ORACLE

6/19/2009

[Sorcerer’s Library] The Codex – Exordium

It is said that The Codex was first compiled eons ago by a race of beings that time has long forgotten. The rituals found within were brought to this world ages before mankind huddled around campfires, fashioned flint weapons and feared the sounds that growled in the long night. The knowledge held within its withered leathern binding is unimaginably ancient, and is surely forbidden by any civilized society that has the misfortune of discovering it.

Countless scribes whose civilizations now rest upon the ocean floor have added to the dark tome. Diabolists, magi, necromancers, witches, sorcerers – these are but a few of the titles used by the depraved beings that have left their mark upon its papyrus. It is their dark legacy that lives on within The Codex. The rituals, many penned by non-human hands, offer power undreamed of and promise a heavy toll will be paid in return. Yet men have killed to know its pages, and by doing so have damned their souls to be devoured by the Outer Dark.

It is unclear how The Codex has survived history’s cycle of death and rebirth, but it has. It is said that it can never truly be lost or destroyed. With each rediscovery a new name is given to the blasphemous tome. No matter how hard antiquity tries to forget this book it always seems to reemerge. The book wants to be found, and longs to be read. It hungers for new pages to be penned. The book is always reaching out for its next reader, and plots to stay in circulation.

Woe to those who read its pages…