>"Yukari is...kind of enigma. She's an immensely youkai who has power over gaps. In practical terms, she has a great deal of power of the borders and worlds. Among other things, she can travel freely between them. As for why she's important. Well...she looks a lot like you, Maribel. And you mentioning that you can see borders and such? And some of the abilities you've shown a proclivity toward, such as opening gates...
>Glance toward the gaps.
>"And now these things connecting to the outside world."
>"Let me try to tell you what happened. In short, history was changed when this whole even with you and Gengetsu went down. Something reach blindly into the past, and started removing bits and pieces of the world. One of those bits had Marisa and her friend Reimu on it, seven years ago. They were pulled into the outside world, and history changed immensely. I ended up following her, hoping to restore history to how it's supposed to be."
>"As for why I think these lead to Yukari, well...she did something to herself, to keep time from changing around her. It involved opening a lot of gaps to...well...heaven knows where. She's there now, in a sort of stasis, having not moved or done anything over the years. The outside of it...looked a lot like this pillar here. We don't really know all of what she did, or why. But, it seems you and she are connected somehow, Maribel."
>"I wonder...would it be possible to follow one of these gaps?"
>Look around for any sign of Yukari's limbs poking through.
>"So there's an extremely powerful youkai who looks a lot like me, with similar abilities to me, and you found her in the same state as... this me?" She points at the Maribel in the column of energy.
>Marisa nods. "Yeah, I saw her and Ran looking at you earlier. Apparently you're practically her mirror; just a little smaller and younger looking. They seemed pretty shocked."
>Maribel turns to her. "So, something pulled you into my world because of all this? And this changed history?"
>"First part's about right," Marisa says. "As for the second, well... Keine says history's changed and all. I only remember one life, so for me this seems like just the way things are. But history's her business, so what do I know?" She shrugs.
>"How's that even possible?"
>"Beats me," Marisa says. "I'm not the one to ask."
>"This is just..." Maribel says. "Do you... have any idea why we might be connected? It's strange enough to hear of someone with that kind of resemblance, let along the other things."
>"Although you've just met someone else who looks
exactly like you," the other Maribel pipes up. "Sure, it's still a dream, and there's probably still just one of us outside in the... waking... world." She stops and frowns.
>"Wait a moment..." the other Maribel says, frowning as well. "If there's two- three of us, and one body... what happens when we wake up? Does the rest of us... disappear?" They both turn nervously to Mugetsu.
>"I- I don't know," she says. "I don't know why there should even be more than one of you in the first place. Your dream is... different from most. I truly wish I could say something more comforting."
>You ask Mugetsu if it would be possible to follow some of the gaps to the outside world. "It... may be," she says. "But I'm not certain how safe it would be. Or if you would even be able to return here the same way you left. I'm reminded of the projection of Gengetsu that you say attacked you through one of the fissures in Gensokyo. Maybe she reached out to you through something like this?"
>You take a closer look around, but don't see any sign of Yukari's limbs or anything else that catches your eyes among the veins of energy.
