Chapter 1: Begin

My name is Tukeli-eli-anandoros, and I hate you all.

So you want to hear a physical description, is that it? You want me to go find a mirror, stare at it like a dumbass corpse-sucker for a few minutes, then try to tell you, exactly, what the shape of my lips are or how pale my skin is. Like some stupid chit who can’t get enough of herself. Well it’s not happening, Mr. Birdshit. It ain’t ever gonna happen, so you could just go on wondering – you’ll never know.

My name’s Tukeli-eli-anandoros, and it ain’t my real one.

So you want to hear about my father? You want to hear how he’s the richest fake-magician ass-licking blackmailer down here in the Slums. You want to know how many whores he bangs every night, how many bitter young sons he keeps alive with his blood money. That’s okay – that’s hair off his ass not mine. I’m gonna give you the numbers, that’s all. Thirteen, twenty hundred, three. Interpret them as you will.

My mom? She’s dead, duh. Dead since I was three or four or five, since I was a little idiot who still knew how to cry. I taught myself good after that, though. I’ve never, ever cried since then. I wouldn’t have wanted to meet her anyway. Those stupid chits are all the same.

My name is Tukeli-eli-anandoros, and you shouldn’t believe what they say about me.

Now that’s the important part, see. That is why I’m writing this stupid crapload. That is why I’m wasting all this time, time I should have spent hitting the sack and giving myself a well-earned rest. Because people have been getting me wrong for years and I’m sick of it.

They say I care only for myself and that’s okay ‘cause they do too, really, and they’re too much of two-faced scum-sippers to see it. They say I’m a thief, a coward, a traitor and a chronic liar. I say I’m too clever to lie down and die just because everyone’s doing it. They say I started a war – as if it wouldn’t have happened anyway.

And then they say I killed the only girl I ever loved. Now that’s pure hemorrhoids, Mr. Birdshit. Everyone should know: I’ve never fallen in love in my life. Never, never; never even came close.

So I’m setting the record straight. I’m writing down what really happened. And since I’m a magician, I’m gonna have to start this right, going by the traditional way.

My name is Tukeli-eli-anandoros, the name given to me when the wind was cold and the tears came hot.

My name is Tukeli-eli-anandoros, the name I won through my blood and the loss of my right hand.

My name is Tukeli-eli-anandoros, and I was murdered and born again to serve the Insane God, the Dancer on the Chaos Cyclone, the Lord of Magic.

By the name of the one creator, by the name of the dead first-born, by the name of the living, and by the name of the man who slaughtered me, my name is Tukeli-eli-anandoros, and this is what I have seen.