Charta Monstrorum

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  Credits 

Concept and Design

Theodore Bergqvist and Magnus Malmberg

Authors
Steven Saville
Luca Cherstich (stats chapters)

Additional Writers
Theodore Bergqvist and Magnus Malmberg,

Additional Helpers
Dan Slottner and Mattias Berglin.

Art Direction
Theodore Bergqvist

Layout and Typesetting

Magnus Malmberg

Cover Art 3
Ola Larsson

Interior Art
Peter Bergting, Per Sjögren
and Justin Sweet

Additional Kudos
Thanks to all the Kickstarter pledgers and to all the backers
who made this project come to life.
Our style is to use “they” as a singular gender-neutral pronoun when
possible. This usage continues to gain m
­ ainstream acceptance, including
among major style guides such as The Associated Press Stylebook
and The Chicago Manual of Style. We believe it is appropriate and
practical, not just to reflect common usage but to accommodate a more
inclusive view of gender identity. The LexOccultum books also use
“he” or “she” when helpful for added clarity.
isbn:
 Table of Contents
On this book.........................................................................................6
On game mechanics............................................................................6
THE JOURNAL OF CLEMENT BIRKENBOSCH 9
HERE BE MONSTERS 11
THE CHURCH GRIM 13
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Church Grim ..............................................................................16
Church Grim typical stats............................................................... 17
THE GARGOYLE 19
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Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Gargoyle.......................................................................................23
Gargoyle typical stats.......................................................................25
THE GHOUL 29
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Ghoul............................................................................................. 31
Ghoul typical stats............................................................................32
THE DJINN 35
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Djinn..............................................................................................37
Djinn typical stats.............................................................................38
chapter 1. the character
GHOSTS 43
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
Ghosts..................................................................................................46
Ghost typical stats............................................................................48
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
Phantoms.............................................................................................52
Phantom typical stats.......................................................................53
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
Spectres and Wraiths.......................................................................54
Specter and Wraith typical stats...................................................55
POSSESING SPIRITS 59
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
Possessing Spirits..............................................................................62
Possessing Spirit typical stats........................................................63
SPIRIT OF DEATH AND VENGEANCE 67
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
Spirits of Death and Vengeance.....................................................70
Spirit of Death and Vengeance typical stats...............................73
SMALL DEVILS 77
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
Small Devils........................................................................................82
Small Devil typical stats..................................................................83
WITCH SPAWN 87
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
Witch Spawn...................................................................................... 91
Witch Spawn typical stats...............................................................94
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THE LEPRECHAUN 97 THE GOLEM 153
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Leprechaun.................................................................................100 the Golem..........................................................................................157
Leprechaun typical stats................................................................101 Golem typical stats.........................................................................160

THE INCUBUS AND SUCCUBUS 105 THE HOMUNCULUS 165

Speculation and Field Notes Regarding Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Incubus and Succubus..............................................................108 the Homunculus...............................................................................168
Incubus & Succubus typical stats................................................. 110 Homunculus typical stats............................................................... 171

MERMAIDS AND NYMPHS 112 LYCANTHROPES 177

Speculation and Field Notes Regarding Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
Mermaids and Nymphs.................................................................. 115 Lycanthropes....................................................................................180
Mermaids and Nymphs’ typical stats......................................... 118 Lycanthrope typical stats..............................................................184
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THE KRAKEN 123 THE VAMPIRE 191
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Kraken.........................................................................................125 the Vampire.......................................................................................194
Kraken Mechanics...........................................................................127 Vampire mechanics..........................................................................199

THE MUMMY 131 THE ZOMBIE 211

Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Mummies....................................................................................136
Special Skills.....................................................................................137
Mummy typical stats......................................................................138
THE ANUBI 143
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Anubis.........................................................................................145
Anubi typical stats...........................................................................148
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Zombie........................................................................................215
Zombie typical stats........................................................................ 217
DEMONS 223
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
Demons..............................................................................................227
Demon typical stats........................................................................233
APPENDIX: ANIMALS 238
Swarms...............................................................................................238
Poison.................................................................................................238

5 chapter 1. the caracter

 On this book
While reading the pages of this tome a warning is due: this
is not a normal “Monster Manual” in the tradition of modern
RPG books. Charta Monstrorum does not aim to give you
the truth about all the exotic and mysterious creatures which
hide behind the veil of normalcy in the 18th-century world
of LexOccultum. What you read here can even be false or,
maybe, it may just be one of the many possible truths about
the monsters here presented. This book is more like a medieval
“Bestiarium”, where many stories and tales, sometimes even
conflicting ones, are collected and the reader is challenged to
establish what to believe and what to regard as pure lies.
This is also a book of impossibilities. The incredible
adventures of Clement Birkenbosch happened mostly during
the late 17th century and the very early 18th century, just
before his tragic death in 1716. Even so, he seems to grasp
things which were impossible to know for his times. He
seems to have read the “One Thousands and One Nights”,
long before the French (1704-1717) and English (1706-1721)
editions. Even if odd for a European gentleman of his age,
Clement Birkenbosch managed to learn oriental Languages,
like Arabic or Old Iranian, during his many travels abroad
and to read those stories directly from the original sources.
However, even more incredibly, Herr Birkenbosch seems to
understand languages impossible to grasp even for the best
scholars of the early 18th-century Europe. He claimed to
6 have read the original notes of the Babylonian King Nimrod
or to have understood the ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs
carved on the walls of the temples in Memphis. However,
the Egyptian way of writing was decoded by Champollion
only in 1822 and, regarding the various Mesopotamian
cuneiform systems, the 18th century scholars were only able
to hypothesize the meaning of very few, isolated words in
vast seas of mostly unreadable texts.
Birkenbosch also displays knowledge of civilizations,
myths, cultures and places which the 18th century historians
knew only as meaningless mentions in the Bible or in some
Greek author, long before the great archaeological discoveries
of the 19th and 20th centuries in the Mediterranean, Africa
and Middle East. His culture seems so vast, that it embraced
the mysteries and mythologies of regions as different as
Northern Europe, the frozen steppes of Central Asia and
even the exotic China. He seems to speak with confidence
about the different types of European Wraiths as well as
about all the various tribes of Djinns inhabiting the Arab-
speaking countries. His expertise in so many fields was also
amazing: this old explorer was clearly also an historian, a
connoisseur of antiquities, a geographer, an epigraphist,
an occultist and a linguist. He also had a very odd family
background, if this true that his own grandmother was
accused of witchcraft.
Reading Birkenbosch’s accounts it is also incredible to
notice how many odd persons he met that revealed him
otherwise impossible-to-know notions. For example,
chapter 1. the character
the unnamed Arab guide that knew things about ancient
Egyptian religion which should have been unknown to
most Islamic inhabitants of his country. On the other
hand, Herr Birkenbosch also mentions oddities like the
“Akkadian Mummies” which do not make sense at all, even
for modern historians and archaeologists, if not as made-up
conjectures created by the fantasy of some amateurish
novelist...unless Birkenbosch did not know things which
are still obscure for us today. Maybe he had access to
ancient lore transmitted by secret traditions or esoteric
societies that he met during his exotic travels. Or maybe
he found a collection of ancient, dusty books, translated in
more “accessible” languages, like Latin or Ancient Greek,
resting in the library of some half-forgotten monastery or
abbey, hidden on the fringes of the known world. It is even
possible that Clement Birkenbosch was just a liar, a mad
man, or just a joke created by some nice RPG author of the
21st century who is trying to make fun of the reader...
Whatever the reality is, it does not matter, it’s you, as
the GM, who decides what is true in your game. The aim
of Charta Monstrorum is to inspire you and help you create
memorable stories, not to give you limits. Take what you like,
ignore or change what you dislike. And, more than anything
else, have fun with your players creating great stories!
On game mechanics
All monsters are different and not all monsters of the
same type are identical. This is the reason why the stats
presented here are just examples, and not something which
must be used for all the individuals of the same species. Each
creature should be worthy of its own story, and therefore
the stats should be adapted by the GM on a case-by-case
basis. This is especially true about skill values, and related
disciplines and specialties. Some stats are missing from
some creatures, especially certain skills which are often
missing. This is done on purpose: give the monster the
values that you need in a specific story, or even make them
automatically succeed or fail rolls in certain situations, if
these are important for a story. Not relevant skills are not
indicated. Nobody wants to know how many levels of the
Craftmanship specialty are in the stats of a Djinn or of a
Mummy, unless (for some very odd reasons) it is important
for the story!
Each creature will also have lists of supernatural
properties which you can use to customize and change the
basic monster types. Feel free to change and mix them.
Monsters in LexOccultum are meant to be terrifying
and always surprising. Each of them is unique and, if the
players have already defeated a certain Lycanthrope placing
a silver bullet on its head, they will be terrified when the
next one will just ignore such a wound, as if it was a simple
scratch. Maybe not all vampires are killed with a wooden
stake through their hearts and, if they have read about
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the stony Gargoyles of French cathedrals, they will be
just surprised to face a wooden equivalent from Northern
Europe. Surprise and terrorize your players. Again: this is
not a “Monster Manual”. Every game mechanic you find
here is meant to be adapted and changed as you like, in
order to allow you to tell the story that you prefer.
Furthermore, any stat, game mechanic or ability that
you find in this book is not meant to give the occasional
player character a “balanced encounter”. LexOccultum has
no system for establishing what is a “balanced encounter”
and this is done on purpose. Nothing should be “balanced”
when you face a monster in this dreaded version of the
18th century. These creatures are supposed to always be
unnaturally deadly and mysterious, and only the foolish face
them directly as you do in a normal fantasy RPG. Cunning,
wits, knowledge and faith are often more important to
defeat a monster than a sabre or a musket. Reading about
the vulnerabilities of your enemy from an ancient tome or
hearing about them from the frothing mouths of a crazy
hermit will definitively save your life more than martial
skills and brutal strength will.
Finally, be ready to change the rules or create new ones.
Players in LexOccultum can meet creatures from any legend
or ancient story in the world, and you cannot pretend that
all the published rules could perfectly work for everything
that you want to represent. This is a horror game which is
supposed to be fun. If rules do not give that fun, just ignore
or change them. There is nothing wrong in doing so, as far
as you and your players enjoy the experience!
Abbreviations
Common abbreviations used in this book are the following.
CP = Combat Points
Dmg = Damage
IM = Initiative Modifier
MHP = Mental Health Points
OR = Open Roll
PHP = Physical Health Points
New Combat Action
✦ Combat Action: Hitting the Weak Spot
✦ Combat Points: 10 + those used for the attack
✦ Damage: x2
7 chapter 1. the caracter
Some monsters can be defeated or weakened only if a
certain specific spot is hit: a ghoul should be decapitated, a
vampire’s heart should be pierced with an oaken stake, etc.
To represent this specific action a character must spend 10
CP on top of the CP spent to make the attack.
If the attack is successful, the “Weak Spot Effect”
is triggered: roll the damage, add up any modifier
(Constitution modifier, Veiled Strike specialty, any magic,
etc..) and multiply the total by 2.
Hitting the Weak Spot of some specific monster may
trigger effect other than the basic one, like instant death,
paralysis, transformation, ignoring natural armor, etc.
Whether one must also add or not the basic effect is left
to the monster description or, more properly, to the GM’s
judgement.
It is worth noting that to try to hit a weak spot, one must
know about it, otherwise it does not make sense to attempt
it, unless the GM rules otherwise.
Furthermore, this new Combat Action can be used also
against mundane animals or normal humans, applying the
basic effect (Damage x2), to represent dangerous wounds
to the throat, to the guts, to the heart, to the head, etc...
It is also worth reminding that, if the GM allows the PCs
to use this action, the players must also know that their
characters may also suffer from it when attacked by NPCs
and monsters.
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Hitting the Weak Spot by Chance
If the GM allows it, it is even possible to hit the Weak Spot
by chance with the right weapon, even if one does not know
what he is doing. It is not recommended to use this option
against mundane animals or normal humans, in order not
to make combat management too cumbersome. On the
other hand, use the rule only when it makes sense to give
the player characters an edge against a terrible creature of
overwhelming power with specific, unknown weaknesses.
First of all, check if the right weapon is used (e.g. you
cannot decapitate a Vampire with a small kitchen knife!).
Secondly, if, while inflicting damage, an Open Roll is
triggered, roll also a further 1d10. On a result of 1-3 the
Weak Spot is hit. The probabilities raise by +2 if more
Open Rolls are triggered. For example, if one rolls an Open
Roll which results in another Open Roll, for a total of Two
Open rolls, the possibility of hitting a Weak Spot will be
1-5 on 1d10.
In theory, if the GM allows so, certain Weak Spots can
be hit also by Unarmed Attacks (which usually lack Open
Rolls). If so, the possibility is 1 on 1d10.
 What caused it to wake up from its long sleep was unclear. What
it knew, however, was that it was hungry, hungrier than for an
eternity.It had slept far too long. In the cold protection of the
darkness it moved easily. The somnambulant body became increas-
ingly alert, waking more with every step it took. When the creature
finally emerged from its nest and looked out over the city, it did
not recognise the world that had grown out there. Everything was
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different. Changed. It felt an overwhelming sense of loss for what
had been and was no more. Its gaze went toward the night sky.
The moon shone as seductively as ever, and all it could think in
that moment was at least something remained. Driven by a mix of
hunger and curiosity, it descended, entering the dwellings of men in
search of food to sate its endless appetite. It was a cycle that would
not be completed until the next time the moon shone in its full glory.
 The Journal of
Clement Birkenbosch
Being an accounting of my journeys through 9
the esoteric world
Whoever finds these words
I offer unto you
The secrets of this world hidden in plain sight

T hese papers were found on the mortal remains

of the explorer, Clement Birkenbosch, and
returned to the Royal Society in the Year
of Our Lord, 1716.
Much of the writing was lost or indecipherable, as some considerable
water damage and other degradations had occurred during the time
between Herr Birkenbosch’s demise and the journal’s recovery. Of note,
the binging was broken, the stitching parting from several blocks of
paper, which meant that the original order of several encounters cannot
be verified though I have attempted to reassemble the notes here as best
as possible, charting his journey of exploration into what he termed the
esoteric world.
It is hard to avoid the somewhat fragmentary nature of certain the
entries as the writing covers some five years of the geographer’s travels
and follows his whim as his fascinations shift from one tale to another,
many of which are likely as not exaggerations or accounts of local
legends rather than actual events the geographer experienced. As
is the current style, the accounts contained herein are written in the
first person, which lends an immediacy to the writing, but it is our
considered opinion having worked on these pages at some length that
several of these fragments are in actual fact little more than rumours of
the marvellous handed down from locals and not, as Herr Birkenbosch
would likely have us believe, situations he survived. As such, this journal
still represents as close to a definitive accumulation of anthropological
evidence and folklore as any amassed to this day, even if the factual
basis beneath much of the writing can be disputed.
Alas, several sections were beyond my ability to repair, including a
lot of his experiences on the African continent, beyond Egypt, and the
Russian territories, both representing a substantial loss if the thickness
of damaged papers counts for anything. Whatever was there, I fear is
lost to us forever, although in several instances I am delighted to report
that I was able to recover some little of the writings and with careful
restoration individual leafs of paper that had come glued together in
 a pulp were teased apart with agonising care, the mould and other
damage that decayed them dried out and the inks lifted from the paper
to enable transcription.
It is nothing short of a miracle of patience that any of the writings
survive.
Every effort has been made to avoid editorialising on my part, as
that is not the archivist’s role, though the temptation to excise the more
fanciful claims of the author was strong, it was resisted. It must be noted
that the author was under considerable duress during such times as he
maintained this journal and frequently refers to his mental state and
that others must think him mad. It is not beyond reason to believe there
is something to that line of thought, as much of the material gathered
herein must be considered the scribblings of a fevered—haunted—mind.
But, I must confess, some of these fragments of regional lore make for
fascinating conjecture as they suggest a foundation to our existence that
very few are aware of, a liminal space that stands on the threshold of
reason and superstitious dread, where the transitions between man and
beast, day and night, between demon and a god, are as real as the
passage of night turning into day.
What is not in doubt is that Herr Birkenbosch lived a remarkable
life. He was a polymath, beyond his gift with the geographic world,
he had a voracious appetite for knowledge and was skilled in the life
sciences, with a healthy interest in the biological world and a keen
understanding of the burgeoning metaphysical studies of the universe.
10
Transcribing these pages, I have come to believe that Herr Birkenbosch
was fascinated by that liminality and viewed the esoteric world much
as we would view dusk or dawn, those moments of transition where
both exist and neither exist, and believed that some certain creatures,
monsters if you will, lived between these realms. We might struggle to
put names to them and understand their nature, but every culture he
explored possessed variations on these realms, be they the Purgatory
of Christians, the Jewish Da’at, the Egyptian Duat or the druidic
Annfwyn of the Celts and other pagan underworlds and otherworlds.
In all of these instances, it is about the between-ness of their nature,
as it is with the lycanthrope and shapeshifters that find themselves the
subject of his writing. I must confess I lament the loss of those many
damaged pages as I believe they would offer considerable insight into his
thought processes beyond the more simple accounting of events. Few, if
any, have experienced such many and varied encounters with the esoteric
world and would be able to draw parallels between the evils of differing
faiths and geographic local as much as the stark differences that make up
the foundation of the world we walk around in. Alas, what is lost is lost,
and to mourn what we never had is pointless when we have so much else
to study and pore over. Some of it, God rest his soul, may even be true.
What appears within these pages is a faithful copy of the last known
journeys of the great geographer and explorer, our brother, Clement
Birkenbosch, who met the Maker in the Year of Our Lord 1715, in the
most grievous of circumstances. Make of it what you will.
Steven Savile
Archivist of the Royal Society
 Here Be Monsters
Scientists, natural philosophers, priests and explorers
have awakened the fascination in the esoteric world
during the course of the mid-17th century, culminating
in what we have come to call The Age of Enlightenment.

11

S ince time immemorial, humans have sought to

catalogue and map the realm of monsters and
define in precise detail the wonders that roam
the earth or rule from other spheres, be they
the heavens or the underworld. From scholars, sorcerers,
witches, alchemists, royal advisers, and secret seekers of truth to
enlightened scientists, bestiologists, natural philosophers, and
theologians, each and every one has attempted to document
all our collective knowledge of the creatures of darkness.
The Babylonian ruler King Nimrod is the source of much
wisdom. It is said he was a great hunter, not only by the wild
prey of the earth but above all by the demons of the darkness.
Secret notes from encounters with darkness speak of surviving
mythological beasts that pre-date the Great Flood, talk of its
progeny, and of King Nimrod’s obsession with collecting trophies
from such creatures.
Nimrod was one of the first to describe in words these dark
creatures, and made clear records of all the prey that fell before
his mighty sword. In journals we can still read today of the war of
the angels and their great war beasts with bull bodies, wings and
human faces. We can see crude sketches of death beasts with jackal
heads, blood sucking corpses, and other man-like predators, not
least the dead who could not be killed with physical weapons. He
described in detail the rituals required to defeat these foul beings.
In his eagerness to apply the arts he had learned, Nimrod
built the Tower of Babel, but that was the least of his miraculous
constructions. He built tunnels to other worlds, erected buildings
that burst into other spheres of existence, and erected monuments that,
in the thrall of his with his magical gift, served to capture souls.
He was, perhaps, the greatest master of the occult and champion
of the esoteric world that ever lived, and yet so much of Nimrod’s
knowledge has fallen into oblivion.
It was only during the Middle Ages that mankind began to take
an interest in bestiology once again. Priests and monks were among
the most of knowledgable of the day, but they were not alone in
that quest for wisdom in what can only be termed the darker arts.
Warlocks, witches and alchemists in their eagerness to discover hidden
secrets, made shocking discoveries that are well documented, records of
which survive even today. It is said that the Medici family in Florence
possessed a vast library of the world’s accumulated knowledge of beasts
and wonders— including those long since extinct as well as those still
hiding in the shadows. With the shifts in political power and influence,
the writings from their great library were lost, spread to the four winds.
Some forgotten, some destroyed. Others were sold or stolen and a
precious few recreated for the learned generations to come, too valuable
to simply cease to be.
There exist two schools of thought:
 First, there are those who believe that all monsters and unnatural
creatures are nothing short of abominations, spawn of the devil in their
various forms.
Then there are those who believe the monsters have been created by
us as the laws of nature are sidelined and nature herself has somehow
become corrupt.
They term their hypothesis corruption theory.
This approach has, in turn, led to a discussion about the precise
nature of these ‘natural laws’ and who created them.
Is it some divine God who lies behind the creation of it all. And if
it is, who can be powerful enough to corrupt them? The Devil? Because
surely if they are God’s creation they should be perfect, shouldn’t they?
In Christianity, as in Islam and Judaism, nature is regarded as the
creation of God Almighty. It is something that cannot be influenced
12
by man. That leads to more questions, for if nature shaped the beasts of
darkness, sure that means it was God Himself who created the vampire,
the ghoul, the grim and more?
Another school of thought posits that everything that is unnatural
and supernatural is created when man tries to go against nature
and the laws that God laid down. That means heretics, witches
and alchemists are accused of sodomitic, sick and vile acts which
in turn ruin and disfigure nature, giving birth to the unnatural.
Through their actions, they accelerate and distort the path of
nature and evolution in such a way to ravage and distort the flesh
into something most morbid and vile. Their eagerness to push far
beyond the limits of reason puts nature’s complex web of perfection
in jeopardy in much the same way as when Eve took that bite out
of the forbidden fruit.
 The Church Grim
T he church bell tolled. That bell has to be one of the
loneliest sounds of the English countryside. The
chime carried for miles in the darkness. The
Cornish night was colder than it had any right
to be given it was midsummer. We three walked along the
narrow country path in the shadow of the old Norman church.
So much of this country is steeped in history, each and every
stone, I swear, capable of telling a story. And what stories
they would be, if you consider all the seven hundred year old
building must have seen in its days.
Beyond the church, the rolling moors of Bodmin were a wall of
absolute night that marked the limits of our lanterns, behind us, the
town proper lay in darkness.
Mist already curled in towards our positions.
It promised to be a long cold night hunting the convict, but we were
prepared.
Every now and then cries went out, messages passing through the
night as the search party roamed across the moors.
The three of us, Lightfoot, Michaelmas and myself, had been walking
the perimeter of the village for hours already, while others were further
afield. Twice I had imagined I heard howls out on the moors, but it was
not our place to venture out to investigate. We each had our assigned
13
roles in the fruitless search. Part of our circuit did take us out onto the
lower hills. We found nothing but empty mist and the gathering dew
out there. All around us, the winds of summer howled across the hills.
They were no more forgiving than their end of year counterparts. It was
bitterly cold. The wind had teeth, as they used to say.
Other groups moved across different search patterns, each group
made up of three or four searchers. There were more then fifty of us
walking the moors that night, hunting the man who had escaped the
summer Assizes in the town proper. A hanging judge had presided over
the court and passed down his favourite sentence upon the poor soul.
There was no mercy in the night. Occasionally, I caught a glimpse of
long coats and darker shadows in the distance and realised we were
crossing paths with more searchers. Though I must confess, my heart
skipped a beat at each sighting, a shiver of dread chasing down the
ladder of my spine. We had been warned just how dangerous the
escapee was, and knew full well the punishment awaiting him, should
we find him before he found his freedom was the hangman’s rope.
Again, the bell tolled, sending a chill to my core.
I looked back over my shoulder wondering who on earth could be
ringing it at this time of night? Was it some kind of alarum? As I turned
I saw a sleek black shape ghosting through the lines of tombstones, but
couldn’t believe my eyes, for surely it had been a huge animal? A black
cat, maybe? Not some domesticated feline, but a powerful wildcat. A
panther, perhaps? Jaguar? Or something larger? An immense Alaunt?
The moonlight gave little away as I tried to focus on the the blacker
14
than black shape loping across the moor. A sudden flurry of movement
drew my gaze as the beast launched itself over the low drystone wall,
and for a split second I saw the full majesty of the creature as its muscles
bunched, taut, and drove it on. It was gone in a heartbeat, disappeared
soundlessly between the tombstones.
“Did you…?” It was a question Michaelmas didn’t finish phrasing.
I saw him staring at the wall where the big cat had leapt into the
grounds of the graveyard, and knew he had seen what I had seen,
which mercifully meant I was not losing my mind.
“A grim beast,” Lightfoot said, crossing himself, and I grasped his
meaning immediately.
If ever there were an entity to cause a man to question his own heart it
was a Church Grim. Folklore had it the soul of the first person buried in
a cemetery stood as its guardian against the Devil, protecting the more
recently departed from that greater evil. To allow the dead to pass on to
the other side, early inhabitants of this region buried a large black dog
beneath the cornerstone of the new church to stand in the spirit’s place.
The sacrifice protected the church against thieves, witches, and warlocks
as well as Old Nick, as they called the Devil around these parts. I had
heard the vigil such black dogs stood called the faire chlaidh, or the
ghost watch, by villagers who venerated the spirit.
God help the convicted man if he had a grim on his trail. Being
hounded down by the supernatural beast promised a fate worse than
the hangman’s rope for an impure soul…
The grim’s presence would explain the storm.
“He has to be in there,” Michaelmas said, stabbing a thin finger
towards the gravestones as the church bell tolled a third and final
time. The man was anything but a coward. Alive to the danger of the
situation he scrambled over the low wall, his lantern held out to light
the graveyard as he stumbled into it. Lightfoot and I had no choice but
to follow him in there.
The wind tore at our clothes. I shivered. I swear to the Lord our Father
the black dog walked across my grave, its presence sending shivers all
the way through my soul as my spirit reacted to the guardian’s presence.
For a moment as the chill sank like a stone to the bottom of my stomach
I feared the dark places in my own heart; were they enough to draw the
grim out and end me?
Another howl split the night, though this one was far more
animalistic than the elegiac cry of the black dog. The suffering within
that stretched-thin cry was chilling. But the silence that followed it was
so much worse for everything it promised.
I ran along the gravel path, following Michaelmas’s lantern as it
wove a pathway between the tombstones, until it finally shone a light
upon the convicted man—or what was left of him.
I saw the black shape looming over the body.
There was no mistaking the grim’s broad, short head, or the power in
its bunched muscles. It was a breed of hound I had never seen, bigger
than an Alaunt, perhaps some exotic Persian mastiff or some such? But
definitely a dog, even if it stood taller than my waistband.
There was blood around its maw and gore still clinging to its incisors
from where it had feasted on the convict’s guts.
A deep growl resonated from the grim, rumbling and grinding bone
against gristle, and filled with threat. It was the single most heinous
sound I have heard in my life following so quickly behind the death
rattle of the corpse at the grim’s feet.
I wasn’t about to move a step closer. I knew full well how my own
childhood pet had guarded his food. Only a fool came between a dog
and his dinner.
“We should do something,” Lightfoot said, his voice as haunted as the
graveyard. He was speaking for the sake of breaking the silence, though
when it brought the grim’s gaunt eyes up to stare at him my companion
immediately regretted it.
The convict was beyond saving, that much was obvious. You didn’t
need to be a surgeon to know there was no putting this man back
together again.
I was surprised I couldn’t see his soul beside the grim, ready to be
shepherded off to Hell, but then, perhaps the beast had shredded it as
effectively as it had shredded his flesh?
Michaelmas raised his lantern, but the black dog stood its ground.
I looked down at the eviscerated corpse, loops of grey intestine spilling
out from the gaping hole torn through his stomach, and drawn out
by those wickedly sharp incisors, and I offered a silent prayer to God 15
that even my blackest thought was not enough to earn the wrath of this
guardian spirit.
“Good dog,” I whispered, earning a manic spiral of laughter from
my two companions, who backed up a step, then another, expecting the
hound to spring at any second. I could not take my eyes away from
the sheer strength within those corded muscles and the killing power of
those wicked incisors.
The oil from my lantern burned out, the wick flickering and failing.
It was too late for anything but the blackest of humour as the
darkness enshrouded me.
I backed up another step, and another, the grim watching me every
step of the way.
It didn’t move to bring me down.
Finally, outside of the lychgate, I could no longer see the grim or the
corpse at its feet.
There was another name for the old lychgate; round here they called
it the resurrection gate. No matter what else happened on this long cold
summer night, I was sure that the convicted man was not coming back…
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Church Grim
Characteristics
The Church Grim is one of the more
familiar motifs of British folklore, a
nocturnal apparition with its roots very
firmly in Celtic culture. The grim is most
commonly seen in the form of a dog—a
large, powerful mastiff. Larger than a
normal hound, and more muscular, that
prowls around church grounds and the
moorlands around them charged with
protecting the dead from the Devil and
his demons.
The howling of these huge dogs is
16 often believed to be a portent of death.
The grim themselves are neither
good nor evil, but rather creatures
of the occult world that are charged
with watching over the bones of the
dead and seeing that no harm comes
to them. They are, however, fearsome
fighters, possessing preternatural speed
and agility, can strike multiple times
with tooth and claw before a mortal
opponent can even draw their weapon,
and with their ghostly aspect are nigh
on impossible to hit, a combination
which makes the grim a formidable foe.
The grim is a distinctive subset of the
Black Dog mythology.
First Impressions
Moving through the night’s dream
gloom of the graveyards they call home,
the grim is a terrifying sight; often
the first hint that they are out there,
watching from within the darkness,
are the glowing eyes that burn with
the intense fire fuelled by the pits of
Hell. Their hide is most often charcoal
black, making it almost impossible to
differentiate them from the darkness on
all but the brightest of moonlit nights.
Their deep-bellied growling is at its
loudest when they are at a distance, as
these uncanny hunters grow silent as
they close in on their kill.
It is believed by some that the
distinct rattle of chains in the night
can presage the arrival of a grim. This
audible harbinger has its root in the
notion of mortal chains and the idea
of sins weighing down upon the soul
once it enters the afterlife. The grim as
a shepherd of such souls can, perhaps,
explain the idea that these clanking
chains might somehow follow the
nocturnal hunter rather than the click
of claws across stone you might expect.
In all cases these huge beasts are
reported to have hellish countenance
with fiery eyes and the stinking breath
of the grave.
What do the Players Know?
The grim guard church yards from
thieves, witches, warlocks and those
who would defile the holy ground. They
are protectors as opposed to instigators
of violence and attack. Their duty is to
watch over the sleep of the dead under
their care. The grim’s bones are buried
under the cornerstone of the church as
a foundation sacrifice, and they will not
rest for eternity so sacred is their duty
to the dead.
It is believed that if the church bells
toll at midnight a death will occur in the
village they protect.
Folklore suggests they know whether
a soul buried in their church is destined
for Heaven or Hell, and can often be
seen on the night of a funeral, prowling
the graveyard.
Some of the more powerful grim may
serve as guardians, guiding the souls of
the dead into the afterlife, while others
watch over the moors and desolate
roads to protect travellers from harm
that might befall them in the risings
mists and long dark nights.
These more often than not are Black
Dogs rather than ‘Church Grim’ and
have their bones buried at crossroads
along the path, rather than beneath the
foundations of a building though they
are of the same family of spirits.
The grim are more akin to spiritual
protectors than monsters—though woe
betide anyone with evil in their hearts
who crosses their paths for they are
fiercely protective of those they watch
over.
There are a number of infamous
Black Dogs, including the Cŵn Annwn,
the nine spectral hounds of the Welsh
otherworld, who are most often
associated with the Wild Hunt and
serve Arawn, King of the Annwn, and
Gwyn ap Nudd, Underworld King, and
often run in the presence of a fearsome
hag known as the Mother.
Legends focus upon our ‘Best Friends’
as guardians, such as Cerberus, the
Hound of Hades who stands as guardian
to the gates of the Underworld in Greek
mythology, keeping the dead from
leaving, and Garmr, the blood-stained
guardian of Hel’s gate in Norse. In
Cornwall, the Devil’s Dandy Dogs are
another version of the Wild Hunt, the
huntsman the Devil himself, the dogs
hellhounds, coal-black in colour and
with fiery breath. These black dogs and
guardians are the natural antecedent’s
of our protective Church Grim.
Other renown grim take the form of
the Black Dogs that haunt the moors
of regions like Dartmoor in the south
of England, and Gurt Dog that prowls
Somerset, Gytrash, Padfoot, Shag, Black
Shuck, Barghest and more are believed
to be Devil Dogs or Hellhounds, their
apparitions ranging at greater and
greater distances from their bones
depending upon their strength. The
Black Dogs of the moors may well
be more devilish in nature than the
protective Church Grim and should be
treated as such.
Main Features
✦ A grim may appear in either corporeal
or ethereal form, phasing in and out
of either state at will which accounts
for reports of weapons passing
through the body of rare white grim
as though they were nothing more
substantial than ghosts, and how the
sinful can still be torn apart by tooth
and claw in their ferocious attacks.
✦ The duality of their corporal and
ethereal existence functions as a form
of displacement, meaning it is next to
impossible to strike a powerful grim
without the aid of enchanted weapons.
✦ Blessed with incredible agility the
grim are capable of multiple attacks
in a single round of combat, utilising
tooth and claw.
✦ Their jaws are powerful enough to
snap bones clean in two.
✦ There is a corruption of the grim in
which a criminal’s heart is cut out
and it is buried inside the carcass of a
sacrificed animal, making it a killer of
the pure, the antithesis of the Church
Grim. It is a parasite, that is fuelled
by the holy energy of the Church,
feeding off people’s hopes and dreams
and fears.
✦ They grim are great hunters, though
they do not track by scent so the
usual tricks of trying to mask smells
and such in water or other ruses to
do not fool them. They ‘smell’ the and most fearful of all, panther-
stain of evil deeds upon the soul of like predators. It is rumoured that
those they hunt so those who cross the Kirkonväki, the nordic Church
their paths with dark deeds in mind Grim, can even appear as an eerily
are in considerably more danger than humanlike pale-skinned ghost,
an innocent soul. Their ‘hunt sense’ perhaps wearing the faces of the dead
is so powerful they may pursue their who were once parishioners of the
prey over incredible distances, driven Church it protects.
to chase them relentlessly across the ✦ Their presence can bring about
countryside. feelings of great sorrow in those
✦ It is believed that some Black Dogs susceptible to fear.
are in fact shapechangers capable of ✦ It is considered bad luck to talk of the
appearing as horse, mule and cow, grim.
 
Church Grim typical stats
What follows are the stats of a typical dog-like Church Grim protecting a old
cemetery, possibly in the countryside of England.
Traits: Perception +8, Psyche +8
Physical Health Points: None.
Mental Health Points: 32-40
Mental Damage levels (for 36 MHP): 1-12 (0) / 13-21 (-1) / 22-28 (-3) / 29-32 (-5)
/ 33-36 (-7)
Movement: 2 CP per 4 m (Max 24 m);
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 8-10).
Skills: Stealth SV 10 Avoidance 1 (Hiding & Camouflage 4, Sneaking 4), 17
Detection 1 (Observation 4).
Natural Weapons: Bite (Dmg 1d10 OR 8-10), Claws (Dmg 1d10 OR 9-10).
Initiative: +3
Combat points: Free 12 / Natural Weapons 10 (Biting 10, Claws 8).
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM +3) Bite SV 15, SV 10, SV 7; Claws SV 8
Common Properties
Between the Worlds
Since a Church Grim is both a corporal and ethereal creature, its MHP are also
its PFP. Its bite can maim and kill both men and supernatural creatures, while
its flesh cannot be harmed by normal attacks. The Church Grim can be wounded
only by enchanted weapons or by weapons blessed by a Priest, although these may
occasionally not work if wielded by somebody who is evil o unworthy.
Heavy Presence
The frail ones (those with negative Psyche modifier) and those who have committed
mortal sin without repent or absolution, will immediately feel intense sorrow,
suffering a mental damage of 1d6 MHP, as they enter a place infested by a Church
Grim, even if the creature is not visible. They will suffer another 1d3 MHP every
hour they remain in the place.
Never Talk to it
Those who speak with the Grim will suffer a modifier of -1 to all the rolls they will
make for 1d10 (OR 10) days.
 Night Sight
The Grim can see in the dark as if it were day.
Sense the Evil
Church Grims automatically succeed any attempt to sense
those who bear the stain of evil, have performed sinful
deeds or have dark deeds in mind. In terms of range this
sense has no limits, other than those decided by the GM as
it deems fit.
Optional Properties
Feeding off the emotions
Everytime somebody suffers damage, either to its mental
or physical health, the Black Dog heals 1d6 MHP. Resting
in a place filled with the emotions and dreams of those who
frequent it (a church, a graveyard, etc.) will also heal 1d6
MHP per hour. If the GM allows so, strong emotions can give
the Black Dog even 1d10 “Bonus MHP” to be added to its first
damage level.
Shapechange
The Grim can shapechange into another animal or creature.
The bell chooses its victim
18 If a bell toll at midnight, the grim will attack somebody in
the area.
Church Grim Variations
Evil Black Dog
For the many varieties of evil Black Dogs (from corrupted
Grims to those who haunt the moors) use the Church Grim
stats, adding the “Feeding off the emotions” ability but
removing the “Sense Evil” ability.
Kirkonväki
These Nordic Grims appear as humanoid pale ghosts,
often resembling old parishioners buried in the church or
animals sacrificed in ancient times in the foundation of a
building. Add the “Shapechange” ability. In most cases,
unless it deems fit to the specific legend, remove the
combat points and natural attacks, but add any ability from
Ghosts’ descriptions.
Church Grim-related Secret Arts
Evil Black Dogs suffer damage from Exorcism (Lex Libris
p.234) as it they were possessing spirits.
Call the Black Dog
New Dark Art, Left-Hand Path
This ancient spell is said to have been used by evil sorcerers
and witches for centuries in Northern Europe and Great
Britain. It possibly derives from perverted versions of ancient
celtic ritual practices, related to cults of the dead and the
underworld. The caster tries to evoke some form of evil Grim,
usually a Barghest or a Black Dog.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -8
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 7
✦ Discipline: The Left-hand Path level 2
✦ Specialty: Black Magic level 3
Other Requirements
✦ Supernatural Beings Discipline level 2, Beastiology
level 3
Material Requirements
An adult, large black dog or black wolf which will be
✦
sacrificed during the dark ritual.
Effect
This ritual should be performed during a dark night of New Moon
and no more than one attempt per night can be made. It takes 3
hours to be performed and, at the end, the sorcerer must make the
Esotericism skill roll. If this is a success, a Black Dog will be evoked
but its will must be bent in order to make it obey the sorcerer.
Make a situation roll with a SV equal to 2 modified by the
sorcerer’s Psyche and levels in Black Magic Specialty (+1 per
level). This SV can be further augmented by +1 per physical
or mental health level that the sorcerer sacrifices (this is not a
permanent since these health levels can be healed later on as
normal, but one must face the risk of having bad health modifiers
while dealing with a Black Dog). If the situation roll fails the
Black Dog attacks the sorcerer. If the situation roll succeeds, the
Black Dig will obey one command of the sorcerer. If the command
needs time to be performed, the Black Dog will perform it for a
maximum time period equal to 1d10 (OR 10) months.
 The Gargoyle
I t was a grotesque thing; a demon in the sky.
That was all I could think, looking at the stone.
The craftsmanship in the carving was exquisite.
What struck me as peculiar was that it was only the
head, but I should have known there was sound reasoning to this.
The Celts long held that there was a spiritual power in the heads of
their enemies that could be used to repel evil. They used to mount
them on spears and stake them out around the perimeter of their
settlements. I suppose such a sight would give an invader pause,
at least, so perhaps that is where the notion of the head serving to
ward off evil originated? Rather like scarecrows set out in the fields
to protect the crop from scavenger birds. I have heard is said often
enough that the church bells, the weathercock and the gargoyles are
defences that ward the holy houses against the devil.
But in this city I find myself thinking twice. Perhaps it is because
at its heart the place is still pagan, and these streets are still rooted
in the days of the celt.
It should not be surprising that as I walked these streets, so close
to the old heart of the land, my mind was drawn up to the stone
demons that watched from on high.
I stopped, my attention given wholly to the stone mask I saw
peering down at me from the corner of the old church. The sculptor
in this instance had known exactly how to place a chill in the
onlooker’s heart. This thing was fearsome. It is easy to understand
how good people could look to the divine for guidance and
19
protection. They came to a house like this to look to some unseen
and unknowable deity to tell them how to best live their lives. They
looked to the priests for confirmation they were doing it right.
What better protection could there be from the stuff of sin than
supernatural beings bound to the walls of your faith? Stone might
weather and erode, but it takes centuries, meaning these things are
always going to be there, looking over them, guarding them from
those who would look to do them harm. It is no different from
believing the crucifix might protect from the vampire or holy water
help banish demons. It’s easy to see how someone who had faith
could draw comfort from that, but I am reminded of the rants of
Bernard of Clairvaux, the 12th century prior, who despised the
grotesqueries and believed them unclean and idolatrous.
The more my travels bring me into contact with the esoteric the
more I find myself cut adrift from the comfort of faith, and even
enlightenment. There is too much of this life we do not understand,
and have barely scratched the surface of understanding.
I have often considered the abyss line between good and evil to
be delicately balanced. Representing a vast array of chimerical
beasts and impish demons it is tempting to believe that these
representations of evil forces, deadly sins rendered in stone, are
anything but guardians, but rather beautifully rendered avatars of
sin and temptation that merely wait, looking down upon familiar
streets, waiting for their next victim.
But what if they are more than just some mason’s folly?
20
 I encountered a man this week, a priest, no less, who had given that wood is sacred to the druids who protect the old ways,
accumulated the evidence he believed would prove that the things and the Green Man as the locals affectionately call him is more of
sitting vigil above his church were anything but benevolent a nature sprite.
guardians. He was insistent, his fear infectious, as he laid it out before You would be forgiven for thinking this Green Man is uniquely
me. Though I confess I find it hard to believe that we are talking celtic in his nature, but his face or variations of it, have appeared
about the petrified souls of men condemned for their sins who sit an all over the continent for centuries. They have another name for
endless vigil rather than face the torments of eternal damnation, but him here, the Green Pan. Though I believe the celts still call him
I could tell that he believed. Of course, his faith have a long history Cernunnos, the bi-fold god, lord of night and day, lord of summer
of burning sinners at the stake, so it is not a stretch to imagine and winter, consort of the Mother Goddess, the Maiden and the
taking that ash and mixing it into the cements that are used to Crone, the Horned God is more often depicted with a beast’s head,
hold their holy houses together, once more symbolising the duality
but that is not what he was of man and beast, not unlike
talking about. His evidence the accursed lycanthrope I have
was far more compelling and gathered so many tales of. He is the
causes me even now to question Warrior, the Father and the Sage. I
the relationship between sin see links in these legends and wonder
and salvation, and the visible how many of them all stem from the
and invisible, given that these same pagan root, where this duality
things are everywhere above us, cannot simply be explained away
lurking, and has he claimed, and thus becomes supernatural in
no two of their countless nature? It is something to think on.
number were the same. It was I doubt very much I shall ever know
true, I had taken to studying the true answer in my life time.
them since he mentioned that But I wonder if this is more
peculiar observation, and it truthful than the mere superstition
gave some credence to his claim that these carved gargoyles are our
that they were bound in some spiritual guardians and protectors, 21
way to souls. and that rather there is a divide, as
I think it is important to the evidence of the priest suggests,
remember it is not so very there are in fact twin natures to
long ago we worshipped very these stone watchers, as one, they
different gods here, and their are the prettified souls of sinners, as
presence is not gone, no matter another they are a link to the earth
how much the Roman’s sought and our place upon it. What I find
to crush such pagan faiths and most disturbing is how both share
grind them under the heel of the aspect Baphomet, the face of the
Constantine’s chosen God. In devil. That can be no coincidence,
many ways, places like this feel surely, can it?
more connected to the land and I looked again at the grotesque
the old ways than it does to the thing above me, knowing that the
new. uglier its appearance the more
In this town alone I have protection the faithful believed it
marked several doorways gave, but the priest was in my head
protected by a very different now with his mortal sins, and my
kind of gargoyle, a leaf-faced fear was that the uglier the petrified
man. soul, the graver its sins.
It is the same as the demonic head, disembodied as before, though And what then if he was right, and that come the phase of the
this time entwined with foliage, with branches extruding from his moon, the thing would stir from its stony state to hunt?
screaming mouth. I was put in mind of the medieval text De Naturis Rerum which
There are subtle differences, though. In several examples I have discusses the nature of the mark upon the moon and the author muses
seen further out into the countryside I have marked that the branch on the nature of the peasant in the moon, who carries thorns. Most
and vine seem to grow out of all of the openings of the head, the tear believe it be a reference to punishment—I have heard some believe it his
ducts of the eyes, spewing out of the mouth, and sprouting from the Cain himself, banished to the moon for the sins of murder, but other
nostrils. The branches are always oak, which can be no coincidence punishments are more banal, a wife churning butter on a Sunday,
 a husband scattering branches across the road before the church to and but a moment later I witnessed a tragedy, as balanced upon
prevent worshippers from attending mass—but it is the reference to the vault he harangued the sky, holy book clutched tight in one
thorns that interests me, and how it binds the phases of the moon to hand, crucifix brandished in the other. His voice carried. He was
the nature sprites and gargoyles that are set in stone. resolute in his faith. I heard the words of the Lord’s prayer, and
The moon was coming into its own in the sky, waxing. If the the opening of the rite of exorcism, but the gargoyle merely beat
priest was right then the demonic vessel would soon stir. Having its massive wings, and in doing so created huge down-draughts
witnessed the relentless nature of the golem brought to life by the that unbalanced the man trying to banish its sin-filled soul to the
secret name of god, I feared what awaited me if such hate and sin pits of Hell.
could indeed be infused in the living stone, how could you end its As he drew upon his faith, the gargoyle drew upon the elements,
unnatural life? Fire could not touch it, at least not beyond basic beating its wings with all the fury of the demonkind I knew it to be.
scarring, a body of granite rock so hard it turned away a blade He lost his footing.
and could not be pierced by an arrow? The answer, according to It was nothing. A mis-step. And there was a moment where
the priest, of course lies in the exorcism of the sinner’s soul, setting I thought he would right himself and find his balance, but the
it finally at rest and leaving the statue was merely that, a statue. creature swooped down, to within touching distance of the holy
I looked to him, armed with bell, book and candle, and shaking man, and beat its huge wings with such rage it summoned a
in the moonlight, aware that what we faced, should the damned howling wind the priest could not hope to stand against.
thing stir, could be the death of us. And yet, still he stood there, The fool fell.
determined to banish the damned soul back to the pit. I admired his I watched, knowing there was nothing I could do to save him,
blind courage if nothing else. The first indication that the creature and knowing that I could not hope to kill the beast I fled into the
truly did live came in the form of a banshee-like howl that tore from sanctuary of the sacristy while the sinner went out to hunt the city.
its mouth as the sinner woke in response to the moon.
Even as it began to tear free of the stone façade, the priest began
his evocation, beseeching the Lord Almighty to offer comfort and
solace to the restless soul.
Those massive stone wings stretched.
His voice carried up to the rooftop where the gargoyle rose
22 gracefully into the night sky, massive talons seeming to claw at the
face of the moon.
The priest cried out a challenge, but the thing wasn’t about to
face him.
This was not about to become a fair fight of faith versus sin.
The stone demon rose beyond the reach of his prayer, mocking
him as it’s majestic form was backlit against the silver moon as it
hung there, a thing of fear and loathing.
How could anyone believe this creature to be their protector?
You only had to gaze at it to understand the nature of evil writ
across its stone.
He was right. I had no doubt of that. But was he right about the
more benevolent Green Man? I do not know, and may never know.
Not about to be deterred, the man rushed into the church,
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Gargoyle
I must confess, it is my considered
opinion that King Nimrod did not,
in fact, encounter what we consider
gargoyles, but rather a similar creature
with the similar attributes. His
descriptions do not quite mate with
what we now know, though perhaps he
was describing a now extinct variant of
the gargoyle? A chimera?
“It was told to me that small winged
creatures had different names in different
parts of the world. We called them azag,
or asakku. They were born out of the
mountain and could live in water. I chased
them for several years through the peaks of
the mountains of Kalden and killed several
though I could never tame one, try as I
might.”
Emanuel Igliano, a devout Catholic
priest devoted much of his life to the
study the gargoyles and their origins :
“The gargoyle is nothing short of a
grotesquery. A vile creature that should
belong in the courtyards of hell. And yet
choose to position them as guardians of
our sacred buildings. Why should this be
so? It is nothing short of a paradox. My
knowledge of the subject is lamentably
shallow, even now, but the conclusions I
make are based upon considered study:
even though these gargoyles wear their
ugliness across their stone skin, and appear
more malicious than any being in the
church yard, appearance has nothing to do
with darkness and evil. The gargoyle is a
patient watcher. A protector. It sits sentinel,
observing, waiting, guarding. And it
performs the task admirably.”
In a recently discovered letter to the
Papal States, Igliano Emanuel writes:
“You have asked me to further investigate
the gargoyles in Notre Dame, and I can
declare with confidence in my findings that
the Gargoyles there obeyed the high priest
and agreed to serve under his watchful eye.
They stir to life when he is nearby, otherwise
not.”
We believe this is proof of a
connection between the guardian of
the church and the gargoyles who have
pledged to guard his house.
A Gargoyle, or grotesque as some
would term it, is a statue made to ward
against evil spirits and is most often seen
looking down from the highest ramparts
and rooftops of buildings, not limited to
churches. They all have a wicked exterior
meant to strike fear into the spirits that
would do harm to those they watch over.
Some are fashioned in such a way that
the rain spews out of their mouths in a
cascade, just as if they were spewing out
the evil spirits that sought to enter the
house under their protection.
We have evidenced a vast array of
gargoyles, and in our searches have come
to the fundamental understanding that
the only limits upon the visage of the
gargoyle’s horrible appearance is the
imagination of the creator. Some possess
wings, others carry more than one head,
some have multiple legs or pairs of arms
while others lack even a body and consist
solely of a large head with arms and legs
protruding from the stone wall.
No one knows how or why a
gargoyle is brought to life for sure.
Some scholars of the esoteric believe
the statues actually catch the evil
spirits trying to get into the buildings
and are some kind of golem, others
that they are benevolent beings of the
earth given shape by the craftsmen
who bear such a strong connection
with the old ways of earth, air, fire and
water.
According to Nimrod, the gargoyles
of his time were fashioned from
mountain sands that were sculpted and
shaped with magic, while a golem was
given life. 23
Gargoyles generally possess limited
supernatural abilities, most in some
way physical—for instance the power
to climb up and down a vertical walls,
across ceilings, through some may
actually fly, their huge stone wing spans
casting protective shadows across the
consecrated ground below, and in rare
cases may even pass through walls, their
stone bodies fusing with the stone walls,
to emerge perfectly whole on the other
side.
A few are even capable of spitting
sulphur from their mouths and other
corrosive mucus that can do untold
damage to human flesh.
Unique individuals
The Borgunda Gargoyles
Not all gargoyles are made of stone.
That is a misconception of our age
because the stone gargoyles are the
variant we see most often.
In tales from the Viking Age, one
can find descriptions of guardians
 being made of wood who were set as
watchers on the walls of both dwelling
houses, great halls, and the temples and
churches dedicated to their pagan gods.
These gargoyles are similar to dragon
heads, but are capable of tearing off
the roofs. They resemble little wooden
dragons perched up on the roof top.
Some of the most famous wooden
gargoyles are the Borgunda Gargoyles
who sit as guardians on several wooden
churches in Norway.
The residents there claim that the
Borgunda church was built on an ancient
pagan site of great spiritual significance
and, to protect the new church, and the
Christian priest who preached within
its walls, the gargoyles were created,
tapping into the earth magic bringing
about a fusing of the new and old ways.
The Notre Dame Gargoyles
The Notre Dame gargoyles are, perhaps,
the most famous stone statues in Paris.
However, few know of their true
purpose, nor why they come to life at
24 least once every decade.
The question that comes to the lips
of many of the faithful as they shuffle
beneath those famous arches into the
huge cathedral is: how can a godly
church in the middle of the known world
house such horrible creatures. As with
most gargoyles, these are grotesque,
some stretch devil wings, others are half
human, half animal.
The priests of Notre Dame do not
have a satisfactory answer, and more
often than not explain merely that all
beings are the work of God and they too
deserve his love and salvation.
According to one legend, the
Merovingian king Clotaire II, who
served as the bishop of Rouen also,
brought with him a winged creature
from the countryside he named
gargouille, or goji as an affectionate
nickname, as though the creature was a
pet. Descriptions of gargouille describe
it as a smaller dragon with wings,
capable of breathing gouts of flame.
A zealot of a priest called the creature
an abomination and struck it with
his cross, commanding the demon be
dissolved into nothingness or forever
serve the Church.
Gargouille refused and for its pains
they tried to burn the damned thing
with little success.
After three days of unremitting
torture, though, the creature gave up
and surrendered to the priest’s will.
To escape further punishment, it
scaled the church roof and sat down to
watch.
Then, something marvellous
happened. More and more creatures
came to join their brother on the watch,
and within a year the whole church was
full of gargoyles who served the priest.
What cannot be denied is that the
gargoyles of Notre Dame serve the
high priest, who has it within his gift
to bring them to life whenever the
need occurs. There are notes within the
sacristy of the church describing the
wakings that occur, and suggest that
the gargoyles are in some strange way
living their own lives, spending the
nocturnal hours exploring the church
environs.
And, if old drawings are to be believed
accurate, it is possible more than one
gargoyle has abandoned its eternal
guard duty never to return…
Appearance
These stone guardians come in all
manner of shapes and forms, limited
only by the imagination of the stone
masons whose lives work they watch
over. More often than not their
visage is twisted and grotesque.
Some believe this serves to ward of
the evils that might otherwise threat
their territory, whilst others believe
it is a manifestation of their own
evil that marks them as demonic in
nature. Often they are carved with thin
leathery wings and fangs and sharp
features, hunched backs ridged with
spines and use their wicked talons to
cling to their perches. In flight, they
move with much more majesty than
their often hunchbacked form would
suggest, their flight bat-like in nature
as they flit across the sky.
First Impressions
They are incredibly patient creatures,
capable of remaining in place for hours
upon hours without moving so much as a
stony muscle. Unless in flight, they look
like what they are, grotesque carvings
set up high on a wall, watching out
over the streets below. So many of them
appear hideous and grotesque, brooding
creatures perched high above the streets
they watch over. The most terrifying of
them appear barely restrained by the
stone moorings, itching to take flight.
Most people, though, will not even
notice they are there unless the gargoyle
chooses to reveal itself to them.
What do the Players Know?
Their name, gargoyle, is derived from
the French word gargouille, which
translates to throat. It is no surprise
they are named for one of the weakest
parts of the human body, given the
wicked fangs so many of them keep
razor-sharp.
The mere sight of them is enough
to inspire fear in weak-minded and
superstitious people.
They are solitary creatures, not
given to living in flocks or hives or
other communities. It is uncommon for
more than a single living gargoyle to
guard a site, though not impossible.
They are incredibly patient creatures,
capable of carrying out their lonely
vigil for hundreds of years without
losing focus or growing bored.
They are nocturnal creatures.
During the day they are stone-like
statues that simply watch, but as the
sun goes down and the moon rises they
slowly wake.
There are various forms of gargoyle that
are somewhat different in nature to the
grotesqueries on the great churches and
cathedrals, like the famous Notre Dame
gargoyle of Paris. These are often found
in what were Celtic lands, and include
things like disembodied heads, open
mouths spewing foliage, Green Men, and
perhaps most strangely, humunculous-like
fusions of man and beast. These bizarre
hybrid creatures mixing different animal
parts are known as chimeras and include
familiar ones like griffins (a lion and eagle
mixed) and harpies (a half woman, half
bird) but also more perverse and horrific
fusions, too. These are all more pagan in
nature and predate the gargoyle guardians
of the Christian churches. The branches
and leaves around the green men and the
spewing mouths are often considered to be
a symbol of divinity, and it is believed the
disembodied heads possess great magic.
The oldest gargoyle-like creation is a
13,000-year-old stone crocodile which
was found in Turkey. This offers up a
world of opportunity for the creative
campaign. Gargoyles in Ancient
Greece? In Egypt? Both cultures had a
fascination with stone lions…
an intruder in their talons and, while
they struggle, beat their leathery
wings steadily, rising gradually higher
and higher until they are far above
the ground, and then, as their prey’s
struggles grow more frantic, simply
relinquish their hold and let them fall.
✦ They are magical creatures, and as
such resistant to a lot of lesser magics.
✦ They are immune to fire.
✦ A few more powerful gargoyles
arecapable of spitting sulphur from
their mouths and other corrosive
 
mucus that can do untold damage to
human flesh.
✦ They are so grotesque of appearance the
mere sight of them is enough to instil fear
in a soul unlucky enough to come face to
face with the stone guardians. And with
good reason, as some are imbued with
the hatreds of their creators and are still
driven by their sinful desires.
✦ Their most terrifying magic is that
of petrification—an ancient gargoyle
can turn a living thing to stone with
its touch.

Main Features Gargoyle typical stats

✦ Gargoyles are watchful guardians,
and as such incredibly perceptive.
✦ They are powerful fighters capable of
multiple attacks utilising tooth and
claw.
✦ They are incredibly difficult to injure
with non-enchanted weapons as their
natural ‘skin’ is tougher than most
manmade armour. They do not bleed,
because their is no blood within their
bodies. This can have a disconcerting
effect upon the person fighting the
gargoyle, increasing the levels of fear
they feel face to face with the creature.
✦ They are capable of flight.
✦ They are incredibly stealthy
creatures in their chosen
environments, able to move from
rooftop to rooftop across a city,
unseen. They can blend in with
The following stats represent a typical, human-sized Gargoyle living and hiding
among the statues on the roof of a Gothic Cathedral in Europe.
Traits: Constitution +6
Physical Health Points: 30-70
Physical Damage levels (for 50 PHP): 1-16 (0) / 17-28 (-1) / 29-38 (-3) / 39-44 (-5) 25
/ 45-50 (-7)
Mental Health Points: None.
Movement: walking or climbing 2 CP per 1 m (Max 10 m); flying 2 CP per 6 m
(Max 30 m).
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 8-10).
Skills: Agility SV 10: Body Control 1 (Parkour 4).
Stealth SV 10: Avoidance 1 (Hiding & Camouflage 4, Sneaking 4),
Detection 1 (Observation 4).
Natural Weapons: Bite (Dmg 1d10 OR 8-10), Claws (Dmg 1d10 OR 10 +6).
Natural Protection: Stone Skin 10
Initiative: 0
Combat points: Free 10 / Natural Weapons 20 / Wrestling 10.
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM 0) Bite SV 10, Claws SV 10, SV 10

other grotesqueries and statues ✦ (IM 0) Claws SV 15, SV 15

carved upon the great buildings. ✦ (IM 0) Wrestling SV 10 (double CP cost as per Lex Libris p.19).
✦ They possess almost preternatural ✦ (IM 0) Wrestling SV 9 + 2 CP spent to fly up to 6 m (see “Terrible Grip” below).

agility, their talons enabling them

to cling to sheer stone as they move
with grace across the rooftops. Common Properties
✦ They are nocturnal beings and
cannot move about in sunlight. Almost Invisible
✦ Many are bonded to a particular When in their ambient (usually roofs and among lines of statues) a Gargoyle
building that they must watch over, automatically succeeds any Stealth skill roll.
which means that they cannot venture
too far from their stone moorings.
✦ A favoured method of killing is to grip
 Dark Statue
The Gargoyle can see in the dark as if it were day. On the
other hand, the Gargoyle must remain immobile under the
sun, otherwise it will suffer 1d10 damage every 5 rounds it
moves.
Bloodless
Even when they are damaged, Gargoyles do not bleed or seem
to suffer pain, causing discomfort to those who are fighting
against them. Every time a Gargoyle’s physical damage level
is diminished, the one who dealt the damage suffer 1d3 mental
health points.
Fearless
Gargoyles do not know fear and their patience is legendary,
therefore they have no Mental Health Points to be diminished.
Immunities
Gargoyles are completely immune to Fire. Lesser magics also
do not work on Gargoyles, but it’s up to the GM to judge
what works.
Natural Climber
A Gargoyle never fail a roll to climb. Furthermore, they can
climb almost vertical walls and even horizontal ceilings.
26 Stone Skin
The Gargoyle’s natural armour (usually 10) is always
subtracted from damage, unless the attack is dealt with an
enchanted or blessed weapon.
Terrible Grip
Gargoyles winning a Grapple struggle inflict also 1d10 PHP
with its sharp claws. If the creature wins the grapple, it can
also raise flying (every 2 CP they can raise of 6 m), making
the victim fall at the end of the round for free, dealing at least
1d10 OR 10 per 3 m (see Lex Libris p.31). If the Gargoyle
spends other, subsequent rounds raising above, the victim can
avoid falling only by winning a Grapple (but still suffering the
1d10 PHP damage from the claws).
Optional Properties
Aura of Hatred
A few powerful gargoyles are so imbued with hatred and sins
that they are surrounded by an evil aura. All those who are
nearby suffer 1d6 mental damage per action round, if the
Gargoyle is active, or per half an hour, if the Gargoyle is
immobile and statue-like during the day.
Breath of Death
Up to three times per day an exceptional Gargoyle can
breathe sulphur, fire, corrosive acid or other deadly matters,
dealing 2d10 (OR 8-10) to all the enemies in front of it. This
attack cannot be parried but can be avoided with a successful
Evade maneuver. The Gargoyle cannot do anything else in
the round.
Guardian
The Gargoyle is linked to a specific building or place which it
defends. If it is brought too far from it, the creature will die or
become a normal statue.
Immune to Pain
Some Gargoyles are so near in nature to stone (or to wood in
the case of other types of Gargoyles) that they do not suffer
penalties from losing PHP. This creature has no damage
levels, just a whole PHP total.
Pass through Stone
A Gargoyle can even pass through walls of stone as if it were
air. Exploiting this ability, they can fuse with the stone, with
only part of their body emerging from it, waiting in this
position even for years.
Petrification
A few ancient Gargoyles can turn victims into stone with
their touch or claw attacks. To avoid the effect the victim must
succeed a situation roll with an SV of 8, modified by their
Constitution.
A few rare Gargoyles can do the same with their sights,
by doing nothing else but looking the victim in the eyes for a
round. In this case the situation roll has an SV of 6, modified
by Psyche.
Victims turned to stone are usually to be considered lost
although, at the GM’ judgement, they can even turn back to
their flesh form if the Gargoyle is killed. If this happens many
years or centuries after the petrification, the victim should
also suffer mental damage, according to the GM’ judgement.
Terrifying Screech
If they do nothing else in the round, some Gargoyles can
emit terrifying screeches inflicting 1d10 (OR 8-10) of mental
damage.
Gargoyle Variations
Borgunda Gargoyles, Green Men
For representing wooden gargoyles remove the Stone Skin or
consider it a “Wooden Skin” which protects only 3-5 points.
The Immune to Pain ability can be added.
Notre Dame Gargoyles, Merovingian Gargouilles
Add “Guardian” ability. Furthermore, they often act in groups
and obey to specific individuals (like the Main Priest of the
Cathedral).
Chimeras, Nimrod’s Azag, Asakku, etc.
Many of these creatures are not in stone but in flesh, therefore
the Stone Skin ability should be removed or substituted with a
Thick Skin giving only 2-3 points of protection. On the other
hand, the GM is encouraged to add specific animal abilities and
qualities, like those given for the Homunculus and Lycanthrope.
Flying Heads
These small Gargoyles fly even if they do not have wings.
Remove the Claw attacks. The Fear Factor should be raised to
1d10 (7-10). They tend to have fewer PHP than full Gargoyles.
For example, 30 PHP and damage levels as follows: 1-10 (0) /
11-17 (-1) / 18-23 (-3) / 24-27 (-5) / 28-30 (-7).
Large Gargoyles
Gargoyles which are two or three times larger than humans
should have stats like these: Constitution +8, Bite (Dmg 2d10
OR 8-10), Claws (Dmg 2d10 OR 10 +8). PHP: 70. Damage
levels :1-23 (0) / 24-40 (-1) / 41-54 (-3) / 55-63 (-5) / 64-70
(-7).
Small Gargoyles
Smaller Gargoyles, about one half or one third of a man’ size,
tend to act in groups and have the following stats. Constitution
+2, Dexterity +4 (to be added to Initiative), Bite (Dmg 1d10
OR 10), Claws (Dmg 1d10 OR 10 +2). PHP: 20. Damage levels:
1-6 (0) / 7-11 (-1) / 12-15 (-3) / 16-18 (-5) / 19-20 (-7).
Gargoyle-related Secret Arts
The Merovingian Sword
New Divine Art
How King Clotaire II managed to have a gargoyle as a pet is
unknown, although there are rumours about now-lost pagan
magic formulas, spelled in Old Frankish. Possibly the same
Christian priests who subdued the Gargoyles in Notre Dame
also deleted the memory of such pagan feats, also in order
not to stain the Merovingian reputation as staunch allies of
Rome’s Church. More certain is the existence of an ancient
prayer in Medieval Latin which is curiously linked with the
memories of the Merovingians, although in reality very few
know about its real origin. At least three copies of the prayer
are kept in the libraries of three minor monasteries in France,
Belgium and Bavaria. There are possibly also similar versions
for non-Catholic Christians, but this is still to be confirmed.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -10
Requirements
✦ Skill: Theology SV 10
✦ Discipline: Divine Power level 3
✦ Specialty: Holy Power level 3
Other Requirements
✦ Communication SV 7, Languages Discipline level 1,
Foreign language: Latin level 3.
Material Requirements
✦ A bladed weapon (sabre, sword, etc..).
✦ To be an ordained priest of the Catholic Church, in full
communion with Rome.
✦ Approval of the bishop whose authority is above the area
where the ritual is held.
✦ A Catholic church.
Effect
During the Easter time (from Easter to Pentecost), after a
night of vigil and prayer, followed by a 3-hours long ritual
to start at dawn, one bladed weapon is blessed. From now
onwards the blade will ignore the natural protection of
unnatural creatures (including the stone skin of Gargoyles
but also other kinds of creatures). Furthermore against such
creatures the open roll range of the weapon is augmented by
1 (for example a Sabre which usually deal 1d10 OR 9-10 will
deal 1d10 OR 9-10 against unnatural creatures). The blade
does not display these properties if wielded by somebody evil
or blasphemous. Only one attempt at performing this ritual
can be made per Easter time.
Asakku’s Blindness 27
New Dark Art, Right-Hand Path
Reputed to have been created by King Nimrod himself, this
ritual allows to pass in front of a Gargoyle or similar creature
without being noticed.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -10
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 10
✦ Discipline: Righ-hand Path level 3
✦ Specialty: White Magic level 3
Other Requirements
✦ Supernatural Beings Discipline level 1, Beastiology level 1
Material Requirements
A lamb to be sacrificed with a bronze knife.
✦
Effect
During the sunset a lamb is sacrificed and its blood is used
to paint the face of up to 10 people. These will be completely
invisible to Gargoyles, Asakku and similar creatures for
the whole night. If the sorcerer is a PC, the dice for the
Esotericism roll should be rolled by the GM and kept secret.
Unfortunately the only way to see whether the spell worked
is to actually be in front of a Gargoyle.
28
 The Ghoul
T he service was melancholy, as such affairs are
wont to be, but the priest offered kind sentiments
and promised an afterlife that must have offered
some of the left behind comfort. He was a tall,
gaunt fellow. One might choose the word cadaverous to
describe his form, as surely he was closer to the grave than the
cradle and looked like a square meal would do him no harm.
The cross loomed large in the heart of the church, reminding
us just how holy the surroundings were.
I had come to town a month before and found myself lingering to
take advantage of the comfortable lodging and the respite it offered
to transcribe my journal. I had encountered so much across the
great continent, and could only begin to wonder at what left to be
discovered. Of course, at the heart of it was someone else’s sorrow. I
watched the widow in black weep, her veil covering her face. At her
side her two children were dressed in their Sunday best to say farewell
to their father who was the guest of honour. There were perhaps forty
mourners, which is more than I imagined would attend my own
funeral, assuming by body was in any fit state for burial when the
time came.
I was one of four pall bearers who carried the coffin out to the hole
in the ground where the dead man’s bones would spent eternity. The
29
wooden casket was light considering it contained the remnants of a
life well lived. I had always imagined a dead weight would be so
much heavier a burden.
With my fellow pallbearers I helped lower the casket into the
ground then stepped back from the edge of the grave to allow the
priest to offer up more sentiment and prayer. I was not one for the
ritual of it, so retreated into the cool of the church proper, thinking
to talk philosophy and theosophy with my new friend over a nice
glass of rum when the mourners had dispersed. I looked forward
to our nightly conversations. He was a deep thinker, and did not
immediately dismiss the otherworld or the supernatural simply
because it fell outside of the remit of Heaven and Hell, but rather
talked of lost books of the bible which, it seemed, supported some of
the darker tales of the demonic and ghoulish nature of our world.
I took myself through to his chambers and poured myself a drink,
settling into the comfortable armchair to wait. Up above, the church
bell tolled out its farewell to the dead father, suggesting that the rite
was already drawing to an end.
I heard noises beneath me, which confused me, I must admit. Even
so, I supped at my rum and looked out through the mullioned window
at the darkening sky, wondering what conundrum I might put before
my scholarly friend when he returned. I was thinking perhaps it was
time for that old chestnut: how can evil flourish in a world created by
a benevolent and loving God? It was always amusing to watch a man
of faith wrestle with the idea that the thing he most cherished was
 also the root of the evil in the world, too, and allowed such horrible
things to happen as a young father to leave behind a grieving widow
and two lost children who would never trust the world again, because
they’d learned that hardest of lessons so young: everyone leaves you
eventually.
I never got to ask him that question, though I had many, many
more I would have given what happened in the next few minutes.
The noise grew more agitated beneath me.
Rats, I realised. Rats in the crypt. But they were so loud I simply
could not ignore them. I looked around for a candlestick, which I lit
from the taper, and went to investigate.
The heavy timber door in the vestry led down to the crypts. There
was no lock, only black iron bands that served as a hinge. I opened it,
holding the guttering flame out before me as I descended.
The sound of rats feasting grew louder and louder with every step
deeper into the earth.
I couldn’t understand how my friend, so fastidious in every
other aspect of his life, could allow such filth to dwell beneath him,
especially when this crypt served as the final resting place for many
of the wealthier of his congregation. Surely he must lay down poison
given everything we knew about that damned plague outbreak
following the Great Northern War had snuffed out so many lives
from Prussia to Estonia, all along the Baltic coast. I had seen first-
hand cordons sanitaire around the infected towns of Stralsund and
Königsberg, and plague houses quarantining people beyond the city
walls of Berlin. It was more than just bad air or dirty clothing, of
30 course, but there were still plenty who believed the terror that had
been claiming lives for three centuries and more was nothing short of
a divine punishment for our collective sins. I made note to bring that
up later, sure it would amuse my friend to hear how we mere mortals
had the temerity to blame God for the plagues afflicting us.
The guttering flame cast little light across the cold stone floor, but it
was enough for me to realise that rats were not the cause of the noises
that had drawn me down to the crypt.
I saw a young man with his back to me. He was dressed in the
vestments of a priest, with a candlestick set down on the lid of a
sarcophagus beside him. That wasn’t the only thing on the stone
tomb. The body of a man—it took me a moment to realise it was
the body of the father we had supposedly buried only moments ago,
which explained the lightness of the casket—was draped across the lid,
spine arched to offer up the secret anatomy of his guts like a lesson
for the young man’s study. Only then I saw him turn, drawn to the
noise of my arrival. Blood smeared his lips. In his hand he held the
dead man’s heart, a ragged wound in it from where he had torn a
mouthful out of the organ.
This was a horror I had never imagined.
A corpse eater.
I knew of ghouls. Of course I did. Though I had thought to
encounter them nearer the deserts beyond Islambol, not here in this
more civilised, Christian, place. That sent a cold shiver down the
bones of my spine. Ghūl in their native tongue, corpse eaters were
demonic creatures that haunted burial grounds, their greatest evil
not that they fed upon the dead—the dead were dead, after all, and
suffered nothing more in the horrors of consumption—that they were
capable of shifting form and passing for normal decent men and
women in the world.
I stared long and hard at the vestments, knowing what they meant,
but struggling to grasp the truth my own eyes offered: that my friend
who I had enjoyed so many spirited discussion of the natural and
supernatural world was himself a corpse-eater.
I crossed myself, knowing I could not allow him to leave this place,
but not sure how I could possibly stop him given that my only weapon
was a silver candlestick.
I thought for one wild second of throwing myself at him and trying
to bash his brains out with the metal in my hand, but that meant
getting close, too close. It meant seeing into the depths of his eyes and
through them into his soul. I could not bear that.
“Why?” I said, not realising I had spoken the word allowed. He had the
perfect situation here for his depraved appetites, I realised, serving as shepherd
for the souls into the afterlife, burying empty coffins and feeding that sick
lust of his for flesh in the privacy of the crypt, none of his parishioners any
the wiser as they brought their dead to him for the ritual circle to begin
again and again. Who did it harm? His victims were already dead, after
all. It wasn’t as though he went out of his way to kill. He merely fed on the
byproduct of life. Part of me considered walking away, simply leaving him
down there and pretending I had not seen what I had seen.
But as raised the heart to his lips and took another mouthful of
meat from it, I knew I couldn’t do that. The ghoul chewed, more
blood streaming down his chin to stain his vestments as he held the
heart out to me, as though he wanted to share his bounty.
I felt sick to the craw.
I shook my head, and backed up.
My heel came up against the last stone step.
I looked around for anything else I might somehow use to send the
priest back to Hell, but there was nothing.
Only the fire I held in my hand, I realised.
But it was a small flame, and nothing down here was going to
burn.
But the pews in the nave above would.
I retreated one step at a time, thinking my friend would follow, but
the lure of the meal before him was too tempting and instead he fell
upon the corpse, burying his hands in the loops of gut and pulling
them free to feast upon the dead man’s last meal.
I left him down there, a prayer on my lips as I barricaded the door,
dragging the wooden pews across the nave to make sure there was no
chance in Hell the ghoul would batter a way through the barrier
before the church burned down and the fires dragged him all the way
back down to Hell with them.
It took me the best part of an hour of backbreaking labour to build
the pyre.
The last few pews were dragged into place to the accompaniment of
nails raking down the heavy timbers of the crypt door and the frantic
ratting of the black iron hinge.
The sound of that hinge desperately rattling as my friend struggled
to be free would haunt me for the rest of my days, but that was not
enough to stop me from lighting the fire from his own candlestick.
I stepped out into the night, unsure if I had saved a soul or
damned two…
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Ghoul
Tales of the ghoul first circulated
throughout the Arabic world, the name
‘ghul’ stemming from ‘gallu’, the name of an
Akkadian demon in ancient Mesopotamian
mythology who dragged mortals into the
Underworld. Bedouin folktales commonly
involve ghouls, who are vile tricksters and
ravenous flesh eaters.
In the old tales they lured lustful men
to their doom by taking the guise of
beautiful women, which is not the image
Western philosophies recognise.
Asian folklore, including the Tamil’s
of India, speak of a shaggy-haired
creature they call the "pey" which seeks
out the battlefields of men to lap blood
from the open wounds of the dying.
In the journey through death described
in the Tibetan Book of the Dead the soul
enters a dreamlike state known as "bardo",
where it encounters the Pishachi ghouls,
fierce female flesh eaters.
First Impressions
Their stench is enough to overpower
most humans.
They look like a grim parody of
humanity; possessing almost canine
features, so pronounced are their teeth,
and are pale creatures with a waxen
complexion. These fiends are sensitive
to light, though not to the same extent
as vampires, though they will recoil from
sunlight as it spills through an open crypt
door as though it causes physical pain.
While some accounts describe ghouls
as evil spirits rather than undead, they
are most commonly depicted as slump-
shouldered humans, capable of walking
on their own two feet though they more
often than not scramble about their hands
and knees. Their flesh is best described as
cadaverous. It is as though the powerful
gluttony that drives them to feast on
flesh cannot be sated and their bodies
are cannibalising themselves with such
ferocious appetite they can never grow fat
regardless of how much they consume.
What do the Players Know?
The natural habitat of the ghoul are places
of human death and misery. They can be
found close to fields of blood and places
that offer easy access to fresh graves, so
are drawn to the crypts and churchyards.
They are nocturnal by nature, choosing
to avoid sunlight. They move by tunnel
and cave, creeping around beneath the
city streets undetected.
Ghouls are scavengers. They feed off
carrion. They are not, by choice, killers.
The oldest surviving literature that
mentions ghouls is most likely One
Thousand and One Nights, though
they may well be described in some of
the more esoteric texts including the
"grand grimoire" dated to 1522 and
other tomes.
They eat flesh and drink blood.
Main Features
✦ Ghouls are driven by an insatiable
hunger for flesh, both necrotic and
living. After all, it doesn’t take long for
the feasting ghoul to turn a live meal
into a dead banquet!
✦ Some ghouls boast a paralyzing
touch—this may be down to the
putrid bacteria that gathers beneath
their claws which acts almost like
a venom when it gets into the
bloodstream of a human.
✦ They are sensitive to the sun. It
causes them physical pain, although
unlike vampires it cannot kill a ghoul.
✦ Occasionally, ghouls use simple weapons
such as spears, but mostly they depend
on their powerful, filth-tipped claws to
fend off adversaries. Factor in a deadly
bite, and the ghoul makes for a fearsome
opponent in hand-to-hand combat.
✦ One of the most devious abilities of
the ghoul is its ability to shape-shift, 31
though they cannot rid themselves
of the corpse-reek that clings to
their flesh, then can take on more
appealing forms to deceive men and
lure them to their deaths.
✦ Ghouls possess sizeable claws
which mean they use to dig through
earth, burrowing out their own
subterranean tunnels.
✦ Used to sneaking around, the ghouls
are skilled at avoiding detection.
✦ They are incredibly strong, with
powerful jaws and wickedly sharp
teeth that make short work of the
cadavers they feed off.
✦ Ghouls tend to live in doglike packs,
ruled by their hungers.
✦ According to folklore, the only way to
kill a ghoul is with one blow; a second
or more will only resurrect it from the
dead. The most common method used
for killing these creatures is decapitation.
✦ Ghouls are susceptible to fire, though
it demands incredibly ferocious
blazes to reduce the ghoul to ashes.
Anything less, and the ghoul will
almost certainly regenerate.
 ✦ The most powerful ghouls possess ✦ When a ghoul consumes the heart
the ability absorb the memories of and brain of a person, it can, for a
the dead by consuming the organs short time, assume both the physical
responsible for processing the senses. appearance of the departed, and
 
Ghoul typical stats
Ghouls are so near to humans that they can display very different
ranges of traits, skills and health points. The following stats represent
only a typical “dexterous” Ghoul. Some of them can shape-shift into
specific individuals for short time periods (see “Feeding from the life
of others”, below) and therefore they can also have the same levels
in Power Spheres of their victims. These are not given in the stats
below, so that the GM can adapt the stats to any social setting.
Traits: Dexterity +2, Constitution +2
Physical Health Points: 28-36
Physical Damage levels (for 34 PHP): 1-11 (0) / 12-19 (-1)
/ 20-24 (-3) / 25-29 (-5) / 30-34 (-7)
Mental Health Points: 40-100.
Mental Damage levels (for 65 PHP): 1-21 (0) / 22-38 (-1) /
39-52 (-3) / 53-61 (-5) / 62-65 (-7)
Movement: walking or climbing 2 CP per 1 m (Max 14 m).
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 9-10), 1d10 (OR 8-10) while feeding.
Skills: Agility SV 10: Body Control 2 (Evade 3, Parkour 3)
32 Fighting SV 10: Close-Combat Weapons 1 (2H Weapons
3), Unarmed Fighting 4 (Claws 5, Wrestling 5).
Profession SV 7: Hunting & Fishing 3 (Hunting 3,
Tracking 3)
Stealth SV 10: Avoidance 1 (Hiding & Camouflage 4,
Sneaking 4), Detection 3.
Natural Weapons: Bite (Dmg 1d10 OR 9-10) see below for
limitations, Claws (Dmg 1d10 OR 10 +2 Constitution).
Initiative: +2 Dexterity
Combat points: Free 10 / Close Combat 1 (2H Weapons 6)
/ Unarmed Combat 4 (Claws 10, Wrestling 10) / Evade 18.
Equipment: They rarely use weapons, preferring their claws.
However, some Ghouls like using a Decent Spear (IM -4, WA 3,
OM 0, BP 10, dmg 1d10 (OR 9-10) +2 Constitution).
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM +2) Claws SV 14, SV 10.
✦ (IM +2) Wrestling SV 12 + Automatic Bite.
✦ (IM -2) Spear SV 17.
✦ (IM +2) Evade SV 18 or two Evade attempts SV 10 and SV 8.
Common Properties
Eternal Hunger
The Ghoul must continuously feed from blood and flesh, it
does not matter whether it is fresh or rotten, otherwise it will
die. Every half lunar month the Ghoul must feed off a quantity
of meat and blood which is roughly equal to ½ of its weight,
access their memories, making it a
cunning adversary. This means they
can blend into society without being
discovered.
although quite often they consume more than that. If the New
Moon or Full Moon (whatever comes first) arrives and the Ghoul
has not consumed enough food, it will lose ½ (rounded down) of
its maximum PHP. If, after a full lunar moon the Ghoul has not
consumed enough food, it will die of starvation and therefore the
“Ghoul Resurrection” ability (see below) will not work.
In any case the points lost with starvation can be healed only
with feeding. If exact regeneration ratings are needed, see “Ghoul’s
Bite” below, for a guidance of how much each bite regenerates.
Ghoul’s Bite
The body of a Ghoul has the same proportions of human beings’
bodies. This means that the only way to bite is to be in a grapple
with the victim. Every time the Ghoul wins a Grapple it can
automatically bite. If the Ghoul was wounded, the taste of blood
automatically heals it ½ (rounded down) of the damage inflicted
to the victim, with a minimum of 1 point. However, this taste also
triggers the “Insatiable” ability (see below), which means that in
the following rounds the Ghoul will try to keep on winning the
Grapple to inflict the Bite and feeds from its victim.
Ghoul’s Claws
The claws of these creatures are large and hard, and Ghouls use
them even to dig tunnels in the soil. A whole range of odd bacteria
grows under these claws, therefore anyone who has been wounded
by them (and somehow survives!) must make a situation roll with
SV 10 modified by Health in order to avoid to become sick and
suffer 1d10 PHP 12 hours after the wound happened.
Imperturbable
Ghouls have mental damage levels, but they rarely suffer any
damage to them. They are so used to death, carnage, darkness
and terrible visions that they can ignore most Fear Factors.
The MHP are here given only to allow the GM inflicting
mental damage to Ghouls only in exceptional cases.
Insatiable
If a Ghoul starts tasting blood or flesh (whether from alive or
dead victims, fresh or partly decomposed), it cannot help but
keep on feeding from it. It can only avoid doing so if it succeeds
a Situation Roll with an SV of 7, modified by the Ghoul’s Psyche
trait (if present) and, of course, by any modifier from damage
levels, if the Ghoul is wounded. The situation roll automatically
succeeds if the Ghoul is physically attacked.
Furthermore, any human being who is watching a Ghoul
while feeding will suffer its Fear Factor, or suffer it again, if it
has already suffered it.
Night Creature
The Ghoul can see in the dark as if it were day. On the other
hand, the sun bothers them to the point that its light is painful
for these creatures. Ghouls suffer a modifier of -3 to all their
rolls made under the light of the sun. The GM may reduce this
penalty to -1 for rolls made during the day inside a building.
Ghoul Resurrection
A killed Ghoul will be resurrect again as a Ghoul during the next
New Moon or Full Moon, unless it has been killed by starvation,
fire or by a single blow, preferably a decapitation, although also
other forms of damage which reduce the Ghoul to 0 PHP with
one single blow are also acceptable. In this sense the new “Hitting
the Weak Spot” rules (see page XXXX) can be used.
The Reek of Putrefaction
Ghouls are always surrounded by the reek of the corpses they
feed from. It is up to the GM to establish how strong this is. It
may be just a faint sensation (in the case of Ghouls shape shifted
as normal humans), of it could be an unbearable stench, especially
if Ghouls are finding while they are feeding from rotten corpses.
In this latter case, those who are in the area must make a
Situation Roll with a SV of 8 modified by Psyche modifier, or
they will start vomiting and feeling bad (-1 to all skill rolls
for 1d6 hours).
Shape-shift
Ghouls can magically change their aspect to look like normal
humans, often choosing more appealing forms, although usually
Ghouls cannot shape-shift into specific individuals. Their illusions
can hide their claws (which magically retract inside their fingers)
and fangs. They are however not able to completely mask the
corpse stench that they emanate. Younger and less expert Ghouls
are easier to identify in this way due to their stronger stench, while
more powerful or expert ones (with a successful Stealth skill roll
with the Hiding & Camouflage specialty) are able to somehow
diminish the reek, or at least to diffuse it in the ambient, masking
the reality that they are the source of the stench. In any case,
quite often the something of this stench remains even if as a faint
sensation, hidden beneath perfumes and oils.
Vulnerable to Fire
All damage dealt by fire to a Ghoul is multiplied x 2 (after all
open rolls and modifiers are added).
Optional Properties
Charming Eyes
Some Ghouls are masters of shape-shifting abilities and they
turn into highly sexually attractive human beings. More than
one man has fallen under the fangs of a girl too beautiful to resist.
There is something unnatural in the eyes of these ghouls. If the
Ghoul stares in the eyes of a victim without doing anything else
but flirting, the victim must make a situation roll with a SV of
8, modified by the Psyche modifier. If this is failed, the victim
will follow the Ghoul and do as it says for 1d10 rounds. They
are usually led into a dark place, automatically grappled (in what
they believe to be a sexual intercourse) and automatically suffer
the “Ghoul’s Bite” (see above) every round. The victim may not
notice that it is been eaten alive by the Ghoul until it is too late.
Feeding from the life of others
Some Ghouls can shapeshift into specific human beings if
they consume the heart and brain of that specific individual.
However, this capacity is short-lived, since they retain the
ability of taking that specific shape only until the next New
Moon or Full Moon, whatever comes first. These creatures
also have access to the memories of these victims and, if they
consume also other specific organs, like eyes, the ears or the
nose, they can have very specific sensorial memories.
Paralyzing Touch
Some Ghouls have the ability of poisoning human’s blood
with their claws. Anyone who has suffered a wound from the
Ghoul’s claws must make a Situation roll with a SV of 10,
modified by the victim’s Health modifier. If failed, the victim
is paralyzed for 1d10 rounds. The Ghoul’s attacks against the
paralyzed victim automatically succeed. The Ghoul usually
use the Bite to feed upon these victims.
33
Unbearable Stench
The stench of this Ghoul is so terrible that anyone who is in
its presence must always do the situation roll (described in
“the Reek of Putrefaction”) every round, even if the Ghoul
is not feeding. This Ghoul cannot use the “Shape-shift” or
similar abilities since its stench cannot be hidden in any case.
Ghoul Variations
Bestial Ghoul
These wild Ghouls are larger than normal ones, at least one
time and half bulkier than a normal man, if not twice. They
are more animalesque in appearances than normal Ghouls,
their faces have more canine features and some of them even
have dog-like legs. These beasts lack the ability to Shape-
Shift but have the following, powered-up stats. Constitution
+4, Bite (Dmg 1d10 OR 8-10), Claws (Dmg 1d10 OR 9-10
+4 Constitution), PHP 36-50. Physical Damage levels (for 42
PHP): 1-14 (0) / 15-24 (-1) / 25-32 (-3) / 33-37 (-5) / 38-42
(-7). A few of the most terrible of these creatures also have the
Paralysis and Unbearable Stench Properties.
Charming Ghoul
These dangerous beauties have the “Charming Eyes” ability,
sometimes with the “Feeding from the life of others” power
which they use to infiltrate a house to prey on people whose
 spouse have been previous victims of the Ghoul. These
Ghouls tend to be less “bestial” than normal Ghouls and their
reek is less pronounced.
Ghoul-related Secret Arts
Ghouls suffer from the Spiked cross of Huet (Lex Libris
p.233-234) as if they were vampires.
Ward against the Ghoul
New Dark Art, Right-Hand Path
This ancient ritual was created by wise men of the Middle East
long time ago. Its knowledge is very rare in Europe, although
the sorcerers and alchemists of North Africa and Near East
may have used variations of this ritual for centuries as a
protection against Ghouls. The most famous formula aims to
create an enchanted tea whose main characteristics come not
from its ingredients but from the spells laid on it. Many have
tried to replicate it, but without the proper formulas nothing
can be obtained. The formula is supposed to have been first
created by the legendary Iranian alchemist Jabir in Hayyan
(8th century AD) also known as “Geber” in the west. However,
this formula does not appear in any of the books presumably
written by Geber circulating among European secret societies,
while many versions of this formula appear in scrolls written in
34 both Arabic and Persian languages, circulating among eastern
alchemists. One needs to learn it from either these oriental
masters or reading it from those rare scrolls.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -7
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 7
✦ Discipline: The Right-hand Path level 2
✦ Specialty: White Magic level 2
Other Requirements
✦ Supernatural Beings Discipline level 1, Beastiology level 1
✦ Science SV 3, Transmutation Discipline level 1, Alchemy
Specialty level 1
✦ Communication SV 7, Languages Discipline level 1, Native
or Foreign language: Arabic or Persian level 1
Material Requirements
✦ A small quantity of grass leaves or roots from plants
growing in a cemetery or above a man’s grave.
✦ Teapot, tea leaves, water. No sugar or milk.
Effect
A special tea is made at the end of an hour-long ritual. This
tea keeps its properties for an hour. All those who drink from
it gain the following abilities until the next New Moon or Full
Moon (whatever comes first).
Ability to automatically see through the Ghoul’s illusions
(“Shape-Shift” and “Feeding from the Life of Others”).
Immunity to the Ghoul’s infection (as in “Ghoul’s claws”),
“Charming Eyes”, “Paralyzing Touch” and any ill effect
from the stench of the creature or of its gruesome food
(the character notices the presence of the reek, but it is not
affected by it).
Inhaling the Ghoul’s Breath
New Dark Art, Left-Hand Path
Nobody knows who firstly created this tainted ritual, but
some occultists believe it was firstly performed by heathen
sorcerers in the dark temples of Babylon. The version which
is nowadays learned among middle eastern sorcerers is in
Arabic, but legends spread among few occultists murmur
about more powerful versions, now lost, which were spelled in
one of the many forgotten languages of ancient Mesopotamia.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -8
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 9
✦ Discipline: The Left-hand Path level 3
✦ Specialty: Black Magic level 3
Other Requirements
✦ Supernatural Beings Discipline level 3, Beastiology level 3
✦ Communication SV 7, Languages Discipline level 1, Native
or Foreign language: Arabic level 3
Material Requirements
✦ Incense and censer.
✦ A few ashes from the burnt body of a Ghoul.
Effect
At the end of a six-hour long ritual a censer is started. The
sorcerer (and only him) breathes the incense mixed with
the Ghoul ashes, which will grant him the following Ghoul
properties: Shape-Shift, Feed from the Life of Others. These
abilities will be retained until the next New Moon or Full
Moon (whatever comes first).
This spell is also incredibly risky for the sorcerer since
it may trigger a curse. If the Esotericism skill roll is failed
the above-mentioned properties will not be gained, but
the sorcerer will suffer the effects of the Ghoul’s “Eternal
Hunger” and “Insatiable” properties for 1d6 lunar months
(each of 28 days) without the “Imperturbable” property to
protect its mental sanity. Every time that he will feed from
rotten or human flesh, he must make a Situation Roll of SV 8
(modified by Psyche) or suffer a loss of MHP equal to 1d10
(OR 10). If he ever reaches the “Insanabilis” mental health
level while under this curse, the sorcerer will permanently
become a full Ghoul.
 The Djinn
T he sun beat down upon the colourful stalls and
tents of the marketplace. It was a city unlike
any other. Vendors hawked their wares, their
voices demanding and shrill. I ducked in and
out of stalls, following my guide. Grubby little street urchins
wove between legs, laughing as they chased through the
crowds. Even unfinished the Grand Bazaar was a sight
to behold. I couldn’t think of its like anywhere in the world.
I bought a weight of figs from a surly rat-faced vendor,
paying with a coin stamped Islambol, 1703. They tasted
like the nectar of the gods as I chewed and swallowed them
down.
It was a city with many names. Miklagarðr, Kustantiniyyah, Kayser-i
Zemin, Rūmiyyat al-kubra, Bolis, Takht-e Rum, Kushtandina Rabati,
and more common ones to our Western ear, Constantinople, Byzantium,
and for every name it owned the city presented a different face to its
visitors.
Even after my short time here, I understand that it truly was a city of
wonders. What surprised me was how willingly it offered those wonders
up to explorers.
I had been in town for three days, the first of which was lost in an
35
opiate haze after Baris, my young guide, mistook my request for a
lodging house and took me into the heart of the city, to an archway
which swam with the heady aromas of opium. I was greeted by a woman
of rare beauty, who guided me under the arch to a room of cushions,
soft fabrics and swags of curtain which partitioned this peculiar den
and offered the illusion of privacy. She led me to a bed where an opium
pipe and the fixings of a narcotic haze waited for my coin. I lounged
amid the swags of silk, breathing deeply on the essence of life.
In the depths of that haze I heard whispers.
I couldn’t trust my mind.
My senses swam, my thoughts chasing down the byways of my mind,
leaving me doubting the lines between what was real and what was
fantasy.
The whispers buzzed like angry flies always in my ears, incessant,
irresistible.
They were talking of a creature of sand and smoke, woken by the
spilling of blood. The man on the mattress beside me, a traveller from
London out to find himself, leaned over and whispered conspiratorially
of a murder just this last week and how he believed someone out there
was seeking to unleash a powerful Shaitan. “And what, pray tell is
that?” I asked.
The fellow looked at me askance, hardly able to credit that I could
be so unenlightened as to not know the name of this devil he spoke of,
then smiled a smile of low cunning. His voice dropping to no more than
a whisper he said, “One of their kind… An Afarit. A death spirit of
 the Underworld,” he looked me dead in the eye, as though daring me
to laugh. Or measuring me as a man. I had seen more things on my
travels than would ever allow me to mock the old ways. I felt sick to my
stomach. “They are the first children.”
“I’m not following.”
“Then use your ears. It is the story of creation. In the beginning,
Allah conjured the Afarit from smokeless fire millennia before he
created mankind. They were his first children. If we think of creation as
something lasting a week, he made the angels on a Wednesday, the Afarit
on a Thursday and humanity on a Friday.” I nodded, like such a conceit
made sense. I had never accepted the notion that some divine being simply
exclaimed let there be light and there was light. That denied the sciences
I held so dear, but I wasn’t about to fall into that old argument. “But like
all children they became prideful and believed themselves more than their
father. That was their greatest sin. There was a great war in the heavens,
with the angels killing all but a few of the Afarit, the survivors were
banished to the flames of the inferno, and the maker created you from the
clay of the earth in their place.” I should have caught the implication of
that pronoun, but my mind was adrift, floating, free forming. “If it helps,
think of them in terms of elements, we are fire, you are earth, the angels
air.” I wondered then what children of these deities would have been born
from the last element, water? “Few of your kind can see or interact with
these sly and malicious demons, my friend, but some few possess the gift.
Or curse. The Shaitan are the worst of them. They walk the streets of the
city, unseen, causing sickness and disease, strife and hardship. They are
demons of irredeemable evil, capable of possessing your flesh and driving
36 you to madness with their waswas.”
Again, I had to admit that I did not understand.
“The whisperings of the mind,” the traveller explained. “Voices. The
children of this city grow up with waswa stories, old wives’ tales If you
like… promising that there are things that move unseen through this
world, malicious things.”
“Waswas?”
“Indeed. Waswas. These Shaitan are base creatures. They feed off
pain and suffering, fermenting misery amongst the living. And like this
place, come in many forms, these Afarit, and answer to many names:
Ifrit, marid, ghoul, hinn, jann, sila, palis, quareen, vetala. Not all are
evil. Some would even try and help you fight.”
Some of those names I recognized; Vetala could possess the corpses
of the dead, preventing from decaying, so that the demons could move
through our world without being recognized for what they were, a
form of psychic parasite. Palis were akin to our vampire of legend,
a sand dweller who drained its victims of blood, though unlike the
iconography of our legends who were always presented as charismatic
and cunning, the Palis were simple bloodsuckers, more like leaches to
my mind, sucking the blood out through the soles their victim’s feet,
rather than drawing on any sort of sophisticated seduction. And Jann
were said to be guardians of the desert oasis, hiding them or revealing
them to the weary traveller as their capricious whim dictated. Like the
Hinn they were shapeshifters, though they tended to take the form
of whirlwinds and desert storms where the Hinn took the shape of
animals, more often than not dogs. And the Marid were known to
grant wishes, though these always came at a steep price. Never has the
adage be careful what you wish for been truer than in the presence
of a marid.
“And you believe someone is trying to release a Shaitan in Islambol?”
I asked, drawing deeply on the tongue of my opium pipe and savouring
the heady hit of the narcotic.
“There is a man here, a dark magician, working in the bazaar, who
seeks to bind an Afarit to a sigil that he has inked into his skin.”
“How can you be sure?” I asked, but as I exhaled, I swear the damned
man drifted away on the smoke as it peeled away from my lips and
rafted up over my face and I was alone, reclining on my mattress in the
fog of opium.
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Djinn
Unique Characters
There are five types of Djinn, four of
which consider themselves as parts of a
tribe, each with their own unique traits
and personalities and offering their own
distinct playing styles as NPCs.
Sílā
Sílā, shapeshifters, predominantly
female. They are the rarest of the
creatures, capable of manipulating the
mind with powerful illusions which
makes them skilled manipulators and
tricksters. They are treacherous spirits,
and by far the most cunning of the djinn.
Ghūl
Ghūl, shapeshifters, also predominantly
female in nature, these Djinn are
believed to be the offspring of Iblis,
who in other tongues is called Saytān.
They stalk the deserts, trying to
lure travellers from the safety of the
established tracks, and will kill and
consume their victims, though never
stray far from an oasis or source of
water, which according to the Hadith
(the teachings of the last messenger of
God, the Prophet Muhammad) is their
lone link to the Throne of Iblis, which
is submerged.
Ifrit
Ifrit, is the most rebellious of the
djinn, capable of great kindness and
unfathomable evil. The Djinn dwells in
the dark places underground, often in
ruins and abandoned structures. Unlike
the Sílā who crave solitude, the Ifrit is a
tribal creature and often hunts in clans.
It is the most magically potent of the
tribes of Djinn, and though its true form
is smoke can manifest in something
resembling human form though with
enormous wings of fine swirling smoke
sprouting from between the shoulder
blades. They are creatures of the wind
rather than fire, and may appear in
particularly violent sandstorms.
Mārid
Mārid, The most powerful of the tribes,
and the most arrogant and proud. They
are creatures of the water, choosing
to dwell in the open waters and great
oceans, and can manifest in the form
of giant tsunami that come crashing
ashore. They are also the root of the
three wishes myth, though to truly
gain such a favour a player must defeat
the Mārid in mortal combat, though
some believe the vanity of the Mārid
will make it susceptible to flattery.
Qareen
There is one form of Djinn that does
not belong to any such tribe, and that
is the Qareen, which is perhaps the
most interesting of the monsters to
play as they are believed to be part
human, and attach themselves to hosts
as companions and friends whilst
whispering in their ears and feeding off
them. The Qareen-host relationship is
a parasitic one. The Qareen will often
force the host to perpetrate some of the
most evil and heinous acts imaginable.
Appearance
The Djinn are sometimes known as
the hidden ones. Some are marked with
what appear to be tribal tattoos on their
skin. No one knows their true form, as
it is invisible to the naked eye, but they
can manifest in a number of ways.
First Impressions
Most often the Djinn will manifest in
the form of swirling smoke or a dust
storm. A dust devil swirling across the
desert floor. A curl of smoke rising from
a long dead fire. A face in the breakers
as the tide rushes ashore. Slowly these
may manifest into a figure, perhaps 37
with smoky wings trailing behind them,
perhaps with bluish tribal tattoos inked
onto their skin, it all depends which
tribe they come from. They may be fat
and jovial like the Mārid, or dangerously
seductive like the Sílā.
What do the Players Know?
According to the Qu’ran the gather
of all Djinn was created from a fire of
scorching wind and from a smokeless
flame of fire. They are elemental
creatures, so are bonded to earth, air,
fire and water in their powers and the
threats they pose. It is believed that
they can place their ‘mark’ upon a
person, and once marked that person
is susceptible to the illusions and
delusions of the Djinn no matter how
far they are from the creature.
Main Features
✦ Some of the Djinn possess foresight,
and are able to glimpse some of the
many possible futures.
 ✦ They are incredibly long lived
beings, with some claiming a
lifespan up to 8,000 years, though
they are not immortal.
✦ They possess the bodily needs of
human beings and can be killed.
✦ Certain Djinn are susceptible to
magic, which can be used to capture
and enslave them.
✦ As elemental spirits Djinn are
capable of conjuring great storms,
causing rivers to surge and with
the snap of their fingers, fire. It
also means they can shapeshift
into forms of their respective
elements, be that a flickering flame,
a churning dust devils chasing
across a desert plane, wisp of
smoke curling up from a fire pit
and so forth.
✦ Their powers are not proportional
to their body size — a Djinn can will
itself to enormous size or down to
the size of a mouse without losing
any of its supernatural strength.
✦ Whilst there is a believe Djinn can
grant wishes this is not true, but
they can make you believe your
desires have been fulfilled with their
manipulative illusions and delusions,
though these never last.
✦ A Djinn can use their magic to put
someone into a deep trance-like state
where they can be forced to live and
relive any memory, true or false, over
and over until they are somehow
brought back to reality. This trance
state can be fatal for the weak-minded.
✦ More powerful Djinn have the gift
of telepathy, which they use to
read peoples’ minds and convince
them they are in fact living their
heart’s desires where in reality it is
nothing more than a delusion. It is
through this gift they are capable
of making it seem as though reality
warps around a player. It is an
incredibly potent power and should
only be used with great care.
✦ Certain Djinn can possess a corpse
and prevent it from decaying,
allowing them to move around
the human world virtually
undetectable.
✦ Djinn have heightened senses
and are capable of moving with
incredible speed and agility.
✦ They feed on human blood,
drawing power and sustenance
from their victims.

 
Djinn typical stats
38 The following stats represent ”standard” Djinn (if such things
exist!). The properties should be used as a basic to be modified
in order to personalize the Djinn according to its type, tribe or
individual characteristics. The suggested ”natural weapon” is a
”Elemental Attacks” is a generic term for whatever is appropriate
to the Djinn’ type: a burst of flame, a first of sand and winds, etc.
Traits: Charisma +4, Intelligence +4
Physical Health Points: 30-150
Physical Damage levels (for 70 PHP): 1-23 (0) / 24-40 (-1)
/ 41-54 (-3) / 55-62 (-5) / 63-70 (-7)
Mental Health Points: None.
Movement: walking, climbing, flying, levitating, swimming,
etc.. 2 CP per 5 m (Max 50 m).
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 8-10).
Skills: Agility SV 10: Body Control 3 (Evade 3).
Stealth SV 10: Detection 3 (Detect Hidden 3,
Observation 3).
Natural Weapons: Elemental Attack (Dmg 1d10 OR 8-10)
Natural Protection: Elemental Aura 6
Initiative: +4
Combat points: Free 20 / Elemental Attack 10 / Evade 18.
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM +4) Elemental Attack SV 15, SV 15.
✦ (IM +4) Evade SV 19 or two Evade attempts SV 10 and
SV 9.
Common Properties
Elemental Body
Since they are made of pure elements, Djinns are mortals
but their lives can spanning through the millennia, being
immune to diseases and poisons. They can be harmed
with weapons (if the Djinn are visible) but the “Natural
Protection” in their stats should always work unless the
Djinn is attacked by enchanted or blessed weapons.
The ”Agility” skills is given above only for Evade
attempts, but otherwise they should be able to automatically
succeed any Agility skill roll. They can move through
elements at will with all kinds of movement: flying,
walking, swimming, etc.
Elemental Mind
Even if Djinn have feelings and passions, their minds are not
mortal, therefore their psyche cannot be harmed in any way.
They act in consequence of terror and fear, but they are not
subject to the mind-altering effects of these feelings, therefore
they do not have Mental Health Points.
Elemental Nature
Most Djinn appear in humanoid shape, but they also know
how to shift into purer “elemental manifestations” like
flames, dust devils, wisps of smoke, etc. The Djinns can
also summon great storms, divert rivers and perform other
“elemental evocations”. The nature and dimensions of
these evocations vary a lot. The GM is therefore, as usual,
the final arbiter about possible consequences, in terms of
mechanics.
Elemental Senses
Djinn can see in the dark, as well as in the densest sandstorm.
No natural phenomenon can hinder their sight, except
distance.
Feeding off Humans
Many Djinn like to feed on human blood, in order to be
nourished or to heal their wounds. A victim is either
blocked with the ”Trance Attack” or made believe that
they are bracing a beautiful lover created by the ”Illusive
Desires” power. If the victim is blocked, the Djinn can
automatically to suck 1d10 (OR 10) PHP of blood through
mystical means or even by a real bite. If it was wounded,
the Djinn heals about half (rounded down) the amount of
”sucked” PHP.
Illusive Desires
Djinn are masters of manipulations and illusions, projecting
false images into their victims’ minds luring them to their
doom or making it believe that all dreams are fulfilled.
This requires a calm situation, with the Djinn slowly
speaking to the victim (either face-to-face or as whispers
in the ear brought by the wind) and it is definitively not
something which can be done in combat. The victim must
make a Situation roll with a SV of 10 minus the Djinn’s
Charisma which is usually +4, to a total SV of 6. This SV
can also be modified by the victim’s Psyche trait. At GM’s
judgement people with strong faith can take a +1 to +4
bonus to their SV.
If the roll is failed, the victims believe any illusion which
the Djinn plants in their mind, including false sensory inputs.
However, sooner or later these illusions disappear, especially
since Djinn are not gods and therefore they cannot modify
the reality.
Invisibility
Djinn can become invisible at will. No mortal can see them
when they are invisible, unless they can use sorcery or
other supernatural mean. In any case, unless the GM rule
otherwise, all Djinn need some kind of physical manifestation
to affect mortals. It may be an almost-silent whisper in the
ear, a gentle wind or a tornado of fire, it does not matter.
They cannot harm or speak to mortals remaining completely
invisible.
Trance Attack
A visible Djinn doing nothing else in an action round but
focusing can perform a mental attack. To resist a Situation
Roll is needed with a SV equal to 10 modified by the Psyche
trait. A failure means that the victim’s mind is blocked into
a memory or a Djinn-created illusion for 1d6 action rounds,
including the round when the attack is performed. When in
this trance-like status the victim cannot do anything else
and will also suffer 1d10 (OR 10) Mental Health Points
per round.
A Djinn can use this attack even against multiple enemies,
up to a maximum number of victims equal to its Charisma
trait (usually +4). However the basic SV to resist the power
is augmented by +2 per additional target beyond the first:
SV 12 for 2 targets, SV 14 for 3 targets, SV 16 for 4 targets.
At GM’s judgement people with strong faith can take a +1
to +4 bonus to their SV.
Variable Size
Djinns can change at will their size, from minimal to colossal,
without any change in stats.
Optional Properties
Elemental Link
Some Djinn are strongly linked to something which they
cannot avoid or cannot live for too long too far from an
abundance of a specific element in environments where this
element is rare. Exemplary are the desert-roaming Ghūls
which are tied to oases as their link to the Throne of Iblis/
Shaytan.
39
Feeding off human hearts.
Some Djinn do not feed off human blood but on human
fear, terror and other strong human negative emotions.
Every time somebody suffers a diminution of MHP
nearby the Djinn, it will heal an amount equal to half of
the mental damage, rounded down. The Qareen have this
power but use it also to feed from the corruption which
they spread to their victims while these are convinced to
do evil acts.
Foresight
A few powerful Djinn know how to predict some of the
possible futures which lie in front of them. They will never
fall into ambushes or other tricks, unless more powerful
entities intervene. The GM may also give a +2 bonus to skill
rolls where knowing the possible fates is important or -2 to
skill rolls made to cheat the Djinn.
Possess the Corpse
Some Djinn can possess corpses, blocking their decay,
and therefore acting as they were normal humans or
even taking the identity of the dead (unless the excessive
decomposition denies this possibility). In this shape the
Djinn uses the Physical Health Points of the corpse (to be
decided by the GM. A normal 32 PHP with Health Levels
as in Lex Libris p.25 is common) but the negative modifiers
from losing Physical Health Levels apply only to physical
 actions performed with the body. The Djinn does not suffer
any diminution of its own PHP, unless the body’s PHP
are reduced to 0, forcing the Djinn to exit the body and
manifest itself.
While possessing a body a Djinn cannot use Djinn-
body-related powers like the elemental attack (see ”natural
weapons” in the stats above), Elemental Nature, Invisibility
and Variable Sizes. The Elemental Body should work only
regarding the Djinn and not the corpse, although some
Djinn retain the ability to fly even when possessing a corpse.
Finally the natural protection does not cover the possessed
body. On the other hand, Elemental Senses and mind-related
powers still work.
Read the Mind
Some powerful Djinn knows how to read a human mind, to
help them conceiving better illusions. This means that the
”Illusive Desires” SV is diminished to a basic SV 7 which,
factoring the common Charisma +4 of most Djinn, means that
the basic SV is only 3 to be modified by the victim’s Psyche.
At GM’s judgement people with strong faith can take a +1 to
+4 bonus to their SV.
Shape-shift
Some Djinn can change their bodies into other forms,
usually those which are useful for luring humans and
40 provoking their desires. It is impossible to just identify the
Djinn through normal means, unless there is some Divine
intervention.
Tumultuous Nature
Due to their link to violent elemental forces, some Djinns
cannot help but fall when tempted with certain traits
of their character like arrogance, wrath, vanity, etc.…
When tempted in the specific way these Djinn must roll
a Situation Roll with a SV of 7 to avoid falling into the
selected feeling.
Djinn Variations
Sílā
These manipulating female Djinn usually have Charisma +6,
which means that the basic SV of ”Illusive Desires” is 4. They
also have the Shape-shift power.
Ghūl
The predominantly female Djinn have the ”Elemental Link”
property linked to a source of water and also the ”Shape-shift”
property.
Ifrit
These evil Djinn have an ”Elemental Link” to underground,
dark places and ruins. They tend to have more violent
versions of the Djinn elemental powers. Their ”Elemental
Attack” (see Natural Attacks in the stats above) deal 2d10
(OR 8-10). Many Ifrit have a ”Tumultuous Nature” linked
with Wrath.
Marid
These powerful Djinn are stronger than others. A typical
example has 120 PHP and the following PH levels: 1-40 (0)
/ 41-70 (-1) / 41-94 (-3) / 95-110 (-5) / 111-120 (-7). Their
”Elemental Attack” (see Natural Attacks in the stats above)
deal 2d10 (OR 8-10). Their ”Tumultuous Nature is linked
with Vanity.
Qareen
These Djinn have the ”Feeding off Human Hearts”
property rather than ”Feeding off Humans”. They tend to
use the ”Illusive Desires” property while being invisible,
whispering into their victims’ ears, to convice them
performing evil acts.
Djinn-related Secrets Arts
Djinn suffer the damage dealt by exorcism (Lex Libris p.234)
even if they are not possessing a body. According to the
Middle Eastern tradition King Solomon had power over the
Djinn and therefore its sign, equivalent to a six-pointed star
like the Star of David, is used in spells against the Djinn. These
are mostly Dark Arts, although the mighty King Solomon
possibly used way more powerful, but nowadays lost, Divine
Arts against the Djinn.
Suleiman’s Ward
New Dark Art, Right-Hand Path
Middle-easterner sorcerers know how to protect an area from
Djinn’s influence by inscribing the Sign of King Solomon on
a wall.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -7
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 7
✦ Discipline: The Right-hand Path level 2
✦ Specialty: White Magic level 3
Material Requirements
Something to write or scratch the symbol.
✦
Effect
If the symbol is properly inscribed on a wall or piece of
architecture, a Djinn cannot enter the area and, if present, it
must leave it immediately, in order not to suffer 1d10 (OR 10)
PHP per round. If inscribed on a corpse’ forehead, it cannot
be possessed by a Djinn.
A Djinn’s prison
New Dark Art, Right-Hand Path
This incredibly difficult art, mastered only by a few Middle-
Eastern sorcerers, allow to imprison the Djinn into a small
object, by inscribing the Symbol of Suleiman on it. Lamps are
a common choice, due to the popularity of the Aladdin’ story
in the One Thousands and One Nights.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -13 or -17
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 10
✦ Discipline: The Right-hand Path level 4
✦ Specialty: White Magic level 3
Other Requirements
✦ Supernatural Beings Discipline level 2, Beastiology level 3
Material Requirements
A small object, like a ring or a vessel (usually a lamp).
✦ like the “Illusive Desires” and “Trance Attack” properties.
Effect
This spell can be done in two levels: lesser (difficulty -13)
and greater (-17).
If the Esotericism roll fails, the nearest Djinn present in
the area (if present at all) will notice the sorcerer’s attempt
and it may even seek revenge. If the Esotericism roll is
successful, the same Djinn will be evoked and locked into
the object. The one who holds the object can force the
Djinn to obey to his wishes. The difference between the
two levels is as follows
✦ Djinn subdued by the lesser version of the spell will
serve the sorcerer until three wishes are fulfilled to the
same object-holder or the object is broken.
✦ Djinn subdued by the greater version can be freed only by
breaking the object or by greater sorcery. Djinn who are
freed from the greater version are usually way more hostile
against the sorcerer who bound them.
It is worth noting that, whatever the level of the spell,
Djinn are not gods, and they will always try to trick their
masters with their illusions. However, the object holder
has a bonus of +10 to the SV for resisting Djinn’ illusions,
It is worth noting that for the “three wishes” versions
only believed illusions count as fulfilled wishes.
41
42
 Ghosts
T he woman led me by the hand up a narrow flight
of stairs to the room above her small Viennese
coffee house. The aromas of the day’s roast were
as heady as anything I had experienced in the
opium dens of Islambol, the black drink every bit as potent
with its effects on the heart. Frau Medik’s skirts whispered
around her ankles. The stairs creaked and groaned beneath
our weight. She was a fine-looking woman, though sadly
cursed with an affliction that robbed her of eyebrows and
caused her hair to thin prematurely. The effect on her
appearance was peculiar as one is not used to looking at a
face, even a pretty one, without that simple line of hair. It is
most disconcerting.
The other members of her society were already at the table, waiting
without the murmur of small talk. I was the last to arrive. The man,
Otto, called himself a spirit medium and claimed the gift. I had heard
talk of it in a few of the more cosmopolitan cities of Europe during my
travels, someone claiming the ability to channel the dead and allowing
loved ones to talk through them one last time. I was, I admit, sceptical of
such. Everyone in the small chamber had lost someone and was looking
for some sort of comfort. Aside from the spirit medium, I was the only
43
man in the room, which set off another small shiver of doubt. It all just
seemed too open to charlatans and trickery for it to be real. I imagined
there could be nothing more comforting than the familiar scent of a
loved one’s tobacco pipe smoke or the turn of a familiar phrase, even
from a strange mouth, but what happened in this room changed my
mind forever.
As Frau Medik showed me to my seat at the table, I took a moment
to look around the room. There were five of us, including me, a younger
woman, heavily pregnant with, I assumed her dead husband’s child.
There was a tragedy to her presence that did not bear dwelling over.
There was another widow, older this time, perhaps of an age with me,
though the lines of her face told me that she had worn this life hard.
Beside her, a dowager closer to the other side than this one, while Frau
Medik herself took up the last seat at the table. Without words, the
women joined hands. The light, such that it was, offered little in to
reveal the geography of shadows in the room, with only a few candles
burning, and two of those already close to the stub.
Otto lowered his head, then looked up again, meeting my curious
stare. He smiled warmly. “The spirits are agitated tonight,” he said,
looking at me. I assumed it was all part of the act. Make no promises,
but rather offer a warning that things may not proceed as the gathered
women hoped. It was an easy excuse, laying the blame at the capricious
dead rather than at his own failings as a translator. Again, he smiled
knowingly my way, as though as the only other man present he was
letting me in on the joke. Still looking at me, he asked, “Perhaps you
 would like to check behind the curtains and beneath the table to prove
I have not set up any tricks to fool you?”
Who was I to argue? So, for the next minute or so I went through the
room looking for hidden wires that might stir the fabrics, sniffed out the
coals of the fire for any oils that might cause the flames to surge and
other little tricks I could think of. I wasn’t disappointed to find that none
of the trappings of trickery I suspected were in place. Satisfied, I took my
seat again, much to the approval of the women who seemed to take my
failure to find any hidden mechanisms as proof positive they were about
to talk to their lonely dead.
Before we began, I asked our hostess, “Might I trouble you for a
drink?”
She decanted a glass of wine from the nearby Cistercian monastery
and set the goblet down on the table before me. I took a sip and nodded
my thanks. She retook her seat, and as the circle of hands was joined,
Otto lit the three candles in the middle of the table, and taking Frau
Medik and the dowager’s hands in his, closed his eyes and intoned,
“Spirits of the past, be guided to our light, we welcome you here. Spirits
of the past, move among us, beloved ones, find your way back to this
place, we bring you gifts from life into death. Spirits of the past, return
to us.” When there was no response, Otto repeated his benedictions,
different this time, asking us to name the loved ones we hoped to find
and repeating those names over and over. I felt a coldness creep into
the room. “They are here,” Otto assured us. “They are looking for their
voices. Who would come through first? Charles? Charles? Yes, he’s here.
I can feel his presence. What would you like to ask him, my dear?” he
44 said, looking at the oh so hopeful face of the young widow who willed
the spirit of her dead to come through from beyond the veil. I felt sick. It
was so obviously fraudulent. The man preying on the desperation of the
left behind, profiting from their pain. I wanted to get up from my seat
and slap him down, and would have but for the fact that the next words
out of his mouth were in a voice so unlike his own I actually began to
believe, for just a second, that he might truly have the gift.
“My love, is it truly you?”
The medium’s lips curled into a harder sneer a moment and I
thought for sure that the mask had slipped to reveal his contempt for
the simpering widow before he threw his head back, entire body tense,
and the shivers akin to a lightning shock coursed through his veins,
every hair standing on end as a smell I couldn’t immediately identify
flourished. He cried out, a tortured wail. When he slumped forward
and his head came up again a warm, gentle smile filled with love lit
his face. That smile filled his eyes and melted the young woman across
the table.
“Ah sweet Helga, love of my love, heart of my heart,” Otto said in a
voice pitched higher and younger, and with no discernible similarity
to his own.
“Lanzo?” The woman said, her voice so full of love and loss I thought
she would burst. She didn’t wait for him to answer. She knew that she
only had moments to ask her question before her spirit would move on,
losing its hold on the medium. “We didn’t pick a name…” She looked
down at her swollen belly and I realised why she had come looking for
the dead. She wanted a name for their son.
The spirit medium inclined his head as though deep in thought, smile
widening, and offered, “I was always fond of Kuno,” he said. There was
a moment where the widow didn’t know how to respond, and before she
could the medium found his own voice once more, the spirit moved on.
“A good name,” Otto explained. “It means family in the old tongue. I
think your husband was trying to tell you something there, dear lady.”
And she nodded as though she had been given the most precious gift
there was.
And so it was around the table, a single question, an answer that
didn’t quite match with the desperate expectations of the women, and
then it came to me.
“There is someone trying to come through,” Otto assured me, “She has
a message for you. I can feel her urgency, but she cannot pierce the veil.
So close.” I resisted the temptation to offer more silver for her miraculous
appearance, whoever she may be. And then his eyes rolled up inside
his skull and his entire frame was wracked by the most tortuous of
convulsions. Over and over. I could see the pain in both women’s eyes
from where he crushed their smaller, more delicate hands in his oafish
grip, and I genuinely believed he had swallowed his tongue in the
torment and was choking. His face took on a deathly sick pallor. The
air in the room changed. It turned markedly colder. And I swear, as
God is my witness, my wine glass flew from the table to shatter in the
hearth, spilling red wine like blood across the stones. The sound of the
breaking glass acted as a catalyst for the horror to come. The spirit
medium looked at me through empty white eyes, and in the voice of the
damned proclaimed, “We know you, Clement Birkenbosch. We see you.”
I could not move. I could not break the circle. The candles in the
centre of the table guttered, the thin flames whickering before they
snuffed out. I had felt no such gust of wind.
“The hunter becomes the hunted,” another voice promised, rasping
from Otto’s mouth, again so utterly devoid of humanity I could not
believe he had formed them.
The charade had ended. This… this was different.
The dead were here. I saw them. Their ethereal white vapours moved
around the table, like dances circling, their own hands joined as they
skipped faster and faster until their ephemeral forms blurred into on
and other.
“Run little man, run and hide,” the dead goaded in yet another voice.
The laughter that followed was filled with the ceaseless buzzing of flies,
the sound spiralling into madness.
My blood ran cold in my veins.
Two tears of blood ran from the medium’s eyes, down his cheeks. He
could not escape the grip of whatever spirit had him. And they were
legion, lining up for their turn to goad me through his mouth.
The blood came thicker. The incessant buzz of the flies drowned
out more mocking messages from the dead. At the table the women
screamed. No, I realised, not all of them. The dowager did not. I turned
my attention from Otto to the chair where she had been sat and realised
that it was empty. The spirits continued their mad capering around us.
The chill wind picked up. It pulled at my hair and clothes. It pushed
at the pregnant woman’s long hair, whipping it around her face. It tore
at our hostess, so savagely I saw the red wheals of nails claw down her
cheeks. We were a long way from the safety of the charade.
When the medium next tried to talk something, an eerie translucent
ooze appeared to issue from his mouth, tendrils of raw spirit lashing out
at the air and coiling around his skull like medusa’s snakes made real.
It was the most haunting sight I had beheld in these years of travelling
and searching on behalf of the Society, for in that moment I knew that
it was all real.
One by one the spirits broke away from their circular dance, the
ring turning faster and faster as words appeared on the walls, written
in blood, ragged, raw letters and semi-literate promises that the
Otherworld knew I was a threat, and that I would be ended. The spirits
did not rejoin the circle. I saw them lining up behind the women and
knew that they had some foul trick planned and feared for the life of
the widow’s unborn child. I could not let this happen. It took all of my
strength to wrench my hands free of the women’s grasp, but I broke the
circle and cried out, “Begone from this place!” with such fervour that the
wind fell to nothing and within moments the heat of the fire once more
began to warm the room.
The shimmering spirits obeyed my order. I do not know why. I do not
know how I found the strength to command them, or the faith. Perhaps
it was my desperation, perhaps the Lord himself intervened on behalf of
the child? Ours is not to reason why. It was enough that they were gone.
The spirit medium collapsed in a heap at the end of the table, head
falling to his chest.
It was only then that I realised he was not breathing and had long
since joined with the dancing ghosts that surrounded us, leading them.
As the sun broke through the small window, I knew that we were
alone. Or as alone as we would ever be in this world of spirits.
“I will make arrangements for the physicians from the Court to collect
his body,” I assured the women, leading them back down the narrow
stairs to the coffee house. I did not make mention of the dowager, as I
fear I was the only one who saw her in that place…
45
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
Ghosts
There is a wealth of material written by
Nimrod that is devoted to musing over
the afflictions and the dead, though more
often than simply bodies rotting in the
ground he was fascinated by what he
called the hamtu bé, which is perhaps
best translated as ‘dead men screaming’
which is as unnatural a phenomenon as
any we might imagine in our mundane
existence. Even so, that translation is
open to interpretation, and any precise
meaning is unclear to say the least. Still,
what we can glean from his writings is a
46 glimpse of the man himself, and whatever
else he was, it is undeniable that was a
hunter of these ‘dead men screaming’.
In one of his more obscure essays
Nimrod recounts an encounter with
what he claims is a deceased relative.
He uses the word ‘father’, but as with
most linguistics this could be easily
interpreted as a more generic ancestor.
“Upon the darkest of nights, in the
long silence between midnight and dawn,
I awoke with my father’s shade standing
at my bedside, a particularly harrowing
tale to tell. He had been dead many a long
year, and yet here he was, just as I had
remembered him. My first thought was
that I was still somehow wrapped up in the
cocoon of an evil dream, so vivid and so
real, and yet at its heart a lie, for he was
transparent and dissolved before my eyes
when he finished his story.”
What is of particular interest is the
duality of the creature in Nimrod’s account,
at once capable of regret and infinite
sadness, and yet, still the most dangerous of
abominations resistant to mortal weapons.
“He came at me, eyes of nothing, offering
a glimpse of the infinite nature of the
universe and that universal truth, offering
up to me the true meaning of death. I drew
my heavy sword, and where before facing
an enemy I have drawn comfort from its
familiar weight in my hand, I knew in
my soul that such a fiend could only be
destroyed by magic.”
Father Ignatius Silviano, one of if not
the most pre-eminent exorcists of the
17th century, wrote extensive treatises
of both anguish and demons. These
books are stored within the vaults of
the Papal States and, as far as we at the
Royal Society can ascertain, have never
left their underground chambers, though
we have repeatedly requested access to
them. However, sometimes fate has a way
of intervening in the most unexpected of
ways. Some fifty years after Ignatius’s
death, a simple notebook was found in
one of the walls of his home, and was
retrieved by one of our members. Upon
examination, the book was found to
contain scattered notes detailing his
thoughts regarding the higher arts
of exorcism as well as notations and
observations of the abominations he had
faced. One that stands out as being of
particular interest is:
“Embarrassment is fleeting and seeks
itself away from the physical world, but
over the vast majority rests a curse that
prevents them from escaping. The body
leaves, but the soul remains and manifests
itself as a scourge.”
A scourge.
And that, in truth, is the nature of
the ghosts we find lingering in the
material world. They are not kindly or
benevolent, they are a scourge in the
most literal of senses. Ignatius was far
from the only student of the esoteric to
come to this conclusion. The Swedish
occultist Emanuel Swedenborg,
delivered a lecture to the Harmonious
Society, a gathering of students in
Uppsala University, accounting his
experiences with spirits and the
anguish of the screaming dead.
“By opening a paranormal astral path,
we sought to discover if this anguish could
speak to us in some way. For many of us it
was a spiritual journey that we had made
before, but for a few it was their first time
opening themselves up to the harrows and
rigours of transportation. It worked. The
creature came to us, light blue in form and
as diaphanous as a veil of fog. Where in life
the spirit had possessed eyes, now sat two
black deep holes, pits into the emptiness of its
being. It moved with eerie grace, hovering in
the air as it spoke to us of its pain.”
In 1670, the cabin boy and pirate,
Ferdo was captured during a raging
sea battle between Caribbean pirates
and the Spanish Crown.
He was one of the few survivors, dragged
up onto decks of a victorious galleon, and
as he lay sodden and gasping, raging
against the harrows he had seen, he was
given over for interrogation. Torturers
carried him below decks and worked
him over with the accoutrements of their
trade, not stopping until, broken, he has
spilled out every terror he had witnessed
with the pirates. These interrogations
are now public documents, disseminated
by the Crown. The intent was to strike
terror into the hearts of the pirates that
still fought on, but the true implications
of Ferdo’s confessions struck fear into the
hearts of the merchant captains who for,
years after, refused to sail west.
What did Ferdo say that could cause
such superstition dread to take hold in
normal god-fearing men? ‘Guests, living
skeletons and undead ship-wreckers who
wander on the ocean floor,’ among other
things. The boy claimed eye-witness
knowledge of supernatural gangs of
sailors that truly ruled the seas:
Curses, everything is about curses.
The rage burns bright, but is at its most
dangerous in the dead calm, like the ocean
itself. When they surrender to the calm,
giving it everything that it craves, they are at
their most dangerous. They cease wandering
in the dark, aimlessly. They find focus. A
target for their wrath, be it another vessel, a
lonely coastal village, or an armada. When
the curse is voiced, and given life, there is no
escaping it, even as a dead man. Especially
as a dead man. Nothing that can stop it.
Not even zealots of the Church.’
What is perhaps more interesting was
the boy’s claim that there were totems
that could protect one against the rage of
the dead, naming amongst other things
both red and white pearls, the tears from
a virgin and three silver coins carried
within the sole of your boot.
Appearance
There are as many possible appearances
for a ghostly apparition as there are
dead souls looking to find a way back
into this life, though some of the more
common appearances include ghostly
mists, glowing orbs, translucent figures
and other apparitions. Most ghosts will
appear in the same form as the physical
body that had when they were still alive,
as this is the most comforting form they
know. In some more harrowing instances,
the ghosts will manifest bearing the
wounds that killed them.
First Impressions
More often than not a ghost may make
itself known by non-visual means
first; a familiar aroma, an attempt at
communication, or a cold spot in an
otherwise warm room. They players
may then notice the lingering trails of
ectoplasmic mist, like wisps of fog, or
the ethereal form of the spectre itself.
What the players experience beyond
that first ghostly encounter is very
much dependent upon the type of spirit
manifestation they have stumbled upon.
In many instances ghosts themselves
are nothing more than the restless dead,
and rather than exorcism to drive them out
they find themselves trapped on this plane,
unable to move on to the next life because
of something they perceive as unfinished.
Some believe they are still alive, others
that they have yet to fulfil their purpose
in this life (most often victims of murder
seeking justice for their fate), while some
ares simply trapped (for instance by suicide
they find themselves bound to the place of
their last breath), or lost because they died
in unfamiliar lands and cannot find their
way back to their loved ones…
To that end, it is sometimes possible to
communicate with the departed, though
there are many fakes and frauds who prey
upon the grief of the loved ones left behind
and manipulate them through elaborate
‘seances’ that have been rigged to give the
illusion of a paranormal presence through
the use of fishing wire and other trickery.
What do the Players Know?
There are a variety of phenomenon we
call ghosts that range from the more
vengeful poltergeist and revenant shade
to the harmless echo.
These include, but are not limited to:
✦ A ghostly mist (a fog like swirl of
ectoplasm that appears several feet
above the ground and is capable of
movement. It is possible for the mist to
solidify into a fully formed apparition.
These mists are most often seen in
graveyards, on the sites of battles and
other places of significance).
✦ The lost soul (it is not uncommon
for someone to witness the ghost of
a loved one in some way. These lost
souls are fascinating in that they retain
the personality of the deceased, so the
haunted person can often draw some
sort of peace from their nearness. In
terms of manifestation, these lost souls
can often speak or at least make some
sort of noise to draw attention to them,
give off a unique and familiar odour,
such as the pipe smoker’s tobacco is
suddenly rich and ripe in the air, as
though they were back in their favourite
arm chair enjoying a smoke, or the
familiar scent of grandma’s powder and
perfume wafts across the air. Some lost
souls have the ability to interact with
their environment, moving things).
✦ The poltergeist, which is a more
malevolent entity (these ‘noisy ghosts’
have the ability to cause havoc.
They are capable of making noise,
causing lights to flicker and fail,
slam doors, throw things, and other
frightening disturbances. They are
profoundly disturbed spirits, though
the haunting may, at first, appear
almost innocuous, an object seemingly 47
misplaced, a candle that keeps blowing
out even though there is no obvious
draught, but as the restless spirit
draws strength from the person it is
haunting, these events grow more
and more frightening and powerful
until they are outright dangerous.
Some believe that the poltergeist isn’t
actually a ghostly manifestation of the
dead at all, but rather a living ghost,
the psychic energy of a troubled
person who is unwittingly behind
the mass of energy that is the ‘ghost’.
Whatever the truth, they are without
doubt the rarest form of haunting).
✦ Another form of ghost is commonly
called an orb because it is nothing more
than a translucent orb of flight that
seems to ghost over the ground. These
are most commonly witnessed around
gravestones and in churchyards, and
are weaker spirits not yet capable of full
manifestation.
✦ The final type of ghost is the echo (it
can most often be felt first in the form of
a cold spot, which coalesces into a swirl
of light that slowly takes the shape of a
 trace memory that is nothing more than
the place remembering the horrors it
has witnessed. The echo itself may be
rooted in a horrifying act, for example the
senseless murder of a child by a mother
driven out of her mind. In that moment
the stark emotions, the rage, the child’s
fear, all of it is indelibly written onto the
bricks and mortar of the murder room
and the place simply cannot forget. There
is a power to this kind of horror that
bleeds back into the world long after the
blood has dried and the bodies have been
carried away. That room has no choice
but to relive the horror over and over and
over, like a camera obscura).
Main Features
✦ Due to their intangibility, ghosts have
no physical health points or other
combat modifiers.
✦ Their primary form of attack is mental,
with them instilling fear in those they
haunt. Sometimes fear is nowhere near
a powerful enough word to describe the
48 sheer terror they are capable of driving
into the heart of the haunted.
✦ One kind of haunter has the ability to
inspire so much fear in the haunted that
they can drive the living to suicide.
✦ There are hungry ghosts that feed off
the energy of human beings, sapping
them slowly of their life-force.
✦ A special kind of echo is a living ghost,
an imprint of a tragedy so profound and
powerful that a person left their own
younger self imprinted upon a place.
Seeing your own ghost is believed to be
a promise of death.
✦ Some of the more powerful apparitions
can cause mild hallucinations in the
minds of the weak.
✦ Ghosts can manifest in the form of
smoke.
✦ All ghosts possess an element of
telekinesis, though this is strongest in
poltergeists.
✦ Some ghosts have the ability to
manipulate the air, causing anything
from the stir of a light breeze to gentle
against the skin of someone in their
presence to the full brute force of a gale
to batter them into submission.
✦ The presence of a ghost can have a
peculiar effect on metal in the possession
of a player, with it acting as though being
drawn towards a powerful magnet.
✦ Ghosts have the ability to appear and
disappear at will. Even when they
manifest, they are usually translucent,
and can appear more or less substantial
depending upon their strength or
nearness to their death site. This
ability bears a limited resemblance to
teleportation. The longer the ghost has
been dead, the stronger it will generally
be, and thus the greater distances it can
teleport itself.
✦ A truly powerful ghost that suffered
a violent death can cause those same
mortal wounds to occur to others as a
special attack.
✦ The ghost of a drowning victim can
conjure and influence water.
✦ A vengeful spirit that has already
claimed lives of others can channel
the strength and skills of those they
have murdered, making themselves
stronger. Even so, only the strongest of
ghosts can conjure ectoplasmic residue.
✦ Most ghosts are fearful of holy
ground and relics.
✦ They are susceptible to certain
elements, notably iron and salt which
can be used to bind and contain a
restless spirit or create barriers the
ghost cannot cross.
✦ A priest performing last rites over the
bones of the ghost can be enough to send
the spirit to eternal rest, as can burning
the bones (which is most often used as a
way to put down vengeful spirits).

 
Ghost typical stats
The following stats represent ”typical” ghosts in the most
generic possible way. There are many varieties, and it is often
difficult to differentiate one type from the other. The majority of
ghosts are linked to deceased persons but many others, unlike the
phantoms, may even not be the souls of dead persons but rather
the echoes of strong feelings and suffering of living persons.
Physical Health Points: none
Mental Health Points: 20-100 (45 is a common value).
Mental Damage levels: not applicable.
Movement: fly up to 16 m (or more for some spirits) at no cost
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 9-10).
Skills: usually none, unless linked to the particular
deceased’s story.
Initiative: 0
Combat points: none. Ghosts tend to have one or more of
the mental attack types described below among the ”optional
properties”.
Common Properties
Control Perception and Space
Most Ghosts can choose who can see it and who cannot,
although some are cursed not to be visible to those they
would like to communicate with (unless dark arts, like
a seance, are used). Furthermore stronger Ghosts may
even appear in places far from the area which they usually
haunt.
Haunting and Unresolved Conflicts
A Ghost is usually created by a specific tragedy or situation
which shapes the Ghost’s unlife. This means that the majority
of Ghosts (but not all) are bound to specific places or areas
which they cannot leave. Furthermore, many ghosts (and
again: not all) have unresolved conflicts, unfinished business
or requirements to be fulfilled. If this is done, quite often the
Ghost may be put to eternal rest.
Spirit
Since they are spirits, Ghosts have no Physical Health Points
and their Mental Health Points represent their spiritual
strength. Furthermore they do not suffer modifiers from lost
MHP since they have no damage levels for MHP.
If a skill roll is needed, most ghosts automatically succeed
the required test (e.g. Perception rolls), although they may
even ignore mortals, since they are not interested in them or
they are too focused on their own stories.
Vulnerabilities
Ghosts tend to have various vulnerabilities. These may vary a
lot according to the culture but most Ghosts in Europe and in
the Mediterranean are vulnerable to the following.
✦ They cannot enter holy ground and cannot harm those
who bear relics. Furthermore forced contact with certain
holy substances may cause the Ghost damage (to be valued
by the GM) or even eternal rest.
✦ Certain specific elements (iron, salt, etc.) or religious relics
can be used to create barriers which the ghost cannot cross
in any form.
✦ Performing last rites on their bones (or burning them) may
put the Ghost to eternal rest.
✦ Many Ghosts are linked to specific, unfinished duties to
be performed or requirements that they were not able to
satisfy during their lives. If these actions are performed the
Ghosts find eternal rest.
✦ Most Ghosts (but not all) cannot endure the light of the
sun, which inflicts them 1 mental damage for every round
of manifestation under the sun.
Optional Properties
Choking
Some terrifying Ghosts may force the lungs or throats of
their victims to act as if they were drowning. The Victim
must make a Situation Roll with SV equal to 10 modified by
Constitution to force themselves to breath.
Failure usually means a horrible death unless one has the
Diving specialty of the Agility skill. In this case, the victim
can make a skill roll to hold their breaths for another round
as per usual rules (see ”Diving” in Alter Ego p.63) and try
another Situation Roll to breath. Every round in which they
succeed the Agility Skill roll (with usual penalties) they can
make a new Situation Roll to try to breath. If the Agility
Skill Roll is failed, they just drown and die.
Continuous Oppression
Living in a building or area infested by this Ghost may
become an unbearable experience, even if the Ghost does not
manifest itself. The chosen victim will continuously feel a
sense of heaviness or continuous oppression. For every month
the chosen victim lives in the area, 1d6 mental damage will be
dealt. These lost Mental Points should be recorded separately
from others, and cannot be recovered unless the victim leaves
the place.
If, after a certain time, one reaches the third level of Mental
Health (“Mens Amissa” or “Lunatic”) the GM should force
the victim to make every month a Situation Roll with SV 10
(modified by Psyche). Failure means that the character does
something stupid to abandon the area, maybe even including
suicide for the most severe situations.
Control the Air
The Ghost knows how to control the Air. It may be a gentle
breeze or even a strong wind. Effects may vary according to
the GM judgement. Strong winds which may make victims
fall or lose objects which they are holding should be resisted
with Situation Rolls with SV of 10 modified by Constitution
or Dexterity (according to the situation). For falling damage
see Lex Libris p.31.
Control the Water
The Ghost of drowned victims may control water to the point
of even conjuring it in a place where no water is present. The
GM should evaluate the consequences regarding the actions
to be done in water areas (seas, rivers, pools). An example may
be a -5 SV to swimming or sailing actions.
49
Death Experience
A victim can be forced to experience the Ghost’s own death
or maybe the echoes can force the humans which originated
them to see their own younger versions as promises of death .
To resist this effect one must succeed a Situation Roll with a
SV of 10 modified by the Psyche trait. Failure means suffering
the whole Fear Factor of the Ghost, usually 1d10 (OR 9-10),
even if the victim has already suffered it when the Ghost was
seen the first time. Particularly gruesome deaths may force
greater amounts of mental damage.
Death Experience (Mortal)
Rare but truly powerful spectres may inflict on their victims
the same wounds which killed them. This works in the same
way as ”Death Experience” but the victim suffers also 1d10
(OR 9-10) physical Health Points (or more if the GM deems
so).
Feeding off the Energy
Some Hungry Ghost feed off human energy. See the
“Continuous Oppression” property but the damage is dealt to
Physical Health rather than to Mental Health.
Ghost Overlord
Those killed by Ghosts may become Ghosts themselves.
Powerful Ghosts may use the Ghosts of their victims as
slaves.
 Invoke Vision
The Ghost can invoke visions and hallucinations into their
victims which must make a Situation Roll with a SV of 10
modified by the Psyche trait. Failure means that the victims
will experience the hallucination and, in the case of terrifying
vision, they will suffer 1d5 mental damage points per round
as long as they remain in that situation or place, experiencing
the vision. The most likely solution for them is to flee away.
Stronger versions of this power (e.g. SV 8 and 1d10 mental
damage) should be used for more powerful ghosts or more
terrifying situations.
Magnetism
Metal reacts in odd ways in an are haunted by this Ghost.
Compasses may not work at all and metal objects may be
attracted or rejected in relation to certain points decided
by the Ghost. Trying not to lose the grip on a metal object
may require a Situation Roll with a SV of 10 modified by
Constitution. Trying to fight with metal weapons attracted
somewhere else may inflict penalties to up to -5.
Mislead
By using misleading lights a victim can be lured astray,
following the charming light, often to some trap or natural
threat. The victim must make a Situation Roll with a SV of 10
modified by Psyche to resist the effect.
50
Screech
The Ghost can emit a screech which requires victims to make
a Situation Roll of SV 10 modified by Psyche in order not to
suffer 1d5 mental damage points.
Some Ghosts are so powerful that, if they do nothing else
in the round, may force greater mental damage losses, up to
their Fear Factor value, which is usually 1d10 (OR 9-10) or, in
the case of Specters or Wraiths, 1d10 (OR 8-10).
Telekinesis
The Ghost can move objects through the air. The maximum
size of movable object is totally up to the GM. Watching
something slowly flying away should inflict at least 1d10, if
not the whole Ghost’ Fear Factor in mental damage.
Ghost Variations
Echo
Common properties are: Continuous Oppression, Death
Experience, Mislead, Thought Control, Invoke Vision and
Screech.
Ghostly Mist, Orbs
These are usually harmless if not for their Fear Factor. They
rarely have any optional property except very rare cases of
”Invoke Vision” or ”Death Experience”, but only in relation to
very violent deaths.
Hungry Ghost
Common properties are: Feeding off the Energy, Choking,
Continuous Oppression, Mislead, Screech and Death
Experience (Mortal).
Lost Soul
They tend to have lighter, harmless versions of Telekinesis,
Control the Air and Magnetism.
Poltergeist
”Telekinetic Attack” is a common property, as well as very
strong versions of Telekinesis.
Ghost-related Secrets Arts
Ghosts are influenced by Exorcism (Lex Libris p.234)
performed in the area which they haunt and suffer the damage
as if they were demons possessing a body.
Ghost-Cursed Jewel
New Dark Art, Left-Hand Path
Old scrolls describe a ritual which is thought to have been
used by the degenerated necromancers of Babylon during
antiquity. This evil ritual exploits the suffering of a lost soul,
imprisoning into a jewel which acts as a trap against an enemy.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -14.

Telekinetic Attack Requirements

Poltergeists and other violent ghosts use telekinesis to throw ✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 8
things to its victim. This ghost has 20 to 40 CP (30 is a ✦ Discipline: The Left-hand Path level 3

common value) to use for attacks throwing objects present in ✦ Specialty: Black Magic level 3

the area (pebbles, chairs, dishes, etc..) against the victim. Each
hit deal 1d10 physical damage, which can vary for specific Other Requirements
object. ✦ Supernatural Beings Discipline level 2
✦ Science level 7, Transmutation Discipline level 1, Alchemy
Thought Control Specialty level 3
The Ghost knows how to force somebody to do things against
their own will, unless the victim succeeds a situation roll with Material Requirements
a SV equal to 8, modified by the Psyche trait. A jewel, some salt and some iron powder.
✦
✦ A place which is known to have been haunted by a ghost
created by violent death and where all the alchemical
processes must be performed during a night of new moon.
The sorcerer should not be disturbed during the night-
long ritual and many ghosts will try to do so. Boundaries
made of iron or salt are usually used to protect the sorcerer,
but they are not always working with all ghosts.
Effect
If the sorcerer is successful in the Esotericism skill roll the
salt and iron powder at dawn are alchemically bound into the
jewel, together with a least some part of the Ghost’s negative
energy. Lesser ghosts may even become trapped into the
jewel, freeing in this way the haunted place, although this
rarely happens for the spirits of those who died the most
gruesome deaths.
Anyone who is gifted the jewel will periodically suffer the effect
of one of the Ghost’s powers, like, for example: Continuous
Oppression, Death Experience, Invoke Vision and Feeding off
the Energy. The GM decides which power works and how
often it does. The power is usually suffered even if the jewel is
not worn: it is necessary to give it as a gift to somebody else
to make it stop. Furthermore the victim tends to not notice
the link between the jewel and the curse, unless he succeeds a
Situation Rolls equal to SV 8 modified by Intelligence, to be
done each time he suffers the power.
The Marvelous Bottle
New Scientific Art
In 1745 the Prussian scientist Ewald Jürgen Georg von Kleist
created the Leyden Jar, the first known electrical condenser.
Or at least that is what official history says. Nobody knew
that similar bottles were secretly used by alchemists of both
the Rosicrucian Order and the Royal Society as early as 1720
to study the existence of ectoplasms and ghosts. By mid-18th
century the scientists of these secrets societies have developed
relatively portable (for the 18th-century standards) versions
of these jars which do not require encumbering external
sources of electricity since, using some esoteric alchemical
formula, they activate and sparks some faint light if invisible
supernatural creatures are in the area.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -12 to create the bottle, -5 to use it.
Requirements
✦ Skill: Science SV 8
✦ Discipline: Natural Philosophy 1
✦ Specialty: Physics level 3
Other Requirements
✦ Transmutation Discipline level 1, Alchemy Specialty level 3
✦ Esotericism SV 5, Supernatural Beings Discipline level 1
Material Requirements
Everything required to make a Leyden Jar (a small bottle,
✦
alcohol, a cork with a nail) without the electrical source,
but adding secret alchemical powders said to be derived
from the ashes of mummies from Egypt.
Effect
A first roll is needed to create the ”Marvellous Bottle” with
the right alchemical powders, a failure means that the powders 51
are lost. In case of success the object is created and can be
reused many times unless it is broken.
The scientist needs half an hour to activate the bottle in
the desired place, making a new Science skill roll. In case
of success the bottle will be considered active until the next
dawn. It will sparkle to demonstrate that an area or a building
is haunted by an invisible presence. If the Ghost (or other
invisible, unnatural creature) is present in the same room
where the bottle is at work, it will be forced to become visible.
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
Phantoms
A phantom is an anxious soul that, for
some reason, cannot sever the ties that
bind them to the world of the living
and enter the world of the dead. They
are often created from the souls of those
whose lives have abruptly ended, perhaps
by accident or murder. They live in a kind
of limbo, between the world of the dead
and the world of the living. The tragedy
of many phantoms is that they aren’t even
aware that they are dead, and instead
remain, bound to the place where they
died in the belief that they are still alive.
52 Not all phantoms are bound to a place
however, some are tied to a particular
person or object.
There are both good and evil
phantoms.
What we consider ‘Good’ phantoms
will invariably try to aid those around
them, and understand why they remain
in this world. Their greatest hope is
that they will one day be able to leave
their past . They are ready to depart to
the other side. What binds them to this
world? Perhaps it is something they
have done, an act that they’re ashamed
of, and need forgiveness or redemption
before they can move on? Or perhaps
they were murdered and can’t leave
knowing their murderer is out there,
evading justice?
The ‘Evil’ phantoms that linger here
often do so for the same reasons as the
good, though they lived such an evil life
that they simply cannot cease their evil
deeds even after their death.
Some discover that in death they
possess powers that they didn’t have in
life, and delight in using them to spread
terror among the living.
Sometimes when a soul is suddenly
forced to leave the world of the living,
they do so with great bitterness. It
is this bitterness that creates the evil
phantoms. Their lingering minds
are twisted and their sole wish is for
vengeance upon the living, whom they
hate with a burning jealously. Perhaps
they hate a person or family line to the
degree that they can’t rest until the
entire family has been eradicated; or
maybe their jealousy compels them to
remain and haunt that person? Equally,
they may vengeance for their untimely
death.
Appearance
Like other ghosts, phantoms have no
physical bodies, and are often perceived
as a translucent, pale figure that hovers
above the ground. They can choose if
and when they reveal themselves to the
living. Some are capable of changing
their appearance, choosing to appear as
a horrifying vision one second, only to
be perceived as an innocent child the
next. It is all part of the torment.
Abilities and Powers
✦ Some phantoms have learned the
ability to choose who can see them
and who they are invisible to, even if
these individuals are in the very same
room.
✦ Some have learned to create visions
of things that have happened, or that
they think will happen.
✦ Some phantoms have learned to
move objects, and sometimes they
 can even lift or hold objects. This
ability is usually limited to smaller
things however, for example, moving
furniture, pushing an item off a shelf
or a table, having a whole tea set fly
around in circles in the air only to fall
to the ground, writing texts with a
feather pen, closing or opening doors,
or extinguishing candles.
✦ Some phantoms have developed
against people who cross their path. It
is completely up to the GM to decide
exactly what powers a phantom
possess, keeping them in fitting with
the campaign they are running.
To harm a phantom
There are different ways to harm a
phantom, including:
✦ Some phantoms haven’t realised that
phantom that they are dead will help
them depart to the other side.
✦ If an exorcism is performed over the
phantom, it will receive the amount
of mental damage indicated by the
exorcism’s description.
✦ When the conflict, which binds the
phantom to a place, is solved, the
phantom disappears.

terrible powers that they can use they are dead. Convincing such a

 
Phantom typical stats Requirements
Use the stats and properties described in the ”Ghosts” ✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 8
section to represent Phantoms, especially regarding Invoke ✦ Discipline: The Left-hand Path level 3

Visions, Death Experience and Continuous Oppression. For ✦ Specialty: Black Magic level 3

these ghosts it is incredibly important to understand what

makes them what they are, therefore, all phantoms have Material Requirements
a vulnerability linked to their specific story and the way At least one participant other than the medium. The
✦

they died (see above “Vulnerabilities” among the Common
Properties of Ghosts).
Phantom-related Secrets Arts
Like all ghosts, phantoms are also influenced by Exorcism (Lex
Libris p.234) performed in the area which they haunt and suffer
the damage as if they were demons possessing a body.
Seance
New Dark Art, Left-Hand Path
There are many kinds of seance, as well as an incredible range
of different practitioners of these arts. Most of them are just
charlatans trying to steal money from wealthy but bored
aristocrats, but others have powers not unlike those of the
famous Witch of Endor in the 28th Chapter of the First Book
of Samuel, and their actions are completely against God’s will.
The following represent a leader-led group seance, similar
to those which will become common later on in the 19th
century England, during the Victorian period. These rituals
are used to call the spirit of a dead relative or to communicate
with otherwise silent phantoms, in order to discover the cause
of their troubles and what needs to be fixed in order to give
them eternal rest.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -20, to be modified by +2 by any
believing participant beyond the first necessary one
(see below, ”material requirements”) and by -2 by any
non-believing participant.
maximum number of participants, including both the
medium and the first required participant, is equal to
the Esotericism skill of the medium (which means, for
SV 10, a maximum of 8 participants giving +2 or -2 per
person). 53
Effect
A successful Esotericism roll evokes the desired spirit which
communicates through the medium for a limited time, either
appearing to medium or speaking through the medium’s
mouth by using an unnatural voice or even causing mild
effects (like light breezes or coldness) to the participants.
The seance is an extremely dangerous ritual to perform
and, even in the case of a successful invocation, other ghosts
or even demons can appear, instead of the desired spirits,
sometimes even pretending to be the desired spirits to harm
the participants. It is also worth noting that the participants
to the seance may want to contact the spirit of somebody
who did not become a ghost, but which is maybe somewhere
else in the Otherworld and therefore may or may not answer.
Contacting somebody burning in Hell may be a terrifying
experience while blessed spirits in the Paradise cannot be
reached by seance (the Witch of Endor could evoke the Ghost
of the Prophet Samuel only because it happened before the
coming of Jesus Christ, saving the just ones who died during
the Old Testament times). In fact, God disdains such ghost-
evoking activities and the mediums are acting against the
Church’s teachings. No rule is given for all these dangerous
situations which the GM should adapt to the story he wants
to tell.
 archival materials by the royal society

Speculation and Field Notes Regarding

Spectres and Wraiths

Another classification of the more

generic term "ghost" is that of spectre
or wraith. These are strong souls, which
have managed to seize a dead body in
order to turn it into its vessel in the
world of the living. The body is most
often the same as the one, which the
soul was once bound to, but on rare
occasions they may use another body
that the spectre seizes.
The difference between a spectre
and a phantom is that the spectre has
a physical body, although it could be
54 both decayed and lack body parts. The
body is really nothing more than a host
vessel for the wraith, and by destroying
this vessel, the wraith, or spirit, is
unleashed and will immediately try
to find a new body (in that moment,
until it finds a new host, the wraith
will functions as a phantom or generic
ghost).
Since the ghost can’t seize a living
body, it will find its way to the body of a
newly buried individual.
The ghost has little time to
accomplish this however, since only the
most powerful ghost is able to dwell in
the world of the living for more than
one lunar month outside of the safe
harbour of a body.

Appearance
Most wraiths possess their own former
body. If that body isn’t available, the
wraith will choose another body to
possess. On rare occasions a wraith
may possess the body of a dead animal,
though it is more through desperation
than desire.
Main Features
✦ Specters and Wraiths are synonyms
of the same, terrifying type of ghost.
They are created by great tragedies
and unresolved conflicts which
sometimes bind them to a place.
When these conflicts are resolved,
the Specters will just disappear.
✦ Specters and Wraiths usually terrorize
their environments through physical
violence. They may have mental
powers, like other ghosts, but they
usually prefer using these powers only
to terrorize and to lure victims into
traps causing physical death.
✦ Wraiths and Specters manifest
through the possession of a corpse
but destroying it will not kill the
spirit, which will only look for
another corpse to possess. While
the Wraith possess the corpse the
rotting may continue, although
at a slower pace, or it may be
blocked into an half-rotten status,
sometimes even for centuries.
✦ The physical health of a Specter
is determined but the status of the
body, although this is often better
than what it was when the corpse
was still living, since wraiths do
not feel any pain. Even extremely
rotten and damaged bodies are
inexplicably strong if possessed by
a Specter.
✦ To kill a Specter or a Wraith one
needs to destroy its mental energy.
However, these energies are
stronger than when the soul was a
living person, since the energies are
linked and powered by the tragedies
which caused the death.
✦ Specters and Wraiths are incredibly
susceptible to Exorcism, Sunlight
and the use of gillyflowers.

 
Specter and W raith typical stats Samples of Attacks:
The following stats represent the Wraith of a soldier ✦ (IM -4) Decent Sabre SV 19
possessing its own, half-rotten body. It also possesses some ✦ (IM -4) Decent Sabre SV 10, SV 9

of its own military equipment, miraculously preserved ✦ (IM -6) Decent Heavy Rifle SV 19

after the tragic death which generated the Specter. ✦ (IM 0) Brawling SV 19

Trait: Constitution +6 (applying to each possessed body), 55

Psyche +6.
Physical Health Points: 32-50 (38 PHP is a common value)
Physical Damage levels: not applicable.
Mental Health Points: 20-100 (45 MHP is a common value).
Mental Damage levels: not applicable.
Movement: land 2 CP per 1 m (Max 10 m).
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 8-10).
Skills: usually none, unless linked to the particular
deceased’s story. Examples are the following, to be
applied to the physical body.
Fighting SV 10: Close Combat 3 (Right 1H
Weapons 3), Ranged Weapons 3 (Rifles 3), Unarmed 3
(Brawling 3, Wrestling 3).
Stealth SV 10: Avoidance 1 (Hiding & Camouflage 4,
Sneaking 4), Detection 1 (Observation 4).
Initiative: 0
Combat points: usually linked to the Fighting skills it had in
life, although somehow powered-up and adapted to the new
condition. An example is Free 10 / Close Combat Weapons 3
(Right 1H weapons 6) / Unarmed 3 (Brawling 6, Wrestling 6).
Equipment:
✦ Decent Sabre (IM -4, WA 3, OM 0, BP 14, dmg 1d10 (OR
9-10) +6 Constitution);
✦ Decent Rifle Sabre (IM -4, WA 3, OM 0, BP 14, dmg 1d10
(OR 9-10) +6 Constitution);
✦ Decent Heavy Rifle (IM -6. P/T 1/5, M 19-20, OM 0, Dmg
1d10 (OR 8-10), Range 1-30/30-45).
Common Properties
Possessed Corpse
Wraiths manifest through the possession of a corpse,
preferably its own, half-rotten body, although other corpses
can be possessed too. The decomposition of corpses slows
down or stops to a certain mummified status, if possessed by
a wraith.
The body to be possessed cannot be living but, on the other
hand, a wraith can easily possess a corpse, without making
any check or roll. A proper religious funeral protects a body
from a Wraith’s possession: this is the reason why many
Specters kill people and hide their corpses, just in case they
need them. Furthermore, desperate Wraiths can even inhabit
an animal’s corpse, although they tend to avoid this practice.
The PHP value in the stats refers to the body’s original
PHP modified by the Wraith’s Constitution (which is at least
+6). These corpses are often half-rotten and damaged but the
wraiths do not feel pain, therefore it does not have physical
health levels, but only a total PHP. When this value is reduced
to ”0” the body is too damaged to be possessed and the wraith
must abandon it.
Fragile Spirit
Specters and Wraiths need a corpse to continue their existence.
When the body is destroyed a Specter must soon find a new
one. For every Full Moon or New Moon which passes without
 having found a new corpse, the Wraith must make a Situation
Roll with a SV of 3 modified by their Psyche trait (usually
+6, for a total SV 9). Every further situation roll to be made
is diminished by a cumulative -5, which means that very few
disembodied Specters survive more than a lunar month.
A disembodied Wraith has usually the same stats and
Common Properties of normal Ghosts (although they should
rarely have Optional Properties since disembodied Specters
are weaker than normal spiritual Ghosts).
The Mental Health Points are the real health of a Specter
or Wraith and, when this reaches 0, the spirit disappears into
eternal rest. However, it is worth saying that the MHP value
tends to be way higher than it was during the mortal life,
since it is energized by tragic death conditions.
Vulnerabilities
Specters and Wraiths have the same vulnerabilities of Ghosts
plus the following.
✦ Exorcism (Lex Libris 234) inflicts the same damage per
round to both MHP and PHP.
✦ They always have conflicts to be solved, although not
all Specters haunt a specific place (see ”Haunting and
Unresolved Conflicts” above among Ghosts’ Common
Properties).
✦ When five nuns simultaneously throw sacred earth against
56 a Wraith, it will suffer 1d6 physical damage for every
sacred clod of earth it is hit by.
✦ All Wraiths suffer the sunlight which inflicts 1 mental
damage per round of exposition.
✦ If gillyflowers are thrown in a ring around the Wraith, it
will suffer 1d10 (OR 8-10) in mental damage it if steps out
of the circle.
Optional Properties
Specters and Wraiths can use also the optional properties of
Ghosts, although they tend to focus more on physical kinds of
damage, rather than on mental one. Two common properties,
used to terrify and lead the victims astray are ”Mislead” and
”Screech”. In addition, Wraiths and Specters may also have
the following other optional properties.
Breath of Disease
The possessed body of a Specter spreads illness by coughing
on its victims. All those in the area must make a Situation
Roll with an SV of 10 modified by Health. Failure means
immediate contagion of a disease to be established by the GM.
An example may be to suffer 1d10 (OR 8-10) at contagion and
then again every week, until properly healed.
Claws
The corpses possessed by some Wraith can develop claws on
their hands. These usually deal 1d10 (OR 10) of damage +
the Constitution trait (usually +6). The Wraith can use CP
coming from the ”Free” and ”Unarmed” types, and they also
get 6 CP specifically locked to these Claws.
Drain Life Force
Each round the Specter manage to have physical contact with a
victim (for example by wrestling, but also other gentler types of
contact are valid), it will inflict 1d3 physical damage point. The
Wraith heals the same amount (if it was wounded) in either PHP
or MHP. This power is also sometimes called ”Kiss of Death”.
Earthen Protection
The Wraith can seek shelter by unnaturally sinking both
spirit and possessed corpse into the ground. This process
takes 3-10 actions rounds (roll 1d10, ignoring 1 and 2) during
which the Specter cannot do anything else. Some Wraiths are
able to move short distances through the ground.
Extra Durable
The Wraith can resist inside a body, even if the PHP are
diminished to 0. The body will keep on working, although
all physical rolls will suffer a modifier of -10. The body will
be destroyed only when the PHP are reduced to a negative
number opposite to the original maximum PHP (e.g. a
maximum PHP value of 40 reduced to -40).
Immortal
The corpses possessed by some rare, powerful Wraiths
cannot be killed if reduced to 0 PHP. They will just ignore the
situation. The possessed corpse can be killed only by cutting
the head with a blade (use the ”Hitting the Weak Spot” new
rules in this book).
One Body
This Wraith is linked only to its own body. When this body
is destroyed, so it the Wraith. This property is often coupled
with one among: Extra Durable, Immortal, Protection or
Revenant.
Protection
The Specter can be harmed only by weapons of a specific type:
other weapons do not deal damage. A common type is ”silver
weapons” (a silver-coated blade, a silver bullet, etc.).
Revenant
When the possessed body is reduced to 0 PHP it will fall dead
on the ground only to be raised again the following night to
full PHP, still possessed by the Specter. The corpse will not be
reanimated only if it will receive a proper religious funeral or
if it is defeated and killed three nights in a row.
Shape-shift
Very rare Wraiths from old, wild cultures have the ability of
shapeshifting a possessed body into a single specific animal.
For example, some Draugr of Northern Europe can shapeshift
the possessed body into a flayed bull, a seal, a cat or a grey
horse with a broken back but no ears or tail.
Strong
Stronger Wraiths have a trait at +8 or more.
Specter- and Wraith-related Secrets Arts
Exorcism (Lex Libris p.234) deal both mental and physical
damage to a Wraith or Specter.
Stealing a servant from Hades
New Dark Art, Left-Hand Path
This ritual is said to have been used by some ancient sorcerer
in a Greek colony on the Black Sea whose name has been
forgotten. Some say that its origin lie in diabolic cults
of pre-hellenic Asia Minor, but whatever the origin, the
formulas which throughout history has been used by cursed
witches and dreaded necromancers are still in Ancient Greek.
The Roman poet Lucan is said to have watched it been used
around the Nekromanteion of Ephyra in Thessaly, but such an
experience is not recorded in the known versions of his book.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -18.
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 10
✦ Discipline: The Left-hand Path level 3
✦ Specialty: Black Magic level 5
Other Requirements
✦ Communication SV 7, Languages Discipline level 2, Foreign
Language: Latin level 3, Foreign Language: Ancient Greek
level 3.
Material Requirements
✦ The missing and otherwise unknown chapters of Marcus
Annaeus Lucanus’ Pharsalia, written in Latin, but with the
formulas in Ancient Greek. These pages are preserved only
in very few scrolls and old books kept as precious treasures
by secret societies like the Rosicrucians or the higher ranks
of the Freemasons.
✦ A living victim to be sacrificed with a knife while chained
or unconscious in a cave or other underground space.
Effect
This gruesome sacrifice, abominable to all devout
Christians, must be performed during a night of New
Moon. In case of failure it will be known only after the
horrible sacrifice has already been performed. If the
Esotericism roll is successful a Wraith is risen from the
dead, to serve the sorcerer until the sorcerer dismiss it
(letting the Wraith go to final rest).
However, each New Moon the Wraith is in service, the
Sorcerer must make a Situation Roll with a SV of 10 modified
by the Psyche trait. If this roll fails, the Wraith will rebel and
try to kill the sorcerer. 57
58
 Possesing Spirits
I first encountered rumours of the soulless ones
deep in the wild woods of the Black Forest.
Naturally, curiosity drove me to investigate,
though what manner of monstrosity awaited
within those dark trees I dared not contemplate. There are
horrors enough on the long road, but they pale in comparison
with those lurking in the isolation of those lost places. I was,
I freely admit, beginning to fear my obsession with the
esoteric and the arcane. It was a sickness I could not shake.
I had been travelling for more than a month through the territories
of the Swabian Circle, following the whispers, gathering more and more
in the way of stories. It was hard to discern what might have been the
truth from what was almost certainly fever dream and fiction. I moved
from lordship to lordship, trading on the goodwill of the people, offering
stories from the road in return for food and drink. I had become quite
the raconteur, able to hold my audience in the palm of my hand with
the more macabre tales I had gathered and offered up as fabulous
diversions. The food was often good, if simple, the company better.
I believed, with good reason, that I was in pursuit of some form of
demonic spirit or other restless dead. There was so many accounts of
ghostly happenings and frightened stories of possession, but of course,
ours is an age for evil spirits. They cling to the living most maliciously.
59
This trail of breadcrumbs that I followed through the regions of the
Black Forest was different, though. It felt more elemental in nature.
I sensed the difference within minutes of walking within a mile of
the town, leaving the safety of the road in favour of exploration. There
were no animals. No foragers in the undergrowth. No bird song in
the canopy of leaves overhead. Only silence. Deep, undisturbed, and
so very, very unnerving. That lack was the first thing about the place
that I marked as uncanny, but by no means the last. According to my
map, I was little more than ten miles from the lordship of Messkirch
as the raven flies. The world can change a lot in such a comparatively
short distance.
I walked into town, not sure what to expect. I did not, I must admit,
expect to be greeted like a saviour, but the township had petitioned its
lord for holy aid, and these poor souls took me for that aid. I did not
disabuse them of the notion for it served my purpose, and truth be told
I had more than a few tricks that would help me pass for a holy man.
Claiming hunger, I ventured into what passed for a taproom in the
small town, looking to whet my appetite and wet my lips after hours
on the road. I tried to pay for the food and drink, but the barkeep
would have none of it. I asked about a room, and though he was quick
to discourage me, when I would not be deterred he did offer up one
of the three rooms he had set aside for guests that never came. After
a decent meal, I retreated to my chamber, where I stumbled upon a
crude carving in the wooden doorway that convinced me I was in the
right place; it is hard to describe with any great accuracy, but easy to
 visualise—a stooped figure of a man, a traveller, nothing unnatural
or sinister about that, but there was a second figure, an almost perfect
mimic of the first, more of a shadow-shape than an actual man, carved
around the traveller’s body as though cradling or clinging to his back
like some sort of demonic burden.
It matched several of the more bizarre tales I had heard on the road.
It was reasonable to assume the carver was the source of the stories, but
there was a message in this crude carving that I knew I would be a
fool to ignore. Despite my better judgment, or perhaps because of it, I
decided to stay long enough to satisfy my curiosity.
All of these stories had similar roots, and all of those roots were
entwined with a grave. It didn’t take long to find a fresh one in what
passed for the town’s cemetery. The marker named the inhabitant as a
nine year old boy, Ezekiel. It is never easy when a child dies, not least
for the child. That is one truth I have learned on this long journey of
enlightenment. I have seen more than enough to know that it is naïve to
dismiss the other world and the afterlife. I have witnessed hauntings and
possessions of the most brutal nature, and indeed performed exorcisms
as a pious man. Very little in this life, or after it, surprises me now. But
what was to happen that night, that surprised me. No, I must not bear
false witness. What I lived through terrified me.
These good people were terrified of sunfall and what it would bring.
The hours of darkness unshackled an entity, allowing it to make
mischief. And what mischief!
When I returned from the grave and sought out the grieving parents
I heard tell how their poor damned son had risen out of the dirt every
60 night since its harrowing death, making a mockery of its tender soul.
Every night.
Both mother and father were living in terror of a child they had
loved and nourished and nurtured, and lost no more than a week
ago. They were living through their own damnable hell. So when they
looked to me and asked if I was the holy man come to see their boy to
his eternal rest how could I tell the truth?
I am no Lutheran minister, neither am I a rabbi, but for these fine
god-fearing parents I would be all that and more. I have come to
understand death. I know now that the dead need a compelling reason
to haunt the living so. I asked questions, hoping that they might offer
some understanding, but the more I heard of young Ezekiel the more he
sounded like a normal nine year old boy, full of curiosity and mischief,
yes, but an innocent with a good heart and a warm smile. Not the
essence of a vengeful wraith come for retribution or to see justice.
I helped them barricade the doors and shutter the windows so that
the boy could not gain access to what had been his home. I hated the
work. It went against my every instinct, which was to gather knowledge,
to learn what drove this restless spirit and help it find peace if peace was
there to be found, but it wasn’t about what I needed right then, it was
about his parents.
I am no fool—or perhaps I am just a small fool, but I had an idea.
“Will you permit me to do something?” I asked, explaining that
on my travels I had encountered this thing, a Mezuzah, which in
the Jewish faith was a warding that placed the words of God on the
doorposts as protection against evil entering. I did not put it on the front
door, but rather on the second doorway inside their home, effectively
protecting the bedroom. I doubted very much that this particular soul
owed allegiance to the Jewish god, but any slight protection was better
than no protection or warding. It wasn’t as though the dead would
mock me for adhering to the wrong religion, after all. I inked out
the words on a piece of paper torn from the back of this very journal,
a single line from Deuteronomy 6:4: Hear O Israel, the LORD our
GOD, the LORD is ONE.
The thing is, the Mezuzah wasn’t for the dead boy, it was for
the living who I asked to hide behind it. I believe in the arcane, the
unnatural and the bizarre, but more than anything I believe in faith
and humanity and these two people trusted me. They looked to me for
help and sometimes the illusion is enough.
It wasn’t until the first rattle of the door that I began to doubt myself.
The dead truly did WALK this unholy land.
But why?
Why, to me, is always a more compelling question than how.
The answers to why are more often than not fascinating, and more
convoluted than simply because something can happen.
I heard his fingers clawing at the wooden shutters. Clawing.
Scratching. Raking down the wood.
My breathing was shallow. Quick.
What I had in mind was suicide. I knew that. And yet… I knew
that I was going to go through with it. I had no choice. Not if I wanted
to free the boy from the evil spirit clinging to his corpse and finally let
him find his eternal rest.
Armed only with an oil lantern, I crept close to the window, leaning
my back against the wall and listening. The thin yellow light offered
a glimpse of the now decomposing face as the boy grinned at me. He
raised his hands, beseeching me, begging without words. I knew what
he wanted. It was such a natural desire, he wanted to come home. Who
was I to deny him?
I whispered, barely loud enough for my words to carry back to the
boy’s parents, and yet he heard, or the thing that possessed him did. It
reeled back, howling at the night sky as though slapped, as I intoned,
“This house is protected.”
During my many ordeals I have learned much of the transmigration
of souls. Some faiths refer to it as reincarnation, but that is an over-
optimistic interpretation of the phenomenon. In the Kabbalah it is
called Gilgul. For whatever reason, a soul cannot ascend. It clings to
this place. To a person. It isn’t ready to ascend. Some call these clinging
spirits. I have heard them called Dybbuks, too.
Is the clinging spirit a sinner? Do they fear punishment or eternal
damnation? Have they been cut off from God, whatever god it is they
believe in? Or is it something more? Unfinished business? That manner
of thought offers a clue to what I had in mind, and how I hoped to deal
with this restless one. I needed to speak with the dead.
There are a pair of abjurations I learned from a Persian mystic
involving an empty vessel and a white candle that might be used to
trap a lost soul. The first involves the discovery of the clinging spirit’s
true name. True names are not necessarily the same as birth names, and
wielding them is never easy, but there is such power in a true name. In
cases of possession, speaking it with confidence, along with the second
flawlessly incanted abjuration, is enough to compel a spirit to flee the
host body, drawing it into the empty vessel which will glow a haunting,
bloody, red when the deed is done. Such is the wielder’s power that
he commands dominance over the spirit and may force it to do his
bidding, not merely retreat into the trap of the empty vessel. For that
reason, as well as many more, denizens of the other world are fiercely
protective of their true names, and more than capable of killing to keep
them secret.
Which is why what I intended to do was nothing short of insanity…
“I am going to open the door,” I warned the parents. “You are going to
hear things… awful things… It will sound like tortures unimaginable,
but remember, it is not your child. Whatever you hear, you must
remember that… It is no longer your boy.”
They did as they were told.
What had become so much more than Ezekiel continued to scratch at
the door. It was a desolate sound. Nails dragging down wood, picking
out splinters, over and over.
I opened the door.
Face-to-face the boy’s injuries were harrowing to see, as was the cruel
intelligence behind his dead eyes. “You are welcome in this place, spirit.
Enter.” I stepped aside to allow him to enter. I have a few conjurations
and abjurations at my disposal. Most are little more than tricks, but
it is how you use those tricks that counts, not how powerful they are. I
once witnessed a single man with little more than a blush of bluish light
create a legend that lives on to this day. That is the true power of it.
“What do you want here?” I demanded.
“This is my home,” the dead boy said, sounding so very reasonable.
Then he giggled, a manic sound that shattered the illusion of sanity.
“Not anymore,” I told it. “Now tell me, what is it you want here?
What do you hope to achieve? How can I help you move on?”
“I have no intention of moving on, I like it here.”
“You mistake me, spirit. I am not giving you a choice.” I began to
shape the first syllables of the abjuration on my tongue and the child
flew at me, sensing what I intended.
Even as he clawed at my eyes, seeking to blind me, I said the first
of the four lines. It tried to choke the air out of my lungs as I said the
second and the third lines, shrieking and howling out its frustration. I
couldn’t breathe. I didn’t need to. All I needed to do was whisper the
fourth and final line, compelling the spirit to name itself.
It spat the name out like it was poison on its tongue. “Morrrrrd eck…
eye… Reeeeezlah.”
I repeated it, along with the simple demand, “Let go of me.” And
the boy relinquished his choke hold on my throat. “You do not
belong in this boy,” I told it. “You are not welcome. The child has
done nothing to you. Leave his flesh, Mordecai Rizla. End the
child’s torment.” The boy’s body bucked and writhed as the evil
spirit clinging to it was expelled from nose and mouth in a black
smoke that hung in the air for a moment. The boy fell, dead again.
Before the spirit could blow away on the wind in search of another
host body, I voiced the second abjuration, forcing it into the small
glass bottle I set down on the table. The smoke streamed in tatters
around the mouth of the bottle, swirling in an eddying gyre until,
as I finished the last word of the abjuration, it coiled and curled
around itself, spilling into the mouth of the bottle. As the last curls
of black smoke disappeared inside, I capped the small glass bottle
with its cork. It was done.
The bottle glowed redly in my hand. 61
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
Possessing Spirits
Appearance
To all intents and purposes the host
body looks like it has always looked, so
a girl looks just like the same girl she
has always been, a boy looks like the
same scruffy urchin he always and so
forth. But, for all the similarities, there
are differences to be found by those who
know what they are looking for. But,
the longer the possession occurs, the
more subtle hints there are to be found
in the person’s appearance as they lose
interest in things like personal hygiene
62 and begin, slowly to exhibit signs of
decay. The mortal flesh cannot host a
possessing spirit indefinitely. And the
longer the possession, the more obvious
it is that the original person is no longer
inside their flesh.
First Impressions
Initially, they appear just like anyone
else, walking amongst us, but that
normality cannot ever last. They
are the drowned girl that crawls
across the floorboards, dripping the
memory of the water that took her
life all across the oak floor. They are
the child’s doll in the corner that
seems to be watching you, its glass
eyes following your every move as
you walk around the room. They are
the awkward, broken-necked rider
who walks beside their horse and the
old woman with rot where her teeth
used to be and dead eyes that offer a
glimpse of eternity no one should ever
be forced to see. Sometimes they are
the child that won’t stay buried.
Their presence is something
that gradually makes itself known,
sometimes in the subtlest of mistakes
where someone who truly knows the
possessed will recognise that something
is wrong, other times (like the dead
child clawing its way out of the grave)
it will be obvious from the first moment
they return.
What do the Players Know?
Spirit possession is nothing more and
nothing less than an invader taking
up residence within a human body and
wresting control of that flesh by spirits,
demons or other entities.
The concept of exists in the main
religions, and most societies across the
world.
The possession may be both
voluntary, with the person offering
themselves up as a host, or involuntary,
with the invader’s presence slowly
destroying the host. Either form of
possession can be banished by exorcism
provided the rite is performed by a
person of faith.
They are susceptible to religious
icons and items, including but not
limited to the rites contained within
holy books and items of faith like the
Christian cross.
Some believe that with the ‘gift’ of
sight, a person can see the possessing
spirit clinging to the back of the
possessed, almost as though riding it.
Main Features
✦ The possessing spirit maintains
a direct link to the memories and
abilities of its host, so the body of a
carpenter hosting a possessing spirit
will still remember how to fashion
wood, just as the body of a solider will
retain the skills with weaponry etc.
✦ The soul of a possessed host gradually
loses the anchors that bind it to the flesh,
and will drift over to the Other Side,
meaning that a successful exorcism
won’t actually save the person, only
allow it’s body to die in peace.
✦ A haunting of this nature can happen
post mortem, making it seem as
though the beloved family member
or friend has been miraculously
returned, though if that is the case,
the cost is never worth paying… as
these parasites are a health drain on all
around them, feeding off the vitality of
those who give the host shelter.
✦ If they are revealed, their primary
attack is physic, causing incredible
fear, but more insidiously they are
capable of warping the sense of reality
around them, so, for instance, they
could weave an illusion that makes it
appear as though blood is spilling out
beneath a closed door, or a skinless
corpse to appear to be reclining in a
bathtub of blood or any other mind-
shattering illusion that undermines
the sanity of the player.
✦ They can cause electrical inference
in the vicinity, generating peculiar
static interference and causing things
to vibrate at an eerie frequency that
sounds not unlike white noise to emit.
✦ They can manipulate the air
temperature, causing a room to
rapidly cool down to the point of
freezing.
✦ They can deliver both physical and
spiritual attacks upon their victims,
including inducing them to self-
harm.
To harm a possessing spirit
✦ While the host body can be ‘killed’
the presence of the possessing spirit
inside it means that the corpse can
still be used, just like any other meat
suit, though any exorcism to banish
the spirit will leave the lifeless body
behind. A dead host will, of course,
decay at a substantially faster rate
than a living one, even after the
original soul has been banished.
✦ Knowing the true name of the
possessing spirit grants the holy
priests and servants of the Lord
power over the entity within the
host, allowing them to conduct the
rituals of exorcism to drive it out.
✦ Driven out of the host, the possessing
spirit possesses the same traits as a
ghost.

 
Possessing Spirit typical stats Samples of Attacks:
The following stats represent a sample body, the corpse of a ✦ (IM 0) Brawling SV 16
common artisan or villager, possessed by a Spirit.

Trait: Psyche +6 (referred to the Spirit, not the corpse),
Constitution +4.
Physical Health Points: variable, as per normal humans but
powered-up by the new Constitution. 36 is a common value
Physical Damage levels: not applicable.
Mental Health Points: 20-100 (50 MHP is a common value).
Mental Damage levels: not applicable.
Movement: land 2 CP per 1 m (Max 10 m).
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 8-10).
Skills: Whatever is needed to suit the story. The Possessing
Spirit has both its own skills and memories and
those of the host body. For example, a Possessing
Spirit which originally was a learned Occultist and
is now possessing the body of a dead artisan can
have the following odd combination of skills.
Communication SV 9: Languages 3 (Foreign
Languages- anyone 3; Foreign Language – Latin 3,
Reading & Writing Latin 3).
Culture SV 9: Humanities 3
Esotericism SV 9: De Sodaliciorum 2 (Occult
Literature 3), Divination 2 (Numerology 3),
Left-Hand Path 3 (Black Magic 3)
Fighting SV 8: Unarmed Fighting 2 (Brawling 3)
Professions SV 8: Crafting 2 (Craftmanship 3).
Natural Weapons: Unarmed Attack (dmg 1d6 +4
Constitution).
Initiative: 0
Combat points: usually linked to the best Fighting skills
(between the Spirit and the dead host) it had in life, although
somehow powered-up and adapted to the new condition. An
example is Free 8 / Unarmed 2 (Brawling 6).
Equipment: nothing, unless it is important for the story.
The Spirit prefers to use psychic attacks and not physical
weapons.
Common Properties
Possessed Corpse
These spirits tend to possess dead bodies, preferably those of
the freshly dead since their aim is to re-enact the life of the
recently dead. The decomposition somehow slows down (it’s
up the GM to decide how much) but it usually does not stop, 63
revealing at the end the real nature of the revenant.
Possessing Spirits know who they were in their first life,
but they also have access to the memories and skills of the
previous’ owner of the body. This means that the Spirit can
choose the best SV among its own skills and those of the
deceased host.
The PHP value in the stats refers to the host body’s original
PHP but, since the Spirit does not care about pain, no physical
health level is recorded. When the PHP are reduced to ”0”
the body is too damaged to be possessed and the Spirit must
abandon it.
Wandering Spirit
A Possessing Spirit can be treated as Ghost (using also Ghost
properties, if the GM wants to), especially when out of its host
body. Possessing Spirits tend not to act unless they possess a
body and, unless the GM rules otherwise, they will always
try to possess a corpse, wandering the earth, looking for the
right host to possess. In any case, Possessing Spirits are not
destroyed unless the MHP are reduced to 0. No damage level
is recorded for these MHP.
Spiritual Parasite
As long as the Possessing Spirit will live among the living in
a possessed corpse, it will feed upon those who are in the same
area. Every living being will lose 1 MHP for every week they
are in the area. These lost Mental Points should be recorded
 separately from others, and cannot be recovered unless the
victim leaves the place and go far from the Possessing Spirit
(those who are under the Spirit’ spell cannot leave by the own
will, see ”Forced Behaviour”).
Every week the sum of all these lost MHP will feed the
Possessing Spirit which can use the same point to heal its own
MHP or to heal lost PHP of the host body.
Environmental control
Possessing spirits may raise or lower the environment’s
temperature or, by causing electrical inference, they can emit
odd noises, causing things to vibrate. Anyone noticing these
unnatural phenomena will suffer 1d6 MHP.
Forced Acceptance
Once they possess a body, the Possessing Spirit try to re-enact
the victims’ lives. The relatives and friends, especially if they
know that the host is dead, usually realize that something
wrong is happening, however the Possessing Spirit’ power
will force them to accept the dead back to their world. A
Situation Roll equal to 10 (modified by the victim’s Psyche)
is necessary to openly refuse the contradiction and not allow
the possessed corpse back to the family or group. Those who
fail may even consciously know that their relative or friend
is dead, but they are also psychologically forced on not
opposing the return of the deceased among the living. With
64 time the Possessing Spirit will not be able to keep a proper
illusion (due to a real lack of interest for the way the living
live or because the decomposition starts again) and therefore
the GM may allow new Situation Rolls.
Unnatural Strength
The possessed body’s original Constitution is often
powered-up by +4. The Spirit uses this augmented strength
to dig its way through the tomb. This is also the reason why
the host corpses of many Possessing Spirits have damaged
fingernails, since they have been used to dig through the soil.
Visions of terror
When discovered a Possessing Spirit will prefers to use its
own form of mental attack, forcing painful feelings and insane
visions into the victims’ minds. The Possessing Spirit cannot
perform other actions while doing this attack. All the living
persons around the Spirit should make a Situation Roll with
SV 10 (modified by Psyche). Those who succeed will suffer
only 1 MHP but will also realize that they are facing unreal
hallucinations. Those who fail will suffer 1d10 (OR 9-10)
MHP from intense fear.
If this damage is enough to make the victim reach the
third level of Mental Health (“Mens Amissa” or “Lunatic”)
the GM should force the victim to make another Situation
Roll with SV 10 (modified by Psyche) to avoid performing
some self-harming act, like trying to suicide in order to stop
the visions.
Vulnerabilities
Possessing Spirits may have the same vulnerabilities of
Ghosts, although the GM is encouraged to tailor them to the
single specific Possessing Spirit. Furthermore, the following
vulnerabilities are more typical of Possessing Spirits.
✦ They usually can possess corpses which received proper
religious funerals but, oddly enough, once the body is
possessed it cannot pass through religiously holy wards or
areas. This may sometimes vary according to the Possessing
Spirit original religion (e.g. a Jewish Mezuzah may be more
effective in blocking a spirit which originally belonged to a
Jew), although they all feel some kind of block in front of
holy places and artefacts.
✦ Knowing the original, true name of the Possessing Spirit
will grant power over it. Christian priests, Jewish rabbis
and other religious officers using a Divine Art of any type
(e.g. the Exorcism in Lex Libris p.234) exploiting the true
name of the specific spirit will get a +15 bonus to their
roll and any damage dealt by the art is doubled. Those
using Dark Arts specifically against this spirit will get a
+10 bonus. Finally, even without knowing any secret art,
anyone can use the true name to force the spirit to leave a
possessed body or to make it stop any violent attack. The
spirit is forced to obey to these commands, even if coming
from somebody without any spiritual or sorcerous power.
Optional Properties
Possessing Spirits can use the optional properties of Ghosts
and, more rarely, those of Spectres and Wraiths. Possessing
Spirits, in fact, prefer psychic forms of attack rather than pure
physical violence, although they may often combine both.
Claws and Fangs
Some Possessing Spirits have the ability to make the host
body develop claws or fangs, possibly even retractable ones.
Claws deal 1d10 (OR 10) PHP + Constitution bonus (usually
+4) and the Brawling-locked CP can be used for claws.
On the other hand, a bite inflicts 1d10 (OR 9-10) and it is
automatically inflicted when a Grapple is won.
Force Suicide
Some Possessing Spirits have a higher version of the “Vision of
Terror” which can be activated triggering the hallucinations
into a single victim rather than on all those who are in the
area. In this case success will inflict 1d10 MHP while failure
will deal 2d10 (OR 9-10) MHP.
Possess living body
Stronger Possessing Spirits can possess the body a living
person. The victim must succeed a Situation Roll with a SV of
10 modified by Psyche to resist. From that moment onwards
the victim’s body will be possessed by the Spirit while victim
‘soul will slowly drift away. Every week the victim will lose
1d10 MHP. When the MHP will reach 0 the soul of the victim
is lost forever to the Other Side, even if the host body is freed
from the Possessed Spirit. If the host body is destroyed, the
victim ‘soul will also go to the Other Side, even if its MHP
have not been extinguished.
Unnatural Movement
Some possessed corpse may acquire impossible ways of
moving like levitating for a short time and short distances,
climbing steep almost vertical walls or burrowing through
the soil. Anyone witnessing these acts must suffer 1d6 MHP
on top of the normal Fear Factor of the Possessing Spirit.
Possessing Spirits-related Secrets Arts
Exorcism (Lex Libris p.234) deal mental damage to the Spirit.
The same amount is subtracted from PHP, only in the case of a
possessed corpse and not in the case of a possessed living body.
Reveal the name
New Dark Art, Right-Hand Path
The ancient magi of Old Persia knew the power that names
have on dangerous spirits and demons, therefore they devised
this ritual to force the entities to reveal the secret names.
Somebody says that the secret of this spell is carved in ancient
symbols on a rock-cut wall in Paphlagonia, dating to the times
of the Achaemenid empire. On the other hand, a few Persian
sorcerers still know the spell which is practiced in Iran and
Mesopotamia.
This Art can be used against Possessing Spirits but also
against the other entities and demons which can be hindered
by their true names.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -8
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 8
✦ Discipline: The Right-hand Path level 3
✦ Specialty: White Magic level 3
Other Requirements
✦ Communication SV 7, Languages Discipline level 1,
Foreign language: Old Persian level 1.
Material Requirements
✦ Possibility to speak at loud voice
Effect
Four lines in Old Persian must be spelled in order to properly
activate this power which may take a few rounds. During this
time period the target spirit will certainly try to fight for
stopping the sorcerer to stop spelling the words. To establish
how long it takes to complete the ritual, follow this sequence.
✦ In the first round the caster makes the Esotericism roll
to activate the art. If successful go to the following step.
Otherwise nothing happens.
✦ During the second round a Communication skill roll must
be performed to complete the sequence in Old Persian. If
successful, the power is activated at the end of the caster’s
turn in this round. On the other hand, if the Communication
roll is failed, the sorcerer must wait the following round to
make a new roll and try again for other rounds, until the
power is activated (or the Possessing Spirit has managed to
stop the sorcerer through violent means).
In the case of very unlucky rolls this power can take several
rounds to be activated. When it is finally activated the Spirit
will freeze, stopping its attacks, and it will be forced to reveal
its true name.
Imprisoning Bottle
New Dark Art, Right-Hand Path
This power is complementary to the other one, described
above, since it needs the knowledge of the True Name. It has
been used mainly to imprison wandering Spirits and Ghosts.
It may or may not be useful with Djinns (if they have True 65
Names), but it is up to the GM to decide about it.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -5
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 9
✦ Discipline: The Right-hand Path level 3
✦ Specialty: White Magic level 3
Other Requirements
✦ Knowledge of the True Name of the spirit which is bound
to be imprisoned.
✦ Communication SV 7, Languages Discipline level 1,
Foreign language: Old Persian level 1.
Material Requirements
An empty bottle and something to close it.
✦
Effect
If power is successful the targeted spirit will be imprisoned
inside the bottle which turns red in colour, as if containing
something vivid like a supernatural fire. If the bottle is
ever broken, the Spirit will be free (and it will certainly
try to take revenge on the sorcerer). The Spirit inside
the bottle can be killed only through Exorcisms or other
MHP-damaging powers.
66
 Spirit of Death and Vengeance
T wo roads diverged in the ancient woodland. I
followed the road more travelled, reasoning that
it would lead me quicker to civilisation than the
other track.
Birdsong was rife.
The air was alive with the delights of Autumn coming into Winter
and day lowering into night.
I could smell the heady aromas of fresh turned soil, and assumed
somewhere not far away a farmer laboured in the fields. This was old
land. It had been tribal territory back in the days of the early Celts.
I knew, no more than a mile from where I was, there was the most
spectacular monument to their ingenuity and faith; a field of dolmen,
huge monolithic stones arranged in row upon row, that stretched as far
as the eye could see. I had often pondered what such a construction might
be, and in my more fanciful imaginings wondered if it were not some
form of battery for the earth’s magic? Wouldn’t that be a marvellous
thing? That these ancient people had realised their connection with the
land and found a way to harness that connection to forge a bond that
was nothing short of magical?
Amid these ancient stones I am told there is a monument, a stone
head, said to be the likeness of the cruel god, Crom Cruach.
The Christians would have us believe there is no magic left in
this place and that their blessed Patrick ended worship of this dark
and hungry god, smashing the stone idol, but I believe that is little
67
more than wishful thinking. This is a god named for slaughter, often
nicknamed the bloody head.
In my experience, a dark faith like this does not simply die out.
And that is why I am here, seeking another truth, from the strands
of another legend.
On that plain, known as Magh Slecht, the fabled High King,
Tighermas fell; on Halloween night, October 31st, 1413. As fate would
have it, this very night, a little over five hundred years since passed.
It was an auspicious date. All Hallows.
I intended to make a visit to the fields to pay my respects as the
High King was a fascinating soul; the first king to have gold smelted
in Ireland, the first to have his clothes dyed purple, blue and green,
and decorated with brooches and finery. These sort of firsts are
mundane, I grant you, but they show a level of forward thinking and
understanding of time’s arrow. But it is not these modernnesses that
catch my imagination. I have always found the legends more appealing
that the facts, as there is often more truth in them than our mundane
world would ever like to admit. And Tighermas was a man around
which many such legends and tall tales were woven, there can be no
denying that.
But the most compelling of them all, I believe, was the last of them.
Humour me.
There are conflicting stories about his death, as there are with any
good legend, but the one I choose to believe closest to the truth—the one
that has brought me out to his death field—is that he was slaughtered
 before those huge monoliths, along with four thousand warriors who
had gathered from the clans to give devotion to Crom Cruach.
Four thousand warriors. It might not sound a huge number to our
modern thinking, but three quarters of the men of Ireland died that
night.
It is as dark a legend as any I have uncovered on this emerald isle.
It is easy, I believe to picture such a gathering, the wizened old druid,
at one with this nature, standing in the heart of it, dirty robes and
emaciated arms raised high, calling forth the magic of the lord of
slaughter, ready to give their blood sacrifice—not merely a knife across
the throat and the corpse left to bleed out its soul into the land where
Crom Cruach lay, feeding off their offerings, no, this dark and hungry
god demanded his sacrifices beheaded.
This is a god who claimed their first born in return for a bountiful
harvest, not some benevolent diety. Those children were killed, their
skulls smashed in on the stone head of Crom Cruach, their blood left to
drip down the stone to feed the ground.
These legends are all recorded; they are written in texts including the
Metrical Dindshenchas, the Annals of the Four Masters, Lebor Gebála
Érenn, and more.
And on this night of all nights, the Crom Cruach’s appetite could
not be sated, so even as Tighermas and his druid offered up the child
of their chosen offering, dashing out the poor boy’s brains on the stone
head of Crom Cruach, the diety moved amongst them, taking on the
form of the Dullahan, a headless rider upon a night-black horse, who
carried a head with burning eyes in his left hand, which he brandished
68 like a lantern, and a whip fashioned from the spinal columns of his
victims in the other.
No words escaped the Dullahan’s lips as it rode amongst the four
thousand, on a blood feast that knew no sating. A wicked smile spread
from ear to ear as it moved through the warriors, its own head held
high so that it might better see its victims and their suffering. Not until
the last, when it lashed its bone whip, stinging blood from Tighermas’s
cheek, opening a wound deep enough to expose the bone beneath, and
with a crooked finger, whispered his name, the Dullahan summoning
the High King’s soul to travel with him.
With the killing done, Patrick was supposed to have split the stone
and banished the demon trapped within it all the way to Hell—but
that part of the story is fairy tale. Christian propaganda. Magh Slecht
was the heart of suffering for this venerable land, and as ever, the
Christians came and wanted to stamp their own stories across the top
of the truth and make their own One True God seem so much more
vital and important than he was before Constantine decided he was
worthy of worship. If they couldn’t convince the folk to abandon their
worship of the old ways and their old gods they would simply build
their new churches on those old holy sites and claim their holy days as
their own and throw accusations of witchcraft in the faces of the pagan
non-believers.
Across the water, we know the Dullahan as the Grim Reaper by
another name, dark, skeletal, burning cavities for eyes, a scythe for a
bone whip, but it is the same monster. In other lands he is called the
headless horseman. Whatever his name, he is a gatherer of souls.
An aspect of the legend I have always liked is how it brought in
the High King’s own forward thinking, and claimed that the headless
Dullahan harboured an irrational fear of gold. That is how all of the
best stories work, they weave fable around truth, but more often than
not there is a grounding for that fable—in this case the slaughter of four
thousand men in one of the bloodiest nights in the history of this land.
I rode on, my imagination running wild with thoughts of those cruel
old gods of this place and their adherents drawing deep to conjure forth
the strangeness and charms needed for the crops in these very fields to
flourish and demanding blood from their flock.
Truth is, I could just as easily imagine three quarters of the men
of Ireland falling to the swords of Christian invaders as I could some
bone-whip wielding monstrous god, and that god could just as easily
be a cruel chieftain of a rival clan, but that is how legends grow. Little
truths become bigger lies.
I would have laughed the whole uneasy feeling off, but for the fact
that I heard the drumming of hooves on the road behind me, coming
fast.
I moved to the side of the track, to allow the wagon and his entourage
to pass, but they did not. They slowed, the lead rider leading his mount
to mine, a hand raised in greeting.
“You don’t want to be out on the road come sundown, stranger,” the
man said without preamble. There was no greeting, no exchange of
pleasantries. “Not on this night of all nights.”
I said nothing, playing stupid in the hope he might explain what
had put the fear of God into him and his companions.
“The black rider is abroad,” he said, as though that should explain
everything.
“A highwayman?”
He shook his head, looking at me as though I were simple.
“You are not from around these parts, are you, man? It’s the
anniversary. He always rides out this night, with a name on his lips.”
I knew exactly who—or rather what—he meant when he said that. The
Dullahan. Looking for his allotted souls. “You don’t want the rider
catching up with you. Ride with us. We are headed to Cill na Fheart.
We have some miles to go, but there is safety in numbers,” he promised.
Tall trees and deep shadows guarded the road ahead. The leaves, yet
to turn from green to gold, offered a soft mantle of bramble and thistle,
meaning it was impossible to simple duck into the trees and run from
the road if the need arose.
We rode on, driving our animals hard; their fear was contagious, but
that is so often the nature of fear. I did not dare slow or allow my beast
to rest until the thatched roofs of the village came into sight.
The town is the site of the holy well and ancient fort Fossa Slecht,
there were rolling dolmens—shallow hills—and stone cairns and all
manner of other monoliths and standing stones along the road, as the
town was still so close to the battlefield, even so it was hard to imagine
this place as the sight of such suffering.
I chanced to look over my shoulder as we approached what were the
limits of the town, and saw it, I swear; the wreaths of flame snorting
from the huge mount’s flaring nostrils, eyes pits of coal, clothed in black
cloak, his head held out to one side like a lantern to light the way as
the Dullahan rode us down.
My follow riders spurred their mounts on, digging their heels into
their animal’s flanks and pulling hard on their manes as they whooped,
urging the animals to fly. It was all I could do to keep pace with them,
but the wagon master didn’t have a prayer. The steel-rimmed wheels of
his cart rattled and juddered through the ruts of the track, the skeins
of wool rocking about on the flatbed. The master lashed the two horses
pulling his wagon with his whip, urging them to gallop, but the poor
beasts had been pulling their burden for a full day and were dead on
their feet.
I looked back over my shoulder, then towards the lights of the
thatched church and the holy well, and saw a priest in the doorway,
face grim, golden crucifix in hand, and felt as though I had stumbled
into the midst of some ancient theatre that had played itself out over
and over again and I was the only one who did not know how the story
ended; though even I could have guessed at this point.
The Dullahan spurred its otherworldly mount on to greater and
greater speeds, its huge gait devouring the distance between headless
rider and the wool merchant faster than even my worst fears. I looked
back towards the church. There wasn’t a prayer of the merchant
reaching sanctuary before the Dullahan rode him down. But, bless
him, he tried. His bodyguards didn’t slow to help him. They spurred
their own mounts on, eyes on the safety of the church. Their only
thoughts were to reach the light. I was torn between wanting to help the
poor bastard in the cart and saving my own skin.
In the end the choice was taken from me.
The Dullahan’s bone whip lashed out, biting into the back of the
wagon master and gouging deep despite the thick coat he wore. The
cloth fell away to expose a gash that ran the length of his spine, exposing
the fillets of meat either side of the bone. I didn’t hear his screams. The
only thing I heard was the ungodly rasp of the headless horseman
breathing out his name, “Aiden Mohr,” and claiming his soul.
I have never seen a soul leave the flesh, not like this.
The stuff of the ether was ripped out of the wagon master’s skin
through the gash the Dullahan had opened in his back, and seemed
to ripple across the night, a bluish flame that crackled and snapped
along the length of the bone whip, sparking and chasing across the
gaps between each vertebrae. There were no features, for souls do not
have faces, I swear, but there was no mistaking what I was witnessing.
My mount wasn’t about to linger so close to the otherworldly creature;
it snorted, reared and ran on, hooves clattering on the hard stone as I
reached the holy well.
“Come! Quick!” the priest yelled from the doorway. “For the love of
God, man! Run!”
I dropped down the side of my horse, slapped the animal’s flank
urging it to run, and without a backward glance, ran for the door, arms
and legs pumping furiously as I chased the other men inside.
I fell across the threshold, breathless, finally daring to look back.
The headless horseman rode on, scattering the gates of the churchyard
with a careless flick of the wrist that sent the iron gates clattering into
the walls beside them. It was his eyes though, burning from a skull
held loosely by the knot of wild hair, that held me rooted to the spot,
even if I had found holy ground. They were like pits of lava in a bone-
white face. Trying to hold their gaze was akin to staring into the very
inferno itself, where Crom Cruach burned for all of his vile depravities.
And still the rider rode on, coming down the winding path through
the churchyard to the open door where we stood behind the priest, as
though some how his golden cross could save us.
“You are not welcome here, rider,” the priest intoned, his voice carrying
surprising conviction given the horror on the threshold.
The rider’s beast stamped the hard-packed dirt and tossed its head,
mane flowing, nostrils flaring, the flames licking out from within the
damned animal every bit as harrowing as the lava-pit eyes of its master.
It stood comfortably at 18 hands, a giant of an animal in every regard.
The lips of the mouth set in the decapitated head swinging in the
rider’s hand moved as though trying to speak some condemnation of
the priest, but the holy man’s name was not on the rider’s lips as he
stepped forward, leaving the sanctuary of consecrated ground, and
thrust the golden cross out—not at the horse, nor the rider’s powerful
frame, but rather at the swinging head, forcing the rider back and
back one step at a time until he was back through the broken gates
and out on the cobbles beside the holy well. The wool merchant’s
wagon stood by the side of the road, the man himself hunched over on 69
the driver’s board, reins still tangled around his wrists, head between
his legs.
The priest raised the golden cross higher, and drove the headless
horseman back another step and another, until he had reached the
side of the wagon and was able to wrap the leather reins around his
wrist. “I claim this soul for the one true god,” he told the black rider.
“Aiden Mohr is not yours to take.” And with that, began to lead the two
animals towards the church grounds.
The Dullahan stared at the holy man, reaper to protector of souls,
and loosed a godawful shriek that was surely a rival for any banshee
howl, horse rising on its hind legs, forelegs kicking out as the black
rider turned and galloped back into the falling night.
In the crack of thunder that followed a fork of brilliant blue lightning
in an otherwise cloudless sky, I heard a sound unlike any I had ever
heard: the souls of four thousand men crying out, lost souls.
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
Spirits of Death and Vengeance
An abomination is a troubled soul that
for some reason cannot severe the bond
between this world and the next.
More often than not, the soul is in
distress, and that distress is the direct
result of their death. Something is
created when their lives end, either
through an accident or murder, that
causes the soul to become locked in a
form of limbo, sometimes in the world
of the dead and sometimes in the living,
or the grey spaces in between. It is
not uncommon for the deceased to be
70 unaware of their passing, which sees
them try to go about their day to day
routines as though still alive, tied forever
to those same rooms they occupied in
life. It isn’t always a room that binds a
spirit. Sometimes it can be a person or
an object that acts as an anchor, holding
the dead in this place.
This can result in a duality in terms
of the spirit’s nature. In simplistic terms,
when we deal with the dead we are as
likely to face those with good intentions
as we are those with bad. The good may
look to somehow help their surroundings,
seeking to understand why they have
been left behind instead of seeing the
reward of paradise. In many ways,
these souls are ready for the afterlife,
and have accepted that their time here
should be over. Evidentiary testimonies
would suggest what binds these spirits
to mortality can be something as simple
as shame; that in life they perpetrated
some act so shameful they cannot leave
this place without forgiveness. Equally,
they might well be the victims unable
find peace until their killer is brought to
justice.
What is most interesting in terms of
this duality and the relationship between
good and evil is that those spirits we
might simply call evil often remain in
this world for the same reasons as those
we more easily consider to be good, not
for some ignoble purpose.
But that by no means accounts for
all; some have lived such a vicious life
that they can do no no more or less than
what they did when they were alive—
tormenting the living—and in death
they have more unearthly powers to help
them spread fear and anguish, so they find
themselves relishing this between-state.
One must assume that a soul suddenly
forced to leave its earthly life will only do
so with great bitterness, as it is not done
experiencing the wonders of creation. It
is that bitterness that festers, creating
the evil anguish that twists and distorts
the mind of the spirit to the point that all
they can imagine in avenging themselves
upon the living, so strong is their envy.
These vengeful spirits remain bound to
buildings, people and totems much as the
kindly ones are, for much the same reasons:
they are not done with the evil they seek
to spread, they hate so much that they
cannot find any rest until the object of their
obsession is dead, their jealousy of a person
drives them to haunt them, or they seeth
with anger, a cankerous festering in their
soul, that can only be sated with revenge.
Another consideration worthy of study
is the nature of the flesh left behind and
its bond to the spirit. The anguished
soul may have become detached from its
physical body, but that body was lived in,
and capable of rot and mutilation, even if
it is nothing more than a shell for the soul,
they are bonded in ways we do not yet
fully comprehend. It is believed by some
that burning and salting the bones of the
dead can be an effective measure when it
comes to banishing the lingering spirits.
Unique individuals
Dullahan
Rumours are rife throughout the
countryside of Europe, each bearing
remarkable similarity to the next in
their tales of headless riders, horsemen
wielding corpse lights to lure the
unsuspecting traveller off the road into
the deep woods, and more. These accounts
are so prevalent we a the Royal Society
have begun to think of them as their own
family of undead rather than a sub-spirit
of ghost. In Ireland, the Dullahan is one of
the most frightening haunts of the Celtic
highways and byways. The decapitated
rider roams the roads on blacker than
black horse, wreathed in a thick shroud of
fog, his own head under one arm. In his
other hand, the warrior Dullahan holds
either a whip fashioned from the spines of
dead men or a sword that burns a ghostly
flame. The Dullahan haunts the foggy
landscape, a being of the mists. He roams
all over Ireland unchecked. Should he
set his sights on you, he will pursue you
relentlessly across hill and valley, untiring.
If the old wives tales are to be believed,
the only thing that will protect its quarry
from the Dullahan’s wrath is gold thrown
into its path, though the truth of that is
questionable, as very few have survived to
give an accounting of their tangles with
the headless horseman.
Captain Saragossa
There are a motley crew of renowned
and feared pirates with names to chill
the blood, Edward Teach, or Black Beard
as he is better remembered, Calico Jack,
Black Caeser, Stede Bonnet, and more,
and they all share one common heritage:
they each met and learned from Captain
Saragossa.
No records of Saragossa’s life survive,
though there are plenty of stories and
seamen who claim to have encountered
his anguish, or much, much worse, his
animated skeleton still bound by the
angers of death, upon the high seas.
Some claim Captain Saragossa was the
victim of horrific injustice the dying
man swore never to lie in the grave,
while others would have us believe
that a sea witch swore a curse upon the
legendary pirate captain which cannot
be lifted.
Regardless, Captain Saragossa is both
a terrible and violent enemy and anyone
venturing out upon the high seas would
be well served to run at the first sight
of his flag snapping in the breeze before
the dead calm settles upon their vessel.
Captain Saragossa commands an
ancient warship, Almira the Mermaid,
which was once the jewel of the Spanish
Crown’s armada—right up until the
fateful night in 1631 that Saragossa
spirited it away. The warship is fully
equipped with cannons and lavettes, and
piloted by Saragossa’s skeleton crew.
Saragossa has been known to leave
his ship and wander the streets of the
coastal cities looking for trouble, and
men to join his dead crew, though the
curse that rests upon him means that he
may never venture more than an hour
away from the sea.
The Sleeping Maid
Sophie, a chambermaid, was a beautiful
young woman with both charisma
and, some would say, a radiance to her
that was almost hypnotic. She had an
effect on boys and men, who found
themselves helpless in her presence.
Some would even say she was an angel
fallen directly from heaven to torment
them.
This kind of beauty brings petty
jealousies out in others. It has always
been thus. And so it was with Maria, the
spoiled daughter of a noble lord. Several
times when merchants sons and other
petty nobles came to court seeking the
favour of the young Maria, they fell mute
with amazement, not at her, but rather at
the charms of her chambermaid.
Rumours of the beautiful
chambermaid spread quickly amongst
the eligible young men of the
duchies, and before long it was the
chambermaid that drew the courtiers
to the castle, not the promise of Maria
and her dowry.
Jealousy is a terrible thing. But it is
perhaps the most human of emotions. It
certainly drove Maria, who knew that
she had no choice but to get rid of the
girl who must surely have been sent by
the devil himself to torment her. It was
no great hardship to sneak into the girl’s
chambers, nor to gather her feather pillow
in both hands and press down against
Sophie’s face, suffocating the life out of
her before she could fully realise what was
happening. It wasn’t much of a fight, over
in moments as the beautiful girl’s heart
gave out. Maria looked down at the dead
chambermaid, thinking to herself that she
did not look so pretty in death, her face
twisted, her hands like claws where they
had clutched at the pillow uselessly.
No one else in the chamber stirred;
all of the other maids and household
servants sleeping on quite unaware that
death was amongst them. And if they
had woken to Sophie’s death rattle, well,
at least they had enough sense to pretend
they slept on, and that was enough.
For a while life in the castle went on,
few mourning the dead girl. She was
only a chambermaid, after all. But, a
few months after her murder the first
mystery occurred. It was not much in
the way of haunting; a few little things
like the candlelights being blown out, or
the sudden child of an icy draft steeling
into a corridor, a book falling from the
shelf. Little things. But then came the
first sighting; a light in a dark corridor, a
dimly lit and translucent girl walking lost
through the passageways of the castle,
dressed in a nightgown. The second and
third sightings were similar, and for a
while they remained almost innocent, but
as they year wore on each new sighting
became increasingly more threatening
than the last until a valet walked through
a corridor when a shrieking spirit raged
clean out of the wall, and in the faltering
candlelight he saw the twisted features,
and long long teeth, that he recognised
as the dead chambermaid.
What he had never admitted was that
he had been there, in that room when
Maria choked the life out of her maid,
and that he had heard her struggles but
had been too frightened to intervene.
There were five others in the room
that night, and each of them witnessed
the twisted features of the dead maid
raging out of the very walls of the castle
that had become her tomb.
Until that fateful night when the
anguished spirit could no longer be
contained, and the translucent girl sat
astride the young noble Maria’s bucking
body, pressing down with an equally
translucent pillow across the young 71
woman’s terrified face as though the
ghost could somehow choke the life out
of her murderer.
Come dawn, Maria fled the place,
determined to put as much distance
between herself and the ghostly reminder
of her crime, but that was not enough to
sate the spirit of Sophie, who continued
to haunt the old castle for years and years
to come, roaming the corridors in her
nightgown, straddling the sleeping bodies
of any women foolish enough to remain
under the castle’s roof come nightfall.
It is no place for beauty now.
The Ålleberg Knights
Twelve riders fought side-by-side with the
Swedish Queen, Margareta, in the Battle of
Åsele, in the Year of Our Lord 1389.
Each was clad in the golden armour and
jewelled helmets befitting their bond with
the queen. They were sworn to her, and
so fierce was their allegiance that when
Margareta fell, they retreated from the
field of battle and retired into a chamber
deep within the mountains to rest until
the day she called upon them again.
 For year after year they twelve
slumbered upon stone altars, waiting.
Everything was peaceful.
Ålleberg’s parish was the very epitome of
tranquillity. There was no enemy to fight.
All that changed one fearful day when
a stranger stumbled upon the entrance
to the mountain hall and thinking to
find lost treasures to make his fortune,
entered the crypt and woke the riders
from their eternal slumber.
The twelve knights rose, gripping
the hilts of their swords, ready to fight
for the queen and realm they served
even in death.
Too scared by what he had stumbled
upon to explain to the dead knights that
they were free to rest now and forever,
the grave robber fled in wild panic.
Ever since, the knights of Ålleberg
have haunted the countryside in search
of their queen so they might once again
offer up their swords in her name.
Characteristics
72 The Headless Horseman is often described
as the ghost of a soldier who suffered
horrific injuries during a bitter war, losing
his head. The ghostly horsemen haunt the
roads surrounding the churchyard where
its mortal remains are buried. As the sun
rises it is believed the ghost rides like the
Devil himself is on his heels in a desperate
rush to return to the cemetery grounds
after their night’s terror.
The solider could come from any armed
force, Bavarian, Parisian, British, there are
a world of opportunities for the Games
Master to amuse themselves. In Scottish
folklore it is a clansman, killed in battle,
and both he and his mount are headless.
In Celtic mythology the rider is more
demonic in nature. The expert from
Clement Birkenbosch’s journal is about
this hunter, the dullahan, which translates
somewhat loosely from the Irish into the
dark man. He is a more dangerous figure
than the simple ghosts of some regions
because when the dullahan calls out a
name, a death occurs.
Another variant of the horseman is
the headless driver of a black carriage
who rides the lonely night roads
looking for passengers to drag to Hell.
Thigh bones make up the spokes of the
black carriage’s wheels, and skulls are
mounted on the corners, with candles
within the eyes to light the way.
First Impressions
Around midnight on feast days,
this black-robed horseman may be
seen riding a dark steed across the
countryside. The horseman is often seen
to be carrying his head like a lantern
with it swinging from the pommel of his
saddle while wreaths of steam rise from
his mount’s flared nostrils.
The dullahan is a more macabre variant
of the headless horseman, a demonic
creature of the fae, who carries his head
under his arm and wields a whip fashioned
from the bones of a human corpse’s spine.
The rider towers over the road.
The horse is always a black beast,
powerful and fast and relentless in the hunt.
The horseman comes riding out of
the mist, an ethereal figure with eyes
that burn with unearthly fire.
The head in the horseman’s hands
is pale and waxen, with a hideous grin
spread across it. Black eyes dart back
and forth. The severed head is imbued
with an eerie luminescence, allowing the
rider to use it as a lantern to guide its
way along the darkened country roads.
What do the Players Know?
The origins of the dullahan are not
known for certain, but it is believed by
occultists to be the embodiment of an
ancient Celtic god, Crom Dubh, or Black
Crom, a fertility god who demanded
human lives each year, the most favoured
method of sacrifice? Decapitation.
A great deal of player knowledge
will depend upon the kind of headless
horseman they encounter, be it the
ghostly apparition of the fallen solider
whose bones lie in the local cemetery
and obey the other natural laws
of haunting, or the more demonic
horseman, like the Celtic dullahan who
is essentially the physical embodiment
of death in that culture.
A similar figure, the gan ceann can
be frightened away by wearing a gold
object or putting one in his path.
Main Features
✦ Wherever the dullahan stops, a
mortal dies. It has limited powers of
speech, though if the horseman says
your name he lays claim upon your
soul. His claim is irresistible.
✦ The dullahan is possessed of
supernatural sight—by holding his
severed head aloft, the horseman can
see for incredible distances, even on
the darkest night.
✦ The horseman can see unerringly in
the darkness.
✦ They are natural riders and will
never fall from their mount no matter
how perilous the chase. Separated
from their steed, the horsemen are
considerably weakened and vulnerable.
✦ The horseman can sense the home
of a dying person, no matter how far
from the road it lies.
✦ The sight of the horseman in full
flight can be enough to render
onlookers temporarily blind.
✦ The steed snorts flame and smoke,
which can cause the undergrowth
to burn.
✦ No gate is barred to the rider—they
merely fly open as the great beast
charges towards them.
✦ The bone whip is a lethal weapon, magical
in nature and capable of delivering
wounds that will not easily heal.
✦ As they were warriors and knights in
their past lives, the horseman make
for fearsome fighters.
To harm a headless horsemen
✦ They are especially vulnerable to gold in
any form, be it coins, candlesticks, rings
or other trinkets. The only thing that
can be sure to turn back the horseman
is gold scattered across its path. This
is a throwback to the older days where
gold was incredibly rare and precious,
its value unrivalled, so in leaving it the
characters are making a sacrifice, just as
the older people did to Black From.
  
Spiritof D eath and Vengeance
typical stats
The following stats represent the most common Spirit of
Death, a headless horseman who has been violently killed
on a battlefield. This Headless Horseman rides a black horse
whose stats are not given, since the animal is part of the
same spiritual manifestation and they never fail Agility roll
regarding horsemanship.
Traits: Constitution +4, Dexterity +4
Mental Health Points: 20-100 (60 MHP is a common value).
Mental Damage levels: not applicable.
Movement: 24 m (see the common properties).
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 7-10).
Skills: depending on the previous life’s skills, although
most have high combat skills like these
Fighting SV 10:Battle Experience 2 (Combat
Reaction 3), Close Combat 3 (Right 1H Weapons 5),
Unarmed 3 (Brawling 5).
Stealth SV 10: Detection 1 (Observation 3).
Initiative: +12
Combat points: Free 12 / Close Combat Weapons 3 (Right
1H weapons 10) / Unarmed 3 (Brawling 10).
Equipment: Spirit-made weapon which can have many shapes
like a sword or a whip and can be used only by the spirit. It is
indestructible and it deals dmg 2d10 (OR 9-10) +4 Constitution.
See also the ”Deadly Attack” entry among the properties.
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM +12) Sorcerous Sword SV 15, SV 10.
✦ (IM +12) Fist SV 15, SV 10.
Common Properties
Spirit Body
Spirits of death manifest through bodies made of spirit-
condensed matter. They can physically harm people but, on
the other hand, they cannot be harmed by normal weapons
(while sorcerous and blessed weapons may have some effect).
This nature is also reflected by their lack of PHP, since their
bodies are not real.
These spirits have only MHP but mental damage level
should not be recorded. When the MHP are reduced to 0
the spirit disappears, although it is up to the GM to establish
whether this effect is long-lasting or not.
Deadly Attack
Whatever is shape this attack (whip, sword, etc.), it is almost
always deadly. When a victim is hit, before rolling damage, a
situation roll is due with SV 10 (modified by victim’s Psyche).
On a success the victim suffers the damage suggested in the
stats above. On a failure the victim automatically dies.
In the case that a victim survives, the wounds dealt by the
Deadly Attack are difficult to heal. The natural healing rate
(Lex Libris p.26) is reduced by 1 step (e.g. Health 0 will not
heal 1 point every day but 1 point every other day, as if the
Health was -1). Health -4 heals 1 point every 5th day.
Relentless Pursuer
A Spirit of Death, whatever his manifestation (a horseman on
a horse, a flying spirit, etc..) always move at its maximum rate
of movement (usually 24 meters) without any need to spend
CP or to make skill rolls. Furthermore, no gate or obstacle
can block the Spirit: doors and gates will just fly open.
Deadly Senses
Since it is made of pure spirit, this creature’ senses are not
hindered by darkness. Furthermore, this Spirit will always
know the position of somebody who is dying (Physical Health
Level 4, “Vulnus Letale”), wherever the dying person is.
Vulnerabilities
The GM may use the vulnerabilities of Ghosts, Wraiths
and Spectres, choosing whatever seems fit for the particular 73
Spirit of Death and Vengeance. Furthermore, the following
vulnerabilities are typical of Headless Horsemen
✦ Dullahan and other Celtic-related Headless Horsemen will stop
pursuing a victim if gold is thrown on the ground. Many Spirits
will even flee away (especially the Dullahan who embodies old
Celtic beliefs). Other Spirits of Death (e.g. the Gan Ceann) can
even be frightened by those wearing golden jewels.
✦ Spirits of Death and Vengeance can enter sacred grounds
(like churchyards or cemeteries), although they may be
blocked by more sacred relics. A Priest or other religious
authority can banish a Spirit of Death from a place or save
a soul which has been recently been stolen by the Dullahan
by making a Situation Roll with a SV 10 modified by the
priest’s Psyche. In the case of Dullahan and other Celtic-
linked spirits, using a golden cross will add +5 SV.
✦ There is no normal way for the Horseman to leave its steed.
However, if this happens (usually by powerful sorcerous
means), the Spirit will become weakened, with its MHP
becoming normal PHP which can be diminished through
normal, mortal weapons.
✦ Most Spirits of Death are blocked into some status: headless
horsemen must always run, Captain Saragossa cannot stan
away from the sea for more than one hour.
✦ Spirits of Death originated from tragic deaths can
sometimes be placated by resolving their conflicts, burying
or burning their bones or covering them with salt.
 Optional Properties
Each Spirit of Death is different, and the GM may use common or
optional properties from the Ghost, Wraith and Spectres lists to
personalize these creatures. Quite often Spirits of Death originated
from violently killed victims may have the “Haunting and
Unresolved Conflicts” of Ghosts, but this is not always the case,
especially for inhuman spirits like the Dullahan. What follows are
a few properties typical of Spirits of Death and Vengeance.
Blinding Vision
Some Spirit of Death are such a powerful vision that those
who see them must make a Situation Roll with an SV of 8
(modified by Psyche). Those who fail will become blind for
1d6 hours (Lex Libris p.23).
Call the Death
Powerful Spirits of Death can call the name of a person and
make it falling dead. They always know the name of those
they want to kill. The Horseman wil stop its ride and just call
the name. The victim must make a situation roll with a SV of
5, modified by both Psyche and Health. In case of failure, it
will just fall dead on the ground.
Control Weather
Some Spirits of Death can control winds, rain and cloud. Exemplary
in this sense is Captain Saragossa’ ability to impose a dead calm on
74 the sea, blocking any attempt of target vessels to fly away.
Fire Breath
The Spirit (or some linked part of it, like the nostril of the
Headless Horseman’ steed) can emit fire. Three times per day
it can even become a full Fire Breath dealing 2d10 (OR 8-10)
to those who fail or cannot perform an Evade maneuver.
Soul Thief
When the Dullahan (and few other Spirits of Death) kill a
victim, it will stop and call the name of the deceased (which
the Dullahan mysteriously knows). Everybody will notice
the soul of the deceased person to leave the corpse and be
absorbed by the Spirit of Death’s weapon. Anyone noticing
this tremendous event will suffer 1d10 (OR 8-10) MHP.
Whip of Death
The Dullahan, as a fae reincarnation of an old Celtic Death
God, has a powered-up version of the Deadly Attack in the
form of a bone whip. If the attack hits the base SV to avoid
death is only 4.
Spirits of Death and Vengeance Variations
Banshee
When the Banshee weeps, sings and cries somebody is bound
to die. The lament is usually called a “keening”. Usually there
is no need for most gaming stats since Banshee do not fight,
although they inflict their Fear Factor. A Banshee can fly above
the witnesses or they can be seen walking alone while crying.
The doomed victim will die just after the Banshee weeps,
usually in the same night. They usually cry for specific families
and clans, usually of noble or even royal blood or ancestry.
Dullahan
The Dullahan or Gan Ceann is the most powerful version of
the Headless Horseman, since it is not a ghost but rather the
fae reincarnation of a Celtic death god. It is always vulnerable
to Gold. On the other hand, it has the following optional
properties: Soul Thief and Whip of Death. Sometimes it has
also Call the Death and Blinding Vision.
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow
The dead Hessian soldier of this famous American story cannot
exist before the Battle of White Plains (in 1776). However,
similar versions of this Spirit of Death and Vengeance can be
found all over the world. Just add an “Unresolved Conflict”
regarding the missing head. When the remains of the head
are found and offered to the Spirit, it will cease to harass the
living and will disappear.
Vengeful Spirits
Like the “Sleeping Maid” Sophie or the “Ålleberg Knights”,
some Spirits of Death will haunt a place trying to make
other people experiencing its own death. The “Haunting and
Unresolved Conflicts” property of Ghosts is appropriate for
this kind of Spirits. Furthermore, they rarely use their “Deadly
Attack”, preferring to terrorize victims with attempted
re-enactments of their tragedies.
Spirit Leader
Some Spirits of Death, like Captain Saragossa, control crews
of lesser, minor undead, usually represented by skeleton
soldiers or ghost pirates. The GM can use the statistics of
Wraiths or Zombies to replicate these minions, although it
may be too deadly. In alternative, use the following:
Physical Health Points: 32 (No Health Levels)
Movement: 2 CP per 1 m (Max 10 m).
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 8-10).
Combat points: Free 10 / Close Combat Weapons 1 (Right
1H weapons 4)
Equipment:
✦ Decent Sabre (IM -4, WA 3, OM 0, BP 14, dmg 1d10 OR
9-10).
Samples of Attacks: (IM -4) Decent Sabre SV 15
These “Lesser Spirits” or skeletons can be destroyed using
mortal weapons, but they are usually very numerous and,
after they are destroyed, sometimes broken bones even raise
up again after 1d10 combat rounds.
Spirits of Death and Vengeance-related
Secrets Arts
These Spirits are influenced by Exorcism (Lex Libris p.234)
which will inflict MHP.
Offering a victim to Crom Cruach
New Dark Art, Left-Hand Path
In the old pagan days of Celtic Europe evil druids knew
how to appease dark gods like Crom Cruach or Crom
Dubh. Their rituals are mostly lost to modern sorcerers,
although some European witches remember parts of the
old curses. This spell is one of these half-remembered
remains of the ancient, prohibited lore of Celtic Europe,
and it is very dangerous to attempt. In fact, it is possibly
just a deformed, lesser version of spells which in antiquity
were more powerful and stable.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -10
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 8
✦ Discipline: The Left-hand Path level 3
✦ Specialty: Black Magic level 3
Other Requirements
✦ Supernatural Beings Discipline level 2, Beastiology level 3
✦ Professions level 5, Crafting level 1
✦ Communication level 5, Languages level 1, Reading and
Writing (Ogham) 1.
Material Requirements
✦ A small token in wood and tools for carving it
✦ An animal, like a lamb, to be sacrificed
✦ A small golden jewel
Effect
During the sorcerer creates a small wooden token inscribed
with Ogham signs and including the small golden jewel. The
whole thing must be covered by pieces of reed (a plant which
symbolizes the period of Samhain) wet with the blood of a
sacrificed animal. At this point the Esotericism roll will be
made and, if the sorcerer is a PC, the GM (and not the PC)
will roll the dice and see the result.
The token can later be hidden under the intended
victim’s bed or somewhere among the victim’s clothes.
If the Esotericism roll was successful, the Dullahan will
visit the victim and its family during the next night of Full
Moon or New Moon (whatever comes first) and will do so
for a whole year.
If the Esotericism roll failed, the Sorcerer will meet the
Dullahan for the year and therefore must be prepared to stop
it with gold.
Weapon of the Sun
New Scientific Art
Gold is an impossible material to be used for crafting
weapons, not just because of its rarity and preciousness, but
especially due to its physical nature. However, it looks like the
procedure to craft a golden weapon was developed by some
unknown alchemist looking for the philosopher’ stone. The
few ones who have heard about this procedure think that it
was discovered by the well-known Irish alchemist William
Butler (1534-1617), but this is yet to be proven true.
This procedure can be used with melee weapons, arrow
heads or bullets.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -10.
Requirements
✦ Skill: Science SV 10
✦ Discipline: Transmutation 3
✦ Specialty: Alchemy level 3 75
Other Requirements
✦ Professions SV 7, Crafting discipline level 1, Craftmanship
(blacksmith) level 3, Craftmanship (goldsmith) level 3.
Material Requirements
✦ Material to create a normal version of the weapon.
✦ Enough gold to equal in weight a normal version of the weapon.
This gold will be lost, whether the art succeeds or not.
✦ A laboratory including all alchemical tools, as well as
blacksmithing and goldsmithing tools.
Effect
The procedure lasts a whole month. After this period the
Science skill roll will be done and, in case of success, a
golden weapon (or a bunch of bullets or arrow heads) will
be crafted, although a properly working one and not soft
as a normal golden object should be. Spirits of Death and
Vengeance can be harmed with this weapon (damaging their
MHP). Whether this weapon can also be used against other
unnatural beings is totally up to the GM.
76
 Small Devils
I was still some thirty miles from the nearest
town, lost, but following a road I hoped would
get me close to where I needed to be; though,
to be fair the term road was rather optimistic.
It was barely a dirt track that meandered through what felt
like ever-thickening trees.
I had been told to look for certain landmarks, and was assured I could
not miss them and yet here I was, chasing my tail round and around.
I am sure I had seen some of these familiar thick-boled trees before.
The sun was lowering on the horizon, meaning that the cold was
creeping in. There was a bite to the wind that was only going to grow
worse as I continued on. A smart man would have been looking for
a place to set up camp, but with the promise of a warm bed in Castle
Rabenhoff, I doggedly and determinedly forged on, aware that my
mount was tiring. Another thirty minutes, surely, and we should reach
journey’s end. I kept that thought up front in my mind, as the cold
winds whipped up and I was forced to pull my woollen scarf up over my
mouth and nose because it became so uncomfortable to breath. Curls of
mist wreathed up from my horse’s flaring nostrils.
The sounds of hooves on the hard-packed dirt of the road were almost
musical in their rhythm.
From the corner of my I caught a flurry of movement off to the left,
but as I turned to try and focus on whatever it was back there deeper in
77
the woodland, I lost sight of it. Probably just a rabbit or deer bolting
at our nearness.
I rode on, an intense feeling of deja vu growing inside me as I marked
a lightning-struck tree before a turn in the road looked more than
a little familiar. It looked like the same hangman’s tree with its long
stretching branch reaching out over the road that I had passed three
times before. But that made no sense as the sun had remained constantly
ahead of me, leading me west all the time as it lowered in the sky.
Reining my ride in, I dismounted beside the hangman’s tree and
took the knife from my belt, scoring a deep mark in the bark. It took a
number of heavy gouges to put my sign on the tree. When I was done,
I slipped my knife back into my belt, and I swear to the Lord I heard
mocking laughter ringing through the trees all around me. I looked
over my shoulder, but there was no one to see. I moved into the first few
rows of trees, stepping away from the dirt road, and peered into the
gathering darkness, but again there was nothing to see.
And still, as I turned to walk back to the horse, that same mocking
laughter—high pitched, I noted, like a child enjoying my confusion—
rang out clear as a bell.
“Show yourself,” I called out, earning more laughter. “I am serious,” I
assured my taunter. “Make yourself known.”
A moment later I caught a glimpse of a well-dressed boy, no more
than waist-high to me, scurrying away through the trees. My first
instinct was to give chase, but I stopped myself. There was nothing to
gain by getting lost out here. So instead, I let the boy run, and returned
 to my mount. One foot in the stirrups, I lifted myself into the saddle and
kicked on, leaving the hangman’s oak and the mocking boy behind me.
The sun was lower now, shepherd’s delight glowing redly over the
tree tops.
I had maybe half an hour until full dark.
I didn’t want to be out on the road at night.
There was no telling what manner of creature stalked these woodlands
after nightfall.
I wasn’t five minutes down the road when more high-pitched laughter
chilled me to the bone. I looked back over my shoulder, wondering if
the boy could really have kept pace with me through the trees. It seemed
unlikely. And yet, when I turned back to gentle the skittish animal
beneath me, I saw the familiar stretching limb of the hangman’s okay a
hundred yards further along the track, which was impossible, unless I
had somehow found myself on a circular road without realising how. I
rode slowly towards it, knowing even before I dismounted, that I would
find my mark gouged into the trunk.
I stood there, listening to that haunting laughter ringing out all
around me, tracing the lines of my knife in the tree, trying to fathom
how I could have allowed myself to get turned around so easily, given
it was a straight track.
I remounted, and this time pushed my mount to full gallop rather
than an easy canter, eyes darting left and right for sign of some branch
of the track I had somehow missed when I stumbled onto this endless
loop. No more than five minutes later I was back where I began,
standing bemused before the hangman’s oak listening that damned boy
78 mock me from the shadows.
It was only as looked up and saw the towers of the castle rising above
the tree tops where they hadn’t been on any of the previous times I had
stood before this tree that I realised something most peculiar was going
on.
It had to be some form of enchantment.
Trees did not otherwise up and move from place to place.
Or so I thought; the truth of the matter revealed itself to me as I stood
there, calling out to my tormentor, “I don’t know how you are doing
this, boy, but it has lost its humour. The hour is getting late and I would
find my way to Castle Rabenhoff,” and the roots of the hangman’s oak
began to push their way up out of the ground and I understood that
somehow the boy was moving the forest, or at least this one part of it
that was so recognisable from the road, to make me think that I was
trapped in a loop when in actual fact I was still moving on down the
road towards the castle. It was a small magic. Petty. But the boy took
great amusement from my confusion.
“Very funny,” I said, knowing my words carried to him because of the
uproarious laughter that greeted them, but did not waste any more time
trying to find the mischievous imp. I mounted up and urged my horse
on, eyes fixed on the towers of the castle. And, surprise, surprise, this
time the hangman’s oak did not reappear along the roadside.
With the last of the sun disappearing beyond the horizon I reached
the wooden bridge that spanned a gulf between the sheer drop of the
valleyside and the plinth of rock the castle known as Raven’s Hope was
built on.
The doors were open.
I was expected.
Crossing the bridge, I looked up to see an unkindness of ravens
looking down at me from the highest rooftops of the place. Amongst
them, I saw the unmistakable silhouette of a boy standing on the
parapet. There was something uncanny about the way the last red glow
of the sun touched his face that made him look almost maleficent, no
innocent mockery in his face—though how I could possibly tell I have
no idea as he was far too high above me for me to genuinely see his
expression. It is funny the tricks a mind will play upon you.
I crossed the threshold into the courtyard of magnificent gothic
construction, marvelling at the workmanship behind the main building.
It was like something out of legend come to life; every angle was lovingly
crafted, every seam and joint a masterpiece of masonic skill. I could not
help but feel dwarfed by the place, and in awe of it as I gazed up once
more at the thirteen pinnacles that punched high into the sky, and the
hundreds of dark windows that looked out over the forest. There must
have been five hundred ravens if not more lining the rooftops, all of
them watching me with their beady eyes as their talons scratched on the
tiles as they shuffled about, jostling for position. There was something
very unsettling about their attentions.
Even so, I turned my attention to my more earthly surroundings. I
dismounted, tying my horse up to the rail outside the stable block, and
went in search of the master of Rabenhoff.
Candles flickered in sconces beyond the door, casting the hallway in
half light and shadow. The wood was dark, rich, lacquered mahogany
and deep cherry woods, I assumed sourced locally. Everything was
panelled. Rich tapestries covered walls. The carving on the balustrade,
of one of the eponymous ravens of this place, exhibited the kind of
intricate craftsmanship a journeyman carpenter would have been proud
of. I rested my hand upon it, turning and turning about. I had expected
someone to come welcome me, but there was no echo of rushing footsteps.
I noticed the golden rope of the bell system beside the door and gave
it one sharp pull, setting in motion a series of pulleys that in turn set a
bell chiming deep within the body of the castle itself.
I waited, my travel bag in hand, until the butler shuffled out of
one of the many doors. He was a curious fellow, stoop-backed with
sharp features and a nose that could have churned butter. He wore a
powdered with that was twice the size of his head and nodded a lot as
he shuffled towards me. He didn’t make eye contact as he took my bag
from me, almost wresting it from my grasp, and muttered, “Master says
you are welcome. Follow me. Room’s upstairs. Raven tower. Nice view of
the valley. ‘Spect you’re hungry. I shall make arrangements with cook
to make sure you’re fed. Master will find you before nightfall, sez you
are share a drink by the fire and tell him tales of the road in return for
your lodging.”
I nodded, indicating that this was most acceptable, and followed
the curious little man through a series of dark, wood-lined hallways to
a servants staircase, and up a winding stair higher and higher until
surely I felt my nose bleed from the heady altitude. Beyond the walls of
the stairwell I swear I heard the scrabble of claws on the stone, and still
we climbed higher.
Finally, we reached a chamber than must have been two hundred feet
higher than the great hall I had entered down below. He opened the
door upon plush furnishings, including a four-poster bed with rich red
velvet drapes and more heavy furniture that I could not help but marvel
they had somehow got up here, around all of those back-breaking turns
of the tight spiral stair, including a writing desk, fully equipped, and a
leather chair that was begging to take my weight.
The little man dumped my bag upon the bed, bowed and shuffled
out before I could ask him more questions about Castle Rabenhoff’s
mysterious master.
There was a basin and wash clothes behind a screen in one corner
of the turret room, so I took the opportunity to freshen up, then stood
for a while in the window, gazing out in wonder over the blanket of
shadows that was the treetops of the forest I had become so utterly lost
in. The forest seemed to stretch on endlessly for miles upon miles in
every direction, highlighting just how isolated the castle was. I could
see the dark curving ribbon of the road, a slash through the treetops,
and follow it with my eyes for miles along a gentle curve that followed
the natural topography of the hillside. I couldn’t understand how I
had got myself so turned about, even with the meddling of that moving
hangman’s tree. There was more to that forest than one enchanted tree
that could be uprooted to cause confusion. There had to be. The longer
I stared out at it, the more convinced I became that I could still hear
that boy’s mocking laughter, even this high up…
A shiver chased down the length of my spine.
I turned my back on the window and retuned to the writing desk to
pen these few lines in my journal before venturing downstairs to find the
master of the house, and tell him of my time on the road in return for
the first warm meal I had eaten in a week.
The place was curiously quiet for what I assumed was a working castle. I
had expected more men-at-arms and servants buzzing around the hallways
like busy little honey bees, but the only person I had seen so far—if I didn’t
include the mocking boy—was the curious chamberlain who had made
me comfortable. I made it down the many tight turns of the tower stair,
imagining how difficult it would be for an invader to fight their way up.
Defensively, the Rabenhoff was intimidating to say the least, with the chasm
between the main land and the plinth it rose up from, and then all of her
internal choke points and barriers which meant the would be intruders
were exposed to assault from above, with no cover, and no quick way to
take evasive measures. The peculiar thing was that I couldn’t ever imagine
conflict making it this far and any actual defence being necessary.
I emerged back in the hallway on the ground level, and was
presented with a number of choices as to which way I might go, though
I knew one led back out towards the main doors and the courtyard,
so following my nose, headed the other way, deeper into the warren of
hallways that made up Rabenhoff.
I took a moment to admire several of the tapestries and realised
they were telling the story of this place. The storyteller’s art has always
fascinated me. How they could express so much emotion in a series of
images and convey so much obvious truth in that simplicity; in this
case, the fall of a once noble house, fallen so far that this emptiness was
all that remained of their previous grandeur.
A polite cough behind me drew my attention from the master of
Rabenhoff’s ancestral tragedy.
The little man who had greeted me stood a little way along the hall. I
noticed what looked like a spider’s web in his powdered wig, but did not
feel tempted to laugh. If anything, it only served to add to the sadness
of what should have been Ravens Hope.
“The master bids you join him in the drawing room,” he said,
motioning for me to follow him. Without waiting for my answer he
turned sharply on his heel and set off stomping awkwardly through the
many twists and turns of the castle. I was convinced I would never find
my way back to my chamber alone.
Eventually, after walking what felt like a mile in these labyrinthine
halls, he brought me to a short stair than opened out onto a somewhat
worn-down antechamber where the chairs with the noble crest of
Rabenhoff woven into them were threadbare and the wallhangings
frayed around the edges. There was a large double door on the far
side of the room, a warm glow of firelight stealing out from around
the edges.
The little man waddled up to the door, rapped on it twice with his
knuckles and then, holding up a hand for me to wait, opened the door
and slipped inside. I heard a brief exchange of murmured voices, and
then a deeper more resonant voice called, “Come.”
I did as I was bade.
The drawing room was perhaps the last room in this once great castle
that still upheld the wealth and grandeur of the previous owners. I was
struck by the golden candelabra and the other finery on display. There
was considerable wealth in this room alone; enough to feed a small
village for several years, I would have thought. The furnishings were
again of the highest quality craftsmanship, though where other edges
wore the marks of time the stuff in this room looked as new as it had on
the day the lacquer was first burnished.
Beside the fire was a tall, cadaverously thin gentleman with a face so
gaunt and drawn it looked as though the skull beneath was pushing 79
through and I was looking at his skeleton. His upturned nose was the
worst; some sort of canker had eaten away at the meat that divided the
poor bastard’s nostrils, meaning he had but a single large wound to
breath through. And I could hear the rasp of every exhalation from
where I was across the room. It sounded wet. There was cruel intelligence
in his beady black eyes though, that resisted any notion of pity for his
plight.
“Sit,” the master of Rabenhoff said, indicating a chair opposite him
beside the crackling hearth. There was a decanter and two glasses on
the small table beside the chair. “If you would be so kind,” he said,
indicating the liquor.
I poured out generous measures into both glasses, handed one to my
host, and sank down into the luxurious comfort of the armchair before
him.
“My thanks,” I said, raising my glass in a toast.
I realised we were alone. There were several hangings on the other
side of the drawing room, one of which no doubt concealed a door to
a servant’s passage.
“What brings you to my home?”
“I am on a journey of discovery,” I admitted. It would have been easy to
lie and pretend at being a merchant or some other peripatetic peddler, but
the truth was easier, and I found myself eager to confide in this stranger.
Perhaps it was the very fine brandy we shared, perhaps it was the hunger
in my belly and the wonderful aromas rising from elsewhere in the castle,
or perhaps it was something else entirely, something less innocent?
“That sounds like a story worthy of telling,” he said, a slow smile
spreading across his skeletal face, and I was reminded of the price of his
 hospitality, so regaled him with tales of far off lands and the mysteries
I had encountered.
“And you believe all of this to be true?” He asked, incredulously, after
I finished telling him the story of the church grim.
“Hand on heart,” I swore.
“Fascinating, and, I am inclined to say, wonderful,” his grin was
wider now. “I do so like the notion that there is more to this life than the
boring old stones we surround ourselves with.” He raised the glass to his
lips, and I found myself saying:
“Indeed, would you believe on the way to this very place I believe I
encountered some petty magic at play?”
He raised an eyebrow at that, as though urging me to go on.
“Are you familiar with the hangman’s tree along the road?”
“Indeed I am,” he said, and I swear to the Lord God Almighty I
heard that mocking laughter chime somewhere hidden within the walls
of this great room, as though we were being spied upon, but the master
of Rabenhoff didn’t give any indication he had heard the sound.
“It was the strangest thing,” I confessed. “I swear that I passed it more
than once upon the long road here.”
“How can that be possible?” He asked, and I couldn’t tell if I was
being made fun of or not.
“That is a reasonable question from a reasonable man. I fear my
answer is not so reasonable,” I told him. “But I believe that some form of
nature sprite or imp caused it to up root and move, intending to confuse
weary travellers.”
“How absolutely wonderful,” my companion remarked. He did not
80 seem remotely surprised by my suggestion. But then why would he,
if he already knew all about the strange little boy who had laughed
so heartily at my confusion? “A sprite of nature? One of the old ones,
here in my forest? Delightful. You have more than earned your meal
tonight, my friend. I shall enjoy this impish prank for months to come.
Were you truly lost?”
“I feared so,” I admitted. “It wasn’t until I carved my mark upon the
tree that I was able to tell that I wasn’t losing my mind, though my
first thought was that I had somehow stumbled upon a track that led
me round and around in circles.” His smirk was more than just wry
amusement, I know now, but in that moment it was, I am loathe to
admit, irksome. “Even then, I found myself looking for a lost turn or
hidden pathway that I must somehow have stumbled off of, though I
was sure I had not. It wasn’t until I witnessed the sight of those great
roots tearing free of the earth and the tree itself receding perhaps two or
three feet from the road—before my very eyes—that I grasped the truth
of the petty magic, and that it was not the track itself that had been
enchanted to befuddle and confound the weary traveller but rather a
single oak that uprooted itself and walked ahead sufficiently far enough
before planting its roots down again.”
And with this the cadaverous master of the house roared with
laughter like it was the funniest thing he had ever heard in his long life.
“Oh thank you! Thank you so much, my friend. This is just delicious.
Such warm company, such amusing stories. This is the very stuff of life,
is it not?”
I couldn’t help but smile, and found myself nodding, even if much of
his amusement was at my expense.
I decanted another measure, and added a couple of logs to the fire.
We shared that second drink, and more stories, before he made his
excuses that he must away on some dirty of the house, and within a
moment of his exit, the familiar shuffling shape of his chamberlain
appeared in the doorway. “If you would be so kind, sir, your meal is
ready in the kitchen. The master will be ready for you once you have
broken you’re fast.”
I nodded happily. The hunger pangs growled fiercely as I followed
him towards the source of such wonderful aromas. Like the rest of the
house, the kitchen was empty, though a veritable feast of slow roasted
venison and roasted winter vegetables had been prepared, along with a
cup of mead to wash it down.
I sat myself at the table and ate with gusto.
It was delicious.
I licked my fingers to make sure not a single dribble of grease or fat
escaped my lips.
The curious little chamberlain stood over me, watching me eat without
a word until I had finished one of the more delicious meals I have ever
eaten, and then escorted me back to the drawing room, where again I
was alone for no more than a minute before the master of Rabenhoff
entered the room. He smiled warmly as he joined me by the fire, and
before I had even decanted another measure for us, was asking me,
“Please, do tell me more stories of your travels. It gets so lonely here, and
I hunger for companionship.”
I was more than happy to oblige, offering a much more chilling
tale of my time in Paris and the labyrinth of tunnels that made up the
under city.
My host sat perched on the edge of his chair through most of the
tale, his face running through the gamut of emotions, from fascination
to fear, to outright horror, then relief as I finally told him of my escape.
We were deep into the night at this point, and I knew that I should
retire, but it seemed that my host was intent to suck the marrow out of
the night and keep us talking all the way to sunrise.
How could I refuse him, even if it meant that I was good for nothing
on the morrow?
So, I found another story from my travels, an amusing little tale of
a run in with a particularly mischievous little boggart who had made
my life hell for a few hours with an array of pranks I knew would
amuse my host. I marked how he wasn’t compelled by the chills, and
much rather preferred those moments of lighthearted mischief where the
boggart threatened to get the better of me, as opposed to the relentless
hunt of the golem, or the horrors the desert. And as every story drew to
a close my host would offer a grin and reach for the decanter, urging,
“More, more,” until I was dead on my feet and really couldn’t muster
another funny story.
The disappointment in his voice as he said, “Of course, of course you
must sleep… where are my manners?” was palpable. I felt so incredibly
sorry for him in that moment and because I felt no particular urgency
to move on, promised to spend another day in his company. “I shall
have my man show you to your room,” he promised, rising from his
seat.
“It’s not necessary,” I reassured him, seeing the first blush of dawn
rising in the windows already. “I’m sure I can find my way back.”
“If you insist,” he said, “But it is no problem.”
“Let the poor soul sleep,” I said, smiling. “I’m sure I shall find my bed
eventually. There can’t be that many rooms here.”
“You would be surprised,” the master of Rabenhoff said, and again
I caught that undercurrent of mirth where there really shouldn’t have
been any.
And a quarter of an hour later, with the dawn broken, and
thoroughly lost, I regretted my insistence on letting his man sleep. Door
after door led to dead ends and empty rooms. Hallway after hallway
let to staircases that led nowhere or turned back on themselves, and
brought me back to where I had been a few minutes ago, confused.
It wasn’t until I claimed two hundred steps to a tower room I felt sure
was my own, and opened the door upon an empty room, that I gave
vent to my frustration, and in answer five hundred ravens took flight,
their claws on rooftops, as that damned mocking laughter spiralled
amid their raucous caws and I realised I was being played with for the
boy’s amusement again. I assumed some form of ensorcellment upon
the doorways to link them to passageways I had already walked, or
glamours to hide the true nature of the rooms I thought were empty.
Nothing particularly spiteful, just immature pranks.
“Show yourself,” I called out, not expecting anything to happen.
My call was greeted by yet more mocking laughter.
“Please, I just want to sleep,” I said to no one.
“You should have let me walk you to your chamber,” a voice answered,
and there on the stair beneath me I saw the curious little chamberlain
in his powdered wig. He looked wryly amused at my plight. “You have
got yourself completely turned about and are in one of the abandoned
towers on the far side of the castle. It is good I came looking for you,
or you might have ended up sleeping the day away on this dusty stair,”
and I realised how deep down bone-tired I was. All I wanted to do was
sink down onto my knees and rest my head against the wall. Was this
some added enchantment? A spell of sleep to drain the strength from
my limbs? “Hardly,” the little man said, as though reading my mind,
“a soul has set foot in this tower in a generation. It was the last Count’s
study. He was fond of the view from the tower window, out across the
plains, you can see for miles around. It is quite the humbling vista.”
“I should like to sleep,” I said, “Please, my bed?”
“This way,” he said, leading me a merry dance through the hallways
of Rabenhoff, until, miracle of miracles I was back in my chamber
and it felt like tomorrow was already an old day. I collapsed onto the
bed and was asleep in moments. I did not bother stripping out of my
travelling clothes. It wasn’t as though I had anyone to complain if I
stank of the road when I set off again.
But sleep was evasive. I found myself waking several times in the grip
of fever-sweats, confused and disorientated, with no idea where I was.
In a half-dazed state I ventured out of my room, thinking to piss out of
one of the lower windows as my bladder was bursting. Eyes gummy with
sleep, I fumbled about with the buckle on my britches as I descended,
thinking only of relief.
Halfway down the twists of the stair, I reached a window that I could
conceivably urinate through, and struggled with the latch and hasp to
get it open before I wet myself, then, content, I sent an arc of urine out
over the side of the castle wall.
Done, I stumbled back up to my chamber, only it wasn’t where I had
left it. Somehow, I returned to an empty room, with no sign that anyone
had been inside it in long years.
Confused, I headed back down the stairs, my tired feet shuffling on
the worn-down stones.
I heard voices below me; a conversation, I assumed, between the
master of the castle and his man. I crept down slowly, thinking too
eavesdrop.
“We really should let him go,” the lighter voice of the chamberlain
urged, only for the deeper tones of my host to say, “No. I am lonely.
Just another day. He promised us another day. Let me enjoy his stories.
What is the harm? We give him good food, and the brandy is delicious.”
It didn’t take more than a moment for his man to say, “It’s not right.
We should let him go. He doesn’t belong here. What if he suspects?”
And that, of course, pricked my interest and had me creeping down
another few steps to better see the two men—only there were not two down
there. It was a conversation between one man, conducted in two voices.
I edged closer still, and realised saw the powdered wig of the master’s
man, and ill-fitting clothes that made him look like a child playing
dress up.
I don’t know whether he heard or sensed my presence, but he turned,
and I saw his face.
It was neither the master or the chamberlain, it was the boy who had
delighted in taunting me so much. Seeing me, he let out a sigh that carried
a weight of sadness that made no sense, and then in the voice I had become
so familiar with over our fireside chat said, “Well, that’s ruined that then.
Seen us, he has,” as though the was talking to someone else I could not see,
only to answer himself. “We’ll have to let him go now, I suppose, because he’s
not going to want to stay with us now, is he?” In the voice of his chamberlain.
“Pity, I was so enjoying his company. He really does tell a good story, and 81
more, he appreciates a good prank. There are so few who come this way who
understand us the way he does,” a third voice said, coming from the same
mouth and I assumed it was the imp’s true voice.
There was no malice in the creature, or his trap.
The wretched soul was lonely and looking for companionship, and
truth be told, can’t the same be said for so many of us?
“Do you think he’ll stay if we ask him nicely?” the imp asked himself.
“All I want to do is sleep,” I told the poor creature, honestly. “And I
promised you another night of stories. I am good for my word. If you
want me to stay in this place a third night, then I think it is up to you
to tell me some of your secrets so that I may add them to my journals.
Do we have a bargain?”
The sheer delight in the imp’s childish features was heartbreaking.
“One last question before I return to bed,” I said.
“Ask it,” the imp agreed, eagerly.
“Are we truly alone in this place?”
It looked at me solemnly then, making a little fluttering gesture with
its fingers, as it said, “There is only us here, and we have been alone for
a very, very long time, we have. Feels like forever.”
“Well, my friend, how about we begin by you telling me your name?”
“I am Hob,” he said, giving a little flourish of a bow. “Though, I will
admit I have many names, some I have forgotten, others I made up to
call myself because there is no one left to remind me who I am.”
“We shall have a grand old time, Hob. I promise you that. But first,
I really need to sleep. Perhaps you would remove the enchantment from
my stair so that I might find my bed?”
He grinned at me. “What would be the fun in that?”
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
Small Devils
Appearance
The small devils are often impish
to look at; small, bony, unattractive
creatures that are almost childlike of
stature and appearance. Though, a
particularly ugly child that has suffered
greatly from plague and other illnesses
that pockmark and scar the skin. In
their natural state, their faces are stony,
set like masks in a permanently twisted
smirk. Large ears and small horns
protrude from their skulls, and leathery,
bat-like wings grow from between their
82 shoulder blades.
Their skin is more often than not
reddish of hue, and may appear scaly or
diseased, so may use powders and wigs
and the like to try and pass as human.
To be fair, some of these impish
devils look more akin to primates than
they do humans, which is a source of
great sorrow for them as it can lead
to incredible loneliness with the imp
forced to hide themselves away from
polite company.
Their features are often sharp, some
with noses that are so elongated they
resemble snouts rather than noses.
First Impressions
These diminutive devils look like
children, though they do not move like
them. Because of their wings they often
appear to waddle as they walk, hunch-
backed beneath their clothes.
That disfigurement is not the only
burden they carry heavy on their
shoulders; they are weighed down by
a great sorrow and are amongst the
loneliest of the monsters in the realm of
man. Their exile is often self-imposed,
from shame at their appearance, which
is, a special kind of torture for the imp
as they crave company and relish the
amusement their pranks offer up.
Some appear to have an uncomfortable
psoriasis-like skin condition that
causes their skin to scale and flake in
rough patches which can leave rich
red blemishes behind that the imp will
scratch at, which only serves to make
the condition worse.
Their laughter haunts the woodlands
they call home.
What do the Players Know?
These small devils are often nature
sprites, their name imp derived from the
terms ympa (a young sapling) or impa
(from the old English, which derives
from a seedling) and because of that
link nature finds the small devil often
associated with a witch’s familiar. They
tend to gravitate to isolated woodlands
and dwell in nature rather than gravitate
towards the cities. This is as much for
the bond they share with the trees they
take their name from as it is because
of their shame a their appearance. The
great forests are a natural home for the
small devils. Plus, the woodlands offer
ample opportunity to torment travellers
as they try to pass through.
Imps are not evil by nature, nor
malicious. They are merely mischievous
and grow easily bored. This can make
them an obnoxious enemy and lends
to their habit of wilfully creating
mayhem around them as their jokes
and pranks may often spiral out of
hand. Much like the fae folk of Celtic
mythology, these small devils are often
wild and unpredictable. A bored imp
is a dangerous creature as it craves
amusement and may reach out to
connect with darker forces purely to
amuse itself. Because of their nature as
lesser beings they may well fall under
the thrall of a greater evil which steers
their pranks towards a more malicious
end. They will happily go along with
this evil if it offers amusement.
They are believed by some scholars
to take the shape of black cats, rats, or
toads when in the service of a witch
or warlock, giving rise to the idea of a
witch’s familiar.
Often considered satanic minions
during the age of witch hunts, these small
devils may be magically bound to an
object, for instance bottles, crystal balls,
and such. They may take a corporeal
form when summoned from this object,
or, if they are trapped for long enough
they may lose the memories necessary to
return to their corporeal form altogether
and exist only as a spirit, bound forever
to the object.
Main Features
✦ Imps are talented pranksters. They
live for their own amusement.
Sometimes their ‘jokes’ are cruel,
though not deliberately malicious.
Other times they are purely a means
of passing the time. Possible ‘pranks’
include switching babies in a cradle,
leading a traveller astray in the
wilderness until they are helplessly
lost.
✦ They are impulse creatures, so tend
not to engage in complex plans but
rather enjoy spur of the moment
amusements.
✦ Imps are incredibly long-lived though
not truly immortal.
✦ They are resistant to most mortal
weapons though can feel pain it is
rare for a human forged weapon to
kill them.
✦ They can be snared by wardings and
kept out of homes by carefully crafted
sigils.
✦ The Imp has a knack for shapeshifting,
often taking the forms of cats, rats
and toads when they enter the service
of a practitioner of witchcraft.
✦ Imps, as creatures of the great woods,
are especially gifted when it comes
to conjuring fire, as it is the most
destructive element they know.
✦ Small devils make exceptional spies,
able to sneak near-silently about
a place, slipping in and out of the
shadows and using small glamours to
disguise themselves. Some possess the
ability to disappear when necessary.
✦ They crave companionship and
human friendship, likewise they love
attention so they are unlikely to
allow travellers to pass through their
territories without at least trying to
amuse themselves at the newcomer’s
expense.
✦ They are feisty souls and if cornered
will fight with all their fury, spitting
and clawing like wild cats.
✦ Imps possess some small affinity for
magical and the supernatural and can
cast basic spells, usually glamours and
illusions, both visual and auditory,
that help them with their pranks.
Their magics are minor.

 
Small Devil typical stats Imp Mind
These stats represent common Imps found in forests or in the Small Devils do not have a strong will but, on the other hand,
service of witches and sorcerers. their nature is alien enough to make them completely immune
to fear and any MHP damage deriving from fear.
Traits: Charisma +1, Dexterity +2 83
Physical Health Points: 15-25 (20 PHP is a common value) Chosen environment
Physical Damage levels (for 20 PHP): 1-6 (0) / 7-11 (-1) / Imps choose an area where to live, usually a forest or some
12-15 (-3) / 16-18 (-5) / 19-20 (-7) ruins. When the Small Devil is in his own area, it can move
Mental Health Points: 15-25 (20 MHP is a common value) (appearing and disappearing) at much quicker speed than
Mental Damage levels (for 20 MHP): 1-6 (0) / 7-11 (-1) / what the movement stats suggests (basically they are not
12-15 (-3) / 16-18 (-5) / 19-20 (-7) hindered by game mechanics).
Movement: walking or flying 2 CP per 1 m (Max 12 m) (but Furthermore, resisting the basic “Trick and Illusions” of
see also common properties). a Small Devil in his chosen environment is more difficult to
Fear Factor: 1d6. resist: the SV of all situation rolls is 5.
Skills: Stealth SV 10 Avoidance 3 (Hiding &
Camouflage 3, Sneaking 3), Sleigth of Hand 3 Shapeshift
(Pickpocketing 2). Small Devils can shapeshift into toads, cats and rats.
Natural Weapons: Claws (Dmg 1d10).
Initiative: +2 Tricks and Illusions
Combat points: Free 10 / Unarmed 3 (Claws 4). Small Devils like to perform small illusions, involving both
Samples of Attacks: visual and auditory features, making fun of people they
✦ (IM +2) Claws SV 17. meet. The nature of these illusion is various: they can lead
✦ (IM +2) Claws SV 9, SV 8. astray casual travellers, hide important objects or modify
their appearance, so that they look like children or deformed
dwarves. Usually nothing too serious should be done with
Common Properties these illusions, although these pranks may be annoying. The
victims usually do not make situation rolls unless they start
Imp Body to be suspicious of what they are seeing. A generous GM may
Small Devils suffer pain and wounds but cannot be harmed allow a situation roll with a SV of 10 (modified by Perception)
by normal weapons which do not inflict any damage on to notice that something wrong is happening. If this awareness
these creatures. On the other hand, enchanted, ensorcelled or is reached, the victim still needs a successful situation roll
blessed weapons can harm small devils. with an SV of 8 (modified by Intelligence) to see through the
 illusions. These rolls are harder if performed in the Small Devil
“Chosen Environment” (see above). It is worth noting that,
even when victims believe the illusions, sooner or later the Imp
will become bored of them, therefore the illusions will end.
Vulnerabilities
Small Devils can be blocked even by otherwise useless
symbols and wards produced by superstition and folk magic.
Optional Properties
Small Devils are usually not very powerful creatures, but the
GM may allow a few properties to slightly power up the imps.
Fury
Some Imps may become crazy if cornered and imprisoned,
becoming stronger and wilder, with the following stats. CP:
Free 10 / Unarmed 5 (Claws 8). Claws damage: 1d10 (OR
9-10). Sample of Attacks: (IM +2) Claws SV 13, SV 10.
Invisibility
Few Small Devils can become completely invisible at will. To
notice the presence of these invisible imps one must make a
situation roll with an SV of 5 modified by Psyche.
84 Small Devil-related Secrets Arts
Small Devils suffer the damage dealt by exorcism (Lex Libris
p.234).
True Sight Eyewash
New Scientific Art
If this alchemical concoction grants the ability to pierce
through the illusions and tricks of fae, small devils and other
minor creatures. Its recipe is kept in some half-forgotten
scrolls kept in the archives of a monastery in Austria, while
a few scholars all around Europe keep secret records of this
art. Nobody knows who was the first alchemist to have made
this concoction, although legendary figures of the Roman
Imperial period, like Zosimos of Panopolis or Maria the
Jewess, are sometimes mentioned.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -10.
Requirements
✦ Skill: Science SV 10
✦ Discipline: Transmutation 4
✦ Specialty: Alchemy level 4
Material Requirements
A small quantity of rock crystal to be ground together with
✦
selected herbs to be collected in a wild place during a night
of full moon.
Effect
The ingredients must be ground, mixed with water, boiled
and filtered until one get a small quantity of concoction which
remain active and working for one month, before losing its
power. If one applies the concoction on the eyes, these will
burn for about 10 painful minutes. When the pain disappears,
one gets the ability to automatically see through the illusions
and tricks of minor fae and small devils. The effect lasts
for about one day before disappearing. The GM may allow
the concoction to work also with the illusions created by
major creatures, although the effect is not automatic but it
rather give the possibility of making a situation roll to see
through these illusions (a common value is SV 10 modified
by Perception).
Enslave the Imp
New Dark Art, Left-Hand Path
The old sorcerers in Europe have enslaved Imps for centuries.
The small devils are not powerful, but they may become
useful servants.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -12.
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 8
✦ Discipline: The Left-hand Path level 2
✦ Specialty: Black Magic level 2
Other Requirements
✦ Supernatural Beings Discipline level 1, Beastiology
Specialty level 2
Material Requirements
A small object used to imprison the small devil like a crystal
✦
ball or a bottle.
Effect '
When this power is successfully performed in an environment
where a small devil lives, the creature will be called and
imprisoned inside the object. As long as the object will remain
intact, the small devil is forced to obey to the owner of the
object. On the other hand, if the Esotericism skill roll for
activating this art is failed, the Imp can never be enslaved by
the same sorcerer and it will certainly focus its worst pranks
on the one who tried to enslave it.
85
86
 Witch Spawn
T here are few things more frightening than those
we call witches in this modern age, not least
for their ability to walk amongst us unseen,
unrecognised for what they are. There is little
wonder to me that wherever I travel there is talk of them, or
variants of their craft. In every city, in every town, every
village, no matter how remote or how populous. There is
something about the people we call witches that inspires fear
and fascination and no little legend.
And given the horrors unleashed upon the English countryside in the
post-Civil war years immediately after Cromwell put an end to the Divine
Right of Kings and proved there was nothing godly about the nobility,
it should come as no surprise that the hysteria mounted as people sought
someone to scapegoat for all the ills of their lives in the austerity and
hardship of this new England. Everything about the world they new was
in turmoil. The disruption was absolute. They had executed the king, for
heavens sake, and for the years of the Interregnum had no monarchy.
That was eleven years in which their very understanding of the world
was turned on its head. The people had the power to shape their own
destines. There was no guiding hand from above, no royal blood. So,
naturally, those same frightened people craved an answer to the most
pressing question they knew: what had gone wrong?
87
In looking for an answer, they started searching for abnormalities.
Differences. Because, they reasoned, different was wrong. So, they
looked at age, at physical deformity and disability, and they saw
evil. Priests used their bibles to back up their accusations. It wasn’t
a new thing. There had been witches in the country for centuries,
all the way back to Tudor, and even medieval times, with records
dating back to the days of the Plantagenet kings. But the hysteria
around the land for those two years in the immediate aftermath of
Naseby was unmatched.
The witch hunters were the most dangerous men in England.
It was nothing short of persecution, and it was not unique to England.
And it is deep-rooted in our collective psyche; from the 13th Century
to today, I have heard it claimed more than fifty thousand men and
women have been executed across continental Europe for supposed
witchcraft. And that does not come close to the reality, I am sure,
given they did not begin burning and beheading witches in the 13th
Century; there are documented cases dating back to medieval times,
and before. Often, these so called Witch Trails were poorly documented,
simply because the courts had no legal powers, and were rather places
of execution and served no other purpose. There are documented and
undocumented realities. Indeed, I would not be surprised to learn that
as many as ten died for any one known execution!
It is not so very long ago that names like Matthew Hopkins and
John Stearne struck fear into every god-fearing soul, for with a
word and a levelled finger they had the power to end a life.
 And it has always been such. I heard tell of a tribe of settlers
who made their homes in the marshlands close to Friesland, on
the banks of the Weser: the Stedinger. It is important to remember
how delicate the social, political and religious balance was
during these days; this was an age when the Catholic Church
were actively seeking to establish dominance over the kingdoms
of Europe. This tribe refused to pay tithes to the Archbishop of
Bremen, who levelled accusations of witchcraft and heresy at these
very ordinary people, claiming they were in collusion with Satan,
which made it easy for him to preach a crusade against them. The
entire settlement—possibly as many as five thousand souls—was
butchered.
Witches and heretics was a common accusation, as was naming
someone a Satanist, and almost impossible to disprove, thus
convenient when the Church needed to justify the torture and
murder of people in the name of Jesus.
It was nothing short of brutal, and, of course, a lie.
Folk like the Stedinger were killed over money, not because they
were in league with the devil.
I have often wondered how many deaths might be laid at the
door of such heresy if we look across history: they could number
in the millions if one were to factor in the crusades against the
Cathars as being driven by such fears. There are countless cases
I have investigated which echo this, with so many the souls who
have been murdered as witches and witch spawn, being obviously
innocent of any such pact, or magic. It has always been thus. It is
88 a convenient weapon to level at ones foes. Hard to fight.
In France a century ago the fires of execution blazed in almost
every town.
Danaeus, in his Dialogus de veneficiis, the dialogue of witches
as it was translated, accounts bonfires so numerous that it would
be nigh on impossible to number them. Think on that! Friends
and loved ones would look on and cheer as the condemned witches
burned! Imagine the damage done to the mind that you might
look at your own child, or your wife, husband or long time friend
and cheer as they are burned to death.
What has always intrigued me was how few accounts there
are of good honest ordinary god-fearing people actually brave
enough to voice any sort of scepticism in light of the relentless
prosecution of witchcraft. Surely the more reasonable minded man
would have thought that someone who truly believed themselves
capable of doing physical harm to another by means of drawing
on the occult must be in fact deluded, or suffering from over-active
imaginations? Or perhaps the these men believed those delusions
were in point of fact the work of the Devil? The undeniable truth
is that a mere century ago witchcraft was not only real in the
minds of educated me, it was virulent and widespread and as a
result dangerous beyond measure. Even this morning I was privy
to a conversation between two powerful men in these parts arguing
that the threat of witchcraft has never been so rife as it is now,
even in the face of Enlightenment. If they are to be believed, there
are witches by the thousand across the landscape, and like vermin
they are infecting many districts with their odious presence. They
truly believe that witchcraft as a threat is unstoppable, and that
those who have aligned with the Devil have infiltrated all aspects
of society. One of these men, a prodigious thinker, I might add,
believes there is nowt we can do except meet these corrupt souls with
fury and the most grievous punishments. I fear what he means by
that is taking to the streets with pitchforks and firebrands and
burning any and every woman accused of consorting with the
Devil, same as it ever was.
And that is where the real damage of these claims always lies,
that what we fear the most could be walking amongst us every
day, lying beside us every night, and we would never know.
That is the true insidious threat of witchcraft, not talk of
poisoned well springs, the eating of babes in the crib, of milk
soured and curdled, and so many more of the commons signs of
witchcraft have been reported. It is nigh on impossible to know
what is real and what is superstition, but as with everything I have
learned of the esoteric world I know that we must consider that
most of it is in fact grounded in truth.
Thomas Aquinas wrote that magic was not inherent in our
bodies, and not part of this world we might somehow draw upon,
but rather done by the use of demons. I do not believe he was
wholly wrong in his thinking. For Aquinas reason that, given he
posited the notion some five hundred years ago, it is likely that
the idea goes back much earlier than the 13th century, but then,
so much we think we now of the esoteric world is nothing short of
the greatest collection of half-truths, fables, myths, legends and
outright lies, but the truth is the typical commoner making an
accusation of witchcraft didn’t do it for fear the woman really was
a servant of the Devil, but because they had suffered some sort of
personal hurt and it was an easy way to hurt them back, just as
with the Stedinger. There are always very human motives behind
any accusation.
It is easy with hindsight to look at those few years after the
Civil War’s final battle in Naseby and see how the Puritanical,
so prevalent during those years of the Witch Hunts, shaped the
belief that the pact was a real thing, and that the witch made a
covenant with the Devil by signing their mark in the Devil’s book.
The rite they accounted was simple in as much as it was only upon
inking their mark—in their own blood—in the Devil’s book that
the petitioner became an actual witch and gained access to the
demonic magics.
But why should such a pact be written and sealed in blood?
Why not merely voiced?
The German monks, Heinrich Kramer and Jacob Sprenger,
wrote the lore we take as gospel now, in their Hammer of the
Witches, the Malleus Maleficarum, which was the most potent
weapon of the Inquisition. As a work it is fundamental in the way
we view witchcraft not as a superstition, but as a heretical practice.
They were the first to associate it with Satan, and named it the
greatest danger to society.
But why? A more cynical soul might believe it was a way to
control the women in society, as more often than not these accused
were women that people looked to, women who perhaps had the
knowledge of a herbalist and understood the potent medicines
growing in the dirt at our feet, how Mother Earth provides, and
how her bounty might best be used. It’s fine when their children
are suffering in the grips of some vile humour, then they would
come beginning for her to do anything they could, but what if she
somehow saved the child? Then was that down to her pact with the
devil? It was laughable, or should have been, but for the fact that
I knew first hand how saving a sick child had damned one such
wise woman as a witch and seen her burn. My own grandmother.
It was a shame my mother had carried with her for years, but in
a way is responsible for my fascination with the esoteric, spiritual
and alchemical, and what drives me still.
The Malleus Maleficarum was one of the first sacred texts I
tracked down to satisfy my craving for knowledge. It is vital to
read and absorb if one is to understand. It offered ways to identify
witches, how to convict them of the charge of witchcraft, and
ultimately execute them for the crime. I would hesitate to call
it my bible, but I have held true to it, even now, as I seek out
those accused of the craft and being in league with the Devil.
The book is divided into three sections, the first offering answers
to the sceptics who still believe witchcraft was mere superstition,
proving it was real and that the witches made pacts with Satan,
promising to cause harm to others. The second documents the
genuine harm caused by Maleficarum, while the final section
lays down procedures for investigation, arrest, and punishment
witches. This is the most compelling part of the text, by far, though
it is far from perfect. The belief running through this old hammer
is simplistic; good and evil tended to the extremes in women. It is
the twin aspects of the mother and the whore, the nurturer and
the harlot, though it has often plagued me that such thinking is
merely a weapon those who claim piety to beat down the female
of the species. Many, of course, will think me demented for such
thoughts. They are not normal, but then I also believe women are
creatures of reason and might equally be trusted in the decisions
that help run our world, so why should I care if a few souls think
I am a madman?
It is fear of difference, of course, that drives some of the
accusations, hence the notion of physical deformity being a
way to identify a witch, including what the Inquisitors like
Bernard Gui called Devil Marks, and always, there are terrible
consequences for those found guilty. One need only look at the
cases all across England to know how terrible: the cases of the
Agnes Nutter and the Pendle witches, burned. Margaret Aitken,
the great witch of Balwearie, burned. The Flowers women and
their familiar spirits, known as the Witches of Belvoir, who very
likely died because of the political scheming of a favourite of the
King himself, James I, hanged. And even as recent as just a few
years ago, a full century later, we have the Islandmagee witches
in Ireland. Mary Dunbar, who had been found seemingly
possessed by a demon, shouting, swearing, blaspheming,
throwing Bibles, going into fits every time a clergyman came
near her and vomiting household items such as pins, buttons,
nails, glass and wool. Dunbar identified the eight women she
claimed had attacked her in spiritual form, and despite nothing
but the girl’s false accusations were held to be true and the eight
were found guilty and sentenced to a year in goal.
So much of the documented cases across Europe are what I would
call low magic; the use of the craft to maim or kill man or beast,
to befoul the water from a well, manipulate the weather, or make a
man fall in love with a woman he wouldn’t otherwise notice. These
low magics are rooted in folklore and traditions handed down from
father to son through the generations. A lot is owed to those old
tales. Consider the Slavic sorceress, Baba Yaga, who I heard tell
is actually a trio of yagas, not a single one, and represents the
Earth Goddess in her three-part guise, the matriarch, bountiful
mother, and the comely maiden, much as the Celts had their three
Morrigna, Babd, Macha and the Morrigan. Mother, maiden and
crone. One aspect of these tri-parate goddesses is always capable of
great fury and vengeance. It was ever thus with strong women, be it
Circe who turned passing sailors into wolves; the Morai, who spin
the loom of fate, and can cut the threads of life as everyone’s fate
was tied to their loom; the Graeae, three malevolent sisters, kin to
Gorgon Medusa and her sisters, who shared an eye, which offered
glimpses of the unknown and of fate, but still lay beyond their
control; Hecate, goddess of witches, Chthonia by another name,
which meant ‘of the underworld’ and source of our belief in the
power of a witch’s curse; Jenny Greenteeth, the green skinned river
hag who drowned the young and the old for amusement, a sadist
with razor-sharp teeth who enjoyed the suffering of her victims; it
was a mistake to earn the rage of these women, and the more the
stories were told the more fearsome they became, the greater their
propensity for evil.
It is easy, knowing what we know of the world now in our 89
Enlightened age, to see how so many of these so-called spells and
their weavers owe their existence to the stories of antiquity.
Think now of the advances our so-called magus has made over
the last century, with discoveries so far in advance of what people
believed even a century ago they would have been considered high
magic. Two hundred years ago, thinkers genuinely believed our
only hope of understanding the universe and the forces governing
it was through magic. Those magics were a curious mixture of the
astrological and the alchemical, what we would term the concord of
the world, its interconnectedness, and the spiritus mundi, the spirit
of the world, which infuses everything from the heavens down to
the earth. Think of sympathetic vibration, pluck one string on a
lute to bring forth music, and the second will resonate in harmony
even though it is untouched. Everything is interconnected. So, it is
unsurprising the fearful saw a witch as a fiend capable of drawing
on the natural magics of the world, either by demonic means, or by
something more organic, and if everything is interconnected, then
their powers were believed boundless; they could manipulate the
weather, they could wither crops in the field, and blight a man’s
fertility as easily as they could stop a man’s heart with a curse, or
bind his fate to a dark path with a potent brew of ingredients.
It is a blessing that we no longer live in those dark days, but
rather find ourselves in an age where we are beginning to grasp
just how mathematics and science binds our universe together, not
some unknowable, demon-manipulated magics.
And yet, for all of the false accusations and innocent deaths,
there is no doubt in my mind that there is more to it that mere
 superstition. Enough, indeed, to have seen me give evidence at two
Witch Trials in the last year, in both of which I denounced the
prosecution for its lazy thinking and reliance upon gossip over
fact. But there was a third witch that I was not so quick to dismiss.
That was what brought me here, a woman living remote from
society, a hermit of sorts, who possesses the gifts of the oracle, able
to see the past, the present and the future, and lay down a geis
upon them, for good or ill. I needed to see the truth of it with my
own two eyes, and to offer myself up as willing recipient of her
gift.
I approached her hovel with little trepidation, after all, how
many times in this life do we encounter someone gifted with the
sight? I cannot think I have ever been in the presence of a true
witch until that moment, and it was obvious that she was blessed—
or cursed, depending upon your viewpoint—even without the
gewgaws and accoutrements of some hokey magic. She had an air
about her, an aura, even. You could feel it in her. The air around
us felt charged. Powerful.
She bade me sit beside the fire.
There was small pot on the boil.
She tossed something inside; I am tempted to claim it was some
exotic ingredient like poisoned entrails of a toad, thirty days dead,
or adder’s fork and blind-worm’s sting, but it wasn’t. It looked like
a shank of lamb, so I assumed she was broiling her supper.
It smelled wonderful.
I settled myself into the seat she had offered, and looked at her
90 properly for the first time, not sure what I had expected, but it was
not the woman before me. She was not old. Neither was she ugly
or bearing some form of obvious deformity, unlike the stars of so
many of the stories I had amassed on my travels. I was not about
to ask to sheer off her hair to see the Devil’s mark. She was more
than capable of walking to market tomorrow, of mingling with the
wool merchants and the livestock traders without anyone raising
an eye. She was utterly normal, even somewhat comely. I could
imagine her lying next to a man, and him having no idea as to
her gift. To look at her I could not imagine a single soul being
frightened by the witch, and yet she was without doubt the single
most dangerous person for miles around.
“You come seeking your fortune, Clement?” She asked. I did not
startle at the fact she knew my name though I had not introduced
myself beyond saying, “Birkenbosch,” as I kissed her hand at the
door. It was the very least of the enchantments she had at her
command.
I nodded.
She knelt before me, taking both of my hands in hers, and
held them up to her face. I did not pull away though the contact
made me uncomfortable. She held my hands there, pressed to her
skin, for what felt like the longest time, and when she finally
relinquished her hold, she looked at me with sadness beyond
measure in her eyes.
“You have several harrows upon you, Clement,” she told me.
I did not understand what she meant. “You have the past, the
present and the future written upon you in a way I have never
seen before. You have seen much in your short life, and you will
see much more.”
“Tell me,” I said, leaning forward.
The fire cackled in the background, mocking me.
“I see the trauma of the storm, unlike any witnessed this century,
the rising seas, the howling gales, and within it, lashing at the
bow and stern of the vessel that is all that stands between you
and death, the tentacles of a great beast. I see the swirling sands
of the desert storm rising, and the flies, everywhere the flies, they
are upon you, in your face, your eyes, your nose, crawling into
you. Their infernal buzzing will not cease. You are marked. They
know you. And they will come for you. I have seen it, and it shall
come to pass.”
“Tell me,” I said again, and the damned woman told me how I
was going to die.
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
Witch Spawn
Ever since the dawn of people, people
have been talking about nature. Satyrs,
woods, and even dragons are said to
belong to this strange genealogy created
by a corrupt nature. It is said that most
of the nature creatures were wiped out
in the flood, but a lot of them are still
living and are terrifying both those
living in the cottages in the country or
at sea on their way to a distant land.
Witchcraft, hedge-witchery, warlocks
and other forms of spell craft and magic
has been long documented, much to the
fascination of students of the occult and
esoteric. There are few secrets when it
comes to these practitioners of natural
magic, as few if any other creatures have
been so thoroughly scrutinised as these.
The nature of the witch, the bonds and
boundaries of their craft, are subject to
countless examinations and studies that
map out the limits of enchantment fully.
The superstitious amongst the
populace still believe these women
tap into sorceries, surrendering their
souls to black magic and its arcane
rituals in return for supernatural
powers that help them sow disorder
and discontent for no other reason that
to frighten people. The Church would
have us believe these women have
made a covenant with the Devil and
meet regularly in their secret covens to
debase themselves before Him in return
for his opening a vein so that they might
sup upon his dark magic. Records held
by the Holy Roman Church state back
centuries, far before the 17th Century
witch hunts that gripped Europe, all
the way to the Dark Ages and before.
In the 1100’s the Russian priest Ilja
Kochsutchin described what he called
the “wise gums” in his Book of Sorcery:
“Witches are more than wise gums, they
are special beings that have discovered access
to the darkest of the world’s powers, not by
God nor by Satan, but rather by the dark
side of nature.”
Snorre Stulasson, in his text Fabel
makes a similar observation, putting
forth the notion that the forest witch,
the hedge witch, and witch are the same,
and that our images of them are turned
to the withered crone by frightened men
seeking to diminish them. This pair
were far from alone in their thinking.
Even Karl the Great’s seer, Kristian
Hageltoft posited much the same when
turning his scrutinies upon the witch’s
male counterpart, the warlock:
“The one does not preclude the other. The
warlock’s powers are bestowed by nature’s
wild magic, the spell crafter having made
pacts with both dark souls and the Devil
himself in return for his supernatural gifts.”
The Catholic Church’s persistent
attempts to undermine the notion of
natural magic and that connection of
man and woman to the natural world
has resulted in something of a scouring
of the archives and collections of
scholars and practitioners of the
occult as the Church’s emissaries
have sought to purge them from the
face of the earth. Rumours persist
that these confiscating books are
hidden away hidden away under some
Papal holding in Rome, though all the
evidence suggests that to be wrong
and that the emissaries burned them
in huge conflagrations, intent on
ridding the world of their influence
forever.
Any discourse on witches is, in their
eyes, the equivalent of some lingering
worship of those pagan gods their
faithful preached so long and hard to
stamp out, and needs to be crushed
because it is nothing short of heresy.
Even now. Armed now with the book
Malleus Maleficarum written by two
Dominican inquisitors who believed 91
they had solved the riddle of how a
witch trial would proceed to prove
guilt, the Church considered it their
most valuable weapon in the fight
against witches. Looking back, the
incontrovertible truth is that a great
many innocent women and men were
murdered because of false accusations
of witchcraft used to bring them
down.
What one must consider is the greater
truth, we have here in our possession at the
Royal Society records from the 1602-1606
witch trials in Fulda that offer unequivocal
evidence that the ‘old’ witches did indeed
exist, and how they drew their strength
from the natural world around them.
For reference, the protocols include:
“The witch exhibited all of the tell tale
signs we knew to look for. Every single one.
She had bumps all over her body, her hair
was pork brush and her mouth reeked of
sulfur. For several days witnessed how she
used her sorcery so that the grain in the fields
died in one long bitter night.”
 Similar records from the witch trials
of Salem, Massachusetts, 1692, read:

“When the witch was confronted with the

fact that she was revealed, her initial fear
was obvious, but it did not last, giving way
to anger. Through ancient enchantments, she
caused her skin to turn out great suppurating
sores and pustules that found purchase on
the flesh of John Patterson, spreading with
horrific haste. Likewise huge whirlpools
of wheals and welts swelled across Francis
Jacob’s throat and neck. It was only when we
severed the head of the damned witch did we
see the full horror of what she contained—
thick, bloated, blood-slick worms peeled away
from the bones of her spine and slithered
around the ragged wounds of her neck,
falling out of her empty skull.”

Unique individuals
Baba Yaga
Across Slavic countries and into
Northern Europe the legend of the evil
92 witch Baba-Yaga is rife. She is a vile
creature that dwells in the deeps of the
darkest forests, more fable than reality,
surely? Accounts that she strides across
the land with her house shaking the
earth with every lumbering step that it
takes, or that she propels herself in some
gigantic mortar, using the pestle to drive
her progress, creating deep cracks in the
heart of the world and massive tidal-
surge waves of earthquake that ripple out
in her wake, swelling, their impact felt for
several kilometres.
Baba-Yaga is said to be one of the last
original witches, and her dark magic
powerful enough to wipe out entire
villages if she surrenders to her wrath
and unleashes it’s full might. She is a hair that has lived for a thousand years of a frog, which makes her the true root
witch to be feared above all. and more, incapable of death. of the fairy tale curse where the trapped
Like many of the nature witches price can be saved by the frog kiss.
Jenny Greenteeth talked about in the old tales, Jenny
Surely Jenny Greenteeth is nothing Greenteeth has taken shelter in the
more than a legend? forests of Britain, but she dwells always Characteristics
Surely, she is nothing more than a near a stream, moving through the Practitioners of magic, devotees of nature,
tale to scare children with? waterways from place to place, nowhere figures of torture and revulsion, the witch
Or, perhaps she is not. Perhaps she is with water safe from her. and warlock have been with us since the
everything we fear. A witch with frog Some believe the witch capable of beginning, though since the widespread
eyes, green fish-like skin and long black transmogrification, taking on the form influence of Christianity the idea of these
ancient practices have become less savoury
to ordinary people who call them ungodly
or pagan. In truth there are few more in
tune with the world around them. Witches
possess a deeper connection to the natural
world, bonded with animal kind, gifted
with herbs and medicines, skilled with
potions and charms. They are fiercely
intelligent, and often just as wicked.
First Impressions
There is little remarkable about these
people; contrary to folkloric studies they
do not have wizened skin or warts or any
such obviously distinguishable marks that
might be visible to the naked eye. There
is nothing to say that the young beautiful
maiden washing laundry down by the river
isn’t a practitioner of the craft, likewise it is
equally possible the handsome young man
walking through the stalls of the market
place who is just oh so charming isn’t a
warlock. The idea of the old crone hunched
over the boiling cauldron is a comfortable
lie meant to make people feel comfortable—
after all, how could you miss such obvious
evil living amongst your township? It’s as
plain and ugly as the wart on her face. Or,
it isn’t. Because that’s the not so ugly truth.
Both witches and warlocks can move easily
within society, both dull and witty, and ugly
and beautiful, just as any of us are capable
of being at different times.
For those who believe in the tests of the
Hammer of the Witches and other tomes
of the Inquisition they would have you
believe that the Devil’s mark is upon these
people, often attributing it to physical
deformity, crooked hands and clubbed
feet, or most commonly, a third nipple.
If only it as that easy to spot the evil
walking amongst us…
What do the Players Know?
Witches, warlocks and their sort have
an aversion to crowded places. Perhaps
it is because they feed off the energy
of all those people and rather than
recharging them it makes them feel a
surge of sickness, like when you have
eaten too much?
They are neither afraid nor revolted by
death and what happens after. It is merely
natural, and they are at one with the natural
world. Death is merely a veil between this
life and the next. They believe our souls
are part of some larger whole. To that end,
nature itself feels natural. They are at home
in the woods and heaths rather in the cities
of stone. Nature restores them.
They are source of wisdom and
knowledge, understanding how the
world works in ways that many of us can
only wonder at, and can feel the energies
that bind and flow through the world.
They have an affinity for the dark arts of
magic, including divination, and other spell
craft, which factors in to their voracious
appetite for knowledge—the more they
know, the more they are driven to learn.
But they are also versed in the healing
arts and their magics may well be the
difference between life and death for a
player in grave danger.
It is a commonly held belief that witches
and warlocks and other witch spawn gain
their malignant powers through training
or inheritance, meaning there are natural
born practitioners who have an affinity
for magic and the esoteric, and there are
those who have devoted their lives to
delving deeper into the dark arts, seeking
to master them. The question is which is
more dangerous? And often it is the mind
driven by compulsive need to tap richer
and richer veins of magic that is more
corrupt and poses the greater threat.
There is an inherent belief that the
use of witchcraft is evil in and of itself,
but that is incorrect. It is very much
dependent upon the personality of the
adherent. However it is hard to fight the
superstitions a lot of people have grown
up with, hence the notion that witches
embody all that is selfish, vindictive and
antisocial within human nature, and
are at the root of disharmony within
communities.
Main Features
✦ Witches are especially good at
reading the emotional energy of a
person or place, and can sense when
great tragedy has occurred in a home,
or when a person in their presence
has suffered great loss.
✦ They can experience incredible
senses of deja vu, so attuned to the
natural world are they.
✦ They are a font of natural wisdom,
well versed in herb lore and natural
remedies.
✦ They are skilled shapers and crafters
of magic, especially natural magic
that relies in some way upon their
connection to the natural world and
the environment.
✦ Others are skilled practitioners of
black magic, or the Sinister Path as it
is sometimes called, with the power
to blight or curse others bringing
about great hardship. This ‘gift’ is
known as The Evil Eye.
✦ They are among the only people
capable of crafting potions,
protections and remedies in the form
of counter-magic, and can fashion
charms, amulets, and talismans that
can be worn to ward off the adverse
effects of the occult and supernatural.
✦ The more powerful a witch or warlock 93
is the deeper and more arcane their
grasp of the esoteric and supernatural
world, including the symbolism, rites,
rituals and literature.
✦ Some are capable of influencing the
sensory perception of others in subtle
ways to cause confusion.
✦ Witches are gifted with animal
husbandry, and training, making them
very sympathetic and empathetic
when dealing with the non-human
inhabitants of the world.
✦ The most powerful witches have
the ability to fly—not some cliched
broomstick fight, but rather, like a
banshee. A witch in flight is one of
the most harrowing sights a mortal
might ever witness.
✦ Many witches possess what they call a
third-sight or sixth sense that allows
them to divine the future in the terms
of prophecy. It is believed by those
who truly fear the witch that their
prognostication is more than that,
and rather, by giving voice to their
prophecies they are shaping the future
and altering destinies…
  
Witch Spawn typical stats
Witches and warlocks are as different as all human beings are
among themselves.. It is impossible to propose here a single
stat format or a single list of all possible powers and feats of all
the witches and warlocks. Some Witch Spawn are incredibly
powerful and evil demon-worshippers, while most of them
are nothing more than minor enchanters, knowing just a few
old tricks to be performed with tarots, secret herbs and mild
hallucinogens. The Church is off course always wary about
dealing with all these individuals, independently from the real
power that they have, since even the most apparently innocuous
trick or sorcerous feat of a warlock may open unexpected links
to evil and demonic threats.
The GM is encouraged to personalize stats and
properties of every Witch Spawn, especially regarding
the creation of specific spells and powers. Furthermore,
the GM may also use the information presented in other
chapters, regarding monsters and entities which can
be allied or connected with the witches (e.g. demons,
small devils, incubi and succubi, nymphs, homunculi,
lycanthropes, zombies, church grims, phantoms, wraiths,
spirits of death and vengeance, etc.).
What follows are just the stats of a common minor witch
living in a forest of continental Europe, still practising old
94 pagan rituals whose origin she maybe barely understands.
These rituals are abominable for the Church, but sometimes
they involve unwary even if apparently God-fearing farmers.
Traits: Perception +2, Psyche +2
Physical Health Points: like normal human beings (32 PHP
is a common value)
Physical Damage levels (for 32 PHP): 1-12 (0) / 13-20 (-1)
/ 21-26 (-3) / 27-30 (-5) / 31-32 (-7)
Mental Health Points: like normal human beings (32 MHP
is a common value)
Mental Damage levels (for 32 MHP): 1-12 (0) / 13-20 (-1)
/ 21-26 (-3) / 27-30 (-5) / 31-32 (-7)
Movement: walking 2 CP per 1 m (Max 10 m).
Fear Factor: usually none, although terrifying witches can
inflict 1d6 to 1d10 MHP.
Skills: Agility SV 6, Culture SV 5, Fighting SV 6,
Theology SV 6
Communication SV 8: Languages 1 (Native
Language 3) Rhetoric 1 (Persuasion 3).
Entertainment SV 7: Music 1 (Play Instrument 1).
Esotericism SV 8: Divination 3 (Numerology 3,
Seer-Tarots 3), Supernatural Beings 2 (Beastiology 3),
Left-Hand Path 3 (Black Magic 3, Medicina Mentis
Sinistra 3).
Professions SV 7: Animal Handling 2 (Animal Care 3),
Hunting & Fishing 3
Science SV 7: Healthcare 2 (Healing 3)
Stealth SV 7: Avoidance 2 (Hiding & Camouflage 3,
Sneaking 3).
Well-Travelled SV 8 Survival 2
Initiative: 0
Combat points: Free 6.
Equipment:
✦ Decent Dagger (IM -2, WA 4, OM 0, BP 12, dmg 1d10
OR 10).
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM -2) Dagger SV 6.
Common Properties
Magic
The GM is encouraged to make witches and warlocks use
Dark Arts of both Left and Right Paths, choosing them from
Lex Libris p.227-232, or from this book or from any other
future book. Most Witches do not know more than 1 or 2
minor arts, although more expert witches off course exist.
Connection with nature
Witches tend to have strong links with the natural world.
To represent this the GM may give them several assets like
the presence of animal companions (wolves, ravens, etc.) or a
bonus (+5 SV) to Science skill rolls specifically linked with
Healthcare using herbs.
Read emotions
Most Witches and Warlocks know how to read emotions and
sense the existence of a tragedy, even if nobody told them
anything about it. Any attempt to cheat a witch through the
Communication skill should therefore receive a penalty of a
least -5 SV.
Sorcerous Remedies
Most witches know how to craft amulets, talismans and other
charms to protect against curse and the Evil Eye of other
witches. The GM should judge whether these really work or
not, according to their own story need. If in doubt, the Witch
can make an Esotericism roll, using the Esotericism SV of the
enemy witch as a modifier to the SV.
Predict the Future
Whether by using tarots, runes or an animal’ entrails, most
witches try to predict the future. This power cannot off course
be given exact statistics to establish whether this works or
not, but the GM is encouraged to choose the outcomings of
these premonitions according to the story needs. In any case,
by realizing that a prophecy has been fulfilled, one must make
a Situation Roll with a SV of 10 (modified by Psyche) in order
not to suffer 1d6 MHP.
Optional Properties
What follows are a few possible stronger powers that witches
and warlocks may have.
Confusion
By staring into the eyes of a victim the witch can force it into
a dazed status for 1d6 rounds or can make it believe minor
illusions like phantasm sounds and mild hallucinations. To
resist this effect, one must succeed a Situation Roll with a SV
of 8 modified by Psyche.
Evil Eye
Once per month the Witch can cast a subtle curse on a subject.
The victim will suffer a penalty of -3 SV on all the skill and
situation rolls for a whole year or until a religious authority
has performed a proper exorcism. More powerful witches may
inflict penalties more severe than -3, but rarely above -6.
Fly
Only the most powerful witches fly, and they always do it in
dramatic conditions, like in the darkest night or in certain
specific days sacred to old pagan religions or after some
gruesome sacrifice to obscure and evil powers. Some witches
may need specific tools (e.g. Baba Yaga’s magic mortar or the
classic broomstick), but this is not always the case and many
of them levitate or fly as birds with no wings. The GM should
decide the specific speed and movement limits. In any case,
the vision of a flying witch is terrifying for the common men,
causing 1d10 MHP damage.
Great Magic
The Witch is a master of Black or White magic, knowing
a wide range of spells (more than 2 dark arts) and, in some
cases, some Scientific art may also be used, but only if linked
with alchemy and the use of herbs.
Shapeshifting
The witch can turn its shape into an animal form, usually
a raven or other bird form, used to spy upon large areas.
Witnessing this transformation is also incredibly terrifying,
causing at least 1d10 (OR 10) MHP damage, while realising
that a specific animal is in reality a witch (but without watching
the transformation) should cause 1d6 MHP damage.
Witch Spawn-related Secrets Arts
Clear the Evil Eye
New Dark Art, Right-Hand Path
Every European region has its own superstitious ritual needed
for clearing the effects of minor curses like the Evil Eye, with
its own material requirements and conditions. For example in
many parts of the Kingdom of Naples (like Abruzzi or Calabria)
some initiated women know how to “togliere la ’mmdia” which
literally means to ”clear the envy” (envy = curse, the local
variety of the “malocchio” or ”Evil Eye”), since they have been
taught the specific rituals during the Christmas Eve’s night by
some old lady, usually a grand-mother or an old aunt. Different
but also equally picturesque practices are diffused throughout
Europe and the GM is encouraged to be creative in adapting
these practices to the game.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: a penalty equal to the Esotericism
SV (without disciplines or specialties) of the witch who cast
the Evil Eye. 95
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 4
✦ Discipline: The Right-hand Path level 1
✦ Specialty: White Magic level 1
Effect
If the Esotericism skill roll is successful, the effects of the Evil
Eye are cleared. It is worth noting that this is just a minor
abjuration, usually not able to nullify the direst effects of the
most powerful curses, which can be defeated only by proper
Exorcism or other Divine arts.
96
 The Leprechaun
T he woman stood in the doorway thrusting the
child she swore wasn’t hers towards me.
I took the babe from her, more for the child’s
safety than from any nurturing instinct. There was
a curious texture to the girl’s skin, almost like the rough bark
of a tree. I wondered if it might be some rare skin condition? A
brutal disease slowly petrifying the child? Could it be so? It was
beyond my medical knowledge, but one thing I had come to learn
during my travels was that my understanding of the world was
thinner than I had ever thought when I set out. There was so much
I did not understand and simply had not experienced. That did
not mean it was either supernatural or evil. And yet there was
something tragic about this scene that made me want to believe
there was some evil that could be defeated. It would be good to
win once in a while.
“Get that thing away from me,” the woman screeched, pushing
at me to drive me back from the threshold.
What woman would deny her own blood a place in her arms?
I had no answer, but retreated so as to spare her more pain.
Beside me, her husband wept, but whether for his wife or his
daughter I could not tell. Although he did not try to take the
child from me, so perhaps he believed her? I looked to him for
guidance.
He shook his head, which I took as an admonishment: not here.
97
I allowed him to lead me away from the houses towards a small
ring of red-capped mushrooms that grew on the mossy hillside. A
bright, brilliant rainbow arced across the emerald landscape. The
palate was so vivid I imagined I could taste the reds as they faded
into yellows and finally blues as the rain lashed down. I held the
child tight in my arms so as to shield her as best I could from the
elements. Several villagers had come out, drawn by the hysteria.
“You need to understand,” the husband said, though how a circle
of fungi on a barren hill could in anyway lead to enlightenment,
I had no idea. “My wife isn’t mad, or wasn’t, but the visitor has
driven her to this.”
“Tell me about him?” I said, knowing that the visitor had to
be male or the husband would have used some more derogatory
epithet to name her. It took no great intelligence to read the man.
He was a simple fellow given to tending his land, the labour
ingrained in the dirt and coarse skin of his hands as he gestured
helplessly.
“He came to us demanding coin, but we had none to give. At
least not the coin he wanted.”
So they viewed this as some form of punishment, I realised.
That helped.
“And what coin was that?”
“His lucky coin,” the husband said. “Or so he called it. I assumed it
was a king’s shilling, but when I offered the thirteen pennies he shook
his head, adamant that it had to be a particular coin.”
 “Did he mean gun money?” I asked, thinking perhaps the
stranger had been looking for one of those older crowns issued
by James II during that fateful war. They called it gun money
because it was struck from the barrels of melted-down weapons, or
so they said. I’d have imagined they would need the guns for the
killing, given the fact they were embroiled in a brutal two-year
war.
The man shook his head. “No. It was another coin entirely he
had in mind. What know you of the Aes Sidhe?”
“Little,” I admitted. The truth was less than little, though more
than nothing.
“The people of the mounds, some call them, others simply call
them the folk. They dwell in that otherland beneath the hill,” I
saw his gaze stray to the ring of red caps. It took me a moment
to grasp the full meaning of his words. He intended me to believe
that the mushroom ring was in truth a Sidhe Circle—a portal to
the otherworld beneath the hill. He meant for me to believe that
the stranger he spoke of was one of the folk, and then what?
“And this coin the stranger sought, it was to be an offering to
appease the folk?”
“Aye,” the husband said. “A lucky coin from the spoils of a long-
forgotten war.”
“And you mean to say that for want of that coin he took your
child and replaced it with a changeling?” I looked down at the
child in my arms, trying to think of it as one of the cursed folk.
“Aye,” he said again. “Look at her, she is not of mortal blood, it
98 is plain to see. She is some wretched faerie brought to this realm
to wither and die.”
I had not heard that manner of legend before, that the Sidhe
would bring their dying to this world to pass over. It felt oddly
cruel to deny the dying the link to their own land, but then,
perhaps their claim on this place was older than ours, and in
truth they were coming back to their ancestral home to die?
“I saw him,” the husband admitted then. “I saw him but could
not stop him.”
“Explain,” I pushed.
“I heard the pipe music first, and followed the sound to see the
Sidhe climbing out through the window, a bundle wrapped in his
arms, and followed him to this place, but he was gone through the
door before I could follow.”
It sounded too fanciful to believe, but in truth was it any more
fanciful than a golem raised by the secret name of God or an
accursed vampire nest?
Curiously, the child appeared to be healing, and I wondered if
the switch had been discovered just a few hours later would the
transformation have been perfect? Because I had no doubt given a
little longer the changeling’s skin would be every bit as smooth as
the new born babe whose life it was stealing.
But how could I be sure that strange barkskin wasn’t a symptom
of a sickness I did not understand and in truth there was nothing
otherworldly about the child?. That was more likely than a portal
into the land of the faerie, wasn’t it?
“That isn’t my little girl,” the husband said, as though reading
my doubts in my face. “That isn’t Niamh. It is Siabhra.” I did not
know the meaning of the name, but surely the man had chosen it
for a reason?
“You truly believe this little one is a changeling?” I pressed the
point, for when I said I knew a little of the Aes Sidhe that little
included a tale of a desperate woman who had put her changeling
child in a pyre and burned it alive—causing the Sidhe that had
stolen her own child to return it. I couldn’t believe I was about to
suggest the man burned his own child… “And you followed the
fellow here?” I asked, trying to imagine the circle as anything
other than the few small stones arranged in a ring that it was.
“I did. Though it wasn’t like this, it was different then,” the man
explained, “I was just a few paces behind him. I could see the way
between our worlds as he rushed three times widdershins around
the Sidhe circle, though I could not follow where he travelled.”
“The door was open? You saw the otherland?”
“It was. And I did.”
I had so many questions, but none of them were of use when it
came to the child in my arms.
“And when will it open again?”
“On this side? I do not know. Perhaps when the stars next align?”
“A full year from now?”
“By which time our precious Niamh will not recognise us. She
will be one of them…”
“Do you trust me?” I asked, knowing that he had no reason to.
He nodded. “We need to bring this fellow back here to face justice,”
I suggested.
“But how do we do that?”
“We burn the thing he left behind,” I told him, looking down at
the changeling in my arms.
“Burn it?” He asked, sickly.
“Yes. Here. In the centre of the circle. He will return to save that
which he left behind.”
The husband looked doubtful.
“If it truly isn’t your child what do you have to fear?” I asked,
though in my heart of hearts all I could think was God help me
if I am wrong…
“Help me gather the kindling,” he said, and we set about the
foul work. It did not take long to build a small pyre in the middle
of the red cap ring, though with each new branch I doubted
myself more.
“Is there some kind of rite?” the man asked as we looked down
together at the crossed sticks. “Some words to summon him?”
“I have no idea,” I admitted, not sure who or what might answer
the flames.
“I do not mind admitting, adventurer, that what we are about
frightens me to the marrow.”
“But imagine your wife’s joy at her baby’s return. We do this
for her, for her mind, as much as for the daughter you have lost.”
“And she won’t care if we burn this creature to a crisp whether
it brings our sweet Niamh home or not,” he confessed.
I knew as much, but it was good to hear it from his mouth. It
gave me permission to pour oil on the kindling and set the tinder
to burning. I stepped back to watch the flames rise, the changeling
child still in my arms, mewling with a sound that was so close to
human it could have fooled me if not for the receding barkskin. It
was no more than a few hours from transformation, the illusion of
mortality complete, the switch perfected. But it would never get to
live in this human realm. Not if I could help it.
I set the thing down, and stepped back outside the ring of
mushrooms, watching as the cloth wrapping blackened and
charred, the wool of the weave shrinking back away from the
flames. And in that second the changeling’s mewling became all
too human.
“Are you the thief?” another voice said, breaking the solemn
silence.
I didn’t follow the question.
I turned to see a short, stout fellow in a red square-cut coat
that had the air of the militia about it, white breeches and a
broad-brimmed hat that covered most of his face in shadow. It
wasn’t until he stepped forward that I saw the wicked rows of teeth,
sharpened like those of a ghoul. There was nothing pleasant about
the man, if man he truly was.
“I did not take the child,” I said, assuming that was what he
meant with his question.
“Ack, no, away with that nonsense. Are you the thief that stole
my lucky coin? Belonged to Fergus mac Léti, the High King of
Conn, so it did. Minted from the stuff of his blade, Caladbolg.”
That was a name I had heard before. In Welsh it was Caledfwlch,
in the Matter of Britain it was named Excalibur. I understood
now why the little fellow might not be best pleased with the theft
of his so-called lucky coin. “It’s mine it is. Gave him a wish for
that coin, so I did.”
I knew the name of the Aes Sidhe of legend who had granted
that king his wishes. Lúchorpáin, or Leithbrágan depending
upon your dialect.
I was in the presence of one of the degenerate faerie known to
plunder the battlefields and horde the treasures of old wartime:
the Leprechaun.
“Give the child back and I shall help you find your coin,” I
offered, knowing the creature’s love of a pact.
“I have your word? No matter what manner of fiend stole it?
You’ll help me find it?”
“If you return the child,” I said.
“Ack, well that is of no matter. It’s giving me a headache with
its constant crying, so it is,” he spat on his hand and held it out to
me. As I took it, the flames died down, and in the place of the ash
lay the unmarked babe, Niamh, crying for her mother with all
the gusto of the day she had been born. “Come,” the small fellow
said, “We have business to be about. I can smell the coin close by
and I mean to have it back.”
What choice did I have but to follow him? Especially if there
was the slightest chance our path might lead through the Sidhe
gateway and into the land of the Tuatha dé Danann?
A pact is a pact, after all, even if it is a fool’s one.
99
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Leprechaun
Unique individuals
There are four famed leprechaun, who
guard the fabled aethergates that open
into the Otherworld. Each has their
own very distinct personalities, though
all four share the same capricious nature
and joy of pranks.
The Logheryman
The Logheryman, this ‘northern’ celt
was more military in nature, a exiled
from his people to walk the wilds of
the grim north still dressed in his red
100 military red coat and white breeches,
he wears a wide-brimmed hat to shade
his eyes and is more acrobatic in nature
than his fellows.
Lurigadawne
The Lurigadawne was a fine swordsman
and renown duellist, more skilled in
magic than his fellows, he is as apt with
spell craft as he is with his blade.
The Luricawne
The Luricawne was a rotund fae,
responsible for our image of the
leprechaun as a jovial fellow. He is
an obsessive compulsive character,
obsessed with numbers, notably the
number seven. He wears a jacket
that always has seven rows of seven
buttons. There is magic in numbers, he
believes. A way to control the universe.
His joviality as a front. The Luricawne
is a dark soul, capable of incredible
malice if crossed. He is known to
switch babies for fae creatures if riled
up the expectant father, giving birth
to the legends of changelings in the
region.
The Cluricawne
The Cluricawne is a light-fingered
trickster, capable of slipping into and
out of shadows at whim, and not averse
to more macabre tricks as it has the
darkest sense of humour of its kind.
Appearance
The Leprechaun isn’t the cuddly
creature of folklore who guards a pot
of gold at the end of a rainbow; it is
one of the fae, meaning a dweller of the
Otherworld, a spiteful trickster who has
more in common with the banshee than
with any picture book rendition that
tames his wildness with cute toe-curled
boots, pipe and that shock of red hair.
Pale skinned, the leprechaun is almost
ethereal in nature, willow-thin creature
with sallow skin and high elfin cheekbones
that is more at home in nightmares than
in this realm. The representation we are
more common with owes itself to an
attempt to neuter the menace the fae poses,
making it appear more like a fat friendly
Father Christmas than the duplicitous
trickster it is at heart. There are a few
things most of the images get right, and
they include the fact that the leprechaun
is often short of stature, averaging two
or three feet, seldom more, and always
immaculately dressed, and always with a
slash of red like blood somewhere on his
garb. The red marks them as loners, cast
out from the safety of the tribes.
First Impressions
They are almost childlike until seen close
up, and then, despite their diminutive
stature, there is nothing childish about
these creatures. To gaze upon the face
of a leprechaun is to gaze upon the .
The earliest accounts of leprechaun’s
in Celtic lore mark them as wisened old
men, cloaked and hunched over, who sat
solitary vigil at the roadside, whittling
wood or working some other small
handcraft. They were friendless souls
who shunned company, their breath
stinking of alcohol.
What do the Players Know?
While they are tricksters by nature
they are not inherently evil. The name
leprechaun has its origins in the old Irish
phrase Lú Chorpain, which literally
means small-bodied, but came to mean
something more akin to a nature sprite.
And like most sprites they are capricious
in nature. They are driven by primal
desires, notably lust, and are capable of
being downright nasty if crossed. They
might well entertain and delight you
one day with their magic and kill you
the next.
One thing is for sure, they cannot be
trusted.
The rogue’s pot of gold is more likely
a metaphor for the weakness between
this realm and the Otherworld rather
than any actual riches.
Main Features
✦ They are fiercely intelligent as a
species, often able to think several
steps ahead in any encounter and
manipulate proceedings to their best
interest.
✦ They are gifted spell casters, though
their command of magic is limited to
smaller cantrips and petty illusions
that best serve their merriment
rather than more destructive magics.
Everything is about amusement, even
their nastier tricks serve to keep them
entertained as opposed to wreak some
sort of craved for revenge.
✦ The leprechauns have a gift for
mesmerism, and are able to influence
weaker minds with their tricks, which
is where the legendary pots of gold
come from.
✦ Perhaps most importantly for the little
fae, they are incredibly lucky creatures
and can often bend fate to the most
bizarre outcome which would seem on
the surface to be just about impossible.
It’s a million to one shot, but it might
just work will more often than not
play out in this creature’s favour. After
all, its that lucky. But, as some say, you
make your own luck…
✦ They are elemental creatures, so may
well have a strong bond in their magic
to one of the four elements, earth, air,
fire and water, using this element to
best play their tricks.
✦ Captured, a leprechaun may offer its
captors wishes, but these wishes are
not something players can ever trust
as the wily fae will seek to make good
on the wish in the most devious ways
imaginable, and there will always be a
sting in the tail for the wisher.
✦ Leprechauns are gifted artists and
musicians, and can weave their petty
magics within verses and tunes, or
imbue them into paintings and the
like that when gazed upon trigger the
spell hidden within them.
✦ Like all members of the Tuatha
de Danann, the leprechaun was
banished from this world—returning
comes at a cost to it, either in terms
of physical pain (which can quickly
fray its temper and cause it to appear
more snide and vicious than it might
otherwise be) or in terms of a drain
on its magical talent. The longer a
leprechaun is forced to remain here
rather than return to the Otherworld
the weaker the creature becomes,
until it has lingered here too long and
is incapable of opening the way back
to its home.

 
Leprechaun typical stats Combat points: Free 7 / Evade 15.
The following stats represent “typical” Leprechauns, if such Equipment: usually nothing since most Leprechauns do not
things exist. They can be used as a basis to mimic one of fight
the four named Leprechauns, or even to represent another Samples of Attacks: 101
Leprechaun, is the GM establishes that there are more than ✦ (IM +4) Brawling SV 7.

the four named Leprechauns. Furthermore, Leprechaun’s ✦ (IM +4) Evade SV 15 or two Evade attempts SV 9 and SV 6.

powers are difficult to establish in terms of stats. The GM is

encouraged to use them as he wishes, bending the results of
these powers to the needs of the story. Remember that most
leprechauns never fight, so often their combat stats are not
very useful.
Traits: Intelligence +2, Dexterity +4, Perception +4.
Physical Health Points: 20 to 40 (32 is a common value)
Physical Damage levels: not applicable
Mental Health Points: none
Movement: walking 2 CP per 1 m (Max 10 m) or whatever is
needed in the story!
Fear Factor: 1d10
Skills: Agility SV 7: Body Control 2 (Evade 3)
Communication SV 9: Rhetoric 2 (Bartering 3,
Persuasion 3)
Culture SV 10
Entertainment SV 10: Acting & Dance 2 (Dancing 3),
Gambling 2 (Cheating 3), Music 2 (Play Instrument
– Violin or Harp 3, Singing Folksong 3).
Fighting SV 7
Stealth SV 8: Avoidance 1 (Hiding & Camouflage 3,
Sneaking 3).
Initiative: +4
Common Properties
Fae nature
Leprechauns have physical health points, although they do
not suffer penalties for lost PHP and, therefore, no damage
level is worth recording. Furthermore, when their PHP are
reduced to “0” Leprechauns do not die, they just disappear for
going nobody knows where.
Their fae nature also means that their psyche cannot be
harmed, therefore Leprechauns do not have MHP.
Grant Wishes
Imprisoned Leprechauns can grant wishes, although the
GM should always come up with a way through which the
Leprechaun take advantage of it.
Illusions
Leprechauns like to use mesmerism, tricks and plant illusions
in the minds of fools and simple people. There is no limit to
the kinds of illusions but usually none of them is directly
harming a victim. To resist these illusions, one must succeed
a Situation Roll with a SV of 8 (modified by Psyche).
 Immune to weapons
Leprechauns cannot be harmed by common weapons and,
in any case, they rarely engage in physical combat. Only a
few substances can harm them, although this depends on the
story which is told: wrought iron, gold or holy water blessed
by a Christian Priest (dealing 1d10 PHP).
Incredible Luck
Leprechauns have a few skill values in the stats above, however
whenever the odds are impossible to beat, Leprechauns are
bound to automatically perform otherwise impossible feats.
Do not make dice rolls, just make a decision!
Incredible Movement
For most normal feats Leprechauns spend CP to move, make
Agility rolls, make Stealth rolls … but sometimes they just
automatically appear and disappear where the story requires
them to be, with no need of any roll. This happens probably
through a temporary passage through the Otherworld, but
nobody knows exactly how Leprechauns do this. Those who
witness these impossible, unnatural movements are bound to
suffer 1d6 MHP.
Vulnerabilities
Leprechauns usually do not fight and are immune to most
harms that mortals can inflict. However, they can be captured
102 using tricks and exploding their vulnerabilities. These are
various and totally depend on the exact story to which the
Leprechaun is linked, therefore the GM is encouraged to
research ancient fae stories or to create ad-hoc stories to
adapt to the specific Leprechaun. Some of these creatures
cannot resist the urge to drink ale or to speak with beautiful
red-haired girls, others are looking for specific, precious old
coins or rare quatrefoil while others cannot endure the light
of the sun.
Finally, it is worth saying that Leprechauns belong to
the Otherworld, since they were banished from this world
long ago. Therefore, the longer they remain in this world,
the weaker they become and the less powers they have. The
GM should adapt the Leprechaun’ stats and powers to this
situation.
Leprechaun Variations
The Logheryman
Change the following:
Agility SV 10, Body Control 3 (Evade 5, Parkour 5).
Samples of Attacks: (IM +4) Two Evade attempts SV 16
and SV 7.
Lurigadwne
Change the following stats for this Leprechaun which is more
prone to fight.
Fighting SV 10, Close Combat 3 Right (One-Handed
Weapons 5).
CP: Free 10 / Close Combat 3 (Right 1H Weapons 10).
Equipment:
✦ Excellent Small Sword (IM -2, WA 4, OM +2, BP 12, dmg
1d10 OR 10).
Samples of Attacks: (IM +2) Excellent Small Sword SV 13,
SV 10.
Furthermore, the Lurigadwne’s illusions are tougher to resist:
the situation roll has a SV of 6 modified by Psyche.
Luricawne
The basic stats of Leprechauns are good for representing
the Luricawne but the GM should always use the creature’s
powers for darker purposes.
Cluricawne
Change the following:
Stealth SV 10, Avoidance 3 (Hiding & Camouflage 3, Sneaking
3), Sleight of Hand 5.
Furthermore, the Cluricawne has a certain control on
shadows.
Leprechaun-related Secrets Arts
Call the Leprechaun
New Dark Art, Right-Hand Path
There are many old rituals to summon a Leprechaun and
this is just one of them. Sometimes Leprechauns can be
even summoned without a Dark Art, if one knows exactly
what the creature wants. This Art represent an old Celtic
ritual, possibly known by some old man in Ireland, to be
performed by dancing, singing and playing on an old pagan
sacred site. Many varieties of this ritual can exist, and the
GM is encouraged to be creative with possible alternatives.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -8.
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 8
✦ Discipline: The Right-hand Path level 3
✦ Specialty: White Magic level 3
Other Requirements
✦ Supernatural Beings Discipline level 2, Beastiology level 3
✦ Communication SV 5, Languages Discipline level 1, Mother
or Foreign Language (Irish) level 3.
✦ Entertainment SV 7, Acting & Dancing Discipline level 1
(Dancing specialty level 3), Music discipline level 1 (Play
Instrument – Violin or Harp specialty level 3, Singing
Folksong specialty level 3).
Material Requirements
An old Celtic, pagan site (like a mound or a circle of stones)
✦ between GM and players to establish what will happen
or, in alternative, some place which according to legend
is strongly associated with fae or circle of red-capped
mushrooms.
✦ The right moment: a night of full moon, a Solstice or an
Equinox, or any old Celtic holiday.
✦ A harp or a violin.
Effect
If the roll is successful a Leprechaun is summoned. The
creature will be curious about why it has been summoned,
but also eager to come back to the Otherworld, possibly
also gaining something that he likes or stopping some
situation that he dislikes. It is totally up the interaction
next. The Leprechaun is not bound to remain more than a
quarter of hour and it will remain longer only if properly
persuaded.
103
104
 The Incubus and Succubus
I heard tell of a scholar in Salon-de-Provence
who claimed to be haunted, not by ghosts but
demons. It was the kind of story that more
times than not I would have ignored, but
after my experiences in Paris it felt compelled to investigate.
His name was Michel. I walked behind him along the
midnight street, not making my presence known. Between
us, the shadow-wings of a great black-winged bird chased
his heels. There wasn’t a single bird in the sky. He kept his
head down. I expected him to run. It was in the way he
moved. It was plain to see that fear filled his muscles. His
feet scraped on the cobbled stones. All around us people slept
wrapped up tight against the night. If the stories of Michel
were right he had not slept for a long time.
Michel heard things. Voices. At first he had believed they were
ghosts trying to communicate with him, but he had become certain
they were demons come to taunt him. He had confessed to a lover that
his greatest fear was that he was wrong, and rather, these demons came
from inside him, each one an aspect of his self as he fractured into
a pantheon of personalities, none of which were his own. He named
105
the thing inside him the Babylonian. His last confession to his love
was the most peculiar of them all: the voices within him demanded
tribute, a most specific charge, that he recover the last holy revelation of
Pedro Martinez de Luna. Seven pages bound in the skin of a martyr.
De Luna had supposedly confessed to consorting with devils before his
excommunication. I had not read the original, though I had heard of it
along with several other confessions held by the Church. I knew though
that before his excommunication de Luna had been known by another
name, Benedict XIII. He was the last of the Babylonian Conspiracy
Popes, declared an Antipope for his sins. It was a strange thing for any
inner demon to demand of Michel, and that more than anything else
frightened her. If he was right in his self-diagnosis then surely the day
her beloved woke with someone else controlling his words and thoughts,
this personality banished to the darkness of the soul, was close at hand.
That was why she asked for my help, not that I believed I possessed
the gifts needed to banish such evils from a man’s inner self. Because I
was in no doubt that evils were at work here.
Behind me the old Cathedral stretched high into the sky.
With its gargoyles leering down at me it transmogrified the Glory of
God from awe into intimidation with threats of demons, spirits, ghosts
and other unholy entities.
Supposedly, the cathedral homed the last remnants of the Great
Library of Alexandria, the rest had been spirited away to vaults beneath
the Holy See itself. It was easy to tell such stories with no one left alive to
refute them. Of course, the notion that in that same vault where Michel
 had found the last revelation of de Luna were the great secrets of Solomon,
Alexander of Macedon himself, and so many other secrets thought lost
was seductive in the extreme. Think on it, a man could spend his entire
lifetime among such treasures and never feel like he had lost the chance
to live. To immerse oneself in the writings of the two hundred thousand
scrolls Mark Antony had given his Egyptian Queen as his wedding gift?
Yo lay eyes upon those words pillaged from the Library of Pergamum?
Surely that was a scholar’s interpretation of heaven on earth. It really
was a place to cure the soul, as the inscription above the main archway of
the lost library was supposed to have said. My head spun and my heart
raced just thinking of it. Aristotle, Ptolemy, their words inked out on the
original papyrus, long before they were transcribed by faithful scribes to
parchment. It sent shivers through ever nerve and fibre of the man.
I followed Michel back to his rooms. A woman with the skin the
colour of absolute midnight met him on threshold. I marked the fierce
cunning in her eyes even from this distance and wondered if I might not
be looking at the Babylonian herself.
I needed to get inside, but it wasn’t as if I could just knock on the door
and follow him up the stairs, so retreated to doorway to sleep out the
night, intending to find Michel in the morning and introduce myself.
I bedded down, drawing my many layers up around my throat and
huddled against the stone lintel, though sleep did not come easily, nor
did it come deep.
Some hours later, as the great bell tolled three, I heard a noise across
the way, and stirred to see the woman climbing out through the window.
His skin glistened with a sheen of sweat. The muscles beneath were
106 incredible, more powerful than the muscles of any warrior I had met.
This was not natural, though that did not mean it was supernatural. I
forced myself not to leap to conclusions even as I watched her scale the
side of the building and disappear across the rooftops.
I waited until I was sure she was gone, then crossed the street.
The door was unlocked, so I ventured inside, not sure what I expected
to find.
He lay on the bed, naked, a withered husk of a man that had so
obviously been fed upon by whatever the Babylonian truly was—and
already I had my suspicions based upon the evidence of my eyes, but
it would not be until the following night that I truly knew what it was
that I was dealing with here, and just how out of my depth I was with
such an ancient and all knowing evil.
I tested his throat for a pulse. It was weak and thready, but he lived
on, even though his eyes stated up at me sightlessly. There were no bite
marks or puncture wounds around the throat, which I admit I checked
for, remembering the warrens beneath Paris and the fiends that dwelled
within them.
This was different.
Taking his beloved at her word, this evil was far more ancient than
any vampiric creature. That it identified itself as the Babylonian could
be no accident, surely?
I took up a seat and waited for Michel to return to his senses. The
chair was considerably more comfortable than the doorway had been
and I found myself falling asleep, which given the fact I was an intruder
here was not the wisest decision I had made in my short life.
I woke to find a gaunt hollow man staring at me, an iron poker in
hand, and thought for sure and certain he intend to open my skull with
it. I held up both hands, naming his beloved and trying to explain that
she sent me because she feared for his soul.
That stopped him.
Michel lowered the iron poker, though he tapped it against his thigh
while I hurriedly explained my presence in his home. “I saw her climb
out of the window and disappear across the rooftops. I feared the worst.”
“You saw her?” He asked.
“I did.”
“You saw her?” He repeated.
I nodded.
“How can that be? Describe her to me.”
“Her skin was ebony, her smile alabaster, her eyes black like the
pit itself, but nowhere near as empty,” I said, waxing poetic in my
description of what I now thought of as pure evil.
He nodded, and for a third time said, “You saw her,” though this
time it wasn’t a question.
“Who is she?” I very nearly asked what, but caught myself. I did not
want to scare him before I learned the truth as he understood it.
“The Babylonian… She first came to me a month ago. I woke to feel her
touch gentling against my cheek and her slightly sour breath prickling in
my throat as she breathed in time with me. In that half-haze of waking I
had thought it was my beloved in bed beside me, and she had moved in the
way of a dream so I did not resist. You have to understand… the mind…
it plays tricks… I hadn’t been frightened… I hadn’t even understood, not
truthfully, as she took me into her. All I remember of that first night is
that I had fallen asleep utterly spent. She had been gone by morning, my
beloved in bed beside me, but when I asked her about her passions of the
night she had no idea what I was talking about. This happened again and
again, until she refused to sleep beside me, returning to her father’s house
across town. That was when I knew it was not her, because again that next
night the Babylonian returned, and returned and returned, each coupling
more urgent, more fulfilling and more intoxicating. She has a hold on me
I cannot escape. She owns me. I feel myself fading away even as she grows
stronger, as though she is feeding upon me. Last night, she turned her head
so that I could see her face in the moonlight and for the first time I saw a
snake tattoo had been inked into her neck. It coiled all the way down to
the flatness between her legs, the snake coming out of the tangle of hair that
rooted her sex.” I said nothing, wondering if perhaps he had been dreaming
at this point, some mad fever dream brought on after their coupling? “The
reptile’s fangs opened around the fat vein that pulsed between collar and
throat,” he painted a vivid picture. “Her hair was braided and pulled tight
to her scalp. Before her, I had never seen a black woman before. She seemed
almost magical, like a harpie or gorgon medusa, dark and wrathful, but I
know what she is. I have always known. But knowing hasn’t protected me
from her lure.”
“What is she?”
“A demon succubus.”
“Do you know what she wants with the last holy revelation of Pedro
Martinez de Luna?”
He answered me with a question of his own. “Do you know why de Luna
was excommunicated and expelled from Avignon, stripped of his Papacy
and left a broken man?” Before I could answer, he told me. “Because, she
owned him, body and soul, then just soul. She told me that whilst I was
inside her. She fed on him just as she feeds on me. He is still inside her just as
much as he ever was, only now it is spiritual possession rather than physical.
When she took those pages from me she clutched them tight to her breast,
and threw back her head, her moans an incredibly sexual sound, like she
was remembering him all the way into her core”
“She took pleasure from the revelation?”
“That is the only way I can describe it… When she looked at me her
eyes blazed with desire. She promised that I would be rewarded with
my heart’s desire.”
“What do you desire?” I asked, almost fearful of his answer, knowing
he had made the request of a demon.
“You have to understand,” he said, begging me to even as he
rationalised the horrors of the night. “My broken soul called out to
her. I brought her here. I did. It was always me. She isn’t some demonic
whore. She doesn’t walk the streets looking for pitiful men to debase
herself with. My soul called out to her. It was my needs that drew her
here and when our bodies came together we made a pact.” I shook my
head but there was truth in Michel’s words. “Our union bound us,” the
scholar continued. “There is no more potent magic than desire. She is
mine as much as I am hers. I feed off her every bit as voraciously as
she feeds off me.”
“How can that be?” I asked, “Look at you. You are nothing more
than skin and bone.”
“Did my beloved tell you about the voices?”
“That you believe yourself haunted? Yes.”
“I hear them... I thought there were ghosts at first, then demons, and
then worse, my soul shattering into hundreds of new identities… but I
was wrong. She explained it to me… The voices I hear… They are the
souls of tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow calling out. I can hear
them. I do not know how. Something inside you is torn. Every word I
hear, every voice, every whispered word and sharp cry… They are every
bit as real as you are.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I stand betwixt and between, that is why she was drawn to me. There
is a schism inside my soul and she is feeding off it. I should be dead by
now. No one should live through so many feedings. But I have fed her for
a month and more, and I could be feeding her in a year to come. Most
men sate a succubus for a week. But I am a banquet for the damned. They
are not all like her. She is a seducer, the others, they are devourers, they
are pillagers, takers and breakers. They come in the night without sweet
tongues and honeyed words, hungry to feed in a frenzy of tooth and claw.”
He pulled open his nightshirt as though to emphasise his point, and I saw
that his torso was cut with a mesh of scars that seemed almost to dance in
the morning light. “The schism inside me is a magnet to them. It calls out to
her kind, every one of them. I fear there are already a dozen lesser demons
living in the skins of the commoners who make Salon-du-Provence their
home. And if not already, then soon. The carpenter who does nothing but
make miniature cruciform carvings of the upside down Jesus? He is lost, like
me. The prim and proper school ma’am who leads the little ones in parrot-
fashion verse through the psalms day in, day out? A sister demon whore.
And so many more of them. Look at their faces when you leave this place.
Look into their souls, if you can bear to see what lies within.”
“This cannot go on,” I said. “She is killing you.”
“And I will willingly die,” Michel told me. “It is not as though I have
a choice in the matter. I am the one who summons her. It is my need
that keeps calling out to her. It is her name I cry out in the night, her
name that comes first to my lips when I dream and when those dreams
turn to arousal. I am lost to my beloved. I am a tainted soul. She needs
to forget me. I need you to tell her that. Promise me that you will.
Promise me that you will make her understand… I am lost to her. I am
unworthy. I wish her a life of happiness and love, but it is not to be at
my side. I am damned. I accept that. It is my lot.” 107
I left him knowing that he was one soul I could not save, simply
because he did not want saving.
That was the greatest horror of Salon-du-Provence. Not the demon
that came at night to feed on her victim, but rather that the victim so
eagerly craved those visits, like an addict who could not go on without
their next dose of Paracelsus’ laudanum until they inevitably took the
fatal one…
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Incubus and Succubus
In the Year of our Lord 1566 Johannes
Mathesius published his collection of
conversations with Martin Luther. The
work went by the name Tischreden and
caused a considerable stir throughout
Europe, gaining the attention of students
of the esoteric world. Within these pages
one can read about what Martin Luther
calls the “incubo”. He claims it is a kind
of dark demonic offspring that seduces
innocent women, occupying their bodies.
In the margins of his original notes,
Mathesius has scribbled:
108 “Incubus is created by men who falter in
their faith and seek sexual intercourse with a
forest being. As this being retains the man’s
grain, they can transform into an incubus
which then seduces the innocent woman. For
this reason some of the offspring enter this
world malformed.”
It is an interesting observation, and
worthy of further investigation.
Both the Ancient Greeks and Romans
believed they were in possession of
genuine evidence that proved the incubus’s
existence. The Romans called the demon
faunus. There is considerable research
matter on this. What is interesting is the
deferral of blame here; natural philosophers
and scientists who support the so-called
‘corruption theory’ believe that dark
beings are created when something goes
awry in nature, which means that these
ancient writings seek to absolve the
individual of blame. It does not matter of
you live a good Christian life or not. It is
simply the darkness of the natural world
exerting itself. The incubus is a corruption
within creation and cannot therefore be
associated with religion. It is a convenient
excuse, but does it truly excuse the sexual
perversions of the demonic being? Or are
these proclivities and desires more human,
working like a flame to draw in the moth
that must feed off them?
Pope Innocent VIII’s Bull of 1484 Ad
futuram rei memoriam directly decries
the incubus as an horrific creature that
couples with innocent women for no other
purpose than to seed corrupted children.
“The women who are subjected to an
incubus must immediately and without mercy
be subjected to the worst torture, because they
are no longer women without the devil’s tools.
Only pain can drive the incubus out of their
body. Children whose inclusion through an
incubus must be locked in and studied.”
In 1602, the priest Ernest Hallway sought
to capture an incubus by perpetrating
a simplistic rouse. Clothed as a nun, he
visited one of the monasteries where such
ravages had been reported. And though
he failed, in his notes he has sketched
out what he saw: a dark shadow creature
crawling through the mouth of a sleeping
nun. Before his very eyes, he notes, that
creature changed its shape and size. It
possessed black shiny skin, ruby-red eyes
and a long prickly tail, similar in nature
to the many stone figures and copper
engravings he has seen of the Church’s
demons.
Unique individuals
The Kaltenberg Prince
One of the better known instances of this
sexual predator in the wild can be found in
the field notes of the the Bavarian warlord,
Johann Tserclaes Tilly. He names the
demonic entity the Kalternberg Prince. He
discovered the creature whilst it occupied
Pfalz in 1620. In his notes, he recounts
hearsay of a persistent nature, behind
the hands whispers of an incubus that
infiltrated the sanctums of many hundreds
of women to violate them. Curious as to
the truth of the phenomenon, Johann was
driven to investigate the matter, only to
find that the truth was considerably more
harrowing than any of the whispers had
prepared him for. His journals account the
creatures sexual crimes in vivid detail, each
account more wretched than titillating.
The truth of the Kaltenberg Prince’s
foul existence was born when a group of
men on a wild hunt from that township
brutally raped what they believed to be a
beautiful woman. The fiend created by this
unholy union was of the foulest nature,
driven by the same brutal angers and
rages that spawned it. Even today, rumours
pertaining to the Kaltberberg Prince are
ride, and despite many attempts to capture
and kill the creature, it is still in the wild.
The incubus survived Elector Maximilian
II Emanuel’s great witch hunt that scoured
the province for the entire year, 1677. He
called upon more than one hundred witch
hunters from all walks of life, bringing
them in from every province within
Germany, twice that number in priests and
holy men from the various clerical orders.
Five hundred women were interrogated
and subjected to torture to give up their
demon lover, and sentenced to death, and
still hunters never came close to catching
the Kaltenberg prince.
Physically, the Kaltenberg prince is tall and
emaciated, while his curved spine sprouted
small undeveloped wings. He is a creature
of darkness, travelling only at night, and
only ever emerging from the darkness
when he is certain there is no threat. The
creature resides in the dark places of the
woodland outside Kaltenberg, though
sometimes he may venture into the city
itself, traversing its underground passages
and primitive sewage systems.
Hopkins Devil
While the civil war raged across England, a
fanatical Protestant took it on as his solemn
duty to clear out the devil’s henchmen.
In a single bloody year he succeeded in
sentencing over three hundred women of
all ages to death for the crime of witchcraft.
His purge began in 1645, deep in the misty
wetlands of the Eastern counties. Young
Matthew Hopkins defied Charles I’s ban
on witch hunts, obsessively believing he
was God’s hammer and conduit, receiving
incontrovertible evidence that an incubus
was hunting throughout the area, preying
upon wanton women. Matthew was
joined by the puritan John Stearne and,
like Hopkins, Stearne is obsessed with
cleansing the countryside. He is a zealot.
A man on a mission willing to watch the
countryside burn if that fire can cleanse
the taint of witchcraft from the soul of
England.
The English Witch Act of 1604
prohibits torture, but the law of hallowed
parliamentary halls and what happens out
in the countryside are two very different
beasts. Hopkins and Stearne are not going
to be dissuaded when they believe they
have undeniable proof that an incubus
has possessed a woman, Elizabeth Clarke,
and the only way to drive the beast out
is through torture, forcing Elizabeth to
endure the most brutal torment in their
eagerness to purify her. The zealots
succeed in driving the creature out of her
flesh, only for it to escape their clutches
and spread its curse through the bodies of
countless women, all accused of witchcraft
and of being possessed by an incubus, and
all tortured to the limits of their life only
for the beast to evade the hunters.
The incubus was named the ‘Devil’s
Eye’, but across the counties, farmers and
merchants alike whisper of the Hopkins
Devil, a name far more suited to its
predatory nature.
The Hopkins Devil causes much
hysteria throughout the country as the
witch hunters brutally torture women
they believe to have been tainted by it,
their salvation worse than any possession
could ever be.
Physically, the Hopkins devil is no
more than two feet tall, with small
black wings rooted high up between
its shoulderblades, and long horns
protruding from its forehead. Black
scales cover its entire body. The incubus
is capable of transmogrification, turning
into a cloud of black smoke that helps it
evade capture more often than not.
Appearance
One would be forgiven for imagining
that these seductive demons are in fact
glamorous in nature; perhaps beautiful
young men with iron-hard muscles, almost
angelic souls with beautiful white-feathered
wings, and, of course, an enchanting sex
appeal. This couldn’t be further from the
hunched, gnarled, gargoyle-like truth of
the Incubi. They are small creatures and
bear a striking resemblance to the small
demon. Many have dark skin or fur, claws,
horns, and leathery wings more akin to a
bat’s than a birds.
And, of course, an exaggeratedly
huge penis.
The reason we believe them to be
these seductive creatures is down to
the fact that the incubus and succubus
both possess some small skills with
shapeshifting, allowing them to
manipulate their appearance to make
it more pleasing. Even with this skill,
many of the demons prefer not to take
on a more human guise and retain their
fully demonic mien when they ravage
the flesh of their unfortunate dreamers.
First Impressions
Many victims who live to survive their
encounters with these demons describe
waking from a half-trance daze to find
the demons sitting on their chests, hands
covering their mouths so that they can’t
breathe even as they grind their flesh
against them.
What do the Players Know?
The clue to their nature lies in their
names. The word Succubus comes
from the Late Latin succubare with suc
meaning “under” and “cubāre” meaning
literally “to lie in bed”, while Incubus
comes from the incubāre which in turn
means “to lie upon”. Quite literally, we are
talking about demons that lie and atop
their victims. These sexual demons spend
their energies seducing and feeding upon
the desires of the flesh and the ecstasy
caused by the heady passions of sex.
They are not driven by grand
schemes. They have no real desires
beyond feeding themselves through the
pleasure they taken in their victims.
Though, an incubus can be incredibly
jealous of males in the lives of their
victims, and succubi may be driven to
insane jealousies of females who care for
their male concubines, which can lead to
trouble.
Main Features
✦ They are incredibly charming and 109
charismatic demons, capable of
seducing even the most stubbornly
unromantic of victims. Because that
is what they are, victims. The more
powerful the demon, the easier the
seduction. The most powerful of these
parasites can seduce an intended
victim with a single look.
✦ These silver-tongued devils have
a way with words and can make
anything they say sound flirtatious
and alluring.
✦ The mere presence of either a
succubus or incubus can cause feelings
of intense arousal in a mortal.
✦ These demons possess the unique skill
of dream walking, and can infiltrate
the sleeping minds of their victims,
feeding off both dream and nightmare.
They may visit the same sleeper many
times, feeding on them one little desire
at a time until they have used them up
and left them as shrivelled corpses on
their sweat-stained mattresses. This
feeding is akin to vampirism, though
of an emotional type rather than a
physical sort. They draw strength
 and vitality from the wild sex-fuelled
dreams of their victims, even as they
ride their sleeping flesh. A simple kiss
is enough to provide some sustenance
to one of these demons.
✦ Because they can walk within
a sleeper’s dreams they can
also manipulate them, causing
incredible stress and fear, enough
to still a beating heart in sheer
terror… if they are denied the
thrill of their base sexual desires
or worse begin to grow bored of
their victim.
✦ Their feeding allows them to defy the
ravages of age, as they drain the flesh
of their victim so do they replenish
the vitality of their own bodies,
essentially turning back the effects
of time. It is in many ways a form of
immortality.
✦ They can mark their victims so that
others of their persuasion will not
feed upon them, or, more insidiously,
mark them as a victim to attract more
of their kind, making the mortal’s life
sheer torture.
✦ Because the Incubus itself is
incapable of reproducing, it uses
sperm ‘collected’ from a human male.
And should the victim carry the
child to term it won’t be a normal
baby, but rather something called
a Cambion—a human with some
magical or demonic abilities.
✦ They possess surprising strength for
their sleight size.
✦ They are capable of flight, with the
steady beating of their leathery wings
they make a nightmarish sight at the
window on a moonless night… they
cannot fly far, though.

 
Incubus & Succubus typical stats
What follows are the stats of a basic Incubus or Succubus.
Greater or more ancient creatures of this kind should have
more powerful stats.
Traits: Charisma +4, Constitution +2, Dexterity +2
Physical Health Points: 20-50
Physical Damage levels (for 34 PHP): 1-11 (0) / 12-19 (-1)
110 / 20-24 (-3) / 25-29 (-5) / 30-34 (-7)
Movement: walking or climbing 2 CP per 1 m (Max 14 m),
flying 2 CP per 1 m (Max 10 m).
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 8-10)
Skills: Agility SV 8: Body Control 3 (Evade 3, Parkour 3)
Communication SV 10: Rhetoric 3 (Persuasion 5)
Stealth SV 10: Avoidance 1 (Hiding & Camouflage 3,
Sneaking 3), Detection 3.
Natural Weapons: Claws (Dmg 1d10 OR 10 +2 Constitution).
Initiative: +2 Dexterity
Combat points: Free 10 / Unarmed Combat 4 (Claws 10,
Wrestling 10)/Evade 17.
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM +2) Claws SV 12, SV 12.
✦ (IM +2) Evade SV 17 or two Evade attempts SV 10 and SV 7.
Common Properties
Demonic Nature
Even if made of flesh, Incubi and Succubi are demonic in
nature. This is the reason why they do not have MHP: their
alien minds cannot be harmed by the fears and stresses that
destroy the psyche of common men.
Demonic Influence
Being in presence of Succubus or Incubus causes strong,
uncontrollable feelings of arousal in all those who are in the
area, even if the creature is not actively seducing them. All
those who are present must make a Situation Roll with a SV
of 10, modified by Psyche, or they will suffer a -2 penalty to all
skill and situation rolls due to distraction, since their brains
will keep on being invaded by these strong feelings.
Demonic Offspring
The result of sexual intercourse with these creatures may be
another Incubus or Succubus or, in other cases, a “Cambion”.
This is a normal but depraved and evil human being which
possess some demonic trait. The GM should give the
Cambion some power from the properties listed here (usually
the “Demonic Seduction” or “Demonic Influence” power) or
from other demonic creatures.
Demonic Parasite
Incubi and Succubi infiltrate a victim’s dreams while starting
a sexual intercourse with it. A sleeping victim must succeed
a situation roll similar to the one described in the “Demonic
Seduction” property, although the basic SV is 10 (which
means SV 6 for basic Incubi and Succubi with +4 Charisma).
While they spend time with their victims, Succubi and Incubi
feed on the spiritual and physical forces of a victim, replenishing
lost PHP and rejuvenating their health. The victim’ PHP are
reduced by 1d10 for each week of parasitic intercourse, modified
by the reverse of the victim’s Psyche trait. For example, a victim
with Psyche +2 will suffer 1d10 -2, while a victim with Psyche -4
will suffer 1d10 +4. These lost PHP cannot be recovered unless
the Succubus stops feeding on the victim for at least a week.
Demonic Seduction
Beyond what they do while infiltrating their victims’ dreams,
Incubi and Succubi are the most powerful of charmers and
seducers, even if their bodies still retain demonic features. To
perform this seduction, they need to speak and dialogue with the
victim so this is rarely something which can be done during a
combat. The victim must succeed a Situation Roll with an SV
of 12 modified by Psyche to resist the seduction. However, the
Incubus’ Charisma is also subtracted from this SV, which means
that the basic SV for resisting a common Incubus is 8 (12-4),
modified by the victim’s Psyche. Those who are seduced will not
harm the Incubus and will fall in love with it.
Mark of the Master
Furthermore, once seduced, the victim can be automatically
“marked” by the creature in a restrictive or attractive mode.
Other Incubi and Succubi will avoid those marked by the
“Restrictive” mark, while those who are marked by the
“Attractive” mark will attract more Incubi and Succubi.
Oppressive Dream Walking
An Incubus which has successfully infiltrated a victim’s
dream (see “Demonic Parasite”) can decide not to feed on the
sexual and dreaming intercourse but rather to manipulate the
victim’s dream inflicting pain and fear. The victim will wake
up suffering 1d10 (OR 9-10) MHP.
Shapeshifting (limited)
Most Incubi and Succubi transform their bodies in order to
appear more seductive to human beings, although they always
retain some demonic or monstrous trait.
Spiritual Addiction
Those who falls victims to Incubi or Succubi (see “Demonic
Parasite”) will invariably become addicted to the intense
pleasure given by their demonic partners. This will happen
after a number of continuous weeks of feeding equal to 4
modified by the victim’s Psyche. For example, a victim with
Psyche +2 will become addicted after 6 weeks.
Optional Properties
Seductive Stare
The most powerful Succubi and Incubi know how to seduce
even if using only a single look. If during an action round
the Incubus or Succubus does nothing else but staring a
victim in the eyes, they can use their “Demonic Seduction”
property. Those who fail the situation roll will stop harming
the creature, feeling a strong emotive bond with it.
Shapeshifting (Complete)
Very few, rare and powerful Incubi and Succubi have the ability of
complete shapeshifting which makes them able to infiltrate human
society. The only limit is that, when they feed on victims through
the “Demonic Parasite” property, they will reveal their nature.
Transmogrification
If this Incubus spends 1 whole action round doing nothing
else but focusing, it will turn into smoke or dust, and therefore
it will be able to run away, only to return to physical form
after 1d10 minutes.
Incubus & Succubus -related Secret Arts
Incubi and Succubi suffer damage from Exorcism (Lex Libris
p. 234). If an exorcism in performed on a victim which is
suffering Spiritual Addiction, the Incubus or Succubus will
feel the urge to go back to its victim and defend it (while also
suffering from Exorcism).
Esoteric Banishing
New Dark Art, Right-Hand Path
This art represents a series of esoteric kinds of exorcism which
are completely different from the normal Exorcism practiced
by Christian authorities. The version here presented includes
the use of many odd Latin phrases and formulae, possibly
derived from what ancient magi and initiates of mysteric cults,
like Sol Invictus or Mitra, used during the Roman Imperial
period. Some Occultists of the 18th-century LexOccultum
version of Europe still know them, although they cannot
exactly determine the real origin of these banishing spells.
This esoteric art does not damage demons as the normal
Divine exorcism does. These powers can be applied to a victim
possessed by a demon, a living man possessed by a Possessing
Spirit or a victim marked by an Incubus or Succubus which 111
had not fallen into Spiritual Addiction. In fact, the main limit
is that this ritual cannot be performed on a victim which does
not want to be cured. Free will is the main requirement of this
ritual: without this will, the art is useless.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -15
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 10
✦ Discipline: The Right-hand Path level 3
✦ Specialty: White Magic level 4
Other Requirements
✦ Supernatural Beings Discipline level 2, Beastiology level 3
✦ Communication SV 7, Languages Discipline level 1, Native
or Foreign language: Latin level 4
Effect
After an hour-long ritual in front of the (usually chained or
otherwise bound) victim the Esotericism skill roll is made (if
the sorcerer survives any of the demon's attacks). If successful,
the possessing creature will make a Situation Roll with an SV
of 10, modified by the creature’ Psyche. In case of failure, it
will be forced to leave the possession or to lift the incubus'
mark from the victim.
After this roll, whether the ritual succeeded or not, the one
who cast the spell will suffer 1d10 (OR 10) PHP from exhaustion.
 Mermaids and Nymphs
112
T he phenomenon deserves a name; I am
thinking the great tragedy of Bohemia, if
that doesn’t sound to melodramatic. It was
certainly a tragedy, and for the small towns of
Vilice, Vilov and Vilin where several of their young men
had fallen to some strange and foul fate.
Sometimes it can be difficult to see the patterns of horror in what at
first appears to be a more mundane tragedy, but when you travel as I
have you start to see patterns within and without and realise that much
of the esoteric world is connected despite distance. For several weeks now
I have been searching through the Southern Slavic states in search a
Strigoi nest. The Strigoi are a more twisted and brutal blood cousin of
the ancient Vrykolakas and Upiors, the antediluvian vampires who
have made their nests beneath the great cities and remain hidden while
the world moves on. They appear emaciated and almost leathery, their
bodies little more than skin and bone and lacking in fat, and yet they
are incredibly powerful foes, more like feral animals—and cunning
predators at that—than any seductive charmer. I confess, I have not
seen a Strigoi in the flesh and can only base my impressions upon the
secondhand accounts of those who claim to have survived encounters
with the bloodsucking fiend. The little I have been able to piece together
suggests they are pack animals, but their broods are relatively small,
no more than five or six in their bloodline, making their nests in the
filth and dark places where they will not be disturbed. According to
some, the Strigoi prefer to feed on cattle rather than mankind, though I
am always suspicious when seemingly decent traits and motivations are
ascribed to what can only be called monsters.
The stories I had been hearing in Vilice, Vilov and Vilin did not align
with what I knew of the Strigo, though. They smacked of something else
entirely. A different kind of horror. I wondered if, perhaps it might be
the work of a Raspail, another blood feeder, wandered south from the
Russian ranges? It was uncommon, though, for creatures to venture
away from familiar killing grounds, so my gut instinct was that it was
some other beast entirely, and that was what made the tragedies of
Bohemia so fascinating to me.
In each town, seemingly unrelated events had claimed the lives of
some of the most popular and beloved young men. These were the kind
of souls you know the future is built upon, and without them tomorrow
was lessened to such a degree we would all feel their loss.
I had questions. Of course I did. I wanted to gather as much fact in
terms of testimony as I could from those left behind, and see if there was
not some common cause that was being missed by these good people.
That meant I needed to talk to the mothers—which was never going
to be an easy conversation under these circumstances, for who felt the
loss more keenly than the mothers left behind? It is unnatural for a
parent to outlive their child, that is not how this world of ours is meant
to function, and yet it happens far too often. The difficulty this presented
was the most obvious; in these more remote Slavic regions of Bohemia
very few spoke a common tongue that we shared, and my grasp of
their regional dialects was slim. Still, with no choice, I attempted to
make myself understood, and to understand, though at the end of the
first interview I was left confused as the woman appeared to believe a
whirlwind had slain her son. I could only think that something had
been lost in translation.
The second and third mothers were no more help, though when people
of the township learned of my presence, and my investigation, some few
others began to come forward helping me to gain and understanding of
the last few days of these il-fated young men’s lives.
And there was a commonality, as I knew there had to be.
They had each of them spoken of meeting a beautiful young woman,
with long flowing golden tresses. They called her a "Wild One". Untamed.
A spirit of nature. And each of them assured me their friends had
fallen for her spell, and were changed. I began to suspect witchcraft,
as the story of boy meets girl is amongst the oldest we tell, and is at
the root of every tragedy the playwrights pen. Whenever we talk about
the young lover losing their mind, or changing their personality so
profoundly, it behoves us to consider darker forces. And yes, I am aware
that makes me sound cynical in my solitude, but I have watched a
demonic entity suckle the life essence out of a doting man who willingly
sacrificed himself, remember. I have seen such things and survived them.
I know what I talk of.
Could this mysterious wild one be the ‘whirlwind’?
As I moved on to the next village, I found myself asking the same
questions I had been asking in the first, and getting the same answers,
and again, I heard that word, "Vila". The whirlwind. Though, when I
asked the dead man’s friends about its meaning, he gave me a slightly
different translation, suggesting it meant more like ‘of the air’ and that
set my mind racing in a very different direction, as I started thinking
about another ‘folk’ who were often interwoven with more elemental
nature; the fae. Could we be looking at one of the fair folk reaping
some sort of revenge on these attractive, popular young men? Was their
one of their number who could appear from within a whirlwind, or
whose passage through the Sidhe gateway from the land of the Tuatha
dé Danann churned up a storm? I did not know enough of those old
ones to be able to answer that. Indeed, I had no idea if the Sidhe gates
could open this far from Celtic lands, or if they were bonded by the
geography, but it made as much sense as any of my earlier theories.
My next line of questioning was more hopeful than expectant, “You
say he met a girl in the forest,” I nodded towards the distance, not
knowing if the woodland was indeed in that direction or if I was in
fact nodding towards the mines or any other landmark, “Do you know
where?”
The friend looked thoughtful for a moment, searching his memories
for any thing the dead man might have said about a landmark
hereabouts, but shook his head. “He talked about a river, I think, or a
lake. I remember him talking about a black swan, if that is any help?”
It wasn’t, but I lied and told him it was.
A black swan?
Could we be looking at some form of shapeshifter, then? There were
others of the cursed blood in the region, so it wasn’t impossible.
My suspect pool kept growing with each interrogation, rather than
narrowing.
“They used to hunt,” he told me, almost an afterthought. It wasn’t the
kind of information that would massively narrow the search area, but
a hunter would know the best ranges in the area, which might help. I
thanked him.
I retired to the small tavern intending to eat, and drink myself into
sleep, and solve the riddle on the morrow, but even such simple plans go
oft awry when we try to put them into practice. I was joined at the fire
by an elderly gentleman who worked his pipe most thoroughly, lighting
up and sucking thrice on the stem to draw the smoke into his lungs.
“In tobacco veritas,” he said with a wry smile, a mist of smoke rafting
up between us.
“That must make tobacco one of the only truthful things in this
world,” I said with my own smile.
“You’re looking for a reason, I hear?”
Not any particular reason, not an answer to the deaths of those boys,
just a reason.
I nodded.
“The question is, do you want to find it, or are you content to just
believe any comfortable truth you learn?”
“You mean like the fact the boys were murdered by wolves?” I said,
knowing that the notion had never been floated by any of the left
behind I had talked to.
“Aye, just like that,” he said, and I knew in that moment he had
another explanation and that I wanted to hear it.
“I consider myself a seeker of the truth,” I told him. “No matter how
peculiar or marvellous.” I have always liked that expression, that the
esoteric world might somehow be a more marvellous world, filled with 113
marvels and wonder and better for it.
“Then I shall give you a truth no one here is willing to talk about.” I
waited for him to go on, but instead of speaking, he drew deeply on his
pipe again and fell into contemplative silence as the wench brought my
bowl of broth and chunks of stale bread along with a tankard of mead
to my fireside perch. It was only after she was gone back out of earshot
that he named the girl, “Anastize, she is your answer.”
“You know the woman he met out in the woods?”
“Knew,” the old man corrected me. “A long time ago, in another life.
We were to be wed.” Which made no sense. How could a man of such
advanced years—he must be seventy or even older, if he was a day—
lay claim to the heart of a girl who had to be fifty years his junior
and more? “She was never a dark soul, not in life. She was beautiful.
Vibrant. She was full of the joys of summer and vitality. She made this
young man’s heart race.” I tried to make sense of what he was saying,
but now he had begun to tell his story he was not about to wait for me
to catch up with my understanding. “But now… she is unclean. An
unclean spirit. I loved her then, you have to believe me. I am not a bad
man. But I made a terrible mistake.”
“Tell me,” I urged, dipping a chunk of bread in the thick broth and
savouring the spicy taste of it in my mouth as I chewed and swallowed.
“They say confession is good for the soul,” the elderly man said, “And
I have carried this burden for so many years.” What he told me was
a tale of such deep sorrow I am loathe to recount it here, save to say
that he made more than a mistake. Out of fear, he broke the poor girl’s
heart, and as good as killed her, even if she took her own life down by
the mountain stream—a waterway that, I noted, connected Vilice, Vilov
 and Vilin—and now, he believed, the vila, or water spirit, as he called
his once beloved Anastize, sought to lure young men who reminded her
of him at his most virile, and seduce them with her looks and voice, to
drown them in her watery grave.
I have encountered similar tales of sirens, they are as old as the seas
themselves and our explorations of this world, as are tales of sprites
and nymphs and other elemental creatures, but there was something
about this man’s confession that rang true. I found myself believing
him. Perhaps it was the weight of guilt he carried, knowing these fine
young men had paid the price of his sins?
“There is only one thing that can stop her,” the told me, finally
finishing his pipe, and tapping out the ash onto the stone floor.
“And that is?”
“Her death must be avenged,” he said, looking me in the eye. “It is
the only way that dear sweet child will die in peace.” I knew what he
meant then, and why he had sought me, a stranger to this place, out.
“Will you help me do one good thing with my life?”
“You are asking me to—?”
“Yes,” he said, and rose from his seat.
I followed him out into the night, my meal half-eaten.
He moved with a determination and agility that defied his advanced
years, but then, he was in a hurry to end his own torment, I knew. I
swallowed hard, still unsure I actually had it in me to do what he
needed of me. I followed him down the street, and another and another
until we were outside the lights of the village and climbing towards the
cradling hills, and, I knew, the stream where his dead beloved waited
114 for him still.
It was a cold night, despite the warmth of the day gone, but then
given the deeds we were at, it was only right that there was a chill to
the air.
We reached the treeline, and the old man pushed on through,
knowing exactly where he was leading me. Of course he did. It was the
site of the greatest crime of his life. I followed him down a well-worn
track until we reached the waterway.
He knelt at the water’s edge, running his fingers through the rippling
surface, and called out her name.
It did not take long for him to get an answer, though it was not the
one I had expected: a black swan swam up the stream, full of grace.
He smiled at the sight of her and told me, without looking back to see
if I were there, “She has found me.”
And she had.
Before my eyes the black swan shifted, shimmering in the rippling
water as she seemed to rise out of it, the most beautiful woman I have
seen in all my days. Her hair was more reddish than golden, but
perhaps that was a trick of the light. The water clung to her naked
body, streaming down in rivulets over every contour and curve, beading
on moonlit skin. She was beyond beautiful. She was hypnotic. She was
elemental.
“Is she not the most beautiful creature you have ever seen?” The old
man asked me.
“She is,” I agreed, understanding all too easily how the young men
of Vilice, Vilov and Vilin could be seduced into death by such a soul.
“It isn’t her fault,” he told me, and reached out a hand for the vila
to take.
She looked at him with an expression torn between love and loathing,
though when she finally spoke it was to call him, “My love.”
“I cannot do it,” he confessed then. “Not like this. I want to. I want
to walk into the river and let her take me, but that won’t avenge her, it
will leave her trapped in this half-life. You need to do it. You need to
draw the knife across my throat and tell my Anastize you have done
it for her, that she is avenged,” and before I could argue that I was no
murderer, he reminded me, “You promised. For her. Not for me. You
have to do it.”
I stepped up behind him, my knife in hand, and touched the cold
steel to his neck even as I grabbed handful of his grey hair and yanked
his head back to better expose the vein.
Then, with one savage stroke, I opened his flesh up, and held him in
my hands as his body bucked and writhed into death.
“You are avenged,” I told the woman in the water, “You can rest now,”
and with a knee in his back, pushed the old man into the river.
His blood fanned out across the surface, turning the moon’s reflection
red.
There was no happy ending here.
The vila took her betrayer into her arms, and in that moment I
swear her face shifted once more, into a thing of malice. Her skin took
on a green taint, and her features distorted with her pure hatred at
the man she cradled to her breast, and then it was gone and she was
this beautiful innocent creature once more: the woman who had killed
herself and her child because of her betrothed’s betrayal.
I felt the wind stir around me, churning and eddying as it gathered
around the woman in the water, and then she seemed to come undone
her flesh tearing away in strips, carried off by the whirlwind, until there
was only me, on the riverbank, and the old man’s corpse in the water.
And that is why I call it the great tragedy of Bohemia, because it was
all done out of some twisted kind of love.
I walked back to the village and my now cold broth, wondering if I
would ever be able to eat again, as the guilt over what I had done ate
away at me.
 archival materials by the royal society

Speculation and Field Notes Regarding

Mermaids and Nymphs

“We bound our helmsman to the mast. He

was a weak-minded man, and more than
once had proven himself easily affected by the
Naiad’s song. We could hear them, even in
the darkness, their voices rolling out over the
waters. We had been warned, and warned
more than once, about these beautiful, and
yet evil creatures, but to hear them was to
forget all of that and simply be captivated,
such was the allure of their song.”
Remarkably similar accounts can be
read in a great many of the surviving texts
that have been subsequently brought to
light by research on the ancient lands of 115
the Greeks. Naiads, nymphs, sirens; they
have many names, but a singular gift
common to all these mermaids:
“These sea-living women sing so beautifully,
their voices so hypnotic and alluring, that
all of the sailors were drawn over the side of
their vessel, throwing themselves into the sea
in a desperate need to reach the nymphs. The
swam out on to the rocks where they sang. Only
a few ever came back. Those that did told a
tale of horror that was brutal counterpoint to
the beauty of their song—a few moments of
pleasure with the nymphs in a shared embrace
of tongues and desperate hands soon turned to a
desperate struggle to stay alive as they dragged
the sailors down and down until they were so
far below the surface there was no hope they
could ever reach the air again, and drowned
them. That was the cost of their kiss.”
In the words of Paracelsus, the
mermaid is half-fish and half-human.
After a visit to the zoologist, Achel
Meopel, he attempts to describe the
nature of the other man’s discovery:
“The skeleton that lay in front of me was
said to be that of a naiad, a mermaid. She
was unlike anything I had ever seen to this
116
day. The lower part looked like the skeleton
of a large fish, filled with hundreds of tiny
filament-like bones, so delicate they were
almost transparent, while the upper half
was unmistakably human. I could not take
my eyes form the thing on the autopsy table
as Achel explained how the creature was in
fact a hermaphrodite, capable of a single
pregnancy in their long lives, which brought
about their own death. He believed it was
some form of spiritual regeneration and
that the consciousness of one naiad must be
reborn within this fresh new body, offering
the creature a form of immortality. I was not
so sure, but this was his house, so who was I
to argue with his assumptions?”
Even in the archives of the Royal
Society we have in our possession
countless records and eye-witness
testimony that highlights the deadly
nature of these island dwellers, though
for the longest time it was our belief
that they all referenced the same original
being, very much akin to the fabled lamia
in nature, who through intercourse
and propagation with her human prey
has eventually evolved into something
entirely different, but just as hungry.
Common to all of these creatures
that lure men to their death with their
either beauty or song is that they live
in the sea and sustain themselves upon
human flesh. It is unsurprising that they
have gained something of a reputation
for luring sailors into the depths, given
the appetites of men who spend most of
their lives at sea.
The mermaid is a seductive creature
that dominates the waters in which she
lives. We are not sure of the veracity of
the claims, but it is believed by some
that you can ward off her charms with a
the discordant ringing of metal hitting
metal, such as a sword hammering
against the rim of a shield, which will
forever be the sound of war to many, and
the counterpoint to the song of love she
promises so falsely.
In his dissertation Cal de Mere,
the catakan physician and alchemist
Arnaldus de Villa Nova posits:
“A fisher of men, she is more often than
not surrounded by minnows as well as much
larger fish, who find her irresistible. She
is of them, but not one of them. Her faux-
humanity sets her apart. If there is anything
a good fisherman knows, it is that you throw
back the biggest fish in the sea because they
carry her curse.”
Unique individuals
Siren
The Siren is the name given to those
mermaids living in and around the
Mediterranean.
They were more common in ancient
times, including the days of Homer,
who described these deadly women in
so much detail. For some reason they
almost died out in the early part of the
Middle Ages. We do not know why,
for those were the first real days of
exploration and ought to have provided
her with a near-endless supply of fresh
meat.
The Siren is often represented as a
naked woman, her ‘legs’ wrapped in
seagrass and seaweed to mask their true
nature. They have rich tresses, with
long curls cascading down their backs,
and often offering mild modesty. These
woman possess unusually large eyes,
and the observant might notice the
marks of gills on their necks. They are
difficult to detect. Indeed, should a man
see the siren in her natural habitat she
would appear quite ordinary. It is the
salt air that betrays that illusion, so in
order to attract people, the siren tends
to lie still in the shallow waters. As
with other naiads, the Siren’s preferred
method of killing is simply to drown the
unfortunate soul, even as their mouths
are locked in a passionate kiss, tasting
his death in her lungs like the most
intoxicating drug.
The Sirens are excellent swimmers.
They hunt around the hours of dawn
and dusk, those between-times, though
they will often use the cover of mist and
thicker fog banks to sing their songs
loud across the sea, looking to tempt the
hapless sailors in to their deaths.
Like many marine animals, they are
no fans of sun and heat, preferring the
damp, moist air.
While their skin looks soft and supple
it actually feels like that of a snake, dry
and scaly, which leads to comparisons
with the ancient lamia.
Caribbean Mermaid
The Caribbean Mermaid is the naiad
that most people are familiar with.
She possesses the upper body of a
beautiful woman, and the lower body of
a huge fish.
The mermaid is usually taller than
a woman, as her lower extremities
can often be almost six feet long. Like
the siren, the Caribbean Mermaid has
the most luxurious, long hair which
cascades across her shoulders and down
her body, hiding her modesty. Her skin
is ebon-black and glistens with the
beads of moisture where the salt water
of the sea still runs from her back.
She lives off the furthest reaches of
the Caribbean coast, and ranges as far
south as the east coast of South America
in search of her next meal.
Sailors will often talk about seeing
playful women, beautiful beyond
compare, splashing and frolicking
around their boats, laughing and
giggling. These are mermaids hunting.
Unlike the Siren, they are omnivores
but prefer meat, animal, but especially
human, as opposed to the more prevalent
fish all around them.
Appearance
These elemental fae are often depicted
as creatures of incredible beauty. There
can be no denying the fact that they
are the beautiful women, nor that there
are those amongst their kind who lure
sailors onto the rocks and gleefully
down their mates even as they couple
with them.
There is a perceptive of intense
sexuality about the mermaid and
siren, the inference being that they use
their bodies for evil, tricking the poor
helpless men, whereas the more earthen
woodland nymphs are wholesome and
chaste, therefore somehow seen as good.
There is no denying that these
creatures are pleasing on the eye, with
lustrous locks and shapely curves, but
the truth is their allure has nothing
to do with their sexuality. It isn’t even
real; it is all illusion meant to gull the
gullible and mess with the minds of the
sailors who have been too long at sea.
They are fae, so naturally taller, more
ethereal and harbour aspects of the
elements they are closest to within their
bodies; so a woodland nymph might
have the moss that usually grows on
the shaded side of a tree growing on her
skin, whilst a mountain dweller might
just as easily have a veil of frost crusting
over her skin. Beauty is very much in
the eye of the beholder, though very few
actually see the truth. Rather, theirs is a
seductive magic to their song, just like
the snake charmer’s flute can hypnotise
the king cobra that works its way inside
the listener’s mind and bend them to
their will.
The truth is they are wild spirits, and
they look exactly that, untamed.
They are beyond the control of cities
and men and all of that petty bureaucracy
that their worlds now contain.
They are the personifications of
nature itself, and every bit as pure
and heady as the wild waters and the
rarefied air of the highest peaks or the
lush loam of the forest floor. Everything
about these creatures is of the elements,
the earth, the air, fire, water.
First Impressions
Naiads are ravishingly beautiful young
women, with long graceful limbs,
supple bodies with seductive curves and
luscious flowing locks. Their beauty is
devastating. The first glimpse of a dyad,
a woodland nymph, roaming through
the deep woods might just be enough
to lure a traveller deeper into the trees, 117
curious. But by the time they find the
grove where the creature has made her
home that curiosity has changed and
become more urgent. It is a driving
need now. Just as the sailor who spies
the siren on the rocks, drawn to her by
the seductive allure of her song, they
don’t see the monster beneath, only
the surface beauty. And given the sheer
physical beauty of these creatures that
move about the world so often naked, it
is unsurprising than so many men have
lost their minds to the unclothed naiads.
The weak, the lonely, they don’t stand a
chance when they hear the siren song…
and they will do anything to please their
new obsessions.
What do the Players Know?
In this group of elemental fae one can
find several very different creatures,
including water nymphs, water sprites,
selkies, mermaids, vilas, rusalka and
naiads. They all have one thing in
common, they are creatures of the
water.
 Nymphs are minor deities, always in
the form of young nubile girls who enjoy
the sheer joy of song, dance and laugher.
Their joy is infectious. Their laughter is
contagious. Their song, hypnotic.
They are persuasive and alluring.
The word that most commonly
springs to mind when sailors talk of
them is seductive.
They are associated with Greek
and Latin myths, and they are usually
connected with nature.
Nymphs live in the wet environments
of mountains, forests, and rivers, while the
meramill, mermaids, sirens and selkies
are creatures of the deep seas. There
are reports of many similar creatures
everywhere there is freshwater; Nymphs
of Springs, of Fountains, Rivers and
Streams, Lakes and even the Marshes,
and legends of them are especially
prevalent in the Hellenic regions and
feature largely in the tales of Ancient
Greece and her heroes.
Main Features
✦ Naiads are the most powerful of
these elemental fae, as they are demi-
goddesses, meaning they have some
talent with magic and the supernatural.
✦ Their nature makes them incredibly
long lived if not actually immortal.
✦ These enchanting elemental creatures
are fiercely protective of their homes
and will use all of their wiles to protect
it, including illusion and other deceptive
magics to hide it away and confuse the
senses of travellers in the vicinity.
✦ They can manipulate water to their
will, causing whitecaps and fierce
currents in even shallow rivers.
✦ They can make the water boil or
freeze.
✦ They are powerful swimmers, capable
of breathing under water every bit as
easily as they breath the air.
✦ They are incredibly seductive,
speaking with a silver-tongue, and
can hypnotise with their song,
causing weaker men to abandon
everything they hold true in return
for the promise of eternity and death
in their loving embrace.
✦ They are tied to the elements of their
nature; literally and figuratively. If
the waters they call home run low,
they weaken. If the forests are cut
back, they weaken. The weaker they
are, the more desperately they need
to feed, but the less potent their
song.
✦ They kill by drowning.

 
118 Mermaids and N ymphs ’ typical stats Natural Weapons: usually none but a weak form of Grappling/
What follows are the stats of “typical” mermaids and Wrestling. Getting free from a Mermaid or Nymph’s embrace
nymphs, representing individuals which are neither too is usually not difficult, since these creatures tend not to be very
strong, nor too weak. As usual, the GM is encouraged strong, but they base their attacks on their Seductive Power.
to personalize the stats according to the story needs and Initiative: +2
specific legends. There is in fact an incredible variety in the Combat points: Free 10 /Wrestling 4.
natures of these water creatures which include old pagan Samples of Attacks:
deities, the revenant spirits of drowned women, ancient ✦ (IM +2) Wrestling SV 7 (double CP cost, as per LEx Libris

charming fae and alien natural entities which have been p.19)
lurking the seas and rivers of the world since the dawn of ✦ (IM +2) Evade SV 19 or two Evade attempts SV 10 and

times. SV 9.

Traits: Charisma +6, Dexterity +2

Physical Health Points: 28-36
Physical Damage levels (for 34 PHP): 1-11 (0) / 12-19 (-1)
/ 20-24 (-3) / 25-29 (-5) / 30-34 (-7)
Mental Health Points: None.
Movement: usually swimming 2 CP per 2 m (Max 50 m) or
walking 2 CP per 1 m (Max 12 m).
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 10) (or none, if the nature of the
creature is hidden).
Skills: Agility SV 10: Body Control 3 (Evade 3), Water 5
(Swimming 5).
Communication SV 10: Rhetoric 3 (Persuasion 3).
Entertainment SV 10: Music 3 (Singing 3)
Stealth SV 8: Avoidance 1 (Hiding & Camouflage
3, Sneaking 3), Detection 1 (Detect Hidden 3,
Observation 3).
Common Properties
Elemental Bodies, alien minds
As elemental creatures, Nymphs and mermaids have physical
bodies which can be harmed and prone to suffer pain. On
the other hand, their minds are alien compared to those of
mortals, and therefore there is no need to record MHP. These
creatures’ lives also span through many centuries, although
they are not immortal.
Control Water (Minor)
These entities have some control over the water which is
in the immediate areas. They can warm it or make it colder,
they can produce bubbles, make the water crystalline or
dim and darker. These effects usually have no mechanical
consequences, other than creating scenic effects. Witnessing
these phenomena usually does not cause mental damage,
although in certain cases the GM may consider MHP
damage of 1d3 or (in extreme cases) 1d6 for the weirdest
situations.
Minor Illusions: Environmental Illusions
Nymphs and mermaids can use minor illusions to slightly
change the appearances of a place, whether in water or
on the firm ground, in order to protect their lairs or led a
passer-by astray. A forest may seem thicker, the entrance of an
underwater cave become invisible hidden by a coral reef or an
otherwise clear path may disappear. The victim must succeed
a Situation Roll with an SV of 8 (modified by Perception) or
believe the illusion with relevant consequences (like getting
lost or missing a specific place).
Seductive Power
All Mermaids and Nymphs have seductive powers linked to
a specific skill (usually Communication or Entertainment)
using silver tongue or beautiful songs to enthral their victims.
The creature must make the skill roll to activate the power
(which is usually a success, since their total SV in Singing or
Persuasion is 19, as shown in the stats above). Once the power
has been activated, the victim must succeed a Situation Roll
with an SV of 8, modified by Psyche to resist the power. If the
Victim has already identified some suspicious detail about the
Nymph (for example a fish tail), the base of the SV will be 10
instead of 8.
In case of failure the victim abandons everything, desiring
just to rest in the loving embrace of the creature. Even if
the creature starts drowning the victim or feeding for it, the
victims will not feel anything, but their minds will be blocked
into the Nymph’s illusion.
The illusion lasts for a number of rounds equal to 10,
modified by the victim’s Psyche modifier, but reversed
(e.g. Psyche +2 means 8 round, while Psyche -2 means 12
rounds).
If a victim’s friend tries to awake the victim, the seduced
victim will resist, often using strength since its only aim in
life will be to reach the nymph. The GM should consider the
possibility of letting the friend using Grappling and Wrestling
attempts (Lex Libris p.19) until the seductive effect ends.
Drowning
This property is usually used after the “Seductive Power” has
succeeded. A victim which is not blocked by a companion will
just automatically drown since, as long as the victim is under
the nymph’ spell, it cannot try to resist.
Somebody which, for whatever reason, wakes up in the
embrace of the Nymph, must escape a Grapple to get free
(Lex Libris p.19) while, in the same round, trying to hold the
breath (Diving Specialty in Alter Ego p.63, if failed the victim
drowns).
Feeding off Humans
Mermaids and Nymphs feed off humans, although different
creatures feed from different sources. Some of these creatures
are nourished only through the consumption of human flesh
from drowned victims, which is the primary reason why
they seduce and drown men (See “Seductive Power” and
“Drowning” properties).
Other Nymphs and Mermaids absorb mental or spiritual
energies through passionate kisses, while others prefer to
drink blood from the throat of seduced victim in ecstasy. The
damage in these cases is dealt to a victim of the “Seductive
Power” property and it is represented by 1d10 (OR 10) MHP
or PHP (GM’s choice, according to the type of nourishment)
per round.
If the Nymph or Mermaid was wounded or unhealthy, the
creature will heal its own PHP by about half (rounded down)
the amount of “sucked” PHP or MHP.
Vulnerabilities
Different Nymphs and Mermaids have different vulnerabilities
which the GM should judge according to the story. For
example:
✦ They lose 1 PHP for everyday that they are far from water
or from their “Beloved Lair” (see above).
✦ Their seductive powers are broken if an ordained priest
sings a psalm from the Bible. 119
✦ Their Seductive Power does not work in an area where the
ringing of metal hitting metal is heard.
✦ Sealing the ears with beeswax may protect against a
Mermaid’s Seductive Power.
✦ They choose one mortal lover and they are bound to believe
everything that their mortal lover says.
Water Creatures
Nymphs and mermaids cannot drown in water and almost all
of them can breathe water as well as air (this is the reason why
they do not have a Diving specialty stat). They should never
fail a Swimming roll, neither suffer damage level modifiers for
swimming tests. The Swimming specialty in the stats is given
only for special cases, where heavy negative modifiers are
inflicted on the creature due to incredible, rare phenomena.
Finally, the Mermaids seem to act in harmony with minor sea
creatures (like small fishes and crabs) which seem to always be
around the Mermaid.
Optional Properties
Beloved Lair
Many Nymphs are usually linked to a specific place which they
call home: the waters of a specific pond, the trees of a specific
forest, a specific spring of a mountain. If such environments are
damaged, the creatures’ PHP are also diminished, according to
 the GM’s judgement about the specific damage. The Nymph
will feel a stronger need to feed (see “Feeding off humans”) but
its PHP will return to the damaged level at the rhythm of 1 PHP
lost per day, until the environment is healed. Remember also
to apply the physical damage level modifiers to the Nymph’s
powers (e.g. the first skill roll of the Seductive Power property).
Control Sea Creatures
Some Mermaids can control large sea creatures like sharks
and huge octopi which act according the Mermaid’s will.
Control Water (Greater)
Some Mermaids and Nymphs have complete control on the
water, albeit limited to small areas. They can do one of the
following.
✦ They can force currents to limit ships and vessels’
movement or make swimming almost impossible. They can
inflict a penalty equal to their Charisma modifier (which
is usually +6, which means a penalty of up to -6) to all
Swimming and Diving skill rolls in the affected areas.
✦ They can make the water freeze or boil to a point which is
damaging for those who are swimming, inflicting 1 PHP
damage per round spent in the water.
Watching these abrupt changes in the environment usually do
120 not inflict MHP damage but, if the change cannot be justified
with anything but sorcerous or superstitious explanations,
MHP damage of 1d6 should be inflicted.
Minor Illusions: False Body
While most Nymphs may pass for mortal women, the Mermaids
need to hide the parts of their bodies which will reveal their
nature, like the fish tail of a Caribbean Mermaid, the ever-
present weed of a Mediterranean Siren or the moss growing on
some body parts of a Forest Nymph. Some powerful Mermaids
know how to weave a minor illusion to mask those unnatural
features. This illusion has limits (e.g. a Mermaid’s tail will look
like normal feminine legs only if seen through the water). The
victim must succeed a Situation Roll with an SV of 8 (modified
by Perception) or believe the illusion for a whole day.
Partial Transformation
Some powerful Mermaids can transform the parts of their
bodies which are in-human (like the Mermaid’ fish tail) for a
brief time, in order to appear like mortal women.
Seductive Power (Greater)
Some powerful nymphs, especially those which are nearer in nature
to old Greek or Celtic pagan goddesses, have higher versions of the
Seductive Power. For these creatures the basic SV for the Situation
Roll is SV 6, modified by Psyche, or SV 8, is some suspicious detail
about the Nymph has been identified. There are rumours about
even more powerful, godly Nymphs with SV 4 and SV 6.
Semi-Octomorph
Not all Mermaids have the lower body of a fish, others have
the lower body of a huge octopus with eight tentacles. These
mermaids can use the tentacles for grappling their victims
while they feed on them. These semi-octomorph Mermaids
have the following CP, to substitute the basic ones in the stats:
Free 10 /Wrestling 20. The Mermaid will automatically
feed (see “Feeding Off Humans”, above) on those who are
grappled and fail their wrestling rolls (Lex Libris p.19) will
automatically suffer
Mermaid and Nymphs’ Variations
Naiads, Greater Nymphs and Sea Witches
Ancient Mythology is filled with so many different characters
which can be assimilated to greater versions of nymphs and
water fae, like for example the Nymph Calypso in the Odyssey.
To represent these powerful creatures, use properties like
Control Sea Creatures, Control Water (Greater), Seductive
Power (greater).
Feral Nymphs
Not all nymphs are beautiful and charming, some of them are
bestial and feed off the victims’ blood and flesh by tearing
these victims apart with claws and fangs. Their Seductive
Power represent illusions triggered by unnatural singing
which mask the bestial nature of these fiends.
Add 20 CP locked to “Claws” which deal 1d10 (OR 10).
Their bites inflict 1d10 (OR 9-10) automatically on those who
are victims of the “Seductive Power” or who are grappled.
These creatures often have thick scaly skins (up to 5 points
of Natural Armor).
Properties like Control Sea Creatures or Semi-Octomorph
are frequent among the leaders of these feral Mermaids and
Nymphs.
Mermaids and Nymphs-related Secrets Arts
Mermaids are usually not influenced by Exorcisms (Lex
Libris p.234) or Banishing spells. However, the GM may
decide that those Nymphs who are ancient Pagan goddesses
may suffer the effects of divine Exorcisms performed by a
Christian priest.
Ulysses’ Hybris
New Dark Art, Right-Hand Path
According to the myth Ulysses/Odysseus commanded his
companions to tie him on the mast of his ship, in order to
resist the Sirens’ song. The mythic Greek hero, in fact,
refused to seal his ears with bee wax due to his never-ending
lust for knowledge. This famous episode told in Book XII of
the Odyssey have inspired countless generations of European
and Mediterranean sorcerers, looking for getting forbidden
knowledge from Mermaids and Nymphs. This is a dangerous
art, since it requires the sorcerer to become victim of a Nymph
or Mermaid’s Seductive Power in exchange for an otherwise
impossible to reach knowledge.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -10
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 7
✦ Discipline: The Right-hand Path level 2
✦ Specialty: White Magic level 3
Other Requirements
✦ Supernatural Beings Discipline level 2, Beastiology level 3
✦ Communication SV 5, Languages Discipline level 1,
Foreign Language: Ancient Greek level 2.
Material Requirements
✦ A Nymph or Mermaid.
✦ Some physical mean through which the Sorcerer is denied
reaching the Nymph or Mermaid (like the ropes which tied
Odysseus/Ulysses to the ship’s mast in the myth).
Effect
The Sorcerer must face the creature’ Seductive Power,
failing the Situation Roll on purpose. The Esotericism skill
roll must be made only after the Seductive Power comes into
action, but the GM must roll it, hidden from the eyes of the
player.
If the Sorcerer survives the encounter and if the GM has
also rolled a success, the sorcerer will immediately wake
up from the Mermaid’s spell with some mystic knowledge
magically awakened in the mind. Get one of the following, to
be chosen by the GM or by rolling 1d6.
1d6 Result
1 nothing!
2 50 adventure points to spend on Esotericism and
Communication skills, disciplines or specialties
(even related to topics which nobody has ever
told to the Sorcerer).
3 70 Adventure points to spend as above described.
4 90 Adventure points to spend as above described.
5 Knowledge of a Secret Art (to be chosen by
the GM) or some other secret knowledge
regarding specific NPCs or mysteries, relevant
to the campaign, which only the GM knows.
6 The ability to use the “Seductive Power” of a
Nymph for the next 1d3 days.
In any case the Nymph or Mermaid (is still alive) may become
enraged about the situation and may seek revenge on the
sorcerer who has stolen the secret knowledge. 121
122
 The Kraken
I wrapped the wool of my heavy coats around
myself tightly as the rain lashed down, cutting
into my face with the sharp edge of a razor’s
blade. Beside me, the fine seafaring men
worked tirelessly despite the elemental savagery, wrestling
with the rigging, setting the sails and other back-breaking
work I did not truly understand to carry us into the heart
of the storm.
I refused to be moved by the sea spray—how would it look to those
men risking their necks on the tall masts if I allowed a little water to
drive me below decks? It was nothing shy of hubris, of course. This
was their world, not mine. I was the interloper here, a landlubber. My
stomach churned every bit as fiercely as the waves roiling beneath us.
We had been out of Chatham Quay for two full nights and a day,
and in better conditions would have expected to be within sight of the
snow-capped peaks of Sogenfjord, but we were still more than half a
day out.
The sea is the last great unknown. And riding the worst it had to
throw at us, it was easy to imagine those murky depths staying that
way for centuries to come, no matter how much more we learned about
our world. There is something incredibly primal about its fury. Even
at its lowest ebb the waters were capricious. I admit to feeling a great
123
weight of disappointment on my shoulders during the day and a night
and a day we had ridden out the storm, but I had reason to hope. The
map in my hand was a crude one—almost 150 years old, vague in
many ways, hopelessly wrong in others, but beneath where the compass
pointed out the cardinals there was a second, more potent illustration of
a sea serpent that the Norwegians named "Hafgufa" and the promise
that "Here Be Monsters".
We sailed right into the eye of the storm, the gale-forced winds
battering the decks and everything on them, but I would not be moved.
I stared out across the churning whitecaps searching for any hint that
the great wyrm was out there. I was sure it was. And close.
We followed the waves as the abyssal depths churned.
There appeared a shadow beneath the surface, but it was impossibly
large, stretching as far as my eyes could see, and darkening as we sailed
towards it. It was as though the sea itself was boiling all around the
dark length of shadow. The waves gyred and eddied, bubbling and
splashing even as more spume spat up from the surf. And on and on
it went.
There was something down there.
And it was rising.
The men around me grappled with the rigging as the ship lurched
through the surf, surging and falling as it cut through the waves. I
have no idea how the boy up in the crow’s nest didn’t spill out into
the sea. Anything not battened down slid across the soaked deck. The
shrieks of wood on wood and twisting metal were lost beneath the
 raging storm. I saw a boy beside me hook one of the trailing ropes
around his ankle without once looking down at his feet. I realised
he was staring out with something approaching horror on his pallid
face as a great wave that gathered height in the distance. It towered
over us already and was coming at us fast. The boy yelled something
at me that was swallowed by the storm, then when I obviously didn’t
understand jabbed a hand towards another coil of rope and grasped
his meaning.
I tied myself to the deck.
Our sister ship was battered back and forth by the elements with all
the weight and substance of a billiard ball. Their oil lamps guttered in
the storm like willow the wisps leading us a merry dance towards the
rocks and a watery grave. Three such lights guttered, flickering and
threatening to fail. Others joined me on the decks. It wasn’t until the
first scream carried back to us that we understood the true nature of
what was behind that rising shadow.
Big Hec, a giant of a man, standing six feet eight inches, with
the faded ink of a half-naked women with a fish-tail curling
around his biceps and more black gaps in his cemetery smile than
tombstone teeth, came up to the side with a bloody great harpoon
in his hand, ready to hurl the barbed spear at the first lashing
tentacle as it broke the surface and send the sea serpent back to
the abyssal deep. He was a courageous soul with a big, big heart.
He was also a fool.
The waves boiled, sucking back away from our bow even as Hafgufa
began to rise, and rise, and rise, putting out the moon and plunging
124 us into a darkness that our lanterns couldn’t touch, and we understood
just how impotent our crude weapons were in the face of that thing.
But that wasn’t about to stop Big Hec. He drew back his arm, screaming
into the maw of the damned thing rising, endlessly rising, and hurled his
harpoon. The iron tip streaked through the howling wind like a streak of
lightning, burying deep in the flesh of the beast even as it opened its foul
mouth to spit bilge and krill.
I couldn’t move–even if I had wanted to. I’d bound myself tight to the
deck. The anchor rope had maybe two or three feet of slack, meaning I
could duck left or right to avoid any immediate danger, but other than
that I wasn’t going anywhere.
Hafgufa towered over the top sail of our sister ship, and still it rose.
Men threw themselves overboard, into the boiling sea to escape biblical
leviathan as its massive tentacles coiled around the mizzenmast and tore
it free of the decking with a tortured splintering and cast it aside. More
massive tentacles enveloped the tall ship, tearing it in two as more of its
crew abandoned ship. I watched in horror as men struggled with the guide
ropes to lower the skiffs and landing boats as a second mountain rose
from the depths—and that was the only way my mind could comprehend
the sheer enormity of it… a mountain.
The legends were true.
And by God were they terrifying!
Dozens upon dozens of tentacles lashed about, each with its own
destructive purpose which hinted at the great intelligence behind the
twin serpents, Hafgufa and Lyngbakr. These things were the source
of so many mariner’s tales, as old, perhaps as any beast that had ever
walked the land. I couldn’t bear to watch as a tentacle curled around
Big Hec and hoisted him up off the deck towards another streak of
lightning as it forked. The sea serpent brought the big man down, hard,
breaking his back across the gunwale. Mercifully, the storm stole away
his screams as death was too long in coming for the big man.
Lyngbakr split the bulk of our ship from stem to stern, wrenching the
tar-smeared timbers free to let the ocean steal in.
And then I was in the water, clinging to a shorn plank for dear life as
the waves surged all around me. All I could think was that to lose my
grip was to lose my life, even as the cold stole in, robbing my fingers of
all feeling and setting a creeping death loose beneath my skin.
I kicked at the water, trying to ride the current away from the
wreckage, ignoring the dead bodies floating in the surf. I never once
took my eyes off the destruction as what little remained of the once great
sailing vessels floundered and sank beneath the waves. One by one, I
saw the lights burn out, knowing what the darkness meant for my fellow
shipmates, and then there was only the night.
I don’t know how long I clung onto that timber, or how long I
drifted—long into the following day, without the strength in my body
to swim for the shore. I let the tide carry me in like driftwood, forever
grateful that the twin serpents had, for whatever reason, spared me.
I waited, battered and broken, laying on the stones that pretended
at being a beach, but there were no other survivors washed up on the
Norwegian coastline. The cruel sea had called them home.
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Kraken
A wealth of first-hand accounts of
giant sea monsters exist dating back
centuries, some easily explained as
drunken seafarers and that fear of
the vast unknown that sailed on their
adventures with them. But other
sightings are less easily explained away.
Some descriptions would have us believe
there lurk huge octopus and squid-
like creatures that ravage the oceans,
undisputed kings of the depths.
Maritime folk of the northen Europe
have a name for this creature: kraken.
For all the supposed sightings, there
are few genuine records, of encounters
with this beast, perhaps because it
has become a thing of tall tales and
exaggerations rather than a genuine
haunter of the deeps?
In a letter to the Spanish king, one of
Christopher Columbus’s captains during
the later expeditions of the Genoese
explorer claims that two of their ships
went down to an attack from the beast:
“We were naive in our confidence as we
worked the rigging, eyes only on the horizon
as the boys set the new tack for the coming
day. The waters all around us were calm.
It was the perfect morning until the bubbles
began to churn up from the depths of the sea.
Big swirls sucked down everything we threw
in, trying to break away from the pull, but
the sea wasn’t about to let us go. By evening
we were in the grip of a raging storm, high
winds and rain lashing at the deck as we
braced ourselves for whatever was about
to come. Men around me were armed with
harpoons and arquebuses and every manner
of makeshift weapon because we all knew,
deep in our bones, that this thing, whatever
it was, was big, and it was coming from the
deepest deep, far below anything any living
eye had ever seen. I shouted orders, seeing a
sudden flurry of white capped froth off to
starboard, but before anyone could react to
them one of our sister ships was suddenly
gone, broken up and sucked into the waves,
along with every last crewman and all. It
was a hellish sight. Those were our kin. The
second ship was crushed under the weight
of the horrific creature that rose up out of
the sea. Even now I can’t find the words
to describe it; it was vast, larger than any
church I have ever set foot in, and I am
a God-fearing man. Immense tentacles
whipped and lashed around, gathering the
ship into a deadly embrace, and hugged it
all the way back down to Davy Jones’ locker.
Another fifty crewmen, friends to a man,
were lost to the sea that day. The youngest
was barely nine summer’s old. Nine. That
bastard fish didn’t care. We were all sardines
as far as it was concerned.”
In the Year of Our Lord 1593, at
Olaus Magnus Carta Marina between
Norway and Iceland, a similar monster
from the deep seas was sighted. We
have many such sightings over the
course of the next few years, though it
is impossible to be sure whether these
creatures were the last of a now extinct
race, or merely fresh marvels from of
the world we are only just beginning to
map with any confidence.
What we can find on several
badly weathered stone tablets that
have survived from both the ancient
Mesopotamia and the triumphs of
Ancient Greek, are a number of very
similar renditions of huge sea wonders,
many with the same tentacles. And
while it is possible these are indeed
some of the first images of the Kraken,
what is most puzzling are the advanced
constellations and carvings of planets
and their movements above these
images of the Kraken, as though the two
are inextricably linked.
In several cases, independently of
each other, the number of Kraken
has been quantified into five unique
individuals. Allusions suggest that each
bears its own supernatural gift, which
in turn affects the earth’s natural forces.
Though, again, much of this is reasoned
supposition, we have come to the 125
conclusion that one thing is common to
them all: they have the ability to affect
the winds and weather, bringing with
them storms so fierce they may very
well block out the sun in a long-lasting
solar eclipse.
Long discussions with the Norwegian
botanist Gaute Godager have seen the
scientist argue that the Kraken belongs
to an almost extinct breed of marine
animals that most likely come to us from
the stars, hence the frequent maps of
constellations in our earliest drawings.
It would make sense that we would then
think of them as aliens, or even gods.
His dissertation on the subject received
extremely limited dissemination, we at
the Royal Society were able to procure
a copy, and have given him a stipendium
to fund further studies. It is our
intention to mount an expedition in the
near future.
Danish theologians exploring the
writings of Scandinavia’s natural
history posit that the Kraken lives on
the bottom of the North Sea, occupying
large caves and crevices without the
 need to rise. It feeds its immense hunger
on large shoals of fish, and giant octopi
are born the Kraken' faeces. It is a
curious idea, but these beasts must come
from somewhere.
There is one similarity in every single
account we have been able to source, and
that is anyone at sea who witnesses the
ridges of the Kraken’s immense body as
it rises from the depths is at risk of being
pulled down by the brutal undertow and
whirlpools of water its presence creates.
And that is why there are previous few
who life to tell.
These same natural scientists have
spent decades mapping the Kraken
and its habits, and unlike the earlier
thinkers classify the beast as a singular
monster, not five of a family dispersed
across the globe. Each sighting, in fact,
may even regard one and the same beast
who travels across all the oceans for
sustenance.
Unique individuals
126
North Sea Kraken
The North Sea Kraken, a sea dragon-
like beast, lives in the frigid waters of
the Arctic Ocean. It may well have been
responsible for sightings as far south as
Ireland, but that is far out of its usual
hunting grounds. This creature is not
as large as others of its kind, and more
dormant—though when it rises it is
perhaps the most brutal and violent of
all the sea monsters.
The North Sea Kraken lies dormant
for long periods, upwards of twenty
years at a time, before hunger brings it
out of its deep slumbers and it is forced
to hunt for food. More often than not,
it is that bread of seaman, the whale
hunters, who fall foul of the Kraken’s
immeasurable appetites. Out hunting
orcas they are easy prey for the Kraken.
Bloated corpses of half-consumed
whales floating in the surf, their bodies
torn apart by some enormous force,
are a good indicator that the North Sea
Kraken has woken.
It is claimed that the nature of the
North Sea Kraken affect the tidal
patterns of the oceans as well as
causing the phenomenon known as the
Northern Lights. With good reason, the
fishermen of the coastal population of
the Northern Hemisphere are reluctant
to go out to sea when the Northern
Lights are shining.
The Globster
In 1556, a group of fishermen reported
an unusual and decidedly unique find
floating close to the Spanish coast.
It was a huge, unformed body, pale
and slimed with threads of mucus, and
what appeared to be eight tentacles.
According to their more outlandish
claims, the body of the thing they called
the "Globster" was so enormous it
would easily have covered their entire
village along with its five hundred
inhabitants. The tentacles were claimed
to be six hundred feet long and more.
A monk from a nearby monastery was
commissioned to study the beast further,
concluding that it was a fabulous beast
that has survived the Great Flood by
hiding in the very depths of the ocean,
burrowing down into the silt and sand
to wait. And wait. Though what was the
Globster waiting for?
A hundred years later, French
fishermen sighted a similar creature off
their own shores.
Their reports to the State authorities
described a marine mammal with
incredibly long tentacles and an
abnormally pale, bloated body. They
described how they threw a goat into
the water, and how rather than swim
away, the poor animal was snared by
the long tentacles and drawn in, and in
and in, until it disappeared beneath the
waves in a frenzy of bleating and spilled
blood.
Like the North Sea Kraken, the
Globster is truly huge.
What sets the two beasts of the sea
apart is that the nature of the Globster’s
body, which is more akin to a jellyfish
where the Kraken is more squid-like
in nature. Likewise, it is believed the
Globster is baser in its instincts, with a
lower natural cunning and intelligence.
It rarely surfaces, though thousands
upon thousands of dead fish floating
on the choppy surface is a sure sign of
the Globster lurking down below. The
beast discharges powerful currents
through its tentacles to electrified
entire shoals of fish so that it can feed
at its leisure.
Appearance
Reports vary as to its appearance, some
survivors claim it is octopus-like in
form, whilst others describe something
more squid-like. There have even been
descriptions of what can only be called
gigantic crabs. It is huge in scale, ten
ships tall, with tentacles that span so
much more distance, each capable of
tearing the timbers of even the stoutest
tall ship asunder. The most outrageous
reports from sailors who claim to have
survived an encounter with this true
king of the depths describe a creature
up to a mile long in size.
First Impressions
The first inkling that this great god of
the seas is in the vicinity comes from the
sudden surge of bubbles and the churn of
white spume as the kraken rises from the
depths. The second most obvious warning
is the profusion of fish that suddenly rise
to the surface, the marine life fleeing
the great kraken. The problem for the
players is that by the time they see the
immense creature it is already too late to
flee, because the process of rising causes
enormous swells and currents that act like
whirlpools to snare the vessels and refuse
to relinquish their hold.
As the first tentacles breach the
surface one thing is obvious—it is far, far
bigger than the vessel you are sailing in.
What do the Players Know?
The kraken is the single most terrifying
of all the sea monsters imaginable.
It is currently classified as a
cephalopod; though that is up for debate.
The sea monster enjoys solitude
and resides on the deepest of the ocean
floors.
 The kraken uses its tentacles to stay
tethered to the bottom, resisting the
pull of currents and eddies and the
incredible pressures of the water, as it
hunts for sustenance. It is believed that
the kraken’s excreta is like catnip to
marine life, a delicacy of sorts that they
cannot resist, which enables the kraken
to purge itself and lay in wait as shoals
of fish are drawn into its faecal trap.
The beast will only surface in warm
weather—or when disrupted.
Its hunting grounds are in the
North Sea, off the coast of Norway and
Greenland.
The kraken has no magical powers or
supernatural abilities.
Main Features
✦ They kill by constriction, like the
deadly boa constrictor, their immense
tentacles squeezing the life out of its
victims.
✦ Its’ incredible strength means it is
capable of crushing even the sturdiest
ship. Mere flesh does not stand a
chance.
✦ Each of the kraken’s tentacles are
fully independent, meaning it is
capable of multiple attacks and
engaging multiple foes at a time.
✦ The kraken’s incredible size instils
fear in all who fall under its shadow.
✦ The sheer size of the creature means it
is inconceivable that normal weapons
like swords, spears, or harpoons could
possibly be anything more than an
irritant.
✦ The creature is so vast it can be
mistaken from a distance for a stony
island.
✦ Driving the kraken off is no guarantee
of survival as, when it submerges,
its descent causes lethal whirlpools
to form, dragging ships and sailors
down with it.
✦ Such is the massive beast’s presence it
is capable of disturbing the weather,
creating wild storms and whirlpools
as it begins to rise and submerge,
changing tidal patterns of a region
and up above, causing a maelstrom.

 
Kraken Mechanics
Krakens are so large that trying to give them stats in the
LexOccultum system is senseless. The GM is suggested to treat
the Kraken as a deadly environmental situation. What follows is
a series of “events” which may happen to the unlucky ones who
happen to be in a ship when a Kraken attacks. A “schedule” of
possible events is given to help the GM which does not want
to improvise the whole encounter. The GM is encouraged to
choose among the various options, adapting and changing them
according to the story needs, without too much concern about
what the real stats of a Kraken should be. This also makes sense
since no weapon crafted the 18th century can hope to kill a
Kraken.
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 6-10).
stop only when they destroy a vessel, other stop when
they have killed their first victim or their first ten victims,
other Krakens stop with no apparent reason. Unless the
GM rules otherwise (about a specific time for the attack to
stop), a 1d10 (OR 7-10) must be rolled at the beginning of
each round after the first, subtracting the number of the 127
current round. If the result is “0” or less, the Kraken will
stop.
Example:
✦ At the beginning of Round 5 the GM rolls 1d10 (OR 7-10)
and gets a “8”, rerolling it gets a “4” for a total of “12”
which means that 12 – 5 = 7 which is greater than 0 and
the Kraken attack continues.
✦ At the beginning of Round 6 the GM rolls 1d10 (OR 7-10)

Initiative: (for any kind of attack) 0 and gets a “3” which means that 3 – 6 = -3, which is lower
than “0”. The Krakens leaves!

Mechanics of the Attack Ship Damage

The following schedule represents the whole encounter.
✦ Step 1: If this is Round 1 go to Step 2. Otherwise roll 1d10
(OR 7-10) for “Attack Duration”.
✦ Step 2: Check “Ship Damage” rolling 1d10 of damage to
the ship.
✦ Step 3: Check “Difficult Waters: on the ship” to see who
remain of their feet.
✦ Step 4: Roll 1d10 per each PC to see if a “Monstrous Limb”
attacks.
Attack Duration
When the Kraken attacks nobody knows when it will
stop, and whether the ship will survive. Some Krakens
Krakens are enormous beasts with the power of crushing
the biggest vessels. However, LexOccultum is not meant
to have specific mechanics for naval combat or exact stats
for the countless vessel types used in the 18th century.
Some ships are incredibly small, while other are enormous.
Furthermore, different Kraken may have different sizes
to be compared with ships. The GM may simply decide
whether a ship survives or not or. In alternative a simple
system is here proposed to abstract this situation.
Each vessel has an abstract number of “Ship Points”
according to its size in terms of how large a crew it can host.
Reference to the old British Royal Navy class system are
also given, but only as a generic reference, not as an accurate
measure.
 Vessel Crew Ship Points
Boat Up to 5 1*
Small Ship 5-50 10
Medium Ship1 51-120 20
Large Ship2 121-300 30
Huge Ship3 301-700 40
Gigantic Ships4 701-900 50
1 Sloop of War
2 Frigates, 5th and 6th Class Ships
3 Ships of the Line, 3rd and 4th Class Ships
4 Ship of the line, 2nd and 1st Class Ships
* usually too small for been noticed by the Kraken.
Each round a Kraken inflicts 1d10 damage to be subtracted
from the Ship Points. When they are reduced to 0, the vessel
is destroyed, and the crew is thrown in the water. The GM
should decide about the destiny of those on the vessel. Each
castaway should firstly suffer at least 1d10 (OR 10) PHP to
represent flying wooden splinters and then make Swimming
and Diving rolls (see “Difficult Waters”).
Difficult Waters: on the ship
The sheer mass of the beast should create strong current or
even a maelstrom. Trying to lead a ship with a Kraken nearby
should be incredibly difficult and the GM should consider it
128 when describing the situation.
Everyone standing on a ship should have difficult time while
trying to stay on their feet. At the beginning of every round all
the PCs should make a Situation Roll with an SV of 12 modified
by Dexterity. Those who fail should roll 1d6: on a “6” they
end up in the waters (see “Difficult Waters: swimming”). For
those who fell on the ship a Stand-Up action (Lex Libris p.23)
otherwise they cannot move or perform any other action.
Furthermore, even if one manages to not fall, every action
needing some precision (like firing a Rifle) should suffer a
penalty of at least -2.
Difficult Waters: swimming
The unlucky ones who are in the waters should make Agility
rolls with Diving or Swimming specialties (Alter Ego p.63)
with a penalty of at least -2, to represent holding the breath
and swimming towards some floating wooden plank or other
big remnant of the ship. Failing will almost always mean a
terrible death while drowning.
Monstrous Limbs
Each round the GM decides how many of the Kraken limbs
attack the player characters or roll 1d10 per every character.
On a result of 10 a PC is attacked, otherwise no limb attacks
the PC.
The GM should describe the Kraken’s attack with
numerous unnamed NPCs automatically grabbed by the
gigantic monster and atrociously submerged into the water,
but stats are needed for the tentacles attacking the PCs.
Most of the Kraken limbs should be tentacles, but there are
occasional reports about crustaceous-like pincers.
✦ The types and sizes of Kraken limbs in the table are generic
on purpose: the smaller limbs should be at least twice as
big as an adult human, while the larger could be five, ten
or even twenty times larger than a human being. Each
limb as a “PHP” stat for indicating how much damage the
limb can suffer before releasing any victim that it holds and
submerging back into the water. No damage level is recorded.
✦ Previously hold victim should roll 1d6. An even roll means
that they are fallen in the water (see “Difficult Waters”) while
an odd roll means that they fall on the ship. They should suffer,
as per normal Falling Damage rules (Lex Libris p.31), 1d10
(OR 10) PHP damage per every full 3 metres. See the “Fall”
column to establish from how many metres the victim falls.
✦ Each limb has several CPs to be used for attacking how many
targets the GM wants. The victim can avoid it only through
“Evade” attempts (Lexi Libris p.21, Alter Ego p.63) or, if the
GM allows it, CP from the Fighting skill and Wrestling
specialty (as per rules in Lex Libris p.19, Alter Ego p.18).
If the attack is successful, apply the “First Damage” and
consider the victim blocked in a grapple without the
possibility of doing anything else but trying to escape. If the
limb already holds a victim, it will not attack but it will keep
on grappling the victim.
✦ Every round a grappled victim suffer damage (“Other Damage”
in the table) and can only to escape by using Wrestling (as
above described) or a Situation Roll with an SV of 8, modified
by both Constitution and Dexterity. In both cases, the SV is
modified by the “Mod” entry in the table.

MONSTROUS LIMBS
Limb PHP Fall CP First Damage Other Damage Mod.
Tentacle 30 1d6 18 1d10 (OR 10) 1d10 (OR 9-10) 0
Large Tentacle 40 1d10 16 1d10 (OR 9-10) 1d10 (OR 8-10) -5
Huge Tentacle 50 2d10 14 2d10 (OR 9-10) 2d10 (OR 8-10) -7
Pincer 40 1d6 16 1d10 (OR 9-10) 1d10 (OR 9-10) 0
Large Pincer 50 1d10 14 1d10 (OR 8-10) 1d10 (OR 8-10) -3
Huge Pincer 60 2d10 12 2d10 (OR 8-10) 2d10 (OR 8-10) -5
✦ Each round in which a victim is blocked in a grapple the
GM should roll 1d10. With results of 9-10 the victim is
submerged in the water and automatically eaten by the
beast. The vision of such a death should cause at least 1d10
MHP damage to friends and companions of the victim.
Optional Properties
Electric Attack
Some Kraken varieties can discharge electricity while
grappling a victim or even cast a kind of lightning (with an
attack at SV 6 which cannot be parried or Evaded). A Situation
Roll with SV 10 modified by Constitution is required in order
not to suffer 1d10 (OR 10) PHP damage. Those who succeed
suffer only half damage (rounded down).
Jellyfish Body
Some Kraken have a gelatinous body like the Globster. This
means a change in the stats of limbs as shown in the table
above. Each limb will have -10 PHP but each contact will also
inflict the Electric Attack (see the property) or the equivalent
damage in acid or poison.
Terrifying Screech
Sometimes during a Kraken attack all limbs stop their attacks
(except those who hold constricted victims) while a terrifying,
alien screech is emitted from the waters, causing 1d10 (OR
8-10) of mental damage to all those who hear it.
Kraken-related Secret Arts
Very few things can harm a Kraken and the GM should
consider wisely whether a secret art can have some effect on
such a titanic monster.
The Leviathan’s Lullaby
New Dark Art, Right-Hand Path
Krakens and Leviathans have been encountered since the
Dawn of Times and sorcerers have often tried to develop
spells to block the creatures’ fury. All these systems involve
some kind or music (usually singing or playing a flute) and
the knowledge of long-dead languages. Various versions of
this spell exist, developed by different cultures. Here are a few
examples:
✦ An ancient walrus tooth with inscribed old Norse runes
is kept in the oldest parts of the Ashmolean Museum in
Oxford. It is part of the Tradescant Collection, the earliest
core of the museum. Nobody knows where it came from,
although there are rumours about an old Viking-age
mound which was pillaged in Norway during the XVII
century. Language: Old Norse.
✦ A few scrolls preserved in the archives of the Doge in
Venice. These secret scrolls contain cuneiform symbols
reputedly copied by Pietro dell Valle in the early 17th
century during his adventurous trip to Persepolis, Iran,
without understanding the meaning. Nobody can read
cuneiform in these days (18th century) but few initiates
from selected secret societies (e.g. the Illuminati) have
retained this knowledge and have read the scrolls. They
have even found mentions about more ancient and stronger
versions of the spell which would allow even to control the
Leviathan, although these versions are now lost. Language:
Aramaic.
✦ A bone flute is kept in the treasure of the Ottoman Sultan
in Istanbul, apparently as part of the artefacts pillaged by
the Turks after the siege of Rhodes in 1522. Together
with the flute there is a parchment apparently written by
an anonymous Christian monk during the crusades. This
monk pretends to have got some knowledge of an ancient
spell from pagan times, apparently used by Philistine
sorcerers in Canaan during the period of Old testament.
The monk wrote the spell in the language that he knew the
most, although this also meant the losing of some of the
spell’s power. Language: Latin
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -10 (to the Esotericism roll in Round 1)
Requirements 129
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 7
✦ Discipline: The Right-hand Path level 2
✦ Specialty: White Magic level 3
Other Requirements
✦ Supernatural Beings Discipline level 1, Beastiology level 3
✦ Communication SV 7, Languages Discipline level 1,
Foreign language (see above) 3.
✦ Entertainment SV 5, Music 1.
Material Requirements
A flute or the possibility to sing in the ancient language.
✦
Effect
Casting this spell requires at least two rounds with two
different skill rolls.
✦ Round 1. An Esotericism skill roll to focus and, only if this
is successful, one can proceed.
✦ Round 2. An Entertainment skill roll.
When the second roll is successful the stars seem to shine (if
it is night) and a red star appears (visible even during the day).
An odd kind of music seems to be emitted from the depths of
the sea, possibly coming from the Kraken. From the following
round onwards the roll for “Attack Duration” of the Kraken
will use only 1d6 instead of 1d10 (OR 7-10).
130
 The Mummy
W e sailed on a river so dirty I could have
sworn it was mud. Sand and silt clung
to the hull of our small boat. It was back-
breaking labour with the sun beating down
remorselessly. I could understand why so few came in search
of de Thévenot’s Memphis. The journey itself was brutal
in ways I was just beginning to understand. We sailed
down the powerful river, though it gave the impression of our
insignificant little craft being swept along in a landslide of
mud and rock at times as my guide battled the currents to row
up stream. I swear, even sitting in the shade of the small sail,
I must have lost half my body weight over these past weeks.
Given the harsh realities of the landscape it was a miracle the
ancient capital had been found after more than a thousand years of
abandonment to the harsh realities of the desert planes. For an entire
civilisation to disappear off the face of the earth is nothing short of
harrowing when you bring yourself to think about the reality that
entails. We are not talking about a few huts here, but a city of thousands
upon thousands of souls, simply abandoned. It makes you wonder why
Ptah would turn his back upon the heart of the Old Kingdom. There
had to be a reason, did there not?
131
That said, there was little in the way of rumour, even less in the
matter of truth know about this rediscovered city. It was not a journey
my fellow travellers chose to take. Indeed, my guide had done his level
best to dissuade me from my sojourn but I would not be deterred. I
knew little about the practices of these people. It was as close, I am
ashamed to admit, as I had come to an alien landscape that defied my
understanding of the world. It was hard to fathom a place existed upon
the planet where water was the most precious and scare commodity.
It would be so easy to ignore the dehydration that comes with such
constant perspiration and find oneself weakening and pitching into a
swoon that would not easily be recovered from such is the relentless
punishment of the sun.
It was equally hard to imagine that a place such as this could ever
have been the hub for the economy and faith of the country, or, indeed
that it had been the seat of kings, and yet I knew some little history of
the region, gleaned from my readings of Herodotus, Diodorus Siculus
and Strabo, a geographer like myself who recorded his visit during the
Roman conquest, and that is exactly what it was.
I must confess, what I have always found most curious is how so little
is known about the days between that occupation and the subsequent
conquest of the country by the Arab nations centuries later. This was a
hub for trade between Babylonia, Assyria and the kingdoms, it was not
some distant outpost of civilisation. It is worth remembering that we are
close to the cradle of civilisation in these territories, who have a history
far richer than many of our younger nations can lay claim to. And yet
 all I have to go upon in my search is a description of the ruins recorded
by the geographer of Baghdad that itself is over five hundred years old.
I always find my curiosity asking the same questions or variants of
them when I travel, all rooted in the same need to know: why?
Why did this place fall?
Why did it lay abandoned for so long when it was obviously close to
the source of nourishment that is the greatest river of them all?
Why does so little knowledge of the place survive?
I am aware that the common line of thought is that the rise of
Alexandria to the north did for it in terms of usefulness as a trade
centre, saving pilots from navigating the long river with their vessels.
But that does not explain haste with which such a pivotal city was
abandoned nor how utterly the land was avoided in subsequent years.
"Avoided" is an interesting word, from the Old French "evuider", that
itself is a conjugation of "vuide", meaning "empty". Time had rendered
the once great capital an empty city.
Why?
There was on observation amongst his papers that lingers in my
memory, these lost buildings of Memphis are reminders of both
human endurance and fate, offering us all these years later a glimpse
of sophistication that was their ancient lives, the complexity of their
politics, the richness of their sciences, and more often than not the genius
of the ingenuity. How can it be then that the greatest city of them all
simply fell off the face of the earth. Which is, of course, why I find
myself drawn to its ruins in a quest for understanding.
We were eight days more upon the river. Entire stretches of water were
132 crystal blue, like a mountain stream, which after the dirt polluting great
lengths of the river nearer to the delta, was a relief. This really was the
aqua vita. Anything that ever had a chance of flourishing here did
so purely because of the presence of this mighty river. I imagined for a
moment what it would be like if someone damed it, or the wellspring
at its source dried up. The effects upon this vast desert land would be
devastating.
Perhaps the river itself had turned on them, carrying some form of
poison released from mining work to quarry out the stones they needed
to build those monuments to man? It was a possibility. Certainly, I was
not in a haste to discount such reasoning. More often than not there is
an utterly prosaic answer for the seemingly miraculous.
I wasn’t sure what I was seeing at first. Thick reeds and rushes lined the
banks of the river, slapping at the sides of our little boat as we navigated
a path through them. I knew, of course, that these water-plants were a
fundamental part of how we understood even the little we understood of
this place, as the old scholars and scribes had flattened them to make
a form of paper that could be used to record their thoughts and stories.
Sadly, of course, so many of them were beyond our understanding as
we had no way of unlocking the curious images they used as a cipher.
Beyond the lush green where the rushes grew I saw scrub grass that
pushed its way stubbornly out of the earth, and beyond that, the rising
red hills that shaded the plains from the worst of the sun’s raw heat.
“We should not enter the ruin,” my guide said, making a gesture I
did not know but bore surprising similarity to a catholic’s cross. “What
is dead is best left dead.”
His reticence surprised me. He had been a willing companion up to
this point, but within hours of leaving the safety of our little boat he
had become more and more markedly anxious. I caught him glancing
over his shoulder more than once, as though he suspected someone—or
something—was back there. We were alone, of course. There wasn’t a
living soul for miles upon miles around.
But perhaps that was what unnerved my guide?
This was his place, after all. Not mine. He understood the nature
of this harsh landscape far better than I ever could. “Tell me,” I asked,
“How is it that these streets remain relatively unexplored?”
He looked at me then like I was mad. “Do you know nothing of
our heritage, Herr Birkenbosch?” He shamed me in perfect German. It
always surprised me how well others spoke the languages of lands far
beyond their own, yet we as a people seemed more intent upon spreading
the influence of our tongues as opposed to learning the wonders of
those new languages. I know how difficult it is to be myself outside
the thoughts of my native Flemish. I am a different man in German,
and likewise different again in French or English. I find my thoughts
are far more complex in my own language, whereas in other tongues I
am reduced to trying to make myself understood, which often means
finding ways of expressing myself that are greatly reduced from the
man I like to believe I am. How can my guide, who has been my
companion now for more than a month, hope to know me if he never
hears me in my own language, and how can I dare to believe I know
him when at best we share pidgin conversations in a language neither
of us call our own?
“Less than I should,” I admitted, though I resisted the urge to add,
more than I’d like, as I had no wish to offend the man.
“It is our obsession with the natural order. With death.” He explained,
making sure I grasped the emphasis he put upon that last word. “Even
centuries ago this was the case. We had rituals that would preserve the
bodies of our Pharaoh kings and their queens long beyond the years of
their natural life, so that the vessels might remain theirs long after they
had ventured into the afterlife. We have always believed in three aspects
of what lies beyond; the first, that the souls of the dead go through
into the underworld, a place we call "Duat", which has but a single
entrance, which can only be reached by travelling through the tomb of
the deceased; the second aspect is that we believe in eternal life, which
you might consider ironic given our obsession with death; the final one
can be best described as the rebirth of the soul.” I nodded. I had heard
tales of Duat. My understanding was that the deceased would walk
through an array of statues bearing the likenesses of Horus and Osiris
and the other gods, the kings on a different pathway to the common
people, where Osiris would stand in judgment to determine whether they
were deserving of a rebirth or or if a more harrowing eternity awaited
them. The worst fate imaginable to these people, if I understood their
psyche, was to be denied a place in eternity, removed from that cycle of
birth and rebirth of the soul.
It is a very different notion of heaven and hell than is more prevalent
in our modern Abrahamic religions.
Duat in many ways mirrors the land those ancient people knew, so
in their depictions it has an almost prosaic geography of rivers and
mountains, fields and lakes, though the key here is the word almost as
these can be lakes of fire and huge walls of iron and trees fashioned from
the most precious minerals. What makes Duat special is that it is the
realm where the gods dwell along with the demons and other supernatural
creatures, though unlike our own demons these grotesque creatures are not
considered evil, but rather under the sway of the gods themselves. Rather
like us, they’re good children and do as they are told.
He marked out a sigil in the dust at our feet. “This is the symbol of
Duat in the old language.”
I nodded. It was familiar to me, though not as the symbol of the
underworld but as something used by practitioners of the dark arts all
across the world: a star-in-a-circle. A pentagram.
“Look around you, tell me what do you see?”
I did as I was bid, and it took me a little while to see what he wanted
me to see. This wasn’t about looking for familiar landmarks or pointing
out a pinnacle here or a wadi there, it was about the sigil. That was
why he had shown it to me, and when told to look for it, I saw. The star
in a circle, laid bare in the geometry of the ruin laid out before me. I
admit, I am not sure what I had been expecting. More ruin, less relic of
civilisation, perhaps, but rather than broken down walls and fragments
of pottery and turquoise shards, it was obvious there had been a city
here because much of it still stood. “The five pointed star,” I said, and my
guide nodded approvingly.
“Now can you tell me what those five points are?” A better question.
“Consider my people’s obsession with death,” he said.
And I knew: necropolis.
Each point of the star—ancient streets worn down to dust and sand,
lead to a death house. Each of them was so very different from the other,
lending an idea as to the person buried within and just how important
they were to the once thriving city. And there was no denying the fact
that these tombs were built to inspire awe and dread in equal amounts.
“The five kings of Memphis,” he explained.
Now this was something I had not heard before. I was familiar with
the ideas of dynasties and the rule of the pharaoh families, but I had
heard nothing of any such five kings. There must be a story here, I
realised, so decided the best course of action was silence, allowing my
guide to fill it.
“It is a little known time in our history,” he said, leading me towards
the incredible structure that stood at the tip of the pentagram. “A curse
on the blood lines that saw five kings all fall within just a few short
years of each other.”
“By kings, you mean pharaohs?” I questioned.
“No, these were mercantile kings, trader kings if you will. Some of
the richest and most powerful men in all of Memphis, it is more of
an honorary title than any actual god-conferred royalty.” I nodded,
we had much the same in Europe, where the rich men wanted to
believe that somehow elevated them above others. “It was during the
rise of the cult of Serapis, who worshipped a combined deity that was
part Osiris, part Apis.” I tried to imagine an incarnation of the bull
god and the green-skinned Osiris with his skinny pharaoh beard
and atef crown, but every fusion I imagined fell well short of the
powerful figure carved into the stones at the necropolis door ahead
of us. “You know the story of Osiris?” my guide asked, but without
waiting for me to say I did, he told me, “Among other things, he
was the god of fertility, alcohol, agriculture and vegetation in our
ancient religion. But that is not why my ancestors revered him so.
He served also as the judge of the dead and the underworld, and
granted all life to all. We have spent days now upon his river, as it
was believed Osiris was the source of the flooding of the Nile River.
He had many names, including the Lord of Silence. He was also the
first divine victim.” I looked at my guide, confused. He elaborated.
“Osiris was murdered by his brother, Set, and butchered, cut into
many pieces. Isis, his wife, found all the pieces and wrapped his
body up in bandages.”
I knew the image immediately: A mummy.
It had become fashionable in the larger cities of the continent to
import the powders of mummified corpses as a cure-all, though how it
could be efficacious to smear the remains of the dead upon ones skin,
I have no idea? It makes you wonder how such ailments as plague
spread so virulently. Of course, it is the notion that these corpses were
all somehow special, and that their luck might rub off. Personally I see
nothing but ill will come from this fashion, but then I have come to
believe that people are inherently stupid.
We continued our walk in the interminable heat, until we reached the
steps of the necropolis, where the cult statue of Serapis, a robed, bearded
man not unlike Zeus, sat upon a throne, his right hand resting on
one of the three heads of Cerberus, the dog who guards the gate of the
underworld, while his left held an upraised sceptre. The presence of the
Greek watchdog here was unexpected, but of course, it was the nature of
civilisation—cultures merged, just like the new city, Alexandria, which
replaced Memphis as the soul of these land. The presence of Serapis
clearly demonstrated that, even if the city of Memphis flourished since
millennia before Jesus Christ, this funerary complex belonged to the
later period, when the Graeco-Macedonian Ptolemies ruled Egypt.
The statue offered some relief in the form of shade, and behind it, an 133
archway that led into the mausoleum itself, which was set deep into the
hillside.
My guide meant for us to go inside. I confess I was reticent to set foot
into the house of the dead, but we had come all this way, and as my
guide had said, it was all about his people’s obsession with death.
So, we stepped around the three-headed statue and entered the
darkness beyond the watchdog and his master.
It was so much colder inside, within a single step. The darkness of the
interior placed a chill in my heart, and not merely for the likenesses of
the strange dog-faced statues that lined the walls like some sort of bizarre
processional. “Anubi,” my guide said, looking at them. “Representations
of our god Anubis himself.”
These things… Dear Lord in Heaven…. These things…
I find it hard to put into words the sheer horror of them, row upon
row of the things. I counted sixty in all, lining the way to the tomb itself,
all standing sentinel, watching implacably as we walked the narrow
path between them. They were intimidating, to say the very least. But
they were far from the worst of the horrors these dark places had to offer
up to travellers in the esoteric realms.
There were faded paintings on the walls, though it was hard to tell
what, precisely, they depicted as cracks and fissures ran through them
and, in places, large chunks of the original stone had decayed, the
plaster-like daub the original builders had prepared, broken away to
expose the heavy stone beneath. These were epic constructions. It was
a marvel that such could have been fashioned a thousand years ago.
Indeed, the ingenuity behind such a build would be beyond many of
our masons today.
 “The king’s tomb lies this way,” he promised me, walking briskly down
the downward sloping corridor deeper into the hillside. The vast weight
of the stone all around us was oppressive. I could feel it pressing down
upon me. “Follow. Quickly.” And he was away, the brand of his torch
lighting the way.
I saw something up ahead, as the passage opened into a burial
chamber. It was smaller than I might have imagined, given the
nature of the tomb, but it did not take wild flights of the imagination
to realise this must have cost a small fortune to build, making it
the ultimate vanity of a dead man. The passages went at least one
hundred and fifty feet into the bedrock, a feat of engineering that
itself was impressive enough when you considered it was most likely
chiselled out by hand, but then there was the artistry, which I assumed
was telling the life story of the deceased, and beyond that, a series of
ramps which descended deeper into the hillside and opened into the
grave goods chambers. I had no intention of breaking the seal on
the doorway of the damned, as I knew exactly what lay beyond—the
bones of the servants the so-called king had entombed with him so
that they might serve him in the Duat. I stared at the doorway for a
moment, imagining what must have gone through the minds of those
poor souls as the priests sealed them into the chamber, alive, but not
for much longer, without air to breath even with the offerings of food
sealed in there with them. They would have lived no more than a day
before the air ran out, first panicking and trying to claw their way out
of the stone tomb, losing fingernails and bloodying themselves as their
frightened breathing wasted precious air, then growing light-headed
134 and sluggish as the life slowly left them, until finally they slumped,
aware, but fading, dizzy, thoughts fear-fractured, before they finally
succumbed to the darkness and even then some of them would have
clung on desperately to this life for a few minutes, perhaps longer,
before finally surrendering.
And all in the service of a king who wasn’t a king at all.
I shuddered at the thought of it, following my guide down the curve
and subsequent curve of the ramp as it ran around the chamber’s
perimeter.
There was considerable wealth here, gold pots and artefacts, and
more. It amazed me that no real protection had been put in place to
make sure tomb raiders did not simply make off with the dead man’s
grave goods, but again, I should have known better. This place was not
as vulnerable as it might have seemed. And my guide was intent on
showing me why.
That was when I noticed the second door, which wasn’t a door at
all, but rather a depiction of one, painted onto the final wall in the
chamber: the door to Duat.
All around the doorway were depictions of the gods and the paradise
that waited on the other side. I stood before the painted door for a
moment, just imagining what it might be like to actually be able to step
through, but before I could become carried away with the notion, my
guide offered a polite cough and I realised I had failed to see the main
treasure of this chamber, the stone sarcophagus of the Memphis king.
“Help me,” he said, and began to push aside the huge stone lid of
the tomb.
Inside was a second sarcophagus, though this one was made of some
sort of reed and wattle construction, daubed with golds and greens,
and painted with the face of the deceased. He was inside, I knew. The
coffin was every bit as gaudy and ostentatious as one would imagine
the final resting place of a man willing to waste precious riches on a
vanity project like this.
“We don’t need to do this,” I said, not really wanting to think about
what we were doing here, even as the man began to pry off the lid of
the painted coffin.
“You need to understand. You come looking for answers. You need to
understand death,” he told me, and with a popping suck of sound, the
seal was broken and for the first time since his entombment, the king of
Memphis saw the light, if not of day, then at least of our guttering torch.
I stared down at his bandage wrapped corpse, thinking of the
story of Osiris, being hacked up into smaller pieces by his own
brother, and then wrapped with tender loving care in bandages by
his widow, only to become judge of the dead and guardian of the
afterlife. Of course, the bandages were no longer white, but were
rather grubby, stained with the dust of the grave, but they were
in better condition than I might have expected. The corpse wore a
golden mask that covered his face, and all manner of jewels were
arranged around the body.
“He is just one of the five that damned this place,” my guide reminded
me, even as he began to peel aside a strip of the bandage to show the
black skin beneath.
I have seen corpses before; of course I have. How can you explore
the esoteric world for so long and not see your fair share of the dead?
But I had seen nothing like that skin. It wasn’t merely aged, it was
hardened, like wood. I could imagine snapping off the finger with no
effort at all. It reminded me of hardened papier mache, so possessing of
a false, almost brittle, hardness. Interesting. The black reminded me of
the jackal-headed guards lining the processional outside the chamber,
who were painted the same black rather than the more natural brown
of the animal they represented. “We should not—” I said, but before I
could finish, I understood what he meant about this damned place and
there was nothing good in that knowledge.
My answer came from the bandaged hand of the corpse itself.
It began as the merest twitch in the little finger of the dead man’s
right hand, so imperceptible I might well have missed it if I hadn’t been
staring at the offending finger—and even then my instinct was to find
another explanation. Something more rational. Some sort of mite or
beetle that had used the mummified corpse like a hermit crab, stealing
it to serve as their new home.
A groan, which might have been the noxious gasses built up within
the corpse’s throat, escaped the wrapping and damned near scared the
life out of me.
I managed an embarrassed laugh as backed up a step, heart
pounding, but the laugh died on my lips as the bandaged hand
reached up out of the coffin, the fifth king of Memphis considerably
less dead than I would have liked, all things considered.
The hand fell back.
“Do you understand now?” My guide asked. I didn’t. Not fully. My
first instinct was purely fear driven. I wanted to run. But I couldn’t. It was
as though my muscles had locked in paralysis. I had always thought
such a remark was stupid at heart. How could fear lead to paralysis? If
you were terrified, you ran. But my legs refused to obey my mind, so what
did I know? “Remember there are five of them. Five of the damned kings
of this place… now can you understand why the city was abandoned?”
I didn’t want to believe.
What was dead should stay dead.
That was the natural way of things.
But this place, under the anvil of the sun, was anything but natural.
“It is their curse. They were denied eternal rest for their hubris, the
judgment of Serapis that they lingered on this mortal plane, denied
Duat. They rest, now, but rest is not death, not as we know it. The
five kings of this place are bound to it in ways we cannot imagine.
They gave their lifeblood to Memphis, and now the city is every bit as
decayed as their black flesh…”
There were five of them.
Five mummified revenants; black bark-skinned guards who could
not rest. Not ever.
I saw the glint of gold across the chamber and knew full well why no
tomb raider sought to make off with these riches.
“Are you telling me that these five…”
“Brought about the downfall of Memphis? Yes. That was their curse.
They remain for eternity, kings of nothing.” 135
There was an irony in that; who would have thought the gods
possessed a sense of humour?
Again, the cloth-wrapped hand stirred, reaching up with more
purpose this time, blackened nails clawing up towards me as a voice as
deep as the darkest pit of the Duat itself rattled through pegs of worn-
down teeth in a language which only my knowledge of ancient Greek
helped understanding, “Who dares disturb my rest?”
A the horns of a single black scarab beetle emerged from beneath the
wrappings. A moment later the membranous wings shimmered in the
light of our firebrand, slick with ichor, as they stretched out beneath the
harder elytra wings.
I was wrong; I hadn’t been afraid before.
Now I was afraid.
And with damned good reason.
The mummified king in his grubby bandages grasped the side of the
sarcophagus and began to haul his shell of a corpse up out of its resting
place. Not dead. Not alive. Something in between.
“Come, we must leave this place,” and I knew he did not mean the
necropolis, he meant the whole accursed land that had once been
Memphis.
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Mummies
Mummies are a wonder known to
Europeans at least since the crusades
or even before: their grounded ashes
have been traded for centuries by
unscrupulous Mediterranean merchants
to the darkest alchemists of the West.
Most people do not know anything
about these ancient, miraculously
preserved corpses, but have heard about
a possible link with Egypt. This land
of dreams and legends is shrouded in
mystery even for the most advanced
European scholarship. Not considering
136 the false claims of a few initiates
from reputedly well-informed secret
societies, the history and culture of
ancient Egypt is mostly unknown, if
not for the references in the Bible, some
Greek author like Herodotus and a few
medieval treaties in Arab, for those who
can read it. There are also rare and
scant reports about difficult-to-believe
marvels seen by the very few European
travelers who have visited Egypt south
of Alexandria. Hieroglyphs cannot be
read by European scholars, although
the link with modern Coptic dialects
have been postulated since 1646 by the
Jesuit Athanasius Kircher.
Nothing is sure about ancient
Egyptians, except the conscience that
their ancient, pagan religion was filled
with sorcery and an almost maniacal
interest for death and the otherworld.
Mummies are at the center of this
mystery, and this certainly increases
their esoteric aura.
What is odd is that, even considering all
this focus on Egypt, the Royal Society
have managed to grasp some forbidden
knowledge on mummies coming from
an area which is even more obscure:
Mesopotamia. Nobody has even seen
or identified a Mesopotomian or Syrian
mummy, but the transcribed copies of
what are believed to be the journals
of King Nimrod from Babylon offer a
certain amount of information about
them.
“The dry rehoboth-lr does not scare me, I have
faced them and ended their pitiful existence
more than once. Akkad, on the other hand,
are both dangerous and insidious. Only a two
have fallen to my hand, and both came at great
cost, with severe injuries to myself.”
King Nimrod’s journals tell of two
types of mummies, Akkadian mummies
from Shinar and Rehoboth mummies.
He offers accounts of how priests
from two different cities, Akkad and
Rehoboth-lr, competed often for power
and influence, and one such race was to
see who amongst their number could be
the first to turn the mythical forces they
discovered in their portal wanderings
into a true resurrection, bringing back
the flesh of the dead and making it walk
once more.
Through extensive rituals the
priests created what they thought to
be the ultimate weapon. The dead were
wrapped in bindings, their corpses filled
with incantations of both minor and
major magics, sacred oils and prayers,
one could create a creature capable of
being brought back from the afterlife and
controlled by sheer force of the priest’s
will.
The Akkadian mummies were
considered to be more accomplished in
design and, in their best form when the
rituals were complete, they looked as close
to perfect as any living human being. The
Rehoboth were far cruder, governed by the
prayers they were wrapped in than their
own will, incapable of thought or action
outside the influence of their bindings.
The tradition of creating Akkadian
mummies became a thing of the past, the
techniques of the resurrections dying off
with the destruction of Babylon, while
the Rehoboth rituals continued, though
rarely. The very few (difficult-to-believe)
reports on living mummies are always
about the Rehoboth kind. An Akkadian
mummy would only ever be found within
the crypt of an Akkadian priest or some
noble of higher rank, where they might
have been set as guardians. The discovery
of such a tomb would, of course, be of
major archaeological significance as it is
centuries since anything of the sort as
come to light.
The majority of our experts in ancient
Egypt within the Royal Society believe
that the ‘undead mummy’ as a creature
does not exist. It is their conjecture
that it is a fabrication of febrile minds,
in other words pure invention. Only
Clement Birkenbosch, whose journals
are herein, claims otherwise, having
encountered one. I tend to favour the
majority wisdom, as there is nothing
contained within the inscriptions of
the royal tombs to indicate any sort of
resurrection curse that might cause the
mummified pharaohs to return from the
afterlife.
However, it behoves me in my capacity
as archivist to note that the retired member,
Emett Creed, shared some correspondence
that had passed between the membership on
the subject, which erred on the side of belief.
 “Although my doubts concern the astral
forces of the mummy and the possibility of
astral walks, I have no doubt in the mummy
as a water-dead and most real best. We should
be cautious in our statements as they may
spread some concern, especially given recent
discoveries and exhibitions in Paris.”
What I do not know is the author of the
letter, nor who it was addressed to.
The veracity of Emett Creed’s
claims should, of course, be questioned.
While he insists the letter comes from
within the Royal Society I can find
no corresponding proofs within our
annals, nor anything that might prove
a match with either the thinking in
terms of either astral projections nor a
link to exhibitions in Paris.
On the other hand, it is hard to deny that
some discoveries have been made.
At a recent exhibition in Paris, a mummy
was put on display to the public along with
a number of other relics of Egypt.
In what street vernacular quickly
termed ‘the escape of the mummy’ all
of the objects displayed by the museum
were destroyed and the mummy
disappeared.
Perhaps the strangest thing about the
entire event is that several testimonies
claim the mummy was witnessed walking
out of the exhibition and into the rain-
swept Parisian streets.
The matter is even more complicated,
considering the reports about living
mummies not only from Egypt, but also
from Central and Southern Americas.
We have in our possession a letter
from the conquistador Hernandes de
Silvast in which he describes something
very similar to a mummy.
“With this simple letter, I seek to send
warning of the strange habits of the
natives. They seem to embalm and bury
their dead, wrap those unfortunates in
linden and bark along with magical
amulets. On at least three occasions, we
have discovered these dead men have gone
when we visited their burial grounds.
When I say gone, I do not mean as a ghost,
but walked as though alive once more,
though still in the damaged state in which
it was buried. Fire seems to be the worst it
can withstand.”
Unique individuals
Akkadian Mummy
The Akkadian mummy is an extremely
unusual, and possibly unique beast.
It has only ever been documented in
a few—now lost—places across the
earth. Priests of the deceased Egyptian
Pharaohs selected fallen warriors from
the king’s bodyguard to be mummified
and set to guard their monarch through
eternity. They are said to come alive
when someone enters the dead king’s
chamber. Wrapped in black bandages
from head to foot, they are equipped with
the weapons they welded in life—and in
death are every bit as accomplished as
they ever were in life.
Bog Men
Bog men are corpses of warriors buried
in the peat bogs of Scotland and Ireland
to guard over the burial mounds of their
warlords and their queens. These bog
men were the subject of ritual sacrifice
by their people and possess many of
the same skills as a more common
Egyptian or Ethiopian mummy, though
they are more ferocious fighters, some
channelling the berserker skill of the
celtic warrior known as the warp-spasm
which makes them into a monstrous
foe (as described in the Cattle Raid of
the Cooley, Táin Bó Cúailnge, more
commonly called The Tain). These
bog men decay more rapidly than those
more common mummies, making them
a more short-lived foe.
Appearance
The image is a familiar one, the corpse
swaddled in bandages, some coming
away, others dirty brown and stained
with what could be sweat or blood
or other bodily fluids. Beneath the
bandages their skin is dry and brittle,
often desiccated.
First Impressions
They move slowly, lumbering
movements with no real thought behind
them. These are more akin to golems
than walking dead, driven by a single
imperative, to protect the tomb they
have been set to guard, though they
are not mute. Their speech is slow and
slurred, giving the impression of the
words being dragged all the way from
the afterlife to be heard.
What do the Players Know?
These undead guardians lay dormant in
their tombs for centuries, alert for the
presence of intruders. They are bonded
to the sites, and to the treasures within
their tombs and will fight on eternally
if need be to recover every last piece of
plunder removed from the site. They
will never rest. Never tire.
There is talk that the mummies are
cursed, and that all who come into contact
with them die the most hideous and painful
of deaths. Whilst this is not entirely true,
it is not an outright lie as most who come
into contact with a mummy and are
foolish enough to remove something from
the tomb they guard do, indeed, meet the
mot grisly of fates. 137
There are all sorts of superstition
about the mummy, ranging from its
invulnerability to damage save for fire,
which is still capable of ravaging its
flesh, to its bite being almost vampiric
in nature and draining the very life force
out of a victim as it feeds. Some more
outlandish stories claim they are capable
of controlling the weather within desert
terrains, conjuring up huge dust storms
and sand storms to snare adventures
looking to escape with plunder from
their tombs.
Special Skills
✦ The mummies are incredibly stealthy,
despite their appearance, and can fade
into the shadows and find hidden
ways to follow their prey.
✦ Despite their lumbering movements,
they are indomitable, and capable
of incredible acrobatics if needed.
Nothing will stand in the way of
them and their prey.
✦ Though not a skilled fighter, the
mummy is an stubborn foe possessed
 of brute strength not easily stopped,
even with no weapons.
✦ The mummy is however capable of
wielding multiple weapons.
✦ The mummy uses a special
strangulation attack to choke the life
out of its foes.
✦ There are parasites that live with in
the bandages wrapping the corpse
that can be used as a separate form
of attack. These parasites can be tiny
scarab beetles or other mites that are
capable of burrowing beneath the skin
of their victims, into the soft stuff of
their eyes and blinding them and
other insidious attacks. Left to fester
and feast these parasites are capable
of hollowing out a victim, mimicking
the process of mummification which
involves the removal of all internal
organs and soft tissues that might
rot.
✦ The breath of the mummy is foetid
and poisonous. To inhale the stale
air is to risk powerful sickness from
those ancient spores.
✦ They carry ancient pathogens and
bacteria on the wrappings of their
bandages, which most people are
no longer immune to, meaning that
they effectively carry a plague with
them and are capable of infecting
entire townships as a sort of patient
zero. One particular sickness is a
lung-assaulting bacteria that makes
it increasing more difficult for a
person to breath until they eventually
suffocate on fresh air. It is a terrible
way to die.

 
Mummy typical stats
The following stats represent a typical Egyptian living-
mummy, defending an ancient tomb.
Traits: Constitution +6
Physical Health Points: 40-80 (60 is a common value)
Mental Health Points: None.
Movement: walking 2 CP per 1 m (Max 15 m).
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 7-10).
138 Skills: Agility SV 10, Body Control 5
Fighting SV 10, Close Combat Weapons 2 (Right 1H
weapons 2), Unarmed 2 (Brawling 4, Wrestling 2).
Stealth SV 10, Avoidance 1 (Hiding & Camouflage 4,
Sneaking 4), Detection 1 (Detect Hidden 2).
Natural Weapons: Fist (Dmg 1d10 +6).
Natural Protection: Toughened Skin 6
Initiative: 0
Combat points: Free 10 / Close Combat 2 (Right 1H weapons
4)/ Unarmed 2 (Brawling 8, Wrestling 4).
Equipment: Most mummies can kill a victim with their
bare hands, but there are also those who still wield ancient,
sorcerously well-preserved weapons, like the one described
below. Mummies can use a range of other, different weapons,
preferably melee ones, although bows cannot be excluded.
✦ Ancient Bronze Khopesh Sword (IM -4, WA 3, BP 14, dmg
1d10 (OR 9-10) +6 Constitution).
✦ Ancient Bronze Dagger (IM -2, WA 4, BP 12, dmg 1d10
(OR 10) +6 Constitution).
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM 0) Fist SV 10, SV 10
✦ (IM 0) Choke Attempt SV 10 (total CP cost included).
✦ (IM 0) Wrestling SV 8 (double CP cost as per Lex Libris
p.19)
✦ (IM -4) Khopesh Sword SV 16
✦ (IM -2) Dagger SV 10, SV 6
Common Properties
Undead
A living mummy has PHP but it does not feel pain,
therefore there is no physical health level to record.
Furthermore, a mummy lacks MHP since its mind has
been preserved but also incredibly transformed by ancient
necromantic rituals.
Mummies do not naturally heal PHP but some of them
know how to feed from victims (see “Vampiric Bite”, “Soul
Devourer” and “Life Drain” special properties). Mummies
can also heal all their PHP if they return in their lairs
(tomb or sarcophagi). There are also sorcerers who know
ancient spells to heal mummies, but these remain mostly a
secret.
Choke
A mummy can try to grab a victim’s throat with a hand by
spending 10 CP on top of the those spent for the normal
unarmed attack. If the attack is successful, the mummy
rolls normal “Fist” attack damage (1d10+6) but the final
result (including the +6 Constitution bonus) must be
multiplied x2.
Furthermore, in the following round, If the undead
performs no other action and if the victim is still alive,
the mummy’s hold on the throat continues. The victim
cannot do any other action but trying to free himself
with a Wrestling skill roll (remember that it costs thrice
CP as per Lex Libris p.19) but reversely modified by
the Mummy’s Constitution bonus (which usually means
suffering -6). In case of failure the victim suffers the same
damage again. The whole process continues usually until
the victim is dead, manages to get free or someone else
forces the mummy to perform other actions and free the
victim.
Fetid Aura
The mummy is surrounded by a spicy aura mixed with the
spores-rich fetid breath which the undead continuously
emits. Anyone who happens to be in close contact with the
mummy breathing the fetid aura (e.g. melee fight, grapple,
victim of Choke attack, etc.) will suffer a penalty of -1 to
all skill rolls to be modified by the Health modifier to a
maximum of “0”. For example, if one has Health +2 the
penalty is reduced to 0, if one has Health -1 the penalty
becomes -2.
Infector
At the end of the encounter with the mummy, all those who
have been in close contact with the undead (as per “Fetid
Aura” above) must make a Situation Roll with an SV of 10
modified by Health modifier. Those who fail will develop a
form of sickness which will deal 1 PHP every day at sunset
for a number of days equal to 7+/- the Health modifier. This
sickness does not stop Natural Healing (Lex Libris p.26) but,
in effects, the continuous losing of PHP can mathematically
nullify it.
Vulnerabilities
Mummies suffer the following vulnerabilities, or even more (if
required by the story).
✦ A Mummy’s Natural Armor is completely ignored by fire
whose damage is also multiplied x 2. Furthermore, due to
their dry flesh, mummies will keep on burning for at least
1d6 rounds. For example, hitting a mummy with a flaming
torch or a lantern will deal it 1d6 damage per round, to be
multiplied x2.
✦ Possessing some specific objects linked with the
mummification ritual (for example all the four Canopic Jars
of Egyptian mummies) can help using dark arts against the
mummy, giving a +5 modifier.
✦ Egyptian mummies have no internal organ but the heart. If
one manages to hit a mummy in the heart (see the new rule
for “Hitting the Weak Spot”) roll the damage and subtract
the natural armor (which is usually 6). Any remaining
damage is multiplied x 3.
✦ Mummies from other cultures may have different
vulnerabilities.
Optional Properties
Astral Oppression
Some powerful mummies choose a victim and they persecute
it every night, by appearing in the victim’s dreams through
astral projection. Each night the victim must perform a
Situation Roll with an SV of 10 (modified by Psyche) or suffer
1d6 MHP. Only the destruction of the Mummy can stop this
mental torture.
Breath of Toxic Death
Up to three times per day this mummy can emit a
sorcerously-powered breath, dealing 2d10 (OR 8-10) to all
the enemies in front of it in addition to all the effects of the
following properties: Fetid Aura, Infector or (in alternative)
Plague-Spreader. The mummy must do no other action
while performing this attack.
Control Weather
Some mummies can summon winds and storms whose effects
are to be judged by the GM. An example could be a penalty of
at least -3 to all ranged attack rolls.
Fury of the Dead
Some mummies like the Bog Men know how to enter in a kind
of Berserker rage. If they do so they cannot parry or evade
any coming attack. They will go towards the threat with no
concern for their safety. However, as long as the fury lasts,
they will get a +2 to all their attack rolls.
Life Drain
If this mummy winds a Wrestling attack its victim must
succeed a Situation Roll with SV of 8, modified by Psyche. In
case of failure there will be a damage of 1d10 (OR 10) MHP,
while the mummy (if it was wounded before) will heal the
same amount in PHP.
In alternative, some more powerful mummies know how 139
to do the same by sucking the life of a victim from a short
distance. The mummy must not perform any other action but
pointing the hand towards a victim which is at no more than
10 m. The victim must do a Situation Roll as above described.
The victim and those watching the energies sucked by the
mummy will also suffer 1d6 MHP.
Parasite Attack
The mummy can emit swarms of parasites from his
bandages. They first need to have contact with a victim. If
this mummy succeeds with a Wrestling or Choke attempt
the parasites will pass to the victim, biting and scratching
it. The victim will immediately suffer 1 points of PHP
damage and will keep on suffer it once per round, as long
as the parasites are on his body. To remove the parasites,
one needs to come near to a fire, since these parasites hate
it and will leave the victim.
Plague-Spreader
Some mummies bear ancient plagues and huge amounts
of otherwise-extinct bacteria which have festered in their
tombs for millennia, and which are now totally effective
against those living in the 18th century. According to the
GM’s judgement about the severity of the situation, this
property can be used in alternative or in addition to the
“Infector” property. To avoid getting the disease a Situation
Roll with SV 8, modified by Health. The situation roll must
 be done after every episode of contact with the mummy (as
per “Fetid Aura”) or with objects and victims infected by the
undead. The details of the plague are totally up to the GM
(whether it involves fever, respiratory problems, intestine
disease, etc.) but epic names like “Stygian Cough” or the
“Boils’ Plague” are recommended.
Regarding the mechanics of the plague the following
system is proposed, with a sickness’ evolution divided in
three stages, with different effects, as per the table below.
During each stage of the disease, every day the victim
will suffer a certain amount of PHP (to be diminished
by a positive Health modifier) and all the skill rolls will
get a penalty (modified by +/- the Health modifier to a
maximum of 0).
The one who contracts the plague will suffer the effects
of the “Stage 1” of the sickness for at least one week. At the
end of every week the victim must make a new Situation
Roll with SV 8 (modified by Health). In case of failure the
victim will pass to a worse stage in the sickness. In case of
success the victim will get to a better stage of the sickness.
Getting a success after one week in “Stage 1” will heal the
sickness.
PLAGUE STAGES
Stage Damage Penalty
1 1 -1
140 2 2 -3
3 1d5 -5
Rapid Decay
Some mummies cannot remain too long out of their original
settings (a sarcophagus or a rock-cut tomb for Egyptian
mummies, or a bog, for Northern European ones). Everyday
that the mummy is outside its lair, its maximum PHP will be
reduced by 1d6 points.
Soul Devourer
Every time a mummy with this ability kills a victim with its
bare hands (Fist, Choke, etc) one can see energies departing
from the victim’s body healing 1d10 (OR 8-10) PHP to the
mummy while the victim’s corpse emits a terrifying screech.
All those who can see these energies and hear the screech will
suffer 1d10 MHP.
Vampiric Bite
If this mummy performs a successful wrestling attack it
will automatically bite its victim, inflicting 1d10 (OR 10)
per round. If the Mummy was wounded, the taste of blood
automatically heals it ½ (rounded down) of the damage
inflicted to the victim, with a minimum of 1 point.
Mummy Variations
Akkadian Mummy
To represent an Akkadian Mummy or the mummy of any
other skilled warrior, the following changes can be made.
Skills: Agility SV 10, Body Control 5 (Ambidexterity 5)
Fighting SV 10 Battle Experience 4, Close
Combat Weapons 4 (Right 1H weapons 5, Left 1H
Weapons 4), Unarmed 4 (Brawling 4, Wrestling 3).
Initiative: Battle Experience +4
Combat points: Free 14 / Close Combat 4 (Right 1H
weapons 10, Left 1H Weapons 8)/ Unarmed 4 (Brawling 8,
Wrestling 6).
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM 0) Fist SV 14, SV 14
✦ (IM 0) Choke Attempt SV 16 (total CP cost included).
✦ (IM 0) Wrestling SV 12 (double CP cost as per Lex Libris
p.19)
✦ (IM -4) Khopesh Sword SV 14, SV 14
✦ (IM -6) Khopesh Sword SV 15, SV 13, Dagger SV 12, SV 10
For Rehoboth Mummies, whose appearances are so perfect
that they look like normal living persons able to infiltrate
human society, remove the “Fetid Aura” and “Infector”
properties or, at least, the mummy turn them down on will
due to its mystic abilities.
Bestial Mummies
The mystic spells used to create mummies sometimes give
them bestial features. Turn the “Fist” unarmed attack
into a Claw attack dealing 1d10 (OR 10) +6 Constitution.
Furthermore, the mummy which succeeds in a Wrestling
attack automatically inflicts 1d10 (9-10) with a Bite.
Bog Men
Add the “Rapid Decay” and “Fury of the Dead” properties.
Dexterous Mummies
Some exotic mummies are especially quick. Give them
Dexterity +4 (which means +4 to both Initiative and
maximum movement) about also the Evade specialty at level
5 (which, added to the basic stats, means 25 SV to be divided
among up to three Evade attempts).
Mummy-related Secret Arts
Some Egyptian Mummies remember the power of the
God of the Jews and all the prodigies described in the Old
Testament. Consequently, these mummies will suffer damage
from Exorcism (Lex Libris p.234) or similar arts practiced by
Jewish and Christian authorities.
It is worth consider that all mummies are exotic
elements, filled with mysteries and esoteric power, even
the "normal" ancient mummies, not awakened as living
mummies. In fact, the ancient Egyptian mysteries for
embalming corpses have mostly been forgotten in the 18th
century, although some European Alchemists managed to
reproduce something similar, as described in the section
about "Mumia Arabum" in Lex Libris p.228. It is worth
noting that the recently embalmed bodies described in
Lex Libris are less powerful than old, ancient Egyptian
mummies. If an alchemist manages to use use one of those
ancient Egyptian bodies for making a "Mumia Arabum"
the diffficulty is reduced from -12 to -7 and it is possible
to produce 1d10 doses, instead of a single one. Some rare
ancient mummies (belonging to famous Kings or High
Priests) will maybe allow to produce even more powerful
versions of the Mumia Arabum (to be established by the
GM). However, wasting the remains of such important
characters, should surely provoke some kind of vengeance
from dangerous enemies like cultitsts, Spirits, Living
Mummies and Anubis.
The Old Coptic Protection
New Divine Art
A few people in Egypt remember old protection spells
which, through time, have been adapted to the Coptic
Christian religion. What possibly once was an esoteric art,
nowadays is a Divine Art, as invoking the power of God
in certain situations seem to have an efficacy unknown
in old times. Unfortunately, the knowledge of this art is
limited, since only few people of Coptic religion in Egypt,
Ethiopia and Eritrea know it and keep the tradition alive.
To activate the power the faithful needs to perform a
series of gestures which for Westerners clearly recall the
Catholic Sign of the Cross, although they are also clearly
different.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -12
Requirements
✦ Skill: Theology SV 10
✦ Discipline: Divine Power level 1
✦ Specialty: Holy Power level 3
Other Requirements
✦ Communication SV 7, Languages Discipline level 1,
Foreign or Mother language: Coptic level 3.
✦ True faith in God. Atheists, Fanatics of the Enlightenment
and other disbelievers cannot use this art.
Effect
This art can be attempted only once per day. If the
Theology skill rolls succeeds the one who feels a sense of
fatigue, which make him losing 1d6 MHP. The effect will
last for a number of hours equal to the number of MHP 141
lost. Any Undead, Demon or other Evil creature cannot
harm the performer of the ritual and those who stand
nearby the performer (up to 10 persons can be protected
in this way). The creature will feel a kind of invisible bond,
blocking any attempt to harm the performer. Furthermore,
if the monster happens to be very near to the one who
succesfully performed the art, the creature will feel a sense
of slowness, making him suffer a penatly of -10 IM.
142
 The Anubi
T hese foul things deserve notation all of their
own, rather than merely a passing mention
during my descent into the hillside necropolis
of Memphis and the gateway to Duat. My
guide made sure I observed the presence of the dogs. They
were all slack skin and protruding bone. They gathered
around the five necropolises, drawn to the dead. Not that
there was a meal worth eating in there.
“They are the reason we began to bury our dead in such lavish tombs,”
he explained. “They are corpse eaters. In the ancient days we would observe
very different funerary rites, but the jackals began to haunt the byres and
more often than not would make off with the dead.” It was not the most
noble of fates, I agreed, for a culture that prided itself upon the pomp and
finery of the ritual, for the guest of honour to be dragged off through the
dirt and torn apart by hungry pack animals was nothing short of an
insult. “It was practical, but it also served as a way for the wealthy and the
powerful to set themselves apart from the slave population.”
I watched the jackals move about the place, like they owned these
empty streets. And, of course, they did. They were the only living things
in what had once been Memphis.
Around us, the wind had gathered the hot desert sands into mounds,
blowing and swirling around them. The mounds were no small things.
143
Beneath some, I could make out the ears and brows of what I assumed
were sphinxes almost entirely buried.
It made me think of the fleeting nature of life, and fear for our safety
if the skies darkened and the winds whipped up; it was easy to imagine
being buried under a weight of sand in a dust storm. In many ways,
the sand was fluid, like an ocean, capable of drowning all beneath it if
the whim took hold.
On the nearest, most of its face exposed, I noticed the carved
hieroglyphics of Apis and Osiris.
The sphinxes, it seemed, formed an avenue in the ruin.
“You see that building over there,” my guide asked. It was hard to miss,
as it was one of the few imposing monuments that still looked habitable,
though the sands of time had done their damage to the facade, biting away
at it and undermining its integrity with every gust of the desert storms.
“That was a temple,” he told me. That made sense. We have always given
more respect to the holy and the mystical than to the practical, which is
why many marketplaces and the lifeblood of our civilisations so often feel
transitory. “It was the temple of Apis, the bull-headed god. Some still call it
the Apieum, though the Greek invaders took to calling it the Serapeum, as
they sought to supplant our gods with theirs. There are vast subterranean
vaults within the tomb of Apis, Herr Birkenbosch. Vast vaults, built in three
parts, the most ancestral chambers were built by the pharaoh Amenophis
II, which served as the death place of the sacred bulls. Every dead sacrificial
bull had his own tomb within the chamber. The second vault dates back to
the reign of Tahraka, the penultimate king of the twenty-fifth dynasty, and
 rather than sacrificial tombs is constructed of a large gallery with mortuary
chambers. The final vault was built during the age of the Ptolemies, and is
grander than all the rest, some one thousand one hundred and fifty English
feet in size, with twenty four galleries leading off it. The tombs themselves
were rifled by early Christians, and little of the wealth survives. Inside, they
buried the corpses of Apis bulls.” I looked at him askance. “A rare calf born
with a diamond shape on the hide of his forehead, the image of an eagle on
its back, double the hairs in its tail and a scarab mark beneath its tongue. It
was a rare bull indeed, and was so scared it was believed to the embodiment
of the bull god returned from the Duat. The festival of Apis was held in its
honour, before its sacrifice. One legend,” he said, with a twinkle in his dark
eyes, “claimed that the bull was consulted as an oracle, and would be asked
a question, the supplicant leaving an offering of food. If the bull ate the
offering it was considered a good omen, but food left uneaten was seen as
an ill omen.” Basic superstition. I had encountered much like this across my
travels. “But, the gift could be passed on.”
“How so?”
“Any child who breathed the breath of an Apis would be gifted
foresight, and become an oracle themselves.”
“And this,” I asked, pointing and the vast tomb, “Is all for this sacred
bull?”
“Not one, my friend. Sixty have been buried here over the generations.”
Sixty scarified within those halls? I looked at him like he’d lost his mind.
I had expected to hear how it was the burial place of princes and kings,
not… bulls? Surely it couldn’t be a vast burial place for sixty bulls.
I could understand why the wild dogs would be drawn to such a
144 place.
As we ventured into the standing ruins of the necropolis of one of
the five kings of Memphis, I noted the processional of jackal-headed
guards, each fashioned in the unnerving likeness of Anubis, leading
the way to the burial chamber.
I questioned by guide about this, as I had assumed Osiris served
as god of the dead, given the statue of the Ptolemaic god Serapis, the
fusion of the deities Apis and Osiris, that we had seen at the door.
“Osiris is lord of the underworld, my friend, but Anubis is the god of
the dying. It is a passage. A journey. He is the god who guards the
souls on their final journey.”
The symbolism of the door at the end of the cold stone corridor made
sense to me then, a processional of jackal-headed statues watching over the
newly dead on their journey to their final resting place in the room beyond.
I nodded my thanks.
It wasn’t until we were fleeing the chamber and the first of the Anubi
crossed their spears, that single fluid motion to block our passage, their
sheer black skin mimicking the mummified king they watched over, our
firebrand guttering as an impossible wind churned up from nowhere—
not nowhere, an irrational voice whispered in the hind part of my brain,
where the ancient shared memory of our species resides, the Duat… the
impossible wind churned up from the underworld and blew through us
like ghosts—that I grasped the true extent of this tomb, which spread out
far beyond the walls carved out of the hillside and stretched on and on
to the banks of the Nile. The Duat might be the underworld these people
worshipped, but in Memphis we were in the capital city at the very heart
of the Kingdom of the Dead.
And these jackal-faced guards intended to see we never left.
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Anubis
We have gathered considerable
evidence to suggest that King Nimrod
encountered Anubis on numerous
occasions. In one of the texts in our
possession he writes:
“Anpu; the offspring of Osiris and Neptus
descended from the alcove. It was twice as
tall as myself, its white teeth shining bright
in the dark. The dog guarded its master’s
grave. I would have been dead now, I swear,
but for the fact that it did not realise my true
intent. It believed like so many others I came
looking to plunder the treasures in the tomb.
I did not. I came looking for his own head
as my trophy.”
Nimrod, 73,6,14.
According to Nimrod, there was a
time before his life when Anubis, Lamasu,
Sphinxes and other mythological
creatures were more than beautiful
statues that stood guard in long columns
before the pharaoh’s temples.
In that age they were living creatures,
just as we are now, though they were
blessed with incredible powers that go
far beyond our understanding. Some of
these legendary creatures swore to a
life as guardians of the people, though
others were forever furious enemies,
looking to tear down all that mankind
had the temerity to build.
Anubis was one of the guardians.
And then came the floods and the
plagues.
Despite being virtually eradicated
during these dark days, myths and
legends remained, keeping them alive
in the minds of Egypt’s priests and
pharaohs. There were many different
varieties of Anubis, the guardians
depicted with human bodies and
jackal, hawk, or crocodile heads. The
notorious "Minos", man and bull
united in one and the same being, was
one of the most infamous of them. For
some reason, however, it was primarily
the Anubis with the jackal head who
has been given the most prominent
role in our collective memories. The
Egyptians saw these as gods, and their
abilities were indeed strong, but they
were never more than guardians skilled
in the ancient mystical arts and the
secrets of tombs. Though such powers
may have made them appear godlike at 145
times.
Nimrod describes them as twice
as tall as a man, with incredible
musculature and copper-coloured
skin. In his accounts, they fought
like gods. They fired lightning bolts
from their spears. Among other more
outrageous claims, he writes that they
were capable of nourishing sleep which
could last as long as a thousand years,
a kind of dreamlike hibernation. They
communicated amongst themselves
through a form of mental telepathy
which meant they were eerily silent
when they were on the hunt.
In 1689, the British pastor, Hubert
Cobb undertook an expedition to the
source of the Nile whose exact location
still remains unknwon.
He never made it beyond the swamps
of the Sudd.
Hubert suffered a mysterious illness
and never returned home. We have
possession of his diary, which describes,
among other things, his encounter with
Anubia, a desert people who lived as
nomads. They claimed to be descendants
 of the descendants of the priests who
served the Pharaohs of Egypt.
“The old man told me of anubis. I offered
him a picture I drew in Cairo, and begged
to know if the beast he spoke of was the same
anubis I had drawn. He answered yes, they
were more than merely myths, they existed
then and still did today, in deep slumbers.
His words and the fear in his voice as he
told me this next will stay with me forever:
they Are terrible beings to face.
The old man presented me with clay
tablets that contained the ritual of creation
for these creatures, though I could not read
a word of it. He explained how it required
a priest with anubia blood running through
his veins, and that only they could become
anubis, no others.
When I questioned him as to why some
had jackal heads, others crocodile or hawk
heads, he smiled indulgently and told me
they were merely tribes.”
The well-traveled Egyptologist, Rich
Lanncaster likewise described these
anubis in his journals, including the
final entires from his 1702 expedition:
146 “Anubis, this creature that we see in almost
all of the old crypt paintings is more than a
fable. It is a guardian of his master’s house,
elicited with ancient rituals of sacrifices and
temptations.”
Similarly, the occultist Thomas
Wilson, a contemporary and colleague
of Lanncaster, goes further in his
theories. In a series of articles published
in the Royal Society Annual Articles,
1705, he claims:
“In the very ritual of anubis, the priestly
kings sacrificed themselves so as to ascend
to a higher form of being. By sacrificing
themselves, they become part of the deity.”
Knowledge, we must accept, is still
limited, though in the Book of the
Dead, those unique burial texts of the
ancient Egyptian royal tombs, there is
much still to be deciphered and learned.
The scriptures contain secret spells and
incantations deigned for the eternal
protection of the buried person. Images
of anubis are prevalent in these secret
writings. Egyptologist and natural
philosopher Florence Gast believes he
has decoded the secrets of at least some
of these slates, and believes that one of
the stones offers the following insight
into the nature of the anubis:
“Inpw is his master’s guardian and
companion from here unto the realm of
death. It shall stand by its master’s side
until the end, and thereafter be dissolved
into nothingness. With thunderstorms and
the god Wepwawet’s wild magic he is set to
defend his master’s grave.”
It has been posited by several of our
number that ‘Inpw’ is in point of fact the
correct pronunciation of Anubis, and
that the name we give these beings is in
fact the Greek interpretation that was
given to them much later. Wepwawet, it
should be noted, was an Egyptian god
who took the form of a jackal.
There are also European sources,
considerably older than Lanncaster and
Wilson, that speak of an anubis-like
guardian. Adam of Bremen, in 1070, for
one, writes:
“Of Kynokephalier’s dark lineage, I
learned from Adalbert’s chamberlain,
Vincent de Guardia. He informed me thus, in
ancient times there were powerful creatures
within Egypt that stood sentinel over the
tombs of their kings and queens, protecting
them. To look at these creatures they cut
the most frightening of figures, rather than
the friendly visage of a man or woman,
they possessed the heads of dogs atop their
human bodies, and stood some nine feet tall.
They existed in a semi-slumber, but were
stirred to wakeful life in the same instant
an interloper set foot within the tomb they
watched over. Vincent de Guardia taught
me many things, but the most shocking of
all was that these eternal watchers were not
unique to the lands of Egypt, but that there
were similar guardians among the wild
Germanic tribes in the north…”
Anubis is a supreme being created
from ancient rituals and magic.
This is knowledge, we believe, that
has long been forgotten, though we
have scholars out in the world even now
pursuing the truth of this lost arcana.
We are hopeful that if it is there to be
found, they are the emissaries to do just
that.
The Anubi are guardians who resist
the abrasive tooth of time, and not
infrequently, they bodies are adorned
with gold and precious stones. In the
sleeping state they take the form of
a stone statue but when they wake up
they transform into their natural ebon
flesh, their eyes burning a sickly yellow
glow.
Unique individuals
The Great Anubi of the Giza
Necropolis
The anubi of Giza’s necropolis are
creatures possessing incredibly
powerful human musculatures, their
dog-faces wrapped in headscarves to
hide their true visage. The statues are
covered with gold and jade stones, and
stand armed with heavy swords and
spears whose edges have not blunted
over the years of their long vigil.
These anubis were created during
the golden age of this land, when the
powers and influence of the Egyptian
pharaohs was as black and dangerous
as the knowledge the priests craved.
Nothing was off limits. Nothing was
taboo. These were men obsessed with
the occult and esoteric, and had a
command of such dark arts as has not
been seen for centuries since.
The knowledge behind the creation
of these guardians has long faded
from the consciousness of god fearing
people. It is one of the great mysteries
how, even now, they abide. The charms
of preservation around their bodies
must be incredibly strong for them to
maintain their watch thousands of years
beyond their birth.
The Giza Anubis are unusual in many
ways, but the most interesting to those
of us in the Royal Society is that they
are found only in the tombs of the most
important pharaohs of the land, and
always they stand within the innermost
chamber together with the dead king’s
embalmed body, rather than at the door
as their kind do in other tombs.
The anubis defend the chamber
against all intruders until they are killed
themselves, though to succeed is an act
of martial strength beyond all but the
most skilled warriors and mages of the
age. And surviving that conflict is not a
given, even if the anubis should fall, as a
final defensive charm on its body is one of
explosive destruction. Should the anubis
fall, his death may well be enough to bring
the tomb down upon the plunderers, such
is the explosive force of its detonation.
Appearance
The guardians have ebon-black skin, the
heads of jackals, with elongated snouts
and feral gold eyes that burn bright as
they awake. The anubi have powerful
physiques, with a daunting musculature
and stand some nine feet tall and taller
as they stand on their eternal watch.
First Impressions
These statuesque guardians of the
tombs of the dead stand in pairs, golden
spears in hand, keeping a lonely vigil.
The passageways they protect lead to
the final resting place of kings, queens,
warlords and high priests. They are
immense, towering figures. Their eyes, as
they come alive, flare gold, matching the
embellishments and jewellery on their
skin, following you as you approach. And
if you dare to trespass upon the sleep of
the soul they guard, then heaven help
you as the golden spears cross across
your path, barring the way.
What do the Players Know?
According to some stories the Anubi
have no overt supernatural skills,
despite their roles as guardians of
the tombs and shepherds of the lost
souls into the afterlife, however these
dog-faced gods are skilled fighters with
immunity to most mortal weapons. The
average sword will strike their flesh like
stone, causing a shower of sparks as it
glances off the Anubi harmlessly.
If plunder is taken from the tombs
they guard, the Anubi will cross
continents to bring it home.
They are sorcerous creatures,
constructions ensorcelled with this ‘life’
that allows them to lie dormant over
centuries, just waiting to be woken to
defend the tombs they guard, rather than
living creatures. It also means that they
have no need of food or water. Their bodies
do not tire. They do not weaken. They have
more in common with the golem and other
automata than they do with the flesh and
blood creatures of this world.
They smell of the sweetest herbs
which are used to mask the fragrance of
death that clings to their surroundings.
Main Features
✦ The Anubi is a skilled martial
combatant, proficient in single and
two-weapon fighting styles.
✦ They fight with incredible discipline.
If a chamber contains more than the
single Anubi they will fight as a unit,
moving in tightly choreographed
unison with all the precision of a
watch mechanism.
✦ The statuesque guardian possesses a
rock-like constitution that makes it
an indomitable foe.
✦ No blood flows through their veins,
so they do not bleed when struck or
cut, which makes then an unnerving
enemy to fight.
✦ The Anubi is imbued with incredible
strength, each blow from its clubbing
fists so much more damaging than
any punch a mere mortal could throw
no matter their prowess in the boxing
ring or arena.
✦ The Anubi has incredible stamina
and can range hundreds of miles
across the desert wastes without the
need for sleep or sustenance.
✦ The warrior possesses heightened
senses thanks to its jackal head,
and is capable of tracking the scent
of intruders on the wind, and hear 147
the slightest sound over incredible
distances, making it a skilled
tracker.
✦ They can traverse the halls of Ma’at,
the Egyptian underworld, acting as a
protector to the dead souls they usher
down.
  
Anubi typical stats
The following stats represent a typical Jackal-headed Anubi
guarding over the tomb of an Egyptian prince.
Traits: Constitution +6
Physical Health Points: 30-70 (50 is a common value)
Physical Damage levels (for 50 PHP, modified levels): 1-28
(0) / 29-38 (-1) / 39-44 (-3) / 45-50 (-5)
Mental Health Points: None.
Movement: walking 2 CP per 1 m (Max 15 m).
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 7-10).
Skills: Agility SV 10, Body Control 5 (Ambidexterity 5,
Evade 5)
Fighting SV 10, Battle Experience 2 (Combat
Reaction 3), Close Combat Weapons 2 (Right 1H
weapons 3, Left 1H weapons 3, 2H Weapons 3),
Unarmed 2 (Brawling 3, Wrestling 3).
Professions SV 10, Hunting & Fishing 1 (Tracking 4)
Stealth SV 10, Avoidance 1 (Hiding & Camouflage 3,
Sneaking 3, Veiled Strike 3), Detection 1 (Detect
Hidden 4).
Natural Weapons: Fist Dmg 1d10 +6. Bite Dmg 1d10 (OR
9-10) +6. Anubi rarely bite, they prefer to use their giant
weapons.
148 Natural Protection: Hard Skin 10
Initiative: +8 (Battle Experience +2 Combat Reaction +6)
Combat points: Free 12 / Close Combat 2 (Right 1H weapons
6, Left 1H weapons 6, 2H Weapons 6) / Unarmed 2 (Brawling
6, Wrestling 6).
Equipment: given their sizes, Anubis are often armed with
larger versions of ancient weapons like these.
✦ Anubi Long-Bladed Spear (IM -6, WA 2, BP 12, dmg 2d10
(OR 8-10) +6 Constitution).
✦ Anubi Khopesh Sword or Epsilon Axe (IM -4, WA 3, BP
14, dmg 2d10 (OR 9-10) +6 Constitution).
✦ Anubi Dagger (IM -2, WA 4, BP 12, dmg 1d10 (OR 9-10)
+6 Constitution).
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM +8) Fist SV 10, SV 10
✦ (IM +8) Wrestling SV 10 (double CP cost as per Lex Libris
p.19)
✦ (IM +2) Long-Bladed Spear SV 15, SV 5
✦ (IM +4) Khopesh Sword/Epsilon Axe SV 10, SV 10
✦ (IM +2) Khopesh Sword SV 12, SV 8, Dagger SV 10, SV 8
✦ (IM +8) Evade SV 25 to be divided among up to three
Evade attempts.
Common Properties
Sorcerous Nature
Even if they once were mortal men, Anubis are not alive,
their bodies do not bleed, and their minds have been
permanently modified by sorcery. They have no MHP to
record but they have a PHP value. When wounded they
record physical health levels, but they feel no pain. Since
these health levels reflect only the diminishing functionality
of a broken body, rather than any perceived pain, they have
only four Health Levels with different modifiers: Level 1
(up to PHP/4, Mod. 0), Level 2 (up to PHP /5, Mod. -1),
Level 3 (up to PHP/8, Mod. -3), Level 4 (remaining PHP,
Mod. -5).
Furthermore, the Anubis do not need to sleep, drink or eat.
They are never tired.
Bloodless
Even when they are damaged, Anubis do not bleed or seem
to suffer pain, causing discomfort to those who are fighting
against them. Every time an Anubi’s physical damage level
is diminished, the one who dealt the damage suffer 1 MHP
(reversely modified by Psyche modifier. Examples: with
Psyche +1 or more no MHP is lost. With Psyche -2, there
will be a losing of 3 MHP).
Perfect Tracker
Anubis do not use their “Professions” skill in the stats above
for anything but for tracking (with a total SV of 19, in the
stats above). They never suffer penalties for tracking and can
follows tracks which are even many days old.
Silent Communication
Anubis communicate between each other through
telepathy, which makes them incredibly silent during their
activities.
Stone-like Black Skin
When a weapon hits an Anubi’s skin, this sparks as if the metal
has hit a hard stone. The Anubi’s natural armour (usually 10)
is always subtracted from damage, unless the attack is dealt
with an enchanted or blessed weapon.
If, during one combat round, all damage dealt to an Anubi
is nullified by the armor, anguish will feel the heart of those
who are facing the Anubi. All those who see the phenomenon
will suffer 1 MHP (to be diminished by Psyche modifier, as
explained in the “Bloodless” property).
Teamwork
If one of more Anubis are fighting in the area, they know
how to coordinate their movements. They all get +1 SV to
all their attacks.
Travellers of the Halls of Mahat
Anubis are meant to travel through the Underworld. No
undead can harm them with sorcery or other magical
properties, neither they can be damaged by Dark Arts
whose power is somehow linked with the Underworld.
Vulnerabilities
Anubis have not many vulnerabilities
✦ The one having an “Ur-Hekaw” scepter (see among the
optional properties) can use Dark Arts against an Anubi
with a bonus of +5.
✦ Almost all the Anubis are linked to a specific place
(usually the tomb of an Egyptian Prince or King) and
they never leave it, unless they need to recover some
object stolen from the tomb. This means that, if one
manages to exit the tomb without stealing anything,
it is likely that the Anubi will not follow outside the
monument.
Optional Properties
Ancient Sorcery
Anubis usually do not master sorcery, although some of their
leaders (e.g. those who wield the “Ur-Hekaw” sceptre) or
some of their relatives (like the bird-headed Anubi) may know
some spell. An Anubi can cast a limited number of spells:
usually only 3, 5 or 7 spells per day, according to the power of
the specific Anubi sorcerer. An Anubi casting a spell cannot
do any other action in the same round.
Here is a list of possible spells. The GM is encouraged to
adapt these spells or create more.
✦ Call the Dead: The Anubi evokes 1d10 undead spirits for
attacking the intruders to the tomb. Use the stats of the
minor spirits in the “Spirit Leader” variant of the “Spirit of
Death & Vengeance” chapter.
✦ Call the Storm: The Anubi evokes a sandstorm whose
strength is to be established by the GM. A penalty of at
least -2 to ranged attacks and similar skill rolls is due.
The following spells are direct attacks and need the victim
to fail a Situation Roll with SV of 8 (usually modified by
Psyche, unless otherwise indicated).
✦ Mind Control: The Anubi will control the actions of
the victim in the current round (or in the next round, if
the victim has already acted before the Anubi).
✦ Withering: The situation roll to resist is modified by
Health. Those who fail will suffer 1d10 damage to PHP
since its body will begin to dry and lose liquids.
✦ Vision of Death: The victim has a brief vision of himself
dying in a horrible way which will cause anguish to fragile
minds. The victim will suffer a penalty of - 4 +/- the
Psyche modifier to all the skill rolls and situation roll of
the following 1d6 hours.
Claws
The hand of some, very rare, Anubis have claws. These Anubis
are usually more bestial in appearances than their normal,
weapon-wielding equivalents. These Claws deal a damage of
1d10 (OR 8-10) +6 Constitution. They use the “Brawling” CP
and the entry for “Fists” in the Sample of Attacks above can
be used for representing Claws.
Final Fire
The Giza Anubi are dangerous even in death. After they
are reduced to 0 PHP or less, their bodies will explode in
1d6 rounds (to be rolled hidden from the players). All those
who happen to be in the vicinity will suffer 2d10 (OR 10)
damage. If the explosion happens inside a tomb or a temple,
the architecture is likely to fall, killing and sealing anyone
who is present under tons of debris.
Lightning Spears
The spears of some powerful Anubi have powers not
unlike those told by King Nimrod in his journals. If
the Anubi does nothing else in a turn bit pointing his
spear towards a target, a lightning or energy arc will be
emitted from the weapon in the direction of the target. 149
The victim cannot parry the attack, although Evade can
be attempted with a penalty of -2. The attack deals 2d10
(OR 10) damage in PHP. An Anubi can emit one single
lightning every hour.
Like a Stone
The body of some Anubi is so hard that they do not suffer
penalties from losing PHP. This creature has no damage
levels, just a whole PHP total.
Ur-Hekaw Sceptre
In some Egyptian wall-painting Anubi is represented with
a magic sceptre used to give life again to a mummy. These
sceptres are of many types: many are serpent-shaped with the
head of a ram or of a reptile. Some high-ranking Anubis bear a
similar sceptre that may have many abilities, according to the
GM’s judgement. Examples are the following.
✦ Heal 1d10 (OR 8-10) wounds to a mortal or heal any kind of
sickness and disease (including those spread by mummies)
(no more than 1 use per day per target).
✦ Heal 2d10 (OR 8-10) wounds to a mummy.
✦ Wake up a normal mummy as a living mummy.
✦ Damage an Anubi or a Living Mummy with 2d10 (OR
8-10), ignoring any kind of armor, if the mummy or anubi
fails a Situation Roll with SV 10.
 An Anubi automatically succeeds in these feats. If a
mortal steals the sceptre and tries to use it, it will need an
Esotericism skill roll with no discipline or specialty to be
added. In any case (whether it works or not) any attempt will
cause the losing of 1 MHP to the mortal trying to use the
sceptre. Anubis and living mummies will always try to find
and kill the one who stole the sceptre.
Anubi Variations
Bird-Headed Giants
Powerful relatives of the Anubi are bird-headed giants
represented by the god Thoth (with an Ibis head) or Horus
(with a Hawk head). They tend to have the “Ancient Sorcery”
property, although they also tend to be less skillful in combat
with the following changes.
Skills: Fighting SV 8 Close Combat Weapons 1 (2H Weapons 3)
Combat Points: Free 8 / Close Combat 1 (Weapons 6).
Initiative: 0
Equipment:
✦ Magician Staff (IM -4, WA 3, BP 12, dmg 1d10 (OR 8-10)
+6 Constitution).
150
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM 0) Fist SV 8
✦ (IM 0) Wrestling SV 4 (double CP cost as per Lex Libris
p.19)
✦ (IM -4) Magician Staff SV 15.
✦ (IM 0) Evade SV 25 to be divided among up to three Evade
attempts.
Giza Anubi
Add the “Final Fire” optional property.
Minos
These rare relatives of Anubi are basically minotaurs:
large, bull-headed giants. They lack the “Evade”
specialty of the Agility skill and they basically never
attempt Evading, since they are lovers of bloodshed and
destruction.
The Constitution bonus is augmented to +8 (and therefore
all the damage dealt by weapons is modified by +8 instead of
+6). They also get a new natural attack, Bull Charge which
deals 2d10 (OR 10). However, to perform it, they need to
move at least 5 m before hitting a target. The attack roll is
against a single enemy and must be performed with an SV of
15. The victim can Evade the attack, not parry it.
Sobek and Sekhmet
Crocodile-headed giants (Sobek) and Lion-headed giantesses
(Sekhmet) have a terrible bite (damage 1d10 (OR 7-10) +6
Constitution) which he can use with the “Brawling” CP
specialty (and therefore in the sample of attacks in the
stats above can substitute the “Fist” entry). On the other
hand, these furious giants, like Minos, do not have Evade
specialties and never attempts Evade manoeuvres. Some of
these creatures, especially the Sekhmet, tend to also have the
“Claws” property.
Anubi-related Secret Arts
The secret spells for creating new Anubi are lost, as it
is the secret of creating new living Mummies, as well as
the numerous spells and arts which the ancient Egyptian
priests and magicians used to know. There are rumors about
esoteric traditions of pagan sorcerers still practicing these
dark rituals in the most remote corners of Ethiopia and
Upper Egypt. In the 18th century European esotericists
long for knowing these powers but, thus far, Egypt
remains a mystery, well-defended against the incursions of
strangers.
The Weapons of Mythras
New Dark Art, Right-Hand Path
After Cambyses II, Great King of the Persians, conquered
Egypt in 525 BC the Iranian Magi and the other Zoroastrian
scholars aimed at deciphering the old mysteries of Egypt
whose magic was already millennia old at the time. Most of
the old wisdom was stored in ancient tombs and funerary
temples, all defended by proud and ever-watching Anubi or
the living Mummies. But the Zoroastrian magic was also
ancient and powerful in that time-period, therefore they
managed invoking the help of what once was just a minor
Persian god, Mythras, to empower the weapons to be used
against the Anubi and the Mummies. Later on, during the
Roman Imperial period, the secrets of those rituals were
transmitted through the highest initiation ranks of the
Cult of Mythras, especially among learned officers of the
legions.
These mysteries were mostly forgotten with the coming of
Christianity and the Middle Ages. However, some weakened,
debased versions of the once powerful spells are still
preserved in selected parchment scrolls hidden, for example,
in the library of the Heidelberg Monastery or in the treasure
of the King of Spain in Madrid. Among the European secret
societies there have been rumours about some ancient papyri
holding the original, more powerful, version of the spell,
having been discovered in the recent digs paid by the King of
Naples in Herculaneum. Nobody knows where the papyri are
now kept hidden, although they may possibly be in the Reggia
di Portici, not far from Naples.
What follows is the description of the weakened version of
the art, as transmitted after the Middle Ages in Latin. The
earlier and more powerful versions were spelled in Ancient
Greek or even Old Iranian languages, but the details of those
spells are left to the GM.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -10
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 10
✦ Discipline: The Right-hand Path level 3
✦ Specialty: White Magic level 3
Other Requirements
✦ De Sodaliciorum Discipline Level 1, Esoteric Symbolism
Specialty Level 3.
✦ Communication SV 7, Languages Discipline level 1, 151
Foreign language Latin 3.
Material Requirements
✦ A bull to be sacrificed during the night in an underground
space by cutting the animal’s throat.
✦ Several assistants which help with the bull and with the
ritual.
Effect
This ritual can only be attempted once per every lunar
month. After a night-long ritual, including the sacrifice of a
bull, the Esotericism roll is made. In case of success, about
ten melee weapons (or 50 arrows, crossbow bolts or bullets)
can be imbued with the blood of the bull. These weapons
will completely ignore the Natural Protection or Armor of
Undead and creatures linked with the Underworld, like living
mummies and Anubis. This effect will last until the next New
Moon or Full Moon (whatever comes first).
152
 The Golem
I wonder if Hell and Heaven are not merely
constructions of our rational minds in search
of understanding? Look at the advances in
theosophy and philosophy since the Renaissance
and Enlightenment. We understand so much more now
than ever before - but in understanding we are only just
beginning to scratch the surface of what we do not know.
What is death?
What is life?
What is the shared nature of these two states of being, and what
sets them apart? Ae the dead aware of reality? Are the living actually
aware of it beyond the small window their eyes offer their souls onto the
world? Our understanding of this wide green earth, of space and time
and our place within them, is so very, very limited. We talk of the past,
we dream of the future and live within the present, but in that moment
when our souls shed their physical form do we become more aware of
these manifold aspects of our identities, with everything opening up to
us, or does it tunnel down into nothing?
Or as Lucretius said in the 1st century BC, do we just fall apart and
become dust? To all things dust returns?
These are questions I have no answer to but I am far from the only
person fascinated by the limits of life. I sought out one such seeker, a
man of science, Aloysius Davok, in Lucerne, who had been making
153
great strides in the understanding of death. Davok is a wiry man, some
six feet and three inches tall, almost cadaverous in appearance, like the
avatar of the Death that so fascinated him. On first meeting he posited
a question I still lack and adequate answer for:
“If our soul is our consciousness, and our consciousness creates this
understanding of our world around us, do we all live in the same
reality, or is each world we walk through unique to us?”
I wanted to believe it was of course an absurd question - I mean,
surely the world can only ever be the world, but once he planted that
seed of doubt in my mind I could not help but wonder.
His second challenge was every bit as thought-provoking: “If we fear
death so much, and the notion of losing this place, why is it we don’t
mourn the loss of all the things that happened before our births?”
Because they lie in the past wasn’t a sufficiently thoughtful answer for
him, but it was the best I had.
“We were nothing before we were born,” I offered.
“So it stands to reason we are nothing after we die?” He countered.
“Is that your argument, friend Clement? Then what happens to ‘us’, our
spirit, our intelligence, our essence, energy? How can the ghosts you
claim to have witnessed even be, if we return to nothing?”
“I do not know,” I admitted. I had come to enjoy the academic rigour
of our conversations. Davok never ceased to challenge my way of
thinking, opening up entirely new avenues of questions that I admired
so very much.
“Why fear death then?”
 “Because it is unknown.”
“Perhaps that is it,” he conceded. “Or perhaps it is that we don’t fear
death, but rather mourn losing the world?”
“I rather like that,” I said.
“And if I told you I believed I had found an ancient ritual that takes
the powers of God Himself and puts them in the hands of us mere
mortals?”
This was, of course, one of the greatest questions of our age. In the
endless search for our maker we have sought to understand His gifts
and replicate them, be it harnessing the wild power of lightning or
conquering the plagues He set upon us. We are on a quest for answers,
and Davok believed he had stumbled upon one of the greatest there
was: the gift of life.
He scared me more than any other man I have ever met. His intellect
was fearsome, but more than that he lacked the inhibitions that would
stop him from the most ungodly of sins.
He invited me to his laboratories, where were part of an old hermitage
on the lake, well away from passing travellers. The monks were long
gone, driven out during the Tossenburg War, where the protestants
toppled the catholics of the inner cantons, and won the battle for
hegemony. It had the air of the insane about it, I admit, but perhaps
that is hindsight offering its wisdom because I walked freely into that
old hermitage, a grey mist on the lake, the moon on the water, excited
by what sights Aloysius Davok had to show me.
How little did I know…
The place was curiously empty - my only companion the haunting
154 rush of the wind through the cracked and broken panes of glass. The
grounds were equally unkempt, nature having reclaimed much of the
land from the tyranny of man - even those pious souls who devoted their
days and nights to the quiet contemplation of the divine.
I knocked and waited on the threshold, not sure what to expect. No
one came to show me into my chamber. I was beginning to think I had
made some horrible mistake, or worse, something most foul had befallen
Davok, when finally I caught the refrain of labour and toil deep within
the ruined building.
I went to investigate, confused by what I found.
Davok was filthy with the red wash of clay; the stuff was all up
his arms and across his apron. There was a handprint on the temple
where he had forgotten the dirt and brushed his hair out of his eyes.
He looked at me, with no reason to recognise me as anything but an
intruder, nothing in his eyes, and then brushed his hands off on his
thighs and offered one to shake.
I remembered my manners.
“You made it. Please forgive the mess. I am so close with my labours…
so very close.”
I followed the direction of his gaze and saw at last what he was
working upon - a giant red clay man. I say man, the statue’s face was
featureless save for a ragged hole that he had fashioned to serve as a
mouth and twin cavities that must have been eyes.
“What in the name of all that is holy are you about here, Davok?”
“Life. I am about life,” the other man said, a touch of mania about
him as he busied around the chamber.
“You mean to grant life to this clay? Impossible,” I said, shaking my
head. I had come such a long way for this madness. The weight of
disappointment was crushing my chest. I had thought to find a miracle
here and instead found the most mundane of insanities.
There was a book open on the table. The cover was fashioned from a
most curious dry leather that still bore the wrinkles and creases of the
life it had once known.
“I found it in the crypts,” Davok said, seeing me eye the text
suspiciously. I could not decipher the words. They were in some lost
tongue from a long forgotten civilisation that more resembled art
than script. “The Book of Formation,” he said, stabbing a finger at
one particular symbol with a dirty finger. “That mark, that means
"Tall Adam". You know the story?” I did. Tall Adam, the first man,
fashioned from the dirt and clay of the earth like the crude monstrosity
of Davok’s, lifeless and empty until the Lord took that shapeless mass
and imbued it with a soul.
“You cannot hope to do this,” I said. “Even if by some wonder you
succeed… what would you make? A crude golem? Only God can
grant the highest of life, that of a soul. We, his children, shouldn’t
wield such power. It is too much. Too dangerous. Think what it is you
are doing here. It can only ever be an unthinking shell. A shallow force,
a monster by another name, for it can never know all that it takes to us
human.” I pleaded, but my pleas fell upon deaf ears. I was here to watch
a birth and bear witness.
Here, in this once holy place, Aloysius Davok brought the clay of the
earth to life with an arcane and unholy ritual that had been lost - and
should have remained lost for centuries more!
He laboured in that room until the stubs of the tallow candles had
all but burned out and the shadows of the chamber were stretched thin.
More times than I cared to remember I made my case, but I admit, a
great part of me simply did not believe. Despite everything that I have
witnessed these long years of travel, from the marvels and rumours of
the fabulous that have obsessed me, the idea that a man, no matter how
learned or pious had it within him to grant life… I did not believe it
could be done.
And for that I beg your forgiveness, for I am nothing short of a fool.
He finished working the clay, giving his creation more definition
and adding to the form so that it more resembled the man he wanted
it to be, then returned to his study of the Book of Formation, poring
over every line until he was absolutely sure he understood, then began
work afresh on a separate lump of wet clay which he flattened out and
shaped into a tablet.
“What are you at?” I asked, not sure I wanted to hear his answer.
“This is the life stone. Before it dries I shall carve into it the secret
name of God, then place it within the golem’s mouth so that it might
live.”
“And that is all it takes to bring this monster to life?” I mocked. I
couldn’t help myself. The secret name of God?
“There is a Kabbalistic formula, and the word TRUTH must be
inscribed into my creation’s forehead to animate him, but it is enough,
yes. It is the secret name of God that grants life.”
“And only you know this name?” I pressed.
“We all do. It is within us. But we have forgotten the name of our
father as completely as we have forgotten His face.”
I could only stand by, helpless, and watch as Davok placed the life
stone inside the crude slash of mouth he had given the thing, and began
to write seven lines of life he had leaned by rote in a tongue I did not
speak. I can’t begin to tell you what he said, but I recognised the letters
he pressed into the clay of the golem’s forehead with his finger -
EMET
The word meant truth in the Hebrew language, on one letter removed
from death.
MET
The link could not be accidental, born from the truth to die when one
single letter was erased.
It was only as the last cross of the T, another slice of symbolism I am
sure, that the automaton began to stir. It was not as though it woke from
a deep slumber. It lacked eyelids so could not open its eyes. Life began as
a twitch in the extremities. A flexing of the fingers. A curling of the toes.
Davok stepped away from his creation, his face a fervour of triumph
and fear as the great creature began to rise.
“It lives…” I breathed. “Dear God, it lives…”
There was no crash of thunder or cry from the universe at the birth
of Davok’s unholy child. It was as though the world did not care…
It took an unsteady moment, but the golem stood on its own two feet
and stared down at us implacably. Even in the few moments I stood
in its shadow staring at it, I imagined the abomination grew just a
fraction. A trick of the light, surely? Or my own fear rather than any
actual growth, surely?
I looked the damned thing in the eye cavity.
It did not move.
It merely waited.
And waited.
Without instruction from its creator the golem, alive or not, remained
absolutely still. It possessed infinite patience. Davok walked in circles
around it, marvelling that it had risen of its own accord. His first
command was easy enough, he directed it to, “Move over there,” and
pointed at the fire pit on the far side of the laboratory.
With great lurching strides the golem lumbered across the chamber
to stand facing the fire as though savouring the heat on its drying clay.
Over the next few hours his commands became more elaborate, testing
the limits of the enchantment and his creation’s understanding, but
without this words to give it fresh purpose the golem simply returned to
its statue state, waiting once for its creator to speak.
It was both ungodly and fascinating, and all I could do was imagine
the horrors it would be capable of without question or conscience to stop
it from atrocity.
It was the single most dangerous thing I had ever seen - strength
unparalleled, it was able to uproot the huge oaks of the forest and batter
down stone walls of the hermitage with nothing more than its clay fists.
What it could do to mere flesh and blood I shuddered to think.
“Kill him,” Davok whispered, turning his thing on me, and I
understood now exactly why I had been summoned to this remote place.
I was not merely the witness, I was to be the sacrifice.
I scrambled away from the golem as it lumbered towards me, knowing
that I could not allow it to close its huge hands around my neck or it
would surely snap the bones in two.
I didn’t even think about fighting.
I am many things, but a warrior I am not. And for that reason I had
a chance. It was a slow lumbering thing. I knew I could out manoeuvre
it, and out run it, so ducked beneath those huge clubbing clay fists and
ran for my life.
I didn’t look back as Davok’s maniacal laughter hounded me out of
that accursed place. My sole focus was on making it to my horse, and
beyond that, giving the animal its head and putting as much distance
between myself and the foul simulacrum.
The horse was restless, chomping at the bit.
Breathing hard, I wrestled with the saddle and girth straps, hauling
my legs up over the animal’s back even as it whinnied and whined, and
I knew the golem had to be close. I couldn’t stop to check. I needed to
get out of there. Even before my backside was in the saddle I kicked the
animal’s flanks and we burst out of that stable at a gallop, both of us
eyes front, staring at the crumbling arch that would take us out of the
hermitage and onto the road - and at the towering red clay monstrosity
between us and our freedom.
Davok stood in the doorway, watching.
I spurred the horse on, and we swept by the golem, which was too
slow to catch us; low over its back I clung onto the animal’s mane as we
surged out into the night and rode her hard, to the point of exhaustion,
putting miles between us and Davok’s monster.
I should have known it wasn’t enough.
I found an inn more than twenty miles along the road. The horse
laboured. My only thought was rest. I paid good coin for a room
overlooking the stables, and extra to have my four-legged friend cared
for, groomed and spoiled with the finest meal they had. I thought to
sleep for no more than five hours, then take to the road again. I had
seen more than enough miracles for one lifetime. 155
But sleep evaded me.
I lay there, tossing back and forth restlessly, the sheets tangling around
my legs and clinging to my sweat-soaked skin. That sleeplessness saved
my life. I heard the colossal crash as the wooden doors were battered
down and didn’t need to look out through the shuttered windows to
know what was out there raising hell.
It was relentless, like a blood hound that had my scent.
I dressed and went out through the window even as the door flew
open behind me, and made the reckless jump to the thatched roof of the
stable, scrambling down the side of the building to the ground. Looking
up, I saw the crudely cut face staring down at me from the open window
and knew I’d been lucky.
Moving as fast as humanly possible, I saddled up again and we were
on the road before the golem could find a way back down to us. This
time I didn’t stop after ten or twenty miles. I was smarter though, and
didn’t push the horse beyond breaking. It was imperative that we kept
moving. How quickly was of less import as the golem could only walk
one lumbering stride at a time.
Through the day, through the night and through the day again, we
travelled, surely one hundred miles between us. We crossed great rivers
and traversed seemingly endless forests looking for somewhere we might
finally rest, safe.
The weather turned during the long hours on the road, rain lashing
in, every new breath like ice burning in my lungs as the constant tears
of the heavens stung my eyes. All I could do was urge the horse on,
thinking to find shelter. The track we were on rose and rose until it was
easily five hundred feet above the valley floor, with a steep escarpment
 and a lethal bank of scree between hoof and drop.
Through the storm I saw the silhouette of a wayfarer’s hut and thought
only of getting into the warm and dry. I wasn’t about to leave my horse
out in the deluge, either, so I led him into the small cabin. The previous
inhabitant had had left the fixings of a fire banked up in the hearth
as was the etiquette of the road. I had it burning brightly within a few
minutes and was out of my wet clothing and warming myself against the
flames while the horse had its nose in the feed bag, eating until it was
empty. We neither of us were in good shape after the headlong flight, but
for the first time in what felt like forever we were safe.
Or so I had the temerity to think.
I did not reckon with the relentless nature of Davok’s creation.
It needed no rest.
It came on and on and on and on.
It had the scent of my soul and existed purely to serve the will of its
twisted master. It would not stop its hunt until it had fulfilled the order
given to it and I was dead.
I had to find some way to beat it - but how did you kill a thing that
was not truly alive?
I carried two weapons, a knife and a double-headed crossbow capable
of firing two bolts from its mechanism rather than a single shot. Neither
would be much use against my unstoppable clay foe.
I awoke the morning after, if not refreshed, at least rested, and as I
stepped out into the early sun saw the familiar red hulk climbing the
path towards the wayfarer’s hut. Panic reared in my mind. Every instinct
screamed at me to continue running, but the cold hard realisation that
156 wherever I ran, however far I ran, no matter how fast, it would follow.
And it would not rest until it had obeyed Davok’s kill order.
I was a dead man.
Running was only prolonging the inevitable. The devil on my
shoulder whispered: why not die here, with the sun on your face? There
were worse places to leave this world.
But I wasn’t ready to make my farewells. At least not yet. I had a basic
grasp of what Davok had done to raise the golem, but no magics of my
own to wrest control of it from him. Life had been blessed by the secret
name of God placed on the clay tablet beneath the golem’s tongue. If I
could somehow prise that clear of the golem’s crude mouth then perhaps,
just perhaps, that which had been given could be taken away?
But that meant getting so close to the monster that it would lay its
huge clay hands on me, making it nothing short of a race to see which
of us could end the other’s existence first.
I watched it come, doubting the wisdom of my decision every unsteady
step of the way. Too soon, it was no more than fifty feet away, its huge,
awkward feet not planting properly on the dirt track. It lurched heavily
from side to side. The sun rose redly behind the creature. It was a vision
I would never forget, not as long as I lived, even if that life could be
counted out in seconds now, or years. I wondered where its master was,
and should I survive this, what it might do without a master to serve?
The urge to run gripped me again. It would have been a pitiful last
thought, I admit. Others die with - if not heroism, at least dignity. No.
I was not about to turn tail. This ended here.
I fingered the trigger of the crossbow, resisting the urge to shoot
until I could see the metaphorical whites of its cavity-eyes, those two
bottomless pits gouged into the middle of its face.
I had one thought; not to kill it by what he held in the mouth, but
rather to try and somehow damage the word of truth that Davok had
carved into its forehead. My hope was that, with the will of God on my
side, that might break the flow of life into its limbs and slow it.
Fifteen feet.
Ten.
I couldn’t wait any longer. I pulled the trigger and loosed both bolts
in quick succession. The first cracked off the golem’s clay hide, not
registering so much as a scratch. My breath hitched in my throat as
the second bolt flew true, the iron head burying itself deep in the first E
of of the word EMET writ large across the beast’s head. I don’t know
what I had expected, but it didn’t so much as slow the golem down by
a single faltering footstep.
I baulked, dropping the crossbow at my feet.
The knife was useless. I didn’t even bother drawing it.
The golem swung a huge clubbing fist at my head. I barely avoided
having the grey matter of my brain spilled out across the mountainside,
flinging myself sideways. I hit the ground hard and rolled, coming up
to my feet just out of reach of those huge arms - close to the edge. Any
more and my momentum would have carried me over the side. Five
hundred feet was a long way to fall, but not so long as it would have
taken for God to grant me wings…
The golem turned, trying to adjust its footing on the uneven ground
as it came at me again.
I will never in my life underestimate anything so small again. A
single pebble, no more than a knucklebone in size, rolled beneath the
huge plate of the monster’s clay foot, upending its clumsy balance. As it
teetered on the edge I made my last desperate move, scrambling forward
to place both of my hands flat against its chest and pushed with every
ounce of my might.
For the longest second, the endless silence between one heartbeat and the
next, the clay golem hung in the balance, unable to adjust or help itself.
And then it fell.
I stood on the edge, looking down, as it fell away, battered and
broken, to the valley below, thinking it was over.
But what is not truly alive cannot truly die.
I rode my animal down to the foot of the mountain where I found the
shattered body of the golem still desperately trying to carry out the will
of its master, one huge clay hand struggling to pull free of the debris
and gather the shattered clay together again.
I looked down into the golem’s empty eyes and saw nothing. No
intelligence. No soul. It was obvious that the secret name of God would not
let the damned thing rest, so I did the only thing I could - I reached inside
its mouth for the small clay tablet bearing the divine upon it, and shattered
it into a hundred tiny pieces against the shale. The dissolution took the
golem in seconds. To dust, returned. The clay desiccated, crumbling and
scattering on the wind even as my footsteps left their mark in the red dust.
Nothing remains.
There is a lesson in that.
That night I dreamed of Aloysius Davok surrounded by a legion of
these soulless simulacra and knew what must be done…
 archival materials by the royal society

Speculation and Field Notes Regarding

the Golem

Again we find references to the golem

in the writings of King Nimrod, who
proves to be the source of much rich
information about the esoteric and the
occult:
“By Anu, the god of heaven! At first I
thought the thing was an overgrown asakku,
or humbaba itself, but I was so terribly,
tragically, wrong. The damned mystics
have created life out of the stuff of the earth,
where no live belongs, and in their hatred
sent several clay beasts against me, looking
to bring me low with their soulless ones.
They did not reckon on our strength, nor our 157
determination. We fought well for two full
days before my sword was so blunted it wasn’t
even good to cut bread, never mind meat.”
In one of Nimrod’s margin notations,
one can find reference to how Nimrod’s
great foe created an entire army of these
soulless clay soldiers to throw at the king’s
ranks. They were defeated and dispatched
to the eastern countries, though we
can find little in the way of evidence
and actual fact of the conflict as there is
little in the way of surviving accounts to
parallel Nimrod’s own writing and offer
a counterpoint, though again we have an
expedition out in the Shaanxi Province
of central China. At the end of the Silk
Road, we are quite interested in Chang’an,
or Xi’an, the "City of Eternal Peace" and
home to the Zhou, Qin, Han and Tang
dynasties’ ruling houses as we believe
this may well prove to be the final resting
place of these clay warriors and would tie which corresponds to the Julian year example of such divine heresy. The art
in with what we know of Qin Shi and his 1580.. He breathed life into it by marking of creating life from where there is none
fabled terracotta army. the creature with a sign carved deep into is the last bastion of God as through our
Rabbi Yehudah Loew created an the clay of its forehead. Much has been enlightenment and reason we decipher
artificial being of clay in Prague in the year written about Loew’s golem, not least the secrets of the universe, and yet that
5340, according to the Jewish calendar, the fact that it is among the most recent same ‘magic’ is thought to be one of the
 mystics’ oldest secrets, long forgotten
across thousands of years, causing many
scholars to argue that we have forgotten
more as a species than even the wisest of
us now remembers, which is in itself an
interesting riddle.
There is, of course, a wealth discourse
on the subject of these automata, one of
the more recent attempts to explain the
alchemical process behind the miracle by
an obscure Polish Kabbalist that has fallen
into our hands. The text is no more the
fifty or sixty years old:
“And I have heard, expressly, from many
respectable persons that the man, Rabbi
Eliyahu, has created a creature of earth and
clay, a golem by any other name, and uses it
like an indentured slave to perform back-
breaking duties for him. The name Emet was
hung on the creature, though when the Rabbi
had cause to removed the name, the creature
crumbled into a choking cloud of dust and was
gone.”
The work of this unknown Polish
Kabbalist is echoed in a subsequent
treatise written in 1674 by the Christian
158 mystic Christoph Arnold, who interprets
some passages in the Psalms as secret
references to a creation that he defines
as a "goylem.". Arnold believes the
source of this particular psalm originates
from the work of Babylonian priests. A
confirm, according to our secret contacts
in the Ottoman Empire, comes from
a clay tablet, found by a Sufi scholar
pillaging a tomb in Mesopotamia, north
of place they call "Eshnunna". The wise
man pretends that he could read the
following, mostly humdrum passage:
“Our lord demanded a servant whom
he could trust, someone who would not be
insidious and try to murder him as a former
servant. He wanted something no one else had
before him, he wanted a goyhelem, a creature
made of clay and who would serve only him.”
There are divergences in scientific
thinking here. According to Aristotelian
thought, artificial life arises when a
‘psyche’ is inserted into clay. There is some
linguistic confusion here, as in Aristotle’s
biology the word "Clay" is the same as
the one he uses for woman’s blood. Sadly
nothing of Aristotle’s original writings
on the subject survives, so our scholars
are dependent upon the secondary and
tertiary accounts of others, both his
contemporaries and his descendants
including the poet Philippus, son of
Aristophanes, who is said to have created a
blood golem by this very method, though
his beast was fashioned to resemble a bull.
One of the primary reasons for our
interest in the Far East and Chinese
Provinces, is the myth of the First
Emperor's Terracotta Warriors, in which
an entire army of golems was created
though locked in ready slumber to be
woken the at the time of the land’s greatest
need. That clay army, which consists of
both horses and warriors, is part of Qin
Shi Huangdi’s tomb. It is rumoured that
he was able to create this powerful army
with his mystical powers, drawing upon
the darker arts of the oriental esoteric.
The Emperor’s personal note-taker Jun
Hong has much to say on the matter in
his many journals, though how we can
interpret these as any form of unbiased
accounting is up for debate:
“The soldiers were stood arrayed in endless
lines as far as the eye could see. Row upon row
upon row. Unique. A miracle of the arcane
art. The sheer perfection of their creation was
absolute. The incantation woven into their
essence was a simple but effective charm that
ensured the army of clay would not come to life
until the crown was joined and the sword was
drawn again… but there were other groups
that had a higher, secret purpose.”
In Jun Hong’s diaries we find detailed
accounts of the many rituals Qin Shi
performed during the creation of his
endless army of terracotta clay warriors,
including the final bindings of the ritual
required to bring a golem of this kind to
life, including a pounding heart for every
soldier he hoped to create, and the tear
from a dying virgin that would be the final
mournful elixir that summoned forth life.
The art of creating a golem is long
forgotten, and varies from faith to faith
though always there is a bond of some
sort to the name of the divine, though the
unusual nature of the creature cannot be
ignored. It is not some common work of
an artificer, but rather the creation of a
master. Commonly, the fashioning of such
a beast is crude, with the bulk of the golem
making it cumbersome and awkward
as clay is not the easiest medium for an
inexperienced sculptor to work with, but
we have in our vaults notes that suggest
these creatures might equally be chiselled
from stone or fused from sand and fire,
like glass.
The golem is a simple thing, cursed
with limited intelligence and incapable
of independent thought. It exists to obey
the orders of its creator, though there is
evidence to suggest that the beast hates its
false life so much it can to easily against
its creator.
Unique individuals
The First Emperor's Warriors
Qin Shi’s terracotta army consists of
thousands and thousands of soldiers, each
one an utterly unique creation, with subtle
differences in shape and size, facial features,
armour and more, so that they truly appear
to be an army of men frozen in time.
They were crafted with a single
purpose: war.
Keen eyes might identify servants and
horses within the ranks of the army, but
the body of this huge golem army, like
any living force, is made up of warriors.
What is of interest to the Royal Society
their mental bond with their master. Very
few Golems turn upon those from whom
they take their order, but this is never the
case with the terracotta warriors from
China. Perhaps it is their essential military
nature, or perhaps it is something else?
Buried in several vast underground
chambers, the army is spread out over
an immense area, but we have reason
to believe that these chambers do not
represent the full extent of the army, but
rather that several smaller forces were
deployed as guardians all across China.
Josele
Rabbi Loew’s ben Bezalei’s golem,
Josele, is among the most famous of
these simulacrums.
No one knows for sure, but there
were whispers amongst the mystics that
could well explain how a devout man
could suddenly bring forth life—Rabbi
Loew unearthed ancient Kabbalistic
parchments from centuries before, linked
to an entity only recorded once, as the
"Babylonian". These lost arcana included
the ritual of creation, and detailed
instruction on how to raise a golem.
Loew used clay from Moldau’s beach
and brought his creature to life by
putting a "shem"—essentially a magic
formula that amounts to the secret
name of God—in the creature’s mouth.
It was that link to the divine that raised
the creature, which Loew named Josele.
He was able to control Josele by
removing the magic formula from the
creature’s mouth every night, returning
it to a lifeless statue-state.
Legend has it that Loew fell sick, and
in the grips of fever one night could not
bear to remove the shem from Josele’s
tongue, and the golem ran amok.
With its enormous strength, the golem
destroyed everything in its path, until
Loew, still weak and feverish, managed to
calm down his creation. Loew understood
that his time was short and his health
failing as this was no ordinary sickness
he might shake off. Such was the damage
that when Loew took the shem from
Josele’s mouth the Rabbi knew he could
never wake Josele again. His lifeless
golem remained for more than a century
in the attic of the synagogue where Loew
served, as a reminder.
It was only a matter of time before
Josele was brought back to life by mystics;
Loew did not destroy his shem, but rather
hid it within the synagogue’s attics. The
mystic Abijah Sharok discovered the
shem and brought the creature to life
again, but the golem' simple mind could
not grasp the passage of time and did
not recognise the face of its master, so
Josele fled into the shadows, living in the
sewers beneath Prague.
If you listen in the water wells across
the city, even now, you can hear the
mournful cries of the creature that has
lost its reason for living.
Appearance
The golem is in essence an artificial
man, shaped to resemble us, and it is
commonly believed that no matter the
skill of the creator it is always going to
look crude and alien in comparison to
a human being. That is not necessarily
true. If Michelangelo had chosen to
imbue his David with the charms and
amulets of life, and hollow out his mouth
to make way for the tablet bearing the
secret name of god, theoretically a most
beautiful stone man, a near-perfect
simulacrum lacking only reason and
freewill, could indeed walk amongst
us—after all the biblical story of Adam
has a man-made of clay receive the
divine breath of god which turns his
flesh into the finished mortal flesh of all
humans?
Traditionally, though, the clay golem
has three ragged holes in its face, two
that serve as eyes and open into the
hollow interior of the construct’s empty
skull, and the third which serves as a
mouth, where the clay tablet bearing
the secret name of god that gives it life
is inserted.
First Impressions
The cruder constructs appear exactly
as though they are statues, unmoving,
standing up against a wall, simply
waiting. It is only after they are given
their first command and come to life
before the eyes that the true horror of
these crudely fashioned simulacrums
can be understood. They lumber
awkwardly, moving as though blind
through cramped spaces, with none of
the grace of a person, bumping into
objects that stand in their way. They are
faceless ones. Nameless ones. They lack
any sense of what we would normally
call ‘life’, and display no sense of being
alive until that first command causes
them to stir… and then they shuffle and
lumber and look as though their balance
is at best precarious as they lurch about
their business.
What do the Players Know?
The golem is a construction, and
therefore neither good nor evil in
intent. It simply is, and exists to obey
the commands of its creator. Whilst
golems are traditionally formed from
the shapeless clay, like the biblical first
man, Adam, it is theoretically possible
to fashion a golem from any number
of materials, including but not limited
to metals like iron, silver and gold—
malleable and sculptable materials
are far more suitable for the task than
materials that must be joined. It is not
impossible to see an incredible artist
drawing forth the form of a golem from
a huge slab of granite one chip of the
chisel at a time, or a skilled woodcrafter
whittling out the form of a golem from
a huge oak tree. The ritual of life and
placing the secret name of god beneath
the creation’s tongue is what gives
it life, not the clay it is traditionally
formed from.
The golem will live as long as the
secret name is within it, though my
remain in an almost hibernation-like
trance until it is given fresh commands
to obey by its creator.
They are given life by Kabbalistic
magic. 159
Their main purpose for existing is to
protect their creator.
There is a Mayan creation myth
that describes the wooden men the
gods created before the first humans.
These wooden men had no soul, and no
conscience, and so wreaked havoc on the
land until they were finally destroyed.
Half a world away, the ancient Greeks
had the living statues fashioned by the
inventor, Daedalus. His sculptures were
supposedly harmless, though if they
were left unrestrained, they would seek
to flee their captivity.
The earliest mention of the golem as
a creature occurs in Psalm 139:16, from
the fifth century BC. “Your eyes saw my
unformed limbs,” The phrase was said
by Adam, the first man, and the term
“golem” used in this passage literally
means unfinished substance. The word
only appears once in the entire bible.
The creation of a golem is an incredibly
complex and difficult undertaking. The
maker must have mastered the sacred
texts, which requires years of study.
There is a huge risk of the smallest
 errors in intonation or phraseology
within the ritual, a mis-drawn sigil
or any number of possible mistakes
during the creation ceremony, with
unimaginable consequences, including
a ‘living’ simulacrum that is completely
out of the control of its maker and
hellbent on destruction.
They are generally thought of as
guardians.
The golem does not possess
intelligence in the way we normally
consider it, but understands the
language of its creator well enough to
do their bidding.
They are slow lumbering constructs
that can be outrun, but they will follow
their prey for eternity as they are not
bound by simple things like exhaustion
and age.
According to legend there comes
a time when every golem turns on its
maker.
Main Features
✦ The golem is inexhaustible.
✦ The golem has no conscience so
is capable of incredibly evil acts as
equally as it is of such bravery no
man could hope to match. Evil, good,
heroism, these are unknown concepts
in the simple mind of the golem.
✦ The golem is incredibly strong,
capable of crushing the life out of a
man with its bare hands. It does not
use weapons in combat.
✦ The golem is a relentless hunter. It
does not track by scent, but rather
some magical fixation that, if applied to
a player cannot by shucked off in water
like dogs or any other trick to mask
the player’s scent, like rolling in a dung
heap. The golem cannot be fooled in
such a simple fashion. And it will not
stop hunting until it is deactivated or
destroyed, or the command to kill has
been overridden by its creator.
✦ Certain materials used for the
golem’s creation may imbue it with
different qualities and weaknesses.
A golem fashioned from an ash tree
would, for instance, be susceptible to
fire, whereas a golem of iron would
be capable of withstanding such
torment. A golem carved from the
stuff of a meteor fallen to earth could
prove to be a formidable foe given
the alien nature of such materials,
especially if they include elements
not found upon the earth. (There
are similarities between a golem
made from the stitched together
flesh of dead men and a homunculus
which for the purposes of our world
will be governed by the rules of
the homunculus as opposed to the
constraints laid down upon the
golem).

 
160
Golem typical stats
The following stats represent a typical Golem crafted in clay.
It usually larger than a normal man, about twice the size of a
human being in bulk, if not in height. Its features are usually
crude-looking, although more skilful crafters may create
more beautiful versions of this monster.
Traits: Constitution +8, Intelligence -4, Dexterity -6
Physical Health Points: 50-90 (70 is a common value)
Physical Damage levels: None
Mental Health Points: None.
Movement: walking 2 CP per 1 m (Max 6 m).
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 9-10).
Skills: Agility SV 5
Fighting SV 10, Unarmed Fighting 2 (Brawling 3,
Wrestling 5).
Natural Weapons: Fist (Dmg 1d10 OR 10 +8 Constitution).
Natural Protection: Incredibly tough skin 8
Initiative: -6
Combat points: Free 10 / Unarmed 2 (Brawling 6, Wrestling 10).
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM -6) Fist SV 18
✦ (IM -6) Fist SV 10, SV 8
✦ (IM -6) Wrestling SV 11 (see Grapple Lex Libris p.19)
Common Properties
Unnatural life
Golems do not have MHP and they also do not have physical
damage levels since they do not feel pain. Golems usually do
not naturally heal but their bodies must be repaired by an
artisan rolling on the Profession skill (and relevant Crafting
discipline and Craftmanship Specialties) as if they were
normal statues.
When the Golem’s PHP are reduced to “0” it usually means
that the body is so damaged and destroyed that it cannot
move. However, a Golem in this situation is not dead and it
can remain in this situation even for centuries, waiting for
somebody to repair their bodies. In order to destroy a golem
certain specific actions are required (as described in the
“Kabbalistic weakness” in the vulnerabilities for most golems,
or maybe other actions for non-Kabbalistic golems).
Choke
A Golem can try to grab a victim’s throat with a hand by
spending 10 CP on top of the those spent for the normal
unarmed attack (which means one single attack at SV 8, if
using the stats above). If the attack is successful, the Golem
rolls normal “Fist” attack damage (1d10 OR +8) but the result
(including the +8 Constitution bonus) must be multiplied x2.
Furthermore, in the following round, If the Golem
performs no other action and if the victim is still alive, the
Golem’s hold on the throat continues. The victim cannot do
any other action but trying to free himself with a Wrestling
skill roll (remember that it costs thrice CP as per Lex Libris
p.19) but reversely modified by the Golem’s Constitution
bonus (which usually means suffering -8). In case of failure
the victim suffers the same damage again. The whole process
continues usually until the victim is dead, manages to get free
or someone else forces the Golem to perform other actions
and free the victim.
Deathly Embrace
If a Golem is successful in a Wrestling attempt (see Lex Libris
p.19) it will automatically also inflict 1d10 (OR 10) +8. If not
doing anything else, the Golem will automatically keep on
grappling the same victim inflicting, in its own turn, another
1d10 (OR 10) +8 until the victim is dead or has manage to
escape the grappling.
Immunities
Golems do not need to eat, sleep or drink and they do not
suffer any disease. Most Golems do usually not suffer damage
from normal fire or cold. On the other hand, since they are
made of clay, very hot fires will damage them (see below
among “vulnerabilities”).
Obedience beyond time and space
Golems tend to obey their master for an indefinite time-
period.
This strong link will even give the Golem unnatural
ability: if the master order to kill somebody, the Golem will
automatically locate the victim wherever the victim is in the
world, whatever trick has been used to hide the target. Time
and distance do not matter, in fact sooner or later the Golem
will find its victim.
On the other hand, if the master dies and the Golem has not
received any order to conclude (like, for example, guarding a
place for the eternity), the creature will fall into confusion.
It is totally up to the GM to evaluate how to handle the
situation, but Golems are known to perform unprecedented
acts in these conditions: roaming free, attacking anybody or
just fall on the ground, as if it was just inert material.
Stable & Clumsy
It is difficult to make a Golem losing its balance in normal
situations. They are tough, heavy and extremely stable on
their feet. The GM should make them automatically succeed
in most normal situations without rolling any dice.
On the other hand, Golems are not agile, and their low
Agility value should be rolled in difficult situations like
unstable grounds or difficult to climb roads. However, their
agility should be rolled only in critical conditions (like a chase
in a combat), since most of the time the creature will just
slowly climb the surface, without any need of rolling dice.
Vulnerabilities
Most golems made of clay have the following vulnerabilities.
✦ Kabbalistic weakness: Two things give life to a normal
golem: a “Shem” paper (with the Sacred Name of God)
inserted in its mouth and the Hebrew word Emet (=Truth)
inscribed on its forehead. Taking the Shem from its mouth or
delete the first letter on the forehead (so that word’s meaning
becomes “Death”) will automatically turn the Golem to inert
material with no life. However, this is easier to say that to
perform, since to do either of these things one must be very
near to the creature (usually in the range of his deathly fists).
This weakness is typical of Golems created by Kabbalistic
arts (which means other, rarer Golem-like creatures should
not suffer it, although most have similar weaknesses).
✦ Falling Damage: Since they are made of a material which is
tough, dense but also heavy and somehow fragile (in certain
conditions), all the damage suffered by falling is multiplied x
3 and the natural protection does not work against it.
✦ Over-Fire: Since they are made of clay, very hot fire can
over-cook a Golem’s body, making it more brittle. Normal
fires do not have this effect, but only very specific situations:
like falling inside an active furnace or being trapped in the
centre of a terrible firestorm which destroys a village. The
GM should evaluate the specific situation according to
the strength of the fire, but a possible result is that all the
damage dealt to an over-fired golem will be multiplied x2. 161
Optional Properties
Charming Statue
The living statue of Pygmalion had this property, which made
it incredibly seductive and different from normal golems. Some
statues need only to be seen by their victims, while other need
to speak or sing. The victim must succeed a Situation Roll
with an SV of 12 modified by Psyche to resist the seduction.
Those who are seduced will not harm the statue and will fall
in love with it.
Guardian
Some Golems are linked to a specific building or place which
it defends. If it is brought too far from it, the creature will die
or become a normal statue.
Terrifying Screech
If they do nothing else in the round, some rare Golems can
emit terrifying screeches inflicting 1d10 (OR 8-10) of mental
damage.
Vulnerable to Fire
If a Golem is made of certain materials (especially wood)
it may become vulnerable to fire. The Natural Armor is
completely ignored by fire whose damage is also multiplied
 x 2. Furthermore, the creature will keep on burning for at
least 1d6 rounds. For example, hitting a wooden Golem with
a flaming torch or a lantern will deal it 1d6 damage per round,
to be multiplied x2.
Golem Variations
Metal Golems
Among the metal golems the most diffused ones are those in
Bronze, since it is way easier to cast a statue in bronze than
in iron (although Iron golems are also not unheard of). Their
natural armors are at least 10 points strong. Metal golems do
not have the “Falling Damage” vulnerability neither a normal
“Over-Fire” vulnerability. However, if they fail into a burning
furnace they may be melted and therefore destroyed.
Meteoric Metal Golems
These rare Golems are made of rare metals, usually involving
complicated sorcerous rituals. Their stats may vary according
to GM’s judgement (since these alien metals may be lighter
or heavier than clay). These Golems tend to be immune to
most Dark Arts and spells (except for some Divine Arts) due
to their alien nature.
Stone Golems
162 The bodies of these golems may be like refined marble Greek
statues, as well as cruder limestone or sandstone humanoids
crafted by some primitive sculptor. These heavier Golems have
Constitution +10 instead of +8 (which therefore also change
the modifier to damage) and their natural armors are at least
10 points strong. On the other hand, they have Dexterity -8
(which also influences Initiative) and a maximum movement
per round of only 4 m. They rarely suffer the “Over-Fire”
vulnerability, but it depends on the type of stone.
Wooden Golems
Most wooden Golems have a natural armor of only 3-5 points
(according to the wood type). They do not suffer the “Falling”
and “Overfire” vulnerabilities. On the other hand, very old
and dry wooden golem may have the “Vulnerable to Fire”
optional property if their creator has not coated them in any
kind of fire-proof material. The Mayan woodmen are of this
type and they usually lack masters: their only purpose is to
destroy everything they see.
Terracotta Warriors
These terracotta golems from China are smaller than normal
Golems since they tend to be human-sized. Off course they do
not have the “Kabbalistic weakness” vulnerability, although
there are legends about them being vulnerable to jade powder
or, if the story about the sacrificed heart is true, they can be
killed by using the new “Hitting the Weak Spot” rule to target
the heart.
Their stats differ from normal golems as follows.
Traits: Constitution +4, Dexterity -2
Physical Health Points: 20-45 (32 is a common value)
Movement: walking 2 CP per 1 m (Max 8 m).
Skills: Agility SV 10
Fighting SV 10, Close-Combat Weapons 2 (Any
Weapon 3), Ranged 2 (Bows 3), Unarmed Fighting 2
(Brawling 2, Wrestling 2).
Natural Weapons: Fist (Dmg 1d10 +4 Constitution).
Natural Protection: armour-moulded skin 6
Initiative: -2
Combat points: Free 10 / Close Combat 2 (Any Weapon 6)
/ Ranged 2 (Bows 6)/ Unarmed 2 (Brawling 4, Wrestling 4).
Equipment:
✦ Decent Ji Polearm (IM -6, WA 2, OM 0, BP 10, dmg 1d10
(OR 8-10) +4 Constitution),
✦ Sword (IM -4, WA 3, OM 0, BP 12, dmg 1d10 (OR 9-10)
+4 Constitution),
✦ Light Crossbow (IM -4. P/T 1/5, OM 0, Dmg 1d10 (OR
10), Range 1-50/50-80).
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM -2) Fist SV 16
✦ (IM -8) Ji Polearm SV 10, SV 8
✦ (IM -6) Sword SV 18
✦ (IM -2) Wrestling SV 8 (see Grapple Lex Libris p.19)
Huge Golems
Some Golems are crafted to be three or even four times larger
than a human being. Their stats differ from normal golems for
the following entries.
Traits: Constitution +10, Intelligence -8, Dexterity -8
Physical Health Points: 70-110 (90 is a common value)
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 8-10).
Natural Weapons: Fist (Dmg 2d10 OR 9-10 +10
Constitution).
Initiative: -8
Furthermore, the damage they deal with “Choke” and “Deathly
Embrace” properties is 2d10 (OR 9-10) +10 Constitution.
Human-sized Golems
Some Golems are crafted to be of the same size of mortal
men. Their stats differ from normal golems for the following
entries.
Traits: Constitution +4, Dexterity -2
Physical Health Points: 20-45 (32 is a common value)
Movement: walking 2 CP per 1 m (Max 8 m).
Natural Weapons: Fist (Dmg 1d10 +4 Constitution).).
Initiative: -2.
Pygmalion’ Statue
According to the Greek Myth, Pygmalion fall in love with
a beautiful statue of Aphrodite. According to some versions
of the legend he was the one who crafted it, according to
other versions he was a Cypriot king and found the statues
in a temple. Whatever the original myth was, there beautiful
statues are different from normal golems. The GM should
apply the suggestions from the “Human-sized” and “Stone
golem” sections above but adding also the “Charming Statue”
optional property.
Golem-related Secret Arts
Most Golems are the result of Kabbalistic arts, as described
in Lex Libris p.236. However, other varieties of Golem exist
(although they are off course not called with the Hebrew
word “Golems”), often crafted with sorcerous arts like the one
described below.
The mirrored image of Qin Shi Huang
New Dark Art, Left-Hand Path
Countless terracotta warriors were buried to protect the
immense tomb of the First Emperor of China, Qin Shi Huang.
Previous kings and warlords used to sacrifice servants in
their tombs, and it is widely believed that what Qin Shi Huang
did was to not waste such a huge amount of good soldier.
However, there are many stories and legends on the matter,
often conflicting one with the other. In one version some of
these terracotta warriors were meant to be animated and
where therefore ensorcelled by performing a human sacrifice.
What follows is the spell as known by a few Eastern sorcerers
or hidden in ancient scrolls preserved in a few places out of
China, like some monasteries in Tibet and Mongolia, although
the monks keeping those documents cannot make sense of
them. Esotericists from the Royal Society have tried to steal
this secret, but they have thus far failed.
The spell is known as the “mirrored image” since there is
a conscience that this is just a faint copy of what the ancient
masters once knew. It is probable that the sorcerers of Qin Shi
Huang knew more powerful versions of this Dark Art, maybe
even not really requiring human sacrifice and creating more
powerful versions of the terracotta warriors.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -18
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 10
✦ Discipline: The Left-hand Path level 3
✦ Specialty: Black Magic level 4
Other Requirements
✦ Supernatural Beings Discipline level 1, Beastiology level 3
✦ Communication SV 7, Languages Discipline level 1,
Foreign language: Old Chinese 3.
✦ Profession SV 7, Crafting Discipline level 1, Craftmanship
specialty: terracotta maker 3.
Material Requirements
✦ A pouding heart from a recent human sacrifice (to be put in
the warrior’s chest).
✦ The tears of a dying virgin.
✦ A human-sized terracotta statue to be ready before the
ritual begins.
Effect
After the terrible human sacrifice is performed, the heart is put
in the terracotta warrior’s chest and imbued with the virgin’s 163
tears, an Esotericism skill roll is done. In case of failure every
ingredient is lost. In case of success a Terracotta Warrior
is animated, ready to obey its master. See above among the
“Golem Variations” for the stats of a Terracotta Warrior.
✦ Note:
A similar spell was probably known to Aristophanes’ son
Philippus with the following differences:
✦ Woman’s blood instead of pounding heart
✦ Foreign Language: Ancient Greek instead of Old Chinese
The resulting Golem should have been human-sized and
possibly even Charming (as the one crafter by Pygmalion) or
crafted in the shape of a bull (as Philippus apparently did).
164
 The Homunculus
A lchemy cannot create life from nothing.
That is just the way of the natural world,
no matter what other faiths hold true, this
I believe with all of my heart. As a
science it utilises any number of living things, animal organs,
blood, the matter of plant and vegetation, and can from them
draw potions that heal, yes, but the potions are not themselves
alive. It is akin to Aloysius Davok’s soulless simulacra.
A golem with no intelligent thought of its own, only existing
to serve the whim of its master.
So, of course, as I travelled through Egypt with my guide I was
fascinated by tales of an ancient one who had created something
almost human; iron-skinned crocodiles that walked upright, were
capable of speech and could use weapons just as we ourselves use
weapons. It was a fanciful tale, and prevalent in many of the desert
regions we visited, and, almost certainly nonsense.
It was here I first encountered the notion of "Takwin", which
in many ways, must be the alchemist’s dream. A form of alchemy
capable of creating life, not just preserving the life already there.
Takwin promises so much more, perhaps even, going beyond the
realm of mortality and granting us the last great power of God?
How so? Imagine the practitioner possesses the skill to cultivate
165
and grow living body parts? Imagine what a dying man would give
to have that which is killing him excised and replaced with a vital,
rejuvenated organ? Why stop at that? Why not follow the quest to
the inevitable fountain of youth and use these gifts to graft on and
replace everything that makes us old so that we might be young
again? It is a seductive thought, is it not? To master such things, to
truly hold mastery over the creation of life and preservation of it?
Such a degree of power in the hands of a mere mortal man? The
thought is chilling.
And not the end of it.
Indeed, it is not only this Islamic mysticism that conjectures over
these homunculi. The first time I saw the word was within the pages
of Liber Vaccae, a medieval text that might otherwise be known as
the "Book of Abominable Mixtures". An Arabic compilation of
magical experiments, the text has been known by many names in
the West, including the "Book of the Cow". It has had as many
false authors, too, including Plato, Galen, and Hunayn ibn Ishâq,
though none of them actually authored this disturbing text.
The writer believes that it is possible to mimic and manipulate
the natural reproductive processes of living things, creating curious
hybrids or homunculi, though they termed it an "Anthroparion"—a
fully functional, living breathing human being with its own
intelligence.
But could that anthroparion ever lay claim to that which makes
us human? Its own soul? That is a moral dilemma beyond my
 thinking, though without one how could it ever be considered real?
Surely it could only ever be a lesser man, a slave, or worse, a zombie?
It was in Egypt that I heard of horrors that chilled me to the core,
and would have had a more cautious man retreat, but curiosity has
ever been my bane, and so I followed the tales of ghastly horrors,
searching out the alchemists who were capable of almost anything
in pursuit of their dreams of Takwin. The first, and by no means
the worst, was a man who had broiled down the essence of two
criminals, rendering them down to fat and other ichors to create
unctions and salves he believed would help fuse the body parts of
animals like wild pig and cattle to the broken bodies of beggars
and cripples littering the streets of his city. Another believed that a
dead man's "ka" (a part of the soul, for ancient Egyptians) could be
returned. to the pieced together body of a made-man. The difference
between life and death in this man’s faith was simply that, the ka
had left the body, so to return the ka to some form of mortal self
was to create a version of immortality. The ka was not exactly the
same as our Christian soul, but more a pale reflection of the self. A
double, if you like, though cruder in form. The main similarity with
the soul is that they believe it is the ka that lives on in the afterlife,
much as we believe it is the soul that moves on to heaven.
Deny a ka the afterlife might even be considered cruel.
Though, I suppose, in his mind, he thought he was doing
something beneficial.
All I saw in his eyes as I visited his laboratory was the bright
fever-glow of madness.
166 That place was filled with all manner of macabre and curious
ingredients that would have been fitting if they were on a list of
some witch’s brew, including things like the semen of the so-called
magician himself, vital in the manufacture the homunculus, animal
blood, sulfur and sulphate of iron, and the base creatures he sought
to fuse into the grotesque creation, dead, and long dead so their
corpses were anything but fresh given the brutal heat.
Excitedly, he talked me through his genius, which seemed to me
to involve a lot of rubbing of faeces and blood onto the genitalia of
the donor beast, and more heinously, inseminating the dead animal
with his seed. A sac would grow on the hide of the animal and from
it, the homunculus would be birthed. That abomination would be
blessed with a tiny fragment of his soul, meaning it was more than
just some golem. And, he told me gleefully, the ritual would only
be completed when the abomination feasted upon the corpse of its
decapitated host.
“There is another experiment I have recently conducted,” he said,
with pride. “One, that I believe will create honey bees from the
corpse of a decapitated calf.” I didn’t want to know the details of
his grotesque experiment, but he told me anyway. “I locked the
calf corpse in a dark house with fourteen closed windows on the
east side— that is important. Light may only enter from the west—
and then, using an unction of my own making, I reattached the
animal’s head, the unction working as a glue, before I stitched it
in place. Then I proceeded to block the animal’s orifices and beat
the corpse with a dog’s penis, which is vital in the ritual’s fertility,
as unpleasant as it sounds. Done, I made an extraction of the flesh
from the skinned corpse and ground that with a certain fusion of
herbs.” I resisted the temptation to make any sort of judgement. “The
mixture, as foul as it is, must be left in the darkest corner of the
house, where it will fester and will become worms which mature into
the sweetest of honey bees.”
I wondered at the mind that first conjured such twisted horrors.
It could not be rational.
These occult sciences are unlike anything I have encountered in
the West, and force us to think about that which cannot be seen, or
as they call it in the old writings of this place, Of-Khemia. I have
heard it translated as "Of the Land of Black Earth", which feels
suitably dark and malignant.
“There was a secret brotherhood,” my guide informed me as we
left that place, “Ikhwan al-Ṣafa, they name themselves the Brethren
of Purity, who view this dark wisdom as a sickness, and trace it
to the fall of lost Babylon and Mesopotamia.” I nodded, and if I
followed his reasoning he was laying the blame of such falls very
much at the feet of the practitioners of this dark wisdom. “They
might be considered guardians,” he went on. “Where they find these
grotesque acts are coming back into practice they seek to dissuade
the alchemist.” And by dissuade, I fear he meant murder. “Such
horrors should remain lost. Consider, a thousand years ago, the
knowledge of the Emerald Tablets of Djehuty, which gave us the
secret knowledge of creation and spawned the cult of the dead and
the processes of mummification, were forbidden by Islam, so much
of what we knew then is gone now, and the Brethren would see that
it remains gone forever. ”
Given what I had seen, I could not help but agree.
And as much as I wanted to believe it was merely a twisted flight
of fantasy, there was an aspect to these Eastern magics that, I confess,
I found compelling: in their quest to understand our universe these
masters of this dark wisdom were drawn to try and create synthetic
life in their laboratories. I had seen a similar glow in Davok’s eyes
as he had carved the Secret Name of God in his creation’s clay skin
to wake it. That thirst for knowledge went beyond all reasonable
craving. The creation of life, the dividing of souls, even just a sliver
of the magician’s essence to give his creation the semblance of
normal life… was almost reasonable. And when I began to think
like that I knew that I was in trouble.
I knew what I was looking for; a building with all of its eastern-
facing windows blocked up. Though I wasn’t sure if I actually
wanted to find it.
“There,” my guide pointed, seeing it first.
It wasn’t a grand house. The sandstone was weathered from the
desert winds and the windows were filled with stones to shut out the
light.
We ventured inside, not sure what manner of experiment we would
find rotting on the floor, only knowing that we could not allow it
to run the full forty days of its incubation and risk the thing being
born into this world.
I say thing, that word comes to mind after the fact, as I struggle
with naming the stitched together monstrosity that was the
alchemist’s creation.
There, on the dirt floor, pushed up against the outside wall, was
the body of a man.
 But it was so much more than that, too.
It was the head of a wild street dog. It was the claws of the
same animal. It was the four bellies of a cow and more, all stitched
together, incubating in the darkness, festering.
The stench was unbearable.
Nausea rose up with the bile in my throat.
I was icy cold despite the feverish sweat on my skin.
This place…
This thing…
It was an abomination.
As my companion struck a naked flame, I better saw the insides
of the room, though I wish I had not. There was a curiously slick
rope of gut that might have been one of the cow’s four stomachs
stretched out through broken stitching in the beast’s gut, and inside
it, I swear I saw something moving.
It looked… less than human.
I could not move. I could not look away.
My companion tugged on my sleeve.
I knew that I could not in good conscience walk away and leave
this thing to… what… wake? Be born?
I nodded silent agreement with him, and without a single word to
one another, my guide and I began gathering anything that might
burn, and stacked it around the stitched-together body. When we
had enough, we doused it with the small amount of oil we carried
with us, and him a solemn nod, set the naked flame to the kindling
and torched the place, turning what should have been the Takwin’s
birthing chamber into its tomb.
We walked out of there in silence, the flames rising high behind us.
You want the truth? This black earth frightens me more than any
other place I have been…
167
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Homunculus
There is much surviving material to
indicate that the alchemists of ancient
and medieval world deciphered the
riddle of the creation of a homunculus
long before any of our modern scientists
did with their superior understanding.
One of the earliest writings to
reference the homunculus suggests that
it may, in point of fact, have begun as a
cure for infertility. By ‘cultivating’ sperm
from different men in a woman’s womb,
you could father an artificial man. There
is much confusion around the earlier
168 processes but a measure is written down
by Qaliqula, one of the advisers to King
Hermanus, circa 300 BC. With no heir
to the throne, the great king sought to
remedy this with the help of Qaliqula.
Together they attempted to sire what
they called a "hannculus". These attempts
are believed to be among the first in a long
succession of attempts to create an artificial
man by Arab scholars. The Alchemist
Jabir ibn Hayyan succeeded where many
before him had failed, creating people who
were both half women and half men, his
decision centred upon the ideal of strong
bodies and superior intelligence. There
are more outlandish claims, including one
that Jaibr ibn Hayyan created a man with
the wings of an angel by mixing sperm
from a bird and a human. The details of
his process and findings are in the archive
in the collected volume: The Hermetic
Book of the Cow, which while attributed
to Plato is considered a collection of
Arabic examinations into the nature of life
and how to give life to an artificial human.
In 1482, the alchemist Paracelsus
wrote the following in his private
journals:
“With all the means and knowledge of
medicine, I had put together a creature that
consisted of body and bone from a suicide,
arms from a butcher and the head from one
of my younger students. With the help of the
lightning I created life in the being, but it
died shortly thereafter.”
It is undeniable now, to look at these
words and not grasp the truth: that
Paracelsus was recounting his first
experiments in the art of creating a
homunculus.
On more than one occasion he is
reported to have said:
“Out of the very seed a man arises with a
soul; from what is more than grain, monsters
and homunculi are born.”
There can be absolutely no doubt that
the alchemist had extensive knowledge
of this subject.
Paracelsus was not just an alchemist
but also a great innovator in medical arts,
challenging notions and concepts which
were firstly established long before by
ancient authorities as Klaudious Galenos,
the famous Greek physician who lived
during the Roman Imperial period. Even
if living twelve centuries later, Paracelsus
considered Galenos as a personal enemy,
at least from an intellectual point of view.
Paracelsus is said to have considered
Galenos’ writings with so much disdain,
that he is reputed to have publicly burned
copies of those ancient books in front of
his students. The following “taunting of
Galanos” is attributed to Paracelsus, and
he seems to speak directly to the ancient
Greek physician.
“Homuncul! I have created a homuncul.
It is more than you have done in all your
days, with your unearned fame, with all of
your riches and the benevolence of imperial
patronage! Sulphur, mercury and salt are the
base requirements. I feel comfortable sharing
this as anybody who still believes your
teachings, is too dim of wit to discover the
rest by himself. Sooner or later the world will
know how wrong you were in your books!”“
Paracelsus further claimed that he
succeeded in creating his own version of
life within a creature that had been dead.
This is in many regards a divergence from
what would fit our common knowledge of
the homunculus, but it is worthy of note.
A once-lost and recently re-discovered
passage of his writing detailing this
abomination shocked Parisian society
in early 1701, causing quite the stir and
generating great dismay amongst both
mystics and occultists.
His collected notes show with
great detail and accuracy the steps he
performed in his ritual experiment and
explained how he brought together the
body parts from different people before
performing a perverse kind of ritual to
give the creature life and a new soul. Or
rather a fragment of his soul.
Until then, science, and the so-called
‘spermists’ had a unified view that an
homunculus was a small creature dwelling
within the man’s ballsack and that it was
transmitted to the woman’s womb where
it could further grow into maturity. In
unusual cases, they believed one could
elicit such an homunculus and nurture
it with both scientific experiments and
occult processes to eventually fuse it with
other beings to create a new being.
One branch of occultism believes that
Paracelsus did, in fact, create a spirit, not a
physical being, whilst another interprets
his meddling as doing nothing more
than sheering off a fragment of his own
soul and lessening himself by putting his
own essential being into two creatures
where it should only ever have dwelled
within the flesh and blood of one. More,
however, believe that the vast majority of
his writings are in actuality symbolic as
opposed to literal, and must be treated as
hypothesis not outright fact.
Like many great minds of his age,
Paracelsus did not work alone. Few of
these enlightened souls did. He had the
benefit of a great workshop and a number
of students who worked at his knee.
Correspondence between one such student,
Angelius Werdenhagen, and the reformer
Kuntzel Baselmann, provides evidence
that Paracelsus did not work alone on even
these most arcane of discoveries.
“At first I thought that the connection
of animal essence and the resonance of the
tissue added was all that was required to
transmogrify dead flesh into living tissue,
but I was naive. The problem is far more
complex than merely identifying the relevant
frequencies. It is a complex equation that
hides within it the face of God.”
In another letter to Baselmann,
Angelius writes:
“I have begun further experiments on the
properties of matter and propagation methods
with the effects of energy on living organisms.
And what news I have! There are two—and
possibly three, depending on definition—
successful muscle stimulation experiments behind
me. Today I got the creature to stand up and of
its own accord, walk. Yes, I know you doubt the
veracity of my words, but friend Baselmann,
have I ever in this life time lied to you or held
false witness? You know I have not. This is akin
to a miracle. This, my friend, is life.”
Writings recovered by the Royal
Society which would appear to have
been written in 1540 and form part of
the estate of Johann Faust, were found
in a desolate Greek monastery some
one hundred years after his death. I have
examined these papers at great length
and in no little detail, and believe the
comprise a comprehensive collection of
protocols on the rituals of necromancy.
One of these protocols details the
creation of the homunculus:
“Resurrecting a dead creature can only
ever be seen as the ultimate achievement in
the black artist’s work, but the gift of life after
assembling the parts of different creatures and
villains is, I regret, beyond my ability. I would
so love to play maker in this regard, but I am
all too aware of my limitations. To create a
homuncul is an act of the highest arts and I am
but a lowly student…”
Renowned Scandinavian occultist
Swedenborg’s work De Infinito is said
to be his crowning achievement in his
quest to find an explanation for the links
between spirit and matter. However, we
have in our possession at the society an
early draft of this work which, contains
many divergences from what was
eventually published, some of them major.
In that early draft, one can read in
detail about Swedenborg’s attempt
to understand the essence of the
homunculus.
“I have had diligent and eager
correspondence with the majority of mystics
studying the field of the esoteric today, and
what is most fascinating to me is the reticence
of these students to speak upon the question of
homunculus. Some have even go so far as to
reply tersely that they will not discuss the matter
with me and ended any and all conversation.
However, there have been a couple willing
to share information but only if I swore to
maintain their privacy and keep their secrets
I will not divulge how I gained such depth of
knowledge concerning the homunculus.
However, one thing is certain to me:
the spirit of a homunculus is created, it is
not divine. It is a combination of animal
magnetism, the astral remains of life, the
remnants of consciousness found in the
organs, and only at the very last moment,
the divine spark it acquires from its creator.
There is a clear connection between these
three factors, but no room for God in any
of this work.”
In an early raw manuscript of
what would become the Malleus
Maleficarum—the Witch’s Hammer—
the creature "homuncul" is mentioned
for the first time by name. This
annotation was made in the year 1486,
over two hundred and fifty years ago.
In the recorded confession and
interrogation of an accused witch, the
homuncul is described as an uncontrollable
creature who calls Hell home. In later
codified and edited editions of the book,
however, much of the references to the
homunculus have been excised, all traces
of such a creature erased from Church
writings. We are fortunate enough to have
in our archives those excised passages
among a lot of other material that is
equally fascinating and horrifying.
Indeed, as recently as 1716, scientist
Georg Hammershaft shocked the world
by showing off a living, fully grown
homunculus that he claimed to have
created after the careful study Paracelsus’s
notes. Of interest is the claim that he had
access to hitherto unknown records and
additional notes which describe a final
stage of the process.
We had dispatched members of the
society to question him further and
examine his more outlandish claims,
though only a month after the unveiling
of his ungodly homunculus, Georg
vanished without a trace and has never
been seen again.
The have been no sightings of his 169
newly awakened beast, either.
Christian von Wolff, mathematician
and cryptologist, is believed to have
tried to publish an article on the
‘artificial man’ at an early age, though
the article disappeared before it was
published. Excerpts from it eventually
appeared in Paris a few years later. We
have highlighted the following passage
as potential interest as it describes:
“The vital force needed to put artificial
life inside a being is all about energy and the
amount of it. To date, we have not been able
to generate such energy, but I have devoted
much of my time to the theoretical aspects
of the problem and created mathematical
calculations that, I believe, lay out just how
much vital force is necessary to assume the
nature of God. The closest natural from of
energy I believe we can harness is in the
form of lightnings from the sky…”
While the origin of the homunculus
may well be disputed, the creature itself
is not.
In nearly every instance the
homunculus is presented as a grotesque
creature that has been cobbled together
 from the body parts and limbs of various
people and then given life.
But in those few unusual cases, they
talk of a creature that a fusion of man
and animal: human bodies with pig
heads, horses with human bodies, and
every other conceivable combination of
the grotesque.
Some recent experiments in the occult,
fusing the esoteric with more modern
scientific reason suggests that newly
discovered energies from lightning and
the magnetic fields gathered in the right
amount are what actually creates life in
a dead creature, whether in its original
form or assembled from an array of
different dead beasts.
One thing we cannot dispute is
that with the aid of electric shocks
applied to recently deceased people,
we have seen a return of life. That
behoves more investigation, though
unsurprisingly, the Church has seen
fit to ban all experiments around the
homunculus, proclaiming the quest for
such knowledge heretical.
170
Unique individuals
Prometheus I
Georg Hammershaft’s homunculus was
created from a series of experiments
using both ancient rituals and new
scientific methods.
Doctor Hammershaft’s goal was
to create a god-being, a stately and
supreme man with the perfect body and
sharp intellect.
To that end, he took the best of
several people and sought to fuse them
with the most majestic of animals.
But something went horribly wrong,
the creature he created was not at all
what Hammerschaft had intended.
His monster, Prometheus I, became an
immense and immovable colossus, but
with a supernatural intellect.
Prometheus I was locked away
in his basement laboratory while
Hammershaft tried for all his life to
forget his creation.
Over time, however, he realised that
Prometheus I was an asset in many ways
he hadn’t initially considered. Heavily
malformed, Prometheus I could not walk or
talk, though the creature quickly learned to
write and the two communicated through
letters. Prometheus I wrote the most
beautiful poetry, seeing the world with
the eyes of an innocent soul, and crafted
some of the most magnificent operas.
It is claimed that many of Prometheu’s
works were sold under pseudonyms and
were later recognised as works of musical
greatness, which you never would have
credited to see the lonely artificial giant
sitting in a dark cellar.
Emeraldi’s Automaton
In his ambitious search for the “Magna
Medicina” (the peak of the medical
art to be applied to all problems of
the world) the 16th-century Italian
physician, Leonardo Fioravanti, penned
a long series of manuals based on his
experiments, which were quite ground-
breaking for his times. Further advances
on the medical art (with possible
consequences on creating a homunculus)
can be found in the “Secreti Nuovi di
Maravigliosa Virtù” compiled by the
polygraph Girolamo Ruscelli in 1567.
Inspired by these works, in the
year 1705, the experimental scientist
Vincenzo Emeraldi took it upon himself
the objective to create a homunculus of
sorts but utilizing mechanical parts as
well as human flesh to build his own
“Automaton”.
The creature was kept alive by a
constant supply of a secret life-giving
substance. Nobody knew the exact
formula, albeit there are stories about
Emeraldi decocting it from living souls
who were boiled to death along with
a number of secret ingredients whose
exact nature was erased from his notes
before we came into possession of them.
However, when Emeraldi died in
1714 the automaton mysteriously
disappeared.
No one has seen his creation since.
Appearance
This chimeral creature is the stuff
of nightmares; a stitched together
man-thing that has no right to be
alive. Depending very much upon the
animals that have been slaughtered to
give it its shape the Homunculus could
just as easily be a boar-headed man or
a pig-trottered bull of a man or any
other insane combination. It is a thing
to strike fear into the souls of men,
women and children, so like us, and yet
so utterly wrong.
It is an abomination and must be
destroyed.
First Impressions
Confronted with the larger, more
brutish and man-like constructs the
sheer impossibility of a man with a
boar’s head or wolf ’s head or a stitched
together jigsaw of dead men brought
together to create a new life, is against
the laws of nature and a repulsive
sight. It is liable to engender horror in
the witness—and disbelief. How can
one trust their eyes when they see a
dog-headed man prowling the streets of
London?
The smaller, impish constructs
birthed from the sacs of dead cows
with the alchemist’s perverse magic are
something else entirely. They have the
aura of the demonic about them, and
with their rows of needle sharp teeth,
leathery wings and wizened features,
like twisted cherubs.
What do the Players Know?
There are those who believe that it is
possible to actually piece together a
whole new man from the parts of other
dead men, though such an abomination
is surely against the will of the Lord
and likely to bring down the wrath of
the heavens upon its maker. The gift of
life is very much the last of the powers
attributed to God that man has yet to
master, and for that reason alone it is of
fascination to alchemists and scientists
alike.
There are rumours out there of ten
homunculi that together can foresee
fragments of the future. These ten have
been hidden away from the world for the
danger their foresight presents. If they
fell under the sway of the wrong man
they could forever change the shape
of history. These are, of course, only
rumours… aren’t they?
These constructs can be as small as a
foot and a half tall, and still maintain a
vaguely humanoid form.
Many possess wings, with a span
more than twice their height, though
some lack wings.
Its skin is rough and leathery, often
with warts and the blemishes and
covered with the scars and stitches that
hold them together.
It is created to serve its maker.
The smaller constructs are generally
weak combatants, their skills are better
served by putting them to work as spies,
messengers, and scout, though the
larger ones are, like the animals they
once were, powerful enemies.
They cannot speak.
They are utterly loyal to their maker.
Main Features
✦ There are different types of Homunculus,
the smaller more nimble and agile
of the them are incredibly fast and
proficient climbers. These tiny ones bear
a resemblance to small devils in many
ways, though lack the sorcerous talent.
Each Homunculus will have its own sets
of skills and talents depending upon the
elements put together in its creation.
✦ Some, with their stitched on wings,
are capable of flight though normally
only over short distances.
✦ As constructs they are not subject to
ageing and could, theoretically outlive
their maker’s though it is thought that
the psychic bond between the two is
so great that no homunculus could
survive the death of its master.
✦ The larger, more brutish of the
Homunculus are savage fighters—
pugilists with fists like ham hocks
capable of knocking a man out cold
with a single clubbing blow.
✦ Some of the creatures have twin rows
of vicious teeth that are sharpened
like needles and capable of biting
clean through a child’s arm.
✦ Some are capable of simple magics,
notably of the darker arts.
✦ There is a bond between the
construct and its maker that allows
the master to share the senses of the
Homunculus across great distances.
This telepathic bond is not shared
with any other human.
✦ This bond can also facilitate
communication between its maker
and other supernatural beings,
including demons.
✦ The bite of a homunculus is thought
to contain poison—this is because
of the unholy seed that is used in its
birthing. The strength of the poison
depends very much upon the nature of
the construct. A smaller creature may
possess the more potent poison.
✦ It is able to see in the dark.

 
Homunculus typical stats
The following stats represent a normal-sized Homunculus,
crafted from the mortal remains of more than one man. It
is an ugly, malformed creature, clearly not adapt to survive
in the world of normal human beings. Homunculi crafted
with the pieces of many mortals tend to be flawed, with at
least three negative traits and one single, positive trait. The
following stats represent a brutish, human-sized homunculus,
whose main advantage is mere strength. There are many
varieties of Homunculi and the following is far from being
the “typical” Homunculus (if such a thing exists). Other
Homunculi may have higher Dexterity or even Intelligence,
often couple with more numerous flaws in other traits. Most
homunculi fight with just their fists, however the following
stats include also some ability with crude weapons, in case
171
Movement: walking 2 CP per 1 m (Max 8 m).
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 9-10).
Skills: Agility SV 6
Fighting SV 8, Close Combat Weapons 1 (Right 1H
Weapons 3, Two-Handed Weapons 3), Unarmed
Fighting 2 (Brawling 3, Wrestling 3).
Stealth SV 7, Avoidance 1 (Hiding & Camouflage 2,
Sneaking 2).
Natural Weapons: Fist (Dmg 1d10 + 4 Constitution).
Natural Protection: leathery skin 2
Initiative: -2
Combat points: Free 8 / Close Combat 1 (Right 1 H weapons
6, 2H weapons 6) / Unarmed 2 (Brawling 6, Wrestling 6).
Equipment:
✦ Decent Cudgel (IM -2, WA 4, BP 10, dmg 1d10 OR 10 +4

the Homunculus’ master has trained the abomination to use Constitution).

these items. ✦ Decent Two-Handed Axe (IM -4, WA 3, BP 10, dmg 1d10

OR 9-10 +4 Constitution).
Traits: Constitution +4, Intelligence -2, Dexterity -2, Samples of Attacks:
Charisma -4 ✦ (IM -2) Fist SV 16

Physical Health Points: 32-60 (45 is a common value) ✦ (IM -2) Fist SV 9, SV 7

Physical Damage levels: (for 45 PHP): 1-15 (0) / 16-26 (-1) ✦ (IM -2) Wrestling SV 8 (see Grapple Lex Libris p.19)

/ 27-35 (-3) / 36-40 (-5) / 41-45 (-7) ✦ (IM -4) Cudgel SV 15

Mental Health Points: 28-40 (32 MHP is a common value) ✦ (IM -6) Two-Handed Axe SV 10, SV 5.

Mental Damage levels (for 32 MHP): 1-12 (0) / 13-20 (-1) /

21-26 (-3) / 27-30 (-5) / 31-32 (-7)
 Common Properties
Bond
Most Homunculi feel a special bond with their creator. It is up
to the GM to decide whether this is simply a psychological link
(for example the creator seen as a father) or if the Dark Arts
which created the Homunculus also created some telepathic link
(for example allowing the master to see through the creature’s
eyes or to command the Homunculus at distance). Whatever the
truth, most Homunculi, if they live long enough, evolve in their
relationship with their masters. The creator is firstly seen as a
beloved father, later to be considered only as merciless master
who cursed the Homunculus into an unhappy existence.
Deformed Psyche
A Homunculus has a MHP value, however its psyche, even
if originally human, has been tremendously changed by the
tremendous processes which created the spark of this unnatural
un-life. This means that Homunculi should ignore most sources of
fear (like other monsters or particularly dangerous situations and
unnatural habitats). However, the MHP value is diminished by a
few, specific fears (see below, among “Weaknesses”), by moments
of self-conscience (when the Homunculus realizes what it has
become) or by specific spells and powers which attack MHP.
Embodied Pain
172 As demonstrated by the stats above, a homunculus tends to
have slightly more PHP than what the original components
of its body had. This phenomenon happens because most
homunculi are usually resistant to suffering and violence due
to the unnatural conditions of their birth. A homunculus can
feel the pain, but it is also extremely used to it, imprisoned
as it is in a body which echoes with suffering at every breath
and movement. Consequently, a Homunculus’ PHP are
unnaturally high for somebody of its size.
Furthermore, even a Homunculus’ fists deal more
damage than normal (1d10 instead of 1d3 or 1d6) since the
Homunculus has no unconscious obstacle to limit damage
when using natural weapons.
Stench
Most Homunculi have a terrible stench which is difficult to
endure. Anyone who is in close contact with the Homunculus
will suffer a penalty of -2 to all the skill and situation rolls.
This penalty can be nullified, totally or in part, by a positive
Health modifier (e.g. a +1 Health reduces the penalty to -1).
Optional Properties
Since the human sense of depravity is potentially limitless,
there are as many types of Homunculi, as different are the
nightmares that one can have. Consequently, the GM is
encouraged to personalize each homunculus, modifying or
adding properties even beyond those here suggested. Many
homunculi are crafted with parts coming from different
animals, therefore some of the abilities should be justified
with the presence of such animal parts.
Alien Mind
Them minds of some homunculi are so alien or they have been
so deeply transformed that it is impossible to classify them
in human standards. The GM may choose to not record the
MHP at all or just to ignore the Mental Damage levels.
Bull Charge
Horned or tough-headed homunculi can try to charge an
opponent, dealing damage equal to “Claws” for the horn and
to “Unarmed” for tough heads (see “Different Sizes: Damage”
property, below). To perform the attack the Homunculus
needs to move at least 5 m before hitting a target. The victim
can Evade the attack, not parry it.
Charming
Disturbing as it may be, some Homunculi have special
charming powers. It may be linked to their hypnotic eyes
or to a melodious voice but anyone who is the target of this
property must succeed a Situation Roll with an SV of 12
modified by Psyche to resist. Those who fail cannot do any
other action but remain still, keeping on experiencing the
charming phenomenon (whether it is a song, a charming
gaze, or anything else). Only when the victim is touched
or damaged, it will wake up (unless the GM allow other
situation rolls, based on other disruptions).
Choke
A particularly large, strong or brutish Homunculus can try to
grab a victim’s throat with a hand by spending 10 CP on top
of the those spent for the normal unarmed attack (which means
one single attack at SV 6, if using the stats above). If the attack
is successful, the Homunculus rolls normal “Fist” attack damage
(1d10 OR + 4 Constitution for the stats above) but the result
(including the Constitution bonus) must be multiplied x2.
Furthermore, in the following round, If the Homunculus
performs no other action and if the victim is still alive, the
Homunculus’ hold on the throat continues. The victim
cannot do any other action but trying to free himself with a
Wrestling skill roll (remember that it costs thrice CP as per
Lex Libris p.19) but reversely modified by the Homunculus’
Constitution bonus (which usually means suffering -4, if using
the stats above). In case of failure the victim suffers the same
damage again. The whole process continues usually until the
victim is dead, manages to get free or someone else forces the
Homunculus to perform other actions and free the victim.
Dark Powers
Some rare Homunculi develop sorcerous abilities or psychic
powers. To mimic them the GM may choose some Dark Art
or apply supernatural properties from other monsters like
Ghosts & Spirits (including Spirit of Death & Vengeance),
Mummy and Anubi (Ancient Sorcery).
Deathly Embrace
This property is typical only of brutish homunculi with large,
strong arms (or similar appendages, like tentacles, etc.). If
a Homunculus is successful in a Wrestling attempt (see Lex
Libris p.19) it will automatically also inflict its “fist” damage
(1d10 +4 Constitution, in the stats above). If not doing anything
else, the Homunculus will automatically keep on grappling the
same victim inflicting, in its own turn, another damage to be
rolled (1d10 +4 in the stats above) until the victim is dead or
has manage to escape the grappling.
Different Sizes
Even if, at least in theory, a Homunculus should be human-
sized, many specimens are way larger or smaller. A Small
Homunculus is about ½ the size of a normal human being
while a Very Small one is only ¼. On the other hand, a Large
Homunculus is up to two times larger than a normal human
being, while an Enormous Homunculus is three or four times
larger than a human being. Consequently, they tend to have
different ranges of PHP. Furthermore, larger Homunculi have
a stronger Fear Factor, while smaller ones are less terrifying.
The basic stats represent a normal-sized Homunculus. For
other Homunculi use the following.
✦ Very Small: 5-20 PHP (10 is a common value). Damage levels
(for 10 PHP): 1-3 (0) / 4-5 (-1) / 6-7 (-3) / 8-9 (-5) / 10 (-7).
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 10).
✦ Small: 10-35 PHP (20 is a common value). Damage levels
(for 20 PHP): 1-6 (0) / 7-11 (-1) / 12-15 (-3) / 16-18 (-5) /
19-20 (-7). Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 9-10).
✦ Large: 45-70 PHP (65 is a common value). Damage levels
(for 65 PHP): 1-21 (0) / 22-38 (-1) / 39-52 (-3) / 53-61 (-5)
/ 62-65 (-7). Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 8-10).
✦ Enormous: 65-100 PHP (85 is a common value). Damage
levels (for 85 PHP): 1-28 (0) / 29-49 (-1) / 50-66 (-3) /
67-76 (-5) / 77-85 (-7). Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 7-10).
Different Sizes: damage
The following table shows how differently sized homunculi
deal different damage with their natural weapons. The
“Unarmed” entry describes many kinds of unarmed attacks
like fists and kicks. There are also two entries for “bite”: the
Size Unarmed Claw
Very Small 1d3 1d6
Small 1d6 1d10
Medium 1d10 1d10 (OR 10)
Large 1d10 (OR 10) 1d10 (OR 9-10)
Enormous 2d10 (OR 10) 2d10 (OR 9-10)
first describe a vaguely human bite albeit with longer fangs,
the second describes larger and more deadly bites, typical of
Homunculi with the heads of animals like wolves or boars.
The Constitution bonus is usually added to the damage dealt
by most types of attack, except for the basic “Bite” in the case
of a Homunculus with perfectly human teeth.
Fly
The wings typically seen in most homunculi are usually just
useless appendages. At most there could be the ability to fly or
glide for short distances or at low speeds (2 CP per 1 m, Max
10 m). Very few homunculi have real skills in flying, especially
given how inharmonious their anatomies are. Those rare
examples tend to be small and have large wings, instead of
arms (2 CP per 6 m, Max 30 m).
Immune to pain
Whether because its nervous system is faulty or because its
psyche is irremediably damaged, the homunculus is completely
immune to pain. It can be literally hacked to pieces without
any psychological or neural consequence, consequently there
is no point in recording physical damage levels.
Immunities (Others)
Some Homunculi are immune to many afflictions of
normal human beings like disease, hunger or thirst. Some
homunculi never eat, sleep or drink, while others are not 173
damaged by extreme cold or hot (in these cases they may
have a natural protection of 4-8 additional points). The
GM should judge the level of needed protection or the
specific immunity.
Natural Climber
This Homunculus never fails an Agility roll to climb.
Furthermore, it can climb almost vertical walls and even
horizontal ceilings. This property is more typical of smaller-
sized and lighter Homunculi or those which have parts coming
from natural climbers (like monkeys, apes or even unnatural,
sorcerous large spiders).
Natural Weapons
Homunculi made with just human parts should deal normal
“unarmed” damage with their fists, as described in the basic
stats. However, homunculi which have animal parts may, in
theory, deal different kinds of damage. See the “Different
Bite Dire Bite
1 (no roll) 1d10
1d3 1d10 (OR 10)
1d6 1d10 (OR 9-10)
1d10 2d10 (OR 9-10)
1d10 (OR 10) 2d10 (OR 8-10)
 Sizes: damage” for the damage dealt by each attack, according
to the homunculus’ size. Most attacks can be mimicked with
either the Brawling specialty of the Fighting skill, while
those which involve Grappling (Lex Libris p.19) should use
the Wrestling specialty. What follows are some further notes.
✦ Bite (large human teeth or small fangs in a human-like
mouth). The damage dealt by this attack usually does not
benefit from Constitution bonus. Furthermore, the only
way to inflict damage is to win a grapple. In this case the
damage will be automatically inflicted.
✦ Dire Bite (animal heads or human heads with very long
fangs). Human heads can only inflict this damage by been
successful in a grapple. On the other hand, long-snouted
animal heads (wolves, boars, crocodiles, etc.) can inflict
damage by a simple attack.
✦ Claws. This is usually typical of animal parts taken from
bears, lions and other beasts with large clawed paws.
✦ Horns. These may resemble those of cows, deer, wild goats
or of any other animals. Use the “Claw” damage entry. The
Homunculus may be able to perform the “Bull Charge”
property.
✦ Sting. Some rare Homunculi have an unnatural sting
(like a giant scorpion’s tail) which deal the same damage
of a Claw, although it may have the “Poison & Diseases”
property.
174 ✦ Tentacles and Pincers. Some rare homunculi may have
parts taken from some huge marine monster. Theses alien
appendages are often linked with the “Choke” and “Deathly
Embrace” properties. For the Pincer use “Claws” entry
for damage, furthermore they have +2 SV on Grapple
Attempts (which means, using the stats above, Wrestling
SV 10). Tentacles may be used for slashing attacks (using
Claws or Unarmed damage entry) and the bonus to Grapple
attempts is +4 SV (which means Wrestling SV 12, if one
uses the basic stats).
Night Vision
The Homunculus has no problem seeing things in the dark.
This property can be linked to animal parts (e.g. the eyes of a
cat, the large ears of a bat, the sense of smell of a dog, etc.) or
just with some sorcerous ability awakened by the dark arts.
Poison & Diseases
Some Homunculi can inject poison or other pathogens through
a specific attack (bites, claws, stings). To resist such effects a
Situation Roll (modified by Health) is needed. This roll should
be done immediately after the injection for “Quick-Effect”
pathogens, while it should be done a few hours later for most
diseases and some “Slow-Effect” poisons.
✦ Infected Bite. Many homunculi, even those with normal
human teeth, may have whole colonies of virulent bacteria
in their mouth. Slow Effect. Situation Roll SV 10. A failure
means high fever, -3 SV to all skill rolls and 1d6 PHP
damage per day. After 2 days a new Situation roll can be
done to heal the disease and, in case of failure, a new roll
can be done every day).
✦ Hallucinogen. Slow or Quick effect. Situation Roll SV 10. In
case of failure the victim’s mind is blocked in hallucinations
which overlay the reality shown by the eyes: -3 SV to all
skill rolls and 1d10 MHP damage.
✦ Paralysis. Slow or Quick effect. Situation Roll SV 10.
Failure means becoming immobilized for 1d10 hours.
✦ Death Poison. Slow or Quick effect. Situation Roll SV 12.
Failure means instant death.
✦ Ancient Diseases. See the “Plague Spreader” property of
mummies.
Talent
Even if monstrous or even completely idiotic, some rare
Homunculi have incredible talents in otherwise unexpected
fields like singing, painting, composing music, cracking
secret codes, understanding ancient languages or writing
poetry. The GM should come out with some ad-hoc solution
for the specific art. For works of art a possibility is to allow
the “Charming” property (see above) when looking at the
artistic craft or just an automatic success in a skill, without
any need to roll dice.
Weaknesses
Some Homunculi have very specific vulnerabilities and
disadvantages. What follows are just few examples
which need to be personalized according to the specific
homunculus.
✦ Fear: Most homunculi (but not all) have a specific element to
fear, possibly because it is linked to their creation method or
with the painful stories which led to the creation of such an
abomination. Examples are daylight, fire, open water (seas,
rivers, etc.), clusters of people, children, women, etc. Looking
at the specific element will cause the Homunculus at least 1d6,
1d10 or even 1d10 (OR 10) MHP damage, to be established
by the GM according to the specific situation and how much
contact the Homunculus has with the source of its fear.
✦ Guardian: Some Homunculi are created as guardians,
tied to a specific place, object or person, whose defence
has been mentally ingrained in their psyche by their
creators. If the Homunculus is separated from the target
of this property, it will suffer a damage of 1d10 MHP
per day.
✦ Limit: The Homunculus is not able to do one action like
speaking or moving. It can even be blind or deaf.
Terrifying Screech
If they do nothing else in the round, some rare Homunculi
can emit terrifying screeches inflicting 1d10 (OR 8-10) of
mental damage.
Homunculus Variations Material Requirements
✦ There could be many dreaded materials needed for this
Prometheus I unholy ritual, the following are just some examples.
This Homunculus is Enormous (“Different Sizes” property), ✦ A dead cow.

has a “Talent” property with “Charming” connected with its ✦ Sulphur and sulphate of iron.

literary works. As a “Weakness” this Homunculus cannot ✦ A man’s semen (preferably from the crafter who is

walk. performing the ritual).

✦ A dog’s phallus.
Automaton
This Homunculus is made mixing mechanical parts and Effect
human flesh. This means that it should have the “Immune When the Esotericism skill roll is successfully performed,
to Pain” property, as well as a Natural Protection of at least the birthing process starts. After an unpredictable number of
5. Emeraldi’s automata has a specific “Weakness” linked to a days, the creature is spawned from a sac created from the dead
mysterious alchemical fluid which is needed for keeping the cow’s remains. The resulting Homunculus is not limited by
automaton alive. the three negative traits described in the basic Homunculus
Dark Art in Lex Libris, however its size cannot be larger than
Takwin “Small”, with consequent low PHP and reduced Fear Factor.
There are many kinds of Takwin (as described in the story at On the other hand, a mental damage of 1d10 (=R 9-10) should
the beginning of this chapter) but, since they are born off a be inflicted on all those who see the “Birthing sac” where the
sac of dead cows, many Takwins tend to be not large. Their Takwin is growing and feel the foul stench of the terrible
bodies are impish and demonic, resembling perverted cherubs, complex of rotten flesh.
with the following properties: Alien Mind, Fly, Different Size
(Small or Very Small), Natural Climber, Natural Weapons
(Claws, Bite), Poison (inflicted through Bite), Weaknesses
(they usually cannot speak). Sometimes they have Dark
Powers.
175
Homunculus-related Secret Arts
Lex Libris p.229 describes a typical Dark Art which creates
homunculi. There are dozens of possible arts for creating
these abominations, and the GM is encouraged to create or
adapt them according to the story needs.

Birth of the Takwin

New Dark Art, Left-Hand Path

This art represents mechanics for a general Homunculus
creation, as described in the introductory story of this chapter.
Middle Eastern alchemists have developed countless methods
for creating these homunculi, and this specific art has some
roots in the pre-islamic Egypt.

✦ Degree of Difficulty: -18

Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 10
✦ Discipline: The Left-hand Path level 3
✦ Specialty: Black Magic level 5

Other Requirements
✦ Supernatural Beings Discipline level 2, Beastiology level 3
✦ Science SV 10, Transmutation discipline 1, Alchemy

Specialty 4, Healthcare discipline 1, Healing Specialty 4.

176
 Lycanthropes
R umours of the lycanthrope as a victim of that
perfidious condition persist from region to
region, but always with subtle differences,
I found, as I moved from geography to
geography. It came to think of it as akin to those games
of whispers we enjoyed as children, where each one in the
line cannot quite remember exactly what that first whisperer
promised and by the time the words reach the last ear they
bear almost no resemblance to those spoken by the first.
What do I mean?
In almost every town I visited I encountered similar stories of the
shapeshifters, though in some they were considered moon cursed, in others
their affliction was the result of the crude poison, aconitum napellus, or as
it is more commonly known, wolfsbane, for one, and even the extent of the
transformation differed, if it is in fact a man who shifts into the form a
wolf, or a wolf that is capable as walking amongst us as a man? There are
countless conflicting reports as to the nature of the affliction: is it, as some
believe, permanent, does it only last for the season the flowers are in bloom,
or is it government by the tidal effect of the full moon as other superstitions
claim? Is it a full metamorphosis of the flesh or rather the familiar spirit
of the man set loose to satisfy more primal urges? Indeed, I was told a
tale during my days wandering the Kola peninsula that claimed the were-
177
creature was no more than an hag in possession of poisoned claws who
could paralyse a child with nothing more than a stare, and would then feed
on them like cattle. In Greenland I heard tell of the Erqigdlet, a chimerical
creature, with the lower limbs of a dog and the upper body of a man, and
of a women found guilty of mortal sins who was cursed to walk the earth in
the body of a wolf for seven years. There are tamed bears in fairy tales that
are really bewitched princes and talking foxes that are truly cursed men.
With so much noise around the truth, I confess, for much of the time
I believed these tales were little more than a mask for a more common
and deadly causes—murder and cannibalism—as the severity of every
recorded attack I found struck me as damning. They were animalistic in
their brutality, yes, but there was much evidence to suggest nothing more
supernatural than murder was the root cause and these flights of fantasy
were used to mask the darker side of my fellow men.
The fundamental point here is my choice of tense. I believed.
I have made it my duty to familiarise myself with all manner of myth
and legend, and search out the basis of fact they are often rooted in. From
the earliest tales of ancient Greece there are accounts of gods who dispense
the curse of lycanthropy as divine punishment, not least the tragic story of
Lycaon, who had the temerity to murder his own son and serve his flesh up
as a feast for the gods, earning Zeus’s wrath, cursed to live out his last days
as a wolf. Indeed, the word as we use this very day is derived from the Greek
roots "Lykos", meaning wolf, and "Anthropos", meaning man..
There is nothing new about this cursed existence. Indeed, there are
accounts of the Valais witch trials where victims were accused of such vile
 acts as murder, heresy and sorcery whilst being sealed in a pact with the
Devil, who revealed himself to his worshippers in the form of a black ram.
The witches, under duress of torture often to death, confessed to evils beyond
imagining, including the killing and eating their own children. The link of
the animalistic to atrocity is not a new thing. What I have come to believe is
that these events were caused by simple minds trying to understand darker
psychologies, and lacked any supernatural origin.
But what they did to those they suspected of lycanthropy…
Records of those trials and ritual punishments exist in the histories of
every land across the Holy Roman Empire. Suspected lycanthropes, still
trapped in their human form, were more often than not burned at the stake,
but only after they had been cut open, limbs amputated in a search for the
wiry hair of their wolfen nature that surely lurked beneath the skin.
It was a sick punishment.
Indeed, the level of superstition and fearful brutality was a match for any
crime these poor afflicted souls might have carried out, surely? The manner
of brutalities good people find themselves capable of in these instances scares
me, especially when, so many of the legends suggest this is an ailment that
can be cured, whether it be by exorcism, by herbs like wolfsbane or more
surgical remedies. And wolfsbane itself is a curious thing; a plant that
sprouted from weeds watered by the drool of Cerberus while he was brought
out of Hades? It is so hard to discern the truth in so much fantasia.
But perhaps it is understandable the fearful mind acts out so violently?
This is something I have mused on often.
We fear what we do not know.
It is not unreasonable then to think those fears are heightened when
178 accounts suggest that this animalistic metamorphosis is the result of some
foul satanic allegiance that drives these monstrous things to crave human
flesh.
Interestingly, perhaps, I have found that in some lands the legends of the
wolf have been consumed by that of another blood-drinker, the vampire,
where they believe that vile creature capable of shifting his form into that of
the wolf as well as taking wing as a bat. Indeed, in one region, Novi Sad
in Serbia, both monsters are known collectively as "vulkodlak" and own no
other name. So how many of the ills of one beast have been confused with
the ills of the other? It is hard to say, but not impossible to countenance a
blurring of the collective memory of the folk.
Indeed, in some territories of Northern France I heard tell of a boy who
had died in mortal sin, only to be cursed to return as a revenant, driven by
a mad blood-lust that could only be quenched by drinking the warm blood
of the living. What struck me about that boy’s story was the belief that his
revenant shade returned to his dead flesh during the hours of daylight and
it was only under the light of the full moon that he rose to hunt. It was a
very different, and yet essentially similar, tale of transformation.
I confess, I am beginning to doubt there can is a single common root that
all of these folkloric memories share.
And that is what I am searching for these long months: a singular truth.
I consider myself a learned man, and possessing an open mind.
So, I do not merely accept the rumours I encounter as God’s honest
truth. In search of the truth, I also look for what passes for scientific
understanding. An explanation. To this end, one curiosity I have
wondered about is the cause of the curse. In many cases it would seem to
be an infected bite from a wild animal. Could it be some actual disease
that is transferred in the bite itself, like a plague? I am thinking primarily
here of a sickness I first saw reported in what, according to the stories
told among the initiates of some secret societies, is a papyrus version of
the Mesopotamian Codex of Eshnunna,, written nearly two thousand
years ago: a sickness passed from dog to man in the form of a bite that
resisted cure. That same disease has been subject to many ineffective,
and frankly ludicrous remedies including animal skin poultices and
even preparations distilled from the skull of a hanged man. Rabies is
a disease that mimics many of the symptoms of lycanthropy. It would
seem reasonable that the curse could well stem from misunderstandings
of such a condition, could it not?
In A southern Italian village, I encountered an elder who claimed to
have cured a boy from the curse by slicing him across the forehead whilst
in animal form, and thus releasing the evil possessing werewolf spirit. He
claimed to have used a silver knife for the ritual.
There is much talk of silver, though I believe this ‘silver weakness’ I hear
cited as a vulnerability that might be exploited by the wolf hunter is little
more than a misrepresentation of quicksilver, an injection of which would
prove fatal to one of the accursed—and of course to all other living things.
Of all the tales I have thus far encountered, the one I am most drawn
to is one that promised this curse was in actuality more of a blessing,
and that the saints themselves had singled out the chosen to grant them
the gift, their metamorphosis seeing them reborn as "Hounds of God"
who went down into the dark places to fight the demons and devils
who would harm us and thus are our protectors. It is a nice thought,
though how it reconciles with the trail of bodies lycanthropes have left
throughout the kingdoms all these years, I do not know. Unless the
victims are more than they at first appear?
Of course, it is not all idolatry and superstition. In England, I
learned recently, they considered these "warwoolfs" as they call them
to be disturbed minds suffering from an abundance of melancholia,
a disorder of the brain, rather than people being capable of actual
transformation. And then you have to question whether a soul with
acute psychosis should be burned at the stake? I think not. But then,
I like to believe we are becoming more enlightened as a society, and
believe that is why the talk of this so-called curse has all but died
out in many regions of the world. Indeed, the werewolf has become a
thing of legend across much of Europe and elsewhere, but what strikes
me strange is that there remains a fascination with the beast within
the bounds of the Austria and Bavaria, and it was that fascination
which has led me to this place in the hopes of learning the truth of the
condition for the purposes of this field journal.
And how I come to question everything I held to be true.
The first corpse had been found in the field three weeks earlier, torn open
from belly to throat, loops of entrails spilled out. The bones were serrated
with what could only be teeth marks where they were broken. I had seen
evidence of this with my own eyes. It was savage. I doubted any man,
however feral, could be responsible for such mutilation, which, I confess,
excited me in ways I should not admit. For several nights following that
first discovery, the farmers working the fields reported the loss of livestock
with the flocks being culled. In the 21 days since that first loss, more
than 80 sheep have fallen prey to whatever was out there, hunting. It is
nothing short of slaughter, and yet it wasn’t until last night that there was
an actual sighting. The young shepherd had taken refuge on the cliffside,
sheltered by a jagged overhang of rock no more than fifty feet from where
the creature fed. And though he hid, he saw enough of the creature to
know that it was a great, powerful, wolf. He swore it was larger than he
had ever seen, though how much of that could be put down to the night
and fear and the swelling of the imagination to make the beast into a
monster, we had no way of knowing.
But with this being Bavaria, the prevailing sense of dread at the naming
of the wolf did not diminish even in the cold light of day.
There were tracks to be followed, so the burgermeister gathered together
a hunting party, for which I volunteered my eyes, and armed with bolts of
carved from the branches of an ash tree, dipped in a solution of wolfsbane
extract we set out to hunt the beast. I did not question the notion that other
arrows were discarded, or that not one of the hunters carried even a simple
flintlock, as to be honest no one in their right mind would want a huge wolf
so close it was in range of their pistol. Better to try and bring the creature
down from range. But ash and wolfsbane? I suspected my fellows knew
exactly what manner of beast we hunted that night, even though they kept
tight lipped about it. The burgermeister had wanted the boy to guide us, but
the lad was too afraid, and I could not blame him, so he was left back in
the village as we set out come nightfall.
Why night? Because wolves are nocturnal predators. We wanted to hunt
it on its cycle, not ours. Better then our chances of finding it.
The moon above was bright and bold in the sky, so large I swear I could
see the shadows of craters in its surface.
Eight of us set out, armed with our crossbows and firebrands. We did not
talk much. Each of us on edge. Wary. Watchful.
The hills were no place for walkers after sundown.
There was more than just a chill out there.
I could sense it… some other hunter out there in the darkness. I wanted
to believe it was nothing more than fearful imagination, but I knew better.
It was out there, watching us even as we looked for it.
We had been out for hours, our firebrands burning low, long before we
heard the first rustle of noise through the darkness beyond the reach of our
lights. My skin prickled, the fine hairs along the nape of my neck bristling.
It was out there. Already I was thinking of it in those terms. It. Something
different. Something wrong.
A shadow ghosted across my vision, blacker than the night, bigger by
far than I had expected, even with the boy’s description fresh in my mind.
I could smell it out there, too.
I can’t explain how, only that the thing had a peculiar odour that stuck
in my craw.
I tapped my companion on the arm and pointed. He nodded. He had
already marked the animal out there in the darkness and was in the process
of adding a bolt to his crossbow and drawing back the mechanism. The
others did likewise, and for a moment I regretted not having armed myself,
but I didn’t come out here to kill this night; I came out to bear witness.
A crunch underfoot, the sharp sound of something breaking, was greeted
by a howl so feral there could be no doubting the lupine nature of the
creature we stalked. That howl rose all the way to the moon and sent a shiver
down the ridges of my spine so chilling I felt sure my bones would freeze and
shatter at the first impact.
We went several minutes without further sound. The hillside was silent
save for the sounds of our passage.
And then in a flurry of movement the creature bolted across my line of
sight. It was magnificent. That is the only word that comes to mind. Huge,
majestic, with so much strength and raw power pent up in those muscles as
it loped across the track, circling us.
I feared then, for the first time, that this might not end well for us hunters
despite our numbers.
And I was right to fear.
Oh God I was so right…
It all happened in an explosive blur of motion and darkness. The thing
came at us. Launched itself, pouncing even as we raised our crossbows
to ward it off. They might as well have been silvered crucifixes for all the
good they did us. Two men died on that hillside, with their throats torn
out by those savage teeth, before one of our number got off a single shot,
the wolfsbane tipped bolt burying deep in the meat of the wolf’s flank.
The beast was immense. Larger than any damned dog I’d ever seen. It
came at us out of the darkness, and it was death, my thoughts in that
moment were as crude as that. It was death made flesh. And we were the
ones lined up to die.
The ferocity of those wicked jaws as they tore into my fellow hunters was
devastating. They were eviscerated. That is the only word that does justice
to their ends.
But as a second bolt hit the mark the whimper that met it gave me hope.
Still the beast did not yield, but fought on, savage and desperate as two
more bolts struck, and as the second bit deep the wolf arced its back, pawing
at the dirt and I knew something vital had been stuck by that blow.
Its cries were pitiful.
We found our courage then, circling the animal to stand over it as it went
to meet its maker.
And as the final mewling sounds escaped its loose jowls something 179
happened that I swear I would not believe if I had not seen it with my own
two eyes. The fur, matted with blood from the buried bolts, began to shrivel
as though burning away from the hide. It began in clumps at first, the
patches revealing soft pink skin beneath, and spread around the bloody
puncture wounds where the bolts had taken the thing down. It took no more
than a minute, and then, God help me, there, in the place of the wolf lay
the corpse of a boy I recognised… the young shepherd who had claimed
to have seen the beast.
The cursed child had been feeding upon the flock he was charged to
protect, a shepherd in a wolf’s skin, the wolfsbane-poisoned bolts that had
claimed his life still protruded from flank and spine where they had struck.
There was no sentimentality about the way the hunters dressed the corpse,
first they beheaded the boy, then they burned his bones.
Watching, I was left in no doubt that they had done this before and
would do it again.
What unnerved me most wasn’t that they took the boy’s head, nor that
they powdered his damned bones when the flames were done burning.
No, what got to me, was that they reserved the same fate for our two
companions who had fallen to the werewolf’s bite. Their friends. The
coldness with which they set about cutting through the gristle and meat of
their necks to make sure there was no chance of the men coming back…
was terrifying.
I sit here now in my chamber, thinking back on events of last night, and
I realise I witnessed something incredible in that transition that few ever
get to see; the vulnerability of a monster and that singular moment in time
when the secret anatomy of man and beast is laid bare there is no difference
between the two. We are one and the same, creatures of this earth…
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
Lycanthropes
These anthropomorphic creatures are
generally considered dangerous, not
only for their extreme supernatural
abilities, but because many of them are
so similar to humans that they can walk
amongst us unnoticed.
The anthropomorphs are more or
less human, but possess both the best of
mind and instinct.
This genus of beast includes both
werewolves and vampires, some of
which are so ancient it is believed they
originate from the time before the Great
180 Flood, which makes them the most
ancient beings on the planet. Some
scholars have come to the conclusion
that these unfortunate souls were
created out of a curse, whilst others
posit that they are contagious and
transfer their bestial abilities to humans
and animals through the passing of
fluids, including blood.
The curse is ancient indeed, as
attested by a passage in what are
thought to be copies of King Nimrod's
journals.
“The shape shifter came to me with full force
in the night’s fog. I had waited for more than ten
days in the hole, my patience tested, my resolve
all but broken, but I would not be defeated no
matter how cunning my foe. I was the greater
hunter. And as the moon was full and shining in
all its glory I knew the creature would come to
life. The fight was short but bloody. I was badly
injured in one arm but claimed his head as my
trophy.” Nimrod, 81.1.4.
According to the surviving
protocols recorded on January 17,
1714, the Swedish zoologist Sven de
Geerde had sought contributions from
the Crown to dig deeper into the issue
of lycanthropy, a pressing issue he
argues, for the lands around Uppsala
and beyond. These documents were
lost, only to eventually surface at an
auction in Bohemia where a doubting
priest sold them to unknown buyers,
including a member of the Royal
Society, which is how they come to be
in our possession.
“In my initial enthusiasm for this
extremely exciting scientific adventure, I
first want to admit that I was foolish enough
to believe that only by undertaking The
Great Tour would I gather anywhere near
enough information about the phenomenon
we call lycanthropy to have some true
understanding of it. I was so very wrong.
I have learned that there is a full spectrum
of both the appearance of lycanthropy and
the end product. I stand by my thesis that
it begins with some kind of illness which in
turn distorts and changes a person’s exterior
and interior, and which in turn is affected by
both the moon and the tide.”
When Hans Nicolovius travelled
around the Swedish countryside in
1699 to map the creatures of the
darkness in the name of the king, he
encountered a glut of information about
the lycanthrope. Among other things,
the people of Dalarna offered more than
mere superstition when they claimed:
“Väruler, were-wolves, the manwolf, come
to be when their mothers in some way try to
avoid the pain of birth, most often through
magical rites, which include crawling
through the foal’s foetal membrane. If she
birthed a boy he succumbed to the curse of the
manul, if it was a girl she became a mara.”
In the same landscape the story
goes that Ida Svennesdottir, a pregnant
woman, had been attacked by a werewolf
who tore open her stomach and drank the
blood to be rid its curse. Hans Nicolovius
notes a clear connection between the
birth of the lycanthrope and a woman’s
birth pains.
In the year 1538 Olaus Magnus,
a Swedish Catholic priest wrote in a
pamphlet to Rome:
“The curse of the werewolf is not a
disease, it is the fruit of witches ‘curses and
sorcerers’ sorrows. Nor is it the punishment
of the cannibal or the birthright of some
miscarried child nor is it one who wears
a magic belt made from the back skin of
a killer. I know, because I’ve studied a
werewolf up close.”
Exactly which werewolf Olaus
Magnus had studied or who gave him
the information he so adamantly claims
to be true is uncertain.
Natural Scientists who have delved
deep into the dark mysteries of the
lycanthropes as an accursed species are
divided into two schools of thought.
On the one hand, there are those who
believe it is possible to categorise the
lycanthropes and that there are at least
six—and perhaps as many as twelve—
different variants, while the other
side argues that such categorisation is
impossible, and rather it is a disease that
takes on different aspects depending
upon the nature of the person affected,
which would mean that all lycanthropes
are by necessity different from each other.
Of course, it is possible to categorise
the variety of abilities and traits that
afflict all lycanthropes, it is impossible to
break down the root causes that would
have some termed "luna lycanthropes",
others "gemini lycanthropes", or even
"silver lycanthrope".
According to materials we have
uncovered on what are supposed to
be later papyrus transcriptions of
Nimrod’s clay tablets, there are but two
types of lycanthrope, the “strong” and
the “weak”, though the great monster
hunter confesses there are an infinite
number of variants therein. The strong,
he explains, are those come from a long
unbroken line of lycanthropes, while the
weak do not carry the same blood as the
lycanthrope they were infected by.
In the Swedish Hunting Protocols of
1677, the Crown’s hunt master reported
to his majesty’s chamberlain:
“Master Hans informed me that one of
the wolves they shot was unusually large,
but that the most startling thing was that
the wolf had an axe inside his skin. Closer
examination later revealed that weapin in
fact belonged to Supervisor Tore Dufva.
Since Tore disappeared as the wolf was
being shot, the hunting team could only
suppose that somehow Tore was the
werewolf they had hunted for so long.”
There are several known cases of what
can only be termed the dissemination of
lycanthropy; it is a virulent curse, and
while there are questions as regards the
first of the line and how such a creature
is created, it is considerably easier to
follow the patterns of the disease as it
spreads.
We at the Royal Society have identified
to two different ways: one, that a person
is bitten or torn by a wolf carrying the
disease, the other that the victim is bitten
or cut by a lycanthrope, which though
similar are subtly different.
We have some concerns that other
animals may well carry the disease,
which has led to a fear that rats are
potential carriers.
An original lycanthrope, one born as
a lycanthrope as opposed to infected,
will always be more powerful than one
that is sired through infection.
What triggers the transformation
is subject of much argument amid our
number.
Some are stubborn and believe that
only the direct light from a full moon
can trigger such a transformation, the hole and carried it on a bier back to
while others argue vociferously that the the town, where it was strung up in public
mere smell of blood is enough. view so that all might see the almost-man
Similarly, it seems that the that had been tormenting their town.
transformation can last for far longer This should have been the end of it, but no
than the phase of the full moon, with more than a few months later the killings
some beasts supposedly transformed for began again, and again it was both animal
months, or even years, at a time, such is and human that fell to the predator. The
the strength of their curse. atmosphere in the township was tense and
Common to all lycanthropes though, no fearful. Could it be that the unholy beast
matter their lineage, is their superhuman was somehow alive once more? Or was
and superanimal powers. Whilst some there a pack of the damned things and in
few become only marginally stronger killing one they had brought the wrath of
during their transformation, others the entire pack upon themselves?
become eerily stronger. Rather than form another hunting
party, as they could not be sure how
many creatures they would face out in
Unique individuals the wilds, the province hired a secret
company of monster hunters who
Ansbadchvarulven prided themselves on dealing ruthlessly
The public records of the German with such a supernatural threat. They
province of Ansbach’s make for were charged with tracking down and
fascinating reading when it comes to killing the beast and every last one of its
events of 1685. gets once and for all.
For month upon month reports came What no one knew was that the beast
down from the hills that a large wolf was in their number all along; the mayor
was preying upon livestock and people of the province had been infected with 181
within the region. Several deaths were the curse of the lycanthrope and had been
recorded. Rumour had it that this was using his position to avoid capture,
no ordinary wolf, for it was though when the moon was in
bigger, faster and more cunning
than any normal predator.
The superstitious amongst
the locals believed the threat
came from a werewolf, and
so compelling was their case
that even the non-believers
gathered with them to form a
hunting party that eventually
drove the wolf into a cavernous hole
where, trapped, it was killed with sling
shot and arrows.
It is the eye witness
testimonials of the hunting party
that make this killing of interest
to the Royal Society as it is
claimed by each and every one of
the hunters that while they killed
a wolf, it was the broken body of a
man, clothed it torn and shredded
rags, with a bruised and swollen
but distinctly human face that lay
at the bottom of the hole.
They brought the body up from
 full influence he was helpless to resist
the pull of the curse, and eventually
made the mistake that revealed his true
nature.
He was captured and killed in 1687,
mid- transformation.
The inhabitants of the township were
circumspect in what they told others as
regards the truth, burying it together
with the mayor’s body in the hope that
everything would be forgotten.
And that was it, for almost twenty
years.
Life went on as it does, the day to day
of the normal world settling in, nothing
remarkable happening in the confines
of the province and eventually only
the eldest recalled the mayor and the
wolf killings, to everyone else what had
happened was forgotten.
But in the Spring of 1708, news came
from hunters working the hills around
the township; there had been a sighting.
A wild beast in the forests, hunting
under the shine of the full moon. It did
not take much for the old wounds to be
182 reopened. Whispers spread like wildfire
amongst the good folk: the Ansbach
curse had woken again.
The sad truth is that Mayor’s son
Henning Tryft carries the same illness
in his blood that cursed his father, and
in turn his father, who inherited it as a
bitter gift from his father, and so on down
the family line for generations. And that
is the true horror of lycanthropy; it is an
hereditary curse that passes down the
bloodline, lying dormant in the child
until it reaches maturity, when it blooms
once more.
But Henning wasn’t a murderous
sort. He was a kindly child who hated the
affliction in his blood who sought every
manner of cure, doing all within his
power to stave off the transformation,
including building a basement dungeon
in his own home where he chains
himself as the moon holds sway rather
than risk what might happen if he ever
tastes human blood.
However, the older he gets, the more
virulent his curse becomes, and with
it his resistance crumbles. It is only a
matter of time before he can no longer
deny his birthright and takes to the
hunt, finally satisfying his craving for
for human blood. And on that day the
people of Ansbach shall live in terror.
Peter Stumpf, the werewolf from
Bedburg
According to Northern European
legend, a werewolf is a result of nature,
the seventh son born to a seventh son,
and not some bitter affliction.
One such werewolf is Peter Stumpf
from Bedburg.
His true nature is a well-kept secret
in the Stumpf household.
As a human, Peter lives much as any
other man of his station, tending to his
estate in Gedschelden, but when the full
moon rises the family knows what they
must do, and imprison him in a custom
built basement where he can cause no
harm to others. Peter possesses all of
the classic characteristics of a werewolf:
he shifts from man to wolf when the
full moon holds dominion in the sky,
he abhors sacred relics, and like the
werewolf, even in lupine form he walks
upon two legs, rather than loping on
four.
More recently, rumours have
surfaced within the city that Peter
Stumpf has managed to escape his
basement captivity on several
occasions. Peasants have seen
their livestock slaughtered,
the dead animals bearing the
wounds of a wolf attack.
A manwolf has been
sighted running
at incredible
speed across
the meadows
and farms,
howling as
it searches
frantically
for fresh
blood.
T h e
Stumpfs
household
is divided,
some believe
there is a
traitor in their midst who would do
harm to either the villagers or the
family themselves, and have deliberately
released Peter knowing that the
villagers will eventually kill him,
bringing down this once great family.
Others within the clan believe that
basements are no longer safe enough
and that they must build a new prison
for their kin. Peter cannot offer any
answers, as when the transformation is
upon him he is purely animal and has no
memory of his actions.
La bête du Gévaudan
In recent times the King of France has
launched a major mission to once and
for all kill the Gévaudan monster that
has ravaged the province of Gévaudan
for so long.
It is believed that the monster is
an unusually large wolf, and most
humanlike.
The king has charged two
professional wolf hunters, Jean-Charles-
Marc-Antoine Vaumesle d’Enneval and
his son Jean-François, to find and kill
the beast, ridding the world of its threat
once and for all.
The hunters have hired a veritable
army to scour the area; more than
one thousand armed men
comb the hills, leaving no
stone unturned in their
hunt and yet still they
fail to capture and kill
the beast Gévudan.
Rumours spread that
the supernatural
threat cannot be
killed with ordinary
weapons; that it is
a ‘loup-garou’ - a
werewolf - that has
ravaged the area for
hundreds of years.
Other whispers
suggest it is not a single
creature, but rather
several, and that the men
of Gévudan all carry the
same accursed blood,
meaning each and every
one of them born to that
place have been affected by the werewolf
disease. It is a terrifying theory, but that
does not mean it is wrong.
What we know for sure of the
Gévaudan monster is that the first of
the afflicted was a giant werewolf who
originally came from the Pyrenees and
arrived in Gévudan in 1682. For many
years that first werewolf, the progenitor
of the wolf-village, ravaged the
mountains, spreading his curse even as
he was driven further and further north.
Unlike many of the lunar lycanthropes,
the Beast of Gévudan no longer shifts
with the waxing and waning of the
moon. Indeed, it is rare for him ever to
wear the skin of a man as he is much
happier in his lupine form where he is a
natural hunter.
Appearance
Wolves are majestic creatures. They
are the great hunters of the mountains
and forests. Feral faces, cruel cunning
burning in their eyes. There is an almost
human intelligence behind them, or so it
seems. And sometimes that is the truth,
as the hunter is wily enough to avoid
even the most devious traps laid out for
it. That is because they aren’t hunting a
wolf at all, but rather a werewolf—part
man, part beast, with the shared nature
of both. The lycanthrope is so often a
tragic creature. It does not fit in with
any pack, and cannot function easily in
either human or animal society. When
they are in human form they are forced
to wrestle with the base instincts and
desires of the wolf, and when they are
in their wolfen aspect they are forced
to contend with the morality and
conscience of the man. It is an uneasy
balance that so often ends up in tragedy.
First Impressions
That howl in the night that sounds so
mournful, the lonely hunter crying out
for a mate that is not out there… the cry
of the lone wolf in the hills that haunts
the moonlit night… it might not be an
animal at all, despite how raw and bestial
it sounds. The huge, muscular beast
that races through the night, powerful
limbs and wicked teeth, chasing the
scent of blood is no dog, nor is it a
wolf despite appearances. It is driven
by an imperative every bit as primal as
the wolf ’s survival instinct. It has no
control over its hungers. In this form it
is every bit as animalistic as mountain
lion or bear, but more cunning by far,
cursed as it is with the mind of a man.
What do the Players Know?
The researchers and scientists who have
devoted themselves to the study of the
darkest mysteries of the esoteric world,
including the legends, arcanum and
superstition regarding the affliction that
is lycanthropy can be segregated into
two schools of thought; in one, there are
those who posit that the categorisation
of lycanthropes is possible, though they
argue between themselves as to the
precise number of strains and variations
that exist, falling between as few as
six or many as twelve. These include
Luna-lycanthrope, Gemini-lycanthrope,
Silver-lycanthrope and more. The
second school of thought argues
vociferously that the affliction cannot
be categorised, since it is a sickness that
manifests differently depending upon
who is infected with it. Some go so far as
to argue that these apparent differences
are in point of fact transitional stages of
the same sickness
Both schools of thought do, however,
concur that it is possible to breakdown
a number of abilities and traits that
are common to most of their kind, and
are united in their understanding of
the disease’s communicability, though
again there are two possible methods
of infection: one, a person is bitten or
scratched by a wolf that carries the
disease, the other a person is bitten or
scratched by an actual lycanthrope.
There is a belief that other animals
may also be carriers, which leads to
the possibility of other variations
of lycanthropes. Rats are especially
suspected of being such carriers.
What exactly triggers the trans-
formation is subject to debate. Some
stubbornly believe that it is only the
clear light of the full moon that causes
the transformation, while others claim
it is far more primal, and that the beast
is brought forth by the smell of blood.
The duration of any transformation
differs. Some are rumoured to have been
turned for several months or even years,
while others are merely turned for a few
days.
Main Features
✦ All lycanthropes possess abnormal
and beastly powers. Some only
become slightly stronger while
turned, while others become much
stronger.
✦ The transformation varies from
individual to individual, which
supports the theory that there aren’t
different breeds of lycanthrope, but
rather that every occurrence of the
disease is individual, and has different
stages of transformation based on
this. 183
✦ Contrary to superstition, not all
lycanthropes receive supernatural
abilities and powers after their
transformation, however their
natural abilities, such as strength,
speed, and physique, are always
improved. Senses, such as hearing,
smell, and sight, are also significantly
improved.
✦ Some lycanthropes possess
regenerative abilities which make
them impossible to kill—even if all
limbs are separated from the body,
new ones will grow from the head.
There is only one way to kill these
lycanthropes, and that is to burn
them to ashes, utterly destroying the
head.
✦ Some are resistant to damage,
and have some form of natural
protection.
✦ Some have a weakness for silver, and
can be killed if the fatal blow is made
with a weapon or projectile made of
silver.
  
Lycanthrope typical stats
Even if the basic concept of a Lycanthrope seems simple (a
man becoming a wolf), there could be numerous approaches
to the concept: the cursed bloodline, the satanic werewolf,
the undead/revenant lycanthrope, the poor victim of
a wolf ’s bite, etc. Furthermore, there are also many
differences in the size and types of the “animal form”. They
could be extremely various: normal-sized albeit extremely
smart wolves, enormous wolfkin humanoids, gigantic
examples of wolves or even completely different animal
shapes, not resembling a wolf at all. It is clearly impossible
to propose mechanics for all these variations, therefore
the GM is strongly encouraged to personalize the basic
lycanthrope.
Usually a Lycanthrope in “human shape” does not need
specific mechanics, but it is just a normal human being,
possibly even to be created with basic rules, as found in Alter
Ego (although some possible exceptions of powered human
shapes are in the optional properties). This is important,
since it helps managing even the case of player characters
which become infected with lycanthropy.
When the change happens, the stats are changed as follows.
These represent a transformation into a human-sized wolf/
man hybrid.
184
Traits: Constitution +6, Dexterity +4, Intelligence -4,
Perception+4 (in alternative, apply these modifiers to
modify the original traits in human shape). The diminution
in Intelligence does not mean that the lycanthrope becomes
dumb, but it rather means a diminution of the rational,
“human-specific” kind of intelligence, for attaining a more
animalesque kind of cunning.
Physical Health Points: 60-80 (70 is a common value)
Physical Damage levels: (for 70 PHP): 1-23 (0) / 24-41 (-1)
/ 42-56 (-3) / 57-65 (-5) / 66-70 (-7)
Mental Health Points: usually identical to the human form,
although the werewolf in its animal form is immune to many
kinds of mental damage.
Movement: walking 2 CP per 1 m (Max 16 m).
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 8-10).
Skills: A Lycanthrope forgets most of the skills known in
human form, unless they remain as simple echoes in
its mind. A Lycanthrope in animal form will usually
get the following range of skill stats (or something
very similar, decided by the GM).
Agility SV 10, Body Control 2 (Evade 2, Parkour 3)
Fighting SV 10, Battle Experience 2 (Combat
Actions 3, Combat Reactions 3), Unarmed Fighting
2 (Biting 2, Brawling 4, Wrestling 2).
Stealth SV 10, Avoidance 2 (Hiding & Camouflage
2, Sneaking 4), Detection 3 (Detect Hidden 3,
Observation 5).
Natural Weapons: Bite (Dmg 1d10 OR 8-10+6 Constitution),
Claw (dmg 1d10 OR 9-10 +6 Constitution), Claws can be
used with the Brawling skill.
Natural Protection: thick skin 2
Initiative: +12 (+4 Dexterity, +2 Battle Experience, +6
Combat Reaction)
Combat points: Free 12 / Combat Actions 6 / Unarmed 2
(Biting 4, Brawling 8, Wrestling 4).
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM +12) Bite SV 10, SV 6, Claws SV 10
✦ (IM +12) Bite SV 17, Claws SV 9
✦ (IM +12) Bite SV 7 (Throat Slashing, see property below),
Claw SV 9.
✦ (IM +12) Wrestling SV 9 (see Grapple Lex Libris p.19 and
the “Savage Grapple” property below)
✦ (IM +12) Evade SV 14 or two Evade attempts SV 8 and
SV 6.
Common Properties
Animal Body
Animal and human forms have different PHP values. However,
all damage done on the Lycanthrope while in animal form, if
not completely regenerated (if the “Regeneration” optional
property is used), will have some effect also on the human
form. Even if the PHP are different, the human form will end
up with its PHP to the maximum possible PHP in the physical
damage level (0, -1, -3, -5, -7) which the animal form had.
Animal Mind
A Lycanthrope in its animal form keeps the same MHP of
its human form, however its mind becomes animalesque,
therefore a Lycanthrope becomes immune to most mental
damage, including MHP damage from fear effects.
Animal Senses
A Lycanthrope’ senses are enhanced in a way which is impossible
to believe for normal human beings. They will automatically
succeed most “sense” rolls, without any need of making skill or
situation rolls. They are able to track their victims in situations
which are impossible for common hunters.
Night’ Sight
The Lycanthrope can see in the dark as if it were day. Some
werewolves keep the same power even in human form.
Savage Grapple
A Lycanthrope in man-wolf hybrid form (not in wolf form)
which attempts and succeeds in a grapple using the Wrestling
specialty (Lex Libris p.19) will also automatically inflict two
damage rolls: a single Claw damage and a Bite damage.
Shape-change
A Lycanthrope can shape-change between human and animal
forms in 5 actions rounds (the GM may allow different durations
for younger or more expert werewolves). Witnessing the
shape-change will cause 1d10 (OR 8-10) mental damage to all
present. Witnessing such a transformation is also extremely
shocking: those who see it must pass a Situation Roll equal to
10 (modified by Psyche) if they want to do anything else but
looking at the beast.
All the damage dealt to a lycanthrope while shape-changing
will inflict damage on the animal-form body points.
Many lycanthropes do not control shape-change: they will
change only with the full moon and for a whole night until
the sun rises. To resist a full moon-caused shape-change is
extremely difficult: a Situation Roll of 2 (modified by Psyche)
is required and, in case of success, the lycanthrope in human
form will suffer 2d10 (OR 9-10) damage in mental health
points.
Older, more powerful or just pure-blooded lycanthropes can
control the timing of their transformation and are therefore
able to change shape even during the day or in whatever phase
the moon is.
Crises, Mental stress and Strong emotions (e.g. wrath, fear,
frustration, etc.) can trigger a transformation. Every time
a strong emotions happens, or if the Mental Damage Level
of a human form is reduced by 1 level, the lycanthrope who
does not want to shape-change should succeed in a Situation
Roll with a SV of 10 (modified by Psyche): in case of failure a
transformation is triggered.
Throat Slashing
Werewolves, like normal wolves, like to attack the throat
of a victim. Use the “Hitting the Weak Spot” new rules to
mimic this tactic (an example is in the stats above, among the
samples of attacks).
Optional Properties
Bestial magnetism
Some Lycanthropes in human form may have an odd
magnetism, involving powerful use of pheromones. Those of
the opposite sex which meet this individual should succeed a
Situation Roll with SV 12 (modified by Psyche) or fall in love
or even feel intense sexual desire towards the Lycanthrope
in human form. This property is particularly appropriate
for stories where the presence of the werewolf is linked
with depravation, debauchery and the fall of morality in an
otherwise “respectable” village or quarter.
Bestial eyes
The “beast” never leaves a Lycanthrope, not even when in
human form when, staring deeply into the eyes of a victim,
it can trigger unconscious fears and terrors. The lycanthrope
in human form must not do anything else but looking in the
eyes of the victim which will suffer the normal Fear Factor
of the Lycanthrope, as if it were in animal form. This kind of
ability can be used for a number of times per day equal to the
Lycanthrope’s Psyche bonus in human form (minimum 1). The
victim will feel intense fear, without realizing the real reason
behind this fear. However, those who know about werewolves,
may understand what is happening. Lycanthropes rarely use
this property since it risks revealing their nature.
Command Animals
Some Lycanthropes have direct command on animals, usually
packs of wolves, albeit other animals are also possible. The GM
should establish how many of these animals are following the
monster and if they obey it also when in human form or not.
Curse Spreading
Not all Lycanthropes inflict their curse with their bite (and,
in fact, the basic version above does not have this affliction).
Some possibilities for the spreading of the curse are as follows.
For possible cures to the curse, see “vulnerabilities”.
✦ To be killed by a lycanthrope. The victim will raise again
the following night as a werewolf.
✦ To be bitten by a cursed wolf.
✦ To be wounded by an infective werewolf.
✦ To be cursed by a witch. 185
Deadly Choke
A Lycanthrope which has successfully performed a “Throat
Slashing” attack (see among common properties) can keep on
pressing on the throat with its Claw or Bite. The victim (if still
alive) will result blocked in the Lycanthrope’s deadly press. In the
following round, If the Lycanthrope performs no other action
and if the victim is still alive, the hold on the throat continues.
The victim cannot do any other action but trying to free himself
with a Wrestling skill roll (remember that it costs thrice CP as
per Lex Libris p.19) but reversely modified by the Lycanthrope’s
Constitution bonus (which usually means suffering -6, if using
the stats above). In case of failure the victim suffers the same
damage again. The whole process continues usually until the
victim is dead, manages to get free or someone else forces the
Lycanthrope to perform other actions and free the victim.
Different Sizes
The generic stats represent a human-sized animal form,
although in theory these forms may be of any size. Larger
than human forms are more frequent than less-than-human
large forms, which are mostly unheard of. In any case,
suggestions are here proposed for animal forms of many sizes,
just in case the GM wants to vary it. These animal forms are
usually in the shape of a man-wolf hybrid or an oddly sized
wolf, however the GM may use them also for other animal
forms (like bears, giant rats, etc..).
 A Small creature is about ½ the size of a normal human
being while a Very Small one is only ¼. On the other hand,
a Large lycanthrope is up to two times larger than a normal
human being, while an Enormous one is three or four times
larger than a human being. Consequently, they tend to have
different ranges of PHP. In any case, it is worth noting that
the PHP value of even small lycanthropes tend to be way
larger than what is typical of creatures of the same size: this
is due to the unnatural strength and vigour of such creatures.
Furthermore, larger lycanthropes have a stronger Fear
Factor, while smaller ones are less terrifying.
The basic stats represent a normal-sized Lycanthrope. For
other sizes use the following.
✦ Very Small: 20-40 PHP (30 is a common value). Damage
levels (for 30 PHP): 1-10 (0) / 11-17 (-1) / 18-23 (-3) /
24-27 (-5) / 28-30 (-7). Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 10).
✦ Small: 40-60 PHP (50 is a common value). Damage levels
(for 50 PHP): 1-16 (0) / 17-28 (-1) / 29-38 (-3) / 39-44 (-5)
/ 45-50 (-7). Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 9-10).
✦ Large: 80-100 PHP (90 is a common value). Damage levels
(for 90 PHP): 1-30 (0) / 31-52 (-1) / 53-70 (-3) / 71-81 (-5)
/ 82-90 (-7). Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 7-10).
✦ Enormous: 100-120 PHP (110 is a common value). Damage
levels (for 110 PHP): 1-37 (0) / 38-64 (-1) / 65-86 (-3) /
87-100 (-5) / 101-110 (-7). Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 6-10).
186 Different Sizes: damage
The following table shows how differently sized lycanthropes
deal different damage with their natural weapons. The
Constitution bonus is usually added to the damage dealt by
all attacks. It is worth noting that often the lycanthropes deal
more damage than similar-sized animals, due to the unnatural
vigour and power which in inherent in lycanthropy.
Size Claw Bite
Very Small 1d10 1d10 (OR 10)
Small 1d10 (OR 10) 1d10 (OR 9-10)
Medium 1d10 (OR 9-10) 1d10 (OR 8-10)
Large 2d10 (OR 9-10) 2d10 (OR 8-10)
Enormous 2d10 (OR 8-10) 2d10 (OR 7-10)
Greater Natural Protection
Lycanthropes can have a natural protection higher than the
basic “2”, but rarely above 4. However, there are some rare
lycanthropes (usually very ancient ones or powered up by
sorcery) whose natural protection is of about 6 to 10 points.
Immune to Pain
It is not worth recording the Physical Damage Levels of this
Lycanthrope: it will feel pain, or it will just ignore it.
Moon’s Influence
Some werewolves, sometimes called “Luna Lycanthropes”,
have their powers particularly influenced by the phases of
the Moon. These are Lycanthropes which can usually shape-
change during any time, whatever the phase of the Moon.
However, their abilities are strongly influenced by the moon
phases. An example of possible influences is as follows.
✦ Full Moon. The Lycanthrope’s Natural Protection
increases by +5 (which means a Natural Protection of 7, if
using the basic stats). They also get +2 SV to all their skill
rolls. The Regeneration (if they have this property) is now
a Greater Regeneration or, if the Lycanthrope normally
lack Regeneration, it will get this property. Furthermore,
the Lycanthrope gets the “Persistent Life” property.
✦ Waning or Waxing Gibbous Moon. The Lycanthrope’s
Natural Protection increases by +2 (which means a Natural
Protection of 4, if using the basic stats). They also get +1
SV to all their skill rolls
✦ Waning or Waxing Crescent Moon. The Lycanthrope has
its basic stats.
✦ New Moon. The Lycanthrope is weaker and more vulnerable.
No natural protection. No Animal Senses (its senses are
reduced to those of its human form). The werewolf suffers
-2 SV to all its rolls and its PHP cannot start at full health
but the animal form is considered to always have enough
PHP to be at the minimum to suffer the -1 level (which
means that the Lycanthrope will always suffer at least a
total -3 SV to all its rolls). If the Lycanthrope has either
Regeneration or Persistent Life, they do not work (which
means that killing the Lycanthrope in this phase will
definitively kill it).
Multiple forms
Some rare lycanthropes can take also shapes other than those
of a wolf, although they rarely can transform in more than
another, single extra form. The GM should consider that to
turn in smaller animal may take quicker times (for example
turning into a cat or a raven ay take 2 rounds). Most of these
extra forms are not as combat-efficient as the wolfish one (and
therefore combat stats may be not useful) and the smaller
sizes are usually used only for infiltration and spying. On the
other hand, larger forms (like man-bear hybrids or similar)
can be mimicked using the “Different Sizes” and “Different
Sizes: damage” properties.
Paralyzing Stare
If the Lycanthrope (in either human or animal form) does
nothing else but staring at the victim’s eyes, the target
must succeed a Situation Roll with an SV of 7 modified by
Psyche. In case of failure it will remain paralyzed for 1d6
action rounds: it cannot move or try to parry or evade the
lycanthrope’s attacks. The victim will wake up before the end
of the established round (if still alive) only after suffering
damage from the creature.
Partial Transformation
Some lycanthropes can shape-change only parts of their
bodies. These are usually the claws which can therefore be
used also in human form.
Persistent Life
When the PHP are reduced to “0” the Lycanthrope will fall
into a death-like coma (usually reverting to human form). It
will seem to be dead, but its body will just slowly regenerate.
Lost limbs may re-grow and flesh covers again otherwise
exposed bones. In one or two days the Lycanthrope will just
raise again, as if nothing happened. See “Vulnerabilities” to
see how to stop the process.
Plague Spreading
Some lycanthropes are surrounded by an evil aura or they just
carry terrible diseases (to which they are immune). The GM
should not just decide which plague is spread, but he must
also decide whether this is transmitted by the Bite, contact
with the beast or just by the presence of the creature in an
area. Possible suggestions for this disease can be found in the
descriptions of the following monsters: Homunculus (Poison
& Diseases optional property), Mummy (Plague-Spreader
property), Spectres & Wraiths (Breath of Disease).
Powered-up Human Form
The Lycanthrope may have some unnaturally high trait
(usually Constitution) even in the human form or, in
alternative, it may have some property (like Regeneration)
working also in the human form.
Regeneration
A Lycanthrope in animal form will regenerate 1 lost PHP every
third action round. Some werewolf has the same regenerative
ability even in human form, but this is not common.
Regeneration (Greater)
A Lycanthrope in animal form will regenerate 1 lost PHP
every action round. Some very rare, greater werewolves are so
powerful that they regenerate 2 lost PHP every round (unless
the damage is dealt by silver or aconitus-poisoned weapons).
Lycanthropes with this ability may become particularly
strong and deadly, therefore it should be limited to unique,
legendary lycanthropes whose myths maybe even identify
them as ancient pagan gods.
Vulnerabilities
The following vulnerabilities are just the most common
ones among Lycanthropes. However, not every lycanthrope is
vulnerable to all these entries. Furthermore, some creatures
are completely immune to these conditions, while others have
completely different and exotic kinds of vulnerabilities.
✦ When a lycanthrope’s PHP are reduced to 0, there is only
one way to avoid the “Persistent Life” property: cutting off
the head and/or burning the body to the point in which the
bones can be smashed in ashes.
✦ Werewolves are notoriously vulnerable to Silver. However,
long-bladed weapons cannot be crafted in this material. It is
most common to craft silver bullets or, at most, arrowheads
or small darts. If a Lycanthrope is wounded by Silver the
Natural Protection will not work and any damaged dealt
will not regenerate if the “Regeneration” optional property
is chosen (the GM should take separate record of these
wounds).
✦ A mixture or an extract of “aconitus” or wolfsbane can be
applied on a weapon. Any wound inflicted will deal double
(x2) damage to the Lycanthrope. It is better to apply it to
arrowheads and bullets since bladed weapons tend to lose
the poison after one or two rounds of combat.
✦ According to their nature (for example satanic lycanthropes
or those who are just revenant spirits) cannot approach
holy grounds, churches or somebody holding a crucifix.
Some of these “unholy” werewolves may even be damaged
by exorcism (Lex Libris p. 234).
Vulnerabilities (greater)
Some lycanthropes have greater vulnerabilities like for
example the following.
✦ Some werewolves are extremely allergic to Silver. Any
damage dealt by silver is multiplied x 2. Furthermore, if
a silver bullet remains inside the body of a Lycanthrope, it 187
will deal 1d10 PHP of damage per hour. The Lycanthrope
will usually just run away from the combat and, once alone,
it will try to remove the silver object from tis body with its
claws, sometimes even tearing apart its own flesh, just to
stop the silver to harm it.
✦ Being sprinkled with Holy Water is particularly damaging
to unholy lycanthropes which may suffer 1d6 MHP and
PHP.
✦ Some lycanthropes have odd weak points, like for example
the Southern Italian story (mentioned in the story at the
beginning of this chapter) of slashing the forehead of the
werewolf in animal form with a silver blade. This can be
mimicked with a “Hitting the Weak Spot” rule with the
effect of making the lycanthrope to immediately turn back
to its human form. Whether the lycanthropy is also cured
or not is totally up to the the GM.
Terrifying Howl
If they do nothing else in the round, some Lycanthropes can
emit terrifying howls inflicting 1d10 (OR 8-10) of mental
damage.
Wolf Form
The generic stats are referred to a man/wolf hybrid form.
This shape is at least as frequent as the man-sized wolf form.
Some lycanthropes can turn in both forms. Others can only
have one (either the man-wolf or the wolf).
 The man-sized form is not a normal wolf, as it is stronger
and smarter than common wolves. It can be represented by
the generic stats above, except for the following.
Movement: walking 2 CP per 4 m (Max 32 m).
Skills: Fighting SV 10, Battle Experience 2 (Combat
Actions 3, Combat Reactions 3), Unarmed Fighting 2 (Biting
5, Claws 1).
Combat points: Free 12 / Combat Actions 6 / Unarmed 2
(Biting 10, Claws 2).
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM +12) Bite SV 14, SV 8, Claws SV 4
✦ (IM +12) Bite SV 12 (Throat Slashing, see property below),
Claw SV 4.
✦ (IM +12) Evade SV 14 or two Evade attempts SV 8 and
SV 6.
Wolf-form lycanthropes cannot use the “Savage Grapple”
property but they have another special attack.
Jump attack: If, when starting a fight after a movement
action, a lycanthrope in wolf form focus all its attacks on a
single target, it can jump on it, attacking also with its hind
legs. This action will give the wolf a bonus SV 10 Claws
attack on the same target.
Lycanthropes Variations
188
Gemini Lycanthrope
These lycanthropes usually shape-change at will with not
relation to the Moon phase and they usually have the Multiple
Forms property.
Great Lycanthrope
Some Lycanthropes are not cursed by a bite, but just by
descending from a strong bloodline of lycanthropes. They
usually can transform at any time (although they may suffer
the temptation of transforming during the Full Moon). They
tend to have stronger Natural Protections (at least 4) and
turn into animal forms of at least Large size (see “Different
sizes” and “Different Sizes: Damage” properties). They also
tend to have the “Command Animals” property since they like
to lead huge packs of wolves.
Witch Werewolf (like the Kola Peninsula Witch, etc.)
This lycanthrope has the Paralyzing Stare, Partial
Transformation and can transmit diseases (“Plague
Spreading”) with its claws.
Luna Lycanthrope
These Lycanthropes usually can transform at will every night
but will the urge more under the Full Moon. Furthermore,
they will suffer the effects of “Moon’s Influence”.
Silver Lycanthrope
Some Lycanthropes are more allergic to silver, suffering a
silver-linked Vulnerability (Greater).
Wererat
These rare lycanthropes are diffused in sewers and in the
poorer quarters of large cities, always trying to hide from
the eyes of men, usually feeding off corpses. Their animal
shapes resemble odd human-rat hybrids of many sizes (see
the “Different Sizes” and “Different Sizes: Damage property).
They tend to have the “Command Animals” property linked
with swarms of rats and also the “Plague Spreading” property.
Lycanthropes-related Secret Arts
Many Dark Arts are linked with lycanthropy, which suggest
how diffused this curse is. Animal Magnetism (Lex Libris p.240)
may in theory heals lycanthropy while evil, satanic-linked or
pagan-linked werewolves may be damaged by exorcism (Lex
Libris p.234). Most Lycanthropes seem also to be damaged by
the “Apostolic Orthodox Confession of Faith (Les Libris p.239).
According to some scholars there is powered-up version of the
Bodily Refinement art (Lex Libris p. 241) which should create
werewolves, although its existence has not been proved yet.
Finally, the Tufloû Loukû Pósis art (Lex Libris p.243) can make
somebody invisible to werewolves.
The Changing Wolf Skin
New Dark Art, Left-Hand Path
This art represents many attempts by witches to take the
power of werewolves. It may also represent ancient, pagan
Germanic rituals, possibly connected with “berserker”
traditions.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -16
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 10
✦ Discipline: The Left-hand Path level 3
✦ Specialty: Black Magic level 3
Other Requirements
✦ Supernatural Beings Discipline level 2, Beastiology level 5
Material Requirements
There could be many dreaded materials needed for this unholy
ritual, the following are just some examples. The important is
that the result is something which can be worn.
✦ A belt done with the skin of an assassin.
✦ The skin of a wolf (or other beasts) sacrificed under the
Full Moon.
✦ Hallucinogenic herbs and mushrooms used during the
ritual and to imbue the object.
Effect
If the Esotericism skill roll is failed the material objects are
usually lost. In case of success the object is filled with the
power of Lycanthropy. The one who wears it during a night
will turn into a Lycanthrope with the “Moon’s Influence”
property. At dawn the skin or belt will automatically detach,
and the target will become human again.
When one is back into human form a Situation Roll with
SV 8 (modified by Psyche) must be made. In case of failure a
permanent addiction to the object will be gained. They will
use it as often as possible, and during every Full Moon they
must make a Situation Roll of SV 10 (modified by Psyche) to
avoid feeling the urge to wear it. Sooner or later these addicted
persons will, irremediably, start using every night, spreading
despair and destruction. If they lose the object, they will
suffer 1 MHP per day until they recover it or become crazy.

189
190
 The Vampire
P aris, a city built on the dreams of some brilliant
souls, at the height of the short century, is a
wonder to behold. The streets teem with all
manner of life, the swish of skirts, the clack
of heels, the heady perfumes that mask all manner of other,
baser, smells… a better nose than mine could learn the secrets
of these people so very easily. I content myself with watching.
I have noticed a waif these last few nights, always floating around the
edges of the flower market, a little wilted bunch of lilies clasped in her
grubby little hands. There is something unnerving about the child that
I cannot put my finger on. Part of it, I think, is how she lurks without
interacting with others out in the night market. She is more akin to a
ghost, watching, watching, always watching. I have never seen her talk
to a single soul. And yet she returns every night with her dead bouquet
to watch the comings and goings as the street vendors look to cater to
the whims of their own peculiar court.
That first time I wondered if she might be lost, but quickly became
obvious that she was exactly where she was meant to be.
So if not lost, what was a child, no more than nine or ten summers
old, doing out alone this late? Where was her mother? That thought
quickly chased down a darker avenue as I imagined what her being
along out here might actually mean, even if she was a child in my
eyes, and that was when I decided to watch over her. I can’t explain
191
why, but there was something compelling about her. Something almost
ensorcelling.
She was no ordinary child.
After a week of watching her skirt around the fringes of the market,
I finally saw her usher a young lad over to her corner. They traded
whispers. I have no idea what went between them, but the boy followed
her as she left, leading him through the streets, across the arch of Petit
Pont and through the Templar’s streets into the Le Marias. They walked
hand in hand, like lovers do, only he couldn’t have been more than a
year or two older than her. No, not lovers. Something else.
Each street was progressively quieter then the last, until, as we stood
in the shadow of the old Templar church, Temple du Marias, we were
alone. I crept along behind them, too far away to hear what sweet
nothings she was using to entice the boy on, but there was no doubting
in my mind that he was a willing victim.
Not alone, I realised, see another figure watching the children from
the shadows. Even from distance I felt the taint of the uncanny on the
watcher. The shadows masked his features. He made no move to leave
the safety of the alleyway. I didn’t so much creep and rush around the
back of the temple, not wanting to let the children out of my sight for
longer than absolutely necessary. The alleyways of Marias reeked of
human smells, but more strongly of the foul water of the nearby river
and the effluence thrown into it. I hoped to work myself around into a
position where I could watch the second watcher—and if luck was truly
on my side, identify him.
 I edged towards the mouth of the alley, taking shelter in a doorway
that offered the best view of the children. What I saw was a tapestry of
horror that defied understanding. For a moment I mistook what passed
between them as a kiss, then I saw the blood around her mouth as the
girl broke the clinch and looked directly at the man in the shadows for
approval. She held the boy’s limp body in her arms as though he were
some precious rag doll she played with during her loneliest moments.
The girl was much stronger than any child of ten ought to be.
Trapped in the pale light her face had a sickly, bloodless pallor,
almost as though it had been weeks since she had seen the sun.
The boy wasn’t dead, I realised, seeing his hand move to his throat,
fingers feeling out the wound where the girl had fed. His head turned
towards me, weak on its neck, and he stared with sightless eyes off into
the middle distance. I did not know what nature of evil she had worked
on the boy, but he wasn’t himself.
I should have returned to my lodging house and just left the girl to
do her vile business, but no, damn my curiosity.
I lurked, waiting when I should have run.
The stranger emerged from the shadows. He was impossibly tall,
cadaverously thin and dressed in the manner of the court. His clothing
was immaculately tailored to his body and spoke of serious wealth and
privilege. The moon offered little in the way of light to see more than
a vague silhouette, but he moved with confidence, placing a protective
hand upon the girl’s head. She looked up at him for approval, and
was rewarded with a nod. His voice didn’t carry clearly, but I heard
well enough as he told the girl, “You have done well, again, little bird.”
192 There was something eerily familiar about the man’s voice. I had heard
it somewhere before, even if I didn’t immediately recognise those gaunt
cheekbones and harrowing eyes. “Your brothers and sisters will feed
well tonight,” he promised her. Together they walked towards the temple.
Not the temple, I realised, as I followed them, but rather an iron
gateway set into an archway along the side of river. They led the boy
down a narrow set of steps still wet with the splash of sailors feet, and
broke the heavy lock that barred the gate, metal grinding on stone as
he opened the way into the tunnel. I waited for a count of thirty before
I followed them down the slippery steps and inside.
The darkness was disorientating.
Mercifully, as I fumbled my way down the low tunnel I saw a firefly
speck of light in the distance and realised they had struck some sort
of torch and were going deeper into what appeared to be a warren of
catacombs that spread out beneath the city: a Paris Below.
The light guttered away, meaning there was a breeze of some sort
down here. The walls, I noted, were roughhewn, but showed the sharp
white streaks where the metal had chiselled the tunnels out of the
bedrock. In the distance I heard the steady tink, tink tink of water
dripping against a metal surface. I followed the sound, edging forward,
careful not to scuff my feet because any sound was going to echo on and
on and on, betraying my presence.
When the firefly of light disappeared I was cast adrift in a senseless
dark with nothing to guide my way.
A glance back over my shoulder told me there was no help
forthcoming.
I was alone in the dark.
Utterly lost. I had no sense of what was above me or where there
might be more ways into and out of these endless catacombs. I stood
absolutely still, listening for any echo in the silence. For the longest time
the only sound belonged to my breath. Then I heard voices. Hushed at
first, but risking. I had no idea what I had stumbled upon, and upon
my life, I fervently wish I had turned and headed back towards the river
instead of plunging deeper into the darkness.
The warren I followed opened up into a vast subterranean hall, a
cathedral space beneath the city, every bit as awe-inspiring as Notre
Dame in Paris Above. The chamber was daunting. Lit by hundreds
upon hundreds of votive candles, I saw banked seats that surrounded
what I can only describe as a throne, and at the foot of that grand seat,
a white-haired albino—no, not a true albino, though her colouring was
so pale, she did not have the pink eyes of those strange ones—leaned
lovingly up against the leg of her master. She was one of the most
hauntingly beautiful women I have ever seen. Beautiful, yes, but more
haunted if I had to pick one of those two words to describe her. Her skin
was alabaster pale, paler than the finest porcelain and the veins beneath
her eyes stood out so profoundly they might as easily have been painted
in. But on her face this wasn’t a flaw. Behind her, her raven-haired
master and lord of this world below, slouched, in the great seat. The steel
blade of his great sword shimmered in the light of the unholy candles,
lending the weapon the illusion of life.
I’d stumbled into some sort of den, though den of what remained to
be seen.
There were maybe a dozen others down here, all of them craning their
necks to look upon the man on the high throne, all of them dressed in
the manner of the court, though not any court of Paris Above. This was
very much the court of Paris Below.
I dared risk edging closer, seeking out a better vantage point from
which to spy upon the gathering. All along one side of the vast chamber
I saw bars set into the arches supporting the ceiling and realised I was
looking at a row of cages, though the shadows were too deep to show
what was inside.
More of the pale ones moved into position, clustering around the
man on the throne and his painted bride. Another dozen and more,
making easily thirty in this peculiar subterranean court. There was
something unnerving about these courtiers, but I couldn’t immediately
place what it was about them that set my skin to crawling until I saw
the girl drag the docile boy before them and with disdain toss the limp
body onto the ground at her master’s feet.
“A toy,” the waif said, looking up at the man on the throne expectantly.
“How does he taste?” the master asked, his voice reedy and thin.
“Like the sweetest honey cakes,” the girl told him. “Try him.”
The man set his sword aside and came down the dais to the floor,
and knelt, taking the boy in his arms like the gentlest of lovers, then
leaned in. There was no kiss. When the master drew back, his lips and
chin were smeared red with the boy’s blood. His grin was wicked as he
nodded approvingly. “You have done well, little one. He shall make a
fine addition to the night’s banquet.” He gave a signal and the first of
the cage doors opened, the iron grating on the stone as the prisoners
shuffled into the light. They were broken men. All of them. They didn’t
look up. There was no defiance left in them. They were damned. I was
looking at a banquet of the damned.
The waif didn’t step away from the boy.
 “What is it, girl?”
“I was hoping… Can I keep him?” she asked.
The master considered this for a moment, looking at the emaciated
boy he had just drained to within an inch of his life. He nodded,
thoughtfully. “You think you are ready to sire a line of your own, little
one?”
She nodded. “It has been eighty years,” she said.
Eighty? How could it be so? She looked no older than a child and
yet she claimed to be more than twice my age?
This was no ordinary den of thieves.
Feeding on their prey? Drawing blood from open wounds at their
throats? Talk of siring?
This wasn’t a den, it was a nest.
And the master of this place, the King Below… was no mere
mortal…
He was a fiend of the immortal blood, a vampire, and his court were
nothing more or less than his gets.
“I forget,” the master said. “I look at you and still see the child I saved
from that other life, the sickness that would have made death a mercy,
and remember your father’s plea… but of course, you are so much more
than all of those memories now. I have one last question for you, little
one, do you understand the nature of the sacred bond that will seal you
forever once he tastes your blood?”
“I do,” she said as though accepting his betrothal.
I couldn’t move. I didn’t dare. The slightest sound would betray me.
I didn’t belong here. This was everything I had ever looked for, a truth
that laid the nature of this world of ours bare, and I wasn’t in any
way prepared for what it meant to everything I had always thought I
understood about the nature of life, death, and the beyond.
“Then yes, take him,” and this time he nodded, handing her the knife
from his boot to open her veins and drip precious dead blood into the
open mouth of her first get, the boy she had dragged in from the flower
market to play with.
His body convulsed, spasms raking his flesh and contorting every
muscle as his failing life rebelled against the creeping death the waif’s
blood promised.
When his eyes finally opened again, the deed done, he seemed to
stare straight through the shadows at me, and only me, as though he
knew I lurked there. I was sure that his new heightened senses could
smell the stench of my fear swirling around me. I had to get out of there,
out and as far away from the damned court as possible.
I knew in that moment I would never be safe again…
193
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Vampire
“The great mystic Udug has told me that
the bloodsuckers are strong and volatile.
They could live for thousands of years or
they could allow their rages to fester and
succumb to their darker tempers and expose
themselves to the hunters. When they hunt,
people fall like cattle to the wolf. One needs
only to listen to the talk on the streets. They
are out there still, drinking the nectar of life.
All the stories I have heard tell are true, I
swear, they are the most fearful enemy, more
powerful than any unthinking monster.”
In the Year of Our Lord 1706 Charles
194 Ferdinand de Schertz released his
work "Magia Posthuma", published in
Olmutz. He claimed in this work to have
spent considerable time near the city of
Kadam, in Bohemia. From the residents
of that place, he writes, he gained a clear
understanding of the vampiric curse.
“Vampirism is like a disease. It is
transmitted from perpetrator to victim, but
only through certain rituals. It is not as
virulent as a common influenza. Becoming
a vampire is not something you choose,
rather it is the vampire who chooses who he
wishes to infect with his immortal curse.”
He goes on to explain that:
“The thing we call a vampire is a living
soul in a dead body. They can live on for
thousands of years. Indeed, the oldest of their
kind, the true progenitors of the curse, are a
remnant of the Great Flood. During my long
excursions to the ruins of the Ottoman Empire,
I have encountered a wealth of superstition
and fact in relation to these blood feeders. I
have encountered more than one man who
swears they have the gift of transmogrification,
and have it within their power to turn into a
vaporous fog and disperse across the air. I have
been told by others that they possess a blood
bond with those they sire, and should one be
slain their entire line is weakened. A priest in
Islambol swears that only the eternal flame
may kill a vampire.”
According to Bulgarian myth, a
magician can snare a vampire in a
cunning trap by merely pouring human
blood into the bottom of an empty
bottle, the trick is to deceive the fiend as
it takes the form of fog.
In 1733 Johann Christian Harenberg
in his work "Philosophicae Cogitationes
de Vampiriis" writes:
“A vampire’s unnatural existence can be
brought short in a number of ways, including
decapitation, removing removing the
unbeating heart from its body, or by driving
a wooden steak through the chest and heart of
the monster, and most assuredly, by burning
the vampire. To be completely safe, you should
combine at least two of these alternatives,
leaving nothing to chance for these beasts are,
like cockroaches, hard to kill.”
We have in our possession in the
archives of the Royal Society unedited
pages from the original manuscript of
the same book, that include claims from
Harenberg which did not make it into
the final work:
“Whether it is the same creature that has
been affected differently by the disease, or
whether we see different creatures with the
same disease, I will let the next generation
penetrate the riddle. In my search for
knowledge about the vampire, I have found
a variety of similar and yet vastly different
blood drinkers:
Raspail vampires who have human form
but many supernatural abilities,
Nosferatu who has much of the beast in
itself but carries human traits,
Strigoi and Blautsauger which are
essentially the same being, but where Strigoi
are more sensitive to the cross and sacred
relics,
Morii and Muli-vampyrs who are what
one might consider archetypal Romanian
vampires, possessed of royal blood and
powerful mystics, and
Empusas vampires who are often
mistaken for lycanthropes because of their
animal-like appearance.
To these should be added the old
vampires; Upiors and the newer ones;
Vrykolakas. Upiors are those that do not
degenerate but belong to the original genus
of vampire. Of these, I believe there are
none left, for they died in the Great Flood.
Though perhaps in the darkest place, in the
deepest loneliness of Babylon, one survives?
And last, Vrykolakas, those who brought the
infection forth, and who in turn are infected
with their vampirism.”
Dr. Allard de Chevalier states in a letter
to the Royal Life Mediator in 1697
that the likelihood of being infected by
vampirism is very small, because, he
believes, only certain types of blood can
be infected.
What he means by certain types of
blood and exactly what types of blood
they are remain unclear.
Is it the blood of different races? Or
does he mean that people have different
types of blood running through their
veins?
In a series of articles—rejected by the
Alliance of Scientists—Allard argues
that very few carry within them the
type of blood that can be infected. The
rest merely succumb to death when they
have been sufficiently drained.
It is said that the vampires hide on the
fringes of society, possessive of their
secrets. They seek only to be allowed
to live on. Immersed in hibernation,
they rest for hundreds of years in the
earth only to emerge, forced to feed
for a few decades before they rest
once more. There are unending myths
about the vampires, most terrifying
and untrue.
Few things stir such disgust at both
the people, the Church and the Royal
Society as the rumour of a vampire.
Of course, others claim that these
enemies hide themselves away for darker
reasons, seeking to manipulate society
and gain influence from the shadows,
until they become the true powers in
our nocturnal cities.
Whichever is true, there is one thing
we have learned, and that is that these
fiends possess countless forms and
names and no vampire is like another.

Unique individuals
Vlad III Dracul
Official account of the life and death of
the cruel and terrifying Vlad III Dracul
record his birth in 1431 and his death
some forty-five years later in 1476.
He was a prince in Valakiet whose
cruelty and blood-lust was widely
known across the Ottoman Empire and
beyond. The name Dracul is believed to
derive from the knight’s order "Societas
Draconistrarum" which was founded by
Sigismund of Luxembourg and which
Vlad’s father was elected into.
Vlad III Dracul’s grim nature and
relentless cruelty are widely known
throughout the realms, with extensive
records surviving.
It is said that he cultivated many dark
hatreds while held in captivity during
his youth, his rage festering day upon
day no matter that he was well-treated.
The humiliation of being prisoner of the
Ottoman Sultan Murad II did not set
well with him. Those dark desires are
laid bare in accounts of vicious rituals
in which Dracul’s enemies were skin-
ridden, buried alive, forced to eat their
own body parts, cooked, and more often
than not, beheaded and impaled. On
several occasions Dracul is rumoured
to have impaled more than ten thousand
enemy combatants, still alive, and left
them to bleed out on the killing fields.
Dracul’s enemies called him "Vlad
the Impaler", though he always named
himself Dracula.
Officially, the knightly order known as
"Societas Draconistrarum" was created
to protect Christian interests in the
region, but what many are ignorant of is
that its founder, the Emperor Sigismund
of Hungary, held in his possession
a special kind of bat that carried an
unusual blood thirst and supernatural
powers.
When Vlad’s father, Vlad II of
Valakiet was admitted to the order,
he swore an oath promising his son in
exchange for membership of the order,
195
and when the boy was only three years
old, he was deliberately infected with
vampirism by Sigismund’s rare bat.
In the coming days Vlad proved
immune to most diseases he was exposed
to, but those around the boy noticed his
ever-increasing thirst for blood.
He was no longer a normal child and
its later captivity among the ottomans
just made him harder and more cruel.
The older Vlad became, the more
prominent his supernatural powers
became until they were undeniable.
The boy was different.
Cursed.
By 1456, the transformation reached
its zenith.
Dracula needed a residence where
he could live undisturbed and feed his
unnatural hungers.
He became increasingly shy of the
sun and could no longer bear to reside
 within proximity of church buildings humans, not beasts, rule. The rumours abounded; an insane
nor bear the sight of crosses. But survival comes at a price. Erzsébet, who, ever since childhood was
Dracula forced a group of servants His body is weaker now than it has told how beautiful she was and what a
to build a castle high in the most ever been, and he lies in deep sleep for divine complexion she had, had bathed
inaccessible reaches beyond the many years, only waking to unlife for in maiden’s blood, believing it made her
outskirts of Poenari, a village in the ever shorter spans of time. smoother and more beautiful. Countless
Valakiet mountains. young girls lost their lives to fill her
Vlad Dracula died in battle in 1476. Erzsébet Báthory baths as Erzsébet chased a youth she
But death could not hold him now. When Countess Erzsébet Bàthory was could not hope to keep.
The curse of the bat flowed through his arrested on December 30, 1610, the However, the truth is far darker.
veins. It was only in death that he truly authorities could not believe the horrors Her first encounter with blood as a
transformed, coming into his powers, discovered within her castle, Csejthe, restorative had been infected blood; a
and as a miasma of thick fog he drifted deep in the Principality of Transylvania. maiden, struck by Erzsébet’s own hand
from the battlefield, his conscious mind Hundreds of bodies of dead young in anger, had taken the tainted blood
racing as he struggled to grasp the true women were found buried in the moat. and smeared it across her mistress’s
extend of what was happening to him. Hundreds more, all girls, had been face, infecting her with the taint of
However, the price of the transformation imprisoned in her dungeons, where they vampirism. Because of her blood type
was high. Dracula was shackled in were tortured and gradually drained of she was not wholly susceptible to the
his castle for endless hours, and only blood. disease, though her thirst for blood
through extensive preparation and great
effort could he leave the principality,
assuming once more the shape of a man.
The hostile terrain and sheer remoteness
of Dracula’s castle serve to keep him safe,
though the good folk of Poenari live in
fear beneath the pall of his long shadow.
196 Rumour of his survival has barely begun
to filter out of Transylvania, and most of
what is claimed about the Impaler is both
diluted and distorted, for he is far worse
than any tale might tell.
Few who reach the mountain village
of Poenari ever leave.
Digging deeper into Dracula’s
mystery has its price, and the price is
blood.

Il Conte Savistano
In Venice’s darkest halls and
underground catacombs, what is perhaps
the world’s oldest vampire lives; today
he calls himself "Conte Savistano".
Occultists and scholars of the esoteric
believe he owns an older name, one that
marks him as the Babylonian.
If the whispers around him are to be
believed, he is the only one of his kind to
have lived before the Great Flood, and
unlike everyone else, his transformation
has been from beast to human and not
the other way around.
For thousands upon thousands of
years he has adapted, becoming adept
at surviving this life on earth where
became unquenchable. Merely to
survive the countess needed several
gallons of blood every week.
The more she drank, the more her
supernatural abilities developed, as is
usual with the cursed blood.
She became so powerful no one dared
stand against her.
And in that strength she found
madness, giving way to her worst
impulses.
An iron maiden was installed in the
basement of the castle and served as an
effective tool for piercing the girls skin
and emptying them of blood as she had
come to feel more the traditional horrors
of the bite-and-drain was simply too
slow to sate her thirst. She needed to
drink great desperate swallows.
When the army under the command
of the witch hunter von Dönigs finally
managed to seige and storm the castle
and reach Elisabeth, she could not
simply be sentenced to imprisonment
and left to die in her own dungeons.
It needed to be more poignant and
satisfying for those left behind.
Instead of the dungeon, the Countess
was walled into her own torture
chamber with only a simple hatch for
delivery of food and water. She could
not move around in there, so cramped
were the confines. Slowly, slowly, she
thinned away to nothing, the meat
falling away from her bones, though
still she would not just lie down and
die. She persisted.
On the night of August 14, 1614, the
Province was hit by the worst storm of
memory.
The wind blew through the hallways of
the castle, rattling the eaves and chilling
the bones of one and all. Witnesses later
spoke of how, impossibly, the immense
storm raged within the confines of the
room Erzsébet sat walled in.
When dawn broke she was found
dead.
There was precious little of her body
left.
It was as though she had been torn
apart by the storm.
Testimonies from her guards say
her corpse was completely dehydrated,
skin leathery and emaciated, so that she
more resembled a bat than a human.
One night, no more than a week after
her funeral, two unknown men came
to Csejthe and disinterred her remains
once more.
They brought her to Ecsed, the
Báthory’s family seat, and with careful
nurturing Erzsébet slowly returned
to her state of unlife once again, for
she had not been properly slain, which
allowed her return.
Over the years, Erzsébet has moved
around the region, slowly but surely
regaining her former powers and more.
Today she is clever enough not to feast
from one village, but rather resides
in different places across Poland and
Russia, though her blood thirst is every
bit as fearsome as it ever was.
She claims to be the last survivor of
the noble family, calling herself "Elina
Bàthory".
Appearance
Vampires are pale skinned as normal
blood circulates through their veins;
rather it is thicker, like oil, and does
not pump to rhythm of their dead
hearts. Some are grotesque, their faces
twisted and emaciated, hollow dead
eyes and feral features, while others are
preternaturally handsome. They possess
fangs wicked enough to puncture deep
into their victims necks to open up the
veins for feeding.
First Impressions
The vampire has a certain gravitas;
all eyes turn their way as they enter
a room. Women want to know who
they are. Men are drawn to their orbit
like moons, feeling the power of their
presence. They are graceful. Poised.
They are deadly. What you see is very
much dependent upon the species
of vampire you encounter, with the
more goblin-like Strigoi appearing
cadaverous as they creep through
the marshes, sniffing the air as they
follow the scent of blood, whereas the
Raspail are almost courtly with their
manners and mannerisms, exuding an
irresistible charm even as they seduce
and kill to sate their need for blood.
One of the first clues to their undead
nature is that fact that few of their kind
cast a shadow.
What do the Players Know?
We at the Royal Society have, after
great deliberation, chosen to divide the
species of vampire into a number of
different categories, depending upon the
traits they exhibit.
There are the Raspail-vampires,
who have human shape but possess
supernatural abilities.
The Nosferatu, who still has much of
its beastly side, but retains the human
shape.
And then there are the Strigoi and
Blautsauger, which are essentially the
same creature with a different name.
The Moroii, which is the typical
Romanian vampire.
The Muli-vampire, which is a special
kind of Romani-vampire. 197
The Empusas, which is a more
animal-like creature.
In short, the list is long and horrifying.
The myths around these monsters are
extensive.
It is believed by some, including
Herr Birkenbosch, that the original
vampires—who must be around 2000
years old now—still exist, living in the
darkest places of the wold, as well as the
o-called Vrykolakas. This South-Slavic
word is used for vampires originated
from excomunicated dead, however it
also used for a kind of ancient vampires,
responsible for spreading the curse,
although they are not the origin of
vampyrism. In fact, their progenitors
are the "Old Ones" or "Upior", powerful
beings that have travelled the earth
for aeons and gained great power and
dangerous abilities.
The one truth that cannot be
ignored is that these creatures are
amongst the deadliest foes travellers
through the new world might face,
and with so many variations to their
nature vampires are as close to us as
 any monster alive. Some live just like
any normal human being, while others
exist as predators perpetually on the
hunt.
All vampires have in common,
however, is that they need blood to
survive.
According to the myths there are
many ways to harm a vampire, although
most people are not sure about what
is more effective. Vampires seem
vulnerable to various elements like
blessed weapons, holy water, garlic,
crosses, silver and, off course, a stake of
oak which needs to be driven through
the heart to kill the undead.
Main Features
✦ Some vampires, it is said, cannot stand
sunlight, yet there are those who live
in the light of day as well as any man.
✦ Others are said to be repelled by
garlic.
✦ Some are burned by holy water.
198 ✦ Others are said to be invisible in
mirrors, casting no reflection while
others are as visible as anyone.
✦ Some can’t enter a house without
receiving an invitation, while others
can walk happily through the door of
a church without a care in the world.
✦ The one thing all vampires have in
common is that they suffer in the
presence of a crucifix — They aren’t
always damaged by the cross. For the
vampire to be wounded or repelled,
the person holding the crucifix must
be a consecrated priest. In the hands of
a layman, the cross won’t have much
more effect than that the vampire
dislikes looking at it. Some vampires
are so sensitive to the cross that they
are an exception to the normal rule,
and are both harmed if someone lays
a cross on them and are stopped dead
in their tracks if someone holds out a
cross before them.
✦ Another weakness all vampires share,
without exception, is that they are
destroyed if an oaken stake is forced
through their dead hearts.
✦ Some vampires are rumoured to be able
to transform into animals, including
bats and wolves, whilst others are able
to shift into a more ethereal mist.
✦ Some are said to be able to affect
a person’s mind, influencing their
thoughts.
✦ Some can effect perception, altering
what a person sees, or more aptly,
doesn’t see.
✦ Some possess an almost hypnotic
allure and can using their silver
tongue can seduce their intended
victims, making them willing.
✦ Yet others can become invisible, and
move from one place to another,
with the power of thought. These
vampires often lead something that
looks like a normal life among people,
often in the upper classes of society,
since their long lives have given them
both experience and money.
✦ Some possess supernatural strength.
✦ Others are gifted with speed and
dexterity that defies the eye.
✦ A vampire can sire gets: this is the
act of turning a living person. They
feed off them three times, drinking
from the same wound night after
night, gradually bleeding them
dry, and on the fourth night they
nourish the mortal with their own
blood, which is all that is needed to
complete the siring. Others claim
that a vampire can turn someone
simply by draining all of their blood
then dropping a single bead of their
own blood into the victim’s open
mouth as they die from blood loss.
Whichever is true, they won’t fully
turn until they feed upon that first
victim of their own…
✦ There are supposedly also vampires
who are more like animals than
humans. Their appearances diverge
greatly. Some have wings while
others walk on all fours. They are
said to have abilities that are more
like physical and natural abilities than
the powers that the more human-like
vampires possess. Walking vertically
up or down a wall, blending into
the environment like a chameleon,
or flying (with wings) are typical
examples of such abilities.
  
Vampire mechanics
The many varieties of Vampires are so different among
themselves, as each human being is different from the others.
Not only many Vampire species exist, but during their
centuries-long lives all the Vampires inevitably develop specific
properties, creating new bloodlines and vampire types, as they
spread the curse. The stats reported in Lex Libris p.219-221
represent a relatively strong and expert vampire, with many
skills and powers, accumulated through centuries of un-life, but
not all vampires are so strong. A recently created vampire tends
to have the same skill set as it had during its mortal life (with a
few exceptions, suggested below) but later, with the experience
of their long lives, those skill values naturally improve. On the
other hand, even the newly created vampire will have almost
all, if not all, the common properties shown below.
What follows are just a few generic guidelines, followed
by typical stats for young (or “common” or “servant”)
vampires (useful also for hordes of lesser vampires) and
older (or “leader” or “elder”) vampires. Off course the GM is
encouraged to personalize them according to the story needs
and the empower the stats of special individuals.
Guidelines for creating a vampire
✦ Traits: Use these traits or apply them to modify the old
stats which the vampire had during its life.
✦ Physical Health Points: 32-80. At the beginning the PHP
tend to be almost the same that the vampire had in life but
modified by the new Constitution trait. As the vampire
becomes older these PHP seem to unnaturally increase, as
their bodies are getting more used to the new situation.
✦ Mental Health Points: 32-100. Like the PHP, the MHP of
a newly made vampire are identical to those it had in life
but modified by the new Psyche. They will increase later in
the un-life of the vampire, as it gets older.
✦ Movement: walking 2 CP per 1 m (Max 10 + 1 per
Dexterity modifier).
✦ Fear Factor: Depending on the age of the vampire and how
much it looks monstrous. This Fear factor must be applied
when the witnesses realizes that the human being in front
of him is a vampire (for example, looking at it is feeding off
a victim). In fact, many vampires (unless they are too pale
or bestial in appearances) try to pass as mortals, therefore
the Fear Factor should not be applied.
✦ Skills: old vampires (like the one on Lex Libris p.219) have
many skills improved through the centuries. Recently made
vampires keep the same skills they had in life. However,
there are also “minimum values” equal to those shown
below in the “Young Vampire” entry. If the recently made
vampires have lower values in those skills (or disciplines
and specialties) these are mystically raised to meet the
minimum shown below. These “minimum” values can be
used for the “common, basic vampire” (but not for more
powerful individuals, like the one in the “Old Vampire”
entry below, or the one in Lex Libris p. 219 or others
created by the GM).
✦ Natural Weapons: Most Vampires have bodies which,
least apparently, resemble “normal” human being, except
for re-tractable fangs (which are easy to hide). See the
optional properties for “Claws” (which are not typical of
all vampires).
✦ Bite: (Dmg 1d10 OR 9-10 but without Constitution bonus).
The Bite cannot be inflicted as an independent attack roll
but will automatically succeed after a successful wrestling
(see “Vampyr’s Bite” among Common Properties).
✦ Unarmed Attacks: Vampires, like mortal human beings,
can use unarmed attacks like fists and kicks, dealing 1d6
damage (+ Constitution bonus) since they tend to have the
Brawling specialty.
✦ Properties: Young Vampires rarely have more than the
“Common Properties” shown below. On the other hand,
older Vampires will have at least one (if not many more) of
the Optional Properties.
✦ Power Spheres: It is not unheard for Vampire to have
values in Power Spheres. Vampires are dependent on human
victims therefore they either stalk on them or they infiltrate
human society. In this latter case, Vampires tend to create 199
bonds using their seductive abilities, taking therefore parts
in the mortal Power Spheres. In any case, it is important to
remember that many Vampire purposively avoid doing so,
in order not to have trouble in case somebody notices how
odd they behave (like appearing only during the night or
never ageing).
Young (or Servant) vampire typical stats
Traits: Constitution +2, Dexterity +2, Perception +2, Psyche
+2.
Physical Health Points: 30-45 (34 is a common value).
Physical Damage levels: (for 34 PHP): 1-11 (0) / 12-19 (-1)
/ 20-24 (-3) / 25-29 (-5) / 30-34 (-7)
Mental Health Points: 30-45 (34 is a common value).
Mental Damage levels: (for 34 PHP): 1-11 (0) / 12-19 (-1) /
20-24 (-3) / 25-29 (-5) / 30-34 (-7)
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 9-10).
Skills: Agility SV 7, Body Control 1 (Evade 2, Parkour 2)
Communication SV 7, Rhetoric 1 (Persuasion 2).
Fighting SV 8, Close Combat Weapons 1, Ranged
Weapons 1, Unarmed Fighting 2 (Brawling 2,
Wrestling 2).
Stealth SV 8, Avoidance 1 (Hiding & Camouflage 2,
Sneaking 2), Detection 3.
Initiative: +2 Dexterity
Combat points: Free 8 / Close Combat 1 / Ranged 1 /
Unarmed Combat 2 (Brawling 4, Wrestling 4) / Evade 12.
 Sample Equipment:
✦ Decent Dagger or Knife (IM -2, WA 4, OM 0, BP 12, dmg
1d10 (OR 10) +2 Constitution).
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM +0) Dagger SV 9.
✦ (IM +2) Brawling (or Claw, if present, see optional
properties) SV 14
✦ (IM +2) Wrestling SV 7 (CP cost x 2 as per Lex Libris
p.19) + Vampyr’s Bite
✦ (IM +2) Evade SV 12
Older (or Leader) vampire typical stats
Traits: Constitution +6, Dexterity +4, Intelligence +4,
Perception +2, Psyche +4.
Physical Health Points: 32-80 (50 is a common value).
Physical Damage levels: (for 50 PHP): 1-16 (0) / 17-28 (-1)
/ 29-38 (-3) / 39-44 (-5) / 45-50 (-7)
Mental Health Points: 40-100 (65 is a common value).
Mental Damage levels: (for 65 MHP): 1-21 (0) / 22-38 (-1) /
39-52 (-3) / 53-61 (-5) / 62-65 (-7)
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 7-10).
Skills: Agility SV 10, Body Control 2 (Evade 3, Parkour 3)
Communication SV 10, Rhetoric 3 (Persuasion 3).
Fighting SV 10, Battle Experience 3 (Combat
Actions 3, Combat Reactions 3), Close Combat
Weapons 3 (One-Handed Right weapons 3),
200 Ranged Weapons 3 (Pistols 1) Unarmed Fighting 3
(Brawling 3, Wrestling 4).
Stealth SV 10, Avoidance 2 (Hiding & Camouflage
2, Sneaking 4), Detection 3 (Detect Hidden 5,
Observation 5).
Initiative: +13 (+4 Dexterity, +3 Battle Experience, +6
Combat Reaction)
Combat points: Free 13 / Close Combat 3 (1H Right weapons
6) / Ranged 3 (Pistols 2) / Unarmed Combat 3 (Brawling 6,
Wrestling 8) / Evade 18.
Sample Equipment:
✦ Decent Dagger (IM -2, WA 4, OM 0, BP 12, dmg 1d10 (OR
10) +6 Constitution);
✦ Excellent Sabre (IM -4, WA 3, OM +2, BP 16, dmg 1d10
(OR 9-10) +6 Constitution);
✦ Excellent Light Pistol (IM -2. P/T 1/4, M 20, OM +2,
Dmg 1d10 (OR 10), Range 0-8/8-15).
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM +11) Dagger SV 15, SV 7.
✦ (IM +9) Excellent Sabre SV 12, SV 10, SV 6 (OM +2 SV
already calculated).
✦ (IM +11) Light Pistol SV 18
✦ (IM +13) Brawling (or Claw, if present, see optional
properties) SV 15, SV 10
✦ (IM +13) Wrestling SV 11 (CP cost x 2 as per Lex Libris
p.19) + Vampyr’s Bite.
✦ (IM +13) Evade SV 18 or two Evade attempts SV 10 and
SV 8.
Common Properties
The following “common” properties are held by all vampires,
whether they are young or old. The use of these esoteric
abilities is what set every young vampire apart from common
human beings, even if their basic “combat stats” may seem low.
Blood Healing
A Vampire does not heal through normal ways: it needs blood.
Any taste of blood (see “Vampyr’s Bite” property) will heal
½ (rounded down) of the damage inflicted to the victim with
a minimum of 1 point. For the sake of “Vampyr’s Bite” both
the initial bite damage and the continuous damage of the
following rounds will count.
Daily Slumber
Most Vampires are allergic to the sun (see vulnerabilities),
therefore during the day they will remain in their lairs (or
coffins or whatever) in a status of slumber. Even those with
the “Day Walker” property (see below, among optional
properties) need to sleep like this for a few hours per day.
While in this status they are extremely lethargic and to
wake up they need to succeed a Situation Roll with an SV
of 10 (modified by Psyche). If they do not wake up, they are
extremely vulnerable, if someone knows how to kill a Vampire.
The “Hit the Weak Spot” (for Decapitation or Heart-Staking)
can be attempted without spending the surplus 10 CP.
Vampires know how dangerous this situation can be for
them: this is the reason why their lairs are always well-hidden,
often protected by servants and slaves.
Eternal Thirst
The Vampire must continuously feed from blood since its
existence depends on blood. Every week the Vampire must
drink a quantity of blood equal to ¼ of its own PHP (rounded
down, with a minimum of 1). If the week passes without
consuming enough blood, the Vampire will suffer a damage to
its PHP equivalent to the PHP which he has not drunk blood.
Furthermore, Vampire cannot resist the urge to feed from
blood, especially when they are wounded or have not feed
for a long time. The GM may allow a Situation Roll with SV
10 (modified by the Vampire’s Psyche) but with -1 negative
modifier per day passed without feeding (in the case of a
wounded Vampire or of a Vampire which has not drunk blood
in a week).
Immortal Parasite
If it keeps on feeding from human blood the Vampire will
not age and therefore cannot die of decrepitude (see “Eternal
Thirst”). It is also immune to diseases and it will always
remain as it was the day that it became a Vampire.
A Vampire reduced to “0” PHP with no blood nourishment
will die, usually turning to dust or, in rare cases, just bones.
Exceptions are those few powerful Vampire having the
“Hibernation” or “Return” optional properties.
Imperturbable
Vampires have mental damage levels, but they rarely suffer any
damage to them. They are so used to death, carnage, darkness
and terrible visions that they can ignore most Fear Factors.
The MHP are here given only to allow the GM inflicting
mental damage to Vampires only in exceptional cases (like
damage dealt by Dark Arts, by Sacred Objects, etc.).
Night Senses
A vampire’ senses are enhanced in a way which is impossible
to believe for normal human beings. They will automatically
succeed most “sense” rolls, without any need of making skill
or situation rolls. They can track their victims in situations
which are impossible for common hunters.
Finally, a Vampire can see in the dark as if it were day.
Protection
Vampires are tough and incredibly resistant to normal
damage. Normal weapons deal only 1/3 damage (rounded
down, to a minimum of 1). See “Vulnerabilities” for possible
exceptions.
Spreading Vampirism
Whatever the legends say, those killed or simply bittern by a
Vampire are not transformed in Vampires themselves. If this
was true, the world would have been dominated by Vampires
centuries ago. To become a Vampire a proper ritual is due.
Usually the victim must be drained of all its blood and must
drink a drop of the master’s blood. According to others one
should be bitten three nights in sequence and be fed blood the
fourth night. Some scholars think that only certain bloodlines
can produces vampires and other stories speak about obscure
pacts with obscene pagan gods which are nothing but
masqueraded demons. Whatever the truth and the exact
nature of the ritual (both to be established by the GM), the new
Vampire will usually become a servant to its sire and master.
Vulnerabilities
The following vulnerabilities are just the most common ones
among Vampires. All Vampires should suffer all, if not almost
all the following.
Vampire in “Daily Slumber” or “Hibernation” are vulnerable:
see the specific property. If the hibernated vampire is found,
it can be permanently killed by being burned, decapitated or
staked with wooden stake through the heart or if the heart
itself is removed.
✦ Properties like “Hibernation” or “Return” cannot be used
if the PHP are reduced to 0 by a final blow with one of
the special attacks or the special weapons mentioned in this
list.
✦ Vampires are extremely allergic to Garlic. To be in presence
of 1 kg of garlic will inflict 1 PHP per action round to
the Vampire (more Garlic will inflict more damage). In
addition, the GM may inflict other effects as mild as a small
penalty (- 1 SV to all skill rolls) or the impossibility to
pass unless the Vampire succeeds a Situation Roll of SV 8
(modified by Psyche).
✦ Holy Water will inflict 1d6 MHP per 10 cc.
✦ The presence of crucifixes and holy relics may block
Vampire’s manipulative properties as “Seduction” or
“Thought Control”, giving -5 to a Vampire’s SV and +5 to
victim’s SV. If these objects are in the hand of an ordained
priest, the modifier may raise to -8 and +8. The GM may
allow similar bonuses for individuals with strong faith or
true love.
✦ To be in presence of a Cross will inflict 1d3 MHP to a
Vampire or 1d6 MHP, if held by a Priest. In some cases, if
the Vampire touches the Crucifix, this damage will be dealt
to both PHP and MHP
✦ To come nearer to the cross held by a Priest requires the
Vampire to succeed a Situation Roll of SV 10 (modified by
Psyche).
✦ Vampires are night creatures. Direct Exposition to the
Sunlight will always cause them 1d10 damage per round
to both MHP and PHP, until they are turned to dust.
However, some exception to this rule exist (see “Day
Walker” optional property).
✦ Vampires are vulnerable to Fire. Not only it will ignore
their “Protection” property, but the damage will also be 201
multiplied x 2. For example, hitting a Vampire with a
flaming torch or a lantern will deal it 1d6 damage, to be
multiplied x2.
✦ A “sacred” weapon will ignore the “Protection” property
and, in addition to the PHP damage, it will also inflict 1/2
(rounded down to a minimum of 1) of the same damage to
the MHP of the Vampire. What is to be defined as a “Sacred
Weapon” is more complicated. Ancient holy relics in the
form of weapons (e.g. the sword of a famous crusader) or
a weapon blessed with a Divine Art (e.g. the “Merovingian
Sword” in the Gargoyle chapter of this book or the “Spiked
Cross of Huet” in Lex Libris p.233) are definitively “Sacred
Weapons”. On the other hand, weapons blessed by a simple
priest may be treated as full “Sacred Weapons” only against
Vampires which are particularly susceptible to the Christian
faith or, in alternative, they can treat the “Protection” as
reducing the damage only to 1/2 instead of 1/3.
✦ Vampires cannot touch silver. Close contact will
immediately cause pain (1 PHP damage). A silver weapon
(bullet, blade, arrowhead, etc.) will ignore the “Protection”
property and, in addition to the PHP damage, it will also
inflict 1/2 (rounded down to a minimum of 1) of the same
damage to the MHP of the Vampire.
✦ Stabbing a Vampire with a wooden stake through the
Heart will kill it. According to some legends the stake
must also be blessed or to be in Oak, Ash, Hawthorn,
Aspen or Maple (the GM decides what works). Use the
 “Hitting the Weak Spot” rules. In case of success the
Vampire will be turned to dust. More powerful Vampires
are not killed by this process but only immobilized until
the stake is removed (a Decapitation will usually end the
Vampire’s un-life in any case).
✦ Decapitating a Vampire will immediately kill it. Use the
“Hitting the Weak Spot” rules.
Vampyr’s Bite
The Attack
Since Vampires have human-like bodies, Bites cannot be
attempted as specific attacks (unless the Vampire has a more
bestial body). On the other hand, if a Vampire wins a Grapple
(Wrestling rolls as per Lex Libris p.19), it will automatically
inflict its Bite in the same round. The same can be done on or
sleeping or otherwise unconscious victims.
A willing victim (maybe because it has been convinced
through the “Seduction” or “Thought Control” optional
properties) will also automatically receive the bite.
When the bite hits, it inflicts the base Bite damage (1d10
OR 9-10 in the generic stats above) unless the Vampire
deliberatively restrains itself (inflicting only 1 PHP or 1d5
PHP). It will also inflict the “Ecstasy” property (see below)
and usually the “Blood Sucking” also immediately starts (see
below).
202
The Ecstasy
Once the victim is bitten, it will fall into a comatose status
of ecstasy: any resistance against the blood-sucking will
cease. The victim is usually fallen into a simple, hypnotic
kind of slumber, although in some cases it can be treated as a
“sleepwalking”: the victim will just go wherever the vampire
will tell it to go or, more frequently, it will just remain still,
while the monster drains all the blood.
This “ecstatic” status will last for 1d6 hours (modified by
the Vampire’s Psyche). Many victims will be dead long before
the ecstasy expires, although less bestial and expert vampires
know how to feed small quantities of blood from victims, in
order to make them also addicted to the feeling.
Only particularly strong-willed victims (Psyche +1 or
more) can try to resist the Ecstasy: when the Bite is inflicted
a Situation Roll of 8 (modified by Psyche) can be attempted to
resist the Ecstasy and to keep on fighting against the Vampire.
Off course, if the victim is not fallen into Ecstasy, later Bites in
later rounds will require new Situation Rolls.
It is worth noting that if a victim is bitten while it sleeps,
it usually cannot resist the Ecstasy, not even in the case of
positive Psyche modifiers.
Blood-Sucking
Once the Bite is successful, the Vampire cannot do any other
action in the same round (not even Evading attacks) since it
will immediately starts sucking the blood.
During the following rounds, if the vampire does no other
actions (and if it is not interrupted before its turn in the action
round), the blood-sucking will continue inflicting 1d5 PHP
(or just 1PHP at vampire’s choice) per round.
The sucked blood will heal and nourish the Vampire (see
“Blood Healing”, “Eternal Thirst” & “Immortal Parasite”
properties above).
Optional Properties
Bestial magnetism
Some Vampires may have an odd magnetism, which may
passively attract people, even without the Vampire actively
using powers like “Seduction”. All the individuals which
meet the Vampire should succeed a Situation Roll with SV
12 (modified by Psyche) or fall in love or even feel intense
sexual desire towards the Vampire or, in alternative, feel
subjection and fascination for this individual. This property is
particularly appropriate for stories where the presence of the
Vampire is linked with depravation, debauchery and the fall
of morality in an otherwise “respectable” village or quarter.
Bestial Weapons
Some Vampires have larger fangs (or larger claws, if they have
that properties) raising the OR range of their natural weapons’
damage by one step. Consequently, Bites deal 1d10 (OR 8-10)
and Claws deal 1d10 (OR 9-10) + Constitution bonus. These
larger natural weapons are usually difficult to hide or to be
retracted. The Vampire appear more bestial and its bite may
be so painful that its victims (whatever their Psyche modifier)
will always roll for resist the Ecstasy but with +5 SV.
Blood Slavery
Feeling the Ecstasy of the Bite may be an addiction for
some victims and Vampire know it. After a certain number
of feedings, the Vampire may decide to make a victim a
permanent slave by making it drink a single drop of their
blood. This is not enough to make the victim a Vampire, but
will make it immortal to decrepitude, if their Master will give
them 1 drop of blood every Full Moon. To avoid becoming a
Slave the victim must succeed a Situation Roll with a SV of
10, modified by Psyche, but also diminished by the number
of Bites that the victim received from the Vampire in the past
month.
Boneless
The vampire’s bones can be turned to gelatin or disappear at
the Vampire’s will. This means that it can pass through small
spaces which would be otherwise inaccessible. The bones will
turn on a solid status when the Vampire wants.
Breath of Death
By doing nothing else in the same round, up to three times
per night, the Vampire can emit mephitic smokes and black
acidic vapors from its mouth. All the victims in front of the
creature will suffer 2d10 (OR 8-10) PHP damage. This attack
cannot be parried but can be avoided with a successful Evade
maneuver.
Breath Drinker
Some traditional Vampires have a variant of the “Breath
Sucker” property (see below). Instead of (or in addition to)
feeding from blood, the Vampire is sustained by the Breath
that is stolen from a victim. Use the same mechanics of the
“Breath Sucker” property but, in case of failure, the victim will
not die but will suffer 1d10 (OR 10) PHP which will count
as “Blood” for the sakes of property like “Blood Healing” and
“Eternal Thirst”.
Breath Sucker
This terrible property can be used on sleeping victims or if
the vampires manage to press its mouth on the victim’s face
(usually after a successful Grapple, as per Lex Libris p.19).
The Vampire will literally suck the breath off the victim,
forcing the victim’s lungs or throat to act as if they were
drowning. The Victim must make a Situation Roll with SV
equal to 10 modified by Constitution to force themselves to
breath.
Failure usually means a horrible death unless one has the
Diving specialty of the Agility skill. In this case, the victim
can make a skill roll to hold their breaths for another round
as per usual rules (see “Diving” in Alter Ego p.63) and try
another Situation Roll to breath. Every round in which they
succeed the Agility Skill roll (with usual penalties) they can
make a new Situation Roll to try to breath. If the Agility Skill
Roll is failed, they just drown and die
Chameleon
This Vampire can change the colors of its body and even of its
clothing, matching those of the surroundings. Those who try
to spot the vampire through either Situation Rolls and Skill
Rolls (e.g. a Stealth skill roll with the Detection discipline and
related specialties) will suffer a -5 SV.
Claws
Only the more bestial Vampires have claws, although a few
expert Vampires have developed the ability to eject and
retract talons inside their fingers. This ability may or may
not be spread among their spawn. It is totally up the GM
to decide, according to the specific kind of Vampire one is
designing.
Claws may remain fixed or can be retracted. They deal
1d10 (OR 10) damage + the constitution bonus and can be
used with the Brawling specialty of fighting.
Command Animals
Some Vampires have direct command on animals, usually
swarms of rats, insects, bats or packs of wolves.
Dark Sorcery
Some ancient Vampires develop sorcerous abilities and
powers. To mimic them the GM may choose some Dark
Art or apply supernatural properties from other monsters
like Witch Spawn, Ghosts & Spirits (including Spirit of
Death & Vengeance), Mummy and Anubi (Ancient Sorcery).
It is recommended not to choose more than 1-3 abilities
and treat them like spells. This is not a high fantasy game
where sorcerers cast multiple spells: each power should be
memorable and dramatic.
Day Walker
Some Vampires are not damaged by the sun, although this rare
capacity tend to be typical of only a few, ancient specimens of
this cursed race. The sun is still a bother to them (inflicting -5
SV to all skill and situation rolls) but they are not damaged.
Some incredibly ancient elders (maybe several millennia old)
are said to be able to act as normal human beings under the
sun: they are immune even to that SV penalty.
Death Feeder
Some Vampires in the European traditions do not feed off
flesh or blood, but they are kept alive by killing victims, often
through suffocation (e.g. the “Breath-Sucker” property) or
other painful and gruesome means. They do this either to
“feed” some ancient pagan god of Death or demon, or they do
it because they feed from the terror released by their victims 203
in their final moments. Whatever the mythic reason behind
this property, each killing will give the Vampire an amount
of theoretical “blood” (as per the “Blood Healing and the
“Eternal Thirst” properties) equal to 1/2 (rounded down) the
PHP of the killed victim.
Dream Seduction
Very powerful Vampires can attempt the “Seduction” optional
property by psychically visiting a victim in the dreams.
How far the Vampire can be from the victim depends on the
Vampire’s power, although they rarely can influence those
who are father than a few kilometers. The Vampire should
have met the victim at least once, even if briefly (although
very powerful Vampires can even not meet this requirement).
Use the same mechanics of “Seduction” but usually the
rolls are made after several nights of Dream Seduction. On
the other hand, the victims of a Dream Seduction tend to have
a stronger bond with the Vampire, and it may last longer.
After a month or more of dream seduction, very old
Vampires can try to impose also a kind of mental slavery not
unlike what is presented in the “Blood Slavery” property (use
the same mechanics).
Dream Vampire
Some rare Vampires can visit a victim in a dream and drain
it of its energies. This is a rare power (subject to limitation
shown also in the “Dream Seduction” property). The victim
 must succeed in a Situation Roll with an SV of 12 modified by
Psyche. In case of failure it will wake up with a damage of 1d6
MHP (the Vampire will get nourishment from this, as if it was
Blood in the “Blood Healing” property).
Energy Drainer
Some very rare Vampires are not nourished by blood but by
the mental and spiritual energies. Resolve the three “Vampyr’s
Bite” properties as usual but the damage is in MHP rather than
in PHP. The Vampire does not really bite but, after having
embraced (or successfully grappled) a victim, it can drain the
victim’s energies by strict eye contact, kiss or some other close-
contact mean. The amount of damage dealt in MHP is the same
that a “Bite” and a “Blood-Sucking” inflicts in PHP.
Mentions of “Blood” in any other property should be
substituted with Mental Energy”.
A Vampire with the “Energy Drainer” property may or
may not have fangs and a bite attack. Other, rare, vampires
drain both blood (PHP) and energy (MHP).
Other Vampires have this property linked with the “Mental
Attack” property which they use to drain victims of their
MHP.
Flesh Eater
Some bestial Vampires are not nourished just by blood. They
need to eat their victims, sometimes even when these are still
204 alive. They usually have rows of sharp teeth (often coupled with
the “Bestial Weapons” property). Every property speaking
about “blood” should include also flesh. Regarding the three
“Vampyr’s Bite” properties make the following changes:
✦ The Attack: no change, but the Vampire cannot retrain
itself.
✦ The Ecstasy: usually does not happen, since the victims
are “eaten alive” and keep on fighting.
✦ The Blood Sucking: the vampire does not suck but keep
on inflicting the same Bite damage, as it devours its victim.
Fly
The vampire can fly. If it has no wing, it will possibly levitate
(2 CP per 2 m, Max 30 m). In the case of wings, it depends on
their forms, if they have used the “Metamorphism” property.
A bat or a bird will fly as the corresponding animal but a
huge, bat-human hybrid with wings instead of arms can fly at
something like 2 CP per 6 m, Max 30 m.
Hibernation
This property is typical of older and more powerful vampires.
Young or lesser vampires rarely have it. If the Vampire’s PHP
are reduced to “0” the creature will not die but it will fall on
hibernation until new blood will be fed on it (or until some
ritual action is performed to permanently kill the vampire, see
Vulnerabilities). Treat this condition as the “Daily Slumber”
property.
Sometimes very old Vampires will heal through hibernation,
albeit at very slow healing rates, taking years, if not centuries,
to come back to a minimum of 1 to 5 PHP (and with a new
thirst for more blood).
The Hibernation is not triggered if the PHP are reduced to
0 by the special attacks mentioned among the Vulnerabilities.
Horrid
A normal human being cannot stand the vision of this
monstrous Vampire. This property may be caused by
incredibly bestial and inhuman appearances, or maybe it is just
an unnatural and mystical aura which surrounds the creature,
causing uncomfortable feelings to all those who are present.
In the better cases this property raises the OR range of the
basic Fear Factor of the Vampire: young vampires deal 1d10
(OR 8-10) MHP and older vampire deal 1d10 (6-10) MHP.
In the worst case the simple vision of this Vampire causes
not just fear (the MHP damage) but also forces to make a
Situation Roll with an SV of 10 (modified by Psyche) for
avoiding fleeing in terror or to remain paralyzed for 1d6
rounds. The situation roll is made after the Fear and therefore
it is modified by any change in mental health.
Incredible Traits
Some Vampires, especially old ones, may have one or two
incredible traits at +8. Remember that changing each trait has
its own consequence: Constitution is added to damage, Dexterity
to the IM, Charisma may change the “Seduction” and similar
properties, while Psyche may make the Ecstasy to last longer.
Immune to Pain
Some old Vampires are so used to their unnatural lives that
they will not suffer any modifier from pain and anguish.
Damage Levels are not recorded for these individuals. The
GM establishes whether this work only for the PHP or also
(more rarely) for the MHP.
Invisibility
This rare power will make the vampire completely invisible.
It can be spotted (at GM’s judgment) only by the sounds it
emits (and it rarely emits any sound while walking). On the
other hand, this property may not work in holy ground or if
in presences of crucifixes or garlic.
Mental Attack
If it does not perform any other action, the Vampire can fix
its eyes on a single victim which is in its visual range, causing
terrible mental pain by telepathic oppression. The victim
must make a Situation Roll with an SV of 10 (modified by
Psyche) or suffer 1d10 (OR 7-10) damage in MHP.
Mental Slaver
If it does not perform any other action, the Vampire can
fix its eyes on a single victim which is in its visual range.
The Victim must succeed a Situation Roll with an SV of
12 (modified by Psyche) or suffer 1d10 (OR 10) MHP.
If the victim reaches the 5th level of Mental Damage
(“Insanabilis”) after one or more of these mental attacks,
the Vampire takes possession of the victim’s body. As long
as the Vampire does not perform any other action, it can
keep on controlling the victim’s body as if it was its own.
The GM decides when the slavery ends (by killing the
Vampire or just by distracting it).
Very ancient vampires deal higher mental damage (1d10
OR 9-10 or even 1d10 OR 8-10) and do not need to focus in
order to control the victim.
Metamorphism
Some Vampires can turn into animals like bats, wolves, owls,
moths, black stallions or other horrifying beasts. The GM
establish whether these are basic forms or powered-up forms
(the “different sizes” property in the Lycanthrope chapter may
help creating the specific form). Usually the Vampire will,
in any case, keep its own PHP and MHP.
Mortal Servants
Some long-living vampires do not need to exercise their
powers to find mortal servants. There may be groups and
families or clans which have allied themselves with the
Vampire so long ago and their descendants are still in league
with the monster, usually in exchange of protection or power
which they will otherwise not have.
Necromancer
Some powerful Vampires can command Ghosts, Specters or
Zombies. See also the stats of the minion spirits in the “Spirit
Leader” variation of the Spirits of Death & Vengeance chapter.
Natural Climber
This Vampire never fail a roll to climb. Furthermore, it can
climb almost vertical walls and even horizontal ceilings.
Paralyzing Stare
If the Vampire does nothing else but staring at the victim’s
eyes, the target must succeed a Situation Roll with an SV
of 7 modified by Psyche. In case of failure it will remain
paralyzed for 1d6 action rounds: it cannot move or try to
parry or evade the Vampire’s attacks. The victim will wake
up before the end of the established round (if still alive) only
after suffering damage from the creature (if not fallen victim
to the Ecstasy).
Plague Spreading
Whether it is because of the evil aura which surrounds them or
because of the rat swarms which follow them, these Vampire
can spread plagues. Vampires are, off course, immune to the
diseases that they spread. The GM should not just decide
which plague is spread, but he must also decide whether this
is transmitted by the Bite, contact with the Vampire or just by
the presence of the creature in an area. Possible suggestions
for this disease can be found in the descriptions of the
following monsters: Homunculus (Poison & Diseases optional
property), Mummy (Plague-Spreader property), Specters &
Wraiths (Breath of Disease).
Regeneration
The Vampire regenerates 1 lost PHP every other action
round.
Return
When reduced to “0” PHP the Vampire will immediately turn
to smoke (like a quicker version of “Transmogrification”)
only to re-appear in its lair. This Vampire will typically also
have the “Regeneration” property or, otherwise, it will need
months to slowly regenerate unless, off course, it can feed on
the blood of a victim.
The “Return” property is not triggered if the PHP are
reduced to 0 by some of the special attacks mentioned among
the Vulnerabilities.
Seduction
A Vampire can use its unnatural magnetism to seduce a victim,
although this require some time to be spent in conversation or
similar close contact. The GM decides how long it does take,
whether it’s minutes or hours, according to the situation. This 205
property is more common that “Thought Control” (which
should be reserved to elder or more expert vampires).
The Vampire must make a successful Communication
roll to attempt this property. If this skill roll is successful,
the victim must make a Situation Roll with a SV of 10,
modified by Psyche (option: if the vampire has a Positive
Charisma modifier, the GM may reduce the victim’s Psyche
modifier by the amount of the Vampire’s Charisma). In
case of failure, the victim will be slowly seduced and will
fall in love with the Vampire. For how long it is up to the
GM, although the Vampire will usually just immediately
approach the victim and Bite it. The Victim will not resist,
neither it will possibly remember to have been bitten (in
case of survival).
Older Vampires are smart and prefer stable blood sources,
keeping these “amours” for sometimes before draining them
completely (or making the become Vampires themselves). If
a Seduction is successful, any further attempt at seducing it
will benefit from a modifier of +1 SV (for the Vampire) and
-1 SV (for the victim) per past successful Seduction. In case
of failed Seduction of all past modifiers will be nullified. See
“Vulnerabilities” for limits to this property.
Sight Control
A Vampire can create visive illusions, deciding what a victim
can see and not see. This ability can be resisted wit ha SV of
8, modified by Psyche.
 Teleportation
A few rare, powerful Vampires can teleport between different
places. However, unless they are particularly old, they can do
it only rarely (maybe once per week), sometimes with a cost
in PHP.
Terrifying Screech
If they do nothing else in the round, some Vampires can
emit terrifying screeches inflicting 1d10 (OR 8-10) of mental
damage.
Thick Skin
Some bestial Vampire have thicker skins giving 2 to 4 points
of Natural Protection. This is not typical of the Vampires
which infiltrate the society, since this leathery skin clearly
does not look human at all.
Transmogrification
If this Vampire spends 1 whole action round doing nothing
else but focusing, it will turn into fog, smoke, dust or even
just a shadow, and therefore it will be able to run away, only to
return to physical form after 1d10 minutes.
Thought Control
Elder vampires with not time or patience to spend with the
“seduction” property, will often use more powerful techniques.
206 They can command victims to do as their wish just with their
superior psychic power and unnatural hypnotic capabilities.
The victim must succeed a Situation Roll with an SV of 8
(modified by Psyche). In case of failure, the victim will do a
single action as the Vampire says, as if they were puppets.
Very ancient vampires can take control of a victim’s actions
for 1d10 hours, but this is incredibly rare.
See “Vulnerabilities” for limits to this property.
Vulnerabilities (Other).
What follows is a list of other possible vulnerabilities or
powered-up versions of the basic vulnerabilities. The GM
should apply them only if these make sense to the specific
Vampire’ story.
✦ Do not reflect any images in mirrors.
✦ Do not cast shadows.
✦ Cannot cross running water.
✦ Cannot enter a Church or other Holy Ground.
✦ Cannot act on Saturdays or Sundays.
✦ Cannot cross lines of thorns, ivy, hawthorn, wolfsbane or
any other specific herd chosen by the GM.
✦ Arithmomania: the Vampire feels the compulsive need to
count things and therefore it cannot pass through a place
without counting all the single pieces of a specific element.
There are different legends on the matter using millet,
beans or grains thrown on the ground to block a Vampire.
In some legends the same effect is caused by leaving a
broom resting on a door: the vampire will be obliged to
count all the single threads of the broom before entering
an area.
✦ Garlic does not simply cause damage (as in the basic
vulnerability) but the Vampire cannot approach it in any
case. No situation roll is allowed.
✦ Cannot pass the threshold of a house, unless invited.
✦ Holy Water will inflict 1d10 (OR 10) per 10 cc in both
MHP and PHP.
✦ To be in presence of a Cross will inflict 1d10 MHP to a
Vampire or 1d10 (OR 9-10) MHP, if held by a Priest. To come
nearer to the cross held by a Priest requires the Vampire to
succeed a Situation Roll of SV 6 (modified by Psyche).
✦ Some Vampires are so terrified by the Cross that they must
succeed a Situation Roll of SV 10 (modified by Psyche) or be
reduced in ash if a Cross is shown at them at close distance.
✦ A Mirror repels the Vampire, or it is treated like a Cross.
✦ A Lycanthrope’s Bite will automatically kill the Vampire.
✦ It can feed only on specific victims (like young virgins,
Christians, aristocracy, those guilty of mortal sin, etc.).
Furthermore, there are dozens of legends and superstitions
about how to properly kill a Vampire (hopefully one which is
blocked in “Daily Slumber” or “Hibernation”) or to avoid a
corpse to raise as a Vampire beyond the commonly-known
methods (Decapitation, Fire, Heart-Staking). A very short list
of possible suggestion is here proposed, but it is up to the GM
to establish what works and what does not work, according to
the specific mythology of the area.
✦ Put a large stone on the chest.
✦ Pierce the skull/the eyes/ fingers with an iron spike, nail
or thorns.
✦ Put small stones or garlic and salt in the mouth, ears or
nose.
✦ Damage to walking abilities (cutting the heels, piercing the
knees or the feet soles with thorns, bind the legs).
✦ Tie the hands on the back.
✦ Bury the deceased face-down.
✦ Fill the coffin with garlic, millet, ivy or roses
✦ Put the head on the knees or cutting the head and put it
between the legs.
Vampire Variations
Raspail
These (usually Russian or vaguely Eastern European)
vampires like to blend in human society and seduce to kill.
They are known for their many supernatural abilities. Adapt
optional properties are: Bestial Magnetism, Blood Slavery,
Day Walker, Seduction and Dream Seduction. Some have
Paralyzing Stare or even more terrible properties like Mental
Attack or even Mental Slaver.
Nosferatu Empusas
Even if they have a human shape, there are so many bestial They Greek vampires are all female. They are both seducers
or just unnatural traits in the shape of the vampires as well as, terrible shapeshifters with animalistic natures.
which cannot usually easily blend in the society of the The GM may adapt some properties from Lycanthropes or
living. The classic image (as shown in the illustration use Vampire properties like: Metamorphism, Flesh-Eater,
of Lex Libris p.221) is of the bald Vampire with Seduction, Dream Seduction, Dream Vampire, Flesh Eater.
impossibly long fangs and claws, although other varies The most powerful Empusas have varieties of “Return” or
are possible. Most Nosferatu have “Transmogrification” which turn them
some (if not all) of the following into burst of flames (dealing 1d6
properties: Bestial Weapons, PHP damage to all those who
Claws, Command Animals, touch them, before the flame
Horrid, Hibernation, disappears).
Natural Climber, Plague
Spreading, Thick Skin Vrykolakas (traditional)
and Terrifying Screech. Traditionally speaking the
name is used in various
Strigo, Blatsaugers versions throughout
These are bestial the Balkans (Greek
vampires which, unlike “Brukólakas”, Bulgar
the Nosferatu, do not “Vǎrkolak”, Serbian
have any resemblance “Vukodlak”) or in
to normal human nearby areas (like in the
beings. Their bodies “Brucolaco” of Italian
are all skin and bones, Salento). They have
although they display various characteristics.
unnatural strength They may have
and fury. They like to originated from 207
hunt in packs and live excommunicated dead
exactly like animals. (which means they may
Typical properties have stronger religious
are: Bestial Weapons, Vulnerabilities). Other
Claws, Horrid, Immune properties can be: Breath
to Pain, Natural Sucker, Death Feeder, Day
Climber and Terrifying Walker, Energy Drainer,
Screech. Some have Terrifying Screech. Some
Paralyzing Stare property have a special vulnerability:
and others, especially on Saturday they remain
those called “Strigo”, have in their lairs since the
greater versions of the Protection property does not
Vulnerabilities linked with work.
the Christian faith. Some have
the “Flesh Eater”, “Thick Skin” Vrykolakas & Upiors
and “Boneless” properties. In the world of LexOccultum the
word “Vrykolakas” is sometimes used
Moroi, Muli for very old Vampires, usually at least one
The “typical” Romanian and or two millennia old. They are definitively
Transylvanian vampires (at least, according a “Second Generation” of Vampires since they
to some of the “Gothic stories” which will be in have got the curse from the earliest Vampires to
fashion in Europe from the second half of the 18th century wander the earth.
onwards) will belong to aristocratic bloodlines and have The most ancient Vampires are, on the other hand,
mystic powers. Typical properties are: Bestial Magnetism, sometimes called with the word “Upior” (clearly linked with
Blood Slavery, Command Animals, Dark Sorcery, Dream other traditional names of vampires, like the Turkic Ubir
Seduction, Dream Vampire, Mental Slavery, Mortal or the Polich Upier) and these are incredibly old creatures,
Servants, Necromancer, Regeneration, Thought Control. having at least four if not five or six millennia.
 Giving “generic” stats for these very old Vampires is
senseless. Each of them should be a unique individual with
a unique story which the GM is encouraged to create. They
will probably have the most powerful versions of many
properties here presented, or maybe even properties like those
of ancient monsters like Mummies and Anubi. However, these
exceptional Vampires should be indefinitely more powerful,
nearer to ancient pagan gods than to monsters.
A new option: the Dhampyr
Even if possessing seductive properties, most Vampires
are either sterile or have no interest in having real sexual
intercourse with mortals. After all, blood is their only focus
and interest. However, it may happen that a son is born from
a Vampire and a mortal. In the Balkans these characters are
called “Dhampyrs”. They are both feared and respected, since
much power is in their blood.
Every attack that a Dhampyr deals on a Vampire will
bypass the Protection property and any other kind of natural
armor (if present) that a Vampire may have. Furthermore, this
damage cannot be healed by Regeneration (if the Vampire has
this property). Only normal “Blood-Healing” may heal these
wounds.
If the Dhampyr cuts himself causing 1 PHP, it can use its
blood to “poison” a bunch of bullets or arrows or a single
208 bladed weapon. For 24 hours these weapons will also bypass
the Protection property and ignore natural protection or
regeneration that a Vampire may have.
✦ Dhampyrs do not suffer the Fear Factor of Vampires.
✦ On the other hand, to be a Dhampyr is also a curse since it
is almost certain that a Dhampir will become a “Vampyr”
after death. This means that quite often people knowing
the exact legends (especially in the Balkans) will try to stay
away from the Dhampyr and even those who do not know
the legends (especially in Western Europe) will always feel
a sense of “uneasiness” when facing a Dhampyr. This often
translates into a -3 modifier to many social skill rolls. This
also means that Dhampyrs almost never have levels in any
Power Sphere (they cost double during character creation)
✦ It is not recommended to play Dhampyrs as PCs but, if the
GM allows it, at least 30 Creation Points must be spent,
only to be qualified as a Dhampyr.
Vampire-related Secret Arts
There are so many stories about Vampires that it is often
difficult to define some Secret Art which involve all the Vampire
types. However, some Divine Arts are especially useful against
Vampires like the “Spiked Cross of Huet” (Lex Libris p.233),
the “Apostolic Orthodox Confession of Faith” (Lex Libris
p.239). Even Exorcism (Lex Libris p.234) has proved to damage
Vampires which are in the area when the ritual is held.
Vampiris Essentia
New Scientific Art
When Constantinople was sacked by the Crusaders in 1204,
many old books and scrolls were brought to Western Europe,
including an odd manuscript written in Old Syriac, a language
which was mostly obscure in Medieval Europe. Manuscripts
were precious at the time, therefore they were taken although
probably, if the Venetian merchant really knew what unholy
work he was carrying, he would have possibly thrown it in the
depths of the Adriatic Sea. In the 16th century the manuscript
somehow arrived in Vienna, where a renegade Jewish Alchemist,
whose name is nowadays lost, was able to make a translation in
Latin with the title “Vampiris Essentia”. A few copies of the Latin
translation are said to have been spread around Europe, possibly
in the secret libraries of alchemists in Paris and Prague, but
nobody knows the location of the original work in Old Syriac.
The cursed manuscript supposedly contains an alchemical
formula created by pagan Assyrian Sorcerers during the times
of the Old Testament. It promises to grant the powers of the
“Blood Demons” without the side-effects of the vampiric curse,
by applying odd ingredients and rituals of the old pagan religions.
Off course, the whole process is completely immoral and good
Christians should avoid it. Even so, many alchemists have tried
to get this formula, but many copies have disappeared during the
centuries, possibly destroyed by Vampires themselves.
The following stats are for the Latin formula. Nobody
knows how the formula in Old Syriac was, which certainly
held powerful secrets which were not passed into the Latin
version, although coupled with terrible risks, especially for
the eternal soul of the alchemist.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -15.
Requirements
✦ Skill: Science SV 10
✦ Discipline: Transmutation level 3
✦ Specialty: Alchemy level 3
Other Requirements
✦ Healthcare Discipline level 2, Healing Specialty level 2
✦ Esotericism SV 7, Supernatural Beings Discipline level 1,
Left-Hand Path Discipline level 2, Black Magic level 2.
✦ Communication SV 7, Languages Discipline level 1,
Reading & Writing (Latin) level 2.
Material Requirements
✦ The ashes of a real Vampire (one creature = one dose).
✦ A huge quantity of exotic herbs from Middle East,
including frankincense, myrrh and saffron to be treated
through many alchemical processes.
✦ About a litre of a fermented liquid (wine, beer, even vinegar)
which needs to be at least 70 years old. The liquid will be
boiled and reduced in volume.
✦ A lamb to be sacrificed during the longest night of the year
(Winter Solstice) and whose fresh blood must put in the
mixture.
Effect
This art can be attempted only during the Winter Solstice
and it creates a single dose of the alchemical compound. A
failure in the Science skill roll will waste all the ingredients
and it will result into a highly deadly poison which causes
3d10 (OR 9-10) damage in PHP. However, the Alchemist will
not know it until somebody drinks it (is the alchemist if a
player character, the GM should roll the dice in secret, not
the player).
In case of success a dose of the “Vampiris Essentia”
compound will be produced but it must be drunk the same
night (Winter Solstice) in which it is produced.
The one who drinks the compound must make a
Situation Roll with an SV of 10 (modified by Psyche and
Health). In case of success it will get 1d6 properties of
the Vampire whose ashes were used. The GM decides
the properties (typical examples are Night Senses,
Imperturbable, Protection, Seduction, Bestial Magnetism
and Regeneration) but without any need for blood-feeding.
In case of failure, it will get the same properties, but with
the Daily Slumber and Eternal Thirst properties. In effects,
the subject will become a kind of Vampire, without the full
abilities of a Vampire.
Whether the situation roll succeeds or not, any vampire
in the presence of somebody with those properties will
unconsciously feel discomfort and will therefore try to learn
the truth. Violence and vengeance are usually the typical
consequence.
After one year is passed, on the new Winter Solstice,
all the effects of the alchemical compound will disappear,
unless a new ritual is performed and the whole process is
started again.
209
210
 The Zombie
O ut of Egypt, we crossed what felt like never-
ending deserts, the land a harsh crucible that
reflects the heat back at you so it feels akin to
walking through the belly of a furnace. That
is my overriding impression of Africa. At times the sheer
labour of putting one foot in front of another has been nothing
short of hell. The sweat clings to the skin, and the skin itself
feels as though it is tightening and shrivelling to the point that
it can no longer stretch over your bones. But worse by far is
the burning in your lungs that comes with every breath. It
is nothing short of torture. I imagine it is how Dante must
have felt traversing Paradiso and Purgatorio with Virgil,
not that I would dare fashion myself any sort of noble hero.
I am anything but that.
I am an observer.
It is not my intention to meddle in the lives of those I encounter, only
to watch and record what I see.
But I must confess, it is difficult to believe any people can flourish
in these conditions. This place is beyond harsh. It is a brutal kingdom
untouched by what we would term "civilisation", where water is the
most precious commodity. Vast swatches of land were dominated by
211
impenetrable forest and jungle across the Congo basin. After the baking
sun, the miles upon unbroken miles of humid vegetation is anything but
relief. The air, thick with water, burns inside your lungs as you struggle
to walk, knowing that nowhere on this damned earth can offer any sort
of respite.
The people, those few we encounter, do not speak any tongue we share,
and look at me as though I am God-cursed for my pale skin. They
creep forward and touch me, then recoil in horror and the strangeness I
represent. I suffer their curiosities in the hope of learning something, but
I fear there is nothing to be learned from this place. The naked savagery
they display is nothing short of terrifying.
And yet, according to my companion, we are walking through the
birth place of the world as we know it. This strikes me as a fanciful notion,
but stranger things are true of this already strange world of ours.
We have made this our destination because of writings we encountered
in the Alhambra which fascinated me. It was a plea that had gone
ignored for more than fifty years; a missive from the ruling monarch of
Great Ardra. The King begged the Spanish Sovereign to send faithful
men south on holy crusade to put down the uprising of a dark faith
in the neighbouring Kingdom of Dahomey. The plea was emotive,
and filled with unlikely threat, but one word in it caught my intention
sufficiently I believed it worth of investigation: "vodun".
I knew little of Dahomey.
It was a society built, as far as I could tell, upon the backs of slavery
and war, and indeed the largest markets traded in the lives of those
 prisoners unfortunate enough to be captured during the conflicts. Their
souls could be bought for the small price of whiskey and gin, bayonets
and bullets, and trade with Europe was becoming more common.
While the Spanish King, Philip, had ignored the pleas, King Louis
XIV of France had passed an edict that has become known as the
"Code Noir" for this very purpose, forcing slaveholders in French
principalities to convert their slaves to Catholicism, and making it
increasingly difficult for the African people to worship their own deities.
The pessimist in me feels that this form of suppression cannot end well.
It is the hammer of faith used to beat down and rob people of their
heritage; and given the importance of ancestry to those who follow
vodun I can only imagine an uprising as slave turns on master if such
harsh rule is enforced.
And the closer we came to these conflicted territories we came, the
more it felt like we were walking out of the crucible into the fire itself.
We entered the township of Abomey, the royal seat of the Kingdom,
and home of the twelve Royal Palaces spread over some one hundred
acres in a vast show of wealth and power, but it wasn’t the palaces or
the King, Akaba, who fought for control of his own land against the ,
that made Abomey feel so on edge. It was something else entirely. People
talked openly of Omosede, a Caplata.
I did not know the term, but my guide was familiar. “Adherents of
vodun believe there are malevolent spirits contained in the forms of
animals and humans they call "Baka", and male priests, "Bokor", or
female witches, "Caplata", who are capable of taming them, and in this
way capable of welding both light and dark magic.”
212 It can never be good when people look to a priestess capable of taming
malevolent spirits rather than a king to protect them.
I have learned more since my arrival here. There is considerable
tension on the streets. Abomey is a melting pot, and I fear it is about to
simmer over into violence and open rebellion, much as that now dead
Ardan king believed it would. Furthermore, slavery is vastly diffused in
these kingdoms, to satisfy both the local masters and the Europeans who
bring the poors souls in the American colonies.
Vodun is a pantheistic cult, with great reverence for the dead.
There are deities—or the invisibles, as many call them—for every
eventuality, or at least that is how it feels to me. In my time here I
have heard speak of the Mami Wata, who, like Poseidon and Neptune
these people worship as the gods and goddesses of the waters; then there
is Legba, a horned and phallic young trickster god sometimes called
Atibon Legba, who commands all human languages and stands at
the crossroads of life and death, guardian between the invisibles and
humanity able to communicate with both; Ògún Lákáayé, the iron
god, a mighty warrior and patron of war and metal; and the one they
fear the most, Shakpana, who rules diseases as the divinity of smallpox,
capable of inflicting insanity on humans. There are more, of course.
As many as the rational mind is able to think up. My knowledge
barely scratches the surface of these fascinating people. I could spend a
year and a day among them and not come close to appreciating their
connection to the esoteric world, but I am beginning to understand.
The slaves look to Omosede for guidance the way they would any
other spiritual guide, although, as caplata she serves the invisibles with
both hands—that is how they term it here—meaning that she is capable
of great good and great evil with equal ease.
As much as I despise the notion of a man’s life being held in servitude,
no matter the colour of his skin or his fate in war, I dare not say which
she serves now, because surely the loss of life will be beyond fathoming
if that tension should give way to the inevitable release. And yet, what
right do these so-called better men have to exploit their kin for money?
I have heard it said more than once in the last few weeks that these
slaves were blessed as the messengers to the ancestors. It sounded like
something worthy of honour until I grasped the full extent of what
it meant: they were the primary source of sacrificial victims in their
ceremonies. That sent a chill to my very heart.
Omosede stands at the epicentre, feared by the slaveowners, revered
by the slaves who wait for the word, ready to rise up. And tonight,
beneath the glory of the full moon, she is to perform a rite for them, a
summoning, to reach Met Kalfou, who stands at the crossroads.
Although not invited, I found myself in attendance as the woman
held a great silver knife in one hand and the hair of a man in tribal
garb in the other, with one smooth move slashing down to open the poor
bastard’s throat and release whatever spirit she believed to be trapped
inside him.
She captured much of the arterial spray in a wooden goblet, and
even as she cast aside the corpse, walked among the congregation,
offering his blood to sup at.
The shared blood no doubt bonded them in some form of pact.
The wretched man lay discarded in the dirt.
No one seemed the least bit perturbed by the shocking violence of the
moment. I looked to my companion, but he said nothing. I knew it was
important we did nothing to reveal our presence of the fringes of this
ritual, but as I looked around the adoring faces in the crowd, black skin
glistening with fever-sweat, I realised that the heat in that moment was
unlike anything I have felt even in this infernal place—I swear the flies
on my skin shrivelled and died, every ounce of moisture drained from
their being—for the first time on my long years of travelling I felt lost.
And then the cup came to us. The slave holding it nodded
encouragingly, and driven by fear, I overcame my revulsion, raising
the cup to my lips and drinking the blood of the sacrifice. She nodded
so happily I could not help but smile and nod in return as the cup was
offered to my companion.
We were no longer observers.
Around the gathering a slow drum beat began. The drummer sat
cross-legged, I saw, beating out a slow, steady rhythm on the taut
goatskin drums. It did not take long for the congregation to take up his
rhythm, and within a minute many of them were swaying to a hidden
breeze, their voices raised in ululating song. There was such passion to
it I didn’t know if it was some sort of prayer of farewell, thinking of the
corpse still bleeding into the dirt, or one of welcome devotion until the
red man seemed to step out of the shimmering heat-haze of air at the
crossroads. You will doubt, me, I know, but I swear on all that is holy,
behind him I saw the gates of Hell themselves, open on the flames of
that other place. It was the only way to explain the incredible heat that
emanated from his presence.
I have thought on what happened in the aftermath of that moment,
and what I saw. The rational part of my mind acknowledges it is
possible that some manner of deliriant drug was used to put us into
a detached, almost dreamlike state, after all, we all supped from the
same cup. It would not have been so difficult to lace the brim with
devil’s snare to leave us susceptible to hallucination and mind control,
but still, I saw what I saw: Met Kalfou. The devil by another name.
And I saw Omosede do the impossible, burying the body of the boy
at the crossroads, in the flickering shadows of those hellish flames, and
covering it over with dirt as we all watched until nothing of his tribal
dress remained to be seen.
And still the goatskin drums pounded.
And still the congregation danced, contorting their bodies in a
frenzy, driven to wilder and wilder gyrations as the drums beat.
“I accept your sacrifice,” the red man said. “What would you have
of me?”
Omosede stared the demonic figure down, showing no fear, as she
said, “Freedom,” in a commanding voice that echoed out across the
gathering. This woman was something special. She radiated a kind of
magic that most of us never come close to touching. It was obvious even
from where I stood.
The red man seemed to consider her request and what delivering it
would entail, and in those long seconds the drums filled my mind and
I felt myself growing strangely dizzy, the focus of my vision blurring
at the edges as darkness threatened to creep in. The ground at my feet
seemed to swell, ululating like the waves of a gentle ocean rolling in
to break on the shore. My breath quickened. Rather than steadying
me, the rapid inhalations only worsened my grip on consciousness.
I tried to focus on the red man, though behind him the rising fires
lashed and licked at the stone gates, a raucous cackle and crack as they
burned. There was more back there, but I couldn’t focus on it no matter
how hard I willed it. The constant agitation of the flames conjured
so many demon shapes I knew they could not be real faces I saw in
there, but rather the doubts and guilts of my own life coming into focus
and fading before I could recognise even half of them—but the half I
recognised I had wronged. In those flames I saw the mistakes of my life,
and felt myself succumbing to the temptation to fall back into them and
let them consume me, such was their potency.
I couldn’t look away from them.
“That is a worthy demand,” the red man said, his voice seeming to
writhe around with the same seductive cackles of the flames behind him.
“But the sacrifice is nowhere near enough for such a boon.”
“How much will be enough?” Omosede asked.
“All of them,” Met Kalfou said.
“It shall be so,” the caplata agreed, and crooked a finger to summon
the closest of the congregation to her. It was a woman, her hair bound
up by what looked like a rag. She moved with serpentine grace, swaying
up towards her death with out any apparent fear. Again it came with
such shocking brutality, a terrible swift cut, and the woman fell while
the red man nodded approvingly.
I had witnessed two people murdered, and yet I could not run. No
one in the congregation screamed. Indeed, their voices rose up in a
heady chant that felt like a celebratory prayer as it filled the night
around us.
“More,” the red man said, hungry for sacrifices.
Another willing victim came forth from the crowd, and when they
were cut down another.
And still I couldn’t run.
The flames held me in their thrall, and the realisation that the time
had come for me to pay for my sins.
These thoughts I was having… they were not my own.
I was not in control of my mind.
My guide was the next to approach the witch woman. I tried to
pull him back, but my hands wouldn’t obey me. There was a moment
that passed between us where he looked at me—and seemed to look into
me, through the haze of narcotic that unmanned me into the real me
he called friend—and pleaded for forgiveness or help, as he sacrificed
himself to the vodun priestess.
I cried out when he fell. It was the first sound I had made in what
felt like hours.
With a single downward slash of the blood-slicked blade I was
suddenly alone in this dangerous land, my skin marking me out as the
enemy where before I had been nothing more than a curious observer
trying to understand the dark faith and the darker magics underlying
the fractious society. In that single moment I shared on a visceral level
the same fears that had driven the king of Great Ardra to beg for holy
intercession; someone willing to earn this level of willing sacrifice from
her followers was beyond dangerous.
Another and another fell beneath the caplata’s knife.
I watched them all line up to be sacrificed.
Every single on of her slave church, thirty souls all told, and still the
red man was not satisfied with his tally of souls.
He stared at me out of the flames, as he said, “One more,” and I felt
my stomach fall away beneath me as the caplata began to motion me
forward. My feet refused to obey my desperate urge to run. I took one 213
shuffling step towards the knife. “No. Not the white man,” Met Kalfou
said, a wry smile spreading across his red lips. “He is not of Dahomey.
He is already free. It must be one of our brothers in slavery.”
There was no-one else here but us three now, and it took Omosede a
second longer than it did me to follow the thought to the only logical
conclusion: that hers was the last soul the red one wanted in return for
his boon. She raised the blade to her own throat without a moment’s
hesitation, though before she could open herself up, Met Kalfou stayed
her hand. “Not yet. Your blood will be needed to fulfil the ritual. Bury
the dead under the crossroads and return here three nights hence. I
shall be waiting for you.”
This may well be my last confession, not that I think anyone will ever
get to read these words now: that was three nights ago and the two of
us stand side-by-side under the still-full moon, the dirt of thirty graves
at our feet, waiting for the door in the air to open and the red one, Met
Kalfou, to emerge from his home in hell to finish the ritual.
I found myself rubbing at my palm, grinding my fingers across the
pad of my thumb.
Every sound had me nervous and jumping.
I had not wanted to come to this place. I wanted nothing to do with
this, but even as I contemplated crossing into Ardran territory and
seeking shelter, more adherents of Omosede’s vodun church found me. It
had been a strange few days in Abomey. There has been tension in the
air, tempers so frayed even a stranger like myself could feel the pent-up
frustration and simmering unrest. The slaves were working the fields,
slaveowners driving them hard to make up for their reduced number,
which only served to make a bad situation worse as the whips came out.
 I hadn’t realised that Omosede was talking; her words were barely
vocalised, like a breath whispering across these still warm graves.
And then I felt the heat rising, oppressive, and sweat bead and run
down my back as the red one emerged from the stuff of the air, and
this time I knew I was not hallucinating because nary a drop of tainted
blood had passed my lips.
“Are you ready to pay your due?” Met Kalfou asked, even as the
flames still curled around his heels.
The caplata nodded. She held her knife in her hand. I noticed the
whiteness around her knuckles and realised she was clutching it tight.
There were no drums this time, only the three of us. And I did not
belong.
“Then, bleed for me, Bokor. And bleed for them. And you shall have
your revolution.”
She cut her wrist. There was so much blood. It ran down her arm,
splashing the freshly turned ground where we had buried her faithful
three nights before. More and more blood spilled down her arm, pulsing
out of the gash to nourish the black earth.
And I swear the first grains of soil shifted and I thought I was going
to loose my bowels, as an earthworm emerged. I caught myself laughing
at my own skittishness. The laughter died stillborn on my lips as the first
black fingers clawed up through the dirt.
The fingers became a wrist, the wrist became an arm, and then in
some hideous parody of birth the head breached the surface, rising up.
It wasn’t alone.
As the caplata spilled more of her essence into the soil, more and
214 more of her congregation rose, born again, clawing their way out of the
damned earth to stand swaying before her.
I looked on in horror.
There was no life behind their eyes. Hell’s teeth, where one should
have had the milky white orb it had an curled up worm, but that didn’t
stop it from answering her call back to this life.
“I am good to my word, Omosede. You have your freedom and
your life,” the red one promised. “Send them forth to deliver it for my
children.”
Before she could thank the trickster god for his intervention, he was
gone, and I was left wondering what sting in the tail her pact could
have with one such as he?
The caplata walked at the head of her zombie army, as they left the
crossroads, slaves no more, ready to burn the fields and tear down the
palaces of the slaveowners and claim a freedom that they were not alive
to enjoy.
I watched my guide lurch down the dirt road one shuffling step at a
time, no longer himself. The grave dirt clung to his clothes. The smell,
even from where I stood, several steps back, was wretched. The others
were no better. A body could rot considerably in three days.
He did not answer when I called out his name.
But why would he?
He wasn’t in there.
Whether his body came back or not, he was dead. The last lesson
of my guide, companion and friend was this, the duality of the soul;
in vodun, the soul possesses dual aspects, the "gros bon ange" and the
"ti bon ange". The gros bon ange is the part of our being responsible
for blood flow, breathing, and other basic biological functions. The ti
bon ange is the source of our personality. It is who we are. I understood
what Met Kalfou had done here; he had granted Omosede the power
to restore the gros bon ange to this wretched flesh, but kept the ti bon
ange in whatever hell he lived in.
That thing walking away from me was not my friend who has been
with me for so long.
No, he was something else entirely now; a creature of basic biology,
nothing more.
It left me sad beyond words to see.
This was my fault.
My curiosity had brought him here.
Give his followers the freedom they so desperately crave, give the
a revolution, but make sure there is nothing of them left inside to
understand they have traded one sort of thraldom for another infinitely
worse one.
It wasn’t so difficult to understand Met Kalfou’s sting after all.
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
the Zombie
“At first I believed these marhi, pale of face
and in the grip of some form of sickness,
were victims of the plague, but I soon came
to realise that these people were brought to
this by some heinous ritual and were little
more than victims of magic most foul. I laid
one low, and as it writhed around at my
feet, I reached down for a tangle of hair and
raised up the creature’s head to discover that
the substances of the fallen one were rotten
and this place was full of walking corpses.”
Nimrod 4.42.3
On his 1678 expedition into the
deepest darkest parts of Africa, the
captain of an English slave ship, Thomas
Allergis, confided:
“Today I witnessed with my own eyes a
most curious and disturbing thing. A dark
miracle I call it. A living shell of what had
moments before been a dead bee. Revived,
it took flight and gravitated toward
life-giving nectar before disappearing
into the undergrowth. The nectar was a
restorative, you will tell me, I know this,
but no, that is not what happened here. It
was the tribal chieftain who sat me down
to reveal his powers in this dark miracle,
bringing back an undead creature—but it
was more sickly sweet than any honey, for
it turns out the chieftain’s son had died
the night before, and his body was being
used to give a new soul something to be
enclosed in, whilst his soul was given to
the bee to fly free.”
On a visit to the Royal Court, French
philosopher Antoine LeCatt spoke of his
horrific and adventurous journeys to all
corners of the world. He told what many
considered incredibly tall tales, though
men with greater wisdom and knowledge
of the esoteric knew better than that. His
words were considered dangerous to the
common man, so all known transcripts
of his travails were confiscated, and
remained lost until almost a decade
later, when, in 1714, they reappeared in
an auction house in Copenhagen where
they were bought amid a job lot of other
arcana for a pittance.
These papers were turned over
to an emissary of the Royal Society
when, amongst other things, the buyer
read eye witness descriptions of what
can only be described as "zombies"
(to use an exotic word). Such was
the buyer’s fear that he voluntarily
sought out members of the society to
take the damned pages off his hands.
One particularly interesting passage
reads:
“Mort vivant are pale in the skin and
many lack eyes. When joints and muscles
are decomposed or eaten by corpuscles,
they are often become increasingly difficult
to move causing an almost stuttering
movement. They exist in a trancelike
state, their movements cumbersome and
awkward, and yet, still there are zombies
that remain difficult to distinguish from
a normal living being. They neither feel
pain nor have any feelings beyond those
that their creator has imbued within them.
The stronger the bond between zombie and
creator, the more powerful they are. There
are zombies whose hands crawl on the floor
despite being separated from their bodies,
just as there are zombies who continue to
walk despite their heads being severed and
other horrors no mortal eye was ever meant
to see.”
He also writes that:
“According to the African tradition, one
must feed a roach vivant, or as the wild ones
themselves call them - zoon bye - with salt
for it to die. Fire is another element capable
of hurting such an abomination, where very
little else can inflict wounds.”
Both LaCatt and Allergis offer
accounts of villages deep within the
inhospitable jungles of Africa where
tribes cut off from the modern world still
master the dangerous arts of the dead,
creating zombies from the corpses of
their lost ones.
But what is most dangerous in the
opinion of the Royal Society is how, 215
through the widespread slave trade,
these macabre practices have spread
all the way to America’s slave colonies,
notably in the cities of Nouvelle-
Orléans on the mainland and Port-au-
Prince on the island of Haiti. There,
the creature is called "zonbi" or
"nzumbe".
There are several different ways
to create a zombie, but the two most
frequent, and most dangerous remain
rituals of the dark faith performed by
a vodun priest who has learned to call
on the god Iwa Dmaballah Wedo’s
spirit and through it occupy a dead
body with a new soul. The other is
when the witch doctors possess the
ability to capture and control a soul
when a person dies.
As with all things, the most
dangerous zombies are the ones created
by humans, but here at the Royal
Society we have also gathered much
in the way of what can only be called
fairy tale and myth concerning lions,
crocodiles and other horrific beasts
that have been resurrected as zombies.
 Unique individuals
Zonnbye Charles de Vittól
Zonnbye are the most common form of
zombie.
The creature is created at the same
moment a human dies, his or her soul
captured in that instant before it flees
the mortal body by a skilled witch
doctor.
This creates a bond between the body
and the soul that can be manipulated
and exploited by the witch doctor,
giving them control the corpse. As long
as the witch doctor is alive and keeps
the soul, he will maintain control of his
zombie creation.
Whilst the Zonnbye has the same body
in death as it did in life it is both stronger
and less sensitive to pain. It is also more
susceptible to manipulation and control
by the witch doctor, though the greater
distance between the witch doctor and
his Zonnbye the weaker their bond and
the slower any response, to the point that
any control can be lost over a matter of a
216 few miles. There are, of course, rituals that
will maintain the spiritual link between
Zonnbye and witch doctor across greater
distances, including a so-called zumbe-
ritual where the witch doctor charges
the Zonnbye with a specific task that
becomes the meaning of their existence
and cannot be denied. Should the bond
waver over the miles the Zonnbye can
become passive, though any who lose
contact with their witch doctor for any
length of time can turn aggressive, going
upon an uncontrollable rampage before
they collapse and die.
And twice dead, a Zonnbye cannot be
revived a second time.
One such Zonnbye is Charles de Vittól.
When he died, a witch doctor,
Christian Jeggert, stood vigil at his
bedside, and at his behest used his skills
to do everything he could to preserve the
life and soul of the acclaimed doctor who
was not yet done with his great work and
was prepared to do anything rather than
go gently into that endless night. Little
did de Vittól know that Jeggert had more
nefarious intentions and used his skills to
turn him into his undead servant.
Since that auspicious night the
elites of the Copenhagen salons have
been amazed at the stinking, decaying
and extremely unpleasant doctor
Vittól’s treatment. Whilst he thought
his extended life would allow him to
continue his work, the unpleasant
doctor has been banished from the
court and excluded from the salons he
so enjoyed, whilst his laboratories have
burned down not once but on three
separate occasions in as many years.
However, a small group of Danish
scientists suspect that Charles de Vittól
has been bewitched and are hunting the
Zonnbye to free de Vittól’s soul long
enough that it may at last find rest if
not peace.
Appearance
Before their resurrection into this
damned unlife, zombies were once
human. That means they look like us,
have all of our features (eyes, nose,
mouth, etc, but unlike the vampire and
other monsters of their kind, the zombie
could not walk unnoticed through
human society. For once thing, they are
not immune to decay. They have also
lost the nature healing abilities so any
wounds inflicted upon the zombie will
not scab over and heal but will remain
there, gaping permanently open and
festering. Lose an eye, rot eat away
at the nasal cavity? The eye is gone
forever, the nose opened up like a raw
wound in the middle of the zombie’s
rotting face.
This rot and ruin, once set in, will
cause a zombie’s face to deteriorate.
There is no end to this rot. It will eat
away at the zombie day and night, for
as long as its shuffling unlife lasts. The
older the zombie the more grotesque its
appearance.
First Impressions
The first clue, from a distance, that
a player is about to face a zombie is,
perhaps surprisingly, the posture of
the figure. The silhouette may well be
human, but it is markedly different from
the silhouette of a living man. For one,
most people stand up straight, but it
is not so for a zombie as their ravaged
brain functions severely limit any sort
of muscular control and comportment.
The stand awkwardly, knees and ankles
bent at awkward angles, giving the
zombie a noticeable lean. It also causes
them to shamble rather than walk, giving
them an immediately recognisable gait.
Because they do not heal and their bones
lack any sort of regenerative ability,
this is only going to worsen as they are
exposed to the worst of the elements.
Brutal cold, snows, frosts, driving rain,
they all serve to accelerate the rot and
weaken the zombies muscular tissue.
Broken bones do not heal, so they would
drag the ruined limb. The older the
zombie, the more awkward and jarring
their movement becomes, making it
increasingly obviously less and less
human.
What do the Players Know?
In early folklore of many countries around
Europe "the Walking Dead" actually
resembled something more akin to what
we would consider to be the victims of
possession: they possess physical bodies
without obvious signs of decay. The only
real clue to their undead state was that they
had strangely un-focused eyes and vacant
expressions. These old tales believed the
zombies were the mortal flesh left behind
by souls that had become trapped in a
limbo between heaven and earth. Without
their souls, the flesh had nothing to give
them purpose and direction.
They are essentially mindless
creatures, incapable of emotion or
complex thought.
They are driven by fierce appetites
and cravings for human flesh.
They are such a terrifying sight, these
undead creatures shuffling towards
you, arms out stretched, moaning and
yearning so desperately for your flesh,
that the sheer terror can paralyse a
character, rendering them vulnerable
and unable to flee despite the screaming
inside their own heads and their mind
urging them to run.
 Zombies live to hunt and hunt to
live. They are a ferocious predator with
those basic senses needed to track and
bring down prey heightened; but rather
than sight, they rely upon an incredible
sense of smell.
Some scholars believe the voodoo
zombies raised by the black magic of
the Bokor and Caplata can be cured if
the link to the priest is severed, which
makes these voodoo zombies different
from the contagion carrying zombies
that, once infected, are doomed.
Main Features
✦ Zombies are cursed with compulsive
cannibalism. They must consume
flesh. And there none so delicious a
delicacy as the brains of the dying.
✦ Lacking any sort of impulse control,
they are savage, aggressive fighters
that will not stop regardless of the
amount of damage inflicted upon
their corpses.
✦ Their brains no longer function
with any sort of cognitive prowess,
making even the most basic of tasks
challenging.
✦ They are dead, which means they are to
all intents and purposes imperviousness
to most wounds. The only sure way to
dispatch a zombie is to destroy what little
remains of its brain, ideally severing the
brain stem. They can withstand musket
and shot, can survive their limbs being
ripped off, bodies being crushed, and
will still relentlessly on, longing to feast
on your flesh.
✦ They tend to hunt in packs, which
makes an already formidable foe an
almost unbeatable one.
✦ Isolated, a zombie may vent a shriek
that carries over incredible distances
to draw more of its kind to it. These
shrieks are so piercing than can cause
the eardrums of the living to rupture
and bleed.
✦ They are susceptible to fire; but it
will only slow, not stop them unless
it consumes the hind brain where the
contagion is rooted.
✦ There is a strain of zombie that
spreads their unlife contagion like
a plague—there is no such thing
as surviving the bit of one of these
zombies. Once the infection is within
your blood it will spread through
your system until you are driven out
of your mind with cravings for human
flesh, cannot keep anything you eat
down, and fall into a violent sickness
that is each and every one of your
organs shutting down and your body
dying, whilst only the infection lives
within you, keeping you in this world,
a victim of the zombie contagion. The
only mercy is execution.
✦ Because of their heightened sense of
smell they make deadly nocturnal
predators as they have no need of
sight to hunt.
✦ The voodoo zombies of the Bokor and
Caplata can be stopped by the deaths
of their masters.

 
Zombie typical stats
These stats represent a typical walking dead. This corpse is
rotting, but it is animated by an unnatural desire to devour
living human beings.
Traits: Use the following or apply these values as modifiers:
Constitution +4, Dexterity -4. Intelligence, Psyche and
Charisma are not existent. Perception and Health remain as
they were in mortal life (usually 0).
Physical Health Points: as before death + the new
Constitution bonus (36 is common value), although rotten
corpses may have less.
Mental Health Points: 0.
Movement: walking 2 CP per 1 m (Max 6 m).
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 9-10).
Skills: (usually none, although the following represents
their sense of smell)
Stealth SV 7, Detection 3 (Detect Hidden 2).
Natural Weapons: Bite (Dmg 1d10 +4 Constitution), Fist
(1d6+4 Constitution).
Initiative: -4 Dexterity
Combat points: Free 8 /Unarmed 2 (Wrestling 6).
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM -4) Wrestling SV 8 (see Grapple Lex Libris p.19) +
Zombie Bite (See Below)
217
Common Properties
Dead Body
The traits of a Zombie are modified as shown in the stats
above. A Zombie has no MHP, therefore they do not know
fear or mental shock. Its PHP are augmented by the new
Constitution trait but there is no need to record physical
damage levels. Furthermore, Zombies do not heal, and any
damage dealt to their PHP remains there.
Stench
Zombies’ bodies keep on rotting and they are therefore often
surrounded by the reek of putrefaction. The GM should decide
how strong the stench is, considering when the body died, the
cause of death and the climatic conditions (warm or cold, wet
or dry). Recently dead zombies may carry just a faint smell
recognisable only at very short distance, if not only when in
direct contact (and therefore it may have no mechanic effect).
For corpses which have been rotting for longer time period the
GM may impose a penalty of -2 to both skill and situation rolls
of those who are in close contact with the Zombie. This penalty
can be nullified, totally or in part, by a positive Health modifier
(e.g. a +1 Health reduces the penalty to -1). On the other hand,
attempts to locate particularly rotten zombies (Situation Rolls
or Stealth Rolls) should get a +1 to +5 SV modifier.
 Zombie Bite
A Zombie’s only desire is to devour its victims, but it cannot
bite as wolves and tigers do, since their bodies are still human-
shaped. The “Fist” damage in the stats above is given just in
case of need. In fact, all the Zombies will always attempt the
same attack tactic: trying to grapple a victim (Lex Libris
p.19).
Zombies whose bodies died recently (no more than a few
days old) are quicker in their attacks, therefore any successful
Grapple will cause an automatic Bite attack in the same round,
without any need for making any rolls
Older (and rottener) zombies are slower, therefore after a
successful grapple in the 1st round, they will automatically
attack with a successful grapple only in the following round.
It is important to notice that Zombies often attack in packs,
therefore they can overcome the above limitations (while a
single victim always has the same amount of CP to spend on
Grappling).
Vulnerabilities
This list presents a few of the most common vulnerabilities of
Zombies, although not all of them are true for all the Zombie.
The GM, as usual, should consider what is best for the story
which is about to be told.
✦ Damaging the brain (whether by decapitation or by piercing
218 the skull) will cause automatic death of the Zombie. Use the
“Hitting the Weak Spot” rules.
✦ In some African legends is the zombie is forced to eat a
“roach vivant” with salt, it will meet final death.
✦ Feeding salt to a Zombie with the “Voodoo Slave” property
will free the zombie from its master. Sometimes these freed
zombies search for their master in search of vengeance.
✦ Some Zombies Vampires are incredibly vulnerable to Fire.
Not only it will ignore any natural protection they may
have (as the “Thick Skin” property, if they have it) but the
damage will also be multiplied x 2. For example, hitting a
Zombie with a flaming torch or a lantern will deal it 1d6
damage, to be multiplied x2.
Optional Properties
Agile
Some very rare spells give the Zombie an unnatural agility,
instead of slowing them. The Dexterity modifiers is not
-4 but +4 with all the obvious consequences (IM +4,
Maximum Movement 14). Furthermore, these zombies
tend to get also the Agility skill, typically with these stats:
Agility SV 7, Body Control 2 (Evade 3). The zombie will
therefore also get the following options among the samples
of attacks: “Evade SV 15 or two Evade attempts SV 8 and
SV 7”. Usually, only special and unique Zombies may have
this property.
Charming Eyes
This property is unique and should be avoided for most
zombies. Odd as it may seem, but some rare Walking Dead
(especially those of the un-rotten type) can attract victims
with their beauty. This is typical of young female walking
dead but, since they usually cannot speak, the attraction is
only of the most basic type involving only visive contacts
(e.g. for praying on those looking for prostitutes in a slum).
This property works exactly like “Normal Appearances” (see
below) but the Situation Roll will have an SV of 7 (modified
by Perception).
Deadly Spit
This is another, very rare ability, better to be reserved to
unique and special demon- or evil Loa- possessed zombies
(not for common zombies hunting in hordes).
By doing nothing else in the same round (and usually, up to
three times per night), the Zombie can invest all those in front
of it with a deadly breath or vomit (it may be an insect swarm,
mephitic smokes, blackish poisonous liquids, acid, etc..). The GM
may decide the effects. Possible example may be plagues, zombie
contagion or 2d10 (OR 10) PHP damage. This attack cannot be
parried but can be avoided with a successful Evade maneuver.
Fury
The dangerous power with woke up this special zombie,
filled it also with an unnatural fury on the battlefield. The
Constitution Trait will raise to +6 (with related consequences
on PHP and bonus to damage). Furthermore, the CP will
change as follows: Free 10 /Unarmed 4 (Wrestling 8).
Consequently, the Sample of attack will be: Wrestling SV
11. Usually only special and unique Zombies may have this
property.
Normal Appearances
Whether because this is just a recently dead victim or due to
sorcerous causes, this zombie does resemble a living person at
a first view and, therefore, the Fear Factor damage is inflicted
only on the moment when one realizes what the creature
really is. Zombies with this property do not have the normal
“Stench” property.
When firstly seeing the Zombie the victim must succeed
a Situation Roll with a SV of 10 (modified by Perception). In
case of failure the victim will not notice anything odd about
the Zombie which will therefore benefit from the effects of a
Surprise Attack (Lex Libris p.23).
If somebody is actively inspecting the Zombie a Stealth
skill roll (with the Detection discipline and the Detect Hidden
and Observation specialties) may be allowed, with modifiers
(from -10 to +10) according to the situation (lighting, the
Zombie’s clothes, etc.) and about how the Zombie is behaving.
It is worth noting that effects of this property usually do
not last long. Zombies are what they are, and they will always
reveal their natures by attacking their victims.
Plague Spreading
Theis Zombie Vampire can spread plagues. The GM should
not just decide which plague is spread, but he must also
decide whether this is transmitted by the Bite, contact with
the Zombie or just by the presence of the creature in an area.
Possible suggestions for this disease can be found in the
descriptions of the following monsters: Homunculus (Poison
& Diseases optional property), Mummy (Plague-Spreader
property), Specters & Wraiths (Breath of Disease).
Reek
The Zombie carries an unbearable stench of putrefaction. On
top of anything suggested in the “Stench” property, all those
who are in the same area of the Zombie must make a
Situation Roll with a SV of 8 modified by Psyche
modifier, or they will start vomiting and feeling
bad (-1 to all skill rolls for 1d6 hours, on top of
any modifier from “Stench”). A Roll is needed
every half an hour or whenever the Zombie
comes into contact.
Attempts to locate a zombie with this
property (Situation Rolls or Stealth Rolls)
automatically succeed.
Terrifying Screech
If they do nothing else in the round,
some rare Zombies can emit terrifying
screeches inflicting 1d10 (OR 9-10) of
mental damage.
Thickened Skin
The terrible spells used to create this
Zombie thickened its skin, giving a
Natural Protection of 2.
Unbearable Reek
This is an augmented version of the
“Reek” property. The stench of this
Zombie is so terrible that anyone
who is in its presence must always
do the situation roll (described
under “Reek”) every round.
Voodoo Slave
This Zombie obeys the Master which
has created them (usually the Witch Doctor,
Houngan, Bokor, Caplata, etc.). The Master can
telepathically communicate with the zombie and somehow
also have basic feelings (but not a clear vision) about what the
zombies are experiencing, but the contact disappears beyond
3 kilometres. Zombies who happen to be farther that this
radius will become free. The Zombie will be freed (or they may
even die) if their Master dies. See also the “vulnerabilities” for
possible limits to this property.
Zombie Contagion
Some Zombies can create more of their species. After one Bite
the victim will be automatically infected, suffering 1d10 PHP
per day, until death. No medicine known in the 18th century
can stop this disease (possibly excluding special powers and
secret arts). After death the victim will become a “Contagion
Zombie” in 1d6 hours.
If the GM allows it, prompt amputation of the bitten limb
(if the bite targeted a limb) can stop the diseases, although
with the usual medical consequences of amputations in terms
of being bedridden and needing healthcare (Lex Libris p.29).
Zombie Shriek
Some rare but powerful zombies can emit an unnatural,
high-pitched shriek. They rarely can perform this ability
more than once or twice per day. The Shriek are a radius
of a few miles and it can attract other zombies. All the
human beings which happen to be in a radius of 10
m from the shrieking Zombie will feel terrible pain
in their ears, making them suffer 1d6 PHP and 1d6
MHP.
Zombie Variations
Animal Zombie
Many animal types can be turned into 219
walking dead. The GM must consider
with great care about possible changes
in the animal stats. The natural weapons
tend to remain similar (the basic zombie
has augmented damage since men usually do
not bite) and the traits are usually modified
by -4 Dexterity and + 4 Constitution.
Contagion Zombie
These zombies have the “Zombie
Contagion” property.
False Walking Dead
There are secret spells and hypnotic
abilities which can be used on living
human beings to make them believe to be
walking dead. In terms of stats the Victim
will effectively turn into a Zombie (+4
Constitution with any consequence on PHP, -4
Dexterity, Bite 1d10, no MHP, no PHP damage
level to record) with all the consequences (craving for human flesh,
obeying a master, etc..). When the spell ends the PHP must be
adjusted (Constitution bonus disappears, and any wound taken as
a “zombie” will remain. If the victim is still alive, there will also be
a MHP damage of 1d10 (OR 8-10) to reflect the surprise for what
the “zombie” has experienced. Sometimes forcing the “Zombie” to
eat salt will immediately end the hypnotic condition.
 Huge Zombies
Sometimes obscure sorcerous traditions may allow the
combination of multiple corpses to create huge monsters.
Treat these creatures as “Homunculi”, with special care about
the “Different Sizes” property.

Revenant Zombie
In some traditions the Walking Dead do not rot or just
remain as if they were the day they died maybe with some
minor differences (e.g. white eyes). This usually does not have
mechanical consequences, but it may make the Zombie not
immediately recognizable as such. “Normal Appearances” is
typical of these zombies. Sometimes they also have the “Agile”
property.

Voodoo Zombie, Zonnbye

These typical zombies have the “Voodoo Slave” property.
These usually meet Final Death if the Master dies.

Zombie-related Secret Arts

Zombies may be vulnerable to Divine Arts like Exorcism (Lex
Libris p.234) or Shield of the Apostles (Lex Libris p.238-239)
if the GM allows so, according to their specific story.

Raising the Dead

220 New Dark Art, Left-Hand Path
This art represents a real Voodoo “Zombie ritual” where real
Zombies are risen. The GM is encouraged to personalize it,
according to the specific story needs (for example to adapt it
to specific African beliefs or Voodoo stories in the American
Colonies).
The zombie to be risen should be recently dead or ritually
killed during the sacrifice. There may be even more than one
victim per night (in which case the sorcerer must perform a
new Esotericism skill roll per each victim, unless a real Spirit
appears, as per the introductory story of this chapter). The
GM may give a positive modifier (up to +5 to Esotericism)
if the ritual is attended by a crowd of believers of the specific
cult.

✦ Degree of Difficulty: -15

Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 10
✦ Discipline: The Left-hand Path level 3
✦ Specialty: Black Magic level 5

Other Requirements
✦ Theology SV 7, De Religionibus discipline level 1, Religio
(Voodoo) specialty level 3.
Material Requirements
✦ A ritual victim to be sacrificed (usually an animal)
✦ Other ritual trappings according to the specific rite.
Effect
In case of success a “Voodoo Zombie” is risen per each
recently dead, ready to obey to its Master. See the “Voodoo
Zombie” description and “Voodoo Slave” property for other
information.
Zombie Dream
New Dark Art, Left-Hand Path
This art represents a variant of the “Hypnotic Sleep” in Lex
Libris p.227. The victim must participate to some exotic
and elaborated ritual, sometimes involving blood sacrifices
(usually animals, but sometimes even human beings)
and, during this night-long ritual, the chosen victim will
believe to die and “resurrect” as a Walking Dead obeying
to the master (the one performing this ritual) while other
participating to the ritual may fall in a similar status of
believing to what is happening, having hallucinations and
odd dreams.
There are many variants of this spell (and the GM
should adapt it to its own story). The stats below imply
that both the sorcerer and the victim share similar beliefs
(Voodoo, Animistic religions, etc.)., otherwise the degree
of difficulty will be higher (as shown below). There may
be even more than one victim per night (in which case the
sorcerer must perform a new Esotericism skill roll per each
victim.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -8 (-15 if there is no shared belief)
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 10
✦ Discipline: The Left-hand Path level 3
✦ Specialty: Black Magic level 3
Other Requirements
✦ Theology SV 7, De Religionibus discipline level 1, Religio
(Voodoo) specialty level 3.
Material Requirements
✦ A ritual victim to be sacrificed (usually an animal)
✦ Other ritual trappings according to the specific rite.
Effect
If the Esotericism skill roll succeeds two effects happen,
on both the chosen victim and the other spectators. Those
with strong beliefs in what is happening may even fail their
situation rolls by their own will. The GM may allow positive
modifiers, in the case of target with strong Christian faith.
All the spectators and passive participants to the ritual
must make a Situation Roll with an SV of 10 (Modified
by Psyche) to avoid believing the hallucinations they are
experiencing (causing 1d10 MHP to the un-believers forced
to see them). The GM may add further mind-conditioning
effects, according to the situation.
The chosen victim must make a Situation Roll with an SV
of 8 (modified by Psyche). In case of failure the victim will 221
believe to be a zombie (see the “False Walking Dead” entry
above) for 2d20 hours.
222
 Demons
T he infernal flies were everywhere. In my ears.
Closer, closer. And then away. Closer.
Closer. And then away. I had long since
given up trying to swat them away, and like the
locals let them crawl across my skin as I walked. The sun
beat down against the anvil of the dead earth. It was beyond
hot. I struggled with every breath. The thick humidity
caused the linen of my shirt to cling to my skin. Beside me,
the turgid river gurgled. Kolkata, land of the flies. That
was how I thought of this place. Three towns pulled together
by foreigners looking to enforce their own rule to make
something greater than the whole. I wondered again at the
irrational need to meddle and impose one’s own will upon the
world. It was an alien conceit to me. I sought to explore
and learn, not to convert everything into a pale imitation of
what I had left behind.
I was expecting to meet Ravenwood by the river, but there was no
sign of the priest. He had come over with the East India Company a
few years earlier, making it his mission to save the souls of the locals.
I had a lot of time for the missionary, even if I did not share his zeal
223
for conversion. I’d watched him the night before, holding court. He
sat on a stone step with dozens of children crowded around to listen to
his stories. He told a good story, I’ll give him that. Mostly they were
parables, but he delivered them well, and his captive audience enjoyed
them. He told me that there were hundreds of these poor children
living on the streets of the Black Town. I was still learning about this
place and what these definitions and demarcations meant.
Another bloated thing crawled across the face of a hungry child
huddling down beside the steps that led down to the water. I watched
it pick around the girl’s nose, black wings vibrating to the music of
poverty. This was so unlike any other place on earth I had been,
and in the hardships I witnessed I saw so many images that other
commentators would steal as inspiration for their Christian versions
of Hell.
The fly is a short-lived creature, only twenty-eight days, and an
uncanny one. Drawn to death, the female lays her eggs in the stuff
of decay: rotten vegetation, spoiled foodstuffs, faeces and even carrion.
So, from death she brings life. The flies outnumbered us thousands to
one on the banks of the Hooghly River. Were they looking to somehow
bring greater life from even more harrowing death? It did not bear
thinking about. And yet it was all I could concentrate on. Ever since the
warnings of the seance in Vienna I had become obsessed with the notion
of forces moving against me. I caught myself looking over my shoulder
when alone, and had grown more easily spooked at the unexplained
sounds that haunted me.
 Across the way, guards in bright uniforms patrolled the walls of the
factory. The British had finished building the outpost not so very long
ago. They called it Fort William after William of Orange and used it
as the heart of their trading company as they sought to exploit these ripe
lands for profit. The main two storey building was known as the factory,
though in truth it was so much more: a warehouse, a marketplace, a
defensive stronghold, staging post for exploration and the de facto centre
of their governance as they sought to impose British rule here.
When I looked at it all I saw was the contrast of wealth in this
so-called White Town juxtaposed with the poverty along the water’s edge
and back the way I had come, all the way into the Black Town as the
strong exploited the weak.
But I told myself it could not be all bad. There were good people
within that company, including my missionary friend, Ravenwood. He
had promised to take me to an orphanage a little way from the factory
and offered shelter and sustenance to those who those lost children
who would have otherwise wandered the streets. The orphanage was
the work of a single woman who acted as mother to more than twenty
children. Indeed, they called her Mother. Walking along the riverbank
I was reminded just how futile a gesture it was. Twenty children? There
were hundreds in need, here. More, by far than I was seeing. Even just
huddled around the steps down to the water there were more then two
dozen. To a child, they looked emaciated. The phrase that kept coming
to my mind was all skin and bone. These poor children were bound in
lack. I could only imagine the hardship these lost children lived under.
Hell’s teeth, I only had to walk down the street to get a taste of the
224 hardship they endured as dozens of tiny figures crowded around me,
pressing up close, hands outstretched, voices yammering in a babel of
words I could not understand and which might not have been words
at all.
At first, I assumed they were drawn to the colour of my skin, but we
all of us make rash assumptions when we do not understand. It was
nothing so banal that drew them to me.
One stood out amongst them, dressed in bright saffron with a powder
of colours smeared across her face and forehead. It was not Hooly, the
festival of colours. That marked the end of winter and the beginning of
spring. We were already in the grips of a blazing hot summer. So those
bright powders had to mean something else, but how significant that
something might prove to be I had no way of knowing.
The girl, no more than nine or ten years of age, held out a hand to
me and waited patiently for me to take it.
I shook my head, and tried to explain that I was waiting for someone.
Two more flies crawled across her skin. They met at her shoulder,
seeming to drink the sweat where it pooled in the jugular notch of her
throat.
She did not once move to brush them away.
She spoke in faltering English, “Ravenwood… he say… come,” and
urged me to follow.
I recalled the last time I had followed a child—in Paris—and what
horrors it had led to, but fool that I am, I trusted her. I was in need of a
soul restorative. I am getting ahead of myself. You must understand the
nature of this place, of this age. Even with our quest for enlightenment
and reason the truth is we still walk in a world of death. Not every child
will survive into adulthood. Walk down any street and you will see the
evidence of mortality in the form of the infernal flies. Even in Europe
that is the case. More than half of the children born in this place would
not see fifteen summers. And yet, if the talk of the traders was to be
believed, this Mother had not lost a single soul in the years since her
peculiar orphanage had begun taking in lost children from the streets,
and she actively sought out the sick and the lame to offer succour. How
could that be? Did she have a gift? Healing hands? Because, surely,
in this place of poverty and privation a place where everyone lived was
nothing short of miraculous.
And what was I looking for if not proof of miracles? Not everything
has to be about the darker aspects of the Otherworld. It is important
to remember that just as demons may walk amongst us, so too may the
divine.
It is a strange thing, though, looking for evil in the whispers of such
goodness, but I could not shake the feeling that all was not as it claimed
to be. How better to mask something more malignant than to wrap it
up in the guise of caring? If my wanderings had taught me any single
lesson it was that evil was insidious and took delight in breaking our
hearts by robbing us of the simple joy of goodness. That didn’t mean
that good did not exist, only that my journey had made me cynical.
And I hoped that here my cynicism would be proved unfounded.
So, of course, I took the child’s hand and followed her and her kin
through the dusty streets, sweat running down my skin, parched and
dizzy from the sun, head spinning with the undercurrent of buzzing
as the flies swarmed, into the shadows of the orphanage. The relief
was immediate. Simply stepping under the archway into the shade
robbed the sun of its raw strength and offered precious respite. The place
was bigger than I had imagined, a rival for the factory in size, which
surprised me.
I took the water flask from my hip and slugged back two deep
swallows of warm water, then wiped my lips with the back of my hand
while the children waited.
I nodded for them to lead me deeper.
There was no sign of my friend.
I called out his name.
The last syllable echoed back to me.
The children scuffed up dirt and giggled and laughed and seemed
just like children the world over. The Mother was doing a good thing
here, I reminded myself, and I was here to help. Ignoring the sight
of the single bloated bluebottle that crawled across the eye of the girl
holding my hand, I crossed the courtyard to the main building. Like
the factory was two storeys. The lower was given over to communal
rooms, including a large chamber dedicated to prayer, the upper, to
dormitories. There was a rectory and a large kitchen where the aroma
of spices still clung to the air. There was another smell, too, though I
could not identify it beneath the masking spices. I walked through the
place, not seeing a soul. The flies were everywhere. They crawled cross
the furniture, coming in through the open windows, the music of their
wings amplified by the peculiar acoustics of the place.
I had expected more… life. This was a place where the sick and the
lost came for help according to the talk of the townsfolk. But it was
abandoned. I moved from room to room looking for someone. Anyone.
If I didn’t know better I would have thought the place abandoned a
long time ago.
 I realised in that moment that I was alone. I had walked into this
place with a dozen clamouring children and every last one of them
was gone. Even the girl who had somehow slipped through my fingers.
I hadn’t noticed them leave. I assumed they were back out in the city,
earning coin for their keep, or perhaps simply playing and enjoying
being children.
I called out again.
Ravenwood’s name came back to me, or for a moment I feared it did,
in the buzzing of the flies.
Humour me when I say this. I do not claim that those insects were
somehow gifted with the vocal chords of a man or that they mocked me,
but rather that the vibrations of their wings seemed to come together to
mimic the words I had called out.
It was most disconcerting.
It wasn’t until I was in the depths of the many passageways that I
found a small room which, when the door opened, reeked of sickness
and decay. The odour was so repulsive I staggered back a step under
its onslaught. Another fly settled on my the back of my hand. Without
any conscious thought behind what I was doing, I cupped my other
hand over the insect, trapping it. I felt the thrum of the wings against
my palm, amazed that the fly had allowed itself to be so easily trapped.
I walked into that rank chamber with the fly as my prisoner. There was
the body of a child, all slack skin and bones, on the bare wooden cot.
I say body, it was obvious from the moment I looked upon it that the
child was dead. I felt the cold fist of dread clench around my gut. All
this talk of miracles and this as a place of healing was undone within
just a few moments of me setting foot inside the orphanage. That could
be no coincidence, could it?
The small room was unbearably hot, meaning that the meat of the
corpse had already begun to turn and was festering.
The buzzing in my cupped palm turned frantic. I released the insect,
and watched it fly to the body on the cot where it settled within the
cavity of its stomach.
More flies gathered.
The harmonies of their wings grew in urgency the longer I lingered
in the doorway.
I walked into the room, not sure why I felt the urge to be closer to
death, until I saw the hundreds upon thousands of white eggs that had
been laid in the cavity of the child’s chest, many already hatched into
a pulsing mass of lavae that churned the stomach.
Closer. Closer. And then away. More buzzing. I felt the flies against
my skin. Not one or two tickles of contact. They were everywhere. My
skin crawled.
I stood over the dead child, the buzzing around me rising to insane
levels as hundreds upon thousands of flies settled on the corpse, going
back into the open cavities, filling the nose and mouth and empty eyes,
until every inch of flesh was lost beneath their writing mass.
And the noise.
Dear God the noise.
But it was nothing beside the madness of hearing my name within
the weird harmonics of the vibrating wings, as though a hundred
thousands flies called out, “Birkenbosch…” dragging out that last
syllable so thin it almost snapped in the humid air.
It knew me.
This thing… whatever it was… knew me.
And, as the child’s head turned my way, I knew that there was life
in there, no matter how twisted and base, and corrupt. And like the
ghosts of the seance it had a message for me. The flies spewed out of the
child’s slack mouth, hundreds upon hundreds of those tiny black insects
tumbling over each other in their eagerness to be free, the harmonics
of their wings creating words that could not be mistaken: “It is your
time… join us…” and for the worst minute of my life I thought the
infernal flies meant to enter my body and possess me. They were all over
my skin, my face, crawling into my noise and my mouth as I tried to
scream and scrambled back away from the corpse on the cot. There was
a cruel intelligence at work here. Some master behind these flies.
I knew my faith, and what kind of foul false god drew the flies like
this: Ba’al Zəbûb. Or Baal muian, Baal of flies, as others called the
Prince of Hell. Where was Ravenwood? If ever I need a damned man
of God at my side it was now!
I scrambled away from the body as it began to rise from the cot,
lifted not by its own life but rather the stolen life within it, the flies, and
lurched towards me.
I could not think how to fight such a thing. I had my holy cross, but
my faith was shattered. I lacked the power to turn a demon. All I could
think to do was run, remembering I had seen a chapel downstairs. It
had to be some macabre hallucination brought on by the heat and
dehydration and the strangeness of this place. Didn’t it?
But the horrors only grew stranger.
So, with the child on my heels, I returned to the heart of the building,
but it was unlike any holy shrine I had ever set foot within. There was no 225
wealth here. No gaudy goblets or precious relics. None of the familiar
trappings of either Christianity or the local Hindu faith. It was an
entirely different kind of church. The incessant chorus of those damned
flies was so loud in this place. I cast about for something… anything
that might be used to fend off a demon. But there was nothing. The
voices of the flies echoed emptily through the chamber.
I looked about me.
The floor was inlaid with a fine golden thread which seemed to mark
out some form of pattern I couldn’t discern from here, but would no doubt
be obvious from the gallery that ran around the upper storey. There
was an alter of sorts dominating the centre of the floor, but no crucifix,
meaning this place was not a Christian church. Behind it was a carved
wooden effigy. I did not recognise it as one of the gods of this place,
not Shiva, nor Kali the many-armed Goddess that leant her name to
this new, growing city. It was of something else entirely. The body was
scrawny, musculature sharply defined by the artist’s chisel, and dwarfed
by unfurled wings. There was so much pain fashioned in that face looking
down upon me that I knew it was no angel I looked upon, though it might
once have been. I knew exactly who it was. The Lord of the flies.
“What is this place?” I breathed, not expecting an answer.
“I call it home,” a voice came from behind me. I turned to see a
woman so old that her body had begun to reverse the process of growth
and seemed to be returning to the cradle.
Mother.
It had to be.
She wore a simple cotton dress that once upon a time had been white,
but which now bore the stains of her kindness all over it.
 “Welcome, Mister Birkenbosch,” she said, naming me. There is
something unnerving about hearing your name voiced by demonkin.
I shook my head. “I shouldn’t have come here,” I said.
“What’s done is done,” the woman spoke cultured English though
in a brittle voice. Her skin had the leathery aspect of a century spent
beneath this punishing sun, with deep folds and creases around her eyes
and mouth. Deep folds and dark hollows. “But now you are here I must
insist you do not leave.”
She smiled at my discomfort as I wrestled with the notion of fighting
for my life against an old woman, but I knew that I would lose and end
up as food for the flies.
“They give me so much,” she explained, meaning the body upstairs,
meaning all of the children she had brought in from the street to this
damned place to feed her hungry demon prince. “So much vitality and
life,” and the way she said that chilled my marrow though I did my best
not to let my discomfort show.
I walked towards Mother, hearing the buzzing of the infernal flies
gathering again. I wondered how anyone could live in this place and
not lose their minds? I swear I could never get used to their ever-present,
high-pitched, whine. It wormed away inside my head, taking on a voice
of its own.
“I stand in awe of you, Mother,” I said, truthfully, though not for
any good reason. “That you have found a way to exist here, feeding
on the lost and the vulnerable of these new towns, in the shadow of
this new regime, and somehow they think your hungers are salvation.
They venerate you. They would bring the lost children to your door so
226 that you might help them, and all the while you feed upon those same
children and turn their shells into vessels for your demonkin to come
through from the Otherworld? It is no small miracle.”
“There are no miracles here,” she assured me, almost choking on the
words as the flies thickened in her throat.
It was only when I grew closer that I saw they crawled over her
unblinking eyes. Two of them. One on each eye. How could she bear
the feel of them without tears? I wanted to reach out, to brush them
away, but she opened her mouth to say something more, and I saw even
more of the glistening black-and-blue bodied insects crawling across
her tongue and up from the depths of her gut before emerging from her
cracked and dry lips to take flight. If ever there had been a doubt, it
was banished. She was one of them. Another host body that served as
an incubator for the demon’s true children, his flies…
“Back, fiend! I command you in the name of Jesus!” came a bellow
of rage from behind me. Ravenwood!
The missionary strode into the defiled chapel, his wooden cross
gripped fiercely in his right hand.
“Let the Holy Cross be my light,” he intoned. “Let not the dragon
be my guide. Step back Satan,” Ravenwood thrust the cross towards
Mother as though it might somehow burn her to a cinder. “Never tempt
me with vain things. What you offer are evils. You drink the poison
yourself.” He turned to me, ushering for me to leave this place. I was not
equipped as he was to fight a demon, though how one man could hope
to face down the Lord fo the Flies I do not know. It was a fight he surely
could not win. And yet he took up the cross to save my soul…
I retreated, hounded by those infernal flies, even as the missionary
voiced the words of Our Father and said his Hail Mary. As I backed
out of the room I recognised the part of the Athanasian Creed, “…
Alia est enim persona Patris alia Filii, alia Spiritus Sancti: Sed Patris,
et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti una est divinitas, aequalis gloria, coeterna
maiestas…” For there is one Person of the Father; another of the Son;
and another of the Holy Ghost. But the Godhead of the Father, of the
Son, and of the Holy Ghost, is all one; the Glory equal, the Majesty
coeternal.
The golden coil set in the ground began to hum beneath my feet, as
though trying to tear free of the stone. I backed up. Behind the altar,
the huge wings of the statue issued the most hideous of cries as a deep
fissure opened up where they met the body of the false god. Talons from
the tips of the wings tore free and flew at the missionary like daggers,
but he did not falter or miss a word in his prayer.
Ravenwood was beginning the rite of exorcism, and once begun,
no matter how long it took, no matter how physically demanding, or
spiritually punishing, he could not break off, not even for a moment,
until it was done and the demon sent back to the Abyss whence it
came, even if it took days, weeks or even months to complete the ritual
and release Mother of her possession, else the demon would pursue
Ravenwood to the ends of the earth. And victory was never a simple
thing, as those entities, those false gods, lived to deceive and cheat.
“You think your precious God cares about you?” the Lord of the
Flies mocked, the words given hideous power by the mad cacophony
of buzzing.
“I do not fear you, demon,” Ravenwood promised, though how he
could stand so fearlessly in the face of such evil I do not know.
“Then you are foolish. You would do well to fear me. You stand alone
against me, in my church, who do you think you are, moral?” And
this next he addressed not to Ravenwood, but to the unseen children
all around us. “Come out now.” And they did. Not twenty, as I’d been
led to expect, but dozens upon dozens of filthy, emaciated, soulless ones,
demon-possessed, filled with the flies of their unholy Lord.
I could not help him, even if I wanted to.
I could not stand by his side, not if I wanted to live.
This was a fight where his faith was his sword and the cross in his
hand his shield and I lacked both.
All I was, no matter my best intentions, was a vulnerability the
demon could exploit to hurt him.
I had to get out of there.
And as though reading my thoughts, the demon sniffed, and
mocked, “You can run for your piss-stinking miserable life, little Clement
Birkenbosch, but we are going to remember you.” She sniffed again,
nostrils flaring even as more flies spewed out of her mouth to swarm at
my face. They buzzed around me. I stumbled back a step, trying not to
breath for fear they would find a way inside me. “You stink like rancid
meat in this heat and I’m going to remember your smell. I’m going to
make sure my flies can find you anywhere.”
I froze.
The missionary bellowed, “RUN!” and God forgive me I abandoned
him…
 archival materials by the royal society
Speculation and Field Notes Regarding
Demons
Few entities are as truly terrifying as
those that exist through the spirit.
While it is true, some spirit entities
lack complete physical form, there are
many that are capable of manifesting
powerful physical forms. Demons
are prime examples of spirit beings
that are capable of both physical and
non-physical existence across the realms.
They reside in the courtyards of hell, but
once unleashed are capable of occupying
the minds of the victims, distorting their
view of the world around them. Ghosts,
wraiths and other ethereal visitors are
prime examples of spirit beings. In
this world, as in any other, people do
everything in their power to discourage
and ward off evil spirits, be it with the
crosses and sacred rituals of faith, or
more extreme measures…
Nimrod’s notes are among the
first known accounts of demonic
manifestation, though he is far from
alone in his observations. Herod
Antipas, ruler of Galilee and Perea,
wrote in detail of the horrific Behemoth
while the Book of Job contains extensive
reports of demonic activity, many going
into considerable detail of how those
demons wielded their wickedness over
the weak. It is even claimed that King
Solomon, in his fear of Molech’s wrath,
built a temple in the demon’s honour.
The first account of demons in
Nimrod’s work reads:
“The Greatest God was said to have a
dark side, a side that had fallen into evil and
suffering. Such a thing I never had to put
down because pazuzu, or demons they are
also called, are unusual to encounter.”
It was his belief that these wicked
divine beings were more powerful and
more dangerous than any other. He
named them "Hamurabhiz", the most
powerful of all evil creatures, and wrote
speculations about the nature of the
invisible Ekimmu, who wandered in the
wind and spread his evil in all weathers,
Galu and Ilu limnu and Lilu, who in
later Christian records came to be called
"Lilith":
“Schakaler live there with other desert
animals, and guests shout there to each
other; yes, there Lilit can rest, where she can
find a resting place.” (Isaiah 13:14)
It may well be hundreds if not
thousands of years before mankind
is subjected to such a clear view of
the demonic kind, though Jewish and
Christian mystics continue to research
with uncommon zeal, risking their own
souls in the process, to unravel the
origins and purpose of these demons.
In one of the earliest versions of Der
Hexenhammer is possible to read:
“When the angels had children with men,
God became angry and punished them. They
fell to the earth like fallen angels and burned
like the demons they were turned into.”
One might be forgiven for
assuming that in this context demons
are nothing more than angels who
defied the will of their father, God,
and were punished for their hubris
with purifying fire. The fires of Hell
consumed them. Their essences wore
jagged charred bodies.
“The demons could never take their form
of origin outside of their burning hell, but as
they entered the world of humans, they did
so as manifestations and creations of what
was already there.”
While Christian mystics speak of
such demons as the offspring of the
Devil himself, who forms his gets into
the Legions of Hell, Jewish Kabbalists
consider them more to be the dark
souls who enter and occupy vulnerable
humans, tormenting them as they
scheme grander invasions.
When the Byzantine collapsed in
the 1400s and the Ottoman Empire
took over Athos, the people fled in
terror to the west. One of the refugees,
the monk Kostas Nikeforos, smuggled
out ancient writings, many of which 227
included tracts about demons. Those
tracts led scholars to believe that
the world’s accumulated knowledge
of demons and their relatives rests
even now in one of the monasteries in
Athos.
One of those scriptures includes the
passage:
“The demons are whimsical and horrible,
they penetrate deep into the minds of weak,
unfaithful people and take root. They occupy
the souls of the weak and govern them for
their own gain. “
And goes on to claim that:
“Casting out a demon is no easy task.
Only the priests versed in the knowledge
taught during the time of Christ are able to
drive a demon back to darkness.”
From the crumbling pages of history,
one thing is sure and certain; Demons
are amongst the most powerful foes
who walk in dimensions far from our
own, and the fact that they are capable
of breaking through the portals into
our universe is worthy of genuine fear.
They exist for no other reason than to
spread their insidious evils. Across the
 scriptures and studies the student of the
esoteric arts finds little if any similarity,
some reports claim they occupy earthly
forms, crushing the soul of the human
they have claimed, others that they
merely share the body and act through
it without destroying the host. Many
accounts would have us believe these
possessed bodies become enhanced
during the occupation, gaining the
demon’s more supernatural abilities and
strength, making them a formidable foe
even without the threat of possession.
In the seventeen hundred years since
the crucifixion of Jesus Christ there
has not been a single reliable sighting
of a demon walking the earth in their
natural form. They are stealthy enemies.
They possess people, animals and in
rare cases, objects in order to propagate
their evil.
There exist a vast arsenal of rites and
rituals aimed at driving out the demonic
spirits, but only priests trained in the
supreme arts of exorcism can banish a
demon completely. An exorcism
228 performed by another practitioner of the
arcane arts leaves the victim vulnerable
to re-possession. Indeed, often they
crave the return of the demon like an
opiate addict clawing at their own skin
in the throes of withdrawal. Of course,
what many do not understand is that
the first—and most important—of the
exorcist’s rituals is that of baptism. The
cleansing by baptismal waters during
that solemn ritual serves to wash away
the demonic taint from the child’s
innocent soul and should protect them
throughout their lives. Nevertheless,
weaker individuals amongst us can still
succumb to the will of the demons and
their spirits.
Unique Individuals
Belial & The Marquis du Miro
One of the more notable, and fearsome
of demonic hierarchy, is Belial— or
Marquis Jean du Mirou as that is the
flesh he wears in the mortal realm.
According to the work of our
brothers, Belial is, as yet, incapable of
assuming his true form here on earth.
But he is gaining strength each and
every day, so it is only a matter of time
before he has found the strength to
channel all of the powers of Hell that
are thus far denied to him on the mortal
realm. The greatest risk the demon faces
in his stolen skin is that of discovery—
should the archangels be called upon
the demon is surely doomed as Belial is
still too weak to face them again.
Once he led the sons of darkness
against the bright angels, but now is a
shadow of himself, reborn in death into
his new form.
Cultural memories are long. People
still talk of the winged guardians
serving the Lord of Light and how, in
the war to end all wars, they killed their
own with swords and spears, hurling
them down into the abyss.
What people don’t talk about is
how they did not die, but were merely
tempered like steel by this banishment
and defeat, and so hardened, their hate
is stronger than ever, the darkness
serving to nurture their rage without
fear of discovery.
Still, Belial suffers every day he his
forced to endure among mortals.
Starved of his powers and unable
to unmake even the weakest of God’s
creations, the children supposedly
crafted in His image, that impotence
only serves to torment and twist his
rage. The only balm in this bleak
existence comes in the form of the
suffering of others; he takes delight
in torturing the street children and
beggars, savouring the fear in their
eyes even as their screams nourish him.
Many a corpse has washed up along the
river because of the demon’s appetites
and angers. But however much he enjoys
inflicting pain upon the residents of the
cities, he knows he most move through
the shadows, because all it would take
to undo his great work is one of the
so-called sons of God to meddle. A
single thread pulled just so can unravel
the most glorious and intricate tapestry.
The demon Belial has roamed the
earth in search of the perfect host for
centuries, so many of the meat suits he
claimed falling into decay, rot and ruin
in little more than a century, which is
akin to a blink of his demonic eye.
But then, as the whims of fate would
have it, he crossed paths with the
Marquis du Mirou (whose true name
is Zacharie Marat) and realised that he
had found the perfect host body for his
needs.
There was power within that meat
suit, more than he had tasted in the
117 years he had worn the flesh of the
Ottoman… He felt the forces beginning
to stir, misinterpreting the power as
little more than a childlike attempt to
invoke the devil, but this was different.
There was genuine strength here, the
like of which he had never felt during
his long banishment. That soul called
out to the demon. But just as it served
to lure him, so too did that unparalleled
strength draw his kindred like flies to a
corpse.
This host was different; it was willing.
And that willing somehow protected the
meat from the decay that ravaged those
other lost bodies, allowing him to dwell
within it, a parasite feeding on its host.
Where Belial had quickly consumed
the minds and souls of those earlier
hosts, this one was a banquet that left
him sated. It was a soul that nourished
him in the darkest of ways. And Belial
recognised in it a kindred evil, allowing
Marat’s soul to become part of him,
and in turn the occultist, Marat, offered
up his network friends and fellows for
Belial to bind new souls to his service.
It is a mistake to imagine that it is
relatively easy for a demon to corrupt
souls into its service; it is anything
but. Exposed to the might of a demon
more often than not the servant
perishes before he can be bound. There
is strength in numbers, a demon like
Belial might draw upon fifty loyal
servants, souls bound to him, but the
truth is that it is near impossible for
that number to serve as people die,
and die and die, and the demon has
to seek out fresh souls to take. Of
course there are no shortage of willing
victims, if the promise of sating their
unhealthy appetites is dangled before
229
 them, but it is no easy task to bind
a soul to a demon. The rituals are
exacting and punishing, and can take
an age to complete. More often than
not the would be soul perishes, their
wickedness not enough to survive the
ordeal.
Even so, Belial roams the shadows,
looking to lure his victims into
his service through manipulation,
eloquence and outright lies.
Everything the demon does is part of
some larger plan.
And the devil, as they say, is in the
smallest of the details, so those plans are
beyond intricate.
Yet, still, the best laid plans can be
thwarted, and when they are Belial’s
wrath is unparalleled, and has cost him
more than a few bound souls as he is not
averse to brutally killing a companion
who has failed him in some small way.
One truth ought to be inescapable,
that Marquis Jean du Mirou, the
demon’s host, is dead.
He has to be, by any known measure
230 because one simply cannot live for
centuries by any mortal means, it defies
the very meaning of the world.
Indeed, the Society has in its
possession eye witness accounts from
the time of du Mirou’s death, detailing
the wounds that ended his life. Wounds
delivered by a dagger deep into the
throat.
He met his maker on a rainy night in
1627.
The testimony identifies his murderer though the similarities across so many indispensable to the estate, assuming
as Zacharie Marat, a deceiver and thief. of these accounts leads the archivist to the role of lord and master and taking
They were not unacquainted. Much believe there is truth to them. on all of the dying man’s chores and
can be made of the fact they had indeed It was many years since Jean had responsibilities. It was a quiet coup.
been the very best of friends up until returned home, but with his father Chillingly, it did not take long for
only weeks before the murder. Zacharie, ailing and his vision failing, the pieces the imposter to realise that the most
it would seem, identified the means of a grand scheme fell into place. expedient thing to do would be to take
to better himself within the strata of Without hesitation, Zacharie took his over the nursing of the dying man, and
society, attaching himself to Jean du friend’s life and assumed the role of the usher along his passing with a potent
Mirou’s star. Marquis du Mirou’s son, Jean. draught of poison to hurry death along.
Jean was the only son of a Count, and No more than a week after the The old man had been dying for a very
all sources indicate that his power and murder, he then stood by his new long time so his eventual passing came
influence across Paris was on the rise. father’s bed and told him that his as no surprise to anyone, and Zacharie
What follows has been pieced travels were over and that he was was left to inherit everything that came
together by various testimonies and now home for good. It was everything along with the name and title "Marquis
includes a substantial amount of the old man wanted to hear. Over the Jean du Mirou".
speculation on behalf of the scribes, coming months, Zacharie made himself For two years he played out the public
life of the Marquis du Mirou, establishing
himself in polite society and earning a
reputation as both a kind and generous
soul, and a raconteur of no little repute.
People remarked upon his generous
spirit and charming nature, marvelling
at the grace with which he carried such
a burden, responsible for the lives of so
many servants and good people and going
out of his way to make their lot better.
But, behind closed doors his life
was as different as could be, with him
embracing the occult and taking the
esoteric world into his heart.
What brought about such a change in
the deceiver’s personality?
Whispers suggest a secret basement
beneath the estate he had stolen, and
within it, a secret vault where the
dead Marquis had hidden away a vast
plethora of tomes and scrolls including
detailed studies of the occult. Such was
the knowledge contained within that
vault, he knew it would take a lifetime
and more just to read through every
page, and considerably longer to truly
explore the power it promised. It did
not take the imposter long to grasp
the potential power such ritual arcana
promised, and with each spell mastered
he became stronger and ever stronger.
And still the new Marquis continued
his experiments, perfecting the rituals
without truly grasping the extent of the
forces he was meddling with.
And so it was that by chance he
opened the door within his being to
Belial, a more potent liar and deceiver
than he could ever have dreamed, and
the two became one.
Together they set out to conquer
Paris’s political and occult world, their
influence all-pervasive.
The occultist Marquis du Mirou
quickly became the most notorious man
in the upper echelons of Parisian society.
Today, still wearing the host flesh
that had once been the Marquis du
Mirou, Belial and Zacharie are stronger
than ever.
Of course, keeping the true nature
of this dual being secret has demanded
sacrifice; as soon as anyone grows
suspicious, they tend to meet an ill-fate,
more often than not disappearing
without leaving so much as a trace.
One can only speculate that Belial has
developed some form of tool or rite
capable of creating a veil of shadow
across the memories of those who
suspect his true nature. Traditions
supposedly dating back to ancient
mesopotamia suggest that disinterring
the corpseof the last Marquis and
recovering the predominant hand, Belial
could bind the ritual to the dead flesh
and create an object capable of such
mind-affecting magics, but again that
is purely speculation on our behalf. The
rest of the ritual demands the sacrifice
of five souls, the vitality of these lives
suffuse the hand, which is then gilded to
trap the essence of the dead within the
rotting flesh, and placed on a stake to
create a powerful artefact.
Our understanding of the staff ’s
power means that anyone coming into its
circle of influence finds a false memory
taking root within their mind, the truth
about the Marquis’s long life hidden
behind a veil of falsehood and lies.
Even today, Du Mirou is in high
demand at noble parties and feasts. He
possesses both mystique and charisma,
and with his wit can spin satirical tales
of society’s ills and woes that are both
hilarious and biting social commentary,
but that is not why he is invited to these
gatherings of the rich and powerful. It
is the fact that he has a gift, and will
entertain with conversations with
the dead. More often than not now,
du Mirou can be found lounging in a
throne, overlooking a secret sect who
seemingly exist for no other reason than
to surrender to the basest urges fo the
flesh and revel in mass orgies, hidden
behind masks to hide their identities.
With the sweat of sex heady in the air,
du Mirou may just climb down from his
throne and call upon dark forces from
the beginning of time to complete the
most arcane and foul of rituals, fuelled
by the carnal desires of his worshippers.
He is without doubt one of the most
evil men in the occult world of Paris.
And his strength is growing every
day.
Characteristics
These infernal spirits come in all manner
of guises, wearing the faces of our
deadliest sins and darkest desires. They
may walk amongst us, their true nature
unrecognised for the longest time, but
there are always clues as to their secret
selves that cannot be denied. There is
the tell-tale stench, the reek of the pit,
that clings to them. Some describe the
sulphurous odour as akin to brimstone
though with a treacly undertone, others
believe it is considerably more redolent,
a musk they describe as the very essence
of the grave. The problem for us is that
no one description is truly accurate, and
no single eyewitness wholly reliable as
the effect an encounter with one of the
demonkind has upon a soul is not to be
underestimated. Once they have found a
host body strong enough to hold them
on this plane, even if only for a few weeks,
they look to all intents and purposes
exactly as the host did in life even so
far as they are capable of sitting down
and breaking bread with a family, the
possession unnoticeable. 231
They are skilled imitators, and
persuasive deceivers, and in some more
powerful entities are capable of passing
themselves off as an angel of the light,
so skilled are their falsehoods.
They utilise telepathic communication,
impressing their thoughts and desires
upon all but the strongest of minds,
convincing the victims that these
dark desires and nightmares they fell
compelled to act upon are their own.
They are not, however, infallible or
unbeatable foes for all of their strengths.
They are not omnipotent, and are cable
of falling for ruses run by the players
as much as any other NPC they might
interact with because they have limited
knowledge—the difference is, having
lived for thousands of years, and meddled
with humanity for much of this time,
they understand the minds of mankind
and how they work, and thus can more
often than not read the lies in those little
tells that give all but the most skilful liar
away.
They require blood sacrifices to
sustain themselves, and it is in the
 immediate hours and days in the
aftermath of such an offering that they
are a their most powerful, though if it
has been some considerable time since
they last received a sacrifice they may
be considerably weaker—though still
more than a match for any mere mortal.
In many instances they are driven
by unnatural passions—often to the
exclusion of all else—with seven of
the most powerful of their kind, the
Princes of Hell, named for such in the
work of John Wycliffe in The Lanterne
of Light.
✦ Lucifer: pride
✦ Belzebub: gluttony
✦ Sathanas: wrath
✦ Leviathan: envy
✦ Mammon: greed
✦ Belphegor: sloth
✦ Lilith: lust
They have the gift of tongues and
are prone to making false prophecy
and weighing such with an almost
232 supernatural importance that can drive
those in the thrall of such predictions
insane in their attempts to fulfil the false
futures the demonkin foretold.
First Impressions
As with any human interaction there
are any of many likely first impressions
when players encounter a demon
within its host body ranging on a scale
from attraction to loathing, but it is
important to remember that demonic
entities are nothing if not charming,
so more often than not those first
impressions will be favourable. This
is how they move amongst us. They
look like the best of us. They are
charming, in some cases sophisticated,
and intelligent. It is only as their skin
suits begin to decay that it becomes
harder and harder for the demon to
pass for one of us, its true nature
unrecognised. In its natural demonic
form a demon has a chameleonic ability
to take on any appearance desired,
though often they are depicted as ugly,
monstrous creatures that is far from
the truth. These renditions owe more
to the imagination of artists like Luca
Signorelli and Hieronymus Bosch.
We find comfort in imagining them as
vile monstrous things, but the truth is
every demon was once angel-kind.
There are some subtle indicators that
can betray the presence of a demon to
an observant player that extend beyond
the musk of the pit; there is the ever-
present buzzing of the congregation of
flies that are never far away from the
demon, even in human form; there is the
reaction of animals to the presence of
the demon, most notably dogs which can
be heard to howl in scream-like anguish
and birds which flock overhead, circling
in a frenzied gyre of tumultuous motion;
there are strange movements in the
shadows just on the edge of vision, and
more.
What do the Players Know?
A player well versed in the esoteric world
may well be familiar with the "Concordia
Pandaemonica", or the "Hierarchy of
Discord" as it is very badly translated,
which is a classification of demonkind
that expands upon the Byzantine
philosopher Psellus’s De Operatione
Daemonum and divides the Infernal
Spirits who exist beneath the Princes of
Hell into seven spheres of influence:
✦ Empyreal - the weird of fire
✦ Aerial - the weird of the sky
✦ Lucifugous - the weird of light and
shadow
✦ Aqueus - the weird of water
✦ Terrene - the weird of the land
✦ Fatum - the weird of destiny
✦ Locus - the weird of space
There are 68 named demons across
the seven spheres, each is ruled over
by powerful arch demons, though
there are countless as yet unnamed and
unidentified lesser demons that dwell
within these weirds and answer to their
masters. They have a singular purposes:
to cause torment and sow chaos amongst
humanity, and each weird offers unique
talents for causing that trouble.
✦ Azus: The Darkness Bearer is master
of Lucifugous
✦ Abaddon: The Sower of Discord is
the master of Fatum
✦ Merihem: Lord of Pestilence is the
master of Aerial
✦ Belial: The Bringer of Sorrows is
master of Empyreal
✦ Ashema: Revenger of Wickedness is
master of Terrene
✦ Astaroth: The Inquisitor is master of
Locus
Several great grimoire detail the abilities
of these demons and their weirds,
including Le Dragon Rouge, Fasciculus
Rerum Geomanticarum, Pseudomonarchia
Daemonum and The Ars Goetia. These
pages contain some of the most potent
rituals, invocations and sigils that,
when conducted and crafted by skilled
occultists, are capable of bridging the gap
between the void of Hell and the material
world allowing the demons entry while
warding the summoner from possession.
Of course, the more powerful the demon
that makes contact, the more devious and
scheming they are and the more likely
they are to find a way to circumvent the
wards protecting the occultist.
Abilities and Main Features
Each demon has its own subset of
abilities and skills, though these include
but are not limited to:
✦ Torment: every demon is especially
skilled at tormenting and torturing
mortals.
✦ Each demon belongs to a subset of
the Concordia Pandaemonica. This is
a hierarchy of the damned and offers
classifications of the Infernal Spirits
according to their sphere of influence.
Each subset grants unique abilities to
their demons, such as Empyreal offers
the demon control of fire, Lucifugous
grants control of light, and so forth.
✦ At a low level, they possess the ability
to mask their presence, cloaking
themselves with shadow, whereas
more powerful demons can appear
and disappear at wil.
✦ They have it within their power to
appear in ethereal form, as ghosts of
the deceased, manipulating sensory
perception.
✦ Ability to perform magic and rituals
from the simplest to most complex of
the esoteric and arcane.
✦ Their persuasive skills are so finely
tuned their lies are insidious and
capable of influencing people, even
whole populations to doing their will.
✦ With the gift of tongues even the
lowliest of demons possesses the
ability to speak through humans and
animals with the same persuasive
skills as above.
✦ To exist for any length of time upon
the Earth the demon must find a host
body to occupy—though it is possible
for them to possess inanimate objects
for a limited time while they await a
suitable host.
✦ Even the lowest of demons can infiltrate
a sleeper’s dreams, shaping them.
More powerful demons are capable of
direct communication in the form of
revelations spoken into the sleeping
mind. This form of communication is
incredible dangerous for the sleeper
as it places an imperative within their
subconscious that their waking mind
cannot override.
✦ One of a demon’s most terrifying
abilities is that of influence—they
are capable of bending all but the
most ferocious minds to their will,
enslaving them. Once enslaved,
humans are little more than puppets
to be played with, no whim or abuse
beyond their demon master.
✦ But it is the demon’s true nature that
causes the biggest risk to mortals—
the influence of a demon can result
in subtle changes happening to the
characters they interact with, as
their sense of morality, justice, and
restraint can gradually be superseded
by a driving immorality, injustice,
and violent behaviour until the player
or NPC is unrecognisable.
✦ All demons share the same virulent
gift; they are capable of spreading
disease (including mental illness)
throughout the populace.

 
Demon typical stats
Demons are extremely powerful opponents which cannot be
defeated with swords and muskets. Furthermore, mortals do
not have the power to destroy a demon, only God can do it:
this is the reason why only those who trust in God can hope
to triumph over these fearsome opponents. Expert soldiers
learned Illuminists and brilliant scientists are usually unable
to face these enemies. In fact, all the “rationalists” who deny
their existence inevitably become victims of these dark
spirits.
Trying to give exact stats to the real forms of Demons is
impossible, and it is also a futile exercise, since they cannot be
harmed by mortals. What follows are just a few suggestions
about how to represent the manifestations of a demon: which
usually means a “possessed human being”. This is, in fact, the
way demons are usually experienced.
It is important to understand that destroying the
manifestation of a demon does mean to destroy the demon
itself. Maybe the evil spirit is weakened and exiled back to
hell, but only Divine Power can hope to really damage a
demon.
Moreover, the following stats represent just a possible
option about the changes which a demon exerts on a
possessed victim. Different demons may cause different
changes on the host. Furthermore, the example here shown
is that of a typical unwilling human possessed by a demon
and whose traits are usually overcome by a demon’s traits.
On the other hand, those evil souls which submit by their
Finally, it is worth noting that the appearances of this
creature may be identical to the original shape of the
possessed victim (especially at the beginning of possession)
or it may be completely alien (especially in the later phases
of possession). Remember that all demons desire only death 233
and destruction for human beings. They will lead victims
into temptation, and they will not refrain in mistreating the
possessed body, if this gives them an advantage.
Traits: Constitution +4, Dexterity +4, Intelligence +6,
Perception+2.
Physical Health Points: 50-150 (100 is a common value).
Movement: walking 2 CP per 1 m (Max 14 m, with +4
Dexterity).
Fear Factor: 1d10 (OR 7-10) to be applied when somebody
realizes that the victim is possessed.
Skills: use the victim ‘skills (especially at the beginning
of the possession) and, when the possession is
complete, use whatever value seem to work for the
demon, although they usually automatically succeed
most skill rolls.
Natural Weapons: Fist (1d6 + Constitution) or Bite (1 php,
to be applied only after a successful grappling). However,
demons usually exploit their powers to attack.
Initiative: +4 Dexterity
Combat points: Free 20 /Unarmed 10 / Evade 15.
Samples of Attacks:
✦ (IM +4) Brawling SV 15, SV 15

own will to demonic possession (as the false “Marquis du ✦ (IM +4) Wrestling SV 15 (see Grapple Lex Libris p.19) +

Mirou” described earlier in this chapter) may retain some of Bite.

their personality, traits and skills, albeit modified, augmented ✦ (IM +4) Evade SV 17 or two Evade attempts SV 8 and SV 7.

or twisted by demonic influence.

 Common Properties
These are just a few of the common properties and these
are the properties which should be firstly considered at the
beginning of the possession. Later, as the demon’s power
become stronger, the possessed host may manifest one or
more of the optional properties.
Possessing Demon
The above-described Traits and PHP are those of a demon
(and it is just an example: many other combinations are
possible). However, at the beginning of the demonic
possession use the victim’s traits, while the demon’s traits
gradually substitute the victim’s one as the possession
becomes stronger.
Once the possession is at its maximum (and the demon’s
PHP are used instead of the victim’s PHP), keep record of
the possessed victim’s PHP but separated from the demon’s
value. Any wound dealt to the demon will also be dealt to
the possessed victim’s PHP (except for specific demon-
targeting powers, like Exorcism on Lex Libris p.234) and
any damage level’s modifier of the victim will not influence
the demon.
Sometimes the possessed victim dies but the rotten body is
still possessed by the demon which moves it and use it, often
deforming it into a monstrous shape. However, sooner or later
the demon is bound to abandon the destroyed body (since it
234 prefers fresher victims for performing its dark plots).
Victims which survive the experience usually bear
incredibly damage psyche, the GM should therefore judge an
appropriate damage level in MHP.
Demonic Body & Mind
A demon has a PHP value but no damage levels, since it does
not care about the damage that is dealt on the victim’s body. If
the demon’s PHP are reduced to “0” it will possibly abandon
the body.
A demon has no MHP to record, since its mind is so alien
that it cannot be harmed by mortal means.
Evil Nourishment
Demons want nothing but the annihilation of the human
beings. They feats on their sufferings and their deaths,
especially gruesome ones. The GM should power-up the
demon stats (e.g. heal lost PHP, get a +5 SV to rolls, etc..) after
some particularly gruesome sacrifices or human sufferings,
especially linked to sinful acts.
Temptation
Whether through their actions or by telepathic skills, all
demons aim to make human beings fall into temptation.
Real sin is committed through free will, therefore game
mechanics should not be used to force temptation,
although the demons are masters at influencing things
to make people fall. it is way better if a specific situation
is created and role-played. Remember that demons want
mortal to fall into sin by their own free will, since only
real corruption may feed demons’ needs (e.g. the “Evil
Nourishment” property).
However, if the GM prefers to use mechanics, after the
whole “tempting situation” is organized, the GM may allow
a Situation Roll to resist it. The SV should be established
according to the specific context, but an example may be SV
8 modified by Psyche.
Vulnerabilities
This list presents a few of the most common vulnerabilities
of Demons.
✦ A demon can only manifest through possessing a mortal,
otherwise it has no real body.
✦ Exorcism (Lex Libris p.234) is particularly effective against
demons. Some demons even suffer double the damage
suggested in the art’s description.
✦ A demon cannot come near to holy relics, churches with
faithful Christian communities, holy sacraments and
anything else which is sacred. God is always more powerful
than any demon, therefore they cannot even attempt to
approach these objects and places.
✦ Holy Water will inflict 1d10 PHP damage per 10 cc.
✦ A crucifix blocks the way to any demon-possessed victim
only if held by somebody with faith in God (to be judged
by the GM).
✦ Proclaiming the Sacred Scriptures (especially the Psalms)
or performing traditional prayers (e.g. Liturgy of the Hours,
Rosary, etc.) including words from the Bible will damage a
demon, especially if these actions are performed with faith.
A Theology skill roll is due (Divine Art discipline and Holy
power specialty may be applied) and, in case of success, the
demon is dealt 1d5 PHP. A new Theology roll is needed
each action round in order to keep on inflicting damage.
Sometimes this is done to help the priest performing the
Exorcism (Lex Libris p.234), adding further damage to
what is dealt to the demon.
✦ Sainthood make demons weaker and feebler (damage PHP,
penalties to SV, etc.).
✦ Sooner or later all demonic possessions become obvious.
Human beings are not made for hosting such unholy spirits
and the demons themselves cannot help but ruining their
hosts. Sometimes odd is bound to be revealed. It may be
in the host’s behaviour, more often in its appearances (like
insects swarming off the mouth, foul or sulphurous smells,
skeletal appearance, fire-coloured eyes, etc..).
✦ Holy or blessed weapons may overcome any protection that
the demon has.
✦ Demons are not omnipotent, even if they believe to be so.
Consequently, they may easily fall in the same sins that
they tempt, especially pride: something which may make
them performing errors.
Optional Properties
Even if they are limited in their manifestations (they are
obliged to possess a victim), the demon types are different
and numerous, as different and numerous are the kinds of
sins linked to these evil spirits. There are so many kinds of
demons with so many different abilities to display through
their possessed victim, therefore the GM is encouraged to use
properties from other monsters (like ghouls, incubi, vampires,
wraiths, etc.) or to create new ones. What follows are just a
few, possible demonic properties.
Accuser
Good Christians know that they are sinners, they hate the
sin and repent for their faults, but they also know that God is
merciful. Therefore, even if they judge and accuse themselves,
they always know that God is hope and love. On the other
hand, Shaitan (the Devil) is the “Accuser”, which means he
does not just point the finger, but it also hides any possible
hope (as well as its role in having tempted the sinner…).
After a sin is performed, a demon will force guilty souls
to hate themselves, to believe them to be beyond any kind
of redemption, as Judas did, feeding the victim’s mind with
suicidal thoughts. Some demons may use telepathic force to
feed these negative feelings with different results. The victim
should make a Situation Roll with an SV of 10 (modified by
Psyche, although the GM may give other modifiers according
to the victim’s faith or psychology).
In case of failure there may be different effects, according to
the specific demons. A failure may cause mental crises (1d10
OR 10 MHP damage) or even imprint the idea that suicide is
the only option.
Astral Oppression
Demons may choose a victim and they persecute it every night,
by appearing in the victim’s dreams through astral projection.
Each night the victim must perform a Situation Roll with an
SV of 10 (modified by Psyche) or suffer 1d6 MHP.
Control element
Some Demons may have control over specific elements or
subjects according to their nature, especially regarding their
position in the Psellus’ classification. Examples are as follows.
✦ Empyreal. The demon may control fire (extinguishing a
fire or feeding it) and they can even emit it. Fire breath is
like “Mortal Spit” property but inflict fire damage.
✦ Aerial. The demon may levitate (2 CP per 2 m, Max 30 m)
or may suck the breath from a victim (see “Breath Sucker”
option of vampires).
✦ Lucifugous. In confined spaces the demon can augment
or diminish light, creating blinding effects (see “Blind
Fighting in Lex Libris p.23).
✦ Aqueus. The demon may move on the waters as if they were
soil, it can move huge amount of waters, even attacking
targets (e.g. using a sea wave to automatically overwhelm
people, making them risking drowning (see ”Diving” in
Alter Ego p.63, those who fail are killed by drowning).
✦ Terrene. Move soil, opening chasms. Agility rolls to avoid
falling inside or fall 1d10 metres (falling damage as per Lex
Libris p.31).
✦ Fatum. If the demon does nothing else and focus on a
victim, this will suffer a -5 SV on any roll that is attempted.
✦ Locus. The possessed host may teleport at will.
Ethereal Form
Some demons may turn to ethereal forms, behaving like
ghosts and using the same mechanics.
Illusions
The devil is the greatest liar. In fact, demons know how to
bend images tricking the minds of their victims. There is no
limit to the kinds of illusions and, to resist them, one must
succeed a Situation Roll with an SV of 8 (modified by Psyche).
Masking Shadow
This demon/possessed host may disappear in shadows and it
is impossible to notice it.
Mental Slaver
If it does not perform any other action, the possessed host/
demon can fix its eyes on a single victim which is in its visual 235
range. The Victim must succeed a Situation Roll with an SV
of 12 (modified by Psyche) or suffer 1d10 (OR 10) MHP. If the
victim reaches the 5th level of Mental Damage (“Insanabilis”)
after one or more of these mental attacks, the demon takes
possession of the victim’s body. As long as the Demon does
not perform any other action, it can keep on controlling the
victim’s body as if it was its own. The GM decides when the
slavery ends (by killing the Demon’s host or just by distracting
it). More powerful demons may deal higher mental damage
(1d10 OR 9-10 or even 1d10 OR 8-10) and do not need to
focus in order to control the victim.
Mortal Spit
A possessed victim may emit foul substances from its mouth.
By doing nothing else in the same round (and usually, up to
three times per night), the demon/possessed victim can invest
all those in front of it with a deadly breath or vomit (it may be
an insect swarm, mephitic smokes, blackish poisonous liquids,
acid, etc..). This attack cannot be parried but can be avoided
with a successful Evade maneuver.
✦ The GM may decide the effects. Possible example may be:
✦ Force to make an SV 10 (modified by Health) Situation Roll
or get a disease chosen by the GM
✦ Force to make an SV 10 (modified by Health or Psyche)
Situation Roll or be paralyzed for 1d10 rounds.
✦ Suffer d10 (OR 10) PHP damage.
 Natural Climber
This possessed host can climb almost vertical walls and even
horizontal ceilings.
Natural Weapons
The demon (or its possessed host) have two natural
weapons: Claws (Dmg 1d10 OR 10 +4 Constitution) and
bite (Dmg 1d10 OR 9-10). Unless the GM rules otherwise,
the bite is automatically inflicted only after a successful
grapple attack.
Natural Weapons (Foul)
The fangs and claws of this demons are not just larger (with
OR ranges augmented by 1) but they are filled with poison or
filth. Anyone who has been wounded by them (and somehow
survives!) must make a situation roll with SV 10 modified by
Health in order to avoid becoming sick and suffer 1d10 PHP
12 hours after the wound happened.
Paralyzing Stare
If the possessed host does nothing else but staring at the
victim’s eyes, the target must succeed a Situation Roll with an
SV of 7 modified by Psyche. In case of failure it will remain
paralyzed for 1d6 action rounds.
Plague Spreading
236 Demons may spread plagues, whether by their mere presence
or by the natural attacks of their possessed hosts. Possible
suggestions for this disease can be found in the descriptions
of the following monsters: Homunculus (Poison & Diseases
optional property), Mummy (Plague-Spreader property),
Specters & Wraiths (Breath of Disease).
Protection
Normal weapons deal only 1/3 damage (rounded down, to a
minimum of 1). See “Vulnerabilities” for possible exceptions.
Sensual Magnetism
Some rare possessed hosts become irremediably attractive
from a sensual point of view, surrounded as they are by
unnatural pheromones. All the individuals which meet the
possessed host should succeed a Situation Roll with SV 12
(modified by Psyche) or fall in love or even feel intense sexual
desire towards the possessed host or, in alternative, feel
subjection and fascination for this individual. This property
is particularly appropriate for stories where the presence
of the Vampire is linked with depravation, debauchery and
the fall of morality in an otherwise “respectable” village or
quarter.
Thick Skin
This is typical of demons whose powers have overcome the
host’ original appearances. A scaly or leathery skin appears,
giving from 2 to 6 points of natural protection.
Terrifying Screech
If they do nothing else in the round, some possessed victims
can emit terrifying screeches inflicting 1d10 (OR 9-10) of
mental damage.
Torment
Demons may use its mental powers to force painful feelings
and insane visions into the victims’ minds. The demon cannot
perform other actions while doing this attack. All the living
persons around the demon should make a Situation Roll with
SV 10 (modified by Psyche). Those who succeed will suffer
only 1 MHP but will also realize that they are facing unreal
hallucinations. Those who fail will suffer 1d10 (OR 9-10)
MHP from intense fear.
If this damage is enough to make the victim reach the third
level of Mental Health (“Mens Amissa” or “Lunatic”) the GM
should force the victim to make another Situation Roll with
SV 10 (modified by Psyche) to avoid performing some self-
harming act, like trying to suicide in order to stop the visions.
Demon Variations
An exact classification of demons is impossible: they may
have so many different powers and appearances (or, more
properly, force these horrid appearances on the possessed
victims). The “Control Elements” above give options to mimic
the six classes of demons as described by Psellus. However, it
is possible that demons exist even beyond that basic.
Demon-related Secret Arts
Quite often demons teach dark arts and secret spells to
ambitious alchemists, witches and sorcerers which, sooner
or later, are bound to become victims and possessed hosts
of these demons. When a demon trade something, it is
never of any real advantage for the mortal taking part into
the pact: a soul is bound to be lost and corrupted, whatever
happens. “Pactum cum diabolo” (Lex Libris p.230) describes
this situation and the GM is strongly encouraged to make
these pacts never advantageous. They should be avoided for
a real reason since demons never cause anything positive
even for those with whom they enter a bargain. Exorcism
(Lex Libris 234) is the main weapon to be used against
demons, since only God has the real power that demons
fear. Esoteric forms of banishing exist (see for example
“Esoteric Banishing” art in the “Incubus & Succubus”
chapter of this book) although they are never as effective
as Divine Arts.
Rabbinic Exorcism
New Divine Art
A special kind of exorcism can be performed by an expert
Rabbi who has faith in God. This exorcism requires a “minyan”
(a group of ten adult male Jews) and deep knowledge of
sacred scriptures. The ten Jews should be in a circle around
the possessed host and they need to recite three times Psalm
91. The Rabbi should then blow a Shofar (the ritual ram’s
horn used in religious rituals).
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -12
Requirements
✦ Skill: Theology SV 10
✦ Discipline: Divine Power level 3
✦ Specialty: Holy Power level 4
Other Requirements
✦ De Religionibus Discipline level 1, Religio Specialty
(Hebraism) level 4
✦ Communication SV 5, Languages Discipline level 1,
Foreign language: Hebrew level 3, Read & Write (Hebrew)
specialty level 2.
Material Requirements
✦ Torah, psalms
✦ A Shofar
Effect
To complete the ritual, one needs 1d6+2 action rounds (to
be rolled at the beginning of the ritual) and none of the
participants (Rabbi or the ten Jews) can be stopped. The
Rabbi will make the Theology skill roll (with the -12, above
mentioned) at the end of the require rounds. The possessed
person/demon should be preferably chained, and it must
make a Situation Roll with SV 8 every round if it wants to
attack any of the ten Jews or the Rabbi. However, if the Rabbi
or the 10 participants are interrupted, they must start again.
After the required rounds are passed the demon will suffer
2d10 (OR 9-10) PHP. The group may start again for another
1d6+2 rounds and make a new Theology skill roll at the end.
Sunbeam Lash
New Dark Art, Right-Hand Path
In the early 18th century a merchant from Crete bought an
ancient decorated papyrus when he was in Alexandria of
Egypt. The seller said that this was stolen from an ancient
tomb of the age of the Ptolemies, somewhere in the delta
area. The papyrus mysteriously arrived in Venice by the end
of the 18th century and, from there, nobody knows where it
went. There are stories about this papyrus in various secret
societies, all about this document describing a Greek version
of a much older ritual, linked with an otherwise unknown
Sun cult. Whoever get the papyrus and read it, will maybe
learn about a powerful esoteric weapon to be used against the
creatures of darkness like demons, vampires and incubi.
✦ Degree of Difficulty: -16
Requirements
✦ Skill: Esotericism SV 10
✦ Discipline: The Right-hand Path level 4
✦ Specialty: White Magic level 4
Other Requirements
✦ Communication SV 7, Languages Discipline level 1,
Foreign language: Ancient Greek level 4
237
Material Requirements
✦ A small amulet crafted in translucent faïence or crystal.
✦ This ritual can only be performed in the open, under the
light of the sun. It cannot be performed in the night or
when clouds hide the sun.
✦ The sorcerer must cut its own palm sacrificing 1 PHP of
blood to be dropped on the amulet.
Effect
The sorcerer must spell the exact formulas in Ancient
Greek, which takes 3 rounds to perform. During the fourth
round a particularly focused sunbeam will illuminate the
target (demon, possessed person or any other dark creature),
inflicting 2d10 PHP. The target’s flesh will seem as if it was
“lashed” in the point where the solar energy hits.
 Appendix: Animals
The following table represent basic stats for a few normal (or
“almost” normal) animals. These creatures do not need exact
skill values and other mechanic values like traits, skills or
PHP. In some cases, the GM may feel the need to ass special
properties which are here not present due to limits of space.
Furthermore, this table does not aim at covering any existent
animal species: there is a huge degree of simplification. The
GM, as usual, is encouraged to use grain of salt when adapting
these stats, especially when creating new animals.
238 Swarms
A “swarm” may be composed by an incredible number of
small creatures like bees, flies, beetles, spiders, scorpions, bats
or rats. Many creatures described in this book (mummies,
vampires, demons, etc.) may be linked with swarms or can
command them. It is recommended to treat swarms not as
“creatures” but rather as environmental effects. It is pointless
to record the PHP of a swarm: one cannot kill all the tiny
members of the swarm with a melee weapon, although some
elements (smoke, water, fire and alchemical compounds) may
deter the swarm to get nearer. The GM should decide what
repels each swarm type.
It is also pointless to record a swarm’s attack SV: a swarm
will usually automatically hit (bite, sting, etc.) anybody who
happen to be in contact. The GM may allow Situation Rolls (e.g.
10 modified by Dexterity), Evade attempts or Agility skill rolls
to avoid physical damage, but it really depends on the situation
and the number of small creatures involved. Sometimes the
tiny creatures are too numerous be avoided. On the other hand,
mental effects should be avoided by succeeding a Situation Roll
with an SV of 10 modified by Psyche.
Swarms may inflict one or more of the following conditions
and the GM may decide what applies.
✦ Huge bother: all the SV suffer a penalty from -1 to -5.
✦ Mental damage in MHP. From 1d6 to 1d10.
✦ Damage in PHP. From 1 single PHP to 1d10 (OR 10).
✦ Poison
Poison
The poison of different creatures (snakes, spiders, scorpions,
etc.) may inflict different kinds of damage. The GM is
encouraged to personalize the effects of poisons, in order
to replicate different poison types choosing the needed
Situation Roll, the Rhythm of the Situation Rolls needed,
the Effects and the Duration. The following are just generic
guidelines which should inspire the GM’s creativity and not
limits.
Situation Roll
Poison effect can be avoided by succeeding a Situation Roll
with SV of 6/8/10/12, usually modified by Health.
Rhythm
Some poisons require just one Situation Roll to be immediately
performed, while other require more than one to be performed
at specific intervals of rounds/hours/ days. Each failure will
provoke again the effects.
Effect
There are so many possible effects which poison may inflict.
What follows are just a few possibilities.
✦ Damage (this may represent anything, from heart attack to
respiratory crises). Damage can be in exact rates (1,2, 3 or
4 PHP points) or it may be rolled: anything from 1d6 PHP
to 3d10 (OR 9-10) PHP.
✦ Hallucinations. For the duration the victim must succeed
a Situation Roll with SV of 4/6/8/10/12 (modified by
Psyche) in order to do anything else but looking at the
hallucinations.
✦ Paralysis for the duration.
✦ Neural attack: suffer -1 to -5 SV for the duration.
✦ Blindness for the duration (Lex Libris p.31).
Duration
Some effects (hallucinations, blindness, etc.) may last for
1d6/1d10/2d10 rounds or hours.
Animal PHP levels (0/-1/-3/-5/7) Natural Metres per CP Sample of Attacks Damage Fear
Armor 2 CP (max Free/ Factor
mov.) Attacks
Bat (giant, 1-3/4-5/6-7/8-9/10 - F 4 m (12 m) 6 / B 10 Fly 12 m 9 1d2 -
unnatural) B SV 10
Bear 1-25/26-44/45-59/60-68/68-76 2 L 6 m (18 m) 10/ B10, B: SV 15, B: 2d10 (OR 9-10) 1d10
C14 C: SV10, SV 9. C: 2d10 (OR 10)
Boar 1-16/17-28/29-38/39-44/45-50 2 L 3 m (12 m) 8 / T14 H: SV 12, SV 10 1d10 (OR 9-10) 1d5
Bovine, 1-30/31-52/53-70/71-81/82-90. 2 L 8 m (16 m) 6 / K16 H: SV 14, SV 8 2d10 (OR 8-10) 1d6
Bull
Bovine, 1-24/25-42/43-57/58-66/67-74 2 F 3 m (9 m) 6/H6 H: SV 6 1d10 (OR 10) -
Cow
Deer/ 1-10/11-18/19-24/25-28/29-32 2 L 4 m (20 m) 10 / H14 H: SV 14 1d10 (OR 10) -
Elk
Dog 1-3/4-5/6-7/8-9/10 - L 4 m (16 m) 8 / B14 B: SV 12, SV 10 1d5 -
Dog (big) 1-5/6-9/10-12/13-14/15-16 - L 4 m (20 m) 8 / B16 B: SV 14, SV 10 1d10 -
/ Wolf
Dog 1-3/4-5/6/7/8 - L 4 m (12 m) 6 / B14 B: SV 12, SV 8 1d3 -
(small) /
Fox
Eagle 1-6/7-10/11-13/14—16/17-18 - F 4 m (28 m) 14 / C12 Fly 20m + C: SV 1d5 -
16
Elephant 1-60/61-105/106-141/142- 3 L 14 m (14 m) 6/S8, K: SV 14 S: 3d10 (OR 8-10), 1d10
163/164-180 T10 T: SV 10 T: 3d10 (OR 9-10)
Falcon/ 1-5/6-8/9-11/12-13/14-15 - F 4 m (32 m) 16 / C10 Fly 20m + C: SV 1d3 -
Hawk 16 239
Horse, 1-25/26-44/45-59/60-68/69-76 2 L 6 m (24 m) 10 / K2 K: SV 12 2d10 (OR 10) -
large
Horse, 1-22/23-39/40-52/53-60/61-68 2 L 8 m (24 m) 10 / K2 K: SV 12 2d10 (OR 10) -
normal
Horse, 1-21/22-37/38-49/50-57/58-64 2 L 6 m (24 m) 10 / K2 K: SV 12 1d10 (OR 10) -
small
Leopard/ 1-21/22-37/38-49/50-57/58-64 - L 6 m (24 m) 8 / B8 B: SV 8 B: 1d10 (OR 9-10) 1d5
Puma C8 C: SV10, SV 8. C: 1d10 (OR 10)
Lion/ 1-25/26-44/45-59/60-68/68-76 1 L 6 m (18 m) 12/ B8 B: SV 10 B: 2d10 (OR 9-10) 1d10
Tiger C10 C: SV10, SV 10. C: 2d10 (OR 10)
Moose 1-15/16-26/27-35/36-40/41-45 2 L 4 m (12 m) 6 / H10 H: SV 16 2d10 (OR 9-10)
Mule/ 1-16/17-28/29-38/39-44/45-50 2 L 4 m (16 m) 8 / K2 K: SV 12 1d10 (OR 10) -
Donkey
Ram/ 1-3/4-5/6-7/8-9/10 1 L 3 m (12 m) 10 / H4 H: SV 14 1d6 -
Goat
Shark 1-60/61-105/106-141/142- 4 W: 7 m (42 m) 12 / B B: SV 13, SV 12 3d10 (OR 8-10) 1d10
163/164-180 13
Snake, 1-2/3-4/5/6/7 - L 1 m (8 m) 8/B6 B: SV 14 1d3 + poison 1d5
Poisonous
Wolverine 1-3/4-5/6-7/8-9/10 2 L 3 m (12 m) 8/ B8, B: SV 8, B: 1d10 (OR 10) 1d5
C8 C: SV8, SV 8. C: 1d10
L = Land Movement, F = Flying Movement W = Water Movement
B = Bite, C = Claw, H = Horn, K = Kick, S = Sweep, T = Tusk