"You missed a spot."
You paused and straightened your back. A quick glance to the side showed that, "No I didn't."
"Yes you did, right there." The booted toe wiggled in front of your face and directed your attention behind you.
"What? No I-?
it's not worth it, Bro. You sighed; your sister was right, of course.
"Fine. Fine," you grumbled. Slow turn into dragging your bright blue plastic water bin over and sopping your sponge with water and soap. Bend over, scrub, scrub.
Shiny floor tile.
One out of too fucking many.
"And there," that demanding voice came down from up high.
??"
"And over-"
The sponge went flying, splatting into the wall and leaving a wet mess along the way. "Are you going to help me or not?" you demanded.
The white-haired woman lounging on the hallway bench crossed her legs. She clinked as she did so, the armor plates that covered her thighs meeting the metal seat. "What? Why would I?"
"Because Rudolph- Ow!" Your mentor had the strongest arm you had ever seen or felt. Somehow, in her capable hands, a spare sponge became more dangerous than a steel ball.
"Do not talk about the Arch Paladin like that," she chided you, tone haughty.
"But his nose is- Ow! Stop it! You call him that too!"
You had thrown up your arms in defense, having expected your accusation to draw a third projectile. The paladin instead turned her head. "I have no idea what you're talking about. Now scrub."
"But he ordered us both to do this after you had the bright idea of burning-"
---
"Was this Rudolph your direct superior? Or the head of the order?" Akyuu asks.
You pause.
At this point you just take the question and roll with it.
Although Akyuu is capable of sitting quietly and listening, she apparently doesn't like to. "He was the militant commander in charge of all acts of intervention. Technically, he and a few others took council together to determine the actions of the Order but his word was law for us stabby-stabby ones."
"Interesting," she remarks, quickly scribbling a few notes into the notebook she had one of her servants bring her. "Then no one person could claim a direct spiritual line to a higher power and seize ultimate control over the Order?"
You appreciate her eagerness and active listening, If nothing else, it gets you thinking about topics you never bothered to before; she would probably make a prized student. "Uh, not quite? The diviners of the group claimed a spiritual connection to the Saint so the head of their branch could have been considered on top. But really, Cynthia truly was the Lady's namesake - a super tomboy that would have kicked the Arch Paladin from his position if she wasn't pegged as the Saint-reborn. She knew she didn't have much of a head for matters outside of fighting or gut judgements."
"Fascinating! So your order, despite having a largely militaristic hierarchy, still managed to avoid the seemingly natural progression that many civilizations devolve into and maintain the separation and balance in their founding? Perhaps due to the meritocratic nature of role fulfillment with the structure of the Order? Hmm?"
You let the history nerd settle herself before shrugging. "It wasn't like we were particularly large. A couple hundred members with only a couple centuries of existence isn't much."
"Still! It is quite an interesting counter-point to- Ah, forgive me, I interrupted. Please, continue."
Akyuu gives you a little wave of her little hands.
---
"I fucking hate-"
"Language!"
"Ow!" You whirled on the paladin marching behind you. "Why are you hitting me when we're in the middle of a mission?"
Your mentor was unrepentant even though she was wearing a solid steel gauntlet. "We must always hold ourselves to Her standards no matter what situation we find ourselves in." Her focus was only on you for a moment as she kept scanning her surroundings, constantly wary for danger. "And your loud whining will spook our target."
"I'm thinking our ?target? is just as lost as we are." You kicked the dirt, not nearly as concerned as she was. You hefted your longsword around, lazily swinging it an arc and chopping apart the spiked vines that were reaching towards you. "Or maybe the maze ate him already."
"it's possible," your mentor agreed with you. She didn't even draw her weapon. Instead, she simply stuck out her massive tower shield to create a wall between her and the hedge. Occasionally she would reach over and snap a grasping branch in half with her fingers.
"Maybe his bones were the ones we saw decorating the frost-hound's den back there," you hypothesized.
"Perhaps."
"Or that mud elemental had dragged him under and we walked over his perfectly preserved corpse three turns ago."
Your mentor grunted and turned around, another dead-end holding nothing for the two of you. "Do you have anything useful to say?"
Theoretically you two probably could have forced your way through, but it turned out the actual vegetation of the hedges bled magical acid. A bit discouraging, that.
"Nope! Sorry, but you only taught me how to swing this overly-large hedge trimmer."
For the first time on that thrice-damned mission, your mentor lost her cool. "That is
not all I have taught you!"
"Sorry, you've taught me a lot more than that. Like how to get lost in a, quote, "trifling wizard's trick that shall not deter us from our sacred duty.?"
"You little brat!" She moved to grab you but you danced away, the year of training letting you deftly avoid the heavily-armed paladin and the grasping plant walls around you.
"Sorry but it's true, and unless you have something else to teach me I think we're stuck here."
"Fine. Since you do not seem to appreciate anything I've had to say for the past year, let me demonstrate what I thought your tutelage under me and Her teachings would give you."
"A really nice singing voice?"
"Ah?" The certainly gave her pause. It was growing rarer and rarer as she grew used to your personality, but you still managed it.
"No," she eventually said. Instead, she rummaged around in her small utility bag and removed a gleaming crystal flask. "Lateral thinking."
---
"Does the water combust because it is enchanted too?"
"I don't know. As far as I'm aware, they just say a few prayers and then bottle it. Nothing magical that I was able to tell in my time using them."
"Perhaps it is not water then? Or a direct intervention from a god upon spillage? But your Order was dedicated to a martyred saint?perhaps a lingering duty of the Ministry?"
You snort. "I can imagine some poor soul getting stuck with the job."
Is that a fate worse than death? Watch the entire world for little crystal flasks breaking just so you can point a little fire their way. Mess up and suddenly you have thousands questioning their faith, all on your little bureaucratic head.
"Quite! Still, all this is fascinating. I wish I was able to travel Outside and see all these mysteries in distant lands."
You bite back your initial response; the mysteries get a lot less alluring after you almost die for the fifth time in a month.
But never boring, right? Of course, never boring.
"Never had the chance to travel?" you instead ask.
"I and my predecessors have never left Japan. Even within this country we know comparatively so little. There is far too much we have missed throughout the ages," Akyuu laments.
"So what about someone like Byakuren, for example. Do you know a lot about her?"
Smooth. "Lady Hijiri?" Akyuu takes a sip of milk and closes her notebook gently. "I assume you mean her far past and not her recent exploits here in Gensokyo."
"Yeah. She's told me a bit and I've heard some tales from the others, but I've always been a bit at a lost." Most of your knowledge could be summed up in what you've seen in the play or in what you read in the Gensokyo Chronicle after Akyuu showed you her life's work.
Sure, some of the information is wrong, but you only have a few personal anecdotes more.
"I see, I see! Yes, missing out on lifetimes of experience would cause you to feel a sense of alienation wouldn't it?" Akyuu leans back on her island stool, tipping it slightly. You see her handmaidens fluster in trepidation behind her at the little action. "I hope you'll forgive me, but those memories are very far back. I would need time and a lot of ink to write everything in order to recall the correct information. It is certainly possible but-"
"No, that's all right. Don't stress yourself." The archivist has already told you that while she's capable of recalling everything perfectly, it's a lot like searching through a vast library by hand. Not painful, but exhausting in some cases.
"Ah, do not dismiss me so soon! Let me see, let me see. In a general sense I can tell you many of my oldest memories are all impressions from within the Imperial Court. My first predecessors were able to glean tales from the help, but we mostly dealt with official records and court gossip back then." Already you can feel Akyuu ramping up again, no matter how few specific details she might remember. "When I say back then, I refer to the Heian Period of Japan's history. That was when the two Hijiri siblings began to appear in records. Yet, even then, they did not appear much. They were kept track of as a small splinter group of their local Buddhist sect, barely noticeable by anybody in the court.
"Myouren's death was one of the few important records. Or in actuality, the suppression of the supernatural within the region he used to operate in was noted. Traders flocked to the area once it was free of perceived danger and the entire region was rejuvenated in many aspects.
"I'm afraid it was at that point that Byakuren went off the radar, so to speak. Any further records I have of her come from rumors, and even then nothing concrete; sightings of roaming demons or youkai packs, a dark sorceress haunting long-abandoned caverns, a miracle here and there for lone travelers. I would assume that you might know more of such things than me.."
You don't answer her beyond a nod. You know the general concept that Byakuren was a bit unhinged after Myouren's death. However, she never cared to delve into the specifics of her time beyond a few anecdotes of her ridiculous demon teacher.
Not so surprising. It wasn't a happy time for her, and many of your conversations were focused on the less heavy topics.
You can imagine what actions she might have taken and regretted in that time.
A spirit of vengeance might not even compare to a cunning, hurting, person.
"Approximately a century later I believe the records made note of her again, in a similar manner as to how her and Myouren were noted of in the past. However by that time the land was beginning to fracture and our records became more muddled with strife. The very human conflict our land spawned also seemed to reinvigorate the supernatural; several of Byakuren's miracles during this time have living proof in the form of the youkai still beside her. Sometime later, I believe as quickly as within ten years of her reappearance, she disappeared again. I believe she came into conflict with a daimyo and was on the losing end of that fight."
What? "She attacked people?"
"No, no!" Akyuu is quick to put down that thought. "I do not mean to misrepresent. If anything, it should have been the daimyo instigating the conflict; in a time of war and conflict, it is only natural to crush potential rivals and show strength for those you rule."
And so she ended up sealed underground, to be released a thousand years later.
It wasn't much, and lacked specifics, but it's a bit more than you knew before. "Thank you, Akyuu."
"Not at all! I am sorry I could not prepare more information for you in advance. It is a sad and intricate tale to tell." For once, Akyuu's cheery countenance seems to fall. The girlish woman rubs her index finger in a circle on the countertop. "You might have figured it out by now, I find stories fascinating. Do you know why?"
By now, you're used to Akyuu asking questions, from how popular your style of underwear is to what walking through a supermarket is like.
This one, this doesn't have the same feel as those. "You like learning?" you respond.
"True! This living, breathing world is such a wonderful place. There is always something new to be discovered! I wish I could experience it for myself, as you have. Unfortunately there is far too much in the world for anybody to grasp, especially me. So instead I take in stories. I talk to try and catch a glimpse of this fleeting life. I write so that I have record that yes, I was here. I-."
Akyuu's speech is broken when a few servants step in to the kitchen and freeze. Her handmaidens immediately respond, blocking and seemingly berating the other servants for intruding. Akyuu looks moderately embarrassed as she jumps off her stool and goes to mediate the conflict.
After several hushed words Akyuu walks back to you and bows, the other servants moving quietly into the kitchen.
"Ah, pardon me! I'm afraid I tend to ramble. Our dinner preparations shall be beginning soon, so I imagine that if you have matters of your own to take care of now would be a good time to end. Thank you so much for indulging me!"
[ ] Find jiang-shi
[ ] Investigate forest
[ ] Return to temple
[ ] Check on Reimu
[ ] Update Nazrin
[ ] Visit Mokou
[ ] Why not talk more?
-[ ] About you
--[ ] Hopes
--[ ] Dreams
--[ ] Worries
--[ ] Shame
-[ ] About her
--[ ] Life
--[ ] Time
--[ ] Death
--[ ] Love
[ ] <Write-in>
---
Slow, low quality, meh content, relatively short - Ew. Fuck me. I also need to start thinking harder to tune these vote options appropriately.
I guess I'm not starting on that with this one.
>>185042 Ya ADD.
But don't worry; a theoretical Akyuu route would have been very difficult.
Thinking about it some, the difficulty would likely have been right up there with people like the celestials and Yuuka.
"it could have been really sweet, though.
>>185047 Because people just want know how to get more sex faster?
