The Taint of Bones
You asked me for my name, so I gave you my name.
The Taint of Bones is probably the disease Savants hate most of all the Taints known to us. Most researchers openly describe it as a vile mockery of Savant culture, its customs and its respect for the scholars of old. The perversity of the Taint lies in its thoroughly innocent beginnings: an adept’s sincere devotion to, and admiration for, the work of their master. It hardly needs saying that today it would be hard to find an adept of the sciences who could not name at least one scientific authority who matters to them. The foulness, however, lies in the details.
In the end, study turns into the Taint. The disease takes root in the scholar’s body and finally drives them to become like their model at any cost. They no longer merely study the master’s research, but also redo the master’s calculations or copy the master’s theorems word for word. In later stages of the disease they may imitate the master’s habits and try to look like the master. The result is usually deeply grotesque, especially when the growing obsession goes hand in hand with hideous bone mutations.
Symptoms
Onset of the Disease
The Taint of Bones is a disease that combines pathological changes to the bones of the infected with a growing obsession with a chosen patron: a great Savant or a codifier of the sciences. The perversity of the Taint lies in its thoroughly innocent beginnings: an adept’s sincere devotion to, and admiration for, the work of their master.
In the first stage of the disease, the Savant becomes obsessed with one of the great Savants of the past. They spend much of their time studying that Savant’s life and collect the theorems connected with them.
Taints
