I was kind of hoping for the swordfight as well, although from a different angle. I expected Reimu to back down after recognizing that Gryphon isn't plotting anything more complicated than saving the world.(1) I like a good Defeat Means Friendship, but it seems to me that this version of Reimu would necessarily be willing to admit being wrong, if only because it saves time.

It doesn't fit the flow of the rest of the story, so I'll take the fight as given, but I think it would have been more fun with the fight than without.

Peter Eng
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(1)At this point, Gryphon probably sees saving the world as, "Complicated, but I've done it before, so not as complicated as it was the first fifty years."