54 Night Parade of One Hundred Oni Every Four Days Part 4
Author Note: 3k word babyyyyy!!
-Evening, In front of my House-
-My POV-
I start searching for the position of the sun.
Of course I'm aware that I'm not gonna find it when I'm standing in the middle of the forest, so I look at the sky stead. Currently the sky is orange in color, which means the sun is still setting in the horizon.
"Isn't it a bit too early for a ghost to come out in this time of day?" I asked.
"No, not at all, this time of day is the time that a ghost starts coming out." Yuyuko replied lightheartedly.
"I see. Then may I know your reason to visit me in this time of day?"
"What are you talking about? I'm just taking a stroll, and we just met on the road. I don't even know the location of your home."
"Hahaha, is that so?" I smile, not because I'm feeling happy, but because I'm feeling despair.
'Is she really telling the truth? Was she really just strolling around until she arrived to my House? …Whatever, at this point I already pass despair, only acceptance.' I thought.
"Please ease your heart, little black cloud. Are you really that scared of me?" she said with a sad look.
I blink.
My useless brain finally starts working. It put all the pieces together, and my eyes widen in realization as to what I've done to Yuyuko until now.
I immediately bow, no, bowing is too light for my sin, I instead perform my very first dogeza to her.
"I'm sorry for my unsightly behavior until now!" I said my sorry to her.
"…So you really were knew about my past self." I heard what Yuyuko said.
I keep my head touching the ground, not moving an inch because of how ashamed I was with the mistake that I've done.
My mistake, the grave mistake that I've done to Yuyuko was that, I viewed her as if she's the embodiment of death.
There's actually more story beside "Yuyuko sacrifice her own soul to seal the Youkai Tree", and I'm going to tell you more about her back story.
It all started when a girl, Saigyouji Yuyuko born with special ability.
The ability to manipulate death.
When she unknowingly tested her ability, everyone realized as to how horrifying her ability is.
Tree and grass slowly wither, animal and insect suddenly collapses or slowly stop moving.
Seeing this, the servants started feeling afraid.
Her parent's afraid of her ability.
Even, the girl's also afraid of her own ability.
Everyone didn't have the courage to offend her and decided to just obediently do everything what she said.
Time passed, the girl changed into a young adult, beside the change of age, her condition also changed. The change was actually not for the better, but for the worse.
While feeling the pressure for having such dreadful ability and also enduring the way that everyone looks at her, Yuyuko's cheerful and friendly personality disappeared and slowly but surely replaced with something morbid, until finally...
"All I'm doing is too save everyone. …Yes, this is to save everyone. …so I'm sure that...….…this is not counted as suicide."
Saigyou Ayakashi, Youkai (Tree) of Saigyou.
A Toukai trees that lure its prey by charming them by its beauty before sap them of their life. Originally, it's just a normal cherry blossom tree, but after Yuyuko's father, a widely adored poet, create a poet about dying under a beautiful cherry blossom tree and then he proceed to die beneath it after his time comes, other people/his fans also following his example by dying under that same tree, so because there were many people that died under it, it eventually turn into a Youkai Tree.
…Let's paused for a moment, I want to do a mental face palm after what I just mentally explained.
…People are fucking stupid.
…Okay, let's continue.
So when she heard about Saigyou Ayakashi, she immediately planned to use herself to seal the Youkai Tree.
But why she didn't use her ability to cause the Youkai tree to die?
Honestly, I don't know.
Maybe the tree already too powerful by eating many people that even her ability has no effect on it, or maybe at that time, such thought of using the ability on it, never crossed inside her mind.
People's mind is a fickle thing.
Once you're at the very bottom, it takes a monstrous effort to go back up. Some people could miraculously go back up with others help, very rarely you could go back up with your own strength, but if you stay at the very bottom for too long, suicidal thought can easily appear and immediately performed without second thought by own self.
That's why; I'll do what I can to prevent someone from reaching that very bottom.
"Please raise you head. It's okay, don't worry about it, but can I ask you a favor?" asked Yuyuko.
I raised my head to look at her.
"…Can I ask you a favor by telling me about my past?" said Yuyuko with a little bit of sadness mixed in her voice.
"I'm sorry, if she hasn't told you about it, then I also won't tell you about it. " I courageously said that word to Yuyuko's face, despite me doing a dogeza to her a second ago.
"…" she shows no reaction from my refusal, it's as if she already expected the answer before hands.
Some of you probably wondering, why is your description of Yuyuko just now, different from the Yuyuko in front of me.
She seems act more cheerful, more playful, more alive, it's as if she has been reborn.
That's actually true, it's actually what happened. She did get "reborn".
When she was still alive, she befriended someone, that someone is Yakumo Yukari. This is the first time they met with each other.
To explain with the simplest method possible, "They become Best Friend Forever from that point in time." Only Yukari understood Yuyuko, and only Yuyuko understood Yukari. They understood each other and thus they become super best friend with one another.
…Is that how you really make friend? It probably is.
With Yukari help, Yuyuko could successfully seal the Youkai Tree, and with Yukari "help", she "resurrected" Yuyuko from her death.
It never specified as to how Yukari resurrect Yuyuko, but people have been theorized how she did it.
Yukari manipulated Yuyuko's border between Life and Death. Yuyuko is alive and death at the same time. A Ghost that's not actually a Ghost.
Like I said some time ago, if you become a ghost, that mean you still have grudge or unsatisfied things that anchor it to the living world, but Yuyuko's doesn't have a grudge or unsatisfied things in the living world. A Ghost is a remained of a living person, but Yuyuko still could use her ability, which is a big part of her. Ghost can't consume anything or doesn't need it in the first place, but Yuyuko's somehow could still do it and savor its taste.
Aside from those positive things, there's also a negative things.
She can't remember the times when she's alive, that's why I said that she has been "reborn", in a certain way. Even thought she didn't remember about the times when she's alive, after she knew that she has one, she occasionally trying to find a clue to someone or something that's know about it. That's why Perfect Cherry Blossom incident happen, she wants to know uncover what's inside the Youkai Tree and trying to understand as to why it feels nostalgia to her.
Now as for the reason of her revival, as to why Yukari resurrect Yuyuko, it never been properly explained. In the first place, the game only dropping a hint about someone revived her, so the community immediately took a guess that that "someone" is actually Yukari.
Why she's doing it? We don't know.
Maybe it's Yukari's selfishness for not wanting her BFF to died, so she wants her to experience as to what life has to offer once again. And there's also the thing with Yukari not telling Yuyuko about her past. Maybe she didn't want to tell her because she's afraid making Yuyuko mad at her for resurrecting her.
We can only draw conclusion with what little information we have, dammit ZUN, release more of your Character Bio Book! Filled up the characters with more back story!!
"…All right, I got it." suddenly said Yuyuko.
"W-what do you mean?" I asked while having a bad feeling with what's going to happen.
"Since both of you didn't want to explained, then I'll punish both of you appropriately." she said while slightly pushing her lips forward.
Is-is she pouting?! She pouted?! It's cute though, but, did she just pout?!
"Hm~, looks like she really mad about it." said a new voice beside me.
"Y-Yukari-san?! You're also here?! Since when?!!" surprised me seeing only upper body of Yukari leaning out from her gap.
"From the start, now then, good luck~" Yukari wave before went inside her gap and disappeared from the scene.
"W-wait! What do you mean by 'good luck'?!"
"Ei!" Yuyuko shoots a pink beam to me.
"Uoh!" I move out of its way by cart wheeling into standing position.
I observe Yuyuko.
Her expression is different from what I've seen until now, she looks determine.
She opened her hand fan and pink butterflies start flying around her.
"It's time for your punishment!"
"…Ugh, even if I'm at fault, I also don't want to get hurt, so I'm sorry for my retaliation." I said as I bring out my Light Jewel.
'Do I reflect it back? No, let's just fight normally like always. I figured out that Reflect doesn't really work with stronger opponent lately, also, I got a feeling that Yuyuko will work around it and somehow by pass it, which is a simple solution once you knew the trick.' I thought.
"Ha!" She thrust her hand fan forward, creating barrage of beams.
'Calculate the trajectory, predict the beam power.' I release barrage of beams of my own.
The clash between our beam barrage happened, and they canceled each other out.
Yuyuko waved her hand fan, creating another barrage with more beam from before.
'Repeat the calculation. Increase the beam power to overpowered Yuyuko's beam.'
The beams clashes and they all cancel each other out once again.
'Looks like she has the same idea.'
Yuyuko send another wave of beams with butterflies mixed in her attack.
'Stop beam clashing, mana pool different, eventually will lose, start dodging her attack, also, destroys the butterfly.'
I changed the Jewel into Light Saber mode and with a little bit of foot work I dodge her beam while slashing at the incoming butterflies.
'I guess I was wrong about the butterfly being the tell tale of her ability activation, those butterfly are Danmaku, a butterfly shaped Danmaku.'
After I deal with her attack, she shot another wave of her attack, but since I don't want to deal with it again, I chose to teleport way above her head.
'Plunging Attack!'
When I'm thinking that she doesn't know what will hit her, flocks of Butterflies Danmaku suddenly appear and they immediately heading towards me.
"You think that will stop me?!"
With adding my mana into the mix, I make the Light Saber thrice bigger than its normal size, and I cleave through the butterflies straight into the ground.
I search for Yuyuko, and there she is, standing just outside of my enchanted Light Saber slash range, and she's already prepared for another one of her barrage.
'Must stick close to her, based on knowledge, ranged attack are nightmarish, but her melee attack are terrible!'
I start rushing toward her position.
When she shot beams, I immediately jumped over it, but then the butterflies start coming from all direction. I Vector Change my whole body to move more forward. I slash all the butterflies in front of me before pointing my other palm behind me to Light Shotgun Blast everything in there.
I look at Yuyuko, and she already creating more space between us by going backward before I even landed on the ground.
'She's kiting me. Good strategy for her, but bad for me. I gotta do something.'
Kiting, a terminology that used by gaming community to refers to keeping an enemy chasing you while also keeping it at a range where it cannot attack you, just like playing with kite. Primarily used by ranged character to defeat a melee character, which is what Yuyuko currently doing right now. The only way to break this strategy is to hinder the kiter movement (this is impossible right now) or the kiter target suddenly has increase in movement speed.
Enchant: Speed, Enchant: Reflex.
I zoomed quickly to Yuyuko's direction as soon as I touch the ground.
With surprised look knowing how quickly I suddenly move, she sent another flocks of butterfly to slow me down.
Of course, like before, I make my Light Saber bigger again and wipe them all out.
'Ugh~, I need to finish this quickly, 5 more of this and I'm out. It might sound I still have a lot, but it's not.' I thought.
I sense something coming from behind me. I turn my body to slash at it, and it revealed to be a single butterfly.
"Distraction in front and then a surprise attack from the back?"
I look toward Yuyuko and she starts moving off road, toward the sea of trees.
"No, all of those are distraction so that she could get away." I chased after her.
From here on, the fight become more annoying.
Butterflies everywhere, butterflies in the Yuyuko's path, butterflies behind the trees, butterflies around the corner, second butterflies behind the first butterflies.
Just when I decided to just tank the hit to go faster, mines start appearing, a pink floating explosive bubble. When it first appeared, I tried to jump over it, but then it immediately exploded.
Right now, I'm manually denoting the mine using my own Danmaku while slashing at the butterflies; occasionally some of the butterflies took the hit for the mine, making me have to take the
roundabout way that Yuyuko already prepared to further slow me down.
I guess the annoyingness balance out with 'she's done when I catch her'.
For the first time, after what I feel like hours chasing after Yuyuko, I see a giant tree ahead of her.
"Fufu~" she just giggled before phasing through the giant tree.
'Pincer attack.'
I create a Danmaku in my other hand. I throw it and make it path curved along the right side of the tree while I went to its left side.
'Please at least make her stop for mo-??!!'
When I saw the other side of the tree, I'm really surprised. There's nobody there. My Danmaku just fly harmlessly in the air until it hit another tree.
"Wha-Don't tell me!" I quickly turn toward the big tree.
A hand came out from the tree and it pointing its finger at me. A thin beam came out from the finger and I barely dodge it by diving in to the ground.
"I missed~" Yuyuko came out from the big tree and proceed to run away once again.
"AN-NO-YING!!" I got up and start chasing her with renewed vigor.
We continue our chasing sequence until we finally arrived on a clearing.
Cherry Blossom Sign "Saigyou Cherry Blossom Blizzard"
She used her spell card.
A big ethereal background picture opened up behind Yuyuko while she's up in the air.
From the ethereal background picture, came out cherry blossoms like Danmaku that flutter around Yuyuko like a blizzard. It really stinks when the petal touched your body, but it doesn't matter. This is the end. SHE STOPS RUNNING AWAY.
I start my stance. I reel in my arm that holds the Light Saber, and I stretch my other hands toward Yuyuko.
I endure the cherry blossoms while I start condensing more energy into the Light Saber.
She looks skeptical at what I'm doing but she still didn't move from her position.
'Do you think I can only make it bigger?! You're wrong! I also could make it longer!! AND IT SOUND SO WRONG DAMMIT!!'
One Point 'Single Thrust'
I launch my charged up attack by doing a thrusting motion, it create a slim but dense beam that penetrate all the cherry blossoms, and it hit straight to Yuyuko's body.
"Ugh!" Yuyuko groan, her spell card end, everything vanished and Yuyuko starting to fall.
'…Did she seriously falling? She's seriously falling!!' I start running to catch her.
Since its look like I'll barely made it, I slide on the ground to make it in time and use my whole body to cushion her fall.
It's mysterious, even though she's a ghost, I can still feel her weight on top of my body.
"Y-Yuyuko-san, are you okay?! I'm not hurting you that badly right?!" I said worriedly.
Yuyuko slowly get up from my body to look at me.
She's pouting.
'CUTE! Wait, no, stop pouting! '
"…This is cruel, this is supposed to be your punishment so why am I the one who's losing?"
"I…Well…I'm sorry." even thought I feel annoyed at her moments ago, what she said was correct, so I can't rebuked to her.
"If I can't punish you, then I'll order someone who can."
"Hm?"
"Yuyuko-sama!"
Another challenger appeared! It's Youmu.
Author Note:
Heyo, Author! I finally finish this chapter. Yuyuko's character is a nightmare to write. So I choose the easy way out, which is telling her background story.
I'm actually surprised with the story behind Saigyou Ayakashi, I never knew about it until I read Yuyuko's bio in Perfect Memento in Strict Sense, the info about the tree origin actually wrote in there, not in the Yuyuko's or the Tree's wiki page.
