>Remind the audience what has happened so far
>Since becoming a full member of the Seeker's Guild, your life has been busy and full of unexpected adventures, much as you had hoped it would be. Unfortunately, not all of them have taken a form you would have wished for.
>Your career got off to a strange start with you tracking down a missing cat for a curious witch named Ellen, then agreeing to furnish the fairies who had nabbed it with two other cats they could keep as pets - cats not already belonging to someone else. On your way back, you got into a scuffle with an ill-tempered oni named Yuzu as you and your friend and junior town watchman Orange tried to keep her from beating another human bloody.
>After this, you tracked down a missing fruit shipment for the Melon Bowl, discovering that it had been hijacked by a self-styled fairy hero named Cirno after she mistook its owner for a villain. In the process, you acquired an unlikely tag-along named Honeysuckle Dewdrop, who had bravely (if inexpertly) intervened to protect Cirno from you after the ice fairy had mistaken you for an aggressor as well. After Honey's desire to be Cirno's sidekick was rebuffed by the stronger fairy, you offered her 'sidekick lessons' in the hope that she might be able to be a tempering force on the overeager swordsman. To that same end (and also as a way of being rid of her), you introduced Cirno to Marisa, with predictable and explosive results. With Honey's hero temporarily scattered to the winds, you then foisted her onto Marisa for further training; the elder Seeker seemed amused by the idea, though offered no promises that she'd go easy on the diminutive fairy.
>Next, and most fatefully, you investigated the disappearance of a large number of cattle in Easthaven, at the behest of Ichirin. This turned out to be the work of monstrous spiders inhabiting the forest north of the village. Fending off repeated attacks from the swift and venomous creatures, you tracked them back to their lair, a network of caves concealed within the northern hills. After cutting a savagely contested path into the depths of these caves, you encountered something different: a fully ascended youkai, furious with you for slaying her kin. You tried to explain your presence and the havoc that the other spiders had been causing to Easthaven, but she could not be swayed from her belief that you had come to eradicate them.
>A desperate battle for survival ensued, resulting in an unplanned dive off a high ledge and a vicious tumble through the frigid rapids below, in pitch darkness. In the end, this may have been what saved you, for your dowsing skills picked up the presence of something ancient and powerful within the river - a finely crafted sword lodged among an outcropping of rocks beneath the water's surface.
>Somehow this sword possessed the ability to slice through the youkai's hardened webbing as through it were string and allowed you to narrowly gain the upper hand against her when she tracked you down once more, though the encounter still left you gouged and bloody. And, as you would discover soon, far worse off than that, for the cloud of black miasma that had engulfed the site of your final confrontation left you infected with an extremely virulent disease and it was only the power of the blade in your hand which sheltered you from succumbing to it on the spot.
>You tried once more to reason with the spider youkai, now seriously wounded, but she was adamant in her distrust and hate of you; she claimed to be the last of her kind, and that the others had long-ago fallen prey to people from the surface, though you have never heard of such a conflict, nor yet has anyone else you've spoken with.
>The youkai escaped when you briefly relinquished your grip on your weapon and were struck by the full force of the disease coursing through your veins. Weakened and suffering from multiple injuries, you slowly made your way back out of the caves before collapsing outside Easthaven, delirious with fever.
>You awoke several days later to a tearful Ichirin who informed you that you were dying. Minoriko, the resident herbalist of the village, had tended you while you were unconscious and recognized the dire symptoms you presented. They were tell-tale markings of something she had encountered many years ago - a blight that afflicted both people and crops alike - and it was one without any cure that she knew of. While she managed to brew a concoction capable of suppressing the worst of your symptoms for a time, she made it clear that you could expect no more than a couple weeks of life before inevitably succumbing to the disease. You refused to accept this. And so you set off to use your remaining time in search of a cure, even where none supposedly existed. You are a Seeker, after all - finding the near impossible is what you
do.
>You left the marshaling of Easthaven's defenses in the capable hands of fellow Seeker Lunasa Prismriver and returned to Braston. There you appealed to Marisa to return to those caverns, find and subdue the spider youkai, and then deliver her to Ichirin. Though you had been unable to reach the youkai through her hate and anger, you had faith that if anyone could, it would be Ichirin. Marisa swore that she would do this and departed on the spot.
>Since then, you have been attending to the matter of your cure, though efforts have not gone smoothly. You consulted with every doctor and healer you could find within Braston, and none of them were able to offer an answer to your disease which you considered credible. You tried to contact the archeological expedition stationed there about translating the inscription on your sword, but also met with little success; access to their dig site was restricted, and a letter from chief archaeologist Keine Kamishirasawa suggested that knowledge of that script was so limited that any translation would take considerable time - time you could ill-afford. Eventually, you decided that your best hope for information about a cure lay in Val Razua, the heart of scholarship and knowledge in Gensokyo, far across the Great Expanse to the west.
>To that end, you sought out a speedy ship that could ferry you there swiftly and found one in the Blue Maiden, a transport vessel of unusual design captained by a woman named Murasa. Unfortunately, this was also not without its trials, as they were currently prohibited from leaving port due to having their export license stolen without a trace - a fact the port authority considered dubious, as no sign of this license ever existing could be found in their records. And so you brokered a deal with Murasa: speedy passage to Val Razua in exchange for sorting this issue out for them. Initial negotiations with head of the port authority, one Louise Saint-Claire, proved trying, though you eventually struck upon the idea of investigating old financial ledgers for the date the license was purchased on. Louise agreed to pull the associated records, though promised no haste in doing so.
>Left with some time to kill, you took another brief contract from the Guild, investigating a crate of expensive wines that had vanished from the basement of the Wild Rose. After a brief search, you uncovered the handiwork of a timid mole youkai who had accidentally tunnelled into the Rose's wine cellar and an opportunistic fairy who had later stumbled upon those very same tunnels in search of treasure. While you were too late to retrieve the wine itself, you reported its fate back to the proprietor, collected your fee, and left one very hung-over fairy with the impression that the wine she had drunk had imparted a terrible curse.
>A small bit of good news was delivered later that night, when you were informed that Louise had discovered record of the export license transaction in the old archives and then reissued it on the spot, as well as promising a full internal investigation of how their records had been tampered with in the first place.
>You left Braston almost immediately and spent an interesting if highly unpleasant night amid a spectacular aether storm. As if this wasn't enough, the very next day, the Blue Maiden was ambushed by a trio of pirate vessels led by the infamous Aya Shameimaru, come seeking a relic which Murasa had been transporting in secret.
>Despite some terrifyingly suicidal manoeuvring on Murasa's part and clever use of a grappling harpoon and rocket boosters to hurl one of their pursuers into the side of an island, the other vessels succeeded in tethering the Maiden and boarding her. During your abortive escape, you personally saved one concussed member of the crew from plummeting over the edge of the deck and then joined the struggle to repulse the invaders. Despite a fierce battle in which several of the crew demonstrated surprising abilities and a great deal of grit, you were ultimately overwhelmed and outmanoeuvred.
>Fortunately, casualties were relatively light and Aya proved merciful regarding the health of her captives, ensuring that any serious wounds were carefully tended to. She even extended an offer to the whole of the Maiden's crew and yourself to join her - an offer that was flatly rejected by all hands. She was less generous when it came to the Maiden's cargo, exacting a high price as compensation for her damaged vessel. And, of course, she found the object she was looking for - a small emblazoned rhombus of unknown origin and inscrutable purpose. While you gathered it had been discovered at the archeological dig north of Braston and may have been intended for Lady Scarlet's hands, few other details were forthcoming and you suppose it may remain a mystery at this point.
>Before the pirates departed, Aya offered you the services of an onmyouji in her employ who examined your sword in the hope that she could offer some insight into its power - insight that might help you find a cure. While she ultimately could offer little help herself in such a short window of time, she suggested that the nature of this power was Shinto in origin and that an expert practitioner of
that art might offer insight that she could not.
>With the pirates gone, the rest of the trip passed without incident and offered a pleasant respite from the hectic schedule of the previous few days, though you could feel the ticking of the clock as the blighted marks upon your flesh grew larger with each passing day.
>Eventually you arrived in Val Razua and immediately headed for the Grand Academy, figuring that if knowledge of your disease is to be found anywhere, it would be found here. And though it took some time and bouncing back and forth between representatives of no less than three departments, you have finally done so!
>Buried in a very old tome within the rare books archive in the basement of Voile Magisterial Library was a recipe for a concoction designed to treat a disease whose symptoms sound very similar to your own. Though the recipe used many obsolete terms for plants and place names, you were able to translate it into modern parlance with the help of Professor Bosqeuverde of the Alchemy and Herbalism department, a very scattered if knowledgeable woman. Unfortunately, this led to another snag: a key ingredient in this mixture is fresh bittercress blossoms, however the flower blooms only every seven years and is not due for another three.
>However, the professor nonetheless left you with a small ray of hope as she delivered this impossible conundrum - the rumoured existence of a garden deep in the wilderness at the southwestern edge of Val Razuan territory where flowers of all kinds remain perpetually in bloom. While she didn't know if this included bittercress and she also didn't precisely where to find it, it at least gave you something to search for. And search you have.
>Unfortunately, a consultation with the Divinations department offered little assistance; the target region was simply too broad and too far away from the city, and you lacked any sympathetic anchor with which to guide a long-range scry. A trip to the library's map room was also fairly unproductive - the region is mapped only crudely as you venture further from settled lands, and none of the maps indicated an obvious location for the garden to be. However, one spot did catch your eye: a fairy village located on the outskirts of this wilderness. Following up on this, you discovered that Dai, the fairy who helped break a troublesome enchantment upon you earlier that day, was from that very village. You tracked her down again and are currently asking if she can tell you how to reach the garden. While she does not seem to know
specifically where it is, she clearly knows of its existence and in fact seems intent on warning you away from it, though you're not about to be deterred just yet.
>"I intend to. Believe me, I'm in no hurry to face another dangerous youkai on her home turf, not after the last time I tried. But like I said, if I come up dry here, then that leaves me with pretty much the one option. So, even if you don't know exactly where this garden is, then giving me an idea would be one more idea than I've got."
>"I realize that she may be dangerous, but trust me when I say, it's important that I find this plant."
>Dai fidgets silently beneath your gaze, a conflicted expression on her face. After a few moment, she opens her mouth to speak, then pauses again.
>"I'm... not sure I could give you directions that would actually be helpful," she says. "There are... I suppose you could call them landmarks - special rocks or trees or other places that some of my sisters have named, but... you won't find them on any map. They're mostly not very important to anyone else," she adds bashfully.
