The Itching Plague

The Itching Plague is a disease associates with shaggy spiders.

Transmission & Vectors

Itching Plague is spread by contact with infected blood in most cases, but it can be contracted by being bitten by a shaggy spider.

Causes

Itching Plague is the result of being infected with the eggs of shaggy spiders, who rely on blood to reproduce. The eggs are incubated in the victims, resulting in the unbearable itch. When the eggs are safely incubated, a process that takes weeks, psychic attacks by the spiderlings drive the host to aggressiveness, and eventually a drive to kill.

Symptoms

The condition starts with a series of itching rashes and bumps under the skin. As time goes on, the victim eventually begins to act aggressively and hallucinate, almost always trying to kill those around them in the final stages of the infection.

Treatment

The peoples of the north rely on burning herbs and applying the ashes as part of a salve when healing magic is unavailable, with plenty of bedrest and water.

Prognosis

Unfortunately, most victims succumb to the madness and burst open as hundreds of spiderlings leave their skin. Afterwards, the victims are nothing more than mindless living hives under the control of the spiderlings. Curiously, the damage from the spiders exiting the body heals extraordinarily quickly. Aside from the hundreds of small holes in the flesh, these mindless minions are identifiable by the fact that their eyes slowly become translucent, revealing a nearly empty skull full of nothing but minimal brain matter and spiders.

Type

Parasitic