Grey Plague

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Ahead of the Grey Horde spreads the Grey Plague, affecting both fauna and flora. It causes flora to become grey, wilting and sickly, while fauna, including intelligent creatures, rapidly degenerate into psychotic rages and insatiable hunger, with a 100% mortality rate within a month of infecting. The Grey Plague has no known cure.

Origins

Unbeknownst to the surviving nations of Autumna, the Grey Plague is neither natural, nor a disease. Prior to The Purge, The Hazrad Imperium made extensive use of microscopic techno-arcane machines for a host of industrial and medical uses. One such machine was colloquially known as Grey Goo and was intended for use on other, more inhospitable worlds within the Mortal Sphere to make them suitable for colonisation by the Imperium. Grey Goo would utilise the resources available on whichever celestial body it was unleashed upon and over the course of several centuries transform it into a world capable of sustaining life. Upon completion, The Hazrad Imperium would transmit a “kill code” to deactivate the Grey Goo and begin populating the planet. Grey Goo was never to be utilised on a populated planet, as the consequences and behaviour of the substance would be impossible to predict. Individually, Grey Goo machines were of limited, base intelligence, however once taken as a whole they achieve a limited sentience and ability to make decisions to better complete their purpose.

Contemporary Application

Millenia later Asha, in her hubris, breached a Hazradian storage vault on the uppermost edges of the Underdark and accidentally unleashed Grey Goo into the topmost levels. Asha quickly sealed the exit to the surface, but did nothing about the spread into the depths. Over the next millenia, Grey Goo began infecting the dead and dying in the underdark, reanimating them for a short period as it tried to return the corpses to a state suitable for life. In the machine’s attempt to create the conditions for life, it created the perfect conditions for unlife. Corpses, post Grey Goo infection, are ideally suited for reanimation by Necromancy as the machines vastly reduce the arcane power required to animate flesh. The semi-sentient machines are aware that they are not fulfilling their primary purpose, but are locked in a logic loop of eternally attempting to create life, while attempting to deactivate due to life being present, but without the lost Hazradian kill code, they must continue their eternal mission.

The Grey Plague

The modern civilised races of Autumna know nothing of microscopic machines, or species of sentient goo. They know only that there is a plague spreading slowly from the borders of Fallen Asha that causes intense rage and hunger in sentient beings and animals before killing every infected host. Fortunately for the species that populate the surface, the Grey Plague actively attempts to avoid living hosts, and will only infect a live body when forced to, usually by a commander in the Grey Horde.

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Infected Boar