Part 4: Present Day
Office of Strategic Research – Threat Assessment – File 114A-36
Artifact: Kotel na Ludostta (The Cauldron of Madness) – A grimoire
Description: (approximate, and based on all available historical resources). A large tome, measuring about 14” by 28” and about 2” thick (page count unknown). The cover of the book is deep black leather, chased with gold. Around the periphery of the front and back covers are arcane symbols of unknown provenance. On the front cover, in gold, is the title: Kotel na Ludostta in gothic script, and a stylized depiction of a cauldron. Descriptions we have suggest that the book probably has several page ribbons, each braided out of some sort of hair, possibly human. The pages within are of the finest vellum, provenance unknown. Each page is densely packed with a combination of gothic script, small and densely packed, as well as arcane symbols similar to the ones on the cover.
History: Apparently penned by the mad monk Gerhardt Kemmler in 1293 after communion with the remains of the god Czernobog somewhere in the forests of Bulgaria. It was, according to accounts at the time, key in a magically induced plague of madness in the Balkan States between 1294 and 1295. Casualties estimated at 14000-16000 in that period.
The book resurfaced, at least in records, as part of the Thule Society library in Germany in 1913, and was moved around Germany as part of that collection during World War II. The last accurate records point to the book being part of a transhipment of occult materials to Argentina in the last days of the war via submarine in the fall of 1945. No records of the grimoire’s use during the war exist, and it is possible the Thule Society were unable to unlock its full potential. No further records of the books whereabouts have been located.
Function: No copy of the book had ever been studied by OSR staff, and only the barest fragments exist anywhere in the historical record. The following assessment is based on slim historical evidence and comparison with similar tomes. The main body of the work seems to involve a kind of mind magic, or rituals whereby a willing person sells their future (soul?) to Czernobog in exchange for worldly or arcane power of some kind.
The historical accounts bear some similarity to the magic possessed by the Djinn, in that however great the granted power, it inevitably turns back on the bearer in some way. Where the accounts seem to differ is in the nature of the how the gift turns on the bearer. In the case of the Kotel, rather than the gift itself rebounding and harming the wearer, it seems that power actually grows until it consumes the wearer, at which point they are transformed into some sort of avatar under the control of Czernobog or one of his acolytes. So the book induces madness and then a transformation into a monstrous form of that madness. In essence, the Grimoire seems to function as some sort of monster factory, although Nightmare might be a more accurate term than monster in this case.
Threat Assessment: This grimoire should be considered a category one threat. Modelling of the events of 1294 applied to current population density information suggests that the impact of the grimoire’s unveiling in any major urban center would be catastrophic, and similar in scope and impact to a bioweapon attack using a vector similar to an airborne variant of the Ebola virus. Modelling done for a city the size of New York suggests complete arcane envelopment within 6 or 7 days and a casualty count somewhere between 4 and 5 million in that same time. This could be mitigated by the discovery of arcane means to reverse or cure the madness described in the events of 1294, but no such arcane safeguards are currently known.
