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

[light_of_willpower]

[Which barely registers aside from a small grunting-noise and him looking at her again sharply. Then shaking his head and that half-smile is back.]

Already told you, any time you want you're welcome to come spar with me.

[unlucky7]

[It's a fair point. It's one reason she's put love-related plaques off as much as possible simply because there's too much that can go wrong there. But now Ginia finds herself second-guessing all the other plaques she's woven together.]

I don't know.

[She pauses and pulls apart the bow she just tied.]

[unlucky7]

["Even if they're dead?" There are a lot of questions about what happens to a shinki when they leave and Ginia isn't sure she wants to go in that direction. Maybe it's better to be hopeful.]

I hope Nona is well. And everyone else that leaves.

[She pauses to bind two plaques together.]

Do we have to write our names on our plaque or can we write a prayer too?

[redmare]

And anytime you wish to expand your wardrobe or your knowledge of pop culture, you've got my number.

[light_of_willpower]

[There is another soft 'Tch' sound, but he's definitely smiling.]

Until then, how about you come help me sort these to make it easier for those who actually do want to tie people together?

[sing_for_me]

[ Alex does notice her untying that string she just knotted, and worried that she might've gotten the woman to doubtful about her decisions. ]

But, um..! Maybe...maybe even those connections are important. Sometimes..good things can come from bad situations...

[ Did that even make sense? Though it's not as if they're purposely putting them in bad situations. It's almost like chance. Which..sounds bad too considering it is people's lives. ]

[unlucky7]

[Doubt is merely the background to Ginia's life. Alex shouldn't take it personally; if not her, someone or something else would have made her regret her decisions eventually.]

Do you really believe that? Good coming out of bad situations?

[Her signs are still slow, but signed a bit firmer, a hard edge with each gesture as Ginia speaks honestly. There's been too much to think about over the last few days.

After the signs are out, Ginia's posture stiffens as she braces, regretting her words.]

Sorry. That was rude. Sorry.

Midnight Disaster

[unlucky7]

[It's a curious thing, isn't it, so many ayakashi taking the form of animals. Standing not too far away is a massive snow leopard, far larger than any normal snow leopard should ever be. It spots the minions and cocks its head before slowly approaching, a hint of a blue glow around its massive paws. It's much, much bigger and tougher looking than the small sloth ayakashi, but think about those sweet, sweet exp gains.

Here's a question: Fight or flee?

Here's a second question: Ayakashi or shinki?]

[sing_for_me]

[ Alex reads each sign carefully, taking a moment to form the sentences in hear head. The apology she recognizes right away, blinking at her questioningly. ]

Oh--no, I didn't think you were rude at all! I guess it did sound like I was back pedaling there...

[ She thinks a little more on her response, not wanting to just blurt things out. ]

I don't think..you need bad things for good to happen, but...I think..you appreciate the good more, when you've had the opposite..

[ Her gaze lowers as she speaks, which probably didn't do well in showing how confident she was in her answer, but she liked to hope that was the case. ]

[futhark]

[ Ah, that catches him off-guard... and makes him sound like such a nihilistic guy- ]

I'm not against being proved wrong, you know? [ That part of his outlook on life is out, no sense in fighting that. So what he does, is to roll with what she said. ] With you I wish I could stay connected forever.

[ Sorry, I'm so sorry, but he would not pass an opportunity like this ]

[futhark]

Wouldn't that be riskier? [ He's got problem keeping eye on just one of his, imagine what could be if he had more... ]

What, are you putting yourself in multiple places in that web?

[futhark]

If that's the right dosage for ya, all is good. [ Some people need more solitary time than others. Chikusa is probably the biggest introvert he knows here. ]

You had birthday, right? Sure you celebrated that. How it was? [ Just making the casual small talk. ]

[redotiertwo]

[Well, that's probably not good, but at least it's a distraction. Davesprite starts a bit when Komaeda appears next to him, grip on his sword tightening, but thankfully he recognises who it is before he makes any bad moves.

Davesprite glances at the ayakashi, then at Komaeda's hand, ultimately taking it.]

As long as we hang around close enough to stop that thing going back to munching on the building it was on when I found it.

[redotiertwo]

So do you think that goes for everyone here, like saying I wouldn't exist without Hajime, because we did kind of exist before this so I'm really not sold on the "we exist because of our gods" buy one get a free obsessive shitshow deal.

[The ayakashi is starting to catch up a bit, but Davesprite sends out a well-timed borderline to get it just as it really starts picking up the pace, knocking it back again.]

[futhark]

Nightmares? [ Because what else can be bad about a long, long sleep, aside, let's guess, a waste of time and agency? But Caster can't help but be curious. There have been two cases of such long sleep to his knowledge, Lavi, and Yona.

Is there the same reason behind it? ]

[lionhearrt]

[ Smoke rises filling the air with an acrid scent that has other gods looking his way in disapproval. ]

Who knows.

[declamando]

[Maria watches long enough to see what Edge does to follow up, even while she's still running, but at the confirmation he'll hold it down, she gives a short nod.]

I'll come back to get rid of it once they're out! [Picking up her pace a bit, she eyes up the buildings nearby, eventually settling on a six-storey apartment complex.]

After being knocked to the ground and discovering the taste of dirt
I realized
Just how high (high) the sky (sky) is...

[Ramming her heel into the ground, she leaps up a distance far beyond any kind of human ability, alighting on the roof of the building in that one leap. The ayakashi seem to be largely avoiding the rooftops, so she figures this should be the quicker and easier way to avoid ayakashi between here and the edge of the affected area.]

[declamando]

[Maria purses her lips a bit, but she's never actually met Nanako, so she can't say much else on that subject.

Once they pass the edge of the afflicted area, Maria crouches down and starts to carefully lower the people one by one to the ground, laying them down. With the strength afforded to her by her Gear, it's not difficult to do one-handed, just awkward.]

Two hours means during the meeting, then...they recorded attendance, but I don't think they recorded departures. We can't rule out this being something internal, especially since it was done when we were all occupied.

[declamando]

I'm not saying there can't be other hands guiding them, but I feel like ascribing all of it to an unseen hand isn't giving people themselves enough credit.

[A nudge this way and that doesn't account for circumstances of meeting, or how things develop from there, or the way people reach out themselves. No god can account for the actions of an individual human, singular God or gods like these ones.]

[declamando]

[Maria's not going to wait for it to attack her with Alex and the kids still so close, and she takes its hesitation as a sign to act, running in before it can settle its decision.]

(Stand up) And this drenched
(Stand up) Heart that has become
(Stand up) Heavy...

[The ayakashi makes a hasty lunge, and Maria catches it, grappling for a moment before flipping it over onto its back with a thump that shakes the street a little.]

(Stand up) Sing the song of the warrior!

[Before it can recover, she leaps into the air, flips, and plunges down with her blade. The fact that this one is a shinki's vessel form becomes obvious when the impact creates a bright white flash, enveloping the ayakashi and disintegrating it.

Maria makes a gesture to Alex, keeping an eye on the other two ayakashi she stunned earlier.]

Head out while I finish off these two.

[futhark]

[ Saber, YES ]

Heey, so we can make the story go her way- [ Holy shit, that's genius. Make a prayer come true, without getting into that weaving fate business. ] You find his sweetheart, but first...

[ He takes one of the empty plaques and starts drawing on it, instead of writing. It's a- dragon, or another kind of monster. An ADVERSARY ] How about adding this. A happy ending you don't have to work for is much less satisfying. Make them kill a dragon first!

[ Hopefully it's not a modern procedural show about lady detective and her dumb sidekick, with no dragons in sight ]

[kagenonadeshiko]

[Whether they're watching or not makes little difference to her at the moment. Instead, Ayumu's focused entirely on this little lesson he's teaching, her gaze settling on the strings. She nods.]

I'd say so. The strings are there but nothing's come to pass because of them yet. Go on.

[revolutionfalcon]

[That's something, at least. While Shun has his doubts the old gods are actually looking deeply into the possibility, he also wonders if the issue of who let the kid at the moon viewing into the Heavens might've increased awareness of it. That, at least, was a direct example of something that should be impossible without an insider.

He can't help but agree with her thoughts on the why, though, and he nods with a grim set to his face.] They could've tried rallying the newcomers against the old gods, but they cared so little about collateral damage from the first attack that nobody in their right mind would follow them. I wouldn't say they're uniting us against them, but they're driving us closer together, if anything.

[Driving people to defend Amaterasu, and such like. That and the temple fire were Shun's main causes for suspicion that it might be someone in her inner circle.]

[revolutionfalcon]

[Shun uses the blowback on their end to put more distance between them and the ayakashi with the flip, though he looks faintly impressed himself at the fact that it actually worked. He supposes they've been doing this a bit longer now, so it's possible they're adjusting more to each other's styles.]

Let's follow it up. [As he lands, he lets his knees bend and then uses the recoil to lunge for the ayakashi before it can finish extinguishing its face.] Rend it!

[He focuses his intent on that this time, as he opens the fans again and slashes them out across the ayakashi's underbelly.]

[revolutionfalcon]

Because there's hardly any people Suoh will let near him. And I don't plan on letting him cut himself off and make things worse. Do you?

[Alex seems fairly meek overall, so he imagines there's a reason she keeps coming back to him. And a reason he lets her, in turn, which is something that could be useful.]