"Oooh! You're here? Then the ritual actually worked? Ahem...Oh Great Hero from another world! Thou hast come so far to fulfill your role in our legend! For our kingdom now stands on the very brink of ruin, and thou… And thou… Hold on. Are you really our Great Hero? You don't look like the thee-and-thou type."
Perhaps a little explanation is due. One, which unfortunately, I cannot give. I'm just as lost as you, reader, and cannot fully understand what the intimidating redhead in front of myself is trying to say.
"Where am I? How did I get here?" I ask.
"What's that? You want to know where you are? And how you got here? Fair enough. You're in-" She's interrupted by a husky male voice.
"FOUND YOU!"
"Drat! How did one of those Emblians get here already? Stand back! I'll take care of him somehow!" She leaves me alone as she fights the weird man with her axe. I meanwhile, decide to run the hell away. I don't want any part of whatever the hell is going on. I was eating domino's pizza at a friend's house not five minutes ago. Now I'm some hero or something? Hell no. I'm just gonna take my chances away from the crazy redhead.
"Whew! We took care of- Hey! Wait! Where are you going?!" She shouts after me. "Come back!" We enter a high speed chase that lasts for around 20 seconds before she tackles me to the ground. "I know you have a lot of questions, and you don't know where you are, but I'm not your enemy! I'm Anna, the commander of the Order of Heroes, a group of fighters that protect the kingdom of Askr and fight the Emblian Empire. They wish to enslave Heroes everywhere, and we need to stop them with your help! With this divine relic Breidablik, I summoned you, the Great Hero, and we need your help to summon more heroes to fight the Emblian Empire!" She tells me.
"This is nonsense! Let me go!" I struggle under her grasp, but unfortunately, she's much stronger than me. "I don't wanna be part of your Cult!"
"We need your help! Without you, we can't defeat the emblian empire! They'll enslave all the heroes across-" She's interrupted by an arrow embedding itself into her skull, killing her. She falls limp onto me. Her strength is gone and her eyes are devoid of light. It's the most uncanny, terrifying thing i've ever seen. Blood drips onto me, staining my white t-shirt.
She's dead! This woman that I just met who kidnapped me and brought me to another world to be part of her cult of heroes is dead! During my shock another arrow embeds itself into her back, snapping me back to reality, and awakening my fight or flight instincts.
I crawl out from under her, which is a rather difficult task, considering my lack of strength and her weight. Eventually I pull myself out from under her, and vomit on the ground. I notice an armored man wielding an axe running towards me, from about 100 meters away, with an archer near him, notching another arrow. Shit! Shit shit shit! What do I do?! I pick up the weird white and gold handgun, Bradenblock I think it's called, and put it in my pocket before running away from the man charging at me, narrowly avoiding an arrow that hits the ground where I was not even a second ago. Oh my god! Am I gonna die here?
Fortunately, I can run away rather easily due to how troublesome his heavy armor seems to be for him, even though I have stamina and speed that is far from impressive. Unfortunately, his pal with the bow keeps shooting at me, almost hitting me occasionally. I pass many trees, but not enough to be able to call my location a forest. Eventually, my breathing becomes labored, and I risk a glance back at my followers. I trip while doing this unfortunately, slamming my head against a tree, and falling to the ground. Everything is spinning for me, and I can't see straight. The only thing I see is the armored man getting closer, and an arrow flying towards me. I throw myself to the side, narrowly avoiding death. Shit! What am I gonna do? The axe man is getting closer to me! In an act of desperation, I fire Bradenblock somewhere in the general vicinity of the axe wielder. A bright light appears, and a young man with a green ponytail tucked behind a blue headband appears from the light. He has a long and slender sword at his waist, strapped to his blue tunic. He can't be much older than 18.
He looks around quickly, unsure of what's happening, before spotting myself on the ground. He runs and kneels over me, concerned.
"Are you okay?" He asks.
"Look behind you," I wheeze, alerting him to the soldiers chasing me slightly before an arrow embeds itself into my knee.
He runs after the soldiers swiftly, leaving me alone on the ground. The axeman swings at his head, but the swordsman ducks under, and impales the knights armor with his sword, presumably piercing his heart. The knight slumps over onto his sword dead, and protects the swordsman from an arrow aimed for him. The bowman, realizing that his partner is dead, takes off. The swordsman jogs back to me, and produces a brown vial from his tunic. He props me up against a nearby tree and hands the vial to me.
"Drink it," He says. I obey him, and feel my knee wound and concussion fade. We stay like that for a bit, the only sounds made being the chirping of birds and my ragged breathing. I can barely think at this point, replying the events that just happened in my mind, seeing Anna's lifeless face a million times. Tears drip down onto my face, and my nose becomes runny. Suddenly, I begin dry heaving, to which the swordsman places a comforting hand on my back. I dry heave until I lose all energy to stay up, and fall onto the ground again. Once the dry heaving ends, I greedily gulp down as much air as I can until I no longer feel short of breath. The swordsman brings me up and looks me in the eyes.
"Where are we?" He asks.
"I-I don't know. Anna said something about Askr, and a war, and me being a Great hero, and I don't know what's going on or why I'm here." I answer. The tears running down my face must make for a rather pathetic image, with me burying myself in my knees and attempting to make myself as small as I possibly can. The swordsman hugs me, providing comfort, and I don't deny it, instead returning the gesture. We sit like that for who knows how long, just passing the time. Eventually he breaks the hug.
"Can you get up?" He asks me. I nod, and rise to my feet, slowly and shakily. "Show me to Anna." I obey, and begin heading into the direction of her corpse. We pass many arrows together, arrows aimed at me from the archer. After around 30 minutes of walking we reach her body, laying on the ground, with small splotches of blood here and there. He bends over her, inspecting her body, checking for a pulse. When he finds nothing, he frowns and stands up.
"She's dead." I knew this, but to hear it again sent me into a dark spiral. I drop to my knees and look at her lifeless figure. She's dead. Gone. Never to be seen again. And it was my fault. If I hadn't ran, she would be alive.
"Oh my god! Commander Anna!" A man with armor much similar to Anna's runs onto the scene, with four soldiers behind him. He notices us and draws his blade. He snarls and charges at us, but stops once he notices Bradenblock sticking out of my pocket. "Are… Are you the great Hero?" He asks me. I nod, and swallow before speaking. "I-I think I am." His expression becomes grim. He inspects Anna's body, like the swordsman had earlier, and sighs once he discovers she's dead.
"My name is Alfonse, prince of Askr" He says, reaching a hand out to me. I tentatively shake his hand. "What is your name?"
"James," I answer.
"And you, sir?" He asks the swordsman.
"My name is Guy of the Kutolah."
Alfonse bends over and picks up Anna's body, holding her in his arms princess style. "Come, follow me. My castle is nearby, I'll lead you to there."
We obey.
This is the first story I've done on this site. I'm rather new to writing fanfiction, but definitely not to reading it. Also, if you'd take a moment to leave a review I would really appreciate it.