007 | Clean Up Your Act

[godsoffortune]

Who: Everyone!
What: Spring cleaning
When: All day April 15
Where: All around the Heavens
Summary: The Heavens don't like things being cluttered, so it's time to clean up a little bit.







Main Hall

While the main hall of the Heavens seems spotlessly clean at all times, that's not the case at all. In fact, it's been at least a decade since the last time they actually cleaned everything out properly. There are a lot of hidden closets and back rooms that have layers of dust and dozens of boxes filled with nothing but junk. Who knows, though! You might find something interesting and useful in there along with all the garbage.

Suprises

Unfortunately, some of the older temples on the Far Shore seem to have some interesting surprises tucked away, ranging from cursed artifacts all the way to magical creatures locked up in long-forgotten rooms. You are free to be creative with this as a way to get your characters into trouble while cleaning.

Complimentary Dinner

After all of your hard work, you deserve to have some tasty food and refreshing beverages. So the Heavens have provided that for you, so that you can wind down after a long day. It's not as fancy as the banquets they often put on, but there is a nice array of food and drinks for everyone to enjoy.

Counselling

As usual, there is a white-robed shinki bearing the gold chrysanthemum of Amaterasu sitting at a table in the Main Hall. There is a small sign that denotes her as the counselling shinki. Anyone is welcome to approach her, and she will smile serenely at anyone passing by as well.



In Summary:

• Clean up your home
• Help clean others' homes
• Get the main hall clean too!
• Hope no hidden magic jumps out
• Seek counselling if you need it
• Enjoy your complimentary dinner
• Have fun~

Comments

[blossomstorm]

Main Hall

[ You are probably a diligent person who just wanted to pass through this corridor and do some actual cleaning work. But for some reason, there are a lot of books on the floor, and also boxes, and random items that seem to be useless... They seem to be taking up a lot of space. And if you look beyond the mess, you'll see a man in a white (white-ish) labcoat digging out even more garbage from wherever, sleeves rolled up. ]

Oh, it's the twenty-seventh tome. Now where did I leave the other twenty-six...?

[ He will have to look for them later, though, because he just saw the fifty-eighth tome of another very important encyclopedia. You'll have to excuse him. Leaving the last book he found on a new pile on the floor, he focuses on the next one... and this pattern will repeat itself until there's virtually no room for anyone to pass through. If you get here early, please stop him. If you're here too late, I hope you like obstacle courses. ]

Surprises

[ The good thing about older, obscure temples is that there is no one around. Specifically, that there are no bureaucrats around to tell people not to smoke indoors. So that's what Tenpou is doing while he keeps casual watch over an old box labeled "Pandora's."

He's already decided he's taking it back to Athena's temple with him, for the record. Gods can do no wrong, right? ]

Main Hall

[lilys_poise]

[Elise takes in the piles of books stacked up everywhere and comes to the only logical conclusion.]

Are you building a book castle?

[Because that sounds awesome. Like a pillow fort but even better.]

Can I help?

[blossomstorm]

[ Elise is not wrong! Tenpou turns around and looks at her.  ]

Hello! I was trying to make thematic piles of books, but it looks like these books are enough to build a castle... Would you like to help with that?

[ Let's make a book castle. With thematic piles of books. This is perfectly logical to him too. ]

[lilys_poise]

I'd love to!

[Finally something fun to do! And the idea of themes for the different piles adds a new twist on the game.]

This is gonna be so fun! What should we start with? The outside walls? What theme should they have?

[Maybe whatever pile is biggest...]

[blossomstorm]

[ He stops to consider this seriously, hand under his chin. ]

Hmm. If it's the outside walls, how about hardcover books? They seem like they could take the most damage under attack.

[ There certainly are enough encyclopedias to block the whole corridor. ]

[freestyle_chrysalis]

[.... Marvelous.... Simply marvelous. Is this guy a fan of Escher or something? Either way, Tenpou- here is your new shinki simply gawking at you as you do your thing. Feel free to get him to help you along, that's the purpose of shinki's right? To help their god's along?]

[blossomstorm]

[ Rei, you think that as if Tenpou wasn't the very considerate person that he is. ]

Rei, feel free to take a seat if you don't want to work yet. You're new here, after all.

[ Having said that (as if Tenpou himself were working), he gestures at a very specific pile of books. IIIIIIIf you look at it with that sort of mindset, it looks sturdy enough to work as a seat... ]

[freestyle_chrysalis]

[Startled at the fact that Tenpou already knows his name, Rei in all his glory spazzed before bowing politely.]

Forgive me!

[Aaaaand no- there's no way that he could see that stack of books as anything other then just a stack of books. And none of them actually deal with furniture. Gosh, if you are to make a chair out of books at least have the books deal with furniture in some matter! Amateur.]

[blossomstorm]

[ See, this is why he needs your guidance as his exemplar. And of course he would know Rei's name, Tenpou's bad memory may be legendary but Rei's vessel form is something to remember, nonetheless. ]

Don't worry about it... Ah, actually. Have you seen the first volume of "The Swim Coaching Bible?" I had it a little while ago but I don't remember where I left it.

[iyashinokaze]

[Goodness. Fuu can't help but stare for a long moment.]

Not that I don't appreciate a good library, but this seems to be defeating the purpose of things, doesn't it?

[blossomstorm]

Well, it's impossible to sort out things without knowing what you have in the first place.

[ Manga volume number thirty-eight of Shoujo Manga Classics (reedited) earns itself a new pile in real time as he speaks. ]

[iyashinokaze]

True, but... It's taking up quite a bit of room. I don't think anyone can get by.

[blossomstorm]

. . . That's true. Can you help me bring that over here?

[ If she pushes those boxes to the left and he pulls some of those books closer as well, there will be a (very small) space for people to squeeze through without having to jump over any book piles. Those boxes have nothing in them, by the way. ]

Main Hall

[reformedsinner]

[These towers are starting to get dangerously tall, by which, at this point, Hakkai means well above the height of his own head. Who's doing this to a perfectly good corridor? This isn't cleaning, it's making the mess worse!

He picks his way very carefully over a few of the shorter piles, dodges some of the taller ones, and then, just as a white-coated figure comes into view.... one of the towers of boxes sways violently behind him. Hakkai whirls around.]

Oh no--

[Oh yes. There it goes, and it's taking out several book piles as it topples sideways in a sudden avalanche. When the dust clears, the hallway behind them is utterly impassable.]

[blossomstorm]

[ When the dust clears, Tenpou puts the handkerchief that is conveniently covering his mouth back in his pocket (he was so prepared for this to happen). And then takes a look around, surveying the mess. And noticing Hakkai, of course. ]

. . . Well, this is a problem.

[ The tone of his voice doesn't sound troubled, though. He might as well be saying "Hello, Hakkai." ]

[reformedsinner]

Ha ha, I should've brought a shovel!

[Hakkai crosses his arms, considering the pile. He, unfortunately, hadn't had a handkerchief on hand. He clears his throat (he can still taste book-dust) and gives Tenpou a dubious look.]

I assume they were being organized?

[He wasn't just... stacking books in the hallway at random. Was he?

How different are they? Not that Hakkai doesn't appreciate a good book, but every order-loving bit of his heart revolts at the idea.]

Surprises

[spes_phthisica]

[At first, Souji isn't quite sure why the smell of the smoke draws him there almost immediately. Then he thinks oh, that's right, his new God smokes too. That must be it. It's a smell that's immediately tinged with strange nostalgia, even if cigarette smoke kind of does smell a bit off in comparison to the sweetness of pipe smoke.

Either way, Souji has shuffled up to follow this god's gaze to the object in front of him, his brow wrinkling in puzzlement.]

What's in there? [Already reaching out to give the box a poke...]

Re: Surprises

[blossomstorm]

[ Tenpou isn't stopping him. In fact, he seems to find his curiosity fun. ]

There's probably nothing interesting in there, other than a bad excuse for a mythology joke... I hope.

[spes_phthisica]

Huh? What kind of mythology?

[He can't really say he recognizes anything about it - but then again, he has already noticed that here are plenty of different cultures and mythologies woven together in this place.

In the meanwhile, he's going to turn the box over to try to see if he can get some kind of clue from that.]

[existentialcrisis]

[ There's a little flutter of wings, at some point. A crow hops past a doorway, or maybe a window.

About half a minute later a human silhouette appears in the front entrance. He's holding a broom in one hand like a walking stick; his clothes are smudged with dust—khakis, a black shirt. He cocks his head like he's not sure what he's looking at. ]

Hi.

I thought this one might be empty. It's not yours, is it?

[ He comes closer, scuffing his sandals on the floor. ]

[blossomstorm]

[ His head turns slightly when he hears the crow, but that's it. And when he sees him, he replies easily enough as he flicks ash out the window. ]

This place? No, it's not. If you want to clean it, go ahead.

[ He's clearly not making any sort of effort towards that... ]

[existentialcrisis]

[ Cleaning is definitely what he's here for, yes!! ]

Well— [ He digs in his pocket and pulls out a pack of cigarettes, busying himself with that for a second— ] really, I like to see what all these old temples have lying around. [ So saying, he peers over the top of a couple of empty shelves—and then at the box. ]

Anything interesting?

Main Hall!

[gentilitea]

[ And to think the temple in question had looked so impressive from the outside. Well—it’s unusual architecture, to be sure, but it seems appropriate for the god Tenpou’s eminent perso— ]

Good lord. [ How long has this mess been piling up? Jakob gazes upon what appears to have been a horrifying avalanche of books and wonders if Tenpou might have been in an accident.

He knew he should have arranged for an earlier appointment, but now…!

He begins frantically digging through the books, searching for the source of that feeble voice. ]

Master Tenpou! Are you there?! Worry not, I will rescue you posthaste—

[blossomstorm]

[ It is important to note that the main hall of Athena's temple is usually very clean (although that is, most certainly, not thanks to Tenpou). In general, he keeps his mess within the rooms (because he hasn't resided in Athena's temple for long enough).

But today has been a special day, and the books he borrowed from the Heavens' Main Hall (borrowed) and objects he took from some of the abandoned (abandoned) temples don't have a place in his temple yet. And so, he is trying to organize them.

So yes, this means that this mess was made in less than a day. ]

Oh, you made it... Jakob, was it? [ But where does this voice come from?

The answer is under a huge pile of books and random objects, where Tenpou's head is buried inside a box because he was looking for something. This explains the muffled voice. Of course, nothing could possibly explain what he's doing there, but some things are not meant to be explained. ]

[gentilitea]

[ This is either the (non-)work of negligent shinki or, more probably, a horrible accident had occurred prior to his arrival. Perhaps an ayakashi has…no. It can’t be— ]

Yes. [ He might sound just a bit exasperated as he shuffles his way past some piles of outdated encyclopedias. ]

Are you injured, sir? Please refrain from moving until I am at your side! [ It doesn’t take long for him to track down the source of that voice anyway, alarmingly muffled as it is. Jakob is quite nimble—mostly owing to the fact that he’s had to balance heavy trays of refreshments for his previous master at official and unofficial functions alike.

When he finally peers behind that veritable mountain of books and nonessentials, he looks upon the figure bent over the box with a mix of concern and—yes—exasperation. ]