Revenant¶
“I will suck the life from your flesh and leave you a withered corpse!”
The revenant null flexed his arms and assumed a fighting pose. He smiled.
“Little late for that.”
The dead walk among us. Some of them are happier about it than others.
Unlike the necromantic rituals that produce wights and wraiths and zombies, revenants rise from the grave through a combination of an unjust death and a burning desire for vengeance. Creatures sustained on pure will, they have no need of food or water or air—and, unlike their zombified cousins, they retain all their memories and personality from life.
These revenants are rare. Many are hunted by ignorant villagers who see only their dead flesh and assume the worst. Those who survive the pitchfork brigade either choose a solitary life, often as a wandering soul seeking out living company yet constantly in fear of it, or they migrate to a metropolis such as Blackbottom or Capital, where lost souls gather to make a home.
On Revenants¶
“I'm telling you, we are being followed.”
“No one knows we're here. No one even knows this place exists! We got all day. We stash everything here, and take a sample to …” The head thief pulled a vial out of a crate stuffed with straw and looked at it.
“It's just …” The junior cutpurse spoke nervously. “There was this lady knight in Blackbottom sniffing around. She seemed serious. I got this weird … chill when I looked at her.”
“Hey,” the head thief said, his brow furrowed as he looked at the label on the vial. “Where'd you say you bought this stuff? You said a ship—a ship from where?”
“I dunno, uh … uh, Capital I think.”
The head thief looked at the panicking cutpurse. “This lady knight—she have a red and blue device on her shield?”
“Black gods,” one of the other thieves said. “It can't be Lady Filliamo, can it?”
There was a firm knock at the door to the safe house. A door which, from the outside, looked like an unremarkable section of wall.
“Oh, you've got to be kidding me.”
“Nonono! How could she … Capital was nine months ago!”
“She's a revenant, idiot! She doesn't even need air. She could have walked here! Just … into the water and across the bottom of the sea! Black gods, why didn't you say anything?”
“I did! You asshole, I just did! I been trying to tell you for—”
“Man, there is a difference between, ‘Hey I think we're being shadowed,' and, ‘There's a deathless copper coming after us!'”
One of the four thieves opened a vial and dipped his dirk into the red oil within.
“What is that gonna do? She's already dead!”
Another knock at the hidden door. “Forget it. Let her knock. Grab as many as you can, and we'll go out the back.”
The head thief ran for the door out the back of the safe house. He jerked it open—and the other thieves watched as a silver flash silently flared across his forehead.
Through the open door, they could see the silhouette of the knight, her open hand held up in front of her.
She clenched her hand into a fist and the judgment she had placed on the head cutpurse detonated, hurling him backward. He sprawled across the floor, conscious but stunned.
The gray-skinned knight walked into the room. Metal heels rang out on the wooden floor. She seemed relaxed, but her eyes burned with inner fire.
“Boys,” Lady Filliamo said pleasantly. “Busy morning.”
“How did you … this is impossible, how did you find us?”
She looked at the man groaning on the floor. “Your boss didn't tell you about the vengeance mark?”
“You marked us. Back in Capital. You marked one of us and just … just walked here.”
“Don't be stupid. I marked you in Blackbottom. Capital was just normal detective work. I came here by ship.” She smiled—black lips on pale gray skin.
“Come on.” The braver of the three remaining thieves drew twin daggers. “She can't get all of us at—”
Lady Filliamo made a broad gesture with her right hand and argent marks flared across the foreheads of all three thieves. A clatter of weapons hitting the floor. Three pairs of hands slowly rose in the air.
“Good boys. Here, put these on.” She tossed three pairs of manacles on the floor.
“Hang on, you can't arrest us,” one of the thieves, unarmed and still holding his hands up, said. “This isn't Capital. You don't have jurisdiction!”
Lady Filliamo shrugged. “I'm a knight of the church. Jurisdiction's for the city watch.” She drew her silver sword a few inches from the scabbard just to show them the blade.
“I deal in steel.”
Revenant Benefits¶
As a revenant character, you have the following benefits.
Former Life¶
Choose the ancestry you were before you died. Your size equals that ancestry's size. Your speed is 5. You lose all other ancestral benefits from your original ancestry.
Vengeance Mark¶
As a maneuver, you place a magic sigil on a creature within 10 squares of you. When you place a sigil, you can decide where it appears on the creature's body, and whether the sigil is visible to only you or to all creatures.
You always know the direction to the exact location of a creature who bears one of your sigils and is on the same plane of existence as you.
Additionally, you gain the following ability.
Detonate Sigil¶
A magical sigil you placed on a creature explodes with energy.
| Keywords: Attack, Magic, Ranged | Type: Action |
| Distance: Ranged 10 | Target: 1 creature with your sigil |
Power Roll + Reason, Intuition, or Presence:
- 11 or lower: 3 damage; slide 1
- 12–16: 7 damage; slide 2
- 17+: 10 damage; slide 3
Effect: The sigil disappears from the creature.
You can have an active number of sigils equal to your level. You can remove a sigil from a creature harmlessly (no action required). If you are already using your maximum number of sigils, your oldest sigil disappears with no other effect.
Tough But Withered¶
Your undead body grants you cold, corruption, lightning immunity, and poison immunity equal to your level. You also have fire weakness 5. You can't suffocate, and you don't need to eat or drink to stay alive.
Additionally, when your Stamina equals the negative of your winded value, you become inert instead of dying. You can continue to observe your surroundings, but you can't speak, take actions, maneuvers, or triggered actions, or move and you fall prone. If you take any fire damage while in this state, your body is destroyed and you die. Otherwise, after 12 hours, you regain Stamina equal to your recovery value.
Undead Influence¶
Your supernatural gifts allow you to influence other undead. You gain an edge on Reason, Intuition, and Presence tests made to interact with undead creatures.