Treasures
You never know where treasure will be found.
Wizard’s lairs. Curiosity shops. The private collections of aristocrats. The offices of psychic investigators. Museum storerooms. Gentleman’s clubs. You might inherit a piece from your eccentric uncle or be hired to transport it across a war zone.
Only valuable possession of an exiled Russian prince. Packed into a crate of fruit. Gathering dust in a warehouse or the back room of a customs office. Hauled up from a sunken ship. Trapped behind the walls of a sixteenth-century alchemist’s house they’re knocking down.
Left behind in a hotel room. Gleams among the tattered possessions of a winter-blasted tramp - why didn’t he trade it for warmth? Dodgy pawn shop owner bought it from a burglar, wants someone to take it off his hands as it gives him the creeps.
Arrives in the post one day. Wrapped in brown paper. Origins unknown. Scrawled on a note - “find out what this is, please.” Did the man who sent it mean you harm?
What is it, anyway? Every piece should have a story. All treasure is a mystery hook in its own right and finding it can lead you to more treasure. Often hard to sell - you need the right connections, and the buyers will come after you if anything goes wrong.
Money comes in Credit points - around $100 in 1920s money, around $1500 in today’s money. Each of the items on this list is worth about a Credit point. Except the diamond, which should make you rich, but it freaks buyers out.
A wizard would pay more. But he’d also be more likely to kill you and take it. Remember NPCs can also use these.
The Sump Of Light. Flawless 140-carat diamond from the Golconda mines. Stolen from the emperor Aurangzeb by Jean-Baptiste Tavernier in 1666 and kept in his possession until his death in Moscow at the jaws of a pack of wild dogs. Of a colour that cannot be described.
Lightning Teeth. Bundle of opalised theropod teeth. Grow into opalised skeleton warriors when sown in fertile soil. Stolen from Kamilaroi elders near what’s now the town of Lightning Ridge. Used to rob banks by the bushranger Captain Thunderbolt, who may still be alive.
Sydenstricker’s Ringsel. Thumbnail-sized pearl discovered in the lama Changchub Dorje’s ashes. Contains a pure garden of infinite bliss. Peer into it and you can see him relaxing. Found on Mount Lu by the missionary Absalom Sydenstricker, who spent years trying to destroy it.
Dormition Egg. Made by Alma Pihl for the twelfth birthday of Anastasia Romanov. Week-old human embryo visible through its shell of frosted diamond-studded glass. Can be hatched into a serviceable replica of any child who spends a few days pretending to be its mum.
1811 Château de Rais. Jeroboam of Sauternes from the Bordeaux vineyard of the Comtesse Juliane de Rais. A “comet vintage”. Said to guarantee any toast drunk in it, i.e. “to your health, sir, and may your foes perish in confusion.” Comtesse torn to bits by peasant mob in 1812.
Brass Oracle. Ten-foot python with a woman’s face, cast by a cult sculptor of Ifẹ̀ as a coronation gift for Oba Oguolo. Stirs on summer days. Animates when thrown into a bonfire. Looted from Benin in 1897. Great aesthetic taste. Can tell you which investments will be profitable.
Devil In Amber. Thumb-high black humanoid figure preserved in a wad of yellow amber. Exorcised from a Baltic shaman by Albert of Riga during the Livonian Crusade. Wear it to bed and learn sorcery in your dreams. Teutonic Knights and Semigallian witch-cultists want it back.
Birth Tusk. Wand carved from hippo ivory. Inscribed with sphinxes and baboons. Dug out of a twelfth-dynasty midwife’s tomb at Thebes. Can be used to bless a newborn baby, making her lucky as long as she’s in full sunlight. Anathema to enemies of children.
Brute In Oils. Painting of a hideous old man. Grows more hideous with the passage of time. Can tentatively be attributed to Ferdinand Bol. The warlock and spice trader Jacob van Eeden, currently living in Buitenzorg, Java, will crumble to dust if the picture is ruined.
Presidential Flesh Request. Letter from George Washington to a prominent Virginia slave dealer, placing an order for ten Africans to be roasted and eaten at the annual feast of the Fredericksburg Masonic Lodge. Authentic beyond a doubt. Bolsheviks want to discredit America with it.
Fat Kris. Wavy-bladed Balinese dagger. Made from patterned steel. Golden hilt in the form of Bataru Bayu, the money god, studded with semi-precious stones. Attracts wealth to its owner, and will one day be used to kill him. Fall into poverty instantly if you lose it.
Long Ben’s Quarter. One quarter of a treasure map. Easily identifiable as such. Leads to Henry Every’s jewel stash, stolen from Aurangzeb’s fleet in 1695. Other quarters - owned by Bugsy Siegel, pinned to wall in Lahore prison, watertight bottle at bottom of Great Blue Hole.
Wall Cat. Mummified domestic feline. Found under floorboards of a peasant's home in rural Saxony. Milk and mice go missing in its vicinity. Faint mewing heard at night. Cold fur brushes against your leg. Reliably catches and eats curses, diseases, imps, bad dreams.
Stillborn Servant. Roasted foetus covered in gold leaf. Green skin and pointed ears. Kept in a black bottle. Coaxed out with toys and candy, sent to pilfer small objects and cash. Scuttles over rooftops. Creeps in through windows. Wants you to cuddle it back to sleep. Cries if you don’t.
Deep Crown. Tiara of lustrous gold, studded with black seed pearls. Khmer? Not really though. High in front, doesn’t fit a human head. Decorated with batrachian figures, riding tiny wire chariots over fields of corpses. Bought by a drunken sailor on a Pacific island whose name he doesn’t know.
Black Mirror. Obsidian Aztec scrying glass. Can be used like a touchscreen, when bathed in the smoke of rare herbs, to browse the Internet of 2024. Briefly owned by John Dee, who tried to contact angels with it. His posts can be found on obscure subreddits, pleading for help.
Flying Ointment. Made from aconite and human fat. Comes in a small clay jar. Works best when applied to the anus and genitals. Allows you to fly at midnight, in astral form, to the nearest witches’ Sabbath, where you will be expected to kiss the Devil’s backside and swear fealty to Hell.
Black Lotus Powder. Comes in a red paper packet. Grown by dwarves in the Burmese highlands - you can buy it from sailors anywhere, but the variety you’re holding is high-grade product used by tcho-tcho priests to commune with the twin obscenities Lloigor and Zhar.
Babylon Battery. Clay pot inscribed with prayers in spiralling Mandaic. Holds two rods of iron and copper. Generates a current when filled with vinegar. Krun, the Flesh Mountain, possesses anyone it zaps and any device it powers. He likes radios and telephones, since they let him talk.
Trismegistus Deck. Produced for cartomantic purposes in 1792 by the Nine Sisters Masonic Lodge. More powerful than they expected. Works like the Deck of Many Things - draw a card, once per day, get a random effect based on the Major Arcana. Death kills you, the Fool makes you a genius but insane.
So, you get another long-ass comment from me :-)
I like and agree with your thesis on how _treasure_ should be found and that it should have its own story and be an adventure hook in its own right. Also love the whole idea of making players think on how these weird effects can be used at all – much like with your spell list. I do wonder however if some of these come with instructions because in some cases I wonder if anyone would ever figure out on their own how to activate them. Or can you divinate that somehow?
It itches my fingers to add my own list right here but I fear that the fives of readers of my book series find this somehow and be spoilered. So I'll only put one very central item from there here:
Mr. Abdi's Lense
A milky lense of an indestructible, glass-like material framed in a ring of grey metal that cannot be scratched with a diamond cutter. If held above antedeluvian writing of the Mu civilization visually translates it into cuneiform script. Gifted by a mysterious dealer of antiques in Addis Abeba.