Disease Grinder

The Disease Grinder looks like a sausage-grinder attached to a complicated looking harness, an appearance that belies an ability to cure any disease. Its many straps and buckles seem to expand and length to fit almost any patient required and will click into close once attached. It is a bulky, heavy thing, but not so much that frail patients cannot lay down with the thing on them. Once attached, the Grinder works by turning a series of handles, causing a ghastly noise that have been compared to teeth being crushed combined with nails across a chalkboard.
The Grinder churns the sickness out of its patient with every turn of the handle, excreting it through a valve-like opening at its beginning in the form of a fine powder. Different types of diseases form different types of powder - bubonic plague is a fine, yellow powder with a sharp oder, while an infestation of Grave Grub is black and tar-like. No matter what kind of disease it grinds out of a body, the Grinder never require cleaning and never fails to perform. The worse kind of disaease might cause the crank to grind slowly or with great effort, but so far nothing has been beyond the grasp of the Grinder.
As the disease is turned to powder, it leaves the patient - when nothing is left, the cranks become light and easy, with no effect. The powder itself is inert, rendered dead by whatever process the Grinder puts it through. It is sometimes useful as a minor magical component and powerful magical disease may leave dust behind that is suitable to be reconstituted into a magic gem.

No one is quite sure who first made the Grinder or what magical principle is hidden beneath the simple looking metals. It must be an artifact of great power, for not even the worse plague or hex have defeated the Grinder.

Current Owner

The Grinder is currently in the possession of a Necromancer whose art saw him struck with all manner of hideous afflictions from his blasphemous excursions. Tired of hanging onto life by sickening necromantic spells, he managed to track down the Grinder. It has since been a constant companion, as his frail constitution mean he is almost always down with something or another - absent-minded turning the handle has become routine for him.