggle: Be a loose end. Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiit.

[X]Be Kotohime
[X]Kotohime: Ask Remilia for romantic advice.

Romantic advice, eh?

Could prove useful.

[x]Be Kotohime
[x]Kotohime: Ask Remilia for romantic advice.
[x]Remilia: Troll the shit out of Kotohime.
[x]

Do want to hear Remilia's trolling from Kotohime's point of view.

[X]Be Kotohime
[X]Kotohime: Ask Remilia for romantic advice.
[X]Remilia: Troll the shit out of Kotohime.
[X]Wriggle: Be a loose end. Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiit.
[X]Hats: Be awesome.

[X]Be Kotohime
[X]Kotohime: Ask Remilia for romantic advice.
[X]Remilia: Actually try to answer Kotohime honestly; inadvertently end up trolling the shit out of her because Remilia's prior romantic experience is like HP Lovecraft editing Vampire Diaries.

I figure Remilia would be completely nonplussed by Kotohime's request; a ditzy redhead that not only isn't terribly impressed by Remilia's Cryptic Queen Bitch act, but one that wants to engage in girl talk!?

And yet, when Remilia attempts to be civil, we all see why people prefer the cryptic bitch mode.

>>134564

>[X]Remilia: Actually try to answer Kotohime honestly; inadvertently end up trolling the shit out of her because Remilia's prior romantic experience is like HP Lovecraft editing Vampire Diaries.

You're a terrible person and you're going to make Kotohime cry. I hope you're happy.

>>134589
>going to make Kotohime cry

Well, this has my vote.

[X]Be Kotohime
[X]Kotohime: Ask Remilia for romantic advice.
[X]Remilia: Actually try to answer Kotohime honestly; inadvertently end up trolling the shit out of her because Remilia's prior romantic experience is like HP Lovecraft editing Vampire Diaries.

[X]Be Kotohime
[X]Kotohime: Ask Remilia for romantic advice.
[X]Remilia: Actually try to answer Kotohime honestly; inadvertently end up trolling the shit out of her because Remilia's prior romantic experience is like HP Lovecraft editing Vampire Diaries.

CHANGING VOTE TO THIS. From koto-remitroll to this which is functionally identical but eleven Reimus more awesome.

>>134564
... I have no words.

So I'll use yours!

[x] Be Kotohime
[x] Kotohime: Ask Remilia for romantic advice.
[x] Remilia: Actually try to answer Kotohime honestly; inadvertently end up trolling the shit out of her because Remilia's prior romantic experience is like H. P. Lovecraft editing Vampire Diaries.

[x] Be Kotohime
[x] Kotohime: Ask Remilia for romantic advice.
[x] Remilia: Actually try to answer Kotohime honestly; inadvertently end up trolling the shit out of her because Remilia's prior romantic experience is like H. P. Lovecraft editing Vampire Diaries.

You smile gracefully as you accept Remilia's offer to sit with her for dinner. At the moment, the only thing available is tea, the food hasn't been brought out yet.

“I'm glad you dropped by, Kotohime. I was just wanting to talk to you about a couple of things.”

Really? This “distraction” business might be easier than I expected~

“Now that Aya's busy rooting through Sakuya's things and you're seperated from that Investigator, I thought we might have a little chat.”

why does nobody tell me about these things

You let out a sigh. “I guess I don't need to try to distract you then.”

“Quite right. Aya's endless meddling and trying to find things might actually be useful right now. Which brings me to point number one. Sakuya is missing, and I can't seem to find any reason why. I'm hoping Aya will find something, and that I can persuade her to part from it. Kind of a long shot, but, one does what one must to keep the good help.”

“Really? Sakuya's missing?” Why? That's really odd~

Wriggle seems to be rather quiet across from you at the table. You give her a quizzical look, but she just looks down and refuses to meet your eyes.

“I was hoping I would be able to call upon the assistance of Gensokyo's number one police officer. Your sense of duty, as demonstrated multiple times, is nothing short of impeccable. Which means I think I can trust you with helping me.”

Aww, that's so nice of her~ You start to feel better now, with Remilia's praise fresh in your ears.

“Simply, a source of mine who wishes to remain anonymous has tipped me off to the fact that this new Investigator in Gensokyo may have had something to do with the disappearance of Sakuya. Nothing concrete, but enough for me to ask for your help.”

How could he have had anything to do with it? I've been with him the whole time-

“But, Remilia, that doesn't make any sense! I've been with him the whole time!”

“Yes, which is why I'm only asking you to keep your eyes open and tell me if anything interesting happens, or if he should say or do something, or if you should remember something.”

“But he's investigating the murder of Akyu. Which I did want to ask you about.”

Remilia waves her hand airily. “She doesn't matter to me. I couldn't care less about how that comes out.”

You heartless bitch

You fix Remilia with a withering glare, and don't say anything. Remilia meets your eyes and chuckles. “Well? What, did you want me to lie to you?”

Lying is bad~ “I guess not.”

“Good. I'm glad I've got someone like you helping me out with my small problem.” She sips her tea. “Now that I've concluded that business, you look rather frustrated.”

You sigh and slump down in your chair. “Yeah. Remilia... how much do you know about guys?”

She almost looks for a second as though she's going to choke on her tea. She gently sets the teacup back on its saucer. “Now why would you ask me about something like that?”

“I need some advice and I don't know who to ask.”

“So you're asking me.”

“Yeah.”

She picks up her teacup. “You hear something new every day. This could be interesting. Well, go ahead and ask.”

“How do I get the guy I like to pay attention to me?”

“Well, there's a lot of ways. Saving his life is almost always a deal-sealer. Unfortunately, those kinds of opportunities don't come around too often. Of course, you could always make your own circumstances where you save his life.”

“But I don't want him to be in danger!”

“But it's effective. Your choice.”

It's not thaaaaaaaaaaaaat bad of an idea~ You decide to file that away in the back of your mind for possible future use.

“What if some harpy is already trying to sink her claws into him?”

“Oh, that's simple, and has a side benefit of being entirely enjoyable. You cut off the claws.”

I hate metaphors~ why the hell did I use oneeeeeeeeeeee You give her a blank look. “Cut off the claws?”

“Entirely not figurative language. Cut off her hands. I mean, I've done that a couple of times. It also helps that there's some major arteries there, and that the blood sprays with some pressure. If you do it right in front of him, you can aim her arms so that he gets covered in blood- mmmmm.” She's obviously enjoying the mental image there. “And then you can lick her blood off him while she slowly bleeds out in front of him. Of course, it helps if they're both tied up. I do so like them to be tied up.”

That's actually a really good idea~! I mean I would really like to cut off that tengu whore's hands. Then she can't put them down his pants an- You stop in mid-thought. No. You tear up a little. I WILL NOT CRY BECAUSE HE'S WITH AYA AND NOT ME

Remilia is enjoying herself. “Oh, and then the things you can do with her body afterward. But most of the time he's not really happy to be sprayed with his lover's blood as she breathes her last in front of him. But I do so enjoy when they struggle.”

“Wait- wait- you mean that'll make him not love me?” You sniffle.

“Well, yes, I suppose so, but you get what you want-”

The floodgates open, and you collapse, head on your arms on the table, and start bawling uncontrollably. “He'llneverlovemehelovesherbutshe'snotrightforhimiknowitwhydoesn'the?”

Remilia is so shocked by your sudden burst of emotion that she's snapped out of her daydream. “Oh dear.” She regards you for a second, while you're there, crying your eyes out, with your thoughts of the Investigator and Aya walking off in the sunset together, leaving you behind, in the forest, when it's raining, in the middle of the night, when it's cold and bad and not good and lonely and BAWWWWWWWWWW

She stands up, walks over to your side, and hesitantly starts to pat and rub your back to try to console you. “There, there, it'll be all right.”

You continue crying and babbling about how you'll die alone and unloved.

Remilia embraces you and whispers in your ear. “Shh. Shh. It'll all be fine. It's really simple to make someone love you, in the end. Be loyal to them, through good times and bad. I promise that'll work.”

You slowly stop crying. “Really? You promise?”

“Yes. Really. Are you going to be alright?”

“I- guess so.”

At that moment, Meiling bursts through the door of the small dining room. “Hate to interrupt, Remilia, but the mansion is on fire.”

“What.”

–

OH GOD WHY IS EVERYTHING FLAMMABLE

Everything you've tried to use to put out the fire in Sakuya's room has just managed to make it worse. Pillows? Phoenix feathers. Blanket? Filled with phoenix feathers. Maid outfits? The starch in them just makes them go up like candles. Books? Why did you even think that was a good idea?

By the time you got to that step, the fire had consumed most of Sakuya's bed, and thankfully wasn't between you and the door.

Which you're running for for your life.

Because it is your life.

Oh god oh god oh god oh god Remilia's going to disembowel me

You dash out the door and start making your way through the twisty maze passages to the front door. As you reach the foyer, you realize: You forgot the Investigator. Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiit.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck. What do I do?

You're conflicted. You'd hate to leave him behind. But, on the other hand, REMILIA DISEMBOWEL.

And God forbid you run into Flan. Where the hell is she, anyway?

–

You sit on the floor of the washroom, thoroughly stunned.

Psycho-hooker knife-chick just invaded your mind, and possibly more of you.

But she had the right idea. Can't have loose ends. You set the dial of the safe in the floor next to you, spin your combination, and open it up. Removing the knives, you close it back up and pocket the dial.

I am so goddamn confused. Dames. Dames ruining EVERYTHING. They can't just leave me alone and leave my life be.

Grumbling to yourself over what could be termed “the worst goddamn luck ever, stuck in here with some flighty broads and some goddamn shitty vampires”, which you did term it, because you JUST SAID THAT, you get to your feet.

And something smells like it's on fire.

It just gets better and better.

You pocket Sakuya's two knives and step out into the hallway.

Yep, that's Sakuya's room on fire. Oh, she's not gonna be happy.

–

[ ] Be the Investigator.
[ ] Write-in.

[ ] Be Aya.
[ ] Leave the Investigator behind and GTFO.
[ ] Go back for him.
[ ] Write-in.

[ ] Be Kotohime.
[ ] Go to find the Investigator.
[ ] Get out of the mansion. Which is on fire. Fire's bad, mkay?
[ ] Write-in.

[ ] Be the hat

–

For this particular choice, even if you don't vote to be a character, it will help if you vote (preferably write-ins! Write-ins set the mansion on fire. And made Kotohime cry. I HOPE YOU ASSHOLES ARE HAPPY)

[x] Be Rumia or one of her friends
[x] Wriggle is missing and we tracked her to the SDM and it's ON FIRE oh god we have to save her! This isn't fun at all This is really fun!

I keep typing him when talking about Wriggle. I have a problem.

Saaaaaaay how much space does that safe have? Enough to, say, loot the mansion while everyone else is dealing with the fire?

>>134634
It is large enough to hold the entire mansion, provided you've broken the mansion down into bits little enough to fit through the door.

It's about 18"x18" for the opening with an apparent depth of 18".

>>134635
Alriiiiiight. In that case, since I have no delusions that my Rumia vote is going to win:

[x] Be the Investigator
[x] You have no idea how to get out of here. Get away from the fire and lootrescue as many paintings (roll up the canvas), vases, and other small valuables as you can. If questioned, say you're saving priceless artifacts from the flames.

It's not votespam if they're different votes, right??

>>134636
Not to me at least.

Also I'm glad you didn't make me do the Rumia vote, I have other plans for them.

[x]Be Aya
-[x]Go back for him

Would this be considered saving his life? Because if you save someones life, they will eventually start loving you, as everyone knows.

>>134644
Oh god are you taking Remilia's romance advice.

>>134644
Not only the saving his life bit... Aya started the fire. She created the circumstances in which she's going to save his life. Kotohime would just be copying her now!

Why'd that fire start anyway? Magic book bursting into flames or something, what

>>134648
It's quite sound advice. Everyone loves the dashing gallant person who saves your life. I kid. I just hate Kotohime and everything involving her, so I vote for Aya

>>pocket the dial.

Okay I know that it's the safe's dial and not say Sakuya's, but the idea of looting Sakuya's bullshit timehax watch artifact doohickey just gave me a mental erection. Also, I laughed at this update. A lot. Loudly.

[X]Be Sakuya.
[X]...'s figment in Investigator's mind, if necessary.

Mostly because this is fucking awesome and it's mostly her fault the mansion is on fire.

>>134648
We have yet to start trimming people's claws so no.

[X] Be Aya.
[X] Go back for that dude. (You're a reporter, you RETRIEVE evidence, not leave it behind!)
[X] But before that somehow take pictures of Remilia embracing a sobbing Kotohime. Somehow. Do speed of light time travel or something.

Obviously there are no (easily findable) pictures of Remilia hugging crying Kotohime. So I will settle with this.

(This update took a little while longer because I simply could not think of how things could get worse.

And then I thought of a way to make things get worse.)

[x] Be the Investigator
[x] You have no idea how to get out of here. Get away from the fire and lootrescue as many paintings (roll up the canvas), vases, and other small valuables as you can. If questioned, say you're saving priceless artifacts from the flames.

[X] Be Aya.
[X] Go back for that dude.
[X] But before that somehow take pictures of Remilia embracing a sobbing Kotohime. Somehow. Do speed of light time travel or something.

–

I hate it when the obvious and right choice is the hard one. Why is it always the hard one?

You shake your head, and dash back towards Sakuya's room. Hopefully you'll find the Investigator somewhere nearby and that he won't be dead somehow.

In the back of your mind, some voice says that you should somehow go and take pictures of a sobbing Kotohime being embraced by Remilia. You say that's silly, you couldn't possibly know they were doing that, and it's asking a lot just to be put into that situation by sheer plot power. Sure, you've got the bonus of “it would be funny and the author's an asshole to his characters, especially Kotohime,” but none of that is necessary, anyways. Seriously, who the hell do you think I am? I'm Aya Shameimaru. The best damn reporter the world has ever seen. And if you don't think I haven't planted hidden cameras EVERYWHERE in the Scarlet Devil Mansion, you're horribly mistaken. You poor, dumb bastards. I'm almost insulted by the presumption that I would be unprepared for this.

You break out of your implausible and sequence-breaking first-person narrative and continue to run back into the mansion.

–

This is bullshit, this mansion is bullshit, this fire is bullshit, these broads are bullshit, this entire fucking situation is absolute bullshit.

You're not particularly happy about being in a mansion, that's on fire, with a crazy-hooker psycho-knife bitch POSSIBLY not even dead or, even worse, inside your head, while you try to cover up TWO murders now, and will probably have to commit more.

I hate this game and I'd like to leave now.

Nope. Nothing. Still here. Mansion's still on fire.

Fuck it. I'm taking some stuff for myself.

You slam your safe dial into the wall, spin your combination in, and open it. Looking around, you see a bunch of things that you would like to have. Stained glass desk lamp? Yep. Toss it into the safe. Antique rotary phone made out of bones? Cool. Giant portrait of dogs playing poker? You try and shove it into the safe, and just barely manage to squeeze it in, and shut the door on the safe. The dial falls off the wall onto the floor, and you reach down and pick it up.

Are you just going to stand around in a burning building stealing things, feeling self-pitying, and not escaping?

You recognize that voice.

You can't die in a fire here.

Fine. If only to get you to shut up.

You pocket the safe dial, and pick a direction to go walking off towards.

–

And now you're back in the hallway where you left the Investigator. The fire has spread across the entirety of the hallway, and into the washroom where he was.

Even if I could go in there without being burnt to a crisp, I think he's probably smart enough not to have stayed in the washroom when there was fire. He's obviously not here.

You fly over the fire in the hallway, coughing on the smoke, and cross to the other side. There's an upended table, and an empty picture frame on the wall.

That's odd.

This hallway ends up leading towards either the garden in the back, or the library near it. Patchouli should probably be in the library, while the Investigator has probably headed out the back to the garden outside. Remilia's got to know about the fire by now, and probably sent Meiling to get Patchouli. And you'd kind of like to avoid dealing with Meiling, they probably suspect you of the fire anyways.

Yeah. Dealing with them would be bad.

–

You reach the back of the mansion, and exit into the garden. The door lets out right into a hedge maze. In the middle of the night.

WHO THE HELL DESIGNED THIS WHY WOULD YOU DO THIS

In frustrated rage, you begin making your own path through the hedge maze, like a bulldozer made of confused anger and hatred. Because this hedge maze bullshit is BULLSHIT.

Finally, you smash through the hedge maze into a clearing in the center, where a small blonde girl is sitting. She looks up at you brightly.

“Did you come to play?”

–

[ ] Be the Investigator.
[ ] Write-in.

[ ] Be Aya

[ ] Be Kotohime
[ ] Write-in

[ ]

[X]Be Remilia
[X]Charisma Break

[x] Be the Investigator.
[x] Just keep running. No time for yet another goddamn dame.

[x] Be the Investigator.
[x] Just keep running. No time for yet another goddamn dame.

>Fourth wall breaking.
Ugh.

[x] Be the Investigator.
[x] Just keep running. No time for yet another goddamn dame.
[x] Remilia: Charisma Break

[x] Be Kotohime
[x] Help Remilia deal with this crisis.

[x]

[X] Be the Investigator.
-[X] Do you live in that house? Because it's on fire.

[x] Be Remilia
-[x] Charisma Break

Remilia having a panic attack, yes please. If not, or you need to do another perspective switch halfway through the update, then

[x] Be Kotohime
-[x] Help Remilia deal with this crisis.

Rearranged votes for comedic value.

[x] Be the Investigator.
-[x] Just keep running. No time for yet another goddamn dame.

[x] Be Kotohime
-[X] Do you live in that house? Because it's on fire.

[x] Be Remilia
-[x] Charisma Break

–

“Did you come to play?”

Did you come to play? DID YOU COME TO PLAY? FUCKING NO. NO YOU DID NOT COME TO PLAY.

“No, I didn't come to play. Because I have had it with fucking dames, I have had it with the people here, and I have had it with lolis like you with their one fucking gimmick. What's yours? You eat people?”

“Um...”

“Yeah, you can go and shove it. I have had enough of your shit, and I just met you. I swear to God if I ever see you again I will hang you using your own intestines as rope. So answer your own goddamn question. DID. I. COME. TO. PLAY.”

“...Is 'no' the right answer?”

“Congratulations! It is. Now don't follow me or I. Will. Kill. You.”

You crash through the bushes in the vague direction of 'away from all this bullshit', represented by the now furiously-burning mansion. Because you obviously need some time to calm down before you start breaking faces. Well, you were planning on breaking faces anyways. You just don't want them to be inconveniently wrong faces.

–

That man reminded you of Remilia during one of her excessively bad days. You suppose he doesn't want to play. One thing that he said, though, completely puzzled you.

“What's a loli?”

–

You feel your eye twitch.

“What do you mean that the mansion is on fire.”

Do note the punctuation. It is very specific. That is a period there. Such an absurd statement brooks no possibility of truth.

“I mean, the mansion is burning.”

At this moment Kotohime decides to butt her way into the conversation.

“Do you live in that house? Because she says it's on fire.”

You grind your teeth, and do a little mental arithmetic. Vampire + Fire = bad.

Like, really bad. Honestly, the only way this could get worse is if some guy burst through the door with a trenchcoat calling himself “Daywalker” started talking about “some dumb motherfucker always trying to ice skate uphill.”

You pause for a moment while you try to process that and wonder where the thought came from.

–

Now, we're going to change perspectives a bit, for the sake of clarity.

Imagine Remilia is a supercomputer. All that massive amount of power, giving her abilities only dreamed of by mortals. She's effectively immortal (barring active attempts on her life.) She's extremely powerful, in that fighting her would be an exercise in futility. She is extremely charismatic, to the point where she lives under the assumption that everyone is wrapped around her finger, and even if they weren't, she could get them there with minimal effort.

Now imagine that supercomputer having a buffer stack overflow, division by zero, and a memory access violation all at once.

–

“Remilia? Are you okay?”

You and Meiling are looking at the slightly-spaced looking Remilia. She's been sitting there for about thirty seconds. This possibility of fire has apparently snapped her out of touch with reality for a bit.

She seems to blink, and then come back.

“I'm sorry. I kind of lost touch there for a moment.”

–

Of course, modern supercomputers have defenses against all of those maladies, and it would be remiss of me to assume that Remilia does not as well, being an old, powerful vampire. It'll take a bit more than that just to get Remilia down!

And then imagine that someone set the supercomputer on fire and pressed down the Halon Release cancel switch.

Now it gets interesting.

–

At that moment, a support beam dislodges itself from the ceiling and lands right on Remilia's teacup.

Said support beam is of dead plant material, and is undergoing combustive chemical changes.

That is, a massive wooden beam smashes the teacup, and under it, the table that Remilia was sitting at and drinking from.

It is also on fire.

–

You sit stock still in your chair as a flaming beam of wooden, fiery death lands right in your lap.

And by in your lap, you note literally: in your lap. Because your legs are under the table that is under the teacup that is under the flaming wooden beam of death.

–

So, we have a supercomputer who has a buffer stack overflow, memory access violation, and is attempting to divide by zero. And it's on fire.

I think we're done here.

–

You take in the entire scene, and...

Breathe in.

Breathe out.

“KYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!”

–

You arrive at the entrance to the garden in the back of the currently-burning-down Scarlet Devil Mansion.

The Investigator probably went this way, as a couple of important bits of evidence fall together in your well-honed journalistic mind:

1. The building is on fire. Anyone in their right mind would evacuate.
2. This is the closest evacuation point from Sakuya's room.
3. The Investigator's hat is on the ground here.

And...

4. There is an Investigator-sized hole in the hedge maze.

He couldn't have been happy.

You pick up his hat, take off your own, stow it in one of your many pockets, and place his hat on your head with a rakish tilt. Maybe it's worth a shot to be a private investigator, if only to dress as awesomely as he does.

You take off through the holes in the hedge maze following the Investigator.

–

You've busted through the other half of the hedge maze and arrived at a ten-foot wall at the edge of the mansion property. You slump down against the wall and let out a deep breath.

Goddamnit I dropped my hat somewhere.

That last bit is not helping with your current rage problem. Gotta calm down.

Gotta calm down. Gotta get out of here. Hopefully this is all a dream.

You take out your gin-filled flask, and take a shot.

Blech. Tastes terrible.

Some drink to forget. Some drink to relax. Some drink to be merry.

You?

You drink to drown the hate.

–

[ ] Be the Investigator
[ ] Get shitfaced
[ ] Write-in
[ ] Be Aya
[ ] Continue pursuing the Investigator's trail
[ ] Write-in
[ ] Be Kotohime
[ ] Help Remilia
[ ] Realize that the building is on fire. And possibly the Investigator as well.
[ ] Write-in
[ ] Be Flandre
Oh look, someone's coming to play! They have
[ ] Black hair
[ ] Red hair
[ ] Be Remilia Your call could not be completed as dialed. Please hang up and try again.
[ ] Be the Hat

[x] Be the Investigator
[x] Get shitfaced

I'm starting to feel like I'm reading A Wizard Is You with every subsequent update. That is not a good thing in any stretch of the imagination.

[X] Be Kotohime
[X] Help Remilia
[X] Realize that the building is on fire. And possibly the Investigator as well.
[X] Spend entire update panicking and trying to decide whether to help Remilia or go find Investigator.

>>135394
In your opinion, maybe. I happen to like it. This story isn't nearly identical, so quit bitching.

[x] Be the Hat

I got nothing.
>>135403
Agreed.

[x] Be the Investigator
[x] Get shitfaced

Update will be a little late because I'm writing something special for you. Yes, you, the one that's reading this message. You specifically. Nobody else. It'll be our secret.

[x] Be the Investigator
[x] Get shitfaced

--

In your entire time in your line of work, you have come to one specific certainty:

Alcohol does not make the situation better.

It just makes it much easier to comprehend, and then deal with.

Of course, sometimes, the quality of the “dealing” you’ll be doing suffers.

But that’s better than a rage-induced murderspree, isn’t it?

You’ve managed to climb atop the wall that divides the Scarlet Devil Mansion from the outside world, and are dangling your feet over the edge as you watch the mansion burn. The fire, and the gin, are having a calming effect on you. In fact, you’re calm enough to have a civil conversation over drinks with a lady.

Sakuya takes a shot from your flask and hands it back to you.

“I can’t see as how Remilia will be happy about this.”

“I’ll be honest with you. I don’t care about her. She can burn to death for all I care. I don’t care about any of this anymore. All I want is to not be prosecuted for my accidental murder-“

“Two murders.”

“Fine. Two. All I want is to not be prosecuted, and LEAVE this town.”

“Might be a bit harder than you think.”

“I don’t care if I have to WALK all the way to Detroit. I just want out of here.”

“Yeah, that’s just the thing. You can’t walk out of here.”

“I’ll steal a goddamn boat.”

“You really don’t have any idea how it works here, do you?”

You take a shot from your flask of gin. You have a feeling you’re going to need it, and pass the flask back to Sakuya.

“Nope. Enlighten me.”

“Alright. Gensokyo runs on what you would call ‘complete bullshit.’ Which is to say it runs on a complex web of magic, sorcery, divine power, and spiritual energy.”

“Sounds like ‘complete bullshit’ all right.”

“Now, that being said, there are obvious entities you’d call ‘supernatural.’ This includes fairies, vampires, demons, oni, youkai, and whatever else.”

“Aw, goddamnit, you’re telling me that Remilia actually IS a vampire? I almost feel bad for sending Red to her almost certain death then.”

“No you don’t. Don’t lie to me.”

“You’re right. I don’t feel bad at all. Pass me the flask, I need another shot.”

Sakuya hands the flask back to you. You take a swig gratefully.

“So, here’s problem number one: You can’t leave.”

“Why’s that?”

“The Hakurei Border. Pretty much impenetrable. Sure, you could try to leave through the Hakurei Shrine. “ She makes a dismissive wave with her hand. “Though that never works.”

“Because?”

“Don’t ask me. It works when it wants to, and that isn’t very often. Besides, you didn’t come in through a shrine, did you?”

“Nope, I kind of woke up near a statue of a dragon with a dead hooker crushed between the front of my car and the statue.”

“Which means something brought you here, and you’re probably stuck until they send you back, or you break something badly enough for a palpable fracture in reality.”

“I ain’t doing anyone’s dirty work, toots.”

“Oh good. I was hoping that you’d go for the ‘break reality’ option. Eventually we’ll have to get to how you’ll do that. But for now, let me finish explaining things.”

You grunt affirmation as you take another swig, and pass the flask back to Sakuya.

“Now, you remember how I froze time?”

“Is that what you were doing?”

“Don’t go getting all snappy on me. You know what it was. Most people in Gensokyo have some sort of ‘bullshit magic’ abilities. Mine? I can locally stop time. But even the most basic of youkai and supernatural beings- and even some humans- have the ability to use danmaku. Before you say ‘dan-whatzit’, it’s like bullets, powered by what we’ve previously lumped under ‘complete bullshit’, specific to the person using it.”

“So? I’ve got bullets too.”

“You’ve got the ability to shoot one at a time. Granted, it’s VERY fast and powerful, but it’s ONE. With danmaku, you’re talking about hundreds at once.”

“Shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit.”

Remilia takes a swig, upends the flask, and looks inside.

”That one’s empty. Got another one?”

“Yeah.” You pass another flask, this one full of rum, to Sakuya. No good, alcoholic, chain smoking, hard-boiled detective would be caught dead without spare alcohol and cigarettes. Speaking of… you draw one out and light it. You take a deep puff, and then look to Sakuya. “Want one?”

“Sure, why not?”

“It’ll kill you eventually.”

“I’m probably already dead.”

You both share a chuckle at that. Sakuya lights up, and takes a drag. And then starts coughing. “Jesus, you smoke these like they’re candy. You’re almost as bad as Eirin.”

“Who?”

“Eirin. She’s like the town doctor of sorts. Made an immortality elixir once too.”

“Bullshit.”

“Yeah, but I bet it only protects you from old age, not bleeding out. You can test that later. Anyways, Eirin is a doctor of sorts, grows her own medicine and everything. Some of it makes you real mellow. And hungry.”

You shake your head at the thought. Doctor, huh? “Who else is important around here?”

“Hmm. Let me think. You’ve met Remilia, she can normally bend people around her finger and make them do what she wants. Her sister is batshit insano. She’s also the one you yelled at and called a loli. I’m surprised you survived. There’s Patchouli, she’s got an entire library of useful stuff that could help you possibly get out of here. Unfortunately for you, that library’s in the burning building over there.”

--

You’re sitting in one of your new beanbag chairs in the library when ANOTHER burning beam tries to land on and crush you while you’re reading. You swat it away with a book, and continue reading. It’s pretty hot in here. Flandre probably is messing with the thermostat again.

--

“Shit.”

“Yeah, I doubt it’s helping you now. There’s also Marisa, she’s a wizard. Or witch. Whatever. In any case, she’s a human that does magic. And steals shit.”

“I could get along with her.”

“You say that now. Then we have the werecow Keine.”

You stifle a giggle. Werecow. Heh. Bovicanthropy. Heh. That’s funny.

“She’s a schoolteacher down at the Human Village. You might be interested in her. She… well, it’s hard to describe. But she effectively has access to the ‘history’, of Gensokyo, so you’d call it, about once a month, when the full moon comes out.”

“Which means?”

“That she doesn’t have to have been present to witness something that’s already happened.”

“Shit. That’s a problem.”

“Yeah. You’ll need to deal with that eventually. Luckily for you, there’s probably about another three weeks to the next full moon, so you’ve got time. In any case… there’s really a bunch of people, with ridiculous powers. And you’re trying to cover up at least a double murder with a side of arson.”

“Anything else?”

“Yeah, lots of stuff, but if I explain all of it, we’ll be sitting here all day. Now, my question to you is, what kind of skills do you have?”

I am so boned and outclassed here. “I… have a gun. And your knives. And I can lie. Really well.”

Sakuya lets out a long breath. “Then, for your sake, I hope it’s enough.”

“Well, it set the mansion of an all-powerful vampire on fire, and probably killed you, didn’t it?”

You take another drag on your cigarette as the mansion burns gloriously.

--

[ ] Hippocrates
[ ] Hippopotamus
[ ] Hippocampus
[ ] Hypothermia
[ ] Hat
[ ] Hippity-hop
[ ] High seas
[ ] Hyper and creepy
[ ] Hyper and creepier
[ ] Hold the strings
[ ] Hold the mustard
[ ] Hatefulness

--

[ ] Write-in.

Damn it, Patchy, you're supposed to be smart. Get out of there.

>>135487
Patchy's bit was less "srs bzns" and more "comedic interlude." You don't have to worry about her.

>Remilia takes a swig, upends the flask, and looks inside.
Is that a typo or did you mean to do that?

Alright, time to vote.
[x] Hold the mustard

>>135489
Fuck. Typo.

Though in retrospect, it would have been funny if I had planned something like that. I'll file that away for future use.

[X] Hello my baby/Hello my darlin...

Goddam I want a Sakuya route now

>>135500
We're one trip to Yuyuko away.

[X] Hippocampus

[x] High fever

>“Alright. Gensokyo runs on what you would call ‘complete bullshit.’

Ahaha, million dollar line.

[x] Be the Hat

Gonna need a tiebreaker at least.
But >>135499
Your vote made me break out laughing.

[x] High fever

[X]DoubleHat

I would say more, but that would be horrible idea, so please, Hat's ahoy!

[X] Be Aya and the Investigator
-- [X] Find out if anyone has a death wish on Aya and pin Akyuu's murder on them.

What?

Who else is better to take the fall?

[x] High Fever

Watching a fire is always therapeutic, always gave you time to think.

“I think I have an idea.”

“And that is?”

“Simple. I don’t want them connecting murders back to me, right?”

“Right.”

“And I mentioned I was good at lying, right?”

“Right…”

“And I have your knives.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“Not in the slightest. Like you said, who are you going to tell?”

Oh, Sakuya, you’re messing with the wrong guy’s head.

--

Remilia’s in danger.

You realize she’s not snapping out of it.

This is a time for action. You dash towards her, push the frantically panicking Kotohime out of the way, and kick the table off Remilia into the wall, where it splinters into fragments. The burning wooden beam you pick up with a single hand and launch out the nearest window.

Remilia is in bad shape- those look like they could be serious burns. And burning vampires is one of the best ways to lead to dead vampires.

Honestly, there’s only one thing you can do. You quickly grab Remilia, sling her over your shoulder, grab Kotohime with your free hand, and leap out the window. You land running, trying to get a small distance away from the burning building.

After you’ve passed the terraces and fountains in the front of the mansion, you’ve put enough distance between you and the fire to allow for some expedient care.

At least it’s the middle of the night. If Remilia had to deal with the sunlight as well, that would make this much worse than it is.

You unceremoniously dump Kotohime on the ground, and she seems to be thoroughly shocked with the speed that all of that just happened. For once, she’s actually shut up.

You tear off the lower half of your dress to make impromptu wrappings for Remilia’s burns. It’s a good thing today you were wearing pants underneath, to train later.

Kotohime is watching in awe as you quickly dress Remilia’s burns.

“Kotohime. We need to get Remilia to Eirin as soon as possible. These are serious, and need to get treated right away.”

She looks overwhelmed, but tentatively nods with a determined look on her face.

Idly, you wonder what happened to Wriggle. She just seemed to disappear in the confusion…

--

When the shit hits the fan, you get going.

When the shit hits the fan, and it’s on fire, you get going even FASTER.

Running through a burning mansion is NOT what you wanted today.

Neither was being threatened by some crazy guy with a knife.

Can’t I just go home? You stop for a moment to catch your breath in the smoky hallway, and close your eyes. It still feels hot to your skin and smoky to your nose. You open your eyes. Unfortunately, you’re not home.

You’re running aimlessly through the mansion, looking for a way out when you see a large set of double doors at the end of the hallway.

That might be a way out.

You run at them at full tilt, and throw your shoulder into it.

Apparently you never learned the correct way to open a door when in a hurry (use the damn knob or kick it), because that hurt. A lot. The doors fly open for you, and you fall to the ground and roll straight into a bookshelf, knocking a few books loose that land on your head.

Patchouli looks up from her reading, and quizzically raises an eyebrow at your crumpled form.

--

You finally catch up to the Investigator after narrowly avoiding Flandre in the hedge maze.

He just seems to be chilling at the top of a wall, smoking and watching as the mansion burns down.

“Thank God I found you!”

He looks towards where you are, looks at his hat you’re wearing, smiles, and raises his hand in mock-salute. You flutter to a seat next to him.

“Um… I think it would be in our best interests to be going. Now.”

“And why is that, Aya? The fire helps me relax and think.”

“That’s great… but… um… we might not want to be found here.”

“Why, Aya, did you have something to do with the fire?”

He’s got a knowing grin on his face. On the “smug-o-meter”, it ranks at about or around “shit-eating grin.”

“N-no! I just wanted to make sure that nobody suspects anything… untoward… about me! And I wanted to make sure you were safe- you’re only human, after all.”

“Aya, this isn’t my first time near a large, burning building that one of my associates had ‘no part that’ll stand in court’ in making it burn. I know we’ve got to go. Where’s Red?”

“I-“ don’t know.

“I’m sure she’ll be fine. This might be a perfect opportunity to get away from her for a bit, though, she was beginning to give me a headache. Or rather, gave me a headache. I feel so much better after having sat here for a while.”

“So… what are we going to do tonight, Mr. Investigator?”

“Same thing we always do, Aya. Try to take over the world!” He coughs and chuckles at the same time. You give him a nonplussed look. “Okay, serious face then. We still need to figure out who killed Akyu. That’s still job one. Kotohime will end up doing the same thing, and we’ll end up running into her.”

“That’s true, I suppose.”

“So we’ll find her when we need her. In the meantime, I want to examine Akyu’s body for clues. Do you know where it might have been taken?”

You think for a moment.

“Probably Eirin’s place. She’s the one with the most medical knowledge of anyone in Gensokyo. If anyone can tell what killed someone, she can.”

“I think we know where we need to go,then. And we need to establish an alibi for where we have been, or more specifically, where we haven’t. And that’s here. Has anyone actually seen you?”

“Don’t think so.”

“Then we should be in the clear. Let’s get going.”

He flicks his cigarette at the burning mansion, hops down on the outside part of the wall, and starts walking.

“Wait! You don’t even know where you’re going! And it’s not safe to wander around here alone at night!”

“Well then, Miss Shameimaru, I think you’d best be coming along quickly then.”

--

It’s so pretty when it’s all burning.

Sister’s burning.

She’s so pretty when she’s burning.

Why didn’t I think of making it all burn?

Tongues of flame, licking,

licking

licking

licking with their tongues

So much fun!

--

[ ] Be Aya and the Investigator
-- [ ] Write-in
[ ] Be Wriggle and Patchouli
-- [ ] Write-in
[ ] Be Kotohime and Meiling
-- [ ] Write-in
[ ] Be Flandre The number you have dialed has been disconnected or is no longer in service. Please try your call again later.

>>135611
Sorry about that, noticed I made a fairly decent-sized DERP in my update.

But I think the Investigator might have a plan in mind for just such an occasion...

[x]Redial
---[x]Firebreaks are not the same as Starbow breaks but if you break the right bits at the right time you can knock down the walls onto the fire so it can all be mine mine mine Isn't that the guy who ran around telling me not to play why isn't he on fire? The world can ill use such a hero as you, monster but no that's the wrong phrase to use because it should be the other way around wouldn't dropping masonry on sis put out the fire? She shouldn't be allowed to have fire.

It's pretty.

[x] Be Aya and the Investigator
-- [x] Cheese it.

[x] Be Aya and the Investigator
-- [x] Cheese it.

[x] Be Aya and the Investigator
-- [x] Cheese it.

[x]Redial
– [x]Firebreaks are not the same as Starbow breaks but if you break the right bits at the right time you can knock down the walls onto the fire so it can all be mine mine mine Isn't that the guy who ran around telling me not to play why isn't he on fire? The world can ill use such a hero as you, monster but no that's the wrong phrase to use because it should be the other way around wouldn't dropping masonry on sis put out the fire? She shouldn't be allowed to have fire.

--

There's crimes you can get away with. Like murder. Or embezzling. Or any one of those others whose evidence can be neatly swept under the rug. Rum-runners are out of the woods when their goods are gone. Embezzlers just shred documents. Murder? There's a wood chipper for that.

There are other crimes, however, that are hard to hide no matter what you do. Robbery's not gonna go unnoticed. Assault and battery inevitably leave witnesses. Arson... leaves a giant, flaming beacon of “HEY LOOK STUFF IS ON FIRE.”

And this is why you're “cheesing it.” Arson DOES tend to get rid of most of the evidence. Because, you know, cleansing fire. Especially if it's a big one. Really, the best way to get pegged for arson is “guilt by association.” Either that of your associates or proximity to the fire while looking guilty.

So you run. Can't very well influence the results of an investigation from the lockup. Aya can't get an exclusive when she's wearing stripes. Besides, you probably did Gensokyo a favor. Can't be letting vampires run loose wherever they do.

You've managed to get a decent distance away from the mansion, and you're in the middle of the woods at night with only a slim crescent of waning moon lighting your way. At least you're not alone.

“Okay, I think we've made enough distance for now.”

Aya slows to a stop ahead of you. “Yeah. I think we'll be good.”

“So whereabouts does this Eirin live?

“Eientei. It's on the other side of the valley, in the Bamboo Forest of the Lost. Probably about a day or two's trip.”

“Aw, you've got to be kidding me.”

“Well, if you're walking.”

oh god oh god I know where this is going SHIIIIIIIIIIIIITTT

Aya grabs you by the waist, and takes to the sky. At least this time she's the one holding onto your hat.

–

The air is hazy and smoky. You've taken some time off to relax, what with all the fuss about “murders” and... well, honestly, you shouldn't have done the dismissive air quotes around that word. You mean, Akyu is dead. Why did they even bother to bring the body to you? You're a doctor, not a mortician.

Ah well. You take another deep drag, and pass it to Yamame.

–

Keeping up with Meiling is haaaaaaard.

Meiling is making impressive time across the valley for a trip that should honestly take a day or two. You've managed to keep up with her so far, but you have a feeling that it's only because she's carrying Remilia and not wanting to jostle her about. If she ran flat-out... well, let's just say that she would outpace most land vehicles. And probably go farther.

And where is he? Ayabetternottryanythingtherearelotsofbonestobreakinwings

–

You gratefully accept the herb from Eirin's outstretched hand.

“So what are you gonna do about Akyu?”

“I don't know, man. Just thinking about that makes me lose my vibe. Can't work right, it's not good for anyone. I don't know what I'm expected to do.”

You exhale a cloud of sweet-smelling smoke.

“Well, the night is young, and I'm kind of hungry. What kind of food do you have here?”

“Not much, man. Just some hot dogs and Doritos.”

“Oh, dude, I know how to make some awesome hotdogritos.”

“Sweeeeeeeeet.”

–

Seriously, can't anyone get some time alone to read here? It's like someone decided to panic and start making all kinds of noise. And can't someone turn down the thermostat? Flandre should not be allowed to mess with it.

A small girl has ended up in a small avalanche of books when she burst in through the door. She seems to almost be on the verge of tears.

Fine, fine. It's not like I didn't have anything to accomplish today, oh no, didn't have a bunch of books I needed to get through...

You breathe out the sigh of the long-suffering, set down your book, and walk over to where Wriggle is lying, and start to pick up books off her and set them aside.

“Are you alright?”

“Are you crazy?!”

No gratitude. Of course. You frown at her.

“The mansion's on fire!”

...Oh. So it is. That makes sense, now.

You take a moment to take in your surroundings, and the mansion, with the notable exception of almost the entire library, is smoldering and smoking around you.

You shrug and sit back in your beanbag chair, pick up your book, and continue reading.

–

You're fiddling with a glass bowl while Yamame is rooting through the kitchen looking to make some hotdogritos, whatever those are, when suddenly, she says from the kitchen:

“Duuuuuuuuuude! Not cool!”

“What are you on about, man?”

“You put Akyu in the freezer, man!”

“Oh, that. The hotdogs should be under her legs.”

“No, dude, I mean, you have a dead person, in your freezer!”

“Where else was I going to put her?”

–

You and the Investigator flutter to a stop in the Bamboo forest, near Eientei.

You set him down on the ground, as the sun begins to rise, casting thin pink light through the forest.

“Eientei should be about a fifteen-minute walk that way. I didn't want to fly in, Mokou doesn't take too kindly to people just dropping in whenever just from the sky. And walking through the Bamboo Forest at sunrise is a great stress reliever. You looked like you needed it.”

The Investigator exhales slowly, looks up at you, and smiles. “You know, Aya, I don't think I've thanked you yet. Without you and your helping me, I don't think I could have made any progress on this at all.”

Unexpectedly, you feel your cheeks flush. “Th-that's not- you're welcome, I guess.” Embarassedly, you turn away from him. “I'm just trying to get a good story!”

You hear him chuckle.

–

You grab the hotdogs and nacho cheese sauce from the freezer, and close it on Akyu. Not really the best thing to help your buzz.

Now, where's the microwave?

–

As the sun rises, you enter the borders of the Bamboo Forest of the Lost.

Not good. Should have been able to make better time. But I couldn't jostle Mistress around too much...

Kotohime is dragging behind, panting. “Hold... on... don't... leave me... in the forest...”

At least you're close. Shouldn't take more than an hour to get to Eientei from here. That is, if you don't get lost.

I hate this forest.

–

The mansion burnt down.

But the fireworks didn't go off! Where's the CRASH BOOM BANG?

Gotta have fireworks! CRASH BOOM BANG!

You run towards the cellar entrance to the mansion just outside the hedge maze, and dash on in.

Whee! I'm going to play with that one guy, whether he wants to or not!

But of course he'll want to! Everyone loves fireworks! Even Patchy! I can remember so clearly, “Flandre,” she'll say, “Why the hell did you bring fireworks into the library? I'm trying to READ!”

She got so excited!

Everyone's excited about fireworks. Everyone. And they'll know you're the hero, dood.

–

[ ] Be the Investigator and Aya
--[ ] Write-in
[ ] Be Meiling and Kotohime
--[ ] Write-in
[ ] Be Patchy and Wriggle
--[ ] Write-in
[ ] Be Eirin and Yamame
--[ ] Write-in
[ ] Be Flandre CRASH BOOM BANG!
[ ] Be the Hat You can't be the hat! Besides, Aya has the hat. Not you.

Don't be afraid to make multiple votes and write-ins. I can probably do them all.

[X] Be the Investigator and Aya
--[X] Plant incriminating evidence that this Mokou person burnt the mansion down. Because she didn't get to pet Remilia.

What? I'd get angry too if I didn't get to pet Remilia on the head.

[x] Be Patchy and Wriggle
--[x] Maybe you should do something about this fire before Remilia throws a tantrum.

[x] Be Meiling and Kotohime
--[x] Be lost.

[x] Be the Investigator and Aya
--[x] You're going to write a story about this shit? What's the point of covering it up?

Voting would be a lot easier if this wasn't so incredibly open. god forbid voting take some thought

[X] Be the Investigator and Aya
--[X] Plant incriminating evidence that this Mokou person burnt the mansion down. Because she didn't get to pet Remilia.

>>135757

>Voting would be a lot easier if this wasn't so incredibly open. god forbid voting take some thought

Honestly, I'm perfectly fine with this. Sure, it means I get less votes, because Anon can't just pick a choice at random. But I get quality votes. Write-ins are the lifeblood of this story- it's very possible for the story to Bad End for the Investigator, without help from Anon and the other characters.

[x] Be Patchy and Wriggle
--[x] Maybe you should do something about this fire before Remilia throws a tantrum.

[x] Be Meiling and Kotohime
--[x] Be lost.

[x] Be the Investigator and Aya
--[X] Plant incriminating evidence that this Mokou person burnt the mansion down. Because she didn't get to pet Remilia.
--[x] You're going to write a story about this shit? What's the point of covering it up?

Planting incriminating evidence would have been awesome if you had thought of it when you were at the mansion. But you didn’t. Because you’re stupid. Stupid stupid dumb. Seriously, you can’t believe how dumb you are. Because that would have been a great idea.

But you have another good idea. You’re gonna write a story about the arson. Or, more accurately, you’re going to get Aya to. Because trial by media is the best kind of trial. Especially when you control the only media outlet in the land. A warm, fuzzy feeling envelops you as you smile to yourself. It’ll all be good.

So, that should solve the arson problem, and prevent it being traced back to you. Even though it wouldn’t be traced back to you. Aya will probably owe you one for being such a genius.

“Hey, Aya, have you considered running a story on the arson of the Scarlet Devil Mansion?”

“Already writing it.”

“Wait, what?”

“Yep. Writing an article on it to direct suspicion away from me. It’s what I call “trial by media.” In fact, I have several templates for crimes that I’ve committed in the past and pinned on other people this way. Nobody can actually PROVE anything, but it does what it needs to do, and what it needs to do is keep suspicion away from me. I think… today I’ll make Mokou the patsy.”

And now I feel like a rank amateur.

You and Aya are walking down a path between bamboo shoots, towards an old-style Japanese mansion. Where the Scarlet Devil Mansion was foreboding and closed, Eientei is open, breezy, and welcoming. This may also have something to do with the fact that you’re approaching it in the morning.

Finally, you reach the unassuming front gate. And by “front gate”, there is only a faded red torii gate, with the dirt path ending in the front step into an open pavilion.

The mansion seems empty, though.

“Aya?”

“Yeah. We’re here, but it is rather quiet. Normally we’d have run into Mokou by now. She’s probably preoccupied with something else. Eirin is probably still sleeping. Kaguya… might be with Mokou. That would explain why neither of them are here. And the rabbits… yeah, no clue where they are. It is oddly empty-seeming.”

“Well, there’s only one way to find out.”

You walk up to one of the paper doors and slide it open, to reveal an empty tatami mat foyer, but for a couple of traditional brush paintings. There are doors to other rooms, hallways that lead deeper into the mansion.

At random, you pick one. The door slides open to reveal a room that is walled on three sides, and has a few cushions on the floor for lounging. The fourth side faces the the rising sun in the east, and casts a latticework of shadows along with the bright morning light.

And then the fact that you’ve been awake, running on pure adrenaline, and fear for most of the past thirty or so hours hits you, and you crumple in a heap on top of the pillows in the sunlight.

okay I think I’ll stop here, I don’t think I’ll be getting up.

Aya chuckles as you drift off to sleep.

--

“I hate this forest.”

You squint into the bright morning sun, as you’re entirely surrounded by bamboo, with the sun blinking between the bamboo shoots, like a ninja. You have Remilia covered entirely, with Kotohime’s kimono doing the job rather well. Kotohime was at least smart enough to wear shorts and a t-shirt under the kimono, non-traditional that it may be.

“Kotohime, do you know where we are?”

“I don’t know. I’ve only been to Eientei once or twice, and then I went with Reisen for drinks. So my memory’s a little cloudy…””

“Do you remember what way we came in from?”

Kotohime thinks for a bit, then nods. “We were walking into the rising sun when we came into the forest, right? If we keep walking towards the sun, we’ll at least be going somewhere we haven’t been.”

Yeah, that’ll help.

“And you never know, we might even be lucky enough to run into Mokou. Unless she tries to sell us some ‘yakitori’.” Kotohime is visibly disgusted by the prospect. “Seriously, that stuff is terrible! What does she put in there to make it so terrible?”

I thought it was pretty good stuff…

Having been so distracted, Kotohime starts to ramble on about why the yakitori is so terrible, suggesting that Mokou uses kittens as meat in the yakitori, and possibly Soylent Green. Whatever that is.

You’ve been wandering in the bamboo forest for hours now, and the sun is already at high noon. You open the kimono that Remilia is wrapped in to check on her. She’s still breathing, but she hasn’t stirred since she got those burns.

Your stomach growls.

For once, I’d even eat Mystia’s terrible lamprey.

Kotohime also seems to be hungry. “I kind of wish Mystia was here. I could go for some grilled lamprey.” She pauses. “I hate to say it. But I could even eat Mokou’s terrible yakitori.”

“Terrible?!”

You whirl around. Behind you and Kotohime, is a miffed-looking Mokou.

“I’ll have you know, that’s a venerated family recipe!”

“It’s still terrible!~”

--

You gape in awe as Patchouli just sits down and continues reading, as the morning light starts to shine in through the burnt walls and ceilings of the Library of the Scarlet Devil Mansion.

“But- aren’t you going to do anything about the fire? Or the mansion?”

“Fire’s out.”

“But what about the mansion?”

“What about it? Remilia will just make Sakuya fix it.”

Your memory is unpleasantly jogged. You had managed to completely forget about your original reason for coming to the Scarlet Devil Mansion in the excitement of the fire.

--

You awaken on the pillows, while a soft evening light filters in through the paper walls to the west. Crickets are chirping in the forest beyond. The mansion itself is still silent. There does seem to be an odd pressure on you, however.

I wonder what that could be.

You slowly open your eyes. Aya is fast asleep next to you, with her arms wrapped around you in a sleeping hug. She’s breathing slowly, and doesn’t seem to have awakened yet. Your hat’s not on her head, though. Strange.

--

[ ] Be the Investigator.
-- [ ] Leave and explore the mansion without awakening Aya.
-- [ ] Wake Aya up.
-- [ ] Write-in.

[ ] Be Aya. Aya’s sleeping.

[ ] Be Kotohime.
-- [ ] Continue to mock Mokou’s yakitori. Yakitori is made of kittens!
-- [ ] Write-in.

[ ] Be Meiling.
-- [ ] Shut Kotohime up and apologize. While you’re at it, ask Mokou to help find Eirin.
---- [ ] Tell Mokou why.
---- [ ] Don’t tell Mokou why, and try to keep her from seeing Remilia.
-- [ ] Let Kotohime rile up Mokou. It’ll be funny when Mokou snaps and breaks a few of Kotohime’s bones. THEN ask for directions to Eirin.
-- [ ] Write-in.

[ ] Be Patchouli. Patchouli doesn’t care what you want her to do. She’s busy reading.

[ ] Be Wriggle.
-- [ ] Tell Patchouli what you saw.
-- [ ] Don’t tell Patchouli.
-- [ ] Write-in.

[ ] General write-in for other characters and actions.

[ ] Be the Hat You don’t know where the hat is!

[x] Be the hat.
-- [x] Figure out where you are.

>>136054
You are absolutely certain that you will ascertain the location of the hat shortly, likely within the next update without actually having to vote for it.

[X] Be the Investigator.
- [X] Cop a feel. Look at Aya's article about the fire.

[x] Be the Investigator.
-- [x] Wake Aya up.

[x] Be Wriggle.
-- [x] Tell Patchouli what you saw.


[x] Be Kotohime.
-- [x] Continue to mock Mokou’s yakitori. Yakitori is made of kittens! Talk about how much better Mystia's lamprey is while you're at it.

I'm going to be really sad when Aya inevitably betrays us and/or dies.

>>136069
Everybody's got to die sometime, Red.

>>136119
Immortals don't!

>>136126
Yeah, I'm still thinking about how best to deal with that. I have some ideas. Can't really have a murder mystery with people who don't die.

>>136145
Stealing their souls still works fine. We already own Sakuya's soul, so yeah.

[X] Be the Investigator.
-- [X] Slip Aya's ever-present notebook out of her blouse (of COURSE it's in her blouse) and skim through it; see what other secrets this dame has. Besides Victoria's secrets dreaming.)

[X] Be Kotohime.
-- [X] Continue to mock Mokou’s yakitori. Yakitori is made of moon bunnies who wandered too far from Eientei... and knew too much.
-- [X] Remember that Mokou once threatened to barbecue Aya after Mokou was involved in a mysterious forest fire and Aya pried too much. Suddenly and inexplicably gain intense desire to learn recipe.

(no, really: http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Article_and_Interview:_Mokou)

[X] Be Meiling.
-- [X] Let Kotohime rile up Mokou. It’ll be funny when Mokou snaps and breaks a few of Kotohime’s bones. THEN ask for directions to Eirin.
---- [X] Tell Mokou why if she asks. Let on that Remilia's contemplated capturing an immortal to provide a permanent source of blood, lesbian rape, torture and dismemberment that can be used over and over again... and Kaguya could be that person.
---- [X] NO BAD MEILING BAD MEILING THAT DOUJIN WAS IMPURE SHOULD NEVER HAVE READ IT
---- [X] SO WHY CAN'T I GET IT OUT OF MY MIND OH MY GOD OH GOD OH GOD I CAN'T HELP IT

[X] Be Wriggle.
-- [X] Tell Patchouli what you saw.
-- [X] Ask how the library didn't burn down.

It's easy to forget, but goddamn Aya is sexy. Dem wings, man. Dem wings.

>>136149
And probably-Demetrious swoops in with a killer write-in.

>>136155
Told you. Less votes, but BETTER votes.

>>136146
Oh, I really hope you don't believe that about Sakuya. Do ho ho ho ho ho.

Also picture entirely related.

[X] Be the Investigator.
-- [X] Slip Aya's ever-present notebook out of her blouse (of COURSE it's in her blouse) and skim through it; see what other secrets this dame has. Besides Victoria's secrets aaaw yeah

[X] Be Aya. (Aya’s dreaming.)

[X] Be Kotohime.
-- [X] Continue to mock Mokou’s yakitori. Yakitori is made of moon bunnies who wandered too far from Eientei... and knew too much.
-- [X] Remember that Mokou once threatened to barbecue Aya after Mokou was involved in a mysterious forest fire and Aya pried too much. Suddenly and inexplicably gain intense desire to learn recipe.

[X] Be Meiling.
-- [X] Let Kotohime rile up Mokou. It’ll be funny when Mokou snaps and breaks a few of Kotohime’s bones. THEN ask for directions to Eirin.
---- [X] Tell Mokou why if she asks. Let on that Remilia's contemplated capturing an immortal to provide a permanent source of blood, lesbian rape, torture and dismemberment that can be used over and over again... and Kaguya could be that person.
---- [X] NO BAD MEILING BAD MEILING THAT DOUJIN WAS IMPURE SHOULD NEVER HAVE READ IT
---- [X] SO WHY CAN'T I GET IT OUT OF MY MIND OH MY GOD OH GOD OH GOD I CAN'T HELP IT

[X] Be Wriggle.
-- [X] Tell Patchouli what you saw.
-- [X] Ask how the library didn't burn down.

–

Okay, gotta think of a way to get out of this hug. There's sleuthing to be done. No time for dames.

What's the best way to get a dame off of you, without waking her up? You cast your mind back to your endless hours spent at bars. It always shut the dames up if you copped a feel. Got them to go away, too. Always nattering on about their problems. Expecting me to fix them for free. Which reminds me, I have got to get someone to pay me for this investigation.

Alright.

You turn over on your side, slowly, as to not disturb Aya. She's still latched onto you, and still has you in a sleeping hug. You have a bit of reach with the arm you're not laying on. You tentatively reach out your arm to Aya's butt. She doesn't move, but just continues to doze. You grab a handful through her skirt, and squeeze.

She giggles. She just giggles, sleepily says, “No... stop that...” and snuggles up to you tighter, nuzzling her face into your chest.

I am pretty sure that her dream's about to get much more interesting if she's still asleep.

You lightly slap her on the bum.

“Oooh...”, she says, and mumbles something that sounds suspiciously like “I've been a dirty girl.” You raise your eyebrow at her as she tries to entwine your legs with hers in the sleeping hug.

She smells like a combination of the forest and smoke. It's not a bad smell. I guess I could get used to this.

No, got business to attend to. Let's try something else.

Knee? Knee might work. Might get her legs off of me. That'd be progress.

You reach down to her knee with your free hand, and start to lightly tickle her behind the knee. She giggles and kicks her legs in her sleep. But now they're not on you. Progress.

Now, how to get her arms off of me... I really hope she doesn't wake up for this.

You edge away very slowly, to give yourself a bit of room between you and her. Her arms are still on you, but now she's not snuggled right up on your chest. And more importantly, her chest isn't squeezed on you anymore.

Well...

You reach out with your free hand, and close on her blouse, on one of her breasts. Now she's visibly smiling in her dream. But her arm is coming off you! Success! No- wait- she's grabbed your wrist, and is moving your hand...

to the other side of her chest. Jesus. Dames. As she presses your hand against her chest, something feels weird. Since she's not latched onto anything but your wrist, you maneuver to a kneeling position next to her.

You slowly peel her fingers off of your wrist with your other hand.

I wonder...

You poke her in the chest again. She giggles. Something still feels weird.

One more time. “Oooh.. harder...” Jesus.

Finally, realization dawns on you.

That's probably where she keeps her journal.

Thinking about it... you'd really like to know if she has any suspicions about you. And you never know. The information might come in handy. But... between the buttons, the ribbon wrapped around her collar, and the belt in the middle of her shirt, you're not sure you can pull this off without waking her up. And if she wakes up half-undressed, you can't claim ignorance, like you could up until now.

Fuck it. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

You reach for the black ribbon wrapped around her neck. It's tied in a simple bow, so all you need to do is grab a hold of one of the ends and pull. This you do, and the ribbon slowly unties. She doesn't seem to have noticed it. As you're pulling off the ribbon, it brushes against her face. You stop for a moment... but she doesn't seem to have awakened.

You could start on the buttons next, but that belt will still be in the way. And it's probably easier to get away with than unbuttoning her blouse. We'll save that for last. You slowly unbuckle the belt on the front of her blouse. That comes away easily.

Finally, for the pièce de résistance. As you reach for the top button of her blouse, she nips at your fingers. While still asleep. She's probably not going happy about this when she wakes up. At least she'll remember a good dream.

Slowly, the first button comes undone, as you don't want to rush this. It reveals pale, blemish-free skin. But you've got another button or two (or three) to go.

Next button comes off, revealing the cleavage in her chest, as it slowly rises and falls. You look up at Aya's face, and it's pretty much fully flushed now. I haven't seen anyone who could sleep through all that.

The third button comes undone, and at this point you're able to open her blouse enough to get a good look at her bra. It's simple white with black trim, nothing too fancy or lacy. It is silk, though. Stop thinking about that! There's work to be done! As you place your hand on her chest, you can feel the warmth of her skin on your hand. It's actually rather hot. You slide your hand under the bra to find her notebook.

Found it! Slowly... slooooooowly... You slowly draw it out, as to not wake her up. Accidentally, you run your hand over her nipple under her bra. She moans, you stop breathing. She's still asleep. Good. You let out a sigh of relief, and finish drawing the book out. You place the small book in your back pocket, as you start to button Aya's blouse back up.

You get the first button redone, and she sleepily mumbles, “No, don't, go back...”

Seriously? Come on! This broad is crazy.

Well... you don't want her to wake up, but you're not mean enough to ruin her dream. You slowly finish buttoning up her blouse, and rebuckle her belt and re-tie her ribbon.

Now she looks sad. Goddamn dames.

You lean in, and kiss her on the mouth, and whisper in her ear, “I must go.”

“Noooo... don't...”

Wordlessly, you step across the tatami mats silently, slide the door open, and step outside. You let out a deep sigh, and light a cigarette as you stand on the walkway, looking out at the setting sun. The tension drains away from your shoulders as you realize you got away with it.

You'll have to get further away from Aya before you start reading her journal- don't want her to walk in on you reading it. It's already going to be awkward enough when she starts asking questions to herself as to how she managed to lose something she kept there.

But for now, cigarette.

Suddenly, you feel a hand around your waist, hot breath on your ear, and an all-too-familiar voice whispering: “You're a terrible person. Taking what you want, and leaving her to awaken alone in the morning? Ice cold, Mr. Investigator.”

Goddamn dames. All they are is trouble.

[x] Be the Investigator.
– [ ] Ask Sakuya to go through the journal with you.
– [ ] Deny everything.
– [ ] Search the mansion with Sakuya.
– – [ ] Search the mansion grounds.
– – [ ] Search inside the mansion.
– [ ] Write-in.

[ ] Be other characters We'll get back to them.

– [x] Ask Sakuya to go through the journal with you.

It's probably in moonrunes. Unless she's writing her journal in English because she knows the Investigator is going to try to read it...

[x] Search the mansion with Sakuya.
-[x] Search inside the mansion.

Mine as well get a good idea of the layout of this place.

[x] Be the Investigator.
– [x] Ask Sakuya to go through the journal with you.

We may as well reap the wisdom of Aya's bosom now; in case she notices it's gone as soon as she wakes up. Then later we can "find" it and return it to her, scoring us more points.

Love Aya, but Kotohime is quite attractive too (yay redheads.) From the way she's written, and the way the Investigator reacts to her, I'm getting the feeling that somebody has had issues with hyperactive crazy clingy girls in the past.

>>136269
Oh god you have no idea.

Update delayed. Because, you know, earthquake + tsunamis + fun times.

[x] Ask Sakuya to go through the journal with you.

Not even gonna look at her. Not gonna give her the satisfaction. Jesus. Can't a man get a moment to himself to get a smoke?

“Well? Are you going to read it?”

“You that interested?”

Obviously she's interested. She's about as interested as a hobo on Grand River that's eyeing a ham sandwich. But she'll deny it. Trying to look cagey. I've got your number, and I can read you like a book.

“Not really. I'm just wondering how you'll read it.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You seen any English letters around here?”

You think back to what you've seen in the bar, and in the other places in Gensokyo.

“Not... really.”

“So how are you gonna read that?”

Sometimes, I hate this broad.

“I'll find someone to translate for me.”

“How about me? I'm right here, and all your secrets are safe with me.”

“Nope.”

The least I can do is keep her off-balance. She obviously wants something. She's not going to get it from me.

“Why not?”

She almost sounds petulant. Oh, mysterious knife-bitch crazy-hooker, you ain't got nothing on me. I've been dealing with crazy broads for years now. I can deal with your type.

“Because you obviously want to read it. Which means that I obviously don't want you to.”

“When have I been anything other than helpful to you?”

You turn around to face her for the first time. She's pouting at you. Pouting. And this is the girl who tried to murder you bloodily with knives earlier. And she's wearing your hat. What the fuck.

“Did you forget that time WHEN YOU TRIED TO MURDER ME.”

“No, but-”

“But nothing. And because of you, I have to hide three murders instead of just one.”

Now she seems like she's getting mad. Now we're getting somewhere.

“So what would you do without me?”

“Same thing I've been doing already. Covering my goddamn tracks and finding a way out of here.”

“And without me, who would you have helping you?”

“Aya seems exceptionally willing to help me.”

“And yet you went and stole her notebook. Somehow I don't think you'll be trusted.”

“Right. Like I'm going for trust here. I'm not looking to be trusted. I'm not looking to be loved. I'm going to use her just like I'm using Red. Just like I'm using you.”

She is struck speechless by that last part of the sentence. You can see her mouth working, but no words are coming out. Perfect. And now I've got her in the palm of my hand. You turn away from her, and start walking into the deeper reaches of the house, and give a dismissive wave of the hand.

“I'm going to find out about where I am. You going to make yourself useful, or are you just going to stand there gaping like a dying fish?”

Wordlessly, she runs up to you and starts walking with you. She's red-faced, and obviously angry. “I'm not doing this for you.”

“Sure you're not.” She is now.

She just folds her arms and pouts. You toss her Aya's notebook.

“You didn't even look at it!”

“Don't have to. You'll translate for me.”

She grumbles and starts reading as she walks with you.

You walk to the end of the open hallway, as the sun finally starts to set to the west. Sakuya sits on top of the railing. She's silhouetted in the setting sun. Really, it's a nice effect, and it makes her look so much less intimidating. Or that could be because of earlier. Nice to be back in charge.

“So, what have we got?”

“Most of it's just gossip she's gathered about other people in Gensokyo.”

“Don't care. Could be useful later, especially if I know I'm going to need to lean on someone, but we'll cross that line when we come to it. Speaking of that. Since I'm an investigator, and I'll need a notebook, that seems a fairly decent place to start. You think you could translate it into English in a second notebook for me?”

“Shouldn't be too hard.”

“Good. Okay, next thing then. Anything about me in there?”

“Yeah. Obviously, you're new, newsworthy, and interesting. That's enough to get Aya to latch on to you. Here she's writing that she's going to try to get close to you so that she can take that and rub it in Kotohime's face.”

“So she's not actually trying to get me. She's just trying to spite Red.”

“Looks like it.”

“Oh, that's so much nicer. At least I only have to deal with one dame like that then. And she's doing it to spite Red. I might actually enjoy her company for that.”

“You're not a very nice person.”

“Neither are you.”

She smiles. “Right. About the murder of Akyu... I don't think she's too worried about that. I don't think she even suspects you- she's pretty much written in here that she's not bothered with investigating it, she's just going to take your results and publish them for the exclusive.”

“Ah, journalistic laziness. Glorious.”

“She obviously thinks this is her big break that she can use against Hatate.”

“Hatate?”

“Yeah, she's another crow tengu reporter. Runs the 'Kakashi Spirit News.' It's another Gensokyo newspaper, but it's not nearly as popular or widespread as the Bunbunmaru. Aya really doesn't like competition, and the murder of Akyu is the biggest news event in... quite a while, actually. So they're both trying to get the story.”

Another person investigating the murder? Horning in on your territory. That could be dangerous for them. You'll have to go... and “inform” them, sooner or later.

“Anything else?”

“Not really anything important. I'll get you that English version.”

“Good. When you come back, do me a favor, and change out of that maid uniform. It makes you look like a hooker.”

She frowns at you. “But I like it!”

“But obviously you want something from me. And since you're going to be investigating along with me, I'm your boss. And I say change it.”

She pouts again. I do like seeing her like that. “What do you want?”

“Something classy. Something along the lines of what I'm wearing now.” You gesture to your black suit and tie and overcoat.

“Fine.”

“And give me back my hat.”

–

Now that Sakuya's gone, you continue searching through the mansion for something to catch your finely-honed investigative instincts.

The sound of laughter filters down to you through the mansion.

Well, at least there's some people here.

You work your way through the passages and rooms of this mansion. Unlike the Scarlet Devil Mansion, Eientei is fairly open and easy to navigate. A nice change.

Finally, you get to the door seperating you from the laughter. You slide it open very slightly, and peek inside.

There you see... some blonde dame with a poofy dress, some hooker sigh in a multicolored nurse's uniform, with silver hair, another dame with ridiculously long violet hair... and Meiling. They're all sitting around a hookah, and passing it around. Though it seems that Meiling is trying to avoid having it passed towards her. She even looks a bit worried.

The blonde one gets up, and walks towards a door, opens it, and steps through. You figure you can make it to that room without being noticed by the other three by going around that room and taking a secondary path to the room that the blonde just entered.

Of course, you could just go into the room with the three in it... but then they'd know you were here. And you'd kind of like to put that off as long as possible. And you'd like to know why Meiling is here. If she followed you, that could be really bad.

Finally, you could just sit and watch... but they're just sitting around getting stoned. Not really that useful.

[x]Be the Investigator.
--[ ] Follow the blonde.
--[ ] Walk into the room.
--[ ] Search for why Meiling might be here.
--[ ] Sit and watch.
--[ ] Write-in.

[x]Be the Investigator.
--[x] Follow the blonde.

Gee, Investigator, you're a real dick.

>>136580
You might say he's a hard man to work with.

[x]Be the Investigator.
--[x] Follow the blonde.

She’s all alone. And nobody knows I’m here.

Perfect.

You duck away from the door, and silently walk across the tatami mats on the floor of the room. As you’re doing that, you slide your hand into the inside of your coat. Yep. It’s still there. Finally, since this time you’re going to do it right, you slide on a pair of black gloves.

Old friends. It’s like they never left me.

--

Oh man, the air in there was starting to get at me.

You giggle.

Eirin’s got the good shit, though.

You’ve moved away from the party based on “got to get some clear air.” And to that end, you’ve gone to a room which leads outside to the Bamboo Forest of the Lost.

Of course, you’re not going to get lost. You’ve been here often enough. And hell, just because it’s dark doesn’t mean anything at all. Besides, there are animal friends in the forest! And you’re going to say hi.

--

Passing through a walkway to another room floored with tatami mats, you silently slide open the doors. At least one thing’s good about this architecture. It’s so much easier to sneak around. Finally, you come to the door which you think probably has the blonde in it. Sliding it open…

Nothing. She’s not there.

Crap. When am I going to get another opportunity like that?

And then you hear a giggle out in the forest.

--

Wheeeeeeeee~

You’re spinning around and around in circles.

Or the world is. You’re not sure which.

But the music and colors are so pretty~!

--

She seems to be spinning in circles out in the forest, running in between the bamboo, and shouting as she does it.

If I could get some of that stuff back to Detroit, I’d make a killing. Maybe I’ll ask about it later.

Shame bamboo is so thin- you won’t really have a place to hide. But it’s dark, and your clothes are black. Maybe you can hide in the shad- FUCKING I HAVE GREEN HAIR. Goddamnit Red!

Okay, maybe you can TRY to hide in the shadows. You pull your hat down over your hair as far as it’ll go.

Fucking green hair.

You slink over to the walkway, and drop silently over the railing behind a bush.

Closer. Gotta get closer.

--

Maybe there’s a unicorn in this forest. Maybe I can find him. Maybe I’ll name him Steve. Steve the Unicorn, yeaaaaaaah~

Thoughts of you riding a triumphant unicorn steed run through your head, as you frolic in the bushes and swing from the bamboo.

Or at least try to swing from the bamboo. When you grab onto it at full speed and jump, it just cracks off and you land flat on your back.

Giggling.

This is so much fun!~

--

I don’t know what kind of bullshit powers this one has. Gotta be sneaky. Can’t have her perceiving me as a threat. It’d really be best if she didn’t perceive me at all. God, I wish I had bullshit powers of invisibility. That’d be so goddamn useful.

You think about that for a second.

Maybe you get bullshit powers just by being here. Because, you know, that’d be really useful. Bullshit invisibility powers, activate!

…Nope. Still visible. Did you really think that was going to work? You’re so stupid. Stupid stupid dumb.

Oh well. Gonna have to rely on sneakiness.

You start to edge slowly towards her, praying and hoping that you will be nothing more than a shadow in the darkness to her.

--

As you’re running around in the forest, you notice a shadow.

You stop, and peer intently at it.

--

Goddamnit the broad spotted me. You freeze, as your mind runs a million miles an hour trying to think of ways out of this. Run? No, suspicious. Charge at her? But what if she has stupid bullshit lasers? Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

--

Bunny!

It’s a bunny rabbit! And the biggest one you’ve ever seen! Well, kind of. Tewi and Reisen are bunnies. But they look like people. This is a bunny! A fluffy, furry bunny and everything! In a suit!

Bunnies need hugs!

With a shout of “Bunny~!” you charge at the rabbit, with full intention of a perfectly executed glomp maneuver.

--

“Bunny!”

What the hell?

And then the dame charges at you, arms outstretched, as she barrels into you and knocks you down in a hug.

oh goddamnit

--

You nuzzle your face into the bunny’s warm chest.

I love bunnies.

With a satisfied “Hmmmmmmmm~” you latch onto the bunny.

--

This “Bunny” stuff gives you an idea.

“But Miss Alice, I’ll be late. Late for an exceedingly important date!”

She looks up at you and says, “But I’m not Alice! Silly bunny.”

While she’s distracted, you reach inside your coat and draw out your knife.

“Of course you’re not. So silly of me.”

--

Silly bunny~ Thinking you’re Alice. You’re so much prettier and nicer than her. But she can be nice sometimes.

I should go say hi to Alice sometime soon~

Unfortunately for you, that was the last thought you had before your consciousness was shattered into a thousand burning fragments, as a searing pain flares up in the side of your neck. Fortunately, the distance between your nerve endings on your skin and your spinal cord was only a few centimeters, a small distance to be closed almost immediately by a skilled man. And he was extremely skilled. When your spinal cord was severed, you didn’t feel a thing.

--

Ugh. Who’d have thought the crazy dame would have so much blood in her?

Perfectly good suit, probably wasted. But there’s a reason you carry spares.

You slide her body unceremoniously off of you, and she thumps softly onto the grass, onto an expanding blood puddle. Her face is fixed in that land between ecstatic joy and excruciating pain. The effect is profoundly disturbing, and her eyes are still open.

Yep. Just gonna leave that there.

Now, to clean off…

You wander off into the forest a bit, until you reach a burbling stream. From there, you strip the blood-soaked suit, and wash the blood off of yourself and the hat in the stream. After that’s finished, you place your safe dial on the ground, dial in your combination, and pull out a fresh, nicely folded suit. You place the bloodstained one in the safe, close it, and pocket the dial.

All things considered, that went rather well.

You adjust the suit, and start whistling a rather jaunty tune as you walk back to the room where Aya is still asleep.

Sakuya’s knife is in the dead broad, and Aya’s still asleep, so I can establish my alibi perfectly. It’ll be nice for them to have someone to pin this on. Especially before they come to the conclusion of ‘Hey, maybe it’s the new guy!’

With the feeling of a job well done, you take off your hat, and place it on Aya’s head as she’s sleeping, and then you lie down next to her, smiling and feeling rather satisfied. You run your finger down Aya’s spine, between her wings. She shudders, and smiles sleepily, and latches onto you in a sleeping hug.

Yes, indeed, I think that went rather well.

--

Now your choices are:

[ ]Be Meiling/Kotohime.
--[ ] See previous write-in.

[ ]Be Patchouli/Wriggle.
--[ ] See previous write-in.

[ ]Be any of the others in Eientei at the moment.
--[ ]Write-in.

[ ]Be Flandre
--[ ]No dial tone.
--[ ]Please hang up and try your call again.
--[ ]2600 hz tone

[ ]Other write-ins?

Why is a story about horribly murdering Touhous for little to no reason so funny? You are a bad man.

[x] The delayed write-ins I don't feel like copy/pasting

>>136710
It's less "picking the delayed write-ins", they're going to happen. It's more "picking which one you want to see first."

[X]Be Aya
--[X]Vivid description of dream.
----[X]Very vivid.

Also goddamn but these updates are GLORIOUS.

Did we just murder Yamame?

>>136717
In cold blood, no less.

You asshole.

>>136711
Ah. This one, then.
[x]Be Patchouli/Wriggle.

[x] Be Meiling
-[x] Fuck it. Remilia doesn't even pay you. Get stoned.

Argh! You were supposed to kill Eirin, damn it!

[X]Be Patchouli/Wriggle.
--[X] See previous write-in.

Our Modus Operandi is to murder every touhou while implicating every other touhou for the murder of other touhous.

It's a way to have work for a long time. Though seriously, did we have to kill Yamane? Couldn't we have, you know, knocked her out?

Ah whatever.

>>136735
I just wonder what you would accomplish by knocking her out when the goal was to frame someone for murder. It wasn't that it was Yamame, or that he didn't want to be noticed by her. It's that there needed to be a body, and she was the best way to get one. Or rather, the most convenient.

I'm glad that youkai can take more physical damage than ordinary humans and can heal from the most grievous of damage, and since Yamame would be in the care of one of the greatest healers in Gensokyo if she's found soon, she'll be perfectly fine.

Right?


Right...";_;

[X]Be Aya
--[X]Vivid description of dream.
----[X]Very vivid.

>>137019
You lost your spine, spider youkai lady? What's that, your spider youkai insurance doesn't cover spines? Too bad!

>>137019
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOPE.

And you doomed her yourself when you voted for [ ] High Fever.

>>137090
ffffffff

Sorry guys. My bad.

Can we get a detailed breakdown of what the fuck the vote choices meant there?

>>137134
Sure.

High Fever was a write-in, so I hadn't planned it. But:

[ ] Hippocrates (Eirin)
[ ] Hippopotamus (Keine)
[ ] Hippocampus (Nitori)
[ ] Hypothermia (Cirno)
[ ] Hat (Marisa)
[ ] Hippity-hop (Tewi)
[ ] High seas (Murasa)
[ ] Hyper and creepy (Koishi)
[ ] Hyper and creepier (Nue)
[ ] Hold the strings (Alice)
[ ] Hold the mustard (Mystia)
[ ] Hatefulness (Parsee)

Each of those choices would have led to the eventual death of the selected character. But it would have played out differently.

>>137182
Ah.

I feel like a bastard for saying this, but better Yamame than most of those.

>>137184
Worry not. I'll do my best to hit most of those.

>>137189
...you bastard.