Deal with the Story Devil

Rumpelstiltskin offers you a deal: in exchange for a wish, giving you anything you want, all he wants is a story.

The wish will not be a Monkey's Paw: it'll be just what you want in the spirit rather than in the letter, though it's entirely possible (likely even) that you will ultimately find out that you never wanted it at all.

The story will be whatever fictional bout of imagination is consuming your - and only your - mind the most right now. Something with true potential for something great, that you could well have put to use one day - a Magnum Opus to be, even, perhaps. It will be simply sapped out of your mind, forever forgotten and never regained.

Say that epic fantasy novel you've been running through your head, maybe written half a draft of, never got around to show anyone else? Or an awesome campaign idea you were about to throw at your friends the next time you were to GM something? Or the character you've always wanted to play yet never got around to? A video game or a movie, perhaps, if you were so inclined, talented, and connected? It's gone now. You'll never even know what you lost.

Would you take up on this bargain? If so, what would you ask in return?

I'll be better off in this reality, thanks.

Hippity hoppity get the fuck off my property.

>Would you take up on this bargain?
Yes, I would.
>If so, what would you ask in return?
To experience said story, without any author foreknowledge of it.

Face it, if I think that it's an awesome story as an author - I will think it's awesome as a viewer.
Your move, Story Devil.

Yeah, but I'm boring, I'll just get about 50mil.

I tell him sorry, but I don't have any good ideas right now.

As a man of the world you should know every contract contains a catch or two. Small print, which nevertheless changes the ultimate meaning of the pact. This applies to oral contracts as well.

>You'll never even know what you lost

Then he's literally granting me a wish for free? What I don't perceive at the moment never existed, specially if it "was" something already imagined in my mind.

The wish would probably be a better story anyways.

I want my waifu to be real

Well I have to ask for something big, what if that story actually did have potential I'd regre-
>You'll never even know what you lost.

Oh then I'll take a couple million dollars and the deed to a nice house then.

Seriously, if I don't know its even gone, why do I care that much? It would be another story entirely if you said I'd know it was gone, know when Rumple inevitably turns it into a true magnum opus (regardless of original quality) that is referenced and beloved for decades to come by millions upon millions of people.

Then I'd regret wishing for frivolous material wealth.

...

I think the implication is that you'll remember that you gave up your greatest story, but you'll never be able to remember what it was

Sheeeet, you got a good answer there.

>only 50 mil
>not asking for the highest number you can think of in liquid revenue generating assets

This is a catch 22 for me. The story consuming my imagination is the one that I would choose to use the results of my wish to live out. If I made the wish and he took that story from my mind I would never remember why i wanted the wish in the first place.

I think that IS the highest number he can think of.

Aw man.

I really want this, but...

Fuck. The story I have in mind has so much war. It isn't even funny. I don't know if I could handle that, even as the protagonist with what is ultimately a happy ending.

You wouldn't want to make that deal if your story was "Woody's Got Wood" levels of bad.

Pride: It could cost you.

He means consume the story as storytelling, not live out the events of the story as the protagonist.

>I wish for power at least comparable to yours, if not utterly limitless, over reality itself.

Or, more reasonable:

>I wish for great wealth.

Honestly all I really want. Not to work. Eat, lift, sleep. Game, drum, write, drink alcohol. Whatever.

That actually makes a lot more sense.

:(

Whenever I die, I want to be reborn at that very moment somewhere on Earth. I will retain all of my memories and cognitive capabilities, and, during developmental years, I will have a child's propensity for acquiring languages but my mental faculties will be otherwise physically divorced from my biological brain.

This gives me effective immortality without that pesky "what if you get trapped in eternal agony" situation.

But what happens after Earth is destroyed?

Granted, that's a long fucking time from now, but still.

Are you sure the life you envision with your waifu isn't the story in your head?

imagine having to live through consciously sucking your mom's tits and then watching her clean the shit off your asshole generation after generation

Easy. Develop a incest fetish, kill self when you find the right milf, seek her out in next incarnation, and get some.

I'd wish for a more complex and strong mind, imagination, set of morals, sense of insight, memory, etc., so that I can more valuable and original stories. Only thing is I'd be scared that I wouldn't hit upon the exact set of circumstances that led to me creating the first story, so it would be lost forever even with improved faculties. I might refuse desu, I wouldn't want the most important parts of my life to be drained of all meaning. That's ultra-depressing. But then again it might not really mean anything at all so it might be worth the risk to invent something better.

That's tuff OP.

>The story will be whatever fictional bout of imagination is consuming your - and only your - mind the most right now. Something with true potential for something great, that you could well have put to use one day - a Magnum Opus to be, even, perhaps.
Well, I've got nothing to offer.