Grademaster - Gu Chapter 15

I woke up to the smell of bacon cooking and a sizzle. As my eyes cracked open the first thing that greeted me was gold and a faintly sweet smell. I breathed in deeper until hair entered my nose. 

“A- achoo!” A lady groaned. No, Yukari groaned, and she raised a hand to brush her bangs aside. My own arms, I noticed, were wrapped around her. We hadn’t gone to sleep like that, it just happened at some point in the night. 

“Whyyyyy?” She complained. 

“Bacon.” 

“Hrmph… go back to sleep. Ran will bring it to us.” I proved once again that I didn’t know what it was like to be truly rich. Breakfast in bed every day? Maybe being a pet wasn’t so bad. 

Taking her advice, I closed my eyes again and dozed alongside the youkai until the door cracked open. A strong life force walked in, one with a faint tie to Yukari. Ran, I assumed. 

The shikigami put something down near us and then knelt in a seiza near the foot of the bed. As comfortable as Yuka’s bed was, I only lasted twenty minutes before I felt too uncomfortable to keep napping. 

The first order of business was getting up. 

“Hey Yuka.” I whispered in her ear. She grumbled something incoherent. Feeling a little mean, I cooled down my ki to an icy temperature, something I’d picked up from one of the yuki-onna in the hot springs village. Then I blew that onto her ear. 

“Fuck!” She shot upward wide-eyed, then turned her anger onto me. “You’ve been awfully cheeky since you’ve gotten back.”

“Sorry Yuka, as pretty as you are sleeping, I’m pretty hungry and you weren’t letting go.” Her anger instantly cooled in response to my shameless flattery. 

“Don’t stress my limits unless you’re prepared for the consequences. Ran, feed me.” She laid back down, fully awake, and waited as her servant stood to the side of the bed with a tray stacked with food. 

Bacon, tamogayaki, tamago kake gohan, miso soup, nigiri, and a seaweed salad. All of it looked exceptionally cooked and richly seasoned. Not to mention that it was tailored for Yukari’s tastes, since I’d never heard of nigiri prepared for breakfast before, nor seaweed.

I reached for one of the nigiri. Without looking at me, Ran produced a fan from somewhere and whacked my hand harshly. I paused. It hadn’t hurt, so I hadn’t learned my lesson. Yukari watched our play with a mild look of amusement, her hands by her side while she slouched and was fed tamogayaki. 

My hand went further and was whacked twice, more forcefully. Mere inches from the meal, I wiggled my fingers playfully. Ran finally deemed me annoying enough to stare at, her flat expression daring me to try again. 

With a burst of ki I snatched one sample off the plate, the shikigami’s movements too slow to stop me. I only got the one and pulled my arm back to stuff it in my mouth only to be met with nothing, my teeth closing around my fingers. 

“Huh?” I looked at my empty hand, baffled. Yukari giggled. 

“As my shikigami I permit Ran to use some of my abilities,” she explained, then savored a bite of bacon. “Mmm, fantastic. If only you hadn’t woken me up so harshly you’d know. A bite of nigiri, Ran.” The servant only glanced at me, her ki flaring at her victory over me. 

“You’ve won this battle, but not the war.” I sat and meditated. Yukari’s ability was bullshit, but she had given away something crucial before I’d left. It was tied to the dimensional gap somehow, a semi-physical place, which was close enough for me. 

There wasn’t an easy way to defend against that, but I could resist it… probably. Maybe? I wasn’t actually sure. But it was worth a try. 

Because I didn’t believe in an instant win button. Every ability could be defeated somehow, it only took ingenuity and effort. Sometimes a lot of those, but it could be done. 

I mustered my ki and performed a certain technique, the same kind that let Yuugi take my most powerful blows and not move an inch. It was a staple of heavyweight fighters, and the easiest way to explain it was that it made a warrior immune to knockback. 

My intention was to take it a step further. My ki shimmied in place, searching for something I couldn’t properly perceive but had felt before. That formless place that she made a part of herself, the-

Eyes eyes eyes eyes eyes eyes -

The alternate dimension. I was in this one, and I wanted to anchor myself more firmly into it, like a snake could worm its way into sand. While I performed the maneuver and focused on my intent, I was unsure if it had actually worked, or if I was going about things in the right way. 

I reached out again toward the platter and was teleported to the other side of the bed. There was the sensation again, a feeling of slipping away. 

Again. I was teleported, my ki slipped, and nothing was achieved. 

A third, fourth, fifth, and sixth attempt went by. I tried more force, less force, more precision, and blanketing my entire body. On the seventh I decided to try the other direction, not a constant effort to shield myself but an explosive strike of a piton into the surface that was space. 

Ran rolled her eyes, the only clear expression of dismissal she had given me, and teleported me once more. As I felt the impending displacement I flared my ki, directing it in a direction that my feeble monkey brain couldn’t explain, only experience. 

I struck, felt the surface crack, and dug myself in. 

It wasn’t enough. I lost my grip and was thrown through space, this time violently. As I landed on the covers of the bed there was a crack and a boom of moving air. With expert precision Ran moved the plate of food behind her, raising her other arm to produce a magical shield. 

Her master was gently rocked on the bed, her hair billowing away from herself. 

“Oh Shin,” she sighed. “You’ve hurt yourself.” I looked down, where my lower body was twisted. My left leg was split in half from the bottom up, the separation leading up to my knee, and then twisted ninety degrees to my left. My right was facing backwards. 

“Ah… oh crap.” I blunted my sense of pain and began fixing myself. Both youkai grimaced as they watched me hold my flesh together to mend and snapped bones back into their proper places. It took a minute, then I got back up on my knees to approach once again. 

“I cannot guarantee your safety if you resist as you did.” Ran warned me robotically. 

“Indomitable human spirit.” 

“If you crave food so desperately I will make you some later.” 

“I want Yuka’s food.” The youkai in question nodded approvingly. 

“You can’t have it. Ran, if he tries again keep doing as you did before. Don’t change your calculations.” The servant only glanced at her master, which was enough to set Yukari off. 

Her parasol appeared in her hands, which she used to quickly whack the servant in the back of the head. It wasn’t gentle, more of the smack of a drunken father than a lady’s rebuke. 

“Do as I say.” She commanded. Ran nodded. I approached, dug myself in as before, and felt space warp me before tearing me away. This time my head was backwards and several of my spinal vertebrae were phased a few centimeters backward, wholly out of place and pinching my spinal cord. I fixed it, but not before a searing flash of pain made me collapse. 

More importantly, I discovered the problem. I was interrupting the teleport, but the energies needed to go somewhere, and they ended up naturally distorting the space I occupied. 

“Yuka, do you naturally distort space if you don’t control your ability?” She raised an eyebrow. 

“Yes. Don’t tell anyone, though.” I nodded absently, factoring that into my technique. Attempt number six, a blanket of ki, seemed like the most promising option. I gave it a try, going from a piton back into a claw. Then I thought better of the attempt. 

It couldn't just be one motion. One single action to deflect the teleportation would be efficient and convenient, but I needed to start with something more complex to get my first result. When I had a success I could start refining the technique into something that didn’t take an impractical amount of focus to pull off. 

I tried a piton first, designed to sink in deeper than before, then a claw following it, one that would use the crack I’d make to hold me more firmly against Ran’s power. Lastly was the blanket, which I’d use to shield myself from the wash of energy that would follow a failed spell. 

When I made my attempt I felt the coming power, like the click of a trigger before a gun fired, and the instant the ability washed over me the piton dug in, breaking space, and the claw slipped into the crack. I was tugged elsewhere, yet this time, to my great surprise, I held firm. When the careful spell construction faltered and broke the energies washed over me. At first my crude cloak held firm, but the moment it tore the entire construct was ripped apart. One of my eyes was gone and my left forearm had been compressed to a paper-thin ribbon. 

That, however, was fixable, and I smiled joyfully at Ran’s poleaxed expression at my success. 

Yukari clapped happily. “How excellent, breakfast and a show! Shin, I forgive you for waking me up so crudely. You may eat with me. Ran, go make a second serving. Oh, before you go, how much of my power were you using?” 

Ran bowed. “.8%, master. Will that be all?” .8%, not even a full hundredth and it tore through me… 

I could surpass it. Someday. My technique was awful and my ki would grow stronger. I wasn’t using all of it either out of consideration for the youkai, who might sense the disturbance. Overpowering the shikigami’s technique had never been my goal. 

Finally, and quite unexpectedly, I had discovered a lever that I could use to muster some resistance against my boss, should things come to a head with her. And knowing that, I couldn’t help the smile that came to my face. 

Ran disappeared into the kitchen and Yuka set the plate between us. I happily began to eat my fill, savoring each bite. 

It was some of the best food I’d ever had, yet it didn’t taste as sweet as my victory. 

I was kicked out of the home not long after stuffing myself, the gap youkai commenting that she had lost out on sleep because of me and needed to recover. Ran bowed to me once, saying nothing of the events beforehand, and just like that I was dropped back in front of the shrine. 

Conveniently placed next to the front sliding door were my two suitcases of electronics, clothes, and gifts. I knocked on the shrine once, waited a minute, and then let myself in. The bags were pushed out of the way while I made a late breakfast for Reimu. 

The smell woke her up and she poked her head out of her room sleepily as if checking I was really there, her hair a rat’s nest, like a kid on Christmas morning looking for presents. 

As soon as she saw me she smiled and walked herself over to the kotatsu, slumping over it and saying nothing. When I brought her her meal she smiled happily. 

“Welcome home.” She said meaningfully. 

“It’s good to be back.” I made as if to sit on the other side, then thought better of it. A sudden image of Sariel’s return to heaven came to me, how she sat between her siblings as if she couldn’t be away from them. Thinking of that, I stood back up and moved to Reimu’s side, where I sat close enough to touch. 

Her cheeks grew scarlet and she didn’t meet my eyes. She broke her fast in a comfortable silence, and only when she was done did she speak again, when I moved to take care of the dishes.

“Don’t,” she said. “You just got back. I can do them.” 

“I slept at Yukari’s place, I’m plenty rested.” She paused and pursed her lips. 

“Did she do anything?”

“I got a lot of answers. Important things, but we can save that for later. Or are you asking about naughty stuff?” I smiled. She looked briefly undecided. 

“Sex things. She keeps flirting with you.” I bumped my shoulder against Reimu’s playfully. 

“We did some things, but didn’t go all the way,” most girls, to my knowledge, would have been angry about that. But I’d read the signs correctly and Reimu looked pleased by the admission. It was decided, next time I met Mokou I owed her big time. “You staked your claim pretty thoroughly, and though I doubt you care too much about whether I’ve been chaste, it wouldn’t feel right to put you second.” 

“… It would have been alright, but thank you,” she said in a moment of gentleness, one that quickly turned impish. “And thanks double for giving me another thing to rub in that hag’s face.” 

“Hm. Don’t be too mean to her.” Reimu rolled her eyes. 

“She’ll recover. If she’s ever actually hurt I’ll fix it.” I nodded and began to stand again, determined to do the dishes. With a tug at my sleeve and a pleading look that resolve was crushed and I reluctantly gave her another few minutes to be clingy. 

“Marissa should be by later today. Or tomorrow. She has a project she’s working on, something about magic beams and heat dissipation over distance.”

“Oh, that sounds cool!” I sucked at magic, but the theory had always interested me. 

“You would think that, wouldn’t you?”

“What’s that mean?”

“Nerd.” 

“You’ve been catty ever since you got that phone.”

“My mind has expanded, my language more verbose.”

“Has it turned you into a pervert yet?”

“The minute I found a web browser I got ads for devil porn. That was the beginning of the end.” I snorted. 

“Well if you’re so tech savvy now, how about we set up our new computer? There’s no wifi, but I bet we can work something out later. Oh, and I got a games console too.”

“You did?!” She raised herself off of my shoulder. “Alright, I know what we’re going to do today!” 

“Saving date night for later?”

“Later this week. I have a few things to get ready first.” She skipped toward the suitcases and puzzled over the zipper for a few seconds before figuring it out. The games I had found were nice. Early 2000s computer games were kind of old, but I remembered playing a few back in my first life. Most of them were altered slightly. 

Civilization III used a hexagonal layout, for example. I was pretty sure that they didn’t use that until the fourth or fifth installment in the series. Arcanum was the same, a game I fondly remembered one of my buddies buying for me. Here the magic system of the RPG was accurate. Clearly one of the writers on the team had been a mage or a supernatural being playing a joke. 

I gave Reimu a surface-level description of each and left her to try Halo. Strategy games didn’t seem to appeal to her as much as the violent ones. By her interested stare into a small TV I’d been able to seal, I figured that in a year or two I’d need to make another trip to the outside world. 

Meanwhile I busied myself around the shrine, checking what chores needed doing and what had been covered, my usual routine after coming back from the underground or the forest of the lost. When all of that was done I bothered her to use one of her teleportation seals on me while practicing my new spatial anchoring technique. 

That was the majority of the day. There were a few breaks where we switched roles, Reimu needing to practice her ofuda drawing and attend to one group of pilgrims who wanted a blessing and some talismans for good fortune. 

At the end of the day we sat outside with some tea while I told her about my trip. I couldn’t help but sit straighter when I came to my sacred gear. 

“Eden’s duel. It helps me hit harder and fight longer! I was hoping for something defensive, but this works just fine. I’ll just have to pester oni sensei for some defensive techniques.” I said as I twisted the club head and revealed the blade within. 

“Oooh,” I could tell that she was playing up her interest for me but barely cared. My weapon was awesome, and I couldn’t wait to test it against some oni. She took out an ofuda, one of her disposable paralysis ones, and waved it into the edge. Without any resistance whatsoever, the paper parted. “Very sharp. Nice find! And this thing is attached to your soul?”

“Yup.”

“Is that safe?”

“Lots of people have them. Maybe there’s something that could be done with God’s system to mess with me, but the people in charge of it wouldn’t do so if they even could.” 

“Then congrats on your first treasure!” I nodded at the accomplishment. “But don’t think that I’ll fall behind you just because you found a decent weapon. Guess what I figured out.”

“Oh? Hmm… you finally figured out an automated personal shield.”

“Nope!”

“Your reverse temporal seal finally stopped disappearing as soon as you activate it?”

She pouted. “No. Time magic is still annoying. Here, watch this.” Without a visible spell circle Reimu drifted upward. 

“Oh! Western magic? No wait, there’s no spell circle, so… it can’t be a talisman, right? No, did you try inking a formation onto your body?” It would have to be hidden under her robes, but I’d suggested it to her before. If ink could convey magical effects then magic tattoos certainly existed. 

“Wrong again! It’s my ability!” I blinked twice. I hadn’t misheard, had I?

“Like an innate ability? You have one?”

“They usually manifest younger, I know, but it just came to me one night while I was stargazing. I call it float. It just feels right, and it can do more than fly, but aside from flight I’ve only figured out one other trick so far.” She settled down in front of me. 

“Attack me.” I shrugged and prepared a bolt of malicious ki. A danmaku, basically, if an unorthodox one. I rarely used them since they were horribly inefficient compared to internal ki usage, but I didn’t want to get up. 

With her feet planted in the ground she turned her body awkwardly and the ki danmaku flew a few dozen feet before breaking down. 

“Again. Do a lot of them. They don’t need to be powerful.” She instructed me. I did as she asked, throwing a small swarm of mostly-harmless danmaku at her. Every one she dodged perfectly, barely moving at all and never more than she needed. On two occasions her mana made a miniscule shield that blocked one of the danmaku. By the end of my attack she hadn’t been hit whatsoever. 

“Pretty cool, right?”

“Yesh, pretty-” I threw one more, this time putting extra care into making it fast and invisible. 

Reimu’s ability to sense ki was present but never honed. Not only was she disinterested in the art, it was one of the vanishingly few places where our talent was roughly equal, and I had pulled ahead through my hard work and early start. With that in mind she wasn’t able to easily identify attacks that were purely spiritual, like the tether I had used against Sariel in our spar. I made this danmaku the same way. She shouldn’t have been able to sense it. 

Yet she took a step toward me and stumbled. Reimu never stumbled, yet as she turned to recover her balance the danmaku went right past her, another missed attack. 

She didn’t even seem to register that there had been an attack, hiking up her robes to check her geta for a broken heel or a stray rock in the dirt. There was nothing. 

“Huh. Hey wait…” I threw three more invisible danmaku. She ducked and twisted, making one miss her head by millimeters and the other two harmlessly going by her shoulder and cheek. She herself even seemed confused as to why she moved that way, moving before she could register why. 

“What the fuck?” I couldn’t help exclaim.

“It’s neat, right? And were those your sneaky invisible attacks?” She brushed off her robe and plopped next to me once more. 

“One you stumbled past and then three that you ducked under.” I said, picking apart the ability. “You said it’s called float? Maybe… we’ll need to test it, but it seems like an evasive precognitive ability. Do you think you could float through a solid surface like a ghost?” 

“Dunno. Probably.” She shrugged carelessly. 

“Well… congrats, Reimu. You finally learned how to fly like a civilized person!”

“No more puddle stomping for me!” She agreed. “And next time we fight someone my legs won’t get so sore afterward. It’s pretty great.” I nodded along, and after a few party tricks she shyly kissed me goodnight and we both tucked in for the night. 

The only word I could use to describe the day was domestic. Quiet, homely, and relaxing, it was all more poignant now that I had spent some time away from Reimu. My seasonal migrations between the shrines and my senseis was more like going to and from work, with the effort demanded of me leaving little time for comparisons. 

This was different somehow. After the talk we’d had just before I left, I couldn’t shake the thought that it was almost like we were married already. If things went well and I agreed to become the next Lord Hakurei I couldn’t imagine much changing from how things we were now. 

Aside from being courted for my potential harem. I didn’t know what I was going to do about that. Yukari and Reimu didn’t get along, Yuuka was owed a child with the potential for more - because like hell was I going to be an absent father, and although my memory of DxD was only in broad strokes of blurry memories, it was a harem anime. 

As I got out into the world more I suspected that the ‘springtime of my youth’ was going to come. 

That is, if I was the protagonist it would. 

Reimu had outshined me once again. If her ability only ever manifested as a danger sense with flight then it would already be excellent. But she’d only had it for two weeks, and although my knowledge of innate abilities was scant, I knew that they often became central to the fighting style of their wielders. 

Yuugi’s unexplainable phenomenon ability was an exception, a whacky and unreliable ability that was either all-powerful or completely useless. Yukari’s was more along the norm to my understanding, and it was a central part of one of the most powerful people I knew. 

From the devilnet I had learned that the original Satan, the Morningstar, had an innate ability too, a holy-demonic element that was lethal to both devils and angels. The archangel Uriel was well known to possess holy fire in addition to the standard holy light all angels wielded. And of course there was Indra, who was the most famed precognitive in the entire world.  

Who else was I missing? Oh yeah, Ophis and Great Red. No explanation was needed there. 

All of the well known people were the cream of the crop, but no less examples because of it. Innate abilities were powerful, and I expected nothing less from Reimu than a similar level of bullshit. 

Really, my impure reincarnation made me look like a chump in comparison, and my sacred gear was neat, but clearly had room for expansion. That idiot red dragon emperor could make his longinus grow into something insane, assuming that my knowledge of him was actually true, so maybe I could do something similar? Like create a subspecies for myself, but I couldn’t recall how to make that kind of thing happen. 

The thoughts of how to grow stronger kept me awake for two hours, not drawn out of any particular desire for power, just an attempt not to be left behind. Even if Reimu and I weren’t competitive with each other, my entire new life had been dedicated to learning to be a warrior. The pride in my skills had come with it, whether I liked it or not. 

I left the shrine the next day, promising to Reimu that it would be a short day trip, and that if I wasn’t back by the night then I’d return the next day. With my word given, she let me go. I had a sensei to meet with. 

Not Mokou, who was in her busy season stocking her campsites with dried foods and firewood, a tedious chore that I was happy to avoid, but Yuugi. I wanted to show her my new technique and ask for advice, as well as my concerns about my defenses. 

Also, I was wondering if she’d forgive Reimu for insulting her and let her back into the hot spring village. It had been long enough that I felt I stood a chance of convincing her to let bygones be bygones. Maybe we could work something out. 

I could always just get strong enough to beat her up and bring Reimu in anyway, but that would take a long time. Even the two of us working together would get destroyed. Putting it in terms of wings, Yuugi was around a ten winged angel, one with an exceptionally strong body and gods-know-how-much combat experience. 

Not an easy foe to face by any measure. The hypothetical battle crossed my mind as an idle musing while I followed my usual route through the cave system. There were a few shortcuts I’d discovered, but the trip to and from the cavern was still one that took at least an hour. 

In the middle of my journey I noted how there were very few lesser youkai around compared to usual, and those that I saw were running scared. Something was wrong. The only question was what that something was. 

Had something happened to the village? Or maybe there was an aberrant youkai around hunting their kin, one who had grown in power enough that they were nearing sapience. It happened from time to time, I heard, and was one of the primary ways new youkai were born. 

I wasn’t worried. Still, I hurried up, burning some of my ki to make a faster pace than usual. 

As it happened, I didn’t find the source of the disturbance, it found me. 

A golden-brown blur pounced on me with a tackle, one with a burning power. I unleashed my sacred gear instinctually and slammed it down on the creature’s back. 

“Gyah!” I was thrown aside into the wall of a tunnel, buried over an inch in the solid stone. I was moving for an attack before the concussive stars left my eyes, my body flooding with ki from the attack on the creature. My overhead swing was met with resistance, hands coming up to stop its descent. “Fuck, you’ve got a swing on you! What’s that? A new club? Kinda fancy looking.” 

“Oh, sensei,” I realized. Yuugi grinned at me warmly. “What the heck are you doing out here? What’s going on in the tunnels?”

“Oh! Right, shit, conceal your ki!” Her eyes widened and her voice dropped to a hushed tone. I immediately did as she asked and was dragged off behind some stalagmites. Oni sensei contorted her life force into an array and wrapped it around the both of us. I recognized it as a more advanced version of a stealth technique she had taught me. 

“Listen, it’s not a great time to come to the village.”

“Why?”

“Because my sisters are here.”

“You have family?!” The horrible image of three tall, stacked, wicked senseis hellbent on teasing me forced its way into my mind. 

“I mean the other devas!” She hissed. “Suika and Kasen. Fuck, she actually came out of her mountain for some reason, gods know why, it’s been over a century, and Suika is being Suika drinking all the good booze and starting fights and games. It’s a big fucking mess, and I’m the one who’s got to clean it all up! At this point you being here will just make the whole thing even more rowdy than it already is!” 

I tactfully didn’t point out that Yuugi wouldn’t be lifting a finger to clean up anything. The weaker youkai would be fixing any property that got destroyed while she drank and told them to work harder, as was the oni way. 

The other oni way was drinking to ignore their problems, which actually worked more often than it had any right to. Sometimes it was Yuugi’s whacky ability making convenient things happen without any explanation and other times the few responsible people in the hot springs village got fed up and solved some of the local problems themselves. 

Either way, oni sensei didn’t do shit. 

“Oh. You know, I’ve been meaning to meet them-”

“Shin!” She cried sufferingly. “If they come by they’re going to be all over you! It’s an ambush, don’t you get it?” 

“But I want to meet your friends. It’s not like they’re going to hurt me, right? Well, no more than you do.” I could tolerate some inevitable teasing to meet new people.

“Suika might.” She admitted

“They- wait, really?” An image was starting to come to mind, a massive, muscle-bound woman who loved to fight and cause trouble, a true warrior who was littered with scars and stories of battle. 

Maybe they’d even have an eyepatch or something cool like that! 

“She gets carried away sometimes, and, well… she’s stronger than me.” I barely caught that last shamefully muttered part, yet couldn’t help but pretend otherwise.

“What was that?” I tried not to grin and earned a glare. 

“Brat, I said she’s stronger than me! There, I said it, alright?! Suika couldn’t use a ki technique to save her life, but fuck if she can’t throw a punch! So don’t get any ideas, smartass!” Two insults in one tirade? Yuugi really got her hackles up around her fellow devas. 

I hummed and considered her pleading. “So how long will they be around for?” Yuugi held a hand up to her chin in thought, brow furrowing. 

“I dunno, like a month? Two? Probably not any more than that, Suika will get bored and leave eventually. Kasen… more like nine or ten months? You never really know with her anymore. She’s kind of weird but isn’t causing problems like Suika.”

“Sensei, you can’t seriously be suggesting that I stay away for a whole year just so your buddies don’t find me. Also, why don’t they just come to the shrine?”

“Because it’s the Hakurei shrine, Shin. That place is to youkai as cursed ground is to humans. Your little girlfriend’s wards might not be able to harm you, being human and all, but a youkai? It’s seriously uncomfortable, like you’re an ant being looked at under a spyglass!” She shivered just thinking about it. That explained a few things, namely why youkai avoided coming by the shrine at all. 

I hadn’t actually thought that the wards were powerful enough to harm someone like Yuugi or Yukari, but maybe I was wrong. Or maybe the gap youkai had a special exception thanks to being there when Hiraku Hakurei had settled the clan in Gensokyo, like a guest pass. 

Or maybe she just knew that she wouldn’t be hurt. She and Reimu weren’t friends, but they were a little more than mere acquaintances. 

“Look, look,” she leaned down only slightly to grab me by the shoulders. On the other side of the stalagmites I heard a noise. “All you have to do is come by a meeting spot later and I’ll pass you some techniques. You’re good at self studying, and since I won’t be able to teach you as much I’ll extend the deadline, um, six months. That’s fair, right?”

I caught a glimpse of pale skin and white fabric, lightly stained with cave dust. Two horns peeked out from behind Yuugi. 

“Let’s say that we meet at the place you killed that centipede thing. You know, where I threw you into the… yeah, I said I was sorry alright? Meet me there and I’ll throw in something nice. I’m sure I’ve got a treasure laying around somewhere that you can use for something fun.” She continued. I was hardly listening. The horns grew longer until eventually a head peeked around the corner of our hideaway. 

That was a very cute girl, and as our eyes met she rounded the corner in full her mouth opened in an enormous smile. 

“Ahaaaah!” She gasped in delight. 

Yuugi froze. 

The oni girl threw herself onto Yuugi in a single motion. One foot slammed the ground, throwing her forward so fast that I caught an afterimage of her smiling face as Yuugi was rocked forward by a hug with the kinetic force of a ballistic missile. Behind the two, part of the cave floor was cratered, stalagmites blown aside from the casual blow. 

“HI HI HI HI HI!” The girl cheered. This was definitely Suika. I had been totally wrong about how they’d look, but could easily see how a character like her could be a problem. “You’re Shin, right?!” The girl crawled over Yuugi like a monkey, peering over her shoulder while pushing her head to the side. Oni sensei reached up to throw her off, but even as her hands wrapped around Suika’s horns the gremlin held fast. 

Sensei’s knees buckled. There was no way the gremlin was that heavy, she was just being dramatic. 

“Yeah, that’s me! I’m glad I get to finally meet you.” I was never good with kids, but I could match her energy somewhat. 

… Wait, wasn’t this kid like a thousand years-? 

“Hyaagh!” Oni sensei roared as she managed to complete some kind of technique. She hurled Suika over her head, muscles and veins bulging with effort. Suika’s mouth turned into an O shape as she went in a weighty arc. 

But with a flailing of her arms and a display of ki-powered flight so clumsy that I briefly doubted that she was actually an oni, she fell into my arms in a princess carry. 

As expected, Yuugi had been messing with me pretending that Suika was heavy. In fact, I was starting to suspect that she had been pranking me about the girl being dangerous at all. Sure she had a lot of very dense ki, but that could be acquired naturally through age. 

If anything, Suika was as light as a feather, and she quickly made herself comfortable in my arms. Maybe a little too comfortable, as she leaned in to grab both of my cheeks and turn my head this way and that. 

“Wha r’ yuu doin?” I asked as she pulled up my gums. 

“Wondering why Yuugi finally took an apprentice!” She chirped. 

“He’s not my apprentice.” The oni in question said flatly. 

“What she said. I’m just a student, and a temporary one at that.”

“Aren’t you going to get her pregnant?” What did that have to do with anything? 

“I owe her a child, yeah.” 

“Eeeeeeeh!” She wiggled and kicked her legs. “That’s so romantic! The student admiring his cool, tall sensei, eventually surpassing her to take her as his wife! Hehehehehe!” She giggled, giddy with secondhand joy. 

Out of the deva’s line of sight, Yuugi pointed at her angrily. She mouthed something at me that I couldn’t pick up then frustratedly waved her arms toward the few remaining stalagmites blocking our line of sight to the main chamber of our local tunnel. 

‘Kasen’ I finally picked up from her. 

“Well, we’re not really sure we want to be married yet.” Suika’s smile dimmed a few degrees and, with an acrobatic twist, she swung her legs up around my neck. 

Without any warning she felt like she was a thousand pounds, and I flailed as I fell to the ground under the crushing weight of a little girl, landing on my front with her sitting on top of me, her legs crushing my windpipe. I pulled with all my might to get just one leg to loosen up to no avail whatsoever.

“Haaaah?! Why not?! Is Yuugi not good enough for you? Or are you some kind of weenie?! Spit it out!” Her attitude flipped on a dime, instantly defensive of her friend. 

“No! I just, we’ve never been on a date before!”

“Whaddya mean?!” She demanded. 

“She’s my sensei! We train a lot!”

“Do you drink?” 

“What-”

“Do you drink together?! Fight together?! Do, uh, other things together?!” 

“Y - yes? Yes, and, um, kind of yes?” I was confused by what exactly she was saying. Luckily it seemed like Suika had confused herself too. 

“From the Hoshiguma dish?!” 

“Nah, I never let him have it,” Yuugi scoffed. I didn’t say anything. She could feel my ki accurately enough to tell a truth from a lie. “No. No you didn’t.” 

“I was really curious!” I protested indignantly. “And you never give me the good stuff! Come on, it’s not like it runs out!” 

“YOU LITTLE SHIT!” She thundered, her voice so loud that the cavern ceiling shook. “SUIKA, CHOKE THE BITCH!” 

“On it!” 

Her legs tightened, strangling me further. I choked and wheezed, trying to wriggle my way out of this. No dice. 

This had to be the most humiliating defeat I’d ever had. Beaten up by a little girl? What would Reimu say about this? 

… She’d laugh at me. 

She could never find out. 

One of my last resorts was forging oxygenation of my muscles via ki, a useful technique for a lot of things, in this case being choked to death. While I focused on not dying oni sensei laughed. 

“That’s how you treat a student, Yuugi? How shameful. I’d expect nothing less.” A stranger spoke with an even, vaguely wise-sounding voice. Out of the corner of my eye I saw her laughter die down to a slump. 

“Ugh. Fun’s over, Suika. Hi Kasen. See, Shin? Should’ve just bolted.”

“I - hagh! - never had the time to!” I protested as I rubbed my sore neck. Suika continued to sit on me, growing lighter now. Heavy, yes, but not unbearable. I stood up and she transitioned into sitting on my shoulders, impeccably balanced the entire time. 

Turning my head, I got a sideways view of the new arrival and some of Suika’s thighs.

Pink hair, pink eyes, and most telling of all, a flower pinned to her chest? She was the least oni-looking oni I’d ever seen. Even Suika had her horns and unrestrained energy. 

First of all, covering up one’s horns? Horns were a source of pride for oni, the same with scars. With the head accessories and the bandages this woman was covering both. 

Then there was the air of softness she had. Her eyes looked at me in a way that reminded me of Sariel, Gabriel, and Michael. It was hard to explain, but felt like optimism. Like I could trust that she was seeing me in the most forgiving, understanding light. 

 Instantly I knew: this youkai was going to be total weirdo. 

“A pleasure to meet you. I am Kasen, a humble hermit.” She bowed respectfully. I momentarily mentally bluescreened. 

This was an oni, right? When the fuck did oni bow to anyone without being forced to? And hermits were generally humans who isolated themselves to seek enlightenment, kind of like druids with a taoist philosophy, but there wasn’t any solid rule against a youkai becoming one. 

“No, it’s my pleasure. Thanks for calling off your friends. Suika.” I reached up and pushed the oni on my shoulders to get off of me. She obstinately refused to budge. 

“Hey, you’re Yuugi’s student, right? It’s not my problem how she trains you!” I could feel the shit-eating grin on her face without seeing it. 

“It is when you’re helping her!” 

“Oho? You’re going to make it my problem? Pretty bold of you! I like this one, Yuu!” She chirped to oni sensei.

“Yeah, that’s what I was afraid of.” She grumbled. 

“Look, I just came around to see sensei. Can the two of you wait a few days before dragging me into something?”

“Mayyyybe~! Got plans?” Suika leaned over my head to view me. 

“For tomorrow and the next day, yes,” tomorrow was when Marisa should be coming and then was my date. “If you have anything really important I can spare some time, but I just got back from the outside world and have a list of things to do.”

“Like Reimu?” Yuugi snarked. 

“Yup.” I said flippantly. Suika growled out of my sight. 

“Nuptials?” Kasen questioned. 

“Our first date.” The goblin growled louder. 

“How lovely. And this would be Reimu Hakurei, I presume?” At my nod she smiled pleasantly. “It would be a terrible thing to intrude upon young love. I will wait until you’re ready. If you have time today, however, might you join us for sake and stories?” I seemed to be having a lot of talks over meals lately. 

“We could. I came here looking to talk with oni-sensei about my training, though. Maybe you two would like to join us? I’m always happy to meet a new sparring partner.”

“Yeah, whatever.” Suika grumbled. She seemed to have no intention of leaving my shoulders, which was kind of freaking me out since she didn’t seem to like me very much. 

“I generally avoid fighting. However I can tell from your ki that you’re trained in martial techniques. If those are included in today’s regimen I would be happy to offer pointers.” Kasen offered. 

“Please!” I exclaimed happily. 

“Kid… you have no idea what you’ve gotten yourself into.” Yuugi looked at me pityingly. 

An hour later Suika was laughing and by all appearances having the time of her life. 

Why? 

Because she was beating me like a drum. 

I was flipped over her head once again, the evil youkai using her small stature to slip under my already low guard once again and grab my ankle. She flipped me into the air like a burger patty and before I could gain any momentum she leapt and kicked me. 

For the hundredth time I crashed through stone, having to push myself out of a crater. We were on the far outskirts of the hot spring village next to one of the towering cave walls, one that was steadily being moved as my body was used to put more and more holes in the earth. 

As soon as I was out and on my feet again I beheld Suika bouncing from foot to foot, hopping like an energizer bunny and ready to pummel me again.

“Alright, that’s it. I give up.” I finally gave in. Being a chew toy was surprisingly helpful for learning how to take a beating and not flinch against a superior foe, but had to be one of the most unpleasant training methods in existence. 

The worst part was that she was taking it easy on me. She had some sort of multiplication/division power, capable of making tiny Suikas that punched almost as hard as the original or making her a giant. Not that she needed it for that. It also adjusted her density, something that came as naturally to her as breathing to her. 

“Awww. Oh well, it was fun while it lasted!” Suika kicked the ground petulantly. “Let me know if you want to do this again sometime! If you try really hard, I bet you could hit me!” 

I had hit her with ki techniques. Her life force was just so unbelievably dense that any ki-based attacks bounced right off of her. I wasn’t dumb enough to try to steal her ki either. I’d probably explode. 

“Thanks, Suika.” 

“Mhm!” She spun around, ready to walk away, but hesitated and spun back around. “By the way, you’re kind of a philanderer, but you’re one of the toughest humans I’ve ever met! So good luck with Yuugi. She could really use a good man!” She grinned at me and waved merrily before disappearing. 

Yuugi approached me. “… Feeling regret yet?” She asked. 

“Mostly pain.” 

“Just goes to show you that I’m a good teacher. You could always be Suika’s disciple.” 

“Please, sensei, don’t leave me with that creature.” I begged. She chuckled. 

“Don’t worry, she’s not looking for one. But that’s actually how she got that strong, ya know? Just kept getting beat up until she was on the other end of things. She only knows a couple techniques, but she honestly doesn’t need them.” 

“I can tell.” 

“Yeah, yeah, you got yourself into this mess so go meet Kasen and finish yourself off. She’s meditating over there.” She waved vaguely at one of the many offshoots of the main cave, one tucked away from the noise of our sparring. 

But I was wiser now than I was before. “And what’s so bad about her?”

“She yaps a lot and always thinks she’s right. Actually, you’ve got the patience of a saint, so maybe you’ll like her.” She considered. 

“She’s not going to beat me up?”

“Psh, no. But I might.” She pushed my shoulder, clueing me in that she was joking. 

She’d already had Suika do that for her. 

“Alright, I’ll see you later sensei.” I left for the second part of my impromptu meet and greet. 

The cave Kasen was in wasn’t one I had explored before, but was well lit by some of the fluorescent lichen the oni had cultivated across the caverns. Deeper in I found it more lush than the usual caves I came across, with some common mushrooms and a few plants that had adapted to low-light conditions. 

At the end of the passage was a circular chamber, in the middle of which sat Kasen in a lotus pose meditating. She opened her eyes at my arrival and waved me in. 

“Welcome, Shin. I trust that Suika didn’t beat you too badly?” She asked. 

“I forfeited after she used me for some landscaping.” She eyed the dust lingering on my clothes and snickered. 

“If she didn’t cause a cave-in then she was being careful. Do you have enough ki to learn something new?”

“Probably.” I was physically beaten, but spiritually I still had some juice in the tank. I sat down across from the oni hermit and waited for instruction. 

“What do you know of external ki use?” She opened up. 

“Like this?” I manifested a tether, the length extending from my wrist. 

“No, that’s a branch of internal to external ki. I mean the manipulation and perception of the life force of other beings without use of one’s own ki, also known as senjutsu.” She clarified. 

“You can do that? I can perceive ki excellently, but manipulation without my own life force?” 

“Of course. Observe.” She lowered a hand to the cavern floor, where a little of the fluorescent lichen grew. Her ki appeared to constrict and relax once, twice, and then a third time. The lichen grew from a patchy growth into a thick bush from her ministrations. 

“What the…? It can do more than that, right?’

“It’s a branch of the hermit arts, one that oni rarely perform. Most are incapable of it,” she explained. Her hand moved from side to side and the glowing lichen followed the movement as best it could, which wasn’t much, being a plant. Not the slightest bit of her own internal energies were used as she showed off the trick. “It requires tapping into the connections between all living things, which itself requires an abstinence from worldly desires and a disconnection from the self. Oni are antithetical to such things. And yes, it can do much, much more than just moving plants.” 

“And you? How are you able to perform the hermit arts?” I glanced questioningly at her covered horns. She smiled patiently. 

“I am not a youkai,” she said simply. Such an insane statement caused me to look at her disbelievingly. “Oh, I am an oni, but the spiritual impurities that make a youkai what they are? I was purified of them. Now I am on a different path. That’s why I stay away from the hot springs village most of the time. This place is a wellspring of violence, impurity, and indolence. I would never deign to destroy it, for such things are as natural as purity and virtue, but it grows unpleasant to linger in.” 

I wouldn’t describe the village quite as harshly as she was. There were plenty of youkai who just sold their goods for a day and went to live their lives peacefully. The oni, who were the majority of the population, could be violent and hedonistic, but it wasn’t as black and white as she made things out to be. 

Not that I would correct her. It was a youkai village at the end of the day, and vice was a core part of any youkai. 

Something that this woman was not, which I surprised myself by readily believing. A youkai, and an oni at that, being purged of violent and base impulses was a crazy story, but not impossible. The only surprising part of her explanation was that she hadn’t died from the purification. Most youkai would perish if they lost the core parts of their identity. 

“If you say so. I’m not much of a hermit myself, but I’ve always been good at sensing ki. Would that help?”

“Certainly. First off, do you meditate?”

“Sometimes.”

“Internal or external?”

“Pardon?” 

“Do you focus on your own energies or the world around you?”

“Almost always the former.” 

“Let us try the latter together,” she folded her hands in front of herself. “Watch my ki if it helps you. When done correctly, your life force will naturally mold itself into a similar shape as my own will take. And… perhaps a little motivation is in order.” Her smile took on a hint of mischievousness. 

“Should you show potential, it would be an honor to grant a gift to a potential sage coming into their own. A technique, if you care for it.” 

“Might I know which one?” 

“One of your choosing.” I was suddenly a lot more motivated to learn senjutsu. Kasen was kind of a looney, but clearly well learned. 

With my acceptance clear she closed her eyes and began to meditate. With a slow grace that spoke of true mastery, her ki unfolded. 

The core of her being, her soul, was laid almost completely bare to see, a small, dense, iridescent form devoid of any distinguishable shape. Her life force, on the other hand, rolled out from herself in a layer so thin that I eventually lost sight of it, even knowing that it had been laid over me. 

Her life force went on and on and on, well past the limits of the cave wall. Material obstructions meant nothing to it, and strangest of all was that it seemed to piggyback off of ambient energy signatures. The latent energies in the air and soil were all used as conduits to bridge herself through. 

She was, in every sense, laid completely bare to the world around her, without any natural armor or defenses. The sheer stimulation of it ought to have been overwhelming, yet she didn’t appear disturbed at all. 

It was fascinating and slightly morbid, like watching someone peel off their skin and feel no pain, or stretch out every nerve in their body across as long a distance as they could. 

The simile wasn’t exact, but to someone like me, who focused so intently on reinforcement of myself to better defend my body and soul, it was the exact opposite of what I usually did. 

But a deal was a deal, and my curiosity was piqued. I extended my ki outward as she had, and instantly ran into a brick wall, that of my own ego. My life force refused to fully detach itself from my soul as Kasen’s had. There was an inherent feeling of almost suicidal skittishness when I tried to do so. 

It wasn’t a matter of not being good enough at manipulating or sensing ki, it was some other block, something mental. Hadn’t she said that my ki would take the shape naturally? 

If senjutsu was my usual techniques performed in the opposite direction, then maybe I should try approaching it from the opposite direction as well. 

I emulated her form as well as I could and then focused on my own mindset. That quickly stopped when I realized that focus wasn’t the point of it. My attention went at first to all that my extended ki could feel, then beyond it to what I could sense. My heartrate slowed, my breaths became so slow and shallow that my chest barely moved, and I stopped focusing on any one thing and tried to pay attention to everything equally. 

The effort mostly failed. Nobody could really pay attention to everything at the same time, but that was expected. All I got were vague impressions of the world around me, and that was enough. 

The stone, the lichen, the energies in the air, it was all pretty boring, which helped in a way. All of it was equally beneath notice, and before long I felt myself begin to zone out. 

My ki inched along, looking for something new to hold my attention. There was a small crevice in the walls with an ancient rat skeleton in it, a loose coin at the bottom of a puddle along the path, and a dozen other tiny, unnoticeable things. They were all logged and moved on from. 

Then I was outside of the cave, drifting along. A lesser youkai had climbed far up one of the cavern’s support pillars, too afraid of the recent commotion to get down and escape. A colony of insects had several of their tunnels collapse during the quakes we created and were trying to rebuild them. Far away was echoing laughter and sparks of ki. 

I drifted further, to the hot spring village. Kasen was right in a sense. The emotions of everyone were laid bare before my near-omniscent attentions, lost in a trance as I was. A few goblin-like youkai, squat and ugly for the most part, bartered in the streets over various trinkets, most of which were stolen. A frog youkai haunted an alleyway waiting for someone gullible to come by and scam. On top of a roof one oni sulked, thinking bitter thoughts about a rival that had bested him. 

Two lives burned brighter than any others, that of Suika and Yuugi. The two of them caught up and poured each other drinks that they knocked back like they had a quota to meet, both embellishing their stories with different goals. 

Yuugi was directing the conversation toward her own ends, the words indistinct yet each carrying purpose. She was trying to draw Suika toward something, nudging her into making a decision that benefitted her. She liked her old friend, truly she did, she just didn’t respect her enough to restrain her manipulations. 

The shorter oni was little different, releasing a frustration that felt ancient. Something had happened, a separation, one she was trying to mend. Not for her own gains, necessarily, more to mend a sense of loss, one that she couldn’t quite name. Something had been taken from her, not something physical, and she longed for it, even not knowing what it was. 

But I knew. She was lonely. She didn’t enjoy wandering but didn’t know what else to do. She was happy, yes, but had nobody to share that happiness with. Suika longed for a friend. And who else but her closest friends? She didn’t care about Shin, about me, at all. She only wanted her family back together. 

Then there was Kasen. Layered over each other, I was only dimly aware of her. Not so for the purified oni. Her consciousness mingled with mine, feeling the same things I was and the same conclusions. She could have held back her own emotions but did not. 

She lamented the state of her friends to me, both Suika’s isolation and Yuugi’s heartlessness. The former couldn’t fathom making new friends, too stuck in the past to move on, while my oni sensei had grown twisted around her own desires and ambitions. 

Kasen, meanwhile, was blind to her own flaws. I pointed this out and her state of being wobbled, losing tranquility. Then she refuted me. She was better now, more at peace than ever before. She had moved on. It was her friends who refused to listen, who belittled her chosen way of life, that were so stuck in the past or mired in future plans. 

It seemed to me that the three devas each had their flaws. Not that I lacked my own, nobody did, but they were letting their flaws divide them and were each worse off for it. That was a sad state for friends to be in. It ought to be the opposite, covering for and working alongside each other. 

That observation was neutral, one mostly devoid of criticism. Still, it stung Kasen. She asked me what I knew about it. I showed Reimu and Yukari, the three of us growing steadily closer as time went by. We all had faults and had our own desires and privacies, but we were growing closer, not farther apart. 

A deep sadness pervaded the hermit, then, and she directed me back toward the cave. My being snapped back into myself. The moment I realized what I had done my ki was like a rubber band, and the natural barriers life force erected were put back into place, making me a single consciousness once again. 

The feeling that came over me was similar to deja-vu, a trippy and out-of-body aftereffect of transcending my state of being, if only briefly. As soon as it passed I looked at Kasen. The oni was looking downcast. 

“You’re a prodigy,” she said without looking at me or any enthusiasm for the achievement. “Two techniques. I will record them for you on scrolls. Apologies, but I will not be there to teach you. I have meditations to perform.” 

“… Are you alright?” I asked with concern. The memories of our minds mingling were hazy but there. We had talked about her friends, I was pretty sure, and she was sad about something. That was all I could remember with any certainty. 

“Merely lamenting some old wounds. It will pass.” She looked at me and smiled spiritlessly. 

“I don’t fully understand what’s between the three of you or the history you share, but if you ever want to talk about it I’m a good listener. You have my word that anything we speak of will stay private between us.” 

“Perhaps someday. I won’t burden you with the troubles of old ladies any time soon, however. Now choose.” 

“I’d like a technique for empowering my ki and one for movement across vast distances.” 

“Energy amplification is a common art, good for powerful attacks, though the fatigue afterward is horrendous unless acclimated to. It also imbalances a body’s natural energies. I don’t recommend it to anyone without a natural energy imbalance. I do have a movement technique that you’ll enjoy. It’s a method of reducing the effect natural laws have on the body, from wind resistance to gravity. You could even use it to surpass the speed of light, though that such a level it would become simpler to teleport. Would that suffice?”

“Could I have something else for my first choice? I didn’t know that the consequences of ki amplification were so severe.”

“Any preference?”

“Something defensive. Your choice.” 

“Death nullification, then. So long as you have ki, you will not die.” I raised an eyebrow. That sounded powerful. And I could regenerate from almost anything but not anything. If my brain was destroyed or I couldn’t replace my heart in time I’d be as dead as anyone else. 

Not anymore, apparently. 

Kasen stood up and reached out a hand to help me stand. “Continue to practice senjutsu and you’ll find the benefits well worth the time investment. I have no intention of picking up a student, but if you encounter any bottlenecks I’ll be happy to advise you as a peer. Thank you for indulging me, and it’s been a true pleasure.” She bowed once more, this time deeper, a sign of true respect. 

I mirrored the gesture. “It’s been an honor to meet a true hermit.” When I rose from my bow the woman was gone, as if she’d never been there in the first place. 

“… I’ll give Suika and Yuugi your farewells.” I said to the empty chamber, unsure if she was paying attention to me. 

What a strange place I lived in. 

AN: Yo! Sorry to take longer than usual to post. I had a hectic week, and not in a fun way, which is why this is coming out at near midnight. I considered splitting this chapter in two but considering that it's been over a week I let it be.

I should be free to write more in the coming days so you all won't need to wait so long for the next one, just FYI. So I'll see you all pretty soon.