Yukari Quest - A Z-machine Adventure

[Hello Purvis]

>We are going to have to walk long distances, aren't we.
http://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=835
>First, we need to make a hat. Make hat out of feather plants.

>You are probably going to have to do quite a lot of walking before you find everything. But if nothing else, at least it'll be easier to open short term gaps now.
>You decide to take a rest and spent some time working the feathery reeds you've harvested into a hat. This takes awhile, you have to clean off each one, then bundle them together properly. You end up having to harvest more of them to finish the job, particularly in finding some that will serve well as cords. This would be faster if you had a knife or a sickle, but there is little you can do about that right now. You estimate it takes you about an hour, all told, but in the end, you are reasonably happy with the product. It's not going to be able to take much abuse, but it should keep your head dry and free of any dust. You also have a pile of fluff, which ought to make decent kindling.
>You obtain: Wide-brimmed Reed Hat.
>While weaving your hat, you find yourself periodically remarking on the stillness of this place. There are no bird cries, no insects or any sign of animals. There is no wind, barely any noise at all. The light doesn't seem to change at all. Every so often you glance upward, wondering if the yawning emptiness is encroaching, but you cannot tell whether it is or whether it is as still as the rest of this place. You've grown used to the air pressing down upon you, at least.

>_

[O4rfish]

>Wander.

[Kilgamayan]

> Might as well try something...
> Pick a flower and nibble on it to see if it's edible.

[Yaersulf]

I was just about to input that Kilga >.<

[Kilgamayan]

ゆ snooze ゆ lose

[Hello Purvis]

> Might as well try something...
> Pick a flower and nibble on it to see if it's edible.

>You try to nibble on one of the fronds, and discover that it is rather like a mouthful of Ran's tail sheddings. That is, neither pleasant nor edible.

>Wander.

>With little else to do, you pick a direction at random and wander.  Deciding to label the direction that you have traveled north, you begin to range out further north. There is little to see, just a sea of softly swaying fronds. Here and there, you find a bare patch of land, seldom more than a few yards wide. Every so often, you look back to make sure that the tree is still within sight. Aside from it, there is practically nothing to see. It would be terribly easy to pass up just about anything lost under the feathery plants;you could almost amuse yourself with the idea of treasures hidden here or there, were it not so terribly bleak.
>With the tree to the south almost entirely out of sight, you find yourself becoming aware of something in the air. After a moment to consider it, it feels more like a tangle among the loose borders and endlessly shifting borders here. It's hard to put a physical location to this, but it feels as though it is up ahead and to the "west" little.

>_

[Shadoweh]

> GO WEST! LIFE IS PEACEFUL THERE!

[Hello Purvis]

> GO WEST! LIFE IS PEACEFUL THERE!

>You proceed westward. Visually, there is no more to see this way than there was to the north. Perhaps that is not true, you think you might see a small tree just on the edge of your vision. However, you can sense that distortion in the borders curves to the west. and up into the sky after some distance. As you draw closer, you can start to get a sense of what it is. It feels like a persistent fold in the fabric of space, as if the loose fabric has managed catch upon its own threads  like a badly made garment. If this were Gensokyo, you would chide yourself on allowing such shoddy work. But here, it's not too surprising to encounter something like this. If manipulated correctly, you could probably cause this entire place to begin to collapse in upon itself. You  also get the feeling it may well run through a much of the space here, given it stretches beyond the horizons of your senses.

>_

[O4rfish]

>Could we fix it, so it's more stable?

[Hello Purvis]

>Could we fix it, so it's more stable?

>It would help if you had all of your tools, but you could probably do something to repair it if you had the time. You doubt you could affect a total repair, but you could do something.

>_

[Kilgamayan]

> What would happen if we made it collapse upon itself while we were here?

[Hello Purvis]

> What would happen if we made it collapse upon itself while we were here?

>You've never really experimented with this kind of thing. Normally, you'd expect to fall between the cracks of reality and return to the background that is within the gaps. Chances are you'd be the only thing to survive.  However, with the emptiness here, you suspect you would just be removing the things that separate you from it.

>_

[O4rfish]

>Can the emptiness be harnessed?

[Hello Purvis]

>Can the emptiness be harnessed?

>Define harnessed in this case?

>_

[Yaersulf]

>Can it be manipulated in any way?
Did I get that right?

[Hello Purvis]

>Can it be manipulated in any way?

>You cannot manipulate it directly; because there is nothing to manipulate. It may be possible to manipulate it indirectly, but you wouldn't consider this without all of your tools in hand. And you should slip up, the consequences would be extraordinary dire.

>_

[O4rfish]

>Can we manipulate the boundary between the emptiness and ... stuffness?

[Hello Purvis]

>Can we manipulate the boundary between the emptiness and ... stuffness?

>That's an interesting question. You've never really had the opportunity to find out. You'd certainly want to be at 100% before you tried it, though.

>_

[O4rfish]

>Search for water.

[Hello Purvis]

>Search for water.

>Looking around, you see nothing that appears to be water around here.

>_

[O4rfish]

>How do the plants survive without water?

[Hello Purvis]

>How do the plants survive without water?

>You have no idea. But as far as you can see in this area, there are no visible sources of water.

>_

[O4rfish]

OK, is it worth walking around this place, or should we try using magic?

[Kilgamayan]

I've had no bloody clue about anything since high-fiving the hand tree proved fruitless. I'm good with whatever.

[O4rfish]

>inventory
>quests

[Shadoweh]

> Try to find the center of this fold, or at least the densest part of it.
> Attempt to repair the fold.

[Hello Purvis]

>inventory
>quests

>Your inventory contains:
>Bedsheet
>Your silken bedsheet, presently being worn as a toga.
>Socks and Undergarments.
>Some of your lost clothing.
>Rock
>A rock your picked up from the cavern floor, good for throwing or bashing. It bears some scuff marks where you tried to use it as an engraving tool
>Yukari's Screwdriver.
>Seemingly a basic screwdriver. With this, you may prise open gaps with much more precision and delicately than you can alone.
>Your quests are:
>Where in the World is Yukari Yakumo?
>You have no idea where you are, and you direly wish to correct that. As well, you want to get home.
>A Part of You
>Your tools are missing, and you desperately need them back.

> Try to find the center of this fold, or at least the densest part of it.
> Attempt to repair the fold.

>Finding where the fold is most dense is difficult, you have to walk along it for awhile, running your fingers through it, feeling out where it branches and where it twists. It proves pliable to your senses, you can easily feel along its length much further than you can see or hear, following it to its various ends. While you've not focused on any one part, you get a rough idea of the size of this place through the fold. It is some distance across, perhaps twenty miles or more. While the land would not conform to this shape, the borders themselves are squashed and very flat, which is curious and likely the cause of at least some of the instability here. As the borders extend toward the void, they wear more and more thin until they fall away entirely. There really is nothing between you and it. After a little examination, you find the part where the fold is worst is some miles to the northeast.
>You set to work, doing the best you can with tools that you have and the circumstances that you are in. The fold, if nothing else, is amazingly pliable to your efforts. Much as you can sense through it much further than you normally could, you can also direct your gaps further along it than you normally can. While completely removing it is impossible right now, you are able to clean up some of the worst aspects of the fold, making space feel a lot more clean. In particular, the sandstorm sensation of the borders here has subsided a little, close to the proximity of the fold. You can open gaps with less effort when near to it. It's still fair from ideal conditions, but it's better than before.

>_

[Shadoweh]

> What can we sense through the fold in this area? Are there any other unusual points of instability we can find?
> Can we extend the borders of this place?

[Hello Purvis]

> What can we sense through the fold in this area? Are there any other unusual points of instability we can find?
> Can we extend the borders of this place?

>You take some time to feel out what you can find through the length of the fold. It wends and branches throughout much of this place like a river with hundreds of branches and tributaries.  Not surprisingly, much of it opens goes through emptiness, and there's little of note to find. You can definitely feel a couple of potential gaps close to it; one of them unfortunately some distance into the sky and inaccessible. You are not able to make out much of the physical layout of the land, save for one point where the fold passes through a tree some miles away to the west.
>You could theoretically work to extend the borders, but it would take weeks to make any real progress.

>_

[Shadoweh]

> Is the gap only inaccessable because it's in the sky?