Video - un: o.zizhen

[buddingromantic]

[Zizhen appears in the video as he always does, wearing his red Baling Ouyang sect robes, hair put up in a top knot with its usual cap. When Zizhen starts the video though, he looks rather alarmed. Something must have happened for him to be this way]

I don't understand, Prisma! There must be some black magic at work, but I don't even know what it could be! It's just frightening!

[He adjusts the camera to show... the microwave in the kitchen]

It takes greater than five minutes for water to boil on this thing called a stove, but this "microwave" can boil the same amount of water in under five! This... this is madness! And those already made foods that have been kept in the ice - there are two details for cooking. Over 30 minutes in the oven, but only five in the "microwave"!

[He's saying microwave like he doesn't believe that's what it could be called]

Surely this must be a cursed item!

[Someone please tell him to calm down about the microwave... or egg him on]

Comments

[voiceofanimus]

I suspect that is not likely to happen.

[But Lunatia is a strange place, so it's definitely not impossible.]

The microwave contraption in your kitchen does not float either, so why do you think that in particular is cursed?

[buddingromantic]

Well, it's doing something very weird. It isn't natural that cooks food so fast. And it has a tendency to make them explode.

[voiceofanimus]

[So what he's saying is no one taught him to use the microwave and he's been manhandling it all wrong.]

While there are no such things in my world and I have little to compare them to, I am under the impression that the pace is normal for these contraptions. Perhaps you ought to learn to use it properly if you are establishing a habit of exploding whatever it is you put within it.

[buddingromantic]

[Sort of?]

But it's different than an oven. Ovens don't risk exploding food. I guess learning more about it won't be bad...

[voiceofanimus]

It would be better to learn about it than to be afraid of it. If you take that approach to everything here, how do you expect to survive.

[buddingromantic]

Probably the same way I have so far. Though sometimes that's surprising

[He's making a joke. Really he is. But also given what's happened recently at home... not too far off]

[voiceofanimus]

[The humour is lost on Caim. No. Surprising, indeed. How can Lunatia be home to both seemingly brilliant minds and fools alike?]

To say as much hardly instils confidence. You are fortunate to still be alike, it would seem. We shall see how long that lasts.

[buddingromantic]

Well, that wasn't really my choice back home. We kind of ended up in the middle of something. I guess here I really don't HAVE to mess around with the microwave.

[See? He's not that stupid]

[voiceofanimus]

Here, you do not have to do anything you do not choose to.

[Which is true, even where moonlacing is concerned, though an objective eye might point out that refusing to moonlace seems to have unpleasant consequences.]

Hardly a need to make food when one can go out and procure whatever it is they want.

[buddingromantic]

Well, I can use the stove and the oven. I can make rice at least. Also there are others to cook in the house as well.

[voiceofanimus]

[So what he means is that even if he couldn't take care of himself, he has others to do so for him. Must be nice. At least Caim might think that if he was an ordinary person.]

Then it sounds as though this minor obstacle will not affect you much going forward.

[At least not at the present moment. Anything can change and nothing ever lasts. Caim won't say it, but who knows, perhaps eventually he might be quite so fortunate.]

[buddingromantic]

I hope it does not. Now that I know it is not in need of being exorcised. Thanks for telling me.

[voiceofanimus]

If someone else had not told me, it is likely I would have reacted the same way. You are in like company.

[...Which is probably one of the nicest things he's said since he's been here. But there's something about misery loving company or some such.]

[buddingromantic]

It's good to know at least that I'm not the only person who has thought that. Such strange devices coming here.

[voiceofanimus]

At the very least. Many of them have been foreign to me as well. In time, it will become more familiar.

[buddingromantic]

I'm sure. I can already use a rice cooker.

I'm Ouyang Zizhen.

[voiceofanimus]

[Caim has no idea what a rice cooker is. Aside from what it sounds like. But to say he really cooks would be inaccurate. If cooking meat over a fire counts, then... Well. There's that.]

Caim.

[He won't say it's nice to meet him. Or anyone else because that's simply not how he is. But issuing his name is better than what he supposes he would ordinarily reply with. Which would be next to nothing.]

Well met.

[Okay. Maybe that's a little better.]

[buddingromantic]

Well met to you, Caim. Have you been here long?

[voiceofanimus]

If their calendar is any indication, I have been here for six months. It has felt longer.

[And at the same time, it feels like time itself has utterly stopped.]

[buddingromantic]

Oh that is a while. I'm sorry to hear that. I mean not much longer than me, but still longer than someone should.

[voiceofanimus]

It is not completely unbearable.

[The truth is that Caim can begrudgingly admit that he has opportunities here he otherwise would not have had. Also, he's alive. There's no guarantee he'd be alive in Midgard.]

While I have not given up on discovering a way to return individuals to their homes, it has come to be relatively unquestionable that those in authoritative power are not likely to give us that information if they have it.

[buddingromantic]

No it is not. Unfortunately it seems like people in authority can do that. I wonder why they would. The chroma?

[voiceofanimus]

That is my consideration, yes. They claim to have desire to return us to our home worlds yet we see no results of this. They, without doubt, benefit from our presence here. They have more reason to keep us here than they do to release us.

[It's all conspiracy theory, but...]

[buddingromantic]

Well, one could claim there is nothing to tell us. One could also claim that they don't want to tell us if there is a benefit. Chroma is the only I can see.

[voiceofanimus]

Both of those assessments are valid. The lack of information prevents us from determining which circumstance it may be. I am no closer to discovering this than I was when I arrived, yet I suspect that Chroma is too valuable a resource to relent on the otherworldly visitors. At least until they can find a way to generate such without our assistance.