26 - The Gods' Month

[godsoffortune]

Who: Everyone!
What: Helping the Heavens prepare for the yearly Meeting of the Gods
When: October 20 - 21
Where: Around the Heavens (and maybe some mortal shopping trips, too!)
Summary: Amaterasu has been told that the newly arrived residents of the Heavens want to take a bigger part in security and administration, so she's convinced her shinki to let them help with preparations for the big yearly gala. It's also time for shinki to rate their gods and gods to find out what their shinki really think of them....







Security Precautions

The white-robed shinki guards are working hard to secure the Meeting Hall for the arrival of all the gods of Japan. Hard-working shinki are scurrying everywhere! Despite Amaterasu's orders, they're still a little unsure of and standoffish towards the strangers who they're supposed to work with, but there's a lot of work to do, so they're happy to hand out jobs to small groups of newcomers before returning to their own duties.


• Help clear out any small spirits who might have sneaked back into the Meeting Hall after the spring cleaning, from sootsprites to nekomata, animal spirits from the park or well-camouflaged plant spirits.


• Check the magical writing worked into art or inlaid in wood all over the building to protect the Meeting Hall from attack, and make sure none of it is scuffed or damaged.


• Join in on the patrols around the building or spend some time guarding one of the gates. It's boring, but the shinki appreciate the help.


• Test the integrity and extent of the magical protections with glass balls that turn purple outside the protections on the Meeting Hall and clear inside them. But don't drop your glass ball! They're fragile.

Event Preparation

It's not just security that the shinki are asking newcomers to help with. They also have plenty of work to do getting ready for the festivities! The Meeting Hall floors need to be swept and scrubbed, the gardens need to be trimmed and tidied, artwork needs to be dusted, flower arrangements arranged, damaged furniture repaired and rafters cleared of cobwebs. Anyone with particularly good handwriting can help write out invitations and name cards, too.

Besides cleaning and calligraphy, there's lots of food and beverages to purchase! Grab a shopping list, a wad of cash, and head to the Near Shore to pick up the necessities. (Don't forget to keep the receipts.)

Rate Your God

Shinki have the opportunity to submit surveys on their life with their new gods before the big event, and even request a transfer if they want one. Early in the morning, every new shinki will be visited by a small white dove carrying a scroll that, when unrolled, reveals the following questionnaire:


What is your name?

What is your god's name?

How do you see your duties as a shinki?

What is your favorite part of life with your god?

What is your least favorite part of life with your god?

What advice would you like to give your god?

Do you wish to be assigned to a different god? []Y []N


Fill it out, discuss it with your fellow shinki, forget about it until you find it under a pile of junk mail in two months: the choice is yours! Gods will receive a copy of the answer that their shinki submit to "What advice would you like to give your god?" -- there's no name attached, but they might be able to guess.

Heavenly Record Keeping

Gods don't get to skip the paperwork entirely! Although the Heavens aren't asking them to rate their shinki, new gods don't have all of their vital statistics on file quite yet, so they get a questionnaire too. The same white doves will drop their scrolls by in the morning, with the following set of questions:


What is your name?

How many shinki do you currently have?

What are your areas of divine responsibility?

How do you see your duties as a god?

What traits do you most want in a shinki?

Do you wish new shinki to be assigned to you? []Y []N


Unlike the doves attending on the shinki, the doves who drop off the gods' scrolls will remain close by and chirp loudly until they finish and submit their questionnaires. If a god is particularly lazy about it, they might even start pecking.

In Summary:

• Help protect the Meeting Hall
• Lend a hand cleaning and shopping
• Rate your gods
• Help Heaven keep its records up to date
• Have fun~

Comments

[badassfreakingoverlord]

Look, dood, no offense, but --

[Oh, hey, opportunity! The Prinny stretches its flippers out to grab onto the leg of her desk. The goat heedlessly marches on, slowly stretching the Prinny out as its pegleg grates against the machinery.]

I get the whole 'overblown reaction for the purpose of comedy' thing! I mean, look at me, my entire kind is a laughing joke! We even explode when we're thrown, dood -- what kind of life is that? One stage we were in featured us set up like a bowling alley, for crying out loud! One pitched Prinny and boom! Game over, dood! If we were any good for farming we'd lived really cursed lives, instead of just badly cursed lives -- but I digress, dood. The point is, aren't you better than this?

[And that was how Hibiki was lectured by a patchwork penguin clinging to her desk while a goat stretched it out by its pegleg.]

[priforprince]

[ This isn't just about sentence enders anymore. This situation is rapidly approaching stupid, and Hibiki doesn't know if she has the werewithal to take part in something stupid right now. She lowers her head, twitching....

Then raises it, and says, in a voice devoid of all expression: ]

So you explode if you're tossed, hm?

[ DON'T TRY HER. ]

[badassfreakingoverlord]

[APPROACHING stupid?]

Yeah, it sucks, dood! Our SOULS actually explode! If you've never had your soul explode, believe me, you're not missing out, dood.

[priforprince]

I'm familiar with the feeling.

[ Drat this. She would love to cow him into submission by heading over and picking him up, making to toss him and putting them both out of their misery -

But she can't approach him! Her sentence enter allergy forbids her from moving, of her own accord, towards the source of her anguish!

The goat abruptly changes directions it's rolling. It's just doing its own thing now, trying to figure out why it can't go places like normal. ]

[badassfreakingoverlord]

[Adding absolutely nothing to the situation, someone knocks on the door.]

[Hibiki didn't think she could kidnap a minion of the Overlord and simply get away with it, did she? Zetta one hundred percent didn't care about the Prinny, but as a matter of principle he had to get the damn thing back.]

[priforprince]

[ Hibiki pauses when she hears the knock, irritated. ] Now what....?!

[ This is called over her shoulder, loud enough for the other party to hear. She's in the middle of something, here! In the middle of gathering her courage to--

Well, perhaps an interruption is not fully unwelcome. ]

[badassfreakingoverlord]

[Crash! In barges the book!]

[This would be much more dramatic and awe-inspiring if that didn't take the form of a helpful minion using the book to smack open the door, but nonetheless!]

I've caught you, minionnapper!

[priforprince]

YOU FOLLOWED IT?!

[ Hibiki had picked up a cup of tea to fortify herself for making an attempt to pick up the Prinny.

She now has both hands free for Prinny-handling again. ]

[badassfreakingoverlord]

Hyaaaha ha ha ha! I wouldn't leave my property to rot unless I didn't want it any more, and also not in a way that would cause me to slightly lose face! I mean it's a Prinny, so it's pretty crap anyway, but that doesn't mean I'll let anyone steal it from me!

[This is not the rousing defense of his minion that anyone might have hoped for, but to be fair, Zetta has a point: it's just a Prinny.]

[priforprince]

Then, reclaim it and be gone!

[ Roused by irritation, Hibiki makes it to the Prinny. Hibiki wrests the Prinny free of the goat.

Hibiki winds her arm back, holding the Prinny. She intends to toss it right at Zetta's face (not that there's much more of him to pose as a target). ] Who'd even WANT to steal such an eyesore?!

[ Hibiki is not thinking about what she just learned. ]

[badassfreakingoverlord]

Look, you have weird priorities anyway, questioning them is just asking for a brain aneurysm.

[Zetta has either missed the point entirely or nailed it way too precisely, or possibly both at the same time. He eyes the Prinny hefted in her hands with a baleful glare.]

And you don't have the --

[The situation goes from bad to much much worse when the other two Prinnies scramble in beneath the Overlord, intent on -- involving themselves in some way! They're beloved franchise mascots, dood, they gotta be in these scenes!]

[priforprince]

I'LL RETURN YOUR PROPERTY NOW!

[ Hibiki

throws

the Prinny.

Right at Zetta, and the other Prinnies.

Polteageist, invisible, in a corner, is having the best day. It didn't even have to do anything. ]

[badassfreakingoverlord]

[The Prinny didn't mention a key portion of Prinny existence: when one explodes, it detonates any other Prinnies the explosion catches.]

[So the first explosion that erupts in her entranceway sets off a much larger one as the two other Prinnies go out in a bang as well. Audible beneath the bone-rocking force of the blast is a faint, strained cry of bookly anguish.]

[priforprince]

[ Hibiki doesn't even get a chance to make a funny noise. There is only explosion.

And perhaps an illusion of the word "BOOM!" written in big rainbow lettering by accident, shocked out of her unconscious mind. Again? For her to suffer this inconvenience again----

How destructive are such explosions, typically? ]

[badassfreakingoverlord]

[Well! On the upsides, Prinny explosions work on ridiculous Netherworld attack animation logic, in which you can blow them up all day and never leave so much as a scuff on the surrounding terrain (unless it's funny). On the downside, PEOPLE suck it! Kaboom!]

[By the time the smoke and dust settle, nothing is left of Zetta and his minions but the Sacred Tome, face-down on the floor, motionless.]

[priforprince]

[ And Hibiki is in a similar position, and similar state, across from him. She has limbs to splay comedically where he doesn't, however, so she'll take care of that aspect of this gag for both of them. Be grateful for her magnanimity.

Whether this is preferable to the sentence enders or not....remains unclear. Because this situation requires a comedic beat or two before continuing. Not that Hibiki has the presence of mind to think of that herself, but so attuned is she to genre that she obliges!

Or maybe everything hurts. ]

[badassfreakingoverlord]

[What the -- hey! How can she possibly think that splaying limbs is funnier than a book with a face being face-down on the ground! There's far more supreme indignity in being an inanimate object!]

[After that highly-appropriate comedic beat, the book lets out a low groan that the floor beneath it muffles.]

...Prinnies explode... when thrown...

[priforprince]

....Get out of my temple.

[ This floor is Hibiki's best friend. Granted, Hibiki only has like, three friends, and two of them are in PriPara and the third was murdered by a crazed shinki a while back. BUT THIS FLOOR. ]

[badassfreakingoverlord]

Funny thing about that...

[The funny thing is that Zetta is a book and has no motive power.]

[priforprince]

TELEPORT!

[ There is no sympathy here.

Also, ouch. She shouldn't have tried to yell. ]

[badassfreakingoverlord]

I can't do that!

[No sympathy here. The book begins to flop, mildly at first, and then more aggressively, as it attempts to right itself.]

[priforprince]

Ngghh...

[ Ugh. She is going to have to get up if she wants Zetta out of the temple, isn't she. Hibiki attempts to pick herself up.

It only works on the third try, and even then, she has to pause with just her torso lifted for a breath. ] Truly a defective god.

[badassfreakingoverlord]

Yeah, but you can always try to get better.

[Zetta's not deliberately twisting her works, he legitimately can't imagine anyone describing him that way.]

[Which makes his next flop all the more ironic, as he heaves himself in such a way that the Sacred Tome comes to a rest on its topmost edge, leaving him looking upside-down at her.]

Huh. This seems unlikely.

[priforprince]

[ Hibiki's forehead twinged anew at Zetta's twisting of her words, there. But at least she's standing, now. This is progress.

Taking full advantage of her sparklehuman upper body strength, she scoops the book up with one hand without bothering to turn Zetta right-side up. Then she stalks towards the door.

Today, it seems, she must personally dispose of the trash. ]

[badassfreakingoverlord]

Oh, here we go! This is progress! Now, just set me upright in midair and then I can teleport.

[You see, he couldn't teleport because it would have been supremely undignified. Not because he didn't have the ability. From a STRICT interpretation he could have left at any time, but of course Hibiki understands how important appearances are and surely will be sympathetic to his reasoning.]