“How could they all left?! Gargh! They had been behaved so well, following us all the way from the North!” Harald complained. Frustrated with his missing Freshian horses.

“Should had tied em up that night! We drank too much that night! Those strange flower tea made us dizzy.”

“But it did help you heal fast.” Hephastos replied politely.

Harald stared at him, still puzzled and in doubt about him. From top to toe, he analysed the man on his light chiton covered by a leather apron. He was busy preparing the iron and forge to make some farming tools.

He couldn’t fight? But he fits in the description!

Hammering on the hot iron, Hephastos flatten the material into shape of a hoe.

Sigh, I guess that’s all he can do, smithing.

Harald leaned against the wooden wall, next to the opened window, with a bottle of wine on his hand, he gazed to the open field. The villagers were busy ploughing on their new land, preparing the soil to turn the place into a farm.

As the day near dusk, villagers brought the breads and distributed them to the workers.

Ah, that beautiful scent of fresh bread.

Harald took a deep breath, indulging in the aroma. Alerted, a hint of foul stink awaken his sense of danger. Something wasn’t right!

The sound of sharp screaming surrounded the village, and it turn louder and louder. The villagers were terrified. Trying to find the source of that eerie cry.

They saw a strange dark cloud appeared, and the villagers screamed in horror. Hundreds of flying creatures heading towards the village.

Creatures with body of vultures but head of women, Harpies!

Harald immediately grabbed an axe, jumped out of Hephastos’s workshop through the opened window. Swiftly, he chopped off the head of one harpy which tried to attack a young farmer.

While hundreds of harpies starting to charge towards the villagers, using their sharp claws, they attacked them by gouging their eyes. Harald blew a loud whistle and his followers came out with their weapons.

Hephastos and his men came with torches of fire. While guiding the weaker villagers to hide from the creature.

When a harpy’s head getting close, trying to bite and clawed Harald. He grabbed its hair with his left hand. When he looked at the harpy’s head, realising it look exactly like a young woman with a sad crying face. Screaming and tears covering her face. As if her soul was trapped and tortured…

“Holy Odin! What the heck are these!” Harald shouted, he threw away the harpy, and then immediately lay a strong punch on another harpy that flew towards him. With his one arm, he has to move fast.

The crying harpies, they were like asking for something. But what do they want? Where are they from? Harald’s men were all terrified. Those faces, they looked like women begging for something. Grabbing on their sword, they were hesitated to kill the harpies. But the creature kept attacking them.

Hephastos tried to scare the harpies with torches of fire. He able to set one of them on fire by burning their feathers. But they kept coming back with their claws.

“Ki… ki… Kill me…”

Harald hear the creatures screamed. Without hesitation, he chopped off the harpies heads with his axe. His men started to hear the same phrase from the crying harpies. They started to cry, although with hesitation, they decapitated the harpies. Until the end of dusk, the land covered with dead birds and women’s heads.

“Those women, those women…” Harald went into a mental breakdown…

“I… I am supposed to be their hero! I am supposed to be the hero!”

He knelt on the bloody floor, shaking. Although he had killed all the harpies, the screaming was still humming in his mind.

Kill me… Kill me… Kill me…

“WHAT HAD I DONE!!!” Roaring in agony, Harald was about to knock his own head with the axe on his hand. Hephastos dashed towards him, grabbing his left arm with his body and pushed him down to the ground. Knocking his axe away.

“You are! Harald! You are our hero! You’ve saved all of us!”

“Arghh!!!” Harald started to scream, and his cry was like the cry of those harpies. Hephastos had to hugged him tightly, preventing him from harming himself. Continuously, he shouted to Harald, reminding him that he had did right.

* * *

After the Harpies attack, Harald had been staying with Hephastos. Some mentally strong villagers had cleared the land and buried the harpies.

“I came to a foreign land. Trying to make a name, climbing that rank of heros. Defeating evil, saving people, killing monsters… killing monsters… killing mon…sters…” Harald mumbled.

“Thank you…” Hephastos said to the man. “Please continue to defend us, continue to be the hero of our village.”

Harald gazed at the average man, and realised about his strength. Their eyes met, and he broke their contact, shied away from Hephastos.

“No. Not me. You are the strongest hero I’ve ever met. I’ve sense it since the very first day we met.” Harald replied with a humbled voice.

Hephastos smiled with a blush on his scared face.