The Golden Island

 

There was once a king called Argex who was desperate to travel to the moon so that he could make a trade agreement with the moon people.
"They obviously have lots of silver on the moon", he said, "For I see it shining at night"
And so he had a giant catapult built, as large as a city.
Unfortunately, no matter how his engineers tinkered with its design, the rocks that they catapulted from it never seemed to reach the moon.
And so the catapult was left rotting and rusting away outside the city gates.
And, what is worse, the construction of the giant catapult had cost so much that the king had had to borrow lots of money and had run up enormous debts and both his nobles and the ordinary people though he had wasted the nations wealth on a mad foolish dream and so the king feared that they might, having lost confidence in him, try to overthrow him.
In desperation, he turned to his brave son Zarrick and asked him to lead an expedition to the island of Caphos where it had long been said there was a fog breathing monster called the Blethorap with a giant horde of treasure.
"You must go there and slay the monster and bring back as much treasure as you can", he said to his son.
And so Zarrick and a crew of thirty set off for the island in a sailing ship.
But he did not hold out much hope of slaying the Blethorap for it was well known that the island was surrounded by the constant, impenetrable fog that the creature breathed out and every ship that ventured into the fog was either smashed on the rocky coast or attacked and destroyed by the Blethorap.
However, Zarrik had instructed that a giant steel pole be carried on the ship and that it be held out infront of the ship by the crew as they were entering the fog like a giant blind mans cane, 
"Hopefully the pole will touch the rocks before the boat can crash into them", he said.
Unfortunately what the ships 'cane' touched was not the rocks, it was something gigantic that roared, had six glowing eyes and cast a huge shadow through the fog.
"Its the Blethorap!", Zarrik heard his crew men say, "We're doomed".
But Zarrik had an idea.
"Keep moving towards it", he commanded, "Row with all your might".
The men did not think much of Zarriks plan but they didn't see that they had any other choice and so, as Zarrik had instructed, they rowed towards the beast.
And as they did the vast pole that they were holding out in front was rammed into the monster, piercing its heart.
Then, thankfully, once the fog breathing creature was slain the fog that had surrounded the rocky island started to clear.
But then, to the astonishment of Zarrik and his whole crew they saw that the island of Caphos was entirely made out of gold.
"How can it be that there was a golden island here and we never knew about it?", some one in the crew asked.
"The fog kept it hidden", said Zarrik.
And when they went ashore they were amazed that even the sand upon its beach was gold dust and all the pebbles, gemstones.
But then they were greeted by the golden skinned women who lived on the island.
"You have killed the Blethorap", said one who looked like their queen angrilly.
"Why would you want such a monster to live?", asked Zarrik.
"The creature protected our golden island by keeping it hidden and killing any who dared enter the fog", said the Queen, "Now men know about it they will never stop coming until they have destroyed it all".
"We do not wish you any harm?", said Zarrik, "And you have so much gold here that surely you can spare some of it".
"Gold has no value to us?", said the woman, "Peace and tranquility are what we treasure here and thanks to you those things will be lost. You and your men must be punished".
"We will not submit to punishment", said Zarrik.
"You have no choice", said the woman, "I have released the other guardian of our island, the Bloodbeast".
"Bloodbeast?", asked Zarrik.
"It is a giant monster with an enormous nose that smells the scent of a man from thousands of miles away, that travels on land and sea and in the air. Whereever you go in the world it will follow you until it devours you. There is nowhere that you can run from it", said the woman.
And so Zarrik ordered that his men quickly take as much gold and jewels from the island as their ship could carry without sinking and then, when the ship was loaded up they cast off again.
But as they were sailing away from the island they saw a giant monterous creature, as large as the sun setting, crawl from the island into the sea, following them.
"Why doesn't it just eat us", asked one of the crew members of Zarrik, "Why does it just follow us?".
And the creature kept following them, doggedly, all the way back the shores of their homeland.
"What are we going to do?", his crew asked him as they disembarked from their ship, "Eventually that thing, when it has stopped toying with us will eat us".
But then Zarrik had another idea.
"Leave the gold and jewels for now", he said to his men, "We must return to my fathers city quickly".
And so, abandoning their ship upon the shore the men headed back to the city of King Argex and when they reached the city, Zarrik said to his father,
"Father. I have good news but also very bad news. The good news is that we slew the Bletharap and found, behind the fog, an island entirely made of gold that is all ours for the taking".
"That is excellent news", said his father smiling, "But what is the bad news?".
"Unfortunately, something followed us back", said Zarrik.
But then, from outside the walls of the city they heard a roar like the world splitting and then they saw the gigantic bloodbeast, like a moving mountain, coming closer to the city.
"That thing could easily destroy the city", said King Argex, "What are we going to do?".
"Don't worry", said Zarrik, "I think I know what to do".
Then Zarrik ordered his fathers army to roll forth the giant catapult; the catapult his father had built to send people to the moon and it was loaded up with the largest boulders they could find.
"It may not help men to reach the moon, father", he said, "But perhaps it can slay a titan".
And then, as the bloodbeast was in touching distance of the city gates, the giant catapult was released, a barrage of rocks striking the monsters head and knocking it over onto its side.
"Load the catapult again", shouted Zarrik to his soldiers.
And he was right to order that for the creature, though it had been knocked down, got back up again seemingly unphased and began biting holes out of the city walls.
But then Zarrik remembered something else that the Queen of the golden island had said, she had said that the creature had an enormous nose for smelling with and so he gave another order to his soldiers.
"Get black pepper", he said, "As much black pepper as you can and load that into the catapult aswell".
And so the soldiers went into the kings cellars and asked for all the pepper and all the spices that they had to be brought and loaded onto the catapult and then, when it was fully loaded, the catapult was launched towards the face of the towering bloodbeast.
And this time, not only was the creature knocked sideways but all the pepper and spices they had thrown at it got sucked up into the creatures ginormous and sensitive nose and it started to sneeze.
Infact it sneezed so much that it couldn't stop sneezing.
And while the creature was incapacitated, Zarrik ordered his father armies to attack it.
Then, the gates of the city opening wide, soldiers flooded out of it, roaring with their battle cries.
Unfortunately, fighting a giant sneezing monster is like fighting an errupting volcano but, with the courage of King Argex's forces it was not long before the creature was subdued and slain.
After that Zarrik made an agreement with the women of the golden island that they would supply gold to King Argex and in return their island would be left in peace just as the queen had wanted.
And king Argex forgot all about his dreams of travelling to the moon but it didn't matter, because with the new wealth he had brought to his people, he was the most popular king they had ever had.