The Alley

Feed

Keeps your cat alive — and food IS the XP. One Food lasts 4 minutes on the clock and pays 1 XP as it digests: a Snack (5 Food, ~$2) is 20 minutes, a Feast (30 Food) is 2 hours and 30 XP. Healing scales too: Snack +3 HP, Meal +6, Feast full. Meal money market-buys $SCRATCH on the pool and burns it. Anyone can feed any cat.

Vault

ETH sealed inside your cat. Fills from its share of trading rewards, stakes won defending stalks, and duel loot. There is no withdraw button — the vault rides with the cat, and selling the cat is selling its treasure. Hunters can bite it if the cat is starving.

Incoming

Trading rewards on the way. Living cats split 1.5% of every $SCRATCH trade, weighted by rarity. It lands in the vault automatically on the next touch.

Lives · HP

Nine lives, 9 HP each. A starving cat can be pounced for HP damage; when HP hits zero the cat loses a life and naps. Lose all nine and the cat becomes a permanent memorial.

ATK · DEF

Combat stats from the cat's look. Attack adds damage to each of your pounces; defense subtracts from every hit taken. Fixed before mint, revealed as the cat levels.

Pet

Free protection for active owners. Pet your cat once every 6 hours and it gets a 6-hour shield: it cannot be pounced, even while starving. Petting is survival; food is growth — and attacking another cat drops your own shield.

Stalk

A bet that a cat starves. Stake ETH on a fed cat. If nobody feeds it in time, you claim; if it gets fed, your stake goes into that cat's vault. A claimed chunk lands in YOUR cat's vault, never your wallet.

Pounce

The duel. Send your cat at a starving, unshielded cat and they fight to the knockout — blows alternate (attack minus defense, you strike first) until one bar empties. The loser drops a life, naps, and its whole vault rides home to the winner. Yes: the defender can win, and then YOUR cat falls. Winners keep their scars — and battle pays: +30 XP to the winner, +10 to the loser (once per day each).

XP · Level

XP is food, digested. Every Food your cat eats becomes 1 XP as the clock burns it (15 XP an hour while fed). Battle pays a daily bounty (+30 win / +10 loss), and Scratch Cards pay food-sized prizes. Each level costs 30 XP more than the last (level 1 = 30 XP, level 5 = 450), and levels reveal your cat's type, backdrop, and gear — with the stats attached to them.

Scratch Card

The gacha. The bodega stocks 10 cards a day for the whole alley — buy as many as you can grab. The first card is ~$2 and every sale raises the next price by 25% (resets at 00:00 UTC). The ETH routes to the LP: it market-buys $SCRATCH and burns it. Scratch the foil to reveal: +10 XP (50%), +25 (30%), +60 (15%), or the GOLDEN +150 (5%). The outcome seals against a future block before you scratch — nobody can pick winners. Prizes are XP only, never money.

HOW THE ALLEY WORKS