Six Hour Fever

Six hour fever is a little-understood disease, which claims an otherwise healthy patient's life in around six hours, less for patients who have other health issues. It's fairly rare, but instances of it are known to occur in families over generations, so there's thought to be a genetic element. It only occurs in humans living on the continent of Tikaj, but affects roughly equally across geographical regions and ethnicities. The cause is unknown.   Symptoms of the disease include a high fever, painful swollen rashes all over the body, coughing up blood, difficulty breathing, titinus, delirium and/or moments of amnesia, severe abdominal cramps, blurred vision, mouth ulcers, painful head and neck, spasms in the legs and feet. They strike suddenly and acutely, in most cases all symptoms beginning with minutes of each other, and grow steadily worse until death.   There is no known cure, and no record of anybody surviving. Currently the only way to help the patient is to treat the symptoms and make them as comfortable as possible, while summoning loved ones to say goodbye and perform any traditional death rites.   Six hour fever is given a roughly equal priority across all countries of Tikaj in medical research. It may be expected to be given a higher priority within the Keizon Empire, given that six hour fever has been given as the cause of death for quite a few members of the Royal Family over the generations, including five Emperors. Even though maladies which affect the ruling Echelfa culture--especially hereditary ones--are generally prioritised over others within the Empire, six hour fever is a notable exception, despite its direct impact on succession.   A little-known fact is that a condition outwardly indistinguishable from six hour fever, including the predicted time of death, can be induced from the inhalation of invisible spores from an extremely rare plant found in the Echel-Chelf region. It was long ago thought to have been intentionally made extinct due to the threat it posed to human lives. However, cuttings were saved and have been cultivated in secret by a dynasty of high value assassins loyal to the Keizornan Senate.   All the Emperors and other royals who died of six hour fever showed signs in private of wanting to change the status quo which put the Senate in power. Every other member of the Royal Family, including eleven Emperors, who did the same fell victim to publicly acknowledged assassinations, each attributed to parties outside of the Empire opposed to it. For those who died of six hour fever, there were no convenient plausible scapegoats.