/jp/ - Otaku Culture

It hadn't given way to the moon quite yet, leaving the sky a deep, dark blue that was edging further toward blackness. "Cold." Yamame muttered, absentmindedly pulling at her sleeve. I wrapped my coat around myself, glad that it was so long and warm, though I asked Yamame if she'd really be alright without some sort of coat herself. "Oh, er, yes. If I get too cold, I'll probably just slow up. Keep going and I might fall asleep until I'm warm again. It's just how spiders are." It was a little worrying that Yamame might just pass out, but not overly so, so I nodded and told her to tell me if she felt like she was going to pass out. Then, I took her hand and we began heading across the darkness to pass through the village. I hoped that since it was night, Yamame's youkai nature would escape notice.

Fortunately, the village was quiet. Some people were out, enough to keep us from looking too suspicious, but not enough to make it obvious that we were different. It wasn't too difficult, then, to get from the side of the village that Yamame's home connect to over to the side of the village that leads out through fields where the farmers live, out onto the path away toward the Hakurei Shrine in one direction and the mountain in the other. While we were walking, Yamame and I talked about the Hot Springs Restoration project. "Reiko told me that now, instead of competing over who can lift the whole keystone, they're trying to compete over who can lift the most chunks of keystone, and now they're dragging them all over the place, the bloody fools. Honestly, the oni can be an absolute nightmare!" Yamame griped, repeating a gripe that Reiko had been incapable of keeping herself quiet about when she had come by recently.

The walk was mostly uneventful, apart from one moment when Yamame had paused, then told me to shut my eyes and let her guide me. After she let me open them again, she told me that a group of fairies had been messing with the perception of the path, and they'd probably trick me into walking off a ledge and falling into the Forest of Magic if I wasn't careful. Aside from that, we were able to make good time, and the moon had only just started to appear above the mountains of the surrounding valley as we started to take the twisting path toward the Misty Lake and the Vampire's mansion. Finally, I began to hear the gentle sound of the water splashing, and we rounded the corner where the trees still protected the Misty Lake from view.

Now that I'd seen the monstrous ocean that covered the coast of Australia, the Misty Lake didn't quite awe me in its size like it had in the past, but it was still a beautiful place, and I could already see the moon's reflection upon the surface. "Did they tell you where to meet?" Yamame asked me, and I frowned. No, they hadn't, but I decided to try where I had met Wakasagihime before, near that collection of white rocks that she used as a table and a ways around from the Vampire's mansion. We did have to pass across the front of the mansion to get there, though, and I was surprised to see that the gate guard, Miss Meiling, wasn't present. Instead, there was a group of fairies, all dressed in maid attire and brandishing big, sharp-looking spears. One of them caught me looking and made a threatening gesture, so I just waved politely and sped up my walk slightly. Yamame didn't look particularly threatened, but did seem to find the whole thing a bit curious. Not really directing the question to Yamame specifically, I wondered out loud where she might have gone. "Who?" Yamame immediately replied, then blinked. "Oh, er, there's another gatekeeper, isn't there? Um...Red hair?" I nodded, suppling her name as Meiling. "I think I remember her from when we were working on the mansion. Didn't see her very much, though." She shrugged. "Maybe she's just asleep. I mean, she can't be guarding the place every minute of the day, right?" I supposed so, nodding as we continued past the mansion and across the edge of the Misty Lake.

Then, I finally began to hear something. Talking, a bit of laughter, and the rippling of waves across the surface of the lake. I squeezed Yamame's hand, looking over at her, and she smiled and nodded back, though I still noted a slight hint of panic in her eyes. Personally, I thought that she'd probably built this up in her head to be something nerve-wracking, and I hoped that it wouldn't be so once we got there. And getting closer, I relaxed a little. I could hear Kagerou's voice, and the musical laughter that could only be Wakasagihime. We cleared the last few rocks in the way of the view, and finally laid eyes upon the meeting of the Grassroots Youkai Network.