Custom Blood Magic: Ritual

Diamond's Doom
This ritual is the trademark of John Diamond, Jonestown's sire. It enchants a wooden object into a powerful anti‐Kindred weapon. The object can be as large as a wooden stake or a cane, or as small as a letter opener; in any case, it must be roughly shaped like a stabbing weapon.

System: A Diamond’s Doom stake gains an additional trait for use in combat challenges. Like any common stake, it can be used to impale the heart of and immobilize a vampire. The attacker makes three simple tests, not two, and if any two of them succeed, the defender is staked. Once the enchanted weapon is in a vampire's heart, it takes root, and cannot be removed without ripping out the heart and putting the vampire into torpor‐‐a disaster for low‐generation Kindred. Furthermore, if weapon and heart are

removed‐‐a task involving considerable strength or crude butchery‐‐the vampire remains staked, similar to the results of staking a removed heart as in Heart of Darkness. If the heart is burned or exposed to the sun, the vampire is destroyed. Furthermore, if the heart is outside of the body of the kindred for more than one hour, it begins to decay, and will lead to the death of the kindred who’s heart it is (this ritual is not a cheap alternative to Heart of Darkness, and does not provide the protections of the heart that the Advanced Serpentis does).

Aegis may be blown to avoid death by heart deterioration. The heart will re‐form in the body when Aegis is blown. The weapon will release its grip and slide out easily if the true name of the one who wielded it is spoken as it is pulled. Anyone may remove it by this method. Other methods of removal would be by the use of Vicissitude (up to Bonecraft is required), the ritual Rotten Wood will destroy the stake, Decay (First Basic Hands of Destruction) will destroy the stake (the Second Basic Gnarl Wood will not work). Other methods such as burning the stake out with a blowtorch will only result in the death of the person so staked. The ritual Purity of Flesh will also expel the stake.

Those who can see auras will notice a shimmering cloud of menace and hate around the weapon if they think to check. Anyone who tries to use Spirit's Touch or its equivalent will be overwhelmed by visions of pain and violence from the malevolent intelligence that inhabits the weapon if they attempt to "read" it. Whether they win or lose, they will gain no useful information from the Spirit's Touch. This ritual can by no means be combined with Shaft of Belated Quiescence or Splinter Servant.