Strigoï

Strigoïs are sorcerers, originating from romanian medieval folklore, who have made a deal with the Devil in order to gain immortality and sorcerous power. They are one of the sources of the modern vampire.

In romanian folflore "strigoï" is used to designate both living vampires (strigoï viu), and undead vampires (strigoï mort), which often result from the former kind dying, but also sometimes of ordinairy people dying unbaptized, commiting suicide, or living a particularly sinful life. To represent that Crypto X Ing uses a living strigoï that become undead if killed

## Appearance

The strigoï viu's magic turn their hair red and their eyes blue even if they were originaly a diferent colour, they also possess a second pair of canine teeth and sometimes other physicall signs. They are othewise humans.

The stigoï mort on the other hand is more explicitely supernatural, being a gaunt humanoid creature with taloned hands, prominent fangs, an unnaturally long tongue and bat-like ears. While modern depictions of strigoï mort often show them as bald, in the maner of the famous movie strigoï count Orlock, this is not acurate to folklore as they keep the red hairs and blue eyes they had in life. Strigoï mort dress themselves in robes made of their burial shrouds, lacking access to normal clothes.

Strigoïs can also appear in the shape of various animals, most commonly owls but also bats, wolves, cats, black dogs, rats, or even fleas and lices.

## Behaviour

Strigoï vius are evil and egotitsical, killing their fellow man to prolong their own life, but are subtle enough to act as normal people to avoid suspicion.

Their undead conterpart however, lack such social grace, as they only have their demonic souls, with no human soul to tempere it. They are ravenous nocturnal predators attacking the living on sight.

## Characteristics

* Strength : alive or dead, the strigoï is much stronger than a human, commonly said to have the strenght of 10 men.
* Claws, fangs and proboscis : while a strigoï viu lack natural weapons in their true form, the strigoï mort meanwhile is equipped with lon claws ans fangs and a long tongue that can pierce the skin and suck blood like a bloodsucking insect's proboscis.
* Resilience : while a strigoï viu is no sturdier than a normal person, the same can't be said of a strigoï mort, whose skin is described to be as hard as stone. Furthermore the stigoï mort being dead means it wont die from ordinary physicall attacks, and can heal from any injury bar removing a limb in time despite lacking a true healling factor (meaning they heal at the same speed than a normal human).
* Speed : strigoïs are much faster than ordinary humans.
* Flight : strigoïs can use the power of their demonic soul to fly, even in forms that should be flightless like their true form. This likely means that naturaly flight capable forms are able to fly faster.
* Intelligence : stigoï vius are as intelligent as a normal person, likely even somewhat smarter due to their occult knowledge and unnaturaly long life, meanwhile strigoï morts are litterally bloodthirsty, theoretically possessing the intelligence of their living conterparts, but less likely to make plans or think things through before they act.

## Powers

* Shapeshifting : strigoïs can take the forms of the following animals : an owl, a bat, a wolf, a cat, a black dog, a rat, a flea or a lice. These animal forms are likely stonger and faster than natural animals in the same way a strigoï is stronger and faster tan a human. In order to shange shape the strigoï need to spin on themselves 3 times (rolling on the ground 3 times also count). Undead stigoïs seldom make use of that power, as their true form already possess much of their animal forms attributes and they don't value subtelety as much as their living conterparts, but they remain capable of it.
* Vampirism : strigoïs can suck the blood of humans to absorb their life force (vitae) and indefinitely prolong their life.
* Second soul : in adition to the normal, human soul they were born with, strigoïs possess a second, demonic soul, which reside in a second heart in their chest which can leave their body in astral travel to cause effect such as causing sickness and controling the temperature of physicall objects or beings, making them hotter or colder at will. This power is only available to strigoï vius as when they die, their human souls go to Hell leaving only their demonic soul to animate their body, which it can therefore no longer leave. One of the upsides of this power on the other hand is that the strigoï's body is not in a comatose state but awake and able to use most of the vampire's power if attacked, side stepping a common weakness of astral travel.

## Gear

* Farming tools : a strigoï might make use of stollen agricultural tools, like sickles or scythes to use as weapons, though they prefer to use their natural weapons, whether innate or those of their animal forms.

## Weaknesses

* Because their flight is powered by their second soul, strigoï vius presumably can't use that power when they send it away on astral travel (they can still take the form of a flying animal to fly though).
* Garlic : the smell of garlic will repel strigoïs and a garlic put in a corpse's mouth will prevent it from becomin a strigoï.
* Holy symbols : because the strigoï's second soul is a demonic entity it can be exorcised through christians holy symbols taking away a strigoï viu's powers and destroying a strigoï mort.
* Sunlight : sunlight has no effect on a strigoï viu (while in some legends they are unable to shapeshift during the day leaving them stuck in the form they have until sundown, this weakeness is not included in Crypto X Ing version of the creature), it is however fatal to a strigoï mort, consuming its vitae and turning it back into a corpse.
* Running water : a strigoï mort can't cross rening water, though theyr living counterpart can.
* Fire : fire will destroy either form of strigoï (conveniently once burnt to ashes a strigoï viu will not come back from the dead).
* Dismemberment : While a strigoï mort won't die from being dismemberded, they won't be able to reatach their limbs or regrow them, leaving them to starve of their vitae until they're gone. As a result dismembering a strigoï viu not only kills them but prehenptively neutralize their undead selves.
* Second heart damage : removing or destroying a strigoï viu's second heart takes away their powers while driving a wooden stake through it only neutralize their powers until they can remove it and is not life threatening (unlike their normal heart), meanwhile doing the same to a strigoï mort will destroy them or, in the stake's case, paralyse them until it's removed.