Transformative Conditions

Medical practice in Wisteria recognizes a special class of conditions and diseases known as Transformative Conditions. These conditions often lead to permanent and irrevocable changes in the fundamental nature of the person who contracts them. This differs from progressive conditions in two major ways:

• Transformative Conditions are necessarily communicable. While a condition like senile dementia irrevocably changes the sufferer, it's not possible to "catch" it. Contrast lycanthropy.
• Transformative Conditions have a "progressive" and "emergent" phase. During the progressive phase, the changes caused by the disease are progressing and the disease may be curable (though usually by extreme means). Once the disease is fully emergent, usually no cure is possible, or instances of the cure are extremely noteworthy, possibly including divine intervention.

Accursed Conditions

Accursed conditions are owed to high-level curses. While a variety of mundane curses exist, often no more than nuisances, some curses carry significant weight and create a transformative conditions, usually by disrupting the balance between body, mind, and soul. By far the most famous and common such condition in this category is Lycanthropy.

• Lycanthropy is a somewhat common condition, at least when viewed as an umbrella condition which covers all the various forms and 'lineages' of lycanthropy across Ahren. The precise relationship varies from form to form, but most Lyncanthropy is tied in some way to the moon, having a lunar Trigger Phase, which is the lunar phase at which the control of the mind over the lycanthrope is weakest. Usually, Lycanthropy is passed from an existing lycanthrope to a new victim through an infected wound. This imposes a condition such as Wolfbite Fever or similar which is curable up until the first transformation, whereupon the condition is then considered emergent, but the preliminary infection, mercifully, has become asymptomatic.
• Dreamscaphe is a rarer condition, and most cases are directly contracted by application of a personal curse by a great Fae power; however, it is communicable in its early stages. Progressive cases of dreamscaphe are passed through shared consumption of food with a dreamscaphe sufferer. The disease manifests as increasingly vivid and restless dream, progressing through insomnia. In the end, the victim disappears outright after dreaming themselves into the Ethereal Plane. Those who can retain the appropriate magics are able to force themselves to re-manifest in the prime material plane of Ahren but are forever outsiders to it and are prone to other unusual happenings as a result.

Undeath

Undeath has a variety of forms and causes, and not all of them are considered transformative conditions; the chief distinction is whether or not the condition applies to an individual before or after death, and the presence of the communicable progressive phase.

• Inthantosiac Plague is a condition that causes progressive and severe physical illness, ultimately resulting in the death of the host, and their "revival" a period of hours or days later as a mindless zombie. Inthanatosiac Plagues are almost always the result of the intervention of necromancers, as the agent that causes the disease is short-lived without a host; however it is readily communicated by contact with the fluids or excretions of Plague Zombies or certain corrupted materials. Fortunately outbreaks of this disease are rare - even talented necromancers have difficulty controlling more than a very small number of zombies and lore is full of cautionary tales of would-be Plague Lords torn asunder by the mindless hordes they created for themselves.
• Vampiric Heamophagia is a condition that leads to vampirism, by far the most common avenue to that condition. It is passed primarily by the consumption of bodily fluids from a sufferer of the condition, and therefore accidental contraction (while possible) is rare. A vampire bite, even to the point of death, is not enough to become a vampire. Someone suffering from Vampiring Heamphagia experiences a progressive phase lasting a full month where their condition rapidly worsens, until death and revival as a vampire at the end of the month; however, up until this point the condition is actually readily curable, provided the sufferer realizes the source of their increasing misanthropy, aversion to sunlight, and dis-regulated sleep schedule.
• Lichdom is listed here because it is a perimortem-aquirable form of undeath, though it has a marked distinction from other Transformative Conditions in that its entire diseased phase is mental deterioration, and therefore arguably not communicable. Vectors for acquiring the Drive to Lichdom are unknown; the host is rarely aware of their own deterioration and is often predisposed. The main progressive phase of the condition - the slow physical death of the body - takes place during the rituals that create objects used in the final transformation of the lich into full lichdom. This process requires advanced knowledge in a large number of magical disciplines (especially Necromancy). It is thought that a large number of occult suicides over the years have been deluded or unsuccessful transformations to lichdom, possibly adding argument to the idea that the condition itself matters to the process. Successful liches have temporarily bound their souls to a physical object in order to reanimate their dying bodies from outside of themselves, and can repeat the process indefinitely so long as the bound object - a phylactery - is unharmed and accessible on the same plane of reality.
• Desiccated Thralls are victims of the disease pariah rot which is passed by Penitentiary Mummies in the bleak. In its early progressive disease phase, the condition is marked by lesions of the skin, progressive paresthesia, and hydrophobia. The victims usually die within a week of dehydration, and reanimate at the following sunrise under the control of whichever Penitentiary Mummy they contracted the condition from. Their wakefulness is tied directly to that mummy lord, however, so they may "reanimate" and then proceed to sit or stand mindlessly in position if their progenitor is dormant.

Aberrant Conditions

Aberrant transformative conditions are extremely rare and tend to be highly specific, in the form of curses applied directly to a given individual on the action of a specific aberration, usually one of great power.