The Dangerous Quest of the Magical Super-Sword
-And the Events that Followed Immediately Afterword-

Jonathan Garrett

Chapter 1

It was warm sunny summer day. The kind of day where people would be extra nice and courteous to their neighbors and, if it had not already been said several times that morning alone, say “This is a perfect day!” But it had already been said many times, so they refrained from saying it again. This particular day, however, had one very large and singularly grating flaw.

To specific, only one location actually had the large flaw. For you see, this location contained in it what was quite possibly the worst attempt at whistling that has ever been heard, and there are people who claim to have heard whistling that could peal paint off of houses. It could have caused grown men to weep openly in the streets. No one actually heard it because the disruption in space-time that it caused could be felt hours ahead of the actual arrival of the sound waves and so anyone in the vicinity had long since taken to the high ground.

Despite the preparation taken to avoid the affects of the whistling, the aftershocks caused by it were felt far in wide. Several hurricanes touched of in the sea far to the east were countless coastal towns were obliterated. The damage was estimated to be very high, as was the number of lives lost. It was later found out the villages had been empty at the time due to the fact that they were owned by several bands of notorious pirates who had all been at sea at the time. This fact had not been discovered until after the relief money had been collected and the groups in question long since departed for places unknown. In the far, wintery north an avalanche killed three men and a pack of wolves, although it has been hotly debated as to whether or not the men would have been killed just minutes later by the wolves if not for the avalanche.

Several small forest animals skittered away to avoid the screeching sound, unattuned as they were to the subtle fluctuations of space-time. A young boy crested a small rise. He was the source of the noise. It should be noted that although many people told him otherwise he himself believed that his whistling was actually very good. His mother always claimed that deafness was inherent in her family. He carried in his hand a bag of bread that he had just recently purchased. He swung it back and forth as he walked and, though it stresses the definition of the word quite greatly, whistled.

As he walked through the grass he was not paying any particular attention where he was going, which is why he failed to notice the lump that protruded from the ground directly in his path. He fell to the ground with muffled “thump”. He jumped up angrily ready to punch whoever had just tripped him up.

No one, or at least anything with the ability to hear, was around. He looked down at the ground and noticed what he believed to be a somewhat middle-sized rock sticking out of the ground. He glared at it. It failed to notice his glaring and continued to do nothing.

“Stupid rock” he growled as he kicked out at it. The “rock” didn’t budge. He yelped in pain and grabbed his foot, which hurt very much at this point. After his foot stopped hurting he brushed aside the grass. The “rock” was actually, as best he could tell, the hilt of a sword.

“Why would someone stick a sword in the ground?” He wondered aloud. He remembered a while back when a traveling merchant had come to his town. Among his wares were some very handsome looking swords, although they probably would have broken instantly had someone actually tried to use it in battle. The boy, His name is Steven, by the way, remembered also that the swords had cost at least 300 golds. Which, for those who are not native to this land, translates to tons of cash money.

He grabbed the sword and pulled as hard as he could, but the sword didn’t budge an inch. He tried again, but to no avail. Finally, he decided, since brute strength wasn’t working, to use his psychic powers to remove the sword. He had no psychic powers, so this attempt failed as well. In a fit of sheer rage he kicked the sword again, which for no reason anyone in the entire history of humanity subsequent to this event has been able to tell, immediately flung itself out of the ground and into the air. It then returned to the ground with a loud clatter.

Steven stared at. It didn’t move. He tentatively touched it with his foot and then quickly withdrew it. The sword remained where it was. He bent down and examined it. It was a rather nice looking sword and unlike others Steven had seen this one actually looked like it could be used in battle. He picked the sword up and held it aloft. This is the point where, had this been a movie or even perhaps one of those hokey fantasy books where it’s written for the express purpose of being made into a movie so that the writer can quickly cash in on the book’s success before people realize what a mess it really is, you would have seen a gleam of light run up the sword. It would have looked very impressive and cost a great deal of money, but sadly this only a very normal fantasy book so you’ll just have to imagine that it happened.

There was a small rock attached to the end of the sword. Steven looked at it, not entirely sure what to make of it. A figure off in the distance, out of the range of Steven’s whistling, who had just moments ago been staring intently at a ruby-throated warbler through a pair of binoculars, noticed Steven noticing the rock at the end of the sword. The figure quickly got up and began, quite briskly, toward where Steven was.

“What is this? Who’d put a stupid rock on the end of a sword anyway?” Steven yelled as he angrily shook the sword from side to side in a manner most dangerous.

The rock didn’t move. He shook harder this time and the rock became dislodged and flew directly at the forehead of the figure that was coming toward him. Steven looked around when he heard the “thunk” and subsequent scream, but saw nothing due to the tall grass. He shrugged and went back to admiring the now rock-on-the-tipless sword.

“I bet this thing is worth at least 500 golds! Oh boy, today is definitely my lucky day!” Steven exclaimed as he waved the sword around.

The figure, which had now picked himself up, came up behind Steven. He stretched out his hands as if to grab the boy. He loomed closer. He clapped his hands down on Steven’s shoulders. Suspenseful, isn’t it? You should realize at this point that this particular segment is not actually intended to be suspenseful at all. If you feel that it is, the author suggests that you lie down for a few hours and contemplate your reasoning behind believing that such a bizarre segment of a satirical fantasy story could, in any way, be contrived as suspenseful. Anyway, back to the story.

“HELLOOOOO!!” The figure exclaimed loudly. Steven yelled and narrowly missed cutting of the figure’s arms.

“What’s the big idea sneaking up on people like that, you crazy old man?” Steven fumed when he finally calmed down.

“Hey, hey!” The man exclaimed, “I’m only 45!”

“Yeah…and that’s old.” Steven explained, “And I bet you’re probably crazy too”

The man looked about to make some retort, but then thought better of it.

“What if I were to tell you that you are the chosen one who will save this land from the clutches of evil and, uh, all that good stuff?” The man asked.

“I’d say you were crazy, except that I’ve already established that to be the case.” Steven said.

The man looked speculatively at the boy. He rubbed his chin. He looked upward for a few seconds. He decided to revise his line of approaching.

“Well, what if I were to tell you that I’m the powerful wizard Killian, who has searched for years to find the mighty hero he can wield that sword you have in your hand and save the world from the evil Lord Callistan.” He looked down at the boy after finishing. The boy stared at him for a moment.

“Are you?” Steven asked.

“Am I what?” the man sputtered, unprepared for the question.

“Are you really the wizard Killian?”

“Of course I am!” Killian exclaimed.

“You certainly don’t look it”

“Why you little…” he started to say, but then decided against going further in that direction. “Umm…what if I were to tell you that with that sword you can defeat this guy and if you do that you’ll get lots and lots of gold, jewels, and other valuables?” He could see a glimmer of interest in the boy’s eye so he added one last part. “And get the attention of lots of adoring fans…female for the most part. If you get my drift.” The boy evidently did get the drift or else the prospects of loads of treasure took a moment to finally sink into his brain.

“That sounds like fun! What do I have to do? Is this guy very far away? Should I tell my mom? And can’t we hurry up, please?” Steven shot out in rapid succession. Killian stared at him for a second trying to decide which question to answer first.

“Why don’t we go talk to your mother?” The wizard said.

The two set out at a brisk pace. The slightly unkempt wizard discovered then just why very few animals had been in the area. He quickly asked the boy about where he lived to head off anymore whistling. Killian quickly stuffed his fingers into his ears to stop the bleeding.

“My mom and I live in a little village about two or three leagues from here. It’s a small village, only about two hundred people live there and it’s awfully boring. Would you believe that I had to walk all the way to the Varkstan just to buy some bread? I tell you, our village could use a few strip markets or at least a Serf-Mart.” Steven’s narrative went.

“Strip…market?” asked Killian, not quite comprehending the correct definition of the words.

“It’s a long row of stalls where they sell all kind of great things. Krichtan has several, but our village doesn’t even have one. It’s a shame really, I’d go there all the time.

“Oh.” The wizard muttered, somewhat disappointedly. The two topped a rise, something which seems to happen quite often as it does an excellent job of giving the read a good idea of what the surrounding land looks like while allowing the writer to avoid doing any actual work, and could see the boy’s village about a mile in the distance. It was neither large nor particularly impressive. Unless you compared to an anthill, but most people didn’t do that because it would have been silly.

“Well, that’s it. Not much to look at, but it’s home all the same.”

The two walked the last mile as the sun was sinking behind the hills to the west. A reddish tint colored the surrounding fields.

“That’s my house.” Steven said pointing to a small cottage near the town center. It was not exactly what one would call the “town center” since it was nothing more than the point where the two roads in the village met. It would be more accurate to say, “That’s the town’s center”. Which it was, in terms of geometrical area. Several chickens flapped away squawking as the two crossed the town’s center to the boy’s house.

“I’m finally home, Mom.” Steven yelled to an interior room as he pushed open the door. His mother poked her head through the kitchen doorway.

“It’s about time, I figured you’d be home hours ago.” His mother chided him.

“I got a bit side-tracked, but I think it was actually a good thing that I was a little late.”

“Really?” His mother said skeptical to the fact that it was. She smiled and waved to Killian. “Who’s your friend, Steven?”

“Oh this is Killian, he’s a famous musician or wrestler or something like that.” Steven said absentmindedly as he flipped through a magazine that had been sitting on a table in the middle of the living room.

“That’s ‘magician’, not ‘musician or whatever’.” Killian explained to the boy’s mother.

“Well that’s nice. You still haven’t explained why it was a good thing that you were late.”

“Oh…yeah. You explain to her, Killian.” Steven said still flipping through the magazine.

“You see, madam, your son found a particularly rare and powerful magic sword. There’s a prophecy that states whoever finds the sword is the chosen one who will face the evil Lord Callistan in a battle which will decide the fate of the entire world!” Killian explained as extravagantly, and quickly, as he could. It was very difficult to correctly convey to the woman just how important her son and his magic sword were because no matter what he said she continued to smile in the way that only a mother from a 50’s sitcom could.

“Well, that’s nice.” The boy’s mother said, either not realizing the gravity of the situation or else events like this were just so commonplace that they lacked the importance that they might otherwise have.

“Umm…I don’t think you quite understand the situation. Your son must go on a perilous quest. You know, dungeons, monsters, fatal traps, very little hope of success, that sort of thing.” The wizard attempted to explain but the boy’s mother seemed not to understand.

“Well, as long as he’s not gone too long.” She said.

The wizard was clearly baffled. He had thought that at the very least she would offer some sort of resistance to the idea of her son going on a dangerous quest. He had worked for some time on the correct replies to things like “My son is too young to face such difficulties” and even gone so far as “I’ll never let my son go off on something like that, especially not with some one as disreputable as yourself”, but he had no experience with how Steven’s mother was handling the situation.

“Aha!” Shouted Steven, who had suddenly stopped flipping through his magazine, “I found it!”

“Found what, dear?” his mother asked.

“It’s the Magical Super-Sword! That’s the one I found today!” Steven shouted, jumping up and down gleefully. “It says in the April issue of ‘The Treasure Hunter’s Companion’ that the Magical Super-Sword is one of the rarest magical weapons in the whole word! They estimate its value at no less than TEN THOUSAND GOLDS!!”

“That’s wonderful!” His mother congratulated him.

Killian was dumbstruck. These people must be insane! The boy was more concerned with how much the sword was worth and his mother only cared about how long he might be gone and whether or not he had plenty of clean underwear! He gaped as he watched Steven bounce around the room waving his magazine while his mother looked appraisingly at their newly acquired sword.

Killian finally grabbed the boy by the arm to stop him, but Steven was moving too fast and flailing quite crazily and the somewhat middle-aged, but not old, wizard fell unceremoniously to the floor.

“Steven!” he called from the floor.

“Yes, what is it?” Steven asked, still running around.

“Could you stop for a minute, please?” The wizard all but pleaded.

“What’s up?”

“I was just wondering, what exactly do you plan to do with sword?”

“I think I’ll sell it.” He said simply.

“You’ll WHAT?!” Killian yelled as he jumped to his feet.

“Sell it. That quest thing of yours sounded kind of cool, but don’t you think it would be much easier to just sell the sword than to poke around in old dungeons trying to find money?”

Killian had never thought of it that way before. He briefly considered it, but in the end decided that he should at least try to convince Steven to go on the quest. And if that failed, well, at least he would have something else to fall back on in the event that all that fate stuff was actually just a load of bunk that some jokers from one thousand year ago had written up so that they could all have a good laugh when people in the future actually believed it.