By Michael S. Webster
Planting 11, 576 CY — Late Afternoon
Irving swung his mace too wide and missed the target completely. Stumbling slightly, he quickly regained his footing. The cleric, Terry Or, swung his own mace and ended the threat of the undead being who had sat on the throne.
Looking down at his hands, he also saw his beard had grown significantly from the touch of the undead creature. In an exhausted and older voice, "Irving, are you all right?"
From under Irving’s great helm came mumbling and spitting sounds. Lifting off his helm, cascades of hair and beard tumbled out. Clearly, he had aged more than Terry had. He felt tired. He looked at the cleric and just nodded that he was okay.
One of the other party members asked Irving if the fallen crown and sword lying in the dust were chaotic, and yes, Irving could feel the chaos worming around. He knew these items needed to be destroyed, but would the mace be up to it?
Removing a knife from his belt pouch, Irving cut off a great deal of the beard and hair growth. Once on the surface, he would take care of the rest. “At least,” thought Irving, “I won't be tripping over the beard.”
“I’ve missed a lot of haircuts,” Irving darkly smirked to himself.
Tossing the cut locks into a corner, he returned his helm to his head and followed the group back up to their campsite. Walking over to his rock seat, Irving sat down, removed his helm, set the mace down. He pulled out a mirror and his shaving knife and started to clear off the extra growth.
Harvey hopped up beside him, sending through their telepathic link:
Well, white hair looks good on you. Can't argue that.
Irving smiled and stroked his friend between the ears.
Squirming.
Writhing.
Waiting.
Harvey interrupted Irving’s thought.
Well, at least there are some rats and vermin that will appreciate the donation to their nests.
Epilogue
Deep in the throne room, not all was still.
Spindly legs reached out through a crack in the wall. A bulbous black body soon followed.
A black widow
spider crawled to the hair piled in the corner. It grasped a lock and slipped
back through the crack.
The Madness to My Method
The undead creature (the DM wouldn’t tell us what he called his creation), had a secondary effect to its attack. In addition to hit point damage, it would also age the person. In this case, 20 for Terry Or and 40 for Irving.
In the story above, I based the aging on metabolism and not temporal. Metabolic ageing affects the physical body of the target, dialing up the aging process to eleven. Temporal ageing would be speeding the character through their timeline, several years or decades.
The effect of the metabolic aging on both characters was accelerated growth of the hair and fingernails, reduced flexibility in joints, wrinkles deepening, and hair becoming grey or white.
However, I did not include the kind of chronic joint pain gained though physical activity. Much in the same way as a soldier will have joint pain following a career of ruck marches, parachute jumps, and parade marches. These effects on the body would not occur with metabolic aging.
Temporal would not only gain the kind of joint damage outlined above but could also feature other bodily damage such as losing a limb, eye, or having major scarring. The character lived through those experiences and would have gained levels, improved gear, and other features though gaining levels.
In both cases, any current damage could end up being healed through such attacks, although a debate on which came first, the hit point loss or the increased age. Any permanent effects, other than the ageing, would be adjudicated by the Dungeon Master.
Regardless, this might inspire some good role-playing.
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