"So, sort this out for me, Suika," Yuugi half-yelled over the transmitter. "You're saying that Marisa's dead, Yuuka's dead, and the Enma is missing?"

"A-yup!" It was easy to tell which of the two had been imbibing recently. "Yuuuugi, the boring ghost is missing too."

This was news to Yuugi. "Marisa was killed by Yuuka, Yuuka was executed by the Enma, and now she's missing because she probably did something she wasn't supposed to do." Yuugi cupped her chin in her free hand, her sake sloshing around in her almost-full saucer. "So why is she missing?"

"I dun know," came back the reply. "Even Yukari can't find her."

---

Yukari had been busy for the past few weeks. She had allowed Shiki access to her gaps for the public "execution", had bid farewell to her previous life with her blessing of Kana and Yuuka, and then had spent a lot of time looking for Yuyuko. Youmu had let Yukari know that Yuyuko said she was leaving for a while, and that had been around the same time as the execution. She was so busy, she forgot to take back the contact orbs Reimu had used on her trip down, and Suika, having found them in the storage shed just outside the house, decided to use her power to bring one of them to Yuugi.

Yuyuko was always a whimsical being. She would be the person that would run a marathon just to enjoy all of the refreshments along the way. To someone like Yukari, while it would be child's play to track her movements, it would much rather be spent sleeping.

While Yukari slept a lot, it was only to conserve her own energy. Youkai were creatures born from emotional responses and/or fears and likes, but eventually even youkai as powerful as the Lady of Borders knew her own strengths and limits. Her own power took very little effort, but if she was to fulfill her end of the bargain to Reimu, she'd have to stay alive. One generation later, and everything seemed to be the same. Old youkai faded away, and new ones came in to take their place. Gone was Elly, Yuuka's gatekeeper, and the former youkai of death, and in came Komachi to take her place. To a human like Akyuu, something like that would go unnoticed. Youkai transitions do not invoke the mind. The mind will always remember Komachi as being the shinigami of death, not remembering that there was no Komachi when there was Elly.

It was this exact thought that brought Yukari from her sleep to a waterfall, just minutes from the Human Village. Because of her power and her notoriety, no human or youkai dared approach her as she walked out of the human village she had gapped into and headed toward the waterfall she now stood at.

Sure enough, at the bottom was Yuyuko, carefully scooping the fish that swam nearby from her fishing nets into a container beside her, filled to the brim with water.

Taking a chance, Yukari took out her parasol, and jumped off the top of the cliff where she stood, gliding down until she reached the small island of sand Yuyuko stood on. It was moist, as if it had been newly built, and the smell of the atmosphere told Yukari that the master of the Netherworld had been here for a while.

Before Yukari could question Yuyuko, however, the ghost princess looked at her best friend with a smile, putting a single finger to her lips. Using that finger, she then pointed to the container of water in-between them, which contained, as confirmed when Yukari looked inside, a few hundred fish.

Yukari smiled at the fish and said nothing. As her best friend continued to catch the fish with her nets, Yukari stood there and waited. Anyone that knew Yukari knew that if she waited for you, you were important.

And so, for the next nineteen hours, Yukari happily watched her friend continue to catch the fish, only stopping every so often to throw food into the container for the fish to eat.

It took every single hour of those nineteen hours until Yuyuko realized Yukari got it. Silently, she let go of her net, releasing all of the fish she had caught in it, then dumped the container out into the rushing river, releasing all of the alive fish back into the water from where they had come from. The only things remaining in the container were three mid-sized trout and two small anchovies, all five of them dead. Nodding her head to Yukari, the missing princess faded out of existence, only to reappear on top of the waterfall, holding the five fish in the container. Again, as was Yuyuko's style, she beckoned the sukima to follow wordlessly.

Yukari laughed, then flew up towards Yuyuko. She now understood why Yuyuko needed some time away from Youmu. Youmu had to learn that what she had done was set off a chain reaction of events. It was that rashness that probably was keeping Youki away, and until Youmu learned to control herself, inside and out, Yuyuko would be the mentor, guiding with her own brand of teaching.

Yukari and Yuyuko, now no longer bidden quiet by the environment, struck up a conversation, all the way to the Netherworld, where they would have trout for supper.

---

While Suika and Yuugi continued to talk over the events and the possible locations of Marisa, Yuuka, and Yuyuko, other notable persons around Gensokyo started to take notice. Byakuren had caught wind of the event, and had asked Nue and Murasa to investigate. Lord Tenma had obtained the information, and his always-frowning face darkened even further. Even the hermit Kasen Ibara heard the news, and her face started to tear.

It had only been two weeks since the public demonstration, but everyone in Gensokyo knew the news. The beacon was gone.

(Direct sequel to >>/th/118235 )