Then hundreds or thousands of years ago, in the Old Time, Euz, a legendary half-Demon, half-Human with great magical powers, banished the Demons from the world.

The plot of the original trilogy involves three major powers: The Union, the Gurkish Empire, and the North, recently united under King Bethod.

Jezal, a vain young nobleman who has become a Union army officer due to his connections, trains for a prestigious swordfighting tournament.

He falls in love with Ardee, the sister of his friend and superior Major Collem West, and wins the tournament with help from Bayaz.

The book also follows the journey of Logen's companions, led by Dogman, to warn Bethod about the Shanka, and Ferro, a mysterious escaped Gurkish slave, with some useful hidden powers, who travels with another Magus to find Bayaz.

In the south, Sand dan Glokta and his inquisitors attempt to repel a Gurkish invasion of the city of Dagoska, the Union's sole possession on the continent, won some decades earlier at great cost.

In the North, the book follows Colonel West and the Northmen as they attempt to deal with Bethod, who intends to force the Union out of Angland, their principal northern possession.

Finally, the book follows Logen, Ferro, and Jezal as they journey into the far west of their world with the sorcerer Bayaz, First of the Magi, seeking out a powerful and dangerous ancient artifact known as the Seed.

The book makes it explicit that all these events are interconnected and part of the greater machinations of a sorcerer called Khalul, Second of the Magi and one of Bayaz's enemies.

Khalul has raised a great army of slaves and Eaters (cannibalistic transformed humanoids with enhanced durability and magical abilities), and has indirectly given Bethod an alliance with the Flatheads, orc-like creatures created as weapons in an ancient war, as well as a man known as the Feared, who is supernaturally all but immune to damage.

The story ends on a low note for all groups involved: Dagoska is lost to the Gurkish; an intrigue sees both heirs to the throne killed and an innocent man is blamed for political reasons; the quest for the Seed is an abject failure; and Bethod remains at large in the North; Ferro and Logen's burgeoning relationship ends abruptly as both are incapable of making it last.

This set of novels is sometimes marketed under the name World of the First Law,[16] and has also been released as a combined, omnibus volume with the title The Great Leveller.

After another successful battle to unite Styria under the rule of Orso, Monza and her brother Benna, who is also her second-in-command, are summoned to the palace of the Grand Duke in Talins.

[17] Each part opens with a short episode from Monza’s past detailing her and her brother’s way from children on a farm to leaders of the mercenary company in Grand Duke Orso’s service.

[19] The third part takes place in Sipani where King Jezal of the Union has arranged a peace conference between the warring factions in Styria.

Monza convinces Jezal to smoke husk which makes him pass out while she, due to her growing addiction and adaptation to it, is only numbed and disoriented.

From this point on Shivers greatly resents Monza for his mutilation, claiming it should have been her instead, and takes a sharp turn from wanting to become a better person to being a cold-blooded killer.

During the battle with Carpi Castor Morveer poisons his apprentice and flees, abandoning Monza to ally himself with Grand Duke Orso instead.

Monza, grown increasingly weary of her quest for revenge, cannot bring herself to kill Foscar but Shivers, turning more and more into a cold-blooded killer, smashes his skull in.

The story features many characters seen in previous First Law novels such as Bremer dan Gorst, Lord Marshal Kroy, and the Dogman.

There are three key positions over which the battle is fought, the small town of Osrung itself in the east, a steep hill in the centre on which a stonehenge-like structure, the eponymous “Heroes” reside, and a bridge over the river to the west.

Lord Marshal Kroy is ordered by the Magus Bayaz to concentrate his army which is scattered across the North and to engage Black Dow in a single decisive battle[21].

In the west several efforts to take the bridge and establish a foothold on the northern banks of the river fail until Bremer dan Gorst again throws himself into the fighting.

Lord Marshal Kroy sees the carnage and devastation and decides to finally take the peace that Black Dow had offered the previous day.

The last of the three is set about thirteen years after the First Law trilogy and revolves around a youthful female protagonist who is hoping to bury her bloody past, but she'll have to sharpen up some of her old ways to get her family back.

Her journey will take her across the barren western plains to a frontier town gripped by gold fever, through feud, duel and massacre and high into the unmapped mountains.

In the north, Stour Nightfall, son of Black Calder and nephew to King Scale Ironhand, leads the invasion of Uffrith and Angland.

Rikke regains control of her Long Eye, and in the mist of Northern attack on Adua, she betrays Leo and claims the North.

"[30] SFX's David Bradley gave the book a five star review and stated that Abercrombie "signs off the trilogy on a high, interspersing breathless skirmishes with thriller-like moments.

"[31] Eric Brown reviewed Red Country for The Guardian and said that Abercrombie was "tipping his hat to the Western genre but continuing his mission to drag fantasy, kicking and screaming, into the 21st century with his characteristic mix of gritty realism, complex characterisation, set-piece scenes of stomach-churning violence and villains who are as fully rounded as his flawed heroes" and concluded that the book was "a marvellous follow-up to his highly praised The Heroes.