Miscellaneous Questions Thread 4 - Bring us your Questions!

[Biakmon]

In Touhou, it just means "disappearing from outside world and appearing in Gensokyo", mostly about humans. Yukari is said to be the one usually behind this.

- What about the reverse "Gensokyo to Outside world" or does the Hakurei Barrier can prevent that from happening?
From the impression I got by reading this particular chapter I did have a slight impression that Rinnosuke could have been also spirited away (assuming he really want to) from the Gensokyo to the outside world... well it either that or he was really just dreaming.

[Drake]

It's two-way. Rinnosuke was by a weak point in the Barrier and picked up an item from the outside (iPod) and tried to use it. Doing so made him really susceptible to "being in the outside world".

[Biakmon]

It's two-way. Rinnosuke was by a weak point in the Barrier and picked up an item from the outside (iPod) and tried to use it. Doing so made him really susceptible to "being in the outside world".

Does those weak pt you are talking about appear spontaneously like that and disappear or are they let say localize?
- If you please could you elaborate a bit what you mean by "Rinnosuke was by a weak point in the Barrier..." Are you implying that maybe Kourindou lies on a weak pt of the barrier?

Also something bother me a bit about one the picture from touhou: SSaBND manga - http://mangafox.me/manga/touhou_sangetsusei_strange_and_bright_nature_deity/v03/c024/7.html

- Since I haven't really pay attention to the representation of Hakurei house in other manga I can't really say for sure but where exactly is the storehouse and the pond in this picture? Are they that far away from the main house?

I may be wrong here but it seems in CoLA chap 13 of new touhou wiki 2 lines have remain untranslated... I want to know if whether they have been translated or not, thanks?
Also in the old touhou wiki, it seems that those 2 lines are missing.

- 「では、貴方が意図的に集めたわけではないのですね」

- 「良かったぁ」

[Drake]

Actually I was mistaken there, I was thinking of Nazrin moving to Muenzuka because there were many treasures coming in from the outside world, which was information given to her by Rinnosuke, who in CoLA previously found that Muenzuka was where these items would periodically pop up, because it is at a weak point along the Barrier. So I mixed that all up. Muenzuka is at a crossing between Gensokyo, the outside world, Higan, and the Netherworld. Also worthy of note is that the Forest of Magic leads to Muenzuka by the Road of Reconsideration, and Rinnosuke lives right outside the Forest of Magic.

The actual reason, as implied by Yukari in that chapter, is that Rinnosuke is part youkai, and so is more easily affected by the outside's influence (just as humans are easily affected by Gensokyo's influence and find their way in more often than getting out). I'm not entirely sure why an iPod in particular was chosen, when by that time I'm pretty sure ZUN already revealed that cell phone towers have popped up, which are arguably just as outside-world-y.


SaBND: Pretty sure that's just because those details weren't important enough to mention. It's likely a error from carelessness, it's difficult to enforce canonical scenery and ZUN doesn't seem to care all that much. Take the SDM for example, which looks different basically every time it's shown. And has windows.

Translation: Done, but now my attention is brought to how shoddy the whole translation is. I fixed the lines afterward because they made little sense in context.

[Delfigamer]

Does anybody happen to know if Keine-hakutaku has a tail?

[Rei Scarlette]

Yes, see attachment.
[attach=1]

Compare to Stage 3, where that's not visible, so it's definitely not just her hair being long or anything.

[Biakmon]

- Anyone care to expl how copyright stuff about popular touhou doujinshi/ fan animation work out in Japan?

Assuming you have the mean plus the resource to finalize your fan project, can anyone just create some good quality fan animation and sell it like that at some official touhou convention irrespectively of whether or not you have the authorization of ZUN?

[Zerviscos]

Anyone care to expl how copyright stuff about popular touhou doujinshi/ fan animation work out in Japan?

Assuming you have the mean plus the resource to finalize your fan project, can anyone just create some good quality fan animation and sell it like that at some official touhou convention irrespectively of whether or not you have the authorization of ZUN?

The 20th chapter of WaHH is going to be the last of this manga, isn't it?

Anyone knows the name of both the singers singing this touhou song
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=98snHMxW4Vs

I don't really know how that works. But probably because there's a convention purposely just for Touhou. As long as it's there, it's fine?

Drake would probably know this better.

[Fuyuumi]

I'm currently working on my new home on my Minecraft server and it's gonna be a tower on a floating island. To make it magically and pretty evil or dark looking I'm gonna use tons of Seared stone from Tinker's Construct mod (a black version of stone made from a regular stone or cobblestone) and set a magical circle in front of my tower. The circle would be propably a slightly remade version of this. I also want to build some runic sings on walls or just throw some random japanese or latin words written in galactic alphabet to make building and coding the meaning easier.

So, to make these runes I need some information about Gensokyo's elements and/or spellcard sings. I know that Patche uses 5 elements (earth, fire, wind, water, wood as in Touhou Soccer 2 game), Cirno uses Ice element, which is a combination of water and wind element but I know I'm missing something since I've seen a lot of magic circles related to octagram... I'm thinking if I can count as elements things like love or chaos... Ugh, I'll propably just find a full spellcard list and take the first part of each one (ie. Fantasy Sign, Love Sing, Curse Sing etc.)...

[Drake]

Have fun working with a 974-gon then. Touhou isn't anywhere near as heavily-structured and constraint as some RPG.
The elements Patchouli uses are based on the days of the week (Sun - Moon - Fire - Water - Wood - Metal - Earth) and have nothing to do with any inherent sort of element system within Touhou. There isn't anything that convenient.

[Fuyuumi]

But still a characters spellcards are mostly rounded up to few sings (and I'm counting the ones with 'Sign' in it's name) and there's a lot of them. It totally works with Thaumcraft and Ars Magica where you either use aspects like Saxum (Earth) to create special blocks or you use specific items in an order to create a spell. Thaumcraft have loke 50 different aspects and Ars Magica's spell crafting potential are almost limitless (you can't make a spell that has more than 13 effects including it's shape). Lots of stuff to choose from.

On another note: If Alice's using color magic and China's spellcards are mostly Colorful Signs then they're using similiar kind of magic? And does Marisa's Master Spark also count as a color magic due to the white beam?

[Drake]

None of those are really "color magic". Alice just fires danmaku in various colors and isn't actually said to perform any specific magic besides puppetry. Meiling uses chi, which happens to glow in rainbow colors in the Touhouverse.  Marisa using light magic is bound to be rainbow-colored as well, but none of this is really similar to each other besides being colorful. The names of the spell cards don't necessarily mean they're related, which is why I'm saying it's a bit troublesome to group them like that. Half of the spell cards that exist don't use "sign" in their name's identifier, either, so you'd run into trouble there too.

Not that I want to stop you or anything, I'm just saying that grouping spells together like you're talking about would be very difficult if you want to remain accurate to the source material.

[Starxsword]

I know that Patche uses 5 elements (earth, fire, wind, water, wood as in Touhou Soccer 2 game),

That is not the 5 elements. The 5 elements are: fire, water, earth, wood, and metal. This is pretty much the standard 5 elements in Eastern philosophy.

[BedrockSolid]

Hello, this is my first post. I was wondering about something that I couldn't find anywhere.

My question is, is the "Sparta Remix" based off of "U.N. Owen Was Her?"? "Sparta Remix" seems to repeat the tune and so does "U.N. Owen Was Her?", but they are heard best in certain areas, although there are a few differences.

Thank you for reading and have a good day!

[Aba Matindesu!]

My question is, is the "Sparta Remix" based off of "U.N. Owen Was Her?"? "Sparta Remix" seems to repeat the tune and so does "U.N. Owen Was Her?", but they are heard best in certain areas, although there are a few differences.

They have nothing to do with each other.

[Biakmon]

- Anyone care to expl how copyright stuff about popular touhou doujinshi/ fan animation work out in Japan?

Assuming you have the mean plus the resource to finalize your fan project, can anyone just create some good quality fan animation and sell it like that at some official touhou convention irrespectively of whether or not you have the authorization of ZUN?

- Anyone knows the name of both the singers singing this touhou song? - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=98snHMxW4Vs

- When was the Jizou Statue made in Japan?
- Since phantoms aren't  youkai as per say (base on Reimu words in CoLA...), then what about evil spirit?

- Does the stamina/energy of those immortal being (the one who consume the Hourai elixir) replenish to full when they die and resurrect?
Let suppose Mokou die to hunger somehow (in the event that she can even die), when she resurrect does her stamina also replenish or does the Hourai elixir prevent her from dying from something like extreme hunger?

- Which vampire trait legend has already been confirmed in touhou? - Are Remilia and Flandre dead being for example or....
Assuming that a Vampire can give birth with another vampire is their a specific name for this new entity? - a bit like Dhampir (human and vampire)

- Has there been any explanation given provided in touhou canon as for why Yukari hibernate in winter?

[Tiamat]

- Has there been any explanation given provided in touhou canon as for why Yukari hibernate in winter?

Closest thing I can think of is a line in PMiSS that says she used to be a lot more active.  Poor girl is growing old

[Sagus]

- Since ghosts aren't  youkai as per say (base on Reimu words in CoLA...), then what about half-ghost/phantom/evil spirit?

Half-ghosts seem to be considered half-youkai, going by Youmu's classification in IN. I don't really know why.
Phantoms and evil spirits are types of ghost, being former humans that died, so if ghosts aren't youkai, they aren't either.

- Does the stamina/energy of those immortal being (the one who consume the Hourai elixir) replenish to full when they die and resurrect?
Let suppose Mokou die to hunger somehow (in the event that she can even die), when she resurrect does her stamina also replenish or does the Hourai elixir prevent her from dying from something like extreme hunger?

They go back to being exactly as they were when they drunk the Elixir, IIRC, so yes. Mokou constantly starves herself to death (or at least near it), since she doesn't really care.

- Which vampire trait legend has already been confirmed in touhou? - Are Remilia and Flandre dead being for example or....

The only "traditional" vampire traits they have are burning under the sun, being unable to cross moving water, turning into bats and mist, and sleeping in coffins. It is unknown if they are undead or not.

Assuming that a Vampire can give birth with another vampire is their a specific name for this new entity? - a bit like Dhampir (human and vampire)

That's unknown, it was never discussed in canon.

- Has there been any explanation given provided in touhou canon as for why Yukari hibernate in winter?

Nope. Akyuu provides a theory that she spends the time she says she's sleeping/hibernating on the outside world, but it's just a theory.

I have a question; in Yuyuko and Yukari's profile for PCB, it's said that Yuyuko was the one that thinned the barrier between the Netherworld and Gensokyo, later requesting Yukari's help in closing it. Youmu and Yukari's profile on PMiSS, though, say that it was Yukari's doing. Do we consider this a retcon or just a "Akyuu lol" moment? 'Cause, many many things that are heavily implied as being Yukari's doing (the creation of the barrier, the original spellcards rules, etc) don't directly state her as being the instigator, yet in this case in particular, two different articles (maybe more, I'm not sure) explicitly point her as the culprit. Maybe this alone should indicate that she's not the culprit, but...

[Prime32]

- Since ghosts aren't  youkai as per say (base on Reimu words in CoLA...), then what about half-ghost/phantom/evil spirit?

Which words? That might have been translation weirdness.
A ghost isn't the same thing as a dead person - a spirit that forms a physical body with odd powers and continues to walk around like they were alive is definitely a youkai (in the sense of "strange creature/event"), and Yuyuko has even had her youkai-ness backed up by game mechanics.
Phantoms seem to be one of those borderline cases where they're technically youkai but also a natural occurence. That said, specific phantoms like Murasa would definitely be considered youkai in the standard sense (note that yuurei is probably the most generic term Japanese has for anything ghostly, so phantoms are a broad category).
As a half-phantom, Youmu is half-youkai.

- Which vampire trait legend has already been confirmed in touhou? - Are Remilia and Flandre dead being for example or....

Their strength, speed, endurance, regeneration and raw magical energy are all among the highest of any youkai species, and they can turn into bats (one or many). However their normal youkai weaknesses are amplified, so they take even more damage from light/holy attacks than normal. They're not vulnerable to crosses, but they can't go out in the rain, sunlight burns them, and due to being identified with oni they can be repelled by random stuff like roast soybeans. Also Remilia sleeps in a coffin but claims she doesn't, so she seems to find it embarassing.

Assuming that a Vampire can give birth with another vampire is their a specific name for this new entity? - a bit like Dhampir (human and vampire)

There's no information on this, but we have some on jiangshi (sometimes called "hopping vampires" or "Chinese vampires") - Yoshika's bite can turn other people into jiangshi, but they'll soon revert to normal as long as they don't die.

[Tiamat]

Nope. Akyuu provides a theory that she spends the time she says she's sleeping/hibernating on the outside world, but it's just a theory.

On the one hand, in Curiosities of Lotus Asia, Yukari remains active in the winter after being called over by Reimu, which confuses everyone why she's still around. This could imply the whole hibernation thing is just a lie she tells everyone and she's actually awake during this time.

On the other hand, there's a scene in either Forbidden Scrollery or WaHH (or maybe Oriental Sacred Place? Pretty sure it was one of the newer mangas, though. Prolly WaHH given that author's love of cameos) that shows her sleeping during the winter.  Of course, just because she's asleep during the winter doesn't mean she was hibernating. Maybe she was just caught "on camera" (you the manga reader, that is) while she happened to be napping or during bed time.

...so yea.

I have a question; in Yuyuko and Yukari's profile for PCB, it's said that Yuyuko was the one that thinned the barrier between the Netherworld and Gensokyo, later requesting Yukari's help in closing it. Youmu and Yukari's profile on PMiSS, though, say that it was Yukari's doing. Do we consider this a retcon or just a "Akyuu lol" moment? 'Cause, many many things that are heavily implied as being Yukari's doing (the creation of the barrier, the original spellcards rules, etc) don't directly state her as being the instigator, yet in this case in particular, two different articles (maybe more, I'm not sure) explicitly point her as the culprit. Maybe this alone should indicate that she's not the culprit, but...

Doesn't Akyuu say "It must have been this youkai", implying Akyuu jumped to that conclusion?  Though it does make more sense to me if it was Yukari but the profiles far as I know are pretty explicit that it's Yuyuko (far as I know. I can't read Japanese well).

[Drake]

Actually guys, when vampires suck the blood of humans they're said to turn into zombies and then disintegrate when the sun rises. At least, this is what's stated in PMiSS, and it's unknown as to whether or not this actually happens, or if it's just Akyuu's recollection. Seeing as the supply of humans for the vampires are provided to them, it isn't very likely that we'll ever confirm this statement.

Re: Busting the barrier to the Netherworld: This was explicitly Yuyuko's doing. Akyuu assumes it's Yukari because she can't think of anyone else, but Yuyuko herself weakened it. She was able to weaken it, but not restore it. I played with the idea of Yuyuko asking Yukari but it never really says so and Yukari does say Yuyuko did it herself.

[game2011]

How did the word "Inchling" came to be?  The wiki uses that as Shinmyoumaru's species name.

And are biwa and lute interchangeable?

Thanks in advance!

[Drake]

http://en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Talk:Shinmyoumaru_Sukuna#Her_Species
Personally I'm more in favor of Clarste's recent point, that リリパット (i.e. Lilliput) was used in a recent FS chapter. Any mention of a useable english title that also alludes to her species should take priority over the fairly limited democratic option.

And not really. A biwa is a lute, but a lute is incredibly general, spanning a wide range of instruments.

[Biakmon]

Anyone knows if the last chap of WoHH (chap. 20) is the last one for this manga?

[Drake]

It's the last for this volume, but the manga isn't just ending. Nothing ending-like even happened.

[Paz legalces]

What is your opinion on the legality (and also your personal opinion) if someone:
-Translate and reprint Doujin books or mini manga from Pixiv/Danbooru and sell it without permission
-Compile musics from different Touhou circles into 1 cd and sell it without permission
-Compile Zun games and other Touhou stuffs like PV into CDs and sell it without permission
-Making a business model out of said acts, selling stuffs at a profit while slapping their brand on it without proper acknowledgement from source artist?

[ark]

That's copyright infringement and also straight up rude. :c

[Drake]

You would be a terrible person and in many circumstances it would be illegal.

[Starxsword]

A ghost isn't the same thing as a dead person - a spirit that forms a physical body with odd powers and continues to walk around like they were alive is definitely a youkai (in the sense of "strange creature/event"), and Yuyuko has even had her youkai-ness backed up by game mechanics.

A ghost is a dead person, they are one and the same. Youkai is a super umbrella that covers pretty much everything super natural and that includes humans that become ghosts. If you aren't human in the strictest sense, then you are likely a youkai in its broadest definition.

However their normal youkai weaknesses are amplified, so they take even more damage from light/holy attacks than normal.

I am pretty sure Remilia takes no extra damage from holy water.

[Tengukami]

A ghost is a dead person, they are one and the same.

I'm not sure in what sense you mean by this, because this is demonstrably untrue. A "dead person" is the corpse itself. A ghost is the active spirit of a dead person. They are not one and the same. Also, not sure the spirits of dead people qualify as youkai. I think they are rather a class of supernatural beings unto themselves.