Rüdiger Gugenot had always been very bright, with a burning desire to learn more about the world. Had he been brought up in a nurturing environment, he would have gotten far, but he grew up in small-minded family all too typical of Schrebersheim, the district he grew up in, and while they realized his intelligence, the only use for it they could see was to encourage him to become a priest of Kortus, which they considered to be a more honest way of life than trying to become one of those "lazy, good-for-nothing" intellectuals at the university. Thus, he largely became an autodidact - but unfortunately, the books that proved to be the most forming for him were texts on conspiracy theories, secret societies, and other groups and people secretly running the world from behind the scenes. Every book he learned after that point provided him with more fodder for his own conspiracy theories on how the world really worked, and soon he started to write down his own thoughts on the subject. He now has returned to Schrebersheim as a parish priest, but most of his free time and income is spent on printing booklets and pamphlets on a variety of subjects - the truth behind the Gnomish World Conspiracy, the "Golden Peril" of the Tsan Empire, and anything else which he believes to be a threat to all that is Good and Decent. He always signs his his treatises with the pseudonym "Veritas" (Atalan for "Truth"), as he believes that THEY would silence him if THEY were to find out who he is.
And indeed, he would have to fear reprisals, for his pamphlets are widely circulated in underground circles of agitators and bigots, and they have caused more than a few assaults on innocent people. This does not faze Gugenot, as he is unwilling to contemplate that the victims were really innocent, and indeed he is glad when he reads about such attacks, for he believes that his works have an effect, and that more and more people are finally willing to rise and stand up to the Secret Masters.