jimreynold2nd said: I believe ZUN said somewhere that Kaguya cannot enter Hakugyukurou because she can't die. But nothing can stop fandom, right?
According to one of the PCB Ghost Team ends, Eirin not only consumed the Hourai Elixir herself, but made a house call to Hakugyokurou. So visitation is not impossible; I think he meant becoming a "resident" through whatever (fatal) means you come to live in the mansion. And the part with counting as dead while you're there seems to be treated like a status effect: has no impact on anything related to the individual. It's biggest effect is the negation of Yuyuko's ability, but I think that's fanon wank?
JakeBob said: I thought it was unconfirmed that Eirin consumed the Hourai elixir.
That's true. Since the Inaba 4Koams are, sadly, supposed to be canon, (debateable, yes, but that's how it really is) they present evidence that Eirin is NOT immortal. After all, she caught a cold, and immortals can't do that.
Mountain_Dew said: That's true. Since the Inaba 4Koams are, sadly, supposed to be canon, (debateable, yes, but that's how it really is) they present evidence that Eirin is NOT immortal. After all, she caught a cold, and immortals can't do that.
The Inaba 4koma's are indeed canon... ZUN wrote/helped write them, after all.
Mountain_Dew said: That's true. Since the Inaba 4Koams are, sadly, supposed to be canon, (debateable, yes, but that's how it really is) they present evidence that Eirin is NOT immortal. After all, she caught a cold, and immortals can't do that.
Maybe she's a different kind of immortal. She may not regenerate continuously, like a Hourai victim, only when her body triggers the process, such as in case of an injury, when her abnormal genetics kick in, and boost her regenerative processes high enough to keep her alive through the ordeal of repair, making her immortal, or at least very hard to kill. Therefore, she may be unkillable, or may not die from old age, but she can still catch a cold, being biologically very similar to humans.
jimreynold2nd said: I believe ZUN said somewhere that Kaguya cannot enter Hakugyukurou because she can't die. But nothing can stop fandom, right?
Actually, I talked to someone about this, and apparantly, in PMiS or something, Yukari states that Mokou and Kaguya's state of being is neither alive nor dead... not being truly alive, they cannot die, but they are not alive. They're simply trapped in an eternal sort of limbo between life and death... after all, if you can't die, you're not truly alive.
You know Lunarians are pretty immortal in terms of life spans by default, all that Kaguya got for drinking it was an inability to die period. It's said in CiLR that drinking the Hourai Elixir renders a person impure
JakeBob said: I thought it was unconfirmed that Eirin consumed the Hourai elixir.
Mountain_Dew said: That's true. Since the Inaba 4Koams are, sadly, supposed to be canon, (debateable, yes, but that's how it really is) they present evidence that Eirin is NOT immortal. After all, she caught a cold, and immortals can't do that.
Some quotes from Eirin - Th08 ending04 (good end, ghost team): 私はありとあらゆる薬の知識も持っている。 その代わり毒も薬も私には効かないわ。 私に毒殺を狙っても無駄よ。 I know the ins and outs of medicine. In exchange, poisons and drugs won't work on me. Trying to poison me is futile.Implying she can die by other means?
まだ、死にたくは無いわ。 それに私は、姫の能力で作られた薬を服用している。 I still don't want to die. Besides, I have taken the medicine which I made through the Princess's power.
Confirmation she took the elixer
These 2 facts contradict eachother, unless... she took the elixer only 1 time, making her unable to age but not fully immortal. Or it's just a story inconsistency.
Well, another possibility. Saw this on a Touhou wiki, and though it made sense:
Mokou says (in CiLR, I think) that it takes three tastes of the Hourai elixir for the full effect. The first makes you ageless. The second makes you immune to disease. The third makes you fully immortal.
Made me start thinking:
Well, Eirin may have been a genius at medicine, BUT, she knows only a fool trusts a new concoction without testing it. Since she'd never made the Hourai Elixir before, she couldn't know if it was safe, or if she'd somehow made a mistake. A potentially deadly mistake. So, rather than accidentally kill her princess, she needed to test it out for safety.
Problem was, who to trust? The only person Eirin could trust to test the Elixir was herself. So she took the first taste. And gained Agelessness. Which no one on the moon would ever notice...since no one ages on the moon in the first place. Thus, no one ever suspected her of drinking it. Satisfied that it was safe, she gave it to Kaguya, who took all three tastes.
Or, maybe Eirin didn't test it on the moon, and only drank some after settling on Earth. She wanted to live on and serve Kaguya, but couldn't since she wasn't immortal on Earth. So, she took the Elixir.
However, being as wise as she is, she knew the kind of living hell true immortality could be, and rejected it. So, she only drank the Agelessness taste. That way, when she finally got sick of living, she could still die.
Again, just random thoughts. Who knows, really? Wouldn't be the first unexplained contradiction in the Touhou-verse.
FJH said: It's biggest effect is the negation of Yuyuko's ability, but I think that's fanon wank?
The dialogue in IN extra, if you're playing with Team Ghost, indicates that Yuyuko can't use her powers over death on Mokou. She lacked 'death spots' or something or another, kinda like the 'lines' of the Mystic Eyes of Death Perception from Tsukihime.
'Is Eirin Immortal Y/N' discussion
How about a compromise: Eirin did take the Hourai Elixir, but she only took two tastes. This renders Eirin incapable of dying from age and illness, but still capable of dying from most unnatural causes. Thus, Eirin would be immune to poisons and be able say that she took the 'elixir made with the princess's power', but it would still allow Eirin to enter the Netherworld. I'm saying two tastes of Hourai Elixir since having her take only one taste is pointless, as Lunarians are inherently incapable of dying from old age.
1) Reimu, Marisa and/or Sakuya can enter and leave Hakugyokurou alive.
2) Eirin knows that the elixir carries impurity (impurity itself being what makes living beings age on Earth, impurity that the moon doesn't have, thus people living there don't age) and is used to test people. The mistake she would have mentioned to make wasn't about its production, but about not expecting Kaguya to use it on herself shortly after Eirin made it by her request and curiosity.
3) Yuyuko seemed knowledgeable enough in IN's FinalA good ending, about Eirin's knowledge, so that Yuyuko knew that Eirin would refuse the "tea", and that Youmu would want the "tea" if she saw it. Yuyuko tells the latter that "the tea is too classy for her (Youmu) to drink."
4) Kaguya almost strangles Eirin in the Inaba comics, as she tries to heal Eirin from the cold, to the point that Eirin says that she glimpsed the "other side"
It can't be helped... Keine, come with me.So it's not at Yukari's place, but here..Temporary Security GuardSo in the end, she didn't come back.I, Reisen Udongein Inaba, won't let you pass he-...Episode 817: Death WarningFrom the Artist's Pixiv page.That fool.To where?Hakugyokurou.We're going to talk about the next performance's "play"....it's actually intruders!!Wait, what?! Princess?!I'm getting worried somehow...I rather thought the spirits were raising a fuss...I'm so dead!What's th-...Oh no, I'm dead!