A Lizardman's Journey

Outside of the Level 1 Dungeon, a party comprising of only two people prepared to enter after signing in for their timeslot. An old man in his seventies, was dressed in garb that marked him as a Mage. Beside him was a teenage boy who's hands would not stop shaking, as he clutched a Magic wand close to his chest. Looking up towards his elder, the boy spoke while trying to hide his nervous stutter.

"Grandpa, are you sure this is a good idea? Am I not rushing things a bit by coming here?"

With a smile on his face, the elderly man placed a warm hand on his grandsons back and then shoved him as hard as he could, sending him tumbling through the portal. The boy was left in shock when he appeared inside the Dungeon, his fear and nervousness at facing real monsters had vanished as he stared ahead. A few seconds later and his grandpa had joined him. Cocking his head to his side, he let out a noise of confusion.

"Huh?"

No monsters were in the vicinity, not even the blue and red Lizardman who usually appear from near the fallen logs. What did greet his eyes and lead to his bewilderment, was a crudely constructed sign planted in the ground. On the sign were several amateurishly drawn pictures and an attempt at writing that amounted to gibberish.

The old man mumbled to himself, while the young boy looked increasingly worried.

"What is this thing? Has someone sneaked in, a prank perhaps?"

While he mulled it over, his grandson examined it more closely and came to a different conclusion.

"Grandpa, did the Lizardmen make it?"

Resorting to violence, the boys grandpa tapped the back of his legs with his staff, causing them to buckle and near dropping him to the ground.

"Lucas you silly boy, this is exactly why you require more practical training! Monsters cannot create, only destroy"

Stretching out a hand and rubbing at the back of his legs, Lucas looked embarrassed about speaking such foolish words.

"Oh, sorry Grandpa"

The old man continued examining the sign in front of him, even so he had just admonished his grandson for saying such things, he himself had a niggling doubt at the back of his mind. Looking closely he could tell the drawings had been carved into the wood, with what looked like a monsters claw.

A sudden series of loud shouts rose up from the forest, before several Lizardmen appeared charging straight for them. Reflexively upon hearing the monsters shouts, the old man lifted up his staff and unleashed his Magic.

"Lightning Call"

A giant Magic Circle appeared in the air high above the approaching monsters, with bolts of lightning arcing out and striking their targets. All of the approaching Lizardmen were fried to death.

At that moment a realisation hit the old man, slowly turning his head towards his grandson, he grimaced while he spoke.

"Ahhh, sorry Lucas, I attacked them on instinct....Do not worry though, there are still plenty of monsters in here for you to practice with"

Lucas grumbled at his grandpa, but did not say anything for fear of his familial wrath. Moving forwards, he set out to eliminate the remaining Lizardmen that inhabited the Dungeon.

After the Dungeon Core had done its work, the Lizardmen were once again milling around as they awaited their inevitable demises. Three of their number were missing from the village though, as Bob, Ted and Suzy were engrossed in a game. Bob was shuffling around cautiously with his arms extended outwards, his vision obscured while he relied on his other senses. A torn piece of cloth had been wrapped around his face to cover his eyes.

Ted was keeping a fair distance from his brother, staying at the edge of the forest with an aim to use the trees as an obstacle for Bob. His precautions were not needed though, as Suzy was the main focus of the blindfolded Lizardman, by way of her staying extremely close to him. The pink skinned female Lizardman had drool escaping from her mouth and a mischievous look on her face. Keeping low, Suzy reached out a hand and tenderly stroked Bob's tail, making him spin around and lunge at thin air. Steadily becoming agitated, Bob shouted out.

"SCALE!"

Upon hearing Bob's shout, an answer came from Ted and Suzy at the same time.

""TAIL""

Bob immediately ignored Ted's shout, as it was relatively far away, whereas Suzy's shout was practically in front of him. Lunging forwards, Bob thought he had got her that time, but all he grasped was air, while he heard her laughter and felt a warm hand caress his chest.

"ARGHHHH!"

Bob had had enough, he simultaneously stamped his foot on the ground and removed his blindfold. Upon his vision being restored, he looked down to see a nervous looking Suzy crouched down directly under him, her quivering hand reaching for his nether regions. Suzy looked up at Bob sheepishly and greeted him.

"Hello Bob"

Out of all of the reactions that were to be anticipated, Bob's action was more akin to a blushing damsel. The bulky, towering Lizardman who had a body designed for battle, cupped his groin with his hands and leapt backwards, all the while emitting a high pitch shriek.

"EEEEKKK"

Bob felt both of his hearts pounding within his chest. He knew Suzy had been using the game as an excuse to grope him, but he did not think she would of gone as far as to attempt to violate him, and all the while his brother looked on from behind a tree. Directing his ire towards his brother, Bob shouted out to him.

"Ted you pervert! I expected this off Suzy, but my own brother to just watch from behind a tree"

Ted quickly joined his brother and Suzy, while he flustered at getting his side of the story across.

"Bob, Bob, you know that's not right! I was just playing the game you made up, Suzy took advantage of you"

"Hmmmm and you just watched....Ted!"

Suzy had taken the most prudent choice to keep quiet and let the brothers quibble between themselves. Bob finally turned his attention away from his brother and directed it to Suzy as well.

"Let's make a few changes to the game then. Now you'll be blindfolded"

Suzy's face lit up at Bob's suggestion, her tail unconsciously wagging away while she spoke.

"You want to blindfold me Bob? You can tie me up as well if you want, actually I insist!"

Realising the need for clarification, Bob quickly poured water on her words as he replied, a deadpan expression covering his face.

"Suzy, I'm sure you're constantly in season......I'll explain the rules. We're all going to be blindfolded and try and catch each other. Anyone can shout 'Scale' at any time and the other two shout 'Tail'....Sound good?"

Ted stood nodding away, knowing full well why his brother wanted to do the game that way, meanwhile the cause of the change looked dejected. Suzy was pulling her face, thinking of any which way she could turn the game to her advantage. After racking her lizard brain for long enough, she relented and agreed to the changes.

Suzy brought out a large piece of cloth that an Adventurer had left by mistake. Ripping the material in two, she handed a piece to Ted and proceeded to blindfold herself while staring intently at Bob, her thoughts running wild as her vision faded underneath the cloth. Bob reapplied the blindfold that had slipped around his neck like a scarf.

With everyone blindfolded, Bob spoke up to give the instructions.

"Suzy, Ted, everyone spin around ten times and then walk forwards five paces. That's when we will start"

The trio began to spin around, with Ted's rotations becoming less and less stable. Upon completion of the revolutions, Ted had fallen over out of dizziness. After clambering back to his feet, he walked five paces forwards and then heard Suzy's voice callout.

"SCALE"

""TAIL""

Suzy immediately honed in on Bob's voice and ran towards it, only to be stopped dead in her tracks as she collided with a tree. The other two had fared no better, with Ted also slamming into a tree and Bob tripping over a fallen log.

At that moment the worst thing possible that could happen, decided to happen. The Lizardmen felt their reasoning start to vanish and underneath their blindfolds, their eyes turned bright red. Bob frantically shouted while he went to remove his blindfold, only to find out his hands would not obey him.

"QUICK, TAKE YOUR BLINDFOLDS OFF, IT'S HUMANS!"

It was too late, the Dungeon Core had taken hold of their minds and reduced them to monsters with the mental faculties of a beast. One problem though had occurred, the Lizardmen now were not smart enough to take off their blindfolds and they also did not know which way to charge.

Emerging from the portal was a fresh batch of Adventurers, as well as a seasoned guide provided by the Guild in charge of the area. The man wore the attire of a Mage and was well into his twilight years, and as such his vision was poor. To compensate for this, he wore a monocle over his left eye, that was connected to his clothing by a gold chain.

The Adventurers all stood in disbelief at the sight they were witnessing. The Mage could not believe his lying eyes, even going as far as to repeatedly take off and put back on his monocle. Three Lizardmen appeared to be blindfolded and were running forwards blindly in random directions. Every few seconds one of their number would either slam into a tree, or fall over and then start the act all over again.

To witness such large monsters acting so comically, resulted in a cognitive dissonance from the Adventurers. One of their number sought clarification on if it were a normal occurrence.

"Errr excuse me, Mr Guide, is this normal for a Level 1 Dungeon? Is it a way of making it easier for our first time?"

Without taking his eyes off the Lizardmen, he replied to the question.

"No, no, not at all....I have never seen anything like this before....It would seem that some prankster has blindfolded the Lizardmen and then made their escape....It is too dangerous for me to remove the blindfolds without killing them. I will vanquish them and the Guild will reimburse you a small portion of your fee.....Hopefully it is just these three buffoons"

Everyone heard his explanation and nodded with understanding. At that point a thought occurred to a woman in the group.

"But old man, why would someone do it as a prank? That sounds a bit dangerous"

Letting out a deep sigh, the Mage dropped his shoulders and replied.

"Tsch, old man?......Back in my day, we did not have electrical games and such, so we made our own fun.....One of those was cow tipping, pushing a cow over without getting attacked....Now with the advent of Dungeons and monsters, I would wager it is something similar....It does sound rather fun now that I think about it...If only these bones of mine were not so old"

While listening to the Mage's lecture on the good old days, all of them had vivid memories of their granddads droning on about their youth. The woman though had no such fond memories and spoke up again, her face contorted into anger.

"Old man, that's animal abuse ya know! What did that poor cow ever do to you!?"

Everyone else rolled their eyes after hearing her preaching, even the Mage was that taken aback that he stopped watching the Lizardmen, so he could look directly at the moron in front of him.

"Animal abuse? Yet you have come into these creatures natural habitat to slaughter them? You are okay eating meat from animals that were killed as well I presume? The youth of today really are hypocritical"

The woman's face had turned to one of shock, never had someone spoke back to her and put her in her place before. Attempting to save face, she spoke again.

"Actually I'm vegan"

A chuckle escaped from the Mage's mouth as he finished her off verbally.

"Ha Ha. So the little girl is a vegan, I am surprised you did not tell me immediately upon meeting you. Congratulations on the self restraint...I am guessing you also do CrossFat as well"

"Tsch, actually old man it's 'CrossFit' and no I don't anymore. I do Hot Yoga instead!"

Before the conversation could become anymore heated, the man who spoke at first, pointed towards the Lizardmen and spoke up.

"Excuse me, Mr Guide. That ones coming this way, what should we do?"

Wasting no time whatsoever, the Mage gripped his staff tight and prepared for battle, while instructing the rest of the party.

"All of you stand back, I shall handle this beast"

Charging across the open grassland, the red Lizardman had heard the Humans voices and was zeroing in on his prey, all the while his vision was completely obscured by the special fabric.

The Adventurers moved out of the way and left the fight to the Mage. Standing in front of the Dungeons entrance, the Mage repeatedly tapped his staff against the stone circle that formed the Magic portal. The tapping noises caught the attention of the Lizardman and drew him straight towards him, pulling him slightly away from his original course.

Bob had picked up on the sound of the Humans talking and it drew his monster instincts towards them. A tapping noise then caught his attention, making him charge towards the new noise with renewed vigour. With his thermal vision obscured by the specialised fabric, Bob was solely relying on sound and smell, with those two senses he knew a Human was somewhere in front of him.

Bob blindly ran forwards and slammed face first into a solid object. The Dungeon portal that acted as a two-way gate for Humans to enter and exit the Dungeon, completely barred exit to the Lizardmen, whilst the Dungeon Core was intact. This was a feature of Level 1 and 2 Dungeons, a fact that made them the best places for new Adventurers to train.

Electrical discharges raced across the surface of the portal, with many arcing outwards and scorching Bob's flesh. The pain from the electrocution, mixed with the impact, hardly registered with him though, his mind completely subjugated by the Dungeon Core. Bob bounced off the portal and unknowingly came face to face with the Mage.

The blindfold that covered Bobs eyes had been dislodged by the initial impact and now revealed to him the scene before his eyes. Bringing a hand up towards the Mage, his instinctual action caught the old man by surprise, as his claws made contact with his face. The chain securing the monocle was severed, causing the circular lens to tumble to the ground. The Mage was enraged, with a swift movement he bonked the Lizardman on the head with his staff and cast his Magic.

"Explosion"

Bobs head exploded.