February Training

[godsoffortune]

Who: Everyone
What: Information and Training
When: October 15th
Where: Meeting Hall, the Far Shore
Summary: Training and informational sessions for newly arrived gods and shinki



Gods and shinki arriving at heaven's meeting hall are, should they allow it, guided to the Meeting Hall, where a reception area and a traditionally styled dojo and training ground have been made available for the day. The gods and shinki are free to take their time during this day to learn about the details of their new life from Amaterasu's shinki or from the many veteran new god and shinki volunteers.




God Training

Newly arrived gods are escorted into a traditional reception room within the Meeting Hall for an informational meeting covering the basics of proper god behavior. A minor deity is giving the speech, and none of the white-robed shinki enter. They are encouraged to discuss the information with each other and ask questions of more experienced gods, as well as instructed to guide their new shinki appropriately.

Shinki Training

Various shinki in the white-and-gold of Amaterasu's hosuehold are stationed around the dojo, passing out helpful informational pamphlets. They will be happy to instruct the newcomers in the use of the borderline as well as offering an explanation of what is expected of a shinki and the importance of teamwork with other shinki and with gods. Shinki are encouraged to work together to practice what they've learned and discuss their perspectives.

A training game has been set up through a section of the Meeting Hall gardens, with little cut-outs of ayakashi hidden in the landscaping, tucked into bushes or taped under bridges. Prize ribbons are being offered for every ten "ayakashi" a shinki (or team) discovers.

Physical Training

The dojo is stocked with a wide variety of practice weapons, traditional and modern, to offer some practice opportunity to gods who, for example, find themselves with a sword shinki but are at risk of cutting off their own toes. It's also useful for veteran new gods wishing to train with their current partner shinki. Several magically animated straw-stuffed training dummies, many of which have been carefully mended and patched with neat black stitching, are set up on the lawn with a white-robed shinki hovering nearby to watch over them. They make good training partners, although anyone who comes too close risks being targeted for a sparring match whether they wanted one or not.

The pond behind the dojo has had dozens wooden poles sunk in it, spaced a few feet apart, with a bunch of brightly colored ribbons tied around the pole in the very center. Some of the white-robed shinki are practicing scaling the poles and leaping from one to the next, until they get close enough that they can snatch a ribbon from the center pole, and several have fallen in and are being teased by their fellows.

Rest and Refreshments

Instead of snacks being served at the training session, this week, white-robed shinki with little flags are conducting groups of newcomers and volunteers down to the Tokyo Daijingu shrine and into a street festival currently being held in Tokyo. Traditional dance troupes are performing on street corners, and vendors have every kind of fall street foods, from barbecue to takoyaki, chocolate-dipped bananas and red-bean pancakes. New arrivals will get a white-and-gold envelope with spending money for the fair, although gods and shinki who have had some time to settle in will have to handle their own lunch expenses.

In Summary:

• Get all the information you can handle
• Veteran new gods and shinki are welcome to volunteer showing the ropes
• Get in some training
• Go to a festival
• Spectate if you want
• Have fun~

Comments

[blizzardrock]

...Is that what it looks like? [Because yeah, "shinki's pasts don't matter" is something he doesn't really believe himself. But there'd been no reason not to relay it. At least until he'd seen how badly Chikusa had reacted.]

I said it because it's something that shinki should follow. But I...don't know why I can't follow that conviction. [No, he does know, but the reason is "because I'm me," and that's not exactly convincing, or even logical.]

...It might have been a mistake to say it when I don't believe it. [But there'd been a reason he'd chosen to.] ...The conversation might have headed somewhere dangerous. I wanted to head that off. You caught me...I lied.

...Does that anger you?

[kokuyoyo]

Yes.

[...Count on Chikusa to be blunt.]

[Still, he watches Fubuki wordlessly after that, listening to his explanations and reasonings to himself. It's like being a sounding board, although he never volunteered for the position. Instead, he huffs quietly.]

It's annoying... [But it takes a lo to anger him. That's energy, and emotion, and he's in low supply of both, Chikusa figures.] Anyway.... Obviously it matters. More with our memories different than those of old shinki.

[blizzardrock]

I’m...sorry I gave you that impression.

...Sorry about the borderline, too. [Considering the ferocity with which Chikusa had turned around, he must have perceived it as a threat. That...had not been one of Fubuki’s better ideas.]

[But he’s been making a lot of those, lately.]

...It wasn’t a question. [It was a conviction. The fact that he fails at it himself doesn’t make it not one.] ...Why respond now? You seemed angry at it, before.

[kokuyoyo]

...Did I?

[Another sluggishly slow blink.]

[blizzardrock]

You did.

...People don't just walk away like that if they're not. [He looks away.] ...Unless you have another reason for doing that.

[kokuyoyo]

It was just annoying.... and I don't particularly want to talk about the specifics with strangers.

[Reaching up, he nudges his glasses up closer to his face.]

I'm not like Ken...

[blizzardrock]

[...Fubuki doesn’t know who that is.]

[But there's no mistaking what that "stranger" remark means.] ...Do you always tell strangers about not being able to relate to happiness?

[kokuyoyo]

It doesn't usually come up... but I'm pretty sure it's not a secret, either.

[After all, he's already learned that others view him as outside the norm in matters like these.]

[blizzardrock]

...It’s not a secret that you’d kill, then.

[It isn’t a real secret that Fubuki wouldn’t have been able to stop Chikusa. Even if he tries to hide it, he’d exposed how weak his borderlines are to Chikusa himself. But if he weren’t...?]

...What made you decide I wasn’t a threat?

[kokuyoyo]

...I mean, the fight did happen in a public place...

[Although perhaps that means, due to the circumstances, people would have been willing to forgive it under some misconception. Chikusa doesn't really care.]

As for you... [Chikusa tilts his head to the side, surveying him.] ...You don't have.... that lack of uncertainty....

[blizzardrock]

[...He didn't know that the attempt had been seen. That changes things. Kind of. In a way he can't really make sense of right now.]

[But that by itself does explain the next thing, even if Chikusa hadn't given another explanation for that.]

[...And what an explanation it is. Between Chikusa's comment earlier on Fubuki's..."habit," and now this... Fubuki's beginning to realize that Chikusa sees more than Fubuki thought he did. ...Which might have been a ridiculous thing of Fubuki to think to begin with. He'd been afraid of him at first, after all.]

...And that's why you could be honest, huh.

[kokuyoyo]

I mean, I'm usually honest... Lying takes too much effort.

[Lying as most people think of it, anyway. Not saying anything takes no effort at all, and Chikusa usually takes refuge in that. As long as he's not inclined to say anything anyway, then it's not so unusual...]

[Well, he hasn't been called out on it yet.]

[Staring at the other, Chikusa consides him.]

...Is it bothersome?

[blizzardrock]

[Is it bothersome that Chikusa's usually honest? No...]

...I was mistaken about something.

[...He sits back down. He'd revealed how weak his borderlines were to Chikusa without even a second thought because he'd trusted him. Looking back on it, he doesn't think it was a mistake, but he also doesn't know why. Like a lot of things, it'd just...come to him. No one ever needs a reason to be friends with someone.]

...You're really going to do it? You're really going to go kill someone.

[kokuyoyo]

I have to.

[Glancing away, Chikusa curls his fingers a little tighter together. Ken had been all he'd had back when the poisoning had first taken place. Now, with his memories back of his partner, the idea of going through that again... It's even worse. It gives him an even clearer idea of how Ken must have felt as he'd died in his arms.]

[That sort of thing... He won't ever let it happen again. So he can't let Add keep surviving like this.]

The only obstacle... is making it happen in a way that gets past the defenses.

[blizzardrock]

[Fubuki brings a hand up, an unconscious action, mostly, that ends up covering his eyes. He wants to protest, but he finds that he does have an inkling of what could cause someone to "have to" kill someone. Maybe he always has. Plus Chikusa's said that there was someone he needed to protect.]

[Not to mention...it'd been hard for him to tell at first since it was so...internal, but Fubuki's become aware by now that he...changes, a little (maybe a lot), under stress. Maybe a narrow, specific kind of stress. The idea that he'd do anything, even kill, to survive isn't his own mind playing tricks on him.]

[...Even so.]

...I won't help you with that. You know that, right?

[kokuyoyo]

[Blinking slowly, Chikusa stares at Fubuki for a long quiet moment.]

....Did I ever ask you to?

[In the fragments of memories that he has, Chikusa feels certain that he's done this on his own enough times, although his only memories are with Ken. It was only the two of them, and... someone else. Yet the idea that he had to be self sufficient, the idea that he had to pull his own weight... It's heavy in those memories.]

[He wouldn't ask anyone to go with him. He's used to not being allowed it.]

[blizzardrock]

Maybe I needed the reassurance. [Maybe he's afraid of being convinced. There are times he wonders if sneaking into someplace is something he's done before. But it's pointless to speculate now.]

[And anyway, people don't bring up the problems they're having apropos of nothing—all Fubuki had asked (wanted confirmation on, to be accurate) was whether Chikusa would really go through with it, after all.]

[But of course, the most probable reason is—] Seems like it's been on your mind. ...Are you frustrated?

[kokuyoyo]

[To say it's been on his mind would be an understatement. If there's anything his encounters with Add have taught him, it's that taking him down will take a lot of thought and planning. He's gone through a couple of different thoughts, and yet still...]

[Narrowing his eyes, Chikusa's bout of sullen silence should be answer enough.]

...He's a nuisance to kill.

[blizzardrock]

[He'd hope that people are hard to kill, in a general sense. But he gets the feeling that that's not what Chikusa means.]

...What kind of defenses?

[kokuyoyo]

A lot of them...

[This is going to take a while; Chikusa sinks back down onto the grass with his fingers interlaced against his knees.]

He can go through portals in space so that he isn't hit, or trap people in them... Getting too close results in electricution... And he has shields which pop up in response to threats.

An upfront battle isn't something that can be won against him.... [At least, Chikusa knows it wouldn't be with his skills.]

[blizzardrock]

[Ah, those kinds of defenses. He considers it for a second, but...]

[He leans his chin on his arms.]

Does it feel better to talk about it? [Because he's offering. That statement was an offer.]

[kokuyoyo]

[For that offering, all he gets is a wary side eye.]

...Don't you want to stop me from killing him...

[blizzardrock]

Maybe you'll talk yourself out of it.

[...Okay, no, he doesn't actually think that.]

I won't tell him what you're planning, if that's what you're worried about. [For one thing, Chikusa hasn't told him who it is, and for another, those defenses don't correlate to anyone he recognizes.]

You won't let me try [—to stop him, that is—], so I'm doing the next best thing.

[kokuyoyo]

[Yeah, good for moving on from that 'talking out of' thing. Chikusa's dead eyed stare says it wasn't going over too well.]

...and the best next thing is...

[blizzardrock]

Letting you talk about it. It’s been on your mind, right?

[...Maybe the next “best” thing wasn’t the right way to say it.]

[His expression falls into shadow.] ...Maybe it’ll feel less alone that way.

...Does he know? ["He" being—] The person you’re protecting.