Side Story: Uldar's Research Notes on The Seed, pages 4 - 5

... all I can devise of its physical nature and internal structure without dissection, which my Dark Lord has explicitly forbidden.

On to the physical nature of its assimilation of body processes of its host and those that it infects with its progeny.

Henceforth I shall note that I approach The Seed and is progeny as a kind of infectious parasite when speaking of it taking over a body, and will reference it in terms appropriate to a kind of disease whether or not that is accurate.

Dissection of the bodies it's used is most revealing, and I've been kept more happily busy than I have in years. Each one is fascinating. When introduced to a new host The Seed appears to immediately and instinctively climb a short way down the throat, create an incision in the posterior of the esophagus a short way down, lodge itself near the host's back in its chest cavity, and then extremely quickly send out both reparative of filaments to suture its incision and nerve-like sensory filaments that almost immediately integrate with the host's system. Locomotion is possible almost immediately, as are other basic gross motor skills. True coordination and good use of fine motor skills takes a little longer but the process is still extremely rapid... almost full functionality that the host possessed before invasion is achieved in two minutes or less.

I've had limited ability to view more long-term effects of The Seed's presence, but preliminary findings are astounding. Feeding seems to accelerate the process, and I haven't seen the effects of starvation, but regardless it appears that after an initial introductory phase of a few days where little major action happens except some strengthening of muscle fibers and replacement of nervous structures as well as, for some reason, some major altering of the bone marrow. The Seed begins to slowly and systematically replace major organs with those of its own design, consuming and replacing the host from the inside. The next adjustments appear to be the digestive system. The room created for its condensed tentacles and filaments by doing this is astounding, even in a small host. In those few bodies where The Seed has been allowed a longer period of introduction I've seen more systems acquire major adjustments. The major organs of the circulatory system seems next, although this system has slow changes throughout. I can only imagine that the respiratory system would follow, and further adjustments... given time who knows how this thing would shape its hosts body. Regardless, it's clear that although so far I've noted no obvious external changes to any host, internally The Seed goes to work with brutal efficiency, and I believe I have evidence that it's learning and becoming more efficient at its task with each new host. The early bodies it abandoned certainly do not have the same finesse the latest batch of cadavers has had.

Upon changing hosts almost all of this alteration and the structures its created are abandoned, but it appears to care little for the effort lost by doing this and this doesn't seem to damage The Seed. Its adjustments are for its convenience and utility, not necessarily a part of permanent attachment.

Its spawn are somewhat different, both in structure themselves but as noted here also with their interaction with their host. After the gestation period in which they are created they appear to be able to rest unharmed and mostly unmoving as long as they are kept in a moist environment. They activate once they are placed in the oral cavity of an uninfected host. I will leave a more thorough analysis of their physicality in later pages, only noting here that the first generation (those spawned directly from The Seed) follow the same basic pattern of infecting and overtaking their host as their creator, but are far less resilient. Unlike their progenitor they appear to be unable to abandon their host without dying, and are firmly attached once their takeover has begun. Still, it appears that they, too, grow in their host and grow stronger over time. It appears to me that as The Seed has learned to more gracefully overtake and adjust its host's systems, so too has those specific learnings passed on to its 'children' in some as-yet unknown way that might have further implications for how powerful they might eventually make their host bodies.

Their spawn (the second and last generation) are true abominations that superficially resemble a kind of blind cephalopod-maggot crossbreed, and hasn't the finesse of either their parent or the original. Upon infection they create a kind of dumb shell of their host that, while still dangerous and able to feed (but little else!) and still displaying many physical advantages, is still far less than their 'parent' and not even a shadow of The Seed, and thankfully as yet unable to breed.

I worry about the potential of this thing, how it might spread like a plague. I feel my Dark Lord might be acting too much out of boredom. He tires of this impasse, as do his subjects. His patience has grown thin. Even allowing in the so-called 'heroes' of the alliance against him no longer entertains him - staging mock battles, like a play, with his horde as his faithful actors... watching them strive through blood and tears as their companions fall to his monsters and the most intricate, painful traps that we can devise.

The few that make it through are the only things that seem to uplift his spirits... when he crushes and slashes them as they attempt to unleash their fury and their best, thinking their ultimate triumph over his rule is somehow at hand, that they are the ones, the chosen. Maybe even believing that they are the first to make it so far, that they truly overcame my Dark Lord's forces and weren't simply allowed and guided into the final hall of his palace for his entertainment.

But I digress. Old Uldar rambles these days, and I fear that it may be time to leave this shell for another cloning process. The Dark Lord almost ensured that happened when I angered him upon the awakening of The Seed in our latest experiment, and much data would have been lost if this Uldar incarnation was lost prematurely. I must be more careful with my words.

On to the behaviors of those subjects infected by The Seed's spawn. I've observed incredible consistency with the previous behavior of the host prior to infection, punctuated by bizarre...