Lore.Land

A small game · the whole book, carried

Exactly One Pie

Someone is destined to spill exactly one pie. The prophecy has been very clear about the number and no help at all about the name.

Someone in a hat carries it, level, through the book, chapter by chapter, while the land streams down at them and the chapter’s own words go by on either side. Its wonders wait up the lanes; step ahead to keep them.

The prophecy always holds. What changes is who carried it, how far, and how many clowns went home happy.

  1. ←→ step across
  2. ↑↓ step ahead, or back
  3. Space hop over low things
  4. X throw along the needle (or click where)
  5. Esc pause

On a phone: swipe to step, any way; tap the carrier to hop; tap the lanes to throw toward the tap.

Nobody has carried it yet.

What everything is ↓ What your carries have done ↓ What the pies let slip ↓

Chapter One Dawn in Boon.land

Waiting in this chapter

    Steer into a wonder, up the lanes, to keep it.

    Each one, kept, goes into your almanac and gives the carry something: light, echoes, a honk, a moment unkept.

    What everything is

    In the lanes

    The land comes in rows, and every row leaves a way through, never more than a step from the last. Step across, or ahead and back: four steps up the lanes, where the wonders wait and what is coming comes sooner. Or hop: low things pass under you, and a slice thrown at the top of a hop is lofted like one off a ramp.

    The tilt is what is at stake. Every step tilts the pie a little, hurried steps more; a knock tilts it a lot. Step under the direction it is tipping to catch the balance, or hold your lane a breath to poise the plate: a poised throw costs no tilt and widens the gold window. A deft hop just as something low reaches your feet steadies the landing. The red ring beside the pie, and the level under the screen, show how far it has tipped. Full, it spills.

    The pie in hand stays whole because an aura keeps replenishing it, and the aura needs two ingredients: flour for the crust, boonberries for the filling. Every slice you throw draws on both; a slice that reaches nobody costs more. Run either dry and the slices go without it (the clowns are not particular), and a thin pie tips more easily. Keep both high and the pies grow: the pie in hand swells, and every slice is bigger, reaches wider, and satisfies more. The two levels at the foot of the screen show what is left.

    Flour in the air feeds the two pies of the quinary five: a burst bag, a slice into a bag, a kicked-up pile, a march of Mimes Against WAP shaking out their placards. It brings them sooner, and makes whichever is here stronger.

    Knocks the pie

    A red zone at the foot; it pulses when it is coming down your lane. A knock tilts the pie by the amount shown (the porter takes it best, a clown worst), and some take something more. Then a breath of grace, while the carrier blinks. Tilted to the top, it spills: exactly once. Low things marked ⤒ can be hopped clear.

    • Bronze post · tilt +50%Curves for everyone. A thrown slice bends round it toward the nearest face, and counts as Perfect.
    • Field stone · tilt +60% · ⤒Older than the furrow. Has never moved for anyone. Hop it.
    • A hole · tilt +55%, a step back · ⤒Freshly dug, in the field; a cobble gone, in the lanes. In and out again, a step further down the lanes. Hop it.
    • A ditch · tilt +60%, a step back · ⤒Across every lane, in the field and at the gate. No way round: only over. Time the hop.
    • Pane of Bonk glass · tilt +45%It remembers being struck. A thrown slice banks off it as a Perfect shot, and a whole slice splits off a remembered shard.
    • Crown-wasps · tilt +25%, − fillingThey knew sweetness before anyone. Sting the filling, and snatch a thrown slice.
    • Gate-pigeon · tilt +25%, − crustPecks the crust, and takes any slice thrown past it.
    • Spool · tilt +30%, tripped · ⤒Rolls a little in its own lane, and trips you a lane over.
    • Pie-dividers · tilt +30%, − bothTwo children, two lanes, measuring. It comes out even. It never does.
    • A mime · tilt +30%In the lanes, the plaza and the court. Silent. A slice thrown at one is caught in an invisible box; a lofted slice sails over it.
    • The wall it is miming · tilt +45%Beside every mime, a lane over: invisible, and also there. A shimmer and two gloves show where. It boxes low slices too.
    • Mimes Against WAP · tilt +45%A silent protest across the lanes, placards blank but one. One gap. Any slice thrown into them is boxed; through the gap, or over them off a hop or a ramp. Mr. BaneWAP likes to say he organised them.
    • Pane-snail · tilt +35% · ⤒Was there first.
    • Feast clerk · tilt +35%Carries a DAMAGE slip. Share a whole slice with one and they stamp it SETTLED and step aside.
    • Subject · tilt +40%Halfway through an errand. Share a whole slice and they trade you crust from their loaf.
    • Chair · tilt +45%Pulled out for someone else.
    • Rented throne · tilt +55%The rented court. Gilt over pine.
    • Long table · banner · tilt +45–60%A whole row with one way through. At the table, the empty place. A fallen banner can be hopped; the table cannot.

    Slips and setbacks

    A blue zone, dashed. Not a knock, but not nothing. All of them can be hopped clear.

    • Bag of flour · story set backCrust for the aura, and it pushes you back in the story: the track at the top shows where. It never slows the carrier. Throw a slice at a bag and it bursts into a pile.
    • Puddle · tilt +36%The pie slides.
    • Frost · the next step slidesIn the field. Your next step across goes a lane further than you meant.

    Go toward

    These glow.

    • ClownClowns love WAP: a pie in the eye. Each wants so much pie, shown as pips over its head: a whole slice fills one (more, the richer your aura), a Perfect twice that, a slice short of crust or filling half, crumbs a quarter. Satisfied, it goes home delighted and tosses back whatever your aura is shortest of; wanting more, it follows the pie. Step into one, or throw: the needle sweeps from the pie, and when it lines up with a clown’s face the ring turns gold (or click or tap right where to throw). Dead centre, off a wall, off the glass, or off a ramp is Perfect and counts twice. WAPs close together are a combo: the pie steadies, and from three a slice is ready at once.
    • A wonderOne of the land’s own, from this chapter: it waits a moment up the lanes, then goes about its business. Step ahead and into it to keep it in your almanac, and it gives the carry something. Torch-ants light the way through; echo-wrens echo your throws; the lag-stag lags the land; jazz-geese honk the way clear; the hob-deer and the page-fox leave you unkept for a moment.
    • BaneberriesPlum-black, a cold violet sheen, a ring of violet dashes: what Mr. BaneWAP is made of. Mimes gather them for him, and while he is here any that get past you are his; each one makes his scheme last longer. Step on them to keep them from him, or pass a thrown slice through one to sweeten its core.
    • A slow beaverIn no hurry. Steer into one and for a while the land goes at its pace, and you do not: easier to step through. (The lag-stag does the same.)
    • A warm furrowIn the field. Something keeps it warm from underneath: a little crust, a little filling, a little steadier.
    • Something warm, egg-shapedNow and then, at the very top of the lanes. It is not for taking. Pass close, and the pie settles faster for a while, and the next knock is forgiven.
    • BoonberriesTeal and amber, lit from within: the filling for the aura. Step through them.
    • Pile of flourA little crust underfoot. And a ramp: a slice thrown over a pile is lofted clean over whatever is next. Piles in a row loft it further.
    • BoofCrosses the lanes on her own business. Brush past her and the pie steadies.
    • Off switchMr. BaneWAP always leaves one. Step on it, or hit it with a slice, and he is foiled. His rented wind drifts slices too.

    Two of the quinary five

    They come and go, never together, and they talk.

    • Mr. BoonWAPA sentient pie who means well. While he holds court, clowns flock, every pie finds an eye, he pours filling back into your aura and catches any slice you waste, and he says one true thing about the land. Flour in the air feeds him: he throws faster, pours crust, and stays longer.
    • Mr. BaneWAPHis foil, made of baneberries: the more he is brought, the fuller he sits and the longer his schemes run. A rented wind, a tax on every step, the lanes re-let, a march of Mimes Against WAP. Flour in the air feeds him too: his scheme quickens and lasts. Foiled, he says more than he means to.

    Under the hat

    It is not always him. The hat settles on someone, and at a new chapter it may move on.

    • The figure in plain linesThe one the hat was made for, perhaps.
    • The porterSteady, slow, broad.
    • A feast clerkQuick, narrow, nervous.
    • The Genie, off-seasonGlides; the pie settles fast.
    • A clownShould not be trusted with a pie.

    Kept in this browser

    What your carries have done to the book

    Every chapter you carry the pie through keeps a mark. How the carry went leans that chapter’s reading a little: toward fairy tale where clowns were satisfied and wonders kept, toward absurd reality where you were knocked about and Mr. BaneWAP was fed, toward low magic where you hopped clean and threw true. Where Mimes Against WAP out-did the pie, they hold the chapter, and it is harder to wonder about pie there: its pie words go quiet, on the page and in the passage, until you carry it through again and win it back. Each chapter page says so at the top, with a switch to read it plainly.

    Unlockables

    What the pies let slip

    Mr. BoonWAP says one true thing about the land each time he holds court. Mr. BaneWAP, foiled, blurts one. More of it opens as you find more of the land: chapters read, wonders kept in your almanac, the figure under the hat noticed, tellings heard, and what you do in the lanes.

    Mr. BoonWAP, holding court

      Mr. BaneWAP, foiled

        Read where the city decides who will spill it → See the hat first →