Nemedia, Ophir, Brythunia, Hyperborea, Zamora with its dark-haired women and towers of spider-haunted mystery, Zingara with its chivalry, Koth that bordered on the pastoral lands of Shem, Stygia with its shadow-guarded tombs, Hyrkania whose riders wore steel and silk and gold. But the proudest kingdom of the world was Aquilonia, reigning supreme in the dreaming west.

As the Road of Kings takes a traveller through the glittering and decadent realms of the lost Hyborian Age, so too does this tome work toward the same end. These fabled lands of ancient times are the shimmering background of Conan the Roleplaying Game, the gleaming backdrop against which your action is set. These cultures, the grand forbearers of more modern times, are both magnificent and tarnished. Superficially cosmopolitan and enlightened, nestling beneath this glittering exterior a core of ancient barbarism lingers.

Herein are written the descriptions of this harsh world: Proud lands of blemished civility burning with civil wars; barbaric wildernesses of savage killers hunting with primitive weapons; dreaming kingdoms of dark priests worshipping with bloodied daggers; noble demesnes of arrogant knights fighting with grim determination; ancient realms of haunted towers lurking with baleful menace; glowering crags of icy rock slumbering with hidden peoples. All this and more, for know, O prince, that this is Hyboria!