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Speaking in Tongues ....
...
You gain the following benefits as long as you are wearing this Artifact.
You may understand and communicate to Creatures, humans, and Sapient beings as if you are fluent in a relevant language.
This also includes understanding any recorded communications from the relevant targets, including writings, scent trails, etc.
Anyone who touches this Artifact will notice it warping their mind and may drop it. If they choose to hold or use it, they immediately receive the following Trauma: truthful to a fault. If they lose possession of this Artifact, the Trauma heals over the course of the next day.
- Communing with creatures does not grant them intellect but does allow you to converse with them.
- The target of "human" refers to any target that speaks a human language.
- When reading written communications, you get no information beyond what the writer was intending to communicate.
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Charlatans
“Unsettling are the days in which everyone is an expert.”
― Criss Jami
Nowadays you can't go a day without some phony prophet trying to peddle their wares to you.
Driven by the increased interest in the supernatural, charlatans from palm readers to televangelists are everywhere. And while the vast majority of witches, psychics, magicians, hypnotists, cures, potions, faith healers, and clairvoyants are complete fakes, they do make a living.
As the saying goes, "it's easier for an actor to make it in alternative medicine than Hollywood."
Most people scoff at these clearly-phony supernatural services, yet those same people often buy into at least one scam.
The most dangerous charlatans are the self-styled monster hunters who carry a mall-ninja arsenal and guns with silver bullets. Most have never encountered anything supernatural and do absolutely nothing besides burn some sage and patrol the area for a night or two. Even so, those who are superstitious, fearful, or desperate enough will hire them to solve the problems they simply don't understand. In some cases with disastrous results.
For Contractors, charlatans are red herrings and obstacles. Clumsy fakes that conjure a smokescreen of misinformation and escalate the situations they're in.
Community
Commune Gifts
The Language of the Birds
Understanding birdsong, or any animal really.
A lot of animal communication is soundless, and most of that is through movement and posture. I've learned to understand that and make the appropriate motions in return. That much is obvious to anyone's eyes, though they may not realize that I intuitively understand the sounds animals make as well. When communicating back with them it can get tricky, I haven't learned many of the right sounds in their speech. Thankfully they understand my tone of voice for emotional context, even when I'm whistling to a bird or meowing to a cat. They seem to pick up on human language, at least when I say it, but it's like someone speaking with a bad accent. If I'm slow they get enough, and maybe part of the problem is that humans use more intricate concepts linguistically. Animals don't need most of that.
Anyhow, they get me and I get them, but if I take the form of a similar enough animal (or the same kind) then they understand me flawlessly. We can talk easier then, and also not be understood by humans when we talk.
Some legends talk about humans learning the languages of animals, often from a mystical source like tasting dragon blood, but also as simple as being taught bird tongue by a bird. How did this ability spontaneously manifest? Honestly, it's through an inherent connection with animals that comes about from latent and innate shapeshifting abilities. It's in the blood, metaphorically anyway.
You gain the following benefits at all times.
You may understand and communicate to terrestrial animal as if you are fluent in a relevant language.
- Communing with terrestrial animal does not grant them intellect but does allow you to converse with them.
Secret Histories
Communicate with scars on the world's skin
Ritual caster quietly mutters a rite under his breath. Few seconds pass, and he is finished, and starts to communicate - be it via reading a text or talking to creatures.
There is countless amount of scars inflicted upon the world. Some of them are deep - major historical figures that wage wars of conquests and forge empires, events that change course of history. Some of them can hardly be called scars at all - animals, humans and products of their activity, such as languages, texts, machinery, as well as the dead.
Rite of Secret Histories is a ritual which allows the one performing the rite to "read" said scars for an hour, though scope of this specific version of a rite is limited quite limited. This rite received it's name for it's immense help in learning what otherwise would be left in the dark - ancient texts, written in long-dead languages. Research notes, written by scholars in ciphers known only be them. Folklore, shared only verbally in uncommon languages.
Exert your Mind and spend an Action to activate.
You may understand and communicate to Creatures as if you are fluent in a relevant language for the next ten minutes.
This also includes understanding any recorded communications from the relevant targets, including writings, scent trails, etc.
- Communing with creatures does not grant them intellect but does allow you to converse with them.
- When reading written communications, you get no information beyond what the writer was intending to communicate.
Xibalba Phone provider
let them speak
The necromancer's teeth and mouth will become obseidan color after speaking the deceaced name. The dead uses the wielder's mouth to speak through it.
Expend a point of Battery and spend an Action. Select a human or Dead target within 50 feet. For dead targets, you must possess their their full name.
The target can communicate in your language for the next hour.
- The target of "human" refers to any target that speaks a human language.
- You can target yourself if you qualify as a valid target by the other requirements.
- Your target must be within line of sight, or within range of another sense if more fitting for the Gift's flavor.
The Signal
Eins's own signal, a three note oddity in the song of the world
Very faint white noise is heard near Eins. If someone were to manage to perceive beyond this veil, they would hear the Three Note Oddity, a set of numbers being spoken by Eins and then her actual message being spoken.
Spend an Action. Select a target within 300 feet of you. You must have a specific target in mind, but you require only an intuitive understanding of them, such as their name, face, or Location.
You may send a single message to your target. It can be no more complicated than a multi-page letter or a long email.
The message will only be perceived by the intended recipient. You must share a common language for your target to understand the message.
This Effect is not obvious, and the only sign you are using an Effect is very faint white noise. If someone suspects that an Effect was used, they must roll Perception + Alertness, Difficulty 8 to pick up on your Tell.
- Receiving a message does not force a target to pay attention to you, and they can feel free to ignore your message if they choose. Depending on the flavor of your Gift, they may or may not be able to return to it and read it later on.
- Generally you cannot communicate with Contractors who are not in a Contract with you.
- You can target yourself if you qualify as a valid target by the other requirements.
Sympathy
"The first step to peace is mutual understanding."
The user can understand and be understood by any being thanks to the suit's ability to translate. As they speak, their message is transcribed through a speech bubble that appears next to them in an inky, comic book style, where their words are also dubbed over in the event they cannot be read. On their end, any messages they receive can be understood through a series of text bubbles that they can only see.
Exert your Mind (unless you win a coin flip) and spend an Action. You must use up a cartridge of ink in order to activate this Effect.
You may understand and communicate to Creatures, humans, and Sapient beings as if you are fluent in a relevant language for the next hour.
This also includes understanding any recorded communications from the relevant targets, including writings, scent trails, etc.
- Communing with creatures does not grant them intellect but does allow you to converse with them.
- The target of "human" refers to any target that speaks a human language.
- When reading written communications, you get no information beyond what the writer was intending to communicate.
Stock
Commune Gifts
Death Speak
They want to speak, but their mouths are too dry.
The Necromancer spits into the mouth of a recently deceased corpse. For the few minutes, the corpse's head comes back to life and speaks to the Necromancer.
Exert your Mind and spend an Action. Select a Dead target within 50 feet. Dead targets must have died within the past week, and you must have their remains in your possession.
The target can communicate in your language for the next hour.
- You can target yourself if you qualify as a valid target by the other requirements.
- Your target must be within line of sight, or within range of another sense if more fitting for the Gift's flavor.
Beastlish
"Yip yap! Yip yap!"
The beastmaster can speak to and understand any animal.
You gain the following benefits at all times.
You may understand and communicate to terrestrial animal as if you are fluent in a relevant language.
- Communing with terrestrial animal does not grant them intellect but does allow you to converse with them.