As I returned to consciousness three things immediately demanded my attention. The first was that everything hurt like I had been run over by a truck. The second was that it was way too hot for winter in Washington. In point of fact it was too hot for life. The final thing was the sound of waves and the cries of sea birds.
The pain was enough that I soon black out once again. It was hard to tell how long it had been since I last woke up when I dragged my way back to consciousness once again. I still hurt quite a bit but it didn't seem like I was in danger of blacking out again anytime soon. Well with no better time then the present I figured I should find out if I still had all of my limbs.
It was with great effort that I began go take inventory of my body.
Legs? Check.
Arms? Check again.
Okay next was toes. I wiggled my toes and they seemed to all be there. They felt funny but that could have been from the pain I was in.
It was as I began to move my fingers that I realized something was wrong. First was that I seemed to be wearing some kind of gauntlets. The second was that my fingers now ended in claws. With a sense of confusion I opened my eyes and immediately snapped them back shut with a groan of pain.
Looking straight at the sun was not a pleasant experience. Resolving not to do that again I rolled over onto my side causing something around my waist to shift and a second thing to bang against my hip and thigh. I was forced to ignore that for the moment as muscles screamed in protest at my movement. Well seems like my earlier thought about not passing out again was only correct as long as I didn't move.
Once the pain had passed I opened my eyes slowly, letting them adjust to the light before I found myself staring out at a strange scene. The clearest blue sky that I had ever seen along with a dark blue ocean stretched out to the horizon. My mind went blank as I tried to process the information my eyes were giving me when I glanced down at my arm.
An arm that was covered in golden armor, ended in a clawed hand, and that was a hell of a lot longer then I was used to. Glancing down my body I could see that the golden armor covered me completely, a kite shield of the same golden sheen hung from a belt at my waist and was what had made the thud earlier. As something stirred down past my feet I realized something else was out of place.
Well more a pair of things that were out of place. The first one was what had caught my intrest in the first place. I was a lot bigger then normal, both in size and proportion. The second was the new appendage that I had discovered. A thick tail covered in fiery colored scales, thicker on the top then on the bottom, that swept back and forth by my feet. It had been this movement that I had noticed earlier.
As the pain continued to fade I decided to see if I couldn't get up at least onto my hands and knees. The action hurt and my vision swam for a moment but I had at least managed to do it. As I waited for the bout of dizziness to pass I noted that on the belt opposite the shield hung a sheathed sword. Something else to look into.
The sound of waves splashing against rock drew my attention to the edge of the hill a few feet away from me. Crawling over to the edge I peered down five or six feet into the surf below. The sight of foamy waves that greeted me was a disappointment as I had hoped to use the water to see my reflection.
I groaned at that point as I realized what an idiot I was being and crawled backwards slightly until I could properly sit down with my legs tucked beneath me. The pain was still there but I could ignore it as I grabbed the shield at my side. Unhooking my shield I turned it around to use the slightly reflective front as a mirror. There I beheld the rest of the changes that had occurred.
Looking back at me from the surface of the shield was a lizard like head and face, covered in scales the same color as the tail. Deep set eyes of orange stared back at me and the nostrils of the muzzle flared as I inhaled in shock. My eyes drank in the unusual reflection as I continued to study it with a growing sense of wonder. Everything about the face was so animated so natural like I had lived in this body my entire life. That extended beyond the face as well as I realized with a start that instinctively I had been moving the tail the whole time.
Somehow I had become one of my own dnd characters. Tii'chia the name of a lizard folk fighter that I had created for a campaign that I had long since finished. Judging from my apparent size it would have been my character as they were towards the end if the campaign.
If that was the case however shouldn't I have wings? There was a great snap from somewhere behind me and as I turned to look I saw the pair of massive wings extended to either side of me. Instinctively I flexed them, feeling the faint breeze running across the leathery skin as they stretched out to their full length. Another thought and they vanished as suddenly as they had appeared. Grabbing the shield once more I angled it behind me to see where the wings had gone.
The space on my back that the wings had occupied was replaced by a pair of small golden wings that swept up over my shoulders by a couple of feet. I stared at the wings for several minutes until I realized what I was seeing. When I wasn't using them the wings returned to the state that they had been in at the start of the campaign. Vestigial and too weak to actually fly they had still been seen as a sign of favor in Tii'chia's tribe. Enough favor that the tribal shamans had encased them in molten gold and then carved sigils onto them so that the magic would eventually cause them to grow into proper wings. Either way I was happy that I could conceal the wings when not in use.
I needed to take inventory of what I had in order to figure out where in the campaign that my character had been drawn from. Judging from what I could obviously see I was at some point in part 5 or 6. The pain was more a dull ache then anything else but deciding not to push things any further just yet I instead glanced around at my surroundings.
I had noticed earlier I was on a low hill of grass that jutted out over the water. The hill sloped gently down to either side until the grass merged with the sandy shores. Directly in front of me and opposite from the spot I was at rose a towering tropical forest that I could see only a few feet into before everything became lost in the foliage. The general noise of animal activity reassuring me that I wasn't the only living thing nearby.
I started my examination with the shield, it was packing some series defensive enchantments but nothing else. I snorted as I realized that the shield wasn't going to be any help in things narrowing down so I set it aside.
As I placed my hand upon the hilt of the sword at my side I could feel the enchantments on it calling out to me. I felt my mouth curling into a smile as I drew the long sword slowly from its sheath. Perfectly straight double edged length of steel greeted my eyes as the blade slipped free. It was powerful, deadly, and it whispered that I should lead. That I should subjugate all that opposed me. Yep this character was firmly into part 6 if the blade was acting dominant.
I swung the sword around for a few moments feeling how my instincts guided it exactly where I wanted it. That was something that would take some time to adjust to, the knowledge I needed was there but I didn't yet have full control of it. Sheathing the blade I changed my focus next to the items resting on my belt.
Over an hour had passed by the time I had completed my inspection of my person and equipment. I had saved removing the armor for last as I knew it would take time to remove and then don once again. In retrospect I should have done it first since the revelation that had been hidden underneath told me precisely where my character had come from in the campaign.
"Well I'm certainly occupying my character as they were at the end of the campaign." I muttered while tapping one hand against the breastplate of my armor as I recalled the gemstone shards that I had seen embedded into the skin of my chest. Everything else was accounted for as well at least what I had remembered of it, several items I couldn't recall having before but were there now. Like a bag of holding to store all of the the loose items and other things like a bed roll.
However the hell I had ended up where ever I was I could at least be thankful that there was instinctive memories of how to use all of my equipment. Well that and the knowledge of how to move and use the abilities of a 13 foot tall lizard man with wings like a dragons that was also a master of the sword that was sheathed at my hip. Knowledge that would take some time to absorb but until then I wouldn't be completely helpless either.
The next order of business was getting of some idea of where I was and what dangers might be lurking about. A glance up and down along the beach revealed nothing noteworthy and the jungle before me was dense enough that I would be lost in minutes if I tried to work my way through it. I could use my wings to get a better idea of where I was from the air but I was hesitant to do so without knowing what I might encounter in the air. Still I hadn't seen anything or heard anything but seabirds and hopefully I would see anything that was coming at me in time to react.
My choice finally decided on my wings snapped out to their full length and with a powerful downward thrust lifted me off the ground.. I could feel how the muscles were stretching and flexing as they worked to carry my higher into the air. I ascended up first a foot but soon two and then three feet. A minute later I was circling slowly out over the water and the hill about twenty feet off the ground.
Coming to a stop over the hill I hovered in place as I surveyed the area. It was easy to see now that I was on some kind of large tropical island. In the distance beyond the jungle I could make out a tall spire of stone that loomed above the trees on the far shore and beyond that was more ocean. It was hard to tell but it seemed like the land slowly slanted upwards in the direction of the spire. Outside of that though there seemed to be nothing but the beach that I had woken up by and the jungle itself.
Furling my wings I swooped back down to land upon the sandy beach in order to think about what I now knew. It wasn't much sadly. I had never really traveled all that far from home and certainly never to anyplace that could be called tropical. So that left me basically as lost as when I had started for whereever in the world I happened to be
The spire served as the only thing that I could easily use as a landmark. Now that I knew it was there I could see the spire over the top of the trees from my current position. I considered taking to the air again in order to arrive at the spire sooner but quickly rejected the idea. I still didn't know what might be lurking about or what lived on this island, plus I was a bit worried how well I would do if I actually got attacked in the air. Even if this body knew what it was doing I had never tried fighting in the air before and wasn't eager to try it out just yet.
AS all of these thoughts swirled around in my head I started off along the sandy beach. The enchantments woven into the boots that increased my speed letting me set a rapid pace. The weight of the armor slowed me down a bit but without the boots I would have ended up being even slower. I marveled at how easy the pace was to maintain. I hadn't been all that fit before arriving here and I was sure after only a minute at my current pace I'd have been panting for air.
As I traveled along the beach I let my mind wander back to one of the experiments I had tried while looking over my equipment. While I could tell right away that the enchantments woven into everything were still working the other magical properties of things might not have been. I was limited in the ability to test several of my items because they might only ever have a single charge and with no way to refill them experimenting was right out.
Thankfully as I discovered there was an item with multiple charges as I could use to test with. It had been an item I'd forgotten about and I couldn't remember why I even had it on me. The item was a bottle of shadows, I could remove the stopper and pour out a literal shadow that would help fight with me. While the time I could use it was limited it naturally recharged when the sun set everyday.
So I had tested the bottle and found that it did indeed work. I dismissed the shadow right away so as to not use too much of the time avaliable. But it did confirm what I needed to know, that my items would function as they should in regards to things other then enchantments.
Sometime later I noticed that the jungle off to my left had started to gradually slant upwards. The sandy beach continued on at the same level in front of me. As I continued along the level of the forest was soon above my head, leaving me traveling along the beach with a cliff hanging over me.
I glanced up at the position of sun and then back to my slowly lengthening shadow. It was probably about 2 to 3 in the evening and judging by the way it had only gotten hotter as the day went on I guessed that it was summer. I had been a little surprised at how fast I had adjusted to the heat but then remembered that as I currently was I was likely to be cold blooded.
A glance back along the beach revealed only my footprints and the unbroken line of my tail dragging against the sand. Looking towards the spire of stone I estimated that I had covered about half of the distance between it and where I had started from.
As I continued onwards I let my mind wander once again. I had no idea how I had gotten here, the last thing I remembered was laying down to bed and drifting off to sleep. After that I had woken up here and in the body of Tii'chia. I toyed briefly with the idea I wasn't even who I thought I was and that the actual me was continuing on with his life somewhere.
I swiftly shoved that idea to the back of my mind, locked it up and threw away the king. Yep not gonna think about that any longer, only madness, insanity, and a splitting headache could come from thoughts like that. A small part of me did wonder as to what I was going to introduce myself as if I ended up meeting people.
I was pulled from my musings as the ground began to slope up in front of me, sand giving away to dirt and grass. I soon found myself traveling up a steep incline that brought me level with where the trees sat. There the land ended in a sheer cliff as if something had taken a massive bite out of the island. Where the water met another stretch of sandy beach about a hundred feet below me was a sheltered bay that stretched all the way to the opposite cliff side where the spire of stone I had seen before stuck up proudly into the sky. A small village sat at the end of the bay and stretched back into a clear cut area of the jungle.
I took all of this in even as my eyes were fixed on the three masted ship floating in the middle of the bay. A black flag flapping in the breeze hanging from the middle mast. As the flag flapped the picture on it became visible and I found myself staring at a sinister looking white skull with golden teeth and blood dripping from the eye sockets.
A scream followed by the sound of wood splintering drew my attention back to the village just in time to see one of the houses collapse and kick up a cloud of dust. I could see people running about the streets of the village chased by other figures holding a variety of weapons. I felt a low growl building in the back of my throat as I watched helpless civilians getting attacked. I didn't even think or consider what I was about to do before I acted.
Yanking my sword free from it's sheath I also grabbed the handle of my shield and brought it up into a ready position. Wings snapped out to their full extent as I leapt from the edge of the cliff and into open air. Powerful beats of my wings carried me out to and above the village in moments. Immediately below me I spotted a heavily tattooed and bearded pirate wielding a two handed axe chasing a young man and woman between a couple of buildings.
Pulling my wings to my sides I swooped down at the pirate. Wind whipped by my face as I hurtled down and just before I would impact with the pirate I flared my wings to kill some of my forward momentum. The strain was immense but it slowed me enough that my clawed feet slammed into the pirate first instead of head on. The pirate didn't even have time to scream as my weight slammed him backwards to the ground, the tip of my sword burying itself into the man's throat.
Before I could check if the villagers were alright a glint of light warned me of another threat. Snapping my shield up before me I was just in time for a pair of shots to ring out. The two shots cracked against my shield less then a second between the bullets. I was surprised that the impact was significantly less then I had been expecting for getting shot at.
As I looked in the direction of the latest threat I was greeted by the strangest pair of people I had ever seen. A pair that was laughing quite distinctivly.
"Geeerogerogerogero, well well look what just dropped into the party Mr. Seven."
A woman dressed in a jester costume if it was themed as a frog. In one hand she leveled a froggy looking pistol at me.
"Ohohohohohoho, indeed quite a catch I'd say miss father's day."
A man dressed like he wouldn't look out of place besides George Washington except for the motif of 7's that ran from his hair all the way down to his shoes. Even the gun he leveled my way was shaped like a 7.
I felt a tendril of dread curl around my heart as I realized there was only one world where laughs were that distinctive. Pirates, islands, men named after numbers, women named after days. All the pieces clicked into place as that tendril of dread constricted around my heart.
I hadn't just awoken up in the lizard folk body of my dnd character I had also woken up in the world of One Piece. A world that I wasn't sure even my current body could survive all the madness that was likely to come my way.