Two allies notified --
Lys from Detroit ( I really like this npc. )
Ashbriar

New scene to be created -- meeting with Ashbriar

REWARDS
To Chance -->
1 arcane beat
1 beat

Action: 6 w/ 9a - Wits + Investigation (Asset Skill) to map out the corruption. And some Occult to identify what the hell is going on. Lastly, letting Ashbriar know, so we can go over notes.

Description:
Chance didn’t need to see the Source directly to know when he’d gone far enough.

The air thickened first—not physically, but causally. Coincidences stopped drifting and began to stack. Footsteps echoed where no one walked. The Threads he followed no longer wandered; they converged. That was the tell.

If I can see it, he thought, slowing his pace, it can see me better.

He eased backward, step by careful step, letting the worst of the resonance slip out of range. Even then, he kept his Mage Sight open...He wasn’t done gathering information. He was just done tempting whatever stood watch.

The ley lines here didn’t flow so much as ooze. Chance crouched near a cracked storm drain and traced the pattern with his eyes, then with his mind, following the tendrils as they split and rejoined. Long years of practice carried him through the chaos, sorting signal from noise, allowing him to do what he did best: turning impressions into structure. South, then west. Old industrial corridors. Places where people stopped caring enough for the city to care back.

He layered his Occult knowledge over what he saw. This wasn’t just corruption—it was managed corruption. Artificial hallows, grown like tumors to redirect the flow. You didn’t get this kind of distribution by accident. Someone had learned where the ley lines wanted to go and nudged them, again and again, until the poison found its way downtown.

Cultivation, he decided. Not a spill. Not negligence.

With Fate Sight fully engaged, he began to notice the scars.

Places where probability bent sharply away, like a river around a rock. A vacant lot where nothing stayed built. An underpass where accidents almost happened—almost—over and over again. Containment attempts. Failed ones. Each left a residue in the Threads, a subtle knot of inevitability that whispered: this didn’t end the way they hoped.

He marked them mentally, building the map he’d later commit to paper and memory. Each node told a story—not of success, but of cost. Fate remembered who interfered, even if the city forgot.

And all the while, he could feel it.

Attention.

Not eyes, exactly. More like pressure. A sense of being accounted for. When he paused too long, the resonance thickened. When he moved, it eased. The watchers didn’t rush him. They didn’t need to. Whatever guarded the Source understood patience.

Chance straightened, closed his Sight in careful stages, and walked away without running.

Two blocks later, he pulled out his phone.

“Lys,” he said after the tone, voice low. “It’s Chance. Chicago’s ley lines are poisoned—engineered, not incidental. If you’re feeling ripples up your way, that’s why. Call me back.”

He ended the call knowing full well he wouldn’t get an answer. The Empty Stage never responded on cue. But corruption like this didn’t respect borders. It would hum all the way to Detroit, whether Lys liked it or not.

His next call connected.

“Ashbriar,” he said, keeping his words deliberately vague. “I’m seeing widespread spiritual contamination tied to altered ley lines. South and west. It’s being guided.” A pause. “I don’t want to get into details over the phone. But I’d like to compare notes—see if this overlaps with anything you’ve already clocked.”

Another pause, listening.

“Good,” he said finally. “Let’s meet. Soon.”

Chance slipped the phone back into his pocket and kept walking, posture easy, unhurried. The city swallowed him again—traffic noise, neon, the ordinary violence of human life.

Behind him, far away, something shifted.

It let him go.

For now.

Chance has seen this before, but never so wide spread. It was a spirit poison, from a spring somewhere. A Wound, an Abyssal nexus. It had to be something that severe. Had to be at least one, if not more.

The poison was pooled, thick in places. Chance had to be careful. There were...things nesting in the pools, lapping up the thick poison and gorging on the ichor of darkness. Most of these things were probably people once, but that was some time ago. The things had crawled inside them and now wore them like a cheap skin suit, shuffling about, huffing the tainted essence like a meth head.

The pools got deeper as Chance went south, then west. Something out there, on the outskirts of the city, had to be the source. It was clearly flowing from there, with small tears and filthy hallows inbetween. It looked like it had been cultivated though, like someone had steered the natural river towards the center of the city on purpose, that the source had happened of its own, but someone had created tainted hallows to draw its path and point it in a direction.

When the air shimmered, and the became thick with a humming energy, Chance knew to pull back. He was getting close to the SOURCE, and it was being watched, guarded, patrolled, by the things that ate from its waters.

These were things that only the worst nightmare got close to resembling. Horrid things that crawled from the deepest recesses of the spirit worlds. Abyssal horrors hungry for pain, hate, fear.

What Chance could tell, even from the distance he had to assume he was at from the Source, was that something had gone fundamentally wrong with the Veil between worlds. Something had twisted it, and warped it until it broke, and upon breaking, snapped open wide and deep. This didn't have the feeling of a ritualized space, not of the clean lines, the INTENT that ritual gave a place. This felt raw.

Did you want to investigate any of the sites, look at something in particular, or call in anybody?

Goal: Trace poisoned ley lines to identify source pattern; create a map of the issue (my specialty)

Dice Pool: 3+3 Wits+Compsure (Perception)

Health: 7 - no damage
Mana: 6
Willpower: 6
Conditions: Charmed, Inspired, Steadfast

Description:
Chicago never stopped moving. Even at this hour, the streets pulsed with traffic, footsteps, and the low, restless hum of a city that didn’t know how to sleep. As usual, Chance walked instead of driving. It made it easier to feel the rhythm under his feet.

Don’t look for monsters, he reminded himself. Look for patterns.

He slowed near the intersection of Michigan Avenue and Wacker Drive, letting his breathing settle. With a practiced mental shift, he opened his Mage Sight, letting Time bloom first—his native lens. The world sharpened, then layered. Moments overlapped like transparent slides: the echo of yesterday’s rain, the ghost of a car that had nearly run a red light, the residue of an argument that had ended badly an hour ago. Temporal afterimages clung to the pavement.

And beneath it all—something off.

The ley line threading through the avenue wasn’t clean. It dragged, like syrup poured into a clockwork mechanism. Events hesitated where they should have flowed. Near-misses stacked up in improbable clusters. A cyclist wobbled, recovered, and rode on—three seconds away from being a statistic.

Probability distortion, Chance thought. Not chaos. Pressure.

He shifted his Sight, letting Fate bleed in alongside Time. The city’s luck showed itself in subtle ways: traffic lights that lingered too long on red, pedestrians who instinctively hesitated at the curb, a man dropping his phone only to catch it at the last second. Threads of chance tangled and knotted where the ley line pooled, glowing faintly with a sick, oily resonance.

Something’s feeding, he realized. And it’s not taking bites. It’s slurping.

He followed the sensation south, staying on foot, mapping the flow in his head. Each major artery told the same story. The poison wasn’t localized—it traveled the lines, settling into places where power naturally collected: underpasses, plazas, old foundations layered with forgotten intent. The city wasn’t dying, but it was running a fever.

Cause or symptom? he wondered. Did this start the possessions… or invite them?

Chance stopped beneath the elevated tracks, where the ley line thickened into a stagnant knot. He crouched, palm hovering inches above the concrete, resisting the urge to push further—to rewind, to dig. Not yet. Guardians didn’t pull threads until they knew what tapestry they were dealing with.

First, define the scope. Then find the source. Then decide who gets burned.

A shiver ran through the air behind him. Not movement. Attention. Chance straightened slowly, closing his Sight just enough to dull the glow without severing it entirely.

Yeah, he thought grimly. You’re watching too.

He stepped back into the flow of the city, already building the map in his mind.