Unreasonably Haunted Restricted Section

A wizard-school-flavored location where you ring a bell, get silently judged by a spectral librarian with weaponized paperwork energy, and are handed “the perfect book for you” (which is never a sentence that ends well). You can read once per day (readtoday pref). The book outcome is random (20 possibilities) and ranges from “pleasantly helpful” to “the book tries to eat your soul, but only manages a small bite because it’s paperback.”

Location & Access

Where: Location (hauntedlibraryloc setting, default: capital). Navigation link: “Restricted Section” (under Tavern/Inn navigation section). Once per day (readtoday resets at newday).

The Encounter (Incredibly Serious Academic Institution)

Atmosphere: A door that wasn’t there yesterday leads to shelves of whispering books, disapproving portraits, and the general smell of dust and poor choices.

The Bell: A small hammer and bell with a sign: “Ring Bell for Assistance”. Assistance is not specified, nor is it guaranteed.

The Librarian: Tall, thin, bespectacled, and smugly aware he’s in a scripted scene. He says he’s “been expecting you” (not because he’s psychic—because that’s how these scenes go), vanishes into stacks, returns with a book like it’s a live ferret.

Choice: Take the book (random outcome) or flee dramatically (no mechanical consequence, just emotional ones).

Book Outcomes (20 possibilities)

Mechanically identical to the original module; only the flavor text is wearing a pointy hat.

Positive (70%):

  • 15%: +1 charm (“Charmcraft for the Socially Doomed”)
  • 15%: Gold (goldmin–goldmax) (“Unauthorised Guide to ‘Finding’ Galleons”)
  • 15%: Heal (full restore if below max, otherwise +10% HP) (“Madam Pomfrey’s ‘Stop Bleeding’ Primer”)
  • 15%: +1 forest fight (“Defense Against Being Eaten: Inspirational Edition”)
  • 5%: +5% XP (“Revision Spells for the Chronically Unprepared”)
  • 5%: +1 specialty point if you have a specialty, otherwise +1 gem (“The Monster Book of Career Guidance”)

Negative (30%):

  • 10%: -1 charm if charm > 0 (“Advanced Snark: How To Lose Friends and Make Them Angry”)
  • 10%: -1 forest fight if turns > 0 (“Witch Weekly: 400 Pages of Time Theft”)
  • 5%: HP loss equal to hploss% of max HP (won’t reduce you below 1 HP) (“Quidditch for People Who Enjoy Gravity Too Much” + falling bookcase)
  • 5%: -0.5% XP (“Horcruxes for Dummies (Do Not Read This)” — tries to steal your soul; achieves a light nibble)

Strategy

Usually take the book: still 70% positive. The downsides are mild and survivable (HP loss won’t kill you; XP loss is only 0.5%).

Best outcomes: +5% XP, specialty point, +1 forest fight, full heal.

Worst outcomes: HP loss (scaled by setting) and the 0.5% XP drain. Annoying, not catastrophic.

Settings

  • hauntedlibraryloc: Location (default: capital)
  • hploss: HP% lost from bookcase accident (2–80%, default: 10%)
  • goldmin / goldmax: Gold range from the “finding galleons” book (default: 5–50)

Lore (and Other Administrative Failures)

The Librarian: Not psychic. Just genre-savvy. Knows you’re here because the module says so.

The Books: Some teach charm, some dispense money, some heal, some steal time, and one attempts soul theft with the ambition of a cheap textbook.

Safety Note: The falling bookcase is a longstanding feature, not a bug. Wizard OSHA has been notified. Repeatedly.

Unreasonably Haunted Restricted Section: where you get exactly one book per day, because otherwise you’d read until you accidentally became competent and then the plot would have nothing left to do.