The Legend of First Hero

The Legend of First Hero is one of the well-known folklore among Eremidians as well as some other neighboring nations in Runemilenia, noting the origin of the Kingdom and the alleged “denial of the catastrophe” he had committed in the late Goldian era. While the citizens acknowledged of the heroic tale as some sort of their history and heritage, the secret behind it is quite grim and inevitable; the tale itself tells when and how the Kingdom will fall in the future.

Despite the contents it has, the tale clearly describes the First Hero’s deeds in the past and how he managed to establish a kingdom that would prosper for at least 1000 years.

While the tale’s origin is a subject of dispute among scholars, the first evidence was found in the Classburg Archive room, dated AE15—meaning the first physical copy of such tale was made seven years after the First Hero’s disappearance from Runemilenia. The Royal Court didn’t deny this discovery, instead, the Court remarked it as “legacy from the founding father of this nation.”

Since the first years of the Kingdom, Bards often recite the tale as part of their performance throughout the Kingdom. The College of Bards in Classburg, as well as Faleon, often use the tale as part of their curriculum and test for bards-in-training.

The Legend of First Hero is a tale consisted of seven chapters, each contains eighteen proses telling the deeds of First Hero and his journey to “save the world”.

• Chapter One tells the origin of First Hero as a little boy. Hailed from a family of farmers, the destiny chose him to be a hero who will save the world after a series of event that led him into a cavern and witnessed the “imagery of a goddess looked upon him”.
• Chapter Two marks the First Hero’s embarkment from his former life, now as a traveling swordsman-for-hire. In a relatively short time he mastered his swordplay. In his early journeys, he stumbled upon brigands who harassed a Maiden. Eventually, he saved the Maiden only to realize that she was an “incarnation of god”.
• Chapter Three reveals First Hero’s encounter with an unremarkable scholar. The scholar brought First Hero and Maiden into abandoned ruins where they would find “an agent of chaos”. They eventually defeated the Agent, only to realize that the ruins actually held a Crystal which had secured the realm of Runemilenia from “chaos invasions”.
• Chapter Four is where First Hero, Maiden, and Scholar decided to take the impossible quest of securing any remaining Crystals in Runemilenia. Scholar learned that there might be some more Crystals around Runemilenia, and they have to find and secure them at all costs. At this point, they set a path of the journey across the world.
• Chapter Five describes their struggles in finding the Crystals; across the islands, mountains, and even into the depth of volcanoes. With help of people along the way of their quest, they managed to reach the Crystals; however, the Crystal in each sites was shattered every time they reached the sites, and the Agents sent for such particular task were responsible for the destruction of the Crystals.
• Chapter Six tells the event when all the Crystals were shattered, an island in the sky emerged from the western sky, and a faint image of Devourer appeared in the sky. The image became more and more visible. First Hero and his party didn’t have much time; they went straight to the island using their Airship they obtained at the Chapter Five.
• Chapter Seven tells the outcome of First Hero and party’s confrontation against the doom that is Devourer. With the help of divine interventions, scholarly knowledge and power from the restless fighter, the Devourer repelled from Runemilenia and the catastrophe halted for a thousand year. Their deeds, although proven successful, came with grief consequences.

The tale is the first and foremost origin of the notorious Prophecy of Five Races, with several of the phrases in the last chapter of the tale clearly describes how the Kingdom would fall; starting from the appearance of an island in the west sky of the Kingdom, the great famine, “an attack from the hellish kingdom“ and ended with “the Devourer comes, its claws rip the realm’s corners, its teeth sink into the very soil of Classburg—the world as we know it will be gone.”

First Hero, allegedly was aware of the consequences of his acts in his heroic adventure, warned his closest allies of the inevitable, eventually made a reminder of such prophecy in form of Kingdom Tenets and the artifacts that he and his allies deemed would be useful shall the event happen in the future, including the Farsight Amulet.