The outfit Marisa had given her was very strange—walking in it was actually less comfortable than the starter battle gear, though at least it looked nicer.
Since it was made for a child, the design was considerably more conservative. The sleeves were attached, at least, so it was no longer an exposed-armpit look. But Yimi's hair wasn't long enough for anything more than short pigtails, nowhere near enough to support a big butterfly bow like Reimu's. So Marisa had produced a small bow hairclip from somewhere and pinned it on her head.
The problem was, ever since she'd gone outside wearing this outfit, quite a few youkai had greeted her along the way. A handful had even shown hostility, though none actually stepped out to start trouble.
The Garden of the Sun was a sight the little cat had truly never seen before. Sunflowers taller than she was lined up in dense rows, blocking the path in every direction. The field stretched endlessly—from Yimi's height she couldn't even begin to gauge how deep it went. Fragrant, sure—her keen nose was already reacting—but sadly, the cat didn't eat vegetables.
"Whoa."
She took a step back, clutching her gohei. For some reason, she got the strange feeling that a vast army was bearing down to seize Princess Yimi.
Unfortunately, her brief cat-life hadn't included much entertainment, so she couldn't sustain the fantasy any further. She just whacked the nearest sunflower with the gohei instead.
The stalk was that thick—naturally, she didn't break it. This was actually the first plant she'd come across on her journey that she couldn't beat.
The little cat crossed her arms and finally dredged up what she considered a cool-sounding phrase from the few pages of picture books she'd leafed through back in the seafaring world: "Since you are a heart… less… per-son, don't bluh… blame me for—"
She couldn't read the last two characters, so she stopped there.
Nudge.
Something prickly pushed her from behind.
"Who's there?"
The little cat turned around. Several sunflowers that should have been off to her side had somehow circled behind her, bending down to face her at close range, their backs to the sun. Their faceless seed-heads loomed over her, eerily ominous, while their lower stems rubbed together in a hand-wringing motion.
"Mew?! MEW!"
Yimi's tail fur puffed straight out. She swung the gohei wildly to bat them away and bolted.
These things could move—and they'd touched her!
Now the little cat remembered. The naughty cat who used to hang around Mama had once bought her something like this to scare her when she was being mischievous—a green thing that wriggled around and mimicked her voice in a high-pitched screech!
Yimi quickly clamped her hands over her mouth. If this many of them started copying her voice at once, the noise would be unbearable. Maybe she should toss a mushroom at them.
"Heh heh." A faint, soft laugh drifted over from the side.
A green-haired woman in a red plaid skirt approached, carrying a beautiful parasol, walking with an elegant, leisurely gait. This was the mistress of the Garden of the Sun—the Master of the Flowers of the Four Seasons, Yuuka Kazami.
On the surface, despite her red eyes, she came across as a gentle, kindly big sister. But in Gensokyo's danger-level rankings for youkai, she sat near the very top. Rumors abounded of trespassers being dragged into the flower field to serve as fertilizer, and such claims were far from baseless.
Still, having lived so long that she'd lost some of her vitality, she mostly stayed in her garden and rarely ventured out. As long as you didn't get lost or deliberately court death, you wouldn't run into her.
Yuuka looked at the little cat—hands clamped over her mouth, apparently too frightened to speak—and let her gaze linger on the shrine maiden outfit for a good while.
"So you're the next-generation Hakurei Shrine Maiden? Humans really do have lifespans as brief as flowers. I don't recall having fought her all that many times."
"How did you know? …Auntie?" The little cat quickly clapped her hands over her mouth again after answering, backing further away from the sunflowers.
The black-and-white one had told her to be polite.
"'Auntie'? Now that's an amusing thing to call me. Don't be afraid—if you don't bother them, they won't bother you." Of course, the little nudge just now had been Yuuka's doing.
"Mmph." Yimi bit down on her finger, agonizing as she stared at the vast field. "I'm sorry."
Yuuka raised an eyebrow, gently pried Yimi's hand away from her mouth to correct the finger-chewing habit, then crouched down and wiped Yimi's hand with a handkerchief.
"Are you lost? The shrine is a very long way from here, you know. How strange—you have animal ears, but you don't smell the slightest bit like a youkai." She gave Yimi's small cat ears a gentle squeeze.
"I came here to find catnip." Yimi shook her head, pulling away.
Yuuka stood back up, not pressing the matter. "Catnip? Well, that is a rare request. Why come here for catnip? That little cat Yukari keeps—her home should be full of the stuff."
At the mention of Yukari's name, Yuuka's mood soured several notches. Yesterday that woman had ambushed her out of nowhere, and when Yuuka went looking for payback, the scoundrel hadn't shown up until the middle of the night, at which point they'd had a perfunctory fight.
Something about "a god that redirects harm" or whatever—Yuuka hadn't listened closely. She just wanted to pick a fight with Yukari for being so rude.
When she'd gotten home afterward, she'd noticed something was off—suspicious drool on her pillow, for instance.
She'd have to go pick another fight today.
"There's none?" the little girl's clear voice broke her train of thought.
The kid looked so disappointed—even her ears were drooping.
Yuuka rested one arm across her stomach and propped her chin on the other hand. "I may have some seeds at home that aren't flower seeds. Want me to give them to you?"
"Are seeds like plant eggs?" Yimi vaguely recalled learning something like that from picture books and what little she knew as a toddler.
"You could say that, I suppose. With seeds you can grow your own plants at home, though you'd need to take good care of them."
"I want them!"
"Hmm… so what are you going to trade for them?" Yuuka studied her with amusement. "You didn't think I'd give them away for free, did you?"
"You can pet my head." Yimi lowered her head and leaned in.
"Heh heh." Yuuka didn't refuse the quirky offer, and reached over to pat her head.
"Fine, come along. Hold my hand—don't get lost." Not that this was the Bamboo Forest of the Lost or anything.
Deep in the Garden of the Sun sat a Western-style cottage—not a grand manor, just her home. Beyond this point the endless sunflowers finally thinned out.
A packet of seeds no bigger than Yimi's fist was placed in her hands.
The little cat stared down at it, troubled. This thing was smaller than her fist. Nowhere near enough to eat.
"Do you know how to grow them?"
"No."
Yuuka took out a single seed, crouched down, and pressed it into the soil of an empty flowerpot by the front door. "Like this—bury it in well-drained soil and give it a tiny bit of water each day. In about ten days or so it'll sprout."
"Ten days!" The little cat spread both hands and counted on her fingers. "Can't it be faster?"
"Faster?"
Yuuka held out her hand. The catnip seed she'd just planted burst through the soil, growing at a visibly healthy pace.
"Whoa!" The little cat clenched her fists, instantly hooked. "Teach me!"
"You wouldn't be able to learn."