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 Posted: Sun Apr 03, 2016 2:06 pm
Phaedra
Post 5 - Choice C
HP: 19
Oh sweet food! Phaedra was pleased to have something to eat. Everything looked delicious and smelled divine. However, as she ate she noticed that her throat was closing. What was wrong with the food!? People around her started to drop and soon she did as well.
When things changed to become some sort of spectacle Phaedra looked around at everything. The thing with the food taught her to be a little weary of things. So when Mano put his hand on her shoulder she blinked at him. Should she join in the game or not? Or! They could share! Phae liked the idea of sharing the luck so she did a joint bid with her favorite water tribesman and watched to see how it all played out.
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Posted: Sun Apr 03, 2016 3:35 pm
I CHOOSE CHOICE B
Kian - 12 HP - Post 5
They were just phantoms! Still as the little one fell, Kian cursed. It was almost as if this place was teasing out his weaknesses and then taunting him for it. I pitied a child, so you repay me by showing me that no matter what I do disaster will fall? He truly was a harbinger of death then. Perhaps he could do the same for whatever was behind this endless maze...
He would gladly give them a taste of their own medicine.
Oh, look. Things are changing again. What could it be this time? Eventually these spirits, or whatever was behind this, would run out of fresh ideas. He just hoped that didn't mean all of this would go on repeat. Speaking of repeat...Kian frowned as he noticed the game going on before him. "Gambling?" He questioned out loud before nearly snapping the hands off of whoever it was that touched him. They really are running out of options. To dig that far back into his past to find this person....Kian shook his head. "Not this time."
He didn't even care if he was going to get punished for refusing. Kian did not trust any game in this place, nor did he want luck to decide his fate.
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Posted: Sun Apr 03, 2016 4:17 pm
I CHOOSE CHOICE A Nadiya - 18 HP
Okay, so perhaps the food wasn't the best idea. Closing her eyes, Nadiya let her body fall to the floor. At least it had been yummy while it lasted... The only question was did she really just die? She truly hoped not. That would be a dreadfully boring ending to such an interesting adventure~
As the betting board came into view, Nadiya bounced on her feet. She always had good intuition for these! Plus, it looked like the poisoned food hadn't killed her...so what was the harm in a little fun? Nodding towards her friend the girl reached out to place her bet. She lived on luck after all~ As a traveler so just let the wind decide the path of her feet for the day.
Even if she did end up in strange situations like these...
At least they're fun~
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Posted: Sun Apr 03, 2016 6:08 pm
I CHOOSE CHOICE C Shadiya 16 HP
Even if she wasn't the one poisoned, Shadiya's gut clenched at the sight. All the girl could do was close her eyes as the room shifted again. "A game?" Frowning, she studied the area. Once a long time ago in the markets she might have seen something like this...
As her friend nudged her, Shadiya blinked in surprise. Honestly at this point she should just stop questioning things. "Should we?" She glanced towards her friend and back towards the spinning wheel. The next thing she knew she had placed half of her coin with his on the same spot.
If not alone at least they could try together...
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Posted: Sun Apr 03, 2016 7:57 pm
Dexurn- Post 5HP 14 I CHOOSE CHOICE C Hearing everyone else chowing down was torture. Dexurn closed his eyes, trying to ignore what he couldn’t escape. When the odd thuds began to take the place of the chewing, he looked up and scrambled backward with horror. They.. they were all dying! Was it the food?! The tears fell harder as he watched each person drop to the ground, unable to do a thing to help...
His eyes widened further as the scene before him seemed to melt away. With the dead people out of sight, he brushed at his face.. and wondered why he’d been crying. After all, he was now in a room full of living people. ..They were ignoring him, but what else was new?
Hearing the strange clicks, he turned to head for the sound and see what was going on. Oh! A gambling game! He’d seen his master play things like that before. Feeling his arm taken, he turned and smiled brightly to see the friendly face of his auntie. She was guiding him to the game table... His brow knit, and he looked at Shikori hesitantly. He wasn’t sure about playing such a game, but if she really wanted to... He was more willing when he was told they could share the bet, and he put his half onto the table, shifting nervously on his feet.
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Posted: Sun Apr 03, 2016 7:59 pm
Rhonann– Post 5HP 10 I CHOOSE CHOICE B It warmed her heart to see the child light up. Oh, but her own stomach... Rhonann was gazing longingly at the remaining, inedible scraps when the people around her started to drop like flies. Heart stopping, she spun to look at the child and try to smack the food away... but she was too late. A knife seemed to stick into her chest as she watched the child drop...
As the furniture and people melted away, she cried out and reached for the child, hand catching only empty air. The sudden rush of air seemed to dry the tears from her cheeks, leaving her calm once again.
She looked around at the new faces, turning to see what they were all so focused on. A game? She’d never seen it before. Or had she? Turning at a light touch, she looked at her friend encouraging her to play. She stepped forward for a closer look, and then shook her head. It was a game of luck. It was bad enough that life was all about luck; she didn’t need it in her games as well. So, she stepped back while her friend walked forward to take the chance instead.
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Posted: Sun Apr 03, 2016 8:00 pm
Faamy- Post 5HP 13 I CHOOSE CHOICE A Faamy ate as quickly as she could, looking around to make sure she was getting her share. The more she ate though, she could feel herself getting unbalanced. She hadn’t been eating that long. How could she have a belly ache already? Fear tickled the back of her neck when she saw the others around her dropping, and she leaned against the table, gasping for breath.
She dropped to her knees as the table seemed to melt, taking the sick people and her pain along with it. Once the pain was gone, she stood up again with relief. No harm done!
The sudden fog of smoke made her cough. She waved a hand in front of her face, looking around at the new people surrounding her. Her eyes landed on the game that everyone seemed to be focused on. A betting game? Risk and luck!
She looked over at who was touching her arm, and smiled brightly with her friend’s encouragement. She was going for it! Faamy stepped forward boldly, and slapped down her bet.
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Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2016 11:02 am
I CHOOSE CHOICE A || Damissan ❂
|| Post: 5
|| HP: 16It seemed like, in the end, the only way to go about things.
Damissan did not second-guess or deliberate. He’d seen the child; he had to help, and that felt right. It did not occur to him that it could be a wrong choice—until the atmosphere began to shift. Subtly at first, and then more dramatically, the room, once bustling with a rush of activity, began to quiet. A dying hush, and all around, the air seemed to follow that pattern: the table a wasteland of nothing left where once it was heaping, and before him—
Damissan tensed as the surrounding feast-goers began to collapse, and was about to reach and snatch back whatever the child hadn’t eaten yet. But too late. The child’s eyes were already on him, widening, what remained of their food dropping from their weakening grip, and Damis reached to steady them, but already they were collapsing too.
Panic lurched into guilt and regret, and somehow, despite meaning well by it, this was his fault. But what could he do—?
Before he could decide, if there was anything to do at all, the room began dissipating again, the scene vanishing out before his thoughts could linger on it, swallowed by the dream. Though the memory remained lodged in his gut—a knot of chilling responsibility for the child he couldn’t save—it was a welcome relief to slip into a new phase.
And this — he blinked, fanning a hand before his nose at the smell of smoke — this was a familiar scene. Granted, it usually looked a little different. Higher class and set up in the home of a noble, while this looked to be more of a street scene, tavern betting hall. But still, it intrigued him. Though he’d never been specifically into gambling, there was a certain familiar thrill that came with it all. Chance. Fate. The rush of the unknown and unpredictable. Taking a shot at something.
Risk rarely got boring, after all, and as he settled into the scene, he realized he wasn’t alone. As the weight of a hand dropped onto his shoulder, he glanced sideways, and raised his eyebrows. “Akachi…? What are you—”
“Put in anythin’ yet? Or has fear of your God sapped that from you too. It’s a big night tonight. You can feel it.” As he spoke, Akachi leaned with his words, hip taking up a partial prop against Damis, and Damis snorted, but allowed it, eyes moving to the betting table and watching as the surrounding participants whooped and hollered—cheering or cursing, depending on their relative fate. “So?”
“You’re joining me in this?” Damis fingered the coin pouch at his hip as he asked, studying the board. At his side, though, Akachi’s look immediately told him the answer.
“It…might just so happen that I put my faith in the wrong peg earlier already, yeah? So, eh—”
“You’ve nothing left to bet.” Damis couldn’t tell whether he was disappointed or amused. It wasn’t actually surprising. Beside him, Akachi cleared his throat.
“Well, I’ve nothing left to lose…”
“And you’re encouraging me to join you in that lot?”
“Only to have a pinch of fun once more after how heartless you were to me last—”
Damis’ snorting laugh was unconvinced, at least as it related to his own ‘heartlessness.’ But otherwise, he stepped forward, and didn’t feel he had to admit that there was any private thread of glee that came with putting forward his coin and the toothy, feral grin this induced in Akachi when he did.
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Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2016 11:05 am
I CHOOSE CHOICE C || Jakkoa ღ ❅
|| Post: 5
|| HP: 7Once satisfied of his safety, solidly separated from the surging masses, Jakkoa allowed himself to settle—and eat. It was an almost unnatural hunger, greater even, and stranger than any he’d ever felt, but the food, even having picked simple things, was as delicious as he could possibly have hoped for. But after only a brief period it, too, seemed strange. Not satisfying in the way it ought, and Jak found himself slowing down, frowning as his body swayed with dizziness and—
Poisoned.
Someone or something had sabotaged the feast. He realized it too late for himself, but soon enough to look and see that it was indeed everyone, not just him: hordes upon hordes of them staggering, clutching their stomachs or heads—and collapsing beside the wasteland of a banquet table.
Jak dropped what he had, and reached for his mouth. If it was poison, the sooner he removed it from his system the better, and if he could induce himself to get it out, then maybe—the room, though, was already spinning, his lashes heavy and groggy. He needed to fix it, but the effects took over too fast, making it impossible to act, and a moment later, he was collapsing to the tiled floor.
He woke slowly.
Or, more accurately, became newly aware of a different scene. This was less strange. Though he’d rarely been allowed to partake as of yet, he knew the look, the smell, the sounds, and could almost feel the pull of anticipatory tension in the air. Jakkoa did love to gamble. His preferred scene, however, involved bets with answers, ways to predict and win and tip the odds in his favor. This — with the clck, clck, clck of small ball to by chance determine everyone’s fate — was something he tended to prefer to watch rather than partake in.
“Oh aye, Jak!”
He blinked, turning, and there, only half to his surprise, was Teya again, her white teeth flashing with a teasing grin as she bounded up behind him—and then knocked a grunt from him as she hit up against his back, arms around his middle.
“Didn’t expect to see you here quite yet. Are you gonna play after all?”
Jak glanced to the betting table just as a round concluded, giving rise to a sea of varied outbursts. He tucked fingers through his hair, slipping a loose lock behind his ear. “You know I prefer bets I can predi—”
“Cheat at and always know what you’ll get. That’s not the same.”
“It’s not cheating.”
“It ruins the thrill.” Teya let her grip drop, slipping around him to weedle into a position at the table for the next round. “The idea is to live a little, take chances.”
“Throw your money away…”
“Have fun.” She shot him a pout, blue eyes large and round as she propped a hand beneath her chin. “You really won’t even split it with me? Just once?”
“I’m not sure what I get out of it,” Jak said, “besides a good chance at losing my money.”
“I don’t have enough left to go in on my own. But if you contribute half to our in-pot now,” Teya said, “and we win, I’ll break the difference with you sixty-forty, you on top—”
“Deal.”
And so they did.
Though he felt no need to admit it, there was a certain rush to it, even when the odds were completely blind and unstackable.
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Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2016 11:07 am
I CHOOSE CHOICE B || Naqenni ❋
|| Post: 5
|| HP: 5Once she had her hands on the food, Naqenni barely noticed anyone else, for they just didn’t seem to matter particularly much. She was starving, and she had everything she could possibly want to eat right there. On mouthful at a time, as much as she could manage. She’d never been this hungry before — ravenous, even — and in that state she wasn’t yet considering how rushing herself might cause a stomach ache or other consequences. All that mattered was satiating her immediate need.
Until her body began to throw out warning signs, at which point she stiffened, freezing mid-mouthful. This couldn’t be right. It had tasted delicious. But no, there was absolutely something wrong with it, and as her head began to pound, she snarled, dropping what she had and pulling away from the table. It was one of them — the earthlings, the strangers — they had poisoned her food, and she could have strangled them for it. Would have done something about it, except that, even as she fumbled backwards to distance herself from the poison feast it became apparent that all of them were affected.
All groaning. Swaying. Collapsing.
Naq took another step back, and another, her pulse picking up as her vision swam because it would not end like this. She’d get away and find help, and force her body to obey her. That, at least, was the plan, until her legs gave, and she fell to the stone floor, joining the heap.
“Naqenni—”
She stirred, grunting.
“Naqenni…” A hand shook her shoulder encouragingly and she huffed, squeezing her eyes tighter shut. Unfortunately: “Naqenni.”
Her eyes snapped open to glower at—Ku? “What?” It looked, at least, like Ku, and she rumbled her discontent as her dream’s interpretation of her sister bounced.
“We’re playing a game. Come on, you’ve got to get up.”
Naq squinted. She shifted. She sat up. Her surroundings were different. Smoky and odd, but more like home in its own way. A game did sound like something Ku would like, but— “We’re too old for games…”
As might be predicted, her objections were ignored. She was tugged forward and into a tent she didn’t recognize, large enough to house a great cluster of her cousins, many huddled around a center table. Naq wasn’t entirely familiar with the point of such ‘games,’ but she had seen them played. All chance, no skill. It seemed a gross waste of time and — if you played that way — coin, though few of her cousins bet with coin, as that was more of an earthling practice. All the same, Ku was explaining how fun it was and how it worked, encouraging her to partake.
After enough stubborn objection, though, finally her sister gave up on her, explaining how little fun and boring she was overall before happily diving into the endeavor herself. From the background, Naq squinted, and eyed the proceedings. Even if she wasn’t a part of it, now that Ku was, surely it was worth it to at least see what came of it all.
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Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2016 11:08 am
I CHOOSE CHOICE A || Lenila ▼
|| Post: 5
|| HP: 7
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Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2016 3:47 pm
I CHOOSE CHOICE B Xilarn
Post: 5
HP: 21De-sgusting. People truly were. Xilarn huffed softly at the sight they made, crossing his arms and fervently ignoring the distressed howling of his own stomach. It wouldn't do to be a part of this, and joining them definitely felt like condoning these gross strangers' actions. Eating was a perfectly acceptable activity on its own, but watching them shovel it down was almost revolting enough to make him lose his appetite, anyway.
But in hardly a handful of minutes, the whole mood of the room changed. The sounds of lip-smacking and obnoxiously loud chewing morphed into even louder groans and rumbles. People staggered away from the table, clutching their stomachs. When the first hit the ground, Xil couldn’t stop himself from flinching in very mild alarm. He didn’t personally feel any more ill than he had when he’d arrived (and despite being obviously hungry, he didn’t feel like he might collapse from it), but seeing this massive crowd all become sick so soon wasn’t especially comforting.
One by one the rest went down. The whole process couldn’t have taken more than a few moments. Vaguely, Xilarn wondered if whatever they’d ingested was lethal or if they’d be getting up sometime in the future.
It mattered little. The room swallowed the people, the table, and everything else up in a pit of blackness.
He was not completely unfamiliar with the new scene. There’d been a time, when Akiyal was still very young and Xil entertained the idea that he didn’t have much more to lose, when he might have engaged in rowdy tavern games, gambles, dares, and bets. It was what his friends were doing, and it wasn’t if he had better plans for himself.
Unfortunately, the excitement and newness of it had long since passed. Losing had ceased to strike him as entertaining after little more than a season. The rest of his company seemed to enjoy it, though. “‘Ey, Attlee!” Xil just barely had time to register Janella’s approach before she punched him in the shoulder. He squinted at her and muttered out a slightly less enthusiastic greeting. “You decided to come ‘round after all, eh? Don’t tell me, you couldn’t stay away? Decided to throw in? One more last big bet?”
He rubbed at his shoulder. Not hurt, per se, but the woman had the boniest knuckles that had ever repeatedly collided with him on several instances. "You know I don't gamble-"
"Anymore."
"Anymore," Xil uttered in agreement. "So, no, not this time."
"Ah." She rolled her eyes and gave a dismissive wave of her arm at him. "Stick in the mud is what you are." She rolled her shoulders, cracked her knuckles, and stretched her arms above her head. Xilarn couldn't help but snort in amusement. "Why don't you stand back and watch a winner play?" Just like old times, he found that he didn't have any better plans for himself, so he stood at Jan's back while she whooped and hollered at the little ball in the wheel.
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Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2016 5:05 pm
I CHOOSE CHOICE A Akiyal
Post: 5
HP: 3This girl had a big mouth to accompany her tiny little hands and her tiny little eyes and her tiny little stomach. Akiyal watched her rip a chunk out of the meat leg with her teeth, the juices of her meal trickling down her now fully-puffed cheeks. She reminded him vaguely of an animal stuffing itself after a long winter hibernation, and he wondered if he'd looked anything like that as a starving four-year-old. He didn't remember gorging himself, but that didn't make it impossible.
Aki crouched in front of her with his best dumb, farm boy grin. "Hey, y'know, if yer not careful, you'll choke," he warned teasingly. It was all in jest, of course. He didn't actually expect her to-
An agonized moan and dull 'thwmp' of sound over his shoulder made him look from the youngster back to the crowd gathered at the table. The feast itself had all but vanished under grubby, greedy hands, but the people looked significantly less satisfied than he would've expected. Hesitantly, he rose from his crouch as he stared at them. The lot of them. All of those people. He felt perfectly fine, so whatever it was-
The realization hit him immediately, and he whipped around, arm snapping out to knock the remains of the food from the little girl's hands. Too late. Of course he was. There was no telling if she was knocked down by the sheer force of his revulsion toward her food or if she'd already been going down before he'd down anything about it. Either way, she was on the floor. And Aki's breath caught in his throat.
He shouldn't have offered her anything. But then, how was he supposed to have known? He would've eaten the food himself and had been planning on it. Really, this... didn't even seem like his fault.
She probably wasn't even dead. Just briefly and violently sickened. Of course, that's what it was.
He was not offered time to dwell on it because the scene was shifting again. The room was cooler. The people were just as loud, if not louder. There was a wispy tendril of smoke coiling its way toward him. He blew out a stiff exhale to whisk it away. Aki didn't rightly know where he was or what these people were shouting over. Cheering? Booing? The boos and groans were louder, it seemed. But he stepped forward, peering between the folk at whatever type of... game they were playing.
"You've always struck me as the gambling type."
Aki cast a quick glance over his shoulder and broke into a grin at the sight of Kan. "Guess you are too?" He retorted with a careless shrug.
"Nnnnah- I work here!"
"You do not. Dunno what the point in saying that is," Akiyal scoffed with a half muted laugh.
"Ah, whaddyou know?" Kan grunted. "Not enough to know how to play, I'd wager. C'mooon." He gave a tug to Aki's hair, edging him closer to the table. "What good are friends if they can't teach you new tricks. It's easy, besides. Just-" Kan slipped a hand into Akiyal's pocket, and frankly Aki was surprised there was enough in there to jingle at all. When his companion drew back, he dropped a small sum of coins on the table. "And that's pretty much it, y'know? All that's left to do is say 'good luck.'"
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Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2016 6:07 pm
I CHOOSE CHOICE A Edathe
HP - 13 (-0) = 13!
Edathe saw all of the others rush forward, devouring the food on the table, and she was left behind, her stomach rumbling and aching. But before long the others were dropping to the floor. Edathe's eyes widened. What was happening? But that could have been her. She frowned, the last of the group falling to the floor but when they hit... everyone started to get sucked up.
The scene around her changed again and she coughed at the smoke. What was happening to her? She tried to fan the smoke away from her nose and she looked around. Everyone else was so big, and they were all playing this game. Edathe propped herself up so she could see over the table. It looked like so much fun. She grinned as the bookie looked at her. Was she supposed to play? Well she guessed she would. What if she won? She put her money on the table and watched the ball spin around and around.
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Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2016 6:10 pm
I CHOOSE CHOICE A Vaena
HP - 11 (-2) = 9!
Vaena chewed on the food, enjoying the tastes that swirled in her mouth. It was so good, and filling her starving belly. But then she felt something strange. She couldn't understand what was going on with her throat... and her head. She looked at the food in her hand and tried to cough, nothing came out. She felt the world go black and then she fell to the floor. But when she landed she was in a smoke filled room and there was cheering and laughter all around her.
What was going on? She looked at the table in front of her and realized that it was a game, a wager. The bookie looked to her and she locked onto the wheel. She could play... she might even win. What did she have to lose if she just placed a small bet?
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