jigokulogs | July 2022 Mini Event

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July 2022 Mini Event

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Tanabata is on the horizon, and the city seems to be recovering well from last month. But there's work to be done, and it's time to get to it...

1. SHUTEN CLAN - THE HOUSE ALWAYS WINS

With construction wrapping up, the new Shuten Clan casino will be opening soon. The casino has a number of new staff positions opening. It is a golden opportunity for anyone looking for a cash rich position. The money promised upon assignment to the underground casino is bound to be life-changing. Given the potentials in clientele, Toraguma is expecting the very best. Shutens are to report to the above ground Celestial Phoenix casino for their training.

They will be taught all the traditional casino fare, both Japanese and abroad. This includes being taught how to cheat at these games as well. For example:
Blackjack dealers will learn card count, and how to catch others doing the same.
Roulette attendants will learn both how and when to discreetly adjust the wheel.
Craps and Cee-lo dealers will learn how to feel for loaded dice and how to switch in the house's dice without notice.
Cee-lo dealers are also taught a specific way to line the dice tray to cause more lost throws.
Cho-Han dealers will learn how to distract players as they adjust the dice.
That's not all the Shutens will be learning. The clan needs skilled bouncers as well: people who can handle rowdy customers or haughty celestials. The more tenured Shutens will take up the roles of rude customers and challenge the trainees in how to handle them.

While not everyone will receive employment in the casino, they are all expected to participate in training. Shuten officers are expected to guide and oversee their juniors.

2. TAMAMO CLAN - CHARM SCHOOL

The Tamamo Clan also has preparations to make in anticipation of the underground's opening. The clan is opening their own brothel and cabaret, as well as providing food and drink services to the new Shuten casino.

All Tamamo Clan members must report for training at Mizukume. The lesson of the day is to use one's charisma to secure a huge payout. For example:
Hosts and hostesses will learn the art of schmoozing away clients' money.
Performers will learn more provocative means of soliciting large tips.
Oiran are taught the erotic arts; the perfect balance to both please a client, and how to leave them begging (and paying) for more. There's no technique Tenkohime finds too shameful. Money is power, and power is freedom.
Food service workers are provided master classes in mixology, plating, and how to serve high-profile clients without breaking a sweat.
Each role comes with its own set of pressures, but also the promise of great reward. Everyone is going to get rich, if everyone plays their part well.

Tenured Tamamo are asked to roleplay as clients for the benefit of those Lost Souls new to the work. While not everyone will be selected to work in the Underground, everyone is expected to train for it.

3. SUTOKU ALLIANCE - BLACK MARKETS AND BACK ALLEYS

After months of meetings, it's finally time for some real action. Sutoku Lieutenant Ryouma Sakamoto has made some pretty big commitments on the Alliance's behalf. His temerity comes from his earnest belief in the other Sutoku Lost Souls! No pressure, though!

To succeed, the Alliance must determine who is behind the current black market operation. Ryouma is relying on the Alliance's extensive information network and the hard work of the Lost Souls to make it happen.

This is the work that Ryouma mentioned when he welcomed the new arrivals recently.

This assignment is all about what you know. The Sutoku need to learn more about the competition, through any means necessary. The Alliance wants to know everything about what goods are moving around the city and who is moving it. Time to follow the money. You might even discover an unfulfilled niche in the market through your investigations.

The current influx of Stardust in the city is a great opportunity to investigate the existing dealers and supply lines. The Alliance is gathering Stardust just like everyone else, but it is becoming increasingly scarce as the factions vie for it. The value of this commodity is shooting up every day. Take some cash or other compelling bartering tools with you to grease the palms of a few shady dealers. Try to convince them to be more honest about their supply lines, beyond just the sparkly stuff. Stick the landing, and you might just be closing in on the heart of those shipping loopholes.

This is no easy undertaking. Creativity and tenacity will determine just how far you can go. Be careful not to be too obvious, the threat of unwanted attention will cause your sources to clam up.

4. DEPARTMENT OF THE ENMA - CRACK DOWNS

The Stardust's street presence has shifted naturally over the past few weeks: from an easy resource to simply scoop up in garbage bags overnight to a hot commodity. The street value of the material has increased considerably, and that means that the unaffiliated street gangs are greedy to get in on the action.

Enma officers are called upon to round up any black market dealers of Stardust and confiscate as much of their supply as they can find. This might just bring them into some direct conflict with the Sutoku Alliance members hoping to connect with market insiders. That's just how things boil out sometimes, though.

It is more important to the Department to get Stardust out of the hands of the black marketeers… and into their own lockers.

Officers are given permission to use any amount of force against individual actors, and members of the Law and Records Department are expected to draft up warrants (no matter how doctored) to obtain access to buildings they otherwise would never be allowed into; even Mizukume and the Arena. The Department's orders are clear: if it's not an approved market, shut it down.

This is in the name of maintaining Order, so get out there. Move at least in pairs, or you're likely to meet some serious resistance, and keep an eye out for the newbies.

5. ALL FACTIONS - LUNAR RABBIT RETURNS

It isn't just the factions, dealers, and petty gangs who are interested in the Stardust now that it's a premium item.

A familiar face has resurfaced: the mysterious gyokuto medicine woman and her army of white rabbits. While her little kin have managed to gather a healthy amount of Stardust for her "research", she still needs more. She is willing to pay a huge premium to those who retrieve more materials for her.

She understands that this will require you to either pilfer from one of the factions, or potentially someone even more dangerous. She will be providing samples of one of her drugs, which can grant temporary invisibility in moonlight. Use it for whatever hijinks you want, but she really would prefer if you brought her the goods in the end.

If invisibility doesn't cut if for you, she can provide another sample that provides 10 times your normal strength. While you can KO anyone who gets in your way, it wears off within 5 to 10 seconds. She is very clear that you should not take more than 3 doses of this, or you will very possibly die. Probably. Maybe? It will be unpleasant. So use it only when you need to.

The reward for getting her some Stardust, depending on the amount, can easily pay all a character's expenses for a month, if not longer. The temptation is great, but do you trust this strange rabbit woman?

Welcome to the mini event!

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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.

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[General content warnings and At-A-Glance for Leshy!]

i. The House Always Wins (Open to all Shuten and Tamamo)

[Leshy had won, fair and square, a Shuten Clan lapel pin. He dawned this sigil upon the opening of the underground casino. Walking in, he wasn't overlooked long. Some oni began questioning him, growing more and more frustrated by Leshy's inscrutable demeanor. He had the pin, but look at the guy! Someone would recognize this beastman if he was apart of their ranks.

He's not on any rosters, so the Oni begin roughing him up. They're in for it, because Leshy is a large entity and not too intent to get shown the door.

At least one Oni gets picked up by the neck and thrown. If you're Shuten, you should probably try and help get this creature kicked out! If you're actually of Tamamo, as Leshy is, talking down the ever escalating situation might be best all around. Leshy seems ready to fight tooth and nail to stay, even though it's a lost cause at this point. There's no way anybody is letting him play his games, after this...]

ii. Charm School (Tamamo Only)

[One Leshy, Scrybe of Beasts, staggers into Charm School looking like absolute shit. He always looks like a bog monster crawled up from the bowels of the earth itself, but he's even more roughed up than usual. He'd picked a fight with the Shuten Clan at their casino and got kicked around. He'd gotten in a fight at the mingling of factions and was sporting a still fresh bullet wound to one shoulder. He's lost a finger to a knife game he lost...

Also, he's late to school.]

I got lost. [he did not, but his offset blinking of one eye and then the other doesn't bode well for how stable he is. This is not a creature who will receive criticism or a scolding. Best to let that go... he's clearly already fucked around and found out on several occassions.

Besides, he has a camera in hand. That's. Something.]

I will take the photographs.

iii. Lunar Rabbit (Limit 1 character, any faction!)

[The value of the stardust was something Leshy quickly understood. People would play any number of dangerous games to acquire the stuff. He speaks with interest to the rabbit woman seeks it... for she offers great rewards. Leshy takes all she will give him; strength and invisibility. Three doses of the former, even though she warns him of the consequences to using it so much, they are tools he could use.

Invisibility is tested first. The moon shines brightly nearby the rivers edge. Some Oni laugh and drink together, the same ones who roughed up Leshy at the casino earlier in the week.

One by one, each gets picked up and thrown down the sewer drain nearby. Their screams of dismay and struggle could easily draw attention of any walking through the area this time of night, though it is an isolated spot they decided to hang out. The last Oni gets his jacket pulled off of him before he's pitched headfirst down the drainpipe. Shaken out from the coat is a baggy of stardust, an ID card, and his Shuten pin.

The moonlight becomes obscured by a passing cloud and Leshy stands, looting the items for himself. Seems he got his sigil back in the end, with a bonus to give back to his benefactor, the rabbit.]

Don't worry about it. It happens to the best of us.

[Nie Huaisang's tone is friendly enough though there might be a visible hint of judgment in those doe-like eyes before it vanishes. In contrast to the photographer, he's dressed to the nines in an elaborate garment of his own design, another of his pieces combining kimono patterns with the looser hanfu forms from his homeland. It's crafted from fine green silks purchased in Tamamo territory with the cash bonuses he's been earning and delicately embroidered with a variety of trees, flowers, birds, and woodland creatures. It's a one-of-a-kind garment, one that was rather expensive to make, and Nie Huaisang's really quite proud of the work he and his tailors managed to accomplish together.

By this point, he's grown quite comfortable with being photographed or videotaped in all sorts of states of undress and provocative poses, depending on what his clients are looking for. He's even accustomed to some of them looking a little stranger and less human than others.]

Where do you want me?

[He prefers to let the photographer call the shots and play along to the best of his ability.]

[Leshy is... not even wearing clothing. It's likely if he could get anything on, it would need to be tailor made for his strange body. He looks like some ancient, twisted tree decided to pull itself up from the earth one day and walk around on hooves it borrowed. That might actually be the case, for all anybody knows about Leshy.

It's mostly a wonder why he's apart of Tamamo Clan at all. His eyes spin with hypnotic circles when he responds.]

Go about as you will. The only good photographs are natural ones. I will know the correct moment to capture your visage.

[he's a wildlife photographer, so he has no opinions on staging.]

Really? I thought that staging and composition were important parts of photography.

[But maybe he's had the wrong idea about it all this time. It's not like he even knew what a camera was prior to coming here. They don't even exist as a concept where he's from.

Nie Huaisang shrugs and just plops down on a nearby cushion. If he's going to be told to act natural, plopping down and not moving like a lazy housecat is about as natural as it gets for him.]

Have you been doing this for a long time? You seem pretty experienced.

[And he certainly is curious why Tenkohime would take in such an individual like that. It's obviously not for his looks or social graces so there must be something else about him that's valuable.]

All through my existence; Leshy, Scrybe of Beasts, has captured beasts using his wildlife camera.

[an oddly... narrative way of speaking, perhaps. He's like the flair of it.

He also seems to be considering Nie Huaisang carefully as his subject. Leshy moves, adjusts his stance, checks through the lens, but does not waste a shot on anything he does not deem suitable to capture. He might be a bit precious with his film rolls... though there is nothing special about what he has loaded into his camera at the moment.]

[Nie Huaisang just sits there primly, paper fan folded in his lap. It doesn't take long for his posture to slump into something a bit more lazy and sloppy. He works hard and he's frequently tired as a result. This fellow seems interesting, though, so he continues to pay attention. He is trying to get better at making friends, or reliable allies, at least, within the clan.]

Scrybe of Beasts? That's an interesting title, Master Leshy. Are you a scholar then?

[He doesn't really look like a scholar to him but then again, Nie Huaisang doesn't look like a tactician either.]

My clan's emblem is a beast.

[Master Leshy is good. That's the kind of title he deserves. He's not precisely easy to ingratiate one's self to... but that's a start.]

Scholar. Perhaps. Some would not see it that way.

[It seems to amuse Leshy, thinking on how Magnificus would take umbrage with the beastman claiming such a title. Naturally, that makes it more appealing. He is a scholar of survivorship, an expert at the craft. It is something he knows and he teaches. What is not scholarly about that?

The flashbulb goes off the moment Nie Huaisang slumps. A resonant clap of shutters from the device echoes through the room.

The composition was lined up, the only thing needed was a gesture worth capturing. A split second can make all the difference. Leshy looks to photo as it slides out the side of the camera...

It's shaped like a blank playing card. The image of Nie Huaisang seems to surprise Leshy, a clear photograph just like the real thing. It's so interesting, being a world not so... limited. He seems to marvel at it]

What fidelity.

Really? That shows up in a photograph?

[These cameras truly are wondrous devices. In his eyes, they are the true sorcery in this place, mystical tools beyond Nie Huaisang's comprehension like so many thing here people take for granted.]

How interesting! What else does the camera show?

[He flicks open his fan and starts fanning himself, more out of habit than anything else.]

The image in crisp, but it is only a replica of you. [Leshy hands to card to him. The image on it is small compared to what a more regularly formatted device might produce, but the photo is well taken. It says something of Leshy's priorities that he wanted to catch the moment the man began to slack, to let his guard down maybe.]

Should you have ink, then inscrybe your name to the top. It is your likeness to keep.

[if he only had the correct film, he could have captured the man himself inside the card... but then he would be keeping that. Maybe one day he'll get back his legendary film rolls, craft a proper collection of beasts to command]

[ Thankfully, Mima has the pencil held away from her eye when she hears the doors beyond their fluorescent dressing room burst open.

The sound jolts through her, her heart leaping into her throat, and she turns to watch the wall - following the sounds of shuffling, staggering footsteps beyond it with her eyes. She sets the pencil down among the rest of her inexpensive drugstore cosmetics and rises from her seat, rushing to open the dressing room door.

It's getting to be less and less of a shock, seeing things like the green man stumbling down the hallway toward her. Yokai are as common a fact of life as water now. She's seen, spoken to, flattered less human than the shambling mound before her in her new line of work. But still, the way his blood oozes all the way down the hallway behind him is concerning.

His voice shakes in her ears. She struggles not to recede back into the safe modernity of the dressing room just beside her, and instead, contents herself with pressing firmly into the frame. ]

The-- [ Her eyes flit from his massive beard of greenery, over those splintering wounds and cut vines, to the camera caught in long, clawlike fingers, ] --photographs?

[ It's familiar enough territory, at least... but not territory she'd expected to tread here. ]

[Leshy certainly looms tall and imposing. Surely, he would be even taller if he did not slouch forward like a crooked tree grown out from the side of a hill. The slouch is perhaps more intimidating, angling his vision downward at her. His eyes, though, they seem not to point directly forward, pupils just offset enough to may it seem like he looks a little bit of each way, unfocused.

That is, until he speaks, His eyes turn to orange and black, a hypnotic pattern spinning]

Yes, the photographs. The Mother Fox desires to take stock of her kits. [the camera is lifted for her to look at, if not pointed in a way that looks like he will yet photographer her. Just showing off the device in his hands. It is a massive thing for a handheld camera, with a large flashbulb.]

You will pose. I will capture.

[This Stardust was quite an interesting material... and given how it's suddenly spiked in popularity, he could understand people's desire to obtain it. And given how the Daitengu has asked all Sutoku members to investigate, Fumikage does his best to follow the trails of Stardust.]

[With his unique physical appearance, most don't offer him too much grief or even ask too many questions; looking like a Tengu does have its benefits. But while he's casually trying to investigate a potential lead in Shuten territory, he hears the scream further down, near the sewers. And even if he's technically investigating a lead, he's also a hero in training; he can't just leave screams alone when he hears them.]

[So he goes to the source of the screaming, following it down to the sewer drain pipes. There he sees the beaten-up Oni, as well as the figure pilfering through their coats. He sticks to the shadows, but calls out.]

What's going on here?

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July 2022 Mini Event

Leshy | Inscryption | ota

charm school!

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charm school

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Lunar Rabbit