For four hundred years, I have lived a life of deceit. It isn't that I wanted to deceive humans, but if they knew what I was, they would either run in fear or try to kill me. It has never been my desire to cause unbridled fear. Nor to live in it.

I am Barakon the Bard, minstrel, story-teller, master of lore. But not human. Not human at all, despite the facade you see.

My blood is the priceless substance that all men want. It is a source of tremendous power that can be used by anyone. But I must die for someone to obtain it, and I will not go down so easily. I am a dragon, and this is the tale of the war I began.

It is full of joy, laughter, heroic moments, good friendship, and dark and sorrowful endings that will haunt my existence for, perhaps, thousands of years to come.

I will tell you of how I, Barakon the Bard, was employed to write a heroic song about a fellow's adventure - not a rare thing for me to do. Except this time, this fellow had decided to take an army and hunt a dragon.

And what is a dragon in disguise to do, but to find a way to foil such plans?

Unfortunately, in whatever dark shadows the goddess of death keeps, a greater plan for dragon extinction was being launched, that would rob me of all that was dear to me and would send me into the throes of war. Events that would change my life irrevocably.

I would like to say it all ends well. But I can no longer muster the deceit. It ends as all wars must...

With too much blood and too little love.