27 - The Gods' Meeting

[godsoffortune]

Who: Everyone!
What: The Meeting of the Gods is here at last.
When: October 30
Where: Heaven's Meeting Hall
Summary:







Pre-Meeting

Guards at the front door are carefully checking each god who enters off on their list of attendees, and taking the names of each of their shinki attendants.

Once the participants are past the doors, they are guided down the hallway to a huge meeting room by one of the guards, who will announce them by divine title, and each of their shinki by whatever name they gave. It's an open question as to who's actually listening, though, because the room is swiftly filling up with gods and shinki. As well as the newcomers, old gods are here, some in human form attended by their uniformed shinki, others in stranger shapes -- giant bears, round-bellied tanuki, turtles, dragons, and more. There's even one tricolored tabby cat in a small blue cap, seated majestically in the arms of a uniformed shinki and chatting with another god.

Buffet tables bearing every kind of food and drink imaginable are set up at one end of the room, and a dais with a podium is at the other, draped in bright gold and white bunting and emblazoned with a chrysanthemum emblem.

Early Announcements

Finally, the socialization comes to an end, and the meeting itself begins as Ookuninushi grabs the microphone and steps up to the podium. The year's most popular gods are named first: Hotei, one of the Seven Gods of Fortune, is in third place, Tenjin in second and Ebisu in first place. Each steps up to bow and accept their accolades in turn: Hotei is a big man with a wide smile, Tenjin a tall, ascetic man wearing old robes and concealing his smug expression behind a fan, and a tired-looking younger man in a business suit announces himself as representing Ebisu, who is watching over the Near Shore during the event.

Next, the most popular new god is announced: Ookuninushi has to stop and wrinkle his nose at the name for several seconds before he pronounces it-- Nekhbet, a new arrival in the Heavens.

He moves on to call for a moment of silence recognizing the difficulties of the last year. Many gods have faced reincarnation and returned wearing unfamiliar faces! The Heavens can't yet explain the cause of these changes, but Amaterasu herself urges them to welcome their friends' new incarnations as brothers and sisters in the Heavens.

His final announcement is that, after the successful resolution of the trouble associated with some recent deaths, Orihime has been restored to her place among the eight million gods.

Fortune Weaving

Announcements finished, the main activity of the evening begins. The white-robed shinki bring in huge baskets filled with wooden prayer plaques, setting them down all around the room, and the gods begin to form into circles around each basket. The older gods will gladly explain to any confused newcomers that they're weaving fortunate connections between mortal lives as they spread the plaques out and tie strings off together with great care. All the plaques have names written on them; some are filled out with prayers, some just with notes, and others adorned with pictures of flowers, animals or favorite characters.

Gods and shinki are given blank plaques to inscribe with their own names, too, in order to give them the chance to make fortunate connections as well. (Not necessarily romantic, the other gods will assure them! There are many different kinds of fated connection.)

Help out, take the opportunity to chat, and make some fortunate matches for yourself as well as these hard-working petitioners.

Midnight Disaster

Just shy of midnight, while the gods are still matching up plaques, finishing the last of the banquet, and getting into drunken arguments over who to connect to whom, a shinki in a dark suit torn at the shoulder comes dashing into the Meeting Hall.

"Calamity!" he cries-- and tells the assembled Heavens that a mysterious blight has fallen across a sleepy residential community in the Tokyo suburbs. The blight, a huge circle covering about two blocks, is sucking the life out of everything inside it: plants are wilting, and people and animals have fallen into deathly slumber. As if that weren't bad enough, it's also attracting big, dangerous ayakashi. Ebisu and his shinki are there now, but there aren't enough of them to fight the ayakashi and move the people trapped inside the blighted circle to a safer place before they die.

Volunteers will need to fight ayakashi and rescue the mortals trapped in the blight -- once they're outside its edge, they'll begin to wake up and recover on their own.

In Summary:

• Enjoy the banquet before the announcements
• Hear about the most popular gods
• Help make fortunate connections for the living
• Respond to a disaster
• Have fun~

Comments

[unlucky7]

[With a size meant for hauling around a god--though Caster is also on the lankier side of things--Shun doesn't give Ginia any trouble. She takes off at a fast sprint, mindful of her left shoulder as she runs and adjusts her gait to compensate. With a good headstart, Ginia easily leaves the ayakashi behind, constantly checking her path for other ayakashi in the area, any people left in the blighted zone, or Caster.

She slows as she spots an office building with a roof that would make a good vantage point. Ginia tosses her head up at the building and huffs to get Shun's attention. Mind teleporting them up?]

[futhark]

[ They work separately for a while, always someone somewhere to pick up- or an ayakashi to chase off should they appear. But Caster keeps an eye for the golden flashes, and at some point, he uses that to find her ]

Hey- [ a simple greeting, but without usual cheer ] There are some people in a building few streets from here, but I'm unable to locate them.

[ The longer this lasts, the more it drains the people inside the area, and that makes them harder and harder to find. He can tell there are few in the building, but searching them room by room, floor by floor would take a lot of time. Time, they don't have. ]

[futhark]

[ Killing or just making the ayakashi move out of there would help everyone who now must navigate around it. Good idea, sharp thinking, Caster gives a nod as he does indeed "hop on" the back of the incredible snow leopard ]

Then let's chase it off from that spot, shall we?

[ Now he's curious how those arrows with holy water would work with if also frozen. ]

Give me some of that ice, I've got an idea.

[ A frozen water arrow won't just splash the water on the ayakashi. It could pierce its hide, and do much more painful damage this way ]

[unlucky7]

Sorry! Sorry!

[The sign comes slower as Ginia's smile turns grateful, relieved. There are still so few around that know sign language it's hard not getting excited.

She looks over at the new plaques, grabbing a handful of her's as well to share, laying them out above. Oh, a name that matches a prayer, one wishing good fortune upon the recipient. Ginia carefully binds the two together, tying a bow in the string. She looks at the bound plaques and over to the other woman, waving her hand to get her attention.]

This is strange, isn't it. [She gestures at the fortunes being woven together.] Tying fates together.

[lionhearrt]

[ He grabs one of the bodies and sets it down and then another until, between the two of them, they're all laid out. ]

Stay.

[ He tells as he crouches in front of the smallest one and covers the body in fire. Little by little the pain smoothes out into something calm, their expression peaceful as they purifying flame eradicates the dark. ]

[lionhearrt]

[ He lets her push his arm down but the flames keep on burning tarnishing the polished finished - he's determined to turn it to ash. ]

[junkyarddog]

[A scruffy blond teenager is watching Judar. There's a touch of wariness to him, as though he expects Judar to cause some mischief, but he doesn't seem as though he intends to stop him, either. He's just sort of observing from the sidelines.]

You're gonna get in trouble, byon.

[junkyarddog]

Everybody likes pets, byon. [Ken says this with confidence as he wanders over to Ayumu's side.] Even Hibari liked pets, and Hibari didn't like anything.

Pre-Meeting

[junkyarddog]

Hey.

[Ken has stopped near Fushimi, eyeing him with something somewhere between dislike and reluctant concern.]

I didn't know what happened to you after Roy-sama disappeared, byon. [Maybe, belatedly, he's wondering how Fushimi is doing, and if he's been okay since their former god left.]

[monkeyblue]

Hm?

[Fushimi looks up, realizes who it is, and looks back down at his phone.]

Tch. I'm Izumo's shinki now, with Misaki and Judar. [. . .] Where did you and Chikusa end up?

[You know. So he can avoid you two, though honestly mostly Chikusa. Ken was annoying and Fushimi doesn't like him, but he was leagues more tolerable than Chikusa.]

A

[junkyarddog]

What're you waiting for, byon? [Ken knows Chikusa more than well enough to give his partner a look of surprise; for all his laziness, Chikusa's pretty proactive about gorging himself on food, especially if it's free. Not as proactive as Ken, perhaps, but hardly anyone could be.

Well, Ken's not going to hold off even if Chikusa does. He's reaching straight for the food.]

C

[junkyarddog]

Nanako-sama! [Ken catches up to her before she's gotten far, already in Cheetah Channel; when the danger had been announced, Ken had immediately gone to seek her out. He doesn't know where Hakkai and Chikusa are at this exact moment, but he's a lot more confident of Hakkai's ability to look after himself than he is Nanako's, especially if Chikusa might be with him. And, as a stronger fighter who's gotten semi-decent with borderlines by now, he should probably prioritize helping out the younger and less experienced - and, he assumes, less combat-oriented - of his two gods.]

I'll protect you, byon!

Fortune Weaving

[junkyarddog]

[Ken is squinting at Hibiki's activities. He's been watching her for the past thirty seconds or so, trying to put together what she's doing, but finally he sees fit to speak.]

...are you playing with dolls?

[sweetspringwater]

[A deeper frown right back at her-- what does she mean, she's handled worse on her own. Geez.]

You're right. There's lots of other gods and shinki around to take care of things.

So no one will mind while we duck out for a minute to get that treated.

[He turns slightly in a 'follow me' kind of gesture. But if she insists on sticking around, he's not above carrying her out of here.]

[sweetspringwater]

It has been a while. [With a smile in her voice, she elegantly seats herself beside Hakkai and takes a closer look at his sorting.]

I see. Well done. This does make the more straight-forward matches simple.

[Taking up two plaques she smoothly ties a knot to bind them.]

You have no interest in tying a bond yourself, though?

[sweetspringwater]

"Indeed. This is one of the most enjoyable times for us, after all."

Turning to face him she adds, "And it seems that you enjoyed the announcements in particular, as well."

[sweetspringwater]

[The reputation of this one precedes her, but as they have not yet met in person Suijin watches carefully...

And blinks in surprise at her words. Was that... perhaps it was a poem?
But more than her flamboyant words, the dolls catch her attention.]

A pleasure to make your acquaintance in person, Apollo.
I will admit, this is a method I have not seen before. Did you create these dolls?

[sweetspringwater]

[Suijin listens and tilts her head thoughtfully. She begins to see, now.]

I hear what you have expressed, Trunks. You are not wrong- there has been unrest. As is natural with such an event as you newcomers arriving.

Perhaps most pertinent to your concerns, the 'new' gods do not share our culture nor our disdain of nora. I would hope as well that such fear would be ultimately unfounded, but I do not fault your caution. Particularly as you have your god's well-being in mind.

Among the 'old' gods, however, you should properly introduce yourself fully.

[sweetspringwater]

[He's right- she suspected that's not what he meant. But it is also not wrong to give consideration to the more positive side of events. He is missing half the picture. Sensing that he means to let the subject drop though, she leaves it at that for now.]

It is a reasonable train of thought. [So, as the pieces seem to point towards suspecting a traitor among the 'old' gods, it immediately becomes 'us versus them', because they do not know who to trust. How unfortunate. She shakes her head slightly.]

If the motive is to cause unrest in Heaven, there would be any number of other ways to go about it than this, though. It would seem that, just as much as the culprit, the 'why' of it continues to elude us.

[risingdarkness]

You really think the old gods here are going to sit around if someone steps out of line? You probably couldn't even take one of them out one-on-one.

[He'd really like to see someone try, though. Unfortunately, it's hard to find a god with enough spine to actually give it a try. He knows full well it's impossible for a shinki like him.]

[ittenbari]

With tanuki it's kinda, you know, their trademark and stuff so you kinda can't help but notice. I'd wear pants. I really think I'd wear pants.

[He nods to himself like he's agreeing with his own conclusion on the matter.]

I mean, clothes make the man, right? If you don't dress right, you feel really out of place.

[revolutionfalcon]

[Shun has to wonder how a cat is supposed to effectively communicate with their followers, but he's lingered long enough to get noticed, apparently, which is rare at these things. None of the other old gods who aren't normally present have given him a second glance, so even if it's a cat...well, he's been stuck having conversations with animals a few times recently, so one more isn't any great hit to his dignity at this point.

He comes a bit closer, but not too close. Even if he hasn't read it in a while, he knows the story behind this one.]

"Tama", right? Most of the established gods aren't paying much attention to the newcomers. [He's somehow not that surprised that a literal cat is the first old god to pay him any mind tonight.]

[ittenbari]

A shinki bear?!

[Sakon boggles at the concept, looking back and forth between Tatara and the bear.]

Sure, he could protect a god from, uh, a lot of stuff, really, but he can't really look out for one, right? Keeping them from doing anything they shouldn't? I guess he could...sit on them, maybe? That would stop it, but...

[It just doesn't seem like the best arrangement.]

And where would he put his name? He's all furry!

C, eventually segueing into D...?

[fortunesmiles]

[Komaeda has his plaque tucked under his arm; his name is carved onto it, but he hasn't tied it to anyone else's yet. He smiles at Garry as he stops beside him.] Is it hard? It all seems rather random to me.

I'm really not sure how I feel about it, in any case. Are these things the only way to make connections with others...? Couldn't gods and shinki manipulate this system, since they know how it works? Are all our relationships really determined by the heavens? And are they really decided so casually as this...? [He purses his lips as he looks over the baskets and the gods and shinki gathered around them.] It all seems very...strange. Unless it's purely symbolic, I suppose, but I didn't get the impression it was.

[fauxcalibur]

Not at all!

[And he doesn't sound the least bit ashamed.]

I'm looking for things that catch my interest and seeing what I can do about it.

[He holds up one plaque with a picture sketched on it.]

I do believe this is some young lady's favorite anime character. She wants him to find true love with...I'm not certain, to be honest, but if I find a picture of another anime character, I think I'll tie them together.

[Saber, no.]