Phil starts to think he should rack up some heroic deeds of his own after running into Chiron, a rival who has experience with doing rather than simply teaching.
This episode includes examples of the following tropes:
- An Aesop:
- If you try to do something, start small, don't immediately try to do the hard stuff. Phil learns it painfully in a Failure Montage during several failed attempts of defeating monsters.
- There's more of being a hero than just rescuing people or defeating monsters that are attacking a town. Even something simple as helping someone in their time of need can make you a hero in their eyes.
- Brown Note Being: Looking into the Catoblepas' eyes leaves the person frozen in place. Phil deals with this by blindfolding Hercules.
- Brutish Bulls: The Catoblepas essentially looks like a huge bull with a bronze hide and a stupefying gaze. As one would expect, it rampages quite a bit.
- Extreme Omnigoat: Phil eats some of Hercules' trash after they go to Speedy Pita.
- Lawful Stupid: An Obstructive Bureaucrat almost forbids Hercules from fighting the Catoblepas because he doesn't have a license. "Deadly chaos is no excuse for breaking the law!" Fortunately he both issues a training license, which lets him fight until 5:00 (which is in 6 minutes) and has the courtesy to get incapacitated by the Catoblepas before that time limit becomes relevant.
- Heart Is an Awesome Power: Phil doesn't fight monsters himself (which Chiron mocks him about) but he does know a lot of things about them that are necessary to defeat them. This allows him to become a hero by instructing his student.
- Jerkass: Chiron mocks Phil every chance he gets, and his guide on being a hero culminates in him mocking the reader, saying they will never be a hero.
- Logical Weakness: The Catoblepas has a hide made of bronze, which means the spear Hercules tries to use against it bounces off. Since its skin is made of metal, it also means it sinks once it falls into the sea.
- Super Drowning Skills: The Catoblepas sinks like a stone when it falls into the sea. Justified as its skin is made of bronze, so it's much heavier than a flesh and blood animal.
- Too Dumb to Live: The bureaucrat walks up to the Catoblepas to tell it something, an unwise thing to do to a rampaging bull monster even if one doesn't know about its other powers. He promptly gets frozen when he meets its gaze.
