Purgatorio
Purgatorio
Contagion 1e
Ghost: Despite this grand design, this road map of the soul’s journey, some mortals deviate from the plan. Through force of will, or by decree of a higher being, these souls linger on beyond death itself. Shunning (or shunned by) Heaven and Hell, these ghosts continue their existence in a mockery of their former lives.
Ghosts are those spirits who refused true death.
Lich: A lich is a violation of all accepted rules of magical theory. Magic is channeled through life force. The living essence of a Magus commands mystical energy to create spells. Foolish or greedy Magi who do not show this energy the respect it deserves suffer from Burn.
Because of the nature of magic, undead creatures are typically unable to harness its power. There simply isn’t any life essence to guide the mystical energy into spell form. Vampires, ghosts, and zombies are all incapable of harnessing the tools of the Magus.
It is rumored among some scholars that the Council of Tears has discovered a means of circumventing this magical truth, a way to cheat death by bestowing undeath and immortality onto a Magus without sacrificing access to his power and spells. Ancient and forbidden rituals are rumored to grant the ability to become an unholy and foul creature, known to the scholarly as a lich.
“Lich” is an acquired template that can be added to any humanoid creature, provided it can create the required phylactery; see the lich’s phylactery, below.
Trappings of unholy transformation
The following rituals and conditions are required for the transformation into a lich. Failure to meet any of the following conditions before attempting the change results in the slow, incredibly painful, and entirely irreversible death of the Magus. No magic can prevent the death from a botched ritual on the path to becoming a lich. It is also important to note that nothing short of the direct intervention of God can reverse a lich’s condition.
Requisite knowledge
The quest to become a lich is not undertaken lightly. To even begin the proper research and rituals a character must meet the following prerequisites:
Class levels: Arcane spellcaster level 18
Ability scores: Intelligence 20
Skills: Concentration: 20 ranks, Knowledge (Arcana) 20 ranks, Research 20 ranks, Spellcraft 20 ranks
Feats: craft wondrous item, empower spell
Spells: animate dead, magic jar, permanency, Persephone’s voyage, prepare spell trigger, and steal contagion.
The First Step: Research
Becoming a lich requires access to hidden and forbidden knowledge. The necessary rituals are not a common part of any magical teachings, and are quite difficult to acquire. To learn the secrets of unholy transformation, the Archmage must do a massive amount of legwork. The first trick is to locate a library that might contain a glimpse of the rituals. This can take years to accomplish. It is suggested that the Gamemaster simply resolves this through roleplaying, but if a random system is required, the search should take a minimum of 10d10 months. A knowledge (arcana) check at DC 45 can cut this time in half (as the Archmage has a good idea of where to start looking.) Travel expenses mount up as the quest for information likely takes the character across the globe. Assume a minimum of $6000 dollars in travel expenses per month of research. Of course, the Archmage may reduce or negate this cost through means magical and mundane at gm discretion.
As this jet-setting info chasing proceeds, the Archmage must make monthly rolls to keep on the proper trail. Each month the Archmage must make a research check at DC 45. Success allows the character to move forward with his studies, having gained some new piece of the puzzle. Failure means that the Archmage has made no progress that month and must try again in a month.
Once the allotted time (and research checks) has been completed, the Archmage must compile his data and attempt to combine his gathered components into a working series of rituals. This is an extremely difficult process, requiring a Spellcraft check at dc 50 and 1d6 months of steady (six hours a day) work. Failing this roll indicates that the Archmage made a miscalculation somewhere and (unbeknownst to the Archmage) is doomed to a grisly demise upon attempting the final ritual. To avoid this fate, an Archmage may ask another character to double check his notes (effectively giving the assistant a chance to make the same Spellcraft check. If the assistant fails, the notes are simply beyond the assistant’s grasp and he can offer no insight. If the assistant succeeds, he can catch any mistakes in the research.) The Archmage (and the assistant) may also take 10 or 20 on this roll, adjusting the work time accordingly. The Archmage may also double check his own notes before finalizing the ritual formulas by adding 1d4 months to the work time. This extra step grants the Archmage a +10 bonus on the Spellcraft check to devise the rituals.
If this process is interrupted at any point, it freezes, with no progress made or lost while the Archmage attends to other affairs. At his convenience the Archmage may pick up where he left off.
The Archmage may skip this research if he can find a lich to instruct him, which is incredibly unlikely. Most liches are not the least bit interested in sharing their secrets, and would likely feel that anyone looking for a handout of such metaphysical magnitude scarcely deserves to be a lich. Liches have been known to kill Archmages foolish enough to make such requests.
In either case, the Archmage learns the rituals necessary for unholy transformation (the Ritual of Harvest, Trial by Fire, and the Ritual of Unholy Transformation)
The Second Step: The Ritual of Harvest.
Once the rituals have been discovered, the prospective lich needs to gather a whole lot of Contagion energy. The best and fastest method for doing so is through mass ritual sacrifice. Once the Archmage has learned the ritual of harvest, he must anoint himself in the lifeblood of a human newborn. The child must be less than twenty-eight days old. Once the Archmage has bathed in the infant’s blood, he may begin the harvest.
The harvest is the process of gathering energy to fuel the unholy transformation. This requires one hundred Contagion Points. Once the ritual of harvest has been performed, the Archmage must then acquire Contagion Points through the steal contagion spell. These Contagion Points are not added to the Archmage’s Contagion Point total, but tracked separately. It is important to note that every point of Contagion used to fuel the harvest must be stolen. The Archmage may not contribute any of his personal Contagion Points to this pool.
The Archmage may elect to take Contagion Points gained through steal contagion into his own pool, or to contribute them to the harvest at the time they are taken. Once this decision has been made, it cannot be changed. An Archmage may not tap into the reserve of Contagion Points dedicated to the harvest under any circumstances.
The Third Step: Trial by Fire
After the harvest is complete, the Archmage must begin preparations of the phylactery that shall hold his soul and enable the unholy transformation.
The first step of the Trial by Fire is to prepare an object using the spell magic jar, fortified with permanency. This allows the character to have an item designed to hold his soul indefinitely. The Archmage must then travel to Purgatory using the spell Persephone’s voyage. Carrying the magic jar, the Archmage must seek out a Rueda del Fuego and engage the creature in combat.
An Archmage carrying a magic jar through Purgatory is a beacon to the servants of the divine. While a Rueda del Fuego (or two) is very likely to find the character almost immediately, it is also quite likely that the Archmage will have to fight his way trough Soulflayers, Confessors and Lashers as well. Keep in mind that the Archmage will have no access to his magic while in Purgatory, so planning ahead is vital.
Once the Archmage is able to locate a Rueda del Fuego, he must find a way to wound the creature (likely through the use of other remnant weaponry or the like). Even a single hit point of damage will suffice. At the time of wounding, the Archmage may then spend his harvested Contagion to bind the Rueda del Fuego into the magic jar. The Rueda del Fuego may resist the attempt by making a will save (DC= the Archmages arcane caster level + Spellcraft ranks). If the Rueda del Fuego succeeds in resisting the attempt, the Contagion Points are held in reserve, and the Archmage may try again upon inflicting a new wound to the Rueda del Fuego.
Once the Rueda del Fuego is captured, the Archmage may exit Purgatory with his magic jar, now one step closer to completing the unholy transformation.
The Fourth Step: Unholy Transformation
Once the phylactery has been prepared, the Archmage must perform the ritual of unholy transformation. This ritual requires the use of prepare spell trigger in conjunction with animate dead and permanency. The Archmage then commits suicide while in physical contact with his phylactery. At the last possible moment, the Archmage releases the animate dead (with permanency) spell trigger as well as bonding his soul into the magic jar with the same trigger word. As the magic jar is also host to a Rueda del Fuego, the Archmage must succeed at a will save (DC 35) in order to force his soul to co-habitate with the entity. It is this co-habitation that allows the Archmage to continue existence as a lich. Should the will save fail, the Archmage dies slowly and painfully, his soul consumed by the Rueda del Fuego. In this case the phylactery is destroyed.
If the will save succeeds, the Archmage rises as a lich. He is now static and immortal. He is in constant pain from the perpetual torture of his soul by the Rueda del Fuego, a small price to pay for immortality and unspeakable power.
The Lich’s Phylactery
An integral part of becoming a lich is creating a magic phylactery in which the character stores his life force. As a rule, the only way to get rid of a lich for sure is to destroy its phylactery. Unless its phylactery is located and destroyed, a lich reforms 1d10 days after its apparent death.
Each lich must make its own phylactery, as detailed above.
The most common form of phylactery is a sealed metal box containing strips of parchment on which magical phrases have been transcribed. The box is tiny and has 40 hit points, hardness 20, and a break DC of 40. Other forms of phylacteries can exist, such as rings, amulets, PDAs or similar items. A phylactery typically has the same stats as its mundane counterpart unless augmented magically by the lich.
Undead: Saddened by the curse laid upon mankind, the Chammadi sought a way to reverse mortality no matter the cost. It was this defiance that birthed the many species of undead.
Confessor: Confessors are ghosts who have abandoned their own personal goals and aspirations in favor of assisting other ghosts in their chosen quests.
Confessor is an acquired template that can be added to any ghost.
Confessor Rake 3 Spook 3: ?
Ingrid Voshevik Orc Lich Arcane Student 5/Archmage 3/Infernalist 5/Magus 10: ?
