The affliction of Sin takes many forms. The trauma and the personality of the afflicted to tend to influence what sort of sin the person will develop. Sin is attracted to itself, so people with the same sorts of sin will find themselves drawn together, it also applies to ghosts and demons. Depending on the type of sin that afflicts you, and what race you are playing, you will have different symptoms, powers, or abilities. The intensity of these things grows as the accumulation of sin grows. Sin cannot be destroyed, it can only be moved from entity to entity. Only the Spirit Cleansing ritual is known to be able to remove all sin.
While there could be many ways of interpreting the many subtle forms of sin, for the purpose of the game, and to keep things from getting too complicated as far as real gameplay is concerned, players must choose one sin type to be afflicted with from the list below. This is so that people will be reasonably assured that there will be overlaps of sin types.
RED SIN
Emotional Manifestation: Rage, anger, hate, loathing, outrage to an extreme degree
Mental Symptoms: Uncontrollable bouts of violence, spewing verbal venom without cause, destruction of things precious to them, obsession with weapons, blood, and or cutting/hurting things (always someone other than the sufferer), Paranoia regarding betrayals of people around them, conspiracies, or other plots. Obsessions with getting ‘revenge’ on ‘them’ (although they will only become extremely agitated when asked about ‘them’.
Physical Symptoms: Blackening and thickening of the nails, blackening of the feet and hands, bloody tears constantly dripping from the eyes, excessive drooling, loss of appetite, Blackened tongue and gums, bleeding from the ears, loss of coherent speech, often devolving into shrieking, screaming, and howling.
Ghostly Afflictions: Chains around the arms, Pointy objects projecting from the body, large teeth or black claws, often seen with bloody tears or stains around the eyes. Wounds or stitches around the heart and face are also common.
Causes: This type of Sin is often found in those who have been wronged ( or perceived to have been wronged) who seek vengeance, retribution, or righteous justice. Anger and rage for the wrong done to them becomes cancerous and grows to consume their whole life. The anger might be directed at individuals, or a generalized group. It may also grow out of fear, and is considered a more severe form of sin sickness if that was how it was developed.
BLUE SIN
Emotional Manifestation: Sorrow, hopelessness, loss, grief, heartache, melancholy, pain
Mental Symptoms: Depression, fixation on objects or certain people, inability to eat, sleep, or go out of the house, listlessness, inability to concentrate, loss of identity, obsessiveness with ritual or routine, Inappropriate verbal or emotional outbursts, self inflicted wounds or pain, seeing visions of the cause of their emotional trauma, usually a loved one ‘running away’ from them, mistaking other people for their dead loved one, amnesia
Physical Symptoms: Blackening of the eyes leading to blindness, bloody tears, blackening of the hands, slow paralysis of the legs, sleeping excessively, blackening of the legs, black lesions on the body, extremely dry skin that cracks and blackens over the hands and feet, extreme weight loss.
Ghostly Afflictions: Chains or ropes around the neck, blackened eyes with bloody tears, blindfolds are common, often with some kind of painful looking wrap such as barbed wire, thorns, or spikes. Pointed objects protruding from the back, such as spikes or needles are also common. Less common are masks, wounds on the arms and legs, missing eyes, or skin that looks like peeling paint.
Causes: This sin is usually primarily caused by the loss of someone, usually someone extremely close like a lover, child, or sibling, but it could be a close friend or even a pet. The person cannot get over the loss, and so withdraw, the pain of it causing them to sink deeper and deeper into the pain of their loss. It becomes like an open sore, festering and wallowing in the dark mourning until it begins to grow and infect their whole lives. They want so badly for the person they loved to come back, but they know, in their hearts, that they can’t. Any attempt to placate them can turn violent after a short time. They will reject the outside world to wallow in their own pains, although they are drawn to others who share similar pain. Sometimes the pain is so great they actually cause themselves to forget, suffering various levels of repressed memories and amnesia.
PURPLE SIN
Emotional Manifestation: regret, remorse, anguish, guilt, bitterness
Mental Symptoms: Forgetfulness, memory loss, self loathing, inability to look at faces, fear of mirrors, loss of appetite, depression, difficulty sleeping, nightmares, visions reliving the events, hallucinations, self mutilation, fixations with repayment, or restitution, sadistic or masochistic tenancies where none were present previously, Paranoia, giving away possessions, money, or begging others to hurt them, although they will never confess as to why they are doing anything. Obsession with ‘fairness’ and justice. May or may not engage in ‘punishing’ people they see as having done wrong and not having been punished like they were supposed to be, enacting their own guilt and want of punishment onto other people.
Physical Symptoms: Blackening of the hands and tongue leading to muteness, lesions on the palms of their hands. Painful, itchy rashes on their faces, arms and legs, blackened skin on the neck and wrists, peeling and cracking skin on the forearms and hands. Blackening of toes and fingers sometimes requiring amputation. Inability to speak in more than sobs and moans near the end, excessive sweating and Body odor.
Ghostly Afflictions: Chains around the legs and arms, often a rope or bandages around the neck, a mask or covering of the face. Many also have weapons jutting out of their backs, as if they had been stabbed or run through. Some may display amputated or skeletal limbs. A few have been known to appear headless entirely. Wounds may or may not be present on their body.
Causes: This sort of sin is caused by extreme regret over an action or decision performed or NOT performed (ie: Failing to act when necessary). The person may or may not admit their feelings of guilt, but it is more commonly found in those who are ashamed of what they did and do not/cannot face what they have done or the consequences of failing. These sorts of people feel they should be punished for the act they did, but never received it, or it is not viewed as being a punishable act by society. (like a military commander sending soldiers into a battle.) The regret and anguish festers to become a poison, locking them into a cycle of self loathing and punishment to make up for what they never got punished for, but its never enough to absolve them of their guilt.
BLACK SIN
Emotional Manifestation: Fear, terror, anxiety, cowardice, distress, doubt, foreboding, panic
Mental Symptoms: Timidness, phobias that develop rapidly and severely, inability to tolerate being in the dark, inability to tolerate being alone (or being with people), extreme distrust of people usually with a fixiation (authority figures, friends, loved ones), accusing people of things randomly, paranoia, obsessive compulsive behaviors such as hand washing, counting, and ritualistic behaviors, talking to themselves, hallucinations, nightmares, obsessions with objects, places or people, hoarding.
Physical Symptoms: panic attacks, heart palpitations when agitated, jumpy and nervous all the time, weightloss, loss of appetite, blackening of the ears followed by deafness, black weeping lesions on the back and chest, blackening of the eyes followed by blindness, skin becomes extremely pale, blackening of the tongue, loss of speech, capable of only screaming or moaning.
Ghostly Afflictions: Chains around the torso, may also be ropes or bandages. Thin, black tongue, black eyes, and black ears, sometimes covered by a blindfold or mask, tend to have things tattooed onto them that they are scared of, also often tattooed with scrit or scrawls.
Causes: The powerful fear is usually brought on by some kind of extreme trauma that causes an unimaginable painful experience and devolves into a type of toxic fear that consumes their whole life. They become afraid of everything, even if they may not know it. The fear is caused by the desire not to be hurt so badly again. This could be the result of a physical wound or emotional wound. But the person is then fearful to do anything, fearful of anything they perceptive as dangerous, hence their hatred of the dark, and other primal fears such as spiders, snakes, and the like. Their fear of pain extends to everything, eventually. Paranoia and neurosis run rampant because the fear is so gripping and controls them so completely.
GOLDEN SIN
Emotional Manifestation: Duty, burdened, loyalty, obligation, unfinished, beholden
Mental Symptoms: Obsession with performing an act or duty, fixation on a particular person or persons as their ‘master’, inability to act without ‘master’ figure, co-dependance on fixated person(or people), extreme servitude to a particular person or thing, actions are always for someone, never acts on their own, collects/hoards objects of the person in question. Preoccupation with codes of honor, (historical usually, often military), codes of conduct, manners, protocols, extreme reactions to displays of ‘dishonor’ in their view, violent actions towards anyone they perceive as a ‘threat’ to their ‘master’ figure, even if they are not (such as a lover, or business partner), loss of personal identity and de-humanization of the self. (identifying as a non-human object like a weapon or animal such as a dog.)
Physical Symptoms: blackening of the dominant arm up to the shoulder, blackening of the tongue until muteness, leaching of hair and skin colour until white or very pale, blistering and leisons on the palms and face. Patterns of marking appearing over the back, often described as like ‘whip markings’. Nails crack and bleed painfully on both hands and feet.
Ghostly Afflictions: Chains bind the arms and upper torso, the ghost almost always carries a sort of weapon, anything from a pipe to a sword. Often seen in some kind of formal attire or uniform. White hair and blackened dominant arm usually carry over to the ghost form.
Causes: This is an affliction that usually afflicts professionals, and was more common in times where absolute loyalty to a person or group was demanded and respected. This affliction comes from an extreme form of loyalty where the person is so obsessed, invested, and entwined with that which they serve, that they become consumed by their own desire to serve. This is often after some kind of professional failure (such as a doctor losing a particularly important patient, or a samurai failing to protect his lord), or if the person engages in a sort of unrequited love and fixation with a charge or master. The power of the love for their master/friend/patient/charge becomes so great that it becomes no longer healthy and pure, but polluted and twisted and instead of causing joy causes pain. Sometimes this can even result in the professional killing or destroying the person(s) they were sworn to protect. This sort of extreme pain of love is sometimes also found in mothers with their children, particularly those who required extreme dedication and care. The sufferer tends to lose their own identity and become completely invested in the object of their care.
Showing your Sin
We want to keep the sin subtle in characters without necessarily having to deck the character out in ALL the horrible afflictions each one can cause. Like any disease, most people only suffer a few of the possible symptoms, that way, everyone suffers uniquely and a little differently. Also, we don’t want to have to rely on titlers to show the colour or name of our sin.
Generally new characters won’t be showing any physical symptoms yet, or even know they are sick, but there has to be a way to identify them in game to other players.
The sins are colour coded for a reason. In order to make it easy for other players to spot your sin type, we ask that you wear clothing that runs the colour theme of your sin. It makes it very easy for you as well to spot those who share sin type and will be dangerous to you, or if you should be dangerous to them. That doesn’t mean you have to be ALL in red, or ALL in blue, but have that colour as the major one in your ensemble. For demons it may reflect in other areas such as skintone, hair colour, horns, or other add-ons. Be creative with your colour!
Ghosts may find it difficult to be haunting and colourful, so for the fashionable ghost we ask you pick one item on you to be brightly coloured. You might have a bright red obi, or a yellow rope, or a blue flame. Try to keep other colours in the rest of your avatar subdued to focus the attention on the one splash of colour you do have. If there is no colour, and alot of grey and black people may assume you are black sin. So try to make sure its obvious you aren’t if you aren’t.
