Foul Detective Satori web-manga discussion thread.

[Suspicious person]

Bit late, but new Foul Detective Satori chapter 28 out

Super straightforward chapter this time, as it seems we're closing on the end of the Myouren temple arc. The title of the arc refering to the underground actually made me think for a bit that there might be a chance that there'll be something that'll connect or bring us back to the underground, but the way things look it doesn't seem so

Regarding the possessed person this time, it turns out to be Kyouko. The manga's monthly release kinda made me forget some of the information, and I actually forgot that Kyouko actually appeared in this arc at all, lol. Anyway, the lack of Kyouko among the people worried about Byakuren (among the Myourenji people present in the premises in this arc) does indeed seems kinda sus considering the fact that Myourenji people kinda care about her a lot.

Mystery series generally require a bit of straightforwardness and obviousness in their reveals, so I for one appreciate that there is some logic / explanation behind why Kyouko is the one possessed, explanation that is somewhat consistent with the lack of screentime after the important happening AND already observable (or rather, her being unobservable) in previous chapters. While it would be undoubtedly much more exciting to deduce an actual willing accomplice than some poor sap being controlled without them being aware, imo this is much more preferable than stuff like Kaguya being freaking possessed offscreen in a location we weren't introduced to in the manga and apparently outrunning a flying Reimu straight to Eientei in order to let the plot take place. But speaking of straightforward and obvious, another big thing that is a part of the mystery genre is the part where the big bad reveal their motive : while we know it's a grudge against Gensokyo, actually hearing it from the horse's mouth seems much more appropriate to me.

Although the unexpected thing this time to me was the fact that the possessed Kyouko was trapped and confused by the weird restriction surrounding Myouren temple, which means that it's unlikely that she set up the barrier herself (She might consistently be painting a giant target on her back, but is probably not dumb enough to shoot herself in the foot like that). So, as far as barrier-proficient people that are not confused nor trapped inside Myourenji goes, it's probably got to be Yukari, who I coincidentally forgot made an appearance super-early on in this arc too.

So imo, here's what's going on :
- Yukari probably set up the barrier out of being tired of the BadHu's shenanigans
- Yukari enlisted Flandre's help and sent her to Myourenji to help deal with said source of shenanigans
- Yukari sent Satori there too cuz gap are a much superior means of transportation compared to piggybacks and Satori kinda need her getback for what happened in the bamboo forest AND not look like a fool detective by finally getting a proper confrontation

As for what's gonna happen, either BadHu gets sorted there and then, or she plays a trump card that allows her to get into the next TD arc. I actually think she's gonna get away with it again since we don't seem like we're getting that proper Reimu faceoff yet. And while Satori is supposedly the main character this time, imo we still need BadHu to tell Reimu what her beef with her is, plus the ass whooping that she's long had coming her way.

A few additionnal takeaways :
- Only noticed this upon reread, but this Nazrin DOES have new drip and an especially big bow
- More battle manga action sequences
- Marisa's broom reality check. No seriously what did she expect
- Kyouko REALLY in need of some exorcism right now, probably needs the uncute beaten out of her

[Suspicious person]

New chapter 29 is out after some weird kind of pause

Later chapters various Touhou mangas kinda have this weird tendency of changing into a battle manga (which is especially weird for this initially shoujo / mystery kinda manga), and such is the case for this chapter (and the previous one) as it set up a fight between Reimu, Byakuren and Shou vs Flan.

Chapter's very straightforward but surprisingly leaves room for speculation, for example regarding the mist and the help that Kyoukozuchi speculate Satori to be waiting for (just Flandre or someone else ?) ; pluus the ending with a suspicious looking Satori (possessed or not)

It's gonna be pretty embarrassing if Satori actually got possessed imo cuz that's another fail to add to her list of non-accomplishements in this manga, but the fact that she approaches Marisa (decidedly Mizuchi's favorite possession target) kinda leads me to put my stocks on the "yeah she's possessed" side of speculations

Myouren temple arc is coming to a close, but I feel like we haven't learned anything new or substantial regarding Mizuchi's motivations and plans : I'm kinda hoping that next chapters gonna clarify these else next arc is gonna have virtually the SAME beginning as the IN, MoF, and UFO arc have. I'll take anything 2hu, but even I would like to see quality writing instead of this particular formula for this manga. Slow pace + early chapters of new arcs having nothing happening is kinda unimpressive tbh.

Bunch of takeaways :
-Already in previous chapters, but damn, Marisa. Blood on my 2hu ? Yikes.
-Shou's one chance at getting some action in over a decade gets divided by 3
-Flandre looking more threatening than 2 big shots (+ Shou) for some reason ?

Also a bit unrelated, but fun Flandre fact : she HAS a spell card called "Scarlet Nihility" that she uses in her Route A ending in 17.5 : this means that she's the ONLY character who's got a named attack that's neither illustrated nor can be played in a game : since we are getting actual action / fight scenes, I'm kinda crossing my fingers to see if we're gonna get it in this manga (not likely, I know) or have some other kind of spell card.

[Lebon14]

Been a little while since I posted on here.

The last few chapters were great and it has the most action we had in an official manga ever.

[Suspicious person]

Somewhat late, but we're done with the Myouren temple happenstance into what seems to be an introduction of sorts to what's gonna happen next time and who's gonna take part in it. I actually feel like the plot is about to make a signifiant progress with this chapter, so here's hoping

The new chapter 32(?) reveal that Miss Miyadeguchi is in fact related to the Hakurei Shrine, so that's a W for the guys who expressed theories that goes around these lines, and she is now trapped in the underworld as the various entrances that lead there got sealed after she got sent there.

Now strictly speaking, with the villain clearly identified and more or less sent to prison, it can be said that there are no more real stake at hand here, but the main girls JUST have to be petty and really, REALLY seem like they are going to break through the underground's seal and go to Miss Miyadeguchi cuz they need that getback

I quite like the fact that we're bringing the girls from the previous arcs for this, but it seems to me like we're decidedly going the battle manga route. Now, we've had SO MUCH slice of life stuff in this series to the point where I've managed my expectations and seek out excitement in other series : I quite like NON slice of life stuff as far as touhou goes, but at the same time it seems like an unusual direction to take for this initially mystery manga. I have a remark on that aspect that I'm gonna save for a final review when this manga is completed.

I guess we still need that exposition from Miss Miyadeguchi and hopefullly, HOPEFULLY make use of the opportunity that she presents to get a window to peer into the backstory of Gensokyo.

Minor takeaways :
- Satori showing the MOST skin in the entirety of this series
- Remilia's very cool and sharp look, in comparison to her previous girly (and I assume very pink) one
- Flandre and her own way of being considerate ?
- Reimu, Remilia and Sakuya showing the cutest smile when thinking about absolutely trouncing someone

[Inunaki]

I mean, they said they couldn't be sure that they blocked off every exit, but seeing what Reimu's doing makes me think they're not going to go the "she somehow found a way out" route.

Also, is it bad that my first thought when I read this was "Poor Parsee, she's now out of a job"? She's my favourite character, but she hasn't even appeared in this, so I guess it's sorta odd that I'm thinking about her...

I'm glad, however, that we finally have some backstory for Mizuchi, even if it's only vague now I'm hoping this is a sign that we'll soon be getting more information about her and her exact motives.

[Inunaki]

After two months, we have received a new update.

It was mostly Mizuchi-centric. I like the new character development for Mizuchi, especially since we've only seen her behave more-or-less in one manner. Getting a bigger glimpse into her personality was really nice.

Also, Yuugi taking pity on her and siding with her is interesting. Not just due to the obvious "Yuugi is now helping Mizuchi" development, but if someone who was previously annoyed by her actions actually sympathised with her to the point of actively aiding her, then this I feel is a big development. Whatever this is, it isn't anything minor (I imagine "vengeful spirit" is not a high bar, provided something has made you angry enough, some people can get real petty) and it clearly makes the Miyadeguchis sympathetic. It isn't some cut-and-dry case where Miyadeguchi is clearly in the wrong and the Hakureis were in the right and Miyadeguchi is being petty about it (and maybe that was obvious but cmon, they haven't exactly given the reader any reason to be sympathetic to Mizuchi until now) and I feel it's going to be really interesting when the rest of the cast figure out what exactly happened (from a storywriting perspective, it's unthinkable that they wouldn't find out).

It seems Reimu knows to an extent, but I wonder how much. Back when I first read the previous chapter, I felt that Reimu had just vaguely heard about the Miyadeguchis and simply decided to go after Mizuchi out of pettiness because it was clearly established to be about her, but re-reading it, I'm not so sure. I'm not sure if she knows exactly what happened and is attacking out of honest belief that the Miyadeguchis were in the wrong, or if my previous belief that she's just being petty is correct. I guess we'll have to see.

It seems, at the very least, that my last post was right and we're going to be getting more information about what Mizuchi is getting revenge over, so that's a plus.

Overall, a really good chapter in my opinion. I personally really like Mizuchi and am sorta rooting for her over Satori, Reimu and the others (though that might just be because I tend to sympathise with villains a lot more) and I hope this doesn't end with her being exterminated, though as a vengeful spirit I wonder if she'll cease to exist if she actually succeeds. I hope whatever happens, she doesn't come out too badly.

[nintendonut888]

I'm surprised that it's such a common reading of the last two chapters that Reimu is going after Mizuchi out of pettiness or because she hates the Miyadeguchi. It's not clear what exactly her feelings are or what she's going to do, but from the start I had the sense she feels some manner of responsibility towards Mizuchi for whatever happened in the past. Whether that's sympathy or merely an element of understanding before she stands her ground though, we'll just have to wait and see. I'm excited to see where the story takes us as we presumably head towards the final act.

[Inunaki]

I'm surprised that it's such a common reading of the last two chapters that Reimu is going after Mizuchi out of pettiness or because she hates the Miyadeguchi. It's not clear what exactly her feelings are or what she's going to do, but from the start I had the sense she feels some manner of responsibility towards Mizuchi for whatever happened in the past. Whether that's sympathy or merely an element of understanding before she stands her ground though, we'll just have to wait and see. I'm excited to see where the story takes us as we presumably head towards the final act.

To me, it was the way she worded things. She spoke very vaguely about it, saying the Miyadeguchis served Hakurei Shrine and that it happened before she was born, which is a very vague way of putting things so I originally felt that she might not have known the full story. And then her final words are "We hit back!", which personally felt to me like an indication that she just wanted to get revenge on Mizuchi rather than anything to do with her past, especially considering that Mizuchi was already sealed in Former Hell, it just felt like she was going after her unnecessarily out of spite, due to the confirmation that this incident was about her.

Maybe I'm misinterpreting things, but that's the sense that I got having read it at first. As I said, I'm no longer so sure, but that was my original thought process.

[nintendonut888]

Reimu already knew she was the personal target of the incident since the second arc though. If she hadn't learned her name was Miyadeguchi, it sounds like she may have accepted the outcome as things are, but learning her tormenter's name caused her to choose to confront her directly, even at the risk of her own life. Frankly, more than anything, I just can't believe Reimu is the type of person who would act out of spite over clan politics from before she was born, and her body language didn't read as anger to me. It's very much vague what her thoughts towards Mizuchi are since we don't know what happened between the Hakurei and Miyadeguchi, but I would be very surprised if this encounter will be a simple matter of Reimu trying to exterminate her.

[Inunaki]

Reimu already knew she was the personal target of the incident since the second arc though. If she hadn't learned her name was Miyadeguchi, it sounds like she may have accepted the outcome as things are, but learning her tormenter's name caused her to choose to confront her directly, even at the risk of her own life. Frankly, more than anything, I just can't believe Reimu is the type of person who would act out of spite over clan politics from before she was born, and her body language didn't read as anger to me. It's very much vague what her thoughts towards Mizuchi are since we don't know what happened between the Hakurei and Miyadeguchi, but I would be very surprised if this encounter will be a simple matter of Reimu trying to exterminate her.

I didn't interpret it as her being spiteful over what happened with Mizuchi over things that happened before she was born, I interpreted it as her being spiteful after having direct confirmation that it was about her. It's been a while since I've read the whole thing, but I don't recall it being concretely established that it was targetting Hakurei, aside from them noticing the pattern of Mizuchi's targets and the incidents Reimu handled. Marisa even acknowledges this by saying "That just makes it even more certain! You're that spirit's main target!", the implication being that now they had concretely established it.

Anyway, as you said, her thoughts on the matter are vague. My interpretation of that vague-ness was that she's being super vague about what happened between the Hakurei and Miyadeguchi but directly after we get absolute confirmation that it's targetting her, she seems bent on fight Mizuchi even after she was already dealt with and in spite of all of Former Hell being blocked off.

[nintendonut888]

You likely should give the earlier chapters another look in that case, because a solid half of the PCB arc was Reimu freaking out over the revelation that she was Mizuchi's target after Satori told her, leading her to hide from everyone until Yukari helped her regain some of her nerve. Reimu's been more than aware that Mizuchi is after her for some time, and it was commented on multiple occasions how nervous and defensive her investigations were based on that knowledge. Learning her tormentor is a Miyadeguchi caused something to click in her mind on why she is being targeted, but the fact itself, or even that her grudge is aimed at the Hakurei Shrine, is not new information to her.