Being
the chosen one sucks. It means you don’t
really get a childhood. Oh sure, you
have a few carefree years running around with the other kids, playing like some
normal child. But eventually, usually
around the time puberty hits, you are forced to abscond from everything
familiar, everything you know and love, and go on some grand adventure, usually
with a bunch of people you don’t know, who tell you that growing up on the farm
was a huge mistake, or for your protection, and you’re the subject of some
prophecy, or a long lost heir to a far-away kingdom. As if puberty didn’t suck enough all on its
own.
No, now
you gotta spend your days running and your nights hiding, learning to fight or govern,
or some complex system of magic because, it turns out, the whole world is
riding on your shoulders. Does anyone
ever stop and think what that sort of pressure does to a kid? I mean, there are full-grown adults who can’t
handle the pressures of their work-a-day lives, let alone being the savior of
all mankind. And now, you gotta shoulder
it at the tender age of 13? And that’s
if you’re lucky. Some start even
earlier, if the storybooks are to be believed.
Now,
don’t get me wrong – there are definitely some perks. You get to run a kingdom and everyone jumps
to obey your every command (once you’ve been crowned). Often, you get to master the arcane arts and
shape the very fabric of reality to your whim.
But typically, there’s some archmage, evil emperor or warped demi-god
who’s out for your blood. And the perks
typically only come if you survive. Now,
sure, there’s a prophecy that says everything’s gonna go your way, but you can’t
really count on that, can you? I mean,
if you could, the guy on the other side wouldn’t even bother showing up to the
final battle, because all hope would be lost for him. And even if you CAN count on the prophecy, all
it says is that you’re gonna win. It
doesn’t say anything about you surviving, or coming out the other side unscathed. I’ve seen some pretty righteous cases of PTSD
in my short life. In fact, the guy
teaching me how to swing a sword seems to be rocking a pretty bad case and he’s
only fought in some minor battles.
Perhaps
the most unfair thing about the whole situation is that it’s not balanced. Presumably, the emperor, archmage or demi-god
on the other side got to have a childhood and grow into their evil ways. It’s not like there’s some dark prophecy that
says they’re gonna go off and overthrow my ancestor, causing me to go into
hiding (or if there is, no one’s told me about it). But come on – whose ever heard of a tiny
tyrant who threatens to take over the world?
No one, that’s who. The teenager
always has to go up against the guy in the height of his power, who’s had years
to hone his skills. Meanwhile, I’ll be
lucky to have a year to learn how to wield a sword and magic well enough to
somehow scrape by against someone with a lifetime of experience. How, exactly, is this a good deal for me?
In the
end, I respect the role I have to play.
I mean, what’s my option? Go back
to the farm and let the bad guy win? You
think he’s gonna leave me be? Of course
not. Still, in many ways, I envy the
boys I grew up with back on the farm.
They get a couple more years of irresponsibility and goofing off before
they go off to an apprenticeship, or get more important roles in the daily life
of the farm. And the biggest decision
they’ll ever have to make is whether to plant corn or barley. They’ll likely never know that the fates of
their entire lives rest on my narrow shoulders.
They’ll pick up a hoe instead of a sword. They’ll get to marry the girl they’ve grown
up knowing, rather than the stuck up princess they just met. Yeah – I miss life on the farm. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got a demi-god
to kill.
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