“The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is anxiety over trying to figure out how to assemble that damnable Swedish furniture. These facts most psychologists will dispute, but that is solely due to their horrid and unspoken addiction to köttbullar, and they, therefore, cannot be trusted. Against this chthonian truth are discharged all the shafts of a materialistic desperation, which clings to the inherent human longing for inexpensive kitchen shelving, insipid ikealism which deprecates the aesthetic motive and calls for a didactic pedagogy to uplift the buyer toward a suitable degree of insouciant consumerism. Yet in spite of all this grönsakianistic hubris, the self-assembled furnishings industry has thrived, expanded, and entered nearly every metropolis of the globe; founded as it is on a profound and elementary self-deception involving our ability to put together misshapen bits of wood as if we were, ourselves, all architects of our own destiny and carpenters of our own chattels. These things cannot be explained, for there are Those whose own interests align never with the goals and hopes of ordinary Humanity.”
~H.P. Lovecraft
I will stress this once more:
burn this document before reading it. Unworthy eyes are never to look upon this information, and all human eyes are unworthy. For herein we catalogue that for which we have striven a thousand years; and it is not for us to bring this understanding into our unworthy minds. Better to let your eyes water in its pitiless smoke than to read on.
Now read on.
I. Gamla Uppsalan Credenza.
This large, rectilinear side-table, sturdy upon its eight unusually weighty legs, is the perfect thing for the host who wants to entertain a whole gaggle of guests with a wide variety of foodstuffs and exotic beverages, then drug one of said guests, and, after the other partygoers have gone home, affix the subject’s body firmly to the solid-steel cupholders at the extremities of the dining surface, and sacrifice that mortal unto our Masters from beyond the Void. The well-cured wood is resistant to even substantial bloodstains, and it’s made from the lumber of treelike things which grow only in the hellish soil of the plains of Leng, so if the subject struggles and your dagger misses a couple of times, it oughtn’t do more than leave couple of suspiciously-shaped scratches. We recommend blaming the cat.
II. Carcosan Skrivbod.
An experienced sorcerer can plot the end of the world from just about anywhere; while it helps to have a library of unholy tomes (such as this one), all you really need is meditation, strange herbs, an inhuman lifespan, knowledge of secrets best left undiscovered if the fragile mind of man wishes to maintain its pitiful and tenuous grasp on what it believes to be sanity, and (obviously) a well-organized kitchen.
Nevertheless, we can’t help but note that you have completely failed to successfully summon the Old Ones for hundreds of years, and, frankly, even then, the Mary Celeste barely counted as a snack, and it was a salty one, at that.
So we’ve designed you a desk. The unusual shape is to provide room for a small bookcase, an ergonomic arm rest, an upraised monitor screen, a mini-fridge, a pencil sharpener, a blender, and some Ultharian cat handcuffs. Don’t put any of that stuff on the desk, of course, idiot. This desk has been carefully forged in the shape of a seven-pointed Djävulen Sigil, which focuses occult energies and pours them into anyone seated at the apex point, which ought to be where you’re sitting right now. Use it, you dullard; the Ancient Ones grow impatient.
