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
[Lucky that he had that handy ward to take care of that, hm? Matoba will accept additional thanks any time. Natori plops into his own bed in order to claim it from Matoba's hostile takeover, which puts them nearly back to back, and Matoba scoots himself back a little more in the bed before defiantly flopping down on the pillow.]
Well, I have had quite the long night of ferrying back and forth, [He punctuates with a stretch, kicking up some blankets,] so I believe I will retire.
If you require additional compensation for your hospitality, save it for the morning, please.
no subject
[He reaches over the side of the bed to brush his fingers against a stack of paper dolls (there are some scattered all over the apartment, not (just) because he doesn't bother picking up after himself but to keep them in reach when sleeping; again, old habits) as he deposits the phone on the floor next to them. The top doll obediently hovers over to the light and switches it off.
Lying there in the dark on his back, he's hyper-aware of Matoba's presence in the bed next to him. After a few minutes of listening to the rain pound against the window, muffling but not fully covering the sounds of the city night, he murmurs]
Are you going to get the new umbrella tomorrow?
[Read: he's still thinking about whether Matoba needs that design of the umbrella.]
no subject
[Natori squirms and tugs on blankets and Matoba frowns, but stubbornly clings onto one corner of the comforter as he rolls onto his right side so it didn't get yanked off of him completely.] Oh? We'll see.
[That sounds like fun, he thinks. After a moment of thought, as Natori is dealing with his phone, Matoba also reaches to the side of the bed where everything that had been in his kimono was scattered, then scoots back in to fluff the pillow and make himself comfortable as the paper doll hovers to the lightswitch and shuts it off.]
[Even as they're lying there, blinking his good eye in the darkness to let it adjust, he knows Natori isn't going to be quiet for long. He never is. He remains up in the darkness letting every anxiety whirl about in his head until he can quell it, and part of that is always talking himself through it as he goes to sleep. It's an annoying habit of his, Matoba notes; he always fell asleep right away, except when it was with Natori.]
However long it takes the craftsman to make it, [He drawls sleepily, letting his eye fall shut again.] Are you offering to take care of it for me, Natori?
no subject
One of these days, he'll learn to stop expecting Matoba to be different from how he's always been. He shuts his eyes for a moment, then rolls onto his side so his back faces Matoba's, splitting the bed between them down the middle.] Do your own chores, Matoba.
[It was foolish of him to expect... well, whatever. He shifts once more with an air of finality, securing his side of the blanket around himself and lies there in the definitive silence between them until he falls asleep.
When he dreams of crowds of familiar figures with hollow, sightless eyes, he assumes it's because of Matoba lying next to him-- his subconscious grabbing on the imagery that can't quite leave his head when Matoba's presence is stirring up the questions. But there's a slight pressure, a miasma of energy that seeps in around the corners, that he's learned a long time ago to associate with an outside energy.
He snaps awake in the middle of the night, bolting up as he realizes there's something else there across from the foot of the bed. He slaps a handful of dolls as he instinctively launches himself out of bed and onto the floor for more maneuverability. One doll gets the light-- Natori's sure that Matoba is already up by now anyway-- while the rest dive towards the third presence in the room with them.]
no subject
[Sleeping with another body present was not something Matoba did, almost at all. There had been very few occasions even before he inherited where they were in this situation, and virtually none afterward. But his dreams were normally turbulent anyway, and he was mostly used to it.]
[To the point that he could tell that this time, it was not simply dreaming.]
[There must have been a specific 'point' at which they both became aware of the presence at once because Matoba jolts awake and feels Natori bolt at the same moment; without thought, his hand goes to the tantou he had left under the pillow before they settled in, and draws it towards the singular point his senses tell him is the enemy. Natori's dolls are already swarming it, circling in order to bind.]
[It was.....]
A doll?
[He says it deeply, voice ragged with sleep, the knifepoint mere millimeters away from making contact with the clay figure. His breath is coming out rapid and sharp, adrenaline spiked to fight or flight.]
[With the light on, his eye has to squint slightly to adjust, but just looking at this thing was making him feel nauseated in a strange way he hated, and after a moment of consideration, still holding the knifepoint towards it, he inches back slightly on the mattress.]
--Check the ward. [Instinctively, remembering his feeling from earlier that night. It's an order barked raggedly at Natori without looking away from the figurine.]
no subject
It's down. [He only needs a moment to look it over, prodding the edges of the decaying ward and judging the holes in the barrier it projected.] ...It's like it eroded overnight. Did this thing... [hasten it? Or is it just something that took advantage of another, larger problem?]
no subject
[This was a funerary figurine; he had seen them used to seal ayakashi before. Reaching out cautiously, he brushes a very careful finger over it to sense its qualities; he felt no angry spirit resonating from inside. Then, where was this aura coming from...?]
[(Nausea, disorientation- even with his personal ward, even with his guard up- staring into that thing’s hollow eyes felt so much like—)]
I ...felt some degradation upon entering, last night. [He reaches a hand out towards the pile of things from his kimono and palms an ofuda. Time to prepare another.] I figured it was the natural influence of the ayakashi in this quarter, but...
[Still clasping the knife, he claps his hands over the ofuda and casts another, containing the malicious energy that was pouring out like a gaseous cloud from the haniwa’s being. The paper seals over the haniwa’s eyes, and the aura suddenly lessens to only a passing (malignant) presence in the room.]
[It feels like then he can finally let go of a breath he hadn’t been able to take.]
...Just who did you anger, Natori?
no subject
[He's seen what happens to wards when a determined spellcaster lobs curse after curse at them. It's also why he seriously considers Matoba's suggestion that this haniwa was meant for him specifically. It wouldn't be the first time; the question was why someone would bother with that here. There was the business in the sewers, maybe, but...]
...This can't be from the Shuten. If they had access to this sort of power, we would have seen it before now. [There's no sense in sending one to him unless they were sent to all the Tamamo jujutsushi, but if they had those sort of reserves, why not post them in the underground in the first place? Still, he returns to his side of the bed to dig up his phone and start to power it on, in case there's any communication from someone else. He still finds himself angling his body to keep the haniwa in front of him rather than expose his back to it.] This would be some serious firepower for a petty host rivalry. [Not that it's impossible; of course some ayakashi could escalate to these measures over something stupid like that. He hates that he seriously has to consider this.] What does it feel like?
no subject
...And besides. If those oafs wanted to break you in two, they would simply do it in broad daylight.
[Matoba smiles. At least the straightforward types were very easy to deal with and predict. No, this seems like it would come from a more insidious source. His brow lifts at Natori’s joke- he hopes it’s a joke- about the host club.]
Is Nurikabe-san still so jealous about your sudden rise to popularity? [He seems delighted that it’s so.] Perhaps it should have considered getting into the acting business first.
[He turns again towards the haniwa, choosing to not-quite look at it, this time.]
I don’t think this is a seal. I don’t sense a presence within it. [Then, where was the energy coming from? Now that it’s sealed, he can pick it up, although he’s still handling it with the caution and mistrust of something that might attack at any time. As he turns it over in his hands, his frown deepens.]
Have you ever seen a legitimate haniwa in person, Natori-san?