Final Assault: Talk to Piper

Delphi looked at Piper and then the surrounding groups and news representatives. She then sighed, "I'm not an expert on them. I know the bare basics due to stuff that's happened to me. Fuck it, I'll share that."

Taking in a deep breath, Delphi turns to the groups there to report on the unveiling of Piper's new wooden sculpture. "I hope that you get some time to talk about more than just what's under the sheet over there. I'm going to inform you of the bare-bones information on what a Dryad is. If you've got a recording device, please turn it on now so to ensure you remember what I say. Ready? One, two, three, let's go. Dryads are people, typically humans, who ate some mystical fruit. This fruit is actually a parasite, designed who the fuck knows how long ago, to transform people into Dryads. If you eat one, and are unlucky, you die. If you eat one, and are lucky, you get turned into a dryad. Regardless of what gender you were before becoming a dryad, dryads are always female. Always."

Taking in a deep breath, Delphi continued, "There's also some other important changes that differentiate dryads from who they were before. For one, it's now impossible for them to gain or use any type of mystical power, regardless of whether or not they knew how to beforehand. This is different from the average human, who has the potential to awaken these powers, but lacks either the knowledge or some type of event to actually tap into them. Dryads also have restrictions on their physical strength. For example, if an Olympic World Champion Weightlifter was slipped a Dryad Fruit, they'd be lucky to be able to lift half, or even a quarter, of the weight they could before. Basically, Dryads can be said to be one of the more crippled races of the some people would call the mystical community, similar to people who are missing an arm. They're not crippled enough that they need constant assistance, and might get annoyed at being treated as "special" due to their limitations, but they still suffer from having those limitations."

"On the other hand, there are some double-edged, so called, benefits to being a dryad. For example, you stop ageing, and thus will never die of old age. On the other hand, this could also be seen as the worst curse of being a dryad. The worse case scenario, that I can imagine, is a thirteen year old boy who dreams of becoming a professional Weightlifter. He's hit puberty and has started growing into a young adult. Then, somehow, he ignorantly eats a Dryad Fruit, the parasite that turns you into a Dryad, and, no, it doesn't matter why. Suddenly, he's lost his ability to become a professional Weightlifter. He's become a social pariah at school, no longer fitting in with his male friends, and unable to fit in with the female groups. If he had a girlfriend, he just lost her, too. He now has to learn about periods and how to deal with them, as well. But that's just the short-term effects. This person, who was previously a thirteen year old boy, is now, physically, a thirteen year old girl for the rest of his life, which can effortlessly last over a hundred years. The new dryad will never be able to by herself alcohol, will never be able to hold a real relationship, except with the most atrocious of perverts. Will have incredible difficulty getting a driver's licence, and will likely be pulled over by every police officer she passes if she succeeds. And getting a job would become a horrifying experience. Basically, an ignorant mistake would have turned that person's long life into a living hell."