The Blight
The Deconstruction of Order
She always smiled, my Raliah. Always warmed my heart when she would. It was the type of smile that envelopes you and makes you feel like it's all going to be alright.
I used to see that smile every evening, coming home from the Hylantiastricum to a warm meal and that beautiful look, always so eager to see me.
After the Spawn came, and we rebuilt from the ruins of our home, she would smile and squeeze my arm, let me know that we could do this, together.
Even when we discovered the short, shallow cut just above her left knee, oozing black instead of blue, she smiled as she handed me the saw, and told me she wouldn't mind living with just one leg.
And when she was restrained, tied to her favorite chair as her mind slipped away, she told me one last time, through six mouths instead of one, that she loved me, and they all smiled that same, sweet, perfect smile.
And when I Called forth the flaming blade and stopped, poised to end what had once been my Raliah, I did not see the squirming black and yellow flesh before me. I did not see the frantic, boneless limbs, the uncountable eyes, or the haze of power beyond comprehension. No, all I saw was that damnable smile, and I knew I would be alright, even as my blade fell.
Transmission & Vectors
The Blight is primarily a bloodborne disease, spreading through blood contact with other afflicted or Elder Spawn.
In more rare cases, proximity to an Elder Child may trigger a reaction over time. Extended exposure, over the course of 2 to 10 days, plants a physical seed in the brain. This brain seed will spread until it punctures a blood vessel, and from there the transmission is more or less identical.
Causes
The Blight spreads extraordinarily fast through both individuals and populations. Though its behavior does not conform to typical natural law, the spread of the Old Chaos acts much like a bacterial infection. It may enter the bloodstream through any means so long as it comes in direct contact with new blood. Once the spreading Chaos reaches the heart and begins to circulate the body, hope fades quickly. When it reaches the brain, all is lost.
Symptoms
It was in the Second Era that medical men first deconstructed the Blight into four stages. In what could be considered a miracle of ancient sciences, these have proven startlingly accurate, and are still how the Blight is defined today.
Stage One
In this stage, the infection of the Old Chaos is localized, but will not remain so, and will proceed from the infection site to the heart through the bloodstream. The infected will initially suffer from headaches, nausea,fever, and aches in their chest and other vital areas as the Chaos spreads. After a period of several hours, blood begins to congeal into a black ichor as the Chaos deepens. Auditory and visual hallucinations may begin, coming with extreme paranoia. As Stage One progresses, the infected will suffer from episodes of profuse vomiting and diarrhea. This is a sign that Stage Two will begin within 12 hours.Stage Two
Stage Two begins when the manifest Chaos is fully circulated throughout the bloodstream. Hair loss begins in earnest, as teeth and nails begin to wither and die as well. The eyes, ears, nose, and mouth may expel pus, the last of the original blood, or black ichor. Though racked by hallucinations and severe paranoia, the infected is still fully sapient and aware of their condition at this stage. Lost hair may be replaced by needle-thin cilia protruding from the scalp, jaw, and appendages. Bulbous growths ranging in size from fingertip to skull will begin to appear all over the body, typically near vital nerve centers. Complex motor functions wither and cease, and as the stage progresses basic functions also arrest, leaving the infected immobilized in their terror.Stage Three
Little remains of what had once been a person once the third stage of the Blight begins. Nearly all succumb to madness once the realization of what they are becoming dawns on them, and the Elder Ones welcome and feast upon their minds. Their bodies begin to twist to the Chaos within. The Stage Two pustules burst, revealing rolling yellow eyes or screaming mouths all over the body. In some areas, new knots of hardened flesh form, reaching out like children within a womb, clawin and forming new growths of tooth, talon, and tentacle. In others, the flesh sloughs off by the pound, revealing yellowed bone coated in black Chaos underneath. Some of these areas regrow and die again constantly, forming rippling streams of trasmuting flesh. The end is near.Stage Four
None of what had once been a person remains, the body destroyed and the mind fully in the grasps of the Epiphical Sea. No sentience exists in what had once been an advanced brain; instead, brutal, eldritch instinct and the commands of the Elders have its place. The body is entirely reconstructed, the bones warping, snapping, and growing in seemingly random assortments. Indeed, some Stage Four infected can hardly move at all, due to their unique configurations of flailing limbs. At this point, the only release is death. These are no longer people. These are the Spawn.Treatment
Until the 5th Era, treatment options were few and far between. Amputation was, and in some circles, still is, the primary treatment option for Stage One and Stage Two Blight, cutting off the affected body part as close to the source as possible. Cauterization is also employed, especially up to six hours after the initial wound, as the Old Chaos has hardly spread by this point and can safely be destroyed. Blood transfusion, though risky even in the best of circumstances, also proved to be successful at early stages.
In the Fourth Era, it was discovered that exposure to high doses of radiation can also kill the Blight before it spreads too far, even in as late as early Stage Two infected. However, this can lead to more mundane illnesses, such as cancers, burns, and a shortened lifespan - small prices to pay, all things considered. After Stage Two, though, the only treatment was euthanasia or execution.
The Fifth Era, however, brought with it all the advances of a post-Rhasporian world, most importantly the globalization of the Blood Engine and other technological leaps forward. Medicinal sciences benefited from this greatly, and soon new treatments for the Blight were developed. Full-volume blood transfusions, Vönics reconstruction through Sorthamal Crystals, advanced radiation treatments - the list goes on and on. Though still extraordinarily virulent and capable of wiping whole towns off the map, the Blight today poses far less of a threat to civilization as a whole than it did three hundred years ago.
Prognosis
Unlike most diseases, death is the preferable outcome to the Blight, compared to the alternative.
A single Spawn is a threat in of itself, capable of inflicting massive casualties and creating others like it, but the true danger is in groups of them. A group of Spawn will systematically seek out and eradicate all life in a seemingly random radius - some cases have recorded Spawn marking territory of only a few dozen meters, while others attempt to rival the size of cities.
Once all life has been converted to new Spawn, the creatures pile into each other, congealing into a foul approximation of a gelatinous egg. The monstrosity that emerges from this months later could either be a Hive Mother or a true Elder Child.
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