(Heartfelt thanks to 'Youxia Max', 'Shao Feng Ye', 'Yume no Shouyou', 'God's Regret', 'Chao Zhe An An', 'Lei Xiang', and 'Die Xue Ao Shuang' for their rewards!)
Gensokyo, Magic Forest...
The silent forest remained shrouded in haze, thick with miasma that made one's vision swim. Not a trace of life could be found in this otherwise fairly scenic forest, making it seem like a land of death.
"Bang—!"
At one moment, an enormous blast suddenly erupted within the utterly silent forest, startling many mushroom-like youkai that had been furtively hiding among the trees. Like startled birds, they scattered in every direction.
A closer look would reveal that quite a few of the mushroom youkai had seen it.
In one corner of the Magic Forest, after the blast, a cloud of smoke rose from the area and drifted toward the sky.
That place was where Alice's mansion stood.
If anyone had been nearby, they would have seen that a hole had explosively burst open in the roof of Alice's mansion.
The smoke was rising from that hole.
As the smoke billowed upward, two streaks of light shot out from within. One rose while the other descended, soaring into the sky through the not-too-large hole like meteors chasing each other.
"Whoosh—!"
Before the two streaks of light could fly out of the smoke and reveal themselves in the open air, a sharp whistling sound rang out.
Several tiny afterimages shot out like a charge from the streak of light behind them.
At extreme speed, the afterimages sliced through the rising smoke like sickles. They flashed out like lightning, and amid a chorus of piercing whistles, tore through the airflow and caught up with the streak of light ahead.
The next instant, every afterimage that had caught up with the streak of light