> "Oh, no, nothing so serious. Just a social call after my winter nap, thought I'd invite you over for tea while we catch up."
> Does divination work in Gensokyo, or is it more a way to pass the time?
>"Oh, it has been awhile since I've seen your cottage," says Yuyuko.
>Done correctly by a skilled oracle, Divination is practically a kind of magic derived from faith and can reveal some things about underlying forces of the universe in action. However, divination is likely the most copied ritual by people who aren't really able do it or don't fully understand it, which renders it useless. Yuyuko's typically doesn't use established ritualistic divinations, rather inventing her own forms that, as you understand the art, would realistically work. Her interest isn't in finding what the future may hold so much as determining why it works, and she largely pursues it as a form of meditative contemplation.
>"So, how have things been in general? Anything new and noteworthy?"
>Would she tell us or want us to find out on our own?
>Do we have a pet game with Yuyuko, such as guessing something ...?
>"Mmm, well, Youmu has taken an interest in a few new topiary projects. It'll be some years before they are will bear fruit, but the early results are quite promising. Ah, and I found myself a rather nice collection of poems, I found myself loitering by a frozen stream for a day afterward, to see if ice really did make the kind of noise one of the poems wrote about. It did, I'll note, but only rarely. I think I may be writing a play."
>Yuyuko is often forthright with you, in her own sense. To the average person, she would probably be quite baffling some of the time, but you understand well how she thinks and expresses herself, and can see the genius hidden under what would be random nonsense to the uninitiated.
>The two of you have gone through a number of pet games over the past millennium, starting them on a whim and discarding them once they've worn out their welcome or as the nature of your relationship changed. Right now, however, there isn't one in particular that is active between the two of you.
>Youmu returns with a small knock on the doorframe, bearing a tray with a small bottle of sake, a pair of cups, and a little dish of sashimi, just enough to make a snack of it. "Ah, thank you, Youmu," says Yuyuko. "That will be all for now."
>"Thank you, Mistress," says Youmu, as she bows and quietly departs.
>_
