Once upon a time...
... there lived a Goddess who spent every day peering out at the world she held so dear from the top of a large tower. She was a kind and merciful deity that looked after the land and the animals who called it home. However, she was lonely up in her tower. She wished that she could run free and be among the creatures she so very much loved with all her heart. Alas, it could never be; for who would look after the world from her tower while she was out having fun with the animals? She wept for thirteen days and thirteen nights, saddened at the thought of spending eternity alone.At the base of the tower lived The Rat (Vacant) and The Cat, who were the best of friends. They heard the Goddess' cry and it worried them. Together, the two friends climbed the tower and met with the Goddess for the first time.
"Do not cry," said The Cat, "We know you are lonely, but now we are here to be with you." The Goddess was delighted and was ever grateful to the Cat and the Rat for comforting her.
"I will go and gather the other animals," said The Rat, "and together we will all have a party!"
So The Rat went out and invited many animals to come and be with the Goddess up in her tower for a large party. There was The Ox (Vacant), The Tiger (Vacant), The Rabbit (Vacant), The Sheep (Vacant), The Dragon (Vacant), The Boar (Vacant), The Dog (Vacant), The Bird (Vacant), The Snake (Vacant), The Monkey (Vacant) and The Horse (Vacant). When all the animals arrived, they celebrated with a magnificent banquet and partied together through the night.
When morning came, the animals left the tower and promised to return again the next night to be with the Goddess. At first, She was delighted that she had friends, however the Goddess grew sad during the day when she could not be with her new friends. She wrote up thirteen invitations and handed them to The Rat.
"Give one of these to each of the animals," She pronounced ecstatically, "For tomorrow I will hold the grandest of parties, one that will last forever, and I want all the animals to attend". The Rat, filled with excitement, scurried off to hand out invitations to all the other animals. Yet when it came time for The Rat to hand The Cat his invitation, he lied and told him that The Goddess was not having anymore parties. For you see, The Rat had noticed how The Goddess loved The Cat more than the other animals and grew jealous of his friend.
The day of the party arrived and The Rat hitched a ride up the tower on the back of The Ox. All the animals had arrived for the party that would never end; all except the cat. Greatly saddened by The Cat's betrayal, The Goddess refused to let The Cat into her tower for the rest of the eternity - cursing him to listen to the sounds of Her and the animals having a grand time while he sat below, forever lonely.
The Sohma Family
In the present day, The Sohma family stands as a very large and infamous group residing in the rural areas of Tokyo, Japan. The family owns a large compound where the clan members live among each other as well as an enclosed inner circle where only the most prestigious of the clan are able to reside with their families. To most, they seem to be a fairly ordinary group of people. They go about their days, enjoying school and being with friends just like any normal person. However, the Sohma family harbors a dark secret. Every generation, thirteen members of the Sohma Family are possessed by a spirit of the Chinese Zodiac; including The Cat who was shunned by all the other animals.The curse encompasses their entire being, causing them to transform into their Zodiac Spirit when they become weak or embrace a member of the opposite gender. Bound together by this fate, these members have previous lived in secrecy out of fear of being exposed by the outside world; a fear put there by Jin Sohma, the current head of the Sohma Clan. However as the tide begins to shift, the latest generation of the Zodiac Curse have begun to wish for a life outside the walls of the Inner Circle. Reluctantly, Jin Sohma agreed to give them some freedom to choose where they may go to school. The Cursed members of the Sohma Family are about to begin their first day at a school outside of the Sohma Clan's Inner Circle. The party is about to begin, and everyone's invited!
Greetings and welcome to 'A Banquet for All', based off of one off my all time favorite romance Manga 'Fruits Basket' by Natsuki Takaya. I have taken some liberties with the portrayal of certain things from the canon but essentially the gist of the story is the same. We will be playing as either members of the zodiac, the Sohma Family or outsiders who are wanting to befriend members of the family. I'm not sure how many players I'm looking for, but I'd like it to be a decent handful.
All in all, I'm looking for a group of dedicated roleplayers who are comfortable with writing at the High Casual to Advanced level to play an interesting character in which we can create our own stories with throughout the roleplay. As you can guess the main conflicts in this roleplay are going to be character driven so it is important that we have a variety of well rounded characters that are going to bounce off of each other well to essentially set our scene. I hope that many of you will be interested. With that, let me just say that I really want this to be an enjoyable and emotional experience for everyone involved. I know that I can never imitate the magic that was Fruits Basket, but with the help of the RPGuild community I'm sure we can develop a story that's just as well loved and remembered by us as the original.
Roleplay Rules
- General Roleplay rules apply. No Godmodding, Metagaming etc. Things we all have accepted as the "Don'ts" of roleplaying.
- The character that acts as God is an NPC. Furthermore, they haven't been born yet in our story.
- Every roleplayer can have a maximum of 3 characters, but one of them MUST be a member of the Zodiac.
- Keep characters realistic. Humans are flawed individuals. No Mary Sues or Gary Stu's. That isn't to say you aren't allowed unique character traits such as odd colored hair etc. As long as you present me a character that isn't a flawless cherub cast out of heaven or Satan then we will have no dramas here.
- Keep OOC conflict between roleplayers private. If it becomes an issue, contact a GM to sort it out.
- Keep OOC in the OOC Thread and IC in the IC thread.
- Listen to the GMs. Debates are encouraged but the final word always rests on the GMs.
- Romance is encouraged, but I believe it goes without saying that anything involving sexual relationships between characters is a no-no. You're welcome to take that to a private discussion if that's what you'd like, but here we're sticking to PG 13.
- Have Fun! That's why we're here after all.
