A Tale of Two Knights

Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Sir Ludovicus the dragonheart looked out from the balcony of the home he used to occupy. He was only there to refresh memories and relax, however, the sight of the lake filled with blood made him sick. The war that caused this, his entire family was dead, all his friends missing, and his greatest enemy, Draven the relentless. 

Draven was the one that had caused this mess, he thought, reminiscing on all his memories, however, it was his fault Alfonse was dead. It's your fault that Alfonse the Worthy is dead. Ludovicus choked back tears. He had killed probably the only chance he had at winning. If only the king wasn't so careless on the amount of power he gave away. 

Ludovicus made excuses while arguing with himself. There really was no hope. A huge bounty was on his head, a bounty for 100,000 medallions. Enough money to buy a king's castle. Anyone would want that. The people were absurd. They were insane. In Ludo's mind, Draven was going to assassinate the king, and take all the power for himself, and no one would be able to stop him. 

The king's arrogance will lead to his death, Ludo thought, as leaving the luxurious building. Immediately, the smell of rotten carcasses and dead bodies made Ludovicus almost puke. He was growing lightheaded, and he stumbled and tripped over a dried up carcass of an old man. The dried skin, with mumps, and bumps, as well as the dark color looked horrifying. 

The buboes that were still on his skin even after death only made it worse, however, it might have just been his luckiest day ever, as a shiny golden key snuck out of the corpse's raggedy pockets. Ludo couldn't believe it. The key. The key he had been looking for 2 entire weeks. 2 weeks of searching for the key to get out of the town was right there. The same body that he had seen every day. 

Ludo was locked in the town after the town had died of the great pestilence. This was the reason why the entire world felt dry all of a sudden. Years ago, things were so much different. Everyone was at peace. Ludovicus finished a mission and set for the lord of the town, but found that everyone died of the pestilence. Soon after, he was locked in by the warden who said that Draven told him to do so. Ludo couldn't wait to slice the Warden's head clean off with his damascus, vorpal broadsword, how difficult that may be, left Ludo still thinking about it. The Warden stood 8 feet tall. 

Ludo turned the key into the gate that held him from escape. It turned, and revealed a sandy entrance, or Ludo's exit. The only thing standing between him and freedom was the Warden. And soon he came in, stomping. The Warden was 8 foot tall, but he was well built and extremely muscular for his height. He was practically a giant, with a bare chest, and a golden helm. His legs were covered by giant faulds that were big enough to cover all of Ludo's body. "Heh heh, little lamb finally decided to rebel!" He said in an ogreish accent. 

He might have looked menacing to many, especially with his Zweihänder, but Ludovicus wasn't called Ludovicus the Vicious, or Ludo the DragonHeart for nothing. Gripping his vorpal damascus broadsword in one hand, and his heater shield with heraldry in the other, there was no way he was going to lose against some giant when he had faced people that could *Bonk, the zweihander knocked onto Ludo's body with a clash, and he was knocked to the ground instantly. The blow hurt, but luckily Ludo's left sided larger left pauldron took most of the damage, which was good since the right was for attacking. 

Ludo was not going to make the same mistake again. The Wardens' hits were like boulders, but he was extremely slow because of his size. Ludo dodged out of the way with the second attack, and slashed the Warden's exposed belly, and a smooth line appeared, before blood rushed down from the wound. This had little effect on the Warden, and he charged up for another attack. The next hit was close, and almost hit Ludo by a hair, So then Ludo got another hit on the Warden, this time a thrust at his exposed arm.

 The sword thrust through the entire arm, rendering the Warden's left arm useless. The attacks that came were a lot slower because of the dead arm. They were quite easy to dodge, however the Warden was getting restless. "Draven paid me lots to kill you, and I WILL get the reward..." 

The Warden then managed to hit Ludo across his breastplate, which left a fatally injured Ludo on the ground. However, the victory was cut short by the Wardens neck bleeding like crazy. The giant fell over and squirmed and kicked in a frenzy, but it was too late. Before long, he fell completely still. He was dead. However, Ludovicus had a huge ache in multiple places, and he took quite a beating. Multiple bruises, sore purple spots on his skin, and broken blood vessels. His armour received lots of blows, and it was quite battered. Ludo's red cape had tears in it. 

He needed to find an inn outside of the town, but all he could spot was an enormous forest outside of the village, with no humans for what seemed like hundreds of miles. Ludo felt tiredness tingling in his entire body, and before long, he was asleep.