text: After dousing each other with water from a nearby well, you and Luca quickly change into clean clothes and ride to meet your father at the western end of the village. A thick road travels from the armory-stables for a mile out before it disappears into a thicker forest, lush and with green and full of fattened boars who spend their days scouring the ground for tasty roots or tastier eggs. No doubt, even father's hunting party would have managed to capture a hog worth remembering.
  
  But today, something was off. The riders emerged out of the brush not in a brisk trot, laden down with the spoils of the hunt, but in a faster canter. There was no formation, either. It was as if they scattered in the forest and made individual beelines for the town without regrouping. Some horses came from the left, other the right, seemingly without pattern. And where were the others? More than 40 riders and a handful of servants had left in the early morning. You count barely 20.
  
  Desperately, you scan the armor of the survivors, finally relieved when you see your father's insignia on a black stallion's helmet - a gold-adorned book. Ralin is a respected king, but he cares more about the wisdom of his court than the welfare of his people. Born rich through the hard-earned taxes paid by those loyal to his father, Ralin spent his money not on necessities but on silver vases, rich cloth-of-gold, marbled statues and commissioned paintings. If it came at a reasonable price it was not permitted in his castle. He even purchased original manuscripts in Greek, Latin and Hebrew which he himself was unable to read. Luca once said they wouldn't have been worth reading anyway. He was probably right.
  
  Dismounting with the help of Garik, his man-at-arms, Ralin leads you and the remainder of the entourage into the castle's chamber of reflection, a room with a thrusted stage surrounded on three sides by tiered seating. In the center, a table where maps could be laid out and figurines positioned to discuss and plan strategy. Garik had not always been by Ralin's side. As he was not of noble birth, the king distrusted the soldier when he first came to the court in exile from another land where he fought for the losing side. Having been given the opportunity to make an impression, Garik won favor on the battlefield and once even saved the king's life, becoming one of his most-trusted advisors in the process. Impatiently, you tap him on the shoulder and glare, your eyes asking the only question - 'what happened?'
  
  As he takes his helmet off getting ready to speak you suddenly understand. His eyebrows singed off his face and his left cheek a dry and waxy landscape of red and crisp black. You think, he says, in tandem: "dragon."
  
  "We saw two beasts today the likes of which we had never seen before. The first was a boar, stronger and faster than a dozen of his brethren. Nine feet long and likely over a thousand pounds, he would have fed the town for a week and a day. We should have given up when after an hour of stalking he proved that he could outrun us, but your father is not a practical man. Once he sees the greatest instance of anything desirable, he demands to have it for himself. Convinced that the great boar would tire before our horses, he pressed us on until we had gone deeper into the forest than ever before. When we finally caught up to the boar, it had been caught itself, its carcass licked clean by the second beast: a fire-breathing dragon. Its nostrils puffing plumes of airy smoke in contentment, it might not have noticed us if we had but turned around and fled, but alas your father was curious about this beast, too. King Ralin always instructs us that knowledge is chiefly important and necessary for he who is ignorant has nothing in his mind that merits being said. As he puts it, 'whoever heard of a silent king?'"
  
  "Better a dumb fool than a dead sage"
  
  "Indeed. King Ralin sent his most graceful courtier to approach the dragon. Bowing, the courtier respectfully communicated that we meant no harm and wished only to learn the dragon's ways and to receive permission to explore its chosen lair for food and lumber. The dragon, though it obviously understood him, cocked its head to the side as if considering a different question. Making up its mind, in a matter of seconds it ate first the courtier and then the courtier's horse. Then it realized it was surrounded by all manner of courtiers and horses. Then it realized it was still hungry. We were in disarray. A few brave souls charged the dragon in glorious combat while the rest of us scattered in all directions away from it before fleeing home, painfully aware that we were ill-equipped to fight it. By then too fattened to give chase, the dragon unleashed a circle of fire, roasting alive those closest. I barely escaped with my life. It roared that we were quite tasty and that when hungry again it would come and eat the rest of us. Perhaps it would have been smarter to run the other way but fear overcame us and we fled for the comfort of home. Now it knows where we live, and its coming."
  
  By now, everyone had taken their seat and Ralin was ready to speak. He had just finished rolling out a meticulously drawn out map of the surrounding lands. He himself was an artist because he considered it very noble and worthy in itself, but in times of war when it was necessary to plan out a strategy, there was great utility in drawing of towns, forests, and surrounding farmland. Looking out into the audience, he paused as if to process the reason for why the room was unusually empty.
  
  "My friends, today is a terrible day. We have built our town mere miles away from a bloodthirsty dragon. Perhaps if we never approached him we would have continued to farm and hunt and thrive in peace without incident, but we no longer have the luxury of dwelling on the past. The time will come to mourn, but now is the time to survive. According to my books, dragons eat about once a week. Our friends' deaths, as meaningless as they may seem, have bought us a little time to prepare. That being said, I'm open to suggestions as to what to do next."
  
  Garik, his burnt face still peeling, was the first to offer a suggestion. "We ride out to kill it. Upon my honor and the honor of my fallen comrades and the honor of all our ancestors, we cannot let this beast live. If we wait for it to come to us, it will choose when and how to engage, slowly roasting us one by one until we no longer have the strength to resist it." As if to play devil's advocate, Garik shivered in pain from his wound for a moment until Luca rushed over and steadied him.
  
  "While I would normally agree that war is not to be avoided, but is only put off to the advantage of your enemy, in this case I would counsel that it is more prudent to defend from within the castle walls than to fight the dragon on the open battlefield. We have sufficient supplies within the towns' fortifications to last a year's time, and there is more than enough static artillery to fend off the dragon, the wielding of which would be difficult in the plains and impossible in the forest. We must handle this danger practically, no matter how much the loss of our brothers may make our blood boil.
  
  The king, motioning for further input and receiving none, turns to you.
  
  "My son, there are a great number of things which I am good at, and I once thought that by virtue of those skills I was good at all the other skills, too, but I am no great leader. I am an adviser, a counsel, a scribe, but it is not my place to determine our wisest course of action. In this time of great crisis, I recognize my flaws and pass the crown of leadership unto you. What should we do?"
  
  > bunker down in the safety of the castle walls and let the dragon raze the countryside: Go to section 4
  It would be several days before the dragon was expected to reach the palace walls.
  
  Even if the fields abandoned, save for a few sacrificial livestock to buy additional time, the kingdom could not hold out forever. It had sufficient supplies to last for months, maybe even through the winter, but if the lands were not replanted in the spring starvation would quickly follow.
  
  With a decimated standing army after the initial encounter with the dragon, there are not enough able-bodied men to take care of all the preparations. The city needs to be fire-proofed, lookouts need to be stationed in case the dragon arrived earlier than anticipated or if a neighboring kingdom decided to invade in your time of weakness, and guards need to be sent out with the countryside messengers to make sure they aren't ambushed while informing everyone that they need to get themselves and their family within castle walls.
  
  > send your soldiers to protect the messengers as they inform the countryside of the imminent threat: go to section 5
  Riders are sent out to warn the farmers in the fields around town of incoming danger, accompanied by a contingent of armed soldiers. Thankfully, King Ralin insisted on conducting a census every eight years and the palace messengers are reasonably confident that they know the locations of everyone under his protection had needs to be warned.
  
  > go to section 7
  But all the preparation in the world means nothing when you're fighting a fire-breathing, flying dragon. How on earth are you supposed to kill it? If you get close enough to fight it will simply take to the skies and roast you from afar. Perhaps an arrow to the eye might bring it down, but that's a long shot.
  
  You need to get help, but from whom? There is the kingdom of Merrywed to the North and Thundershield to the East. You have long-standing diplomatic relations with the king of Merrywed, and he has previously offered his daughter's hand in marriage in exchange for an agreement of free trade and mutual protection. You are unsure that the offer of marriage still stands while you are under attack, or even if his soldiers would be enough to drive away the dragon. Alternatively, you could approach the mighty Thundershields and hire yourself a battalion of fearsome but untrustworthy mercenaries. If you are uncomfortable with asking a neighboring kingdom for help, perhaps it is best to look inward and ask your father for advice. He is no great leader, but a wise tactician.
  
  > approach your father for help: go to section 10.
  Worried, you come to your father in his chambers for advice.
  
  The room is a mess. Papers and various scrolls are spread across the table and scattered across the floor. In a corner is a collection of plates with bits of food still in them. It appears that in this time of struggle your father has gone mad with uncertainty about the kingdom and retreated to the comfort of the writings of long-dead authors, leaving you to take care of those who still live. Pathetic. Noticing you come in, Ralin beckons you over.
  
  "Come, come my son. I've found it! Here, take a look at this diagram, and remember that you should always be on guard and keep from falsely persuading yourself of that which you do not know. The practice of arms pertains to both mind and body, and while your men out there practice with useless swords and spears, these letters will be our true salvation. I found it in one of my Greek texts on the art of war."
  
  Puzzled, you take a look at a drawing of what appears to be sort of an elaborate crossbow.
  
  "It's called a gastraphetes, loosely translated as a 'belly releaser.' Our bows are easy to use but are likely too weak to
  pierce a dragon's hide. Rather than pulling on a string, you wield it by pushing down on the slider with your stomach and applying the full weight of your body achieve a level of torsion which would be impossible with only the strength of your arm. Quickly, take it down to the craftsman's guild and see if they can recreate it in time to use it to shoot down the dragon."
  
  Impressed beyond words, you embrace your father. Luca, for all his conviction that a prince out to have no other aim or thought than war and its rules and discipline, would never have devoted the time to learn ancient Greek on the off chance that that it would help defeat dragons. He always argued that evils can be dealt with only when they have been foreseen, but that when permitted to grow in a way that everyone can see them there is no longer a remedy. No one could have predicted the coming of the dragon, and it was now imminently upon us, but through the civic art of letters father found a way to make up for lost time. Perhaps we are not doomed after all.
  
  You rush off to the bowyer's guild and are relieved when told that the design is well documented and they will be able to quickly construct dozens of such weapons. It will take a long time to reload but the strength of its shot will certainly be several times stronger than what can currently be imparted to even their most supple bows. By week's end over twenty gastraphetes are stored in strategic positions around the town, half along the perimeter, and thirty soldiers are training day-in day-out to shoot them accurately.
  
  > go to section 12
  It actually took a few weeks for the dragon to get make its way to the castle walls. There were plenty of fat sheep in the surrounding farmland, and it reportedly enjoyed setting the already cut wheat grass on fire, and houses too. The people grow restless, but at Luca's instructions you overcome such difficulties by giving at one time hope to your subjects by reassuring them that when the dragon comes you will kill it and at the same time inspiring fear in them by recounting the gruesomeness of the dragon and inspiring loyalty in those subjects most likely to be bold and dare advocate another course of action. But when it finally comes, you are ready – and hope it isn't ready for you.
  
  Soaring from afar, it lands and perches on the city wall as if out of respect surveying its glorious meal before consuming it. It lets out a horrific screech. Maybe it has no honor after all and just wants you to be afraid. You aren't. A good prince plans for the forseeable, and this was a long time coming. On your command, you signal Garik to charge the dragon with a javelin. His face still visibly scarred from his first encounter with the dragon, he was brave volunteering for the position of aggravating decoy. It was as he put it 'a matter of honor. I was welcomed into this kingdom an exile, and returned the favor by saving King Ralin's life and becoming his loyal servant. I faltered in that service when I let my brethren get eaten by that beast. Now I must end it, or let it end me. To live without making up for my failures would bring too great a shame upon my ancestors.' And he is a brave sight indeed, charging alone a beast two score his size.
  
  But he isn't alone. As he heaves his javelin at the dragon, catching its attention with a laudable scrape across the lower jaw, it spreads its wings and lunges at him. Never was a threat so great such a perfect target. On cue, the hidden archers all along the city wall let loose a volley of crossbow bolts, aiming for the sinewy leather of the dragons' wings. No less than seven find their mark, the others glancing off or barely piercing its scaly hide, and the dragon loses its balance in the air and goes into a tailspin, crashing more than forty feet off its mark while Garik scrambles to safety. Enraged and bereft of any easy targets, the dragon lets loose a torrent of fire, engulfing the nearby building and threatening with roasting the archers seated on the rooftops while they scramble to jump off the safer side or leap to a nearby building. But key houses were leveled in preparation, and the fire does not spread.
  
  The remaining archers who are unaffected continue to reload and shoot, the dragon surviving most projectiles but getting intermittently nicked and bruised by the powerful shots of incoming metal. It cab no longer fly away to safety. After it is partially subdued, it attempts to get away but there is no hope. The archers advance, staggering their shots while the others reload so that at no point the dragon has the freedom to move around uncontested.
  
  It was at this point that Garik did something both unnecessarily brave and somewhat stupid. Even though the dragon had little chance of hurting anyone else – at most it could burn down another few buildings – Garik could stand its existence no longer. If anyone had the right to deliver the killing blow, it was him. Uttering a guttural yell that answered the dragon's challenge of when it first reached the city, he charges at the beast with yet another spear, aiming to stab it to the throat. The dragon, warned by his cry, whipps around in time and sucks in a dangerous breath. Had a skilled archer not taken the initiative, Garik would likely have been roasted alive right then and there, but a lone arrow flies true through the cold air and catches the dragon right in its eye, jerking its flaming maw in an angle sharply away from where Garik charges. Seizing the advantage, though burned somewhat by the hot fire, Garik makes a heroic leap and skeweres the dragon downwards through its head. With his remaining strength, he ropes his arms around its throat and strangled it to death, before collapsing to the ground from the combined force of his wounds and exhaustion. The dragon is a threat no more.
  
  Without delay, you shout orders to your people. Put out the fires! Carry the wounded to the infirmary, Garik first! Spread the word that people may return to their surrounding lands! After several hours of cleaning up the battle's aftermath, as if on cue your people take in unison a deep breath and let out a deafening cheer. The dragon is dead and your people are safe. Like your grandfather, you proved yourself a strong prince who won the loyalty of his subjects. Bribes keep your people in line while the treasury remains full and their lives aren't threatened, but when you successfully save them from a threat only you could have defended against, they become willing to follow you forever. More challenges lie ahead, but for now take a break. Feast.
  
  The End