The Population Of The Ancients

Welcome back to another day in Nyrn. Rather than focusing on one norn most of the time today I decided to do my best to split my attention between all of them. The first norn to catch my eye was the one that was all eyes! I noticed Arvyn "retreating norn" quite often and soon came to realize he seems to have a fear of other norns. Who knows what taught him that other norns are dangerous, perhaps he was slapped a lot as a kid when I wasn't watching. If this is the case, my slapping him whenever he repeated this undesirable "retreat norn" behavior seemed only like torture so I let him be, but I do feel sorry for him. I tried my best, rather, to distract him from his "fear" by teaching him once again how much fun toys can be! I must admit I found it surprisingly difficult to convince him pushing toys would be fun. Eventually he took my lessons to heart and when I left him he was happily pushing the didgeridoo all over the place.

Adalhard didn't catch my attention per-say.. I was happily and casually just watching him go about his norny business, picking fruits and such. He complained a little bit about being hungry for seeds and when I showed him the seeds on the ground to eat he decided to play dumb and try to eat everything BUT the seeds. I nearly panicked when he shifted from eating "plants, fruits, flowers and toys" to eating weed! (The poisonous mushrooms surrounding him) Luckily his failure in eating anything carried over to the weed too and he never did!(Well if you're gonna do that..) I figured fighting to get him to eat a nut was not worth a mishap with a deathcap mushroom, so I left him alone! He was happily munching on some near by tomatoes when his time to age up hit him and he grew silver linings to his features. C1 norns always look so much more handsome in elder and ancient stages than C3 norns do.

Arethan has happily been living in his old age in his garden his whole life now and not once have I had to come retrain him to do anything. he takes very good care of himself and rarely see's me any more. Every time i'm there and ask him how he's doing he expresses he's happy, and if not he quickly remedies his issue by himself.

Don't let this picture fool you! Xenia is perfectly happy at the moment and taking care of herself, she's just really tired in this snapshot. She fell asleep soon after. Xenia complained to me when she awoke about hunger for protine and I simply told her to go eat a fruit, and she set off on her trek to the middle of the desert to do just that, just by my suggestion! My previous teachings have done her well! With her drum set out of sight, though, she soon complained about being bored also and began playing with her fruits. I only needed to tell her to push toy and she began walking back to her treehouse home. Xenia has become a hermit living up here all by herself in the dead stump of a tree house. Still, it provides her excelent shelter and with all of her needs, even if she does have to make a small journey every once in a while to gather mushrooms.

Areas was the next to be taken by natural causes. He lived to a ripe old age of 5 hours and 39 minutes. Areas was sorrounded by his siblings who looked just like him when he passed so he didn't die a lonely norn in any case. They all gathered around him to bid him farewell into the afterlife and I had to pull them away to take the photo. They continued happily grazing near by.

Aku and Akka have spent most of their lives in the swamp and by the volcano door, living off of mushrooms only and playing with the deathcap seeds. I found to my surprise they were joined by Adalhard (who is sleeping, not dead) who also is now sporting his silver linings. In spite of the occasional complaint of hunger for fat or starch they all seem to be happy.

I returned to check on Arvyn only to find he had taken my suggestion to push toy to heart! He had found himself all the way into the rafters (scaffolding? What is that called anyway?) above the swamp where the symbol was and was playing with it with gusto! The symbol is the only toy in that area and I felt pride that he was able to find it so expertly. It looks like he has no brains, but he's a smart little norn!

Xenia's Storm

Yay! It's another Creatures post! I started off the day panning through the world to see how everybody was doing and where I left them off. I found most everybody was doing quite average and enjoying their life! By now most of the norns have grown to elder stage and it's not long until they begin passing into the great beyond to meet their relatives. I found down at home below the treehouse many of the elders have formed a little club. Aronil, Areas, Anruin and Arlowe enjoy approaching eachother while they feast on the plentiful fruits and seeds around them. It's uncanny how similar they all look to each other.

Of course the star of the show is always Xenia. I found her where I left her last by the dock and very hungry for protine! Xenia loves to "bang on the drums all day" so much that she just can't tear herself away to eat a bite! A couple of slaps from me pause her for just a second before she goes back to playing the drums so I have to drag her away from them far enough so that she can no longer see them before she was convinced the best thing to do would be to eat something! It reminds me a lot of myself as a gamer I spend so much time at the computer I sometimes neglect my own hunger!

After her dinner she returned home to the warm treehouse and asked for some fat. I realized then, there wasn't really anything around that would provide a good source of fat, but saw the honey pot up above on the planks. I dropped it in front of her and convinced her to try some of that. She enjoyed it so much that, with a belly full of honey, she felt so warm and cozy that she just layed down and took a restful sleep. I'm still so proud of myself for having such a happy norn! I really love her adventurous attitude but wish some of the other norns were too, so I could have some more babies.

Anruin met his maker in a field of flowers at the ancient age of 5 hours and 39 minutes. I couldn't be happier that he lived a full life, even if it wasn't as long as some of his ancestors have lived. Rest in peace.

I returned, after taking care of Anruin's death, logging it and what not, back to Xenia only to find her terrified and not knowing what to do huddled under the planks of the dead tree! There was an intense storm passing by over head spitting out bolts of lightening all around her! I have never seen such an intense storm in Nyrn before! Sure there are your average thunder producing clouds, however there were at least three very large ones here right now! I did all I could to help calm Xenia down and keep her from panickedly straying into the ocean!

Xenia made sure to tell me just how scared she was feeling. I didn't snap the photo just at the right time here, as I was trying to catch a lightening bolt that was landing right near Xenia... just to show how intense things were. With more than two giant thunder clouds over head at any one time there were constantly bolts landing all around her.

To make matters worse there were two dust devils (Yes, two! The game was really going crazy!) on either side, granted one was a little further away from Xenia at the time. The second one disappeared but the first one approached xenia..then swept her and all of her seeds, toys and things and carried them out into the ocean. You can't see them in the dust devil very well but her honey pot and other things are in there. I had been busily pulling Xenia away from the edge of the dock every two seconds while trying to calm her with tickles and distract her with the drums, now I had to rescue the honey pot from the ocean floor! And there were still thunder clouds spitting lightening all over!

Eventually the thunder clouds passed (Whiew! I thought they'd never go away.. I swear that was the longest storm I've ever expeirenced in all my creatures playing days.) and Xenia changed from "quite" scared to "kinda" scared.. and eventually not scared. I still watched the dust devil for some time as it stuck around, just to make sure it didn't sweep all of Xenia's things away again.. but generally all went back to normal and Xenia celebrated the clear sky with another drum solo.