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    Kress Chapter


    The Competitors: Kress, Borgick, Midnight, Stan, Ellenell


    The Assistants: Blue, Marigold, Carl, Gareth, Burgandy


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    Kress was finding it surprisingly hard to make his housing models interesting. It wasn''t too hard to make a basic square house and that was probably ''good enough'' if push came to shove but he wanted to make them a bit more interesting then that. Right now he didn''t even have any tiles on the roof. The overhang was barely there and there wasn''t even any windows. The door wasn''t too hard to make though. Kress had set up right next to the ocean. It provided plenty of waterlogged sand, and he didn''t really care if it got washed away. For now this was just testing.


    *Still not entirely happy with this. I''ll need to do some more work on it before I ask Thyme for help. If I can just get the base right without it all falling apart then I can ask Thyme for a copy which should be perfect… it''s harder then I thought keeping everything workable for a ''bucket shape'' even if we''re cheating with the side releasetch. Heck, just the overhangs would be impossible if it was a normal bucket.*


    Kress nced over at the sound of crunching sand and saw Blue. She had her provided bucket, likely full of sand, and was heading his way. Kress brushed down his pants a bit to get some of the sand off, it wasn''t all that effective, but he found the motion familiar and calming. Kress jogged over to Blue who stopped once they got closer. "What do you think of this?" said Blue.


    Kress looked down at the bucket Blue held out towards him. Inside was a lovely mix of purple and orange with a few dashes of other colours added in and a fair amount of it sparkled in the afternoon light. "Wonderfully done Blue. I think this will work as out mix for the castle. Is there anyst minute changes you want to make to it? Or shall I ask for a big bucket?"


    "No I think this is perfect as well… but what do you need a big bucket for?" asked Blue.


    "I thought it was obvious?" said Kress confused before he shook his head. No sense being cocky about it. "Right, sorry, clearly it wasn''t. Ok, so the n for the castle is this. I''m going to ask Timmy to make up an exact match for the sand in the bucket you''ve got there. Well first I''m going to ask for a big bucket from Thyme, but the n is to get one that''s about as tall as I am and as wide as I am with my arms held outwards like this,"


    Kress held his arms outpletely straight before continuing, "Then I''m going to get Timmy topact the sand down into the bucket, just, as much as the little guy can. With water mixed in as well of course, just to keep things workable. Once that''s done, I''ll get Timmy to dump it all into a marked area, and from there I''ll slowly scrape away the sand we don''t need until it looks like a castle. I mean, you''re free to help as well, but I''m not sure how easy it would be for two people to work on the castle together,"


    Blue looked at Kress stunned. "I… I wasn''t thinking you''d make the castle so big… I mean… no I thought you''d just build it up with a bunch of buckets. One tower for each of the corners, do your best for a wall, and then try and stack two or maybe three for the main building… but no clearly you''ve got other ns," said Blue.


    Kress nodded and exined, "Indeed I do. See, your n would work fine… but it would also take more work for a lesser result. With Timmy''s strength and Thyme''s promise of infinitely variable buckets, arge one that will let me carve away will be perfect. I hope I can get it done quickly before the sand dries wrong. That will be the real risk. It''d be better if you could help with that but s, no magic in the marked area…"


    "Couldn''t we… make it outside the marked area then transfer it in?" asked Blue.


    Kress made a ''so-so'' gesture before exining, "It''s possible we could yes… but I see it as a big risk. We''d need a tform, and we''d need to be certain Timmy could move the structure without it falling apart… but we can really only test something like that once it''s built. The tform is probably attainable… but another thing to think about is the fact that we''ll still be left with that at the base of the castle. So we''d need it to look nice, or cover it up with sand afterwards…"


    Kress trailed off with a shrug. Blue frowned at that but she could the general gist of what Kress was saying. Moving the castle would cause a lot of little problems that could be avoided by just epting there was a time limit and being careful when carving away at a big block of sand. "Do you think you can do it?" asked Blue.


    Kress nodded and said, "I think so. It''s not going to be anything too fancy. I''ll add little touches where I can of course… but it will still be fairly simple in overall shape and style. My biggest worry is the walls… but it might be best to just do them separately after the base is done. We''d need to dig out a bunch of sand down at the base if we make them part of the main structure, and that seems like a recipe for disaster,"


    Blue nodded, once again understanding the problem Kress was talking about. "Do you think you can get a bucket for the walls?" asked Blue.


    "Oh certainly," said Kress. "It might need to be done in segments, making it square while the castle has a round base, but that shouldn''t be too much of a problem. We can add a little pond or some trees or something if it looks too weird,"


    "Sounds good," said Blue with a nod.


    "Right, do you want to go give the instructions to Timmy? Perhaps mix in the water first so you can just ask him to copy it with the water included? I''ll go over to Thyme and get the bucket," said Kress.


    Blue shrugged and agreed, "Sure, I''ll go mix in some water and then get Timmy,"


    Kress nodded and walked over to the corner where Thyme was… doing Thyme things. It was hard to find the right words for it, in Kress'' mind anyway. Thyme was tied up to a post and was dressed like a beachgoer… but they had straw poking out of their clothes as if they were a scarecrow. Their head was lolled forward and staring at the ground and their legs were stuck together on the post… somehow. There was no nails or anything that Kress could see.


    *Not that I want to see the guy nailed to a post. That''d be just weird. Doesn''t make them being stuck there with other means any less weird though.* "Hey Thyme…" said Kress slowly. Thyme reacted to the words by snapping their head straight up and staring at Kress with glowing eyes that seemed to hold gxies in them. "Ok that''s just showing off. Whatever, can you please give me a bucket that''s as tall as I am with a diameter approximating my arm span?"


    Thyme just nodded without saying anything. Their body creaking and groaning like they were moving for the first time in a few thousand years… then a bucket vanished from where it was left in the square, and a new one appeared next to Kress matching his specifications. Kress red at the thing. "Right… because that wasn''t creepy at all. Thanks Thyme," said Kress clearly. *I''m not even going toin that it''s nowhere near where I wanted it because honestly? I''m not sure I want to interact with… whatever the fuck Thyme is right now.*


    Kress struggled a bit to get a good grip on the bucket but eventually he managed it. It wasn''t heavy once it was in his hands, but the outside was a bit slippery and hard to hold onto. His ingenious method of carrying it was to put it on his head and use his hands to bnce it once it was there. Kress made his way over to Blue and Timmy with shaky steps. Then Timmy dashed over, to Kress and made a grabby motion with his hands.


    Kress, rightly guessing that Blue had asked Timmy to help, did his best to lower the bucket carefully onto the little guy who took the weight without issue and dashed off to get to work mixing the sand together. Blue was helping out as well. While he''d been busy with Thyme she''d pulled up a bunch of water from the ocean. And was holding it above Timmy where the bucket was. Kress could see that every few seconds Timmy would signal Blue, and she''d add a bit more water to the mix. *Seems like they''ve got this under control.*