This is an ele­gant ho­use. Us pat­rons cla­im it is the fi­nest in the sta­te, if not the na­ti­on, and so­lidly, if sor­didly, en­dor­se it. They des­c­ri­be the fur­nis­hings as per­fecr, the ta­lents of the em­p­lo­ye­es as ex­qu­isi­te and the ar­ran­ge­ments as pa­in­ful­ly dis­c­re­et. Per­haps the­se things are true. Cer­ta­inly the ope­ra­ti­on is so re­fi­ned as to ma­ke un­ne­ces­sary any blac­k­ma­il. The ma­yor co­unts the ma­dam among his clo­sest fri­ends.

    The po­li­ce ne­ver ra­id this ho­use.

    On the gro­und flo­or is a res­ta­urant as fa­mo­us and as res­pec­tab­le as any ot­her, Aman­da slinks de­li­be­ra­tely ac­ross the ma­in sa­lon, drif­ting slowly clo­ser to her tar­get's tab­le. Out of the cor­ner of her eye, she se­es him, se­es the wi­neg­lass in his flac­cid hand. Twi­ce the ma­gick has mis­fi­red. Twi­ce this man has es­ca­ped, all un­wit­tingly, A clumsy wa­iter drop­ped the first ta­in­ted glass; a drun­ken di­ner sto­le the se­cond. Tho­ugh new to her po­wers, al­re­ady Aman­da has co­me to dis­t­rust co­in­ci­den­ce, and ice set­tles in her spi­ne. She longs to se­arch the­se va­cu­o­us fa­ces for the enemy, to fight di­rectly the half-sus­pec­ted op­po­si­ti­on… she cur­ses this clumsy ap­pro­ach even as she ne­ut­ra­li­zes the po­ison of the se­cond glass. A kni­fe, she fe­els, is so much mo­re fi­nal.

    She re­ac­hes the tab­le just as a no­isy party of se­ven crowds past in the ot­her di­rec­ti­on. Jos­t­led, Aman­da le­ans aga­inst the tab­le for sup­port, smi­les va­gu­ely as the mur­mu­red apo­lo­gi­es be­gin. One sa­tin-glo­ved hand mo­ves a frac­ti­on of an inch…

    "Jane, dar­ling! Is it re­al­ly you?" One of the pas­sing di­ners, a han­d­so­me Asi­an gen­t­le­man in a tu­xe­do, ta­kes her firmly by the sho­ul­ders. The pres­su­re is light, but her hands are im­mo­bi­li­zed.

    "Do I know you?" She se­ar­c­hes his fa­ce. Ne­ver in her li­fe has she used "Jane" as an ali­as, but this gi­ves her ti­me for a mo­ment's tho­ught.

    "I'll be so hurt if you don't re­mem­ber, you know." No. It ma­kes no dif­fe­ren­ce whet­her this man is her enemy or not. Her ad­ver­sary do­ub­t­less wat­c­hes, and this is her last chan­ce,

    "How co­uld I ever for­get?" As she kis­ses him, she shifts spa­ce be­hind her, lo­ses her­self to the twis­ting, raw-silk fe­el of re­ality in the ro­om, lifts the bran­c­hing fu­tu­res out of the­ir ran­dom or­der and re­we­aves them aro­und the pla­te be­fo­re her tar­get. Fo­od po­iso­ning. She holds her con­t­rol a mo­ment lon­ger, re­co­ils from the shock of co­un­ter ma­gick, sa­tis­fi­ed that her ad­ver­sary's at­ten­ti­on is held the­re. Only then do­es she flick the wholly mun­da­ne po­ison in­to the wi­neg­lass.

    The gen­t­le­man in her em­b­ra­ce has cold eyes now, and the­re is ste­el be­ne­ath his ple­asant to­nes. He ta­kes her arm, and the­re is ste­el in the gun that pres­ses aga­inst her ribs. The di­ners see only the smi­les, he­ar only the airy chat­ter of old lo­vers; most turn back to the­ir me­als be­fo­re Aman­da and her cap­tor di­sap­pe­ar thro­ugh the sha­do­wed do­ors at the re­ar of the sa­lon. She must play this sce­na­rio out hel­p­les­sly to gi­ve the po­ison ti­me to work.

    They halt by a clo­sed do­or on a top flo­or of the old brick ho­tel. He knocks just on­ce.

    "All's fa­ir. I've got her."

    "What?"

    "Wait a mi­nu­te,"

    "Kill the lights. What she can't see… damn it, hurry up."

    Trapped in this gil­ded hal­lway, Aman­da simply wa­its, won­ders if per­haps he will kill her, won­ders if she sho­uld be af­ra­id… won­ders at her own de­light. She has do­ne what she ca­me he­re ro do. The kill was right, and it was hers, and it was go­od. The fe­eling con­vin­ces the yo­ung Eut­ha­na­tos of the worth of her Path in ways the Old Man's te­ac­hing ne­ver has. As the do­or opens, she fights a smi­le.

    They trip her up, hold her down, ta­ke her kni­ves and trin­kets and cuff her. Then so­me­one slams her in­to an ar­m­c­ha­ir, and the qu­es­ti­ons be­gin aga­in.

    "Who are you?" It's the "gen­t­le­man's" vo­ice, but ro­ug­her, and all ste­el now.

    "Who are you?" Aman­da an­s­wers back, ne­arly la­ug­hing. "Answer me. Who are you?"

    "Why do you want to know?" she asks, re­ady to play the ga­me for ho­urs,

    "Michael?"

    "I'm not to­uc­hing her." This vo­ice is very low, rum­b­ling ac­ross the ro­om li­ke a tiny ear­t­h­qu­ake. "She re­eks of it. We sho­uld kill her and le­ave. Now."

    "Michael, we ne­ed to know," says anot­her. The vo­ice is thin and re­edy and is so­on lost in the pit­ch-black dar­k­ness.

    An exas­pe­ra­ted sigh fills the ro­om. Aman­da fe­els mo­ve­ment be­hind her and a cur­ved bla­de at her thro­at. The ice fe­ar re­turns, and her mus­c­les tig­h­ten aga­inst het will.

    "Who are you, and who do you work for?" the "gen­t­le­man" asks aga­in.

    "Jane Car­ter. I'm free lan­ce." With a start, she re­ali­zes the na­me she picks out of thin air is the sa­me na­me he had cal­led her. But even in the wash of me­mory, she spe­aks ca­re­ful­ly, trying to hold her thro­at as still as pos­sib­le, ho­ping the li­es wil! pass .by him.

    "That's bet­ter. And why are- " He stops as the do­or slams open.

    The tiny sil­ho­u­et­te in the do­or­way stands po­ised for an in­s­tant, un­cer­ta­in, and then fum­b­les for the light switch.

    "He's de­ad," says the sha­dow, and the over­he­ad light re­ve­als her: a small girl with an el­fin po­in­ted chin, ho­ney­dark skin and flinty, flashy eyes. Her mo­ve­ments are sharp and light, and her every ges­tu­re sends her short brown locks twit­c­hing aro­und her fa­ce. Be­hind her stands a sle­ekly mus­c­led man with a gray fe­do­ra and a dark blue su­it. He eyes the child- if child she is- un­com­for­tably, and scrat­c­hes at his shirt col­lar as he spe­aks.

    "Well, not yet, ac­tu­al­ly. But- "

    "But I saw the am­bu­lan­ce pe­op­le, and they're all from Cer­be­rus. Her pe­op­le. She's that old guy's new ap­pren­ti­ce, just with her ha­ir chan­ged and her fa­ce ma­de up. She's prac­ti­cal­ly an Adept. She got him, Da­vid. You mis­sed it." The girl lo­oks past the man in the tu­xe­do to Aman­da. "It was the wi­ne, wasn't it?"

    "Yes." Aman­da's vo­ice is ste­ady, but her glan­ce darts aro­und the ro­om lo­oking for exits, for ho­les in the ca­ge clo­sed ro­und her. The­re are no win­dows, and only one do­or that she can see. Her ga­ze set­tles on her cap­tor, Da­vid, trying to ga­uge his re­ac­ti­on, but by then, his fa­ce shows not­hing. Slowly, she tri­es to mo­ve her neck far eno­ugh to sec the man be­hind her, but the bla­de pres­ses clo­se, war­ningly.

    "And you mis­sed it, Da­vid."

    "I'm sorry." He sits down on the ed­ge of the bed, tri­es to catch her eyes. "But what -"

    "Why did you do it?" The girl ad­van­ces on Aman­da. "Why? What gi­ves you the right to co­me he­re and do this?" Her fa­ce is ble­ac­hed with an­ger, and te­ars of fury stre­am down it li­ke ra­in.

    "His li­fe was al­re­ady over. I only en­ded it." But even rel­ying on the new rock-hard co­re of cer­ta­inty in her he­art, she finds it dif­fi­cult to fa­ce down this ac­cu­ser.

    "How do you know? You're just a stu­dent li­ke the rest of us. How do you know?"

    "He wit­he­red ever­y­t­hing he to­uc­hed… his cor­rup­ti­on was-"

    "Do you know that? Or did they tell you that? Yo­ur pe­op­le only des­t­roy things, and they ne­ver gi­ve any re­al re­asons. They ne­ver gi­ve an­y­t­hing back or ask an­y­body el­se if what they des­t­roy is im­por­tant. Now he's de­ad." Aman­da sta­res, un­su­re and sha­ken, and finds not­hing to say.

    The bla­de le­aves her thro­at, and she se­es its ow­ner for the first ti­me as he cros­ses to the girl's si­de. In si­len­ce, the swarthy, dis­he­ve­led te­ena­ger puts one hand very gently on her sho­ul­der and spe­aks to her qu­i­etly. The man with the gray fe­do­ra stands ne­ar them li­ke an old fri­end at a fu­ne­ral, gu­ar­ding the mo­ur­ners from fur­t­her gri­ef, Da­vid, wat­c­hing all three, cle­ars his thro­at.

    "Well." He turns to Aman­da. "Lo­ok… I al­so think that mot­her­fu…" He he­si­ta­tes, lo­oking at his yo­un­gest col­le­ague- "…that man you've just… rec­y­c­led… was a was­te of… spit. But we ne­eded that bas­tard dow­n­s­ta­irs ali­ve and whe­re he was, so that his wi­fe's lo­ver wo­uld stop the Wel­lesky Parks de­ve­lop­ment bill from re­ac­hing the Sta­te Se­na­te, But no one ever con­sults us in the­se mat­ters. Ob­vi­o­usly." He ri­ses qu­ickly to his fe­et. "Shit."

    "Xia?" The lit­tle girl turns to him. "You sa­id the am­bu­lan­ce was al­re­ady he­re? We ne­ed to mo­ve. That bas­tard will be D.O.A. or wor­se. The po­li­ce will be slow to show up at An­ne's pla­ce, and Big Brot­her is pro­bably al­re­ady on the way. Thank God An­ne ha­tes com­pu­ters.., oh, hel­lo, An­ne."

    A sta­tu­es­que blon­de in eve­ning dress and ela­bo­ra­te, sop­his­ti­ca­ted ma­ke­up co­mes stri­ding thro­ugh the do­or, clut­c­hing a she­af of pa­pers in one hand and a fo­un­ta­in pen in the ot­her. Da­vid flus­hes, but turns and ad­dres­ses her brightly. "Thank God you ha­te com­pu­ters."

    "That's not the only thing I ha­te." She spe­aks qu­ickly and qu­i­etly, but her clip­ped, ne­ar-mo­no­to­ne only lends the words gre­ater bi­te, "What kind of shit are you trying to pull he­re, Cho ? They're car­ting one of my cus­to­mers, one of my up­s­ta­irs cus­to­mers, away, and all Ma­rilyn can say is that you and this bitch prac­ti­cal­ly fell on him ten mi­nu­tes be­fo­re the con­vul­si­ons star­ted."

    "I'm sorry, An­ne, We tri­ed to stop it, I swe­ar, but I'll ex­p­la­in la­ter."

    "I don't want la­ter, I want now. Be­fo­re the Black Hats and Mir­ror­s­ha­des show up."

    David Cho turns to his pri­so­ner. "Jane -"

    "Amanda," She do­esn't know why she says it.

    "Amanda. What was yo­ur exit ro­ute?"

    "Cho! Ha­ve you he­ard a sin­g­le damn thing I've sa­id to you?" Still ig­no­red, the blon­de throws her pa­pers at him.

    "I…" Aman­da he­si­ta­tes in the wash of fury ra­di­ating from the ol­der wo­man. "I was just go­ing to walk out be­fo­re he col­lap­sed. It's a re­la­ti­vely slow po­ison,"

    "That's no go­od." He frowns, clo­ses his eyes for a mo­ment. "They'll be slo­west aro­und the back, I think we can use the la­undry exit… I'll ne­ed the keys to the ne­ed­le ga­te, An­ne."

    "Forget it. I ne­ed you he­re if I'm go­ing to ha­ve the cops in this pla­ce."

    "Anne. Ple­ase. You know it won't just be the cops."

    And, as Aman­da wat­c­hes, the wo­man's fa­ce dar­kens, new li­nes re­ve­aling them­sel­ves in the sha­dows aro­und her eyes. One si­de of her mo­uth gri­ma­ces, as if she we­re lost in so­me pa­in­ful me­mory. When she spe­aks, she se­ems ol­der… but the yo­ung as­sas­sin finds it to be a stran­ge im­p­ro­ve­ment.

    "All right. Ta­ke them. But this is for the kid. Not you."

    He nods. "But I'll rec­ru­it you yet, An­ne dar­ling. Cho­ir­boy, get the cuffs off of Luc­re­tia Bor­gia he­re." A calm-eyed, gra­yish man ap­pe­ars in the far cor­ner and walks to­ward her. "And you, Aman­da, be­ha­ve yo­ur­self, or we may for­get how prin­cip­led we are."

    The gray man bends over ber with the key and holds her wrists gently to un­lock her bonds,

    "Hold still," he whis­pers, "if you ple­ase. And may I sug­gest that you do not­hing what­so­ever to pro­vo­ke my fri­end Mic­ha­el, the­re,"

    "Why do you ca­re ?" she says, as An­ne ha­ran­gu­es Da­vid and Da­vid ad­dres­ses the ot­hers,

    "I, in the sin­gu­lar sen­se, of co­ur­se, fe­el that in ti­me we shall all be both less and mo­re than we now per­mit and that the­se dis­pa­ra­te por­ti­ons of our­sel­ves shall no lon­ger op­po­se each ot­her." He helps her to her fe­et.

    "What?"

    "We of the Tra­di­ti­ons are al­li­es, are we not? Even on the ed­ge of ru­in, we ac­k­now­led­ge the dar­k­ness that is our com­mon foe." He re­ac­hes in­to his char­co­al-co­lo­red co­at and brings forth her fo­ci and a fur­t­her bra­ce of kni­ves, which he hands to her. "You can use the­se, can you not?"

    "Yes."

    "Then fol­low clo­se be­hind us, and may We who are the One bless our com­mon ven­tu­re."

    And from each in the ro­om the­re ca­me the sa­me mum­b­led res­pon­se.

    "Amen."

    A Bo­ok of Sha­dows is a ro­ad map to en­lig­h­ten­ment, a jo­ur­nal of prog­ress upon the Path of ma­gick. In it, the prac­ti­ti­oner charts her jo­ur­ney from ini­ti­ati­on to un­der­s­tan­ding by using anec­do­tes, ta­les, les­sons, ri­tes and ref­lec­ti­ons. The Bo­ok of Sha­dows: The Ma­ge Pla­yers Gu­ide is no Bo­ok of Sha­dows in the tru­est sen­se, but it will ho­pe­ful­ly pro­vi­de so­me gu­idan­ce and in­s­pi­ra­ti­on to Ma­ge pla­yers and Stor­y­tel­lers ali­ke.

    There are few easy an­s­wers wit­hin the­se pa­ges, but many pos­si­bi­li­ti­es. Much of the in­for­ma­ti­on con­ta­ined he­re­in ta­kes the form of sto­ri­es, pa­rab­les im­par­ting truth as se­en from many dif­fe­rent po­ints of vi­ew. So­me of the­se ta­les may ra­ise mo­re qu­es­ti­ons than they an­s­wer, but for Ma­ge, this is only ap­prop­ri­ate. If re­ality is mal­le­ab­le, then the­re are many truths from which to cho­ose. So­lid an­s­wers li­mit pos­si­bi­lity.

    Through ste­re­ot­y­pes and po­pu­lar mis­con­cep­ti­ons, the na­tu­re of a ma­ge has be­en re­du­ced to spell-cas­ting and lab-tin­ke­ring. The met­hods of so­me ma­ges ha­ve be­en per­ce­ived as the me­aning be­hind the­ir prac­ti­ces. Be­fo­re we be­gin, let's ta­ke a lo­ok at the es­sen­ce be­hind the fa­ca­de.

    The Ma­ge

    Each ma­ge is, to him­self or her­self, a he­ro in the tru­est sen­se of the word, step­ping out from the mass of hu­ma­nity to fol­low an ele­va­ted Path. This is as true of the Tec­h­noc­racy and Nep­han­di as it is for the wi­zards of the Tra­di­ti­ons; each fac­ti­on simply fol­lows a dif­fe­rent Path to­wards a dif­fe­rent go­al. Many along the way get si­det­rac­ked and wan­der down the ro­ad of hub­ris, the fa­tal pri­de that co­mes with in­sight in­to the truth and po­wer be­yond mor­tal vi­si­on.

    The ma­ge do­es not simply cast ma­gick spells; he or she be­co­mes ma­gick per­so­ni­fi­ed, tran­s­cen­ding the bo­un­da­ri­es of what is be­li­eved pos­sib­le. A ma­ge- any true ma­ge- al­ters re­ality by simply be­co­ming awa­re.

    The Vi­si­on

    The dif­fe­rent ma­ge fac­ti­ons per­ce­ive the­ir pla­ce in the lar­ger who­le dif­fe­rently. For the Tra­di­ti­ons, that Path in­c­lu­des gat­he­ring all the so­uls of hu­ma­nity, all the Ava­tars of hu­ma­nity, and le­ading them to­wards so­me com­mon go­al (abo­ut which they all di­sag­ree). To the Tec­h­noc­racy, the Path of the com­mon go­od in­vol­ves ma­king re­ality sa­fe for the Mas­ses- con­t­rol­led, pro­tec­ted and gu­ided by the Tec­h­noc­racy's hig­her vi­si­on. The Nep­han­di, it is ru­mo­red, se­ek to po­la­ri­ze light and dar­k­ness in­to the­ir pu­rest forms so that du- stron­gest might over­co­me the we­akest and bring uni­fi­ca­ti­on thro­ugh con­qu­est; the Ma­ra­uders, so­me be­li­eve, se­ek to sha­pe all cre­ati­on in­to a dyna­mic ball of en­d­less pos­si­bi­li­ti­es. Each ma­ge has a vi­si­on; the As­cen­si­on War re­vol­ves aro­und the­se dif­fe­rent go­als and the me­ans to ac­hi­eve them.

    The Path

    Some ma­ges spe­ak of the gu­iding for­ces be­hind the Paths; many see the­se for­ces as cos­mo­lo­gi­cal en­ti­ti­es, whi­le ot­hers vi­ew them as for­ces of exis­ten­ce, sci­en­ti­fic prin­cip­les or shif­ting es­sen­ces of ne­ver-en­ding cre­ati­on. Many spend li­fe­ti­mes trying ro de­fi­ne the­se for­ces, whi­le ot­hers just chuck the who­le de­al and simply strug­gle for sur­vi­val or stri­ve for po­wer. Ne­ver­t­he­less, each in­di­vi­du­al, whet­her rna­ge or mor­tal, has oc­ca­si­onal glim­p­ses of the Big Pic­tu­re. Ma­ges are simply clo­ser to gras­ping the "answer" {assu­ming that the­re is one). Thro­ugh this in­sight, all ma­ges are dyna­mic, gu­iding cre­ati­on for­ward just by exis­ting. Ma­gick po­wers ate only a si­de-ef­fect of this con­di­ti­on,

    The War

    To the cal­mer mind, each Path as­su­mes so­me fun­c­ti­on in the ba­lan­ce of cre­ati­on. Most ma­ges, ho­we­ver, are an­y­t­hing but calm. With en­lig­h­ten­ment co­mes the cer­ta­inty that each cho­sen ro­ad to As­cen­si­on is the only right one; with this cer­ta­inty co­mes con­f­lict, so­me­ti­mes sub­t­le, of­ten de­adly.

    Conflict is dyna­mic; wit­ho­ut strug­gle, cre­ati­on stag­na­tes. The in­ten­sity of the As­cen­si­on War, ho­we­ver, grinds ma­ges and Sle­epers ali­ke be­ne­ath a Whe­el go­ne wild. Each fac­ti­on holds to its vi­si­on with a de­ter­mi­na­ti­on that rends the fab­ric of cre­ati­on's Ta­pestry and crus­hes the so­uls of ever­yo­ne in­vol­ved. Now the ba­lan­ce is lost; the Whe­el wob­bles, the Ta­pestry frays. Wel­co­me to the World of Dar­k­ness.

    The Bo­ok of Sha­dows is bro­ken down in­to Bo­oks in­s­te­ad of chap­ters. Each Bo­ok con­ta­ins ma­te­ri­al of in­te­rest to Ma­ge pla­yers:

    Book One: The Gifts of Awa­ke­ning- Tra­its: This Bo­ok in­c­lu­des new Abi­li­ri­es, Ar­c­het­y­pes and Bac­k­g­ro­unds, plus Me­rits and Flaws, an op­ti­onal spi­ce for Ma­ge cha­rac­ters.

    Book Two: Fa­ces of Ma­gick- Por­t­ra­its: This Bo­ok de­ta­ils the va­ri­o­us ma­ge fac­ti­ons thro­ugh the­ir own eyes and pre­sents the lost Tra­di­ti­on of the Ah­li-Ba­tin.

    Book Three: The Bo­ok of Ru­les - Systems: In this Bo­ok, Ma­ge pla­yers and Stor­y­tel­lers will find new ru­les for fo­ci, ta­lis­mans, study po­ints, fa­mi­li­ars, child ma­ges and the Akas­hic art of Do, as well as a qu­ick-an­d­dirty system for ma­gick and cla­ri­fi­ca­ti­on of many gray are­as of the Ma­ge ru­les.

    Book Fo­ur: The Ma­gick Toy­box - Equ­ip­ment: The Bo­ok pre­sents a col­lec­ti­on of ro­tes, ta­lis­mans and mo­re mun­da­ne equ­ip­ment for the well-equ­ip­ped Ma­ge cha­rac­ter.

    Book Fi­ve: The Fra­gi­le Path - Pa­rab­les: This se­ri­es of ta­les il­lu­mi­na­tes as­pects of the Path of the ma­ge: Se­ekings, Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, the men­tor/ap­pren­ti­ce re­la­ti­on­s­hip, two op­po­sing vi­ews of the end of the Mythic Age and the ri­se of the Tec­h­noc­racy, and mo­re. Un­li­ke sim­p­le es­says, the­se pa­rab­les il­lus­t­ra­te Ma­ge in ac­ti­on and flesh out the world of the Awa­ke­ned thro­ugh the ex­pe­ri­en­ces of the ma­ge.

    Book Six: Gu­iding Words - Co­un­cil: Words of wis­dom to Ma­ge pla­yers and Stor­y­tel­lers ali­ke.

    A Mo­men­tary Dash of Re­ason

    Though many as­pects of the ga­me are ro­oted in re­al-world he­li­efs and me­tap­h­y­sics, Ma­ge is a ga­me. It's fic­ti­on. Pe­ri­od. You won't find lost sec­rets of ar­ca­ne lo­re or aut­hen­tic por­t­ra­yals of oc­cult doc­t­ri­ne he­re. Ho­pe­ful­ly, yo­ur tro­upe will find en­ter­ta­in­ment mi­xed with fo­od for tho­ught in yo­ur Ma­ge chro­nic­le; we at Whi­te Wolf wo­uld li­ke to in­s­pi­re ro­lep­la­yers to ex­pand the­ir ho­ri­zons be­yond the dun­ge­on-crawl, but that's as far as it go­es. Ma­ge is a ga­me. That's all. En­ter fre­ely and of yo­ur own will. Enj­oy.

    This Bo­ok con­ta­ins Tra­its for Ma­ge cha­rac­ters: new Abi­li­ti­es and Bac­k­g­ro­unds, as well as a new Tra­it ca­te­gory, Me­rits and Flaws. The­se Tra­its may be used to bu­ild new cha­rac­ters or to spi­ce up exis­ting ones, with the Stor­y­tel­ler's ap­pro­val.

    An im­por­tant dis­tin­c­ti­on se­pa­ra­tes ma­ges from the­ir "par­t­ners" in the World of Dar­k­ness: ma­ges are mor­tal. They ble­ed. They age. They die easily com­pa­red to re­ge­ne­ra­ting Ga­rou or im­mor­tal Kin­d­red. Wit­ho­ut po­wer­ful com­bat ma­gicks, ma­ges must rely on the­ir savvy, cle­ver­ness and eso­te­ric know­led­ge to sur­vi­ve he­ad-to-he­ad en­co­un­ters with ot­her Awa­ke­ned. A ran­ge of Abi­li­ti­es, co­up­led with go­od sen­se and wi­se use of ma­gick, enab­le ma­ges to com­pe­te with the many for­ces ar­ra­yed, mo­re of­ten than not, aga­inst them.

    The usu­al ru­les for cha­rac­ter cre­ati­on still apply in re­gard to the­se of­fe­rings. Many of the­se Me­rits, Flaws and Abi­li­ti­es ori­gi­na­ted in We­re­wolf or Vam­pi­re, al­t­ho­ugh many ha­ve be­en re­wor­ked to apply to ma­ges. Stor­y­tel­lers and pla­yers sho­uld fe­el free to al­low or di­sal­low any or all of the­se Tra­its in the­ir ga­mes.

    With no words, with no song

    You can dan­ce the dre­am with yo­ur body on

    And this cur­ve, is yo­ur smi­le

    And this cross, is yo­ur he­art

    And this li­ne, is yo­ur path

    - Ka­te Bush, "The Red Sho­es"

    The fol­lo­wing are new Abi­li­ti­es you can use in any Stor­y­tel­ler ga­me. They des­c­ri­be so­me of the li­mit­less abi­li­ti­es yo­ur cha­rac­ter can ta­ke and can help de­fi­ne yo­ur cha­rac­ter. So­me of the­se Abi­li­ti­es may se­em less sig­ni­fi­cant and use­ful than the mo­re ge­ne­ral abi­li­ti­es des­c­ri­bed in Ma­ge. So­me are sub-ca­te­go­ri­es of mo­re ge­ne­ral abi­li­ti­es. For exam­p­le, you might want to ma­ke a cha­rac­ter roll Dex­te­rity + At­h­le­tics when fi­ring a bow rat­her than in­t­ro­du­cing the Ar­c­hery skill. It is up to the Story tel­ler whet­her any of the Abi­li­ti­es lis­ted he­re can be pur­c­ha­sed.

    Artistic Ex­p­res­sion

    You ha­ve the ta­lent to pro­du­ce works of art in va­ri­o­us me­dia. You can pro­du­ce sa­le­ab­le works of two- or thre­edi­men­si­onal art and un­der­s­tand so­met­hing of the tec­h­ni­cal as­pects of pa­in­tings and sket­c­hes. You are ab­le to sketch a re­aso­nably ac­cu­ra­te ren­di­ti­on of a pla­ce or per­son.

    • No­vi­ce: Yo­ur work is sim­p­le, se­en as char­mingly na­ive by so­me and as ama­te­urish by ot­hers.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Yo­ur work co­uld win pri­zes at lo­cal art so­ci­ety shows.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You co­uld get a sho­wing in a mi­nor gal­lery.

    •••• Ex­pert: Yo­ur work is wi­dely ad­mi­red, and gal­le­ri­es con­tact you abo­ut ex­hi­bi­ti­ons. You are in­vi­ted to te­ach at lo­cal art col­le­ges.

    ••••• Mas­ter: You are ac­k­now­led­ged as a dri­ving for­ce in con­tem­po­rary art. Yo­ur work com­mands enor­mo­us pri­ces and is fo­und in art mu­se­ums as well as com­mer­ci­al gal­le­ri­es and pri­va­te col­lec­ti­ons.

    Possessed by: Ar­tists, Com­mer­ci­al Il­lus­t­ra­tors, Car­to­onists, Po­li­ce Ar­tists, For­gers, Wo­od­wor­kers, The­at­re and Mo­vi­eSet Bu­il­ders, Spe­ci­al Ef­fects Tec­h­ni­ci­ans, Mo­del Ma­kers

    Specialties: Oils, Wa­ter­co­lors, Mi­xed Me­dia, Char­co­al, Sket­c­hing, Ca­ri­ca­tu­re, Lig­h­ting Ar­tist, Im­p­res­si­onist, Pho­to-Re­alism, Ab­s­t­ract, Mi­ni­atu­res, Sto­ne, Re­sin, Wo­od, Me­tals, Clas­si­cal, Ki­ne­tic, Mo­dels, De­co­ra­ti­on

    Blatancy

    You spe­ci­ali­ze in do­ing vul­gar ma­gick in pla­in sight and ha­ving Sle­epers ac­cept it. You may be a sta­ge ma­gi­ci­an with a lar­ge fol­lo­wing or a fa­ith he­aler who pre­pa­res the fa­it­h­ful to ac­cept mi­rac­les. Or you may just ap­pe­ar to be so we­ird and out­lan­dish that com­pa­red to yo­ur­self, the things you do are mun­da­ne. This Ta­lent can be com­bi­ned with Ma­ni­pu­la­ti­on to ma­ke Sle­epers vi­ew vul­gar ma­gick as co­in­ci­den­tal. No­te that this Ta­lent only works un­der the right cir­cum­s­tan­ces; thro­wing fi­re­bal­ls down Ma­in Stre­et wo­uld be con­si­de­red vul­gar no mat­ter what the co­ver might be,

    • No­vi­ce: It's ama­zing how you pull gold bricks out of pe­op­le's ears. How do you do that trick?

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Only a we­ir­do wo­uld ta­pe rub­ber bat wings to a cat and throw it out the win­dow. Go­od thing it lan­ded okay. So­me­one sho­uld call the Hu­ma­ne So­ci­ety.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: The gi­ant ro­bot in yo­ur ga­ra­ge is re­al­ly ne­at, and the kids lo­ve wat­c­hing it walk aro­und when you ho­ok up the rub­ber bra­in in the jar. Wo­uld you con­si­der let­ting the scho­ol use it for the­ir Ha­un­ted Ho­use?

    •••• Ex­pert: Mrs. Wil­son is on the ro­of aga­in with her bro­om­s­tick. It's re­al­ly sad how she's got­ten sin­ce her hus­band di­ed. Po­or wo­man. I think she re­al­ly thinks she's a witch. But wo­uld you ex­p­la­in to the chil­d­ren that what we saw was just the wind and that we did not see her flying?

    ••••• Mas­ter: I'm a to­ad! Co­ol! Gi­ve me anot­her hit of that stuff, man. This trip is re­al­ly funky.

    Possessed by: Sta­ge Ma­gi­ci­ans, Ne­ig­h­bor­ho­od We­ir­do­es, Her­mits, Crazy Pe­op­le, Gu­rus, Party Ani­mals, Nan­ni­es

    Specialties: Gad­gets, Co­nj­uring Tricks, Re­li­gi­o­us Mi­rac­les, Drug Trips

    Carousing

    This is the abi­lity to ha­ve a go­od ti­me at a party or ot­her so­ci­al oc­ca­si­on whi­le ma­king su­re ot­hers aro­und you al­so ha­ve a go­od ri­me. It in­vol­ves a mix­tu­re of eating, go­od che­er, and drin­king wit­ho­ut ma­king a fo­ol out of yo­ur­self. On a suc­ces­sful roll of Ma­ni­pu­la­ti­on + Ca­ro­using, the cha­rac­ter can ma­ke a las­ting go­od im­p­res­si­on on ever­yo­ne aro­und him; this can be hel­p­ful if the ma­ge is trying to ma­ke fri­ends, ga­mer in­for­ma­ti­on or dis­t­ract the at­ten­de­es whi­le his ca­bal rif­les thro­ugh the co­at ro­om. The dif­fi­culty of the roll de­pends on the so­ci­al event: three or less for a ho­use party with a buf­fet, se­ven or mo­re for a sit-down din­ner.

    • No­vi­ce: Go­od ol' Un­c­le Bill

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Jake the Frat Rat

    ••• Com­pe­tent: James Bond

    •••• Ex­pert: The Three Mus­ke­te­ers

    ••••• Mas­ter: Blu­to in "Ani­mal Ho­use"

    Possessed by: Ac­tors, Di­let­tan­tes, Col­le­ge Stu­dents, Vam­pi­res

    Specialties: Se­xu­al In­nu­en­do, Bon Mots, Lewd Jokes, Drin­king, Exag­ge­ra­ti­on, Anec­do­tes

    Diplomacy

    You ha­ve the abi­lity to han­d­le ne­go­ti­ati­ons. Even when han­d­ling to­uchy su­bj­ects, you are ab­le to get re­sults wit­ho­ut ruf­fling too many fe­at­hers. You are skil­led at me­di­ating dis­pu­tes and dis­cus­sing de­li­ca­te su­bj­ects. You get along with ot­hers wit­ho­ut overt ma­ni­pu­la­ti­on and wit­ho­ut let­ting yo­ur own aims fall by the way­si­de. This Abi­lity in­vol­ves a know­led­ge of the for­mal ru­les of gi­ve­and- ta­ke, as well as the of­fi­ci­al cul­tu­ral ru­les of con­duct and po­li­te­ness.

    • No­vi­ce: You can iron out scho­ol­yard dis­pu­tes.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Fri­ends ask you to de­al with things for them.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You co­uld shi­ne in ma­na­ge­ment or per­son­nel,

    •••• Ex­pert: You co­uld be a pro­fes­si­onal uni­on ne­go­ti­ator or om­bud­s­man.

    ••••• Mas­ter: You can de­fu­se ne­arly any si­tu­ati­on, from an In­dus­t­ri­al dis­pu­te to a re­li­gi­o­us war.

    Possessed by: Scho­ol­te­ac­hers, Uni­on Ne­go­ti­ators,

    Politicians,Tycoons, Dip­lo­mats, Per­son­nel Of­fi­cers, Co­un­se­lors

    Specialties: Me­di­ati­on, Ne­go­ti­ati­on, Eti­qu­et­te, In­ter­na­ti­onal Re­la­ti­ons, In­dustry, Per­so­nal Re­la­ti­on­s­hips, Tact

    Fortune Tel­ling

    You may or may not ha­ve the gift to tell ac­cu­ra­te for­tu­nes, but you can ma­ke pe­op­le be­li­eve you do. This Abi­lity may pro­ve use­ful as a plot de­vi­ce, a me­ans for the cha­rac­ter to earn mo­ney, or a go­od co­ver for Ti­me ma­gick. Whi­le this Ta­lent con­fers no ma­gick in and of it­self, it may add to yo­ur suc­ces­ses; for each two suc­ces­ses, re­du­ce the dif­fi­culty of di­vi­na­ti­on ma­gick by 1.

    • No­vi­ce: You are ab­le to use one met­hod of di­vi­na­ti­on ade­qu­ately and tre­at this Abi­lity as a pas­ti­me.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You can use one met­hod of for­tu­ne tel­ling well and can tell so­me­one ge­ne­ral in­for­ma­ti­on that will apply to her.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You know a lot abo­ut cer­ta­in met­hods of for­tu­ne tel­ling and can tell an­yo­ne de­ta­iled in­for­ma­ti­on that will be ap­pli­cab­le.

    •••• Ex­pert: You are ab­le to use mul­tip­le met­hods well and ha­ve a ke­en un­der­s­tan­ding of what pe­op­le want to he­ar.

    ••••• Mas­ter: Gypsi­es ta­ke les­sons from you.

    Possessed by: Gypsi­es, Psychics, Pro­fes­si­onal For­tu­ne Tel­lers, New Agers

    Specialties: Ta­rot Cards, Prop­hecy, Ro­man­ce, De­ath, Pal­mistry, I Ching, Go­at En­t­ra­ils

    Instruction

    You ha­ve a ta­lent for pas­sing on in­for­ma­ti­on and skills to ot­hers. You might ha­ve wor­ked as a te­ac­her, or as a Chantry Men­tor, Eit­her way, you can ex­p­la­in things and de­mon­s­t­ra­te tec­h­ni­qu­es in such a way that an­yo­ne who lis­tens to you can le­arn easily. You can te­ach any of yo­ur Skills or Know­led­ges to anot­her cha­rac­ter, but you can ne­ver ra­ise a stu­dent's sco­re abo­ve yo­ur own. For exam­p­le, if you ha­ve three dots in Oc­cult, you can­not te­ach so­me­one eno­ugh to ra­ise her Oc­culr Know­led­ge to fo­ur dots.

    For the ti­me it ta­kes to ra­ise a stu­dent's skill, roll yo­ur Ma­ni­pu­la­ti­on + In­s­t­ruc­ti­on aga­inst a dif­fi­culty of (11 mi­nus the stu­dent's In­tel­li­gen­ce). One roll may be ma­de per month of te­ac­hing. The num­ber of suc­ces­ses is the num­ber of ex­pe­ri­en­ce po­ints the stu­dent can apply to­ward that skill. Exam­p­le: Fa­bi­an Re­nalds is trying to te­ach Wyndi Blac­k­sin the so­ci­al in­t­ri­ca­ci­es of mo­dern art (Cul­tu­re Know­led­ge). Wyndi's pretty sharp (Intel­li­gen­ce 3), so the dif­fi­culty for Fa­bi­an's roll is 8.

    A stu­dent may be­co­me too dis­co­ura­ged or dis­t­rac­ted with ot­her things to pay at­ten­ti­on to his te­ac­her. The­re­fo­re, the stu­dent may ha­ve to spend a Wil­lpo­wer po­int (at the Stor­y­tel­ler's dis­c­re­ti­on) to ke­ep at his stu­di­es. Fre­qu­ent in­ter­rup­ti­ons can cost a stu­dent a num­ber of Wil­lpo­wer po­ints, or may­be they'll just pre­vent him from le­ar­ning an­y­t­hing (in which ca­se, the te­ac­her might wit­h­d­raw her ser­vi­ces).

    With the Stor­y­tel­ler's ap­pro­val, a per­son can te­ach so­me Ta­lents, such as Brawl or Dod­ge. In the­se ca­ses, it is go­od to ro­lep­lay so­me of the tra­ining ses­si­ons. Get a few go­od licks in on the stu­dent and see if he le­arns an­y­t­hing from it. Ta­lents such as Em­pathy or Aler­t­ness can­not be ta­ught- they must be le­ar­ned the hard way.

    • No­vi­ce: You can ta­ke sim­p­le con­ceprs (e.g. ba­sic arit­h­me­tic) and pre­sent them in an in­te­res­ting and di­ges­tib­le man­ner.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You can te­ach mo­de­ra­rely com­p­lex su­bj­ects (such as al­geb­ra) and ma­ke yo­ur les­sons stra­ig­h­t­for­ward and in­te­res­ting.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You can te­ach any su­bj­ect of which you ha­ve Know­led­ge, up to high-sc­ho­ol le­vel su­bj­ects. You can ma­ke dif­fe­ren­ti­al cal­cu­lus so­und li­ke the sim­p­lest thing in the world.

    •••• Ex­pert: Le­ar­ning from you is scar­cely an ef­fort. You co­uld te­ach ir­ra­ti­onal-num­ber the­ory or Su­me­ri­an cu­ne­iform to al­most an­yo­ne.

    ••••• Mas­ter: You are an in­s­pi­ring te­ac­her who bes­tows a to­uch of gre­at­ness on an­yo­ne who stu­di­es with you.

    Possessed by: Men­tors, Te­ac­hers, Do Mas­ters, Pro­fes­sors, Pe­op­le from All Walks of Li­fe

    Specialties: Me­tap­h­y­sics, Tra­di­ti­on Prac­ti­ces, Cus­toms and Laws, Uni­ver­sity, Skills, Know­led­ges

    Interrogation

    You are ab­le to ex­t­ract in­for­ma­ti­on from pe­op­le by fa­ir me­ans or fo­ul. Using a mix­tu­re of thre­ats, tric­kery and per­sis­tent qu­es­ti­oning, you ul­ti­ma­tely une­arth the truth. This is a com­mon skill among the Men in Black,

    • No­vi­ce: Nosy ne­ig­h­bor

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Mo­vie cop

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Talk-show host

    •••• Ex­pert: In­ves­ti­ga­ti­ve jo­ur­na­list

    ••••• Mas­ter: Spymas­ter

    Possessed by: Cops, Jo­ur­na­lists, Sec­ret Ser­vi­ce Per­son­nel, In­qu­isi­tors

    Specialties: Go­od Cop/Bad Cop, Thre­ats, Tric­kery, Mo­ral Blac­k­ma­il

    Intrigue

    You know the fi­ner po­ints of plot­ting and de­al-ma­king in the halls of po­wer. You un­der­s­tand the prac­ti­cal use of po­wer (in so­me­ti­mes thre­ate­ning but al­ways non-con­f­ron­ta­ti­onal ways) to ac­hi­eve yo­ur own ends. This Ta­lent al­so al­lows you to gle­an im­por­tant facts abo­ut ot­hers in yo­ut so­ci­al cir­c­le and se­pa­ra­te truth from the en­d­less amo­unts of fal­se and use­less gos­sip.

    • No­vi­ce: Wi­se­guy

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Con­fi­dant

    ••• Com­pe­tent: PAC lob­byist

    •••• Ex­pert: Vam­pi­re

    ••••• Mas­ter: Big Whe­el in Do­is­se­tep.

    Possessed by: Chantry Mas­ters, Tec­h­noc­racy Sympo­si­um Re­gu­lars

    Specialties: Gos­si­ping, Fe­ig­ning Ig­no­ran­ce, Thre­ats, Plot­ting, Ru­mor­mon­ge­ring, Al­li­an­ces, Bet­ra­yals

    Mimicry

    You ha­ve a ver­sa­ti­le vo­ice and can imi­ta­te ac­cents, pe­op­le and so­me ot­her so­unds. You can use this ta­lent to en­ter­ta­in and de­ce­ive. With eno­ugh ta­lent, al­most any sort of so­und can be cre­ated- the larynx is an ama­zingly fle­xib­le or­gan. This can be very use­ful when de­aling with vo­ice-ke­yed se­cu­tity systems or com­pu­ters, but only if the prac­ti­ti­oner is ex­t­re­mely skil­lful.

    • No­vi­ce: You can ma­na­ge a few ac­cents pas­sably and do im­p­res­si­ons of a co­up­le of well-known per­so­na­li­ti­es.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You can do a ran­ge of ac­cents well eno­ugh to fo­ol an­yo­ne but a na­ti­ve spe­aker and imi­ta­te a ran­ge of ce­leb­ri­ti­es. You can do ba­sic bird calls and so­me pre­da­tory ani­mal so­unds.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You co­uld do ce­leb­rity im­per­so­na­ti­ons on sta­ge. You can pick up so­me­one's vo­cal man­ne­risms by stud­ying her for a co­up­le of ho­urs and imi­ta­te her well eno­ugh to fo­ol an­yo­ne but a clo­se fri­end. You can pro­du­ce many mam­mal and bird so­unds.

    •••• Ex­pert: You can imi­ta­te a spe­ci­fic per­son well eno­ugh to fo­ol so­me­one on the pho­ne, and pass as a na­ti­ve spe­aker in an ac­cent clo­se to yo­ur own. You can do a wi­de ran­ge of ani­mal and tec­h­no­lo­gi­cal no­ises.

    ••••• Mas­ter; You can imi­ta­te al­most any ac­cent, per­son, ani­mal or no­ise.

    Possessed by: Dre­am­s­pe­akers, Cul­tists of Ec­s­tasy, Hun­ters, Co­me­di­ans, Men in Black, HIT Marks

    Specialties: Ac­cents, Ce­leb­ri­ti­es, Birds and Ani­mals, Mec­ha­ni­cal So­unds, Vo­cal Im­per­so­na­ti­on

    Scan

    You are prac­ti­ced at no­ti­cing small de­ta­ils and chan­ges in the en­vi­ron­ment when you pur­po­sely lo­ok at or lis­ten to what is go­ing on aro­und you. This Abi­lity can only be used when you spe­ci­fi­cal­ly say you ate at­tem­p­ting to no­ti­ce if an­y­t­hing is amiss. If you aren't con­cen­t­ra­ting, this Abi­lity will do you no go­od.

    • No­vi­ce: If an­yo­ne no­ti­ces po­li­ce si­rens, it's you.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: The po­li­ce sho­uld use yo­ur de­tec­ti­ve abi­li­ti­es.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: The slig­h­test mo­ti­on draws yo­ur at­ten­ti­on.

    •••• Ex­pert: Not­hing es­ca­pes yo­ur glan­ce.

    ••••• Mas­ter: You can co­unt the gra­ins of salt on a pret­zel- by tas­te.

    Possessed by: De­tec­ti­ves, GIs, FBI Agents, Bod­y­gu­ards, Night Wat­c­h­men

    Specialties: Ke­eping Watch, Qu­ick Scan, Lis­te­ning, Smel­ling, As­sas­sins

    Scrounging

    You ha­ve a knack for fin­ding al­most an­y­t­hing un­der al­most any cir­cum­s­tan­ces. The mas­ters of yo­ur craft co­uld find a hot spring at the North Po­le or a ma­in­f­ra­me com­pu­ter in the he­art of the Ama­zon Jun­g­le, if ne­ces­sary. In the city, you know whe­re to find al­most any kind of item or ser­vi­ce- no qu­es­ti­ons as­ked. {It's ama­zing what you can find in dum­p­s­ters,..)

    • No­vi­ce: You can find ba­sic equ­ip­ment and ser­vi­ces, such as drugs, il­le­gal we­apons and hi­red thugs.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You can get hold of a ve­hic­le, a for­ged pas­sport or a skil­led wi­re­tap­per.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You can find an air­c­raft and pi­lot or a hit­man at an ho­ur's no­ti­ce.

    •••• Ex­pert: You can find sta­te-of-the-art mi­li­tary har­d­wa­re, any ve­hic­le you de­si­re and ser­vi­ces bet­ter ima­gi­ned than des­c­ri­bed.

    ••••• Mas­ter: You co­uld pro­bably find a rent-con­t­rol­led apar­t­ment over­lo­oking Cen­t­ral Park for $100 a month.

    Possessed by: Cri­mi­nals, In­tel­li­gen­ce Ope­ra­ti­ves, En­t­rep­re­ne­urs, Hol­low Ones

    Specialties: Il­le­gal Go­ods, Ve­hic­les, Ser­vi­ces, Art, Tec­h­ni­cal Equ­ip­ment, Ma­gic­kal To­mes

    Search

    You know how best to go abo­ut Lo­oking for so­me­one or so­met­hing in a small area whe­re you can con­cen­t­ra­te yo­ur per­cep­ti­ons. You can se­arch for an­y­t­hing from a lost ring in yo­ur bed­ro­om to the as­sas­sin who might be hi­ding in yo­ur gar­den.

    • No­vi­ce: You are go­od at fin­ding lost items.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Tell-ta­le signs (e.g. bro­ken plants, fo­ot­p­rints) are ap­pa­rent to you.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You know whe­re to lo­ok.

    •••• Ex­pert: Tra­ined pro­fes­si­onals de­fer to yo­ur ex­per­ti­se.

    • •••• Mas­ter: Sher­lock Hol­mes was an ama­te­ur.

    Possessed by: De­tec­ti­ves, In­ge­ni­o­us Ser­vants, Po­li­ce­men, Pri­son Gu­ards, Men in Black

    Specialties: So­unds, Wo­od­work, Small Obj­ects, Pe­op­le, Con­ce­aled Do­ors

    Seduction

    You know how to lu­re, at­tract and com­mand the at­ten­ti­on of ot­hers in a se­xu­al man­ner. By the way you hold yo­ur­self, how you lo­ok at so­me­one and even by the to­ne of yo­ur vo­ice, you are ab­le to aro­use and ex­ci­te tho­se upon whom you prac­ti­ce yo­ur wi­les. On­ce you ha­ve fully se­du­ced so­me­one, he will be wil­ling to do ne­arly an­y­t­hing for you.

    • No­vi­ce: Te­ena­ger

    •• Prac­ti­ced: The "older wo­man"

    ••• Com­pe­tent: He­ar­t­throb

    •••• Ex­pert: Mo­vie star

    ••••• Mas­ter: The envy of vam­pi­res ever­y­w­he­re

    Possessed by: Thes­pi­ans, Es­corts, Cul­tists of Ec­s­tasy, Go­od-for-Not­hing Men, Strip­pers, Pro­ge­ni­tor Gla­mo­ur Traps

    Specialties: Witty Con­ver­sa­ti­on, Ope­ning Li­nes, In­nu­en­do, Al­lu­ring Lo­oks

    Sense De­cep­ti­on

    Over the ye­ars, you ha­ve de­ve­lo­ped the abi­lity to know in­s­tin­c­ti­vely when pe­op­le are not tel­ling you the truth or not tel­ling you the who­le truth. The­re is a way they lo­ok, a to­ne of vo­ice, a mo­ve­ment of the eyes- you can't anal­y­ze it, but it's al­ways the­re, and yo­ur in­s­tincts ra­rely let you down.

    • No­vi­ce: So­me­ti­mes you can tell, but you still get suc­ke­red- tho­ugh mo­re ra­rely than the ave­ra­ge per­son do­es.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: It ta­kes a bit of skill to pull the wo­ol over yo­ur eyes.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: An­yo­ne who can slip one past you is a highly skil­led con ar­tist.

    •••• Ex­pert: You co­uld ma­ke a li­ving scre­ening pe­op­le for se­cu­rity.

    ••••• Mas­ter: Pe­op­le whis­per be­hind yo­ur back, and many are ner­vo­us tal­king to you. Yo­ur abi­lity is al­most su­per­na­tu­ral,

    Possessed by: Bod­y­gu­ards, Re­por­ters, In­ter­ro­ga­tors, Se­cu­rity Per­son­nel, De­tec­ti­ves, Mot­hers

    Specialties: In­ter­vi­ews, In­ves­ti­ga­ti­ve, Co­ur­t­ro­om, Tec­h­ni­cal (Pol­y­g­raphs)

    Style

    You may not ha­ve be­en born go­od-lo­oking, or pos­ses­sed of a na­tu­ral charm, hut you know how to dress and ma­ke the most of yo­ur ap­pe­aran­ce. Even if you ate not physi­cal­ly at­trac­ti­ve, he­ads turn be­ca­use of yo­ur dress sen­se and style. No­te that this Ta­lent only ap­pli­es to pe­op­le's re­ac­ti­ons to yo­ur ap­pe­aran­ce; on­ce you get clo­ser, it's up to you.

    • No­vi­ce: Go­od tas­te

    •• Prac­ti­ced: So­ci­ali­te

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Ce­leb­rity

    •••• Ex­pert: Ce­leb­rity ad­vi­sor

    ••••• Mas­ter: In­ter­na­ti­onal mo­del

    Possessed by: So­ci­ali­tes, Ce­leb­ri­ti­es, Fas­hi­on Pro­fes­si­onals, the Gif­ted Few

    Specialties: Clas­sic, High Fas­hi­on, Stre­et Fas­hi­on, Ret­ro, Et­h­nic

    Ventriloquism

    You ha­ve the abi­lity to throw yo­ur vo­ice, ma­king it ap­pe­ar to co­me from so­mew­he­re el­se. This ta­lent can be used for de­cep­ti­on as well as en­ter­ta­in­ment.

    • No­vi­ce: You co­uld do a ven­t­ri­lo­qu­ist act at a chil­d­ren's party.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You co­uld get a gig at a lo­cal ama­te­ur va­ude­vil­le club. You can ma­ke it se­em li­ke so­me­one stan­ding next to you spo­ke.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You co­uld al­most ma­ke a li­ving from yo­ur ta­lent, with oc­ca­si­onal TV va­ri­ety shows bre­aking up the ro­und of che­ap clubs and the­aters. You can ma­ke it to­ok li­ke so­me­one (or so­met­hing) wit­hin fi­ve yards of you spo­ke.

    •••• Ex­pert: You co­uld ta­ke yo­ur act to Ve­gas and he­ad­li­ne TV spe­ci­als of yo­ur own. You can ma­ke yo­ur vo­ice se­em to co­me from any spot wit­hin 30 fe­et of you.

    ••••• Mas­ter: Yo­ung ho­pe­fuls bom­bard you with qu­es­ti­ons, and Va­ri­ety calls you the sa­vi­or of a lost va­ude­vil­le art. You can ma­ke yo­ur vo­ice se­em to co­me from an­y­w­he­re wit­hin ear­s­hot.

    Possessed by: En­ter­ta­iners, Con Ar­tists, Pran­k­s­ters, so­me Me­di­ums

    Specialties: Dis­tan­ce, Cla­rity, Dummy, Ina­ni­ma­te Obj­ect (e.g. ra­dio)

    Acrobatics

    You are a tra­ined tum­b­ler and ac­ro­bat ab­le to per­form fe­ats of agi­lity far be­yond the ca­pa­bi­li­ti­es of an un­t­ra­ined cha­rac­ter. For each suc­cess with this Skill, a cha­rac­ter can ig­no­re one He­alth Le­vel of fal­ling da­ma­ge. For exam­p­le, a cha­rac­ter with two dots in Ac­ro­ba­tics can fall up to 10 fe­et wit­ho­ut inj­ury or wo­uld ta­ke only one He­alth Le­vel of da­ma­ge from a 15-fo­ot fall. This skill may be pa­ired with Dex­te­rity to roll for le­aps and ot­her ac­ro­ba­tic fe­ats.

    • No­vi­ce: Gra­de scho­ol gym class

    •• Prac­ti­ced: High scho­ol jock

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Col­le­ge te­am

    •••• Ex­pert: Sta­te cham­pi­on

    ••••• Mas­ter: Ol­y­m­pic gold me­da­list

    Possessed by: Pro­fes­si­onal At­h­le­tes, jocks, Mar­ti­al Ar­tists, Dan­cers

    Specialties: Sport, Mar­ti­al Arts, Dan­ce, En­han­ced Jum­ping/Fal­ling

    Animal Tra­ining

    You are ab­le to tra­in ani­mals to obey com­mands and pos­sibly per­form tricks or ot­her fe­ats. Each spe­ci­es is a dif­fe­rent spe­ci­alty.

    • No­vi­ce: He­el, Fetch, Sit, Stay

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Lo­cal shows

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Cham­pi­on she­ep dogs

    •••• Ex­pert: Eli­te po­li­ce dogs

    ••••• Mas­ter: Cir­cus/s­tunt ani­mals

    Possessed by: Dog Han­d­lers, Mo­vie Ani­mal Wran­g­lers, Cir­cus Ani­mal Tra­iners, Ma­ra­uders, Ver­be­na

    Specialties: Dog, Hor­se, Elep­hant, Se­al, Dra­gon, Hel­lho­und, Fa­mi­li­ar

    Archery

    You know how to fi­re a bow, and may be ab­le ro do so with gre­at pro­fi­ci­ency. Bows fi­re wo­oden shafts, ma­king them go­od we­apons aga­inst vam­pi­res.

    • No­vi­ce: High Scho­ol Gym Prac­ti­ce

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Fo­rest Bow Hun­ter

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Me­di­eval Ran­ger

    •••• Ex­pert: Will usu­al­ly hit a bull's eye.

    ••••• Mas­ter: Ro­bin Ho­od

    Possessed by: Hun­ters, Dre­am­s­pe­akers, Hobby En­t­hu­si­asts, Com­pe­ti­tors, Me­di­eval Rec­re­ati­onists, Be­gin­ning Zen Ar­c­hers

    Specialties: Ar­c­hed Flight, Fo­rests, Tar­get, Hun­ting, Kyu­do Tec­h­ni­que, Cros­sbows, Pri­mi­ti­ve Ar­c­hery, Mo­ving Tar­gets

    Blind Fig­h­ting

    Even when unab­le to see yo­ur fo­es, you can use yo­ur Brawl or Me­lee Abi­li­ti­es with a re­du­ced pe­nalty or no pe­nalty. This Skill may al­so be of gre­at use out of com­bat. It sho­uld be no­ted that this Skill do­es not grant any ac­tu­al abi­lity to see bet­ter in dar­k­ness. For each dot the cha­rac­ter has in this Skill, re­du­ce the dif­fi­culty for per­for­ming ac­ti­ons whi­le blind by one. (Na­tu­ral­ly, the dif­fi­culty can ne­ver be re­du­ced be­low its un­hin­de­red equ­iva­lent.) This Skill do­es not add to Cor­res­pon­den­ce sen­sory ef­fects.

    • No­vi­ce: You don't stub yo­ur toe in the dark.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You can pin­po­int the di­rec­ti­on from which so­unds co­me.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You can fight and pre­dict yo­ur ene­mi­es' lo­ca­ti­ons at the sa­me ti­me.

    •••• Ex­pert: You can al­most "fe­el" whe­re yo­ur op­po­nents are,

    ••••• Mas­ter: You pos­sess an al­most mysti­cal sen­se- Zen and the Art of Spa­ti­al Awa­re­ness.

    Possessed by: Ni­nja, As­sas­sins, Do Mas­ters, Spe­lun­kers, Mas­ters of Zen Ar­c­hery

    Specialties: Dod­ging, Pun­c­hing, In­do­ors, Du­eling, Mul­tip­le Fo­es

    Camouflage

    You can chan­ge yo­ur ap­pe­aran­ce thro­ugh a mix­tu­re of clot­hing, ma­ke­up and mo­ve­ment, ren­de­ring you dif­fi­cult to spot in a va­ri­ety of dif­fe­rent sur­ro­un­dings. This is not the abi­lity to lo­ok li­ke so­me­one el­se, but simply to hi­de.

    • No­vi­ce: Boy Sco­ut

    •• Prac­ti­ced: In­fantry tro­oper

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Ma­ri­ne

    •••• Ex­pert: Spe­ci­al For­ces

    ••••• Mas­ter: Ni­nja

    Possessed by: Hun­ters, Mi­li­tary Per­son­nel, Spi­es, As­sas­sins, Po­ac­hers

    Specialties: Wo­ods, Mo­un­ta­ins, Ur­ban, Open Co­untry, Ar­c­tic

    Climbing

    You can climb mo­un­ta­ins and/or walls and sel­dom ha­ve any fe­ar of fal­ling. The tec­h­ni­cal skills of chim­ne­ying, spi­ke-set­ting and rap­pel­ling are all well-known to you, al­t­ho­ugh, de­pen­ding on yo­ur skill, you may be go­od or in­dif­fe­rent at them. Re­mem­ber, mo­un­ta­in clim­bing at night is far mo­re dif­fi­cult than a day­light climb un­less you can see in the dark.

    • No­vi­ce: You can sca­le easy mo­un­ta­ins or walls with han­d­holds.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You go on mo­un­ta­ine­ering va­ca­ti­ons. You can climb he­avily we­at­he­red sto­ne or brick walls.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You work in an "out­do­or pur­su­its cen­ter" as a mo­un­ta­ine­ering in­s­t­ruc­tor. You can climb mo­de­ra­tely ro­ugh sto­ne or brick walls.

    •••• Ex­pert: You've do­ne at le­ast a co­up­le of fa­mo­us pe­aks. You can free-climb a fa­irly smo­oth sto­ne or brick wall,

    ••••• Mas­ter: Eve­rest and K2 are mild hi­kes. You co­uld free-climb the World Tra­de Cen­ter.

    Possessed by: Mo­un­ta­ine­ers, Bur­g­lars, En­t­hu­si­asts

    Specialties: Cliffs, Hi­king, Ice, Bu­il­dings, Free-Clim­bing, Rap­pel­ling

    Crafts

    With this Skill, you can mas­ter ar­ti­san tec­h­ni­qu­es- wo­od­wor­king, le­at­her work, glas­sblo­wing, gem­cut­ting, etc. You can ma­ke fun­c­ti­onal obj­ects from va­ri­o­us sub­s­tan­ces, with qu­ality de­pen­dent on the suc­ces­ses you roll. Each type of ma­te­ri­al you can work must be bo­ught as a se­pa­ra­te spe­ci­alty.

    • No­vi­ce: High-sc­ho­ol shop class

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Apar­t­ment han­d­y­man

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Pro­fes­si­onal

    •••• Ex­pert: Spe­ci­alist

    ••••• Mas­ter: Grand ar­ti­san

    Possessed by: Craf­t­s­man, Re­na­is­san­ce-Fa­ire Ven­dors, Hob­byists, Han­d­y­men

    Specialties: Co­oking, Car­pentry, Blac­k­s­mit­hing, Le­at­her­wor­king, Jewelry, Bre­wing/Dis­til­lery, Glas­swor­king, Sto­ne ma­sonry

    Demolitions

    You ha­ve a know­led­ge of ex­p­lo­si­ves and de­mo­li­ti­ons that al­lows you to set off and bu­ild all types of bombs. You know how to han­d­le ne­arly an­y­t­hing- dyna­mi­te, plas­tic ex­p­lo­si­ve, nit­rog­l­y­ce­rin, black pow­der, bi­as ting cord, even na­palm. Ad­di­ti­onal­ly, you know the tec­h­ni­qu­es for di­sar­ming ex­p­lo­si­ves, which can co­me in very handy.

    • No­vi­ce: Guy Faw­kes

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Le­roy Mo­ody

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Un­der­g­ro­und Che­mist

    •••• Ex­pert: Blows up Tec­h­noc­racy Con­s­t­ructs for a li­ving.

    ••••• Mas­ter: Bye-bye, Pen­ta­gon.

    Possessed by: Ter­ro­rists, Po­li­ce Bomb Squ­ads, Ar­med For­ces Per­son­nel, Anar­c­hists, War Chantry Ca­bals

    Specialties: Dyna­mi­te, Plas­tic Ex­p­lo­si­ve, Car Bombs, Di­sar­ma­ment, De­tec­ti­on, For­ces Ef­fects

    Disguise

    You can chan­ge yo­ur ap­pe­aran­ce- and even ma­ke yo­ur­self lo­ok li­ke anot­her spe­ci­fic per­son- thro­ugh the use of clot­hes and ma­ke­up.

    • No­vi­ce: Go­od eno­ugh to fo­ol so­me­one who knows ne­it­her you nor the per­son you're im­per­so­na­ting.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Go­od eno­ugh to fo­ol so­me of the pe­op­le so­me of the ti­me.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Go­od eno­ugh to fo­ol so­me of the pe­op­le most of the ti­me.

    •••• Ex­pert: Go­od eno­ugh to fo­ol mosr of the pe­op­le most of the ti­me.

    ••••• Mas­ter: Go­od eno­ugh to fo­ol tho­se ne­arest and de­arest to you most of the ti­me.

    Possessed by: Ac­tors, Spi­es, Un­der­co­ver Cops, Cri­mi­nals, Con Ar­tists

    Specialties: Spe­ci­fic Per­son, Type of Per­son, Con­ce­al Own Iden­tity

    Dancing

    You are a pro­fi­ci­ent dan­cer, and may per­form so­ci­al­ly or for the en­ter­ta­in­ment of ot­hers. You are fa­mi­li­ar with most va­ri­eti­es of dan­ce, but spe­ci­ali­ze in one par­ti­cu­lar style.

    • No­vi­ce: You can ma­na­ge a waltz at a wed­ding.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You draw en­vi­o­us glan­ces at wed­dings. You co­uld per­form on the lo­cal ama­te­ur sta­ge.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You are the talk of the ball. You co­uld per­form on the lo­cal pro­fes­si­onal sta­ge.

    •••• Ex­pert: Pe­op­le ask you to te­ach them. You co­uld per­form on TV.

    •••• Mas­ter: Ni­j­insky, Fon­teyn, Nu­re­yev, Ba­ris­h­ni­kov, As­ta­ire, Ro­gers, Kel­ley- and you.

    Possessed by: So­ci­ali­tes, Pop Stars, Mu­sic Vi­deo Dan­cers, Bal­let Dan­cers, En­t­hu­si­asts, Dre­am­s­pe­akers

    Specialties: Waltz, Jazz, Two-step, Fox­t­rot, Dis­co, La­tin, Show, Bal­let, Et­h­nic, Tri­bal, Ec­s­ta­tic

    Do

    Do is the most ba­sic and ru­di­men­tary of all mar­ti­al arts forms. Ta­ught and uti­li­zed by the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od, Do ac­ces­ses the hu­man body's ul­ti­ma­te po­ten­ti­al. This skill is re­qu­ired to prac­ti­ce Do ma­ne­uvers. (See Bo­ok Three for mo­re de­ta­ils abo­ut Do.) This is an ex­cep­ti­onal­ly ra­re and po­wer­ful skill and can only be le­ar­ned from an Akas­hic Brot­her, Be­gin­ning cha­rac­ters may not start with mo­re than two dots in Do; hig­her le­vels may be pur­c­ha­sed only with ex­pe­ri­en­ce and tra­ining.

    Ratings of know­led­ge in Do are usu­al­ly no­ted as part of a per­son's na­me; each tit­le is ba­sed upon a stra­tum of ani­mals who pos­sess the con­cep­tu­al in­s­tincts of that rank of Do Tra­ining. As the stu­dent ad­van­ces, he even­tu­al­ly ac­hi­eves the stra­ta of hu­ma­nity aga­in. But this ri­me, he has ga­ined a know­led­ge of what the hu­man body ac­tu­al­ly is and how to ope­ra­te it to its ul­ti­ma­te po­ten­ti­al. The­se na­mes are only men­ti­oned among mem­bers of the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od.

    • In­sect (gras­shop­per, gnat, worm, etc.): As an ini­ti­ate in the te­ac­hings of Do, you can swing yo­ur arms and legs abo­ut with so­me ef­fi­ci­ency.

    •• Rep­ti­le (sna­ke or li­zard): When you be­co­me a true stu­dent of Do, you be­gin to be­co­me one with yo­ur body.

    ••• Fo­ur-Fo­oted (ti­ger, le­opard, hor­se, dra­gon, etc.): You ha­ve be­gun to spe­ci­ali­ze in a cer­ta­in style of Do. You re­ali­ze that the­re is a hid­den po­ten­ti­al in­si­de of all men. You can sen­se an un­der­l­ying cur­rent of energy be­ne­ath yo­ur physi­cal form.

    •••• Bi­pe­dal (mon­key, ape, be­ar, etc.): As a Mas­ter, you can mo­ve yo­ur body thro­ugh the sim­p­lest mo­ti­on to any go­al or exert a tre­men­do­us amo­unt of for­ce by dra­wing upon the de­sign of the hu­man body.

    ••••• True Hu­ma­nity: Ho­no­red Mas­ter or En­lig­h­te­ned One. All things ha­ve strengths and we­ak­nes­ses. All things are bu­ilt and can be des­t­ro­yed. The pe­ace­ful mind is mo­re ef­fec­ti­ve than the clut­te­red one, for it is easi­er to think than it is not to think.

    Possessed by: Mem­bers of the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od, in­s­pi­red Ori­en­ral Mo­nas­tic Pri­ests, highly ad­van­ced mar­ti­al arts prac­ti­ti­oners

    Specialties: Punch, Kick, Throw, Dod­ge, Ex­ter­nal, In­ter­nal, etc.

    Escapology

    You are skil­led in va­ri­o­us tec­h­ni­qu­es that enab­le you to es­ca­pe from bonds and res­t­ra­ints. This skill is of­ten used for en­ter­ta­in­ment, but can al­so be use­ful in re­al li­fe.

    • No­vi­ce: Chil­d­ren's party en­ter­ta­iner. Can es­ca­pe from lo­ose or po­or­ly-ti­ed bonds.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Ama­te­ur en­ter­ta­iner. Can es­ca­pe from fa­irly well-ti­ed bonds.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Pro­fes­si­onal en­ter­ta­iner. Can es­ca­pe from han­d­cuf­fs and cha­ins.

    •••• Ex­pert: Star, Can es­ca­pe from a stra­it/j­ac­ket

    ••••• Mas­ter: Le­gend. Can es­ca­pe from just abo­ut an­y­t­hing. You wo­uld fe­el sa­fe ti­ed in asack un­der­wa­ter with a tic­king ti­me-bomb.

    Possessed by: En­ter­ta­iners, Spi­es, Spe­ci­al For­ces, Ama­te­urs, Pulp De­tec­ti­ves

    Specialties: Ma­gic Tricks, Ro­pes, Bo­xes, Locks, Un­der­wa­ter, Han­d­cuf­fs, Show­man­s­hip, Arm Locks and Holds

    Fast-Draw

    This skill al­lows you to ma­ke a we­apon re­ady al­most in­s­tantly. By rol­ling Dex­te­rity + Fast-Draw and get­ting three suc­ces­ses, you can draw a we­apon and ha­ve it re­ady for use just as if it had be­en in yo­ur hand all along. The dif­fi­culty de­pends on how se­cu­rely sto­wed the we­apon was- a gun hid­den in yo­ur un­der­we­ar is har­der to re­ach than one in a belt hol­s­ter! This skill can be used with any we­apon. When ap­prop­ri­ate, the Fast-Draw sco­re can be ad­ded to yo­ur Ini­ti­ati­ve roll.

    • No­vi­ce: You ha­ve go­od ref­le­xes.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You're go­od, hut not gre­at,

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You wo­uld ha­ve las­ted a lit­tle whi­le in the Old West. You co­uld work Wild West shows. You are known among tho­se who fol­low du­els.

    •••• Ex­pert: Pretty fast. Yo­ur ene­mi­es are wary of yo­ur spe­ed in dra­wing yo­ur ebon bla­de.

    ••••• Mas­ter: Gre­ased lig­h­t­ning. You might ha­ve be­en ab­le to ta­ke down Billy the Kid.

    Possessed by: Kni­fe-Fig­h­ters, Gun­fig­h­ters, Mar­ti­al Ar­tists, Cops, Spe­ci­al For­ces, Vi­gi­lan­tes.

    Specialties: Kni­fe, Pis­tol, Sword, Ar­row, Rif­le/S­hot­gun.

    Fast-Talk

    This Skill al­lows you to con­vin­ce so­me­one of so­met­hing using a sin­ce­re ex­p­res­si­on and an ava­lan­c­he of words rat­her than re­aso­ned de­ba­te and lo­gic. It's a sur­p­ri­singly ef­fec­ti­ve tec­h­ni­que, pro­vi­ded that the mark has no ti­me to think and do­es not ha­ve a Wits ra­ting of fo­ur or mo­re. The Stor­y­tel­ler sho­uld ca­re­ful­ly jud­ge whet­her this Skill is ap­prop­ri­ate in a gi­ven si­tu­ati­on, or whet­her it wo­uld be bet­ter to use so­me ot­her Abi­lity.

    • No­vi­ce: Va­cu­um-cle­aner sa­les­man

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Used-car sa­les­man

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Pro­fes­si­onal con ar­tist

    •••• Ex­pert: Tef­lon-co­ated po­li­ti­ci­an

    ••••• Mas­ter: You co­uld sell sand to the Sa­udis,

    Possessed by: Sa­les­men, Con Ar­tists, Po­li­ti­ci­ans, Tel evan­ge­lists

    Specialties: Sell, Con­fu­se, Get Off the Ho­ok, Con­vin­ce

    First Aid

    This Skill al­lows a cha­rac­ter to gi­ve ba­sic me­di­cal at­ten­ti­on to anot­her cha­rac­ter. It is not as com­p­re­hen­si­ve an Abi­lity as the Me­di­ci­ne Know­led­ge, but it do­es al­low for a ba­sic grasp of all the prac­ti­ces of first aid, and, at hig­her le­vels, tec­h­ni­qu­es known to pa­ra­me­dics. With suf­fi­ci­ent skill, this can ma­ke vul­gar he­aling ap­pe­ar co­in­ci­den­tal.

    • No­vi­ce: Mot­her of small chil­d­ren

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Boy Sco­ut

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Of­fi­ce sa­fety rep­re­sen­ta­ti­ve

    •••• Ex­pert: Scho­ol nur­se

    ••••• Mas­ter: Pa­ra­me­dic

    Possessed by: Mot­hers, Boy Sco­uts, Pa­ra­me­dics, Ex­p­lo­rers, Out­do­ors Types

    Specialties: CPR, Bro­ken Bo­nes, Ar­ti­fi­ci­al Res­pi­ra­ti­on, Di­ag­no­sis, Ter­mi­no­logy

    Gambling

    You are adept at one or mo­re ga­mes of chan­ce, and can play wit­ho­ut too much risk of lo­sing he­avily. You can al­so in­c­re­ase yo­ur chan­ces of win­ning wit­ho­ut ac­tu­al­ly che­ating.

    • No­vi­ce: Sa­tur­day night po­ker with the boys

    •• Prac­ti­ced: A co­up­le of we­eks in Ve­gas each ye­ar

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You are known in Ve­gas, Re­no and At­lan­tic City.

    •••• Ex­pert: You ma­ke a li­ving from this. Yo­ur mot­her des­pa­irs.

    ••••• Mas­ter: You ha­ve to be ca­re­ful not to tell pe­op­le yo­ur na­me.

    Possessed by: Pro­fes­si­onal Gam­b­lers, Ama­te­ur Gam­b­lers

    Specialties: Card Ga­mes, Di­ce Ga­mes, Ro­ulet­te, One-Ar­med Ban­dits

    Gunsmithing

    You can re­pa­ir fi­re­arms and pro­du­ce am­mu­ni­ti­on for a va­ri­ety of dif­fe­rent guns. At high le­vels of skill, you can con­s­t­ruct spe­ci­alty am­mu­ni­ti­on, such as ca­se­less, hol­low­po­int, mer­cury-tip­ped or sil­ver bul­lets. Gi­ven the ti­me and the to­ols (and eno­ugh skill) you can bu­ild it gun from scratch- per­haps even one of yo­ur own de­sign.

    • No­vi­ce: Black pow­der and pa­per car­t­rid­ges

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Ca­sed stan­dard am­mu­ni­ti­on

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Mag­num ro­unds

    •••• Ex­pert: Ca­se­less and hol­low-po­int ro­unds

    ••••• Mas­ter: You na­me it.

    Possessed by: Gun Nuts, Sur­vi­va­lists, Cops, Se­ri­al Kil­lers

    Specialties: Black Pow­der We­apons, Fi­eld Re­pa­ir, In­ven­ti­on, Mag­num and Su­per­c­har­ged Am­mu­ni­ti­on, Spe­ci­alty Am­mu­ni­ti­on

    Heavy We­apons

    You ha­ve the abi­lity to ope­ra­te he­avy we­apons of all va­ri­eti­es - an­y­t­hing from an M60 he­avy mac­hi­ne gun to a Dra­gon an­ti-tank we­apon. Ad­di­ti­onal­ly, yo­ur know­led­ge of the we­apons in­c­lu­des an abi­lity to re­pa­ir them.

    • No­vi­ce: Ba­sic tra­ining

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Ope­ra­tor

    ••• Com­pe­tent: War­ri­or

    •••• Ex­pert: Kil­ler

    ••••• Mas­ter: Ram­bo

    Possessed by: Mer­ce­na­ri­es, Ar­med For­ces Per­son­nel, HIT Marks, SWAT Of­fi­cers

    Specialties: De­sert, Jun­g­le, Night Fig­h­ting, Fri­end from Foe, Lo­ading

    High Ri­tu­al

    You know how to throw a party or gat­he­ring, an­y­t­hing from wild bac­cha­na­lia to a te­ar-fil­led me­mo­ri­al ser­vi­ce. You know how to plan and cho­re­og­raph the en­ti­re af­fa­ir, down to the last item, ma­king it an event to re­mem­ber. Most pe­op­le think High Ri­tu­al is musty ro­bes and can­d­les. It's not. High Ri­tu­al in­vol­ves con­sum­ma­te show­man­s­hip, cap­tu­ring the par­ti­ci­pants' at­ten­ti­on and fo­cu­sing the­ir will, be­li­ef and emo­ti­on on the par­ti­cu­lar task at hand. A bo­ring ri­tu­al ma­kes for di­sin­te­res­ted ma­ges, which ma­kes for sloppy ma­gic. When High Ri­tu­al is do­ne cor­rectly, it lo­oks ar­t­less, hut it's re­al­ly the hig­hest form of art. Suc­ces­sful use of this Skill might re­du­ce ma­gic­kal dif­fi­cul­ti­es by 1, or pos­sibly mo­re, in ad­di­ti­on to any ot­her mo­di­fi­ers, and co­uld add to So­ci­al im­p­res­si­ons as well.

    • No­vi­ce: You can tas­te­ful­ly plan a wed­ding re­cep­ti­on.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You gi­ve go­od par­ti­es and re­ce­ive mo­re ac­cep­tan­ces than reg­rets when pe­op­le R.S.V.P. The mo­od is high at events you hold, wha­te­ver that mo­od might he.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Yo­ur ce­leb­ra­ti­ons are be­co­ming known, and not just in this world. Ga­tec­ras­hers are a com­mo­noc­cur­ren­ce.

    •••• Ex­pert: When you cho­re­og­raph the High Mass, an­gels ap­pe­ar in the cho­ir loft, al­t­ho­ugh they won't be vi­sib­le to an­yo­ne but the gif­ted. Mi­rac­les may oc­cur, and with far less tro­ub­le than they usu­al­ly do.

    ••••• Mas­ter: Let the Wild Rum­pus Start! When you gi­ve a re­vel, it is an af­fa­ir of le­gend. You we­re pro­bably res­pon­sib­le for Wo­od­s­tock. What are you plan­ning next?

    Possessed by: Ver­be­na, Ca­te­rers, Po­li­ti­cal Ac­ti­vists, Band Ma­na­gers, Hol­lywo­od Pro­du­cers, El­derly Mat­rons

    Specialties: Wed­dings, Fu­ne­rals, Re­li­gi­o­us Ce­re­mo­ni­es, Her­me­tic Myste­ri­es, Bac­cha­nals, Out­do­or Fes­ti­vals

    Hunting

    You are skil­led at fin­ding and kil­ling ani­mals for fo­od or­s­port. In fa­mi­li­ar ter­ra­in, you are ab­le to pre­dict the type, num­ber and li­kely lo­ca­ti­on of fo­od ani­mals and know the best ways to find and kill them,

    • No­vi­ce: We­eken­der

    •• Prac­ti­ced: En­t­hu­si­ast or Tro­oper

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Sur­vi­va­list or Ma­ri­ne

    •••• Ex­pert: Spe­ci­al For­ces

    ••••• Mas­ter: You gi­ve po­in­ters to we­re­wol­ves.

    Possessed by: Sur­vi­va­lists, Mi­li­tary Per­son­nel, Pre-In­dus­t­ri­al So­ci­eti­es, Out­do­or Types, Dre­am­s­pe­akers

    Specialties: Tem­pe­ra­te Fo­rest, Jun­g­le, Bush/S­c­rub, Mo­un­ta­in, Co­ast, Ar­c­tic, De­sert

    Hypnotism

    You can pla­ce a su­bj­ect in­to a tran­ce and use hypno­tism to gat­her in­for­ma­ti­on or tte­at psychi­at­ric prob­lems. To pla­ce a wil­ling su­bj­ect in­to tran­ce, ma­ke an op­po­sed roll of yo­ur Cha­ris­ma + Hypno­tism aga­inst the su­bj­ect's In­tel­li­gen­ce, (For an un­wil­ling su­bj­ect who is im­mo­bi­li­zed or Mind-ma­gic­ked to comply, use In­tel­li­gen­ce + Wil­lpo­wer). The num­ber of suc­ces­ses in­di­ca­tes the depth of the tran­ce and can be ad­ded to the yo­ur Hypno­tism to roll for the suc­cess of tasks. For exam­p­le, a hypno­tist with Cha­ris­ma 4 and Hypno­tism 4 hypno­ti­zes a wil­ling su­bj­ect with In­tel­li­gen­ce 5, The hypno­tist rolls 5 suc­ces­ses and the su­bj­ect rolls 2-a to­tal of 3 suc­ces­ses in the hypno­tist's fa­vor, in­di­ca­ting a fa­irly de­ep tran­ce. The hypno­tist can now roll se­ven di­ce (3 suc­ces­ses plus fo­ur di­ce from Hypno­tism 4) to pro­be the su­bj­ect's mind. Using this Skill suc­ces­sful­ly might re­du­ce the dif­fi­culty of so­me Mind ma­gicks by 1 or mo­re, de­pen­ding on the cir­cum­s­tan­ces.

    • No­vi­ce: You do it to en­tet­ta­in oc­ca­si­onal­ly.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You are a skil­led ama­te­ur.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You can find so­me in­te­res­ting sec­rets,

    •••• Ex­pert: You can dig very de­eply.

    ••••• Mas­ter: You can dis­co­ver sec­rets from, a su­bj­ect's Past Li­ves,

    Possessed by: The­ur­ges, En­ter­ta­iners, Ho­lis­tic He­alers, New Agers, Po­li­ce Spe­ci­alists, Psychi­at­rists

    Specialties: In­ter­ro­ga­ti­on, Past-Li­fe Reg­res­si­on, Hypnot­he­rapy, Be­ha­vi­or Mo­di­fi­ca­ti­on

    Lockpicking

    You are ab­le to open locks wit­ho­ut the cor­rect key or the right com­bi­na­ti­on. Tho­ugh this Skill is cer­ta­inly be­co­ming mo­re and mo­re ob­so­le­te with all the new se­cu­rity de­vi­ces in use, the­re are eno­ugh locks still aro­und to ma­ke it wor­t­h­w­hi­le.

    • No­vi­ce: Sim­p­le mor­ti­se locks

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Cylin­der locks and ba­sic se­cu­rity locks

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Ad­van­ced se­cu­rity locks

    •••• Ex­pert: Sa­fes

    ••••• Mas­ter: Fort Knox

    Possessed by: Bur­g­lars, Sa­fec­rac­kers, Spi­es, Loc­k­s­miths

    Specialties: Key-Ope­ra­ted Locks, Com­bi­na­ti­on Locks, Mag-Card Locks, Alarm Systems

    Misdirection

    Misdirection de­als with dis­t­ract ing pe­op­le from what you are trying to do. By ma­king yo­ur su­bj­ect fo­cus his con­cen­t­ra­ti­on el­sew­he­re, you can ste­er him away from a su­bj­ect of in­te­rest. The su­bj­ect of in­te­rest co­uld be an­y­t­hing from what you are do­ing to an obj­ect sit­ting in pla­in sight.

    Masters of Do are ab­le to uti­li­ze suc­ces­ses on Mis­di­rec­ti­on rolls to lo­wer the dif­fi­culty on the­ir next Do roll to stri­ke the dis­t­rac­ted tar­get. The Do prac­ti­ti­oner throws a fe­int or fal­se blow. Whi­le the op­po­nent is trying to Dod­ge or block that blow, the prac­ti­ti­oner de­li­vers the at­tack that he ori­gi­nal­ly in­ten­ded to uti­li­ze.

    • No­vi­ce: "Hey, yo­ur shoe la­ce is un­ti­ed!"

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You're re­al go­od at card tricks.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You can ma­ke a li­ving at mis­di­rec­ting pe­op­le

    •••• Ex­pert: Pe­op­le gi­ve you things and then for­get that they did.

    ••••• Mas­ter: Stran­gers for­get that they ever met you.

    Possessed by: Sta­ge Ma­gi­ci­ans, Pic­k­poc­kets, Con Men

    Specialties: Theft, Con­ce­al­ment, Le­ading, Con­fu­si­on

    Pilot

    You can ope­ra­te a flying mac­hi­ne. No­te that yo­ur skill Li­mits the types of air­c­raft you can fly. A gli­der pi­lot (one dot) can­not fly a he­li­cop­ter (re­qu­iring fo­ur dots).

    • No­vi­ce: Club mem­ber; hang gli­ders only

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Club cham­pi­on; gli­ders and small air­c­raft only

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Pro­fes­si­onal ot club in­s­t­ruc­tor; com­mer­ci­al air­p­la­ne li­cen­se

    •••• Ex­pert: Mi­li­tary or dis­p­lay pi­lot; he­li­cop­ter, any type of com­mer­ci­al air­c­raft

    ••••• Mas­ter: Top Gun

    Possessed by: En­t­hu­si­asts, Pi­lots, Mi­li­tary, Po­li­ce

    Specialties: Night Flying, Ther­mals, Dog­fights, Long Dis­tan­ces, Ta­ke­of­fs and Lan­dings, Gli­ders, He­li­cop­ters, Light Pla­nes, Cor­po­ra­te Jets, Com­mer­ci­al/T­ran­s­port Jets, Fig­h­ter Jets, Vin­ta­ge Pla­nes, Autog­y­ros, Blimps, Bal­lo­ons, Hang Gli­ders, Mic­ro­lights

    Psychoanalysis

    You are skil­led in di­ag­no­sing and tre­ating men­tal ail­ments wit­ho­ut re­sor­ting to the use of be­ha­vi­or-al­te­ring drugs. Du­ring a ses­si­on of anal­y­sis, you may roll In­tel­li­gen­ce + Psycho­anal­y­sis (dif­fi­culty of the su­bj­ect's In­tel­li­gen­ce + 3). Ke­ep track of yo­ur net suc­ces­ses; the Stor­y­tel­ler will de­ci­de how many suc­ces­ses are ne­ces­sary to re­mo­ve the il­lness. Even Fre­ud co­uldn't cu­re pe­op­le in a sin­g­le ses­si­on, so be pa­ti­ent! No­te that it is pos­sib­le to tre­at an un­wil­ling pa­ti­ent this way, al­t­ho­ugh the dif­fi­culty of so do­ing is equ­al to the su­bj­ect's Wil­lpo­wer + 3,

    • No­vi­ce: A sho­ul­der to cry on

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Vo­lun­te­er co­un­se­lor

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Pro­fes­si­onal co­un­se­lor

    •••• Ex­pert: Qu­ali­fi­ed psycho­analyst

    ••••• Mas­ter: Fre­ud

    Possessed by: Psycho­analysts, Ho­lis­tic He­alers, Go­od Lis­te­ners, Co­un­se­lors, Pa­rents, Te­ac­hers, Pri­ests

    Specialties: Fre­udi­an, Jun­gi­an, Hu­ma­nist, Eric­k­so­ni­an, Ho­lis­tic, Wic­can, Chil­d­ho­od, Psycho­sis, Ne­uro­sis, Self, Sympathy, Ter­mi­no­logy, Re­se­arch

    Ride

    You can climb on­to a ri­ding ani­mal and stand a go­od chan­ce of get­ting whe­re you want to go wit­ho­ut fal­ling off, be­ing thrown or ha­ving an­y­t­hing el­se un­p­le­asant hap­pen to you. When at­tem­p­ting so­met­hing dif­fi­cult, or when dan­ger thre­atens, the Stor­y­tel­ler may re­qu­ire a Dex­te­rity + Ri­de roll to avo­id tro­ub­le. This Skill can al­so be com­bi­ned with Men­tal At­tri­bu­tes to ref­lect yo­ur wor­king know­led­ge of the re­le­vant trap­pings and equ­ip­ment.

    • No­vi­ce: Pony club mem­ber; du­de ranch va­ca­ti­ons

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Pony club cham­pi­on; we­ekend cow­boy

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Pony club in­s­t­ruc­tor; pro­fes­si­onal cow­boy

    •••• Ex­pert: Sho­wj­um­ping cham­pi­on; ro­deo star

    ••••• Mas­ter: Stunt ri­der

    Possessed by: En­t­hu­si­asts, Cow­boys, Stunt Ri­ders, mem­bers of pre-in­dus­t­ri­al so­ci­eti­es

    Specialties: Ba­re­back, Hor­se, Mu­le, Ca­mel, Elep­hant, Gal­lo­ping, Tricks, No Hands

    Singing

    You can sing over a wi­de ran­ge and use a va­ri­ety of styles and tec­h­ni­qu­es. Sin­ging is an ex­t­re­mely luc­ra­ti­ve and po­pu­lar Skill in the mo­dern age. Tho­ugh most sin­gers are ama­te­urs, so­me ma­ke enor­mo­us amo­unts of mo­ney.

    • No­vi­ce: You stand out when the fa­mily gat­hers aro­und the pi­ano.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You co­uld get le­ad ro­les with lo­cal ama­te­ur so­ci­eti­es or be­co­me a le­ad sin­ger with a ga­ra­ge band.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You co­uld get a cho­ral part on the pro­fes­si­onal sta­ge or get a re­cor­ding con­t­ract.

    •••• Ex­pert: You co­uld get a le­ad on Bro­ad­way or a re­cord on the charts.

    ••••• Mas­ter: They'll be pla­ying yo­ur CDs 20 ye­ars from now.

    Possessed by: Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus Ma­ges, Rock Mu­si­ci­ans, Pop Stars, Ope­ra Sin­gers, Drunks

    Specialties: Ope­ra, Easy Lis­te­ning, Ri­tu­al, Rock, Mu­si­cals

    Speed Re­ading

    Through prac­ti­ce, you ha­ve de­ve­lo­ped the abi­lity to re­ad and ab­sorb lar­ge qu­an­ti­ti­es of writ­ten ma­te­ri­al in a short ti­me. This is es­pe­ci­al­ly use­ful when the cha­rac­ter is do­ing re­se­arch or chec­king for an ob­s­cu­re re­fe­ren­ce. It do­es not, ho­we­ver, re­du­ce ti­me ne­eded to ac­qu­ire the be­ne­fits of study po­ints.

    • No­vi­ce: The New York Ti­mes in an ho­ur

    •• Prac­ti­ced: A no­vel in two to three ho­urs

    ••• Com­pe­tent: A tex­t­bo­ok in two to three ho­urs

    •••• Ex­pert: A fat tex­t­bo­ok in two to three ho­urs

    ••••• Mas­ter: War & Pe­ace in two to three ho­urs

    Possessed by: Aca­de­mics, Li­te­rary Cri­tics, Jo­ur­na­lists, Re­se­ar­c­hers

    Specialties: Tec­h­ni­cal, Fic­ti­on, New­s­pa­per, Re­se­arch, Cram­ming

    Swimming

    You can ke­ep yo­ur­self af­lo­at, at the very le­ast. Nor­mal swim­ming spe­ed is 8 yards (plus Dex­te­rity). A swim­mer can in­c­re­ase his spe­ed to 12 yards (plus Dex­te­rity) if he is do­ing not­hing el­se that turn. With Swim­ming skill, a cha­rac­rer can rry to swim fas­tet than nor­mal; roll Sta­mi­na + Swim­ming, dif­fi­culty 7, and add three yards to yo­ur swim­ming spe­ed per suc­cess (one roll per turn ).

    • No­vi­ce: You can swim,

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You can swim fast, or for ex­ten­ded pe­ri­ods.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: In­s­t­ruc­tor/Li­fe­gu­ard

    •••• Ex­pert: Swim te­am

    ••••• Mas­ter: Ol­y­m­pic gold

    Possessed by: At­h­le­tes, Li­fe­gu­ards, Scu­ba Di­vers and al­most an­yo­ne el­se

    Specialties: Ra­cing, Dis­tan­ce, Sea, Sur­vi­val, Li­fe­sa­ving

    Torture

    You know how to in­f­lict pa­in. Yo­ur abi­lity is so pre­ci­se as to be a sci­en­ce. You are ca­pab­le of in­ter­ro­ga­ting pri­so­ners thro­ugh tor­tu­re and pro­lon­ging the­ir suf­fe­ring, ke­eping them ba­rely ali­ve- or un­de­ad.

    • No­vi­ce: You know how to hurt pe­op­le in dif­fe­rent ways.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You are go­od at ca­using ex­t­re­me pa­in and can ke­ep so­me­one ali­ve for in­rer­ro­ga­ti­on pur­po­ses.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You are equ­al to a mi­li­tary tor­tu­rer. You can cre­ate ex­t­re­mes of pa­in most pe­op­le ha­ve ne­ver ex­pe­ri­en­ced.

    •••• Ex­pert: You are equ­al to a pro­fes­si­onal tor­tu­rer. You are ab­le to get al­most any in­for­ma­ti­on you want out of yo­ur su­bj­ect.

    ••••• Mas­ter: You are an ar­tist, a vir­tu­oso of pa­in and suf­fe­ring.

    Possessed by: Mi­li­tary In­ter­ro­ga­tors, Pri­son Gu­ards, Nep­han­di, Cor­rupt Eut­ha­na­tos, Men in Black

    Specialties: Exo­tic Met­hods, Li­fe Ma­gick Ef­fects, Pro­lon­ging Li­fe, Pa­in, Fla­gel­la­ti­on

    Tracking

    You can iden­tify the tra­il of an ani­mal or per­son and fol­low it un­der most con­di­ti­ons. The dif­fi­culty of such a fe­at va­ri­es ac­cor­ding to the con­di­ti­ons-fol­lo­wing fresh tracks in de­ep snow is easi­er than fol­lo­wing we­ek-old tracks ac­ross a con­c­re­te si­de­walk!

    • No­vi­ce: Boy Sco­ut

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Eag­le Sco­ut

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Hun­ter

    •••• Ex­pert: Na­ti­ve Ame­ri­can gu­ide

    ••••• Mas­ter: You tho­ught Sa­mu­el Ha­ight was slow.

    Possessed by: Hun­ters, Sur­vi­va­lists, Spe­ci­al For­ces, De­tec­ti­ves

    Specialties: Wolf, De­er, Rock, Ur­ban, Iden­ti­fi­ca­ti­on

    Traps

    You know how to set va­ri­o­us types of traps ac­cor­ding to the type of ga­me you want to catch.

    • No­vi­ce: Boy Sco­ut

    •• Prac­ti­ced: We­ekend sur­vi­va­list

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Out­do­or­s­man

    •••• Ex­pert: Mo­un­ta­in man

    ••••• Mas­ter: "Well do­ne! And I tho­ught dra­gons we­re ex­tinct…"

    Possessed by: Trap­pers, Spe­ci­al For­ces, In­ha­bi­tants of re­mo­te pla­ces

    Specialties: Spe­ci­fic Spe­ci­es, De­ad­fal­ls, Pits

    Alchemy

    You are fa­mi­li­ar with the wri­tings of the clas­si­cal and me­di­eval al­c­he­mists, and you al­so ha­ve so­me prac­ti­cal ex­pe­ti­en­ce. This Abi­lity is in­di­rectly re­la­ted to the Know­led­ge of Che­mistry, in a man­ner si­mi­lar to the re­la­ti­on­s­hip bet­we­en As­t­ro­nomy and As­t­ro­logy. You can in­rer­p­ret al­c­he­mi­cal texts, and you un­der­s­tand the va­ri­o­us symbols and cip­hers used by the al­c­he­mists even when you find them in a non-al­c­he­mi­cal con­text.

    • No­vi­ce: A me­re dab­bler

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Ap­pren­ti­ce, pro­bably still de­pen­dent on a mas­ter for in­s­t­ruc­ti­on

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Jo­ur­ney­man, ca­pab­le of ma­king yo­ur own way, but with a long ro­ad left to tra­vel

    •••• Ex­pert: Ex­pe­ri­en­ced al­c­he­mist, wit­hin re­ach of the gre­atest sec­rets

    ••••• Mas­ter: One of the true prac­ti­ti­oners of the Craft of Al­c­hemy,

    Possessed by: Oc­cul­tists, Scho­lars, so­me Sci­en­tists

    Specialties: Tran­s­mu­ta­ti­on, Cos­mo­logy, La­pis Phi­lo­sop­ho­rum

    Area Know­led­ge

    You are fa­mi­li­ar with an area- its lan­d­s­ca­pe, his­tory, in­ha­bi­tants and Sle­eper po­li­tics. This Know­led­ge will al­so pro­vi­de a ba­sic "who's who" for the ate­as aro­und a Chantry or Con­s­t­ruct,

    • No­vi­ce: You know a fa­ir amo­unt for an out­si­der.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You may ha­ve li­ved the­re for a ye­ar or two.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You may ha­ve li­ved the­re for 5-10 ye­ars.

    •••• Ex­pert: You're na­ti­ve born, and ne­ver left.

    ••••• Mas­ter: You know every sto­ne, stre­am or bu­il­ding in the area.

    Possessed by: Vi­gi­lan­tes, Gu­ar­di­ans of the Sle­epers, Men in Black, Cops

    Specialties: His­tory, Ge­og­raphy, Wil­d­li­fe, Ene­mi­es, Po­li­tics, Tran­s­por­ta­ti­on, Law

    Astrology

    You know how to com­pi­le and in­ter­p­ret a ho­ros­co­pe. Gi­ven the da­te and ti­me (and, ac­cor­ding to so­me systems, the pla­ce) of a per­son's birth, you can con­s­t­ruct a per­so­na­lity pro­fi­le and a set of pre­dic­ti­ons abo­ut the li­kely co­ur­se of his li­fe. Whet­her you ac­tu­al­ly be­li­eve the­se re­ve­la­ti­ons is a mat­ter of per­so­nal tas­te, but you can pre­sent them in a con­vin­cing and ple­asing man­ner to tho­se who do be­li­eve. This Know­led­ge do­es not con­fer any type of ma­gic­kal abi­lity.

    • No­vi­ce: You me­rely dab­ble.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Fri­ends ask you to ma­ke ho­ros­co­pes for them.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You co­uld run a small as­t­ro­logy bu­si­ness.

    •••• Ex­pert: You co­uld ha­ve a syndi­ca­ted new­s­pa­per co­lumn.

    ••••• Mas­ter: You co­uld work for ce­leb­ri­ti­es and po­li­ti­ci­ans.

    Possessed by: As­t­ro­lo­gers, Ama­te­urs, Mystics, New Agers, Old Hip­pi­es

    Specialties: So­lar Ho­ros­co­pe, Ming Shu, Zu Wei

    Chantry Po­li­tics

    You know so­me of the ins and outs of Chantry al­li­an­ces and re­la­ti­ons- an im­por­tant thing when ac­ting as an emis­sary, se­eking re­fu­ge or se­eking ac­cess to ra­re texts or ro­tes. This Know­led­ge gi­ves you a "sco­re­card" for the va­ti­ed pla­yers in the con­vo­lu­ted world of the Chantry. Cranky Mas­ters may be im­p­res­sed with a new­co­mer who knows her way aro­und; an agen­da can be for­war­ded if one knows the right (or wrong) per­son to ap­pro­ach. A re­la­ted but se­pa­ra­te Know­led­ge, Con­s­t­ruct Po­li­tics, works in a si­mi­lar fas­hi­on for Tec­h­noc­racy stron­g­holds. AT­ra­di­ti­on ma­ge who knows the po­wer struc­tu­re of a Con­s­t­ruct wo­uld be a dan­ge­ro­us op­po­nent. No­te that the Chantry Po­li­tics Know­led­ge in­vol­ves kno­wing pe­op­le and fac­ti­ons; ac­tu­al­ly put­ting this know­led­ge to use in­vol­ves ot­her Abi­li­ti­es, such as In­t­ri­gue and Dip­lo­macy.

    • No­vi­ce: You know a few na­mes and a few pla­ces.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You're fa­mi­li­ar with pla­ces you've vi­si­ted.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You know who's who and what's whe­re.

    •••• Ex­pert: "I know just the per­son you ne­ed! He's in the Ber­mu­da Tri­an­g­le right now…"

    ••••• Mas­ter: You're fa­mi­li­ar with the pit­fal­ls of Do­is­se­tep.

    Possessed by: Mas­ters, Am­bas­sa­dors, Tro­ub­le­ma­kers, Spi­es

    Specialties: Fac­ti­ons, Vi­ces, Scan­dals, Sec­ret Al­li­an­ces, Wi­zards Be­hind the Cur­ta­in

    Computer Hac­king

    The pla­yer must ha­ve at le­ast two dots in Com­pu­ter be­fo­re pur­c­ha­sing this Know­led­ge. Hac­king al­lows the com­pu­ter user to bre­ak the ru­les. It is not a prog­ram­ming skill- that re­qu­ires the Com­pu­ter Know­led­ge. Hac­king rep­re­sents an ima­gi­na­ti­ve fa­culty abo­ve and be­yond the use of the prog­ram­ming co­des. In the bi­nary com­pu­ter world of yes/no, hac­king rep­re­sents the lit­tle bit of ge­ni­us that says, "Well… may­be."

    Hacking is used in­s­te­ad of the Com­pu­ter Know­led­ge when the user is bre­aking in­to ot­her com­pu­ter systems or trying to ma­ni­pu­la­te da­ta in "re­al ti­me." The Com­pu­ter Abi­lity is used for prog­ram­ming or ot­her mis­cel­la­ne­o­us tasks. Hac­king is used most of­ten as a com­p­le­men­tary Abi­lity to Com­pu­ter, but it can aid prog­ram­ming by al­lo­wing the cha­rac­ter to work fas­ter or to crack mi­li­tary co­des that a nor­mal prog­ram­mer wo­uld not even be ab­le to fi­gu­re out. Ru­les for hac­king can be fo­und in Bo­ok Three.

    • No­vi­ce: You are a com­pu­ter ge­ek who knows a few tricks, such as chan­ging yo­ur gra­des in the uni­ver­sity com­pu­ter net­work.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You ha­ve gre­at "luck" in gu­es­sing com­pu­ter pas­swords.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You tho­ught yo­ur elec­t­ric bill was too high last month, but you can fix that with a few key­s­t­ro­kes.

    •••• Ex­pert: Now that you ha­ve crac­ked the bank co­des, which is it: Rio or Ber­mu­da?

    ••••• Mas­ter: The Euro­pe­an Com­mu­nity was pretty an­no­yed abo­ut that ther­mo­nuc­le­ar in­ci­dent, but you know they can ne­ver tra­ce it back to you.

    Possessed by: Com­pu­ter Ge­eks, CIA Ope­ra­ti­ves, Vir­tu­al Adepts

    Specialties: Vi­ru­ses, Da­ta Ret­ri­eval, Net­wor­king, Ma­gic­kal Pro­tec­ti­ons, Te­le­com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons

    Cryptography

    You may skil­lful­ly com­po­se and in­ter­p­ret co­des and cip­hers. You can con­s­t­ruct a co­de that can only be crac­ked by so­me­one who sco­res as many suc­ces­ses as you ha­ve dots in this Know­led­ge, You can al­so crack a co­de, rol­ling yo­ur Know­led­ge aga­inst a dif­fi­culty as­sig­ned by the Stor­y­tel­ler de­pen­ding on the co­de's com­p­le­xity.

    • No­vi­ce: Gra­de-sc­ho­ol spy fan

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Word puz­zle buff, mi­li­tary sig­nals of­fi­cer

    ••• Com­pe­tent: In­tel­li­gen­ce of­fi­cer

    •••• Ex­pert: In­tel­li­gen­ce cip­her spe­ci­alist

    ••••• Mas­ter: James Bond

    Possessed by: Spi­es, Puz­zle Buffs, Mi­li­tary Sig­nals Per­son­nel

    Specialties: Let­ter Shifts, Mat­he­ma­ti­cal En­c­t­y­p­ti­on, Ob­s­cu­re Cha­rac­ter Sets

    Herbalism

    You ha­ve a wor­king know­led­ge of herbs and the­ir pro­per­ti­es, me­di­ci­nal and ot­her­wi­se. You can find and pre­pa­re herbs and know which herb or blend of herbs to use in any si­tu­ati­on. This skill will al­so pro­vi­de know­led­ge of the ma­gi­cal lo­re of plants.

    • No­vi­ce: Re­ad a bo­ok on it on­ce.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Se­ti­o­us stu­dent.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Lo­cal sup­pli­er.

    •••• Ex­pert: Aut­hor of bo­oks on her­ba­lism,

    ••••• Mas­ter: Her­bal doc­tor.

    Possessed by: Ver­be­na, Her­me­tic and Dre­am­s­pe­aker Ma­ges, Ho­lis­tic He­alers, New Agers, Wi­ze­ned Old Wo­men, Mem­bers of Tra­di­ti­onal Cul­tu­res.

    Specialties: Cu­li­nary, Me­di­ci­nal, Po­iso­no­us, Nar­co­tics, Hal­lu­ci­no­gens, Spi­rit

    History

    You've stu­di­ed the his­tory of a spe­ci­fic area or pe­ri­od, and you un­der­s­tand what hap­pe­ned, when, why and who was in­vol­ved. You al­so ha­ve a fa­ir idea of so­ci­al, po­li­ti­cal, eco­no­mic and tec­h­no­lo­gi­cal con­di­ti­ons in va­ri­o­us past ti­mes and pla­ces. No­te that in the ca­se of an­ci­ent ma­ges, this Know­led­ge re­la­tes only to ti­mes and pla­ces that are out­si­de the­ir di­rect ex­pe­ri­en­ce. For in­s­tan­ce, a ma­ge born in Vic­to­ri­an Lon­don wo­uld rely on me­mory for know­led­ge of En­g­lish his­tory and cul­tu­re, but wo­uld use His­tory to un­co­ver in­for­ma­ti­on abo­ut clas­si­cal Gre­ece, which was be­fo­re his ti­me, or abo­ut Cza­rist Rus­sia, which was out­si­de his ex­pe­ri­en­ce.

    • No­vi­ce: Ama­te­ur or high scho­ol

    •• Prac­ti­ced: En­t­hu­si­ast or col­le­ge stu­dent

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Grad stu­dent ot aut­hor

    •••• Ex­pert: Pro­fes­sor

    ••••• Mas­ter: Re­se­arch fel­low

    Possessed by: En­t­hu­si­asts, Scho­lars, Men­tors

    Specialties: Po­li­ti­cal, In­tel­lec­tu­al, So­ci­al, Eco­no­mic, Tec­h­no­lo­gi­cal, Clas­si­cal, Me­di­eval, Re­na­is­san­ce, Mo­dern, Euro­pe, Ame­ri­cas, Asia, Af­ri­ca, Aus­t­ra­lia

    Lore

    You're fa­mi­li­ar with the sub­cul­tu­res of the World of Dar­k­ness - the sco­op on vam­pi­res, we­re­wol­ves, the fey and yo­ur own kind. Each type of Lo­re must be pur­c­ha­sed as a se­pa­ra­te Know­led­ge; ac­cu­ra­te dirt on the Ca­ma­ril­la won't tell you an­y­t­hing abo­ut the halls of Ar­ca­dia.

    Much of yo­ur in­for­ma­ti­on will be se­cond-hand, and thus sus­pect. It be­ars no­ting that the dif­fe­rent "pla­yers" in the wor­ld-be­hind-the-sce­nes of­ten ha­ve wildly inac­cu­ra­te per­cep­ti­ons of each ot­her. A ma­ge, me­eting a vam­pi­re, won't im­me­di­ately ask "What clan are you, and whe­re's yo­ur prin­ce?" Li­ke­wi­se, a Tec­h­no­man­cer will not im­me­di­ately know the his­tory of the Co­un­cil of Ni­ne. Ma­ges ha­ve a lot to le­arn- many are lac­king know­led­ge abo­ut the­ir own Tra­di­ti­ons.

    This kind of know­led­ge will not be easy to co­me by- we­re­wol­ves don't pass the­ir sec­rets on to ca­ern-rob­bers- and so­me know­led­ge can be ac­ti­vely har­m­ful, es­pe­ci­al­ly Wyrm Lo­re. The­re re­al­ly are so­me things man was not me­ant to know!

    • No­vi­ce: You've he­ard a few du­bi­o­us ta­les.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You know a few ac­cu­ra­te facts.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Fa­mi­li­ar eno­ugh to hold an in­tel­li­gent con­ver­sa­ti­on.

    •••• Ex­pert: You know a few things they'd rat­her you didn't know.

    ••••• Mas­ter: You know yo­ur su­bj­ects bet­ter than they know them­sel­ves. This can be­co­me a re­al prob­lem!

    Possessed by: Sa­ges, War Ca­bals, Ta­le-Tel­lers, Re­se­arch As­sis­tants, Spi­es

    Varieties: (Each one bo­ught se­pa­ra­tely) Fa­erie, For­bid­den Sec­rets, Ga­rou, Ghosts, Kin­d­red, Sab­bat, Tec­h­noc­racy, Tra­di­ti­on, Wyrm, Ca­ma­ril­la

    Poisons

    You ha­ve a wor­king know­led­ge of po­isons, the­ir ef­fects and an­ti­do­tes. You can anal­y­ze a po­ison to tell its ori­gin, and can mix a po­ison or an­ti­do­te gi­ven ti­me and equ­ip­ment. You must ha­ve at le­ast one dot in Sci­en­ce to ac­qu­ire this Know­led­ge.

    • No­vi­ce: Dab­bler

    •• Prac­ti­ced: De­tec­ti­ve, Mystery Re­ader

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Phar­ma­cist, Mystery Wri­ter

    •••• Ex­pert: Fo­ren­sic Sci­en­tist, Emer­gen­cy-Ro­om Doc­tor

    ••••• Mas­ter: As­sas­sin

    Possessed by: Pro­ge­ni­tors, Eut­ha­na­tos, Mystery Buffs, De­tec­ti­ves, Phar­ma­cists, Me­dics, As­sas­sins

    Specialties: Ve­noms, Che­mi­cal Po­isons, Plant-ba­sed Po­isons, Anal­y­sis, An­ti­do­tes, In­s­tant Po­isons, Slow-bu­ild Po­isons, Un­de­tec­tab­le Po­isons, Ma­gic­kal Po­isons

    Psychology

    You ha­ve a for­mal edu­ca­ti­on in the sci­en­ce of hu­man na­tu­re. You know the mo­dern the­ori­es of emo­ti­on, cog­ni­ti­ve de­ve­lop­ment, per­so­na­lity, per­cep­ti­on and le­ar­ning. Tho­ugh this is lar­gely a scho­larly un­der­s­tan­ding of the hu­man psyche, it can be used prac­ti­cal­ly to un­der­s­tand tho­se aro­und you.

    • No­vi­ce: High scho­ol

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Col­le­ge stu­dent

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Grad stu­dent

    •••• Ex­pert: Pro­fes­sor

    ••••• Mas­ter: The­orist

    Possessed by: Te­ac­hers, Re­se­ar­c­hers, Sci­en­tists, Co­un­se­lors, Psycho­lo­gists

    Specialties: Be­ha­vi­orism, Fre­udi­an, Jun­gi­an, Hu­ma­nist, De­ve­lop­men­tal, Ex­pe­ri­men­tal, Ani­mals

    Science Spe­ci­al­ties

    The sub­t­le­ti­es of sci­en­ce are many and va­ri­ed, es­pe­ci­al­ly for the Tec­h­no­man­cers who em­p­loy them. Cha­rac­ters who spe­ci­ali­ze in one type of sci­en­ce (Bi­ology, Mat­he­ma­tics, En­gi­ne­ering, Cyber­ne­tics, etc.) mo­re than ot­hers sho­uld simply ta­ke that Sci­en­ce as a se­pa­ra­te Know­led­ge with spe­ci­fic ap­pli­ca­ti­ons out­si­de of the mo­re ge­ne­ral body of know­led­ge that is rep­re­sen­ted by the Sci­en­ce Tra­it.

    Because the­ir ma­gick de­pends on the­ir be­li­ef in a cer­ta­in pa­ra­digm, Tec­h­no­man­cers must work the­ir ef­fects along cer­ta­in 'the­ori­es' to get away with co­in­ci­den­tal ma­gick. Vi­ola­ting the­se pa­ra­digms might ca­use a fa­iled Ef­fect or even a Pa­ra­dox Bac­k­lash, A suc­ces­sful Sci­en­ce roll co­uld al­low a Tec­h­no­man­cer to "fast-cast" a the­ory on the spur of the mo­ment, then ex­p­la­in the ef­fect away in a re­am of com­p­lex gib­be­rish. The im­por­tan­ce of be­li­ef, ho­we­ver, can­not be un­de­res­ti­ma­ted; ma­gick is a fun­c­ti­on of yo­ur be­li­ef over the be­li­efs of tho­se aro­und you. A Tec­h­no­man­cer shac­k­led to a be­li­ef system must still ad­he­re to that pa­ra­digm to work his ma­gick. The gre­ater yo­ur know­led­ge of a su­bj­ect, the bet­ter yo­ur abi­lity to work it to yo­ur de­si­red ends.

    • No­vi­ce: A ba­sic un­der­s­tan­ding of the con­cepts in­vol­ved.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: A wor­king know­led­ge of the su­bj­ect.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Go­od eno­ugh to bend the ru­les wit­ho­ut bre­aking them.

    •••• Ex­pert: Ex­ten­si­ve and eso­te­ric the­ori­es,

    ••••• Mas­ter: You know so much that you can pro­ve an­y­t­hing you want wit­hin yo­ur cho­sen fi­eld.

    Possessed by: Sci­en­tists, Tec­h­no­man­cers, Re­se­arch Tec­h­ni­ci­ans

    Varieties: As­t­ro­nomy, Bi­ology, Ge­ne­tics, Mat­he­ma­tics, Cyber­ne­tics, Me­tal­lurgy, Any Ot­her Type of Spe­ci­fic Sci­en­ce

    Secret Co­de Lan­gu­age

    Many Tra­di­ti­ons and Crafts ha­ve sec­ret ma­gic lan­gu­ages that only Adepts or­bet­ter un­der­s­tand. The Ver­be­na use the Lan­gu­age of Flo­wers, com­po­sing bo­uqu­ets and no­se­gays who­se com­po­nent flo­wers and ar­ran­ge­ments con­ce­al hid­den me­anings- mul­le­in, or hag ta­per, me­ans "ta­ke co­ura­ge," whi­le net­tle me­ans "You are spi­te­ful" and ver­be­na me­ans "You en­c­hant me." The Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od uses the Sec­rets Signs of the no­to­ri­o­us Hung So­ci­ety, Even the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus has its own met­hod of swift, sec­ret com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on, ci­ting Chap­ter and Ver­se from the­ir holy bo­oks, the me­anings of which are only re­adily ap­pa­rent to tho­se who ha­ve com­mit­ted them to he­art.

    Fragments of the­se co­des ha­ve le­aked in­to the world of the Sle­epers, and so­me ba­sic me­anings can be de­cip­he­red by tho­se with the ap­prop­ri­ate bac­k­g­ro­und. Up­per class mat­rons un­der­s­tand bits of the Lan­gu­age of Flo­wers, and Asi­an stre­et gangs know a few of the hand signs of the Hung So­ci­ety. Sec­ret Co­des are pur­c­ha­sed li­ke Lin­gu­is­tics, one per po­int in the Know­led­ge. Li­ke Lo­re, this skill may be dif­fi­cult to ob­ta­in. The co­des are kept sec­ret for a re­ason.

    Possessed by: Ver­be­na, Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od, Spi­es, Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus, Sec­ret So­ci­eti­es, Ho­me­less

    Varieties: Lan­gu­age of Flo­wers, Hung So­ci­ety, Chap­ter & Ver­se

    Sign Lan­gu­age

    Sign Lan­gu­age can be bo­ught as a le­vel in Lin­gu­is­tics. Not all sign lan­gu­ages are the sa­me. You must dec­la­re each lan­gu­age se­pa­ra­tely. Ni­nja, de­af pe­op­le, spi­es and many ma­ge ca­bals ha­ve the­ir own se­pa­ra­te hand co­des. The­se must ge­ne­ral­ly be ta­ught by a mem­ber of a se­lect gro­up; ob­ta­ining this tra­ining may ran­ge from easy to damn ne­at im­pos­sib­le.

    Stone Lo­re

    You know the re­pu­ted pro­per­ti­es of sto­nes and all the ma­gic in­he­rent in them. You may use this know­led­ge in the cre­ati­on of Ta­lis­mans and fe­tis­hes and can as­sist with ri­tu­al ma­gick.

    • No­vi­ce: You sell bir­t­h­s­to­nes and psychic crystals.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: You can match me­tals and sto­nes to ma­ke amu­lets for most oc­ca­si­ons.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: You know yo­ur sto­nes. Ot­her ma­ges co­me to you to get the­ir rocks.

    •••• Ex­pert: The Ga­rou co­me to you to get rocks and me­tals. You talk to sto­nes.

    ••••• Mas­ter: Not only do you talk to sto­nes, but so­me­ti­mes they talk back. You know all the po­wers of the mi­ne­rals, and can iden­tify the gre­at jewels of le­gend.

    Possessed by: New Agers, Jewe­lers, Al­c­he­mists, Dre­am­s­pe­akers

    Specialties: Pla­ne­tary In­f­lu­en­ces, Jade Car­ving, Me­tals

    Taxidermy

    You can ta­ke an ani­mal apart and pre­ser­ve all the bits and pi­eces, not just the skins and he­ads. Yo­ur de­er skins won't rot and yo­ur ra­ven claws won't smell funny. Mo­re­over, you can ma­ke su­re newts' eyes will stay fresh for ye­ars.

    • No­vi­ce: The newts sho­uld fre­eze well.

    •• Prac­ti­ced: No­body will buy from you, but you sho­uld be ab­le to cu­re a pelt or pro­perly pre­ser­ve a sna­ke in for­mal­deh­y­de.

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Re­la­ti­ves who li­ke ani­mal he­ads na­iled to the­ir walls ap­pre­ci­ate yo­ur pre­sents. Ot­hers find yo­ur hobby dis­tas­te­ful be­ca­use the ani­mals don't lo­ok de­ad an­y­mo­re. Of co­ur­se, they don't lo­ok ali­ve eit­her.

    •••• Ex­pert: You co­uld get a job at the na­tu­ral his­tory mu­se­um. Old la­di­es who want the­ir chi­hu­ahu­as stuf­fed co­me to you, and the frog to­es are as fresh as the day you got them.

    ••••• Mas­ter: You pro­bably em­bal­med the Pha­ra­ohs in a past li­fe. Yo­ur work lo­oks li­ke its go­ing to get up and run off any se­cond now.

    Possessed by: Mor­ti­ci­ans, Hun­ters, Fur­ri­ers, Sons of Et­her, Se­ri­al Kil­lers, High Scho­ol Sci­en­ce Te­ac­hers

    Specialties: Tan­ning, Em­bal­ming, Pre­ser­ving, Trop­hi­es, Tec­h­ni­qu­es of Fran­ken­s­te­in, Vic­tims

    Theology

    Religion is a fa­mi­li­ar as­pect of hu­man en­de­avor for you, and you fully un­der­s­tand its pla­ce in the world. At hig­her le­vels, this Know­led­ge im­parts an ap­pre­ci­ati­on for all re­li­gi­o­us be­li­efs, whi­le in­di­vi­du­als with less skill tend to vi­ew the­ir own be­li­efs as in­t­rin­si­cal­ly su­pe­ri­or to any ot­hers. This, of co­ur­se, va­ri­es with the in­di­vi­du­al. Pos­ses­si­on of this Know­led­ge in no way re­qu­ires per­so­nal be­li­ef in the te­nets of any spe­ci­fic re­li­gi­on.

    • No­vi­ce: Par­ti­ci­pant

    •• Prac­ti­ced: Al­tar boy

    ••• Com­pe­tent: Pri­est

    •••• Ex­pert: Pro­fes­sor

    ••••• Mas­ter: The­olo­gi­an

    Possessed by: Mis­si­ona­ri­es, Pri­ests, Pas­tors, Nuns, The­olo­gi­ans, At­he­ists

    Specialties: Wo­men's The­ology (often cal­led The­a­ology), Com­pa­ra­ti­ve, Li­be­ra­ti­on, Ag­nos­ti­cism, Chris­ti­an, Bud­dhist, Branch Da­vi­di­an

    I will walk with my hands bo­und

    I will walk with my fa­ce blo­od

    I will walk with my sha­dow flag

    Into yo­ur gar­den

    Garden of sto­ne

    - Pe­arl Jam, "Gar­den"

    Merits and Flaws are new cha­rac­ter Tra­its that add co­lor and fla­vor to yo­ur Ma­ge chro­nic­le. Me­rits pro­vi­de cha­rac­ters with so­me be­ne­fit, whi­le Flaws act to the­ir det­ri­ment. So­me of the­se Tra­its will ha­ve lit­tle ef­fect on a ga­me be­yond a dash of style; ot­hers co­uld un­ba­lan­ce a chro­nic­le or com­p­le­tely chan­ge its di­rec­ti­on. Po­wer­ful Me­rits or Flaws will sha­pe a cha­rac­ter's des­tiny and any re­la­ti­on­s­hips he or she has.

    When you cre­ate a cha­rac­ter in Ma­ge, you are gi­ven 15 "fre­ebie" po­ints to as­sign to wha­te­ver Tra­its you li­ke in or­der to gi­ve yo­ur cha­rac­ter the fi­nis­hing to­uc­hes that ma­ke her uni­que. The op­ti­onal system of Me­rits and Flaws ex­pands on this idea and fur­t­her al­lows you to per­so­na­li­ze yo­ur cha­rac­ter.

    Merits may be pur­c­ha­sed only with "fre­ebie" po­ints and only du­ring cha­tac­ter con­cep­ti­on. Flaws pro­vi­de ad­di­ti­onal fre­ebi­es to spend, aga­in, only du­ring ini­ti­al con­cep­ti­on, A ma­xi­mum of se­ven po­ints of Flaws may be ta­ken, li­mi­ting po­ten­ti­al fre­ebie po­ints to a to­tal of 22. Man­gus War­hawk, for exam­p­le, buys Dark Fa­te and Ob­ses­si­on, a to­tal of se­ven po­ints in Flaws. If he al­so cho­oses to buy Ab­sent-Min­ded, he wo­uldn't ga­in any ad­di­ti­onal po­ints, al­t­ho­ugh he wo­uld add an in­te­res­ting (and po­ten­ti­al­ly dan­ge­ro­us) new qu­irk to his per­so­na­lity. So­me Me­rits and Flaws ha­ve va­ri­ab­le po­int costs; the­se Tra­its of­fer mo­re op­ti­ons for cha­rac­ter cre­ati­on.

    Merits and Flaws are pro­vi­ded to flesh out a cha­rac­ter and add new story ho­oks and de­ta­ils, not to al­low po­wer­ga­mers to mi­ni-max the­ir cha­rac­ters in­to war-mac­hi­nes, Pla­yers sho­uld ma­ke su­re that the Stor­y­tel­ler al­lows the­se op­ti­ons in the chro­nic­le be­fo­re cre­ating cha­rac­ters ba­sed aro­und the­se op­ti­ons. Each chro­nic­le is in­di­vi­du­al and uni­que, so the­re is no tel­ling what res­t­ric­ti­ons or chan­ges the Stor­y­tel­ler has in mind. The­re is no right or wrong way, only ways that work for ever­yo­ne con­cer­ned.

    These Me­rits and Flaws de­al with the psycho­lo­gi­cal ma­ke­up of yo­ur cha­rac­ter, and may des­c­ri­be ide­als, mo­ti­va­ti­ons or pat­ho­lo­gi­es. So­me psycho­lo­gi­cal Flaws can be tem­po­ra­rily ig­no­red by spen­ding a Wil­lpo­wer po­int, and are so no­ted. If you pos­sess such a Flaw and do not ro­lep­lay it when the Stor­y­tel­ler thinks you sho­uld, then she may tell you that you ha­ve spent a po­int of Wil­lpo­wer for the ef­fort. Flaws can­not be con­ve­ni­ently ig­no­red.

    Code of ho­nor: (1 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve a per­so­nal co­de of et­hics to which you strictly ad­he­re. You can auto­ma­ti­cal­ly re­sist most tem­p­ta­ti­ons that wo­uld bring you in con­f­lict with yo­ur co­de. When bat­tling su­per­na­tu­ral per­su­asi­on (Mind ma­gick or vam­pi­ric Do­mi­na­ti­on) that wo­uld ma­ke you vi­ola­te yo­ur co­de, eit­her you ga­in three ex­t­ra di­ce to re­sist or yo­ur op­po­nent's dif­fi­cul­ti­es are in­c­re­ased by two (Stor­y­tel­ler's cho­ice). You must con­s­t­ruct yo­ur own per­so­nal co­de of ho­nor in as much de­ta­il as you can, out­li­ning the ge­ne­ral ru­les of con­duct by which you abi­de.

    Higher Pur­po­se: (1 pt Me­rit)

    All ma­ges ha­ve so­me vi­si­on of the­ir Path, but you ha­ve a spe­ci­al com­mit­ment to it. Yo­ur cho­sen go­al dri­ves and di­rects you in ever­y­t­hing. You do not con­cern yo­ur­self with petty mat­ters and ca­su­al con­cerns, be­ca­use yo­ur hig­her pur­po­se is ever­y­t­hing. Tho­ugh you may so­me­ti­mes be dri­ven by this pur­po­se and find yo­ur­self for­ced to be­ha­ve in ways con­t­rary to the ne­eds of per­so­nal sur­vi­val, it can al­so grant you gre­at per­so­nal strength. You ga­in two ex­t­ra di­ce on any roll that has so­met­hing to do with this hig­her pur­po­se. You ne­ed to de­ci­de what yo­ur hig­her pur­po­se is. Ma­ke su­re you talk it over with the Stor­y­tel­ler first. (If you ha­ve the Flaw: Dri­ving Go­al, lis­ted be­low, you can­not ta­ke this Me­rit.)

    Curiosity: (2 pt Flaw)

    You are a na­tu­ral­ly cu­ri­o­us per­son and find myste­ri­es of any sort ir­re­sis­tib­le. In most cir­cum­s­tan­ces, you find that yo­ur cu­ri­osity easily over­ri­des yo­ur com­mon sen­se. To re­sist the tem­p­ta­ti­on, ma­ke a Wits roll ver­ses dif­fi­culty 5 for sim­p­le things li­ke "I won­der what is in that ca­bi­net?" In­c­re­ase the dif­fi­culty up to 9 for things li­ke "I'll just pe­ek in­to the Pro­ge­ni­tor lab- no one will know. What co­uld pos­sibly go wrong?"

    Addiction: (1-3 pt Flaw)

    You are ad­dic­ted to any one of a va­ri­ety of things. A one po­int Flaw wo­uld be a mild ad­dic­ti­on to a easily at­ta­ined sub­s­tan­ce, such as caf­fe­ine, ni­co­ti­ne or al­co­hol. A two po­int Flaw wo­uld be eit­her a se­ve­re ad­dic­ti­on to any easily-ob­ta­ined sub­s­tan­ce or any "mild" drug, such as pa­in kil­lers, sle­epin­g­pil­ls or ma­ri­j­u­ana. A three po­int Ad­dic­ti­on in­vol­ves the he­avy stre­et drugs or hard-to-find drugs. The ne­ed for the­se drugs va­ri­es from on­ce a day for so­me drugs to two to three ti­mes a day for ot­hers, de­pen­ding on the strength of the drug and the ad­dic­ti­on. If, for wha­te­ver re­ason, you are de­ni­ed ac­cess to the drug, you lo­se the num­ber of di­ce equ­al to the le­vel of yo­ur ad­dic­ti­on (one, two or three) un­til you re­ce­ive yo­ur "fix." If you are dep­ri­ved of the drugs for an ex­ten­ded length of ti­me, you will be for­ced to ma­ke a Wil­lpo­wer check (dif­fi­culty of 4 for the first day, + 1 for each ad­di­ti­onal day). If you fa­il, you will for­go ever­y­t­hing and for­cibly go se­eking the drug. This wo­uld be an easy way for you to be eit­her con­t­rol­led or for­ced to do fa­vors for yo­ur sup­pli­er, es­pe­ci­al­ly if the drug is hard to ob­ta­in due to its ra­rity or pri­ce.

    Compulsion: (1 pt Flaw)

    You ha­ve a psycho­lo­gi­cal com­pul­si­on of so­me sort, which can ca­use you a num­ber of dif­fe­rent prob­lems. Yo­ur com­pul­si­on may be for cle­an­li­ness, per­fec­ti­on, brag­ging, ste­aling, ga­ming, exag­ge­ra­ti­on or just tal­king. A com­pul­si­on can be tem­po­ra­rily avo­ided at the cost of a Wil­lpo­wer po­int, but it is in ef­fect at all ot­her ti­mes,

    Dark Sec­ret: (1 pt Flaw)

    You ha­ve so­me sort of sec­ret that, if un­co­ve­red, wo­uld be of im­men­se em­bar­ras­sment to you and wo­uld ma­ke you a pa­ri­ah among yo­ur pe­ers. This can be an­y­t­hing from ha­ving mur­de­red a Mas­ter to ha­ving on­ce fal­len to a Nep­han­di's tem­p­ta­ti­ons. Whi­le this sec­ret we­ighs on yo­ur mind at all ti­mes, it will only sur­fa­ce in oc­ca­si­onal sto­ri­es. Ot­her­wi­se, it will be­gin to lo­se its im­pact.

    Intolerance: (1 pt Flaw)

    You ha­ve an un­re­aso­ning dis­li­ke of a cer­ta­in thing. This may be an ani­mal, a class of per­son, a co­lor, a si­tu­ati­on or just abo­ut an­y­t­hing el­se. The dif­fi­cul­ti­es of all di­ce rolls in­vol­ving the su­bj­ect are in­c­re­ased by two. No­te that so­me dis­li­kes may be too tri­vi­al to be ref­lec­ted he­re- a dis­li­ke of Whi­te Wolf Ma­ga­zi­ne or tis­sue pa­per, for in­s­tan­ce, will ha­ve lit­tle ef­fect on play in most chro­nic­les. The Stor­y­tel­ler is the fi­nal ar­bi­ter on what you can pick to dis­li­ke.

    Nightmares: (1 pt Flaw)

    You ex­pe­ri­en­ce hor­ren­do­us nig­h­t­ma­res every ti­me you sle­ep, and me­mo­ri­es of them ha­unt you du­ring yo­ur wa­king ho­urs. So­me­ti­mes the nig­h­t­ma­res are so bad they ca­use you to lo­se one die on all yo­ur ac­ti­ons for the next day (Stot­y­tel­ler's dis­c­re­ti­on). So­me of the nig­h­t­ma­res may be so in­ten­se that you mis­ta­ke them for re­ality. A crafty Stor­y­tel­ler will be qu­ick to ta­ke ad­van­ta­ge of this. Con­f­lict with yo­ur Ava­tar, Pa­ra­dox, bad epi­so­des of Qu­i­et or even dif­fi­cult Se­ekings may lie at the ro­ots of the­se night ter­rors.

    Phobia (Mild): (1 pt Flaw)

    You ha­ve an over­po­we­ring fe­ar of so­met­hing. You in­s­tin­c­ti­vely and il­lo­gi­cal­ly ret­re­at from and avo­id the obj­ect of yo­ur fe­ar. Com­mon obj­ects of pho­bi­as in­c­lu­de cer­ta­in ani­mals, in­sects, crowds, open spa­ces, con­fi­ned spa­ces and he­ights. You must ma­ke a Wil­lpo­wer roll whe­ne­ver you en­co­un­ter the obj­ect of yo­ur fe­ar. The dif­fi­culty of this roll is de­ter­mi­ned by the Stor­y­tel­ler. If you fa­il the roll, you must ret­re­at from the obj­ect.

    Overconfident: (1 pt Flaw)

    You ha­ve an exag­ge­ra­ted and un­s­ha­kab­le opi­ni­on of yo­ur own worth and ca­pa­bi­li­ti­es- you ne­ver he­si­ta­te to trust yo­ur abi­li­ti­es, even in si­tu­ati­ons whe­re you risk de­fe­at. Be­ca­use yo­ur abi­li­ti­es may not be eno­ugh, such over­con­fi­den­ce can be very dan­ge­ro­us. When you do fa­il, you qu­ickly find so­me­one or so­met­hing el­se to bla­me. If you are con­vin­cing eno­ugh, you can in­fect ot­hers with yo­ur over­con­fi­den­ce.

    Shy: (1 pt Flaw)

    You are dis­tinctly ill at ease when de­aling with pe­op­le and try to avo­id so­ci­al si­tu­ati­ons whe­ne­ver pos­sib­le. The dif­fi­cul­ti­es of all rolls con­cer­ned with so­ci­al de­alings are in­c­re­ased by one; the dif­fi­cul­ti­es of any rolls ma­de whi­le you are the cen­ter of at­ten­ti­on are in­c­re­ased by two. Don't ex­pect yo­ur cha­rac­ter to ma­ke a pub­lic spe­ech.

    Speech Im­pe­di­ment: (1 pt Flaw)

    You ha­ve a stam­mer or so­me ot­her spe­ech im­pe­di­ment which ham­pers ver­bal com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on. The dif­fi­cul­ti­es of all re­le­vant rolls are in­c­re­ased by two. Do not fe­el ob­li­ged to ro­lep­lay this im­pe­di­ment all the ti­me, but in ti­mes of du­ress, or when de­aling with out­si­ders, you sho­uld at­tempt to si­mu­la­te it.

    Sadism/Masochism: (2 pt Flaw)

    You are ex­ci­ted eit­her by ca­using pa­in or re­ce­iving it. In many si­tu­ati­ons, you will se­ek eit­her to be hurt or hurt so­me­one for yo­ur ple­asu­re. For a ma­soc­hist (so­me­one who enj­oys pa­in), yo­ur so­ak roll for ac­tu­al physi­cal da­ma­ge is in­c­re­ased by one be­ca­use you re­al­ly want to fe­el the pa­in. A sa­dist (so­me­one who li­kes to hurt ot­hers) must ma­ke a Wil­lpo­wer roll ver­ses a 5 to stop com­bat (mo­di­fi­ed de­pen­ding on how much you are in­to the at­tack and how much you are enj­oying hur­ting the ot­her per­son). If you fa­il, you are so ca­ught up in the event that you are una­wa­re of an­y­t­hing el­se hap­pe­ning aro­und you.

    Obsession: (2 po­int Flaw)

    There is so­met­hing you li­ke, lo­ve or are fas­ci­na­ted by to the po­int whe­re you of­ten dis­re­gard com­mon sen­se to ca­ter to this dri­ve. You re­act po­si­ti­vely to an­y­t­hing re­la­ted to yo­ur ob­ses­si­on, even if it's not in yo­ur best in­te­rests. For exam­p­le, if you are ob­ses­sed with su­per­na­tu­ral cre­atu­res, you will go out of yo­ur way to talk to and bef­ri­end vam­pi­res, we­re­wol­ves and stran­ger things, and find out as much as you can abo­ut them, dis­re­gar­ding all war­nings. If you are ob­ses­sed with El­vis, you ha­ve yo­ur ho­use de­co­ra­ted with vel­vet pa­in­tings and an­noy yo­ur fri­ends with yo­ur con­s­tant talk abo­ut the King. You don't ne­ces­sa­rily be­li­eve that El­vis is still ali­ve, but you buy every su­per­mar­ket tab­lo­id that car­ri­es an ar­tic­le abo­ut him an­y­way. The­re are many ot­her ob­ses­si­ons, in­c­lu­ding Bri­tish Ro­yalty, guns, kni­ves, fo­ot­ball, ro­lep­la­ying ga­mes… you know the type.

    Vengeance: (2 pt Flaw)

    You ha­ve a sco­re to set­tle- a ca­bal was wi­ped out, a fri­end was cor­rup­ted, a men­tor was sla­in… wha­te­ver. You are ob­ses­sed with wre­aking ven­ge­an­ce on the gu­ilty party. Re­ven­ge is yo­ur first pri­ority in all si­tu­ati­ons. The ne­ed for ven­ge­an­ce can only be over­co­me by spen­ding Wil­lpo­wer po­ints, and even then, it only tem­po­ra­rily sub­si­des. So­me­day you may ha­ve yo­ur re­ven­ge, but the Stor­y­tel­ler won't ma­ke it easy.

    Flashbacks: (3 pt Flaw)

    You are pro­ne to flas­h­backs if you are in eit­her hig­h­p­res­su­re si­tu­ati­ons or cir­cum­s­tan­ces that are si­mi­lar to the event that ca­used the flas­h­back it­self. The flas­h­back do­es not ha­ve to be com­bat-ori­en­ted. Eit­her po­si­ti­ve or ne­ga­ti­ve sti­mu­la­ti­on co­uld re­sult in a flas­h­back epi­so­de. The re­pe­ated use of drugs has be­en pro­ven to­ca­use a wi­de ran­ge of hal­lu­ci­na­ti­ons, and in the right cir­cum­s­tan­ces, the mind co­uld flas­h­back to any one of them. Emo­ti­onal an­xi­ety and stress are the usu­al ca­talysts for the flas­h­backs to be­gin. Flas­hing back to a go­od and happy vi­si­on can be just as dan­ge­ro­us or dis­t­rac­ting as sud­denly flas­hing to be­ing sur­ro­un­ded by de­mons. The flas­h­backs can be ca­used by al­most any tra­uma- tor­tu­re, ex­ten­ded com­bat or re­pe­ated drug ex­pe­ri­men­ta­ti­on. Du­ring the flas­h­back, you are not awa­re of what is re­al­ly aro­und you. Even pe­op­le spe­aking to you will be vi­ewed as pe­op­le or obj­ects from the vi­si­on. You can mis­ta­ke men for wo­men, pe­op­le for ani­mals and even ina­ni­ma­te obj­ects for pe­op­le. To you, re­ality has shif­ted, and you are back the­re aga­in,

    Driving Go­al: (3 pt Flaw)

    You ha­ve a per­so­nal go­al, which so­me­ti­mes com­pels and di­rects you in star­t­ling ways. The go­al is al­ways li­mit­less in depth, and you can ne­ver truly ac­hi­eve it. It co­uld be to era­di­ca­te the Tec­h­noc­racy or ac­hi­eve to­tal en­lig­h­ten­ment. Be­ca­use you must work to­ward yo­ur go­al thro­ug­ho­ut the chro­nic­le (tho­ugh you can avo­id it for short pe­ri­ods by spen­ding Wil­lpo­wer), it will get you in­to tro­ub­le and may je­opar­di­ze ot­he­rac­ti­ons. Cho­ose yo­ur dri­ving go­al ca­re­ful­ly, as it will di­rect and fo­cus ever­y­t­hing yo­ur cha­rac­ter do­es.

    Hatred: (3 pt Flaw)

    You ha­ve an un­re­aso­ning hat­red of a cer­ta­in thing. This ha­te is to­tal and lar­gely un­con­t­rol­lab­le. You may ha­te a spe­ci­es of ani­mal, a class of per­son, a co­lor, a si­tu­ati­on or jusr abo­ut an­y­t­hing el­se, and you con­s­tantly pur­sue op­por­tu­ni­ti­es to harm the ha­ted obj­ect or to ga­in po­wer over it.

    Lifesaver: (3 pt Flaw)

    You be­li­eve that hu­man li­fe is a sac­red gift and will not ta­ke a per­son's li­fe ex­cept in the most ex­t­re­me of cir­cum­s­tan­ces. You may not ever wil­lingly en­dan­ger the li­ves of in­no­cents or in any way par­ti­ci­pa­te in a kil­ling. You ha­ve no prob­lems with kil­ling ani­mals (for the right re­asons), and will k i l l evil and in­hu­man cre­atu­res to pro­tect ot­hers if ne­ces­sary. (Be very ca­re­ful, ho­we­ver, with yo­ur de­fi­ni­ti­on of "evil",…) Sen­se­less de­ath in all forms re­pul­ses you, and you fe­el that tho­se who per­form mur­der sho­uld be pu­nis­hed and stop­ped.

    Phobia (Se­ve­re): (3 pt Flaw)

    You ha­ve an over­po­we­ring fe­ar of so­met­hing. Com­mon obj­ects of fe­ar in­c­lu­de cer­ta­in ani­mals, in­sects, crowds, open spa­ces, con­fi­ned spa­ces, he­ights and so on. You must ma­ke a Wil­lpo­wer roll not to fre­ak out when fa­ced with the obj­ect of yo­ur fe­ar. The dif­fi­culty de­pends on the cir­cum­s­tan­ces. If you fa­il the roll, you must ret­re­at in ter­ror from the obj­ect of fe­ar. If you sco­re less than three suc­ces­ses, you will not ap­pro­ach it. The Stor­y­tel­ler has fi­nal say over which pho­bi­as are al­lo­wed in a chro­nic­le.

    These Me­rits and Flaws de­al with the mind: its strengths, we­ak­nes­ses and spe­ci­al ca­pa­ci­ti­es. The mind of a ma­ge is a po­wer­ful we­apon; qu­irks sho­uld be con­si­de­red ca­re­ful­ly.

    Common Sen­se: (1 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve a sig­ni­fi­cant amo­unt of prac­ti­cal, ever­y­day wis­dom. Whe­ne­ver you are abo­ut to­do so­met­hing con­t­rary to com­mon sen­se, the Stor­y­tel­ler sho­uld alert you to how yo­ur po­ten­ti­al ac­ti­on might vi­ola­te prac­ti­ca­lity. This is an ide­al Me­rit if you are a no­vi­ce pla­yer be­ca­use it al­lows you to re­ce­ive ad­vi­ce from the Stor­y­tel­ler con­cer­ning what you can and can­not do, and (even mo­re im­por­tantly) what you sho­uld and sho­uld not do,

    Concentration: (1 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve the abi­lity to fo­cus yo­ur mind and shut out any dis­t­rac­ti­ons or an­no­yan­ces, abo­ve and be­yond nor­mal ma­gely dis­cip­li­ne. Any pe­nalty to a dif­fi­culty or Di­ce Po­ol ari­sing from a dis­t­rac­ri­on or ot­her ina­us­pi­ci­o­us cir­cum­s­tan­ce is li­mi­ted to two di­ce, tho­ugh no ex­t­ra be­ne­fits are ga­ined if only one pe­nalty die is im­po­sed,

    Lightning Cal­cu­la­tor: (1 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve a na­tu­ral af­fi­nity with num­bers and a ta­lent for men­tal arit­h­me­tic, ma­king you a na­tu­ral when wor­king with com­pu­ters or bet­ting at the ra­cet­racks. The dif­fi­cul­ti­es of all re­le­vant rolls are dec­re­ased by two. Anot­her pos­sib­le use for this abi­lity, as­su­ming you ha­ve num­bers on which to ba­se yo­ur con­c­lu­si­ons, is the abi­lity to cal­cu­la­te the dif­fi­culty of cer­ta­in tasks. In ap­prop­ri­ate si­tu­ati­ons, you may ask the Stor­y­tel­ler to es­ti­ma­te the dif­fi­culty ra­ting of a task you are abo­ut to per­form. This Me­rit is com­mon among the sci­en­tists of Ite­ra­ti­on X and Vir­tu­al Adept hac­kers.

    Eidetic Me­mory: (2 pt Me­rit)

    You can re­mem­ber things se­en and he­ard with per­fect de­ta­il. By ga­ining at le­ast one suc­cess on an In­tel­li­gen­ce + Aler­t­ness roll, you can re­call any sigh t or so­und ac­cu­ra­tely, even if you he­ard it or glan­ced at it only on­ce (altho­ugh the dif­fi­culty of such a fe­at wo­uld be high). Fi­ve suc­ces­ses enab­le you to re­call an event per­fectly: the Stor­y­tel­ler re­la­res to you exactly what was se­en or he­ard.

    Prodigy: (2 pt Me­rit)

    You we­re Awa­ke­ned very early in yo­ur li­fe and ha­ve not be­en su­bj­ect to the prob­lems of un­le­ar­ning the cul­tu­ral re­ality. Per­haps one or both of yo­ur pa­rents we­re Awa­ke­ned and shel­te­red you from the re­ality cre­ated by the Tec­h­no­man­cers. As a re­sult of this pro­tec­ti­on, you ha­ve an easi­er ti­me gras­ping the most ab­s­t­ract Sphe­res of ma­gick. You re­ce­ive one ex­t­ra die on rolls that re­la­te to ab­s­t­ract ide­asot ma­gic­kal com­p­re­hen­si­on. Tho­ugh you we­re Awa­ke­ned at an early age, yo­ur ac­tu­al tra­ining in ma­gick pro­bably be­gan much la­ter.

    Iron Will: (3 pt Me­rit)

    When you are de­ter­mi­ned and yo­ur mind is set, not­hing can di­vert you from yo­ur go­als. You can­not be Do­mi­na­ted, nor can yo­ur mind be af­fec­ted in any way by Tha­uma­tur­gic ri­tu­als. Ma­ges using men­tal at­tacks aga­inst you ga­in an ad­di­ti­onal + 3 to the­ir dif­fi­cul­ti­es if you ate awa­re of them and re­sis­ting. Ho­we­ver, the ad­di­ti­onal men­tal de­fen­se costs you one Wil­lpo­wer per turn. Even if you are una­wa­re of them, ma­ges se­eking to ma­gic­kal­ly in­f­lu­en­ce you add + 1 to the­ir dif­fi­cul­ti­es,

    Self-Confident: (5 pt Me­rit)

    When you spend a po­int of Wil­lpo­wer to ga­in an auto­ma­tic suc­cess, yo­ur self-con­fi­den­ce may al­low you to ga­in the be­ne­fit of that ex­pen­di­tu­re wit­ho­ut ac­tu­al­ly lo­sing the Wil­lpo­wer po­int. When you dec­la­re that you are using a po­int of Wil­lpo­wer and roll for suc­ces­ses, you do not lo­se the po­int of Wil­lpo­wer un­less you fa­il. This will al­so pre­vent you from bot­c­hing, hut only if you dec­la­re that you arc spen­ding the Wil­lpo­wer po­int be­fo­re you roll. This Me­rit may only be used when you ne­ed con­fi­den­ce in yo­ur abi­li­ti­es in or­der to suc­ce­ed. You can use it only when the dif­fi­culty of yo­ur roll is six or hig­her. You may spend Wil­lpo­wer at ot­her ti­mes; ho­we­ver, if the dif­fi­culty is fi­ve or less, the Me­rit: Self-Con­fi­den­ce will not help you.

    Amnesia: (2 pt Flaw)

    You are unab­le to re­mem­ber an­y­t­hing abo­ut yo­ur past, yo­ur­self or yo­ur fa­mily. Yo­ur li­fe is a blank sla­te. Ho­we­ver, yo­ur past may so­me­day co­me back to ha­unt you. (You can, if you wish, ta­ke up to fi­ve po­ints of ot­her Flaws wit­ho­ut spe­cif­ying what they are. The Stor­y­tel­ler can supply the de­ta­ils. Over the co­ur­se of the chro­nic­le, you and yo­ur cha­rac­ter will slowly dis­co­ver them.)

    Confused: (2 pt Flaw)

    You are of­ten con­fu­sed, and the world se­ems to be a very dis­tor­ted and twis­ted pla­ce. So­me­ti­mes you are simply unab­le to ma­ke sen­se of things. You ne­ed to ro­lep­lay this be­ha­vi­or all the ti­me to a small deg­ree, but yo­ur con­fu­si­on be­co­mes es­pe­ci­al­ly strong whe­ne­ver sti­mu­li sur­ro­und you (such as when a num­ber of dif­fe­rent pe­op­le talk all at on­ce, or you en­ter a nig­h­t­c­lub with lo­ud po­un­ding mu­sic). You may spend Wil­lpo­wer to over­ri­de the ef­fects of yo­ur con­fu­si­on, but only tem­po­ra­rily,

    Absent-Minded: (3 pt Flaw)

    This Flaw may not be ta­ken with the Me­rit: Con­cen­t­ra­ti­on. Tho­ugh you do not for­get such things as Know­led­ges or Skills, you do for­get such things as na­mes, ad­dres­ses and the last ti­me you me­di­ta­ted. In or­der to re­mem­ber an­y­t­hing mo­re than­yo­urown na­me and the lo­ca­ti­onof yo­ur Chantry, you ne­ed to ma­ke a Wits roll or, as a last re­sort, spend a Wil­lpo­wer po­int.

    AWARENESS

    These Me­rits and Flaws in­vol­ve per­cep­ti­on (or the lack the­re­of). Li­fe ma­gick may be used to re­pa­ir so­me of the­se Flaws; cha­rac­ters do­ing so must buy off the Flaw with new po­ints.

    Acute Sen­ses: (1 pt. Me­rit)

    You ha­ve ex­cep­ti­onal­ly sharp he­aring, smell, vi­si­on or tas­te. The dif­fi­cul­ti­es of all di­ce rolls that re­la­te to the sen­se in qu­es­ti­on (e.g. Per­cep­ti­on + Awa­re­ness to he­ar a fa­int no­ise, tas­te po­ison in fo­od or see an on­co­ming at­tac­ker) are dec­re­ased by two. Com­bi­ned with sen­sory Ef­fects (first rank Ef­fects), this Me­rit al­lows the ma­ge to add an ad­di­ti­onal suc­cess to her die roll.

    Color Blin­d­ness: (1 pt Flaw)

    You can only see in black and whi­te. Co­lor me­ans not­hing to you, al­t­ho­ugh you are sen­si­ti­ve to co­lor den­sity, which you per­ce­ive as sha­des of gray. Li­fe 3 can­not fix this prob­lem, as you can't truly con­ce­ive the true na­tu­re of co­lor! No­te: co­lor blin­d­ness ac­tu­al­ly in­di­ca­tes an ina­bi­lity to dis­tin­gu­ish bet­we­en two co­lors, but we fud­ged a bit for the sa­ke of pa­ya­bi­lity.

    Hard of He­aring: (1 pt Flaw)

    Your he­aring is de­fec­ti­ve. The dif­fi­cul­ti­es of all di­ce tolls re­la­ted to he­aring are in­c­re­ased by two. You may not ta­ke Acu­te He­aring if you ta­ke this Flaw.

    Bad Sight: (3 pt Flaw)

    Your sight is de­fec­ti­ve. The dif­fi­cul­ti­es of all di­ce rolls re­la­ted to vi­si­on are in­c­re­ased by two. This Flaw is ne­it­her ne­ar­sig­h­ted­ness nor far­sig­h­ted­ness - it is a mi­nor form of blin­d­ness. The im­pa­ir­ment is not cor­rec­tab­le. Li­fe 3 may cor­rect this for a short ti­me, but te­pa­iring the blin­d­ness per­ma­nently re­qu­ires bu­ying off the Flaw or tying the ef­fect to a fo­cus (gog­gles, a vi­sor, etc.). You may not ta­ke Acu­te Vi­si­on if you ta­ke this Flaw.

    Deaf: (4 pt Flaw)

    You can­not he­ar so­und, and auto­ma­ti­cal­ly fa­il any rolls that re­qu­ire he­aring.

    Blind: (6 pt Flaw)

    You auto­ma­ti­cal­ly fa­il all di­ce rolls in­vol­ving vi­si­on. You can­not see - the world of co­lor and light is lost to you.

    APTITUDE

    These Me­rits and Flaws es­tab­lish spe­ci­al ca­pa­ci­ti­es and abi­li­ti­es for yo­ur cha­rac­ter, or mo­dify the ef­fects and po­wers of yo­ur cha­rac­ter's ot­her Tra­its.

    Animal Mag­ne­tism: (1 pt Me­rit)

    You are es­pe­ci­al­ly at­trac­ti­ve to ot­hers. You re­ce­ive a - 2 to yo­ur dif­fi­culty on Se­duc­ti­on or Sub­ter­fu­ge rolls. Ho­we­ver, this will ag­gra­va­te ot­hers of yo­ur gen­der.

    Ambidextrous: (1 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve a high deg­ree of off-hand dex­te­rity and can per­form tasks with the "wrong" hand at no pe­nalty. The nor­mal pe­nalty for using both hands at on­ce to per­form dif­fe­rent tasks (e.g. fig­h­ting with a we­apon in each hand) is at a + 1 dif­fi­culty for the "tight" hand and a +3 dif­fi­culty for the ot­her hand.

    Computer Ap­ti­tu­de: (1 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve a na­ru­ral af­fi­nity wirh com­pu­ters, so the dif­fi­cul­ti­es of all rolls to re­pa­ir, con­s­t­ruct or ope­ra­te them are re­du­ced by two. This is es­pe­ci­al­ly handy for Vir­tu­al Adepts and ser­vants of Ite­ra­ti­on X.

    Crack Dri­ver: (1 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve a na­tu­ral af­fi­nity with dri­ving mo­to­ri­zed whe­eled ve­hic­les, such as cars, 18-whe­elers and even trac­tors. The dif­fi­cul­ti­es of all rolls re­qu­iring risky or es­pe­ci­al­ly dif­fi­cult dri­ving ma­ne­uvers are re­du­ced by two.

    Mechanical Ap­ti­tu­de: (1 pt Me­rit)

    You are na­tu­ral­ly adepr with all kinds of mec­ha­ni­cal de­vi­ces (no­te that this ap­ti­tu­de do­es not ex­tend to elec­t­ro­nic de­vi­ces, such as com­pu­ters). The dif­fi­cul­ti­es of all di­ce colls to un­der­s­tand, te­pa­it or ope­ra­te any kind of mec­ha­ni­cal de­vi­ce are re­du­ced by two. Ho­we­ver, this Me­rit do­esn't help you dri­ve any sort of ve­hic­le.

    Poison Re­sis­tan­ce: (1 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve, for so­me re­ason or anot­her, be­co­me re­sis­tant to po­isons. It co­uld be that you are so­me­how na­tu­ral­ly re­sis­tant or that you ha­ve spent ye­ars bu­il­ding up yo­ur re­sis­tan­ce aga­inst all known rypes of po­isons. Any ti­me you ne­ed to ma­ke a so­ak roll aga­inst the ef­fects of a po­ison or to­xin, re­du­ce yo­ur dif­fi­culty by 3.

    Natural Lin­gu­ist: (2 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve a fla­ir for lan­gu­ages. This Me­rit do­es not al­low you to le­arn mo­re lan­gu­ages than the num­ber per­mit­ted by yo­ur Lin­gu­is­tics sco­re, but you may add three di­ce to any Di­ce Po­ol in­vol­ving lan­gu­ages (both writ­ten and spo­ken). This Me­tit is com­mon among Or­der of Her­mes ma­ges and Gypsi­es,

    Daredevil: (3 pt Me­rit)

    You are go­od at ta­king risks, and are even bet­ter at sur­vi­ving them. All dif­fi­cul­ti­es are one less whe­ne­ver you try so­met­hing par­ti­cu­larly dan­ge­ro­us, and you can ig­no­re one botch re­sult when you roll "ones" on such ac­ti­ons (you can can­cel a sin­g­le "one" that is rol­led, as if you ha­ve an ex­t­ra suc­cess).

    Fast Le­ar­ner: (3 pt Me­rit)

    You le­arn very qu­ickly, and pick up on new things fas­ter than most do. You ga­in one ex­t­ra ex­pe­ri­en­ce po­int at the con­c­lu­si­on of each story (not each ga­me ses­si­on).

    Perfect Ba­lan­ce: (3 pt Me­rit)

    Your sen­se of ba­lan­ce has ac­hi­eved gre­at he­ights by con­s­tant tra­ining or in­he­ri­ted tra­its. It is very un­li­kely that you will ever fall du­ring yo­ur li­fe. You may trip, but you will al­ways catch yo­ur­self be­fo­re you fully lo­se yo­ur fo­oting or han­d­hold.

    This Me­rit fun­c­ti­ons for such ac­ti­ons as tig­h­t­ro­pe wal­king, cros­sing ice and clim­bing mo­un­ta­in si­des. All dif­fi­cul­ti­es in­vol­ving such fe­ats are re­du­ced by 3. It wo­uld ta­ke a lot to push or sho­ve a cha­rac­ter off his fe­et if he has this Me­rit. This is very ap­prop­ri­ate for Akas­hic Brot­hers or Mas­ters of Li­fe ma­gick.

    Jack-Of-AIl-Trades: (5 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve a lar­ge po­ol of mis­cel­la­ne­o­us skills and know­led­ge ob­ta­ined thro­ugh yo­ur ex­ten­si­ve tra­vels, the jobs you've held, or just all-aro­und know-how. You auto­ma­ti­cal­ly ha­ve one dot in all Skill and Know­led­ge Di­ce Po­ols. This is an il­lu­sory le­vel, used only to si­mu­la­te a wi­de ran­ge of abi­li­ti­es. If the cha­rac­ter tra­ins or spends ex­pe­ri­en­ce in the Skill or Know­led­ge, he must pay the po­int cost for the first le­vel a "se­cond ti­me" be­fo­re ra­ising the Skill or Know­led­ge to two dots.

    Age: (1 pt Flaw)

    You be­gan yo­ur tra­ining in ma­gick eit­her very early in yo­ur li­fe or very la­te. May­be you we­re not dis­co­ve­red by an­yo­ne un­til you had al­re­ady pas­sed the usu­al age of stu­dents, but the Mas­ter, for wha­re­ver re­ason, cho­se to te­ach you an­y­way. Or per­haps so­met­hing abo­ut you in­t­ri­gu­ed yo­ur mas­ters so much that they be­gan yo­ur stu­di­es very early (see the Pro­digy Me­rit). This age dif­fe­ren­ce will ca­use pe­op­le to re­act to you dif­fe­rently. If you are ol­der than the norm, they may eit­her think that you are mo­re skil­led than you ac­tu­al­ly are (which co­uld get you in ovet yo­ur he­ad qu­ickly) or think that you're a joke. If you're yo­ung, the ol­der stu­dents may re­sent you or not ta­ke you se­ri­o­usly. ("You've got to be kid­ding. He's just a kid!") In­c­re­ase the dif­fi­culty of yo­ur So­ci­al rolls by 1 to 3 de­pen­ding on the cir­cum­s­tan­ces of yo­ur si­tu­ati­on or the in­di­vi­du­al you are con­f­ron­ting.

    These Me­rits and Flaws ate dif­fe­rent kinds of su­per­na­tu­ral be­ne­fits or det­ri­menrs. Tho­ugh ra­re, they are far mo­re com­mon among ma­ges- who al­ter re­ality by the­ir very pre­sen­ce- than among ot­her be­ings. Be­ca­use of the po­ten­ti­al of the­se par­ti­cu­lar Tra­its, the Stor­y­tel­ler may not al­low you to cho­ose from this ca­te­gory- ask be­fo­re you cho­ose one. Fur­t­her­mo­re, you sho­uld not se­lect such Tra­its un­less they firmly fit yo­ur cha­rac­ter con­cept, and you can ex­p­la­in why yo­ur cha­rac­ter pos­ses­ses them. In ge­ne­ral, we do not re­com­mend that an­yo­ne ha­ve mo­re than one or two su­per­na­tu­ral Me­rits or Flaws- they sho­uld be strictly con­t­rol­led by the Stor­y­tel­ler.

    Past Li­fe: (1-5 pt Me­rit)

    The ma­ge can re­mem­ber one or mo­re of her pre­vi­o­us in­car­na­ti­ons. This can be as sim­p­le as con­s­tant de­ja vu in pla­ces known to her past li­ves, or as com­p­lex as con­s­ci­o­us, wa­king me­mo­ri­es of be­ing anot­her per­son. In prac­ti­cal terms, this me­ans that the ma­ge, and the­re­fo­re the pla­yer, knows slightly mo­re abo­ut wha­te­ver si­tu­ati­ons the de­ad me­mo­ri­es con­ta­in. The ma­ge might know her way aro­und the past li­fe's ho­me­town, or back away from her mur­de­rer wit­ho­ut kno­wing why. This is a go­od Bac­k­g­ro­und for be­gin­ning pla­yers; the Stor­y­tel­ler can tell them that so­met­hing they are abo­ut to do is stu­pid, dan­ge­ro­us, or both, be­ca­use even if the cha­rac­ter wo­uldn't lo­gi­cal­ly know that, one of her past li­ves might. Ho­we­ver, this Bac­k­g­ro­und can­not be used to 're­mem­ber' Abi­li­ti­es; the cha­rac­ter still ne­eds the Dre­am Bac­k­g­ro­und to do that.

    The Stor­y­tel­ler can, and li­kely sho­uld, ta­ke the op­por­tu­nity to flesh out one or mo­re of the­se past sel­ves with the pla­yer. Un­less the me­mory is very de­ta­iled, the cha­rac­ter, and pro­bably the pla­yer, isn't li­kely to know ever­y­t­hing abo­ut that past. In fact, this half-and-half re­col­lec­ti­on is a rich so­ur­ce of story ide­as, par­ti­cu­larly if any of the past li­ves we­re Awa­ke­ned them­sel­ves. This is fa­irly com­mon for tho­se with "old so­uls" and po­wer­ful Ava­tars.

    • One po­int-De­ja vu me­mo­ri­es of one li­fe

    • Two po­ints- Dre­amy, va­gue me­mo­ri­es of one li­fe, with de­ja vu from se­ve­ral li­ves

    • Three po­ints- Va­gue me­mo­ri­es of se­ve­ral li­ves and one or two well-re­mem­be­red im­p­res­si­ons from one li­fe

    • Fo­ur po­ints- Se­ve­ral well-re­mem­be­red im­p­res­si­ons from many li­ves

    • Fi­ve po­ints- A cle­ar but bro­ken thre­ad of me­mo­ri­es back to the Mythic Age and be­yond…

    True Lo­ve: (1 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve dis­co­ve­red, and pos­sibly lost (at le­ast tem­po­ra­rily) a true lo­ve. No­net­he­less, this lo­ve pro­vi­des joy in a tor­rid exis­ten­ce usu­al­ly de­vo­id of such en­lig­h­te­ned emo­ti­ons. Whe­ne­ver you are suf­fe­ring, in dan­ger, or de­j­ec­ted, the tho­ught of yo­ur true lo­ve is eno­ugh to gi­ve you the strength to per­se­ve­re. In ga­me terms, this lo­ve al­lows you to suc­ce­ed auto­ma­ti­cal­ly on any Wil­lpo­wer roll, but only when you are ac­ti­vely stri­ving to pro­tect or co­me clo­ser to yo­ur true lo­ve. Al­so, the po­we­rof yo­ur lo­ve may be po­wer­ful eno­ugh to pro­tect you from ot­her su­per­na­tu­ral for­ces (Stor­y­tel­ler's dis­c­re­ti­on). Ho­we­ver, yo­ur true lo­ve may al­so be a hin­d­ran­ce and re­qu­ire aid (or even res­cue) from ti­me to ti­me. Be fo­re­war­ned: this is a most exac­ting Me­rit to play over the co­ur­se of a chro­nic­le.

    Medium: (2 pt Me­rit)

    You pos­sess the na­tu­ral af­fi­nity to sen­se and he­ar spi­rits, ghosts and sha­des. Tho­ugh you can­not see them, you fe­el the­ir pre­sen­ce and are ab­le to spe­ak with them when they are in the vi­ci­nity. It is even pos­sib­le for you to sum­mon them (thro­ugh ple­ading and ca­j­oling) to yo­ur pre­sen­ce. Spi­rits will not simply aid you or gi­ve you ad­vi­ce for free- they will al­ways want so­met­hing in re­turn. Ma­ges with both this Me­rit and the Spi­rit Sphe­re re­du­ce the dif­fi­cul­ti­es of Spi­rit ma­gick by two. Com­bi­ning the Me­di­um Me­rit with the Spi­rit Mag­net Me­rit will ma­ke yo­ur li­fe ex­ce­edingly in­te­res­ting and prob­le­ma­tic.

    Danger Sen­se: (2 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve a sixth sen­se that warns you of dan­ger. When you are in dan­ger, the Stor­y­tel­ler sho­uld ma­ke a sec­ret roll aga­inst yo­ur Per­cep­ti­on + Aler­t­ness; the dif­fi­culty de­pends on the re­mo­te­ness of the dan­ger. If the roll suc­ce­eds, the Stor­y­tel­ler tells you that you ha­ve a sen­se of fo­re­bo­ding. Mul­tip­le suc­ces­ses may re­fi­ne the fe­eling and gi­ve an in­di­ca­ti­on of di­rec­ti­on, dis­tan­ce or na­tu­re. This Me­rit is mo­re re­li­ab­le and spe­ci­fic than rank one sen­sing ef­fects; the two can be com­bi­ned to cre­ate an even mo­re po­tent war­ning system.

    Faerie Af­fi­nity: (2 pt Me­rit)

    Your pre­sen­ce do­es not frig­h­ten fa­eri­es; in­de­ed, it at­tracts them, and you are na­tu­ral­ly at­tu­ned to the­ir ways. You may even sha­re so­me small amo­unt of fa­erie blo­od. Fri­endly fey might al­low you to me­di­ta­te at the­ir cir­c­le on­ce in a whi­le (tho­ugh gods only know what ef­fect this might ha­ve in the long run…).

    Spirit Men­tor: (3 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve a ghostly com­pa­ni­on and gu­ide. This spi­rit is ab­le to em­p­loy a num­ber of mi­nor po­wers when it re­al­ly strug­gles to exert it­self (see Ha­un­ted, be­low), but for the most part, its be­ne­fit to you is thro­ugh the ad­vi­ce it can gi­ve. This ghost is the in­cor­po­re­al spi­rit of so­me­one who was on­ce li­ving, per­haps even so­me­one par­ti­cu­larly fa­mo­us or wi­se. The Stor­y­tel­ler will cre­ate the ghost cha­rac­ter, but will not re­ve­al to you its full po­wers and po­ten­ci­es. Men­tors of this sort are not true Men­tors of ma­gick, but might gi­ve spe­ci­al in­sights in­to as­pects of Sle­eper li­fe that ma­ges ha­ve mis­sed or for­got­ten. (Fur­t­her ide­as for this Me­rit can be ob­ta­ined from Wra­ith.)

    Werewolf/Vampire Com­pa­ni­on: (3 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve a fri­end and ally who just hap­pens to be a we­re­wolf or vam­pi­re. Tho­ugh you may call upon this be­ing in ti­me of ne­ed, she al­so has the right to call upon you (after all, you are fri­ends). Ne­it­her yo­ur kind nor hers ap­pre­ci­ate such a re­la­ti­on­s­hip; whi­le rna­ges de­al with the ot­her Awa­ke­ned of­ten, all si­des sha­re a he­althy dis­t­rust of each ot­her. Yo­ur fri­end will not be­co­me a wal­king Qu­in­tes­sen­ce bat­tery for gre­edy ma­ges. Such re­la­ti­on­s­hips of­ten end badly…. The Stor­y­tel­ler will cre­ate the cha­rac­ter in qu­es­ti­on, and will not re­ve­al its full po­wers and po­ten­ci­es.

    Luck: (3 pt Me­rit)

    You we­re born lucky: yo­ur Ava­tar gu­ides yo­ur steps, or may­be the De­vil lo­oks af­ter his own. Eit­her way, you can re­pe­at three fa­iled non-ma­gic­kal rolls per story. Only one re­pe­at at­tempt may be ma­de on any sin­g­le roll.

    Twin So­uls: (4 po­int Me­rit)

    Your Ava­tar has be­en frag­men­ted and has a "so­ul­ma­te" equ­al in po­wer to yo­ur own Ava­tar and si­mi­lar in Es­sen­ce, Na­tu­re and De­me­anor. This frag­ment may be pos­ses­sed by yo­ur physi­cal twin (brot­her or sis­ter, iden­ti­cal or ot­her­wi­se), a lo­ok-ali­ke, anot­her ma­ge, or a com­p­le­te stran­ger- pos­sibly even a Sle­eper. When in physi­cal con­tact with yo­ur so­ul­ma­te (or spi­ri­tu­al con­tact, for ac­ti­ons in the Um­b­ra), the two may sha­re Qu­in­tes­sen­ce and use ma­gick as one (if both are ma­ges), ta­king the hig­hest ra­tings in Are­te and Sphe­res whi­le ga­ining an ad­di­ti­onal me­asu­re of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce equ­al to the strength of eit­her in­di­vi­du­al. The parts are gre­ater than the who­le. This jo­int poo! must be rep­le­nis­hed thro­ugh me­di­ta­ti­on in a No­de, li­ke a re­gu­lar po­ol of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce. Pa­ra­dox po­ints ga­ined from jo­int spells are not split, ho­we­ver, and each twin ga­ins the sa­me amo­unt of Pa­ra­dox.

    With only one le­vel of Cor­res­pon­den­ce, you will al­ways know whe­re yo­ur so­ul­ma­te is; with one dot in Li­fe, you'll know his sta­te of he­alth; with one rank in Mind, you may sha­re tho­ughts. If one so­ul­ma­te di­es, the ot­her must ma­ke a Wil­lpo­wer roll, dif­fi­culty 8, to avo­id fol­lo­wing you due to psychic shock. She must wa­it al­so un­til her so­ul ma­te's re­in­car­na­ti­on be­fo­re the po­wer may aga­in be sha­red. So­ul­ma­tes are not just wal­king Me­rits and must be pre­sen­ted and run as cha­rac­ters, pre­fe­rably by dif­fe­rent pla­yers in a gro­up. Al­so no­te that you do not ha­ve to get along with yo­ur so­ul­ma­te… Twin so­uls are dis­tinct and se­pa­ra­te in­di­vi­du­als, not just tag-te­am po­wer­ho­uses, and Stor­y­tel­lers sho­uld fe­el free to ta­ke over one half of a pa­ir be­ing pla­yed as one mind with two bo­di­es,

    Unbondable: (4 pt Me­rit)

    You are im­mu­ne to be­ing Blo­od Bo­und. No mat­ter how much vam­pi­re blo­od you drink, you will ne­ver be Bo­und to one. This is ex­ce­edingly ra­re among mor­tals, and the Me­rit sho­uld be ca­re­ful­ly con­si­de­red by Stor­y­tel­lers be­fo­re it is al­lo­wed in­to the ga­me.

    Spark of Li­fe: (5 po­int Me­rit)

    The vi­ta­lity of Li­fe flows wit­hin you with pre­ter­na­tu­ral strength. This li­fe­for­ce is so strong, in fact, that all no­nag­gra­va­ted wo­unds he­al as if they we­re one wo­und le­vel less; if you are Inj­ured, you will he­al in three days what ot­hers he­al in a we­ek. If you are Hurt, you he­al in only one day. Bru­ises di­sap­pe­ar in an ho­ur.

    If in per­fect he­alth yo­ur­self, you may sha­re yo­ur vi­ta­lity with ot­hers thro­ugh the po­wer of yo­ur to­uch. An­yo­ne you as­sist re­co­vers at yo­ur ac­ce­le­ra­ted ra­te, but if the per­son is badly ma­uled or crip­pled, she will re­qu­ire months of con­s­tant bed­si­de nur­sing. If the pos­ses­sor of this gift is pro­fi­ci­ent in the Sphe­re of Li­fe, he may he­al ag­gra­va­ted wo­unds as if they we­re non-ag­gra­va­ted. All dif­fi­cul­ti­es with Li­fe ma­gic for the pur­po­se of he­aling, cre­ati­on, growth or po­si­ti­ve chan­ge (re­pa­iring con­ge­ni­tal de­fects, for exam­p­le) are at - 2 when the to­uch is used. The ma­ge's su­per­na­tu­ral vi­ta­lity aids the ef­fect. Ver­be­na con­si­der this me­rit to be the mark of a bom he­aler, whi­le the Sons of Et­her think it is a re­ces­si­ve, al­be­it de­si­rab­le, mu­ta­ti­on.

    On the dow­n­si­de, yo­ur blo­od is par­ti­cu­larly tasty to vam­pi­res, be­ing twi­ce as po­tent as most mor­tals, and you re­ge­ne­ra­te on top of it. Vam­pi­res ha­ve na­mes for pe­op­le li­ke you - "Cor­nu­co­pia," "Big Gulp," or simply "Mi­ne!"

    Sphere Na­tu­ral: (5 pt. Me­rit)

    You are ab­le to uti­li­ze one of the Sphe­res of ma­gick with a gre­ater­deg­ree of ease than ot­her ma­ges. In a pre­vi­o­us in­car­na­ti­on, you we­re ex­t­re­mely pro­fi­ci­ent in one of the Sphe­res - so much so that yo­ur Ava­tar has ma­na­ged to draw a small por­ti­on of that know­led­ge thro­ugh in­to this li­fe­ti­me.

    Select a Sphe­re; when spen­ding ex­pe­ri­en­ce po­ints to ga­in le­vels in that Sphe­re, you pay three-qu­ar­ter of the nor­mal cost. This Sphe­re must be dec­la­red du­ring cha­rac­ter con­cep­ti­on. Of co­ur­se, this Me­rit may only be pur­c­ha­sed on­ce.

    Guardian An­gel: (6 pt. Me­rit)

    Someone or so­met­hing wat­c­hes over you and pro­tects you from harm. You ha­ve no idea who or what it is, but you ha­ve an idea that so­me­one is lo­oking out for you. In ti­mes of gre­at ne­ed, you may be su­per­na­tu­ral­ly pro­tec­ted. Ho­we­ver, one can ne­ver co­unt upon a gu­ar­di­an an­gel , The Stor­y­tel­ler must de­ci­de why you are be­ing wat­c­hed and what is wat­c­hing you (not ne­ces­sa­rily an an­gel, des­pi­te the na­me),

    Avatar Com­pa­ni­on: (7 pt. Me­rit)

    You are in a cycle of re­in­car­n­ti­on. Ho­we­ver, every ti­me yo­ur cor­po­re­al form is re­es­tab­lis­hed, yo­ur Ava­tar has to start its path back se­ve­ral pa­ces. The world is a new pla­ce on­ce aga­in, and even the Awa­ke­ning can not bring back the Know­led­ges the Ava­tar sto­red wit­hin a pre­vi­o­us in­car­na­ti­on. The stran­ge thin­ga­bo­ut yo­ur pas­sa­ges thro­ugh the bir­th-de­ath-re­birth cycle co­mes from the fact that yo­ur Ava­tar has anot­her les­ser Ava­tar con­nec­ted to it. This frag­ment al­so en­ters the re­in­car­na­ti­on cycle, fol­lows yo­ur Ava­tar thro­ugh each in­car­na­ti­on, and of­ten re­ta­ins me­mo­ri­es of its pre­vi­o­us in­car­na­ti­on.

    This com­pa­ni­on will fight by the si­de of yo­ur Ava­tar un­til de­ath. For many com­pa­ni­ons, the­re is no re­al re­ason to do this; the Ava­tar com­pa­ni­on knows, ho­we­ver, that her pla­ce in the way of things is to fol­low alon­g­si­de yo­ur Ava­tar and do just that.

    The Story tel­ler cre­ates and con­t­rols this ot­her be­ing in wha­te­ver form it may ta­ke. Li­ke ot­her com­pa­ni­on Me­rits, this is a bac­k­g­ro­und be­ne­fit, not an op­por­tu­nity to get two cha­rac­ters for the pri­ce of one.

    True Fa­ith: (7 pt. Me­rit)

    You ha­ve a de­ep-se­ated fa­ith in and lo­ve for God, or wha­te­ver na­me you cho­ose to call the Al­mighty. You be­gin the ga­me with one po­int of Fa­ith {a Tra­it with a ran­ge of 1- 10). This Fa­ith pro­vi­des you with an in­ner strength and com­fort that con­ti­nu­es to sup­port you when all el­se bet­rays you. This Me­rit is most com­mon among mem­bers of the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­tus. Al­t­ho­ugh ot­her fac­ti­ons may pos­sess Fa­ith, Tec­h­no­man­cers of any kind may not (and Fa­ith in Ki­bo do­es not co­unt!).

    Your Fa­ith adds to Wil­lpo­wer rolls, gi­ving + 1 to the Di­ce Po­ol for each po­int in Fa­ith. It do­es not af­fect ma­gick use in any way, but may al­low for so­me ot­her form of out­si­de in­ter­ven­ti­on (see, for exam­p­le, Gu­ar­di­an An­gel or Luck). Cer­ta­in types of ma­ge may, at the Stor­y­tel­ler's dis­c­re­ti­on, re­du­ce any Pa­ra­dox ga­ined aro­und Sle­epers if tho­se Sle­epers sha­re the ma­ge's fa­ith (in ef­fect, per­for­ming mi­rac­les be­fo­re the fa­it­h­ful). The exact su­per­na­tu­ral ef­fects of Fa­ith, if any, are com­p­le­tely up to the Stor­y­tel­ler, al­t­ho­ugh it will typi­cal­ly re­pel vam­pi­res. (Ba­si­cal­ly, the ma­ge must ma­ke aFa­ith roll aga­inst a dif­fi­culty of the vam­pi­re's Wil­lpo­wer to re­pel him.) It will cer­ta­inly vary from per­son to per­son, and will al­most ne­ver be ob­vi­o­us- so­me of the most sa­intly pe­op­le ha­ve ne­ver per­for­med a mi­rac­le gre­ater than ma­na­ging to ease the suf­fe­ring an inj­ured so­ul. The na­tu­re of any mi­rac­les you do per­form will usu­al­ly be ti­ed to yo­ur own Na­tu­re, and you may ne­ver re­ali­ze that you ha­ve be­en aided by a for­ce be­yond yo­ur­self.

    An ad­di­ti­onal be­ne­fit of True Fa­ith is in­na­te co­un­ter­ma­gick. This ef­fect will not work for ma­ges (the­ori­es abo­ut the re­ason for this vary), but can add a dan­ge­ro­us wrin­k­le to fa­na­ti­cal wit­ch-hun­ters or enemy Acol­y­tes. Each po­int of True Fa­ith grants one die worth of co­un­ter­ma­gick. A ma­ge, the­re­fo­re, fa­cing a hun­ter with 5 po­ints of True Fa­ith stands a slim chan­ce of sen­ding po­wer­ful ef­fects aga­inst him.

    True Fa­ith is a ra­re at­tri­bu­te in this day and age. No­one may start the ga­me with mo­re than one Fa­ith po­int. Ad­di­ti­onal po­ints are only awar­ded at the Stor­y­tel­ler's dis­c­re­ti­on, ba­sed on ap­prop­ri­ate be­ha­vi­or and de­eds.

    Spirit Mag­net: (3-7 pt Me­rit or 2-6 pt FI­aw)

    Spirits con­g­re­ga­te at lo­ca­ti­on in the Um­b­ra that pa­ral­lels yo­ur po­si­ti­on in the Re­alm. You do not know of the­ir pre­sen­ce un­less you pos­sess the first Rank of the Spi­rit Sphe­re or ha­ve be­en aler­ted by ot­hers that do. Spi­rits are the­re be­ca­use they li­ke be­ing aro­und the Qu­in­tes­sen­ce that forms yo­ur physi­cal body's Pat­tern or yo­ur Ava­tar. The­se spi­rirs of­ten­fight amongst them­sel­ves for va­ri­o­us re­asons- the spi­rits are ene­mi­es, they all want to be aro­und the cha­rac­ter's he­art or bra­in, they want ro pro­tect the cha­rac­ter, they wanr to kill the cha­rac­ter, etc.

    Some of the­se spi­rits might re­ma­in wit­hin the Spi­rir Re­alms in are­as that cor­re­la­te with the physi­cal spa­ce that ma­kes up a ma­ge's Pat­tern in the physi­cal world. (So­me are­as in the Spi­rit Re­alms cor­re­la­te to physi­cal lo­ca­ri­ons.) The­se spi­rits af­fect the be­ha­vi­or and ap­pe­aran­ce of the cha­rac­ter. If the­re are evil spi­rits wit­hin the cha­rac­rer's "spi­rit" form, the cha­rac­rer will slowly be twis­ted in­to do­ing evil acts un­less the pro­per pro­ce­du­res are ra­ken to re­mo­ve the­se blights from the cha­rac­ter's Ava­tar. If go­od spi­rits pos­sess the "spi­rit" form, they will be li­kely to help the cha­rac­ter out in ap­prop­ri­ate si­tu­ati­ons. Al­so no­te that the­re is a dis­tin­c­ti­on bet­we­en spi­rits and wra­iths.

    • If the Spi­rit Mag­net is a Me­rit, be­nign spi­rits will flock abo­ut the Um­b­ra in area (of the Pe­num­b­ra) that cor­re­la­tes to the cha­rac­ter's physi­cal lo­ca­ti­on. They will do what they can to alert the cha­rac­ter to dan­gers wit­hin the Um­b­ra. If the cha­rac­ter is abo­ut to un­k­no­wingly per­form an act that is "evil," the spi­rirs will do the­ir besr ro alert the cha­rac­ter of that fact. If the­se spi­rits are des­t­ro­yed, ot­hers will so­on ar­ri­ve to ta­ke the­ir pla­ce,

    • If the Spi­ri­tu­al Mag­net is a Flaw, ma­lig­nant spi­rits bat­tle over the sa­me lo­ca­ti­on. They se­ek to ta­int the cha­rac­ter with evil tho­ughts and pol­lu­te the Um­b­ra abo­ut the lo­ca­ti­on. Evil spi­rits will of­ten ta­unt cha­rac­ters and try to an­noy the ma­ge at the worsr of ti­mes. Ot­her ma­ges will no­ti­ce this, and no amo­unt of ma­gicks will ke­ep the­se spi­rits away for long.

    The num­ber of fre­ebie po­ints spent or ga­ined af­fects the le­vel of spi­rit in­vol­ve­ment with the cha­rac­ter and ot­her spi­rits wit­hin the Um­b­ra. For mo­re in­for­ma­ti­on on the Um­b­ra, see Bo­ok Three of this to­me, Um­b­ra: The Vel­vet Sha­dow or We­re­wolf: The Apo­cal­y­p­se, Se­cond Edi­ti­on.

    Strangeness: (1 pt. Flaw)

    Reality is slightly stran­ger for you. On­ce per ga­me ses­si­on, the Stor­y­tel­ler will cho­ose one of yo­ur Sphe­res, pick an Ef­fect at ran­dom and roll for a bi­zar­re co­in­ci­den­tal ef­fect. If the roll suc­ce­eds, so­met­hing unu­su­al in­vol­ving the Sphe­re will hap­pen for no ap­pa­rent re­ason. For in­s­tan­ce, Mind 3 co­uld re­sult in a ma­ge get­ting a vi­sit from a te­le­pat­hic dog, pic­king up Me­xi­can ra­dio sta­ti­ons in his he­ad or he­aring stray tho­ughts from a pas­sing se­ri­al kil­ler. If the roll fa­ils, the stran­ge­ness pas­ses. If the roll bot­c­hes, Pa­ra­dox des­cends on the ma­ge, pus­hing him a lit­tle clo­ser to­wards Qu­i­et. This Flaw can al­ter the to­ne of a cam­pa­ign; the­re­fo­re, al­lo­wing a cha­rac­ter to ta­ke it sho­uld re­qu­ire the ap­pro­val of not only the Stor­y­tel­ler, but al­so the ot­her pla­yers in the gro­up.

    Throwback: (1-5 pt. Flaw)

    One or mo­re of yo­ur past li­ves still af­fects you... badly. The­ir fe­ars co­me back to ha­unt you in yo­ur dre­ams, and you ha­ve flas­h­backs of the­ir worst me­mo­ri­es (such as the­ir de­ath, or, even wor­se, a per­so­na­lity that en­c­ro­ac­hes on yo­ur own). For bad dre­ams or flas­h­backs, ta­ke one to two po­ints de­pen­ding on the se­ve­rity of the con­di­ti­on and how much it will af­fect yo­ur stu­di­es or per­for­man­ce in dan­ge­ro­us si­tu­ati­ons. For a "ro­om­ma­te in yo­ur he­ad," ta­ke three po­ints (whet­her you know he exists or not). For the pac­ka­ge de­al and a truly mi­se­rab­le exis­ten­ce, ta­ke 5 po­ints, but ex­pect the Stor­y­tel­ler to ta­ke every op­por­tu­nity to use the­se aga­inst you. This Flaw can be "wor­ked off" du­ring the co­ur­se of play, but only with dif­fi­culty.

    Echoes: (1-5 pt. Flaw)

    The be­li­efs of the una­wa­ke­ned af­fect you mo­re strongly than they do most ma­ges. De­pen­ding on whe­re you are at any gi­ven ti­me, the su­per­s­ti­ti­o­us be­li­efs of the Sle­epers aro­und you can ac­tu­al­ly be­co­me yo­ur re­aliry. The se­venty of the Ec­ho­es dif­fers from ma­ge to ma­ge- for so­me, the­re is only mi­nor in­con­ve­ni­en­ce, but for ot­hers, the si­tu­ati­on can be de­adly. In so­me ca­ses, the be­li­efs of the Sle­epers can be be­ne­fi­ci­al, but they are most of­ten har­m­ful in so­me way.

    • Very mi­nor: Whi­le you are not truly af­fec­ted by the Ec­ho­es, you ha­ve an af­fect on the na­tu­re of re­ality in the area. For exam­p­le, milk may so­ur in yo­ur pre­sen­ce, or bre­ad do­es not ri­se whi­le you are in a kir­c­hen. (1 pt)

    • Mild: Ec­ho­es of this le­vel can be an in­con­ve­ni­en­ce, so­me­ti­mes physi­cal­ly and so­me­ti­mes men­tal­ly. For exam­p­le, dogs ha­ve a ten­dency to growl when you are aro­und; you co­uld be physi­cal­ly in­ca­pab­le of en­te­ring a per­son's ho­me wit­ho­ut per­mis­si­on (anyo­ne at all can in­vi­te you in, it ne­ed not be the ow­ner of the pro­perty); hor­ses bre­ak in­to a hard swe­at when you are ne­arby. (2 pts.)

    • No­ti­ce­ab­le: The flaws are easily no­ti­ced by tho­se with a tra­ined eye. You are easily dis­t­rac­ted by re­li­gi­o­us symbols of any na­tu­re; you de­ve­lop a sud­den al­lergy to salt; yo­ur ha­ir mo­ves op­po­si­te the bre­eze. (3 pts.)

    • Dis­t­rac­ting: You ha­ve tro­ub­le con­cen­t­ra­ting when pe­op­le act a cer­ta­in way aro­und you, and pe­op­le of a su­per­s­ti­ti­o­us na­tu­re will not trust you wit­ho­ur the aid of ma­gick. You may be af­fec­ted by the "evil eye"; an­yo­ne cas­ting this ges­tu­re in yo­ur di­rec­ti­on is unaf­fec­ted by yo­ur po­wers; cer­ta­in herbs and ho­me re­me­di­es ha­ve the sa­me af­fect on you; you cast no sha­dow, or yo­ur sha­dow mo­ves of its own vo­li­ti­on. (4 pts.)

    • Po­wer­ful: You are still ab­le to al­ter re­aliry, bur you are now sus­cep­tib­le to the whims of the col­lec­ti­ve un­con­s­ci­o­us. Al­so, you now af­fect re­ality wit­ho­ut trying. The be­li­efs of the area whe­re you are cur­rently lo­ca­ted can grant you ex­t­ra po­wers and ca­use you physi­cal chan­ges. You might not sink in wa­ter, you flo­at; physi­cal­ly to­uc­hing the gro­und can ca­use you pa­in; tho­se who are "psychi­cal­ly awa­re" are thrown in­to con­vul­si­ons in yo­ur pre­sen­ce and of­ten spe­ak in ton­gu­es. (5 pts)

    Cursed: (1-5 pt Flaw)

    You ha­ve be­en cur­sed by so­me­one or so­met­hing with su­per­na­tu­ral or ma­gi­cal po­wers. This cur­se is spe­ci­fic and de­ta­iled. It can­not be dis­pel­led wit­ho­ut ex­t­re­me ef­fort, and it can be li­fe-th­re­ate­ning. So­me exam­p­les fol­low:

    • If you pass on a sec­ret that was told to you, yo­ur bet­ra­yal will la­ter harm you in so­me way. (1 pt.)

    • You stut­ter un­con­t­rol­lably when you try to des­c­ri­be what you ha­ve se­en or he­ard. (2 pt.)

    • To­ols of­ten bre­ak or mal­fun­c­ti­on when you at­tempt to use them. (3 pts.)

    • You are do­omed to ma­ke ene­mi­es of tho­se to whom you be­co­me most at­tac­hed (so wha­te­ver you do, don't get too clo­se to the ot­her cha­rac­ters!). (4 pts.)

    • Every one of yo­ur ac­com­p­lis­h­ments or ac­hi­eve­ments will even­tu­al­ly, ine­vi­tably, be­co­me so­iled and fa­il in so­me way. (5 pts.)

    Magical Pro­hi­bi­ti­on or Im­pe­ra­tive: (2-7 po­int Flaw)

    There is so­met­hing you must or must not do, and yo­ur li­fe, yo­ur luck, yo­ur ma­gic and per­haps yo­ur very so­ul de­pends on it. It may be so­met­hing that has al­ways be­en upon you, a ge­as prop­he­si­ed by dru­ids at yo­ur birth, a sac­red oath or vow you swo­re, or a pro­mi­se or bar­ga­in you ma­de, and So­me­one (with a ca­pi­tal S) wit­nes­sed it and is go­ing to hold you to it. If you di­so­bey, the con­se­qu­en­ces are di­re, if not de­adly.

    For exam­p­le, Do­mi­nic De Wo­ol­fe is for­bid­den to ever harm a wolf, the to­tem sha­pe cho­sen by his Ava­tar. A cra­zed Nep­han­di dis­co­vers this and pulls a ra­bid wolf out of his hat. Do­mi­nic then has the cho­ice of vi­ola­ting his ge­as or get­ting bit­ten by a ra­bid wolf. He cho­oses to sho­ot both the wolf and the Nep­han­di, and, as a re­sult, his Ava­tar de­serts him, le­aving him a mor­tal wit­ho­ut the abi­lity to do ma­gic.

    Characters may ha­ve se­ve­ral ma­gi­cal pro­hi­bi­ti­ons or im­pe­ra­ti­ves, and the­se may co­me in­to con­f­lict. In Cel­tic myth, Cuc­hu­la­inn had the­ge­asa to "Ne­ver re­fu­se hos­pi­ta­lity" and "Ne­ver eat dog me­at. "Three hags on­ce of­fe­red him ro­ast dog for din­ner, and Cuc­hu­la­inn di­ed so­on af­ter. Con­se­qu­ently, most ma­ges ke­ep the­ir ma­gi­cal pro­hi­bi­ti­ons and im­pe­ra­ri­ves sec­ret, lest they be used aga­inst them by enemy ma­ges. Per­ver­sely, ge­asa cur­ses and sac­red oaths are al­so marks of gre­at sta­tus among cer­ta­in Tra­di­ti­ons, es­pe­ci­al­ly the Ver­be­na and Dre­am­s­pe­akers, who ac­cord sta­tus to ma­ges with such Flaws as if each we­re ex­t­ra po­ints of Des­tiny. Simply put, unim­por­tant pe­op­le don't ha­ve ge­asa or fa­mily cur­ses.

    Storytellers sho­uld exa­mi­ne each pro­hi­bi­ti­on or im­pe­ra­ti­ve and as­sign a po­int va­lue to it, as well as to the pu­nis­h­ment for vi­ola­ting it. Easily avo­ided cir­cum­s­tan­ces, such as "Ne­ver bre­ak bre­ad with a red-ha­ired man," are worth 1 po­int, whi­le mo­re com­mon, or dif­fi­cult, things, such as "Stop and pet every cat you see," are worth 2 po­ints, and par­ti­cu­larly dras­tic or dan­ge­ro­us cir­cum­s­tan­ces, such as "Ne­ver back down from a fight," are worth 3 (or mo­re) po­ints. Con­se­qu­en­ces are worth po­ints as well. Auto­ma­ti­cal­ly bot­c­hing the next ma­j­or spell you do is worth 1 po­int, ha­ving bad luck for the rest of yo­ur li­fe is worth 2, lo­sing all yo­ur fri­ends and worldly pos­ses­si­ons is worth 3, dying is worth 4, and be­ing de­ser­ted by yo­ur Ava­tar is worth 5. Cha­rac­ters and Stor­y­tel­lers may co­me up with va­ri­ants of the­se.

    Traditionally, the­re is very lit­tle that may be do­ne abo­ut ge­asa, which are simply fa­cets of one's Des­tiny, and cur­ses are de­vi­lishly hard to lift (and the Flaw must be bo­ught off if they are). Cha­rac­ters who ac­ci­den­tal­ly vi­ola­te them may at­tempt to ato­ne for the­ir cri­me, fi­xing wha­te­ver they did wrong. A witch who has vo­wed to ne­ver eat any red me­at, and then sud­denly finds ham in her pea so­up, might be ab­le to ato­ne for the tres­pass by fas­ting and sen­ding checks to PE­TA. Ho­we­ver, if a ma­ge vi­ola­tes an oath wil­lingly and with full know­led­ge - and sur­vi­ves - he be­co­mes an oat­h­b­re­aker, one of the fo­ulesr epit­hets among the Tra­di­ti­ons. Oat­h­b­re­akers are psychi­cal­ly mar­ked. It is vir­tu­al­ly im­pos­sib­le for them to find a tu­tor or any sort of aid. So­me Tra­di­ti­ons, no­tably the Or­der of Her­mes and the Ver­be­na, kill them on sight, num­be­ring them among the Nep­han­di, who­se dark paths of po­wer are the only ones left open to them.

    Characters who wish to be­gin as oat­h­b­re­akers sho­uld ta­ke Dark Fa­te or so­me Cur­se, as well as the Flaw: Oat­h­b­re­aker, worth 4 po­ints,

    The Bard's Ton­gue: (1 po­int Flaw)

    You spe­ak the truth, un­can­nily so. Things you say tend to co­me true. This is not a fa­ci­lity for bles­sing or cur­sing, or an Ef­fect that can be ru­led by any con­s­ci­o­us con­t­rol (use Ti­me 3 in­s­te­ad). Ho­we­ver, at le­ast on­ce per story, an un­com­for­tab­le truth re­gar­ding any cur­rent si­tu­ati­on will ap­pe­ar in yo­ur he­ad and co­me out yo­ur lips. To avo­id spe­aking prop­hecy, the ow­ner of this 'gift' must ex­pend a Wil­lpo­wer po­int and ta­ke a wo­und le­vel from the stra­in of re­sis­ting (espe­ci­al­ly if he bi­tes a ho­le in his ton­gue).

    Primal Marks: (2 po­int Flaw)

    You ha­ve an Ava­tar of the Pri­mor­di­al es­sen­ce-so­me to­tem or god of le­gend. If the to­tem spi­rit is an ani­mal, you strongly re­sem­b­le what one wo­uld lo­ok li­ke in hu­man form, so much that pe­op­le who don't even know you call you "Be­ar," "Mo­ose" or "Ra­ven." If the Ava­tar is so­me well known god or he­ro, you lo­ok just li­ke pe­op­le wo­uld ex­pect him to, in­c­lu­ding any par­ti­cu­lar de­for­mi­ti­es (tho­ugh you do get ex­t­ra po­ints for tho­se). You lo­ok the part so much that an­yo­ne can gu­ess yo­ur na­tu­re at a glan­ce, and the­re is so­me dan­ger in that, es­pe­ci­al­ly if yo­ur Ava­tar has le­gen­dary ene­mi­es (and most do). Yo­ur Ava­tar will al­so re­qu­ire you to pro­tect its spe­ci­es if it is an ani­mal, or fi­nish up its un­fi­nis­hed agen­da if it is so­me god or he­ro.

    Haunted: (3 pt Flaw)

    You are ha­un­ted by a ghost that only you (and Me­di­ums) can see and he­ar. It ac­ti­vely dis­li­kes you and enj­oys ma­king yo­ur li­fe mi­se­rab­le by in­sul­ting, be­ra­ting and dis­t­rac­ting you, es­pe­ci­al­ly when you ne­ed to ke­ep yo­ur co­ol. It al­so has a num­ber of mi­nor po­wers it can use aga­inst you (once per story for each po­wer): hi­ding small obj­ects; brin­ging a "chill" over ot­hers, ma­king them very ill at ease with you; ca­using a lo­ud buz­zing in yo­ur ear or the ears of ot­hers; mo­ving a small obj­ect such as a kni­fe or pen; bre­aking a fra­gi­le item such as a bot­tle or mir­ror; trip­ping you; or ma­king eerie no­ises, such as cha­ins rat­tling. Yel­ling at the ghost can so­me­ti­mes dri­ve it away, but it will con­fu­se tho­se who are aro­und you. The Stor­y­tel­ler will li­kely per­so­nify the ghost in or­der to ma­ke things all the mo­re frus­t­ra­ting for you. (Mo­re ide­as for this Flaw can be ob­ta­ined from Wra­ith.)

    Sphere Inept:(5 pt. Flaw)

    You are unab­le to uti­li­ze the ma­gicks of one of the Sphe­res. This is not due to the fact that you ha­ve not yet be­en tra­ined in the par­ti­cu­lar Sphe­re of ma­gick. You are de­ni­ed ac­cess to this Sphe­re be­ca­use yo­ur Ava­tar has be­en 'crip­pled' in so­me way. No mat­ter how much ti­me you spend trying to cor­rect the prob­lem, you are unab­le to re­medy it. You will be fo­re­ver dis­con­nec­ted from the mystic Sphe­re se­lec­ted. Dis­co­ve­ring the ca­use of this 'inj­ury' might be­co­me a cha­rac­ter's long-term go­al. Per­haps so­me sort of 'pe­nan­ce' co­uld be fo­und to even­tu­al­ly buy this Flaw off. This ef­fect co­uld ha­ve be­en ge­ne­ra­ted by the ma­ge be­ing put thro­ugh a les­ser Gil­gul in a pre­vi­o­us in­car­na­ti­on. The Sphe­re of Inep­ti­tu­de must be dec­la­red du­ring cha­rac­ter con­cep­ti­on.

    Psychic Vam­pi­re:(5 po­int Flaw)

    The spark of Li­fe is dying wit­hin you and must be con­ti­nu­al­ly fed from out­si­de for­ces. You are a psychic vam­pi­re. Plants and in­sect li­fe wit­her or die in yo­ur pre­sen­ce as you fe­ed on the­ir ener­gi­es, and any per­son you to­uch for mo­re than an ho­ur will suf­fer one non-ag­gra­va­ted He­alth Le­vel as you sip­hon away his li­fe. Tho­se al­re­ady inj­ured (inclu­ding tho­se who­se Bru­ised He­alth Le­vel has be­en suc­ked away) will not he­al whi­le in yo­ur pre­sen­ce. You can still be in the sa­me bu­il­ding wit­ho­ut har­ming so­me­one, but sha­ring a bed is not pos­sib­le un­less you want the ot­her per­son to slowly die. If you do not fe­ed the em­p­ti­ness wit­hin yo­ur­self at le­ast on­ce a day, you will be­gin to die. The ra­te at which you ta­ke wo­unds fol­lows the prog­res­si­on for na­tu­ral he­aling in re­ver­se: you ta­ke a He­alth Le­vel af­ter one day, a se­cond in three days, a third in a we­ek, a fo­urth in a month, and, fi­nal­ly, one wo­und every three months.

    Mages with this Flaw who pos­sess the Sphe­re of Li­fe ha­ve a -2 on all dif­fi­cul­ti­es with Ef­fects de­sig­ned to da­ma­ge, stunt, des­t­roy or cor­rupt a li­ving thing when the he­aling to­uch is used. For each He­alth Le­vel do­ne in this mat­ter, ho­we­ver, a He­alth Le­vel ca­used to the ma­ge as the re­sult of li­fe-energy star­va­ti­on may he he­aled, or, if the ma­ge has not go­ne wit­ho­ut, the dying fla­me may be sa­ted for an ad­di­ti­onal ho­ur per Le­vel do­ne. Whi­le a psychic vam­pi­re is blo­ated with Li­fe ener­gi­es, he will not auto­ma­ti­cal­ly ca­use de­ath and inj­ury to tho­se aro­und him. The Ver­be­na and the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus both find this Flaw to be a mark of ex­t­re­me evil, best de­alt with by the ex­ter­mi­na­ti­on of the one pos­ses­sing it, whi­le the Nep­han­di ac­ti­vely rec­ru­it tho­se with this dark bles­sing. On the plus si­de, vam­pi­res find yo­ur blo­od com­p­le­tely lac­king in sus­te­nan­ce,

    Dark Fa­te: (5 pt Flaw)

    You are do­omed to ex­pe­ri­en­ce a most hor­rib­le de­mi­se or, wor­se, suf­fer eter­nal agony. No mat­ter what you do, so­me­day you will be out of the pic­tu­re. In the end, all yo­ur ef­forts, yo­ur strug­gles and yo­ur dre­ams will co­me to na­ught. Yo­ur fa­te is cer­ta­in, and the­re is not­hing you can do abo­ut it. Even mo­re ghastly, you ha­ve par­ti­al know­led­ge of this, for you oc­ca­si­onal­ly ha­ve vi­si­ons of yo­ur fa­te-and they are most dis­tur­bing. The ma­la­ise the­se vi­si­ons in­s­pi­re in you can only be over­co­me thro­ugh the use of Wil­lpo­wer, and the ma­la­ise will re­turn af­ter each vi­si­on. At so­me po­int in the chro­nic­le, you will in­de­ed fa­ce yo­ur fa­te, but when and how is com­p­le­tely up to the Stor­y­tel­ler. Tho­ugh you can't do an­y­t­hing abo­ut yo­ur fa­te, you can still at­tempt to re­ach so­me go­al be­fo­re it oc­curs, or at le­ast try to ma­ke su­re that yo­ur fri­ends are not des­t­ro­yed as well. This is a dif­fi­cult Flaw to ro­lep­lay; tho­ugh it may se­em as if it ta­kes away all free will, we ha­ve fo­und that, iro­ni­cal­ly, it grants fre­edom. Com­bi­ning this Flaw with the Des­tiny Bac­k­g­ro­und is very ap­prop­ri­ate- El­ric and Van­yel are clas­sic li­te­rary exam­p­les.

    MAGE TI­ES

    These Me­rits and Flaws de­al with the pla­ce, po­si­ti­on and sta­tus of a cha­rac­ter wit­hin ma­ge so­ci­ety. The­se ne­ed not only apply to Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges; the Tec­h­noc­racy and Nep­han­di (and per­haps even the Ma­ra­uders) ha­ve in­ter­nal po­li­tics with which they must con­tend,

    Boom (1-3 pt Me­rit)

    A Mas­ter owes you a fa­vor be­ca­use of so­met­hing eit­her you or yo­ur Men­tor on­ce did for him. The ex­tent of the bo­on owed to you de­pends on how many po­ints you spend. One po­int wo­uld in­di­ca­te a re­la­ti­vely mi­nor bo­on, whi­le three po­ints wo­uld in­di­ca­te that the Mas­ter pro­bably owes you his li­fe.

    Prestigious Men­tor: (1 pt Me­rit)

    Your Men­tor had or has gre­at Sta­tus among yo­ur Tra­di­ti­on, and this has ac­cor­ded you a pe­cu­li­ar ho­nor. Most tre­at you res­pec­t­ful­ly as a re­sult, whi­le so­me ha­ve only con­tempt for you, be­li­eving you to be not­hing com­pa­red to them. This pres­ti­ge co­uld gre­atly aid you when de­aling with el­ders ac­qu­a­in­ted with yo­ur Men­tor. In­de­ed, yo­ur Men­tor's con­tacts may ac­tu­al­ly ap­pro­ach you at so­me po­int of­fe­ring aid. Al­t­ho­ugh yo­ur Men­tor might no lon­ger ha­ve con­tact with you, the sim­p­le fact of yo­ur ap­pren­ti­ces­hip has mar­ked you fo­re­ver.

    Reputation: (2 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve a go­od re­pu­ta­ti­on among the ma­ges of yo­ur Tra­di­ti­on. This may be yo­ur own re­pu­ta­ti­on, or it may be de­ri­ved from yo­ur Men­tor. Add three di­ce to any Di­ce Po­ols in­vol­ving so­ci­al de­alings with ot­hers of yo­ur Chantry or Tra­di­ti­on. A cha­rac­ter with this Me­rit may not ta­ke the Flaw: No­to­ri­ety.

    Enemy: (1-5 pt Flaw)

    You ha­ve an enemy, or per­haps a gro­up of ene­mi­es. So­me­one wants to harm you. The va­lue of the Flaw de­ter­mi­nes how po­wer­ful the­se ene­mi­es are. The most po­wer­ful ene­mi­es (Mas­ters or el­der vam­pi­res) wo­uld be fi­ve po­int Flaws, whi­le so­me­one ne­arer to yo­ur own po­wer wo­uld be worth only one po­int. You must de­ci­de who yo­ur enemy is and how you ear­ned such en­mity in the first pla­ce.

    Infamous Men­tor: (1 pt Flaw)

    Your Men­tor was, and per­haps still is, dis­t­rus­ted and dis­li­ked by many of yo­ur fel­low ma­ges. As a re­sult, you are dis­t­rus­ted and dis­li­ked as well. This is a he­avy lo­ad, and one not easily shed.

    Insane Men­tor: (1 pt Flaw)

    Your Men­tor has com­p­le­tely lost his grip on con­sen­su­al re­ality, and has be­co­me lost in Qu­i­et or dan­ge­ro­usly in­sa­ne. Any wrong com­mit­ted by yo­ur Men­tor may af­fect yo­ur re­pu­ta­ti­on, and so­me of yo­ur Men­tor's dan­ge­ro­us sche­mes may so­me­how in­vol­ve you. This Flaw do­es not apply to Ma­ra­uders.

    Mentor's Re­sen­t­ment: (1 pt Flaw)

    Your Men­tor dis­li­kes you and wis­hes you ill. Gi­ven the smal­lest op­por­tu­nity, yo­ur Men­tor will se­ek to do you harm, and may even at­tack you if pro­vo­ked. Yo­ur Men­tor's fri­ends will al­so work aga­inst you. Go­od luck!

    Twisted Ap­pren­ti­ces­hip: (1 pt Flaw)

    Your Men­tor was qu­ite ma­le­vo­lent and ta­ught you all the wrong things abo­ut ma­ge so­ci­ety. Yo­ur con­cepts of Chantry po­li­tics are all wrong, and yo­ur fa­ulty be­li­efs are li­kely to get you in­to a gre­at de­al of tro­ub­le. Over ti­me, af­ter many hard les­sons, you can over­co­me this bad start (the Stor­y­tel­ler will tell you when). But un­til then, you will con­ti­nue to be­li­eve what you we­re first told, no mat­ter how ot­hers try to "trick" you in­to thin­king ot­her­wi­se.

    Diabolical Men­tor: (2 pt Flaw)

    Your Men­tor is en­ga­ged in acts that co­uld ca­use a tre­men­do­us up­ro­ar. She co­uld be wan­tonly ig­no­ting Pro­to­cols, ca­using ha­voc with vul­gar ma­gick and Pa­ra­dox, de­aling with Nep­han­di or tor­tu­ring cap­tu­red Tec­h­no­man­cers. Plenty of folks are af­ter yo­ur Men­tor's hi­de, and yo­ur skin may be tar­red with the sa­me brush.

    Notoriety: (3 pt Flaw)

    You ha­ve a bad re­pu­ta­ti­on among yo­ur pe­ers; per­haps you vi­ola­ted the Pro­to­cols on­ce too of­ten, or be­long to an un­po­pu­lar Chantry. The­re is a two di­ce pe­nalty to all di­ce rolls for so­ci­al de­alings with as­so­ci­ated ma­ges. A cha­rac­ter with this Flaw may not ta­ke the Me­rit: Re­pu­ta­ti­on.

    SLEPEER SO­CI­ETY

    These Me­rits and Flaws de­al with the in­f­lu­en­ce, po­wer and sta­ti­on of a cha­rac­ter among the Sle­epers. So­me of them cor­res­pond very clo­sely to cer­ta­in Bac­k­g­ro­und Tra­its (such as In­f­lu­en­ce and Re­so­ur­ces), whi­le ot­hers simply ela­bo­ra­te and ex­pand upon them. The Bac­k­g­ro­unds gi­ve you mo­re cre­ati­ve fre­edom, whi­le the Me­rits pro­vi­de you with exact de­ta­ils of what you pos­sess.

    Such In­f­lu­en­ce is com­mon among the up­per ranks of the Tec­h­noc­racy, but Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges and even Nep­han­di may sha­re it. Ma­ges with the­ir fin­gers em­hed­ded too de­eply in the­se pi­es may find them­sel­ves cros­sing swords with vam­pi­res, who exert a con­s­tant in­f­lu­en­ce on the li­ves of the mor­tals aro­und them,

    Black Mar­ket Ti­es: (1-5 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve spe­ci­al ti­es to the un­der­g­ro­und shop­ping net­work, ti­es that help you ac­qu­ire hard-to-find equ­ip­ment. This Me­rir adds + 1 die per po­int to yo­ur Stre­et­wi­se roll when trying, for in­s­tan­ce, to ob­ta­in black mar­ket we­aponry. Dif­fi­cul­ti­es for such rolls are left up to the Stor­y­tel­ler (typi­cal­ly 7 or hig­her). The po­int cost ref­lects how "con­nec­ted" you may be. The Stor­y­tel­ler may al­low you to use yo­ur Black Mar­ket con­nec­ti­ons du­ring the ga­me to pro­vi­de you with ne­eded or use­ful equ­ip­ment. Such con­nec­ti­ons will not simply hand you wha­te­ver you want - such things don't co­me che­ap! It is up to the Stor­y­tel­ler to de­ter­mi­ne the qu­an­tity, qu­ality and ava­ila­bi­lity of the equ­ip­ment. He may fe­el free to di­sal­low it en­ti­rely if such con­nec­ti­ons wo­uld un­ba­lan­ce the ga­me.

    • One po­int - Small items: am­mo, low-cle­aran­ce ID bad­ges, go­od sof­t­wa­re

    • Two po­ints - Ave­ra­ge items: guns, hi-tech sof­t­wa­re, spe­ci­al am­mo

    • Three po­ints - Fancy items: an­ti­que cars, ex­p­lo­si­ves, auto­ma­tic we­apons

    • Fo­ur po­ints - Hefty items: he­avy we­apons, hig­h­se­cu­rity IDs or ac­cess co­des

    • Fi­ve po­ints- "Ye­ah, right. May­be next ga­me.": hi­tech mi­li­tary we­apons, high ex­p­lo­si­ves, mi­li­tary ve­hic­les

    Judicial Ti­es: (2 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve both in­f­lu­en­ce over and con­tacts in the jus­ti­ce sysrem. You know most of the jud­ges as well as the at­tor­neys in the pro­se­cu­tor's de­par­t­ment, and can af­fect the prog­ress of va­ri­o­us ca­ses and tri­als with li­mi­ted dif­fi­culty. Tho­ugh it is dif­fi­cult to in­ter­ve­ne in a ca­se, you can in­f­lu­en­ce it in one di­rec­ti­on or anot­her. The­se ti­es can al­so ma­ke it easy to ac­qu­ire se­arch war­rants,

    Mansion: (3 pt Me­rit)

    You own a lar­ge man­si­on - a ho­me with 25 or mo­re ro­oms - as well as the sur­ro­un­ding es­ta­te. The ser­vants, if you ha­ve any, are pro­vi­ded for if you cho­ose this Me­rit, al­t­ho­ugh they can­not be used as Acol­y­tes (Alli­es) un­less you pur­c­ha­se the ap­prop­ri­ate Bac­k­g­ro­und. The man­si­on is as­su­med ro ha­ve the most cur­rent elec­t­ro­nic se­cu­rity ava­ilab­le and a fen­ce aro­und the pe­ri­me­ter, but has no ti­es to No­des or Ho­ri­zon Re­alms (see the Chantry Bac­k­g­ro­und for such a pla­ce). Whi­le the man­si­on can be in as po­or or as go­od a sha­pe as you wish, the mo­re in­ha­bi­ted it ap­pe­ars to be, the mo­re at­ten­ti­on it will gar­ner, A ghost ho­use won't at­tract IRS audits, but it may at­tract po­li­ce scru­tiny if bands of stran­ge kids hang out the­re.

    Media Ti­es: (2 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve both in­f­lu­en­ce over and con­tacts in the lo­cal me­dia. You can sup­press and cre­ate news sto­ri­es (tho­ugh not al­ways with 100 per­cent ef­fi­ci­ency; jo­ur­na­lists are an un­ruly bunch) and you ha­ve ac­cess to the fi­les and gos­sip of the staffs of new­s­pa­pers and TV sta­ti­ons. Com­mon among agents of the N.W.O. and Vir­tu­al Adepts.

    Nightclub: (2 pt Me­rit)

    You own a mo­de­ra­te-si­zed nig­h­t­c­lub, per­haps one of the hot­test nig­h­t­s­pots in the city. This club brings in eno­ugh mo­ney to sup­port you in mo­de­ra­te lu­xury ($1000 a month, but it can grow), but mo­re im­por­tant than the mo­ney is the pres­ti­ge. You may use the nig­h­t­c­lub as yo­ur Chantry, or you may simply hang out the­re. The na­me of the nig­h­t­c­lub, its style, de­sign and its re­gu­lar pat­rons are all up to you. Va­ri­ati­ons on this the­me co­uld in­c­lu­de: a res­ta­urant, the­ater, co­medy club, sports are­na or re­ta­il sto­re.

    Church Ti­es: (3 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve in­f­lu­en­ce and con­tacts in so­me lo­cal chur­c­hes, and ha­ve the me­ans to cre­ate pro­test ral­li­es, help the ne­edy or ra­ise mo­ney. The mo­re you use yo­ur ti­es, of co­ur­se, the gre­ater yo­ur risk of be­ing dis­co­ve­red. This is ap­prop­ri­ate for the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus and, per­ver­sely, the Nep­han­di.

    Corporate Ti­es: (3 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve both in­f­lu­en­ce ovet and con­tacts in the Lo­cal cor­po­ra­te com­mu­nity. You un­der­s­tand the dyna­mics of mo­ney in the city and ha­ve links with all the ma­j­or pla­yers. In ti­mes of ne­ed, you can ca­use all sorts of fi­nan­ci­al may­hem, and can ra­ise con­si­de­rab­le amo­unts of mo­ney (in the form of lo­ans) in a very short pe­ri­od of ti­me. Com­mon among Tec­h­no­man­cers, and al­most ob­li­ga­tory in the Syndi­ca­te.

    Entertainment Ti­es: (3 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve a deg­ree of fa­me and in­f­lu­en­ce in the lo­cal en­ter­ta­in­ment sce­ne (mu­sic, the­at­re, dan­ce, S.C.A., etc.). Eit­her you own or ma­na­ge a go­od ve­nue or si­te or you ha­ve so­me no­to­ri­ety among both pe­ers and fans. You can exert this in­f­lu­en­ce to fer­ret out in­for­ma­ti­on, or buy fa­vors. This is es­pe­ci­al­ly use­ful when se­ar­c­hing for Acol­y­tes or at­tem­p­ting un­sub­t­le ma­gick un­der the right cir­cum­s­tan­ces ("But he's a sta­ge ma­gi­ci­an! He's al­ways do­ing stuff li­ke that."). For 5 po­ints, this fa­me can be­co­me na­ti­on­wi­de (Is Da­vid Cop­per­fi­eld re­al­ly wor­king for the Or­der of Her­mes?).

    Police Ti­es: (3 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve both in­f­lu­en­ce over and con­tacts in the lo­cal po­li­ce de­par­t­ment. You can, with a sin­g­le pho­ne call, ca­use an APB to be is­su­ed. Ho­we­ver, the mo­re of­ten you use yo­ur ti­es with the po­li­ce de­par­t­ment, the we­aker they be­co­me, and the mo­re at­ten­ti­on you at­tract to­ward yo­ur­self. Yo­ur in­f­lu­en­ce is not so­lid (that can be ac­hi­eved only thro­ugh ga­me play), and it can let you down at ti­mes.

    Political Ti­es: (3 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve both in­f­lu­en­ce over and con­tacts among the po­li­ti­ci­ans and bu­re­a­uc­rats of the city. In ti­mes of ne­ed, you can shut off the po­wer and wa­ter to a bu­il­ding or ne­ig­h­bor­ho­od, and can un­le­ash many dif­fe­rent me­ans of ha­ras­sment aga­inst yo­ur ene­mi­es. The mo­re you use yo­ur po­li­ti­cal ti­es, the we­aker they be­co­me. To­tal con­t­rol can only be ac­hi­eved thro­ugh ga­me play. Syndi­ca­te and N.W.O. ma­ges of­ten ha­ve this Met it.

    Underworld Ti­es: (3 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve both in­f­lu­en­ce over and con­tacts in the lo­cal Ma­fia and or­ga­ni­zed stre­et gangs. This pro­vi­des you with li­mi­ted ac­cess to lar­ge num­bers of "sol­di­ers," as well as ex­ten­si­ve links to the un­der­world of cri­me. The mo­re of­ten you use yo­ur ti­es with the cri­mi­nal ele­ment, the we­aker they grow.

    Corporation CEO: (5 pt Me­rit)

    You ha­ve a par­ti­cu­lar in­f­lu­en­ce and sway over a ma­j­or cor­po­ra­ti­on and as­so­ci­ated com­pa­ni­es, just as if you we­re its chi­ef exe­cu­ti­ve of­fi­cer. In­de­ed, you might ha­ve ow­ned this com­pany be­fo­re yo­ur Awa­ke­ning, and you ha­ve re­ta­ined yo­ur con­t­rol. Thro­ugh this cor­po­ra­ti­on, you know much that ta­kes pla­ce in the cor­po­ra­te com­mu­nity and ha­ve the me­ans to wa­ge eco­no­mic war­fa­re. This Me­rit pro­vi­des you with so­me in­for­mal Al­li­es and Re­so­ur­ces, the exact ex­tent of which are de­ter­mi­ned by the Stor­y­tel­ler. This is a Com­mon Me­rit for Tec­h­noc­racy hig­her-ups.

    Ward: (3 pt Flaw)

    You are de­vo­ted to the pro­tec­ti­on of a Sle­eper. You may des­c­ri­be yo­ur ward, tho­ugh the Stor­y­tel­ler will ac­tu­al­ly cre­ate her. This cha­rac­ter may be a fri­end or re­la­ti­ve from yo­ur pre-Awa­ke­ned days, or just a go­od fri­end. Acol­y­tes do not co­unt as Wards, as they "pay the­ir own way," Wards ha­ve a ta­lent for get­ting ca­ught up in the ac­ti­on of sto­ri­es, and they're fre­qu­ent tar­gets of a cha­rac­ter's ene­mi­es.

    Hunted: (4 pt Flaw)

    Vampires and we­re­wol­ves are not the only Awa­ke­ned who ne­ed to fe­ar fa­na­ti­cal wit­ch-hun­ters (see "The Ru­le of Sha­de" in Bo­ok Three), You ha­ve so­me­how at­trac­ted the in­te­rest of so­me Sle­eper agency (per­haps con­t­rol­led by the Tec­h­noc­racy or Nep­han­di) or in­di­vi­du­al who now se­eks yo­ur des­t­ruc­ti­on. This hun­ter is be­yond re­ason and has so­me form of po­wer, in­f­lu­en­ce or aut­ho­rity that puts you at a di­sad­van­ta­ge, Yo­ut fri­ends, fa­mily and as­so­ci­ates are li­ke­wi­se en­dan­ge­red. So­oner or la­ter, this Flaw will re­sult in a con­f­ron­ta­ti­on. The re­so­lu­ti­on sho­uld not be an easy one.

    These Me­rits and Flaws de­al with yo­ur he­alth and physi­cal ma­ke­up. Li­fe 3 can rec­re­ate the­se Me­rits or fix the­se Flaws to a deg­ree, but the li­mi­ta­ti­ons of the Bet­ter Body Ef­fect apply.

    Double-Jointed: (1 pt Me­rit)

    You are unu­su­al­ly sup­ple. Re­du­ce the dif­fi­culty of any Dex­te­rity roll in­vol­ving body fle­xi­bi­lity by two. Squ­e­ezing thro­ugh a tiny spa­ce is one exam­p­le of a use for this Me­rit.

    Huge Si­ze: (4 pt Me­rit)

    You are ab­nor­mal­ly lar­ge in si­ze, pos­sibly over se­ven fe­et tall and 400 po­unds in we­ight. You the­re­fo­re ha­ve one ad­di­ti­onal He­alth Le­vel, and are ab­le to suf­fer mo­re harm be­fo­re you are in­ca­pa­ci­ta­ted. Tre­at this as an ex­t­ra He­alth Le­vel, with no pe­nal­ti­es to rolls.

    Allergic: (1-4 pt Flaw)

    You are al­ler­gic to so­me sub­s­tan­ce - pol­len, ani­mal fur, al­co­hol, cho­co­la­te, etc. For one po­int, you ger hi­ves, sne­eze or be­co­me dizzy upon pro­lon­ged con­tact with yo­ur ba­ne; for two po­ints, you swell up un­com­for­tably in the af­fec­ted area, re­du­cing all Di­ce Po­ols by one; for three po­ints, yo­ur re­ac­ti­on ac­tu­al­ly in­ca­pa­ci­ta­tes you, re­du­cing ap­prop­ri­ate Di­ce Po­ols by three. If the sub­s­tan­ce is re­al­ly com­mon in yo­ur chro­nic­le, add an ad­di­ti­onal po­int to this Flaw.

    Asthma: (1 pt Flaw)

    You ha­ve dif­fi­culty per­for­ming stre­nu­o­us tasks be­ca­use you can­not bre­at­he pro­perly. With as­t­h­ma, yo­ur lungs only pull in a frac­ri­on of the air that nor­mal lungs re­qu­ire. Any ti­me that you exert yo­ur­self, you must ma­ke a Sta­mi­na roll aga­inst dif­fi­culty of 6 or be unab­le to per­form any ac­ti­on on the next ro­und whi­le you catch yo­ur bre­ath.

    Short: (1 pt Flaw)

    You are well be­low ave­ra­ge he­ight, and ha­ve tro­ub­le se­e­ing over high obj­ects and mo­ving qu­ickly. You suf­fer a two di­ce pe­nalty to all pur­su­it rolls, and you and the Stor­y­tel­ler sho­uld ma­ke su­re yo­ur he­ight is ta­ken in­to ac­co­unt in all si­tu­ati­ons. In so­me cir­cum­s­tan­ces, this will gi­ve you a con­ce­al­ment bo­nus.

    Disfigured: (2 pt Flaw)

    A hi­de­o­us dis­fi­gu­re­ment ma­kes you ugly and easy to no­ti­ce or re­mem­ber. You the­re­fo­re ha­ve a ze­ro Ap­pe­aran­ce, Com­mon among the Nep­han­di and so­me par­ti­cu­larly bi­zar­re Tec­h­no­man­cers.

    Child: (3 pt Flaw)

    You we­re a small child at the ti­me of yo­ur Awa­ke­ning (see "Child Ma­ges" in Bo­ok Three). You may be pre­co­ci­o­us, but you're still just a kid. You ha­ve the Flaw: Short (see abo­ve), and find it dif­fi­cult to be ta­ken se­ri­o­usly by ot­hers (two di­ce pe­nalty to all re­le­vant rolls). Ad­di­ti­onal­ly, you may be su­bj­ect to pa­ren­tal con­t­rol, cur­fews and child la­bor and tru­ancy laws. Few clubs will ad­mit you, be­ca­use you are "unde­ra­ge."

    Deformity: (3 pt Flaw)

    You ha­ve so­me kind of de­for­mity - a mis­sha­pen limb, a hun­c­h­back or wha­te­ver- that af­fects yo­ur in­te­rac­ti­ons with ot­hers and may in­con­ve­ni­en­ce you physi­cal­ly. The dif­fi­cul­ti­es of all di­ce rolls re­la­ted to physi­cal ap­pe­aran­ce are ra­ised by two. Yo­ur de­for­mity will al­so ra­ise the dif­fi­culty of so­me Dex­te­rity rolls by two, de­pen­ding on the type of de­for­mity you pos­sess.

    Lame: (3 pt Flaw)

    Your legs are inj­ured or ot­her­wi­se pre­ven­ted from wor­king ef­fec­ti­vely. You suf­fer a two di­ce pe­nalty to all di­ce rolls re­la­ted to mo­ve­ment, A cha­rac­ter may not ta­ke this Flaw along with the Me­rit: Do­ub­le-Jo­in­ted.

    One Arm: (3 pf Flaw)

    You ha­ve only one arm - cho­ose which, or de­ter­mi­ne ran­domly at cha­rac­ter cre­ati­on. This co­uld be a bat­tle scar, birth de­fect or ot­her torm til inj­ury. It is as­su­med that you ti­re ac­cus­to­med to using yo­ur re­ma­ining linml, so you suf­fer no off-hand pe­nalty. Ho­we­ver, you do suf­fer a two di­ce pe­nalty to any Di­ce Po­ol whe­re two hands wo­uld not­mal­ly be ne­eded to per­form a task, A cha­rac­ter may not ta­ke this Flaw along with the Me­rit: Am­bi­dex­t­ro­us,

    Mute: (4 pt Flaw)

    Your vo­cal ap­pa­ra­tus do­es not fun­c­ti­on, and you can­not spe­ak at all. You can com­mu­ni­ca­te thro­ugh ot­her me­ans - typi­cal­ly wri­ting, Mind ma­gick or sig­ning.

    Paraplegic: (6 pt Flaw)

    You can hardly mo­ve wit­ho­ut as­sis­tan­ce, such as a pa­ir of crut­c­hes or a whe­el­c­ha­ir. Even then it can be pa­in­ful and cum­ber­so­me to do so. The Stor­y­tel­ler and you sho­uld ta­ke ca­re to ro­lep­lay this Flaw cor­rectly, no mat­ter how dif­fi­cult it ma­kes things. A cha­rac­ter may not ta­ke this Flaw along with the Me­rit: Do­ub­le-Jo­in­ted.

    Before en­lig­h­ten­ment,

    Carrying wa­ter and chop­ping wo­od.

    After en­lig­h­ten­ment,

    Carrying wa­ter and chop­ping wo­od.

    - Anon­y­mo­us Zen Pro­verb

    These Bac­k­g­ro­unds may gi­ve a chro­nic­le a bit of fla­vor. So­me mo­di­fi­ca­ti­ons to the Ta­lis­man Bac­k­g­ro­und are pro­vi­ded in Bo­ok Three. As al­ways, the su­ita­bi­lity of the­se Bac­k­g­ro­unds will de­pend on yo­ur Chro­nic­le.

    Chantry

    This bac­k­g­ro­und can work two ways: with a stra­ig­h­t­for­ward ra­ting of the pla­yer's Chantry strength, or in tan­dem with the op­ti­onal po­int-ba­sed system des­c­ri­bed in Ap­pen­dix Two of The Bo­ok of Chan­t­ri­es. No­te that the Chantry Bac­k­g­ro­und dif­fers from the No­de Bac­k­g­ro­und, which re­fers to the amo­unt of ad­di­ti­onal Qu­in­tes­sen­ce the pla­yers' ca­bal may ac­cess on its own.

    If the ra­ting equ­als the Chantry's strength, the cha­rac­ter be­longs to an exis­ting Chantry, sha­ring in its du­ti­es, po­li­tics and wars. This mem­ber­s­hip is pro­por­ti­ona­te to the cha­rac­ter's rank; a be­gin­ning ma­ge from Do­is­se­tep may ha­ve po­wer­ful fri­ends, but is still a be­gin­ning ma­ge and sits very low on the Chantry to­tem po­le. This can be a mi­xed bles­sing, as low-ran­king ma­ges from high-ca­li­ber Chan­t­ri­es tend to get stuck with grunt work, de­adly ene­mi­es and cranky su­pe­ri­ors. Stor­y­tel­lers are ad­vi­sed to play this up to co­un­ter­ba­lan­ce the be­ne­fits of Chantry mem­ber­s­hip. We­aker Chan­t­ri­es will de­mand less from the­ir mem­bers than po­wer­ful ones.

    All ca­bal mem­bers must be­long to the sa­me Chantry if this Bac­k­g­ro­und is cho­sen by mo­re than one mem­ber, un­less the ca­bal has be­en for­med spe­ci­fi­cal­ly thro­ugh an al­li­an­ce of Chan­t­ri­es (which is pos­sib­le). Pla­yer cha­rac­ters with Chantry mem­ber­s­hip can call upon a deg­ree of help, find cer­ta­in in­for­ma­ti­on, or pull a bit of we­ight with ot­her ma­ges, hut are su­bj­ect to Chantry laws (cal­led co­ve­nants) and the whims of the­ir mas­ters. This cho­ice can pro­vi­de any num­ber of story pos­si­bi­li­ti­es, but can be a pa­in as well. If the cha­rac­ters are po­oling the­ir Chantry Bac­k­g­ro­und po­ints, the cha­rac­ters may bu­ild the Chantry them­sel­ves using the cre­ati­on ru­les re­fer­red to abo­ve. For sim­p­li­city, the Stor­y­tel­ler may com­pa­re the to­tal of the ca­bal's po­ints aga­inst the tab­le be­low:

    Pitifully We­ak Chantry -· 10-20

    Weak Chantry -· 20-50

    Average Chantry -· 30-50

    Strong Chantry -· 50-70

    Powerful Chantry -· 70-100

    Overwhelmingly Po­wer­ful -· 100+

    If the cha­rac­ters bu­ild the Chantry, they run it. This as­su­res both in­de­pen­den­ce and a ne­ver-en­ding stre­am of he­adac­hes; ma­in­te­nan­ce, in­ter­nal and ex­ter­nal po­li­tics, and pos­sib­le dis­co­very by out­si­de par­ti­es. Pla­yers are re­fer­red to The Bo­ok of Chan­t­ri­es for de­ta­ils on Chantry con­s­t­ruc­ti­on, wor­kings and mem­ber­s­hip. Cha­rac­ters ne­ed not ha­ve this Bac­k­g­ro­und to be­long to a Chantry, but it sho­uld he bo­ught if that Chantry plays an im­por­tant part in the chro­nic­le.

    • 1 Cre­ati­on Po­int, or mem­ber­s­hip in a pi­ti­ful Chantry (the Nig­h­t­ma­re The­at­re)

    •• 2 Cre­ati­on Po­ints, or a small Chantry (the Se­pul­c­her)

    • • • 3 Cre­ati­on Po­ints, or a strong Chantry (the Lod­ge of the Gray Squ­ir­rel)

    • • • • 4 Cre­ati­on Po­ints, or a po­wer­ful Chantry (the Ho­use of He­le­kar)

    • • • • • 5 Cre­ati­on Po­ints, or an over­w­hel­mingly po­wer­ful Chantry (Do­is­se­tep)

    Familiar

    Mages with this Bac­k­g­ro­und ha­ve a fa­mi­li­ar, an in­tel­li­gent cre­atu­re of spi­rit-ma­de-mat­ter which is ma­gi­cal­ly bon­ded to the ma­ge. But just as the fa­mi­li­ar is bon­ded to the ma­ge, so too is the ma­ge bon­ded to the fa­mi­li­ar. The re­la­ti­on­s­hip bet­we­en a ma­ge and her fa­mi­li­ar va­ri­es wi­dely, but the re­la­ti­on­s­hip it­self is an ex­t­re­mely po­wer­ful tie (see the ru­les for fa­mi­li­ars in Bo­ok Three).

    The fa­mi­li­ars of dif­fe­rent Tra­di­ti­ons tend to vary in form. The fa­mi­li­ars of Ver­be­na are of­ten cat-cre­atu­res, whi­le the fa­mi­li­ars of the Dre­am­s­pe­akers are mo­re of­ten eag­les, hawks, ot­her birds or sna­kes. The Sons of Et­her im­bue go­lems with the spi­rits of fa­mi­li­ars, whi­le so­me Hol­low Ones ha­ve be­en known to ta­ke se­wer rats or stray dogs as fa­mi­li­ars. The Vir­tu­al Adepts, it is sa­id, even ma­ke fa­mi­li­ars out of the­ir com­pu­ters!

    Regardless of the­ir form, fa­mi­li­ars pro­vi­de the­ir ma­ges with in­for­ma­ti­on and even abi­li­ti­es be­yond tho­se the ma­ge can at­ta­in alo­ne. The exact na­tu­re of the­se po­wers va­ri­es with the fa­mi­li­ar. In re­turn, fa­mi­li­ars fe­ed on the ma­ge's Qu­in­tes­sen­ce. The strength of the fa­mi­li­ar de­ter­mi­nes both the amo­unt of po­wer and in­for­ma­ti­on it can con­fer to the ma­ge and the amo­unt of Pri­me energy it must be fed we­ekly. If it do­es not re­ce­ive suf­fi­ci­ent "fo­od," the fa­mi­li­ar may be­co­me dis­g­run­t­led and le­ave. If a fa­mi­li­ar bre­aks its bond, that ma­ge lo­ses all the be­ne­fits the fa­mi­li­ar con­fer­red. A ma­ge who­se fa­mi­li­ar di­es im­me­di­ately lo­ses an amo­unt of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce equ­al to twi­ce the po­wer le­vel of the­ir fa­mi­li­ar, as well as all the abi­li­ti­es con­fer­red by the fa­mi­li­ar.

    Mages with this Bac­k­g­ro­und are as­su­med to ha­ve al­re­ady cal­led the­ir fa­mi­li­ar or to ha­ve used the Li­fe Ef­fect: Im­bue Flesh to cre­ate one.

    • Fa­mi­li­ar can eat one po­int of Pa­ra­dox per month. Fa­mi­li­ar has ac­cess to a few pi­eces of in­for­ma­ti­on. Re­qu­ires one po­int of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce per we­ek.

    •• Fa­mi­li­ar can eat one po­int of Pa­ra­dox every ot­her we­ek and has ac­cess to no­te­worthy pi­eces of in­for­ma­ti­on. Re­qu­ires two po­ints of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce per we­ek.

    ••• Fa­mi­li­ar can eat one po­int of Pa­ra­dox per we­ek, knows a gre­at de­al abo­ut Eso­te­ric su­bj­ects and is con­si­de­red equ­iva­lent to a one dot Men­tor. Re­qu­ires three po­ints of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce per we­ek.

    •••• Fa­mi­li­ar can eat two po­ints of Pa­ra­dox per we­ek and is con­si­de­red a two dot Men­tor for study pur­po­ses. Re­qu­ires fo­ur po­ints of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce per we­ek.

    ••••• Fa­mi­li­ar can eat one po­int of Pa­ra­dox per day and has a vast we­alth of in­for­ma­ti­on, equ­iva­lent to a three dot Men­tor. Re­qu­ires fi­ve po­ints of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce per we­ek.

    Resources

    Mages can get the­ir hands on mo­ney in a va­ri­ety of ways. Many Vir­tu­al Adepts sip­hon funds from bank ac­co­unts; Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus ma­ges or Acol­y­tes may "pass the hat" and co­in­ci­den­tal­ly end up with mo­re mo­ney than one wo­uld think pos­sib­le; Hol­low Ones and Cul­tists of Ec­s­tasy of­ten use Mind ma­gick to beg; Tec­h­noc­racy re­se­arch as­so­ci­ates wran­g­le over fun­ding for the­ir spe­ci­al pro­j­ects. So­me ma­ges even co­nj­ure mo­ney "as ne­eded" by using vul­gar ma­gick. All of the­se met­hods work, and all ha­ve a com­mon draw­back: so­oner or la­ter, so­me­one won­ders whe­re the­se ma­ges get all the­ir mo­ney.

    "Someone" can ta­ke many for­ms-IRS agents, N.W.O. sno­ops, Pa­ra­dox Spi­rits, ci­ti­zens' wat­c­h­dog gro­ups or just pla­in thugs. The­se put­ti­es will, when they dis­co­ver a ma­ge's mo­ne­tary in­dis­c­re­ti­ons, se­ek to part that ma­ge from his funds by one me­ans or anot­her. Thus, whi­le ma­gic­kal­ly aug­men­ting one's in­co­me works on­ce in a whi­le, it's a go­od idea to ha­ve mo­re mun­da­ne Re­so­ur­ces at hand.

    This Tra­it des­c­ri­bes yo­ur fi­nan­ci­al re­so­ur­ces or ac­cess to such re­so­ur­ces. The­se Re­so­ur­ces are not com­p­le­tely li­qu­id as­sets, but you can of­ten sell them to ga­in mo­ney. It may ta­ke we­eks or even months to do so, de­pen­ding on how much ne­eds to be sold. It may even rep­re­sent yo­ur re­gu­lar "ha­ul" from one or mo­re of the met­hods des­c­ri­bed abo­ve.

    This Tra­it as­su­mes that the cha­rac­ter ga­ins a ba­sic al­lo­wan­ce each month ap­prop­ri­ate to the le­vel of Re­so­ur­ces. The so­ur­ce of this in­co­me must be de­ta­iled, ho­we­ver, as it co­uld easily "dry up" de­pen­ding on the cir­cum­s­tan­ces of the chro­nic­le.

    • Small sa­vings: You ha­ve an apar­t­ment and per­haps a mo­tor­c­y­c­le. If li­qu­ida­ted, you wo­uld ha­ve $1000 in cash. Al­lo­wan­ce of $500 a month.

    •• Mid­dle class: You ha­ve an apar­t­ment or con­do­mi­ni­um. If li­qu­ida­ted, you wo­uld ha­ve $8,000 in cash. Al­lo­wan­ce of $1200 a month,

    ••• Lar­ge sa­vings: You own a ho­use (or at le­ast ha­ve so­me equ­ity). If li­qu­ida­ted, you wo­uld ha­ve $50,000 in cash. Al­lo­wan­ce of $3000 a month.

    •••• Well-off: You own a lar­ge ho­use, or per­haps a di­la­pi­da­ted co­untry ma­nor. If li­qu­ida­ted, you wo­uld ha­ve $500,000 in cash. Al­lo­wan­ce of $9000 a month.

    ••••• Fan­tas­ti­cal­ly rich: You are easily a mil­li­ona­ire many ti­mes over. If li­qu­ida­ted, you wo­uld ha­ve at le­ast $5,000,000 in cash. Al­lo­wan­ce of $30,000 a month.

    Sanctum

    "Sanctum" is a ge­ne­ral term for a pla­ce whe­re a ma­ge "sets" re­ality to her pa­ra­digm, sha­ping it to her will. This Bac­k­g­ro­und pro­vi­des a sa­fe pla­ce to ex­pe­ri­ment - a spot pro­tec­ted aga­inst mun­da­ne in­t­ru­si­ons or, to a deg­ree, Pa­ra­dox. San­c­tums are not Ho­ri­zon Re­alms or Chan­t­ri­es. They exist in con­sen­su­al re­ality, al­t­ho­ugh they ha­ve so­me amo­unt of pri­vacy and pro­tec­ti­on. San­c­tums can vary from dun­ge­ons fil­led with we­ird sci­en­ce con­t­rap­ti­ons to a Ver­be­na's cot­ta­ge still ro­om, from up­town apar­t­ments fil­led with al­c­he­mi­cal and aca­de­mic re­ga­lia to out-of-the­way cha­pels fre­qu­en­ted by be­li­eving Sle­epers.

    Sanctums con­ta­in many of the bul­ki­er fo­ci that a ma­ge might use- ca­ul­d­rons, sum­mo­ning cir­c­les, al­c­hemy ge­ar or clo­ne tanks. The­se fo­ci ser­ve a du­el pur­po­se: as­sis­ting the ma­ge with her work and hel­ping her ma­in­ta­in the in­teg­rity of the San­c­tum, This stock of fo­ci can be rat­her unu­su­al- herbs, de­vi­ces, of­fe­rings, an­ces­t­ral bo­nes, hal­lu­ci­no­gens and spe­ci­al mu­si­cal in­s­t­ru­ments are a few exam­p­les.

    Setting up a San­c­tum re­qu­ires so­me prep ti­me. The ma­ge se­lects a su­itab­le pla­ce, stocks it and enacts her will upon it in so­me fas­hi­on. Dre­am­s­pe­akers may per­form a spi­rit-sum­mo­ning ri­te; Ec­s­tasy Cul­tists might sha­re a vi­si­on­qu­est; a Ver­be­na might cast pro­tec­ti­ve wards, whi­le a Ba­ti­ni might pray Al­lah's bles­sings on the pla­ce. New ma­ges can in­he­rit a San­c­tum from the­ir men­tors or sha­re a com­mu­nal cir­c­le. The de­ta­ils sho­uld be de­ci­ded by the Stor­y­tel­ler and pla­yers.

    Because the ma­ge has "set" the re­ality wit­hin a San­c­tum to co­in­ci­de with her own be­li­efs, ma­gick of­ten con­si­de­red vul­gar is con­si­de­red co­in­ci­den­tal in a ma­ge's cho­sen San­c­tum, This al­lows her to roll her stra­ight Are­te when using ma­gick, re­gar­d­less of its "vul­ga­rity." Pa­ra­dox is li­ke­wi­se fi­gu­red as if an ef­fect cast in the San­c­tum we­re co­in­ci­den­tal. San­c­tums al­so re­du­ce ma­gick dif­fi­cul­ti­es if a ma­ge ta­kes her ti­me, grant a tem­po­rary po­int of Ar­ca­ne wit­hin the San­c­tum, and ma­ke so­me hel­p­ful skills pos­sib­le.

    These ef­fects last in­de­fi­ni­tely, so long as the ma­ge pe­ri­odi­cal­ly "re-sets" the ro­om's pa­ra­digm. Tho­ugh the­se be­ne­fits apply only in­si­de the San­c­tum, fig­h­ting a ma­ge on her ho­me gro­und is a dan­ge­ro­us task.

    Many eso­te­ric sup­pli­es can be kept or grown in a San­c­tum- po­ti­ons, mi­ne­rals and me­tal­lic ores, ani­mal com­po­nents (ra­ven's claws, rab­bit pelts, gol­d­fish and whi­te mi­ce), musty to­mes, stran­ge bub­bling se­rums or wha­te­ver fits. The so­ur­ce of the­se com­po­nents can be an­y­t­hing from a clas­sic witch's gar­den to a juni­or high scho­ol sci­en­ce lab "gif­ted" by stu­dent dis­co­ve­ri­es. Ma­ges of all types shar­pen the­ir con­cen­t­ra­ti­on with pro­per "trap­pings." The­se usu­al­ly de­pend on the type of San­c­tum.

    Sanctums may only en­com­pass a ro­om or two- no mo­re than 200 squ­are fe­et or so. Dif­fe­rent Tra­di­ti­ons are at a -1 to use each ot­her's "wor­k­s­pa­ce" due to mi­nor pa­ra­digm dif­fe­ren­ces. So­me ma­ges may not use ot­hers' San­c­tums at all - a Son of Et­her won't ha­ve much use for an an­ces­t­ral bu­ri­al mo­und. San­c­tums are ra­ted by the­ir stock of sup­pli­es, the­ir ef­fect on ma­gick roll dif­fi­cul­ti­es, and the Ar­ca­ne the ow­ner ga­ins when "ho­me".

    • Ba­rely ade­qu­ate stock: no re­duc­ti­ons for dif­fi­cul­ti­es, al­t­ho­ugh the ow­ner's ma­gick is all co­in­ci­den­tal he­re. One po­int of Ar­ca­ne.

    •• Small stock; dif­fi­cul­ti­es re­du­ced by 1. Two po­ints of Ar­ca­ne,

    ••• Ave­ra­ge stock; dif­fi­cul­ti­es -2. Three po­ints of Ar­ca­ne,

    •••• Go­od stock; dif­fi­cul­ti­es -3. Fo­ur po­ints of Ar­ca­ne.

    ••••• Ex­cel­lent stock; dif­fi­cul­ti­es -4. Fi­ve po­ints of Ar­ca­ne.

    Morality is not a sim­p­le set of ru­les. It's a very com­p­lex strug­gle of con­f­lic­ting pat­terns of va­lu­es.

    - Ro­bert Pir­sig, Li­la

    Look in­to the so­ul of the ma­ge, and you will see a Path: a des­tiny and pa­ra­digm that gu­ides his steps, be­li­efs and ac­ti­ons. Vam­pi­res fol­low the dic­ta­tes of sur­vi­val in a so­ul­less exis­ten­ce be­ca­use they know they are im­mor­tal and dam­ned. A vam­pi­re eit­her fights the Be­ast wit­hin or ri­des it to des­t­ruc­ti­on. We­re­wol­ves are gal­lantly do­omed from birth to bat­tle te­eth-to-th­ro­at with an un­s­top­pab­le foe. The ma­ge is dif­fe­rent: he ma­kes his own des­tiny. Tho­ugh gu­ided by an Ava­tar, Men­tor and cir­cum­s­tan­ces, the ma­ge steps out from the mass of Sle­epers and sets out to sha­pe re­ality by for­ce of know­led­ge, hand and will.

    Each Path is a lo­nely ro­ad; we are born alo­ne and we die alo­ne. The ma­ge, with his in­sight of the Big Pic­tu­re, stands mo­re alo­ne than most of us. The­re are so many fo­es, in­si­de and out, and so many cho­ices, tem­p­ta­ti­ons and fa­ilu­res. For se­cu­rity and sur­vi­val, most ma­ges jo­in so­me sort of fel­low­s­hip- a Tra­di­ti­on or Con­ven­ti­on sha­ring so­me com­mon gro­und with the ma­ge him­self. Pre­dic­tably, the­se Paths di­sag­ree; many see wor­l­d­wi­de As­cen­si­on as the day when the­ir cho­sen gro­up wins out over the ot­hers. A few see As­cen­si­on as unity, a fu­tu­re whe­re all Paths be­co­me one. Ne­it­her op­ti­on se­ems to be ap­pro­ac­hing an­y­ti­me so­on.

    In the spi­rit world, many say, the­re is a ro­ugh cor­res­pon­den­ce to the Tri­at: the We­aver (Sta­sis), the Wyld (Dyna­mism) and the Wyrm (Entropy). Whet­her this Tri­at rep­re­sents physi­cal be­ings or me­tap­h­y­si­cal con­cepts co­uld be de­ba­ted at gre­at length. In any ca­se, the stron­gest ma­ge fac­ti­ons se­em to cor­res­pond to this Tri­at: the Tec­h­noc­racy to the We­aver, the Ma­ra­uders to the Wyld and the Nep­han­di to the Wyrm, with the Tra­di­ti­ons tre­ading a mid­dle Path bet­we­en them all. Per­haps it's this mid­dle ro­ad that le­ads to ul­ti­ma­te As­cen­si­on. The world may ne­ver know.

    Seekers of Per­fec­ti­on

    And the­re we ha­ve it; the who­le thing; cas­te, kar­ma, the whe­el of re­birth and es­ca­pe from it; an as­so­ci­ati­on of the mo­on with the cycle of de­ath and birth, and of the so­lar do­or with re­le­ase; dis­cip­les of se­cu­lar pi­ety (sac­ri­fi­ci­al ri­tes, al­m­s­gi­ving, etc.) as the me­ans, to a fa­vo­rab­le birth, as well as to a ple­asant he­avenly so­j­o­urn among the fat­hers, and, on the ot­her hand, dis­cip­li­nes of aus­te­rity prac­ti­ced in the fo­rest, as the me­ans to re­le­ase.

    - Joseph Cam­p­bell, The Masks of God: Ori­en­tal Mytho­logy

    The Dis­cip­le, Fall Bre­eze, sat in lo­tus po­si­ti­on be­fo­re the Chantry's two Pe­da­go­gu­es:

    Sitting mo­ti­on­less in me­di­ta­ti­ve pos­tu­re, Gen­t­le Mo­un­ta­in's mind loc­ked de­eply in­to in­ner tran­qu­il­lity and the flo­wing cur­rents of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce.

    Raging Eag­le's mus­cu­lar form gli­ded subtly thro­ugh an or­na­te ka­ta. His fo­cus mar­ked lo­ca­ti­ons just wit­hin re­ach of his las­hing limbs that mo­ved qu­ic­ker than the eye co­uld see.

    'What is the way to As­cen­si­on?" The qu­es­tion bub­bled up in­to Fall Bre­eze's me­di­ta­ting mind.

    "Perfection of the mind." The tho­ughts of Gen­t­le Mo­un­ta­in, hum­med in her he­ad.

    "Perfection of the body," Ra­ging Eag­le spo­ke the words in slow dis­tinct syllab­les. His body se­emed to fly with his le­aping kicks to the high ar­c­hed ro­of.

    "Is it both ways? Is it two ways at on­ce? Is that the sec­ret?" She tri­ed to cen­ter her­self, but the qu­es­ti­ons kept bub­bling up from her sub­con­s­ci­ous.

    For cen­tu­ri­es, the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od has be­en bro­ken down in­to se­ve­ral scho­ols of tho­ug­ht.the pri­mary scho­ols be­ing tho­se of the de­ve­lop­ment of the mind and the de­ve­lop­ment of the body. Per­fec­ti­on of hu­man na­tu­re is the key to both. Pe­ace of be­ing ac­hi­eved by un­der­s­tan­ding of the form and li­mi­ta­ti­ons of each. One must un­der­s­tand the self in or­der to un­der­s­tand the Cos­mic All and one's pla­ce wit­hin it.

    "There are as many ways to As­cen­si­on as the­re are pe­op­le who ha­ve As­cen­ded." Gen­t­le Mo­un­ta­in's lo­gic fit snugly in­to Fall Bre­eze's psyche. It ma­de so much truth that it hurt her bra­in.

    "In re­pe­ated in­car­na­ti­ons, we slowly work our Ava­tars for­ward to­ward As­cen­si­on." Ra­ging Eag­le's kic­king and pun­c­hing con­ti­nu­ed. Now it se­emed as tho­ugh three or fo­ur ima­ges of him dar­ted abo­ut the da­is,

    "How do I at­ta­in it?" She cur­sed and tri­ed aga­in to cle­ar all tho­ughts frmn her mind.

    "Ascension is not a pos­ses­si­on." Ra­ging Eag­le blew out twenty can­d­les ne­arly three me­ters away with a swe­eping kick.

    "But how do­es one ac­hi­eve it? Why as­pi­re to find it if we tra­vel to­ward it na­tu­ral­ly.'" Fall Bre­eze's lips slowly mo­ut­hed the words, but her tho­ughts pro­j­ec­ted from her mind with gre­ater cla­rity. She co­uld con­ta­in her ne­ed for an­s­wers no lon­ger,

    "Forge the body in­to that which it was me­ant to be. Link in­to the pri­mal for­ces of the Pat­tern and fo­cus it thro­ugh you. Be­co­me the hig­her be­ing you are." Ra­ging Eag­le le­apt in a mighty flying kick to tran­s­ver­se the length of the tra­ining hall from the da­is to the far con­fi­ning wall and kic­ked a sto­ne sta­tue twi­ce his si­ze in­to smo­ke-li­ke dust be­fo­re re­co­iling back to land with one leg still po­ised in the air.

    "It is the will of yo­ur mind," Gen­t­le Mo­un­ta­in's tho­ughts rol­led out to en­com­pass Fall Bre­eze. It felt li­ke the old man's mind was wit­hin her. Li­ke he was her. Li­ke he was ever­y­t­hing. She knew that Gen­t­le Mo­un­ta­in was right; the­re was no do­ub­ting that fact, "You must think wit­hin yo­ur mind in­to a sin­g­le po­int, thus, the hu­man mind en­com­pas­ses the Cos­mic All."

    With gre­at po­wer co­mes gre­at res­pon­si­bi­lity. Hub­ris gets in the way of many. Such in­di­vi­du­als are fu­el for the As­cen­si­on War- fod­der for the cos­mic cycle. The go­al of the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od is per­so­nal As­cen­si­on. Be pu­re in mind. Re­mem­ber that me­di­ta­ti­on and be­ing is the met­hod to ac­hi­eve en­lig­h­ten­ment and, thro­ugh en­lig­h­ten­ment, As­cen­si­on. Do not be dis­t­rac­ted by the ne­ed to bat­tle. Do not he­si­ta­te to des­t­roy tho­se who block yo­ur Way or im­pe­de the Flow.

    "Understanding the world? Fe­eling se­pa­ra­te from it? Lost to the Um­b­ra? Be­co­ming a Sle­eper to think abo­ut it ne­ver aga­in?

    "No one knows. Few of tho­se who As­cend re­turn. Tho­se that ma­na­ged to do so can ne­ver last long in the Re­alm. On­ce the form has re­ac­hed sa­tu­ra­ti­on with Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, the physi­cal Pat­tern be­gins to dis­sol­ve, It can no lon­ger find rep­re­sen­ta­ti­on in this pla­ne of exis­ten­ce, for it is too big to fit." Ra­ging Eag­le's mi­ce se­emed to be spo­ken so that the words wo­uld re­ach Fall Bre­ed's ears and hers alo­ne.

    "Such po­wer tran­s­cends the ra­ti­ona­le that ma­kes up what we sen­se."

    There is a gre­ater truth that the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od se­eks. It can not be fo­und in le­ar­ned study or ho­urs of te­ac­hing. The go­al can only be shown by exam­p­le. The in­di­vi­du­al must lo­ok de­ep wit­hin him­self and sum­mon up the strength and sight to find what it is to be. The act of trying to do con­ti­nu­al­ly gets in the way of this. The pro­cess is na­tu­ral and must oc­cur with in­ten­se con­cen­t­ra­ti­on un­til it can be na­tu­ral­ly oc­cur­ring. Li­ke a ri­ver bed di­rects the flow of wa­ter, so sho­uld the Ava­tar of the ma­ge le­arn to di­rect Pri­me.

    "Peace of mind. Ob­ta­in the Ba­lan­ce. Fe­el the in­ten­se eup­ho­ria of the Pu­re Ones rus­hing thro­ugh you. Be­ing tran­s­cends spa­ce and ti­me. It is ever­y­w­he­re and al­ways."

    "How do I ac­hi­eve this?" Her mind ra­ced. Thro­ugh her men­tal link with Gen­t­le Mo­un­ta­in, she wat­c­hed her body flo­od with the Qu­in­tes­sen­ce that ma­de up the Pat­terns that es­tab­lis­hed the Re­alm.

    "Are we not yo­ur te­ac­hers?" The words and tho­ughts pa­used. "This you must ac­hi­eve by yo­ur­self. We can only le­ad you thro­ugh the fo­ot­hil­ls.

    "You must sca­le the mo­un­ta­in alo­ne. Only thro­ugh one's own strength of be­ing can As­cen­si­on be ac­hi­eved."

    "Perfect the body in or­der for the mind to ha­ve its pro­per pla­ce. If the body is we­ak, it draws down the vi­ta­lity of the bra­in. Ru­in yo­ur bra­in, and you will ru­in yo­ur mind,"

    Fall Bre­eze felt her link to Gen­t­le Mo­un­ta­in slip­ping away.

    "The go­al is to per­fect the body, but, sin­ce this re­qu­ires tho­ught, the mind must tra­in it­self to con­cen­t­ra­te its will in­to the tig­h­test of po­ints, You must not think abo­ut it. Al­low yo­ur mind to find its own way. Be. The Ava­tar is the gu­ide."

    Fall Bre­eze gras­ped at the­ir tho­ughts and words, but her mind was still slip­ping.

    "The body must re­ma­in lim­ber. One must fo­cus to pu­rify the body of po­isons and fo­re­ign mat­ter." Fall Bre­eze adj­us­ted her pos­tu­re and le­aned in­to the te­ac­hings with her mind.

    "Pick away ex­t­ra­ne­o­us tho­ughts. Con­cen­t­ra­ti­on is the key." Ra­ging Eag­le loc­ked his body in­to a ste­ady stan­ce. His fe­et re­ma­ined still, but his form be­gan to sli­de along the brick work un­til he had tran­s­ver­sed the ro­om. With a mighty le­ap, he was back upon the da­is.

    "Open yo­ur eyes to what is cal­led "Ascen­si­on"."

    "Project yo­ur­self from the fi­res that kin­d­le de­eply wit­hin you. Fu­el it and ma­ke it grow, Bu­ilt it up un­til yo­ur Pat­tern is con­su­med."

    "Slow down." The sud­den flo­od of in­for­ma­ti­on rus­hed too ra­pidly thro­ugh Fall Bre­eze's mind.

    "Go to town and beg for so­me ri­ce."

    Who had sa­id that? Her tho­ughts frac­tu­red. She sat in the empty tem­p­le on­ce aga­in. Her eyes blin­ked in the dar­k­ness. She sho­ok her arms and stra­ig­h­te­ned her spi­ne.

    The mem­bers of Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od ha­ve al­ways le­ad mo­nas­tic li­fes­t­y­les. Me­di­ta­ti­on ta­kes pla­ce in tem­p­les, and, du­ring sta­tes of in­ten­se me­di­ati­on, Men­tors "appe­ar" to stu­dents eit­her thro­ugh use of the Sphe­re of Mind or via the Cor­res­pon­den­ce or Ti­me Sphe­re. This wit­h­d­rawn sta­te lends to the Brot­hers' pe­ace of mind. Thro­ugh the use of the Se­cond Rank of the Sphe­re of the Mind, it is easy for a Brot­her to dis­cern true te­ac­hing from fal­se.

    Slowly Fall Bre­eze left the tem­p­le. A sim­p­le bow sho­wed her res­pect as she pul­led cloth sho­es on­to cal­lu­sed fe­et. She strap­ped on her outer tra­vel­ling clot­hes with her sash and wal­ked away from the tree-li­ned mo­un­ta­in si­de.

    The small vil­la­ge at the bot­tom of the hill- that wo­uld be the pla­ce whe­re she wo­uld find ri­ce - and with ri­ce wo­uld co­me anot­her day to se­ek As­cen­si­on.

    "Attune to the All, and the All will see thro­ugh you. Be yo­ur most ef­fi­ci­ent sta­te. Le­an in­to it. What are you trying to ac­hi­eve? Be; do not do."

    The Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od ap­pli­es ba­sic prin­cip­les one at a ti­me. A gro­up of ide­as may be re­la­ted to an in­di­vi­du­al. That in­di­vi­du­al must de­ci­de which idea is most im­por­tant, fin­ding the prin­cip­le upon which her Ava­tar must fo­cus. Qu­es­ti­oning by the stu­dent is an im­por­tant part of this pro­cess; pe­op­le can not truly le­arn what they are not in­te­res­ted in. Pu­ri­fi­ca­ti­on and prac­ti­ce of the Do with strict ad­he­ren­ce to di­rec­ti­ons gi­ven by a Men­tor are ne­ces­sary to grasp com­p­le­te com­p­re­hen­si­on.

    Fall Bre­eze felt her tho­ughts drif­ting to happy ti­mes; she con­cen­t­rated in­to the Flow.

    "'Never gi­ve up the path or le­ave le­ar­ning to a one vi­ew per­s­pec­tive of exis­ten­ce. Ex­pand yo­ur sen­ses."

    "Cleanse the body. Be as you must to pu­rify. Wit­ho­ut this, you will ne­ver re­ach As­cen­si­on."

    "The body sho­uld be free of the pol­lu­tants that the be­as­t­men call the Wyrm. Be not cor­rupt. Be true to yo­ur­self. Cle­an­se yo­ur­self of that which sic­kens you. Yo­ur mind, body and spi­rit must run cle­an as the cold, cle­ar mo­un­ta­in stre­ams,"

    "Gain har­mony in yo­ur he­art. The rest will fol­low. All things fall in­to the­ir ap­prop­ri­ate pla­ce in ti­me."

    Keepers of the Fa­ith

    Harmonies un­he­ard cre­ate the har­mo­ni­es we he­ar and wa­ke the so­ul to the con­s­ci­o­us­ness of be­a­uty, sho­wing it the one es­sen­ce in anot­her kind; for the me­asu­res of our mu­sic are not ar­bit­rary, but are de­ter­mi­ned by the Prin­cip­le who­se la­bor is to do­mi­na­te mat­ter and bring pat­tern in­to be­ing.

    - Plo­ti­nus

    Brother Ran­dall Dex­ter knelt to exa­mi­ne the yo­ung wo­man. She had be­en badly be­aten, and Dex­ter co­uld de­tect a se­ve­re con­cus­sion and se­ve­ral bro­ken bo­nes. She wo­uld most li­kely die wit­ho­ut im­me­di­ate at­ten­ti­on. Dex­ter glan­ced to­ward the mo­uth of the al­ley in which the wo­man lay. Se­e­ing no one, he qu­i­etly be­gan to sing. Run­ning his hands lightly oner the wo­man's body, he he­aled the worst of her inj­uri­es. He sto­od as she slowly re­ga­ined con­s­ci­o­us­ness.

    The Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus re­ma­ins ha­un­ted by its past. Al­t­ho­ugh it has had a long his­tory of gu­iding and pro­tec­ting the Sle­epers, it is all too of­ten re­mem­be­red for its in­vol­ve­ment in the In­qu­isi­ti­on. Un­for­tu­na­tely, a few ex­t­re­me mem­bers of the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus used the In­qu­isi­ti­on to fer­ret out and pu­nish ma­ges who we­re gu­ilty of ha­ving be­li­efs or phi­lo­sop­hi­es that the­se ze­alots de­emed in­cor­rect. Ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons Li­ke to for­get that the Sle­epers we­re ul­ti­ma­tely res­pon­sib­le for the at­ro­ci­ti­es of the In­qu­isi­ti­on and pla­ce the bla­me on the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus. Whi­le the Cho­rus- li­ke all Tra­di­ti­ons- has al­ways con­ta­ined its con­tin­gent of ze­alots, the ma­j­ority of its mem­bers are mo­re con­cer­ned with the hand of mercy than with the fist of dis­cip­li­ne. The Cho­rus' det­rac­tors all too easily ig­no­re the go­od that the Cho­rus has do­ne.

    More than any ot­her Tra­di­ti­on, the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus is con­cer­ned with the well-be­ing of the Sle­epers: the go­al of the Cho­rus is to help us­her all to­ward As­cen­si­on. Whi­le many ma­ges li­ve clo­is­te­red li­ves of song-fil­led me­di­ta­ti­on, many ot­hers ser­ve the Sle­epers in a va­ri­ety of man­ners. So­me do so thro­ugh vi­gi­lan­ce aga­inst the many evils in the Ta­pestry- the Kin­d­red, the Nep­han­di, the Tec­h­noc­racy, even so­me Sle­epers. Ot­hers ser­ve the Sle­epers by ten­ding to tho­se in ne­ed: mi­nis­te­ring to in­no­cent vic­tims in war zo­nes, hel­ping the ho­me­less, jun­ki­es and ot­her lost so­uls of ur­ban blight, or me­rely tra­vel­ling from pla­ce to pla­ce and as­sis­ting Sle­epers as they can. The mis­si­ona­ri­es be­co­me im­por­tant parts of the lo­cal com­mu­nity, so­ur­ces of spi­ri­tu­al strength, so­la­ce and en­co­ura­ge­ment. They are ne­ver known as ma­ges, of co­ur­se, and are se­en in mo­re mun­da­ne terms: the doc­tor at a lo­cal cli­nic, the mis­si­onary, the pa­rish pri­est, the so­ci­al wor­ker.

    "How are you. fe­eling, Miss?" Dex­ter as­ked.

    The wo­man put her hand to her he­ad, win­cing. Her res­pon­se was li­mi­ted to a low gro­an. Dex­ter to­ok her arm and hel­ped her stand. He re­cog­ni­zed her from the stre­ets: anot­her ho­oker. They had even spo­ken on oc­ca­si­on. She was pro­bably be­aten by her john for so­me ima­gi­ned of­fen­se. May­be she was yet anot­her vic­tim of a trick tur­ned bad.

    "They're co­min' for you, brot­her," the wo­man sa­id. "They set you up. Get out­ta he­re whi­le you can." She le­aned aga­inst Dex­ter for sup­port. She lo­oked aro­und, frig­h­te­ned, con­fu­sed, and still da­zed. Slowly at first, and then mo­re strongly, Dex­ter re­ali­sed that he had be­en drawn in­to a trap with a ba­it he co­uld not ig­no­re.

    The squ­e­aling of car ti­res ca­used Dex­ter to turn qu­ickly to the mo­uth of the al­ley: an im­men­se black Ca­dil­lac bloc­ked his exit. "Men in Black?" Dex­ter tho­ught, con­fu­sed. Fo­ur men step­ped out, in­de­ed in black, but not the so­ul­less uni­forms of the Tec­h­noc­racy: in­s­tead they wo­re le­at­hers and over­co­ats and re­ac­hed for we­apons be­ne­ath the­ir co­ats. He had se­en the­se men be­fo­re too; en­for­cers for a lo­cal cri­mi­nal who­se drug and pros­ti­tu­ti­on bu­si­ness had be­en suf­fe­ring due to Dex­ter's pre­sen­ce in the com­mu­nity.

    Mages tend to ma­ke ene­mi­es easily, but few Tra­di­ti­ons ot­her than the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus gar­ner ene­mi­es me­rely by hel­ping pe­op­le. Cer­ta­inly mem­bers of the Cho­rus who fe­el cal­led to bat­tle aga­inst the myri­ad evils of the uni­ver­se are li­kely to es­tab­lish a ros­ter of ene­mi­es. Ho­we­ver, even tho­se who mi­nis­ter to hel­p­less Sle­epers are li­kely to at­tract un­due at­ten­ti­on. Whi­le inj­udi­ci­o­us use of ma­gick at­tracts the Tec­h­noc­racy, of co­ur­se, the well-in­ten­ti­oned ac­ti­vi­ti­es of so­me Cho­rus mem­bers al­so at­tracts the at­ten­ti­on of Sle­epers who pro­fit from the suf­fe­ring of ot­hers: drug pus­hers, pimps, cri­me lords and ot­hers.

    The thugs ra­ced down the al­ley, ap­pa­rently in­te­res­ted in ta­king Dex­ter ali­ve. Dex­ter con­tem­p­la­ted a fight. He co­uld best the Sle­eper thugs easily with even co­in­ci­den­tal ma­gick. But the wo­man's pre­sen­ce cre­ated an ob­vi­o­us prob­lem. She was li­kely to be ca­ught in any cros­sfi­re that en­su­ed, and he was not wil­ling to tal­ce the risk. She was ob­vi­o­usly ex­pen­dab­le eno­ugh for the thugs to be­at her and use her as ba­it. He do­ub­ted that they'd show any con­cern for her sa­fety now,

    He wit­h­d­rew a tiny sil­ver orb from a jac­ket poc­ket, then hur­led it to the gro­und. Smo­ke be­gan to po­ur out from the bro­ken shell, ob­s­cu­ring him from the fo­ur men. Grab­bing the wo­man aro­und her wa­ist, he be­gan to as­cend the wall of one of the bu­il­dings en­c­lo­sing the al­ley. He ho­ped the wo­man was still too ad­dled to fully re­ali­se what was hap­pe­ning as they sca­led the bu­il­ding mo­re qu­ickly than co­uld be pos­sib­le. Dex­ter felt the cold mist of Pa­ra­dox set­tle in­to him as he de­fi­ed re­ality. He ha­ted it when that hap­pe­ned, but he had no cho­ice at the mo­ment.

    The Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus has pro­du­ced its sha­re of mi­li­tant cru­sa­ders, and few Cho­rus mem­bers are to­tal­ly wit­ho­ut so­me com­bat tra­ining. Mar­t­y­r­dom is not un­com­mon as a tra­it in the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus, but tho­se who fall in bat­tle tend to ta­ke the­ir ene­mi­es with them. Whi­le cer­ta­in ze­alots may be wil­ling to sac­ri­fi­ce Sle­epers for the gre­ater go­od, most Cho­rus mem­bers will not en­dan­ger the in­no­cents they are sworn to gu­ide and pro­tect. Co­wards are ra­re among the Cho­rus, but the Tra­di­ti­on avo­ids con­f­lict whe­ne­ver pos­sib­le. Li­ke­wi­se, even the mo­re pe­ace­ful mem­bers of the Cho­rus can be bra­ve fig­h­ters when ne­ces­sary.

    Dexter ga­ined the ro­of with his squ­ir­ming pac­ka­ge. He had only a mat­ter of mi­nu­tes be­fo­re the thugs be­gan se­ar­c­hing the area. This was no ti­me to be gen­t­le; he deftly pres­sed on the wo­man's ca­ro­tid, and she fed in­to limp un­con­s­ci­o­us­ness. He shif­ted his per­cep­ti­ons to a ne­arby shel­ter for bat­te­red wo­men, a num­ber of blocks away. Se­e­ing that the al­ley be­hind it was empty, he step­ped in­to it.

    He ban­ged on the re­ar do­or of the shel­ter. It ope­ned par­ti­al­ly, and a wo­man's fa­mi­li­ar fa­ce pe­ered out thro­ugh the cha­ined ope­ning.

    "Dex! What the hell hap­pe­ned?"

    "No ti­me now, San­d­ra," Dex­ter his­sed.

    "Open up!" The do­or clo­sed mo­men­ta­rily as the cha­ins we­re un­do­ne, and then it re­ope­ned. San­d­ra ges­tu­red Dex­ter and his char­ge in, and clo­sed the thick do­or be­hind them, loc­king it. Dex­ter ca­re­ful­ly de­po­si­ted the wo­man on one of the many cots that fil­led the small ro­om.

    " How'd you find this one?" his fri­end as­ked, exa­mi­ning the wo­man. Dex­ter me­rely shrug­ged. The less sa­id, the bet­ter. San­d­ra had ac­cep­ted that a lon­g­ti­me ago. She had le­ar­ned to lo­ve her fri­end for his sel­f­les­sness and al­low him his many enig­mas. He'd an­s­wer when he was re­ady.

    Members of the Cho­rus tend to gat­her a flock whe­re­ver they go. The ma­ge and her flock ha­ve a re­cip­ro­cal re­la­ti­on­s­hip; whi­le the flock usu­al­ly de­pends upon the ma­ge for gu­idan­ce and so­la­ce, the ma­ge must so­me­ti­mes call upon her flock for as­sis­tan­ce. Most of the ma­ge's flock will not know of the ma­ge's true na­tu­re; they just see her as a dyna­mic, de­di­ca­ted in­di­vi­du­al. So­me­ti­mes, if the ma­ge has le­ar­ned to trust so­me­one eno­ugh, she will sha­re her sec­ret.

    They we­re in a pri­va­te of­fi­ce on the se­cond flo­or of the shel­ter. "Will you be all right?" San­d­ra as­ked. Dex­ter was glan­cing down at the stre­et thro­ugh the blinds. He shrug­ged. The­re was no way the thugs wo­uld gu­ess he was he­re, but he didn't want to en­dan­ger an­yo­ne el­se, just in ca­se,

    "Will SHE be all right?" he res­pon­ded.

    "The usu­al," San­d­ra shrug­ged. "We'll cle­an her up, gi­ve her a pla­ce to stay, and ho­pe she ke­eps off the stre­ets. Chan­ces are, in a few months, she'll be tur­ning tricks aga­in." San­d­ra lo­oked clo­sely at her fri­end and sa­id, "You ne­ver can tell, of co­ur­se. May­be you just chan­ged her li­fe, the way you chan­ged mi­ne." San­d­ra smi­led warmly, lo­oking not­hing li­ke the ho­me­less drug ad­dict that Dex had bef­ri­en­ded fi­ve ye­ars go,

    Many mem­bers of the Cho­rus fe­el that even one li­fe sa­ved, one spi­rit nur­tu­red, is worth any amo­unt of per­so­nal risk and self-sac­ri­fi­ce. So­me Cho­rus mem­bers may ta­ke vows of ab­s­ti­nen­ce and po­verty, but this is hardly a ru­le. Ot­her Cho­rus mem­bers will still en­ga­ge in se­xu­al ac­ti­vity and ma­in­ta­in an in­te­rest in fi­nan­ci­al mat­ters. Even then, it is of­ten with an un­der­s­tan­ding of the ep­he­me­ral na­tu­re of mo­ney and se­xu­al sa­tis­fac­ti­on. Even tho­se that re­ma­in unat­tac­hed to any one per­son are ne­ver lo­nely: they are sur­ro­un­ded by a ca­ring and lo­ving flock, as well as the me­mo­ri­es of the­ir per­so­nal suc­ces­ses and the fi­re of the­ir com­mit­ment.

    Dexter sat alo­ne in the of­fi­ce, his fe­et on a cof­fee tab­le. He le­aned fits he­ad back and clo­sed his eyes, "What to do?" he won­de­red. He had be­en he­re less than a ye­ar, and he'd al­re­ady se­en a chan­ge in the com­mu­nity, Pe­op­le's fa­ces se­emed brig­h­te­ned by ho­pe, and the stre­ets se­emed a lit­tle less grim than be­fo­re. Un­for­tu­na­tely, he was star­ting to at­tract ene­mi­es. He knew from ex­pe­ri­en­ce that ene­mi­es co­uld be ig­no­red or avo­ided for only so long. It was ti­me for ac­ti­on.

    He fon­d­led the cross at his neck, fin­ge­ring the small bla­zing sun in the cen­ter of the cross. Si­lently, he is­su­ed a sup­pli­ca­ti­on to the One. Sho­uld he ta­ke the war back to­his ene­mi­es? He co­uld easily de­fe­at one cri­me­lord, but did he want to de­al with an army of bra­in­less thugs? Was it worth the risk af pos­sibly aler­ting the Tec­h­noc­racy? Sho­uld he just le­ave, let his flock lan­gu­ish and drift back away from As­cen­si­on af­ter he had bro­ught them so far?

    Many com­monly in­ter­p­ret the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus as a re­li­gi­on of its own. Rat­her, it is a sha­red me­ta-be­li­ef: all re­li­gi­ons are ma­ni­fes­ta­ti­ons of the One, and as all cre­ati­on ca­me from the One, all cre­ati­on ul­ti­ma­tely be­longs in the One aga­in. Whi­le the Cho­rus has be­en pre­do­mi­nantly Chtis­ti­an for cen­tu­ri­es, it con­ta­ins mem­bers from a num­ber of re­li­gi­o­us tra­di­ti­ons. Li­ke­wi­se, a mul­ti­tu­de of fac­ti­ons exist wit­hin the Cho­rus; a long-stan­ding po­int of de­ba­te is whet­her the One sho­uld be per­ce­ived as ma­le, fe­ma­le, ne­it­her or both. Re­gar­d­less, most wit­hin the Cho­rus be­li­eve that all gods are masks of the One, and all they can re­al­ly do is dis­cuss the masks. The One de­fi­es true com­p­re­hen­si­on.

    Dexter sig­hed. He had ga­ined too much just to le­ave now and aban­don his pe­op­le. He knew his li­fe wo­uld not be easy if he to­ok this path. He co­uld ha­ve cho­sen a li­fe of con­tem­p­la­ti­ve so­li­tude in a re­mo­te Chantry, but this was his Des­tiny. The Nep­han­di-sla­yers think the­ir job is to­ugh…

    Revelers in Dre­am

    The Gra­te­ful De­ad are the best an­s­wer to­day to the atom bomb.

    -Joseph Cam­p­bell, "Ri­tu­al and Rap­tu­re"

    Jank stro­de thro­ugh the dark, dank tun­nel, past sec­tor num­bers sten­ci­led on the pe­eling pa­int of the cin­der­b­lock walk. He step­ped off the musty con­c­re­te flo­or of the sta­di­um hal­lway and emer­ged in pa­ra­di­se. The bright sun­light flas­hed an ex­p­lo­si­on of bright, pris­ma­tic co­lors be­fo­re his eyes, as lit­he, sup­ple, dan­cing bo­di­es in la­vish tie-dyed clot­hes swir­led and eb­bed be­fo­re him. Fi­ne tra­ce­ri­es of smo­ke flo­ated de­li­ca­tely on the air. Gra­ce­ful pat­c­ho­uli and musky hemp. And the mu­sic- the sac­red mu­sic en­fol­ded him li­ke a bles­sed womb and drew him for­ward in­to the gat­he­ring.

    The eso­te­ric pur­po­se of the Cult of Ec­s­tasy is sec­retly en­co­ded in­to the­ir na­me. The word "ecstasy" co­mes from the Gre­ek phra­se "ex sta­sis," or "out of sta­sis." This Tra­di­ti­on was fo­un­ded to li­te­ral­ly bre­ak out of Sta­tic Re­ality thro­ugh ex­p­lo­ra­ti­on of all as­pects of hu­man po­ten­ti­al. The­ir mis­si­on is sim­p­le, but easily mi­sun­der­s­to­od: if Sta­tic Re­ality is en­for­ced by res­t­ric­ting pos­si­bi­li­ti­es, it is the duty of all ex-sta­sis ma­ges to ex­p­lo­re ot­her paths. They con­f­ront, he­ad-on, what the rest of the world fe­ars- the sha­dows of the in­ner lan­d­s­ca­pe.

    Many ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons see the Cult as an ir­res­pon­sib­le mob of self-ob­ses­sed sen­su­alists who re­qu­ire fa­vo­red "vi­ces" to per­form ma­gick. In truth, they are a for­ce of fre­edom and con­s­ci­o­us­ness in a world of en­s­la­ved Sle­epers, li­be­ra­tors who uti­li­ze the po­wer­ful and for­bid­den to­ols of il­lu­mi­na­ti­on. The Cult of Ec­s­tasy con­ti­nu­al­ly and un­he­si­ta­tingly of­fers op­por­tu­ni­ti­es for bre­ak­t­h­ro­ugh to a sus­pi­ci­o­us and un­g­ra­te­ful world, gle­eful­ly cas­ting the­ir ma­gic­kal pe­arls be­fo­re swi­ne. They li­ve true to the cre­do that they ne­it­her for­ce nor pre­vent the Awa­ke­ning in ot­hers. In the­ir he­re­ti­cal de­vi­ati­on from the po­li­ti­cal, so­ci­al and per­so­nal or­t­ho­do­xi­es of the­ir ti­mes (ortho­do­xi­es that con­s­ti­tu­te the true "Po­li­ti­cal Cor­rec­t­ness"), the Cult of Ec­s­tasy has con­t­ri­bu­ted mo­re to the col­lec­ti­ve Awa­ke­ning of man­kind than any ot­her Tra­di­ti­on.

    In the midst of the un­du­la­ting pa­ra­di­se, Jank sen­sed a ri­gid in­ter­rup­tion. So­me­one was not ha­ving fun. He knew who they we­re be­fo­re he saw them - two men in ill-fit­ting poly-blend su­its that we­re se­ve­ral ye­ars too old and se­ve­ral in­c­hes too tight. The­ir dis­ten­ded po­wer bel­li­es prot­ru­ded over belts cut with ex­t­ra not­c­hes, and the­ir arms we­re cros­sed and fol­ded over the­ir chests, as if to pro­tect the­ir he­arts from the out­po­uring of lo­ve from the swa­ying crowd. The­ir mo­uths frow­ned, and the­ir eyes smol­de­red. They we­re the sel­fap­po­in­ted yet un­wit­ting gu­ar­di­ans of sta­tic re­ality, fo­ot sol­di­ers in the tren­c­hes of the re­ality wars- in a word, cops. Jank no­ted with sly amu­se­ment his mo­men­tary pity for the men, who scow­led when they met his ga­ze. Af­ter all, they we­re vil­la­ge -bur­ning grunts in the­ir own per­so­nal Vi­et­nam aga­inst sub­s­tan­ce abu­se. They had put the­ir bo­di­es on the li­ne in a war they co­uld ne­ver win but co­uld not stop fig­h­ting. He in­dul­ged the mo­ment of pity, mar­ked the­ir lo­ca­ti­on, and mo­ved on in­to the warm, pul­sing, in­vi­ting crowd.

    The Cult of Ec­s­tasy has con­fo­un­ded ma­ges of the Tec­h­noc­racy ti­me and ti­me aga­in thro­ug­ho­ut the­ir co­lor­ful his­tory. Li­ke tric­k­s­ters, they shat­ter se­emingly mo­no­lit­hic pa­ra­digms from wit­hin. Tho­ugh they ha­ve lost many bat­tles to the Tec­h­noc­ra­tic jug­ger­na­ut, they ha­ve al­so in­fil­t­ra­ted the in­s­ti­tu­ti­ons that are the cor­ner­s­to­nes of sta­tic re­ality, then chip­ped away from the in­si­de. When holy war­ri­ors for­ced swor­d­po­int con­ver­si­ons from the pa­gan wor­s­hip­pers of Pan and Di­on­y­sus, the Cult of Ec­s­tasy simply went un­der­g­ro­und wit­hin the. Church. They co­vertly en­co­ura­ged sac­ra­men­tal de­ba­uc­hery, ec­s­ta­tic wor­s­hi­pand the gre­atest he­resy-God­dess wor­s­hip- thro­ugh the es­tab­lis­h­ment of the Cult of the Vir­gin. Tho­ugh the Church ma­na­ged to de-se­xu­ali­ze the­ir pri­ests, twis­ting re­ma­ining se­xu­al in­te­rests in­to per­ver­si­ons, the fla­mes of Cult of Ec­s­tasy fre­edom con­ti­nue to bum brightly in glo­bal li­be­ra­ti­on the­ology.

    Jank mo­ved thro­ugh the de­li­ri­o­us crowd, drawn by a warm and wel­co­ming pre­sen­ce. His body rip­pled aga­inst the­irs, and he lost him­self in the sen­sa­ti­on - brus­hing he­re, to­uc­hing the­re, and fully em­b­ra­cing anot­her be­fo­re mo­ving on to­ward the wel­co­ming pre­sen­ce. He saw her ha­ir first - a gen­t­le gol­den storm that ap­pe­ared to mo­ve in slow mo­ri­on, blur­ring in­to her sim­p­le whi­te gown. She mo­ved with aban­don and gra­ce, a vi­si­on of lush sen­su­ality and ex­qu­isite po­wer in the warm af­ter­no­on sun­light. Jank's eyes un­fo­cu­sed as his ot­her sen­ses rus­hed up to bring him far mo­re po­tent and ur­gent in­for­ma­ti­on. He smel­led her, and knew that her na­me was Ma­ura, and that she was freshly Awa­ke­ned. They smi­led to­get­her, and co­iling, ser­pen­ti­ne energy ro­se the full length of Jank's spi­ne. They dan­ced ba­re­fo­ot on the grass; cir­c­ling clo­ser and clo­ser to­get­her. They grew ob­li­vi­o­us to the fresh, ten­der bo­di­es that dan­ced ne­ar them and so­me­ti­mes ca­res­sed them as they pas­sed. Jank drew up the la­ce hem of Ma­ura's dress and pul­led her to­ward him. They mo­ved as one to the mu­sic that was now in­dis­tin­gu­is­hab­le from the­ir en­t­wi­ned bo­di­es. For a mo­ment, Jank's ra­ti­onal mind re­tur­ned to him, and he no­ted with in­te­rest that he was sud­denly we­aring a con­dom. "What a co­in­ci­den­ce," his ob­ser­ver mind no­ted, "that even in my fu­gue sta­te, I de­ci­ded to not rely on co­in­ci­den­ce alo­ne. Re­mar­kab­le." And then he went un­der aga­in, over­ta­ken by the rap­tu­re.

    Virtually all mem­bers of the Cult of Ec­s­tasy ac­cess the con­s­ci­o­us­ness-al­te­ring por­ti­ons of the­ir minds and exalt the­ir spi­rits thro­ugh ex­p­lo­ra­ti­ons of physi­ca­lity. Thro­ugh dan­ce, fo­od, the­at­re and se­xu­al de­light, they ce­leb­ra­te the uni­on of the­ir sac­red physi­cal be­ings with the sac­red tran­s­cen­den­ce of eter­nity. The Tec­h­noc­racy has ga­ined gre­at po­wer and rob­bed man­kind of one of the gre­atest so­ur­ces of po­ten­ti­al for Awa­ke­ning by de­mo­ni­zing se­xu­ality. The Cult of Ec­s­tasy ser­ves as a re­min­der to a frig­h­te­ned, se­xu­al­ly-rep­res­sed po­pu­la­ce that free-flo­wing se­xu­al energy is al­ways a he­aling for­ce, and that se­xu­al energy is only ma­de da­ma­ging by bin­ding it up, cut­ting it off or brin­ging it whe­re it is not wel­co­me.

    Convention ma­ges ha­ve pro­pa­gan­di­zed that the Cult of Ec­s­tasy san­c­ti­ons all forms of sex. Much to mo­re "con­ven­ti­onal" ma­ges' dis­gust, this in­c­lu­des "de­vi­ant" prac­ti­ces as well - do­mi­na­ti­on, body al­te­ra­ti­on, S&M and ot­hers. Many Cul­tists ac­k­now­led­ge the thin li­ne bet­we­en ple­asu­re and pa­in and see a tran­s­cen­den­tal Path thro­ugh both. True to the­ir cre­do, ho­we­ver, the Cult of Ec­s­tasy docs not san­c­ti­on for­ced sex. Ra­pe, mo­les­ta­ti­on and pe­de­rasty are even mo­re rep­re­hen­sib­le to Cul­tists than to the po­pu­la­ce at lar­ge; the­se per­ver­si­ons vi­ola­te the san­c­tity of a per­son's in­ner self and de­fi­le what sho­uld be di­vi­ne. Sadly, too many out­si­de the Cult see all forms of sex as dirty and ever­y­t­hing as per­ver­si­on.

    The Cult's phe­no­me­nal suc­cess in un­le­as­hing the se­xu­al re­vo­lu­ti­on of the 60's and 70's be­gan to trig­ger mass Awa­ke­nings ac­ross the glo­be, ca­using the Tec­h­noc­racy to re­ta­li­ate with dras­tic ef­forts to ma­ke sex fe­ar­so­me and de­adly. The Cult of Ec­s­tasy per­se­ve­res, ho­we­ver, and ac­ti­vely se­eks a so­lu­ti­on to the AIDS cri­sis that stands bet­we­en man­kind and mass Awa­ke­ning.

    Jank and Ma­ura fi­nis­hed the­ir re­ve­rie, and sank pe­ace­ful­ly to the grass of the sta­di­um. They lay in si­len­ce, bre­at­hing de­eply in the twi­light. Gen­t­le clo­uds of smo­ke flo­ated past them, the warm, fa­mi­li­ar smell awa­ke­ning de­li­ca­te vi­si­ons that twin­k­led at the ed­ge of the­ir per­cep­ti­ons. Jank smi­led at the po­wer of the con­tact high; with his Awa­ke­ned sen­si­ti­vi­ties and Ti­me mas­tery, the­re was no ne­ed to ac­tu­al­ly smo­ke do­pe an­y­mo­re. He lo­oked over at Ma­ura and pe­ered de­eply in­to the yo­ung ma­ge's spi­rit. The warm, wet po­wer in her sur­ged im­pa­ti­ently, li­ke a yo­ung dra­gon. The pa­ir nes­t­led in each ot­her's arms, and felt the world bre­at­he with them as the stars be­gan to bre­ak thro­ugh the dar­ke­ning sky.

    The most po­wer­ful lie told to dis­c­re­dit the Cult of Ec­s­tasy is that they use and ad­vo­ca­te the use of all drugs. The truth is mo­re ela­bo­ra­te, and do­es not re­du­ce well to sim­p­le­min­ded slo­ga­ne­ering. The Cult of Ec­s­tasy ad­vo­ca­tes per­so­nal res­pon­si­bi­lity in con­s­ci­o­us­ness-al­te­ra­ti­on, re­j­ec­ting the no­ti­on that an­yo­ne sho­uld be al­lo­wed to res­t­rict the cho­ices of ot­hers. They do not, ho­we­ver, fe­el that all drugs are cre­ated equ­al.

    Most mem­bers of the Cult res­pect psyche­de­lics - re­ve­red by man­kind for cen­tu­ri­es as sac­red ma­te­ri­als - but re­j­ect tran­qu­ili­zers, sti­mu­lants and pres­c­rip­ti­on drugs that mask il­lness wit­ho­ut cu­ring it. They re­fer to psyche­de­lics as "ope­ning up" or "run­ning to­ward" drugs, be­li­eving that judi­ci­o­us use of psyche­de­lics can im­pel hu­mans to­ward gre­at re­ve­la­ti­on, in­sight and joy. Al­co­hol, ni­co­ti­ne, bar­bi­tu­ra­tes and co­ca­ine, ho­we­ver, are cal­led "clo­sing down" or "run­ning away" drugs, be­ca­use they numb the va­lu­ab­le pa­in and joy that are such es­sen­ti­al parts of li­fe.

    The Cult of Ec­s­tasy is, ho­we­ver, di­vi­ded over the use of synthe­tic psyche­de­lics li­ke LSD. So­me em­b­ra­ce them as mo­re po­tent ver­si­ons of na­tu­ral hal­lu­ci­no­gens, but ot­hers fe­el that only "na­tu­ral" drugs re­al­ly cre­ate truly na­tu­ral bre­ak­t­h­ro­ughs. Most Ec­s­ta­tic ma­ges re­ali­ze that the po­wer of the mind un­le­as­hed re­qu­ires a ste­ady hand, and frown on ca­re­less trip­ping.

    Because both na­tu­ral and un­na­tu­ral psycha­de­lics ha­ve such gre­at po­wer, the for­ces of or­der ha­ve ma­ni­pu­la­ted po­li­ti­cal and mi­li­tary in­s­ti­tu­ti­ons to sup­press the "run­ning to­ward" drugs, even in tra­di­ti­onal re­li­gi­o­us set­tings, whi­le flo­oding the mar­ket with "run­ning away" drugs, even re­sor­ting to using the Tec­h­no­man­cer-in­f­lu­en­ced CIA to im­port vast qu­an­ti­ti­es co­ca­ine in­to the U.S. Many Cul­tists fe­ar that the Pro­ge­ni­tors ha­ve a fin­ger in the drug pie, and that they use the­ir own che­mi­cal com­po­unds to fur­t­her en­s­la­ve the Sle­epers.

    Jank flo­ated blis­sful­ly thro­ugh the de­ep po­ols of lon­ging, dra­wing po­wer and so­ot­hing old wo­unds. Gra­du­al­ly, a long, low vib­ra­tion hum­med thro­ugh him. He res­pon­ded to it on a cel­lu­lar le­vel, and mo­ved to­ward it li­ke a child to a mot­her's bre­ast. The vib­ra­ti­on bro­ught him back up to­ward the sur­fa­ce, and he emer­ged in the sta­di­um aga­in. The De­ad we­re pla­ying "Rip­ple," and it ra­ised him up out of the po­ols of lon­ging and in­to the air, li­ke a co­lor­ful bal­lo­on ona string. He sa­iled high in­to the air, and saw the crowd be­low as a swir­ling, shif­ting man­da­la of he­aling energy. Ma­ura was the­re as well, using her ro­iling po­wer to fu­el the li­ving man­da­la that pul­sed to the mu­sic. A bo­un­d­less pre­sen­ce sur­ro­un­ded and en­gul­fed them. "Rip­ple in still wa­ter…"

    The Cult of Ec­s­tasy re­ve­res mu­sic abo­ve all forms of con­s­ci­o­us­ness ex­p­lo­ra­ti­on, tho­ugh even they scar­cely un­der­s­tand the ma­gic­kal ef­fects of mu­sic. Mu­sic se­ems to defy cle­ar ca­te­go­ri­za­ti­on. So­me mem­bers the­ori­ze that mu­sic is part of the fun­da­men­tal vib­ra­ti­on that sum­mo­ned re­ality and li­fe in­to be­ing. Per­haps un­der­s­tan­ding the chords and rests of mu­sic will bring an in­tu­iti­ve un­der­s­tan­ding of the chords and rests of Uni­ver­se. Per­haps the­se sac­red har­mo­ni­es hold the keys to As­cen­si­on.

    The Tec­h­noc­racy's ma­ges ha­ve no re­al way to stop mu­sic, tho­ugh they've enj­oyed so­me suc­cess with com­mer­ci­ali­zing mu­sic to ba­na­lity. They ha­ve, ho­we­ver, fa­iled badly at re­mo­ving tran­s­cen­dent mu­sic from the hands of Sle­epers, let alo­ne ma­ges. Clumsy at­tempts to ban per­for­mers and put war­ning la­bels on re­cor­dings usu­al­ly crash and burn, tho­ugh re­cent at­tempts ha­ve be­en mo­re suc­ces­sful. Most Cult of Ec­s­tasy mem­bers ta­ke full ad­van­ta­ge of the le­ga­lity and ava­ila­bi­lity of mu­sic and be­co­me mu­si­ci­ans or avid mu­sic lo­vers. Many em­p­loy mu­sic and dan­ce as fo­ci for the­ir ma­gick. Al­t­ho­ugh they ra­rely ag­ree abo­ut which mu­sic af­fords the gre­atest po­ten­ti­al for As­cen­si­on, the fi­er­cely in­de­pen­dent Cult of Ec­s­tasy mem­bers put asi­de the­ir dif­fe­ren­ces to enj­oy mu­sic to­get­her in bles­sed si­len­ce.

    This open­ness to all forms of sen­sa­ti­on ex­po­ses the dark si­de of the Tra­di­ti­on. Sen­su­al tran­s­cen­den­ce opens the flo­od­ga­tes to the pas­si­ons. Ha­te, fury, gre­ed, lust be­yond re­ason or res­pect - the­se are pas­si­ons, too, and the Cul­tists of Ec­s­tasy are per­haps mo­re vul­ne­rab­le than most ma­ges to the bes­ti­al si­de of the­ir na­tu­res. Ad­dic­ti­on to a tran­s­cen­den­tal sta­te be­co­mes a pla­gue to the Cul­tists as well; so­me for­get how to fun­c­ti­on wit­ho­ut ar­ti­fi­ci­al­ly-bo­os­ted sen­ses or be­co­me ob­ses­sed with new forms of sti­mu­la­ti­on. Stran­ge as it may se­em, self-dis­cip­li­ne is mo­re im­por­tant to Ec­s­ta­tic ma­ges than to ne­arly any ot­her Tra­di­ti­on. To lo­se it is to be­co­me all that the Tra­di­ti­on des­pi­ses.

    An ex­p­lo­si­on of la­ug­h­ter drew Jank's at­ten­ti­on to the two pla­in­c­lothes po­li­ce of­fi­cers as they stag­ge­red and re­eled un­der vi­si­ons be­yond the­ir com­p­re­hen­si­on. De­ad­he­ads po­in­ted and la­ug­hed, but Jank's he­art fro­ze at the des­pe­ra­te ter­ror et­c­hed ac­ross the fa­ces of the sud­den­ly-trip­ping cops. Jank tur­ned to Ma­ura: "Stop it." She me­rely wat­c­hed the cops dan­ce, her fa­ce cold. " Why?" she rep­li­ed. "They're just a co­up­le of pigs. I know the­ir type; they lo­ve to push pe­op­le aro­und." She tur­ned her at­ten­ti­on back to the cops; "Ha­ve a lit­tle sun­s­hi­ne, boys."

    "It's not right," Jank rep­li­ed, "Knock it off."

    "Why? They we­re just has­sling tho­se guys over the­re. They wo­uld has­sle us, too. I'm not hur­ting them, just gi­ving them so­met­hing to think abo­ut."

    Jank to­ok her wrist; "Stop it. Ple­ase." His vo­ice was po­li­te but firm. "So­me folks can ne­ver see past the­ir blin­ders. May­be so­me ne­ver sho­uld. But they ne­ed to co­me that de­ci­si­on on the­ir own. As­cen­sion is a ca­ress, not a club. The flip si­de of fre­edom is res­pon­si­bi­lity. Let 'em go."

    Maura drop­ped the mind-fu­gue, al­lo­wing the of­fi­cers the be­ne­fit of the­ir own blin­d­ness. "Thank you," Jank sa­id as he re­le­ased her wrist.

    "I didn't me­an an­y­t­hing by it," Ma­ura in­sis­ted, lo­oking at Jank ner­vo­usly, fe­aring fur­t­her di­sap­pro­val.

    He smi­led and to­ok bot­h­her hands in his. "I'm su­re you didn't, but you ha­ve to be ca­re­ful." He ges­tu­red aro­und the gat­he­ring, en­com­pas­sing the re­velry abo­ut them; "He­re's a world of gre­at be­a­uty and splen­dor. The mo­re I see it, the mo­re I lo­ve it. The mo­re I lo­ve it, the mo­re I see it. The mo­re I see the be­a­uty and lo­ve the splen­dor, the mo­re the world be­co­mes be­a­uti­ful and splen­did. Do you see it? In one mo­ment, I can stop the world and re­ma­ke it, and not all the po­wers of hell can stop me. Trust, yo­ung one-trust and exalt. You mir­ror the ex­cel­len­ce of the uni­ver­se, and the world in turn mir­rors yo­ur trust and exal­ta­ti­on."

    She ruf­fled his ha­ir; "You're kin­da cu­te yo­ur­self, you bum!" They em­b­ra­ced, fell to­get­her la­ug­hing and lost them­sel­ves in the song.

    Primal Dan­cers

    The po­wer of the world al­ways works in cir­c­les, and ever­y­t­hing tri­es to be ro­und.

    - Black Elk, Black Elk Spe­aks

    Annalise wal­ked in the fo­ot­s­teps of her own dre­ams this night. She dan­ced in the arms of the Earth Mot­her. Her com­pa­ni­ons be­at the­ir cal­lu­sed palms aga­inst the well-oiled drums who­se po­un­ding rhythms spi­ra­led An­na­li­se dow­n­wards in­to the wel­lsp­ring of her own spi­rit-so­ul. As the po­un­ding of the drums in­c­re­ased, the sha­man, La­ug­hing Eag­le, pla­ced a small drum in An­na­li­se's hands.

    "Join yo­ur dre­ams with ours, An­na­li­se. The rhythms of Ga­ia are the rhythms of yo­ur he­ar­t­be­at, the rhythms of yo­ur own ima­gi­nings."

    Dreamspeakers con­ce­ive of the world as an en­tity in which each pi­ece, from the smal­lest peb­ble to the lar­gest wha­le, has a part. The con­g­lo­me­ra­te of mat­ter and li­fe com­bi­ne to cre­ate the unity most of­ten re­fer­red to as Ga­ia or the All-Mot­her. The­ir ri­tu­als of­ten in­vol­ve mu­sic and drum­ming. The Dre­am­s­pe­akers fe­el the rhythmic pul­sing of drums is most con­du­ci­ve to gu­iding the mind and body in­to a sta­te in which true en­lig­h­ten­ment may oc­cur. In such an en­lig­h­te­ned sta­te, ever­y­t­hing from he­aling to con­tem­p­la­ting the na­tu­re of the uni­ver­se is easi­er to ac­com­p­lish.

    Looking down, An­na­li­se co­uld see her fo­ot­p­rints in the sand of the be­ach. Even as she ma­de the fo­ot­p­rints, they shif­ted and tran­s­for­med. One fil­led with wa­ter and swir­led in­to not­hin­g­ness, whi­le anot­her qu­ickly be­ca­me ho­me to a small crab. Still anot­her re­ve­aled the pe­ar­les­cent be­a­uty of a conch shell.

    "We each act in con­cert with the world, An­na­li­se. The Re­ality of the Tec­h­no­man­cers is a ste­ri­le one des­ti­ned to die a hnely de­ath, ours is the Re­ality of Ga­ia, We ha­ve al­ways be­en and we al­ways will be. We know that our po­wer, our true be­a­uty, co­mes in our con­nec­ti­on to the All. By our­sel­ves, we are less than the ti­ni­est gra­in of sand, a lo­ne drum­be­at, but in ope­ning our­sel­ves to the uni­ver­se, we are ever­y­t­hing. We are the All-Mot­her and the tur­t­le and the earth be­ne­ath our fe­et." Mot­her Um­ba­la's pro­ud to­nes we­re a co­un­ter­po­int to the po­un­ding rhythms that now co­ur­sed thro­ugh An­na­li­se, body and so­ul.

    There is so­me de­ba­te abo­ut the true con­s­ci­o­us­ness of Ga­ia, but all Dre­am­s­pe­akers be­li­eve in the fun­da­men­tal con­nec­ti­on that each li­ving be­ing has to every ot­her be­ing, and that the dan­ce of li­fe is gre­ater than the sum of its parts. The craft of the Dre­am­s­pe­akers is per­haps the most an­ci­ent of all the Tra­di­ti­ons. Its ro­ots are fo­und de­ep in the pri­mal es­sen­ce of all li­ving cre­atu­res, the­ir li­zard-bra­ins, the­ir so­uls. Such po­wer, tho­ugh per­haps raw and pri­mi­ti­ve in com­pa­ri­son to ot­hers, has de­ep con­nec­ti­ons to all as­pects of Re­ality. It is the World Tree of the Tra­di­ti­ons, and the Dre­am­s­pe­akers are at ho­me clim­bing in its bran­c­hes and dig­ging among its ro­ots.

    Mother Um­ba­la pus­hed An­na­li­se's he­ad un­der the wa­ves, and she co­uld fe­el her body pus­hed this way and that by the swir­ling ti­des. Ti­me mo­ved by her in a fo­re­ver-mo­ment as An­na­lise tas­ted salt and sand on her ton­gue. Mot­her Um­ba­la's hands we­re go­ne from An­na­li­se's he­ad, and she se­emed sud­denly to be in de­ep wa­ter. Trying to swim, An­na­li­se co­uld not se­em to find the sur­fa­ce. As she felt her lungs gre­edily ta­ke in the last of her ox­y­gen, An­na­li­se ac­k­now­led­ged the awe­so­me po­wer of the All and ope­ned her mo­uth to let the wa­ter ta­ke her - and fo­und her­self lying in a fo­ot of wa­ter.

    Placing the drum back in An­na­li­se's hands, Mot­her Um­ba­la sa­id; "You are cle­an­sed and ma­de re­ady to ta­ke on the na­me of Dre­am­s­pe­aker.'"

    The Dre­am­s­pe­akers be­li­eve the re­ality cre­ated by the Tec­h­no­man­cers is the ma­in ca­use of the di­vi­si­ve dic­ho­tomy bet­we­en mind and body, sci­en­ce and na­tu­re. In or­der to be­gin he­aling this rift in new Dre­am­s­pe­akers, the Tra­di­ti­on re­qu­ires a ri­tu­al de­ath of the di­vi­ded self and the sub­se­qu­ent re­birth of the who­le. This cle­an­sing jo­ur­ney of de­ath and re­birth al­so gi­ves the yo­ung Dre­am­s­pe­aker her first true con­tact with the pri­mal po­ol of po­wer ma­de up of the dre­ams, the li­ves, the so­uls of all li­fe. Even Ga­ia's body is part of this col­lec­ti­ve, her sto­nes and dirt, wa­ter and air all be­long to this po­ol. From, this gre­at po­ol of Be­ing, the Dre­am­s­pe­akers draw the­ir po­wer and the­ir know­led­ge. All li­ving be­ings are con­nec­ted to this po­ol, and the­ir com­bi­ned dre­ams, fe­ars and know­led­ge co­me from and con­t­ri­bu­te to the po­ol. The Dre­am­s­pe­akers see it as both the­ir right and res­pon­si­bi­lity to draw upon the po­wer the­re­in.

    As An­na­li­se aro­se and spun in the cir­c­le ma­de up of Dre­am­s­pe­akers, the cir­c­le of earth, air andsky, she co­uld fe­el her sen­ses fil­ling with the he­ady po­wer of Ga­ia. Her drum, li­ke all of Re­ality, stret­c­hed out ta­ut and strong, and An­na­li­se knew she co­uld play Re­ality as easily as she did her drum. "So long as you re­ma­in a part of the Ta­pestry that is Ga­ia, so long as you ta­ke part in the gre­at dan­ce of li­fe and de­ath and re­birth, so long as you fre­ely gi­ve back that po­wer which Ga­ia grants, you can play in the fi­elds of the All-Mot­her," La­ug­hing Eag­le in­to­ned over the or­c­hes­t­ra of drums and surf and cal­ling birds. "But al­ways hold on to the rhythms of Ga­ia, lest you be­co­me in­to­xi­ca­ted with yo­ur gifts and spurn yo­ur Mot­her's em­b­ra­ce. Just as the be­at you play on the drum in yo­ur hand wo­uld turn so­ur sho­uld the wo­od warp or the strings bre­ak, so wo­uld yo­ur ma­gick warp in­to dust and de­ath if you we­re to deny yo­ur con­nec­ti­on to the rest of the uni­ver­se. A drum­mer can­not play wit­ho­ut her drum."

    The po­wer of the Dre­am­s­pe­akers' ma­gick ari­ses from, the­ir ac­k­now­led­g­ment of the in­t­ri­ca­te con­nec­ti­ons bet­we­en all li­ving be­ings. It is the abi­lity to chan­nel the ener­gi­es of the world that brings ma­gick. Wit­ho­ut this ac­k­now­led­g­ment, Dre­am­s­pe­akers fe­el the­ir po­wer wo­uld at best le­ave them, and at wor­se act as a can­cer on Ga­ia, bre­aking up the con­nec­ti­ons that ke­ep her who­le. As part of this ac­k­now­led­g­ment, the Tra­di­ti­on is ma­de up of ma­ges from a va­ri­ety of cul­tu­res and bac­k­g­ro­unds. Witch doc­tors, pa­gans, sha­mans and eco­lo­gists, among ot­hers, are all part of this di­ver­se Tra­di­ti­on. Dre­am­s­pe­akers ac­k­now­led­ge that dif­fe­rent paths are ne­ces­sary to rep­re­sent the en­ti­rety of the world's ener­gi­es. In the in­ter­we­aving of minds vi­ewing the world from dif­fe­rent an­g­les of per­cep­ti­on, the truth of the who­le can be se­en. With just one vi­ew­po­int, one se­es only part of the truth. Un­der­s­tan­ding part of the truth can be far mo­re dan­ge­ro­us than un­der­s­tan­ding not­hing of the truth at all.

    "Body and mind co­me to­get­her to cre­ate so­me thing gre­ater than eit­her con­cept by it­self. In the wed­ding of the two li­es gre­at­ness. To de­nig­ra­te one is to de­nig­ra­te all. Do not lo­se yo­ur­self in eit­her, An­na­li­se," ad­ded Mot­her Um­ba­la as she kis­sed the new­born Dre­am­s­pe­aker. "Co­me, we ha­ve dwelt over­long in the re­alms of the spi­rit this night! An­yo­ne up for­piz­za?"

    Menders of the Whe­el

    Is so­met­hing wrong, she sa­id.

    Of co­ur­se the­re is.

    You're still ali­ve, she sa­id.

    Oh, but do I de­ser­ve to be?

    h that the. Qu­es­ti­on?

    And if so, if so,

    Who an­s­wers, who an­s­wers?

    -Pearl Jam, "Ali­ve"

    Stan Ed­wards sta­red at his old high scho­ol chum lying in the hos­pi­tal bed and frow­ned; "How're you do­ing, Jack?" Jack co­uld not res­pond. He'd be­en in a co­ma for the last fi­ve we­eks, and his doc­tors sa­id that his chan­ces of re­co­very with even part of his men­tal fa­ci­li­ti­es in­tact we­re neg­li­gib­le. Jack An­der­son, star qu­ar­ter­back in col­le­ge and high scho­ol ali­ke, had le­ar­ned at last that he was not in­des­t­ruc­tib­le. Not bul­let-pro­of. Part of Stan's mind re­fu­sed what had to be do­ne, but his be­li­efs we­re strong eno­ugh to over­ri­de his emo­ti­ons. Stan fo­cu­sed his will, pul­led his po­wer in­to a tight fist in his mind, and re­le­ased that po­wer at his fri­end. Jack's he­art stut­te­red bri­efly and simply ga­ve way to the en­t­ropy wit­hin.

    Many of the Tra­di­ti­ons frown upon the ac­ti­ons of the Eut­ha­na­tos. The Eut­ha­na­tos do not ca­re. They hold ste­ady in the be­li­ef that de­ath is not the end of li­fe, simply anot­her be­gin­ning in an en­d­less cycle. De­ath is a ne­ces­sary as­pect of li­fe, mo­re ne­ces­sary for so­me than it is for ot­hers.

    Sometimes the du­ti­es of pro­vi­ding the Go­od De­ath bo­re down he­avily upon Stan's sho­ul­ders, a crus­hing we­ight that was per­fectly ca­pab­le of dri­ving a we­ak man to his kne­es. Stan was not of­ten we­ak, but to­day he felt the ne­ed for re­le­ase. At ti­mes li­ke this, he co­uld easily see su­ici­de as a vi­ab­le op­ti­on. Con­t­rary to what the ot­her ma­ges in his Chantry tho­ught, Stan felt the loss of his fri­end's li­fe as strongly as an­yo­ne wo­uld. Jack was de­ad. Even kno­wing that Jack wo­uld be re­in­car­na­ted, Stan mis­sed him hor­ribly.

    The Eut­ha­na­tos be­li­eve that they know when a per­son's ti­me to die is at hand, of­ten be­fo­re the per­son knows it him­self. From ti­me to ti­me, they as­sist tho­se who­se ne­ed to die is stron­ger than the­ir will to li­ve. This duty is con­si­de­red an ho­nor, one of the fo­un­da­ti­ons of the Eut­ha­na­tos phi­lo­sophy. Alas, most of the pe­op­le that the Tra­di­ti­on helps along the path to re­in­car­na­ti­on do not go wil­lingly. In many ca­ses, the Eut­ha­na­tos act as jud­ge and exe­cu­ti­oner aga­inst the mo­re cor­rupt in­di­vi­du­als they en­co­un­ter. Kar­mic Ba­lan­ce, they be­li­eve, pro­vi­des new op­por­tu­ni­ti­es, new op­ti­ons for cho­se who ha­ve be­en for­ced to go in the wrong di­rec­ti­on in li­fe. To the Eut­ha­na­tos, it is simply bet­ter to get the fo­olish mo­ving on to the­ir next li­fe as so­on as pos­sib­le.

    Stan wan­de­red the dar­kest al­leys in town, le­aving him­self vul­ne­rab­le, an open in­vi­ta­ti­on to the mo­re pre­da­tory mem­bers of the una­wa­ke­ned. One of the town's Kin­d­red ca­me too clo­se for his li­king, but was dri­ven away with only a lo­ok. Be­fo­re an ho­ur had pas­sed, Stan was as­sa­ul­ted by a yo­ung gro­up of wo­ul­d­be mug­gers. The­ir de­aths we­re mo­re re­war­ding than Jack's had be­en. Jack's de­ath had be­en a mercy kil­ling; the gut­ter-scums' de­aths we­re a wel­co­me ne­ces­sity.

    The Eut­ha­na­tos are of­ten se­en as grim and un­for­gi­ving, and to most pe­op­le, that as­ses­sment is fully ac­cu­ra­te. But the Eut­ha­na­tos are simply de­di­ca­ted to a li­fes­t­y­le that of­ten re­qu­ires them to kill even tho­se that are clo­se to them, They ho­pe that the next li­fe will pro­vi­de bet­ter op­ti­ons for the­ir lo­ved ones. The Eut­ha­na­tos are as sus­cep­tib­le to the loss of a lo­ved one or clo­se re­la­ti­ve as an­yo­ne el­se; the­re is no gu­aran­tee that the freshly re­le­ased so­ul will re­in­car­na­te ne­ar the ma­ge who has bro­ught abo­ut des­t­ruc­ti­on, no gu­aran­tee that sa­id so­ul will for­gi­ve the one who en­ded its pre­vi­o­us li­fe.

    Most Eut­ha­na­tos cho­ose not to ha­ve clo­se fri­ends at all, as a pro­tec­ti­ve ma­ne­uver aga­inst the tra­umas ca­used by the de­ath of so­me­one clo­se. Li­ke ne­arly ever­yo­ne el­se, the Eut­ha­na­tos pre­fer not to suf­fer the los­sof a fri­end. The­se ma­ges fully un­der­s­tand the pa­in they ca­use whe­ne­ver they must kill anot­her. For every per­son who di­es, ot­hers among the li­ving will li­kely mo­urn that per­son's loss. Few among the Eut­ha­na­tos enj­oy kil­ling, ne­ces­sary tho­ugh it is for dyna­mic chan­ge.

    Stan tho­ught back to his First De­ath, the ti­me he spent wan­de­ring the re­alms of the de­ad be­fo­re co­ming ho­me. He shun­ted su­ici­dal tho­ughts asi­de and went on his way. De­ath wo­uld co­me when the ti­me was right; he wo­uld not for­ce him­self to die. Be­si­des, best to al­low the ot­hers of the Chantry to de­ci­de when his ti­me had co­me.

    Stan wal­ked in si­len­ce for se­ve­ral ho­urs, pa­using only to sho­ve fu­el in­to the mo­uth of his In­car­na­ti­on, his physi­cal form. He felt no hun­ger, but re­ali­sed that fo­od was im­por­tant. Stan had le­ar­ned the hard way that the body ne­eded pro­per ca­re. He still suf­fe­red nig­h­t­ma­res of his last de­ath and had no de­si­re to re­pe­at the pro­cess.

    The Eut­ha­na­tos are al­so uni­que in that they do not fe­ar de­ath. Most ha­ve al­re­ady ex­pe­ri­en­ced de­ath be­fo­re, du­ring the­ir ini­ti­ati­on. De­ath li­te­ral­ly holds no sec­rets for the Eut­ha­na­tos; they ha­ve co­me to know it in­ti­ma­tely and to un­der­s­tand its wor­kings and fun­c­ti­ons. De­ath is a me­ans to an end for the Eut­ha­na­tos, a use­ful to­ol in the res­t­ruc­tu­ring of the world. As of­ten as not, the Eut­ha­na­tos will kill the­ir own when the ti­me has co­me, cer­ta­in that the­ir com­ra­des will re­turn to them when the ti­me is right. Most Eut­ha­na­tos ha­ve bri­ef flas­hes from the­ir pre­vi­o­us li­ves, and many are cer­ta­in that the­ir Ava­tars ha­ve be­en with the Eut­ha­na­tos in pre­vi­o­us li­ves. The­re are no do­ub­ters of this be­li­ef among the Tra­di­ti­on. Even the few who do not ha­ve ac­cess to the­ir pre­vi­o­us li­ves' me­mo­ri­es suf­fer from de­ja vu mo­re fre­qu­ently than any among the una­wa­ke­ned.

    For re­asons they still ha­ve not dis­co­ve­red com­p­le­tely, the Eut­ha­na­tos ha­ve ga­ined the en­mity of the we­re­wol­ves. The only vi­ab­le hypot­he­sis they ha­ve run ac­ross is that the­ir pro­xi­mity to de­ath has left them "Wyrm-cor­rup­ted" in the eyes of the Ga­rou. Oddly eno­ugh, this ne­ga­ti­ve re­ac­ti­on is re­mo­ved with every de­ath a Eut­ha­na­tos ma­ge en­du­res, co­ming back to bot­her them only af­ter they ha­ve star­ted on the path of stal­king tho­se re­ady for de­ath. Ge­ne­ral­ly spe­aking, ho­we­ver, the Eut­ha­na­tos do the­ir best to avo­id the Ga­rou.

    The wra­iths how­led. Stan ig­no­red them. In ti­me, even the res­t­less de­ad wo­uld un­der­s­tand the ways of the Go­od De­ath. Me­an­w­hi­le, the Eut­ha­na­tos mostly left them to the­ir own de­vi­ces. Pla­ying with the de­ad was left to the Gi­ovan­ni and the Sa­me­di. Thin­king of his Tra­di­ti­on's vam­pi­ric co­un­ter­parts, Stan al­lo­wed him­self to smi­le, step­ping fas­ter and wal­king to­wards the ho­me of his fri­end, Daw­son. What he ne­eded was a go­od de­ba­te, and Daw­son was al­ways wil­ling to ar­gue the res­pon­si­bi­lities of de­ath-de­alers.

    Euthanatos do not dab­ble in nec­ro­mancy, fin­ding the idea of stop­ping as­pi­rit from fol­lo­wing irs co­ur­se to be vul­gar. They do not, ho­we­ver, con­demn ot­hers who do per­form the dar­ker arts. They simply see nec­ro­man­cers as be­ing so­met­hing li­ke bac­k­wa­ter co­usins-slow, but with the­ir he­arts in the right pla­ce. As­cen­si­on is a per­so­nal thing, and each ma­ge must te­am at her own pa­ce. They es­pe­ci­al­ly enj­oy con­ver­sa­ti­ons with the Gi­ovan­ni and Sa­me­di vam­pi­res, fin­ding the dis­cus­si­ons of eter­nal li­fe ver­sus the fol­lo­wing of re­in­car­na­ti­on prin­cip­les a fas­ci­na­ting su­bj­ect. Ru­mors abo­und that the three gro­ups ha­ve ac­tu­al­ly ma­de a pact, al­lo­wing for in­for­ma­ti­on ex­c­han­ges bet­we­en them. No­ne are wil­ling to con­firm or deny the ac­cu­sa­ti­ons.

    Dawson ope­ned the do­or to his ha­ven af­ter the very first knock. Wit­ho­ut a word, he ges­tu­red for Stan to en­ter, gu­iding him to a com­for­tab­le cha­ir in his of­fi­ces. Stan tal­ked of his tro­ub­les in the night, and Daw­son lis­te­ned as he al­ways did, nod­ding and ma­king com­ments when ne­ces­sary. Of all the vam­pi­res he had met in his li­ves, only the Sa­me­di se­emed to un­der­s­tand whe­re he was co­ming from with his be­li­efs. Aga­in he of­fe­red to as­sist the Sa­me­di in ex­pe­ri­en­cing de­ath, and aga­in, Daw­son po­li­tely dec­li­ned, ex­p­la­ining that when the ti­me, was right, he wo­uld co­me to Stan. ''My work among the Kin­d­red is not yet fi­nis­hed. The­re are many among them who do not un­der­s­tand the ne­ed for the work we sha­re. So­me­one must te­ach them."

    While ut­terly fas­ci­na­ted by the con­cept of vam­pi­rism, most Eut­ha­na­tos are le­ery of ris­king the Em­b­ra­ce. The­re is a strong be­li­ef that the Em­b­ra­ce wo­uld des­t­roy the con­nec­ti­on a ma­ge has to his Ava­tar, and very few are wil­ling to risk the loss of the­ir po­wer for so­met­hing as petty as im­mor­ta­lity. Still, many Eut­ha­na­tos ta­ke com­fort in the know­led­ge that the Sa­me­di fol­low si­mi­lar be­li­efs, and are per­fectly wil­ling to des­t­roy vam­pi­res who ha­ve not re­ali­zed when the ti­me is right for de­ath.

    After le­aving Daw­son' s pla­ce, Stan wan­de­red aga­in, we­aving slowly to­wards the Chantry. No­ne of his as­so­ci­ates spo­ke to him; one lo­ok at the black cowl he drew upon en­te­ring the bu­il­ding ma­de his de­si­re to mo­urn in si­len­ce ob­vi­o­us to all who saw him. As the sun fi­nal­ly ro­se, Stan al­lo­wed the cold he­avy dre­ad of his loss to es­ca­pe. Jack was go­ne and now, in his own ro­om, and with no­ne sa­ve the ot­her mem­bers of his Tra­di­ti­on to he­ar, he co­uld mo­urn. Let the ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons say that he and his had no he­art, let them all cla­im that the Eut­ha­na­tos we­re cold and he­ar­t­less. They wo­uld ne­ver un­der­s­tand the we­ight of his res­pon­si­bi­li­ties, at le­ast not in this In­car­na­ti­on.

    Masters of the Art

    We can­not li­ve by po­wer, and a cul­tu­re that se­eks to li­ve by it be­co­mes bru­tal and ste­ri­le. But we can die wit­ho­ut it.

    - Max Ler­ner

    It's hard to fight an enemy who has out­posts in yo­ur he­ad.

    - Sally Kem­p­ton

    Like sen­ti­nels, the walls stand, eter­nal­ly wat­c­hing, eter­rnal­ly in­dif­fe­rent. Li­ke­wi­se, I stand fa­cing a flat, fe­atu­re­less pa­nel and shi­ver as the pri­son's chill pe­net­ra­tes my skin. The wall at my back cur­ves slightly, a half-em­b­ra­ce. At ti­mes, I think cle­arly; at ot­her ti­mes, I qu­es­ti­on my sa­nity. Of­ten, a strong, cle­ar vo­ice co­mes to me, spe­aking the ap­pal­ling truth. Ap­pal­ling, yes; but if truth, how do I da­re re­j­ect it?

    YOU ARE RIGHT- IF YO­UR AVA­TAR SPE­AKS THE TRUTH- HOW CAN YOU RE­J­ECT IT?

    Yet why do­es so­met­hing fe­el wrong when I spe­ak to you? Am I not im­p­ri­so­ned? Why cant I le­ave if I li­ke?

    THE SA­ME QU­ES­TI­ONS AGA­IN AND, AGA­IN, DO YOU NOT RE­MEM­BER? THE AN­S­WER IS AL­WAYS THE SA­ME: YOU SO­UGHT THE TRUTH THRO­UGH RE­VE­LA­TI­ON, AND YOU WILL NOT LE­AVE UN­TIL YOU FIND IT.

    Yes, I re­mem­ber.

    As Or­der of Her­mes ma­ges grow mo­re ex­pe­ri­en­ced, they of­ten wil­lingly en­ter a sta­te akin to the Se­eking, which they term "The Re­ve­la­ti­on." Du­ring this ti­me, they are par­ti­cu­larly vul­ne­rab­le to Mind and Spi­rit ma­gick. They open them­sel­ves fully to the­ir Ava­tars in or­der to le­arn mo­re abo­ut re­ality. The gre­at dan­ger of this prac­ti­ce is that, on oc­ca­si­on, Tec­h­no­man­cers de­tect the qu­es­ting ma­ge, cap­tu­re her, and su­bj­ect her to "re­edu­ca­ti­on." Ma­ges cap­tu­red in this fas­hi­on are of­ten bra­in­was­hed by Tec­h­no­man­cers po­sing as the ma­ge's own Ava­tar.

    GOOD. NOW LET US RE­TURN TO THE BE­GIN­NING. WHAT IS YO­UR NA­ME?

    Me lla­mo di­ez y tres. I am num­ber 13, The ta­rot card of De­ath and Re­birth,

    WHY IS THIS YO­UR NA­ME?

    I am dying and be­ing re­born.

    AND YO­UR MIS­SI­ON, YO­UR PUR­PO­SE?

    To study and to know. To bring hu­ma­nity to the As­cen­si­on fa­ted by the stars. Yet, even as I think this, I see a man and a wo­man, li­ke fi­gu­res ani­ma­ted from a Go­ya pa­in­ting, lar­ger than li­fe. On the­ir backs they carry he­avy bur­dens, bun­d­les dot­ted with ar­ca­ne symbols of Li­fe and Spi­rit, They clam­ber up a ste­ep, rocky hill. As they as­cend, the­ir packs grow lar­ger and mo­re symbols ap­pe­ar on the dark cloth, one by one, li­ke stars in the night sky. They as­cend fur­t­her; the symbols of spi­rit and li­fe wrig­gle and squ­irm on the cloth, thras­hing li­ke worms in the ra­in, tran­s­for­ming-I can't ma­ke it out, but then I see: they melt in­to the symbols of En­t­ropy and De­ath, The man and wo­man col­lap­se be­ne­ath the­ir writ­hing bur­dens and sli­de down the slo­pe in­to a muddy ditch. The­re they de­cay and di­sap­pe­ar li­ke salt in­to wa­ter.

    In the­ory, Or­der of Her­mes ma­ges hold that they ser­ve hu­ma­nity by re­sis­ting the Tec­h­noc­racy, stud­ying ar­ca­ne lo­re and tran­s­for­ming that lo­re in­to ever­y­day re­ality. In prac­ti­ce, they ha­ve be­co­me so en­t­wi­ned in po­li­ti­cal in­t­ri­gue wit­hin the­ir own Chan­t­ri­es that Tec­h­no­man­cers ha­ve to co­me knoc­king down the­ir do­ors be­fo­re they re­mem­ber the­ir sta­ted mis­si­on. Even if they work to chan­ge re­ality in hu­ma­nity's fa­vor, most ca­bals di­sag­ree on po­licy, and of­ten thwart each ot­her's ef­forts. On.the po­si­ti­ve si­de, Or­der of Her­mes may work hin­d­sig­h­tedly, but when they fall, they typi­cal­ly ta­ke mo­re than the­ir sha­re of Tec­h­no­man­cers down with them.

    HAVE YOU AT­TA­INED AS­CEN­SI­ON?

    Of co­ur­se not.

    BUT YOU BE­LI­EVE AS­CEN­SI­ON EXISTS AND IS AT­TA­INAB­LE. WHY DO YOU BE­LI­EVE THIS, 13?

    Because ot­hers in the Or­der ha­ve at­ta­ined it.

    The Or­der of Her­mes, be­ca­use it se­es it­self as the ol­dest and most re­now­ned of the Tra­di­ti­ons, has de­lu­ded it­self in­to thin­king it can spre­ad ru­mors of its mem­bers' at­ta­in­ments wit­ho­ut eli­ci­ting the scorn of the ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons. Whi­le its cla­ims that mo­re Orac­les ori­gi­na­ted in the­ir Tra­di­ti­on than any ot­her Tra­di­ti­on are li­kely true (simply be­ca­use the­ir Tra­di­ti­on is so an­ci­ent), ru­mors of As­cen­ded Or­der of Her­mes ma­ges are the pro­ducts of too many ma­ges sin­king in­to Qu­i­et.

    HAVE YOU SE­EN EVI­DEN­CE OF THIS?

    No sci­en­ti­fic evi­den­ce.

    A MAT­HE­MA­TI­CI­AN, ARE YOU NOT? HOW CAN THIS BE THAT YOU BE­LI­EVE IN SUCH A THE­ORY WIT­HO­UT A SCRAP OF EVI­DEN­CE?

    It is a be­ne­vo­lent mis­si­on, to se­ek As­cen­si­on. (The ima­ge of a de­ca­ying man and wo­man, mud-spat­te­red and lying in a for­got­ten ditch, re­sur­fa­ces.) Even if it is do­omed to fa­ilu­re, it is a far bet­ter ca­use than the Tec­h­noc­racy's dark, wor­t­h­less go­als. OUr ca­use is go­od; we se­ek the po­wer that will al­low us to de­fe­at the Tec­h­noc­racy.

    WHAT PO­WER IS THAT?

    A com­p­lex ad­mix­tu­re of fac­tors: po­li­ti­cal, fi­nan­ci­al, ma­gic­kal. Our ca­bal, as you know, fe­els that the best pla­ce for our re­ality to ga­in a fo­ot­hold is in uni­ver­si­ti­es and scho­ols. If we can gra­du­al­ly ma­ke our vi­ews aca­de­mi­cal­ly fe­asib­le, then they wi­il pro­pa­ga­ted thro­ug­ho­ut the edu­ca­ti­onal system, from te­nu­red pro­fes­sors down to ele­men­tary scho­ol stu­dents. A who­le ge­ne­ra­ti­on of stu­dents will be­li­eve, and they will pass this know­led­ge on to the next ge­ne­ra­ti­on.

    The Or­der of Her­mes fe­els that the best way to con­t­rol No­des and ley li­nes, which will ul­ti­ma­tely de­ter­mi­ne who wins the strug­gle over con­sen­su­al re­ality, is to ha­ve fi­nan­ci­al and po­li­ti­cal con­t­rol over the are­as in which they ap­pe­ar. Con­se­qu­ently, many Or­der of Her­mes ma­ges ha­ve used the­ir ma­gick to be­co­me we­althy or po­li­ti­cal­ly pro­mi­nent. Ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons lo­ok skep­ti­cal­ly upon this prac­ti­ce as an ex­cu­se for gre­ed and ot­her vi­ces. A sig­ni­fi­cant per­cen­ta­ge of Or­der of Her­mes ma­ges are uni­ver­sity pro­fes­sors or ot­her kinds of edu­ca­tors. They fe­el that edu­ca­ti­on is one of the hest forms of con­t­rol, and that it can be di­rec­ted via the fi­nan­ci­al and po­li­ti­cal pres­su­res the­ir Her­me­tic col­le­agu­es can bring to be­ar. Un­for­tu­na­tely, the Tec­h­noc­racy is savvy to the­se tac­tics, and, to da­te, has suc­ces­sful­ly un­der­mi­ned the re­pu­ta­ti­ons of all such "pi­one­ers" of re­ality,

    DO YOU TRULY THINK IT POS­SIB­LE THAT YO­UR VI­EWS WILL BE AC­CEP­TED?

    It is pos­sib­le. Pro­bably the best way is to ha­ve them ac­cep­ted as "sci­en­ce," a form of sci­en­ce long aban­do­ned, but only now re­ve­aling its hid­den worth. The sci­en­ces of nu­me­ro­logy and of Forms wo­uld, of co­ur­se, ha­ve to be re­na­med. But they co­uld ap­pe­ar and spre­ad un­der the gu­ise of com­p­lex mat­he­ma­tical for­mu­lae and bre­ak­t­h­ro­ughs in physics.

    IS THAT NOT AC­CEP­TING THE TEC­H­NO­MAN­CERS' PA­RA­DIGMS?

    Perhaps, per­haps. But the­re are tho­se of the Or­der who align them­sel­ves with Ma­ra­uders just to bre­ak out of the per­va­sive pa­ra­digms of the­Tec­h­noc­racy, only to find them­sel­ves com­mit­ting acts just as per­ver­se. Per­so­nal­ly, I find the slo­wer, sa­fer, mo­re tra­di­ti­onal ro­ute mo­re ap­pe­aling.

    All Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges, if they think abo­ut it, even­tu­al­ly find them­sel­ves in a qu­an­dary: if they use ma­gick with co­in­ci­den­tal ef­fect, they are not wor­king to chan­ge hu­ma­nity's vi­ew of r e a l i ty and thus are fur­t­her sta­bi­li­zing the Tec­h­noc­racy-con­t­rol­led con­sen­su­al re­ality. If they at­tempt to bre­ak out of the Con­ven­ti­ons' pa­ra­digm by ig­no­ring co­in­ci­den­tal ef­fect, they kill them­sel­ves, only to ac­com­p­lish the Tec­h­noc­racy's ends, Or­der of Her­mes ma­ges, so­me of them re­cal­ling the Mythic Age be­fo­re the cur­rent pa­ra­digm to­ok hold, wish to re­turn the mo­dern world to its ma­gic­kal ro­ots. To do so, so­me ha­ve se­ar­c­hed tor al­li­es in odd pla­ces, and so­me ha­ve even ma­de al­li­an­ces with Ma­ra­uders and fa­eri­es. A very few Or­der of Her­mes ma­ges are ru­mo­red to ha­ve le­ar­ned ma­gick from the­se so­ur­ces; the­re are even ru­mors that the­re is an un­dis­co­ve­red Sphe­re to which the­se fac­ti­ons ha­ve ac­cess. Ho­we­ver, most ma­ges of this Tra­di­ti­on be­li­eve that the mid­dle ro­ad is the sa­fest and, tho­ugh plod­ding, will so­me­day enab­le them to res­ha­pe re­ality wit­ho­ut ris­king the li­ves or sa­nity of its mem­bers.

    DO YOU BE­LI­EVE THAT THE TRA­DI­TI­ONS SHO­ULD WORK TO­GET­HER TO THIS END?

    Of co­ur­se; who wo­uldn't! But it is ra­re that we do. How can we work to­get­her when we do not ag­ree on our go­als? Even the most ba­sic go­al - As­cen­si­on- is a fun­da­men­tal so­ur­ce of di­sag­re­ement.

    HOW DO YOU SEE IT?

    It is a sta­te of pu­re Un­der­s­tan­ding

    OMNISCIENCE?

    No, be­ca­use it is not al­so a sta­te of full ex­pe­ri­en­ce. When a ma­ge has As­cen­ded,he un­der­s­tands all that he en­co­un­ters. But he do­es not in­s­tantly know ever­y­t­hing the­re is to he known.

    YOU SAY "MA­GE"-CAN THE REST OF HU­MA­NITY AS­CEND?

    Mages are des­ti­ned to shep­herd hu­ma­nity to As­cen­si­on.

    "SHEPHEHD," YOU SAY? SO HU­MA­NITY NE­EDS YOU TO BRING IT TO AS­CEN­SI­ON; IT CAN­NOT AC­HI­EVE AS­CEN­SI­ON ON ITS OWN?

    No, it can­not. Its spi­rit is we­ak, so we­ak in in­di­vi­du­als that it al­most do­esn't exist. The Ava­tars of tho­se in the Or­der are strong eno­ugh to ac­hi­eve As­cen­si­on alo­ne and then gu­ide the we­ak mas­ses along the path that the stars dic­ta­te.

    Ascension, to Or­der of Her­mes ma­ges, is an act of will that only tho­se with po­wer­ful Ava­tars can ac­hi­eve. Or­di­nary hu­mans, in the­ir vi­ew, must be ac­cli­ma­ted to the prin­cip­les that will le­ad them to As­cen­si­on. The only way to ori­ent hu­ma­nity to the­se prin­cip­les is to tran­s­la­te the re­ali­ti­es be­hind the Or­ders nu­me­ro­lo­gi­es, charts and for­mu­lae in­to com­p­re­hen­sib­le no­ti­ons. Of co­ur­se, Or­der of Her­mes ma­ges be­li­eve they are the only ones who can do so; the ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons exist only as the­ir hel­p­ma­tes, for they ha­ve les­ser ma­gicks. Ne­ed­less to say, whi­le the Sphe­re of For­ces is po­wer­ful, the for­ce of hub­ris is far mo­re po­wer­ful, and it has pre­ven­ted many a ma­ge from As­cen­ding.

    The mo­dus ope­ran­di of the Or­der is to ke­ep the­ir in­f­lu­en­ce on phi­lo­sop­hi­cal, cul­tu­ral and po­li­ti­cal di­rec­ti­on sec­ret. Sec­recy en­su­res sa­fety from hu­ma­nity's fe­ar and ig­no­ran­ce and the Tec­h­noc­racy's ven­ge­an­ce,

    AND IF THE MAS­SES DO NOT WISH TO FOL­LOW?

    My jaw mus­c­les tig­h­ten in­vo­lun­ta­rily. They will wish to fol­low be­ca­use they won't know they­re do­ing so. Is not ig­no­ran­ce a form of sla­very? No! The Or­der of Her­mes exists to use its sec­rets to be­ne­fit hu­ma­nity.

    WHAT OF THO­SE WHO DO NOT WISH TO BE SO BE­NE­FIT­TED?

    We help them des­pi­te the­ir ig­no­ran­ce.

    IS THIS NOT THE PO­LICY OF YO­UR ENE­MI­ES?

    My he­art skips a be­at. No, the­res a dif­fe­ren­ce. We do not kill the spi­rit. We fos­ter in­tel­li­gen­ce, cre­ati­vity, ho­nor and res­pect.

    DO YOU?

    An ima­ge of me as a dis­cip­le at the ca­bal, sto­nily sta­ring out my mo­on­lit win­dow. The ac­he re­turns as I watch. The De­acon has whis­pe­red to Nu­ria, in pas­sing, that my des­tiny is un­re­len­ting me­di­oc­rity. I've over­he­ard.

    AND NU­RIA?

    My te­ac­her frowns and sha­kes her he­ad. The De­acon shrugs be­nignly as the pa­ir walks down the ec­ho­ing sto­ne cor­ri­dor.

    AND HOW WILL THE REST OF HU­MA­NITY, WHO­SE AVA­TARS ARE IN­FE­RI­OR, BE TRE­ATED?

    I ha­ve no an­s­wer.

    HOW HAS IT BE­EN AT THE CA­BAL FOR YOU SIN­CE THEN?

    That was a long ti­me ago.

    NOT SO LONG.

    No… not so long.

    HOW DO YOU AC­HI­EVE AS­CEN­SI­ON, 13?

    Through dis­cip­li­ned re­se­arch and de­di­ca­ti­on to the truth.

    HOW DO­ES THIS AC­COM­P­LISH YO­UR ENDS?

    The ri­gors of un­der­s­tan­ding Forms at all le­vels, from the physi­cal thro­ugh the spi­ri­tu­al, sculpt the mind in­to the Ava­tar's to­ol. Even­tu­al­ly, if we are true to our­sel­ves, we ac­hi­eve sel­f­mas­tery and thus mas­tery over ot­hers. The rod of scho­lar­s­hip and the res­pect es­tab­lis­hed by the hi­erarchy in the Or­der re­in­for­ce the­se ac­com­p­lis­h­ments. Only thro­ugh that pro­cess of dis­cip­li­ning mind and spi­rit can we de­fe­at the enemy. When the Or­der has do­ne so, we can at­ta­in our for­mer he­ight, ac­hi­eve As­cen­si­on, and ru­le, hu­ma­nity as we are fa­ted by the Whe­el to do.

    To the Or­ders ma­ges, scho­lar­s­hip with an em­p­ha­sis on ma­gick and ad­he­ren­ce to tra­di­ti­on ho­nes the mind. Sin­ce the mind is the to­ol by which ma­ges ac­hi­eve As­cen­si­on, the­re are no ac­ti­vi­ti­es mo­re im­por­tant than ac­ti­ve scho­lar­s­hip and re­ve­ring the tra­di­ti­ons an­ci­ent wis­dom. Per­haps be­ca­use they know they are lo­sing the strug­gle, the Or­der's ma­ges al­so cling to the be­li­ef that the Whe­el of For­tu­ne (of the ta­rot's Ma­j­or Ar­ca­na) will so­me­day bring them back in­to emi­nen­ce.

    IS SUP­RE­MACY IN­DE­ED A NA­TU­RAL OUT­CO­ME OF AD­HE­SI­ON TO THE­SE PRIN­CIP­LES?

    More me­mo­ri­es: he­at blasts my fa­ce; it is so hot that I can­not see. Julio scre­ams. I can he­ar his ho­ar­se, ago­ni­zed cry two sto­ri­es abo­ve, but I can't lo­ok up. I dra­pe the wet blan­ket over my he­ad and sho­ul­ders and en­ter the flat. Mo­ments la­ter, Julio's shri­eking ce­ases, I stum­b­le for­ward, blind, af­ra­id to to­uch an­y­t­hing, for ever­y­t­hing is smol­de­ring, sput­te­ring, mel­ting or in fla­mes. The ca­us­tic smo­ke fills my lungs, ma­kes my eyes te­ar. I gro­pe to­wards the sta­irs and put my fo­ot on the first step. No scre­ams; I know Julio is de­ad, go­ne. The fi­re trucks ar­ri­ve and us­her me out of the flat. I am hel­p­less. That eve­ning, Nu­ria says Pa­ra­dox pu­nis­hed him; he didn't use sub­t­lety to tem­per the for­ce of his ma­gick. Let that be a les­son to us all, she sa­id.

    YOU ME­AN THAT THE RI­GORS OF THE OR­DER'S TRA­INING DO NOT AL­WAYS SUC­CE­ED?

    Yes. It do­esn't al­ways suc­ce­ed.

    BUT IT WILL NE­VER­T­HE­LESS AT­TA­IN ITS GO­ALS…. WHAT ARE ITS GO­ALS?

    Primarily, to des­t­roy the Tec­h­noc­racy. It stands bet­we­en us and As­cen­si­on; it com­p­ro­mi­sed the Or­der long ago an­d­con­ti­nues to do so. Un­til it is an­ni­hi­la­ted, it will dis­t­ract us from As­cen­sion and the se­arch for re­ality.

    More than any ot­her Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges, the Or­der of Her­mes ha­tes the Tec­h­noc­racy, bla­ming it for the dow­n­fall of its re­gency in the la­te Mid­dle Ages. The bla­me they pla­ce on the Tec­h­noc­racy is lar­gely well-fo­un­ded.

    WHAT IF THE TEC­H­NOC­RACY DO­ES NOT OP­PO­SE YO­UR GO­ALS?

    Hah. But asl scoff, the kindly, owl-eyed De­acon at Se­vil­la pe­ers up at me from the midst of his ar­ca­ne bo­ok col­lec­ti­on; from bet­we­en his lips flicks a for­ked ton­gue as black as a vi­per's. My ene­mi­es, I think, are tho­se who op­po­se the go­als of the Or­der. Then I see a hand scre­wing a bron­ze pla­que in­to the cor­ner­s­to­ne of a lib­rary at the ca­bal. So­me of my fel­low ap­pren­ti­ces sit at a desk ne­ar the lib­rary win­dow, the­ir he­ads bu­ri­ed in ar­ca­ne to­mes.

    READ THE PLA­QUE;

    "Dedicado al OMN. Uni­fi­ca­ci­on, le­al­tad y paz."

    WHO FUN­DED YO­UR LIB­RARY?

    This OMN, ap­pa­rently. Why?

    HOW MUCH HAS YO­UR CA­BAL IN SE­VIL­LA BE­NE­FIT­TED FROM THAT RE­SO­UR­CE?

    Tremendously. Most ap­pren­ti­ces wo­uld sell the­ir so­uls to get in­to its ra­re bo­ok col­lec­ti­on.

    DO YOU HA­VE ANY IDEA WHAT OMN STANDS FOR?

    Some cor­po­ra­ti­on's ini­ti­als, right? "De­di­ca­ted to the OMN. Uni­fi­ca­tion, lo­yalty and pe­ace."

    OMN STANDS FOR OR­DEN DEL MUN­DO NU­EVO.

    The New World Or­der?

    EL OR­DEN DEL MUN­DO NU­EVO AC­TI­VELY SUP­PORTS YO­UR RE­SE­ARCH, YO­UR SELF-DIS­CIP­LI­NE,

    Yes. If the OMN has al­ways sec­retly sup­por­ted us, it is not the evil the De­acon cla­ims it is. It sha­res our go­als; it must be an ally in the se­arch for As­cen­si­on. Sud­denly, I re­call a tall, cle­an­s­ha­ven ma­ge na­med Mor­tez; he hands me a bo­ok writ­ten in San­s­k­rit with the num­ber 13 em­bos­sed on the co­ver. I ta­ke it. Ye­ars la­ter, un­c­han­ged, he re­turns to ret­ri­eve it and I find myself he­re.

    YES, YOU ARE RE­ADY TO GO NOW, 13. LE­AVE US AND FIGHT THE ENE­MI­ES OF BOTH OR­DE­NES: EL OR­DEN DE HER­MES Y EL OR­DEN DEL MUN­DO NU­EVO.

    Already I fe­el a stran­ge pang of lon­ging for the­se walls. The cur­ved wall at my back has sup­por­ted me, it se­ems, fo­re­ver. Be­fo­re me I see three whi­te­was­hed walls, cle­an, free of the filth of the stre­ets, smo­oth li­ke iro­ned she­ets and co­ol as a glis­te­ning icic­le. I ye­arn for this pris­ti­ne pla­ce of truth. And I know be­yond a sha­dow of a do­ubt that I will re­turn.

    Artisans of Re­ality

    Magic and tec­h­no­logy

    Voodoo dolls and chants

    Electricity

    We're ma­king

    Weird Sci­en­ce

    - Oin­go Bo­in­go, "We­ird Sci­en­ce"

    The wisps of smo­ke ro­se from the still-warm cin­ders, blo­wing ac­ross the hill and in­to Pro­fes­sor Var­gel's eyes. But he did not blink as he mar­c­hed re­so­lu­tely for­ward, fol­lo­wed by the dwarf, lug­ging a he­avy-lo­oking bag. When he re­ac­hed the cen­ter of the ru­ined ho­use, s tep­ping over the burnt fo­un­da­ti­on posts and blac­ke­ned fur­ni­tu­re, he stop­ped and stam­ped the ash-st­rewn gro­und, A hol­low so­und res­pon­ded. "He­re! It is still he­re! Co­me!" he yel­led to his com­pa­ni­on, and the dwarf ca­me over and pul­led a crow­bar out of the bag, han­ding it to Vor­gel. Vo­gel kic­ked the as­hes away from the wo­oden trap do­or on the flo­or and fit the crow­bar un­der the lip, then he­aved hard. The wo­od crac­ked and splin­te­red, we­ake­ned al­re­ady by the fi­re, its ma­gic­kal wards ha­ving pro­tec­ted it from des­t­ruc­ti­on. It ga­ve way and Vo­gel threw the old wo­od off, re­ve­aling a dark sto­ne sta­ir­well le­ading down, "Thank God, Janus, tho­se fo­ols did not re­ali­ze the la­bo­ra­tory was be­ne­ath the ho­use. Idi­ot Sle­epers! Qu­es­ti­oning my in­tents?.' How da­re they say I spurn God with my work- I, Vor­gel! Well, they can burn what they don't un­der­s­tand, but they won' t s top the march of Sci­en­ce with the­ir pe­asant thre­ats!"

    While Sle­epers are sus­pi­ci­o­us and fe­ar­ful of most ma­ges, the Sons of Et­her ha­ve born the brunt of this pho­bia mo­re than most Tra­di­ti­ons, ex­cep­ting, per­haps, the Ver­be­na. Many Sle­epers fe­ar that sci­en­ce can en­dan­ger them with nuc­le­ar ra­di­ati­on or even gi­ant mu­ta­ted in­sects, and this le­ads to ri­di­cu­le and wit­ch-hunts aga­inst the sci­en­tists at fa­ult - a t le­ast, aga­inst tho­se who se­em to be at fa­ult. The Tec­h­noc­racy ac­tu­al­ly uses Et­her ma­ges as sca­pe­go­ats for the­ir ex­pe­ri­ments go­ne wrong. They bla­me them for any "gu­inea pig" ex­pe­ri­ment they can't hi­de from the Sle­epers any lon­ger, such as sec­ret nuc­le­ar tes­ting aga­inst ci­ti­zenry du­ring the '50s. This so­me­ti­mes le­ads to vi­olent ret­ri­bu­ti­on by the ci­ti­zenry of so­me co­un­t­ri­es. The Sons of Et­her see this as a bet­ra­yal of sorts, for they are only stri­ving to im­p­ro­ve the lot of Man, Yes, so­me get hurt in the pro­cess, but Sci­en­ce must pro­ce­ed…

    Vogel and Janos en­te­red the dar­k­ness and mo­ved down the sta­irs to the iron do­or at the bot­tom. Vor­gel ner­vo­usly fum­b­led with the keys that hung from a lar­ge ring at­tac­hed to his belt. The lock clic­ked and tur­ned, and Vor­gel pus­hed the he­avy do­or open. He re­ac­hed in­to the de­eper dar­k­ness be­yond and hit a switch just past the do­or. The­re was a low whi­ne, which bu­ilt in pitch for a few se­conds and then ste­adi­ed out to a lo­ud hum. The ro­om was sud­denly bat­hed in light, and the ge­ne­ra­tor kic­ked in. They en­te­red the ro­om and lo­oked abo­ut. "It's per­fect. They ha­ve to­uc­hed not­hing." Vor­gel sa­id, yel­ling to be he­ard over the in­ces­sant hum­ming. "We can pro­ce­ed with the fi­nal sta­ges. Pre­pa­re the Ray Pro­j­ec­tor, Janos. In but an ho­ur, I shall pro­ve to the world that the tran­s­mu­ta­ti­on of man in­to me­tal can be ac­hi­eved on a nor­mal sca­le. Think of it, Janos-any man can be­co­me a man of ste­el, ne­ver to worry any lon­ger abo­ut me­re inj­ury or pa­in. Such a man can mo­ve mo­un­ta­ins with his ba­re hands! No- such men! For this sci­en­ce will be ava­ilab­le to all on­ce we ha­ve per­fec­ted the Or­ga­nic Smel­ting Tran­s­mog­ri­fi­ca­ti­on. Ray!"

    Each Son of Et­her usu­al­ly has his or her own pet the­ory with which to storm the ga­tes of As­cen­si­on. This the­ory of­ten be­co­mes a dri­ving go­al to them, and ex­t­re­me ob­ses­si­on and pa­ra­no­ia of­ten bu­ilds up aro­und the the­ory and its det­rac­tors. The­ori­es vary wi­dely, but they of­ten in­vol­ve pro­ving that a ma­gic­kal ef­fect is ac­tu­al­ly a Na­tu­ral Law, an obj­ec­ti­ve truth which must be al­lo­wed in­to con­sen­su­al re­ality, for to do ot­her­wi­se wo­uld deny the te­nants of Sci­en­ce. The­ir gre­at an­ger at the Tec­h­noc­racy aro­se when the Con­ven­ti­ons re­fu­sed to re­cog­ni­ze the "com­mon sen­se" and "pla­in facts" of many Sons of Et­her pet the­ori­es.

    The pri­mary con­cept of the Tra­di­ti­on's fo­un­ding con­cer­ned et­her, the un­se­en "fifth es­sen­se" which con­t­rols how light tra­vels. If a Son of Et­her can suc­ces­sful­ly con­vin­ce the world that her the­ory is cor­rect, any ma­gick per­for­med wit­hin the te­nants of that the­ory be­co­mes co­in­ci­den­tal, with no dan­ger of Pa­ra­dox. This is the key to the Et­her ma­ges' As­cen­si­on go­al: to turn all things we­ird and won­der­ful in­to a sci­en­ce, a met­hod ava­ilab­le to all hu­man­kind. The Tec­h­no­man­cers des­pe­ra­tely try to pre­vent such in­cur­si­ons in­to the­ir plan, but ha­ve be­en unab­le to stop Son of Et­her the­ori­es that wo­uld re­turn the et­her to cos­mo­logy.

    Vorgel mo­ved to­wards a lar­ge desk pi­led high with pa­pers. He be­gan to mo­ve them asi­de when he stop­ped, sta­ring at the top she­et! "Janos! So­me­one has be­en he­re! I did not le­ave the di­ag­ram for the fifth mat­rix on top of my desk; it was in my dra­wer when we fled. Damn!" He tos­sed the pa­pers ac­ross the ro­om with a swe­ep of his hand. "Who co­uld it ha­ve be­en? Aha! Tho­se fo­ols back at the Chantry. They we­re chec­king up on us, Janos, trying to see if I was cor­rect af­ter all. Oho! I bet they're- get­ting re­ady to eat the­ir words right now. Su­rely they co­uld not deny the evi­den­ce he­re; they must re­cog­ni­ze my the­ory now! The next is­sue of Pa­ra­dig­ma will be de­di­ca­ted to my work."

    There is of­ten in­ten­se ri­valry among Sons of Et­her ma­ges, es­pe­ci­al­ly when the­ori­es con­f­lict. Such ri­val­ri­es of­ten le­ad to spying and sa­bo­ta­ge of anot­her ma­ge's work, just in ca­se a com­pe­ti­tor is get­ting to clo­se to one's own dis­co­ve­ri­es. The Sons of Et­her re­le­ase a qu­ar­terly jo­ur­nal de­di­ca­ted to the the­ori­es of its mem­bers. This jo­ur­nal, cal­led Pa­ra­dig­ma, is of­ten a pla­ce for fu­ri­o­us ver­bal bic­ke­ring and bac­k­s­tab­bing, as ma­ges try to dis­p­ro­ve the the­ori­es of the­ir ri­vals. Only the Mas­ters and Orac­les are re­sis­tant to this in­fig­h­ting, as all uni­ver­sal­ly res­pect the­ir the­ori­es, and so­me even de­di­ca­te the­ir work to im­p­ro­ving upon the­ir Mas­ters' the­ori­es.

    "Oh yes, Janos," Vor­gel sa­id as he se­ar­c­hed the pa­pers on the desk, "I will ha­ve qu­ite a ta­le to tell on my re­turn. Tho­se ar­m­c­hair sci­en­tists in the Lo­un­ge will clam­ber all over me, des­pe­rate to so­ak in the in­tel­lect of a true sci­en­tist! Ha! Hum­p­h­reys was so pro­ud of his Ama­zon dis­co­very, stin­king up the ro­om with his che­ap ci­gar- I'll show him! They'll cho­ke on the­ir sherry when they see a de­mon­s­t­ra­ti­on of my ex­pe­ri­ment! Even Ma­da­me Dup­re­au will not be ab­le to hi­de her ad­mi­ra­tion. It is not li­ke the old days, Janos. Wo­men knew how to show pro­per res­pect for a man's dis­co­ve­ri­es. Oh, M. Dup­re­au has cer­ta­inly shown her ge­ni­us, what with her mag­ne­tism ex­pe­ri­ments, but she co­uld cer­ta­inly act mo­re li­ke a pro­per Son." Vor­gel sho­ok his he­ad, wis­t­ful for bygo­ne days.

    While the Sons of Et­her cle­ave to a de­vo­ut ide­al of prog­ress, a con­ti­nu­al ri­sing of hu­man as­pi­ra­ti­ons, the­ir ide­al is rat­her Vic­to­ri­an, with a cor­res­pon­dent of what they ba­se or hin­li­eve they be­ar a sort of "ma­ge's bur­den," that they alo­ne among the Tra­di­ti­ons se­ek true prog­ress. So­ci­al­ly, they usu­al­ly gat­her in­to an old style "men's club" of sorts, al­t­ho­ugh wo­men are cer­ta­inly wel­co­me in mo­dern ti­mes. Ho­we­ver, many Sons are Vic­to­ri­an in the­ir so­ci­al vi­ews, and wish wo­men wo­uld act mo­re li­ke "la­di­es," They prac­ti­ces do­ub­le-stan­dard with im­pu­nity. The Twen­ti­eth cen­tury, ho­we­ver is cat­c­hing up with this Tra­di­ti­on, Wo­men in the Tra­di­ti­on hold mo­re and mo­re po­wer, and the­re is an ac­ti­ve lobby to chan­ge the na­me from "Sons" to so­met­hing less se­xist. This is, of co­ur­se, hotly re­sis­ted by the old boys net­work wit­hin the Tra­di­ti­on, blindly den­ying the ide­al of prog­ress they so fer­vently pro­fess.

    Vorgel wal­ked ac­ross the ro­om to in­s­pect the lar­ge mach ne bol­ted to the flo­or the­re. It re­sem­b­led a gi­ant gun, but the tes­la co­ils along its hu­ge bar­rel po­in­ted to ot­her, od­der uses. Janos had a hatch in the si­de open and was cle­aning co­ils wit­hin when he ac­ci­den­tally drop­ped a screw­d­ri­ver-li­ke in­s­t­ru­ment. The clan­ging no­ise re­ver­be­ra­ted ac­ross the ro­om.

    "You fo­ol! Do you re­ali­ze what you've do­ne!" Vor­gel yel­led. "If the co­il adj­us­ter is even den­ted by a mic­ro­me­ter, the ex­pe­ri­ment is ru­ined! Idi­ot! Pick it up and check it on the mic­ro­lathe for da­ma­ge. Now.'" Janos she­epishly scut­tled over to the fal­len in­s­t­ru­ment, pic­ked it up and went to exa­mi­ne it on anot­her bi­zar­re mac­hi­ne. Vor­gel sho­ok his he­ad and bu­ri­ed it in his hands. "You're lucky I sa­ved you from tho­se sol­di­ers. Anot­her, less com­pas­si­ona­te man wo­uld ha­ve let them kill you. Sur­ro­un­ded by fo­ols…" he mut­te­red.

    Unlike ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons, the Sons of Et­her of­ten ha­ve tro­ub­le ga­ining kno­wing and wil­ling Acol­y­tes, Most pu­pils in­te­res­ted in su­per-sci­en­ce and tec­h­no­logy are all too easily se­du­ced by the Tec­h­noc­racy. This, com­po­un­ded by the usu­al­ly ac­ri­mo­ni­o­us so­ci­al skills of the Et­her ma­ges, ca­uses the Sons of Et­her to of­ten bri­be, ca­j­ole, thre­aten or gu­ilt-trip the­ir Acol­y­tes to en­su­re the­ir lo­yalty. Many Acol­y­tes are pul­led from the dregs of so­ci­ety and be­li­eve they truly ha­ve now­he­re bet­ter to go. Ot­her Sons of Et­her, dis­t­rus­ting the hu­man pen­c­hant for cri­me, bu­ild ro­bot ser­vi­tors in­s­te­ad to help them in the­ir la­bors.

    "Excuse me, Pro­fes­sor Vor­gel," Janos sa­id humbly, in­ter­rup­ting Vor­gel as he ma­de so­me adj­us­t­ments to the ray's tar­ge­ting.

    "What it it?" Vor­gel bar­ked.

    "It is ti­me for the Euro­pe­an Sci­en­ce Con­fe­ren­ce. On the ra­dio, Pro­fes­sor."

    "Ah, yes. Cor­rect you are. Turn it on, then. I want to he­ar tho­se fo­ols among the Tec­h­noc­racy and what they are plan­ning now." Vor­gel smi­led to him­self. It didn't mat­ter what They did, They co­uldn't stop him from ga­ining de­fi­ni­ti­ve pro­of of his the­ory now. The ra­dio ca­me on, and the chi­ef spe­aker was al­re­ady an­no­un­cing the first gu­est, a Dr. Tho­mas Hol­der. Af­ter ap­pla­use in the audi­en­ce, Dr. Hol­der be­gan to spe­ak abo­ut his re­cent dis­co­very in the la­bo­ra­tory. As he spo­ke on, Vor­gel slowly clim­bed down the step­lad­der he was stan­ding on. He dis­p­la­yed a shoc­ked lo­ok. Hol­der was, po­int by po­int, dis­p­ro­ving the the­ory of so­me un­na­med "col­le­ague" who be­li­eved it was pos­sib­le to rep­la­ce or­ga­nic ma­te­ri­els in a li­ving spe­ci­men with mi­ne­rals, spe­ci­fi­cal­ly me­tal­lur­gic, com­po­nents and still ha­ve the pa­ti­ent li­ve and adj­ust. Hol­der con­c­lu­ded by sta­ting that only thro­ugh the bur­ge­oning fi­eld of bi­onics- rep­la­cing limbs with pre-mac­hi­ned parts- co­uld such a the­ory ever work.

    Vorgel scre­amed: "It was him! He was the one who bro­ke in he­re and sto­le a lo­ok at my no­tes! A Tec­h­no­man­cer! He… he has ri­di­cu­led my the­ory, and ma­de them be­li­eve tho­se fo­ols at Ite­ra­tion X are on the right path! My work! It is for not­hing!" Vor­gel slowly slid to the flo­or, sta­ring at the wall blankly.

    The Tec­h­noc­racy con­ti­nu­al­ly sends spi­es forth to dis­co­ver the va­ri­o­us the­ori­es of Sons of Et­her ma­ges. They then blast such the­ori­es in the me­dia, dis­p­ro­ving them be­fo­re they even ha­ve a chan­ce to con­vin­ce the Sle­epers. So­me­ti­mes the Tec­h­noc­racy will even ste­al such the­ori­es and ta­ke cre­dit for them, dri­ving an Et­her ma­ge to fits of ra­ge and ul­ti­ma­tely even in­sa­nity as his li­fe's work is per­ver­ted aro­und him.

    Janos loc­ked the do­or be­hind him and ran up the sta­irs to whe­re Vor­gel sto­od, sta­ring blankly in­to the night sky. He to­ok the Pro­fes­sor's hand and be­gan to le­ad him thro­ugh the ma­ze of bro­ken and bur­ned wo­od and fur­ni­tu­re, hel­ping him to step ca­re­ful­ly over the ob­s­tac­les. All the whi­le, Vor­gel sta­red blankly ahe­ad, as if he pos­ses­sed no mind what­so­ever. When they re­ac­hed the bot­tom of the hill and the small ro­ad­way, Janos sat the Pro­fes­sor down and went to stand in the ro­ad, with his thumb out, wa­iting for a car to co­me by. No one ca­me.

    Hours pas­sed. As the sun ro­se over the ho­ri­zon, Janos tur­ned to lo­ok at the Pro­fes­sor. The blank lo­ok was go­ne, ho­we­ver, rep­la­ced by an in­ten­se sta­re, di­rec­ted to­wards the ri­sing sun. The Pro­fes­sor be­gan to mut­ter, "Yes… yes, of co­ur­se. How blind of me… The sun! Yes, that's it! Why turn men in­to ste­el, Janos, when we fu­we the sun? What po­wer! What pu­re energy, wa­iting to be tap­ped. If a sin­g­le man co­uld re­ali­ze the fu­si­on po­ten­ti­al, then all men wo­uld be­ne­fit. I'm su­re that the­re must be a way, a met­hod to har­ness such po­wer in a sim­p­le, hand-held de­vi­ce…" His mut­te­ring drop­ped off in vo­lu­me as Vor­gel fu­ri­o­usly be­gan cal­cu­la­ting fi­gu­res in his he­ad, Janos smi­led to see the Pro­fes­sor back, and smi­led even bro­ader as he he­ard the so­und of a car co­ming, out of sight be­hind the hill.

    "Janos," Vor­gel sa­id, "I ha­ve a fe­eling that this ap­pro­ac­hing ve­hic­le is car­rying so­lar pa­nels. Flag it down. I'm su­re it is me­ant for us."

    Delvers of the Es­sen­ce

    "But the no­uris­h­ment I pro­vi­de," she tho­ught "is not milk, but a dif­fe­rent hu­mor." She con­ti­nu­ed her pe­dan­tic, dis­t­rac­ting spe­ech. "My skin is very pa­le, clo­se to tran­s­pa­rent. It lo­oks fra­gi­le, but I he­al very qu­ickly. My ve­ins are clo­se to the sur­fa­ce, easy to get to. See how thick and blue they are? I ne­ver ha­ve any tro­ub­le gi­ving blo­od. The ne­ed­le j u s t pops right in, and out it spurts. Easy as sin."

    - Pat Ca­li­fia, "The Vam­pi­re"

    "First of all," she sa­id, "we must first de­al with this prob­lem you ha­ve with yo­ur body, with yo­ur blo­od." She held his arm firmly as the kni­fe was bro­ught clo­se to his skin. It flas­hed in the light, very sharp, con­sec­ra­ted, cle­an­sed and sa­ni­ti­zed. He tri­ed to flinch, but his body bet­ra­yed him. She had just whis­pe­red a few words, and now his body was loc­ked in pla­ce. He co­uldn't ma­ke his mus­c­les mo­ve. She drew a de­li­ca­te cur­ve on his chest as he wat­c­hed in the mir­ror she had pro­vi­ded, Anot­her. A symbol, swe­eping and be­a­uti­ful, drawn on the par­c­h­ment which pro­vi­des its own ink. The blo­od flo­wed softly down his chest, tic­k­ling his skin.

    "Are you as­ha­med of li­fe, Jay? Be­ca­use we can't ha­ve you as one of us if you can't li­ve. I me­an truly li­ve. If you want to die, we can ar­ran­ge it, and you may ad­van­ce among tho­se who study De­ath. But among us, you ha­ve to want to li­ve. Re­al­ly li­ve."

    Jay mo­aned as he felt en­dor­p­hins ro­ar thro­ugh him, and felt so­met­hing in­si­de him chan­ge. He was chan­ging li­ke a se­ed just be­fo­re ger­mi­na­ti­on, li­ke a plant po­king its sho­ots up thro­ugh the earth. She saw he had be­gun to ac­cept his body and his blo­od, and she felt the li­fe energy wit­hin him sur­ge. "Let the­re be li­fe, Jay…" she sa­id, kis­sing him, her ha­ir fal­ling all aro­und him.

    The Ver­be­na hold them­sel­ves as one of the ol­dest Tra­di­ti­ons. The­ir walks thro­ugh the Sphe­re of Ti­me (so­me Ver­be­na call it the Ri­ver of Ti­me) ha­ve shown them that, even in the dark ti­mes of pre-his­tory when hu­ma­nity was but an em­ber abo­ut to burst in­to fla­me, the­re we­re we­avers of ma­gic, twis­ters of fa­te that fol­lo­wed the­ir ways and the­ir Tra­di­ti­on- the ro­ots of the­ir Tree, if you will.

    Is it any won­der that the Tra­di­ti­on is lar­gely ac­cu­sed of over­w­hel­ming ar­ro­gan­ce? Hardly. When one con­si­ders the­ir many suc­ces­ses and fa­ilu­res, the­ir sta­tic ga­ins and cos­mic los­ses, the­ir ge­ne­ra­ti­onal har­mony and the­ir en­d­less in­ter­nal wars, the Ver­be­na ha­ve many re­asons to be pro­ud… and many re­asons to be as­ha­med.

    Though they ha­ve jo­ur­ne­yed to diz­zying he­ights and ha­ve plum­me­ted to gre­at depths, they ha­ve sur­vi­ved. As ot­her Crafts, the­ir na­mes now lost to ti­me, ha­ve fal­len in­to dust with no fan­fa­re and no mo­ur­ners, the Ver­be­na ha­ve adap­ted, grown and thri­ved in the har­s­hest ti­mes. Per­haps the best ana­logy for the Ver­be­na is that of an an­ci­ent gnar­led oak. The oak's ro­ots re­ach de­ep in­to the bed­rock. Its trunk is strong, and yet it has had to grow aro­und ob­s­tac­les pla­ced in its way as it grew. The bran­c­hes are many and var­ying in si­ze and strength, but chi­efly, they are fle­xib­le and al­ways se­ek the wind and the sky. The fru­it, the acorns, drop to the gro­und from the bran­c­hes and start brand new tre­es, ker­nels of dis­til­led strength and wis­dom from the pa­rent.

    The Ver­he­na are as va­ri­ed and as strong as the an­ci­ent tree. The­re are so­me who fol­low the an­ci­ent, pri­mi­ti­ve, pri­mor­di­al ways- the old ru­nes, the blo­od -sac­ri­fi­ce, the chan­ting, the drum­ming, the tur­ning of the Whe­el, the ro­ots of the tree. The­re are so­me who, as the tree's trunk, up­hold the strength of the tree by fol­lo­wing the an­ci­ent Pat­terns as pres­c­ti­bed by the mat­ri­li­ne­al Bo­oks of Sha­dow and the pat­ri­li­ne­al Ru­nes­ticks which, to this day, must be used in tan­dem be­fo­re they re­ve­al the­ir wis­dom.

    Then ca­me the Bur­ning Ti­mes, the In­qu­isi­ti­on, and the tree was ne­arly split asun­der- but this did not des­t­roy it. In­s­te­ad, the Dyna­mic bran­c­hes of the tree shot up and out in many new, li­ving va­ri­ati­ons, as the Li­fe­dan­cers bla­tantly de­fi­ed the an­ci­ent Pat­terns and so­ught to dis­co­ver the­ir own un­der­s­tan­ding. From the­se ex­p­lo­ra­ti­ons, un­c­ha­ined but chan­ne­led by the sha­dows the Tec­h­noc­racy, ca­me tho­se who se­ar­c­hed for the ul­ti­ma­te wis­dom, the Truth. And in the­ir ec­clec­tic Qu­es­ting, se­ar­c­hing out old and new, stran­ge and fa­mi­li­ar, they so­oh le­ar­ned that they them­sel­ves we­re the ker­nel or Truth, that in ex­p­lo­ring all that ma­gick had to of­fer, they them­sel­ves ca­me to be a mic­ro­cosm of the who­le Tree- the fru­it, the Acorn of Wis­dom.

    The Ver­be­na aren't just one part of the Tree, al­t­ho­ugh many see them as tho­se who are fol­lo­wing the Pat­terns of old- the ben­ders and twis­ters of fa­te, tho­se pri­es­tes­ses and prac­ti­ti­oners ti­ed to pat­tern and old symbols. In­de­ed, that seg­ment is im­por­tant- it is the­ir strength. But the re­al Ver­be­na form the who­le of the Tree. Only by con­si­de­ring the who­le can you be­gin to un­der­s­tand that each Ver­be­na is a ref­lec­ti­on of it.

    "You see, Jay, in the old ti­mes, we wo­uldn't ha­ve to do this. Li­fe was ever­y­w­he­re then. And Li­fe was ho­no­red, res­pec­ted. From a per­son's First Blo­od, be it men­s­t­ru­ati­on or the first hunt, to the­ir Bir­t­hing Blo­od, the pri­ce they pay for an­y­t­hing las­ting and sus­ta­inab­le, to the­ir fi­nal Li­fe's Blo­od, which they gi­ve fre­ely back to the cycle of Li­fe. But you mustn't think Blo­od is the only car­ri­er of Li­fe. In­de­ed, it is only one of many of Li­fe's sac­red sub­s­tan­ces. Li­fe, it se­ems, re­al­ly is a sticky su­bj­ect, a very wet one at that. Wa­ter and Li­fe go to­get­her, Jay, and that's all the Blo­od is, an­y­way."

    To the Ver­be­na, blo­od, swe­at, te­ars and ot­her hu­mors ace as the wa­ter in the gre­at sea of Li­fe. In­de­ed, Li­fe ca­me from the sea. The Ver­be­na hold res­pect for the sea, as well as the Mo­on, which go­verns both the­ir he­arts and the­ir Blo­od. They hold all Li­fe in high re­gard and work to pro­tect it whe­ne­ver pos­sib­le, as long as do­ing so do­es not be­co­me un­na­tu­ral. A Ver­be­na wo­uld not stop a na­tu­ral pre­da­tor from at­tac­king its na­tu­ral prey, but he wo­uld stop wol­ves from be­ing hun­ted by hu­mans in he­li­cop­ters. The wolf's hun­ting is a na­tu­ral part of the Li­fe cycle; sho­oting from a he­li­cop­ter is an abo­mi­na­ti­on and af­f­ront to that cycle.

    "This is the Cir­c­le, Jay. He­re we are out­si­de of the world, out­si­de of our past. He­re, you will co­me in­to yo­ur own. He­re, you will be re­born in­to yo­ur own body and truly we­ar it for the first ti­me. How many Sle­epers go thro­ugh li­fe to­tal­ly out of con­t­rol, unab­le to pro­perly re­act to the stres­ses and stra­ins of mo­dern li­fe? You must le­arn, by ro­te, the way to cle­an yo­ur blo­od of such po­isons."

    To a Ver­be­na, the body is it­self a sca­red shri­ne, and fe­eling is a form of pra­yer. A bac­k­rub is a bri­ef bles­sing, whi­le a full-body mas­sa­ge is a sac­ra­ment. Se­xu­al in­ter­co­ur­se is a ma­j­or ri­te, a pra­yer for Li­fe. The Body is a mic­ro­cosm all its own. The ul­ti­ma­te in ho­lis­tic me­di­ci­ne, Ver­be­na he­aling at­tempts to ta­ke in­to ac­co­unt the full na­tu­re of the il­lness or wrong do­ne to the body. It al­lows a Ver­be­na to un­der­s­tand the na­tu­re of tho­se di­se­ases by vo­lun­ta­rily ta­king them, in­to her­self and de­aling with them.

    But you mustn't think that the only sphe­re that the Ver­be­na know is Li­fe. They are mas­ters of it, but are the fo­un­ders of know­led­ge in many very im­por­tant sphe­res: Mat­ter, For­ces, Mind, Pri­me and Cor­res­pon­den­ce we­re the­ir ori­gi­nal dis­co­ve­ri­es, it's sa­id. Still, Li­fe de­fi­nes them be­ca­use they are Li­fe.

    "The wo­od at yo­ur back is the Tree of Li­fe. Its ro­ots dig de­ep, and it has be­en fed the blo­od of all who ha­ve ever li­ved he­re. Now our Co­ven no­uris­hes it. And so­on, so will yo­urs. This Tree knows all our na­mes, and so­on it will le­arn yo­urs. Yo­ur mot­her ne­ver knew what she was do­ing, na­ming you as she did. To me, you are a ful­fil­lment of a prop­hecy- when I set my spi­rit cal­ling for an ap­pren­ti­ce, I saw a blue jay in my dre­ams that night. How was I to know that it wo­uld be you, my Jay, my Jacob, who wo­uld co­me to me? But so­on you will be re­born, and you will be yo­ur own mot­her. You will na­me yo­ur­self. Da­re you cho­ose a gre­at na­me and a gre­at des­tiny? Or will you li­ve among us as a qu­i­et her­mit, with a na­me that one only bre­at­hes, not sa­vors? Cho­ose well! And re­mem­ber me, Jay. We ho­nor our te­ac­hers with our na­mes, and when it is all sa­id and do­ne, all of our na­mes are the sa­me. We are Ver­be­na."

    Names are ex­t­re­mely im­por­tant to the Ver­be­na, be­ca­use they be­li­eve that one's na­me rep­re­sents one's li­ving Es­sen­ce. The es­sen­ce of bre­ath cre­ates ma­gick when it na­mes a thing, a pla­ce or a per­son. To know a Ver­be­na's sec­ret blo­od-na­me is to ha­ve a se­ri­o­us po­wer over him. A Ver­be­na may chan­ge his na­me se­ve­ral ti­mes over the co­ur­se of his li­fe to show that he has chan­ged, or grown in a spe­ci­fic way. Of­ten this is a mi­nor chan­ge, such as 'He­as­ha Mor­nin­g­s­ha­de' to 'He­as­ha Mor­nin­g­s­tar.' So­me­ti­mes, ho­we­ver, it is a ma­j­or chan­ge. Many Ver­be­na do not as­su­me yo­ur na­me is the sa­me every ti­me they me­et you: the po­li­ce thing to ask is "What are you cal­led?"

    "You to­uch the Tree, but you do not Fe­el it. You must re­ach out with yo­ur know­led­ge, with yo­ur ma­gick, and meld yo­ur sen­ses with it. Fe­el the sap rus­hing thro­ugh you. Fe­el yo­ur ro­ots go­ing down, so­aking in the fer­ti­le so­il. Fe­el the gen­t­le mo­ve­ment of yo­ur le­aves, the swe­et tin­ge of pa­in as I pluck a tiny branch from you. Yes. That's it. Bre­at­he in the tree. Yo­ur blo­od to its blo­od."

    The Ver­be­na are abo­ut as or­ga­ni­zed as a bat­h­tub full of drun­ken cats. The­re are many dif­fe­rent 'fla­vors' of Ver­be­na, from ul­t­ra-con­ser­va­ti­ves who still chant in an­ci­ent Nor­se and Gre­ek and still per­form re­gu­lar blo­od sac­ri­fi­ces, to tho­se who work to per­fect the­ir bo­di­es as the next step on the evo­lu­ti­onary sca­le, to the free ra­di­cal li­be­rals who es­c­hew vul­gar ma­gick and in­s­te­ad use herbs, mot­her­wit and po­si­ti­vity to he­al and do ma­gick.

    Though they do not ha­ve a ri­gid hi­erarchy, the Ver­be­na do be­li­eve in a com­mon set of et­hics and mo­rals re­gar­ding ma­gick. First and fo­re­most, they hold that Li­fe sho­uld not be ma­de un­na­tu­ral thro­ugh Ma­gick. They will ex­tend the­ir own li­ves ma­gic­kal­ly, but only up to the ut­most li­mit of hu­man aging. They will not ca­use things which sho­uld not li­ve to co­me ali­ve, and they will not di­rectly al­ter the fun­da­men­tal or­ga­nic struc­tu­re of a cre­atu­re- such as its ge­ne­tic co­de.

    They ha­ve no qu­alms, ho­we­ver, abo­ut chan­ging one kind of li­fe in­to a com­p­le­tely dif­fe­rent kind. They al­so ha­ve no prob­lem with do­ing da­ma­ge to a cre­atu­re with ma­gick if its li­fe-pat­tern co­uld con­ce­ivably adapt to or he­al the da­ma­ge. That li­fe is sac­red to them sho­uld be ob­vi­o­us; they will not re­du­ce it or ma­ke it in­to so­met­hing that they con­si­der to be un­na­tu­ral.

    Because one's own in­di­vi­du­ality and uni­qu­eness of vi­si­on: is so sac­red to the Vet­be­na, the idea of ma­king a clo­ne of one's self, li­te­ral­ly anot­her fal­se Self, is ab­hor­rent to them. This is one of the re­asons the clo­ne-ma­king Pro­ge­ni­tors are such ha­ted ene­mi­es. So­me of the mo­re po­wer­ful Mas­ters of the Ver­be­na ha­ve de­ve­lo­ped ro­tes to help them lo­ca­te and des­t­roy clo­nes ma­de from them­sel­ves or from the­ir al­li­es.

    They al­so ha­ve so­me an­ta­go­nists in the Tra­di­ti­ons: the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus. The Ver­be­na see the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus' ne­ar-wor­s­hip of the tran­s­cen­dent One as the­ir fo­olish at­tempt to ex­ter­na­li­ze so­met­hing that is wit­hin ever­yo­ne. The Ver­be­na as­sert that the Self is the true One, the One Wit­hin, and this is in di­rect op­po­si­ti­on to the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus' vi­ews. It's a mi­rac­le that the two can co-exist wit­hin the Tra­di­ti­ons, which is a strong ar­gu­ment for the Cho­rus' be­li­efs; mi­rac­les are the­ir tra­de­mark.

    The Ver­be­na be­li­eve that hu­ma­nity will re­ach As­cen­si­on when hu­mans re­ali­ze this es­sen­ti­al con­cept: wit­hin the Self, all things are pos­sib­le. In­si­de the Self, the per­so­nal is sac­red and Li­fe is Truth. The re­ason they are con­s­tantly fo­cu­sing in­ward, fo­cu­sing on the­ir own per­s­pec­ti­ve rat­her than trying to un­der­s­tand ot­hers, is that they be­li­eve that by chan­ging one's Self, one can ut­terly chan­ge all Sel­ves. Ga­ia Her­self wo­uld. As­cend if eno­ugh pe­op­le As­cen­ded. Be­ca­use of this, they are wil­ling to spend much of the­ir re­so­ur­ces on gu­iding in­di­vi­du­als to the Path, re­aso­ning that one so­ul can bla­ze the way for many.

    From the ro­ots of the tree which to­uch on the most pri­mal parts of Li­fe to the fru­it-be­aring bran­c­hes that re­ach to the sky of As­cen­si­on, it's qu­ite pos­sib­le that the Ver­be­na's in­fa­mo­us ar­ro­gan­ce is de­ser­ved, or at le­ast un­der­s­tan­dab­le. Af­ter all, be­fo­re the­re was wri­ting, be­fo­re hu­ma­nity used fi­res to warm them­sel­ves, the Ver­be­na ta­ught wo­men and men how to pa­int blo­od-pic­tu­res to gu­aran­tee the hunt. The Ver­be­na as­sert that, if all the ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons we­re to sud­denly va­nish to­mor­row, they alo­ne co­uld le­ad hu­ma­nity to­ward As­cen­si­on, and they just might be right.

    "Oh, Jay. You are ne­op­h­y­te in so many things, aren't you? I sa­vor yo­ur inex­pe­ri­en­ce, yo­ur ig­no­ran­ce. It's so de­li­ci­o­us to watch yo­ur eyes as yo­ur sen­ses be­ca­me mo­re and mo­re open. But now you must pla­ce yo­ur hand in the li­fes­t­re­am, for you must un­der­s­tand what it is to gently gu­ide it, to chan­nel its li­mit­less po­wer. Co­me, Jay, let me show you whe­re it li­es…."

    Crafters of New Vi­si­on

    Most pe­op­le spend the­ir li­ves avo­iding get­ting in­to ten­se si­tu­ati­ons. A re­po man spends his li­fe get­ting in­to ten­se si­tu­ati­ons.

    - Harry De­an Stan­ton, Re­po Man

    "You with me, Scre­amer?" as­ked Janor, the Or­der of Her­mes ma­ge.

    "I'm with you," ca­me the crac­k­ling reply. The Adept was using a te­le­pathy ro­te that si­mu­la­ted crac­k­ling ra­dio in­si­de the mind of his in­ten­ded tar­get. To his com­pat­ri­ots, it was pretty ir­ri­ta­ting, a bit of flash they didn't ne­ed.

    "Just li­ke we re­he­ar­sed. Ta­ke out the se­cu­rity system, and un­lock the do­ors."

    "Right-o."

    An in­s­tant la­ter, the lights on the bu­il­ding flas­hed and the do­ors kac­hun­ked open. No war­ning si­rens bla­red, and the emer­gency lights didn't ac­ti­va­te. The Pro­ge­ni­tor lab had be­en bre­ac­hed.

    "Piece o' ca­ke," crac­k­led Scre­amer's vo­ice in­si­de the­ir he­ads.

    "That's only the be­gin­ning, you ar­ro­gant putz," mut­te­red Janor.

    The Vir­tu­al Adepts are a stran­ge Tra­di­ti­on in­de­ed. Many do not con­si­der them full mem­bers of the Tra­di­ti­ons, mostly be­ca­use they we­re mem­bers of the Tec­h­noc­racy not so long ago. Many hold a low opi­ni­on of them, even tho­ugh the Adepts ha­ve sa­ved many ma­ges with the­ir spe­ci­al know­led­ge of tec­h­no­ma­gick and the Tec­h­noc­racy. The Adepts see them­sel­ves as Sa­vi­ors at the Ga­tes of Ob­li­vi­on. Ot­her Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges ha­ve less ple­asant na­mes for the­ir kind.

    The gro­up of ma­ges skit­te­red ner­vo­usly to­wards the lab. The ras­te­ri­zed map in­si­de each of the­ir he­ads kept track of whe­re they we­re in the bu­il­ding and led them ine­xo­rably to­wards the he­art of the lab. Janor aga­in sho­wed his dis­t­rust of tec­h­no­logy by op­ting to use the sta­irs, al­t­ho­ugh Scre­amer as­su­red him that all the ele­va­tors we­re sa­fe . They clim­bed down twen­ty-th­ree flights of sta­irs and ca­me to the Con­s­t­ruct lab.

    The re­la­ti­on­s­hip the Adepts ha­ve with the Tec­h­noc­racy is a two way stre­et- the Adepts lo­at­he the Tec­h­noc­racy, whi­le the Tec­h­noc­racy wo­uld li­ke not­hing mo­re than to see them ex­ter­mi­na­ted. Many Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges, not wan­ting to be­co­me can­non fod­der, will not as­so­ci­ate with the Adepts un­less for­ced. Many agents of the Tec­h­noc­racy tend-to be­co­me mo­re rut­h­less than usu­al when fa­ced with Vir­tu­al Adepts and will stop at not­hing to des­t­roy them. This kind of be­ha­vi­or rightly frig­h­tens ot­her ma­ges. So­me Tec­h­noc­racy le­aders, ho­we­ver, ta­ke a mo­re prag­ma­tic ap­pro­ach, rightly sen­sing the kin­s­hip be­ne­ath the ha­te. Tho­se Tec­h­no­man­cers who ma­na­ge to con­vert Vir­tu­al Adepts back to the fold win va­lu­ab­le al­li­es.

    The ro­ots of this re­la­ti­on­s­hip go back to the bre­akup bet­we­en the Con­ven­ti­ons and the Vir­tu­al Adepts. The Adepts hurt the Tec­h­noc­racy very badly by ta­king co­pi­es of many Tec­h­noc­racy fi­les to the Tra­di­ti­ons. The Tec­h­noc­racy res­pon­ded by ro­un­ding up as many Adepts as pos­sib­le and tor­tu­ring them. The­re are so­me who say that even to­day, Adepts from this era are be­ing tor­tu­red in hor­rif­ying ex­pe­ri­ments abo­ut the pa­in thres­hold of the a hu­man body. Gi­ven the sta­te of Tec­h­noc­racy ad­van­ces in this area, it is not en­ti­rely im­pos­sib­le.

    As they ope­ned the do­or, the ani­mals shif­ted ner­vo­usly in the­ir ca­ges. A few tur­ned to watch the in­co­ming ma­ges with eyes not de­vo­id of re­ason, yet ut­terly ani­mal­li­ke at the sa­me ti­me. "Be ca­re­ful, bo­yos. My in­fo shows they've be­en rus­ti­in­gup so­me nasty things down the­re," crac­k­led the in­ces­sant vo­ice in the ma­ges' he­ads.

    Being the most dis­t­rus­ted Tra­di­ti­on hasn't stop­ped the Vir­tu­al Adepts. They re­gu­larly jo­in bands of ad­ven­tu­ro­us ma­ges, in stor­ming Tec­h­noc­racy stron­g­holds. Whi­le many es­c­hew per­so­nal con­tact, they re­ali­ze the ne­ces­sity of get­ting in­to the midst of things and dir­t­ying the­ir hands a bit. Many of the ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons rightly be­li­eve that the Adepts ha­ve so­me kind of per­so­nal ven­det­ta with the Tec­h­noc­racy. The know­led­ge that the Adepts ha­ve of the Tec­h­noc­racy al­so ma­kes them for­mi­dab­le al­li­es in any ra­id, aga­inst Tec­h­noc­racy hol­dings.

    As mas­ters of all things di­gi­tal and elec­t­ri­cal, Vir­tu­al Adepts li­ve by the ada­ge that In­for­ma­ti­on is Re­ality, Many al­so be­li­eve that in­for­ma­ti­on is a li­ving, sen­ti­ent for­ce that wis­hes to be fre­ed from its "top sec­ret" clas­si­fi­ca­ti­ons and en­c­r­y­p­ted da­ta fi­les. De­aling in in­for­ma­ti­on is a he­avy part of Vir­tu­al Adept so­ci­ety, al­t­ho­ugh they hold cer­ta­in types of know­led­ge in hig­her es­te­em than an Or­der of Her­mes ma­ge wo­uld.

    Screamer be­gan as the so­und of gun­fi­re rat­tled in­si­de his he­ad. He chec­ked his rig and scan­ned the lab for a li­ne in­to the bu­il­ding. Fin­ding a fe­ed­back anal­y­zer in the ro­om, he pre­pa­red the ro­tes to sho­ot him­self to the ro­om and re­adi­ed his hip com­pu­ter.

    At on­ce fi­ve ima­ges of the Adept le­apt in­to the ro­om. Just out­si­de the sta­ir­well, Scre­amer as­ses­sed the si­tu­ati­on from the eyes of his con­s­t­ructs. Stan­ding squ­are in the mid­dle of the ro­om was a gro­tes­que dog-sha­ped nig­h­t­ma­re with a cha­in gun spro­uting from its back. "Flas­hing red eyes loc­ked on each of the fi­ve new tar­gets and spra­yed the ro­om. The rest of his te­am, lying pro­ne on the flo­or, scram­b­led for co­ver.

    "Go ahe­ad, stu­pid. Was­te that am­mo."

    Virtual Adepts are al­so mas­ters of de­cep­ti­on and tric­kery. Using cer­ta­in abi­li­ti­es they ha­ve ho­ned sin­ce be­fo­re le­aving the Tec­h­noc­racy, the Adepts use de­cep­ti­on in nor­mal com­bat as well as in at­tempts to ga­mer pas­swords for re­mo­te com­pu­ter systems. The Adepts ha­ve mas­tery over the Sphe­re of Cor­res­pon­den­ce. As such, they of­ten avo­id lo­ca­ti­ons whe­re com­bat is ta­king pla­ce. In a pinch, they will ap­pe­ar to aid the­ir fal­ling com­ra­des. Adepts think very well un­der pres­su­re, and ha­ve an un­can­ny knack for "hac­king" out a so­lu­ti­on to a ne­arly im­pos­sib­le si­tu­ati­on, even if ot­hers aro­und them are lying on the flo­or crying for help.

    Spotting the ge­ne se­qu­en­cer in the cor­ner, Scre­amer pra­yed it hadn't be­en hit by the ri­coc­he­ting bul­lets. Ac­ces­sing the mac­hi­ne thro­ugh the Net, he prog­ram­med it to spit out a de­adly vi­rus with a se­qu­ence he had sto­len from anot­her Pro­ge­ni­tor ge­ne se­qu­en­cer. The se­qu­ence had be­en co­ded as a HIT Mark des­t­ruct vi­rus in the fi­es. Scre­amer just pra­yed it was a true HIT Mark they we­re fa­cing, and not so­me new evil.

    One of Scre­amer's ho­log­rams mo­ved sud­denly and went stra­ight for the ge­ne se­qu­en­cer. The HIT Mark trac­ked to fol­low and spra­yed the he­avy mac­hi­ne with ura­ni­um-dep­le­ted slugs from its cha­in gun. Scre­amer he­ard a short hiss, and he knew that the co­oker cham­ber on the se­qu­en­cer had be­en hit, re­le­asing a de­adly ge­ne coc­k­ta­il in­to the se­aled lab. Wat­c­hing thro­ugh ho­log­rap­hic eyes, Scre­amer saw the HIT Mark sud­denly fall over and scrab­ble at the flo­or, li­ke a chic­ken with its neck bro­ken. The HIT Mark ga­ve a sud­den whe­eze and was still.

    The Adepts pre­fer to me­et ot­hers of the­ir kind in a vir­tu­al re­ality, a con­sen­su­al hal­lu­ci­na­ti­on whe­re physi­cal abi­li­ti­es and ap­pe­aran­ces do not mat­ter. They ha­ve even bre­ac­hed a fo­ot­hold in­to what so­me say is an en­ti­re Re­alm ma­de up of not­hing but in­for­ma­ti­on. This pla­ce is cal­led the Net. The Net is en­ti­rely too big to be ex­p­lo­red in one li­fe­ti­me, but te­ams of Adepts are busy map­ping it and ca­ta­lo­gu­ing its stran­ge in­ha­bi­tants in pre­pa­ra­ti­on of As­cen­si­on, when they will res­cue the hud­dled mas­ses of. Sle­epers from the rot­ting ball of Earth. They want to Awa­ken them in a gle­aming vir­tu­al re­ality that will ne­ver grow old and ne­ver die.

    Screamer burst in­to the lab. His fo­ot­s­teps crun­c­hed on bro­ken glass. "We got­ta get the hell out­ta he­re!" he scre­amed at his fri­ends. "That ma­de WAY too much no­ise."

    The rest of the te­am co­uld not an­s­wer. As the stun­ned ma­ge lo­oked aro­und, Scre­amer co­uld see that the rest of the te­am was writ­hing on the flo­or be­si­de the HIT Mark, A gre­at plan; a ter­rib­le mis­ta­ke. "Shit,"moaned the Adept, hel­p­less to ease the­ir suf­fe­ring. He fa­iled to he­ar the se­cond HIT Mark as it step­ped in­to po­si­ti­on. Too la­te, he felt the Cor­res­pon­den­ce Po­int shift as the new as­pect alig­ned it­self in his sec­tor. Scre­amer tur­ned in ti­me to see the ha­il of slugs te­ar thro­ugh his ho­log­ram.

    DIE, TRA­ITOR! the des­t­ruct prog­ram buz­zed as pa­in she­ared thro­ugh Scre­amer's Net con­nec­ti­on. The ro­om went whi­te, then co­balt blue.

    "I knew this was a bad idea," he tho­ught as his ne­urons sizzkd. And then the­re was si­len­ce. As­cen­sion wasn't co­ming che­aply.

    Static Re­ason

    The le­aders of the pe­op­le ca­use them to err, and they that are led by them are des­t­ro­yed.

    -Isaiah 11:16

    I held the pis­tol up aga­inst the left si­de of his he­ad. It was the mo­ment I had be­en wa­iting for. The Cul­tist of Ec­s­tasy kne­eling in front of me had spi­ked the wa­ter system with psychot­ro­pic drugs, blown up my car, and tri­ed to kill me fi­ve mi­nu­tes ago. I had to show him what a Man in Black do­es best. All my tra­ining sa­id I sho­uld blow him away. So why was my hand sha­king? I knew the HIT Mark bac­king me up wo­uld ar­ri­ve in fi­ve mi­nu­tes. Damn. Think fast…

    Tradition ma­ges ha­ve a very bi­ased vi­ew of the world. They see them­sel­ves as he­ro­es who are stri­ving to sa­ve the world, re­ne­ga­des fig­h­ting aga­inst an in­hu­man, fa­ce­less, so­ul­less Col­lec­ti­ve. The Tec­h­noc­racy is se­en as a rut­h­less, un­s­top­pab­le mac­hi­ne. The Tec­h­noc­racy do­es in­c­lu­de des­pi­cab­le over­lords, so­ul­less Con­s­t­ructs and in­hu­man as­sas­sins. Ho­we­ver, the­re are many pe­op­le ser­ving the Tec­h­noc­racy who don't fall in­to that shal­low ste­re­ot­y­pe. Just as it's fo­olish to say that all tec­h­no­logy is evil, it is sim­p­lis­tic to say that all Tec­h­no­man­cers are "evil." The is­su­es of the Tec­h­noc­racy are not al­ways black and whi­te. For so­me, the World of Dar­k­ness is a world of ex­t­re­mes, but for many- in­c­lu­ding the ro­gu­es who work for both the Tec­h­noc­racy and the Tra­di­ti­ons, the Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges who de­fect, and the sur­vi­vors who ser­ve only them­sel­ves- ever­y­t­hing is in sha­des of gray,

    The Schism

    I kept the gun aimed at his he­art.

    "Get on yo­ur fe­et."

    "What?"

    He was sur­p­ri­sed; just the ed­ge I ne­eded. My mind star­ted pro­bing in­to his sub­con­s­ci­o­us. Than­k­ful­ly, des­pi­te his com­mand of Ti­me, he was min­d­b­lind. I star­ted sif­ting thro­ugh his me­mory, aiming the pis­tol at his he­art just in ca­se.

    My su­pe­ri­ors kept as­king for re­sults. Af­ter all, we we­re at war. Well, they'd get re­sults.

    I fo­und what I was lo­oking for: a se­ed of do­ubt. He was ha­ving se­cond tho­ughts abo­ut his Chantry and the fo­ur Hol­low Ones he was hel­ping. I al­so fo­und out whe­re his stash of we­apons was kept. He was just what I ne­eded; so­me­one I co­uld easily ma­ni­pu­la­te.

    I ga­ve hi­ma swift left ho­ok to the jaw and knoc­ked him out. Af­ter fol­lo­wing thro­ugh with lit­tle bit of psi, I fi­gu­red he'd be out for abo­ut an ho­ur.

    The Tec­h­noc­racy is com­po­sed of many con­tes­ting fac­ti­ons; the­se go be­yond the or­ga­ni­za­ti­onal struc­tu­res of the Con­ven­ti­ons. The de­ve­lo­ping Schism bet­we­en the for­ces "Be­yond the Ho­ri­zon" (the Sympo­si­ums and re­se­arch in­s­tal­la­ti­ons in the De­ep Um­b­ra) and the agents wor­king in the fi­eld has re­sul­ted in dif­fe­rent vi­ew­po­ints on what the Tec­h­noc­racy is. Just as the Tec­h­noc­racy is com­po­sed of dif­fe­rent Con­ven­ti­ons, each Con­ven­ti­on is com­po­sed of many dif­fe­rent types of Tec­h­no­man­cers.

    The Shock Tro­ops- The­se are the gre­atest vic­tims of the As­cen­si­on War. The­ir bo­di­es and so­uls ha­ve be­co­me con­su­med by the ef­forts of the Col­lec­ti­ve. Fa­ce­less Con­s­t­ructs of the Men in Black and cyborgs of Ite­ra­ti­on X are vi­sib­le exam­p­les, but the­se agents ac­tu­al­ly run in­ter­fe­ren­ce for the truly ta­len­ted mem­bers of the­se two Con­ven­ti­ons. Pro­ge­ni­tor clo­nes and Vo­id En­gi­ne­er ro­bots are al­so Con­s­t­ructs. Many are self-awa­re, and many fight to ma­in­ta­in the­ir iden­tity at all costs.

    The Ro­gu­es- Ro­gu­es walk in the sha­dow world of es­pi­ona­ge. The­ir true al­le­gi­an­ce is un­k­nown. So­me of them ste­al in­for­ma­ti­on from ot­her Con­ven­ti­ons. Ot­hers de­vo­te them­sel­ves to gat­he­ring da­ta on the Tra­di­ti­ons. So­me­ti­mes the only way to stri­ke aga­inst the Tra­di­ti­ona­lists is to in­fil­t­ra­te them. An­yo­ne fa­mi­li­ar with the Tec­h­noc­racy is al­so tem­p­ted to es­ca­pe from the ter­ror and pa­ra­no­ia that is ram­pant in so­me sec­ti­ons of it. Ro­gu­es li­ve in a world of con­s­tant mo­ral di­lem­mas. Many are re­ady to de­fect... but for how long?

    Agents in the Fi­eld- The­se are the de­di­ca­ted agents wor­king on the front li­nes. They ha­ve the best un­der­s­tan­ding of the grim re­ali­ti­es of the War for As­cen­si­on, but each al­so has so­me re­ason for con­ti­nu­ing the fight- re­ali­za­ti­on of the thre­at of the su­per­na­tu­ral world, per­so­nal be­li­ef in a met­hod of As­cen­si­on and ac­tu­al con­cern for the fa­te of hu­ma­nity are exam­p­les. The­ir gre­atest prob­lem is con­vin­cing the Ide­alists and Es­ca­pists of the re­al si­tu­ati­on. Any Con­ven­ti­on can be aided by this type of Tec­h­no­man­cer.

    The Ide­alists- They are re­mo­ved from the war on Earth, and se­ek per­fec­ti­on as they "help" the Mas­ses. So­me of them ha­ve lost to­uch with the re­ali­ti­es of the si­tu­ati­on on Earth and de­al with is­su­es by using ab­s­t­rac­ti­ons and ove­ra­nal­y­sis. Ot­hers watch the war with a deg­ree of obj­ec­ti­vity, of­fe­ring gu­idan­ce and ad­vo­ca­ting "mo­ra­lity." The­re are al­so Ide­alists who are com­p­le­tely ali­en to hu­ma­nity…

    The Es­ca­pists- The Es­ca­pists se­ek to re­sol­ve the prob­lems of the world by for­ming new re­ali­ti­es in the depths of spa­ce and the et­her of the De­ep Um­b­ra. Whi­le Earth slowly di­es, they be­li­eve they can form a bet­ter re­ality so­mew­he­re el­se. So­me mem­bers of this gro­up are me­rely pe­op­le se­eking or­der amidst the cha­os of the mo­dern world. The ser­vants of Autoc­h­t­ho­nia and the ex­p­lo­rer-sco­uts of the Vo­id En­gi­ne­ers are two exam­p­les.

    The Fa­na­tics- The­ir one go­al is in­no­va­ti­on, and they will ad­van­ce tec­h­no­logy pu­rely for the sa­ke of "pus­hing the en­ve­lo­pe." Re­se­arch is the­ir pri­mary ac­ti­vity, and they sel­dom re­ali­ze the con­se­qu­en­ces of the­ir ac­ti­ons. One com­mon mo­ti­va­tor is a fe­ar of the un­k­nown, as well as the ne­ed to es­tab­lish a sa­fe system of or­der and re­ason. The pur­su­it of know­led­ge and or­der, re­gar­d­less of the ap­pli­ca­ti­ons and pa­ra­digm-shifts that re­sult, le­ads them on the­ir cru­sa­de.

    The Po­wer-Hungry- The­se are in­di­vi­du­als con­su­med by the­ir per­so­nal fa­ilings. Lust for po­wer, the ec­s­tacy of des­t­ruc­ti­on, sim­p­le gre­ed, the thrill of dis­co­very (re­gar­d­less of mo­ral res­pon­si­bi­lity) and the fal­se pri­de of eli­tism are po­wer­ful mo­ti­va­tors. The Tec­h­noc­racy sa­tes the­se hun­gers.

    The Sur­vi­vors- The only lo­yalty of the­se in­di­vi­du­als is to them­sel­ves. Bo­di­es are fal­ling in the As­cen­si­on War, and so­me Tec­h­no­man­cers just want to sur­vi­ve at any cost. Ca­ught bet­we­en the de­di­ca­ti­on of the Fi­eld Agents and the re­mo­ved de­tac­h­ment of the Ide­alists and Fa­na­tics, they don't al­ways un­der­s­tand the "big pic­tu­re," but do un­der­s­tand the world aro­und them.

    Again, the­se di­vi­si­ons are not ne­ces­sa­rily de­li­ne­ated by Con­ven­ti­ons. Con­s­t­ructs of the Syndi­ca­te try to ma­xi­mi­ze pro­fits in small eco­no­mic zo­nes; they are dif­fe­rent from the Fa­na­tic Syndi­ca­te re­se­ar­c­hers wat­c­hing from the Ho­ri­zon who de­vi­se new met­hods of sel­ling to the Mas­ses. Fa­na­tic mem­bers of Ite­ra­ti­on X ser­ve the gre­at in­tel­li­gen­ce in the De­ep Um­b­ra that di­rects the mo­ve­ments of its tro­ops; they can­not iden­tify with the de­di­ca­ted HIT Marks in the fi­eld who try to ma­in­ta­in a ba­lan­ce bet­we­en the­ir ves­ti­gi­al hu­ma­nity and de­hu­ma­ni­zing prog­ram­ming.

    Ascension

    Now what was I go­ing to say in the re­port? Hell, it was get­ting har­der to ke­ep up my mind shi­elds. If the Men in Whi­te, the ones who ma­de su­re of our "lo­yalty," ever fo­und out…

    I wasn't go­ing to get any whe­re just blo­wing him away. I've se­en eno­ugh kil­ling. It wo­uld ma­ke a ni­ce lit­tle gold star on my re­cord, but I knew I was go­ing to ha­ve to go ro­gue for a lit­tle whi­le. I wasn't re­al­ly af­ter the Cul­tist, des­pi­te the or­ders from my In­tel­li­gen­ce Analyst. I wan­ted the gun-run­ners he wor­ked with, the Hol­low Ones I had be­en lo­oking for.

    They we­re the bas­tards who led a ra­id on a scho­ol the Pro­ge­ni­tors ma­in­ta­ined. They we­re the scum who set fi­re to the bu­il­ding and loc­ked ever­yo­ne in­si­de.

    I've cap­tu­red a few pe­op­le, su­re, but bur­ning down a bu­il­ding full of col­le­ge kids was mo­re than I'd ever do. I still re­mem­ber sor­ting thro­ugh the char­red bo­di­es.

    They pro­bably think they're he­ro­es, now. I think they're as go­od as de­ad.

    The sim­p­le go­al of "ser­ving the Tec­h­noc­racy to win the war" is not eno­ugh for most Tec­h­no­man­cers. Many are stri­ving for a per­so­nal As­cen­si­on, and each one li­as his own vi­ew of what As­cen­si­on sho­uld be. Any Tec­h­no­man­cer must even­tu­al­ly de­ter­mi­ne what path he cho­oses to ad­vo­ca­te. He­re are a few exam­p­les:

    -The World Must Be Ma­de Sa­fe

    "The Mas­ses are at the mercy of un­se­en su­per­na­tural for­ces. Su­per­s­ti­ti­on still lin­gers in a world whe­re ever­yo­ne sho­uld be sa­fe. We must ma­ke the world se­cu­re. We're the ones who do the dirty work, and our Col­lec­ti­ve im­p­le­ments all the the­ori­es of the Sympo­si­ums. They've lost sight of what's re­al­ly hap­pe­ning.

    "All this talk of As­cen­si­on is ri­di­cu­lo­us. The Re­alm we ne­ed is right he­re- on­ce we ma­ke it sa­fe. All we ne­ed to do is pur­ge it of the cor­rup­ti­on of the oc­cult." -Da­ni­el Smith, In­tel­li­gen­ce Analyst of the Men in Black

    -Perfect All of Hu­ma­nity

    "Ascension is, simply put, the per­fec­ti­on of one's self. We im­p­le­ment that. Sa­ying that tec­h­no­logy is in­he­rently evil is ri­di­cu­lo­us. We he­al the sick, per­fect the body, and cre­ate a world in which the Mas­ses are not de­pen­dent on the mysti­cism of a li­mi­ted few. The world as a who­le must As­cend."

    -Dr. Ire­ne Rol­lins, Pro­ge­ni­tor

    -Ascend to Autoc­h­t­ho­nia

    "Technology is a per­fect mo­del of re­ality. Ever­y­t­hing works to­get­her. I've se­en the way that mo­del sho­uld work… be­ca­use I've se­en Autoc­h­t­ho­nia. That's the way the world sho­uld be. We can all find the joy of Autoc­h­t­ho­nia. We're evol­ving, and ma­king the mac­hi­nes a part of us is just the next step…"

    -Test Su­bj­ect #137, Ite­ra­ti­on X

    -Ascend to the Ho­ri­zon to Ma­in­ta­in the Earth

    "There are many mem­bers of the Tec­h­noc­racy, in­c­lu­ding mem­bers of the Syndi­ca­te, who work in the stre­ets, and I res­pect that. But in or­der for us to co­or­di­na­te our ef­forts, we can't lo­se sight of the ide­as that fo­un­ded our Or­der. That's why the Sympo­si­ums over­see ever­y­t­hing. By re­mo­ving our­sel­ves from the filth in the stre­ets, we ke­ep our pu­re mo­dels of re­ality. We can im­p­le­ment our pu­rest ide­als.

    "We're ex­perts. We ha­ve the to­ols of re­ason on our si­de. And from our van­ta­ge po­int, we can con­t­rol the Mas­ses for the­ir own go­od. This crap abo­ut the 'New Fe­uda­lism' is a cat­c­h­word for the tra­itors in the Tec­h­noc­racy who are je­alo­us of the pe­op­le at the top. We, the ru­lers, of the Tec­h­noc­racy, ha­ve As­cen­ded to our rig­h­t­ful pla­ces of po­wer, and the mis­ta­kes of the Mythic Age will be era­di­ca­ted for all ti­me."

    -Dr. Ha­rold Ka­lis­h­na­kov, Syndi­ca­te Rep­re­sen­ta­ti­ve

    - As­cend to the Worlds Be­yond

    "Do yo­ure­al­ly think you'll fin­da per­fect mo­del of re­ality he­re? This world has be­en torn apart. This world is only one mo­del of what re­ality can be. The­re are li­mit­less pos­si­bi­li­ti­es wa­iting be­yond. In the depths of spa­ce, we will find ot­her worlds wa­iting to yi­eld know­led­ge. We must watch, for so­mew­he­re in the li­mi­ti­ess re­ali­ti­es of the un­k­nown is the world to which we must As­cend,

    "This world is dying. We must tra­vel far be­yond the Ho­ri­zon.

    "We must al­so pre­pa­re our­sel­ves. Do you re­al­ly think the only thre­ats to hu­ma­nity are he­re on Earth? We've be­gun to see what rut­h­less in­hu­man po­wers lurk be­yond the bo­un­da­ri­es of our ex­p­lo­ra­ti­on. They're wa­iting for us… so that they can con­su­me us."

    -Dr. Eli­za Tron­d­he­im, Vo­id En­gi­ne­er

    The Chal­len­ge

    I hid the Cul­tist's un­con­s­ci­o­us body. The HIT Mark wasn't equ­ip­ped to do a ge­ne­tics scan of the bu­il­ding. The con­s­t­ruct MIBs we had wor­king with us used gen-scans, but they we­re se­ar­c­hing the next block. This part of the mis­si­on was all mi­ne.

    Construct #32 wal­ked in­to the ro­om, ra­ising the 45mm cha­in gun out of his back. My ad­re­na­li­ne al­ways kic­ked in when he did that. As I sta­red in­to the bar­rel of his gun, I re­ali­sed that my act had to be per­fect now. One fal­se mo­ve and I'd be de­ad.

    Taking on a front of rig­h­te­o­us in­dig­na­ti­on and op­po­sing an­yo­ne with a po­si­ti­on of po­wer is easy. Ac­tu­al­ly trying toc­han­ge things and wor­king to fix a cor­rupt system is mo­re dif­fi­cult. In the sa­me way, it's easy for the Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges to see the As­cen­si­on War as con­test bet­we­en "go­od" and "evil." The re­al si­tu­ati­on, is mo­re com­p­lex. In­di­vi­du­als must cho­ose the­ir own be­li­efs, and the­re are al­ways op­por­tu­ni­ti­es to re­de­fi­ne them.

    The truly ta­len­ted mem­bers of the Tec­h­noc­racy ha­ve ot­her con­cerns be­yond the thre­at of the Tra­di­ti­ons. They must li­ve with et­hi­cal am­bi­gu­ity and per­so­nal so­ul-se­ar­c­hing. They must re­ta­in the­ir free will, anal­y­ze the­ir own li­ves and pur­sue a per­so­nal vi­si­on of As­cen­si­on. The war is ra­ging; the chal­len­ge awa­its.

    Yeah, I had a job to do, but this was per­so­nal. This was a mat­ter of ho­nor. I hol­s­te­red my gun and lo­oked him stra­ight in the eye.

    "No prob­lem. All cle­ar."

    He tur­ned to walk out the do­or, and my char­co­al-gray su­it hel­ped me fa­de in­to the sha­dows. That's what I do. Ke­ep yo­ur damn bat­tle­fi­elds. The war is be­ing won in the sha­dows. For­tu­na­tely, hu­ma­nity is win­ning.

    Dark Mir­rors

    Head li­ke a ho­le

    Black as yo­ur so­ul

    I'd rat­her die than gi­ve you con­t­rol

    Bow down be­fo­re the one you ser­ve

    You're go­ing to get what you de­ser­ve

    -Nine Inch Na­ils, "He­ad Li­ke a Ho­le"

    Jodi Bla­ke sta­red down at the form la­ying pro­ne on her al­tar and smi­led. "You're ter­ri­fi­ed, aren't you?" The only an­s­wer to the qu­es­ti­on was si­len­ce and mo­re swe­at po­uring off the yo­ung ma­ge's body. "You sho­uld be. In less than an ho­ur, you'll be go­ne from this world." She ran one blac­k­lac­qu­ered fin­ger­nail from the man's ba­re chest down to whe­re his pants wo­uld ha­ve star­ted, had the ah­ri­man be­en ni­ce eno­ugh to le­ave the pants in pla­ce. Her vic­tim squ­ir­med; she smi­led, "Don't worry, yo­ur de­ath will ser­ve a gre­ater ca­use."

    The Nep­han­di are al­most uni­que among the Awa­ke­ned, in that they cho­ose to ser­ve a gre­ater for­ce in the­ir dri­ve re­wards As­cen­si­on. They are al­so uni­que among the Tra­di­ti­ons in that they are per­fectly wil­ling to ma­ke sac­ri­fi­ces- both hu­man and Awa­ke­ned- to the gre­ater glory of the­ir mas­ters. No­ne can truly say exactly what the­ir mas­ters are, sa­ve that the Nep­han­di-Lords per­so­nify cor­rup­ti­on and all that is fo­ul in hu­man so­ci­ety. So­me among the Nep­han­di cla­im that they ser­ve Sa­tan. Ot­hers spe­ak of mo­re ne­bu­lo­us cre­atu­res, things best not men­ti­oned by na­me. Even tho­se who ha­ve ser­ved the Nep­han­di-Lords for tho­usands of ye­ars can­not ag­ree on the na­tu­re of the­ir mas­ters, sa­ve to say that they are gro­wing mo­re po­wer­ful all the ti­me. Most Nep­han­di simply cla­im that they ser­ve "Dar­k­ness, Cor­rup­ti­on and Ob­li­vi­on."

    Jodi sat be­si­de the trem­b­ling man, stro­ked a hand thro­ugh his swe­at-dam­pe­ned ha­ir and kis­sed him lightly on the fo­re­he­ad. "You are yo­ung, in­no­cent. You think that I am a vi­le cre­atu­re. You think that I wish to see the dam­na­ti­on of all that is 'Holy,' but you are very wrong. You of the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus, you of all the Tra­di­ti­ons, sho­uld know bet­ter than that. What is yo­ur One Sup­re­me Be­ing wit­ho­ut a co­un­ter­part to ser­ve as a re­min­der of what fa­ilu­re to fol­low the ru­les me­ans? Whe­re wo­uld yo­ur be­li­efs be, if not for our be­li­efs to show that you are right? How can the­re be light wit­ho­ut dar­k­ness?"

    The Nep­han­di ha­ve long ac­cep­ted that the­ir ro­le in the sche­me of re­ality is two­fold. First, they must ser­ve the­ir mas­ters, the dark for­ces that cor­rupt the uni­ver­se. Se­cond, they pro­vi­de a dark ref­lec­ti­on of re­ality for the ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons. Many of the Tra­di­ti­ons un­der­s­tand the Nep­han­di phi­lo­sophy, but fe­el that the twis­ted Nep­han­di ser­ve no true pur­po­se be­yond the cor­rup­ti­on of all that is wor­t­h­w­hi­le in the world. Most Tra­di­ti­ons wo­uld simply rat­her see them des­t­ro­yed than risk the dar­k­ness of the Nep­han­di spre­ading fur­t­her.

    Jodi te­ased her vic­tim's flesh, pin­c­hing with her na­ils and nip­ping with her te­eth. The man's physi­cal re­pul­si­on was ob­vi­o­us, al­most as ob­vi­o­us as his de­si­re. Jodi smi­led at both re­ac­ti­ons. "You co­uld jo­in with us. You wo­uld hardly be the first of the Cho­rus to le­arn new songs. I was on­ce of the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus myself. Back then I was Sis­ter Mary Eli­za­beth, but I le­ar­ned that I was wrong in my be­li­efs, I le­ar­ned that the­re was mo­re that I co­uld do to pro­vi­de the Cho­rus with As­cen­si­on from whe­re I am now than I co­uld ever do whi­le stic­king to tho­se bot­her­some vows of chas­tity and po­verty." Jodi saw his in­te­rest pe­ak and smi­led. She pa­used long eno­ugh to for­ce a pas­si­onate kiss upon his mo­uth, sa­tis­fi­ed that he was now res­pon­ding in kind to her mi­nis­t­ra­ti­ons. "The best part is that I can ha­ve an­y­t­hing I want whi­le in this world. I ha­ve mo­re po­wer than most of the Tra­di­ti­ons co­uld com­p­re­hend."

    The Nep­han­di of­ten draw ot­hers to the­ir be­li­efs from ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons, se­du­cing them with pro­mi­ses of po­wer, ma­te­ri­al we­alth and eter­nal li­fe. Nor­mal­ly they fo­cus on the newly Awa­ke­ned, tho­se who ha­ve only star­ted to tas­te the po­wers of ma­gick, tho­se who des­pe­ra­tely se­ek mo­re know­led­ge and abi­lity, im­pa­ti­ent with the ways of the­ir Tra­di­ti­ons. The­se re­nun­ci­ates, known as the ba­rab­bi, are a ca­use of gre­at un­rest among the ma­ges.

    When she had fi­nis­hed, Jodi was­hed her vic­tim's body with swe­et-scen­ted oils, ta­king ca­re to en­su­re that every part of him was tho­ro­ughly dren­c­hed. His bre­at­hing slowly re­tur­ned to nor­mal, his fa­ce bo­re a fa­int smi­le un­der the gri­ma­ce of dis­gust at his bo­dily we­ak­ness. "I used to think that ple­asu­re was wrong as well, that all of my 'sins' wo­uld en­su­re me im­me­di­ate de­ath and eter­nal suf­fe­ring. It's be­en hun­d­reds of ye­ars and, as you can see, I am qu­ite happy and hardly suf­fe­ring. In fact, we of the Nep­han­di are win­ning yo­ur 'Ascen­si­on War,'" Jodi pa­in­ted symbols on his body, symbols that he so­ught in va­in to see and un­der­s­tand. She wat­c­hed his body twitch with each symbol that was drawn, and she smi­led.

    The Nep­han­di ha­ve long sin­ce le­ar­ned a spe­ci­al lan­gu­age all the­ir own, cal­led the Dra­gon's Ton­gue. The Dra­gon's Ton­gue is used in ri­tu­als to spe­ak wit­hin the­ir ca­bals (cal­led ah­ri­man) and com­mu­ne with the­ir mas­ters. Un­less one has go­ne thro­ugh the pro­per ri­tu­als, no po­wer can al­low a per­son to un­der­s­tand the symbols and words. Ad­di­ti­onal­ly, the vast ma­j­ority of the Nep­han­di ha­ve le­ar­ned the Pic­tish ton­gue, as­su­ring easi­er com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons with the Black Spi­ral Dan­cers, the­ir we­re­wolf co­un­ter­parts, in ser­vi­tu­de to all that is cor­rupt.

    "We ha­ve many al­li­es among the Kin­d­red and the Ga­rou, even among the ot­hers of the Awa­ke­ned. We ha­ve al­li­es that do not even re­ali­ze that they are wor­king to­wards the sa­me go­als as the Nep­han­di. 'Be­wa­re fal­se prop­hets.'" Jodi chuc­k­led de­ep in her thro­at, "Inde­ed."

    The Nep­han­di ma­ke full use of the com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons net­works pro­vi­ded by the Tec­h­noc­racy, pro­vi­ding many te­le­vi­si­on mi­nis­t­ri­es with the ne­ces­sary funds to start the­ir prog­rams and to ex­pand at a la­ter ti­me. The Nep­han­di use the­se pawn mi­nis­ters to ex­tend the ge­ne­ral po­pu­la­ce's dis­con­tent and fun­da­men­tal lack of be­li­ef in the es­tab­lis­hed re­li­gi­ons, se­eding do­ubts that can la­ter be used to bet­ter the­ir own po­si­ti­on wit­hin the ranks of Awa­ke­ned. The Nep­han­di al­so work well along si­de the Black Spi­ral Dan­cers and with the most cor­rupt of the vam­pi­res, so­me among the Sab­bat and with the Ba­ali. The Nep­han­di cla­im that the Ba­ali we­re cre­ated using mem­bers of the­ir own fol­lo­wing. The Ba­ali re­fu­se to spe­ak of such mat­ters,

    Jodi step­ped back from her la­test work, ma­king cer­ta­in that all of the ru­nes and sac­ra­ments we­re in pla­ce upon the body of her vic­tim. All was as it sho­uld be. Jodi nod­ded her sa­tis­fac­ti­on. So­on the de­ci­si­on wo­uld be ma­de, her la­test ac­qu­isi­ti­on wo­uld eit­her jo­in in the ranks of the Nep­han­di or he wo­uld be­co­me a sac­ri­fice to the po­wers the Nep­han­di wil­lingly ser­ved. "You can jo­in us," her vo­ice was al­most a plea, a pro­mi­se of re­wards and ti­me spent kno­wing her body. "We ha­ve ways of en­su­ring lo­yalty, we wo­uld ne­ver fe­ar yo­ur bet­ra­yal, and you co­uld be with me, fo­re­ver." She was sa­tis­fi­ed to see the way his brow fur­ro­wed; she knew he wo­uld jo­in them.

    Much li­ke the Black Spi­ral Dan­cers of the Ga­rou, the Nep­han­di use spe­ci­al ri­tu­als in lo­ca­ti­ons held as sac­red to pro­mo­te unity among the ser­vi­tors of the­ir mas­ters. The­se ri­tu­als are cal­led by many na­mes, but the end re­sult is al­ways the sa­me; in the end, the ini­ti­ate co­mes to un­der­s­tand the ways of the Nep­han­di and wil­lingly sac­ri­fi­ces a sub­s­tan­ti­al por­ti­on of his free will in ex­c­han­ge for po­wer and per­so­nal gra­ti­fi­ca­ti­on. In many ca­ses, the fol­lo­wers of the Nep­han­di Path go thro­ugh the­se ri­tu­als re­gu­larly, re­in­for­cing the­ir be­li­efs upon them­sel­ves. Many cla­im that the ri­tu­als are ac­tu­al­ly ad­dic­ti­ve, whi­le ot­hers cla­im them to be the fo­re­most way for Nep­han­di to re­ach a gre­ater le­vel of un­der­s­tan­ding, a gre­ater know­led­ge of po­we­rand its uses. The ri­tu­als pla­ce the Nep­han­di in di­rect com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on with the­ir mas­ters. The first ti­me a Nep­han­di ini­ti­ate ta­kes pla­ce in the­se ri­tu­als is re­fer­red to as the "Re­birth." Sub­se­qu­ent vi­sits in­to the ri­tu­al are­as are most of­ten cal­led "Re­ge­ne­ra­ti­ons,"

    Jodi's joy knew no bo­unds when the yo­ung man be­fo­re her lic­ked his swe­at-sta­ined, oil-co­ated lips and cro­aked out the words from a mo­uth wo dry for easy com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on: "I ac­cept," She cal­led out with to her ah­ri­man, in­hu­man so­unds pas­sing her lips, so­unds that sent pri­mal spasms of fe­ar thro­ugh her yo­ung char­ge's body. Ima­ges of angry abor­ted fe­tu­ses and things that slit­he­red in the blo­od-dren­c­hed dar­k­ness flas­hed be­hind his eyes. No hu­man co­uld pos­sibly ma­ke such no­ises, no sa­ne mind co­uld com­p­re­hend the­ir me­aning. Ot­hers ca­me to the cham­ber from dis­tant sec­ti­ons of the Lab­y­rinth. They ca­me from the Pits and the to­wers; they po­ured forth from the Ca­ul and the lib­rary. So­on the en­ti­re Chantry sto­od to­get­her, uni­ted in har­mony and re­ady to re­ce­ive a new mem­ber. Jodi shed te­ars of hap­pi­ness. Her mas­ters wo­uld be so ple­ased…

    The Lab­y­rinths of the Nep­han­di are, as of­ten as not, li­ving en­ti­ti­es in the­ir own right. The­se pla­ces can be in­c­re­dibly di­ver­se, but all are hi­de­o­us mo­nu­ments to the mas­ters of the Nep­han­di. Lab­y­rinths that ha­ve suc­ces­sful­ly bre­ac­hed the Ho­ri­zon and for­med Re­alms of the­ir own of­ten ha­ve uni­que pla­ces wit­hin the­ir re­ality to tie them to the Nep­han­di's mas­ters on a per­so­nal le­vel. The mo­re po­wer­ful of the­se Chan­t­ri­es ha­ve are­as re­fer­red to as the Pit and the Ca­ul, The Pit is the area whe­re gro­up ri­tu­als are per­for­med, whe­re many of the dar­ker sec­rets of the Nep­han­di are prac­ti­ced in re­la­ti­ve sa­fety. The Ca­ul is the area whe­re a Nep­han­di's "Re­birth" and sub­se­qu­ent "Re­ge­ne­ra­ti­ons" ta­ke pla­ce. Ru­mors abo­und that the Ca­ul is ac­tu­al­ly a physi­cal ma­ni­fes­ta­ti­on of a Nep­han­di-Lord's body, a womb for des­t­ro­ying and then rec­re­ating the in­di­vi­du­al ma­ge on a gre­ater le­vel of po­wer or with a stron­ger be­li­ef in the mas­ter's ways to Des­cend. Such ru­mors se­em to be un­fo­un­ded. To da­te, no one has be­en ab­le to de­tect any se­ve­re ge­ne­tic chan­ges among cap­tu­red Nep­han­di, Still, the ru­mors per­sist, as do the ru­mors that the Pro­ge­ni­tors ha­ve re­cently dis­cus­sed a mer­ger with the Nep­han­di.

    Jodi wat­c­hed re­ve­rently as the ne­op­h­y­te for­ced his way past the he­avy outer skin of the Ca­ul. She saw the amor­p­ho­us ten­d­rils that re­ac­hed eagerly for him and then plun­ged in­to his very body and so­ul, twis­ting flesh out of the­ir way and res­ha­ping his spi­rit. Blo­od was­hed ac­ross the in­te­ri­or of the Ca­ul, le­aking thro­ugh the mem­b­rane and ste­aming as it rol­led to­wards the flo­or. Jodi wat­c­hed in ne­ar-ec­s­tasy as his eyes grew wi­de with com­p­re­hen­si­on and hor­ror, en­ve­lo­ping his mind even as the vo­mi­to­us mass of the Ca­ul en­ve­lo­ped and to­re apart his body, She lis­te­ned as his vo­ice chan­ged. His ple­as for mercy be­ca­me scre­ams of ec­s­tasy and un­der­s­tan­ding. Jodi was ple­ased, her mas­ters we­re ple­ased. Anot­her had jo­ined the ranks of the In­fer­nal and all was as it sho­uld be. The ne­op­h­y­te was be­gin­ning his Des­cent.

    Dynamic Mad­ness

    I al­most wish I hadn't go­ne down that rab­bit ho­le- and yet- and yet- it's rat­her cu­ri­o­us, you know, this sort of li­fe!

    - Char­les L. Dod­g­son, Ali­ce's Ad­ven­tu­res in Won­der­land

    Robert Da­ven­port re­la­xed in­to the whi­te wic­ker cha­ir and was sur­p­ri­sed to find it com­for­tab­le. He pic­ked up the glass of iced tea that so­me­one had ­tho­ug­h­t­fully pro­vi­ded for him. That, too, he fo­und to his tas­te, and he smi­led. He still wasn't su­re whe­re they we­re, but the ma­ni­fes­ta­ti­ons se­emed very, very ni­ce.

    Marauders are ab­so­lu­tely in­sa­ne. Of all the fac­ti­ons at war in the Tel­lu­ri­an, they are the le­ast un­der­s­to­od, and are per­haps mo­re fe­ared than any ot­her. No mat­ter what gri­evan­ces lie bet­we­en Con­s­t­ruct and Tra­di­ti­on, ca­bal and Chantry, or Sle­eper and Awa­ke­ned, all are equ­al­ly de­vas­ta­ted in the cha­os and wrec­ka­ge left be­hind by Ma­ra­uders on the war­path. Even the Nep­han­di will turn the­ir co­ur­se to fight the com­mon me­na­ce; a re­ality shred­ded by Pa­ra­dox is a less in­vi­ting pri­ze.

    He pla­ced the glass back on­to the tiny tab­le, nar­rowly avo­iding a pla­id bee. The in­sect skit­te­red back and flew away down the hall. Da­ven­port let his ga­ze fol­low it as it sped to­wards his com­pa­ni­ons in the me­adow be­low. They sprin­ted af­ter it ho­pe­ful­ly, but­terfly nets wa­ving in the bre­eze, and he chuc­k­led. The one in the le­ad- it had to be Mar­tins, in that su­it- stop­ped short sud­denly, and then all fo­ur be­gan run­ning in the ot­her di­rec­ti­on.

    The Tec­h­noc­racy are af­fec­ted the worst by en­co­un­ters with ra­iding Ma­ra­uders. The­ir hol­dings are con­cen­t­ra­ted on Earth, and this is whe­re die Ma­ra­uders' im­mu­nity to Pa­ra­dox be­co­mes most use­ful. A skil­lful or lucky hand of "cra­zi­es" can crip­ple a Con­ven­ti­on ba­se by the­ir me­re pre­sen­ce: the­ir psycho­ses tend to ma­ni­fest in physi­cal limns, "frac­tu­res" in re­ality and ho­les in the Ga­un­t­let. The Tec­h­no­man­cers stay so busy hi­ding the vul­gar ma­gick that they can­not de­fend them­sel­ves pro­perly.

    "Daddy? Can I go play too?"

    "Oh." He wasn't re­ady for this. Not he­re. Not to­day. "Su­re ho­ney. Do you ha­ve a net?" He was ca­re­ful not to lo­ok at her as he spo­ke.

    "No…" Her to­ne ro­se slightly, and he knew she had her he­ad coc­ked to one si­de in an­xi­o­us ex­pec­ta­ti­on.

    One of the most suc­ces­sful Ma­ra­uder tac­tics is to bring mythi­cal cre­atu­res thro­ugh the Ga­un­t­let di­rectly in­to Con­ven­ti­on ter­ri­tory. An Aus­t­ra­li­an Tec­h­noc­ra­tic Con­s­t­ruct was pla­gu­ed with myste­ri­o­us di­sap­pe­aran­ces for months be­fo­re the ca­use was fo­und: a mi­no­ta­ur that Ma­ra­uders (a splin­ter gro­up known as King So­lo­mon's Whi­nes) had in­t­ro­du­ced to the­ir sub­s­t­ruc­tu­res was li­ving off of the­ir No­de- and the­ir per­son­nel.

    He re­ac­hed in­to the air be­si­de him and pul­led out a net, sca­led down for an eig­ht-ye­ar-old's con­ve­ni­en­ce. "He­re you go, Kary. Ha­ve fun," But he clo­sed his eyes un­til he he­ard her skip­ping fo­ot­s­teps fa­de away. Then, very ca­re­ful­ly, he ope­ned them, and scan­ned the grassy slo­pe be­fo­re him. Now­he­re was the­re any sign of his da­ug­h­ter.

    But the very exis­ten­ce of the Ma­ra­uders po­ses anot­her prob­lem, far wor­se than any me­re physi­cal thre­at. Al­t­ho­ugh the Con­ven­ti­ons and Tra­di­ti­ons ha­ve be­en awa­re of the­ir ac­ti­vi­ti­es for cen­tu­ri­es- the le­ading the­ory cla­ims that they first ap­pe­ared be­fo­re the Age of Re­ason- to this day no one is qu­ite su­re whe­re they ca­me from.

    He re­le­ased his pent-up bre­ath and un­c­len­c­hed his grip on the arm of the cha­ir. For a mo­ment, he wat­c­hed the blo­od re­turn to the wo­ven li­nes im­p­res­sed in­to his palm, than­king his God that to­day it had be­en Kary and not her mot­her. To­day Da­ven­port was mo­re pa­in­ful­ly sa­ne than he had be­en sin­ce the ac­ci­dent, to­day co­uld re­mem­ber that ac­ci­dent, and to­day knew that his wi­fe and da­ug­h­ter we­re de­ad.

    In fact, the mec­ha­nism thro­ugh which an or­di­nary ma­ge- whet­her Tra­di­ti­onal, Tec­h­no­man­cer, Craft mem­ber or Or­p­han-be­co­me­sa Ma­ra­uder re­ma­ins un­k­nown. It is po­pu­lar among the yo­un­ger ma­ges of the Tra­di­ti­ons to be­li­eve' di­at che­se "unfor­tu­na­tes" are all Or­p­hans simply go­ne mad and un­con­t­rol­lab­le with the shock of the Awa­ke­ning. The­ir el­ders sha­ke the­ir he­ads kno­wingly: they ha­ve lost too many es­tab­lis­hed and res­pec­ted col­le­agu­es to ac­cept this.

    Davenport sho­ok his he­ad to cle­ar it, and re­tur­ned to wat­c­hing his fri­ends. He won­de­red how many of them co­uld re­mem­ber how they ca­me to be- whet­her they even knew what they had be­co­me. Was the world al­ways Hell for Mar­tins? Chi­na for Miss Zhao? Wo­uld the Ti­ta­nic sa­il fo­re­ver for The Go­ur­met? Did they ever know?

    Most aut­ho­ri­ti­es hold that the chan­ge is ac­ci­den­tal, and this is the of­fi­ci­al vi­ew em­b­ra­ced by the Tec­h­noc­racy. The Pro­ge­ni­tors- the most vo­ci­fe­ro­us pro­po­nents of this hypot­he­sis-ac­ti­vely hunt Ma­ra­uders for ex­pe­ri­men­tal tes­ting. How the Ma­ra­uders are kept inac­ti­ve af­ter the­ir ini­ti­al cap­tu­re is un­k­nown, but at last re­port, se­ve­ral su­bj­ects we­re un­der ob­ser­va­ti­on in Pro­ge­ni­tor la­bo­ra­to­ri­es. Tho­se few pa­pers the sci­en­tists ha­ve pre­sen­ted sug­gest that they are at­tem­p­ting to iso­la­te a vi­rus in­vol­ved in the tran­s­mis­si­on of the "di­se­ase," Con­si­de­red in the light of that Con­ven­ti­on's pro­pen­sity to­wards germ war­fa­re, this is alar­ming news in­de­ed.

    The only Tra­di­ti­on that do­es not se­em so alar­med, in fact, is the Dre­am­s­pe­akers, who are sa­id to be con­duc­ting the­ir own stu­di­es on so­me of the "cal­mer" Ma­ra­uders. Du­bi­o­us sig­h­tings of Ma­ra­uders in Dre­am­s­pe­aker ter­ri­to­ri­es and the ca­erns of the­ir Ga­rou al­li­es abo­und, gi­ving ri­se to ru­mors of a spi­rit "se­da­ti­ve" de­ve­lo­ped by the Spe­akers. The Tra­di­ti­on's rep­re­sen­ta­ti­ves for­mal­ly deny any in­vol­ve­ment, and few ma­ges are yet des­pe­ra­te eno­ugh to ask the we­re­wol­ves for com­ment.

    A stiff wind be­gan to blow ac­ross the me­adow, whip­ping the nets to a fren­zi­ed flut­ter, ma­king co­lo­red wa­ves in the tall grass. Funny, the way his fri­ends ran… al­most li­ke… yes. He co­uld ba­rely see the but­ter­f­lies they cha­sed, but the pat­tern of its flight was too fa­mi­li­ar. Tra­ced by the in­sects, the­ir pur­su­ers, and the gray-whi­te nets, the­re ap­pe­ared anot­her but­terfly- and old words ro­se un­bid­den to his lips.

    "Phase spa­ce?"

    "We can't be in pha­se spa­ce. It's an ab­s­t­rac­ti­on, a to­ol… it's im­pos­sib­le!" he sho­uted. But he knew that it was pos­sib­le, and that the ma­ni­fes­ta­tion was his. So­met­hing in his mad­ness ge­ne­ra­ted this pla­ce, and not­hing was sa­ne in him at all.

    In fact, the Dre­am­s­pe­akers may be tel­ling the truth. The most frig­h­te­ning thing abo­ut the Ma­ra­uders, and the re­ason that so lit­tle is known abo­ut them, is that the­re is no way to tell whet­her a ma­ge is a Ma­ra­uder be­fo­re the fig­h­ting starts, A Ma­ra­uder using co­in­ci­den­tal ma­gick is in­dis­tin­gu­is­hab­le from any ot­her ma­ge, and the­ir cha­rac­te­ris­tic im­mu­nity to Pa­ra­dox do­esn't mat­ter in the Um­b­ra. The dif­fe­ren­ce shows only when the Ma­ra­uder uses lar­ge amo­unts of vul­gar ma­gick.

    "Chef?" The Go­ur­met's vo­ice bro­ke the si­len­ce. "Chef Da­ven­port. I sho­uld li­ke to ar­ran­ge din­ner for this eve­ning, if you wo­uld be so kind. Se­no­ri­ta Aab­ra­xas will be jo­ining us, you know…"

    "Yes." Da­ven­port sto­od and cle­ared his thro­at, "Yes, of co­ur­se," he sa­id, tur­ning to ta­ke his co­at off of the cha­ir. He fo­und both oc­cu­pi­ed.

    "You're not my wi­fe," he sa­id. But she was ac­hingly clo­se-it was al­ways the eyes, old eyes whe­re Ma­ra­ya's we­re so yo­ung- and she smi­led at him sadly.

    "Why do you do this to me?"

    "For fre­edom," she rep­li­ed. "For the in­fi­ni­te fre­edom."

    "But why the calm? Why this know­led­ge?"

    "Someone must know. Yo­ur so­ul is light eno­ugh for the rest to see by." And her hand ro­se to to­uch his che­ek.

    The Ma­ra­uders' mad­ness is no su­re clue to iden­ti­fi­ca­ti­on. As with many di­sor­ders, the­ir par­ti­cu­lar lu­nacy may not be ob­vi­o­us to the eye or ap­pa­rent in ca­su­al con­ver­sa­ti­on. Clo­se as­so­ci­ati­on may not re­ve­al any prob­lem.

    Furthermore, not every in­sa­ne ma­ge is a Ma­ra­uder. The Con­ti­nu­um has plenty of or­di­nary fa­na­tics, psycho­tics and ma­ges in Qu­i­et, It simply adds an ex­t­ra ed­ge to any men­tal cri­sis to know that one's ne­arest and de­arest may ex­pect one to jo­in the enemy.

    "And why the fight? Didn't I-didn't we swe­ar an oath be­fo­re the ac­ci­dent?"

    "We fight for the world as it was. You can ke­ep yo­ur oath bet­ter in the el­der age to co­me."

    "But why the sec­recy? What are we?"

    "We shall be si­lent for our al­li­es, and the­ir char­ges."

    "And?"

    "And you know what you are. You knew all this when you ma­de yo­ur cho­ice, Ro­bert. This is an old ar­gu­ment."

    "It is." He sig­hed de­eply. "I think that you sho­uld go away now. Co­me back when I for­get aga­in."

    Clear Paths

    Can you fe­el it, see it, he­ar it to­day?

    If you can't, then it do­esn't mat­ter an­y­way

    You will ne­ver un­der­s­tand, it hap­pens too fast

    And it fe­els so go­od, it's li­ke wal­king on glass

    - Fa­ith No Mo­re, "Epic"

    Bryce sto­od be­hind the co­un­ter of Grimm's Oc­cult Spe­ci­alty Shop and ob­ser­ved few cus­to­mers in the pla­ce. One was a mid­dle-aged wo­man sta­ring at the sec­ti­on for Re­in­car­na­ti­on and Tran­s­cen­den­tal Me­di­ta­ti­on. She was so eager for know­led­ge, so hungry to know that the­re was mo­re to li­fe than de­ath and ta­xes. Bryce smi­led sadly; her chan­ces we­re so slim. Des­pi­te the pas­si­on she felt for the ide­as of High Ma­gick, she still ac­cep­ted the re­ality that had be­en im­po­sed on her. It was a sha­me, re­al­ly - she wan­ted so much, yet re­fu­sed her­self the right to see be­yond the Cur­ta­in. He es­ti­ma­ted her chan­ces of ever Awa­ke­ning on her own at slightly less than a snow­ball's chan­ce in Hell.

    The ot­her cus­to­mers we­re a dif­fe­rent story en­ti­rely; not one, but two ma­ges sto­od in his sto­re. Both com­p­le­tely ig­no­red the "ma­gic items" on the shel­ves and went stra­ight to the le­ast gla­mo­rous part of the sto­re, the sec­ti­on whe­re True Ma­gick co­uld be fo­und, The small Ori­en­tal wo­man was from the Or­der of Her­mes, and she wo­re her pri­de in the old ways li­ke a shi­eld aga­inst the Sle­epers, The ol­der man he co­uldn't pla­ce, but he sus­pec­ted the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od, simply by the way the man car­ri­ed him­self- re­la­xed and gra­ce­ful- al­most su­re signs that he was skil­led in the physi­cal as­pects of Do. He won­de­red how they re­gar­ded what they saw.

    There can be lit­tle do­ubt that the ave­ra­ge Tra­di­ti­on ma­ge has not­hing but con­tempt for the Or­p­hans, Most ma­ges don't want the self-Awa­ke­ned an­y­w­he­re ne­ar them, fe­aring that the lack of pro­per tra­ining is in­he­rently dan­ge­ro­us. So­me Or­p­hans wo­uld ag­ree with this idea, but the­se are nor­mal­ly the sa­me ones that beg the­ir way in­to a Tra­di­ti­on pro­per.

    For most Or­p­hans, the de­ci­si­on to jo­in with a re­cog­ni­zed Tra­di­ti­on is simply a mat­ter of sur­vi­val. The Tec­h­noc­racy wo­uld lo­ve not­hing mo­re than to lo­ca­te Or­p­hans and eit­her con­vert them or wi­pe them out of exis­ten­ce. The­re is both strength and se­cu­rity in num­bers. A si­zab­le num­ber of the Or­p­hans simply jo­in with the Hol­low Ones, ac­cep­ting the­ir less stre­nu­o­us phi­lo­sop­hi­es and ga­ining most of the be­ne­fits that co­uld be gat­he­red by jo­ining with one of the ni­ne "True" Tra­di­ti­ons. For so­me, ho­we­ver, that is simply not a vi­ab­le op­ti­on. Tho­se that re­ma­in be­hind are the true Or­p­hans, the self-Awa­ke­ned.

    The man was the first to co­me over. He had re­cog­ni­zed Bryce as one of the Awa­ke­ned des­pi­te Bra­ce's de­li­be­ra­te at­tempts to re­ma­in un­no­ti­ced. The gen­t­le­man smi­led apo­lo­ge­ti­cal­ly and as­ked his qu­es­ti­on. "Excu­se me, do you ha­ve any ot­her items, per­haps of the type not nor­mal­ly left in the open?" The qu­es­tion was whis­pe­red and Bryce ap­pre­ci­ated the sof­t­ness of the man's to­ne. No one ne­eded Sle­epers or, wor­se still, the Tec­h­noc­racy he­aring too much abo­ut one of the few se­ri­o­us sto­res in town. Bryce nod­ded and led him to­wards the back ro­om, away from prying ears.

    Orphans pay a high pri­ce for the­ir in­de­pen­dent ac­ti­ons. Many can­not lo­ca­te a Chantry or even a ca­bal that will ac­cept them, and even when they are ac­cep­ted as mem­bers, they are hardly tre­ated as equ­als. Mo­re of­ten than not, an Or­p­han must bar­ter fa­vors for ad­mit­tan­ce in­to a Chantry. So­me even work as mer­ce­na­ri­es for the Tra­di­ti­ons, ta­king high-risk as­sig­n­ments or ad­ding to a ca­bal's po­wer ba­se in ex­c­han­ge for not­hing mo­re than Tass. The mo­re ex­pe­ri­en­ced Or­p­hans so­me­ti­mes work in ex­c­han­ge for in­for­ma­ti­on, in­c­lu­ding ac­cess to a Chantry's lib­ra­ri­es, but even know­led­ge do­es not co­me wit­ho­ut a cost.

    No words we­re ne­eded as the man lo­oked aro­und at the col­lec­tion of Ta­lis­mans and fas­te­ned his eyes on the ka­ta­na prop­ped ca­re­ful­ly aga­inst a col­lec­ti­on of ta­rot cards. "Right aga­in," Bryce tho­ught, but did not say. Bryce him­self had le­ar­ned first from an old sen­sei in Hong Kong, and he knew the Brot­her­hood fa­irly well. The hag­gling only las­ted a few mi­nu­tes, and Bryce was di­sap­po­in­ted as usu­al; the man had be­en too eager to pos­sess the sword, and had mis­sed out on the full ple­asu­res of bar­te­ring.

    Those who cho­ose to stay Or­p­hans fe­el that the Tra­di­ti­ons are too li­mi­ted in the­ir ways of thin­king. Whi­le many Or­p­hans pre­fer to call them­sel­ves self-Awa­ke­ned, a sub­s­tan­ti­al num­ber of them star­ted with one Tra­di­ti­on or anot­her. In so­me ca­ses, Or­p­hans ha­ve li­te­ral­ly go­ne from Tra­di­ti­on to Tra­di­ti­on, se­eking a phi­lo­sophy that ma­kes sen­se. They sel­dom find what they are lo­oking for, and of­ten "co­me ho­me" to the Non-Tra­di­ti­ons, Most of the self-Awa­ke­ned wo­uld eagerly po­int out that be­fo­re the Tra­di­ti­ons co­uld be for­med, ma­ges had to exist. So­me Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges se­em to ha­ve for­got­ten that po­int. To the ones that re­ma­in Or­p­hans, even the Hol­low Ones are too li­mi­ted in the way they think. It sho­uld be po­in­ted out, ho­we­ver, that many of the self-Awa­ke­ned work in Cli­qu­es of the­ii own, for­ming what may well be­co­me Tra­di­ti­ons in the­ir own right in the fu­tu­re,

    Eventually, the Her­me­tic ma­ge was led in­to the back ro­om as well. She to­ok her ti­me, win­dow shop­ping, not re­al­ly lo­oking for an­y­t­hing spe­ci­fic. Bryce tho­ught she was at­trac­ti­ve, and the fe­eling was mu­tu­al. They to­ok to tal­king. When Bryce bro­ught up her Tra­di­ti­on, in­di­ca­ting a pre-Ro­man por­ti­on of the Kab­ba­la, she la­ug­hed softly and sho­ok her he­ad. "No, Mis­ter Grimm, I'm af­ra­id you're mis­ta­ken, I'm not with the Or­der, I'm Ver­be­na." Bryce chal­ked one up for his ima­gi­nary com­pe­ti­ti­on when she ex­p­la­ined that the Se­al of So­lo­mon was simply a gift from, a fri­end, and one she fo­und ple­asing to the eye. Bryce im­me­di­ately be­gan po­in­ting out a few items that he felt wo­uld be of par­ti­cu­lar in­te­rest to Ka­mi, as the wo­man iden­ti­fi­ed her­self, and had ma­de anot­her sa­le in a mat­ter of ten mi­nu­tes.

    One exam­p­le of the Or­p­han gro­ups that has do­ne very well is the Hol­low Ones. Ot­her Cli­qu­es, or Crafts, in­c­lu­ding the Chil­d­ren of Pro­te­us, Ba­ta'a, Sis­ters of Hip­pol­y­ta, Scul­p­tors of Fa­te, Chil­d­ren of Know­led­ge and Frin­ge Wal­kers, grow in num­ber. Most of the­se gro­ups are very new. Most star­ted in this cen­tury. The Frin­ge Wal­kers, who stand at the bor­der bet­we­en Tra­di­ti­on ba­lan­ce and Ma­ra­uder mad­ness, ha­ve be­en aro­und for cen­tu­ri­es, chan­ging many ti­mes over the ye­ars, whi­le the al­c­he­mi­cal Chil­d­ren of Know­led­ge cla­im to be the ol­dest Tra­di­ti­on of them all.

    The two tal­ked un­til well af­ter the sto­re had clo­sed, and Ka­mi sug­ges­ted ma­king lo­ve, Bryce had no obj­ec­ti­ons, and he pro­ved him­self to be a worthy ma­te. He had spent most of his te­en ye­ars le­ar­ning from a very pas­si­ona­te mem­ber of Ka­mi's Tra­di­ti­on , and ap­pa­rently a few things had rub­bed off. Ka­mi fi­nal­ly bro­ke down and as­ked him the qu­es­ti­on he nor­mal­ly avo­ided an­s­we­ring: what Tra­di­ti­on did Bryce fol­low? Bryce ne­ver li­ed abo­ut the mat­ter; he told her mat­ter-of-factly that he was an Or­p­han. Ka­mi was sur­p­ri­sed, but hid her shock well. They tal­ked of phi­lo­sop­hi­es un­til the sun was on the ri­se. Then they went up­s­ta­irs to Bryce's apar­t­ment to sle­ep.

    When he awo­ke just af­ter no­on, Ka­mi was go­ne. She'd left a no­te for him, pro­mi­sing to re­turn in a few days. The Win­ter Sol­s­tice was ne­ar. Ka­mi had pre­pa­ra­ti­ons to ma­ke for the for­mal gat­he­ring. Bryce smi­led; it was al­ways ni­ce ma­king a new fri­end. The buz­zer so­un­ded be­low as he was get­ting dres­sed; anot­her day, and Grimm's Oc­cult Spe­ci­alty Shop was open 365 days a ye­ar. He won­de­red what sur­p­ri­ses the day wo­uld bring, and ho­ped fer­vently that he wo­uld me­et a per­son who sha­red his pas­si­on for bar­te­ring. Bryce lo­ved a to­ugh sa­le.

    Laughter in Sha­dow

    What an in­he­ri­tance

    The salt and the Kle­enex

    Morbid self-at­ten­ti­on

    Bending my pinky back…

    You're per­fect, yes, it's true

    But wit­ho­ut me, you're only you

    Your men­s­t­ru­atin' he­art

    It ain't ble­edin' eno­ugh for two

    - Fa­ith No Mo­re, "Mid­li­fe Cri­sis"

    Sascha mo­ved ac­ross the pul­sing dan­ce flo­or with a prac­ti­ced non­c­ha­lance she did not fe­el. The wra­ith sto­od only a few fe­et away from her, and .she felt the chill that po­ured from its ra­di­ant form even from whe­re she sto­od; the idea of ac­tu­al­ly ap­pro­ac­hing the glo­ri­o­us form was eno­ugh to ma­ke her fe­el un­worthy. Be­fo­re she co­uld spe­ak, the wra­ith cal­led out to her softly. Even its vo­ice was be­a­uti­ful. "I see you. I me­an you no harm. Co­me to me."

    That the wra­ith sen­sed her fe­ar was eno­ugh of an an­no­yan­ce to ma­ke her for­ce her dre­ad in­to the bac­k­g­ro­und, "I'm sup­po­sed to talk to you… But I don't know what to say." She ha­ted that the words we­re fa­int, al­most we­ak. She un­con­s­ci­o­usly lo­oked aro­und the ro­om to ma­ke cer­ta­in that no­ne of the Sle­epers we­re lo­oking at her and la­ug­hing. They we­re not, and she al­lo­wed her­self to re­lax.

    Contrary to the be­li­efs of most Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges, the Hol­low Ones do ha­ve the­ir own set of be­li­efs. The pri­mary dif­fe­ren­ce is that most Hol­low Ones do not dis­cuss the­ir mu­tu­al be­li­efs with ot­her ma­ges. Many deny thar As­cen­si­on is a true as­pect of re­ality, pre­fer­ring to li­ve in the he­re and now in­s­te­ad of fo­cu­sing the­ir at­ten­ti­ons on the fu­tu­re. The Hol­low Ones, mo­re than any ot­her Tra­di­ti­on, ref­lect the mass-me­dia's be­li­efs in the oc­cult. As the me­dia is- for the most part- ig­no­rant abo­ut the truths of the su­per­na­tu­ral, the Hol­low Ones fe­el a po­wer­ful ne­ed to le­arn for them­sel­ves abo­ut the re­ali­ti­es be­yond the le­gends of we­re­wol­ves, vam­pi­res and wra­iths.

    To a fol­lo­wer of the Hol­low Tra­di­ti­on, the most im­por­tant as­pect of ma­gick is the vast know­led­ge that can be le­ar­ned. Mind you, no Hol­low One wo­uld ever ad­mit an­y­t­hing of the sort to one of his pe­ers. To this end, they are mo­re li­kely to use a ou­i­ja bo­ard or a deck of ta­rot cards than to use a ca­ul­d­ron or wand; they are so en­w­rap­ped in the ge­ne­ral be­li­efs of ma­gick as per­ce­ived by the me­dia that what most of the Awa­ke­ned wo­uld dis­da­in as par­lor ga­mes work qu­ite well as fo­ci for them. Mo­re than a few of the Hol­low Ones ha­ve be­en known to use a black silk top hat for mo­re than the pro­duc­ti­on of a rab­bit. Most Tra­di­ti­ons as­su­me that the Goth ma­ges ne­ed no fo­ci, but that is usu­al­ly be­ca­use the­ir fo­ci are har­der to lo­ca­te with ease and nor­mal­ly ta­ke the form of jewelry or fas­hi­on ac­ces­so­ri­es. The Hol­low Ones re­ali­ze that ma­gick wit­ho­ut fo­ci is pos­sib­le and so­me even dis­da­in the use of fo­ci. Tho­se that cho­ose not to find a fo­cus for the­ir ma­gick, ho­we­ver, find le­ar­ning new Sphe­res dif­fi­cult.

    Sascha was ut­terly fas­ci­na­ted by the scin­til­la­ting light that com­po­sed the wra­ith's form, and she had to fight to avo­id trying to to­uch its im­ma­te­ri­al sub­s­tan­ce. "Do­es it hurt to be de­ad?" She ha­ted the words as so­on as they we­re out of her mo­uth. What if the wra­ith we­re to ta­ke of­fen­se?

    The wra­ith la­ug­hed, a so­und li­ke crystal chi­mes struck by sil­ver bells. "No, child, the­re is no pa­in." The wra­ith se­emed to fa­de away for a se­cond, but re­tur­ned al­most in­s­tantly. "No physi­cal pa­in at le­ast. Am I all that you ex­pec­ted?"

    Sascha co­uld he­ar the gen­t­le moc­kery in the vo­ice of the an­ge­lic form, but to­ok no of­fen­se. "No, you are so much mo­re than I co­uld ha­ve ho­ped for…" The­re she went aga­in, ma­king stu­pid com­ments and so­un­ding li­ke an ama­te­ur. Sas­c­ha ha­ted lo­oking li­ke she didn't know an­y­t­hing. What was the pur­po­se of dres­sing Goth if you ac­ted li­ke a ge­ek?

    Hollow Ones are very much the sla­ves to fas­hi­on, but only if fas­hi­on rep­re­sents the dar­k­ness and de­cay that sur­ro­unds them. No Hol­low One li­kes to ad­mit to be­ing less than know­led­ge­ab­le, es­pe­ci­al­ly in the pre­sen­ce of the ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons. Whi­le they will deny ve­he­mently a ne­ed to be ac­cep­ted as equ­als - nor­mal­ly cla­iming that they are abo­ve such pet­ti­ness- the fol­lo­wers of the Hol­low Tra­di­ti­on are as sus­cep­tib­le to fe­elings of re­j­ec­ti­on and ina­de­qu­acy as any of the Awa­ke­ned,

    "Who we­re you… I me­an… who are you?" Aga­in, mo­re stu­pid qu­es­ti­ons, but Sas­c­ha felt the ne­ed to Ic­no­ui abo­ut the wra­ith, to know abo­ut all of the wra­iths. Su­rely the­re was no gre­ater exam­p­le of what lay be­yond de­ath's do­or. Su­rely the­re was no bet­ter rep­re­sen­ta­ti­on of what ca­me with the sup­po­sed As­cen­sion than the be­ing that sto­od be­fo­re her.

    The wra­ith smi­led, and even its smi­le was en­c­han­tingly be­a­uti­ful. She wan­ted to we­ep with joy at what she saw, but was awa­re that the ca­bal was wat­c­hing, wa­iting to see a sign of we­ak­ness in the­ir new ini­ti­ate. "No­body spe­ci­al," the wra­ith rep­li­ed, "My past li­fe wo­uld simply bo­re you." The wra­ith re­ac­hed out and to­uc­hed be­yond her flesh, to­uc­hed her so­ul, her Ava­tar. "Cer­ta­inly I was not as gre­at as you will be, pro­vi­ded you le­arn the ne­ces­sary les­sons be­fo­re yo­ur ti­me is over."

    "What les­sons? Ple­ase, I ne­ed to know." The wra­ith smi­led aga­in, sho­ok its he­ad sadly. The­re wo­uld be no an­s­wer, not now at le­ast, but the kno­wing eyes that lo­oked at her pro­mi­sed know­led­ge when the ti­me was right. In spi­te of the pro­mi­se, Sas­c­ha's he­art fell. "Ple­ase, tell me so­met­hing. I ha­ve to know what to ex­pect."

    The Hol­low Ones be­li­eve in the em­p­ti­ness they all fe­el in­si­de, the vo­id that they can­not fill no mat­ter how hard they try. This em­p­ti­ness, or mo­re ap­prop­ri­ately, this hol­low fe­eling, is the pri­mary mo­ti­va­ting fac­tor in fol­lo­wers of the Tra­di­ti­on, The clot­hes they we­ar, the at­ti­tu­des they carry, all mir­ror the de­so­la­ti­on and Eon­ging that many of the Hol­low Ones fe­el.

    The wra­ith smi­led aga­in, and this ti­me it an­s­we­red her qu­es­ti­on. "You are right to em­b­ra­ce the dar­k­ness. The em­p­ti­ness in­si­de you is apart of what you must lo­se in or­der to mo­ve on, But child, ple­ase re­mem­ber that the­re is al­so light in the world. Em­b­race the light as well." As the last words es­ca­ped past glo­ri­o­us, se­pul­c­h­ral lips, the wra­ith fa­ded away, le­aving only mo­re vo­id whe­re be­fo­re the­re was such be­a­uti­ful light. Sas­c­ha felt the loss in the depths of her so­ul.

    She tur­ned and saw the ca­bal sta­ring at her, wa­iting to see what she wo­uld do, still jud­ging whet­her or not she was worthy. To hell with them; if they de­ci­ded that she was less than the­ir equ­als, she wo­uld still sur­vi­ve. She had le­ar­ned so much on her own al­re­ady that she didn't ne­ed them to te­ach her an­y­t­hing. Still, she wan­ted to ha­ve fri­ends. Ever­yo­ne wants fri­ends. Ever­yo­ne ne­eds fa­mily.

    The fol­lo­wers of the Hol­low Tra­di­ti­on pre­fer to stay in are­as po­pu­la­ted by pe­op­le, pre­fe­rably tho­se that fol­low the sa­me Got­hic men­ta­lity in both dress and li­fes­t­y­le. In many ca­ses, the bars whe­re Hol­low Ones hang be­co­me the mo­dern equ­iva­lent of opi­um dens. The­se punk bars and thrash dan­ce halls are of­ten so fil­led with Sle­epers hop­ped up or knoc­ked out on drugs that vul­gar ma­gick can be used with a les­se­ned risk of suf­fe­ring Pa­ra­dox. As of­ten as not, the ma­gick per­for­med is less im­p­res­si­ve than what the Sle­epers are al­re­ady se­e­ing.

    Baron wal­ked over to whe­re she sto­od and lo­oked down at her. Ba­ron was­tal­land le­an, his ha­ir dyed to match his clot­hes, and his ears and no­se de­co­ra­ted with flas­hes of light to help gu­ide him in his se­arch thro­ugh the dar­k­ness. He did not smi­le; he did not ha­ve to smi­le. She had be­en ac­cep­ted. Aro­und them the Sle­epers lis­te­ned to the harsh, bla­ring mu­sic and con­su­med al­co­hol or a va­ri­ety of il­le­gal nar­co­tics. Ba­ron stuck a ci­ga­ret­te in his mo­uth and Sas­c­ha ig­ni­ted her hand so that he co­uld in turn ig­ni­te the tip of his ci­ga­ret­te. Not sur­p­ri­singly, no one no­ti­ced. They dan­ced to the­ir own rhythm as the mu­sic pla­yed on. It was go­od to be ho­me at last.

    The Sub­t­le Ones

    Well the Scrip­tu­re

    Is a scul­p­tu­re

    Which encrypts yo­ur

    Soul

    With its cul­tu­re…

    -Norman B., De­vi­ati­ons from The Norm

    Harken and at­tend! Thus spa­ke the Khwa­ja-al-Ak­bar:

    In a Ti­me be­fo­re the­re was ti­me, a gre­at He­ro slew a gre­at Be­ast. The car­cass of the Be­ast for­med a hu­ge Mo­un­ta­in co­ve­ring the World, and the He­ro knew that the World must be cle­ared for the co­ming of Hu­ma­nity. By acts of Pri­mal Ma­gick only dimly un­der­s­to­od by tho­se such as Mysel­ves, the He­ro car­ved Mo­un­ta­in Qaf in­to a mo­del of As­cen­si­on it­self with the bro­ad cha­otic di­ver­sity of Hu­man Be­li­ef span­ning the ba­se, and who­se col­lec­ti­ve stri­vings form the Au­atars, the Paths of As­cen­dence re­ac­hing up the mo­un­ta­in­si­de thro­ugh the Ranks of the Awa­ke­ned and the Re­alms of the Orac­les, thro­ugh the Re­alms of In­car­nae and Ce­les­ti­nes, and con­ver­ging in the Pre­sen­ces, which are the Sha­dows of the Pu­re Ones, be­fo­re jo­ining at the Sum­mit, Which Is The Unity.

    Such a Gre­at Work was not wit­ho­ut a Pri­ce, ho­we­ver. The Blo­od of the Be­ast se­eped de­ep in­to the Earth, sa­tu­ra­ting it with highly char­ged Qu­in­tes­sen­ce and for­ming a dan­ge­ro­usly un­s­tab­le Ba­se for the mo­un­ta­in of As­cen­si­on. It mu­se be the Task of the re­uni­fi­ed Tra­di­ti­ons to chan­nel this raw un­wi­el­dab­le Po­wer sa­fely in­to the paths of As­cen­si­on, Wri­ting The Na­me Of The Unity ac­ross the fa­ce of the World, be­fo­re the sta­bi­lity of the Mo­un­tain It­self is thre­ate­ned.

    - From The Doc­t­ri­ne of the Unity, Re­ve­aled by the Khwa­ja al-Ak­bar upon the Night of­Fa­na in the Das­ht-i-Mar­go, Com­mit­ted to Me­mory by Ru­fai the Me­de of the Dar­wus­him, Tran­s­c­ri­bed by Khat­ta­both Kag­han of the Uni­ver­sity of Light, and Pre­ser­ved for the Edi­fi­ca­ti­on and En­lig­h­ten­ment of All who are Awa­ke­ned by Josep­hus the As­ce­tic of the Bret­h­ren of the Uni­fi­ed So­ul

    Although they we­re one of the ori­gi­nal mem­bers of the Co­un­cil of Ni­ne (occup­ying the se­at now held by the Vir­tu­al Adepts), the Ahl-i-Ba­tin are prac­ti­cal­ly un­k­nown to many Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges. Most as­su­me that they we­re wi­ped out when the Tec­h­noc­racy mo­ved in­to the Mid­dle East to en­su­re its con­t­rol of the newly dis­co­ve­red oil fi­elds. That the Ahl-i-Ba­tin elu­de the ma­gicks of most Awa­ke­ned so easily may be ta­ken as so­me tri­bu­te to this Tra­di­ti­on's mas­tery of ke­eping to the sha­dows. At va­ri­o­us ti­mes thro­ug­ho­ut his­tory, the Ahl-i-Ba­tin ha­ve be­en one of the most po­li­ti­cal­ly po­wer­ful Tra­di­ti­ons on the pla­net (tho­ugh not many re­ali­zed it).

    The Night of Fa­na

    The his­tory of the Ahl-i-Ba­tin be­gins with the Hi­ma­la­yan Wars of 900-600 BC, when a sect of Han­du­ra (la­ter sub­su­med in­to the Eut­ha­na­tos) vi­ci­o­usly fo­ught to dri­ve the old Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od out of the In­di­an sub­con­ti­nent. Now, it hap­pe­ned that a gro­up of yo­ung Ini­ti­ates and Acol­y­tes, who all hap­pe­ned to be bu­il­ders and sto­ne­ma­sons by tra­de, we­re se­pa­ra­ted from the Brot­her­ho­od by a Eut­ha­na­tos am­bush whi­le tra­vel­ling bet­we­en mo­nas­te­ri­es. Har­ri­ed thro­ugh the Khyber Pass and in­to what is now Af­g­ha­nis­tan, so­me of the band di­ed, and many we­re dri­ven to the ed­ge of sa­nity by the En­t­ropy ma­gicks of the Eut­ha­na­tos.

    Finding them­sel­ves upon a bro­ad ver­dant pla­in bo­un­ded at eit­her hand by gre­at dis­tant mo­un­ta­ins, the gro­up ca­me upon a band of der­vis­hes en­ga­ged in a mad fren­zi­ed dan­ce. The­se we­re the Dar­wus­him, a schis­ma­tic sect of the Cult of Ec­s­tasy that had in­cur­red the wrath of cer­ta­in fac­ti­ons of what be­ca­me the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus by da­ring to sug­gest that the hig­her in­tel­li­gen­ce the ec­s­ta­tics con­tac­ted thro­ugh the­ir ri­tes was the One of Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus dog­ma. Wit­ho­ut mis­sing a be­at, one of the drum­mers mo­ti­oned the Akas­hic Brot­hers to jo­in the dan­ce, and they did so.

    Much has be­en sa­id of that eve­ning, which is now cal­led the Night of Fa­na, and most Ba­ti­ni cus­toms and doc­t­ri­ne are sa­id to ha­ve the­ir ori­gins in the mer­ging of Tra­di­ti­ons that oc­cur­red. The un­con­t­rol­led pas­si­on of the

    Background

    Darwushim fo­und a kind of dis­cip­li­ne and im­p­li­cit or­der in the Do forms thro­ugh which the Brot­hers dan­ced, and, in a sta­te of di­vi­ne in­to­xi­ca­ti­on, pi­er­ced them­sel­ves with long ste­el ne­ed­les. The con­tem­p­la­ti­ve mo­ve­ments of the Akas­hic Brot­hers we­re in­fu­sed with an in­com­p­re­hen­sib­le energy, dra­wing them be­yond the­ir li­mi­ted un­der­s­tan­ding of Mind, and many twis­ted aro­und in the­ir skins stri­ving to find the Way of the­se un­k­nown vis­tas of con­s­ci­o­us­ness.

    At the cli­max of this gre­at dan­ce, a very stran­ge thing hap­pe­ned. Mah­lav, a Dar­wus­him Acol­y­te, sin­g­led out a mem­ber of the Akas­hic re­ti­nue, a scul­p­tor by the na­me of Sad­dhu, and sto­od be­fo­re him. Now Sad­dhu was a po­or sickly man with a wit­he­red left arm who had spe­ci­ali­zed in car­ving the eyes of god­des­ses with his go­od right arm; Mah­lav, tho­ugh a skil­led dan­cer with a gre­at so­ul, had ne­ver be­en ac­cor­ded his pro­per sta­tus among the Dar­wus­him, for lie had no left arm (an af­f­lic­ti­on then con­si­de­red a cur­se among them).

    A flash of pro­fo­und re­cog­ni­ti­on pas­sed bet­we­en them, and they step­ped for­ward us tho­ugh to em­b­ra­ce. Upon to­uc­hing, the two men fu­sed in­to one, with Mah­lav's fa­ce on the back of Sad­dhu's he­ad and Sad­dhu's fe­atu­res emer­ging from the back of Mah­lav's skull. This do­ub­le­si­ded fi­gu­re, with stran­gely symmet­ri­cal legs and arms now ma­de who­le, be­gan a stran­ge im­p­ro­vi­sed Do-dan­ce, chan­ting (in ste­reo) to the as­sem­b­led ma­ges and Acol­y­tes.

    I am the Khu­i­a­ju al-Ak­bar, it ex­p­la­ined, an Orac­le of the Pla­ce Which Is One, and my jo­ur­neys among the world of men are en­ded and I am re­lu­med to my self. I bring to you, who ha­ve no mo­re Fel­low­s­hip of yo­ur own, the Doc­t­ri­ne of the Unity, whe­reby As­cen­si­on may be ma­de known to all, and the squ­ab­bling-fen­ces of dog­ma­tic phi­lo­sophy be tran­s­cen­ded. I call in you, who are now Or­p­ha­ned, to cle­ave to me in fo­un­ding a Path of yo­ur own.

    The mis­si­on of the Khwa­ja, and all who wo­uld fol­low, was to wri­te a gre­at ru­ne or man­da­la ac­ross the fa­ce of the earth which wo­uld fo­cus the tho­ughts and as­pi­ra­ti­ons of Sle­eper and Awa­ke­ned ali­ke in­to a cos­mo­lo­gi­cal ide­al that af­for­ded so­me con­t­rol of- and pro­tec­ti­on from- the pow­der­keg of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce on which the world res­ted.

    As the Khwa­ja chan­ted, Dar­wus­him bards stro­ve to me­mo­ri­ze the rhythms of the re­ci­tal, and Akas­hic scri­bes scrib­bled the Khwa­ja's words in hasty no­ta­ti­onal San­s­k­rit. When the Khwa­ja sang of the Unity, its words des­c­ri­bed not only the Cor­res­pon­den­ce Po­int of spa­ce and ti­me, bur the Uni­ver­sal Mind as well, and the un­di­vi­ded One of pu­re Pri­me, All Paths must re­cog­ni­ze the com­mo­na­lity of the­ir res­pec­ti­ve doc­t­ri­nes, the Khwa­ja abj­ured, lest the­ir ene­mi­es di­vi­de and con­qu­er them. The Doc­t­ri­ne of the Unit­y­wo­uld pro­vi­de the key to the trust of ot­hers.

    It is iro­nic that the Night of Fa­na cli­ma­xed with the Khwa­ja's call to uni­fi­ca­ti­on, for at that mo­ment, the wes­tern ho­ri­zon dar­ke­ned as Han­du­ra re­in­for­ce­ments ar­ri­ved to ho­und the­ir Akas­hic qu­ar­ry in­to ob­li­vi­on, and the sky to the east bla­zed with the ap­pro­ach of a host of the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus bent on squ­el­c­hing the Dar­wus­him he­resy on­ce and for all. Of the en­su­ing con­f­lag­ra­ti­on, one can only spe­cu­la­te, for the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus and the Eut­ha­na­tos gi­ve stran­gely con­f­lic­ting ac­co­unts, and the Ahl-i-Ba­tin ha­ve ne­ver be­en in­du­ced to spe­ak upon the mat­ter. All that can be sa­id for cer­ta­in is that the rich fer­ti­le pla­in upon which this event to­ok pla­ce is now cal­led the Das­ht-i-Mar­go, or Gre­ar De­sert of De­ath, which spans much of Af­g­ha­nis­tan.

    The Hid­den Plan of Unity

    Impossible tho­ugh it may se­em, the fled­g­ling Tra­di­ti­on sur­vi­ved the Night of Fa­na, but wo­uld not re­ve­al its exis­ten­ce to ot­her ma­ges for se­ve­ral cen­tu­ri­es. The­ir ac­ti­vi­ti­es may he in­fer­red from his­to­ri­cal so­ur­ces: em­pi­res be­gan to ri­se and fall mo­re qu­ickly, con­qu­ering each ot­her in in­c­re­asingly ra­pid suc­ces­si­on. Cer­ta­in gro­ups, ho­we­ver, ac­hi­eved a kind of per­ma­nen­ce, par­ti­cu­larly so­me re­li­gi­o­us se­ers in Pa­les­ti­ne and ru­ling fa­mi­li­es in Per­sia. The en­vi­ron­ment of the ci­ti­es chan­ged dra­ma­ti­cal­ly; an en­gi­ne­ering bre­ak­t­h­ro­ugh cal­led a qa­nat al­lo­wed wa­ter from mel­ting mo­un­ta­in snows to be tran­s­por­ted un­der­g­ro­und ac­ross the arid Per­si­an pla­ins to the ci­ti­es, whe­re lush gar­dens with tin­k­ling fo­un­ta­ins we­re b u i l t . The arts of ur­ban plan­ning adap­ted and grew ac­cor­dingly, whi­le ar­c­hi­tec­tu­re aro­se to new he­ights, cas­ting the man­da­la pat­terns of the ci­ti­es in sharp re­li­ef.

    By the ti­me of the Ro­man Em­pi­re, the pro­li­fe­ra­ti­on of schis­ma­tic re­li­gi­o­us sects was ta­king its toll upon the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus, and its in­qu­isi­to­ri­al fac­ti­ons had a fi­eld day ro­un­ding up he­re­tics. Thro­ugh re­ams of con­fes­si­ons and in­ter­ro­ga­ti­on tran­s­c­ripts, a frag­men­tary pic­tu­re emer­ged, and the Cho­rus ca­me to the re­ali­za­ti­on that its ho­me turf, the thickly No­ded crad­le of ci­vi­li­za­ti­on, was be­ing in­fil­t­ra­ted and ap­prop­ri­ated un­der its very no­se. Pur­ges and pog­roms we­re set in mo­ti­on, and dun­ge­ons thic­ke­ned with Es­se­ne­me­nes, Cha­opts, Ig­nos­tics and he­re­tics of all va­ri­eti­es, but even the com­bi­ned ef­forts of all such gro­ups co­uld not ac­co­unt fot the mas­si­ve de­fi­cit of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce which the Cho­rus was ex­pe­ri­en­cing at many of its most po­wer­ful No­des.

    With the ab­sen­ce of the Ro­man Em­pi­re, the on­ce fer­ti­le cres­cent was re­du­ced to a was­te­land de­nu­ded by hu­man con­sum­p­ti­on, in which Ma­ra­uders and the­ir Dj­inn hor­des pre­yed upon un­wary tra­vel­lers. The iso­la­ti­on of the ci­ti­es dot­ting this lan­d­s­ca­pe en­for­ced an iso­la­ti­on upon all wit­hin the re­gi­on, with com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on un­cer­ta­in at best.

    At length, when the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus se­emed abo­ut to aban­don its holy land for the gre­ener pas­tu­res of Euro­pe, the chi­ef mem­ber of the in­qu­isi­to­ri­al fac­ti­on awo­ke to find, upon the pil­low be­si­de his­he­ad, a warm lo­af of swe­et ma­nab­re­ad and a thick she­af of pa­pers la­bo­ri­o­usly in­s­c­ri­bed with a plan which wo­uld unify the ci­ti­es of the was­tes with an ar­ray of No­des alig­ned aro­und a cen­t­ral axis. Ac­com­pan­ying this plan was an en­g­ra­ved in­vi­ta­ti­on to dis­cuss its im­p­le­men­ta­ti­on sig­ned by Her­me­tic po­ten­ta­tes, the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od and the Cult of Ec­s­tasy, be­aring a ma­gic­kal char­ge which was easily tra­ce­ab­le to the ho­use of a rich mer­c­hant of Is­fa­han.

    Chorus de­le­ga­tes ar­ri­ved to find ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons rep­re­sen­ted and en­ga­ged in vi­go­ro­us dis­cus­si­on of the plan. Cho­rus el­ders qu­ickly dis­cer­ned the wis­dom of the plan: a syner­ge­tic net of lin­ked No­des which wo­uld frac­tu­re and di­vi­de the blan­ket hold of the Mad Ones upon the lands. In a ra­re ces­sa­ti­on of in­ter­ne­ci­ne fe­uding, the pre-Co­un­cil Tra­di­ti­ons ag­re­ed to re­cog­ni­ze a go­od thing when they saw it, for the mu­tu­al be­ne­fit to all was un­mis­ta­kab­le.

    Certain mem­bers of each Tra­di­ti­on, ho­we­ver, skep­tics sus­pi­ci­o­us of the plan's met­hod of de­li­very, ca­me to the col­lec­ti­ve re­ali­za­ti­on that no­ne of the rep­re­sen­ted Tra­di­ti­ons we­re the ori­gi­na­tors of the plan, and in­ci­si­ve in­qu­iri­es so­on re­ve­aled that the­ir host, the "rich mer­c­hant" of Is­fa­han, was, in fact, a co­ali­ti­on of mi­nor but res­pec­tab­le Crafts with de­ep ro­ots in the pre­his­tory of Cen­t­ral Asia and the Fer­ti­le Cres­cent. The mem­bers of this co­ali­ti­on we­re known to in­c­lu­de the Ik­h­wan at-Taw­hid ("Bret­h­ren of the Uni­fi­ed So­ul," rec­lu­si­ve as­ce­tic mystics on the frin­ge of the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus), Us­tad Ak­h­dir Jabal, who ta­ught mu­sic and dan­ce in his "Pa­ra­di­se Gar­den" at Is­fa­han, the Uni­ver­sity of Light (Qa­ba­lists from Jeru­sa­lem), the Silk Car­tel of Sa­mar­kand and the Dar­wus­him, now unaf­ra­id to use the­ir na­me openly. In­qu­isi­to­ri­al for­ces did the­ir best to dis­cern so­me con­s­pi­racy be­hind this co­ali­ti­on, but fo­und only lowly mystics of li­mi­ted ma­gic­kal un­der­s­tan­ding, prac­ti­ti­oners sin­ce­tely an­xi­o­us to rally aro­und the stron­gest so­ur­ce of ma­gic­kal energy in the­ir midst.

    After a bri­ef but vi­ci­o­us flurry of in­fig­h­ting over the lo­ca­le of the cen­t­ral No­de, the plan was ac­cep­ted. Its dis­ser­ta­ti­ons upon the me­tap­h­y­sic of Unity cap­tu­red the he­arts of the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus' old gu­ard. Qu­in­tes­sen­ce was to be chan­ne­led ac­ross the was­tes by con­du­its of raw hu­man fa­ith, sent by pra­yer or car­ri­ed in per­son, col­lec­ted at a mas­si­ve cen­t­ral No­de and re­dis­t­ri­bu­ted back to the con­t­ri­bu­tory no­des. The net swept the fa­ce of the pla­net in tre­men­do­us wa­ves of wil­ling rec­ru­its, re­sul­ting in a vast re­na­is­san­ce, not only for the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus, who ten­ded the Cen­t­ral No­de with the aid of the Ik­h­wan at-Taw­hid, but for all ma­gery in its re­gi­ons. The Ma­ra­uders we­re dri­ven from the was­te­land re­alms, and even the cul­tu­re and ci­vi­li­za­ti­on of the Sle­epers we­re ele­va­ted to hit­her­to un­se­en he­ights.

    Mount Qaf and the Web of Fa­ith

    With the spre­ad of the Web of Fa­ith, as it ca­me to be ta­iled, ca­me the pro­li­fe­ra­ti­on of cults and re­li­gi­o­us sects, usu­al­ly cen­te­red aro­und an Er­rant who drew upon the Qu­in­tes­sen­ti­al energy of the Web, which alar­med not only the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus, but the ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons as well. Steps we­re ta­ken to dri­ve gro­ups li­ke the Ib­li­si, Ya­zu­di, Abu­lu­li­ans and Shi­ma­ili­tes out of the Web. Per­se­cu­ti­on es­ca­la­ted over the next few cen­tu­ri­es, un­til the Cho­rus and the Or­der of Her­mes cal­led in mas­si­ve re­in­for­ce­ments from Euro­pe, Fe­aring anot­her ho­lo­ca­ust, such as that which en­ded the Night of Fa­na, the true mas­ters of the Ahl-i-Ba­tin re­ve­aled them­sel­ves in sec­ret to high-ran­king mem­bers of the Tra­di­ti­ons, In­vo­king the Doc­t­ri­ne of Unity, they as­su­red the Tra­di­ti­on le­aders of the­ir go­od in­ten­ti­ons, ex­p­la­ining the­ir long de­cep­ti­on as a me­ans of pro­tec­ti­on aga­inst the Han­du­ra. Le­aders we­re in­vi­ted to Sihr Ma­qa­mut, and Mo­unt Qaf was re­ve­aled to them. Many Tra­di­ti­on le­aders cla­imed to ha­ve se­en the­ir own Ava­tars bec­ko­ning to them from the up­per slo­pes of the mo­un­ta­in­si­de.

    Though they had se­cu­red so­me po­wer­ful al­li­es, the Ahl-i-Ba­tin still li­ved in fe­ar of ene­mi­es old and new, and kept sec­ret two of the­ir ma­j­or so­ur­ces of strength: the Qutbs, Mas­ters of the Sphe­re of Mind who kept the far­f­lung Ba­ti­ni le­aders in clo­se te­le­pat­hic con­tact, and the qa­nat, a met­hod of dra­wing up Qu­in­tes­sen­ti­al energy from the vast re­se­vo­irs of "dra­gon's blo­od" which lay be­ne­ath most of the Mid­dle East (see the ex­cerpt from the Doc­t­ri­ne of the Unity, abo­ve), which co­uld be used to cre­ate a tem­po­rary mi­ni­atu­re No­de of sorts.

    Batini dip­lo­mats may ha­ve be­en in­s­t­ru­men­tal in the for­ma­ti­on of the Co­un­cil of the Ni­ne, but we­re still re­luc­tant to re­ve­al them­sel­ves to any but the hig­hest le­aders of ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons. The­ir pla­ce on the Co­un­cil was of­fi­ci­al­ly de­fi­ned as lo­ose af­fi­li­ati­on of "Crafts" cal­led the Ge­omat­ric Co­ali­ti­on. As ye­ars pas­sed, ho­we­ver, the Ba­ti­ni in­sis­ten­ce upon the­ir clo­ak-and-dag­ger cha­ra­de be­ca­me so­met­hing of an in­si­de joke among Co­un­cil mem­bers, prom­p­ting one to re­mark: "The­se 'sub­t­le ones' se­em to be so-o-o sub­t­le that even they don't know what they are do­ing!"

    Though me­rely a joke, this sta­te­ment may in­di­ca­te the ma­j­or re­ason for the Ahl-i-Ba­tin's even­tu­al dow­n­fall. Whi­le they ma­de in­c­re­dib­le prog­ress in brin­ging the Tra­di­ti­ons to­get­her, the­ir own frag­men­ted struc­tu­re ten­ded to blind them to cor­rup­ti­on wit­hin the­ir ranks, and the­ir con­s­tant med­dling in Mid-Eas­tern po­li­tics be­gan to whe­el out of con­t­rol. At the be­gin­ning of the ni­ne­te­enth cen­tury, the Tec­h­noc­racy be­ca­me awa­re of the vast Qu­in­tes­sen­ce re­ser­ves un­der the re­gi­on and mo­ved in to ta­ke over. In the fi­er­ce bat­tles which fol­lo­wed, both si­des lost; Mo­unt Qaf was shut away from the Earth and both par­ti­es we­re ba­nis­hed from its inef­fab­le slo­pes.

    What fol­lo­wed do­es lit­tle cre­dit to the Ba­ti­ni le­ader­s­hip, which promptly aban­do­ned its Dis­cip­les with va­gue cla­ims of a fu­tu­re re­turn and tri­umph. Af­ter de­ca­des of dec­li­ne, the ailing Tra­di­ti­on bro­ke ranks with the Co­un­cil fol­lo­wing a dis­pu­te with the Euro­pe­an-ba­sed Tra­di­ti­ons bet­we­en the two World Wars. The Ba­ti­ni, vo­wing to pro­tect the­ir ho­me­land aga­inst the Tec­h­noc­racy sin­g­le­han­dedly, va­nis­hed lar­gely from the Co­un­cil's sight.

    It is pos­sib­le that many (or even all) Ba­ti­ni le­aders we­re hun­ted down and des­t­ro­yed, for no hid­den Mas­ters ha­ve yet be­en dis­co­ve­red, eit­her by Tra­di­ti­on, Tec­h­noc­racy or the­ir own fol­lo­wers. Tho­se left be­hind, cut off from each ot­her and from the­ir al­li­es among the Tra­di­ti­ons, li­te­ral­ly ne­ver knew what hit them. Thus the Ahl-i-Ba­tin be­ca­me the butt of anot­her, mo­re cru­el joke at the hands of the Tec­h­no­man­tic vic­tors, to wit: "They ha­ve di­vi­ded, now we will con­qu­er!"

    Extra-Traditional Ini­ti­ati­on

    Before this cen­tury, and back in­to ear­li­est his­tory, cer­ta­in Orac­les to­ok an ac­ti­ve ro­le in Awa­ke­ning the Ava­tars of pro­mi­sing mor­tals, par­ti­cu­larly tho­se with no con­nec­ti­on to the kha­na­qahs who might ot­her­wi­se ha­ve be­co­me Or­p­hans. The ap­pe­aran­ce of such be­ings among the kha­na­qahs may tem­po­ra­rily "re­mind" them of the Doc­t­ri­ne of Unity and the­ir kin­s­hip with each ot­her, but schis­ma­tic ri­val­ri­es in­va­ri­ably re­su­me on­ce the Orac­le has left. A pla­yer who wis­hes her Ba­ti­ni cha­rac­ter to be awa­re of the Ahl-i-Ba­tin's full Tra­di­ti­onal he­ri­ta­ge may wish to in­c­lu­de one of the fol­lo­wing Pre­sen­ces in her Pre­lu­de:

    • Al­kidr, an im­mor­tal prop­het from the age of Ib­ra­him (Abra­ham), an Orac­le of the Sphe­re of Ti­me.

    • The Khwa­ja al-Ak­bar, em­bo­di­ment of cos­t­no­lo­gi­cal eru­di­ti­on iden­ti­fi­ed with the Eg­y­p­ti­an Thoth and the Gre­ek Her­mes, sa­id to ha­ve ini­ti­ated Pytha­go­ras, Euc­lid and Pla­to in­to the first le­vels of un­der­s­tan­ding of the Sphe­re of Cor­res­pon­den­ce,

    •Nazdhur-i-Khan, a tric­k­s­ter of Cen­t­ral Asi­an fol­k­lo­re, who­se "fo­olish" and "insa­ne" be­ha­vi­or is the re­sult of (and of­ten re­sults in) an in­c­re­ased com­p­re­hen­si­on of the Sphe­re of Mind.

    • The 'Aql-i-Khul, cal­led the Uni­ver­sal Mind, the Akas­ha, The First Tho­ught of God, etc., an an­ge­lic be­ing of pris­ti­ne ab­s­t­rac­ti­on, tho­ught to be a Pri­mal ma­ni­fes­ta­ti­on of the Pu­re Ones by the Ahl-i-Ba­tin, but con­si­de­red an In­cat­na by ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons.

    Organization

    The hig­her ranks of the old Ahl-i-Ba­tin we­re sa­id to ex­tend up­ward (or rat­her, in­ward, to­ward the Unity) thro­ugh the lost Ho­ri­zon Re­alm of Mo­unt Qaf with all its an­ci­ent and ve­ne­ra­ted sa­ges, sa­ints and prop­hets, thro­ugh the Re­alms of such Orac­les as Al­kidr, the Khwa­ja al-Ak­bar and Naz­d­hur-i-Khan, thro­ugh thick ranks of "Pre­sen­ces," an­gels, pre-mo­not­he­ist de­iti­es and ot­her Um­b­ral de­ni­zens such as the 'Aql-i-Khul, and, ul­ti­ma­tely, to the Unity It­self. On a mo­re mun­da­ne le­vel, ho­we­ver, the­ir or­ga­ni­za­ti­on mo­re clo­sely re­sem­b­les that of a mo­dern co­vert in­tel­li­gen­ce ope­ra­ti­on, one with clo­sely-knit self-con­ta­ined gro­ups which may not even be awa­re of each ot­hers' exis­ten­ce or af­fi­li­ati­on, and with the in­ter­com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons co­uc­hed in ela­bo­ra­te co­des (usu­al­ly of a mysti­cal or eso­te­ric na­tu­re).

    The Ahl-i-Ba­tin hi­erarchy of te­ac­her/s­tu­dent in­ter­re­la­ti­on­s­hips gat­her in­to lod­ges cal­led kha­na­qahs. The­se can ta­ke the form of craft and tra­de gu­ilds, sec­ret so­ci­eti­es or openly re­li­gi­o­us in­s­ti­tu­ti­ons. Tho­se who ha­ve ac­hi­eved 94 The Bo­ok of Sha­dows: The Ma­ge Pla­yers Gu­ide Adep­ti­on or Mas­tery of a Sphe­re are ini­ti­ated in­to the full Tra­di­ti­onal he­ri­ta­ge of the Ahl-i-Ba­tin, and ate cal­led Mur­s­hids. Be­ne­ath them are the Mu­rids, who may ha­ve at­ta­ined up to Rank 3 in a Sphe­re, but who­se ini­ti­ati­on is con­fi­ned to the out­ward doc­t­ri­nes and mythos of the lo­cal kha­na­qah to which they be­long.

    Each kha­na­qah is pre­si­ded over by a shaykh or co­un­cil of shaykhs, who, in this cen­tury, ha­ve ra­rely prog­res­sed be­yond the Mu­rid le­vel. The ma­in fun­c­ti­on of most kha­na­qahs is to ma­in­ta­in a worldly po­wer ba­se for the Mur­s­hids, eit­her thro­ugh po­li­ti­cal and com­mer­ci­al ma­ni­pu­la­ti­ons or thro­ugh the wi­el­ding of re­li­gi­o­us in­f­lu­en­ce. Each kha­na­qah ma­in­ta­ins lar­ge pri­va­te gu­est qu­ar­ters cal­led the ha­ram, which is re­ser­ved for vi­si­ting Mur­s­hids.

    When the Ahl-i-Ba­tin hi­erarchy was in­ter­rup­ted by the des­t­ruc­ti­on of the Qutbs, most ot­her Mur­s­hids went in­to hi­ding- even from the­ir own ini­ti­ates, "Prop­he­ci­es" of a tri­um­p­hant re­turn we­re mut­te­ted, and many kha­na­qahs in­cor­po­ra­ted ta­les of lost "once-and-fu­tu­re" holy men (alre­ady a com­mon the­me) in­to the­ir sec­ta­ri­an mythos. Scat­te­ring to the far­t­hest re­ac­hes of the world, the mas­ters clo­aked them­sel­ves in po­li­ti­cal and cor­po­ra­te con­s­pi­ra­ci­es when pos­sib­le, or re­sor­ted to me­di­cal qu­ac­kery, new age scams and te­le­van­ge­lism when for­tu­ne did not fa­vor the­ir sche­mes.

    The only kha­na­qahs in which Mur­s­hids still re­ta­in per­ma­nent re­si­den­ce are the chan­t­ri­es of the ori­gi­nal fi­ve "Crafts" (cal­led Kha­na­tes): the Ik­h­wan at-Taw­hid (Mak­kah), the Uni­ver­siry of Light (Jeru­sa­lem), the Silk Car­tel (Sa­mar­kand), the Pa­ra­di­se Gar­den (Isfa­han) and the Dar­wus­him (Bag­h­dad).

    Meetings

    There ha­ve be­en no full me­etings of the Ahl-i-Ba­tin sin­ce the tri­umph of the Tec­h­noc­racy. In the old days, most Ba­ti­ni bu­si­ness was con­duc­ted via the te­le­pat­hic net­work of the Qutbs, but in the twen­ti­eth cen­tury, what lit­tle com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on do­es oc­cur must rely on mun­da­ne clan­des­ti­ne mo­des, such as sec­ret co­des and signs subtly co­uc­hed in art, po­etry, mu­sic and ar­c­hi­rec­m­re.

    Initiation

    The ini­ti­atory ri­tes of Mu­rids are as di­ver­se and va­ri­ed as the kha­na­qahs them­sel­ves, for­ming too bro­ad and in­sig­ni­fi­cant of a to­pic to be co­ve­red he­re. The ini­ti­ati­on of a Mur­s­hid in­va­ri­ably in­vol­ves a gre­at de­al of eso­te­ric scho­lar­s­hip, usu­al­ly so­me va­ri­ant of "sac­red ge­ometry." Of­ten the ini­ti­ate is pre­sen­ted with an in­so­lub­le mat­he­ma­ti­cal co­nun­d­rum, such as di­vi­ding go­ogols by ze­ro, per­for­ming cal­cu­lus ba­sed upon the alephs of in­fi­nity, or hol­ding a tan­gib­le ma­ni­fes­ta­ti­on of the squ­are ro­ot of ne­ga­ti­ve one (inste­ad of a me­re ima­gi­nary rep­re­sen­ta­ti­on).

    In the mo­dem era, ini­ti­ati­on ra­rely oc­curs abo­ve the Mu­rid le­vel, and ini­ti­ates are ne­arly al­ways in­doc­t­ri­na­ted in­to wha­te­ver schis­ma­tic spi­ri­tu­al se­er pre­do­mi­na­tes in that kha­na­qah's re­gi­on (usu­al­ly one of the many of­f­s­ho­ots of Shi'ite Is­lam). Most mo­dern ini­ti­ates know not­hing of the full ex­tent of the Ahl-i-Ba­tin, nor of the­ir own com­mon he­ri­ta­ge sha­red with ri­val re­gi­onal sects.

    Chantry

    A lar­ge part of the Doc­t­ri­ne of Unity con­cerns it­self with the ico­nog­rap­hic "sac­red to­po­logy" of a gre­at Ho­ri­zon Re­alm known as Mo­unt Qaf, which was po­pu­la­ted by a pyra­mi­dal hi­erarchy of en­lig­h­te­ned be­ings. Vi­si­tors to this Re­alm fo­und them­sel­ves in the la­vish gar­den of Sihr Ma­qa­mut, a pa­la­ce of the Per­si­an style per­c­hed upon a lar­ge out­c­rop­ping on the lo­wer slo­pes of the mo­un­ta­in. From this star­ting po­int, one may em­bark upon what the Ba­ti­ni re­fer to as the path of one's Ava­tar, sca­ling the mo­un­ta­in in se­arch of the wi­se one most su­ited to the­ir own per­so­nal di­rec­ti­on and sta­ge of de­ve­lop­ment. The Ahl-i-Ba­tin ma­in­ta­ined that all Tra­di­ti­ons, phi­lo­sop­hi­es and Paths of As­cen­si­on we­re con­ta­ined in Mo­unt Qaf, and that only a few slo­pes had thus far be­en ex­p­lo­red. The world of Sle­epers is vi­ewed as the pla­in sur­ro­un­ding the mo­unt, whi­le as­cen­ding deg­re­es of ma­ges form the ba­se. The up­per te­ac­hes of the mo­un­ta­in are in­ha­bi­ted by Orac­les, Ce­les­ti­nes and (accor­ding to Ba­ti­ni doc­t­ri­ne) Pu­re Ones, all con­ver­ging at the sum­mit, which is Unity (equ­al to Pri­me, rep­re­sen­ting the One and em­bod­ying the Cor­res­pon­den­ce Po­int).

    In Sle­eper mytho­logy, Qaf is known as a mo­un­ta­in ran­ge which sur­ro­unds the known world, but the Ahl-i- Ba­tin con­si­der it to be the cen­ter of the world, in­de­ed, of the Tel­lu­ri­an it­self. So­me in­sight may be gle­aned from Ba­ti­ni po­etry which des­c­ri­bes the sum­mit of Mo­unt Qaf as the si­te of the Se­pul­c­h­re of Adam Qad­ha­mun (also known as the Akas­hic "Pan Gu"), who­se body forms the sub­s­tan­ce of all the re­alms, and who slew the be­ast who­se car­cass forms Mo­unt Qaf. Such "insi­de-out/up­si­de-down" me­tap­hors are typi­cal of Ba­ti­ni Cor­res­pon­den­ce Cos­mo­logy.

    When the Ahl-i-Ba­tin we­re de­fe­ated by the Tec­h­noc­racy, the Ho­ri­zon Re­alm of Mo­unt Qaf was lost, the mo­un­ta­in it­self be­li­eved des­t­ro­yed. Ac­co­unts say the sum­mit burst and gre­at clo­uds of ash and smo­ke aro­se which dar­ke­ned ne­arly all the re­alms of the Um­b­ra for days. So­me be­li­eve that the mal­le­ab­le ot­her­s­pa­ce now cal­led the Web is for­med of the fo­ot­hil­ls of Mo­unt Qaf, which li­es be­yond ma­ges' grasp un­til the day of As­cen­si­on.

    Acolytes

    The Ahl-i-Ba­tin ha­ve al­ways ma­in­ta­ined ex­t­re­mely clo­se re­la­ti­ons with the wi­de va­ri­ety of mysti­cal gro­ups and "he­re­ti­cal" sects which ac­cu­mu­la­te on the out­s­kirts (and in the he­art) of ne­arly every ma­j­or re­li­gi­on born in the M idd le East. Acol­y­tes ha­ve be­en cho­sen from the Gnos­tics of Zo­ro­as­t­ri­anism and early Chris­ti­anity, the Qa­ba­lists of Juda­ism and the Su­fis of Is­lam, as well as any num­ber of sel­f­p­roc­la­imed holy men, as­ce­tics, fa­kirs and der­vis­hes.

    Spheres

    Correspondence: Long be­fo­re the Vir­tu­al Adeprs of the mo­dern era, the Ahl-i-Ba­tin had ac­hi­eved the de­epest un­der­s­tan­ding of the na­tu­re of spa­ce and lo­ca­lity of any known ma­ges. Many as­pects of the­ir Doc­t­ri­ne of Unity re­sem­b­le mo­dern mat­he­ma­ti­cal des­c­rip­ti­ons of the Cor­res­pon­den­ce Po­int, but any Ba­ti­ni wo­uld be qu­ick to ex­p­la­in that the Unity re­fers not only to the hig­her (or in­ner) di­men­si­ons of spa­ce, but to tho­se of the mind, so­ul and spi­ri­tu­al spa­ces as well. The Ahl-i-Ba­tin at­tri­bu­te all of the­ir ma­gic­kal ef­fects to the­ir un­der­s­tan­ding of how the One fits in­to the Many, or, as they li­ke to say in the pre­sen­ce of the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus, "kno­wing the mind of God." When the Ahl-i-Ba­tin ori­gi­nal­ly ca­me to the Mid­dle East, they dis­co­ve­red and pre­ser­ved the early at­tempts to de­fi­ne the Sphe­re of Cor­res­pon­den­ce con­duc­ted by the clas­si­cal Gre­eks, in­cor­po­ra­ting such fin­dings in­to the­ir ar­c­hi­tec­tu­re and ur­ban plan­ning. In­de­ed, most of the ol­dest ci­ti­es of this area are map­ped out along gre­at si­gils of Cor­res­pon­den­ce, and the bi­zar­re and in­t­ri­ca­te war­pings of spa­ce thus cre­ated can be des­c­ri­bed by any vi­si­tor who has tri­ed to find an ad­dress in the Old Qu­ar­ter.

    Mind: Li­ke the­ir ide­olo­gi­cal an­ces­tors, the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od, the Ahl-i-Ba­tin te­ach the­ir ini­ti­ates un­der­s­tan­ding of the Sphe­re of Mind, and, un­til this cen­tury, ma­in­ta­ined a net­work of te­le­pat­hic in­ter­com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on ac­ross Nor­t­hern Af­ri­ca, the Mid-East and Cen­t­ral Asia. This net­work was sus­ta­ined by a system of Qutbs (li­te­ral­ly "Po­les") men­tal mas­ters who by the­ir very exis­ten­ce ser­ved as the re­fe­ren­ce po­ints for this te­le­pat­hic form of pri­mi­ti­ve cyber­s­pa­ce. The Tec­h­noc­racy's vic­tory in the Mid­dle East early in this cen­tury ca­me with the­ir de­tec­ti­on and des­t­ruc­ti­on of many prin­cip­le Qutbs. The Ahl-i-Ba­tin cla­im that the sub­se­qu­ent ri­se of the Vir­tu­al Adepts was due en­ti­rely to Tec­h­not­nan­tic plun­de­ring of the Gre­at Truths known to the Qutbs.

    Entropy: The Ahl-i-Ba­tin are in­ca­pab­le of un­der­s­tan­ding or using the Sphe­re of En­t­ropy. Whet­her this is due to the­ir hat­red of the Eut­ha­na­tos or so­me sort of cur­se pla­ced upon them by the Han­du­ra du­ring the Hi­ma­la­yan Wars is not known.

    Foci

    Please no­te that the Fo­ci pre­sen­ted he­re are gi­ven only as exam­p­les, for the Ahl-i-Ba­tin are par­ti­cu­larly skil­led at ma­king a Fo­cus out of wha­te­ver obj­ect or be­ha­vi­or is ap­prop­ri­ate to the­ir out­ward li­fes­t­y­le. An­yo­ne pla­ying a Ba­ti­ni sho­uld cre­ate the­ir own ran­ge of Fo­ci ba­sed on the to­ols or ac­ces­so­ri­es most strongly as­so­ci­ated with the­ir cha­rac­ter con­cept. Sin­ce pra­yer is a com­mon da­ily oc­cur­ren­ce in Mus­lim co­un­t­ri­es, this Fo­cus is the sa­me for ne­arly all Ba­ti­ni. Ro­tes for the Ahl-i-Ba­tin can be fo­und in Bo­ok Fo­ur.

    Prayer or Me­di­ta­tion - Mind / Spi­rit (for an ar­c­hi­tect:)

    Ruler, com­pass, tri­an­g­le - Cor­res­pon­den­ce

    Paper - Mat­ter

    Pen and ink - Pri­me (for a he­aler:)

    Placebo pills - Li­fe (for a beg­ging der­vish:)

    Music - Ti­me

    Dancing - For­ces

    Begging bowl - Pri­me

    Concepts

    Batini ini­ti­ates co­ver per­haps the bro­adest ran­ge of cha­rac­ter con­cepts of any Tra­di­ti­on, as the Ahl-i-Ba­tin has de­fi­ni­tely re­j­ec­ted the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od's at­ti­tu­de of iso­la­ti­on from the world of Sle­epers, and ha­ve ac­ti­vely so­ught to in­si­nu­ate them­sel­ves in­to all le­vels of any so­ci­ety in which they find them­sel­ves. He­alers, te­ac­hers and ar­c­hi­tects can be sa­id to pre­do­mi­na­te, ho­we­ver, and Mur­s­hids are as li­kely to be kings as beg­gars.

    The vast ma­j­ority of Ba­ti­ni are from re­gi­ons on­ce part of the Is­la­mic Em­pi­re, but hid­den Mur­s­hids are be­li­eved to be all ovet the world.

    Quote: "We are frag­men­ted now, our so­uls as spre­ad and scat­te­red as the as­hes of Mo­unt Qaf. A bit­ter wall stands bet­we­en the Co­un­cil and our pre­sent sta­te, and yet we might all so­me day gat­her the as­hes and hurl the in­va­ders from our lands. Ours is the Fa­ith, the Vi­si­on and the Sec­ret. To tho­se who wo­uld bef­ri­end us, we are the bre­eze, the oasis, the clas­ping hand. To tho­se who cross our sword, we are the as­sas­sin's whis­per and the mid­night san­d­s­torm. By Al­lah's will and Khwa­ja al-Ak­bar's wis­dom, we shall pre­va­il!"

    Stereotypes

    • Vir­tu­al Adepts: "They ha­ve usur­ped our po­si­ti­on in the Co­un­cil of Ni­ne, but lack our spi­ri­tu­al un­der­s­tan­ding and are de­pen­dent upon the­ir Tec­h­no­man­tic crut­c­hes."

    • Eut­ha­na­tos: "Ne­ver For­gi­ve. Ne­ver For­get."

    • Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus, Or­der of Her­mes and Cult of Ec­s­tasy: "Tho­ugh we con­si­der the­se gre­at Tra­di­ti­ons to be our clo­sest al­li­es, it is well to di­sap­pe­ar when the­ir old fe­uds fla­re up."

    • Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od: "We sha­re a gre­at de­al, but we co­uld ne­ver af­ford to ta­ke the­ir path of spi­ri­tu­al ret­re­at."

    • Ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons: "We must all fo­cus upon our si­mi­la­ri­ti­es rat­her than our dif­fe­ren­ces."

    • Tec­h­noc­racy: No com­ment (see Eut­ha­na­tos)

    • Ma­ra­uders: "Dri­ven out, they can­not thre­aten us so long as the Web is pre­ser­ved."

    • Nep­han­di: "Our in­ti­ma­te know­led­ge of the Unity ren­ders us im­mu­ne to the cor­rup­ti­on of­fe­red by the­Nep­han­di, and the lab­y­rinths we ha­ve ma­de of our lands now ri­val the­ir own. The­ir dark sec­rets are of old ac­co­unt with us, and the only thre­at they rep­re­sent is to the yo­ung and uni­ni­ti­ated."

    • Or­p­hans: "Once we pri­ded our­sel­ves on the ra­rity of Or­p­hans in our lands, but now cir­cum­s­tan­ces ha­ve for­ced us to ma­ke Or­p­hans of our own Ini­ti­ates, many of whom no lon­ger re­cog­ni­ze the­ir old men­tors. The­re­fo­re do as the prop­hets ha­ve ex­hor­ted, and tre­at all Or­p­hans with ge­ne­ro­sity and com­pas­si­on."

    The Bo­ok of Ru­les of­fers clas­si­fi­ca­ti­ons, al­ter­na­ti­ves and re­vi­si­ons, in­c­lu­ding new mec­ha­nics for Do, fa­mi­li­ars and mo­re. Part One: Ma­gick co­vers the myri­ad as­pects of ma­gick and up­da­tes so­me ru­les from the Ma­ge ru­le­bo­ok. Part Two: New Ru­les pro­vi­des plenty of new stuff to use.

    Some ga­mes rely so­lely on ru­les to ma­ke them work; Ma­ge and ot­her Stor­y­tel­ler ga­mes rely upon the sto­nes and the pla­yers, Stor­y­tel­lers and cha­rac­ters who col­lec­ti­vely tell them. The­se ru­les are me­ant to be flu­id, not ri­gid. The to­pics co­ve­red in­c­lu­de:

    • Sim­p­lif­ying and Cla­rif­ying the Ma­gick Ru­les: Sug­ges­ti­ons and mo­di­fi­ca­ti­ons for Ma­ge ma­gick.

    • Adj­us­t­ments: Ru­le re­vi­si­ons for fo­ci, Ta­lis­mans, study po­ints and di­rect at­tacks, plus new ru­les for co­un­ter­ma­gick and com­bi­ning Abi­li­ti­es and ma­gick.

    • Ex­p­la­na­ti­ons: Sec­ti­ons de­ta­iling re­so­nan­ce, Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, Pa­ra­dox, and the Um­b­ra, plus sug­ges­ti­ons for per­so­na­li­zing ma­gick and de­ta­iling the dan­gers of Sle­epers and the vam­pi­ric Em­b­ra­ce.

    • The Um­b­ra: De­ta­ils abo­ut the worlds of the spi­rit.

    Listen to the MUSTN'TS, child

    Listen to the DON'TS

    Listen to the SHO­ULDN'TS

    The IM­POS­SIB­LES, the WONTS

    Listen to the NE­VER HA­VES

    Then lis­ten clo­se to me-

    Anything can hap­pen, child,

    ANYTHING can be.

    - Shel Sil­ver­s­te­in

    Magick li­es at the he­art of Ma­ge: The As­cen­si­on. From the mo­ment of the Awa­ke­ning, a rna­ge can­not shut off the gifts of his Ava­tar or stop them from ta­king the­ir toll on his li­fe. Co­ping with the li­be­ra­ti­on and bur­dens of ma­gick ma­kes the Stor­y­tel­ling ex­pe­ri­en­ce of Ma­ge: The As­cen­si­on emo­ti­onal­ly mo­ving and tho­ug­ht-pro­vo­king. Ho­we­ver, whi­le ma­gick ser­ves as the crux for the spe­ci­al prob­lems of a ma­ge's li­fe, the systems sho­uld not hin­der ro­lep­la­ying. Just as the Sle­epers ma­in­ta­in the con­sen­su­al pa­ra­digm of re­ality, each tro­upe cre­ates its own in­ter­p­re­ta­ti­on of the me­tap­h­y­sics of ma­gick for the­ir sto­ri­es.

    The mo­re you tig­h­ten yo­ur grip, the mo­re star systems will slip thro­ugh yo­ur fin­gers.

    - Prin­cess Le­ia, Star Wars

    The Ma­ge system con­fu­ses so­me pla­yers and Stor­y­tel­lers. Be­ca­use of its fle­xi­bi­lity and bro­ad sco­pe, it can be dif­fi­cult to know what li­mits a ma­ge pos­ses­ses. The pa­ra­dox (so to spe­ak) of Ma­ge's ga­me mec­ha­nics is this: al­t­ho­ugh the ru­les sho­uld be lo­ose, to avo­id in­ter­fe­ring in the flow of the story, the ru­les are so lo­ose that the story so­me­ti­mes bogs down whi­le the Stor­y­tel­ler and pla­yers try to sort ever­y­t­hing out. A few lo­op­ho­les in the Ma­ge ru­le­bo­ok muddy the wa­ters fur­t­her. This sec­ti­on pre­sents a strip­ped-down lo­ok at the ma­gick system, cla­ri­fi­es so­me nag­ging qu­es­ti­ons abo­ut Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, Pa­ra­dox, co­un­ter­ma­gick and fo­ci, and pre­sents new ru­les for Ta­lis­mans and study po­ints, for both pla­yers and Stor­y­tel­lers.

    These mo­di­fi­ca­ti­ons are op­ti­onal; not all of them will apply to yo­ur chro­nic­le. Re­mem­ber that the story is first and fo­re­most. At­tem­p­ting to cre­ate a ru­le for every pos­si­bi­lity wo­uld be an in­fi­ni­te and po­in­t­less exer­ci­se. Let evo­king dra­ma, tem­pe­red by ma­in­ta­ining con­sis­tency and using jud­g­ment, ta­ke the pla­ce of crun­c­hing num­bers and con­sul­ting charts.

    Drama and Ba­lan­ce

    Mentor: Re­ach out with yo­ur in­ner be­ing, with all the skill and wis­dom you pos­sess. Fe­el the pull of re­ality's un­der­tow, gu­ide its co­ur­se, and sha­pe it as you will. The­re is no ri­gid form to this, no sin­g­le way. Yo­ur own sen­se and ima­gi­na­ti­on must pa­ve the ro­ad to ma­gick.

    Apprentice: How?

    Mentor: Wing it.

    Apprentice: But HOW?

    The gre­atest strength of using ma­gick in Ma­ge is fle­xi­bi­lity. The Awa­ke­ned tran­s­cend or­de­red spells, flu­idly ben­ding the laws of re­ality to the­ir whims. Ma­gick is not an exact sci­en­ce, much as the Tec­h­noc­racy might li­ke to ma­ke it so. A ma­ge do­es not ha­ve to spend her free ti­me me­mo­ri­zing in­can­ta­ti­ons and glyphs- she has the fre­edom to cho­se her own path to en­lig­h­ten­ment. In­de­ed, the ro­ad to As­cen­si­on twists and turns dif­fe­rently for each in­di­vi­du­al. The ro­tes cre­ated by the Tra­di­ti­ons ser­ve as gu­ide­li­nes and te­ac­hing aids for Chan­t­ri­es. They do not li­mit ma­gick use in prac­ti­ce to a few set spells.

    With the pro­per co­nj­un­c­ti­on of Sphe­res, eno­ugh Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, and a high Are­te sco­re, a cre­ati­ve pla­yer cha­rac­ter may ma­ni­pu­la­te re­ality to in­vo­ke ne­arly any ef­fect he de­si­res. Only Pa­ra­dox li­mits his pos­si­bi­li­ti­es.

    Magickal know­led­ge li­ves and grows as the hu­man con­s­ci­o­us­ness ex­pands. Even the Tec­h­noc­racy has not stag­na­ted the uni­ver­se-the ga­tes of sci­en­ti­fic pos­si­bi­li­ti­es re­ma­in open thanks to the Sons of Et­her and the Vir­tu­al Adepts, Yo­ung ma­ges con­ti­nu­al­ly dis­co­ver new ways to mold the Ef­fects of the Sphe­res.

    There are a few dan­gers in­he­rent in this lo­ose system. First, Ma­ge has the po­ten­ti­al to be­co­me a high-po­we­red "Monty Ha­ul" style ga­me or a ma­gic­kal su­per­he­ro ga­me wit­ho­ut pla­yer and Stor­y­tel­ler jud­g­ment. If yo­ur gro­up wants to play Ma­ge that way, fi­ne. Enj­oy. Ho­we­ver, de­eper is­su­es will be­co­me mo­re dif­fi­cult to ex­p­lo­re if ma­ges ne­ver ha­ve to de­al with the con­se­qu­en­ces of the­ir ac­ti­ons.

    Most pla­yers want so­met­hing de­eper: a mo­re mo­ving, in­ten­se emo­ti­onal and in­tel­lec­tu­al od­y­s­sey, the chan­ce toc­re­ate a mo­dern myth. In or­der to do this, a Stor­y­tel­ler sho­uld in­t­ro­du­ce ma­gick slowly. Cha­rac­ters ha­ve to le­arn how to use the gifts they've re­ce­ived. Just be­ca­use a cha­rac­ter has the pos­si­bi­lity of do­ing so­met­hing do­esn't me­an he can. It's easi­er for Stor­y­tel­lers to li­mit po­wer ini­ti­al­ly and gra­du­al­ly in­c­re­ase it than it is to re­du­ce the ef­fects of Sphe­res af­ter pla­yer cha­rac­ters ha­ve star­ted rel­ying on the­ir abi­li­ti­es. Li­ke­wi­se, it is easi­er for pla­yers to ap­pre­ci­ate ma­gick's pos­si­bi­li­ti­es when they ha­ve ex­p­lo­red them from the ba­sics on­ward. Re­mem­ber the les­son of the sor­ce­rer's ap­pren­ti­ce! Un­con­t­rol­led po­wer le­ads to ob­li­vi­on.

    Magick Ma­de Sim­p­le

    Don't Pa­nic!

    - Do­ug­las Adams, The Hit­c­h­hi­ker's Gu­ide to the Ga­laxy

    It's easy to get flus­te­red when fa­ced with free-form ga­me ma­gick. At its he­art, ho­we­ver, the Ma­ge ma­gick system bo­ils down to fo­ur sim­p­le qu­es­ti­ons:

    • What do you want to do, and how do you want to do it?

    • Do you know eno­ugh to pull it off?

    • Do you suc­ce­ed ?

    • If so, or if not, what hap­pens?

    This is the system at its co­re. All the rest is win­dow dres­sing. Don't let ru­les-hed­ging get in the way of a go­od story.

    Success and Ef­fect

    The fol­lo­wing chart may be used eit­her in co­nj­un­c­ti­on with or in fa­vor of the charts in Chap­ter Se­ven of Ma­ge: The As­cen­si­on for de­ter­mi­ning the ef­fec­ti­ve­ness of ma­gick. This chart is mo­re sim­p­lis­tic than the ot­hers, and may spe­ed play. If you're using the tab­les in the Ma­ge ru­le­bo­ok, apply da­ma­ge, ran­ge or du­ra­ti­on nor­mal­ly ba­sed on the tab­les for the dif­fe­rent Sphe­res. Un­less the­re's a spe­ci­fic chart ba­sed on the Sphe­re, use the ge­ne­ral tab­les. If tho­se charts are too com­p­lex for you, simply use the Ge­ne­ral Ma­gic­kal Re­sults tab­le. (The tab­le is not exactly li­ke the ones, but as long as the Stor­y­tel­ler is con­sis­tent, the story will be con­sis­tent.)

    Magick by Num­bers

    1. The pla­yer des­c­ri­bes the ef­fect she de­si­res and the Sphe­res she is using. The ef­fect of the ma­gic in­c­lu­des how the ma­gick will ap­pe­ar in sta­tic re­ality if the ma­gick is co­in­ci­den­tal

    2. The Stor­y­tel­ler de­ter­mi­nes the dif­fi­culty and num­ber of suc­ces­ses ne­eded. Stan­dard dif­fi­culty is the hig­hest Sphe­re used + 3, but this might vary ac­cor­ding to the si­tu­ati­on if the Stor­y­tel­ler de­si­res. If the Stor­y­tel­ler fe­els that the ma­ge's Sphe­res aren't up to the task, then he in­c­re­ases the dif­fi­culty to wha­te­ver is ap­prop­ri­ate and ra­ises the num­ber of suc­ces­ses ne­eded. The Stor­y­tel­ler then an­no­un­ces the dif­fi­culty.

    3. The pla­yer dec­la­res Wil­lpo­wer and Qu­in­tes­sen­ce ex­pen­di­tu­res and then rolls. In the ca­se of vul­gar ma­gicks, the pla­yer rolls a num­ber of di­ce less than or equ­al to the hig­hest Sphe­re he is using. For sta­tic ma­gicks, the pla­yer may roll a num­ber of di­ce less than or equ­al to his Are­te sco­re.

    4. The Stor­y­tel­ler de­ter­mi­nes the re­sults, in­c­lu­ding Pa­ra­dox. The Stor­y­tel­ler sho­uld des­c­ri­be the ma­gic­kal ef­fect (or the Pa­ra­dox) in an ex­ci­ting way. If the cha­rac­ter uses vul­gar ma­gick in front of a Sle­eper and suc­ce­eds, he still ga­ins one po­int of Pa­ra­dox. If the cha­rac­ter uses vul­gar ma­gick wit­ho­ut a Sle­eper pre­sent and bot­c­hes, he gets one po­int of Pa­ra­dox for each die rol­led for the ma­gick; if the cha­rac­ter uses vul­gar ma­gick and bot­c­hes with a Sle­eper pre­sent, he ga­ins two po­ints for each die and must check for Pa­ra­dox Bac­k­lash, When bot­c­hing with co­in­ci­den­tal ma­gick, the cha­rac­ter ga­ins a po­int of Pa­ra­dox auto­ma­ti­cal­ly and one po­int for every "1" rol­led.

    Successes

    1 -· The ma­gick ba­rely works, ac­hi­eving the mi­ni­mum ef­fect ne­ces­sary for tem­po­rary suc­cess (Da­ma­ge: No­ne. Ran­ge: To­uch. Du­ra­ti­on: One turn)

    2 -· The ma­ge suc­ce­eds, but not as well as she wo­uld li­ke. (Da­ma­ge: Suc­ces­ses x 1, Ran­ge: One clo­se tar­get. Du­ra­ti­on: One sce­ne)

    3 -· The ba­sic re­sult the ma­ge de­si­res oc­curs. (Da­ma­ge: Suc­ces­ses x 2. Ran­ge: Im­me­di­ate vi­ci­nity. Du­ra­ti­on: One day)

    4 -· The ma­ge's ma­gick has an ad­ded be­ne­fit; per­haps it works mo­re ef­fec­ti­vely than she en­vi­si­oned. (Da­ma­ge: Suc­ces­ses x 2. Ran­ge: Li­ne of sight. Du­ra­ti­on: One story)

    5 -· An ex­t­ra­or­di­nary suc­cess re­sults, wor­king as well as the ma­ge wo­uld ha­ve dre­amed. Se­ve­ral be­ne­fi­ci­al si­de ef­fects may oc­cur. (Da­ma­ge: Suc­ces­ses x3 or 4. Ran­ge: An­y­t­hing wit­hin sen­sory ran­ge. Du­ra­ti­on: Per­ma­nent)

    6+ -· The ma­ge ama­zes her­self and ot­hers with an in­c­re­dib­le dis­p­lay of ma­gic­kal for­ces. She may even in­ci­den­tal­ly ga­in a po­int ot Qu­in­tes­sen­ce. (Da­ma­ge: Suc­cess x 4. Ran­ge and Du­ra­ti­on: As abo­ve)

    Example

    A Man in Black fa­ces Tre­vor, a mem­ber of the Or­der of Her­mes. Tte­vor an­no­un­ces to the Stor­y­tel­ler that he will use his For­ces 3 to fi­re a lig­h­t­ning bolt from his fin­ger­tips in­to the Tec­h­no­man­cer. The Stor­y­tel­ler an­no­un­ces a dif­fi­culty of 7, ra­ised from 6 be­ca­use of the ge­ne­ra! stress of the si­tu­ati­on.

    Trevor spends a po­int of Wil­lpo­wer and a po­int of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, He now has one suc­cess and has a 6 as his tar­get num­ber for the test. He rolls three di­ce be­ca­use of his For­ces 3 rank. The di­ce co­me up 7, 4 and 10. Two suc­ces­ses!! With his Wil­lpo­wer, he ac­hi­eved a to­tal of three suc­ces­ses. The Ge­ne­tal Ma­gic­kal Re­sults Chart de­fi­nes this as six po­ten­ti­al da­ma­ge le­vels to the Man in Black.

    The Stor­y­tel­ler des­c­ri­bes the blue bolt of elec­t­ri­city as it cracks from Tre­vor's fin­ger­tips. It stri­kes the Man in Black, He ma­kes a so­ak roll, but the Stor­y­tel­ler de­ci­des to ma­ke a se­cond Sta­mi­na roll for the Man in Black to see if he is stun­ned by the sud­den jolt. If the Man in Black was stan­ding in po­ol of wa­ter, the bolt might ha­ve do­ne anex­t­ra two da­ma­ge le­vels.

    Trevor gets an auto­ma­tic po­int of Pa­ra­dox for using vul­gar ma­gick, hut do­esn't much ca­re, and he fle­es in­to the dar­ke­ned stte­ets.

    Failure

    AAAAUUUGGH!!!

    - Char­lie Brown

    When a ma­ge fa­ils her roll, not­hing oc­curs. If she bot­c­hes that roll, she in­curs Pa­ra­dox. Rol­ling for Pa­ra­dox Bac­k­lash every ti­me a pla­yer bot­c­hes, ho­we­ver, can slow things down. As a ge­ne­ral ru­le of thumb, tro­upes may as­su­me that Pa­ra­dox will not kick in un­less the ma­ge in qu­es­ti­on has mo­re than fi­ve po­ints of Pa­ra­dox be­fo­re she bot­c­hes, or earns mo­re than fi­ve po­ints in a sin­g­le botch. The me­tap­h­y­si­cal wa­ters of re­ality are rip­pled, but are not dis­tur­bed eno­ugh to crash sud­denly back upon the ma­ge. Apply wha­te­ver Pa­ra­dox the ma­ge ac­cu­mu­la­tes to het usu­al to­tal. Af­ter she ex­ce­eds fi­ve po­ints of Pa­ra­dox, things start to get ha­iry. This pro­vi­des a be­gin­ning ma­ge an in­cen­ti­ve to ke­ep her no­se cle­an.

    An ex­cep­ti­onal amo­unt of co­in­ci­den­tal ma­gick used in a short pe­ri­od of ti­me, ho­we­ver, co­uld stir up a lar­ger Pa­ra­dox Bac­k­lash than any sin­g­le Ef­fect co­uld (see The Do­mi­no Ef­fect, be­low). This bac­k­lash might well af­fect ever­yo­ne in the area, not just the po­or ma­ge res­pon­sib­le.

    Difficulty

    The ba­se dif­fi­culty of a ma­gic­kal Ef­fect is that Ef­fect's hig­hest Sphe­re + 3. Not all ma­ni­pu­la­ti­ons of re­ality, ho­we­vet, are cre­ated equ­al. A ma­ge who walks in­to a bar, spi­es an at­trac­ti­ve Sle­eper and de­ci­des to se­du­ce him using Mind co­in­ci­den­tal­ly, and a ma­ge who clips a pi­ece of his tar­get's ha­ir, wa­its un­til the stars are alig­ned and per­forms a ri­tu­al using his fo­cus sho­uldn't ha­ve an equ­al chan­ce of suc­cess. A pla­yer cha­rac­ter may per­form ma­gick wit­ho­ut put­ting a lot of ef­fort in­to the pro­cess, but a pla­yer who ro­lep­lays her ma­gick use, ad­ding to the at­mos­p­he­re of the story, de­ser­ves a re­ward.

    The dif­fi­culty adj­us­t­ments for ma­gick be­low ref­lect this, but no set of ru­les works as well as a go­od Stor­y­tel­ler. For sa­me ba­lan­ce, we re­com­mend that the­se mo­di­fi­ers not re­du­ce dif­fi­cul­ti­es by mo­re than 3. (In ad­di­ti­on, it's po­in­t­less to re­du­ce a dif­fi­culty be­low 2.) As al­ways, the­se are gu­ide­li­nes, not­hing mo­re. The im­por­tant thing to re­mem­ber is not to let ga­me mec­ha­nics li­mit cha­rac­ters. Go­od ro­lep­la­ying, the type that evo­kes the ima­gi­na­ti­on of the en­ti­re tro­upe, sho­uld be re­war­ded for the re­al ma­gick that it is.

    Uses fo­cus wit­ho­ut net­tling it -· -1

    Descriptive ro­lep­la­ying of ma­gick use -· -1

    Researches lo­re on su­bj­ect be­fo­re using ma­gick -· -1 to -3

    Has item re­so­na­ting with tar­get's es­sen­ce (sympat­he­tic ma­gick) -· -1 to -3

    Extra ti­me spent on ma­gick -· -1

    Mage dis­t­rac­ted -· +1 to +3

    Spending a po­int of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce -· -1

    Using Tass with ap­prop­ri­ate Re­so­nan­ce -· -1

    Using Tass with op­po­sed Re­so­nan­ce -· +1

    The Do­mi­no Ef­fect

    Q: When is a co­in­ci­den­tal ef­fect not co­in­ci­den­tal?

    A: Af­ter too many ot­her ma­ges ha­ve used sta­tic ma­gick.

    Aftet the first use of sta­tic ma­gick in an area, prog­res­si­ve use of sta­tic ma­gick be­co­mes mo­re dif­fi­cult. Whi­le ca­using a ti­re on a car to def­la­te li­es wit­hin the bo­unds of pos­si­bi­lity, ca­using the ti­res of every car that pas­ses to go flat, ha­ving a sud­den ra­in­s­torm start, an earth tre­mor oc­cur, and a he­li­cop­ter car­rying Del­ta For­ce mem­bers ma­ke an emer­gency lan­ding in the sa­me in­ter­sec­ti­on wit­hin fi­ve mi­nu­tes ca­uses re­ality to un­du­la­te. One ex­t­re­me co­in­ci­den­ce is one thing; we­ird oc­cur­ren­ces af­ter the first be­co­me much less pla­usib­le. This is the Do­mi­no Ef­fect. So­me co­in­ci­den­tal ef­fects are mo­re pro­bab­le than ot­hers. Ope­ning a new­s­pa­per to a cer­ta­in story, fin­ding ex­t­ra poc­ket chan­ge and ha­ving a ta­xi pull up just as a ma­ge ne­eds one may not trig­ger the Do­mi­no ef­fect.

    As a ge­ne­ral ru­le, every ot­her use ot im­p­ro­bab­le co­in­ci­den­tal ma­gick in a sce­ne af­ter the first in­c­re­ases in dif­fi­culty by 1. This ef­fect is cu­mu­la­ti­ve, so the ba­se tar­get num­ber for the fifth sta­tic ma­gic­kal ef­fect ri­ses by 2.

    Additionally, a Pa­ra­dox Bac­k­lash, when it co­mes, can ta­ke so­me harsh all-en­com­pas­sing form: a sud­den rip in the Ga­un­t­let, a mas­si­ve lo­ca­li­zed blac­ko­ut, an in­va­si­on of pis­sed-off Pa­ra­dox Spi­rits, etc. As al­ways, the Bac­k­lash sho­uld ad­van­ce the story, not clog the ga­me whi­le the Stor­y­tel­ler rolls di­ce or scans charts.

    If you ne­ed mo­re par­ti­cu­lar de­ta­ils for Pa­ra­dox Bac­k­lash, then use this gu­ide­li­ne: Pa­ra­dox Bac­k­lash in­cur­red du­ring com­bat can ca­use one ag­gra­va­ted wo­und le­vel per po­int of bac­k­lash; bac­k­lash bro­ught abo­ut by in­dis­c­re­et ma­gick might sum­mon a Pa­ra­dox Spi­rit with a num­ber of le­vels equ­al to the num­ber of po­ints of bac­k­lash; ma­gick that grossly vi­ola­tes re­ality may shunt an of­fen­ding ma­ge in­to anot­her Re­alm if eno­ugh suc­ces­ses are ob­ta­ined on a Pa­ra­dox Bac­k­lash roll. Let the story be yo­ur gu­ide.

    The Do­mi­no Ef­fect is op­ti­onal, and Stor­y­tel­lers can in­vo­ke it to ke­ep ma­gick from get­ting out of con­t­rol.

    Damage

    Tbere are two dis­tinct types of da­ma­ge in Ma­ge: ag­gra­va­ted and non-ag­gra­va­ted. Most forms of ma­gi ckal at­tack do re­gu­lar (non-ag­gra­va­ted) da­ma­ge, but the­re are ex­cep­ti­ons. So­me su­per­na­tu­ral cre­atu­res, such as we­re­wol­ves and vam­pi­res, ta­ke ag­gra­va­ted da­ma­ge from at­tacks such as sil­ver or fi­re in ad­di­ti­on to the types be­low.

    Aggravated da­ma­ge for ma­ges oc­curs from:

    • A di­rect vul­gar blast of Pri­me, or da­ma­ge do­ne from vul­gar Li­fe ma­gicks. (Be­ca­use vul­gar Li­fe ma­gicks di­rectly wo­und a tar­get's in­ner li­fe-for­ce, they can­not be he­aled thro­ugh nor­mal me­ans; hen­ce, they are ag­gra­va­ted wo­unds.)

    • Ma­gicks, such as For­ces, aug­men­ted with Pri­me (inclu­ding we­apon Ta­lis­mans that uti­li­ze Pri­me in the­ir da­ma­ge). This do­es not in­c­lu­de For­ces, Li­fe or Mat­ter cre­ated with Pri­me, only at­tacks uti­li­zing Pri­me to "ener­gi­ze" da­ma­ge, (For exam­p­le, Spaw­ning Mi­nor For­ces do­es not in­cur ag­gra­va­ted da­ma­ge, whi­le the Ta­lons ro­te in Bo­ok Fo­ur, which uses a po­int of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce each ti­me it hits, do­es).

    • The na­tu­ral we­aponry of su­per­na­tu­ral cre­atu­res

    • Spi­rit ma­gicks that sum­mon spi­rits to di­rectly at­tack a tar­get.

    • Di­rect En­t­ro­pic at­tacks on a physi­cal body (see the Bo­ne Twis­ting Palm ro­te).

    In all ot­her ca­ses, da­ma­ge is non-ag­gra­va­ted. Ma­gick may he­al the da­ma­ge nor­mal­ly. As a spe­ci­al no­te, Mind ma­gicks ne­ver do ag­gra­va­ted da­ma­ge.

    One cla­ri­fi­ca­ti­on abo­ut da­ma­ge and cas­ting ma­gick sho­uld al­so be ma­de he­re: a cha­rac­ter who is inj­ured do­es ha­ve his Di­ce Po­ols for At­tri­bu­te + Abi­lity rolls re­du­ced be­ca­use of inj­uri­es. Ho­we­ver, He­alth Le­vel pe­nal­ti­es sho­uld not sub­t­ract from rolls for cas­ting ma­gick (such as rolls aga­inst Are­te). Using Are­te is a sta­te of mind, not of the body; ha­ving a bro­ken leg or frac­tu­red rib will not pre­vent you from dra­wing upon yo­ur un­der­s­tan­ding of the Sphe­res.

    Perception Ma­gick and Awa­re­ness

    Perception Ma­gick, the first rank of any Sphe­re, al­lows a ma­ge's sen­ses to in­c­re­ase, not just for a mo­ment, but for a length of ti­me. Use the tab­le in Ma­ge: The As­cen­si­on for sug­ges­ted du­ra­ti­ons ba­sed on suc­ces­ses (igno­ring "Per­ma­nent"; Li­fe ma­gick is ne­ces­sary to af­fect long-term bo­dily chan­ges). Du­ring the du­ra­ti­on of the ef­fect, the ex­t­ra-sen­sory abi­li­ti­es co­me as na­tu­ral­ly to the ma­ge as his re­gu­lar per­cep­ti­ons.

    The Awa­re­ness Ta­lent enab­les a per­son to fe­el the ma­gick in an area. A per­son with Awa­re­ness can sen­se the Awa­ke­ned Ava­tar in a ne­arby ma­ge or ot­her su­per­na­tu­ral be­ing and may dis­cern the dif­fe­ren­ces of ma­gick Sphe­re ra­tings of ot­her Re­alms. Awa­re­ness al­so lets a cha­rac­ter sen­se whe­ne­ver ma­gick is used in her vi­ci­nity. De­pen­ding on the num­ber of suc­ces­ses, he may just fe­el bot­he­red (1 suc­cess) or sud­denly re­ali­ze the truth abo­ut the ma­ge (5 suc­ces­ses). At a Stor­y­tel­ler's dis­c­re­ti­on, Awa­re­ness can work al­most li­ke a dan­ger sen­se. Ani­mals and chil­d­ren ha­ve hig­her Awa­re­ness ra­tings than most adults.

    At any ti­me in the past, pe­op­le ha­ve held a vi­ew of the way the uni­ver­se works which was for them si­mi­larly de­fi­ni­ti­ve, whet­her it was ba­sed on myths or re­se­arch. And at any ti­me, that vi­ew they held was so­oner or la­ter al­te­red by chan­ges in the body of know­led­ge.

    - James Bur­ke, The Day the Uni­ver­se Chan­ged

    Nothing is per­fect. The fol­lo­wing ru­les ha­ve be­en mo­di­fi­ed from the Ma­ge ru­le­bo­ok for cla­tity, va­ri­ety and ga­me ba­lan­ce. If yo­ur tro­upe pre­fers the ori­gi­nal ru­les, by all me­ans use them. If the ru­les be­low ma­ke yo­ur ga­me easi­er, fe­el free to use them in­s­te­ad. Aga­in, as long as the Stor­y­tel­ler is con­sis­tent, the story will be con­sis­tent.

    Foci

    A fo­cus is an obj­ect which helps a ma­ge tap her Ava­tar's po­wer. Fo­ci ma­ke the pro­cess of ma­gick easi­er, gi­ving a ma­ge an an­c­hor when her tho­ughts stretch be­yond re­ality. The re­la­ti­on of the ma­ge to her fo­cus is li­ke the re­la­ti­on­s­hip of a su­bj­ect un­der hypno­sis to the gold watch spin­ning in front of her. The obj­ect helps a ma­ge al­ter her sta­te of con­s­ci­o­us­ness. On­ce a ma­ge com­p­le­tely ac­cepts the me­tap­h­y­sic of ma­gick, she no lon­ger ne­eds the fo­cus.

    Technological fo­ci ha­ve a dif­fe­rent use. In this mo­dem age, pe­op­le are wil­ling to ac­cept in­c­re­dib­le events as long as they be­li­eve the­re is a sci­en­ti­fic ex­p­la­na­ti­on. The Tec­h­noc­racy suf­fers less from Pa­ra­dox, be­ca­use in the ca­se of the­ir ma­gicks, se­e­ing is be­li­eving. Sle­epers do not re­act to high-tech scan­ners or cyber­ne­tics with the sa­me dis­be­li­ef they wo­uld har­bor whi­le wit­nes­sing a Ver­be­na use blo­od ma­gick.

    A cre­ati­ve ca­bal of Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges in Los An­ge­les has le­ar­ned from the Tec­h­noc­racy's exam­p­le. Al­t­ho­ugh no­ne of the ca­bal's mem­bers are Tec­h­no­man­cers, most Sle­epers ig­no­re the­ir ma­gicks. The re­ason: they al­ways tra­vel with a gro­up of Acol­y­tes, who set up vi­deo equ­ip­ment and lig­h­ting and carry signs sa­ying "Fil­ming in Prog­ress," Sle­epers find the ca­bal's im­p­res­si­ve spe­ci­al ef­fects wit­hin the re­alm of re­ason.

    Unique Fo­ci vs. Uni­ver­sal Fo­ci

    As a ge­ne­ral ru­le, uni­que fo­ci work bet­ter than uni­ver­sal fo­ci. Be­ca­use the ma­ge has in­ves­ted so much of him­self in­to the uni­que fo­cus, dif­fi­cul­ti­es for his ma­gick are lo­we­red by 1 (or mo­re at the Stor­y­tel­ler's dis­c­re­ti­on). The di­sad­van­ta­ge of a uni­que fo­cus is not be­ing ab­le to per­form ma­gick if you lo­se the item.

    Acquiring or Rep­la­cing Fo­ci

    One idea for a pre­lu­de wo­uld he to ha­ve the cha­rac­ter's men­tor ta­ke her on a qu­est for her fo­ci. A Dre­am­s­pe­aker might ha­ve to climb a me­sa to re­ach an eag­le's nest for a fe­at­her ro use his spi­rit ma­gick, just be­ca­use a fo­cus is uni­ver­sal do­es not me­an that it is easy to rep­la­ce. Uni­que fo­ci can ne­ver be truly rep­la­ced, in­s­te­ad, the ma­ge must re­le­arn what she had le­ar­ned.

    Quality of Fo­ci

    Some fo­ci are bet­ter than ot­hers and enab­le a ma­ge to cast ma­gicks mo­te ef­fec­ti­vely, to­we­ring dif­fi­culty num­bers. An Or­der of Her­mes ma­ge wo­uld no do­ubt dis­co­ver that a cir­c­le la­id out in sil­ver with nu­me­ro­us in­t­ri­ca­te ma­gic­kal symbols wor­ked in­to it wo­uld work bet­ter than a cir­c­le drawn with a pi­ece of chalk on the as­p­halt of an unu­sed par­king lot. Al­so, a Dre­am­s­pe­aker using the fe­at­her of a pi­ge­on he fo­und in Cen­t­ral Park wo­uld ha­ve gre­ater dif­fi­culty de­aling with most spi­ri­tu­al ma­gic than a Dre­am­s­pe­aker who sca­led a cliff to ste­al an eag­le's fe­at­her.

    Unnecessary Fo­ci

    A fo­cus is an aid to a ma­ge. If a ma­ge de­ci­des to ta­ke a fo­cus af­ter his le­vel of mas­tery has pas­sed the po­int whe­re he ne­eds the fo­cus for the ma­gick, the Stor­y­tel­ler may still mo­dify dif­fi­culty num­bers to ma­ke his ma­gick flow easi­er.

    Types of Fo­ci

    Each Tra­di­ti­on te­ac­hes its Ap­pren­ti­ces dif­fe­rent Fo­ci for each of the Sphe­res. Ho­we­ver, wit­hin the Tra­di­ti­ons, the­te are many va­ri­ati­ons on the ac­cep­tab­le types of fo­ci. So­me of the­se are spel­led our in Ma­ge: The As­cen­si­on. Ot­hers are left to the tro­upe's dis­c­re­ti­on.

    Foci ne­ed not be physi­cal obj­ects: song, dan­ce, ru­ne­car­ving and tran­ce sta­tes may fo­cus a ma­ge's will as well. Al­ter­na­ti­ve fo­ci sho­uld he dis­cus­sed be­fo­re­hand - why do­es a cer­ta­in fo­cus work? Use this con­cept for fla­vor, not for ru­les-abu­se. The key to jud­ging a va­ri­ant's su­ita­bi­lity de­pends upon whet­her it has the sa­me sig­ni­fi­can­ce that ma­kes the stan­dard fo­cus spe­ci­al. Fla­vor: Per­so­na­li­sing Ma­gic­k­may in­s­pi­re al­ter­na­ti­ve fo­ci for pla­yers.

    Technomagick

    Technomancer is the pro­per term for ma­ges who fo­cus the­ir ma­gick thro­ugh so­me tec­h­no­lo­gi­cal pa­ra­digm; that is, they be­li­eve that the­ir sci­en­ce al­lows them to do ma­gick. Al­t­ho­ugh the term is com­monly ap­pli­ed to Tec­h­noc­racy ma­ges, it in­c­lu­des the Sons of Et­her and Vir­tu­al Adepts. Whi­le the Or­der of Her­mes has ma­de a kind of sci­en­ce of the­ir ma­gick, it is a mystic sci­en­ce, not a tec­h­no­lo­gi­cal one.

    The up­si­de of this mystic tec­h­no­logy is Sle­eper be­li­ef; the man on the stre­et will so­oner ac­cept we­ird sci­en­ce than ar­ca­ne mi­rac­les. Many tec­h­no­ma­gic­kal ef­fects can be con­si­de­red so­mew­hat co­in­ci­den­tal (wit­hin re­ason). The dow­n­si­de is an over-re­li­an­ce on fo­ci; wit­ho­ut so­me kind of tec­h­no­logy, many Tec­h­no­man­cers can­not be­li­eve in the­ir own ma­gick. And wit­ho­ut so­me kind of "sci­en­ti­fic" the­ory to ex­p­la­in the­ir ac­ti­ons, Tec­h­no­man­cers risk gre­ater Pa­ra­dox (or out­right fa­ilu­re) than the­ir mystic co­un­ter­parts. The Tec­h­noc­racy has "set" re­ality, but they do not own it. De­pen­ding on the Tec­h­no­man­cer, ma­gick at­tem­p­ted wit­ho­ut a fo­cus co­uld eit­her fun­c­ti­on as "vul­gar ma­gick with wit­ness" (the skep­ti­cal ma­ge him­self!) or fa­il com­p­le­tely,

    Through the­ir con­tact with ot­her ma­gick the­ori­es, en­lig­h­te­ned Sons of Et­her and Vir­tu­al Adepts can even­tu­al­ly tran­s­cend the ne­ed for any type of fo­cus, un­li­ke Tec­h­noc­racy ma­ges. Ho­we­ver, Tra­di­ti­on Tec­h­no­man­cers must re­ach a hig­her le­vel of Are­te (fi­ve, not two) be­fo­re dis­pen­sing with any fo­ci.

    Tradition Fo­ci

    The stan­dard fo­ci for the Tra­di­ti­ons are dis­cus­sed be­low:

    The Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od

    Do is the ar­c­het­y­pal phi­lo­sophy be­hind a num­ber of mar­ti­al arts styles in the World of Dar­k­ness. So­me Stor­y­tel­lers may re­qu­ire an Akas­hic Brot­her to ha­ve an abi­lity sco­re in Do or Me­di­ta­ti­on equ­al to the Sphe­re le­vel he wis­hes ro ac­cess. For exam­p­le, to use Mind 2, a mem­ber of the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od must ha­ve Me­di­ta­ti­on 2. Do can­not be re­mo­ved.

    There ate many ri­tes of pu­ri­fi­ca­ti­on in the mystic world. They ran­ge from bat­hing in holy wa­ter to dres­sing in whi­te li­nen or be­ing ano­in­ted with drops of oil. The Stor­y­tel­ler and pla­yer sho­uld de­fi­ne the type of Pu­ri­fi­ca­ti­on an in­di­vi­du­al Akas­hic Brot­her must un­der­go. The ri­tu­al sho­uld be of mo­de­ra­te dif­fi­culty and re­qu­ire ti­me or a spe­ci­al sub­s­tan­ce.

    Each mem­ber of the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od has an in­di­vi­du­al sash which rep­re­sents his know­led­ge of ma­gick. Li­ke belts in mar­ti­al art scho­ols, the sas­hes chan­ge in co­lor and de­co­ra­ti­on as the ma­ge in­c­re­ases in pres­ti­ge and ac­com­p­lis­h­ment. Stor­y­tel­lers may wish to re­ward pla­yers who des­c­ri­be the­ir cha­rac­ter's sas­hes. Belts, he­ad­bands or spe­ci­al ro­bes are va­ri­ants.

    The we­apon cho­sen by a mem­ber of the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od be­co­mes an ex­ten­si­on of her­self. Most ma­ges of this Tra­di­ti­on cho­ose a staff, a re­mar­kably sim­p­le, but very dan­ge­ro­us we­apon. The many dif­fe­rent styles and scho­ols of the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od all cho­ose dif­fe­rent mar­ti­al arts we­apons. In­s­te­ad of re­qu­iring a uni­que we­apon for a mem­ber of the Brot­her­ho­od, a Stor­y­tel­ler co­uld re­qu­ire a Me­lee skill equ­al to the rank of the Sphe­re to ac­cess the ma­gick when using the cho­sen we­apon type.

    Celestial Cho­rus

    Fire rep­re­sents the sun, the ori­gi­nal ho­me of the One. Fi­re dri­ves away the cre­atu­res of the night. For so­me fac­ti­ons of the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus, the light holds mo­te me­aning than the fla­me. So­me gro­ups use a lan­tern as a fo­cus, trus­ting the light from the One to gu­ide them. Fi­re is an in­c­re­dibly an­ci­ent re­li­gi­o­us symbol, and the Cho­rus tends many eter­nal fla­mes. Using an eter­nal fla­me as a fo­cus re­du­ces ma­gick dif­fi­cul­ti­es by a mi­ni­mum of 2. If the fla­me di­es out, the ma­ge has no fo­cus.

    Depending on the­ir bac­k­g­ro­unds, each mem­ber of the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus has her own Holy Symbol, Dif­fe­rent gro­ups use the Star of Da­vid (ca­using con­fu­si­on with mem­bers of the Or­der of Her­mes), the Cross, the Ankh, the Cres­cent Mo­on and ot­her symbols. Each of the­se has so­me re­li­gi­o­us sig­ni­fi­can­ce in hu­man his­tory, A holy symbol is a uni­que fo­cus.

    Like the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od, the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus be­li­eves in cle­an­sing. Pu­re wa­ter or holy wa­ter was­hes the im­pu­ri­ti­es of evil from a si­te. They use this fo­cus to bring luck and pro­tec­ti­on from de­cay. The wa­ter is usu­al­ly sprin­k­led over the tar­get of the ma­gick. The­re are few sub­s­ti­tu­tes for pu­re wa­ter, al­t­ho­ugh so­me an­ci­ent gro­ups used na­tu­ral oils for cle­an­sing.

    Songs ran­ge from Gre­go­ri­an chants to spon­ta­ne­o­us po­etry, de­pen­ding on the phi­lo­sophy of the ma­ge. A song calls upon the po­wer of the One to aid the Cho­rus mem­ber. A Stor­y­tel­ler may re­qu­ire a Cho­rus mem­ber to ha­ve an Ex­p­res­si­on Abi­lity equ­al to the rank of the Sphe­re she wants to use.

    Physical to­uch pro­vi­des a con­nec­ti­on bet­we­en the ma­ge and the su­bj­ect of her ma­gick. In ra­re ca­ses, fac­ti­ons of the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus use to­uch as a fo­cus for Li­fe ma­gick in­s­te­ad of song, "la­ying on the­ir hands" to per­form he­aling ma­gicks. The­re are no sub­s­ti­tu­tes for to­uch.

    Cult of Ec­s­tasy

    Incense al­lows a Cult of Ec­s­tasy mem­ber to al­ter her con­s­ci­o­us­ness. Smell is the most po­wer­ful of the fi­ve sen­ses, and the most me­mo­rab­le. Any bre­at­hab­le sub­s­tan­ce that can help an ma­ge dis­con­nect with the re­ality aro­und him may work as a fo­cus in­s­te­ad of in­cen­se.

    Music, li­ke in­cen­se, shifts a ma­ge's per­cep­ti­ons of re­ality and sha­pes emo­ti­ons. Any type of mu­sic may ha­ve this po­wer, from clas­si­cal to he­avy me­tal. Most Cult of Ec­s­tasy mem­bers use in­s­t­ru­ments to cre­ate mu­sic, but so­me ha­ve tra­ined the­ir vo­ices. As in the ca­se of the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus, an Ex­p­res­si­on sco­re equ­al to the rank of the Sphe­re in­vo­ked may be re­qu­ired.

    Every mem­ber of the Cult has a ring or pi­ece of jewelry which rep­re­sents the world. All rings are uni­que. Va­ri­ants in­c­lu­de nec­k­la­ces, cha­ins, bra­ce­lets and an­k­lets. Cult mem­bers ra­rely re­mo­ve this type of fo­cus, ex­cept to adorn it, "Vi­ces" al­re­ady vary from in­di­vi­du­al to in­di­vi­du­al. The­se odd fo­ci pro­vi­de a me­ans to tran­s­cen­den­ce to the Cul­tist, but may ra­ise eyeb­rows among his com­pa­ni­ons.

    Dreamspeakers

    The Dre­am­s­pe­akers be­li­eve that the energy of Ga­ia col­lects in na­tu­ral crystals. Un­cut gem­s­to­nes and ot­her mi­ne­rals hold spe­ci­al me­anings for so­me gro­ups of Dre­am­s­pe­akers, Yo­un­ger Dre­am­s­pe­akers so­me­ti­mes pla­ce the­ir crystals or ot­her sto­nes in jewelry, but most carry a le­at­her po­uch fil­led with lo­ose sto­nes. Va­ri­ants in­c­lu­de bo­nes, as­hes, ru­nes or sticks.

    Music is a com­mon fo­cus for Spi­rit ma­gick; drums are me­rely the most com­mon type of in­s­t­ru­ment used. De­pen­ding on the chro­nic­le, a ma­ge's Ex­p­res­si­on ra­ting may li­mit her abi­lity to in­vo­ke Sphe­res with this fo­cus, as in the ca­se of the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus and Cult of Ec­s­tasy,

    Each Dre­am­s­pe­aker gat­hers his own set of fe­at­hers to use for his ma­gicks. Mas­ters of Spi­rit tra­vel de­ep in­to the re­alms of the Um­b­ra, such as Pan­ga­ea (see Um­b­ra: The Vel­vet Sha­dow for We­re­wolf: The Apo­cal­y­p­se) to col­lect fe­at­hers from po­wer­ful spi­rits.

    Euthanatos

    Bones rep­re­sent the de­ath that co­mes for each li­ving cre­atu­re. The re­ma­ins of the de­ad con­ta­in a stran­ge dark energy which the Eut­ha­na­tos tap to help them fo­cus the­ir ma­gicks. Ot­her types of re­ma­ins will work. The cor­p­ses of the re­cently de­ad and the an­ci­ent de­ad ha­ve tre­men­do­us po­wer as fo­ci, but ta­les abo­und of po­wer­ful ghosts ap­pe­aring to pro­tect fal­len bo­di­es.

    The dan­ces of the Eut­ha­na­tos co­me from pre­his­to­ric fu­ne­ral dan­ces prac­ti­ced by many early cul­tu­res. So­me of the­se dan­ces are the sa­me ones used by an­ci­ent sha­mans to en­ter the Um­b­ra to ne­go­ti­ate the fa­te of de­ad tri­be mem­bers with spi­rits. Ri­tu­ali­zed physi­cal exer­ti­on with a symbo­lic de­ath ac­ti­va­tes the ma­gick. So­me Eut­ha­na­tos prac­ti­ce sel­f­wo­un­ding in­s­te­ad of per­for­ming dan­ces. Af­ter a po­int, the pa­in pas­ses and the ma­ge may use his Sphe­re. In so­me ca­ses, the Stor­y­tel­ler may call for an Ex­p­res­si­on roll or a Sta­mi­na roll. A few Dre­am­s­pe­akers cla­im that Eut­ha­na­tos do not pass the Vel­vet Cur­ta­in, but in­s­te­ad use Spi­rit to fol­low the paths of the de­ad.

    The es­sen­ti­al pur­po­se of dolls as a fo­cus for a Eut­ha­na­cos is to ser­ve as a proxy for the tar­get. So­me ma­ges use pho­tog­raphs or pa­in­tings of the­ir vic­tims as va­ri­ant fo­ci, bur­ning or cut­ting them to in­vo­ke the de­si­red ma­gic­kal ef­fect (sympat­he­tic ma­gick). To im­p­ro­ve the qu­ality of a doll, a ma­ge may fill it with things as­so­ci­ated with the tar­get: ha­ir, fin­ger­na­il clip­pings, per­so­nal me­men­tos, etc.

    Rattles imi­ta­te the de­ath cho­ke of a fi­nal bre­ath. Any soft no­ise­ma­ker ser­ves the pur­po­se of a Eut­ha­na­tos. Cer­ta­in types of dark mu­sic work as well for fo­ci. So­me Eut­ha­na­tos sing a soft lul­laby or pi­ece of po­etry be­fo­re gi­ving the Go­od De­ath.

    The we­apon cho­sen by an ap­pren­ti­ce of the Eut­ha­na­tos is not a uni­que fo­cus. Most Eut­ha­na­tos ha­ve col­lec­ti­ons of we­apons for ma­gic­kal and mun­da­ne pur­po­ses. Per­so­nal pre­fe­ren­ce and phi­lo­sop­hi­es abo­ut kil­ling help the ma­ge cho­ose a fa­vo­red we­apon,

    Order of Her­mes

    In ad­di­ti­on to the cir­c­le fo­cus, ma­ges may use ot­her pat­terns, in­c­lu­ding in­s­c­ri­bing a Se­al of So­lo­mon for the­ir ma­gicks. If a ma­ge can­not spend the two ho­urs ne­eded to pro­perly in­s­c­ri­be a cir­c­le, they may cre­ate a cir­c­le ras­ter, but sho­uld suf­fer a ma­j­or pe­nalty to the­ir dif­fi­culty num­bers (incre­ase by 3 or mo­re).

    The Or­der of Her­mes ma­in­ta­ins that words carry po­wer, and lan­gu­age be­ca­me the Or­der's ma­j­or fo­cus. The sec­ret lan­gu­age of the Ot­der has ele­ments of the en­ti­re In­do-Euro­pe­an fa­mily and Se­mi­tic ton­gu­es. Mem­bers of the Or­der still dis­co­ver ma­gick in pat­terns of let­ters, syllab­les and words. A ma­ge using this fo­cus sho­uld ha­ve a sco­re in Lin­gu­is­tics equ­al to the rank of the Sphe­re she wis­hes to use.

    The Se­al of So­lo­mon ga­ve a wi­se king po­wer over the spi­rit world. This symbol, al­so known as the Star of Da­vid, was chan­ged to a pen­tag­ram by Chris­ti­an mystics. Li­ke most things in the Or­der of Her­mes, dif­fe­rent gro­ups ar­gue con­s­tantly over this fo­cus. One si­de ar­gu­es that the true symbol is the Star of Da­vid. The­irop­po­si­ti­on sta­tes that the pen­tag­ram has mo­re tra­di­ti­onal use and do­esn't ca­use ma­ges to be con­fu­sed with the Is­ra­eli go­ver­n­ment. Who­le Chan­t­ri­es ha­ve di­sa­vo­wed eit­her symbol and use ot­her an­ci­ent signs of pro­tec­ti­on, in­c­lu­ding the spi­ral, the tri­an­g­le and the cir­c­le. Pla­yers may cho­se any fa­vo­red mystic symbol as a fo­cus, but they sho­uld re­mem­ber that the­ir fel­low Tra­di­ti­on mem­bers will jud­ge them by the­ir cho­ice.

    Each mem­ber of the Or­der has a uni­que fo­cus, usu­al­ly a Show­s­to­ne. The Show­s­to­nes are gems, so­me­ti­mes mo­un­ted in jewelry. As an op­ti­on, ot­her mem­bers of the Or­der just we­ar uni­que pi­eces of jewelry, such as sig­net rings or amu­lets.

    Sons of Et­her

    A for­mer Tec­h­no­man­cer Con­ven­ti­on, the Sons of Et­her, still re­qu­ires fo­ci ro use ma­gick. Af­ter the Are­te of a Son of Et­her in­c­re­ases suf­fi­ci­ently, he no lon­ger re­qu­ires a spe­ci­fic fo­cus to work ma­gic. Ho­we­ver, the Sons of Et­her ra­rely es­ca­pe fo­ci com­p­le­tely, so they of­ten carry aro­und bags of odds and ends or we­ar lab co­ats with poc­kets fil­led with va­ri­o­us to­ols and in­ven­ti­ons.

    The Sons of Et­her avo­id be­co­ming trap­ped in systems of mat­he­ma­tics by not trus­ting com­p­le­tely in mac­hi­nes. Many of the Sons carry aro­und an aba­cus to per­form im­por­tant cal­cu­la­ti­ons qu­ickly. For a Son of Et­her, the im­por­tant part of the ma­gick is to work the math by hand. So­me mo­dern Sons of Et­her just carry mec­ha­ni­cal pen­cils and me­mo pads in­s­te­ad of a por­tab­le aba­cus. Ot­her Sons say pen­cil cal­cu­la­ti­ons are too im­p­re­ci­se. The pa­per ma­ges cla­im that mis­ta­kes le­ad to the gre­atest dis­co­ve­ri­es.

    Electricity pro­vi­des the po­wer for most ex­pe­ri­ments per­for­med by the Sons of Et­her. A few ha­ve tur­ned to ot­her so­ur­ces, such as so­lar po­wer, wind po­wer or (be af­ra­id!) nuc­le­ar energy. Ho­we­ver, the­se are ex­t­re­mely ra­re. Ad­mit­tedly, Sons of Et­her are as li­kely to gat­her elec­t­ri­city from thun­der­s­torms as wall soc­kets, but they all use elec­t­ri­city.

    The Et­her Gog­gles are the sig­na­tu­re fo­cus of the mem­bers of this tra­di­ti­on. Un­for­tu­na­tely for the Sons of Et­her, the­re are no go­od va­ri­ants for the gog­gles. Et­her must co­ver the fa­ce of the ma­ge. So­me Sons use en­ti­re hel­mets fil­led with Et­her, but this fo­cus is easily one of the most re­cog­ni­zab­le in all the Tra­di­ti­ons.

    Any type of sci­en­ti­fic me­ter will work for a Son of Et­her, as long as it can me­asu­re so­me sort of en­vi­ron­men­tal phe­no­me­na. Ge­iger co­un­ters, vol­t­me­ters, pH kits- the­se de­vi­ces fun­c­ti­on to let the Sons of Et­her col­lect eno­ugh in­for­ma­ti­on to use ma­gick.

    Verbena

    Followers of the Ver­be­naT­ra­di­ti­on, so­me of the ol­dest prac­ti­ti­oners of ma­gick in the world, of­fer few op­ti­ons to the­ir dis­cip­les for dif­fe­rent fo­ci. The ways of the Ver­be­na ha­ve sur­vi­ved with lit­tle chan­ge from an­ci­ent ti­mes.

    Blood con­ta­ins the es­sen­ce of li­fe to the Ver­be­na, and the blo­od of all be­ings has po­wer. A Ver­be­na ma­ge may get blo­od from any so­ur­ce, al­t­ho­ugh fresh warm blo­od has the gre­atest po­tency. Ol­der so­ur­ces of blo­od ca­use the ma­ge to ha­ve dif­fi­culty using her ma­gick (pe­nal­ti­es of 1 to 5). Pro­ces­sed blo­od, such as that fro­zen in blo­od banks, is use­less to the Ver­be­na.

    The Ca­ul­d­ron, one of the few Ver­be­na fo­ci that has va­ri­ants, may be rep­la­ced by any lar­ge con­ta­iner whe­re flu­ids may be mi­xed. A few Ver­be­na try to get along by car­rying small bowls (ma­gick dif­fi­cul­ti­es in­c­re­ase by 3). Ho­we­ver, even the best sub­s­ti­tu­tes do not work as well as the ca­ul­d­ron ( + 1 dif­fi­culty).

    Natural herbs are can­not be rep­la­ced as fo­ci for Ver­be­na ma­gick. Ar­ti­fi­ci­al or che­mi­cal sub­s­ti­tu­tes do not ha­ve the Qu­in­tes­sen­ce ne­eded.

    The wand of a Ver­be­na must be na­tu­ral wo­od. Dif­fe­rent Ver­be­na may de­co­ra­te or in­s­c­ri­be the­ir wands. So­me wands co­uld even pass as slight wal­king sticks.

    The we­apon of the Ver­be­na is al­ways a dag­ger. The­se bla­des may be in­di­vi­du­ali­zed with ru­nes, but no ot­her we­apon can sub­s­ti­tu­te for them.

    Virtual Adepts

    The Vir­tu­al Adepts ne­ed fo­ci to per­form all the­ir ma­gick, li­ke the­ir fel­low Tec­h­no­man­cer Tra­di­ti­on, the Sons of Et­her. For most Vir­tu­al Adepts, this me­ans the­ir per­so­nal com­pu­ter or lap­top. The Adepts use a va­ri­ety of pe­rip­he­rals and types of mac­hi­ne, but in the end, not­hing rep­la­ces a com­pu­ter, a net­work to con­nect it, and the elec­t­ri­city to po­wer the who­le se­tup.

    Even in Ma­gick, we can­not get on wit­ho­ut the help of ot­hers.

    - Ale­is­ter Crow­ley, Ma­gick in The­ory and Prac­ti­ce

    A ma­ge who cre­ates a Ta­lis­man le­aves an en­du­ring le­gacy. Of­ten, the pos­ses­si­on of one of the­se items can me­an the dif­fe­ren­ce bet­we­en vic­tory and de­fe­at in the As­cen­si­on War. Ta­lis­mans are the we­apons of the Awa­ke­ned. A few mis­ta­kenly be­li­eve that even the una­wa­ke­ned may use a Ta­lis­man, dra­wing on the item's Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, but such ac­co­unts spe­ak of ar­ti­facts, le­gen­dary obj­ects mo­re po­wer­ful than the gre­atest Ta­lis­mans.

    Any Ta­lis­man has an Are­te ra­ting and a Qu­in­tes­sen­ce ra­ting. A Ta­lis­man may hold a ma­xi­mum of fi­ve ti­mes its Are­te sco­re in Qu­in­tes­sen­ce. Ta­lis­mans may pos­sess a num­ber of ma­gic­kal po­wers, si­mi­lar to ro­tes, up to its Are­te sco­re. A ma­ge rolls her Are­te aga­inst the Ta­lis­man's Are­te to ac­ti­va­te the item's vul­gar ma­gicks or to tap its Qu­in­tes­sen­ce supply. A ma­ge may burn up to the Ta­lis­man's le­vel in Qu­in­tes­sen­ce from the item in a sin­g­le turn. So­me Ta­lis­mans re­qu­ire ex­t­ra ac­ti­ons or the use of com­mand words to ac­ti­va­te. Ot­her Ta­lis­mans re­qu­ire an At­tri­bu­te + Abi­lity roll to use suc­ces­sful­ly. Each suc­cess on the ac­ti­va­ti­on roll in­c­re­ases the length of ti­me that the Ta­lis­man re­ma­ins ac­ti­ve (see chart be­low). Ta­lis­mans ha­ve a Sphe­re rank equ­al to the­ir own le­vel. The wi­el­der suf­fers the si­de­ef­fects of all Pa­ra­dox the Ta­lis­man ge­ne­ra­tes.

    A ma­ge who uses a Ta­lis­man as a fo­cus for ma­gick may draw on its Qu­in­tes­sen­ce or rep­la­ce his own Are­te sco­re or Sphe­re le­vel with the ra­ting of the item as long as the Ta­lis­man stays ac­ti­ve.

    If a Ta­lis­man lo­ses all of its Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, it be­co­mes inert. An inert Ta­lis­man may not be ac­ti­va­ted. Un­less the Ta­lis­man is des­t­ro­yed, a new flow of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce will res­to­re its po­wer. Even a sin­g­le sto­red po­int of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce ke­eps a Ta­lis­man from be­co­ming inert.

    Talisman ac­ti­va­ti­on chart

    Success -· Du­ra­ti­on

    1 -· One turn

    2 -· Fi­ve mi­nu­tes

    3 -· One ho­ur

    4 -· One sce­ne

    5 -· One day

    Creating Ta­lis­mans

    Mages usu­al­ly go to Ho­ri­zon Re­alms to ma­ke Ta­lis­mans so that they can avo­id con­f­ront ing Pa­ra­dox. Ta­lis­man cre­ati­on re­qu­ires an ex­ten­ded use of Pri­me 4 and ot­her ma­gicks. Any Pa­ra­dox ge­ne­ra­ted du­ring the pro­cess des­t­roys the at­tempt to en­c­hant the item, and any Qu­in­tes­sen­ce spent by the ma­ge is lost per­ma­nently.

    First, the ma­ge must cre­ate or lo­ca­te an item su­itab­le for en­c­han­t­ment. This can be ne­arly an­y­t­hing, ex­cept for an ar­ti­fact or anot­her Ta­lis­man. On­ce an item is em­po­we­red, lit­tle can chan­ge its na­tu­re. The ma­ge then ta­kes the Ta­lis­man-to-be to her Chantry's Ho­ri­zon Re­alm.

    She starts the pro­cess by using Pri­me 4 to in­fu­se the Ta­lis­man with a bit of her­self. This is a vul­gar ma­gick (wit­ho­ut wit­ness) roll. She may re­du­ce her dif­fi­culty num­ber by 1 for each spe­ci­al cir­cum­s­tan­ce she re­qu­ires for ac­ti­va­ti­on, such as a ges­tu­re, com­mand word or At­tri­bu­te + Abi­lity roll. She spends a per­ma­nent po­int of Wil­lpo­wer in­vo­king this ef­fect. Then, for every po­int of Are­te she wis­hes the Ta­lis­man to con­ta­in, she must chan­nel 10 Qu­in­tes­sen­ce in­to the item using her Pri­me. The Are­te pos­ses­sed by the Ta­lis­man can­not ex­ce­ed the ma­ge's Are­te.

    The ma­ge must then use her Sphe­res to cre­ate the ma­gic­kal Ef­fects that she wants the Ta­lis­man to per­form. For every dot of a Sphe­re ne­eded for the ma­gic­kal Ef­fect, she spends a po­int of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce and rolls her Are­te ver­ses a dif­fi­culty of 8, If she suc­ce­eds, the Ta­lis­man ga­ins the po­wer. If she fa­ils, she lo­ses the Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, but may try aga­in. A botch me­ans she lo­ses her con­cen­t­ra­ti­on on the en­c­han­t­ment, and not­hing but Qu­in­tes­sen­ce may be tran­s­fer­red to the Ta­lis­man. A Ta­lis­man may hold a num­ber of ma­gic­kal Ef­fects equ­al to its Are­te sco­re. The ma­ge then chan­nels mo­re Qu­in­tes­sen­ce in­to the Ta­lis­man, up to fi­ve ti­mes its Are­te sco­re.

    The cre­ati­on pro­cess re­qu­ires mas­si­ve amo­unts of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, but the rna­ge may ta­ke as much ti­me as she ne­eds, as long as the pro­cess isn't in­ter­rup­ted. Sle­eping du­ring Ta­lis­man cre­ati­on is im­pos­sib­le, but the ma­ge may re­new her­self du­ring the ef­fort by ma­king Sta­mi­na + Me­di­ta­ti­on rolls. An­y­t­hing that in­ter­rupts the en­c­han­t­ment pro­cess ru­ins the Ta­lis­man cre­ati­on, le­aving it com­p­le­te only up to a po­int. Any Pa­ra­dox ga­ined du­ring the cre­ati­on des­t­roys the Ta­lis­man com­p­le­tely.

    Fetishes

    Spirit Adepts may bind spi­rits in­to fe­tis­hes. The­se pri­mal ma­gick tre­asu­res re­sem­b­le Ta­lis­mans, but de­ri­ve rhe­ir po­wer from spi­rits rat­her than chan­ne­led Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, Most fe­tis­hes ha­ve one po­wer; few ha­ve mo­re than three, and the­se in­vol­ve po­tent spi­rit-bin­dings, A fe­tish is not an ina­ni­ma­te obj­ect- its ma­gick flows from a spi­rit. Fe­tis­hes, the­re­fo­re, are picky, and may ca­use mo­re prob­lems than they're worth…

    Fetish cre­ati­on works li­ke Ta­lis­man cre­ati­on, with the fol­lo­wing dif­fe­ren­ces:

    • The ma­ge ne­ed not tra­vel to a Ho­ri­zon Re­alm to cre­ate one.

    • Spi­rit 4 is used in­s­te­ad of Pri­me 4.

    • Fe­tis­hes ha­ve one Ef­fect for every two po­ints of Are­te.

    • The ma­ge ne­ed not tran­s­fer Qu­in­tes­sen­ce in­to the fe­tish, al­t­ho­ugh do­ing so may ma­in­ta­in a go­od re­la­ti­on­s­hip with the spi­rit.

    • Bot­c­hing do­es not re­sult in Pa­ra­dox; it re­sults in a pis­sed-off spi­rit.

    If you are using a fe­tish from the We­re­wolf ru­les, sub­s­ti­tu­te Are­te for Gno­sis.

    Talismans: New Bac­k­g­ro­und

    Rules

    With the­se ex­pan­ded Ta­lis­man ru­les, Stor­y­tel­lers sho­uld chan­ge the Ta­lis­man Bac­k­g­ro­und in Ma­ge: The As­cen­si­on, A sin­g­le Bac­k­g­ro­und po­int no lon­ger buys one le­vel of a Ta­lis­man. Bac­k­g­ro­und po­ints must now be spent for the Are­te, Qu­in­tes­sen­ce and Ef­fects pos­ses­sed by a Ta­lis­man, as per the chart be­low. Con­ti­nue to in­di­ca­te the le­vel of the Ta­lis­man by fil­ling in the dots on the cha­rac­ter she­et, but the pla­yer must re­cord the ot­her in­for­ma­ti­on as well. As an op­ti­on, a pla­yer may gi­ve the Stor­y­tel­ler a num­ber of bac­k­g­ro­und po­ints to cre­ate a Ta­lis­man for her. This adds an ele­ment of mystery to the stran­ge item that falls in­to the hands of the be­gin­ning ma­ge.

    The mun­da­ne uses of a Ta­lis­man and any spe­ci­al ac­ti­va­ti­on re­qu­ire­ments are left to the dis­c­re­ti­on of the pla­yer and Stor­y­tel­ler. A gun may se­em mo­re use­ful than a ring for a Ta­lis­man, but mun­da­ne aut­ho­ri­ti­es may con­fis­ca­te the gun. Al­so, ac­ti­va­ti­on re­qu­ire­ments may pre­vent ot­hers from ste­aling and using a Ta­lis­man, but they al­so ma­ke it mo­re dif­fi­cult for the ow­ner to tap in­to the item's po­wers.

    Talisman Bac­k­g­ro­und cost

    Points -· Pur­c­ha­ses

    1 -· One Le­vel of Ta­lis­man

    1 -· One Are­te

    1 -· Fo­ur Qu­in­tes­sen­ce

    1 -· Two dots in a Sphe­re for a po­wer of the Ta­lis­man

    Direct Ma­gick and Hit­ting Yo­ur Tar­get

    I don't ca­re if he do­es lo­ok li­ke Ram­bo in po­wer-ar­mor - he can't hurt what he can't hit!

    - Job Lig­h­t­fo­ot, Cult of Ec­s­tasy

    Opponents don't al­way­s­stand still; the tar­get­sof di­rect ma­gic­kal ar­racks sho­uld, the­re­fo­re, ha­ve so­me chan­ce to dod­ge in­co­ming at­tacks. Di­rect at­tacks- lig­h­t­ning bolts, ex­p­lo­si­ons, tran­s­for­ma­ti­on spells, ma­gick bul­lets, blasts of holy light- are of­ten vul­gar and usu­al­ly vi­sib­le. If an op­po­nent can see or sen­se an in­co­ming ma­gic­kal Ef­fect, she can elect to dod­ge that Ef­fect as if it we­re so­me nor­mal mis­si­le we­apon, fal­ling bu­il­ding, ere.

    Mind at­tacks may be li­ke­wi­se "dod­ged" with a Wil­lpo­wer roll in pla­ce of the usu­al dod­ge if the su­bj­ect is awa­re of the ar­rack. The dif­fi­culty to re­sist is 6 (yes, this is a chan­ge from the ru­le­bo­ok); each suc­cess re­mo­ves one of the ma­ge's suc­ces­ses.

    Physical dod­ges roll aga­inst dif­fi­culty of 6 and sub­t­ract suc­ces­ses as usu­al. The ma­gick, the­re­fo­re, can still ha­ve an ef­fect, but it may be much less than what the cas­ter in­ten­ded. So­me Ef­fects may be dod­ged com­p­le­tely with a go­od roll, i.e. a fal­ling bo­ul­der, an at­tac­king spi­rit, etc. Wil­lpo­wer can­not be used to ac­ti­vely "dis­be­li­eve" physi­cal at­tacks.

    Any at­tack that do­es physi­cal da­ma­ge can be so­aked. At­tacks that do di­rect men­tal da­ma­ge can­not be so­aked. This set of ru­les ma­kes ag­gres­si­ve ma­gick mo­re chal­len­ging for the cas­ter and less let­hal for the re­ci­pi­ent. Ma­ges fig­h­ting a HIT Mark with a For­ce can­non now ha­ve op­ti­ons ot­het than co­un­ter­ma­gick. Li­ke­wi­se, a ma­ge at­tem­p­ting to turn a vam­pi­re in­ro a lawn cha­ir wo­uld be bet­ter off trying so­me ot­her tac­tic…

    Countermagick

    There are many ways to com­bat anot­her ma­ge's mysti­cal abi­li­ti­es be­si­des ba­sic co­un­ter­ma­gick. A ma­ge do­es not ne­ed to know the Sphe­re her at­tac­ker is using in or­der to at­tempt co­un­ter­ma­gick. Pru­dent use of al­most any Sphe­re may dis­rupt a ma­gic­kal at­tack. Dif­fi­cul­ti­es for co­un­ter­ma­gick are ba­sed on the hig­hest at­tac­king Sphe­re + 3, Co­un­ter ma­gicks, re­mem­ber, dis­rupt in­co­ming ma­gicks; they do not da­ma­ge the­ir tar­gets.

    The sug­ges­ti­ons be­low of­fer so­me cre­ati­ve pos­si­bi­li­ti­es for co­un­ter­ma­gick:

    Correspondence

    By al­te­ring anot­her per­son's per­cep­ti­ons of spa­ce, a ma­ge can pre­vent her op­po­nent from using her ma­gick ac­cu­ra­tely. Any of the Awa­ke­ned with Rank 3 in Cor­res­pon­den­ce may stack sce­nes in the mind of an op­po­nent, ca­using him to lo­se his abi­lity to per­ce­ive his ene­mi­es.

    Entropy

    A ma­ge with the abi­lity to al­ter pro­ba­bi­li­ti­es has many ways to af­fect a ri­val. Using En­t­ropy 2, a ma­ge may in­c­re­ase the dif­fi­culty of any co­in­ci­den­tal ma­gicks tri­ed by his op­po­nent, ra­ising them by 1 fot every suc­cess rol­led. Di­rectly at­tac­king an enemy with En­t­ropy, es­pe­ci­al­ly rank 4 or 5, may com­p­le­tely dis­rupt ma­gicks, but a Stor­y­tel­ler must jud­ge this on a ca­se by ca­se ba­sis.

    Forces

    Forces are not sub­t­le. To stop ot­her ma­ges, blast them be­fo­re they blast you.

    Life

    Mages are only hu­man. Li­ke all ot­her li­ving things, a Mas­ter of Li­fe can mold and sha­pe them, ca­using ner­ves to mis­fi­re and blo­od clots to block ar­te­ri­es. Rank 3 in the Li­fe Sphe­re sho­uld pro­ve suf­fi­ci­ent to dis­t­ract most tar­gets.

    Matter

    As with For­ces Ef­fects, at­tack first.

    Mind

    The sec­ret to stop­ping ma­gicks is to ke­ep anot­her ma­ge from con­cen­t­ra­ting. With Mind 3, a ma­ge can ef­fec­ti­vely clo­ud anot­her's per­cep­ti­ons long eno­ugh to ru­in ma­gick use, A strong sub­con­s­ci­o­us sug­ges­ti­on from Mind 2 may al­so work, de­pen­ding on the cir­cum­s­tan­ces.

    Prime

    The Sphe­re of Pri­me has a spe­ci­al use in bat­tles bet­we­en ma­ges. See An­ti-Ma­gick, lis­ted be­low.

    Spirit

    If a ma­ge can ca­use her op­po­nent to per­ce­ive events in the Um­b­ra and the physi­cal world, she may dis­rupt the­ir ma­gick use. Three dots are ne­eded in Spi­rit ma­gick, with at le­ast that many suc­ces­ses on the ma­gick ro­le. So­me po­wer­ful Um­b­ro­od, such as In­car­na, ha­ve the abi­lity to co­un­ter so­me ma­gicks in the­ir Re­alms,

    Time

    As with Mind and Cor­res­pon­den­ce, ca­using a ma­ge's per­cep­ti­ons of the ti­mes­t­re­am to al­ter can dis­rupt ma­gick. Rank 3 of Ti­me may stop most Ef­fects.

    Anti-Magick

    A ma­ge with Pri­me 2 or gre­ater may use his sto­red Qu­in­tes­sen­ce to de­fe­at anot­her ma­ge's ma­gicks. This is a spe­ci­al de­fen­si­ve ma­gick that re­qu­ires an en­ti­re ac­ti­on. It ne­ver ge­ne­ra­tes Pa­ra­dox, sin­ce the ma­ge tri­es to stop the dis­rup­ti­on of re­ality. The de­fen­ding ma­ge rolls a num­ber of di­ce equ­al to her Pri­me ra­ting aga­inst a dif­fi­culty of her op­po­nent's di­ce po­ol +3 (ma­xi­mum of 10). Qu­in­tes­sen­ce may not lo­wer the dif­fi­culty num­ber of this spe­ci­al Pri­me ma­gick. Each suc­cess al­lows the de­fen­ding ma­ge to spend a po­int of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce to ra­ise her op­po­nent's tar­get num­ber by 1 (aga­in, to a ma­xi­mum of 10).

    The de­fen­ding ma­ge do­es not ha­ve to spend as much Qu­in­tes­sen­ce as she has suc­ces­ses. The at­tac­king ma­ge gets a chan­ce to spend Qu­in­tes­sen­ce and Wil­lpo­wer im­me­di­ately af­ter­wards. This Pri­me ma­gick may co­un­ter a spell that is not di­rec­ted at the de­fen­ding ma­ge.

    Anti-Magick Dis­rup­ti­on

    Bethany, a mem­ber of the Cult of Ec­s­tasy, se­es a Tec­h­no­man­cer pre­pa­ring to in­ci­ne­ra­te a crowd of Sle­epers with a plas­ma pro­j­ec­tor. She de­ci­des to use her Pri­me 3 to stop this ma­gic­kal we­apon. The Tec­h­no­man­cer has a co­in­ci­den­tal ma­gick Di­ce Po­ol of 4, be­ca­use the Sle­epers con­si­der his we­apon "sec­ret mi­li­tary tec­h­no­logy," The Stor­y­tel­ler dec­la­res the dif­fi­culty to be a 6. Bet­hany acts to co­un­ter his ma­gick and spends a po­int of Wil­lpo­wer. She rolls her Di­ce Po­ol of 3 for her Pri­me sco­re. The re­sults are 7, 9, and 10. She re­ce­ives three suc­ces­ses, and the Wil­lpo­wer po­int ma­kes her to­tal 4. She spends 4 po­ints of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, ra­ising the Tec­h­no­man­cer's dif­fi­culty from 6 to 10. The Tec­h­no­man­cers spends a pre­ci­o­us po­int of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce to lo­wer the dif­fi­culty back down to 9 and burns a Wil­lpo­wer po­int as well. He rolls, but only suc­ce­eds due to the ex­t­ra suc­cess from his Wil­lpo­wer. Still, Bet­hany sa­ved many Sle­epers from in­s­tant in­ci­ne­ra­ti­on.

    Abilities and Ma­gick

    Magick do­es not exist in a va­cu­um: ma­gick is an ex­ten­si­on of the ma­ge. The­re­fo­re, it is only fa­ir that cer­ta­in Abi­li­ti­es of that ma­ge sho­uld af­fect the ma­gick that he or she works. The fol­lo­wing ru­les are sug­ges­ti­ons to add fla­vor to a Ma­ge chro­nic­le, not new ways to mi­ni-max ma­gick dif­fi­cul­ti­es. The Stor­y­tel­ler will ha­ve the fi­nal say as to how (or if) a gi­ven Abi­liry af­fects a cha­rac­ter's ma­gick, or if the ru­les are used at all.

    We re­com­mend that Abi­li­ti­es co­me in­to play when ap­prop­ri­ate, that the­ir ef­fect be li­mi­ted to +/- 3 on dif­fi­culty mo­di­fi­ers, and that the pla­yer gi­ve so­me re­aso­nab­le and cre­ati­ve ex­p­la­na­ti­on for using the Abi­lity. The­se op­ti­onal ru­les sho­uld pro­vi­de op­por­ru­ni­ti­es to spi­ce up a story, not pro­vo­ke 40-mi­nu­te ar­gu­ments.

    Abilities En­han­cing Ma­gick

    In so­me cir­cum­s­tan­ces, mun­da­ne Abi­li­ti­es can im­p­ro­ve a ma­ge's chan­ces of suc­ces­sful ma­gick use. If a ma­ge has a Ta­lenr, Skill or Know­led­ge that ap­pli­es to the spe­ci­fic use of ma­gick, he may use rhat Abi­lity the turn be­fo­re he uses his ma­gick. The dif­fi­culty sho­uld be the sa­me for both Abi­lity and ma­gick, not­wit­h­s­tan­ding any Qu­in­tes­sen­ce spent for the ma­gick. Each suc­cess that he ma­kes on an ap­prop­ri­ate Abi­lity roll can re­du­ce the ma­gick dif­fi­culty by 1, up to a ma­xi­mum mo­di­fi­er of -3. (No­te: this sho­uld not he cu­mu­la­ti­ve with ot­her mo­di­fi­ers to the cas­ting dif­fi­culty ex­cept for the ex­pen­di­tu­re of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce.)

    The Stor­y­tel­ler may ru­le that cer­ta­in Abi­li­ti­es are es­sen­ti­al to using an Ef­fect; chan­ne­ling For­ces thro­ugh a blast-can­non might re­qu­ire Fi­re­arms, whi­le fi­xing a ge­ne­ra­tor with Mat­ter co­uld re­qu­ire Tec­h­no­logy Skill. Ot­her be­ne­fi­ci­al ef­fects, li­ke an ex­t­ra suc­cess on the ma­gick for every two on the Abi­lity roll, are al­so an op­ti­on, de­pen­ding on the si­tu­ati­on and the whims of the Stor­y­tel­ler,

    Magick En­han­cing Abi­li­ti­es

    A ma­ge may use ma­gick to im­p­ro­ve her chan­ces of suc­cess with her Abi­li­ti­es. As with the ru­le abo­ve, every suc­cess using ma­gick drops the dif­fi­culty num­ber for the Abi­lity roll by 1, to a ma­xi­mum mo­di­fi­er of -3, En­t­ropy has nu­me­ro­us ap­pli­ca­ti­ons for en­han­cing Abi­li­ti­es.

    Note that the ma­gick must be cast in the turn be­fo­re the At­tri­bu­te + Abi­lity roll is ma­de. Cas­ting the ma­gick and rol­ling an At­tri­bu­te + Abi­lity must be do­ne as two se­pa­ra­te ac­ti­ons. The ma­ge must con­cen­t­ra­te and cast the Ef­fect as his first ac­ti­on be­fo­re chan­ne­ling his ma­gick in­to his se­cond ac­ti­on. Split­ting Di­ce Po­ols (which re­qu­ires "fas­ting-cas­ting") is pos­sib­le, but is highly inef­fec­ti­ve. Al­so no­te that one way to get in ex­t­ra ac­ti­ons du­ring a turn is by using the Ac­ce­le­ra­te Ti­me Ef­fect.

    Examples

    Enhancing Ma­gick

    Oh So­on Hai works much of her ma­gick thro­ugh, ec­s­ta­tic dan­ce. Whi­le using a Li­fe Ef­fect to kill a wor­t­h­less yup­pie, she dan­ces wi­kily, using her Ex­p­res­si­on 4. Her Ef­fect is dif­fi­culty 7. Al­t­ho­ugh she spends two Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, her dan­ce dif­fi­culty is still 7. She rolls two suc­ces­ses, brin­ging her ma­gick dif­fi­culty to 4.

    Gregor Sha­dow­mo­on, a ha­un­ted Eut­ha­na­tos ma­ge, tri­es to sum­mon a de­mon from the net­her­world. The Stor­y­tel­ler al­lows him to ma­ke an In­tel­li­gen­ce + Oc­cult roll be­fo­re he calls for the fi­end to ari­se. De­ci­ding that this event has a high chan­ce of ca­using Pa­ra­dox, the Stor­y­tel­ler gi­ves Gre­gor an ex­t­ra ma­gick suc­cess for every two suc­ces­ses on his Abi­lity roll in­s­te­ad of cut­ting the dif­fi­culty num­bers.

    Enhancing Abi­li­ti­es

    Kayla Da­re's car bre­ak­s­down on a co­untry ro­ad lo­ca­ted in the ter­ri­tory of a pack of we­re­wol­ves. Be­fo­re she even opens the ho­od, Kay­la de­ci­des to ma­ke li­fe a bit easi­er. Kay­la uses her Mat­ter 3 to ma­ke cer­ta­in that not­hing cru­ci­al is bro­ken. She rolls her Are­te of 5 as a Di­ce Po­ol be­ca­use her kind Stor­y­tel­ler con­si­ders this use to be sta­tic ma­gick. She gets 2 suc­ces­ses, then opens the ho­od. The Stor­y­tel­ler drops the dif­fi­culty of her Wits + Tec­h­no­logy roll from 7 to 5. With 4 dots in Wits and 3 dots in Tec­h­no­logy, she rolls 5 suc­ces­ses. She finds a lo­ose wi­re and slips it back in­to pla­ce as a howl ec­ho­es from off in the dis­tan­ce.

    The fol­lo­wing sec­ti­ons may shed so­me light on as­pects of Ma­ge that se­em un­c­le­ar. So­me of­fer new pos­si­bi­li­ti­es, whi­le ot­hers ex­pand or il­lu­mi­na­te old ide­as. For fur­t­her ex­p­lo­ra­ti­ons of so­me con­cepts of the ma­ge's exis­ten­ce, see Bo­ok Fi­ve: The Fra­gi­le Path.

    Resonance

    Verily all things mo­ve wit­hin yo­ur be­ing in con­s­tant half em­b­ra­ce, the de­si­red and the dre­aded, the re­pug­nant and the che­ris­hed, the pur­su­ed and that which you wo­uld es­ca­pe. The­se things mo­ve wit­hin you as lights and sha­dows in pa­irs that cling.

    - Kah­lil Gib­ran, The Prop­het

    According to so­me mystic scho­lars, just as a ma­ge sha­pes her ma­gicks, the flow of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce in­f­lu­en­ces her. Ma­ges first do­cu­men­ted the­se ef­fects in Ho­ri­zon Re­alms, but a few scho­lars of the Or­der of Her­mes cla­im that re­so­nan­ce is uni­ver­sal. They say that every ma­gic­kal ef­fect le­aves a sta­in on re­ality.

    All Ap­pren­ti­ces le­arn that Mas­ters of the Sphe­res re­ce­ive cer­ta­in be­ne­fits from the­ir know­led­ge. A Mas­ter of Li­fe, for in­s­tan­ce, ne­ver gets sick and re­ta­ins his yo­ut­h­ful vi­ta­lity long past his pri­me. The­se si­de be­ne­fits re­sult from the re­so­nan­ce left by ye­ars of mas­te­ring a Sphe­re. Fur­t­her­mo­re, so­me ma­ges cla­im that even psychic ema­na­ti­ons left at No­des are part of Re­so­nan­ce. When Sle­epers ex­pe­ri­en­ce in­ten­se emo­ti­on or tra­uma, they tran­s­mit the­ir fe­elings to the area aro­und them. The Eut­ha­na­tos be­li­eve that vam­pi­res can see this emo­ti­onal re­si­due and that wra­iths fe­ed on it.

    In the la­test is­sue of Pa­ra­dig­ma, the no­ted Son of Et­her, Dr. So­la­ris, cla­imed to ha­ve dis­til­led a dark re­so­nan­ce out of Tass col­lec­ted from the Ci­vil War bat­tle­fi­eld of An­ti­etam, This in­f­lu­en­ce "lends it­self to vi­olent ma­gic­kal ef­fects," ac­cor­ding to the ar­tic­le. Un­for­tu­na­tely, no fur­t­her in­for­ma­ti­on on Dr. So­la­ris' ex­pe­ri­ments are for­t­h­co­ming, be­ca­use shortly af­ter pub­li­ca­ti­on, un­k­nown spi­rits of the de­ad at­tac­ked Dr. So­la­ris. His acol­y­tes cla­im they drag­ged the doc­tor in­to an un­k­nown part of the Um­b­ra. Most ma­ges say Dr. So­la­ris' ex­pe­ri­ment was a mas­si­ve ho­ax.

    The gre­atest sup­por­ters of the re­so­nan­ce the­ory, mem­bers of the Or­der of Her­mes and Ver­be­na, say that all ma­ges ha­ve de­fi­ni­ti­ve pro­of that re­so­nan­ce exists. Qu­i­et, they cla­im, is the re­si­due of Pa­ra­dox.

    Quintessence

    Few things are mo­re im­por­tant to ma­ges than Qu­in­tes­sen­ce. Chan­t­ri­es, ca­bals, even Tra­di­ti­ons ha­ve fo­ught wars over No­des, the pri­mary re­ser­vo­irs of Pri­me. Inex­pe­ri­en­ced Ap­pren­ti­ces of­ten don't un­der­s­tand the im­por­tan­ce of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce be­ca­use they don't know how to use this po­wer ef­fec­ti­vely.

    Even the most unen­lig­h­te­ned le­arn that pos­ses­si­on of Tass ma­kes ma­gick easi­er. A ma­ge who fo­cu­ses her supply of energy can warp sta­tic re­ality to her will. Ho­we­ver, among the Or­p­hans, many Ap­pren­ti­ces re­gard Tass as a lu­xury, hardly a ne­ces­sity. They say if a ma­ge has the po­wer, he do­esn't ne­ed Qu­in­tes­sen­ce.

    The true va­lue of pri­mal energy li­es not in cre­ating ma­gic­kal ef­fects, but in sus­ta­ining them. Ho­ri­zon Re­alms de­pend on Qu­in­tes­sen­ce to ma­in­ta­in the­ir re­ality. Cre­ating Ta­lis­mans re­qu­ires lar­ge qu­an­ti­ti­es of rna­gic­kal energy. An­y­t­hing with a supply of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce flo­wing thro­ugh it is me­tap­h­y­si­cal­ly stron­ger than so­met­hing wit­ho­ut that energy. Qu­in­tes­sen­ce Awa­kens obj­ects and pe­op­le. Ma­ges may al­so spend Qu­in­tes­sen­ce to re­du­ce the dif­fi­culty of the­ir co­un­ter­ma­gick rolls. The ma­ge burns energy to stren­g­t­hen re­ality aga­inst her op­po­nent.

    Using Pri­me to Ga­in Qu­in­tes­sence

    A ma­ge with Pri­me 1 may ma­gic­kal­ly draw Qu­in­tes­sen­ce di­rectly from No­des. This is a co­in­ci­den­tal use of ma­gick. For each suc­cess she ob­ta­ins, she ga­ins a po­int of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce. This is can­not ex­ce­ed the num­ber of dots she has in Ava­tar. Ex­cess Qu­in­tes­sen­ce ble­eds off in­to the sur­ro­un­ding area.

    With Pri­me 3, ma­ges may draw Qu­in­tes­sen­ce from Tass. This pro­cess works the sa­me way as dra­wing Qu­in­tes­sen­ce from No­des. Ho­we­ver, un­li­ke a No­de, Tass do­es not rep­le­nish it­self.

    When a ma­ge mas­ters Pri­me 5, he may tap raw Qu­in­tes­sen­ce from an­y­w­he­re. Ho­we­ver, un­li­ke dra­wing ma­gick from No­des or Tass, this is a vul­gar Ef­fect. Ot­her­wi­se, the pro­cess works in the sa­me man­ner: each suc­cess equ­als a po­int of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce. Sin­ce the world is fil­led with raw Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, this ma­gick has few det­ri­men­tal ef­fects. So­me­ti­mes the air will grow cold, lights will flic­ker, and mir­rors may crack, but that is abo­ut all. A Sle­eper is a po­or so­ur­ce of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, and typi­cal­ly has one to three po­ints of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce in his pat­tern. We­re­wol­ves and vam­pi­res are ric­her so­ur­ces of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, but woe to the ma­ge who ac­tu­al­ly tri­es to tap it! This kind of li­fe-for­ce theft wo­uld be con­si­de­red the worst kind of in­sult. The of­fen­ding tna­ge might ha­ve to de­al with his "wel­lsp­ring's" fri­ends as well as the vam­pi­re or we­re­wolf it­self.

    Paradox

    Paradox is a puz­zle. The key to As­cen­si­on is to un­lock this puz­zle.

    - Mar­cus Tri­li­ox, Or­der of Her­mes

    Paradox is an im­mu­ne system; its spi­rits pro­tect Ga­ia from the di­se­ase of rec­k­less ma­gick.

    - He­as­ha Mor­nin­g­la­de, Ver­be­na

    Paradox is Jim­miny Cric­ket with a cha­in­saw.

    - Ze­rox, Or­p­han

    Paradox is the cur­se of the Tec­h­noc­ra­tic plun­der of this world. When we're rid of them, we'll be rid of Pa­ra­dox!

    - Dr. Vol­ca­no, Vir­tu­al Adept

    Paradox is not­hing mo­re than our lack of fa­ith in our­sel­ves.

    - Oh So­on Hai, Eut­ha­na­tos

    What is Pa­ra­dox? No one is qu­ite su­re, exactly. The­re are many the­ori­es, but no re­al an­s­wers. Per­haps in a world whe­re be­li­ef sha­pes re­ality, the­re can ne­ver be one re­al an­s­wer. Te­ac­hers of ma­gick re­co­unt pa­rab­les, sto­ri­es and myths abo­ut Pa­ra­dox for the­ir pu­pils. The­se ta­les tell of stran­ge spi­rits lin­ked to the Sphe­res who co­me to en­for­ce re­ality on ma­gick-abu­sers. So­me­ti­mes the spi­rits even kid­nap ma­ges and carry them off to a stran­ge re­ality un­til they've ma­de up for the­ir cri­mes. A tna­ge, it is sa­id, ne­ver es­ca­pes the con­se­qu­en­ces of her ac­ti­ons.

    Tradition mem­bers ra­rely talk abo­ut the­ir own per­so­nal Pa­ra­dox, ex­cept to clo­se mem­bers of the­ir own ca­bal. So­me be­li­eve Pa­ra­dox is the pri­ce of fa­ilu­re; ha­ving ot­hers dis­cuss yo­ur pri­va­te strug­gles with Pa­ra­dox is hu­mi­li­ating, even mor­tif­ying. Ma­ges at an­ci­ent Chan­t­ri­es, li­ke Do­is­se­tep, use the­ir know­led­ge of ot­her ma­ges' Pa­ra­dox flaws and spi­rits to blac­k­ma­il the­ir ene­mi­es. In re­cent ye­ars, ru­mors of an un­der­g­ro­und mo­ve­ment de­di­ca­ted to re­mo­ving the stig­ma of ac­cu­mu­la­ted Pa­ra­dox ha­ve star­ted, but un­less ma­ge so­ci­ety chan­ges ra­di­cal­ly, such a mo­ve­ment is do­omed to fa­il. Of co­ur­se, this so­ci­al­ly-im­po­sed si­len­ce only in­c­re­ases the dif­fi­culty of a ma­ge's per­so­nal strug­gle to stay on the path of As­cen­si­on.

    Few of the Awa­ke­ned ho­nestly un­der­s­tand Pa­ra­dox, its forms and how to com­bat it suc­ces­sful­ly. Yo­ung Ap­pren­ti­ces ask the­ir men­tors an­no­ying qu­es­ti­ons abo­ut Pa­ra­dox. Why do­es Pa­ra­dox only af­fect ma­ges, and not ot­her su­per­na­tu­ral cre­atu­res, such as vam­pi­res and we­re­wol­ves? Aren't Mas­ters po­wer­ful eno­ugh to des­t­roy Pa­ra­dox spi­rits? How can Pa­ra­dox spi­rits al­ways find a ma­ge? Did tna­ges ha­ve to strug­gle with Pa­ra­dox in the Mythic Age? Why do­esn't Pa­ra­dox des­t­roy all the Ma­ra­uders in­s­te­ad of ig­no­ring them? Most te­ac­hers ig­no­re the­se qu­es­ti­ons or gi­ve the­ir stu­dents cryptic an­s­wers, such as, "You'll find out so­on eno­ugh, yo­ung ma­ge." So­me­ti­mes the te­ac­hers them­sel­ves do not know.

    Theories

    There are as many the­ori­es abo­ut Pa­ra­dox as the­re are tri­ages who ha­ve stu­di­ed it. So­me fe­el that Pa­ra­dox stems from the Ava­tar's qu­est to­ward unity. The Ava­tar, then, sum­mons Pa­ra­dox to crush ma­ges who da­re too much or stray too far. This ex­p­la­ins why we­re­wol­ves, vam­pi­res, psychics and hed­ge-ma­gi­ci­ans do not suf­fer from Pa­ra­dox. This do­es, ho­we­ver, le­ave ot­her qu­es­ti­ons unan­s­we­red.

    Others spe­cu­la­te that Pa­ra­dox ma­ni­fests our of Sle­epers' fe­ar of the un­k­nown, fu­eled by the­ir sle­eping Ava­tars; that vul­gar ma­gick, an in­sult to cre­ati­on, is pu­nis­hed by God or the gre­at Ear­th-Spi­rit; that Dyna­mic chan­ge is har­nes­sed by na­tu­ral law from go­ing too far, lest re­ality be un­ra­ve­led; that po­wer­ful Tec­h­noc­racy ma­ges "prog­ram­med" re­ality to ex­cept cer­ta­in things but re­j­ect ot­hers; that the world is win­ding down and the po­wer of ima­gi­na­ti­on it­self has tur­ned back aga­inst the vi­si­ona­ri­es; or that na­tu­ral and physi­cal law can­not abi­de a va­cu­um and will fill it by for­ce if ne­ces­sary. All of the­se ide­as ha­ve va­li­dity. Not one of them, ho­we­ver, an­s­wers all pos­sib­le qu­es­ti­ons.

    According to an­ci­ent ac­co­unts, the­re has al­ways be­en so­me deg­ree of Pa­ra­dox. Its ef­fects we­re mo­re lo­ca­li­zed in the past, and the deg­ree to which re­ality co­uld be stret­c­hed was far bro­ader. The ori­gi­nal Tec­h­no­man­cers we­re ap­pa­rently on the re­ce­iving end of Pa­ra­dox un­til the ri­se of the Age of Re­ason. Early Sle­epers wo­uld so­oner be­li­eve in de­mo­nic gli­ding-winds or men­tal le­vi­ta­ti­on than in flying mac­hi­nes. With the spre­ading of the Tec­h­noc­ra­tic vi­si­on, mass com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on and ex­ten­si­ve map­ping and ex­p­lo­ra­ti­on, one set pa­ra­digm was mo­re or less es­tab­lis­hed. Thus, the bor­ders of Pa­ra­dox we­re re­es­tab­lis­hed, Pa­ra­dox oc­curs when re­ality is al­te­red be­yond tho­se bor­ders.

    How and Why

    The con­s­t­ra­ints of Pa­ra­dox do se­em to vary; the pa­ra­digm of re­al and un­re­al shifts a bit from pla­ce to pla­ce and gro­up to gro­up. Cle­ver ma­ges can ta­ke ad­van­ta­ge of Sle­epers' fle­xi­bi­lity of be­li­ef (see the Bla­tancy abi­lity in Bo­ok One). Sta­tic re­ality wo­uld be mo­re firmly set at a ban­ker's con­ven­ti­on than in an abo­ri­gi­ne vil­la­ge. Ne­ver­t­he­less, con­sen­su­al re­ality has only so much gi­ve to it. He­re­in li­es the pa­ra­dox of Pa­ra­dox: re­ality has no bo­unds be­ca­use it is con­s­t­ra­ined only by the be­li­ef of sen­ti­ent be­ings, but be­ca­use tho­se be­li­efs set li­mits, con­sen­su­al re­ality is not bo­un­d­less. Chan­ging the li­mi­ta­ti­ons of tho­se be­li­efs, and thus the li­mits of re­ality, is the ma­ge's task. As­cen­si­on tran­s­cends tho­se li­mits, and the War is wa­ged aro­und them.

    Some sa­ges use the me­tap­hor of a lar­ge air-bub­ble to des­c­ri­be Pa­ra­dox, ma­gick and re­ality. Re­ality, they say, is li­ke wa­ter; ma­gick dis­p­la­ces this wa­ter-slightly and gra­du­al­ly in the ca­se of small co­in­ci­den­ces, qu­ickly and ra­di­cal­ly in the ca­se of vul­gar ma­gicks or ri­di­cu­lo­us co­in­ci­den­ce (see The Do­mi­no Ef­fect), Gi­ven ti­me, this me­tap­h­y­si­cal "wa­ter" se­eps back in­to pla­ce, re­dis­t­ri­bu­ting the we­ight of con­sen­su­al be­li­ef. If the bub­ble pops, ho­we­ver, the wa­ter rus­hes in…. Pa­ra­dox flaws, they say, are las­ting rip­ples of this ef­fect that cen­ter aro­und the one who "bro­ke the bub­ble." Pa­ra­dox Spi­rits and the­ir Re­alms are sa­id to be cre­ati­ons of the sub­con­s­ci­o­us mind ma­de ma­ni­fest.

    Belief is cri­ti­cal to ma­gick. A mo­men­tary fal­te­ring of be­li­ef can spell di­sas­ter. "Se­e­ing the wi­res," "lo­oking down," and "lo­sing yo­ur fa­ith" are so­me terms rhar des­c­ri­be the split-se­cond do­ubt (a "botch") that brings re­ality cras­hing back in on you. This ef­fect can ca­use Pa­ra­dox even when the­re are no Sle­epers aro­und if the re­ality-dis­p­la­ce­ment is pro­fo­und eno­ugh. Ho­ri­zon­Re­alms ha­ve lit­tle prob­lem with Pa­ra­dox, but vul­gar eno­ugh ma­gick can dis­rupt even tho­se ecos­y­s­tems. Per­haps, then, any form of re­ality can stand only so much tam­pe­ring be­fo­re it las­hes back in wha­te­ver fas­hi­on it can.

    Paradox is an enig­ma. Per­haps with uni­ver­sal As­cen­si­on, this li­mi­ta­ti­on of re­ality will ce­ase to be.

    Flavor: Per­so­na­li­zing Ma­gick

    Boil, bo­il, to­il and tro­ub­le

    Fire burn and ca­ul­d­ron bub­ble!

    - Wil­li­am Sha­kes­pe­are, Mac­beth

    Mages do not all sha­re the sa­me vi­ew of re­ality. The ru­les ha­ve be­en set down, and the va­ri­o­us Sphe­res ha­ve be­en la­be­led and ex­p­la­ined, but this is just as ar­ti­fi­ci­al as an­y­t­hing cre­ated by the Tec­h­noc­racy. The ma­gic system of Ma­ge is me­rely a con­s­t­ruc­ti­on of su­bj­ec­ti­ve re­ality (and, for the Tra­di­ti­ons, po­li­ti­cal ne­ces­sity) de­sig­ned to fa­ci­li­ta­te easy ga­me mec­ha­nics and smo­oth stor­y­tel­ling, not to be­co­me a body of dog­ma in its own right. Ma­ges of each Tra­di­ti­on, and of each Tra­di­ti­on's sub-gro­ups, con­ce­ive of re­ality dif­fe­rently. Even the mo­re uni­fi­ed Tra­di­ti­ons ha­ve the­ir own he­re­si­es and in­ter­nal di­sag­re­ements.

    It is very use­ful in ga­me terms to spe­ak of "Pat­tern ma­gicks" and "per­ce­iving an en­tity's li­fe pat­tern," but each Tra­di­ti­on will ha­ve its own way of con­ce­iving of the­se things and its own par­ti­cu­lar buz­zwords as­so­ci­ated with them. A gro­ups of ma­ges skil­led in the Sphe­re of Li­fe (which is a su­bj­ec­ti­ve term an­y­way) can all per­ce­ive an en­tity's pat­tern, but each will de­fi­ne it dif­fe­rently. A ma­ge of the Or­der of Her­mes wo­uld spe­ak of ha­ving dis­co­ve­red a cre­atu­re's "True Na­me," and wo­uld use this ver­bal rep­re­sen­ta­ti­on of the pat­tern in in­can­ta­ti­ons. He might al­so use nu­me­ro­logy to de­ri­ve the cre­atu­re's "num­ber" or graph the True Na­me as a ma­gi­cal si­gil. One of the Sons of Et­her, on the ot­her hand, wo­uld pro­udly hold up her la­test giz­mo and an­no­un­ce that she has "re­ad the DNA se­qu­en­ce" of a su­bj­ect, whi­le a mem­ber of the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od will ha­ve "per­ce­ived the physi­cal na­tu­re of his Do." All of the­se terms me­an ro­ughly the sa­me thing, but the­re are still sha­des of me­aning bet­we­en them.

    Short of com­pi­ling a se­pa­ra­te bo­ok for every ma­gick style known to man, the­re is no way Ma­ge co­uld dup­li­ca­te the be­wil­de­ring va­ri­ety of re­al-world prac­ti­ces and be­li­efs. All the sa­me, por­t­ra­ying every ma­gic­kal Ef­fect as just anot­her die roll robs the ga­me of ma­gick's rich fla­vor. Pla­yers sho­uld de­ve­lop a de­fi­ni­ti­ve style for the­ir cha­rac­ters with the help of the Stor­y­tel­ler,

    Magick flows dif­fe­rently from each Ava­tar, and each ma­ge has a dis­tin­c­ti­ve style of ma­gick. So­me­ti­mes this style is sub­t­le- a few ten­den­ci­es only no­ti­ced by men­tors. Ot­her ma­ges use ma­gick to ma­ke an in­di­vi­du­al sta­te­ment, slap­ping a cal­ling card down even with co­in­ci­den­tal ef­fects. The­se styles can ran­ge from a bre­eze in­ci­den­tal­ly blo­wing af­ter an Ef­fect to a ma­ge twit­c­hing her no­se every ti­me she ma­ni­pu­la­tes re­ality.

    A well-de­ve­lo­ped style may al­so lo­wer dif­fi­culty num­bers. Per­haps a Cul­tist of Ec­s­tasy's style in­vol­ves lo­ud mu­sic. The Stor­y­tel­ler de­ci­des that mu­sic fol­lows the cha­rac­ter ever­y­w­he­re. If this ma­ge wan­ted to de­afen a Tec­h­nor­nan­cer in a nig­h­t­c­lub, co­in­ci­den­tal­ly chan­ging vo­lu­me con­t­rol on a spe­aker next to her enemy, the Stor­y­tel­ler may gi­ve her a bo­nus. By the sa­me to­ken, she might in­cur a pe­nalty trying to si­len­ce an area.

    Each Tra­di­ti­on vi­ews ma­gick dif­fe­rently. If a mem­ber of the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus calls upon For­ces, the ma­gick may ap­pe­ar as a be­am of in­ten­se holy light cal­led from che he­avens, whi­le a Son of Et­her might ha­ve elec­t­ri­city fly from her sci­en­ti­fic me­ter. The­se des­c­rip­ti­ons are mo­re than at­mos­p­he­re - they pro­vi­de the re­ality of the ga­me. Each cha­rac­ter sho­uld ha­ve a uni­que fla­vor of ef­fects to se­ason her ma­gick. A Dre­am­s­pe­aker might ha­ve dif­fi­culty de­ter­mi­ning the fre­qu­ency of ra­dio tran­s­mis­si­ons, but a Vir­tu­al Adept wo­uld be hard-pres­sed to call upon the spi­rit of the land to an­s­wer his qu­es­ri­ons. Spe­ci­al ef­fects may li­mit a ma­ge's ma­gic­kal abi­li­ti­es, but they en­han­ce them as well.

    Players sho­uld think ca­re­ful­ly abo­ut the­ir cha­rac­ters' per­so­nal be­li­efs and styles as well. If a Ver­be­na wis­hes to cast a spell, the pla­yer sho­uld de­vi­se so­me ri­tu­al ke­eping with the be­li­efs of not only the Ver­be­na Tra­di­ti­on, but of the in­di­vi­du­al prac­ti­ti­oner as well. An En­g­lish vil­la­ge witch and a Me­xi­can bru­ja both ma­ke com­p­lex uses of herbs, and might both be­long to the Ver­be­na Tra­di­ti­on, Ho­we­ver, the herbs they use dif­fer, and the­ir met­ho­do­lo­gi­es as well; the mo­dern En­g­lish vil­la­ge witch might ha­ve a sta­tue of the God­dess of Wil­len­dorf on her al­tar, whi­le the bru­ja or cu­ran­de­ra wo­uld be lig­h­ting can­d­les be­fo­re a rep­re­sen­ta­ti­ons of the Vir­gin of Gu­ada­lu­pe. A Nor­se skald might car­ve ru­nes be­ne­ath his World Tree. Pa­gan God­dess wor­s­hi­pers wo­uldn't buy in­to the stan­dard de­fi­ni­ti­ons of "go­od" and "evil," but a cu­ran­de­ra who­se folk ma­gic in­vol­ved Our Lady wo­uld be very ca­re­ful to ob­ser­ve the Cat­ho­lic vir­tu­es. One Tra­di­ti­on, dif­fe­rent prac­ti­ces.

    Players and Stor­y­tel­lers sho­uld con­si­der a ma­ge's Chantry and ca­bal as well as and the ca­bal's pur­po­ses when con­si­de­ring a cha­rac­ter's style. If that cha­rac­ter spends most of her li­fe at a Ho­ri­zon Re­alm re­so­na­ting with de­ath ener­gi­es, she will ha­ve mo­re dif­fi­culty he­aling a com­ra­de than a ma­ge be­lon­ging to a Chantry fo­cu­sing on re­ne­wal and re­ge­ne­ra­ti­on. By the sa­me to­ken, a ca­bal fo­cu­sed on at­ta­ining know­led­ge might ha­ve an easi­er ti­me pe­net­ra­ting the net­works of the Di­gi­tal Web than a ca­bal de­di­ca­ted to vi­olent con­f­lict.

    Storytellers sho­uld em­p­ha­si­ze dif­fe­rent styles, and pla­yers sho­uld help, even to the ex­tent of im­po­sing li­mits on the­ir cha­rac­ter's ma­gicks ba­sed on the­ir phi­lo­sop­hi­es. All the sa­me, re­mem­ber that en­lig­h­ten­ment and wil­lpo­wer out­we­igh ma­te­ri­al con­cerns. In Ma­ge,an­y­t­hing is pos­sib­le with so­me hard work, know­led­ge and a to­uch of cre­ati­vity.

    Different Sphe­res, Sa­me Re­sult

    The Sphe­res of Ma­gick over­lap in Ma­ge, pla­yer cha­rac­ters can ac­com­p­lish the sa­me ef­fects using dif­fe­rent Sphe­res. The­re is not­hing wrong with this over­lap. Ma­ge re­wards cre­ati­ve use of ma­gick.

    If Job wan­ted to ma­ke a Sle­eper wal­king ac­ross a car­pet in a sto­re trip, he co­uld do it using a num­ber of Sphe­res. Job co­uld use Mat­ter to cre­ate a pre­vi­o­usly un­no­ti­ced se­am whe­re his vic­tim was abo­ut to step. He co­uld use Li­fe to ca­use the wo­man to ha­ve a sud­den mus­c­le spasm in her leg. He co­uld use Mind to dis­t­ract her, so she wo­uld be mo­re li­kely to stum­b­le, or For­ces to ca­use the sun­light to ref­lect in­to her eyes in mid-step. The­re are even mo­re al­ter­na­ti­ves just using the Sphe­res men­ti­oned so far.

    One of the most im­por­tant sec­rets to ef­fec­ti­vely mas­te­ring ma­gick is to de­ter­mi­ne exactly what re­sult you de­si­re and then con­si­de­ring how to use ma­gick to ac­hi­eve that re­sult. If you don't ha­ve the Sphe­res or can't think of a way to ma­ni­pu­la­te them to ac­hi­eve yo­ur go­al, then you ha­ve to re­de­fi­ne yo­ur met­hod. So­me­ti­mes the ac­tu­al re­sult you de­si­re may not be what you first de­ci­de. In the abo­ve exam­p­le, Job's go­al is to trip the wo­man. Ho­we­ver, he may be do­ing this simply to get an op­por­tu­nity to in­t­ro­du­ce him­self. If this is the ca­se, Job might be bet­ter off just star­ting a con­ver­sa­ti­on with her by as­king a qu­es­ti­on. If he wants to ste­al her cre­dit card, and ho­pes to trip her and filch it whi­le pic­king up her items, he might just use Mind to ma­ke her ab­sent-min­dedly le­ave it so­mew­he­re. And if he wants to mo­ve her out of his fi­eld of vi­si­on, a handy mir­ror used to spot shop­lif­ters might let him see aro­und her.

    Apprentices of­ten use ma­gick when it isn't ne­eded. An ex­pe­ri­en­ced ma­ge uses ma­gick subtly to aug­ment his ot­her abi­li­ti­es, ne­ver to rep­la­ce them. Dis­c­re­ti­on ke­eps Pa­ra­dox and the Tec­h­noc­racy away.

    The Fa­tal Em­b­ra­ce

    "Think of it, wi­zard," says the vam­pi­re, eyes gle­aming in the fi­rep­la­ce glow, "eter­nity to cha­se yo­ur'As­cen­si­on'. Eter­nity to ri­se abo­ve the ot­hers, per­fect yo­ur craft and gat­her po­wer of the sha­dows for yo­ur own." He holds out a wrist al­re­ady drip­ping with vi­tae, and ba­res his fangs. The Eut­ha­na­tos' fa­ce spar­k­les with swe­at. He licks his lips, we­ig­hing the gre­atest de­ci­si­on of his li­fe.

    "I ac­cept," he says fi­nal­ly. His shirt falls to the. flo­or. The vam­pi­re's skin is ice aga­inst his own, and the bi­te is a brand, dra­wing po­iso­ned mor­ta­lity from his ve­ins. Sud­den star­va­ti­on wracks him, rip­ping up­ward from gut to thro­at, rep­la­cing lost blo­od with gas­ping, drow­ning ne­ed. He re­ac­hes thro­ugh dar­k­ness for the vam­pi­re's wrist, grasps it, and sucks the im­mor­tal fi­re.

    Sweet brim­s­to­ne/T­he walls shat­ter/Re­ality scre­ams… "Fo­ol", the vam­pi­re mocks, lic­king his lips. At his fe­et, the yo­ung ma­ge fe­els his Ava­tar shred. Bit­terly, he howls…

    Werewolves and vam­pi­res can­nor be­co­me ma­ges.

    Mages can­not sur­vi­ve the Kin­d­red's Em­b­ra­ce and re­ta­in the­ir abi­lity to use True Ma­gick. Whi­le so­me ma­ges ha­ve ex­pe­ri­men­ted with vam­pi­re blo­od, and so­me ra­re Ga­rou Kin­folk work True Ma­gick, the paths of the Awa­ke­ned of­ten le­ad in dif­fe­rent di­rec­ti­ons.

    Some wi­zards spe­cu­la­te that a vam­pi­re's Em­b­ra­ce des­t­roys the es­sen­ce of the Ava­tar that gi­ves a ma­ge his po­wer. Ot­hers be­li­eve that the Ava­tars of vam­pi­res are set upon a cer­ta­in pre­de­ter­mi­ned Path that do­es not in­c­lu­de ma­gick. Still ot­hers ma­in­ta­in that vam­pi­res, be­ing dam­ned, are shut out fo­re­ver from the light of the One. Wha­te­ver the re­ason, it is ge­ne­ral­ly ag­re­ed that vam­pi­rism and ma­gick don't mix. Vam­pi­ric tha­u­ina­turgy, say the ma­ges, is only a pa­le sha­dow of True Ma­gick and do­es not work out­si­de the sta­tic bo­unds of con­ven­ti­onal re­ality.

    Awakening do­es not pre­vent the dre­aded "Blo­od Bond" of the un­de­ad, as many ma­ges ha­ve dis­co­ve­red. Po­wer­ful ma­ges so­me­ti­mes hunt down vam­pi­res for the­ir blo­od, but this is chancy at best. Mo­re than one ma­ge is sa­id to ha­ve fal­len in­to eter­nal Qu­i­et af­ter drin­king from one too many Kin­d­red, and vam­pi­res ma­ke very bad long-term ene­mi­es.

    The Dre­am­s­pe­akers cla­im that we­re­wol­ves sha­re a com­mon Ava­tar, the so­ul of Ga­ia Her­self. Sons of Et­her dab­bling with Mat­ter sta­te that the­re are pro­per­ti­es of the chan­ging blo­od that prec­lu­de ma­gick out­si­de the spi­rit­gifts of the Ga­rou. This may be why so­me Kin­folk can grasp the Sphe­res, whi­le we­re­wol­ves can­not.

    It be­ars no­ting that ma­ges, we­re­wol­ves and vam­pi­res don't col­lect tra­ding cards of the ot­her Awa­ke­ned. Whi­le most Awa­ke­ned be­ings are awa­re of each ot­her's exis­ten­ce, they usu­al­ly ha­ve the­ir facts all wrong. It's a ra­re ma­ge who holds re­al in­sight in­to the po­li­tics of the Ca­ma­ril­la or the wor­kings of the Thir­te­en Tri­bes. Li­ke­wi­se, most su­per­na­tu­ral be­ings see ma­ges as mo­dern-day Gan­dalfs and wo­uldn't know an Akas­hic Brot­het from a Tec­h­no­man­cer. The­re are ex­cep­ti­ons, but most su­per­na­tu­ral en­ti­ti­es know not­hing abo­ut the As­cen­si­on War. Most of them co­uldn't ca­re less.

    The Ru­le of Sha­de

    And if the­re ri­se among you a prop­het, or a dre­amer of dre­ams, and gi­veth thee a sign of won­der,

    And the sign is the won­der ca­me to pass, whe­re­of he spa­ke un­to thee, sa­ying, "Let us go af­ter ot­her gods, which thou hast not known, and let us ser­ve them;"

    Thou shall not he­ar­ken un­to the words of that prop­het, or that dre­amer of dre­ams…

    And that prop­het, or that dre­amer of dre­ams, shall be put to de­ath…

    So shalt you put the evil away from the midst of thee.

    - De­ute­ro­nomy 13: 1-5

    Mortals, when con­f­ron­ted with things they can­not com­p­re­hend, tend to eit­her wor­s­hip tho­se things or des­t­roy them. So­me do both, "Wit­ch-hun­ters" are well-na­med; whi­le the In­qu­isi­ti­on car­ri­es the most vi­sib­le torch in the wit­ch-hun­ting mob, all cul­tu­res ha­ve Sle­epers who wo­uld de­fend the­ir blin­d­ness or be­li­ef with de­adly for­ce. A hun­ter with True Fa­ith (see Bo­ok One) is a dan­ge­ro­us foe. The Sons of Et­her and Ver­be­na are par­ti­cu­larly awa­re of this thre­at.

    The Ru­le of Sha­de

    Seek not in the Dar­k­ness, for fe­ar of cor­rup­ti­on;

    Seek not in Day­light, for fe­ar of dis­co­very.

    Ascension walks the Mid­dle Path of Sha­de

    That Awa­ke­ned may le­ad

    And Sle­epers fol­low wit­ho­ut fe­ar.

    An in­for­mal Tra­di­ti­on Pro­to­col-the Ru­le of Sha­de- puts fur­t­her con­s­t­ra­ints on ca­re­less ma­gick; flashy ma­ges may find them­sel­ves bet­ra­yed to the hun­ters or Tec­h­noc­racy by wo­uld-be al­li­es if they put ma­ge so­ci­ety as a who­le in dan­ger. Tho­ugh the Ru­le of Sha­de is not a hard-a rid-fast law, ma­ges ex­po­se the­ir true na­tu­res at the­ir own pe­ril. All too many Sle­epers wo­uld be wil­ling eit­her to throw them­sel­ves at an un­wit­ting sa­vi­or's fe­et, or throw self-sa­me sa­vi­or in­to the ne­arest bon­fi­re if he pro­ved to be an­y­t­hing less than the an­s­wer to the­ir pra­yers.

    "What is this pla­ce?" Jen­ni­fer as­ked as the ca­bal pas­sed thro­ugh the Bar­ri­er. The sil­ver bar­ri­er had par­ted to re­ve­al a misty half-mir­ror of the ro­om they had just left, "Lo­ok," she con­ti­nu­ed, po­in­ting to whe­re the com­pu­ter had be­en. In the Um­b­ra, the pat­tern of the de­vi­ce co­uld be se­en cle­arly, It shim­me­red in the Um­b­ral twi­light; tiny phos­p­hors of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce dan­ced thro­ug­hout its fra­me. Jen­ni­fer grin­ned tri­um­p­hantly.

    "I KNEW that was no or­di­nary deck!"

    "No," the ow­ner rep­li­ed, un­fol­ding from the sha­dows. "It isn't…"

    The Um­b­ra is a cat­ch-all term for the spi­rit worlds that lie just be­yond the con­sen­su­al re­ality of Earth's "re­al world." Its ap­pa­rent struc­tu­re is so flu­id and so de­pen­dent on in­di­vi­du­al per­cep­ti­on that all at­tempts to "map" it fa­il. Most highly en­lig­h­te­ned ma­ges cla­im that by map­ping so­met­hing out, you fix it in pla­ce (a prac­ti­ce the Vo­id En­gi­ne­ers use to li­mit the spre­ad of "ran­dom ele­ments"). The Um­b­ra, they say, re­fu­ses to be set.

    The Three Um­b­ral Worlds

    Most ag­ree that the Um­b­ra has a three la­yers: the "high" Um­b­ra, a re­alm of ide­as ma­de ma­ni­fest, the "mid­dle "Umbra, the spi­ri­tu­al ref­lec­ti­on of na­tu­re, and the "lo­wer" Um­b­ra, the land of de­cay and the de­ad. The­se lo­ca­ti­ons are mo­re li­ke la­bels of un­der­s­tan­ding than "physi­cal" lo­ca­ti­ons; the Um­b­ra is ne­bu­lo­us, and tra­vel wit­hin it is gu­ided by in­tent rat­her than by di­rec­ti­on.

    Certain as­pects of the Um­b­ra re­ma­in con­s­tant:

    • The Pe­rip­hery, whe­re the pul­se of the spi­rit world can be felt fa­intly in ma­te­ri­al re­ality. Even Sle­epers can pass in­to this sta­te, which is the na­tu­ral ho­me of the Awa­ke­ned. This is less a sta­te of "pla­ce" than of "be­ing"; many ma­ges be­co­me so at­tu­ned to the Pe­rip­hery that they ce­ase to fe­el the won­der of it.

    • The Ga­un­t­let, or Bar­ri­er, which blocks the world of the spi­rit from the world of physi­cal form.

    • The Pe­num­b­ra, a sha­dowy ref­lec­ti­on of the world as we know it.

    • The Three Worlds, whe­re con­cepts of ab­s­t­ract tho­ught, the so­ul of na­tu­re and the sha­dow of de­ath sha­pe the Re­alms an Um­b­ral tra­ve­ler en­co­un­ters.

    • The Ne­ar Um­b­ra ex­tends from the Pe­num­b­ra in­to the Re­alms of the three la­yers. The­se la­yers, con­nec­ted by the Pe­num­b­ra, con­ta­in Re­alms of va­ri­o­us sorts- Do­ma­ins, Spi­rit Re­alms, De­ad Zo­nes and ot­her lo­ca­ti­ons.

    • The Re­alms them­sel­ves are lo­ca­ti­ons whe­re Um­b­ral re­ality has ta­ken on so­me set form, eit­her as a re­ac­ti­on to so­me po­wer­ful phe­no­me­na on Earth, ma­gic­kal pat­ter­ning, or the will of so­me Um­b­ro­od en­tity. The na­tu­re of the­se Re­alms va­ri­es bet­we­en the Three Worlds.

    • The Ho­ri­zon, or the Mem­b­ra­ne, di­vi­des the De­ep Um­b­ra from the Ne­ar Um­b­ra. Ho­ri­zon Re­alms, as pla­ces of spi­rit pat­ter­ned by hu­man will, re­si­de in the Ho­ri­zon.

    • The De­ep Um­b­ra ex­tends in­to in­fi­nity be­yond the Ho­ri­zon. The Shard Re­alms and Pa­ra­dox Re­alms spin en­d­les­sly in this cos­mic vo­id. The Nep­han­di and Ma­ra­uders (and, many be­li­eve, wor­se things…) dwell in the outer spa­ce of the spi­rit world.

    • The Zo­nes are pla­ces which per­me­ate the Three Worlds and Tran­s­cend the bo­un­da­ri­es bet­we­en them. The­se in­c­lu­de the Net, al­so known as the Di­gi­tal Web, the Mir­ror Zo­ne, the Dre­am Re­alms, and pos­sibly ot­hers. The­se pla­ces drift bet­we­en the Re­alms but do not truly be­long to them.

    The Ne­ar Um­b­ra

    Everything is mo­re vi­vid in this spi­ri­tu­al ref­lec­ti­on of Earth, Al­t­ho­ugh it ta­kes on an ali­en cast, forms ap­pe­ar mo­re li­ke the­ir "true sel­ves" he­re. High-tech re­se­arch labs ap­pe­ar in the Um­b­ra as a se­ri­es of crystal­li­ne ca­ves co­ve­red in webs of wi­re, crac­k­ling with elec­t­ri­city. A to­xic was­te dump grows dar­ker, with spi­rits of mu­ta­ted in­sects flying abo­ut it. An un­to­uc­hed spring gla­de se­ems mo­re be­a­uti­ful and se­re­ne than in the physi­cal world. In pla­ces whe­re the Ga­un­t­let is thin, the Um­b­ra and the physi­cal world be­ar a strong re­sem­b­lan­ce. A few ma­ges cla­im that on the right nights when the mo­on shi­nes down on the ca­erns of the we­re­wol­ves, the Um­b­ra and the physi­cal world be­co­me one.

    Each tra­vel­ler ex­pe­ri­en­ces the Um­b­ra dif­fe­rently, co­lo­ring it with his own per­cep­ti­ons. The Um­b­ra gi­ves form to a pla­ce's me­aning. A ste­ri­le an­ti­sep­tic un­com­for­tab­le hos­pi­tal might ha­ve walls and flo­ors of me­tal in the Um­b­ra. It might ha­ve no spi­ri­tu­al ma­ni­fes­ta­ti­on, no me­aning to the world's col­lec­ti­ve un­con­s­ci­o­us. Only Awa­ke­ned items, obj­ects con­ta­ining Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, ha­ve form in the Um­b­ra. This in­c­lu­des any area to­uc­hed by ma­gick or pos­ses­sing a strong emo­ti­onal sig­ni­fi­can­ce to a Sle­eper. This Pri­me energy spar­k­les in its pat­terns, and many ma­ges see them dif­fe­rently. Ma­ges may see them as glo­wing webs, shim­me­ring graphs, dan­cing spi­rits or any num­ber of things.

    Items in the Um­b­ra and the re­al world af­fect each ot­her. If a physi­cal chan­ge is ma­de to a pla­ce, its ap­pe­aran­ce in the Um­b­ra may chan­ge. An aban­do­ned ho­use get­ting fi­xed up as a ho­me for ter­mi­nal­ly ill chil­d­ren will ta­ke on a new spi­ri­tu­al me­aning. In the Um­b­ra, the ho­use may go from a dank pla­ce re­eking of de­cay to a bright sun­lit si­te fil­led with as much joy as pa­rents and vo­lun­te­ers can gi­ve.

    If the spi­ri­tu­al na­tu­re of a lo­ca­ti­on chan­ges, the Stor­y­tel­ler must de­ci­de whet­her the physi­cal world shifts as well. Spi­rit ma­gick af­fects ever­y­t­hing in the Um­b­ra, even things that can­not he re­cog­ni­zed as spi­rits. Many ma­ges, such as the Dre­am­s­pe­akers, be­li­eve that the Um­b­ra and physi­cal world are in­ter­t­wi­ned, and ne­it­her can exist wit­ho­ut the ot­her. The Um­b­ra gi­ves a lo­ca­ti­on at­mos­p­he­re. Wit­ho­ut a spi­ri­tu­al ma­ni­fes­ta­ti­on, a gro­ve of tre­es might die. If a Nep­han­dus in­fec­ted the spi­rits of the gro­ve, the area co­uld be­co­me a si­te of vi­olent cri­me.

    Travel

    We fol­lo­wed the Dre­amer thro­ugh the Pur­p­le hazy clo­uds,

    Felt we co­uld con­t­rol our sen­se of ti­me.

    We tho­ught we we­re lost, but

    No mat­ter how we tri­ed

    Everyone was in pe­ace of mind

    - Judas Pri­est, "Dre­amer/De­ce­iver"

    Travel thro­ugh the Ne­ar Um­b­ra is mo­re a mat­ter of in­tent than of dis­tan­ce. A ma­ge simply walks in­to the Um­b­ral misrs and ar­ri­ves whe­re he wants to be. Ho­pe­ful­ly…. Thro­ugh the­se mists wind paths in­to the va­ri­o­us Re­alms. Many of the­se paths (cal­led "airts," "high ro­ads," "mo­on paths," "byways," "dre­am tra­ils," and ot­her na­mes) are of­ten gu­ar­ded by spi­rits and are qu­ite dan­ge­ro­us.

    Mages tra­vel easily to the Re­alms of the High Um­b­ra; the­ir Dyna­mic na­tu­res and in­qu­isi­ti­ve minds le­ad them on the paths to the Ab­s­t­ract Lands mo­re easily than to the Pri­mor­di­al Forms of na­tu­re. Only the de­ad may ven­tu­re in­to the De­ad Lands. Al­t­ho­ugh so­me Eut­ha­na­tos and Nep­han­di are sa­id to ha­ve wal­ked the De­ad Ro­ad, few are po­wer­ful eno­ugh to ha­ve re­tur­ned from such a jo­ur­ney.

    Primordial ma­ges wi­se in the ways of na­tu­re can pass in­to the na­tu­ral Re­alms (de­ta­iled in the We­re­wolf sup­ple­ment Um­b­ra: The Vel­vet Sha­dow), but most ma­ges tra­vel to the up­per Re­alms sha­ped by ide­as: the He­avens, Hells, tes­sa­racts and met­ro­po­li con­s­t­ruc­ted by hu­man con­cepts. In bet­we­en lie Do­ma­ins, pla­ces whe­re the Um­b­ral ref­lec­ri­on ta­kes on a par­ti­cu­larly strong form: "Blights," whe­re dark pas­si­ons or to­xic was­tes po­ison the spi­rit sha­dow; "Glens," the po­lar op­pos­t­tes of blights, whe­re pu­rity shi­nes thro­ugh; "Trods," whe­re the an­ci­ent aura of Ar­ca­dia lin­gers in the Um­b­ra, and ot­her va­ri­ati­ons. The­se Do­ma­ins are not Re­alms in the tru­esr sen­se- they sha­de the Pe­num­b­ra with the­ir in­f­lu­en­ce, but ha­ve no bor­ders.

    Technomancers, with the­ir strong ti­es to the ma­te­ri­al world, ha­ve a hard ti­me in the Um­b­ra. Ma­ges wit­ho­ut so­me know­led­ge of eit­her Cos­mo­logy or the Spi­rit Sphe­re get ut­terly lost in the Um­b­ral mists. Adepts or Mas­ters of Spi­rit, on the ot­her hand, glow li­ke be­acons with the po­wer of the­ir know­led­ge (this is nor al­ways a go­od thing…).

    The De­ep Um­b­ra

    The De­ep Um­b­ra is a mystery, and a dan­ge­ro­us one at that. Few Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges ven­tu­re in­to this vo­id and re­turn to tell of it. The Sons of Et­her (and the­ir Tec­h­noc­racy co­un­ter­parts, the Vo­id En­gi­ne­ers) bu­ild ves­sels to tra­vel in­to this en­d­less spa­ce, but ate hard-pres­sed to re­ve­al the won­ders they ha­ve fo­und the­re. Many re­turn from the­ir vo­ya­ges so­me­how chan­ged; per­haps the Nep­han­di or the­ir nig­h­t­ma­rish mas­ters cor­rupt the­se tra­ve­lers. May­be the sec­rets be­yond the Bar­ri­er are too gre­at (or too fo­ul) for the hu­man mind, even the mind of a ma­ge, to com­p­re­hend…

    The Um­b­ro­od

    But tho­ugh the­re is much to be le­arnt from a cyni­cal de­vil, I re­al­ly can­not stand a sen­ti­men­tal one. Se­nor Com­man­der: you know the way to the fron­ti­er of hell and he­aven. Be go­od eno­ugh to di­rect me.

    - Ge­or­ge Ber­nard Shaw, Man and Su­per­man

    "Umbrood" is a ge­ne­ral term des­c­ri­bing the Um­b­ral be­ings cal­led "spi­rits." The Tec­h­noc­racy (and so­me Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges) equ­ate the­se en­ti­ti­es with ali­en li­fe-forms, whi­le mo­re mystic ma­ges see the Um­b­ro­od for the spi­rit­things they are: ref­lec­ti­ons and in­car­na­ti­ons of as­pects of the ma­te­ri­al world (or are we a ref­lec­ti­on of them? The de­ba­te con­ti­nu­es…).

    Magic

    These spi­rits ha­ve odd po­wers that equ­ate to ma­gick in so­me ele­men­tal fas­hi­on. They, li­ke so many ot­her su­per­na­tu­rals, are unaf­fec­ted by Pa­ra­dox on the­ir ho­me gro­und, per­haps be­ca­use so-cal­led ma­gick is the­ir na­tu­ral sta­te. Hu­man ma­ges must still con­tend with Pa­ra­dox he­re, al­t­ho­ugh all ma­gick he­re is co­in­ci­den­tal. Ne­ver­t­he­less, ma­ges ha­ve an ed­ge when de­aling with the­se ep­he­me­ral be­ings. Ma­ges are of­ten mo­re in­ven­ti­ve, whi­le spi­rits tend to fol­low mo­re pre­dic­tab­le pat­terns. A cle­ver ma­ge can out­ma­ne­uver even an Um­b­ro­od Lord.

    Damage

    Paradox, in the ma­te­ri­al world, ac­tu­al­ly da­ma­ges Um­b­ro­od. Ma­gicks ot­her than Spi­rit in­f­lict nor­mal da­ma­ge on Um­b­ro­od. Spi­rit Sphe­re Ef­fects, ho­we­ver, do ag­gra­va­ted da­ma­ge to Um­b­ral be­ings. Thus, the Mas­ter of this Sphe­re is ac­cor­ded gre­at res­pect, fe­ar and hos­ti­lity in the Um­b­ra.

    Materialization

    Many Um­b­ro­od ma­ni­fest in the physi­cal world, ta­king on physi­cal forms. In the past, a few ma­ges, in­c­lu­ding the Pro­ge­ni­tors, spe­cu­la­ted that all of the­se spi­rits had so­me rank in Li­fe ma­gick. The truth of the mat­ter, as pro­ven by mem­bers of the Dre­am­s­pe­akers, is that Ma­te­ri­ali­ze is a spe­ci­al Ef­fect of Spi­rit 3. Ma­ges who step si­de­ways tran­s­form the­ir physi­cal bo­di­es in­to spi­ri­tu­al ep­he­me­ra and then back from spi­rit stuff to physi­cal forms aga­in. The spi­rits use the sa­me tec­h­ni­que, but in re­ver­se. They start with the se­cond part of the tran­s­for­ma­ti­on, tur­ning the­ir spi­rit bo­di­es in­to flesh. Spi­rits and the­ir ma­ni­fes­ta­ti­ons are not truly "ali­ve" on the physi­cal pla­ne. When kil­led, they dis­pel, re­for­ming la­ter el­sew­he­re in the Um­b­ra.

    The fol­lo­wing en­t­ri­es gi­ve new ru­les for a va­ri­ety of things:

    • Child Ma­ges: Not all ma­ges are "grown-ups." The­se bri­ef ru­les co­ver yo­ung ma­ges as cha­rac­ters for both pla­yers and Stor­y­tel­lers.

    • The Art of Do: New ru­les for the Akas­hic art of The Way.

    • Fa­mi­li­ars: De­ta­ils abo­ut the tra­di­ti­onal ma­ge com­pa­ni­ons.

    • Cer­ta­men: A for­mal du­el system ap­pro­ved by the Co­un­cil of Ni­ne,

    • Com­pu­ters: So­me bri­ef ru­les for nor­mal com­pu­ter use and hac­king. Di­gi­tal Web has mo­re de­ta­ils abo­ut com­pu­ter tec­h­no­ma­gick.

    "Huh!" sa­id the Star­ling con­tem­p­tu­o­usly, "Lo­ok at 'em. They think they're the World's Won­ders. Lit­tle mi­rac­les - I DON'T think! Of co­ur­se you'll for­get-sa­me as Jane and Mic­ha­el."

    "We WON'T," sa­id the Twins, lo­oking at the Star­ling as if they wo­uld li­ke to mur­der him.

    The Star­ling je­ered.

    "I say you will," he in­sis­ted. "It isn't yo­ur fa­ult, of co­ur­se," he ad­ded mo­re kindly. "You'll for­get be­ca­use you just can't help it. The­re ne­ver was a hu­man be­ing that re­mem­be­red af­ter the age of one-at the very la­test- ex­cept, of co­ur­se, Her." And he jer­ked his he­ad over his sho­ul­der at Mary Pop­pins.

    "But why can she re­mem­ber and not us?" sa­id John.

    "A-a-a-h! She's dif­fe­rent. She's the Gre­at Ex­cep­ti­on. Can't go by HER," sa­id the Star­ling, grin­ning at them both.

    John and Bar­ba­ra we­re si­lent.

    - P.L. Tra­vers, Mary Pop­pins

    Most Or­p­hans Awa­ken as ado­les­cents. A few, ho­we­ver, are born Awa­ke, or just ne­ver go to Sle­ep. In­de­ed, the­re are tho­se who be­li­eve that all ba­bi­es are Awa­ke­ned, and it's only af­ter so­me ti­me in the world that they go to Sle­ep. Pe­op­le spend the­ir li­ves trying re­ali­ze things with the cla­rity and sim­p­li­city that they did as chil­d­ren. A few chil­d­ren ne­ver for­get.

    Children in­s­tin­c­ti­vely know ri­tu­al and ma­gic, and tho­se with suf­fi­ci­ent ima­gi­na­ti­on can ac­com­p­lish so­me of the most ama­zing fe­ats. They al­so know of the for­ces of Pa­ra­dox and why not to do ma­gick aro­und Sle­epers. Al­most all grow­nups- and chil­d­ren who act li­ke grow­nup­s­t­hink they know ever­y­t­hing. Ma­gic zap-guns and so on tend to turn back in­to or­di­nary toys when grow­nups are aro­und, but by the sa­me to­ken, the bo­gey­man in the clo­set has to hi­de when mommy's aro­und be­ca­use she do­esn't be­li­eve in him. Sle­epers do ha­ve the­ir uses.

    Children are among the most po­wer­ful and the most dan­ge­ro­us of all ma­ges. So­me be­li­eve that chil­d­ren lack the ne­ces­sary wil­lpo­wer for ma­gick. The­se pe­op­le ob­vi­o­usly ha­ve not be­en aro­und many chil­d­ren, or ha­ve for­got­ten what it is li­ke to be a child. Most adults lack the wil­lpo­wer to be ma­ges. What chil­d­ren lack is ex­pe­ri­en­ce and in­te­rest: ex­pe­ri­en­ce in what is and is not sup­po­sed to be pos­sib­le, and in­te­rest in chan­ging the way of the world. A child who has had the spi­rit crus­hed out of her is not go­ing to be­li­eve her­self ca­pab­le of chan­ging the world and will con­se­qu­ently go to Sle­ep, Con­ver­sely, a child fil­led with self-as­su­ran­ce ge­ne­ral­ly li­ves in a si­tu­ati­on qu­ite to her li­king and will see no re­ason to chan­ge re­ality. Sle­ep will co­me slowly and gra­du­al­ly, and the child wilt re­ali­ze she is a ma­ge only if the­re is so­me ab­rupt and dras­tic chan­ge which ma­kes her ne­ed to use her po­wer. Then the­re are chil­d­ren who are just so we­ird and wil­lful that they ne­ver buy in­to the Tec­h­noc­tacy's li­es in the first pla­ce, and con­ti­nue the­ir li­ves as ma­ges….

    There are so­me chil­d­ren who are born with know­led­ge of the­ir past li­ves, of­ten even know­led­ge of the­ir past li­ves as ma­ges. The­se are of­ten the most dan­ge­ro­us, as they know so­met­hing of the world and of the im­por­tan­ce of ma­gick. En­lig­h­ten­ment can be a dan­ge­ro­us bur­den, but such chil­d­ren usu­al­ly know what to do, and can be qu­ite adept at hi­ding vul­gar ma­gick from grow­nups and ot­her Sle­epers. Usu­al­ly, such chil­d­ren go to op­po­si­te ends of the Kar­mic equ­ati­on, be­ing eit­her bles­sed and holy Gol­den Chil­d­ren or wic­ked and evil Chil­d­ren of Dar­k­ness. Then aga­in, so­me may simply be very strong-wil­led ma­ges who ha­ven't for­got­ten the­ir pre­vi­o­us li­ves and in­tend to pick up whe­re they left off.

    On the ot­her si­de of the equ­ati­on are the In­no­cents, chil­d­ren so pu­re and na­ive that they are in fact, en­lig­h­te­ned. By so­me phi­lo­sop­hi­es, in­no­cents are new spi­rits in the­ir first in­car­na­ti­on, and hen­ce ha­ve no me­mo­ri­es of an­y­t­hing, not even phan­tom wis­dom. In­no­cents know lit­tle or not­hing, but do ma­gick in­s­tin­c­ti­vely. Many lo­se the fa­ci­lity as they lo­se the­ir in­no­cen­ce, rep­la­cing it with know­led­ge. Even the­se chil­d­ren will even­tu­al­ly lo­se most, if not all, of the­ir pu­rity. In­no­cents are al­so pro­tec­ted from many types of harm, but as they ne­ed it, it ge­ne­ral­ly isn't much of a prob­lem for ga­me ba­lan­ce. Ro­lep­la­ying such a cha­rac­ter has gre­at dra­ma­tic po­ten­ti­al.

    Awakened chil­d­ren can be a chal­len­ge to play, but the ex­pe­ri­en­ce can al­so pro­ve very re­war­ding. Fin­ding out that the me­an old ne­ig­h­bor lady is a Nep­han­dus can ma­ke for an ex­ci­ting ad­ven­tu­te, and the Her­me­tic Or­der can ha­ve an in­te­res­ting ti­me when they dis­co­ver that Awa­ke­ned ni­ne-ye­ar-olds ha­ve snuck in­to the Mas­que of the Sac­red Myste­ri­es. Child ma­ges al­so are among the most unu­su­al fo­es cha­rac­ters may fa­ce, whet­her it's a ca­se of Chantry be­ing pes­te­red by Awa­ke­ned brats, or an en­co­un­ter with so­me evil sor­ce­ress in her la­test in­car­na­ti­on.

    Child Ma­ges as Pla­yer Cha­rac­ters

    Young ma­ges be­gin with the Flaws: Short and Child; they start with only 10 fre­ebie po­ints (to ref­lect the­ir lack of ex­pe­ri­en­ce). Child ma­ges can­not spend mo­te than six po­ints in Physi­cal At­tri­bu­tes and can­not start with a Strength hig­her than 2. (Chil­d­ren can be qu­ite dex­te­ro­us, and they do get ama­zing bursts of sta­mi­na.) They be­gin with two po­ints of Are­te in­s­te­ad of one, can be­gin with an­yo­ne Sphe­re, and will al­most al­ways ha­ve a Men­tor, Des­tiny, and a strong Ava­tar, In­no­cents may start with one to three po­ints of True Fa­ith, tho­ugh this will be so­rely tes­ted…. Re­in­car­na­ted ma­ges will of­ten ha­ve a strong Dre­am ra­ting.

    Another pos­si­bi­lity is the chi­id pos­ses­sed by the so­ul of a de­ad ma­ge. Si­mon Haw­ke's Wi­zard of Whi­tec­ha­pel has an amu­sing exam­p­le of this. This type of cha­rac­ter wo­uld be bu­ilt with the Flaws abo­ve, but wo­uld ha­ve nor­mal be­gin­ning Tra­its and a re­al iden­tity prob­lem!

    The ani­mal grin­ned, a wic­ked smi­le, but was not sen­si­ti­ve to the di­vi­ne vib­ra­ti­ons. He did not qu­iver with de­light on he­aring a few words from the mysti­cal Bo­ok. In­s­tead he spat on the out­do­or car­pet of the truck flo­or arid cur­sed.

    - Step­hen Bil­li­as, The Ame­ri­can Bo­ok of the De­ad

    The hu­man body is ma­de to bend and twist in many ways. The Way of Do (pro­no­un­ced the sa­me way as "do­ugh") se­eks out the na­tu­ral mo­ti­ons of the hu­man form: which [no­ti­ons con­ser­ve the most energy, which pro­du­ce the most for­ce from the smal­lest ef­fort, and which al­low the body to re­ma­in strong and he­althy. The­se exer­ci­ses co­ver the who­le of the body both in­ter­nal­ly and ex­ter­nal­ly. Sta­mi­na, spe­ed, strength and ac­cu­racy are chi­se­led in­to the stylist's body, mind and spi­rit.

    Proper exe­cu­ti­on of Do al­lows the stylist to lock in­to the Flow of the Cos­mic All and thus be­co­me an un­s­top­pab­le for­ce or in­vul­ne­rab­le tar­get. Akas­hic Brot­hers may al­so aug­ment such mo­ves with ma­gick when ne­ces­sary, ac­hi­eving truly ama­zing fe­ats of awe-in­s­pin­ng be­a­uty and

    devastating des­t­ruc­ti­ve po­ten­ti­al.

    The Mas­ter of Do mo­ves wit­ho­ut tho­ught of con­ven­ti­on or style. The body, mind and spi­rit must all flow na­tu­ral­ly li­ke a rol­ling, bab­bling stre­am. The wa­ter laps over a muddy, sto­ne-co­ve­red pat­h­way to ma­ke its way back to a lar­ger so­ur­ce. The be­ing ne­eds to be as sup­ple as a wil­low, hard as a rock, sharp as ste­el, strong as a ri­ver, and as pe­ace­ful as a rol­ling me­adow.

    The sec­ret of Do is to be ever­y­t­hing at on­ce and not­hing at all.

    Do as a Skill

    Do is the most ba­sic of mar­ti­al forms, and, it is sa­id, the ba­sis for all ot­her arts. Pri­mi­ti­ve, yet re­fi­ned, it stems from the very ba­sis of hu­man hand-to-hand com­bat: pun­c­hing, kic­king, dod­ging and thro­wing. The Do mas­ter pun­c­hes, k icks, avo­ids or re­di­rects all blows; ot­her ma­ne­uvers are the easy man's way out of a fight.

    The sec­tet of the Do is that it is the tru­est and sim­p­lest met­hod of ap­plying, tran­s­fer­ring, ab­sor­bing and re­di­rec­ting the Pat­tern known as in­t­rin­sic in­ter­nal ener­gi­es, al­so known as Chi or Ki. This Pat­tern runs with the flow of the Pri­me. That is to say, it is not in it­self the Pri­me, but it is a Pat­tern that at­tempts to dup­li­ca­te the flow of the Pri­me. Prac­ti­ti­oners le­arn to ri­de along the cur­rents of the­ir in­t­rin­sic in­ter­nal ener­gi­es.

    The Mas­ters of the Do can per­form acts with the use of in­t­rin­sic in­ter­nal po­wer that are very si­mi­lar to a stan­dard ma­ge's usa­ge of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce. Ho­we­ver, this in­t­rin­sic in­ter­nal po­wer do­es not co­me in re­adily physi­cal forms li­ke Tass and can­not be tran­s­fer­red. The Akas­hic ma­ge me­rely uses what is al­re­ady the­re to its ful­lest ex­tent. In­t­rin­sic in­ter­nal po­wer can be drawn out by me­rely prac­ti­cing Do ma­ne­uvers; this is cal­led "cul­ti­va­ting" one's in­t­rin­sic in­ter­nal ener­gi­es. The use of in­t­rin­sic in­ter­nal po­wer has be­en known to pro­du­ce in­c­re­dib­le ef­fects. By aug­men­ting the­se ef­fects with ma­gick, Akas­hic ma­ges can use tra­di­ti­onal ro­tes that no one el­se can (see the spe­ci­al Do ro­tes in Bo­ok Fo­ur).

    Do Skill must be pur­c­ha­sed du­ring cha­rac­ter cre­ati­on by an­yo­ne pla­ying an Akas­hic Brot­her, Cha­rac­ters al­re­ady cre­ated may ex­c­han­ge the­ir Brawl skill for Do by di­vi­ding Brawl in half, ro­un­ding up (Brawl 3 be­co­mes Do 2, etc.). This may se­em un­fa­ir at first, but Do is a fat mo­re in­t­ri­ca­te and po­wer­ful Skill than Brawl. An­yo­ne can be a go­od braw­ler; only the wi­sest ar­tists may mas­ter Do. Brawl ne­ver car­ri­es over in­to Do, even when that Skill rep­re­sents so­me mar­ti­al art. Even the most ac­com­p­lis­hed fig­h­ter must start at the be­gin­ning when le­ar­ning the Way, Whe­ne­ver an Akas­hic Brot­her fights anot­her mar­ti­al ar­tist, Do is al­ways used in­s­te­ad of Brawl, as a mat­ter of ho­nor. The Way can­not be le­ar­ned just an­y­w­he­re- one must tra­in vi­go­ro­usly un­der a Men­tor to le­arn the Skill and its spe­ci­al po­wers.

    Do stylists tend to ha­ve high rat ings in ot­her Abi­li­ti­es, al­t­ho­ugh the Skill it­self adds not­hing to tho­se ra­tings. The­se skills may in­c­lu­de Aler­t­ness, At­h­le­tics, Dod­ge, Me­lee, Ste­alth, Enig­mas and Me­di­ci­ne. The Abi­lity ra­tings will vary from cha­rac­ter to cha­rac­ter, but many Akas­hic Brot­hers ha­ve at le­ast one dot in most, if not all, of the­se Abi­li­ti­es.

    The Po­wers of Do

    A gre­at war­ri­or fe­els no pa­in!

    - Bar­ba­ri­an, Ori­en­tal He­ro­es

    Do has two pri­mary fun­c­ti­ons. The first is to link the body in­to the flow of in­t­rin­sic in­ter­nal ener­gi­es; the se­cond is to di­rect this flow to en­han­ce the abi­li­ti­es of the body, Do, in many ways, is the study of one's own be­ing. Thro­ugh this mas­tery, Do mas­ters can per­form ama­zing fe­ats wit­ho­ut vul­gar ma­gick. The­se po­wers are ma­gick of a sort, but af­fect the in­ner be­ing rat­her than ex­ter­nal re­ality. One ne­ed not be­co­me a ma­ge to uti­li­ze the­se ef­fects- they re­qu­ire in­ten­se tra­ining and will, but not the Ta­pes­t­ry-re­we­aving po­wers of True Ma­gick.

    Because the­se abi­li­ti­es ha­ve be­en so in­g­ra­ined in hu­man be­li­ef that they do not in­vo­ke Pa­ra­dox. Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, ho­we­ver, can­not be spent to re­du­ce dif­fi­cul­ti­es.

    The Ba­sic Ma­ne­uvers

    These mo­ves are ef­fi­ci­ent va­ri­ati­ons on nor­mal fig­h­ting stri­kes. Any Do stylist can use all of the­se stri­kes with a roll of Dex­te­rity + Do. Each of the fo­ur ba­sic ma­ne­uvers of Do uti­li­ze the hu­man body to its ul­ti­ma­te po­ten­ti­al. Thro­ugh per­fec­ti­on of the art, Do war­ri­ors add the­ir suc­ces­ses to the da­ma­ge of the­se ma­ne­uvers. Be­ca­use the stri­kes de­pend mo­re on fo­cus than on strength (and for sim­p­li­city's sa­ke), ba­se da­ma­ge re­ma­ins con­s­tant.

    Example: A mug­ger at­tacks Sa­ra Lynch, Akas­hic war­ri­or. With gra­ce and spe­ed, Sa­ra's body mo­ves li­ke the wind, slam­ming the bot­tom of her fo­ot in­to her tar­get with ul­ti­ma­te pre­ci­si­on. Sa­ra rolls for her Dex­te­rity of 4 and her Do of 3, ga­ining throe suc­ces­ses. She adds the­se to her kick da­ma­ge of 4, for a to­tal of se­ven He­alth le­vels of da­ma­ge.

    Exercises and Body Con­t­rol

    There are mil­li­ons of exer­ci­ses for Do. Each set of exer­ci­ses is lin­ked to one of fo­ur ma­in go­als of the Brot­her­ho­od and, in turn, to one of the fo­ur Ava­tar Es­sen­ces: per­fec­ti­on of the body (Qu­es­ting Style), per­fec­ti­on of the mind (Pat­tern Style), per­fec­ti­on of the spi­rit (Dyna­mic Style), or per­fec­ti­on of be­ing (Pri­mor­di­al Style). Most of the­se exer­ci­ses over­lap ca­te­go­ri­es of dis­tin­c­ti­on. For one to find per­fec­ti­on in any, one must ac­hi­eve a grasp of the cos­mic all. The­se exer­ci­ses ha­ve no re­al ap­pli­ca­ti­on in ga­me mec­ha­nics, but add ro­lep­la­ying fla­vor to stylist cha­rac­ters.

    Precise bo­dily con­t­rol is of pri­mary im­por­tan­ce to the true Do prac­ti­ti­oner, con­t­rol not only of mo­ve­ment and per­cep­ti­on, but of in­ter­nal pro­ces­ses and struc­tu­res as well. The­se skills al­lo­wed many Brot­hers to es­ca­pe Eut­ha­na­tos de­ath squ­ads by pla­ying de­ad du­ring the gre­at Hi­ma­la­yan Wars of 900-600 B. C, This con­t­rol can be me­asu­red by the le­vel that the stylist has in Do and al­lows her to ma­ni­pu­la­te her bo­dily fun­c­ti­ons to a deg­ree. The­se non-ma­gic­kal ef­fects ta­ke a roll of Dex­te­rity + Do or Sta­mi­na + Do, dif­fi­culty 8. The ef­fect lasts for one sce­ne.

    Do Le­vel -· Ef­fect

    1 -· can slow bre­ath, con­t­rol ref­le­xes

    2 -· can slow he­art, iso­la­te blo­od flow to/f­rom ex­t­re­mi­ti­es

    3 -· can slightly dis­lo­ca­te smal­ler bo­nes (slip hands out of bonds), eat glass/s­harp obj­ects wit­ho­ut in­ter­nal inj­ury

    4 -· can dis­lo­ca­te ma­j­or bo­nes, ce­ase all physi­cal li­fe signs

    5 -· can in­ter­nal­ly ne­ut­ra­li­ze most po­isons, si­mu­la­te de­ath to most ma­gic­kal per­cep­ti­ons - i.e., no aura, elec­t­ro­mag­ne­tic fi­eld or ani­ma­ting spi­rit (pro­lon­ged usa­ge can le­ad to at­rophy of ex­t­re­mi­ti­es and even­tu­al de­cay)

    Energy So­ur­ces

    Do stylists di­rects the­ir in­ner Chi one of two ways: in­ter­nal­ly or ex­ter­nal­ly. Do prac­ti­ti­oners tend to em­p­loy one of the­se energy so­ur­ces, tho­ugh gre­at mas­ters (le­vel 4 or 5) can uti­li­ze both qu­ite ef­fec­ti­vely. When the stylist at­ta­ins a deg­ree of skill (three or mo­re dots), he may dec­la­re as­pe­ci­alty with his energy so­ur­ce.

    Internal: The in­ter­nal stylist di­rects in­t­rin­sic in­ter­nal ener­gi­es thro­ugh the body di­rectly by mo­ti­oning with the energy's flow, and, thus, fol­lo­wing the way of the cur­rents in the Pri­me. The prac­ti­ti­oner le­arns to di­rect this flow thro­ugh me­di­ta­ti­ve mo­ti­ons and stu­di­es of the in­t­rin­sic in­ter­nal energy he chan­nels wit­hin his body.

    Internal style energy tran­s­fers from the prac­ti­ti­oner's body in mo­ti­on (po­ten­ti­al energy) to the tar­get's body in re­la­ti­ve non-mo­ti­on as ki­ne­tic energy. Al­t­ho­ugh the Brot­her se­ems to mo­ve very slowly, his blows are dif­fi­cult to dod­ge. Spe­ci­alists in the in­ter­nal style may re­roll 10s on rolls to hit and of­ten ha­ve high Dex­te­rity sco­res.

    External:The Ex­ter­nal Stylist for­ces in­t­rin­sic in­ter­nal ener­gi­es to co­ales­ce wit­hin her mus­c­les, bo­ne struc­tu­re, skin and ten­dons. This met­hod is le­ar­ned thro­ugh re­pe­ti­ti­on of exer­ci­ses. In this met­hod, the energy of the Do re­le­ases as physi­cal ki­ne­tic energy. Spe­ci­alists in "exter­nal" style re­roll 10s for da­ma­ge and usu­al­ly ha­ve high Sta­mi­na.

    Special Ma­ne­uvers

    Through the art of Do, stylists may le­arn a num­ber of spe­ci­al mo­ves. Cha­rac­ters with mo­re than two dots in Do may le­arn one of the fol­lo­wing ma­ne­uvers, in no par­ti­cu­lar or­der, for each po­int of Do over the se­cond (e.g. a Do of 3 con­fers one Spe­ci­al Ma­ne­uver, a Do of 4 bes­tows two Ma­ne­uvers, and so on). Tho­se ini­ti­ates new to Do (i.e., with one dot) do not yet ha­ve the skill to mas­ter the­se ma­ne­uvers.

    Maneuver -· Dif­fu­culty -· Da­ma­ge

    Punch -· 6 -· 3 + Suc­cess

    Kick -· 7 -· 4 + Suc­cess

    Flying Kick -· 8 -· 5 + Suc­cess

    Throw -· 8 -· 3 + Suc­cess

    Opponents tra­ined in Do may roll a Dex­te­rity + Do roll ver­sus 6 to land on the­ir fe­et rat­her than at­tem­p­ting to Dod­ge a throw. If this roll is suc­ces­sful, no da­ma­ge is in­f­lic­ted.

    Return Me­lee At­tack

    Roll: Dex­te­rity + Do

    Difficulty: see be­low

    Damage: spe­ci­al

    Primarily used aga­inst op­po­nents at­tac­king with cit­her swords, kni­ves or clubs, this ma­ne­uver al­lows the de­fen­der to re­di­rect the energy of the at­tack aro­und and back in­to the at­tac­ker. The prac­ti­ti­oner rolls a re­sis­ted roll aga­inst the at­tac­ker's Dex­te­rity + .3. If the Do ar­tist wins, he do­es his Do + suc­ces­ses in da­ma­ge; this ref­lects how well he re­di­rec­ted the blow. This ac­ti­on must be dec­la­red be­fo­re the At­tack Sta­ge be­gins.

    Deflect/Catch Mis­si­les

    Roll: Dex­te­rity + Do

    Difficulty: spe­ci­al

    Damage: no­ne

    Do prac­ti­ti­oners are of­ten tra­ined in ba­re han­ded met­hods of de­fen­se aga­inst we­apons which can be thrown or shot thro­ugh the air. Def­lec­ti­on may be at­tem­p­ted as long as the de­fen­der has an arm (or leg) free, and can see the mis­si­le co­ming (or has Cor­res­pon­den­ce 1). Cat­c­hing, ho­we­ver, re­qu­ires full con­cen­t­ra­ti­on, so the de­fen­der must be ini­ti­al­ly awa­re of the at­tack and must ta­ke no ot­her ac­ti­on that turn. This skill do­es not work aga­inst any form of ma­gic­kal mis­si­le, al­t­ho­ugh a mun­da­ne obj­ect pro­pel­led thro­ugh co­in­ci­den­tal ma­gick can be def­lec­ted nor­mal­ly. Be­low are dif­fi­cul­ti­es for the most com­mon mis­si­les (a num­ber in pa­ren­t­he­ses in­di­ca­tes the num­ber of suc­ces­ses re­qu­ired):

    Missile -· to def­lect -· to catch

    rock, thrown -· 4 -· 5

    rock, slung -· 5 -· 6

    knife -· 6 -· 7

    shuriken -· 6 -· 8 (both hands)

    spear -· 5 -· 4 (both hands)

    hatchet -· 8 -· 7

    arrow -· 7(2) -· 8(2)

    crossbow bolt -· 8(2) -· 9(2)

    bullet -· 10(3) -· 10(5)

    Kiai

    Roll; Sta­mi­na + Do

    Difficulty: 6

    Damage: no­ne

    When struck, the Brot­her emits a lo­ud yell which ex­pels all air from the lungs, tig­h­tens the sto­mach mus­c­les, and draws the tes­tic­les up in­to the ab­do­mi­nal ca­vity (when ap­pli­cab­le). This ma­ne­uver al­lows an Akas­hic Brot­her to fo­cus his Ki (or Chi). Li­ke a dod­ge, the Ki­ai must be dec­la­red du­ring the at­tack pha­se of a turn, but ot­her ac­ti­ons may still be ta­ken (the Di­ce Po­ol must be split, as usu­al). For each suc­cess on this roll, one ex­t­ra die may be ad­ded to a re­gu­lar so­ak roll or an In­ti­mi­da­ti­on roll if the cha­rac­ter de­si­res.

    If Ki­ai is used as a pre­re­qu­isi­te for a Do Ro­te (see Bo­ok Fo­ur), the stylist rolls his Are­te in­s­te­ad of Sta­mi­na + Do. The task is a ma­ni­fes­ta­ti­on of his en­lig­h­ten­ment rat­her than a dis­p­lay of po­wer. The roll may be do­ne the turn be­fo­re the ro­te is exe­cu­ted to avo­id split­ting a Di­ce Po­ol.

    The Fi­nal Blow

    Roll: no­ne

    Difficulty: see be­low

    Damage: nor­mal

    The lon­g­his­tory of the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od is rep­le­te with many exam­p­les of the su­per­hu­man ca­pa­bi­li­ti­es of Do prac­ti­ti­oners, in­c­lu­ding the abi­lity to sus­ta­in and yet tem­po­ra­rily ig­no­re mas­si­ve amo­unts of physi­cal da­ma­ge. Few high-ran­king Brot­hers die in com­bat wit­ho­ut eit­her de­li­ve­ring one last blow to the­ir kil­ler or gi­ving a pro­lon­ged ex­p­li­ca­ti­on of the fi­nal sec­ret of her style to a te­ar­ful stu­dent. On­ce du­ring his li­fe­ti­me, a Brot­her may, if the Stor­y­tel­ler al­lows it, com­p­le­tely ig­no­re all He­alth Le­vel pe­nal­ti­es, in­c­lu­ding de­ath, for a num­ber turns equ­al to his Do.

    If this ca­pa­bi­lity isu­sed at any ti­me ot­her than the mo­ment of de­ath, the Stor­y­tel­ler may tell the pla­yer that an amo­unt of per­ma­nent Wil­lpo­wer equ­al to the He­alth pe­nalty over­co­me in this way is lost; this dra­ma­tic ac­ti­on may even re­sult in a co­ma or per­ma­nent han­di­cap.

    A fa­mo­us de­mon­s­t­ra­ti­on of this po­wer is the fi­nal bat­tle of the We­apon­less De­fen­der Nic­hi­ba, who was di­sem­bo­we­led by the war­lord Ha­kai but used his own dan­g­ling en­t­ra­ils to stran­g­le his sla­yer.

    Optional Ru­le: Tra­ining Flas­h­back

    On oc­ca­si­on, an Akas­hic Brot­her's pla­yer may wish to per­form so­me ex­t­re­mely com­p­lex or spe­ci­ali­zed ma­ne­uver for which the Stor­y­tel­ler must de­mand a dif­fi­culty of 10. With this op­ti­onal ru­le, the pla­yer may call for a flas­h­back to her early Do tra­ining, and thro­ugh it, ne­go­ti­ate a lo­wer dif­fi­culty by me­ans of bril­li­ant ro­lep­la­ying. The Men­tor Bac­k­g­ro­und is usu­al­ly in­vol­ved, and both the pla­yer and Stor­y­tel­ler sho­uld work out the mas­ter-stu­dent re­Sa­ti­on­s­hip(s) in so­me de­ta­il.

    A ti­me li­mit of two or three mi­nu­tes sho­uld be set (this usu­al­ly hap­pens in the mid­dle of com­bat, af­ter all), and the Stor­y­tel­ler may dis­co­unt the en­ti­re flas­h­back if an­yo­ne in­vol­ved says the word "gras­shop­per."

    Example: Su­ni­la is at­tem­p­ting to free her com­pa­ni­ons from a Nep­han­di dun­ge­on, des­pi­te the fact the she is sus­pen­ded by one leg (and a lo­oped sash) from a ce­iling vent as she fo­olishly tri­es to swing ac­ross the hall and lift the dun­ge­on key from the no­se-ring of the slum­be­ring gu­ard wit­ho­ut wa­king the gu­ard or da­ma­ging her­self on its aci­dic der­mal sec­re­ti­ons, (whew!) Her highly tra­ined and fo­cu­sed mind drifts back to the ti­me she spent with the Old Man, and how the Old Man li­ked to nap whi­le for­cing Su­ni­la to pick the fli­es off his fa­ce wit­ho­ut wa­king him…

    Frequent abu­se of the Tra­ining Flas­h­back can le­ad to po­wer­ful Qu­i­et. Brot­hers ha­ve be­en known to sta­re in blis­sful re­ve­rie whi­le com­bat is re­sol­ved aro­und them by the­ir com­pa­ni­ons. Brot­hers who ha­ve wit­nes­sed the de­aths of te­ac­hers, fa­mily or fri­ends can be­co­me pla­gu­ed with un­wan­ted flas­h­backs of the event, and be­co­me prey to ven­ge­ful ob­ses­si­ons.

    Spirit ma­king a pas­sa­ge for him­self

    Spirit ma­king a bre­ath for him­self

    out of me, out of me

    - Es­ki­mo Sha­ma­ness Hi­wu­na

    Familiars are the com­pa­ni­on spi­rit-cre­atu­res-ma­de­mat­ter who work with ma­ges. The exact na­tu­re of the­se in­tel­li­gent and po­wer­ful be­ings is un­k­nown, al­t­ho­ugh mem­bers of the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus ha­ve as­ser­ted that fa­mi­li­ars are ac­tu­al­ly frag­ments of Ava­tars shat­te­red by Ma­ra­uders or ot­her po­wer­ful cre­atu­res. The Dre­am­s­pe­akers, on the ot­her hand, in­sist that fa­mi­li­ars are me­rely Awa­ke­ned spi­rit­be­ings who­se true ho­me­land li­es so­mew­he­re in the De­ep Um­b­ra. So­me Dre­am­s­pe­akers even go so far as to say that ma­ges in the de­epest thro­es of Qu­i­et may them­sel­ves be fa­mi­li­ars in that ho­me­land. Wha­te­ver the truth be­hind the­se ide­as, fa­mi­li­ars are truly ali­en cre­atu­res who­se true mo­ti­ves for jo­ining with ma­ges re­ma­in un­cer­ta­in.

    Familiars co­me in a va­ri­ety of forms, from the go­lems of the Sons of Et­her to the black cats of the Ver­be­na, from the fer­rets of the Cult of Ec­s­tasy to the hyper-ad­van­ced AIs of the Vir­tu­al Adepts, It is sa­id that even so­me Tec­h­noc­racy ma­ges ha­ve fa­mi­li­ars, tho­ugh they wo­uld ne­ver re­fer to them as such. Fa­mi­li­ars can ta­ke the form of al­most any cre­atu­re, even ro­bots and go­lems. They of­ten ha­ve so­me form of mo­bi­lity, and thus ra­rely ta­ke the form of, say, a crystal ball or staff. On ra­re oc­ca­si­ons, ho­we­ver, ma­ges cre­ate fa­mi­li­ars in the form of ani­ma­ted bro­om­s­ticks, mus­h­ro­oms, cars and the li­ke. The Sons of Et­her and Vir­tu­al Adepts are most li­kely to cre­ate such fa­mi­li­ars. Be war­ned tho­ugh: the­se fa­mi­li­ars may ca­use Pa­ra­dox to ac­crue to the ma­ge if any Sle­epers see the fa­mi­li­ars be­ha­ving in a man­ner "impos­sib­le" in the­ir re­ality!

    The Fa­mi­li­ar-Ma­ge Bond

    The fa­mi­li­ar is a spi­rit fo­re­ign to the re­ality which the ma­ge calls ho­me. Its per­cep­ti­ons, the la­yers of its mind and the na­tu­re of its per­ver­si­ti­es are far dif­fe­rent from tho­se of its ma­ge. The re­la­ti­on­s­hip bet­we­en a ma­ge and his fa­mi­li­ar is in­c­re­dibly de­ep and com­p­lex. It is not the re­la­ti­on­s­hip of a mas­ter and a ser­vant. Rat­her, it is a mel­ding, and thro­ugh mel­ding, the em­po­we­ring of two dis­tinct and di­ver­se in­di­vi­du­als. Ma­ges who be­li­eve they will con­t­rol the­ir fa­mi­li­ars are qu­ickly di­sa­bu­sed of this no­ti­on.

    The bond bet­we­en a fa­mi­li­ar and a ma­ge is al­most al­ways an ex­c­lu­si­ve one, al­t­ho­ugh a few ma­ges ha­ve be­en known to ha­ve mo­re than one fa­mi­li­ar. Usu­al­ly, ho­we­ver, the fa­mi­li­ars will not ag­ree to this ar­ran­ge­ment. Even if the ma­ge can get two or mo­re fa­mi­li­ar spi­rits to ag­ree to bond, most ma­ges can­not ke­ep mo­re than one fa­mi­li­ar fed and happy. Thus is de­mon­s­t­ra­ted the ex­t­re­me ra­rity of such a mul­tip­le bond.

    Familiars of­ten ac­cept a physi­cal form be­ca­use they wish to con­duct the­ir own ex­pe­ri­ments on Earth, which they find to be a bi­zar­re and fas­ci­na­ting pla­ce. A spi­rit may al­so be­co­me a fa­mi­li­ar in or­der to hi­de from its ene­mi­es, find a par­ti­cu­lar to­me or dis­co­ver a way to ha­ve so­me fun. The re­asons are as di­ver­se as the fa­mi­li­ars them­sel­ves. Al­t­ho­ugh ma­ges and fa­mi­li­ars are known to bic­ker amongst them­sel­ves (espe­ci­al­ly the Hol­low Ones and the­ir fa­mi­li­ars), the bond bet­we­en such in­di­vi­du­als is strong. A fa­mi­li­ar will al­ways lo­ok af­ter the in­te­rests of its ma­ge, whom the fa­mi­li­ar may re­fer to as its fa­mi­li­ar (which may le­ad to a cer­ta­in amo­unt of con­fu­si­on and jokes on the part of a ma­ge's bud­di­es), so long as the ma­ge do­es the sa­me for the fa­mi­li­ar. It is a com­pact that is ra­rely bro­ken de­li­be­ra­tely by eit­her party. Cer­ta­in fa­mi­li­ars ha­ve be­en with the­ir ma­ges for cen­tu­ri­es. When the com­pact is bro­ken, it is al­most al­ways due to eit­her a out­si­de in­ter­fe­ren­ce, or the ma­ge him­self scre­wing up.

    Familiars are sen­si­ti­ve cre­atu­res who can ta­ke of­fen­se easily if they are not fed the pro­per amo­unt of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce or gi­ven so­met­hing they vi­ew as truly im­por­tant. This is not to say that a fa­mi­li­ar will drop the ma­ge simply be­ca­use he do­esn't buy it the Bar­ney doll it finds so fas­ci­na­ting, un­less, of co­ur­se, stuf­fed ani­mals are part of the com­pact ma­de bet­we­en the two par­ti­es. Re­gar­d­less of the­ir many pec­ca­dil­lo­es, fa­mi­li­ars ate ge­ne­ral­ly lo­yal and can pro­vi­de the­ir ma­ge-fa­mi­li­ars with in­c­re­dib­le amo­unts of in­for­ma­ti­on and po­wer.

    Finding the Fa­mi­li­ar

    There are a va­ri­ety of ways in which a ma­ge can se­ek a fa­mi­li­ar. The most com­mon way for a ma­ge to se­ek out a fa­mi­li­ar is to fitst use the Li­fe ro­te Im­bue Flesh to pre­pa­re an ap­prop­ri­ate ves­sel which a spi­rit-be­ing may ta­ke up re­si­den­ce as a fa­mi­li­ar. Ho­we­ver, the Sons of Et­her and cer­ta­in Vir­tu­al Adepts are known to use a dif­fe­rent ro­te to pre­pa­re a su­itab­le physi­cal form for a fa­mi­li­ar. The­se ma­ges use the Mat­ter ro­te Pygma­li­on's Pa­ra­digm (Bo­ok Fi­ve) to pre­pa­re a physi­cal ves­sel.

    The ma­ge must de­ci­de be­fo­re­hand how much po­wer she wants to se­ek when se­ar­c­hing for a fa­mi­li­ar. This de­ci­si­on is usu­al­ly de­ter­mi­ned by two fac­tors: how much Qu­in­tes­sen­ce the ma­ge thinks she can ma­na­ge to fe­ed her fa­mi­li­ar and the le­vel of the ma­ge's Are­te. The de­si­res of the fa­mi­li­ar, of co­ur­se, play so­me part in the equ­ati­on…

    It is not wi­se for a ma­ge to at­tempt to bond with a fa­mi­li­ar which she can­not pro­perly fe­ed. Sin­ce a fa­mi­li­ar can only fe­ed upon the Qu­in­tes­sen­ce of its ma­ge whi­le bon­ded to her, it ne­eds to ha­ve a ste­ady supply of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce. The mo­re po­wer­ful the fa­mi­li­ar, the mo­re Pri­me For­ce is re­qu­ired to ini­ti­al­ly at­tract it and ke­ep it fed.

    A ma­ge can only call a fa­mi­li­ar spi­rit up to that ma­ge's le­vel of Are­te. Thus, a ma­ge with an Are­te of 3 can at­tract a le­vel three or lo­wer fa­mi­li­ar. Mo­re po­wer­ful fa­mi­li­ars will simply ig­no­re the ma­ge's call, vi­ewing the ma­ge as un­worthy of the­ir at­ten­ti­ons.

    The Se­arch

    Preparing a ves­sel su­itab­le for a fa­mi­li­ar to in­ha­bit is only the first step in fin­ding a true fa­mi­li­ar. Fa­mi­li­ar spi­rits are po­wer­ful, Awa­ke­ned, self-wil­led be­ings who ac­ti­vely cho­ose whom they will ac­cept as the­ir own "fa­mi­li­ar," or mas­ter, as most ma­ges pre­fer to think of them­sel­ves. Fin­ding a fa­mi­li­ar in­vol­ves go­ing on so­me form of a qu­est. This qu­est most of­ten in­vol­ves re­ac­hing in­to the Um­b­ra, al­t­ho­ugh cer­ta­in Vir­tu­al Adepts ha­ve suc­ces­sful­ly fo­und fa­mi­li­ars wit­hin the Di­gi­tal Web. Mem­bers of the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od are sa­id to ha­ve at­trac­ted fa­mi­li­ars by re­ma­ining in a sta­te of such pro­fo­und se­re­nity whi­le me­di­ta­ting be­si­de the fa­mi­li­ar shell they ha­ve cre­ated that spi­rits en­ter the shells in or­der to be­gin a dis­co­ur­se with the ma­ges. In most ca­ses, ho­we­ver, the ma­ge must se­ek out the fa­mi­li­ar him­self.

    Each Tra­di­ti­on has its own met­hod of go­ing on such qu­ests. The mem­bers of the Dre­am­s­pe­akers se­arch the world of the­ir dre­ams lo­oking for the al­le­go­ri­cal clu­es that will tell the ma­ge how to ap­pro­ach the spi­rit he se­eks. Even­tu­al­ly a chal­len­ge in­t­ru­des on his dre­am. If the ma­ge can suc­ces­sful­ly over­co­me the chal­len­ge that is pre­sen­ted in the dre­am, the spi­rit will pre­sent it­self to him.

    The Dre­am­s­pe­akers qu­ests are far dif­fe­rent from the be­a­uti­ful and ela­bo­ra­te hymns a mem­ber of the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus will com­po­se and sing du­ring a nig­h­t­long vi­gil. A hymn will tell of her de­si­re for a com­pa­ni­on to aid the ma­ge in her mis­si­on to re­mo­ve the evil sco­ur­ge from her world or to bring back the know­led­ge of true spi­ri­tu­ality to the arid world of the Tec­h­no­man­cers. If the song is in­t­ri­ca­te and po­wer­ful eno­ugh, a spi­rit may pre­sent it­self to the ma­ge du­ring her vi­gil.

    The Bar­ga­in

    When a fa­mi­li­ar spi­rit pre­sents it­self to the ma­ge, it do­es so by en­te­ring the body pre­pa­red for it. At this po­int, the ma­ge must gi­ve the fa­mi­li­ar an amo­unt of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce equ­al to the spi­rit's po­wer le­vel. Thus, a three dot fa­mi­li­ar re­qu­ires three po­ints of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, or el­se it will im­me­di­ately le­ave the ma­ge, ne­ver to re­turn. In ad­di­ti­on to this ini­ti­al amo­unt, the ma­ge must ag­ree to pro­vi­de the fa­mi­li­ar with the sa­me amo­unt of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce every se­ven days. The ma­ge will pro­bably al­so ha­ve to bar­ga­in with the fa­mi­li­ar abo­ut cer­ta­in ot­her pre­fe­ren­ces the cre­atu­re has. The­se pre­fe­ren­ces vary wi­dely from fa­mi­li­ar to fa­mi­li­ar. The ran­ge of de­mands can en­com­pass just abo­ut an­y­t­hing, from a spe­ci­al bed to ac­cess to a new ma­gic­kal to­me on every third new mo­on. Fa­mi­li­ars will al­most ne­ver ex­p­la­in the re­asons be­hind such de­mands usu­al­ly as­ser­ting that the re­asons are ob­vi­o­us.

    In re­turn for the de­mands of the fa­mi­li­ar, the ma­ge may al­so re­qu­est fa­vors of the spi­rit. Such fa­vors can ta­ke a va­ri­ety of forms, but the most com­mon are gi­ven be­low.

    Advantages

    Familiars pro­vi­de ma­ges with a va­ri­ety of po­wers and ser­vi­ces. Cer­ta­in po­wers such as Pa­ra­dox Nul­li­fi­ca­ti­on and In­for­ma­ti­on Font are pos­ses­sed by all fa­mi­li­ars to one deg­ree or anot­her. Ot­her fa­mi­li­ars ha­ve ad­di­ti­onal po­wers that can be of use to a ma­ge.

    On the ave­ra­ge, fa­mi­li­ars of each po­wer le­vel will grant the ma­ge the fol­lo­wing ad­van­ta­ges for so long as they re­ma­in with the ma­ge.

    • One dot in a Know­led­ge Abi­lity

    •• Two dots in a Know­led­ge

    ••• Two dots in a Know­led­ge, acts as le­vel one Men­tor

    •••• Three dots in a Know­led­ge, acts as le­vel two Men­tor and pro­vi­des one tem­po­rary po­int of Are­te

    ••••• Three dots in a Know­led­ge, acts as le­vel three Men­tor and pro­vi­des one tem­po­rary po­int of Are­te

    The Men­tor fun­c­ti­on al­lows the ma­ge to le­arn from the fa­mi­li­ar; the ot­her at­tri­bu­tes of the Men tor Bac­k­g­ro­und are be­yond fa­mi­li­ars. Po­wer­ful fa­mi­li­ars can even add to the­ir "pet" ma­ge's en­lig­h­ten­ment. This be­ne­fit di­sap­pe­ars if the two are se­pa­ra­ted for mo­re than a day or so.

    Paradox Nul­li­fi­ca­tion

    Familiars can ab­sorb and sub­se­qu­ently nul­lify a cer­ta­in amo­unt of Pa­ra­dox ener­gi­es. Fa­mi­li­ars them­sel­ves se­em im­mu­ne to tho­se sa­me ener­gi­es. Al­t­ho­ugh the re­ason for this abi­lity is a mystery, so­me the­ori­ze that fa­mi­li­ars can so­me­how ab­sorb Pa­ra­dox ener­gi­es in­to them­sel­ves and then chan­nel or carry that energy thro­ugh the De­ep Um­b­ra back to the­ir ho­me­land. It is al­so sa­id that in the fa­mi­li­ars' ho­me­land the Pa­ra­dox ener­gi­es are so­me­how dis­ban­ded or tran­s­for­med. As no one is known to ha­ve tra­vel­led to the fa­mi­li­ars' ho­me­land, the na­tu­re of this pro­cess is an enig­ma. When as­ked, fa­mi­li­ar spi­rits me­rely res­pond in se­eming non-se­qu­iturs, act huffy, shar­pen claws on fur­ni­tu­re, and so on.

    The amo­unt of Pa­ra­dox a fa­mi­li­ar can ab­sorb and nul­lify de­pends upon its po­wer le­vel. A one dot fa­mi­li­ar can ab­sorb up to one po­int of Pa­ra­dox per month, a two dot fa­mi­li­ar eats up to one po­int bi­we­ekly, one with three dots con­su­mes one po­int per we­ek, a fo­ur po­int fa­mi­li­ar mun­c­hes on two po­ints per we­ek, and a fi­ve dot fa­mi­li­ar can ab­sorb one po­int of Pa­ra­dox per day.

    Information Font

    All fa­mi­li­ars ha­ve ac­cess to in­for­ma­ri­on not nor­mal­ly ava­ilab­le to the ma­ge. This po­wer ma­ni­fests it­self in a va­ri­ety of ways. All fa­mi­li­ars will oc­ca­si­onal­ly spo­ut pi­eces of in­for­ma­ti­on at va­ri­o­us ti­mes. Such in­for­ma­ti­on is al­most al­ways cryptic in na­ru­re, al­t­ho­ugh of­ten ex­t­re­mely use­ful. The fa­mi­li­ar do­es not ne­ces­sa­rily in­tend to puz­zle the ma­ge, but the minds of fa­mi­li­ar spi­rits are pe­cu­li­ar things. It is per­haps the na­tu­re of the fa­mi­li­ar's mind that both al­lows it to dis­co­ver such pi­eces of flo­ating know­led­ge and ca­uses the know­led­ge ga­ined to be so dam­ned con­fu­sing.

    In ad­di­ti­on to ran­dom, pi­eces of in­for­ma­ti­on tos­sed at the ma­ge from left fi­eld, a fa­mi­li­ar al­so pro­vi­des the ma­ge ac­cess to the know­led­ge sto­red wit­hin its mind. The exact na­tu­re of this know­led­ge and its be­ne­fits to the rna­ge vary so­mew­hat with both the na­tu­re of the fa­mi­li­ar and its le­vel of po­wer,

    Other Po­wers

    Certain fa­mi­li­ars ha­ve ot­her po­wers pe­cu­li­ar to the par­ti­cu­lar fa­mi­li­ar or type of fa­mi­li­ar. The­se po­wers of­ten se­em to re­sult from so­me com­bi­na­ti­on of the na­tu­re of the physi­cal body the spi­rit in­ha­bits and the pe­cu­li­ar na­tu­re of the spi­rit ir­self. Of co­ur­se, mo­re po­wer­ful fa­mi­li­ars ha­ve a gre­ater va­ri­ety or depth of po­wers, whi­le re­la­ti­vely we­ak fa­mi­li­ars may only be ab­le to do one or two unu­su­al things.

    Some com­mon po­wers in­c­lu­de: be­ing ab­le to use a few Sphe­res of ma­gick; the abi­lity to tra­vel in the Um­b­ra at will; the abi­lity to sen­se dan­ger; and the oc­ca­si­onal po­wer to de­mand res­pect from the stran­gest pla­ces- Um­b­ro­od, old ma­ges and, oc­ca­si­onal­ly, we re cre­atu­res.

    The Fa­mi­li­ar Di­lem­ma

    Although fa­mi­li­ars con­fer a num­ber of ad­van­ta­ges and po­wers on the ma­ges they ac­com­pany, they al­so ma­ke that ma­ge mo­re vul­ne­rab­le. The most ob­vi­o­us di­sad­van­ta­ge of ke­eping a fa­mi­li­ar is that the cre­atu­re must be fed a sre­ady di­et of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce. Ma­ges va­lue Pri­me For­ce gre­atly and do not ha­ve an un­li­mi­ted supply of this all-im­por­tant sub­s­tan­ce. If a ma­ge do­es not supply its fa­mi­li­ar with the ne­ces­sary Qu­in­tes­sen­ce for mo­re than two or three we­eks, the fa­mi­li­ar may le­ave the ma­ge, ta­king all its ad­van­ta­ges with it. Fa­mi­li­ars star­ved by the­ir ma­ges of­ten vi­ew such tre­at­ment as a bet­ra­yal of the pact bet­we­en the two par­ti­es. Bet­ra­yed fa­mi­li­ars ha­ve be­en known to go on ram­pa­ges, rip­ping away Qu­in­tes­sen­ce from ot­her cre­atu­res and pe­op­le clo­se to the ma­ge. Ot­her fa­mi­li­ars ha­ve rec­han­ne­led the Pa­ra­dox ener­gi­es they ha­ve most re­cently ab­sor­bed back in­to the ma­ge with di­sas­t­ro­us ef­fect. Oc­ca­si­onal­ly, such a fa­mi­li­ar can be mol­li­fi­ed by fe­eding it an exor­bi­tant amo­unt of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, and per­haps gif­ting it with a Ta­lis­man or ma­gic­kal to­me for go­od me­asu­re.

    Rival ma­ges, Ma­ra­uders or Nep­han­di may al­so cap­tu­re or des­t­roy fa­mi­li­ars. Ma­ra­uders are par­ti­cu­larly fond of rip­ping apart fa­mi­li­ars and fe­eding on the raw Qu­in­tes­sen­ce of the­ir bo­di­es. In such a way, the Ma­ra­uder can ga­in an amo­unt of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce equ­al to the po­wer le­vel of the fa­mi­li­ar.

    The des­t­ruc­ti­on of a fa­mi­li­ar ca­uses the ma­ge to im­me­di­ately lo­se do­ub­le the fa­mi­li­ar's po­wer in Qu­in­tes­sen­ce. Ho­we­ver, the cap­tu­re of a fa­mi­li­ar is a far gre­ater dan­ger to the ma­ge, A ma­ge ga­ins new Know­led­ges from his fa­mi­li­ar thro­ugh his in­ti­ma­te con­nec­ti­on to the fa­mi­li­ar's mind, and this in­ti­macy is not a one-way stre­et- the fa­mi­li­ar al­so ga­ins ac­cess to the mind of the ma­ge. This is of­ten an ad­van­ta­ge to the ma­ge, as the fa­mi­li­ar can he­ar a sum­mons from an­y­w­he­re in the Tel­lu­ri­an and knows when the ma­ge is in dan­ger. Ho­we­ver, the ene­mi­es of a ma­ge may be ab­le to ga­in ac­cess to his sec­rets, and per­haps even his mind, thro­ugh a cap­tu­red fa­mi­li­ar. It is ru­mo­red that bet­ra­yed fa­mi­li­ars ha­ve oc­ca­si­onal­ly sold such in­for­ma­ti­on to ot­hers for a few po­ints of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce,

    A wi­se ma­ge tre­ats her fa­mi­li­ac with gre­at res­pect and will co­me to the fa­mi­li­ar's de­fen­se whe­ne­ver it is en­dan­ge­red.

    Thou hast be­co­me the path and the way

    That le­adeth to des­t­ruc­tion

    Be thou ac­cur­sed

    Be thou abo­lis­hed

    Be thou an­ni­hi­la­ted

    - Chris­ti­an De­ath, "Path of Sor­rows"

    A Tran­s­c­ript from a con­ver­sa­ti­on with Kj­arl Ha­mar­s­kald, of the Or­der of Her­mes:

    You co­me to me, an old and we­ak man, to le­arn abo­ut du­eling, do you? Heh. Shows how much you know. Still, I'll tell you a few things. And you can de­ci­de whet­her they're true or fal­se, eh? Or per­haps you'll find out too la­te. Heh. Back in the days be­fo­re even the Mythic Pa­ra­digm was in pla­ce, the Pu­re Ones du­eled thro­ugh storms and ra­in, wind and sun. They bo­iled up gre­at la­va flows from the earth and sum­mo­ned down hu­ge mo­un­ta­ins from the sky. The­ir con­f­licts for­med oce­ans, ra­ised gla­ci­ers, bir­t­hed is­lands, and, so­me say, star­ted an ice age. Who wo­uld bla­me the Sle­epers for the­ir thin­king the­se war­ring Pu­re Ones we­re gods? Many ti­mes who­le tri­bes of hu­mans we­re wi­ped out by the bat­tles of the­se gods.

    In the early Mythic Age, I know the­re we­re many kinds of ma­gic­kal con­tests: the sha­pec­hangmg du­el (so­me fo­ught in the­ir new forms, so­me didn't), the con­tests of Will (whe­re a gre­at bell was hung bet­we­en two Adepts and the first to ca­use the thing to ring won), the con­tests of Fa­te (whe­re two ma­ges wo­uld le­ap off a high cliff, each hol­ding an eag­le's egg- the win­ner wo­uld be the one who lan­ded ali­ve with the egg in­tact), and the Du­els Ar­ca­ne (whe­re a sin­g­le Sphe­res was the fo­cus, and the ma­ge who co­uld de­mon­s­t­ra­te a gre­ater fa­ci­lity and un­der­s­tan­ding of a par­ti­cu­lar area of ma­gick was con­si­de­red the win­ner). It was not un­til the grand and glo­ri­o­us Or­der of Her­mes tur­ned its tho­ughts to du­eling that we we­re gi­ven a me­ans of true tes­ting!

    That's right, boy. What I'm tal­king abo­ut is cer­ta­men! Evol­ved from an an­ci­ent con­test put to mem­bers of the old Cult of Mer­cury, cer­ta­men was a true tes­ting of the full me­asu­re of a ma­ge, do­ne wit­ho­ut pos­sib­le harm to Sle­epers ne­arby or the ma­ges them­sel­ves. Now we can set­tle our con­f­licts on the fi­eld of ho­nor, just li­ke knights in the old days, wit­ho­ut drag­ging the lo­cals in­to it.

    When the Co­un­cil of the Ni­ne put out the qu­es­ti­on of how they might sol­ve dis­pu­tes, it was the Or­der that sug­ges­ted the­ir way of du­eling. The­re was an up­ro­ar among the mo­re dyna­mic Tra­di­ti­ons: they com­p­la­ined that cer­ta­men with all its forms and for­ma­lity was too ri­gid and struc­tu­red- too much li­ke the Tec­h­noc­racy. But even they so­on le­ar­ned that the­re was a sub­t­le wil­d­ness in the play of Aegis and Gla­di­us. When all is sa­id and do­ne, it is as swift and as stre­nu­o­us as any vi­deo ga­me of the Vir­tu­al Adepts or sha­pe chan­ging com­bat of the Ver­be­na. Did yo­ur Men­tor te­ach you how it works? He did? Ca­re to ta­ke on an old go­at li­ke me? No? Why am I not sur­p­ri­sed?

    Certamen Un­ve­iled

    "I am an­ti-li­fe, the be­ast of jud­g­ment. I am the dark at the end of ever­y­t­hing. The end of uni­ver­ses, gods, wor­l­ds…of ever­y­t­hing. Sss. And what will you be then, Dre­am­lord?"

    "I am ho­pe."

    - Ne­il Ga­iman, "A Ho­pe in Hell", San­d­man #5

    Certamen has be­en up­da­ted and re­vi­sed sin­ce the days when the Or­der of Her­mes first cre­ated it. It was adap­ted to the Tra­di­ti­on's Sphe­res and had to be re­vi­sed to fun­c­ti­on in (or rat­her, out­si­de of) the new re­ality pa­ra­digm that the Tec­h­noc­racy had as­ser­ted. The gre­atest minds of the Tra­di­ti­ons, in­c­lu­ding the ima­gi­na­ti­ve Ahl-i-Ba­tin, jo­ined for­ces to tran­s­la­te the du­eling system in­to so­met­hing that all the Tra­di­ti­ons co­uld use. The pre­sent day system is not per­fect, but it do­es ac­cu­ra­tely and obj­ec­ti­vely test ma­ges aga­inst each ot­her.

    Setting the Sta­ge

    An Adept of Pri­me, cal­led the Mar­s­hall, must be pre­sent to enact the ri­tu­al. A cer­ta­men cir­c­le, cre­ated in exac­ting de­ta­il, must al­so be pre­sent. This cir­c­le gat­hers ma­gic­kal energy in­to li­te­ral Sphe­res, which ho­ver and crac­k­le with po­wer. The­se Sphe­res epi­to­mi­ze the energy which cre­ates them: Li­fe Sphe­res pul­sa­te or­ga­ni­cal­ly whi­le For­ces Sphe­res bris­t­le li­ke balls of Sa­int El­mo's Fi­re. The exact form the Sphe­res ta­ke on va­ri­es from Tra­di­ti­on to Tra­di­ti­on, but the­ir na­tu­re re­ma­ins cle­ar to all who see them. Each com­ba­tant sum­mons her Sphe­res in­to be­ing, then cho­oses which ones to use in the up­co­ming con­test.

    Many Chan­t­ri­es ha­ve a cer­ta­men cir­c­le in­s­c­ri­bed in a spe­ci­al ro­om that is kept pro­tec­ted. The act of in­s­c­ri­bing the cir­c­le re­qu­ires Adepts of each of the Sphe­res, and is a costly ac­ti­vity as well. A Chantry will of­ten ha­ve only one, al­t­ho­ugh it is ru­mo­red that Do­is­se­tep has many, in­c­lu­ding one that is sa­id to be in­s­c­ri­bed by Ver­di him­self. If you are using the Chantry Cre­ati­on Ru­les from The Bo­ok of Chan­t­ri­es, a cer­ta­men cir­c­le costs 3 cre­ati­on po­ints. Cer­ta­men is highly vul­gar and can­not be uti­li­zed on Earth wit­ho­ut se­ri­o­us re­per­cus­si­ons.

    The Cer­ta­men Mar­s­hal enacts the set­ting ri­tu­al, then wat­c­hes the con­f­lict and ma­kes su­re that sa­fety and ho­nor are ma­in­ta­ined. The two com­ba­tants stand wit­hin it in a pres­c­ri­bed pla­ce and must stay put un­til they are gi­ven le­ave to mo­ve. When the ri­tu­al is com­p­le­te, a bub­ble of Pat­ter­ned Qu­in­tes­sen­ce sur­ro­unds the two ma­ges, enab­ling them to fight wit­ho­ut fe­ar of da­ma­ging the out­si­de world. This bub­ble al­so pre­vents out­si­de ef­fects from in­ter­fe­ring with the con­test. Even if the Mar­s­hall is sla­in, the cer­ta­men will con­ti­nue un­til the­re is a win­ner.

    Dunng the Sum­mo­ning, when the two ma­ges each draw forth the­ir Sphe­res, the ma­ges draw forth one Sphe­re per po­int of Are­te that they pos­sess. Any Sphe­res not sum­mo­ned can­not be used. A ma­ge's rank in a cer­ta­in Sphe­re is not im­por­tant- if she has any know­led­ge of an ele­ment, she may sum­mon the ap­prop­ri­ate Sphe­re. Com­ba­tants must draw the Pri­me Sphe­re first; this Sphe­re enab­les them to uti­li­zes the ot­hers. They may not sum­mon the sa­me Sphe­re twi­ce (i.e., two Li­fe Sphe­res, or two For­ces Sphe­res). The Sphe­res form glo­wing balls of light as they ri­se up from the­ir ap­prop­ri­ate symbols from the cer­ta­men cir­c­le. Sum­mo­ned Sphe­res may not be used for ma­gic­kal ef­fects: the form they ta­ke is an Ef­fect in it­self.

    The next pha­se of cer­ta­men is cal­led the Ar­ming - when the com­ba­tants form the Gla­di­us (or we­apon) and the Aegis (or shi­eld) for the up­co­ming com­bat. They do this by men­tal­ly vi­su­ali­zing the Sphe­re mor­p­hing in­to a dag­ger and a shi­eld, res­pec­ti­vely. They must cho­ose which Sphe­res to use for the­ir Gla­di­us or Aegis. It is cus­to­mary for the chal­len­ger to call out his Gla­di­us Sphe­re upon chal­len­ging, and it is cus­to­mary for the chal­len­ged to call out his Aegis Sphe­re at the sa­me ti­me. It's bad form to chan­ge yo­ur Gla­di­us or Aegis, but it's be­en known to hap­pen.

    During this pha­se, they al­so ta­ke all of the ot­her Sphe­res they Sum­mo­ned in the first pha­se (inclu­ding the Pri­me Sphe­re) and le­ave them han­ging in re­ser­ve be­hind them, to bob and we­ave un­til sum­mo­ned with a men­tal com­mand or uti­li­zed in the fight (in which ca­se they glow brightly for a mo­ment). Of co­ur­se, the ma­xi­mum num­ber of cur­rent ac­ti­ve Sphe­res (inclu­ding the Sphe­res for the Gla­di­us and the Aegis) can ne­ver be mo­re than the ma­ge's Are­te ra­ting.

    Before pro­ce­eding, each ma­ge form a Lo­cus, or Cen­ter. The Lo­cus is ma­de up of a po­ol of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, and rep­re­sents the true tar­get of any at­tack in cer­ta­men. Com­ba­tants ne­ed not use the­ir full po­ol of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce on the Lo­cus, but it's con­si­de­red po­li­te to do so. Many con­si­der hol­ding on­to Qu­in­tes­sen­ce to use in bat­tle as che­ating. When all pre­pa­ra­ti­ons ha­ve be­en ma­de, cer­ta­men can be­gin.

    The obj­ect of cer­ta­men is to rob yo­ur op­po­nent of all her Qu­in­tes­sen­ce. The Gla­di­us is used as a to­ol to mo­ve past or pi­er­ce an op­po­nent's Aegis, which forms a chan­nel bet­we­en the At­tac­ker's Lo­cus and the De­fen­der's Lo­cus. Thro­ugh this chan­nel, the at­tac­ker stri­ves to sip­hon the de­fen­der's Pri­me For­ce away.

    Viewing a cer­ta­men from the si­de­li­nes is qu­ite ex­ci­ting. The Gla­di­us forms a jag­ged dag­ger-li­ke sha­pe, whi­le the Aegis ge­ne­ral­ly forms a ro­und shi­eld-li­ke ef­fect. Both the­se to­ols fly aro­und, pro­pel­led by the craft and skill of the­ir ma­kers. Mo­re ela­bo­ra­te du­els are per­for­med in cir­c­les that can cast il­lu­si­ons il­lus­t­ra­ting a me­tap­hor for any con­f­lict in prog­ress.

    One "ro­und" of cer­ta­men lasts for a very short pe­ri­od of ti­me, obj­ec­ti­vely. Each ro­und is usu­al­ly over in less than a mi­nu­te. Many cer­ta­men du­els are over be­fo­re you can even see the mo­ve­ment of the Sphe­res, and ac­tu­al­ly ta­ke lon­ger to set up than they do to con­duct.

    Certamen Ru­les

    Or art thou a dag­ger of the mind, a fal­se cre­ati­on, pro­ce­eding from the he­at-op­pres­sed bra­in?

    - Sha­kes­pe­are, Mac­beth

    Both ma­ges roll ini­ti­ati­ve each ro­und. On a tie, the per­son with the hig­hest Wits go­es first. Ot­her­wi­se, the win­ner may eit­her at­tack or wa­it her op­po­nent out, sa­ving her ac­ti­on un­til the ot­her mo­ves. Cer­ta­men com­bats are then pla­yed out li­ke nor­mal fights. An at­tack is a toll of Wits + Sphe­re, At­tac­kers roll the ra­ting of the Gla­di­us Sphe­re aga­inst the de­fen­der's Aegis Sphe­re + 3, rat­her than the usu­al Dex­te­rity + Brawl or Me­lee roll aga­inst a dif­fi­culty of 6.

    If the at­tac­ker fa­ils, her at­tack has be­en bloc­ked by the Aegis. A suc­ces­sful at­tack hits the Lo­cus, dra­ining one Qu­in­tes­sen­ce per suc­cess. Lo­ci can so­ak dra­in da­ma­ge: roll the de­fen­der's Pri­me sco­re aga­inst dif­fi­culty 6, A de­fen­der may use part of his Di­ce Po­ol for that turn to block an in­co­ming at­tack en­ti­rely by rol­ling Wits + Aegis aga­inst the at­tac­ker's Gla­di­us + 3. If he suc­ce­eds, the Gla­di­us gets now­he­re ne­ar the Lo­cus. He can al­so try a Lo­cus Dod­ge, rol­ling his Wits + Are­te aga­inst dif­fi­culty 6, but can­not at­tack on that ro­und if he do­es. Each suc­cess ta­kes away one of the at­tac­ker's suc­ces­ses.

    Victory Con­di­ti­ons

    When one ma­ge's Lo­cus is dra­ined, the bat­tle is usu­al­ly over, un­less both ag­ree to "re­fu­el" and try aga­in. The win­ner then dis­sol­ves her Lo­cus and the Qu­in­tes­sen­ce is sto­red in her Pat­tern.

    A draw oc­curs if both ma­ges dra­in each ot­her's lo­cus si­mul­ta­ne­o­usly. Draws are ra­re, but they ha­ve oc­cur­red, es­pe­ci­al­ly with par­ti­cu­larly ad­ro­it war­ri­ors.

    Optionally, a com­ba­tant may yi­eld to his op­po­nent. He do­es this by in­ten­ti­onal­ly dis­sol­ving his Lo­cus (but this may be a pre­lu­de to a ter­rib­le at­tack, as well…). The shi­eld which pro­tects the con­test will only drop when both par­ti­es' Lo­ci are dis­sol­ved. At that ti­me, the Gla­di­us and Aegis of both par­ti­ci­pants va­nish.

    Stakes vary with the ma­ges con­cer­ned. Of­ten, a sim­p­le apo­logy or ret­rac­ti­on from the lo­ser will suf­fi­ce. Ot­her ti­mes, the win­ner may cla­im so­me pay­ment or ser­vi­ce from the lo­ser. In ex­t­re­me ca­ses, lo­sers of cer­ta­men may be exi­led from the­ir Chantry or ca­bal. The win­ner usu­al­ly ke­eps wha­te­ver Qu­in­tes­sen­ce she wins in the con­test. Re­fu­sing to ho­nor the out­co­me of a cer­ta­men du­el is a se­ri­o­us bre­ach of eti­qu­et­te, but it hap­pens mo­re of­ten than the Tra­di­ti­ons wo­uld li­ke to ad­mit.

    Permutations

    You call that hard? I used to bull's-eye womp rat in my T-16 back ho­me. They aren't much big­ger than two me­ters .

    - Lu­ke Skywal­ker, Star Wars: A New Ho­pe

    Different Sphe­res and ma­ne­uvers can ha­ve va­ri­o­us ef­fects in cer­ta­men. The sug­ges­ti­ons be­low sho­uld gu­ide the­se ef­fects. As al­ways, ke­ep the com­bat ten­se and dra­ma­tic thro­ugh cha­rac­ter in­ter­p­lay. Don't let ru­les per­mu­ta­ti­on slow you down. Ul­ti­ma­tely, cer­ta­men is a bat­tle of skills, wits, ma­gick and ho­nor, not of ru­les-hac­king and chart-con­sul­ting.

    Certamen and Es­sen­ce

    A ma­ge's Es­sen­ce can af­fect his or her stra­tegy. Kno­wing the na­tu­re of one's op­po­nent is use­ful. Dyna­mic ma­ges are known for the­ir in­con­s­tancy and se­emingly ran­dom cho­ices of stra­te­gi­es.

    Pattern ma­ges are the op­po­si­te: they ha­ve set stra­te­gi­es that they of­ten use, and they are very met­ho­di­cal cer­ta­men op­po­nents. They ace, ho­we­ver, ex­cel­lent at anal­y­zing we­ak­nes­ses and ex­p­lo­iting them.

    Primordial ma­ges are very ba­se in the­ir stra­te­gi­es and at­tacks. They se­em to ha­ve a dri­ving energy which un­der­s­co­res the­ir con­s­ci­o­us­ness.

    Questing ma­ges fo­cus on one go­al and mo­ve to­wards it uner­ringly. Of co­ur­se, this me­ans they are not in­c­re­dibly adap­tab­le, and can be so­mew­hat pre­dic­tab­le.

    Maneuvers

    Botching: A bot­c­hed roll me­ans the ma­ge has lost con­t­rol of the Sphe­re; he "fum­b­les" it and it di­sap­pe­ars. See "Re-ar­ming."

    Disarming: A ma­ge can try to di­sarm his op­po­nent by at­tac­king eit­her her we­apon or shi­eld with his own. This des­pe­ra­te ma­ne­uver is at a dif­fi­culty of 9, but suc­cess will dis­rupt the op­po­nent's Sphe­re for one turn per suc­cess. Fo­ur or mo­re suc­ces­ses des­t­roys the cho­sen Sphe­re for the du­ra­ti­on.

    Re-arming: A com­ba­tant may find him­self wit­ho­ut a Gla­di­us, an Aegis, or both. He must then eit­her form a new we­apon or shi­eld by dra­wing on one of the Sphe­res he has held in re­ser­ve or, if he has no ap­prop­ri­ate Sphe­res in re­ser­ve, by sum­mo­ning a Sphe­re anew. For­ming a new we­apon or shi­eld from a re­ser­ve Sphe­re ta­kes only one ro­und, whi­le sum­mo­ning a new Sphe­re and for­ming a we­apon or shi­eld from it re­qu­ires two ro­unds. Du­ring this ti­me, de­vas­ta­ting da­ma­ge may be do­ne to the com­ba­tant's Lo­cus.

    Changing We­apons or Shi­elds: It ta­kes one ro­und to form a Gla­di­us or Aegis out of one ava­ilab­le Sphe­re and dis­card the pre­vi­o­us Gla­di­us or Aegis (the Sphe­re do­es not va­nish when it is dis­car­ded; it be­co­mes a Sphe­re in re­ser­ve). Ne­it­her for­ming a new Gla­di­us or Aegis nor sum­mo­ning a new Sphe­re re­qu­ires a roll. Both are auto­ma­ti­cal­ly bu­ilt in­to the cer­ta­men cir­c­le.

    Refueling: It is pos­sib­le for a ma­ge to carry Tass in­to a du­el in or­der to re­fu­el the Lo­cus. If this is not ag­re­ed upon ahe­ad of ti­me, it can be a form of che­ating. Still, the tra­di­ti­on of car­rying Tass in­to cer­ta­men ori­gi­na­ted with the Or­der of Her­mes and it still go­es on to­day. Re­fu­eling ta­kes one ro­und. It is ne­ces­sary to ha­ve the Pri­me Sphe­re ac­ti­ve and in re­ser­ve. The Sphe­re must be at le­ast 2 and a nor­mal Pri­me ef­fect must be cast. The dif­fi­culty for the ef­fect is 6. The num­ber of suc­ces­ses equ­als the Qu­in­tes­sen­ce po­ints that go to re­fu­el the Lo­cus. Tec­h­ni­cal­ly, it is pos­sib­le to Re­fu­el from a No­de du­ring cer­ta­men, but this is truly bad form.

    Sphere Spe­ci­al Ef­fects

    Different Sphe­res do dif­fe­rent things. The op­ti­onal ef­fects be­low ref­lect the pro and cons of the ma­gic­kal Sphe­res. A com­bat Sphe­re may be used as eit­her an Aegis or a Gla­di­us; re­ser­ve Sphe­res don't work as we­apons, but al­low the ma­ge ac­cess to so­me spe­ci­al ma­ne­uver on the ro­und(s) that they are tap­ped. Tap­ping a re­ser­ve Sphe­re ta­kes a half-ac­ti­on, split­ting the Di­ce Po­ol for that ro­und in half. No roll ne­ed be ma­de.

    Correspondence (Re­ser­ve): A glit­te­ring and di­so­ri­en­ting Sphe­re, Cor­res­pon­den­ce can be tap­ped for ex­t­ra di­ce, which can be used eit­her for At­tack or De­fen­se. They must be com­mit­ted at the be­gin­ning of the ro­und and can­not be chan­ged un­til the start of the next ro­und.

    Entropy (Com­bat): The scin­til­la­ting bla­de of an En­t­ropy Gla­di­us adds one suc­cess to dra­in rolls, but con­su­mes one po­int of any Qu­in­tes­sen­ce ga­ined whi­le tran­s­fer­ring the rest to the at­tac­ker's Lo­cus.

    Forces (Com­bat): For­ce of­ten ap­pe­ars as a crac­k­ling ball or shi­eld of fi­re or elec­t­ri­city. On a roll of "10", a For­ces Gla­di­us forks, gi­ving the at­tac­ker one ex­t­ra die per "10" to roll aga­inst the Lo­cus. For­ces shi­elds gi­ve no spe­ci­al be­ne­fits.

    Life (Com­bat): This ro­bust Sphe­re grants no spe­ci­al ef­fects in at­tack. De­fen­ding Li­fe Sphe­res, ho­we­ver, add + 1 to an at­tac­ker's dif­fi­culty.

    Matter (Com­bat): Mat­ter of­ten ta­kes on the form of a sto­ne shi­eld or a gi­ant ham­mer. When used as an Aegis, Mat­ter adds + 2 to the dif­fi­cul­ti­es of in­co­ming at­tacks. Mat­ter Gla­dii ga­in no bo­nus but are as in­ti­mi­da­ting as hell.

    Mind (Com­bat): Mind we­apons and shi­elds are ne­arly in­vi­sib­le. All at­tack or block rolls aga­inst them are at a +3 dif­fi­culty.

    Prime (Re­ser­ve): This bla­zing light Sphe­re al­lows a ma­ge to ex­pend Qu­in­tes­sen­ce to lo­wer his dif­fi­cul­ti­es for both at­tacks and de­fen­ses, and to re­fu­el the Lo­ci.

    Spirit (Com­bat): The smoky gray Spi­rit Gla­di­us adds one ad­di­ti­onal dra­in suc­cess for every "10" rol­led.

    Time (Re­ser­ve): Li­ke Cor­res­pon­den­ce Sphe­res, co­ales­ced Ti­me Sphe­res are dif­fi­cult to ga­ze upon. The air se­ems to warp in and aro­und it­self for se­ve­ral fe­et in eit­her di­rec­ti­on. For each po­int of Ti­me ex­per­ti­se af­ter the first, a ma­ge tap­ping this Sphe­re may ma­ke one ex­t­ra ac­ti­on - at­tack, de­fend, re-arm, re­fu­el or sum­mon- by spen­ding a po­int of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce per ex­t­ra ac­ti­on.

    Cheating

    There are many ways to che­at at cer­ta­men. So­me are con­si­de­red me­rely bad form and a few are con­si­de­red gro­unds for san­c­ti­on aga­inst the ma­ge em­p­lo­ying them.

    Forming a "bac­kup" Gla­di­us be­fo­re you re­le­ase the cur­rent Gla­di­us is bad form, and at­tac­king twi­ce using the Ti­me Sphe­re with both of them is a Fo­ul which might in­di­ca­te a pe­nalty. Ma­ges who stash Tass on them­sel­ves wit­ho­ut in­di­ca­ting so to the­ir op­po­nent can fa­ce a Fo­ul or even a For­fe­it if it is dis­co­ve­red, but this is a com­mon way of che­ating at cer­ta­men. Se­ri­o­us of­fen­ses in­c­lu­de al­te­ring or af­fec­ting the cer­ta­men cir­c­le it­self, brin­ging in Ta­lis­mans which aid in the ma­ni­pu­la­ti­on of cer­ta­men ener­gi­es, or cal­ling in out­si­de help from out­si­de the cer­ta­men cir­c­le. The­se of­fen­ses co­uld le­ad to cen­su­re.

    Differences and Res­pect

    By fig­h­ting each ot­her thro­ugh cer­ta­men, each ma­ge is tre­ated to a very per­so­nal ex­po­su­re as to how each ma­ge se­es the Sphe­res, for they form in ac­cor­dan­ce to the­ir own be­li­efs and know­led­ge. For exam­p­le, a Vir­tu­al Adept's Sphe­res might ap­pe­ar com­pu­te­ri­zed or di­gi­tal; a Hol­low Ones' Sphe­res may ap­pe­ar gray or dull; a Son of Et­her's Sphe­res may arc with energy or flux for one re­ason or anot­her.

    By be­ing for­ced to see how each ma­ge vi­ews the­ir own Sphe­res thro­ugh cer­ta­men, a Tra­di­ti­on ma­ge gets a pe­ek at anot­her's vi­ew­po­int of As­cen­si­on, In­s­te­ad of di­vi­ding the Tra­di­ti­ons fur­t­her, cer­ta­men is a con­f­lict re­so­lu­ti­on system which re­ve­als the ul­ti­ma­te unity of vi­si­on in the Tra­di­ti­ons. Even if they do not co­me away en­lig­h­te­ned, ho­we­ver, cer­ta­men exists be­ca­use it do­es not harm Sle­epers, it is a true test of skill and know­led­ge of the Sphe­res, and it is the best system the Tra­di­ti­ons ha­ve.

    Players are en­co­ura­ged to ma­ke the­ir cer­ta­men du­els con­tests of cre­ati­vity and stor­y­tel­ling. Rat­her than mec­ha­ni­cal­ly rol­ling di­ce and as­ses­sing da­ma­ge, the pla­yers may des­c­ri­be the con­test ho­we­ver they see fit. Il­lu­si­ons can easily spring up wit­hin well-pre­pa­red cer­ta­men cir­c­les. An Akas­hic Brot­her might as­su­me the form of a gi­ant ser­pent or a ra­ging ti­ger, a Eut­ha­na­tos might ma­ke the cir­c­le ap­pe­ar to fall away, re­ve­aling a yaw­ning cos­mic vo­id, and so on. It is qu­ite pos­sib­le to "lo­se" cer­ta­men and still put on a go­od show. Fe­el free to use the cir­c­le to tell a story.

    "Don't Call Me Mary Lou!"

    While vi­si­ting the Eut­ha­na­tos Ho­use of He­le­kar, Hol­low Ones "Bitch Qu­e­en" Van­noy and "Hutch" Hut­c­hen­son ha­ve a spat (Hutch cal­led Van­noy "Mary Lou" one too many ti­mes). Much as the Eut­ha­na­tos wo­uld li­ke to see the two Hol­lows te­ar each ot­her apart, co­ur­tesy pre­va­ils, and the two ma­ges are shown the way to the cer­ta­men cir­c­le. The win­ner gets the Qu­in­tes­sen­ce; the lo­ser do­es dis­hes for a month,

    Vannoy has an ed­ge over Hutch in the Are­te de­par­t­ment: she has 4 to Hutch's 3, On­ce in the cir­c­le, she sum­mons up all fo­ur of her Sphe­res: En­t­ropy, For­ces, Mat­ter and Pri­me. Hutch turns swir­ling balls of For­ces and Mat­ter in­to her Gla­di­us and Aegis, res­pec­ti­vely, whi­le her Pri­me Sphe­re ho­vers in re­ser­ve. Both ma­ges cre­ate Lo­ci out of the­ir me­ager Qu­in­tes­sen­ce sto­res and the fight be­gins.

    The Bitch Qu­e­en wins ini­ti­ati­ve and at­tacks with her For­ces sword. Her Wits 2 and For­ces 2 com­bi­ne in­to a to­tal po­ol of 4 di­ce. Hutch's Mat­ter 1 gi­ves Van­noy a to­tal dif­fi­culty of 4 to suc­ce­ed. Ne­it­her ma­ge has Qu­in­tes­sen­ce to spa­re, so the Bitch Qu­e­en blows a Wil­lpo­wer and wins a to­tal of 2 suc­ces­ses, "God­damn it!" howls Hutch as the Gla­di­us slips past her and hits the Lo­cus. Hutch's so­ak roll fa­ils, and two Qu­in­tes­sen­ce flow from Hutch to Mary Lo… uh, the Bitch Qu­e­en.

    Hutch co­un­te­rat­tacks with a bla­zing ball of For­ces (Wits 3 + For­ces 3 = 6 di­ce); she rolls three suc­ces­ses aga­inst Van­noy's Mat­ter shi­eld (dif­fi­culty 6). Two of tho­se di­ce co­me up 10s. "Hi­ding be­hind a rock won't help you, bitch! "she growls as her Gla­di­us forks in­to twin ton­gu­es of lig­h­t­ning. The two ex­t­ra di­ce she ga­ins turn up one mo­re suc­cess, for a to­tal of fo­ur. Van­noy cur­ses and rri­es to so­ak. She has only one die to roll, and blows it. Fo­ur Qu­in­tes­sen­ce chan­ge Hutch's Lo­cus in­to a bla­zing ball of blu­ish fi­re.

    Next ro­und, Hutch elects to Lo­cus Dod­ge Van­noy's ex­pec­ted at­tack. Van­noy ob­li­ges by shif­ting her Gla­di­us from For­ces to En­t­ropy. "You che­at!" Hutch spits, but Van­noy only la­ughs; "All's fa­ir in lo­ve and war, fas­hi­on vic­tim!" When Hutch wins the next ini­ti­ati­ve ro­und, she plun­ges her Gla­di­us stra­ight at Van­noy's own. Spen­ding a Wil­lpo­wer, she rolls aga­inst dif­fi­culty 9… Two suc­ces­ses! Van­noy's En­t­ropy dag­ger scat­ters as she scre­ams with ra­ge.

    The in­co­ming bolt of For­ces stri­kes Hutch's Lo­cus de­ad cen­ter. Van­noy's 4 di­ce are aug­men­ted with 2 Wil­lpo­wer, She rolls well-an ad­di­ti­onal three suc­ces­ses- and Hutch so­aks only one. The air turns blue with Qu­in­tes­sen­ce and pro­fa­nity. Hutch stri­kes back, but the Bitch Qu­e­en co­un­ters. Ro­und three ends.

    Both ma­ges sco­re de­vas­ta­ting hits on the next ro­und. Van­noy dra­ins Hutch's last two Qu­in­tes­sen­ce as Hutch's Gla­di­us, aided by a Wil­lpo­wer po­int, spe­ars the Bitch Qu­e­en's Lo­cus. The scat­te­red Qu­in­tes­sen­ce set­tles in­to the Cir­c­le and the Mar­s­hall smi­les; "Draw!"

    "That was che­ap!" Hutch snarls.

    "You're che­ap, fas­hi­on vic­tim," the Bitch Qu­e­en re­torts.

    "I gu­ess," says Chan­t­r­y­ma­te Al­vin Loc­ke, "you're both do­ing dis­hes this month."

    They pum­mel him wit­ho­ut mercy.

    Variations

    I he­ar The­ir la­ug­h­ter

    I'm not alo­ne but I fe­ar

    That la­ug­h­ter is my own

    - Li­ers In Wa­it, "Tor­tu­re Cham­ber"

    The Du­els Ar­ca­ne

    Not every Tra­di­ti­on ma­ge uses the for­mal cer­ta­men to sol­ve the­ir dis­pu­tes. Each Tra­di­ti­on has its own "ho­use" met­hod of sol­ving prob­lems, and the­re are still the old ways to con­si­der. Ge­ne­ral­ly, in or­der to pro­vi­de so­me struc­tu­re and to try and not en­dan­ger many mor­tals in the­ir mac­hi­na­ti­ons, two ma­ges of­ten ag­ree upon a cer­ta­in set of go­als which they are both stri­ving to at­ta­in.

    Two Eut­ha­na­tos may de­ci­de to du­el to see which one can kill the ot­her first. Cul­tists of Ec­s­tasy ha­ve be­en known to ha­ve sen­sory over­lo­ad du­els with mu­sic, drugs, sex and ci­ne­ma (the in­fa­mo­us Mo­vie Crawls of Man­hat­tan); the first Cul­tist to drop lo­ses. The Ver­be­na re­turn to the sha­pes­hif­ting du­els of old. The Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od has a ro­te which al­lows two Brot­hers to chal­len­ge one anot­her simply by ga­zing in­to each ot­her's eyes. The first ma­ge to blink lo­ses. The Vir­tu­al Adepts ha­ve con­s­t­ruc­ted war­ga­mes in the Di­gi­tal Web to sol­ve the­ir dis­pu­tes, al­t­ho­ugh "fla­me wars" are al­so com­mon.

    Some of the ene­mi­es of the Tra­di­ti­ons al­so know and can use cer­ta­men, par­ti­cu­larly the ba­rab­bi ma­ges of the Nep­han­di, who of­ten li­ke to cer­ta­men for the so­ul of a ma­ge. Even so­me Tec­h­no­man­cers know the use of a cer­ta­men cir­c­le, if only for the pur­po­ses of "blen­ding in" with ot­her ma­ges.

    Marauders dis­da­in any such for­mal system, and of­ten ha­ve very dan­ge­ro­us, Pa­ra­dox-rid­den con­tests. (See Lo­om of Fa­te for so­me of the­ir fa­vo­ri­te kinds of chal­len­ges.)

    The Ul­ti­ma­te Du­el: Re­ality Sha­ping

    As the Tra­di­ti­ons grow in po­wer and the Tec­h­noc­racy clen­c­hes its fist over re­ality, it is ul­ti­ma­tely the gre­atest test of any Tra­di­ti­on ma­ge to sha­pe mun­da­ne re­ality ac­cor­ding to its vi­ew of As­cen­si­on. For this re­ason, one of the mo­re po­pu­lar of the "new" du­eling prac­ti­ces is to ta­ke a spe­ci­fic fa­cet of re­ality and sha­pe it in­to so­met­hing new, pre­fe­rably so­met­hing mo­re to­wards As­cen­si­on.

    For exam­p­le, the city block at San­ford Stre­et and Ha­ir­s­ton Ro­ad is a run-down area of the city, full of cri­me, drugs, and po­verty. A Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus ma­ge is con­f­ron­ted by a Man in Black, who de­mands that he le­ave the area. The Cho­rus ma­ge chal­len­ges the Man in Black to a Re­ality Sha­ping du­el, and na­mes as his go­al 100% at­ten­dan­ce in the lo­cal ele­men­tary scho­ol. Thus, thro­ugh hard work, co­in­ci­den­tal ma­gick, lots of so­ci­al ma­ni­pu­la­ti­on and so­me judi­ci­o­us bri­bes to tru­ant of­fi­cers, the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus ma­ge tri­es to col­lect hun­d­reds of chil­d­ren and get them back in­to scho­ol wit­ho­ut much tro­ub­le and win the Sha­ping. Of co­ur­se, the Tec­h­noc­racy might bring in big guns, slap co­urt or­ders on the Cho­rus ma­ge, des­t­roy his Chantry and su­born the scho­ol. The Tec­h­noc­racy is un­der no ob­li­ga­ti­on to "play fa­ir."

    Although it is de­adly se­ri­o­us, ul­ti­ma­tely the bat­tle that the Tra­di­ti­ons ha­ve with the Ma­ra­uders and the Tec­h­noc­racy is not a mor­tal one, but a war of ide­als and et­hics- a war for and abo­ut Re­ality.

    The new li­te­racy is com­pu­ter li­te­racy. Tho­se who can use even the low­li­est com­pu­ters ha­ve ac­cess to in­for­ma­ti­on mac­hi­nes of vast po­ten­ti­al. The Vir­tu­al Adepts are the mas­ters of this new lan­gu­age, but any ma­ge can use a com­pu­ter. The fol­lo­wing ru­les are for nor­mal com­pu­ters; ma­gic­kal decks are co­ve­red in Di­gi­tal Web, whi­le so­me exam­p­les of the Adepts' Tri­nary com­pu­ters can be fo­und in Bo­ok Fo­ur.

    A com­pu­ter is a to­ol for ac­ces­sing in­for­ma­ti­on, anal­y­zing the in­for­ma­ti­on and ac­ting upon that anal­y­sis- all at the sa­me ti­me. Com­pu­ters in the re­al world are very com­p­lex. For the sa­ke of sim­p­li­city, we des­c­ri­be fo­ur types of nor­mal com­pu­rers and of­fer so­me ru­les for using them in a stor­y­tel­ling ga­me:

    Laptop: The smal­lest of the com­pu­ters, lap­tops are de­sig­ned pri­ma­rily for por­ta­bi­lity. Al­t­ho­ugh small, the­se com­pu­ters will still run most sof­t­wa­re. Cost: $2000.

    Personal Com­pu­ter: A des­k­top com­pu­ter li­ke the type fo­und in most of­fi­ces to­day. The­se com­pu­ters are qu­ite po­wer­ful and may run a wi­de va­ri­ety of sup­ple­men­tary sof­t­wa­re to ac­com­p­lish many dif­fe­rent tasks. Cost: $1000.

    Minicomputer: Typi­cal­ly used by a smal­ler of­fi­ce or or­ga­ni­za­ti­on, mi­ni­com­pu­ters ha­ve mul­ti-user ca­pa­city (mo­re than one per­son can use the com­pu­ter at on­ce). Cost: $10,000.

    Mainframe Com­pu­ter: Used by banks, go­ver­n­ments and lar­ge in­s­ti­tu­ti­ons; ma­in­f­ra­mes are li­ke mi­nis, only much lar­ger and mo­re po­wer­ful. Cost: $100,000+.

    Computers Equ­al In­for­ma­tion

    Computers nor­mal­ly be­co­me in­vol­ved in a ga­me be­ca­use in­for­ma­ti­on is on so­me­one el­se's com­pu­ter and the cha­rac­ters want it, al­t­ho­ugh com­pu­ters do ha­ve ot­her uses (wri­ting and ad­dres­sing form let­ters, for exam­p­le). The cha­rac­ters may be ke­eping in­for­ma­ti­on of the­ir own on a com­pu­ter (this sho­uld gi­ve a he­althy bo­nus to a re­col­lec­ti­on roll).

    Computer Se­cu­rity

    Computer se­cu­rity co­mes in two forms: physi­cal se­cu­rity and "sof­t­wa­re" se­cu­rity. Physi­cal se­cu­rity is the de­ni­al of physi­cal ac­cess to the com­pu­ter- no ac­cess, no da­ta, no da­ta theft. A physi­cal­ly se­cu­re com­pu­ter is one that is not con­nec­ted to the pho­ne li­nes. Tur­ning a com­pu­ter off is a go­od way to bol­s­ter physi­cal se­cu­rity.

    Software se­cu­rity is any prog­ram that ke­eps una­ut­ho­ri­zed pe­op­le from lo­oking at cer­ta­in in­for­ma­ti­on sto­red on a com­pu­ter. Un­less the per­son using a com­pu­ter has pur­po­se­ful­ly hid­den or en­c­r­y­p­ted in­for­ma­ti­on, an­yo­ne with any Com­pu­ter Know­led­ge will be ab­le to ret­ri­eve all in­for­ma­ti­on on that com­pu­ter- gi­ven eno­ugh ti­me.

    In the re­al world, so­me­one hi­ding in­for­ma­ti­on on a com­pu­ter eit­her do­es it right ot do­esn't. If in­for­ma­ti­on ts hid­den cor­rectly (and that me­ans using se­cu­rity sof­t­wa­re), then get­ting the in­for­ma­ti­on wit­ho­ut the cor­rect pas­sword is very dif­fi­cult. This ma­kes pas­swords a va­lu­ab­le com­mo­dity.

    In or­der to use (or abu­se) a com­pu­ter system, a cha­rac­ter must ha­ve both physi­cal ac­cess to the com­pu­ter {in per­son or by te­lep­ho­ne), and sof­t­wa­re ac­cess to the in­for­ma­ti­on de­si­red- whet­her thro­ugh the cor­rect pas­sword or a Com­pu­ter roll to bre­ak thro­ugh ("crack") the se­cu­rity system.

    Before in­t­ro­du­cing a com­pu­ter in­to the chro­nic­le, a Stor­y­tel­ler sho­uld de­ci­de the fol­lo­wing things:

    • What in­for­ma­ti­on on the com­pu­ter is re­le­vant to the chro­nic­le?

    • What ot­her in­for­ma­ti­on is on the com­pu­ter (for des­c­rip­ti­ve pur­po­ses)?

    • How well (or po­orly) or­ga­ni­zed is the in­for­ma­ti­on?

    • Was any at­tempt ma­de to hi­de in­for­ma­ti­on? If so, how much ti­me/dif­fi­culty will this add?

    • Ta­king all of the abo­ve in­to ac­co­unt, how many suc­ces­ses must the cha­rac­ters sco­re to ret­ri­eve the in­for­ma­ti­on?

    In or­der to wri­te a se­cu­rity prog­ram, ma­ke three rolls (Intel­li­gen­ce + Com­pu­ter, dif­fi­culty 7). The to­tal num­ber of suc­ces­ses ac­cu­mu­la­ted from the rolls is the dif­fi­culty of the se­cu­rity prog­ram. Se­cu­rity sof­t­wa­re can push the dif­fi­culty ra­ting over 10. The only way to crack such a system is to use "crac­king sof­t­wa­re" (cre­ated the sa­me way) to re­du­ce the dif­fi­culty to 10 or lo­wer.

    Poor Or­ga­ni­za­ti­on will ne­ver push the dif­fi­culty ra­ting over ni­ne. It is ti­me-con­su­ming, but not mo­re dif­fi­cult, to find in­for­ma­ti­on on a po­orly or­ga­ni­zed com­pu­ter. Al­so no­te that "po­or or­ga­ni­za­ti­on" may be a per­fectly lo­gi­cal fi­ling system the cha­rac­ters do not un­der­s­tand!

    Example: A lap­top (1) with mo­de­ra­te se­cu­rity sof­t­wa­re (3) will re­qu­ire fo­ur ho­urs for each roll to crack its system; the dif­fi­culty of such a fe­at is 3. The num­ber of suc­ces­ses must be set by the Stor­y­tel­ler.

    Hacking Chart

    System -· Ho­urs -· Dif­fu­culty

    Laptop -· 1 -· 5

    PC -· 2 -· 6

    Mini -· 3 -· 7

    Main -· 4 -· 8

    Security -· +1 to +6 -· +1 to +6

    Poorly Or­ga­ni­zed -· +1 to +6 -· +1 to +3 (up to 9)

    Cracking Sof­t­wa­re -· -1 to -8 -· -1 to -8

    Computer uses

    Dedicated Com­pu­ters: A de­di­ca­ted com­pu­ter system is a com­pu­ter de­sig­ned to do only one task. A bank ATM mac­hi­ne is a go­od exam­p­le, as are the fi­re-con­t­rol systems on mo­dern na­val ves­sels. The­se com­pu­ters are nor­mal­ly PC or mi­ni-si­zed systems, but bre­aking in­to one is usu­al­ly very hard. Add 2 to the dif­fi­culty to bre­ak in­to one. Mat­ter or For­ces ma­gick can dis­rupt such com­pu­ters, but af­fec­ting one wit­ho­ut wrec­king it re­qu­ires a roll of In­tel­li­gen­ce plus Tec­h­no­logy, Com­pu­ter or Com­pu­tet Hac­king. De­di­ca­ted com­pu­ters sto­re a re­cord of ever­y­t­hing that the com­pu­ter do­es. For exam­p­le, an ATM sto­res a re­cord of all its tran­sac­ti­ons, and it al­so sto­res a re­cord of its com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons with the bank's ot­her com­pu­ters. Na­val fi­re-con­t­rol systems ke­ep a re­cord of every tat­get that they track.

    Example: Bank auto­ma­tic tel­ler mac­hi­ne (ATM)- PC system with ad­ded se­cu­rity and se­cu­rity sof­t­wa­re (dif­fi­culty 10, ti­me 6).

    Typical Of­fi­ce Com­pu­ters: Word pro­ces­sors and spre­ad­s­he­ets ac­co­unt for mo­re than 50 per­cent of all com­pu­ter use. Da­ta­ba­ses ac­co­unt for anot­her 25 per­cent. Typi­cal Ho­me Com­pu­ters: Ga­mes ac­co­unt for abo­ut 80 per­cent of ho­me com­pu­ter sof­t­wa­re and word pro­ces­sing ac­co­unts for 15 per­cent.

    Programming: This clas­sic com­pu­ter ope­ra­ti­on re­qu­ires a num­ber of suc­ces­ses de­ter­mi­ned by the Stor­y­tel­ler (ge­ne­ral­ly 10-25) rol­led aga­inst a dif­fi­culty set by the Stor­y­tel­ler (ge­ne­ral­ly 7). Each roll nor­mal­ly re­qu­ires two ho­urs, al­t­ho­ugh Ti­me or Mind ma­gick can spe­ed things up (at the Stor­y­tel­ler's dis­c­re­ti­on).

    Magick is not su­per­na­tu­ral. If our en­ti­re uni­ver­se ca­me abo­ut eit­her as the cre­ati­on of an in­tel­li­gent be­ing or be­ings, or me­rely as the re­sult of chan­ce events, we still must co­me to the sa­me con­c­lu­si­on; ever­y­t­hing in the uni­ver­se is na­tu­ral!

    - Do­nald Mic­ha­el Kra­ig, Mo­dern Ma­gick

    This Bo­ok pre­sents new ro­tes and Ta­lis­mans for Ma­ge ad­ven­tu­rers. it sho­uld be stres­sed that ma­gick is not bo­und to the­se Ef­fects, nor are cer­ta­in ro­tes the only pos­sib­le way of ac­com­p­lis­hing re­sults. The­se are sug­ges­ti­ons and gu­ide­li­nes only, not ab­so­lu­te lists of "spells" or "ma­gic items." Whi­le the ri­tu­als of vam­pi­re Tha­uma­turgy ha­ve so­me sta­tic form, True Ma­gick is far mo­re flu­id. As al­ways, gu­ide the ma­gick by story in­tent, not nit-pic­king. Re­ality is su­bj­ec­ti­ve, ma­gick mo­re­so. Re­ality sha­ping is an art, not a sci­en­ce.

    The po­wer of ma­gic sho­uld not be un­de­res­ti­ma­ted. It works, of­ten in ways that are unex­pec­ted and dif­fi­cult to con­t­rol. But ne­it­her sho­uld the po­wer of ma­gic be ove­res­ti­ma­ted. It do­es not work simply, or ef­for­t­les­sly; it do­es not con­fer om­ni­po­ten­ce.

    - Star­hawk, The Spi­ral Dan­ce

    Mage ma­gick is not sta­tic. Lists and bo­oks of "spells" are not the ru­le in the World of Dar­k­ness, at le­ast not among True Ma­gi. All the sa­me, so­me sta­tic Ef­fects- ro­tes- exist as tri­ed-and-true ways to get things do­ne. When a ma­ge pulls off a par­ti­cu­larly use­ful or spec­ta­cu­lar Ef­fect, ot­her ma­ges ine­vi­tably ask, "How did you do that?" Hen­ce, ro­tes be­co­me a sort of com­mo­dity. You show me yo­urs, and I'll show you mi­ne.

    While so­me ro­tes "be­long" to a cer­ta­in Tra­di­ti­on, they get pas­sed from hand to hand bet­we­en al­li­es, and are so­me­ti­mes even sto­len. Many of the ro­tes be­low ha­ve chan­ged over the ye­ars as ot­hers ha­ve im­p­ro­ved on the­ir ori­gi­nal forms. For sim­p­li­city, sig­na­tu­re ro­tes ha­ve be­en gro­uped by the­ir spe­ci­fic Tra­di­ti­ons (the Hol­low Ones and Ahl-i-Ba­tin are al­so rep­re­sen­ted he­re); com­mon "free" ro­tes fol­low in the Ge­ne­ral ca­te­gory. Spe­ci­fic ro­tes for Do ro­und out the ro­tes sec­ti­on. The­se ro­tes are ex­ten­si­ons of Do ma­ne­uvers and may not be used alo­ne or by tho­se un­ver­sed in the art.

    Tradition Ro­tes

    The va­lue of a tra­di­ti­on, of any sort, is that it gi­ves us so­me fra­me­work wit­hin which to in­ter­p­ret events that hap­pen du­rin­g­t­he sta­ges of psychic tran­s­for­ma­ti­on. Wit­ho­ut the tra­di­ti­on… we may lo­se sight of the way and lin­ger far lon­ger than we ne­ed in any one sta­ge or sta­te of con­s­ci­o­us­ness. In ti­mes of ex­t­re­me dif­fi­culty, it is pos­sib­le to use the tra­di­ti­on … as a li­fe­li­ne.

    - R.J. Ste­wart, The Way of Mer­lin

    Akashic Brot­her­ho­od

    Peace of Bud­dha (•• Mind): It is sa­id that Ah Mu co­uld calm an­yo­ne or an­y­t­hing with a sim­p­le hand ges­tu­re and the words "Bud­dha bless you." The mem­bers of the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od who uti­li­ze this ro­te up­hold that tra­di­ti­on. By ges­tu­ring with a pe­ace­ful hand pos­tu­re and ut­te­ring "Bud­dha Bless you," the Brot­her pro­j­ects pe­ace and tran­qu­il­lity upon his tar­get. All but the most blo­od­t­hirsty in­di­vi­du­als will im­me­di­ately be­co­me calm and ce­ase to per­form fur­t­her hos­ti­le ac­ti­ons.

    The ma­ge for­ces a fe­eling of pe­ace in­to the op­po­nent's psyche. If the num­ber of suc­ces­ses equ­als or ex­ce­eds the op­po­nent's Wil­lpo­wer, the cas­ter will dra­in the su­bj­ect's will to do harm for the ro­te's du­ra­ti­on. The in­di­vi­du­al is un­li­kely to do things that he wo­uldn't nor­mal­ly do. This ro­te fun­c­ti­ons as co­in­ci­den­tal ma­gic as it re­sem­b­les a bles­sing, not an at­tack.

    Avatar Form (••• Li­fe, •• Pri­me, •• Mind): Vi­ban­su­mitra co­uld lo­ok back in ti­me thro­ugh his Ava­tar, even be­fo­re his Awa­ke­ning. One of his gre­atest fe­ats was his abi­lity to pro­j­ect the true form of his Ava­tar in­to this physi­cal Re­alm. His skin wo­uld turn a bright sky blue and be­co­me im­mu­ne to the ef­fects of na­tu­ral tem­pe­ra­tu­te chan­ges. In­s­te­ad of two arms, Vi­ban­su­mit­ra now had six. Each hand was con­s­tantly busy fid­dling with so­met­hing of im­por­tan­ce to him; yet one al­ways re­ma­ined clas­ped in a po­si­ti­on of res­pect for his Ava­tar,

    All who saw Vi­ban­su­mit­ra ga­zed in awe at his he­avenly form.

    This ro­te har­dens the skin so that it can ta­ke ex­po­su­re to in­ten­se tem­pe­ra­tu­re ex­t­re­mes, from, chil­ling ar­c­tic wind to the he­at of a la­va flow. It might, op­ti­onal­ly, har­den the skin li­ke ar­mor, ad­ding one le­vel of Ar­mor per suc­cess. This lat­ter Ef­fect slows the ma­ge down, ap­plying the nor­mal pe­nalty of ac­tu­al­ly we­aring ar­mor of that type. The Brot­her may de­ci­de the le­vel of Ar­mor af­ter the suc­cess of the ini­ti­al ma­gick roll.

    The ma­ge grows fo­ur ad­di­ti­onal arms. He may add fo­ur di­ce to his Di­ce Po­ol for ma­nu­al tasks, but must split that po­ol bet­we­en the va­ri­o­us ac­ti­ons he per­forms. Dif­fi­cul­ti­es for each ac­ti­on might in­c­re­ase, due to the con­cen­t­ra­ti­on in­vol­ved in using six arms. The skin of the prac­ti­ti­oner al­so turns blue. Whi­le in this form, an over­w­hel­ming fe­eling of awe pro­j­ects in­to the minds of ever­yo­ne vi­ewing the cas­ter via the se­cond Rank of the Mind Sphe­re. A sim­p­ler form of this to­te, Iron Body, to­ug­hens the ma­ge's body but con­fers no­ne of the ot­her ef­fects. The sim­p­ler ro­te uses Li­fe and Pri­me to har­den the body li­ke ar­mor and do­es not re­qu­ire Mind.

    Ahl-i-Batin

    Eagle Eye (•• Cor­res­pon­den­ce, • Li­fe): Whi­le Sha­lit­za was go­ing thro­ugh a ma­ze in Ca­iro, she pro­j­ec­ted her sen­ses up in­to the sky to lo­ok down upon her sur­ro­un­dings. Thro­ugh the re­pe­ated use of this ro­te, Sha­lit­za fi­nal­ly burst thro­ugh the bar­ri­er hol­ding her from at­ta­ining the Third Sphe­re of Cor­res­pon­den­ce. This ro­te is one of the first les­sons ta­ught to new ini­ti­ates of the Ba­ti­ni, even if they are not yet ver­sed in the Sphe­res ne­ces­sary to per­form it.

    The ma­ge lo­oks in­to the sky and fo­cu­ses her sen­ses so that she is lo­oking down from that po­int in the sky. This is of­ten used for trac­king op­po­nents ac­ross ro­of­tops and thro­ugh crowds of pe­op­le. It has al­so be­en used to help ma­ges es­ca­pe from ma­zes and de­tect ap­pro­ac­hing in­di­vi­du­als.

    Sneaking Sha­dow (•• For­ces, •• Mind): Ali By-yam set abo­ut to dri­ve his op­po­nents mad by pla­ying sub­t­le tricks on the­ir minds. Many ro­tes used du­ring bat­tles in the As­cen­si­on War ha­ve be­en ta­ken from his no­tes. Ali By-yam wo­uld lo­ca­te his op­po­nent and cast ma­gick on his enemy's sha­dow, gi­ving it a frig­h­te­ning ap­pe­aran­ce. The sha­dow wo­uld dart abo­ut as if it we­re at­tac­king the tar­get, ca­using the in­di­vi­du­al to be­co­me sub­con­s­ci­o­usly pa­ra­no­id un­til he re­ali­zed that his sha­dow was "attac­king" him. This re­ali­za­ti­on was eno­ugh to dri­ve many to even­tu­al mad­ness.

    Ali By-yam cla­imed that he first used this ro­te to dri­ve a sul­tan in­sa­ne. Whet­her a sul­tan's vi­zi­er wo­uld be stu­pid eno­ugh not to re­ali­ze what was go­ing on is anot­her po­int en­ti­rely.

    The Sphe­re of For­ces is used to ma­ni­pu­la­te light wa­ves from ava­ilab­le lig­h­ting so that the tar­get's sha­dow will shift abo­ut in a dis­tur­bing man­ner. The sha­dow is of­ten ma­ni­pu­la­ted to ta­ke on the form of a mon­s­ter or known enemy of the tar­get. The sha­dow can be ma­de to ap­pe­ar on the op­po­si­te si­de of its na­tu­ral lo­ca­ti­on ot even up­si­de­down. The Sphe­re of Mind is used to ke­ep the tar­get from in­ten­ti­onal­ly lo­oking at her sha­dow; this do­es not stop the tar­get from sra­ring di­rectly at the sha­dow, but it af­fects the tar­get's com­p­re­hen­si­on and sug­ges­ti­bi­lity. To avo­id cre­eping pa­ra­no­ia, he must ma­ke a Wil­lpo­wer roll and ex­ce­ed the num­ber of suc­ces­ses the ma­ge ob­ta­ined when the ro­te was cast. If the tar­get can­not sha­ke off the ef­fects of the "lur­king sha­dow," he may ma­ke a Wits + Aler­t­ness roll to re­ali­ze that the sha­dow is be­ha­ving stran­gely. If the se­cond roll is un­suc­ces­sful, he will be at a -2 to his Di­ce Po­ol for the du­ra­ti­on of the ro­te, and he will be­co­me in­c­re­asingly ir­ri­tab­le and ne­uro­tic. Ot­hers may no­ti­ce that the sha­dow lo­oks odd, but will not suf­fer the Mind Ef­fects.

    Mages, if they no­ti­ce the odd sha­dow, will im­me­di­ately be ab­le to de­tect the ma­gick. Sle­epers who no­ti­ce, on the ot­her hand, must ma­ke a Wil­lpo­wer roll ver­sus a dif­fi­culty of 8 in or­der to ma­in­ta­in sa­nity. Tho­se who fa­il will be ha­un­ted by the sha­dow. If the du­ra­ti­on of the spell lasts long eno­ugh, the Sle­eper will be wor­ked up in­to such a sta­te that he will be­co­me ca­ta­to­nic af­ter a num­ber of ho­urs equ­al to her Wil­lpo­wer, So­me­ti­mes it is bet­ter not to see the bo­gey­man that lurks right over yo­ur sho­ul­der.

    Celestial Cho­rus

    Sense Cor­rup­ti­on (• En­t­ropy, • Spi­rit): An­to­ni­us, an an­ci­ent Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus ma­ge, al­li­ed him­self with so­me Ga­rou, cre­atu­res ot­her­wi­se known as we­re­wol­ves, Lu­pi­nes or lycan­t­h­ro­pes. The­se Ga­rou be­li­eved that the One was pla­gu­ed by a for­ce known as the Wyrm. The Wyrm was a gre­at so­ur­ce of cor­rup­ti­on and wis­hed to bring abo­ut the end of the Re­alm. An­to­ni­us re­cog­ni­zed the com­mon na­tu­re of the Wyrm and his own Ad­ver­sary and so­ught to de­tect cor­rup­ti­on the way the Ga­rou did.

    Seeking first for ta­in­ted spi­rits in the Um­b­ra, he was unab­le to de­tect them as they we­re per­ce­ived by the Ga­rou. Next, he tri­ed se­ar­c­hing for so­ur­ces of gre­at en­t­ropy. Lin­king his se­arch in the Um­b­ra with his se­arch for cha­os enab­led him to iden­tify the Ga­rou-ter­med "Wyrm spi­rits".

    This is a dan­ge­ro­us ro­te, one known to dri­ve ma­ges crazy; the­re is only so much that can be do­ne in the fa­ce of eter­nal cor­rup­ti­on.

    The first Spi­rit Sphe­re is used to pan thro­ugh the Um­b­ra whi­le the first Sphe­re of En­t­ropy is used to fo­cus on ran­dom fluc­tu­ati­ons of de­com­po­si­ti­on. The­re is usu­al­ly a low-le­vel un­der­l­ying cur­rent of En­t­ropy and an in­c­re­ased le­vel of Pat­tern cor­rup­ti­on in Wyrm cre­atu­res that can be de­tec­ted with ca­re­ful anal­y­sis of one's per­cep­ti­ons. This al­lows the ma­ge to un­der­s­tand the dif­fe­ren­ce bet­we­en an "evil" spi­rit and a Wyrm -fet­te­red one.

    Wall of Mir­rors(•••• Cor­res­pon­den­ce, ••• For­ce): The Wall of Mir­rors was de­sig­ned by Sis­ter Mar­cel­la of the Ro­man Cho­rus to pro­tect her from unex­pec­ted at­tacks as she mi­nis­te­red to the pa­gan hor­des of Dark Age Euro­pe. This ro­te is strictly de­fen­si­ve and can­not be used in co­nj­un­c­ti­on with any at­tacks, but can pro­ve de­vas­ta­ting as a de­fen­se.

    The Wall sub­t­racts suc­ces­ses from any at­tack di­rec­ted at the ma­ge, mo­ving the as­sa­ult thro­ugh spa­ce in a dif­fe­rent di­rec­ti­on than that which was ori­gi­nal­ly in­ten­ded. The di­rec­ti­on is com­p­le­tely ran­dom and nor­mal­ly ap­pe­ars as if the at­tac­ker simply mis­sed, or as if the at­tack was "co­in­ci­den­tal­ly" def­lec­ted. For exam­p­le, a bul­let might ri­coc­het off of a pen­dant, bo­un­cing har­m­les­sly off of a wall. Each suc­cess de­ducts one die from any at­tack Di­ce Po­ol used aga­inst the ma­ge. This ro­te do­es not de­fend aga­inst in­di­rect at­tacks, such as strong winds rhat buf­fet an en­ti­re area.

    Cult of Ec­s­tasy

    Tune Psychic Ra­dio (•• For­ces, • Mind): Jen­ny "Son­g­bird" Lo­gan, the no­tab­le 1960's pro­test sin­ger, was cor­ne­red by se­ve­ral Pro­ge­ni­tor agents. She ba­rely es­ca­ped wirh her li­fe, and a cha­se en­su­ed. As she fled, she be­gan to scan the ra­dio wa­ves for the sig­nal band the Pro­ge­ni­tors we­re using. On­ce she had ho­med in on the sig­nal, it was easy for her to be­gin to use the­ir own in­tel­li­gen­ce net­work aga­inst them. First she fo­und the "bug" that they we­re using to track her mo­ti­on. Then she loc­ked her mind in­to the ra­dio com­mu­ni­ca­ti­on bet­we­en the Pro­ge­ni­tor agents. Even­tu­al­ly, she was ab­le to flee thro­ugh a crow­ded sto­re and lo­se eno­ugh of her clot­hing so that her Pro­ge­ni­tor fol­lo­wers ab­duc­ted a gro­upie lo­ok-ali­ke in­s­te­ad.

    Unfortunately for Jen­ny, she had not prog­res­sed to mas­tery of the third Sphe­re of For­ces. If she had, she wo­uld ha­ve be­en ab­le to pro­du­ce her own sig­nals as well…

    Of la­te, Cul­tists ha­ve used this ro­te to lis­ten in­to po­li­ce, fi­re, res­cue, news and en­ter­ta­in­ment tran­s­mis­si­ons. So­me mem­bers of the Cult be­li­eve that this ro­te can be used to lock on­to vo­ice pat­terns so that con­ver­sa­ti­ons can be he­ard ac­ross crow­ded ro­oms and re­cog­ni­zed the next ti­me the Cul­tist is ex­po­sed to them.

    Using the Sphe­re of For­ces, the ma­ge tu­nes in­to any ra­dio fre­qu­ency that he wis­hes. The Sphe­re of the Mind is used to tran­s­la­te the ra­dio sig­nal in­to a form that can be un­der­s­to­od. No ac­tu­al so­und is pro­du­ced; all in­te­rac­ti­on is wit­hin the ma­ge's mind.

    The Trip (•••• Mind, •• Cor­res­pon­den­ce, •• Ti­me, • En­t­ropy): Mem­bers of the Cult ha­ve al­ways so­ught ways to al­ter the minds and bo­di­es of them­sel­ves and ot­hers. This ro­te ca­uses the mind of anot­her in­di­vi­du­al to ex­t­ra­po­la­te on events in the past and the pre­sent in a highly struc­tu­red yet cha­otic fas­hi­on.

    Tim "Doc" Pe­re first uti­li­zed this ro­te to sti­mu­la­te wo­men. Ac­ting as a hypno­tist, he wo­uld lock his mind in­to the wo­man's mind and se­arch for parts of her past that we­re se­xu­al­ly gra­tif­ying to her. He wo­uld lo­ca­te mo­ments of cha­otic ple­asu­re wit­hin her mind as well. On­ce he had this in­for­ma­ti­on, he wo­uld mer­ge his per­cep­ti­ons in­to her own. As this in­fu­si­on of ple­asu­re flo­oded in­to her, he wo­uld re­ve­al the mo­ment in the past that she ex­pe­ri­en­ced as it was hap­pe­ning.

    When at­tac­ked by a mem­ber of Nep­han­di, "Doc" was for­ced to uti­li­ze this ro­te of­fen­si­vely. Ope­ning up the wo­man's mind, he loc­ked in­to the mo­ments of con­fu­si­on in her li­fe. He lin­ked the­se mo­ments back in­to her body via sen­sory in­put, but in­s­te­ad of lin­king the sa­me mo­ments in ri­me back in­to her mind, he be­gan to flash al­ter­na­tely for­ward and bac­k­ward in ti­me with as lit­tle re­la­ti­ve re­la­ti­on as pos­sib­le. As her will be­gan to bre­ak, he bom­bar­ded her with the go­od ti­mes that had hap­pe­ned du­ring her li­fe, then pro­j­ec­ted ima­ges of the evil things she had per­for­med. The wo­man was left a bab­bling ve­ge­tab­le.

    Using the fo­urth Sphe­re of Mind, the Cul­tist ta­kes con­t­rol of the tar­get's mind. Any de­lu­si­ons or mis­con­cep­ti­ons that the tar­get has wit­hin his mind are de­tec­ted by the first Sphe­re of En­t­ropy and ma­ni­pu­la­ted by the Sphe­re of Mind. On­ce the­se are­as of the tar­get's me­mory ha­ve be­en lo­ca­ted, they are fed in­to the tar­get's wa­king mind as sen­sory in­pur. On­ce the ri­me and pla­ce of the me­mory ha­ve be­en re­ve­aled, the Cul­tist lo­ca­tes the pla­ce via the Sphe­re of Cor­res­pon­den­ce and the ti­me by the Sphe­re of Ti­me. The ac­tu­al ti­me and pla­ce of the in­ci­dent are then re­ve­aled to the tar­get.

    Dreamspeakers

    Scrying (•• Cor­res­pon­den­ce, • Spi­rit): Dre­am­s­pe­aker ma­ges de­ve­lo­ped this ro­te to "dre­am" of ot­her lo­ca­ti­ons. This is mostly used for spying and ex­p­lo­ra­ti­on. The Dre­am­s­pe­aker go­es in­to a drum­ming frenzy and al­lows her sen­ses to wan­der our away from her­self un­til they co­me to so­me po­int on which the Dre­am­s­pe­aker wis­hes to con­cen­r­ra­te. Dre­am­s­pe­akers are known to use this ro­te qu­ite fre­qu­ently; it is not only use­ful, but highly en­ter­ta­ining.

    Dreamspeakers ha­ve be­en known to send the­ir "dre­aming" in­to the Um­b­ra as well. This gi­ves a dif­fe­rent in­sight to the spi­rit world than one wo­uld nor­mal­ly ac­hi­eve. Sin­ce the po­int of vi­ew is wit­hin the Re­alm rat­her than the Um­b­ra, the sen­ses co­ming out of the spi­rit world ma­ke the spi­rits ap­pe­ar mo­re li­ke pat­terns of the Re­alm than they nor­mal­ly wo­uld. This can ga­in the ma­ge in­sight in­to the na­tu­re of spi­rits that wo­uld ot­her­wi­se be con­ce­aled - not that spi­rits are any go­od at con­ce­aling the­ir true na­tu­re.

    This ro­te al­lows the ma­ge to vi­ew ot­her lo­ca­ti­ons. It is usu­al­ly li­mi­ted to fa­mi­li­ar lo­ca­ti­ons or tho­se that ha­ve be­en pur­po­se­ful­ly me­mo­ri­zed, but this can be used to slowly "drag" one's Sphe­re sen­sing ac­ross an area by mo­ving the po­int of Cor­res­pon­den­ce aro­und wit­hin sen­sing ran­ge. This ta­kes ti­me and can be bloc­ked by (and is vi­sib­le thro­ugh) ot­her ma­gicks. This is co­in­ci­den­tal ma­gick, as it ap­pe­ars that the sha­man is com­p­le­tely im­mer­sed wit­hin her drum­ming frenzy. Ot­hers do not know what she is do­ing.

    Sucking Ga­te (•••• Spi­rit, •••• For­ces, •• Pri­me): Fa­cing an ever in­c­re­asing num­ber of HIT Marks, Wa­ter Rhythm, de­ci­ded to ta­ke a wild chan­ce. If her idea suc­ce­eded, she wo­uld ta­ke ca­re of all her op­po­nents with one blow; if she fa­iled, the Pa­ra­dox might kill her. She drew upon what Qu­in­tes­sen­ce she had at her dis­po­sal and to­re thro­ugh the Ga­un­t­let. The Um­b­ra suc­ked ever­y­t­hing in­to its ga­ping maw. Wa­ter Rhythm was drawn in as well, but un­li­ke the HIT Marks, she pos­ses­sed the abi­lity to con­t­rol the ga­te. As the ga­te ce­ased to draw upon the Re­alm, Wa­ter Rhythm rus­hed back thro­ugh and se­aled the ga­te­way be­hind her.

    Water Rhythm swo­re ne­ver to uti­li­ze such dra­ma­ti­cal­ly vul­gar ma­gick aga­in, but, of co­ur­se, on­ce Des­tiny be­gins her drum­ming, the­re is no way to stop her. The Dre­am­s­pe­akers ha­ve held this ro­te in re­ser­ve for ti­mes of gre­at emer­gency. It is not ta­ught to all stu­dents of ma­gick. In fact, the Dre­am­s­pe­akers ta­ke gre­at pa­ins to era­se all tra­ces of its use with the hig­her Sphe­res of En­t­ropy,

    The fo­urth rank of the Spi­rit Sphe­re is used to bre­ach the Ga­un­t­let, On­ce the Ga­un­t­let is bre­ac­hed, the fo­urth rank of For­ces al­ters the di­rec­ti­on of gra­vity so that it draws ever­y­t­hing wit­hin its area in­to the Um­b­ra. The se­cond Sphe­re of Pri­me sup­pli­es the ne­ces­sary Qu­in­tes­sen­ce supply to ma­in­ta­in the ga­te and ma­ni­pu­la­te gra­vity.

    Euthanatos

    Random Im­pul­se (•••• Mind, •• En­t­ropy): Cat­hi Ma­ris­ha, a Eut­ha­na­tos spe­ci­ali­zing in in­di­rect may­hem, con­ce­ived this ro­te. By con­t­rol­ling the ran­dom im­pul­ses of her tar­gets, Cat­hi was ab­le to im­pel them in­to ran­dom acts of cha­os.

    The ma­ge using this Ef­fect may con­t­rol her su­bj­ect's ac­ti­ons to a cer­ta­in ex­tent, but en­t­ropy ru­les the tar­get's mind for the most part. For each suc­cess the ma­ge sco­res, she robs her tar­get of con­s­ci­o­us con­t­rol over his own ac­ti­ons for one fi­ve-mi­nu­te in­c­re­ment (one suc­cess, fi­ve mi­nu­tes, three suc­ces­ses, fif­te­en, etc.). She may di­rect one ac­ti­on of her tar­get for every suc­cess she sco­res, but the tar­get may re­sist this con­t­rol with a suc­ces­sful Wil­lpo­wer roll, dif­fi­culty 7.

    Bone Twis­ting Palm (•••• En­t­ropy, •••• Li­fe, ••• Pri­me): De­ve­lo­ped by the Eut­ha­na­tos ma­ge Ho Chow Fan, the Bo­ne Twis­ting Palm tec­h­ni­que mu­ta­tes an op­po­nent's bo­nes upon them­sel­ves un­til they fi­nal­ly shat­ter from the stra­in or be­co­me hor­ribly mal­for­med. Ho to­ok ex­t­re­me ple­asu­re in em­p­lo­ying this at­tack; it was one of his fa­vo­ri­te ro­tes to cast on fa­iling adepts.

    Many of the ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons cla­im that Ho Chow Fan was sec­retly ba­rab­bi and that this ro­te had no pla­ce in Eut­ha­na­tos' te­ac­hings. The Pe­da­go­gu­es of the Eut­ha­na­tos re­fu­se to dis­con­ti­nue the te­ac­hing of this ro­te.

    This ro­te can only be cast on one op­po­nent and one limb at a ti­me. It is usu­al­ly em­p­lo­yed by to­uch. The Sphe­re of Li­fe is used to bend and twist the op­po­nent's limb, whi­le the Sphe­re of En­t­ropy be­gins to work the re­al da­ma­ge upon the bo­ne and mar­row struc­tu­re. Know­led­ge of the Sphe­re of Pri­me chan­nels Qu­in­tes­sen­ce to mu­ta­te the op­po­nent's Pat­tern,

    If ca­using da­ma­ge in­s­te­ad of crip­pling, this ro­te in­f­licts ag­gra­va­ted da­ma­ge. If the ma­ge is se­eking to crip­ple the op­po­nent, the crip­pling ca­uses nor­mal da­ma­ge, but twists the limb for the du­ra­ti­on of the Ef­fect. The­re is no met­hod of na­tu­ral­ly he­aling such da­ma­ge; the only met­hod of re­co­very is to use the Sphe­re of Li­fe to re­turn the bo­nes to the­ir na­tu­ral sta­te. In eit­her ca­se, the ro­te is qu­ite vul­gar.

    Hollow Ones

    Be Co­ol (•• Mind): Wendy "Spi­der" Jones al­ways ne­eded to fe­el hip to wha­te­ver sce­ne she in­dul­ged in at the ti­me. On­ce she be­ca­me Awa­ke­ned, she re­ali­zed that be­ing co­ol was only a mat­ter of con­for­ming to the vi­ews of ot­hers and that the­ir mo­ods and at­ti­tu­des co­uld easily be drawn out of them.

    "Spider" star­ted by fe­eling out pe­op­le by re­ading the­ir sur­fa­ce emo­ti­ons. Next she be­gan to im­p­lant the fe­eling that she was "co­ol" in­to the minds of ot­hets aro­und her. Fi­nal­ly she de­ci­ded that she wan­ted to stop was­ting ti­me cas­ting the ma­gick each ti­me she went out; it was brin­ging her too much Pa­ra­dox. "Spi­der" fo­und it was best to per­ma­nently cast the ro­te on a gi­ven bar or club. In this way, she was ab­le to "be co­ol" at the­se ma­gic­ked lo­ca­ti­ons whe­ne­ver she re­tur­ned to them.

    The Hol­low Ones je­alo­usly ke­ep this ro­te hid­den from the mem­bers of the Cult of Ec­s­tasy. Let 'em find the­ir own way to be co­ol!

    Using the se­cond rank of the Mind Sphe­re, the Hol­low One pro­bes the emo­ti­ons of ot­hers to see when he is con­si­de­red "co­ol." On­ce the ma­ge hits the right tra­in of tho­ught, he con­ti­nu­es along it, using the sa­me Mind rank to im­p­lant the im­p­res­si­on that what he's sa­ying is co­ol, no mat­ter what he might be bab­bling.

    Hollow Ones ha­ve be­en known to cast this ro­te on pla­ces that they fre­qu­ent. Ho­we­ver, this le­aves mystic­kal re­si­due that can be de­tec­ted by ot­her ma­ges. This prac­ti­ce is strongly dis­co­ura­ged by tu­tors, but many Hol­lows don't know any bet­ter. Such re­si­due has le­ad mem­bers of the Tec­h­noc­racy to many Hol­low One hang-outs.

    Lecherous Kiss (•• Mind, •• Li­fe, •• Pri­me): Ho­ward "Rex" Mac­Nesh prac­ti­ced this ro­te whi­le tra­vel­ling the world in se­arch of the per­fect tu­tor. In his Awa­ke­ned sta­te, he qu­ickly re­ali­zed that he co­uld easily aug­ment his al­re­ady pro­fi­ci­ent se­duc­ti­on skills. "Rex" stu­di­ed phe­ro­mo­nal re­le­ases in hu­mans. With prac­ti­ce, he was ab­le to pro­du­ce a phe­ro­mo­nal che­mi­cal on his lips that wo­uld am­p­lify his own phe­ro­mo­nes and in­c­re­ase the im­pact of the en­doc­ri­ne that he was re­le­asing wit­hin the tar­gets' minds.

    This ro­te is uti­li­zed to sti­mu­la­te an in­di­vi­du­al in­to a sta­te in which he will ac­cept se­xu­al ad­van­ces or will ma­ke se­xu­al ad­van­ces him­self. Using the se­cond Sphe­re of Mind, the ma­ge sways his or her tar­get in­to thin­king se­xu­al­ly. The se­cond Sphe­re of Pri­me fu­els the work do­ne by the se­cond Sphe­re of Li­fe, pro­du­cing both en­doc­ri­ne wit­hin the tar­get's mind and a phe­ro­mo­nal com­po­und on the cas­ter's lips. A kiss se­als the Ef­fect.

    Penny Dre­ad­ful's Bright New Penny (••• or •••• Mat­ter, •• Pri­me, •• Ti­me): One Hol­low One, Penny Dre­ad­ful, de­vi­sed this ro­te to res­to­re sticks of old rub­bish in­to the be­a­uti­ful fur­nis­hings they had on­ce be­en. By per­ce­iving them in the­ir hey­day, she re­tur­ned them to the­ir for­mer splen­dor. Mo­re­over, an an­ti­que tab­lec­loth al­lo­wed her to co­nj­ure every me­al that had ever be­en pla­ced upon it, gat­he­ring a for­tu­ne in vin­ta­ge chi­na and sil­ver­wa­re. Af­ter ti­ring of Pa­ra­dox, she de­vi­sed se­ve­ral non-vul­gar ap­pli­ca­ti­ons. Af­ter all, one ne­ver knows exactly what tre­asu­res you might find in the at­tics of aban­do­ned ho­uses or loc­ked in­si­de that an­ti­que ho­pe chest wil­led to you by yo­ur Gre­at Aunt Mar­t­ha.

    Time 2 al­lows the ma­ges to to­ok back ac­ross the "li­fe" of her fo­cus. The Third Rank of Mat­ter res­ha­pes old ar­tic­les, whi­le the Forth rec­re­ates them en­ti­rely. Pri­me fu­els the cre­ated pat­tern.

    Order of Her­mes

    Unseen No­men­c­la­tu­re (•• Mind, •• Mat­ter, •• Pri­me): The Or­der of Her­mes used this ro­te to dis­gu­ise most of the­ir te­ac­hings du­ring the In­qu­isi­ti­on. It al­lows in­for­ma­ti­on to be im­p­lan­ted in­to a text in an non-al­p­ha­nu­me­ric form. This ro­te is usu­al­ly em­p­lo­yed to im­p­reg­na­te the pa­ges of a bo­ok with in­for­ma­ti­on in a non-stan­dard or­der.

    For exam­p­le, a ma­ge wants to im­p­lant a mes­sa­ge in­to a bo­ok so that ot­hers won't hap­pen upon it. She uses the ro­te to put the mes­sa­ge in­to the bo­ok so that if it is re­ad bac­k­wards, the in­for­ma­ti­on is tran­s­fer­red in­to the re­ader's bra­in. The­se mes­sa­ges work on a pri­mal le­vel. If so­me­one hap­pens upon the met­hod of ac­ti­va­ting the im­pul­se, she may not re­cog­ni­ze what she has stum­b­led upon, as the mes­sa­ges tend to be lo­osely con­nec­ted ima­ges or fe­elings,

    The Sphe­re of Pri­me is used to po­wer the Sphe­res of Mind and Mat­ter to pla­ce an emo­ti­onal or sub­li­mi­nal mes­sa­ge in­to the Pat­tern that ma­kes up the bo­ok. The clo­ser that mes­sa­ge is to the ori­gi­nal con­cept, the fe­wer suc­cess a ma­ge ne­eds to pla­ce a hid­den mes­sa­ge "bet­we­en the li­nes," Put­ting a com­p­le­tely dif­fe­rent mes­sa­ge in a bo­ok can ta­ke fi­ve or mo­re suc­ces­ses. The mes­sa­ge can be sto­red in any se­qu­en­ce the ma­ge wis­hes. Of co­ur­se, va­ri­ati­on from li­ne­ar im­p­lan­ta­ti­on will me­an that a stu­dent wis­hing to le­arn from the ma­te­ri­al must re­ad the text in the pro­per or­der.

    Mages can de­tect that prin­ted ma­te­ri­als ha­ve be­en ef­fec­ted by ma­gick, but they will not know what sort of ma­gick was used. Even if they do, they won't be ab­le to fi­gu­re out how to draw the in­for­ma­ti­on from the bo­ok if they fa­il a Wits + In­tel­li­gen­ce roll ver­sus dif­fi­culty 8.

    Unraveling the Text (•• En­t­ropy, •• Mat­ter, •• Pri­me): This ro­te ma­kes it im­pos­sib­le to re­ad a bo­ok. No mat­ter how hard the in­di­vi­du­al tri­es to con­cen­t­ra­te on the words, the words them­sel­ves will not al­low the in­for­ma­ti­on to be tran­s­mit­ted in­to the re­ader's bra­in.

    This for­ces a per­son re­ading a text to start jum­ping aro­und the pa­ge in­s­te­ad of be­ing ab[e to re­ad it nor­mal­ly. This can be very frus­t­ra­ting to the re­ader. Most pe­op­le will stop re­ading the bo­ok al­to­get­her. If a ma­ge re­ali­zes what is go­ing on, she can ta­ke ma­gic­kal steps to thwart the ro­te in or­der to un­der­s­tand the writ­ten words.

    Sons of Et­her

    Jury Rig (•• Mat­ter, •• Pri­me, •• Cor­res­pon­den­ce, • Mind): Ruf Ar­gon­holf was an Or­p­han who co­uld fix mac­hi­nery wit­ho­ut ta­king it apart. By sen­sing in­si­de the mac­hi­nery, he co­uld fix the prob­lems by use of his men­tal po­wers alo­ne. It wasn't long be­fo­re mem­bers of the Sons of Et­her ap­pro­ac­hed him and as­ked him to jo­in in the­ir sci­en­ti­fic ex­pe­ti­ments. This ro­te was too much for the Sons of Et­her to pass up and was ad­ded to the­ir tu­to­ring ma­nu­als for new ini­ti­ates.

    A suc­ces­sful Wits + Re­pa­ir or In­tel­li­gen­ce + Sci­en­ce roll must be ma­de ver­sus the sta­te of the mac­hi­ne's da­ma­ge. The num­ber of suc­cess re­qu­ired de­pends on the con­di­ti­on of the mac­hi­ne:

    • 10 - To­tal­ly smas­hed (vul­gar ma­gick re­qu­ired)

    • 8 - Ob­vi­o­us da­ma­ge that sho­uld stop the mac­hi­ne from ope­ra­ting

    • 6 - Out­si­de of the mac­hi­ne lo­oks fi­ne

    • 4 - Elec­t­ro­nics that can't be chec­ked for ac­tu­al fun­c­ti­oning just by lo­oking (i.e. com­pu­ter chips, di­odes and bat­te­ri­es,)

    The Son of Et­her can tem­po­ra­rily (for the du­ra­ti­on of the ro­te) re­turn a mac­hi­ne to a fun­c­ti­oning con­di­ti­on by anal­y­zing the da­ma­ge and ma­gic­kal­ly men­ding the Pat­terns that are da­ma­ged, dis­con­nec­ted or com­p­le­tely mis­sing. First, the ma­ge uses the Sphe­re of Cor­res­pon­den­ce to lo­ok in­si­de of the mac­hi­ne. His in­na­te sci­en­ti­fic or re­pa­ir skills are then aug­men­ted by the Mind Sphe­re. Lastly, Pri­me fu­els Mat­ter to re­pa­ir or to rep­la­ce any da­ma­ge to the mac­hi­ne. When the du­ra­ti­on of the ro­te ex­pi­res, the mac­hi­ne re­turns to its pre­vi­o­usly bro­ken sta­te.

    Supporting the Bra­in (•••• Li­fe, •• Mat­ter, •• Mind, •• Pri­me): Gre­at sci­en­tists thro­ug­ho­ut the ages ha­ve strug­gled to ex­tend the li­fes­pan of hu­ma­nity. The Sons of Et­her of­ten try to tran­s­p­lant the bra­in in­to anot­her body- hu­man, com­po­si­te hu­man, cyborg or ro­bot. So­me me­ans of sup­por­ting the bra­in af­ter de­ath had to be cre­ated.

    Doctor Gus­tov Fin­ney cre­ated of the ne­west ver­si­on of this ro­te. Ha­ving suc­ces­sful­ly de­ca­pi­ta­ted a Man in Black, Dr, Fin­ney was struck with a sud­den bolt of en­lig­h­ten­ment. "I will ke­ep this bra­in ali­ve! It will be an in­va­lu­ab­le so­ur­ce of in­for­ma­ti­on for de­ca­des to co­me!" Fin­ney qu­ick-fro­ze the se­ve­red he­ad with li­qu­id nit­ro­gen, car­ri­ed it to his lab, and be­gan his work.

    Carefully, he sa­wed open the skull and skil­lful­ly re­mo­ved the bra­in, eyes and re­ma­ining spi­nal co­lumn. The­se or­gans we­re set in­to a sus­pen­si­on flu­id fil­led with spe­ci­al nut­ri­ents and su­per­sa­tu­ra­ted with ox­y­gen. On­ce this pro­cess was com­p­le­ted, Fin­ney ho­oked elec­t­ro­des in­to the bra­in and spi­nal co­lumn to check for res­pon­se.

    Eureka! "The ex­pe­ri­ment ac­hi­eved the de­si­red re­sults and even­tu­al­ly the bra­in was sap­ped of its in­for­ma­ti­on con­cer­ning the New World Or­der and the tac­tics of the Men in Black.

    A bra­in se­ve­red from its body ne­eds two ma­in things to stay ali­ve: anot­her li­fe-sup­port system and the will to li­ve. The li­fe-sup­port system is cre­ated by use of three Sphe­res of ma­gick. Mat­ter is used to cre­ate the sup­por­ti­ve flu­id, the nut­ri­ent bath, and the su­per­sa­tu­ra­ti­on of ox­y­gen wit­hin it. Li­fe is used to ke­ep the elec­t­ri­cal cut­rent run­ning wit­hin the bra­in and to in­su­re that the­re is no de­com­po­si­ti­on or da­ma­ge be­fo­re the bra­in is pla­ced wit­hin its "new body." Both of the­se Sphe­res re­qu­ire the use of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce to ac­com­p­lish the­ir tasks; the Sphe­re of Pri­me is ne­ces­sary to in­su­re the suc­cess of his ro­te.

    Mind ma­gick is used to sti­mu­la­te the su­bj­ect's will to li­ve. This ur­ge is sub­con­s­ci­o­us; it is ex­t­re­mely hard for a per­son to fight aga­inst such a pri­mal bra­in fun­c­ti­on. Of co­ur­se, if you're a ma­ge, the­re's al­ways ma­gick…

    Verbena

    Shadows in the Mist (•• For­ces, • Spi­rit): Wit­hin any qu­an­tity of mist, fog or smo­ke (such as from a bunch of herbs thrown in a char­co­al bra­zi­er, or a bun­d­le of in­cen­se sticks lit at on­ce), Ver­be­na ma­ges can ma­ni­pu­la­te the va­pors to con­form to the sha­pes of obj­ects in the Um­b­ra. Whet­her or not this is vul­gar ma­gic de­pends on a vi­ewer's opi­ni­on and cre­du­lo­us­ness. Mem­bers of the Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus use a va­ri­ant em­p­lo­ying in­cen­se.

    In the ab­sen­ce of any pro­per amo­unt of smo­ke or fog, it is pos­sib­le to cre­ate it via Mat­ter 2 and Pri­me 2.

    Spirit Wo­un­ding (•••• Spi­rit, ••• Mat­ter): This an­ci­ent fey ro­te al­lows a Ver­be­na to tran­s­la­te physi­cal mat­ter in­to spi­ti­tu­al mat­ter wit­ho­ut en­te­ring the Um­b­ra. War-wit­c­hes use the ro­te to in­f­lict psychic wo­unds which ca­use tra­uma­tic Pat­tern le­aka­ge at the sa­me ra­te as nor­mal physi­cal wo­unds. The ad­van­ta­ge of such wo­unds is that on­ce ar­row­he­ads or po­isons lod­ge in a per­son's spi­rit, they will not he­al un­less a physi­ci­an can see and re­ach in­to the Um­b­ra to re­mo­ve them.

    The Fab­ri­ca­te Spi­rit Ef­fect al­lows the ma­ge to gat­her and so­li­dify spi­rit ener­gi­es whi­le Mat­ter ma­gick grants this spi­rit-form sha­pe. A ma­ge re­ac­hing in­to the Um­b­ra may re­mo­ve such mis­si­les with ease.]

    Virtual Adepts

    Adrenal Rush (••• Li­fe, •• Pri­me): No one is su­re who was the first to re­ali­ze that the Ad­re­nal Rush from pla­ying vi­deo ga­mes co­uld be uti­li­zed as a ro­te to hype an in­di­vi­du­al, but the Ef­fect is known to many Sle­epers as well. This ro­te is con­si­de­red co­in­ci­den­ral ma­gick.

    The Vir­tu­al Adept me­rely be­gins pla­ying a vi­deo ga­me. Wit­hin a short amo­unt of ti­me, her body be­gins to sec­re­te hor­mo­nes and che­mi­cals that not only in­c­re­ase the body's aler­t­ness and energy, but al­so flush to­xins from the ma­ge's system.

    Some Vir­tu­al Adepts be­li­eve that this sta­te is ac­hi­eved by loc­king in­to the Net and al­lo­wing the pris­ti­ne na­tu­re of per­fectly co­ded prog­ram­ming to flow thro­ugh the­ir be­ings, loc­king them de­eply in­to the very co­re of the sub­ro­uti­nes con­s­tantly cal­led upon to carry in­for­ma­ti­on. Ot­hers be­li­eve they are just ex­ci­ted by the thrill of des­t­ro­ying things wit­ho­ut the fe­ar of de­ath get­ting in the way.

    This ro­te al­lows the Adept to ref­resh his body and cle­an­se it of all to­xins. Any po­isons, fo­re­ign che­mi­cals, di­se­ases or vi­ru­ses wit­hin the ma­ge's body are flus­hed out thro­ugh his swe­at glands. With three suc­ces­ses, the Adept al­so ga­ins an ad­di­ti­onal dot of Sta­mi­na, Strength and Aler­t­ness for the du­ra­ti­on of the ro­te. The Li­fe Sphe­re sti­mu­la­tes the body to re­le­ase the ne­ces­sary by-pro­ducts and pu­rify the body, whi­le Pri­me fu­els the re­we­aving of the Pat­tern.

    Override Sig­nal (•• For­ces, or so­me­ti­mes •••• Li­fe): The Men in Black we­re sig­na­ling for back-ups. Ken Jav­lin was wed­ged in­to a tight spot. Using his lap­top, Ken sent out a nar­row be­am sig­nal from his wi­re­less mo­dem to jam the MIBs' call. On­ce he was su­re that the MIBs wo­uld be unab­le to call in sup­port tro­ops, he cal­led in the rest of his ca­bal. The MIBs we­re easily kil­led by the gro­up of no­vi­ce ma­ges, as they we­re unac­cus­to­med to be­ing cut off from the­ir or­ga­ni­za­ti­on, the New World Or­der.

    Over the ye­ars, Ken's ro­te has evol­ved to in­c­lu­de the jam­ming of mo­dems, both wi­red and wi­re­less. In fact, so­me Vir­tu­al Adeprs cal­led Re­ality Hac­kers ha­ve go­ne so far as to jam only cer­ta­in wa­ve­lengths of energy that cor­res­pond to the elec­t­ri­cal cur­rent that pas­ses ac­ross ne­ural synap­ses. It is ex­t­re­mely hard (dif­fi­culty 10) for even a ma­ge to pin­po­int such a small va­ri­ati­on in fre­qu­ency, but in-depth stu­di­es on one in­di­vi­du­al can le­ad to le­ar­ning the exact fre­qu­ency ne­ces­sary to put an in­di­vi­du­al in­to a co­ma; the su­bj­ect will re­ma­in in the co­ma un­til bom­bar­d­ment by this fre­qu­ency ce­ases. This va­ri­ati­on re­qu­ires Li­fe ma­gick.

    The Vir­tu­al Adept blocks any tran­s­mit­ted sig­nal that he wis­hes to jam using the Sphe­re of For­ces. Most Adepts use this ro­te to jam ra­di­owa­ve, mic­ro­wa­ve and in­f­ra­red tran­s­mis­si­ons. This re­qu­ires a In­tel­li­gen­ce + Tec­h­no­logy or Wits + In­ves­ti­ga­ti­on roll. The dif­fi­culty de­pends on the ma­ge's fa­mi­li­arity with the sort of tec­h­no­logy be­ing used:

    • 10 -Ali­en

    • 8 - He­ard abo­ut it on­ce

    • 6 - Se­en it work be­fo­re

    • 4 - "Ha­ve one right he­re"

    An In­tel­li­gen­ce + Com­pu­ter roll may be sub­s­ti­tu­ted if the tar­get de­vi­ce is a com­pu­ter. An In­tel­li­gen­ce + Me­di­ci­ne roll may be ex­c­han­ged when at­tem­p­ting to jam me­di­cal equ­ip­ment (or pe­op­le). Roll In­tel­li­gen­ce + Sci­en­ce if the ro­te is ap­pli­ed aga­inst sci­en­ti­fic re­se­arch equ­ip­ment.

    Once the ba­sic know­led­ge is dis­co­ve­red, a cas­ting roll de­ter­mi­nes the deg­ree of suc­cess (of co­ur­se).

    General Ro­tes

    We lift and we ke­ep tur­ning the sa­me few fi­gu­res; we can al­most un­der­s­tand why they don't pe­rish- but we're me­ant only mo­re de­eply and won­de­ringly to cling to what on­ce was and smi­le: a bit mo­re cle­arly per­haps than a ye­ar be­fo­re,

    - Ra­iner Ril­ke, "Ta­nag­ra"

    Ariadne's Thre­ad (• Mind, • Cor­res­pon­den­ce): Vir­tu­al Adepts ha­ve ma­de the most re­cent use of this an­ci­ent ro­te, whe­reby a ma­ge may fix any par­ti­cu­lar spa­ti­al lo­ca­ti­on in her mind, then play out a men­tal li­ne, me­mo­ri­zing her prog­res­si­on thro­ugh spa­ce. A ma­ge can thus me­mo­ri­se the pat­tern of any ma­ze, lab­y­rinth, fre­eway in­ter­c­han­ge or vir­tu­al re­ality flow­c­hart se­qu­en­cing ro­uti­ne, Lan­d­marks may chan­ge on the way back, of co­ur­se, and ro­ad­b­locks may be erec­ted, but the ma­ge will not be con­fu­sed by any il­lu­si­ons or de­to­urs off the be­aten path.

    Used in co­nj­un­c­ti­on with the Se­ven Le­ague Stri­de, Ari­ad­ne's Thre­ad gu­aran­te­es a re­turn to one's pre­vi­o­us lo­ca­ti­on with even the slig­h­test deg­ree of suc­cess, al­t­ho­ugh the­re are Ef­fects to co­un­ter this…

    Detect the Dre­am Ga­te­way (• Cor­res­pon­den­ce, • Spi­rit): Dre­am­s­pe­akers use this ro­te to in­s­pect the­ir im­me­di­ate vi­ci­nity for spots whe­re the ga­un­t­let is we­aker. This is es­pe­ci­al­ly im­por­tant in the in­ner city, whe­re a Dre­am­s­pe­aker may de­tect that the ar­c­h­way of the Pub­lic Lib­rary (bu­ilt by Ma­sons) has a ga­un­t­let of 3, com­pa­red to the 5 of the sur­ro­un­ding blight, whi­le the jun­g­le gym in su­bur­ban park may ha­ve a ga­un­t­let of 2 in one par­ti­cu­lar cor­ner. This is not so much a ro­te as it is a roll of Per­cep­ti­on + Awa­re­ness to no­ti­ce such fe­atu­res. Ho­we­ver, a cas­ting roll is still re­qu­ired to aug­ment the ma­ge's awa­re­ness.

    Prime Lo­ca­ti­on (• or •• Cor­res­pon­den­ce, • Pri­me): The old joke in re­al es­ta­te is that the three most im­por­tant sel­ling po­ints of a ho­use are lo­ca­ti­on, lo­ca­ti­on and lo­ca­ti­on. Ma­ges know abo­ut the im­por­tan­ce of lo­ca­ti­ons, as the most va­lu­ab­le spots in any area are the fo­cal po­ints of ma­gi­cal energy cal­led No­des. Just as the tem­po­ral jun­c­tu­res of­ten co­ales­ce at ti­mes of tran­si­ti­on and at the mid­po­ints of cer­ta­in cycles, No­des tend to ap­pe­ar at bor­ders and cen­ters. The ed­ge of a fo­rest may ha­ve one, the mid­dle anot­her. The de­epest part of the de­ep blue sea has a third, whi­le a far mo­re ac­ces­sib­le spot forms at the con­s­tantly shif­ting sho­re­li­ne. Ge­ne­ral­ly spe­aking, they oc­cur in the cen­ter and at the tran­si­ti­on of the ele­ments.

    In Ore­gon, one of the most spec­ta­cu­lar sights (and si­tes) is Mul­t­no­mah Falls. Be­hind the cur­ta­in of the falls is a grot­to, and in the cen­ter, just abo­ve the li­ne of the wa­ter, is an al­tar-sha­ped sto­ne. If you we­re to stand on the sto­ne, the wind wo­uld blow spray thro­ugh the cur­ta­in of the fa­ils in­to yo­ur fa­ce, whi­le the mo­un­ta­in wo­uld be di­rectly over yo­ur he­ad. It is an an­ci­ent sac­red si­te, the me­eting of wa­ter, wind and earth. The No­de is the­re, des­pi­te the to­urists, few of whom know or ca­re eno­ugh to find the spot. The po­int of tran­si­ti­on forms the No­de, the in­ter­sec­ti­on of li­nes of ma­gi­cal for­ce.

    Western lo­re re­fers to the­se paths of energy as ley li­nes, whi­le Eas­tern tra­di­ti­ons re­fer to them as Dra­gon Paths, Yin paths fol­low the co­ur­se of val­leys and the low pla­ces on the gro­und, whi­le Yang paths fol­low the co­ur­ses of mo­un­ta­ins and hills. A mo­un­ta­in pass bet­we­en two val­leys wo­uld con­ta­in a pri­me No­de, tho­ugh the exact lo­ca­ti­on wo­uld de­pend on mi­nor ge­olo­gi­cal fe­atu­res. Mo­un­ta­in pas­ses are al­so are­as of high wind and ge­olo­gi­cal ac­ti­vity (which is for­med by fa­ult li­nes).

    Nodes, ho­we­ver, shift, as do the ele­ments, and hu­man han­di­work can af­fect a chan­ge in a No­de's po­si­ti­on. For exam­p­le, so­me of the most ma­gi­cal­ly char­ged si­tes are cros­sro­ads. Fol­k­lo­re tells us that ghosts, de­vils, vam­pi­res and wit­c­hes all tra­vel to cros­sro­ads for po­wer (espe­ci­al­ly at the jun­c­tu­re of mid­night). The po­wer is ob­vi­o­us and the No­de at a cros­sro­ad is well-mar­ked. The psychic energy and stres­ses in­vol­ved with the ro­ad ke­eps the exis­ting ley li­nes fi­xed in pla­ce, or ca­uses new ones to form (or old ones to shift). The ex­cess energy Pri­me For­ce col­lects at the cros­sro­ads, for­ming the No­de.

    By use of the Pri­me Lo­ca­ti­on ro­te, ma­ges may find the pre­ci­se spot of a No­de, and may roll Per­cep­ti­on + Awa­re­ness to no­ti­ce spon­ta­ne­o­usly cre­ated No­des if they ap­pe­ar.

    Burn Out (•• For­ces, • En­t­ropy): By ran­domly lo­ca­ting the most de­li­ca­te part of an elec­t­ric cir­cu­it or IC chip, the ma­ge can sur­gi­cal­ly cre­ate and di­rect a small energy sur­ge and ca­use the de­vi­ce to fa­il wit­ho­ut to­tal­ly des­t­ro­ying the who­le de­vi­ce. This dis­rupts the de­vi­ce's fun­c­ti­on for one turn per suc­cess. (No­te that tec­h­no­ma­gic­kal de­vi­ces typi­cal­ly ha­ve an Are­te or co­un­ter­ma­gick to re­sist this.)

    Hallmark (•• Mind, • Pri­me): A ma­ge's ma­gicks are as dis­tin­c­ti­ve as his han­d­w­ri­ting or fin­ger­p­rints. With this ro­te, a ma­ge may exa­mi­ne a ma­gic­kal wor­king and ga­in in­sights in­to the per­so­na­lity and iden­tity of the ma­ge who ma­de it, in­c­lu­ding the tec­h­ni­qu­es and af­fi­li­ati­on of the cas­ter. With a roll of Per­cep­ti­on + Awa­re­ness, he may at­tempt to match it to ot­her ma­gi­cal wor­kings or auras of ma­ges he knows. So­me­ti­mes this is very easy, as so­me ma­ges who know this ro­te (typi­cal­ly the Or­der of Her­mes) use it to bla­zon an ela­bo­ra­te se­al at the end of all the­ir wor­kings. Such hal­lmarks are vi­sib­le to tho­se lo­oking with only the first dot of Pri­me, tho­ugh it re­qu­ires Mind to de­tect the per­so­na­lity be­hind the ma­gic. Hol­low Ones re­fer to this tec­h­ni­que as "tag­ging" and so­me­ti­mes scrawl psychic graf­fi­ti over things for she­er amu­se­ment va­lue. Such se­als and tag­ging are easily vi­sib­le from the Um­b­ra.

    If a ma­ge wis­hes to con­ce­al his iden­tity as the aut­hor of any par­ti­cu­lar Ef­fect, he may roll Wits + Sub­ter­fu­ge ver­sus the dif­fi­culty of the Ef­fect be­ing at­tem­p­ted. Par­ti­al suc­ces­ses will le­ave an in­de­ter­mi­na­te or smud­ged hal­lmark. If a ma­ge wis­hes to for­ge the hal­lmark of anot­her ma­ge, he sho­uld roll Ma­ni­pu­la­ti­on + Ex­p­res­si­on at the dif­fi­culty of the Ef­fect be­ing cast, with ad­di­ti­onal pe­nal­ti­es for for­ging the im­p­res­si­ons of ma­ges he is un­fa­mi­li­ar with or the tec­h­ni­qu­es of ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons. The Ver­be­na and the Vir­tu­al Adepts use very dif­fe­rent met­hods, and the style of ma­gic­kal han­d­w­ri­ting is equ­al­ly dis­tinct.

    Pixie Le­ad (••• Mind, •• Cor­res­pon­den­ce): This ro­te chan­ges a su­bj­ect's per­cep­ti­ons such that he easily gets lost, fol­lo­wing one path whi­le per­ce­iving anot­her in his mind. This is par­ti­cu­larly use­ful when con­fu­sing pur­su­it in a lar­ge city, whe­re wrong turns are a com­mon oc­cur­ren­ce. Vir­tu­al Adepts use a si­mi­lar ro­uti­ne, cal­led Con­fu­se Po­in­ter Fi­le, re­la­be­ling any gi­ven path to the po­int whe­re the su­bj­ect be­co­mes ho­pe­les­sly lost.

    Talons (••• Li­fe, •• Mat­ter, •• Pri­me): The ori­gins of this ro­te ha­ve be­en lost to an­ti­qu­ity; its po­pu­la­rity with Eut­ha­na­tos, Ver­be­na and Akas­hic Brot­hers can not be de­ni­ed, and Ite­ra­ti­on X uses a va­ri­ant of it in the­ir cyber­ne­tic en­han­ce­ment prog­rams. The ma­ge in qu­es­ti­on ex­tends the bo­nes in her fin­gers thro­ugh the skin, har­dens them in­to ste­el-li­ke claws, and fu­els the re­sul­ting bla­des with Pri­me energy. The re­sult, a ga­un­t­let of bla­zing bla­des, is highly vul­gar, but very ef­fec­ti­ve in a knock-down drag-out fight.

    The claws enab­le the ma­ge to do her Strength+2 in ag­gra­va­ted da­ma­ge, with a dif­fi­culty of 6 on rolls to hit. The claws last for two turns per suc­cess sco­red and dra­in one Qu­in­tes­sen­ce from the ma­ge's supply with each suc­ces­sful stri­ke.

    Pygmalion's Pa­ra­digm (•••• Mat­ter, ••• Li­fe, •• Pri­me, •• Spi­rit): This ro­te was sup­po­sedly de­ve­lo­ped by the an­ci­ent ma­ge, Pygma­li­on, in an ef­fort to cre­ate anot­her be­ing who wo­uld un­der­s­tand his bi­zar­re con­cep­ti­on of Re­ality, Wor­king with ivory and gold, Pygma­li­on tran­s­for­med mat­ter in­to a re­cep­ti­ve ves­sel for a spi­rit-be­ing. The re­sult of Pygma­li­on's ex­pe­ri­ment was the fa­mi­li­ar he cal­led Ga­la­tea (see Bo­ok Thtee for ru­les de­ta­iling fa­mi­li­ars). Pygma­li­on is sa­id to ha­ve ori­gi­nal­ly in­ten­ded to cre­ate a who­le com­mu­nity of such fa­mi­li­ars, but be­ca­me so je­alo­usly pro­tec­ti­ve of Ga­la­tea that he co­uld not be­ar the tho­ught of any ot­her cre­atu­re dis­t­rac­ting him from the pro­fo­und link with Ga­la­tea. So­me ma­ges, ho­we­ver, ma­in­ta­in that Ga­la­tea so­on be­ca­me the do­mi­nant per­so­na­lity in the re­la­ti­on­s­hip, and simply told Pygma­li­on she wo­uld le­ave if he cre­ated anot­her go­lem. The­se ma­ges al­so in­sist that Pygma­li­on went in­to a sta­te of de­epest Qu­i­et when Ga­la­tea even­tu­al­ly ti­red of this re­ality. The truth is a mat­ter for de­ba­te, but le­gend cla­ims Pygma­li­on be­ca­me ex­t­ra­or­di­na­rily po­wer­ful fol­lo­wing Ga­la­tea's cre­ati­on,

    The num­ber of suc­ces­ses de­ter­mi­nes the ma­xi­mum fa­mi­li­ar po­wer le­vel the pre­pa­red body is ca­pab­le of hol­ding. The ma­ge is still li­mi­ted by his own ca­pa­bi­li­ti­es to at­tract a po­wer­ful fa­mi­li­ar, ho­we­ver. To cre­ate a fa­mi­li­ar out of li­ving flesh, see the Li­fe Sphe­re des­c­rip­ti­on.

    The Po­ison Ma­iden (•••• Li­fe): The Eut­ha­na­tos pi­one­ered this ro­te as one of the most in­si­di­o­us forms of as­sas­si­na­ti­on. Af­ter con­fer­ring im­mu­nity to a par­ti­cu­lar po­ison, the ma­ge then in­fu­ses the su­bj­ect with the to­xin, so much that it swe­ats from her po­res and co­mes out with each bre­ath. This lasts for a num­ber of months equ­al to the suc­ces­ses; fi­ve or mo­re suc­ces­ses ma­ke it per­ma­nent. Whi­le the ma­iden gi­ven to Ale­xan­der the Gre­at is the clas­sic exam­p­le, the su­bj­ect ne­edn't be a ma­iden, and the po­ison ne­edn't be bel­la­don­na, al­t­ho­ugh the Hol­low Ones who ha­ve le­ar­ned this ro­te find it stylish.

    Song of Or­p­he­us (•••• or ••••• Li­fe, •• Mat­ter, •• Pri­me, •• Ti­me, •• Spi­rit): Dre­am­s­pe­akers tell of Or­p­he­us, who so lo­ved his wi­fe Eur­y­di­ce that he jo­ur­ne­yed to the un­der­world to bring her back. Or­p­he­us fa­iled, but ot­her ma­ges ha­ve suc­ce­eded in this Ef­fect. The ma­ge must ha­ve the body on hand, res­to­re the frag­men­ted pat­tern, re­vi­vify the cor­p­se and sum­mon the spi­rit back to its mor­tal shell. Ho­we­ver, if the de­ath was not re­cent, it may be dif­fi­cult to con­tact the spi­rit, and the ma­ge may only suc­ce­ed in res­to­ring the body, but not re­tur­ning the so­ul.

    With the very re­cently de­ad (tho­se still re­cog­ni­zab­le and wit­ho­ut mis­sing parts), Pri­me is un­ne­ces­sary, whi­le tho­se ma­ges who wish to gi­ve a nasty (or won­der­ful) sur­p­ri­se to a vam­pi­re ha­ve fo­und no ne­ed for the Sphe­re of Spi­rit, as a vam­pi­re's spi­rit is al­re­ady the­re to re­vi­vify the cor­p­se (unless it has be­en sold or sto­len…). The Sphe­re of Ti­me is ne­eded only if the body is mis­sing, in which ca­se the fifth le­vel of Li­fe must be used, whi­le the se­cond le­vel of Mat­ter is ma­de un­ne­ces­sary. The dif­fi­culty of this ro­te of­ten de­pends mo­re upon the cir­cum­s­tan­ces than on the Sphe­res used. Al­so no­re that the re­vi­vi­fi­ca­ti­on might not be per­ma­nent. Stor­y­tel­lers can, and sho­uld, ma­ke this ro­te as dif­fi­cult as they li­ke.

    Entire Chro­nic­les can be ba­sed on at­tem­p­ting to use this ro­te suc­ces­sful­ly. Af­ter all, the­re are for­ces that at­tack ma­ges who at­tempt such im­pu­dent ma­gicks, and the­re can be very se­ve­re or bi­zar­re con­se­qu­en­ces for rna­ges who fa­il. (Re­mem­ber the Mon­key's Paw?)

    Call Forth the For­got­ten: (••••• Li­fe, •• Pri­me, •• Spi­rit): This ro­te was cre­ated ori­gi­nal­ly by the Ma­ra­uders, but has sin­ce ga­ined a cer­ta­in po­pu­la­rity among the Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges. Call Forth the For­got­ten al­lows a ma­ge to sum­mon forth a cre­atu­re of myth. Whi­le the be­ast is li­kely to be gra­te­ful for the sum­mons, the ma­ge has no con­t­rol over the mythic cre­atu­re, sa­ve de­ci­ding what type of cre­atu­re ap­pe­ars.

    While the­re is a ob­vi­o­us risk in­vol­ving Pa­ra­dox, the ma­ges ha­ve le­ar­ned rhat sum­mo­ning a dra­gon in­to this re­ality whi­le fig­h­ting the Tec­h­noc­racy is li­kely to at le­ast buy the ma­ge ti­me to es­ca­pe whi­le the Tec­h­noc­racy tri­es to res­to­re or­der. Each suc­cess on the roll al­lows the sum­mo­ned cre­atu­re to ma­in­ta­in its te­nu­o­us hold on re­ality for one turn.

    Spirit ma­gick sum­mons the (ho­pe­ful­ly!) ap­prop­ri­ate spi­rit from the Um­b­ra whi­le the Li­fe and Pri­me Sphe­res bu­ild the spi­rit a body to in­ha­bit. Wit­ho­ut For­ces or ot­her Sphe­res, the cre­atu­re has only physi­cal po­wers. A dra­gon, for exam­p­le, co­uld not fly or bre­at­he fi­re wit­ho­ut ad­di­ti­onal ma­gicks.

    Do Ro­tes

    If one se­eks to un­ra­vel his sen­sa­ti­on from the mesh in which it li­es ca­ught, he will find the charm of the thing to con­sist, I think, in ener­ge­tic rhythm.

    - Per­ci­val Lo­well, Oc­cult Japan

    Although the Akas­hic Brot­hers are the only mo­dern prac­ti­ti­oners of Do in its ori­gi­nal form, le­gend re­la­tes that on­ce all pe­op­le, Sle­epers and Awa­ke­ned ali­ke, prac­ti­ced Do- not as so­me spe­ci­ali­zed me­di­ta­ti­ve art, but simply as the Way in which they li­ved the­ir li­ves. This co­uld be con­si­de­red the Mythic Age of Asia. The he­ro­es of the­se ages de­mon­s­t­ra­te fe­ats not only of mar­ti­al pro­wess, but of physi­cal and men­tal su­per­he­ro­ics which co­uld only be con­si­de­red ma­gic­kal in this day and age. Tho­ugh this is ge­ne­ral­ly at­tri­bu­ted to prac­ti­ce of Do, the fab­ric of re­ality re­ma­ins far mo­re mu­tab­le in the Ori­ent. The Wes­tern ide­as of the Tec­h­noc­racy ca­me la­re to this part of the world, al­t­ho­ugh the­ir fo­un­da­ti­ons can be fo­und in the per­fec­ti­on et­hics of Chi­ne­se phi­lo­sophy.

    Miraculous po­wers ha­ve be­en at­tri­bu­ted to mar­ti­al art mas­ters. Ta­les of the­ir fe­ats ha­ve pas­sed thro­ugh his­tory vir­tu­al­ly unal­te­red and une­xag­ge­ra­ted, pre­ser­ved in li­te­ra­tu­re, dan­ce, and most no­tably, in the evo­lu­ti­on of Chi­ne­se stre­et ope­ra in­to the mo­dern mar­ti­al arts mo­vie. Al­t­ho­ugh wes­tern audi­en­ces tend to con­si­der the­se films ab­surd, they may be ta­ken as ac­cu­ra­te rep­re­sen­ta­ti­ons of what an ad­van­ced Akas­hic Brot­her may be ca­pab­le of in com­bat.

    The ma­gic­kal Ef­fects be­low can be used only with cer­ta­in Do ma­ne­uvers. Un­li­ke spe­ci­al ma­ne­uvers (Bo­ok Three), the­se po­wers are True Ma­gick, and are su­bj­ect to the usu­al ru­les of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce and Pa­ra­dox. Most are ex­t­re­mely vul­gar, but qu­ite tra­di­ti­onal. De­pen­ding on the cir­cum­s­tan­ces, the Stor­y­tel­ler may con­si­der many flam­bo­yant Ef­fects co­in­ci­den­tal if the set­ting is ap­prop­ri­ate (a mar­ti­al arts to­ur­na­ment, re­mo­te Chi­ne­se vil­la­ge, la­te­night mo­vie ho­use, etc,).

    Dragon Fist (••• Li­fe, •• Pri­me, so­me­ti­mes ••• For­ces). Re­qu­ired Ma­ne­uver: Punch or Kick: This ro­te is cre­di­ted to Sla­yer D, who sto­od re­so­lu­te aga­inst a pla­gue of vam­pi­res that swept ac­ross his lands. Re­ali­zing that his Do skills did lit­tle las­ting harm to the un­de­ad, Sla­yer D fo­cu­sed his Chi in­to his hands and fe­et, ma­king them bla­ze with con­cen­t­ra­ted po­wer which bur­ned the scre­aming blo­od­suc­kers,

    By chan­ne­ling Pri­me Chi be­hind his blows, the ma­ge may do ag­gra­va­ted da­ma­ge with his Do at­tacks. A va­ri­ant on this tec­h­ni­que ca­uses the ma­ge's fists to li­te­ral­ly burst in­to fla­me, bur­ning his tar­get, but not him­self. This vul­gar at­tack al­lows the ma­ge to add an ex­t­ra die to his da­ma­ge. Both at­tacks ex­pend one Qu­in­tes­sen­ce for every blow that lands, as the energy dis­c­har­ges aga­inst the tar­get.

    Screech of the Owl (••• Mind, ••• En­t­ropy). Re­qu­ired Ma­ne­uver: Ki­ai: Much of the phi­lo­sophy of mar­ti­al arts in­vol­ves avo­iding physi­cal con­f­lict al­to­get­her, and few ha­ve em­bo­di­ed this prin­cip­le bet­ter than Nic­hi­ba, who wal­ked thro­ugh thir­ty-six bat­tles and se­ven­ty-two per­so­nal chal­len­ges wit­ho­ut ever stri­king a blow.

    By aug­men­ting his Chi in this way, the Brot­her can psycho­lo­gi­cal­ly stun a num­ber of op­po­nents equ­al to his Sta­mi­na + In­ti­mi­da­ti­on, ren­de­ring them in­ca­pab­le of ac­ti­on for a num­ber of turns equ­al to his suc­ces­ses.

    Piercing Cry (••• Mat­ter, ••• En­t­ropy). Re­qu­ired Ma­ne­uver: Ki­ai: Fol­k­ta­les tell of Cheng Sa, The Aven­ging Wo­od­cut­ter, who wo­uld of­fer to split logs in ex­c­han­ge for mil­let, then carry the wo­od in­to the fo­rest and emit a se­ri­es of pi­er­cing cri­es. Af­ter­ward, the as­sem­b­led crowd wo­uld mar­vel at the stac­ked cor­d­wo­od and won­der how he did it all wit­ho­ut an axe.

    By aug­men­ting his Chi in this way, the Brot­her can shat­ter obj­ects. All obj­ects are not af­fec­ted equ­al­ly; do­ub­le the suc­ces­ses of the ma­gic­kal ef­fect roll to de­ter­mi­ne the ef­fec­ti­ve Strength to shat­ter. One suc­cess al­lows the Brot­her to bre­ak glass, whi­le three or fo­ur may be ne­eded to crack a wall or he­avy do­or.

    Long Fist (•••• Cor­res­pon­den­ce, •• Pri­me). Re­qu­ired Ma­ne­uver: Punch: A punch is no lon­ger me­rely the im­pact which can be de­li­ve­red at arm's length, but may be pro­j­ec­ted thro­ugh spa­ce be­yond the body's li­mits. As­tu­te mi­li­tary scho­lars ha­ve no­ted that the Sha­olin Mo­nas­tery did not fall to the Man­c­hu army un­til Ge­ne­ral Kwai Chi­en or­de­red his tro­ops to at­tack in a stag­ge­red for­ma­ti­on in­s­te­ad of the­ir tra­di­ti­onal stra­ig­ht-li­ne mar­c­hing or­der.

    By chan­ne­ling her Chi for­ce in­to her punch, the Brot­her can stri­ke one ad­di­ti­onal tar­get per suc­cess. This ro­te do­es nor­mal For­ce da­ma­ge (suc­ces­ses ti­mes 3), not the Brot­her's usu­al punch da­ma­ge. Long Fist may al­so be used to punch a tar­get at a dis­tan­ce (ran­ge equ­als 3 yards per le­vel of Do), or to punch "thro­ugh" an in­ter­ve­ning obj­ect or per­son, such as walls, car do­ors, lo­ved ones, etc., wit­ho­ut dis­tur­bing it/t­hem (+2 dif­fi­culty). The punch can only tra­vel in a stra­ight li­ne, so mul­tip­le tar­gets must be si­tu­ated di­rectly be­hind one anot­her.

    Flying Dra­gon Kick (•••• For­ces, • Cor­res­pon­den­ce). Re­qu­ired Ma­ne­uver: Flying Kick: The Sto­ne Sut­ra re­la­tes that Yu Fong ini­ti­ated this ma­ne­uver from his mo­nas­tery in the Hi­ma­la­yas to suc­ces­sful­ly at­tract the at­ten­ti­on of Wao Mu Ling when that ve­ne­rab­le her­mit did emer­ge from the Thrang grot­to at Mo­unt Ta­is­han, over one hun­d­red and eight mi­les away, for his ye­arly sip of wa­ter and bre­ath of air. This may, of co­ur­se, be a slight exag­ge­ra­ti­on…

    The Brot­her le­aps in­to the air for a nor­mal le­aping kick, and re­ma­ins in flight un­til tar­get is re­ac­hed, even if it in­vol­ves se­ve­ral mi­nu­tes of cross-co­untry tra­vel, so long as the tar­get was in sight when the kick be­gan and the ma­ge tra­vels in a stra­ight li­ne. Da­ma­ge is equ­al to the num­ber of suc­ces­ses ti­mes 3. Yes, this is vul­gar as hell.

    Shout, if you will, but that just won't do. I, for one, wo­uld rat­her fol­low sof­ter op­ti­ons

    -Jethro Tull, "Flying Co­lo­urs"

    The Ta­lis­mans gi­ven he­re are bu­ilt ac­cor­ding to the new ru­les gi­ven in Bo­ok Three, The Qu­in­tes­sen­ce amo­unts lis­ted are the ma­xi­mum the item can con­ta­in; "fo­und" Ta­lis­mans may ha­ve much less. Stor­y­tel­lers are ad­vi­sed to tre­ad lightly with Ta­lis­mans; re­mem­ber that they are ti­ed to spe­ci­fic Ef­fects, not to ge­ne­ral Sphe­re ma­gicks. Pla­yers are ad­vi­sed to use Ta­lis­mans as stor­y­tel­ling de­vi­ces, not wor­ld-des­t­ro­yers.

    Talismans are much mo­re than "ro­tes-in-a-box"; they are obj­ects im­bu­ed with the Pri­me es­sen­ce of cre­ati­on and sha­ped by scul­p­ted re­ality. They are not com­mon, even among the Tec­h­noc­racy. Ma­ges res­pect Ta­lis­mans as the pro­duct of hard work, vi­si­on and po­wer. The­se ma­gic­kal to­ols are ne­ver tre­ated lightly.

    The num­bers of dots re­fer to a ge­ne­ral ran­king of the Ta­lis­man's po­wer, not the to­tal po­int cost for ow­ning one. Stor­y­tel­lers who wish to cal­cu­la­te the po­int cost of a Ta­lis­man are re­fer­red to pg. 110 of Bo­ok Three.

    •• Gol­den Wal­nut

    Arete 3, Qu­in­tes­sen­ce 10

    This Ta­lis­man is a lar­ge wal­nut with a rich am­ber co­lo­ring that shi­nes in strong lig­h­ting. When a ma­ge grasps the wal­nut tightly in her hand and fo­cu­ses her will upon an in­di­vi­du­al plant, she can call upon the po­wers of li­fe to ex­t­ra­po­la­te the growth mec­ha­nism of that plant. The sur­fa­ce are­as of the plant, most no­tably le­aves and ro­ots, be­co­me gor­ged with Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, and are ab­le to draw in nut­ri­ents much fas­ter than nor­mal­ly pos­sib­le. Cells rep­li­ca­te at a gre­atly in­c­re­ased spe­ed.

    The Ver­be­na tend to uti­li­ze Gol­den Wal­nuts the mor­ning or eve­ning be­fo­re mystick ce­re­mo­ni­es to in­su­re that flo­we­ring plants are in blo­om. They al­so call upon the­se Ta­lis­mans' po­wers to ma­ke plants yi­eld gre­ater har­vests, in­c­re­asing both the num­ber of suc­ces­sful blo­oms and the si­ze of the in­di­vi­du­al fru­its, ve­ge­tab­les, etc. A ma­ge fo­cu­sing his will for a mar­ret of mi­nu­tes can ca­use a se­ed to spro­ut, pass thro­ugh the dan­ge­ro­us "days" of se­ed­ling growth and stren­g­t­hen in­to a he­althy plant that will su­rely re­ach adul­t­ho­od. Tre­es can be ma­de to spro­ut new bran­c­hes, and fast gro­wing plants li­ke bam­boo can be ma­de to grow se­ve­ral fe­et ne­arly in­s­tantly.

    •• Lycan­t­h­ros­cope

    Arete 3, Qu­in­tes­sen­ce 15

    The Lycan­t­h­ros­co­pe was cre­ated to track down we­re­wol­ves, mo­re po­li­tely ter­med "Ga­rou." Using the Sphe­res of Li­fe and Spi­rit to lo­ok for known tra­its of we­re­wol­ves, the Lycan­t­h­ros­co­pe shows hig­her re­adings in the ge­ne­ral di­rec­ti­on of the ne­arest we­re­wolf. The­re is a me­ter on the box with a ne­ed­le that in­di­ca­tes in­ten­sity and a flas­hing light that warns as the sci­en­tist gets dan­ge­ro­usly clo­se to the Ga­rou in qu­es­ti­on. Va­ri­ants exist for de­tec­ting vam­pi­res, wra­iths and fa­eri­es.

    This de­vi­ce al­lows an ad­di­ti­onal + 2 di­ce to any Per­cep­ti­on + Awa­re­ness rolls used to de­tect the be­ing in qu­es­ti­on.

    •• Pra­yer Be­ads

    Arete 4, Qu­in­tes­sen­ce 20

    The Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od are known most for the­ir de­vas­ta­ting mar­ti­al arts and su­pe­ri­or po­wers of the mind. Yet the Brot­her­ho­od has al­ways be­en an or­ga­ni­za­ti­on of pe­ace. Thro­ug­ho­ut his­tory, Adepts of the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od ha­ve worn such Ta­lis­mans in or­der to ke­ep pe­ace aro­und them.

    The Pra­yer Be­ads ge­ne­ra­te pe­ace by ra­di­ating tho­ughts of se­re­nity; this is the se­cond rank of the Mind Sphe­re at work pro­j­ec­ting tho­ughts in­to ot­her pe­op­les' minds. Whi­le the Brot­her clut­c­hes the be­ads, he is al­so ab­le to sen­se all ani­mal li­fe in the sur­ro­un­ding area via the Li­fe Sphe­re. If the Brot­her ce­ases all mo­ti­on, most ani­mals will le­ave him com­p­le­tely alo­ne (tho­ugh a hungry ti­ger will not be tur­ned away!). The Brot­her­ho­od wis­hes ever­yo­ne to go thro­ugh the­ir na­tu­ral flow, but ca­using so­me­one to be pe­ace­ful is a bet­ter al­ter­na­ti­ve than using Do to so­undly tro­un­ce so­me­one or so­met­hing in­to non-ag­gres­si­on.

    ••• Cord of Three Winds

    Arete 4, Qu­in­tes­sen­ce 20

    With this tra­di­ti­onal Ver­be­na ma­gick, a par­ti­cu­lar spe­ci­alist, cal­led a "storm wi­fe," uses a te­aket­tle in pla­ce of a ca­ul­d­ron and whis­t­les up a wind, bin­ding a wind spi­rit in­to a knot­ted cord. When the cord is un­do­ne, the spi­rit is re­le­ased and will blow a wind from wha­te­ver di­rec­ti­on the ma­ge sum­mons. Tra­di­ri­onal­ly, the­se cords will ha­ve three knots, the first hol­ding a gen­t­le west wind, the se­cond hol­ding a stron­ger east wind, and the third hol­ding a fu­ri­o­us north wind.

    ••• Fan of Kang Wu

    Arete 5, Qu­in­tes­sen­ce 25

    An avid war­ri­or-ma­ge, Kang Wu, had a ter­rib­le re­pu­ta­ti­on as a tro­ub­le­ma­ker. In or­der to con­ce­al his we­aponry, Kang Wu had a Ta­lis­man craf­ted to su­it his ne­eds. This sim­p­le-lo­oking silk fan has the po­wer of the third rank of the Sphe­re of Mat­ter. Thro­ugh the use of the Scul­p­tu­re Ef­fect, Kang Wu was ab­le to con­vert the fan in­to any me­lee we­apon he co­uld ima­gi­ne. In ad­di­ti­on, the fan has the po­wer of the se­cond rank of the Sphe­re of For­ce; the fan can be­co­me mag­ne­ti­cal­ly at­trac­ti­ve or re­pul­si­ve. The fan's fi­nal pro­perty is to sen­se Qu­in­tes­sen­ce with the first rank of the Sphe­re of Pri­me.

    During long sus­ta­ined bat­tles, Kang Wu wo­uld not only con­vert the fan from one we­apon in­to anot­her, but wo­uld al­so uti­li­ze it to find out what items the enemy ma­ge pos­ses­sed that we­re fil­led with Qu­in­tes­sen­ce (Ta­lis­man, fe­tis­hes, Tass, etc.). On­ce lo­ca­ted, Kang Wu wo­uld pro­ce­ed to re­mo­ve the­se obj­ects from the op­po­nent. He de­fe­ated many an un­wary ma­ge in this man­ner.

    ••• Glas­ses of Spe­ed Re­ading

    Arete 3, Qu­in­tes­sen­ce 15

    Wear this Ta­lis­man whi­le re­ading and im­me­di­ately be­gin to ab­sorb in­for­ma­ti­on. The mind is roc­ked with the im­pul­se to me­mo­ri­ze, in­for­ma­ti­on is dum­ped in­to the bra­in pa­rag­raph by pa­rag­raph rat­her than word for word, and ti­me is di­la­ted so an en­ti­re bo­ok can be re­ad in next to no ti­me.

    Size of the bo­ok and the le­vel of com­p­le­xity of in­for­ma­ti­on will ra­te the dif­fi­culty for com­p­re­hen­si­on and length of ti­me ne­ces­sary to "re­ad" the text.

    ••• Her­bal Plas­ter of the An­ci­ents

    Arete 3, Qu­in­tes­sen­ce 15

    These spe­ci­al­ly-tre­ated pi­eces of cloth we­re de­ve­lo­ped by the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od to he­al them­sel­ves qu­ickly in ti­mes of di­re emer­gency. The Ta­lis­man is ac­ti­va­ted as it is ap­pli­ed di­rectly on­to a wo­und. First, the Plas­ter anal­y­zes the wo­un­ded area and fi­gu­res out what ne­eds to be do­ne to cu­re the prob­lem. Next, the Sphe­re of Pri­me chan­nels energy in­to the wo­un­ded area. As the wo­und be­gins to co­ales­ce with Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, Li­fe is used aga­in to re­align the per­son's Li­fe Pat­tern to its na­tu­ral sta­te.

    ••• Mas­ter Re­mo­te

    Arete 4, Qu­in­tes­sen­ce 20

    This Ta­lis­man is cre­ated to run any type of mac­hi­nery that can be ac­ti­va­ted by re­mo­te con­t­rol. The Ta­lis­man lo­ca­tes the met­hod of in­for­ma­ti­on tran­s­mis­si­on- elec­t­ri­cal, elec­t­ro­mag­ne­tic, etc.- and cre­ates sig­nals to ac­ti­va­te the de­vi­ce.

    The let­te­ring on the top of the re­mo­te mu­ta­tes as the Ta­lis­man is ac­ti­va­ted to la­bel every fun­c­ti­on ava­ilab­le on the ac­ces­sed de­vi­ce.

    ••• To­nics and Po­ti­ons

    Arete n/a, Qu­in­tes­sen­ce n/a

    These her­bal or al­c­he­mi­cal mix­tu­res ha­ve a va­ri­ety of Ef­fects, use­ful for one use each. The most com­mon are me­di­ci­nes which pre­vent one di­se­ase or anot­her. Mo­re use­ful are tho­se which cu­re di­se­ases. The­re are al­so to­nics that ra­ise at­tri­bu­tes tem­po­ra­rily. Most, for sa­fety's sa­ke, con­ta­in co­in­ci­den­tal ma­gi­cal Ef­fects, as the­se eli­xirs may be used by Sle­epers as well as the Awa­ke­ned. One Li­fe Ef­fect, up to the third Rank, can be con­ta­ined wit­hin a po­ti­on.

    ••• Wolf Link

    Arete 4, Qu­in­tes­sen­ce 20

    The Ta­lis­man al­lows the ma­ge ta­ke on the form of a wolf. As her Li­fe Pat­tern is mo­du­la­ted to be­co­me a wolf, so too are her tho­ught pro­ces­ses. This Ef­fect will trick wol­ves and un­wary Kin­d­red or Ga­rou as the ma­ge is, for all prac­ti­cal pur­po­ses, a wolf. The Ta­lis­man blends in with the wolf-form du­ring tran­s­for­ma­ti­on; ho­we­ver, no clot­hing or ot­her items will be tran­s­for­med along with the ma­ge.

    •••• Car­te Blan­c­he

    Arete 5, Qu­in­tes­sen­ce 25

    This is one of the most pri­zed Ta­lis­mans of the Vir­tu­al Adepts, tho­ugh si­mi­lar obj­ects ha­ve be­en ma­de by ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons down thro­ugh the ages. The Car­te Blan­c­he is a small whi­te cre­dit card blank with a mag­ne­tic strip on the back. When in­ser­ted in­to any cash mac­hi­ne, pay po­int, elec­t­ro­nic lock or such, it will act as a ske­le­ton key, prompt the mac­hi­ne to gre­et John or Jane Doe, gi­ve him or her wha­te­ver cash is ava­ilab­le, up to the re­gu­lar tran­sac­ti­on li­mit, or wha­te­ver ac­cess is usu­al­ly per­mis­sib­le, and then era­se the ope­ra­ti­on from the mac­hi­ne's log.

    When gi­ven to a li­ving be­ing, Car­te Blan­c­he will ap­pe­ar as a dri­ver's li­cen­se, lib­rary card, or wha­te­ver form of iden­ti­fi­ca­ti­on the re­ci­pi­ent ex­pects, sho­wing the na­me of who­ever the ma­ge says he or she is. Car­te Blan­c­he it­self has an Ar­ca­ne of 5 for pur­po­ses of pe­op­le re­mem­be­ring the na­me on it, tho­ugh it will not pro­tect the ma­ge's fa­ce. Spen­ding one po­int of Qu­in­tes­sen­ce will al­low the card to fun­c­ti­on for a sce­ne.

    •••• Hand of Glory

    Arete 5, Qu­in­tes­sen­ce 25

    One of the most ce­leb­ra­ted of me­di­eval Ta­lis­mans, the Hand of Glory is al­so among the most po­tent. The Ta­lis­man is a mum­mi­fi­ed hand that has be­en ta­ken from a han­ged man and then so­aked in va­ri­o­us herbs, re­sins and the fat of a mur­de­red man. The Hand is lit whi­le the fol­lo­wing charm is sa­id: "Hand of Glory, Hand of Glory! Let tho­se who are as­le­ep, be as­le­ep. Let tho­se who are awa­ke, be awa­ke." The Hand then be­co­mes a fi­ve-fin­ge­red can­de­lab­ra of blue fla­me; the light thus shed hig­h­lights pas­sa­ges of ma­gic­kal works be­ing stu­di­ed, whi­le ke­eping the rna­ge from fal­ling as­le­ep du­ring such dry re­ading, and pre­ven­ting the wa­king (and sub­se­qu­ent in­ter­rup­ti­ons) of ot­hers in the sa­me ho­use who might be dis­tur­bed by mid­night chan­tings.

    The last Ef­fect of the Hand of Glory is, ho­we­ver, the most fa­mo­us and po­tent: any who see the bur­ning hand will be pa­ral­y­zed by fas­ci­na­ti­on un­til the vi­ew is ob­s­cu­red or the Hand is ex­tin­gu­is­hed. Ma­ges, vam­pi­res and ot­her Awa­ke­ned cre­atu­res may spend a Wil­lpo­wer po­int to bre­ak this fas­ci­na­ti­on, but re­gu­lar mor­tals are sna­red by the Hand's ma­gi­cal light. The only sub­s­tan­ce which will ex­tin­gu­ish this grisly Ta­lis­man on­ce it's lit is milk. (The symbo­lism of this can be ex­p­la­ined by the Ver­be­na and Nep­han­di who cre­ate the­se ar­ti­facts.)

    •••• Ni­ne-Dra­gon Tat­to­os

    Arete 5, Qu­in­tes­sen­ce 30

    Developed by the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od (with va­ri­ati­ons by the Cult of Ec­s­tasy and Dre­am­s­pe­akers), this Ta­lis­man is for­med and en­do­wed with its po­wer di­rectly on the sur­fa­ce of an Adept's skin thro­ugh a mystic­kal tat­to­o­ing pro­cess known to a cho­sen few. Tho­ugh ru­mor has it that the tat­to­os still pos­sess the­ir po­wer af­ter a Brot­her's de­ath, few wo­uld da­re of­fend the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od by at­tem­p­ting to use the skin of a Brot­her as a Ta­lis­man.

    As the tat­to­o­ing inks are im­p­reg­na­ted in­to the Brot­her's skin, the Pat­terns that ma­ke up the po­wers in­he­rent in spe­ci­fic Sphe­res of ma­gick are wo­ven in­to the in­di­vi­du­al's flesh. The­se tat­to­os are not stag­nant, but mo­ve abo­ut the body in very slow re­pe­ti­ti­ve se­qu­en­ces when ac­ti­va­ted. The tat­to­os work to sen­se li­fe in the ge­ne­ral sur­ro­un­dings, whet­her it is in the physi­cal Re­alm by me­ans of the Li­fe Sphe­re or in the Um­b­ra by the Sphe­re of Spi­rit. The three tat­to­os of red dra­gons ma­ke the­ir way to the Brot­her's arms and fa­ce. The dra­gons, now em­b­la­zo­ned on each fo­re­arm, be­gin to ro­ar and flick the­ir ton­gu­es out in the di­rec­ti­on of sen­sed li­fe forms. If the sen­sed cre­atu­re is wit­hin the Re­alm, the dra­gons' wings are held tight aga­inst the body. If the cre­atu­re is wit­hin the Um­b­ra, the dra­gon will un­furl its wings. Typi­cal­ly, the dra­gon on the right arm res­ponds to the Tel­lu­ri­an Re­alm, whi­le the one on the left res­ponds to the Um­b­ra.

    The gre­en dra­gon tat­to­os help the Brot­her to ma­in­ta­in or­der abo­ut him­self by lo­we­ring the ra­te of En­t­ropy in the sur­ro­und ing area. One gre­en dra­gon do­mi­na­tes the Brot­her's back with wings out­s­t­ret­c­hed, whi­le the se­cond li­ke­wi­se fills the chest. The third gre­en dra­gon darts abo­ut the body and spits out fi­re at any so­ur­ce of en­t­ropy. The Brot­her me­rely out­s­t­ret­c­hes his arm to­ward En­t­ro­pic evenrs, and the third gre­en dra­gon's use of the Sphe­re of En­t­ropy will in­c­re­ase the amo­unt of or­der pre­sent (Con­t­rol Ran­dom­ness).

    The three whi­te dra­gon tat­to­os fun­c­ti­on to open a ga­te­way in­to the Um­b­ra thro­ugh which the Brot­her can pass. Tho­se dra­gons pos­sess the know­led­ge of the third rank of the Spi­rit Sphe­re and enab­le the Brot­her to step in­to the Um­b­ra on­ce they ha­ve mig­ra­ted as a gro­up on­to the Brot­her's chest. With the­ir ta­ils wrap­ped to­get­her and claws ex­ten­ded, they slowly shred the­ir way thro­ugh the Ga­un­t­let and in­to the Um­b­ra.

    •••• Tho­ught Tran­s­fe­ren­ce De­vi­ce

    Arete 6, Qu­in­tes­sen­ce 30

    This lar­ge Ta­lis­man ta­kes up abo­ut half a ro­om. It has two lar­ge se­ats and me­tal caps that fit over the two su­bj­ects' he­ads. As the Ta­lis­man is ac­ti­va­ted, the bra­ins of the two su­bj­ects are li­te­ral­ly te­le­por­ted via the Cor­res­pon­den­ce Sphe­re. The bra­ins are swit­c­hed. The Li­fe Pat­tern of each su­bj­ect is al­te­red. Even tho­ugh each su­bj­ect's bra­in is in the ot­her su­bj­ect's body, each can still fun­c­ti­on as if he was fa­mi­li­ar with the mo­ti­ons of the ot­her per­son's body.

    Talents are spe­ci­fic to the body in qu­es­ti­on, so a per­son with a low Brawl skill can ga­in Braw­ling abi­li­ti­es by put­ting his mind in­to a pro­fes­si­onal bo­xer's body. Skills and Know­led­ges, ho­we­ver, re­qu­ire use of the mind.

    This Ef­fect only lasts for a day be­fo­re the body will be­gin to re­j­ect the ali­en bra­in.

    I'm yo­ur lit­tle fri­end

    I'm not yo­ur only fri­end

    But I'm yo­ur lit­tle glo­wing fri­end

    But re­al­ly I'm not ac­tu­al­ly yo­ur fri­end

    But I am…

    - They MIGHT Be Gi­ants, "Bir­d­ho­use in Yo­ur So­ul"

    These com­pu­ters exem­p­lify the Tri­nary com­pu­ters of the Vir­tu­al Adepts. The­se com­pu­ters are uni­que fo­ci, not Ta­lis­mans, al­t­ho­ugh ma­gick go­es in­to the­ir cre­ati­on. Tri­nary decks can sto­re dow­n­lo­aded ro­tes for qu­ick use la­ter. Nor­mal com­pu­ters can do this, but only with ro­tes of the first or se­cond Sphe­re. Tho­ugh ot­her ma­ges may use Tri­nary com­pu­ters, it's fa­irly dif­fi­cult (an ad­di­ti­onal + 2 to + 4 to dif­fi­cul­ti­es) due to the com­p­le­xity of the mac­hi­nes. Vir­tu­al Adepts, it sho­uld be no­ted, are very pos­ses­si­ve of the­ir Tri­nary decks!

    Alpha Se­ri­es: "The First Na­me in Com­pu­ters"

    Alpha Com­pu­ting cre­ates Tri­nary com­pu­ters for con­nec­ted Vir­tu­al Adepts. The­ir out­put, ob­vi­o­usly, is qu­ite low, and pri­ces are high, but the­ir qu­ality is su­perb. Al­p­ha's cur­rent high-end mo­del, the Al­p­ha IX, has a Kev­lar co­ating that al­lows it to do­ub­le as an emer­gency shi­eld and pro­tects it from most da­ma­ge. The IX has a bu­ilt-in mo­dem ab­le to tran­s­mit at spe­eds well be­yond 14.4s, Se­ve­ral gi­gab­y­tes of sto­ra­ge spa­ce re­si­de in the bri­ef­ca­se-si­zed mac­hi­ne. Al­so, Al­p­has ha­ve mul­tip­le pro­ces­sors. Each con­ta­ins hun­d­reds of megs of me­mory, ma­king them ab­le to do ama­zing mul­ti­tas­king. They al­so ha­ve tre­men­do­us pro­ces­sing spe­eds. The Al­p­ha IX may re­ad and wri­te CDs as well as ac­cess the mo­re com­mon 5 1/4" and 3 1/2" discs, and can tran­s­la­te every type of mun­da­ne com­pu­ter lan­gu­age.

    An in­ter­nal po­wer supply al­lows the Al­p­ha IX to fun­c­ti­on for days (or at le­ast un­til a ma­ge bot­c­hes his Com­pu­ter roll). Se­ve­ral se­ri­al ports and bu­ilt-in con­nec­ti­ons let the Al­p­ha in­ter­fa­ce with ne­arly any ot­her system. Al­p­has al­so con­ta­in full mul­ti-me­dia systems, and ha­ve bu­ilt-in scan­ners.

    The key re­ason for Al­p­ha's suc­cess is re­li­abi­lity. Al­p­has may run out of po­wer, but they ne­ver bre­ak down. On­ce a ma­ge owns an Al­p­ha, she has a fo­cus fo­re­ver.

    Elite Se­ri­es: "The Na­me Says It All"

    Second only to Al­p­has in po­pu­la­rity, the Eli­te Se­ri­es lap­tops ha­ve li­mi­ted ar­ti­fi­ci­al in­tel­li­gen­ce, and all co­me with Net On-Li­ne Pac­ka­ges. As an ad­di­ti­onal fe­atu­re, two kni­ves are hid­den on the un­der­si­de of the com­pu­ter, so the Adept is ne­ver unar­med.

    Elites res­pond to the­ir user's vo­ice com­mands and do not ha­ve a tra­di­ti­onal key­pad. Li­ke the Al­p­has, they con­ta­in gi­gab­y­tes of sto­ra­ge spa­ce and tre­men­do­us me­mory. They are al­so full mul­ti-me­dia mac­hi­nes with the ca­pa­bi­lity of do­ub­ling as cel­lu­lar pho­nes. The Eli­te even con­ta­ins its own an­s­we­ring mac­hi­ne. Eli­tes may con­nect to al­most any in­ter­fa­ce, and they may re­ad/w­ri­te any type of sto­ra­ge de­vi­ce, even CDs. Eli­tes co­me with he­ad­p­ho­nes and ha­ve a fi­ve-CD hol­der for audio CDs as well.

    As an op­ti­on, the Stor­y­tel­ler may al­low the AI wit­hin an Eli­te com­pu­ter to ha­ve po­ints in va­ri­o­us Know­led­ges. If a pla­yer de­si­res this type of AI, she must spend one Bac­k­g­ro­und po­int per Know­led­ge po­int in the com­pu­ter. The po­ints add to the ma­ge's own sco­re, but the ma­ge's to­tal Know­led­ge sco­re may not ex­ce­ed 5.

    Elites suf­fer from only one ma­j­or draw­back: they bre­ak re­la­ti­vely easily. If a ma­ge bot­c­hes a com­pu­ter roll whi­le using an Eli­te, the mac­hi­ne bre­aks down. An ex­ten­ded In­tel­li­gen­ce + Tec­h­no­logy roll (dif­fi­culty 8, 10 suc­ces­ses) must be ma­de to get it ope­ra­ting aga­in. A botch at any po­int on this roll me­ans that the ma­ge ne­eds at le­ast a day of work to re­pa­ir her com­pu­ter. No­net­he­less, Eli­tes re­ma­in po­pu­lar; so­me Adepts cla­im that "if you're go­od, you don't mind li­ving on the ed­ge." To get an Eli­te, po­ten­ti­al cus­to­mers must per­form a ser­vi­ce for the Eli­te Ca­bal, So­me say the­se ser­vi­ces in­c­lu­de ter­ro­rist-st­y­le at­tacks on Al­p­ha Com­pu­ting.

    Grandmaster Com­pu­ter: "The Key to Know­led­ge"

    The Gran­d­mas­ter se­ri­es of com­pu­ters are pro­bably on the­ir way out with the Adepts. They are the Tri­na­ri­es that aren't com­p­le­tely por­tab­le. Gran­d­mas­ters are ba­rely lug­gab­le mac­hi­nes, we­ig­hing aro­und 25 po­unds. The mac­hi­ne folds in­to a lar­ge bri­ef­ca­se. So­me Adepts joke that Gran­d­mas­ters al­so ma­ke gre­at bas­hing we­apons.

    A Chantry of Vir­tu­al Adepts ma­nu­fac­tu­res two types of Gran­d­mas­ters: the Whi­te Knight and the Gran­d­mas­ter- 1000. The Whi­te Knight has se­ve­ral te­rab­y­tes of sto­ra­ge spa­ce, ma­king it lar­ger than the Al­p­has, and it per­forms al­most all of the sa­me fun­c­ti­ons as the Al­p­ha IX. Tho­ugh it do­esn't in­ter­fa­ce ne­arly as well with ot­her mac­hi­nes and do­esn't ha­ve the Kev­lar co­ating, the Whi­te Knight do­es con­ta­in a fast high-qu­ality co­lor la­ser prin­ter. The Gran­d­mas­ter-1000 has the sa­me fe­atu­res as a Whi­te Knight, with one ad­di­ti­onal fun­c­ti­on. Each Gran­d­mas­ter-1000 con­ta­ins a le­vel 4 Ta­lis­man, a Ma­gic­kal Mac­ro Key­bo­ard (Are­te 7, Qu­in­tes­sen­ce 30). The user pre­pa­res a ma­gic­ka! Ef­fect and casts it in­to the bo­ard. He then de­sig­na­tes a sin­g­le key or se­qu­en­ce of keys to press to re­le­ase the ma­gick. When the ma­ge uses the sto­red ma­gicks, then Pa­ra­dox is de­ter­mi­ned.

    Sadly, the Gran­d­mas­ter se­ri­es has the sa­me bre­ak­down prob­lems as the Eli­tes. In re­cent ye­ars, so­me ma­ges ha­ve re­tur­ned Gran­d­mas­ter-1000 mo­dels be­ca­use "they we­ren't co­ol eno­ugh."

    Magical systems are highly ela­bo­ra­ted me­tap­hors, not truths…. The va­lue of ma­gi­cal me­tap­hors is that thro­ugh them we iden­tify our­sel­ves and con­nect with lar­ger for­ces… But if we use them for glib ex­p­la­na­ti­ons and che­ap ca­te­go­ri­za­ti­ons, they nar­row the mind in­s­te­ad of ex­pan­ding it and re­du­ce ex­pe­ri­en­ce to a set of for­mu­las that se­pa­ra­te us from each ot­her and our own po­wer.

    - Star­hawk, The Spi­ral Dan­ce

    Mage is a ga­me of sto­ri­es, of tri­als fa­ced and cho­ices ma­de. Tho­ugh ele­ments of the­se ta­les, li­ke Qu­in­tes­sen­ce or the gu­iding Ava­tar, re­ma­in ab­s­t­ract, the ma­ges de­pen­ding on them fe­el the for­ce of the in­de­fi­nab­le every day of the­ir li­ves.

    Is the Ava­tar the so­ul, the mind, the self or so­met­hing el­se? Do­es the Se­eking ta­ke one in­to the spi­rit Re­alms, the in­ner self or anot­her re­ality en­ti­rely? Do­es Qu­in­tes­sen­ce form the fo­un­da­ti­ons of Li­fe, or do­es it spring from Li­fe? The most en­lig­h­te­ned ma­ges ha­ve wres­t­led with the­se qu­es­ti­ons for cen­tu­ri­es and se­em no clo­ser to re­al an­s­wers. Many ar­gue that to qu­an­tify such ide­as, set­ting them in sto­ne, wo­uld press the ma­gic­kal es­sen­ce from them, li­ke Vo­id En­gi­ne­ers map­ping the ma­gick from hid­den pla­ces. Bet­ter, then, to del­ve in­to con­cepts li­ke Pa­ra­dox or the Se­eking in fab­les and re­ad the les­sons bet­we­en the li­nes than to try to ham­mer them in­to dry text. The hard crust of fan­tasy se­ems mo­re nur­tu­ring, in the long run, than dry and crum­b­ling facts.

    Stories pro­vi­de gu­ide­posts to the Path of the Awa­ke­ned. Fol­low with an open mind and a qu­es­ting he­art.

    … Yo­ur pi­o­us En­g­lish ha­bit of re­gar­ding the world as a mo­ral gymna­si­um bu­ilt ex­p­res­sly to stren­g­t­hen yo­ur cha­rac­ter in oc­ca­si­onal­ly le­ads you to think abo­ut yo­ur own con­fo­un­ded prin­cip­les when you sho­uld be thin­king abo­ut ot­her pe­op­le's ne­ces­si­ti­es.

    - Ge­or­ge Ber­nard Shaw, Man and Su­per­man Mah­met,

    For yo­ur edi­fi­ca­ti­on, an ex­cerpt from The Bo­ok of Hu­mo­urs , writ­ten by the Her­me­tic ma­ge Li­vi­us (ca, 1352, my tran­s­la­ti­on) and ba­sed lo­osely in the tra­di­ti­on of the me­di­eval ani­mal fab­le. Even tho­ugh it is a da­ted set of al­le­go­ri­es, it con­ta­ins ker­nels of truth ap­pli­cab­le to­day; re­ad this and un­der­s­tand what you fa­ce on the Path ahe­ad - and what you've left be­hind.

    - Por­t­hos

    CHOLERA: The Far­mer and the Mo­use

    Moral for Ap­pren­ti­ces: hun­ger for know­led­ge gnaws at tho­se me­ant for the Path, but over­ze­alo­us­ness kills tho­se who in­dul­ge.

    Long ago, on a small co­untry farm, li­ved a mo­use who­se only de­si­re in the world was to vi­sit the city. It so hap­pe­ned that it was early spring, and the far­mer, who ow­ned the farm, was pre­pa­ring to tra­vel to the city to buy so­me se­ed, As he sad­dled the hor­se, he glim­p­sed the lit­tle mo­use clam­be­ring in­to a small hag in the back of his cart.

    "Ho the­re, lit­tle mo­use! What be ye a-do­ing?" cri­ed he.

    Squeaked the bra­ve lit­tle mo­use, "I am tra­ve­ling with you to the big City, as it ap­pe­ars that you are he­aded the­re."

    "What be ye a-wan­ting to find the­re, Mo­use?" as­ked the far­mer, amu­sed.

    The lit­tle mo­use, his eyes spar­k­ling with an­ti­ci­pa­ti­on, rep­li­ed, "The an­s­wer to ever­y­t­hing. Su­rely in the City the­re is one who can do jus­ti­ce to my qu­est, and I in­tend to find him."

    The far­mer sho­ok his he­ad. "The jo­ur­ney to the City is long. Is this An­s­wer worth le­aving yo­ur fa­mily and fri­ends he­re on the farm?"

    Replied the mo­use, " I t is worth suf­fe­ring and dying for, Far­mer. I wo­uld do an­y­t­hing to know the an­s­wer to ever­y­t­hing."

    "Well," sa­id the far­mer, a bit sur­p­ri­sed, "I can't pro­mi­se ye the An­s­wer, but ye'er wel­co­me to jo­in me if ye carry ye'er we­ight."

    The mo­use per­c­hed pre­ca­ri­o­usly on the bag. "I will help you in every way I can!" he eagerly dec­la­red.

    "Then," sa­id the tan­ner, "I'll ste­er the cart, gu­ide us to the City, and pro­vi­de us with fo­od along the way if ye will but scra­pe the hor­se's ho­oves cle­an o' mud, en­su­re the cart's ax­le-pins 'r in pla­ce, and wax my sad­dle."

    "That I will, and mo­re," pro­mi­sed the eager lit­tle mo­use. And he got right to work.

    When the mo­use had fi­nis­hed, the far­mer, who had be­en wat­c­hing him, sa­id, "Ye ha­ve a gre­at de­al of ta­lent, Mo­use, I'll be happy to ha­ve you with me on the jo­ur­ney to the City." Ha­ving sa­id this, he mo­un­ted the hor­se and snap­ped the re­ins. The hor­se star­ted oft at a slow trot, and the cart jol­ted for­ward.

    The lit­tle mo­use had ne­ver rid­den a cart be­fo­re and was qu­ite over­w­hel­med by the fe­eling of the wind aga­inst his fur. He clim­bed to the very top of the sack, right ne­ar the wall of the cart, and sto­od on his tip­to­es, no­se to the bre­eze, Just then, the cart hit a rut in the ro­ad.

    The mo­use, jar­red by the bump, fell out of the cart, stra­ight in­to a muddy pud­dle right in the path of the whe­el. The fan­ner, he­aring the mo­use's frig­h­te­ned squ­e­ak, re­ined back the hor­se just in ti­me.

    Ctied the far­mer, "What be ye a-do­ing in that pud­dle the­re, Mo­use?"

    Angrily, the sod­den mo­use sho­uted, "You jol­ted the cart, and I fell out in­to this pud­dle. You sho­uld be mo­re ca­re­ful!"

    "Would ye rat­her ye we­re back at the farm?" sa­id the far­mer.

    The mo­use rep­li­ed iras­cibly, "Inde­ed not. Yet I wo­uld rat­her ha­ve my hand at the re­ins than let you con­ti­nue to jolt me in­to mud pud­dles in this man­ner!"

    "Then ye try, Mo­use, and see how ye fa­re." The far­mer clim­bed in­to the cart and res­ted his he­ad aga­inst the sack, whi­le the mo­use clim­bed atop the hor­se's sad­dle, gat­he­red the re­ins, and pul­led as hard as he co­uld on them. The hor­se, not fe­eling the slig­h­test tug, blit­hely con­ti­nu­ed to nib­ble on the grass.

    Finally, the mo­use sa­id to the far­mer, "Wo­uld you pull on the­se re­ins so we co­uld at le­ast get star­ted?" The far­mer tug­ged on the re­ins, and aga­in the mo­use and the far­mer we­re off.

    After so­me ho­urs ot tra­vel­ling, the mo­use sa­id, "The ro­ad to the City is much lon­ger and mo­re dif­fi­cult than I ever ex­pec­ted, and I am be­gin­ning to miss my fa­mily."

    The far­mer la­ug­hed, ''The path is much lon­ger and mo­re dif­fi­cult than ye sus­pect even now, Mo­use, and ye'll miss ye'er fa­mily even mo­re. Is the An­s­wer still worth the cost?"

    Without he­si­ta­ti­on, the mo­use rep­li­ed, "Yes! I wo­uld not aban­don it for all the fa­mi­li­es in the world."

    Some ho­urs la­ter, they ca­me to a hill whe­re the path ra­pidly des­cen­ded in­to a rocky val­ley. As they be­gan down it, the hor­se and cart sped up, and the mo­use tig­h­te­ned his grip on the re­ins. So­on, the hor­se and cart we­re lur­c­hing down the ste­ep path rat­her too qu­ickly for the mo­use's tas­te. The mo­use pul­led back the re­ins, but the hor­se con­ti­nu­ed just as fast as be­fo­re. Des­pe­ra­tely, he pul­led on the re­ins, the cart now swa­ying pre­ca­ri­o­usly in the hor­se's wa­ke. Then the far­mer, who had be­en sle­eping, awo­ke and clam­be­red to the front of the cart. Ta­king the re­ins, he slo­wed the hor­se just be­fo­re it ca­me to a lar­ge sto­ne in the ro­ad that wo­uld su­rely ha­ve over­tur­ned the cart and its oc­cu­pants,

    "Mouse, did ye not see this ste­ep hill and the sto­nes in the path?" the far­mer as­ked an­g­rily.

    Replied the mo­use, "Yes, but the hor­se wo­uld not he­ed my re­ins."

    Said the far­mer, "'T'isn't the hor­se's fa­ult, but ye who ha­ve not the abi­lity to han­d­le the hor­se. I'll ta­ke the re­ins, and ye'll le­arn how to gu­ide the hor­se by wat­c­hing me." And so the far­mer did. As for the wi­se lit­tle mo­use, for the rest of the day, and the rest of the jo­ur­ney, he ca­re­ful­ly wat­c­hed the far­mer, to­ok he­ed of the path to the City, and ne­ver aga­in com­p­la­ined abo­ut who held the re­ins.

    MELANCHOLIA: The Fish in the Pond

    Moral for Dis­cip­les:be­ware three things: yo­ur new­fo­und po­wer, yo­ur ene­mi­es who know how to use it aga­inst you, and, most of all, yo­ur­self when you dis­co­ver that you will ne­ver over­co­me eit­her.

    Once, in a de­ep pond who­se wa­ters ran down to the sea, the­re li­ved a fish who co­uld swim fes­ter, far­t­her, and lon­ger than all of his scho­ol­ma­tes com­bi­ned. The fish brag­ged grandly of his pro­wess to his fa­mily and fri­ends, un­til ever­yo­ne had grown ti­red of his bo­asts. His scho­ol­ma­tes, whom he had hu­mi­li­ated one too many ti­mes, wan­ted to kill him, but they da­red not do so be­fo­re all the ot­her fish in the pond.

    Thus, one day, one of the fish's scho­ol­ma­tes sa­id, "Brot­her, we do not be­li­eve that you can be­at us to ot­her si­de of the pond. We want you to pro­ve it to us."

    Said the fish, "I ha­ve be­aten all of you to the ot­her si­de of the pond and back aga­in many a ti­me. Why sho­uld I aga­in, when I know I will win?"

    The fish's scho­ol­ma­tes, who had an­ti­ci­pa­ted his res­pon­se, rep­li­ed, "You are right. You are a bet­ter swim­mer than all of us com­bi­ned. Per­haps we sho­uld chan­ge the ga­me."

    "Oh?" sa­id the fish, "And how do you pro­po­se the ga­me sho­uld be chan­ged?"

    Replied one of the fish's scho­ol­ma­tes, "Do you see the fly on that re­ed, just abo­ve the wa­ter?"

    "Yes," sa­id the fish, se­e­ing a va­gue, black speck far abo­ve the sur­fa­ce of the wa­ter.

    "One of us will jump out of the wa­ter and catch that fly. To be­at him, you will ha­ve to jump out just as far or far­t­her,"

    The fish, ne­ver be­fo­re ha­ving be­aten his scho­ol­ma­tes in this fas­hi­on, ag­re­ed. His com­pe­ti­tor, who was to go first, swam to the very bot­tom of the pond, and then shot stra­ight up, fas­ter an­d­fas­ter, past all the ot­her fish who had gat­he­red aro­und to watch. And su­re eno­ugh, the fish's scho­ol­ma­te bro­ke thro­ugh the pond's sur­fa­ce, ca­ught the fly in his mo­uth, and then plun­ged back in­to the co­ol wa­ter.

    The fish was as­to­un­ded and je­alo­us. With all the po­wer he co­uld mus­ter, he swam stra­ight up, stre­aming past the on­lo­okers, and le­aped in­to the warm air. Up and up he sa­iled to­ward the hot sum­mer sun. Thin­king that he had pas­sed over the top of the re­ed, with a flick of his ta­il, he tur­ned and fell to­wards the wa­ter.

    "I will show my scho­ol­ma­tes who is the best swim­mer in the pond, and then they will ne­ver want to com­pe­te aga­in!" tho­ught the fish,

    But in­s­te­ad of lan­ding in the co­ol wa­ter as he tho­ught he wo­uld, the fish lan­ded hard on the pac­ked earth along the pond's ed­ge. Unab­le to bre­at­he, the fish flop­ped abo­ut, trying to throw him­self back in­to the wa­ter.

    "Help me!" cri­ed the fish des­pe­ra­tely. He flop­ped so­me mo­re, and then so­me mo­re, but no help ar­ri­ved. So­on, glo­omy tho­ughts of de­ath over­ca­me him, and he res­ted qu­i­etly on the hot earth, ti­red and re­ady to die.

    After wa­iting a whi­le, his scho­ol­ma­tes gat­he­red in the wa­ter aro­und the sho­re. Ha­ving sus­pec­ted that the fish wo­uld jump so far and so high that he wo­uld land on sho­re, they glo­ated, "We are sorry you ha­ve pro­ven to us that the­re is no one he­re so strong and so fast that he can sa­ve you. But you ha­ve won."

    The fish strug­gled on­ce aga­in, but, wit­ho­ut ho­pe, he so­on di­ed on the bank of the pond.

    PHLEGMA: The Tor­to­ise and His Shell

    Moral for Adepts: ca­ring sof­tens you to hard blows, but it al­so gi­ves yo­ur li­fe pur­po­se.

    One mor­ning just be­fo­re dawn, a wi­se old owl lit upon a branch ne­ar a pond, thin­king it a ni­ce pla­ce to sle­ep for the day. Be­ne­ath him, he hap­pe­ned to no­ti­ce a yo­ung tor­to­ise lying on the cold, le­af-co­ve­red gro­und. At first, the owl tho­ught the tor­to­ise was as­le­ep, for the tor­to­ise did not mo­ve at all. But then he be­gan to won­der why the tor­to­ise had not drawn his limbs in­to the sa­fety of his shell for the eve­ning.

    "Perhaps Tor­to­ise is just res­ting," tho­ught the old owl. Then, a few mi­nu­tes la­ter, "What if Tor­to­ise is ill?" and "What if Tor­to­ise is de­ad?" The owl co­uld no lon­ger ig­no­re the Tor­to­ise, and so he flap­ped down to land on the gro­und be­si­de him,

    "Tortoise, are you as­le­ep?" as­ked the owl.

    The tor­to­ise slowly lif­ted his he­ad to lo­ok at the owl, "No," he rep­li­ed.

    The owl bent over to pe­er in­to the tor­to­ise's fa­ce. "Then are you ill?"

    "No," sa­id the tor­to­ise.

    "Then, for he­aven's sa­ke, what is wrong?" as­ked the owl.

    The tor­to­ise, un­con­cer­ned, slowly lo­we­red his he­ad back to the gro­und. "Why sho­uld you ca­re?"

    "Because I am yo­ur ne­ig­h­bor," The owl stam­ped his fo­ot. "What is wrong?"

    Looking out at the pond, which was just be­gin­ning to ice over with the fall's chill to­uch, the tor­to­ise rep­li­ed, "If you ca­re to know, Owl, then I will tell you. Sna­ke is a po­wer­ful enemy, and he has kil­led my en­ti­re fa­mily and all my fri­ends. I am the only tor­to­ise left in this pond."

    The owl was ta­ken aback. "Why do you sit he­re ex­po­sed if Sna­ke is so dan­ge­ro­us?" he as­ked.

    The tor­to­ise snor­ted. "Be­ca­use I don't ca­re if he kills me- I ha­ve not­hing left to li­ve for."

    "Of co­ur­se you do," the Owl en­co­ura­ged. "You must work to im­p­ro­ve the pond by rid­ding it of Sna­ke. You must re­mem­ber yo­ur fri­ends and fa­mily who ha­ve di­ed."

    Said the tor­to­ise, "But how can I when I do not ca­re to li­ve?"

    The owl tho­ught for a mo­ment, then rep­li­ed, "I know of a way, but you will ha­ve to trust me,"

    The tor­to­ise yaw­ned. "Do what you will. I do not ca­re."

    Said the owl, "Then I must ask you to crawl out of yo­ur shell."

    The tor­to­ise blin­ked. "Out of my shell? Why?"

    "Ah, Tor­to­ise," sa­id the owl, "you do ca­re what be­co­mes of yo­ur hi­de. Don't worry- I only me­an to carry you abo­ve the pond so that you can see whe­re Sna­ke li­es,"

    The tor­to­ise tho­ught abo­ut the owl's of­fer, then slug­gishly emer­ged from the warmth of his shell in­to the fri­gid dawn air. "We had bet­ter find Sna­ke," war­ned the tor­to­ise.

    "Don't worry," sa­id the wi­se old owl, "you will spot yo­ur enemy im­me­di­ately." With that, he ca­ught the tor­to­ise in his ta­lons and to­ok off. Slowly, he flap­ped his gre­at whi­te wings and lif­ted them abo­ve the tre­es and abo­ve the pond. As they flew, the sun ro­se and the air war­med.

    The tor­to­ise lo­oked down at the tiny pond and his ti­ni­er shell, aban­do­ned, far be­low him and sud­denly felt re­li­eved of a gre­at bur­den. "Owl," sa­id he, "how can I ever thank you?"

    Replied the sa­ge owl, "Li­ve li­ke an owl, wit­ho­ut yo­ur shell, for then you will re­ma­in strong, in­de­pen­dent, and free of earthly bur­dens. Se­condly, pur­sue yo­ur pur­po­se, for then you will ha­ve re­ason to re­ma­in so."

    The owl des­cen­ded from the he­ights and put the tor­to­ise back on the gro­und. Sa­id the owl, "Did you spot yo­ur enemy?"

    Then the tor­to­ise re­ali­zed that the vi­ew had be­en so be­a­uti­ful that he had for­got­ten to lo­ok for Sna­ke. "Truly," sa­id he, "the only thing asi­de from the pond and the tre­es I re­mem­ber se­e­ing was my shell."

    "Then," sa­id the wi­se old owl, "you spot­ted yo­ur enemy."

    SANGUIS: The Li­on and the Mo­use

    Moral for Mas­ters: mas­ter ho­pe, even in the midst of lost fre­edom, and a com­mit­ment to truth, and you will mas­ter yo­ur own li­fe.

    It is sa­id that many ye­ars ago, the­re was a li­on who li­ved the wor­ri­so­me li­fe of king of the jun­g­le. Whi­le he had few res­pon­si­bi­li­ti­es and no one to lo­ok af­ter, he had to watch his back, for tre­ac­hery was ri­fe in his co­urt. All of the jun­g­le ani­mals we­re en­vi­o­us of him, for it se­emed that the­li­on had ever­y­t­hing: po­wer over all the ani­mals of the jun­g­le and the fre­edom to li­ve his li­fe as he cho­se.

    The li­on, ho­we­ver, felt that he had lit­tle; the co­urt over which he pre­si­ded was cor­rupt. He had se­ar­c­hed long and hard for hap­pi­ness: he had bul­li­ed ot­hers, but that had only cre­ated ene­mi­es. He had tri­ed to oc­cupy his mind thro­ugh study, but fo­und the­ory dry. He tri­ed to ma­ke fri­ends, but they se­emed only to res­pect his po­si­ti­on. He had to gi­ve up fa­mily and fri­ends to find know­led­ge; when he fo­und know­led­ge, he fo­und po­wer; when he fo­und po­wer, he fo­und ene­mi­es; when he fo­und ene­mi­es, they des­t­ro­yed his fa­mily and fri­ends; in fig­h­ting his ene­mi­es, he tho­ught he had dis­co­ve­red a pur­po­se to li­fe, but la­ter fo­und it dark.

    Now, this li­on had sur­ro­un­ded him­self with the most le­ar­ned ad­vi­sors in the jun­g­le, but no­ne of them had be­en ab­le to show him what hap­pi­ness was. In fact, the­se very sa­me ad­vi­sors hel­ped him se­ek hap­pi­ness and plot­ted to kill him in the sa­me bre­ath. The li­on, who on­ce was con­vin­ced that he wo­uld so­me­day find what he so­ught, was not so su­re an­y­mo­re.

    One day, in the he­at of no­on, whi­le his ad­vi­sors we­re nap­ping, the li­on to­ok a stroll in his gar­den and ran ac­ross a mo­use.

    "Good day, lit­tle mo­use," sa­id the li­on. "How did you get in­si­de the ro­yal gar­dens?"

    "I am sorry, yo­ur Ma­j­esty, but I had to sne­ak in he­re in or­der to find you," rep­li­ed the mo­use.

    "To find me?" The li­on la­ug­hed. "Do you not know that the­se gar­dens are pri­va­te? I co­uld ha­ve you kil­led."

    Replied the bra­ve lit­tle mo­use, "Oh, ple­ase, he­ar me out. I ha­ve so­ught yo­ur Ma­j­esty far and wi­de, and I beg you to let me spe­ak."

    The li­on, who did not in­tend to kill the mo­use, was amu­sed by the lit­tle one's bra­very. "Spe­ak on," sa­id he.

    "Thank you, Ma­j­esty," he sa­id, and the lit­tle mo­use bo­wed, "You see, I ha­ve so­ught the An­s­wer far and wi­de; I ha­ve tra­vel­led from city to city, but I ha­ve not yet fo­und what I se­ek. Now, I was told that you we­re know­led­ge­ab­le and wi­se. I had da­red to ho­pe that you co­uld gu­ide me to the City I se­ek."

    "Which City is that?" as­ked the li­on.

    "Why, the City that holds the An­s­wer, yo­ur Ma­j­esty," rep­li­ed the mo­use.

    "The an­s­wer to what, Mo­use?," sa­id the li­on.

    Said the mo­use, "To li­fe, Sir,"

    The li­on chuc­k­led in bit­ter amu­se­ment. Sa­id he, "Li­fe is but a se­ri­es of fa­ilu­res, each one mo­re des­pe­ra­te than the last. The­re is yo­ur An­s­wer."

    "Forgive me, Yo­ur Ma­j­esty, but you are wrong. Only tho­se wit­ho­ut ho­pe wo­uld spe­ak such fo­olis­h­ness. I am con­fi­dent that the­re is an An­s­wer, and I in­tend to find the City that holds it."

    The mo­use's fran­k­ness mo­men­ta­rily as­to­nis­hed the li­on, for he was used to the ca­j­oling li­es of co­urt. Sa­id the li­on, "Mo­use, you are qu­ite right, I am su­re the­re is an An­s­wer. I he­si­ta­te to ta­ke on the res­pon­si­bi­lity of sho­wing you the way, but you ha­ve gi­ven me con­fi­den­ce in our even­tu­al suc­cess."

    Asked the mo­use, "So you will show me the way?"

    "If I can, I will in­de­ed," sa­id the li­on.

    Years la­ter, the li­on, re­mem­be­ring his ad­ven­tu­res with the mo­use, re­cal­led the­ir som­ber par­ting. Ran­ging far ac­ross the li­on's kin­g­dom, the mo­use had not fo­und his city. Fi­nal­ly, he had ta­ken le­ave of the li­on, who was sul­len and glo­omy.

    Said the li­on, "I am sorry you must go, Mo­use. I know now that the­re is a City hid­den so­mew­he­re in this re­alm, and I am de­ter­mi­ned to find it. I am sorry that you will miss it."

    "Your Ma­j­esty," rep­li­ed the mo­use, "we ha­ve se­ar­c­hed for many months now, and I grow we­ary. I long for my ho­me."

    "Seek yo­ur ho­me, then. Mo­use. So­me­day you will re­turn he­re and we will con­ti­nue our se­arch."

    "And will you re­turn to co­urt?" as­ked the mo­use.

    "Court? He­avens, no, Mo­use. Co­urt is a dis­t­rac­ti­on from my se­eking. I ha­ve ne­ver had as much con­t­rol over my li­fe as I do now, I in­tend to con­ti­nue this way."

    "Do you not miss yo­ur fre­edom?"

    Said the wi­se li­on, "Fre­edom? That was not fre­edom, fri­end; tho­se ye­ars we­re a net bin­ding me to my own sel­fin­dul­gen­ce. You ha­ve shown me fre­edom: yo­ur ho­pe ga­ve me wings, and my res­pon­si­bi­lity to you was the wind that lif­ted us."

    The im­p­ro­ve­ment of un­der­s­tan­ding is for two ends: first, our own in­c­re­ase of know­led­ge; se­cond, to enab­le us to de­li­ver that know­led­ge to ot­hers.

    - John Loc­ke

    By le­ar­ning, you will te­ach; by te­ac­hing, you will le­arn.

    - La­tin pro­verb

    "You Ame­ri­can kids think you know ever­y­t­hing the­re is to know abo­ut te­ac­hers, no? Well, I te­ach you a thing or two."

    Mother Fran­ces­ca clut­c­hed her sun me­dal­li­on and clo­sed her eyes. For se­ve­ral long mi­nu­tes, I shif­ted un­com­for­tably on my kne­es and wat­c­hed the fra­gi­le old wo­man me­di­ta­te. The ro­om gra­du­al­ly grew hot­ter, un­til the walls se­emed to shim­mer with the he­at of the Me­di­ter­ra­ne­an sun. I fo­und myself lon­ging to be out­si­de, bat­hing in the co­ol wa­ters of the pi­az­za's fo­un­ta­in.

    Slowly, the Mot­her ope­ned her eyes and ges­tu­red to­watds the shim­me­ring walls, "Ma­gick is won­der­ful study, no?" Her ga­ze slid to­wards me and her eyes nar­ro­wed. "I he­ar you try on yo­ur own? E ve­to?" The ac­cu­sa­ti­on hung he­avily bet­we­en us.

    After a mo­ment, I rep­li­ed, "Yes, it's true."

    "I tell you what's true. You're a fo­ol-that's the truth. I sat the­re thin­king that she had no right to tell me this, te­ac­her or not. But be­fo­re I co­uld re­tort, she con­ti­nu­ed, "I tell you anot­her truth: the Cho­rus ke­eps you in Ro­ma un­til you le­arn to be less a fo­ol. That les­son starts now."

    With a slow, de­li­be­ra­te gra­ce, the old wo­man lif­ted her hands high over her he­ad. As she did, a bre­eze swept thro­ugh the ro­om, co­oling it, but the walls con­ti­nu­ed to shim­mer, A sha­dow crept ac­ross the ro­om li­ke slow mo­las­ses. The walls cur­ved in as if I we­re se­e­ing them thro­ugh a fis­he­ye lens, then se­emed to drop away in­to a de­ep blac­k­ness, which gra­du­al­ly en­ve­lo­ped me. Still, I co­uld see Mot­her Fran­ces­ca sit­ting as she was be­fo­re- ex­cept that her ric­kety wo­oden sto­ol had be­co­me an or­na­te ivory thro­ne in­la­id with gold and stud­ded with ru­bi­es and onyx. She sto­od, to­ok my hand, and ba­de me stand. Ever­y­t­hing se­emed stran­ge, new- when I lo­oked at her fa­ce, it sho­ne with the pu­re whi­te light of an an­gel, flo­wing out on­to the vo­id.

    Quietly, a swe­et, lon­ging me­lody mo­re be­a­uti­ful than even the ro­ost sub­li­me no­te of Mo­zart's Re­qu­i­em, a song of ac­hingly dis­tant joy, wel­led up aro­und us, its so­ur­ce in­vi­sib­le. Its mu­si­cal light bat­hed me, and I flo­ated, un­com­p­re­hen­ding, in it. Gra­du­al­ly, the mu­sic and light fo­cu­sed in­to one glo­ri­o­us, bu­oyant me­lody, swe­eter than the swe­etest fru­it, and I he­ard in the so­und a vo­ice li­ke Fran­ces­ca's:

    "A men­tor is a so­ur­ce of light and truth, a gu­iding Hand of the One,"

    I felt re­awa­ke­ned. Even af­ter three ye­ars of study, my te­ac­her in Wil­li­am­s­burg, who had tre­ated me far bet­ter than the Mot­her did, had ne­ver shown me ma­gick li­ke this. This bent, gnar­led old wo­man was awa­ke­ning me to an es­sen­ce I had ne­ver felt; she was lig­h­ting my so­ul on fi­re. It was be­a­uti­ful- all I co­uld think was that this was the te­ac­her I so­ught. But Mot­her Fran­ces­ca was no par­lor ma­gi­ci­an on sta­ge for my amu­se­ment.

    Suddenly, I was plun­ging stra­ight in­to the bla­zing in­fer­no of a fi­ery sun.

    Its bo­iling gas­ses cur­led aro­und me, blin­ding me as I flew in­to it, whi­te fla­mes ro­ared and de­afe­ned me, its hur­ri­ca­ne winds tos­sed me li­ke a pa­per doll- but I felt no he­at. Gra­du­al­ly, I slo­wed to a stop. My vi­si­on re­tur­ned, pa­in­ful­ly. Yet my mind still re­eled from shock and ter­ror.

    I was flo­ating in the calm eye of a gar­gan­tu­an cyclo­ne of fla­me that stret­c­hed be­yond sight abo­ve and be­low me. On all si­des, fla­mes ra­ged, whir­ling up­ward in a mad dan­ce. The shaft's crac­k­ling, walls se­emed to twist in­to each ot­her and cur­ve away mi­les abo­ve me. I felt fra­gi­le, vul­ne­rab­le, hor­ribly small. Mot­her Fran­ces­ca's ma­gick was my only pro­tec­ti­on from in­s­tant, fi­ery an­ni­hi­la­ti­on.

    I squ­in­ted in the bright light, trying to lo­ok at Mot­her Fran­ces­ca-and lo­oked away, my eyes bur­ning even mo­re. She ra­di­ated bril­li­ant light, li­ke that of the oce­an on a bright, bre­ezy mor­ning, when tho­usands of tiny wa­ves scin­til­la­te in. the sun­light. The ra­di­ant splen­dor of the One sho­ne thro­ugh her, a co­ol, glo­ri­o­us bril­li­an­ce amidst the Stygi­an sha­dows of the fla­mes.

    "Mother Fran­ces­ca," I cri­ed, "what is this pla­ce?"

    "This is the po­wer- and dan­ger- of yo­ur stu­di­es, child."

    "Why did you bring me he­re?"

    "To show you why you ne­ed a te­ac­her, a true men­tor."

    The Mot­her's ac­cent had di­sap­pe­ared. She pas­sed a co­ol hand over my bur­ning eyes, and I co­uld lo­ok aga­in at her. Her fa­ce shim­me­red with a be­nign whi­te light. She se­emed tall, an­ge­lic.

    "What do you me­an?"

    "I simply me­an that you must le­arn why you are he­re and not in Wil­li­am­s­burg tin­ke­ring on yo­ur own with for­ces be­yond yo­ur con­t­rol. You ne­ed gu­idan­ce, both away from dan­gers and to­ward yo­ur true path. If you are he­re to le­arn, I will show you yo­ur Ava­tar, the frag­ment of the One that re­si­des in yo­ur in­ner­most be­ing. The One has cho­sen you to be con­s­ci­o­usly uni­ted with her, thro­ugh yo­ur Ava­tar. As you le­arn mo­re and se­ek yo­ur path with gro­wing com­mit­ment, you will ne­ed to ask qu­es­ti­ons, I am ho­no­red that the One has cho­sen me to le­ad you to the right qu­es­ti­ons and to help ac­qu­a­int you with yo­ur Ava­tar. Per­haps I will even le­arn with you."

    She ga­ve me her hand. "At the sa­me ti­me, I will show you the dar­k­ness wit­hin and out­si­de of yo­ur­self. Bo­oks and ma­gick do not se­em li­ke dan­ge­ro­us things un­til you le­arn the con­se­qu­en­ces of the­ir con­tents. The­re are pe­rils be­yond yo­ur ken, child, but two in par­ti­cu­lar ma­ke yo­ur stu­di­es mo­re dan­ge­ro­us than you re­ali­ze."

    "What are tho­se?" I as­ked.

    Mother Fran­ces­ca gently brus­hed my che­ek with her shi­ning hand. "Yo­ur­self and ot­hers, lit­tle one. I am he­re to gu­ide you thro­ugh both sna­res."

    I had he­ard such war­nings from ear­li­er te­ac­hers, and, of co­ur­se, I didn't ig­no­re them. Still, they ne­ver se­emed to be per­ti­nent. Yet the­re, in the midst of a sun that te­emed with mo­re sha­dows than the­re sho­uld ha­ve be­en, the words se­emed so­me­how dif­fe­rent. This ti­me they held me­aning.

    As if she knew my tho­ughts, Mot­her Fran­ces­ca ad­ded, "The­se sna­res are in­si­di­o­us: pri­de-which you know in abun­dan­ce-Pa­ra­dox, po­li­tics, fo­es and fa­ilu­re."

    "So you're he­re to te­ach me abo­ut the­se sna­res?"

    "No. I am he­re to te­ach you how to avo­id them. If you will le­arn, I will te­ach you hu­mi­lity, a gre­at gift that most men­tors ne­ver bes­tow upon the­ir un­for­tu­na­te stu­dents. Hu­mi­lity re­ins back over­con­fi­den­ce, which can and will des­t­roy you if it ca­uses you to wi­eld po­wer you can­not con­t­rol," She pa­used, as if to let her words set­tle in my mind. She con­ti­nu­ed, "As most men­tors do, I will al­so te­ach you the po­wer of co­in­ci­den­ce, so that anot­her re­ality do­es not des­t­roy you. I will te­ach you what I know of the Tra­di­ti­ons, the­ir go­als, and the dan­gers of such go­als clas­hing. I will te­ach you to avo­id yo­ur fo­es, of which you ha­ve many,"

    "What fo­es?"

    "Hidden fo­es, and ob­vi­o­us fo­es. Many mo­re than you sus­pect you ha­ve; pro­bably mo­re than I sus­pect you ha­ve." She re­le­ased my hand and flo­ated a short dis­tan­ce away. "And, last, I will te­ach you the fe­ar of fa­ilu­re, which will des­t­roy you, but which you can pre­vent if you are ca­re­ful."

    "I don't un­der­s­tand-"

    "You will."

    A co­ol bre­eze waf­ted past me, and I shi­ve­red ple­asantly, in­con­g­ru­o­us as it se­emed in the midst of the gi­ant fun­nel of fla­me. Then, very sud­denly, Mot­her Fran­ces­ca di­sap­pe­ared and the he­at of the so­lar cyclo­ne blas­ted me mer­ci­les­sly. I scre­amed in agony and ter­ri­fi­ed an­ger at her ut­ter bet­ra­yal. I felt myself blac­ken and crum­b­le to ash. Then, for one ap­pal­ling, in­sa­ne se­cond, I knew not­hing ex­cept the mo­men­tary, ab­so­lu­te hor­ror of be­co­ming ut­terly no one, the frig­h­te­ned, hel­p­less mo­ment just be­fo­re the con­cept of "I" no lon­ger had me­aning. The mo­ment pas­sed, and all sem­b­lan­ce of con­s­ci­o­us­ness di­sap­pe­ared in­to vo­id, "I" was no mo­re.

    Hours, may­be se­conds la­ter, from the dark ma­ze of vo­id that was mind, I he­ard the fa­int mu­sic of Fran­ces­ca's vo­ice whis­pe­ring my na­me. Lon­ging li­ke in­s­tinct fil­led me, then lig­h­t­ness, and I felt myself flo­ating up to­wards a bright, wa­tery whi­te light far abo­ve me.

    My eye­lids flut­te­red open, and I fo­und myself kne­eling be­fo­re Mot­her Fran­ces­ca in the lit­tle stuc­co ro­om in the Ro­man ca­bal. She res­ted a warm hand on my che­ek. Slowly, the mad­ness dis­si­pa­ted. Gra­du­al­ly, my sen­se of self, my re­ality, re­tur­ned li­ke the flow of the oce­an ti­de.

    The wrin­k­led old wo­man, dwar­fed now even by the bw-ce­ilin­ged ro­om, co­ve­red my hands with her gnar­led hands and sa­id, "I ask you now, child: what se­ems to be the most im­por­tant as­pect of le­ar­ning ma­gick ?"

    "Most im­por­tant?" I me­di­ta­ted on the qu­es­ti­on. I tho­ught abo­ut that mo­ment of as­to­nis­hed hor­ror just be­fo­re I had ce­ased to exist. Then the tho­ught struck me- the most ob­vi­o­us an­s­wet to the Mot­her's qu­es­ti­on-and I gras­ped to ver­ba­li­ze my new­fo­und know­led­ge: "Mas­tery of one­self. The abi­lity to re­sist the loss of yo­ur re­ality."

    Mother Fran­ces­ca smi­led se­re­nely. "Pre­ci­sely, lit­tle one. Wil­lpo­wer, yo­ur abi­lity to ke­ep yo­ur­self whi­le sha­ping re­ality, is most im­por­tant. It is cru­ci­al to le­ar­ning and to sur­vi­ving. That, my child, is so­met­hing no men­tor can te­ach." She pa­used. "But know this: abo­ve all, and ac­cor­ding to our own un­der­s­tan­ding of re­ality, men­tors pro­tect the­ir dis­cip­les as a mot­her pro­tects her child." Gently, she ca­res­sed my che­ek and smo­ot­hed my brow. Slowly, pe­ace­ful­ly, as if the Mot­her's words had so­ot­hed so­me wo­und de­ep wit­hin me, I slip­ped de­ep in­to slum­ber.

    We know what we are, but know not what we may be.

    - Op­he­lia, Ham­let Act IV, Scer­te-V

    One man is equ­iva­lent to all Cre­ati­on. One man is a World in mi­ni­atu­re.

    - Abot de Rab­bi Nat­han. Pa­les­ti­ne. 2nd cen­tury

    To: sysop42@myob.org

    From: bla­ke@j­edi.mit.edu

    Subject: ava­tar & es­sen­ce

    Hope this li­ne's se­cu­re, 'ca­use I'm re­ady to chat. BTW, when you gon­na get me that he­ad­ge­ar you've be­en tal­king abo­ut?

    · Well, now that you've pro­ven you won't sell yo­ur Ava­tar for a pi­ece of tec­h­no­logy, you'll get the he­ad­ge­ar re­al so­on.

    ·What do you me­an "pro­ven"?- Last we­ekend wasn't anot­her test, was i t? I tho­ught you sa­id the tes­ting was over,

    ·I li­ed. ;) We had to be ab­so­lu­tely cer­ta­in tbat you are who you ap­pe­ar to be. By re­fu­sing to gi­ve yo­ur pas­sword in ex­c­han­ge for ac­cess to the Tec­h­no­man­cer da­ta­ba­se, you pro­ved yo­ur lo­yalty.

    · You know, I got this stran­ge pi­ece of e-ma­il the day be­fo­re, war­ning me to ke­ep my pri­ori­ti­es stra­ight. It didn't ha­ve any con­text at the ti­me, and it didn't ha­ve a sen­der. I tho­ught may­be it was one of yo­ur prac­ti­cal jokes.

    · In­te­res­ting. The sa­me thing hap­pe­ned to me when I was an ini­ti­ate. You'll pro­bably ne­ver gu­ess who it tur­ned out to be…

    · New World Or­der?

    · No, no, not­hing li­ke chat…

    · Who?

    · My Ava­tar,

    · Ye­ah, right,

    · No, se­ri­o­usly. Every now and then, e-ma­il from an un­na­med user ap­pe­ared in my ma­il­box, war­ning me of so­met­hing or pre­dic­ting that I wo­uld do so­met­hing I la­ter did. It was eerie, un­til I re­ali­zed that my Ava­tar was gu­iding me,

    · You talk abo­ut yo­ur Ava­tar as if it's a re­al per­son, with go­als & de­si­res.

    · It is, just as you're "re­al".

    · You me­an pe­op­le are fo­oled by the e-ma­il and think the­re's re­al­ly so­me­body sen­ding it.

    · No, I me­an that the­re IS so­me­body sen­ding if. It's not one of yo­ur mec­ha­ni­cal MIT lab cre­ati­ons. It's a so­me­body, and when thar so­me­body fe­els you're re­ady, it'll ap­pe­ar right in front of yo­ur eyes. In fact, it ap­pe­ars to so­me as a re­al, blo­od-pum­ping, air-bre­at­hing per­son.

    · Ye­ah, but what abo­ut to ot­hers? What the hell do­es an Ava­tar lo­ok l i k e to most of us? An an­gel with pra­ying hands and fe­at­he­red wings?

    · To so­me. Ot­hers say they see a ghostly spi­rit or a sha­dow. Or El­vis. It de­pends on who you are, what you're li­ke, and, to a small ex­tent, what you ex­pect to see: now and then I re­ce­ived e-ma­il from this myste­ri­o­us per­son. Af­ter a whi­le, that cor­res­pon­den­ce be­gan to evol­ve in­to a sort of on-li­ne hi­de-and-se­ek, whe­re I'd wa­it at my ma­il­box (with my VR ge­ar on) for ma­il from this stran­ger and then try to tract the ma­il back to its so­ur­ce.

    · So what do­es yo­ur Ava­tar lo­ok li­ke? I bet it's tall and ge­eky- ta­ped glas­ses and a poc­ket pro­tec­tor, right? · Hardly. Mo­re the strong, myste­ri­o­us type. :o I saw it on­ce, a few ye­ars ago- fle­etingly. It was bec­ko­ning to me from a dark al­ley on the Net. It was sha­dowy and va­gue, but it de­fi­ni­tely re­sem­b­led a hu­man be­ing, I wal­ked to­wards it, but it se­emed to drift in­to the back of the al­ley, and it di­sap­pe­ared be­fo­re I co­uld get a go­od lo­ok. A few se­conds la­ter, I over­he­ard a con­ver­sa­ti­on bet­we­en a Vir­tu­al Adept from Ca­li­for­nia and a HIT Mark. I was ab­le to sne­ak away and re­port the VA as a tra­itor to so­me of the guys in L.A.

    · Wow. You think yo­ur Ava­tar did that in­ten­ti­onal­ly?

    · Pro­bably. So­me­one on­ce told me that all our Ava­tars are frag­ments of an en­tity known as Pri­me. The­se shards, at so­me po­int in the hu­gely dis­tant past, be­ca­me our so­uls. Now all the­se shards want to do is be­co­me re­uni­ted, which can only hap­pen when we re­ach As­cen­si­on. So our Ava­tars gu­ide us lit­tle by lit­tle to glo­bal As­cen­si­on. Sle­epers ha­ve Ava­tars, too, but the­irs are such small frag­ments that most ne­ver know they ha­ve them. Our Ava­tars gu­ide us so that we can gu­ide Sle­epers to As­cen­si­on and re­uni­te Pri­me.

    · What abo­ut Ein­s­te­in and Ga­tes-do they ha­ve Ava­tars?

    · Most ani­mals ha­ve them, but can't use them. Tho­ugh if Ein­s­te­in and Ga­tes re­al­ly can open be­er cans as you cla­im, may­be we sho­uld ret­hink our the­ori­es abo­ut ani­mals. Hmm… I won­der how the­ir Ava­tars wo­uld spe­ak to them?

    · Doggy dre­ams, of co­ur­se. How do they spe­ak to ma­ges?

    · Of the Tra­di­ti­ons? I met a mem­ber of the Cult of Ec­s­tasy a few ye­ars ago who cla­imed that her Ava­tar spo­ke to her not in words, but thro­ugh the''pas­si­ona­te emo­ti­ons" that her mu­sic evo­ked. I sup­po­se it's pos­sib­le, but she se­emed a lit­tle flaky. She cal­led the Ava­tar her "Mu­se".

    · What did her "Mu­se" say to her?

    · Ne­ver told me. I won­de­red for a long ti­me what it was li­ke to he­ar yo­ur Ava­tar spe­ak. La­ter, a fri­end of mi­ne in the Or­der of Her­mes told me that the Ava­tar ap­pe­ars to us in fi­ve as­pects, each which spe­aks to us dif­fe­rently: the Mo­ni­tor, the Gu­ar­di­an, the Mo­ver, the Pro­ge­ni­tor, and the Fo­ol.

    · What do they me­an?

    · Well, to be ho­nest, I'm not cer­ta­in how the OOH vi­ews them. But I ' ve co­me to in­ter­p­ret the­se as­pects in my own way. The Mo­ni­tor sur­fa­ces as our con­s­ci­en­ce. The Gu­ar­di­an gu­ards the ga­te to As­cen­si­on to pre­vent pri­de from over­w­hel­ming us. The Mo­ver mo­ti­va­tes and gu­ides us to­ward As­cen­si­on. The Pro­ge­ni­tor and the Fo­ol are two highly myste­ri­o­us as­pects of the Ava­tar, but se­em to cor­res­pond to the birth and li­ne­age of the Ava­tar and to what the tran­s­cen­dent na­tu­re of the Ava­tar will be when we at­ta­in As­cen­si­on.

    · The li­ne­age of the Ava­tar? You me­an Ava­tars be­long to fa­mi­li­es?

    · Well, the OOH fri­end I was cor­res­pon­ding with se­emed to think so. She sa­id the­re we­re two ma­in li­ne­ages, each of which had many bran­c­hes. She ter­med the li­ne­ages "Di­ano­ia" and "Res"-one Gre­ek for "tho­ught from me­di­ta­ti­on" and the ot­her La­tin for "physi­cal thing". Bluntly put, the li­ne­ages rep­re­sent the old mind/mat­ter di­vi­si­on.

    · I bet she tho­ught the OOH sprang from Di­ano­ia.

    · Ac­tu­al­ly, yes. But she went in­to mo­re de­ta­il than that. She men­ti­oned fi­ve bran­c­hes: Men­tem (pu­re in­tel­lect), Aes­t­he­ti­ca (tas­te/a­es­t­he­tics), Mo­ra­lis (mo­ra­lity/et­hics), Cre­atus (cre­ati­ve spi­rit) , and Mu­ta­tio (sha­ping spi­rit). The first three, she sa­id, we­re bran­c­hes of Di­ano­ia; the last two, brun­c­hes of Res. She felt strongly that each Tra­di­ti­on had a go­ver­ning Ava­tar li­ne­age, but I've se­en too many ex­cep­ti­ons to be­li­eve it pla­usib­le.

    · Let me gu­ess: the OOH's li­ne­age was Di­ano­ia and Men­tem.

    · Right aga­in. She cla­imed that the Di­ano­ia: Men­tem li­ne­age go­ver­ned the OOH, the Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od, and the Dre­am­s­pe­akers. The Di­ano­ia: Aes­t­he­ti­ca li­ne­age, she sa­id, go­ver­ned the Cult of Ec­s­tasy, and the Di­ano­ia: Mo­ra­lis li­ne­age go­ver­ned the Eut­ha­na­tos and Ce­les­ti­al Cho­rus.

    · So who are we?

    · Res: Mu­ta­tio-us and the Sons of Et­her. The only one left, Res: Cre­atus, go­verns the Ver­be­na.

    · What abo­ut the Or­p­hans?

    · She ig­no­red them. She do­esn't think they're ma­ges at all.

    · God, I can't stand tho­se OOH ma­ges. They're so stuck up!

    · Ac­tu­al­ly, she's not that hor­rib­le, on­ce you get past all the La­tin drills and ho­cus-po­cus nu­me­ro­logy.

    · May­be. But the OOH's so set on the rank and fi­le gig. They lo­ve the idea that we can be ca­te­go­ri­zed or stuf­fed in­to ar­ca­ne li­ne­ages that con­t­rol our be­ha­vi­or.

    · Not exactly. That's sim­p­lif­ying the­ir po­si­ti­on-li­ke sa­ying "be­ing a sof­t­wa­re en­gi­ne­er has ma­de me a sof­t­wa­re en­gi­ne­er." Chan­ce de­ter­mi­ned the na­tu­re of yo­ur Ava­tar and, sin­ce you're in lar­ge part yo­ur Ava­tar, yo­ur Ava­tar de­ter­mi­ned yo­ur na­tu­re. Think of yo­ur Ava­tar as a be­ing hid­den wit­hin you that you ha­ven't dis­co­ve­red yet.

    · Very com­for­ting. Do­es that me­an I ha­ve just as much in­f­lu­en­ce on it as it has on me?

    · I don't know. What it do­es me­an, tho­ugh, is that you ha­ve SO­ME in­f­lu­en­ce on it. Yo­ur de­ci­si­ons-mo­ral, et­hi­cal, or ot­her­wi­se- may at­tract or re­pul­se yo­ur Ava­tar, just as they may at­tract or re­pul­se ot­her hu­man be­ings. If you ma­ke de­ci­si­ons that you and yo­ur Ava­tar con­si­der unet­hi­cal or wrong, you may cor­rupt yo­ur Ava­tar or ma­ke it im­po­tent.

    · Im­po­tent?

    · Yup. A re­pul­sed Ava­tar may fes­ter and be­co­me as cor­rupt as the ma­ge with whom it's as­so­ci­ated and/or it may re­fu­se to le­ad the ma­ge to As­cen­si­on un­til the so­ur­ce of in­fec­ti­on has be­en pu­ri­fi­ed. Such ma­ges are usu­al­ly so pre­oc­cu­pi­ed with self-lo­at­hing that they ha­ve very lit­tle energy left to le­arn abo­ut re­ality and ma­gick. It's tho­ught that the Mo­ni­tor - that as­pect of the Gu­ar­di­an that ser­ves as the con­s­ci­en­ce- pur­po­se­ful­ly re­di­rects the ma­ge's energy in­to mor­bid self-lo­at­hing un­til the ma­ge cor­rects his ac­ti­ons.

    · That's the ne­ga­ti­ve si­de… can a ma­ge ha­ve a po­si­ti­ve in­f­lu­en­ce on his Ava­tar?

    · Of co­ur­se. The mo­re go­od de­ci­si­ons a ma­ge ma­kes (by his Ava­tar's stan­dards), the mo­re sec­rets the Gu­ar­di­an lets him in on.

    · So do you think my Ava­tar was ple­ased with me this we­ekend?

    · I'm su­re yo­ur Ava­tar is very sa­tis­fi­ed with yo­ur de­ci­si­on.

    · Think so?

    · Be­yond a do­ubt. We're hol­ding this con­ver­sa­ti­on, aren't we?

    · Ye­ah, but I tho­ught that this kind of te­ac­hing's the do­ma­in-of the Ava­tar.

    ·

    · Hel­lo? You the­re, sysop? Damn it, are you the­re?

    ·

    ·

    · exit chat

    %who?

    blake ttyq5 Jan 6 3:23

    themover ttyq5 Jan 6 3:23

    Great men are they who see that the spi­ri­tu­al is stron­ger than any ma­te­ri­al for­ce.

    - Ralph Wal­do Emer­son

    To Da­ria, the sle­eping Lu­pi­ne lo­oked and smel­led li­ke a hu­ge flea-bit­ten mon­g­rel with gi­gan­tic claws. Her Cli­que had co­me upon it as it slept at the back of the town dump; it was cur­led up in­si­de a ca­ve of bro­ken fur­ni­tu­re and old, soggy new­s­pa­pers. Now it was fro­zen in sle­ep, thanks to Da­ria's fri­end Is­bel­le, who had in­ca­pa­ci­ta­ted it using Ti­me ma­gick.

    Still, Is­bel­le had pos­ted gu­ards, pre­pa­red to so­ot­he the be­ast's ra­ge if an­y­t­hing went wrong, whi­le Rich, a Vir­tu­al Adept along for the ri­de, re­adi­ed the­ir ge­ta­way. They only had a few ho­urs to ste­al Qu­in­tes­sen­ce be­fo­re the we­re­wolf awo­ke.

    "Daria, get yo­ur ass over he­re," Is­bel­le mo­ti­oned her clo­set to the sle­eping be­ast. Re­luc­tantly, Da­ria ap­pro­ac­hed. "You as­ked me be­fo­re abo­ut Ju­ice. I want to show you what it fe­els li­ke to gat­her it."

    "But-this is whe­re we're get­ting it? In the mid­dle of a jun­k­yard?"

    Isbelle chuc­k­led. "I think you're af­ra­id of the Pit Bull. Ne­ver mind him. C'mon, I'll show you how to get ju­iced." She slip­ped aro­und the we­re­wolf and mer­ged in­to the sha­dows of its jun­k­yard ca­ve. The damp, musty smell of mo­ul­de­ring new­s­pa­pers waf­ted out of the ca­ve. Da­ria step­ped in­si­de, ca­re­ful to avo­id the slum­be­ring be­ast.

    The fra­il be­am of Is­bel­le's flas­h­light lit va­gue sha­pes and the ed­ges of de­eper ho­les. Da­ria fer­vently ho­ped they we­re for­med by rus­ting ref­ri­ge­ra­tors and ot­her for­got­ten fur­ni­tu­re. In the dar­k­ness, she co­uld he­ar a ste­ady, hol­low plink, li­ke ra­in­d­rops on me­tal, and tiny squ­e­aks and rus­t­les is­su­ed from, the back of the ca­ve.

    "Juice," Is­bel­le whis­pe­red, "or Qu­in­tes­sen­ce as so­me call it, is the con­den­sa­ti­on of re­ality. The con­cen­t­ra­ted raw es­sen­ce of the uni­ver­se fu­els ma­gick. So­me ma­ges be­li­eve this 'Qu­in­tes­sen­ce' to be shards of a gre­at, slum­be­ring be­ing cal­led the One; ot­hers be­li­eve it to be the tan­gib­le, spi­ri­tu­al es­sen­ce of sen­ti­ent cre­ati­vity, I think Ge­or­ge Lu­cas al­most had it right: Qu­in­tes­sen­ce is a con­cen­t­ra­ted ma­ni­fes­ta­ti­on of the For­ce,"

    Daria scow­led. "Oh, co­me on…"

    "No, re­al­ly," Is­bel­le con­ti­nu­ed, "Di­lu­ted Qu­in­tes­sen­ce is all aro­und us, wit­hin us- it is us. Con­cen­t­ra­ted Ju­ice is the energy that is ma­gick."

    Daria squ­in­ted to see in­to the de­eper dar­k­ness of the ca­ve. "So whe­re's the Ju­ice?"

    "Don't bot­her trying to see it; try to fe­el it. It's in­c­re­dibly strong he­re."

    Daria clo­sed her eyes and tri­ed to empty her mind. Yet tho­ughts of an awa­ke­ning Lu­pi­ne crept back in. She pic­tu­red a blank sla­re. Slowly, the ima­ge of a fa­ded black and whi­te pho­tog­raph, yel­lo­wed with age, sto­le be­fo­re her mind's eye. Unac­cus­to­med nos­tal­gia was­hed over her, and mo­re ima­ges- a wil­low dip­ping its fronds in­to a sha­ded po­ol; her old three-spe­ed bi­ke prop­ped aga­inst the cha­in link fen­ce, its blue pa­int chip­ped with ye­ars of use; her aban­do­ned cast, co­lor­ful with fri­ends' sig­na­tu­res, from when she'd bro­ken her leg; the li­lac smell of her fa­vo­ri­te aunt's per­fu­me-all drif­ted over her li­ke a lazy clo­ud at no­on.

    Somebody was sha­kin­g­her sho­ul­der. The ima­ges fa­ded. Is­bel­le was whis­pe­ring ex­ci­tedly, "…think you fe­el it. This is a full-blown No­de, Awa­ke­ned and ever­y­t­hing."

    "The things I saw -"

    "This No­de se­ems to re­so­na­te with a fe­eling of nos­tal­gia. You we­re pro­bably at­tu­ned to it." Is­bel­le po­in­ted the flas­h­light in­to a dark nic­he, spot­lig­h­ting a rat which blin­ked and scur­ri­ed away. She sat down on an over­tur­ned ice­box.

    Daria re­ma­ined stan­ding, sen­ses alert. "It was very po­wer­ful. Are all No­des li­ke this one?"

    Isbelle sho­ok her he­ad. "No, most of the ones I've ra­ided don't ha­ve Ju­ice co­lo­red so strongly by emo­ti­on. The Ju­ice in this No­de must re­so­na­te so­me­how with him." She tos­sed her chin in the sle­eping we­re­wolf s di­rec­ti­on. Put­ting her hands to her mo­uth, she his­sed, "OK, guys, it's sa­fe, C'mon in." Fo­ur of Da­ria's fri­ends crept in­to the ca­ve and sat down at op­po­si­te ends. The ot­hers, she no­ted, sta­yed out­si­de to gu­ard them.

    Said Is­bel­le, "I'll te­ach you how to do what they're do­ing so­me ot­her ti­me. Right now, I want you to le­arn what ju­ice is, what it fe­els li­ke-" As she spo­ke, her flas­h­light ro­ved from nic­he to nic­he. Her eyes went wi­de. "What is it? What's wrong?" Da­ria's he­art thum­ped as she lo­oked aro­und for mo­re wol­ves,

    "I fe­el so­met­hing I ha­ven't felt for ye­ars," whis­pe­red Is­bel­le.

    Daria's thro­at tig­h­te­ned. "What? What is it?"

    "C'mere." Is­bel­le la­un­c­hed her­self from the rusty ice­box to­wards the sha­dowy re­ar of the ca­ve, the flas­h­light be­am bo­un­cing hap­ha­zardly in all di­rec­ti­ons. Da­ria fol­lo­wed mo­re ca­uti­o­usly. "We've al­ways ma­de a ha­bit of pe­eking in­to the Um­b­ra when we ra­id No­des," con­ti­nu­ed Is­bel­le, her vo­ice lo­uder than be­fo­re, "ever sin­ce I fo­und Dram in the form of a So­un­d­B­las­ter card in a Vir­tu­al Adept No­de fo­ur ye­ars ago. It's pa­id off aga­in!" Is­bel­le stop­ped ne­ar the back of the ca­ve, light brus­hing the lips of sha­do­wed no­oks and cran­ni­es all aro­und her. As Da­ria ran to catch up, all she co­uld see was Is­bel­le's sil­ho­u­et­te cro­uc­hing over so­met­hing, ra­cing away. She ran up to Is­bel­le ana stop­ped.

    "Wait a sec- back up. What's Dram?"

    Without tur­ning, Is­bel­le mo­ti­oned her clo­ser with an im­pa­ti­ent hand. "This. Can't you see it?"

    Daria pe­eked aro­und Is be lie, who had po­in­ted her flas­h­light at the gro­und whe­re a tar­nis­hed old vic­t­ro­la sat. On its tur­n­tab­le lay a thick, scrat­c­hed re­cord with no la­bel. The he­avy stylus res­ted on the gro­und ne­arby,

    "See what? This is a rot­ting old pi­ece of junk,"

    Isbelle sho­ok her he­ad, still lo­oking at the vic­t­ro­la, "If that's all you see, then you're blind." She tur­ned to lo­ok up at Da­ria. "Don't be­li­eve in physi­cal ap­pe­aran­ces. Lo­oking past the sur­fa­ce la­yer ma­kes us ma­ges, af­ter all. Lo­ok in­to the Um­b­ra with yo­ur mind."

    Daria shut her eyes aga­in and re­ac­hed out to the vic­t­ro­la with her mind. Blindly, she brus­hed it with her fin­gers, to­uc­hing it, tur­ning it over, run­ning her fin­gers along its smo­oth, cold sur­fa­ce. Dimly, an ima­ge of the vic­t­ro­la grew in her mind, still an old, aban­do­ned vic­t­ro­la, but now pul­sing with a me­lan­c­holy glow. She co­uld fe­el its warmth, but al­so the sad­ness as­so­ci­ated with it.

    "Is this Ju­ice?" she as­ked.

    Isbelle's vo­ice se­emed to co­me from far away. "Do­es it fe­el li­ke it?"

    "No, it fe­els dif­fe­rent so­me­how. It's- tan­gib­le."

    "Exactly. It's Dram. So­me call it 'Tass.' It's a physi­cal form that Qu­in­tes­sen­ce ta­kes only on­ce in a very gre­at whi­le."

    Daria men­tal­ly hef­ted the stylus. It had no ne­ed­le. "When?"

    "I'm not su­re, but I've he­ard it sa­id that No­des can form Tass when they ha­ven't be­en tap­ped for a long ti­me- when Ju­ice bu­ilds up qu­ickly, for so­me re­ason, and starts to over­f­low in­to the physi­cal re­alm."

    Daria ope­ned her eyes and lo­oked aga­in at the vic­t­ro­la. "But why do­es it lo­ok li­ke that. I me­an, it's junk!"

    "Take a lo­ok aro­und. What el­se wo­uld you ex­pect it to lo­ok li­ke in a dump?" Is­bel­le to­ok a se­at on the cold dirt, "Dram usu­al­ly ta­kes the form you ex­pect it to ta­ke. For exam­p­le, des­c­ri­be to me what you see." Da­ria des­c­ri­bed the vic­t­ro­la to Is­bel­le. "You know what's funny? I don't see a vic­t­ro­la at all."

    "Seriously?"

    "Yeah, se­ri­o­usly. I see a bro­ken eig­ht-track ta­pe. Li­ke I sa­id, what Tass lo­oks li­ke will dif­fer from per­son to per­son wit­hin the ran­ge of ex­pec­ted sur­ro­un­dings,"

    Daria sat down. "You felt the nos­tal­gia, tho­ugh."

    Isbelle nod­ded. "Ye­ah, but that's Ju­ice, not Dram. Ju­ice isn't physi­cal-you can fe­el it with yo­ur mind, but you can't pick it up with yo­ur hands. This," she pic­ked up the bro­ken stylus, "you can to­uch and carry," She han­ded the stylus to Da­ria. "Spe­aking of which, you'll ha­ve the res­pon­si­bi­lity of car­rying this Dram back with us when tho­se guys are re­ady." She ges­tu­red to­wards the ot­her ma­ges in the cor­ners of the ca­ve. They all se­emed to be as­le­ep, sit­ting qu­i­etly and con­cen­t­ra­ting with the­ir eyes clo­sed.

    "There's so­met­hing I don't get, tho­ugh. Why has Tass for­med he­re, in this dump, at alt?" Is­bel­le po­in­ted the flas­h­light at the sle­eping lu­pi­ne.

    "That's pro­bably why. That and the fact that this dump holds a lot of en­t­ro­pic energy."

    Daria's fa­ce was blank, and Is­bel­le nod­ded as if ex­pec­ting the res­pon­se. "Lu­pi­nes se­em to at­tract ley li­nes to them. It's an odd phe­no­me­non. Add to that the fact that this dump is a gra­ve­yard for a com­mu­nity's me­mo­ri­es, an area rich in lost li­fe energy, and you get lots of Ju­ice, may­be even so­me Dram, es­pe­ci­al­ly sin­ce it's so out of the way, so un­tap­ped."

    Datia nod­ded. "Whe­re el­se can you gat­her Ju­ice?"

    "Oh, lots of pla­ces. Usu­al­ly we don't go di­rectly in­to the No­de-it's too dan­ge­ro­us. We stay out­si­de and use a form of ma­gick you'll so­on le­arn."

    Daria was sha­king her he­ad. "But, I me­an, what sort of pla­ces ha­ve Qu­in­tes­sen­ce in them?"

    Isbelle tho­ught a mo­ment and sa­id, "I've ta­ken it from all sorts of pla­ces - nig­h­t­c­lubs, uni­ver­si­ti­es, so­me cor­po­ra­te bu­il­dings up­town, chur­c­hes, malls, a men­tal in­s­ti­tu­ti­on or two. We even tap­ped so­me in a hoc­key sta­di­um one ti­me,"

    "Where'd you find the Dram?"

    "Corporate bu­il­ding." She grin­ned. "Actu­al­ly, I to­ok it from Rich's ca­bal, but he do­esn't know that yet. Don't tell him. I'm go­ing to gi­ve it back to him for his bir­t­h­day."

    Daria chuc­k­led. Re­mem­be­ring what she held in her hand, she as­ked, "What are we go­ing to do with this Dram, an­y­way?"

    Isbelle po­in­ted the flas­h­light in Da­ria's eyes. "You ask too many qu­es­ti­ons!"

    Daria shi­el­ded her eyes, but per­sis­ted, "Oh, co­me on, tell me!"

    "All right, all right." She shut off the light. "Usu­al­ly, we tap in­to it as an energy so­ur­ce, in the sa­me way we sto­re Ju­ice in our bo­di­es. I think with this one, tho­ugh, sin­ce it's not so por­tab­le, we'll pawn it off to so­me­one in the Glee Club."

    "The who?"

    "The Cult of Ec­s­tasy." Is­bel­le set­tled back aga­inst a pi­ece of rusty me­tal. "Eno­ugh talk. Ti­me we got star­ted, or we'll find our­sel­ves de­aling with an un­hap­py doggy." Is­bel­le win­ked mis­c­hi­evo­usly. Da­ria fol­lo­wed Is­bel­le's le­ad as she shut her eyes and con­cen­t­ra­ted on the Qu­in­tes­sen­ce alt aro­und her.

    I had ever­y­t­hing wit­hin my re­ach

    I had mo­ney and stuff

    Each and every call

    Too much, but ne­ver eno­ugh.

    Tear it up and watch it fall

    - Sis­ters of Mercy, "Ne­ver­land"

    Otherworldly vo­ices whis­pe­red aro­und them: "She is be­a­uti­ful, li­ke a cha­in of lig­h­t­ning," "And fi­ne, li­ke a lo­tus fi­ber," "And shi­nes in the minds of the sa­ges." "She is sub­t­le, the Awa­ke­ner of pu­re know­led­ge," "The em­bo­di­ment of all bliss," "Who­se true na­tu­re is pu­re con­s­ci­o­us­ness."

    Xiao and Bran­ton flo­ated on air, ri­ding the Wa­ve of Bliss, Bran­ton's tho­ughts ca­res­sed her mind as he slo­wed ti­me to enj­oy the­ir in­ti­macy. Xi­ao had so much to te­ach him, the le­ast of which we­re the Tantrtc ri­tu­als. Tho­ugh tra­ined of the Cult of Ec­s­tasy, he had so much po­ten­ti­al that she was su­re he wo­uld so­me­day be a gre­at mem­ber of the Brot­her­ho­od.

    Branton sig­hed. "I ne­ver be­li­eved it co­uld be this go­od."

    "Believe." Then Xi­ao ten­sed- "Wa­it, do­es that me­an at first you did not be­li­eve?"

    "No- it's just an ex­p­res­si­on." He ca­res­sed her che­ek ten­derly. "Re­al­ly."

    "Honestly?"

    Branton shif­ted aw­k­wardly. "Yes, ho­nestly."

    "Good." Still, Xi­ao lo­oked aro­und the ro­om, un­su­re. Not­hing se­emed out of pla­ce- ex­cept a fra­med pho­tog­raph that hadn't be­en the­re mi­nu­tes be­fo­re. Slowly, she wit­h­d­rew and slip­ped on a nig­h­t­s­hirt,

    "Why-" Bran­ton re­ac­hed for her, but she deftly step­ped away.

    "You li­ed. Ne­ver lie to yo­ur­self or ot­hers when qu­es­ti­ons of re­ality and be­li­ef are in­vol­ved."

    He slam­med his fist on the bed. "What do you me­an by that? I li­ed?"

    "Isn't it ob­vi­o­us? You en­te­red the Ri­tu­al not be­li­eving. You've cre­ated what we call yerk dim -a flaw- in the fab­ric of the re­ality we we­re cre­ating. The de­sign has run amok; it is un­ba­lan­ced now."

    Branton's fa­ce flus­hed hot. "Lo­ok, I don't know what you're-"

    Xiao sho­ok her he­ad. "I am sad­de­ned that you do not wish to le­arn."

    "Learn what? How to ma­ke fun of kwai lun ? The Ame­ri­can guy?" Bran­ton put on his pants and be­gan to gat­her his be­lon­gings.

    "Of co­ur­se not. I spe­ak only of le­ar­ning how to con­t­rol yo­ur tem­per and of le­ar­ning how to ma­ke yo­ur way out of a Qu­i­et."

    Branton sho­ok his he­ad. "I don't know what you're ram­b­ling on abo­ut."

    "Do you want to know?"

    Branton pa­used. Slowly, with so­me re­sen­t­ment, he met her eyes, "Yes, I gu­ess I do."

    Xiao nod­ded so­lemnly. "Go­od. Sit down." Tos­sing his bag to the flo­or, Bran­ton sat grud­gingly. Xi­ao con­ti­nu­ed, un­dis­tur­bed, "Yo­ur dis­be­li­ef star­ted the fab­ric run­ning. It cre­ated Pa­ra­dox which-"

    "Before you go on, what is this Pa­ra­dox shit you ke­ep men­ti­oning? I've be­en told to avo­id it, but I've ne­ver be­en told what it is, what it do­es,"

    Xiao nod­ded. "Yo­ur un­dis­cip­li­ned Cult mas­ters do you a dis­ser­vi­ce, Pa­ra­dox is the na­tu­ral­ly oc­cur­ring for­ce that ba­lan­ces Yin and Yang. Too much Yin or Yang, and you vi­ola­te the re­ality that World Mind has es­tab­lis­hed- you un­ba­lan­ce it. Pa­ra­dox simply pre­ser­ves ba­lan­ce."

    Xiao sat down on the bed be­si­de Bran­ton, and the yo­ung ma­ge to­ok her out­s­t­ret­c­hed hand. Gently, he res­ted his he­ad on her lap and sta­red up in­to her eyes. "So you're sa­ying that the World Mind, which I pre­su­me is con­sen­su­al re­ality, is the na­tu­ral sta­te of things, that we sho­uldn't vi­ola­te it?"

    Xiao stro­ked his ha­ir. She sho­ok her he­ad, "No, ab­so­lu­tely not. I ma­de no jud­g­ments upon World Mind; just that it is. World Mind is mu­tab­le by na­tu­re, and its cur­rent form is one that all Tra­di­ti­ons wish to chan­ge."

    "So I un­ba­lan­ced the World Mind, but that's OK, sin­ce we want to sha­pe it in­to a re­ality of our own ma­king an­y­way,"

    "With pa­ti­en­ce and wis­dom."

    "Meaning?"

    "Do not vi­ola­te the World Mind too bla­tantly, or yo­ur ef­forts will be for na­ught. You see, World Mind is in the em­p­loy of the Tec­h­noc­racy now, and, con­se­qu­ently, so is Pa­ra­dox. If you ig­no­re World Mind, Pa­ra­dox will des­t­roy you, and you will only ha­ve ac­hi­eved the enemy's go­al."

    "I'm still not su­re I un­der­s­tand what Pa­ra­dox is. Is it sen­ti­ent, or is it a for­ce li­ke wind or wa­ter? Is it, for in­s­tan­ce, ca­pab­le of mercy? Do­es it know lo­ve?"

    Xiao smi­led. "Not all things know lo­ve. So­me know only jus­ti­ce be­ca­use they are for­med only of an im­pul­se for jus­ti­ce." She pa­used. Co­uld she risk ex­po­sing him to the truth? Yes, per­haps she co­uld. They had co­me this far, and he se­emed open eno­ugh. "Do you see that pho­tog­raph?"

    Branton sat up and lo­oked at the pho­to to which Xi­ao was po­in­ting. "What's that do­ing the­re?" The pho­to, in a gilt lac­qu­ered fra­me, sho­wed Xi­ao and an ol­der man lying na­ked on a be­ach in each ot­her's arms. In the bac­k­g­ro­und, the wa­ves of the oce­an se­emed to spar­k­le and shift. "Who is that guy?"

    Xiao we­ig­hed her res­pon­se. "That, my lo­ve, is my fat­her."

    "What the fu-" Bran­ton sta­red at her, dis­gus­ted.

    Xiao clo­sed her eyes and smi­led, "Be­fo­re you jump to con­c­lu­si­ons, let me ex­p­la­in."

    "I think you bet­ter."

    "First, bring that pic­tu­re to me."

    Reluctantly, Bran­ton sto­od and wal­ked over to the bu­re­au whe­re the pho­to sto­od. He put his hand on it, but wit­h­d­rew it qu­ickly, "Ow! It's hot!"

    "That's all right. It won't harm you- just bring it he­re."

    Branton lif­ted the fra­me ca­re­ful­ly. "It se­ems he­avy. C'mon, tell me what's go­ing on."

    Xiao held out her hand, and he pla­ced the fra­med pho­to in it. "World Mind is li­ke this oce­an, and Pa­ra­dox is its mo­bi­lity. The oce­an slos­hes and sways, hut it stays wit­hin its ba­sin. It do­es not fill the sky one day, then di­sap­pe­ar in­to un­der­g­ro­und ca­verns the next. Am I right?"

    "Yes, but-"

    "Listen, World Mind is the sa­me: the­re are dif­fe­rent be­li­efs- wa­ves and cur­rents in the oce­an- but com­mon fun­da­men­tal be­li­efs in the na­tu­re of re­ality ca­use all be­li­efs to co­he­re."

    Branton sat down next to Xi­ao. "What abo­ut his pho­to, Xi­ao?"

    "We'll get to that." She po­in­ted to the spar­k­ling wa­ves in the pho­to. "But what ca­uses the­se to gat­her to­get­her and crash down in a ti­dal wa­ve, wash over the land in a mon­so­on, or form a wa­ter spo­ut and fill the sky ? Ot­her for­ces. The for­ces from you and me-Self Mind con­t­ra­dic­ting World Mind."

    Branton sho­ok his he­ad, con­fu­sed.

    "Paradox oc­curs when the right mix of for­ces des­ta­bi­li­zes re­ality, just as a ti­dal wa­ve cras­hes on­s­ho­re when an erup­ti­on oc­curs un­der­wa­ter. If the la­va oozes out on­to the se­af­lo­or slowly, wit­ho­ut dis­p­la­cing lar­ge qu­an­ti­ti­es of wa­ter, the­re is no ti­dal wa­ve. If a vol­ca­no blasts mol­ten rock in­to the oce­an, sud­denly dis­p­la­cing hu­ge qu­an­ti­ti­es of wa­ter, the­re is su­re to be a bac­k­lash. The ti­dal wa­ve is li­ke a Pa­ra­dox Bac­k­lash."

    "So Pa­ra­dox is not sen­ti­ent- it is just a for­ce?"

    "Not exactly. That me­tap­hor des­c­ri­bes how Pa­ra­dox works, not what it is."

    Bcanton sto­od and be­gan to pa­ce back and forth, "Lo­ok, I want to know why you ha­ve that pic­tu­re, OK? If it's re­la­ted to Pa­ra­dox, ex­p­la­in it. Just stop dan­cing aro­und the is­sue!"

    Xiao lo­oked down at the flo­or. "Yes, you are right. I will ex­p­la­in. This pic­tu­re is re­la­ted to Pa­ra­dox, so he­ar me out. Pa­ra­dox is all that I ha­ve sa­id it is, but it is al­so mo­re. In a sen­se, it is sen­ti­ent: as sen­ti­ent and mer­ci­ful as tho­se who pu­nish them­sel­ves with it. To put it pla­inly, Pa­ra­dox is a ma­ni­fes­ta­ti­on of our own im­pul­se to pu­nish our­sel­ves. Down de­ep in­si­de, we ex­pect pu­nis­h­ment for vi­ola­ting World Mind, and we get it by in­f­lic­ting it upon our­sel­ves,"

    "So if we tra­in our­sel­ves not to ex­pect pu­nis­h­ment-

    "We do not re­ce­ive it. But that is very, very dif­fi­cult, if not im­pos­sib­le. And luck plays a ro­le in it."

    "How?"

    "If so­me­one who do­ubts se­es ma­gick wit­ho­ut co­in­ci­den­tal ef­fect, World Mind sends the pu­nis­h­ment even be­fo­re the ma­ge's self-pu­nis­hing im­pul­se has a chan­ce to."

    "Can the two work to­get­her?"

    "Yes."

    "Is that what hap­pe­ned he­re?" Bran­ton's vo­ice so­un­ded ten­se.

    "Yes."

    Tenser still: "But why the pic­tu­re? Why didn't lig­h­t­ning stri­ke us down or so­met­hing?"

    Xiao smi­led, "The na­tu­re of Pa­ra­dox is sub­t­le and of­ten po­etic. Du­ring our Ri­tu­al, we slip­ped in­to a Qu­i­et." Bran­ton step­ped clo­ser to Xi­ao. "Yes, what is that?"

    "It is a sta­te of Pa­ra­dox for which my only clue was this." Xi­ao held up the pho­tog­raph.

    "So are we de­ad?"

    Xiao chuc­k­led sof­tiy. "No, no. We are simply stuck in an al­te­red men­tal sta­te,"

    Branton drew up a cha­ir and strad­dled it. "Li­ke we're on drugs?"

    Xiao nod­ded. "In a way."

    "What's the me­aning of the pho­to, then?"

    "It's a kind of psychic re­si­due- the im­ba­lan­ced por­ti­on of Yin and Yang. Even­tu­al­ly, it will di­sap­pe­ar from our sight, as World Mind rights it­self. In the me­an­ti­me, we are the only ones who can see it."

    Branton snor­ted, "So ever­yo­ne el­se wo­uld see us car­rying not­hing in our hands and sa­ying, 'See this?' and, 'Ow! It's hot!', and they'd think we're crazy, is that it?"

    Xiao smi­led. "Yes."

    Branton's smi­le stif­fe­ned, "But why'd it ha­ve to show you and yo­ur Dad? How do­es Pa­ra­dox de­ci­de to pu­nish you?"

    "That is a wi­se qu­es­ti­on. I do not know the an­s­wer, but I can gu­ess. Per­haps be­ca­use of the na­tu­re of the ri­tu­al and the fact that the­re was do­ubt in yo­ur mind and worry in mi­ne, the ri­tu­al didn't suc­ce­ed en­ti­rely wit­ho­ut Pa­ra­dox. I ha­ve, and I am su­re you ha­ve, ac­cu­mu­la­ted Pa­ra­dox energy in the past. That energy was chan­ne­led in­to the psychic cre­ati­on of the pho­to. It was so­met­hing that, du­ring a ri­tu­al in­ten­ded to cre­ate con­cord, cre­ated dis­cord in­s­te­ad,"

    "What we­re the vo­ices, then, if the ri­tu­al fa­iled?"

    "Part of the Qu­i­et. Part of our own con­cord, even as our do­ubt cre­ated dis­cord."

    Branton to­ok Xi­ao's hand. "Yin and Yang ba­lan­cing each ot­her?"

    "Yes, Yin and Yang," she rep­li­ed, let­ting the pho­to drop to the car­pet.

    Branton lo­oked de­ep in­to her eyes. "Do you for­gi­ve me?"

    "I lo­ve you and ho­nor you. You re­qu­ire no for­gi­ve­ness."

    "Then I'll ta­ke this as a- what do you call it?"

    "Ha job ging yim ."

    "Yes, a le­ar­ning ex­pe­ri­en­ce."

    For the hu­man kin­g­dom, be­ne­ath the flo­or of the com­pa­ra­ti­vely ne­at lit­tle dwel­ling that we call our con­s­ci­o­us­ness, go­es down in­to un­sus­pec­ted Alad­din ca­ves. The­re, not only jewels, but al­so dan­ge­ro­us jinn abi­de.

    - Joseph Cam­p­bell, The He­ro with a Tho­usand Fa­ces

    Tasha felt the rock be­ne­ath her fe­et trem­b­le slightly as she pad­ded in­to the ca­verns. Her skin se­emed to hum, tin­g­ling with fe­ar­ful an­ti­ci­pa­ti­on, A wall of fi­re crac­k­led ac­ross her path. Hot air se­ared her thro­at and nos­t­rils and her ba­re skin had a she­en of swe­at. Ca­ught bet­we­en the clammy fe­ar in­si­de and the dry he­at of the ca­vern, Tas­ha shi­ve­red, ste­eled her­self, then step­ped for­ward thro­ugh the cur­ta­in of fi­re and in­to the lab­y­rinth.

    The Dan­cer gli­ded from a nic­he and drew her­self up on po­in­te be­si­de Tas­ha, res­p­len­dent in gra­ce Tas­ha only wis­hed she co­uld pos­sess. They sha­red the fa­ce and form of a pro­fes­si­onal, but the Ava­tar per­so­ni­fi­ed the cat­li­ke flow that the ma­ge her­self lac­ked. Back aga­in so so­on? the Dan­cer as­ked si­lently. Tas­ha nod­ded as­sent. Am­bi­ti­ous, aren't we? The Dan­cer smi­led, but her eyes clo­uded with nig­h­t­ma­re. Her em­path "vo­ice" ec­ho­ed in Tas­ha's bo­nes, li­ke a hal­f­felt se­is­mic tre­mor. Be­yond this po­int, you go alo­ne; I'll ad­vi­se, but can­not aid you.

    "I know the drill," Tas­ha sa­id alo­ud as the tun­nel lo­omed ahe­ad. It was black, pitch black, and wo­und en­d­les­sly down ward. Tas­ha ste­adi­ed her bre­at­hing as she sta­red in­to the ear­t­hen vo­id. Far be­low, she knew, lay the Light, the Led­ge, the Po­ol, and ot­her pla­ces… but to re­ach them, she must pass thro­ugh dar­k­ness. He­art ham­me­ring, she en­te­red, le­aving light and Dan­cer be­hind.

    She spre­ad her arms to fe­el her way along the ro­ugh sto­ne walls. Her to­es pas­sed lightly ac­ross the pebbly dirt flo­or, se­ar­c­hing for trips and pit­fal­ls. Each ste­ady bre­ath ex­pan­ded in­to the tun­nel, se­ar­c­hing for the things eyes co­uld not see. As Tas­ha crept for­ward, the walls nar­ro­wed. The flo­or and ce­iling tig­h­te­ned. So­on, her ha­ir brus­hed the tun­nel's crum­b­ling top. The air grew thin, stif­ling, he­avy, Still she con­ti­nu­ed, hum­ming softly to her­self.

    The tun­nel shrunk to cro­uch-he­ight, then to craw­l­si­ze. Dar­k­ness was eter­nal he­re, and the air was thick with rich ear­th-scent. Tas­ha's he­art thun­de­red in spi­te of her com­for­ting hum. Dirt sif­ted in­to her ha­ir, wor­ked its way be­ne­ath her qu­es­ting fin­ger­na­ils, grit­ted in her mo­uth and no­se, plas­te­red it­self to swe­aty skin. Cold slick- things qu­es­ted, fo­und her, and wit­h­d­rew. Sto­ne walls scra­ped her flesh as she slid de­eper dow­n­ward, to­wards the Light she knew wa­ited be­yond.

    Years pas­sed. Eons. Eter­ni­ti­es. Not fa­ir! she mo­aned. The tun­nel grew lon­ger and tig­h­ter each ti­me she en­te­red. It sho­uld get easi­er! Tas­ha wor­med her way thro­ugh a pas­sa­ge ba­rely wi­de eno­ugh to pull her he­ad thro­ugh. Her bre­asts and ribs pres­sed pa­in­ful­ly aga­inst the walls with each ca­uti­o­us bre­ath, each he­ar­t­be­at. Wild pa­nic sur­ged at the trap. Ca­ve, in! scre­amed her fe­ar. They'd ne­ver find you! Was that a light ahe­ad? Or only a wis­h­ful vi­si­on?

    The pas­sa­ge wi­de­ned from won­nho­le to craw­l­s­pa­ce. Fresh air flo­wed from the dar­k­ness ahe­ad. Then the Light, the bles­sed Light, war­med the tun­nel from black to gray to earthy brown. Tas­ha pa­used at last to wi­pe away the din be­fo­re ro­un­ding a fi­nal co­mer and en­te­ring the Ca­vern of Winds.

    The air he­re was go­ose-bump cold in con­t­rast to the stif­ling tun­nel, and it swept her ha­ir in­to tan­g­les. The walls glo­wed gre­en with iri­des­cent fun­gus and co­ol light bec­ko­ned from the Led­ge of Fa­ith. Not bad, sa­id the Dan­cer. "I knew you'd be he­re," Tas­ha rep­li­ed alo­ud, wrap­ping her arms to her si­des. The two of them wal­ked to the Led­ge in si­len­ce. I didn't think you'd get thro­ugh it the first ti­me, the Dan­cer fi­nal­ly ad­mit­ted,

    "Why do­es it ke­ep get­ting lon­ger?" Tas­ha as­ked tes­tily.

    Each new sec­ret ups the sta­kes. Each new in­sight ups the cost. Each new po­wer ups the thre­at. Wit­ho­ut dis­cip­li­ne co­mes di­sas­ter.

    "You so­und li­ke von Dag­ram," the ma­ge shot back, re­cal­ling her pre­achy men­tor. The wind ro­ared thro­ugh the ca­vern, bi­ting to the bo­ne. Light blas­ted thro­ugh the chinks in the rock walls as they pad­ded to the sun­lit Led­ge. This part al­ways ga­ve Tas­ha the cre­eps.

    The gro­und at the mo­un­ta­in's fo­ot se­emed mi­les away. The ma­ge's sto­mach drop­ped away with it. Sco­uring winds thre­ate­ned to swe­ep Tas­ha and the Dan­cer from the Led­ge in­to ob­li­vi­on. Frost spar­k­led on the Led­ge, and Tas­ha's bre­ath puf­fed in the icy air. In the dis­tan­ce, anot­her mo­un­ta­in ro­se, with anot­her Led­ge le­ading to fur­t­her tests, Bet­we­en the mo­un­ta­ins lay a vo­id brid­ged by not­hing. The ma­ge wa­ve­red, clin­ging to the Led­ge's walls, fig­h­ting ver­ti­go and the pul­ling of the wind.

    Well? sa­id the Dan­cer.

    "I'm wor­king on it," Tas­ha snap­ped, "Gi­ve me a mi­nu­te." A bo­ok she'd on­ce re­ad sa­id that the sec­ret to flying was to throw yo­ur­self at the gro­und and miss. The aut­hor wasn't far from wrong. It had ta­ken Tas­ha three tri­es be­fo­re she'd mas­te­red the Led­ge, and two of them had ne­arly kil­led her.

    The ma­ge hum­med softly, dra­wing her con­cen­t­ra­ti­on in­ward from dis­t­rac­ti­ons, Go­osef­lesh rip­pled, and ha­ir whip­ped her clo­sed eyes. The de­ep chill she felt ca­me only so­mew­hat from the wind. She step­ped back in­to the ca­vern and gat­he­red her­con­fi­den­ce li­ke a blan­ket aga­inst the cold, then rus­hed out to the Led­ge and le­aped.

    The sto­mach-lurch of free-fall hit her as she sa­iled in­to the vo­id, and then the winds lif­ted her. I did it!! She la­ug­hed wildly as she flew, arms and legs spre­ad wi­de, he­ad thrown back, brown ha­ir tra­iling be­hind her. Icy air-fin­gers ca­res­sed her as she swept ac­ross the chasm li­ke a na­ked hu­man ki­te, the cold for­got­ten. Her dan­cer's in­s­tincts to­ok over and she spun in flight, pi­ro­u­et­ting and twis­ting as she la­ug­hed. The mo­un­ta­in lo­omed ahe­ad, but Tas­ha to­ok her ti­me, cha­sing spar­rows high abo­ve the snow-co­ve­red was­tes. Fi­nal­ly, she alig­h­ted on the far led­ge to con­ti­nue her qu­est. Ha­ve fun? the Dan­cer as­ked, but Tas­ha only nod­ded, pan­ting and grin­ning. Catch yo­ur bre­ath, sa­id the Ava­tar; You'll ne­ed it.

    The Po­ol wa­ited at the end of a long spi­ral pas­sa­ge thro­ugh the mo­un­ta­in. In­si­de the mo­un­ta­in, the air grew wan­ner, tho­ugh Tas­ha still shi­ve­red with ex­hi­la­ra­ted chill. Along the way, the ma­ge pre­pa­red her­self by bre­at­hing de­eply, ex­pan­ding her lungs to the li­mit. The rush from her flight ga­ve way to con­cen­t­ra­ti­on. "Last ti­me," she sa­id to the Dan­cer, "I met the Gu­ar­di­an at the Po­ol and fet­c­hed him the pe­arl be­fo­re the oy­s­ter shut. This is as far as I've go­ne so far. Whe­re do I go from he­re?"

    You'll know.

    "How?"

    Look for what is dif­fe­rent, fol­low it. The Gu­ar­di­an will me­et you at the next brid­ge.

    The Gu­ar­di­an was the eter­nal end of this se­emingly en­d­less jo­ur­ney: the Wat­c­her at the So­ul's Cros­sro­ads, the Ga­te­ke­eper of the In­ner Self, Gran­ter of En­lig­h­ten­ment, the Mi­ser of Are­te. The Gu­ar­di­an, Tas­ha knew, per­so­ni­fi­es as­pects of con­s­ci­en­ce, fe­ar, dis­cip­li­ne and rep­res­si­on. All the things the ma­ge co­uld not yet han­d­le as­su­med the form of her Gu­ar­di­an, and she knew she had to ta­ke her de­mands of en­lig­h­ten­ment to him. In the past, she'd met him at the end of the tun­nel, the far Led­ge and the Po­ol. At the tho­ught of the new test, she shi­ve­red. To con­vin­ce the Gu­ar­di­an of yo­ur worth, you had to fa­ce symbo­lic tests of fe­ar, fa­ith, gre­ed, wis­dom and ot­her tra­its. Tas­ha was still wor­king on sim­p­le fa­ith and fe­ar. The ca­verns glit­te­red with crystal ve­ins and light bre­ezes stir­red the sandy flo­or. The Po­ol sat in the cen­ter of a gi­gan­tic cham­ber. The Gu­ar­di­an was now­he­re to be se­en.

    The mir­ro­red sur­fa­ce was de­cep­ti­ve; the Po­ol went down far­t­her than Tas­ha ca­red to gu­ess, to a rocky bot­tom strewn with gi­ant oy­s­ters and stran­ge crab-li­ke stri­ders. It had be­en all the ma­ge co­uld do to re­ach the bot­tom, cla­im a pe­arl from the jaws of an open clam, and sur­fa­ce. Each ti­me, the tests chan­ged slightly. The ma­ge dre­aded the va­ri­ati­ons. She fle­xed her limbs and fil­led her lungs. "Sa­me de­al as last ti­me?" she as­ked the Ava­tar. The Dan­cer shrug­ged and han­ded her a bel­ted le­at­her sack. Tas­ha slip­ped it on. "See you on the ot­her si­de," she sa­id, then gul­ped a lun­g­ful of co­ot air and di­ved.

    The shock of bre­aking the icy Po­ol hit Tas­ha hard. She kic­ked dow­n­ward, fe­eling the wa­ter's we­ight press in aga­inst her ear­d­rums. As her lungs be­gan to pro­test, Tas­ha sig­h­ted the bot­tom. To her an­no­yan­ce, it had chan­ged from last ti­me - now it re­sem­b­led an or­na­te Ori­en­tal ru­in, as if the Po­ol had swal­lo­wed so­me an­ci­ent pa­go­da. The gar­den, she no­ted, se­emed in­tact. Fish dar­ted among the ca­re­ful­ly-ten­ded rock pat­terns and trim­med flo­wers. The pa­go­da, ho­we­ver, was a sham­b­les. Lo­ok for what is dif­fe­rent, the Dan­cer had sa­id. The ma­ge shrug­ged and swam in­to the ru­ins.

    The dim in­te­ri­or glit­te­red with scat­te­red gold and whi­te­ned bo­ne. The­re had be­en a mas­sac­re he­re, it se­emed; the bo­di­es of do­zens of long-de­ad com­ba­tants lit­te­red the flo­or, min­g­ling with pi­les of gems and bright gold co­ins. Tas­ha's pul­se qu­ic­ke­ned, thum­ping in her ears. Gre­ed swel­led, Jesus, lo­ok at this ha­ul! She gli­ded to a pi­le of tre­asu­re. This must be what the sack is for! Qu­ickly, she stuf­fed han­d­fuls of lo­ot in­to the po­uch, wat­c­hing the bo­nes for so­me sight of a trap.

    The sha­dow wrap­ped aro­und her an­k­le, tight and bi­ting cold. She gas­ped, and pre­ci­o­us air bub­bled past her lips. Her lungs hit­c­hed as the sha­dow drew her bac­k­wards, away from the do­or­way and in­to the ru­in. Tas­ha scre­amed men­tal cur­ses as she fla­iled for a han­d­hold. The light fell away and dar­k­ness col­der than the windy Led­ge en­fol­ded her. Dan­cer! she tho­ught fran­ti­cal­ly, but the­re was no reply.

    Panic burst forth, bright and crazy. Tas­ha scrab­bled at the dar­k­ness, her tho­ughts flying, her con­cen­t­ra­ti­on wrec­ked. To die du­ring Se­eking was wor­se than sim­p­le fa­ilu­re. It was a tiny de­ath of the so­ul, and ma­ges had di­ed physi­cal­ly of the shock. So­me Se­ekers had simply di­sap­pe­ared, and Tas­ha fe­ared she might be­co­me one of them. She co­uld bre­ak the tran­ce that bo­und her he­re, but didn't want to think of what that might do to her.

    The dar­k­ness bo­und her tightly. Its em­b­ra­ce was warm, com­for­ting. The ur­ge to qu­it fig­h­ting and mer­ge with the dar­k­ness wel­led up li­ke fresh-drawn blo­od. Out­si­de the dar­k­ness, the wa­ter was cold. The thun­der in her he­art eased to a ste­ady thump. Each pul­se se­emed to dta­in the air from her stra­ining lungs. Wha­te­ver you do, she tho­ught, you'd bet­ter do it qu­ick!

    Embrace the dar­k­ness., sa­id von Dag­ram, and dar­k­ness is what you'll re­ce­ive.

    What did I do? Grab a few co­ins?

    You rob­bed the de­ad. Was this von Dag­ram, or the Gu­ar­di­an? I didn't co­me to ste­al. I ca­me to ta­ke what was al­re­ady mi­ne!

    She ne­arly spo­ke the words alo­ud. Her lips par­ted, and she tas­ted wa­ter. Her lungs spas­med, and she cho­ked. Get out!

    Darkness squ­e­ezed. Tas­ha strug­gled, slip­ped off the po­uch of gold, The dar­k­ness wo­uld not let go. To hell with this! The ma­ge gat­he­red her des­pe­ra­te fury in­to a co­re of Pri­me for­ce and re­le­ased it. Bright light se­ared the sha­dow away. Light spil­led in, and cold wa­ter. The sha­dow wa­ve­red and Tas­ha kic­ked away for the sur­fa­ce. Ten­d­rils clung to her, tug­ging at her as she pul­led for the light abo­ve. The sha­dow drew her down aga­in. The last of her air slip­ped past her lips. She tur­ned in its grasp and fi­red a blast of pu­re Pri­me in­to the dar­k­ness. The ten­d­rils re­le­ased her, and she burst up­ward, in­to light,

    Fresh air ex­p­lo­ded in­to her lungs, bur­ning as she gas­ped. Tas­ha's limbs felt li­ke sto­ne as she swam ra­pidly for the si­de of the Po­ol. The rock ed­ge felt go­od be­ne­ath her num­bed fin­gers. She ha­uled her­self up and cro­uc­hed in the sand, vo­mi­ting wa­ter. When the fit pas­sed, she sank, ex­ha­us­ted, to the gro­und and lay the­re for a long ti­me.

    The Dan­cer to­uc­hed her arm with gen­t­le fin­gers. The Ava­tar's eyes we­re bright with con­cern. " Was that it?" Tas­ha as­ked we­akly. The Dan­cer sho­ok her he­ad. "Damn. Well, I'm gon­na rest, and tbe Gu­ar­di­an can go screw him­self."

    She awo­ke on sto­nes he­ated by the fi­re of a vol­ca­nic chasm. The Dan­cer still cro­uc­hed be­si­de her, but the Po­ol was go­ne. In its pla­ce was a mam­moth ca­vern split by a fla­ming abyss. Tas­ha lay on one si­de, in a shel­te­red al­co­ve; the Gu­ar­di­an lo­omed on the ot­her si­de, im­pas­si­ve in his black ro­bes, tal­ler than her mot­her's ho­use. As the ma­ge stir­red, the Gu­ar­di­an fol­ded his han­d­less sle­eves ac­ross his chest. As Tas­ha pul­led her­self to her fe­et, the chasm wi­de­ned and the fla­mes le­apt hig­her. You ha­ve co­me, sa­id the Gu­ar­di­an, but you are not yet re­ady. Re­turn la­ter.

    "Like hell!" The ro­om re­min­ded her of Hell, a Dan­te­es­que vi­si­on of gulfs that co­uld not be brid­ged. She stro­de to the ed­ge of the cliff, swe­aty from the ca­vern he­at. Pri­mal fe­ar and an­ger war­red with frus­t­ra­ti­on. She co­uld still fe­el the slip­pery grasp of dar­k­ness. Her belly sic­ke­ned with ter­ror and Po­ol-wa­ter. "I didn't co­me all this way for not­hing,"she ro­ared ac­ross the gulf; "Gi­ve me what I ca­me for. I'm re­ady!"

    You are not. Ar her fe­et, the ma­ge no­ti­ced a tig­h­t­ro­pe, old hemp stret­c­hed ac­ross the fla­ming chasm. Splin­tery pegs an­c­ho­red the ro­pe at both ends. Wisps of smo­ke ro­se whe­re fi­re sin­ged the tig­h­t­ro­pe. You ha­ve fa­iled the tests .

    "I sur­vi­ved!" she cri­ed. "I ca­me out on the ot­her si­de all three ti­mes. I've do­ne it be­fo­re!" The in­fer­no's si­ze and rum­b­le swal­lo­wed her words. ''I'm re­ady, dam­mit! I'm re­ady!" Is ma­gick me­re sur­vi­val, then? Is Awa­ke­ning a me­ans to ga­in and ple­asu­re ? Or is it a me­ans to sta­ve off fe­ar of dar­k­ness?

    "I'm not af­ra­id!"

    You lie.

    Tasha sho­ok her he­ad. Ha­ir stuck to her fa­ce, and she pul­led it asi­de. "You're right. I am af­ra­id…."

    And angry, too.

    "And angry," she ad­mit­ted… "Christ, ma­ges get angry, ma­ges get sca­red. We're hu­man, we're not per­fect, and I've known ot­hers who've co­me this way who still carry an­ger and fe­ar in the­ir he­arts." She ex­ten­ded a fo­ot to the tig­h­t­ro­pe, tes­ted it, and gin­gerly step­ped on­to it. It dip­ped cra­zily, but held.

    Their way was not yo­ur way, the Gu­ar­di­an rep­li­ed. Each finds her in­ner de­mons he­re. Each cre­ates her own test.

    Tasha spre­ad her arms, ba­lan­cing aga­inst the sic­ke­ning pitch of the ro­pe ac­ross the fi­re. Go­uts of fla­me tic­ked at her so­les from the la­va far be­low. Li­ve ste­am bur­ned her no­se and thro­at. Be­hind her, the Dan­cer wa­ited, si­lent, "I fa­ced my fe­ars," sa­id Tas­ha. "I'm do­ing it now."

    Indeed. The Gu­ar­di­an in­c­li­ned his he­ad a bit. And if you fall? A wa­ve of pa­nic hit Tas­ha li­ke a blow, te­ete­rin­g­her on the ro­pe. She glan­ced down as a blast of he­at se­ared up­ward. Her legs wob­bled. Her to­es clen­c­hed the ro­pe. Fal­ling, the Gu­ar­di­an in­to­ned, is de­ath. Wor­se than de­ath.

    Falling. The fe­ar of twis­ted an­k­les and bro­ken bo­nes that ha­unts the dan­cers who defy gra­vity, ti­me and hu­man li­mi­ta­ti­ons. Tas­ha re­mem­be­red the fe­ar of fal­ling that had pa­ral­y­zed her af­ter a bad spill in high scho­ol. And she re­mem­be­red how she over­ca­me that fe­ar; she shif­ted her fe­ars to the mu­sic and em­b­ra­ced her­self and the mu­sic as one.

    She to­ok a de­ep bre­ath and hum­med, fe­eling the hum re­ver­be­ra­te down in­to her bo­nes. She clo­sed her eyes and was­hed the pa­nic asi­de with a cal­ming of her Mind. Don't think of the pa­in, her dan­ce in­s­t­ruc­tor sa­id, don't think of what you're not sup­po­sed to be ab­le to do. Think of the mu­sic and the dan­ce and flow with it. The dan­ce! Of co­ur­se! The dan­ce of cre­ati­on; the dan­ce of gra­ce and po­wer, art and lo­ve and pas­si­on, the dyna­mic rhythm of eter­nity's pul­se, en­d­les­sly pum­ping the li­feb­lo­od of exis­ten­ce thro­ugh form, mind and spi­rit. Li­fe, she sud­denly knew, was mo­re than a rest of wills or an act of de­fi­an­ce. Re­ality's a dan­ce, she tho­ught, and I am the Dan­cer!

    Her fe­et step­ped lightly ac­ross a tig­h­t­ro­pe go­ne sud­denly strong and ta­ut. Eup­ho­ria lif­ted her abo­ve the pa­ins of her tri­als. Her arms ro­de the ri­sing fi­re cur­rents, and her ha­ir swir­led in the up­d­rafts. Tas­ha ro­pe-dan­ced with cat­li­ke per­fec­ti­on, and was ne­arly di­sap­po­in­ted when she re­ac­hed the ot­her si­de.

    The Gu­ar­di­an to­we­red abo­ve her, his black sle­eves rip­pling in the hot bre­eze. Tas­ha swal­lo­wed, wet­ting her lips and ton­gue to spe­ak. The exer­ti­on thrill rus­hed gid­dyin­giy to her he­ad. She for­ced her bre­at­hing and he­ar­t­be­at to slow; "I'm re­ady," she sa­id, "to ad­van­ce."

    The Gu­ar­di­an ap­pra­ised her slowly. The dan­ce is fas­ter, the mo­ves are mo­re com­p­lex, the le­aps are hig­her and the rinks of fal­ling are gre­ater.

    "I un­der­s­tand," the ma­ge sa­id, "and ac­cept what's mi­ne."

    The Gu­ar­di­an swept his arms open, tra­iling mid­night sle­eves. His ho­od flas­hed open for a bri­ef in­s­tant- was it a wo­man's fa­ce in the folds?- then sha­do­wed his (her?) fa­ce aga­in. Light flo­wed from the Gu­ar­di­an, light mi­xed with dar­k­ness li­ke an oil slick, both flo­wing to­get­her and wrap­ping them­sel­ves aro­und the ma­ge. Un­li­ke the dar­k­ness in the Po­ol, this es­sen­ce held no fe­ar or pa­nic, only ful­fil­lment, as if so­me mis­sing vi­tal thing had be­en res­to­red.

    When I re­ach As­cen­si­on , she won­de­red, do­es the Gu­ar­di­an di­sap­pe­ar?

    Perhaps, sa­id a vo­ice, the Dan­cer's vo­ice, and per­haps not. Only then will you know. The Ava­tar emer­ged from the Gu­ar­di­an's cas­ca­de and ex­ten­ded her hands to Tas­ha, then to­ok her in her arms.

    Mage and Ava­tar hug­ged li­ke sis­ters, mer­ging in­to a sin­g­le who­le. A hum­ming li­ke a tho­usand mel­ding songs set­tled in Tas­ha's mind and spi­rit, and her hands swept up­wards to ca­ress the fal­ling es­sen­ce. My self and my dan­ce are one, she tho­ught as she flo­ated from the pla­ce of Se­eking in­to wis­dom's warm em­b­ra­ce. Cold, an­ger, fe­ar, all of the­se wo­uld re­turn in ti­me, hut for the mo­ment, Tas­ha had what she ne­eded.

    Until next ti­me…

    The Co­un­cil of Ni­ne

    In the be­gin­ning

    There was the cold and the night

    Prophets and an­gels ga­ve us the fi­re and the light

    Man was tri­um­p­hant

    Armed with the fa­ith and the will

    That even the dar­kest ages co­uldn't kill.

    - Billy Jo­el, "Two Tho­usand Ye­ars"

    "H-a-a-a-rley, you pro­mi­sed me you'd talk abo­ut the Tra­di­ti­ons to­night, I wan­na know." De­at­h­la­ce smi­led and pus­hed back an un­ruly lock of her mid­night black ha­ir. Har­ley was per­haps the sin­g­le bright spot in her re­cent dark li­fe: he was pre­ten­ti­o­us, and silly, and funky. Har­ley was a self-des­c­ri­bed li­ving ste­re­ot­y­pe, a 'hard roc­ker' from New Jer­sey who spo­ke 'rock n' rol­le­se' li­ke he was a cha­rac­ter from the la­test Spi­nal Tap mo­vie. His fa­ke roc­ker ac­cent and roc­ker spe­ech didn't ne­ga­te his charm. For so­me re­ason it fit: he lo­oked li­ke a wi­zardry ver­si­on of Me­at Lo­af and did his best ma­gic­kal work with his gu­itar.

    Ever sin­ce De­at­h­la­ce left At­lan­ta in Har­ley's bus (cal­led, pre­dic­tably, the 'Ma­gic Bus'), she had a sen­se of des­tiny, li­ke she was be­ing drawn ac­ross the con­ti­nent, dri­ving se­ve­ral tho­usand mi­les to ha­ve her da­te with fa­te. She fell in lo­ve with the ma­gic­kal bus, which was big­ger on the in­si­de than it was out­si­de. The in­si­de had three sta­ir­ca­ses, and, when it got up to spe­ed on the hig­h­way, it slip­ped in­to so­me stran­ge re­ality which ma­de the win­dows in­to psyche­de­lic lig­h­t­s­hows. She wan­ted to know mo­re abo­ut be­ing a ma­ge, mo­re than Sad Wil­lie, her for­mer men­tor, co­uld ever te­ach her. Har­ley had be­en put­ting her off the en­ti­re trip.

    Harley dow­ned the last of the che­ap be­er that he was slur­ping on and threw the can be­hind him with a belch. Stra­ig­h­te­ning his bul­ging le­at­her vest and pic­king up a fi­nely-tu­ned Gib­son ax in the cha­ir next to him, he fil­led the back of the tra­vel­ling Chan­t­ry-cum-to­ur­bus with a light strum­ming in the man­ner of a me­di­eval tro­uba­do­ur. Nor­mal­ly, De­at­h­la­ce wo­uld lo­ve to lis­ten to him play- she wo­uld sit for ho­urs, he­re in the li­ving ro­om of the bus, lis­te­ning to him. Now she grew im­pa­ti­ent, and her fa­ce sho­wed it.

    He pa­used for a mo­ment, pic­ked out a mad­ri­gal and lo­oked up at De­at­h­la­ce, grin­ning. She was pretty, in a de­li­ca­te way, and she knew it. Long black strands of ha­ir cas­ca­ded hap­ha­zardly down her fa­ce, and her eye was out­li­ned in black li­ke a co­mic bo­ok cha­rac­ter she lo­ved. She tho­ught for a mo­ment that Har­ley was co­ming on to her, but it tur­ned out he was just trying to fre­ak her.

    "You wan­na know abo­ut the Trads, do ya? Well, missy, you su­re ? 'Ca­use it ain't all that short a story, and it ain't all true, but it's what m'Boss told me, and that's what I got­ta be­li­eve." Har­ley sa­id, his fa­ke roc­ker ac­cent in full swing.

    "Oh, Har­ley, qu­it fo­olin' aro­und and just tell it," De­at­h­la­ce sa­id,

    Harley fi­xed his Ray-Bans and lit up a ci­ga­ret­te - per­fectly le­gi­ti­ma­te ex­cept for the bril­li­ant pur­p­le smo­ke it cre­ated. To hell with Pa­ra­dox. He got a wild lo­ok in his eyes and grin­ned wildly at De­at­h­la­ce. "Okay, su­gar, you as­ked for it…"

    "See, on­ce, all the­se Trads, they we­ren't not­hin' but a bun­c­ha prop­hets, wi­se men, fre­aks, we­ir­do­es, her­mits, cra­zi­es, me­di­ci­ne men, sha­mans, sor­ce­rers and hed­ge wi­zards. Gee, kin­da li­ke they are now. An­y­way, wa­a­a­ay back then, the Tra­di­ti­ons we­ren't li­ke they are now. They we­re just folks who sor­ta ag­re­ed with one anot­her abo­ut how things we­re. They we­re Awa­ke­ned, don't get me wrong. They just didn't ha­ve any kind of fo­cus- kind of all over the pla­ce. Then, well, the­se re­al­ly tig­ht-as­sed du­des who we­re cal­ling them­sel­ves the Or­der of Her­mes…"

    "I beg yo­ur par­don…" Lady Cul­len sa­id from the front of the bus. Tur­ning aro­und, and ca­re­ful­ly step­ping down from the pas­sen­ger se­at, she ma­de her way back in the ca­bin to whe­re Har­ley and De­at­h­la­ce sat. "I think that you sho­uld watch what you say abo­ut things Her­me­tic. I be­li­eve I'll just lis­ten in on this tra­vesty of his­tory that you in­sist is truth."

    Harley smi­led sho­wing rag­ged te­eth, sho­ok his he­ad on­ce and be­gan aga­in as Lady Cul­len sat down op­po­si­te them, "Anyway, so the Or­der went aro­und well, trying to get ever­yo­ne or­ga­ni­sed, you know, li­ke it was a col­le­ge or a pep rally or so­met­hin'. The Cult, well, you know how the Cult li­kes to be or­ga­ni­zed. Not an op­ti­on, baby. A few of us he­re and the­re went to check things out, but ba­si­cal­ly it was se­ri­o­us nil­s­vil­le."

    Deathlace rol­led her eyes and lo­oked du­bi­o­usly at Har­ley. The slang was get­ting a bit thick, even for her. She co­uld ne­ver tell whet­her Har­ley was kid­ding her or not. The­re was a bit of si­len­ce, and then Lady Cul­len in­ter­rup­ted it, pla­cing her hand on De­at­h­la­ce's sil­ken fo­re­arm. "Child, the Or­der was de­sig­ned in tho­se days to ac­cept any of the Tra­di­ti­ons who wis­hed to jo­in and be­co­me part of our gre­at ex­pe­ri­ment. The Ho­uses of our cur­rent-day Or­der sprang from this wi­des­p­re­ad ac­cep­tan­ce. Many of the ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons ha­ve be­en en­ric­hed by our know­led­ge."

    Harley lo­oked down over his sun­g­las­ses at the Lady, and then back at De­at­h­la­ce. "Yah. So, an­y­way, I don't know if you've he­ard abo­ut it, but back then, abo­ut the ti­me of the Re­na­is­san­ce, the­re was a gro­up of anal-re­ten­ti­ve re­ality fre­aks who de­ci­ded that the­ir ways we­re the best ways, and that they we­re gon­na ta­ke over. No, I ain't tal­kin' abo­ut the Or­der of Her­mes…" Har­ley grin­ned, lo­oking to Lady Cul­len to ta­ke the ba­it. She didn't. "…I'm tal­kin' abo­ut the Or­der of Re­ason. They met in sec­ret, it's sa­id, and they cre­ated and plan­ned to throw the lar­gest wet blan­ket in the world on top of the best party in all his­tory. What I'm tal­kin' abo­ut is the Ga­un­t­let, su­gar. You see, it wasn't li­ke one day the­re we­re fa­eri­es and dra­gons and ma­gick and pretty girls with tiny fe­et and not­hin' on the next."

    "There's still pretty girls with tiny fe­et…" De­at­h­la­ce sa­id, gig­gling and wig­gling her to­es in his fa­ce, Har­ley grin­ned, but he was on a roll, "It was slow, gra­du­al, qu­i­et. An idea he­re, a bit o' lo­re the­re. The best thing that the Or­der did was to not openly at­tack the Church, even tho­ugh the Church im­me­di­ately at­tac­ked it. No­pe, folks, it im­me­di­ately went right out and hel­ped the Church with its lit­tle In­qu­isi­ti­on. I can't pro­ve an­y­t­hing, but I be­li­eve that the Ca­bal of Pu­re Tho­ught, which wo­uld la­ter be­co­me the Con­ven­ti­on of the New World Or­der, had long in­fil­t­ra­ted the Do­mi­ni­cans. An­y­way, the In­qu­isi­ti­on tur­ned from se­ar­c­hing for he­resy to se­ar­c­hing for the su­per­na­tu­ral. They star­ted chec­king for vam­pi­res, wit­c­hes, and we­re­wol­ves. Now, m'Boss told me…"

    Lady Cul­len nod­ded slowly, "Yes." She shut her eyes. "Yes, Tor­qu­ema­da was most li­kely of the Ca­bal of Pu­re Tho­ught. He was a hor­rib­le man who enj­oyed the psychic pa­in of ot­hers."

    "Tha's right. So, the In­qu­isi­ti­on, the Black De­ath, the Cru­sa­des, the ri­se of the po­wer of the Syndics all spel­led ma­j­or chan­ge for us. But re­al­ly, what knoc­ked us for a lo­op was the Ga­un­t­let. Re­ality star­ted get­tin' thick, li­ke Jel­lo con­ge­alin' in a frid­ge. A who­le bunch of ma­ges ran off in­to the Vo­id, li­ke the Ma­ra­uders do. A who­le bunch de­ci­ded that they wo­uld throw in with the Big S him­self and went the he­avy-me­tal ro­ute. Heh. And then the­re's us. We we­ren't too ke­en abo­ut le­aving our won­der­ful Earth, and then the­re's the Big Flop of the Or­der of Her­mes…"

    "Child, yo­ur tu­tor spe­aks to you lightly of so­met­hing that was as bad to us as the Ho­lo­ca­ust was to yo­ur pe­op­le. When the Ga­un­t­let was fi­nal­ly dep­lo­yed, the qu­i­eting of ma­gick that oc­cur­red shat­te­red an­ci­ent spells that held our most po­wer­ful ma­gicks. It des­t­ro­yed over a cen­tury of ma­gic­kal le­ar­ning. Tho­se who had co­me to de­pend upon ma­gick to sur­vi­ve we­re ut­terly and im­me­di­ately sla­in. And, in the worst ca­ses, the Ava­tar wit­hin many of us was rip­ped asun­der, our minds we­re ma­de in­to a child's toy of tan­g­led string. We we­re even de­ni­ed the ut­ter tran­s­cen­den­ce of Twi­light, then. So much was lost, so many di­ed. It was a dark day for the Tra­di­ti­ons then," Lady Cul­len sa­id, lips ma­king a thin li­ne, her chin wrin­k­led, her eyes in­ten­se, "Many mor­tals al­so di­ed in the re­sul­ting strug­gles. Our pe­op­le first bla­med the Ver­be­na and the Cho­rus, and they re­ac­ted with ma­gic­kal at­tack. This ca­used many un­ne­eded and un­ne­ces­sary de­aths, even among Sle­epers- a fact that the Or­der of Re­ason used aga­inst us. We we­re do­omed as the mas­ses uni­ted aga­inst us."

    Deathlace lo­oked up at Har­ley, qu­es­ti­oningly. A dark pall hung in the air. Har­ley to­ok a big long swig of his Jack Da­ni­els and ran his hand ac­ross his Fen­der. "But, I tho­ught you guys we­re ma­ges. Why didn't you just… blast 'em?" De­at­h­la­ce as­ked, lo­oking at Lady Cul­len.

    "Blast 'em? You know bet­ter than that, Bar­ba­ra," ca­me anot­her fe­ma­le vo­ice. It was He­as­ha. De­at­h­la­ce ha­ted to be cal­led 'Bar­ba­ra.' He­as­ha ma­de a grand en­t­ran­ce, mel­ting out of the sha­dowy area ne­ar the sta­irs. She co­uldn't ke­ep her opi­ni­ons out of any con­ver­sa­ti­on. Har­ley had be­en wa­iting fot her Ver­be­na in­put. "Hell, at le­ast the Or­der of Re­ason sho­ok us up and got us to the tab­le, wor­king to­get­her…" He­as­ha mut­te­red un­der her bre­ath, "Let me show you what hap­pe­ned, child…"

    The Ver­be­na knelt down next to her and to­ok off a le­at­her thong-neck la­ce that she was we­aring, and slowly eased it aro­und De­at­h­la­ce's hands. "You see, Bar­ba­ra, it's very easy to be­co­me en­t­ran­ced when so­me­one's qu­i­etly easing so­met­hing aro­und you.."- with a snap, He­as­ha pul­led up, and in­s­tantly bo­und the yo­un­ger stu­dent's wrists to­get­her- "… and then clo­ses the sna­re qu­ickly. As you can see, the­re's not much you can do with yo­ur hands ti­ed." Har­ley to­ok anot­her long drag on his ci­ga­ret­te as he wat­c­hed the in­ter­p­lay bet­we­en his stu­dent and his Chan­t­r­y­ma­te.

    "You do­ne?" He as­ked, lo­oking He­as­ha in the eyes. He­as­ha nod­ded and let the yo­ung girl's arms go. De­at­h­la­ce sho­ok out her ha­ir, grin­ning, a lit­tle flus­hed, and just lo­oked at Har­ley, ta­king a long pull on the whis­key her­self this ti­me. She was still blus­hing when He­as­ha fi­nal­ly sat down ac­ross from Lady Cul­len.

    Heasha smi­led, bri­efly no­ting De­at­h­la­ce's em­bar­ras­sment. "The po­int I'm trying to ma­ke, sis­ter, is that if we had known what the Or­der of Re­ason was do­ing, we wo­uld've pre­ven­ted it. It's that sim­p­le. But they we­re ut­terly sub­t­le, and the chan­ges they ma­de we­re so slowly and ca­re­ful­ly tho­ught out that we we­re ca­ught una­wa­res."

    "Why didn't the Cho­rus warn you? I me­an, we­ren't they part of the Church back then?" De­at­h­la­ce sa­id, rub­bing her wrists and lo­oking qu­i­etly at He­as­ha, who bent for­ward and mas­sa­ged them apo­lo­ge­ti­cal­ly.

    "The Cho­rus was too busy se­ar­c­hing for the One to lis­ten to the cri­es of the Tra­di­ti­ons. They we­re off in the­ir ab­beys and her­mi­ta­ges, pra­ying and fas­ting. Boy, we­re they sur­p­ri­sed when they ca­me out­ta the clo­uds," Har­ley sa­id, grin­ning. He pla­yed a riff on his axe, and De­at­h­la­ce re­cog­ni­zed it from "Jesus Christ Su­per­s­tar."

    A fifth vo­ice jo­ined them in the li­ving ro­om of the bus, de­ep, re­so­nant, and lyri­cal. "We we­re in­de­ed. Ne­ver has the Cho­rus be­en so de­eply bet­ra­yed. Ne­ver ha­ve we le­ar­ned such a harsh les­son." Chris­top­her step­ped in­to the ro­om, from the top of the sta­irs. Dres­sed in sim­p­le je­ans and a whi­te t-shirt, he had just ta­ken a sho­wer. With his li­on's ma­ne of ha­ir and his pu­re fa­ce, he lo­oked li­ke an an­gel in a 501 com­mer­ci­al. With him ca­me He­as­ha's fa­mi­li­ar, a whi­te Ab­y­s­si­ni­an na­med She­ila.

    Lady Cul­len tur­ned and ad­dres­sed him, "Well, Chris­top­her, that's alt very well and go­od. What abo­ut the co­ven­folk and cus­tos that we­re sla­ug­h­te­red in the na­me of the Cru­sa­des and the In­qu­isi­ti­on? How we­re we sup­po­sed to res­pond when we be­li­eved it was the Cho­rus be­hind the­se at­tacks?"

    Christopher bo­wed his he­ad. "Yes. Well. If you had but co­me to us so­oner, you wo­uld ha­ve le­ar­ned the truth…" He sat down next to De­at­h­la­ce on the co­uch.

    Harley swo­re and to­ok a long drag on his cig, "The who­le damn Chantry's in th' li­ving ro­om! Ain't the­re an­y­body dri­vin' this thing??"

    Heasha nod­ded as her fa­mi­li­ar jum­ped up in­to her lap. She pet­ted the whi­te Ab­y­s­si­ni­an, "The Doc­tor. Or per­haps one of his dri­ving prog­rams?"

    The who­le Ma­gic Bus Chantry lur­c­hed as it chan­ged la­nes, and even the in­ter­nal re­ality was af­fec­ted. Har­ley sho­ok his he­ad. "Let's just ho­pe it ain't the for­mu­la-one prog­ram he did the ot­her we­ek. She­esh. I don't want to get stop­ped by the cops for spe­edin'."

    Deathlace sat down and cros­sed her arms, po­uting. "Hey, folks, Har­ley was tel­ling me a story and…"

    "And, ob­vi­o­usly, be­ing a wi­se so­ul, you want the Truth. Or do you?" He­as­ha sa­id, her eyes chal­len­ging the yo­ung wo­man's re­sol­ve. Lo­oking up, He­as­ha pat­ted the se­at next to her. "Co­me over and sit down, Chris­top­her. Be­si­des, She­ila wants to see you." Chris­top­her to­ok the be­a­uti­ful cat in­to his lap and be­gan scrit­c­hing her fa­vo­ri­te spot.

    "Anyway, so, ba­si­cal­ly, the story go­es that Bal­d­ric of the Or­der of Her­mes, on the go­od word of a Cul­tist of Ec­s­tasy na­med Sh'zar, to­ok a gro­up o' grogs and went lo­okin' for so­me­one of the Ver­be­na and so­me­one of the Cho­rus who'd talk to 'm, be­ca­use they we­re the easi­est to find. Now, mind you, as our go­od com­pa­ni­ons ha­ve sa­id al­re­ady, tho­se gro­ups we­re al­re­ady up to the­ir ears in tro­ub­le and me­aner than a dog on Ex-Lax."

    "There was no Cul­tist in­vol­ved. He went alo­ne, ba­sed on a di­vi­na­ti­on he did for him­self." Lady Cul­len sa­id.

    Heasha sho­ok her ma­ne of fla­me-red ha­ir. "No, Lady, I'm sorry. The God­dess Her­self ca­me to the man, and he had the go­od sen­se to lis­ten to Her for on­ce."

    Christopher sig­hed, "I don't sup­po­sed men­ti­oning the Ar­c­han­gel Gab­ri­el wo­uld help at this po­int, wo­uld it?"

    "Would y'all ple­ase shut up? Y'all know the­re's mo­re ver­si­ons of this ta­le than the­re are ver­si­ons of 'Lo­u­ie, Lo­u­ie,' so gi­ve me a frig­gin' bre­ak. I'm tel­lin' it, so it's a Cul­tist, okay," Har­ley sa­id, ta­king the bot­tle back from De­at­h­la­ce and swig­ging down anot­her shot.

    "Anyway, he luc­ked out. He hap­pe­ned to find a ma­ge na­med Nig­h­t­s­ha­de of the Ver­be­na, and an old fol­lo­wer of St. Ne­ri­us na­med Va­lo­ran from the Cho­rus, both of whom hap­pe­ned to ha­ve a go­od so­lid he­ad on the­ir sho­ul­ders, a ra­rity among the­ir Tra­di­ti­ons at that ti­me."

    Heasha snor­ted. "Nig­h­t­s­ha­de is my na­me-mot­her, and you bet­ter be ni­ce to her, or I'll ma­ke all that lo­vely whis­key in yo­ur system go away. Hard."

    Harley shud­de­red and grin­ned, "Don't worry 'bo­ut me, He­ash. I'm jus' ha­vin' so­me fun. An­y­way, so; they ac­tu­al­ly, all three, got to­get­her in the ru­ins of an old Her­me­tic Chantry cal­led Mis­t­rid­ge that had got­ten slam­med in the Al­bi­gen­si­an Cru­sa­de, in the so­uth of Fran­ce. You see, Nig­h­t­s­ha­de was a bi… I me­an, was a very, ahh, stron­g­wil­led wo­man with clo­sely-held opi­ni­ons. Bal­d­ric was from Ho­use Tyta­lus, and had a hard ti­me let­ting so­me­one el­se get a word in ed­ge­wi­se, let alo­ne ma­ke pe­ace with them. And Va­lo­ran, well, he was the ho­li­est of the ho­li­er-than­t­hou's, 'ca­use he used to be a Her­mes and had spent a lot of ti­me pre­ac­hin' to the Ver­be­na's He­at­hen in the Mo­orish So­uth. Well, af­ter a lot of fin­ger-po­in­tin' and wa­ilin' and yel­lin' and a vi­sit from so­me fa­eri­es, they fi­nal­ly got down to bu­si­ness. And they tal­ked, sat down and got to know each ot­her. Par­ti­ed. Jam­med. You know, just sat down and has­hed ever­y­t­hing out. They went ro­und and ro­und and ro­und, and when they we­re do­ne they we­ren't su­re whet­her they sho­uld off each ot­her or get mar­ri­ed. Luc­kily for us, they de­ci­ded ta get hit­c­hed."

    Lady Cul­len lo­oked in­dig­nant "I'd hardly call the Tra­di­ti­ons Tri­bu­nal a mar­ri­age!"

    "That's be­ca­use you'd rat­her call it a 'Tri­bu­nal'. Heck, what do you call so­met­hin' that puts to­get­her folks so to­tal­ly and com­p­le­tely dif­fe­rent from each ot­her, ma­kes 'em ag­ree on stuff, and ke­eps them stuck to­get­her for the­ir own go­od?"

    "Only, I gu­ess, this was a gro­up mar­ri­age. Whe­re did the ot­her Tra­di­ti­ons co­me from?" De­at­h­la­ce as­ked, trying to le­arn so­met­hing from the di­at­ri­be.

    "All over the pla­ce. They re­al­ly didn't ha­ve na­mes li­ke they do to­day. Ba­si­cal­ly, Nig­h­t­s­ha­de went ro­amin' all over the pla­ce and bro­ught Star-of-Eag­les, the Dre­am­s­pe­aker ma­ge, and the Ahl-i-Ba­tin ma­ge…"

    "Ahl-i-Batin? What's that?" De­at­h­la­ce as­ked, we­aving her fin­gers to­get­her.

    "Arabian ma­ges. They drop­ped out la­ter, to be rep­la­ced by the Vir­tu­al­ly Inept, I me­an, the Vir­tu­al Adepts. Let me fi­nish. Bal­d­ric from the Or­der of Her­mes bro­ught with him Cha­lech, the Eut­ha­na­tos ma­ge, and Sh'Zar, his fri­end and prop­het from the Cult of Ec­s­tasy, and Va­lo­ran bro­ught Wu Jin, the first Akas­hic Brot­her, and a for­mer fol­lo­wer of the ar­ti­fi­cer-ma­ge Ver­di na­med Dip­lo­ma­te Lu­is, a le­ar­ned scho­lar who wo­uld la­ter be cal­led the first Son of Et­her."

    "Like the Doc?" De­at­h­la­ce sa­id, bor­ro­wing Har­ley's pur­p­le cig be­fo­re it bur­ned his hand.

    "Like Herr Doc­tor Ge­ro­ni­mo him­self. Most of the­se folks wo­uldn't ha­ve set fo­ot in the sa­me ro­om to­get­her. You see, they all felt li­ke they we­re the A-num­ber-one aut­ho­rity on ma­gick and all that it en­ta­iled,"

    "Nightshade was the gre­atest en­c­han­t­ress of her ti­me." He­as­ha sa­id.

    "Valoran was a very pi­o­us man, the One's to­ol in his ti­me," co­un­te­red Chris­top­her,

    "Baldric was a pom­po­us ass. But he was well res­pec­ted. And well le­ar­ned," fi­nis­hed Lady Cul­len.

    Harley grin­ned, "Sh'Zar was al­most too co­ol for the party, you know what I me­an? But he stuck it out, and I gu­ess we sho­uld be gra­te­ful. Ot­her­wi­se the­re wo­uldn't be any ma­ges at all."

    "Why's that?"

    "Haven't you be­en lis­te­nin'?? I me­an, je­ez-o-piz­za, girl. The Or­der of Re­ason was out for our ass and our re­ality. And they had al­re­ady won! It wasn't li­ke this was the ninth in­ning an' we still had so­me at-bats. No­pers, It was 'ga­me over,' man. We had no cho­ice, re­al­ly, I me­an, the­re was a lot of gnas­hin' o' te­eth, but in the end, what el­se co­uld we do? Gi­ve up and go li­ve full-ti­me in tho­se grey­fa­ces' co­oki­ecut­ter re­ality, whe­re the sun ri­ses and sets on the ho-hum Yawn Clock? I think per­haps may­be frig­gin' not."

    "Indeed not. We had to co­me to so­me kind of con­sen­sus, and per­haps it was only in that ti­me and in that pla­ce that we co­uld ha­ve," He­as­ha sa­id as the fa­mi­li­ar She­ila stret­c­hed out her paws in Chris­top­her's lap.

    "What pla­ce?" De­at­h­la­ce as­ked, ope­ning a bag of pret­zels.

    "They cal­led the pla­ce 'Ho­ri­zon'. I'll ha­ve to ta­ke ya the­re so­me­ti­me, Ni­ce pla­ce. Kin­da we­ird, tho­ugh. Each Pri­mus- Pri­mus, that's the na­me they ga­ve ya if you sho­wed up to the me­etin'. Li­te­ral­ly me­ans 'first one.' So, I gu­ess the Tra­di­ti­ons we­re fir­st-co­me, fir­st-ser­ved. Heh-each Pri­mus do­na­ted ac­cess to one of his or her No­des, and we we­aved us a pla­ce whe­re even the Or­der of Re­ason wo­uld ha­ve tro­ub­le fin­ding us," Har­ley sa­id, re­ac­hing over and nab­bing a pret­zel.

    "Baldric was a stu­dent of Shal­lo­wing Ef­fects and of Re­gio, and it just so hap­pe­ned that Va­lo­ran, Star-of-Eag­les and Wu Jin le­ar­ned how to work well to­get­her in a very short ti­me. So­on the Chantry was for­med, and one of the first in­ten­ti­onal Ho­ri­zon Re­alms was flown," Lady Cul­len in­ter­rup­ted.

    "Yes, that's whe­re the na­me co­mes from, from Ho­ri­zon Chantry. Af­ter that lit­tle bit of bu­si­ness, ma­king a lit­tle re­ality all yo­ur own, ever­y­t­hing el­se was re­la­ti­vely easy. I me­an, I ima­gi­ne the first fi­ve mi­nu­tes of the me­eting we­re the most dan­ge­ro­us, and af­ter that had pas­sed, and no one got kil­led, shif­ted or de­vol­ved, I ima­gi­ne things wo­uld go easily from the­re," Chris­top­her sa­id in his won­der­ful­ly warm vo­ice.

    "Indeed, Chris­top­her. The po­wer of the Ni­ne." He­as­ha sa­id with cer­ta­inty.

    "What's Ni­ne got to do with it?" De­at­h­la­ce as­ked.

    "Numba Ni­ne, Num­ba Ni­ne… McCar­t­ney had ahold on it, ba­be. It's old nu­me­ro­logy. Ni­ne rep­re­sents a pu­rity of pur­po­se, an epi­to­me. The fact that ni­ne ma­ges tur­ned out for a me­eting to ma­ke pe­ace with each ot­her and at­tempt to do so­met­hing abo­ut this who­le Or­der of Re­ason thing was a he­avy por­tent back then. An­y­way, just li­ke Chris­sie says, the rest was easy com­pa­red to the first fif­te­en mi­nu­tes. I me­an, this was li­ke, the ul­ti­ma­te le­ave-yo­ur-po­li­tics-at­the-do­or gig. Of co­ur­se the­re we­re scrab­bles he­re and the­re, most not ably bet­we­en Va­lo­ran and Ali-bel­v­s­ha­ar, who was a Mo­or. Still a lot of bad blo­od abo­ut Jeru­sa­lem, I bet…"

    "It was not­hing of the sort! The man was a known con­sor­ter-with-de­mons!"Christopher ex­c­la­imed, his vo­ice ri­sing an oc­ta­ve.

    "Demon, sche­mons. They we­re hot lit­tle lust-spi­rits co­nj­ured up for his own amu­se­ment. Just be­ca­use he of­fe­red Va­lo­ran one do­esn't me­an that he me­ant an­y­t­hing by it… cer­ta­inly wasn't trying to con­vert him… or cor­rupt him." He­as­ha be­gan, a smi­le on her fa­ce. "Va­lo­ran was a vir­gin; that's why it was such a big de­al, Bar­ba­ra."

    With a chuc­k­le, Har­ley con­ti­nu­ed. "Anyway, so the­re we­re a few squ­ab­bles, but not­hing ma­j­or. Ever­yo­ne still mis­t­rus­ted the Cho­rus, be­ca­use of the In­qu­isi­ti­on, but for the most part, a lot of po­si­ti­ve work got do­ne. Pe­op­le de­ci­ded to work to­get­her, de­ci­ded they wo­uld me­et aga­in at each Equ­inox and Sol­s­ti­ce, and that they wo­uld each bring a gift to the gro­up as a who­le the next ti­me they ca­me. That was it, but that lit­tle bit was eno­ugh. Thro­ug­ho­ut the win­ter, Va­lo­ran and Bal­d­ric and Nig­h­t­s­ha­de ham­me­red out a plan to for­ma­li­ze ma­gick in a way that the Pri­mi wo­uld ac­cept. Using so­me thing of the Her­me­tic system of ma­gic­k­ma­na­ge­ment, they de­ci­ded to ca­te­go­ri­ze ma­gick in­to Sphe­res of po­wer, and do it in such a way that they didn't of­fend an­yo­ne. Too much, that is. When the Spring Equ­inox ca­me, and ever­yo­ne gat­he­red back to­get­her brin­ging gifts, it was a re­al­ly go­od vi­be, li­ke a re­al­ly go­od De­ad con­cert, you know?"

    "Humph. If it we­ren't for Nig­h­t­s­ha­de sel­ling every sin­g­le Pri­mus on the Sphe­res, we'd be Sle­epers at ho­me wat­c­hing our MTV right now," He­as­ha sa­id, snag­ging the bag of pret­zels as She­ila po­ked her no­se in­to it.

    "The Sphe­res, the Tra­di­ti­ons, the ran­king of know­led­ge, the Pro­to­cols, ever­y­t­hing was ham­me­red out and ag­re­ed upon at Ho­ri­zon Chantry, the Co­un­cil of the Ni­ne. For ni­ne ye­ars they met, fo­ur ti­mes a ye­ar, the word spre­ading and mem­bers of the fled­g­ling Tra­di­ti­ons jo­ining at each me­eting of the Co­un­cil. And He­as­ha, what you sa­id is right: ex­cept that if it we­ren't for the Pri­mi of the Tra­di­ti­ons, no­ne of us wo­uld be Awa­ke. They put the­ir necks and the­ir re­pu­ta­ti­ons on the li­ne. Not ever­yo­ne in the­ir af­fi­li­ated ma­gic­kal as­so­ci­ati­ons ag­re­ed with the con­cepts of the Sphe­res and the Tra­di­ti­ons. They wan­ted to go the­ir own way, and li­ke lo­ne wol­ves, they usu­al­ly met with an un­ti­mely end," Chris­top­her sa­id, wa­ving asi­de the pret­zels when they we­re of­fe­red to him.

    "That's pretty much it, then…" Har­ley sa­id, lo­oking lon­gingly at his Fen­der, wan­ting to to­uch it, wan­ting to buzz off all the chat­ter with a he­avy riff.

    "What abo­ut the Ara­bi­an guys?" De­at­h­la­ce sa­id, crun­c­hing on a pret­zel. She­ila jum­ped from Chris­top­her's lap in­to hers, and she la­ug­hed when her ta­il brus­hed her no­se.

    "The Ahl-i-Ba­tin we­re not su­ited for the Tra­di­ti­ons. They kept to them­sel­ves," Chris­top­her sa­id, qu­i­etly.

    "I beg to dif­fer, Chris­top­her," sa­id Lady Cul­len, "I be­li­eve the­ir re­asons for le­aving had to do with the chan­ges in the­ir na­ti­ve ho­me­land. When the spi­ri­tu­ality of the­ir ho­me­land be­gan to be twis­ted for the Tec­h­noc­racy's pur­po­ses, and the po­wer of oil be­gan to be mo­re im­por­tant, they bla­med the Tra­di­ti­ons for not do­ing eno­ugh to stop the Tec­h­noc­racy's ad­van­ce. So, they ret­re­ated to the­ir pri­va­te re­ality. In the end, I think it is best." She sip­ped a cup of hot tea that she must've got­ten for her­self.

    Heasha sho­ok her he­ad no. "Ah, I think we mis­sed out on a lot. Lo­ok what kind of spi­ri­tu­al was­te­land we got in­to in the ye­ars that fol­lo­wed. The im­ba­lan­ce…."

    "You're just su­per­s­ti­ti­o­us abo­ut the Ni­ne thing. The­re we­re only Eight Trads for a whi­le, De­at­hie, and ever­yo­ne got all bent out of sha­pe abo­ut it. Luc­kily the Vir­tu­al Idi­ots, I me­an, the Adepts, drop­ped in when they did. I be­li­eve that '67 was the last big me­eting of the Co­un­cil." Har­ley sa­id, pul­ling out a set of picks and lo­oking for a fresh pa­ir of bat­te­ri­es for his tu­ner in the big le­at­her bag he al­ways car­ri­ed.

    "How of­ten do they me­et?" De­at­h­la­ce as­ked, scrit­c­hing She­ila.

    "They we­re sup­po­sed to me­et every ni­ne ye­ars, but you know ma­ges- we're busy folks. It kin­da got over­lo­oked, and now they only me­et when they ab­so­lu­tely haf­ta. Be­si­des, the Tra­di­ti­ons are so in­ter­mi­xed and in­ter­t­wi­ned now that you can't spit wit­ho­ut hit­ting ot­her Ttads in a Chantry, re­gar­d­less of whe­re the Chantry is. Not too many are Tra­di­ti­on-spe­ci­fic any mo­re.

    "What abo­ut ma­ges li­ke Blac­k­ro­se, in San Fran?" De­at­h­la­ce sa­id, put­ting She­ila on the flo­or. The fa­mi­li­ar snif­fed and bo­un­ded off in­to the coc­k­pit. De­at­h­la­ce felt a twin­ge in her gut. Blac­k­ro­se was a go­od fri­end of hers.

    The sun­light flus­hed thro­ugh the win­dow, sud­denly the world was co­ming in­to fo­cus. The psyche­de­lic lig­h­t­s­how was dying down, and the bus was slo­wing down. Har­ley held up a de­ad bat­tery and cro­oked an eyeb­row at Lady Cul­len. She rol­led her eyes and held out her hand, li­ke a mot­her ke­eping her son from thro­wing so­met­hing rat­her than gently han­ding it over. Har­ley co­ug­hed and lo­oked down at his frets, run­ning a soft cloth over the fi­nish of his be­a­uty. De­at­h­la­ce sta­red hard at Har­ley, sen­sing his sub­ter­fu­ge, fe­eling his un­wil­lin­g­ness to dis­cuss this par­ti­cu­lar to­pic.

    "They're… not one of us, ba­be. Hol­low Ones. Or­p­hans,"

    Harley sa­id, not lo­oking up.

    "Like me?" De­at­h­la­ce sa­id, her to­ne and fa­ce da­ring Har­ley. He knew she had Awa­ke­ned on the stre­et, with no mas­ter to gu­ide her. No Tra­di­ti­on had cla­imed her yet.

    He didn't even lo­ok up. "Li­ke you, ba­be. Only you're gon­na be in the Cult of Ec­s­tacy, li­ke we tal­ked abo­ut,"

    "Or the Ver­be­na, if you so wish, child. We wo­uld be ab­le to te­ach you much. And I think you'd pre­fer be­ing among my co­ven-sis­ters back ho­me in Bos­ton," He­as­ha sa­id, her to­ne fri­endly and warm.

    Lady Cul­len smi­led. "Lis­ten to them, Bar­ba­ra. You'd think they we­re co­ac­hes of a fo­ot­ball te­am rec­ru­iting you. I'm su­re it's be­ca­use of yo­ur par­ti­cu­larly po­tent Ava­tar. Ne­ver fe­ar. But do ke­ep in mind the Or­der, We co­uld te­ach you much, if you are wil­ling to le­arn."

    Christopher just smi­led.

    "Well, Chris, you gon­na gi­ve her a sa­les pitch, too?" He­as­ha sa­id, la­ug­hing.

    His ma­ne of blon­de ha­ir was li­ke a ha­lo aro­und him. "No, if she do­esn't wish to he­ar the mu­sic of the Cho­rus, then I will sit qu­i­etly. She will ask if she fe­els li­ke jo­ining with us, jo­ining with the One."

    "What's wrong with the Hol­low Ones?" De­at­h­la­ce as­ked, qu­i­etly. The things Blac­k­ro­se had sa­id abo­ut tra­vel­ling with the Chantry star­ted to co­me back. Am I re­al­ly not one of them? she sa­id to her­self.

    Heasha didn't even pa­use. "They don't gi­ve a damn abo­ut As­cen­si­on for one thing. For anot­her, they're just pla­in sel­fish and stuck on them­sel­ves. I me­an, I co­uld see them re­vel­ling in the­ir pi­ti­ful sta­te if they did it for ple­asu­re, or for en­lig­h­ten­ment, but they do it out she­er apathy. They just don't ca­re. They're lost so­uls, as far as I'm con­cer­ned. Most of them are a was­te of go­od skin." The ve­nom in her vo­ice was li­ke a splash of ice wa­ter on De­at­h­la­ce's fa­ce.

    "The Or­p­hans must be led, too, Sis­ter." Lady Cul­len sa­id, a to­uch pat­ro­ni­zing. The ol­der wo­man se­emed ob­li­vi­o­us to the ra­ge that was bu­il­ding up in­si­de of Bar­ba­ra. "They will co­me to see the Truth, just as the Tra­di­ti­ons did." She to­ok a pen­dant with a Se­al of So­lo­mon on it and to­uc­hed the symbol to both ends of the bat­te­ri­es. The­re was a crac­k­ling no­ise, and a few sparks, and then she han­ded them back to Har­ley.

    "Maybe they wo­uld, if they had a pla­ce on the Co­un­cil," De­at­h­la­ce sa­id, lo­oking down at her fe­et, re­mem­be­ring what Blac­k­ro­se had told her now. All of it fi­nal­ly ca­me in­to pla­ce.

    Harley tuc­ked the bat­te­ri­es in­to his gu­itar tu­ner and be­gan to cot­rect its to­ne, smi­ling at Lady Cul­len. "Thanks, Lady. You're bet­ter than that bunny with the drums on TV." De­at­h­la­ce ha­ted to be ig­no­red, and Har­ley was do­ing a pretty go­od job of it.

    Heasha spo­ke in res­pon­se, trying to bre­ak the he­avy si­len­ce. "They wo­uldn't ac­cept a se­at on the Co­un­cil, even if it we­re of­fe­red to them. They're just li­ke the Dis­pa­ra­te in the early days, tho­se who re­fu­sed to jo­in the Tra­di­ti­ons, but in­s­te­ad went de­ep in­to hi­ding. They are too ca­ught up in the­ir own. vi­ews to ac­cept the ide­as of ot­hers."

    Deathlace lo­oked up at He­as­ha. "Oh re­al­ly? Well, what wo­uld you say if I told you I was al­re­ady a Hol­low One? In­si­de me, that's what I am. Hol­low in­si­de. Hol­low li­ke the Co­un­cil of the Ni­ne, be­ca­use you don't know the who­le story. You know what I think? I think it's ti­me you grew up and en­te­red the twen­ti­eth cen­tury. Who ca­res abo­ut nu­me­ro­logy? Who ca­res abo­ut stu­pid su­per­s­ti­ti­ons? I'm a Can­cer- do­es that me­an I can't be a ma­ge? You're just hung up on this damn Ni­ne thing, all of you."

    The ot­her ma­ges we­re sur­p­ri­sed by De­at­h­la­ce's to­ne, the ve­he­men­ce in her vo­ice. Even Har­ley sta­red at her, dum­b­fo­un­ded, for on­ce not ha­ving a snappy co­me­back for the si­tu­ati­on.

    Her eyes flas­hing, De­at­h­la­ce held up a sin­g­le fin­ger. "Get used to anot­her num­ber, how abo­ut it? Not 10, Ze­ro. The end, the be­gin­ning, all in one cir­c­le. Hol­low. Li­ke this…" Har­ley wat­c­hed as her na­il grew long and sharp and di­amond-hard. She cut a cir­c­le in the glass cof­fee tab­le and didn't even blink when the glass cir­c­le shat­te­red on the flo­or be­ne­ath it.

    "Get over it. We're the end, we're the be­gin­ning. Get over it. And un­til you ac­cept us… warts and all… well, you can just hang up As­cen­si­on."

    There was an ec­ho in the li­ving ro­om, an ec­ho of the shat­te­red cir­c­le, so­met­hing that spo­ke to every Ava­tar in every ma­ge in the ro­om. It was an un­mis­ta­kab­le so­und to tho­se gat­he­red the­re. It was the ring of truth.

    As De­at­h­la­ce clim­bed the sta­irs, the te­ars of ra­ge star­ting to flow, she co­uldn't help but smi­le to her­self.

    Downstairs, the­re was so­me se­ri­o­us qu­i­et.

    A BRI­EF HIS­TORY OF THE TEC­H­NOC­RATY

    … if mo­ral jud­g­ments are es­sen­ti­al­ly as­ser­ti­ons of va­lue, and if va­lue is the fun­da­men­tal gro­und-stuff of the world, then mo­ral jud­g­ments are the fun­da­men­tal gro­und-stuff of the world.

    - Ro­bert Pir­sig, Li­la

    Notes of Pro­fes­sor Ter­ran­ce Whyte Col­le­gium of His­tory

    "A Bri­ef His­tory of Tec­h­noc­racy," Les­son One

    The war has bro­ught suf­fe­ring to all of us. As we work to bring hu­ma­nity in­to the next mil­len­ni­um, the­re are tho­se who re­j­ect us and blindly re­bel aga­inst re­ality. The­ir gu­er­ril­la tac­tics stri­ke at us re­pe­atedly, des­pi­te the ef­forts of a bra­ve few who try to of­fer the re­bel­li­o­us ma­ges a pla­ce wit­hin our Uni­on. Many of the Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges se­ek to re­ma­ke the world in the­ir own ima­ge. They've do­ne that be­fo­re.

    Most Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges know very lit­tle abo­ut the his­tory of the Tec­h­noc­racy. Each Tra­di­ti­on has its own his­tory of what hap­pe­ned, but each Tra­di­ti­on has ad­ded its own bi­as. As I am so fond of sa­ying, his­tory is not an ab­so­lu­te sci­en­ce, it is an in­ter­p­re­ta­ti­on. The ma­ges ha­ve in­ter­p­re­ted his­tory to sup­port the­ir own be­li­efs, and in each ver­si­on they ad­van­ce, the­ir por­t­ra­yal of us is grossly dis­tor­ted.

    The Tec­h­noc­racy has its own re­asons for fig­h­ting the War for As­cen­si­on. In­di­vi­du­als wit­hin the "Col­lec­ti­ve" ha­ve the­ir own vi­ews on the po­ten­ti­al of the Tec­h­noc­racy and the­ir own per­so­nal vi­si­ons of how to "he­al" the gro­wing Schism wit­hin it. Our ene­mi­es see us as mon­s­ters- fa­ce­less con­for­mists, rut­h­less dic­ta­tors or evil over­lords. They will not ac­cept that we are hu­man be­ings, strug­gling aga­inst po­wer­ful odds to bring the light of re­ason to a dark world.

    Mages who wish to le­ave the se­pa­ra­tism and the bit­ter­ness of the fa­iled Tra­di­ti­ons be­hind sho­uld con­si­der so­me of the his­to­ri­cal ac­co­unts com­monly re­la­ted wit­hin the Tec­h­noc­racy. As new mem­bers of the Tec­h­noc­racy, you must re­mem­ber that truth can be the most po­wer­ful we­apon of all. We must exa­mi­ne the truths be­hind the War. Al­t­ho­ugh the early ef­forts of our Uni­on can be tra­ced to the birth of ci­vi­li­za­ti­on, the re­al story of the Tec­h­no­man­cers' ro­le in the As­cen­si­on War be­gins in the Mythic Age.

    The Mythic Age

    Everything in the his­tory bo­oks abo­ut the Mid­dle Ages is wrong. The Mas­ses will ne­ver know the truth, and they do not want to re­mem­ber. Only We know the re­al story of the Mythic Age. The Or­der of Her­mes has for­got­ten what re­al­ly hap­pe­ned. They ha­ve re­li­ed on ar­c­ha­ic met­hods of pre­ser­ving da­ta, and the­ir da­ta is cor­rup­ted.

    Before the Age of Re­ason, the first ma­ges cla­imed to li­ve in a Uto­pia. It was a Uto­pia… for them. They cla­imed to be­ne­vo­lently watch over the­ir vas­sals from the sa­fety of the­ir co­ve­nants, but for many, the­ir only true in­te­rest was in pur­su­ing the­ir ar­ca­ne stu­di­es. The pe­asants of­ten suf­fe­red, re­gar­d­less of what the Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges say. Per­haps a few co­ve­nants pro­perly ten­ded the­ir flocks, but in many are­as, the Mas­ses slowly di­ed as the for­ces of the su­per­na­tu­ral world grew stron­ger.

    As many of the ma­gi be­gan to slowly go in­sa­ne, the pe­asants in the fi­eld be­gan to won­der if they sho­uld re­al­ly rely on them…

    The Mythic Age was a ti­me when su­per­s­ti­ti­on and ig­no­ran­ce we­re the fo­un­da­ti­ons of ci­vi­li­za­ti­on. Af­ter the Fall of Ro­me, most of Euro­pe ne­eded a system to pro­tect the pe­op­le who wor­ked the land. The re­sult was a system of fe­uda­lism. The most po­wer­ful or­ga­ni­za­ti­on in this struc­tu­re was a gro­up of in­di­vi­du­als Gif­ted with the ta­lent of ma­gic: the ma­gi.

    The ma­gi es­tab­lis­hed Her­me­tic Or­ders to per­fect the­ir skills. To find the fre­edom to prac­ti­ce the­ir craft, many ma­de ar­ran­ge­ments with the po­pu­la­ce of the­ir re­gi­ons. The prac­ti­ti­oners of ma­gic of­fe­red to as­sist the po­pu­la­ce in ca­ring for the­ir com­mu­nity. They of­fe­red to pro­tect the land from dan­ger, de­al with the thre­at of su­per­na­tu­ral for­ces, and em­p­loy the most ta­len­ted mem­bers of the po­pu­la­ce as patt of the­ir re­ti­nu­es. In ex­c­han­ge for this, the pe­op­le wo­uld help the ma­gi ma­in­ta­in for­t­res­ses in which ma­gic co­uld be stu­di­ed. The­se pla­ces we­re known as co­ve­nants. The system was sim­p­le, and it wor­ked… for a whi­le.

    While the vam­pi­res con­t­rol­led the lar­gest ci­ti­es and the we­re­wol­ves ca­red for the un­ta­med wild, the ma­gi led a do­ub­le li­fe: they pur­su­ed in­tel­lec­tu­al per­fec­ti­on whi­le they over­saw the­ir land and the­ir pe­op­le. Many ba­lan­ced the two as­pects of the­ir li­fe well. Many of the ma­gi, ho­we­ver, did not.

    Some ma­gi neg­lec­ted the­ir part of the bar­ga­in. So­me went slowly in­sa­ne or di­sap­pe­ared en­ti­rely as they re­ac­hed the hig­her le­vels of the­ir dis­cip­li­ne. Ot­hers simply fa­iled to pro­tect the­ir lands from the for­ces that thre­ate­ned to des­t­roy them. For every ma­ge that neg­lec­ted the ne­eds of the Mas­ses, trust in the co­ve­nants be­gan to fal­ter.

    I wo­uld li­ke to fo­cus on a clas­sic exam­p­le of a on­ce thri­ving co­ve­nant that bet­ra­yed that trust: a co­ve­nant known as Mis­t­rid­ge. As the de­ca­des wo­re on, the pe­op­le li­ving ne­ar Mis­t­rid­ge grew in­c­re­asingly dis­sa­tis­fi­ed with the­ir pro­tec­tors. At­tacks by su­per­na­tu­ral cre­atu­res, the loss: of a few mem­bers of the con­ve­nant to the ef­fects of cre­eping in­sa­nity, and the bet­ra­yal of the Tre­me­re ma­gus na­med Grim­g­roth we­re are all part of the gra­du­al di­sin­teg­ra­ti­on of a on­ce res­pec­ted co­ve­nant.

    At the sa­me ti­me, an ob­s­cu­re Or­der of ma­ges who li­ved sec­rerly in a re­gi­on ne­ar Mis­t­rid­ge we­re ex­p­lo­ring ra­di­cal new the­ori­es of ma­gic. Al­t­ho­ugh the­ir Or­der was not lar­ge in this area, many prac­ti­ti­oners of this gro­up we­re mi­nor mem­bers of a lar­ger gro­up of ra­di­cals cal­led Ho­use Ex Mis­cel­la­nia. They had the­ir ori­gins in many mo­ve­ments, and they ha­ve be­en re­fer­red to by many na­mes. Many Tec­h­no­man­cer ac­co­unts iden­tify this gro­up as simply "The Craf­t­ma­sons."

    There has be­en am­p­le spe­cu­la­ti­on con­cer­ning the­ir ori­gi­nal phi­lo­sophy. One com­mon ac­co­unt is that the Craf­t­ma­sons wan­ted to find a way for the Mas­ses to hold the­ir own po­wer and li­ve in­de­pen­dently of the co­ve­nants. By cre­ating items of po­wer that an­yo­ne co­uld use, they wor­ked to un­der­mi­ne the system of fe­uda­lism. Fur­t­her­mo­re, they saw the su­per­na­tu­ral ac­ti­vity ne­ar the co­ve­nants as thre­ats to ever­yo­ne's sur­vi­val. By shut­ting off the po­wer of the spi­rit world, by dra­ining the land of ma­gic, the thre­at of the­se for­ces to the ma­ges and the Mas­ses wo­uld be re­du­ced.

    To ex­pand the­ir do­ma­in, as­sist the Mas­ses, and test the­ir re­cent in­no­va­ti­ons in ma­gi­cal the­ory, they ma­de the­ir mo­ve on a win­ter day in the early 13th cen­tury. They be­gan the li­be­ra­ti­on of Mis­t­rid­ge.

    The War for As­cen­si­on had be­gun.

    The Re­vo­lu­ti­on of Mis­t­rid­ge is a clas­sic exam­p­le of how to han­d­le a Chantry. First, a few Ex Mis­cel­la­nia ma­ges ra­ised the Spi­rit Ga­un­t­let aro­und the bu­il­ding and lo­we­red the ma­gi­cal po­wer wit­hin. Then the shock tro­ops- con­sis­ting of ira­te pe­asan­ts-kept ever­yo­ne in­si­de the co­ve­nant. Of co­ur­se, a few spi­es wit­hin had al­re­ady ta­ken out a few key ma­gi, but the re­al sol­di­ers ar­ri­ved la­ter to lay in­to them with the­ir gre­atest we­apon.

    Hey, all tho­se ide­as abo­ut chi­valry and sin­g­le com­bat we­re use­ful in the Mythic Age, but the pro­tec­tors of the land co­uldn't do the­ir job. That's why we in­ven­ted the to­ols of li­be­ra­ti­on. That's why the can­non was in­ven­ted. That's why Mis­t­rid­ge was re­du­ced to rub­ble.

    - Fi­eld Com­man­der Da­vis, In­s­t­ruc­tor of Ite­ra­ti­on X HIT Marks

    Terrance Whyte, Col­le­gi­um of His­tory Ex­cerpts from Les­son One

    …and al­t­ho­ugh Sle­epers we­re not ab­le to use the can­non in bat­tle un­til the Si­ege of Metz in 1324, it ma­de for an out­s­tan­ding ma­gi­cal­ly-en­han­ced we­apon for the Craf­t­ma­sons of the I3th cen­tury. Mat­he­ma­ti­ci­ans and en­gi­ne­ers tran­s­por­ted se­ve­ral of the de­vi­ces to sup­port re­vo­lu­ti­ons in ot­her parts of Euro­pe…

    After the des­t­ruc­ti­on of Mis­t­rid­ge, the Craf­t­ma­sons ta­ught the­ir Gif­ted ap­pren­ti­ces the ba­sics of the­ir tec­h­ni­qu­es. This in­c­lu­ded erec­ting Spi­rit Ga­un­t­lets to iso­la­te co­ve­nants, met­hods of dra­ining the­se co­ve­nants of the­ir ma­gi­cal energy, and skills for ma­nu­fac­tu­ring de­vi­ces to bring pros­pe­rity to the pe­op­le. The Mas­ses no lon­ger ne­eded to rely on ma­gic to pro­tect them­sel­ves from the un­k­nown. They re­li­ed in­s­te­ad on the de­vi­ces of the Craf­t­ma­sons to im­p­ro­ve the­ir li­ves. Bet­ter far­ming tec­h­ni­qu­es, me­di­ci­ne, sa­ni­ta­ti­on and edu­ca­ti­on are but a few exam­p­les. The most ef­fec­ti­ve we­apon aga­inst the Tra­di­ti­ons was the idea that an eli­te gro­up of ma­ges was no lon­ger ne­eded to ru­le the world. So­ci­ety no lon­ger exis­ted to ser­ve the ma­gi. It exis­ted to al­low the Mas­ses to thri­ve.

    The first Craf­t­ma­son "com­mu­nity" at Mis­t­rid­ge was a suc­cess. Ot­hers he­ard of this un­be­li­evab­le event. They he­ard of the co­ura­ge of a gro­up of pe­asants who as­ser­ted the­ir will and hel­ped des­t­roy a cor­rupt co­ve­nant. Si­mi­lar re­vo­lu­ti­ons we­re oc­cur­ring thro­ug­ho­ut Euro­pe.

    The be­li­ef in ma­gic as a form of pro­tec­ti­on wa­ned. Be­li­ef in the ne­ed for ma­gic be­gan to wa­ne as well. A dif­fe­rent pa­ra­digm of re­ality was born: a system whe­re su­per­s­ti­ti­on did not hi­de so­lu­ti­ons to one's prob­lems, whe­re mysti­cism did not le­ave true know­led­ge to the few. The idea it­self was qu­ite old, but the Craf­t­ma­sons hel­ped spre­ad it thro­ug­ho­ut Euro­pe. Re­ason and or­der be­gan to rep­la­ce fe­ar and su­per­s­ti­ti­on. The new le­aders who emer­ged we­re not prac­ti­ti­oners of the ma­gi­cal arts. They we­re Sle­epers.

    Another mo­ve­ment in the 13th cen­tury al­so fu­eled the fi­res of dis­sent. The In­qu­isi­ti­on stren­g­t­he­ned the po­wer of the Church and as­sa­ul­ted the fot­ces of the su­per­na­tu­ral. The Craf­t­ma­sons and the­ir al­li­es we­re not the only ones to re­cog­ni­ze the thre­at of the su­per­na­tu­ral world; they me­rely han­d­led the si­tu­ati­on dif­fe­rently. So­me seg­ments of the In­qu­isi­ti­on dec­la­red the ma­ges to be "evil" and ad­ded to the blo­od­s­hed of the fust Pog­roms.

    The de­ath and mi­sery was com­po­un­ded by the gre­atest fa­ilu­re of the co­ve­nants: the Black Pla­gue, a sco­ur­ge of un­k­nown ori­gin that des­t­ro­yed ma­gi and Sle­epers ali­ke, Many Sle­epers who for­merly trus­ted the co­ve­nants had no cho­ice but to turn to al­ter­na­ti­ves.

    As the sup­port of ma­gic les­se­ned, the for­ces of Do­mi­ni­on and Re­ason we­re stren­g­t­he­ned by be­li­ef. Ma­gic had al­ways be­en pre­di­ca­ted on be­li­ef. The Fa­ith of a holy man co­uld en­rich the spi­ri­tu­ality of a church, a be­li­ef in the fey co­uld help so­me­one en­ter a re­gi­on of the fa­erie world, and the be­li­ef of a ma­ge in his own po­wer as­sis­ted him in exer­ting his will. This en­ti­re system was sup­por­ted by the be­li­ef of ever­yo­ne that the po­wer of ma­gic was re­al. Re­ality shif­ted. The Church's po­wer of Do­mi­ni­on and the gro­wing po­wer of Re­ason ec­lip­sed the po­wers of ma­gic.

    Magic di­ed be­ca­use hu­ma­nity wan­ted it to die. The spi­ri­tu­ality of the land still exis­ted in so­me pla­ces, but hat­red to­wards the ma­ges and the me­mory of the­ir fa­ilu­res ra­ised ot­her for­ces in its pla­ce.

    Science did not be­gin with the Age of Re­ason, The­re was al­ways sci­en­ce- the ru­les we­re me­rely dif­fe­rent back then. Pe­op­le we­re wil­ling to be­li­eve in just abo­ut an­y­t­hing: ghosts, fa­eri­es, gi­ants, even the phi­lo­sop­her's sto­ne. But the­re we­re still things that we­re too far from re­ality to be be­li­eved. They hid in the re­alms of Ar­ca­dia or ot­her worlds wa­iting ne­arby. They we­re held at bay by a spi­ri­tu­al for­ce that man­kind ne­ver knew exis­ted. Now we ha­ve a na­me for it. "Pa­ra­dox."

    -Ashton, de­fec­tor from the Or­der of Her­mes

    The Mas­ses swar­med the con­ti­nent hun­ting ma­ges as well, and the for­ce of Pa­ra­dox aided them. The pe­op­le vo­wed ne­ver to be at the mercy of ma­ges aga­in. The Craf­t­ma­sons hid and wat­c­hed, le­aving mo­re of hu­man his­tory to the Sle­epers. The­ir po­wer­ful spi­rit ma­gics, in the me­an­ti­me, hel­ped gu­ide the for­ces of Pa­ra­dox. A re­na­is­san­ce was un­der­way.

    The re­vo­lu­ti­on of Sle­epers, the cam­pa­igns of the Craf­t­ma­sons, the Black Pla­gue and the In­qu­isi­ti­on we­re ma­j­or for­ces in en­ding the fa­ilu­re known as the Mythic Age. A few eva­si­ve ma­ges es­ca­ped in­to the "spi­rit world" as they aban­do­ned the­ir co­ve­nants. One Or­der, the Tre­me­re, even jo­ined with the vam­pi­res to es­ca­pe ret­ri­bu­ti­on. As the Pog­rom ra­ged, the Craf­t­ma­sons con­ti­nu­ed the­ir re­se­ar­c­hes. The items they craf­ted be­ca­me mo­re and mo­re fan­tas­tic.

    Excerpt from Les­son Three

    …soon the sur­vi­ving ma­gi pro­tec­ted them­sel­ves by sec­retly for­ming the Or­der of Her­mes. They al­li­ed with the so-cal­led "Tra­di­ti­ons," many of which we­re no ol­der than the ori­gins of the Con­ven­ti­ons. The re­al ma­gi­cal po­wer was ves­ted in a ra­pidly gro­wing so­ci­ety of Awa­ke­ned phi­lo­sop­hers and in­ven­tors who held many of the be­li­efs of the ori­gi­nal Craf­t­ma­sons. The Or­der of Re­ason was lar­ger, stron­ger, and held the sup­port of a gro­wing con­sen­su­al re­ality.

    The ori­gins of the Con­ven­ti­ons exis­ted long be­fo­re the Or­der of Re­ason. The scho­lars who first ga­ve the world mat­he­ma­tics be­gan the long path to­wards the prog­ram­ming of Ite­ra­ti­on X. The he­alers of An­ci­ent Gre­ece and Ro­me we­re the hum­b­le be­gin­nings of the Pro­ge­ni­tors. An­ci­ent as­t­ro­no­mers la­id the fo­un­da­ti­ons for the twen­ti­eth cen­tury Vo­id En­gi­ne­ers. Of co­ur­se, the­se dis­co­ve­ri­es ca­me from thro­ug­ho­ut the world. En­lig­h­te­ned men and wo­men pur­su­ed sci­en­ce thro­ug­ho­ut the world, from the in­ven­tors of Chi­na to the na­vi­ga­tors of the Pho­eni­ci­ans. On­ce the Or­der of Re­ason ga­ined strength, the­se dis­pa­ra­te his­to­ri­cal ele­ments ca­me to­get­her, and the Or­der chan­ged the co­ur­se of his­tory.

    Behind the sce­nes, ho­we­ver, the Craf­t­ma­sons kept the­ir exis­ten­ce sec­ret. They we­re the ho­ar­ders of we­alth, the ma­kers of kings, the ar­c­hi­tects of re­ality, and the most po­wer­ful of the ma­ges. They we­re al­so hu­man, with hu­man fra­il­ti­es. A few be­ca­me cor­rupt in the­ir po­wer, and the first se­eds of the Schism we­re sown.

    The Age of Re­ason

    Even in the Age of Re­ason, sci­en­ce was just a way of pro­ving that an­y­t­hing was pos­sib­le. Sci­en­ce used to be a to­ol for dre­aming. Yes, the­re was Pa­ra­dox then, but pe­op­le we­re so en­rap­tu­red by the pos­si­bi­li­ti­es of sci­en­ce that its for­ces we­re we­ak.

    If only we co­uld bu­ild Da Vin­ci's in­ven­ti­ons aga­in. They re­al­ly wor­ked then…

    -Dr. Ho­ra­tio Bal­d­rid­ge, Son of Et­her, cur­rently li­ving in the Clo­ud Re­alm of Mon­t­gol­fi­er

    Excerpt from Les­son Fo­ur

    The hid­den le­aders con­ti­nu­ed the­ir agen­da whi­le many mem­bers of the Or­der of Re­ason fo­und met­hods of per­fec­ting the­ir ma­gic. They we­re in­ven­tors, ex­p­lo­rers, dre­amers and in­no­va­tors. It was a Gol­den Age, es­pe­ci­al­ly for one ra­pidly gro­wing sec­ret so­ci­ety- the Par­me­ni­de­ans.

    Their na­me be­gan as a joke, for the Gre­ek phi­lo­sop­her Par­me­ni­des ri­gidly be­li­eved in the po­wer of sta­sis. The ma­ges of this sec­ret or­der so­ught to defy this sta­sis whe­ne­ver pos­sib­le. As a re­sult, early sci­en­ce was just as out­lan­dish as ma­gic. Ho­we­ver, the il­lu­si­on of sta­sis was ma­in­ta­ined whi­le the dyna­mism of ma­gic was ex­p­lo­red. The prac­ti­ce of the­ir craft, the per­fec­ti­on of in­ven­ti­on and cre­ati­on, was so­met­hing they knew they had to do sec­retly. This mo­ve­ment re­fi­ned many of the early ide­as of co­in­ci­den­tal ma­gic. Fur­t­her­mo­re, by al­te­ring the bo­un­da­ri­es of re­ality, by per­for­ming co­in­ci­den­tal acts that co­uld la­ter be rep­li­ca­ted by ac­tu­al in­ven­ti­ons, sci­en­ce ad­van­ced.

    The Par­me­ni­de­ans un­der­s­to­od the prac­ti­ce of ma­gic in the pre­sen­ce of Sle­epers. The In­ner Cir­c­le ga­ined its po­wer by ca­re­ful­ly di­rec­ting and or­c­hes­t­ra­ting the­ir ef­forts. They for­med or­ga­ni­za­ti­ons to over­see the ef­forts of the Outer Cir­c­le and or­ga­ni­zed august bo­di­es to de­ba­te the con­se­qu­en­ces of the­ir ac­ti­ons. The­se we­re the first for­mal Sympo­si­ums.

    With the pas­sa­ge of ti­me, the na­mes of va­ri­o­us sub­g­ro­ups ca­me and went. The word "Craf­t­ma­son" fell out of use, al­t­ho­ugh the word "Par­me­ni­de­an" re­ma­ined thro­ug­ho­ut this pe­ri­od. The na­me re­ma­ined in use thro­ug­ho­ut the Re­na­is­san­ce, an era that al­lo­wed for the bu­il­ding of a mo­re ega­li­ta­ri­an ci­vi­li­za­ti­on. Sin­ce the Par­me­ni­de­ans es­tab­lis­hed the fo­un­da­ti­on for the Sons of Et­her, the Tra­di­ti­ons are qu­ick to cla­im the­ir ac­hi­eve­ments as Tra­di­ti­on ide­as. This is, of co­ur­se, fo­olish. The Par­me­ni­de­ans fol­lo­wed the dic­ta­tes of the In­ner Cir­c­le…

    Excerpt from Les­son Fi­ve

    As they con­ti­nu­ed this ex­p­lo­ra­ti­on, a few no­ted Par­me­ni­de­ans bro­ke the bo­un­da­ri­es of re­ality. The pa­ra­me­ters of pos­si­bi­lity shif­ted. By over­co­ming the for­ce of Pa­ra­dox, they re­de­fi­ned the na­tu­re of so­ci­ety. One exam­p­le was Gu­ten­berg, a Tec­h­no­man­cer who fo­und a bril­li­ant co­in­ci­den­tal ap­pli­ca­ti­on of the po­wers of the Mind to dis­se­mi­na­te in­for­ma­ti­on- un­der the gu­ise of the prin­ting press,

    Copernicus was, un­do­ub­tedly, one of the gre­atest mem­bers of the Or­der of Re­ason. By dra­wing upon the as­sis­tan­ce of a gro­up of sci­en­tists, he per­for­med one the most po­wer­ful com­mu­nal ro­tes the world had se­en. The Tra­di­ti­ons ha­ve sta­ted that be­ca­use of Co­per­ni­cus, the Sun ac­tu­al­ly ce­ased to re­vol­ve aro­und the Earth. The Tra­di­ti­ons ex­pect its rec­ru­its to be­li­eve that the po­wer of Cor­res­pon­den­ce mo­ved the Sun and the Earth. This is yet anot­her one of the­ir li­es. The Earth has al­ways re­vol­ved aro­und the sun.

    Publicly, Co­per­ni­cus dis­p­ro­ved er­ro­ne­o­us be­li­efs con­cer­ning the na­tu­re­of the so­lar system. Pri­va­tely, Co­per­ni­cus had be­en wat­c­hing events in the depths of spa­ce. His ca­bal suc­ce­eded in fur­t­her stren­g­t­he­ning the Ga­un­t­let aro­und the Earth, shut­ting out ma­le­fic for­ces he had se­en wa­iting be­yond the Ho­ri­zon. His sup­por­ters, fol­lo­wing the pre­cepts of ear­li­er as­t­ro­no­mers, ad­van­ced his Con­ven­ti­on, one that wo­uld la­ter be­co­me part of the Vo­id En­gi­ne­ers.

    The Vic­to­ri­an Age

    Hell, the word 'Tec­h­noc­racy' star­ted in the Sympo­si­ums of the Vic­to­ri­an Era, We al­most won the war right then. When this VR prog­ram is fi­nis­hed, it's gon­na show a lot of the new rec­ru­its what Vic­to­ri­an Lon­don was re­al­ly li­ke…

    - Lig­h­t­s­pe­ed, VR prog­ram­mer, for­mer Vir­tu­al Adept

    Excerpts from Les­son Six

    One of the most pro­duc­ti­ve ti­me pe­ri­ods for the Tec­h­noc­racy was the Vic­to­ri­an Age. Se­ve­ral Con­ven­ti­ons grew mo­re vi­sib­le. One was the re­sult of a few Awa­ke­ned sec­ret so­ci­ety mem­bers who had for­med a Lod­ge hid­den wit­hin Scot­land Yard…

    December 18th, 1886

    The scre­aming will not stop. I ha­ve tri­ed re­pe­atedly to pur­ge the ne­ig­h­bor­ho­od of tho­se hor­ri­fic spi­rits, but my ef­forts are not eno­ugh. If sor­cery can ra­ise them, then sor­cery can dis­pel them. I ha­ve or­ga­ni­zed my as­sis­tants from Scot­land Yard, and we will dri­ve this hor­ror from our midst. We will act as one to pu­rify this ne­ig­h­bor­hood for the sa­fety of all.

    -Diary of In­s­pec­tor Rat­h­bo­ne

    This well-or­c­hes­t­ra­ted te­am of hun­ters who used the­ir ma­gic­kal abi­li­ti­es to sa­fe­gu­ard En­g­land aga­inst the en­c­ro­ac­hing hor­rors of the un­k­nown for­med the fo­un­da­ti­on of what wo­uld la­ter be­co­me the Men in Black…

    London grows each day. If our pro­duc­ti­on is to pro­perly me­et the de­mands of the po­pu­la­ce, we must in­c­re­ase our ef­forts to me­et the de­mands of the mac­hi­nes. Ot­her­wi­se, the Mas­ses will star­ve.

    - Augus­tus For­tin­b­ras, Exe­cu­ti­ve Di­rec­tor of the Gu­ild

    Industry al­so flo­uris­hed. A few En­lig­h­te­ned ma­gi we­re ab­le to ca­pi­ta­li­ze on the pos­si­bi­lity of using ma­gick to spe­ed pro­duc­ti­on and pre­dict the suc­cess of com­pa­ni­es. The idea of using bu­si­ness to as­sist the Mas­ses be­gan in the la­te Mid­dle Ages with a so­ci­ety known as The Gu­ild. This Con­ven­ti­on evol­ved in the Vic­to­ri­an Age with the ad­vent of the In­dus­t­ri­al Re­vo­lu­ti­on, and the Gu­ild la­ter be­ca­me the Syndi­ca­te.

    The des­cen­dants of the ap­pren­ti­ces who as­sis­ted Co­per­ni­cus and Kep­ler still la­bo­red to­wards the­ir ex­p­lo­ra­ti­on of the he­avens. The frin­ge Con­ven­ti­on of the Ce­les­ti­al Mas­ters- who la­ter mer­ged with the "Se­ekers of the Vo­id"- con­ti­nu­ed to col­lect the­ir da­ta.

    The Par­me­ni­de­ans be­ca­me en­t­h­ral­led with the idea that the Earth was bat­hing in a spi­ri­tu­al mist. Da­ta col­lec­ted from ma­gi­cal ex­pe­ri­ments le­ad to the dis­co­very of the De­ep Um­b­ra, al­t­ho­ugh two of the le­ading ma­ges in this sec­ret in­ves­ti­ga­ti­on, Mic­ha­el­son and Mor­ley, in­sis­ted on cal­ling it the "Ethe­ric Con­ti­nu­um," The dis­co­very so alar­med this Con­ven­ti­on of ma­ges that the na­me "Sons of Et­her" ca­me in­to vo­gue. The na­me stuck.

    The "Cor­rup­ti­on" of Tec­h­no­logy

    Do you re­al­ly think the Tec­h­no­man­cers sha­ped re­ality? You re­al­ly be­li­eve that? It's the sa­me old qu­es­ti­on: do­es man­kind res­ha­pe his­tory, or do­es his­tory res­ha­pe man­kind? I think the events of this cen­tury got out of con­t­rol, and that des­t­ro­yed the Or­der of Re­ason. I am free from bla­me. My only fa­ult was trying to des­c­ri­be things as they re­al­ly are. Now I'm glad you're go­ing to kill me, be­ca­use now I can re­al­ly be free.

    -Xerxes, for­mer agent of the New World Or­der, Eut­ha­na­tos spy

    As tec­h­no­logy con­ti­nu­ed to ad­van­ce, so did the Con­ven­ti­ons. In­ven­ti­ons in com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons led to fur­t­her de­ve­lop­ment of the Cor­res­pon­den­ce Sphe­re, and a gro­up of Sons of Et­her be­gan to split off to pur­sue this study. The Vo­id En­gi­ne­ers, lo­oking out upon the en­d­less re­ac­hes of spa­ce, al­so set out to mas­ter Cor­res­pon­den­ce, pus­hing in­to new fron­ti­ers.

    The Sympo­si­ums, still led by the In­ner Cir­c­le of the long oc­cul­ted Craf­t­ma­sons, had ot­her agen­da. By ex­t­ra­po­la­ting upon the da­ta of the Sons of Et­her, they fo­und a way to ex­p­lo­re the fur­t­her re­ac­hes of the et­her. Ve­hic­les we­re con­s­t­ruc­ted to carry Sympo­si­ums be­yond the Ho­ri­zon, es­tab­lis­hing re­se­arch in­s­tal­la­ri­ons in the De­ep Um­b­ra.

    Beyond the Ho­ri­zon, the Sympo­si­ums we­re ab­le to es­tab­lish the­ir ba­ses of ope­ra­ti­ons. The Tec­h­no­man­cers we­re ab­le to fully pur­sue re­se­arch wit­ho­ut fe­ar of Pa­ra­dox. With this ad­van­ta­ge at the­ir dis­po­sal, the­ir sci­en­ce grew by le­aps and bo­unds. In fact, the­ir know­led­ge grew too qu­ickly…

    The Cut­ting Ed­ge

    If a man's re­ach can't ex­ce­ed his grasp, then what's a he­aven for?

    -Robert Brow­ning

    Freed from the con­s­t­ra­ints of Earthly re­ality, the Tec­h­noc­racy so­on ad­van­ced far be­yond the tec­h­no­logy of Earth. So­me of the Tec­h­no­man­cers of the De­ep Um­b­ra lost to­uch with the re­ality, and mo­ra­lity, they left be­hind. By the '80s, so­me Tec­h­no­man­cer in­no­va­ti­ons we­re es­ti­ma­ted to be ap­pro­xi­ma­tely 50 ye­ars ahe­ad of the tec­h­no­logy of the Mas­ses.

    Eighty ye­ars of un­res­t­ra­ined re­se­arch had a de­le­te­ri­o­us ef­fect on what on­ce be­gan as a frin­ge re­vo­lu­ti­on aga­inst the co­ve­nants. So­me analysts of the Col­le­gi­ums ha­ve boldly sta­ted that this was the re­sult of im­p­ro­per le­ader­s­hip in the In­ner Cir­c­le. I find such ra­di­cal be­li­efs dis­tur­bing. Our le­aders de­ep in the Gre­at Be­yond still hold the ori­gi­nal ide­as of "hel­ping" the Mas­ses. Ho­we­ver, I will ad­van­ce this qu­ali­fi­ca­ti­on: so­me le­aders of the re­se­arch in­s­tal­la­ti­ons, in­c­lu­ding so­me of my for­mer col­le­agu­es, ha­ve adj­us­ted the con­cepr. They see them­sel­ves as in­fal­lib­le, re­mo­ved from rhe im­per­fec­ti­ons of the Earth. They cla­im to know what is best for hu­ma­nity. Our vic­tory has be­en pre­dic­ted, and in turn, this has gi­ven them the for­ti­tu­de to­do an­y­t­hing in the na­me of prog­ress. This, ho­we­ver, is only one seg­ment of the Tec­h­noc­racy. For­gi­ve me. I dig­ress.

    Countless dis­co­ve­ri­es in Tec­h­no­man­cer tec­h­no­logy oc­cur­red du­ring the twen­ti­eth cen­tury. The first sec­re­ti­ve spa­cec­raft be­gan ex­p­lo­ring the so­lar system, ven­tu­ring be­yond the Ga­un­t­let stren­g­t­he­ned by the Craf­t­ma­sons, Co­per­ni­cus, Kep­ler and ot­hers. Ba­ses we­re es­tab­lis­hed on the Ho­ri­zon, in the De­ep Um­b­ra and on or­her worlds.

    One De­ep Um­b­ral jo­ur­ney led to the dis­co­very of Autoc­h­t­ho­nia, a Mac­hi­ne Re­alm lo­ca­ted in Earth's or­bit on the far si­de of the Sun. Co­nj­ec­tu­re con­ti­nu­es as to whet­her this world is me­rely a pa­ral­lel Earth, the re­sult of the com­mu­nal ma­gick of Co­per­ni­cus and Kep­ler, or ac­tu­al­ly a "spi­rit re­alm" of the Tec­h­noc­racy. So­me call it Uto­pia; ot­hers call it a frin­ge re­li­gi­on.

    Fuelled by our va­ri­ants of ma­gick, we ha­ve per­fec­ted ar­ti­fi­ci­al in­tel­li­gen­ce, clo­ning, cyborg tec­h­no­logy, fan­tas­tic met­hods of tran­s­por­ta­ti­on, mind-shat­te­ring in­no­va­ti­ons in ar­ti­fi­ci­al li­fe, and ot­her bre­ak­t­h­ro­ughs. We are wa­iting to slowly in­t­ro­du­ce them in­to the world. Ne­ver aga­in will our in­f­lu­en­ce be hur­ri­ed.

    The Schism

    Technology is a to­ol to em­po­wer in­di­vi­du­als. We just wan­ted to em­po­wer pe­op­le with the to­ols to con­t­rol the­ir own li­ves. The Tec­h­noc­racy has for­got­ten that go­al. They see tec­h­no­logy as a for­ce to en­s­la­ve the Mas­ses, not li­be­ra­te them. They're fa­na­tics. That's why I'd do an­y­t­hing to des­t­roy them.

    - Za­rat­hus­t­ra, Vir­tu­al Adept, From is­sue #136 of the web­s­lin­ger, spys -de­mi­se sa­mi­zi­ne

    …despite the on­go­ing de­ba­tes, many of the Sympo­si­ums and re­se­arch labs had al­re­ady ret­re­ated to the Ho­ri­zon and we­re ob­li­vi­o­us to the cri­ti­cisms of in­di­vi­du­al Tec­h­no­man­cers. Many analysts of the aca­de­mic Col­le­gi­ums, for in­s­tan­ce, we­re dis­co­un­ted by the mo­re "eli­te" prac­ti­ti­oners of the Exe­cu­ti­ve Or­ders, They ob­ta­ined the fre­edom to cri­ti­que and anal­y­ze, yet our gre­atest chan­ce to of­fer our in­sight to the Tec­h­noc­racy al­ways ca­me from our task as edu­ca­tors…

    There are two Con­ven­ti­ons that ha­ve not con­cur­red with the new Tec­h­noc­ra­tic agen­da. They co­uld not pur­sue the­ir go­als thro­ugh ci­vi­li­zed dis­co­ur­se, and they ha­ve be­en di­sen­f­ran­c­hi­sed from the Col­lec­ti­ve. Whet­her they de­fec­ted or we­re cast out is a mat­ter of so­me co­nj­ec­tu­re. The Sons of Et­her, se­e­ing the re­sults of the­ir re­se­arch, no lon­ger fit wit­hin the ri­gid hi­erarchy that was be­ing es­tab­lis­hed. Many left du­ring the Vic­to­ri­an Age rat­her than at­tempt to he­al the Tec­h­noc­racy. De­ca­des la­ter, the Vir­tu­al Adepts, a Con­ven­ti­on ba­sed aro­und the dis­co­very of Vir­tu­al Re­ality, al­so fled, di­vor­cing them­sel­ves from res­pon­si­bi­lity in fa­vor of es­ca­pism…

    After the de­fec­ti­ons, we ha­ve exa­mi­ned our Uni­on with gre­ater scru­tiny. So­me mem­bers of the New World 190 The Bo­ok of Sha­dows: The Ma­ge Pla­yers Gu­ide Or­der ha­ve spo­ken of a gro­wing Schism in our ranks. Our le­aders be­yond the Ho­ri­zon do not al­ways ha­ve di­rect con­tact with our agents in the fi­eld. Tho­se who bring in­no­va­ti­ons thro­ugh re­se­arch do not al­ways lis­ten to war­nings from the the­orists and aca­de­mi­ci­ans. Dif­fe­rent vi­ews of As­cen­si­on, dif­fe­rent opi­ni­ons on our fu­tu­re, dif­fe­rent opi­ni­ons on how we must han­d­le the Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges- al­t­ho­ugh we stand Uni­ted, the de­ba­te we pur­sue over the­se is­su­es is ri­go­ro­us.

    There is, ho­we­ver, a gre­at de­al of com­mon gro­und. We ca­re for the fu­tu­re of hu­ma­nity. We bring prog­ress, in­no­va­ti­on, se­cu­rity and en­lig­h­ten­ment. We are the ad­vo­ca­tes of tec­h­no­logy and, as such, the pro­tec­tors of hu­ma­nity.

    The Fu­tu­re of Tec­h­noc­racy

    ...both si­des are be­co­ming iden­ti­cal. What, in fact, is be­ing cre­ated; an in­ter­na­ti­onal com­mu­nity, a per­fect blu­ep­rint for World Or­der. When the si­des fa­cing each ot­her re­ali­ze that they're lo­oking in­to a mir­ror, they will see that THIS is the pat­tern for the fu­tu­re.

    -#2, The Pri­so­ner, "Chi­mes of Big Ben"

    Do the ac­ti­ons of the Tec­h­no­man­cers in this mil­len­ni­um de­mon­s­t­ra­te that all tec­h­no­logy is "evil?" Far from it. Me­di­ci­ne, com­mu­ni­ca­ti­ons, sa­ni­ta­ti­on, edu­ca­ti­on, tran­s­por­ta­ti­on… all the­se bre­ak­t­h­ro­ughs for man­kind re­sul­ted from the ex­p­lo­ra­ti­ons of the Tec­h­no­man­cers.

    The Tra­di­ti­ons, who on­ce fa­iled to le­ad the world, re­j­ec­ted the­ir op­por­tu­nity to jo­in our fu­tu­re. Self-de­lu­si­on, es­ca­pism and fan­ta­si­es of As­cen­si­on help them to pro­no­un­ce all Tec­h­no­man­cers as "evil." Anac­h­ro­nists, cul­tists, pri­mi­ti­ves, he­do­nists, wor­s­hi­pers of de­ath- so­me of the­se mis­fits of re­ality la­bel all tec­h­no­logy as "evil," des­pi­te the many ad­van­ces it has gi­ven ci­vi­li­za­ti­on.

    The clock can­not be re­ver­sed. The ma­gi on­ce con­t­rol­led the Mythic Age, but they ha­ve fa­iled. The Tra­di­ti­on le­aders stri­ve to shift the pa­ra­me­ters of re­ality to ser­ve them­sel­ves, but they do not un­der­s­tand hu­ma­nity. Now we of­fer the Tra­di­ti­on ma­ges two cho­ices. They can ta­ke the chal­len­ge of jo­ining the lo­west le­vels of the Tec­h­noc­racy and help to he­al re­ality or they can con­ti­nue to defy us and be­co­me ex­tinct. If they do not jo­in us, if they di­rectly op­po­se the dic­ta­tes of the In­ner Cir­c­le, they will die. They can cho­ose to end this war. The­ir cho­ice is a sim­p­le one: li­fe or de­ath.

    We must ne­ver for­get the im­por­tan­ce of our ca­use. We must ne­ver for­get what his­tory has shown us. Our Uni­on has bro­ught hu­ma­nity out of the Dark Ages and in­to the light of Re­ason. Now we must gat­her ro­get­her to he­al the gro­wing Schism in our ranks. For the sa­ke of hu­ma­nity and the sta­bi­lity of re­ality, the­re is only one op­ti­on for us: over­w­hel­ming vic­tory.

    Mage co­vers a lot of gro­und, but at a ba­sic le­vel, it's a ga­me abo­ut cho­ices; if you had the po­wer to mold re­ality, what wo­uld you do with it? How wo­uld it chan­ge you? And how wo­uld you co­pe with the ob­s­tac­les and tem­p­ta­ti­ons that wo­uld co­me with such a re­ali­za­ti­on?

    The fol­lo­wing es­says of­fer so­me gu­idan­ce to Ma­ge pla­yers and Stor­y­tel­lers, So­me ad­dress the ga­me it­self, whi­le ot­hers com­pa­re the World of Dar­k­ness with our own "re­al world." The­se es­says are me­di­ta­ti­ons on the ga­me and our tho­ughts abo­ut it, not gos­pel han­ded down from on high. We're all pla­yers he­re… pla­yers of one ga­me or anot­her.

    By John Ro­bey

    The mytho­lo­gi­cal he­ro, set­ting forth from his com­mon-day hut or cas­t­le, is lu­red, car­ri­ed away, or el­se vo­lun­ta­rily pro­ce­eds, to the thres­hold of ad­ven­tu­re. The­re he en­co­un­ters a sha­dow pre­sen­ce that gu­ards the pas­sa­ge. The he­ro may de­fe­at or con­ci­li­ate this po­wer and go ali­ve in­to the kin­g­dom of the dark… or be sla­in by the op­po­nent and des­cend in de­ath… Be­yond the thres­hold… the he­ro jo­ur­neys thro­ugh un­fa­mi­li­ar yet stran­gely in­ti­mate for­ces, so­me of which se­ve­rely thre­aten him (tests), so­me of which gi­ve him ma­gi­cal aid (hel­pers). When he ar­ri­ves at the na­dir of the mytho­lo­gi­cal ro­und, he un­der­go­es a sup­re­me or­de­al and ga­ins his re­ward. The tri­umph may be rep­re­sen­ted as the he­ro's se­xu­al uni­on with the god­dess-mot­her of the world…, his re­cog­ni­ti­on by the fat­her-cre­ator…, his own di­vi­ni­za­ti­on…, or, aga­in- if the po­wers ha­ve re­ma­ined un­f­ri­endly to him- his theft of the bo­on he ca­me to ga­in…; in­t­rin­si­cal­ly, it is an ex­pan­sion of con­s­ci­o­us­ness and the­re­with of be­ing…. The fi­nal work is that of the re­turn. If the po­wers ha­ve bles­sed the he­ro, he now sets forth un­der the­ir pro­tec­ti­on…; if not, he fle­es and is pur­su­ed… At the re­turn thres­hold the tran­s­cen­den­tal po­wers must re­ma­in be­hind; the he­ro re-emer­ges from the kin­g­dom of dre­ad… The bo­on that he brings res­to­res the world…

    - Joseph Cam­p­bell's cap­su­le de­fi­ni­ti­on of the Mo­nomyth, from The He­ro with a Tho­usand Fa­ces

    The Ran­dom Ho­use Col­le­ge Dic­ti­onary, Re­vi­sed Edi­ti­on de­fi­nes a he­ro as "a man of dis­tin­gu­is­hed co­ura­ge or abi­lity, ad­mi­red for his bra­ve de­eds and nob­le qu­ali­ti­es," "a man who is re­gar­ded as ha­ving he­ro­ic qu­ali­ti­es and is con­si­de­red a mo­del or ide­al," or "a small lo­af of Ita­li­an bre­ad." Ho­we­ver, Joseph Cam­p­bell Fa­na­tics (li­ke me) tend to pre­fer the Cam­p­bel­li­an de­fi­ni­ti­on of a He­ro, which is simply an­yo­ne (man, wo­man, child, spi­rit) who is de­di­ca­ted to so­met­hing ot­her than him­self - anot­her per­son a re­la­ti­on­s­hip, a ca­use, and so on. In Ma­ge, the pla­yer cha­rac­ters are He­ro­es who ha­ve de­di­ca­ted them­sel­ves to ma­king the world bet­ter by un­ra­ve­ling the in­t­ri­ca­te grid of the Tec­h­noc­racy - or who will ma­ke the world bet­ter when they dis­co­ver what the Tec­h­noc­racy plans to ac­hi­eve.

    In or­der to ac­hi­eve this go­al, the he­ro­es must first un­der­go the long and dif­fi­cult pro­cess of ma­king them­sel­ves bet­ter pe­op­le; this is the ar­c­het­y­pal He­ro's Jo­ur­ney, whe­re­in the He­ro im­p­ro­ves the world by im­p­ro­ving her­self. This es­say is de­sig­ned to iden­tify steps in this jo­ur­ney, to help pla­yers think of di­rec­ti­ons for the cha­rac­ters, and to pro­vi­de Stor­y­tel­lers with to­ols to add me­aning to the­ir sto­ri­es. Ke­ep in mind that the­se are only the ma­j­or po­ints; plenty of mi­nor mo­tifs ine­vi­tably fall thro­ugh the cracks. In­te­res­ted par­ti­es are re­fer­red to The He­ro with a Tho­usand Fa­ces or Joseph Cam­p­bell and the Po­wer of Myth as go­od star­ting pla­ces for mo­re de­ta­iled dis­cus­si­ons.

    The ba­sic mo­tifs of the Jo­ur­ney are con­ta­ined in the Mo­nomyth, qu­oted at the be­gin­ning of this es­say. The Mo­nomyth is not­hing mo­re than the re­duc­ti­on of the many and va­ri­ed sro­ri­es of the dif­fe­rent cul­tu­res of the world to the most ba­sic ele­ments that they ha­ve in com­mon. The sto­ri­es that en­du­re for cen­tu­ri­es or mil­len­nia (Anci­ent Gre­ek mytho­logy, the mytho-re­li­gi­o­us sto­ri­es of the Judeo- Chris­ti­an tra­di­ti­on, Bud­dhism, Is­lam, Sha­kes­pe­are, Ar­t­hu­ri­an le­gends, fa­iry ta­les and so on) all con­ta­in ele­ments of the Mo­nomyth, as do the best sto­ri­es in po­pu­lar cul­tu­re. So­me mo­dern stor­y­tel­lers con­s­ci­o­usly emu­la­te the Mo­nomyth (Ge­or­ge Lu­cas is the ob­vi­o­us exam­p­le, but the­re are hun­d­reds of ot­hers), whi­le ot­hers simply tap in­to the "col­lec­ti­ve un­con­s­ci­o­us." The Stor­y­tel­ler Ga­mes ha­ve all be­en writ­ten with an eye to­wards lin­king them to the Mo­nomyth, but Ma­ge pro­vi­des the most ho­pe of bre­aking thro­ugh the dar­k­ness and get­ting to the light be­yond. The Stor­y­tel­ler must re­mem­ber the He­ro's Jo­ur­ney so that pla­yers may des­cend and as­cend over and over aga­in.

    Keep in mind that the mo­tifs of the He­ro's Jo­ur­ney, whi­le ar­c­het­y­pal, sho­uld not be clic­hes. Uni­ma­gi­na­ti­vely fol­lo­wing the qu­est for­mu­la will only gi­ve you an uni­ma­gi­na­ti­ve ga­me. One way to do this is to avo­id the ob­vi­o­us; the He­ro's Jo­ur­ney to the Un­der­world co­uld cer­ta­inly be a trip in­to a de­ep se­wer or a Wyrm-infes­ted sec­ti­on of the Um­b­ra, but a far mo­re uni­que trip to the Un­der­wotld might be a fo­ray in­to the up­per­most le­vels of a Tec­h­noc­ra­tic cor­po­ra­ti­on's skyscra­per or a vam­pi­re's dow­n­town ha­ven. The­se mo­tifs sho­uld be ob­s­cu­red whe­ne­ver pos­sib­le, pre­fe­rably only dis­co­ve­red when the pla­yer thinks back. If ever­yo­ne in the gro­up sho­uts, "Hey, lo­ok, we're go­ing to the Un­der­world!", the Stor­y­tel­ler ne­eds to be mo­re sub­t­le.

    Elements of the He­ro's Jo­ur­ney

    The ar­c­het­y­pal He­ro is unu­su­al in so­me way, but is still "incom­p­le­te". That is, the­re is so­met­hing that sets him apart from his pe­ers. Even Jack (of "The Be­an­s­talk" fa­me), one of the le­ast cha­rac­te­ri­zed He­ro­es of all ti­me, is unu­su­al: his fat­her is de­ad, sla­in by a gi­ant, and Jack and his mot­her li­ve far away from town. This dif­fe­ren­ce is ne­ces­sary: or­di­nary pe­op­le don't ha­ve ad­ven­tu­res. If they did, they wo­uldn't be or­di­nary any mo­re! Ob­vi­o­usly, the ma­ge is "Awa­ke­ned" and can per­form ma­gick. His "he­ro­ic" sta­tu­re go­es de­eper than that. Pla­yer cha­rac­ters rep­re­sent the ho­pe for the fu­tu­re, and, as such, sho­uld be unu­su­al even among ma­ges.

    Orphans ma­ke ex­cel­lent pla­yer cha­rac­ters for just this re­ason. Be­ca­use they ha­ven't be­en in­doc­t­ri­na­ted in­to the dog­ma of any one Tra­di­ti­on, they ha­ve an all-en­com­pas­sing per­s­pec­ti­ve which al­lows them to see the se­eds of truth in each Tra­di­ti­on's cre­ed wit­ho­ut be­ing sna­red by the Tra­di­ti­on's par­ti­cu­lar blind spots.

    The He­ro le­aves ho­me; he eit­her go­es vo­lun­ta­rily or is thrown out by her pe­ers or su­pe­ri­ors. Pri­or ad­ven­tu­res can't ta­ke pla­ce at ho­me: they must oc­cur in the wil­der­ness, or on a fron­ti­er of so­me kind. Just as the He­ro has be­en ele­va­ted be­yond or­di­nary ex­pe­ri­en­ce by be­ing "dif­fe­rent," his ex­pe­ri­en­ces must be ele­va­ted to be worthy of him. The He­ro's ad­ven­tu­re is the one the He­ro is re­ady for. In the best sto­ri­es, only that he­ro co­uld ha­ve that ad­ven­tu­re. Ed­die Murphy as a stre­et­wi­se cop in Det­ro­it is just anot­her stre­et­wi­se cop. Put him in Be­verly Hills, on the ot­her hand, and he stands out. His brand of stre­et-smarts is not only a qu­irk, it's a li­abi­lity, tho­ugh one that ul­ti­ma­tely ma­kes vic­tory pos­sib­le.

    The He­ro ac­qu­ires a hel­per or men­tor. Ar­t­hur had Mer­lin; Bil­bo had Gan­dalf; Jason had Me­dea; Bond had Q. The hel­per is very of­ten an ol­der kind of "ex-he­ro" who can no lon­ger com­p­le­te an ad­ven­tu­re her­self, but wis­hes to pass her ex­pe­ri­en­ce on (e.g. Obi-Wan Ke­no­bi). This hel­per of­ten puts her­self in­to con­si­de­rab­le dan­ger, and may even sac­ri­fi­ce her li­fe to pro­tect the He­ro at his most vul­ne­rab­le ti­me. This not only pro­tects the He­ro, but in­s­til­ls a sen­se of duty and an ide­al that will carry the He­ro thro­ugh in la­ter ti­mes of tro­ub­le. Even­tu­al­ly, the He­ro must see thro­ugh the ide­al and see the per­son in the hel­per - Ben tells Lu­ke a pretty whop­ping lie, af­ter all - but he will ho­pe­ful­ly ha­ve eno­ugh wis­dom to even­tu­al­ly un­der­s­tand why the hel­per did this.

    The He­ro must con­f­ront The Enemy, usu­al­ly in open com­bat. The Enemy can be a po­wer­ful en­tity (a Tec­h­no­man­cer ne­ar the top of the hi­erarchy with an Are­te 10 and a ke­rj­il­li­on mi­ni­ons) or can be an idea or a si­tu­ati­on (ra­cism and pre­j­udi­ce). The He­ro's ear­li­est vic­to­ri­es are li­kely to be small ones (be­ating up a se­cu­rity gu­ard in a Tec­h­noc­ra­tic Con­s­t­ruct), and the­re will be de­fe­ats. One of the most com­mon de­fe­ats is be­ing cap­tu­red, but sin­ce cap­tu­red he­ro­es are usu­al­ly ta­ken in­to the Enemy's stron­g­hold, this only le­ads to (even­tu­al­ly) big­ger and bet­ter vic­to­ri­es. Anot­her com­mon de­fe­at is the loss of fri­ends and lo­ved ones. This is of­ten the di­rect or in­di­rect re­sult of the He­ro's ac­ti­ons (thus gi­ving him so­met­hing to fe­el gu­ilty for la­ter) tho­ugh it ne­ed not be.

    Entering the Un­der­world: The he­ro even­tu­al­ly gets to the Un­der­world, usu­al­ly by cho­ice, in an ef­fort to ga­in so­met­hing or ac­hi­eve a go­al (ga­in in­for­ma­ti­on, res­cue a per­son, des­t­roy the Evil King's ru­le over the land, find Prin­ce Char­ming, etc.). So­me­ti­mes, ho­we­ver, the He­ro is ta­ken to the Un­der­world as a pri­so­ner of The Enemy. The Un­der­world is usu­al­ly whe­re the He­ro's most sig­ni­fi­cant vic­to­ri­es (and de­fe­ats) will oc­cur.

    Obviously the Un­der­world do­esn't ha­ve to be un­der­g­ro­und; it's simply so­mep­la­ce dan­ge­ro­us and/or myste­ri­o­us. Very of­ten, it forms the he­art of The Enemy's do­ma­in. In Ma­ge, the most com­mon Un­der­worlds might be Tec­h­noc­ra­tic Con­s­t­ructs, Nep­han­dus Lab­y­rinths, Shard Re­alms, or (best of all) per­so­nal Qu­i­et.

    The Un­der­world is a rot­ten pla­ce to vi­sit, but you re­al­ly wo­uldn't want to li­ve the­re. It is a so­ur­ce of pri­mal know­led­ge and po­wer, but it al­so con­f­ronts the He­ro with all of the pa­in and sor­row of exis­ten­ce, and his exis­ten­ce in par­ti­cu­lar. The Un­der­world sho­uld be frig­h­te­ning, pa­in­ful and just pla­in nasty.

    The He­ro's to­ug­hest bat­tles will al­ways be tho­se in which the He­ro is con­f­ront ing so­met­hing wit­hin him­self- a we­ak­ness, or a cri­me (often un­con­fes­sed) for which he must ato­ne, or his own in­ner ca­pa­city for evil. So­me­ti­mes, the cha­rac­ter fa­ils the­se tests (King Ar­t­hur's ma­ri­tal prob­lems co­me to mind), but the­se fa­ilu­res are only tem­po­rary set­backs.

    Once in a very gre­at whi­le, a cha­rac­ter may not only fa­il the test, but be ne­arly des­t­ro­yed by it, such as Darth Va­der's fall or Fa­ust's sel­ling of his so­ul. This can be a tra­uma­tic thing to play, and will ca­use lar­ge shifts in the struc­tu­re of the chro­nic­le. Very of­ten, the cha­rac­ter will die or find her­self for­ced from her ca­bal. Run­ning such a fall sho­uld be set up bet­we­en the pla­yers and the Stor­y­tel­ler, but the cha­rac­ter sho­uld ul­ti­ma­tely cho­ose bet­we­en an at­tempt at re­dem­p­ti­on, even­tu­al de­ath or re­sig­na­ti­on to the Land of Re­cur­ring NPCs,

    The He­ro can­not le­ave the Un­der­world un­til she is re­de­emed- which isn't to say that she's held pri­so­ner, al­t­ho­ugh she may be. Mo­re of­ten, a He­ro fal­len from gra­ce car­ri­es the Un­der­world with her whe­re­ver she may go. Oedi­pus, Jason and a do­ub­le-han­d­ful of ot­her tra­gic he­ro­es spent the lat­ter hal­ves of the­ir li­ves wan­de­ring the world in tor­ment and ne­ver ma­na­ged to ga­in re­dem­p­ti­on. King Ar­t­hur and Lan­ce­lot co­uld only be re­de­emed by the re­co­very of the Gra­il, and En­g­land wit­he­red and be­ca­me a was­te­land in the me­an­ti­me…

    Eventually, the vic­to­ri­o­us (or re­de­emed) He­ro es­ca­pes from the Un­der­world. It isn't easy; the He­ro has to get thro­ugh gre­at dif­fi­culty and/or sac­ri­fi­ce. Ge­or­ge Lu­cas' film Re­turn of the Jedi, from the mo­ment Lu­ke Skywal­ker sur­ren­ders to Darth Va­der un­til the re­mo­val of Darth Va­der's mask, is simply one long trip in­to the Un­der­world. Lu­ke un­der­go­es one of the ol­dest of qu­ests - to bring his fat­her back up from the abyss. Lu­ke's tri­als, in this one film, in­c­lu­de des­pa­ir in the fa­ce of the Em­pe­ror's po­wer, ra­ge at the Em­pe­ror's tre­ac­hery, and self-dis­co­very when he is go­aded in­to ne­arly kil­ling his fat­her. Even tho­ugh Lu­ke suc­ces­sful­ly pas­ses all the­se tri­als, suc­ces­sful­ly re­de­eming his fat­her, a sac­ri­fi­ce is still ma­de - Va­der's de­ath at the end. Any Ma­ge cha­rac­ter's tri­als can be just as dif­fi­cult.

    The He­ro has his fi­nal con­f­ron­ta­ti­on with, and ul­ti­ma­tely de­fe­ats, The Enemy, even if The Enemy is not­hing mo­re than the cha­rac­ter's own per­so­nal bug­be­ar. This of­ten co­mes la­te in the cha­rac­ter's ca­re­er, for ob­vi­o­us re­asons. If the pla­yers and the Stor­y­tel­ler want to wrap up the chro­nic­le, then a cli­mac­tic end-ga­me in which all of the cha­rac­ters get a chan­ce to wi­pe out the­ir per­so­nal Enemy and sco­re a ma­j­or vic­tory aga­inst the Tec­h­noc­racy is in or­der. If the ta­le simply con­c­lu­des one cha­rac­ter's Jo­ur­ney, that cha­rac­ter can eit­her stay in the ga­me or re­ti­re, de­pen­ding on the wis­hes of the pla­yer and the Stor­y­tel­ler. Pla­yers sho­uldn't as­su­me that a He­ro's jo­ur­ney ends with the con­qu­est of The Enemy. Li­fe go­es on; the world still turns. If not­hing el­se, the He­ro can act as the gu­ide/hel­per for ot­hers in the chro­nic­le still un­der­go­ing the­ir own Jo­ur­neys.

    Once the He­ro has fi­nis­hed his Jo­ur­ney and de­fe­ated The Enemy, the He­ro re­turns ho­me (or set­tles down in wha­te­ver new ho­me he's adop­ted), chan­ged and ma­tu­red by his ad­ven­tu­res, in or­der to (attempt to) bring his ex­pe­ri­en­ce hard-won wis­dom back to or­di­nary pe­op­le. The fru­its of the He­ro's la­bor thus fe­ed the com­mon go­od. Even­tu­al­ly, con­ti­nu­ing the cycle, the He­ro will be the men­tor for yo­un­ger He­ro­es go­ing thro­ugh the sa­me cycle.

    And so it go­es…

    By Beth Fis­c­hi

    Therefore, trust to thy he­art, and to what the world calls il­lu­si­ons.

    - Henry Wad­s­worth Lon­g­fel­low

    We don't see things as they are; we see them as we are.

    - Ana­is Nin

    It's of­ten dif­fi­cult to iden­tify with cha­rac­ters who ha­ve un­der­go­ne so­met­hing to­tal­ly fo­re­ign to our own ex­pe­ri­en­ces. This be­co­mes par­ti­cu­larly prob­le­ma­tic when we try to ro­lep­lay an Awa­ke­ning; sin­ce we (pro­bably) ha­ven't ex­pe­ri­en­ced such a thing, we re­qu­ire an "in" in­to the mind, bac­k­g­ro­und, and ex­pe­ri­en­ces of the ma­ge-to-be who is just be­gin­ning to grasp what re­ality's all abo­ut. A num­ber of fac­tors gi­ve us that "in": the cha­rac­ter's emo­ti­ons, her Tra­di­ti­on, her Es­sen­ce and her per­so­na­lity.

    EMOTION

    Think of the Awa­ke­ning as a co­usin to the kind of dre­ams that Wal­ter de la Ma­re on­ce wro­te of: "A lost but happy dre­am may shed its light upon our wa­king ho­urs, and the who­le day may be in­fec­ted with the glo­om of a dre­ary or sor­row­ful one, yet of ne­it­her may we be ab­le to re­co­ver a tra­ce." The ma­ge can­not for­get an Awa­ke­ning, as such dre­ams are so­on for­got­ten, but she may ex­pe­ri­en­ce the si­mi­lar thrill of ha­ving to­uc­hed a pro­fo­und re­ality. The ex­ci­te­ment of pur­su­it and dis­co­very, of in­ten­se new un­der­s­tan­ding, is what the Awa­ke­ning is all abo­ut; it's abo­ut the elec­t­ric mo­ment when con­s­ci­o­us, ever­y­day exis­ten­ce con­f­ronts a dre­am re­ality that is so­me­how mo­re sub­s­tan­ti­al.

    TRADITION

    Your cha­rac­ter's Tra­di­ti­on lar­gely de­ter­mi­nes the plot of the Awa­ke­ning. On­ce you've cho­sen a Tra­di­ti­on for yo­ur cha­rac­ter, think abo­ut its uni­que vi­ew of re­ality. The types of ma­ges it at­tracts, the at­ti­tu­des it fos­ters and the ene­mi­es it has ear­ned will sha­pe yo­ur cha­rac­ter's Awa­ke­ning. Re­mem­ber that, with the ex­cep­ti­on of Or­p­hans, the mem­bers of yo­ur adop­ted Tra­di­ti­on usu­al­ly ta­ke the ini­ti­ati­ve in Awa­ke­ning yo­ur cha­rac­ter. Con­si­der how the­se ma­ges vi­ew the Awa­ke­ning: is it the­ir duty to help you? Is it a sac­red res­pon­si­bi­lity? Do they gu­ide you out of lo­ve, fe­ar, ho­pe for the fu­tu­re, ne­ces­sity or so­me ot­her re­ason? How Long ha­ve they be­en wat­c­hing you? Must you pass an in­for­mal or for­mal tri­al pe­ri­od first? Is the Tra­di­ti­on li­ke an ex­c­lu­si­ve club who­se mem­bers must ha­ve "cre­den­ti­als," or is an­yo­ne with po­ten­ti­al bro­ught in­to the fold? Fi­nal­ly, who are yo­ur Tra­di­ti­on's ar­ch-ne­me­ses, and will they emer­ge du­ring the Awa­ke­ning to pre­vent the Tra­di­ti­on's in­duc­ti­on of yet anot­her sol­di­er in­to its ranks?

    The Or­der of Her­mes, for in­s­tan­ce, might re­qu­ire the po­ten­ti­al ma­ge to ma­ke a small bre­ak­t­h­ro­ugh in nu­me­ro­logy or as­t­ro­logy be­fo­re be­ing con­si­de­red. The Akas­hic Brot­her­ho­od might ease yo­ur cha­rac­ter in­to the con­cepts of dyna­mic re­ality and ma­gick thro­ugh a phi­lo­sophy she has al­re­ady be gun to prac­ti­ce. Eut­ha­na­tos ma­ges might at­tempt to as­sas­si­na­te the cha­rac­ter to te­ach her the me­aning of de­ath and the va­lue of fle­eting li­fe.

    ESSENCE

    A cha­rac­ter's Es­sen­ce al­so in­f­lu­en­ces the Awa­ke­ning, but mo­re subtly and per­va­si­vely than her Tra­di­ti­on. The Es­sen­ce that you cho­ose for yo­ur cha­rac­ter now be­co­mes the fo­un­da­ti­on for the many Se­ekings that she un­der­go­es la­ter. Ar­gu­ably the most im­por­tant Se­eking, the Awa­ke­ning, sho­uld be the cha­rac­ter's first step to­ward the dis­co­very of her Ava­tar; it can set the pat­tern and the mo­od for her la­ter dis­co­ve­ri­es as she ga­ins mo­re po­ints in Are­te.

    A Sle­eper ha­ving a Dyna­mic Es­sen­ce may find her­self lon­ging to ma­ke a dif­fe­ren­ce in the world, but fe­el a lack of po­wer and fo­cus. Du­ring the Awa­ke­ning, her Es­sen­ce helps her em­b­ra­ce the stran­ge, new re­ality she's en­co­un­te­ring. Thro­ugh the Awa­ke­ning, such a per­son wo­uld see ma­gick's po­ten­ti­al to chan­ge the world for the bet­ter.

    A Sle­eper with a Pat­tern Es­sen­ce may be dis­tur­bed by the pa­ce of li­fe to­day, fe­eling that tec­h­no­lo­gi­cal ad­van­ce­ment has be­co­me di­vor­ced from et­hi­cal un­der­s­tan­ding, ot fe­aring that un­fet­te­red ma­te­ri­alism has ero­ded the hu­man spi­rit. Such a cha­rac­ter is li­kely to ex­pe­ri­en­ce an Awa­ke­ning who­se the­me re­vol­ves aro­und pre­ser­ving et­hi­cal res­pon­si­bi­lity whi­le dis­co­ve­ring one's self. Thro­ugh it, she may dis­co­ver that her ro­le is to slow the pa­ce of a cha­oti­cal­ly chan­ging world.

    Unlike a cha­rac­ter with a Dyna­mic Es­sen­ce, a cha­rac­ter with a Qu­es­ting Es­sen­ce pro­bably knows pre­ci­sely how he wo­uld li­ke to chan­ge the wotld, but do­esn't ha­ve the po­wer to do it. The Awa­ke­ning enab­les such a cha­rac­ter to pur­sue his go­als. For pes­si­mis­tic or cyni­cal cha­rac­ters, the Awa­ke­ning may even res­to­re her ho­pe in the fe­asi­bi­lity of her task. The Awa­ke­ning ses­si­on can gi­ve cha­rac­ters of this Es­sen­ce a tan­ta­li­zing tas­te of the ma­gick that will help them ac­hi­eve the­ir de­ep, in­net qu­ests, and it can ma­ke them hun­ger for mo­re,

    A cha­rac­ter with a Pri­mor­di­al Es­sen­ce may ini­ti­al­ly be es­t­ran­ged from her own fe­elings as a re­sult of so­me de­eply dis­tur­bing event in her past. She may un­con­s­ci­o­usly long for a ti­me when her emo­ti­ons we­re still un­to­uc­hed by the ob­ses­si­ve, ali­ena­ted and ali­ena­ting so­ci­ety that has de­mo­ra­li­zed her. The Awa­ke­ning, for such a cha­rac­ter, re­uni­tes her mind with her he­art. Thro­ugh it, she re­li­ves that pi­vo­tal, de­ba­sing event and de­fe­ats it, at the sa­me ti­me she finds a new ho­pe, one that she can sha­pe with each ad­van­ce she ma­kes to­wards com­p­re­hen­ding it.

    PERSONALITY

    Personality adds emo­ti­onal depth to the pre­lu­de and ex­ter­na­li­zes the pro­fo­und me­ta­mor­p­ho­sis that has ca­used the Sle­eper to Awa­ken. When yo­ur cha­rac­ter un­der­go­es such an ex­pe­ri­en­ce, ask yo­ur­self what has hap­pe­ned to him-what chan­ges ha­ve oc­cur­red in his psycho­logy, his out­lo­ok? Then think abo­ut what it ta­kes to get a sen­se of the emo­ti­onal mag­ni­tu­de of the Awa­ke­ning:

    Discovering you ha­ve AIDS?

    Or that you've fo­und the cu­re for can­cer?

    Before you play an Awa­ke­ning pre­lu­de, con­si­der how yo­ur cha­rac­ter will re­act to a world in which ma­gick re­al­ly exists. The cha­rac­ter might shi­ver with the know­led­ge that cre­atu­res of un­s­pe­akab­le evil cor­rupt sco­res da­ily. He might fe­ar a world in which ma­le­vo­lent or­ga­ni­za­ti­ons hunt him and his fri­ends to ex­tin­c­ti­on. He might cry for a world in which ever­yo­ne for whom he fights is too blind to see the dan­gers, and the po­ten­ti­als, sur­ro­un­ding them. And he might sa­vor a world that is fun­da­men­tal­ly fo­re­ign to our own, in which an­y­t­hing from myth and an­y­t­hing from the dark or­for­bid­den re­ces­ses of the un­con­s­ci­o­us might emer­ge.

    Also con­si­der what sort of a per­so­na­lity prog­res­si­on, if any, wo­uld ma­ke sen­se. A Sle­eper with a Jes­ter na­tu­re might be­co­me a Ca­re­gi­ver when she con­f­ronts and de­fe­ats her sor­row and pa­in; a Bon Vi­vant who re­ali­zes that As­cen­si­on exists and is at­ta­inab­le might be­co­me a Fa­na­tic or a Vi­si­onary. A Cur­mud­ge­on who ga­ins an ima­gi­na­ti­on might even be­co­me an Ar­c­hi­tect whi­le re­ma­ining hid­den be­hind his ha­bi­tu­al­ly chur­lish de­me­anor. On the ot­her hand, the­re are go­od re­asons for a Cur­mud­ge­on to re­ma­in a Cur­mud­ge­on and a Jes­ter to re­ma­in a Jes­ter. It's up to you.

    Remember that a suc­ces­sful Awa­ke­ning story lets you ex­p­lo­re the the­mes of chan­ge and dis­co­very. Much of the work of set­ting up this ex­p­lo­ra­ti­on li­es in the Stor­y­tel­ler's hands, but as a pla­yer, you ha­ve the chal­len­ge of de­vi­sing the fo­cus aro­und which the Awa­ke­ning re­vol­ves: yo­ur cha­rac­ter. The Awa­ke­ning ses­si­on sho­uld be a ve­hic­le thro­ugh which you ex­p­lo­re yo­ur cha­rac­ter. With a lit­tle pre­pa­ra­ti­on, yo­ur cha­rac­ter can as­cend to that elec­t­ric mo­ment of com­pa­ri­son and fe­el the dre­am co­me ali­ve, not fle­etingly, but fo­re­ver.

    by Do­nald H. Frew

    If you ask most pla­yers of fan­tasy ro­lep­la­ying ga­mes abo­ut ma­gick, you'll get an en­t­hu­si­as­tic des­c­rip­ti­on of fi­re­ball spells, le­vi­ta­ti­on spells, sha­pes­hif­ting spells and the li­ke in res­pon­se. You co­uld easily get the im­p­res­si­on that ma­gick in ro­lep­la­ying ga­mes con­sists ba­si­cal­ly of im­per­so­nal lists of spells that are le­ar­ned and cast with mec­ha­ni­cal ef­fi­ci­ency. Well, may­be that's how ma­gick works in so­me fan­tasy ro­lep­la­ying ga­mes, but not in Ma­ge, and not in re­al li­fe. That's right- re­al li­fe.

    Whether or not you or yo­ur fel­low pla­yers be­li­eve in ma­gick, the fact is that the vast ma­j­ority of the world's po­pu­la­ti­on do­es be­li­eve in it. For them, ma­gick is an in­teg­ral part of ever­y­day li­fe. In the world of Ma­ge, it is this wi­des­p­re­ad be­li­ef that ma­kes ma­gick pos­sib­le. The Ma­ge ru­le­bo­ok re­fers to the Pa­ra­digm, the do­mi­nant be­li­ef abo­ut the na­tu­re of re­ality. It is easy for Wes­tern re­aders to equ­ate the Pa­ra­digm with the Wes­tern sci­en­ti­fic wor­ld-vi­ew, but this is not the ca­se. Ever­yo­ne ac­ross the world may be­li­eve that drop­ped obj­ects fall, but that do­es not me­an that they all be­li­eve in gra­vity. They may all be­li­eve in il­lness, but com­pa­ra­ti­vely few be­li­eve in germs.

    In Ma­ge, when a sor­ce­rer per­forms co­in­ci­den­tal or sta­tic ma­gick, she is ope­ra­ting wit­hin the con­fi­nes of the Pa­ra­digm of her own cul­tu­re, in most ca­ses, that of Wes­tern so­ci­ety. When a ma­gi­ci­an per­forms dyna­mic or vul­gar ma­gick, she is trying to bre­ak tho­se con­fi­nes to pro­du­ce spec­ta­cu­lar and dra­ma­tic dis­p­lays of po­wer. Even with an Awa­ke­ned Ava­tar, it hardly se­ems pos­sib­le that any in­di­vi­du­al co­uld over­co­me the "mo­men­tum" of the Pa­ra­digm of an en­ti­re cul­tu­re. But a ma­ge has at her dis­po­sal al­ter­na­te Pa­ra­digms, ways of un­der­s­tan­ding the world that al­low for ma­gick. The­se ways are be­li­eved in by suf­fi­ci­ent num­bers of pe­op­le to over­co­me the be­li­efs of the lo­cal cul­tu­re, at le­ast tem­po­ra­rily, and at the di­rec­ti­on of an ac­com­p­lis­hed ma­gi­ci­an.

    These al­ter­na­te Pa­ra­digms, the wor­ld-vi­ews of ot­her cul­tu­res, are rep­re­sen­ted, in part, by the Tra­di­ti­ons. A ma­gi­ci­an's tra­ining in the be­li­efs of her Tra­di­ti­on is what al­lows her to per­form dyna­mic or vul­gar ma­gick, A pla­yer and a pla­yer cha­rac­ter must both co­me to terms with the idea of mul­tip­le Pa­ra­digms exis­ting as pact of a spec­t­rum from the glo­bal to the per­so­nal, with the cul­tu­ral Pa­ra­digms and tho­se of the Tra­di­ti­ons lying so­mew­he­re in bet­we­en.

    The glo­bal Pa­ra­digm is con­cer­ned with the com­mon hu­man ex­pe­ri­en­ces of the world, lar­gely as per­ce­ived by the fi­ve sen­ses, e.g. things fall, the sun ri­ses in the mor­ning, hun­ger is al­le­vi­ated by fo­od, etc. The cul­tu­ral Pa­ra­digms try to ex­p­la­in why things hap­pen, whet­her thro­ugh ca­use and ef­fect, by the ac­ti­on of spi­rits, or wha­te­ver. The Pa­ra­digms of the Tra­di­ti­ons (and of hu­man ima­gi­na­ti­on) the­ore­ti­cal­ly ma­ke ma­gick pos­sib­le. Per­so­nal Pa­ra­digms gu­ide the ma­gi­ci­an's ac­ti­ons in li­fe and ex­p­la­in her re­la­ti­on­s­hip to her world.

    Our con­tem­po­rary Wes­tern cul­tu­ral Pa­ra­digm in­cor­po­ra­res two at­ti­tu­des to­wards ma­gick: eit­her it is ig­no­red com­p­le­tely or it is se­en as a kind of pro­to-sci­en­ce. Ro­lep­la­ying ga­mes of­ten tend to ta­ke the sa­me ap­pro­ach- eit­her ig­no­ring ma­gick or ta­king Clar­ke's Law to he­art, tre­ating it as a tec­h­no­logy vir­tu­al­ly in­dis­tin­gu­is­hab­le from sci­en­ce. What do­es it mat­ter if yo­ur ma­gi­ci­an casts a fi­re­ball spell or fi­res a la­ser pis­tol? In most ga­mes, very lit­tle. Ma­gick and sci­en­ce are both tre­ated as pre­dic­tab­le and im­per­so­nal.

    In the re­al world, and in the world of Ma­ge, ma­gick is only so­mew­hat pre­dic­tab­le and is ne­ver im­per­so­nal. Ma­gick is the pro­cess by which we and our cha­rac­ters ma­ke con­tact with and in­te­ract with a re­ality that un­der­li­es the ever­y­day world. In so­me sen­se, this is a re­ality un­der­s­to­od as be­ing mo­re fun­da­men­tal, mo­re "true," than the ever­y­day world. As li­mi­ted physi­cal be­ings, we and our cha­rac­ters un­der­s­tand this re­ality by me­ans of va­ri­o­us per­so­nal symbol sets. What a Chtis­ti­an adept may en­co­un­ter as an­gels, a Pa­gan sor­ce­rer may en­co­un­ter as Gods or a Her­me­tic ma­gus as im­per­so­nal pla­ne­tary for­ces. A ma­gi­ci­an can­not ha­ve such an en­co­un­ter and re­ma­in un­c­han­ged.

    As a re­sult of our ma­gic­kal ex­pe­ri­en­ces, we de­ve­lop be­li­efs abo­ut that fun­da­men­tal re­ality, as well as be­li­efs abo­ut the ever­y­day world, our per­so­nal Pa­ra­digm. The­se be­li­efs ta­ke the form of con­cep­ti­ons of di­vi­nity, ide­as of the af­ter­li­fe and spi­rit world, mo­rals and et­hics go­ver­ning day-to-day be­ha­vi­or and mo­re. Such be­li­efs in turn, sha­pe our fu­tu­re prac­ti­ce of ma­gick.

    Indeed, ma­gick in the re­al world and in Ma­ge can be se­en as be­li­ef fo­cu­sed by will and skill. In Ma­ge, be­li­ef be­co­mes Are­te, will is rep­re­sen­ted by Wil­lpo­wer and skill is rep­re­sen­ted by the Sphe­res. It is up to each Pla­yer and Stor­y­tel­ler to de­ter­mi­ne the way be­li­ef co­mes in­to play, we­aving it in­to the stor­y­tel­ling as­pect of the Ma­ge ma­gick system. Pla­yers and Stor­y­tel­lers sho­uld con­si­der the fol­lo­wing qu­es­ti­ons, both as con­di­ti­ons for ma­gick use in the ga­me and as fac­tors sha­ping the de­ve­lop­ment of a cha­rac­ter thro­ug­ho­ut a chro­nic­le.

    • What do­es the cha­rac­ter, ba­sed on pre­vi­o­us ma­gic­kal ex­pe­ri­en­ce, be­li­eve is pos­sib­le? Self-im­po­sed con­cep­tu­al li­mi­ta­ti­ons sho­uld li­mit ma­gick as much as the ga­me ru­les do, A be­gin­ning Ma­ge cha­rac­ter, new to the ways of ma­gick, may still re­j­ect the spec­ta­cu­lar ef­fects of dyna­mic ma­gick out of hand as pa­tently im­pos­sib­le. Un­til she is con­f­ron­ted with the re­ality of such ef­fects, she sho­uld not be ab­le to cre­ate them. They are out­si­de of her per­so­nal Pa­ra­digm.

    • What do­es the cha­rac­ter be­li­eve is mo­ral and et­hi­cal? For so­me cha­rac­ters, this may just be an in­na­te sen­se of right and wrong; for ot­hers, this co­uld be a fe­ar of di­vi­ne rer­ri­bu­ti­on. A be­li­ef that cer­ta­in ma­gic­kal acts are im­mo­ral or unet­hi­cal may ca­use a cha­rac­ters ma­gick to bac­k­fi­re upon her, not thro­ugh any out­si­de for­ce, but thro­ugh the in­tent that her own sub­con­s­ci­o­us im­po­ses upon the ma­gick. A cha­rac­ter may in­vo­ke her own Pa­ra­dox Spi­rits, not thro­ugh vul­gar ma­gick, but so­lely thro­ugh her own ex­pec­ta­ti­on of pu­nis­h­ment for unet­hi­cal ma­gick.

    • How do­es each use of ma­gick add to or chan­ge the cha­rac­ter's be­li­efs? Few things can en­gen­der, sup­port, qu­es­ti­on or shat­ter re­li­gi­o­us be­li­efs li­ke ma­gick. Dra­ma­tic con­ver­si­ons and cri­ses of fa­ith sho­uld not be un­com­mon for ma­ges. A cha­rac­ter who ro­uti­nely calls upon a par­ti­cu­lar de­ity for aid, and re­ce­ives that aid, may co­me to think of her­self as a rep­re­sen­ta­ti­ve of that de­ity upon earth and suf­fer from de­lu­si­ons of gran­de­ur. Anot­her cha­rac­ter may see ma­gick as an im­per­so­nal for­ce, only to ha­ve a vul­gar fi­re­ball ma­ni­fest as a 15-fo­ot Ag­ni, Hin­du god of fi­re, who smi­tes the in­ten­ded vic­tim. Or a cha­rac­ter may call upon her god(s) in a mo­ment of cri­sis and get no as­sis­tan­ce or res­pon­se at all. Eit­her of the­se si­tu­ati­ons co­uld and sho­uld le­ad to a ra­di­cal ret­hin­king of the cha­rac­ter's per­so­nal Pa­ra­digm. In fact, it sho­uld not be all that ra­re for ma­ges to chan­ge the­ir Tra­di­ti­on af­ter one or mo­re such ex­pe­ri­en­ces. As a cha­rac­ter's Pa­ra­digm chan­ges, so might her Tra­di­ti­on.

    Belief is an in­teg­ral part of the prac­ti­ce of ma­gick. It is both the ex­p­res­si­on of the in­cor­po­ra­ti­on of one's ma­gic­kal ex­pe­ri­en­ces in­to one's li­fe and the con­text out of which fur­t­her such ex­pe­ri­en­ces ari­se. This is true in both the re­al world and the world of Ma­ge. The be­li­efs of ma­ges will al­ways be flu­id, chan­ging with each new ma­gic­kal ex­pe­ri­en­ce and, in turn, chan­ging the way in which the ma­ge ex­pe­ri­en­ces ma­gick. This as­pect of the li­fe and prac­ti­ce of a ma­ge may be mo­re dif­fi­cult to ro­lep­lay, re­qu­iring mo­re ca­re, tho­ught, and ti­me from pla­yers and Stor­y­tel­lers ali­ke. It can, ho­we­ver, lend a new di­men­si­on of depth and re­alism to any Ma­ge cha­rac­ter.

    By Wil­li­am Spen­cer-Ma­le

    Around me, the world whirls abo­ut its lu­dic­ro­us bu­si­ness. It do­esn't even re­ali­ze what it owes me. Jesus, I'm tal­king li­ke a pratt, a pa­ra­no­id, lo­nely, pratt.

    - Jamie De­la­no, John Con­s­tan­tine, Hel­lbla­zer

    Loneliness. Hol­low fo­ot­s­teps ec­ho­ing down dar­ke­ned stte­ets; whis­pers in the sha­dows he­ard only by you. This is the li­fe of the ma­ge, a re­ality that no one eise can see, a world that can be sha­red with no ot­her for fe­ar of what may be­fall the con­fes­sor. It is an exis­ten­ce of si­lent frus­t­ra­ti­on and an­ger whe­re one has the po­wer to al­ter re­ality, but can­not hold re­in on the fra­gi­le strings of one's own li­fe.

    The Got­hic-Punk world of the Stor­y­tel­ler system is dark and lo­nely; a world of vi­olen­ce, cor­rup­ti­on, bet­ra­yal and sud­den de­ath. This is per­haps mo­re true for ma­ges than for any ot­her in­ha­bi­tants.

    Playing a ma­ge, you pur­sue a lo­nely exis­ten­ce re­mo­ved, to a lar­ge ex­tent, from the world of the mun­da­ne. You go abo­ut yo­ur bu­si­ness as nor­mal, hi­ding be­hind the fa­ca­de that you ha­ve cre­ated to blend in to yo­ur sur­ro­un­dings, but the­re is mo­re to you than tho­se aro­und you can see. You hold the fab­ric of re­ality in the palm of yo­ur hand- the re­ality of Sle­epers, day­d­re­amers who cir­c­le abo­ut you so in­vol­ved in the­ir da­ily ro­uti­ne that they re­ma­in ig­no­rant to the truth right be­fo­re the­ir eyes. It's a truth that you know all too well.

    Like the vam­pi­re, who can call upon her clan in ti­mes of ne­ed, or the we­re­wolf, who sha­res clo­se bonds with the pack as well as the tri­be, the ma­ge can call upon mem­bers of his Chantry when ne­ces­sary. What se­pa­ra­tes a ma­ge from the ot­her in­ha­bi­tants of the World of Dar­k­ness is his uni­qu­ely mor­tal and pa­in­ful­ly hu­man po­int of vi­ew.

    Indeed, the ma­ge is hu­man, ma­de of flesh and blo­od. Her pro­fes­si­on se­pa­ra­tes her from the world aro­und her, but hu­man na­tu­re and emo­ti­ons still bind her to this world. Thus, the ma­ge li­ves li­fe in a pa­ra­dox, fo­re­ver cur­sed to pro­tect a world she can ne­ver truly em­b­ra­ce.

    As a pla­yer in Ma­ge: The As­cen­si­on, you must em­b­ra­ce all the con­f­lic­ting emo­ti­ons of the world aro­und you and mold them in­to yo­ur own re­ality. In yo­ur world, not­hing is black and whi­te. The­re are no ab­so­lu­tes. Ever­y­t­hing is awash in var­ying sha­des of gray, and go­od and evil are not­hing mo­re than po­ints on an in­vi­sib­le com­pass cre­ated by the ig­no­rant fo­ols who whirl blindly aro­und you. You ha­ve no ti­me to pon­der what is evil and what is not, only what is right for the mo­ment, what ne­eds to be do­ne. Will using "the end" to jus­tify "the me­ans" be eno­ugh of an ex­cu­se when yo­ur con­s­ci­en­ce burns yo­ur so­ul and you just can't se­em to qu­i­et the scre­ams that ec­ho thro­ugh yo­ur he­ad?

    The world has no ca­re or un­der­s­tan­ding of yo­ur strug­gle. You act as a shi­eld aga­inst for­ces at­tem­p­ting to des­t­roy the fab­ric of Sle­eper re­ality. This can be a than­k­less duty; few be­li­eve in yo­ur world, and fe­wer still wo­uld ca­re if you li­ved or di­ed the­re. This in­g­ra­ti­tu­de so­me­ti­mes awa­kens bit­ter re­sen­t­ment in you and yo­ur kind, and this re­sen­t­ment can be po­ison in the As­cen­si­on War.

    You are the­ir true sa­vi­or; the one who al­lows Sle­epers to con­ti­nue the­ir pe­ace­ful, ig­no­rant exis­ten­ce in sa­fety. Yet they do not ac­k­now­led­ge you as an­y­t­hing mo­re than anot­her she­ep when, in re­ality, you are the shep­herd rhat gu­ides them along the­ir path.

    Instead, they help cre­ate a re­ality that ser­ves ot­hers who they be­li­eve are the sa­vi­ors of hu­ma­nity. They for­ge the­se mes­si­ahs in the­ir own ima­ge and be­li­eve them to be the sa­vi­ors who will bless them and le­ad them away from the evils that they are too we­ak to com­bat them­sel­ves. Yet it is ne­ces­sary that you ma­in­ta­in yo­ur sec­rets, ke­ep them well hid­den from tho­se who wo­uld not un­der­s­tand. They are in­fa­mo­us for the­ir fe­ar of the un­k­nown and, his­to­ri­cal­ly spe­aking, of­ten ta­ke vi­olent me­asu­res to eli­mi­na­te an­y­t­hing that they can­not fat­hom.

    Your lo­ne­li­ness, yo­ur mi­sery is yo­ur own, and it must re­ma­in that way. The only pe­op­le you can turn to are tho­se of yo­ur own kind, and they suf­fer from the sa­me tor­ments that you do; ali­ena­ti­on from the world that they li­ve in. You can pre­tend to be li­ke them, but you will be an out­cast fo­re­ver.

    Remember, the­re is a ba­lan­ce to yo­ur tra­gedy- the po­wer that you wi­eld. You hold the for­ces of re­ality in the palm of yo­ur hand. Ti­me, Spi­rits, the very fab­ric of re­ality are me­re toys for yo­ur en­ter­ta­in­ment. Only you can de­ci­de if it is worth the pri­ce that you must pay.

    By Te­e­uwynn

    Each one of us, wit­ho­ut ex­cep­ti­on,… is so­mew­he­re at­tac­hed to, co­lo­red by, or even un­der­mi­ned by the spi­rit which go­es thro­ugh the mass. Fre­edom stret­c­hes only as far as the li­mits of our con­s­ci­o­us­ness,

    - Carl Gus­tav Jung

    Mages lo­ve know­led­ge; they cra­ve it li­ke the drug it is. They are- let's fa­ce it- know­led­ge jun­ki­es. The se­arch for mo­re know­led­ge, mo­re po­wer, one mo­re an­ci­ent to­me of ma­gick, can ca­use ma­ges to lo­se sight of the big pic­tu­re. Big pic­tu­re? But the mo­re hard know­led­ge you pos­sess, the clo­ser you are to gras­ping the big pic­tu­re, right? Wrong- to a deg­ree.

    Knowledge and le­ar­ning ra­ken out of con­text can pro­vi­de an en­ti­rely ske­wed vi­ew of re­ality. Know­led­ge wit­ho­ut ba­lan­ce of so­me kind can be mo­re dan­ge­ro­us than to­tal ig­no­ran­ce. Just ask so­me po­or te­ena­ge Ein­s­te­in­wan­na­be who blows off his fin­ger in a ho­me che­mistry ex­pe­ri­ment. Ye­ah, he pos­ses­sed the know­led­ge to ma­ke the for­mu­la, but he didn't ha­ve a han­d­le on the con­se­qu­en­ces of cre­ating that not-so-nifty po­ti­on.

    Metaphysically, ma­ges can be se­en as be­ing in the sa­me bo­at as Ein­s­te­in Juni­or. The­re is a gra­ve dan­ger for ma­ges to­ying with Re­ality. They ha­ve the po­wer, yes. Pa­ra­dox spi­rits are the­re to spank them if they fla­unt the­ir po­wer too bla­tantly, true. Ho­we­ver, Pa­ra­dox spi­rits ca­re lit­tle abo­ut any ot­her ways the ma­ge might screw up.

    The world is ma­de up of mo­re than hard facts. Ac­ti­ons do not oc­cur in a va­cu­um. In Ma­ge, the­re is a gre­at tem­p­ta­ti­on to ma­ni­pu­la­te Re­ality and gat­her know­led­ge wit­ho­ut any true con­tem­p­la­ti­on of the spi­ri­tu­al and et­hi­cal con­se­qu­en­ces of such ma­ni­pu­la­ti­ons. Su­re, you can play Ma­ge wit­ho­ut a mo­ment's tho­ught to spi­ri­tu­ality or emo­ti­on, but you may be mis­sing out on so­me of the mo­re in­t­ri­gu­ing as­pects of the ga­me. The­re is a Yang to every Yin, and of­ten, spi­ri­tu­ality, fa­ith and emo­ti­ons are con­si­de­red anat­he­ma to de­tac­hed ob­ser­va­ti­on and the sor­ting of fact from fic­ti­on. But facts can­not truly be di­vor­ced from the­ir emo­ti­onal and spi­ri­tu­al as­so­ci­ati­ons, lest they be­co­me less im­por­tant, less vi­tal to Re­ality, A flag wit­ho­ut me­aning to the pe­op­le stan­ding be­ne­ath it is me­rely a pi­ece of co­lo­red cloth, but a flag that stirs up po­wer­ful emo­ti­ons in the pe­op­le ob­ser­ving it flut­ter in the bre­eze is so­met­hing mo­re than its physi­cal es­sen­ce. It be­co­mes a symbol, and thus has the po­wer to in­s­pi­re. Many ha­ve di­ed for such symbols and the ide­als they rep­re­sent to the­ir ob­ser­vers. The fa­ce of Re­ality it­self has be­en al­te­red by the ac­ti­ons die flag in­s­pi­res.

    In a si­mi­lar man­ner, the ma­ge who re­ac­hes out emo­ti­onal­ly and spi­ri­tu­al­ly to the world aro­und her is­so­met­hing mo­re than just anot­her wi­zard. Her con­nec­ti­ons he­ig­h­ten her un­der­s­tan­ding, and thus, her po­wer. A sci­en­tist who stu­di­es a po­ol of wa­ter from the out­si­de (no­ting its com­po­si­ti­on, co­lor, salt con­tent, etc.) do­es not truly un­der­s­tand the wa­ter as much as a sci­en­tist who plun­ges in­to the wa­ter and fe­els it wash over his he­ad, fe­els that in­s­tant of pa­nic as he le­aves the sur­fa­ce world be­hind. Per­haps he fe­els joy as gra­vity lo­osens its im­p­la­cab­le hold on him for just a lit­tle whi­le, or per­haps he fe­els fas­ci­na­ti­on ob­ser­ving the odd be­a­uty of a dol­p­hin. The lat­ter sci­en­tist has a gre­ater un­der­s­tan­ding of wa­ter be­ca­use he has felt so­me of its emo­ti­onal im­pact, not just the facts of its exis­ten­ce.

    Mages who vi­ew Re­ality as a po­ol to be stu­di­ed and ma­ni­pu­la­ted, so­met­hing from which they them­sel­ves are de­tac­hed, can ne­ver ha­ve a full un­der­s­tan­ding of Re­ality. They ha­ve loc­ked them­sel­ves out of the party and, as Jung po­ints out, they are not truly free. In or­der to stay de­tac­hed and cli­ni­cal, one can ne­ver be free to plun­ge in­to the po­ol and ma­ke one's own splash.

    This is not to say that le­ar­ning and re­ason are not im­por­tant to Ma­ge, but if you li­mit yo­ur­self to just that half of Re­ality, to just the sur­fa­ce of the po­ol, the de­eper me­anings and in­ter­con­nec­ti­ons of Re­ality will ne­ver be yo­urs to un­det­s­tand… or com­mand.

    Of co­ur­se, ope­ning one's mind and sen­ses to the spi­ri­tu­al rhythms of the uni­ver­se ne­ces­si­ta­tes one's se­e­ing the ra­mi­fi­ca­ti­ons of ac­ti­ons as mo­re than just any ob­vi­o­us, fac­tu­al re­sults. Ma­ges are res­pon­sib­le for the­ir ac­ti­ons and the con­se­qu­en­ces of tho­se ac­ti­ons. No one el­se holds res­pon­si­bi­lity for anot­her. In plun­ging in­to the po­ol, in ope­ning one's mind and he­art to the uni­ver­se, one can­not deny this res­pon­si­bi­lity; the­re is no one el­se to bla­me.

    It has be­en ob­ser­ved that cha­ins can be com­for­ting be­ca­use a per­son cha­ined is a per­son wit­ho­ut res­pon­si­bi­li­ti­es. So­me­one el­se is in con­t­rol; so­me­one el­se un­der­s­tands. Such et­hi­cal sla­very can in­de­ed be com­for­ting, but it ul­ti­ma­tely ke­eps a ma­ge from ever ha­ving any me­anin­g­ful im­pact of her own upon Re­ality. Cla­wing for de­tac­hed, dry know­led­ge and re­ason, the ma­ge only blinds her­self.

    In or­der to open her eyes and sha­ke off the cha­ins of re­ason, a ma­ge must be wil­ling to let the wa­ves of un­cer­ta­inty and in­s­tinct wash over her. She must re­cog­ni­ze that she holds the keys to Re­ality and that, in fre­e­ing her­self, she ac­cepts all that im­p­li­es. The­re are no mo­re pa­rents, no mo­re ja­ilers. The res­pon­si­bi­lity of fre­edom rests squ­arely on the ma­ge… and on you.

    Enjoy.

    By Step­han Wi­eck

    "So, can we at le­ast ag­ree that re­ality in the World of Dar­k­ness is su­bj­ec­ti­ve?" so­me­one sa­id.

    It was Janu­ary of 1993, and Mark Re­in*Ha­gen, Chris Early, my brot­her Ste­wart and I we­re in the mid­dle of fu­sing our bra­ins to­get­her to cre­ate the ba­sis for Ma­ge.

    "Yes," sa­id Mark.

    "Yes," sa­id Chris.

    "Yes!" sa­id I.

    "Yes, for now, but re­mem­ber Li­la ," sa­id Ste­wart (who­se equ­ivo­cal res­pon­se bran­c­hed in­to a dis­cus­si­on that sha­ped a fu­tu­re for the me­tap­h­y­sics of Ma­ge, but that's a story for anot­her ti­me).

    So, in de­sig­ning the me­tap­h­y­sics, and the­reby the ma­gick system of Ma­ge, we be­gan with the ba­sic pre­mi­se that re­ality is su­bj­ec­ti­ve and bu­ilt a system of me­tap­h­y­sics which grew to in­c­lu­de such od­di­ti­es as Qu­in­tes­sen­ce, Pa­ra­dox and Pat­terns. In the end, we had a system that was cer­ta­inly not per­fect (what system of me­tap­h­y­sics is?), but was com­p­le­te eno­ugh to be a go­od fo­un­da­ti­on for a system of ma­gick, and for a ma­ge's con­cept of the uni­ver­se it­self. From the me­tap­h­y­sics, it was a na­tu­ral prog­res­si­on in­to de­fi­ning the Sphe­res, and then fi­nal­ly, the ga­me mec­ha­nics evol­ved.

    The prob­lem we had was that the ori­gi­nal ma­gick system ra­rely bo­wed to the al­tar of ga­me ba­lan­ce or pla­ya­bi­lity if it me­ant sac­ri­fi­cing its ad­he­ren­ce to me­tap­h­y­si­cal con­cepts. I had al­ways felt that such a sac­ri­fi­ce was ana­lo­go­us to kil­ling story to pre­ser­ve ru­les, which the Stor­y­tel­ler se­ri­es of ga­mes has al­ways ab­hor­red. But, as the de­ve­lo­pers at Whi­te Wolf pa­ti­ently (well, po­in­tedly) re­min­ded me, Ma­ge is still a ga­me. In the end, the­re we­re ro­tes and ru­les and flow­c­harts so that pla­yers and Stor­y­tel­lers wo­uld at le­ast ha­ve a snow­ball's chan­ce in hell of na­vi­ga­ting the ma­gick system wit­ho­ut lo­sing the­ir minds.

    Nevertheless, the system is still in­c­re­dibly open, di­ver­se, and, li­ke the me­tap­h­y­sics it is ba­sed upon, su­bj­ec­ti­ve. It is open to in­ter­p­re­ta­ti­on by each per­son pla­ying the ga­me. For so­me stor­y­tel­ling gro­ups, this will be a cur­se that ful­fil­ls a po­wer-mad pla­yer's fon­dest dre­am; for ot­hers, it can open up what I see as an evo­lu­ti­onary step the stor­y­tel­ling ex­pe­ri­en­ce, be­ca­use in Ma­ge, the pla­yers ine­vi­tably be­co­me as­sis­tant Stor­y­tel­lers,

    Mages truly be­li­eve that an­y­t­hing is pos­sib­le using so­me com­bi­na­ti­on of the Sphe­res. Stor­y­tel­lers will qu­ickly dis­co­ver that the pla­yers will be ca­pab­le of an in­c­re­dib­le as­sor­t­ment of ef­fects even at low Sphe­re le­vels. This alo­ne ma­kes it nigh-im­pos­sib­le to plan a firm plot li­ne for a Ma­ge ad­ven­tu­re. It is im­pos­sib­le for a Stor­y­tel­ler to pre­dict every use of ma­gick the pla­yers might con­coct over the co­ur­se of an ad­ven­tu­re, and then plan a plot­li­ne aro­und it. Just try to ima­gi­ne ke­eping Ma­ge pla­yers on­to a li­ne­ar plot­li­ne whe­re the Stor­y­tel­ler wants events X, Y and Z to hap­pen in or­der right af­ter one anot­her. The pla­yers will ine­vi­tably get to sce­ne X and then per­form so­me ma­gic­kal fe­at that ma­ke sce­nes Y and Z me­anin­g­less and ca­ta­pults the stor­y­li­ne in an en­ti­rely new di­rec­ti­on.

    One Ma­ge pla­yer wro­te to us and sa­id (I'm pa­rap­h­ra­sing he­re), "Sin­ce my ma­ge has rank such-and-such in Sphe­re so-and-so, do­esn't that me­an he co­uld walk up to a vam­pi­re and turn her in­to a lawn cha­ir?" Now ima­gi­ne the po­or Stor­y­tel­ler who has plan­ned a vam­pi­re enemy to be cen­t­ral to the eve­ning stor­y­li­ne, and when the cha­rac­ters first me­et the vam­pi­re, a pla­yer an­no­un­ces that his ma­ge will turn the vam­pi­re in­to a lawn cha­ir, sum­mon up a mar­ga­ri­ta and start a lawn party. Thus en­deth the story.

    Well, I cer­ta­inly won't deny that it is pos­sib­le to turn vam­pi­res in­to lawn cha­irs at so­me rank of Sphe­res. But is this go­od for the story? So­me ar­gue that Ma­ge's ma­gick system is in­he­rently fla­wed by be­ing so open to in­ter­p­re­ta­ti­on that Ma­ge ga­me ses­si­ons will ine­vi­tably bre­ak down in­to ar­gu­ments bet­we­en pla­yers and Stor­y­tel­lers over what it says on pa­ge 123 ver­sus what it im­p­li­es on pa­ge 243, etc., etc., etc. Who's ha­ving fun in that si­tu­ati­on?

    Ultimately, the folks hol­ding this bo­ok, the pla­yers, de­ter­mi­ne the qu­ality of any Ma­ge story. I ar­gue that the ma­gick system's open­ness is not a flaw, but rat­her its pri­mary strength. It al­lows the pla­yers to par­ti­ci­pa­te in tel­ling a go­od story. I can­not think of any ot­her stor­y­tel­ling ga­me that re­qu­ires as much cre­ati­vity, self-dis­cip­li­ne and stor­y­tel­ling abi­lity from its pla­yers as Ma­ge do­es. Ever­y­t­hing from thin­king of when and what type of ma­gick to use, to com­bi­ning Sphe­res for new ef­fects or the ap­pe­aran­ce of co­in­ci­den­tal ma­gick, re­qu­ires the pla­yer to be cre­ati­ve.

    More im­por­tant than a cre­ati­ve pla­yer, ho­we­ver, is pla­yer self-dis­cip­li­ne. Do­es tur­ning a vam­pi­re in­to a pa­tio set con­t­ri­bu­te to the mo­od or the­me of the story? Do­es the story be­co­me mo­re me­anin­g­ful or en­ter­ta­ining by yo­ur cha­rac­ter's ac­ti­on? The­re will be plenty of op­por­tu­ni­ti­es for you to blow big ho­les in yo­ur Stor­y­tel­ler's plot­li­ne. Don't. This is not a com­man­d­ment to ar­ti­fi­ci­al­ly res­t­ra­in yo­ur cha­rac­ter- yo­ur cre­ati­vity de­ter­mi­nes how suc­ces­sful­ly yo­ur cha­rac­ter will sur­vi­ve the harsh world of Ma­ge. But if you must dis­rupt the stor­y­li­ne, do it in such a way that the story is ta­ken in a new and even mo­re ex­ci­ting or sus­pen­se­ful di­rec­ti­on. In Ma­ge, you are not so much a pla­yer as an as­sis­tant Stor­y­tel­ler. Most of a Ma­ge story's ex­ci­te­ment must co­me from the pla­yers hel­ping to cre­ate the sa­ga.

    If yo­ur Stor­y­tel­ler cla­ims to ha­ve tro­ub­le de­sig­ning a Ma­ge story, then you and the ot­her pla­yers aren't do­ing eno­ugh. What mo­ti­va­tes yo­ur cha­rac­ter? What do­es she stri­ve for? How do­es she pur­sue it? Don't wa­it to be led in­to an ad­ven­tu­re- tell yo­ur Stor­y­tel­ler that in the next ga­me ses­si­on, yo­ur cha­rac­ter plans to qu­est af­ter the know­led­ge of the Orac­les, or go in­to the Chi­me­rae, or wha­te­ver el­se you de­si­re. The Stor­y­tel­ler might con­coct so­met­hing that will can­cel or de­lay yo­ur cha­rac­ter's plans, but at le­ast you've set a cha­rac­ter's go­al. As the Stor­y­tel­ler's story prog­res­ses, you can we­ave in yo­ur cha­rac­ter's own story.

    So, that's the mes­sa­ge. In Ma­ge, you aren't just a pla­yer, you're an as­sis­tant Stor­y­tel­ler (ama­zing what a chan­ge in tit­le can do to yo­ur out­lo­ok on so­met­hing). Use yo­ur cha­rac­ter's ver­sa­ti­lity and raw po­wer to fur­t­her the story, not to des­t­roy it.

    By Ste­ven Brown

    The fa­ce ga­zed up at him, he­avy, calm, pro­tec­ting, but what kind of smi­le was hid­den be­ne­ath the dark mus­tac­he? Li­ke a le­aden knell the words ca­me back to him:

    WAR IS PE­ACE

    FREEDOM IS SLA­VERY

    IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH

    -George Or­well, 1984

    I am a me­dia who­re, just li­ke the rest of you (even you "tra­gi­cal­ly-hip" Goths who are ma­ni­pu­la­ted in­to bu­ying Whi­te Wolf pro­ducts. Hey, no­body's in­no­cent). We just can­not li­ve in the mo­dern world wit­ho­ut suf­fe­ring so­me psycho­lo­gi­cal ma­ni­pu­la­ti­on. Still, des­pi­te Ma­di­son Ave­nue's at­tacks, I be­li­eve I spend my mo­ney on what I re­al­ly want to spend it on.

    I am a na­me and num­ber in the da­ta­ba­ses of cor­po­ra­ti­ons and the go­ver­n­ment just li­ke the rest of you. We use num­bers for prac­ti­cal­ly all de­alings with each ot­her. But I still be­li­eve in in­di­vi­du­ality.

    I watch the news on te­le­vi­si­on and re­ad it in the new­s­pa­per, and I usu­al­ly ac­cept it as fact, just li­ke most ever­yo­ne el­se, wit­ho­ut ever qu­es­ti­oning it. Still, I know that the news me­dia ma­ni­pu­la­tes the in­for­ma­ti­on to su­it its spon­sors and ot­hers who hold po­wer.

    I know my co­untry is the gre­atest co­untry on Earth and that it stands for fre­edom and jus­ti­ce for all, just li­ke... well, a lot of you might think. Still, I know the go­ver­n­ment ca­ters to spe­ci­al in­te­rest gro­ups, ta­kes part in il­le­gal ac­ti­vi­ti­es, and that vir­tu­al­ly all the hig­her po­si­ti­ons are held by the we­althy. (Ha­ve we ever had a po­or pre­si­dent? How abo­ut a po­or se­na­tor?)

    I am en­ter­ta­ined by vi­olen­ce. I watch Be­avis and But­the­ad, play Mor­tal Kom­bat and re­ad plenty of vi­olent bo­oks and co­mic bo­oks. Still, I know that vi­olen­ce is pla­gu­ing our so­ci­ety and that we must stop it from hap­pe­ning be­fo­re it is too la­te.

    I lo­ve tho­se com­mer­ci­als with all tho­se half-na­ked be­a­uti­ful, hard-bo­di­ed wo­men who tell me to buy cer­ta­in com­pa­ni­es' pro­ducts. Why not? But hey, I know wo­men sho­uldn't be tre­ated as sex obj­ects. Right?

    I dri­ve a car and buy co­un­t­less non-rec­y­c­lab­le pro­ducts be­ca­use I ac­cept that it's okay for me to do so. Still, I think it's aw­ful that the en­vi­ron­ment is be­ing des­t­ro­yed at such a ra­te that it pro­bably can ne­ver be men­ded.

    I am re­gis­te­red with so­ci­al se­cu­rity, the draft, the U.S. cen­sus and so on. I use a cre­dit card, even tho­ugh I know that I gi­ve tho­se who ke­ep up with it a des­c­rip­ti­on of my pur­c­ha­sing ha­bits. I ha­ve al­so fil­led out co­un­t­less forms for jobs and lo­ans. Still, I know that much of the in­for­ma­ti­on can, and pro­bably do­es, re­ach the wrong pe­op­le.

    I buy pro­ducts tes­ted on ani­mals, and al­so eat me­at. The­re's not­hing wrong with that, right? Ho­we­ver, I ha­te cru­elty to ani­mals mo­re than just abo­ut an­y­t­hing, and I lo­ve my dog as if he we­re a per­son.

    Different "truths," but I ac­cept them. We, as a so­ci­ety, ac­cept them. As Or­well put it, we are "do­ub­le-thin­king": hol­ding two in­con­g­ru­ent "truths" in our he­ads wit­ho­ut re­ali­zing how in­sa­ne it is do­ing so. We don't re­al­ly be­li­eve them, we re­al­ly don't know what to be­li­eve. "Do­ub­let­hin­king" just ma­kes li­fe easi­er, and isn't that what li­fe is all abo­ut?

    We se­em to be wil­ling vic­tims. Li­ke drug ad­dicts, we think we are in­con­t­rol of our own li­ves, al­t­ho­ugh we're not. The men­tal prog­ram­ming we are bom­bar­ded with each day in­s­til­ls in us de­lu­si­ons of a so­mew­hat per­fect world whe­re we are free-wil­led in­di­vi­du­als li­ving in a de­moc­ra­tic so­ci­ety. When we do bel­ly-ac­he abo­ut all our ills, as so­on as we fi­nish, we turn aro­und aga­in and con­ti­nue be­ha­ving as they ha­ve tra­ined us to be­ha­ve. The only prob­lems we ha­ve are the ones the me­dia cho­oses to fo­cus on.

    Is this prog­ress? Are we even the slig­h­test bit awa­re of how much we are ma­ni­pu­la­ted by the po­wers that be? Are we una­wa­re of how many of us ha­ve gi­ven up ho­pe? We ha­ve em­b­ra­ced this won­d­ro­us age with all the mi­rac­les it has to of­fer us: lon­ger li­fe, sa­ni­ta­ti­on, su­per-tec­h­no­logy and con­ve­ni­en­ce, along with mass-mar­ke­ted pro­ducts and ser­vi­ces. And the cost? You say, "Oh, not much, just our in­di­vi­du­ality, sen­se of iden­tity, fre­edom, energy, be­li­efs and mo­ney." But don't worry, you'll ne­vet know it, or at le­ast ne­ver ca­re (be­ca­use they won't tell you to ca­re).

    So what if our tec­h­no­logy can cre­ate mac­hi­nes to work and fun­c­ti­on as hu­man wor­kers, only bet­ter? So what if bu­si­nes­ses want to turn the­ir em­p­lo­ye­es in­to mac­hi­ne-li­ke con­for­mists? So what if we spend bil­li­ons of dol­lars each ye­ar con­su­ming tas­te­less, mass-pro­du­ced, fast-fo­ods that are bad for our he­alth? So what if we spend ho­ur af­ter ho­ur in front of the te­le­vi­si­on wat­c­hing si­tu­ati­on-co­me­di­es and po­li­ce shows de­sig­ned for vi­ewers with an IQ of 3? So what if we gi­ve stran­gers all sorts of in­for­ma­ti­on con­cer­ning our li­ves when we fill out forms for this or that? So what if we don't know what they do with all that in­for­ma­ti­on, or if we be­li­eve ever­y­t­hing the me­dia tells us, or if we rush out and buy pro­ducts be­ca­use we've se­en a do­zen com­mer­ci­als abo­ut them this we­ek alo­ne?

    So what? That's prog­ress. Right? Isn't li­fe so much bet­ter this way? Af­ter all, aren't we ta­ught that it is? May­be we do li­ve in a cold, im­per­so­nal age whe­re we cho­ose con­ve­ni­en­ce and con­for­mity over free will. The qu­es­ti­on is, what are we wil­ling to do abo­ut it ? What can we do abo­ut it?

    How do­es this re­la­te to Ma­ge? That's the qu­es­ti­on you've be­en as­king yo­ur­self, right? Well, if the Tec­h­noc­racy we­re to exist, wo­uld the world aro­und us "Sle­epers" re­al­ly lo­ok any dif­fe­rent than the way it lo­oks to us now? Yes, Ma­ge is a ga­me of ma­ke-be­li­eve. But we know that gro­ups just as con­s­pi­ra­to­ri­al, ma­ni­pu­la­ti­ve and self-ser­ving as the Tec­h­noc­racy co­uld be out the­re wat­c­hing over us, gu­iding our li­ves. The­re­in li­es the re­al hor­ror we "Sle­epers" sho­uld con­si­der.

    A bo­ok is a par­ti­ci­pa­tory ad­ven­tu­re. It in­vol­ves a cre­ati­ve act at its in­cep­ti­on and a cre­ati­ve act when its pur­po­se is ful­fil­led. The wri­ter dre­ams the dre­am and sets it down; the re­ader re­in­ter­p­rets the dre­am in per­so­nal terms, with per­so­nal vi­si­on, when he or she re­ads it. Each cre­ates a world. The tem­p­la­te is the bo­ok.

    - Har­lan El­li­son, In­t­ro to Stran­ge Wi­ne

    There are so many go­od bo­oks- gre­at bo­oks- of in­te­rest to the Ma­ge pla­yer that it's hard to com­pi­le any sort of list. For what it's worth, ho­we­ver, the bo­oks be­low ha­ve all of­fe­red so­met­hing use­ful to the wri­ters of this bo­ok. Ma­ge pla­yers and Stor­y­tel­lers may want to check them out them­sel­ves.

    • Ar­ri­en, An­ge­les. The Ta­rot Han­d­bo­ok: Prac­ti­cal Ap­pli­ca­tions of An­ci­ent Vi­su­al Symbols - In­t­ro­du­ces the Ta­rot deck as a por­tal to un­der­s­tan­ding Ta­rot symbols from a Jun­gi­an psycho­lo­gi­cal, mytho­lo­gi­cal and cross-cul­tu­ral per­s­pec­ti­ves.

    • Cam­p­bell, Joseph. The He­ro with a Tho­usand Fa­ces; Joseph Cam­p­bell and the Po­wer of Myth - In­va­lu­ab­le bo­oks, not only for Ma­ge, but for any pla­yer se­ri­o­usly in­te­res­ted in the uni­ver­sal ro­ots of all myths, fa­iths and fol­k­lo­re. Un­li­ke many phi­lo­sop­hers or mytho­lo­gists, Cam­p­bell is­qu­ite ac­ces­sib­le; his gre­atest flaw is ela­bo­ra­ting so ex­ten­si­vely that the re­ader's tho­ughts be­co­me de­ra­iled. The Po­wer of Myth is al­so ava­ilab­le on audio cas­set­tes and vi­de­ota­pe and co­mes highly re­com­men­ded.

    • Cun­nin­g­ham, Scott, The Truth Abo­ut Wit­c­h­c­raft To­day - Des­c­ri­bes folk ma­gic and Wic­can be­li­efs in the con­text of mo­dern cul­tu­re. Whi­le the bo­ok is a bit too gu­ar­ded, in that Cun­nin­g­ham in­c­lu­des re­pe­ated re­min­ders that Wic­cans are not evil, hu­man-sac­ri­fi­cing Sa­tan-wor­s­hip­pers, it is ne­ver­t­he­less a go­od, ba­sic in­t­ro­duc­ti­on to folk ma­gic and Wic­can be­li­efs.

    • El­li­son, Har­lan. Stran­ge Wi­ne; Pa­in­god and Ot­her De­lu­si­ons; De­at­h­bird Sto­ri­es - El­li­son is the most de­co­ra­ted fan­ta­sist of our ti­me, and many of his in­t­ri­gu­ing, dis­tur­bing and of­ten hi­la­ri­o­us ta­les tie in well with the the­mes of Ma­ge. The bo­oks abo­ve are par­ti­cu­larly su­ited for fans of the World of Dar­k­ness, but any bo­ok of his is worth re­ading.

    • Fra­iser, Sir James Ge­or­ge, The Gol­den Bo­ugh - The qu­in­tes­sen­ti­al work on an­t­h­ro­po­logy and folk tra­di­ti­ons and be­li­efs. A pon­de­ro­us re­ad, but very in­for­ma­ti­ve.

    • Gu­iley, Ro­se­mary El­len. The En­c­y­c­lo­pe­dia of Wit­c­hes and Wit­c­h­c­raft - A go­od re­so­ur­ce for tho­se se­eking in­for­ma­ti­on not only on his­to­ri­cal and mo­dem wit­c­h­c­raft, but on the per­so­na­li­ti­es in­vol­ved as well. Al­so in­c­lu­des an ex­ten­si­ve bib­li­og­raphy co­ve­ring a va­ri­ety of so­ur­ces.

    • Ha­le­vi, Z'ev ben Shi­mon. Kab­ba­lah: Tra­di­ti­on of Hid­den Know­led­ge - Des­c­ri­bes the kab­ba­lah's be­li­efs and tra­di­ti­ons in de­ta­il, pro­vi­ding di­ag­rams and co­lor pla­tes to il­lus­t­ra­te po­ints. Al­so pro­vi­des a 38-item bib­li­og­raphy for fur­t­her re­ading. Very use­ful to an­yo­ne pla­ying Or­der of Her­mes cha­rac­ters.

    • Hawk, Si­mon, The Wi­zard of Fo­urth Stre­et - An es­pe­ci­al­ly en­ter­ta­ining lo­ok at ma­gick, tec­h­no­logy and the mi­xing of the two in a wi­se­ass neo-Got­hic set­ting. The first se­qu­el, The Wi­zard of Whi­tec­ha­pel, is de­cent, but the ot­her bo­oks in Hawk's "Wi­zard" se­ri­es go dow­n­hill fast.

    • Ki­ec­k­he­fer, Ric­hard. Ma­gic in the Mid­dle Ages. - An aca­de­mic ap­pro­ach to the ma­gi­cal tra­di­ti­ons in me­di­eval Euro­pe and the Mid­dle East. Less the­ore­ti­cal than de­ta­il-ori­en­ted. Very use­ful for pla­yers run­ning chro­nic­les in the Mid­dle Ages.

    • Lac­key, Mer­ce­des, Bur­ning Wa­ter; Chil­d­ren of the Night - Tho­ugh the ma­gic is a bit flas­hi­er than our own Pa­ra­dox-bo­und world, the he­ro­ine of the­se bo­oks, Di­ana Tre­gar­de, co­uld be a Ma­ge cha­rac­ter! The si­tu­ati­ons and set­ting of Lac­key's Tre­gar­de bo­oks are qu­ite ap­prop­ri­ate for Ma­ge pla­yers, and fun as well. The third bo­ok, Jinx High, is fa­irly la­me (sorry, Misty!), but the first two are mo­re than wor­t­h­w­hi­le.

    • Star­hawk, The Spi­ral Dan­ce. - A bit New-Agey, but cer­ta­inly worth re­ading. This bo­ok is a de­ve­lo­per's fa­vo­ri­te and ex­p­lo­res the re­la­ti­ons of fa­ith and be­li­ef to ma­gick and per­so­nal ful­fil­lment. Star­hawk her­self sup­pli­es the salt to ta­ke with this (or any ot­her) bo­ok of per­so­nal truth - "… all the ma­te­ri­al in this bo­ok is pre­sen­ted so that you can ta­ke it and ma­ke it yo­ur own, adapt it to fit yo­ur in­c­li­na­ti­ons and cir­cum­s­tan­ces, add what works and dis­card what do­esn't. I con­si­der this a bo­ok of to­ols, not dog­ma." The sa­me co­uld be sa­id for this so­cal­led Bo­ok of Sha­dows: The Ma­ge Pla­yers Gu­ide.