An invitation to Gensokyo

Chapter 8: Tools of the trade

It's been a full month since Ryusashi arrived in Gensokyo. He'd been working with Kasen and Yuugi every day up until now, but one thing was still left to be learnt. Tonight, him, Chen, Ran and Yukari had sat down for some tea after dinner. "You've been here quite a while now, I assume you know what you'll need to pick up next?" Yukari told Ryusashi as he took a sip from his cup, which had coffee instead of tea. "Can't say I do." He replied, and Yukari frowned. "You need to learn magic of course, we talked about this." Yukari said, somewhat upset. "I can do magic though." He explained, everyone looked at him with confusion. "Y-you can?" Ran said, unsure of wether he was joking or not. He took another drink and placed his cup on the table. "Do you have a deck of cards?" Ran looked over at Yukari, and she shook her head, causing Ran in turn to do the same. Ryusashi sighed. "It's fine, I've got my own." He pulled a deck of playing cards out of his pocket, and began shuffling them. Afterwards, he spread them out on the table, face down. "Chen, take a card, and show it to Ran and Yukari." Chen nodded, taking a card from the middle. It was the seven of hearts. She raised it to Ran and Yukari, not showing Ryusashi. "Now Chen, you need to remember that seven, alright?" He said, taking the card from her without looking at it and shuffled it back into the deck. "Now then, ace of clubs on top of the deck." He said, taking the ace of the top, revealing it to them. "Chen, take this, flip it upside down, wave it and say woof." Chen waved the card side to side without looking at it. "Woof!" She said excitedly, but Ryusashi just gave her a confused look. "A kitty cat that barks like a dog? Now I've seen everything." He said jokingly, making Chen giggle a little. Ran pat her on the head. "Now then flip that card over, and you'll see..." Chen flipped the card over, revealing it's face to everyone. "That it's the seven." Ryusashi continued after they saw the card. Ran and Chen gasped in amazement but Yukari rolled her eyes. "Ryusashi, parlour tricks hardly count as ma-" She began, but Ryusashi held a finger up, silencing her. "Yes, yes I know I'm amazing but please, save your praise for the ending." He took the card back from Chen and slid it into the middle of the deck. "Now, in the middle I have the seven..." He took off the top card, revealing it to the three of them. "And here I have the Jack of clubs." He said placing it face down on the table. "If the Jack is there, and the seven's in the deck..." he flipped the face down card over, revealing the seven. "Why do I have the seven here..." he split the deck down the middle to reveal the Jack of clubs. "And the Jack there?" Ran and Chen applauded him, astounded by his "magic", but Yukari still wasn't amused. "Now then, for my final trick." He declared as he split the deck into 8 even piles. "Now Chen, point to the pile where you want the seven." Chen thought about it for a moment, then pointed to the pile in the far right corner. "Are you sure you don't want it over here? Or maybe here?" He asked her, pointing to two completely different piles. Chen nodded, very sure of her decision, and Ryusashi sighed. "Well whatever, have it anywhere you want." He said before flipping the top card of each pile over to reveal that they were all sevens of hearts. Chen gasped in awe as Ran applauded him once again. Yukari continued to watch his act, still annoyed somewhat. "Now you might be thinking..." Ryusashi gathered up his cards and spread them out like a fan. "But Takano-kun, you're using more than one seven!" He said flickering his eyelashes to mimic Yukari while using his cards like her fan. His impersonation made Ran and Chen giggle, but Yukari sighed while rolling her eyes. She clearly didn't like his joke. "Well, I assure you, I'm not using more than one seven you see?" He said before turning his card fan around, revealing the entirety of the deck. "All the cards are different." He placed the cards face down, still fanned out. "If I were using more than one seven, well my deck would look more like this." He ran his hand along the cards, flipping them over to reveal all of them as sevens of hearts. Chen and Ran gave him one last round of applause, and Yukari sarcastically applauded as well. "Yes, yes. Your "magic" is very impressive." Yukari said, Ryusashi gave her a little bow. "Yes, your card tricks are very nice Ryusashi, but you will need to learn actual magic." Ran cut in, still impressed by his interesting card tricks, and Yukari nodded in agreement. "Tomorrow you'll meet your next teacher, understand?" Ryusashi brought all his cards back together and shuffled them before putting them back into his pocket. "And who might that be?"