The Longing-ist Playthrough: Day 23 – 23/01/22 – 346 Days, 9 Hours, 47 Minutes and 10 Seconds to go…

Day 23 came with a major breakthrough! Did I see it all the way to fruition? No. But I realised something very important and it steered me to make a decision that I know will pay off and allow me to progress. I only feel stupid for not realising it sooner…

I turned on my Switch and at first, I couldn’t see Monty on the screen, which confused the life out of me… Where are you bud? What I did see however, was an Abomination mushroom right in the centre of the screen! How in the hell has that grown there?! I plucked all of the green mushrooms except the once in the crook of the corner…! It turned out that Monty was asleep and had become obscured by the massive fungus, but he soon popped his head out and made his presence known.

I was confused. That green mushroom was defintely not there last night... 🤔

I went digging into my Switch’s screenshots and wouldn’t you know it, the night before that mushroom had been purple – not green! I’ve been planting the wrong bloody mushrooms this whole time! 😡 Annoyed at my thinking so rigidly, but also elated that I finally knew what to do, I asked Monty to pluck the stunted green ‘shroom from the crook… see ya, stinky..! and replaced it with a purple one. This is actually going to work, and I can finally get somewhere! 🤩

Pretty happy with myself, I decided to head down to the [Abomination cave] (where huge mushrooms lined the ceiling), and went ahead and planted three purple fungus in the ground beneath them. There was something about this spot that felt like something was missing and I thought that growing loads of Abominations might have some effect? Who knows, but at this point – I’ll try anything!

Happy that I’d done everything I needed to do in the [mushroom mines] to plant the seed of success for Day 24, I asked Monty to head home. He’d been sleeping on the floor for too many nights, and the least I could do was let him have a comfy armchair, a fire, and a good book. Monty eventually made it home and gave me a rendition of his favourite tune, six-note, three-note, six-note, and then relaxed into the chair. Hold on a minute…

Before letting him settled down, I wanted to check if the mushrooms in the mushroom garden were turning to Abominations… I don’t fancy those growing at home! Having a quick peek, it turned out that all the ones we were growing looked fine – but I was definitely going to make sure they stayed that way. 😅 I had Monty light a nice fire… a normal one this time, since I didn’t fancy watching him walk all the way back to the mines to escape the sulphur… and then set him going on a good book.

Today, I went with The Secret Garden – a favourite from my childhood that saw a slight and sickly little creature blossom into a well-rounded and adventurous soul. Hmm… 🤔 maybe there’s still hope for you yet, Monty…

Continue reading: Day 24