Vampires or Nosferatu are a species of Other that flounders due to the rules of modern magic.
Reputation[]
Modern vampires are infamously weak, fearing even unawakened humans. The original vampires may have found ways to harvest a decent amount of nourishment, but they were crippled by the Seal of Solomon. Their bodies are atrophied, their minds deteriorated, occupying a social role in magical society akin to the most strung-out and detested addicts.[1][2]
Innocent popular culture portrays them in a more positive light, downplaying not only their weaknesses[1] but also how rare and monstrous they are.[3] However many of the weaknesses it describes are accurate, forearming humans against them (without covering enough of their weaknesses to prepare a fledgeling vampire for the problems they'll face.)[2][4]
Origins[]
According to an older text, Nosferatu (probably the same as vampires) are speculated to be the natural counterpart to Banes. Born through the blight of blood, where a Bane may be based on the sufferers of any illness. Spirits of death incubate inside of them[4] and are infused into the victim's tormented soul through repeated feeding.[5]
On the other hand, some speculate that they are descended from life-drinking Heartless.[3]
Appearances[]
None have appeared directly in-story so far.
A woodcut of some vampires appeared in the book on Undead On the Threshold of Death. They resembled huddled, emaciated bat-human hybrids.[2]
Some Fae have been known to roleplay as these wretched beings. They adopt the best traits of vampires, while mixing in their own and dropping the weaknesses. A group of such, who had lost themselves in the illusion, were among the tougher enemies Andy and Eva faced.[6][7]
Maggie Holt has or will likely meet one of them at some time.[8]
Uses[]
Horrible creatures to be pitied but never confronted when they can bite you.[2]
Abilities[]
Seemingly similar to Banes:[4]
- Magic Resistant: Most magic curses and hexes will simply glance off of them due to their undead nature.[9][10]
- Supernatural Strength: It is noted to have a level of above average strength.[11]
- Supernatural Durability: Being already dead, they can be hard to hurt.[12]
- Conversion: By attacking victims it can inflict a "blight of blood" and eventually make them into a creature like itself.[4][5]
Weaknesses[]
Natural Energies: Natural things can be used as a conduit to allow the life energy to escape the dead prison.[4][13] These include:
- Green Wood
- Fresh Bone
- Lighting Strikes
- Running Water (Natural Source)
- Fire
- Daylight
- A spike of crystal
- A stalagmite with a history of attachment to the ground
Need to Feed: Vampires need to drink living[14] human blood. With their prey protected by the Seal of Solomon, vampires are forced to either hunt for scraps; or take from innocents and accept the bad karma it generates. They are often compared to strung-out addicts.[1][2]
Other weaknesses: Vampires have a lot of weaknesses, and many of the things popularized in pop culture are genuinely effective. Their weaknesses are so numerous that newborn vampires are still discovering new ones decades after being turned.[2]
Trivia[]
- The cinematic Nosferatu is one of the codifiers for the popular imagination of vampires. The term itself is an old Romanian one for vampire, popularised in English by Bram Stoker's novel Dracula and subsequent adaptations.
- The author has expressed a boredom with this type of creature, which is why they suck so badly in the Otherverse.[15]
References[]
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 “[Familiar bonds] can be a break from their standard responsibilities or the demands they have for certain foods. A vampire, for example, would not need to drink blood.”
“Ye’d be as dumb as a tit without a curve in it if ye picked a vampire, I’ll tell you that,” Alpeana said.
“Why?” Verona asked. “Also, I want to know everything about this.”
“Vampires?” Alpeana asked.
“Familiars!” Verona said.
“Vampires are not what they are in your media,” Miss said. “The closest analogue would be a drug addict in your world, penniless, desperate, and ground down by reality. Should you find one, it will likely be more scared of you than you are of it. Even if you weren’t a practitioner, it would be so.”
“Got it,” Avery said. “Sad.”
“The Seal of Solomon was far harsher to them than it was to most." - Excerpt from Stolen Away 2.6 - ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 Vampires exist in the classic sense, but in the Pactverse, they're wretched things. They're not the kings and queens of the Pactverse, but the bottom feeders. They may have been decently strong before, but the Seal of Solomon barred their access to humanity and sustenance.
They're strung out meth addicts without a steady supply. Their bodies are long gone, their past relationships destroyed, they have next to nothing, the authorities crack down on them any time they start to figure anything out. They're stupid, ugly, smelly, and weak, and many of the things you've heard about diminish them or bar them, with many other things besides- it's to the point where many new vampires are still discovering new things that screw with them, even 20-30 years after being turned. - Comment by Wildbow on Reddit - ↑ 3.0 3.1 The second answer is that monsters are practitioners. We know about some cases. See Mara in the files for Jacob’s Bell. It’s a common theory with Faerie, and obviously the likes of vampires and werewolves, which are much rarer and more monstrous than conventional media would have us believe. - Excerpt from Gathered Pages: 10
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 :…care must be taken, as the Bane is a thing of blight, and will blight all it touches. Many will alter their Banes to make this contact easier. Fire will serve if the Bane was carelessly wrought, but many will be coated or painted to protect their flesh. One might surmise that the Nosferatu are a natural variation of the Bane, insofar as they are natural. The Nosferatu, if this theory were correct, would incubate spirits of death within them, and depositing them within a victim, inviting them to and from the veil of death. The blight, both pre-existing and given, would be one of the blood.
- As such, consider the same methods that function on the Nosferatu. A length of green wood will serve as a conduit for the living energies to vacate the dead prison that confine them. Natural energies, too, will suffice, with daylight, running water from a natural source, lightning strikes, clean fire if the Bane is not pre-treated, a spike of crystal, or a stalagmite with a history of attachment to the ground serving to provide this conduit of natural forces. Like the Nosferatu, the Bane is a wretched thing, and death should be seen as a mercy. - Morte Vilify: Perversions of Death, quoted in Duress 12.3
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 The Bane is form’d of one with a blight of body, already within the grasp of Death, they yet hold a breath of life. The Dark Necromagus must be at the bedside of the deceased as they cross over, to catch the breath in a prepared vessel. Thrice must the blighted man be bestowed that foul breath that escapes the mouth of the long dead, as airs and humors bloat the corpse, the soul released at death introduced between each to accept and accommodate those airs most foul. During these times the body will be well restrained, as the soul will be in the worst of agonies and the body will not be limited to their normal strength. - Morte Vilify: Perversions of Death, quoted in Duress 12.3
- ↑ She can go toe to toe with a faerie that’s glamoured itself up as a vampire, harboring some of the best traits of both, and still cut the thing’s head from its shoulders. - Interlude 10
- ↑ “Cold-forged iron,” he responded, a little sullen. “Bone. Paper. Every other follows different rule. What looks like a goblin could be a demon, or a wraith, or a glamour. I mean, you remember those ‘vampires’ from out west.”
“The faerie? Sure.”
“You’re not getting what I’m saying. If they can fool themselves into thinking they’re vampires, and believe it to the point it becomes sort of true, sparkly skin aside, then they can fool us. This is what bothers me about all this. You can’t make any guarantees, you can’t slap on convenient labels. It’s why we call them others. You can’t plot-”
“We can try. And if we can murder self-deluding faerie, we can murder whatever this is.” - Excerpt from Bonds 1.1 - ↑ A parasitic, sad wretch of a vampire like in those bad Maggie Holt movies, finally with a willing victim? - Reference to Pactverse in Ward ch 4.4, another of Wildbow's stories
- ↑ :The Bane is oft used as a devise against those who practise, for death has already taken them thrice over, while their spirit and soul are inured to the worst torments and agonies. Barriers will serve their purpose, but hexes and deleterious magics will often glance off the Bane, rendering them a potent devise against the unwary. Without expecting their workings to go awry and come back to them, such a Magus might find themselves dealing with their own practises and the Bane both. [...] Once destroyed, the Bane will never return. - Morte Vilify: Perversions of Death, quoted in Duress 12.3
- ↑ Ty and Alexis’ paper tags touched the skeletal thing, and the papers stuck, a mixture of two very different handwriting styles.
“Nope,” I heard Eva say from upstairs.
The thing brushed at itself with one of its scythe limbs, and the papers came free.
She knew. Is it an anti-practitioner measure? Something special made for coming after people and creatures like us?
- excerpt from Duress 12.3 - ↑ With the sound of her footsteps, the reaper-thing turned, arm raising. Green Eyes used her tail to try and bind the arm down, as if she was tying the skeleton thing down. One more contortion among many that kept her on the offensive, her full body weight piled on it without making it so much as bend, doing her best to stay out of the way of those twin scythes. Even as she worked to entwine it, the reaper still twisted its arm around, upper arm pressed against its body, the bit past the elbow jutting out. It walked toward Kathryn, spike of bone sticking forth.
- excerpt from Duress 12.3 - ↑ Green Eyes pounced on the scythe-armed thing, teeth gnashing as she bit into the bones of its shoulder and neck.
But it was only bone and tattered cloth. There was refuge in simplicity, it seemed.
[...]
Peter threw a tome at it, striking it in the back of the head. Same mistake that Green Eyes had made, trying to fight it or bite. It didn’t function along those lines. It didn’t have flesh to wound. The only hurt that probably mattered was a bone-breaking level of hurt. - Excerpt from Duress 12.3 - ↑ Eva staked the thing through the back.
It crumbled into its constituent parts. I saw a wisp of something person-shaped flow out of the base of the stake.
- excerpt from Duress 12.3 - ↑ At the Threshold of Death.
[...]
In one woodcut, a pair of vampires were weedy, emaciated things with bat features and wings and other stuff all mixed in, huddled in a nook while an onlooker held a lantern, shining it into the alcove. There were ghouls, far more common, who could thrive because unlike Vampires, they could eat the dead, who were plentiful and not innocent. - Excerpt from Cutting Class 6.2 - ↑ I think some characters make passing mention of vampires - at the time I was conceiving of the Pactverse, modern supernatural fiction was taking off. I grew sick of the mention of vampires, so I definitely wanted to downplay them in Pact. - Comment by Wildbow on Reddit