Chapter One: The Accidental Hero and the Very Grumpy Wizard

Chapter One: The Accidental Hero and the Very Grumpy Wizard

It was a perfectly normal Tuesday when everything went wrong.

Rufus Thistlewhistle, a boy of seventeen with no exceptional talents (unless you counted an impressive ability to nap through anything), had been running late for his job at "The Squeaky Stool," the most disreputable inn in the entire village of Blunderbark. It wasn’t that he particularly *enjoyed* cleaning up spilled ale and broken stools; it was just that if he didn’t, his mother would find out he’d been sacked from his sixth job this year, and the woman had a broom that doubled as a weapon.

That morning, as Rufus sprinted down the cobblestone streets, dodging carts of turnips and baskets of laundry, he was blissfully unaware that his life was about to take a sharp detour—right into the lap of destiny, or more accurately, the lap of a very annoyed wizard.

Blunderbark was a quiet village. Mostly because nothing ever happened there. People grew turnips, traded turnips, and occasionally argued about whose turnips were the best. Every now and then, someone from the capital would pass through, take one look at the muddy streets and general smell of cabbage, and leave as quickly as possible. That was the rhythm of life in Blunderbark, and it suited Rufus just fine. He had no grand ambitions, no desire for adventure. He just wanted to make it to work without tripping over a stray goat and getting yelled at by old Mrs. Pumbleton for the third time this week.

But that wasn’t meant to be.

As he rounded the corner by the village well, a sudden crackling noise filled the air. Rufus skidded to a halt, his worn boots squeaking against the cobblestones. Sparks of blue lightning shot from the sky, curling and twisting like angry snakes, before slamming into the ground a few feet in front of him. There, in the center of the street, surrounded by a ring of faintly glowing runes, stood a tall, gangly man in a billowing cloak. His beard was long, tangled, and streaked with gray, giving the impression he had recently wrestled with a flock of particularly aggressive sheep—and lost. A wide-brimmed hat drooped over his face, obscuring his expression, but the tight grip he had on his staff suggested that he was *not* having a good day.

“Who summoned me here?” the wizard bellowed, voice crackling like thunder. His sharp eyes scanned the street before landing squarely on Rufus, who had taken a few cautious steps backward, trying very hard to disappear into a nearby cabbage cart.

Rufus swallowed. “Uh… I didn’t summon anyone. I was just… running. To work. At the inn. Definitely not doing any summoning.” He gestured awkwardly, hoping the wizard would lose interest and maybe vaporize a goat or something instead.

The wizard’s eyes narrowed. “Lies. Do you know who I am?”

Rufus blinked. “Not… really? Are you, um… lost?”

The wizard let out a deep sigh, the kind that implied he had long since given up on humanity as a whole. “I am Magnaran the Magnificent, Archmage of the Threefold Realm, Keeper of Arcane Lore, Defeater of the Blighted Wyrms of—”

“Magnificent? Really?” Rufus couldn’t help himself. “That’s a bit much, isn’t it?”

Magnaran shot him a withering look, his staff crackling ominously. “I *did not* choose my title, boy. It was bestowed upon me after many great deeds.”

Rufus nodded quickly, deciding it was probably best not to argue with a wizard who could fry him into a crisp. “Right, right. Sorry. Please continue.”

Magnaran glared at him for a moment longer, as if debating whether Rufus was worth the effort of disintegrating. “As I was saying,” the wizard continued, clearly irritated, “I have been summoned here by someone in this wretched village for a task of utmost importance.”

“Well, it wasn’t me,” Rufus said, shifting uncomfortably. “I’ve never summoned anything in my life. I can barely summon the energy to get out of bed.”

The wizard pinched the bridge of his nose. “Someone summoned me, and I *will* find out who.” He glanced around the street, where a few villagers had paused to gawk at the scene. “You there! Peasant!” he barked at a nearby turnip seller, who promptly dropped his entire basket of produce in fright. “Did you summon me?”

The man looked like he might faint. “N-n-no, sir! I don’t even know how to spell ‘summon’!”

Magnaran grumbled something under his breath about “incompetence” and “backwater villages.” Then, with a grand sweep of his hand, he flicked his staff. A burst of light shot from its tip, wrapping around Rufus like a glowing ribbon. The boy yelped, feeling a strange tingling sensation crawl up his arms.

“Wait! What are you doing?” Rufus protested, trying to pull away from the magical bonds. “I already told you, I didn’t summon you!”

“Oh, I’m aware,” Magnaran said with a cold smirk. “But I need someone to assist me on this… endeavor. And, as luck would have it, you happen to be standing in the exact spot where I arrived. Congratulations, boy, you’ve just been promoted to wizard’s apprentice.”

“Apprentice?” Rufus stared at him in disbelief. “But I don’t know any magic! I can’t even juggle!”

“Not my problem.” The wizard waved his hand dismissively, the magical bonds tightening slightly. “Now, follow me. We’ve got work to do.”

Rufus had no choice but to stumble along behind the wizard as he marched down the street, grumbling to himself. The glowing ribbon around him tugged at his feet, dragging him forward even as he tripped over cobblestones and his own boots.

“Wait! I can’t just leave! I have a job!”

The wizard didn’t even bother looking back. “Not anymore, you don’t. Consider yourself employed in the service of the greatest wizard in all the realms. Your job is now to carry my things, take notes, and, if necessary, serve as a distraction for particularly hungry dragons.”

Rufus paled. “Did you say *dragons*?”

Magnaran stopped suddenly, causing Rufus to crash into the back of him. “Of course,” the wizard said matter-of-factly. “Why else would I be here? Did you think this was a casual stroll through the countryside?”

“Well, I mean… you *could* be here for turnips,” Rufus mumbled, rubbing his nose. “That’s mostly what people come for.”

Magnaran gave him a long, disdainful look. “If I wanted turnips, I would simply summon them from the ground myself.”

“Can you do that?” Rufus asked, genuinely curious now. “Summon turnips?”

The wizard’s eye twitched. “We are *not* here for turnips!” He resumed walking, faster this time, and Rufus struggled to keep up.

“Then what are we here for?” Rufus asked, panting as he tried to match the wizard’s long strides.

Magnaran hesitated for a moment, glancing up at the sky as if weighing whether or not to answer. Finally, he muttered, “There’s been a… disturbance. Something dark, ancient, and unspeakably dangerous has been unleashed.”

Rufus gulped. “And you’re going to stop it?”

“Of course,” Magnaran said with the kind of confidence that made Rufus feel slightly better. “I’m a wizard. It’s what I do.”

“And I’m… supposed to help?”

Magnaran gave him a side-eye. “You’ll help by not getting in the way.”

Rufus didn’t find that particularly reassuring.

As they neared the edge of the village, Rufus spotted something in the distance—a thick, ominous fog creeping in from the hills. It slithered across the ground like a living thing, swallowing the trees and turning the sky an eerie shade of purple. The temperature seemed to drop, and Rufus shivered involuntarily.

“That,” the wizard said grimly, “is the disturbance.”

Rufus stared at it, his heart pounding in his chest. “You’re going to make that go away, right?”

Magnaran’s expression darkened. “I’ll try. But if it doesn’t, well… that’s where you come in.”

Rufus blinked. “Me? What am I supposed to do?”

The wizard’s mouth twisted into something that could generously be called a smile. “Run. And scream. Very loudly.”

Before Rufus could argue further, the ground trembled beneath their feet. The fog thickened, and within its swirling depths, dark shapes began to move—indistinct figures, shifting and whispering, growing closer by the second. Rufus took an instinctive step backward, his knees wobbling.

“Uh, Magnaran?” he said, his voice cracking. “I think we should go.”

But the wizard didn’t move. Instead, he raised his staff high, his eyes gleaming with a sudden fire. “There’s no going back now, boy. We stand and fight.”

Rufus groaned. “Of course we do.”