oh god why-----
"So...this is it."
Reimu felt the sweat dripping down her face, the immense heat nearly overwhelming her. This was the absolute deepest region of the city, and the source of whatever had been releasing those geysers. She could make out some sort of winged figure sitting in the distance below an awe-inspiring orb of fire.
"Well, Reimu, do what you do best. Beat that youkai up and everything should be back to normal."
Yukari took another opportunity to throw guidance at the shrinemaiden through the orbs she had brought down with her. She had half a mind to throw then into the river of magma beneath her, but they did technically make her a little stronger so she resisted the urge. Flying onto the small island of rock where her final foe sat, Reimu expected her to turn around and begin some dramatic elegant speech given the top hat and monocle she was wearing.
The raven was too distracted by her drink to even notice her.
What the hell am I dealing with this time?She only seemed to have one good arm, the other being some sort of control rod which Reimu didn't recognise, but in that arm she was holding a teacup filled with molten lava. She sipped at it like it was water, treating it as if it were the Holy Grail itself. At her side sat a plate on which were sitting a trio of scones, all buttered perfectly and giving off a disturbing green glow.
"Ah, nothing pleases the senses more than time to yourself and a nice cup of tea. Or at least, as close as one can expect to find to tea in a hellhole such as this. I really shall have to advise Mistress Satori to invest in proper meals sometime down the line..."
She spoke to herself with a dialect that Reimu didn't recognise, still ignorant of the shrine maiden's presence. Eventually Reimu got tired of waiting to be noticed and, without a hint of guilt, walked over to her and kicked the plate of scones into the magma.
"Hi there. Sorry for interrupting your little tea party."
The raven stood up, looked awkwardly at the spot where the plate had fallen, then turned to Reimu with the most dignified expression of anger physically possible.
"You...you bloody nutcase! Can't you even knock or say hello? Or is this what all of you ruffians above ground call a greeting?"
The head of the house and the cat were nothing like this, from what Reimu could remember beyond beating the crap out of both of them. Hell, she didn't even remember Remilia being this stuck-up. She decided to make the most of the situation and carefully poke the teacup off the edge of the island for an encore, hoping to invoke a reaction.
"Maybe I'd be more civil if you weren't throwing freaking geysers around up there. It gets kind of annoying, you know."
Some sort of profanity hung in the raven's mouth for a few seconds, barely held in by her sense of civility. She started up on a calmer response, still visibly struggling to maintain her pride.
"Firstly, I prefer to be called Utsuho Yatagarasu Reiuji III, not this brutish 'you' that seems to come so naturally to you. Secondly, I am afraid that these geysers are merely a side effect of my own powers, things like this wonderful fusion reaction occuring right above me. Unless you're willing to eliminate me personally, you will simply have to-"
Utsuho's monologue was cut off as Reimu held the tip of her gohei against her throat. The shrine maiden's expression hadn't changed in the slightest.
"Now why couldn't you have just said that earlier? Youkai extermination is what I do best."
Utsuho simply looked down at the stick in Reimu's hands, unimpressed by such primitive weaponry. She honestly hadn't expected this moron to take the hint and refer to her by her name, given that she probably had as many brain cells as London had clear, sunny days. (Sometimes Utsuho wished she knew where exactly this London place was, because for some reason the name had been popping into her head ever since she'd been given the power of the Yatagarasu.)
"What, so that's it? No introductions, no battle of wits? Just a simplistic brawl until one of us is unable to stand?"
"You haven't been out much, have you?" Reimu finished, prodding the top hat off of the raven's head. There were plenty of ways to irritate the residents of Touhou, but none were more rage-inducing than depriving them of their headwear. There was a pause as Utsuho comprehended exactly what had just happened.
"...P...Piss off!"
The red eye on Utsuho's chest glowed for an instant before releasing a massive burst of flame. Reimu's reactions were barely enough to save her from being burned to a crisp, taking to the air and quickly trying to gain some distance.
"What, you're running away now? That's hardly very polite, you know!"
The rod on her right arm started to spin slightly, and from its tip a sphere started to emerge. It grew rapidly, easily larger than Reimu was tall and still expanding. Immediately the shrine maiden knew that she wasn't going to win this with firepower alone.
Crap, when was the last time I had to use my brain to beat someone down?The sphere finally finished expanding, large enough to fit maybe four shrine maidens in. Utsuho adjusted her monocle with her free arm as she aimed at Reimu, all still while maintaining her flawless posture.
"Well, fools like you are probably at their most useful when they're reduced to carbon anyway. Farewell!"
She fired, sending the overgrown bullet towards the shrine maiden at ludicrous speed. She had no hope of dodging out of the way of it in time, and on instinct alone she grabbed at one of the floating orbs she'd been given.
"Yukari!"
The one word of warning was all her partner needed. A gap appeared in the air in front of Reimu, swallowing her up and producing her a few feet above Utsuho. The raven couldn't make out her foe's escape from behind the bullet itself, so she initially assumed that the fight was already over.
"Hah! Bloody loony thought she could take me on."
She would have just sat down and made herself another cup of
lava tea had Reimu not grabbed her monocle from above her, lifting it off of her face.
"Missed me."
Utsuho's expression was one of total shock - there was no way someone like her could have been outsmarted by someone so simple, so plain, so
working-class, and now here she was being humiliated on top of that?
She wouldn't accept that. She couldn't accept that.
"You little piece of...!"
Utsuho flew straight upwards, planning to pierce Reimu with her overgrown rod of an arm. If she'd had anything resembling a brain, she'd probably have just shot her. Or maybe realised that Reimu was planning to teleport away the instant Utsuho charged at her.
And on top of that, she would likely have realised that as soon as Reimu disappeared she was on an unstoppable crash course with her own violent fusion reaction.
"...Oh, bugger."
Utsuho Yatagarasu Reiuji III was never seen again, but given the explosion that tore apart the entire underground network she'd been residing in no-one was foolish enough to think she had escaped alive. Somewhere in the distance, Reimu Hakurei sipped at her tea quietly, pleased that she had resolved yet another incident.
---
"You made her British?"
Sanae asked the question again for good measure, still not believing what her god was telling her. She'd heard of Britain from her time before Gensokyo, but all that she knew of it were the parodies that people made of British people on television back home.
"Yeah, I said it was the price she'd have to pay to control nuclear fusion. It wasn't really, obviously, I just thought it'd be kinda funny."
Come to think of it, that was all that Kanako knew of the British as well.
"...You're kind of a bitch, Kanako-sama."
"You're welcome."
