My theme is a month of prompts and ideas for tabletop role-playing games or prompts for fantasy writers.
Zombie Mummy
People in a fictional society were having a fictional pandemic. And the fictional leader suggested they inject cleaning products into their lungs. A disinfectant producer flat out tells people not to do this, but they do anyway. Really, what kind of leader would even speculate about injecting cleaning products into the lungs? But there you go, people doing it, and the poorest people eating and snorting soap. "I was only kidding!" the leader claims as his people die.
A wizard, who was banned from the kingdom by the leader, attempts a spell to end the pandemic. He doesn't know about the cleaning products. By chance, having soapy lungs is the only way this spell could possibly backfire. (But really, who would think someone would have cleaning product in the lungs? I mean, come on...) So everyone in the fictional land that was still alive or recently died and followed the idea of the leader turns into a zombie. Those who had died earlier in the week after following the idea become zombie mummies (walking around with bandages, because that's how the land cares for their dead). Oh, and anyone who ignored the cleaning idea has just been cured of the pandemic and now has to deal with zombies and zombie mummies.
Your party might include the wizard, adventurers from other lands, residents from the land...
Kill them? Try to cure them? Risk restarting the pandemic?
Side with the leader? Replace the leader with someone in your party?
Some people like to use a fictional game to make light of an impossible situation. Winning a fictional game can almost feel like regaining a little control. And rolling natural 20s while slaying fictional evil can be a healthy outlet for anger. All players should be aware of the premise beforehand, as many people are experiencing mental health challenges right now. The idea for the post was written in early March, not including the cleaning products. Originally the leader suggested drinking ogre milk and the party had to figure out if an ogre even could be milked... but, I mean... real life just outdid my idea, as you can see by the hyperlinks.
PLEASE do not ingest cleaning products. Follow the nice Wizard Sanders... 😉
And that's it for the A to Z Challenge 2020! Thanks to everyone who visited me. This is a personal blog, and 11 months of the year it's just me sharing my thoughts somewhere other than FB or Twitter.
