After explaining the rules of playing Piktionary, the first group steps up to the front.
The one they appoint as their artist is a young human woman who is fidgeting quite nervously as she takes a few cards from me.
"It's alright; you don't have to be so nervous." I smile gently at the anxious lady to encourage her.
However, I'm not too sure about how to give her more reassurance, so I decide to give her a quick recap, for now, to distract her, "Just remember, you're not allowed to write 'word' clues, okay? Drawings only, or you'll forfeit your turn. You can use a few symbols, though. Like, if ever you'd want to indicate that the word they have to guess is a combination of two words, like 'married woman', for example. A plus symbol would be appropriate to use here."
"Mm..." She manages to nod, while seemingly being a bit distracted.
Her auburn hair, that's slung over her shoulder at first; slowly falls as she turns her head a few times towards one direction in particular. Just like water, each strand cascades smoothly across her back in one smooth motion.
Curious, I follow her line of sight and it ends where her other groupmates are at.
Her round doe eyes, seemingly stopping to stare at a certain individual. The person she is staring at is a demi-goddess who has a smile that's like a beautiful sunny, warm, and breezy afternoon.
She is quite the vision herself, and has long, vibrant chocolate brown locks that go past a few inches down her shoulders.
Feeling a wee nosy, I question her, "... A friend of yours...?"
The young woman snaps her head back at me in shock, and she stutters out, "N-No! I mean, maybe? Kind... of...? I'm not even sure if she still remembers me, to be honest. She... has been extremely kind to me when we were still alive..."
Her eyes are now tinged with sadness and longing. That expression is a little bit too affectionate to say that it's how a friend would look at another, so it's quite like...
Is she...?
Hmm... interesting.
Like a little girl who has found something quite fascinating and new to play with, I immediately feel like digging in further to see if I can play cupid.
I sidle up to her; maybe I can poke something out of this person next to me and get her to spill the details, "Sorry, what was your name again?"
"Oh... my name is Qrihl...", the shy girl responds to me quietly.
Showing my pearly whites to Qrihl, I start going on the offensive off the bat, "Sooo... it seems like you have quite an interest in that gorgeous demi-goddess over there?"
"Wh-What?! What are you...?!?!" Qrihl exclaims; her adorable blue eyes grow wide open and look striking against her beautiful, straight red hair.
Pfft!
I couldn't help but giggle because of how cute she's reacting.
"Don't worry, Qrihl. I promise you; if you loosen up and just concentrate on the game, I'll make sure to help you spend more time with her, alright?" I wink at her right after giving her a bit more incentive.
[...]
It didn't take long for the once shy lady to get more and more into her element.
Everyone's been praising her drawing skills, and it made it extremely easy for her team to rack up points in no time within a few minutes.
I haven't succeeded in collecting any tears yet, but thanks to how much fun this group is having, it has successfully attracted plenty of people to join us.
So they start forming their own groups to sign up and take part. We're now close to hitting the maximum amount of participants, so it's only a matter of time now, I think.
It's amusing how we could barely get willing players earlier, but look at this area now!
With a huge satisfied grin being plastered on my face, my yellow pupils scan through a large crowd that has all of us surrounded now.
I'd like to do a victory dance, as this means this is pretty much in the bag now.
The thing is, though, I hate counting chickens before my eggs have hatched, so, I'll do the sensible thing and wait for the current round to finish first.
...
Finally, the three minutes are up, and they've all managed to rack up five points.
That's pretty darn good, actually.
Breaking into a jog, I go over to where Qrihl is; I immediately get to patting her back to congratulate her for a job well done.
I immediately hatch the plan I've been concocting the entire three minutes they were playing earlier.
"Alright, so as per the rules, you need to choose someone else who'll draw for the next round." After asking them about their next representative, the entire group remains completely silent.
Yes! It's actually somewhat easier if no one else wants to volunteer.
"We don't have too much time, unfortunately. I'm warning you guys, if no one steps up, I'll have to choose randomly and you're not allowed to turn me down, alright?" I remind them, pretending to look concerned. I want to make it more convincing; to a point that whoever I'll be picking, was all done coincidentally.
...
Cricket sounds. Nothing. Zilch.
Wow. No one's budging at all! I'm almost a bit disappointed that this is going to be TOO easy instead.
Nah, who doesn't love a good cupid match-up every now and then?
"Okay. You better not blame me for this." I pretend to scan through the crowd, searching for the next victi— I mean, group artist.
"That lovely demi-goddess over there."
"Yes."
"You."
... Did I really just call her 'you'? I better ask what her name is. "... Sorry, I'm being quite rude, aren't I? May I know your name, please?"
"... t's Fi...t"
I can barely hear her as she's feeling rather shy at the moment, so I ask her once again, "Sorry, what did you say your name was?"
The soft-spoken demi-goddess, who has a nice, glowing, peachy skin tone; tells me her name and makes herself speak a little bit louder, "... y name... is Fiorret."
She continues; with a meek tone in her voice, "I... I'm nowhere near good enough, though. Certainly not like..."
"Don't worry about that, Fiorret. You don't need to be able to draw to win this game. It just has to be easy enough to understand at first glance or two. It's also more important to choose what to draw exactly. So you just have to be at your most comfortable. Thank you Fiorret, please come to the front. I'll give you a quick recap on what to do." I reassure her with a friendly smile and encourage her to take on this role and accept it.
Fiorret's friends start pushing her from behind. With great reluctance, she gets up from her chair and walks towards me.
I feel slightly bad for her, but it's good for us if she isn't confident... as then it wouldn't be too odd to do this!
"Alright. How about this? I can assign Qrihl as your assistant." Fiorret's eyes start to show some signs of life again.
Not wanting to give her the wrong idea, however, I immediately follow it up with, "BUT—! You'll still be the main artist for the next three minutes. She's not allowed to draw for you, but she can give you suggestions as you plan out how to draw what's on the card. She can have her own sketch pad, but she is not allowed to show it to the rest of your members."
I grow quiet to give myself a bit more time to think, making sure I'm not missing anything before I keep going. "Mm, what else... Ah! You can do like, a 10~20 second practice before you draw it for real. So the rest of your groupmates can start guessing what the word is as soon as you're ready to. The clock will still be running though so you should do all of this as quickly as possible."
This time, the demi-goddess' face lights up, as I throw her this lifeline.
The worry lines above her forehead disappear, she looks at peace now. "Thank you SO much. Qrihl's a wonderful artist and above that, she can draw SO quickly. I'm sure I can learn a lot from her. I admire her work so much!"
O ooh. 'Admire', eh? I think we can work with that.