Massive Clam

Image

Encounter Conditions

None?

Initial Text

Cresting a small ridge, you find a clam half sunk into the sand. It's massive. You could probably fold your entire body into its mouth, if it'd let you.

Summary of Choices

1. Open it - Pull rewards out from yesterday, or:
   1. Drop some sand in - Put item in to be retrieved later
   2. Drop in a shark tooth - Put item in to be retrieved later
   3. Cut out some meat - (With sashimi knife) Get clam meat (with enough Diving Ability), adds blood to clam
   4. Bleed into it - (Only if you've waited around) Put item in to be retrieved later
   5. Leave it - Walk away
2. Inspect it - Gain 4 XP Perception
3. Wait around - Gain 4 XP Will
4. Wait in ambush - (Only if you've waited around) Fight Deep Hunter
5. Swim away - Walk away

Choice Text and Results

Open it

If you put something into the clam the previous day:

You can see a pearly gleam from within the clam and prop it open far enough to reach inside. Thankfully, it doesn't close back around your arm.

If you had put in one grain of sand

You pull your arm back with a single massive pearl. Wow.

You found: massive pearl (or only black pearl if you ever bled into clam while slag-poisoned)

If you put in several grains of sand and never EVER bled into it while under Slags Poisoning

You pull your arm back with a handful of pearls and have to go back several more times to clear things out.

You found: <x> lake pearls

Or, if you dropped in only one shark tooth

You pull your arm back with the tooth you left here, now covered in pearl.

You found: pearled shark tooth (or black shark tooth if you have bled into the clam with Slags Poisoning)

Or if dropped in only shark teeth

You pull your arm back with one of the teeth you left here, now covered in pearl. Groping around blindly, you find the rest, thankful that the pearl has dulled their edges.

You found: <x> pearled shark teeth (or only black shark teeth if you ever bled into clam while slag-poisoned)

If you had put in several grains of sand and at some point had bled into it while under Slags Poisoning

You pull your arm back with a handful of pearls and have to go back several more times to clear things out.

You found: <x> tiny black pearls
You found: black shark tooth

Otherwise, or on subsequent occasion the same day:

You're able to edge the clam open a bit wider, enough that you could probably reach in if you wanted to. On the other side, this thing is as big as you are and could probably crush bones if you just blithely stuck your arm in there.

So it might not be a good idea either way.

<Options to put something into the clam.>

Drop some sand in

You dredge up a handful of silt from the lakebed and filter it through your fingers, into the clam. It reflexively closes and you're kind of glad your arm wasn't in there.

Bleed into it

You cut yourself over the clam's mouth. Unlike the fish person, your blood doesn't stay in nice coherent droplets.

You try to push the bloodied water into the clam, but what little makes its way into the mouth doesn't provoke much of a response.

You take 2 - 4 damage.

Or, with Slags Poisoning active

You cut yourself over the clam's mouth. Your blood drips from your body in black-streaked globules, slowly drifting down into the open mouth.

After the first glob touches the clam's flesh, it snaps shut violently. But, if it was trying to seal your blood away, it succeeded only in trapping it.

You take 2 - 4 damage.

Effect: Permanently alters the items gained from the clam from the Pearl variant to the Black variant.

Or, if the clam has already drunk poisoned blood?

The giant clam's mouth lolls open and you bleed into it easily. You wait for a bit, but your blood doesn't seem to have done much one way or another.

Drop in a shark tooth

You gingerly drop a shark tooth into the clam's waiting mouth. A moment later, it snaps shut and refuses to reopen.

Cut out some meat

Sometimes (75%) with 3 Diving Ability

You reach into the clam with your sushi knife, cutting at a chunk of meat near its mouth. You manage to lift the meat free as the clam's mouth snaps shut with an echoing 'click.'

You found: clam meat

Sometimes (25%) with 3 Diving Ability

You reach into the clam with your sushi knife, cutting at a chunk of meat near its mouth. There still isn't enough time to stop it from clamping down around your knife, bending the steel unpleasantly.

Well, at least it wasn't your arm. You give the clam a while to let go, but its patience seems infinite.

(Lose your sashimi knife)

With <3 Diving Ability, or low reflexes or something?

You reach into the clam with your sushi knife, cutting at a chunk of meat near its mouth. You just don't react fast enough as its mouth closes, crushing your sushi knife and the hand holding it.

You eventually pull the ruined mess of your hand back out of the clam's mouth. You keep telling yourself you've been through worse, but that doesn't stop the pain now.

You take 23-25 damage.
You've gained 10 energy of Crushed Hand.

Inspect it

The clam seems quite content to let you inspect it, if it even notices your presence. You're not really familiar enough with normal-sized clams to say if there are a differences other than size, but it seems a little… simple to you.

It's hard to put your finger on it, but the clam doesn't have the organs and fine details you'd expect of something this size. In fact, it looks a lot like a clam would if someone at Mikhail's asked you to sketch one. Perhaps it's slightly more detailed than that, but not much.

You've earned 4 XP in Perception

Or, if you've bled into it?

You take a peek inside the clam. Its expanse of slimy-looking flesh is run through with black streaks.

The streaks seem to radiate out in clusters, each jagged line surrounded by angry red welts. You're sure if something like that was attached to a human, it'd be agonizing, but you're not sure what the clam might think.

You've earned 4 XP in Perception

Wait around

You wait patiently, a ways back from the clam. A strange fish person carrying a jagged spear swims up to inspect the clam.

It swims left and right, checking the clams' surfaces. Apparently satisfied with the results, it suddenly rips a jagged cut in one arm with its spear.

You watch calmly as it dribbles droplets of ichor into the clam. Eventually, the clam opens and closes several times in a manner than looks fairly cheerful.

After that, the person stops hurting himself and swims off.

You've earned 4 XP in Will

Or, if you've already watched him several times?

You wait patiently for the fish person to come back. When he does, he carefully inspects the surface of the clam, then sings a long quavering note.

Once it's done, he just swims away.

You've earned 4 XP in Will

Wait in ambush

You wait for the fish thing to return and inspect the clam. You might be projecting, but it seems disturbed by something.

It doesn't slash itself, instead turning to leave. You ambush it anyway, laying into it from below.

(Fight Deep Hunter)

Or, with some trigger? (Possibly having bled into the clam with Slag's Poisoning)

You wait for the fish person to return and even give it enough time to slash itself open to drip blood into the clam. Then you strike, while it's still bleeding and hopefully at its weakest.
(Fight Deep Hunter)
(Deep Hunter will begin the fight suffering from some jagged wounds)

Swim away

Something happens, but mostly it's just

See Walk Away