Solemnikatica

The Solemnikatica is a Nikatic book written by Setnik Albath approximately 750 years before the end of the Long Night. Though only 54 years of age, Setnik claimed the book was the culmination of his life's work, and he died not long after.

Description

The Solemnikatica is written entirely in poetic verse and is around 750,000 words long. The various chapters and stanzas primarily take the form of conversations between repeating characters identified by non-repeating three-letter names. Most often one character is telling a story or explaining a concept to another, who then asks questions. The text was written originally in Endu, which makes its use of poetic verse particularly impressive. Even more impressive is that a nearly straight translation into Common retains the lyrical quality to a remarkable degree despite the simplicity of the language. If taken as a fiction, it would be considered a masterwork of Necromancer Neo-Classical literature.

However, the Solemnikatica is by all accounts not fiction.

Creation

The Solemnikatica is an example of a Nikatic text, that is a book written not by a living necromancer but dictated by undead shades to a summoning necromancer. The practice of creating such books was primarily performed by the Grey Temple necromancers, who used magics effectively amounting to torture on summoned shades to extract information. Though some nikatica were written by Green Temple, the practice became reviled during the Necromanic Wars and was abandoned then after. The Solemnikatica is therefore one of the last examples of this dead art.

The Solemnikatica is different from other nikatic texts insofar as it does not have a single author. In the book, shades are identified by 3-letter names. Setnik claimed to have spoken with "1,001 shades" but the actual number is difficult to determine. The commonly agreed-upon number is 999, but some versions of the text appear to have as having as many as 1,500 shades. Some interpretations of the text hold that some of the speakers are not shades at all, but demons or other dark creatures.

Contents

Most summaries of the text frequently use words like "vile" and "wicked", and it is true the Solemnikatica is not light reading. The book speaks on a very wide variety of subjects and shifts fluidly between them, but # of themes are commonly agreed upon by scholars of the text:

• The nature of magic
• Philosophy and theosophy
• Forgotten epochs of history
• Esoteric information, not to be confused with wisdom

The discussions on the nature and mechanics of magic, if taken at face value, are some of the frankest descriptions outside of textbooks written thousands of years later. Assuming the information is not allegorical, it is thought that an a mage who undertakes a thorough reading could gain a rather considerable amount of power. Many passages describe in detail dark and forbidden rituals not attempted since the Mage Wars over two thousand years before the Solemnikatica was written.

One area of particular note is that the book delves into the lost religion of the Marcon Alliance, destroyed some 6,500 years before the book's composition. These, and other details, point to Setnik raising up very ancient Shades indeed. The book contains what are said to be verbatim passages from the Marconian Bravkar, or sacred text. These are in a part called "The NEE SEE Dialogues", which make up a long conversation between Shades identified as NEE and SEE. In this section, NEE states that he will read directly from the Bravkar and quotes a passage, and SEE replies with a description of something either "Older", "Darker", or "Worse". Some interpretations of the text hold that SEE is not a shade at all but a demon, and that the whole section is the transcribed conversation between the shade of a Marconian priest and a demon raised up to torture him.

In another lengthy passage, the book diverges from the conversation style and instead takes on a first-person narrative as a shade identified as DOE tells a long and rambling story about his life. This portion is especially unusual because it uses many words that are spelled phonetically using the Endu alphabet but are not themselves words in Endu. Most interpretations consider this section to be a fiction because it describes a mystical realm that cannot be identified with any known civilization or era. Some scholars have, however, claimed the passage was dictated by a shade raised up from the impossibly ancient Mythical Age.

Necromancers who have commented on the book admit that while such a thing would be extremely difficult, it is not impossible that, with the right reagents and the right ritual elements, a shade from such an age could be found. However, most necromancers agree that raising a shade from more than a few centuries back, without proper preparation having been made around the individual's death, is impossible.

The esoteric knowledge in the book contains information about luna/solar cycles on Aren, the Lion Calendar, and various commentaries on Alchemy, Ritual Magic, and sacred geometry. These passages are particularly interesting for their frankness, when compared to the many books on esoteric wisdom.

Commentaries

On the whole the book is interesting enough to frequently attract scholarly attention, but its contents are difficult to consume. Many readers are said to have gone insane for delving too deep into the text, while others say it is merely words on a page.

Authorship and Copies

Setnik Albath composed the book first in his own blood. Doing so immediately drew the ire of necromancer priests, as writing in blood automatically elevated the book to the status of a sacred text. Something which, it not being about necromancy, made Setnik's authorship of it break a very powerful taboo.