Ice rat­tled into the frost­ed tum­bler. Then clear, syrupy liqueur, rolling like melt­wa­ter over river­stones, louch­ing milky clear where it touched the ice.

A thumb and mid­dle fin­ger, all what remained of the drinker’s dig­its, wrapped round the con­dens­ing glass and upend­ed it through whiskered lips.

“Anoth­er, per favore,” he said, voice gum­my, squint­ing to the bar­mouse.

The fur­ry bar­man nod­ded. He tipped the bot­tle to pour again.

A shad­ow crossed the gleam­ing bar­top. “This one is on us,” said a voice beside. Young, accent­ed like a South­ern grandee.

The drinker crin­kled his eye­brows, turned his grey­ing head. Beside stood a pair in junior Navy uni­forms. A young man and woman, both with the ear-length cur­tains of black hair so pop­u­lar amongst cadets. They grinned awk­ward­ly, yet eager­ly, leaned against the oth­er­wise emp­ty bar.

“Elias, you brought a friend,” nod­ded the bar­mouse. He poured again, caught a drip off the bot­tle with a servi­ette.

“Gottmus, Gior­gio, hola.” said Elias, bobbed his head in turn to the mouse, the grey­ing man.

“You again,” grum­bled Gior­gio. He squeezed his glass, hunched.

“This is my friend Per­al,” said Elias. Per­al grinned wide­ly.

“Bah.” He did not look at her.

“You are hard to find, friend. What are you hav­ing?” said Elias, mov­ing to occu­py the stool beside him.

“Sam­bu­ca,” grum­bled Gior­gio.

“Again? I will have one, too.” Elias raised a fin­ger to Gottmus.

“You will not like it.”

“He like­ly won’t,” sec­ond­ed the bar­mouse. “Only Gior­gio likes it this way.”

“Sure he will. He likes drinks that hurt,” gig­gled Per­al.

Gottmus retrieved anoth­er glass, some ice, poured. “Salud,” said Elias. He knocked it back, con­sid­ered it, frowned, stuck out his tongue, sticky. “My Lord.”

Per­al cov­ered her mouth, chuck­led. Gottmus squint­ed, twitched his nose. “I warned you. Not meant to be had on ice.”

Per­al sat as well, turned to sur­vey the man across from Elias. “How did you acquire such a taste, eh?”

“Off. Do not both­er me,” insist­ed Gior­gio. “Gottmus,” he snapped a fin­ger. “Do not let these two buy my drinks, under­stand?” The mouse shrugged.

“But Gior­gio,” said Elias, rais­ing his eye­brows. “This place is prac­ti­cal­ly emp­ty.” He waved a hand about the bar, emp­ty save for some qui­et sorts in booths of dark wood and col­ored glass. “Let us give you some com­pa­ny.”

“It is emp­ty because it is late,” snapped Gior­gio. “Go. It is past your bed­time.”

“Gior–”

“Why do you want to buy me drinks, eh?” snapped the aging man. He half rose, taller than his hunch sug­gest­ed. He snapped his cold eyes to each. Per­al shrunk a lit­tle. Elias went agape.“Because, well,” start­ed Elias. “Eh…”

“Elias says you told him the most excit­ing sto­ries, last time,” said Per­al, qui­et.

Gior­gio frowned. “Oh.” He seemed to shrink a mite. He grum­bled, frowned more. “Why do you want to hear old cut­ter non­sense? Eh? No hap­py sto­ries.”

“We don’t want hap­py sto­ries,” said Per­al, quick. She shift­ed for­ward. “Hap­py ones are bor­ing.”

Gior­gio’s brows met, bushy. “You like the scary ones, then?”

The cadets bobbed their heads, eager. Gior­gio sighed. He plucked up the mouse’s next pour, tossed it down. “Fine,” he grum­bled, voice sticky. “You pups can­not account me for your bad dreams, though.”

“Yes!”

“What did I tell you, last?”

Elias perked up. “You told me about how you lost your fin­gers.”

“Ai, that was noth­ing.”

“Can­ni­bal rag­men bit­ing off your fin­gers is noth­ing?” said Elias. Per­al’s eyes widened.

Gior­gio shook his head, slow, lip down­turned. “Not com­pared to the worst.”

“Lord. What is worst, then?”

“Hm,” hummed Gior­gio.

“Ban­shees?” sug­gest­ed Elias.

“Nev­er fought a ban­shee.” Gior­gio shook his head.

“Wolf spi­ders?” said Per­al.

“No. They just keep you up at night.”

“Sirens?”

“No. Hate sail­ing, any­way.”

“What is it?” said Per­al, anx­ious.

Gior­gio looked blank. He ges­tured for anoth­er pour. Slow, he put it down in three sips, breathed the licorice fumes with rel­ish. Then, he huffed, nod­ded. “I recall.”

Both cadets leaned close, eyes wide. Across the bar, even Gottmus, occu­pied decant­i­ng a dusty bot­tle through a strain­ing cloth, perked his ears.

“It was an expe­di­tion on Illa Cor­voy, south of the Penin­su­la,” said Gior­gio, slow, as if remem­ber­ing. “I was young as you both, and I had signed on with a green bunch of poor bas­tar­dos to delve a cave in the deep jun­gle slopes.” He nod­ded. “We were in good spir­its when we set out, for the bank assured us it was an easy ven­ture. Just a scrape of some old buried gold. Work for the back, not the sword arm.”

Gior­gio shook his head. “But it was not that way.”

“What went wrong?” said Per­al.

Ice clinked as the old cut­ter swirled it round his glass. “Have you heard of the Asp of Soren­to?” Elias and Per­al nod­ded, quick. “No one’s ever fought it and lived,” mut­tered the lat­ter. Across the bar, Gottmus shiv­ered.

“Ai, well,” said the old cut­ter. “Before he was the Asp of Soren­to, he was the Ser­pent of Cor­voy, though none knew him by that name, at the time, and he lived in a cave all cov­ered over with ivy.”

Gior­gio paused, swal­lowed. The oth­ers kept qui­et. “We walked into the island inte­ri­or for a day, until we could see the place we were meant to scrape. Set a camp, there, and designed to work come the morn­ing. Kept an eye on that cave, all the while, though, for we saw a light inside, in the dark. We were curi­ous, won­der­ing what glit­tered in there,” he paused. “In the dark past the ivy.”

“We were impa­tient,” he said. “Kept guess­ing about what mea­sure of gold could be so large to glim­mer after sun­set. So we went down after sup­per to see.” Gior­gio blinked, slow. “When we got to the cave, and they start­ed crawl­ing inside, I lagged back, for I want­ed sleep. Glad I did.”

“Why?” said Per­al, soft.

“Because it was­n’t much time before they start­ed scream­ing.”

Across the bar, Gottmus jumped. Some­thing clat­tered to the bar­top. “Sor­ry,” he said, picked up a spoon.

“Go on,” urged Elias.

“They were qui­et, soon enough. Like­ly a bless­ing, for by the sound of how they suf­fered, I would not wish it upon any man,” said Gior­gio. “And from what I saw.”

“You saw the Asp?” said Elias, sharply, breath­less.

“Yes.”

“What was it like?”

Gior­gio squint­ed at the cadets. “You know how the heart pan­ics when you see a lit­tle ser­pent in the grass?” They nod­ded.

“It was much the same way, the beast which came through the ivy.” He nod­ded. “But coil­ing, and huge, and black as jet, with reach­ing arms, and fires in its eyes.” He shut his eyes. “And the bod­ies of three young fools melt­ing in its jaws.”

At this, the cadets breathed shal­low. Gior­gio squint­ed, fur­rowed, eyes near obscured. “I will not for­get the way a ser­pent makes a man comes apart; burn­ing, drip­ping. Nor the way his flesh smells.” He winced. “Nor how long you can see the life in his eyes, even after he stops his scream­ing.”

He swal­lowed twice, dry­ly, hasti­ly swal­lowed the watery licorice dregs. “That is the worst I recall,” nod­ding.

Covert­ly, Elias looked Per­al in the eye. She met his look, mouth drawn down, unnerved. Gior­gio looked at them both, sneered. “Is this the kind of sto­ry you like?” Ten­ta­tive, both still nod­ded.

“Bah.”

Under the bar, Bottmus squeaked. “Cer­tain­ly not the sort of sto­ry for me.”

Gior­gio chuck­led, wet­ly. “My good baris­to, I will refrain, in the future, for your soft ears’ sake. Now, pour me anoth­er, per favore.” Awk­ward­ly, Elias gig­gled, too. Per­al stayed silent.

“But Gior­gio,” she said. “How can it be true? No one has ever fought the Asp of Soren­to and lived.“ ‘

At this, the old cut­ter laughed again. Long, harsh. He quit. “Ai, I did­n’t fight the ser­pent,” said he. “A cer­tain fear is a cut­ter’s friend. How else do you get to grow fat and grey and tell sil­ly chil­dren their bed­time sto­ries, eh?”

He grinned at the cadets. They shirked at that expres­sion, at the cut­ter’s cold eyes. “No, I did not fight it,” he said, after a moment. He swal­lowed his drink.

“I ran the hell away.”

Horror

Be it grad­ual or sud­den, peace of mind is eas­i­ly tempt­ed away.

The fol­low­ing is a mech­a­nism from the Incunab­u­li Playtest:

DISTRESS

Awful, graph­ic things may cause a char­ac­ter Dis­tress.

When a char­ac­ter sens­es some­thing graph­ic, upset­ting, or hope­less, they may opt to gain 1 Dis­tress.

The GM may offer a chance to opt into dis­tress, or play­ers may vol­un­teer, if a sit­u­a­tion is applic­a­ble.

Opt­ing into Dis­tress pro­vides 5XP imme­di­ate­ly. A char­ac­ter may gain up to 15 XP this way per ses­sion.

Pos­sess­ing any lev­el of dis­tress caus­es a char­ac­ter to roll for Night­mares when next they sleep.

TERROR

Hor­ri­ble mon­sters may cause a char­ac­ter Ter­ror, prompt­ing them to freeze, fight, or flee.

When a char­ac­ter encoun­ters a mon­ster, they may opt to give into Ter­ror.

If they do, they gain 1 Dis­tress and must roll on the table below:

• 12-9: Fear spurs the char­ac­ter’s heels. They receive a speed bonus of 1 for one round and must flee until they can no longer sense the hor­ror.
• 8-7: Irra­tional Rage. The character’s next four actions must be devot­ed to near­ing and destroy­ing the object of their fear. They will take no actions, such as swap­ping weapons, that do not facil­i­tate this.
• 6-5: Unrea­son­able Pan­ic. The char­ac­ter uses their next 2 actions to grap­ple a near­by ally, or, fail­ing that, dive for a hid­ing place.
• 4-2: Lock­up. The char­ac­ter is frozen in a con­test between fight or flight. They are stunned for 2 actions.
• 1: Vio­lent Con­fu­sion. The character’s next four actions must be devot­ed to near­ing and destroy­ing their near­est ally. As in irra­tional rage, they will take no extra­ne­ous actions.

As with Dis­tress, chances to opt into Ter­ror may be offered or vol­un­teered for.

A Ter­ri­fied char­ac­ter gains 10 XP imme­di­ate­ly. They may gain up to 20XP this way per ses­sion. Cer­tain mon­sters may give more XP when used as a hor­ror trig­ger.

Ter­ror may be remem­bered in Night­mares.

NIGHTMARES

Regret; pan­ic; foes who nev­er die: All come to vis­it come the night.

When­ev­er a char­ac­ter takes a Night’s Rest, they must roll for Night­mares using a d12 on the table below. 

• 16-15: Haunt­ed. The sleep­er acquires the atten­tion of a slink­ing night­mare. It fol­lows them in wake­ful­ness and in the night, apply­ing +2 to all future Night­mare rolls until killed. Addi­tion­al­ly, the sleep­er gains two lev­els of Drowsy until their next Peace­ful Sleep.
• 14-13: Ter­ri­fied. Night ter­rors wrack the sleep­er, infec­tious and dis­qui­et­ing. They gain a lev­el of Drowsy until their next Peace­ful Sleep. Addi­tion­al­ly, their thrash­ing and fear­ful excla­ma­tions keep near­by sleep­ers awake, inflict­ing the same lev­el of Drowsy upon them. If kept awake, the Ter­ri­fied sleep­er suf­fers 2 lev­els of Drowsy instead of 1.
• 12-11: Rest­less. Dis­qui­et­ed by visions or rocky sleep, the char­ac­ter find lit­tle gain­ful rest. They gain a lev­el of Drowsy until their next Peace­ful Sleep. This may stack.
• 10-1: Peace­ful sleep. The char­ac­ter dreams as usu­al.

For every 5XP a char­ac­ter gained via Hor­ror in the time before they went to sleep, add +1 to their Night­mare roll.

Cir­cum­stances oth­er than Hor­ror may influ­ence the bonus applied to a Night­mare roll. Sleep­ing in espe­cial­ly unnerv­ing areas may add up to +4. Con­sum­ing cer­tain foods, drinks, or drugs may apply up to -3.

Note

This is cer­tain­ly a first for the site. Rarely do I include sys­tems in a post, but here we are with a post devot­ed to sys­tems. This serves, I sup­pose, to high­light the recent devel­op­ment of the Incunab­u­li playtest by dis­play­ing one of its flag­ship mechan­ics, and to com­pli­ment recent mate­r­i­al which com­pli­ments these sys­tems. 

For con­sid­er­a­tion, do be aware that the above mechan­ics do assume a d12 base, hence the die used, and involve a high-val­ue XP econ­o­my. Val­ues will need edit­ing, for your preference/system.

The above info will be occas­sion­al­ly updat­ed to reflect its form in the Incunab­u­li sys­tem doc­u­ment on Google Dri­ve. Changes will always be most up to date, there. Also, the above sys­tems, while some­what playtest­ed, will almost cer­tain­ly change. Night­mares are the least test­ed, of the two.

Please, enjoy.