Somewhere in the boundary where the Yakumo household is, Ran's voice is tight, nine tails bristling with anxiety.
"Milady, these are a wave of critical data. His power is even more fundamental than we theorized. The '50ms Author' that healed you... it doesn't just erase. It rewinds. It commands local reality to a previous state. That is how he restored you, he reversed the injury itself within a confined space." She was mostly right. But they missed a crucial detail. The 50ms Author was a separate ability. The one he never spoke of, the one that truly erases, was the "VoidFlame".
Yukari's eyes are wide, not with fear, but with greed for understanding. She leaned forward, her fan still.
"Precisely. He didn't 'heal' me. He edited the narrative of my body to a point before Zero's attack. A temporal-localized revision... And this 'Framework Rune'... it's the opposite. Not revision, but addition. A symbiotic, permanent addition to reality's code." She lets out a slow, shuddering breath. "Two sides of the same coin. The power to unwrite and the knowledge to write. He is a living paradox."
Ran added. "And the cost! To power such 'miracles' with his own soul... The energy required is immeasurable. For him to do so without evaporating... Milady, his personal mana isn't just vast; it's infinite for all practical purposes. He must be tapping into a source beyond our understanding, the void itself. Perhaps, He isn't just a container full of power; he is a gateway."
Yukari let a slow, grim smile spread across her face. "There it is. The connection. The gateway. It's a potential. A vacuum. The '50ms Author' consumes his own body because he is channeling a power that devours reality, and he uses his own existence as the buffer. The Framework Rune is stable because it cleverly offloads that cost onto the environment, creating a perfect, self-sustaining loop. He is both the unstoppable force and the immovable object."
Ran whispered to a horrified voice. "Then Reimu's question was correct. His revolver, his pouch... they are pieces of his soul. Not in a metaphorical sense. They are solidified, stabilized fragments of that gateway, given permanent form by the Framework. If they are destroyed..."
Yukari completed Ran's answer. "The corresponding part of his 'gate' would be damaged. Perhaps permanently. He has distributed his own existence as his arsenal." She finally snaps her fan open, a sharp, decisive sound. "And that is our answer, Ran."
Ran tilted her head slightly. "Milady?" Yukari added. "His retreat into his 'fortress' isn't a setback. It's a confirmation. He built those walls to protect others from the storm inside him. He cares enough to hide the true reason why he is here and his pain. And that pain, that emptiness... is our key." She gestures to the scene where Nowa admits his exhaustion.
"He is a God who believes he is a failure. A creator who thinks he is a destroyer. He has spent years, perhaps decades, carving himself apart for others. Now, he has nothing left to give, and he sees no reason to take anything for himself."
Ran calmly asked. "So how do we weaponize that? How does this help us?"
Yukari let a small smile spread her lips, a knowing smile. "We don't weaponize it, my dear Ran. We cure it. His 'completion' is no longer a thing to be found. It is a function to be restored. We must make Gensokyo itself the answer to his emptiness. Its chaos, its beauty, its stubborn, irritating life... we must make it so compelling that he chooses to open his gate not to erase, but to preserve. We must make him want to be the immovable object that protects this place, rather than the unstoppable force that passes through it."
Ran understanding the dawns, but with it, a profound fear. "You're betting everything... that we can fill a void that has consumed itself."
Yukari's smile is weary but resolute. "No, Ran. I am betting everything on the one thing in all the multiverse that has ever truly been able to fill any void. Connection. Reimu and Marisa are not just his guards. They are his doctors. And his therapy is just... living."
Back within the Hakurei Shrine, after quiet moments where Nowa just revealed his emptiness, Reimu's voice lost its aggressive edge, becoming flat and matter-of-fact.
"...I see." She paused. "Then your 'questionable life choices' are your own business. But they become mine the moment they affect my shrine. Understood?"
Marisa cleared her throat, trying to lighten the mood but missing her usual mark. "Heh... Yeah, okay. Questionable life choices club, I guess." She quickly gestured to the revolver. "So, uh... you gonna put your... 'piece of you'... away now, or...?"
Nowa made a soft smirking face to lighten the mood too. "Yeah, sure." The rune revolver is holstered to his side.
Then Reimu asked. "By the way," she began, both Nowa and Marisa looked at her. "Hmm?" he hummed.
"What's this 'treasure' you're talking about earlier before we entered the kitchen?"
Nowa theatrically trailed off. "Ahhh, I remember. Thanks, for reminding me." He dryly chuckled as he took another rune pouch in a pouch. "I do forget something from time to time."
Marisa leaned in, all awkwardness forgotten. "Hey, no fair! You can't just drop a word like 'treasure' and then almost forget about it! Is it jewels? A legendary artifact? Some kind of ultimate magic catalyst? Show us, show us!"
Nowa stood up and went to a spacious corner away from the table. "Yeps, Gunna placed it right here." he pointed at the empty space. "Don't mind me."
Reimu stood up following Nowa, voice alert. "Before you open that," her voice firm. "Define 'treasure.' Is it another one of your 'vessels'? Is it stable? Or is it something that's going to rewrite the concept of value in my shrine and crash the human village's economy?" Marisa stood up as well, not wasting a second as Nowa glanced back.
"What do you mean 'define'? Treasure is treasure, my bank saving money across the multiverse. Basically it's my earned or given funds I've acquired, and just in case you don't trust the conjured coins I donated."
A pause. "Para kang tanga, pero sabagay may punto ka.(You sound like a fool, but you have a point.)" he muttered. Reimu slightly arched an eyebrow. "Excuse me? Say that in our language." Marisa gleamed in the different language. "Was that a different language you told us about?! Cool! What does it mean?!"
Nowa waved his hand dismissively in the air. "Nothing, just gibberish words or grumble." Then his focus shifted and started to open his rune pouch. "I'm going to drop them here, so you can see and take it for yourself, if the conjured coins are a no go."
He opened the pouch and poured on the floor, what poured out is not conjured but with true History, from Pesos, to gems, to different varieties of crystal to diamonds, to unrecognizable metallic, some stood out, an artifact. The smell of mixed metals, crystals, and strange flowers from the sun-crystal. A low hum from the philosopher's stone that vibrates. A temperature shift of one artifact is perpetually cold, another faintly warm. A play of light not just glitter, but light that seems to bend slowly around certain items. All have the same conclusion, they have history and values, all the while Nowa kicked the artifact back at the piles that rolled farther off the hoard.
Marisa's eyes widened in awe, pointing at a familiar looking stone. "Whoa! Is that a philosopher's stone?! What does this crystal do? Can I trade you for this? I've got... uh... this really cool mini-hakkero prototype! ...Okay, it's not as cool as interdimensional bling, but still!"
Reimu had slowly kneel down to look at the items, not touching anything. The prickle of dormant power against her skin, the weird gravitational pull that makes dust motes spiral towards a particular gem. Her voice hushed. "...These relics from another world I've never heard of. And this... and this..." She turned to look at Nowa. "So you weren't lying about being a multiversal traveller. These are proof of what you've been through."
Nowa crossed his arms and sagely nodded. "Yup, they're gifts from the world I've saved, so on and so forth, so I don't get where all these accusations I get from you guys."
Reimu stared at him for a long moment before looking back at the evidence in the piles of gifts, and saved history on her floor. 'He's right. We've been treating him like a bomb because of his power. But this... this is the proof of his character. Every single one of these is a "thank you." We've been accusing a savior of being a monster.' Her voice was low, but without its earlier edge. "I get it now." She stood up, brushing off her knees, her gaze steady on him.
"The accusations came from the power you wield, Beckitzer. Not the man you are. It's my job to be suspicious of the former. But this..." She gestured to the hoard. "...this speaks for the latter."
Marisa finally stopped eyeballing the Philosopher's Stone and looked at Nowa with a new kind of respect. "Whoa. So every time you saved the day, you got a souvenir? That's... actually way more legit than just being rich." She grinned. "Okay, so you're not just a crazy powerful old-timer. You're a reliable crazy powerful old-timer. That's a pretty big difference."
Nowa smug uncrossed his arm a flicker of acknowledgement pride crossed his face. "Well, my power tends to get overlooked by what I do, so it's not surprising anymore." He paused. "So, miko Ribbon. Which one do you prefer? The conjured local coins of your world, or this pile of souvenirs that you have to painstakingly trade to a pawnshop before you get local coins?"
He smirked, while Reimu let out a short, almost imperceptible sigh of resignation. A tiny, reluctant smile touched her lips before it returned to neutrality. She looked back from the magnificent, unwieldy pile of treasure back to Nowa.
"The conjured coins," her voice dry and deadpan. "They're already in the box. They're less of a tripping hazard and won't attract every youkai with a greed gland from here to the Forest of Magic. Now, help me get this... evidence... back in your pouch before Marisa actually manages to pocket the philosopher's stone."
Marisa pouted dramatically at being called out. "Hey! you're no fun, Reimu!" She still helped anyway, all while firing questions at Nowa. "Okay, okay, but while we clean, you gotta tell us about one. Just one story! Like, what did you do to get the glowy crystal? Or the spiky metal thing? Come on, Old-timer, a 'reliable' guy shares stories with his friends!"
Nowa looked at the glowing crystal. "The glowy crystal?" he turned to meet her gaze back. "That was from a world where the sun was dying. They used these to light their cities. I just helped them by creating a new one."
Marisa's jaw fell on the floor. "What!!?" Not a hint of surprise crossed Nowa's face. "What do you mean, what? We're talking about the framework rune creation here, so I made sure their universe stays alive. Plus didn't I say anything is possible?" he dryly chuckled.
The words 'anything is possible' seemed to suck the air from the room. Marisa's jaw was still on the floor. Reimu simply stared, the last vestiges of her suspicion crumbling under the weight of a simple, terrifying truth. The rumors Yukari had chased, the whispers of a 'Cosmic Slayer' and 'Flame Noah' who saved dying worlds, were no longer just whispers. They were standing in her shrine, looking mildly amused after casually mentioning he created a sun. The suspicious, powerful stranger was gone. In his place stood the real, living legend from the multiverse's rumors, and the entirety of Gensokyo suddenly felt very, very small.