Ortgeist - Act 1

Spirits

Kikimora
Kikimora has come a long way from her humble flint and stick beginnings. She spent her golden days as a kamado at the Yamado Court in Japan. For the few centuries that she remained in Japan, she was treated very well by the families she came in contact with, who viewed her as a spirit worth respect and devotion. She became blissfully happy, and her warmth and passion made her a coveted friend to many. When she finally immigrated to the United States, she was taken aback at how differently our citizens treated her. Unused to such treatment Kikimora is known to explode at minor provocations.

Emesh
Emesh has never really felt welcome anywhere. Although he has been around since before many of the other nature spirits, they've never really liked or respected him all that much. They accuse him of being a parasite -- of sucking up nutrients and water from the ground that other plants could thrive off of, of smothering rocks and other natural formations. Most of the other nature spirits see him as shy and sheepish. Emesh knows that this is all an act. He learned that in order to get by he had to retreat into the background, to creep around the Earth silently and carefully. He is, in reality, a master manipulator.

Act 1: The Proper Preparations to Rumble

Its easy to get lost in the tunnels, and hard to avoid misunderstandings. When the furniture first came to Jackson Park Emesh, the spirit of moss, looked forward to reaching outside his small circle. The jovial Kikimora, spirit of ovens, took him up on his offer, and they became fast friends. However a sarcastic comment by Emesh has sparked an intense fight, driving the moss spirit into hiding and leaving Kikimora fuming.

Puzzles

Sweep-Stakes
Something has gotten into the pantry and spilled flour, millet and cereal everywhere. The players need to clean up this mess in a hurry. But as players sweep the debris over the ground they notice that it catches in certain cracks – spelling out a clue! Following the direction they find, of all things a colander.

Sieve-Vous-Plait
Initially stumped, the players decide to run their pile of sweepings through the colander in case they have missed something. Everything is the perfect size to slip through, except one of the cereals: alphabets. Amazingly, the only four letters scattered through the whole area LACP, someone anagrams these letters to CLAP, and does so.

The Great Mouse Detective
From under a ledge a roomba shoots out – the players have discovered their intruder – but it starts making wild turns. Realizing that it is trying to communicate with them, but without any way to record the turns accurately, the players must think quickly and re-scatter the flour in the roomba's path. Having traced out a sacred word, its battery dies.

We Didn't Start the Fire
The sacred word, Moss, reveals the physical identity of Emesh – the spirit under the bridge. The players can now resolve the feud with Kikimora, the stove spirit. Biggs offers to start a fire inside the stove to burn the moss. Here the players are confronted with an open and improvisatory chance: is there a better way to end the conflict?