Broken Heart

"I'm broken, cracked. How can I hope to help the Knights if I can't even control my own body? I should just be thrown out."

— Jérémie Aumerle

Causes

Broken Heart is a condition that effects Shades and occurs when their heart is damaged. The shade heart is the center of everything they are and allows the shade to exist and function, and as a result, if it becomes broken, it can negatively impact a shade in disastrous ways.
The Shade heart is made out of Magic Crystals Voidstone, a sturdy gem, but not immune to acquiring cracks and fissures. A severe enough physical impact to the crystal can cause significant damage to the surface.
Some hearts are more at risk of showing symptoms than others. Very early prototypes of the heart like those of older Shades like Vahit are susceptible to showing symptoms of heart damage even with out breaking, due to the inherent imperfections deep in the heart itself.

Symptoms

Damage to the heart can cause they shade's mind and body to stop working they way it should, corrupting it's form.

Physical

Physical effects to heart damage are more common. Minor cracks and scuffs can lead to the shade being physically weaker, they often start to lose control of their powers and shape shifting abilities. They are no longer as strong as they used to be, and they become far less resistant to the sun and have a hard time storing energy. While it can hinder a shade's performance, minor damage will not ruin a shade.
As cracks become larger, Shades start to lose more control of their forms. They may begin to shift involuntarily to emotional stimuli. The most significant version of this comes in the form of corrupted shade forms, most common in Elite Shades. In severe stress or anger, the shade may painfully shift into a violent, corrupted, mutated version of their demon forms and lose control completely. Often times the shade will not completely shift out of their human form, leaving them a horrific amalgamation of their demon and human forms.

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Type

Magical

Origin

Magical

Cycle

Chronic, Acquired

Rarity

Uncommon

Affected Species

• Shade
• Elite Shade

Related Articles

More severe cracks are when the body starts to breaks down completely. The shade may no longer be able to hold a human form at all, and even their demon form may become malformed. Some shades who have sustained significant damage have been known to become melted piles of black blood, no longer capable of holding a solid, detailed form. Often these shade's are seen as lost causes and shattered.
If a heart is damaged enough, it can cause the shade to be unable to reform at all, making the heart dormant and lifeless. This is closest to death a shade can get before being shattered completely.

Mental

Because the heart contains the soul of the Shade, damage to the heard --especially near the white gem in the center-- can drastically effect the Shade's mind. It can start with something as simple as a lack of emotional control or memory loss. As it progresses, the Shade can become less attached to reality, having hallucinations about their past and forgetting what the current time or year is.
Shades may completely lost track of reality and get lost in their own mind, or give into their most primal, demonic urges. Memory loss can cause a Shade to forget who they are or what they look like, causing them to lose their human form, or for their human form to look strange and unnatural.

Treatment

There is no way to fix damage to he crystal heart once it's been broken. A shade can continue to live a normal life with minor damage, but more significant breakage is often cause to be decommissioned or even shattered, as the shade is no longer useful in their dysfunctional state.
Shades with broken hearts need to take extra precautions to keep their condition from getting worse, be it taking care of their bodies or their mental health.

Cultural Perception

Shades with enough damage to effect their performance are often isolated from other shades after being decommissioned. They are seen as useless, lacking any value to the The Suit of Hearts. They are often forced to live in small communities in the The Shadow Realm, hidden away from mocking eyes.
Some have tried fusing their bodies together to make up for individual weaknesses, but this has only resulted in horrible mutant shades that wander the depths of the shadow realm.