In this first book, Ankh-Morpork, and the rest of the Discworld, is not as well-defined as it becomes in later books. Only to be expected. And Pratchett's first "hero" isn't much of a hero - an incompetent and cowardly wizard named Rincewind (truth to tell, my least favorite of all of Pratchett's recurring heroes.)
After the prologue, Pratchett opens with:
Fire roared through the bifurcated city of Ankh-Morpork. Where it licked the Wizard's Quarter it burned blue and green and was even laced with strange sparks of the eighth color, octarine.
The first two characters introduced are Bravd the Highlander and his partner, the Weasel, who are on a distant hillside watching the city burn when Rincewind rides a horse into their midst.
Accroding to the LSpace Wiki, "Bravd and Weasel are parodies of the popular sword & sorcery heroes Fafhrd and Gray Mouser created by Fritz Leiber." Bravd is similar to Fafhrd and Weasel to the Gray Mouser.
Indeed, in the four interconnected novellas in this book, Pratchett parodies quite a few genres...and will continue to do so in future Discworld novels.
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