Terminal Fracture

Five. That is the number. Five Fractures accumulated from any combination of sources, and the mind reaches a threshold from which it does not return.
  A Terminal Fracture is the endpoint of cumulative psychological damage. It is not a disease. It cannot be treated as one. No local mechanics kit, no improvised remedy, no chapter-specific customization can touch it. The restriction exists because Terminal Fracture is standardized across the entire network; every game, every settlement, every character operates under the same rules for how Fractures interact with the mind. There are no local exceptions and no creative workarounds.
  The comparison most often drawn is to final-stage Bad Brain, and the comparison holds. The character's psychological architecture collapses completely and permanently. They cannot sustain coherent thought, cannot function as a participant in the world around them, cannot recover. The character's journey is over. Not dead in the way that the Infection can reverse, not incapacitated in a way that time or medicine can address. Simply, irreversibly broken.
  The only prevention is intervention before the fifth Fracture lands. Fractures can be removed through specific means, and managing that count is one of the most important long-term survival considerations any character faces. Every death adds a Fracture. Certain high-impact skills and equipment carry the same risk. The wasteland applies psychological pressure constantly, and Terminal Fracture is what happens when that pressure finally exceeds the mind's capacity to absorb it.
  What makes Terminal Fracture particularly sobering is its permanence in a world built on impermanence. Characters die and return. Infection depletes and can be partially restored. Even the most grievous physical injuries heal through the Mortis Amaranthine's reformation process. But a Terminal Fracture does not reverse. The mind, it turns out, is the one thing the Infection cannot rebuild.