Chapter 97: Cataloguing a Beautiful Girl's Embarrassing Habits.
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"Uuugh... the room won't stop spinning..."
"Whose fault is that for spending an entire night drinking with a youkai?" Rikka had been busy in the kitchen and emerged with a bowl of hangover soup, helped Kihara sit upright on the sofa, and began feeding it to him spoonful by spoonful. "Better?"
"...Yeah. Thanks, Rikka."
"Don't even think about kissing me right now — you reek."
"I'll brush my teeth first."
It was well into the afternoon before the hangover fully released its grip. Kihara glanced at the shadow pooled at his feet, where Shinobu resided. Thanks to their shared soul, she was in precisely the same state — lying on the sofa in her shadow-space with a face like curdled milk, clutching a chibi Kihara plushie and hammering it feebly with her tiny fist.
"Serves you right for drinking... serves you right..."
Still, drinking with Suika hadn't been entirely without benefit. At minimum, he could now borrow her abilities through Gensokyo's Divine Music Arts.
He had just returned the watering can to the storage chest when a gap yawned open behind him. Yukari's arm reached through, seized the back of his collar, and yanked him inside before he could react.
He stumbled two steps backward and caught himself. When he looked around, he was standing in Kaguya's room.
Kaguya patted the cushion beside her.
"Good timing. Sit. I've finalised the next two worlds."
"Which ones?"
"One is related to a dungeon — specifically the kind of mine you've been needing. The other involves an adventurer's guild."
"You could just tell me the names, you know."
She tapped her own temple with one finger, winked, and stuck out her tongue. "Ehe☆ — where's the fun in that~?"
"I'll let it slide purely because you're cute."
The moment the words left his mouth, something tugged at his sleeve. Yukari — that utterly shameless youkai sage — had reverted to her little form and was now mimicking Kaguya's expression with studied innocence, angling for the same treatment.
The words left Kihara's mouth before he could stop them.
"Why does the ancient crone insist on playing the blushing maiden?"
Thunk.
His eyes rolled back and he toppled onto the tatami. A lump the size of a fist rose from his skull in vivid red. Yukari blew the smoke from her right knuckle and shot Kaguya a sharp sideways look. "What are you laughing at? You're not exactly young either."
"Blockhead and I are old friends from the internet — kindred spirits." Kaguya tilted her chin serenely. "You're nothing but the girl who's been publicly, perpetually seventeen. Of course he wouldn't say something like that to me."
"Old friends from the internet."
Yukari repeated the phrase with magnificent contempt. There were things Kihara didn't know that she knew in exhaustive detail.
"Don't think I'm unaware of what you did — using the Hourai ability to go back in time and weave yourself into his life. The friendly older-sister neighbour. The daughter of the shop owner downstairs. The other three hundred-odd members of that QQ group. Years of quietly, carefully cultivating him into a childhood sweetheart who fits your exact preferences."
Kaguya's pupils contracted to pinpoints. The laugh died in her throat and came out as a short, undignified cough. She stared at Yukari with naked disbelief. "How do you know all of that in such specific detail—"
"What kind of sane person keeps a diary."
"You voyeuristic creep—"
Kaguya's teeth ground together audibly. It all made sense now — she'd always wondered how Yukari had chosen such impeccable timing when she came to propose the kidnapping plan. The answer was that she'd been watching the whole time.
"Yukari. You appointing yourself as Reimu's matchmaker was one thing — and engineering every little incident to push them together was another thing — but you've suddenly started showering Blockhead with all sorts of personal attention. Don't tell me you've decided Reimu is a lost cause and you're entering the field yourself."
"You're not wrong. That is what I'm considering."
"...Excuse me?"
Yukari, to her credit, didn't even blink. Where Kaguya's instinct when caught was indignation, Yukari's was simple, unhurried acknowledgement.
"Yagokoro Eirin tells me I don't understand the human heart. She may be right. But I don't need to truly understand it — I only need to convert Kihara from an unpredictable variable into a stabilising force that benefits Gensokyo. If the method is blunt, so be it."
"What a terrifying need for control."
"You haven't been here long enough to understand what this place means to me..."
The Gensokyo of the distant past was nothing like what it had become. Youkai preying on humans, entire villages razed — these were not stories. They were living memory. The peace that existed now had been paid for across generations of Hakurei shrine maidens, in lives spent and exhausted in quiet service.
Yukari thought of a particular shrine maiden — the one who wore a mask and laughed easily, and who had once said, in passing, that the human heart is more fearsome than any demon. A wave of something old and complicated moved through her chest and settled into a long, quiet exhale.
"I won't expose your little game with Kihara. In return, you don't interfere with my plans."
"Deal."
"Then leave him here for now. Have him call me when it's time to set out."
After Yukari's gap had folded shut behind her, Kaguya crouched beside the still-unconscious Kihara and began poking his face with one slender finger. Idly. Repeatedly.
"Hey, Blockhead. How long do you think we're going to keep playing this game of ours?"
She knew perfectly well that the moment she said the words, things would change. One honest confession and they would stop being internet friends, stop being something that sat in the comfortable, ambiguous territory of good mates, and become something else entirely. But she wasn't ready for that. Not yet.
What Kaguya wanted was for him to find it himself — to notice her feelings through the accumulation of small things, through the texture of the time they spent together. Even if it took centuries, that was fine. A piece of candy made with such painstaking care was worth taking slowly.
Time would not erode what she felt. If anything, it would deepen it, the way a good wine grows more complex with age. When Kihara finally reached for that bottle himself — when he held it up to the light and understood what it was — what expression would cross his face? What would he do?
She didn't try too hard to imagine it. Like a farmer who has planted good fruit and simply waits with warm anticipation for the season to turn, she let herself look forward to that day.
Kihara came to and immediately conducted a full inventory of his person. Then he directed a silent inquiry inward.
[Did Yukari or Kaguya do anything to me while I was out?]
[Dear master, when you are unconscious, I am unconscious — such is the nature of sharing a soul. How could I possibly know what they did to you.]
[Fair point.]
Kaguya was watching him with her chin in her hands, eyes bright and fixed on his face with an intensity that made him vaguely uneasy.
"Shut-in. What are you staring at? You're planning something again, aren't you."
"I protected you from Yukari, you know. Is this how you treat your saviour?"
"I don't believe you. Produce evidence."
"Tch — you didn't fall for it. When did you get so hard to trick?"
Kihara crossed his arms with considerable self-satisfaction and tilted his nose upward. "A man who stands apart even three days later is worthy of a second look. I am no longer merely a galgame scholar with extensive theoretical knowledge. I am a man with four — five — wives. You really think you can take me that easily?"
"What does one have to do with the other?"
"Don't you know? The more beautiful the woman, the more dangerous she is."
"Oh?" Her eyes glinted. "So you're saying I'm beautiful?"
"Setting aside the chronic messiness, the under-eye circles that would make a panda feel better about itself, the toe-picking habit, and various other qualities too numerous to list — yes, objectively quite beautiful."
The vein at Kaguya's temple made its presence known.
"You have the nerve to sit there and catalogue the embarrassing habits of a beautiful girl — I'm going to kill you—"
"Bring it on, I've never lost a fight in my life—"
They collided in a tangle of limbs and went rolling across the tatami, the sounds of completely undignified combat echoing through the room.
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Thank you for reading.