One Curious Kobold

[lurkingkobold]

It's winter, and all is well with the tribe. Their new magic, an ability to make portals from one place to another, which was found by one of their members during the early-summer trip to meet with the other tribes in the area, let them both build up a decadent food stockpile and move to a much deeper part of the cave system without the worry of being unable to find their way back out. No-one has had to go hungry, and even the fiercest ice storm doesn't reach them; they are as content as kobolds can be.

Well, aside from their new mage, that is. She's bored, and curious. Making portals to known places is straightforward enough, with the magic she found, but that's far from the limit of what it can do... so one day, she slips away, portals off to a different cave system - one can't be too careful, after all - and experiments.

Temperature roughly the same... gravity roughly the same... air the same, not into stone or underwater or in a volcano or on top of a mountain... but, instead of patterning it after a place she knows, what happens if she only specifies those things, and lets the innate patterns of the spot she's casting on do the rest? Particularly this one part, which seems to specify the world...

She finishes the spell, and hesitates for just a moment before activating it.

Comments

[lurkingkobold]

How strange. The kobold pokes her head through the portal and looks around, not stepping through quite yet.

[characterquarry]

If it's a cave, it's a very bright and clean and square cave. There are occasional perfectly vertical gaps in the wall between which some plantlife is visible. But there's no sign of any creatures other than herself.

[lurkingkobold]

Huh. Neat. She sets the portal to close behind her and steps through, staying alert while she goes to get a closer look at the pool.

[characterquarry]

Nothing in particular happens while she does this.

The pool's colorful tiles are fairly large, and seem to be following a particular pattern. It gets slightly deeper towards the center of the room.

[lurkingkobold]

She crouches down and carefully skims a finger along the surface of the water.

[characterquarry]

Though her finger is now wet, the water is not disturbed at all. No rippling, no splashing.

For a brief instant there is the sense of being watched- then it's gone as quickly as it came and twelve softly glowing spots of light appear on various parts of her body.

Something tells her that these are her wishes, and she can wish by desiring something just so in a way that idle fantasies definitely won't accidentally trigger.

Very shortly after this, a (short for a human) person comes running through one of the gaps. She says in perfect animalperson, "You touch the water?"

[lurkingkobold]

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaa.

The person gets just about through saying 'touch', and then the kobold disappears in a brief burst of light.

[characterquarry]

The human says "...What." Then she sits down, not touching the water, and points her sense-of-magic at the place the strange little person was.

[lurkingkobold]

Meanwhile, in another world, the strange little person is panicking and trying to scrub a glowing wish out of her fur. When this utterly fails to work, she takes another few minutes to calm down and consider her options, and, eventually, hesitantly opens the portal back up.

[characterquarry]

The human who ran in earlier is sitting on the ground, looking in the general direction of the portal. She points at herself. "Erin."

After a brief pause, "Other person want Erin do of explain wishes?"

[lurkingkobold]

Aaaaaaa.

Aaa.

Aa.

...

Erin's not actually looking through the portal. She's kind of looking vaguely in its general direction, but she doesn't seem to know where it is, exactly. And she's talking to the kobold, probably, but she's not talking to the kobold.

And the kobold does want an explanation of what exactly just happened to her.

She's going to have to at least stick her head through the portal in order to say that, though. She'll take another minute to get calmed down a bit first.

[characterquarry]

Erin will be sitting calmly, eating berries out of a pouch and glancing portalward every few seconds.

[lurkingkobold]

Eventually, between one glance and another, there comes to be a kobold. A very stressed-looking kobold. (The portal disappears behind her again after a minute.)

[characterquarry]

"Erin is of human, is of talk-wish and sense-wish. Other person is of...?"

[lurkingkobold]

Confused, for one, at the description of the wishes, but, "kobold."

[characterquarry]

"Sense-wish shows of kind of magic. Talk-wish shows of how speak all people. Wish is of... Some say of god, some say no of god. Not sure. Person is born, person touches pool of wish, person gets wish. Can use wish when person is of twelve years... Kobold is of person, is of new kind of person. Erin is very curious."

[lurkingkobold]

Well.

"Sense-wish do of see of magic - wishes do of look of magic?"

[characterquarry]

"Wishes do of any of magic. Sense-wish of weak magic. Sense-wish see 'kobold of magic,' 'kobold magic is of move,' sense-wish no see how kobold of magic."

[lurkingkobold]

Headshake, headshake, no, that's not what she was trying to ask.

"Person do of see of magic: person do of see of wish," she points to one of the glowing spots, "do of see of magic?"

[characterquarry]

"...Erin no of understand. Kobold want of hide wish-light?"

[lurkingkobold]

Brief hesitation, and then a nod. "Tribe mage do of see of strange magic, do of worry of hex. Big trouble."

[characterquarry]

"Wish no hide of wish light. Use one wish, one wish-light gone. Use all wish, all wish-light gone."

[lurkingkobold]

Well.

It's a solvable problem, at least? The kobold is still pretty distressed, but calming down some.

[characterquarry]

"Hex is of bad kobold magic?"

[lurkingkobold]

"Hex is of bad of magic," nod. "Hex is of... mage do of magic; mage do of magic of person, person is of spellbearer; mage do of good, spellbearer do of choose of magic do of thing; mage do of bad, spellbearer no do of choose, spell is of hex. Hex spellbearer, maybe is of danger of other of person, if magic is of danger. Mage do of see of magic, no do of see of kind of magic, no do of know of danger."