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The biting, freezing coldness of the milk popsicle had completely numbed the delicate sense of taste in Reimu's mouth; aggressively chugging this incredibly expensive, potent bottle of Iridium-quality wine was physically no different to her tongue than chugging plain, chilled water, at most carrying a faint, lingering hint of artificial strawberry sweetness.
"Whew!" Reimu gasped, slamming the bottle down, her eyes tearing up.
Bitter wine enters the throat as the broke heart violently aches; one single, tiny bottle of this fruit juice costs exactly nine hundred bucks!
Returning the mostly empty, heavy glass wine bottle to the trembling hands of little Suika—who looked exactly like she was about to burst into loud, agonizing tears over the loss of her precious alcohol—Reimu tilted her head back heavily against the wooden barrel, looked blankly up at the clear blue sky, and passed out into a deep, alcohol-induced sleep in no time.
"What's wrong with Reimu? I haven't seen her like this before, da ze."
Marisa Kirisame was happily, loudly sucking on a sweet, melting small milk popsicle, genuinely curious about what was going on with her usually violently energetic friend. Reimu currently looked exactly like a tragic, exhausted office worker who had just come home from a grueling shift only to find a mother completely obsessed with buying scam health supplements, a gambling-addicted father, an eldest sister who was a suggestive internet streamer preparing to elope and run off with her top donor, and a useless younger brother hiding in his messy room smoking, chewing betel nuts, and acting as a failed ticket scalper only to have the expensive goods rot in his hands.
It was just too incredibly, pathetically broken.
"Oh, that. It's because the current, official administrator of Gensokyo is Yagokoro Eirin. A new, strict financial policy was just introduced a couple of days ago, officially stating that Reimu's Hakurei Shrine is administratively irregular and not actively open for business, so it absolutely can't claim to take a leading role in the social development of Gensokyo. Plus, it's been greedily occupying the spot for the highest government subsidy for years without results. Eirin explicitly wants her to formally find a recognized divine statue to worship; otherwise, she absolutely won't issue the annual religious subsidy and even maliciously wants to rename the Hakurei Shrine to the 'Hakurei Group' commercial enterprise."
Suika Ibuki, the legendary Heavenly King of 'Mystery' among the Four Heavenly Kings of the Oni, might physically look exactly as small and harmless as the fairy Cirno, but her raw, magical abilities were absolutely top-tier. Because she simply didn't want to deal with the headache of managing Oni tribal affairs, she lazily wandered around Gensokyo every single day and comfortably rested at the Hakurei Shrine when she was tired. The mere fact that the notoriously stingy Reimu absolutely hadn't violently kicked her out yet was proof enough of her immense worth as a bodyguard.
She had quietly overheard the depressing shrine financial matters while resting in the back room. At the time, the furious Reimu was fully ready to fly over and physically fight Eirin Yagokoro, but since absolutely all of Gensokyo's public treasury funds were currently firmly locked in the Sage of the Moon's hands, Reimu could only miserably swallow her burning anger and give a submissive, defeated 'oh'.
"That shouldn't be right. Isn't my Master at the shrine? She sits on the altar every day cosplaying as a divine statue. It shouldn't be like this, da ze."
Marisa magically pulled another freezing milk popsicle directly from her messy apron and handed it generously to Suika. She absolutely loved listening to juicy, tragic gossip the most. She had sneakily swiped quite a few milk popsicles from the sample table, originally planning to greedily eat them slowly back home, but now she happily contributed one as a 'throat-moistening fee' for Suika's insider information.
"About that, Eirin said Mima is a ghost, not a deity. Worshipping her formally counts as a 'wicked god in a lewd temple.' In the modern outside world, such illegal places would be brutally demolished by the city management and the temples entirely razed to the ground. It absolutely doesn't count for tax exemption."
The two of them sat there comfortably in the shade, licking their popsicles and chatting happily away, completely and utterly disregarding the painful, bankrupt feelings of the person directly involved, the snoring Reimu.
On the brightly lit host's stage, Eirin Yagokoro, who supposedly never rudely eavesdropped on others' private conversations, smoothly cut off the invisible eavesdropping magic spell pulsing at her ear, a cold, victorious smile curling on her elegant lips.
Since she was heavily tasked with managing Gensokyo's chaotic administration while Yukari slacked off, she absolutely wouldn't be polite about balancing the budget. Useless, lazy parasites like Reimu Hakurei, who fundamentally produced absolutely zero economic value yet greedily occupied most of the realm's financial resources, definitely needed to be harshly, ruthlessly cracked down on. Never mind the terrifying rumors about the Shrine Maiden being physically invincible in Gensokyo with infinite mana and health.
In the actual, cold reality of the adult world, one must logically talk about bureaucratic power and administrative methods; pure, unga-bunga brute force alone is completely useless against a denied funding request.
The massive tax revenue of the entire Gensokyo realm was entirely, legally locked in her pristine hands. Exactly who to give it to, who to completely cut off, how much or how little to allocate—it was absolutely all up to her pen strokes. To think that broke little girl actually dared to try and raise a violent hand against her; Reimu could fully prepare to literally starve on the porch this year!
Back to the massive treasure hunting competition, the energetic contestant Hong Meiling had basically already mathematically secured her absolute victory, dominating the leaderboard and leading the exhausted second-place Youmu by nearly 50 massive points. This massive lead was maintained even with Youmu loyally, exhaustingly running back to bring food for Yuyuko whenever she dug it up, which formally granted her double bonus points. From third place onwards, the terrifying point gap grew even wider.
However, absolutely no one in the crowd really cared about the strict scores anymore. The massive event was ultimately meant for pure fun and chaos. Hardcore, try-hard 'pay-to-win' players like Meiling had their intense way, and the lazy, casual players had theirs. They happily joined the event just to hang out in the sun, see the beautiful tropical scenery, eat unlimited free snacks, and casually, occasionally dig up a wooden treasure chest in the muddy fields. They were already very, very satisfied with the vacation.
"Based strictly on the current, official score rankings, contestant Hong Meiling should have completely secured her absolute victory in advance," Eirin spoke smoothly into the microphone, her voice echoing over the square. "I formally saw in the newspaper earlier that the grand champion's prize is a full month of fresh milk delivery. Compared to the sheer, frustrating difficulty of the Little Fairies' abstract treasure maps, this specific prize seems a bit... small. Little brother, have you officially considered generously adding more prizes to the pool? Quite a massive few of our struggling contestants haven't successfully found a single thing all day."
Eirin Yagokoro's pointed, manipulative words reached the entire venue through the microphone, instantly sparking a massive, loud wave of strong agreement and resonance from the crowd. After all, there was logically only one athletic Hong Meiling. Many ordinary people absolutely hadn't found a single, pathetic thing in the dirt all day yesterday, and today they simply, depressingly chose to give up entirely and just sit in the venue eating free snacks. Little Suika was absolutely one of them.
"About that..."
Leo nervously glanced at the massive pile of crumpled treasure maps that had been exhaustingly returned to Daiyousei's side at the desk. The Little Fairies' crayon drawings were indeed a bit far too abstract and chaotic for sane minds. He had personally looked at the returned maps last night, and many were completely, utterly incomprehensible even to a seasoned, 500-hour Stardew Valley veteran player like him. It was indeed genuinely, unfairly difficult for everyone.
"How about this!" Leo grabbed the mic, an idea forming. "Since the official puzzle difficulty of this event was admittedly far too high, the organizers have generously decided to formally provide every single registered contestant with an exclusive, digital shopping voucher for '500 off on purchases over 1000.' You can freely use the voucher to buy any premium item on the Stardew Valley mobile app store. The digital voucher is officially valid until March 30th; it will permanently expire after that date!"
The ordinary, sheltered Youkai of Gensokyo absolutely didn't logically understand the dark, underlying capitalist tricks of the modern world. Having never, ever seen predatory modern e-commerce marketing tactics or coupon minimums, they only genuinely, joyfully felt that Boss Leo was being incredibly generous, actively offering them a full 500-yuan of free money!
But after hearing this specific phrasing, Eirin Yagokoro's brilliant, ancient mind raced, and she instantly, flawlessly understood exactly what dark scam was going on. This greedy guy was not only actively using a completely virtual, fabricated shopping voucher with absolutely zero actual cash value to successfully appease the Youkai's rising resentment, but he was also aggressively driving massive consumer traffic directly to his own shop and artificially inducing mandatory, high-volume consumption! So incredibly treacherous!
When the humid tropical evening finally came, Leo completely didn't go back to the farmhouse to eat dinner this time. Instead, he happily took absolutely everyone left at the venue directly to the newly renovated Star Bar in the center of Pelican Town.
It absolutely hadn't opened for business before because the developing farm could previously only provide basic river water and dirty foot-washing water, absolutely not even qualifying for a basic sanitary opening license. Now that the fully upgraded farm could aggressively mass-produce premium, high-quality alcohol, it officially, grandly began business.
Pushing open the heavy, polished oak door, incredibly warm, bright amber lights illuminated the entire, cozy tavern. The absolute first thing one saw upon entering was a massive, beautifully polished long mahogany bar counter with a dozen tall, leather-cushioned high stools neatly arranged in front of it. The entire back wall was an elaborate, glowing glass display cabinet completely filled with sparkling fruit wines of various, vibrant flavors and colors. There were also several massive, empty oak barrels stacked in the corner, which would legally be used for aging pale ale and beer later.
On the left side was a comfortable, dimly lit dining and lounge rest area with plush, small velvet sofas and polished glass tables. When physically tired or heavily drunk, one could comfortably lean back here into the cushions and order some fresh fruit platters and salty snacks—it was quite incredibly blissful.
On the far right was the loud, flashing game area. A few brightly lit, vintage arcade machines and a smooth, green-felt pool table came completely free with the bar's renovation. The games on the buzzing machines were those absolute, blood-pressure-raising, impossible mini-games (Journey of the Prairie King and Junimo Kart). Anyway, except for the twin-stick cowboy shooting game which Leo had painfully, exhaustingly cleared after hours of raging, he had absolutely never even physically seen the brutal third level of the minecart jumping game. The pixel hitboxes on those carts were just too mysterious and unfair!
"Today! Absolutely everything on the menu is exactly 50% off! For one grand opening day only!"
Leo walked happily behind the polished mahogany bar to act as the head bartender. Although he honestly didn't know the first actual thing about professionally mixing complex drinks, he had watched Daiyousei mix food earlier. Basically, you just violently put random things into a silver shaker, wiggle your butt for a while to look busy, toss the tin into the air a couple of times to successfully provide some cheap emotional value to the drunk customers, and smoothly tell them their money was well spent!
The tavern atmosphere instantly became incredibly, roaringly lively. Most of the thirsty Youkai violently swarmed around the wooden bar, eagerly ordering their favorite sweet drinks.
A white-haired girl wearing red, fire-proof overalls with many paper talismans stuck haphazardly on them was just about to excitedly, happily join the line for a few cold drinks when she was suddenly, violently grabbed by the collar and forcibly, aggressively dragged directly over to the pool table in the game area to settle a grudge.