The Back Door of What Was

[LegacyOfWriter]

There is often a time and a place, a time and a place which sets the moment, which sets the theme.
In this case, events unfolded in which no one could predict, but could always be thought of as obvious in hindsight.
The events which are told, are of a time and a place, which existed, but yet it did not, a certain "what if", if you will.
This is the story of The Back Door of What Was.

Marisa had always thought of increasing her strength in magic, it was something which defined her to a large extent and it often lead to where she either "borrowed" or decided to implement others spells or techniques in her own way. Still, one thing she didn't have, was the ability to be in multiple places at the same time, nor open up gaps to teleport herself where she wished or the ability to control any sort of actual boundaries or manipulate any elements, but she still was a skilled magic user. "Alice has something new, it's been a while since I've last been there" she thought, as she now headed towards Alice's home, after having raided the Scarlet Devil's Mansion or rather Patchouli's library.

---

The soft mist and fog like matter covered many things from view as it slowly shifted towards different colors of the spectrum. Probably a nice sight, if it were a light show, but it did give an unusual and partially worrisome feel. The shapes which materialized were square and rectangular, before revealing themselves to be doors, so one quickly realized they were within the realm of the Land of the Backdoor, the known residence of Okina Matara, both sage and hidden god of Gensokyo or rather one of many gods, but she happened to pride herself on the fact of being a Sage of Gensokyo, a title and feat only a few had, but what had to her attention was that someone or rather something had asked to see her, a rather unusual request.

Sitting on her throne, she relaxed her shoulders and enjoyed the warmth the seasonal flames provided. Whoever had requested her attention had better be worth it, she thought, before thinking if she should summon her servants to fetch whoever had asked for her, but she didn't need to wait a second longer as they begun to materialize.

"Greetings Okina" they said, before fully materializing, before revealing the figure of a woman.
"This better not be a waste of my time" Okina replied, slightly agitated that she had been made to wait, but it did not show on her face.
"Of course, I know how you are, but I did hear you wished to replace your servants...."
"Obviously, your information is out of date" the hidden sage said as she prepared to open a back door.
"Our interests are mutual, rest assured, for you may miss what I am about to say"
"Testing my patience has been known not to end well"
"The Hidden Sage of Gensokyo, well known for now, but soon may be forgotten again, but of course this can be stopped."
Okina's eyes narrowed, partially wondering what was the goal of said woman, as after all, what could anyone give to a god, well, besides faith of course.
"You did say you could remake Gensokyo if you wished, but that's of course a waste of energy, but that's why I'm here, to give you something you'll probably be searching for."

---

Reimu knew of imbalances in the borders, she had even learn to sense them, mostly from Yukari, as manipulation of borders was one thing, but sensing when they changed or shifted was another, something now told her to hurry, as some events were going to unfold, possibly with the destruction of Gensokyo as a whole.

The imbalance she now felt, seemed to be different, it wasn't Sumeriko's, Yukari's, it seemed to be from a long time ago, reminding her of a recent incident, but than again, there wasn't any certainty, especially considering the recent events which had unfolded.

---

Junko had waited long enough, her anger was temporarily appeased by the events of "LoLK", before deciding to wait once more.
"Junko, you might get your revenge soon enough"
Junko turned towards the voice with the look of expectation of a long awaited.

---

Joon Yorigami had blown away 20 gold coins in gambling, another 40 in clothing, 60 on jewelry and at least 80 more on miscellaneous, which she didn't even remember. It only took a little bit of her power and people felt the desire to spend money, but as quickly as she got it, she spent it, leaving her broke at the end of the day.

Seeing another potential source of "income", she was about to work her magic, until "how would you like unlimited funds to spend?".
Skeptical and unsure, since she could almost always get by unseen, perhaps it was being addressed to someone else?
The cloaked figure turned and gave an unsettling smile, it was one of those which made one feel uneasy by the nature of it, not by the appearance.

"Surely you were thinking, 'might encourage someone to spend a bit more'".
"uh, yeah"
"You could surely do better, why not listen to me for a bit and gain some wealth in the process?"

---

Shion Yorigami had nearly always brought great misfortune to others, although there happened to be a sole exception.
She would have been normally on her way to see Tenshi, but a voice did offer her the possibility of happiness...
Oddly enough, she still went on her way, but kept pondering if it were possible.

[LegacyOfWriter]

Setting aside the time had been worth it, Okina thought to herself.
What she had been told, had been related to gaining more faith as well as reverence and respect, which would prevent her from falling into obscurity. The one thing which struck her as it was odd though, normally any "deities" she knew or was familiar with, tended to be interested in gathering as much faith for themselves, unless they weren't, but normally most youkai wouldn't be that well versed with matters of gaining faith.

She decided to summon her servants, before setting aside time to complete what had been discussed before, a single thought did emerge of where she should contact Yukari or Kasen, both of which would likely know of the origin of the deity which had contacted her, but decided against it, as simply her status as a Sage of Gensokyo was mostly of influence and respect, but didn't provide much more, besides some occasional work regarding the Great Hakurei Barrier.

The doors opened as Mai and Satono stood besides them, as they danced and praised her.
Matara smiled, as they both went in the door after her...

---

Princess Kaguya had taken a slight interest in the outside world over time, and the interest included video games, although most were boring to her, as simply using a bit of manipulation of both the instant and eternal made virtually every game no challenge, but the Shrine Maiden series of games did draw a bit of her interest, but today was a bit different, she hadn't fought or seen Mokou in some months and being a bit of a pain in the neck to her was somewhat of a side hobby.

Bringing along a few items, she headed out into the forest.

---

Marisa hopped off her broom and opened the door to Alice's home, "yo, Alice, you in here?".
Alice sighed, "won't you at least knock before opening?"
"come on, if yar like that, you'wll end up like Patchy".
Alice finally got up and motioned to her workbench "there's a difference between theory and practical".
Marisa moved up over the workbench, before glancing at what seemed to be a doll, but nearby were a few odd crystals and books and writing, "so what's with da crystals Alice, trying to copy our resident bookworm?".
"Crystals can provide animated actions in various magical potions, see, if I place her on the ground" Alice said as she carefully lifted the little doll and put her on the ground, before letting her go.
"see what happens when I go to the door".
As Alice went to the door, the little doll quickly rushed to it and opened it, Marisa stood, somewhat struck at seeing the doll open the door, and as Alice went back, the doll closed it.
"but, there is one little thing, notice what happens when I put this chair nearby the door.", Alice went again to the door, the little doll quickly rushed by, before stopping in front of the chair, almost as if completely puzzled by what had happened, before Alice went back and the doll looked up once again at where the door was supposed to be, but seeing the chair in front of it, it acted puzzled, as if uncertain to what to do.
"She knows, but isn't aware or take into account changing surroundings, so I'm beginning to think that 'animation' is not where I'm supposed to be looking at."...

---

Yuuka Kazami, known and referenced as both "Flower Master of the Four Seasons" and the "Beauty of Everlasting Darkness".
She felt as the soft breeze moved across the Garden of the Sun, a place of everlasting summer.
Knowing full well how much of a special connection to nature she had, it came as no surprise when someone happened to be nearby.
"You wouldn't happen to be lost here?" Yuuka asked in a playful and slightly teasing tone of voice.
"I'm not lost, but it would be a nice place to be lost in".
Opening her parasol as she turned "it is, since it has significance, summer, spring, fall, winter, each has a flower which blooms in season, same as this garden, which is always perpetually blooming."
"If someone were to say that flowers of a certain season were the only ones which should bloom...."
"They'd need to see the ever lasting beauty of flowers can bloom in every season."

---

Mokou no Fujiwara had been eating, before having sighted Kaguya some distance away.
"sheesh, what's with the 'come and try to kill me every day'" she muttered, before wondering how long it had been.
Racking her mind, she had forgotten as days were irrelevant to immortals, so days, weeks and even years could pass without much if any notice, this just happened to be another day.
"What the heck Mokou?!?!?!" Kaguya yelled some distance away... *huh, I didn't do anything.*... Mokou turned to see a figure dressed in black emerge, before the ground lite up around as dozens of orbs of light formed around Kaguya and circled in.
Kaguya turned and was fighting back, using the branch of Hourai and some of her other treasures. *nobody thought of robbing her all this time, even though she carriers her treasures around, wait that was centuries or was it decades ago and..* Mokou's thoughts trailed off as it was a bit out of the ordinary. *wait, who is that anyway?* Mokou thought as she decided to finally get up and see what was going on, but before she was able to, Kaguya had been already defeated and it seems the forest blocked out the rest of the view. Upon reaching her, she noticed Kaguya's breathing was shallow as if she had been pushed way past her normal limits.

[LegacyOfWriter]

Eirin Yagokoro's hands moved quickly and efficiently, with uttermost precision as she began to go over her notes and medicines.
Truth to be told, while most things did not surprise her, a few things generally stood out as unusual, especially what had or had not happened in this case.

Looking over Kaguya's case of extreme level of exhaustion was unusual due to method and operation of the Hourai Elixir, which would have normally prevented it, as a small side effect of its capabilities.

Now, the way the Elixir worked had some interesting principles behind it, which weren't generally widely known, but frequently speculated upon, but in this case, the "immortality" it granted was not that of "not" being able to die, but rather "ending" the ability for death to fully and permanently manifest itself.
This was how Mokou and Kaguya had fought for centuries, killing each other countless times, since the final and absolute sentence of "death" never occurred.

Now death is a strange and odd concept, the mostly widely held misconception was that it was a very "concrete" event, but when trying to clarify precisely where it occurs, it becomes vague and uncertain, such as dementia which becomes a death of the mind or other illnesses which become a death of the body or simply when the body itself is no longer able to function.

That's where the Hourai Elixir came in, the mind reminded precise as it always was, so did the body whose aging effects would be stopped and if the body itself would get close to reaching a point of inability to function, it would "undo" that effect, thus providing the sought after "immortality", but as Eirin looked over Kaguya's condition, the more puzzling side effects of what was were present.

The level of exhaustion brought on by whatever had nearly brought her to a death like state, however it wasn't like "death" itself, since it could never be permanently brought on towards any of the Hourai Elixir's immortals, but the effects and symptoms were almost as if "life" itself had been removed.

Whatever it was, the signs weren't good and seemingly haunting, since the inability to die did not mean protection against the absence of life, something which hadn't been considered in the creation of the elixir

---

Reimu had seen the start of many incidents and the feeling of unease at what she had seen was still present.
At first, she thought Mokou might have learned a new spell or something, but nothing in Gensokyo had been present which had either metaphorically or literally sucked the life out of one, well maybe besides vampires, but that wasn't the point, people bitten by vampires either died or became one themselves, not simply exhaustion towards near inability.

Recalling some of the previous incidents, she quickly went through the list of previous incident causers, with only a few names propping up.

Yukari's manipulation of borders came to mind, as did Okina's abilities, which still sometimes felt almost like a clone of Yukari's and Yuyuko's ability of causing death.

"Nope, can't be them, already two of them caused incidents" she thought, still feeling as if she had forgotten someone.

---

Yuuka had bid farewell to Elly as she placed her in charge of her mansion while she was away.
Mainly the reason for her trip being the interest of the existence of someone who was said to have prevented flowers of certain seasons from growing and interrupting their cycles and the part of them either being a weakling or strong being of interest.
Since if they were strong, it meant a challenge of power, if they were weak, they were meant to be crushed.
Still, the very thought of messing with flowers, was unforgivable to Yuuka Kazami and everything which defined her.

---

Hecatia Lapislazuli was many things, a Hell Goddess, an Earth Goddess and a Moon Goddess.
Three bodies and strength in ability unmatched by any in Gensokyo.
It took generally a lot of courage or foolishness to challenge her, let alone question her.
There were only a few minor things which tended to set Hecatia off, mainly being critical of her fashion sense or insulting it, but another was to act as if above her, which many found out, didn't tend to lead to good results.
So when Clownpiece told her of some secret god in Gensokyo saying "let her know I'm here", it was just as good as asking for trouble.