Bottled Emotion

By S.M. Agle (agles@mindnet.org)

Level Three Ritual

Description

With this ritual, most common among Giovanni, some Kyasid, and Spirit Thaumaturgists among the Tremere, the Thaumaturgist can literally siphon an emotion from a mortal, bottling it for future use. The emotions most often bottled include fear, pain, and grief, because they are the easiest to harvest. With a little more work, other emotions such as joy, hope, and even love can be obtained. When bartering for services with spirits, these emotions are incredibly valuable.

Some Giovanni also use this ritual to ensure mortal servants that are literally fearless, although most find that this makes them too difficult to control.

System: A bottle must be made by the Thaumaturgist, a difficult task involving molten glass and intense heat. Certain herbs and powders must be added to the glass while still molten, including a large quantity of gold dust, giving the finished bottle a shimmering, multi-colored sheen. Once finished, the bottle must be held before a mortal's mouth, to catch the exhalation during an intense emotional state. This begins the process, which cannot be interrupted save by means of a Thaumaturgic Disruption ritual. For the next hour, during which the bottle must remain within one hundred yards of the mortal to which it is now attuned, the mortal will be wracked by uncontrollable emotion, unable to stop feeling whatever he/she felt when the bottle was primed. This emotion, in an almost-visible stream (quite visible to those with Auspex 2), will flow from the mortal's mouth to the bottle. After the hour is up, the mortal will fall, completely drained of that emotion (In roughly three months, the victim's aura will begin to heal, and by the end of six months, they will be able to feel normally once more.) and the bottle will cap itself, now glowing with the appropriate aura color to those who can see such a thing. The ritual drains so deeply, and concentrates the emotion so greatly, that the bottle will now contain enough raw emotion to provide a wraith with 10 points of Pathos if the emotion bottled is included in that wraith's Passions. When emptied, the bottle must be purified by means of a level one ritual that must be learned separately, and may then be reused.

This ritual has a second use, which remained unknown until Ignazio Giovanni discovered it quite by accident. Should a bottle be smashed, the emotion is spilled in an area effect blast affecting mortals and kindred and wraith alike. Breaking the bottle is not easy, requiring five successes on a strength roll difficulty nine, which must be obtained in one round as the bottle will instantly repair cracks. The emotion will cover a one yard radius per point of Pathos contained at the time. To resist the emotion, victims must roll Willpower at a difficulty of 10. It will wear off in a number of minutes equal to the amount of Pathos in the bottle at the time it was smashed.