Chapter 0 - Introduction

Every great story needs an author.

Samuel Bragg was a fairly ordinary human. He lived in a simple home, and he did simple work. The village he lived in, Harlest, was a simple village. Every day of his life was the same. He woke up at dawn, went to the study of his small home, and made maps. This was how he made a living for himself, and it was all he knew. But despite the normal life he led, Samuel craved more.

Samuel had been the result of a chance encounter between a traveling bard and a tavern maid. He had been raised well enough, cared for by his mother until she passed away. He had been 17 years old when she died, leaving him her home and meager life savings. He had very few memories of his father, and only knew what he looked like from what the other villagers had told him. They told him that he had inherited much of his father in his jet black hair and dark brown eyes. He was also told that his father had also been tall and lanky, as he was. The village women, those who had children of their own, were always fussing over Samuel, telling him that he needed to eat more. It wasn't that Samuel had little to eat. He ate just as much as anyone else, but it made no difference. He stayed painfully thin, and he'd submitted to that fact.

There was one thing that Samuel was sure he'd inherited from his mother, and that was his love of stories. Some of his greatest memories were of his mother telling him stories as he fell asleep. To him, she had been a great repository of myths and legends. She told him of many great heroes, from his own home country of Gorteau, and even from other nations. She told him stories whenever he asked, and he had listened to his heart's content. When his mother had passed away, he felt a void in his life, that he attributed to his inability to hear those stories again. When he sought out the stories in book form, he found that they didn't exist. For some reason, Samuel found this frustrating. He had a desire to learn as much history and myth as he could, yet he could not find any.

This, in turn, had created his passion. Whenever he wasn't making maps and charts to support himself, he was researching every chance he got. He searched for stories among the small dusty library of his village, and begged the few travelers who passed through Harlest to share any they knew. When he heard them, he made sure to record them. His ultimate passion was to leave Harlest and search for more, but he did not have the funds to support such an idealistic venture. So he remained in his small home, impatient with his extremely normal life, and furious that he could do nothing to change it. But like the start of all great stories, he had no idea that everything was about to change for him.

Samuel's story starts on a perfectly normal day, in his normal village. But he soon learns that even amongst the ordinary, the extraordinary can spring up.

The story of the legendary traveler, the all-knowing servant of the God of Knowledge, the greatest author, cartographer, and collection of magicks; the story of Samuel Bragg, is a truly extraordinary tale. But it all starts with a normal man, in a normal home, in a normal village, with a normal job.