Two Otherspaces for dukes who like to live dangerously.
-I know I said that my otherspaces would get more convoluted, and the Blue is still quite simplistic, in fact thats what its known for, but I had an Idea I wanted to tryout. Its possible the blue is a little too useful, I’ve been contemplating adding more risk to it, even a slight variance on the time it takes for the exit gate to appear can make a huge difference in landing points, or maybe adding some birds?
YAMBE (THE BLACK)
description
A dark shadowy place filled with a thick smoky fog that makes breathing difficult, lethe is one of many otherspaces formed around death. Through the fog and the dark it is possible to make out the ruins of buildings, rotting or burned, all decayed and forgotten. Bodies are strewn around, of men and animals, as if they had died in the street, and not been swept up. Examining the bodies reveals more – the animals are all pets, dead possibly years but seemingly only minutes by the condition of the body. The humans too appear only recently dead, although the clothing on some reveals them to be dead decades. More over while they did not die here, their bodies lie in the exact positions they died in. The bodies are duplicates, not real, but identical in every way to people and pets who have died, and are missed. Yambe is the land of the mourned dead, filled with perfect replicas of the departed, made at the moment they were lost to the living. These duplicate bodies lie here, like 3-D photos, until the dead is remembered no more, at which point the decay that has held off sets in, and the body quickly decomposes.
It is always night in Yambe, and the stars aren’t visible through the fog. The cold of the grave is palpable here, and dukes who can feel cold take damage from the cold every hour they stay here (this damage is as unarmed damage). Visitors who bring light and heat into this dark place discover that not all is dead in Yambe, For there are two kinds of creature to be found here.
The first is the tenebrae, those who eat the unmourned dead. Most dukes wonder why tenebrae would congregate in the land of the mourned dead, where there is no food for them, even if the dark, damp conditions do suit them, but cannier dukes suspect they are here to wait, till the mourned are forgotten at last, and Yambe’s hold over them fades and they rot and dissolve away, allowing the tenebrae a meal.
The second kind of creatures found here are Ghouls, who seem to wait here, in the shadows, until someone dies and they vanish, to appear in the world and look on, as they are compelled to do. True demons float here too, incorporeally, waiting for a foolish duke to enter unprepared, as possessions are Much, Much Easier to accomplish here.
With all this risk some wonder why a duke would seek to come here at all, and while there could be many reasons, two stand out as the most common.
Inexperienced or foolish dukes come here to hunt and capture tenebrae, to study them, try (vainly) to train them, or to use them as material in a ritual. Tenebrae are stronger in Yambe than they are in the regular world however (add 40 points split over their stats. This is in addition to the fact that they are almost certainly in darkness), and are more aggressive. The tenebrae in danger here have also been known to do something almost unheard of elsewhere- make noise. Some dukes have reported hearing a wail that strongly resembles that of a baby coming from a wounded tenebrae, though just what this means about the Yambe tenebrae is unknown.
Wiser dukes come to Yambe for information about the dead. If they have brought the right tools with them, and are prepared to spend the time searching they can examine and even autopsy the bodies of the dead, to learn about how they died. Some adepts even come to speak to the dead, when they can’t reach the real body. Even those not versed in the magicks needed to make the dead speak, or the sciences of the coroner, can find out information on the dead by tracking down the ghouls, and convincing them to talk.
Of course, getting to Yambe is risky in itself.
entry
Enter Yambe 1 minor charge
To enter Yambe you must find, and wear, the clothes that someone was buried in, their age, gender and whether you knew the person or not don’t matter (but its safest to ensure they are someone who is still mourned, or you’ll smell like food to the tenebrae and they’ll attack soon after you arrive). You then place a large ravens feather into the top of each ear (either in a piercing hole you have anyway, or by jabbing it into your flesh) such that they stick upwards, similar to comical rabbit ears. And paint a short rune with the blood of the raven who donated the feathers on everything else you need to take with you, which must all be able to fit in/on one car, truck or other form of motorised transport. You must then drive (with all the equipment) to a famed local traffic black spot, and crash your vehicle into another car, in a non-superficial way. Assuming you don’t die in the crash, make a ritual roll, and if you succeed you and any marked gear appear in Yambe. It’s a good idea to have someone else (even a corpse) in the car who doesn’t plan on going to Yambe, so the sleepers don’t come after you for driverless car crashes.
Leaving Yambe is both easier, and harder, as you need to wait for outside conditions. All it takes is burning the raven feathers (and some paper with the raven’s blood symbol on it if you want your gear back too), while concentrating on going back. You will return to the world at the site of the nearest death to where you disappeared.
Some dukes desperate to destroy evidence have been known to perform the Yambe ritual with the ravens feathers on fire while they are wearing them, then go crashing very hard into another car, hoping that the crash is fatal to the other driver and they reappear almost instantly where they left. Of course the police will want to speak to them about the accident, and they are probably very wounded, but when your desperate to rid yourself of something you can’t destroy, that sounds like a fair trade.
SKYE (THE BLUE)
description
An endless Azure sky. No ground or sea to end its wonder, nor clouds to mar its beauty. Stark and clean, Skye is a fast (if incredibly dangerous) way to travel for dukes with no other options. There are no credible reports of dukes seeing anything but blue sky and other dukes in the blue, but there are rumours of birds flying through the void, and carefully stored artefacts plummeting till their needed. The basic ritual of the blue is perhaps the most commonly spread ritual of the Sydney underground, and one of the most infrequently used. Most consider it an if all else fails- fall into the Skye option, but careful dukes, with strong knowledge of physics and geography (and a few spare parachutes) have managed to use skye to spectacular effect.
entry
Fall into the Skye 4 minor charge
To cast this ritual you need to be above ground ( but not necessarily outside). This is the simplest otherspace ritual known to the underground, and there are dozens of paranoid whispers as to why this is. But casting this ritual is as simple as wearing some blue, closing your eyes spreading your arms wide out facing the direction you intend to go, whispering the words “Rangi your child seeks an audience”. If the ritual is successful a shimmering circle of air appears before the caster flowing over him (and anything else directly behind him that seeks to come or he seeks to bring). Instantly the caster feels a swift wind and a change in gravity as he is now in the endless Skye, falling faster and faster, with no ground in sight. Any duke in Skye that seeks to return need only close their eyes again, pull themselves up into a tight ball and say “Papa I return with word from Rangi” to instantly find themselves back on earth. However all that time spent falling doesn’t go away- the caster has moved a distance equal to the amount he fell in the direction he was facing (the gate appears at the same approximate height above ground level, regardless of mountains/ valleys). Dukes who hear this without checking the rest of the details often think this is too good to be true, as it allows for overland travel at terminal velocity. However the reason the ritual isn’t popular is that while the distance travelled isn’t lost, the speed travelled isn’t either. The duke exits the shimmering gate at the speed he enters it, which is most likely going to be terminal velocity (what few dukes know is that terminal velocity in the Blue is twice that on earth). Dukes who haven’t very carefully planned out the direction and time of their travel are likely to find themselves hitting a wall or tree at a speed that will leave them nothing more than a giant pizza. Even if they get lucky and don’t slam into something, that much vertical momentum is going to drag them along the ground for a long distance before they stop, resulting in the biker’s favourite cheese grater effect. However someone with thick leather clothes, a parachute, and a very good understanding of physics, could potentially use this ritual to get anywhere above ground, with only minimal bruising. Of course even if you have calculated the fall time and direction well, opening the portal at exactly the right moment is tricky in itself. (Mind and Speed rolls abound for those attempting this kind of thing).
What most dukes don’t know, is the rest of the ritual.
For 5 additional charges, you can open a gateway that doesn’t automatically swallow you. The ritual starts the same as before, but instead of saying “Rangi your child seeks an audience” you say “Rangi, may I see you” this allows you to place things into Skye without going also. You may send anything blue through the doorway, and it will disappear into the skye, sealing the gate behind it. Rumours abound of powerful artefacts hidden this way, falling constantly through Skye until a duke opens a portal in its flight path at the precise moment it is dropping by. If such were the case though no one claims to know just where and when you’d need to open a portal to find such artefacts.
So…..
Suggestions? Comments? Scathing Criticisms?
Also up next the Red and the White, Incredible resources for the battle-happy, and useful to the sane dukes too.