CastleVania: Legato of Tomorrow

Game Master Orthos

Omen: The bow grows warm and emits small plumes of smoke when within 60 feet of an arcane spellcaster or alchemist with whom the wielder is not allied, and the drawstring becomes covered in frost when within 60 feet of an incorporeal creature. These effects can happen simultaneously.

History: An inquisitor by the name of Thibodeaux is responsible for the creation of this gruesome weapon; a witch hunter and mage breaker by trade, he collected a trophy of a single hair from every witch he executed and a thread from every noose he employed once its victim had died. He wove these one by one into a single strand, which he wore around his neck like a talisman as he went about his missions.

Most of the people tortured and murdered by Thibodeaux and his inquisitors were, of course, innocent of any wrongdoing and not truly possessed of any supernatural powers; however, he did manage to successfully capture some in his long career. One of these witches happened to be the younger sibling of a more powerful sorcerer, who swore vengeance against the cruel cleric. Calling upon the power of her enemy's many victims, the witch summoned forth their angry spirits and - using the thread of hair as a beacon - directed them toward the sleeping Thibodeaux, and locked him in a torturous nightmare coma for years.

In his slumber, he was eventually approached by a sinister dream demon (posing, of course, as a celestial envoy) who made a deal with the inquisitor - if he would give his body and soul to its god, surrendering his life, he would be freed from his entrapment within the witch's dreamscape. Thibodeaux accepted the deal, only to find his soul caught within the demon's clutches - perhaps, where it had always been bound - and his body under its control. It would be several more years before the possession and deception would be discovered and Thibodeaux's body eventually slain, banishing the fiend back to the pits from whence it came, but in that time it would craft Netherstrand from the thread of hair and rope the inquisitor had begun creating.

Starting Statistics: adaptive wyroot longbow

Legacy Rituals:

The Bloody Braid: You must participate in the death of a spell-casting enemy of your CR or higher and collect a trophy stained with its blood or made from its flesh, hair, scales, or other body materials.

The Witch's Wrath: Using whatever tools, allies, and skills you have at your disposal, you must sate the desire for vengeance, retribution, or punishment for a deceased or undead being or a living entity working on their behalf.

The Demon's Deal: You must engage in single, lone interaction with a fiend of CR equal or greater than yourself and emerge alive and victorious, either by negotiating a deal or agremeent with it or destroying it in combat. Fleeing does not count as completing this trial.

Omen: Though the ring seems featureless and feels smooth to the touch, whenever an arcane spell is cast within fifteen feet of it the ring glows with a pale blue-green light and makes a soft, almost inaudible chime.

History: Cold iron is known across the earth by almost any society that has dealings with the magical to be a bane and preventative of arcane mischief. Used in wardings, protective talismans, and in weapons against the likes of fiend, fey, and folklore, it's only natural that such a regularly-used material would begin to develop unusual traits of its own as a result of so much exposure to and absorbtion of magical energy. Thus is where the story of the Iron Wish-Ring of Jedza begins - as a simple ingot of cold iron used by simple village folk as a defensive measure against trickster faeries and troublesome demons. Hammered out by a local smith and passed from family member to family member over the years, the names of all forgotten in time, the simple lump of metal served its purpose well - placed on windowsills and mantlepieces to keep out the unwanted magical creatures, cast at the feet of strangers or in the faces of skulking shadows, placed for safety under the pillows of newlyweds, newborns, and deathbeds alike.

Though the original maker of the iron ingot and the names of all its owners over the ages are long forgotten, the legacy of its final owner lives on in its common name. Jedza was a young woman set to be betrothed, and her parents - worried that a trickster creature of some sort might try to steal her away by some interruption of the ceremony - had the ingot forged into the form of a ring, then instructed their daughter to wear it around her neck or on her finger at all times until her wedding night was complete. Unbeknownst to them, it was no trickery that would risk to steal Jedza from her betrothal - she had no love for the man her parents had arranged for her to marry, and instead wished to seek adventure and mystery in the surrounding lands, not to be kept at home with a husband and children to manage for the rest of her life. With the last gift of the ring to assure she would be able to keep herself safe from the mysterious powers of the wilds, Jedza packed her few precious possessions and disappeared one day while she was supposed to be working the fields, never to be seen by her family or her betrothed again.

It wasn't long, all things considered, before the young wanderer found herself entranced by the secrets of the wilds and sought to learn their ways and their magicks for herself, and thus her search for a teacher began; depending on where the story is told, her teacher is said to be any of all manner of powerful women of magic from folklore - in the Celtic lands she is said to have been taught the ways of witchcraft from Queen Brigid or The Morrigan; to the Britons she was the pupil of Morgan le Fay; in the Norselands she was considered the student of the Vanir, particularly Freya; in Greece and Italy her legend is tied to the goddess Hecate; and in Russia and the Slavic countries she is said to have studied at the feet of the infamous Baba Yaga. Whatever their source, the mystical mentor asks as payment for her teachings the gift of the ring in return, and often admonishes Jedza that the iron she wears prohibits her from fully realizing her magical talents as she's being taught, but the girl, wise beyond her years, refuses to surrender her payment until the teaching is complete. When finally the time comes to pass that her mentor declares she has nothing further to learn, Jedza at last agrees to surrender the ring as payment; in some versions of the story she is allowed to go in peace, but in most the mentor immediately turns on her, their prize now finally in hand they wish to turn their frustrations for years of delay against the girl, but Jedza - no longer burdened by the presence of cold iron - swiftly defeats her teacher, proving indeed she had nothing further to learn. What became of her after is a mystery, but the ring has been passed through the generations until arriving here.

Starting Statistics: Cold Iron ring or amulet. The wearer possesses Spell Resistance 5 plus their caster level.

Legacy Rituals:

Talisman Against the Intruder: The spell resistance granted by the ring must nullify a spell cast on its target unknowingly, from stealth or surprise, protecting its wearer from an unseen attack or harm.

Gift to the Departer: The ring must be melted down then reforged, granting it a "new" shape (it does not actually have to be a different shape, should the owner desire). It maintains its properties through this process.

Mastery Over the Mentor: You must prevail over a spellcaster of higher caster level than yourself in combat or a challenge of arcane skill, with either the ring removed from your person or its Spell Resistance willingly suppressed.

Omen: Illegible text is etched along the ribbons that comprise Blessed Helix. When held by a divine caster, these characters rearrange and reshape themselves into a quoted scripture, philosophical saying, or mantra of importance to that caster's faith.

History: It's impossible to say which faith is responsible for the creation of Blessed Helix, as the text that covers its surfaces is the only clue as to its nature and it changes with each new owner to match that person's particular philosophy. What is safe to presume is that the creators came from a society that had problems with the reanimation of undead and the presence of fiendish creatures. Plagued by the constant presence of unclean souls, the peoples of this land found themselves in constant need of aid from those with the capability to battle the unholy creatures, and even more from those with the ability to heal those affected by their corruption.

Seeking a tool that would allow them to complete both these seemingly-impossible tasks, the faith-leaders of this land gathered at a riverside to pray, commune, contemplate, and plan amongst themselves. The river in question was somewhat known to the townsfolk to occasionally wash up small bits of precious metals and the occasional gem, from an as-of-yet undiscovered vein that would much later be unearthed and bring the location some well-earned prosperity, but for the time being it was still a source of minor curiosity for the villagers and little more. Thus it did not at first surprise the gathered people to see the slight glint of silver at the riverside, but when one of the younger of their number decided to claim the shiny stone as a souveneir, they were exceptionally shocked to see it unearthed as a clump of ore almost the size of a grown man's fist. Seeing this as an omen or miracle, the leaders quickly decided to have the ore crafted into a symbol of their faith that would be a rallying talisman and perhaps the very weapon they needed to drive back the undead plague. Thus was Blessed Helix forged.

And blessed it was. With their talisman now in hand, the people of the village gathered allies - warriors, hunters, sailors, anyone capable of fighting - from surrounding regions with the promise of protection from their faith in the form of the holy symbol they now carried. Where they went, the dead fell, the wounded were healed, the sick were cured, the plagued were cleansed, and the unholy were struck down and driven away. Seeing this sudden uprising of the oppressed peoples, the fiendish leaders of the undead horde sent their champion, a mighty demon of battle, to face off against the upstart mortals that dared to stand against them. But instead of finding a holy knight or swarthy rebel awaiting them, the fiend found only a gathering of villagers led by an elder holding a bit of silver on a chain. Unimpressed, the fiend moved to strike the old healer down, but as its blade neared Blessed Helix the symbol glowed with a bright silvery light; when it cleared, the fiend was no more, either banished or destroyed by the holy symbol's power. Their greatest champion vanquished, the demons fled back to the pit from whence they came, and the plague of undeath eventually came to an end. Blessed Helix has passed from person to person, faith to faith over the intervening years, always seeming ot vanish when its task is done and reappear somewhere it is most needed.

Starting Statistics: Silver holy symbol. The wearer gains the feat Touch of Healing for free while it is worn.

Legacy Rituals:

They Shall Be Healed: Using spells, feats, class abilities, and/or magic items, you must heal a total of over 100 hit points to beings other than yourself.

From Water Comes Life: You must descend into a river, lake, stream, or other source of water and remain submerged with Blessed Helix in hand for one minute (ten rounds) in prayer.

The Wicked Cannot Stand: You must strike the killing blow against a fiendish or undead creature of your CR or higher with a spell you have cast or a weapon you have conjured or enhanced with divine magic. A spell that removes such a creature from your vicinity without necessarily killing them, such as banishment, is considered the "killing blow" for the purpose of this trial.

Omen: The initial shape of the implanted shard resembles a budding flower made of stained glass. Each time it absorbs a monstrous soul, it "blooms", adding another petal- or leaf-shaped shard in place of a section of skin.

History: The crystal that makes a Shardbinder who and what they are was implanted in their body by a guild of powerful Alchemists seeking to manipulate fiendish energy in a way that gave them control over its power without the risks of directly summoning such infernal creatures. Unfortunately, a combination of unfortunate events - one guild losing control of their Shardbinders who then went violently rogue, another concocting a mad scheme to sacrifice their Shardbinders in a monstrous ritual to summon a vast horde of fiends, and other equally deranged or unfortunate happenings - resulted in many of the details of the process being lost or hidden away deliberately, reducing the number of potential Shardbinders in the world.

Those who remain are often drawn by a sort of hunger or calling to places of supernatural happenstance or violence, as the crystal that grows in their bodies seeks to gather more shards of fiendish soul energy to itself, to allow the crystal to bloom and grow. Gathering too much, however, without performing proper purification rituals can result in the Shardbinder's body becoming totally crystallized, causing them to either petrify in place as a stained glass statue or to burst in a torrent of fiendish energies that either destroys them or reanimates their crystalline body in some manner of undead or fiendish form.

Starting Statistics: Soul Capture vest or amulet.

Soul Capture: Every time the Shardbinder deals the killing blow or a critical hit to an enemy that can produce soul shards, the GM rolls a percentile die; on a success (a roll of [100-2x{Shardbinder's level + casting modifier}] or higher) or when the GM determines an automatic success, the Shardbinder absorbs a portion of the monster's soul, gaining one of its supernatural or spell-like abilities (GM's choice).

The Shardbinder can use these abilities from a pool of shard points, having 4+(modifier) to start and gaining 2+(modifier) each level. Activating any shard ability costs one point. The caster level for shard abilities is equal to the Shardbinder's total hit die. The DC for spell-like shard abilities is determined normally, using the Shardbinder's casting modifier of choice; the DC for supernatural shard abilities is equal to 10+[half Shardbinder's hit die]+[modifier].

A Shardbinder who absorbs the same soul shard multiple times can choose to improve that shard in one of the following ways:
1. For every shard after the first, the Shardbinder can choose to add 1 round/level to the duration of a shard power that is not instantaneous.
2. For every three shards after the first, the Shardbinder can choose to add 1 to the DC of the effect.
3. For every three shards after the first, the Shardbinder can choose to add an extra die of damage to the effect. This may push the damage dealt by the effect above the spell's normal limit.
Once chosen, the bonus effect cannot be changed for that extra shard; different bonuses can be chosen if that shard is acquired yet again. If the contributing shards are removed, the bonuses are lost.

For every shard the Shardbinder possesses, he gains a Corruption Point. If the Shardbinder gains Corruption Points equal to 3 times his level plus casting modifier, he gains the Evil subtype due to all the fiendish energy suffusing his body (his alignment does not change). So long as he has this subtype as a result of his shards, the Shardbinder takes a -2 penalty to saves against mind-affecting effects, ability and energy drain, and possession effects used against him by fiends.

If he gains 5 times that, his body begins to crystallize, reducing his Dexterity by 4 and movement speed by 10, and increasing the save penalty to -4.

At 10 times that, the corruption overcomes his body and he is considered petrified; he can be returned to flesh form as normal, but only if his Corruption Points are first reduced to below 5 times level plus casting modifier.

Legacy Rituals: None. Unlike a traditional legacy item, the Shardbinder's Seed Shard gains power by absorbing more soul shards, rather than improving with the bearer's level and performing specific rituals. However, the Shardbinder must regularly perform a Cleansing Ritual to remove unnecessary or unwanted shards and to prevent the fiendish energy that suffuses his body from taking over or petrifying him. This ritual destroys the discarded shards and lowers the Shardbinder's Corruption, staving off the ultimate detrimental effects of the Seed Shard.