Post: #2

Hmm, your motto certainly isn't - "the simpler, the better". Why are you making it so difficult for yourself? Classic quest system isn't better?

The worst thing would be forcing the npc attacking you I guess, the rest is just checking and lots of unnecessary code.
Use on=Quest under char definition (if it doesn't work, use speech block [speech spk_my_quest] and add it to that npc under tspeech=spk_my_quest)
Then the checking and prolly linking the new item on the certain player - give it event(or typedef?) which will remove the link when the item is picked up. (and also remove the event itself)
To force the npc attack you... i don't think its possible if you have the system (default one), that npcs attack randomly and change their targets. You can force the npc do some animation, say "Go to hell" and use damage function+some animation (a fireball for example) on the talker.

E: when i think about it... default link allows you to pick it up but not to equip it. In that case... add a checking line to the event mentioned above.