34 - Love is in the Air

[godsoffortune]

Who: Everyone!
What: An enterprising pair of shinki is trying to spread love throughout the Far Shore with exciting blind dates.
When: February 14
Where: Hot romantic spots throughout Tokyo
Summary: Blind dates on Valentine's Day? Sounds like fun (or possibly a disaster, but everyone needs some good disaster stories.) That's not all that's going on, though. Ayakashi are looking to chow down on the negative emotions that a romantic holiday can generate, and those who aren't busy with their own dates might be sucked into helping out followers who need help to make the day go well.






The Dates

Blind Date Matchups

Those who have signed up -- or whose friends and colleagues have signed them up -- for dates will get cards with specified times and meeting places inside for the big event. The cards don't list their dates' names, but instead have a matching symbol to allow everyone to find their proper partner. If anyone tries to stand up their date, they can expect a small and angry owl to harass them until they give in.


• Date One: The Romantic Brunch.
  Couples will find themselves with reservations (and pre-paid coupons for the prix fixe menu) at a swanky French restaurant with a wide balcony overlooking the lake in a central Tokyo park. They can dine on dainty pastries, sweet milk coffees, bowls of grapes and hothouse strawberries, and a selection of fancy chocolates and petit-fours-- plus, some of the trees in the park are blooming in holiday-appropriate red and white!



• Date Two: The Aquarium.
  Couples scheduled for this date have tickets to a rooftop aquarium in Ikebukuro: brightly colored fish, animals including penguins, seals and pelicans, a small petting zoo and plenty of shadowy, secluded nooks to cuddle in make for a fun lunchtime date. The tickets even include admission to the one o'clock penguin and seal show!



• Date Three: The Amusement Park.
  This date sends couples to spend the evening enjoying themselves at a seaside amusement park. Ride the roller coasters! Take selfies with the costumed attendants! Share an overpriced ice cream cone while you watch the fireworks after sunset, then wind up the night with a ride on the colorfully lit Ferris wheel with a romantic view of the Tokyo skyline.

Ayakashi Menace

There's more than just romantic couples out to enjoy themselves today. Romantic holidays can be tough for those whose love lives aren't so rosy, and as always, those negative feelings draw in ayakashi who are ready to ruin everybody's day.

All across the city, besides the usual ayakashi, characters might encounter the following:

Flocks of dove ayakashi whose mournful call induces self-doubt, suspicion and paranoia in everyone who hears it. Are your friends really your friends? Is your lover betraying you? Shouldn't you hurry up and stab them in the back before they can do it to you? These ayakashi are small and agile, difficult to catch but easy to destroy once they're caught... if you can overcome the urge to turn on your allies first.

Long-fingered shadow ayakashi, large and powerful, and capable of sneaking around by blending into genuine shadows. These ayakashi draw those who are alone into their clutches, filling them with resentment and despair. Anyone battling them needs to watch out for the humans they might already have influenced, who may become unpredictable and violent as the ayakashi influencing them grows more desperate.

Cute teddy bear ayakashi, that influence anyone they cling to into greedy obsession: they need attention, affection and gifts, and they can never have enough. When attacked, the teddy bears turn out to fight a little more like a grizzly bear than a stuffed toy, so gods and shinki beware!

Praying for Love

Those who aren't busy with their own dates might find themselves busy taking care of other people's instead. On a day like this one, everyone's praying that things turn out perfectly! Prayers gods might hear include:

"He's just got to ask me out! I made him the biggest box of chocolates... please, let senpai notice me!"

"Does she really like me? Please, give me a sign."

"I got concert tickets for our date, but it's supposed to rain. Please let me find a way to make this work out anyway!"

"The restaurant I wanted to take him to isn't taking any more reservations for tonight. What can I do? I can't cook!"

Wild Card -- players are free to make up their own romance-adjacent prayers for their characters to fulfill.

In Summary:

• Enjoy your dates
• Fight some ayakashi
• Make sure to answer prayers for a good Valentine's Day
• Have fun~

Comments

[wildguardian]

Good thought, bro, but we've got to get them further away from these people first!

[Zhao doesn't trust his own borderline yet, not in areas this crowded; he can hold it for a decent length of time, and it's fast and cutting, but he can't easily distinguish between cutting an ayakashi and cutting the person standing right next to or behind it. He's not going to risk hurting someone.]

There's a spot over there, by the lake.

[Here, under the plum trees, is where most of the visitors have clustered. The lake is surrounded by bushes that'll look great in spring and summer but are still dead sticks in this season, and it's correspondingly deserted.]

[irishfriskey]

Then we'll head that way!

[Maybe the sticks will slow the bears down? Unlikely. But, they can still try as he moves over that way with him.]

We're going to take care of them no matter what!

[That was his promise, and dammit if he wouldn't live up to it.]

[wildguardian]

You got it! [They're so fucked. At least he's got borderlines he can throw at the bear -- as soon as they're away from the civilians, anyway. They're getting closer to the edge of the lake, and the strolling couples are thinned out enough at last that Zhao spins on his heel, hand raised, and casts, slicing a cutting borderline through the growling creature on their heels.

Absurdly, fluffy stuffing spills out of the slash. The ayakashi wails, thrashing, and throws out tendrils of purplish skin to knit the gash in its torso together again; Zhao takes the few seconds' reprieve to get a better stance, dashing out to the left and gesturing his companion to the right. There are two of them, they can flank it.]

Hey, friend! Shinki or god?

[irishfriskey]

[Fucked doesn't even begin to describe this, but the borderline does seem to help a bit. They just need 500 more of those, and they might actually stall it for more than a minute. He stands beside him, one foot on the ground and the other ready to just kick off.]

Shinki!

[He spins his spear around and watches closely.]

I'll distract it if you can keep doing that to it.

[wildguardian]

I can keep this up all day. Problem is, I've tried it on a few of these things, and so can they. How well does that spear of yours work?

[He punctuates his question with another borderline, slashing through the bear and bringing it down just as it starts to lumber to its feet again. If they're both shinki, and they're going to have to do something to get this bear permanently distracted...]

Maybe we should be luring it away from all these people here. There's gotta be some shitty abandoned warehouse nearby we can leave it in.