[Origin Cave]

CORRUPTION

TOUCHED

Gembound coming into contact with sources of Corruption will begin to suffer Visions of Corruption, and are considered Touched. At this stage, the Gembound will see and hear things that are not there. These things are chaotic, disturbing, often including visions of alien creatures making violent war, and of death. Some of the visions, or whispers, along with strange urges, may drive the Gembound to seek out and consume further sources of Corruption. Any powerful negative emotions may trigger a dreadful desire to inflict chaotic destruction. A return to the Chrysalis will purge this stage and return the Gembound to a healthy state.

CORRUPTED

After a certain threshold has been passed, the Gembound progresses to a Corrupted state. In addition to visions and drives toward entropy, their blood turns black, thickening, and if left unstable, they will leak this fluid from eyes, mouth, ears and nostrils. They must spend time stabilizing themselves at the Dark Altar at least per week, or they will be consumed by this magic and die. Gembound can no longer return to their chrysalis; the corruption would consume and kill them before they woke (they could, however, chrysalize near the Altar instead, but this will no longer purge the Corruption).
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EXPOSURE

Corruption is advanced via exposure to Corrupted sources of varying power. Any Gembound exposed to any corruption source will become Touched, and begin seeing Visions of Corruption. From there, 30 Corruption Points are needed to get to the Corrupted stage, and from there, another 30 for full Converted status. As a force of pure entropy, this magic can be deadly if absorbed too quickly. Therefore, a maximum of five Corruption Points can be obtained per real life and in-game day. Threads with characters consuming more than this without real life and threaded time-skip rests will cause the character to die, the Corruption consuming them completely. A Gembound may choose to spend time at the Altar to both add to their corruption and to stabilize it; they may consume the black liquid left behind when a creature dies; they may touch or otherwise interact with the oily, black cracks across the Spire; or they may be exposed to the corrupted magic of a Converted Gembound.

Altar 'Prayer' - 3 points
Goop Consumption - 2 points
Spire-Corruption Interaction - 2 points
Magical Exposure - 1 point

It will therefore take a minimum of twelve days of continuous posting for a Gembound to reach fully Converted state. Conversion requests should be posted in Update Me, a???

THE DARK ALTAR

'Some may call it prayer. Others, meditation. Still others may see it in a more practical light: dipping a toe into the river that will otherwise sweep us away.'

A strange place. A tunnel, pitch-black regardless of any introduced light, cold and lifeless, stretches down from a hidden crevice in the darkness of Tunnel K. Far down in its depths, this tunnel ends in a room, lit with an eerie violet-black light that seems to cast everything into negative: light becomes dark, dark becomes pale. The "altar" itself is a slab of oily black crystal, glittering with slicks of violet and green. Spending time near this altar will corrupt uncorrupted Gembound, but will stabilize those already Corrupted. Those who keep themselves stable may feel and look almost normal, even at the final stages of Conversion. However, those who visit only at a bare minimum may find their bodies and minds succumbing to entropy: visions and whispers will torment them, and the physical effects--e.g. leaking of oil from the eyes, and so forth--will be severe. Gemstones will change to a dark sheen regardless of stabilization. ?ỹ̴̗͉̟̚͝ę̴̺̠̾s