Alter Aeon The Great Library

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Note - as with any topic, researchers should question the reliability
and veracity of these texts.  The library's aim is to preserve
documents, not verify accuracy.

AABN:  13780
Title: The Necromarcanorum Volume I: Souls

 This scroll is made from black leather, rolled around a waxed rod of
darkwood. The text is large and blocky, written with dense white chalk that
is sealed into the leather:

"The art of necromancy originally arose from priestly disciplines. Clerics
learned to manipulate life forces through healing spells worked in concert
with divine will. Power was found to reside in blood and teeth, and to a
lesser extent in flesh, bone and breath. As healing spells can be reversed
to cause harm, so these energies can be manipulated in other more subtle
ways.

It is said that angels taught the first purely necromantic arts to mortals
in Old Q'thelas. Clerics learned to imbue the semblence of life into
inanimate things, creating temporary constructs from base materials using
their own life force (sometimes known as homunculi) and more elaborate,
permanent constructs powered by elemental magic called golems.

It was the invention of golems that shed light on new techniques for the
young art of necromancy. It became divorced from the purview of clerics and
fell under the scrutiny of magical scholars. They formalized rituals into a
comprehensive body of spells. Necromantic runecraft followed, based heavily
on elementalist rune formulae.

Eventually these mages learned to capture the energies that bind souls to
bodies, distilling them into soulstones. These marvellous stones are not
truly prisons for souls, which are protected by divine mandate, but rather
are receptacles for the energies that bind souls to living beings. This
energy can be harvested and utilized in many ways.

Demons and angels both covet soulstone energy for unknown reasons. Demons
in particular will barter goods and services in exchange for soulstones.
Soulstones can also be bound to items created from teeth, such as bone
armor or shields. Furthermore, soulstone energy can be organized into a
primitive consciousness that is used as a substitute for a soul when making
undead minions.

The harvesting and utilization of soulstone energy is one of the pillars of
modern necromancy. The invention thereof is considered the point where
necromancy fully broke away from both its priestly and elementalist roots
and became an art unto itself."