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T he D r agon an d the P hoe n ixEpisode 2: The Dead of NightCanst thou draw out Leviathan with an hook? or his tongue with a cord which thoulettest down? Canst thou put an hook into his nose? or bore his jaw through with athorn?Job 41:1-2An Episode for the Buffy the VampireSlayer Role-playing GameBy Garner Johnson with additionalcontributions by Timothy S. Brannan.For the KittensIntroductionSix black robed figures stood in atriple circle drawn in powdered bones whichcontrasted markedly with their garments.Each had a seemingly glowing white squareof vellum displayed on their breasts,suspended by a red pin. On the sheets was apentacle of Solomon, a star of David drawnin red blood and surrounded by the names ofvarious archangels and god. They held intheir hands a glistening cream-colored wandwith the words Tetragrammaton and Satanisinscribed along their lengths in silver andgold respectively.A seventh person was laid out alongthe ground, their head facing east and theirarms crossed over their chest as if alreadydead. The slight shaking and shudderingfrom the form belied that conditionhowever. A series of severed left indexfingers surrounded the struggling body in athird circle.“By the virtue of the HolyResurrection, and the torments of thedamned, We conjure and exorcise thouSpirits of the deceased to answer our liegedemands, being obedient unto these sacredceremonies, on pain of everlasting tormentand distress. Berald, Beraold, Balbin, Gab,Gabor, Agaba!”The voices were throaty and feral.The barbarous names spoken with acontrolled ferocity and constrained will. Anmist unnatural for this time of year inSunnydale softened and dampened thevoices so that they did not carry very far.One of the robed figures movedtowards the head of the supine body. Hemuttered something unintelligible in amasculine voice, and the bone wandsuddenly flattened and became knife-like.“Death calls to death,” the othersintoned as the first cut a scarlet line alongthe throat of the immobile captive.“Blood and life, return to the Earth,”they intoned again as the crimson fluidpumped regularly onto the cemetery dirt.“By the mysteries of the deep, by theflames of Banal, by the power of the Eastand the silence of night, by the Holy Rites ofHecate, we conjure and constrain thouDeceased Spirits to present thyselves here1

and reveal unto us thy violence andcalamity. Alim, Jehoh, Jehovah, Agla, On,Tetragrammaton!”A burning red light flashed out fromthe corpse amongst the robed figures intoeach of the fingers laid around it. A deeperand slowly throbbing red tendril snaked outof each finger and wound its way to thirteengraves nearby. The ground over each beganto shake and shortly a hand, the flesh rottedand decayed, thrust upwards. A momentlater a large number of cadaverous formsstood in the tattered remains of funeral suitsand equally tattered flesh. Bright red sparksglowed in sunken sockets that regardedthose that had summoned them.“Adon, Schadai, Eligon, Elion,Lucifage, Eloi, Satanis, Messias, Ja, Hagios,Ho Theos!” The six chanted three times asthey turned outwards towards the zombiesthey had raised.“Go forth from this spot and showthy violence and calamity unto the world!”the first commanded.Initially the zombies seemed tostruggle to move forward, but after amoment they turned and began to leave.Slowly at first, but then moving moreassuredly and less shamblingly the furtheraway they got.The mist thickened,seemingly swallowing all of the obscenefigures.Director InformationThis adventure requires the use of the Buffythe Vampire Slayer Role Playing GameCore Rulebook by Eden Studios.It is intended for Original cast set during ahypothetical Season 7.Characterssupported are Buffy, Dawn, Xander,Willow, Tara, Anya, Giles and Spike.Players also have the option of picking up aSorcerer NPC by Act 3.Players can also use their own characters orpre-generated ones provided in the core2rulebook. Alterations in character/castcontent are expected and welcome. Manyoptions will be given to the players tocustomize the content as they need. TheEpisode should not take more than one,perhaps longish, session to complete, butmay be enhanced as the Director sees fit tomake it longer.The overall plot of this episode isthat a group of necromancers from the Orderof 6 have come to Sunnydale in order toopen a gate into the dimension whereLeviathan lies dead, in order to use theirnecromantic magic to siphon off power fromthe dead god. The Order of 6 is differentfrom anything Buffy and the Scoobies havefaced before. They have access to a lot ofinformation from demonic and necromanticsources, are an organized group, and knowof the Slayer’s existence and the threat sherepresents. As Director keep in mind thatthe organization is fairly intelligent andrealizes they need to keep the Slayerdistracted and out of their way. (Forexample the sacrifices they must use fortheir spells were taken from LA’s homelesswhere they will not be missed and to preventany investigations from aroused suspicionsin Sunnydale.) Once they open the portaland absorb the power there, such minorthreats as the Slayer are negligible andeasily dealt with.The Order has discovered that thepoint where Glory tried to return home wasnot entirely closed by Buffy’s sacrifice. Herblood was close to Dawn’s, but not thesame, and she was not the Key so thereforea weak spot has remained, which can beripped open through a special ritual that theOrder has learned. Note that the Order doesnot need Dawn as the Key to do this. Nordo they know that Dawn was/is the Key.That is irrelevant to them. All they careabout is enacting their ritual and getting atthe power beyond.They have four plans to allow themto succeed at their mission. 1. They will

raise some zombies and set them loose towreak havoc, thus occupying the Slayer’sattention. 2. They have three shapeshiftingspirits that can assume the form of anyonewhose blood has been spilled within the last24 hours. They intend to use these beings toconfuse the Slayer and Scoobies and sowdissension within their ranks. At the veryleast they will provide another distraction tomask the Order’s true intentions by alsothreatening to open the Hellmouth thusdrawing attention away from the weak pointthey need to open. 3. They will raise theskeletal remains of the Knights ofByzantium that Glory killed. Their leader’sbody was transported back home, but therest of the remains were interred inSunnydale.These will provide fineguardians with a higher than normal degreeof fighting skill. The Knights also blameBuffy for their deaths, after all she had theKey and didn’t relinquish it, and some sheactually slew directly, so they should fightwith more fervor against her. 4. Ben’sbody itself is also buried here in Sunnydale.The Order will raise this as well, and callGlory back to inhabit it. Glory will bepissed at Buffy for stopping her, while Benis mad at Giles for killing him. Yes, theOrder is playing with a bit of fire here,Glory will keep getting stronger the longershe is back and would eventually slip theircontrol. However, they reason that once thepower of Leviathan is theirs, they will haveno problem controlling her or sending herback.Besides being able to animate thedead, necromancy allows for the divinationof the future through the dead. This meansthat if the group does something you as thedirector did not expect, there is a reasonablechance that the Order DID expect it andcould plan a counter ahead of time. As said,this is a foe much more organized andresourceful than any ones Buffy haspreviously faced.However, they are not all powerful.There are several things they did not, andcan not, “see” or divine. The first is thatTara is back. Her ties to “The Powers ThatBe” kept her return secret, so they are notplanning on having to face an active witch.Similarly, their information is that Willowhas given up magic and is no longer capableof spellcraft. They do not know about theCodex or that Tara is aiding her soulmatewith white magic. Again they are notprepared to face this. Finally Giles andAnya are harder to clearly predict. Anya isa Vengeance Demon and thus hard to divineand Giles ties to the demon Eyghon, and hislimited power, make him harder to clearly“see” as well. That is partially why theOrder wants the shapeshifters to drive thesetwo off or separate them from the group.As a final note, this episode isdesigned to probably take about 6 hours,depending on combats, though it could lasttwo sessions. It is also a bit more difficultroleplaying wise as it asks certain castmembers to play out a shapeshifter when ittakes their forms (to try and help fool theother players as to what is going on!) andsome degree of intercharacter angst shouldalso be played out. Otherwise the actionfactor is fairly high.The following handouts are includedto help each player get into character andgive them an idea what their prime concernsare.Buffy: At the moment Buffy’s mainresolve is to be a better parent for Dawn.She wants to make sure that Dawn is moreinvolved with the Scoobies and that she seesall that Sunnydale has to offer. Dawn is inhigh school now and Buffy also wants her tosucceed there as much as possible. She isstill trying to find the line between beingDawn’s sister, her surrogate mother, and herfriend. She also still feels guilty abouthaving ignored Dawn last year and is tryingto make that up to her.3