Brood & Bloom shipped with three broods of parasites and the order of physicians that catalogs them. It now has the people who disagree with that order, the medicine both sides carry, and the magic nobody publishes.
The library goes from sixty-one creatures to sixty-seven, and gains nineteen alchemical preparations and twenty-three spells. It is still free to read in full, and the spells are now castable in the console.
A cult, in six stat blocks
Chapter 3 is The Hands of the Host. Its founder was an officer of the Lazaret who spent eleven years copying case records, drew the opposite conclusion from them, published it as doctrine requires, and then walked out with a hundred and forty pages. What he published was an argument that a graft is not an affliction but an offer.
The six stat blocks range from CR 1 to CR 15:
| Creature | CR | What they do |
|---|---|---|
| Almoner | 1 | Uninfected. Arrives during an outbreak with real medicine |
| Postulant | 2 | The newest grade. Digs, carries, holds doors |
| Sexton | 6 | Keeps the ground, and gets bodies to it before the day is out |
| Ostiary | 8 | The doorkeeper. Performs the rite and keeps the clutch |
| Ciborium | 12 | The third grade, seated, counting the depth of its own case |
| The First Graft | 15 | The author. A tired administrator who asks about your symptoms |
The Hands prefer conversation to opening a fight. An almoner can first appear as a source of medicine during an outbreak. Hands surrender readily, talk freely, and treat capture as a chance to explain their doctrine.
The Ciborium tracks Depth, spends it to seed the party, and takes it back from anybody standing nearby, including its own hands, who thank it for the attention.
Nineteen jars
Chapter 7 opens with alchemy, and none of it needs a spellcaster. Every preparation is rendered from one of the three broods, and the differences decide what a party can keep on hand: Sporophore material stockpiles for a month, Inquiline material lasts an hour off a living parasite, and Necrophore material needs a fresh death.
There are draughts, unguents, fumes and poisons, from an 8 sp fume that keeps driftlings off a camp to a 750 gp injury poison. Three of them have no price at all.
The preparations use familiar item actions. Drinking a draught takes a Bonus Action, as does coating a weapon; the coating lasts 1 minute. Throwing a preparation replaces an attack, as with Alchemist’s Fire.
Twenty-three spells, and who has them
The spells come from the order, the cult, and lone practitioners’ notebooks. None are published within the setting. Each entry names its origin, which determines where a party might find it and who might teach it.
| Level | Spells |
|---|---|
| Cantrips | Anamnesis, Douter, Fair Copy, Latchwork, Unction |
| 1 | Brood Inquest, Countenance, Exacerbation, Lazaret Sill |
| 2 | Assumption of the Case, Bloom Interdict, Discharge, Efflorescence |
| 3 | Chantry Tithe, False Wakelight, Glebe, Prosector’s Purgation |
| 4 | Instar, Second Assignment, Sequestration |
| 5 | Extirpation, Laying-In, Preferment |
Three spells require the caster to carry a graft, which the cult considers proof of everything it teaches. Extirpation ends a case at any stage short of the last, but leaves the fully grown parasite in the room with you.
Brood & Bloom is the first library beyond Basic Rules 2024 and Basic Rules 2014 to include castable spells. Four offer to apply their effects to the board; the rest require the Game Master to resolve their effects.
What moved
The book was rearranged to make room, so a bookmark may have shifted:
- The Lazaret has its own chapter now, at 2, instead of sharing chapter 1 with everything else.
- Growth and reproduction moved out of the appendix and into chapter 1, next to the rules it explains.
- The three broods are chapters 4, 5 and 6.
- Appendix C is a new index: every preparation with what it does, and every spell twice over, by level and by the class that can learn it.
Three creatures from the earlier chapters picked up spells. The Orcshroom Sporespeaker casts Glebe, which makes contaminated ground where there was none. The Psalter Tick can spend a stolen spell slot on Chantry Tithe, which rewards it for staying near your casters. The Choirgall gains Bloom Interdict.
The Lazaret officers carry the order’s own counter-work, split by rank. The registrar surveys, the prosector works in the field, the lector holds what a house does behind its own doors, and they have gear lines now.
Reading it
The whole library is on the site, and the print edition is 101 pages. Turn it on in the console under Settings, and its creatures join Add creature with everything else.
The terms have not changed. Stat blocks, spells, and mechanics are under CC BY 4.0. You may share and adapt them, including commercially, with credit and a note of any changes. The lore, the chapter text and each creature’s description are © 2026 Nicola Mustone, all rights reserved.