The legend that wasn't -- Luna
The story is told of the hero who wanted to be a legendary one. Ze had read a great deal of legends and was immediately disappointed to find hirself lacking supernatural guardians. Let's call hir... Wannabe.
No Faerie Goodparents. No Eldritch entities interested in hir prosperity or demise. No devils wanted to deal with hir and no gods decided to warp hir fate.
No mysterious entities at crossroads, either. Which was the greatest disappointment of them all.
So without magical gifts from interesting entities, Wannabe went searching in the likeliest places to find a mysterious artefact. Alas, hills were mere hills, and not the barrows of ancient warrior kings. The area was quite lacking in caves or caverns, let alone ruins where Wannabe might find a forgotten artifact that contained phenominal powers or could give hir an edge in the forthcoming adventure.
In the end, ze had to set forth with a shield made of boards, and whatever ze could cobble together for weapons and armor. Wannabe had no idea how legendary ze could get with a cooking pot helmet, or a poker for a weapon. Hir armour was hardwood sticks woven together with briar vines, a choice that ze was beginning to regret.
Legends had to endure hardships and this certainly counted.
Wannabe left hir village, on a path with as many crossroads as ze could find on the best map ze could find. Just in case some otherworldly entity decided to turn up.
They didn't.
Worse and worse, there was nothing and nobody to rescue. No talking animals begged for their lives. No omens led Wannabe into a special destination. No dreams gave hir guidance, they were all nonsense if they were anything at all.
All ze found were normal hamlets and normal villages with nothing legendary to do there. There weren't even any cellars with an invasion of Dire Rats. No Kobold infestations, no Gobelliin bandits, not even a haunting to unravel and resolve.
Nothing but normal life without any kind of disturbance.
In desperation, Wannabe went to a city that had a large temple to Shai. There, ze spent the last of hir money to ask one question: "Where must I go to become a legendary hero?"
The prophet of the temple emerged from her haze of bayleaf smoke and said, "Home."
Wannabe had to forage and hunt just to do so. Sleeping under the blanket of the night sky was romantic on the page or in the epics recited by the wandering Bards. In reality, it was cold, uncomfortable, and made for a horrible night's sleep.
Ze was a sad, sorry, sore, and slouching soul when ze finally made it back to the little hut ze had wanted so badly to leave behind.
What in all the hells was heroic or legendary here?
Wannabe would wait. Prophets knew what they were talking about. And while ze was waiting, ze filled hir time with fixing all the little things that had gone awry.
A fencepost here. A fallen tree there. An empty woodpile for a widow living alone. Replacing a missing cobblestone that regularly caught people unawares in the wrong season. Wannabe might not thatch or tile a roof, but ze did cut the reeds or haul the tiles to help others finish the task before the weather turned.
No songs are sung about hir, and there is only one story... but ze was a hero to many, every day.
[Photo by engin akyurt on Unsplash]
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