41 - Cultist Arc Finale

[godsoffortune]

Who: Everyone!
When: June 2nd 2017
Where: Mostly the Near Shore
What: Tracking down cultists to remove them as threats to Heaven, erase as much of their presence from the Near Shore as possible, and consequences of such







With it being made clear that the cult's influence was scattered throughout not just Japan but spread far and wide, the gods of the Far Shore have been asked to assemble in the same place where Conclaves normally happen. Bishamonten is assigned the task of rallying the old gods, while Orihime is given the same duty for the new gods. Essentially, the old gods will be working in Japan and the new gods elsewhere. Both Bishamonten and Orihime have a long list of individuals and their last known locations with vague descriptions, collected by those who went out hunting them on Heavens' behalf when everyone was last gathered. ("A Different Sort of Hunt")

Orihime gathers the new gods at her home along the river. Outside her small abode, there are several soulless shinki pulled from their temple. Ostensibly, they are to help any new gods who don't have a shinki available to create the Cutting ties or Rend effects, but no one is there to stop a shinki from commanding them as well.

Orihime will direct the gods to many places in the Scandinavian countries of Europe, south as far as Italy, west to the United Kingdom, and east as far as Belarus and Ukraine. Meanwhile, another contingent is sent to Australia, New Zealand, Indonesia, the Philippines, and the South Pacific / Oceania islands around there. There's even some scattered across the Americas - north in Alaska and the Yukon as far south as Chile and Argentia. Getting to any region requires the permission of a Near Shore god with a local shrine there to teleport, or a much more mundane plane trip.

Since this is all taking place over an extended period of time - roughly 48 hours - new gods are welcome to jump around the regions at their own choosing, not restricted to just one place.

Cutting Ties

Tracking down the cultists won't be easy. Some of their last known locations just confirmed their home addresses, work addresses, school addresses, etc. It's not like there's a GPS on them! However, with the address being specific to a city and country, along with a description of the person involved, it's possible to track down the rank-and-file cultists in these places beyond Japan. Many of them you won't even need to speak to, just find them and use a shinki to cut the string of fate that binds them to their cult activities, spell knowledge, and awareness of Heaven.

It's possible to run into other gods and shinki, though! Especially in major hubs of regular human activity, the cult was able to thus recruit more people to their causes. Maybe you can team up, swap information based on who you're looking for, that sort of thing.

Blight Circles

Where the human cultist recruits favored larger cities, their blight circles are much farther into countrysides - where they were less likely to be disturbed while the cultists crafted them. These circles are fairly simple in their lasting impressions: spellwork in a large circle on the ground, dead or dying flora for double the diameter of such a circle, and powerful ayakashi drawn to their vicinity. Strike down the ayakashi gathering there, purify the area if you can with magic or holy water, and physically break the circle's symbols. Particularly large blight circles might have been crafted near a Vent, increasing the likelihood of powerful ayakashi being there.

The larger and more powerful an ayakashi, the more Rend attacks it will take to bring them down. Maybe you can survive a long battle with one, or maybe you work together as a team with another god / soulless-wield shinki? The choice is up to you!

Cult Hubs

In the true cultural capitals of the world, there is a single Cult Hub - a physical building that was under the governance of a higher cultist official, where spellwork training and other informational sessions took place. Note that these hubs are not always the capitals of their countries, as with New York City or Los Angeles, Toronto or Munich, Sydney or Quezon City. The physical structures where cultists met have a wealth of inventory to look through and either dispose of or use in future efforts for the Heavens. It might not be glamorous work, but it could offer surprising rewards.

Event Bonus:
A thread of 10+ comments earns a character a random item that would have been stored at the cult hub. As with other missions involving "random item" rewards, players can give the mods 3 choices for review and we'll reply with a comment about any choice which might be too powerful / not suitable, or players can ask for the mods to give them 2-3 random items and pick only one as their reward.

Between Scenes / Afterward

As everyone returns to the Far Shore between their major efforts on the Near Shore, recovering from the battles, enlisting backup, or simply looking for another assignment from Orihime, you might still bump into one another, particularly around Orihime's home or down the river in either direction. Feel free to use this as a kind of catchall space or a place to look for healing, food, and sleep with your fellows from the Far Shore.

Alternatively, this could all happen when the last assignments have been handed out and people start to disperse back to their own temples.

Event Bonus: Gift Baskets!

For Gods and Shinki alike, Orihime will provide a gift basket to each and every character, customized as much as possible. This will include, among other things, an article of clothing with a wondrous power unlike any she's made before. Players can request what these items are OOCly, kind of like book requests in the library, but we hope it can to be something you as a player truly feel like is a reward to your character for having come this far.

To claim this reward, simply reply to the Orihime OOC comment below with your desired item and its ability to begin the discussion. Remember: Orihime would avoid granting items that help in battle; rather they're meant to enhance the character's everyday life, make their hobbies easier or more fun, that sort of thing. Example abilities might include: hover-style flight, lite elemental resistance, green-thumb plant growth boost, etc. - they're just tied to the item.

An IC week after the event, gift baskets will be delivered, along with an Epilogue announcement on the BBS.

Event Bonus (all prompts):
A thread of 10+ comments will gain 150 followers / 15 exp per thread.



In Summary:

• Travel the world
• Hunt down the last vestiges of the cult's influences
• Get goodies
• Await the epilogue announcement
• Have fun~

Comments

[disregardeddagger]

They are holding, despite the amount of ayakashi. Or perhaps because of the amount of ayakashi. She doesn't need any lessons to know what will happen if those ayakashi break through to them.

She nodded as Ginia's phone spoke to her, sigils, the marks on the ground. Magic in some way. Borderlines and blessed water.

"I will head there now, I will need to drop this shield in order to use lines to destroy the sigils." Ginia might be able to attack and defend simultaneously but Nesir is not that good yet and though she hates admitting to weakness, being over confident could get them both killed.

Or something. Could shinki even die? She's not planning to find that out today. She gets ready to run towards the nearest sigil line.

[unlucky7]

Ginia doesn't know how well Nesir can fight, but there's no time to question things either. If Nesir is confident in her ability to get the job done, Ginia will trust in that. Besides, she made it out here. Even with others guiding the way, it's no easy task. Ginia nods as she slips her phone back into her pocket, raising Luger to shoot at the ayakashi surrounding them. Rend! REND! She carries the will of the spell in her heart as she mouths the command, fingers writing signs against the rifle's body just in case. Spells are strange and she's not sure how it works, but it does. A few of the smaller ayakashi disappear into dust as bullets pierce their multicolored flesh. It'll take more hits on some  of the larger ones, and the more cunning ones twist and dodge the attacks. The bullets simply are and though it's no fault of Luger's, Ginia wishes she had the backup of another set of borderlines or an ability. Still, she'll work with what she has.

Ginia moves ahead, changing the orientation of her borderline as she moves, giving Nesir one side of protection if she moves parallel with it. The ayakashi give chase (as she expected) and she continues to shoot them with bullets and borderlines. A few get close enough she's forced to swing Luger at them, slamming the stock into them and rending them that way. She's mindful of keeping any attacks away from Luger as a whole, countering attacks with attacks and shields. If anyone has to take injuries, she would rather her than anyone else. For all the silence in her mind, Luger is not merely a gun for a shinki too.

[disregardeddagger]

Nesir heads straight for the sigil, a couple of quick borderlines to shield her as she ran. She is obviously focused on the task at hand but it is foolish to ignore the rest of a battlefield and Nesir is no fool. Part of her awareness knows where Ginia is and is aware of her fighting. Taking note of the fact Ginia seems to be destroying these ayakashi, despite the fact that everyone has spent the last week and a half telling Nesir that is something she cannot do alone. Shinki cannot fight these monsters, they can only be weapons for their gods to destroy them.

She sends slashing borderlines down at the sigils, disturbing the lines and pouring the water onto the ground, it sizzled as it hit the lines of power and Nesir took that as a good sign. She worked as fast as she could but took care to be thorough, using her feet to scuff up the ground even as she sent borderlines and water into it.

[unlucky7]

In the back of her mind, Ginia too is aware the elephant in the room needs to be addressed after the fact. Shinki rending with soulless shinki isn't any kind of deep secret, but it's not something readily talked about either. Of the people present at the meeting in December, Ginia isn't sure if any of the shinki still remaining have tried it themselves. With all the questions surrounding soulless shinki and the wariness people seem to have about them, maybe not. So if Nesir finds out... well, as long as she's careful about it, it should be fine.

Slash, shoot, defend. Ginia moves fast and fights relentlessly against the onslaught of ayakashi. If she takes a graze, a peck, a sting, she shrugs it off and keeps going. Borderlines flash up and down as she juggles her barrier, cutting off attacks on her side, keeping it up to protect Nesir. It's a honed dance as she keeps moving, a flurry of gunshots and borderlines, focused and honed working on her own.

Such a sight would likely horrify the greater portion of Heaven, a shinki acting and rending on her own. A good thing the shinki of Ebisu's temple are all rebels in their own way and the other old gods are busy in Japan.

There's only a brief chance to glance at Nesir's progress, but it's positive. Like the ones in the forest, it'll take destroying the majority of the sigil, but at least they don't have the oppressive draining field surrounding them.

[disregardeddagger]

Nesir is fully focused on her task, darting from line to line, wrecking them with borderlines and holy water alike. But she is aware of Ginia and impressed. Nesir can appreciate a good fighter and it is clear Ginia has talent.

It took a while, the sigil was large and covered a significant area. She had to use the holy water she had sparingly but soon the last of the lines fizzled away.

Nesir didn't stop, even as the lines faded from the ground she made sure to sent borderlines at the remaining ayakashi, to keep them busy as Ginia destroyed them, however she was doing that.

[unlucky7]

As the lines break up and the power loosens, so does the draw of ayakashi. Ginia still has to rend the few insistent on making a meal of them, but even a few of the smaller ones turn and flee the area. When the last ayakashi is left as black dust fading into the air, Ginia finally stops to catch her breath. She looks around at the wide circle of dead plants. It'll take awhile for all the dead foliage to grow back, but at least it will. Nature is resilient like that.

"Return, Nearu." Ginia signs the command. A name glows in the air and the rifle turns into light, bounding to reform into a tall, lanky man with short white-hair. He smiles at Ginia politely, hanging by her. Ginia looks over Luger for any signs of blight or other injury. His clothing is a bit torn up or rumpled, but she's the one worse off. Blight burns her flesh from where errant strikes have hit her and though she can't take care of all of it right now, she can still clean up to some degree. She pulls a blue handkerchief from inside her jacket and unfolds it, again and again until a large bottle of water is uncovered. Uncapping it, she sheds her jacket and pours it on blight-bruised arms.

'Let me help you,' Luger says, taking the bottle and helping pour and catch water. Ginia nods appreciatively and turns to look at Nesir. There's a bow of her head in thanks, an offer of her substantial bottle of water in case she needs to clean any blight off herself.

"Nesir, this is Luger." Ginia explains through her phone once she's had a chance to dry her hands. "He's what people would call a soulless shinki."

[disregardeddagger]

And all at once it was quiet. Ayakashi destroyed or fled, leaving Nesir and Ginia in an area of dead plants. Nesir watched, curious as the rifle turned into a man who helped Ginia heal from the touch of the ayakashi.

After a moment Nesir went over, accepting the water with a nod of thanks. She doesn't have that much blight, a little on her arms. The water soothes and heals it instantly.

"Thank you." She nodded both at Ginia and at Luger in both thanks and greeting. "Yes you told me about soulless shinki. Though it seems you left out the fact you could wield them."

Her voice is not accusing, it remains friendly. Nesir doesn't expect people to give up all their secrets, if she had any secrets she would want to keep them close to her. She had known there would be other things to discover about this place.

Could shinki wield other shinki then? Or just soulless ones? Or was it just Ginia?

[unlucky7]

"It was your first day. Didn't want to overload you with information." A smile twitches across Ginia's face. Luger is smiling calmly, but it's more his default expression. Ginia writes him a quick message to survey the area and to check in with Chris. He nods and takes out his own phone, moving a few feet away.

"I know one other shinki with a soulless shinki. I don't know if any other shinki have tried." It's not hard to guess what questions Nesir might have about the situation. "The naming works only on soulless shinki too, not others. And no, you can't name gods."

There's another twitch of a smile. Maybe it was because she tried to name Ebisu, but she's pretty sure it holds with all other gods too. If shinki and gods of their generation are only divided by an arbitrary barrier and otherwise the same, and gods can't name gods, it stands to reason they can't break things so much with shinki naming gods.

"I do not know how much the old gods are aware of this. I would rather not find out. If you decide to name a soulless shinki, be very careful. I would also see what your god thinks about it."

Hadn't Nesir mentioned her god had a soulless shinki? Naming his would be the easiest versus heading out to find one to name.

[disregardeddagger]

Fair. There had been a lot of information to take in and a week was not a long time to go before having conceptions shattered. Better to learn now than later. Only on soulless shinki, not on gods. Some kind of shinki hierarchy then? Shinki with souls had more power.

"I will talk to him about it before trying anything."

No telling old gods, be careful about naming any soulless shinki. She can stick to that. Moriyo comes to mind, but she doesn't even know him that well. It seems like something that would have to be approached cautiously.

"It is interesting to know, though."

Any knowledge was important. She would talk to Noctis about it regardless, it might be that he did not know.

[unlucky7]

"If you decide to name a soulless shinki, you use the same words a god uses to name a shinki. Your god should know them, but I can send the words to you too."

With all the times she's heard it herself and the times she's signed it herself, the words have stuck in her mind.

"And if you do name a soulless shinki, accept whatever vessel form you get. It's nothing anyone can control, though there are some old wives tales about compatibility between shinki and god depending on form."

Her mouth twists in a dry smile as she glances at Luger.

"Or shinki and shinki."

[disregardeddagger]

"Right. I remember bits of it, but reading it will be best if it is to be exact." Something about grasping true names and binding them here. She remembered from when Noctis had said them to her.

"Is there much truth in them? Or do gods get weapons they have no idea how to wield?"

Noctis was good with a throwing dagger, so that was a good thing. But it could have been difficult if he wasn't, throwing daggers took quite a bit of practice to master.

[unlucky7]

"I'll send you the words once I'm back at my temple, promise."

It's a long thing to write and Ginia would rather focus on Nesir's other questions.

"My first god didn't know how to use my form. I don't know if my second and third forms were compatible with my gods either. My current vessels fit better now."

It's a superstition, but it's hard not to think about the connection either. Two people working together can make any form work, but that's something easier said than executed in practice.

"A shinki that takes the form of a weapon is probably better suited to a god of combat than one of art. However, it's up the god and shinki to figure out how to work together. It's also possible a shinki has a vessel form that reflects themself more. For example, my boyfriend is apparently cooking instruments across his forms."

[disregardeddagger]

Cooking instruments, so weapons weren't always... conventional. Interesting. Nesir nodded along as she took in the information. A weapon for a god of war, forms could reflect the shinki themselves.

Nesir was a dagger and the fact she arrived with a dagger was the only thing she knew about herself, so perhaps there is a link there. "What is your form?"

[unlucky7]

"I'm a scarf for Ebisu, an archery bow for Chris, and I'm a bird for Tsubasa. For previous gods, I was a sniper rifle, a snow leopard, and a crystal sword."

If there's any kind of theme or reflection of herself, Ginia hasn't figured it out. A mess, she's called herself deprecatingly, but she's trying to be better than that too. Her forms are her forms, she'll make the best use of them.

"Can't tell you the vessel ability for all of them though. There are two I never figured out."

[disregardeddagger]

You are a bird? [And had been a snow leopard? Somehow the idea of turning into an animal was even strange than turning into an object.

What must it be like to be an animal or a bird? Shinki could jump to great heights, Ginia had been the one to teach her that, but flying? That was something else.]

We haven't figured out mine yet either, but we haven't been in a proper fight yet.

[The time would come, probably soon with all these cult actions.]

[unlucky7]

"A bird that can create sharp feathers or a sword."

There's a bit of a proud smile accompanying her words. At first glance, the form doesn't look like much, but it sure packs a punch. Also flying is incredible even if dizzying.

"The key to figuring it out is not overthinking it. Everyone has an ability so tap into yourself and see what feels natural."

[disregardeddagger]

A bird that can create a sword is definitely an impressive feat, the pride is warranted.

"I will do, Noctis seems keen to fight so I am sure we shall have plenty of practice opportunities."

She looks around, "I think we are done here though." The circle is broken, the monsters are gone, job well done. She should probably find her god and check up on him.

[unlucky7]

"I'm going to make sure there's nothing else around. The other shinki around can guide you out. You can use the shrine again too."

Assuming Noctis doesn't meet her and teleport out. It's sure handy gods can teleport anywhere with a connection.

Ginia smiles and nods her head again.

"Thanks for the help."

She'll have to drop by Noctis's temple later with some money. Help deserves proper compensation after all.

[disregardeddagger]

"Thank you." She should be able to meet up with Noctis, but the offer is still appreciated.

"I will see you soon, Ginia."

[unlucky7]

Ginia waves goodbye, moving to confer with Luger and makes plans moving forward for the area.

Two days after the situation is settled, an envelope addressed to Nesir is left at Noctis's temple. Inside the envelope is 100,000 yen in neat, clean bills and a thank you note from Ginia. Enjoy.

[disregardeddagger]

The money is met with confusion and suspicion. Why would Ginia pay her? She wasn't part of the heavens rulers. Nesir had helped her yes, but it could also be said that Ginia had helped her.

Perhaps Ginia had felt in debt to her? But this made Nesir in debt to Ginia and that was dangerous. Ginia had never been anything but helpful and friendly but still. Nesir would rather not owe her anything.

She puts the money aside and decides to speak to Noctis about it. Perhaps it is customary to gift people after they assist with ayakashi killing. In which case she probably needed a source of income, to pay others with. Noctis would know more she is sure.