It was another cold and breezy night, the wind rattled through the windowsills. Ren shivered and pulled up the sorry excuse of a blanket, a tattered cloth that barely covered his small frame, closer around his neck. He made sure that the old threadbare tablecloth that he used as a curtain to separate the room from his parents’ was blocking the light of his candle. He had gotten it at the merchant caravan that comes during Ice Dragon Week a few years ago, it was the first thing Ren had ever bought himself. He had fallen in love with the faded ornate patterns and luckily it suited his needs. He changed his seating position ever so slightly on his bed and it made a loud creak. It was made of a discarded slab of wood that his father had found, his mother had tried adding some comfort with a burlap sack filled with straw, but it didn’t really help.

The book in front of him contained his favorite story, one that his grandfather used to tell him late at night to help him fall asleep. It was called The Legend of the Three Heroes, and no matter how many times he read it, he was always filled with wonder. The book was also filled with notes from his grandfather, located in the margins of the page. Arrows pointing and underlining different sections adding more “flavor” to the story, at least that’s what his mother told him, and crossing out others that his grandfather said didn’t make sense. The story had started off with three friends, who traveled the world together, helping people, and trying to earn a name for themselves.

The Hero of the Shield was a strong, stern, motherly type who always looked after her friends as if they were her family. She could cast healing spells when her friends were hurt and protected them when they got attacked by monsters. The Hero of the Bow was a lighthearted, energetic, bouncy character that was always making jokes at the others expense. She had razor sharp reflexes, the eyes of a hawk, and with her trusty bow in her hands she never missed. Then there was the Hero of the Tome, he had a harsh and brisk way of speaking, almost arrogant in a way. However, he was by far the strongest of the Heroes, able to conjure up windstorms and walls of fire, he had the power of the elements at his disposal. Ren always found the Hero of the Tome to be especially cool. Without him, Ren thought for the umpteenth time, the group of friends would never have had a book written about them. His grandfather felt differently about the Hero of the Tome and always had a sour face when Ren would ask for more stories about him. He would mumble something under his breath about “You’re missing the point of the story…” but would tell him more stories anyways.

In the book, the Heros had been traveling home when The Hero of the Bow had heard muffled cries of pain, and cheers from the villagers. The Hero of the bow took off to see what the commotion was, only to find a group of villagers beating a small child, no older than eight years of age. Small, Malnourished and obviously hurt the child was attempting to crawl away from the villagers using only one arm, but the villagers kicked the child back into the circle. The Hero of the Bow had drawn back the string of her bow and had yelled for the villagers to back away just as the other Heroes caught up to her.

The Villagers scattered, leaving the small child, who appeared to be wrapped in what seemed to be nothing but rags, laying splayed out in the cobblestone pathway. When the heroes approached him to nurse his wounds, they got the first good look at his face. He was, by every meaning of the word, grotesque, almost monstrous in a way. The boy’s clothes were ripped, and they could see his horribly disfigured body. His face appeared to be squished, and had small purple tentacles growing off of it, with little to no hair on his head. His left arm wasn’t the right size for his body, but that of an adult Orc, veins bulging and sickly purple, his hand the size of a human head. His right arm seemed to have quills protruding out of it like that of a porcupine or hedgehog. His left leg wasn’t much of a leg at all, more like the tentacle of a giant octopus, with suction cups covering it all over. His right leg, while shaped like a leg, appeared to be covered with a brown tree bark. And in the center of his chest was a large dark purple pulsating Orb, with purple veins spidering across his chest. The boy had flinched at their approach and attempted to crawl away from them into a nearby alleyway.

The Hero of the Shield and the Hero of the Tome had argued about what they should do with the boy, with the Hero of the Shield being adamant that he needed medical attention, and the Hero of the Tome arguing against, however they eventually decided to care for him. They had nursed him back to health and decided that he would travel with them from now on as he was heavily discriminated against by the other villagers in the village. The story goes on to explain the different adventures that the group goes on, from saving an underground kingdom of Dwarves from an infestation of angry giant spiders, to negotiating with two rivaling dragons that had destroyed many small mountain villages and towns in their battles. The small child grew over the years and became a talented inventor. The team of four began to be called the Four Heroes and where very well known throughout the land. He created items that allowed him to keep up with the Heroes and became both powerful and versatile, able to conjure spells just as powerful as the Tome, be as perspective and fast as the Bow, and as strong as the shield. He had surpassed his friends and mentors. The Tome became weary of the young boy’s rapid growth of power and warned the others as such. However, The Heroes of the Bow and Shield had begun to see the boy as their son and wanted to hear nothing of what the Hero of the Tome had to say.

When the Heroes had finally decided to retire from their life of adventuring, the boy had offered a final gift to each of them. A gift that symbolized them, a gift to repay them for everything they had done for him. These gifts later became known as the artifacts for which each Hero was named. These gifts had bestowed each of them eternal life and had returned their youthful bodies, granting them access to a world that was beyond all of their imagining. At first the heroes were overjoyed, only later did the Hero of the Tome realize their folly.

The heroes invited all their friends and family to come live with them as they retired. They settled a small village near the ocean, where their children grew and had children of their own. Eventually the children would move away and began setting up their own villages, and the heroes would travel to each one teaching the younger one’s magic and other skills. The Hero of the Tome became distant, hiding away in the mountains with some of his closest followers, for many years no one heard from them.

Eventually the Hero of the Bow and Shield grew suspicious of them and confronted them in their mountain home. Only to find them changed. The Hero of the Tome explained that their changed appearance was due to his artifact. While studying it he had uncovered a dark secret, that it was draining the magic from the people around them. That the boy that they had raised together had given them artifacts that had cursed them, turning them into some sort of magical battery. When he attempted to remove the curse, it had changed him.

The Heroes had been trapped in a prison of their own creation. The boy had betrayed his friends, his family, and was siphoning their magic abilities to feed his own power. The heroes needed to once again band together. The other Heroes didn’t believe it at first, but how could they ignore the vast armies of monsters that began invading the land massacring their children soon after confronting the Hero of the Tome. The monsters seemed to have the boy’s physical characteristics too, some with tentacles, others with spikes on their arms, all with the same purple orb embedded in their chest.

Soon the Heroes had discovered that the boy, now an old man, went by a new title, The Demon King. For many months The Demon King had been unleashing monsters throughout the world, causing havoc and killing thousands. Cursing themselves for being so blind, the Heroes with their artifacts and eternally youthful bodies easily dispatched the Legions of monsters, sealed them off from the rest of the world, and set their eyes on what became known as the Demon Kings Tower. The Tower had been created by the boy when he gave the Heroes their artifacts and was located on an island in the center of the world. However, when the Heroes arrived at the Tower, they noticed that the Demon King had contracted a powerful Demon to guard his tower. A horrible thing covered by a mass of writhing tentacles and living underwater, it was difficult for the heroes to fight it. Unable to truly defeat the Demon, the Hero of the Shield instead sealed it under the island and restricted its movements while The Heroes of the Tome and Bow went inside to confront the boy.

They had arrived in the central chamber through a large set of stone double doors that loomed high above them. In the center of the room sat an undead, not a man, in a high-backed throne. The Demon King had stood, blue fire in his eye sockets, staring coldly at them. As he did so his cloak fell away from his chest and there, shining for all to see, was his pulsating purple Orb.

Just as the Demon King had unhinged his jaw to speak, a flaming spear had pierced the orb in the center of his chest and the flames in his eyes went out. The Hero of the Bow looked at the Hero of the Tome in shock, only to find his eyes filled with tears and a hard look. The Heroes had left the Tower silently, without looking at each other. They knew that attack would not be enough to end the unnatural life of an undead. So together they used all the power in the Artifacts to seal the tower in time, it is said that this magic was so powerful that it created The Crystal Mountain in place of the seal.

Together they had raised the boy, and together they had killed him. It was never the same between them after that. The Shield never forgave herself for not being there to protect him when he needed her most and despised the Tome for killing him. The Bow failed to notice the changes in the world and preferred to live in solitude. All the while The Hero of the Tome continued to attempt to rekindle their friendship, regretting what he had done.

The Hero of the Tome is said to have founded the Kingdom of Gernt to rebuild society after the Demon King had destroyed most of civilization, and the Hero of the Shield is said to have created the Queendom of Juliet to oppose him. The Hero of the Bow was never heard from again after disappearing into the Misty forests of Nuna and is said to have died soon after the creation of The Crystal Mountain.

Ren sighed and closed the book in front of him. It was late into the night, and he could hear his father snoring on the other side of the curtain. Smiling, he blew out the remnants of the candle he was using to read and turned to fall asleep, his head still dancing with imagined images of the heroes fighting the Demon King.