"Suddenly, only minutes after consuming the black substance, I collapsed, feeling a sharp pain in my chest. It was as if I was being brutally sliced open, ripped apart and stabbed, all at once."

"Then, I began to change. The substance ripped it's way through my midsection, exposing itself like some sort of malicious alien parasite. It then dove back in, and wreaked havoc on the rest of me. I felt it break or dislocate every single bone in my body... Why wasn't I born an intangible creature, such that I would never have been able to make this fatal, excruciating mistake?.."

"...The pain simply kept increasing to other parts of my bodies. Black, spiked growths formed, piercing my skin like a thousand spearheads, and then curving into fractal patterns, or growing into grasping, writhing hands and tendrils. . . I decided, no, I knew: this is what Avernus feels like."

"And when the agony finally ended, when the gruesome transformation subsided, my form was... Warped. Shifted. My mind, then, and now, was utterly clouded by the stone's influence..."

"...In other words... Do not eat the rocks in that Vestige, no matter what promises they make. They are merely trying to influence you, to assimilate your flesh, machinery, or stone... For what purpose, I cannot say."

"Damn you, Raphael Von Tempus.

Damn you."

-Thorne, local Red goblin.