TANABATA ⟶ July Sanctuary Log

[likethelight]

 

Sanctuary - TANABATA

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"SEE YOU AGAIN, MOM"

The "star festival", celebrating the one time of the year when star-crossed lovers could cross over a sea of stars to meet again. One based on hopes, wishes, and the fervent desire to see each other again. Following the departure of Amaterasu back to the sea, wolf momgod of all who is responsible for the Guardian Saplings including the one Sanctuary has been founded around, Sanctuary is hosting the best approximation to a Tanabata celebration as the Trench will allow. Why? Because hope keeps the trees alive and strong, and Tanabata is about people having hope -- and would have been happening around the same time.

And because people miss dogmom and she would have liked it.

The festival is taking place at Sanctuary, but all Guardian Saplings can be paid visits. Paper for wishes and decorations have been set up at each/given to the other caretakers.

A Sea of Stars
The main hall has been transformed into a living night sky, with jars of hope from the moonlit butterflies back in April hung with care high up, each repacked with a single orb of hope per small vial with care, creating a river of starlike glowing lights overhead. The windows have been covered to aid with the nighttime effect, in addition to helping to keep out the light of the Beast Moon after dark. The gentle glow, as they are literally the tactile hopes and dreams of people, provides a small purifying, uplifting effect to everyone underneath. The light ebbs and flows calmly. The hall is cool as well, thanks to the pale/cold bloodstone cooling system that glows like moonstone along the walls and keeps the indoor areas regulated.

In the evening, as the sun sets, the new choir bell will ring out as well, cleansing corruption entirely from all who hear it. The lights gently pulse in time with it.

Wishes and the Guardian Sapling
The sapling is no longer in bloom, but despite the sweltering heat in full glory. Paper wishes are hung in its branches, along with origami streamers in colorful paper of cranes and other shapes. A bustle of activity is in the cloisters around it in particular, with most tables set up there to keep the courtyard itself clear. Origami streamers are hung in all the doorways leading out to it as well, creating the effect of string curtains, and there are paper lanterns as well.

A life-size stone statue of a wolf bearing a striking resemblance to Amaterasu has been erected next to the sapling, with her most radiantly happy canine expression she could sometimes get. There is room to place offerings for her, and people are encouraged that she would like "all the foods."

Colorful strips of paper (tanzaku) have been cut and placed out on a table in the cloisters surrounding the courtyard, where one can write their wishes for the next year down on them and hang them on the guardian sapling. They come in the following colors with a helpful, but... somewhat hard to read note with arcane handwritten note:

Red will help with wishes relating to ancestors and family, and giving thanks.
Yellow is the color of friendship and is the best choice for wishes about relationships.
White is the color for determination and responsibility, and for making personal resolutions.
Blue represents tranquility and trust and will aid wishes aimed at self-improvement.
Purple is the color to choose if you want to improve your brainpower and skills.

Food and Activities
Following all of the best creative recreation methods available to them in Trench, the cooks in the kitchens have been trained by Megumi Fushiguro, among others, on how to best serve culturally appropriate dishes. These foods are served free at little vendor booths in the main hall (with people encouraged to help out and help serve!) and include pawprint mochi (the inside is either chocolate or strawberry), pickled sakura mochi, mitarashi and tricolor dango, chilled somen with a yuzu-soy dipping sauce, various types of filled onigiri, and cut watermelon in a variety of shapes including stars, sunbursts, and pawprints. Many have been made with small amounts of the Paleblood jam from June and have mild corruption cleansing effects as well. Various kinds of tea made from the dried or pickled cherry blossoms and/or leaves of the guardian sapling are being served as well, and they have a corruption-cleansing effect and have been noted as tasting "heavenly". Some of the jams have been cut with fruit juice/lemonade and frozen into popsicles as well... you're welcome, CorruptionPops are now a thing.

Various demonstration and activity tables have been set up including origami, with... questionably penned instructions from Palamedes in an arcane style for several shapes including cranes, sunbursts, stars, and wolves. Various Sleepers familiar with the practice have also been encouraged to set up there and help teach people how, and everyone is encouraged to hang their completed crafts in the guardian sapling. Most of the paper is red, white, pink, and gold. Paper lanterns have been made as well and light up various parts of the whole festivities.

A few vendor booths are set up, including one "selling" white yukata, trimmed in red and gold and bearing a distinctive star pattern on the back of it and intricate embroidery. Most Sanctuary members would receive one for free if they expressed interest, and anyone else can receive one for volunteering their time and helping out. People are encouraged to wear them for the celebration if they didn't have their own; these are styled in honor of Amaterasu.

Koz Orphanage has been specially invited as well, and children from it can be found running around during much of the event and given various activities to do or items to play with.

Sparklers are available for individuals as well, also courtesy of Viktor. Perhaps there might even be glowsticks from someone... :)

Fireworks and Closing Celebrations
On the final night, all the wishes will be gathered from the trees and collected in a ceremonial firepit. The wishes are burnt in order to release them to the heavens to be heard—and perhaps by Amaterasu still at sea—and will be ignited by several Sleepers with fire abilities (Shouto Todoroki, Megumi Fushiguro).

As they're burnt a fireworks display will begin overhead, launched from the steeple up high, courtesy of Viktor and anyone else assisting him in the matter. Anyone outside watching them in the courtyard will have the effects of the Beast Moon diminished by the blessing in effect from Moon Presence. The choir bell will toll a final time at the end, to clear the effects of any lingering corruption, and signal an end to the festivities.

WHAT

Sanctuary is about humane beast purification efforts and corruption relief. Renovations began in May 2022 and room clearing and rebuilding is still in progress. Beast patrol efforts and purification started more in earnest in June-July.

All roles are volunteer on an as-you-can basis up to full time, with time reimbursed by food, shelter, care, and community support. And because it's run by people who BLEED SENTIMENTALITY EVERYWHERE in addition to being founded on discovery of a Guardian Sapling, it's hosting a Tanabata celebration in conjunction with honoring the memory of Amaterasu.

WHEN

Starting July 7, ending after a few days in a final celebration and ceremonial burning of the wishes.

THINGS OF NOTE

Tanabata
➢ Please feel free to presume your character could have helped out with setup if they have any ties to Sanctuary or characters here! If they would provide a food, service, or game they are free to have a table set up.

➢ This event is open to the whole of Trench and would have been freely advertised as such, including as a safe place to treat effects from the Beast Moon and corruption.

General / Member Update
➢ Sanctuary has been blessed by Moon Presence for the month of July, thanks to the efforts of Luna and Sansa. All negative effects of July and the Beast Moon are lessened within its walls, and anyone meaning Sanctuary or the people in it will be physically repelled. Lunar flowers have begun growing up the sides of the monastery in earnest like morning glories as a result.

➢ as of June, coordinated efforts to patrol Trench on their own and save Beasts and people both have begun. Members will be on a group chat in order to coordinate with each other and reach out to purification Sleepers when encountering Beasts. Everyone is encouraged to work in teams, especially to partner with someone who can purify Beasts or corruption.

➢ a training facility has opened up, with currently self-defense hand-to-hand combat classes being taught by Jason and others willing to train others encouraged to come forward. Fighters on patrol and wardens will be contacted to let them know about open sparring times so members can coordinate better in fights. There is an indoor room with training dummies (that fight back courtesy of Viktor) that opens up into an outdoor space between two of the long halls that can also be used.

➢ with the hidden archives now unlocked, scholarly members of Sanctuary are encouraged to help study them and uncover other artifacts—and especially the strange new locked door discovered within.

➢ there is a family of batcat kittens old enough to be crawling everywhere throughout the building now. They might still be learning manners and latch onto you in an overexcitement to taste your blood from time to time.

➢ the large communal baths have been cleared out and renovated, thank god. They run on being open to male-identifying characters for one set of hours, female-identifying for another, and the rest of the time operate on "nobody cares". Privacy screens are hung between the tubs though—one side is regularly cooled down with ice for the hot months.

➢ with more people needing safe harbor during the Beast Moon and rising violence from natives during July, more actual rooms have been cleared out and are free to use for anyone who will also help work to maintain the place (chores, grounds keeping, etc.). There are always spare beds in the infirmary wing as well.

➢ members who patrol or purify beasts/fight in some way now have access to various relic items that have been donated for use for when they are actively on patrol. These will eventually be tracked in the member spreadsheet... eventually. Just give them back when you're done.

➢ Viktor and K's efforts have resulted in the lunar generator coming online and bringing lunar lighting and cooling throughout the building via a cold-pale bloodstone network. Rejoice!

➢ There is now a small, hidden stash of coffee bartered from Dabi. Someone might have to pry it from Viktor's jittery fingers.

 

This log is WIDE OPEN for Tanabata festivities and serves as the general log for Sanctuary for the month. Go wild and do whatever you want, have fun with your top levels, etc. :)

Comments

[megatheorem]

[If Palamedes should ever be asked what his singular gift is, his greatest skill, it would be this: he can think. He thinks now, and it isn't hard to slide the pieces into place; she tells him her name, and of her family, and dances around the subject of the other day all the while, and so: oh. He fell into the sea, and so he can be trusted with this. He didn't cut any throats or stand idly by during the cutting, so he's passed some kind of unknown test.

He'll feel some kind of way about that eventually. For now, the boiling hot jumble of his emotions has cooled to something hard— he feels almost distanced from a wholly realized emotion besides the ones Viktor has eked out of him, which he's already rationalized as a defense mechanism.

He rolls the apple back and forth between his palms and says,] He's lied the entire time. If he tears a hole in this world and goes back, I think he'll drop my entire people into the sun without hesitation.

[So there's a sobering thought. He looks away from her, down the hall and at nothing at all, a shade more tired than a moment ago.]

More than likely for my crime of not being interested in his bullshit. —Sorry.

[For swearing and also dumping this abruptly; he shakes his head.]

Be mindful, I suppose. When picking up.

[dohaeris]

[well, that's familiar enough to sansa, and also–not, incomprehensible power. so the emperor is her worst fear, somehow, littlefinger with all the power of–more than the white walkers, more than any of the stories. it isn't fair. of course it isn't. it's never been. she smiles humorlessly.]

I'll have to be more than that if I ever want to save my people–whatever's left of them come spring.

[what had lazarus told her when she was crying on her kitchen floor? that there were still unknowns she might discover to help her, that it wasn't over so long as she was alive. she's not sure that would be in the best taste, if he's spent the past two days as a squid. she doesn't know. what she does know:]

The Emperor couldn't tear a hole in this world, and now all the Pthumerians have seen him try.

[her smile twists.]

My Lord Father wouldn't fight in the melee, because he never wanted his enemies to see what he could do.

[it's unlikely that he should succeed if he tries again. but, sansa would be remiss if she didn't at least offer to lend her expertise. she knows men like the emperor. she hesitates a moment.]

I know how to flatter men like him. I know the games they play. I would help you, if it came down to it.

[megatheorem]

I don't play games with tyrants.

[He's tired, and it comes out gently enough, but this is not a point he's willing to compromise on. No, he's not interested in making himself a game piece on this particular board, and especially not when the people he loves are involved simply by knowing him.

He says,] Thank you, but I'm tired of pretending this disaster has only two sides. He can burn, for all I care, but I'm taking my family and leaving his blast area.

[Vengeance is for the short-sighted and the thought of playing the game exhausts him, but taking the shortest path out of the fray is clear-cut and immediate. He's had it; he's done.]

And if you think me a coward for that, that's your own problem. [Anna screamed it at him for leaving the beach, and he doesn't imagine she's the only one who might think so—] Keeping him placated isn't my job— literally. Whatever the rest of you need of me, I'll try; but not if it makes my people collateral.

[dohaeris]

[sansa lets out a tiny huff of laughter–surprised, perhaps, at the absurdity of anyone telling her this, when all she had wanted for so long was a way out of their games–]

No, it's wise counsel. It's how House Stark survived for thousands of years–it's only that sometimes the tyrants play games with us.

[she would have given anything to take her family and leave–except she hadn't, had she, but she didn't understand it, then–she had been misled. they all had. she can't forget who was at fault. she can't blame herself. this was done to her.]

It's terrible, placating them. You shouldn't do it, if you have any other choice. I would have never left Winterfell–

[but that's another road that leads nowhere. anything might have happened. bausphomette showed her that.]

He should burn. But he shouldn't take anyone else with him.

[megatheorem]

[Palamedes lets out a short huff, looking down to put the apple - into his pocket, where it may look silly but at least he'll stop squeezing it mercilessly. Alright.]

I'm not giving counsel, I'm telling you what I'm doing.

[Different items. He frowns.]

And, again: I don't disagree. But I'm not risking my people for the sake of the ones who want to play with fire. They should know better by now.

[dohaeris]

[lady whines gently as the apple disappears. sansa frowns gently.]

I would never ask that of you.

[she thinks about bran the breaker and joramun's armies. it wouldn't work if the night's king and his corpse queen could just resurrect their fallen. there must be something she's missing. or it might just be that in her world, the wights will burn.]

I only meant to offer what aid I can. He thinks himself equal to the Pthumerians; I imagine some of them might be eager to prove otherwise.

[she smiles grimly.]

I just hope none of us are in the...blast area?

[this is the first time she's ever used this phrase and it doesn't sound as clever as she hoped it might.]

[megatheorem]

[The frown tightens for a moment- can nobody in this city stop obsessing over Emperor Nobodycares for ten minutes- and he shrugs.]

I'm not going to waste time and energy wondering about it. Shockingly, I have the rest of my life to get back to.

[Apple pockets, and so on.]

[dohaeris]

[sansa forces herself to be patient, as palamedes has probably just died, or at least fallen into the pthumerian ocean, which can't be very pleasant–especially during a battle, especially during a battle with mariana. she smiles as politely as she can.]

Well, I shouldn't like to keep you from it. I hope you're able get some rest before the Tanabata festival.

[sansa fixes lady with a look that says there are more apples in the kitchen. she will have to go fetch one, now.]