No Longer Fiction
In an English cottage next to a forest, a man was shedding tears as he turned the TV off in front of him as he had just finished watching something for the first time. Richard Evans has finally seen the Lord of the Rings trilogy for the first time in his life.
Richard was a 35 year old man with short brown hair, brown eyes, stubble that started growing and his nose, forehead and knuckles on both hands had scars on them. He's just a casual fan of fantasy as he was more obsessed with medieval lore and history but people he knew like his family told him that he'd love the Lord of the Rings trilogy because of how it was like a medieval tale.
Of course, he watched the extended editions and he truly loved these films. Not only are they simply great films, but they're also so immersive to the point that Richard felt like he was in Middle Earth and even wished he could go there.
"So good…." He muttered to himself as he finished wiping his tears from the truly emotional ending of The Return of the King where Frodo leaves Middle Earth after destroying the One Ring and Sam returns back to his family in the Shire.
Now that he's finished with the trilogy, having taken up to three days to do so, he now can do one of his favourite things to do, hiking in medieval attire in the woods.
Richard walked to a room near the living room and in it was all of his medieval items and clothes. The first thing he laid his eyes on was his sword, which was heavily based on the famous sword, Excalibur, in particular, the version from the film King Arthur: Legend of the Sword as he loved the design. The hilt, blade and crossguard are all the same except the blade has runes on it that translate to 'Steelfang', which he named his sword.
He's proud of the sword as he crafted it himself and showcased it at any medieval event, even partaking in sword fights, having been trained by one of his best friends.
After looking at his sword, Richard walked directly to a wardrobe and a chest. The first he opens in the wardrobe and in it was period accurate clothing that someone he knows makes for a living.
With a smile, he started changing out of what he's currently wearing and started putting on trousers first before putting on leather boots, which were made accurately and then Richard put on a long sleeve white shirt that had two buttons and a collar that stood up and covered his neck. After that, he put on a brown leather lace vest and then leather arm guards as well as fingerless gloves that made holding Steelfang easy.
Once putting all this clothes on, the man then opened up the chest which had a whole bunch of backpacks and the scabbard for his sword. He pulled it out as well as a backpack, which he carried out into his kitchen where he first packed some food in as well as filling up his water bottle.
Once done, he went back into the previous room and there, he put some other clothes in his backpack before putting on a brown, high collar padded jacket that buckled on the left side of the jacket.
Finally dressed up, Richard grabbed the scabbard and placed his sword in it before tying it around his waist. The scabbard itself has both a utility knife and a wet stone kept in it. The wet stone was what he uses to sharpen his sword and the knife was simple to be used when eating.
He looked at himself in the mirror and smiled as he looked right out of the medieval times, which he wanted to capture.
After he looked at his reflection, he grabbed his backpack and put it on before grabbing a green cloak and put it on and smiled, remembering that a lot of the characters in Lord of the Rings wore a green cloak like him.
Once he was now finally prepared, he headed to the front door but stopped to look at a framed photo of his core group of friends which was taken 6 years ago. This group was called the Fellowship and there were 9 of them, just like Lord of the Rings and they were all friends since high school. They bonded over their love of fantasy and medieval history and have stuck together ever since.
However, Richard looked at one of the Fellowship in particular with sadness. In the photo, he looked at a woman with blonde hair, blue eyes and the tallest of the group at 6'3'' while Richard is 5'11'' for example. She was his best friend in the entire world and someone who he had romantic feelings for. Marion Stormwood.
The reason he looked at her in sadness was because some time after the photo was taken, she had disappeared off the face of the Earth and the group were all devastated, especially Richard and they still to this day haven't found her.
"I still miss you." He whispered, grazing his fingers on the photo where Marion was and then he walked out of his home, closed the front door, leaving up a sign to let people who arrived to know that he was out.
After putting the sign up, he looked up at the spring era overcast sky and took a deep breath before walking down the path that led directly to the forest and once he made it to the tree line, he walked off the path as he knew this forest like the back of his hand, having trekked through it ever since he was a child.
Richard loves the forest so much. It brings a sense of calm, serenity and peace in him and it's why when watching the trilogy, he enjoyed the parts that are set in the various forests of Middle Earth.
During his trek, he took a sip of water and had a bit of bread when he walked past the largest lake in the forest and he wondered what it would be like to be in Middle Earth as it seemed like his dream world, being heavily based on medieval England while having fantasy.
A while later, an hour into his hike, he found himself by a tunnel that he was very familiar with. It's one that he's been into before and ever since he was a kid, he'd imagine that there was a troll inside it and he'd fight against it.
Today, however, he decided not to go in it and as he was about to leave it, RIchard heard the sound of whispering coming from within it. The whispering sounded very ethereal and mystical, somehow having an effect on Richard, as though it enticed him to enter into the tunnel.
Considering he never experienced this before, he decided to see what this whispering is about and bravely entered the tunnel. Upon entering, there was a whole different atmosphere. Whereas the forest was calm and serene, the tunnel was more otherworldly and mysterious, which wasn't normal with this tunnel.
Eventually, he got in deep enough to see a bluish glow a bit further ahead, which was never there before in all the times Richard had been in this tunnel.
"What the hell?" He said aloud, confused upon seeing the glow. Of course, he needed to know what this was and so he walked further in and after squeezing past a tight gap, he saw what was causing that glow and his jaw dropped.
What he was looking at in front of him can be best described as a void that rippled like water as though it was some kind of portal and the whispering was now more clear.
"Enter our world. Help us to defeat the Dark Lord." The voice said, as though there was something on the other side. But to Richard's shock, the voice sounded exactly like Lady Galadriel. This was just impossible. There's no way Middle Earth exists, it's just a fictional world created by a WW1 veteran and English academic and yet here's proof right in front of him that said otherwise.
He even touched the void and it felt like a smooth sheet of water. He pulled his hand back instantly, feeling that it was indeed real and had to just accept the fact that Middle Earth was on the other side.
And based on what Galadriel had said, it seemed that she's asking him to help in the fight against Sauron. But what could he do that others couldn't? He may know how to use a sword, and well, but he's never taken a life before and never fought in battle.
After a short while, Richard had to accept the call since Galadriel must know something that he doesn't.
"Here I go." He said to himself, prepared for what may come as he stepped forward and walked through the void.
In the middle of a cornfield, a figure stepped out into a pathway that was formed to walk through the field with ease. This figure is of a Hobbit, a short humanoid being that commonly has a head of curly hair, furry feet that are sturdy for travel and pointed ears similar to another race in Middle Earth, Elves.
This particular Hobbit is Samwise Gamgee. He is currently searching for his fellow Hobbit, Frodo Baggins as he was separated from him somehow and needed to be with him, both because of him making a promise to a being named Gandalf the Grey and because he and Frodo are on a task to take a particular item out of their home, the Shire for their people's safety, in particular, they are headed for the village of Bree.
"Mr Frodo?! Frodo! Frodo!" He called out, concerned, walking down the pathway until said Hobbit appeared in front of him, looking concerned as to why he was being called for.
"I thought I'd lost you." Sam said in relief, seeing that he's alright.
"What are you talking about?" Frodo asked, confused as to what he meant.
"It's just something Gandalf said." Sam told him.
"What did he say?" He asked his friend.
"'Don't you lose him, Samwise Gamgee.' And I don't mean to." Sam confessed as he walked up to Frodo.
"Sam, we're still in the Shire, what could possibly happen?" Frodo asked, slightly amused. But before Sam could reply, a Hobbit crashed into him from the corn crop and then another crashed into Frodo, all of them now on the ground.
Frodo looked to see that it was the duo of Merry and Pippin. Pippin himself seeing who he crashed into.
"Frodo, Merry, it's Frodo Baggins." He said to his friend, who, along with Sam, got on their feet.
"Hello, Frodo." Merry greeted.
"Get off him!" Sam growled as he pulled Pippin off of Frodo and helped Frodo up on his feet. The two then saw Merry and Pippin grab various vegetables from the ground.
"What's the meaning of this?" Frodo asked in utter confusion as Merry put some of the veg into Sam's arms, Sam now realising what they just did as Pippin grabbed some cabbages and Merry grabbed carrots.
"You've been into Farmer Maggot's crop!" He accused them.
All four then heard the sound of a dog barking and a male voice yelling. They all looked in the direction they came from and saw a bladed farm tool above the corn. Farmer Maggot and his dog were coming for them.
All the Hobbits, minus Sam started running away as fast as they could and Sam stood as he heard Maggot cursing. Initially frozen, he just dropped the veg and ran to catch up with the others.
"Don't know why he's so upset. It's only a couple of carrots." Merry admitted, sounding innocent.
"And some cabbages. And those big bags of potatoes that we lifted last week, and then the mushrooms the week before!" Pippin added, further revealing that they've done this type of thing before. It's really no surprise why Maggot is furious.
"Yes, Pippin! My point is he's clearly overreacting!" Merry replied as they just about reached the edge of the cornfield.
"Run!" Merry barked as they continued, only to stop as they reached the edge of a slope.
Sam, however, didn't see them stop and ran into them all, causing them to fall down the slope and roll down crazily until they landed on a road, all on top of each other. Sam then spit out some grass that got into his mouth.
"Oh, that was close." Pippin commented as he saw a pile of dung right in front of him. Merry groaned as he felt something stab into his back.
"I think I broken something." He groaned, pulling out a carrot that snapped from the landing.
"Hey, are you four okay?" A voice asked them with concern. They all turned to see Richard standing on the road, looking at them in slight awe.
I've decided to do a complete rewrite of this story, partly because I wasn't entirely pleased with the initial version of this story and I thought I'd add some things and do some changes that would help make this more of an interesting story. And I wanted to write in third person as it was easier to write in that style for me personally.