The children of Eilswhire quickly heard of the strange man with a stranger sword who had wandered into town. Such novelty rarely found its way to the sleepy town, and so the children were ecstatic to find out more. They had heard that he had been hanging around the edges of town, near the woods surrounding Eilswhire. And so, ignoring their parents chiding, the children of the village began to scour the woods for the Vagabond. The children never believed the woods could be dangerous. After all, what could hurt them? They’ve all had scraped knees and broken arms before; it was nothing that could stop them for long.

As wise men say, trouble attracts trouble. People like the Vagabond tend to have a sort of gravity about them, where they draw misfortune and danger towards them. So, when the children saw a bear for the very first time, they were unsure of what to do.

“What is that?” Clyde asked, staring at the brown-furred beast.

“Shh!” Luciene hissed, just as loudly as Clyde had been speaking.

“I think it’s a wolf,” Arthur said, desperately digging through his brain to dredge up all the animals his parents had taught him about.

“It can’t be a wolf,” Clyde responded. “It’s too big. I saw a wolf once, it was trying to attack our goats. Pa chased it away. This thing is way bigger.”

“Shh!” Luciene hissed again, this time louder than either of the boys had been speaking.

It was the sudden hiss in the distance that shook the bear into alertness. It stood up on his hind legs, reaching midway up into the forest's canopy. The children were all stunned. They had never seen something living that was that massive.

“Wolves don’t do that,” Clyde whispered, awestruck.

“I think we should go home now,” Ren, the fourth of five assembled children, whispered, his voice trembling.

The bear, who had been facing away from the children, now turned towards the voices and fell back onto all fours. It began slowly stomping towards the children. Despite the power in its legs, the steps made barely any noise.

The assembled children nodded their heads in agreement, and all began backpedaling towards town. However, the sudden motion only served to excite the bear.

It began to gallop towards them, at a gait that would easily catch them within seconds. Arthur, the poor kid in the group who had always been the slowest, began to trail behind his friends. The bear easily caught him first, swiping its mighty paw at him, knocking him to the ground and pinning him there.

He wanted to scream, to yell at his friends to come save him. However, he found his throat tight and cold, unable to produce a sound past a frightful whimper, as if calling out any louder would offend the bear further.

His stomach on the ground, he didn’t dare to turn his head to make eye contact with the beast pinning him down. He could feel the hot breath on his back, condensating the nape of his neck. He closed his eyes tightly, hoping that it was just a dream, but also hoping that it would be over soon, one way or another.

Suddenly, the paw was gone. He realized a second later that the bear had let out a roar, one that almost hinted at pain. Arthur reluctantly opened his eyes, flipping over onto his back, and looking around.

He saw, in front of him, a strange sight. The bear was off him, yes, and fighting a man. A man, who dared to challenge that thing, that king of all beasts, in Arthur’s young eyes. Not only that, but the man was also dressed far stranger than any other man the child had seen before. The straw hat, poncho acting almost like a cape, and that dazzling near-white sword with black marbling. The Vagabond, taking on a beast triple his size.

It was foolish, of course. The Vagabond knew his sword was the incorrect weapon for this sort of beast. His blade was made for cutting above all else, slicing flesh perpendicularly. However, a bear didn’t care for superficial lacerations on its hide. Its pelt was thick, and it could take dozens of slashes before it felt a thing.

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Conventional wisdom would recommend thrusting weapons, a similar kind meant to hunt boars. A long spear or lance, meant to strike all the way to the core of the beast. However, the Vagabond was not a conventional warrior, nor a conventional man. His sword would do nicely.

The bear lashed out at the Vagabond with its powerful claws, attempting to swat the man down. The bear was fast, but the Vagabond was faster, not a single claw making contact. Every missed strike upon him was an opening for half a dozen blows upon the bear, raking its hide with a mess of lacerations. One wouldn’t do much, yes, but dozens of them would add up.

The bear began to slow as it lost more and more blood from the cuts now lining its body. Finally, it slowed too much to protect its face anymore. The Vagabond lined himself up, slashing through one of the bear’s eyes, partially blinding it. The beast roared in pain, staggering backward. But the stranger wasn’t finished.

He stepped forward, like a cloth upon the wind, and brought the blade down into the bear’s neck. A single slash couldn’t do the job, certainly not with a single arm powered the sword, but it started the end.

One more blow, the bear could barely move. Another, it slumped to the ground, tongue falling out of its mouth and eye rolling in its head. A final slash, the head separated from the rest of the body, falling to the ground with a thud.

The Vagabond breathed deeply as he stood upright, filling his body with oxygen. His sword was now splashed with streaks of crimson, dimming the near-white and black blade. He moved to sheath his blade, cleaning the blood off with a piece of cloth tied to the sheath.

“…doesn’t bode well…” the Vagabond whispered to himself. “Bears aren’t usually so aggressive…”

He turned to the child, still sitting on his rump, awestruck of the man before him.

“Come on,” the stranger said, “We need to get you back to town. I’m sure your parents are worried sick.”

“What are you?” Arthur exclaimed.

“I’m a ronin,” the Vagabond said, unthinking of his words as he pulled the child to his feet.

“What’s a ‘roamin’? Someone that roams around?” Aruthur asked, staring up at the strange man.

A slight smile played onto the edges Ronin’s lips. “You could say that. Now come on, hop on my back, it’ll be faster that way.”

Arthur obliged, climbing onto the Vagabond’s back, and wrapping his arms around the Ronin’s shoulders. The Ronin, in turn, moved his one arm underneath the boy to support him.

“Hold tight and don’t let go.”

The man took off through the forest path at a pace that would seem impossible for a man laden with a child on his back. He leaned forward enough that gravity pulled the child onto him instead of off him. Arthur could hardly tell where the Ronin would put his feet, and he had no idea how the Ronin didn’t slip moving this quickly.

Within a handful of minutes, the town slowly came into view. Already there was a commotion, the surviving children crying to their parents, and a party of adults now carrying pitchforks and other makeshift weapons gathering at the edge of town.

They all stopped talking when the Ronin exited the tree line, Arthur upon his back. One of the adults stepped forward before any others.

“Put my boy down right now,” he said, pointing his finger at the Vagabond. His voice was thick with the rural accent common to this region of the world.

“Calm down, Amoze, he helped the poor kid-“

The man turned. “You shut your damn mouth, he’s my kid,”

The Ronin put Arthur down, and Arthur giddily ran across the field to his parents. His mother finally managed to break through the crowd, embracing her child, nearly weeping into his hair.

“I’m so glad your safe, Arthur.”

The child managed to pull away from a moment from his mother, gesturing towards the Ronin.

“He saved me! The Roamin killed the big bear with his sword! He was all ‘whoosh!’ ‘Whish’!” Arthur swung his arms, trying to recreate the Ronin’s perfectly trained moves.

Arthur’s mother stood, keeping the boy close to him as she walked towards the Ronin.

“Thank you so much for saving out little Arthur. Do you have a name?”

Elscer took a moment before answering, debating whether to give her his true name. “I’m just a ronin.”

“A Ronin?” she asked, raising an eyebrow inquisitively. “What is that?”

“Doesn’t matter,” Elscer said. “Your boy is just lucky I was there. Make sure he knows how dangerous the woods can be. Do you have an alderman or a priest? I need to talk to them.”

“We have one priest, he lives on the church up on the hill, Father Heneroe. But please, can we have you for dinner first? It’s the least we can do.”

“I need to talk to the Father first, it’s important. But… I suppose I shouldn’t turn down food.”

“Great,” The mother said, “We just live across the street from the blacksmith.”

The Ronin nodded his thanks and pushed his way through the crowd towards the church on the hill.

Amoze grabbed Julia’s arm pulling her close to him.

“Did you invite that stranger to dinner at my house?”

She furrowed her brow at him. “He saved Arthur. It’s the least we can do.”

He stared hard into her eyes. “This better not be about her. She made her choice; she can live with it.”

Julia shook Amoze’ grip off her arm, pulling Arthur with her back to their house. He threw his arms in the arm, then placed his hands on his hips, pacing around the grass field for a while.