When I was young--and perhaps foolhardy--I travelled with a mercenary corps of modest renown. In (year), we were commissioned by an affluent merchant to recover an item of no small worth. The gleam of our promised treasure blinded us to everything--including the terrors of the wastelands, where this certain item had been hidden.

Our journey was ill-fated, though--the company lost all but two of our numbers to the sandstorms all too common to the deserted landscape. Let my years teach you one thing: a young adventurer should equate roaming through the wastelands to the fabled kiss of death. Nothing--not even companionship--can brace you for the desolation, or the horrors which make their homes in that barren place.

We two who survived the storm were on the brink of starvation when what could only be described as an oasis appeared. Inspired, we struggled forward and arrived in a verdant township--Shadowmoor. As we are told, the inkeeper's wife found us on her doorstep, where we had collapsed in exhaustion. The idea of repeating that dread journey does not appeal to me--so it is quite likely I shall end my days within the borders of this frontier town.