Staging Area
Anybody got any suggestions about things they'd like to see in the tournament? I've got a simple concept in mind but I'd like to see if there are any other ideas. If there are no other contestants other than the current 6 (Coolrune, Toaster, Salsacookies, Hawk, Wolfkit and Alarith) and no groundbreaking suggestions, I'll start sometime this week.
John shrugged. "Nothing a torrent of couches couldn't fix, right?"
"Yeah, that's the spirit."
"By the way, big man hasn't made the announcement yet, but they're having you fight each other for the next challenge. Think you can manage with no weapons? I mean, it's not like you can launch a wall of couches.""Yes! My other entity! His name is...
...
...
Gerald! Yes, his name is Gerald! Go find Gerald and take care of him! In the meantime, I'm going to go hide from y- I mean, I'm going to go wait eagerly for your return! Over THERE! Right THERE!"
The moment the entity leaves, run in the direct opposite direction from the way I pointed. I am DONE with this guy.
"Gerald! Got it. I'll show her for trying to steal my player!"The crow cows angrily and flies away, releasing a small burst of lightning in the process.
"She won't know what hit her!"The moment it is out of sight, you run in the opposite direction from which you pointed. You run away from the town, crossing the bridge and then follow the path leading to a small watermill further up the stream.
"Yep."
Pick up something heavy to show my strength
You pick up John and Bryan to show your strength. They don't look very happy about that.
"Oh. Well, at its simplest form, cooking means preparing food. For example, most humans do not eat eggs or meat raw. That's because unlike those food bars of yours, they aren't ready to eat. They have to put them under a fire for a while, since that makes them safer to eat."
"But, and here's the interesting part, cooking also changes how things taste. And humans have that remarkable tendency for abusing their senses to derive more pleasure out of them. Colour, sound, danger, pain, alcohol, drugs, sex, they devote so much effort to transforming those into things that pleasantly stimulate their senses even more. Many times in ways they were not meant to be stimulated. And one of the greatest and easiest to receive sources of pleasure is, of course, food. Because almost everybody's got to eat, yet preparation can take little time and few societies frown upon preparing or enjoying food."
"Now, the most important thing to remember is that there is no right or wrong with eating. Want to mix watermelons and cheese? Go ahead. Want to mix salt with chocolate? No problem. Yoghurt with ketchup, rice and spaghetti, salad with alcohol and honey, any combination of food and any way to prepare it or consume it is acceptable. Food, like music or art, is a personal thing. The best thing you can do is experiment. Try new things. Figure out what you like. Sure, sometimes you'll end up with disasters, but sometimes you'll end up with something good. And in time, you'll figure out what you like, how each ingredient works and start knowing how to improve it. And after you find something you like, be it an ingredient or a recipe, don't just stick with that. Keep experimenting. Eating the same thing over and over again gets boring. It's variety that makes things interesting and fun."
"Of course there are recipes and simple bits of knowledge that will make your life easier and help you get started that I can share, if you want. Or we can just go ahead and have you try cook something of your own. Maybe deep fry one of those food bars of yours. I dunno. Got any questions, maybe?"
"Oh, and you've got to remember that organics like you might want to take it easy when outside of the staging area, unless you've got good endurance. Many of the things humans do for pleasure tend to imbalance their body and have an adverse affect to their health. But don't worry, in here you can do whatever you want, as long as it doesn't result to anyone's harm."The bartender finishes cooking his... thing and sets it down on the counter in a large plate.
Campaign
((Busy today.))
"Mmhh.. hungry.. need food.. soon."
He stole glances at Irine, his mind too deluded in the moment to consider the ethics of even thinking of making a meal of a friend of his.
Hungry.. anything would be nice about now. Cupcakes, grapes, bananas, cereal.. anything would work.
..
I wonder.. how foxes.. taste?
..mmh...
...Haha...
..WAIT. NO. NONONONONONONONO. WHAT THE HELL, NO. I NEED FOOD, BUT NEVER- NOT- NO, THAT WILL NEVER WORK. I WOULD RATHER DIE THAN DO THAT.
"Could.. could we get something to eat? Quickly? Just... something?"
Search for some food with Irine. Preferably, not Irine herself, because that would probably make me lose my mind. Afterwards, continue on the journey.
Hey! What? It's a perfectly legitimate and totally innocent question. You know, just wondering about things, it doesn't have to mean anything.
Like thinking "should I drink saltwater?" when thirsty or "what would be the best way to kill the others?" when dividing loot or "what would happen if someone was pushed into traffic?" when stopped at a pedestrian crossing or "how would a man react to being choked?" when you are standing over a sleeping person. You know, what ifs.
Everyone asks these sorts of questions, right? Right? It's just curiosity, purely theoretical. One could say academical. For science!
They say people will eat anything when hungry. Some even say that the way things taste changes when humans are very hungry. Their brain itself changes. And you're just wondering whether or not that's true.
The fact that there's a probably very tasty fox right there for you to experiment with has nothing to do with that. Nothing at all.
Yes, there's certainly nothing wrong with pursuing knowledge. It's a noble ideal, is it not? I mean, what if you end up having to eat a fox? Wouldn't you like to know how it tastes beforehand?
<Hunuh? Oh. Okay, I'm kinda hungry too anyway, let's find some food.>
hunt for food, cook it with my abilities, and give it to Zech.
((last post on reliable net, auto me if I can't make it for turns.))
((Okay. Hope all goes well.))
You start searching for food, smelling and listening for any signs of something edible.
The search is fruitless. There's only rotting, foul smelling corpses around and those would probably be unsuitable for consumption, unless you want to risk diseases. The creatures feeding on the corpses are not any better. Mostly small insects, flying or skittering around. And while those could be eaten by Irine, they'd need to capture a large number of them to sate Zechariah's hunger, assuming he is willing to eat them. Then again, judging from his looks, he'd start eating stones if he could chew them.
But then they catch a lucky break. Irine goes through a hole and finds a pair of rats, feeding on a corpse. Big rats. Really big rats. Larger than she is. And they don't look very happy that she's here, interrupting their meal. They start moving towards her. They could actually be dangerous, even to a human. But lucky for her, she may be unarmed, but she's not defenceless.
...
Zechariah watches the hole Irine went through, hoping she will come out with some food. A few seconds pass. His mind starts to wander, continuing to go in circles about the subject of food, when suddenly he is startled by jet of fire escaping from the hole at high speed. A few seconds later, Irine comes out dragging two giant rats that have been burnt to a crisp with her.
Well, it's probably going to taste like charcoal. And its a rat feasting on corpses, not one of the the healthiest things you could eat. But food is food, right? Beats rotting corpses.
Campaign, Ike!
"By the way, hope there's no hard feelings about me getting mind controlled back there like a complete chump - serves me right for being curious about the native wildlife and actually trying diplomacy for once. I'll try my best not to let it happen again, though with willpower as abysmal as mine, I can make no promises. For future reference, I'm pretty easy to mind control, apparently."
Follow River! Make conversation. Look, smell and listen while we encounter gaps in conversation.
"There are no 'hard feelings'. You were protecting us. You were alone. You did your best against an unknown foe much stronger than you. You did not give up. You kept fighting. I see nothing wrong with that.""Your weakness is not my problem. I can take care of myself. I am fine on my own. It is your problem. You are the one that will be more affected by it.""You are alive. You can improve. You can learn. You can become a better fighter."You keep moving, occasionally sniffing around for something of interest. Hm. That's strange... It's very faint, you would not have caught it if you weren't devoting attention to it, but you catch a scent that smells very... out of place. Very salty. It reminds you of the sea, not what you would expect to find in such dry terrain. Might be worth following the scent to investigate.