[roguebfl]

The show Ascendance of A Bookworm has an interesting disorder called The Devouring. Now in the setting, the Nobles consider magic their exclusive domain (saving for a few magical items they let the merchant guild use to do things like magically binding contracts) so as of season 2 we've seen very little of the nobles so far so I can not definitely say if this disorder is something that all mages have to deal with, or if there are mages that are born that don't have it.

What the Devouring is if you have ER (magical) and it stays full for a prolonged period it turns on the mage and acts like a degenerative fever if the isn't relieved. Such relief comes from casting spells or using magical items (or even just recharging an item that can be charged)

But commoners with the devouring typically don't have access to any means to achieve such a release so typical die between the ages of 6 and 10. And given nobles generally don't want to acknowledge that mage born commons exists, and magery and ER is part of what determines a noble's pecking order, that number skews heavily to the low end of the range, as the commoners don't even know the cause let alone possible mitigating treatments save for a few wealthy families the have regular dealing with the nobles. They do not know it exists nor that the willful pursuit of a passion helps slow down the effect but depression accelerates it. But eventually that is not enough and the only option is to enter into an agreement with a noble who will supply the child with quirked, or otherwise defective, magical items that lets the child spend their ER, often overloaded the magical item to its destruction. (the only other character other than the protagonist that is known to have the devouring is the granddaughter of the Guildmaster of the merchant guild whose agreement is when she comes of age she will become the noble's concubine)

Game Mechanics:

I'm thinking for every time period divided by magery level that character ER (Magical) remains full, they need to make HT check or have a fever bout that permanently reduces the character HT Stat by 1.

Cost would be Base Cost * (Magery/2) with either and -80% mitigator for knowing a spell that has an ER (magical) cost. Or a -60% mitigator for having access to a magical item that costs ER (magical) to use