This charming tome was first crafted by Hastur, a
now-deceased Calabite Captain of the Infernal
Hourglass and lieutenant of Hatiphas. Designed to
ease individuals into Sorcery, these relics can ease
someone down the path of Fate subtly - and for the
best of motives. After all, what could be more
selfless than to attempt to bring someone back to
life?
Needless to say, there are catches.
The text of the Book can be interpreted on several
levels: a cursory reading will reveal only a somewhat
longwinded and baroque discussion on how remembering
the dead fondly is psychologically healthy. Most
people who attempt to read it will simply shrug and
put it aside after a while: the thesis rambles and the
language is somewhat overblown. There's too much
verbiage for such a simple argument. The odd
handwritten scrawls in the back of the Book are
faintly disturbing, too, although one couldn't exactly
explain why.
However, if the right sort of reader - intelligent,
curious, fond of puzzles, suffering from the loss of a
loved one and fairly ruthless - picks up the Book, he
or she will find themselves drawn to read it several
times. Every time that they do, the subject may
roll against (Perception +4): if he succeeds, he will
begin to realize that certain passages are actually subtly encoded. Those passages, when looked at in
the right manner, will suggest that there are ways to
recreate a ghostly image of a loved one. In fact,
when looked at in the right manner those passages will
tell a person how to go about doing just that: all one
needs are some live plants and a few fairly common substances.
Sometimes someone will even try the experiment ... and
be shocked to find that the method works.
Now, this is not the lost loved one (he or she will
have nothing to do with the matter at all, actually).
What happens is that the relic will scan the reader's
mind and turn a Corporeal Force (that's what the
plant's for) into a pseudo-ghost that looks like the
lost beloved. It won't be perfect ... but it hardly
has to be at this point. The smiling apparition will
last for a variable length of time (never more than
four or five minutes), then fade. If everything has
gone properly, the reader will be happy to get another
plant and try again. The reader will also be taking
1D6 Mind Hits as a result of the process. She will
usually interpret this as simple fatigue and
loneliness.
Eventually, the reader will take enough Mind Hits to
trigger unconsciousness and Ethereal Discord - in this
case, a unique (and temporary) one known as Obsession.
Those suffering from this Discord will begin to focus
unhealthily on a particular concept or action (in this
case, the memory of the lost beloved), and must make a
Will Roll to do anything that might harm or trivialize
the Obsession. At higher levels (4 or above), this
becomes 'anything that does not further the pursuit of
the Obsession'. Worse, the apparition will stop
smiling: it will instead start to look worried and,
later, frightened. Eventually it will begin pleading
silently... then begin to look wracked with pain.
At this point, the reader will almost certainly begin
looking through the Book again for clues - and
suddenly come to a revelation about a previously
obscure passage. Obviously, the reader's actions have
drawn the spirit back from the beyond ... but spirits
are too light and airy to thrive on Earth without a
body. Clearly, one must be made for the beloved, and
the Book can provide the necessary clues - and list of
ingredients.
Well, its not like house pets are precisely rare, is
it?
At this stage, the Book will 'explain' how to create a
small simulacrum of the beloved: the ritual involves
using the mass and life force of a living creature.
The pages will very, very carefully explain that the
only safe way to go about doing this is to use a
non-sentient creature: indeed, it will make it
extremely clear that sacrificing a human runs
terrible risks - and is usually unnecessary, to boot.
Most readers, at this point, will probably sigh in
faintly guilty relief and go looking for a cat or two.
When finally done, the ritual works, apparently
stabilizing the 'spirit' in the corporeal plane. It
also does another 1d6 Mind Hits to the reader, but
that's another story. Unfortunately, the beloved's
new form is so ... limited. The Book warns against
adding more life force, but by now the reader should
be ever so slightly contemptuous of whoever wrote this
thing in the first place. It's all becoming so clear,
and yet the author felt the need to cover such useful,
such necessary, such beneficial wisdom from the rest
of humanity. True, many couldn't understand it
anyway, but that's no excuse. Adding another cat or
two does nothing harmful to the simulacrum: indeed, it
simply makes it bigger and gives the beloved some of
his or her memories back. Needless to say, what's
actually happening is that the relic is telling the
reader exactly what she wants to hear: the 'spirit'
has no more sentience than a computer program ... but
to an Obsessive, that's close enough.
There comes a limit, though, beyond which no more life
force can be added - well, no more from a perfectly
safe source. Anyone who has gotten this far will of
course know what the next step would be; the Book's
clues are only superficially obscure. Yes, it warns
specifically against just this sort of thing, but ...
they're so close to being reunited again, forever.
There are six billion people outside the reader's
door: surely one of them doesn't really deserve to
keep breathing.
It would be right about now that the aforementioned
handwritten scrawls suddenly become quite clear. It
would seem that there was at least one previous reader
out there that understood what the current one was
contemplating, and had worked out a proper methodology
to facilitate matters. Very, very good: now, all one
needs are the right raw materials...
All in all, the Book is quite good at spawning
Sorcerers with necromantic aptitude: the 'ritual' is
actually a combination of an Infernal Pact and
Sorcerous Initiation. When the demon shows up to make
a deal, the reader is usually so wracked with
Obsession that he will shrug off such trivia as
eternal damnation. Besides, the 'ritual' only works
after you've... used up... a human victim: intent is
pretty clear, here. Once the bargain is made, the
demon collects the Book, drops off a volume or two of
mainstream Sorcerous materials and animates the victim
as a zombie with the beloved's face and features.
Once the Book is gone, the Discord will quickly fade
away, but the new Hellsworn Sorcerer probably won't
notice.
After all, they're together again. Forever and ever
and ever...
As a system for allowing someone to voluntarily damn
him or herself, the Book is stellar: after all, you
can always put it down (any Discord resulting from its
use disappears within 24 hours after renunciation of
the Book and its works). Hastur rode the acclaim from
his work all the way to a Distinction: it was a real
shame that he didn't survive to see it become part of
Fate's standard arsenal.
You see, the Calabite decided to expand the idea.
Adult Sorcerers were all very well, but everyone knows
that the best time to teach humans is when they're
young. Unfortunately, Hastur's Heart shattered within
12 hours of his ascension to the Corporeal Plane with
a prototype Sorcery grimoire for children. Any doubts
about what happened to him were dispelled with the
discovery of his savaged vessel found nailed to the
door of Kronos' primary Tether. The prototype was
presumably neutralized as well, judging from the smoke
coming from the vessel's mouth and the distended
nature of its throat.
Kronos just shrugged. It was probably too early for
that innovation anyway: besides, knowing an
Archangel's reaction time was useful data, in and of itself...
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