Chapter 1287  1287 Questioning the Path


    --- Green ---


    "So can you give us any examples of the sort of challenges we could be facing?" asked Carl.


    Thyme pondered for a second, getting into a proper thinker pose and even summoning what looked like a thought-cloud to show off a rapid series of images. It was a bit fast, but Green had good eyes and she managed to make out, a campfire, a statue, three mice in a conga line and at least one set of creepy eyes. Green was unsure if those repeated, or if the eyes were different each time, the images were a bit too quick.


    "I suppose I can give you a bit of information. Please keep in mind though, that the point of these challenges is to be random and varied. You''re just as likely to get abat challenge as you are one where you pretend to seduce an orange. Sure not every tform will trigger a challenge, but a lot of them will. Though, keep in mind, if one person beats the challenge on a tform it will be cleared for everyone…


    "But if you want to be sneaky and try to jump onto a tform with someone already doing the challenge on it? You''ll still find yourself locked into the challenge… most of the time. If you''re locked in you won''t be allowed to leave until it''spleted. Though if teleportation does ur a sign will appear with a hint as to the nature of the challenge, so perhaps you can swoop in and clear it faster," exined Thyme.


    Carl nodded in understanding at Thyme''s exnation even though it didn''t reveal much about the challenges themselves. The extra information was useful though. Knowing that you couldn''t just sneak through a tform while someone else was doing a challenge was nice.


    Green however, had a different idea. *Does that mean you won''t trigger the challenge if you don''t stand on top of the tform? I''d love that to be confirmed. I think I''m the only one here with wind powers, and likely the only one that can skip tforms asionally. Still, it''s a risk to just ask and give everyone else the idea. They might be able to just hang off the side and jump from tform to tform that way. Hmm… decisions decisions.*


    Nabras, despite not being in the round, asked the next question. "How much damage do you need to do to destroy a checkpoint?"


    Thyme shrugged and said, "It depends on the checkpoint. They all take different amounts, but generally, the less people that can use the checkpoint the less effort it takes to destroy them. Though I''ll also add that if it''s a checkpoint you''ve attuned yourself to, then it takes less effort to destroy.


    "Though it''s not just a matter of effort but time as well. I don''t want you to use special moves to try and destroy checkpoints in one shot. Instead, they have a timer that dictates how long you need to attack them for, with that timer being reduced by sufficient damage up to a point. Let''s say… just for the sake of argument that it takes ten minutes to destroy the checkpoint.


    "You can attack for those ten minutes, and you might be able to knock off five of those minutes as you go. Then let''s say, it''s a two person checkpoint and you''re one of those people. Then it starts at 5 minutes, and you can hit it enough to cut that time down to one or two minutes. Then you can destroy it easily. Of course, if you''re the only one attached to the checkpoint you can destroy it as you like, but that would be a bit of a strange decision,"


    *Hmm… so you''re encouraged to take risks if you want to destroy a checkpoint… and it seems like trying to destroy a proper five person checkpoint will take a lot of time. That… probably isn''t important to me. I don''t do that much damage without my bow… something I perhaps should have brought along with me. Wait it''s all in my storage ring. Should I swap intobat attire? Shit I probably need to.*


    Green jumped behind the couch while Kat gave her an odd look. While Green was changing, Burnice asked "Do the tforms stayplete if we get reset to a checkpoint?"


    "Yes they do!" said Thyme with a smile. "The challenge is remembering exactly which tforms you''ve already jumped on. It''s even worse because some of them move!"


    Burnice red back at Thyme''s cheery smile. *Ok, I probably needed to know that. I guess… I guess I''ll throw out my question. Better to know now and not potentially waste a life on it.* Green jumped back over the couch next to Kat who just raised an eyebrow when she saw Green decked out in herbat outfit. It was a quick change, but well practiced one. "Hey Thyme, do the challenges activate if you don''t stand on top of them?"


    Thyme looked over at Green, and then started to slowly expand in height until they were clearly looming over the audience… before deting back down to half their normal size and saying in a squeaky high-pitch voice. "As soon as you touch a tform, it triggers the challenge… but I suppose depending on the challenge and how you touch the tform you might not be forced toplete it. Make of that what you will,"


    *That''s… less helpful then I imagined. Do I have to worry about my fingers getting sliced off if a barrier goes up when my hand touches the tform? Are the barriers just around the top of the tform like I was imagining… or do they cover a bigger box around the tform and would keep me in? What about the ones that teleport you away? Will they return me to where I was or the top of the tform… and if the answer is ''where you were'' what about my momentum? Am I doomed to just fall off the tform because I''ve got no forward momentum to jump to the next one?


    Fuck was this even worth asking? I''d assumed Thyme would''ve answered, and perhaps given out an extra hint like they did for all the other questions, but frankly I''m left with more questions then answers, and I don''t know if I should bother asking the follow-up ones. Thyme clearly isn''t interested in borating or they would''ve done so already. Dammit. I suppose I can assume Thyme wants us to participate in the game in good faith… but Thyme also likes us to use creative solutions when we can. So… what does that mean for this challenge right here?*


    While Green wasining mentally, Burgandy asked "Can we attack people while they''re doing challenges?"


    "You can certainly try. Their isn''t anything in the rules stopping you… but many of the challenges have in-built safetys. The ones that lock the challenger onto the tform mean that others can''t join in, while the ones that teleport you away will rarely send you to the same arena even if it''s the same task. Still, nothing is going to stop you from making the attempt,"


    *Why! See this is exactly what I mean! Not only did Burgandy just get a nice straight answer ''you''re allowed to attack but it won''t work a lot of the time'' but Thyme then went on to add that if you''re teleported someone for a task, it''s not going to be the same ce as the person who steps on it after you. So why did Thyme give such a bad answer?*


    "Kat, do you know why Thyme would give such a… poor answer to my question. Did we annoy them while I was away or something?" asked Green.


    Kat thought for a moment before saying, "Well, not after the Gareth fiasco… but if I had to guess the reason we got a… ''bad'' answer, for a given definition of bad anyway… is that we''re winning. I''d say this is a small way to give the others a chance at catching up. It''s not a big deal, and probably won''t cost you the game, but it''s just a touch of a handicap because we''re really far ahead this time, even with Gareth not scoring any points in the first event of the day,"


    Green considered that for a moment, chewing on the answer. *That seems… potentially correct? I suppose we''re quite far ahead already, and… wait did Nixilei win thest event? Mint heavily implied it… but I was distracted by rtionship stuff.* "Did we win thest event? Or actually, how was that scored?" asked Green.


    "Asteodia and Nixilei both got full marks because they were clearly working together and didn''t just tie randomly, or so Thyme said. I think it''s because otherwise Thyme would need to give out one and a half points to them both, or give Asteodia, Nixilei and Ellenell a point each which would''ve been unfair to Nixilei and Asteodia who won, technically. So I think this was Thyme''s way ofpromising… but I could be wrong," exined Kat.


    *Hmm… seems correct enough.*