A long journey that I literally walked through the fire to save. It was the one thing I managed to save when my house burned to the ground a year ago. I'm putting it out here for the first time for people to read. Please let me know what you think and thank you for taking the time. Hopefully we'll continue to enjoy this journey together. This is a tale of Slade, a young boy who was convinced his life didn't matter. He lives in a massive empire that was carved out of hundreds of frightened villages centuries ago during the Long Night. Now what was once an army of adventurers and guild members is now one of the greatest forces in the world. But strange forces seek to undo all of this when the Withered Hand unleashes a sleeping sickness that deprives of waking child of tomorrow. Slade and his friends are the only ones that manage to escape the clutches of the Nightmare King. Now, with the help of the ancient wizard Rune, they will travel the Empire, enlisting the aid of the sage Guilds, each keepers of a different type of knowledge and skill, to find a way to wake the children of the Empire once again. *Each of the 4 guilds has a special focus of knowledge. They are: The Engineers: Designers and builders of machinery The Sorcerers: The keepers of the arcane and magic The Alchemists: The workers of change and transmutation, seeing what can be changed from one element to the next The Apothecaries: Keepers of the body. Makers of tinctures, salves, potions and other remedy to ailments of the body and mind.