The old man meditated regally upon his pedestal, gazing upon his apprentice with intensity.
"Oh Chosen One, for years you've trained under me, preparing for this day. You will set out upon your destiny to save this land from the undead-demon-dragon triad emperors. My mortal years are coming to their close, just as I once saved the world centuries ago, now it is your turn to take up this great and terrible burden to protect the mortal peoples from these rising tyrants."
"And now with the last of my magic, I bestow upon you, this enchantment. It shall be a part of your very being, as long as you exist, even as a concept across time and time as having EVER existed, this enchantment shall be impossible to remove in any shape or form. ... " The old man glowed, and that grow passed from him, and into the hero. The old looked to have aged a decade in a moment. "And this enchantment... it is impossible for you to be turned into any kind of female or non-male of any kind."
The hero stared for several seconds.
"... What?" Silence again before exclaiming, "WHAT?! What kind of final enchantment is that?!"
The old man coughed and sighed. "Why do we Chosen Ones always start out so naive? Adrian, trust me, this enchantment is going to save you in ways you can't even guess yet! This world is FILLED with creatures that enjoy the idea of getting rid of the thing between your legs either for fun and games, or their own greed, or they just think they're doing you a favor. ... Problem is that usually a million other changes come with it. Being turned into a dryad that only cares about the forest rather than the rest of the world. A mermaid that just wants to play all day while the town just off the shore burns. A siren whose only interested in growing their collection of slaves. Succubi demons who lose all sense of empathy and feed not on sex, but on broken relationships and wasted dreams. For some twisted reason, all these various enchantments seem fixated on reducing the population of men in the world.
"Trust me when I say you won't get five minutes down the path from the sanctuary without someone or something ambushing you and trying to turn you into a female something or other. I spent a year as a tavern girl before my friends snapped me out of it. Then then I was the dark lord harem girl for a month, and-"
"I get the idea Master Aron!" Adrian interrupted. He looked at his enchanted silver sword, and reflective mirror shield. Along with the countless alchemy ingerdients he'd been taught to master along with the fundamentals of magic. "So this is it then?"
"I doubt we'll ever see each other again boy. Go forth, don't worry about finding your destiny, trust me, as the Chosen One, your destiny will find you... whether you like it or not. First think I did as the Chosen One was change my name and move to a different town... it never works. Good luck Adrian, you will find friends and allies upon your path and objects of power you shall earn along the way. And never forget to help those in need."
"Yes Master Aron." Adrian bowed, and left the sanctuary that had now been his home for years.
---
Master Aron was wrong... it was three minutes. Going down the forest path Adrian had chosen, he randomly encountered a dryad. She looked at him and laughed. "What have we here? A new sister for our forest!" She made gestures and the naked plant woman let loose a green bolt of magic that hit you.
"And there we go. Your old memories gone. Your old name gone. Your old self gone. Nothing but another of our sisters to... to..." She looked at you confusion.
"HEY! Why aren't you a dryad now?!" She cast the spell again. And again. With still no result. "Hey! This isn't fair! You're supposed to be one of us already!" She stomped a foot. "This is no fun! I'm leaving!" She turned around and began to walk towards the nearest tree... but stopped with a look of fear. "... But.. if I go back without changing you... everyone will laugh at me! ... " She looked back at you determined. "I'm gonna turn you into a dryad no matter what!"
So the dryad kept following you, trying the same enchantment over and over and over, with no affect what so ever.
She kept following you... to the edge of the forest. She looked as scared as a fish about to leave water... She hesitated. But she gulped and followed after you.
You were impressed when she didn't run away when she saw the fires. And she did a good job of keeping up with you as you ran towards the burning town.
The people in the town, men, women, the elderly, children, and infants alike, were gathered up in the town square.
There was a vampiress holding a large black umbrella, doing her best to not look uncomfortable in the daytime. There was a tall muscular red dragonness, grinning at the flames. And finally a demon, feathery black wing spread wide behind him in dramatic fashion, his pale perfectly sculpted body on sight for all to see.
Surrounding the people were imps flying the air wielding pitch forks taller than themselves, skeleton soldiers standing like mindless golems wielding rusted but still deadly weapons, and finally red scaled kobolds wearing cheap mass produced armor and gear.
The hero had arrived just in time to hear the end of the demon's speech.
"And so our great empire was founded on the truth that mortals are inherently inferior to demons," the vampiress and dragoness glared at him. "And to undead and dragons. And subservience to us is your natural state. But we are not without mercy, surrender your bodies, minds, and memories to us, and you can join the superior species. Or you can languish as slaves for the rest of your finite lives... This won't be offered to you again."
"Uh-oh. Better run." said the dryad... you kept going. "What are you doing?!"
"My job." You said matter of fact.
"Your job is to die horrible?!" The dryaid said panicked.
"No. It's to save people."
"You can't save anyone! Those people are already doomed! Just leave them, come back to the forest, and remove whatever magic jewelry you're wearing to somehow cheat my magic and stay safe in the forest forever!"
"... You stay safe in your forest... Unless the triad empire comes to take it for its own. If you think you'll get a better deal as slaves for demons."
The Dryad looked stunned, and unsure.
"Excuse me! ... Messengers of the triad empire? This town isn't part of your domain, and won't be as long I am here... go home. Or face the consequences." Adrian called out.
"Huh?" The vampiress looked disinterested in you. "Looks like we missed one. Doomvak, have your pets take care of it."
The demon rolled his eyes. "Fine Quintess. You're doing so much right now. Imps. Disarm that human and bring it here."
"Yes sir!" One of the rubbery skinned imps saluted, her fang filled mouth grinning. "Get'em girls!"
The bright red imps charged at Adrian at once, forming a circle... big mistakes. A flash of silver as Afraid swung his sword in a ring of blessed metal... The imps screamed their bodies bisected, and burst into sulfur, their spirits kicked back to their native domain.
"... What the Emperor just happened?!" Doomvak declared.
"Was that... some sort of accident?" One of the villagers whispered.
The Vampiress laughed. "Doomvak your imps are completely out of practice! Can't even handle one human? What's next? Losing to a dwarf? A halfling? An elf? A band of gnomes? Heh. Sorry human, well, not really, but now we need to make an example... Skeletons. Kill that human, and bring me its head."
The skeletons mindlessly obeyed and marched toward Adrian. Adrian wasn't impressed. These weren't warriors spirits forced to reanimate their bones... these were mindless puppets animated by the necromantic curse. The automatons swung their weapons the same way, the same fighting style, Adrian moved like liquid, a years of cuts and bruises from being caught how to use the sword not going to waste. Chop. Slash. Smash! The skeletons fell like wheat.
"Oh that's cute." Quintess said, "Reanimate!" She command, and the bones began to rise again. The villagers calmly accepted this was where their hero died.
Adrian didn't give them a chance. The triads were not expected any human to dare attack them. He went straight for the vampire.
"Wha-WHAT ARE YOU DOING?! ARE YOU INSANE?!" Quintess shouted, Adrian cut her ornament umbrella in town, She caught fire immediately under the sun's light.
"FUCK!" She hissed, making a claw swipe at him even as she burned. When Adrian blocked her attack, she chose survival and leap into a nearby building through the window. Adrian leapt right after her, he grabbed her still smoldering arm and looked. Naturally, she looked back, ready to sink her fangs into his throat. Her strength was like iron, which was what Adrian had been counting on as he used her own momentum to tumble over her and throw her out a different window.
As Quintess got up, Adrain impaled her with his sword, sticking her to the ground. Quintess screamed as she burned to ash... Then the REAL Quintess' soul rose up. She whispered, "Thank you!" Before vanishing to the afterlife.
Without their mistress' will and magic, the skeletons stood about like mindless paperweights.
The people were left in awe. The mystique of their enemies shattered. One human... had just killed a vampire? What was going on?
"Is this a dream?" Asked a barmaid confused.
The kobolds actually looked scared. Their first impulse being to hide behind their dragon, but she hadn't commanded them to retreat, so they couldn't.
"You... you... YOU WORTHLESS APE! HOW DARE YOU!" Roared the demon. "I'LL TEAR YOUR ARMS AND LEGS OFF! Then turn you into my harem woman, with only the tiniest hint of who you once were in your mind as I hump you again and again and again for eternity! In fact! Why don't we get that part of the way first!" Doomvak fired a bolt of magic, it hit Adrian... And nothing happened. Doomvak growled and cast the same spell again to again no result.
The dryad felt a bit better about herself.
"FRAUD! FAKE! IMPOSTER! What farce is this?! I'll rip your manhood off myself!" Doomvak swore.
The dragonness calculated. The imps were gone and wouldn't return in time to make a different. The skeletons were now useless without a necromancer to give them new orders. Quintess was gone (the dragoness found that amusing). And there was no way her kobolds could fight this human. And he had at least one powerful protective ward around him.
She knew Doomvak would rip her wings off if she tried to take advantage of him attacking this troublemaker by attacking it at the same time (what humans called "help"). Demons weren't anything if not proud. Still... she felt confident that Doomvak would take care of this pest... right?