*Ignores the last two pages of discussion*
*Looks for Servant to post*
Yes, how about this one.
*******
*******
Hēi Bái Wú Cháng (黑白无常)
Class: (False) Ruler
Gender: Female
Height: 168 cm (White) – 160 cm (Black)
Weight: 52 kg (White) – 49 kg (Black)
Three Sizes: 81/58/84 (White) – 85/58/81 (Black)
Alignment: Lawful Neutral
Appearance:
* Xie Bian (White): A young woman with pale skin, white hair, red eyes and legs that seem to never end. She wears white thigh highs with frilly blue hems, a white strapless one-piece that resembles a school swimsuit and bizarrely huge, detached white sleeves with blue borders. She also wears a tall white hat with gold adornments, a big belt of ceremonial rope with a pair of ceremonial demon-like masks tied to it, and two hair ornaments shaped like blue roses, large enough to hide her ears.
* Fan Wujiu (Black): A young woman with black hair, elfin ears, blood red eyes and a body as shapely as that of her white companion. Two red, sharply curved horns adorn the top of her head, from which complicated teardrop-like extensions protrude out of. She wears black thigh highs, a black strapless one piece with gold and red hems and ample cleavage, and floor-length black sleeves with flower motifs. Her shoulders are protected by black pauldrons shaped like demonic heads.
Hei-Bai-Wu-Chang_pcw_01af49d3350f9280ee7b419e06bbe90f.jpg
|
Black |
White |
Strength |
E |
D+ |
Endurance |
E |
D+ |
Agility |
B |
B+ |
Magic |
A |
C |
Luck |
E |
D |
Noble Phantasm |
B |
B |
Class Skills (shared):
* Magic Resistance: Grants protection against magical effects.B – Cancels spells with a chant below three verses. Even if targeted by High-Thaumaturgy and Greater Rituals, it is difficult for Ruler to be affected.
* Presence Detection: The skill unique to the Servant supposed to supervise the Holy Grail War. The ability to detect other Servants and local mana sources.D+ – A low rank for a Servant that, while suitable for the role, was not supposed to claim the position of ‘Ruler’. The Hēi Bái Wú Cháng are aware of a Servant summoning the moment it happens. They may also sense how many Servants remain at any given time and the gender and elemental affinity of every Servant, if any.
Personal Skills (Black):
* Sphere Boundary: A technique in which, by use of Qi, one perceives the circumstances of his surroundings, and can make his own existence vanish. For those who have mastered it, unification with the world and even making their figure naturally transparent becomes possible.A++ – The nigh-supreme ability of a high-level spirit that embodies the concept of “yin”. Unification with the world allows for miracles such as extrasensory perception to several kilometers, large-scale manipulation of ambient energies, ultra-long-range spellcasting and complete erasure of presence.
Personal Skills (White):
* Chinese Martial Arts: A Chinese rationality. A value that measures one's mastery of the martial arts that made becoming one with the universe as its objective. Its difficulty to learn is of the highest level and, unlike other Skills, it is at A Rank that one is at a level where he is said to have finally "learned it".A+ – Complete understanding of Taoist martial arts and mastery of the Eighteen Arms of Wushu.
Personal Skills (Shared):
* Synergistic Destiny: The skill unique to those Heroic Spirits that can only be summoned as part of a pair, such as Romulus and Remus or the Dioscuri. A supernatural resonance of souls that allows the bound companions to share perceptions and thoughts. Higher ranks provide greater benefits, but the sense of individuality is lost.C+ – The partners can share perception and communicate telepathically to a distance of up to eight kilometers. Bonus effect of rank-up to Endurance and Luck when fighting together.
Noble Phantasm (Black):
** Èr Yé Bó Dà Lián – The Gentle Blade that Guides the Virtuous to the Underworld (二爷伯大镰, Second Grand Elder Great Scythe)
Type: Anti-Unit/Anti-Army
Rank: C+
Range: 2-3/1-100
Maximum number of targets: 1 person/∞
The monstrous scythe of Fan Wujiu; an awkward choice of work implement for the less martial of the two Underworld guides. The part that connects the curved blade to the snaith has been meticulously crafted to resemble the head of a fearsome demonic beast equal parts bird of prey and dragon. The blade itself, tinged a bright red, looks like the awesomely sharp beak of an ancient avian predator. The dark-colored snaith is shaped like a J-letter, the curve pointing in the direction opposite to the blade.
In spite of its fearsome appearance, the scythe is in fact a protective weapon. In its Anti-Army function, the invocation of its name creates a Bounded Field centered on the weapon’s current position. The size of the field is defined by the wielder’s will and prana capacity. The Bounded Field ensures that souls that lose their anchors to the material realm for whatever reason—most likely death and/or destruction of the body—are properly dispersed and returned to the Root. Absorption, redirection, transmutation and any other form of soul-tampering is impeded within the Bounded Field. However, the creation of such a large scale effect implies a trade-off with effectiveness: particularly large souls might not be directed towards the Root quickly enough to be protected from external tampering; and particularly powerful magic rituals can overcome the protection of the Bounded Field.
The passive Anti-Unit function of the scythe is identical, but substantially more powerful, as the effect is focused solely on the victim of the blade. Upon invoking the name of the blade, Fan Wujiu can make a single attack of power far superior to what she could accomplish without extreme magical reinforcement (C-rank), at no cost of prana to herself. A creature killed by this attack will have its soul safely delivered to Akasha, no questions asked—an absolute commandment impinged upon the soul, irrevocable and irremovable by any power other than the will of Akasha itself. In a way, it is the worst possible Noble Phantasm that could be wielded in the midst of the Heaven’s Feel ritual.
Noble Phantasm (White):
* Dà Yé Bó Chán Zhàng – The Banner Swaying before the Gates of the Underworld (大爷伯禪仗, Great Grand Elder Zen Weapon)
Type: Anti-Unit
Rank: D+
Range: 2-3
Maximum number of targets: 1 person
The monk’s spade Xie Bian uses as her weapon. Despite its charmingly ornate appearance, its owner wields it dexterously and with deadly efficiency. The neck of the polearm connecting the bluish silver spade to the dark blue stick is adorned with an elaborate ornament of gold and embedded lapis stones resembling a cross made of circles connected at their edges. The opposite side, which should carry a crescent blade, instead ends in a bizarre golden mask of somewhat demonic appearance, whose mouth holds a blue and white banner with ancient runes sewn along its surface. The spells inscribed on the banner are the only spells Xie Bian knows and can use. The list includes ancient curses, spells associated with distant transference of energy and information and, most importantly, the thaumaturgical principles and incantations of the original form of Tao, from which all Taoist and onmyoudou magic came from. The runes are in fact a thaumatugical spell engine of divine origin; they act as an independent magic crest, which simplifies the process of spellcasting and reduces casting time roughly by half (High-Speed Aria).
Noble Phantasm (Shared):
* Wújí ér Tàijí – Anthology of the Dual Nature of Existence (無極而太極, The Supreme Polarity that is Non-Polar)
Type: Anti-Unit
Rank: B
Range: --
Maximum number of targets: 2 people
The externalization of the chimeric legend of the Hēi Bái Wú Cháng which, despite its many variations and expositions throughout time and space, remains firmly embedded in the principle of the dual nature of the two eternal companions and their duty as guides of the Underworld. Most appropriately for its very nature, it can be considered two separate Noble Phantasms with completely different effects acting in unison.
In its first aspect, it is an addition to the Hēi Bái Wú Cháng’s Synergistic Destiny skill. Upon invoking this Noble Phantasm, the two partners share the effects of their Noble Phantasms: Xie Bian’s spade can direct souls to Akasha and Fan Wujiu’s scythe displays the ancient spells as glowing symbols on the flat of the blade.
The second aspect is a reinterpretation of the two spirit’s role directing the proper destination of soul and spirit. As entities closed connected to the yin-yang duality, the way this second aspect of the Noble Phantasm empowers them is also divided into two possibilities according to the gender of the opponent they are facing:
- Against a male opponent, the white guide Xie Bian’s attacks drain the enemy’s prana, while the black guide’s Fan Wujiu’s attacks disrupt the connection that anchors the soul to the body. While an ordinary human will be inevitably killed even by the slightest touch, spiritual beings such as a Servants are allowed an Endurance roll to make a conscious effort to maintain their metaphysical stability. Spirits with Endurance A or higher are not affected by this effect.
- Against a female opponent, the roles are reversed: Fan Wujiu’s attacks drain prana, and Xie Bian’s attack forcefully separate body from soul.
Setting Notes
The two guides of the Underworld, who escort all souls, both good and evil, to their proper judgment at the hands of the Lord of Hell, according to the millenary Chinese tradition. The White Guard of Impermanence, Xie Bian, hunts down the evil souls that refuse to accept their death and remain in the mortal realm to stalk and hurt the living. The Black Guard of Impermanence, Fan Wujiu, gently leads the souls of the good to the gates of the Underworld. With their dual natures, they separate the yin and yang components of spirits and souls, thus ensuring that all souls properly make it to the halls of their Lord.
The story of how the two friends, Xie Bian and Fan Wujiu, became the guides of Hell has been told and retold thousands of times. It exists in dozens of different forms across different locations and periods of history. Sometimes they are law enforcers who lost a prisoner during a transfer and whose search ended up in sad death. Sometimes they are constables who die after preventing the British from spreading their opium market throughout mainland China. Sometimes they are simply a pair of very close friends, and Fan Wujiu finds her death while waiting for Xie Bian to find medicine for her. In her grief upon finding her dearest friend’s corpse, Xie Bian takes her own life. Regardless of the narrative, the constant element is Fan Wujiu’s death and Xie Bian’s subsequent suicide.
The original story (in this setting) goes all the way back to the first emperor of China. Xie Bian and Fan Wujiu were the attendants, concubines and bodyguards of Ying Zheng, the young man that would eventually become Qin Shi Huang. At the age of 21, while King Ying Zheng traveled to the capital of Yong, the false eunuch Lao Ai attempted a coup with the support of Prime Minister Lü Buwei. Lao Ai’s men aimed for the young king’s life on the road. King Zheng and his two faithful concubines escaped multiple ambushes, but assassins were rapidly closing in on them and a final, dire assault was imminent. The man that would become emperor came up with a plan: they would feed false information to the peasants, who would tell the assassins that King Zheng and his women would split and take different routes through the forest to confuse them. They would also leak the location of a certain bridge where the three would supposedly meet again. However, only one of the women would actually reach the bridge—King Zheng would take a completely different route back to the Qin capital while his attendants captured the assassin’s attention.
It was a suicide mission, and the two women, loyal to Zheng and to each other to the end, accepted their fate without hesitation. Fan Wujiu was the one chosen by a coin toss, and it was she who was felled by the assassins expecting the threesome at the bridge. By the time they realized they had been fooled, King Zheng was already well on the way to gathering his men to go after Lao Ai’s supporters. Xie Bian, who had led her own pursuers on a merry chase all over the forest as she killed them one by one, eventually reached the bridge to find her best friend’s corpse surrounded by the bodies of those she had manage to take with her. In one last act of loyalty and love, instead of trying to make her way back to her liege, Xie Bian took her own life right in front of Fan Wujiu’s corpse, so that her lifeless form would fall on top for one last, eternal embrace.
However, the planet had other plans for them. Unlike other Heroic Spirits, who are bound to the Throne of Heroes until the time comes for their abilities to be of use, these two were assigned a very specific job: to intervene whenever souls are being denied their proper return to Akasha for whatever reason. They cannot be everywhere, so their performance is far from ideal, but the two girlfriends, now bound to each other for eternity, perform their duties with patience and dedication.
Keywords
Magical Talent: Of the two, it is Fan Wujiu who has significant talent for magic—which is troublesome because Xie Bian is the one with the Noble Phantasm that acts like a book of spells. The White Guard of Impermanence is no slouch, however, focusing instead on qi-based abilities to reinforce her body. The plus-signs on her physical parameters reflect this emphasis. Together, they make for a decently balanced team, with Xie Bian acting as the front-liner while Fan Wujiu offers medium-to-long range support.