Oracle

[TwoKillerMockingbirds]

Darkness has fallen outside your window, with just the faintest glow from streetlights and the soft illumination to cast long, faded shadows in the darkness of your room.

You do the only sensible thing. You turn on a light.

Poetry. Always so much nonsense.

You throw your backpack down at the foot of your bed, and clamber over the untidy piles strewn about your floor. You’d just gotten back from school, after staying after for awhile to get some chemistry project taken care of, and you are looking forward to this long and glorious winter weekend. In your hand you hold a package, which, by its very existence, fills this weekend with at least three times as much potential for awesomeness.

You wake your computer from sleep mode, and begin opening the package. It’s a simple manila folder, addressed in a gloriously looping handwriting to one Mr. Roman Dupont, at 1243 Oakbridge Street. The return address simply says, “Trinity” which would be cryptic if you didn’t know Trinity so very well.

Also, if this wasn’t all she’d been talking about for the last ungodly amount of time.

You finally make it into the package, and achieve your prize. It’s just a regular looking flash drive, but Trinity swears the /sickest/ game ever is all loaded up, brand swanky new for you to play.

But, enough dawdling. You plug that thing right into your computer, and open up the main folder. There appear to be two files. One is labeled “Oracle.” You can only assume that’s the game itself. The other is labeled “README – NO S3RIOUSLY YOU J3RK, OPEN TH3 FR3AKIN9 THIN9 UP AND R3AD!”

Yeeeah, that’s Trinity for you.

You decide to humor her, and open up the instructions:

“ROOOMAN! You’d have b3tt3r l3t m3 know wh3n you 9ot this, otherwise I will hav3 a f333w harsh words to exchan9e with you lat3r, assumin9 you 9et throu9h the 9ame. But don’t worry tooo much, I have faith in you! And r3ally, what more could you n33d? Just a not3, though- This game is rrr333aaalllyyy important, and it’d be 9r3at if you tr3at it so- w3ll, I actually ima9in3 it won’t 3nd up bein9 tooo important to you, but th3n a9ain, I’ve n3v3r s33n what diff3r3nt s3ssions brin9 up. Just b3 car3ful, okay? I r3ally wish I didn’t hav3 to b3 so cryptic with you, but it kinda 9oes alon9 with th3 9ame. I know, it annoy3d me wh3n I first play3d, all thos3 lon9 a9o years I k33p t3llin9 you about, but its of sup3r-dup3r-tripl3-tripl3-TRIPL3 importanc3 that 3v3ry mov3 you mak3, you d3cid3 on. I took a bit of a 9ambl3 in 3l3ctin9 you to play, but I think you ar3 stron9 enou9h now to make 9ood choices! I hav3 faith in you, Roman! 9o, fulfill your destiny! And who knows, mayb3 I’ll s33 you th3r3!!!
::: DDD”

Stran93, 3xci- you mean strange, excitable child, Trinity is. But she’s really into this shindig, so you give it a whirl. You load up the game page. A solitary word, and a few squiggles greet you.


‘*~,ORACLE,~*’

[TwoKillerMockingbirds]

Darkness. Then, spreading slowly across the screen, white. Pixel by pixel, the room brightens until you are forced to shield your eyes. Then, a small winking sound. You briefly wonder how a sound can wink, and then darkness drops again. Suddenly, a figure is standing before you, cloaked in shadows. He is also cloaked in a cloak, a royal purple. A breeze stirs, gently rustling the long, grey beard of the specter before you. You wonder where it came from. The breeze, of course. You imagine the beard came from the man’s chin. A gong crashes loudly nearby, resonating the room with its deep tone. A fire leaps into existence behind this strange figure, replacing his cloaking shadows with some a bit more ominous. Clearly, you are in the middle of a mysterious, and deeply important ceremony

To be perfectly honest, you’re finding it all just a wee bit silly.

The cloaked, shadowed and shadowy-ed figure lifts his arms in an imperial display of power and majesty. You wonder if shadowy-ed is actually a word. Suddenly, a booming voice echoes throughout the room.

“Greetings, chosen one!”

1- “… Hi?”
2- “S’up?”
3- "Out of all my possible and lengthy honorifics, noble titles, land deeds, and vast, expansive accomplishments, the only thing you could possibly think to greet me by is chosen one?"

[atoms2ashes]

>Draw several childish scribbles on the manila paper and stick them on your monitor with tape

[TwoKillerMockingbirds]

You glance down at the manila envelope, sitting so temptingly on your desk, beckoning to you.
Or at least it would, if you had any skills with drawing whatsoever. You're not even sure of you could pull of childish. More like... Mutant lumps of graphite dying painful, atrocious deaths. Possibly in a leper colony. (Somewhere, your political correctness sirens wail)

You need to stop with the similes, sometimes. These things get more out of hand then an angry bobcat wearing poor-fitting overalls.

Gods. Just stop. For the love of all that is sacred, just stop.

You return your attention to the three options on the screen

[TechtonicLogician]

>Make a mental note on how shadowy-ed is totally a word, be sure to create a dictionary where it qualifies as such.

Alternatively and/or subsequently,

3- "Out of all my possible and lengthy honorifics, noble titles, land deeds, and vast, expansive accomplishments, the only thing you could possibly think to greet me by is chosen one?"

[TwoKillerMockingbirds]

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You slap a mental sticky note right up in you head. That thing is going to TRANSPIRE

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Theoretically

The figure seems completely taken aback- nay, even mortified. He practically starts quivering, and reaches into his robe and pulls out a sheaf of papers

“I-I.. Excuse me, y-your royal h-highne- I mean, y-your g-gracious god-like, ah, m-majesty…”

The figure fumbles through his papers, stumbles over words, and generally acts like a small dog caught mid-act with its owner’s prized beanie-baby collection. You attempt to suppress that image, regretful that it ever came up.

“I-I-I’m sorry, most dign-nified and stately o-one, the, ah, notes my superiors p-procured for me seem to have the, err, m-most regretful mistake in the, ah, that us to say, they don’t provide your full, ah, t-title…”

1. “Humph. I will overlook your impudence this time. If you ever enter my glorified presence again, I expect you to have discovered my proper title, and address me as such. Understood?”
2. “Understandable. My full title is far too lengthy and impressive to ever be contained in such dreary notes as your. However, you may refer to me as ‘Your Broship’”
3. “I find you a disgrace to your profession. What kind of a herald are you if you don’t even know my proper title. Enough of this foolishness. Continue with your meager report.”

[atoms2ashes]

2. “Understandable. My full title is far too lengthy and impressive to ever be contained in such dreary notes as your. However, you may refer to me as ‘Your Broship’”


>Be known throughout the virtual kingdom as a kind ruler with a strong grip.

[TwoKillerMockingbirds]

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Strange... There's no king button on the text display. You slap another sticky note up in your mind. When you ascend to kinghood in this game, you're not only going to benevolence the hell out of this thing- You're going to establish buttons

The figure frowns. “I, err… Don’t think that has been a title officially claimed by the g-gods,” he began

“Yeah, don’t worry about that. The gods are chill with it. There are some days when I just sit back and pop a tab soda open with the gods, and we chill. They bestowed this title on me. King of the bros. Broseiden. Broki. I’m a Brohemoth, man, what can I say. Pounding a Bro-fist with me is like touching Jesus’s robe was in the bible. Bam! Clean of all your uncoolness. But don’t worry, man, I know I was kinda uptight with you earlier, but we’ll let that all slide, right? You got some important news for me?”

You are getting such a kick out of this, it should be illegal.

“Ah… a-alright. As I’m sure the gods have informed you, as you… seem to claim, you know that you should find your familiar and choose your allegiance with your god. I-I guess I’ll just send you off now.”

“Sounds chill, man, and,” you add, “Lighten up a little bro.” You give him your most debonair wink.

“I-uh… Sure. Just.. good luck.”

“Good luck, who?” You angle, wiggling your eyebrows in an extremely ridiculous fashion.

“Good luck your… Broship.” The wizard forces out.

Before you can get another word, you’re whisked out and away from the room. As your sigh fades to white, all you can think is “Player: 1 NPC: 0”

Hell yes.

[TwoKillerMockingbirds]

The light clears. You start to feel a slight throbbing behind your eyes. You really hope they stop doing this. You blink once, then twice, and your eyes begin to adjust.

You stand in a field- no, scratch that, you realize. You stand on a dirt road smack in the center of deity-accursed oblivion.

That is to say, gods-damned nowhere

At least it’s a beautiful day. The sun shines in the sky above you like a gaudy yellow jewel radiating happy, 1970’s smiles and possibly fuzzy baby animals

It’s making your headache worse. Like some sort of teleportation hangover.

You attempt to take a more sober view of your surroundings. Tall grass. Maybe wheat. Dirt. I mean seriously, what part of gods-damned nowhere did you not understand? A light wind blows, rustling the leaves of the forest to your right. To your left, more field. In front of you the road stretches on. You see structures off in the distance- A town, you assume. Looks like that’d be the first stop on your journey.

Better get to it, chosen one.

1-1- Start walking to the village. You might make it by sun-down
1-2- Screw the village. Start romping down in those woods yonder
1-3- Get lost in a field

[atoms2ashes]

1-1- Start walking to the village. You might make it by sun-down

>Start searching for Trinity

[aattss]

>Check options. If there's an option which lets you choose the minimum amount of relevance a command has to have, then make it higher.

>Check your inventory. Do you have a cell phone? If so, call the person. After all, you might actually be going to an insane asylum.

[TwoKillerMockingbirds]

((From now on, I'm going to continue putting entered commands in spoilers, and game text just below))

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>Start searching for Trinity

Not a bad idea at all. You wouldn't put it past the girl at all to code herself into this thing. You would not be surprised in the least if she just tapped right into this thing and tweaked around with its source code. You feel like she mentioned something about a high priestess or something. Maybe you'll run across her in a temple or something. You decide to file that little bit of knowledge up there with all your mental sticky notes.

Although, now that you think about it, it is getting a little bit crowded. In a flash of brilliance, you recall the Manila envelope on your desk and quickly jot down your notes. There. Taken care of.

>Check your inventory. Do you have a cell phone? If so, call the person. After all, you might actually be going to an insane asylum.

Inventory? You feel as though the whole world just turned and stared at you. You know, that stare you get when you as a little kid what he wants for Christmas, and you wonder why everyone went silent until someone gently grabs your shoulder and tells you you’re at a Bar Mitzvah.

That look

You don’t have an inventory. All you have is your trusty SACK. Which, judging by the game so far is probably just a bag. You’d see if it had an item limit or something, but you don’t relish getting that look again. It’d be like you had just shuffled to the door to leave the Bar Mitzvah and someone politely reminded you not to forget the Santa suit you ditched in the corner.

You’re really starting to wonder where all these metaphors are popping up from.

Either way, you think you can make out some sort of shapes to the village, little houses and puffs of smoke and whatnot. And even if it were an insane asylum, looks like it's the only game in town.

>Check options. If there's an option which lets you choose the minimum amount of relevance a command has to have, then make it higher.

Options, options, options..... You search around the screen, looking for any type of options bar, or help bar, or really anything on this program. To be bluntly honest, you don't think there is anything. All you've got is a black box with some white text, and every so often a picture pops up you guess. Probably and indie game. It's the kind of thing Trin would be into, anyways. You glance down at your folder-notes. Yup, still there on the objective lists. Maybe in-game Trin'd have some useful advice.

Very well, then. You stride forward, wind at your back, afternoon sun blazing over your head. Mister No-Nonsense, yessir, that’s you. Just walking right on along this here dirt road. One foot in front of the other, just strutting along. Meandering right on down this road here. Mhm.

Oh, man this boring. You’d look at the scenery to distract you, but there’s just no really gripping flora around here, no seat-of-your-pants plants.

Although you do wonder what kind of plant would qualify as seat of your pants. It’d have to be really darned intriguing, and as a plant, there’s not much to work with. You doubt anyone’s ever said, “Oh look at that thrilling petunia!” except maybe a falling whale but that is entirely beside the point. You imagine it’d have tentacles. All really interesting things have tentacles. And eat people. Has to eat people too…

Thus engaged in your line of thought, you successfully manage to distract yourself from your travelling. You also manage to distract yourself from the fields, the village, the road, and the things on the road, including the rater hurried female it appears you just ran into.

“Watch it,” she growls, picking herself up off the ground, dusting a bit of dirt off her skirt. “I’m having hard enough time watching out for myself, much less being on the lookout for any stranger as can’t keep his head on.”

1. Be chivalrous
2. Apologize profusely and be on your way
3. Stand like a dumb-struck idiot.

[WeaselExorcist]

Be Chivalrous and ask if there is anything you can do to make up for it

[TwoKillerMockingbirds]

What, a maiden in distress? By your own hand, what’s more. You there, don’t just stand around!

You promptly apologize for your absent-mindedness, and offer the damsel a hand up.

The girl waves you away. “Aye, aye. I’m fine. I’ll just get on my way. Pleasure running into you, have an absolutely grand feast day, best of luck to you in a Trickster’s Year, etcetera et al.” As she talks, she steadily heads off down the road, back to you, gesturing every once and a while.

A smile spreads across your face. “Miss?” you call, before she gets out of earshot. She pauses for a second.

“Aye?”

“I believe this is yours.” You hold out the bag you found lying on the ground, presumably one that she dropped when you so rudely barreled into her.

She turns and gives you an eyebrow. “Aye, I suppose it is.” The smug little smile stays on your face as she walks back, snatching the bag from your hand. “Say, where’re you headed?”

You shrug. “I’m new here. Probably into town, but I’ve no obligations. Is there any way I could give you hand with something?”

“That depends. Are you up for joining a goat search party?”

1- “Sure.”
2- “Wow, would you look at my no-existent watch. I’m late for an appointment with the guy who’s helping me come up with valid excuses.”
3- “Wait… what?”

[Naristar]

3
Why are you searching for goats??

[TwoKillerMockingbirds]

You raise one eyebrow, quizzical. “A… goat?” you ask. “Ummm… Pray tell why, exactly?”

The girl returns your likewise incredulous look. You can’t tell whether she’s mocking you, or being serious, or some combination thereof. “Because the damn thing chewed through his rope?”

“Okay… So your goat wandered off?”

“Aye.”

“Uh-huh. Next question. Why do you have a goat?”

Okay, now you are completely, one hundred percent positive that’s a look of actual dismay. “It’s the first week of a Trickster’s Years? It’s Kathon’s Feast Day, and we need a sacrifice. Besides, what else would you ever use a goat for?” She pauses, and stares at you disbelievingly. You realize she’s actually quite pretty, when her red-brown eyes aren’t ogling you disconcertingly. “Just how not from here are you?”

“About as not from here as you could possibly get,” you admit. “The name’s Roman.”

“Aye, aye, sure it is. Right. On the run then, it’s fine. I don’t much care for prying, anyways. So, are you going to help me find Roald?”

“No, I mean, it really is my name. It’s pretty odd where I come from, too- most people don’t believe me,” you affirm. “And… Roald?”

“Look, I said I wasn’t going to pry. I don’t care what you wish to be called. And it’s the goat. Roald, I mean. What else’d it be?”

“A… person?” you suggest.

More disconcerting looks. “You aren’t lyin’, are you? Everyone knows- names beginning with ‘Ro’ are reserved for the gods. Roman…” She trails off, staring off into the distance. She catches her self, and shakes her head. Much like a horse would shake a fly away, you realize.

“Anyways, Roman. Can I count you in?”

1- Yes
2- No

[Naristar]

1 why the hell not!

[WeaselExorcist]

1 YES.

[Dar'Joras]

1 sure any other answer is out of question anyways

[TwoKillerMockingbirds]

“Well, alright then. Come on, he’s probably lost off in the field, somewhere.” The girl starts heading off the road, wading into the waves of waist-high grass. A wind whips her auburn hair. “Well, are you coming?”

There is absolutely no way you’re not coming, to speak in perfect honesty.

You wonder about the syntax of that sentence briefly, but you’re too busy being waist-deep in a field to worry about that. Oh, and a goat. You should also be busy worrying about a goat. That is why you’re here.

Goat. Right.

The girl is saying something, and you mentally shift gears from ‘nod and pretend to be listening’ to ‘actually listening’

“So, just take a look on that side of the field, and I got this one. He’s not exactly the smartest goat I’ve ever met, he’ll likely be chewing on something. Or peeing on someone’s shoe. Or something goat-like. Or, it’s entirely possible he’s doing something non goat-like. He’s a sacrificial goat, after all. Just look for something hoofed and mammalian.”

You’re starting to wonder how complicated goat-searching could actually be. You mean, a goat is a goat is a goat, right? Right?

Although, as you force your way through undulating stalks, you kind of wonder if anything is simple around here. A little nagging voice in your head says that would take the fun out of it.

Somewhere, you hear a low chuckling.

For some reason, you get the feeling this is not a good thing.

A patch of the tall grass rustles.

You attempt to put a lid on the Pokémon references springing to your mind. It’s not very effective. Damnit. You very seriously harbor thoughts of slapping yourself silly.

In all seriousness, though, you’re faced with a decision.

1- Investigate
2- Back away, slowly and calmly
3- Flip the hell out

[Naristar]

Can we do a combo of 1 and 3?

[Dar'Joras]

0- slap yourself silly

[TwoKillerMockingbirds]

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0- slap yourself silly

Ow. Okay. You deserved that. You admit it.

OHGOGOHGOGOHGOGOHGOGDFKDTGLKDFKHKMYHDFXGSzh

There is a patch of GRASS. And it’s MOVING. And it can only be completely and ridiculously SINISTER. This can only be BAD, a fact which you are choosing to emphasize as YOU CAPATILIZE RANDOM WORDS. Words like, “SHIT SHIT, THE GRASS MOVED SHIT.” You are so TOTALLY flipping OUT right now.

Surprisingly, this does absolutely nothing. Imagine that.

With that out of the way, you get down to business. Namely, the fact you still have to figure out what’s in that patch of grass. Or flee, with your tail behind your leg and explain to goat-chick that you freaked and needed her help because a patch of grass moved. Yeah. You can’t see that going over well.

You decide to man up, and investigate.

Carefully, quietly you make your way over to the suspect plot. You brace yourself, push aside the stalks and…

A pair of very excited, very blue goat eyes stare up at you, filled to the brim with a tender innocence that just seems to proclaim, “I’m a goat! Love me!”

Of course it was the freaking goat. What else could it be on a goat searching quest? You’re struck by that urge to slap yourself silly again.

Anyways, the chewed-off rope stub is just dangling around its neck, you can probably just grab it and walk the little thing back to its owner, so she can rip out its intestines and splatter its blood on an altar or some weird fantasy thing like that. You don’t really want to think about the process too much.

You just reach your hand right on down and…

The goat chuckles. Quietly at first, but the laughing soon crescendos to evil-maniac level.

Shit.

1- Slap goat silly
2- Call over goat-girl
3- Just take the leash and try not to make eye contact
4- Scream, “Be gone foul demon!” at the top of your lungs

[WeaselExorcist]

a combination of 1 and 4

[patcheen]

4-
›Pour salt on it to kill it (like with witches)