HIS is the testimony of all that I have seen, and all that I have
               learned, in those years that I have possessed the Three Seals of
               MASSHU. I have seen One Thousand-and-One moons, and surely
               this is enough for the span of a man's life, though it is said the
               Prophets lived much longer. I am weak, and ill, and bear a great
               tiredness and exhaustion, and a sigh hangs in my breast like a dark
               lantern. I am old.
                    The wolves carry my name in their midnight speeches, and that quiet, subtle Voice
               is summoning me from afar. And a Voice much closer will shout into my ear with
               unholy impatience. The weight of my soul will decide its final resting place. Before
               that time, I must put down here all that I can concerning the horrors that stalk
               Without, and which lie in wait at the door of every man, for this is the ancient arcana
               that has been handed down of old, but which has been forgotten by all but a few men,
               the worshippers of the Ancient Ones (may their names be blotted out!).
                    And if I do not finish this task, take what is here and discover the rest, for time
               is short and mankind does not know nor understand the evil that awaits it, from every
               side, from every Gate, from every broken barrier, from every mindless acolyte at the
               alters of madness.
                    For this is the Book of the Dead, the Book of the Black Earth, that I have writ
               down at the peril of my life, exactly as I received it, on the planes of the IGIGI, the
               cruel celestial spirits from beyond the Wanderers of the Wastes.