Music, Rebellion & Love: Mina and Kent's Journey

"Why do you want to..."

Reimu Chang was confused, she was in the middle of a conversation with Marisa Kirisame and the witch seemed to be waiting for something. "What?" Reimu asked.

"Why do you want to travel with me?" Marisa repeated. "I mean, I'm not one of those uppity nobles that think they're better than everyone else, but you're a shrine maiden. You're kind of... well... you know."

"No, I don't know," Reimu said. "I never really thought about it."

"Oh," Marisa said. "Well, uh.. just think about it," Marisa started fidgeting around in her dress pockets until she found what she was looking for. She pulled out a pipe and lit it. It started smoking up the room as their conversation continued. "You really should think about it, like seriously," Marisa said as she exhaled some smoke into the air. The two were sitting in Marisa's house, which was in a small clearing in the forest outside Gensokyo.

"I guess I've been traveling with you for so long that I didn't think about why anymore," Reimu said as she looked up at the ceiling fan spinning slowly above them.

"That's probably true," Marisa said as she put her feet up on her table and leaned back in her chair with her arms behind her head, blowing more smoke away from Reimu. "So how many years have we known each other?"

Reimu thought for a second before responding with "seven years."

Marisa shook her head and took another puff of her pipe before saying, "no that can't be right."

Reimu sat silently as Marisa figured out how many years they had known each other for by counting on her fingers underneath her arms, then she stopped at three fingers and took another puff before saying: "well that's wrong too." Reimu smiled and took a drink from her glass of water which had been sitting on the table in front of her all this time without being sipped from once since they started talking.

Marisa put down her pipe and continued talking: "you just don't age do you? Is it because you're a shrine maiden?"

"Maybe," Reimu responded while looking at the floor under herself. She didn't quite like where this conversation was going or maybe it wasn't even going somewhere bad but still, it was making her feel strange inside. She couldn't explain it but there was definitely something wrong inside of here if only for a second or two until she looked back up at Marisa who was getting ready to say something else as if nothing strange had happened at all. "Do you like smoking?" Reimu quickly interrupted before Marisa could speak again after seeing the witch light another match and stick it to the bowl of her pipe again which was already glowing red hot this time around and producing heavy amounts of white smoke that made its way over to Reimu's direction again much faster than before.