的場静司 | Matoba Seiji (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
worldbent) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
jigokulogs2022-05-18 10:18 pm
worldbent) wrote in jigokulogs2022-05-18 10:18 pm
OPEN ➸ May Catchall
Who ⬤ Matoba and you!
What ⬤ Curses. So very many curses- eye attack, haniwa, and... the arcade?
When ⬤ Throughout May
Where ⬤ Around the city, but mostly Sutoku territory
Content Warnings ⬤ Possible light violence from the attack prompt?
1 ➸ Fight Fire With Fire (Substory 4/May Eyeakashi Attack)
[ooc; please read this info/permissions post before replying to this prompt (and feel free to ping me with questions!)]
[A]
[Whatever you happen to be doing when the low, rumbling groan begins to sound from the sky overhead of you, the crowds around you uneasily stop and glance around. Its source is unclear, and others on the street seem equally puzzled-- all but one, a man, who withdraws the paper parasol tucked into his obi and opens it with a smile. Matoba bends over, and deposits something on the ground from a bundle he is carrying- if your eye is sharp, you'll see that they're those haniwa that have been popping up around the city, the ones the Enma specifically said not to mess with. His parasol is left to shade them, like a little house.]
[Are you going to ask what he's up to?]
--
[B]
[If not, he begins to walk away from his little dioarama- directly towards you, it so happens.]
[A mass of black sludge suddenly rockets out of the sky and smashes into the sidewalk moments later, leaving a small crater where the man had been; instead of him, the haniwa are devoured in an instant, absorbing a seismic flash of cursed energy that anyone with spiritual senses is sure to feel. The parasol is left crunching into its formless, toothy mouth before it realizes it has been tricked, and stares into the crowd- directly at Matoba.]
[And you.] OooouuGGGHHhhhhh.... EYE..
2 ➸ Cursoid (Substory 4)
[The trouble with cursed objects was that they seemed innocuous to those that needed to avoid them the most. As more and more of the little haniwa figurines began to appear throughout the city, Matoba had reluctantly taken it upon himself to do what he could to seal and remove them from public spaces, either delivering them to Department of Enma stations or whisking them away to less populated spaces. Those in Enma may find themselves tasked with a sudden delivery, wrapped in strange paper spells as Matoba gives you a skeptical once-over.] ...Are you sure you can handle this?
--
[Those outside the Enma- those who can't leave well enough alone on the streets- get even less benefit of the doubt.]
I'd appreciate if you could avoid touching that. [His tone is more exhausted than sharp, at this point; you might get the sense that he's tired of repeating himself, but with people kidnapping them to dress them in cutesy little costumes and all manner of other absurdities, he's really over it. Maybe he should just let you all get cursed.]
3 ➸ SHMUP is just fun to say (arcade)
[Some time ago, Matoba made the Daitengu a promise. For a while there, it seemed as if that promise would be a fruitless endeavor... After all, why compete against a dead body? Fortunately, news of the Daitengu's demise was highly exaggerated, and so Matoba can be found in the arcades from time to time, his single uncovered eye narrowed in focus.]
[...He is, as Daitengu said, 'in the zone'.]
[Bright lights and colors flash across the screen as explosions and bullets fly across the screen, Matoba's movements precise and automatic. It was pretty different from the old 90's games he'd played growing up in the rural arcades back home- flashier, extra mechanics- but the basic idea was the same, right?]
[Alas, after a tough late-stage boss battle, his ship explodes. Matoba lets out a soft 'tch', finally detaching from the machine to reach into his coinpurse for more yen... When he finally notices you hovering nearby with a slow blink. Forgive his strained eye, it needs to refocus.]
...My apologies, were you waiting for this machine?
----
[Hit me at![[plurk.com profile]](https://plurk.com/favicon.ico)
kitsoru or via PM for plotting or questions!]
What ⬤ Curses. So very many curses- eye attack, haniwa, and... the arcade?
When ⬤ Throughout May
Where ⬤ Around the city, but mostly Sutoku territory
Content Warnings ⬤ Possible light violence from the attack prompt?
1 ➸ Fight Fire With Fire (Substory 4/May Eyeakashi Attack)
[ooc; please read this info/permissions post before replying to this prompt (and feel free to ping me with questions!)]
[A]
[Whatever you happen to be doing when the low, rumbling groan begins to sound from the sky overhead of you, the crowds around you uneasily stop and glance around. Its source is unclear, and others on the street seem equally puzzled-- all but one, a man, who withdraws the paper parasol tucked into his obi and opens it with a smile. Matoba bends over, and deposits something on the ground from a bundle he is carrying- if your eye is sharp, you'll see that they're those haniwa that have been popping up around the city, the ones the Enma specifically said not to mess with. His parasol is left to shade them, like a little house.]
[Are you going to ask what he's up to?]
--
[B]
[If not, he begins to walk away from his little dioarama- directly towards you, it so happens.]
[A mass of black sludge suddenly rockets out of the sky and smashes into the sidewalk moments later, leaving a small crater where the man had been; instead of him, the haniwa are devoured in an instant, absorbing a seismic flash of cursed energy that anyone with spiritual senses is sure to feel. The parasol is left crunching into its formless, toothy mouth before it realizes it has been tricked, and stares into the crowd- directly at Matoba.]
[And you.] OooouuGGGHHhhhhh.... EYE..
2 ➸ Cursoid (Substory 4)
[The trouble with cursed objects was that they seemed innocuous to those that needed to avoid them the most. As more and more of the little haniwa figurines began to appear throughout the city, Matoba had reluctantly taken it upon himself to do what he could to seal and remove them from public spaces, either delivering them to Department of Enma stations or whisking them away to less populated spaces. Those in Enma may find themselves tasked with a sudden delivery, wrapped in strange paper spells as Matoba gives you a skeptical once-over.] ...Are you sure you can handle this?
--
[Those outside the Enma- those who can't leave well enough alone on the streets- get even less benefit of the doubt.]
I'd appreciate if you could avoid touching that. [His tone is more exhausted than sharp, at this point; you might get the sense that he's tired of repeating himself, but with people kidnapping them to dress them in cutesy little costumes and all manner of other absurdities, he's really over it. Maybe he should just let you all get cursed.]
3 ➸ SHMUP is just fun to say (arcade)
[Some time ago, Matoba made the Daitengu a promise. For a while there, it seemed as if that promise would be a fruitless endeavor... After all, why compete against a dead body? Fortunately, news of the Daitengu's demise was highly exaggerated, and so Matoba can be found in the arcades from time to time, his single uncovered eye narrowed in focus.]
[...He is, as Daitengu said, 'in the zone'.]
[Bright lights and colors flash across the screen as explosions and bullets fly across the screen, Matoba's movements precise and automatic. It was pretty different from the old 90's games he'd played growing up in the rural arcades back home- flashier, extra mechanics- but the basic idea was the same, right?]
[Alas, after a tough late-stage boss battle, his ship explodes. Matoba lets out a soft 'tch', finally detaching from the machine to reach into his coinpurse for more yen... When he finally notices you hovering nearby with a slow blink. Forgive his strained eye, it needs to refocus.]
...My apologies, were you waiting for this machine?
----
[Hit me at
no subject
...I see, [Matoba replies with his obvious, knowing smile, and turns back towards the machine again. He puts his hands on the controls as Chongyun inserts the coin, but for a moment he doesn't move the claw.]
Chongyun-kun. You recall that I warned you, after last month's events, about allowing yourself to be swept away in fanciful pursuits. [He operates the claw, now that he's put that out there, before continuing,] Now, I want to be clearer about what I mean by that.
[The claw drops, hovering over a second bunny with brown ears and spots, and the claw grips onto it, dragging it over towards the edge of the prize chute. It falls out of the claw, half-dangling over the spout. Annoying. One more coin for that one, then.]
Ayakashi do not have senses rooted only in the physical world the same as us humans, or even those of us born with power. As our shadows, when they look at us and see our complete human souls, they see everything that is reflected in them- surface thoughts and dearly-kept memories, the connections to other souls that have been forged in our hearts.
...But do not misunderstand perception for understanding. [He inserts the next coin and takes the controls again, this time snapping up the bunny's tail just enough to knock it into the prize chute. Phew, there we go. Which prey shall he aim for next...] For ayakashi- who have only loose connections to the physical world, whose existences are incomplete- human bonds may throw them into a jealous rage, or ignite the forgotten sorrows and anger that a spirit has forgotten it was attached to in a previous life. Ayakashi, who are ageless beings that cannot simply perish with time alone, cannot understand the preciousness of life... or the loss of it.
[Another coin, and he's on the prowl.] As an exorcist- as one who has accepted the task of making ayakashi your enemy- you cannot risk what will happen if the wrong ayakashi reads what is in your heart, and uses it against you. [He tilts the joystick, stopping over a grey bunny that had tumbled off the pile before, to reposition it.] That is why it is better, for your own sake, and for the sake of those you seek to protect- if you open your heart, you can never close it again. If you allow even the smallest gap....
[He's distracting himself. Which rabbit next... The black one, perhaps. What shows of his face is blank, and the paper eyepatch covering his right eye is hiding his expression. Only in the reflection of the glass tank around the machine can Chongyun see the bitter distance in the gaze of his left eye.] ...The day will come that you regret it.
no subject
The young exorcist stays quiet as his senior speaks and works. Fingers tap the directional buttons for the claw; it moves, rabbits tumble, and though Chongyun keeps his eyes steadily on the game his thoughts are on the man's words. What he says is true: spirits can and will take advantage of whatever they can. That, as the heir to an exorcist clan that's protected Liyue for generations, the weight on his shoulders is much greater than the average person. That there is no room to be careless and unguarded when they're at their most vulnerable.
Discipline is everything. Unbridled passion can have disastrous consequences.
Chongyun's hands tighten over the rabbit. He's always known he has to keep himself in check—he's had to since birth due to his condition and position—and he has done it fairly well over the years. But it's getting harder as new feelings grow; what were once buds are beginning to bloom. He's so restless. What's he supposed to do with all of these feelings? One of the main symptoms of congenital positivity is excess passion, and that's not even taking into account being a young man in the prime of youth.
These are unchartered waters. New territory. Eating yin foods and wearing light clothes, indulging no tempers and taking no quarrels, isolating himself, eating only cold foods ... these are all things he can do and does do to keep his spirit's condition in check. But what is he supposed to do when it's a condition of the heart?
He watches Matoba's reflection in the glass. Wonders as the man speaks of regrets and, despite how it's almost certainly overstepping, Chongyun asks: ]
Have you ever ... had feelings for someone?
no subject
[He admits it quietly, but calmly. For just a moment, he tears his gaze away from where it has been glued to the game, dissociating from his own words, and in that movement he manages to tamp down what was in his eye and repress it back to a controlled and neutral smile. Still, it manages some of the teasing mischief that he's had in dealing with Chongyun in the past; it was something he reserved for those he was genuinely fond of.]
[He was often accused of being made of stone, or of being more unfeeling and cruel than the very ayakashi he loathed and hunted. For the head of Matoba, rumors and remarks like those were a far safer thing to earn, and so there was need to shun them. He had cultivated his image carefully, even from his younger years- in the public eye, he had been the Matoba's young prince, their promising new power; and in inheriting he had immediately proven himself a force to be reckoned with and not one to be crossed. You were either with him, or you were out of his way.]
[But that was 'Matoba'. Before that, he had been Seiji, little as that identity as his own person had been. And in those days, there had only ever been one person who had treated him as his own person, seen him as separate from the image of the Matoba he projected then, and had indulged him in his fanciful and desperate tastes for freedom, before he lost it forever.]
[...Now, perhaps, that had changed... But even if -he- no longer saw him as anything but Matoba, he still had his treasured memories of before buried down and locked away as they were.]
Shall we go for a full set of colors? [He nods to Chongyun's growing collection. They were missing the pure white rabbit, still.]
no subject
But none of them actually manage to fall. The young exorcist swallows scattered words back as he glances up to meet the elder man's eye for that unspoken moment. Of course Matoba is human—but with the difference in age and experience between them, he had always felt just beyond reach. Even with the sweets at cafes, games in arcades, and similar backgrounds.
Right now ... he doesn't feel so far after all.
Chongyun will think about it later on. Maybe when he's home with his rabbits and figuring out how to deliver them to Xingqiu's room, he'll imagine what kind of person Matoba might have once wanted to entrust his heart to (some demure raven-haired beauty, full of elegance and grace?) and what happened to them (tragically eaten by spirits, parting them forever?!). For now, he is content to leave things as is. His path and how to walk it is his own to figure out. Confusing as it may be, it's something he must do for himself.
Expression softening, the boy smiles. ]
Yes. Let's. I still have plenty of yen to spare.