#erick reverse 1999

Chronic Illness: Cristallo, Rabies, Erick, Semmelweis, Barbara

Cristallo was born prematurely, with an added condition that makes her physically fragile. As seen in the game, she needs a life-support system to maintain her health when she’s outside. It’s also implied that her condition may be a recurrent cancer, as her arcane abilities are tied to a machine that provides cobalt therapy, a known advancement in radiotherapy in the post-WWII era.

In Sotheby’s anecdote, it’s been noted that Cristallo needs extra accommodations to her room, and it’s crucial that the electricity is kept running; she would risk having episodes like seizures otherwise.

Rabies is an odd case. In his stories, it’s stated that Adam Miłosz cured Alicia of rabies through unknown means, at the cost of contracting the disease himself. However, instead of the virus being acute and guaranteed to be fatal, it became a chronic illness to Rabies due to the abundance and use of arcanum.

Since the rabies virus attacks the brain, his cognitive capabilities and ability to recall things before the present had been impaired, making him rather docile and animal-like in nature as a result.

As revealed in her anecdote, Erick has a hereditary blood condition that came with her arcane skill. While her arcane skill grants her insane strength, overusing it will accelerate the effects of her blood condition to the point that it can turn fatal. To prevent this, she also inherited an armband from her grandfather, Harald. The armband suppresses Erick’s ability to use arcane skills, but by extension it also prevents her condition getting worse.

Semmelweis’ journey in the roguelike has been very clear that she suffers from the Beyond disease, a parasitic and incurable disease that mainly affects the brain by heightened hallucinatory symptoms paired with vampiric-like symptoms. The disease has a high fatality rate, but survivors tend to be granted abilities and urges equivalent to that of a vampire.

Semmelweis keeps her symptoms at bay through Lorelei’s arcane skill, and maintains her urges with sweets such as chocolate. While the Beyond Disease is most known for being passed on via contact, (e.g. biting) it has also been found to be genetically carried by some people.

(Bonus mention: Valentina is also a canon survivor of the Beyond Disease, having become a full vampiric-like being. She was the one that bit and infected Semmelweis)

Being born as a cross of 3 different beings, Barbara was born with a delicate body and she suffered a multitude of conditions growing up. Among them, asthma and insomnia were the most prominent. These conditions were incredibly debilitating for her growing up, and they continue to persist til her adulthood. Because of these medical scares (and her instinctive tendencies), she also has anxiety. For this—and strangely enough—her conditions can be alleviated with stuffed toys and the country music that she keeps on her at all times, much to her chagrin.

Amputees: Shamane & Willow

Shamane lost his left arm as a punishment for his previous failures. But after having lived without it for 20 years, the lack of it doesn’t bother him anymore. In fact, he finds pride in his loss, claiming it as a “token of bravery.”

Prior to the events of 1.3, he crafted his prosthetic arm as a means to avoid scaring kids. In his I2, we see that he was provided with a more modern prosthetic, likely provided by Laplace.

Willow is mainly characterised by her ability to perform in floor gymnastics having a prosthetic leg. Even when she lost her leg when she was younger, it didn’t stop her from performing to the best of her capabilities and reworking her skills in floor.

Blindness: Urd, Ms. Radio, Argus

Urd, despite her mysterious presence in the story, is most notable for her blindness. Throughout all her appearances, she's always found with a covering over her eyes, and has been referred to as the “blind woman” throughout the game many times even prior to her reveal. She also has recurring partial amnesia, with the “Storm” being the main cause of it.

She still chooses to travel across cities despite it, documenting her travels and insights about each place as the “Friend From Afar.”

Despite all the awakened lacking any eyes, Ms. Radio is the only character that has explicitly stated that she does not have any eyesight. She uses her body vessel and the radiowaves to be able to sense things around her, and is a generally sensitive entity.

Argus is notable for her vision impairment and partial blindness due to an untreated injury paired with her arcane skill. She struggles to see at nighttime, and has to activate her arcane skill to be able to do work. She tends to use picrasma candies to keep her arcane skill running for as long as possible.

However, Argus will tend to overexert herself and her arcane skill, which can result in her having temporary complete blindness. She refuses to have her injured eye treated nor be provided a prosthetic either.

Others

Mobile Disability - Noire *revised on 25th September 2025

Our diva Noire here is unique for the fact that she is one of the few fictional characters who actively uses a wheelchair in the game. She suffered from a car accident that left her paralyzed from the waist down, and her story explored her interpreting her condition as a "sign" to change her approach in her life and work. She willingly accepted her outcome and decided to refuse treatment, since she believed in that this change—as violent as it was—was a way for her to reevaluate and relearn how to live and to create.

Speech Impediment - Balloon Party

Balloon Party as a child had contracted an illness that caused her to have a persistent high fever. In the end, she awakened her arcane skill this way, with her being able to cough up balloons that can be harmful or a cure to anything. However, it might have also affected her speech because of the physical strain that comes from coughing, it results to Balloon Party’s speech being slowed and having abnormal pauses before she speaks again. 

Burn Scarring - Joe

Being a blacksmith, Joe gained a lot of burn injuries due to his work. He developed his skill over time, but it came at a cost; these scars became a part of him. Considering that Joe very likely never went to get proper treatment due to him growing up less privileged, it’s also likely that these scars crudely healed and can cause some pain. His scars are most prominently seen in his face, but they extend down the left arm and even both his hands, which are bandaged.

Albinism - Windsong

Windsong has indicators that she may have albinism; from her white hair, pale skin, and differently-coloured eyes. It can be assumed that she has Type 1 OCA, which leaves her to have the aforementioned features. There isn’t much beyond that mainly due to this being a popularized headcanon among the fandom, so what other symptoms she might have is open to interpretation.

Honorable Mentions

What is this section? The honorable mentions list is meant as a list for:

-Characters I realized I should've added here but it was too late

-Characters who have some headcanons/insights from other users from both Twitter and Tumblr, and I took it to consideration

I hope you enjoy these ones. :)

Oliver Fog - Depression, Arthritis/Chronic Pain (credited: @space-magician on tumblr)

Early on in childhood, Oliver had been exposed to how the London fog takes a heavy toll on his family and has experienced grief early on due to his father passing away from overexertion. It prompted him to start working as a (greatly desensitized) Fogwalker, feeling an unbearable weight on his shoulders metaphorically and even literally with how he struggles to get up in certain weather conditions. It hints towards him having chronic pain/arthritis due to the intensive nature of his work, as well as depression stemming from his grief.

Loggerhead - Short-Term Memory Loss

Loggerhead has short-term memory loss as an aftereffect of her awakening, causing her to slowly lose memory over the course of 3 days. However, Laplace provided her with a special film that allowed her to maintain her memories for longer.

Last Notes

Of course, these are only the first batch of this list, and I hope you'll have fun reading the next two installments here once linked. :)

Psychologically Disabled Characters

Neurodivergent Characters

Cristallo, Rabies, Erick : Chronic Illness

It's quite self explanatory that Cristallo herself has a chronic illness. She was born prematurely, with an added condition that makes her physically fragile. As seen in the game, she needs a life-support system to maintain her health when she's outside. It's also implied that her condition may be a recurrent cancer, as her arcane abilities are tied to a machine that provides cobalt therapy, a known advancement in radiotherapy in the post-WWII era.

Rabies is an odd case. In his stories, it's noted that Adam cured Alicia through unknown means at the cost of contracting rabies himself. However, instead of the virus being acute and guaranteed to be fatal, it becomes a chronic illness to Rabies due to the abundance and use of arcanum. And since the rabies virus attacks the brain, his cognitive capabilities and ability to recall things before the present had been impaired, making him rather docile and animal-like in nature as a result.

Erick, as revealed in her anecdote, has a hereditary blood condition that came with her arcane skill. With her arcane skill making her physically powerful, overusing it will accelerate the effects of her blood condition to the point that it can become fatal. To prevent this, she also inherited an armband from her grandfather, Harald. The armband suppresses one's ability to use arcane skills, but by extension it also prevents Erick's condition getting worse.

Shamane : Amputee

Shamane's circumstances are also self-explanatory. He lost his arm for unknown reasons, but after having lived without it for 20 years, it doesn't bother him anymore. However as we know, he crafted his prosthetic arm as a means to avoid scaring kids. (which I think is quite cool in itself)

Ms. Radio, Bessmert : Blindness

Ms. Radio and our new friend, Bessmert, are both canonically blind. Ms. Radio has stated that she cannot see, and asks Vertin to left in places where she can feel temperatures to make her feel at peace.

And as we know, Yenisei (or in other words, Yenisei's VA) has stated in the 1.6 livestream that Bessmert is known to be blind, but even with that, she's a great researcher and guide to her.

Mesmer Jr. : OCD [Content Warning: Mentions of Self Harm and Suicide.]

Mesmer Jr.'s character has heavily implied throughout the main story and her own to have OCD as a result of the traumatic experiences she had gone through from her field of work and her family’s history in it. She identifies that she has "incurable" anxiety, which causes her to think differently about arcanists and act a little irrationally from our own perspective. This anxiety results in double checking everything and having a slightly intensive routine.

This routine is created as a means to maintain herself and her own sanity, but an imbalance or interruption can greatly upset her. As a result, she has conflicting ideals, experiences hallucinations and panic attacks, has suicidal thoughts, and actively inflicts self harm as a means to cope with her anxiety. However, she’s calmer and at peace with herself when she's left alone in a quieter and clean space, away from others, and where nature is heard more than constant buzzing. In short, Mesmer Jr.’s mental health is really complex and would be better if it's explored in a separate post.

Baby Blue : Alice in Wonderland syndrome

It's no secret that Baby Blue has Alice in Wonderland syndrome, or in other words dysmetropsia. This affects her perception of reality and her ability to recall, but this in turn makes her arcane abilities all the more powerful. As a result, she doesn't realize that she's growing up, yet it seems she doesn't mind that much. This doesn't seem to affect her physically either; In fact, it has a heavy influence on how she displays her arcane skills.

Poltergeist : Social Anxiety

Poltergeist has been known to be anxious in social settings which conflicts with her people-pleasing tendencies. She's also insecure about herself which adds up to her not wanting to be directly perceived. At the same time, she doesn't like being left alone as a result of having been ignored and forgotten post mortem. Poltergeist is also elaborate (i.e. not wanting to be looked at for too long) yet awkward at the same time when communicating them.

However, I'm not sure how to describe Poltergeist's case quite well, but the idea of her having social anxiety resonates greatly in my mind, so it can be treated as a partial headcanon.

Balloon Party : Autism and Speech Impairment

Balloon Party as a child had contracted an illness that caused her to have a persistent high fever. In the end, she awakened her arcane skill this way, with her being able to cough up balloons that can be harmful or a cure to anything.

However, it might have also affected her speech because of the physical strain that comes from coughing, it results to BP's speech being a bit slow and having abnormal pauses before she speaks again. Though, this also might be a sign of her possibly also having autism, where rigid and uneven language development is a common pattern in how autism affects one's ability in communication. Her speech also has a pattern of echolalia, having a flat tone, and lack of control of it.

However, speech impediment isn't everything about autism, and there's a lot more about BP's character that also connects with it such as her special interests. I can better explore this in a different post, which will be explained below.

Last Notes

These are the characters I’ve written down, most of these are less headcanon and more of observations I’ve found when looking into these characters. Some people from the lore chat have also added their own insights on some of them. (Thank you lupjo for beta-reading through it and helping me out) 

Of course, there are a few more characters I want to discuss because of the implications of them having autism / ADHD, but these will be written in another post in the future because I still need to research and gather other information. Additionally, it would be an opportunity to talk about the connections between an arcanist’s and neurodivergent person’s relationships with modern society.