The Windflower, a cure for Windis

For centuries, Naturalists, mages that have focused their skills on Natural Magic, have been developing remedies from plants they find, combine or sometimes even create. With thousands of years of knowledge, most common sickness have now cures that everybody can buy with little ressources, from peasants to kings. But a few of the more rare sicknesses are still researched by the Naturalists. That was, until recently, the case of the Windis.

The Windis, a rare but terrible sickness

The Windis is a badly known sickness that can affect both humans and elves, but is only fatal to humans. The symptoms are, in order and cumulative:

a tightness in the chest

difficulty to breathe

a sense of smell impaired where the air begins to smell rancid

unconsciousness because of the lack of air in the patient’s lungs

and finally death, only for human patients. Elves usually wake up at this stage, feeling ill and weak but alive.

It takes most patients two weeks to pass through all these stages, but the agony can continue much longer than that, sometimes several months.
It is not really contagious, and doesn’t seem to spread by air, despite the name of the sickness. But an exchange of saliva, of blood or any other fluid could transmit the virus.

What you need to know about the way research works in most countries of the Oryuh Archipelago

The sad truth about the research process for Naturalists is that they can only officially research what has been funded by the local monarch. Even if the Mages often bend the rules and try to help as many people as possibles, rare diseases often get forgotten both by the Hierarchy and the Mages. If the research doesn’t save a fair amount of citizen, the Mages don’t get to spend time on it.

The actual invention of the Windflower

A few weeks ago, two Naturalists laboratories, one in elf territory, with a speciality in Scientific Magic, and one in human territory, specialized in Magical Science, have received orders to find a cure for the Windis. The orders were clear: they should find a cure as quickly as humanly possible, even quicker if could be. The Naturalists, under strict orders to pause every other research, but not knowing the reason of the request, still tried their best. When they realized that Bothe their communities were working on the same urgent task, they even combine their efforts, exchanging ideas by Transiper, to be as efficient as possible, trying for the first time to combine their two types of very different magic. Finally, last week, all their efforts finally paid and a new plant was created, the perfect combination of Magic and Science: The Windflower.
The Windflower is a big flower, half a meter tall with its stem when fully grown, with each petal a different color. The flower can only bloom once a month. But once bloomed, it should be picked up with its stem and leaves and someone with magic should blow on it in front of the victim’s face. The wind passing through the petal would make them turn and release the flower's spores, immediately relieving the patient who would be able to breathe again normally.

The real story behind this creation

I have been curious to find out what motivated this sudden interest in a sickness that was previously forgotten and ignored, and I was very interested by what I actually found out.
It turns out, the two countries that allied to finance the research had been in war for a few years before that. Recently though, the daughter of the Human King had been sent as an ambassador to the Elven King, and was supposed to negotiate the terms of a treaty. Instead, it seems she seduced the King and he infected her with the sickness. Trying to avoid a political scandal, both countries quickly agree their priority was to find a cure, therefore financing the research.