Pestilence-Bearing Touch

Cost: 5m, 1wp; Mins: Medicine 3, Essence 3; Type: Simple (Speed 5, DV -1)
Keywords: Combo-OK, Shaping, Sickness, Touch
Duration: Instant
Prerequisite Charms: Plague-Eating Kiss

One disease, the Great Contagion, killed more people than all of Creation's wars put together. The Chosen of the Void can use the lethal power of disease. If the Abyssal can touch a living creature, she can expose that person or animal to any natural disease that she has ever imbibed through Plague-Eating Kiss. Doing so requires an (Intelligence + Medicine) roll at a difficulty one lower than the disease's Virulence. The target's player then rolls (Stamina + Resistance) against the disease's Virulence. The supernaturally induced disease behaves like the natural disease in every way, except it is not contagious.

When a character learns this Charm, she selects one natural disease that she can induce. Characters can induce one additional disease at a cost of one experience point each, or two per bonus point spent on this Charm.

At Essence 4, Abyssals can learn to induce supernatural diseases such as Green Rage, White Sun Sickness (see The Manual of Exalted Power—The Lunars, pp. 212–213), Drunken Moth Sickness or Broken-Tile Organ Condition (see Scroll of the Monk, p. 125). These diseases all come from the first two circles of supernatural disease (defined in Scroll of the Monk, p. 154). At Essence 5, Abyssals can learn to induce Third Circle supernatural diseases, including a comparatively mild strain of the Great Contagion—it's actually treatable. Finding most supernatural diseases is left as a challenge to the deathknight. Some Deathlords, however, keep samples of the Great Contagion for their servants.