/jp/ - Otaku Culture

Reimu didn't seem that interested in the small talk now, so she sighed, hopped out of the crater that Tenshi had landed in, and dragged me back up and into the air. "Yes, I do." She called at Tenshi, who rose up to join her. "And I'm as nervous about it as you are." She muttered that last part under her breath, and I only barely heard it.

A few minutes later, she was performing complicated turns and spins in mid air, making my stomach turn from the way everything kept spinning around. I'd catch vague glances at Yamame and Tenshi - Both just blurry suggestions of colour - Every few turns, and I started to wonder if I was going to throw up when I felt the branches brush against my face. Suddenly, we were in Lady Kasen's senkai, and Reimu set me down on the ground.

I made it two steps before tipping over and falling flat on my face. Groaning, I rolled over and threw my arms out to lie on the grass until the world stopped spinning. The warmth was already lulling me to sleep, and I sighed deeply. It had been quite a while since I'd been to Lady Kasen's senkai, but I always remembered how nice it was inside once I did. "See?" Tenshi's voice came from right next to me, so I cracked open an eye to see her sitting cross-legged next to me. "Not-Heaven, because it's kind of like Heaven's climate, but not quite." I'd only sort of been to Heaven when Miss Iku had kidnapped me. "Oh, yeah...I didn't know she lived there, actually. I thought she lived in the Dragon Palace." Well, there'd been clouds and floating things, and I hadn't seen any dragons. "Hmm...I saw Iku recently, actually. She was looking at that celestial veil of hers. I think she was annoyed because it was damaged, and she'd have to write a whole letter of apology for it." I wondered if she'd tossed someone else off of the clouds.

"Well - Here's the thing, and I'm gonna tell you." Tenshi scooted slightly closer and dropped her voice to a whisper. "Iku's always been a real stick in the mud, but when she drinks..." I wondered where she was going with this. "Well - It's weird. She doesn't act drunk at all. Like, if you saw her standing there, completely plastered, you wouldn't even realise. Instead, it just makes her make...Bad decisions. Without thinking twice, and without considering the consequences."

So...that would mean that...? "Er, yeah. I think it's possible that she tried to make you marry her because she was drunk out of her mind." That...Might actually have some traction. Especially when I considered how much of a mess her room had been. There'd been plenty of empty bottles on the floor that day. "It's - I don't exactly see her often anymore, but I think she had a lot of work for a very long time, and as a result, she drinks a lot to unwind when work is finished." I wasn't sure that it particularly excused essentially throwing me to my death, but it did explain how we'd had a relatively normal conversation, followed by a strange turn of events to me having to marry Iku. I hoped she was doing better now. "I hope we'll be doing better when we leave her." Tenshi muttered. "Alright, shall we?" She hopped up and offered me a hand, which I gratefully accepted. The dizziness had mostly subsided now, so I managed to stand up just fine.

Reimu and Yamame were nowhere in sight, and I looked around at the mountainous landscape beyond the peak that Lady Kasen's dojo sat on. "They went inside. Reimu said to just leave you with me." Tenshi explained, shrugging. "Yamame looked a bit conflicted, but agreed eventually." That was good. It would have been a little embarrassing if she'd sat here, all worried for me, just to find out that I'd been a bit dizzy. Shrugging, I headed over to the dojo's doors and pulled them open. I'd had a suspicion of a certain someone trying to jump me, so I immediately jumped to the side, just in time for Houso to launch past me. He turned, spotted me, and tried to jump at me a second time, but I was fortunately prepared, so I was able to brace myself and hold my own when he crashed into me, just barely avoiding falling over. Of course, he was very gentle with people he liked, so when he started licking me all over my face, standing on his hind legs to be just about as tall as I was, I'd just laughed a little and said that I'd missed him too.

"Never does that to me." Tenshi muttered as we stepped inside. Maybe he just thought she was a bit suspicious since she was a celestial? Tenshi considered that while we wandered across the dojo. There was no one in the kitchens, nor could I see anyone in most of the other rooms.