Damage, Death, and Revival

Sporebound are still human, but thanks to their symbiosis with the Mycos, their attachment to this mortal coil isn’t as fragile as other humans.

If a Sporebound is still alive, any amount of damage will be fully healed within 1 month’s time. Skin will scar, muscles and bones will mend, whole limbs can regenerate. Anything lost before one becomes Sporebound stays lost, but anything after can be regrown. It will still hurt like all hell in the meantime though.

Sporebound who have sustained and regenerated injuries will often bear scars from the healing, and when viewed by other Sporebound the threads of their Mycos will show, glowing the same color as their eyes. Those who have repeated healed injuries will begin to look like living Kintsugi pottery, with glowing lines of mycelial hyphae threads wherever they’ve been mended. If the parts have been regenerated, glowing mushroom caps will sprout along the healed part. If the Sporebound has been regenerated entirely, they will sprout from the head.

If a Sporebound reaches 0 health, they are dying. As long as they are brought back to a Stipe, a Mycos place of power, they will gain 1 health and be revived, even returning from the dead, within 15 minutes. There is no cost for the revival. Death is still an extremely unpleasant experience, but for Sporebound it can be temporary. More than a few Sporebound have been recovered from the morgue and put back on their feet within a night’s time.

If a Sporebound is brought dead to a Stipe, but without at least 50% of their body (including the head and brain) intact, they will still be regenerated, but at a higher cost. They will be revived at full health in 1 month’s time, but one of their Anchors will be Exhausted by the regeneration during the next game they attend. If that Anchor is already Exhausted, it is Removed.

If a Sporebound dies, and at least their head (with intact brain) is not brought back intact, they will be regenerated fully in 1 month’s time. They will reappear at a Stipe controlled by their Clade’s Mycos, the one closest to the location of their death. When they are revived, one of their Anchors will be Removed, burned in the action of their reincarnation. They will have no memories of the day of their death – their memories will end from when they slept the previous night. This miracle leaves many unanswered questions about the nature of consciousness and individuality, and these questions can be debated at length with Dr Leonard McCoy cosplayers at Star Trek conventions. At the very least, it is clear that the ordeal harms their connection to humanity. If the head is recovered and brought to the Stipe before regeneration is complete, those pesky philosophical questions don’t matter anyway.

Some dead Sporebound, even ones presented at a Stipe fully intact, never revive. There is no reason given. The Sporebound believe that the Mycos give dead Sporebound the same choices they give living mortals, and some choose not to return. There is also no regeneration that will extend a Sporebound’s lifetime, so extremely lucky Sporebound will simply die of old age.

A Sporebound fully regenerated and losing their last Anchor finds themselves in a precarious position, on edge of becoming a Hilum if they lose their connection to humanity, but there is an even worse condition to find oneself in. If a Sporebound dies without at least their intact head brought to a Stipe, and they have no Anchors to empower their reincarnation, they will not be returned to life. They will be permanently dead.

If a Sporebound’s body or even just their head are left in control of The Blighted, or in The Blight’s territory, even worse things can happen. If Sporebound need to make a quick retreat and can’t fully recover their fallen comrades, it’s standard procedure to yank the heads from the bodies and take that if possible, or set the bodies on fire if not.

There is one case where the Mycos will not revive or regenerate a Sporebound brought to a Stipe: when the Colony’s Pharmakon, judge of the Sporebound, rules they should not.

If a Sporebound fucks up in a serious way, it’s common for a Pharmakon to punish them with Suspension – suspension from this mortal coil. A Sporebound that has been suspended will not come back to life if they die, so long as that suspension remains in effect. If this Suspension is ruled to be for quite some time, it is common for the Pharmakon to keep only the Sporebound’s head. Some perpetual fuckups may be Suspended indefinitely, only brought back when they are truly needed, or the ire towards them has waned, or a sympathetic Sporebound takes over the position. In the meantime, their pickled head hangs in a jar in the Stipe.

For the most heinous of Sporebound crimes, there is the most severe of punishments: Abscission. A Pharmakon can rule that a Sporebound is no longer fit to be Sporebound at all, severing their connection to their Mycos. This can only be declared during the process of reviving from the dead; they will be revived, but they will simply be mortal, forgetting about the Sporebound and their war as soon as they leave the Stipe … if they are for some reason left to walk away. If they are killed again after revival, they die permanently, like any other mortal.

The judgements of the Pharmakon aren’t exclusively based on guilt – they are also based on what action is best for the Colony. If a Pharmakon is aware someone will be regenerated by burning their last Anchor left to the human world, a Pharmakon may practice Abscission in lieu of risking an Anchorless Sporebound returning on the precipice of becoming a Hilum. This is the closest the Sporebound come to a retirement plan; walking away without memory of the war, left to reconstruct their identity as a mortal and live a relatively normal life. If they are particularly useful, though, once they’ve connected to new Anchors, a Mycos might give them the offer again, giving them a glimpse of the Sporebound they once were in the process. It may not even be the same Mycos giving the offer.