Scavengers of the Dead: The Icck (Patreon)

So for Scavengers of the Dead, I've called my ailment The Icck. It is a deep-sea parasite brought into Appalachia by unregulated fish markets. Spreading in the small town of Willamson fast, this deep-sea life corrupts the body of their host into a voracious zombie that has its body corroded down to the muscle layer. Mutating Limbs and body parts with writhing masses of smokey black tentacles that can create a temporary salinated environment to survive in. When hunting in a pact, it becomes like a thin, black fog of sea mist high in salt that makes darkness much more deeper. They reconnect limbs as quickly as they can break down flesh in swarms, keeping the base nerves and muscles intact to puppeteer.

The Icck take time to corrupt in small doses meaning it can be removed if fast enough. Thankfully, they are deeply hypersensitive to light and Freshwater. As such, they avoid bodies of water without salt and only come out when no illumination is in the way.

Thriving on Human bodies due to our Biochemistry granting them nutrients similar to the deep-sea pools they come from. It has spread from initial consumers of fish infected by Icck and brought for whole sale. Forcing Day 0 victims to isolate into dark, damp, corners for their metamorphosis. They are fast, and need to eat to continue growing over the remains of their host. But are stuck hunting during cloudy days and nighttime or else they'll fry. Icck-Rotted can infect fast if the zombies have excess tentacle-larvae, killing victims that get too close if they burst. Burrowing into them as a new nest of breeding.

Outside of coming in variants, they retain some of their muscle memory. Even some of the instincts of the host they swarm. Survivors praying that those unfortunate to get Rotted, are truly dead.