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Nerdarchy > Speak With Dead  > Speak With Dead #00: Raising Questions

Speak With Dead #00: Raising Questions

Speak With Dead #01: Brain Food

Salutations nerds! I’ve got an idea I think we’re all going to have a lot of fun with, but I’m going to need your help to make it happen. The idea is to do an advice column like “Dear Abby,” but from the point of view of a necromancer, and more for entertainment than for actual advice.

Advice Column From a Mid-Level Necromancer

necromancerWizards, even the ones who like to play with dead things, have the potential to spend a lot of time gazing across the planes, and Maxillae the Mad is no exception. Sometimes those crystal balls and scrying dishes lead the wizard to look into strange planes. Planes with electric lights and cars, for example, or planes where there are a bunch of nerds like us looking for guidance.

I have the fortune of having come across such a planar rift and am looking forward to sharing what such a wizard has to say with everyone. So if you (as yourself or as one of your D&D characters) have a question you want to ask, now is the opportunity.

Appeal for Questions

I am really excited about this conceptually, but since this is an advice column (albeit a facetious one), it can’t happen without contributions from readers like you. I’d like to take a moment to solicit your questions, and hopefully we can do something really fun with this together.

So if you would like to be a part of the very first “Speak With Dead” article, you can ask your questions in the comment section below and I will get to as many of them as I can.

Bear in mind this is for entertainment purposes only, and ultimately you should probably not actually act on the advice you receive from Maxillae. After all, I’m sure even in places like Waterdeep, digging up dead bodies is illegal or at least frowned upon.

Thank you so much in advance for your time, and I hope you all have as much fun with this as I know I will. From here, I turn it over to Maxillae.

Greetings, Modern Mortals of the Nerd’s Guild

Dungeons and DragonsI look forward to this opportunity to impart some arcane wisdom unto you. Your world is a shining, glorious death trap and I hold in my hands not only two of my three rat companions (the third is currently curled up in my most recent zombie slave’s chest cavity, thank you for asking) but also the secrets to building a better, more durable version of yourselves.

My conduit into your fleshy realm has assured me swift and easy access to your most personal thoughts and information regarding your fragile defenses, by which of course I mean those things which occupy your everyday thoughts. It should prove to be an interesting diversion whilst I continue to build my shambling army. Even future liches need hobbies, my dears!

I look forward to further communication with your plane’s most interesting denizens. Until then, take care, my dears, and do try not to die until I’m there to make use of your remains.

Regards,

Maxillae the Mad

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Robin Miller

Speculative fiction writer and part-time Dungeon Master Robin Miller lives in southern Ohio where they keep mostly nocturnal hours and enjoys life’s quiet moments. They have a deep love for occult things, antiques, herbalism, big floppy hats and the wonders of the small world (such as insects and arachnids), and they are happy to be owned by the beloved ghost of a black cat. Their fiction, such as The Chronicles of Drasule and the Nimbus Mysteries, can be found on Amazon.

5 Comments

  • Grant
    June 21, 2017 at 2:08 pm

    What is the best way to avoid the whole issue regarding my friend, we were going out for a while but she is unfortunately an alchemist who shed her mortal coil. I still want to keep things going but I just don’t know if I can deal with her hunger for brains anymore or if I should just become a lich to be with her?

  • Currently De-Composing
    June 21, 2017 at 6:42 pm

    Dear Maxillae the Mad,
    I am an aspiring bard, but my friends say my music is bad enough to wake the dead. Is this actually possible? Also, any advice for my career, or should I just give up in my dream?
    Signed,
    Currently De-Composing

  • Elvish Farmer
    June 22, 2017 at 12:20 am

    My daughter’s ‘imaginary’ friend is now doing actual harm to our farm. Should I be worried about her spending more and more time with this being? What could it actually be? She’s only 102 years old, and I think it’s past time for her to give up on the friendship, but she insists that he’s her only true friend. What should I do?

  • Merlin
    December 16, 2017 at 10:24 pm

    Salutation’s Maxillae; I am known to many as the Wanderer, however you may call me “Nilrem”… I am Extremely old and have walked the planes of time see all the major & minor change’s to the world’s and even bearing witness to many God’s fall while other’s rise. As a True Necromancer it has come to my attention that many of the spell’s the elder’s left are…lacking. I have come up with a few that would help those up-start’s and even Noble Job’s that even a Church / Society would accept Our unique talent’s for with fair pay. From one fellow caster of the art, what were your First Choice’s for spell’s…aside that of “Speaking with the Dead”?

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