beautifuldreamermods: (Default)
Beautiful Dreamer Mod Account ([personal profile] beautifuldreamermods) wrote in [community profile] yumemigaoka2024-07-07 02:09 pm

Tanabata Log

YUMEMIGAOKA



    As it is every year, Yumemigaoka's annual Tanabata festival is held at the street just outside of the Hikawa Shrine. The street and the shrine itself have been closed off during the day beforehand and despite the absolute rancid weather, the community has come together to get the festival space set up and ready for everyone to enjoy. And somehow, as they usually do, things just seem to come together somehow.

    Come seven in the evening, the street opens to pedestrians and the festival finally kicks off. A steady, misty drizzle of rain persists through the entire evening but somehow, it just adds to the dreamy atmosphere. Hanging lanterns twinkle with raindrops and cast a warm glow over the street, paper stars are fluttering gently down from strings strung between lampposts and stalls line the full length of the street with food offerings, festival games and just about everything in between. In the wake of all the chaos over the last few months, isn't it nice that some things are still simple, quiet and unchanged?

    For folks looking for games, they can enjoy:

      ⧖ The most popular stalls, the shooting games! Using a gun loaded with paper bullets (so, you know, mostly harmless) the aim of the game is to get a clean hit on one of the prizes along the back of the booth and knock it down! The prizes are mostly candy, snacks or kids' toys but they're deceptively hard to get a good shot at...
      ⧖ Goldfish scooping, a summertime classic! Using a scooper with a thin sheet of paper for the net, try your best to catch as many goldfish swimming around the water below. Do well enough and you'll win a prize and you might even be able to take your goldfish home - make sure to take good care of it!
      ⧖ Senbonbiki is basically pure luck - bundles of prizes, usually candies and small toys, are strung up along the top of the stall and you just have to give the corresponding other end of the string a tug. Whichever bundle of snacks comes down is yours! Of course, if you're particularly unlucky then you might get a dud or penalty prize... but surely nobody's luck is THAT bad, right?
      ⧖ Ring toss! Throw rings onto targets marked "1" through "10", each worth different amounts depending on where they land. Beat the high score and you'll win a prize! Though do you really want to walk around the whole festival with a giant plushie under your arm all night...?

    There's also a ton of options for Japanese street food; some traditional, others more modern takes. There's fried stuff, grilled skewers, rice balls, all manner of delicious noodle dishes and mountains of sweets too; taiyaki, chocolate covered bananas, shaved ice, cotton candy, and just about everything and anything else you'd want to spend an evening stuffing your belly with. And naturally there are plenty of drinks available including freshly squeezed fruit juice and tea and some booze for those who feel like playing with fire.

    Aside from the rest of the festivities, the main event is really the hanging of wishes - it is Tanabata, after all. A few tables at the top of bottom of the street have been set up to carefully shelter them from the rain and have a whole rainbow of tanzaku for people to write and hang their wishes on the bamboo trees both in the street and in the shrine down below. You can hang as many wishes as you like, if you're feeling particularly greedy, but...

    The festival doesn't really reach its peak until darkness falls and, undeterred by the continued drizzle, the Hikawa Shrine lights up the sky with its famous annual fireworks show - it's always pretty spectacular but perhaps out of spite for the nasty weather, it looks even more fantastic than usual this year.

    With the fireworks done, the festival begins wrapping up and it's time to head home. But just as with last year, the night's festivities seem to have only just begun and as you drift off to sleep that night, you feel a gentle unmooring as you're carried off to somewhere new...




THE DREAM SPHERE





    Most people in Yumemigaoka seem to have known what was coming tonight and sure enough, it's happened again - a week's worth of dreams of a strangely vivid image, an enormous bamboo tree with a wide canopy of leaves under a dazzling night sky, just like last year. And, just like last year, when you fall asleep on Tanabata evening, you find yourself arriving Somewhere Else.

    The dream unfolds as an expansive open field, drenched in the silvery light of a magnificently star-spangled sky above and cut through with a river of flowing water that reflects the sky so clearly, it looks to be filled with stars of its own. Just like the real festival, there's a fine rain drizzling down from the sky, filling the air with mist and the sweet fragrance of the hundreds of tiny, bell-shaped flowers swaying lazily in the grass. And at the center of the field, just as it was last time, is the bamboo tree from your dreams. In the year since last Tanabata, it seems to have somehow gotten even taller and even though it's so huge, though, it doesn't seem like a threatening presence at all. Its branches are spread out even wider than before, hanging low enough for you to reach out and touch and this time, they're not just weighed down by tanzaku strips but glass wind chimes, too, that tinkle and sing whenever the breeze rustles the trees.

    It seems tht once again, the magic of those two starcrossed lovers has allowed everyone in Yumemigaoka to cross the Dream Sphere tonight, Dreamer or not! The effect will only last until morning, at which point the dream will unravel, so you might as well enjoy it while you're here. Many of the mundane dreamers will find they're able to move differently in the Dream Sphere, running faster and jumping impossibly high and long distances with nary a scratch to show for it; no magic of their own yet, but at least enough to have a little fun while they're here.

    There's a little bit of natural magic at play here in the environment, too. If you approach the tree with a wish in mind, there's no need to write it down; it'll appear in pretty, sparkly ink on an appropriately colored tanzaku strip, already tied to the tree. Or if you go to peer at your reflection in the river, you might see it take on a shape that reflects the wish you're carrying in your heart.

    ... Except...

    What sort of things are you really wishing for? The things you won't admit out loud to anyone, or even to yourself? The deepest wishes right in the darkest part of your heart that you want more than anything? Unfortunately for you, this tree seems to be of a mind to grant wishes and once it's gathered enough of everybody's tanzaku, there's a bright flash of light...

    And suddenly everyone's secret wishes have been made manifest... though only in the Dream Sphere, of course. These can be anything from silly wishes to something more serious - the important part is that these secret dreams and wishes have been pulled out of your head and put on display for everyone here to see! How on earth are you going to deal with this gracefully?!

    Regardless of what you choose to do, the apparitions only last for an hour or so before fading away and the sky lights up with a beautiful meteor shower that seems to go on forever. You're free to stay and watch the meteor shower and enjoy your last moments in the Dream Sphere for as long as you like but eventually, as you're watching the stars streak down from the sky, the dream around you begins to gradually fade away until you find yourself stirring in your own bed. Though it was an exceptionally busy dream, you find you're well rested and... okay, maybe a little embarrassed after all that.

    Nobody will be able to return to that strange field or find the dream to stabilize it but... maybe that's fine. Aren't some things all the more special for only happening once a year?


hanamane: @phaiinein (✿ 313)

[personal profile] hanamane 2024-07-10 11:18 am (UTC)(link)
[URGH....... of course the person who winds up seeing this is the one he can't properly cover the eyes of!!! Granted, he tries his damnedest anyway, turning off the intangibility on his arms and legs so he can grapple Shinsha like a tree, hands flailing to slap over their face, but... that darn mercury is just too much around them. Although maybe if he gets poisoned badly enough, he can make this whole stupid fantasy disappear in one fell swoop--]

It's not like that!! At all!!!!

[And, because the wires in his brain seem to have greatly shorted out thanks to his desperation, he blurts out:]

I've had dirty thoughts about her too!!!

[HANAKO NO!!!!!!!]
hgs: (disgust)

[personal profile] hgs 2024-07-11 05:53 am (UTC)(link)
......

[For a moment, the raucous Tanabata party goes awkwardly silent, until they can hear crickets chirping amid the soft rustling of the bamboo. Hanako's sweet fantasy fades away into wisps of fog, like mist on a hot summer night.

Cinnabar's mercury blobs sink to the ground and flow together, becoming a roiling pool beneath Hanako's ghostly feet. Silver tendrils emerge from the puddle and grow into spindly branches and vines that encirle Hanako like a rose bower... or a giant cage.]


Go to jail, and stay there until you're done with puberty. Ten thousand years should be long enough, I think.

[...If it's any comfort to Hanako, at least Cinnabar's control over their powers has developed to the point where they probably won't hurt him!]
hanamane: (✿ 317)

[personal profile] hanamane 2024-07-13 02:14 am (UTC)(link)
[He realizes what just left his mouth a moment too late, and the sudden hush of the party is almost deafening in his ears, oppressive in all of it's stillness. Or... no, maybe that's the sound of blood rushing to his head instead, as he glimpses at the crowd behind him, and then back at Shinsha, his face as red as the sand in his knife as he gapes in horror. That had come out entirely wrong-- he hadn't wanted them to think he was some innocent, pure-hearted child who only wanted to hold hands with the girl he liked. Heck, he'd already held her hand! Multiple times! On a sort-of-date, even!! It was more... the principle of the thing?? Getting to spend time with her and getting her undivided attention???

... well, okay, he did have spicy thoughts about her too, but it's not like he wanted to tell the whole city about them, for crying out loud! And especially not Shinsha!!!

He's so mortified that he doesn't fight or struggle when Cinnabun's massive cage encircles around him, instead sinking slowly back to the ground, flopping face-first onto whatever clear patch of ground remains in his new mercury enclosure.]


Can you just poison me now and get it over with? I'm more or less dead as it is.

[PLEASE.... JUST EJECT HIM OUT OF HERE ALREADY]
hgs: (unimpressed)

[personal profile] hgs 2024-07-17 06:06 am (UTC)(link)
[Hanako's intangibility power should let him phase right through Cinnabar's mercury cage unharmed... but he makes no attempt to escape. He doesn't even bother to float, and Cinnabar can't remember the last time they saw Hanako touch the ground. Right now, he's not the ghostly Dreamer based on a spooky urban legend... he's a very-much-alive teenage boy, and he's got it bad for Nene Yashiro.]

...At least Yashiro-san didn't have to hear that.

[Nene seems to be the romantic type. Cinnabar's knowledge of romance comes mainly from shoujo manga (and the classic Bride of Teki-Terra, of course), but they're pretty sure that Nene won't want to know the lewd details of Amane's dreams. That's an entirely different category of manga, after all.

Cinnabar lets their cage melt back into a silver puddle on the ground - since this dream will disappear for another year, they don't have to worry too much about their poison harming the environment.]


You should probably move away from the tree so it can't pick up on your subconscious wishes.

[They pause, looking down at Hanako.]

...You really like her, don't you?
hanamane: (✿ 016)

[personal profile] hanamane 2024-07-20 01:47 am (UTC)(link)
[There's a bit of a grumble from where he was still planted face down on the grassy ground, their suggestion clearly hitting a sore spot on his end.]

I did. Whaddya think I'm all the way out here for?

[It's not like Hanako would normally pick patrolling when he could be having fun with everyone else, after all! But clearly he hadn't moved far enough away-- maybe next year he should just try to find the edges of this dream and stick to those until this was all over, instead. He's had enough people prying into his subconscious, thank you very much!!

That last question of theirs, however, is met by a long stretch of silence, and for a moment, it seems like he was ignoring it entirely. But finally, he peeks up at Shinsha, face still tinted pink, looking absolutely wretched as he mumbles:]


... is it that obvious?

[He moves to flop over onto his back, the lack of mercury caging him in letting him spread out his limbs as he turns his way towards the dazzling sky. There's gotta be some sort of cosmic irony over airing out romantic grievances on Tanabata, of all things...]

I mean... not that it matters, anyway. I'm not really her type to begin with. She likes 'em tall and pretty, like Keiwa-san.

[A beat, as a thought occurs to him, and he shifts his gaze back over towards Cinnabun, before adding:]

... actually, I'm kinda surprised she hasn't gone gaga over you yet, to be honest.

[Granted, maybe he might not have been around on the shifts that Shinsha worked that Nene happened to drop in, so he couldn't say for sure. But with their long legs and androgynous looks, they seemed like they'd be the sort of person Nene would swoon over, right?]
hgs: (flustered)

[personal profile] hgs 2024-07-23 04:56 am (UTC)(link)
M...me!?

[Keiwa is arguably the most popular thing on Camellia's menu, drawing in even more customers than the coffee and cakes. Shinsha is content to stay in the background, working on floral arrangements or cleaning the kitchen while Keiwa handles the crowd. Customers who approach Shinsha are usually only there to ask (in whispered tones) whether Sakurai-san is single.

But... there are some regular customers who come in even on Keiwa's days off, who ask for Shinsha's dessert recommendations, who bring in flowers from their gardens as little gifts...

Cinnabar makes a choked noise in the back of their throat. What if Nene is one of their secret admirers and they just... never noticed?]


I-I'm sure Yashiro-san isn't interested in me that way... her affections would be wasted on someone like me.

[They clear their throat awkwardly.]

...In any case, I'm told that personality matters more than looks in these situations. If that's true, you're probably still in trouble.
hanamane: (✿ 002)

[personal profile] hanamane 2024-07-27 08:51 pm (UTC)(link)
[His eyes glance back over towards Shinsha as they sputter, raising an eyebrow of his dubiously at their response. Was it really that hard for them to believe? It's not like they were ugly or anything-- heck, they could probably be a decent model if they had more confidence. But then, Shinsha never really seemed interested in that sort of stuff-- or so he assumed, anyway, by the disgusted looks they usually gave him at his dirty jokes. But then, that's just probably a normal reaction]

Oh, I'm sure even you'd be able to notice it if she did. You can practically see the little cartoon hearts come off her sometimes.

[And if not that, then the glazed eyes and the goofy smile, at least! That was sort of hard to miss, wasn't it? Before he could say anything else on the matter, though, Shinsha's last little retort hits him with all the force of a hurled brick, and he gapes up at them for a good moment or two from his prone position on the ground. Did he just hear them right??]

... huh? [How could such a simple sound hold so much indignant disbelief--] Excuse me, my personality is fantastic, thank you very much. The little old ladies at the shop think I'm darling.

[Though that may just be them being relieved by his relatively tamer personality compared to Tsukasa... a stinky docile cat was better than a feral gremlin one, after all!]
daikonic: (DEEPLY regretting life choices)

Gagtag

[personal profile] daikonic 2024-07-11 10:43 am (UTC)(link)
[ Weirdly, she cares less about him having dirty thoughts about her than she cares about being called a daikon. ]
hanamane: (✿ 099)

[personal profile] hanamane 2024-07-13 01:31 pm (UTC)(link)
[GIRL......... PLEASE GET YOUR PRIORITIES IN ORDER]