bright squid ink

For quite some time, the creature named as the bright squid was viewed as a ultimately harmless but mildly annoying small cephalopod. Roughly two feet in diameter when they spread all their tentacles to the max, they are only a little larger than a human fist when coiled up.
Bright squid are not very physically threatening, but their very vibrant ink can stain the skin a very long time, often taking longer than a month to disappear entirely, but otherwise they are near defenseless.
A somewhat bumbling ojiongo alchemist was experimenting with new substances and then happened to accidentally get sprayed by a bright squid. The ink stain lasted much longer than a month. After three years, the alchemist consigned himself that the stain would never go away and decided to make the best of this and try to figure out a useful byproduct from this accident.
It was later discovered after his natural death that advanced Purification magic can remove stains from alchemically enhanced bright squid ink.
After some more experimented he found that if he took the vellum made from almost any sea creature's hid a sharp pen tipped with alchemically treated bright squid ink could create ink that could be used to write underwater and hold up many decades before needing to be re-penned.
This technology quickly spread through Scaraqua and led to a surge in literacy as using bright squid ink and vellum is a lot more practical than using a clay tablet and stylus.
Once viewed as a pest, now bright squid are actively cultivated. Some cultures even use selective breeding to create bright squid ink of specific colors though for the most part only artists bother with this. Most pragmatic record keepers and writers will take the in in whatever color they can get (reddish brown is the most common variant).

Significance

Bright squid ink makes writing and by extension reading and general literacy much more practical in Scaraqua.

Item type

Miscellaneous

Current Location

Scaraqua

Raw materials & Components

Bright squid ink is mixed with some grainy substance dubbed "ink sand" to make the ink.  The ink sand is made from literal sand plus a small extract of some cultivated underwater herbs.