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Description
This is an illustration for a series of post I've been creating for the Science Fantasy Hub website. The webmaster invited several authors to write their own humorous series. My posts are entries from The Bestiary, a compendium of unusual creatures as related by the staff of the Abreen Library. These posts were inspired by my love of weird, sometimes silly D&D monsters like Flumphs, Duckbunnies, Thought Eaters and Wolf's-in-Sheep's-Clothing (yes, that's an actual full name for a Dungeons & Dragons monster).

You can read all my posts on the Science Fantasy Hub here: sciencefantasyhub.com/public_h…

WORM WIZARD

     There is power in books. I’m sure that statement, coming from a librarian, is no surprise to you, my readers. But, nonetheless, I think you will agree it is very true. Books shape our past and pave the way for our future. They color our world from the bioluminescent blue of the deep seas to the lambent velvet black of space. They-- but I’d best stop here before I end up waxing poetic about books all day...

     Let’s go back to my original statement: there is power in books. Sometimes quite literally. In the Year of the Red Cockatrice, 1587, Serpenthon Press produced Profound Magicks, a thirty-volume set of books detailing the lives and times of great wizards, witches and magicians. This series is infamous among bibliophiles for the inclusion of a spell of Mental Simulacrum on the endpapers of each copy. A spell which was merely supposed to create an illusion of the volume’s subject to enhance the reading experience. Unfortunately, the generated illusions proved far too vivid- and distracting- to allow anyone to actually read the books themselves. As a result, most copies of the series remained on bookshop and library shelves, unopened and unappreciated.

     Though a financial flop when first released, the volumes of Profound Magicks have since become collector’s items prized for their oddity. Apparently, they’re pretty entertaining reads, too, if one can ignore the distracting illusions that flit about when any of the books are opened.

     The Abreen Library has a complete set of the series, of course, kept in the Special Collections of The History of Arcana wing. Since acquiring them we've discovered another odd effect of the Spell of Mental Simulacrum. It seems that the spell causes the personality of the featured magic-user to permeate the pages of the book. And when these pages are nibbled by bookworms- that eternal enemy of the classic tome- some of that personality is imparted to the little beasts. The invertebrates gain a degree of intelligence (though how much is questionable) and come to believe that they themselves are the magic-wielder described in the book.

     For example, a few summers ago the Entomological stacks were plagued by a grub vociferously proclaiming itself to be “Jean deSangmort, Master of the Dead”. Though loud deSangmort was relatively harmless, spending most of his time gathering and trying to reanimate the many husks of dead spiders, wasps and other small vermin that collect on the windowsills and behind the shelves. Complaints eventually forced us to relocate deSangmort to a terrarium in the custodian’s closet, though he does not appear to mind and has, in fact, declaring the glass tank to be his “impenetrable, invisible sanctum”.

     Somewhat more annoying than deSangmort is “Velcaloth the Long-Dreaming”, an industrious worm who hollowed out one of the banister poles on the main staircase to serve as his “wizard’s tower”. Velcaloth spends the majority of his time poring over his library of “ancient manuscripts”- actually just scraps of paper that he has fished out of the waste bins (not that genuine books would be much use to him since bookworms, even magically-enhanced ones, are completely illiterate).

   On a more pleasant not, there’s the worm that lives in the Reading Garden and calls herself “Henrietta Grampus”. Like the famous witch whose identity she has assumed, Henrietta spends her days meticulously gathering fungi, herbs, lichens, cyanobacteria and other flora to concoct her potions. In a pleasant surprise for we here at the Library, her creations have proven to be quite delectable and several have been recorded and sold as tea infusions available at the front desk.

Description
This is an illustration for a series of post I've been creating for the Science Fantasy Hub website. The webmaster invited several authors to write their own humorous series. My posts are entries from The Bestiary, a compendium of unusual creatures as related by the staff of the Abreen Library. These posts were inspired by my love of weird, sometimes silly D&D monsters like Flumphs, Duckbunnies, Thought Eaters and Wolf's-in-Sheep's-Clothing (yes, that's an actual full name for a Dungeons & Dragons monster).

You can read all my posts on the Science Fantasy Hub here: sciencefantasyhub.com/public_h…

WORM WIZARD

     There is power in books. I’m sure that statement, coming from a librarian, is no surprise to you, my readers. But, nonetheless, I think you will agree it is very true. Books shape our past and pave the way for our future. They color our world from the bioluminescent blue of the deep seas to the lambent velvet black of space. They-- but I’d best stop here before I end up waxing poetic about books all day...

     Let’s go back to my original statement: there is power in books. Sometimes quite literally. In the Year of the Red Cockatrice, 1587, Serpenthon Press produced Profound Magicks, a thirty-volume set of books detailing the lives and times of great wizards, witches and magicians. This series is infamous among bibliophiles for the inclusion of a spell of Mental Simulacrum on the endpapers of each copy. A spell which was merely supposed to create an illusion of the volume’s subject to enhance the reading experience. Unfortunately, the generated illusions proved far too vivid- and distracting- to allow anyone to actually read the books themselves. As a result, most copies of the series remained on bookshop and library shelves, unopened and unappreciated.

     Though a financial flop when first released, the volumes of Profound Magicks have since become collector’s items prized for their oddity. Apparently, they’re pretty entertaining reads, too, if one can ignore the distracting illusions that flit about when any of the books are opened.

     The Abreen Library has a complete set of the series, of course, kept in the Special Collections of The History of Arcana wing. Since acquiring them we've discovered another odd effect of the Spell of Mental Simulacrum. It seems that the spell causes the personality of the featured magic-user to permeate the pages of the book. And when these pages are nibbled by bookworms- that eternal enemy of the classic tome- some of that personality is imparted to the little beasts. The invertebrates gain a degree of intelligence (though how much is questionable) and come to believe that they themselves are the magic-wielder described in the book.

     For example, a few summers ago the Entomological stacks were plagued by a grub vociferously proclaiming itself to be “Jean deSangmort, Master of the Dead”. Though loud deSangmort was relatively harmless, spending most of his time gathering and trying to reanimate the many husks of dead spiders, wasps and other small vermin that collect on the windowsills and behind the shelves. Complaints eventually forced us to relocate deSangmort to a terrarium in the custodian’s closet, though he does not appear to mind and has, in fact, declaring the glass tank to be his “impenetrable, invisible sanctum”.

     Somewhat more annoying than deSangmort is “Velcaloth the Long-Dreaming”, an industrious worm who hollowed out one of the banister poles on the main staircase to serve as his “wizard’s tower”. Velcaloth spends the majority of his time poring over his library of “ancient manuscripts”- actually just scraps of paper that he has fished out of the waste bins (not that genuine books would be much use to him since bookworms, even magically-enhanced ones, are completely illiterate).

   On a more pleasant not, there’s the worm that lives in the Reading Garden and calls herself “Henrietta Grampus”. Like the famous witch whose identity she has assumed, Henrietta spends her days meticulously gathering fungi, herbs, lichens, cyanobacteria and other flora to concoct her potions. In a pleasant surprise for we here at the Library, her creations have proven to be quite delectable and several have been recorded and sold as tea infusions available at the front desk.