Based on what the false Adjunct knew concerning the matter, the original Öht Nürn Aldhii had become nearly impossible to follow. Fading, difficult to read passages, references, cross-references, and later additions, were scribbled in every margin, or were written upon scraps of parchment, skin and cloth, and inserted between the pages. Much of the text in the Book’s earlier chapters was written in the various scripts of generations of past Loremasters, many being in ancient tongues and dialects now long out of use.
The result of this haphazard compilation was that generations of lore and related knowledge had been added without being properly integrated into the existing text, until recently, as none save Haloch possessed either the skill or the confidence to dare such a task.
The false Adjunct smiled to himself at this. During his younger days as an apprentice, many of his teachers had deemed Haloch to be insufferably irreverent. Yet it appeared later that this seeming irreverence served an important use; veneration of the original document had prevented generations of scholars from attempting what Haloch was able to accomplish with relative ease, without fear, awe, or doubt of his own abilities or worth to blind him to the task. To him it was, after all, nothing more than just another book of Lore. It wasn’t arrogance, cockiness, or even a misguided sense of self-confidence that caused Haloch to view such artifacts with what many misunderstood as being disdain. In truth, the real reason was so simple that it was easily overlooked.