Resurrection Pit

From SFWiki

A Resurrection Pit is an alchemical and magickal device that is used to regenerate and restore the dead to life. Resurrection pits are Blood Magick devices.

Individuals are bound to specific Resurrection Pits. Upon dying, the individual's body and soul is discorporated instantly and pulled into the Corruption dimension where it remains until enough energy is regenerated by the soul of the dead (it is possible for this to take no time at all). At this time, the body is reconstructed inside of the bound Resurrection Pit and the individual returns to life.

Since Resurrection Pits are tied to Corruptive Blood Magick, those who use them invariably gain a small amount of Corruption whenever they are used.

Once an individual is bound to a Resurrection Pit, they are bound to the totality of Blood Magicks in an irrevocable way: they can never unbind from a Pit. However, it is possible for an individual to change the specific Resurrection Pit that they are bound to. All that it takes to bind to a pit is simply touching the "ichor" that bubbles within it; no other magick is required.

Before the existence of the Resurrection Pit, death was final and irreversible. The creation of the first Resurrection Pit has been tied to the event that created a pinpoint gate to the Corruption dimension and the continual creation of new Pits is theorized to be one of the primary reasons for the spreading of the Blight.

[edit] History

The creation of the first Pit is credited to Fausto of Napoli, a wizard and member of the Pompeii Wise Council. Fausto was a known addict of opium, and had become increasingly distant from the Council and society in general. He would spend days locked in his laboratory, performing experiments with the magickal science of Ley Depletion. He, like all wizards - even opium addicted ones - kept copius notes, however, so it was later determined that he had begun experimenting with Ley Depletion on a living target: himself.

Fausto disappeared one day without a trace, and it was only after he hadn't come out of the laboratory for a week that his apprentice, Drago, broke in to see that he hadn't killed himself. There, Drago found the lab in a state of manic dissarray - books everywhere, tables turned over. In one corner, however, there sat a new element to the lab: a curious, bathtub like device made of stone and carved with runes. Bubbling in the center of it was a grey, gruel-like substance, and he found it warm to the touch despite there being no source of heat.

Drago, being that he didn't much care for his master, and being an apprentice (and therefore stupid), decided to keep this knowledge for himself. He tried working through Fausto's notes but they were incomprehensible.

It wasn't until a few weeks later that Drago understood the enormity of what the strange tub was, as he was killed accidentally, thrown from horseback. However, from his perspective, he saw himself fly from the horse and then suddenly found himself back in the lab, submerged in the ichor of the pit. At this point, he took all of Fausto's notes to the Wise Council.

At first, the council was wary of this new development, and tried to keep it a secret. However, some of the council created their own pits in secret, working from Fausto's notes. Gradually, the existence of "Pit Magick" had become a "public secret." Eventually, the magickal knowledge was stolen by spies on the Council and sold to other nationalities.

Within five years of the creation of the first Pit, a huge percentage of the wealthier population had been pit-bound. Within ten years, pit-binding was compulsory for many militaries. As the knowledge spread, more and more common folk found themselves with access to a Pit, and eventually children were bound at birth.

The existence of the Resurrection Pit has radically altered the state of the military world. Wars are no longer about attrition of soldiers and are instead almost entirely about control of supply lines and equipment. Many prisons will force prisoners to bind to an internal pit, so that they cannot use death as a method of escape.