Ouzelia was a realm famed for its beauty.

A picture book of berry farms upon rolling hills ushered in feelings of warmth and comfort, while distant mountains and forests promised untapped tales of wild adventures.

Protected by its stalwart heroes and heroines, it was a land far from the minds and concerns of the ambitions seen far and wide across the continent.

But that did not mean it was devoid of shadows, nor that they were any lesser.

Within the alleys of Ouzelia, a shadow war was raging. And even the streets under the purview of the Clockwork Duchess were no exception.

A man hooded and cloaked swept from corner to corner.

Keeping himself to the walls, none paid any attention to this lone stranger. Despite the balmy sunlight and the crowds which thronged the town of Witschblume, he moved unseen like a shadow panther shrouded in magic.

Padding with soft steps, he slid himself along the side of a busy tavern. Even had those inside seen him, they would not have paid him any heed. Not even when a hand slipped from beneath his cloak and swiped at a notice bleached from the sunlight, leaving only a torn scrap stuck behind on its rusted nail.

The figure glanced around himself, yet neither resident nor guard challenged him.

He was a shadow. And shadows did not exist here in the flowering heart of Witschblume.

Moving swifter than an arrow in flight, his hand once again shot out, this time to slap a tall length of parchment lined with heavy-duty glue beside the nail. And on it was the face of a man all would recognise–unless they wore a full hood and cloak.

Sir Gardrin Pavont examined his drawing. He nodded with quiet satisfaction. Then he swept away for another corner, another alley, another street.

A job well done.

As the Hero of Heizholm glued his posters throughout the rival town of Witschblume, he was soon rewarded by the sound of giggling. Groups of maidens paused to discuss his drawing, taking note as well of the most recent news of his triumphs.

Recent being subjective.

In truth, it’d been some time since he’d last fought a killer orca with his pinky, rescued a damsel from a crumbling tower or wrestled the three heads of a hydra all at the same time.

Because any time he was defeating some nameless horror with designs on world conquest in some faraway tomb, he was losing on a different front.

The Cosmos Monthly Hero Popularity Rankings.

Sir Gardrin came to a stop, sighing at the unfairness of it all.

He was handsome, wealthy and popular. But did those things truly matter?

They say it was lonely at the top. But for Sir Gardrin, it was far too crowded.

Behind him, he could practically see the daring smile of Captain Rainier as he steered his immense galleon directly towards his ranking. A galleon. Compared to that, what was his silver armour and white steed? People could see Sir Gardrin’s smile from exactly 3.27 kilometres away. A feat that was impressive all the way until everyone spotted that absurdly shining mast from the far horizon.

Even so, Sir Gardrin did not claw his way into the top ten rankings by meekly standing aside.

He vowed to continue onwards, one adhesively sticky poster of himself at a time … even if that meant occasionally being barrelled aside for the effort.

All of a sudden, he felt a jolt as a rotund man accidentally collided with him.

He knew it was accidental by virtue of the fact none of his hero’s protections activated. If it’d been a dagger thrust from a sleeve, he’d have sensed the intent before the blade even left. But a baker wielding several sacks of flour? That may very well have been the death of him.

“Oh, sorry,” said the man without looking.

“It’s fine,” came Sir Gardrin’s gruff reply, so different from his usual tone that none would recognise him even beside his own posters. Particularly as he was about to become a hero purée.

As the baker waddled onwards, Sir Gardrin found himself squished as an entire throng converged upon him. And none of it due to his identity being revealed. The crowds all parted to the sides, ebbing away like tides. And the reason was instantly clear why.

The head maid of Witschblume Castle.

“Lady Uxna, please notice meeee!”

A notable figure amidst the region’s political elite.

While a maid raised to nobility on a whim was ordinarily as devoid of power as a squire raised by a landless knight, as a representative of the ogre tribes, hers cut an impressive figure … and yet to Sir Gardrin’s widening eyes, she went almost unseen.

His attention was on the maiden she was escorting.

He did a double-take at once. Not for the fact that the girl’s elegance stood in contrast to the shaggy horse she was riding. Nor for the fact that she was clearly no resident of Ouzelia.

No … he had to look twice because he could barely stomach the sight of her.

A queasiness worse than spoiled porridge filled his stomach.

It was a deep, terrible discomfort worming away at his very being. Nausea, vertigo and an itch on the part of his back he couldn’t reach all fought to overcome him in a tidal wave of unease. And the Hero of Heizholm experienced something he’d never known before. Not since he’d been gifted his sword.

Fear.

Sir Gardrin remembered little of this emotion.

He’d once headbutted a giant. Yet when he blinked at the young maiden atop her unkempt horse, he realised that as he tried to swallow, no moisture was left in his throat to do so.

And before he knew it, his hand was upon the hilt of his sword.

He shook his head as the fog lessened almost immediately, and what he saw after the 3rd … 4th attempt was very much a girl who did not hold herself as a swordswoman at all, despite the blade by her side.

Sir Gardrin knew at once from just the way she rode that she had lived a pampered lifestyle, caring more for appearance than posture. And were that all he saw, he may have convinced himself to let the matter be for a different hero to consider.

“It can’t be,” he whispered, daring to lift his hood slightly.

There, shining upon her hand as she gripped her horse’s reins, was a copper ring.

And all thoughts of Cosmos Monthly left Sir Gardrin’s mind. Because if dropping out of the top ten was the worst case scenario, then to see his livelihood lost to that organisation which replaced romance with bureaucracy was the second worst.

She was … an adventurer!

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

Sir Gardrin could only gawp as he watched the newcomer being escorted by Witschblume’s head maid.

He already knew her destination. And so as much to force his mind to work as to stop himself from being turned to purée against one of his posters, he pressed his way through and followed.

Eventually, he had nothing but his cloak to hide him as the crowds thinned against the gates of the castle. And in the time that followed, he despaired.

Absentmindedly slapping posters on walls, he could only imagine why the Clockwork Duchess would send her own representative to meet with one of the guild’s. She had her own heroine to care for, after all. One whose presence he’d yet to feel, despite the week he’d spent peppering her town with his face.

And suddenly, he wondered whether or not she truly was simply on a quest as he had assumed.

What if … What if the Clockwork Duchess, mad as she was, was considering allowing them a foothold?

That would spell disaster for them all!

It was a crisis. And for once, Sir Gardrin wished for a hero of his own. But he was all he had.

He was all every hero had.

As the girl left with only a sprightly attendant by her side, he watched as they left the eastern gate and made for all of Ouzelia. And Sir Gardrin knew they must be stopped.

No matter the cost.

Without wasting a moment of time, he whistled for his white stallion, and together, they went forth like the heralds of a storm. The world rushed past in a haze of colour as a hood and cloak was lost to the wind. In just mere moments, they’d caught up with the far slower horse … before promptly passing them via a wide berth in order to wait at a more appropriate setting ahead.

Sir Gardrin positioned himself upon a bridge with the sun behind his back.

The maidens started to gather the moment he fixed his smile in place.

There would be questions later regarding his presence in Witschblume, but this was no time to be concerned with rivalry. If adventurers were allowed to join Ouzelia’s ranks, then Cosmos Monthly’s rankings would swell astronomically for them all.

They would come like a plague, and nothing would be left of the charts but foreign names and faces.

“... I accept your service and dismiss you at once. I’ve no need of a stableboy. Should I do, I will call upon you from a distance.”

Unless, of course, they were as charming as this.

Sir Gardrin ignored the ceaseless quips with a smile which failed to dent the maiden’s heart.

That made him worry as much as hearing the admission she was here to rescue a dragon. A dragon. The very lifeblood of heroes. Whether it was to slay or befriend them, anything to do with dragons was to heroes what mutton was to a butcher.

It couldn’t be lost.

Who she was and where she was from was irrelevant. Yet the fact that she was immune to his charms meant he’d need to resort to other means to politely hurry her away.

And what more civilised way was there than a knightly challenge?

Even if it was one so weighted in his favour that the other half of the scales was lost in the clouds.

As the officially appointed hero of Heizholm, he could perform manoeuvres the types of which acrobats who’d spent their childhood dancing upon the high lines of a circus would baulk at. It mattered little whether the danger was the bottle of a drunkard in a bar or the tusks of a frost mammoth.

If he saw it, he would evade it. And if he didn’t see it, he would evade it to even more acclaim.

Few knew how the powers imbued by a Sword of Heroism truly functioned. Only that the older the sword, the more powerful the gifts, for they were more than weapons. In each blade was carried a bit of the experience of those who wielded it before.

Sir Gardrin did not boast an ogre’s strength or an elf’s nimbleness. Yet when he slapped away the rubble of a falling avalanche or swept through a forest with more grasping vines than leaves, it was with the technique of countless years of victory and defeat.

And so he readied himself with as little showmanship as he could muster. To disrespect a maiden from afar was not in his blood. But this was as much for her sake as it was his.

He would parry each and every strike, until satisfied that he’d humoured the adventurer’s attempts at striking him for long enough that she and all to follow would understand the lack of need to their presence. And he would mark that moment by sending her sword flying through the air.

As a result–

“Poke.”

He could only blink as the girl effortlessly prodded his armour instead.

“Ohhohohohhoho!! Is that it?! To whack away until I strike you?!”

Sir Gardrin felt like his soul had left him.

He’d … He’d been struck!

That simply didn’t happen!

Water did not slide upwards and maidens did not prod his armour!

Instincts derived from generations of peers refused to permit it … and yet none of them could do more than complain in silence. He had not even seen the blade leave her side, much less strike towards him.

Swallowing an empty gulp, he immediately shook the moment away as utter lethargy on his part. A mistake he would not make again. Everything about the girl made him uncomfortable. But none of it was because he was terrified of her swordsmanship. It did not take a knight to know she was no duellist.

Regardless, he watched the girl with respect as he raised his sword in a guard.

And then–

“Poke.”

He promptly gawped as her sword found itself prodding into his silver pauldron once more.

Sir Gardrin Pavont, Hero of Heizholm and Knight of the Cresting Sun, was gobsmacked.

His guard hadn’t just been bypassed. It’d been ignored.

The sword he’d been watching was nothing more than a streak of flashing steel as swift as a mockingbird’s wings … and all he heard was the laughter that followed.

“Ohhohohohohoho!!”

That was it.

Whoever she was, Sir Gardrin knew he could not allow her to have free reign over Ouzelia.

She was not just an adventurer. But Sir Gardrin was also no ordinary knight.

He was a hero of Ouzelia. And to protect the pride of himself and all around him, he could not allow sentiment to cloud what must be done.

He would use his powers of heroism. Not just passively. But with purpose.

Leaping from his horse, he assumed a posture he’d not made since his days sparring as a knight. As he held his sword with both hands, it was to mirror the slightest movement of the girl standing with no regard to what he would do next.

“[Cresting Glare].”

The light burned away all sight other than his own.

Yet he did not allow his caution to fade.

He couldn’t.

For as she thrust forward her blade, it was all he could do to suck in a shallow breath in prayer. And for a moment, it seemed as if all the heavens had chosen to answer.

Strength and clarity filled him like a basin that was overflowing. He was weightless and free as the rest of the world turned still … all except for a blade continuing unerringly towards his breastplate.

Sir Gardrin prayed once more. And this time, his sword answered.

With a speed to defy his own arms, his blade swept up to meet the oncoming strike.

Sweat formed upon his brows as at the last moment, the broad length of his blade turned to act as a shield, blocking the very tip of that maiden’s attack. Exhaustion threatened to overcome him at once, yet no spark of clashing steel or gasp of surprise rewarded his monumental effort.

For while he could stop that first strike, he could do little against what came next.

To his absolute horror … she began to scratch away.

“Life tempered beneath the night of a duvet, as verses forged in celestial ink! Poetry Form, 2nd Stance … [Midnight Muse]!”

Sir Gardrin felt as the other sword began to etch into his own.

He was as helpless as an oak to a woodpecker.

For a moment, he wasn’t certain if any damage could be caused. But as he read the words of slander newly inscribed, he wished it had been.

The scars of a scratch could be repaired … embraced. But the poem pronouncing him twice divorced upon his badge of office was a mar without joy.

At once, only thoughts of mortification came over him, as severe as the silence of the maidens whose footsteps gradually shuffled away. Emptiness took his mind, and all he heard was the din of his own despair.

Only when the last had departed did he finally look behind him to see the back of a girl attempting to hurry her horse away, all the while a clockwork doll struggled to stop herself falling over with laughter.

And Sir Gardrin Pavont … couldn’t help but join her.

“Ahaha … ahahaha … hahahahahahah!”

His shoulders slumped.

For the first time, he saw as his popularity ranking plummeted.

Even so … as he looked up at the departing girl and the blessed sunlight shining upon the smear written upon his sword, he strangely found he did not care.

A weight upon his shoulder had been lifted … and for the first time in years, he could hold his sword so high that even those from Heizholm could see the defamation emblazoned upon it.

Ah.

What had he been doing all this time?

He had forgotten what had made him a hero.

For as he watched the adventurer heading into the unknown, he saw what he should have been instead.

Sir Gardrin Pavont took a deep breath.

Then, he opened the saddlebag by his patient and pitying horse and tossed a stack of posters into the river. His face faded at once, before being taken by the current. And that was fine.

There were other ways to rise up the rankings. And he’d ensure that not even an adventurer could best him.

He was a hero. And he would work for his happy ending.