MATHRISIAN CODEX
"I met the Creator. The One True God. Never have I been so utterly terrified. He wore the very face of Madness..."
"As I was exploring these wretched wastes, a strange, small man surprised me. He offered me water, food, and safety in his cavern in the mountains. His name was Dr. Stridsibum. But it was a trick. He lured me into a trap. He drugged me, took me underneath his cave down to the entrails of the world and into his demented lab made of metal, hooked me up on alien machines. He studied me, injected me with nauseating liquids. He changed me. Mutated me. I'm no longer human, he made me a monster! I managed to escape by stealing his strange, alien device he used to control the lab. It looked like the hammer of a smith, but it was far, far more... It flashed with a dozen lights, and obeyed his verbal commands spoken in an unknown tongue. This technological marvel granted him absolute control over the entire underground laboratory: its metallic doors, it's strange weapons array, its magical screens full of runes and symbols, its terrifying walking machines... So I stole it, used it to escape, and hid it deep in the mountain. Then I ran and ran and ran... My mutated legs hurt, my deformed body is twisted and bloated. I'm nothing more than an abomination. These are my last words. After writing this, I will take my own life. May the God-Emperor have mercy on my soul."
"Dr. Stridsibum revealed everything to me. Knowledge not meant to be bestowed on any human mind..."
"He was an explorer from another world, and discovered our world 20 000 years ago. His ship encountered a strange energy, and crashed deep into the mountain. I believe he was referring to magic..."
"Trapped on our world, he experimented on his crew, mutated them, vivisected them. From their flesh, he created us, humans. He made us in the image of his otherworldly people, to become slaves and serve as cattle, on the day the rest of his people would come. He seeded Andoria with our ancestors, but not Varannar, for its native Minotaur civilisation was great and strong and he failed to exterminate them."
"He told me he should have died after a few centuries, but he loved his creations so much, that he could not bear to abandon them. So he made a Longevity Serum, extending his life perpetually. I believe that's when he went mad."
"He said he looked like me once. But the Serum mutated his body and his mind, twisted him through the millenia into this pitiful mishapen form."
"In his madness, he decided to create more humans to seed Varannar, even though the marvelous minotaur cities were everywhere. His crew being all long dead, the mad mutated man used his own flesh and blood to create new humans. But he failed, and his creations grew to mirror his deformed, twisted shape. I have seen these creations. They're everywhere in the mountains. They're of a sickly greenish complexion, small of mind and body, crude, ugly and grotesque imitations of men. And they breed like vermin."
"He told me about endless experimentations in the hope of creating more humans, to seed Varannar like he once did Andoria. Each attempt proved a failure worst than the last. He spoke of bloated and violent human-like giants, and of green-skinned humanoid monsters who could tear off their own limbs and regrow them. He experimented on reptiles, accidentally creating the huge fearsome beasts I've seen flying above the mountains. He mixed some with his own blood, made human-shaped reptiles of the same kin. He repeated the same experiment with boars, frogs, apes and bears..."
"I've known minotaurs back on Andoria. They can be dangerous, but they also have a rich culture, beautiful cities and excel in poetry and art. Varannar, because of this mad Dr. Stridsibum, has been filled with all manner of monsters throughout the millenia, twisted humanoid creatures that are more beasts than men."
"And now that I've been a victim of Dr. Stridsibum's mad experimentations, I, too, have become a mutant monster. I cannot live like this. My journey ends here. I just hope humanity never comes to this hellish isle of Varannar. But if someone does, please, I beg of you... avenge me. Avenge our world. Kill the mad Dr. Stridsibum!"