Gunther sat upright in bed as the first rays of sunlight shined onto his face, blocking the light with an arm. Opening his eyes he sighed as he knew it was morning and jumped off the bed feet first to the floor and stretched to pop his back, he had a long day to go through. Getting dressed he stared into a copper mirror to check his horns and smiled to see that they were okay. "Gunther! Get out here and help with the crops you a damn billy goat, they won't grow themselves you know!" The Demi-Humans smile faded as he frowned, his master was calling him.
"I'm coming out Master!" He said laying the copper mirror back on the table and ran out of the small shack he called home. Outside was his Owner, he was not the kindest of men but at least he was fair for the most part. Gunther's master looked at him with a disappointed glare "How many times do I have to tell you, Don't sleep in!" Gunther winched a little at his master shouting, it's not his fault he's so tired after working the fields all day. "I-I'm sorry master, I'll do better to wake up next time." He said stuttering a first.
His master looked down on him, Gunther was very short for his age, only 5'1, while his master was 6'5 and was a very imposing figure. After a few seconds, his master sighed "Agh Whatever, just make sure you get to work." He told Gunther who nodded in understanding while looking at the ground knowing he had upset his master. Seeing this the tall man thought of something as an incentive to lighten his slave's mood, a slave works harder when they have something to gain after all. "You know, if you get your work done, I'll let you visit the Library."
Gunther eyes widened in surprise and looked up at his master with eyes full of joy "R-Really?" he asked quietly. His master nodded "Yes, I know how much you like books" He told Gunther with the ghost of a smile on his face, something the Demi-Human rarely saw, before glaring again "But you better get to work if you want to go alright."
Nodding his head quickly he ran off to the farm shed to get his tools. Gunther then spent his time watering crops and making sure none of them had spoiled or showed signs of being eaten. At times he would find weeds that needed removing and groaned when he had to pull out the shovel to dig a particularly stubborn weed out of the ground.
Once he was done with that looked across the field and smiled at his hard work. Gunther stiffed however when the sound of a growl alerted him and he turned around. Right there was a wolf that was snarling at him with hungry eyes that was stepping ever so slowly closer. The Slave froze at the sight of the beast before raising his hand in reflex as the wolves so this as its chance to kill him.
With a sudden yep the wolf few backs into a tree, Gunther having cast a small fireball at his attacker. With its fur on fire, the wolf starts panicking before an arrow pierces its head straight through its left eye. Turing around the slave saw his master with a crossbow and lowered it as he walked over to Gunther's side as the two watched the beast burn.
"Odd, I've never seen wolves this close to the farm before in a long time..." His master commented before bring his attention back to Gunther "While im glad you defended yourself, you know not to use your magic right?" His master asked in a disappointed tone. Fidgeting with his hands the slave felt nervous "Y-Yes, I remember..." he said knowing slaves were not supposed to know or use magic. The only reason he knows is that he was born with its and could cast it every so often that his master felt safe enough to leave him be, so long as he does not burn anything of course
"Good, while your use of magic is, discouraging, I have to say its good that you know it. If only to make sure you don't get killed during work." His master told Gunther before looking around the farm. "You did a good job, guess I'll uphold my end then." The slave had to hold in his excitement, every time his master let him go the Library Gunther would look and read as many books that struck his interest.
After he and his master took the wolf into the house to be skinned Gunther was given his slave ring so that people can know who he belonged to and went off into town. Once he walked through the gates and past the guard after showing them his ring he looked around at all the many different shops, store's, market's and house there are that people walked in and out of. Making his way past many humans who gave him a disapproving look Gunther found what he was looking for and went inside.
Gunther always took the time to take in how big the library was, while not as big as some others he had heard of in the capital. It saddened him that can't ever get near that library however, it was run by the church and he doubted they would let a Demi-Human inside its walls. Hearing a cough he turned and saw the librarian who looked at him "Gunther right?"
The slave nodded, to which the Librarian smiled "Welcome back Gunther, it has been about a week since you last came by and I got a little worried." Gunther shrugged "Well I had to work a lot more recently, master want to make sure that his crops are okay and ready to be harvested." The Librarian gave a looked that seemed to convey some worry.
"Um, well there was a wolf that tried to attack me but master shot it in the eye with his crossbow so I'm fine!" he told them, leaving out the fact he set the wolf on fire, the librarian did not need to know he could cast magic. Bring a hand to their chin they hummed slightly "I, see...Well at least your alright, I shouldn't take more of your time to take a look around for something to read Gunther."
The slave jumped up in the air "Yes!" He shouted out load before being hushed by the unamused Librarian. He smiled awkwardly "Sorry." he said quietly before walking over to the bookshelves. Using a finger to keep track of the titles he read each one carefully, looking for a book that interested him the most. Soon he stopped his finger on a boom called 'Legend of the Four Heroes'.
He remembers this one, his father and mother used to tell him about the heroes before he slept. Each one of them had a legendary weapon they are named after. Finding a place to sit down he opened up the book and read through it, the sword hero was said to have great strength, the spear hero was known to value and protect their friends and the bow hero was always there to fight for the justice of those who are wronged. Each of these three heroes where great and kind people, but they did have some flaws which surprised him as he read.
The church always spoke highly of these three as if they had no flaws, so to read a book that spoke that they did was odd. The sword hero despite being so strong he was always looking for ways to get stronger, at times at the expense of others. The bow hero was extremely stubborn, almost never admitting he had done something wrong and would often not listen to advice that would help.
Gunther found the spear hero to have the worst flaws, they were very naive to the point of bordering stupidity and were easily manipulated. Despite these flaws, however, he did not hold any of this against the heroes. To him, them having flaws made them more heroic than simply being the near flawless saints that the church makes them out to be.
Last but not least was the shield hero, someone the church demonizes but he himself idolizes. His parents told him that the Shield hero was the one who helps Demi-humans when no one else did, protecting them from danger and being kind over all. The church makes the Shield hero out to be some destructive evil demon, but he knew better than to listen to their dogma.
As Gunther turned the page to see what the book had to say about the shield hero he found the page empty. Confused he turned the pages back and confirmed that the first parts of the book did have writing in them. In fact, it read more like sort character bio's for each of the heroes now that Gunther thought about it. Yet every time he went to the page that should have the shield heroes bio it was simply blank.
Blinking Gunther scratched his head, this was did not seem right, the slave was about to go and ask the librarian about why they would what seemed to be an unfinished book on the shelf before he noticed it start to glow. "W-What The-!" That was all he could shout out as the light shined over him and in a flash he was gone.
The Librarian heard Gunther's sudden panicked shouting and ran over to see what was wrong only to look around to find no trace of the Demi-human. Worried they looked down to find the book Gunther had been reading wide open on a blank page on the floor.