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| | *Characters may choose one of the options appropriate to their Archetype in the [[Tales_of_Perpetual_Peace/ShanlinLoresheets#Life_in_Perpetual_Peace|Life in Perpetual Peace Lores]]. | | *Characters may choose one of the options appropriate to their Archetype in the [[Tales_of_Perpetual_Peace/ShanlinLoresheets#Life_in_Perpetual_Peace|Life in Perpetual Peace Lores]]. |
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| − | ==Dancing Red Demon==
| + | IJWTS wow! Why can't I think of tnhigs like that? |
| − | The first accounts of the plague appear in Imperial reports dated around 8 months ago; though those files have since been destroyed, they comport with accounts from travelling merchants who had been in the west around the same time. A caravan -- none can agree whence it came -- in Only Six Devils was stricken with what appeared at first to be a violent lung infection; the disease then progressed to a form of wasting sickness, leaving the infected nearly catatonic for days on end. But it was the next stage that proved the most disturbing, and which gives the illness its name: the stricken patients each seemingly enjoyed a full recovery. And not just recovery, but an overabundance of health and energy. Within three days, however, that overabundance leads to fever, mania, hostility and lust; within another three, it culminates in a bloody scene of bodily disintegration.<br>
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| − | Within two months of those initial cases, Only Six Devils was a ghost town; the few who avoided the grisly embrace of the Dancing Red Demon fled, spreading tales of a city that surpassed the Ten Hells in its horrors. Perhaps traveling with those refugees, or perhaps emerging by some other means, the Dancing Red Demon has struck cities across Shen Zhou since: Magnificent Ink, Thrashing Minister, Gathering Clouds -- all have been visited by the Demon, and if they have escaped the nightmare tableau of Only Six Devils, it has only been because so many city-dwellers have fled to their ancestral villages.
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| − | *'''The Disease Itself''' As stated above, the disease proceeds in four stages. The first is a Minor Metal Condition that leaves the afflicted short of breath and prone to constant coughing fits; once infected, you can make a Recovery roll at difficulty 60 every 2 days. If you succeed five times, you have weathered the disease, and cannot be affected again. If you fail three times, the disease progresses to the second stage. The second is a Major Water Condition that deprives the afflicted of energy and in constant need of deep, near-comatose sleep; once infected, you can make a Recovery roll at difficulty 60 every 2 days. If you succeed five times, you have weathered the disease, and cannot be affected again. If you fail twice, the disease progresses to the third stage. The third is a Major Fire Condition that drives the afflicted to constant activity and leaves them swinging wildly between exuberance and rage; once infected, you can make a Recovery roll at difficulty 80 every 12 hours. If you succeed three times, you have weathered the disease, and cannot be infected again. If you fail twice, the disease progresses to the fourth stage. The nature of the fourth stage is believed to be a Major Wood Condition, but is otherwise currently unknown.
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| − | **'''3 Status''': You have already put a tremendous amount of study into the disease, and have gained a reputation among your fellow Doctors and the Imperial Bureaucracy as an '''Red Demon Expert'''. ''You must have the '''Secret Arts of Medicine''' loresheet to purchase this option.''
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| − | ***'''0 Bonus''': You have a +5 bonus to any Learning or Medicine rolls relating to the disease.
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| − | **'''8 Destiny''': Where the greatest medical minds of Shen Zhou have failed, you will succeed. You will cure the Dancing Red Demon! There is much to be done before you can announce success, but you have already gained a key insight into the sickness that will allow you to vanquish it.
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| − | ***'''-3''': This discovery will come at a heavy price -- at some point, you must become infected yourself before you can discover the cure.
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| − | ***'''-2''': You will not get the whole of the glory; a rival pursues the same end, and will -- if not stopped -- find a cure of his or her own.
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| − | *'''The Quarantine''' The response of the Imperial Bureaucracy in Perpetual Peace has been swift, decisive, and some say merciless. (Others, more inclined to the newly resurgent Legalist ministers in charge of the efforts, say prudent.) All those entering the city must pass through a makeshift cordon set up outside the city walls that allows specially-trained soldiers to observe travelers from a distance, and to have them inspected before they can approach the gates -- often by common criminals, pressed into the duty, or by the desperately poor -- if something seems amiss. If anything seems amiss (and 'anything' need not imply suspicion of Dancing Red Demon infection), the traveler is turned away at the tip of a crossbow bolt. If anyone tries to sneak past, they are shot on sight. Whether this has been effective, or whether Perpetual Peace has merely been fortunate thus far, is all but impossible to say.
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| − | **'''3 Bonus''': For reasons righteous, malevolent, or merely mercenary, you've gotten to be an expert at making your way around, through, over, or under the Quarantine without undergoing inspection. This makes you an awfully valuable ally for those who value their discretion -- but also puts you in very real and near constant danger. You have a +10 bonus to any Finesse, Survival or Stealth roll involving evading the Quarantine.
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| − | **'''2 Fortune''': You have connections among the poor unfortunates forced to inspect those going into the city; why do you hang around such people? In any case, they have a first-hand view of the government's efforts to keep the Demon at bay, and are privy to all sorts of interesting tidbits gleaned from the merchants and visitors approaching the city.
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| − | *'''Only Six Devils: Ground Zero?''' As far as anyone knows, the first appearance of the Dancing Red Demon was in the city of Only Six Devils, home to the most famous black market in Shen Zhou, and under the protection -- as it has been for centuries -- of the New Six Devils Gang. The city, never known for its welcoming presence, is now (again, as far as anyone knows) a ghost town. If the New Six Devils survived, they have not reappeared in the Jianghu, and none have dared come closer to the city than spyglass-range. There are those who say that such an iniquitous place somehow deserved its fate, that the evil of its rulers and the meanness of its citizens attracted evil to them. Whether that is a comforting thought to the inhabitants of Perpetual Peace or a bracing one depends very much on your point of view.
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| − | **'''4 Fortune''': You are privy to some secret knowledge of the circumstances of the plague's arrival in Only Six Devils. Perhaps you know the identity of the first to fall ill, what became of the New Six Devils Gang -- or even ''why'' that city was the epicenter of the disease.
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| − | **'''5+ Treasure''': One of the exotic treasures of the ruined city has found its way into your hands. Work with your Sage to determine just what it is that you have found, and how it came into your hands.
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| − | ***'''-3''': Some measure of the disaster that befell Only Six Devils lingers on the treasure you hold. As long as you hold on to it, you suffer a Minor Curse of some type.
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| | ==Vile Rain Cult Legend== | | ==Vile Rain Cult Legend== |
