Yet this world keeps us here, and all was just for ink and gold.
I'm saying fantasy is a tool for self-improvement and for emphasizing our own humanity, magnifying it with more intense circumstance than is possible in this world. An example could be something like, as this thread says, a person leaving prison starting out at rock bottom, coming out into the light and realizing who they are, moving on from there to accomplish great things. Or, for a more negative example, see a lot of fantasies where people tap into powers beyond their normal boundaries and thus have the flaws of their human psyches magnified by the increased consequence.