Hello and welcome to An Adventurer's Journal.

I am Laferno and this is the first major writing project I have ever undertaken. Like many projects, it started small and has taken on a life of its own over the last 10 months or so. Quite frankly, I started playing D&D and to keep track of the things happening in the game I portrayed my character as having a literal in world journal that he would periodically record the events that he went through...and then I went and wrote that journal in real life. I originally started writing it for myself, but eventually the other players found out and wanted to read it, and then my kids liked it as a weekly story, and then my wife encouraged me to put it somewhere online. So now 40 sessions and 70,000 words later, the campaign is not yet half done, and the creation feels more like a novel than a series of notes. Those that have read it seem to enjoy it, so I am finally getting around to publishing it somewhere in case others find it entertaining.

There are a lot of caveats I need to add about this story. I am not a professional author and hadn't written anything of length prior to this. At the start of this I was mostly taking notes for myself, but my style of writing has evolved as I continued to write. The first dozen chapters are terse to say the least, but my writing becomes more literature-like as the story goes on. If this somehow becomes popular, then I may go back and rewrite the first 10 or so chapters. (Or maybe the change in writing style over time reflects the character's improvement and the change is an intentional feature of the story). Additionally, as I said before this is from the perspective of a character in a D&D game. Simeon does NOT have plot armor. If he dies, the next character I play will take up the journal. In fact, the game is kind of hard and several player characters have died, um spoilers. It also means that I, the author, do not actually control the plot of this story outside of my character's choices. The GM, and to an extent the other players, do that.

The journal being written by the POV character is an actual object in the world and only contains the things seen or known about by the character that he is willing to write in a journal. If he learns secrets that must not be shared, then they are not written down. If he learns incorrect information, then the incorrect info is presented as correct. The world is also presented through his perspective lens, which could get highly distorted. As a journal there is very little direct quotes or conversations. Unless a conversation's exact words were important, what the perspective character writes is a summary of conversations. Also, in world characters don't know how many hit points they have, what class levels are, etc. If someone says they are a thief, that does not mean they are a Thief. Astute readers may be able to figure out levels and stats, but that kind of stuff is not presented literally.

The world of the story is entirely homebrew and created by the GM, not me. I have his blessing to publish this, but if you find this world interesting and would like to join one of his games, you can find him on Roll20 as Draconus. Google search Roll20 and Draconus and he should be the first result. Planned updates are two chapters a week until I catch up with real time, at which point it will be one chapter a week as each chapter covers one game session.

I hope you enjoy the story.

Sincerely,

Laferno