Our protagonist has restrictions and obligations to contend with for now, but soon enough he’ll have some freedom. Please read warmly.

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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. He couldn’t shake an uncanny feeling gripping him, however.

That aside, 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.

I couldn't help but mutter, "Just what have I gotten myself into...?" I had just left a bus whose driver spoke in unsettlingly cryptic messages, and now was left with a far more disturbing scene ahead. Looking back when I heard the bus drive off, I found a complete lack of any vehicle, bus or otherwise. Swallowing my heckles down like tiny frogs, I looked forward instead, to the aforementioned disturbing scene. What I saw wasn't pretty; a scene right out of a horror movie, in fact! Complete with its checklist of spooky stuff, too!

Seriously, if I had one, I'd bet money that everything around me would leave a full column of check-marks!

After all, there were tombstones, dead trees and a liberal smattering of seemingly pointless skulls in what looked like a freaking graveyard. And that was just the left! To the right, a cliff with a sheer drop of at least a hundred feet bottomed out with a jagged end in a sea of what I hoped wasn't freaking blood! And down the path, far in the distance, was a school that looked more like a haunted mansion rather than a place of learning! "Shoulda just freakin' said screw it and went back when I had the chance... I'd rather drop out than chance it." I got a chill up my spine at what all this could only lead to. "Feel like I'll just go missing or something if I stick around this pla—"

"Look out!" Huh?

I looked back just in time for a blonde to run me down on a bike. Last thing I saw was a pretty headbutt and no small number of stars.

When I came to, I found my bangs to be covering my entire face. That can't be right. "Ugh..." I nursed a fresh lump on my head, complaining, "The hell...?" Before me, I found that the blonde obstruction was actually a girl, and not my own hair. Wasn't expecting to see another blonde around. I mean, it could be worse, b

[x] Grab Marisa and hide until the flying woman is gone, then carry her to Kourindou.
-[x] Watch and listen to the flying woman if opportunity presents itself: if you get some indication she's not malevolent, first come out from hiding by yourself to ask what's going on.

There isn't much time to think. For the sake of survival, you have to assume this flying woman is a threat. Priority number one is Mori, so you grab her arm and pull her close so you can whisper to her. "Pick a spot to hide and don't move until I tell you to come out. Be absolutely silent. Understand?"

Thankfully, Mori isn't petty enough to have an attitude in this situation. She looks hesitant, but nods and retreats into the trees on the other side of the path. That's one blonde secure.

You look up to see what the flying woman is doing. She's floating around, still nearby but unaware of you or Marisa's location. Fortunately, she doesn't appear to be any sort of beast-related youkai with super-hearing. If that were the case, she wouldn't have had any problems finding Marisa in the first place.

You turn to the drug-addled witch, who is staring right at you in her rainbow daze. "Ah!" she cries, much like a child who doesn't know words. Then she screams with giddy mirth, scattering some birds in the trees above.

This other blonde isn't going to be so cooperative, it seems. You close the distance between the two of you in a flat second, snag her by the waist, and throw yourself into the same brush she first stumbled out of. You land face-down in the grass with Marisa right by your side, who lands on her back and starts giggling. You cusp your hand over her mouth, and surprisingly she offers no resistance — content to stare up at the canopy of trees with her starry eyes glazed over in foggy delight.

The animals and other creatures of the forest around you have gone quiet after Marisa's little outburst, so it's easy to hear the woman touch down on the path. "I know I heard her," she grumbles loudly. "Marisa! Just come out already!" she calls. "Give me the doll back and I won�

You are a demon.

Your job is to heed to the call of humans who require favours or tasks to be completed. The craft of summoning creatures such as you and binding them to contracts is known as diabolism. Likewise, those who practice the craft are called diabolists. As a demon, once you have been summoned into the human world, you are unable to leave until you finish your master’s terms or die in the process.

Presently, your consciousness is manifesting in the human world. A diabolist stands over his summoning circle, reciting the incantations to anchor you to his world. A human corpse lies on the ground in front of him in the center of a hexagram. He recites from the large leather-bound book in his hands for at least ten minutes. The words are familiar to you; it is an ancient spell in a nearly forgotten language. His words will grant you the ability to do things in this world. In diabolism, the list of abilities you are granted are known as permissions. Without these incantations, you would be unable to breathe the air or to move through physical space. Experienced diabolists can add or remove words from the spell, modifying what you are allowed to do. In this case, the human’s ritual does not seem to be very advanced. His list of permissions are very textbook-standard – you’re allowed to walk, talk, apply force to matter, use magic, and so forth. You’re glad you will have the standard range of freedom this time around.

Soon the incantation is complete, and your essence enters the vessel set before you. You rise to your feet, but you are unable to go far. Your movements are confined only to the summoning circle beneath your feet. You circle around, taking in the empty room around you. The diabolist interrupts your thoughts with a feeble “H-hey!” and immediately you turn, fixing him with a neutral stare. He’s barely more than a boy, you realize. You’d place him for 17 or 18 years old – an impressive age to be able to successfully summon a demon.

“I, Caesar, have summoned you,” he says. You can tell from how he is speaking that he’s trying to sound commanding

Yukari was bored.

Now, this was nothing unusual by itself. Yukari was bored very often. However, this time it was a problem, because there hadn't been any kind of incident for months now, and it was starting to make her antsy.

To help pass the time, she watched the outside world a bit, but that didn't help much. It did, however, give her an idea. An idea involving a certain group of crooks she found...
====================
You shake your head and emerge from the van, your crewmates doing the same. Funny, you were pretty sure that, last you checked, you were in the middle of downtown Washington, DC, not in the middle of some forest.

Before any of you can properly question what the fuck just happened, your earpiece buzzes, and you start to hear the voice of your "handler", Bain.

"Uh, guys, you alright? Well, I don't know why, but apparently, we've caught the eye of someone very powerful, calls herself... 'Yukari', I think? Anyway, sorry, but she's pretty much holding you guys hostage in... come on, she wrote it down somewhere... Ah, here it is. 'Gensokyo'. Yeah, somewhere in Japan, hidden world full of magic and shit, I don't even know. Anyway, she pretty much told me that you guys are stuck there until she says, but she also gave me a pile of intel on the area, including some places where you can get some serious loot."

You all stay silent, taking in what he just said. "Yeah, doesn't make any sense to me, either. Apparently, she was bored, and decided to bring us here to alleviate that. Regardless, the van should have an ample amount of supplies, and... wait... she tells me she dropped a list of potential locations to hit in the van, and that once you've decided, she'll send both of us some more specific intel. And I know what you're thinking, that this all sounds stupid and very unlikely, but it seems like we don't have a choice either way. So we might as well make the most of a bad situation and profit from this. You all know what you do best, and I'll still be here to help you out, so good luck.

Previous thread: >>62965
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You should really mind your own business, but you can't help it.

If you were working anywhere else, you'd tell her no and that would be the end of it. But you aren't, so who really cares? You grumble to yourself and snatch a manila envelope from the file cabinet. Sighing, you dump the envelope onto the hands of your employee.

Rylee stares hard at the envelope. A bewildered noise escapes her lips, but you don't say a word until she can form coherent sentences. “U-Uh. What is this?”

“It's an envelope,” you reply, folding your arms impatiently.

With a low voice, she seethes, “I know that.”

“Then? We were talking about your pay. What else do you think is in this envelope? A sincere letter of apology?”

It's cold again today, but that's okay. It's always cold in the winter, and concrete only makes everything colder. But that bracing chill on my legs and face every time I leave a happy customer's house is just another reminder that I'm still here and kicking, so why be bothered by a friendly reminder that I'm alive?

A little money to afford something longer than my usual skirt wouldn't hurt though. Or maybe socks would help more. Of course, if I have time to worry about something silly like that, I have time to head over to my next client! It's my duty to my customers to make sure they feel loved on Christmas, even if only for an hour! I can't waste time thinking about sad things like not affording a longer skirt!

I take a quick check in the secret pocket I keep on my body proper. Nobody in their right mind would think to look in the umbrella for the money, so it makes a perfect hiding place! So long as the wind doesn't pick up and tear the pocket out over a drain, like yesterday, or like how the news on my last customer's television said there would be a record snowstorm tonight with high winds! I still have the seven yen from my last customers. The local Girls don't let me work for more than 20 yen an hour or their boss will hurt them for not telling them about a potential employee, they tell me. The thing is, I get so scared that my friends will get hurt that I can never bring myself to work for more than a single yen, and I always end up advertising them at the end of my sales pitch...

I'm getting side-tracked. So, there's the seven yen. Snug and secure in its pocket. Good. There's the Ticket Home that should get me back to Gensokyo if I can earn the money for a trip from Okayama to Hakuba. While simultaneously feeding myself. And finding children that are young enough to not be numbed by video games and actually be scared when I find them. Between jobs to feed my body.

I'm getting sidetracked again. Seven more yen than you had this morning, good. Ticket Home, good. Box of home-made matches to sell between clients, good.

It's getting dark, and I'm on 221 Minato Dori. I only

Blackjack and games of youth.

Previous thread >>62644

Blurbs: www.touhou-project.com/others/moretheater.txt

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“You really are incorrigible,” Reimu crossed her arms and shook her head. Still, I could tell she had a soft spot for my antics. Somewhat more than Alice did, at least. After a pause, she added, “maybe I should talk to the poor girl myself.”

“Maybe,” I said. “I’m not too keen on breaking hearts.”

“Could have fooled me,” she smirked.

I could get used to to that kind of banter. President and veep all alone in the student council room, trading friendly barbs, dealing with the needs of the student body… and, well, maybe the needs of our student bodies from time to time.

CONFIDENTIAL - YOUR ORDERS

To: [REDACTED]

Tenma has picked up on a potential situation outside.
A criminal element operating in the National Capital Region has, in the course of their expeditious acquisitions, obtained information lending weighty credence to the possibility of a land existing cut off from modern day Japan. This particular band of thieves and malcontents has, on basis of intelligence gleaned from your prior investigation, been assessed as radicalized and non-trivially competent, and must be dealt with before they realize what they have on their hands. Your mission is to find and interrogate their leader, and evaluate the level of intelligence they have procured as well as the origin of this information before reporting back to the handler for new orders and eventual extraction. It is imperative that you determine the source—it is currently unknown how this information still exists after the separation from the outside world.

--------

PROLOGUE - FIRST WORLD PROBLEMS


Humans never realize just how much they keep hurting everyone.

As you pass through the door of the convenience store, the clerk at the front gives you a hearty welcome—clearly with little actual heart, as you note the scent of apathy people in her position always seem to give off beneath the surface. Skimming over the racks of magazines, you pick out one at random to read.

The morning smashes you on the head and cracks your eyes open. It's a feeling you're intensely familiar with — the result of far too many drinks at the shithole down the street. You sit up and rub as much crust and haze out of your eyes as you can and silently praise the curtains keeping most of the intruding light out of your bedroom. The alarm clock reads 7:02. It's early, but apparently you were too drunk to wash your mouth out whenever you made it home. Now your tongue feels rotten and all you can taste is stale alcohol and ass. You breathe into your hand. It doesn't smell much better. You can't fall back asleep like this.

But when you throw your legs over the side of the bed, you become aware of slow, faint breaths that are not your own. You turn carefully behind yourself to the blonde head of the woman who had been sleeping next to you the whole time.

Holy fuck. You've had a barren run of it these past several years, so you can't help but feel impressed with yourself for hooking up with someone in a bar. But this is also way more awkward than you want to deal with this morning. If only you could remember the actual hooking up business. Maybe if you take a good look at her face, you could figure it out. . .

You hover closer to see, but her looks stop you cold. She's cute for sure, but there's definitely something that's... unsettling. She's hunched over into the fetal position, her slim shoulders barely sticking out of the blankets. Her face is round, just slightly tanned, and flawless even without the touch of makeup. There's just enough fat in her cheeks to where you'd like to pinch them, and she snores gently through tiny nostrils and pursed lips.

In conclusion, she looks just a little young, doesn't she?

Some women are that way though, and many even consider having a babyface to be an attractive feature. Yet as you look closer at her small form obscured by the blankets, you feel less and less convinced that this is a woman at all. Carefully, you lift up the covers to settle the matter once and for all.

Shit. Shit.

You are no expert of fe