Worldly Illnesses and Diseases

Mer’s Friend

Created By: Vluharqih

Quick Facts: A disease obtained through long-term contact with Mer. No long term consequences, but treated for aesthetic reasons.

Origins: Mer. It is unknown what exactly causes this, as some reports claim something as simple as touching something that once belonged to a Mer can cause it, however all sources agree that the Mer are the original cause.

Races: Will Not affect the Mer, Yludih, Wisp or Tunawa

Symptoms: A hacking cough that expels a thick, grey mucus and a loss of colour on the tongue are two major signs that hint towards this disease. As it progresses, the hands and feet will begin to go grey as well, the colour retreating up the limbs.

Treatments: The disease can never be cured, however the symptoms can be erased by weekly leeching of the extremities. It appears something in the body forgets to produce coloured blood, but by forcing it to create new blood, the issue is temporarily managed.

The cough can not be helped, and most will simply prescribe a soothing tea.

Complications: The disease is not fatal, nor does there seem to be any other complications that arise from it. The main issue is aesthetics, as a slight social stigma is associated with this disease.

Skinwalker’s Curse

Created By: Vluharqih

Quick Facts: A disease that only affects the Yludih, Skinwalkers will follow them throughout their forms.

Origins: Unknown. No one has been able to determine what causes it, nor how to reliably cure it. If one were to figure out where it came from, it would make an incredibly powerful tool for finding Yludih.

Races: Yludih

Symptoms: This disease manifests as faint lines that circle their body.

In one obscure text, the author managed to accurately link the locations of the lines to the shape of the Yludih while in Uleuda (OOC: Very difficult to find this information).

These lines slowly grow in opacity, looking similar to tattoos. Every time that the Yludih switches forms, the lines disappear, however it is only a temporary reprieve.

It manifests itself within two trials of not shifting, though any shifting completed after that will reset both the time before they reappear and the opacity of the lines.

Finally, the lines appear above any projected illusion. For a fully feathered avriel, they would appear atop their feathers, not on their skin. Likewise, it reacts to the colour of the Yludih, and will always manifest in an obvious colour. Dark skinned or feathered forms will find light or white lines appearing.

Treatments: None have been discovered, though it is highly likely that there exists a simple remedy. The difficult part would be convincing Yludih to reveal themselves for treatment.

Complications: No complications exist. This disease is merely aesthetic, however it can spell the end for a Yludih who is recognized due to it.

Snake Tongue

Quick Facts: A degenerative disease affecting Ithecal resulting in a loss of tongue control.

Origins: Unknown

Races: Half and Full Ithecal.

Symptoms: Snake Tongue is a degenerative disease that often strikes just after the mid-point in one’s life.

The tongue begins to lose fine motor control, and the result is somewhat similar to a lisp. As it progresses, the loss of control becomes more and more obvious, eventually leading to an inability to move the tongue. Due to the lisp that develops as this disease runs it couse, and the fact that it targets the Ithecal, the slightly offensive name has become commonplace.

Treatments: Therapy and practice moving it can help to repair the damaged nerves. The disease can be held off indefinitely if one is diligent at training every trial.

Complications: At the later stages it can become very difficult to swallow or chew. Often thinner, more easily swallowed food is eaten in the later stages.

Credit: Vluharqih

The Jack

Created By: Vluharqih

Quick Facts: A widespread disease affecting only humans.

Origins: Unknown, assumed Lissira.

Races: Half and Full Human

Symptoms: This disease strikes hard and fast, running the full gambit of its symptoms within a few trials.

It begins with intense joint pain, often out of nowhere. The pain will increase the more the join is used. However, when the joint is not moved, it will slowly lock up. Eventually this progresses to every joint. When the jaw locks it becomes nearly impossible to feed the individual.

Externally moving the joints causes the patients indescribable pain. Their joints will lock in a fully extended position, making them appear like a corpse.

Thankfully, after the paitent has become fully immobilized, they will fall unconscious. This comatose state will last for two trials. Without fail all the patients describe terrible nightmare from which they cannot wake, even if their limbs are moved. Several doctors have noted that the patients seem to have worse nightmares when their limbs are moved, however.

Treatments: Nothing but time can help. Some doctors will prescribe a pain medication prior to them falling asleep, however most simply tell them to fill up on food and find a hard, flat surface to rest on. This doesn’t help the pain, but staying immobile seems to make it pass more quickly.

Complications: IF this strikes at an inopportune time, the patient may die. Dehydrated patients are unable to drink while comatose, and many have been found frozen to death as their limbs locked up far from their homes in Zi’da and Cylus. Other than that, the disease carries no lasting effects, and it is not possible to contract it more than once in a lifetime.

The Rot

Name: Brain Rot, or more commonly, The Rot

Quick Facts: A degenerative nervous disease passed through procreation or contact with contaminated brain matter.

Origins: Unknown

Races: Yludih, Wisps and Tunawa are not effected by this disease, though they can carry it through touching infected brain matter, and thus infect others

Symptoms: The disease is passed by the parents to the offspring often unknowingly. If either parent has it, the child will be born with it. Men can pass it to women by causing her to become pregnant. Even if the baby is removed, it has already been spread.

The surest symptom is blinding headaches. Theses will begin from adolescence and continue on into adulthood, growing in severity. Common headache remedies will not help. As the patient ages, blood will occasionally leak from the facial orifices while the migraine persists.

Less common symptoms include nausea, spots in one eye or inexplicable and temporary blindness in one eye. Further along in the disease, tremors and partial paralysis is common.

At the end stages the brain shuts down, resulting in a slow creep of paralysis up the body. This takes several seasons, and can be very traumatic for both the victim and their family.

Treatments: There is nothing definitive to be done. Doctors are experimenting at this time with surgery to remove part of the skull, or directly introduce antitoxins directly to the nervous system, but nothing seems to work.

Most doctors will provide an excessively large dosage of sleep medication, hinting that the person should put their affairs in order and handle things themselves.

Druce LaVarro of "The Bedside Manor" in Etzos has begun therapy to drastically reduce the manifestation of the disease. Through a careful administration of hallucinogenics and neurocranial stimulation via needles stuck in the skull, the life expectancy of his patients has nearly doubled. He is still researching this, and offers treatments for low prices. The treatments are required three times a trial for a season, once every two seasons. This has limited the number of places those with the Rot can live, as long distance travel to get to Etzos is not always possible for many.

Complications: Death is inevitable. Most people who contract this disease will die by their thirtieth arc, but those who are fortunate enough to obtain Druce LaVarro's treatment have lived to be well over fifty arcs of age.

Credit: Vluharqih

White Touch

Created By: Vluharqih

This is a picture of the early stages of the disease, when several white patches have just begun to meet and rot the flesh.

Quick Facts: A disease that seems to strike randomly, it affects those who are already plagued with another disease, the elderly or the very young (OOC: Have a weakened immune system).

Origins: Unknown, Assumed Lissira

Races: All except Wisps

Symptoms: The skin will begin by whitening in odd shaped patches all across the victims skin. They slowly grow, however it is not an issue until two patches meet each other. Where this happens, the skin begins to wither and die. The nerves are the first to die, though this is more cruel than one thinks. These spots continue to rot, and reports have been heard where holes have been seen though people who are still up and walking. The spots will weep an odd, yellowy pus, however are always bloodless.

The spots are warm to the touch, though they will feel numb to the patient.

Treatments: In the past, many doctors would incise out all of the spots, however this was incredibly time consuming and, understandably, expensive for the patient. Once all such spots were removed, the disease seemed to disappear; however if a spot was missed, they would continue to regrow. Most doctors will rely by this tried-and-true approach.

A new approach has been found, apparently starting in Andaris. The enterprising doctors there discovered that by leeching the spots, the rot would recede. This is still quite expensive, as the leeches wither and die after completing their task, and will have to be run for half a dozen trials or so before all the spots are gone, depending on how early the disease is caught.

Much more secretly, the Cauldron has discovered a much more effective method. The dried, ground shell of the Skoda can be snorted to combat the disease. It has a host of nasty side effects-vomiting, dizziness, occasional bleeding from facial orifices and, in extreme cases, death. However a daily dose of this can completely eliminate the symptoms, though the white spots will remain as dollar-sized dots. If the treatment is halted, the spots will continue to grow. The Cauldron has begun selling its remedy, but none outside of those within the secretive group know what it is made of, so it is impossible to replicate.

Complications: If two such spots meet over a vital organ, the victim will die when the rot eats into it. Additionally, other diseases become rampant as the body is exposed to the elements.

Often most will die of another, more common disease before the White Touch kills them.