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[劳伦斯·塔利斯曼]

阿萨库之路 The Path of Asakku

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无论阿萨库的起源是什么，说书人都能用阿萨库之路代表血族对精神污染的臣服。当吸血鬼沉迷于变幻术，并对这项律能本身表现出认同时，他就走上了这条道路。这并不总是一趟自愿的旅程；有些人是在与阿萨库的受害者接触后，不自觉地追寻堕落。

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No matter the ultimate origin of the Asakku state, the Storyteller may use the Path of the Asakku to represent a Kindred’s surrender to its spiritual pollution. Vampires set upon the Path when they grow obsessed with Vicissitude to the point of identifying with the Discipline itself. This is not always a voluntary journey; some unconsciously seek corruption after making contact with another victim of Asakku.

要获得这条心路的资格，角色必须将其当前的人性或心路等级降至三级或三级以下，并遵照《吸血鬼》20周年版核心规则中315—316页的规则。角色可以从另一条启蒙心路转移至阿萨库之路。角色必须至少达到四级变幻术，并通过摄入阿萨库的血液、学习观察者的知识或者完成其他说书人设置的任务来接触这条心路。

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To qualify for the Path, the character must lower her current Humanity or Path rating to 3 or less and follow the rules set out in V20, pp. 315-316. The character may transfer from another Path of Enlightenment to the Path of Asakku. The character must attain at least four dots in Vicissitude and make contact with the Path by ingesting the blood of an Asakku, studying the lore of the Watchers, or performing another task set by the Storyteller.

走上这条心路的第一级已经是一个无可挽回的选择，角色无法再次更换心路，如果她的心路等级将至0，她就会迷失在心兽中，成为说书人控制的角色。说书人可以对身负强大法术与玄奥仪式的角色作例外(译注：就是这种情况下，玩家不会失去对角色的控制），但如果这些法术与仪式被发现，编年史就会永久地改变，因为埃利乌德（译注:真手下属的一个部门，又叫阴影十字军，以猎杀阿萨库为业），现在可以治愈而不是摧毁阿萨库了。

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Taking the first dot of this Path is an irrevocable choice. The character cannot switch Paths again, and if her rating drops to 0, she is lost to the Beast and falls under the Storyteller’s control. The Storyteller might make exceptions for mighty spells and obscure rituals, but if discovered, these permanently alter the chronicle, since the Elioud can now cure instead of destroy the Asakku.

别名：堕落者
美德：坚定与本能
气场：出世。阿萨库之道的追随者们采取一种怪异的行为方式。绝大部分人不断使用变幻术。即使他们尝试融入人类社会，但除却最精明机敏的人之外，所有人都会犯下一些不同寻常的错误，将自己定位为不近人世的生物。他们对社会习俗置之不理，只凝视着奇怪的目标。一个阿萨库的气场适用于关于超感与神秘的掷骰。
基础信念：阿萨库的追随者们所信奉的与其说是一种思想体系，不如说是一种痴迷于研究变幻术，同时与隐藏于背后的黑暗智能体交流所促成的存在状态。作为一条凭借直觉获知的心路当中的成员，堕落者们往往要一起共事一段时间后才能使用共同的术语，即使高阶追随者有时会展现出一种怪异的同步性。他们可能将召唤出来的存在称为“内心之影”或“观察者”，或者将其辨认为是与变幻术相关联的孽躯魔。
变幻术是堕落者们痴迷的中心点。阿萨库之路通过血液与指导广泛地传播这一种力量。堕落者们憎恨通过氏族与血系正常承袭变幻术的血族，特别注意转化和摧毁他们。
一般能力：因为这条心路依赖于获取原初的超自然能力，阿萨库们越来越沉迷于无形的力量，磨炼他们的超感，并掌握神秘知识。一些堕落者对他们种族的历史与律能/血律显著的效果产生了兴趣，并且还研究起了学术和科学。他们也清楚自己会因为身上的疾病而被猎杀，因而有时会学习潜行和盗窃来掩藏自身踪迹。
偏好律能/血律：如前所述，堕落者们青睐变幻术，且确实必须拥有它。其他律能/血律并没有被禁止，但时常被忽略。若只是为了创造组合律能/血律去拓展变幻术的作用范围，也有些特别虔诚的阿萨库会提高其他律能/血律的能力。

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Nicknames: Corrupted
Virtues: Conviction and Instinct
Bearing: Otherworldly. Followers adopt an alien demeanor. Most utilize their Vicissitude constantly. Even when they attempt to blend in, all but the cleverest make unusual mistakes, marking themselves as beings unfamiliar with the human world. They ignore social conventions and stare in odd directions. An Asakku’s bearing modifier applies to Awareness and Occult rolls to sense supernatural energies.
Basic Beliefs: Asakku followers are less an ideology than a state of being prompted by the obsessive study of Vicissitude and communion with the dark intelligences behind it. As members of an intuitive Path, the Corrupted only use common terminology after working together for some time, though advanced followers display a strange synchronicity at times. They may call the presence they summon forth a “shadow within” or a “Watcher,” or identify with one of the Qlippothic demons associated with Vicissitude.
Vicissitude is the focus of the Corrupted’s obsessions. It spreads this power through blood and instruction as widely as possible. They resent untainted Kindred who inherit Vicissitude through a Clan or bloodline, devoting special attention to converting or destroying them.
Common Abilities: Since their Path relies on acquiring raw supernatural power, Asakku grow obsessed with invisible forces, honing their Awareness and master the Occult Knowledge. Some Corrupted grow interested in the history of their kind or the measurable effects of their Disciplines, and study Academics and Science as well. They are well aware that they would be hunted for their disease and sometimes cultivate Stealth and Larceny to cover their tracks.
Preferred Disciplines: As noted, Corrupted favor Vicissitude, and indeed must have it. Other Disciplines are not disallowed, but often fall by the wayside in focus. However, some particularly devoted Asakku develop other Disciplines if only to create Combination Disciplines to broaden their Vicissitude’s scope。

心路道德
• 你并非是一个吸血鬼，而是律能/血律的显化：一个观察者的化身或一个心兽的阴影。
• 你不再是一个独立的个体，而是猛禽翼上的一根羽毛，或是无边心海中的一段记忆。
• 掌握变幻术，它将揭开万古的诡秘。
• 从氏族或血系承袭变幻术的非阿萨库者是在篡夺这一力量。转化或摧毁他们。
• 你的内心之声呼唤着大地之上的存在。分享你的力量、鲜血以及承载这一切的心路。
• 向敌人隐藏你的本性。在迈向你的最终转化之前，准备一个栖身之所吧。

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The Ethics of the Path
• You are not a vampire. You are a Discipline personified: an emanation of a Watcher or a shadow within your Beast.
• You are no more an individual than a raptor’s feather on a wing or a single memory locked in a mind with a million memories.
• Master Vicissitude and it will unlock the secrets of the Ancients.
• Non-Asakku who inherit Vicissitude from a Clan or bloodline usurp power. Convert or destroy them.
• The voice within you cries for a presence on Earth. Share your power, blood, and Path to host it.
• Hide your nature from enemies. Prepare a place to dwell in advance of your ultimate transformation.

阿萨库之路的罪孽等级表
等级	道德准则	理由
10	使用或回答从前的姓名	你并非吸血鬼，你是力量之网的其中一缕丝线。
9	拒绝每一个使用变幻术的机会	成汝之力，为汝之能。
8	未能在掌握变幻术上尽善	竭尽汝之力，找到心中的观察者吧。
7	未能犯下不凋花之罪，或未使修习变幻术的氏族成员皈依	收回他们窃取的力量。
6	拒绝教导变幻术	使观察者以千百之眼看世界。
5	允许敌人发现你真正的庇护所	汝之巢穴归于观察者。
4	背叛另一个堕落者	同自黑暗而来，共闯天下而去。
3	让敌人发现你的真本性	让该隐的私生子们忘记他们赠礼的来源，直至我们准备公开回收这一切。
2	拒绝使受你血缚者皈依圣道	观察者要求追随者展现更强大的力量。
1	在非麻痹状态下，拒绝每晚使用变幻术	内心的喃喃之影应诉诸口头。

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Hierarchy of Sins against the Asakku
Rating Moral Guideline Rationale
10 Using or answering to your former name You are not a vampire. You are one strand in a web of power.
9 Refusing to use Vicissitude at every opportunity Become your power.
8 Failing to increase your command of Vicissitude to the greatest extent possible You must apply all your efforts to identifying with the Watcher within.
7 Failing to commit Amaranth or convert a member of the Clan that practices Vicissitude Take back the power they have stolen.
6 Refusing to teach Vicissitude Let the Watcher see through a thousand eyes.
5 Allowing enemies to discover your true haven Your lair belongs to the Watcher.
4 Betraying another of the Corrupted We emanate from the same darkness and must claw our way into the world together.
3 Allowing enemies to discover your true nature Let Caine’s bastards forget the origins of their gifts until we are ready to reclaim them openly.
2 Refusing to convert those under the blood bond to the Path The Watcher requires followers to manifest more powerfully.
1 Failing to use Vicissitude nightly, unless in torpor The murmuring shadow within must speak.

嬗变
作为一个行走在阿萨库之路上的吸血鬼，她越来越臣服于变幻术，继而她获得了一些特殊能力。这些嬗变代表了这一律能/血律的意志扩散到了其他该隐子嗣与生物，以及其更牢牢地抓住吸血鬼意识的能力。心路的追随者在心路的第一级获得司罪掌孽能力，此后每一个偶数等级选择一个嬗变。她可以反复获得与失去能力，这去取决于她与律能/血律之支配实体的协调程度。一旦嬗变被选择，它就被确定——当角色从跌落的心路等级恢复并重新取得资格时，她恢复之前的嬗变。

司罪掌孽（所有阿萨库共有）：堕落者将她的变幻术经验花费乘数减一。以变幻术构成的组合律能购入花费减半，四舍五入。

授血启明：堕落者可以将堕落的该隐子嗣转化成像她一样的阿萨库。受害者必须处于麻痹状态且完全放血，之后堕落者必须用自身血池替换对方至少一半的血池点数。
在下个黄昏时分，目标将醒来，皈依阿萨库之路。如果受害者之前没有变幻术，他将获得一级变化术，但同时在其最薄弱的律能/血律上失去一级。被转换的角色在直至达到四级变幻术之前不能超过心路的第一级。授血启明视作血缚中的两个步骤。

絮语萦心：低语的心兽或观察者使吸血鬼的脑海充斥着一连串不谐的声音与不可思议的图像。难以猜度的情绪荡漾在其气场中。心灵感应在絮语之墙前败下阵来。观占术及相似的能力除却注意到其怪异、朦胧的表象外，不再能读出角色的气场。

掩星：阿萨库越发怪异的本质使得其成为大地试图摒弃之物。命运抹去了堕落者的足迹。怪奇之事将她存在过的记录擦掉。这个嬗变可以多次选取，每次选取都将给予角色一级隐晦优势（Arcane Merit，在该扩展书的第177页）。这个嬗变与现有的隐晦等级叠加。

越限：阿萨库获得了跨越其世代极限的能力，能够多掌握一级变幻术。角色最多可以获取三次这个嬗变，但永远不能使角色超越第九级变幻术。

播种花园：阿萨库以变幻术的精髓污染一个地区，使鲜血流至生机勃勃的土壤中。每一点血池点数都会污染当地的生态系统一个月，或直至其被大型动物吞食。毒液扩散到一个最终大小由说书人决定的相连区域，但其增长基于阿萨库的世代与变幻术的等级。植物会呈现出淡红的色调、明显的阿萨库变幻术要素，同时以怪异的方式扭曲纠缠。
一头动物，食用了植物或饮用了受播种花园影响的水，可能每月会间接摄入一点投入的血液，变成一个具有一级变形术与一级变幻术的尸鬼。如果它被食用，捕食者继承尸鬼状态。若堕落者具有灵魂默语嬗变，她可以决定哪些生物从其血液中受益。

灵魂默语：堕落的阿萨库获得了一种能力——通过血液接触受到其生命力或变幻术污染的生物。灵魂默语适用于阿萨库的尸鬼、其他走上此途的堕落者，还有任何受到着相邪妄污染的人（同书118页）。如果玩家花费一点鲜血，堕落者可以体验到目标的感受，而非其本身的想法。她可以通过这种链接使用观占术、兽性术、支配术和变幻术，如同接触到了目标一样。
若目标至少具有一级变幻术，污染者可以将对方作为中介，通过目标使用任意等级的变幻术。除非堕落者能够发出连贯的指令，否则让目标进行任何带有先决条件的行动，例如抓住肉体使用变幻术，会是相当困难。

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Transmutations
As a vampire on the Path of the Asakku increasingly surrenders to her Vicissitude, she attains special abilities. These Transmutations represent the Discipline’s will to expand into other Cainites and living things, and its ability to take firmer hold of the vampire’s consciousness. A follower of the Path gains Sinister Mastery at the first dot of the Path, and another Transmutation of the player’s choice at every even numbered dot thereafter. She can gain and lose power depending on her degree of harmony with the Discipline’s ruling entity. Once a Transmutation is selected, it is set — when the character returns from a Path rating drop and re-qualifies, she regains the prior Transmutation.

Sinister Mastery (Possessed by All Asakku): The Corrupted reduces her Vicissitude experience cost multi-plier by 1. Combination Disciplines featuring Vicissitude are purchased at half cost, rounded up.

Blood Inception: The Corrupted can convert a fallen Cainite into an Asakku like herself. The victim must be placed in torpor and completely exsanguinated, after which the Corrupted must replace at least half of his blood pool with her own.
Upon the following sunset the target awakens, converted to the Path of Asakku. If the victim does not possess Vicissitude, he acquires one dot, but loses another dot in his weakest Discipline. The converted character cannot rise above the first dot in the Path until he attains four dots in Vicissitude. Blood Inception counts as two steps toward the blood bond.

Inner Babble: The whispering Beast or Watcher within fills the vampire’s mind with a stream of dissonant sounds and impossible images. Unfathomable emotions ripple through her aura. Telepathy (wanted or not) fails against the wall of babble. Auspex and similar powers can no longer read the character’s aura except to note its strange, hazy appearance.

Occultation: The Asakku’s increasingly alien nature becomes something the very Earth seeks to abjure. Fate erases the Corrupted’s footsteps. Freak events erase records of her presence. This Transmutation may be selected multiple times. Each time it is selected, give the character one point of the Arcane Merit (p. 177 ). This stacks with existing points of Arcane.

Potentiation: The Asakku acquires the power to exceed her Generation’s limit on Vicissitude mastery by one dot. The character may acquire this Transmutation up to three times. It can never allow her to exceed the ninth dot.

Seeding the Garden: Bleeding into living soil, the Asakku infects an area with the essence of his Vicissitude. Each blood point poisons the local ecosystem for one lunar month or until consumed by a large animal. The poison spreads over a contiguous area whose ultimate size is determined by the Storyteller, but which grows based on the strength of the Asakku’s Generation and Vicissitude dots. Plants take on a reddish hue and manifest elements of the Asakku’s Vicissitude, warping and twisting in alien fashion.

An animal that eats plants or drinks water from a seeded garden may indirectly ingest one point of the invested blood per month, becoming a ghoul with one dot of Potence and one dot in Vicissitude. If it is eaten in turn, the predator inherits the ghoul state. If the Corrupted possesses the Soul Whispers Transmutation, below, she may determine which creatures may benefit from her blood, if any.

Soul Whispers: The Asakku within the Corrupted attains the ability to reach out through the blood to creatures tainted by its vitae or Vicissitude. Soul Whispers may be used on the Asakku’s ghouls, other Corrupted it has incepted, and any being it has tainted with the Sinister Obsession derangement (p. 118). If the player spends a blood point, the Corrupted may experience what her target senses, though not his thoughts. She may use the Auspex, Animalism, Dominate，and Vicissitude Disciplines through this connection as if she were touching him, and relay emotions and instincts, such as the sense that someone the target sees is an enemy (though not information explaining why this is so). If the target possesses at least a dot in Vicissitude, the Corrupted may utilize any rank of Vicissitude through the target, using it as a proxy. Getting the creature to perform any prerequisite actions, such as grasping flesh to use Vicissitude, may prove difficult unless the Corrupted can send coherent instructions.

灵魂感染
当鲜血和超自然力量让观察者能够接触到血族的灵魂时，那些没有进入圣道的堕落者就会自甘堕落。它低语、它督促堕落者走向堕落之路。这通常是个循序渐进的过程，即使通过授血启明嬗变（同书117页）可以将此命运加于被捕获、被麻痹的猎物。
当合适的时候，说书人的角色可以成为阿萨库的猎物，但作为说书人，你可能需要明确的大纲。你可以决定主角们永远不会成为阿萨库，或者在游戏外和玩家讨论这种可能性。如果对方愿意，她的角色可以违背从前的道德准则，而无需任何特殊规则地探索这条心路。玩家控制着角色的堕落，但在故事中，角色已经深陷其中。

着相邪妄
如果你更喜欢有条理的方式，你可以决定一些事件让角色能够陷入一种新的堕落：着相邪妄。它只能在下列情况之一时发生：
• 角色喝了血液，一个受感染的阿萨库的。
• 角色和一个这条心路上的成员进行了一次心灵接触（通过观占术或者其他超自然能力）。
• 堕落者用变幻术极大地改变了角色（视乎说书人判断，但五次四级变幻术的成功或者更高等级能力的成功就够了。）
当以上任意之一的情况实现时，角色获得灵魂污染作为下一次从道德败坏中陷入的堕落。（根据V20第310页视作一次失败的良知或坚定骰点。）

这种堕落有两种影响。首先，角色必须从一次意志骰点（难度8）中成功，以实现除却追求变幻术外的任意长期目标。其次，她每在变幻术取得一个等级，道德信念就愈发脆弱，内心的魔音亦随之愈发强盛，之后的堕落判定所需的最低成功数亦因此增多一个。这既使角色加速堕落，又使阿萨库之路自然而然地成为可能的救赎。

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Soul Infection
Corrupted who do not enter the Path voluntarily fall to it when blood and supernatural power give a Watcher access to a Kindred’s soul. It whispers and prods her down the road to degeneration. This is normally a gradual process, though Asakku with the Blood Inception Transmutation (p. 117 ) can inflict it more rapidly upon captured, torpid prey.

Storyteller characters fall prey to the Asakku whenever you see fit, but as Storyteller, you may require specific guidelines. You might decide that the protagonists can never become Asakku, or you might discuss the possibility with a player outside of the session. If she wishes, her character can violate his former moral code and explore the Path without needing any special rules. She controls his descent, but in the story, he’s being lured in.

Sinister Obsession
If you’d prefer a more structured method, you may instead decide that certain events make it possible for a character to acquire a new derangement: Sinister Obsession. It can only take hold in one of the following circumstances:
• The character drinks Asakku-infected blood
• The character makes telepathic contact (via Auspex or another supernatural ability) with a member of the Path.
• A Corrupted uses Vicissitude on the character to great effect (Storyteller’s discretion, but five successes with a four dot or higher power should be sufficient.)
When any of these circumstances have been satisfied, the character will acquire Soul Infection as the next derangement earned out of moral degeneration (a botched Conscience or Conviction roll as per V20, p. 310).
The derangement has two effects. First, the character must succeed at a Willpower roll (difficulty 8) to act on any long-term goal other than improving Vicissitude. Voices and bizarre images flood her mind, encouraging her to pursue Vicissitude first. Second, each dot she possesses in Vicissitude strengthens its alien voice at the expense of her ethical resolve, adding one success to the minimum needed to avoid a future degeneration check. This hastens the character’s degeneration, but automatically makes the Path of Asakku available as a possible source of “salvation.”