Chapter 86: 4: Hidden Gods

Lin Hao rubbed his head and agreed, "Well yeah, of course he seems more complex." He laughed when both girls looked at him with surprise, and said a bit proudly, "It's because he is. The NPCs have learning functions built into the conversation system, they can remember who they've spoken to and what was said before and base their conversations on it."

"Ok?" Danika prompted.

Lin Hao obligingly explained, "The traveling merchant has the largest conversational library of any NPC in the game. Everyone talks to him at some point, and most people talk to him quite often."

Danika replied, "Oh, I see." She thought for a moment and then asked, "Is there any work-around for the purchasing problem though? For things like the quest map she needs to buy, can she buy it from another NPC, or could I buy it for her?"

Kit glanced at ZipZing and then looked at Lin Hao hopefully. Lin Hao frowned and pulled his screens back up. Kit dried her tears and both girls waited silently with hopeful faces. Finally he sighed and shook his head. "No, I can give you the map, but things like this will come up again in the future. I told you, the traveling merchant is part of the quest system."

Kit said shyly, "I know, he's a God who's not labeled as a God." 

"What?" Danika asked with shock.

Lin Hao blinked and looked thoughtful, while Kit explained, "He told me that Gods are the only NPCs who can revive like players." Danika nodded at this, because Tiana Treebane had told her the same, and Kit continued, "But then once, when a whole mob of slimes attacked at once I," Kit blushed and continued, "I tried to protect him, because suddenly I realized that I could revive but I thought he wouldn't be able to." 

"Ok?" Danika replied questioningly.

Kit explained with chagrin, "He just tapped his staff on the ground and stunned them all for a minute and then scolded me. He told me that not even the largest existing slime in Living Jade Empire could hurt him, and that he would revive if he were somehow killed." She looked at Lin Hao nervously and added, "When he told me that he could revive, I pointed out that he'd said only Gods could, and then he said there was a conflict between the mentor information and the actual list of NPCs who can revive, and asked if he should report it, but I said no?"

Lin Hao opened his mouth to speak but Kit continued worriedly, "I guess I should have said yes, but I thought it was just that the mentor script was simplified and maybe some of the NPCs are secret?"

Lin Hao said gently, "It's ok. NPCs only ask if they should report a dialogue as a bug if the player indicates confusion after repetition. You didn't do anything wrong." He tapped something on his screen and then held out the parchment that appeared in his hand. He said more briskly, "Here is the map you need this time, but if you insist on keeping your marriage with the merchant going, you're going to run into things like this quite a lot, and I'm going to put a minimum priority flag on your requests." 

Danika frowned at him, but Kit took the parchment and actually bowed to the Celestial Servant. "Thank you!" Kit replied happily. She straightened and declared, "I'll try not to put in a request unless there's really no other way!" 

"Ok," Lin Hao replied cheerfully, "do your best. I've got more work to do." He vanished.

Kit gazed at the map in her hand and Danika looked around and realized suddenly that the traveling merchant had left before she'd been able to replenish her supplies and she hadn't asked about finding wild Amaranth. She asked Kit, "Does it show your spring?" 

Kit looked up at her and said, "I'm not sure. It's supposed to be a map, but it seems to be a riddle?"

"Do you mind if I look at it?" Danika asked curiously.

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Kit obligingly held out the map and Danika hovered over it. It did have a map drawn on it, but none of the marks were labeled with place names.

The line beside a wobbly spiral that possibly had a face on it read: "A wooly monkey with a yellow tail where the fruit grows."  

Another shape that might be a bird with its mouth open had a line beside it that read: "The dark hooded one steals sweet hearts." 

A third marking that looked like a cat face to Danika was accompanied by: "Long teeth, short temper, wide feet, travel back to water.

The last mark was a circle with two wavy lines, that Danika guessed was the destination.

Kit commented, "It's not even like the riddles I have to solve to unlock my skills." 

Danika looked up at her and asked with confusion, "You have to solve riddles to unlock your skills?"

Kit blinked at her and asked, "You don't?" She assumed the familiar pose and looked at ZipZing through her menu lens. "You haven't chosen a path?" Kit asked with amazement. "How did you manage to gain so many levels without one?" 

Danika explained about her skill that let her learn new skills while bringing up her own menus to look up information about druids in "Living Jade Empire". Druids were a magic path, and they were priests of the God of Separation, the Tiger of the West. There were a lot of player complaints about how Living Jade Empire was trying to combine both Oriental and Celtic mythology in the druid path. Druids in the beta had apparently been unable to read, to enforce the idea of an oral tradition, but this had been met by so much opposition that the path had been altered to allow druids to read, but to be required to solve dynamically generated riddles, which were an oral type of puzzle, to advance their skills.  

Druids were also shapeshifters, which made Danika gasp and look at Kit while asking excitedly, "You can shapeshift?!"

Kit blinked at her and then grinned and replied, "Yeah! That's why I chose this path. I asked what race or profession could transform into the most kinds of creatures." She touched her belt, and her form shimmered and a hawk stood in her place. She fanned her tail, flapped her wings and launched herself into the air. The hawk that was Kit Tay flew in a wide circle and Danika zipped after her until she landed in the spot they'd started from, and shifted back into her ordinary looking human form.

ZipZing literally sparkled with excitement as Danika asked, "Would you teach that skill to me?" 

"I wonder if just watching me transform will really work," Kit replied doubtfully. "I can only transform into animals that I have," she quoted, "tooth or nail, hair or scale, in a belt woven beneath the moon."

"Where do you get the belt?" Danika questioned. 

"I have to make it myself, that was my second druid skill, Weaving Moonlight," Kit explained. She looked at ZipZing admiringly and offered, "If you can learn my skills, can I have one of your claws or scales? Fairy dragons look really fun!"

"Sure!" Danika agreed quickly. Even if giving Kit a claw wound up involving chopping off a fingertip, she could heal completely within the game, and shapeshifting seemed worth it.

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