Paternity Leave

>Yeah!

444 - Read harder!

Speed reading intensifies!

Apparently, playing a certain TUNE on a PAN FLUTE can bring back those afflicted with CLAY GOLEM ZOMBIE THING to their senses. While the BOOK does not say what the TUNE is, you feel confident that you can rule out that smash hit, "POPCORN."

Additionally, either a poultice, unguent, cerate, or emollient made from a specific plant, Pottus nepenthes, can temporarily stall the progress of conversion into one of those... THINGS, possibly giving time to find a final CURE. But where could you possibly find such a SPECIMEN as this?

Is all HOPE lost? All of it? Even that little bit you were saving for later?

>

443 - Read BOOKS

You try to pawn off some of the reading onto the wounded MARK and the grieving TOURIST (FEMALE). Neither seems very interesting in reading on account of being wounded and grieving, respectively. You still leave the BOOK OF PUNs with MARK, just sort of propping it on his FACE. Maybe it can cheer him up?

Still you have all of the rest of the BOOKS to go through. This calls for some serious speed reading, since reading all of them is very likely impossible. You have to try!

>

442 - Get WET WIPE, Get BOOKS

You ask the TOURIST (FEMALE) for a DISINFECTANT WIPE from her FANNY PACK. She wordlessly hands you one such WIPE, which you then use on your ARM WOUND and then misspell in your INVENTORY. The FORMER TOURIST (MALE) does not look like he is a threat any longer.

In order to better understand your CONDITION (and MARK'S, while you're at it), you head to the bookshelves and (using the DEWEY DECIMAL SYSTEM) find a series of books in section 738.8 that may relate to your predicament. Even with your SPEED READING, you don't have much time for more than one or two. Which BOOK(S) will you read?

• This Bites! A Guide To Transitioning Into A Modern Ceramic Unlife (738.232)
• Ceramo-Necromancy: A Primer (738.287)
• Cracking Up: A Self-Maintenance Guide (738.368)
• Clay Golemry For The Utterly Incompetent (738.42)
• Everything You Wanted To Know About Clay Golems But Were Afraid To Ask (738.588)
• You're Kiln Me: Puns, Clever Wordplay And More About Clay Golems (738.601)

>

441 - Seek MEDICAL AID

After a moment of QUIET REFLECTION, you begin to run around the LIBRARY in an effort to find MEDICAL AID.

It's not very effective.

Taking stock, you realize that you need to (A) find a way to subdue the FORMER TOURIST (MALE) and (B) use the GUNPOWDER in the BLUNDERBUSS/MUSKET THING to cleanse the BITE WOUND on your ARM before you succumb to infection.

You hear a loud GUNSHOT across the room and realize that while (A) may have just been taken care of, (B) is no longer a practical plan.

>

440 - Start PLAYLIST of PAN FLUTE FAVORITES to---

Ah, no, I guess we won't launch into a FAN FAVORITE MEDLEY of songs.

YOU'VE GOT: INFECTED BITE!

(It's SUPER EFFECTIVE....)

>

439 - Distract FORMER TOURIST (MALE) with PAN FLUTE

You haven't played the PAN FLUTE in so long... not since THE ACCIDENT. But now, with NOTHING to lose, you have no choice. Perhaps MUSIC can soothe this savage GOLEM. Perhaps, just perhaps, it can connect once more to that which was once a MAN. You have to try!

You pick up the PAN FLUTE and begin to play POPCORN.

It appears... EFFECTIVE?

>

438 - Continue cursing CRUEL FATE

You curse CRUEL FATE as hard as you can. It's not very effective...

...and the FORMER TOURIST (MALE) is getting closer.

>

437 - Collect HAT

Realizing how upset MARK is about your missing HAT, you dart back across the LIBRARY and place the errant CHAPEAU upon your DOME. A NOISE behind you causes you to turn and---

MARK! Noooooooooo! He was the best of us!

Completely unbeknownst to you, the TOURIST (MALE) is now a CLAY ZOMBIE TOURIST (MALE) and is tearing into poor, defenseless MARK! You were entirely unaware of the TOURIST (MALE)'s CONDITION, and had not factored such a thing into any of your multitudinous PLANS!

You think back to all of the great MEMORIES that you have of your time with MARK.

There was that TIME when he was trying to warn you about SOMETHING behind you...

...and that's it. That's really the only MEMORY of your time with MARK that you have. Still, it should have been YOU, not HIM. Goodness, why? Why? WHY?

>

Wicked Awesome Schedule Update!

Wicked Awesome Adventure will not be updating today or Friday because of house remodeling and the ensuing lack of computer access! The adventure will resume on Monday, September 11 and continue for a few weeks until I go on a sort of vacation for two weeks at the beginning of October. (At which point the comic will come back in mid-October.) Enjoy the eight year old graphic above!

NEW POST TITLE

436 - Chat with MARK

You stride over to MARK and attempt to calm his FEARS. He's nice. Despite how jumpy he seems to be, you're sure that once he calms down everything will be copacetic.

Even though you've just met him, it's like you can read his whole LIFE just by looking at him....

MARK has led a productive LIFE, despite his somewhat difficult UPBRINGING. From a poor FAMILY, he managed (through hard WORK) to earn a PRESTIGIOUS SCHOLARSHIP, which he parlayed into graduating at the top of his CLASS with a DEGREE in MECHANICAL ENGINEERING. He and his long-term GIRLFRIEND have been getting serious about their RELATIONSHIP and he plans to shortly propose MARRIAGE. Everything about his LIFE is going great! Nothing could possibly go wrong.

So what the heck is he so panicky about?

>Collect HAT