Calendar & Festivals

Yomi no Sho runs on a ritual year loosely based on the traditional Japanese calendar, with four major festivals corresponding to the four seasons. Each festival is a two-week in-game event with unique content, limited-time Shades, and lore drops that advance the game’s overarching plot. The ritual year is also reflected in the ambient world — the Banks of Sanzu are slightly different in spring than in winter, and the Hollow Shrine’s lantern cycle shifts with the seasons.

This page describes the ritual year, the four major festivals, and the smaller recurring events that punctuate the calendar.

The ritual year

The ritual year is divided into four seasons of three months each, with each season anchored by a major festival. The seasons do not correspond to real-world seasons — the ritual year is its own calendar, synced to the game’s release cycle rather than the Earth’s orbit. A ritual year is exactly 48 weeks, with each season lasting 12 weeks and each festival running for the final 2 weeks of its season.

The seasons are:

1. Spring of Lanterns — the season of arrival, when new souls enter Yomi in greatest numbers.
2. Summer of Bells — the season of celebration, when the souls of Mount Kagura are most active.
3. Autumn of Tethers — the season of unfinished business, when the Field of Tethered Bones is most dangerous.
4. Winter of Ash — the season of diminution, when souls fade most rapidly and the Sunless Throne is most accessible.

Each season has a corresponding Warden whose blessing is enhanced during that season. During the Spring of Lanterns, Sanzu-no-Onna’s Safe Passage blessing is doubled; during the Summer of Bells, Kagutsuchi’s Ember Joy is doubled; and so on. This creates a natural rotation in the optimal farming focus across the year.

The Spring Festival: Matsuri of Arrival

The Matsuri of Arrival is the spring festival, running for the last two weeks of the Spring of Lanterns. It is the game’s “anniversary” event — the festival that celebrates the game’s release — and it is consistently the largest content drop of the year. The festival introduces:

• A limited-time Shade, typically an SSR-rarity unit whose lore ties into the theme of arrival and new beginnings. Past festival Shades have included Hana-no-Yado (the Innkeeper of Flowers, 2024) and Aki-no-Tsuki (the Moon of Autumn, 2025 — released early as a tie-in to the Autumn of Tethers).
• A limited-time zone, accessible only during the festival, with unique encounters and a unique material drop. The zone is thematically linked to the festival’s lore drop and is removed from the game when the festival ends.
• A story quest chain that advances the overarching plot. The chain is permanent — players who miss the festival can play it later — but the festival’s unique items and Shades are not.
• A community leaderboard, ranking players by festival-specific accomplishments. The top 100 players receive a cosmetic reward; the top 10 receive a permanent title.

The Matsuri of Arrival is the most generous event of the year. Free-to-play players can typically summon 30–40 times during the festival without spending real money, which is roughly 4–5 times the normal monthly summon rate.

The Summer Festival: Matsuri of Bells

The Matsuri of Bells is the summer festival, running for the last two weeks of the Summer of Bells. It is the smallest of the four festivals in terms of content but the most mechanically focused. The festival is built around Mount Kagura and the worship of Kagutsuchi.

The festival introduces:

• A time-attack challenge on Mount Kagura, with a leaderboard ranking players by clear speed. The challenge uses a modified version of the zone with adjusted enemy stats and a fixed party composition (the player must use Kagutsuchi’s signature Shade).
• A crafting event, where players collect festival-specific materials to craft a unique item. The item is always a best-in-slot option for a fire-aspected Shade, which makes the festival a high priority for accounts building around Kagutsuchi.
• A lore drop focused on Kagutsuchi’s backstory. The lore is delivered through environmental storytelling in the festival zone — there are no cutscenes, only item descriptions and environmental cues.

The Matsuri of Bells is the favourite festival of the lore-focused community. The environmental storytelling is dense and the writing quality is consistently high; the festival’s lore drops have produced some of the most-discussed theories in the community.

The Autumn Festival: Matsuri of Tethers

The Matsuri of Tethers is the autumn festival, running for the last two weeks of the Autumn of Tethers. It is the most combat-focused of the four festivals and the most punishing for underlevelled accounts. The festival is built around the Field of Tethered Bones.

The festival introduces:

• A wave-survival mode in the Field, where players face escalating waves of Tethered Skeletons. The mode runs in 10-wave increments, with a checkpoint every 10 waves. The leaderboard ranks players by the deepest wave reached.
• A world boss that spawns in the Field during the festival’s final week. The boss is a unique Tethered Skeleton variant with significantly inflated stats and a unique mechanic — it grows stronger with each wave it survives, which creates a soft enrage timer.
• A limited-time Shade, typically a tank-aspected unit whose lore ties into the theme of persistence and unfinished business.

The Matsuri of Tethers is the festival most likely to overwhelm new players. The wave-survival mode is balanced for Ascension-3 parties, and accounts below that threshold will struggle to clear even the first checkpoint. The community recommends that new players save their resources for the Matsuri of Arrival instead, which is more accessible.

The Winter Festival: Matsuri of Ash

The Matsuri of Ash is the winter festival, running for the last two weeks of the Winter of Ash. It is the most lore-heavy of the four festivals and the most directly tied to the game’s overarching plot. The festival is built around the Sunless Throne and the Unmade.

The festival introduces:

• A permanent expansion to the Sunless Throne, adding new encounters and a new boss phase. The expansion is permanent — it remains in the game after the festival ends — but the festival is the only time the new content is celebrated with unique rewards.
• A lore drop focused on the Loss and the Scribe’s role in it. This is the festival where the game’s biggest plot twists are typically revealed.
• A cosmetic event, where players collect festival-specific materials to craft unique visual customisations for their Shades. The cosmetics are exclusive to the festival and do not return in subsequent years.

The Matsuri of Ash is the most anticipated festival of the year. The lore drops are major events in the community, with players gathering on Discord to discuss each new reveal in real time. The festival’s reputation for plot twists has made it the most-watched event on the game’s streaming community.

Smaller recurring events

In addition to the four major festivals, the calendar includes several smaller recurring events that punctuate the year:

• The Monthly Memorial. On the first of each month, all players receive a free Sanzu Coin and a small bundle of Ascension materials. This is the game’s primary pacing mechanism for free-to-play players.
• The Weekly Watch. Each week, a different Warden’s blessing is enhanced for 24 hours. The rotation is fixed and predictable; see the Reference section for the schedule.
• The Dark Moon. Once per season, on the new moon, the Sunless Throne’s difficulty is reduced and its rewards are increased. This is the optimal time to attempt the Unmade King for accounts that cannot clear him on standard difficulty.
• The Scribe’s Day. Once per year, on the anniversary of the Scribe’s appointment, the Scribe offers a unique quest with a unique reward. The quest is short — typically 30 minutes — but the reward is a cosmetic that cannot be obtained any other way.

Further reading

• Pantheon — the gods honoured by each festival.
• Realms of Yomi — the zones that host each festival.
• Patch Notes — historical record of festival content updates.