【東方】Touhou Iceberg: Explained 

I am aware that many names are mispronounced. I do not speak or read Japanese. List of corrections/additions (will continue to update) Thank you to everyone who helped me find more information! Stage 1: >4th heavenly king: refers to the 4 oni devas, only 3 of which are known, Yuugi, Suika, and Kasen. >Unidentified beast gang: beast spirits mentioned in Yachie's omake.txt in TH17. >Yukari/Merry: addition - when Lafcadio Hearn moved to Japan, he changed his name to Koizumi Yakumo, meaning Maribel *Hearn* and Yukari *Yakumo* are both named after him. Stage 3: >Matarajin rabbit hole: many other characters have references to the Matarajin and its avatars. >Rinnosuke is ZUN's self-insert: in an interview with PLAYER1, ZUN showed a self-portrait that looks very similar to Rinnosuke. Stage 4: >UFO grey alien: in volume 5 of SCoOW, ZUN states that he once planned an alien boss for UFO, but canceled it due to worldbuilding issues involving the lunarians. >Alicesoft Eroges: Marisa's spell screen in PoDD seems traced from an Alicesoft game. Stage 5: >Quon Kisaragi: seems to have inspired the design of Yukari >Sarai: several characters in EoSD seem to be named after Sarai characters Stage 6: >Hourai Shoujo: refers to illustrations of unused characters on ZUN's website. Music featured: 00:00 - ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-5m4yoYMSBNw.html 01:53 - ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-eqhKHxQH3c0.html 08:14 - ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-zdZtMJySQio.html 15:55 - ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-uqX_oVuupzE.html 22:03 - ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-ePWycN68sD4.html 28:15 - ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-A86mBOubWUY.html 32:44 - ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-AAllLFzV1jI.html 36:45 - ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-6TAVFiq6MUk.html Links to content referenced: Chang'e fan video: www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm27528041 Merry/Yukari THwiki page: en.touhouwiki.net/wiki/Contemplations/Maribel_Hearn_and_Yukari_Yakumo Izayoi Phantasm Stage: www.bilibili.com/video/av844046/ Marisa mentions a nurse: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-BIOEfAytW-o.html Anime Top Scholar discusses Touhou x Tenchou: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-VgI9tChGVoc.html EoSD Trial download page: www16.big.or.jp/~zun/data/html/th06.html Shrine Maiden Org music restoration: www.shrinemaiden.org/forum/index.php/topic,18989.0.html Angel Record: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Tj0fu1_Iyqg.html Canni-Chan: dynasty-scans.com/chapters/canni_chan#10

Remember: ZUN did all of this while drunk. Imagine what he's truly capable of when sober

23:33 actually, there is a concept book, there is concept and even the storyboard of the TenchoXToho Ova! I just got it today and feels weird no one has updated it about the info

Sakuya's eyes turn brown not red though... Fun fact: even though Remilia says she's the second generation of vampires, ZUN stated that she is lying.

Minoriko's feet: it's speculated that Minoriko has 2 left feet based from her portrait. This might either be a reference to the one legged scarecrow or just ZUN that was particularly drunk (or sober)

Someone did it. They made a Touhou Iceberg video. There really is an iceberg video for everything When is the Iceberg Iceberg

Chang'e is important in Touhou 15. In there, her husband Hou'yi shot down 9 suns... killing Junko's son and Apollo. Junko killed Hou'yi for this, and Chang'e was imprisoned and turned into a frog. But for Junko, that was not enough.

If you want a random theory, my headcanon was always that ZUN himself is the God of Hakurei Shrine XD If I have to expand on it, I guess I'd say that he incarnated as a mortal to tell the tales of the land he protects, to gather new faith on that land, and so make it exist for longer XD

Of all the icebergs, I'm surprised I hadn't previously sought this one out. Glad it got recc'd.

“It’s nothing more than Urban legend” Oh no

Another thing to add about the Yukari-Merry Lafcadio Hearn Connection. When Lafcadio Hearn moved to Japan, he changed his name to Koizumi *Yakumo.* The full names of Yukari and Merry are Yukari *Yakumo* and Maribel *Hearn.* As for "Hourai Shoujo", it's an umbrella term made by the fans to refer to the unnamed characters drawn by zun. The shrine maiden from the Angel Record picture is one of these "Hourai Shoujo." Other hourai shoujos include "Jacket Girl" who has only appeared in the album cover of Dolls in Pseudo Paradise, "Label Girl" who only appears in the CD label of Dolls in Pseudo Paradise and finally, Rin Satsuki/C62 Circle Cut Girl. There are a couple more of these Hourai Shoujos however I don't know what the fans have named them

imma add some parts that may be missed or not too on point - Rumia's true form : this might be a fans misconception about EX Rumia or the adult rumia from Shinra-Bansho's animation (also includes the well known Hakurei Miko no Sendai, the buffed up shrine maiden said to be in place before reimu) - Matarajin rabbit hole : this also could connect to other character's background, if following their folklore - Rinnosuke is Zun's self insert : in the 20th issue of swedish game magazine namely PLAYER1 has an interview with them and Zun himself, which the article page shows a never before seen art that Zun says as "his self portrait", that looks suspiciously similar to Rinnosuke - Alicesoft eroges : missed the part where Marisa's spell screen on PoDD was traced from one of Rance series games - Quon Kisaragi : she's a character from the anime/manga series RahXephon, that she's speculated to be the inspiration for the design of Yukari and DiPP jacket girl, referencing to her arts in the manga (someone pointed a picture of the similarities but i lost it) - Hourai Shoujo : though i'm still unsure, someone pointed out that this is a term for the girls in Zun's misc arts/unnamed characters that's all i can point out, was surprised that you got the ORIENTAL085.jpg more accurately

There is an observation that ZUN underwent some interesting attitude changes towards his own works. He wasn't meant to build an influencing IP but to make things to heart's content back then, and probably only realized at around the time of PoFV that the Touhou fandom had grown so well that he was revered by the fandom as a sorta omni-divine-like existence over his 'Touhou Universe' (hence the name Hakurei Kannushi). Then all his works were related to Touhou Project. Hifuu Club was likely set in a different universe to begin with, but officially merged with the Touhou Project afterwards anyway.

Humans ARE cattle in Gensokyo, but not in the way you think. Yokai are sustained by fear, which means the humans are fear turkeys. And as we've learned from Alucard's letter, sometimes you have to fuck the fear turkey.

You also forgot to mention.that rumias "hair band" is speculated to be a talisman seal the locks her power

the ominous music makes me regret watching this in a dark room a lot man

I don't know if anyone knows this, ZUN's Twitter has the title:博麗神主 And onced I translate this, and it said The Hakurei God or something Is ZUN trying to say he is the hakurei god or is he just playing a joke over us

Hourai Shoujo refers to the unnamed characters that don't appear in games, such as the dipp girls, the poster girl, beerko, the unnamed shrine maidens that only appeared in some illustrations, maybe rin satsuki could also fit in this group despite being named

scared waching icberg? juts rember... Fumo

The part about Shinmyomaru possibly switching with her dream world counterpart is pretty spooky

Unidentified Beast Gang refers to a fourth gang in the Animal Realm. Currently, there are three known gangs: • the Kiketsu Family (otter spirits, led by Yachie Kicchou) • the Keiga Family (wolf spirits, led by Saki Kurokoma) • the Gouyoku Alliance (eagle spirits, led by Yuuma Toutetsu) However, a fourth gang was mentioned, and not even the three leaders of each gang seem to know about who's their leader (or at least that's what I remember).

I'm not even sure why PC-98 is a debate. 1: There is nothing in Windows that counteracts it being canon 2: Alice references it in 7 [She recognises Reimu; but Reimu does not recognise her due to redesign] and in 9 [Yuuka is accused of being the cause of the flowers due to Lotus Land Story]. So these both confirm it as canon. ZUN basically said 'If anything contradicts an older game; newer = canon'.

Holy shit I didn't know that Touhou was a hard rabbit hole to get into... I think i'll just come back when I've played the rest of the games...

AMAZING video, I was waiting for a touhou iceberg for so long, I live touhou lore discussions and this video gave me goosebumps. One criticism I have is that many times you left the video empty without reference pictures, this is a bad thing because some people might not know what you are talking about

suika is actually the hakurei god *gasp* she is angry over the lack of donations for her sake

yo how TF did someone find Angel Record WHAAAAAAAAAAT

One I think should be on here is: Tewi is the white rabbit of Inaba. Which if true would make her the oldest youkai in Gensokyo, possibly the oldest in existence. Since youkai tend to get stronger with age, this would mean Tewi is way more powerful than she lets on.

I think the four heavenly kings might refer to 4 oni devas in touhou (they are also named shittenno in japanese lore iirc). So far we only know 3 oni devas: Suika, Yuugi and Kasen. The 4th one is unknown yet, which is why it become a popular question.

"Humans spirited away for use as food" Zounose and his "culinary" doujinshi

Intro [0:00 - 1:54] Stage 1 [1:55 - 8:12] PC-98 Canonocity/Sanae Has a Hairband/4th Heavenly King/Chang'e/Hakurei God/Mima's Avsence/Unidentified Beast Gang/Tsukuyomi and Watatsumi/Yukari-Merry Lafcafio Hearn Connection/The Ryuujin Stage 2 [8:13 - 15:53] Comiket 62 Circle Cut/Previous Hakurei Shrine Maidens/Yuuka's True Power/Rumia True Form/Perfect Cherry Blossom 体験版Plus/Eternity Larva is Tokoyo no Kami/Sakuya-Konosakuyahime Connection Theory/Eika is Keiki's Older Sibling/Imperishable Night Phantasm Stage/Meiling is a Hong (Rainbow Dragon)/Rin Satsuki Stage 3 [15:54 - 22:01] 2004 Indian Ocean Earthquake and Tsunami Caused PoFV/Matarajin Rabbit Hole/Alice's Grimoire Holds Incredible Power/Real Shinmyoumary is Trapped in the Dream World/Iku Works for the Moon/Mahavairocana vs. Tenryuu 3000 AD/Humans Spirited Away for Use as Food/Rinnosuke is ZUN's Self-Insert/Mima's Grudge/Seihou Bad Timeline Theory Stage 4 [22:02 - 28:14] Original Grey Alien UFO Extra Boss/Seiga's Fetus-Using Magic/Lost Tenchou x Touhou Project UFOtable OVA/AliceSoft PC-98 Eroges Influenced ZUN/Heaven Conspiracy/Renko is an Expy for Yumemi/Renko will Become Yumemi/Okina Is Okuninushi/Embodiment of Scarlet Devil Trial Version 0.01 Stage 5 [28:15 - 32:42] Quon Kisaragi/Kana Anaberal is Layla's 4th Poltergeist/Izumi Takemoto References/Touhou Yumejikan/True Power of the Hakurei Yin Yang Orb is Grating Wishes/Sarai/Frontal Attack/Touhou is ZUN's Kiki Kakai x Megami Tensei Fanfiction/Lost 1996 Hatoyama Matsuri Highly Responsive to Prayers Prototype Stage 6 [32:43 - 36:44] Hourai Shoujo/1884 Gensokyo Murders and Attempted Suicide/Shanghai Genya/ORIENTAL085.JPG/Angel Record/Kikurihime is Hakurei God Extra Stage [36:45 - 38:12] Sakura is a Lunarian/Humans are Cattle Final Words [38:13 - 38:54]

I don’t know anything about Touhou, but this was a great experience Edit: I’ve played the “Fairy War” one and it’s really fun.

I'm not ready for a 40-minutes Touhou lore video. But life doesn't wait until you're ready.

okay let's talk about some things. - 4th heavenly king is a reference to the 4th oni we haven't seen yet. suika/yuugi/kasen are members of a quartet named "4 deva of the mountain" or four heavenly kings. - unidentified beast gang is a reference to a fourth beast gang that we haven't seen nor heard about yet. Note that this isn't the eagle gang with toutetsu, it's a fourth gang. It's only mentionned in yachie's profile in WBaWC - zun said a lot of conflicting statements about whether the pc98 are canon or not, best way to approach this is to simply not care. weirdly, nothing from the pc98 was either retkonned or disproved in 20 years of windows touhou, so meh. He also said that genji and yumemy are still out there chilling and living their lives, the characters are still there, they're just not important atm. - yukari/merry will probably never be explained, they're certainly linked (the wiki page you linked doesn't disprove that, it just tackles some nuthead theories that are indeed obviously faulty) but we'll probably never know how much they're linked anyway. Also please note that magical astronomy was intended to be the last renmerry album, and it ended with merry warping to the moon the same way yukari did. Their story was supposed to end there without any other explanation. - rumia's true form refers to her hairband which is apparently a seal she can't take off (something something "who knows what would happen if she took it off"). This is a joke. Zun wanted the boss stage 1 to have a super powerful ability she can't really use because it's sealed off, that's just a meta joke. - some insight you might have missed on tokoyo no kami; in the nihonshoki it's stated that the cult was destroy by kawakatsu of the hata clan. Who is.. the "real" person hata no kokoro is based on. After that he was deified blablablabla. He's now mingled with matarajin too. As a god of plays and theater. That's why they're antagonist to each others. That's a whole other rabbit hole in itself, go look into it if you want. - yumejikan is a weird prototype of touhou 3 that was an HORIZONTAL shooter. zun scrapped it. anyway great vid, never heard of the th8 phantasm stage, do you have any source on that ? the source video on bilibili is just some fanmade BS made in danmakufu. Also it gives a lot of good insight to think about concerning rainbows and dragons, we'll see how th18 turns out...

Man this background music was creeping me out

36:34 Something important to note about this theory: Shirayama-hime is a mountain goddess. We never learn the name of the mountain that the Hakurei shrine resides on. In real-world Japan, Shirayama-hime is enshrined at Hakusan (this is the same kanji as her name and means white mountain) . Another kanji for mountain is 嶺 which is read as rei.

An iceberg on Touhou? Yay, I get to learn more about Touhou! Though it feels like I know more about Touhou yet at the same time, I don't. 23:01 I gotta stop laughing on instinct every time I hear the words "content warning." Gosh I raised my expectations too high up. I didn't find that disturbing. 36:05 That image alone is gonna get Touhou banned in China lol, just wait.

One thing to add about Chang'e (嫦娥): She is the goddess of the Moon in Chinese mythology and is married to Houyi (后羿), who shot down nine suns and leaving only one. In Touhou lore (according to the wiki), he also killed Junko's son and is disliked by Hecatia due to him shooting down the suns and weakening the shadows of Hell. He was later pronounced as the emperor but later turned into a tyrannical ruler and asked Xiwangmu (西王母) for the elixir of immortality. On the 15th of August Chang'e stole the elixir from Houyi and drank it instead because she didn't want him to live forever and make the people suffer from his rule. After drinking it she drifted towards the moon and became a goddess, Houyi later found out and died from anger. People later learned of what had happened and was sympathetic to Chang'e and burned incense and lay of offerings to honor Chang'e, becoming what we now know as the Mid-Autumn Festival. *As a side note, moon rabbits are also a thing in Chinese mythology, known as 玉兔. The rabbit is said to accompany Chang'e on the moon with a pestle and mortar, constantly pounding the elixir.

here's one: What is Lily White? Even among fairies she seems to be elusive enough to be legend (fairies of light chap 8 iirc). Unlike other fairies she's not seen as a pest but as a good omen to humans

I don’t believe Okina is Ookininushi, because in SSiB, Tewi says that the other rabbits adored him and that he was very popular amongst the females. He’s also sealed in the Izumo shrine, according to Yukari.

All of these sound like future touhou installments. I mean we're getting a card game touhou for TH18. Also surprised you didn't include the after 8k tries and fails the game apparently automatically lets you move up to the next stage.

I absolutely loved this; you've compiled a really valuable resource for Touhou fans. Amazing work!!!

10:26 Most fans also believe her PC-98 appearances were closer to her true power, especially the fan theory she created the Original Master Spark.

Your pronunciation is a bit off but I can tell you put a lot of effort into researching some of these, which is really appreciated.

Touhou HRtP Last Stage is 20, there is Stage 21-24 but you have to type Escape and type "game d" on the HRtP command and press enter. And then press Start and type 20 and press Enter then type 1 and press Enter again and you can play Stage 21-24, here if you want to see the Gameplay : ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-ODpoVd4tGTA.html

I think this is my favourite iceberg ever, I think a lot of my love for it comes from Touhou's connections to Japanese culture and mythology, I've always loved mythologies they tend to be very gritty and mysterious, it's like a life I couldn't even imagine in my wildest dreams, mythology is just so surreal, we know they didn't happen but there were people who created these mythologies and added to it, all of it together just makes such a crazy and interesting story, which I guess describes Touhou as well.

Of all these icebergs being made, I guess its only a matter of time before touhou got one.

Okay, just gonna. Type these out as I think of them while listening. Chang'e: How can Eirin be Chang'e when she's Omoikane? Yuuka's True Power: Could also be referring to the fact that in the extra stage ending of Mystic Square, Yuuka was said to have gained "the ultimate magic." Look at her Seihou profile for this. Spirited away humans used as food: Of course Yukari and Remilia know each other in IaMP... Who do you think put the Scarlet Devil Mansion in Gensokyo? This is also brought up far more in Wild and Horned Hermit Chapter 14. In addition, I think it's a little misleading to say ZUN flat out said Yukari and Maribel aren't related in *any* way. He said "There was this guy called Lafcadio Hearn... Don't think too much about it." That hardly debunks the theory, does it? It's an intentionally ambiguous statement. For god's sake, Yukari is said to be a "one of a kind youkai" for having border manipulation, so having Maribel also be able to do it while ALSO being named after the same historical figure and ALSO looking just like Yukari and ALSO having Yukari sing along to a song Maribel sung in Changeability of Strange Dream and ALSO etc. etc. whatever connections you prefer... is clearly not a coincidence. It's just plain not possible ZUN is unaware of what he's writing. I'd say unquestionably there is a connection, but rather ZUN is uninterested in confirming exactly *what* the connection is, hence "don't think too much about it"- because vagueness like that is kind of the appeal of Touhou! There are tons of mysteries in the series, and not all of them have answers.

"please wait warmly" me sitting next to the AC on a rainy day: yes

Sakuya was actually based on another character from Sarai named Nudge (or Najji) and several names were also lifted from it. There is not much information on Sarai in english though. I think the Quon Kisaragi entry is referring to heavy similarities between Yukari's PCB portrait and official art on Quon Kisaragi. good vid though.

For a series so old and deep there totally deserves to be an 'iceberg video', but given how a lot of Touhou's lore is purposely vague this must have made it both harder and easier due to the ease with which things could be interpreted. Well done!

The best thing about knowing nothing of the touhou series for the most part is that I technically got a whole video of the bottom of the iceberg, fufufu. Amazing video, Im glad i was recommended this!

The enshrined God is the Buddhist 'Hidden God in all Seasons', Okina Matara. As the patron saint of the marginalized, she took pity on the Yokai fading out from lack of belief, and thus helped create Gensokyo as one of it's sages, creating a back door world for them. As a hidden god of back doors, being unknown suits her fine

15:15 Actually there's a guess of Rin's ability. The kanji in parentheses next to her name in the code is 風(wind) and 花( flower), representing her spell cards.

And at the bottom Fumos

I literally got into Touhou more seriously this year, because I just listened to the songs and played like 2 games in 2014

Honestly, I just got into the touhou franchise, and it is great to see it's thriving even after all these years. Great video man!

I personally think the reason Hakurei god is unknown to all but a select few is because it's a God of unbelief it gains more power the less people know about it. this is also why it's able to let Reimu beat all other opponents you know the old quote what is a god to a non-believer. plus paradoxical dreams are a recurring theme in Touhou so a god whose very existence is a paradox would fit right in.

I had no idea about a lot of this stuff, cool vid

Wow, this was quite a good video with nice editing, music, and backgrounds, along with well researched and informative content. I'm surprised this doesn't have more views.

Amazing video. You did a hell of a research there

When theres a 30 minute video explaining the lore of your game you know its fucking great

Sick work on this!

Another Sakuya-Sakuyahime connection is seen in FS and PoFV, where Sakuyahime is stated by Akyuu as the Goddess of Impermanence, and Yuuka says that Sakuya is an Evening Primrose, known as the Flower of Impermanence.

damn even a touhou iceberg exists

I am lucky that I was not part of the cause of PoFV haha, managed to catch a plane haha

13:40 I know this is late but i just wanna point out something. The Izayoi used in Sakuya's name and the Phantasm level title means the 16th day, aka the day after the full moon which fit with the subtitle that follow it (the full moon has passed) and since the difficulty of IN follow the theme of the moon's phrases, there's a non zero chance the connection between the Phantasm stage and Sakuya Izayoi is just a funny coincident.

Although im late. This made me revisit touhou again and im happy to be back. Thank you

This video made me love touhou more

Oh well, i didn't know this existed, kinda sent me back in the seeing some of these theories that i had forgotten about And seeing some stuff i hadn't known before was also pretty cool

is Cirno the strongest fairy in Gensokyo. the deepest iceberg

I got into Touhou pretty recently, so this is a very interesting watch!

very interesting and well researched

Oh god now I know why people fear Yukari.. Imagine yukari popping into your room and taking you... just to feed you to the vampires

This channel and video is underrated and im glad i found this cuz tho i only played touhou luna nights, i love the touhou series.

The Hourai shoujou refer to all of the girls zun draws that was posted on his websites including the jacket cover girl and the label cd girl on Dolls in Pseudo paradise. There's only few to little fans that refer this most of them are japanese (obv) but it has nothing to do with alice hourai doll

Thanks for this so much

Random theory about Quon Kisaragi: I ain't sure for this but i think Quon Kisaragi is related to Yukari due to Yukari one of her spell card "Aimless journey to abandoned station" (Summons a train by gap) And Kisaragi is one of the japanese creepypasta/myth called Kisaragi Station where the girl was lost and ended up on that station Once again im not sure on this theory so feel free to correct me or smth

Re: Hakurei god, my theory is that one of the secrets underlying the Touhou universe is that youkai and kami are one and the same, or at least races of the same species. Self-described gods like Okina and the Moriya gods might be on a different power level or a different subgroup.

37:40 The same happened with Youmu, Red in PCB and IN's Last Word, while Blue onwards

10:00 as an interesting note, ZUN once said that Letty's power during winter was strong enough to cause an incident

4 Heavenly Kings refers to the Big 4 of the Mountain- a group of 4 powerful oni that existed in Gensokyo a long time ago, inspired by a similar group from Japanese mythology, which in turn drew its inspiration for this group from the Buddhist concept. So far, we've met Shuten-Doji [Suika Ibuki], Ibaraki-Doji [Ibraraki Kasen], Hoshikuma-Doji [Yuugi Hoishiguma] and a fourth guy who hasn't appeared and IDK the original name of.

Imagine this iceberg also has phantasm stage 💀

I've decided this is the way to learn as much as i can about touhou in a short time

This music is amazing and love this vid dude

you really make a good video congratulations ^^

Lovely video

Wow thanks for this!

OHHHH So that's why Kikuri's Theme is Like Reimu's Theme because Kikuri(Kukurihime) is the Hakurei God. Now that Makes sense!

10:08 There are actually two story modes in PoFV where Yuuka is shown to have taken damage when she loses, those being the story modes for Komachi and, of all people, Medicine. Make of that what you will, I guess. 13:45 I don't know about the other teams, but in IN's Netherworld team good ending, Yuyuko calls Eirin over to help deal with Youmu's moon-induced madness, and a lot of text (in IN, in relation to Reisen and her spellcards, or otherwise) seems to imply that seeing the "true" moon makes people go insane, so the insanity isn't a Sakuya-specific thing. 20:26 In addition to this, in chapter 14 of Wild and Horned Hermit, Yukari explains to Kasen that the reason that the zashiki-warashi of the human village disappeared during the chapter was because they got "requests from the outside", which "takes priority", and tells her that "Gensokyo's getting enough food to fill the stomachs of all its youkai from somewhere," which seems to imply that the zashiki-warashi were sent out to find humans in the outside world to spirit away as food, although this reading is far from a rock-solid interpretation. 37:06 Following up on the Netherworld team thing, Youmu's eyes are red in her PCB portrait, her IN Last Word cut-in, and the Netherworld team good ending in IN, but blue everywhere else (including the rest of IN). Additionally, Sakuya's eyes are red in her EoSD portrait and some of her fighting game sprites, but blue in most other locations (including her fighting game art). Make of that what you will, I guess. 37:35 In Eirin's profile in the omake.txt, it's stated that "Eirin is very surprised to see Sakuya, but only Eirin knows the reason why." Given Eirin's importance to the Lunarians, it's possible that if Sakuya is at all related to the moon, for whatever reason she doesn't remember it. 37:55 Forbidden Scrollery goes into a lot of depth over this, but basically youkai protect the village because they live off of people's belief in them / fear of them, and as such the humans are only really there for the youkai's benefit. In a way, saying that "humans are cattle" is true in Gensokyo, but not in the utterly bleak way the phrase implies, as the youkai keep them safe from natural disasters rather than killing and eating them. I figured I'd contribute the bits of random trivia I'm aware of to this veritable stockpile of knowledge. This was a lot of really cool information, and I did learn a couple new things from it (especially regarding lost media), so thanks for making it!

I wonder if Zun's extra note on Touhou 6 actually count as a standalone knowledge of the iceberg. It's a pretty interesting read and you can find what was Zun thought on EoSD and shmups' complication in gameplay and mechanic in general (He also referenced his progression to Loop 2 of DDP DOJ and Progear)

this was uploaded right after i fell into it

Enjoyed the video

At 5:45 you discussed the Unidentified Beast Gang. Perhaps also this could relate to Houjuu Nue somehow? Firstly, she is known for her ability to make objects unidentifiable. Secondly, her name Houjuu (封獣) has the kanji for beast in it, kemono (獣). The gang part of this theory could mean that she has more than one familiar in her arsenal. It is known that Mamizou Futasuiwa was summoned by her, so perhaps she has more that are theorized? Edit: Someone below me has identified what this theory is. However, it feels like this theory is too purposefully named to simply relate to a single idea. Maybe it is a double entendre? I'd like to think so :P

Finally someone made a touhou iceberg vid..

This part made me really interested. I like to know what happened to the trail. (27:16)

I think the unidentified beast gang (just a guess) is referring to the 4th kind of spirit you can find in the game, fish spirits. Perhaps they are the ones mentioned in Yachie's omake, but I dont see many people mention the fish beasts. If you missed em, take a closer look at the spirits that give you items, they are always surrounded by 2 fish

One entry to the iceberg that I wished to see but didn't was the possible connection between the real village of Tohno and the Mayohiga we see in the Stage 2 of PCB. That, and what Chen's connection to it all is. I remember that in one of Aya's works, perhaps Bohemian Archive, we see that Chen has become sort of leader for a gang of stray and feral cats in Mayohiga, but I'm pretty sure that's the last time it's mentioned. Thus, its connection to the real Tohno in Gensokyo lore remains unknown.

touhou iceberg? holyshit

This is very helpful

Im new to touhou so this is great