May 2022 Mini Event

[jigokumods]

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As the Haniwa continue to pop up in the city and the turf war rages on, life goes on in the city.

1. SHUTEN CLAN

Remember the Isonade? Yeah, those guys. The surly shark-dudes who were no doubt involved in some black market smuggling along the banks of the Sanzu. They were too tough to fight off in order to figure out what they were up to, last time.

Well, Toraguma has caught wind of them now. Despite the ongoing turf war, he’s not about to lose out on an opportunity here! He wants his Shuten Clan operatives to scour the river looking for these guys. They will be a lot harder to find without the rabbits’ help, though. If you find them, you are to “inform them” that the Shuten Clan will be taking over their operation. If they have problems with that, well… you know what to do.

Don’t forget that they’re quite strong and that they aren’t too keen on giving up the information on their supply line without a fight. You’ll need to use teamwork to get what you need out of them.

Should you manage your way to their warehouse, you’ll find a fresh shipment of their products: specialized herbs, mineral-rich clay, and rarefied ore. None of these products can be found in the city naturally. The Isonade won’t dare name their primary buyer but they will let slip that all of this is being smuggled into the city from the outer Wastelands.

The Shuten Clan will demand their cut out of this operation, but you may get the impression that this is only one small piece of a much larger shadow creeping over the city…

Art by Alejandro Gonzalez Agudelo

2. SUTOKU ALLIANCE

The death and subsequent “rebirth” of the Daitengu has caused a considerable amount of chaos. Many of the subsidiary tribes have struggled under the weight of uncertainty during this debacle. The Daitengu has decided that an apology tour is owed. It’s good for the sake of the Alliance, after all.

Oh, but they’re not going to be doing it themselves. You, the Sutoku Lost Souls, will be fully responsible for it. ૮ ˶ᵔ ᵕ ᵔ˶ ა

Sutoku Souls are tasked with going to various businesses and tribe centers with an offering of gifts and deference to any and every group within the Alliance who will agree to meet with you. The gifts have been provided by the Daitengu, and are mainly snacks and coupons. Which will not be enough to please everyone. Some clans will demand more and some, in their rage, will try to take their anger out on you. You are an (lowly) ambassador right now, better to turn the other cheek.

This all boils down to be less of an apology tour and more of a bribe tour. What the Daitengu has provided won’t cover everything and you’re going to have to go out of pocket to truly placate the other clans. If you don’t have enough cash on hand, you may be asked to do various unpaid tasks and labors: washing dishes, scrubbing floors, cleaning windows, taking out the trash, serving kids’ birthday parties; any amount of the lowest work you can imagine.

It’s rough! But somebody’s gotta do it

3. DEPARTMENT OF THE ENMA

The chaos of the Night Parade has caused a resurgence of unaffiliated gangs popping up around Jigokucho. They can usually be found identifying themselves through the use of basic colors and mascots. They are made up almost entirely of violent youths with uncertain futures, who are lashing out at an uncaring world. The antics of the Daitengu, the accusations against the Enma, and the squabbling between Shuten and Tamamo is not inspiring their confidence nor loyalty.

In addition to this problem, the retrieval of the Haniwa is going poorly. Most residents are too uncomfortable to even touch the statues and their appearances don’t seem to be slowing down. There are too many for the Department to collect.

With an abundance of cursed objects in town, the petty gangs have decided this is an ample resource for them. They are using the Haniwa to harass the general public and against one another. They have weaponized the excess Haniwa and are using them as “curse bombs”, hurling them at both each other and the residents they want to intimidate. It’s getting nasty.

It’s the Department’s job to keep the Haniwa figures from falling into the wrong hands and to keep some semblance of order. The official orders from the Office of the Enma are directing all hands to converge against the youth gangs. Use any force necessary and retrieve those figurines.

4. TAMAMO CLAN

How inconvenient! In addition to the complications of the turf war, an extremely important time of the year has arrived for the Tamamo Clan.

It is time for the yearly visit of one of the clan’s greatest benefactors: the Tennin. These Celestial Immortals descend from the Heavenly Realms to spend time (and incredible amounts of money) in Hell’s Playground, Jigokucho. Hell simply offers the sort of delights you just can’t get in Heaven. Due to Tenkohime’s connections with them, the Celestials have had her host them for several years in a row now. She emphasizes how incredibly important it is to keep them happy.

The Celestials want entertainment and delights of every variety. It’s up to the Tamamo Clan’s Lost Souls to entertain them. Your entertainments can take many forms: keeping the Celestials company, putting on a performance, showing off your cooking and skills, tea ceremonies, and other exhibitions. Should you choose the carnal and kinky route for entertainments, know that you won’t be laying down with any Celestials themselves. Oh, no no no, they’re Heavenly, after all! This is still performance, so you may need a partner to help you out.

Keep in mind that the legends are true! The Celestials are deeply deeply fond of peaches. Both literal and metaphorical. 🍑

The Celestials love to chat and gossip, so keeping them entertained is also an excellent way to hear some interesting information. Tamamo artisans will likely learn that many Celestials openly trade with Tenkohime. In fact, the aphrodisiac goods that the Tamamos so famously deal in come, in large part, from the Celestials. Tamamo isn’t the only clan they do business with either. They also have connections within the Sutoku Alliance and are the land owners of several Alliance properties. They are considered one of the primary sources of capital in the real estate market.

Why would the Celestials want properties in a world they literally can’t live in? Doesn’t that just reek of capitalism.

5. TURF WAR (ALL FACTIONS)

The turf war between the Shuten and Tamamo clans is at a simmer right now. Which doesn’t mean that it’s over – not even close. Minor magical traps, similar to those found in the sewer, have been found in Shuten territory. Frustrated Shuten enforcers have been taking out their anger on anyone that so much as looks at them funny. Bars in both districts are regularly getting smashed up. Knife fights are breaking out in the streets. Cars known to belong to members of both clans turn up with slashed tires. There’s even rumors of hits being taken out on higher ranking members.

Watch your step if you’re out and about in either territory. Faction affiliation doesn’t matter when tensions are running high. What’s more, rumors are flying all over about which of the two warring clans is going to be the one to escalate the violence further.

Will tensions boil over at any moment? At what point does the Department of the Enma have to step in? Why haven’t they already?

It’s all getting too much to handle…

6. CURSED OBJECTS (ALL FACTIONS)

The presence of the Haniwa is having increasingly frightening effects. There are whispers about blood coming out of the walls and the floors in apartments, about black ooze pouring from faucets and coming up from storm drains. There are even whispers of terrible household hauntings.

These aren’t just rumors though. Bars are having to close early due to the presence of wailing ghosts inhabiting the toilet or blood pouring from the taps. People run screaming out of alleyways pursued by ghostly hands.

These curses and hauntings seem to be fairly localized; kept to one building or one block at a time. Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be much rhyme or reason as to when these accursed sightings will take effect.

Be careful out there! Who knows what could happen with so much terrible energy running rampant.

Welcome to the mini event!

• If you have any questions about event content, please ask them here!
• FOR THE PURPOSES OF REWARDS, since all of these prompts tie into the main plot in some way, we will count all qualified threads in this post as 2 point threads!
• If you have questions about the game itself, please check out the premise, FAQ, and rules pages.

Comments

HORRIBLE

[wingclip]

[Shinobu and the oni had only run into each other a handful of times but she had gained enough foresight to know that she had to keep away when those small dainty feet jumped off the roof. She jumps back nearly against the wall behind her as things proceed in slow motion— quick and blurred at first, then transitioning into sluggish movements seen only in dreams.

Except in this case, everything has become nothing short of a nightmare.

Breath escapes her as the oni touches down on the youkai's back and the sickening sounds of clay (and bones) breaking are enough to make her stomach lurch in shock. As the gravity in the room intensifies she feels a terrible weight shifting all around her, as though they had become submerged in a smoke of which there was no escape.

Shadows dance and flit across her vision. Her hair whips about as the hari-onna succumbs, engulfed by the darkness until both her eyes and mouths are nothing but pitch black shapes. She lies motionless as the residual curse scatters about like blackened mice at their feet, scurrying up the walls and into the smallest cracks in the foundation, undoubtedly off to curse more poor souls.

... 'That's better.'

Her hand moves.

Shinobu moves.

Steel cuts through wind, whistles sharp and deafening for a split second as she lurches away from the wall and towards Shuten with the end of that poisonous stinger aimed towards her chest. Shinobu seethes as she makes for her mark, her rich angered voice resonating throughout the greying walls.] Enough out of you!!

This was between us!

[If only she hadn't run into her again, if only she hadn't followed her to this place— if only she had stuck to the job. Now someone had suffered for it, now more would suffer for it... all because of her mistakes.

She had to rectify it herself.]

[osake]

[ sadistic satisfaction makes her light. as though she shed the evil of the haniwa and their curse like blackened mud and washed it down the well of the demon slayer's patience and pride, shuten dodges that straight and true strike like she knew it was coming.

it wasn't hard to predict.

neither is the hissing and shouting, sweet like midnight passion and just as searing on her skin. veering left, she hears the singing of that stinger as it narrowly misses her ear, stopping somewhere behind her. like reflex, she truly can't help the way she smiles then. ]

Fu, fufufu! Good! That's the expression I wanted to see!

[ then, darker, in a hush not unlike the cursed voice that were just flying about the room: ]

You do know how to cooperate when it counts, don't you?

[ shuten jumps back, snapping the fragile bamboo frame of the sliding door with the round, lithe corner of her shoulder as she leaps out. the one advantage she truly has in a close quarters brawl with a speedy, poison-bearer like this one — is the fact that she's a demon: in her strength, and in her cruelty, unbeholden to the human burden of minimizing damages and casualties.

there's nothing to save anyway, she might say, as her heels skid through a red and sticky pool of something soaked through the floor of the hallway. with the sliding door between her and the demon slayer as a brief barrier, shuten winds up — and launches through it feet first, sending it crashing down with the force of her kick towards (her last known) direction of the woman. ]

[wingclip]

[Oni were the same no matter where she wandered.

Fickle, deceitful and cruel— they only thrived in the darkest crevices created by the currents of this world. The youkai had been erratic yes, had probably the intention to frighten Shinobu out of her house and continue hoarding the haniwa... but she even so, she didn't deserve that fate. As far as Shinobu was concerned the hari-onna was just as much as a victim as anyone else that had suffered at the hands of their kind.

And she was a demon slayer, at her very core.

Her mouth flattens into a rosy line as she watches the bulk of the sliding door hurl towards her, the weight of it already reaching her in a gust that threatens to teeter her back down the hallway.

She moves and her arm is a blur.

Dance of the Dragonfly!

Six diagonal strikes alight like struck matches before the oni, effectively cutting the sliding door into several splintered pieces. She bursts through them, her arm bringing the sleeve of her wing-patterned haori in front to block the wreckage from her eyes. Almost as soon as she fixes her gaze on the oni again she breathes and goes for another swift thrusting strike. In the midst of all this her voice rises above the din— gentle and calling.]

How laughable.

To think I'd ever cooperate with an oni!

[Much less a nameless one! She thrusts forward— her feet lift off the ground and the tip of that stinger flies forward once more— this time aimed for the green bauble adorned on the oni's brow.]

[osake]

[ the door splinters into a dozen pieces, bamboo and paper scattering like confetti around her. the destruction is natural — oni don't live in homes, after all, they pillage them, and when one sets foot in a comfortable abode, rotten and cursed or not, its frame is bound to crumble under their whims.

if this were the ancient capital, if this were a central townhouse, if this were a thousand years ago — the whole neighborhood would be up in flames to assuage her brief temper.

with the demon slayer exploding through these walls to meet her, shuten finds she can forgive the difference in scale. ]

Fufu! Rage is surprisingly elegant on that pretty face of yours. And with those wings, it looks like you're flying ...

[ as the door breaks opens like a punctured balloon, shuten angles her trajectory underneath the soles of those hovering sandals, that poised stinger cutting the air between her horns as she ducks — and slides under her. as she turns, ready to flip up behind the woman, shuten grasps at the fluttering hem of that butterfly haori. ]

You really stand out.

[ with a handful of her tail, shuten pulls downward, aiming to send its wearer crashing to the floor below. ]

[wingclip]

[The woman— her target— the one now standing before her... is lacking in something distinctly familiar to her. Something she's all too used to seeing on the faces of loathsome oni, something that tells her that she's a threat to them, a nuisance, a danger. When she doesn't see it in the sleek gaze of the woman behind the shattered wood, something rings out in alarm..

This oni doesn't look angry.

She isn't seething with rage, isn't even slightly put off by the fact that Shinobu has already once tried to run through her with her sword. There were brief flashes before, in the midst of that heated club, that could have been mistaken for sarcasm and irritation— but anger? Hatred? Genuine contempt?

It wasn't there.

When she disappears from sight Shinobu thinks for a fleeting second that she's attempting to escape and prepares to skid to a stop with her heel against the floor. She feels her breath taken— almost literally— when a firm grip takes hold of her haori.

Fiery indignation consumes her, blinds her completely and utterly to the trajectory her body is currently hurtling towards. How dare she— Comes the seething thought, roiling hot like water on scalding volcanic rocks, steaming between her teeth. How dare she touch my haori—!!

The world turns over and brittle wood meets her back as she crashes— shoulders first and then her feet.] —Ugh!!

[Immediately she rises to her feet, her face surprisingly resilient—

—until her balance suddenly tips. Shinobu drops to one knee with a grimace, pain resonating throughout her core.] ...

[Delicately she raises a hand to touch nape of her neck. When she pulls away her fingertips are wet with blood.] Hah.

Hah... I stand out?

Out of the two of us you're definitely flashier than me, Miss.

[Her eyes dart to the oni's feet, where the same red color stains her skin.]

... Why did you do that? To that youkai?

[Tell me so I can become angry again.]

[osake]

[ oddly, shuten doesn't go for a follow-up attack, seemingly content, instead, to watch as the demon slayer struggles to find the ground underneath her again. the draw of her brimming violets is nearly distracted as she turns to face her, placing her back to the eastern wall of the apartment, but — shadowed by the cast of sunlight trickling through the boarded up window — it's barely noticeable.

and the woman pulls her attention to her once again before long, the vivid color of crimson on those pale fingers like a lure for her violence-prone senses.

shuten tips her head, the apathetic angle of her lithe shoulders playing at carelessness. still, she steps no closer.

her voice drops to a winding hum, brushing along the shoji panels still standing. ]

Don't pretend like you don't know. You felt the same way ... didn't you?

[ this is meant to distract her, she figures, but shuten obliges the question, the conversation by clasping her hands behind her back anyway. ]

... She got between us.

[ fangs peek to bring the sharp and dangerous reality to the cute sway of her sleek dark hair. ]

We were in the middle of something ... and she decided to get involved. She should know better — that's what you get when you nose your way into an oni's business.

[wingclip]

[She can feel the blood already drying on her fingertips.

Her knees ache in protest as she rises to her feet, her eyes still fixed on the deadly fanged smile before her. It's occurred to her— quite suddenly and without preamble— that Shuten isn't going for the next shot this time. She keeps herself steady on her heels, flexing the fingers that aren't currently holding her sword.]

Did I feel the same way?

[Her voice comes light, lifting and just on the end of mocking. Her brow lowers as a shadow crosses her expression, resigned and disappointed with the oni's response.] She was an unfortunate victim of this entire mess. You merely did away with her to sate your own insatiable boredom... which leaves me to believe only one thing.

Everything that's happened until now... it wasn't enough, was it? You only ever want more.

You terrible oni.

[She raises her sword, as well as the hand still stained with blood. Her lips press together until the rosy tint of them becomes a shade darker, and the dark gradient bangs that fall across her cheekbones blow quietly in the remnants of the haniwa's lingering curse.

She brings her bloodied fingers to the very end of her sharp stinger. Without so much as a twitch or wince she pricks her forefinger on the end and watches as a dot of fresh welling blood rises from the wound.

From where she stands she extends a hand forward, her lips slowly lifting into a quiet smile.]

This is what your lot are always after... right?

Then come.

[A blur— a fraction of a second after that last syllable leaves her lips. Her silvery sword is hissing through the air for a second time and close behind it— a blur of red, her own bleeding hand aimed for the oni's mouth as if to silence her once and for all.

Whether her stinger connects first or her hand, it hardly matters now.]

👋

[osake]

[ with the rhythm of their bout coming to a halt, suspended on strings by the demon slayer and her sudden need to monologue, whatever balm for her temper she squeezed out of this violence begins to wear thin. as the woman continues, shuten entertains the idea of launching at her again, rending her with abilities and weapons she no longer possesses.

if only she had a fraction of her original strength, her tsurugi — her resistance to poison. this would be over in an instant.

distantly, she thinks of toraguma, of the beaten and battered ibaraki who foolishly took him on. she might share more of their feelings than she let on.

still, she remains loose and unprepared, unpoised for the fight the demon slayer before her is winding up to continue. she watches as she draws her own blood, the scent of it strong enough from this distance that she feels it like needles in her throat, coming up again. ]

You're something else, you know that?

[ does she want to be eaten? what a funny thought.

just as she moves, so does shuten, dodging left. ]

I wouldn't mind having you completely one day ... but today isn't that day.

[ she swings her arm — not towards the girl, but to the window at her back. the heel of her fist connects with the weakened crux of the already rot-infested boards covering it, and it all shatters in an instant. ]

See you, dear. If you know what's good for you, you won't follow me this time. You've got a couple of curses nipping at your heels, after all.

[ like the body of a youkai blackened by them on the floor.

shuten jumps, feet first, and crashes through the rest of the crumbled window — and takes off. ]

[wingclip]

[An spooling of fresh anger unravels in her chest as the oni shatters the remains of what used to be a simple window with a view. She grits her teeth, her eyes flashing as she takes a step towards the oni, her sword far too belated to make a proper swing at her.

She tries anyways— thrusts it once into the space where the slender body once stood before she skids to a stop. Her free hand clenches into a fist, her chest burns with something bitter and old. All at once the adrenaline expels out of her in a heaving sigh and she brushes a strand of hair away before looking out where the shattered glass still hangs.

Ah, she really is gone.

What a cheater.

A stillness overcomes her, heavy and creeping like the many curses now steadily eating through this building's foundation. With some help she may be able to retrieve the haniwa yet, but now she has another problem— that being the youkai currently indisposed in the other room. A pang of guilt stabs at her as she calmly sheathes her sword.]

'If you know what's good for you', hm?

... Don't make me laugh.

[Shinobu kicks away a piece of glass and glances down at the cut at her finger, already smudged and stinging a bit. Bringing the finger to her lips her tongue peeks out to gently touch the cut once.

Her hand drops. With the taste of her own blood to take back with her she turns on her heel and in the direction of the fallen youkai.

... It's going to be a long evening.]