Curse of Immortality

Whether it was a poorly worded wish from a djinn, an ill-advised deal with a devil or fey, or an ancient ritual you may not have studied carefully enough, you managed to attain a boon coveted by archmages everywhere: true immortality, a way to live long enough to learn all there is to know and ever will be. While you can still be killed, you always return, and you will never grow older or lose your beauty. For the first few centuries, maybe even for the first few millennia, it was everything you ever dreamed of: no permanent consequences, no more living in fear of death, never having to worry about the seconds ticking away.

Eventually, though, you came to see immortality for what it truly is: a curse that ensures that there is never an end to your torment. No matter what happens, each dawn resets your physical form to its state at the moment you were cursed. You could do nothing but watch as everyone you ever cared about withered and died, you ran out of new things to discover and explore, and you began to grow apathetic and withdrawn as the world around you changed so much that you could no longer recognize or relate to it. You’re an artifact of a long gone era, and now there’s nothing left for you to do but to finally see what happens if you don’t come back…

Immortality Ailments

As a creature accursed with endless life, you suffer the following ailments:

• Whenever you get your hair cut, get a piercing or tattoo, or in any other way alter your body in a nonmagical way, your curse reverts the changes at the next day’s dawn.

• Your curse actively resists magic of a similar restorative nature. You can’t regain hit points from spells cast by other creatures, and when you die, you can’t be returned to life by any means other than the wish spell or your accursed class features.

Level 1: Ageless

Time seems to have ceased for your biological form. You don’t age and are immune to effects that would age you. You must still breathe, eat, drink, and sleep as is normal for a member of your race.

Additionally, you have forgotten more in your years than most will ever learn, and can delve into your memories to recall old talents. You learn one cantrip of your choice from the wizard spell list and one language of your choice, and you gain proficiency with one martial weapon of your choice, in a skill of your choice, and with a tool of your choice. Whenever you finish a long rest, you can choose to replace the cantrip, language, weapon proficiency, skill proficiency, or tool proficiency learned from this feature with a different one of the same type. Any cantrip you learn from this feature uses your curse ability as its spellcasting ability for as long as you know it.

Level 1: Undying

Dying is merely a painful inconvenience for you. At dawn each day, if you are dead, you magically return to life. When you are revived by this feature, you gain the benefits of having taken a long rest, and neutralize any poisons and cure any nonmagical diseases that were affecting you at the time of your death. Your wounds close and you regrow any lost limbs or other body parts, resetting your body to the way it was at the moment you gained your immortality.

No matter how many times you have endured this process, it remains extremely traumatic. When you return to life with this feature, you suffer a −1 penalty to all attack rolls, ability checks, and saving throws you make until you finish your next long rest.

Once you reach 20th level in this class, you finally attain enough control over your curse that you can break the endless cycle of revival. When you die, you can choose for this feature not to function until you are otherwise returned to life.

Level 2: Curse Spells

Your increasing mastery of your curse causes you to learn a particular spell when you reach certain levels in this class, as shown in the Immortality Curse Spells table. See the Spellcasting class feature for how curse spells work.

Immortality Curse Spells

Level 3: Wisdom of the Ages

You have dabbled in nearly every trade, even if only for the purpose of alleviating your boredom. You can add half your proficiency bonus, rounded down, to any ability check you make using a skill or tool that doesn’t already include your proficiency bonus.

Level 3: Adventuring Discipline

The adventuring you have done in pursuit of ending your curse forces you to focus your training, mastering combat skills that you may only have previously dabbled in. Choose one of the following disciplines.

Mage. You learn two additional cantrips and one 1st-level spell of your choice from the wizard spell list. You learn additional wizard spells of your choice when you reach higher levels in this class: a 2nd-level spell at 5th level, an additional cantrip and a 3rd-level spell at 9th level, a 4th-level spell at 13th level, and a 5th-level spell at 17th level. Each spell you learn with this feature counts as an accursed spell for you, and doesn’t count against the number of accursed spells you know.

Warrior. You gain proficiency with all martial weapons and with heavy armor. As a bonus action, you can focus on a creature you can see within 30 feet of you, aiming for a weakness in its defense. The next time you hit the target with a weapon attack this turn, it takes an extra 1d6 damage from the attack. This damage increases by 1d6 when you reach certain levels in this class: 11th level (2d6), and 17th level (3d6).

Level 5: Disciplinary Adept

You recall skills of ages past through contemporary training, gaining an additional benefit depending on the discipline you chose as your Adventuring Discipline.

Mage. Once during each of your turns when you deal damage to a creature with an accursed cantrip, you can cause the creature to take extra damage from the cantrip equal to your curse ability modifier (minimum 1).

Warrior. You can attack twice, instead of once, whenever you take the Attack action on your turn.

Level 11: Shared Immortality

You can temporarily share the restorative magic of your curse with another creature. When you finish a long rest, you can choose a willing creature within 30 feet of you. That creature gains the effects of your Undying feature until it returns to life or until you finish your next long rest.

Level 15: Revert

You learn to tap into your curse’s magic to revert damage you have sustained. As an action, you can regain a number of hit points equal to half your hit point maximum.

Once you use this feature, you must finish a long rest before you can use it again.

Level 20: Ancient Malediction

You have lived so long with your curse that it evolves one final time. You gain a sixth malediction metamorphosis of your choice, given that you meet its prerequisites.

Alternative Immortality If you want your character to emulate a particular unnamed doctor who travels through time and space in a police box, you can replace the Undying class feature with the Regenerate feature below. If you do, each Curse of Immortality feature that references the Undying class feature instead references the Regenerate class feature, and the Reincarnate spell replaces Raise Dead in the Immortality Curse Spells table.

Regenerate

Starting at 1st level, dying is merely a painful inconvenience for you. At dawn each day, if you are dead, you magically return to life. When you are revived by this feature, your curse replaces your lifeless corpse with a healthy, new adult body, though you still recall your former life and experiences. You determine the new body’s race using a process you discuss with your DM, or at the DM’s option you can roll on the table from the Reincarnate. You then exchange your original racial traits for those of your new race.

Once you reach 20th level in this class, you finally attain enough control over your curse that you can break the endless cycle of rebirth. When you die, you can choose for this feature not to function until you are otherwise returned to life.