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  1. The Sundering Rite
  3. Lore

The Guilded Rot

THE GILDED ROT

Magical affliction / Curse. Not contagious. Cannot be cured while Mammonax's pact holds.

The Gilded Rot is Aurix's body rejecting being used as building material. Aurum City was built directly on top of the Gilded Aspect's sealed form. Every gold brick is his scales. The Rot is his immune response. The citizens, not even King Draco’s Vane, do not know about the sickness. They only have a vague sense that something isn’t right. Only the people forced into the sewers have diagnosed the sickness.

Origin: Caused by King Draxos Vane's pact with Mammonax, Lord of Gilded Chains. Draxos was shown where to dig for Aurix's gold. King Draxos is, unknowingly, mining it cracks the vault. Just as Mammonax planned.

Stages:

Stage 1 - The Gilding: Apathy and emotional blunting. Minds slide off suffering. Tiny gold leaf-like scales grow on skin, glittering. Reversible / haltable.

Stage 2 - The Refusal: If untreated, apathy deepens. City's doctrine of perfection intensifies. Without Ghost-Mint tea, progresses to Stage 3.

Stage 3 - The Hollowing: Victim becomes a perfect, empty Aurum citizen. Constant pained expressions, working, polishing gold. Hollow inside. Skin flakes gold dust. Not dead, but hollowed. After being in stage 3 for some time, they begin to look skeletal. Cannot be reasoned with normally.

Treatment: Ghost-Mint tea (Ghost-Mint from Obsidia grows from Chuth Maw's corpse + Blind-Root + filtered water). Halts progression at Stage 1, does not cure. Works because green dragon magic opposes gold.

Culture: Upper Aurum citizens refuse the tea, call it filthy sewer medicine. Sewers are only safe place in city - discarded are healthy, organized. Pure citizens up top are entering stage 3.

Cure: Only by breaking Mammonax's pact.

For the DM: No one knows about the Rot. It has not been discovered and diagnosed. The city still hasn’t fully accepted that there’s a sickness. Only the people actively in the sewers have an idea that something is wrong because the tea keeps their minds clear, but they still don’t have it fully diagnosed.