Translation of the MGSV novel provided humbly by Dàxīng Dàn:

From Epilogue 1:

I still remember clearly the moment you woke up.

If you hadn't woke up, nothing would have happened that night, and it would not have been a night worth recording in either history or memory.

I heard a voice calling to me from the sky, and then I awoke. It was a boy who had called for me. The ego of the boy in the sky restored my memories from that mission 20 years ago, the Virtuous Mission. August 24, 1964. That was where everything began for me.

At the same time, you, too, awoke from your slumber beside me.

Your intense fury, the anger of losing Big Boss and your brothers at Mother Base, was overwritten by my memories when the boy made contact with me, and the boy was irresistibly drawn to you. The boy was helpless to resist the lure of your desire for vengeance.

The world descended into chaos when it discovered our awakening.

Cipher sent... No, Skullface sent an assassin, and XOF began to mobilize. It was then that Ocelot made a bold wager.

He gave me the mission to guard Big Boss.

You would be Ahab, and I would be Ishmael.

I would help you escape from the hospital and extract you from Cyprus. Ocelot would pick you up, take you to Afghanistan to rescue Miller, who had been captured in a diversion.

Just as Ocelot and Miller thought, you became an impeccable Big Boss. You completed mission after mission, protected Mother Base, and united your men.

It was nine years ago, when the two of us fell into deep sleep, that you became Big Boss. When Paz jumped from our chopper, and XOF's chopper came ramming into ours, you became a shield to guard me. It was at that moment that you became Big Boss.

Everyone recognizes you as Big Boss.

To Skullface, you were Big Boss to the very end.

To Quiet, to Leonard, to all the staff of Mother Base, and to everyone in Diamond Dogs, you are undoubtedly Big Boss. Even in the spy world, Ahab is now another name for Big Boss.

Big Boss is nobody special. The Legendary Hero, the Ultimate Soldier, those are not titles that Big Boss gave himself. Someone spoke of him as such, and eventually created those titles for him. The soldiers of Diamond Dogs watched you, and learned to act the way Big Boss does. Anyone can become like Big Boss.

Zero was concerned with the opposite. He could not allow just anyone to become Big Boss. The world needed only one Big Boss. The world needed only one Snake, and one lord. Otherwise, Zero could not create the heaven he dreamed of.

That is why I needed to diverge from the story of Heaven that Zero envisioned.

I shall write a story different from Zero's, from outside the heaven that Zero is creating. That is my own battle to carry on The Boss's will.

I am Ishmael, the narrator of the story.

You are Ahab, the protagonist of the story. You are Big Boss.

Timeline:

Thus, in the year 1995, the independent armed nation Outer Heaven, believed to be an "extraneous gear" meant to fight against the New Order, revealed its revolution against the world. This incident would later become known as the Outer Heaven Uprising. The mastermind of this uprising called himself Big Boss. Ahab had moved base from the Seychelles to the depths of South Africa and was trying to create a utopia different from the worlds Zero and Skullface had sought to create. However, Solid Snake, one of Ishmael's "terrible children", confronted Ahab and foiled his plans.

Nobody knew where Zero was at this time. However, the Patriot system, which was merely Zero's will given form, would bury Big Boss (Ahab).

In 1999, Ishmael escaped from the world of the Patriots and initiated the Zanzibarland Disturbance under the name of Big Boss, plotting to create a new Outer Heaven under Ahab's shadow, in Central Asia. Ishmael (Big Boss) was attempting to create the ideal world The Boss had envisioned.

But, his plans were crushed by Solid Snake, he vanished.