Auction! Trollgate Guide

[Katzaniel]

Now-permanent description of the Trollgate Guide (thanks to all voters, and all description-writers, I forgot to do that in the poll-close thread):

 

There is an island in the middle of a sea, somewhere in the middle of nowhere. Due to the remote nature of this location, it has allowed Trollgates, generally a very ponderous and solitary race, to flourish. A Trollgate, now, is very like a troll in that... well, in very few ways actually. They are large, and difficult to injure. Some say that they were created by Trolls, but that rumour is difficult to credit. The part of their name that is much easier to explain is the "Gate" bit. You see, each Trollgate is shaped roughly like a giant arching gateway with a small head that looks more like a design over the arch than a face. They move by swinging one "leg" forward and then using the momentum to move the other, then the first, then the other again, and so on. This is a very slow process, though, and Trollgates tend to stay in one spot for hundreds of years at a time. When they do move, though, they really take advantage of it.

 

As a species, Trollgates aren't well known. They tend to be ignored by the smaller and the more fleshy of races, because they look more like a door in the middle of nowhere than anything else. This is all right by them, though, as they tend to spend most of their time puzzling out the universe. If anyone ever cared to ask the average Trollgate, for example, whether or not there is a God, or whether it's possible to travel back in time, or what the smallest possible particle was, they might learn a great deal. But a Trollgate's answer might take upwards of half a year, and so no one who has ever asked a question of a Trollgate has realized that the sounds it emits is actually the beginning of a comprehensive answer, and no one has ever found out how much the Trollgates know. The majority of Trollgates stay on their little island, but some, a very few, venture out into the world. They travel just as easily under water as over, but even the adventurous ones usually give up as they grow older, and stop wherever they are to instead ponder over the meaning of life or some other important question.

 

The really neat thing about Trollgates, though, is how they are, without exception, born in pairs of two. And, without exception, the death of one Trollgate will mean the imminent death of its twin. No one but the Trollgates themselves understands the connection, but each knows the others thoughts, and what is most interesting for those not themselves a Trollgate, anything that passes under a stationary Trollgate will come out from under its twin.

 

This is where I can really begin to explain what the Trollgate Guide is all about. A few hundred years ago, a solitary explorer discovered this property of the Trollgates (though he actually lived out his entire life never realizing that the Trollgates were alive). He took it upon himself to map out the crisscrossing connection points of the "Magic Archways" as he called them. He realized the danger of this task, though, when he came out one time inches from the edge of a cliff. He began to take precautions, such as going through holding a rope attached to something solid on the other side, and giving his map a few survival-oriented magical properties. As a consequence, when he died (by coming out one Trollgate that happened to be in the vicinity of a shark (who later died by swimming through the selfsame Trollgate)), anyway when he died, the map slowly but surely found its way to the surface of the water, unruined, to be discovered years later by a geolist. This man knew better what a Trollgate actually was, and gave the Guide its proper name. After that, it's a long and boring story that tells how it made its way to the Pen.

 

The use of the Trollgate Guide is that it makes quick and easy travel to many locations around the world, and sometimes through other, more usual, portals to other worlds. The danger is that Trollgates do, occasionally, move, or die, and although some updates have been made over the years, the Guide is not one-hundred percent reliable. Nor is it by any means complete. Also, in the case of the Trollgates still on the island, it relies extensively on the reader's ability to distinguish between multiple similar objects via an antiquated written description. Nevertheless, it is a useful guide for the brave or curious traveller.

Katz, feeling slightly more creative than when starting the other polls, starts chanting, "Whatcha gonna do when they go on sale, i-tems, i-tems, whatcha gonna pay when they go on sale..."

[Katzaniel]

Katzaniel stops chanting and jumps down off the stage for a moment, grins shyly at the gathering crowd, and shouts, "10 geld!" before jumping back onto the stage and writing the newest bid into the ledger.

[Sweetcherrie]

Sweetcherrie nods, and with that confirms her bid of 15 geld.

[Patrick]

Hmmm...this might be an interesting item.

 

"I'll bid 20 geld for the guide!" - Patham shouted over the heads of the other bidders from the back.

[Katzaniel]

Katzaniel marks down the newest bids, and without stopping the usual auctioneering monologue, leans over and riffles through her coin purse a little. She thinks, looks at the item, moves her head back and forth in a "should-I-or-shouldn't-I" manner, and finally returns her attention to watching the crowd.

[Sweetcherrie]

Sweetcherrie fiddled with her geldbag, and counted of she could afford to bid again, after all she also had to think about the Bachelors being auctioned off....but she really wanted this...

 

"21!"

[Patrick]

Patham glanced at Sweetcherrie. He exactly knew how much geld he had, so did not need to count, and he did not have to set aside any for the bachelor auction either.

 

"25 geld." - he announced his new bid.

[Mira]

Congratulations to Patrick Durham who has won the Trollgate Guide with a bid of 25 Geld!

[Patrick]

Patham smiled as he was announced as the winner and went to take his newest item. It sounded quite interesting and he planned to try it out later that day.

 

OOC: story about the trying out to follow, if not today then during the week.

Edited September 12, 2005 by Patrick Durham