CLXXXI. Legen: Sir Pelial and the Left-Handed Knight

*This story was meant to be published before the event, but due to unforeseen circumstances that became impossible. Now it can serve as a tribute to Don Manos. May he rest in peace. For now...

Don Manos was the second son of an influential lord. His martial prowess was considerable and he would have gained much renown, except for the fact that he was left-handed. Forced to wield a lance with his weaker right hand, he brought great shame to his family by ending last in a big jousting tournament.
 

Riddled by guilt and humiliation, he set off into the world on a quest to restore his honor by performing noble deeds. He was accompanied by a small group of retainers, most of whom died along the way. Only the squire Panchos remains, too stubborn to die and too loyal to abandon his master.
 

As time went by, Manos' mental and physical state kept worsening. No matter how many brigands he slew, how many nights he stood in vigil, how many people he saved, he could not remove the stain of shame. As years passed, he became increasingly unhinged and obsessed with hands, which brought him so much misfortune. He has taken up a disgusting habit of displaying the severed hands of his enemies. Even this has done little to soothe his troubled soul.
 

During his wanderings, Don Manos has heard rumors of a group of Gargants converging on a small village. Determined to protect the villagers from this onslaught, Manos knows this will likely be his final battle. He cares not. Redemption is at hand.

Sir Pelial of Turm and Don Manos met not long before the Battle of Dol. They both tracked down a Gargant, and wanted to test their strength against him. The knights agreed to join forces.

The Gargant Manson had heard of Nerod and his herd. It did not interest him much. He was perfectly fine where he was - he spent his time in the wilderness, occasionally coming down to the lowlands to take away a few pigs or a cow from farmers. This upset them, of course. They even sent some armed men to find him and kill him in the woods a few times. But they were obivously not trying that hard.

This time was different. As Manson walked up to a farm, a pair of mounted knights were waiting for him, their lances ready. They spurred ther horses and charged at the giant.

Surprised by their ferocity, Manson barely withstood the attacks. Their sticks broke, so they began swinging their swords and slashing at the giant's legs. 

One well-timed slash from Don Manos left the monster handless. Shocked and in pain, the Gargant took off, howling and clutching his stump. The knights and their warhorses were too exhausted to take pursuit, and Manson got away. 

Don Manos added the giant's hand to his collection of grisly trophies. It was so large that Panchos, his squire, could hoist it as a banner of sorts. The knights continued their journey together, and very soon they would fight side by side in the Battle of Dol.

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Manson the giant ended up joining Nerod just so he could take revenge on the two knights. Unfortunately for him, he was the first giant to die during the Battle of Dol.

Don Manos fought Nerod himself, but did not survive. Panchos was killed by the Legen-King's Prophet, too, when he attempted to retrieve his fallen master's body. Manos' remains stayed in the village, as he was the only one with no retainers left alive to take them home. 

Sir Pelial was sad to see his new friend die. He made sure to send word to his family of his noble sacrifice. Sir Pelial's losses were not half as great. His hound fled during the battle and is nowhere to be found. The animated skeleton he had was destroyed by one of the Gargants, sadly beyond repair. The Aelf and Westott the Tracker both lived and decided to remain in Pelial's service. 

Pelial claimed the village of Dol for himself. The villagers are very cross with their lord for leaving them at the mercy of a horde of giants, so they quickly accepted one of their saviours as their new master. Vvolos was pleased. But there is a lot of work still ahead for Pelial. The Gargant carcasses littering the village must be cleared, the damaged cottages repaired, the evacuated peasants returned to their homes. And if he means to keep Dol as his property, he will have to defend it from its former owner. I'm glad my knight survived the fight and ended up where he is. There's a lot of potential for continuation of Sir Pelial's story, and I hope some day I will do just that. But now I'll let him rest for a while, as there are a few new and exciting projects I want to move on to.

 

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Don Manos was my brother Ivan's knight for the Legen event. Ivan came up with the backstory and the design. I converted the models to his specifications.

The knight is an Empire knight on top of a Bretonnian horse. I had to switch the lance to his left hand and shield to the right. Most of the trophy hands hanging from the steed and shield are press mould copies of hands from a metal Chaos Knight shield.When he left his home, Manos stopped displaying his family's coat of arms and using their name. He painted his shield black. As he gradually went mad, he adopted three hands as his personal heraldry, which he now represents with actual severed human hands. People he wants to help often flee before him in terror...

Panchos, the squire, rides atop a donkey. This was a toy antelope that I heavily converted with putty. These two are obviously partly based on Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, that's why Ivan wanted a donkey for the squire's mount.

During the Battle of Dol, Panchos used Manson's lost hand to taunt the Gargants. This proved very useful as it distracted them and helped the knights a great deal.

The lovely panicked peasants in the story above came from Saul Painter. My favourite is the running one. Sadly, they arrived late and missed the actual event. But they came in handy for this tale, so they haven't travelled all this way in vain.

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This big bearded creature is a Leshi, a forest demon. Painted something for fun after a little break from the hobby. Legen was great, but it ended up causing a burnout in me.

The model was sculpted by Vladimir during our evenings drinking on and around the days of the Legen event. The guy has a habit of carrying a little sculpting kit with him, with a few tools and super fast-curing putty for sculpting on the go. Pretty cool!