dramatispersonae | CARNELIAN

You can see the other teams, but there is an invisible barrier preventing you from hearing them. You can assume that they can't hear you, either. There is a hefty serving of sweet wine and liquor, should you choose it. With a loaf of bread that you can slice. Nimue is in the center of the formation of teams, and when she speaks, you can hear her loud and clear.

"Storytelling has been a tradition of the knights of Camelot for some time. They would tell of the awesome feats of their king, and of their fellow knights... and... they were also prone to exaggeration in some cases."

There appears a small set of cards next to the liquor. You can read them, or you can implicitly understand them if you can't read.

"What feats have the heroes of Aather accomplished, I wonder? And what... exaggerations they may take? Before you, you will find prompts for your tales. You will write one for yourselves, for a set of knights, and for another team. I will select the most inspiring, as will your peers."

She tilts her head. "Ah, perhaps it is bad to encourage grandstanding..."

But before you can ask her, she vanishes.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Hm...

But if it's not a real assassin, then there's no real danger and there's no conflict to overcome.

Sure there is! When people are desperate enough to attack one another, that's plenty of struggle and danger! And then it'd be hard to get them to stop attacking and listen and stuff!

It's harder to listen to one another than it is to fight.

Yeah... that's why the listening will have to wait until after the fight, when they've cooled their heads a little.

So in this case the assassin would be defeated not with superior fighting ability, but by superior sharing-what-she-gathered ability?

It could be both! Alena defeats the assassin, but wants to know why she's been attacked! After interrogating, Alena takes pity!

Okay, we'll try that angle!

"Once upon a time, there was a hero named Alena who traveled Aather looking for food to bring to her team. Before she knew it, dusk had fallen and many monsters appeared again and again, each more vicious than the last. Alena scarcely made it through, her adventuring cape was torn, her gloves were marred with scratches, and her boots had holes from where the monsters had bit at her ankles.

The only edible food available was on an island in the middle of a lake. Though it was far, she swam out to the island and climbed the tall fruit tree to pick its many oranges, lemons, and pineapples. When she jumped down with her haul and thought it was safe to relax, one last obstacle appeared. She heard a dark voice remark: 'Good work... I will take that fruit for myself!' A vicious assassin, with a knife had appeared and reached out to attack her and steal the food she had worked so hard to get!

The assassin made one bold slash, rending Alena's prized adventuring cape, which was a perfect shade of blue to match the Carnelian orange. It had carried her through many adventures and hearing it rip at the hands of a knife held by an assassin was too much for Alena. She boldly leaped forward with a strong punch that connected with the assassin's jaw and sent him flying!

Knowing he was beat, the assassin pleaded for mercy. Alena had only one question: why? Why should she have been so attacked? The assassin admitted he was hired by another team to gather food, but he only knew how to be an assassin, so he waited for someone else to steal from. Alena took pity and to show she was generous gave him half of the food she gathered. Though to pay him back for hurting her cape, she bent the knife until it was ruined and threw it in the lake, forcing the assassin to cease assassinating forever.

Their teams were fed and they lived happily... for now."

That's good! Suzaku brought up a good point though, about making it something precious like healing stones instead of gems... and the assassin was actually desperate to heal their sick teammate! And so she let the assassin borrow the healing stone and they all lied happily ever after?

Gems? They're fighting over food.

Yeah, but you could change it! Besides, food doesn't make too much sense when you can just quest for it from knights... so why not a healing stone, which is a rare treasure?

I guess that makes sense.

"Once upon a time, there was a hero named Alena who traveled Aather looking for a healing stone to bring to her team. Before she knew it, dusk had fallen and many monsters appeared again and again, each more vicious than the last. Alena scarcely made it through, her adventuring cape was frayed, her gloves were marred with scratches, and her boots had holes from where the monsters had bit at her ankles.

The only edible food available was on an island in the middle of a lake. Though it was far, she swam out to the island and searched all over until she found a stone. When she picked it up and thought it was safe to relax, one last obstacle appeared. She heard a dark voice remark: 'Good work... I will take that stone for myself!' A vicious assassin, with a knife had appeared and reached out to attack her and steal the stone she had worked so hard to get!

The assassin made one bold slash, rending Alena's prized adventuring cape, which was a perfect shade of blue to match the Carnelian orange. It had carried her through many adventures and hearing it rip at the hands of a knife held by an assassin was too much for Alena. She boldly leaped forward with a strong punch that connected with the assassin's jaw and sent him flying!

Knowing he was beat, the assassin pleaded for mercy. Alena had only one question: why? Why should she have been so attacked? The assassin admitted he was hired by another team to find a healing stone, but he only knew how to be an assassin, so he waited for someone else to steal from. Alena took pity and to show she was generous lent the stone to him if he promised to return it to Carnelian later. Though to pay him back for hurting her cape, she bent the knife until it was ruined and threw it in the lake, forcing the assassin to cease assassinating forever.

Their teams were healed and they lived happily... for now."

I'd change "The only edible food available was on an island in the middle of a lake." to "The only place to get healing stones was on an island in the middle of a lake."

... but otherwise, I'd say it's pretty good like that!

Oops, missed that one.

Right!

I think if the two of them had a misunderstanding—perhaps she took something very precious that he needed—and then they overcame that, it would work better. There's no need for Alena to be the only good part of the story, because then it sounds like you're trying to make yourself sound good.

What's wrong with that?

You're not very inspiring if you're talking yourself up, are you?

But that's the entire point of the game!

A story needs a hero.

Wouldn't it be more of a feat if you allowed yourself and the "assassin" to be on equal footing?

It'd be a completely different story then.

Fine, do what you want.

Don't worry about it, the assassin turned out to be doing good in the end too! That's the big thing that matters.

CARNELIAN

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