39 - Where Do We Stand?

[godsoffortune]

Who: Everyone!
What: Help the Heavens investigate what remains of the cult and their compound
When: May 2
Where: A converted farm on the rural edge of the Tokyo metro area
Summary: Characters can discuss what they know about the cult, choose how much or how little they tell the Heavens' representative Suijin, and help make decisions about where to go from here.






This place was once a farm, then rebuilt into a compound with a big central building, heavy concrete walls and plenty of outdoor spaces for ritual magic. Now, the rooftop has caved in, and the main floor has collapsed as well, leaving a basement open to the skies above. All around, police tape from a local Near Shore department has quarantined off the area. Amaterasu's shinki, in cooperation with those from Suijin, Fuujin, and Raijin have managed to take shifts warning miscreants and the police away from the area, but left the tape to help with those efforts. Just beyond the tape, they've now put up Borderlines to safely guard against ayakashi for the duration of this meeting, but they're pretty far out of earshot and very focused.

Letter of Invitation

Everyone should have seen the digital letter that Amaterasu sent out, but just in case, later that day each temple receives a single letter, with a wax seal on it with Amaterasu's chrysanthemum as the emblem. It is a reproduction of the same digital letter that Amaterasu crafted the day before; it's not printed out, but rather handwritten with painstaking accuracy. The shinki could be from Amaterasu, Suijin, Raijin, or Fuujin, and they will not force anyone to take the letter, in particular if they're told that the god/dess already saw the message on their phone earlier.

Early Arrival

There's a set time that Suijin will arrive - Noon - but as everyone is encouraged to come early, it is possible you are one of the first or last to arrive among the "early" crowd. How did you get there? Was it by stealth or impossible to miss, even by any Near Shore people in the area?

Topics of Discussion

Now is your chance to discuss with your fellows what you know, don't know, wish you knew, etc. about the cult or their compound. Do your characters think they are still being spied on by Heavens and want to hold back, or are they reasonably confident speaking out with the protecting shinki so far away? At the very least, none of the shinki are making very obvious attempts to return to the compound itself. For the very paranoid, there are little alcoves out of visual range or a small room that still has a door on it, albeit not a ceiling.

Suijin's Arrival

Suijin arrives at the appointed time, stepping onto the compound's front drive and under the police tape at precisely Noon. She comes in the capacity of official counselor for Amaterasu. OOCly, this thread will be free-form individual threading.

After her arrival, we will have mirrored top-level comments with Suijin supplying a piece of information as a jumping off point for discussions about each topic. From that point, it will be individual threading, or multi-character threads if you would like. All of these threads will still be addressed to the group at large, loud enough for them to hear and jump in if players would like.

Redacted April 7th via OOC post: We will run this similar to how we ran the Compound's Second Fight: there will be an opportunity for Suijin and/or her shinki to speak, then characters will be given free reign to respond to her and amongst themselves for a period of time. Then, another "round" will begin with Suijin and/or her shinki's responses to the characters. This structure allows for characters to still react with late comments or reactions to anything being said, or jump in whenever they feel comfortable speaking up.

In Summary:

• Talk amongst yourselves before Suijin arrives
• Check out the damage inflicted on the Compound
• Discuss next steps with Suijin, if you would like
• Have fun~

Comments

[bakusatsuo]

"There's a chance that how goddamn idiotic and ineffectual the old gods have been is a product of the traitor, too," Bakugou grunts, almost seeming unwilling to concede that the old gods might not be intentional bastards. "They could be spreading condescension or shit-talking us new gods behind the scenes, which could explain how little the old gods give a shit about us and how much they've been looking down on us. Especially if whoever it is got to be on the decision-making committee for having us clean up every goddamn mess that comes down the pipe, with no help from any of the old gods.

"I don't know if the old gods need any help or encouragement to be assholes to us, but if getting the old gods and new gods at each other's throats is what they want, it's a possibility. It's definitely a fucking fact that if the old gods were trying to make us resent them, they couldn't be doing a much better job than they already are. So the million dollar question is how much of all this bullshit has been arrogant stupidity, and how much of it was someone trying to piss us off?"

[unlucky7]

"The question is who benefits the most either from us being here or from our sudden removal? There is the greater reality that we exist on a different scale of time than the old. From what I've been told by my temple, the old gods cooperate with each other far less than our generation does with each other. A year is also nothing compared to centuries. We could be ignored because we could be fleeting in their eyes."

Ginia levels a look at Shun and lightly waggles her phone toward him before she resumes typing.

"However, they can't ignore you, Hakkai, and Hibiki have become Gods of Fortune in such a short span. Maybe now they're paying attention to us more. Maybe now we're a threat. So again. Who benefits the most?"

[bakusatsuo]

"Who benefits the most from us being here is obvious enough," Bakugou growls. "The old gods do. They've been treating us like fucking servants and cannon fodder from the minute we arrived. And concern? Appreciation? Barely seen a single goddamn scrap of it.

"You remember that ape monster that tried to level the western district? You ever hear word one from the old gods about it? And who fucking dealt with it? Me, my exemplar, and Goku. Did the old gods even notice? Does the western district just not matter that much, since it's almost all new gods? They don't give a fuck about us...but they'll use us all day long, if we let 'em. I hope for their sakes someone is encouraging them to treat us like shit, because if they're just naturally this level of bastard then they're walking arguments for blasphemy."

He folds his arms with a snort. "As for who'd be better off with us gone, who knows. Seems like the cult's the group trying to get rid of us, although search me if I can figure out why. Maybe the cult's master plan is to make the gods become so reliant on outsourcing all their work to us that getting rid of us would cripple 'em." The last remark is accompanied by another, more sardonic snort. "I don't think the old gods would cry to see us gone...but considering how much heavy lifting we're doing for 'em, I'm not sure they'd actively try to get rid of us, either. Not when we're so useful. And then they'd have to field all this shit on their own, which based on their results they're completely unequipped to handle."