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Message: <blockquote data-quote="mythusmage" data-source="post: 2624957" data-attributes="member: 571">Elvish anthropophagy (and demi-anthropophagy) has nothing to do with curses or like malarky. Elves as a group suffer from a genetic condition in which the victim cannot manufacture vitamin D, unlike the other races. In addition they cannot process vitamin D from other sources (such as milk) unless it is the specific form produced by humans and non-elven demi-humans. Without a source of vitamin D elves quickly start to suffer the effects of rickets.Were that not bad enough, elves were originally the final result of the transformative event recounted in Land of the Dead in which the 'zombies' were changed into something much different. The restoration to life profoundly changed the creatures, rendering them effectively immortal. But they unfortunately retained their pathological obsession with the ingestion of living human flesh. It's a treatable condition, but the number of people who know how to treat it is small indeed.Keep in mind that even if an elf is successfully treated for 'the hunger' he'll still need to eat people etc. in order to get his daily vitamin D requirement.BTW, humans with elvish blood sometimes suffer from either or both conditions. If the latter is the case such are often known as ghouls.</blockquote>