Imperishable Night…Not! part 1

Chapter 57: Imperishable Night…Not! part 1​

Editor: the_guy (Questionable Questing)

-Evening, My House-

-My POV-​

I lift my Yukata and stare at its back side, on it there's a kanji that's been painted with a white ink brush, "Touhou", it means "East" in the english language.

"This probably gonna cause many misunderstandings." I smile mischievously. "or maybe this'll be the death of me, who knows." I morbidly thought as I put on my Yukata.

*ding*

[Achievement earned]

[KYAAAA! WORLD-CHAN, I'M YOUR BIGGEST FAN!!]

[Openly fanboying over the world you're currently in]

[Reward: 20.000 IP & AP]

"...Thank you, I guess." I said with a wry smile.

It has been a month since Akyuu's birthday, Autumn has arrived, and I start my preparations for the upcoming incident by coming up with new technique with my all of my abilities, especially my Teleport ability, I kinda keep procrastinating from properly practicing it because I'm afraid of if I screwed up when using it, and here's the result of that training.

Question, what would happen if Object A got teleported into Object B?

Answer, Object A won.

When Object A gers teleported into Object B, the mass of Object B gets replaced with Object A, in other words, Object A "impales" Object B. I have tried it with a living thing in the simulation room, and the result was...let's just say the first time I did it, I hugged Bara for the whole day. There's a "resistance" whenever I'm trying to teleport an object into another object. I could use more energy to bypass the "resistance" of an object, but the amount required varies depending on how powerful the target is or how thick the targets are, I guess with this I could know if I'm unknowingly about to Teleport into something in the future.

I guess that's it for any major finding in my training, now into the next issue, the incident.

[Main Story Quest Received]

[Imperishable Night..Not!]

[Objective: Become the first to solve the incident]

[Failure Penalty: Losing of Senior Pioneer privilege]

[Bonus Objective: Solve the incident with a partner]

'...I think that penalty is permanently staying there from now on.' I thought.

I went down the stairs, and I saw Bara's excited figure waiting for me in the living room.

"Finally! It's time for master and me work together again!" she said happily.

"Well, just be careful, this is for real after all." I warned.

"Don't worry, I trust master to have my back after all!" she said with confidence .

"...." I wordlessly pinch and then stretch her cheeks.

"Bweh?!" Bara quacked.

"You're missing the point of my warning." I said with a mix of anger and happiness.

The quest had appeared an hour ago, but I didn't panic because I was already waiting for it ever since Autumn arrived, I remembered in the Timeline that Imperishable Night had happen a season after Immaterial and Missing Power solved, and since the characters that appear in this incidence are quite powerful, I started my training before the quest appeared, and I included Bara as well since I got a feeling that I'll need to form a team as well, just like in the canon.

Moving on, Imperishable Night, that's the title of the game/incident, it all started when the creature of the night are enjoying the moon, then all of sudden they noticed that the moon suddenly "looks" different, and thus they concluded that someone replaced the moon with the fake one. And since they still want to continue with their moon viewing, they stopped the time while they're finding out who's behind the fake moon, hence where Imperishable Night name came from.

Yeah, that's pretty much the gist of it, and now for in depth explanation. Someone inside Gensokyo had decided to tie-up their loose ends by covering the whole earth with a barrier, causing nothing to go in or out from earth, but since they didn't want anyone to be suspicious, they created an image of all the sky within the barrier. The Humans are fooled by this but not the Youkai, and so they start moving with their partner/servant/subordinate to solve the incident.

I finished putting my Combat Boots on.

"...Hey, Bara, do you know about the Human Village?" I suddenly asked.

"Human Village? No, I don't know. Is there even village like that here?" Bara answered and asked back with genuine curiosity.

"...I see." I said. 'Keine already did it, let's hope I'm faster than everyone else.' I thought.

I reach for the front door and opened, revealing someone with pink hair floating and a school girl with white hair waiting in front of my house.

"Ara, what a great timing, we don't need to knock the door now." said Yuyuko as she smiles behind her hand fan.

"G-good evening, Arah-dono." Youmu bowed.

"..." and I just smile.

I tried really hard not to slam the door shut immediately. For one, it's rude, and also there's probably a consequences after I did it.

Remember when I said "They bring their servant/slave/partner to solve the incident" part? Well, here's one of them, in total there's 4 teams in total that we're racing against.

Barrier Team, Magic Team, Scarlet Team, and Netherworld Team. You can guess which one I didn't want to meet the most...nah, I'm kidding, I didn't want to meet any of them.

I don't know which one is the one that stopped the night , but I can think that such feats are not outright impossible and maybe simple in the execution if you knew where to tweak Gensokyo. After all, this place is inside the Great Hakurei Barrier, if you knew in and out of how the barrier works then you could do the deed easily. Or you could just pour more power to stop time, considering how easy this incident happened in Gensokyo, I reckon this method will work flawlessly.

"Master?" Bara poked her head out from between my body and the door.

Yuyuko and Youmu looks curiously at Bara.

I noticed it and realized something, I start lightly push Bara forward from her back.

"I think this is the first time you two saw her, she's my servant, come on, introduce yourself." I urged her to introduce herself.

"G-good evening, my name is Bara Api, but you can call me Bara, it's a pleasure to meet both of you." said Bara before she bowed her head.

"Ara, what a polite girl. My name is Saigyouji Yuyuko, but you can call me Yuyuko-neechan you know." Yuyuko said with amusement.

"Y-yuyuko-sama!" Youmu looks troubled.

Bara also looks troubled with how to react to this.

And I just smile at her antics.

"A-anyway, my name is Konpaku Youmu, I'm Yuyuko-sama's servant, it's a pleasure to meet you as well." Youmu bowed.

"S-same here." Bara bowed back.

What a peaceful scene, but Bara, why are you secretly glancing between Youmu and me? Are you worried about this school girl wannabe stealing me from you? Don't worry, to me both of your cuteness is equal. Let's dress you up as a schoolgirl after this is over.

"Now that the introduction is over, mind telling me the reason for the visit?" I inquired.

"Ah, yes, you see, it suddenly changed." she said shortly.

I blink.

I immediately look upward, toward the moon.

This is the first time I saw the moon tonight, I'm just too busy with preparing for this incident that I just forgot to at least check the moon, and the result is…

It's the same.

The moon looks the same just like yesterday, it didn't look shinier, it also didn't look dimmer, it size is still the same, it even looks the same, a frown appeared because I can't find any differences between the real one and the fake one.

"Exactly!" Yuyuko suddenly continued. "It suddenly changed in the middle of my Moon Viewing, it bothered me so much that I can't enjoy my moon dumpling in peace." she pouted.

I stay silent and wait for her to continue.

"And that's why we're here." she applied her pressure. "For my moon dumpling, why don't you lead us directly to the culprit, Arah-kun?" her smile turned menacing.

'...Ah, she's actually serious about this.' I thought as I smile, not the happy kind but instead the 'fuck this shit I'm out' kind.

Youmu also looks serious, ready to do anything for her Mistress.

Bara looks tense, waiting for my response.

…

'Fuck this shit I'm out' indeed, YOLO!!

Clairvoyant.

"Then you make the right choice, is what I would say in normal circumstances." I pulled Bara to me and then picked her up ("Funya!").

Calculate the distance, calculate our weight.

"But unfortunately, this is a race." I said while looking directly at Yuyuko..

Preparation complete.

"And we'll be the first one to solve it." and I jumped.

Teleport.

-Bamboo Forest of the Lost-​

I appeared in mid air, and then landed softly on the ground.

Currently we're at the entrance of the Bamboo Forest, just like I planned.

"...I'm gonna get so much shit after everything is over." I said as I regret everything that I did until now.

I look at Bara in my arm.

"Bara, you okay?" I asked.

"M-maybe??" She look disoriented from the jump.

"I see, but I won't be taking any chances. I'll wait for you until the dizziness disappeared." I said while I let her down, letting her stand on her feet.

"...Sorry." she apologies.

"Don't worry about it, it takes a while for me to get used to the jump too." I assured her.

And I wait for Bara to collect herself and start thinking about the plan from here on.

I will finally go into this bamboo forest, The Bamboo Forest of the Lost, that's the full name of this place. It didn't take a genius to figure out that the name comes from the fact that it's easy to get lost in this bamboo forest. If you want to navigate inside a forest, one of the important things in doing so is to know where you are, recognize a landmark or a clearing inside the forest, but based on what I remembered, this bamboo forest doesn't have any of it. The only one that knows how to navigate inside are the people that has been lived inside the forest for many years. That means if by chance I encountered Mokou in the middle of the forest, then I'm lucky. And if I'm not, then I'll just rely on my luck to get us to my destination.

...Hm? Why don't I just get Keine to call Mokou again just like back then you say? Based on the game, right now Keine is the 3rd stage boss in this incident, and with how fast Yuyuko comes for me, by the time I got there, the place probably already crawling with other incident solver.

"Master, I think I'm good now." said Bara.

I nod. "Then we'll move right away." I said while I picked her up again (Funya!).

"D-do we need to travel like this Master?" asked Bara.

I nod again. "Yes, with this we won't be separated in the forest." I said seriously.

"T-then, I'll do my best!" she said with determination and embarrassment.

"Right, let's move on." I said as I started floating into the air..

And we both entered the Bamboo Forest of the Lost.

-A few minutes later-​

Turned out.

'This is actually easier than I thought.' I thought.

We're flying through the air, avoiding and passing by many bamboo trees that's in our way while also keep an eye out for a particular bamboo tree.

Suddenly my eyes starts to glow, indicating that my Gaia Cell activating.

I look at Bara.

Her head slowly moving away from that specific tree, looks like she wasn't aware that she's doing it, just like the other time.

"That way." I said as I go to the opposite direction that this particular bamboo tree want me to.

Bara didn't say anything as to why we went this way, she really trusts that I know where we were going in this bamboo maze, and I'm thankful for it.

To explain what just happened, we're currently hunting for traps, not that "trap", ...god I wish I'm hunting "trap", but sadly not that one, it's the normal one. And the trap is "Illusion Induced Bamboo Tree", the effect of that trap can be seen from Bara's actions just now, the trap make her look at a different path, if she was alone, she'd probably went to god knows where, losing your direction in a forest is a death sentence for normal people. But since I'm immune to Illusion based attacks, the trap is not dangerous anymore but instead it became a trail for me to follow to my destination.

I got this idea when I encountered this trap for the first time, which made me remember this part of the game, that part is the conversation between Yukari and Reimu while flying through this area. Yukari asked where they should go next?, Reimu point at one direction but then immediately Yukari point at different direction, a direction opposite where Reimu pointing, at that time, I've no idea why she did it, but now after experiencing it myself, I finally understand. She's checking where she should go next by checking at the one that was affected by the trap, and since the purpose of the trap is to defend the culprit, then all you need to do is to go where the trap dosen't want you to go.

"Ahaha." I heard a girl giggle up ahead.

I saw Fairies starts to come out from the Bamboo Trees ahead, but then they immediately turned into a fireball and by the time I bypass them, *PICHUN*, they died.

It's our current strategy for dealing with small fry, when they appeared Bara will immediately burn them down, if they're still trying to fight while being burned, then I'll finish them off. With this speed, I should arrive at the destination soon, but that calculation didn't include the fact that "we didn't run in a circle while following the trap trails" and "We didn't encounter other incident solvers on the way, effectively skipping the stage 4 boss fight", and let's hope it stays that way shall we.

…

By the way, I'm bored.

I did a quick peck to Bara's cheek.

"FUNYAAAAA!!" she immediately flustered by this..

'Better' I smile.

-A few minutes later-​

After flying for quite some time, we finally enter a new area of the bamboo forest. The bamboo trees in this area standing super tall when compared to the other bamboo trees from the start. If I compare it with an easy to understand explanation, then the normal bamboo trees are like at the height of 3 story building, these new bamboo tree is like at the height of 8-9 story building, it's really tall.

Since I got a feeling that we're in the right place, I drop Bara down, making her flying on her own beside me, we keep flying forward, and then finally, we found our target.

[Lv.18 Youkai Bunny]

[Lv.17 Youkai Bunny]

"Human!"

"Attack them!"

A bunch of bunny girls dressed in frilly, pink nightgowns and had nothing on their feet start to appear and tried to shoot us down with their danmaku, but I block them using a barrier and then Bara enveloped them with flame.

"Hot!"

"Fire! Fire!"

They start panicking and then starts rolling on the ground, trying to put the fire off on their body.

We, still sticking to our usual strategies, pass them since they can't attack us anymore. We repeat this process several more times until we encounter a blockade of bunny girls that are protecting the japensse style mansion behind them.

[Lv.33 Inaba Tewi, the White Hare of Luck]

One bunny girl in particular stood out from the rest of them. She had dark red eyes, black shoulder-length hair, white fluffy rabbit ears, and a carrot necklace. She stood on some wooden boxes, which made her higher than the rest of her kind, indicating that she's the leader of the rabbits.

"I commend you for coming this far intruder! But this is as far as you could go! Now taste the power of rabbits! CHAAAAARRGEEEEE!!" Tewi said, rallying the other rabbits.

""""""OOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHH!!!!"""""" responded All of the rabbit youkai charging at us.

Calculating that it's gonna take more time to deal with all of them one by one, I decided to end it in one go.

"Bara, Fire Bomber!" I command.

"Yes!" she complied.

Fire Bomber, Bara makes the "Fire" and I did the "Bomber". It's easy to understand and easy to execute.

Bara stopped and stays still to concentrate on making a growing orb of fire in front of us, seeing this orb the charging rabbit also stopped in their tracks, then they try to back away from the orb. A Beasts weakness is fire, no matter if they are part youkai, a beast is still a beast.

Once the orb is big enough, I went to the orb, and then I punch it. With Bara relinquishing the control of the orb, and my Vector Change activated when my fist touched the orb, resulting in a shockwave of heat that only went to the group of bunny youkai.

"EEKKKK FIRE!" "HOT! HOT!" "RUN AWAY!!" "I DON'T WANT TO GET ROASTED!" "I'M OUT!!"

Some of them hide behind their allys body, some of them tried to get away, and some of them took the attack head on, but in the end, they all got hit by the attack one way or the other. And since I spread the heat extra wide, the attack turned out to be less lethal than it originally was, but it should be enough to disorient them. I'm doing this so that they don't have a grudge against me you know.

After everything is cleared out, bunny girls "corpse" are strewn across the ground. We hurriedly flew into the mansion before they could wake up and chase us.

And that's how we successfully went inside the culprit hideout, the Eientei, House of Eternity.

Author note:

Ohmygod, finally, this chapter is over, for you people that haven't got the news yet. This chapter has gone to rewrite 3 times so far, the first one when I didn't like how the story went, the second one when MS.Word spit on me, the thing gave me an error message and then replace all the words in the document into a weird symbol, effectively making me have to start all over again, do you know how demoralized that shit is?! And this is the third one, ohmygoood.

There's also the fact there's a fucked up in my job, so I must fully focused in correcting them before I could write the chapter.

*sigh*

So, yeah, promotion is a mistake, good thing my boss is patient with this stuff.

Btw, I'm going back playing "Epic Seven" recently, the game took away most of my time, probably one of the reasons as to why I'm writing really slow.

Editor's note: yes I imagine most things are weak to fire