Red Plague
Red Plague (known also a Red Death, Screaming Plague and Flesh That Hates) is one of the most terrifying biological weapons ever concocted by the biosmiths following the teachings of the Moonlit Anvil. It is, in fact, quite possibly the most dangerous bioweapon ever created, capable of ending life on Earth with nothing but a single outbreak. This forced its creators to deploy them against a targets where uncontrolled spread isn't a problem - and earned the Red Plague yet another nickname. The Enclave Killer.
Transmission & Vectors
Red Plague spreads by multiple vectors, both 'natural' and 'supernatural'. It starts with more direct methods. Red Death transfers through blood contact (100% transmission rate) and sex (100%). It can infect water sources (25-100%, more in stale water but much less in running one). Droplet transmissions is a thing as well, though the chance to infect via that way is initially low. Contact with saliva is infectious as well, making bites (though not scratches) dangerous.
As the ammounts of the virus in the vicinity grows, its capabilities expand. It begins to spread via contact with any infected organic matter (the disease begins to attack animals, food and even plants, spreading to nearby humans via typical transmission vectors). When the area is utterly overwhelmed, massive growths begin to devour entire buildings, exhaling massive ammounts of virus into the air: at this point the virus is fully airborne, though it needs to achieve certain degree of density to be truly infectious.
Causes
Exact mechanisms of the Red Plague infection remains unknown - unfortunately to the world, the Erithian Catholic Church remains behind the biosmiths of the Moonlit Anvil when it comes to bioengineering. What is known is that it works in a highly unnatural way. Even after initial symptoms, the disease' progression essentially freezes. It will progress on its own, but extremely slowly and can be countered by certain treatments. Further exposure to the infection will slowly overwhelm the immunity system, making the disease gradually get worse and worse.
Symptoms
The initial symptoms include rapidly increasing fever, muscle pains, bloody vomits, pain in stomach, chest and head, and extremely itchy rash. Overtime the rash proceeds into boils, pain and fever rapidly grow stronger. The latter part can reach 41C. Later stages include paralysis and hallucinations (both visual and auditory).
What's worst, it also causes rampant mutations throughout the body (at least in later stages) - it begins with what is essentially a quickly growing tumors on majority of internal organs. This is caused by a massive ammounts of life energy transferred through the infected' body by the virus - it causes tumors, but it also keep the victim alive (while it keeps spreading the infection) and conscious.
Overtime the situation worsens even further, as the victims are typically slowly dissolved and merged with a quickly spreading fleshy growths enveloping entire city districts. It is not known how long they remain conscious. The entire process lasts from two days to three months, depending on the intensity of outbreak and number of infected in a close vicinity.
Treatment
A number of treatments exists. Antibiotics are essentially useless, and so is thaumorphine and other modern medicines. What works are various diet suplements and other medicines that work by reinforcing immune system - unfortunately, they are very few of them out there. Another alternative is poison: carefully picked doses of several toxic compounds (cyanide is typically the most common) can kill the viruses slightly faster than the body. And even they can only temporarily force the disease back, as there is no way to fight it back fully.
Prognosis
The Red Plague has 100% mortality rate, however death can be postponed (theoretically: indefinitely). It is, however, a trap - unless the disease is continuously suppressed by powerful drugs, such a person will keep infecting others. For people without access to medicines, the end result is always an extremely painful death within 2 to 5 days.
Prevention
No vaccine. It was developed several times. However, the virus constantly mutates. Any vaccine is rendered unusable within at best few months.
History
It is believed that several early iterations of Red Plague were employed during the War of Hatred and War of Murder. It was then that most of its current names were created. It was perfected during centuries that pasted since the end of the Age of Fire. It's newest and most potent version was deployed against the Ankryptian Enclave in 1913, to a terrifying success.
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