Tome of Ancient Lore

Price (Item Level): 5,500 gp (10th)
Body Slot: —
Activation: 1 hour; see text
Weight: 2 lb.

This ancient, leather-bound book is stuffed to overflowing with yellowing sheets of parchment.

Caster Level: 20th
Aura: Strong; (DC 25) transmutation
Prerequisites: Craft Wondrous Item, Sanctify Relic, Secret Page.
Cost to Create: 2,750 gp, 220 XP, 6 days.

A boon to arcane spellcasters of all sorts, a tome of ancient lore contains every conceivable spell. Perusing it for 1 hour gives you a +5 competence bonus on Knowledge (arcana) and Spellcraft checks made that day, provided that you are neutral, neutral good, neutral evil, lawful neutral, or chaotic neutral. The hour spent studying the tome is in addition to any time you spend preparing spells.

Relic Power:

Though the pages of this book contain all the world’s arcane knowledge, a tome of ancient lore is cursed with a deliberately confusing, ever-changing system of cross-referencing. Because its pages constantly rearrange themselves, apparently at random, finding any useful information by browsing the book is impossible. However, if you have established the proper divine connection, you can use a tome of ancient lore while preparing arcane spells to prepare a single spell that isn’t in your spellbook. You have a 50% chance of finding any arcane spell of the highest level you can cast, and a 100% chance to find any other spell that you can cast. The book functions in this manner once per day.

To use the relic power, you must worship Boccob and either sacrifice a 5th-level divine spell slot or have the True Believer feat and at least 9 HD.

Lore:

Knowledge (religion) DC 20: Allegedly penned by Boccob himself and “borrowed” from his library, the original tome disappeared for centuries. Eventually, copies began to appear in the possession of arcane colleges, spell-casting dragons, and powerful wizards.