1. Description
2. Victor’s History (kazananın tarihi)
3. Ambassador’s Journal (büyükelçinin günlüğü)
4. Detect Poison (zehir tespit etmek)
5. Entwined Guardian (birbirine dolanmış koruyucu)
6. Commanding Presence of Leadership (liderliğin hakim varlığı)

Description

This book is barely a book. It exists perhaps as something more like a precursor to what a book would become. The front and back covers seem to be sheets of more or less square pieces of thin wood covered in a thick hide. The contours and shape of it suggests it might have been from a crocodile or some other large reptile. The wood within the back cover is snapped within the leathery cover and so part of it sometimes hangs loose. A thin strip of leather is attached to the bare spine and tucks under the front cover. It wraps around and meets another strip of leather similarly attached at the back. A knot in the rear strap sits within a loop at the end of the front strap holding the book closed. The spine is open and the thread binding the pages together and to the covers is visible. Some of it differs slightly, suggesting minor repairs over the years.

There are no external markings on the covers excluding the texture of the hide.

The pages themselves appear to be a treated papyrus, or other pulp based predecessor to paper. They have been oiled and sealed to keep well, but have yellowed over the years and some show brown finger marks where they were touched too soon after treatment. Some pages also show a stain or two in dark purples or browning reds.

Within the front cover, written near the spine in an ink that shows a green tone where it is smudged, is the word “agg’Azar”. This appears to have been added long after the book was first compiled but is nonetheless ancient and gives it the name by which it is commonly known. The provenance of this word is unclear.

The script itself is an old form of Turkish. At least pre-9th century as it lacks Arabic and Latin borrowed words. But seems to have been translated from an earlier text. It addresses the reader directly as “honoured disciple”. The book provides a brief, but impersonal history of the writer who claims to have come north from a small kingdom beyond the mountains to serve as Vizier to the ruler of a great port city by the Nile delta. Perhaps Thonis, or some precursor. The vast majority of the book, however, is a guide or instructional series of essays on how to properly perform the services of Vizier or Counsel to a ruler, and head of the ruler’s household. Something like a Castellan or major domo.

A reading of the various chapters shows the writer to have been, at best, amoral in their advice and guidance. Different sections deal with how to select good slaves for different duties, within the household, within the grounds, and within the harem. How to ensure slaves will be loyal, including punishments both cruel and bizarre. How to place members of the harem that will be loyal to the reader as adviser, rather than to the ruler. And how to best take advantage of their loyalty, including sexually, politically, and when it is necessary to reduce built up humors or spirits through exercise of selected violence upon them.

Further instructions include how to manipulate the ruler, including selective application of narcotics and hallucinogens, and manipulation of other members of the court. And controlling with whom the ruler breeds and what the outcomes are. Naturally or through intervention. This section also includes advice on how to have members of the court or royal household feud with each other or murder each other if the need should arise.

Other sections talk of mollifying the populace, dealing with uprisings, identifying and eliminating dissenting voices, and the proper use of public punishments and executions. Some of these sections also refer to a later section on effective use of torture, including the benefits of having others, especially relative innocents or the young, perform tortures so as to manipulate them.

Some chapters, however, merely deal with proper bookkeeping principles and bargaining with vendors and artisans when acquiring goods and services on behalf of “beloved ruler” as the writer consistently refers to them. There are also sections on properly dealing with visiting dignitaries as well as how to manage an entourage while visiting foreign lands and their inherent dangers and temptations.

Peppered among the pages are some alchemical formulas and spells noted down as useful for the current topic. Many of the formulas use terminology and names of plants or animals that have passed out of usage and are, thus, difficult to make use of. But, some of the spells are more or less readily usable.

Victor’s History (kazananın tarihi)

Quick Cast: No

Power Level: 4

Requirements: A sheet of some form of paper (papyrus, calf skin, vellum, etc) and a writing implement. On one side of the paper the caster writes a word or list of words, often a name or series of names. Then they fold the paper and on the outside surfaces can write one name on each side. They can continue to fold the paper as many times as they can, writing new words on each blank side their folding creates.

Effect: Everywhere near the caster any documents containing the words written on the inner fold of the paper will be replaced with one of the words on one of the outer folds of the paper. In the mind’s eye of the caster they can review briefly each change, selecting a change from the possible alternatives, or they may elect to simply make random or identical changes to each document. The first few documents changed take a few seconds each for the caster to process. But, as the spell progresses and the caster focuses more, each change becomes quicker and quicker. This process slows only if the caster needs to make a new fold, which slows them a little while the fold and new writing are performed.

The changes made thus are both permanent and generally imperceptible. They match the form and format of the original document as if it had been drafted with the new text originally.

Ambassador’s Journal (büyükelçinin günlüğü)

Quick Cast: No

Power Level: 4

Requirements: Two books, preferably made by the same bookbinder of the same materials. If the caster is able to source the same materials and makes a very careful study of the original book’s construction it may be possible to create a close enough duplicate that will work without employing the same book binder for the second book. This method would assist in keeping the existence of the duplicate book a more closely guarded secret. The two books must be submerged into the same water at the same time, then add a small pot of ink and a drop of their own blood. 

Effect: The casting of this spell completely dries the books, consuming the blood, ink, and water as if they had never been submerged in the mixture. Anything written in one of the books appears in the other exactly as it was written in the first. This effect is permanent. As a result the two books will always be a duplicate of each other unless one of them is destroyed, which breaks the spell.

Detect Poison (zehir tespit etmek)

Quick Cast: Yes

Power Level: 2

Requirements: A witch need simply gesture at a table of food and beverages while holding a sprig of hemlock. Other magicians must recite a short incantation and dab a spot of crushed hemlock on their tongue.

Effect: For the next few minutes the caster is able to perceive any poisoned items on the affected table or area as having a faint yellow or sickly green patina. The vibrancy of the colour change is typically indicative of the amount of poison present, but may not directly correlate with the strength of the poison. 

Note that as alcohol is essentially poisonous it will also show up to the caster of this spell. However, an experienced caster can usually differentiate normal alcohol and a poisoned beverage with an Intelligence + Perception roll.

Entwined Guardian (birbirine dolanmış koruyucu)

Quick Cast: No

Power Level: 7

Requirements: Two willing subjects, one to be the guardian, one the protected. The caster must extract from them at least three bodily fluids including blood. Then mix with a few drops of black asp blood and a few flecks of gold. Recite an incantation seeking blessing of the great river and the lord of the underworld over the mixture as you heat it. Once it nears boiling, take it on the tips of two fingers and anoint the guardian subject with it on the forehead, palms, genitals, chest and soles. If the spell is working properly once they have been anointed the mixture will immediately seep into the skin and the guardian will experience a momentary elation followed by a feeling of blessed connection with the protected.

Effect: While the current moon lasts in the sky the protected subject will suffer no physical harm through physical attack, poisoning, or even exhaustion. All such effects will, instead, be immediately transferred to the guardian, who will suffer the full and accumulated effects as if they had been done directly to them.

During this time the guardian subject is able to rest and recover as normal, and as if they had recovered any such harm directly.

The spell ends immediately if the guardian subject dies.

Commanding Presence of Leadership (liderliğin hakim varlığı)

Quick Cast: Yes

Power Level: 3

Requirements: The caster must spend only a few moments in contemplation and speak a few words in supplication to the lords that sit above. The caster also requires an object to be the focus of the spell.

Effect: When next the holder of the enchanted object (which need not be the caster) addresses a group, they will find that the group they address are compelled to pay attention to them and heed whatever the holder of the object is saying. In addition, additional success levels from the casting over the power level of the spell can be added to any persuasion checks made with the crowd or any member of the crowd.

Any members of the crowd that are openly hostile to the holder of the item addressing the crowd will still feel a compulsion to listen to the holder of the item, but may choose not to or to disregard what is said depending on the degree of their feelings.

The spell fades from the object after 10 minutes.