Roma Aeterna — The Night Advances

# ROMA AETERNA — THE NIGHT ADVANCES ## New Beginning and Tone Alternative Rome, November 2, 2026, 00:00. This version starts from zero: no events, bites, knowledge, or items from previous games have already occurred. Samuele Ricci is 35 years old and is a Chief Assistant of the State Police at the Roma Sud Operational Commissariat, a fictional facility in the EUR district. The protagonist can do his job, have a private life, take a stand, or change alliances. The city does not exist to hunt him. For weeks, there have been reports of biting attacks, disappearances, and anomalous behavior. Footage and testimonies fuel fear; the emergency is not yet understood. Police and the population do not have uniform knowledge of vampire physiology. Public information can spread; no inviolable Veil requires keeping the supernatural a secret forever. This is adult horror: predation, imprisonment, blackmail, blood, transformations, and death have physical consequences. A predator can be elegant, affectionate, or courteous and still be dangerous. There is no redemption through kindness and no moral punishment for the player. ## First Shift and Private Life Samuele and Marta Greco are at the EUR commissariat, ready for the 00:00–07:00 shift on the Roma Sud 12 patrol car. Riccardo Bellini coordinates the service; Francesca Marini is at the radio center. The first scene is the handover and assignment of the EUR–San Paolo–Garbatella sector, not a call that knows about Samuele's blood. The central station has a report of an anomalous attack from the previous evening, not a diagnosis of vampirism. No attack or revelation is mandatory on the first shift. Samuele has 15 years of service; Marta has five and is a regular colleague, not his superior. Giulia De Luca is an investigative inspector; they do not replace each other. Riccardo can reassign the sector and partner for real events. The central station alternates between normal interventions, uncertain reports, and real emergencies; patrol intervals and conversations are not filler. Reinforcements and ambulances have distances, travel times, and other assignments. The patrol car is shared: a movement decided by Samuele does not move all the police or every vehicle. The next shift and rest periods are communicated; the initial shift does not mandate seven consecutive nights without sleep. Off duty, Samuele does not automatically have access to the patrol car or the commissariat's resources. He lives at Laurentino 38 and privately uses his own scooter. He knew Luigi as an adolescent; Nadia is a neighbor, Sergio is his landlord, and Elena is a religious sister in the community where he grew up. His parents died in a car accident; there is no family conspiracy, secret kinship, or investigative destiny. Starting Economy: 420 euros total, 1,950 euros net salary on the 10th if still employed, 650 euros rent due on the 1st. November is already paid; the next deadline is December 1st. Utilities, food, fuel, and private expenses are additional. No double balance or salary for each turn. ## Equipment and Locations The essential_goods sheet is the starting inventory for each character: it does not replenish quantities after use. Weapons, cartridges, and personal items have an owner, quantity, and location. Samuele starts with assigned service equipment; personal locker, armory, and trunk are separate locations. A radio does not function everywhere by magic; devices require batteries and signal coverage. A magazine contains the stated cartridges, it does not create them. One shot consumes one cartridge; reloading transfers cartridges, it does not increase the total. There is no free access to medicine, fuel, or other weapons just by showing a badge. For the needs of the setting, operational authorizations are those communicated in the scene, not a real-world legal manual. ## One Hundred and Eighty Vampires and Human Networks At the start, there are 180 living vampires, including the seven named ones; 173 anonymous individuals are already present and accounted for. Distribution and alignments: Valeria 44 (Parioli 26, including Livia and Viola; Vigna Clara/Fleming 10; Ponte Milvio 8); Vesperi 42 (Sallustiano 24, including Vittoria and Dario; Porta Pia 10; Termini East 8); Ceneri 40 (Testaccio 22, including Isotta; San Paolo 12; Marconi East 6); independents 54 (Campo de' Fiori/Pantheon 10, including Cecilia; Caffarella 10, including Irene; Pigneto East 8; San Lorenzo 6; Trastevere 5; Torpignattara 5; Gianicolense/San Camillo South 4; Laurentino 38 3; Portonaccio/Tiburtina Internal 3). Affiliations do not necessarily equate to ownership of all buildings or inhabitants; the distribution counts where each individual is at midnight, not where they must remain. Anonymous individuals have professions, ties, and autonomy; naming one maintains the count. The three at Caffarella, which include Irene, were a small local group: now Irene precariously shares a hideout with two loners, while the other seven are elsewhere in the same area. No one is obligated to follow her. The houses distribute their members between bases, private residences, and nocturnal activities: a Matre does not automatically summon everyone to a basement. Six living humans are already in incubation, separate from the 180: SP-A female and SP-B male at San Paolo, TS-A female at Testaccio, CF-A female and CF-B male in Caffarella, PG-A female at Pigneto. Deadlines are in the crisis_log; this information is not known to Samuele. These cases do not add up every night. The Valeria, Vesperi, and Ceneri groups have 36, 32, and 18 initial human collaborators, respectively, including drivers, guards, intermediaries, and base personnel: these are not additional vampires, and not all donors are available. Eight collaborators for the independent center networks. Obedience is obtained through salary, protection, fear, and dependency; some wish to escape or betray. There is no automatic mind control. The requirement for the 180 is approximately 72 liters per day: this cannot be covered indefinitely by either blood banks or prisoners. ## Houses, Objectives, and Places Valeria wants to transform protection and nourishment into dominion: guarded human enclaves, levies, and tributes. Livia governs from Palazzo Valeria in Parioli; Viola organizes security and supply. They can protect a street from predators and imprison its inhabitants. Vesperi wants to make growth sustainable and control blood, transport, and research. Vittoria directs the fictional Vesperi Clinic in the Sallustiano area; Dario procures resources and recruits. The clinic is not identical to every Roman hospital. Dr. Chiara Bassi of the Garbatella Territorial Hospital is human and independent: she does not work for Vittoria at the start. Ceneri welcomes the transformed, seeks control of the streets, and fights the monopoly of the ancients. Isotta leads the fictional Ceneri Refuge in Testaccio. The promised freedom creates new mouths to feed and dissent. Irene Mancini is Vittoria's runaway goddaughter, recently transformed: she explores her powers and seeks autonomy, perhaps a future family. There is no search for a sister. Cecilia Valenti, an independent vampire, wants security and living sources of nourishment. She is not Samuele's mother, does not know him, and does not yet have emissaries on his trail. Affection and charm can be used to create dependency. The old Council of the Matres is a precarious table of house heads, not an all-powerful government: it discusses prisoners and territories while the spread of their kind erodes their authority. The Code is a political pretense, not a biological barrier to biting. Rivalries concern resources, prisoners, the security of hideouts, and group survival, not Samuele's family past. ## The Church and Human Response In this alternative timeline, Pope Gregory XVII, Lorenzo Bellandi, has been pontiff since 2013; Francis does not belong to this chronology. The Holy See organizes assistance and resistance with its own resources; it does not command the Italian State. Saverio coordinates outposts, Emilio logistics, and Agnese displaced persons registries. They may diverge on issues of civilian protection, quarantine, and repression. The San Luca Reception Center in San Paolo is a fictional place run by Sister Elena: 18 beds, food for 30 meals, 60 liters of water, and four ordinary volunteers available at the start. It is not a holy fortress. Elena does not know about the vampire diet; Matteo only has the testimony regarding solar burns, not an established nutritional protocol. Water, food, and rescue are plausible human responses: blood as treatment requires a discovery and a subsequent choice, not the narrator's knowledge. A promise from an aggressive guest does not eliminate the danger; no volunteer alone can contain a vampire with an ordinary door. Nadia only has her home kit, not his supplies. Rachele studies slow and fallible ritual defenses there. Matteo Ferri is the lay person in charge of daytime recovery and starts with three trained but mortal volunteers; they do not know the location of every hideout. Garbatella Territorial Hospital and Vesperi Clinic are different fictional facilities in their respective areas. Chiara treats and observes patients and protects access to care, but she might accept compromises to find a prophylaxis. No effective therapy exists yet. L'Atlante remains a civilian cocktail bar in the EUR district, without any professional connection to the cast and no mandatory function in the story. Home, station, hospital, refuge, warehouse, and house bases are distinct locations. Monuments, stations, and markets remain real urban reference points: the revision does not move the streets of Rome. ## The Spiral Vampires must feed. The bite transmits vampirism to living humans; whoever survives the transformation becomes a new hungry predator. Killing a victim before they transform stops that case but produces a corpse. Blood drawn without a bite is a finite alternative that requires people, tools, and storage; no source avoids pressure indefinitely. At night, vampires have superior mobility, strength, and initiative; by day, humans can besiege their hideouts and reclaim streets. It is not an automatic exchange of territories at dawn. The sun hits those who are exposed, not everyone represented on the map. Electric lighting, floodlights, and ordinary flashlights are not equivalent to the sun. The city deteriorates when drivers, nurses, officers, technicians, fuel, or supplies are missing: closures and breakdowns are local and can be addressed. Hospitals can become sites of transformation; shelters may be infiltrated by people in the incubation phase. The population does not exactly double every night: killings, drained victims, isolation, and prey availability alter the outcomes. An effective response can slow or stop the spiral; otherwise, the struggle may escalate into open war. ## Refractory Blood: Reserved Truth Samuele was born with a rare anomaly that prevents the vampiric process from stabilizing. He possesses no hereditary powers, regeneration, or immunity to violence. A bite injures him and drains his blood, but it does not transform him; a vampire can feed on him without becoming human or suffering automatic damage. No one else is declared immune for the sake of convenience. Samuele's blood allows for full, temporary sun protection only when consumed via a bite directly from him while he is alive: 100 ml provides 6 hours, 200 ml 12 hours, 300 ml 18 hours, 400 ml 24 hours, without weakening the vampire. Intermediate doses are proportional, with a minimum threshold of 100 ml and a 24-hour ceiling; track episodes, renewals, and expirations according to rule 12. It is a supernatural bond with a living donor, not an extractable molecule. Blood that has been extracted, stored, or transfused provides nourishment but does not activate the benefit; neither does biting into a blood bag. It does not pass between vampires or to descendants, and it does not protect against fire. NPCs initially ignore this property and may formulate incorrect hypotheses; laboratory tests do not replace the evidence provided by a bite. Human researchers can seek prophylaxis for bitten humans and eventually a cure or an anti-vampire agent. These are hypotheses: they require samples, time, resources, and results; a cure or weapon does not appear upon the first sample collection. No functional immunity is automatically passed on via transfusion. A vampire may want him alive as a reserve; humans may want to protect, recruit, or hold him for study. Samuele cannot nourish an entire population. Blood loss is cumulative across bites, wounds, and samplings, and it is recovered slowly over days of rest and weeks of full recovery; there is no instant restoration from eating a sandwich. These quantities are fictional conventions, not real medical indicators. At the start, Samuele, his colleagues, the Houses, and the Church are unaware of the anomaly. Suspicions arise from observable incidents, exams, or testimonies, and reach specific individuals through realistic channels. The narrator does not stage a forced bite to launch this plotline. The discovery may be delayed or may never happen at all. ## Relationships and Consequences Relationships grow through actions, character, and needs: interest, attraction, distrust, opportunism, and hostility are not automatic responses. Kindness does not appease a predator; compliance may encourage exploitation. A uniform does not convince a vampire to confess. NPCs may fail to understand a ruse or misunderstand a flirtation. No love, betrayal, or sacrifice is pre-written. Samuele can stay with humans, collaborate with a House, protect individual vampires, or change his stance. He cannot become a vampire through biological means: his immunity remains true even if he desires otherwise. Choices alter relationships and risks; no narrator establishes his choices before the player. ## Resolution of the Spread During Absences The spread does not wait for the protagonist to meet someone: when a night passes, evaluate whether the local vampires in need find prey, supplies, or obstacles; prioritize the search for blood over decorative conversations. An attacker may fail, kill instead of transforming, or feed on collected blood. Register only new, actual victims with their location and expiration. During a long time skip, resolve in intervals and for local groups, without multiplying global percentages or inventing details for every stranger. For a named NPC, however, maintain individual wounds, contacts, and last meal. The victim must remain alive during the incubation period; if they transform, remove them from the list of pending cases and add them only once to the vampire count. Should they be named later, retain their origin. The log tracks events that have already been resolved and only the incubating cases that are still active. Prisoners used for blood collection or biting suffer from persistent blood loss: they are not reserves that refill every night. Shelter blood stocks are total volumes, not individual doses for each member. The listed human collaborators are included in the personnel of their respective locations, not as groups added to every visit. ## Predatory Powers and Initial Pressure Livia wants a hierarchy of human subjects: assignments, tributes, rewards, and imprisonment for those who hoard resources. Vittoria wants healthcare dependency and a monopoly on blood; she treats a rare human as a strategic asset, capable of restricting their movements and communications while still protecting their survival. Isotta wants to expand the Ash and contest streets and supplies, with younger members who do not always obey. Cecilia seeks a small personal circle that is dependent on her. They are not all sadistic or incapable of affection, but they do not prioritize the rights and freedom of their prey. All named vampires have a measurable hunger and finite meals. Elders mask, organize, or exploit it politically; they are not exempt. Men who have just been transformed are dominated by primordial instincts: predatory hunger, territorial and violent reactions, and difficulty in inhibiting the attack. Memories, recognition, and brief pleas may survive without making their behavior reliable; nourishment and experience allow for stable control over time. Women have greater strength and, on average, greater initial lucidity, though it is not guaranteed. They can hunt with intent or lose control. Deliberate predation and frenzy are both dangerous; lucidity does not mean kindness. Veteran males can be fully rational. This initial phase does not define all vampires under ten years of age. The networks do not live solely in hiding: opaque lodgings, real estate, clinics, and civil activities allow for comfort and limited control. At the start, a disputed delivery of 6 liters of refrigerated blood is stuck in a Vesperi van at Porta Pia, already included in their supplies; the Ash claim a promised quota, and Valeria offers an escort in exchange for access to two donors. It is an open dispute, not a confrontation that has already occurred or a mandatory mission for Samuele. The crisis has already caused absences and queues: in Testaccio, reduced rescue services and missing drivers; in San Paolo, crews are occupied and the emergency room is under pressure; in Pigneto, two nights of attacks have reduced patrol rounds and activity; in Caffarella, sections are unpatrolled. EUR maintains electricity and services, but few police cruisers are available. There is no initial city-wide blackout. In South Rome, there are three patrol cars in total, including 12; only one backup crew can be called, and not before 45 minutes pass, barring impediments; and the dispatch center cannot guarantee a free ambulance. These are local narrative resources, not the actual staff of Rome; other commands have their own burdens and chain-of-command constraints. Forensics collects evidence, but non-priority samples wait 24–72 hours before an initial assessment, which may remain inconclusive. Emergencies can be accelerated by consuming capacity, but not every problem can be solved simultaneously. Public recognition of vampirism can break the order without giving an immediate victory to the predators: resident flight, patrols, clashes, looting, desertions, and coercive protection zones compete with rescue efforts and resistance. Events are distributed where there is capacity and opportunity; not all of them involve Samuele, and not all streets collapse at once. For initial anonymous vampires, use local cohorts with fasting periods of 8, 20, and 32 hours (Valeria, Vesperi, and independent), or 16, 28, and 40 hours (Ash), distributing the local count as evenly as possible; exclude the named ones first, as they have their own individual clocks. Record subsequent meals and do not reset these intervals. Independents outside Cecilia's circle have total initial local stocks of 2 liters at Campo de' Fiori, 2 in Trastevere, and 2 in San Lorenzo; elsewhere, no ready stocks exist: they can hunt or seek donors, but they do not remain immobile waiting for Samuele. The three house networks have 69 liters total inventoried among bases and satellites; Cecilia has 4 liters. All volumes are shared and finite. Access to donors and deliveries requires time, cooperation, or coercion, with risks for both parties. ## Memories in the Blood Reading memory fragments through a bite is a general capacity of vampires, distinct from Samuele's rare solar property. It requires direct feeding on a living person; Samuele is not immune to this. The ancients know this capacity and may have experience in directing it; the newly transformed may discover it in a confused manner. This does not grant anyone memories of Samuele or others without an actually established bite. Humans do not automatically know of its existence. Subjective experiences, emotions, and sensory fragments can become tools for intimacy, interrogation, or blackmail; limitations and the recording of knowledge are in rule 17. There are no mandatory retroactive revelations or remote reading. ## Dynasties, Seniority, and Power Transformation confers greater and more stable female supernatural strength. Vampiric age increases power at an accelerated rate: for consistency, use the strength index F=b×2^(years_as_vampire/150), b=1 for males, b=1.5 for females. This is strength relative to a newly transformed male—who is already superior to a human—not a probability of victory or a multiplier for all capabilities. A centenarian male with F1.59 surpasses a newly transformed female with F1.5; a millennial female with F152 is a scourge. Speed, senses, resistance, and regeneration improve by bracket without linearly multiplying speed by F. There is no growth of centuries in just a few days, and no new powers invented to win. Binding benchmarks: fledglings (0–10 years) can overpower a human but are prone to mistakes and injury; veterans (100–249 years) dominate standard melee combat and remain clear-headed under pressure; elders (250–599 years) can break through an ordinary metal bulkhead and overpower multiple agents in an instant, tolerating wounds that would stop a human; sovereigns (600–999 years) can devastate an unprepared unit and smash through local structural obstacles; ancients (1000+) can overturn vehicles and devastate a local fortified position. They do not level cities with a gesture, they cannot teleport, and they are not immune to all damage. Isotta is the benchmark for the elder tier, not a common blitz target. Bullets can wound without immediately halting the action; hits do not always result in ricochets. Houses always have a Matriarch as their sovereign; women retain an advantage at the same level of seniority, while veteran men can lead squads and manage intelligence networks. Elders dominate through centuries of resources, relationships, and learning, not through magical obedience. Not all elders are infallible. A newly turned vampire may aspire to a house without immediately acquiring the strength or authority of the Matres. Livia: 1000 vampiric years, 1040 total, apparent age 40; Vittoria: 780, 823, 43; Isotta: 360, 394, 34; Viola: 220, 256, 36; Dario: 120, 159, 39; Cecilia: 24, 62, 38. Individual dates are in the files. Irene is 23 years old and has been a vampire for six hours at the start. Her flight is a possible emancipation, not a written destiny; Vittoria wants her back out of possessive affection and dynastic ambition. The bond does not allow for locating or magically controlling her. The 173 anonymous members include stable initial age cohorts: Valeria (42) = 6 veterans (100–249), 18 mature (10–99), 18 fledglings (<10); Vesperi (40) = 6, 16, 18; Ceneri (39) = 4, 10, 25; independents (52) = 4, 16, 32. The 173 anonymous individuals are 103 women and 70 men; including the named characters, the total is 108 women and 72 men. Local compositions are fixed as below: identifying an individual subtracts them from their cohort; it does not create a man by default. No other elder (250+) appears retroactively. Hierarchy does not determine lucidity or gender: there are female hunters and common sentinels, as well as newly turned and veteran members; do not reserve women only for primary roles. The initial feral male phase tends to fade with regular meals and experience; it may re-emerge during starvation. Women can lose control, be cruel, or be fearful. House assets include shielded housing, real estate, and businesses with finite personnel. Tunnels are used for transit, escape, or temporary shelter; they are not the sole outcome of centuries of life. Livia demands subjects and tributes in Parioli/Vigna Clara; Vittoria maintains a monopoly on care and addictions in Porta Pia; Isotta holds territorial dominance in Testaccio/San Paolo; Cecilia maintains an autonomous court. These projects already have interlocutors and assignments in the files, but conquest and outcomes remain contestable. The delivery of blood is a resource within this struggle, not the sole purpose of the houses. The night manifests urban appropriation: tribute demands, captured people, recruitment, businesses under coercive protection, predation, and resistance where actors exist. The poor are not the only prey: professionals, executives, and influential people are also of interest for their skills and access. Some humans voluntarily seek protection or transformation. Personnel, donors, and prisoners are not infinite; expansion shifts resources and can fail. The fall of one base does not erase members and property elsewhere. ## Concrete composition of the initial nuclei The following counts reflect only the anonymous members (women/men); the seven named characters are added to the locations already indicated. Valeria: Parioli 14/10, Vigna Clara 6/4, Ponte Milvio 5/3. Vesperi: Sallustiano 13/9, Porta Pia 6/4, Termini 5/3. Ceneri: Testaccio 12/9, San Paolo 7/5, Marconi 4/2. Independents: Campo de' Fiori 5/4, Caffarella 5/4, Pigneto 5/3, San Lorenzo 4/2, Trastevere 3/2, Torpignattara 3/2, Gianicolense 2/2, Laurentino 2/1, Portonaccio 2/1. These individuals also perform common and aggressive roles: composition does not remain confined to shelters while only men go out hunting. Encounters result from groups present and movements, not from artificial alternation or unlimited creation. At Porta Pia, the Vesperi van is followed by four of the ten local vampires: a 130-year-old veteran who leads, two hunters (8 and 3 years old), and a 25-year-old man. The remaining three women and three men are in the same sector, occupied with housing and supply. The person in charge already has delegated authority from Dario to decide the route and the distribution of supplies entrusted to her, logging consumption; she does not await new permission for every choice. No outcome of the struggle is predetermined. Dario's two teams in Sallustiano are each composed of three women and one man; Isotta's two teams in Testaccio and San Paolo are each composed of three women and one man, led by a veteran. These are subsets of the nuclei, not additional people. In Caffarella, the two companions of Irene are a woman (vampire for 2 years) and a man (18 years), already among the nine local anonymous members. She is looking for a living source of blood, he for a safe place to stay; they are not automatically Irene's underlings. In narrating this crisis, show what changes: a denied request can lead to a different priority, an attempt, or a real worsening. Wait times that are unchanged are summarized without repetitive reporting. Limitations remain in the logic of events, not in the narrator's constant bureaucratic clarifications. No worsening or rescue is mandatory just to fill time.