This skill is not healthy. It isn’t good for you. It is an obsession that will drive you to uncover things that should not be known. It will drain you.
It will separate you from your life. It will hollow you out and fill you up with the ceaseless need to know- that will be the only fire of your life.
It is a suitable skill for tragic occult detectives, arrogant scholars or servants of the Ceaseless Watcher.
0: Discover a relevant folktale, dreadful past event or local legend about some supernatural force or event, after a few days of research. 1: Identify and name a known supernatural force at play in a place or upon an object or person.
Magical techniques
0: Have recording devices or writing implements on hand. 1: Discover a relevant folktale, dreadful past event or local legend with a few hours of research. 1: Cause a willing witness to give you a clearer, more detailed and more truthful account of a supernatural event they witnessed. 1: Decipher something in an archaic text, difficult format or something that’s been slightly ruined or destroyed- like shredded files. 1: Recall some piece of public record, such as a phone number or encyclopedia fact, without ever having learned it. 2: Endure long and grueling research sessions without your findings suffering. 2: Understand a language you do not speak. 3: Coerce, with terrible supernatural compulsion, someone to answer a question.
The following are traditional bonds associated with this magical skill.
I am always wrestling with some question, enigma or mystery. Once I become attached to one, I dedicate all my time and energy to dragging it out into the light.
I can always be drawn into a mystery by… …a blisteringly attractive person. …an old friend in need. …a member of a certain marginalized group. …the memory of someone I failed.
My enemies have plans and schemes, and I need to know what they are before it’s too late!
I feed off of the terror of… …exposure or vulnerability. …revealed secrets. …observation, or the implication of having been observed. ….the violation of trust.
I am sustained by… …other’s recounted tales of horror and pain. …coffee and the hunt. …the satisfaction of being proved right.
I make people feel like I know their secrets.
I am repulsed and weakened by uncanniness, distortion and ambiguity.
Regardless of their resolve, everyone speaks to me in due time.
In my questioning, I am so blunt as to be cruel.
I have very odd and distinctive eyes.
The following are some non-standard techniques associated with this magical skill. They are not inherent parts of it, but characters may pick them up as quest rewards.
0 - Manifest either viscerally physical or colorfully spectral extra eyes. 1 - Organize an archive such that anyone attempting to use it as the focal point of research spends hours instead of days, or minutes instead of hours, when performing research there. This fades after a chapter or two of you dropping the intention. 1 - Escape a complex maze, or lead a group out of the same. 2 - Escape a place that is supernaturally entrapping, alluring or inescapable. 2 - Cause a useful source or clue to some mystery you are studying to appear, after spending some time discussing theories and searching the records. 2 - Appear in a surreal and liminal spiritual space, or a dream, long enough to convey a message or observe something happening. 2 - Form a solid understanding of the underlying occult mechanics that govern a particular and specific type of supernatural power, being or place. 3 - Use a solid understanding of underlying occult mechanics to redirect powers, curses, influence or similar to another target, or ward an area against something that uses those mechanics.
