12
Anyway, new chapter, a bridge between Glass Scenery Arc and Two Clubs Arc ...
Intermezzo: The Long Awaited Sleepovers and The Time is only Boundary...
Hajime took the bowl of sake from a Shanghai who was with many sisters working as the waitresses during the last summer day party. He was only half listening to Hieda and Kosuzu discussing this summer's events. He spoke with Reimu and Aya about the Scarlet Weather and he lived through the Forgiveness Bloom. He still felt bad about the pain, he caused to Tsugumi, but also relieved. For the first time he was free. 'Ayumi,' he silently promised, 'when I saw you again, I will beg you for the forgiveness myself. You didn't do anything wrong, it was all my fault.'
"Good words," soft regal voice interrupted his musing. He turned and saw the Yama standing near him with a female he didn't saw before but he guessed was her employee Komachi, the shinigami. The Yama was slightly smiling, she seemed almost peaceful and soft doing it. "Don't forget your promise, and you will find the salvation for sure." She then turned to her left and addressed someone invisible "Yukari-sama, I see you managed to come at least."
A Gap opened from which Yukari stepped out with Reimu in tow. "I was able to solve the misunderstanding easily enough, isn't it right, Reimu?"
"You aren't from the hook still, Yukari," Reimu grumbled. "And why Suika?"
"Because she was a famous architect before she was send to hell by her jealous concurrent," Yukari explained. "She was also the one who build the Palace of Earth in the Old Hell when she took on the manacles of Oni."
"There is someone, who was send to Hell by Jigoku Tsuushin, running around the Gensokyo?" Hajime asked perplexed.
"There are many like her," Yukari answered. "What do you thought happened to the innocent send to Hell? Most of them are given the choice to enter the Hell God's employment. They will loose their humanity, true, but it's still better than the alternative. They all wore manacles as their sign of their status as servants or in Suika's and her friend's case as the token of their former status. After the centuries of their work the Hell God released bunch of Oni from his employment when he build for himself and the Damned new hell on the other side of the Sanzu river."
"Suika is a good girl," Reimu took over. "She is constantly drunk, and loves good fight as much as a good party, but she is lovely and strangely innocent. I didn't know about her being the Hell's famous Architect."
"She even built the New Hell's public buildings as well. The Spider and Yama entered with her in a contract for that," Shikieiki Yamaxanadu told them with a sigh. "The prize was for us to give her free pass to go wherever she wanted. She can even settle in a Heaven if she so choose, but as an Oni she will probably find the Heavens somewhat boring."
"Oh, Yukari," Reimu turned to the most powerful Youkai in Gensokyo, "tell our new citizens that I will watch over them as a hawk. When they cause an Incident, I will be there."
"Didn't you want to say, 'If they cause an Incident,' Reimu-san?" Hajime wondered. All women around him, even Kosuzu, burst out laughing.
"I did meant When," Reimu told him.
"Why?" he was truly confused by the mirth of all others.
"Because they are Youkai!" all women told him at once laughing. "Causing at least one Incident is normal for us/them."
"Even Komachi here is responsible for one," Shikieiki told him to embarrass her employee. "Her laziness cause once in a while spiritual equivalent of traffic jam." He gave Komachi her patented disappointed look.
Komachi didn't looked too ashamed tough. "I'm not responsible for the annual sexagenary death peak between humans. I worked as normally, even more so but it was beyond me."
'I'm not drunk enough for them to make sense,' Hajime sighed to himself and helped himself to new sake. He looked out and was perplexed. 'It's snowing there? In the Summer?'
***
Meanwhile in Tsugumi's room she and the younger girls plus Mystia giggled over prank retelling from Chen. She told them about the one time Cirno managed to smuggle several frozen Faeries past the Small Barrier, a ward that covers the Human Village against such penetrations. Unluckily, it then didn't cover the hill above the village and the frozen Faeries didn't count as 'living' according the Wards. So the 'Iceballs' - nine if she told the truth - each containing one Greater Fairy, were thrown by Cirno and her companion Wriggle down the hill and ended in the center of the village. When the ice melted the Faeries wrecked havoc through the village for month before Reimu managed to capture all of them and threw them out of the wards personally. She was annoyed because the 'Great Fairies Hunt' took her too much time for such nuisance. She did kill Cirno for it - it took the Ice Fairy two weeks to recover - and Wriggle ended with sever beating as well. Reimu also forced her and Mystia, who was innocent in this, to help with the cleanup of the village. Reimu also remodeled the Small Barrier to include the hill, so no one will repeat Cirno's ingenious prank, and bullied Mystia into responsibility of the 'Nineballs', like the infamous duo was called from then, and the Night Sparrow ended as an older cool sister to those troublemakers.
"That was the start of our group," Chen ended the story. "Strangely one of the Fairies, that Cirno managed to include in her prank, shoved later, and she accompanies Cirno ever since. She didn't have name then so Wriggle and Mystia simply called her Daiyousei, Greater Fairy, and it stuck. Everyone calls her that, even Reimu-san and Yukari-sama. She later introduced Rumia to the group. This was during the Scarlet Devil Mansion Incident or Red Mist Incident like some people called it. Rumia is freaky sometimes, and she attacked Reimu-san and wanted to eat her. She was promptly shot down by her and Daiyousei found her knocked out shortly after she and Cirno were beaten as well when trying to take revenge for the previous beating." Chen and Mystia giggled remembering all the times Cirno tried to take revenge for something that was mostly her own doing, and ended beaten again or forced to run away. Ability to learn from past mistakes wasn't Cirno's, Daiyousei's or Rumia's strongest trait.
"I met them through Mystia here recently when I ran some errands for Ran-sama in the Human Village. When I stopped at her stand to buy some lampreys to eat - they are delicious, and when you end in the village sometime you should try them - Wriggle was there, persuading Mystia to go with them 'treasure hunting' in Mayohiga. I ended on the run with them, and it was fun. I'm their occasional associate and the 'Honourable Nineball' ever since."
"Can you told us about the Treasure Hunt please,Chen?" Nina was curious.
"Maybe sometime latter," Mystia interrupted them. "Now, please, could you turn the lights down, Nina-cha, and come here?" she motioned to the window. "I have a surprise for you."
The girls moved to the small balcony the suite was equipped with, and Nina turned the lamps of with her magic. "Ah," Tsugumi was left speechless with the spectacle in front of them. Thousands of fireflies formed the most intriguing light show in the dark of the summer's moonless night. It even surpassed the spectacle of Danmaku battles Tsugumi occasionally witnessed from Shibata's first day in Gensokyo. "That's beautiful," she heard Nina whisper while Odoriko's music picked up, and was now joyous and full of wonder, magnifying the fairytale atmosphere of the night show. Then it started to snow! In the summer! The snowflakes were unnaturally cold but as beautiful as the firefly's lights.
"This is our gift for you, Tsugumi-chan, so you will not forget Gensokyo," Mystia told them. "Behold the power of the Nineballs," she gestured to the three larger lights flying above them in an intriguing pattern.
"That's Cirno!" Chen pointed the rainbow light ball caused by refraction of star- and firefly's light through the ice shards around the Ice Fairy. "And Dai-chan!" she pointed to the gold and green light of the Fairy circling around Cirno. Tsugumi learned latter that she was turning the shards into snowflakes and then used her wind-based magic to sprinkle the sanatorium with it. "And there is Wriggle! Right in the midst of the fireflies!" Chen pointed the largest and brightest of the night bugs that was leading and organizing the aerial ballet. Of course, with Nineballs being Nineballs that was when it went all wrong. And it was Chen's mistake this time. "Guys!" she shrieked as loudly as she could. "Wriggle! Down here! Heey!"
Wriggle, as she latter told them, heard the Nekomata's shooting, looked for her, and lost control over the firefly's swarm. The swarm went in wrong direction, and collided with the cold air around Cirno. The girls down shrieked in alarm when it started to rain half frozen bugs. This startled Daiyousei who collided with Cirno herself, and the Greater Faerie landed with heavy 'thud' in the midst of the parking lot encased in ice and completely frozen. Startled Cirno lost control of her power freezing most of the remaining fireflies, and ended in shooting and impromptus Danmaku duel with the Firefly Youkai. Even with her Spellcards being flawed, even from Tsugumi's perspective, she somehow won against more elegant Spellcards Wriggle used.
"You saw?" Cirno bragged when she dragged her annoyed friend down to them. "I won again! I'm the strongest!" It seamed she completely forgot or never mind their show being interrupted. "Chen, you Baka!" Wriggle grumbled. "You startled me!"
"Sorry," Chen looked down embarrassed, and was looking so cute even Wriggle couldn't stay mad at her for long. "I wasn't thinking. Please, forgive me!" she bowed to Wriggle and Cirno.
"Eh?" Cirno looked confused. "What for?"
Mystia and Wriggle face-palmed. Cirno wasn't exactly dumb but her attention span was low even for a Fairy. She forgot or didn't noticed things others wouldn't. Cirno was lucky Daiyousei was much better in this regard than most others Faeries. Tsugumi and the other girls giggled, observing Chen's and her friend's antics.
"Wouldn't it be better to take it inside?" Tsugumi asked. "It's cold here out." She shivered slightly.
"Sorry for that," Mystia apologized. "Cirno, could you please turn your power of for the time?" she turned to the Fairy.
"Eh? Sorry, I forgot," Cirno squeezed her face in concentration, and the cold waned. "It would be better to have some source of heat. I can't hold my power back for long. I'm too strong!"
Nina blinked and then told them "Come with me. There is a grate in the large lounge across your room, Tsugumi-chan. The fire should be lit by now."
"So, lets go," Cirno sounded relieved and turned to go inside.
"Wait!" Tsugumi stopped them again. "What about her?" she pointed to the block of the ice in the midst of the parking lot.
"Eh?" Wriggle and the rest of the Nineballs turned to the frozen Fairy. "Dai-chan!" Chen and Mystia flew down.
"She will be alright," Cirno shrugged while from the dark several loud thuds and crunches sounded. "I'm alright," somewhat shaky and uneasy but sweet and kind voice could be heard. "See," Cirno turned back and ushered the girls inside. "Hurry into the warm,so I can stop to repress myself, please!" So Nina led them through Tsugumi's room and across the passage into much larger and opulent room with a small lounge with lit fire that was making it too hot. Cirno sighed in relief, and the hot air in the room quickly cooled to pleasantly warm. Cirno seated herself as far as possible from the fire while the other girls sat near the fire on the provided pillows, and took the provided hot chocolate. They were joined by Chen, Mystia and girl with gold wings and green hair who was shivering violently and looked half drowned.
"Are you really alright, Dai-chan?" Wriggle asked.
"I will be," she took a mug of the hot chocolate. "At least today you didn't forget to thaw me, and thanks Gods for the chocolate!"
"That was amazing!" Tsugumi, now relieved that Daiyousei was obviously alright, remembered the show Chen's friends put for her and the other girls.
"It was truly something!" Nina was almost as excited as Tsugumi.
(In the background Cirno turned her mug of hot chocolate into frozen chocolate, and was wondering how to get the now hard mass of sugar and cocoa from the mug).
"Sorry for the mishap in the end," Mystia apologize. "I wanted to show you, what we sometimes do at festivals or such. I didn't think Chen and Wriggle will end jumbling it in the end!" she gave those two her best disappointed look.
"It's alright!" Odoriko dismissed the apology with Nina and Tsugumi nodding. "It was honest accident, and the show was beautiful. I wonder if we could try to combine it with my magic sometime," she sounded pensive and eager.
"The snow was nice touch," Chen smiled at a blushing Daiyousei. "I didn't know you and Cirno could combine your powers in such manner."
"I heard about your Talent Tsugumi-chan," Wriggle turned to the only human in the room. "I didn't met a Seer in my life. Can you see, what will we be doing in five months? And by we, I mean those who are here in this room?"
"I don't know," Tsugumi sounded unsure. "Alice-san and Yukari-sama warned me to not Look too far ahead, and certainly not without supervision."
"Please, pretty please," Wriggle sounded eager. "It will be alright, I'm sure. And besides we have Mystia and Chen here. They can make sure you are alright."
("Can I know where Rumia-chan is?" Chen asked Daiyousei meanwhile.
"Mystia told us, it would be better to not take her with us today. With Tsugumi-chan being human and Rumia being Rumia..." Daiyousei explained.
"Ah," Chen nodded in understanding. Cirno created utensils from ice, was able to get the chocolate ice out, and was eating it with delight.)
"Well if you think it's alright, Mystia-san?" Tsugumi asked the eldest looking Youkai in the room. Mystia, unsure but as intrigued as Wriggle, nodded after short while. "Nina-chan, could you bring here the equipment Alice-san get for me?"
Nina blinked, and after short while something landed with dull thud on the large table in the lounge. When they turned to it the equipment was laying on it. Tsugumi stood up, and started to prepare herself for the experiment. If Chen wouldn't be distracted by Cirno making mess of her chocolate and Daiyousei still not being fully recovered, she would stop Tsugumi on the spot. What she was doing was extremely dangerous and forbidden. Seeing into future was even for the most experienced Seers deadly risk. Future isn't carved in stone, and Seer will see EVERY possible futures. Also the 'everyone in the room' definition was too broad. The amount of data for the possible futures were compounded by every being in the room. So you ended with amount data compounded by ten. Almost no one could survive this. Tsugumi had the luck to be too inexperienced - most of the informations went through her mind unnoticed, and she lately didn't recalled anything she Saw.
"Tsugumi?" Chen saw too late what was happening. "What? O, sh*t!"
It was too late to stop her. Tsugumi was in a Trance by now, and interrupting her will badly hurt her. Chen could only hope for the best. She and others gathered around the young Seer, providing her with the focus and magic she needed unknowingly. Burst of Divine energy erupted from Tsugumi without hurting anyone in the room when the Gods of Time heard Tsugumi's plea, and provided her with what she wanted.
"I See... I see myself talking with a girl I don't know. Is she truly called Imouto (younger sister)?" Tsugumi was bleeding from her nose now.
"I See... I see Wriggle. Cirno snowman. Pretty ..." she giggled. "I see Wriggle fighting a ghost?" she spat out blood but didn't pay attention to it.
"I See... I see Chen. A Geyser erupted from the ground? The snow is melting. The Rainbow is pretty." she blinked away the bloody tears.
"I See... I see Nina-chan and Odoriko-chan. They drink chocolate. Someone is with them. Don't know the Horned girl..." she spat another blob of blood.
"I See... I see Mystia-san. Lamprey stand? That's how you make money? There is a Cat, another one than Chen. Red hair. Warning. About fire blazing again. What?"
"I See... Cirno. So many Cirnos, so chaotic... Fighting, playing. The damned Faeries of Light. How you could lost Dai-chan again? All the time she was searching for you and you are at home," she was bleeding from her ears as well.
"I SEE... Goddess? Who is she? The North High... The frozen mansion. The Goddess powerless? The Goddess powerful? She welcoming opening of a Gap? Why is the Gap green? Are those electronic circuits? Not Yukari with a snow girl. Time is only Boundary..." Tsugumi fainted, leaving the bewildered Youkai to take care of her, Chen frantically casting every healing spell she knew...
So right now the Nineballs were the only one who KNEW about the dangers the Future will bring.
***
(Somewhere. Time unknown)
"So you think we can see the Lost Ones, Merry?"
"It should be really easy. The theory of United Fields tell us the Time is discrete, not continuous. And all discrete variables has boundaries. So Time is only another set of Boundaries, Renko-chan. And I See. I See the Age of Wonders clearly with this understanding. The Books are the false Moons, the distorted reflections. Find me one perfect, one True and I will Dream a Path to the time the Last Gods walked the world. Find me such book, Renko Usami, and you have the focus you physicists are searching for so long."
***
"The Sealing Club. Another success!"
The End of the Glass Scenery Arc. The Two Clubs Arc starts now!
Also Nitewind can't continue as my betareader and if someone would be so kind write me to my Inbox. Pretty, pretty please?
So to answer your question. It is much more complicated then this. I gave you hints in my earlier chapter when Yukari told to Nina and Odoriko
The red citations are what you should take as my headcanon. Warning, spoilers ahead!
Intermezzo: The Long Awaited Sleepovers and The Time is only Boundary...
Hajime took the bowl of sake from a Shanghai who was with many sisters working as the waitresses during the last summer day party. He was only half listening to Hieda and Kosuzu discussing this summer's events. He spoke with Reimu and Aya about the Scarlet Weather and he lived through the Forgiveness Bloom. He still felt bad about the pain, he caused to Tsugumi, but also relieved. For the first time he was free. 'Ayumi,' he silently promised, 'when I saw you again, I will beg you for the forgiveness myself. You didn't do anything wrong, it was all my fault.'
"Good words," soft regal voice interrupted his musing. He turned and saw the Yama standing near him with a female he didn't saw before but he guessed was her employee Komachi, the shinigami. The Yama was slightly smiling, she seemed almost peaceful and soft doing it. "Don't forget your promise, and you will find the salvation for sure." She then turned to her left and addressed someone invisible "Yukari-sama, I see you managed to come at least."
A Gap opened from which Yukari stepped out with Reimu in tow. "I was able to solve the misunderstanding easily enough, isn't it right, Reimu?"
"You aren't from the hook still, Yukari," Reimu grumbled. "And why Suika?"
"Because she was a famous architect before she was send to hell by her jealous concurrent," Yukari explained. "She was also the one who build the Palace of Earth in the Old Hell when she took on the manacles of Oni."
"There is someone, who was send to Hell by Jigoku Tsuushin, running around the Gensokyo?" Hajime asked perplexed.
"There are many like her," Yukari answered. "What do you thought happened to the innocent send to Hell? Most of them are given the choice to enter the Hell God's employment. They will loose their humanity, true, but it's still better than the alternative. They all wore manacles as their sign of their status as servants or in Suika's and her friend's case as the token of their former status. After the centuries of their work the Hell God released bunch of Oni from his employment when he build for himself and the Damned new hell on the other side of the Sanzu river."
"Suika is a good girl," Reimu took over. "She is constantly drunk, and loves good fight as much as a good party, but she is lovely and strangely innocent. I didn't know about her being the Hell's famous Architect."
"She even built the New Hell's public buildings as well. The Spider and Yama entered with her in a contract for that," Shikieiki Yamaxanadu told them with a sigh. "The prize was for us to give her free pass to go wherever she wanted. She can even settle in a Heaven if she so choose, but as an Oni she will probably find the Heavens somewhat boring."
"Oh, Yukari," Reimu turned to the most powerful Youkai in Gensokyo, "tell our new citizens that I will watch over them as a hawk. When they cause an Incident, I will be there."
"Didn't you want to say, 'If they cause an Incident,' Reimu-san?" Hajime wondered. All women around him, even Kosuzu, burst out laughing.
"I did meant When," Reimu told him.
"Why?" he was truly confused by the mirth of all others.
"Because they are Youkai!" all women told him at once laughing. "Causing at least one Incident is normal for us/them."
"Even Komachi here is responsible for one," Shikieiki told him to embarrass her employee. "Her laziness cause once in a while spiritual equivalent of traffic jam." He gave Komachi her patented disappointed look.
Komachi didn't looked too ashamed tough. "I'm not responsible for the annual sexagenary death peak between humans. I worked as normally, even more so but it was beyond me."
'I'm not drunk enough for them to make sense,' Hajime sighed to himself and helped himself to new sake. He looked out and was perplexed. 'It's snowing there? In the Summer?'
***
Meanwhile in Tsugumi's room she and the younger girls plus Mystia giggled over prank retelling from Chen. She told them about the one time Cirno managed to smuggle several frozen Faeries past the Small Barrier, a ward that covers the Human Village against such penetrations. Unluckily, it then didn't cover the hill above the village and the frozen Faeries didn't count as 'living' according the Wards. So the 'Iceballs' - nine if she told the truth - each containing one Greater Fairy, were thrown by Cirno and her companion Wriggle down the hill and ended in the center of the village. When the ice melted the Faeries wrecked havoc through the village for month before Reimu managed to capture all of them and threw them out of the wards personally. She was annoyed because the 'Great Fairies Hunt' took her too much time for such nuisance. She did kill Cirno for it - it took the Ice Fairy two weeks to recover - and Wriggle ended with sever beating as well. Reimu also forced her and Mystia, who was innocent in this, to help with the cleanup of the village. Reimu also remodeled the Small Barrier to include the hill, so no one will repeat Cirno's ingenious prank, and bullied Mystia into responsibility of the 'Nineballs', like the infamous duo was called from then, and the Night Sparrow ended as an older cool sister to those troublemakers.
"That was the start of our group," Chen ended the story. "Strangely one of the Fairies, that Cirno managed to include in her prank, shoved later, and she accompanies Cirno ever since. She didn't have name then so Wriggle and Mystia simply called her Daiyousei, Greater Fairy, and it stuck. Everyone calls her that, even Reimu-san and Yukari-sama. She later introduced Rumia to the group. This was during the Scarlet Devil Mansion Incident or Red Mist Incident like some people called it. Rumia is freaky sometimes, and she attacked Reimu-san and wanted to eat her. She was promptly shot down by her and Daiyousei found her knocked out shortly after she and Cirno were beaten as well when trying to take revenge for the previous beating." Chen and Mystia giggled remembering all the times Cirno tried to take revenge for something that was mostly her own doing, and ended beaten again or forced to run away. Ability to learn from past mistakes wasn't Cirno's, Daiyousei's or Rumia's strongest trait.
"I met them through Mystia here recently when I ran some errands for Ran-sama in the Human Village. When I stopped at her stand to buy some lampreys to eat - they are delicious, and when you end in the village sometime you should try them - Wriggle was there, persuading Mystia to go with them 'treasure hunting' in Mayohiga. I ended on the run with them, and it was fun. I'm their occasional associate and the 'Honourable Nineball' ever since."
"Can you told us about the Treasure Hunt please,Chen?" Nina was curious.
"Maybe sometime latter," Mystia interrupted them. "Now, please, could you turn the lights down, Nina-cha, and come here?" she motioned to the window. "I have a surprise for you."
The girls moved to the small balcony the suite was equipped with, and Nina turned the lamps of with her magic. "Ah," Tsugumi was left speechless with the spectacle in front of them. Thousands of fireflies formed the most intriguing light show in the dark of the summer's moonless night. It even surpassed the spectacle of Danmaku battles Tsugumi occasionally witnessed from Shibata's first day in Gensokyo. "That's beautiful," she heard Nina whisper while Odoriko's music picked up, and was now joyous and full of wonder, magnifying the fairytale atmosphere of the night show. Then it started to snow! In the summer! The snowflakes were unnaturally cold but as beautiful as the firefly's lights.
"This is our gift for you, Tsugumi-chan, so you will not forget Gensokyo," Mystia told them. "Behold the power of the Nineballs," she gestured to the three larger lights flying above them in an intriguing pattern.
"That's Cirno!" Chen pointed the rainbow light ball caused by refraction of star- and firefly's light through the ice shards around the Ice Fairy. "And Dai-chan!" she pointed to the gold and green light of the Fairy circling around Cirno. Tsugumi learned latter that she was turning the shards into snowflakes and then used her wind-based magic to sprinkle the sanatorium with it. "And there is Wriggle! Right in the midst of the fireflies!" Chen pointed the largest and brightest of the night bugs that was leading and organizing the aerial ballet. Of course, with Nineballs being Nineballs that was when it went all wrong. And it was Chen's mistake this time. "Guys!" she shrieked as loudly as she could. "Wriggle! Down here! Heey!"
Wriggle, as she latter told them, heard the Nekomata's shooting, looked for her, and lost control over the firefly's swarm. The swarm went in wrong direction, and collided with the cold air around Cirno. The girls down shrieked in alarm when it started to rain half frozen bugs. This startled Daiyousei who collided with Cirno herself, and the Greater Faerie landed with heavy 'thud' in the midst of the parking lot encased in ice and completely frozen. Startled Cirno lost control of her power freezing most of the remaining fireflies, and ended in shooting and impromptus Danmaku duel with the Firefly Youkai. Even with her Spellcards being flawed, even from Tsugumi's perspective, she somehow won against more elegant Spellcards Wriggle used.
"You saw?" Cirno bragged when she dragged her annoyed friend down to them. "I won again! I'm the strongest!" It seamed she completely forgot or never mind their show being interrupted. "Chen, you Baka!" Wriggle grumbled. "You startled me!"
"Sorry," Chen looked down embarrassed, and was looking so cute even Wriggle couldn't stay mad at her for long. "I wasn't thinking. Please, forgive me!" she bowed to Wriggle and Cirno.
"Eh?" Cirno looked confused. "What for?"
Mystia and Wriggle face-palmed. Cirno wasn't exactly dumb but her attention span was low even for a Fairy. She forgot or didn't noticed things others wouldn't. Cirno was lucky Daiyousei was much better in this regard than most others Faeries. Tsugumi and the other girls giggled, observing Chen's and her friend's antics.
"Wouldn't it be better to take it inside?" Tsugumi asked. "It's cold here out." She shivered slightly.
"Sorry for that," Mystia apologized. "Cirno, could you please turn your power of for the time?" she turned to the Fairy.
"Eh? Sorry, I forgot," Cirno squeezed her face in concentration, and the cold waned. "It would be better to have some source of heat. I can't hold my power back for long. I'm too strong!"
Nina blinked and then told them "Come with me. There is a grate in the large lounge across your room, Tsugumi-chan. The fire should be lit by now."
"So, lets go," Cirno sounded relieved and turned to go inside.
"Wait!" Tsugumi stopped them again. "What about her?" she pointed to the block of the ice in the midst of the parking lot.
"Eh?" Wriggle and the rest of the Nineballs turned to the frozen Fairy. "Dai-chan!" Chen and Mystia flew down.
"She will be alright," Cirno shrugged while from the dark several loud thuds and crunches sounded. "I'm alright," somewhat shaky and uneasy but sweet and kind voice could be heard. "See," Cirno turned back and ushered the girls inside. "Hurry into the warm,so I can stop to repress myself, please!" So Nina led them through Tsugumi's room and across the passage into much larger and opulent room with a small lounge with lit fire that was making it too hot. Cirno sighed in relief, and the hot air in the room quickly cooled to pleasantly warm. Cirno seated herself as far as possible from the fire while the other girls sat near the fire on the provided pillows, and took the provided hot chocolate. They were joined by Chen, Mystia and girl with gold wings and green hair who was shivering violently and looked half drowned.
"Are you really alright, Dai-chan?" Wriggle asked.
"I will be," she took a mug of the hot chocolate. "At least today you didn't forget to thaw me, and thanks Gods for the chocolate!"
"That was amazing!" Tsugumi, now relieved that Daiyousei was obviously alright, remembered the show Chen's friends put for her and the other girls.
"It was truly something!" Nina was almost as excited as Tsugumi.
(In the background Cirno turned her mug of hot chocolate into frozen chocolate, and was wondering how to get the now hard mass of sugar and cocoa from the mug).
"Sorry for the mishap in the end," Mystia apologize. "I wanted to show you, what we sometimes do at festivals or such. I didn't think Chen and Wriggle will end jumbling it in the end!" she gave those two her best disappointed look.
"It's alright!" Odoriko dismissed the apology with Nina and Tsugumi nodding. "It was honest accident, and the show was beautiful. I wonder if we could try to combine it with my magic sometime," she sounded pensive and eager.
"The snow was nice touch," Chen smiled at a blushing Daiyousei. "I didn't know you and Cirno could combine your powers in such manner."
"I heard about your Talent Tsugumi-chan," Wriggle turned to the only human in the room. "I didn't met a Seer in my life. Can you see, what will we be doing in five months? And by we, I mean those who are here in this room?"
"I don't know," Tsugumi sounded unsure. "Alice-san and Yukari-sama warned me to not Look too far ahead, and certainly not without supervision."
"Please, pretty please," Wriggle sounded eager. "It will be alright, I'm sure. And besides we have Mystia and Chen here. They can make sure you are alright."
("Can I know where Rumia-chan is?" Chen asked Daiyousei meanwhile.
"Mystia told us, it would be better to not take her with us today. With Tsugumi-chan being human and Rumia being Rumia..." Daiyousei explained.
"Ah," Chen nodded in understanding. Cirno created utensils from ice, was able to get the chocolate ice out, and was eating it with delight.)
"Well if you think it's alright, Mystia-san?" Tsugumi asked the eldest looking Youkai in the room. Mystia, unsure but as intrigued as Wriggle, nodded after short while. "Nina-chan, could you bring here the equipment Alice-san get for me?"
Nina blinked, and after short while something landed with dull thud on the large table in the lounge. When they turned to it the equipment was laying on it. Tsugumi stood up, and started to prepare herself for the experiment. If Chen wouldn't be distracted by Cirno making mess of her chocolate and Daiyousei still not being fully recovered, she would stop Tsugumi on the spot. What she was doing was extremely dangerous and forbidden. Seeing into future was even for the most experienced Seers deadly risk. Future isn't carved in stone, and Seer will see EVERY possible futures. Also the 'everyone in the room' definition was too broad. The amount of data for the possible futures were compounded by every being in the room. So you ended with amount data compounded by ten. Almost no one could survive this. Tsugumi had the luck to be too inexperienced - most of the informations went through her mind unnoticed, and she lately didn't recalled anything she Saw.
"Tsugumi?" Chen saw too late what was happening. "What? O, sh*t!"
It was too late to stop her. Tsugumi was in a Trance by now, and interrupting her will badly hurt her. Chen could only hope for the best. She and others gathered around the young Seer, providing her with the focus and magic she needed unknowingly. Burst of Divine energy erupted from Tsugumi without hurting anyone in the room when the Gods of Time heard Tsugumi's plea, and provided her with what she wanted.
"I See... I see myself talking with a girl I don't know. Is she truly called Imouto (younger sister)?" Tsugumi was bleeding from her nose now.
"I See... I see Wriggle. Cirno snowman. Pretty ..." she giggled. "I see Wriggle fighting a ghost?" she spat out blood but didn't pay attention to it.
"I See... I see Chen. A Geyser erupted from the ground? The snow is melting. The Rainbow is pretty." she blinked away the bloody tears.
"I See... I see Nina-chan and Odoriko-chan. They drink chocolate. Someone is with them. Don't know the Horned girl..." she spat another blob of blood.
"I See... I see Mystia-san. Lamprey stand? That's how you make money? There is a Cat, another one than Chen. Red hair. Warning. About fire blazing again. What?"
"I See... Cirno. So many Cirnos, so chaotic... Fighting, playing. The damned Faeries of Light. How you could lost Dai-chan again? All the time she was searching for you and you are at home," she was bleeding from her ears as well.
"I SEE... Goddess? Who is she? The North High... The frozen mansion. The Goddess powerless? The Goddess powerful? She welcoming opening of a Gap? Why is the Gap green? Are those electronic circuits? Not Yukari with a snow girl. Time is only Boundary..." Tsugumi fainted, leaving the bewildered Youkai to take care of her, Chen frantically casting every healing spell she knew...
So right now the Nineballs were the only one who KNEW about the dangers the Future will bring.
***
(Somewhere. Time unknown)
"So you think we can see the Lost Ones, Merry?"
"It should be really easy. The theory of United Fields tell us the Time is discrete, not continuous. And all discrete variables has boundaries. So Time is only another set of Boundaries, Renko-chan. And I See. I See the Age of Wonders clearly with this understanding. The Books are the false Moons, the distorted reflections. Find me one perfect, one True and I will Dream a Path to the time the Last Gods walked the world. Find me such book, Renko Usami, and you have the focus you physicists are searching for so long."
***
"The Sealing Club. Another success!"
The End of the Glass Scenery Arc. The Two Clubs Arc starts now!
Also Nitewind can't continue as my betareader and if someone would be so kind write me to my Inbox. Pretty, pretty please?
So to answer your question. It is much more complicated then this. I gave you hints in my earlier chapter when Yukari told to Nina and Odoriko
The red citations are what you should take as my headcanon. Warning, spoilers ahead!
Yukari is to Maribel what Yasumi Watahashi is to Haruhi Suzumiya. She is part of her Creator but is not exactly her. But Maribel can also be taken as a creation of Yukari! Those two exists as a part of a whole but independently. So she isn't Maribel but Maribel is known to her, even if she knows only little about her. They also met - in Yukari's past and current Maribel's future. And no, Yukari didn't met Renko - yet. But this will change, in this story at least.
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