"No."

Marisa stared, unable to accept such a flat rejection. She tried again. "It's not like I'm asking you for money. Hell, I'm offering my help!"

"No."

And with that, as if the matter was settled, Reimu flew past Marisa and towards the Human Village.

"Now hold on just a tick..." Marisa made a U-turn with her broom and flew after Reimu until they were travelling side-by-side. "Since when have you solved incidents all by yourself?"

"This is not that kind of incident." Reimu turned to glare at Marisa without pausing. Her grip on the large bundle in her arms tightened. "Go home."

"Too low-key to really count? I'm bored anyway. Any incident is better than none."

"You're wrong." When Marisa made no sign of leaving, Reimu sighed. "What can I say that will actually make you go away?"

"You coulda told me there was treasure elsewhere, or that Patchouli just got some new books flown in." Marisa flashed a grin. "Too late now. I'm coming with ya, and you can't convince me otherwise."

Reimu stared at her blankly, with the kind of look that made Marisa think the shrine maiden was considering whether she could murder and bury Marisa without anyone finding out. Then, she turned around and kept going. "Suit yourself, then. Blame me for not liking what you see, and I'll wring your neck."

Marisa chuckled as she flew after Reimu. "I won't complain. Magician's honour."

Reimu made no indication she acknowledged her words, and kept going as if Marisa weren't there after all.

"So, is this really an incident, or are we heading to the woods to pick mushrooms?" asked Marisa after several minutes of silence, grinning. "Gotta warn ya, some of 'em need to be rinsed before cooking if you don't wanna die. Then again, I've tried your cooking. You've gotta have an iron stomach if you can digest that stuff day in day out."

Reimu made no response.

"What are you carrying, anyway?" Marisa peered more closely at the bundle cradled in Reimu's arms. It was a heavy and lumpy, tightly wrapped in white cotton cloth. "Someone manage to make the shrine maiden a delivery girl by promising some pocket money?"

The glare Reimu gave her was venomous enough to kill a weaker person dead in their tracks. Marisa, steeled as her soul was, grinned back, trying to vehemently hide the twinge of foreboding within her. "Just kidding, Reimu. Don't take it seriously."

"This is serious," said Reimu, then shut up like a clam, correcting her course towards the Human Village and going back to pretending Marisa was nothing more than a noisy gust of wind.

Since Reimu was clearly not in a receptive mood, Marisa continued to make jibes inside her head instead. Perhaps the bundle held Reimu's dirty laundry, and she just didn't want Marisa to see her unwashed bloomers. Or maybe the bundle's size was a ruse, and somewhere underneath those white folds was a love letter, addressed to some poor sap who would soon enough be tending to the Hakurei progeny.

Several people were waiting for Reimu on the main street of Human Village, far more in fact than Marisa had seen show interest in the Hakurei shrine maiden in a long time. The only face she could name was that of Keine Kamishirasawa, standing by a distressed young couple, her hands clasped and her expression grim.

At the sight of Reimu, and the bundle in her hands, the woman next to Keine burst into tears. The man quickly took hold of her shoulders, looking like he was desperately holding back tears himself.

A queer feeling took Marisa, and she stayed behind as they descended. She looked on as Reimu approached Keine and the couple. The faces of the villagers around them were funereal: everyone looked at their feet, only briefly glimpsing at Reimu and the bundle before averting their eyes again. An old woman near Marisa, her face a map of wrinkles, mumbled under her breath and made a warding gesture.

Reimu, handling the bundle as if it were as precious as life itself, first offered it to the woman, but to no avail; by now her sobs had become so violent her entire body shook with them. The man by her side seemed to wilfully ignore Reimu as he comforted the woman, shedding silent tears of his own. When no hands were extended to accept her offering, Reimu turned to Keine, who took the burden solemnly.

During the exchange, the bundle got slightly unravelled, and while Keine hastily rearranged the cloth before staring worriedly at the couple, Marisa had time to catch sight of what was revealed. A tiny pale hand, and an arm as thin as reeds.

The bottom fell off Marisa's stomach.

She saw lips flapping, but heard none of the words accompanying them. She saw more emerging tears, the heartbreak, and the pitying eyes of the onlookers. She saw Reimu bow her head and follow the disconsolable couple and Keine into their home.

Marisa didn't follow. A few villagers gave her looks, but none disturbed her. Despite the mist gathering in her mind, she caught sight of another village couple, the only people around who looked anything but sympathetic or sad. They stood some way apart from everyone else, whispering to each other, a nameless terror lurking behind their eyes, mounting panic obvious in their gestures.

Marisa's ears buzzed. She wished she could hear what was being said, but any words spoken around her might have as well been the droning of insects.

Reimu re-emerged, empty-handed, in what was probably five minutes but felt like a year. Ignoring the murmuring villagers, she walked straight towards Marisa before pausing two yards away.

Their eyes met.

"Sorry about what I said," Marisa began quietly. "Earlier, I mean."

"You didn't know," said Reimu, like that was all that needed to be said at all.

"Yeah, but still." Marisa scratched the back of her head, feeling foolish and far more hollow than she cared to admit. "I should have listened to you anyway. So what I'm trying to say is that I'm seriously sorry."

"Apology accepted." Reimu turned to face Marisa. "You can go home now."

Marisa hesitated. "Actually, if it's all the same to you, I'd like to tag along still."

Reimu raised her eyebrow, if only for a second. "This isn't the fun kind of incident."

"The other ones weren't all moonlight and roses either." Marisa managed a weak grin. "Look, I'd only feel more rotten if I ditched you now and made you deal with this crap all by yourself."

Reimu shrugged. "It's my duty."

"Well, making sure you're doing okay is my duty, right?" When Reimu gave her a confused look, Marisa found she could smile in earnest again, if only faintly. "It's something friends do. Get used to it."

Reimu clicked her tongue, but made no further effort to stop Marisa from trailing her.

They flew together in silence for a while.

"So," Marisa said after a long silence. "What exactly happened?"

Only the wind replied at first. Then, matter-of-factly: "There are actually two girls missing."

"Huh." Marisa's mind immediately jumped to the other couple she had seen in the village. Had they been the other girl's parents? She regretted she had been too dazed to spy on them.

Reimu took a deep breath. "The pair of them were playing by the edge of the fields. Too close to the woods, common sense says, but kids rarely listen. The people tending to the crops lost sight of them. They didn't come back. The villagers searched the edge of the forest. Nothing." Her voice was toneless, like she was reciting a particularly boring news article from the Bunbunmaru. "They summoned me, so I searched. Found the corpse, not too far into the woods. Fang marks. Claw marks. Guts missing. Flesh missing. No sign of the other girl. I took the corpse back."

Marisa digested the new information, allowing it to sink in on its own accord. Several questions emerged, but although she opened her mouth, she decided not to voice them after all. Any other time, she would have gleefully speculated over the details and presented her own theories, but there and then it felt pointless. Childish, even. What was the use of pointing out this wasn't how the youkai of Gensokyo behaved nowadays, that any youkai ready to kill and eat a village child under the watchful eyes of Reimu and Yukari was either very stupid, very hungry, or unfamiliar with how Gensokyo worked. That it was weird the other girl was still missing and Reimu hadn't found her yet, or that is was extremely odd Reimu hadn't immediately rushed to search for the other missing child, since the corpse wasn't going anywhere and there was a chance the other girl was still out there somewhere, alive and most likely terrified. Or at least that she was out there in one form or another. So many theories available, and yet...

"You have a hunch," she said.

Reimu nodded, the movement barely visible. "I don't know how it happened, but..." She gazed into the distance, towards the Road of Limininality. "I have two courses of action here. Either I take the time to investigate and find out if my hunch is correct before acting on it, or else I follow my instinct and go straight to hunting the other child."

Marisa hesitated. She had never known Reimu had more than one course of action in her. "Don't you always go with your instinct? You know it's probably right. Hell, I know it's probably right."

"I don't care to be right here."

Marisa hesitated. "Yeah." So, Reimu's instinct told her the same thing Marisa's imagination had presented to her as a possible, if unlikely scenario. It hadn't been a theory Marisa had seriously entertained, but Reimu's instinct was uncanny, to the point where Marisa suspected it was her true supernatural ability. A shiver ran down her spine.

"Of course, if it's not what you think it is, making sure beforehand is risking another life," she said.

"I'm aware." The reply was brusque even for Reimu.

Marisa exhaled through her nose. "But you don't think you're wrong."

Reimu said nothing.

"Gotcha." Marisa raised her broom upwards and adjusted her course. "Then we'll investigate. Let's make sure."

Ignorance isn't really bliss, she thought as they travelled onwards in silence. As someone who had pursued knowledge from childhood, she knew ignorance was a curse. But even if ignorance had been a bliss, she wasn't sure it was one Reimu could've ever enjoyed, not with such a heavy duty hanging over her head and such a troublesome instinct hounding her mind. Not after what she must have seen earlier that day, when she had discovered the mangled body of that girl.

But, even Reimu could have a moment of respite. She had the burden of a whole world on her shoulders. She deserved a small break. And Marisa would fight a dragon to give her friend that much.

Marisa raised her collar towards her mouth as they landed on the banks of River Sanzu. Calm though it was, the atmosphere by the river to the other side was always heavy, and the thick air hard to breathe.

She glanced at Reimu, then followed her lead and waited in silence. It wasn't long until a tall figure on a boat emerged from the river mist.

"Hey, what's this?" Komachi hopped onto the riverbank with practised ease. "A suicide pact? How many times do I have to tell you it's no use."

"Spare us the jokes." Marisa had expected Reimu to glare or at least roll her eyes as she confronted Komachi, but her expression was like the tone of her voice: utterly blank. "Have you ferried any children across today?"

Komachi chewed her lip. "None of your business last time I checked. Don't think so, though." Her expression softened. "Why do you wanna know?"

"A little girl was found dead today," Reimu droned on. "About eight, brown hair and eyes. I need to talk to her."

"Haven't ferried anyone like that across today, no."

"I hoped so. Your slacking off has paid off for once."

"Wow, rude." Komachi pulled a face, but one with a smile. The smile faded, however, as she saw the look on Reimu's face hadn't moved an inch. "Right, well. She's probably here somewhere, but I can't have living humans snooping around here while I'm working. Any idea of the kind of lecture I'll have to sit through if— Hey!"

Ignoring Komachi, Reimu had turned around and waded deep into the sea of grass by the river, her gohei on the ready.

"The ghosts aren't in flowers now anyway," Komachi complained at Marisa quietly before raising her voice. "Oi! Shrine maiden or not, you can't just waltz in here and start interrogating ghosts! It's not even your domain." She was still smiling, but Marisa couldn't help but notice how tightly she was gripping her scythe.

Reimu didn't bother to even look back.

Komachi turned towards Marisa. "What's with her?"

Marisa shrugged. "She's taking this incident pretty seriously." Now that she thought about it, perhaps it wasn't at all surprising: as far as Marisa knew, this was the first time the spellcard rules had been violated to the point where a resident of Gensokyo died.

As Marisa watched Reimu stumble deeper into the fields, squinting at the spider lilies sprouting from it, she saw vague outlines of dead spirits separate themselves from the mist, visible only when they moved. She squinted to make out the details, but she only got hints of costumes and hairstyles, all else as indistinct as vapour.

From the way they moved, she assumed the spirits were disturbed by Reimu's actions, and escaped towards the river and in turn, Marisa and Komachi. Marisa blinked, but remained adamant. No reason to fear the dead before they open fire.

As the ghosts approached, it became more apparent what each of them had been in life: young and old, men and women, human and youkai. And one young child with long, dark hair and spindly arms, weeping as she approached the riverbank.

Reimu turned back and headed back towards the river, eyes peeled on the ghost child. The child's shoulders hitched, and it ran straight towards Komachi.

"Oh dear." Komachi discarded her scythe and crouched down, holding out her arms. The child sobbed silently, then rushed over and allowed Komachi to grab her into a bear-hug.

"Don't cry now, okay?" Komachi said, stroking the ghost child's hair. "Big sister's here, so everything's going to be fine."

"That's the one." Reimu said without inflection.

Komachi kept petting the ghost's head as if she hadn't heard. "And I should care because?" Her eyes narrowed ever so slightly. "I'd like to remind you that you have no right whatsoever to come over here and harass the dead."

Reimu folded her arms. "Consider this a debt. Next time you need assistance, I'll give it to you." She shrugged. "I'll lie to your boss about your procrastination or something."

Komachi chuckled wryly. "She's a bloodhound with lies. Smells them coming a while away." Still, Marisa could tell she was considering her options. "Now, some other favour, who knows..."

"Anything," replied Reimu without blinking an eye.

Komachi sighed. "This mustn't become a habit, okay?" She crouched down next the ghost child. "Can you still speak?" When the girl nodded hesitantly, she put her hands on the child's shoulder and turned her gently towards Reimu. "The big sister over there has some questions for you. Don't worry, she just looks mean. She'll be nice to you. Or else."

The ghost's translucent eyes flittered between Reimu and Komachi, but eventually she let go of Komachi's robes and slouched towards Reimu. It was the shrine maiden's turn to lean down, but the words she spoke to the child were so quiet Marisa could make no sense of them.

"She won't smile even to the kid today, huh?" She said out loud. Not that she was really surprised; obviously finding the body had taken its toll on Reimu. Still, Reimu did usually wear, if not her heart, at least some emotions on her sleeve, and the zombie-like determination on her face was starting to give Marisa the willies.

Komachi leaned into her scythe, a thoughtful look on her face. "Yeah, well. Let me think of a good way to put this..." She chewed her lip. "You know, after a while working jobs like this...you run into people of all sorts, right? You get to hear and see some really wild things sometimes. It can get pretty heavy, if you know what I'm saying."

Marisa glanced at Reimu still focused on the ghost. "Gotcha. How do you deal with it?"

Komachi shrugged. "Everyone's got their own way, I s'ppose. Me, I kick back and try to enjoy what I can." She winked. "You can only last so long as a shinigami and not have the work change you if you don't have a sense of humour about what you do. Besides, everyone I ferry across is going to get their comeuppance on the other side. Even when things get bad, I can rely on that. That's why I think there's no harm in listening to stories about grisly things as long as I know there'll be justice in the end."

Marisa smiled a little. "I wonder if Reimu feels the same way."

"That I couldn't tell ya." Komachi squinted at Reimu. "Humans might feel differently about it, anyway. Your guess is probably better than mine."

"Right."

"I'm sure she has some way of coping with it. Well, pretty sure." Komachi stood up straight and placed her scythe on her shoulder. "You're friends, right?" When Marisa nodded, she continued. "Keep an eye on her, then. I thought she was pretty half-hearted about her job, but seeing her today... If she takes things too personally, she might get depressed and close herself to the world. Isolation like that only breeds more isolation and then sin."

Marisa grinned. "You sound like your boss sometimes."

Komachi hung her head. "You'd pick up the habit too if you were lectured at as often as me."

"Heh." Marisa looked at Reimu again. The shrine maiden had finally stood up and was slowly walking away, without a word to Komachi or Marisa.

"I'll keep what you said in mind," said Marisa, before dashing after Reimu.

Even after Marisa caught up with Reimu, they didn't exchange a single word for the first five minutes on their way back towards the forest.

Marisa had thought herself itching to know what Reimu had learned from the ghost, but now that she had the opportunity to ask, she felt it wasn't that important to her after all. She knew already, in a way, or at least, had made an educated guess.

Once they were above the forest near which they had first met that day, Reimu broke the silence. "She was taken completely by surprise. She couldn't see the attacker very clearly, and it was over before she had time to think about running away."

Marisa nodded. "Right."

"She noticed the youkai had blonde hair and really sharp claws, but little else."

"Yeah."

"And," Reimu gave Marisa a lingering look. "She had just enough time to wonder where her friend had gone, and if she had been eaten first or had managed to run away." She took a sharp breath.

"You don't have to spell it out if you don't wanna," Marisa quickly said. "I get the picture." She would have bet all her books, and those of many other people, that the murder was the doing of a jinyou, a human turned youkai. And given the circumstances, there was only one likely jinyou around, as strange as it was. Just as she, and no doubt Reimu, had already suspected before their detour to River Sanzu.

"I suppose the real question is," she wondered out loud, "how it happened. We're talking about children, not sorcerers." A shiver ran down her spine. "You don't think Kosuzu—"

"No. I don't think Kosuzu has anything to do with this. For once," Reimu added flatly. "Keine knew nothing of it, anyway. I think the catalyst came from outside the village. There might be some misplaced artifact radiating magic over in the wilderness somewhere. But rather," and here, Reimu's eyes narrowed. "I have a feeling this is the work of some youkai. Purposeful, too, and trying to cover their tracks."

Marisa racked her brain for possible culprits. Yukari? Nutty as she was, she wouldn't do something this detrimental to the balance of Gensokyo. Would she? Seija? Some other ill-behaved prankster who had now completely crossed the line?

"This is heavy," she said.

"We can think about that later. First things first, we have to find that girl." Reimu raised her head towards the sky with the jerky move of a bloodhound sniffing a scent. "She's not far, I think. We need to catch her."

"Should we spread out?"

Reimu shook her head. "Give me a moment." Without waiting for a reply, she descended.

The copse of woods where they landed was a tranquil slice of paradise. Tiny violets and other remnants of the passing summer grew amidst the grass and twigs. All was quiet.

Funny to think there had been a body lying somewhere in the same forest that morning.

Reimu stood in place, eyes gently shut, both hands on her gohei. She made a pretty good impression of a statue.

Marisa leaned against the nearest tree, a lone gingko tree still in leaf. A mischievous instinct in her told her to make some quick quip, but she stopped herself, knowing perfectly well Reimu wouldn't appreciate it. Not that Reimu had ever been the number one fan of her jokes, but today...

If Marisa had thought Reimu still before, she was mistaken; out of the blue, she turned as rigid as a dead body, limbs stiff, eyes open and wide, pupils contracting, nostrils flared.

Marisa stood up straight, not daring to approach.

Almost as soon as it had appeared, the strange mood to come over Reimu was gone; her muscles relaxed, and a long, profound sigh escaped her like a spirit leaving her body. She remained upright, but from the way she stood it was a miracle she didn't simply collapse and land on her nose.

She opened her eyes again.

"I know."

And then, she was gone.

"Reimu?" Marisa called out, blazing through the forest. For someone so sedate, Reimu sure could move quickly when she was in a hurry.

She spotted something red and white through the trees, and as she approached, saw something with blonde hair quivering in the bushes near Reimu. The shrine maiden was yet to notice.

She pointed at the bushes. "There!"

Without a moment's hesitation, Reimu tossed several ofuda towards a nearby bush with shocking speed. The scraps of enchanted paper flew like knives, and only missed their mark because the alarmed youkai, warned by the yell, immediately ducked.

Marisa got her first proper look at their opponent. She had impressive claws and fangs, and eyes burning with fire. She was also small enough to pass for a human child.

"Tch" Reimu pulled new ofuda into her hand, but it was too late: after one last fearful glance, the youkai rushed away with almost tengu-like speed.

"Sor—" But before Marisa could finish her apology, she was alone again; Reimu was far ahead, trailing after the youkai, somehow matching her haste.

"Geez!" Holding her hat, Marisa gave chase. This was the entirely wrong kind of incident, sure, but she could at least enjoy the adrealine and excitement of an honest pursuit.

Weaving past the trees and the few alarmed fairies stalking these parts of the woods, she managed to regain sight of Reimu and the youkai. Both flew at alarming speeds, but by now Reimu was gaining, gaining fast... ten yards... five... one.

Reimu's knee struck the youkai on the back of her head, hard. To a youkai, it was a mere bump, but it was enough to cause her to falter and lose her balance, if only for a moment.

A moment was all Reimu needed.

She grabbed the youkai by her scruffy hair and indiscriminately shoved all three ofuda in her hand against the youkai's forehead. The youkai screamed as the divine spells inscribed on the ofuda began their work, and swiped furiously at Reimu, missing only by a hair.

Reimu grimaced, but her work wasn't done; she held onto the youkai as golden chains materialised from the ofuda, barely retaining her grip as the youkai thrashed like a mad bull. Marisa stared as the chains solidified and the youkai's limbs, one by one, were forced immobile by the moorings. Finally, the youkai fell over, and lay prone and helpless on the ground, her hair still in Reimu's grip. She snarled.

Marisa landed and was just about to take a step forward to both congratulate Reimu and offer help taking the youkai back to the shrine, when Reimu raised her hand and shut her eyes in intense concentration.

"What are you—" Marisa began, to no response. Her voice petered out as stunning, blinding light enveloped Reimu's fist.

"You can call gods just to a single body part?" Marisa wondered out loud. Surely it was possible, but she would never have assumed Reimu to have to kind of power necessary to do so. Wasn't the god of Reimu's shrine a total joke, at least?

Whatever questions she had about the situation, no answers were forthcoming. Reimu brought her glowing fist down the her chest level and held close to her body. Marisa caught glimpse of her eyes only a second, but the blank look in them told her everything she needed to know.

The youkai looked at the fist with a curious expression, a mixture of widened eyes and terror, but also a sort of impressed awe. She had ceased to struggle, and looked on as if hypnotised.

The chains made no sound as Reimu grabbed the youkai by the collar with her normal hand, helping her back to her feet. Perhaps whatever deity Reimu had summoned was assisting her with more than the glowing fist, as Marisa doubted Reimu usually had the kind of strength to single-handedly pick up a youkai from the ground, a fun-sized one or not.

And then Reimu struck.

It was a brutal punch, the kind to break bones and maul bodies. Normally, bare fists were a futile weapon against youkai, and that only made Marisa's blood curdle more as she saw the punch land and heard the sickening squelch of collapsing organs.

The youkai gasped, causing a mist-like cloud of blood to escape from her mouth.

Marisa expected a scream, a curse, something to fill the void in the air. Instead, the youkai only let out a shocked sigh as her life escaped her body. Coughing out one last spatter of blood, she turned limp in Reimu's hand.

Reimu let go. The youkai collapsed into a heap on the ground.

Reimu gave her an assessing tap with the tip of her feet, then turned towards Marisa. The initial spray of blood had hit her head on, leaving stains on her neck and shirt.

"It's done."

Marisa had no words.

Reimu gave her a long look. "What?"

"I know you've said 'exterminate' before, but..." Cold sweat ran down Marisa's spine, and she stopped. She had ceased to take Reimu's colder words as anything but trash talking and euphemisms years ago. Now, she had to wonder, in how many cases extermination had actually stood for killing someone.

"You've always known this." Marisa might have felt better if the words, cold as ice, had been accompanied by a sneer, or pity, or anything but the completely impassive, soulless look on Reimu's face. "This is what has always bubbled underneath the surface of Gensokyo. Didn't your parents tell you when you were a kid never to go into the woods at night because youkai would eat you?"

"Yeah..." Marisa's knees kept clashing against one another.

"And like you said, I've told you again and again that my job is to crush youkai?"

"Yeah, but..."

"Humans fear youkai. Youkai attack humans. Humans exterminate youkai."

Marisa shuddered. Reimu had always said that, yes, usually with a vaguely bored look on her face. This was different. This was a reality where Reimu's hands were covered in blood she felt no ounce of pity for. "I thought you devised the spellcard rules exactly so that something like this wouldn't happen."

"And now someone broke the rules. And I dealt with it. Youkai attack humans. Human exterminate youkai."

"I thought," Marisa's voice quavered. "I thought you didn't want to kill anyone."

"This isn't about wanting something. This is about duty. Youkai attack humans. Humans exterminate youkai," Reimu repeated the words like a wind-up doll designed to utter the same phrase for all eternity.

"You're friends with youkai," Marisa said with emphasis. As soon as she said the words, she began to waver. Was Reimu really friends with the youkai who kept wandering to her shrine, or did she merely tolerate them?

Reimu neither confirmed nor denied what she has said. "Youkai attack humans." She looked down the body by her feet. "Humans exterminate youkai."

"You..." Marisa raised her hand to her brow to find cold sweat. "You really are something else, huh?"

Reimu looked through her. A blank, pitiless gaze.

Marisa looked back at her rival, her best friend, a complete and utter stranger, she realised.

Something collapsed within her.

Reimu eventually broke the silence, picking up the corpse like it was nothing but air and stepping towards Marisa. "I'm taking the body to the village. Proof that it's been dealt with. After that, it's time for the real hunt."

"Yeah. You do that." Marisa's own voice sounded like it was coming from miles away. "And then, if you find out that the youkai behind this is someone you know..."

"It won't make a difference."

"What if it was Remilia? Or Yukari?"

"They know better than to do something like this."

"But what if it happened?"

"It doesn't matter now. There's even a chance the youkai wasn't a jinyou. Maybe she was some normal youkai masquerading as a child." Reimu looked up at the cloudy sky. "But if it did happen, I'd do my duty. Die trying with Yukari, probably."

Marisa shuddered. "Yukari wouldn't kill you. She knows what's at stake."

Reimu responded only with a single gaze, but Marisa could tell what it said. Youkai attack humans. Humans exterminate youkai. And with that, the shrine maiden floated gently into the air, as serene as if she hadn't been carrying the mangled corpse of a recently slaughtered youkai.

Marisa didn't follow her, not even with her eyes. Her gaze was still fixed to where Reimu had stood a while ago. Perhaps if she stared hard enough, she would discover she was stuck in a bizarre nightmare with no bearing to reality. That in reality, no-one had died, and Reimu had merely pummelled the youkai for scaring a child and then offered her tea. A world where the dark undercurrent remained where it was supposed to, the undeniable foundation of the land, but now so far removed from everyday life.

That had been so far removed from it...

There were no tears, but Marisa felt like there ought to have been. There should have been anger, fear, disgust, pity, some emotion that would pull her from the shock and screaming into reality, whether the old one or the new, uncertain one.

There should have been, but there was only the narcotic haze of barely controlled hysteria.

A giggle escaped Marisa's lips. It wasn't funny, but what she might feel if she didn't laugh scared her more.

Finally, when darkness fell, Marisa's legs gave way underneath her, leaving her kneeling in the undergrowth.

She had to leave, she realised distantly. This wasn't the Forest of Magic.

If you go into the woods at night, youkai will eat you.

Marisa got back up, dragging her leaden body.

"That's how it goes, right?" she muttered to Reimu, regardless of the fact she was miles away and could in no way hear her. "Youkai attack humans."

She began to laugh in earnest, heedless of who or what she might attract to her. She wasn't afraid.

After all, humans exterminated youkai.