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

[darkestbefore]

[ The return of a typed response is a little surprising, but Yona doesn't comment on it outright, although she does wonder. But she starts reaching for some of the unmatched plaques she still had set aside from her own basket so they could start comparing them. ]

You're very welcome. My name is Yona, although I'm here as the goddess Áine. May I ask your name?

[heartshutter]

Mhm, a shinki bear! [ Tatara shrugs. Maybe his logic here is fundamentally flawed, but... is the bear the shinki’s other form, perhaps? And there’s actually a human in there somewhere?? ] Shinki turn into lots of things, you know?

[ Case in point, his own shinki. Previously, between his two -- one current and one now-former shinki -- Tatara probably looked about one trenchcoat and some impossible hair away from a Yu-Gi-Oh character. Seriously. ]

Anyway, a name doesn’t have to be seen to be called, right? Or... [ here’s a rather terrifying idea ] ...maybe they shaved him to put it on him?

[darkestbefore]

[ It had, actually, but that's a tale in and of itself.

She listens intently, her eyes widening slightly as she glances over at him again. ]

Your grandfather? He sounds as if he were a very important person. I think I've heard mention of him in the studies I've done... [ She pauses as she tries to remember what it had been about. And then... ] Wasn't he the father of the king? If he was your grandfather, does that mean...?

[heartshutter]

[ Good to know Tatara’s extended practice of his craft has paid off. (Or so he thinks.)

To that offer, however, Hakkai receives a dismissively-waving hand. ]

Sorry, but they’re not even worth that much, I promise!

[ As though somehow changing the price tag will also negate Hakkai’s interest...? Tatara’s logic is sometimes fundamentally flawed. ]

[letteropener]

I'm not sure you can apply the parallel. Where I come from, for example, we do not have gods.

[mithrarin]

I didn't say you did. [He passes the obvious mistake she JUST did as too easy, more preferring the course of conflict for bizarre and untenable reasons. There's a reason Chinatsu is his best friend: Dust thrives on challenge and competition.]

[Though he's also a helpful sort, taking a step around the table to see if any of her dolls had fallen even as he continues.]

But would you want someone praying to you to be a mistake?

[sanzohoshi]

[This isn't the time to argue, really, and Sanzang's not sure she could even explain herself well. In the end, he's not wrong, so it doesn't particularly matter.]

Gods are notorious for getting set in their ways, that's true. I think it comes from being so old sometimes!

But that's a good sign, if the gods are willing to listen to people and change their minds. This Heaven is different from the one I know, but it's nice that they're all still capable of growth and change... Maybe there's still hope for this place yet!

[godsoffortune]

[With great dignity, Tama flicks her whiskers forward and nods.]

[fuuthewind]

[Kaede tries to keep her manners in place regardless of who she speaks about. It's her way and to be a good role model to younger shinki. Even a goddess like Kofuku deserves respect in her eyes.]

Lady Kofuku is a Goddess of Poverty. Were it not for her abilities she would have been forgotten as just another nameless god that isn't actively worshiped to. I think you know already understand how important a god's following is?

[She hasn't had to speak of that goddess in a long while. It feels strange like misfortune is going to somehow stick to her just for mentioning it at all. But Kaede continues along.]

She follows a different set of rules as it were. She resides in the Near Shore, which is why you've probably never seen her and there is never much talk of her.

[mithrarin]

Yeah. I was... worried.

[Because if the gods maintained power in cruel and unjust tyranny, he had only one other option.]

It wasn't perfect, but perfect's too much to hope for. In the end, it was done. That's what counts, right?

[godsoffortune]

[Tama stays in loaf position, reopening her eyes to fix Shun with a long, wordless look.]

[sweetdeath]

[Box-office god.... Tsuzuki taps a finger on the edge of that plaque.]

That's you?

[sweetdeath]

At least till we get the people out. [He drops his phone back in his pocket and turns to strike a lunging ayakashi with a borderline that slices it right down the middle. Both halves thump to the ground, ripple, and begin humping back towards one another.

It's frustrating how hard it is to keep them down without Sakura around.]

After that, I'm with you for trying to shut this whole spell down.

[fuuthewind]

[She blinks slowly at that but a smile does tug at the corners of her lips]

Dust, that was the hard work of you and the others. I don't think it would have ever been possible without that but I am grateful it has. Fuujin-sama is pleased to. I feel like I am the one that owes you.

[She giggles a bit, muffling it behind her long kimono sleeve.]

[priforprince]

My shrine is located there, you see.

[ And she doesn't particularly mind the nickname.

The tennis player and their fan are united with a careful, beautiful knot. ]

[onehandsomeslickninja]

Yeah, it's less 'meddling' and more opportunity, the way I see it. Here I am in the company of a cute girl, for example. Did someone weave our plaques together for a connection, or did it just happen by coincidence? Doesn't matter, I'll never know, but it's not like it's somehow worse or false if it was from a woven connection!

[Again, Edge's smile is bright and playful in his eyes even as the mask hides his mouth -- though after a second, he stops his sorting to rub the back of his head sheepishly.] Though if you didn't actually make one for yourself, I guess the question kind of answers itself, but the point remains!

[onehandsomeslickninja]

[Edge doesn't flinch at the sudden sounds of battle and blight, but every muscle goes tense and his free hand lifts from his side, half-curling in preparation for grabbing any one of a number of weapons.]

Good teleport. [Credit where credit is due, she'd placed them pretty much perfectly.] Are you calling your shinki? Otherwise we're just going to focus on getting people out.

[sanzohoshi]

I'm sure I could've whipped you into shape! [Her tone is light and teasing though, but it probably IS for the best. Things had been a bit of a mess then--hell they were still a mess now--and it probably would've been a disaster.

At least it would've been entertaining?

She hums in acknowledgement and seems about ready to ask more when one of the bat ayakashi swooping down has her quickly dodging to the side, holding onto the unconscious girl with an annoyed groan.] Geez, really? So rude! Can't they wait until we can actually fight back to be such a pain?

[kokuyoyo]

And do you know-

[A defensive line, shining brightly in opposition to another couple. It shimmers blue and strange, almost like water, and the energy clings to the bewildered creatures.]

-how many more are still stuck around?

[fuuthewind]

[All that makes sense and she nods her head in understanding until his last few words. Wow, don't be rude Kayonaga. Her shoulders hitch up a bit at that. Despite the blight on her ankle she pushes through to speed up her pace, ignoring the throbbing. Her smile becomes strained because while she does appreciate what he is doing she doesn't care for the rest of it.]

Is that so? Please do not let me get in the way of your duties to Suijin-sama. You've done more then enough.

[A bit of a huff there. She may not be nearly as stubborn as her god but some of it has clearly rubbed off. It's not often she lets it show through though as she does like keeping a good image up with the younger inexperience shinki. Kayonaga gets so such thing. They've known each other for far too long.]

[sanzohoshi]

Haha, if everything was perfect the first time, it'd be a little boring, right?

[She hums and nods] And Orihime seems happy now. [Curiously she adds:] Does she know it was you guys who did it?

[nibelungvalesti]

[If the line is faltering, so too is the shinki that cast it.]

Release it! We shall handle things here!

[With the distance the girl has put between herself and the ayakashi, she need fear nothing. The Valkyrie will not let it past.]

[mithrarin]

If you hadn't told us how to approach Fuujin, and helped us with that... it'd never have happened. [Dust is pretty sure that between himself Takumi, and Wendy, one of them would have screwed it up at a minimum had they just gone straight in. If not all three of them together. He's much more used to solving problems through violence...] So--

[An ayakashi darts in for the pair of them. Without looking, Dust lifts his arm and opens his hand, letting his sword blur into a vortex as it spins on his palm. The whirling blade sucks in the ayakashi, shredding through it like it had been dropped into a blender, before Dust grabs the hilt and sends it flying with one backhand strike.]

Sorry about that. So don't shortchange yourself.

[kokuyoyo]

[Well, that has him stir in interest.]

What did you talk about...?

[mithrarin]

Everyone helped. [At least, he doesn't know who didn't help, and enough people rallied behind Orihime during her test or whatever you want to call it that she'd won the approval of the Far Shore.] But yeah, she knows I was the one who started it. She almost begged me not to interfere... I don't think I'll remind her of that.