Skin-Scraping
A sickness of shrouded origins, Skin-Scraping is a disease that ravages parts of Sciadan and Osteodor in varying intervals, flaring up and affecting many people at a time, then dying down and not being seen for a while.
Transmission & Vectors
Skin-Scraping transmits itself through skin to skin contact, no matter how minor, as even a handshake could spread it. Though during times where the disease flares up in certain regions it is said to also spread through the air, being able to infect whole villages at once.
However, while incredibly infectious, Skin-Scraping ends up killing itself later in the lifecycle of the disease when it has a host, the infected actually no longer being infectious at later stages.
Causes
Skin-Scraping appears very suddenly, without warning or reason in seemingly whatever area it pleases, almost as if it has a mind of its own. Due to the suddenness of the disease, when it appears in great numbers all of a sudden it can shut down whole districts and villages almost instantly due to how quickly it spreads.
Symptoms
Skin-Scraping manifests as immediate onset psychosis and anger, completely altering the individuals mind and mannerisms as they become increasingly more angry and agitated as the disease progresses, eventually gaining a hunger for flesh of any kind, going through violent means to satiate this hunger. The disease becomes untreatable when the second set of symptoms start to kick in, where the skin of the infected will begin to harden to a sandpaper-like substance until the infected has died and turned into a fully mummified statue.
Curiously enough, when in the second untreatable state of the illness, the disease seemingly kills itself as the biology of the infected is completely altered, hence why it is untreatable, though at the same time the infected can no longer transmit the disease in this state.
Treatment
Treatment, if caught early, is relatively simple, consisting of basic quarantine within a Chapel, Hospital or other medical building and the calling of a cleric or other healer. While it can be treated through simpler means and natural medicines, rituals and spells work better as to not risk infecting the healer as well, due to the traditional means involving a bit too much contact.
Prognosis
Skin-Scraping has only ever been observed to progress in a single, linear path, progressively turning the infected mad until they eventually harden and mummify and the disease kills itself off. The disease is only classified in its two distinct stages, the gestating stage where it progressively makes the infected mad, and the scraping stage, where the disease gets its name, turning the infected into a horrible mummified figure.
Sequela
If the disease progresses far into the first stage, the infecteds psyche may permanently be damage, continuing to show signs of minor aggression even after the disease has been cured. While it isn't a large alteration of the original person, many end up showing signs of aggression when they otherwise would not.
Affected Groups
The only affected groups by Skin-Scraping are Humans, Dwarves and Elves, with the disease outright being unable to affect anyone that differs from these, even Fleshwarps who may be a modified Elf or Human. There are rumors that it can affect Halflings as well, but there have been no officially documented cases.
Hosts & Carriers
The disease will only attach onto those susceptible to its effects as it has been observed to die out if outside of a suitable host.
Prevention
The only prevention for Skin-Scraping is lack of contact with others during an outbreak. Alternatively, the disease seems to actively seek humans, dwarves and elves exclusively, as no cases of any other race being infected has ever been recorded, some people have taken to using some of Sciadans other peoples, like Fleshwarps, and sticking around them during outbreaks, using them as living camoflage from the virus. The second method has cases where it has worked, but occasionally slips through the cracks and you may still be infected.
Epidemiology
Outbreaks of Skin-Scraping act almost like roots, with few cases being spotted at the middles of cities and villages, and rapidly spreading outwards. In most cases, when the first few cases are spotted it becomes too late to quarantine it quickly enough and Skin-Scraping ends up spreading and taking whole city districts offline for at least a few weeks, though in severe outbreaks, even a couple of months.
History
Nobody knows where the disease truly originated from, but every scholar has their theories. Certain adventurers and archeologists have at least traced the origin of where it has come from, finding the oldest mummified bodies from Skin-Scraping to be found in the land between Sciadan and Osteodor, around the city now known as Aringlade and the old Swamps Of Shedal, the bodies being traced to hundreds and some thousands of years old.
Cultural Reception
The carriers are usually feared, especially during outbreaks when most should be quarantined, as the change in personality and aggressiveness of carriers enables them to commit horrible violent acts, even murder, when the original person wouldn't harm a soul.
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