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yumemigaoka2024-07-07 02:09 pm
beautifuldreamermods) wrote in 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?
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Still, it's not his business to sus out any of the details. So he shelves the deflection and the nonchalant smile for later (in case it does become a problem)]
That's... Kinda sad to think about. Here, you can be whatever or whoever you want to be and you choose to be a problem for yourself. [he turns to look out at all the non-Dreamers and huffs a little] Some people go through life living up to other people's expectations or lying to themselves to survive. What's the point of a Dream if you're just going to treat it the same as if it was real? Seems like a waste to me.
And I hate to disappoint but... [a grin as he gestures to himself in a 'ta-da' fashion] What you see is what you get; just a guy who loves adventure.
no subject
Boooo... you say all of that, and you're still the same guy you are back in the real world? Lame. You said you can be whoever you wanna be, right?
[Not that Hanako can recognize somebody who's absolutely and wholly confident in themselves and who they are. Couldn't be him!!
His eyes travel back out to the gathering, Dreamers and regular folk alike milling about the field, his expression tempering to something a bit more pensive. If only it were as easy as leaving all of your troubles behind in the real world...]
... anyway, it's not as simple as all of that. Sure, we get to be the people we wanna be here, but that doesn't mean all our problems are gone when we're awake. Most Dreamers Awaken 'cos of Nightmares, don't they? And happy, content people don't exactly generate those things on their own. Sure, being a Dreamer means we can protect the rest of the people here from them, but... it's not like we immediately eliminated those problems from reality just because we can fight a bunch of monsters or anything.
no subject
[for anyone else, it's clearly putting on airs, but from Sonic? He's one of maybe two people in the entire city that's perfectly happy with themselves (Chaosbringer being the OG, of course). Basically, Hanako's attempt at a reversal has bounced harmlessly off of his target]
Sure, but even happy and content people have their worries. Just because you have one Nightmare doesn't mean you stop dreaming. [he looks at the crowd, and his confident smirk turns to something a little gentler] And you're a Dreamer, aren't you? I heard that people who awaken via a nightmare attack do so because they overcame it. They didn't back down. So why let your insecurities stop from doing it again?
[he crosses his arms and looks at Hanako]
Life's not perfect. Stuff's going to inevitably go wrong, but you just gotta pick yourself up again and keep going. Knowing things can go wrong is why things going right feels so much better!
no subject
He shrugs a shoulder indifferently in response, keeping his eyes still trained on the crowds of people around them.]
Oh yeah, fighting against a real monster is easy enough. You just attack it until it's dead and boom, problem solved. But you can't really do that with your troubles in real life, can you? It's not like you can beat up an illness or fistfight any bad feelings you happen to have and be done with it. We wouldn't have these problems to deal with if things were as straight-forward as that.
[He finally turns back to Nikki, the bright smile on his face wide and friendly and absolutely 100% customer service levels of fake.]
Ah-- not that you would know anything about that, right? Mr. "I'm So Happy To Be Me"? I bet you were probably one of those Dreamers who just happened to Awaken all on your own, weren't you!
[And you wonder why people complain about your personality, Hanako.......]
no subject
Y'know... That unchecked bitterness is probably what Nightmares are made of. Might want to get that checked out before it bites you and everyone around you again.
[Hanako's toilet vibes don't even bother Sonic - he's been through Casinopolis' sewers, he's smelled some things - who continues on like this is a perfectly normal conversation]
Well, at least we know that no one bullies you. [a stretch before he crosses his arms behind his head, pose languid and comfortable] But with an attitude like that, no wonder you styled yourself after a toilet ghost.
[when Hanako points out that Sonic is someone who probably awakened without a Nightmare catalyst, he just grins in response] Hey now. Don't sell yourself short. Staring down something made of a person's worst thoughts and feelings only to decide you're going to fight that anyway? Come on, you have to admit that's pretty impressive too!