Try to make a vessel that could float on the water.
[5] You realize that it's time to stop messing around and get down to business, put your firewood away and then fell some trees, from which you make a perfectly respectable raft. This in combination with some sails, which you learn how to make from Kurgle, lets you prepare a very decent water vehicle.
Try to bribe them with my unlimited amounts of alcohol, promise I can make more.
[5] The thought appeals to them, and they decide that perhaps they will take you up on that offer. Especially when they've dragged you back to the forest, only to find it completely burned, any visible signs of their own tribe completely gone. They ask you, what do you need to make this alcohol?
Search for any evidence which may help us learn who's kidnapping our people
[3] The Gulls seem the likeliest suspect, but then again, that might just be what the real kidnapper wanted you to think. Or maybe the Gulls really did do it, and hoped that people would think they were too obvious a group of suspects. Or maybe the Heads faked the whole thing so that they had a pretext to turn against the Gulls. Or maybe the quiet Spears were responsible, hoping to weaken the two other tribes to take control of the council more readily. Or perhaps it was someone else entirely - your investigation reveals little, for the women and children seem to have disappeared without a trace, considering the terrain is unsuitable to check for tracks. There are no signs of violence, though, this you can tell - whoever took them away, the people went freely, so that rules out any truly hostile parties. But who does that leave, then?
Despite everything, I'm still a scout and I know the layout of the land. Carefully travel back to my tribe.
[2] You travel very carefully indeed, and realize that this will take you roughly double the time a regular person would need to travel the plains. Fortunately, nothing seems willing to follow you.
Finally! I shall unite us all with the power of dance, and the whole tribe will join Lanku and me in our jokes! Then the other tribes will too and we will all dance!!!!
Chantututututu consolidates his political power through the best form of campaigning there is: dance campaigning! For the war hawks, he does a dark but amusing dance of foreigners being struck down. For everyone else, he does a dance of the tribe thriving at the general expense of those dumb, smelly foreigners. This place probably really hates foreigners by now, after all.
[4] Your campaign of hatred, isolation and well-choreographed performances gains you increasing support among the tribespeople - you dare say they actually seem to like you, especially with Lanku's disposition toward you all but confirming that you're not all that terrible a person. In addition, your ability to express complex ideas of war, peace and xenophobia through nothing more than choreographed movements of your body is held to be a sign of intellect and refinement as well. Your position as top candidate is certainly reinforced now. The shaman, however, does not seem to be quite won over by this alone.
Spread some poop on the ground around my plants to make the earth spirits angry. Then go looking for a new apprentice.
[4] You believe the earth spirits should be well and truly angered now that you've spread feces all over the area, though you do need to wash your hands extremely thoroughly afterward to get the smell out. You then begin to look for new apprentices.
[4] One does present herself - it is none other than Lanku, the potential new chief's consort. She feels you may have interesting things to tell her, as she needs to be 'learned' to be a proper chief's consort, and she finds your idea of creating strife in the earth fascinating, considering the copious amount of feces it seems to involve.
respawn as a member of conraks harem gossip with the others
[2] You are now Akkata, Conrak's least favorite consort, as well as the oldest at thirty-seven. Not that it really matters, you find. Conrak's a bit too preoccupied with tripwires, drinking and inventions to bother with any of the three of you. The general neglect has damaged the relationship between you and the other two consorts, Jutta and Matikira, who are both significantly younger, better-looking and generally more pleasant than you are, and they have born him more children than you have as well, since you've only managed a single daughter, Nuuta, and she's not made much of herself yet. She used to be so sweet on Plok, and they made such a lovely couple, but then he disappeared. Come to think of it, a lot of people have disappeared, or died, or otherwise gone out of your life. That makes you a bit sad, and also slightly lonely.
Continue rebuilding. Find out how many of my tribe is still with those northern fools
[6] The breeding and rebuilding go wonderfully with the new tribespeople present! There's still only three men including you, of course, but that's a problem you guess you have to live with. On the bright side, every last one of your tribe's members is now reunited with you - the rest you know to be dead. On the other hand, this is pretty good land, and there's lots of fish in the sea, and, given a few decades, you could resurrect your tribe, stronger than ever! Of course, you might want to migrate before then. And it might be a bit difficult about a year from now, when there will literally be an army of screaming infants for you and the others to take care of.
Gonjabet Uthon shakes his head. "The Southern lands are a barbaric, wretched, and silly place. Let us regroup back home at Moshagadi."
Leave and head home to the land of the Desert to the North.
[1] Your fellows agree that it would be a most terrible idea to push your luck, and so you head north - unfortunately, without your supplies living off the land proves much more difficult than imagined, and progress is quite slow due to intermittent periods of diarrhea, encounters with wild animals and more.
[1] As a few weeks pass, you are the only one left of your group of twelve, still wandering northward deliriously. You believe you've caught some disease now, and that this impure water you're drinking is negatively affecting you. You have not eaten in days, and death feels close. It's now a question of how you will meet it.
EAT MY FILL OF THE MAN'S FLESH, BUT NOT HIS BRAIN
THE BRAIN OF SOMEONE WHO FELL (LITERALLY) INTO SUCH A SIMPLE TRAP IS NOT GOING TO HELP ME MUCH
LEAVE IT AS OFFERING TO LOCAL SPIRITS INSTEAD (BUT DON'T TELL THEM IT WASN'T GOOD ENOUGH FOR ME)
PRESERVE THE LEFTOVERS BY WHATEVER MY USUAL METHOD IS, CLEAN OFF MY WEAPONS, THEN LOOK BACK TO THE DELTA TRIBE. WHAT'S GOING ON WITH THEM?
[4] After filling yourself up on manflesh and manflesh reserves, you offer up his brain to the spirits, and feel very clever for doing so, which must be a sign that the sacrifice has worked. You then look at the delta tribe - it seems a commotion has ensued, and you spot an odd dancing man who seems very popular among the tribe for some reason, with people bowing their heads to him as they pass. He has a fairly good-looking wife, and seems rather fortunate despite looking quite lumpy and not very clever. Perhaps this is a deception.
Remembering an old custom to bow to our elders, I tip my head low. I realize perhaps customs are not a priority now. I come closer, and ask,
"Sir? Are you hurt? Do you need help?"
I realize he might not understand me, so I give him my water skin. Maybe it'll soothe him...
[5] He refuses your water skin, pointing to a gourd of his own that he has filled with water. It feels cold and seems fresh, which you confirm when he offers you a drink of it. When you begin to wonder where he could have gotten it, he points to a hole in the burrow he's in, quite a deep one. He takes a rope tied to a wooden bucket and lowers it down there, then pulls it up with some difficulty, showing that it is full of cool groundwater. Ah, a well! You immediately notice seems very proud of it. You wonder if he invented it all on his own.
Before you devote it much thought, he then points to a certain patch of his burrow where a generous helping of moss and mushrooms seems to grow. He grabs a handful and starts chewing part of it, offering the other half to you.
Demonstrate the usage of sails and the making of sailboats to the tribe.
[6] They all seem to understand the principle, and while it seems very intuitive to all of them, they are nevertheless wowed by it, and impressed by your skill, despite the fact that you've never actually sailed before. They ask if you could demonstrate the actual act of sailing, and you immediately agree, figuring it can't be very difficult if foreigners could grasp it.
[1] You are promptly educated by the wind spirits how trying to tame their wrath is a poor idea, as your mast collapses due to inept handling and your entire boat goes under as you sail out into the sea. It is right about this point that you try and urgently recall if you ever really learned how to swim.
[4] The answer, fortunately, is yes, and you make it back to the shore, wet and humiliated, but still quite alive.
((You should nominate Tuktu if he gets back. He single-handedly stopped or at least severely hampered the Painted Menace, a story I'm sure he'll be glad to share.))
Back to my tribe to share tales of my brave feats.
[6] You return to the tribe caked in blood and ash as usual, and recount the tale of how you singlehandedly burnt and/or murdered every member of the painted skulkers you could, that their forest you have destroyed and their spirit you have broken, sparing no honest detail in your laconic, brutal telling of the tale, including how you slit the throats of a sleeping family and then left their crying infant to burn in the fire that followed (which is something your listeners seem to have deduced slightly correctly, you realize, though you still try to blame the fire spirits). You get the feeling that last detail may have made them a little afraid of you, and not in a good way. More in an uneasy coexistence "we can never be friends or trust one another" sort of way.
Delay tribespeople from making a decision till a better option is available.
[5] They agree that they can wait to select a new chief - while Chantututu is in the clear lead as a favorite, they admit that perhaps there could be other people that will show a similar level of subtlety and intellect fitting for a chief.
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Topic: History: the Minimalist RTD (Read 125461 times)