Pug is an orphan in the Kingdom of the Isles who comes to study under the master magician Kulgan. His power is real but different — unruly, resistant to normal training — and it wins him little credit at court even as it earns him love and the beginnings of friendship. Then dark beings from another world open a rift in spacetime, and an ancient war between the forces of Order and Chaos resumes, pulling Pug and his companions into a conflict that spans worlds.

Pug is the definitive 'late-bloomer' wizard hero — quiet, earnest, persistently underestimated, and ultimately extraordinary. His power is not dramatic or flashy but slow-building and world-altering, and his humanity — his capacity for loyalty, grief, and love — remains the series' emotional anchor even as his abilities transcend mortal scale.

Across four books the Riftwar Saga follows Pug from apprentice to the most powerful magician alive, tracing his capture and enslavement by the alien Tsurani, his mastery of their very different magic in the Empire of Kelewan, and his return to Midkemia for the final confrontation at Sethanon. His friend Tomas undergoes a parallel transformation, merging with the memories of an ancient dragon warrior, and together they face an Enemy older than recorded time. The saga launched one of fantasy's most expansive shared universes, spanning thirty-plus novels.