++From the Writings of Kyvaine; the Inheritor, Hero of the Ten Realms, Saviour of all the lands, vanquisher of evil and master of arts most arcane. Journal One, entry one. Introduction.++

  Let’s get one thing clear to begin with, I’m a bloody coward. I was when I started, and believe it or not I’m even more cowardly now. Yes, yes. I did kill all those monsters and demons and whatnot, but not because I wanted to. This record serves as a true, unbiased account of what happened over the course of my somehow-legendary life. It will probably never see the light of day, because those whoremongers in Catun and the Imperial Council have, for all their disagreements, ever been unanimous on lying about me.

  Yes, the truth is a prize greater than anything except God’s love. Yes, the Empire was founded upon intellectual enlightenment and the search of answers. No, this does not mean either of those packs of bastards are actually going to follow their own preaching. I keep people happy. My existence, as this big, epic hero, makes people confident in the Empire and certain that God is watching their back. So the lie is maintained. If that’s shocking to you, you’re as naive as I was.

  And fuck, was I naive.

  I’m writing this record because it’s important to me that some documentation exists to let the world know what a little shit I was, even if it never sees the light of day. Because I was such a little cockwart that it feels some kind of ontological violation that the fact not be committed to writing.

  This is going to, in no small part, be an angry sort of story. Contemptuous, and somewhat…scattered. I’ve never had much of a gift for conveying my thoughts—not when I’m not manipulating someone that is. So don’t go into this expecting some flawless continuity or well-researched document.

  On the other hand, Asira is reading through it and editing for me. Because it really wouldn’t be a “Kyvaine” story without some woman doing most of the work and getting none of the credit.

  Be prepared to get angry at this, to feel rage at the sheer injustice of the world. And know that even now as I write it, I’m one of the wealthiest men alive. Life really isn’t fair.

  I wasn’t always of course, no. Like all good heroes I came from a more humble place than I marched towards. I was only the son of the wealthiest merchant in my town of Sheppleberry. My father was what you might call a “big shit”, by the way. I want to get that clear right away. I wasn’t some victim of circumstance of course, oh no, but that old bastard was in no way better than the little prick he squirted into a woman.

  This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

  All he cared about was money, which is fair enough. Money, whoring and drinking. Also fair enough. Everybody hated him, but everybody pretended otherwise because, tight-fisted though he was, the stupid arsehole owned most of the town’s caravans. Even the local lord—Baron Levoir—had to defer to him. Or, at least, not boss him around when they weren’t around other Peers.

  My father was actually quite a clever man, to credit him for the only thing in all the world he deserved credit for. Shrewd, knew how to control people, get them to do as he pleased. I could, too. And I reckon I got it from him. What I did not get from him were my good looks, those all came from my mother.

  She was a whore, nothing short of bought by my father from Tirkan. Foreign to the land of Anglyn, though not the wider continent of Uros. She was, to this day, one of the most beautiful women I’ve ever seen, dark skinned and with hair like pitch. I was a little shit in a thousand ways, but even I could appreciate my mother. She was clever, and kind. Which meant that by the time I was nearing manhood she spent most of our time together smacking me across the head for one thing or another—all of which was deserved.

  It was on my mother’s insistence that I learned to read, which at the time I thought was an embarrassing, womanly thing to do. You know. Because I was a fucking idiot. She also tried to teach me not to go around whoremongering like my father, which, rather unusually for one of her efforts, was a spectacular failure.

  When I wasn’t being dragged around to learn the family business by my father, or given fruitless moral lessons by my mother, I tended to pass the time by chasing skirts and kicking the shit out of the town’s other boys. I was tall, you see, and well-built. Anyone who looked at me then might’ve said I was practically a stereotype for what a young, unknowing Hero looked like. Only if they looked at me, mind, not if they heard me speak.

  So there you are, that’s what I was back then. A big bundle of good qualities being wasted by the idiot they’d been crammed into. If you’re hoping to read about how I defied my worse nature and grew into the man described in all the legends, put this book down now. That never happened. I am, to this day, as much a cowardly shit as I ever was, and I suspect I will be on the day I die. This isn’t a story about a Hero, because they don’t exist. It’s the story of how a young, stupid prick was dragged kicking and screaming along the Hero’s journey and forced to save the world despite dedicating most of his life in the attempt to not.

  I’m rambling, forgive me. I’ve gotten too used to being actually listened to when I speak. Another of the world’s injustices. Let’s get on with things.

  ###

  ++The following sections are relatively unedited, lacking historic context and points of clarification. This is due to the quality of record-keeping around the era and regions in which the accounts take place.

  This opening section, if no others, can be verifiably set on the Seventh day of autumn, year 2,492 R.A. Shepleberry, East Anglyn.++