FEBRUARY EVENT PT 1

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→ 2/2 Infodump

Three weeks have passed in the outside world since everybody had first entered the dungeons, and they exit to find themselves back in Hirajiro. It's quiet, late at night, streets dry around both the house and the clubhouse as they all trudge on home. For the rest of the night, everybody is encouraged to sleep, waking up to breakfast and in the late afternoon on the 2nd, an official team meeting is called. This time, there is no enforcement for people to come or stay, and food will be served after the bulk of the discussion is dealt with. Those who care will take things seriously, and those who don't are free to walk away.

To start, each team shares what went on in each respective dungeon.

(click to expand details) From the castle dungeon:

⬥ Room 1: The team finds Rio's, Yamato's, and Kido's omamoris that had been returned to the shrine back on New Years, and allows them to burn.

⬥ Room 2: In a war between Hirajiro and a neighboring town, Terry kills a hundred of the other town's soldiers with a single arrow and saves Hirajiro.

⬥ Room 3: In the aftermath of the war, the townspeople praise the Kotengu for saving them. They say he came to power half a year ago and can strengthen people and bring them back from the dead. In the offertory box in the forest shrine, Cyrus, Sasuke, and Jiro find a scrap of paper.

⬥ Room 4: In the aftermath of the war, Terry, Rei, and Yamato fight through a horde of zombies: the townspeople that Terry killed with his arrows who have been brought back to life- but wrong.

⬥ Room 5: In the aftermath of the war, Minato, Nero, and Red help out the remains of the town that attacked Hirajiro. These townspeople blame themselves for attacking and underestimating the Kotengu's strength. Red falls into ego death.

⬥ Room 6: In a war between the Kotengu and Daitengu, Hirajiro has been destroyed by active earthquakes and rockslides triggered by the Daitengu after the townspeople decide to side with the Kotengu. The team gathers up the remaining townspeople and bring them to safety at the shrine, where the Kotengu spirits everybody away to safety. Cyrus falls into ego death. Sasuke receives a second scrap of paper.

⬥ Final Room: In the boss' chamber, the team is met with the ghosts of all their old teammates lost to ego death and permadeath. Minato fully remembers and explains his contract: he and Souji became Attendants to help their Guests defeat the Daitengu and free to Kotengu, after which the Kotengu will use his powers to bring their team back from death. The Kotengu has the ability to bring people back from the dead and has been doing so for the Persona users. The Daitengu have the ability to shatter people's souls, which is the reason why there are Persona users who permadied and did not revive, and will not reincarnate. To restore these souls, the Attendants planned to use the Kotengu's power to access the Sea of Souls. Sasuke receives a third scrap of paper.

(click to expand details) From the shrine dungeon:

⬥ Room 1: In the main hub, the team meets the ghost of a young human boy who runs away and seals half the doors. In the first room, everybody meets doppelgangers of each person in the team, but defeat them and find a fourth scrap of paper in Souji's doppelganger's bag.

⬥ Room 2: In modern-day Hirajiro, the townspeople turn against the Persona users and burn down the clubhouse. Jiro and Ala fight through the crowd of townspeople who attack them with torches and farming tools and chase the two until they escape into the forest.

⬥ Room 3: During the Kotengu's rise in power, the lake is polluted and turned into a dumping ground for scrap metal and other trash, and only a small handful of people remain who argue against industrialization and the destruction of nature. The townspeople attack and drive away 45, Kido, and the few people who dare to disagree with the Kotengu.

⬥ Room 4: During the Kotengu's rise in power, students learn about weaponsmithing and war tactics instead of the usual subjects like math and science. Souji and Iris meet the boy from the hub. He introduces himself as Hiroto, and agrees to lower the barrier in the main hub.

⬥ Room 5: During the Kotengu's rise in power, the forest around Hirajiro is being cut down to light iron furnaces for smithing weapons. The forest animals are displaced from their homes, and take refuge in the beginnings of the Kotengu's castle, where Akira, Rio, and Wei Wuxian find a fifth scrap of paper.

⬥ Room 6: In modern-day Hirajiro, the team lives out their daily lives believing they are natives to the town, until they pick up on the discrepancies such as the isolation of the town. With brainwashing from the Daitengu, this is the idyllic life they could have, if they choose it over reality.

⬥ Final Room: The team meets Miyamoto-no-Yamazaki, who reveals he was originally human and went by the name Hiroto. Daitengu can be born as a Daitengu, as in the case of the previous three Daitengu, or they can be born as a human and turn into one, as in Hiroto's case. In the middle of the discussion, Jiro goes into anaphylactic shock and Hiroto sends everybody out of the dungeon, saying that every time one of them dies and is revived, their soul becomes more and more corrupted. He will reopen the dungeon on the 3rd for the whole team to come back. Jiro falls into ego death.

For the sake of refreshing everybody's memories, Akira and Kido then go over everything they have learned about this world and how it's time to make a decision for how to bring everything to an end.

The Kotengu and Daitengu vied for power in the past, with the Daitengu being guardians of nature and peace and the Kotengu bringing war and advancement. The Kotengu was sealed away but has the power to bring in people from other worlds and make them Persona users. The last group include Minato and Souji, whose entire team was killed except for Minato: he was saved by the Kotengu, and signed a contract promising to lead the new Persona users to kill the Daitengu and free the Kotengu. In return, he and Souji were made into Attendants, and upon completion of the contract, the Kotengu will restore their team's shattered souls and bring them back to life.

Supported by multiple sources, the ofuda door in the castle is their way home. Both teams have been gathering up torn parts of the same ofuda, with five pieces out of six in their possession, and one more piece will complete the last ofuda needed to go home. All the ofudas, complete and incomplete, are given to Akira for safekeeping. As the Kotengu controls the passage, they may be able to open the door and leave without fighting, while the Kotengu is busy fighting the last Daitengu. If they stay and fight the Kotengu as originally planned, however, they must be aware that 1) the Kotengu may be able to seal the omamori he created, and 2) each time somebody is brought back to life by the Kotengu, he corrupts their souls. In the past, Souji and the rest of his team were able to summon their Personas without a medium like Minato's team required, and Souji promises to help figure out the mechanics so they no longer require the omamori. As for the second point... there's already been too many casualties, and it's unclear what corruption means, only that it terrified Hiroto.

Along with whether to kill the Kotengu (somehow) or forge a deal with him, they must decide on what to do with the last Daitengu. If they kill Hiroto, it's hinted that the Daitengu will never truly disappear from the world because humans with high spiritual energy may turn into Daitengu. Souta, the grandson of the occult shop owners, is a prime candidate for this, and the town may never be free of a Daitengu's influence. For those who want to stay in Hirajiro when everything is over, the world may retain its prison system and constantly try to boot any remaining Persona users out unless Hiroto or another Daitengu can rework the system.

And then there's the Sea of Souls, the possibility of bringing everybody back to life— Mondo and Hibiki and Naoya and all the dozens upon dozens of people who were dragged into this war against their will. Shattered souls, corrupted souls, they could all be saved. All this time, ever since they arrived here in the summer, the team battled for their lives and their freedom against the Daitengu and the Kotengu, pledging to kill the fucking birds and forge their own paths. But they need the Kotengu to go home. They need the Daitengu to stay in Hirajiro. It isn't so easy to drop the convictions they've poured so much into already. What shall they do?

Tomorrow, they speak with Hiroto, and make their first decision of whether to work together, or make a stand and fight.

→ 2/3 - 2/29 Around Town

Outside of the hidden hour, life goes on... Bundled up in coats and scarves, the townspeople flock outside for much of the month, catching up with each other and going shopping together, turning to the Persona users with warm smiles and exclamations that they're glad to see everybody recovered from their illnesses too— they've all been gone for weeks, after all, presumably stuck at home with the sniffles. The patients in the clinic have all started to recover over the past few weeks, with a little garden of medicinal plants started beside the community center now that there is no danger of frost, and construction is already underway to rebuild the hospital building.

For Setsubun on the 3rd, little bags of roasted soybeans and samples of ginger sake for the adults are given out in the marketplace, and at the mountain shrine, priests pass out sweets and small toys and envelopes of money to those who make the trek to the peak. Young men wearing nothing but loincloths parade around the lake before plunging into the freezing water for "purification." Tiny daruma with blank eyes are sold to grant wishes— daruma are so weird: you give the doll the gift of sight by painting in just one eye, write your wish down on its back, and then withhold filling in the other eye until the doll grants your wish through some mystical power. The townspeople believe in this sort of stuff, okay. But none of the townspeople seem to be able to see summoned Personas anymore, and when asked or shown anything out of the ordinary, the townspeople laugh and say you're silly, turning their attention back to the festivities. In the evening, a bonfire is raised by the lakefront with a stage set up next to it for musical performances, historical reenactments and dramas, and dancing all through the night until morning comes with the arrival of spring.

And sure enough, by morning, the snow has all melted, the sun shining brightly in a clear blue sky, though the air is crisp and the nights still get cold. Several townspeople have been hard at work building rowboats, which can be rented to paddle out into the lake, the water so clear one can see several meters into the depths where schools of freshwater fish now swim about, and birds can be seen floating on the surface until a boat comes too close and scares them away. At the community center, a soup kitchen has been set up by a group of volunteers, with hot stews and freshly baked bread served in a large room filled wall to wall with tables and benches, the townspeople enjoying lunches and dinners together with donations going towards the hospital and covering the costs of patients so no one needs to worry about affording treatment. The illness has abated and winter has ended, hope alight on each person's face.

→ MOD NOTES

⬥ A lot of the information detailed in the infodump has been repeated ad nauseam over the course of the game, but is presented here for summary and completion, and so all characters will fully understand the situation and can make an informed decision about the ending. The team meeting does not have to the played out unless people are interested or have something they want to discuss.
⬥ The encounter with Hiroto on 2/3 will be threaded out in the toplevel below. Whether Hiroto lives or dies will be determined by the characters volunteering to talk to him, and they will receive the last ofuda piece from him regardless of their decision.
⬥ The townspeople have reverted back to their previously oblivious state regarding Personas or anything supernatural.
⬥ This month, the full moon occurs on 2/8 - 2/10, when Personas are stronger but more difficult to control. This is an optional mechanic.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

i. setsubun wildcard (2/3)
bonuses: incredibly hopeful, incredibly lucky

[When leaving the dungeon days ago, a crow dropped a glass jar on Toki's head. It contained an eyeball; his, but he didn't know, and didn't have time to figure anything out. The jar broke and the crow stole its contents...

During Setsubun, Toki can be found wandering around, now that the townspeople are no longer hostile. Dolls frighten him, or they did. But he can't see the daruma he bought, and the fear is lessened. He sloppily paints an approximation of an eye on the doll, and his wish is appropriate for the situation: for sight.

Later, he'll be at the bonfire for festivities. Today is a good day somehow, and he believes it will continue.]

ii. amnesia bonus wildcard (2/4)
Toki won't remember anything at all on this day.

iii. canon update (2/6+)

a. closed to rei

[Toki has been very sick for the last day, after forgetting everything. Not all of his memories return. He spends hours in delirium, memories mixed from four realities until they crumble and disappear one by one, until his life in France is gone completely.

His family isn't rich, he never had a sister, he never made a deal with a daemon, he's never been outside of Japan, magic doesn't exist, his months of mental anguish are forgotten. Those memories overwritten with a different time; parents who left him at a boarding school and stopped calling, a courier with a motorcycle who took him in, that woman and the conflicting feelings she brings, the detective, the "accident", the Bakumatsu Interactive Exhibit... And yet another different world; demons and gods and samurai, months there and who knows how long in his own world has passed, manipulating the strings of Heaven's Net, the reset, the realization, the truth so close and-

Toki opens his eyes, and for a moment, he doesn't recognize anything in his half-asleep state. It's strange, the shapes and colours, and with sudden intense surprise, he understands why he's confused. He can see. After over a month and a half in Hirajiro of nothing, and months before that with just one eye. There's depth, so sharp and so real. He can see, and he's back in Hirajiro. The memories of it are faint and distant in some respects, yet also as if they happened yesterday. Has it been a day, or a lifetime? There are holes in the recall, where things he remembers don't make sense emotionally, or logically, because they're dependent on his feelings and experiences in the world where he lived in the mountains of France, the world that has been erased.

Toki pulls his knees to his chest and looks over his room in the Black Cat House. Their room. He'll sit and think, waiting for Rei to wake up while the early light of the morning shines through the gap in the curtains on the window. How long has it been since he's seen the sun? Yesterday? Or was it weeks ago?

Rei stirs; the blankets shifting down, and she's wearing her maid dress. Oh my god. It's the first time Toki's actually seen it, and there's a strange dissonance for him. The dress and imagery of maids don't... do anything for him. They used to, in Hirajiro, but why?]

b; wildcard
For anything immediately post-update, really.
Noticeable things: Toki's eyes are both brown instead of one red, his hair is light brown and not blond, he has no bitemarks on his hand.

iv. lake

Ah! Look at that one!

[Toki stands up in the rowboat, making it rock precariously, and points excitedly as a bright orange and white fish swims by. They're so pretty, and so vivid, and he's still amazed at this level of depth and colour to things. He'd had it before, but it's true that things are taken for granted when they've always been there.]

v. soup kitchen

[Everything smells delicious, and and looks delicious, and the atmosphere is light and jovial. This is the Hirajiro Toki wants to remain, where it's a community of hardworking and supportive people.

Since he's been cooking a little, Toki has tried his hand at turtle bread to contribute. His results are malformed shells and uneven patterns, charred appendages, and a couple of the heads have fallen off into the oversized basket. He goes from table to table, proudly holding out the basket for people to grab one of his creations from.]

Would you like one!? It's a turtle! Isn't it cute~!? I think they're adorable and they're tasty as well! Please enjoy my hard work!

vi. wildcard
Anything goes~! Inbox threads also always welcomed!
** leftover bonuses **
- 1 lucky day
- confesses a secret
- punches someone in the stomach

[ Feeling under the weather, Rei has been sleeping in for the past few days. Luckily, it’s nothing serious, but the exhaustion is real. She sleeps heavier and Toki’s movements aren’t enough to wake her up. However, the sun shining through and landing on her face does the job, causing her to stir with a small whine. She opens her eyes slightly, only to see what time of day it might be from how bright it is outside, but Toki sitting up in bed catches her attention. ]

Mm, Tokidoki...?

[ She’s still half-asleep. She doesn’t recognize the changes right now. ]

Rei...

[Toki is still a little confused, and things are fuzzy, but he smiles. She's so beautiful, and he'd almost forgotten.]

Something happened.

[He touches her arm gently; now that's she's awake, he doesn't want her to go back to sleep.]

I can see.

[ That single sentence is enough to suddenly launch Rei into consciousness. She immediately sits up, her fatigue forgotten as excitement overtakes it. ]

Really?!

[ She knows that he wouldn’t lie about something like this, but to suddenly just wake up and regain back your sight, it has to be a miracle. Now looking at him properly, the change in eye and hair colour are apparent. Maybe the change in eyes is what allowed him to see? But then what about the hair? Hmmm... she hasn’t noticed his hand just yet. ]

Yes!

[Her excitement is catching, and though there are other things to address at some point, this takes priority.]

Both eyes!

[It feels weird to say, because in his "real" life, nothing happened to his eyes. But in the other world it did, and somehow in Hirajiro too though he can't remember which came first. He does remember the weeks of darkness and how the world got so small at that point, and at the same time an endless space. It's almost like a walking dream that he'd just woken up from.]

I wished for this... With the daruma doll...

[His is sitting in the corner near the cat backpack leash. Which Toki frowns at when he looks over, because where did that come from again?]

Oh! The daruma doll granted your wish!

[ That now makes sense. Making a wish with the doll? Obviously, that's why this miracle happened. This world is strange and wishes sometimes do come true so she believes it. ]

That must be why your eye is now brown and your hair is also brown!

[ While the doll was fixing both eyes, it must have turned his red one back to normal brown and just spilled its colouring over to his hair. That logic works in her head and she seems satisfied with that, but then she sees his frown at something. She turns her head towards to whatever he's looking at. ]

What's wrong?

It really did!

[He'll have to paint the other eye on it soon.]

Wait, it's brown, my eye?

[His hair is concerning too, but they'd both have come from the same place. But that means... Hirajiro is part of the real world, his reality, or... another setting where he's whole because it's a new game. He shakes his head to get rid of those thoughts.]

Uh, where did that cat backpack come from? I... remember it, and having it with me whan I talked to Terry at his pinpointing stand, but... I don't know why I had it. I guess this is the time to say that I think I'm missing some information and I don't... understand some things; I know they happened, but I can't...

[The reasons for them are gone.]

[ She nods her head at his first question. It figures that he wouldn't know that his eye colour has changed, if he hasn't looked in a mirror since regaining his sight. She'll have to grab one for him and show him. Oh! Show him! She has so many things that she wants him to see. She'll have to do that later. ]

Ummm, I don't really know, but I do know that it's yours. What information are you missing and what don't you understand?

It's mine.

[It's not quite a question, because he knows somewhere in the back of his mind that it's his. He considered it as such when he used it to bring Terry sandwiches.]

Things like... why I have that. I remember it showing up one day, I remember that I felt... frightened and disturbed by it. I remember it made me sad to look at and it... hurt inside, but I can't... I don't know why I felt those things.

[Looking at the leash now, he feels nothing. It's a cute cat.]

It's like this with other things too. Freaking out in the dungeon, with that boy... I knew his voice then and there were so many emotions attached, but I couldn't tell you who he was now. Kano, but that name doesn't mean anything. He was here in Hirajiro and I know he was somehow important to me, but he isn't now. I can't figure it out, the connection.

I know I went blind from brain surgery, but I don't know why I wanted it in the first place. Why did I let a snake cut open my brain!? I don't know what could have possibly been so bad that made me do that. I know I wanted to, desperately, but... why?

[ Is this one of those effects from this world? Those random ones that seemingly come out of nowhere and cause people to act strangely, forget things, etc? Toki has always been a little absent-minded, but he should at least know these answers. Unfortunately, Rei doesn't know some of them. ]

I don't know about the backpack or Kano... but you had the surgery because it would help you with your thinking. It also made it easier for you to remember things.

[ She's starting to get concerned and she reaches out with one of her hands to place over his. ]

Maybe we should talk to Snake-chan to find out what's wrong...

Help with my thinking...

[Remembering things that happened in Hirajiro, that would make sense. Toki, right now, can't relate some of his choices or actions here. His thought processes are weird, he knows this and people have told him, but... it being so intrusive as to cause that much distress?]

I guess that makes sense. I did... used to forget a lot of things.

[But this Toki did that intentionally. He considered it the process of deleting people and experiences to make room for new ones, because very little had mattered to him, or had significance. Toki lifts Rei's hand to his mouth to kiss. Even his feelings for her have confusing emotions behind them. The love is real, though the path to that is foggy and distant.]

Yeah, he might know.

[It could be a brain thing, a delayed reaction to the surgery. Or the Kotengu. Or any number of things.]

[ She smiles faintly. She's glad that, at the very least, he remembers her and their relationship. She would have been quite distressed about the previous day when he forgot everything. Will that be something to thread? Who knows. ]

We can talk to him together. He would know more about the procedure.

[ It sounded a very different type of operation than the one she received so she can't offer any clues. ]

But I'm glad that you can see again. There were so many things that I wanted to show you, but couldn't. Now I can share everything with you.

[Who knows?]

Okay, we'll talk to Orien.

[Toki is more calm than he could have been, and this is just one more weird experience in a chain of them. Both the snake doctor, and the memory shenanigans.]

I am too. I didn't... think I would.

[He had tried to accept it, though he'd cried in private and once in front of Kido over it. He'd accepted blindness as a trade off, he remembers. But... it hadn't gone so well in the end? Recalling that panic is almost a foreign feeling; he's panicked, sure, and overreacts to things, but that was... hysteria and dread so deep. Something had to have happened to him, or who he used to be? No, he's done thinking about that.]

I want to see everything I missed, Rei.

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→ 2/2 Infodump

→ 2/3 - 2/29 Around Town

→ MOD NOTES

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