When he got to the entrance he had another problem to deal with, he couldn’t climb while holding the egg. He had no bag to carry the egg so he briefly considered having Bodger hold it in its mouth but a second look at the sharp pointed teeth in Badger’s mouth and he rethought that idea. Though it did make him consider Bodger for a second, he had been thinking of it as an animal not a skeleton. Gar slid the egg inside Bodger’s rib cage before using the rope to secure Bodger, with its head down, on to his back. While this would be cruel to do to an animal he needed to remember Bodger was just a skeletal puppet it didn’t feel or think.
The climb down was uneventful and Gar untied Bodger as he waded the last few meters out of the water. Reunited with B1 and B2 Gar started the walk back to base, it was only during the walk that he noticed how late I was he had gotten. So used to his dark vision in the blackness of the cave he hadn’t even noticed it was the middle of the night. He thought he should be planning out what his next step would be as he walked; for the most part he was just too tired he walked in a mindless haze, trusting the badgers to alert him if anything was about. After getting back to base and several trips up and down the ladder to get all the badgers up, Gar rescued the egg from Bodger’s ribcage and set it down in his shelter next to B3. The last thing he did before sleep took him was to do his best to dry off, as it had been raining all day and after numerous trips wading in and out of the water Gar was soaking wet. While he didn’t manage fully dry he was at least no longer dripping when he lay down to sleep.
“New stats added to status: +1 agility”
Gar awoke late in the morning still feeling drained from the previous day both physically and emotionally. He was bruised, scrapped and covered with acid burns so all he wanted to do was to take the day to rest, recover and try to sort out his emotions. Unfortunately he wasn’t that lucky there where things that needed dealing with and they needed dealing with as soon as possible, well as soon as possible after he had some breakfast they could wait that long.
The ant bodies needed dealing with he couldn’t just leave them to rot where they were or they would just bring more creatures sniffing around looking for an easy meal. His old dumping pile also needed dealing with, it had attracted one danger he wasn’t about to leave it to attract more. He was short on food and as it was still raining he figured he should check on the flooding, he needed to know if it was going to be a problem. With so much to do even if he could have made time Gar ended up eating a few nuts and berries on the move for breakfast.
He would deal with the ants first, as there was a chance that they might solve his food shortage as well. Taking Bodger and B2 with him he left B3 in his shelter to recuperate while B1 waited at the top of the cliff over the dump pile, where he also hung down a rope. Once down his ladder as he made his way round Gar grabbed up ant bodies that they passed, fortunately for him none had strayed too far from his waste pile. Dumping the bodies next to the waste pile he had Bodger and B2 run off to start dragging the worker ant bodies to his new pile while he dealt with the larger solider ant bodies carrying them to pile with the rest. Gar was really feeling his wounds by the time they only had one body left. The queen’s guard, the large ant was in ankle deep water when they got to it. It seemed the flooding had continued as Gar was sure it was dry ground when he had killed the ant. Between Gar pushing and the badgers pulling they got the bulky ant back to the pile. Gar stared down the path towards the cave that held the body of the ant queen, should he try to get that body as well? He decided it was far enough away it wouldn’t cause a problem, he would let that cave be her tomb. Taking the end of the hanging rope Gar started tying it round an ant worker. It took some trial and error and a level in Knot-working.
“Knot-working level up knot-working level 3”
Until eventually he was able to get what he was after, a knot that held the ant worker securely but was able to be undone by one of the badgers pulling on the loose end. With the first worker secured Gar had B1 start hauling, soon the ant was up and over the edge onto Gars ledge. Moments later the rope was dropped down and so it went as the ants got hauled up. When the workers where all done Gar had to tie B2 onto the rope and send it up. Between B1 and B2 they were able to bring up the solders in a similar fashion. When it was only the queen’s guard left Gar sent Bodger up in the hopes that the three badgers would be able to pull up the body, it was no such luck.
Gar was nervous walking back alone it was the first time since he had made Bodger that he had gone anywhere alone and he did not like it. Once he was up with the badgers his added strength to the rope was enough to bring the body up. With all the bodies up on his platform and out of reach of most scavengers Gar figured it was safe to leave them for a bit while he got on with other tasks.
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Another trip down the ladder bringing the three healthy badgers with him, although for the next job he also brought his sled and shovel with him. His waste pile needed dealing with he couldn’t be lazy with these things like he had been it was, literally a matter of his survival who knew what it would attract next time if he left it. Gars first thought had been to bury it but the dirt layer on his ledge and down below didn’t go very deep before it hit solid rock, he wasn’t sure he could bury it deep enough. If it wasn’t for the rain that had soaked everything and made a fire nearly impossible he might have tried burning it. With these options out he figured his best option was to get it as far away from himself as possible. To that end Gar started shovelling the pile of rotten smelly mess onto his sled. Once the sled was fully laden Gar dragged it along the path he had travelled the previous day towards the ants cave. He dragged the sled as deep into the water as he could then started shovelling the mess off and throwing it into the deeper water and stronger current. It took only two trips to clear the entire pile, much of it having been eaten by the ants. Anyhow he suspected that by the time he had finished harvesting the ants he would have much more to deal with.
Gar took a few moments to wash himself clean in the water after the messy task before getting on with his to do list. Leaving the shovel and sled at the base of his ladder Gar set off in the other direction heading towards the axen trees, he wanted to stock up on nuts and pods. Spear in hand and three skeletal badgers around him he made his way through the forest, stepping lightly despite the noise the skeletons made. Making it to the axen trees Gar started filling his backpack, with his worries about the rain and the rising water level he wanted to gather plenty of supplies. He took a looping route back to base going towards the river in the hopes of gathering some thorn berries. The river was flowing fast and the water level was high having swollen the banks in places taking out many thorn berry bushes, it was only due too there sheer numbers in the area that Gar was able to find enough out of the water to fill one of his sacks. With his food supply in a much better situation Gar headed back to his ledge.
As he climbed the ladder up he had thoughts of a rest in mind, a break as much of what he absolutely needed to do was done. That was until he got to the top of his ladder and saw the piles of bodies, he had pushed the thought of them so far to the back of his mind he had practically forgotten about them. He couldn’t leave them they needed dealing with or else they were going to rot and that would bring in insects and disease none of which he was in any state to deal with. Storing his new food supplies in his shelter out of the rain, he picked up his big knife and his small conrex claw knife before dragging an ant worker over to the large flat rock that he used for butchery.
Staring at the body he tried to work out where to start, it was very different to anything he had taken apart before. Its exoskeleton posed numerous problems the word exoskeleton sparked an idea in Gars mind; perhaps he could simply use the bodies as they were. So Gar stood back and cast skeletal puppet on the Mega-ra ant workers body, then he waited. Nothing happened, he flicked on mana sight to confirm and there was no movement in his mana besides the normal and nothing connected to the ant. Gar figured he would have to remove the non-skeletal parts before the spell would work, he would try again later. It hadn’t hurt to try. To take the ant apart Gar realised the first step would have to be to separate the body parts at the joints. Using his large knife he was able to remove the legs where they joined the thorax, then off with the antenna before finally separating the head and abdomen from the thorax. The next step wasn’t so obvious, Gar decided to start with the abdomen it seemed to be essentially a solid piece with one opening where he had separated it from the thorax. He started by scooping everything out with his knife using inspect on it as he did so to make sure he missed nothing of import. He eventually gave up with the knife and resorted to scooping it out with his fingers, it was messier but the work went much easier and the organs he found where less likely to get damaged in the process. Inspect gave no results on anything he scooped out and Gar did not know enough to be able to identify any of it himself. With the abdomen scooped out he did get an inspect result on the exoskeleton.
Mega-ra ant worker carapace
The exoskeleton of a meg-ra ant worker a light weight but strong material. Has an interesting property when heated.
Uses: alchemy, smithing
Value: ????
Quality: good
Rarity: frequent
Durability: 180/180
Defiantly an interesting material Gar wanted to experiment with it but when he got the rest of this body cleaned out he had plans for the skeleton. Looking at the pile of slop on the ground none of it looked like edible meat and while it may have been he wasn’t willing to take that risk he would dispose of all of it.
