[center][img]https://img.roleplayerguild.com/prod/users/adb01259-53a5-4c37-8dd0-07d9259d9823.png[/img] [b]Beta.[/b][/center] The Alma came on a midsummer morning, while Chopstick Eyes sat on a stone, watching sheep watching lambs watching butterflies over the fields. [i][colour=lightblue]"Good people of Galbar, I bring you grave news..."[/colour][/i] The air flickered, and Chopstick jolted. [color=wheat][i]"Azura!"[/i][/color] There. Right there! Atop a whale with Asceal at her side! But Chopstick's smile faded, and the recording played on, lies and illusions all. [i][color=lightblue]"...and the tools to claim your freedom. Each and everyone of you has an immortal soul, the essence of your being that contains your mind and memories. This soul is the very core of your being, more vital to your..."[/color][/i] It wasn't meant for her at all, no more than it was for the sheep. Somewhere, where living beings crowded the space between god and livestock, this message belonged. But not with Chopstick Eyes. [i][color=lightblue]"Katharsos, the tyrant of death, has decreed that your souls, once severed from flesh should be put to the flame..."[/color][/i] Chopstick Eyes listened to the broadcast with growing apathy. Her thoughts were elsewhere by the time the footage of a griffin-soul burning was replayed, and she watched it as she had watched the sheep: without feeling. [i][color=lightblue]"...so I ask you, I beg you, please people of Galbar, when your time comes let the Alma help you. Please use them to save yourselves! For only by your own wills can you set yourselves free!"[/color][/i] The bird fell silent. The two watched each other, chopsticks to eyes and back again, each waiting. The Alma, it seemed, had nowhere else to be, and nothing better to do, than to wait and see if she would die. Chopstick shook her head. [color=wheat]"You're wasting your time, buddy."[/color] Perhaps mistaking this for a preemptive denial of access to her soul, the Alma preened, fluttered, and went on its way. Chopstick suspected it would find Ya-Shuur, and deliver the same message. She shook her head, picked up her shepherding crook, and stretched. She wondered if either the glowing lady or Azura actually believed that they could forestall annihilation. She suspected they both did. How... breathtakingly naïve. [color=wheat][i]Everything burns,[/i][/color] thought the alien shepherd, drawing an ancient fabric from the pocket of her overalls. [color=wheat][i]Everything rots.[/i][/color] She looked out into the distant sky. Somewhere, far away, she smelled water. Fresh, fresh water. Miles and miles of it, splattered across the earth of midsummer. She looked back at the ancient kite, and wondered how many times she had reached this point, an instant away from alighting the high winds and travelling onwards, only to falter. She didn't know what she was waiting for. She didn't know why she failed. [color=wheat][i]Even me.[/i][/color] Azura was still out there. Sitting on an armoured whale, perhaps. Fighting a burning tyrant. Something like that. And here she was, stuck. She sat back down on the rock. A lamb looked up at her. She looked away. Her gaze fell upon a tiny whorl of leaves peeking out from a crack in the stone she sat on. There, too, there was something stuck: an ant, writhing on the sticky surface of the succulent mucilage. She knew this plant, had made use of it before. It was a butterwort, and true to its name, the honey with which it trapped and pickled its insect prey was also a great additive in the goatmilk that she and Ya-Shuur fermented in the spring. The ant struggled on. The exoskeletons of its compatriots lay perfectly preserved elsewhere on the leaf. On the tip of a long pedicel, a tiny purple flower marked what their remains had fed. [color=wheat][i]Out of the eater came something to eat,[/i][/color] thought Chopstick Eyes. [color=wheat][i]Out of the strong, something sweet.[/i][/color] She leaned in and watched the ant struggle anew. The skewers on her face pinched off the tiny flower and dangled it before her face. [color=blanchedalmond][i]Butterwort.[/i][/color] She took the flower on her fingertip and shook it about, saw that it wouldn't come off. It was stuck. [color=blanchedalmond][i]Butterwort in midsummer.[/i][/color] The name fit her like a glove never could. One of Ya-Shuur's herder-wolves bounded up, momentarily spooking the sheep, and panted eagerly at the godlet, sensing change. [color=blanchedalmond]"BUTTERWORT IN MIDSUMMER!"[/color] Chopstick's laugh echoed across the island of rain, and the molf shot a happy doggy grin as she wiped her sticky, sticky hands clean on its fur. She didn't know what it meant, quite possibly never would, but it was hers and it had stuck. She wiped more of the mysterious sticky fluid on her overalls, and unfolded the kite. It was time to get out of this place, yes. She'd go to the north where the water was, and seek Li'Kalla's beast out there, and failing that, she would speak with Azura in its reflection. She'd check her postbox, pay her bills, and chase Kalmar over the cold flats, if she could find him. Together they would solve this riddle. The wind picked up, and Chopstick Eyes was gone within the hour. [center][img]https://img.roleplayerguild.com/prod/users/adb01259-53a5-4c37-8dd0-07d9259d9823.png[/img] [b]Alpha.[/b][/center] Chopstick stood on a raft of kelp, squeezed a brilliant rainbow bird under her arm, and said, [color=wheat]"Pew!"[/color] The Alma didn't budge. Chopstick sighed, adjusted her grip under the bird, wrapped her one hand around the creature's right leg and the other under its breast, tugged its leg sharply, and said, [color=wheat]"PEW!"[/color] With a squawk, the Alma lit up and blasted a mighty sunbeam into the air, shooting down a passing Skestral. The gargoyle returned to the basement of Galbar exactly as confused as it had come, only much deader. The Alma clucked. Liv croaked disapprovingly. Chopstick cackled. [i][color=wheat]"This is AWESOME!"[/color][/i] [hider=oh dear] Betasticks goes through something of a crisis, being too depressed to pursue any of her goals. The Alma broadcast reminds her of Azura, though she cares very little of what happens to anyone's soul. After a few more minutes of moping, she sees her stuck-ness reflected in a small carnivorous plant, the butterwort, and comes to learn her soul-name (which she was taught about by Ya-Shuur). Beta Chopstick, now Butterwort in Midsummer, finally gets a-going, and celebrates with a new text colour. As a side note, the etymology I gave for butterworts here isn't actually accurate, they're actually named for their greasy sheen (although they can indeed be used in fermented dishes). Her soul-name power is that she has sticky hands, and as such is nearly impossible to disarm. Hopefully she figures out how to turn them off soon. Alphasticks learns that you can use Alma as portable laser cannons. [b]Chopstick Eyes | Butterwort in Midsummer 13 Might (Native) 8 Might (Age of Lords) Markets | Knives Kites (5/5) Lanterns (2/5) Cuisine (4/5)[/b] [/hider]