The Final Battle

There was nothing Li'esco Worgana loved more than being a hero. 

The people of his kingdom often called him Hercules and Li'esco didn't plan on disappointing them anytime soon. Which is exactly how he found himself standing in front of the single most revolting creature he had ever known to exist, tightly gripping the handle of his father's mightiest sword.

In all honestly, Li'esco didn't know how to fight monsters. He had no idea how to skillfully mix hand-eye coordination with agility, precision, and strength to save the all the onlooking peasants his family ruled. What he did know how to mix was luck, reputation, and greed to make people think he was responsible for all the greatness brought to the nation. And because they would be executed otherwise, no one ever questioned him. 

It wasn't like his father didn't try with him. Everyone in their family lineage had been a hero, but no matter the lesson, the instructor, or the weapon, Li'esco was hopeless. He couldn't strategize, he couldn't fight, he couldn't lead. The one thing his father wished more than anything was that their country would never go to war. That way, they could keep saying the heir was just a private person who didn't like to flaunt his abilities. 

But now, that wasn't an option. At this point, Li'esco's brain was in full fight of flight mode, and every single part of him was screaming flight! Except even in the heat of the moment, he knew he would have no chance against the nine-foot monster. 

The monster's skin was tinged red and was covered in boils that grew and shifted on the surface of its body. It looked like a body builder but multiplied by ten. Li'esco could spot each one of the muscles and tendons bulging outwards. The thing possessed a countless amount of solid yellow eyes that were packed tightly on the top half of the creature's face. The mouth took up the rest of the face with foam dripping out of its lips and a set of jagged, uneven teeth. And if that wasn't bad enough, while Li'esco had one blade, the creature had twenty in the place where its fingers should've been. 

The handle of Li'esco's sword was covered in sweat to the point where he predicted the weapon would slip right out of his hand in a matter of seconds. The monster swiped a lethal claw down sloppily, no doubt testing whether Li'esco was a worthy opponent or not. It got its answer very quickly. It was a no. Li'esco just barely dodged the blades, surprising even himself, since he accepted that his feet were firmly planted in the ground. Well, even 'dodged' was a generous word. He flung his body to the side, face-planting into the dirt, a blood-curling scream escaping his lips on the way down. 

He scrambled back to his feet because even if he was a useless fighter, he remembered the one lesson that was drilled into him more than anything. Wounds on the front would mean he died fighting. Wounds on the back would mean he died a coward. 

He tried swinging his sword, surprised by the immense weight of it. The weapon slipped from his hand at last on the way to hitting the monster and hit with the flat of the blade. If he thought he had hit rock bottom then this was where he drilled his own way past rock bottom to center earth where the magma of the earth's core was hitting him in the face. This was Li'esco Worgana's ultimate 'oh crap' moment. 

As the monster's claws came down on him once again he didn't even try to move away. He couldn't. In a slow-motion moment, he accepted his death. In an out of body moment, he witnessed himself standing weaponless in front of this monster, eyes open and ready. He imagined his own bloody body sprawled on the gravel.

And then,

he died.