Scourge

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One of the first Immortals to be struck with the plague. It has been thousands of years since he contracted it, but somehow he has not been killed by it. As he slowly is consumed -- while he watches the ones around him die -- he sits and waits; for what he does not know.

He has a single item that he carries around with him: a notebook. The pages are worn and the spine was long ago broken, some pages barely staying in the book some ripped out completely. It is filled with drawings of plants and other materials all asking the same question Will it work? None seemed to, violent scribbles over anything that might have been legible. On one page, obviously not from the book by the extreme difference of paper, is written:


As a note to [Iledgeable]

Signs of the Infected (in order of appearance):
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• Drastic mood shifts. Note: generally towards anger - Watch for claws when examining.
• Greying colors. (If already grey then colors begin to shift to white. Have yet to encounter any all-white dragons - cannot conclude what happens to them.)
• Fungal Growths. Note: Only found on corpses or ones that are dying. Rotting flesh seems to be better nutrients for fungus.
• Brittle Bones - Fungus still attached or obvious signs of once being.
  
  On a personal and scientific note, only once before but I observed some corpses produce round protuberances near clusters of fully formed fungus. They burst. Got some on me, followed protocol.
  
  - P

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”Phen! You’re sick! Please… let me… Phe-”

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Phen… who was Phen? That voice… who was it? Why couldn’t he remember?

The Gaoler snarled, hating the name that echoed within his mind, hating the voice that tormented him, and hating himself for failing to remember. He was angry, but he didn’t know why.

Every movement he made was painless yet full of rage as he dragged himself to the unmoving, grey body before him. Somehow, it looked familiar, but he could not remember its name or where he knew it from. But he did remember the plague.

The dragon before him fell to the very same illness that plagued him and every other corpse he remembered finding – he could tell by the goopy fungus covering it. It smelled, too; he could smell it from miles away, even over the scent of his own illness.

He hated it.

He wished nothing more than to blast the cursed thing with flames and reduce it to ashes, but of course, it would hardly accomplish a thing. He, himself, had tried and failed to burn the fungus off of his body to no avail. The fungus would sit here, consuming its host until only bone remained...

Then and only then would it release its grip and die...

He hoped others who found such bodies had the sense to leave them be, but he knew that was unlikely. Those who knew the dead and those with gentle and caring souls like... like a dragon he once knew whose name and face he could no longer remember... they would bury the dead, and in doing so would doom themselves to the same slow death.

Yet he still lived. Why? Why did he still live? Why did he outlive all the others who were ill?

He did not know. Perhaps he merely did not remember a reason.

But he did remember one thing. He started this. Somehow, he did. He did not remember why, but he did. He was a Scourge on the land, a Scourge on dragonkind, a Scourge among Immortals, spreading this illness wherever he walked even before he knew he had it, and once he knew it was far too late.

Written by Dragongirl00100

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Art by GlitchBird

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Originally named Phen but through the years the people have forgotten his name, and so has he.
Phen was not the same dragon he is now. Everything about him has changed. A once jovial, studious, and generally good-natured being is now irritable and aggressive.
Phen was mated with Kiy, she was the one who gave Scourge his notebook.

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