Blessings and Curses II - The Challenging

[Harri-chan]

"I don't see anything weird happening to anyone else... only the ones that won... ", she says as she picks up a ring and hands it over to Kiara.

"But... maybe that's just something to put me off wanting to win. Yeah! Maybe whoever is in charge is afraid we're going to beat their challenge, so wants to put us off! Damn, and I nearly fell for it... go for it, Mom! It might get a little weird when we do win, but as long as we beat the whole challenge... I'm sure everything will be fine".

[Whatevr89532]

And so Ookalf continues on her way; this path turns right..and then right again, and again, apparently moving in a spiral-like pattern. Toward what must be the center of the spiral is another guard; it's hard to say for sure whether this spiral dead-ends or spins the other way to exit in another direction.


Well, it's clear that changing two people's gender and age without even them noticing must take a lot of magic..maybe one of the elves did it? They're always so fair-looking it's hard to tell what they're up to. That's not to say that, if there's some sort of potion involved, a human might not have done it. But whoever did it is doing a good job of being inconspicuous; no one did anything suspicious even nearby either of the wolves before they started changing. The only clue the pair of fox-girls have to their challenge is the words still floating above the banner, as before, stating their goal is to win the competition.

[Ookalf]

And so Ookalf continues on her way; this path turns right..and then right again, and again, apparently moving in a spiral-like pattern. Toward what must be the center of the spiral is another guard; it's hard to say for sure whether this spiral dead-ends or spins the other way to exit in another direction.

Hmm... *Ookalf stands back and waits to see if the guard's going to go anywhere.*

[Kether]

*She looks more carefully at the people outside the competition the so called Judges, what they do anything that gives off a hint of wrongness*

[Harri-chan]

Elliot shakes her head, and she leans forward slightly on her toes and tosses the ring towards the pegs, and this time she was actually trying!

"C'mon, Mom, you need to hurry this up", she says impatiently.

[Whatevr89532]

Eliko scores another hit! Three points now. Kiara hasn't exactly taken the turn between "her little girl"'s turns, but nobody seems to be paying enough attention to care. The officiator lady and the man with the pad seem..remarkably ordinary. They're older than most of the people here, and seem pretty mild-mannered. Given the lady's ability to get people's attention and sound strict, they probably work for whatever school Eliko goes to in this setting. It's hard to say whether coming to this conclusion is logical or some consequence of their roles for the challenge.


The metal clanking of the nearby guard moves outward through the spiral a bit and winds up on the other side of a hedge wall from Ookalf, going the same direction as she's facing.

[Kether]

Eliko scores another hit! Three points now. Kiara hasn't exactly taken the turn between "her little girl"'s turns, but nobody seems to be paying enough attention to care. The officiator lady and the man with the pad seem..remarkably ordinary. They're older than most of the people here, and seem pretty mild-mannered. Given the lady's ability to get people's attention and sound strict, they probably work for whatever school Eliko goes to in this setting. It's hard to say whether coming to this conclusion is logical or some consequence of their roles for the challenge.


The metal clanking of the nearby guard moves outward through the spiral a bit and winds up on the other side of a hedge wall from Ookalf, going the same direction as she's facing.

*SHe continues observing them while taking a throw*

[Harri-chan]

Elliot clenched her fist and punched the air as she saw she scored another hit. Unlike Kether, she wasn't really watching anyone else to see who was responsible for the changes to the Wolf pair, but shouted encouragement to the older Fox girl as she finally tossed her ring towards the pegs.

"We're going to win!".

[Ookalf]

The metal clanking of the nearby guard moves outward through the spiral a bit and winds up on the other side of a hedge wall from Ookalf, going the same direction as she's facing.

*Now that the guard's on the move, Ookalf decides to follow them - from a safe distance, of course.*

[Whatevr89532]

Kiara's ring seems to come really close to the peg, but lands just past it. Was it a distracted throw or just bad luck? Either way, three in five is at least an above-average result judging by the other teams' pegs, and how many rings that missed their mark litter the grass. Her split attention might be rewarded, though, as she does see an elvish woman walking behind the man with the pad, definitely looking at the pad. Clearly she isn't actually participating in this event, though, so she might just be innocently curious about the scores.


Following along the guard on the other side of the hedge wall starts taking Ookalf back out the spiral by the way she came, but when she gets all the way to the intersection with the torch the guard continues on to Ookalf's left, indicating that this spiral did have another exit, and it leads right there.

[Ookalf]

Following along the guard on the other side of the hedge wall starts taking Ookalf back out the spiral by the way she came, but when she gets all the way to the intersection with the torch the guard continues on to Ookalf's left, indicating that this spiral did have another exit, and it leads right there.

We just came back around... *Ookalf sighs, then figures that, between where she came from and the two ends of this loop, she's got three of the four paths at this crossroad figured out. Thus, she heads down the last uncovered path.*

[Harri-chan]

Elliot stomped a foot in frustration as Kiara's ring missed the pegs, meaning more dropped points. She plucks another ring up, and then holds it up to the more mature fox again.

"Still your turn since you're being so slow... ", she muttered, and then glanced to see just how many turns the others were having!

[Kether]

*she continues observing the people writing as she tosses her next ring*

[Whatevr89532]

Like the pair of fox-girls, most other pairs seem to be slightly past half through. Kiara's second distracted try lands easily on the peg, making another score! The score-keeper's not doing anything interesting, but the announcer lady is quietly berating a pair of humans for one of their having stepped past the line.


((I think I've miscommunicated a bit what happened with the guard, so I made a small map to show what I'm talking about. "T" is the torch platform thing, "O" is Ookalf, "G" is the rough location of the guard. Black lines are the hedge "walls", and red lines are (roughly) Ookalf's recent movement))

[Ookalf]

((I think I've miscommunicated a bit what happened with the guard, so I made a small map to show what I'm talking about. "T" is the torch platform thing, "O" is Ookalf, "G" is the rough location of the guard. Black lines are the hedge "walls", and red lines are (roughly) Ookalf's recent movement))

(Oops... Yeah, it looks I misinterpreted things a bit. Sorry!)

*OK, so maybe Ookalf can't move quite like that. Instead, she'll just continue down the spiral, hoping that eventually leads somewhere.*