Spiders in the Mind

Level 2 - Storyline Rituals / The Way of the Spider

This ritual reaches into the victim's subconscious, causing a nightmare the next time the victim sleeps. The nightmare involves one of the victim's greater fears, but may be resisted and changed normally with the Lucid Dreaming skill. If the nightmare is not resisted, the victim looses one die from all pools the following night (or day in the case of mortals).

System: The caster removes an eggsac from a spider's web, and soaks it in a concoction mixed from vampiric vitae and the powdered remains of a personal token important to the victim. The mother spider must remain active and alert, as it is from her defensiveness that the ritual draws its power. As the mixture slowly burns off, the caster invokes the name a Mesopotamian spirit dedicated to bad dreams.

This ritual gives the caster no way to know what nightmare the mind-spider invokes. A botch inflicts the caster with a nightmare, usually involving spiders, the next time he or she sleeps. Such a nightmare will be persistent, recurring even if it has been banished or altered with the Dreaming skill.