The Donkey

The donkey brings you corpses. He is a talking donkey (“a respectable, distinguished, magical animal!”, in his own words) who resents the job but prefers it to becoming lunch meat. He drops off your first body during the introduction, and from Certificate, Please on he comes on a fixed schedule. There is nothing to trade or ask him; unless the story has something to say, the only answer when you talk to him is Leave.

Delivery days

He comes every second day at 13:12, which always falls on Gluttony, Lust and Pride (see Time and the Week). You hear his bell when he arrives. At first he brings one corpse per visit.

Until the morgue door is repaired, he leaves the body outside at the Corpse Dumping Point. After that, he puts it on a free Corpse Pallet if there is one, and on the morgue floor if not. Until an Iron Detail is within reach the door cannot be repaired (see The Morgue), so every body ends up outside.

He does not always come. He skips the visit when the morgue is full, and even when there is room his delivery chance drops after each delivery and rises again after each miss. Corpses has the numbers.

After Agatha the Nun leaves the tavern, the donkey’s next visit ends with him waiting at the morgue to complain about her. He makes no further deliveries until you have heard him out.

The strike

Once you have summoned the fairy, the donkey goes on strike. The next time he comes he waits at the morgue with no body: Agatha has ordered that the dead stay with her at the Crossroads, and he refuses to go near her. When you ask him about zombies (the fairy told you he knows how to raise them), he admits to having a book and strikes a deal: sort out his problem and he will give it to you.

While the strike lasts, Agatha supplies the corpses instead. Her page has what she wants before she lets him work again: a better graveyard and her sacred well repaired. Then tell the donkey he can go back to work (The Ingenious Gentleman Don Keyote): he has to wash his hooves before every pick-up and may no longer relieve himself at the Crossroads. His deliveries resume.

The Necronomicon

Then he admits he does not have the book. He knows who might: the Poet, who now calls himself Gunter and works as an astrologer. Ask Gunter about the Necronomicon (20 reputation with him). He is too busy with your PR campaign to look for it; ask again at 30, and he finds it under his bed. You get the Necronomicon, 10 reputation with Gunter, a Story and the achievement Forbidden Knowledge, and the Reanimation Liquid technology appears on the tree. Gunter adds that he sells the stones for zombie collars himself.

Later talks

A few more times in the story, the donkey arrives with no body and waits at the morgue for a chat: once soon after the strike ends, once after you get the Necronomicon, once when town quality reaches 50, and once after the election when it reaches 100. He grumbles about the town’s traders, drinks with Larry, and drops hints about “a dark hat and a red eye”. Each time, he makes no more deliveries until you have talked to him.