Harkness is absolutely not a hero—but unfortunately for him, he’s been volunteered by his village to save the world, and he quickly finds that modern-day sarcasm is no match for ancient dragons.

Harkness, a medieval peasant with a millennial’s mindset, is quite happy to sit back and make quips while everyone else does the hard work. His calculated laziness is interrupted when the gods send an ancient and terrible scourge-by-dragonfire upon his village, and he is forced (peer-pressured, really) into trying to save his fiancée from the dragon who has kidnapped her.

When Harkness is sent by the village elder to find the one weapon that is capable of killing the beast, his real plan is to go off on his own and use his village’s money to live the high life. This, of course, would require ditching his two companions: Karla, an aspiring troubadour whose passion makes up for her lack of adventuring skills, and Aldric, whose kindheartedness does not make up for his lack of intelligence. Harkness sees this journey as a paid vacation under the pretense of world-saving, but it quickly turns serious when he realizes what’s at stake when he is forced to actually care about something—or at the very least, pretend to.

Born and raised near Charleston, South Carolina, Benjamin Gamble always had a passion for writing. He has written Dragons Suck, a novel about the worst person you knew from high school having to save the world. With past jobs as a camp counselor and a waiter, he has dealt with monsters far more horrifying than the ones in his book. His next novel is currently in publication talks.