>Examine ourselves. Get bearings.
> You are still in the grand square in Heaven that leads in all the compass directions. It has been completely abandoned at some point, you are not sure when.
> You are still yourself, as far as you can tell. Your left arm that should have been shredded by Shou's attack is whole, and even your clothes are good as new.
> Assess the woman and get ready to attack.
> She is painful to look at.
Divinity courses within her like a mighty river, radiating off her in blinding waves. She
must have
greed and
ambition and
age within her, but you cannot see them.
> You draw your sword.
>"Do you wish to fight me?"
> "You have something to do with the Palace of Night and Day, don't you?"
> "It doesn't matter, I'm only here for one thing anyway."
> "Oh, goodness me!" she says, not to anyone in particular, her voice echoing across the empty square, "A mortal
threatens me, with the desire to claim something that is not
hers! Why, this goes against
every Mandate in Heaven!"
> "Why, should she succeed, what an uproar there would be!" She raises her hands to her face in mock horror. "Heaven
itself would practically come crumbling down under the weight of its own hubris!"
> She looks straight at you, smiling an unpleasant smile, and opens her hand that holds the miniature sun.
> "
Here you go."
> You don't know what she does after, for the sun shoots straight into your chest like an arrow and everything goes
golden.
>
Divinity pulses its way through your body, touching every part of
you. Your muscles grow stronger, your eyes sharper, your mind quicker, but the infusion goes so much deeper than that. The strangest sensation of
authority fills you. The authority to
challenge, the ability to
refuse and the ability to
declare things the mortal cannot.
> With no place for it any more, the tiger-essence departs your body, leaving only the strangest ability. You know that you can, with absolute certainty,
sever the left arm of Are of the Hieda, as Shou did so many years ago.
> Your vision clears. You are not in Heaven any more.
> You can see
everything.
Concepts float around you like petals in the wind, and you can pluck them out of the air with a thought. With a single strike of your sword you could take the
flow out of a river or the
dark out of the night.
> It is a beautiful day. The air is warm, but a gentle breeze blows to make it pleasant. You are sitting on the top of a small hill, and before you grasslands stretch out as far as the eye can see. You remember this place, you stopped here with Youmu on the way to see the Lady Saigyouji.
> And here is Youmu, sitting at your side, a black-and-white form, looking so fragile as though a strong gust of wind might blow her away.
> "Thank you, Aichi," she says, "thank you for everything you have done for me. I have... had a good life."
> This is it. This is your
last chance to stop Youmu from passing on. She will no longer regress. Should you succeed, you will have bought only until sundown for Youmu to pass on.
> You have no time to
observe her to determine
strengths and
weaknesses.
> Fortunately, you have a few advantages from having known her since childhood.
> You can use the
Guilt ability
once to guarantee an
automatic success or to nullify an
automatic failure. This must be used in conjunction with presenting an argument.
> You can use the
Best Friend ability
once to guarantee an
automatic success or to nullify an
automatic failure. This must be used in conjunction with presenting an argument.
> A reminder of the social combat system:
> Every round you must make an argument that is relevant to the stakes at hand.
> If Youmu has no good response, it will count as a
success. If Youmu has a response available, then no progress is made. With no progress three times in a row Youmu will recognise that you are
stalling and it will count as an
automatic failure.
> Arguing against a
weakness prevents Youmu from coming up with a response - it is an
automatic success.
> Arguing against a
strength provides Youmu assurance that she is correct - it is an
automatic failure.
> Four successes will induce enough doubt in Youmu to stall her passing on.
> Three failures will show to Youmu that her time on the mortal plane is over.
> Enforced Participation Corollary: every participating player may present only
one argument,
once. If a player does not wish to present an argument, they may do the following instead:
> You can use the
Flashback ability to reveal
one each of Youmu's
strengths and
weaknesses. This counts as presenting an argument for purposes of player participation.
