Rick sighed as he walked down the street towards the Crusty Crust, the next bakery they were going to try their hands at. Lorenza and Paul had opted to take a break. They’d arrived in this world with enough money to live on for a few weeks, at the cheapest inn they could find that didn’t look like they’d get a rash from sleeping in the beds. The food was… fine. The bread was generally very hearty, filling, and with a thick and chewy crust that was pleasant. Finely milled white flour existed but held little value to most people.

Lamb, pork, some beef, lots of goat. Those were the stable ingredients. Plenty of savory herbs. They had sugar beets and sugar but again… it was a niche market.

Rick was a baker for money and a pastry chef as his passion. They’d just convinced the owner at Le Croissant to let them actually make more of the delicate French pastries implied by the name! That had been another ‘hearty bread’ person, even though pastries were all the rage back home and had been for decades. Some people just liked their whole grains.

Rick patted his rippling abs. They weren’t visible underneath the sturdy linen clothes they had picked up to replace their work smocks and aprons as daily wear, but he knew they were there. It was a big step up from the gut he’d been growing since he hit his mid-twenties. Too many pastries and nights out drinking with the guys.

He missed home. He had just been starting to get close to his girlfriend and really get over Becky. Oof, he broke his rule and thought about Becky. Well, nothing to do but just distract himself with the baker! Thankfully, it was just around this corner.

He didn’t see the manhole until his organs did that funny thing where they let him know he was experiencing freefall. He hated that thing. His broadly muscled chest wedged firmly into the stone ring. His breath blew out in shock and he shifted a little deeper, wedging further.

Who the hell makes the manholes so small a well built Summoned Baker couldn’t fit? Even if he was built like some kind of Atlas now instead of a small, increasingly fleshy guy who didn’t have the guts to tell his boss they should make more desserts for almost a year. A year of lost profits his boss hadn’t even seemed to notice. Some people were just too rich.

That fateful morning almost a week ago, they were just pulling the first batches of pastries out of the ovens when the ceiling had glowed all blue with weird letters and circles. Lorenza had been geeking out about it ever since they suddenly found themselves in Pruit City, the central city of the Luinea Kingdom and the most developed ‘city of Man’.

Whatever it was that had brought them here, it changed them into like fitness model versions of themselves, made them all three sixteen years old again, plus gave them all sorts of weird magical abilities. Rick could make anything he could imagine into the most incredible pastries. It wasn’t even like it just happened, he knew how to do it, it was like all of his skill and dreams had been amplified a thousandfold.

A man blinked in surprise when he walked slowly past Rick, stuck in the manhole. Rick just waived politely. He wasn’t feeling any particular urgency to get free. Plus this was the third hole he’d fallen into this week. He could swear it was something magical. Even when he was looking out for them, he kept missing construction pits, or that steel crate.

He felt a little bad about the crate, he’d bent it forcing his way out. Yeah, maybe he should see if someone would help him actually, rather than just breaking the stonework. Oh, plus something was poking at his feet.

“Hey, whacha doin down there?” The feeling of poking went away along with a weird shuffling sound. Nobody answered. Anyways, what was he pondering?

Oh right, how he could suddenly do the most amazing things. Lorenza could frost or decorate with photorealism. Paul liked bread so of course he could make incredible bread, only his bread was literally magic. The first baker had sold nine loves of Paul’s bread for so much money the man closed shop and retired, leaving them unemployed and unable to afford the landlord’s rent. The landlord had been unreachable and his staff had refused to believe they were so amazing the prior tenant had been able to retire in a single day.

The second baker had literally gone to heaven after tasting the cake that Rick and Lorenze had poured their heart and soul into, making it look so perfectly like the divine Herald from on the sample tapestry that when the baker tasted it…

Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

A divine Herald appeared and declared the baker had earned the blessing of a god for being so full of holy energy. The man sprouted wings, donned a halo, then disappeared with the Herald. They tasted the cake. It was good. Really good. They ate the whole thing and no wings or halos or trips to heaven. Another employer lost.

Hell, they hadn’t even been paid by anyone yet! The innkeeper wouldn’t even let them borrow an oven, it was illegal to sell baked goods without a license and that required the health inspectors to check out your bakery first and so… and so he was on his way to another bakery.

Just have to be normal. No more supernatural baking. Just good, normal pastries or even bread. They needed work so they could eventually get the opportunity to really share their love of baked desserts. Oh that weird poking was back again, this time more of it and more insistent.

“That tickles. Stop it!” It went away from just a moment, then continued. Annoyed, Rick swung a foot and contacted something hard. The cobblestone surface nearby cracked slightly. Oops. The poking immediately stopped. “You… you ok down there buddy?” Bystanders were starting to gather, coming out of shops or walking over to see what had happened.

Roads cracking were a bit loud and… unusual. Damnit, this day was not going well. Oh, great, now the poking is back. Ah! It took his boot! He swung again and connected with something smooth and hard. The road surface lifted a little and split where it bulged upward from the impact of whatever Rick had kicked.

People screamed, some ran, others ran to see. People, right? Always running towards the accident to see what they could see, slowing down traffic. Damnit, something was poking him again and it took his other boot!

“Fine.” Rick flexed, the stone around him cracking and crumbling. His thick linen shirt and light jacket split as he flexed his muscles, tearing between the unstoppable force and the almost-immovable stonework. One had to give.

It wasn’t going to be Rick.

Dust exploded as stone disintegrated, letting Rick drop down into the poorly lit sewer. There were things that looked like terrifying mutant beetles. They clacked their jaws at him, at face height. Two had apparently exploded against the ceiling of the space where he’d kicked them. They came at him and Rick used his innate ability.

Identified: Dire Monster Weevils (Extreme Hazard!)

Weevils! Those bastards ruined good flour! Rick popped his neck. The first of the weevils lunged forward, mandible reaching for their target.

The baker at the Crusty Crust sat down heavily the stool in his baking space, utterly shocked by the thing before him. Containing hundreds of thousands of flaky layers, coated with glistening honey and glistening with translucent butter, glistening sugar crystals just fine enough to look like a million tiny stars in the light. It glistened. It very glistened.

There was one problem. The wannabe baker looked like he could crush rocks between his butt cheeks. He was so gorgeous even Gorn, who didn’t swing that way in the slightest, would have taken a shot if he’d been thirty years younger and the kid a few years older… Plus the ‘pastry’ before him was an epic work of art. It looked exactly like Gorn had, when he’d been twenty.

No, no it looked like Gorn imagined he’d looked like. He didn’t think the kid even had any idea of what he’d done. Plus the thing was practically humming, probably with magic. Not that Gorn had any sensitivity to that. Part of him wanted to run to the Mages Guild and sell it to them. Humming meant big magic and big magic… he could probably retire.

Part of him wanted to taste it, like the kid was asking him to do. Damn. What would even happen? Would he explode? Would he get his wishes granted? Would his hair grow back? Maybe he’d get a bigger ‘baguette’ and go see if Jen down the lane was still single…

Swallowing back his nervousness and his greed, Gorn hesitantly broke off a sticky piece with a fork. Shaking, he brought it to his mouth. It melted the moment it touched his tongue and Gorn barely hesitated, greedily shoveling more and more into his mouth.

In no time at all, the incredibly detailed baked doll-sized pastry of a fantasy Gorn was gone. The baker licked the crumbs off of the plate, his fingers, he even ate a hole in his apron were a bit of honeyed butter had dripped.

The kid looked on with concern. Oh, well… Gorn had just acted in a very uncivilized manner… oh maybe that wasn’t it, he seemed relieved now. Smiling, Gorn nodded at the kid.

“Hell son, I think I’ve got a j-“ His body grew rigid. Skin startle to ripple. His scalp tingled. Popping and slurping sounds filled the space as Gorn compressed. Luscious locks erupted from his head in that almost red-headed color he’d always dreamed of having, rather than the boring plain brown he’d gotten from his father. Fat sucked in and muscles bulged out.

More than muscles.

Gorn stared at the kid. The kid stared at Gorn with… resignation? Defeat?

“Kid. Give me a piece of paper.” Oh, his voice was so manly now! None of the nasal sound or his tongue getting in the way. Quickly Gorn wrote out instructions to his landlord, his solicitor, and the local Baker’s Guild. “There. Now, I have a lady to visit.” Gorn almost left before noticing his shirt was in tatters. Returning just to grab a clean apron to put on for some minimal coverage over his statuesque chest, he nodded once more to the dumbfounded boy.

Jen was still single, for all of about ten minutes longer.