Life's Confection

The aatian people have performed the Life's confection ritual for centuries. This ritual comes with risks and can be harmful, so do take care.

For this ritual, you will need the following items.
 * A pair of pants with at least one left and one right pocket.
 * A mirror that is at least 4 feet tall and 2 feet wide. It may be larger, but it must fit in it's destination.
 * A fairly large candle that can burn for atleast 35 minutes and stand on it's own.
 * Some matches, or a lighter, or other fast and viable fire starting apparatus.
 * A chair. It must be a chair that doesn't have the seat directly on the floor, so it should have legs.
 * A dark square, or nearly square room. It should be large enough that your arms outstretched from the center of the room are still at least 3.5 feet away from the walls. The room should have no furniture aside from you and your items, and any windows should be sufficiently blocked and darkened. It must have a door that can completely shut.
 * A stopwatch is optional, but good to have if you are impatient.

Place your mirror against the wall farthest from the door. Try to get it as upright as you can without much rise of it falling over. Place your chair in such a way that the chair's back is at least 3 feet away from the mirror. Place your candle behind the chair, at least 2 feet away from the chair's back.

The room should be vacant aside from you and your selected materials and clothing articles. It is best to perform this ritual at night, when it's dark outside. The best rooms for this ritual are actually rooms in abandoned homes or buildings, or, even better, a room of a building which you have just moved into or purchased.

When you are prepared, enter the room and close the door. No other people should be within the building, nor should they enter during the ritual. Make sure the room is dark, shut the door completely, and then light your candle, placing it back behind the chair. Sit in the chair calmly. If you have brought a stopwatch, you should set it to 15 minutes before you look into the mirror. When you are ready, look into the mirror and stare into your reflection. Try your best not to take your eyes off of your reflection. It's okay to look away for a moment, but this may make it taste ever so slightly worse.

When you are sure 15 minutes have passed, you should calmly and clearly state your full name out loud. Try to say it politely, or it may taste ever so slightly more bitter. Once you have done this, you should not look into the mirror any further. Stand up and turn your chair to face the candle, and sit back down. If you have a stopwatch, set it to 15 minutes again. Afterwards, you should pick up your candle and gently blow it out. Place it back on the floor in front of you and try to sit calmly for the next 15 minutes.

If you begin to hear whispering during this stage of the ritual, you should immediately leave the room as calmly as you feel you can. Do not look in the mirror. Do not look back into the room as you leave. Do not forget to shut the door completely. Leave the building and do not return until at least 12 hours have passed. Until then, go about your business and try not to think about the ritual. Return only to remove your items, and discard them carefully in a location of your choosing. Do not reattempt the ritual. Do not return to the building, even if you own it.

If you don't hear whispering, simply sit calmly for at least 15 minutes. If you choose to sit longer, the black one may have a better effect. When at least 15 minutes has passed and you are ready to leave, calmly leave the room and shut the door completely behind you. Don't look behind yourself as you exit. Do not enter again for at least 12 hours. You should immediately go to bed in a seperate building. Try to get a full night's sleep. Try not to think about the ritual.

When you wake up, you should feel something in each of your pockets that was not there before. In the left pocket, there should be a white candy, wrapped in a clear wrapper. In the right pocket, there should be a black candy, in a translucent black wrapper. I suggest you consume the white candy first.

This candy should taste unique to you personally. It may taste foul, bitter, cloyingly sweet, pleasant, or simply mouthwatering. It may last mere seconds, or it may last for slightly over an hour. It may have different stages to it's flavor. It may or may not have an aftertaste, which may in itself have it's own flavor, or flavors, and should last anywhere from mere seconds to multiple hours.

You should wait until all flavors have passed before consuming the other piece of candy. To be safe, i would even advise you to brush your teeth once or twice and wait a day or two before you consume the other candy.

Also note that you may not want to consume the other candy. If you enjoyed the taste of the white candy, i would suggest that you carefully disgard the black candy in a place where nobody else may consume it.

If you choose to consume the black candy, you will find that it has an earthy, muddy, yet pleasant flavor, not unlike the taste of a roasted chestnut. This flavor is the same for anybody who consumes it.

You wouldn't notice, but the flavor of the black candy changes the flavor of the white candy. Sometimes for better. Sometimes first worse.

The white candy represents your life. It's flavor represents the tone of your life in general. It's duration represents your longevity. It's stages of flavor represent the different stages of your life. The aftertaste's flavor represents how people think of you after you've died, and the duration of the aftertaste represents how long humanity remembers you.

You should understand what the black candy does.

Under no circumstances should you ever taste both candies at once, nor should you share them with anyone else. Do not try to taste both candies by consuming them in alternating intervals. Do not even consume one while the flavor of the other is in your mouth. And under no circumstances should you have both candies in your mouth at the same time.

If you don't heed that warning... well. You'll find that both candies combined taste of nothing. For the first time, you will taste absolutely nothing at all. You see, this makes sense when you think about it. You can't taste anything if you don't have a mouth anymore.

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