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Chapter One: The Grimoire Appears

Roman Thresh sighed to himself as he walked from the Social Sciences building at the university. It had been a long, hard day of classes, but now he could finally return to his dorm room and relax. The tall, slim, eighteen year old Tasmanian Devil with shiny black fur, white under fur, and light green eyes strolled leisurely through the campus of Ractorm Univerisity, in the large city of Streen. Roman wore a comfortable yet loose white button down with a light suit suit jacket, and dark jeans that came down to cover most of his well-polished black boots. He carried a red backpack, filled with his textbooks and papers for his classes, as well as his comic books, sketch pads, and pet projects.

Looking around at the large dark buildings and the cloudy sky, Roman admired the somber scenery. Unlike most, he enjoyed the dark textures and colors of the campus, finding it inspiring for his writing and drawing. The dorms were only a few blocks away, he would reach them and then he and Rasp would eat and hang out for the rest of the night.

A small noise distracted Roman's thoughts as he walked; he turned and spotted a small crack in the ground he hadn't noticed before. As he watched, the crack suddenly snapped loudly, doubling in length and width.

"What in the-" Thresh started to say to himself, but the crack suddenly split several times more, before a blinding flash and bang blinded him and filled his ears with white noise. Roman didn't know which way was up or down, his eyes unseeing, and his ears ringing. Eventually, he felt himself hit the ground, and the blinding light and noise faded away, leaving him blind and deaf.

"Ugh... " Roman groaned a little, slowly orienting himself with his surroundings. Once his eyes cleared and his ears no longer stung, he glanced around, and gasped. A large crater, about fifteen feet in diameter and ten feet in depth had dimpled the earth, where the crack had once been.

At the very bottom, lay an old, battered plum-colored book the size of a large encyclopedia, glowing with an eldritch light. The book steamed and smoked a little, seeming to have an aura of power radiating from it.

"What's a book doing down there?" Roman asked aloud, slowly inching toward the book on his hands and knees, staring at it with wide, curious eyes.

Once he reached the book, he slowly reached out, and grabbed the volume, feeling its strange, almost leather-like texture. He stared at the symbols on the front, illustrated in golden runes of some kind.

Am I drugged or something? How can this be real? Roman was so confused. That one guy in the biology lab always talked about drugs, and from what he described as a "trip", Roman didn't feel like that. He felt like it was real, and he could remember his whole life clearly; he wasn't drugged, he wasn't dreaming, he really was sitting in a crater holding a book that looked like it had fallen from the sky like a meteor.

He gasped suddenly; the aura of the book seemed to flow into his arm, warm and prickling, and the warmth spread throughout his whole body. After a second of this warmth, it faded, the book now dull and cold.

Roman blinked a few times, and as he blinked, the symbols on the book changed into English. It read: The Dread Grimoire: The Complete Guide to Alchemy, Magick, and Incantations.

"I've got to figure out more about this... Time to get out of here!" He stumbled out of the smoky crater, managing to get away before the crowd that was rushing to the scene noticed him, while packing the Dread Grimoire into his backpack.

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That night, once his roommate and best friend Rasp had gone to bed, Roman flicked on the light in his desk light, opened to the first page of the grimoire, and began to read:

This Book of Sorcery, created at the Equinox of the Twelve Stars, is filled with the Incantations, Alchemical Equations, and Magick Techniques of every and any race in the known Dimensions. This Book was created to preserve the arcane knowledge of the Universes. This Book, however, must be protected at all Costs, and the fact that You are now reading it... Means the Dimensions are in terrible danger; that this Book has somehow escaped it's Dimensional Void, where it was stored to keep it from being abused.

Roman kept reading, his eyes wide.

The Morning Allies, an organization of demons, sorcerers, and beings of immense power, has desired to use this Book to recreate the worlds in their image. With the powerful Spells, Curses, and other Magickal powers contained within this Book at their disposal, none would be able to stop them. Therefore, it is your job, as the new Guardian of this Book, to wield its power fairly and to stop any and all forms of tyranny, corruption, evil, or any and all attempts to remove this Book from your Person. Should this Book be caught by the Morning Allies, then every world will fall under their tyrannical rule. This mustn't happen. As you train to use the Gifts given to you as the new Guardian, you must always beware sharing any knowledge of the Book with others; it will only endanger them. Now, Guardian, read on, and you will discover the power of the Dread Grimoire; your new Mentor.

As he finished reading, Roman stopped for a moment and thought about all this. Magic, demons, sorcerers... It was like someone had taken one of those fantasy short stories he'd written and made a sick joke of it. He knew that there were no such things as demons, but still, the fact of how this book came to him was undeniably magical.

What did it mean by Gifts? He decided that the only way he could get more answers, was to continue reading. So, he flipped to the first chapter, and began to read the Dread Grimoire.

Chapter One: Simple Magic Commands: Section One: Motion Magic

Magic, as with any other force, is contained within laws. These laws constrain magic to have a cost ratio equal to the wielders power: the more internal magic a wielder possesses, the more magic they can use at any one time. Magic regenerates within a person over time, and the magic potential within a person is contained within their aura, or life essence. These first three Spells are simple commands, that even the newly awakened magician can accomplish. These Spells are Push, Pull, and Stop, and consist of the three main forms of what is known as Motion Magic. Magic also dilutes over distance, so the amount of magic used per Spell depends on the distance between two objects, the user and the target.

Now, as far as using magic, it is a matter of willpower and focus. If the magician focuses on an object, and then uses his willpower to call up the magic within him, he will accomplish magic. Magic also functions like a muscle: the more times magic is used, the user's magical potential increases. It can be depleted over a short period of time if used too much, and will cause physical sickness and weakness in the user until it has regenerated sufficiently to be used again.

Motion Magic has to do with any and all forms of movement of matter, and the forces upon them. Once you master Motion Magic, you can negate gravity, slow or speed up time for a short time, or stop violent chemical explosions with a wave of your hand. The basics first, though.

Push Magic

Push Magic is the Magic used to create distance between two objects...

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By the time Roman awoke the next day, it was nearly noon, way past the time he normally awoke. It was a Saturday though, so he wasn't really stressed about it. No, it was the fact he'd awoken to find himself with his head resting on the Dread Grimoire that had him so worried.

"Oh crap, it wasn't a dream..." He groaned out, cracking his sore neck and rubbing his eyes.

"What wasn't a dream, bro?" Calvin Rasp asked, noticing his friend was finally awake.

Roman jumped a little, turning to look at his scaly friend. Rasp was eating his lunch, his vertically-slit golden eyes fixed on the Tasmanian Devil. The lizard scraped his plate clean, his scaly green skin and back and red highlighted hair glinting in the sunlight streaming into the room from their tiny window.

"Oh, uh..." Roman remembered the book had warned to tell no one. He had no idea if it was the truth, but better safe than sorry.

"Uh... That it's the weekend!" Roman smiled a little, recovering from sleep and surprise.

"Ah, gotcha. What'cha got there?" Rasp asked, gesturing to the Grimoire under Roman's arms. Roman quickly closed the book, tucking it into his backpack.

"Oh, it's just... an encyclopedia, of sorts." He said distractedly, turning to face his friend as he stood. He popped a bagel into the toaster, and poured himself a glass of orange juice, staring at his friend and making light conversation.

"So, how'd your exam go?" Roman asked, pulling out the cream cheese.

"Awful, yours?" Rasp responded.

"Oh you know, the usual."

"Nearly hundred percent again, I'm guessing?"

"Yep." Roman said.

"Jerk."

Roman smirked at his friend. "You ought to study more."

"You ought to stop being such an overachiever." Rasp stuck out his long, reptilian tongue at him, as the the bagel popped out. Roman chuckled, smearing his bagel with cream cheese as he did so.

"Hey listen, I'm gonna go to the Scraps for a while. I need to think about some things." Roman said as he wrapped his bagel in a napkin and poured his juice into a plastic cup.

"Sure, when'll you be back?" Rasp asked, looking at his friend with a bit of concern. The Scraps were an abandoned field of small trees and piles of junk the two had discovered exploring around the outskirts of the campus. It had become their secret sanctum, as it were, where if either of them needed time alone, they'd tell the other that's where they were, and the other would keep their distance until they either came home or were explicitly invited to come.

"Say, around three-ish." Roman said, nodding at his friend appreciatively.

"Sure. See you then." Rasp nodded, and with that, Roman slung his backpack over his back, grabbed his meal, and headed out the door.