It's automatic, you've gotta have it

[roundandaround]

WHO: Rinku, you
WHAT: Playing with animal transformation, research attempts, rolling gacha with touch energy, and watching a Sobble buy groceries.
WHEN: Early March
WHERE: Solarpeak, Amberfall, Nightwake
WARNINGS: Some NSFW discussion in threads

[1) Solarpeak Lake]

[There's a fish in the Solarpeak lake/pool today. A specific fish, and one that seems to be diving into the bottom of the pool and then dragging stuff up to the shore in its mouth. Mostly cool-looking seashells, come to think of it... What's with that?

Anyone who comes to shore to check it out will be greeted by the fish speaking in Rinku's voice when she surfaces.]

Hi! Are you looking for shells too?

[2) Amberfall Library]

[Rinku's last trip in here to try and study didn't go well, mostly because she's really bad at it. But she's trying it anyway, and right now, with a basket full of romance novels (again?), she's wandering the cookbook section with a growing frown.]

There's a lot of books about cake, but I don't see any about blood yet...

[3) Gacha Arcade]

[Hey, remember the Gacha My Heart quest? Because that game store's still going strong, including the machines that run on touch energy, and Rinku is all over it today. This time, she's hit up a machine that advertises gift certificates for restaurants around the city. She pulls a ticket and reads it over.]

Aww, please play again? Okay!

[She looks and waves to the nearest person.]

Oh, hey, can you help? I'll need more touch energy to pull a bunch more!

[4) Grocery Store]

[Rinku is outside a grocery store, peering in from behind a telephone pole. If someone approaches, she'll look over, wave, and whisper to them.]

Shh! I'm following to make sure Mecchan does okay. He's on his first errand!

[Sure enough, when she points toward the shop doors, there's her Sobble, dragging a shopping tote bigger than he is behind him into the store and holding a shopping list in the other hand.]

Comments

2

[abnormalizes]

Blood's mostly used in meat dishes, I think? Blood sausage and stuff. So it probably wouldn't be with the cake recipe books.

[...she's eyeing those romance novels but she hasn't said anything about them yet.]

[roundandaround]

[The romance novels range from modern "this is clean, cute, and probably fanfic with the serial numbers filed off" illustrated covers to flat out '80s Horny Oil Painting, and don't seem to have any real throughline -- for every "Seduced by the Werewolf Hypnotist" there's a "Hockey Rink Love Song."]

Aww. I know I have three months to do it, but I'm trying to figure out how to make a blood cake for Hina-chan's birthday since you gave me the idea.

[abnormalizes]

I feel like you're probably not going to find blood cake in a human cookbook! You might have to search for the specialty ones.

[roundandaround]

Eh? Specialty ones? [headtilt] If it's not for humans, are there cookbooks for Zubat?

[abnormalizes]

There are books from our worlds here, right? So somebody's got to have written something about cooking for Pokemon. Or vampires. One of the two.

[roundandaround]

I guess so. [Rinku scratches her head.] Can vampires eat the other ingredients in cake, though? Or just blood?

[abnormalizes]

I think they can? They might not get any nourishment from it but it's not like they're allergic to it, unless you used holy water for your baking for some reason.

1

[urtitan]

[Frieda recognises the blck-and-white fish even before it speaks with Rinku's voice. She's swimming in mermaid form with her Magikarp like she does almost every day, so they can keep talking underwater!]

No, I'm just spending time with Karpje! Wouldn't collecting shells be easier if you had arms? Let me help you!

[roundandaround]

[Rinku can't smile as a fish, but it sounds like she's smiling anyway as she swims around to greet them.]

Oh, that's true! I just thought this looked like fun, and my fish form looks so cool, isn't it? Neechan really liked it when I showed her.

[Well, she got emotional about its resemblance to her, but.]

[urtitan]

It does!! It looks a little like the night sky. I'm a little surprised that this is your default fish form, honestly - your mermaid tail looks so different!

[Karpje circles around looking for Mecchan, then stares at the girls with big questioning eyes. Isn't he with Rinku today?]

[roundandaround]

Oh, do you wanna go get him?

[Rinku swims up to the surface and shifts back to human. She calls over to where Mecchan is sitting a little bit away from the small shell pile, building a sandcastle with Hina (well, he's doing most of the work, she doesn't have hands).]

Mecchan! Hina-chan! Frieda-chan and Karpje-chan wanna play!

[Mecchan (looking relieved to go play with friends -- all these strangers were starting to get to him!) swims over right away, and Hina flies over, wearing so much pet sunscreen you can smell it as soon as she gets close.]

There you two are! [Rinku's already pulling out her Mermaid Necklace to use that instead.] How's that?

[urtitan]

[Despite having grown much larger than Mecchan so fast, Karpje seems to think that she can still play with him like in the beginning, splashing water at him and Hina with delight.]

Play nice, Karpje! If Hina falls in, you have you bring her to the surface, you hear me?

[She gets some "dor, dor" sounds as confirmation. That's reassurance enough for her to turn her attention to Rinku, delighted as always to see her mermaid transformation once she has her necklace on.]

Since you won the auction for my lessons, let me show you some tricks about how to use your tail - not that I think you need much help; you're such a good swimmer already! We can collect shells as we go.

[Rinku is acting just as happy as always, so she probably doesn't remember that long dream of hers that Frieda inadvertently invaded... but isn't that for the better? Who knows if she'd have wanted her to see all that!]

[roundandaround]

That sounds fun!

[Rinku came out of it with some vague feelings, all of which she still seems to be processing, but she's smiling so far. She nods and lights up at the mention of shells.]

What kinds of tricks, Frieda-chan? You're an expert, so I can't wait!

[Mecchan, to his credit, does not cry when splashed, though that's probably just because Karpje is his friend! He shoots water back at Karpje, smiling.]

2 OKAY NOW I'M HERE lmao

[ghostfromthemachine]

[ um. ]

... Wouldn't that be with the fairy tales?

[roundandaround]

Oh, Kaiko-chan! [wave wave] I'm looking to see if there's any recipes for cake that use blood. Hina-chan's birthday's not for another couple months, but it sounded hard to find, so I wanted to try looking now.

[ghostfromthemachine]

—oh! I thought— there are fairy tales about that sort of thing, actually? But no recipes included, I'm afraid.

...I think blood does curdle when heated, though, so you might have a difficult time...

[roundandaround]

Aww. Hina-chan's favourite food is blood -- it's what her species eats in the wild, and she doesn't like the substitutes as much as the real stuff. So I was thinking, after Neechan talked about whether or not there's blood pizza this one time, what if there's blood cake? Or cake that has blood in it?

[ghostfromthemachine]

[ wrinkles her nose a little, but nods twice and then puts one hand to her chin in thought ]

Maybe— it might work in the frosting, since that's usually not cooked? Or— oh! Wait a moment, actually—

[ perking up and starting to look through the books for something in particular ]

It's not uncommon to soak some kinds of sponge cake in different things— sweetened cream or liqueur, usually. But there's no reason you couldn't soak it in... well, blood.

[roundandaround]

Really? I gotta try that! At least for a little one. But Hina-chan is pretty small and she's turning 1, so I wouldn't wanna make a really big blood cake anyway. Probably not a lot of people'd wanna try some.

2, sorry this is so late!

[chimaerically]

[ She’s finally made it to the library, and she is absolutely amazed. It’s bigger than the one in the magic school she attended, and that one already made her feel like she was surrounded by every single book in the world; with this one, she feels like she could move into it for the rest of her life and still not see everything it has to offer. She’s been here for almost two hours, and she’s only just now stumbled into the cookbook section, and just in time to run into Rinku. ]

Oh, I know a little about cooking with blood! Only a little bit, though, and just monster blood, so I don’t know if it’ll help, but I can tell you if you like!

[ Offering to share her obscure and mildly concerning knowledge is a perfectly appropriate way to say hi to someone, as far as Falin is concerned. ]

[roundandaround]

[Rinku lights up, her sparkling eyes lighting on the newcomer.]

That sounds great! I guess I could get monster blood, but usually I just get stuff from the butcher. Hina-chan's been biting people way less ever since I switched her from blood substitutes to real blood.

[chimaerically]

[ She has no idea what sort of creatures could be found at a butcher’s in Ellipsa, but she decides to assume it’s just normal animals until proven otherwise. That’s what she’s been doing so far in this place and it’s been working out alright. ]

Great! Do you want to find a seat somewhere and chat? I wouldn’t want to bother anyone looking for books… [ Or the fairies; she’s heard enough about them to know that they take the library rules very seriously. ]

Ah, um… [ One more thing stands out to her. ] If I may ask, who’s Hina-chan? [ She’s picturing a person, chasing people around to bite them and steal their blood, and it’s a concerning image to say the least. ]

[roundandaround]

Oh, sure! Come on!

[Rinku steps out of the aisle and sets her books down on a table. She sits down, fishes out her phone, and pulls up a photo of a small Zubat napping against a blue rag doll.]

This is her! She hatched a little under a year ago, and I wanna learn how to make blood cake so I can make her one for her birthday in a couple months.

[chimaerically]

[ She settles in next to Rinku and squints at her phone; she’s still not used to looking at screens, so it takes her a second to make sense of what she’s looking at, but once she does, she gasps quietly in delight. ]

Oh! This little bat creature? She’s so cute! [ She instinctively wants to reach out and pet the picture with her finger, as if the Zubat could feel it through the display, but she remembers all sorts of strange and unpredictable things can happen when you touch a phone screen, so she manages to stop herself. ] And she drinks blood, you said? Um, people’s blood?

[roundandaround]

Sometimes, but she's been doing it less since I've been trying to keep her from biting people. Nowadays I usually get her animal blood from the butcher or the grocery store. She eats human food, too, and kibble.