Drinking the Blood of Ahriman
By drawing the shadow essence of the Abyss into himself and fusing it with his blood, a mystic who knows this ritual may undergo a frightening transformation.
System: The mystic summons a Nocturne and cuts her palm with a knife that has never tasted blood. Chanting softly, the mystic flicks blood into the Nocturne, drawing its hunger into her wound. The shadow melds into the palm, traveling through the veins to suffuse the vampire’s entire form. This painful process takes half an hour. During this time the vampire is at –2 dice from the cold agony of the fusion. At the end of the ritual, the vampire’s player rolls Manipulation + Occult (difficulty 8). Failure means the fusion is unsuccessful and the shadow escapes to the Abyss. A botch means the shadow drinks one blood point per 1 rolled before departing. Success causes the vampire’s skin to darken noticeably and her eyes to become the impossibly inky black of the Abyss. In this augmented state, all Physical Attributes lower than her Obtenebration rating rise to that level. All Obtenebration powers up to level three receive a –2 difficulty, and the blood cost to grow or expand an Arm of Ahriman is halved (rounded up). The void-augmented vampire must spend a number of blood points upon awakening each night equal to her Obtenebration rating. Failure to pay this surcharge immediately revokes the transformation. In addition, the vampire’s shadowy form takes triple damage from sunlight and her Appearance drops by one dot while this ritual is in effect.
Side Effect: Once a vampire spends more consecutive days in spectral form than her highest Virtue, the darkening of her skin becomes permanent. This resembles the darkening of an elder Assamite and grows more pronounced the more frequently the mystic casts and maintains this ritual.
