Kyuden Shika

"It's pressure."

With a rough strike, he returned to practice as he explained.

"It's weird to think about but, when you put something people naturally crave on the line, who do they go to afterwards when they feel tired or upset or angry? They aren't going to spend time with people they come to dislike or who leave them angry. Given some time, patterns start to form, and affections are forged in fire."

He made another strike.

"The rice gets cooking when you let people decide who marries who based on this arbitrary set of tasks, or as you'd call them, 'bullshit'. Suddenly it's not just 'let's impress Shika-san for the glory of the clan', but you're playing go for the future love of your life. Is it ethical? ...On reflection, no. Fortunes know I'd need a very serious reason to let my child go to one of these Topaz Miais. But it forges marriages, and thus alliances, in fire, which in theory should make them stronger and more steeled for what the future holds for them."

Another draw.

"Does my theory make sense?"

"All except for the part where I fell head over heels for a ronin. What alliance is there to be won, hm?"

"That,"

The Kitsu responded as if he had expected this,

"Would be between you and the Deer and the ronin. The ronin would owe the hosts for letting them into the Miai - and thus into a clan - so they would in theory remember and vouch for the Deer when appropriate. That'd be the theory, at least -"

sheathed.

"But as we discussed yesterday, the world is messier in practice than the labels we place in theory."

"And the part where ronin aren't a unified group with any shared sense of obligation."

"Yes, but that goes into the question of why Aimi-san was invited in the first place, which I wouldn't feel is an appropriate line of inquiry for one as uninvolved as I."

"Just saying. There are... corner cases which make me question the broader supposition."

Another vicious swing, this one rising from the floor.

"And what of those who have refused to participate? That big Scorpion I saw around but never at the events, for example."

Shiba Raizo wrote: ↑

Mon Sep 06, 2021 9:42 pm

"Just saying. There are... corner cases which make me question the broader supposition."

Another vicious swing, this one rising from the floor.

"And what of those who have refused to participate? That big Scorpion I saw around but never at the events, for example."

"Individuals with their own reasons, I imagine - it was the clans that sent them to the miai, not them. Those with no drive to hunt will be given scraps off the table, which still result in a marriage. A technical completion of duty, but one punished for not following the spirit of the competition with getting whoever you get."

The Kitsu drew once more.

"Between you and me, I'd put my honour on the Scorpion having lost someone dear. It's not my place to comment, but every conversation feels like she's been grieving for a long time - and I would know grief."

"Everybody here's grieving something."

A disemboweling stroke across a horizontal axis followed.

"And I don't know that they'll be punished any more than those of us with strong hopes that don't have them met."

"Hence why I don't call it ethical."

"The whole process is... vexing."