Mentioned Characters: Reimu, Sanae, Shizuha

"Fall, leaves of autumn, in all your rich, vivid color! I'll kick down anything or anyone foolish enough to get in my way!" Shizuha Aki, the autumn goddess, was usually the quiet type. Not this time. A new shrine had suddenly appeared on the Youkai Mountain, and it was throwing the whole place into disorder. The youkai, unruly enough to begin with, had split into believers and skeptics, and the clashes between them had dragged everything into a hopeless mess. Worst of all, the gods, who already struggled to hold their ground, found themselves pushed further into a corner. This wasn't something she was willing to tolerate. She'd been kicking tree trunks for who knows how many years now. But at last, it was time to take a stand.

Prolonged Incidents An incident can be interpreted as a system contained within Gensokyo (along with all its neighboring otherworlds, such as Hell, the Netherworld, etc.). That would make a prolonged incident something like a mutation, where a small system inside a larger one learns to sustain itself independently. That would be reason enough to call it a new form of life.

Moriya Shrine's Prolonged Great Migration A mysterious shrine maiden had appeared at Hakurei Shrine. It was Sanae Kochiya, priestess of the new shrine that had sprung up on the Youkai Mountain, Moriya Shrine. She announced to Reimu that Moriya Shrine intended to take over all of Gensokyo's faith. It was, in effect, a declaration of war. Reimu, though, barely batted an eye. Hakurei Shrine had never exactly been swimming in faith, so she couldn't help but wonder where it all ended up. Maybe there was some corner of Gensokyo packed with gods nobody talked about, probably doing better than her own shrine.

EX Beings have the ability, or perhaps the potential, to prolong incidents. It might not have fully developed into an ability yet. This can also be referred to as them being "mainly capable of prolonging incidents," "capable of causing Prolonged Incidents," "capable of drawing incidents out," or "capable of never letting an incident end."

Shizuha Aki is a goddess of autumn, and more specifically, of autumn leaves. She has a younger sister, and together, they preside over autumn in Gensokyo. Ordinarily, she doesn't say much. If history had followed its proper course, her only involvement with the incident would have been to fire her attack and walk away. A calm, quiet goddess. Or at least, that's how she appears to be. In mythology, it's common for sister gods to represent opposing halves of something: farmland and mountain, wood and stone, abundance and longevity, etc. The Aki sisters are no exception. One governs autumn's abundance, reaping what summer sowed. The other governs autumn's decline, easing the world toward winter. Shizuha is the latter. This Shizuha draws on the strength of countless gods, but the most powerful among them is probably the eternal goddess of stone, Iwanagahime.