Ancient Tablets

**Ancient Tablets**, are the most common types of "Knowledge" that can be found. There are 10 tablets that are accessed via hidden rooms and 5 notes that can be found in specific locations. All Knowledge is acquired during crusades after defeating The One Who Waits. Tablets can be found in any of the four realms, but will be received in order.

## Hidden Room

### Location

Darkwood
Anura
Anchordeep
Silk Cradle

There is a chance that, once per crusade, two totems will appear: one hidden in the background, the other in the room with the player. Attacking it will cause it to activate. A beam of red light will appear to connect the two totems, and a secret path will open up. Once inside, the player will have to offer up one red heart to receive a tablet. On doing so, the lights on the shrine will flash one of five colors and a black, fuzzy hand will reach down to deliver the Ancient Tablet.

After receiving the first and last tablet, text will appear on screen that is similar to how the prophecies appear.

Blue-Purple VariantYellow-Orange VariantGreen VariantWhite VariantRed Variant
# Ancient Tablet I

I meant only to survive, and yet she, feathered hand of Great Ones gone, has seen me to be worthy. Oh, First Gods, guide me! I devote myself to you, wholly, body and soul. I will strike down dissent. I will cull doubt. I will nourish this Crown and be worthy of this power. In blood, I swear.

# Ancient Tablet II

Great Ones, I find fragments of your power across these vast lands. The blades once gripped by your mighty fists, the tears once fallen from your all-seeing eyes, the ichor that runs through the very veins of the earth… I seek your understanding. I prostrate myself before you. I vow that those who will not serve in their life will serve with their death instead.

# Ancient Tablet III

Simple things… silly, almost… creatures seek protection in my shadow, pour faith into my soul and by their devotion I am changed. I was like them, once…

# Ancient Tablet IV

I used to think them strange, these three feathered beasts, unworn and unweathered by the passage of time. To be keepers of Godly tools, and yet not be tempted to Godliness themselves—do they not hunger as we do?

Now, wisened in age, I understand. Hatched beneath the First, they crave no power, seek no other fulfillment, for it is not in their nature. And it is by nature that we must abide.

# Ancient Tablet V

My pilgrimage has lead me thus, to the caverns of a Godly skull, remnants of a Great One now decaying into earth. The air here smells sweet, the soil rich and dark… I hear whispers, I feel watched, yet there is naught around, just these strange, small mushrooms, their spots almost like eyes… but that’s impossible…?

# Ancient Tablet VI

I had not seen her in some dozen years, perhaps a score, perhaps a hundred. She is changed, alarmingly so, the mutilation of her body naught compared to the madness taking root in her mind. Her kin were indifferent. ‘Twas foreseen, the card reader said. I asked, what of her duty? What of the Crowns? What of her very nature?

And the smith answered: it is lost.

# Ancient Tablet VII

I have lived long, too long for simple memory and so I must continue to chronicle these histories. Followers rise, bloom, and die, like so much clover on the ground, and my troublesome peers, Gods by a right no longer divine, rise and fall like tides cut free from the moon. One came to my temple, young and ambitious and thirsty for war. I dismissed them. I will not abide such blasphemy.

# Ancient Tablet VIII

Whispers reach my temple. Gods fallen, shrines crumbled, Followers taken, and Crowns simply gone. Our numbers are beginning to dwindle. I do not fear. I will swing my righteous axe, draw my zealous sword, and know that I walk with the blessing of the First at my brow. Heresy shall not be tolerated in these Lands.

# Ancient Tablet IX

Yngya cannot be found, and the leaves change no more. ‘Tis clear, now, that none shall survive this purging. The Owl has chosen a different tact, one I cannot condone; for regardless of what they threaten, I shall never relinquish my beliefs. They call me the greatest of fanatics, and perchance this is true: for I would rather perish than sacrifice my devotion. Great Ones, I am yours eternally.

# Ancient Tablet X

He of havoc, he of blight; she of hunger, they of might. He that lays a soul to rest; five remain of hundreds blessed

* An initial version of the tablet instead read:

I am shamed, shamed. I deserve no forgiveness. I deserve to die here, shrouded in sin. I renounced the First Gods. How easily pain made a defector of me. I will take whatever punishment is due, but I beg you, reader of these chronicles, remember: they call their faith old, but they are nothing more than heretics.
He of havoc, he of blight; she of hunger, they of might. He that lays a soul to rest; five remain of hundreds blessed.

It was changed to simplify things, but the original version adds further context into the fate of the Fanatic, the state of the Bishops and the history of the Old Faith.

The player will receive a Serpent Follower Form after the tenth tablet.

## Trivia

* Tablet V mentions that Spore Grotto was once the head of one of "The First Ones".
* Tablet VI mentions Clauneck and Kudaii ("the card reader" and "the smith"). It also mentions someone who has lost her mind, who might be Chemach.
* Tablet VII mentions a young God, ambitious and thirsty for war. Since the Fanatic refers to this God as "them", they are probably referring to Shamura, who is the Bishop of War.
* The final tablet says that Leshy, Heket, Kallamar, Shamura and Narinder ("He of havoc, he of blight, she of hunger, they of might. He that lays a soul to rest;") are the only survivors of unknown events that killed hundreds of the Fanatic's followers.
* The tablets continuously mention some sort of owl god, whose crown the Fanatic wears while writing the tablets.