As for her arrival on the Shiv only she and three animals, the captain's dog and two cats, survive the aptly named “Alma’s Ruin” shipwreck. In retrospect purchasing voyage to Eleder from Westcrown wasn’t the adventure she was hoping for. While asylum far from her quite boring and fastidious family was the original goal, this was not the jungle dream she imagined. Fortunately she has always been a positive soul and intends to make the best of this female Gnomish jungle castaway evolution.
Quickly overcoming her initial despair, Fijit fetches arms, tools, and other supplies from the ship before it breaks apart and sinks. Unfortunately the aforementioned animals disappear quite quickly taking away the only true link to Westcrown she had. Prior to said animals departure Fijit manages to build a hidden fenced-in habitat in and around a cave which she excavates. Finding and fighting off one giant crab and two immature cave fishers the cave has made a great area for rest and storage. The giant crab tasted good but do not in any case ever attempt to eat cave fisher. One bite is enough to make you run, wobbly mind you, to the SW side of the Shiv and eat viper nettle berries! The back of the cave’s coolness is good for storing food and the outside plant life makes for good camouflage. Lighting a fire was a bit difficult but upon finding that a small fire from driftwood releases little to no smoke solved that problem.
By making marks in a wooden cross, she creates a calendar to track her time, by using tools salvaged from the ship she learns to harvest edible plants. Mentioning plants, Fijit also learns the berries from the Viper Nettle help with many ailments including bites from the nasty bugs incessantly flitting to and fro. Foraging and attempting rudimentary beach racking she learns to dry grapes to make raisins, teaching herself basic trapping techniques she learns to keep the monkeys at bay, catch jungle goats and kill dire rats. She also adopts a small parrot who frequently flies off in search of who knows what. The parrot is not friendly but for some reason flits about Fijit when it wants to be mischievous. Actually the only redeeming quality of the parrot is it gives short warning when anything is greatly amiss. Greatly amiss equals a Dimorphodon flying near, cannibals on a lively trek, a recent shipwreck or her favorite pastime following the colorful pirates.
While searching beaches near an old ship wreck she finds a book about Desna and then out of boredom becomes religious, thanking Desna for her fate in which nothing is missing but civilized society. Desna has become her comfort yet never hearing from Desna she quickly realizes that asking for divine assistance, as the books’ authors tend to ramble on about, is 100% fruitless.
After six years of dodging Dimorphodons, beating off pesky monkeys, avoiding blood thirsty plants, Shiv dragons and big ass lizards Fijit discovers a local tribe of dirty cannibals who have recently begun to venture near her cave in search of castaways or anything edible unaware. She learns to avoid these forays yet occasionally harangues and steals from them gaining her little in useful supplies and anyways, pushing her luck isn't something she likes to do. If anything this island has taught Fijit to be cautious and quiet which is very unlike the Miss Kreutznaer of yesteryear.
Most times the cannibal tribe is unorganized and tend to bicker amongst themselves which on a few occasions has offered Fijit the chance to rid the island of one or two when they wander away from camp alone. These killings leave her feeling remorseful yet also powerful knowing she can survive alone on this island apparently designed to devour any hapless creature who finds itself abandoned here. Year after year the island has tested Fijit in many ways yet luckily enough she has survived the inhabitants, flora, fauna and fierce storms that plague this small little green “hell”. Improvising tools and traps, cautious exploration, cleanliness, a varied diet and camouflage are her assets. Pirates, cannibals and that damn parrot are her entertainment. Never giving up hope, Fijit dreams of finding a safe way off this desolate island. Many times she has spied pirates hiding booty yet knows stowing away on a ship or alerting them to her presence would most likely end in death or worse.
During a recent daytime beach scavenge Fijit noticed an off shore sizable ship wreck whose booty had yet to wash up takes notice of tracks leading away from the shore. Fijit, stealthily follows these tracks and begins spying on a small group of castaways who are very similar to her previous self. They appear crafty yet sadly a few have passed away when fighting a group of decaying locals… The camp they have made seems to offer limited shelter and she wonders, could these people be my way out? When Fijit returns from the most recent foray spying on the small group she asks herself out loud: “Should I introduce myself? Should I help them or should I just go back to being safe and not allowing any in? I could share my food, I could share my shelter and I could talk to someone! Yes, yes I shall.”
