The next King

Chapter 1

It was morning and Prince Luchigan the third son of King Galliard had led the hunt team to the woods to catch some game. He was a very good fighter but contemptible when it came to hunting. His fighting skills seemed like they were naturally embedded into him, and so he wanted to focus all his effort on becoming a good hunter too. The castle was so graceful that morning as always. They rode out when the morning haze was still thick.

The sun hadn't woken up yet and the moon was vaguely seen. A team of eleven men, all on brown and black horses. Hunting was the only thing which made Luchigan ride on a horse which wasn't his spotless white stallion, whom he named after its own spotless nature. It seemed the horse knew its name was ‘spotless’. And the prince treated him as such. It took them thirteen minutes to get to the hunting spot from the gate of the kingdom.

"That was pretty fast," said sir Gertrude.

He was the eldest person in the team and the king had put him in charge of his son's life. The young prince could get reckless a lot of times.

“Yeah, Gertrude. But I'm still wondering why I didn't enjoy a single second of my journey. I rode on this wobbly and shaky old horse," said the prince in disgust.

"It's not old, my prince. She's a female and seems to be having mood swings," Gertrude teased, part of his statement being true and the other a jest.

"Oh, really? Horses in our kingdom now have mood swings? You could have told me I broke her heart too!" he said.

"Nope! You didn't break her heart. You just rode her hard," Gertrude calmly ridiculed the prince. Everyone laughed at his joke as the prince sat wordless on the horse he was complaining about. That was one reason which made the knights love him. He was the prince whom they could freely associate with. He cracked jokes with them and a lot of times went to the local tavern with them to drink.

"Very well, I'll just come down of this horse whom according to Gertrude I rode hard this morning. But I won't be riding it home after our hunt," said the prince as he jumped down and started to loosen his armory which he had fastened to the horses saddle.

"Hush!" Gertrude said to them. His arm immediately gripping his sword. He had heard a rustle in the bushes. After about ten seconds of silence, a little rat came squeaking from the direction he had heard the rustle.

"Oh my goodness, Gertrude. Don't tell me you now eat rats?" said Luchigan.

"That was too much of a rustle for a squeaking little rat," he defended himself.

“Nope! It's just your craving for rat that's in control right now," Luchigan ridiculed him. They laughed and then got down for business.

"I heard this area has fat aggressive boars," Gertrude said.

"Those hideous creatures," Luchigan said, "I wish we were here for a deer." He had been knocked down by a boar on his first hunt when he was little. A memory that had been engraved into his mind, never to be forgotten. Almost immediately they had talked about boars, a big black boar wandered out of the bush. It paused for a moment and looked at them. Immediately it spotted their weapons, it broke off into a fierce run, heading back inside the thicker part of the woods where it had come from.

"You see that boar? That boar... I like that boar and I'm definitely getting that boar!" said the prince, pulling out his bow and arrow and running after the boar immediately. That was why his father entrusted his life in Gertrude's hands. How could he be going right after a hunt that was healthily making a fun for it's life. He could make other nearby games freak out and run away too. But that was the last thing that could come across the prince's mind at a time like this. The thrill from chasing after the running boar was what he wanted.

Luchigan started racing through the thick woods, his men following him closely, discovering other game who started fleeing for their own lives. The continued running, springing over small plants, crackling dry leaves and twigs, and dashing through fresh and damp leaves.

The boar was so energetic, likewise the prince who was chasing after it. It carefully maneuvered through curves despite its big size. The prince was not surprised, but the then his hunt was going to deep into the forest that he got bothered too. He decided to use his magic. His crests were fire and wind. The fire being his main element and the wind being assistant but a combined attack of the two could set fire on the woods since there were dry twigs and leaves everywhere.

The prince decided to use his wind magic, but it kept going wide range without definitively hitting his target.

"Shit!" he cursed in anger, still on chase.

After firing some more wind magic attacks on the boar and not hitting it down, the prince was about to give up, but then he heard the footsteps of someone running up the trees. Then he heard him chant "earth magic: swallow swamp!"

The floor turned swampy immediately and both the boar and the prince slid down with heavy thuds. The boar hit its head on mahogany tree and lost consciousness.

“Who the hell are you?" the prince roared at the person who was yet to show himself. At this point he wasn't bothered by the mud he was sitting in. All his concern was moved towards the person in the wood.

"My father thought me not to respect a man who cannot hunt?" said the person.

"Do I have any business with whosoever your father is?" Luchigan asked in wonder.

"Nope! Keep the hunt but you'll have to show me you're man enough to protect yourself too," replied the person.

"What do you mean?" asked Luchigan. "Questions over!" the person said, vanishing deeper into the canopy. From where he hid, the person threw daggers at the prince and he deflected them with the fuller of his blade.

"Nice moves, my prince," the person clapped from his hiding point. "I guess it's my turn now!" the prince chuckled, skillfully flinging his sword to where he heard the voice from. The hilt of the sword hit the person on the head and he came falling down from the tree. "Oh! A little boy!" the prince chuckled, "I got two games today!" The rest of the team arrived and found the prince with a person and a boar.

"What is this?" Gertrude asked. "I'm not a good hunter of animals, but I can hunt down a man who tries to hunt me!" he chuckled, "let's ride home to the kingdom with my two preys. And let's I forget, I'm not getting on that wobbly horse." "You mean you don't want to ride her hard again?" Gertrude teased. "Shut up, Gertrude! What kind of are you? Are you indirectly exposing your fantasies?" the prince countered. "Woooh!!" Everyone chuckled then mounted their horses. The rode home with the boar and the boy.