The Laughing Plague

The Laughter Plague, otherwise known as Risus a Morte (Laughing to Death). Others call it by different names and titles like the Chuckle Curse or Blue-Smile Disease. However, it has been misconceived by a vast majority as Gnoll-Fever. This is a type of disease that exists mainly within the continents of Aetha'Shar, and can be transmitted to any humanoid, animal or monster - except Fey creatures. It can be contracted from coming into contact with a powdered form of pollinated Fey flower originally from the wildlands of Savasha, otherwise known as a Jubillen, where it becomes ingested or inhaled in large quantities with a living organism. In smaller forms, Jubillen powder is a popular additive spice used in cooking and baking among Halfling communities, but is also considered an aphrodisiac in certain circles that causes the body to feel a slight surge of endorphins and a sense of jovialness and loosened inhibitions. In this later form, it had been used as a popular 'festive drug'.

Transmission & Vectors

Laughter Plague has many ways in which it can infect a living being but almost all have to do with coming into contact with Jubillen Powder.
The powder can be eaten or drunk (used as an additive spice in food or drink), which for a time was unrealised to be a food contaminant that can cause Laughter Plague. One becomes contagious if consumed in great portions, or one has an immediate reaction due to a poor immune system or response. It has been realised that consumption of this through food is less likely to make one contagious and susceptible, but when imbibed as a drink or through alcohol, one is more susceptible and more likely to contract the disease and become contagious. This is the second most popular method of transmission.
The powder can be absorbed through touch or skin contact, which can affect or infect someone, although this is the least likely way of infecting someone. It requires long-term exposure and immediate proximity to the powder - if those who do not handle the powder without protective gear or gloves, it is most likely that they will contract the disease through this method.   The powder can be inhaled through oral or olfactory means, as it has sometimes been used to flavour or enhance snuff-powders or snorting drugs. This causes the most potent and deadly cases of Laughing Plague to manifest within a few short hours, but this can also cause allergic reactions and can cause new allergies to be obtained by the individual. Those who have contracted the Laughing Plague in this manner may also pass on the disease as an airborne pathogen through sneezing, spitting or when in close contact with the person (within two metres).
The powder, in very rare cases, can also be injected into the bloodstream - an indefinite means of contracting the Laughing Plague. Those afflicted this way, however, can only transmit the disease through contact with their blood.
Although rarer, if one traverses through fields or bundles of Jubillan flowers, one can contract a minor form of Laughing Plague that lasts for a few hours, and does not usually pass into the deadlier stages of the disease. But without magical means of curing, this becomes a reoccurring and can even become congenital but non-contagious.
Laughter Plague can be known to be contagious, but only through sexual activity with one infected by Laughter Plague or by coming into contact with someone's saliva, sneezing, and more rarely their breath.

Symptoms

As Laughter Plague arises from a naturally evolved, wild and uncontrolled plant from the Feywild known as Jubillen Flower, a cousin to much more deadly Jovian Flower that occurs only in the Feywild. The only difference between the two is that one is rarer and enriched with the wild and chaotic magic of the Fey, and the other has a smaller and diluted version of a curse. Thus, the symptoms come in different shapes and sizes, but one factor is common among all cases - unending laughter and artificial joy. The symptoms depend mainly upon two factors: on the way in which the Jubillen Powder interacted with the being, and the being's body's natural reaction to the Jubillen Powder, as it is can highly on each person, how influential that the Powder can be to them. For instance, Fey creatures seem to be fully immune to the subsequent Laughter Plague they develop. Elves, Halflings and Gnomes who hold hints of Fey blood and ancestry show less significant symptoms when they are affected by the Laughing Plague, and recover in significantly shorter periods of time.
The Laughter Plague can differ from being a mild change in behaviour, finding minor things worthwhile for a giggle or wry chuckle, with visual changes in the eyes iris' becoming larger and brighter, to a significant life-threatening excess of laughter at all things and a sensitivity for being ticklish, resulting in being tickled by ones own clothes, hair or even by a slight breeze. Worse cases show that they cannot feel comfort in their clothes, leading to becoming nude to feel more comfortable, but also each step tickles ones being so much that leaping into the air allows a small sense of comfort, only to lead into another bound and another. Some affected by Laughing Plague have jumped, hopped and skipped for hours across many miles in the nude, cold, injured and breathless until falling unconscious. It also can develop fevers of sweating, and lung-damage, making breathing more difficult where one laughs to the point that they can no longer inhale and die from asphyxiation. Due to the excessive laughter, depending on the periods of hours one laughs, it loosens other bodily functions, causing cramps and loss of control of bodily fluids (leading to self-urination and self-defecation). The Laughter Plague also can lead to hallucinations, due to the lack of oxygen left for the brain at times, each one being personally individualistic and malignent or helpful in some ways. They refer to these as the "Imaginary Jesters" - by this point, the infected person has reached an unstable stage of the disease, and is likely to self-harm or harm others based on the hallucinations guidance and desperate desire to stop laughing, amid despair and joy as the disease runs through their system.
The stages are different and more severe as the Plague continues: Widening of the iris, turning to a brighter colour - the feeling of euphoric joy and rush of endorphines. Following is a sudden change in temperature, hot to cold, cold to hot, and numbness in fingers and toes. Then in different stages is periods of uncontrollable laughter, ranging from a few seconds to potentially a day. As the laughter continues, the sensitiveness of contact with the skin becomes exceedingly ticklish and irritating - followed by physical jerks and tics, being in clothes and shoes becomes unbearable. Panic follows, with the paradoxical feeling of fear and continuous joy continuing. Laughter becomes painful and addictively euphoric, the throat dries and lungs hurt, but then follows the loss of bodily functions, and the early stages of hopping and skipping to release the tension of the skins sensitivity - the constant rush of the air becomes a temporary release, and then the desire to move constantly follows. Changes in extreme emotional conditions lead to hallucinations (Imaginary Jesters), and become extremely suggestible - to the point of self-harm and harming of others i.e. hair becomes ticklish, so they tear it out; scratching and prodding of own skin becomes numb to ticklish sensation, thus leading to lesions and cuts and bruising, or even breaking bones. After this, if the person has not already fainted or become unconscious from the physical strains on the body - they suffer a heart attack, which is largely the main factor of death. Leaving as a marker blue or dark lips, giving it the moniker of the 'Blue-Smile Disease'.

Treatment

Firstly, no matter how insignificant the symptom, it cannot be cured completely without the ways of magic. Methods in which have helped to counteract the disease by normal means are through being stung multiple times by a common honey bee or wasp, nettles, and in more drastic cases, being purposefully stung by a spider or scorpion. These are the most common and easily accessible means that most are able to treat the Laughing Plague, but not necessarily cure it.
But depending on the severity of the Laughing Plague that a person has been afflicted with it can be cured by the use of lesser restoration, a paladin's Divine Touch, or through an Aasimar's Lay on Hands. But, it is most likely more severe and needs a cleansing ritual, or much higher level magic to be cured. For these reasons, the Laughing Plague is difficult to cure completely - the chances of finding an Aasimar are slim, however paladins or healers are more likely to be found. Most paladins would be glad to aid an innocent, though it has been known that those who are unaware of the disease have cut down the afflicted - believing that they have become possessed. Healers on the other hand are cautious to approach the afflicted, and usually only the kind-hearted or reckless will approach an afflicted person.
If done as a ritual, the Laughing Plague can be cured either by divine magic via a group of clerics or can be cured with the ways of druidic healing magic involving a group of druids and herbalists. In some yet rare cases, the Laughing Plague can end on its own, although this doesn't happen because the Laughing Plague as a disease merges with Jubillen Powder with one's own body and so almost never is it a temporary disease, becoming congenital. Affecting family lineages, though sometimes remaining dormant and rising once in younger generations.

Sequela

The most common pathological condition resulting from the Laughing Plague is the chronic complication of a permanent smile. Muscles around the face have become overly stressed to the point that a person can no longer naturally frown without the aid of muscle relaxants or herbs - giving a permanent and eerily-viewed smile.
An uncommon pathological condition from the Laughing Plague is 'Phantom Laughter', whilst consciously awake or even sleeping - a person afflicted with the Laughing Plague can spontaneously giggle, chuckle, laugh or wheeze at indeterminate times for short periods of time.

Prevention

Once the Laughing Plague spread and became a large issue among the populations of the world, initial reactions were to cull or kill the infected creatures and humanoids - with mostly Gnolls being blamed for this occurrence due to their racial stereotype of evil laughter. Then removing the bodies without coming into contact with the vapours that release from their lungs post-mortem.
By other means, the presence of iron and Cold-Iron strangely mitigated the symptoms to a more manageable form and were sold as protective amulets and idols against the disease - but this served only to weaken the symptoms, but not cure the disease.
Over time it became known from Halfling communities that chewing stinging nettles, having a beesting on the tongue reduced the symptoms, or even eating a live bee. Though this was not an acceptable means of prevention to most common-sensed people, believing it to be another Halfling prank, when in actuality to did waylay the symptoms for those that consumed or imbibed Jubillen Powder (as the bees who pollinated the plant were endowed with some of the flowers Fey magic, but purified into other flowers through their journey around the area of the hive). Thus, further investigation and research allowed the discovery of a series of potential cures:

1. One, was the mixture of Pixie Dust into a tea, that could be drunk to intermittently cure the Laughing Plague, but this resource was rare to obtain and usually expensive to purchase.
2. Two, was to find a nearby beehive close to the location of where the Jubillen flowers grew and harvest its honey, to derive an extract that can be consumed to 'clear the pipes', so to speak. Similarly, plugging one's nose with beeswax from this beehive has been known to 'plug the bug' - though this was considered by popular culture as ridiculous and unconventional.
3. Third, was to carry around the other flowers pollinated by a Jubillen beehive in a bag and sniff it in order to mitigate the symptoms to a manageable level.

Cultural Reception

Most disregard the early stages of the disease to disorderliness, drunken-behaviour and even madness. The Laughter spreads a good sense amongst the people for a time, these people believed to be good and popular hosts for a time until they are not - and quickly leads to being fearful and ostracized.
Victims and carriers of the condition are no longer welcome at their workplaces, most are pushed away from their families for fear that they will catch the disease. Survivors typically become wandering vagrants and are forced to don masks to hide their permanently smiling faces after surviving - often labelled 'Grim Grinners', 'Two-Facers' or 'Blue Smirkies'. Treated like freaks and outcasts, most can only find work or employment as entertainers, bards, members of travelling circuses, fools or jesters. Ostracised collectives of Laughing-Plague survivors known as the Honest Faces tend to gather when they have no other options but to resort to crime in order to survive - and has resulted in many facing prejudice and discrimination as the 'scapegoats' for crimes amongst the communities.

Type

Magical

Cycle

Chronic, Acquired

Rarity

Rare