FrivYeti/NihilsSoulConsumption

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Desecrations: Soul Consumption

Soul Consumption is among the most frightening powers that Nihils have access to. By using these powers, Nihils steal the capabilities and energies of their victims, consigning them to eternal death in exchange for a short-term burst of power. The capabilities granted by these powers are widespread, but are always based on the power or nature of the souls consumed.

Unless specifically mentioned otherwise, there are two effects to soul consumption. First, any soul sacrificed to one of these Desecrations is destroyed, and cannot be used as a sacrifice to a different Desecration. Secondly, each individual Desecration of this sort can only be activated once per scene. A character may activate multiple Desecrations in a scene, but not the same one multiple times (in the case of scenes with particularly long durations, Desecrations can be activated once every half-hour.) Using a Soul Consumption Desecration is a Speed 5, DV -1 Simple action with a Rate of 1, unless otherwise mentioned.

As a general rule, soul consumption requires a character to have the mental wit to understand a concept, the cunning to modify it, or the durability to withstand it. As such, they tend to require the Attributes of Wits, Manipulation, or Stamina.

Consumption of Knowledge

Tasting Of The Fruits Of Understanding</i>

Prerequisites: Essence 2, Wits 3

Souls remember their training, albeit faintly. By making use of this Desecration, a Nihil steals a measure of that understanding for herself. Upon activating this Desecration, the character spends 3 motes and chooses a single Ability and a single soul to sacrifice. For the duration of the scene, she may behave as though the soul's former rating in that Ability. The character does not gain instinctive knowledge of a soul's Ability ratings, but does know if they are greater than her own or not.

<i>Stealing From The Tree Of Wisdom

Prerequisites: Essence 3, Wits 4, Tasting Of The Fruits Of Understanding

A soul's knowledge is a transient thing, but that does not matter to a Nihil. Using this Desecration, she tears her victim's soulstuff apart, adding its knowledge to her own. Activating this Desecration costs one Willpower, and requires the sacrifice of a soul. The character immediately gains one of the following: one dot in an Ability that the soul had at a higher rating than the player, or one Charm or spell that the soul knew and the character is capable of learning (this requires the character to have all prerequisites for said Charm). Generally, characters can only learn Martial Arts in this way, but a Nihil who devours the soul of another Nihil might learn other Charms. This is a training effect, and follows the usual rules for XP debt.

Magics Of A Forbidden God

Prerequities: Essence 5, Manipulation 5, Stealing From The Tree Of Wisdom

The most devastating of the Nihil's ability to steal the understanding of her victims, this Desecration allows her to steal a Charm that she does not have the capability to learn. The character spends one Willpower, chooses any one Charm that her victim knew and sacrifices their soul. For the duration of the scene, she may activate that Charm as though she was the victim, following whatever rules the victim followed to use it. The character cannot steal Combos in this manner, only individual Charms.

Consumption Of Thought

Interrogating The Entombed</b>

<b>Prerequisites: Essence 2, Manipulation 3

Although they are imprisoned within their slayers, the victims of a Nihil still have some form and nature. By pushing Essence through their frames, the Nihil stirs this sluggish understanding to life, enabling her to converse with the souls of her victims. Activating this Desecration requires the commitment of 3 motes of Essence, and does not consume the soul of its target. For the duration of the scene, the captive soul is awakened and able to communicate with the Nihil. The Nihil may choose to allow the soul to borrow any or all of her senses; if she does not, her victim feels only the chill of Oblivion and hears only the words of the Nihil. The Nihil gains no automatic ability to control the soul beyond the natural, but has a very powerful bargaining position.

Swallowing The Strains of the Past

Prerequisites: Essence 3, Manipulation 4, Interrogating The Entombed

Conversation is ultimately an inefficient way to gather information. With this Desecration, a Nihil learns to cut straight to the source. She spends one Willpower, and sacrifices a soul of her choice. She then names either a specific time period or a specific event, object, or person. She can be as vague or as specific as she likes. She may then take up to a year’s worth of memories that the sacrificed soul possesses from that time or surrounding that trigger. She can narrow down the criteria, taking all memories of that trigger from that time period, provided the total memories taken do not exceed one year. The character now has access to these memories as though they were her own. The soul she took them from, if it survives being sacrificed (see other Desecration), no longer has access to those memories. This is a permanent effect.

Restoring Oblivion’s Victims

Prerequisites: Essence 3, Stamina 4, Interrogating The Entombed

Oblivion’s maw is ever-consuming, but even it can be denied its prey. By enacting this Desecration, the Nihil sins against the Neverborn and returns one of her victims. She must spend ten motes and two points of Willpower to do this. Upon doing so, tendrils of pale energy leech from her eyes and mouth, pooling on the ground before her, and gradually taking on shape. She chooses one of her souls, and returns it to existence as a ghost. The former victim is created as though she just died and became a ghost; if she was always a ghost, she is returned to her original traits. This Desecration is an affront to Oblivion; each time that it is used, the user gains a dot of Resonance for defying the grip of Oblivion within herself. Note that this Desecration can only be used on creatures that can become ghosts; when used on beings that eternally resurrect, it returns them to their species’ life cycle, while beings that leave no ghost are returned to Lethe.

Forging The Tools Of The Void

Prerequisites: Essence 4, Manipulation 4, Interrogating The Entombed

The power of Oblivion is vast, and sometimes it must send its minions ranging far in order to accomplish its goals. In order to serve her Neverborn masters, the character spawns a new child of Oblivion from one of her victims, winnowing all that is good within him to forge him into a spectre, a terrible reflection of his former self . Activating this power requires the expenditure of 15 motes and 2 Willpower. The character chooses a soul that she has devoured. Black goblets of plasm bleed from her body, taking on the form of a monstrous ghost, irrevocably tainted from its trip to the edge of Oblivion. The spectre is created exactly as if that soul had died and become a ghost, with four changes. First, it gains +1 to all Physical Attributes, and increases their maximums to 6. Secondly, it gains a Whispers rating equal to the Nihil’s Essence (Maximum 5). Third, it gains the Charm ‘Shadowlands Circle Necromancy’. Finally, all of its positive Intimacies transform into negative Intimacies towards their original target (For example, an Intimacy towards House Peleps would become a hatred of House Peleps), and its Motivation changes to “Serve Oblivion”.

Spectres transformed via the use of this power bear no supernatural loyalty towards their progenitor, but most of them will feel a certain twisted gratitude for being shown the truth of Creation’s end, and all have a certain sympathy to a fellow follower of the Void.

Consumption Of Power

Patching The Flesh With Oblivion's Remnants</b>

<b>Prerequisites: Essence 2, Stamina 3

Soulstuff has more uses than mere knowledge. The character chooses any soul and sacrifices it, spending 2 motes. At the end of the scene, she recovers one level of Lethal or two levels of Bashing damage that she has taken.

Armoured With The Stuff Of Souls</b>

<b>Prerequisites: Essence 3, Stamina 4

The character draws out strands of soulstuff, spreading it across herself in gossamer strands. The next time the character would take at least one level of damage, the damage is reduced by the Essence of the soul she is using as armor. Each time this occurs, the soul's Essence is reduced by 1. When the soul's Essence reaches 0, or the scene ends, it is destroyed. Unlike normal Desecration, the character may armor herself repeatedly over the course of a scene; however, each new armoring replaces the previous, instantly sacrificing that soul.

All-Consuming Void Transformation</b>

<b>Prerequisites: Essence 2, Stamina 3

This mighty form is all that remains of the Deadly Beastman that Lunars instinctively know the form of. While Nihils cannot create the strange flesh-warping effects of that transformation, they have learned their own variant which is just as dangerous. Activating this power requires the expenditure of 5 motes and the sacrifice of a soul; unlike normal Desecration, this is a reflexive action. The character grows a foot in height, black plasm stretching to cover her form, shifting it into a nightmare shape that bears a passing resemblance to whatever soul the character devoured to empower herself. Her clothing stretches, but does not break, her skin and shape oozing around it as necessary.

The character gains a variety of benefits from this form. First, she gains +1 to all of her Physical Attributes. Secondly, she does not lose Dying health levels if rendered unconscious, and returns to Incapacitated at the end of the scene (assuming she is not killed outright). The third power, however, depends both on the Essence and the nature of the soul that she has consumed, as follows:

• A human soul, either higher or lower, empowers the Nihil with its nature, showing to horrified onlookers their own fears and failures. All onlookers who do not have dots in the Whispers background lose one dot from a Virtue for every dot of Essence that the sacrificed soul has; this is spread as evenly as possible, favouring the watcher's highest Virtues first. Furthermore, anyone with a positive Intimacy or Motivation towards the victim consumed for this effect suffers a -2 die penalty to all actions against the Nihil. Both of these are Emotion effects that cannot be overcome by spending Willpower. Exalts are treated as human for the purposes of this Desecration.
• An animal soul empowers the Nihil with an animalistic frenzy and fervour. The Nihil increases her Wits by 1, and increases her MDVs by the animal's Essence; this does not count as a Charm bonus.
• The soul of an elemental provides immunity to natural effects of its element, and adds the soul's Essence in soak or dice to resist magical manifestations of that element.
• The soul of a god or demon partially dematerializes the Nihil; all post-soak damage dice dealt to her by effects that cannot strike dematerialized beings is reduced by half the spirit's Essence, rounding up.
• The soul of a Dragon King lends its raw power to the Nihil, granting her a +1 bonus to (Dragon King's Essence) Attributes of her choice. She must choose at least one Physical and one Mental Attribute to boost.
• The soul of a Mountain Folk lends its immutable nature to the Nihil, increasing the difficulty of all Shaping effects against her by the Mountain Folk's Essence and raising one Virtue that the Mountain Folk had a higher rating than the Nihil by 1 (including an extra Virtue Channel).