Wizard's Bookshelf 8
Hymn To Shalmo, by Zenelin The Foul
A creased scroll of stitched papyrus scraps. Its enigmatic Caveman runes describe folk customs, focusing on the intricate code of clothing worn by different classes of people at subterranean weddings, including colourful illustrations. Despite appearing to be a rare historical piece, it is actually a modern recreation.
Value: 80sp (Appears to be 400sp)
Weight: 10cn
Mumbling Volumes by Unknown Author
A row of 8 volumes, bound in human skin that is luke-warm, and twitches when touched. On either end of the set is a face, eyes closed and nostrils flaring as if asleep. Each book pulled from the middle of the set has a 1-in-6 chance of waking the whole set, removing either face always wakes them. The books contain detailed prophesies, inscribed around animated illuminations of complicated organs. Each volume has a 1-in-6 chance of containing the answer to a given question. Once awoken, the books move together like an accordion (HD 8, AC as Leather, Attack as Bite)
Value: 100sp each (10sp dead)
Weight: 25cn each
Flesh Of Kathrine, by Brunissende Lorrain
A wormeaten arbutus case engraved with sea sponges and closed with a corroded brass lock. Inside is a cracked glass tablet with concise Merman script about the behaviour and passions of sirens, worth a +2 to reaction roles if studied in the same day. If lit from below, the tablet projects a map of the onyx-studded coast, and the locations of siren nests with large treasure hoards. Not many of these remain.
Value: 100sp
Weight: 30cn
Inquisition of the Ghoul Hunters by Philcox Paulen
A pristine ebony inlaid iron case with a copper crossbody chain and a lawful holy symbol emblazoned on the front. Inside are two masterwork iron panels in archaic Berserker runes that record court cases against necromancers, blood mages and demon cultists, including the execution and burial practices meant to keep them from rising again. The back of each panel is inscribed with the text of a scroll of protection from undead. Though it was produced in high numbers, most copies were thrown into the great forge along with their owners during the ascension of the Ghoul King.
Value: 800sp (-300sp for each protection scroll used)
Weight: 100cn
Eubulus, by Wulveve Prieler
A codex with a good quality wax cover etched with knotted and braided wheat shafts. Its pages are of crumpled papyrus. The smudged Berserker runes discuss the act of farming in elevated prose. The frontmatter hosts a circular calendar of planting and harvesting times and the backmatter has a vovelle that serves as a primitive solar compass to assist in surveying land. Not many of these were made.
Value: 200sp
Weight: 40cn
Book of Darkness by Vandil Vasti
A tome whose dark grey stuccoed wood cover is a textural map of a cave system. Embossed text on black-dyed wool paper gives the account of a monk who lived for thirty years sealed in a cave with no light, subsisting on beetles and mushrooms. The last page is a clerical light spell scroll that can be cast in the dark.
Value: 200sp (-150s if the spell scroll is cast)
Weight: 20cn
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Reading: Werebeasts of Hel by Asa Drake
Listening: Starship Velociraptor by Galactikraken