Corpus Delicti
After a battle, most people count the dead. Corpus Delicti counts the inventory.
They are flesh merchants, battlefield scavengers who see dying bodies not as casualties but as raw material with a diminishing window of value. Before the Infection consumes a corpse entirely, before the Mortis Amaranthine reclaims what is left, there are organs to harvest, tissues to preserve, and biological material to extract. Corpus Delicti specializes in getting there first and getting it done efficiently.
The methods vary by opportunity. Battlefield acquisition teams follow conflicts the way carrion birds follow herds, arriving in the aftermath to salvage what the victors left behind. Back-alley collection clinics in settlements offer desperate people currency in exchange for body parts they will eventually regrow. Contractors take custom orders from clients who need specific materials. And involuntary harvesters operate where no one is watching, taking what they need from those who have no say in the matter.
What sets Corpus Delicti apart from common body traders is the science. Their operatives understand regrowth suspension, Infection stalling, and preservation techniques that keep biological material viable long after it should have degraded. Damaged bodies are not discarded; a severed hand, a foot, even raw biomass retains value in the right market. Dead Aberrants are particularly prized, sometimes kept strapped to slabs as ongoing resources rather than single-use inventory.
Corpus Delicti teams are also among the few willing to enter Corrupted Morgues. Where other operators see catastrophic risk, they see untapped supply. Materials extracted from Morgue sites, substances that most settlements would burn rather than study, command premium prices among the right buyers.
The flesh merchants view Lineage bodies as the wasteland's most valuable resource. In their calculus, every person is potential inventory. The only question is timing.
They are flesh merchants, battlefield scavengers who see dying bodies not as casualties but as raw material with a diminishing window of value. Before the Infection consumes a corpse entirely, before the Mortis Amaranthine reclaims what is left, there are organs to harvest, tissues to preserve, and biological material to extract. Corpus Delicti specializes in getting there first and getting it done efficiently.
The methods vary by opportunity. Battlefield acquisition teams follow conflicts the way carrion birds follow herds, arriving in the aftermath to salvage what the victors left behind. Back-alley collection clinics in settlements offer desperate people currency in exchange for body parts they will eventually regrow. Contractors take custom orders from clients who need specific materials. And involuntary harvesters operate where no one is watching, taking what they need from those who have no say in the matter.
What sets Corpus Delicti apart from common body traders is the science. Their operatives understand regrowth suspension, Infection stalling, and preservation techniques that keep biological material viable long after it should have degraded. Damaged bodies are not discarded; a severed hand, a foot, even raw biomass retains value in the right market. Dead Aberrants are particularly prized, sometimes kept strapped to slabs as ongoing resources rather than single-use inventory.
Corpus Delicti teams are also among the few willing to enter Corrupted Morgues. Where other operators see catastrophic risk, they see untapped supply. Materials extracted from Morgue sites, substances that most settlements would burn rather than study, command premium prices among the right buyers.
The flesh merchants view Lineage bodies as the wasteland's most valuable resource. In their calculus, every person is potential inventory. The only question is timing.
Structure
Corpus Delicti operates through a mix of battlefield opportunists, settlement-based back-alley collection clinics, and contractors who take custom orders. Some members are scavengers who stalk warzones and raids to harvest organs before Infection consumes them. Others run clinics where desperate people sell parts of themselves for currency. A specialized tier handles targeted acquisition: locating, tracking, and abducting specific individuals for custom orders. All materials flow into a network of black-site storage facilities where bodies are kept in near-death states through unclean preservation sciences.
Public Agenda
Corpus Delicti views every dying body as an investment and every corpse as inventory. Their mission is the acquisition, preservation, and sale of biological material harvested from battlefields, morgues, and willing or unwilling donors. They see themselves as pragmatists filling a market demand: organs, tissues, and Infection-rich materials have value, and someone is going to harvest them regardless. The Corpus Delicti simply ensure that nothing goes to waste.
History
Corpus Delicti grew within The Dead Market pillar of the Black Market as specialists in flesh acquisition and body brokerage. The organization developed expertise in regrowth suspension and Infection stalling, allowing them to preserve harvested materials far longer than conventional methods permit. This preservation knowledge became their competitive advantage, enabling them to maintain inventory that other harvesters would lose to decomposition.
Their operations expanded from simple battlefield scavenging into a full-spectrum body trade. They learned to enter Corrupted Morgues and the Mortis Amaranthine that others feared, extracting materials that settlements would sooner burn than study. The addition of targeted acquisition services, where specific individuals are tracked and abducted for custom orders, transformed them from opportunistic scavengers into an organized procurement network.
Their operations expanded from simple battlefield scavenging into a full-spectrum body trade. They learned to enter Corrupted Morgues and the Mortis Amaranthine that others feared, extracting materials that settlements would sooner burn than study. The addition of targeted acquisition services, where specific individuals are tracked and abducted for custom orders, transformed them from opportunistic scavengers into an organized procurement network.
Battlefield flesh merchants. They count the dead as inventory and harvest before the Infection claims what is left.
