[X][Skip Grades] You'll skip grades (probably a lot very quickly)
[X][Training?] Focus on your Chlorokinesis. Plant control saved your but after all
[X][Training?] Meditate on the Concept of Growth. It felt important to you, and surely it's not limited to just plants.
[X][Training?] Have your dad teach you how to survive on your own. Not just in the wilderness, but in cities too.
I don't think the martial arts will be that useful except for maybe physical conditioning especially considering that from what I remember of the books a demigod will almost always only have to deal with monsters which can only be killed by celestial bronze, imperial gold, or powers and I don't think running into hand to hand combat with monsters that can and will quite possibly be physically stronger than us is a smart of a thing to do.
[X][Skip Grades] You'll skip grades (probably a lot very quickly)
[X][Training?] Focus on your Chlorokinesis. Plant control saved your but after all
[X][Training?] Meditate on the Concept of Growth. It felt important to you, and surely it's not limited to just plants.
[X][Training?] Have your dad teach you how to survive on your own. Not just in the wilderness, but in cities too.
Then, one of them reached into their pocket and pulled out… a breathalyzer. You're not sure what the Zombie's blood alcohol content was, but apparently, it was enough that the two officers dragged him away.
You just watched a zombie get arrested. What a surreal experience.
Fuckin' alcoholic zombies... giving a bad name to undead.
[X][Skip Grades] You'll skip grades (probably a lot very quickly)
well always act older than "kids" our age so lets be know for acting older now
[X][Training?] Focus on your Chlorokinesis. Plant control saved your but after all
[X][Training?] Join a sports team (Athleticism is important after all)
-[X][Training?] Soccer
[X][Training?] Have your dad teach you how to survive on your own. Not just in the wilderness, but in cities too
[X][Skip Grades] You'll skip grades (probably a lot very quickly)
[X][Training?] Focus on your Chlorokinesis. Plant control saved your but after all
[X][Training?] Have your dad teach you how to survive on your own. Not just in the wilderness, but in cities too
[X][Training?] Meditate on the Concept of Growth. It felt important to you, and surely it's not limited to just plants.
[X][Skip Grades] You'll skip grades (probably a lot very quickly)
[X][Training?] Focus on your Chlorokinesis. Plant control saved your but after all
[X][Training?] Meditate on the Concept of Growth. It felt important to you, and surely it's not limited to just plants.
[X][Training?] Have your dad teach you how to survive on your own. Not just in the wilderness, but in cities too.
[X][Skip Grades] You'll skip grades (probably a lot very quickly)
[X][Training?] Focus on your Chlorokinesis. Plant control saved your but after all
[X][Training?] Join a sports team (Athleticism is important after all)
-[X][Training?] Soccer
[X][Training?] Have your dad teach you how to survive on your own. Not just in the wilderness, but in cities too.
Partially doing this because the sports team is the only way I feel like we'll get any social.
could you give a comment on what happen if we choose either Skipping or Staying? I mean, on the other votes we know which skills would go up and so what would increase if we picked either option? Would we get more activities if we weren't moved up the grades and having to do more fitting schoolwork for us (which means they'll be more difficult and take more time) or will they take the same amount of effort because they having trouble placing us that well right off the bat (ie, will both options take the same amount of time like it's currently planned) or will something else happen? And how long with this turn last (ie, months, a year, more)?
I'd estimate that next turn will be the one year (half this one) it takes for you to finish up with elementary school. Even as a genius, they won't let you skip faster than that because you have learning disabilities. That sort of work is trivial to you either way, so staying back wont significantly decrease your workload.
Staying back will allow you to train your social skills. While skipping increases the chance you run into someone supernatural as you'll be interacting with more and different people.
Are there other pantheons in this story/quest?
I wonder we can be a strong plant user like Kurama from yuyuhakusho with his rose whip and other tricks. [X][Skip Grades] You'll skip grades (probably a lot very quickly)
[X][Training?] Focus on your Chlorokinesis. Plant control saved your but after all
[X][Training?] Join a Martial Arts Dojo of some kind.
-[X][Training?] Krav Maga
[X][Training?] Meditate on the Concept of Growth. It felt important to you, and surely it's not limited to just plants.
[X][Skip Grades] You'll skip grades (probably a lot very quickly)
[X][Training?] Join a Martial Arts Dojo of some kind.
-[X][Training?] Krav Maga
X][Training?] Focus on your Chlorokinesis. Plant control saved your but after all
[X][Training?] Meditate on the Concept of Growth. It felt important to you, and surely it's not limited to just plants.
[X][Skip Grades] You'll skip grades (probably a lot very quickly)
[X][Training?] Focus on your Chlorokinesis. Plant control saved your but after all
[X][Training?] Meditate on the Concept of Growth. It felt important to you, and surely it's not limited to just plants.
[X][Training?] Have your dad teach you how to survive on your own. Not just in the wilderness, but in cities too.
I'd estimate that next turn will be the one year (half this one) it takes for you to finish up with elementary school. Even as a genius, they won't let you skip faster than that because you have learning disabilities. That sort of work is trivial to you either way, so staying back wont significantly decrease your workload.
Staying back will allow you to train your social skills. While skipping increases the chance you run into someone supernatural as you'll be interacting with more and different people.
Just a question, since we're interacting with more and different people, will our social skill increase at all, or will it not because we're moving up in the grades too quickly to really get to socialize? I could see us getting a very small increase from skipping grades while staying would fetch us a much larger increase or we could not get any improvement in Social by skipping, either way is possible.
[X][Skip Grades] You're happy sticking with your peers and heading up to second grade.
[X][Training?] Focus on your Chlorokinesis. Plant control saved your but after all
[X][Training?] Have your dad teach you how to survive on your own. Not just in the wilderness, but in cities too.
[X][Training?] Join a Martial Arts Dojo of some kind.
-[X][Training?] Krav Maga
I know I'd rather get better at social than get caught up with more supernatural stuff, plus I feel like the dad would prefer that. He was already upset that we got attacked at our home and he wasn't even able to notice, so let's avoid that sort of thing again. The longer we avoid the supernatural, the more we can actions we can spend on training and getting better at surviving it. I'm not seeing a huge need us to stand out among the mortals/meet supernatural people and I'm expecting the supernatural people to be trouble. Cursed, evil, misguided, unknowing (ie, another demigod who doesn't know their parentage or such, put at risk by us being there), not getting along, well-meaning people who try and tell us what to do, take your pick. We're a Greek Demigod, and that generally means drama, if not doubled-drama (because we're Greek and a Demigod).
Chlorokinesis is our go to ability. We're already getting better at it, but we've still got a ways to go. Plus, as child of Demeter, let's get good at our signature ability.
As for Survival, a lot of people are agreeing on it, we need to get good at survival both urban and wild. Plus, if we're good at Survival we can thrive with having to live on the run. We need food? Use our survival skill and and chlorokinesis. Need shelter? Use them again. Stuck on our own for a while? Use both our skills. Honestly, if we could get geokinesis we'd be really awesome at this (I mean, controlling plants and the earth means food and shelter made easy).
Next up, I want to train Martial Arts, get us doing something physical, start working on our muscles and fighting instincts. There's also the chance of a correlation between a strong body and being able to use our abilities (ie, with a stronger body we can do more/endure using it more, if we were weak and sickly we'd struggle to use our abilities for long periods of time, and such).
[X][Skip Grades] You'll skip grades (probably a lot very quickly)
[X][Training?] Focus on your Chlorokinesis. Plant control saved your but after all
[X][Training?] Meditate on the Concept of Growth. It felt important to you, and surely it's not limited to just plants.
[X][Training?] Have your dad teach you how to survive on your own. Not just in the wilderness, but in cities too.
[X][Skip Grades] You'll skip grades (probably a lot very quickly)
[X][Training?] Focus on your Chlorokinesis. Plant control saved your but after all
[X][Training?] Join a sports team (Athleticism is important after all)
-[X][Training?] Soccer
[X][Training?] Have your dad teach you how to survive on your own. Not just in the wilderness, but in cities too.
[X][Skip Grades] You'll skip grades (probably a lot very quickly)
[X][Training?] Focus on your Chlorokinesis. Plant control saved your but after all
[X][Training?] Join a sports team (Athleticism is important after all)
-[X][Training?] Soccer
[X][Training?] Have your dad teach you how to survive on your own. Not just in the wilderness, but in cities too.
[X][Skip Grades] You'll skip grades (probably a lot very quickly)
[X][Training?] Meditate on the Concept of Growth. It felt important to you, and surely it's not limited to just plants.
[X][Training?] Focus on your Chlorokinesis. Plant control saved your but after all
[X][Training?] Have your dad teach you how to survive on your own. Not just in the wilderness, but in cities too.
[X] Undead Situation Write-In: Tell the teachers that during recess you saw some man beyond the fence staring at your class, specifically at the kids in a rather weird manner. Say you'd feel more comfortable if they have the cops investigate and if your parents are called.
[X][Skip Grades] You'll skip grades (probably a lot very quickly)
[X][Preparation] Focus on your Chlorokinesis. Plant control saved your butt after all
[X][Preparation] Have your dad teach you how to survive on your own. Not just in the wilderness, but in cities too.
[X][Preparation] Meditate on the Concept of Growth. It felt important to you, and surely it's not limited to just plants.
Despite your dad's worries, you decided that you would start skipping grades. The first thing they let you do was immediately skip up from your age-appropriate second grade to third grade. Of course, when you proved to them that even third grade was too easy, they let you switch to fourth grade halfway through the semester. You hardly knew anybody in your third grade class because you were with them for all of a month and a half before you were switched into the next year.
The work was still trivial for you, but your second skip did make your dad very fussy for a while. It was simultaneously annoying and endearing. Take, for example, your typical afternoon routine. You'd finish your homework in your room, then go out to the backyard to practice your plant manipulation or chlorokinesis.
"Have you finished your homework?" your dad would always ask as you stepped out of your room in the one-floor house you shared with your father.
"Yes, Dad," you would always say.
"Would you like me to look over it?" Several times, you were tempted to inform your dad that you were probably better at math than he was. After all, you doubted he did much math when he was getting his ecology degree from NYU.
Of course, you don't say that instead, you say, "Sure, Dad," and then you sit with him as he checks over your (always perfect) homework. The only times where he would need to correct it was in some of the writing portions where you would misspell words here and there. Damn dyslexia, no matter how many times you reread your work you could never catch all the errors. Well, you probably could if you spent so much time on it, but you think it made your dad feel better that there was something you still needed his help with. It was pleasantly mundane and it always made you feel like despite being a single parent, your dad was the best.
Of course, afterward, the two of you would head out into the backyard to "garden.' Your dad actually gardened while you practiced making plants do things they didn't want to do. You soon learned that the trick wasn't to force them, but to coax them gently into the shape you wanted. You sort of imagined it like water, creating resistance on all the sides you didn't want the plant to grow as you pushed your (Juju? Energy? Magic?) power into them. Over time, it felt as though you were getting more skilled with the practice. Your pool of energy never felt like it expanded, but you did get better at using it before you got tired.
Chlorokinesis practice was equal parts comforting and distressing for your father. He was happy to see you developing the ability to defend yourself. The zombies hadn't let up just because you'd killed one after all. The distressing part was when you would do something, like grow an entire raspberry bush from a couple of seeds.
"What do you think?" you'd asked him.
"About what?"
"The raspberry bush I grew."
"What about it? Haven't you been working on it for a while?"
"No Dad, I just grew it right now."
"Oh."
You hated how helpless you made him feel. A part of you, the rational part, told you that you couldn't blame yourself. It was the fault of The Mist after all, and you weren't strong or skilled enough to manipulate that yet. Those parts were steamrolled by the crushing emotional guilt of watching the stress practically age your father before your eyes. You did your best to comfort him, but you didn't know the right words to say, the right things to do to make him feel better.
The Zombie issue came to a head during Winter break, 1996. You were scheduled to head into fifth grade the coming spring, and the lack of zombie attacks for a whole six months seemed to have calmed your father a bit. They were always watching, but as long as they didn't do anything, it was ok, right? Wrong.
Just after your seventh Christmas, your dad had finally opened up about him and your mother, Demeter, had gotten together.
"I didn't know about her… background at first," the two of you were at a cafe where your dad had taken your mother often, due to its proximity to a nearby state park. "We first met on a scheduled tour of the park. She was beautiful, long blonde hair, and kind brown eyes, just like yours," he ruffled your hair. "And she knew so much about the park and all the animals and plants that live there. I joked that she should take over the tour, and she got this glint in her eye, and then she did. She did a much better job of it than I ever have. Afterward, I screwed up my courage and asked her to join me for a drink. I brought her here and she convinced me to try tea for the first time," you make a face. Underdeveloped taste buds make anything with a nuanced flavor, like tea, incredibly disgusting. You didn't need to make your opinion on tea known, but sometimes it was nice to act your (body's?) age.
"What happened then?"
"She'd come to visit me when I was on duty in the parks. I didn't know how she found me until, well, a story for later. She'd walk with me as I did my duties and we'd just chat. Then, well, one thing led to another. I'm sure you don't really want to hear the rest."
"Ew, gross." Godly parent or not, hearing about your parents having sex is just gross.
When you stepped out of the cafe, it was snowing, "Wait here, Sam, I'll go get the car."
Your wonderful day was ruined by the telltale moaning of a zombie right after your dad got out of sight.
You turned and grimaced at the zombie in winter clothes lumbering at you slowly. You could only be thankful it was still only a single zombie. You looked around and found that you were alone other than the zombie. You looked for possible weapons and found… the zombie was going to pass a tree planted in the sidewalk before it reached you. Excellent
You put your practiced powers to good use. As the Zombie passed by the tree, its roots erupted through the sidewalk, tripping it and then slowly wrapping around it. This time, without a weapon to kill it, you had the roots of the tree grow into it's wriggling form. After a moment, it poofed into yellow powder. The roots started to recede, looking as if they'd simply grown out and then down, breaking some of the sidewalk, rather than as if they'd grown over a human-sized gap.
You were hit by a dizzy spell. Not as strong as before, but still significant. That was how your dad found you.
The fact that you'd been attacked again only made your dad more worried about you. When you let slip that you'd never seen a zombie when you were in a park or preserve, he'd take you to one practically any time he could, on or off duty.
You started fifth grade halfway through your peers' year. You did get to know them slightly better than your previous classes, but that was only because the school board wanted you to graduate fifth grade in the spring so they could parade you around at their elementary school 'graduation.' Or so your dad said.
Regardless, while you may have considered them worthy of talking to, they didn't want to interact with you in the way you wanted to be interacted with. The two ways they saw you were either "freakish genius" or "adorable child." You wanted to be neither, but you weren't sure how to accomplish that. You did excellent academically.
All it took was a few dropped hints about possibly needing to survive on your own and your dad started teaching you survival skills. You started off simple with things like scavenging for edible and useful plants, making a fire, purifying water, and constructing a makeshift shelter. It wasn't too bad, though it did take your dad two months to figure out that you were using chlorokinesis to make more food out of what you did find.
"Sam," he said disapprovingly.
"What?" you put on your best innocent face.
"I know you're proud of your powers, and I'm proud of you too, but what if there's a situation where you can't use them, say you're too exhausted, or they're being blocked somehow. What will you do then?"
"I understand," you look down, "I'll stop using them during lessons unless I absolutely need to."
He ruffled your hair like he always does. "That's my boy."
Your seventh birthday came and went with little fanfare. You had a small "party" with just your dad. You didn't want anything else.
By summer, you were learning how to lay traps for small game, prepare them, and cook them. It was tougher, not using your plant manipulation, but you found other ways to train it. Your control was much finer now, and you believed you could probably stab a zombie to death with a sufficiently hard plant.
Speaking of zombies, you'd had another encounter with one during your fifth-grade spring, but you had dealt with it easily. The zombies still weren't coming in packs of more than one, but you knew they would at some point.
The lack of school also gave you time to focus on something else you'd been neglecting. The Concept of Growth.
You spent a lot of time thinking about it as you wandered the parks your father worked in. It was the one place he felt safe letting you wander about on your own. What is Growth? How do you use it? You know that the way you make plants grow could be considered Growth, but that can't be it. The concept is far too broad for that to be all there is to it. The trouble is that you have no basis to work off of to figure it out.
After some more days thinking about it, you realize that that's not quite the case. You do have one basis, your chlorokinesis. You can make the plants grow, but to make them Grow, you need another aspect or quality to Grow them into. But what other qualities could you want to grow them into?
Embarrassingly, you don't figure it out until nearly the end of summer. What qualities do you want your plants to have and that they don't already have? Magical ones of course.
Of course, your chances to practice this are slim to none, as your dad is busy again. The number of zombies that appear by your house seems to be increasing. You hope you're ready for when they attack.
Sixth grade is, well the beginning of middle school, not that you're the right age to be in middle school. You just tested out of all the previous grades. You'll probably end up testing out of this one as well. You're more worried about the zombies than school anyway.
There is one noteworthy thing to happen though. About a month into your middle school tenure at South Woods Middle School, you noted someone sitting out at the seventh grade PE time. They had a pair of crutches by their side. The first thing you assumed was, of course, satyr. You held yourself back by reasoning that it could just be an injured person. You tried asking around, but no one would answer your questions until one kind eighth-grader. She only did so after pinching and squeezing your cheeks and gushing about how "cute" you were.
"You want to know about the girl with crutches, yeah?" You nod. "That's Blossom Hill. She has some sort of leg condition, incurable. She doesn't let it affect her though. So, when are you going to ask her out?" You sputter. The girl winks at you and walks off. You didn't even ger her name. Blossom presents an interesting dilemma. On the one hand, she could be a satyr and help you find your way to Camp Half-Blood. On the other hand, she could just be a girl with a leg condition.
[][Blossom] Approach her
-[][Blossom] Try and befriend her like a normal classmate
-[][Blossom] Try and gauge if she has any supernatural knowledge
[][Blossom] Ignore her, if she's a satyr, she'll probably find you eventually.
[][Blossom] Write-in.
Over one year, you have gotten 20 exp points in Survival, 15 exp points in Chlorokinesis, 1 exp point in Social, and unlocked the Concept of Growth: Stage 1.
Pick 3 to focus on for the next year.
[][Preparation] Join a Martial Arts Dojo of some kind.
-[][Preparation] Karate
-[][Preparation] Taekwondo
-[][Preparation] Judo
-[][Preparation] Jujutsu
-[][Preparation] Krav Maga
[][Preparation] Train your Chlorokinesis
[][Preparation] Read up on Greek Legends
[][Preparation] Join a sports team (Athleticism is important after all)
-[][Preparation] Soccer
-[][Preparation] Football
-[][Preparation] Write-in.
[][Preparation] Practice imbuing plants with qualities they shouldn't have and sometimes qualities that shouldn't exist.
[][Preparation] Have your dad teach you how to survive on your own. Not just in the wilderness, but in cities too.
[][Preparation] Your dad knows how to shoot a gun, maybe you should start taking gun safety courses so you can have one as well.
[][Preparation] You should probably learn some first-aid skills at some point.
[][Preparation] Maybe try and make some friends?
[][Preparation] Write-in.
ΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦΦ
Votes for the next chapter:
[X][Blossom] Approach her
-[X][Blossom] Try and befriend her like a normal classmate
[X][Preparation] Practice imbuing plants with qualities they shouldn't have and sometimes qualities that shouldn't exist.
[X][Preparation] Have your dad teach you how to survive on your own. Not just in the wilderness, but in cities too.
[X][Preparation] Your dad knows how to shoot a gun, maybe you should start taking gun safety courses so you can have one as well.
Blossom Hill sure sounds like a satyr name, I'd risk befriending her
