The Darcaster
Ninth Level Spells
Astral Projection
Necromancy
Level: Clr 9, Sor/Wiz 9, Travel 7
Components: V, S, M
Casting Time: 30 minutes
Range: Touch
Targets: You plus one additional creature touched per two levels
Duration: See text
Saving Throw: None
Spell Resistance: Yes
   Freeing your spirit from your physical body, this spell allows you to project an astral body into another plane altogether. You can bring the astral forms of other creatures with you, provided the creatures are linked in a circle with you at the time of casting. These fellow travelers are dependent upon you and must accompany you at all times. If something happens to you during the journey, the companions are stranded wherever you left them.
   You project your astral self into the Astral Plane, leaving your physical body behind on the Material Plane in a state of suspended animation. The spell projects an astral copy of you and all you carry onto the Astral Plane. Since the Astral Plane touches upon other planes, you can travel astrally to any of these other planes as you will. You then leave the Astral Plane, forming a new physical body (and equipment) on the plane of existence you have chosen to enter.
   When on the Astral Plane or another plane, your astral body is connected at all times to your material body by a silvery cord. If the cord is broken, you are killed, astrally and materially. Luckily, very few things can destroy a silver cord. When a second body is formed on a different plane, the incorporeal silvery cord remains invisibly attached to the new body. If the second body or astral form is slain, the cord simply returns to your body where it rests on the Material Plane, reviving it from its state of suspended animation. Although astral projections are able to function on the Astral Plane, their actions affect only creatures existing on the Astral Plane; a physical body must be materialized on other planes.
   You and your companions may travel through the Astral Plane indefinitely. Your bodies simply wait behind in a state of suspended animation until you choose to return your spirits to their physical bodies. The spell lasts until you desire to end it, or until it is terminated by some outside means, such as dispel magic cast upon either the physical body or astral form, or the destruction of your body back on the Material Plane (which kills you).
   Material Components: A jacinth worth at least 1 000 gp, plus a silver bar worth 5 gp for each person to be affected.
Duplicate
Necromancy
Level: Sor/Wiz 9
Components: V, S, M
Casting Time: 1 round
Range: Personal
Target: You
Duration: 1 round per level
Saving Throw: None
Spell Resistance: No
   You create a temporary duplicate of yourself and your gear. This is not a clone—you control the duplicate as surely as you control yourself, for you and it are one person: one mind with two bodies. Both you and the duplicate can do anything you can do, independantly. For example, if you are an 18th level sorcerer, so is the duplicate—you can both cast spells, communicate with your familiar, walk across the room, use items, and so on. In any given round of the duration, you can both take independant actions, so the duplicate can cast a spell and you can use a wand. You and the duplicate do not need to stay close to each other. If you create a duplicate, you can have it step through a magic gate to explore what lies beyond, while the "real you" stays safe on this side. You share the same thoughts—your thoughts are the duplicate's.
   The duplicate is an exact replica of you as you are at the moment you cast the spell. If you are down 11 hit points and 1 point of Constitution, so is the duplicate. The duplicate does not carry lingering spell effects (neither beneficial ones, such as cat's grace or stoneskin, nor harmful ones, such as slow or doom), but even then, spell effects are not necessarily shared by both of you. The spell cannot be commanded to hurt you more easily than you can be commanded to harm yourself.
   Spells cast by either the duplicate or you come from your spell total. For example, if you are a wizard and have one lightning bolt spell prepared, when the duplicate casts the spell, it is no longer available to you. Charged items (or items or abilities with a number of available uses per day) that you or the duplicate use count against the total number of charges or uses per day.
   If the duplicate dies, the spell duration ends. If you die, the duplicate becomes the permanent version of you, its gear becomes the "real gear," and your gear disapears. You suffer an immediate loss of 2d4 x 1 000 XP as you transition your soul into the new form. The duplicate is now you (and can cast duplicate again).
   You cannot have more than one duplicate at a time (and a duplicate cannot have a duplicate). This spell cannot be made permanent, other than by the death of the caster, as mentioned above.
   Material Components: Two perfectly matched diamonds, each worth at least 1 000 gp.
Energy Drain
Necromancy
Level: Clr 9, Sor/Wiz 9
Components: V, S
Casting Time: 1 action
Range: Close (25 feet + 5 feet per two levels)
Effect: Ray of negative energy
Duration: Instantaneous
Saving Throw: Fortitude negates (see text)
Spell Resistance: Yes
   As enervation, you must make a ranged touch attack to hit. If the attack succeeds, the subject gains 2d4 negative levels.
   If the subject has at least as many negative levels as HD, he dies. Each negative level gives a creature the following penalties: -1 competence penalty on attack rolls, saving throws, skill checks, ability checks, and effective level (for determining the power, duration, DC, and other details of spells or special abilities). Additionally, a spellcaster loses one spell or spell slot from her highest available level. Negative levels stack.
   Twenty-four hours after gaining any negative levels, the subject must make a Fortitude saving throw (using the spell DC in this case) for each negative level. If the save succeeds, the negative level is negated. If it fails, the negative level goes away, but one of the subject's character levels has been permanently drained.
   If the ray strikes an undead creature, that creature gains 2d4x5 temporary hit points.
Hide Life
Necromancy
Level: Sor/Wiz 9
Components: V, S, M, XP
Casting Time: 1 day
Range: Personal
Target: You
Duration: Instantaneous (see text)
Saving Throw: None
Spell Resistance: No
   You isolate your life force in one single part of your body—typically the little finger on the left hand. You can then remove this part and store it in some safe place. Once the spell takes effect, you can no longer be killed by ordinary means: If damage or a spell effect would normally render you disabled, dying, or dead, you ignore the usual effects. Instead, you are staggered (only able to take partial actions).
   While this spell is in effect, if you would otherwise be disabled or dying, you do not lose hit points for taking actions or having a negative hit point total. Healing does not automatically return you to 0 hit points but simply adjusts your current total upward. If you would otherwise be dead, you cannot benefit from healing and simply fall down dead if the spell is ended.
   If the hidden body part is ever destroyed, the spell is broken and your life force returns to your body if you would not otherwise be dead.
   Material Component: A small sickle made of the purest silver, which you must use to detatch the body part to be stored.
   XP Cost: 5 000 XP.
Soul Bind
Necromancy
Level: Clr 9, Sor/Wiz 9
Components: V, S, F
Casting Time: 1 action
Range: Close (25 feet + 5 feet per two levels)
Target: Corpse
Duration: Permanent
Saving Throw: Will negates
Spell Resistance: No
   You draw the soul from a newly dead body and imprison it in a black sapphire gem. The subject must have been dead no more than 1 round per caster level. The soul, once trapped in the gem, cannot be returned through clone, raise dead, reincarnation, resurrection, true resurrection, or even a miracle or wish. Only by destroying the gem or dispelling the spell on the gem can one free the soul (which is then still dead).
   Focus: A black sapphire of at least 1 000 gp value for every Hit Dice possessed by the creature whose soul is to be bound. If the gem is not valuable enough, it shatters when the binding is attempted. (While characters have no concept of level or Hit Dice as such, the value of the gem needed to trap an individual can be researched. Remember that this value can change over time as characters advance.)
Wail of the Banshee
Necromancy [Death, Sonic]
Level: Death 9, Sor/Wiz 9
Components: V
Casting Time: 1 action
Range: Close (25 feet + 5 feet per two levels)
Area: One living creature per level within a 30-foot-radius spread
Duration: Instantaneous
Saving Throw: Fortitude negates
Spell Resistance: Yes
   You emit a terrible scream that kills creatures who hear it (except yourself). The spell affects up to one creature per caster level. Creatures closest to the point of origin are affected first.