The story
Fiction and adapted settings written by Akitsora Gaming for this title, including invented dialogue and events. This is not a historical or folklore reference. The rules and specification tables define the gameplay and math.
An ancient pond / a frog leaps in / the sound of water.
— Matsuo Bashō
I. The Hanging Scroll in the Alcove
In a quiet thatched hermitage, a travelling poet sits before the tokonoma alcove with an inkstone and brush laid ready on the low desk. A single seasonal branch rests in a bamboo vase beside a vertical silk scroll, while outside the open veranda a green frog crouches on a mossy stone at the edge of an old pond.
The reel grid is that three-column hanging scroll, arranged in the classic five-seven-five rhythm of a Japanese haiku poem. Symbols pay whenever matching imagery appears across all three vertical lines at once, turning every spin of the silk scroll into a brief verse brushed in black ink.
II. The First Season Word Sets the Mood
No true haiku is complete without a kigo — a season word that anchors the poem in one of the four seasons of the year. When the reels come to rest in the base game, the very first Season words wild found on the scroll sets the season of that spin to spring, summer, autumn, or winter.
Each of the four seasons is paired with its own emblem of nature on the paytable, and whichever low symbol matches the active season has its payout multiplied for that spin. At the same time, every season word on the scroll acts as a wild symbol to link verses across all three vertical lines.
III. A Frog Leaps into the Ancient Pond
As the poet listens to the stillness of the garden, the Frog symbol may land on the middle line of the hanging scroll. With a sudden spring, it leaps straight into the pond below, sending ripples from top to bottom and transforming that entire middle column into the wild Sound of water.
Because the spin's active season is read before the frog jumps into the water, any season word covered by the splash still counts toward setting the season of the verse, while the full-column water wild bridges every matching symbol shared between the left and right lines.
IV. Masterpieces Under the Moon
Open enough stitched Haiku notebook scatters and the room gathers under the moon for the Haiku Gathering. Here the four seasons rotate in strict order — spring, summer, autumn, and winter, one season per spin — and whenever all three lines hold a season word or a leaping frog, a Masterpiece is brushed onto the scroll for a multiplied payout.
Best of all, if the frog leaps on the middle line while both outer lines display the old pond itself, the scroll completes Bashō's immortal verse for the highest multiplier in the game. Seventeen syllables holding a whole season is the game's poetic theme, not a promise: every spin's outcome is still decided by the RGS random number generator.