Wandering Dungeon

The group strolled through the forest on their way back toward Lakefall when April had a thought. "Hey Garrett, how are you going to explain the giant hole in your stomach and leg?"

The group stopped and looked at the large black-red hole in Garretts shirt, where a horned rabbit had stabbed him earlier. "I forgot about that." Garrett replied.

"Adventurers get hurt all the time on quests, but it would be hard to explain that away without us having someone with healing abilities in the group." Blixie said as she flew toward Garrett. She gagged when she got within a couple of feet of garret. "Ugh. I think that body is done for Garrett. The smell coming from that wound is horrendous."

Garrett took a moment to really look over his borrowed body. "I guess you are right, but what else can I use. We haven't run into anymore bandits that we could kill, and we need to go back to turn in the quest."

"Why not just make a new body?" April suggested.

"What do you mean make a new body? I don't have that kind of ability."

"Your imaginative dungeon master skills must have been left in our world." April laughed. "Just use your Earth Shaping skill to make a mannequin and your Unseen Force skill to stitch it together like you did with the skeleton you told us about.

Garrett stood there flabbergasted while Kyle broke out in laughter. "I can't believe I didn't think of that." Kyle said. "Leave it to the low intelligence fighter to think of a creative solution."

"Hey!" April huffed. "It's not my fault no one else wanted to play the tank in our campaigns. Besides, intelligence is a dump stat for them anyways."

Blixie just stared blankly at the two of them, unable to comprehend the meaning of their conversation. "Sometimes I think you are all talking a different language." She said.

"Well, that would solve the body problem, but that still leaves the problem of turning in the quest."

"What do you mean?" April asked.

"The orc that gave us the quest knows what we look like. From his perspective it would be suspicious if someone else came in to claim the quest using my guild card."

"True, but do we need to go back though?" April asked.

"How else are we supposed to turn in the quest?"

"Well, Blixie said there are guild branches in every town, right? So, we just follow the road and go to the next town and turn in the quest there." The demon face on her chest grinned. "Easy peasy."

"Well, I feel like an idiot now." Garrett groaned. "Alright, let's move into the forest so we don't draw attention." The group moved through the forest until the road was well out of sight before stopping. It took Garrett about an hour to use his Earth Shaping skill to collect the surrounding dirt and mold it into the different parts to make a semblance of a person roughly the same height as his current body.

"What about the clothes?" Kyle commented. "People will wonder about the blood and the holes."

Garrett thought for a bit then looked through the few things he still had in his inventory. "I forgot I had these." He said as a cloth sack dropped at his feet. He opened the bag and pulled out a few sets of men's clothes that looked like they should be worn to a fancy ball than what one would wear to roam the forests. Most of the clothes were bright blues and reds with silver and gold accents. Only someone that wanted to flaunt their wealth would even consider wearing them.

"Why didn't you sell those earlier?" Kyle asked. "We could have gotten better armor."

"I forgot about them." Garrett said. "They were part of the loot that we got from those bandits that had killed a merchant. Then we meet you, Kyle, and they slipped my mind."

"They might stand out a bit more than what we would want though." April chimed in. "We wouldn't want people to think that you are some kind or noble playing at being an adventurer and try to rob us."

"Fair point." Garrett said as he continued to look through the bag. "But all I really need is a new shirt that doesn't have a hole in it, and we could sell the rest at the next town." He pulled out a brilliant white tunic that had a few ruffles along the cuffs and neckline. "This is the plainest thing in here so it will have to do I guess." He spent a few minutes dressing up his new dirt mannequin and threaded his Unseen Force threads throughout it to tie it all together. After he had transferred all of his clothes, weapons and armor, and his coin pouch that contained his core to his new body, he absorbed the old body.

Garrett looked over his new puppet with a critical eye. "Something doesn't seem just right." He looked around until he saw what he wanted. He walked over to the base of a tree and found some wet dirt. He grabbed some of the dirt and rubbed it over the shirt. "Now the shirt is almost as dirty as the rest of the outfit."

"Now that that is taken care of, let's head to the next town." Kyle said as he headed back toward the road. The rest of the group followed him and headed off.

Several hours later they could see the end of the forest. "This mannequin is a lot harder to control than the last body." Garrett commented. "It reminds me of the skeleton but a bit slower." The group had slowed down so Garrett could get used to the new puppet. "Just let me know if a foot falls off or something, okay?"

"Luckly, you are pretending to be a monster tamer." Blixie replied. "No one will expect you to be fast or dexterous."

The group continued down the road and discussed how the fight went and where they could improve. The sun set and rose again before the group finally saw the next town on the horizon. It was about half the size of Lakefall and was surrounded by farms with several well-worn roads extending from it in several directions. They could see a large mountain range on the far horizon, past the town, that must have been hundreds of miles wide.

"Looks like a pass-through town." April said. "But at least they should have a guild office."

"We should discuss what we want to see in this world." Kyle offered. "It could give some direction to head for."

"Good idea." Garrett replied. "Let's go turn in the quest, see what other quests they can offer us, and then we can get a room at the inn to discuss where to go from here."

"I really miss not being able to eat." April sighed as the group headed off to the town. "I would love to have some fresh fruit from those farms."