Chapter One: The Continued Nightmare
The footsteps of a man could be heard as each foot hit the hard ground under him. The man was sweating due to the heat coming from the fire that was slowly burning the whole village to the ground. Loud screams coming from men, woman and children echoed through out the village as a bandit killed them with a blade or an arrow. He had to get out of the village before he was the next to be killed. The man could all ready hear arrows fly by his head and he would watch as they hit the guard's chest, killing them.
The exit was only a few feet away. Guards advanced forward to take on the bandits. The man turned to watch them do battle with the bandits, but instead of seeing it happen he tripped and fell into a small puddle of water. A bandit came over, the man raised his hands to guard from the bandit's strike, but the bandit laughed and lifted the man up.
"Are you all right? I thought you had been killed my poor aim from the others," the bandit said. The man looked at the bandit weird. "We can't loose our leader now, Oakvale must be destroyed!" the bandit shouted. He ran off and attacked the guards from behind. The man looked confused when the bandit had called him their "leader." He looked down at the puddle and felt his jaw drop. On his head were to huge horns, his eyes were completely red and his skin was paler than the moon itself. The man yelled into the night sky as the battle continued.
Zoar sat up in his bed screaming, his eyes shut. He felt someone come over to his side and shake his shoulder saying, "Zoar, Zoar! Stop screaming, you're going to get us in trouble again." Zoar stopped and opened his eyes. His sheets and blanket were scattered all over his bed and his clothes were soaking wet from sweating so much while he had the same nightmare he had been having for several months now. He turned to see who had decided to wake him up and found himself face to face with his best friend Algreth.
Zoar stood up and looked out the window to see it early in the morning, which meant that he was going to have to go to lessons soon. Everyone else that slept in the same room as Zoar and Algreth had all ready gone downstairs for breakfast at the bar. Zoar quickly stood up and pulled off his wet clothes, while Algreth just stared at him. "It's the same dream isn't it? The one you've been having for the past four months," Algreth said. Zoar nodded, putting on his apprentice robes.
"Yeah, the same one. It always ends with me seeing the horns and me screaming as my hometown is being destroyed," Zoar said. He walked over to a cabinet that had two closed doors. He opened them and pulled out a Longsword made out of iron and a long bow made out a yew, which also included his arrows. He put everything on his back and turned back to Algreth. "I've been thinking. This dream could be me in the future. There have been stories of people having dreams like these and it ends up happening," Zoar said. He and Algreth walked out of the room and down the stairs.
"I don't think it is you. You might be eating something wrong and it is giving you nightmares," Algreth said. The reached the bottom of the stairs and entered the map room. A giant map of Albion sat in the center of the room. To their left was a little platform where heroes teleported in and out of the guild. Apprentices were forbidden to use it, but that didn't stop some from trying it out. The two made a left and went down the stairs and into the bar where all the apprentices were at, eating. The two grabbed a plate of what the bartender was serving and grabbed a seat at the long table.
"When is graduation?" Zoar asked after stuffing his mouthful of what seemed to be beans. Zoar had been attending the Heroes Guild for ten years now and he was about to graduate and go out to be a hero for everyone in Albion. Algreth had been at the Guild for eleven years, but failed the year before.
"I think graduation is next week. In three days we will have the Melee Combat test, then the Ranged Combat test and then Will Reaction Drills. If we do everything perfectly, we become new heroes," Algreth said. Zoar grunted. He didn't like the people who gave the tests. There were always dressed in black coats with hoods pulled over their head. They freaked him out a little, but he didn't look any better. His hair was a light brown and hadn't been put in a different fashion since his parents sent him to the guild. His eyes were a dark coffee brown and he was one of the tall people at the guild. Zoar was always wearing his robes because it was required that the apprentices wore the white robes.
Algreth looked like he was Zoar's twin brother. The only difference was their hair and eye color. Zoar had red hair and blue eyes. Both of them had all ready saved money so they could go to the barber shop and get their hair cut and maybe some facial hair, then go to the clothing shop to buy new clothes. Both of the men finished eating and put their plates in the dirty plat stack at the bar. "Come on, we don't want to be late for class again. Last time we had to do extra practices," Algreth said. The two exited the bar and went to their classes.
Sorry if it seemed boring. This chapter is supposed to be an introduction chapter. I promise it will get a whole lot better as the chapters' progress.