🌸 sunshine, she's here, you can take a break

[mistsplitter]

WHO: Everyone!! :D
WHAT: A get-to-know-you-together!
WHEN: end of August
WHERE: shinrin-yoku, Sunwaning
WARNINGS: None for now!


[ The past week, Ayaka and Aether made an announcement on the network, inviting everyone interested to make friends and meet new people to the shinrin-yoku teahouse the following weekend. Well, this is it! The time has come! ]

Welcome
🌸 shinrin-yoku seems like a simple tea house upon entering, with a large wooden sliding door that's already opened for guests to enter.

Ayaka will be the one to personally greet her guests, offering three possible areas for seating– the traditional Inazuman set up, the space for where you can let your legs down and not kneel while seated, or outside in the gardens. Familiar faces may be abound, and guests may like to walk around and see the interior, perhaps even say hello to the manager who is walking around and sniffing people here and there.

For future endeavours, Ayaka informs guests that they may use the shinrin-yoku for business gatherings and meetings. Members of Ayato's committee are more than welcome to use the shinrin-yoku, and may even become a place for exchanging information and the like. The tea house promises to be a safe place to all.

And for this particular gathering, Ayaka is not only serving tea, but also sake. It never hurts to make things more fun!


Konpeito, Truth, or Dare
🌸 All guests, upon entering, will be given a small clear glass container. They will also be presented with a giant bowl containing konpeito. They must take at least one, and as many as they could possibly want, and put it inside their own container. They are told not to eat any for now, but no one's really stopping them from doing so!

At some point during the occasion, a game is announced. Everyone is told to check their konpeito and count how many they have! Now, they must pick a partner and play a couple of rounds of truth or dare with them. Every time they get a turn, whether they pick truth or dare, they can eat a piece of candy! Or eat three or five at the same time Once they've had five rounds, though, then they have to choose another partner and start over until they've finished their konpeito bowls.

There is an added rule to the konpeitos, but not necessarily required to be followed! A white konpeito must have a truth or dare related to family, green for a "favourite", yellow for love or sex, orange for childhood or childlike-ness, and pink for "hate".

Ringo (Ayaka's Eevee) and Taroumaru will be watching people and make sure they aren't cheating! Though sometimes, they may not be looking, and can even be bribed with snacks. Participants who can finish their konpeito in an hour (which we'll conveniently handwave) will receive a box of sakura mochi to take home.


Introduction Bingo
🌸 Guests are given bingo cards to fill up at some point during the afternoon! Pens are also provided, or if they have their own, then that's cool!

Participants may put someone's name twice on any of the squares, but more than that, and it won't count. The objective is to get a blackout by filling out names of people who fit the description! How one does this is completely up to them. They could even slip it into their conversations during the truth or dare games, or just randomly walk up to people and ask them things.


Two Twists and a Lie
🌸 A card is given to participants for them to write two truths and one lie on it, then they have to pin or stick it to the back of their clothing. When someone wants to play, they must first challenge you to a game of janken. If you win, you get to turn the game around and guess which is the lie on their card. If they win, then they're entitled to one guess! If they get it wrong, you have to play janken again.

So, what happens when the person gets it right? The person can now make a rule that the other person has to follow. Whether it means they have to call you "Master", end all their sentences with "yes, please", or some other rule that you can think of! And in case you can't think of anything, there's a box nearby with cute props that you can make the loser wear: cat ears, a cat tail, bunny ears, a bunny tail, a raccoon kigurumi, and some goofy glasses.


---

( OOC: Feel free to play around with the prompts. Get creative! )

Comments

Two Twists and a Lie

[mayoninofukucho]

[Hijikata is happy to see Eren. Sure, the idea of the mingle is to get to know new people - but how well does he really know Eren? The two of them have the uncanny ability to go on days-long quests together without really talking about their personal lives. He decides to take the opportunity and start with what appears to be the easiest option: Eren's truths-and-lie note.]

Eren, you've made this too easy. You can turn into a titan, not into a dragon.

[But that means Eren has a brother..? He never mentioned him! Granted, Hijikata also didn't tell Eren that he originally had 9 siblings (a couple of them have died since).]

i don't actually have an appropriate icon so just take this one

[dreamsofwings]

[ Eren is always glad to see Hijikata too, really. In the end, he doesn't know most people all that well below the surface level things, right? So this…counts. It's easier on Eren, too, since he's just wildly antisocial these days whoops.

He raises an eyebrow at the guess. ]

Oh? Yeah, I can turn into a titan, obviously.

[ He doesn't smile because that's a work in progress, but he gets this sort of smirk. It's usually reserved for Reiner, but even now Eren does like winning, so… ]

But I can also turn into a dragon. It's a power from Folkmore. It required a dragon scale and I got that back recently. So much for it being easy, huh?

I'll always accept Sunglasses Eren!

[mayoninofukucho]

[Talk about being too self-assured! Hijikata is baffled.]

No way. A real dragon? A huge one? With wings and all?

[He needs to see that!! Well, probably not right here at the teahouse, but maybe on the next quest they tackle!]

[dreamsofwings]

A real dragon. It doesn't have wings, but it flies? I don't know how dragons work. It's like...long, I guess.

[ How do you describe something you've been but haven't seen yourself as? He's really struggling. ]

It would be easier to show you sometime.

[ So that's settled, but... ]

So what do I get for tricking you?

[mayoninofukucho]

Oh! An eastern dragon? With a really long body?

[He didn't expect that, given that Eldians, in his eyes, are some anglo-germanic flavour of westerner, but since it's a form Eren acquired through a scale - and on another world, to boot - it makes sense.]

Those can fly without wings, yeah.

[What does Eren get for winning the game, though? What were the rules again?]

I think you get to make up a rule I've got to follow. If you can't think of anything, you can instead pick an accessory from the box over there that I've got to wear.

[He kind of got it wrong - in the first place they're supposed to play janken to determine who gets to guess each time, and only once someone guesses right does he get to call the shots -, but while he'd almost certainly double-check the rules in hopes of getting out of it, Eren once again is given an extra amount of lenience and goodwill!]

[dreamsofwings]

Eastern? Sure, I guess. You're right about what it looks like, I think. That's what it feels like.

[ RIP them not actually following the rules, but who's gonna know? Eren only vaguely listened to the actual rules (and has no idea what janken even is). He just wanted to tease Hijikata. ]

A rule, huh? Lemme see.

[ He thinks for a minute or so. He doesn't really want to do something upsetting or embarrassing. Hijikata's had enough embarrassment (Eren heard about whatever that was on the network, but vaguely enough to not get pissed off about taking away people's freedom and whatnot). Anyway, it's not Eren's style to humiliate people he likes, other than maybe that one time in Liberio with Reiner. That was a side-effect, though, not his actual intention. ]

Okay. You have to answer the next question I ask you honestly. How's that?

[mayoninofukucho]

[Right, Eren wouldn't have a the same concept of 'western' and 'eastern' as people from any of the Earths... regardless, Hijikata really wants to see his dragon form! He once turned into something like a weredragon during one of Prismatica's moon phases, and that was already a wild ride. A full-sized dragon, though, is a whole different ballpark!

Right, the game, though-- answering a question sounds harmless enough, especially since Hijikata does trust Eren to not make it something super awful.]

Sure. Shoot.

[Aren't they playing truth or dare now, though... they sure are succeeding at these games!]

casually slides this in here bc I'm terrible

[dreamsofwings]

[ He barely consider Paradis's position in the world, geographically speaking. He just knows he'll someday crush most of what's out there, whoops. ]

Would you have still been into me if the meadow wasn't screwing with us?

[ He just asks before he loses his nerve. He can't actually hold Hijikata to the truth rule. He's not a human lie detector. But as far as questions go, it's harmless. Right? ]

Be brave, Eren!!

[mayoninofukucho]

[Hijikata somehow manages not to get flustered (which is remarkable). Perhaps he subconsciously realises that it would be hard on Eren to see him freak out after he mustered the courage for the question... but then again perhaps Eren didn't have to muster any courage. He remains hard to read for Hijikata, at times.]

I already liked you before that quest.

['Liking' someone can take many forms, though. In this case it manifested in a strong sense of sympathy for Eren and a deeply felt wish for him to live a happy life. It still surprises Hijikata, even now, how intense those feelings are, especially since he hasn't know Eren for all that long. But what he learned about him early on left some deep impressions, it seems.]

It's just that I usually avoid getting that close to others.

[Romance, even something intended as just a casual affair, is full of pitfalls! (Granted, the excuses from back home - the danger of his work, the target the association with him would paint on his partner's back - don't apply here, so he couldn't very well have rejected Eren on those grounds... all the less given that he can turn into a goddamn titan and heal from any wound.

It's a bit of a non-answer for Eren, probably, but the bigger issue for Hijikata - something he still hasn't been able to figure out - is what kind of relationship he should, can, and wants to have with Eren going forward. He's more or less been trying to simply go back to how things were before the meadow incident, but is Eren happy with that?]

[dreamsofwings]

[ It is a little bit non-answer, but it's something. Eren has a hard time with feelings in general; he repressed his on purpose for so long and relearning them is a slower process. He's resistant to doing it but things like the memory sharing pushed him. ]

Me too.

[ To which part? He doesn't specify! Also a non-answer. Two can play it that close to the chest after all. ]

It would be nice to have a bed instead of grass, though.

[ In some ways that's a better answer.

Anyways, baby steps. Eren doesn't think in terms of the future, even though he's been told now he won't die at 24. He's not sure he believes that.

He also doesn't think about romance as such. Whatever he has with Reiner makes him feel alive, and that burns in him. He doesn't know what to do with it.

Hijikata...that's not as complicated since Hijikata isn't from their world and doesn't have that baggage. He's also not as open as someone like Reiner. But of course neither is Eren. ]

Should I guess yours? Did you pick some for the lie game?

[mayoninofukucho]

I owe you a bed, don't I?

[Next time. That's what he kept saying as they made do with the hard ground and wide open sky over them, lacking comfort and pressed for time, and still too heated to even consider stopping. One more time, then, Eren. (When and where, and whether that'll be an easy end to it where there's no real reason to stop - nothing besides Hijikata's vague apprehensions -, all that remains to be seen.)

(Hijikata is lucky to never have learned of how short a titan shifter's lifespan is. It would have saddened him enough to weigh him down, and he wouldn't even have felt the slightest vindictive glee regarding Reiner. Much as he can't forgive him, and much as he can't help but get into senseless little power struggles with him, he doesn't hate him anymore, not after understanding the circumstances he was raised, trained and indoctrinated in.)]

But yeah, I did. Here are my items.

[He shows his short list:]

I've visited 3 worlds across the multiverse already (not counting my homeworld).
I used to be able to see ghosts, but can't anymore.
All 3 of my swords were cursed when I first got them, but I broke all the curses.

[dreamsofwings]

Yeah. Probably at your place or a hotel. I don’t think the captain would appreciate if I had someone over. Though it's all soundproof, so...

[ JUST KIDDING, he would die first. He shakes his head. That's definitely a no go unless Levi is off on a quest.

Sometime he really needs to work this out. Get a bigger place. Learn communication. The last one isn't likely, alas.

Eren doesn't think of it as if that would be the only time. He doesn't have hangups about it. They're friends. They like each other. Simple, right? As if anything with Eren has ever been simple. He's naive if he thinks otherwise. ]

Huh...is it the swords one?

[mayoninofukucho]

[Hijikata briefly winces. The idea of having sex with Eren while Levi is in the next room is more stressful than most things he can imagine! He probably wouldn't even want to come over with Levi off on a quest, because he wouldn't put it past the man to return days later and still say he smells a pig.

That being said he doesn't live alone either, and while Shoto also occasionally goes on quests, Hijikata still wouldn't want to bring Eren over in his absence. It was hard enough to explain to him the whole Master-Servant thing he has going on with Medusa (because he had to explain it after the recent disaster); he doesn't want the boy to somehow find out and feel like his sensei has totally lost control of his life!

So a hotel it'll be, most likely. They'll cross that bridge when they get there. For now, he'll refocus on the games they're playing.]

Yeah, that's right. Only one of them was cursed. How'd you guess that?

[At least he has three swords! He thought the ghost item would sound more unlikely to most people.]

[dreamsofwings]

[ Eren will probably feel even less like ever bringing anyone home after the fallout of his too public choices happens. For now he's just a normal level of cautious.

Still, hotel it is. He doesn't really care. That's something for later; at least he has an idea of where Hijikata stands, since he more or less agreed to the bed idea.

He shrugs. ]

I knew the first one was true, so it was a 50/50 chance. I figured the ghost one was true because you said you had them in…Avalon, was it? The first time we did a mission, you were worried about ghosts.

[mayoninofukucho]

[RIP Eren... see, that's why it's safer to just be endlessly repressed (never mind that Hijikata totally slipped up on the 'Hot or Not' meme)! 🍿🍿🍿]

Right, I told you about that... well deduced! You win again.

[At least they only had one set of questions each, so this is the last rule Eren gets to make - if he doesn't opt to inject a truth-or-dare segment again instead.]