Professor Abelhous Nicholsi (NPC)

Abelhous Nicholsi was a renowned botanist and biologist who taught at the University of Il Aluk. He was born in Darkon to a family of farmers in 689 BC. After completing his studies at the University of Il Aluk in 718 BC, he was asked to stay on as a teacher.

Six years later, he was attacked by a carnivorous crawling ivy, which spurred his interest in dread plants. The plant had been used by Julia Fyrehaaven to murder her husband, another professor at the university. Professor Nicholsi exposed the plot and earned Julia's wrath. She escaped the police and from time to time attempted to have her revenge, generally using plant-based poisons or dread plants.

The face of the professor was scarred by the feasting of a goblyn during a field trip to Forlorn in 731 BC. He investigated a meteor shower in Hazlan in 743 BC in hopes of locating the infamous doppelganger plant. While he was there, Governor Pall Ibington arranged for him to inspect the remains of an illithid.

The professor escaped the grisly fate visited upon Il Aluk by the Requiem in 750 BC, being away on a sabbatical in the jungle of Sri Raji. Upon his return, he settled in Karg from where he attempted to pull together the surviving faculty of the University of Il Aluk. His success in this gave rise to the University of Il Aluk in Exile at Karg.

At the latest, the professor perished in 755 BC. At the earliest, he perished in the fall of 751 BC (based upon the in-game date of The Book of Souls). In any case, he had time to write about about his research in Sri Raji.

Curiously enough, the lantern jack was developed with the assistance of the professor, despite him having no recognized aptitude for magic.

The cause of his death is unknown. It doesn't seem to be implied that he was killed by any dread plant. One of the students who joined him in Sri Raji returned as a Typhoid Mary, but again it doesn't seem to be implied that this led to his end either.

He is described as a tough, physically strong man despite his age. His skin shows the signs of long work outdoors, and he is balding, with the remains of his long white hair pulled into a tail at the back. He has a white beard and mustache.

Professor Nicholsi published numerous works:

• Soil Content and Agricultural Crops
• Crop Yields and Traditional Farming Techniques
• Medicinal Applications of Native Darkonian Flora
• Psychotropic Plants and the Mystic Tradition
• Distinctive Signatures of Flora and Floral Derivatives in Homicide
• Practical Chemical Derivatives of Core Flora
• Dangerous Flora: A Guide to Carnivorous and Toxic Plants
• Flora and Fauna of the Forfarian Forests
• Flora and Fauna of the Mordent Moorlands
• Cryptobotany: Search for the Doppelganger Plant and Others
• Speculative Biology of an Inhabitant of Bluetspur
• Native Flora of the Tropical Forests of Sri Raji

He is known to have studied:

• crawling ivy
• bloodrose
• Hangman Trees
• Fear Weed
• doppelganger plant (failed attempt)

Statistics

male human Thief - 5th Level, Lawful Good (2nd edition)

Data not yet in the Ravenloft Catalogue

		The Book of Souls
		The Book of Souls - p47
		The Book of Souls - p46-7