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

[iron59]

[It takes a long time, at least relatively speaking, for the boy to realize that she was talking to him, because in truth, she's the first living thing he's ever met that can talk without being human. Of course, even that fact isn't too far out of the realm of weird he's been living in; unfortunately, even her grace and charm can't completely counter the fact that he is actually rather frightened by large animals - even ones as regal as Celestia.

His hands, clenched in fists at his side, don't move, and it takes an effort of will for him to force a slow breath, closing his eyes for a moment.]

I wasn't...um. Looking.

[His voice is much weaker than when he first apologized, and there may even be a quaver to it, but he presses on.]

I should have noticed that you had stopped. Really, sorry.

[Situational awareness keeps one alive. Running into someone because he was distracted is a good way to get himself killed...at least, it was back home. Here, he's still going to act as though that's true, because the last time he lost focus, a bunch of evil spirits almost ate him.]

[letteropener]

[The Far Shore is a good place to have all your notions of 'usual' torn down. As had just happened to Celestia once again, despite all her time here.]

It's really quite all right, and no harm was done at all. [She steps forward to keep traffic moving again, even as she watches him over her shoulder with that same smile.] Were you heading anyplace in particular? It's terribly crowded here.

[iron59]

[Yeah. He's seen some of that already. He doesn't like it; this place is rather abrupt about it. He follows without thinking about it; they're talking, even if she is a pony-pegasus-unicorn. With a rainbow mane.]

Um. No. I was just looking, and wondering if there was something to eat maybe.

[He licks his lips, glancing around. No one else seems to be worried, even though the more he looks, the more creatures he can see. He focuses back on Celestia; she can speak, and so he has to keep talking to her, or he's being rude.]

Getting kinda tired of sandwiches. I don't really know how to make anything else. Uh. Were you...going somewhere?

[letteropener]

Inside, but I think I can answer your question. There's a table over there simply loaded with food.

[Celestia flicks a wing out to indicate the path, then starts in that direction, using her equine bulk to gracefully clear a path for the young colt.]

[iron59]

[Felix follows her without thinking, taking a moment as they moved to try and gather his thoughts. She could talk, and she didn't have sharp teeth. Both facts helped him slow the racing of his heart a bit, though not necessarily in that order.]

That's a lot of food, isn't it?

[He tugs on his shirt, mostly for something to do with his hands.]

Um. My name is Lucky. You don't have to walk me over, it's okay. If you have something else...or...

[letteropener]

It's nice to meet you, Lucky. My name is Princess Celestia. And I don't have anything pressing to do at all, so I assure you you're not keeping me from anything. [Really, she wonders, what anypony WOULD have to do at a thing like this besides light socialization. Political intrigue and social manipulation do not seem like hallmarks of the gods and shinki here.]

[iron59]

[Well, this little colt, for one, has plans to listen and maybe make a few contacts, because while political intrigue may not mean much to him, the regular kind if very familiar.

He stops walking when she introduces herself, at least long enough to let her get a little ahead of him. Princess was not exactly a common thing for someone to introduce themselves as. Even if that someone was a talking pony. He hurries to catch up to her.]

Princess? I don't think I've ever met a princess before. A couple of Queens, but they didn't look anything like you.

[It was a poor choice of words, maybe, but he wasn't talking about her being a pony.]

Mom has all kinds of friends.

[letteropener]

Here in the Far Shore, I think you can say the same very easily. [Celestia chuckles softly as she steps up to the table, then gently encourages some others to move aside so that Lucky can come up to it in turn.]