thenearshore | 018 | Season Spirits

Who: Everyone!
What: Season spirits and spooky things
When: IC August 1-15
Where: The Near Shore and Far Shore
Summary: It's the time for spirits to get a bit more 'lively'.

August is a spiritual season in Japan with many people preparing for the Obon festival but many others get into the spirit in another way. All across Japan, people have begun to share their favorite summer ghost stories. Movie theaters advertise the hottest horror flick of the season, teenagers challenge each other to do trials of courage, haunted houses begin to pop up, and it feels like you can't change the channel without switching to some ghost hunting urban legend special. All of this talk about spirits comes at a cost, though.

July comes and passes easily enough but it's almost as if as soon as August begins, so do the incidents. There's an increase in spiritual activity and shenanigans on both shores. Some of them are harmless spooks but others are much more sinister. Arm yourselves with all of the ofuda and omamori you can find and get out there and restore peace!

Possessed Possessions

Inhabitants of the Far Shore may awaken to find their sheets trying to strangle them and shoes stomping on the floor around them. Others may go about their day and find out their teapots suddenly only serve lukewarm tea or their weapons are trying to take swings at them. They're just playful spirits that will abandon their hosts if you shove any ofuda/omamori at them or yell loudly enough. They aren't malicious spirits... they were only just trying to have some fun.

Spirited Festivals

There's a festival every weekend and some of them have set up haunted houses for patrons to visit. You have your standard haunted house thrills... costume make up, jump scares, special effects smoke, the usual! But it looks like some real ghosts have made themselves at home here. Visitors are going in and emerging hours later absolutely traumatized. It looks like once you enter, the real spirits walk you around in circles and give you real scares. There are some spirits here just to have fun thrills and these are spirits that can be chased away with regular ofuda. But it looks like the more violent ones are actually ayakashi out for vengeance. Be careful in there!

Cursed Charms

There sure are some weird trends out there, huh? The latest one is buying cursed trinkets off the internet and passing them off as gifts to unsuspecting victims whether it be to prank a friend or get revenge on an enemy. Cursed mirrors, dolls, fake ofuda, VHS tapes, and so on are being passed around the Near Shore and spreading all sorts of curses.

Bad luck. As long as you're in possession of the cursed item, you'll be followed by bad luck to varying degrees depending on the quality of the charm.
Fear. Holding onto this charm results in intense, crippling fear. The fear can manifest as an intense paranoia at all times or being frozen with fear in the face of danger. Some say you can even die of fright...
Sickness. This charm is pretty straightforward. Having this charm just makes you feel incredibly under the weather and your health will worsen the longer you have the charm.
Evil. Holding onto this charm results in you being followed attracting evil instead of warding it. Suddenly, you feel as though you are always being followed, as if something is stalking you and clearly out to get you. You begin to run into smaller ayakashi at first but they keep growing in strength and number until you can't fight anymore.
Bad romance. Someone's meddled with a romance charm so it ends relationships instead of making them! People stuck with this charm are suddenly hyper aware of the faults of others. Everything gets on your nerves and you can't stand being around that person because they're just that annoying. It doesn't just work on couples! It also works on friends and relatives too.
Bears? An oddly specific curse. It looks like someone has taken a protection from bears charm and made it so now you attract bears where ever you go. Some of them are nice but others...

You can try to destroy the charms but you will find that unless you have purification powers or rend it, the effects last. It looks like most people have been able to shake off the effects by simply disposing of them at temples and buying another charm to counter the effects.

Haunting Hour

There are reports of violent attacks at night-- people being pulled into alleys and attacked, school children being chased by slashers while walking home from school, homes being broken into-- and all of it is done without a single clue left behind to explain who did it. People are warned to be careful at night and as the sun begins to set, something happens. The hour between sunset and dark is supposed to be the scariest hour them all. At this time, the shadows are suspiciously bigger and darker and you constantly see things just out of the corner of your eye. Suddenly, the wind blows cold and there's a rotten smell in the air like blood. It's Oumagatoki, the hour evil spirits meet. Small time ayakashi and spirits on the verge of becoming ayakashi spill into the streets and begin to terrorize others. Protect the people of the Near Shore and watch your own backs.*

* These are just generic ayakashi! Nothing special, nothing specific. Feel free to make up and NPC your own two-bit ayakashi.

THEN WHO WAS PHONE?

In the evening, everyone will receive a set of coordinates and a message from an Anonymous sender,

I want to talk about the
mysterious things that have been happening
lately.
OF course, i
NEED
EVERYONE to come. so don't be
late! see
yoU.
:)

Everyone receives it and there is no way to track where the message came from. If you follow the directions, you'll arrive at a small temple on the outskirts of a city. A sacred fire is lit on the grounds for people to dispose of any cursed or old charms they may have collected. Hang around a bit and it'll become obvious that no one knows who has gathered all of you here tonight. The only ones around are gods and shinki. It doesn't look like any evil spirits are around so other than being invited to the middle of no where at night... there's nothing to worry about. If you wait around, nothing will happen. So while you're here, you might as well discuss the strange happenings! Or tell ghost stories around the fire.

Wildcard

Choose your own adventure! Feel free to make up your own prompts. Ronald Knox's player (

diehardreaper) has offered up their temple as a test of courage in the Far Shore for those who want to try their luck. Check out their description under the Baron's manor.

In Summary:

Beat the heat by feeling a scary chill
Deal with cursed and spirit-imbued items
Keep the Near Shore people safe
Chat about your scary encounters
Have fun~

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ Well, that’s what getting slapped just as he’d finally been about to make his exit would do for anyone, but he quickly relents when he realizes who it is he’s been addressing all along. ]

Lady Sakura! [ He’s still frowning, but there’s none of his usual asperity in his voice as he slowly approaches her. ] My apologies. Are you all right?

( She takes a step back, eyes shut tight out of fright. When she hears his voice, she opens one eye and it's light a weight is lifted off her shoulders the moment she recognizes who it is. She could cry from relief now and she wipes at her eyes as she tries to regain her composure. )

J-Jakob...! ( She sounds grateful and she nods her head, yes. ) I-I'm fine.

( Not really but she's better now than she was 2 seconds ago. )

I'm.... I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have-- ( hit him. ) -- Forgive me.

( For the oen step she'd taken back, she takes two forward, )

I... Did I h-hurt you?

It was merely a sting. Think nothing of it. [ Waving her off—turns out good manners go a long way with him, as he decides against asking what she’s doing here or why, when she’d always struck him as being the skittish type, and with none of her own shinki around, besides. ]

( She flinches. A sting is still something and she begins to reach out to touch the spot she'd struck...
but pulls her hand back. She can heal but something like this is so minor. It would be an over-reaction, wouldn't it? )

Forgive me.

( She bows her head once and just then, one of the fog machines kicks off randomly, letting out a puff of smoke and a loud whirring noise. She yelps and jumps away from the source of the sound. )

Oh... it's just...? ( Fog? Steam? She's trying to still her rapidly beating heart now. ) W-what brings you h-here, Jakob?

( She's trying to change the topic. Trying her best. She isn't going to think about how scary this place is. )

[ If she has to hold back from spontaneously healing him, he has to keep from instinctively yanking her behind him. The machine had startled him as well, though he’s able to compose himself much more quickly. Instead, he peers at the thing as if tsukumogami might have caused the malfunction somehow. ]

I’ve had suspicions that ayakashi might be in the area. [ He continues his survey of the attraction, nothing the monstrous animatronics and the utterly tasteless cobwebs-and-tattered-shrouds décor, noting in particular the vanished exit. ]

Now, I don’t wish to alarm you, but it appears that one might be stalking us as we speak.

( An ayakashi. She looks up, obviously interested in this bit of information but not in a good way. She looks absolutely dreadful. Oh... what did she get herself into? Alone and unarmed and now she's troubling Jakob...

And even if Jakob hadn't meant to... he sure did. She stands straighter, almost at attention, and grimaces. She doesn't move,
afraid to make any sudden movement that might attract attention to them but she speaks, barely above and a whisper and voice tense, )

Is that... is that why the e-exit disappeared? ( She feels dizzy with anxiety. ) Jakob, w-we aren't... trapped here, are we?

Worry not. [ He already feels terrible, seeing her react in that way. But he has to be blunt with the truth now, if they’re to have any chance of getting the hell out of here in one piece. With the both of them alone in here they won’t be able to rend any ayakashi anytime soon, and it’s not as if his skill at borderlines is going to help him much if there is a lot of them swarming about.

Though he’s not even sure if there’s just one ayakashi menacing them or several. ]

Just stay close to me. I will dispatch anything that gets in our way.

(Stay close? She takes a step closer as if on cue. She can do that.)

I'm sorry for the trouble. (She needs to apologize now while an apology is still good enough. But she doesnt want to be merely helpless. Jakob is her friend and not someone she can just use to feel safe.) If I can help... please, let me.

[ Well…at the end of the day, it’s not as if he’s unused to looking after helpless gods. Though to be fair in Add’s case, his weird inventions usually do the fighting for him. ]

That is all right. [ He’s not really sure how she can help him, anyway, since she doesn’t look built for fighting. ]

I am a shinki. It is my duty to protect. [ His god, really, whom he was indirectly protecting by letting his conscience dictate his actions.

And, well, Sakura isn’t actually a bad person… ]

018 | Season Spirits

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