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About Occult Arts
Wondrous arts are the abilities in the Phantom World that go past ordinary martial study. Unlike the traditional work on the inside and the outside of the body, they reach into strange ground: life and death, souls, reshaping. People who hold them have power past ordinary fighters — and may pay a great price for it.
They are rare in the Phantom World, held by only a few factions and a few individuals. The best known are The Order’s Ghost Envoy arts and Transcension.
Introduction
The Ghost Envoy arts are an Occult Art held by The Order. They can take a dead man and turn him into a Ghost Envoy who obeys whoever made him. The Ghost Envoy Corps is The Order’s basic strength: huge in number, and frightening to face.
How it works
The Ghost Envoy arts use a particular rite and particular drugs to turn a corpse into a fighting tool with no mind of its own, obeying only the one who made it. A Ghost Envoy keeps some of the martial skill it had in life, and none of its own will.
What it is used for
- Ghost Envoy Corps: The Order’s basic strength, and there are a great many of them
- Assassination: Ghost Envoys can be sent on contracts too dangerous for anyone else, with no losses to think about
- Intelligence: they can get inside an enemy position and bring back what they find
Introduction
Transcension drives Sha-Chi into a body by particular means and rebuilds that body around it, so that it gains power past an ordinary fighter. It usually costs the subject his reason and leaves a monster that only knows how to kill.
How it works
Transcension pours a large amount of Sha-Chi into the body and changes its structure — muscle, bone and nerve all reinforced. Too much Sha-Chi eats into the mind, and the subject loses his reason.
What it is used for
- Mirage’s masks: the mask soldiers Mirage builds through Transcension
- The Bastion of Mó’s arts: the Bastion’s martial study also involves Transcension
- The Order’s experiments: The Order has run Transcension experiments of its own
The Poisoned-Heart Art
An Occult Art created by the mysterious physician Ghost Hand. It brings a fighter’s skill back quickly, and leaves him only sixty-six days. Soul accepted it while The Order was hunting him.
Mechanical arts
The craft of building mechanisms, represented by the Ying clan: enormous mechanism men, flying ships, and more. It is not an Occult Art in the strict sense, but the technology runs so far ahead of its time that it counts as a power of its own.
Illusion craft
An Occult Art that uses Sha-Chi to build illusions and draw enemies into attacking them. Soul’s Phantom Kill technique involves illusion craft.
Wondrous arts against martial study
| Aspect | martial arts | Wondrous arts |
|---|---|---|
| Foundation | inner work, outer work, footwork | life and death, souls, reshaping |
| Learning | can be mastered by training | needs a special gift or a rite |
| Price | time and effort | may cost you your reason, or your life |
| Power | depends how far you train it | usually past ordinary martial study |
| Rarity | fairly common | fairly rare |