Tales of Yhore: The Chronicles of Monch

By D.F. Monk

In the beginning, the Developers made Yhore. It was a world somewhat like many others, but slightly different in a really unique way in the hopes that it would appeal to a slightly different demographic and might be able to capture some of the market share of those other worlds that have much higher populations, but really aren't as good as... ok, nevermind that for now.

Yhore was a world of courageous men and women, struggling for survival in the face of an uncertain future. They would forge alliances, topple giants and stand against the greatest evil that had ever been coded since the game was conceived. Together these players would explore all the places, both known and unknown, until there was no place left unmarked by their passing... at least until the next respawn.

Over time it would face many revisions, but in the beginning there was only Yhore, and it was a world of fantastic adventure... minus a glitch or two here and there."

Kingdoms of Yhore is a popular new massively multiplayer online role playing game (MMORPG) based on the works of pulp fantasy author R. James Whitecastle. Shortly after launch, a new character is created, one that defies merely playing in the game world. His goal was beyond simple digital existence. Instead he dared to conquer it for his own purpose. Monch, the Unholy Templar of Ahriman, knew his destiny was to bring back the fabled city of Akaeron, the dark kingdom that had been relegated to mere backstory for the game. To that end, he would become a champion like no other in the Kingdoms of Yhore (the game and the world).

These are the tales of his creation and rise to power, his trials and tribulations and the beginning of his foothold as a major influence in this world that rejects having major influences from the player-base. Can Monch succeed, even though hundreds of other players, millions of lines of computer code and dozens of game developers literally stand in his way?

The story unfolds inside.

Spoilers: Monch also frequently talks to a dead cat.

-written by d.f. Monk, edited by Lions of the Empire-

• Language: English
• Publisher: D.F. Monk
• Release date: Dec 23, 2014
• ISBN: 9781310464232

D.F. Monk

D.F. Monk claims to be an exile from a parallel dimension. He lives with his partner in this world and their lovechild while he crafts "memoirs" of his lost home, all the while searching the globe for the one portal that might take him back. In the interim, he and fellow author TB Schmid formed Lions of the Empire in 2014 to promote their collaborative "RUINE" series. "Tales of Yhore" is his first published work on this plane of reality.

Book preview

The Author would like to thank the members, supporters, friends and family of the Lions of the Empire, whose support and encouragement helped make this happen. All characters presented inside are the creation of D.F. Monk, except Tchikatta, Steelscream and Keranos who have generously allowed me the use of these characters for the chapter(s) in which they appear. Further thanks to members of my online guild for their cooperation and consent to mention and/or embarrass them without further remuneration or recompense.

I hope you enjoy this story, presented for your enjoyment. If you purchased this for reading, I hope you enjoy it even more, you have my personal thanks for supporting my hobby and would-be career.

> monk

Author’s Note(s)

The Tales of Yhore do not have a glorious beginning. They began as a series of short fiction stories written by me about one of the characters I created to play in an online MMORPG (that's Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game for the uninitiated, one of those internet videogame things). The stories were originally intended to be a fairly satirical look at the game world and the trappings of the genre from the perspective of a character that examined his surroundings and game events critically, rather than just accepting them for what they were. I had fun poking at the game and the players and the way that the two interact with each other.

The basic goal of most MMOs follow a similar trajectory: create a character, start as a rank novice at level 1 and through questing, exploring and killing monsters, you work on improving your character all the way up until the end level, whatever arbitrary number that may be. You share this world and these quests and these monsters with other players. The characters in the game that are not played by other players, for the most part, treat you exactly the same as everyone else playing the game. These Non-Player Characters (NPCs) will always have a problem and will ask you to help. They will ask you to gather some weeds or kill some rats or fetch some object from some other person, often imploring you that if you personally do not handle this, that it is likely calamitous results will follow. But if you do help (or even if you don’t), the problem really never goes away, even after you've accomplished the task and received the glowing praise from the character you’ve helped. As soon as the next player comes along, it’s more weedhunting, ratkilling, or parcel delivery, just the same as you got. Merchants have an unlimited quantity of everything and each of these characters can stand in place for days, months or even years, sustaining themselves wholly on the act of swaying slightly from side to side while looking around.

It has to be this way for the game to work. Everyone has to have the same opportunity to kill monsters and collect weeds in order to progress through the game. It's a thing that we (as players) have just come to accept as expected behavior. These automated shopkeepers or task givers must be accessible all the time to make the game work. If those quest givers stopped handing out missions or the store owners closed up shop for the night or were out of healing potions, then the game world could come to a grinding halt.

When I conceived of Monch, however, and began to write him into stories, I asked myself what would happen if those accepted tropes from MMOs collided with more conventional fantasy. What if the characters inside the game had to explain it all? What if, from the perspective of the character in the game there was a reason that everything that we take for granted as being for our convenience or understanding as a player, had legitimate reasons for occurring? From that, I came up with Yhore. It's a game world, based on a game that doesn't exist, but takes its inspiration from other games of the fantasy genre, some of which that have millions of players. There are monsters, mages and resolute men and women that challenge the odds. It's a world teaming with static characters and real player drama. The real world will peek through anywhere from occasionally to often, depending on who Monch interacts with, but much as when I played him, Monch is not a character in a video game; I played him as a character in that world, where he had no outside frame of reference.

Monch was as real to that world and all of its nuances as much as the vendors in the city or the monsters in the wild, it's just that he was not rooted in place. Though not content on merely existing, Monch carries it to an extreme. He is not merely a hero in the video game world. He is the hero of his own central narrative, the special snowflake in this odd place. As such, he has special privileges that others do not share, since this is a work of fiction based on that imaginary world with him as the key player. Even so, I tried to keep the key core elements of the game and all of the events influenced by mechanics or abilities inherent to the game world as consistent as possible in order to maintain a world rooted by the elements of game play.

Welcome to Yhore. It is heavily influenced by the game I conceived Monch for, but has elements of other games I have played and read about and some of my own ideas thrown in just for fun. I hope you enjoy meeting Monch and getting to know his world. Since this is the Special Collector's Edition, I'll even be adding commentary and meta-snippets as we go along, but this is his tale... one you may have unknowingly already been a part of it.

In the beginning, the Developers made Yhore. It was a world somewhat like many others, but slightly different in a really unique way in the hopes that it would appeal to a slightly different demographic and might be able to capture some of the market share of those other worlds that have much higher populations, but really aren't as good as... ok, nevermind that for now.

Yhore was a world of courageous men and women, struggling for survival in the face of an uncertain future. They would forge alliances, topple giants and stand against the greatest evil that had ever been coded since the game was conceived. Together these players would explore all the places, both known and unknown, until there was no place left unmarked by their passing... at least until the next respawn.

Over time it would face many revisions, but in the beginning there was only Yhore, and it was a world of fantastic adventure... minus a glitch or two here and there."

Part the First:

The Lion of Ahriman

It was the time known as the Third Patching of the First Release of Yhore. Brom, the bloody bladezerker from the North, having gained notoriety and a great deal of grass-roots support after having driven out the foul Orts from his homeland, had staked a claim to the throne of Yhore's most civilized kingdom: Kouros. Guarded by the Holy Knights of Ythra, in the heartland of Yhore, Kouros stood at the crossroads between frozen, unyielding Vohlfhein to the north, the burning, diabolical Sarthiss to the south and the savage wilds of Axxeronne to the east. To the west was the unexplored Ocean of the Expansion, a mythical place that was rumored to contain new lands not yet developed for discovery.

Apollon was the gem of Kouros, the shining city on the bluff, overlooking the Bay of Victories, whose waters were stained with the blood of those described in the compelling backstory documented elsewhere. The focus here, is Brom, the undefeated hero of the Frozen Tribes.

Many say Brom claimed the throne just to get away from the frigid winters of Vohlfhein and into the warm bed of Ismene, the widowed witch-queen of Kouros. Others say it was so that he could get closer to his strongest rival, the Devilspawned Amhu-Vex, whose followers cast a dark cloud over the lands of Sarthiss. Yet another rumor was that he chased the Orts all the way to the borders of Axxeronne, but stopped at a tavern along the way, had a massive bender, woke up sometime later in a whorehouse in Apollon and just never bothered to go home. Whatever the reason, Brom now sat on the throne of gleaming Apollon, and ruled it with a courageous hand. He called to his seat of power those of strong limb and defiant hearts to help rid Yhore of the threats that plagued it.

And there were many things that plagued Yhore. From monster infested catacombs, to king-hating insurgents and randomly-generated threats for all adventurers (both novice and experienced), all usually conveniently grouped in geographically isolated areas that prevented them from mixing with each other while providing a steady curve of training for those aspiring to the greatest of their chosen class's abilities. Yes, Yhore was a place one could easily live a profitable life of adventure most weeknights during prime time and lazy afternoons on the weekends as well.

During those adventures, heroes would gradually uncover information regarding the greatest threat to Yhore, the shadow that loomed over all creation, the mysterious lost civilization of Akaeron. According to the backstory, it had been the greatest power on Yhore, a foul empire of tyrannical demons and the pet wizards that held all of the lands captive under their foul enchantments for untold ages. Akaeron was held up as a standard of excellence that all Evil things aspired to, even though few would ever reach.

Yet even the greatest of Great Evils can fall. Thus Akaeron, after one thousand years of deadly rule, was challenged by heroic champions from the island citadel of Nautillus. These heroes of great renown rose up to destroy the Demon Wizard-Kings of Akaeron and their minions. Victory was secured by spirit, spell and steel, though many died in that struggle. Ultimately the forces of Good prevailed, even though Nautillus paid a terrible price for it, doomed by a final dark spell to be forever lost to the depths of the ocean. Though broken, Akaeron itself could not be wholly destroyed. A way was found to... misplace it, dispelling it to the shadows, like a nightmare fading in the light of the dawn.

For hundreds of years, the realms were in upheaval, as new kingdoms were forged and broken in the fires of conquest. Eventually, new nations were formed and Man would be able to rebuild what had been sundered. Stronger than ever, these were the Kingdoms of Men, ruled by the strongest of the strong. But not every man was a champion, not every woman a hero and the secrets of Akaeron persisted, seductively whispering from the shadows, ready to fall into the willing hands and heads of those that would still heed the sinister goals of darkness.

The legends tell that Amhu-Vex, was one such individual, originally just a simple neophyte of Angarr. At first he was content with his simple aspirations to serve the God of Reptiles, until stumbling upon a nest of secrets captured from that ancient kingdom. Such time had passed that now Akaeron was merely a legend spoken of only in curses and hushed whispers. Those texts and treasures opened his mind, freed his spirit and put a dark cloud over his heart. In the years that followed, he steadily rose to power over the lands of Sarthiss. For a time, the Southern kingdom was enough, but his ambition would not rest easily and it was not long before Amhu-Vex desired all the lands of Yhore. He envisioned himself as the new Wizard-King that would rule over it all, a second Dark Age of his own design.

With Amhu-Vex's ambitions well-documented by the backstory, the challenge fell to Brom and his cohort of chosen champions to rise and stand against such great evil. The stakes of this new conflict were so great that even the spirits of those long-dead heroes of Nautillus were roused from their eternal slumber. Those restless ghosts would not have their sacrifice so soon undone. They reached out from beyond the grave to bestow their power on a handful of new heroes, ones who could stand against Amhu-Vex and the followers of Angarr, the Reptile God of the Sarthens. These warriors, mages, priests and rogues would forge a mighty destiny for themselves and become celebrated above all other heroes in the annals of history.

This story... is not about one of those champions.

In a dark cave, sequestered from the eyes of the world, another story was unfolding. It would begin the story about a hero of another kind, one for whom Destiny would not lay such a clear path. Though there are words