NPF Avatars IV, Chapter V: Beyond the Wall of Teeth

[Arhra]

Evidentally Arhra was a starving hobo.

The Capitalist tipped his hat to Rei as she introduced herself, "How pleasant to meet you miss. Now if you'll all come along, the manor is this way."

Leading them through the plantation's grounds, The Capitalist seemed happy to give them something of a small tour, "We've found there's a high degree of unusual properties cropping up in the vegetation around here. We've been trying to selectively introduce desirable qualities into our plants. With such things as that 'bacon-fruit' we're hoping to pull in the reluctant vegetarian crowd."

He pointed out the workers in the fields. "I've actually ended up using trolls as workers. These ones are partially fungoid so its easy to grow more if we need to and since they eat almost anything, we use them as waste disposal too. They're practically slaves too - virtually no rights and they work for a pittiance." The Capitalist beamed at this then looked slightly more sombre, "Only problem is they're not too bright and we get the occaisional mutant. We had one recently that wouldn't stop regenerating. Kept growing all these extra limbs that would fall off. Very messy. Ended up freezing it since we thought it might be something marketable."

The manor was getting quite close. It looked exactly like someone had transplanted an old fashioned English manor-house into this huge underground cave. In an open area along the path, they walked near a tree with oddly bulging fruit. Tethered to it was a massive troll, as wide as it was tall, that was practically a walking slab of muscle. It sat happily under the tree, munching on the fallen fruit.

"We've been researching the so called 'stat enhancing' food that adventurers seem to like so much. A bit of a niche market, but adventurers are willing to shell out a lot of money for this kind of thing. Some could have more mainstream applications too. We found this fruit appears to encourage muscle development, but regrettably diminishes mental ability. Thod here is one of our guinea pigs - we want to see if there's a saturation limit or potential problems with overdosing. Say hello Thod."

The troll grunted happily, juice-stained mouth twisting into a vague grin, and half lifted a hand as if to wave. Its ugly mottled green face went blank, seeming to forget what it was doing and dropped the hand again. Instead it popped another fruit into its mouth.

"We're beginning to think he's already at the saturation limit. Still, we're letting the test go on a little longer, then we can find out with an autopsy."

It was a little like being in a tour of a chocolate factory run by a bug-eyed madman. Of course, instead of chocolate, there was a variety of bizarre fruits and vegetables, the factory-slaves were green instead of orange and the only madness The Capitalist showed was worshipping the Almighty Dollar.

At the manor itself, The Capitalist certainly hadn't been lying about the buffet. Outside, spread on a large trestle table lay a startlingly variety of foods with artfully arranged centerpieces. Some trolls - smaller than the ones in the fields - had evidentally been carefully trained as waiters; they were still putting food on the table. The hardest part of their training had been stopping them from eating the food they were meant to bring out or the guests.

"Lucky you came along really." The Capitalist said, "Most of it would have gone to waste otherwise. We're prototyping our processing and presentation too you see. This is a test meal." He gestured at a plate piled with what looked like bacon. "We've been quite successful I feel. Much more appealing with a bit of spit and polish eh?"

He grabbed a plate, "Forgive me for going on so much, but nice to have company. Don't see many people down here and trolls are hardly the world's greatest conversationalists. Please, enjoy yourselves and then I'll go and get those NDA's for you to sign." Piling up his plate with a generous sampling of the table's delights, it was obvious The Capitalist loved his food. As if his girth hadn't been enough of a clue.

Now, Arhra was hardly one to object to a free buffet. She happily took a plate herself and started prodding things with interest and adding them to her plate. With her current metabolism, Arhra was quite scary when near any sort of 'All you can eat' deal. It was one of the perks of her energy draining incarnation - she digested food extremely quickly. You might as well try to fill a bottomless pit. Starting with some pasta, Arhra was making a spirited attempt at it though.

[Flarecobra]

"I think I know a bunch of Marines that already eat that stuff." I said looking at the musclehead troll. As they entered the dining hall, I looked a little suspect at the food. "Are you sure that this is actually safe for all species? I'm sure you can tell, we're not all exactly human...."

[Darth SS]

"Okay, well I'm human. That looks edible. Feed me. Feed me now you bastards," interjected Darth from behind Flare. As if in support of him, his stomach rumbled.

"I have a gun, and I will shoot whomever attempts to halt my retrieval of sustenance."

[Toastburner B]

TB looked at the buffet, but found himself untrusting of NPCs in general...especially ones who appear in the the middle of a quest, right after a large, regenerating boulder that seemed intent on smashing people.

"I hate to be a stick in the mud," TB said, "but, you know...we are trying to prevent the lastest apcolypse, remember? I mean, we're five chapters in and still in the first dungeon. Or do all end of world events operate on Final Fantasy timeframes...where nothing happens until we enter a certain area?"

[Flarecobra]

"That's my guess. And so to move things along..." I said, just as I quickly formed a fireball and shot it at The Capitalist. "We'll just get him out of the way, so we can be on our's."

[The Artist Formerly Known as Hawk]

Originally Posted by Toastburner B

"I hate to be a stick in the mud," TB said, "but, you know...we are trying to prevent the lastest apcolypse, remember? I mean, we're five chapters in and still in the first dungeon. Or do all end of world events operation on Final Fantasy timeframes...where nothing happens until we enter a certain area?"

"Thats my guess as well, and i did think this was a bit of an unnecessary sub-quest". He looked up from behind the extra large roast chicken that he had begun to eat, beak stuffed with food and with a slightly annoyed tone he continued, "I hate unnecessary sub-quests!!". After a few seconds he shrugged (well, as much a hawk can shrug), and turned back to the chicken, ripping off chunks of meat and swallowing them whole.

He didnt even look up when a fireball flew past, figuring that, if it hit The Capitalist then they would have one less problem to deal with.

[Skyshot]

Skyshot looked at his surroundings. On the one hand, the Capitalist seemed sufficiently corrupt enough to justify stealing from. On the other hand, he needed this. He put a hand on Arhra's shoulder.

"I've already eaten, so if you plan to make any deals with this guy that don't involve my kind of person, I'm over here." He grabbed a chair, dragged it over behind a tree, and sat down to commune with the gods. Nothing like a good spiritual refreshment.

[Tarrin]

Tarrin watched as the fireball engulfed the capitalist, Reaching thru the neather he retireved his lance, Either the guy was toast, Or the Gm was gonna be pissed and they were up for some nasty, nasty combat.

Suddenly a thought hit Tarrin "Gm? What the hell am i takling about, It's not like this is some elaborite game setup just to kill or entertain the gods" pushing the thought out of his head Tarrin readied himself for whatever would come next.

[Steel Shadow]

Steel had taken to leaning against a wall watching his fellow forumites, hoping they'd do something interesting, or something big and nasty would come along and they could fight it. But since neither of these things seemed to be forth coming, he folded his arms and rested a moment. There had been quie a bit of excitment recently, and it was nice to have a reprive. Then of course, Flare attacked.
As the fireball flew past him, Steel seized his opertunity. His power enveloped Flare's attack, stopping it dead in it's tracks. He looked over at Flare.
"You know, that's not very polite. He did invite us freely into his home and all. We could have just left in peace." He paused. "Then again, he is clearly evil, and this quest does seem to be taking a while. Plus, the odds of us going *anywhere* without some sort of violence would give you money even if you didn't bet." He shrugged.
"Fine, have it your way" He sighed and, having had his say, let the fireball continue on it's course. He put his hand to his sword hilt, anticipating that the next few minutes were going to be eventful.

[Arhra]

Of course, The Capitalist had the presence of mind to take a few judicious steps to the side when Steel temporarily froze the fireball. It flew harmlessly past, not even humorously hitting a squirrel or other small animal. The Capitalist on the other hand turned bright red, swelling with rage, face red and moustache bristling. "How dare you!" he cried, "Get out of here!" He seemed to calm down slightly, a grim light glinting in his eyes and monocle as he continued in a quieter tone. "Get off my property and if you breathe a word of my business venture, you'll be hearing from my lawyers."

Arhra carefully put her plate down. A doggy bag was clearly out of the question. "Oh, great idea Flare." she said, voice dripping with sarcasm and bitterness. "Let's not have a rest and a free meal and instead wander around in the poison jungle filled with sharp toothed things!" Arhra didn't know whether it actually was poison or filled with teeth, but she had her suspicions.

"I'm surrounded by idiots!" Arhra stated loudly, casting a dirty look at Flare, Hawk, Tarrin and Steel.

She stormed off.