Crimson Earth
Blood. There is something magical about blood. The way it drips between your fingers as you force your weapon through the flesh of your foes, the way it seems to twist and to turn, to dance, in the moonlight. There is an art about it. The way blood sprays from the stump of a severed limb, cavorting through the air and spattering the lilacs a crimson, sanguine red. And the smell of it! The way the smell pervades you, follows you beyond the battlefield as if it might awaken you to the joys and sorrows of the world outside the dance of death. The way it sinks into your skin and your hair and your nails and marks you, and how no matter the amount you wash it can never be removed, caressing you eternally, a jacket of rose petals formed from living blood. The knowledge that you bathe in the very life of your foes, that your blood mingles with theirs, making you one. There is no station in battle. No leaders and no followers. Only warriors. Only swords and axes, bows and spears. Only flesh and bone. Only blood.
This is the philosophy of those who practice the Crimson Earth discipline, so named for the manner in which adepts would leave the ground they tread forever stained in the blood of their enemies. Through the manipulation of their own life force, their fighting will, and the blood that surrounds the battlefield, adepts of Crimson Earth become capable of incredible feats: of toughing their bodies, stopping their bleeding and healing, or ignoring, any wounds they might receive. Crimson Earth practitioners can tear the very limbs from their foes, can maim them, leaving them unfit for battle, or slay them outright. They can even harness the power of the blood they spill, though only adepts know the truth of such techniques. The associated skill for Crimson Earth is Intimidate, and its associated weapons are the axe, the greataxe, the scythe, the long-sword, the bastard sword, the katana, the nodachi, the two-bladed sword, the greatsword, the scimitar, the falchion, the fullblade, and the jovar.
The only way to learn the Crimson Earth discipline is to seek out a master–a martial adept capable of using at least 6th-level maneuvers from the discipline. You must train for a month under the master and spend 1,000 xp at the end of your training, in addition to defeating the master in one-on-one combat martial combat. You gain the ability to learn maneuvers from the Crimson Earth discipline. Furthermore, you may exchange your maneuvers known for maneuvers of the Crimson Earth discipline. You may exchange one maneuver of each level, and the new maneuvers you learn must be of the same level as the exchanged maneuvers, unlike normal. The difficulty of finding an appropriate mentor is left to the DM to choose.
Maneuvers coming soon!
