I am Herman, called the Recluse, a monk condemned for sins too vile to name aloud. Death was promised, and the walls of my cell pressed in like stone, suffocating and cold. In the silence, a voice stirred, carried on shadows, soft and cunning. It promised me life, but at a cost I could scarcely comprehend. One night of labor, it said, and I would live. In desperation, I agreed. I gave my soul to the Devil, and he took it, unseen and immediate.
The candle flickered as I began to write. My hand ached, my back screamed, my mind teetered on the edge of madness. Yet the words came, flowing like black fire across parchment. I inscribed the Latin Bible, its sacred words heavy on my mind, each verse echoing like a hymn in the darkness. Between prayers and psalms, I wrote chronicles of kingdoms long vanished, their wars and betrayals carved into ink. Remedies and recipes filled the pages, some drawn from holy tradition, some whispered to me in shadow, dangerous in ways I scarcely understood. I copied exorcisms and spells, words meant to call or banish spirits, and I felt the weight of each syllable press against my soul. Lists of monasteries, liturgical calendars, and moral teachings crept along the margins, punctuated by warnings that chilled my blood. Sometimes my hand shook, for the knowledge I was copying was not meant for human minds, yet I could not stop. Every stroke was a tether binding me to the Devil’s promise, each page a step deeper into darkness, each line a secret whispered that would outlast me long after I was dust.
The manuscript grew beyond reason. It weighed more than a man could lift. Each page chained me tighter to the bargain I had made, and still I wrote. When exhaustion threatened to undo me, I felt it, presence at my shoulder, cold and watching. I dared not look, yet I knew he leaned over me. The Devil himself. His eyes followed each stroke, his grin a whisper of hunger. He offered no guidance, yet his shadow guided my hand, shaping every line, every letter, until my own will was drowned beneath the rhythm of his demand.
By the time I reached the final pages, madness had taken root in my mind. I drew him then, full-page, staring from the parchment. His gaze pierced through ink and paper, into the marrow of my bones, into the corners of memory I had long hidden. I knew every secret he would claim and every thought that had dared to linger in my heart. My hand trembled, my breath caught, but still I wrote, page after page, until dawn cracked the sky and the candle guttered.
The book was finished. The Codex was complete. I survived, yet survival is a cruel joke. The whispers do not end. They coil around the edges of my vision, curl in the margins of my thoughts. Shadows stretch where no light can touch, and sometimes, when I close my eyes, I hear a pen scratching behind me, echoing the labor of that night. I am Herman, and I live with the price of my bargain. My soul is bound to a manuscript that will endure when I am forgotten, a book too vast, too dark, and too alive for any man to hold without surrendering himself entirely.
Some knowledge is too dangerous to hold. Some bargains can never be undone. I know, and yet I write still in memory, in confession, in warning. Beware the night when the shadow offers salvation. It will take more than you are willing to give, and it will remember everything.
His sin lives on in The Codex Gigas Mug, where every sip recalls the price of a soul.