Harald Harding

Harald Harding is an adventure book and motion picture series published in the absolute royal federation and has reached rather high popularity amongst young men and boys alike. Depicting the adventures of the long family line of the fictional Harding household, a long line of adventurers and gunslingers that over the years have been involved in high adventure all over what is today the Absolute royal federation no matter how little sense such adventures make from a historical standpoint. The most outrageous example of this is "Harald Harding 16; Amongst the death worshippers!" that takes place in Sydvinland at the height of the footland wars where the various mountain kingdoms tried to ensure dominance over the mountain foothills from the coastal city states despite Scanderan contact with the Sydvinlanders being unrecorded at the time.

The average book is very formulaic in it's structure and most of the Harald Hardings are very interchangeable with no noticeable personality changes between them nor any defining features. Something that is specially odd as most of the main characters have married foreign women over the cause of the series. Something that makes the trademark blue eyes and blond braided hair always described in the protagonists odd. In the movies have this fact been made rather more obvious as the actor Birke Belvaldssen have to date played ever single Harald Harding.

Often compared to the Tales of Rikard Guardsman due to both being adventure stories aimed at younger audiences and filled with morals and other useful tips have some people noticed that while Rikard Guardsman tends to be more about preparing boys for soldiering are Harald Harding more individualistic and tends to teach it's reader more generaly useful things. Good examples of this is that while very historically inaccurate is the book and movie series very good for wilderness survival lessons. Often does these take the form of being very descriptive of how the Haralds find drinkable water, skin animals, or catch fish and the end of the books often include shorter comic sections where these lessons are repeated with pictures where Harald explain to the reader how to best go around such tasks.

Stories

Name	Published	Takes place	Summary
Hard as oak.	1995	1995	This adventures follow the modern harald Harding as he is forced to fight of an evil cult intent on bringing about their evil necromantic leader in Sfartmård north of the Vedian mountains.
Harder still	1997	1997	The adventures of Harald continues in Vinland as he and his trusty elf must hurry to find an ancient temple lost far in the Vinlander forests before an evil business baron can discover it and use the treasures there for evil.
Hard on Heresy.	1998	1243	The earliest story as an distant ancestor of the Haralds must defend an important forest road against a band of EinIld heretics wanting to scout a road through the interior to attack the heartland of the Orthodox gudaföljare during the religious wars. This is a very odd scenario as it seems to forget that the woodlands were held by the björkists, a third heretical faith that were hostal to both sides.
Hard and Blue.	1999	1830	Harald and his trusty sidekick

Characters

Harald Hardings

Every Harald Harding is essentially the same character all over the book series and is played by the same actor, Björn auf Hardakra, no matter which Harald it is about. However in theory does the series cover events ranging from the religious conflicts in the 12th century right up to the modern day and age. No matter the era is he generally depicted as a rugged individual that tends to be as home in the ballrooms of high society as he is with the commonry and the wilderness. They are all said to be blond with long hair that is tied up in the back in a military ponytail. Their eyes are always described as deep blue with a duelling scar running over their right chin.

Their skills are always depicted as being rather good knife fighters and gunslingers, earlier depictions have this changed for just skills with shortswords. He is a good horseman with good grasp of languages but other generally masculine skills such as painting.

Kirke Kniveara

Kirke is the line of loyal elven manservants and followers of the Haralds and there have so far always been an Kirke supporting every Harald in each book. In the latest books however were the latest man of the bloodline freed and with the sudden realignment on slavery in the federation did the bookseries take a more abolitionist turn even if having supported slavery wholeheartedly prior to the liberation. They are generally depicted as woodsmen and despite having been in the Harding household's service for several generations are they all born and raised in the mountainous Scanderan wilderness. While not as good a shot as the Haralds are they often the better knife fighters.

Homare Sawa

Homare Sawa is a character from Malgrave and compared to both the Kirkes and Haralds just one character that first showed up in "The Malgravean plot". She is noted for actually being a good representation of Malgraveans, and stand at the oddly correct height of 159 cm which is surprisingly correct. She is generally seen as a very smart character and provides Harald with technological expertise as well as research. She is officially the cook and accountant of the Harding household.

One mistake in the Malgravean plot is that she was revealed to be an impoverished member of Malgravean nobility which would not be possible due to the lack of a Malgravean nobility. This was however clarified in later books where it was explained that she descended from a Paragon and she mentioned she just used Imerian terms to make it easier for Harald to understand her position in society.

Kour Kourisdottir

• Real name needed*

Books and movies

The books and movies are widely different in tone, while the books takes a more realistic and down to earth perspective that is very educational in how to survive wilderness and the fight scenes are often tense affairs between very few fighters are the movies on the other hand more epic. They have vastly unrealistic scenes as are common in Scanderan movies where the heroes perform feats that would be impossible in reality. Examples include Harald jumping off a horse in full sprint and make a sudden halt, then preceding to shoot both Magazines at a crowd of enemies before grabbing onto an oncomming car and being dragged along with no injuries to which he precedes to simply beat up the trio of men driving.

Compare this to the scene in the book it was inspired from when Harald simply rode past the car, narrowly avoiding a collision as he unleashed his magazine into the drivers seat severely wounding him causing the car to spin.