Chapter Text
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He awoke from a terrible and strange dream.
Followed by death, running from clouds of blood, and finding fantastic lights to guide him toward a crimson moon.
At the end, he was pretty sure he’d died.
But it was just a dream and now he was awake. However, there was an uncanny feeling gripping him which he simply could not shake.
Aside from that: physically, he now felt something similar to a blanket of weakened fire, enough to notice your being warmed but nothing too threatening all the same. It matched well with the scent of tea and dust in the air. Dust was actually thick in the air, apparently; it tickled his ears as it settled on his still body. The one neglected feeling was sound. Even a taste of iron lingered in his mouth, but wherever he currently was was—
Flip.
Not soundless.
“If you’re going to open your eyes,” spoke a vaguely raspy, feminine voice, “then look up.”
He opened his eyes while looking up. “Up” seemed limitless. He was certain he was indoors, but the ceiling of this place gave an impression of the cosmos. Actually, was it the cosmos? Space, inside? There weren’t any stars... perhaps.
“Close your eyes.”
He did.
... A faint whining noise could be heard.
“Do you hear that?”
“Yes. Am I naked?”
He felt naked.
“You aren’t naked.” There was a clink of cup to plate. “Do you want to be naked?”
“No?”
“Why are you asking? You don’t answer questions with questions.”
“Does that count?”
“‘Why are you asking?’”
“Yes.”
“No.”
“No?”
“If you want to keep your ears—” he heard a page turning “—you’ll use them to listen to me. I would recommend listening to me in general, if you’d like to be worth anything.”
“Yes ma’am.”
“Now look to the right.”
Fairly certain at this point that he was dreaming, the young man decided to look to the left.
“Was that malfunction or defiance?”
She didn’t seem to want an answer from her tone, so the young man said nothing, closed his eyes once more, and returned his head to a neutral position.
“Remi’s mist shouldn’t have changed a human’s sense of direction like that.”
“Who?”
“Who is Remilia Scarlet? A question that rates lower than this tea.
However, like this awful tea, it hasn’t been long since Remi got here.
One could say it’s expected to not know the Mistress of Scarlet Devil Mansion.
So the question rates higher than this tea.”
He opened his eyes again.
“Remilia Scarlet... is my dear friend and the owner of this, the Scarlet Devil Mansion. The red mist you swallowed was hers. I didn’t tell you to look anywhere else.”
“What reason do you have to keep drinking tea that’s awful?”
“Our cat is trying something different for a special occasion. If she’s listening, I want her to know how poor it is. Although, I’m sure she’d make tea bad on purpose if she knew it would bother me or Remi.”
Cat?
“But you don’t have to drink it.”
“Itou Gen,” said the girl, “you can learn nothing if you do nothing.”
Across the clothed-table lit with two candles and topped with book-towers sat the woman he was speaking with. In spite of her sharp and biting tone, this woman, visually, gave off an overwhelming feeling of softness. She seemed to be dressed in somewhat fanciful sleepwear, furthermore a strange puffy hat atop her head decorated with a crescent moon, and pink cloth shoes were on her feet and adorned with bows of various colors. In fact, much of her person was adorned with bows, including her obscene length of hair. Like the rest of her, her hair was colored as if with bright pastels. Violet, same as her eyes which now blankly looked at the young man, named Gen, as he looked at her.
“I am Patchouli Knowledge, a magician.”
“And you seem to know that I’m Itou Gen, a college student.”
“I try to know, in general. If I want to learn about it, I’ll make sure that I do.”
“I’m flattered you wanted to learn about me.”
“You’re mistaken. Your wallet was found by our cat when she changed you and she rudely told me your name. Your name is a very useless bit of trivia.”
Gen realized he was not wearing the clothes he had worn yesterday (now, he looked like a medieval, Western farmhand), and that this and last night were probably not dreams. Perhaps his hobby of wandering had bitten him badly...?
Patchouli Knowledge closed her eyes and plainly announced: “Itou Gen, on a scale of usefulness, knowing your name would be twenty out of forty-three quintillion, two hundred fifty-two quadrillion, three trillion, two hundred seventy-four billion, four hundred eighty-nine million, eight hundred fifty-six thousand.”
“You don’t pull punches.”
“That was a sentence. Do you feel lightheaded?”
“I don’t.”
“I’m going to test you quite a lot before dinnertime. While we probably won’t use the red mist again, it’s good to know exactly what effect it has on humans.”
Patchouli began writing something down in another book. Gen allowed himself to look around the room some more, discovering that this was in fact a library: a really, very, absurdly large one.
“Miss Patchouli... when you say you’re a magician, you don’t mean you perform tricks do you?”
“I know sleight of hand, but can’t really do it.”
“A magician who can’t do sleight of hand...”
“Ahh, what am I doing? I should give up.”
Gen smirked.
“I’m a magician and was born that way. Interrupt me any more and I’ll turn you into charcoal.”
Gen pursed his lips and wore a strained and quizzical expression.
“May I ask some more serious questions?” he said.
“Fine,” she replied.
The answer was fast; much faster than he was expecting. Something about it, and how she seemed to be taking notes without paying him any mind, gave him an important impression: Patchouli Knowledge did not like wasting time.
“Where am I?”
“Generic...”
“I’d call it obvious, rather. Can you tell me?”
“If we’re being exact you’re in six places right now. Would you like to know them all?”
“...”
Gen was beside himself with this statement. He had lifted his hand and positioned himself in a pose reminiscent of The Thinker. He gazed upon Patchouli with eyes at once full of bewilderment and fascination. He was like this for more than a few moments, before settling on answering—
“Tell me the third place.”
“Beside Misty Lake.”
“Then... the fifth.”
“It’s called Japan, Nippon, or Nihon depending.”
“Sixth?”
“This is my interpretation.” Here, Patchouli lifted her eyes and gave Gen a smile indicating she was quietly pleased with herself. “Ordinarily, Japan is considered a part of the Asian continent, but anyone could tell you that it’s an island nation. I don’t see why you’d count it, and its land mass is certainly not large enough to be considered its own continent. In short, the sixth place is Earth.”
“I think I get it. Then the second place is the Scarlet Devil Mansion.”
“Correct.” Here, she returned her attention to her notes.
“The first is this library...”
“I haven’t named it anything particularly special.”
“The fourth is the answer I was looking for.”
“Gensokyo.”
Gen frowned and lowered his brow.
“Gensokyo,” he repeated.
“Yes,” she answered.
“I don’t imagine that’s written with the ‘Gen’ from my name.”
“I refused to read your name; I don’t know how it’s written.”
“Like ‘boy’.”
“Quiet.”
“Then it’s ‘Gensokyo’ written with the ‘gen’ for illusions?”
“Yes.”
“... Am I dreaming?”
“That’s a question with a lot of weight to it; if things go well for you, save it for another day.”
With this, the magician closed her notebook and stood up. She looked at Gen for a little while, and then seemed to glide to a bookshelf.
“I have something to do,” she said. “Until I return, read this.”
She had taken a large book from its shelf while speaking and came to stand before Gen, placing it on the table in front of him.
“What’s this?”
A fair question. The book had no title or indeed any manner of identification on its covers or spine.
“I greatly suggest you read it thoroughly. I also suggest you drink your tea before it gets cold. Goodbye.”
She left.
He watched her trudge into the darkness between the aisles of the library, and after some time heard a distant, but surely large door opening and closing. He returned his attention to the table, the book, and the tea set out for him he had only noticed due to Patchouli’s advice.
The book first. He opened it to three blank pages and a very ancient scent. On the fourth page he found words – English words; mercifully a honed skill of his. They were: “Firstly to the aspirant with willingness to become a practitioner of the art, sorcery, magic, or how it is called the strange and mystical forces which run a course through the earth and the air and the body and mind: your magic is never enough, and there is always a means to improve it.”
“‘You will learn magic,’” Gen muttered, “‘you will learn your magic is weak, and you will be better.’”
He gripped the handle of his teacup and brought it to his lips while turning the page. He took a sip, and shortly spat it out.
~~
Unknown to many along with being a wanderer Itou Gen was often a dreamer. He had more than passing interest in the occult, and at times had even practiced magic – to no avail, of course. It had never been terribly wild, either: charms, wishes, and bids for control of the classical elements. He never honestly practiced for anything more than curiosity and meditation. However Itou Gen was a dreamer, and so within him there was a spark, and this tome turned out to be for him a healthy grip of kindling.
When Patchouli Knowledge returned, the young man she’d decided to observe was slouched over the book she’d given him and a third of the way through it. Truly his posture was deplorable: he had a hand in his hair, an elbow on a handkerchief, and a whole arm bent and resting on the table. To be certain, the lad was absorbed.
The magician spoke before waiting for him to realize her presence.
“Have you learned anything?”
“—! You’re back!”
“Answer at once.”
Gen, who had nearly fallen out of his chair, turned his entire body to face his observer, readjusting his peasant-clothing in the process. Patchouli’s returning gaze was at once full of disinterest and pity.
“Yeah, I guess I have.”
“Slow.”
“Hm?”
“Is that all you have to say, not even at once? For various reasons, I’d classify you as slow.”
“Sorry.”
Patchouli huffed lightly and went back to her seat across from the college student. She looked at her teacup for a moment, and then looked at his. She smirked, then spoke.
“You didn’t enjoy Sakuya’s tea?”
“That the cat’s name?”
“Yes. But that aside, I feel you must have learned more from that book than what would warrant an ‘I guess’.” Patchouli reached across the table and took the grimoire, lightly adding, “It’s a good book after all.”
Gen had taken to slovenly placing both his elbows on the table, leaning forward with his fingers interlocked before his face. He stared at the magician, who fondly paged through her book, and thought Of course I’ve learned more. By his internal clock’s measure, Patchouli had left him in the library for about an hour, and though he found the tome fascinating (it really was a good book) he hadn’t spent all that time poring over it. Frankly, by all of this he was subtly perturbed, and had many, many questions.
His guess was that he’d come to “The Land of Illusions” (Gensokyo), seemingly by accident, but apparently nothing in it was illusory. Thus he knew: this world was quite dangerous. He hadn’t neglected to notice: he was currently in a mansion that was home to a devil master, the same master who had created the mist that had nearly killed him during his not-dream. Patchouli had also, perhaps subtly, suggested that he was not necessarily long for this world. Although he could speak with her calmly, he understood that his current standing was on about the same level as a lab rat. To be true, he felt it was probably less.
Why Patchouli wanted him to learn magic was a mystery, but having been shaken out of his reading by her return he remembered the sense of danger he had considered for some minutes earlier. Taking a serious tone, he spoke up.
“You know... I remembered earlier, I’d actually collapsed outside your mansion, and just before I did I’d honestly thought ‘I’m going to die’.”
Patchouli stopped paging through her book and looked at Gen dully.
“What are you bringing that up for all of a sudden?” she asked.
“Because I still feel like I’m gonna die.”
“Humans always die. It’s your nature as humans.”
“More specifically, I’m worried something will kill me.”
“Hm.”
The lad put one hand down and straightened his back a bit.
“Patchouli Knowledge,” he said, “why do you want me to learn magic?”
“You’ve been thinking a lot, boy-‘Gen’.”
She smiled at him, not altogether pleasantly.
“I don’t imagine you intend to make me your student,” he said.
“I’m a researcher, not an instructor,” she replied.
“Then what opportunity do you see in me?”
“I’m impressed. You’re starting to understand me despite us being acquainted for less than a pair of hours.”
Gen frowned. She continued.
“I mentioned before that it hadn’t been long since my friend arrived in Gensokyo. You’ve probably figured out that I arrived no sooner or later. Despite having researched this land extensively before we moved, there are many things about it that I don’t know.”
Here Patchouli took a sip from her... tea? Apparently she had a new cup, if the steam rising from it was any indication. Gen did as well. The boy was tempted to ask about it, but the magician moved on.
“Did you know? Shortly after we arrived here there was a sea change in Gensokyo. Remi was going a little wild, so the Shrine Maiden declared new laws of the land to stay her, as well as better maintain this realm’s fragile existence. What Remi did last night was provoke the Shrine Maiden to action, creating a situation where she had to enforce her new rules.”
Gen chimed in, saying: “What rules are these?”
“Putting it plainly, they’re rules forbidding death and harm. Conflict in this world is now settled with grace and beauty rather than violence.”
Patchouli set down her cup, and finished saying—
“However, these rules don’t apply to human outsiders.”
Itou Gen’s lips quivered and his mouth turned up at its corners. Slowly, he covered it with his palm, and laid his fingers on his face. Thumb on one cheek, three more fingers on the other, and a pointer cross his nose bridge. He looked Patchouli Knowledge in her eyes, and spoke with a desperation to hide the fluttering in his chest.
“... You never answered my first questions.”
Patchouli was smiling as she delivered her response.
“I was getting to that. You see, I’m in luck. Remi and I also came from your world, but in it we were bound by its laws. For a brief, exciting moment, our arrival in Gensokyo meant a chance that I could do as I wished to who I wished without any trouble.” She chuckled, her voice a bit more hoarse than before and thus sounding like a cough. Finally, she said: “Human experimentation.”
“Right. Human experimentation. That’s what I’d figured.” Gen began cyclically, rhythmically, tapping his fingers on the tablecloth. “But Miss Patchouli, I can’t say you strike me as the mad scientist type.”
“I probably won’t do anything classless, but you may not survive.”
“So you want me to learn magic because...?”
“I want to see if an outsider, ordinarily incapable of such feats, can do so here.” Patchouli took one of her books from the table and opened it to a remembered place. “And of course how strong they are.” She stood up. The hairs on the back of Gen’s neck stood up as well.
“I really am lucky,” the magician continued, not bothering to contain her grin, “Remi may have just drained you of your blood had she not decided to visit the shrine today. So soon after things changed drastically in Gensokyo, an opportunity presents itself.”
“... Miss Patchouli,” Gen ventured, “... you weren’t wrong, I learned more from that book than would warrant an ‘I guess’.”
“... The satisfaction from having a correct theory: it’s like a bite of cake.”
“Don’t be too pleased. I’ll disappoint you soon enough.”
Where Patchouli stood now, a candle stood between her and Gen. He stared at her through its gentle flame, and forgot to breathe. Holding his eyes closed for a moment, he gathered composure and spoke again.
“But hey, you might be surprised.”
Out from Gen’s lips crawled an archaic whisper in a lost tongue, and the flame of the candle between him and his captor curled into a spiral. It lurched back, and Patchouli smiled lightly as it flung forward, aimed at her nose.
She stepped aside and dodged it effortlessly, casting a smug and satisfied look at Gen as it flew past her ear. However Gen remained locked with her eyes without changing his expression, whispering again.
At once the dancing flame began to orbit rapidly around the magician, keeping her in place before suddenly pausing at her chest. The woman glared, and the flame erupted like a firecracker with a Pah!
Patchouli flew back quite a ways to avoid the sparks and embers, which tried in vain to follow her and died off in weak, twisted contrails and wisps. Gen stood slowly from the table, one hand on it so as to keep him still.
And Patchouli, again, looked satisfied. She huffed with excitement and a light wheeze decorated her voice when she spoke.
“This is great,” she breathed. “Not only is an outsider capable of the arts, so shortly after the spell card rules were set—” she lifted the book she had picked up out in front of herself, and offered Gen a wicked smile “—I can freely ignore them.”
Patchouli began to speak darkly, her incantations precise as opposed to Gen’s mumbling, and her words most definitely practiced and confident. Above her book’s pages, a plate-sized glyph materialized and glowed, and out of it licked eager fires, winding up her arm and gathering in the air above and behind her. The resulting amalgamation burned, and roared.
“Fire was it?” Patchouli cried in a louder voice. “In the West we have an old and common saying: ‘fight fire with fire’. I will invoke that sentiment now, and you ought to count yourself privileged—” the flames were becoming... ornate? “—you shall bear witness to the strongest unbridled flames Gensokyo will see in so many years, the fires that once started and shaped the world!”
The gathering flames had become something akin to a small sun, surrounded by what looked like a searing nebula that swirled around it menacingly. There was no comparison between the strengths of sorcery. To the simple and curious college boy, Patchouli Knowledge was a truly unimaginable magician.
“I hope you prepared well, Itou Gen! I will hold nothing back!”
Swiping the nearest candle from the table by its wax, Itou Gen fled, flames converging where he had been and crashing together like a violent sea. They turned and turned until they became a tall vortex of fire, swaying like a living being and reaching for the young man as he dashed behind bookshelves.
“I’ve yet to figure out how to make this sorcery into a spell card, but I can tell you all about it! While it mimics the sun this is no more than the classic element of fire! An Eastern variety. I have to admit I find Eastern magic to be rather fascinating!”
Itou Gen now hid behind a shelf different from that which he’d originally fled to, and he wasn’t listening very well to Patchouli’s musings. Gen had felt this was one possible outcome of his being “tested” by Patchouli. The book had equipped him with knowledge of simple offensive magic, after all, and in truth from it he had begun to understand three classic elements. Fire wasn’t the only one available to him at the moment, but after Patchouli’s declarations, he felt it wouldn’t be much in the spirit of things to call on air in this battle of flames. At any rate he was now in a duel, possibly to his death, with an absurdly powerful magician, and while he was terribly compelled to simply stand witness to the girl’s powers he knew that wouldn’t be the best of ideas. Itou Gen had to win, but unfortunately he couldn’t conceive any conditions of victory.
His magic couldn’t kill her and even if it could it wasn’t like murdering a person was something he wanted to do. It was also very unlikely that his magic could even incapacitate her. And just to kick him while he was down: his attacks had a very limited range, and he had gotten the distinct impression that Patchouli could fly.
Swallowing, Gen decided to give away his position in exchange for clarity.
“That’s fascinating, Miss Patchouli, really and honestly, but I have an important question. How does this end? With your discretion, my death, or some sort of victory on my part?”
Immediately after he finished speaking, he could hear flames coming from ‘round a corner. They flooded into the aisle like an unset river, eliciting the thought Is this fire or water? from Gen as he fled once more. Flame reached between his legs, fire shot over his shoulder, and a piece of his sleeve was burned away. This was simply terrifying.
“I will keep this up until you die,” crowed Patchouli, “but I’ll give you one exit: if you can manage five hits on me with your attacks, I will stop. Don’t bother trying to escape, there’s a barrier before the door.”
“Five,” whispered Gen as he dove under a table and fire soared overheard. He wasn’t even sure if he could pull five fires from a single candle! Hiding beneath this table, with candle melting in-hand, Itou Gen thought on his situation and environs, and he thought on them deeply.
~~
[ ♫: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWQ6JfbU8o08 ]
[Locked Girl ~ Burst Of The Flastration – The Best of Toho Tempest (Sonic Hybrid Orchestra)]
Patchouli honestly wasn’t entirely sure where everything was in her library. The mansion’s head maid liked to fiddle with its space and dimensions partially for small joys but mainly to get under the magician’s skin. Most of what that maid did was for such express, malicious purpose. But, she was a good maid.
However, with a hide-happy opponent like Itou Gen, and no firmly established conditions for a duel, Sakuya’s spatial manipulation actually put the master of the library at quite a disadvantage. Her not quite knowing her own area’s layout paired with a general lack of awareness on her part perhaps evened out this match more than one would think from a cursory evaluation.
Itou Gen did not want to die, and since he seemed fairly intelligent she wagered he wouldn’t try anything that would obviously get him killed. He would not face her head on, but instead try to fool her and land a sneaked blow. So, in the first place Patchouli would rise into the air and not move. She would create a fortress of magic where their fight had begun and wait for him to come to her, whereupon she would probably reduce him to ashes.
A few minutes had passed since then, and her first spell was dying down. Thus, she turned a page in her book and readied herself to incant the next one.
Pah!
Before she could speak, she heard a small, popping explosion from behind an aisle. She prepared to send her fire there when behind her another Pah! resounded. Another, and another came, from all around the library.
“Mu...” she mumbled with a tired face, “kyuu... I already don’t know where you are, Itou Gen. What’s the point in—? Hm?”
A strange burning scent was rising up from somewhere.
“Burning...? You...”
It didn’t quite smell like paper set aflame but not all of these books were in the best condition. If he’d put fire to one that carried a mold or mildew...
“... Earlier last night a small and loathsome human threatened to snatch away some of my books. But... theft is recoverable, boy-Gen. If you’re burning one of my books—” Patchouli turned to a different page in her grimoire, “—I’ll burn you away so thoroughly not even the Yama could put back together the blackened cinders that were once your soul.”
She bellowed another incantation. This one caused orange and red to ooze out from another risen seal, falling to the floor and beginning to snake and hop across it. The fires grew until they resembled animate ropes, and then ancient vines, and last serpentine, Eastern dragons. Patchouli called them to answer, and set them out to dance and kill whatever still breathed in her library’s halls.
And when the last darted out of sight, she realized there was warmth behind her neck. Curious, she looked there and found a small orb of fire that dove into her breasts.
“—!?”
She dropped as the orb burst harmlessly against her chest, singeing her clothing. As she fell she felt warmth at her neck again and swatted at it as if it were a gnat. In response, the orb circled her twice and stopped in front of her before flying at her stomach and torching her clothes there as well.
Patchouli soon reached the ground, landing softly but angrily. She turned about expecting to find Gen there, realizing only then that the lad had set two more magics in wait at the floor, which leapt at her without pause. She awkwardly stumbled ahead and tripped over herself, dodging the small bullets but smacking her nose on the carpet below. While she attempted to recover, the spheres did a roundabout in the air and aimed for her rear, marking two more successful hits.
Patchouli rose on one knee, still gripping her tome and now rather cross. She would have to cast another spell or retrieve her dragons—
Before her, Gen was emerging from beneath the table where they had previously conversed, having taken refuge behind the tablecloth. He cast aside a spent candle and reached for the one which remained atop his hiding place. He ran toward her, and began to incant.
And without a second thought, Patchouli drew from her sleeve a slip of paper. Gen drew near.
“Fire Sign—!”
“Rugiet!”
And each completed their spell at once.
“‘Agni Shine High Level’!”
“Ignis!”
The paper was burned and Gen’s candle heeded his call. An avalanche of fire erupted from Patchouli’s slip and began to spin out from her, while the flame of Gen’s candled lunged forward. The heat of Patchouli’s sorcery threatened to incinerate every hair on Gen’s body before swallowing the body itself, but before any of Patchouli’s boulders of flame could strike him, his spell shot out toward her hat, knocked it off, and then flicked the greater magician in her forehead.
And,
just like that,
all fires quieted.
Gen was frozen in his last pose, his candle thrust out in front of him like it was a crucifix and she a vampire. He wasn’t breathing particularly heavily, but his heart was causing chaos in his chest. That could have gone really badly for me, he thought, and yes, it could’ve. The fear of death and his opponent’s self-assurance had opened up a path to survival.
Patchouli looked at her opponent with involuntary tears in her eyes. The final flame had stung, and this ridiculous loss did something to sting her pride as well. Eventually she was the one to break their silence with a fact.
“Had that been a duel under the new system, you would have been disqualified.”
“A-And...” stuttered Gen, “and your spells? There’d be nothing wrong with using them?”
“I could’ve made it work, but underhanded spells that prey on opponent’s blind spots are truly unsportsmanlike.”
Gen put out his candle and let it fall to the floor, crouching to one knee like Patchouli (who kept talking).
“The new rules are about putting everything you have out for your enemy to see and letting them contend with it in its entirety. The basis is respect.”
Gen reached behind the magician and retrieved her hat, dusting it off.
“Well I’m sorry,” he said, offering her the toppled accessory, “when you tell a human you’re going to kill them, this is what happens. By the way, what I burned earlier was the contents of our teacups; please don’t make me into cinders.”
Patchouli took her hat and fixed it atop her head. She then stood, and Gen stood too.
“So what happens now?” he continued. “You let me go? You kill me anyway? Keep testing me?”
“What do you want to happen?”
“Huh?”
“What do you want to happen now?” she repeated.
Gen stared at the magician blankly for some seconds before settling on the answer:
“I want to live, obviously.
I just don’t know how much of a choice I have here.”
“Well then, shall we ask your fate?”
Gen looked to his right, Patchouli to her left. Gen looked incredulous, Patchouli fed up. Beside them, someone new had spoken: a very-composed, apparently happy maid who had suddenly appeared. Or, she seemed to be a maid. Her skirt was rather short...
“Who?” said Gen.
The maid continued speaking as if Gen had said nothing.
“Come, let’s see the Mistress. I don’t think it would be right to decide what to do with a guest of the house without first consulting its master, even if it’s you Lady Patchouli.”
“Remi’s back? ... Fine, you can tell Remi what you want to happen, Sir Gen.”
Patchouli started walking, the maid following after her. Slow on the uptake, Gen was the last to move. And so they left the great library, and entered Scarlet Devil Mansion proper.
~~
The mansion of the devil was certainly dark... that was Gen’s overwhelming opinion of the fanciful western home. There was nothing to let light in along the walls and very little else to create the stuff along them either. Frankly, it was an unnerving place, like it wasn’t somewhere where humans should tread.
He wondered if the maid was human; Patchouli, the magician, wasn’t after all. But, he distinctly felt that asking such a question would be dangerous. He would just assume she wasn’t for now, as they climbed stairs up from what seemed to have been a basement and into the mansion’s main area. This was considerably more opulent, but not pleasant. Not for him. There was a flower mural painted on the ceiling, and more candles flickering around them. To counter these mansion normalcies, there were several ways one could go from here, but each way led into a wall of darkness. Perhaps this wasn’t a mansion, and was in fact a prison of some kind. That was how Gen felt.
The three of them continued to climb, but there wasn’t much to see along the way. Every so often, out the corner of his eye Gen swore he saw children darting around corners, and every time he whispered his fear to no reaction from the native pair. Like this – certainly uneventful, horribly tense – they would reach the mansion’s highest points.
Out a ways before them as they summited the final staircase was a pair of gently swaying vermillion curtains. Behind them one could see the burning summer color of a sky approaching night, and there were glimpses of a table where somebody sat under a large parasol.
The maid stepped forward and cheerfully called, “Mistress.”
“Sakuya—” replied a child’s voice “did one of the maids start a fire again? I smell something burning.”
“That would be Lady Patchouli.”
“Patche did?”
Patchouli’s answer was cool as she approached the balcony, “I started some fire, but I didn’t burn anything.”
“What’s with that? Anyway, Patche—” for some reason, Gen was now instinctively frowning “—Patcheee, come here. I want to talk to you about the Shrine Maiden, and it’s been quite a while since you came out of the library again. Let’s talk!”
“Yes...”
The Mistress of the Scarlet Devil Mansion sounded unquestionably charming; there was no other word more appropriate to describe it. Her voice was an attractive blend of youth and power, topped with a smooth and gentle inflection full of absolute love. When she spoke, you could tell she only had care in her heart, and there was a playful quality that beckoned you speak with her. Why Gen frowned was not due to distaste for her speech, but instead distaste for his reaction to it. He was compelled to know her, and he knew immediately that this was unnatural. He didn’t get the sense that there was magic layered atop it or anything, but he understood it to be a phenomenal and inhuman voice. The Mistress of the Scarlet Devil Mansion would have to be a devil, and that her words and how she spoke them bid attention and desire of those who would hear them brought up a kind of fear at the back of Gen’s mind that he never imagined he could conceive.
The maid of the devil drew back the curtains as Patchouli came to step through them. Gen could see from the side of her face that the magician looked on the Mistress fondly. In response, the Mistress wore a very glad expression, but it was somewhat difficult to see against the sky colored with falling sun. Furthermore it didn’t last long. The Mistress soon made a face at her friend.
“Patche, did you forget to bathe again?”
“That never happens.”
“You spend so long in the library, don’t you?”
“That doesn’t mean I don’t bathe.”
The devil held her nose.
“Do you know a perfume or soap magic to use with your water? You should use one, right now.”
“Remi, my clothes are only singed.” With this, Patchouli took a seat across from her friend. “Settle down. Besides, one of the vampire’s weaknesses was the sun, wasn’t it? Not fire.”
“Didn’t you just say you didn’t burn anything?”
“I didn’t. He did.”
And they all three directed their attention to the human who had not moved from the top of the staircase.
“Hmm?” the Mistress cooed. “What are you doing over there? Come to me.”
Despite himself, Gen obeyed, beginning his approach. As he did so, the devil spoke again.
“You’re Patchouli’s guest?”
“‘Guest’, that’s... not what I’d call it.”
“Kidnapping victim?”
“That... yeah, I think that’s about right.”
She chuckled, and Gen’s heart beat. As he neared the balcony, he couldn’t suppress a question of his.
“Are you doing something with your voice?” he asked.
“No, I’m not.” Gen stepped outside and his eyes fell on the little woman as she continued. “I can, but I take pride in how charming I am without any help.”
Eyes adjusting to new light, Gen could now see that she didn’t simply sound like a child, she was one. She then introduced herself, allure falling from her every phrase.
“I should welcome you. This is the Scarlet Devil Mansion, and I am both its master and namesake: Remilia Scarlet. It seems you’ve arrived at an excellent time to Gensokyo. I’ve just changed this entire world, and not one day ago had it all under my thumb. A small push and I could’ve laid it utterly flat. What you suffered when you came here was me, and you should know that in this new age of the land of fantasy, none have passed into it as terrible as me. You should know my name and take pride in being one of the first here to remember it. And remember it well: Remilia Scarlet, the Scarlet Devil, and which vampire fate has been brought to heel.”
Skin that almost looked like it carried frost, eyes sharp and knowing, features demonstrating delicacy and sure stature, and small. She was small and unreal, a gorgeous non-human that at a glance might fool you into believing her “normal”, but only one good look could tell you she was altogether impossible. In opposition to her spellweaver friend, Remilia Scarlet was mostly “sharp” in her features. Her clothing (an expensive-looking pale rose dress and mob cap) was pillowy and comfortable in parts, but the slope of her physique, the fangs showing over her lips, the crafted nails, the black wings folded at her back, and the wild yet tamed and cropped hair were all pointed and curved like finely made glass. With red slit eyes shining beneath cold blue bangs, the Scarlet Devil offered Itou Gen a most pleasant look.
“Hi, nice... meeting you.” was the lad’s eloquent response. He coughed after saying it.
Remilia sat straight in her chair and folded her arms. She turned down her lips and brought down her brow. Gen just looked at her, and Patchouli decided to rescue him.
“He just used magic for the first time and used it against me. I think he’s been overwhelmed.”
“If he’s going to be boring,” said Remilia, turning to her friend, “I’m going to just enact my deal. I have the right. He’s not from Gensokyo, yeah?”
“I’d guess he’s from Chiba,” said Patchouli, once more drinking tea.
“Oh? He’s not from Korea?” asked the maid.
Her master was quick to reprimand.
“Sakuya,” she said, aghast, “that’s a terrible thing to say.”
“Because he’s Chinese?”
“I’ll admit his face made me think he was from Ecuador,” Patchouli offered.
The vampire was incredulous.
“That’s not even in Asia...” muttered Remilia.
“Is he from the Philippines, Lady Patchouli?”
“Sakuya—”
“I’ll admit his face made me think he was from Lithuania,” offered Patchouli again.
“That’s completely different!”
Itou Gen gazed upon the vaguely bigoted comedy routine before him with very little thought in his head. His kidnapper was right: he had been overwhelmed. Just how much was there to absorb since he’d gotten here? No. Really. There were many places where questions were raised and needed answers. Just a random thought: who was that red and white clad person that saved him from what had been chasing him the night before, and why hadn’t they picked him up? Another! Wasn’t that thing chasing him a ghost? At so many places he needed to stop and think and was given no time to do so, and now he stood in front of proclaimed killers: inhuman creatures that were open about how dismissive they were of human lives, and were having a black giggle. Gen just really needed a pause.
“Um... Miss... Lady Devil, I think the most pressing issue on my mind is the question of how much freedom I have.”
Remilia broke her concentration from Patchouli, who had been suggesting Gen’s South African heritage, and looked at Gen with concern. He wasn’t sure if the concern was based on “these are the people I spend all day with” or concern for him, but he did appreciate it all the same. Remilia then said:
“You aren’t free.”
To which Gen answered:
“Oh.”
Remilia then gave all her attention to Gen, while the other two talked about... British tea conglomerates?
“I’m sorry to say, Gen, that Gensokyo was never a safe place for people like you, and it especially isn’t now. In fact, it almost never will be: your fate is a dull dead end.”
“My fate, huh...”
“You would have two options,” Remilia raised two fingers, “in what will become the ordinary case at least: you could go to the Human Village and live a life of ignorance, or you could try to reach the Shrine Maiden and go home.”
“Hm...” Gen mumbled, blinked, and replied: “after your threats, I thought you wouldn’t be helpful at all.”
Remilia smirked.
“I said ‘you would have’. Fortune doesn’t favor you, child of man. You are not free. You’ve got no options. You’re here and we decide what to do with you.”
“I—” Gen furrowed his brow as he spoke “—I can’t accept such a fate.”
“Can you think of an option that doesn’t exist?”
And Remilia Scarlet gave him a look that told him he should.
Leaving him to think on this, the devil turned to the magician and said: “Forget about that, I enjoyed myself with the Shrine Maiden.”
Patchouli gave Remilia her (negative) opinion of this Shrine Maiden, saying, “When I met her earlier she was terribly violent. Like a...”
“Boar?” the maid suggested.
“No... It slipped my mind, though, so let’s call her a boar.”
“Well she’s still a child,” said the Child Mistress of Scarlet Devil Mansion, “but she’s very cute, and those rules she came up with were excellent. I have to thank me for getting her to make them.”
And Gen (who had to this point been quite uncomfortable) witnessed something quite comforting. The two in front of him began feeling supremely... happy. It was almost like there was radiance coming from them. Patchouli looked at Remilia similar to how siblings years older looked on those years younger, her lips showing her serenity and peaceful ease with all honesty. And Remilia, Remilia had her eyes closed and chuckled to herself like she was being tickled, basking in the presence of her friend who she so rarely saw aboveground. Oddly enough, the sight washed many of Gen’s troubling thoughts away.
“Did you have fun?” Patchouli asked.
“Tons of fun,” Remilia replied, still giggling.
“You were so eager to start an Incident we didn’t get to practice with spell cards very much before you spread the mist.”
“You want to try right now, don’t you? You do right?”
“Yes... I think I should become more familiar with the system, and the moon is rising.”
“Then, let’s.”
And simple as that, the two stood up and soared off the balcony into the almost-night sky, Remilia saying she’d talk more about “Reimu” as they fought, and Patchouli saying “Please do”.
So Gen was left with the maid of the Devil to watch as the two friends prepared for a fight.
“I should apologize.”
Gen looked at Sakuya, who had spoken suddenly, like he’d forgotten she was there. He might have.
“I meant to poke fun,” said the maid, “but Lady Patchouli informed me that your history is a bit troubled in Asia. I don’t tend to joke from ignorance.”
“Ah, well...” Gen folded his arms as he answered, “I honestly believe jokes like that only happen because there’s at least some truth to them...” He turned back to the pair, who seemed to be hashing out conditions. Shrugging, he admitted to the young lady: “If anything I appreciate the attempt to lighten the atmosphere.”
“It was mainly an attempt to bother you.”
“I still appreciate it.”
Now the two seemed to be arguing...
“... You’re Sakuya, right?” Gen continued.
“Yes. The Mistress named me Izayoi Sakuya.”
“Named you...” I guess that explains the jokes in spite of the name, but... Gen decided to file this train of thought away in his mental cabinet of questions and retrieved another one in its stead: “Are you human?” he inquired.
“What else would I be?” asked the beaming maid.
Since the battle had yet to start, Gen chose to instead look closely over this maid. She was nearing his height, slender, and... still: unnaturally well-balanced and unmoving. Was she breathing...? She had short white hair and wide, blue-grey eyes. She wasn’t abnormally pale or anything, but... Gen still thought she wasn’t human.
“A magician, like Miss Patchouli,” he finally answered.
“Well I’m not. I’m just a human like you. I’ve been offered the chance to become a magician among other things, but I have had to decline.”
Become, eh, thought Gen as he returned his gaze to the battle now about to begin. So many questions, too many questions.
“So,” called Patchouli in the short distance, “I’ll only be using metal and earth!”
“Handicap yourself however you wish, I won’t be playing!” came Remilia’s answer.
“I only mention this so you know I bested you with just two elements!”
“I’ll beat you with a single spell!”
“Now what’s a handicap?”
“Well you can only use one card at a time...”
They seemed to be radiating again. They called for the start of their duel both at once, and the fireworks began.
Patchouli immediately began with an invocation of earth she’d dubbed “Trilithon Shake”. Remilia allowed it, with no counterattack of her own. Upon casting it, clouds of dust emanated from a card she held in her hand, aimless but pervasive. Remilia moved through them like they weren’t even there, finding a path of avoidance with ease. With the dust came a regular materialization of crags, hurling through the air in seven directions around the magician. The sight reminded Gen, oddly enough, of screensavers and 3D shows. Several times he felt like ducking at the edge of the balcony to hide from the storm of terrain. Still he never looked away. His eyes were stuck on his captor, even as Remilia began firing back large bullets of blood-colored energy that would shatter into sharp pieces as they flew. It seemed to be a non-declared attack, or at least Gen hadn’t noticed a name. He did notice: he had become completely transfixed.
After Remilia showed a display of her own, marked with passion and the heat of blood, Patchouli’s returned and from her fingertips flowed metal. She spun and shined with impossible light, and with a falling hand rained waves of platinum and silver. The vampire mistress became a red blur in the face of it. She spread her arms. She became a cloud of winged creatures of the night. What erupted between them seemed a mad sprawl of chaos and magic, but it took little more observation to see the truth: that these were patterns, and highly directed. The magician summoned monoliths of green and dark metal and earth, the vampire colored the air in scarlet. There was an almost snapping quality to their bout—to their movements: this was a grand match of awe and splendor, with dances of grace in-between. Witnessing it...
“Danmaku...” thought Gen aloud, to which Sakuya blissfully replied:
“Yes: curtains of bullets.”
“Metal Sign: ‘Silver Dragon’,” Patchouli spoke with a paper in her hand.
When the web of metal was scattered and done, Remilia lifted a slip of her own and replied, “Scarlet Sign: ‘Scarlet Shoot’.”
He realized: every spell required these paper cards to use, but often Patchouli would be concentrating on a book as she cast one. He wondered how exactly her magic worked...
Patchouli and Remilia hardly seemed to grow tired, though they did grow more excited. Remilia cast many kinds of magic that Gen was sure he’d used the night before as guiding lights during his waking nightmare. He didn’t give the scores of rose-like bullets much of his focus. Patchouli’s sorcery, on the other hand, was definitely keeping Gen’s attention. Remilia’s attacks tended to follow a similar scheme of elegance, passion, and the color red. Miss Patchouli had great variety and power. Every spell of hers felt absolutely unique, and he was reminded that these were spells crafted under some manner of constraint. After all, he’d born witness to impossible incantations for fire from her not long ago which did not follow the rules. Just how much did she know of the arts?
“Earth and Metal Sign: ‘Emerald Megalith’!”
With her attacks, Patchouli had moved Remilia to a “corner” of the sky, forged from orbiting chunks of mud and steel. In this open sky, the magician seemed to have a commanding sense of space. Debris began to storm. Backing away, the vampire did well for a good while, yet eventually found herself encircled. She swore, and looked through the curtain at the earth’s summoner, just as spherical boulder met unceremoniously with her front side. The sound was immense, and at once she was driven down into the land. After this, Patchouli bid her summoned stuff to continue pounding her friend into the gardens below, causing dust to rise up like mist. She only relented when over half a minute had passed.
Gen leaned over the balcony railing and gazed upon Remilia’s smoldering figure with eyes aglow. Patchouli then said: “I win. Now, I think you need a bath,” and he could easily hear the grin she must’ve been sporting from the sound of her voice.
~~
The mistress of the Scarlet Devil Mansion looked considerably less fancy when she returned to the balcony. Her maid, Sakuya, almost seemed like she was glittering with joy while looking at her dirty, beaten master in torn clothes. Patchouli looked self-satisfied, and Remilia herself did not look pleased at all.
“I’ll prepare the bath,” said Sakuya, and then she disappeared.
Gen spoke up “... How does she do that?”
“Sakuya can control time and space, I can control fate,” said the vampire.
“Why didn’t you fate yourself to win back there?”
Remilia glared at the young man, who looked as if he had asked that question entirely in earnest (though he hadn’t, and was inwardly amused with himself).
Patchouli decided to clarify.
“People can say anything, but whether or not they’re speaking truthfully is another matter. That’s basic, Itou Gen.”
“So the Mistress is lying?”
“She’s not,” said Patchouli with a shake of her head, “but fate is not absolute; if Remi can manipulate it, that much is obvious.”
“You don’t say...”
Remilia re-entered the conversation with a flat, matter-of-fact tone, arms folded as she spoke.
“It’s ironic,” she said. “Fate is in fact quite whimsical. Some incredible things in this world are fated to happen, but the mundane – such as slipping on a banana peel – can be fated as well. The finer details are fascinating to discuss, all told, but generally you can think of things happening outside of your control as the will of gods.” She huffed, and turned her head to look at the rising moon before continuing. “Or you can think of it as plain rolling luck. Fortune and fate are not dissimilar.”
And soon all three were silently looking at the moon. Gen went over what Remilia had said in detail in his thoughts. She was clearly giving him a choice, talking of fate in one breath as if it was undefeatable, but in another as if it could be defied.
... Or rather, maybe it was his fate to die here, and soon, and the vampire wanted him to give her a reason that that shouldn’t come to pass. She’d be his benefactor to readjust his life’s course. It... seemed like something she’d do.
He looked at Patchouli.
And then, he addressed the devil.
“Remilia Scarlet, I have a request.”
Remilia didn’t turn from the moon as she answered.
“You’re requesting something of me with nothing to offer.”
“Yes.”
She laughed and said, “Go on,” as if she was very amused.
“Change my fate. I wish to become an apprentice of the magician Patchouli Knowledge.”
“Okay...” Remilia looked back at him from over her shoulder, smirking delightfully and saying, “This Remilia Scarlet will grant your wish.”
“Wait.”
Patchouli interrupted. She was grimacing at her pal, and continued with an irritated tone.
“What do you even mean to do? Entwine my fate with his?”
“Correct.”
“I don’t want an apprentice.”
“You’ll have one. You’ll want one.”
“Don’t... try looking cool while you’re covered in dirt! I don’t want an apprentice!”
“Fufu...”
“Remi, are you seriously...”
Remilia turned around fully and presented Gen with a grand, bright grin. She then declared in a glorious tone, her arms spread wide: “It’s a good thing you waited for our duel to be over! Had you made your request sooner and I lost, you would’ve died!”
“Right,” said the magician, biting her thumbnail, “because I’d never accept a lab rat as a student.”
Oh, thought Gen, I am on the same level as a lab rat to her.
“What’s the matter!” cried Remilia in disbelief. “You already have an assistant!”
Patchouli replied, “I have a familiar I sometimes summon for sorting or cleaning, yes, but a student...”
She looked at Gen like she was looking on a pile of garbage in somebody’s home. She shut her eyes before glaring at Remilia again, saying, “Why would I want a student!?”
“I’m not a seer, Patche... Fate will work itself out.”
“I’m going to have Sakuya put garlic in your tea.”
“P-Patche!” Remilia suddenly flared out her wings as if startled, balling up her fists and crying at the magician.
“Remove my fate from his!”
Remilia looked pleading, and spoke like a distraught daughter to her obstinate mother, “I can’t. I already brought you two together.”
“Already!?”
“Pretty much immediately.”
“Remi!”
“Well now,” chimed in Gen, “that’s a relief.”
Patchouli now looked as though she was genuinely trying to kill Gen with a gaze. The soon-to-be apprentice offered a pleasant expression in return. She pointed a finger at him, almost touching his nose.
“You—!” she said, “even if you’re my fated student, I’ll never accept you as a person. I will always treat you poorly. You will have no peace.”
Gen’s expression turned serious before he answered her.
“Miss Patchouli... if Mistress Remilia isn’t kidding and we’re fated to interact, I want you to know that my prior statement was mostly in jest. I didn’t make this bid simply for survival, and I think Mistress Remilia knew that,” Patchouli lowered her hand, still fuming, “I honestly want to be your apprentice, even if it’s only for a short time. I’ve been captured by your spells.”
“Captured...” she grumbled.
“I’m not sure about anything yet, but I can tell you’re an incredible person, Miss Patchouli. I feel like under you I’d be able to come to terms with Gensokyo, and figure out what I want to do, and...” Gen paused before looking directly into the magician’s eyes, “that power of yours was so astounding, I can’t help but want it.”
“A selfish apprentice...” she grumbled, yet her expression had softened.
“If this is a land of fantasy, I’d like to be able to bask in it.”
Patchouli closed her eyes for a moment before looking sideways at Remilia and answering Gen.
“There are men and women who have said the same thing and have died...” she turned her eyes on him, “even if you become my apprentice, there’s no guarantee of your survival. Whether you live or die out there is your responsibility.”
“If I had your magic in my grasp, I imagine I’d feel rather unstoppable.”
“You’re a flatterer,” she closed her eyes again, “but don’t expect to just take my magic. You’ll need to have your own signature.”
“I see...”
“... Gen,” spoke Patchouli, grabbing the young man’s attention firmly, “you’re a weak and cowardly man. I don’t want an apprentice, but I especially don’t want you.”
“I guess I’ll have to change into someone more admirable.”
“... You will.”
Patchouli walked past him and back into the mansion, stopping a few steps in and barely turning her head to address him.
“I have a request of my own, Gen, and that is you change how you call me.”
At this point Sakuya reappeared between the two of them, looking incredulous. Patchouli continued, unfazed.
“How do you address a teacher, Gen?”
Gen was resolute in his answer.
“With unending respect, Master Patchouli.”
She showed him a small, half smile and finished their conversation with:
“Nothing less.”
She made for the stairs, Gen following shortly after.
And Remilia was very happy; elation came from her like an aura, and her wings were fluttering unconsciously. She simply could not stop smiling. Sakuya asked her what had happened, and she proudly declared that it wasn’t often she had the chance to twist fate.