Nurgle

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This article contains PROMOTIONS! Don't say we didn't warn you.

Nurgle pictured making his famous entrée: Asshole explosion

NURGLE IS LOVE! NURGLE IS LIFE! ALL PRAISE THE PLAGUE FATHER WITH THE CORPSE OF DEATH!
- The Pact of Nurgle in a Nutshell

"Or have you only comfort, and the lust for comfort, that stealthy thing that enters the house a guest, and then becomes a host and then a master?"

– Kahlil Gibran

"To me death is not a fearful thing. It's living that's cursed."

– Jim Jones

"Behold the floral magnificence of Nurgle. Budding flowers of flesh growth, the tessellating landscapes of mould spore. There is no beauty to the unadorned. Nurgle is first and foremost an artist. Tzeentch, he is a mere mischief maker, and young Slaanesh no more than a libertine. Let us not even begin with the linear, narrow-minded aggression of Khorne."

– Opsarus "the Crow", Plague Marine Captain, Champion of Nurgle

"If everything is shit, why worry about it?"

– Unknown Wehrmacht Soldier

"These germs of disease have taken toll of humanity since the beginning of things--taken toll of our prehuman ancestors since life began here. But by virtue of this natural selection of our kind we have developed resisting power; to no germs do we succumb without a struggle. . . By the toll of a billion deaths man has bought his birthright of the earth, and it is his against all comers; it would still be his were the Martians ten times as mighty as they are. For neither do men live nor die in vain."

– H.G Wells, War of the worlds

The total "wet weight" of humanity on Terra (ca. 020.M3 anyway) is 7.33×10¹¹ kg.

The total weight of bacteria, 9.9×10¹¹.

Facts.

Facts?...HERSEY *BLAM*

Introduction

WARNING HE'S FUCKING GROSS!!!

The unholy combination of your loving grandfather and Santa, if all he gave you were plagues, and every day was Christmas.

Also known as Papa or Grandpa Nurgle, he is the god of misunderstood sick fucks (no, not those, we mean literally sick) and all diseases. Nurgle is primarily the god of despair, stagnation, death, decay, and (in a way)Entropy signifying the end of things in the material realm (though this is technically a position he shares with Tzeentch, something that both of them Question and hate). Nurgle can be considered the god of everything, because no matter how permanent anything may seem, it will always eventually wither and decay in the end. While death is inevitable, sapient creatures will also fight against it with all available power, even to the point where they'd bargain with the Gods of the Warp to flip death the bird. While some may turn to Tzeentch (or Nagash), only the children of Grandfather Nurgle transcend the feeble divisions between life and death, achieving true immortality (or at least unnatural resilience and eventual rebirth as Plaguebearers).

We get an actual description of his appearance in the Age of Sigmar novel, Hallowed Knights Plague Garden: "Through the ragged shroud of smoke, Gardus saw what lay below the Inevitable Citadel, at the heart of Nurgle’s garden. Almost immediately, he closed his eyes and turned away, unable to bear it. It was impossible to describe. Impossible to comprehend. To his eyes, it was a wallowing swamp of black stars and dying worlds, of rotting galaxies alive with immense, writhing shapes as large as nebulas. Cosmic maggots, gnawing at the roots of infinity. Galactic plagues, eating away at the very flesh of existence, reducing all that was to leprous ruin in their unending hunger. It was a dark mirror of Azyr, corrupted, reduced, strangled. All glory vanished, all hope quashed. A thunder of screams echoed upwards, driving him back. A million million voices, raised up in anguish and despair. Forever crying out for that which would never come. Down below, something began to crawl out of the black heart of that cancerous infinity. It was no shape, and all shapes. Fat and thin, a plume of smoke, a puddle of oil, spreading ever upwards. There were eyes in the smoke, as round as cold, dead suns, and teeth that stretched in a grin as wide as the horizon. Fingers like comets clutched at the void, as the Lord of All Things stirred from his manse, and began the long, arduous climb to his garden. Moons crumbled beneath that impossible bulk, and stars were snuffed out."

Nurgle is also the god of other stoic emotions, such as: empathy, kinship, happiness, struggle, love, tradition, inevitability, mercy and memory. While Tzeentch seeks to twist fate and change reality, Nurgle teaches to accept entropy and rot and persevere despite it, with solace and happiness. His followers will vigorously spread the joyous teachings of Papa Nurgle and if those living fleshbags won't listen, they'll be shown all the pleasant ways for them to experience the unending cycle of death and rebirth.

In the 1984-esque cold grimdarkness of outer space, where life sucks and everyone's a dick, Nurgle cares. And he loves you. He brings you family, love and the time to embrace that love fully and become one with it. He accepts you for who you are, as long as you stay that way. Also don't wash, don't shave, don't change your underwear. You're great the way you are. He knows that you have been abandoned by your past lovers, friends and family. He knows that you need the feeling of belonging, security and stability in your life. He will embrace you if you trust him to bring you an eternal, painless existence. Just ignore the pus and the smell coming from the forming folds inside and outside your body.

Nurgle's chosen champions are the Warriors of Chaos/Plague Marines, who have willingly accepted his myriad diseases and let him turn them into shambling, bloated zombie-like carrions that no longer feel any pain. Though it is not well known, he does have a few Sisters of Battle who worship him. The nature of Nurgle is that anyone suffering from one of his plagues is counted as one of his worshipers, and he'll grant Chaos blessings freely to them.

In 40k, he saved the Eldar goddess Isha from Slaanesh, to become his Poxfulcrum (a guinea pig for Nurgle's concoctions, who can't be killed by them) and wife. Slaanesh is still upset and doesn't really like Nurgle for that. Nowadays, Nurgle and Isha live as a happy couple in Nurgle's Garden somewhere in the Warp. Nurgle likes to cook, and Isha is always eager to taste his stewings.

In Fantasy, Nurgle kept the human goddess Shallya captive as his Poxfulcrum, until she was rescued by Dante Alighieri (Kaldor Draigo), and two Elves, with the second (a female) taking Shallya's place. In Age of Sigmar he becomes fixated on Alarielle and her Dryad daughters.

Generally speaking he's the third most powerful Chaos God after Khorne and Tzeentch, respectively. All the chaos gods have their power wax and wane, but Nurgle's strength is the most subject to change. His power waxes during great plagues and times of great despair, decay, stagnation and when individuals let go of their ambitions. He becomes less influential during periods of great hope, change, evolution and when cures for his plagues are found, as well when individuals give in to their ambitions. During an especially big plague and/or period of stagnation (even more so than is usual for Warhammer any way, excluding GW's own stagnation of the story-line (as well as their business), which would in theory make him the strongest god, but as soon as this is acknowledged, things would no longer be stagnant, just as Tzeentch had planned), decay and despair, he can temporarily become the mightiest chaos god and his realm will encroach upon the realms of the other Chaos Gods and the neutral (Undivided, Law or unaligned) parts of the Warp. But as all power in the Warp is in constant change due to the life in the material realm being what it is, events that fuel his burst of power will eventually end and he will return to the position of being in the third place.

Ironically, he's easily one of the most successful of the Chaos Gods in Fantasy, having had the champion sworn to him specifically, rather than Chaos Undivided, get closest to claiming the Throne of Chaos, and having contributed the most to the End Times.

Nurgle is hero of all fa/tg/uys; ripe, fat and smelly! Other than being bloated, living corpses filled with wriggling vermin, Nurgle followers have other iconic traits: singular or triple eyes arranged in a triangle, long tongues or insectoid appearances, singular horns, and ringing bells. They usually paint their armor in snotty greens, dookie browns, or biley yellow. Most often greens, though. As can be expected, of all the Chaos Gods, Nurgle is the most likely to corrupt Orcs & Goblins/Orks. As if those sons of bitches couldn't get any tougher...

Papa Nurgle's Forces

The first depiction of Nurgle in Warhammer art, back when an obvious phallic symbol as a sigil was nothing to be sneezed at.

• Great Unclean Ones - Greater Daemons with great sense of humor and a jolly split belly ready to jiggle with laughter. These merry guffaws make their entrails dangle from their open festering wounds, which Nurglings and Beasts love to jump up and down on and play with. You can smell the tangy perfume of ruptured boils, and it's said Nurgle himself is kind enough to coat their swords in the contagion of his own throne! What a swell chap; never too high and mighty to help his followers!
• Beasts of Nurgle - These are the puppydogs you asked Santa for! Complete and equipped with wagging tails, a long tongue to lick you in the face, the scampering excitement of youth, a slug-like texture and paralytic toxins!! If they get a little too excited they might piddle corrosive acid! Become a stalwart Nurgle follower and get one today!
• Rot Fly - Beasts of Nurgle who have become bitter and have transformed into a giant insect. Typically ridden by Plaguebearers into battle.
• Plaguebearers - Reincarnated souls of Nurgle's followers or the victims that fell to Nurgle's Rot. Nurgle is so generous that the gift of Daemonhood isn't just for Daemon Princes! They look like the bloated corpses of the drowned, but instead of water, they swell with pus and black bile. They are typically surrounded with swarms of buzzing flies, who make the plaguebearers much more complicated targets of shooting attacks. Really love to share their gifts. Their arms are made for hugging!
• Nurglings - look like a tiny child's toy versions of Nurgle himself. They are CYOOOT and every Nurgle trooper wants the "shlorp, pitter, drip" of a pet Nurgling of their own, which is great because Nurglings can grow inside the skin of any Nurgle worshiper: the more plagued you are, the more likely you are to be "pregnant" with a few or more of these cute buggers at any given time.
• Poxwalkers - Mortals infected by Walking Pox and perhaps representing the transitional stage before one becomes a Plaguebearer after succumbing to Papa Nurgle's blessings. They are basically demon-powered zombies, shambling forward slowly and carrying only improvised melee weapons.
• Plague Marines - mostly consist of members of the Fourteenth Legion, although a substantial number of the Sixteenth Legion are now also "blessed" with Papa Nurgle's gifts. As Astartes who are immune to pain and minor injuries, these guys are particularly difficult to kill.
• Plaguetouched Warbands - Warriors of Chaos who worship Nurgle, 'nuff said.
• Nurgle Rotbringers - His mortal servants in Age of Sigmar.
  • Putrid Blightkings - Plaguetouched who are blessed with a living rot by Nurgle via his Daemonflies. Many have lost their internal organs and either constantly give birth to Nurglings or use it as a fungus-infested storage space (much like refrigerators in student corridors) or a place for hanging bells.
  • Pusgoyle Blightlords - Elite Putrid Blightkings who have been given the right to ride a Rot Fly into battle.
  • Harbingers of Decay - more corpses than men who ride from settlement to settlement spreading Nurgle's plagues.
  • Rotbringers - the Wizards of Nurgle.
  • Maggoth Lords - Blightkings who are particularly favored by Nurgle and are granted giant eyeless ogre-like Daemons with gaping maws called Pox Maggoths to ride.
  • Feculent Gnarlmaw - Daemon-trees from the Garden of Nurgle that pop up in the wake of Nurglite incursions.

Anecdotes about Nurgle

Grandfather Nurgle loves all of his Children.

• About a year ago, I was out having a few drinks with the bois, when in walks Nurgle. He bought drinks for everyone in the bar. When we were all too hammered to drive home, he loaded us all up in his old Mazda 96 and bused us around town until we all made it back home. And when that cop pulled us over and tried to make trouble, Nurgle boiled his eyes out of his anus. Nurgle is a great guy.

• Me and Nurgle were going to go see this movie, I can't remember the name, and we were passing through the bad part of this Khornate neighborhood. Some fucking bloodletters ran out in front of the car and started denting up the damned thing. Nurgle just sits there, waiting for them to get out of the way, with that big goofy smile on his face. It wasn't until one of them busted my window and tried to drag me out of the car that Nurgle absolutely flips out. Before I know it, the whole road is ground zero for like an army of little black things. I couldn't figure out what they were until the bloodletters start screeching, running around in circles and clawing at their nuts, as their genitals just start exploding, one by one. Nurgle drives off, just wearing a smile. Fucker gave them all a case of super crabs. We laughed all the way to the show. I love Nurgle. He is a pretty fun guy to be around, just like Khârn.

• When I visited the Nurglette's family and met Papa Nurgle, he greeted me at the doorstep, football in hand, wearing an old fuzzy sweater and funny orange slacks, with a big goofy grin that said, "I like you already."

• Y'know, its a good thing in that grimdark universe, with pointy aliens blowing off your limbs, some undead robots trying to de-atomize you, the Imperium with its Throne Vegetable for an emperor and the Inquisition trying to Exterminatus the shit out of everybody, you get to have the most loving family circle ever. Sure, you start to smell a little funny, get a sore here and there, a rash in your ass, but hell, you never ever feel pain or get upset since you no longer fear death, you get to have an immortal, eternal father that spreads joy and gifts all around, with plenty to spare, and a nurglette wife that is most loving and caring, if you can stand her burps and farts. And while you will be the most hideous thing in the universe, what use is appearance and health if everybody else is willing to take it away from you?

• When i was about 7 years old, my mother got diagnosed with lung cancer. After a month or two, her condition became worse and she started to have these random coughing fits and shortly thereafter, she started to cough blood. My father was not allowed to take a loan to try to find a trustworthy and professional (and thus expensive) doctor to set up a recovery program. So my mother decided to just live on pain pills and do as much as possible for our family before her body gave up. Then one day, completely out of nowhere, my mother collapses on the stairs of our home and does not wake up even as we put wet blankets on her face. My father takes the car and immediately drives us to the hospital. The physicians tell us that her body is dying. She is in great pain and there is nothing we can do. As we are standing there, next to her bunk, exhausted from unrest and tears, i see Nurgle standing next to me. Time freezes and the room suddenly fills with a sweet scent, like those white flowers of blooming apple trees. Nurgle has this goofy smile on his face. He reaches down towards my mother and just as i see his finger make contact with her shoulder, she gasps and her face lights up as if she instantly got 20 years younger. She looks so beautiful and innocent, laying there. Nurgle tells me that he is sorry, but for my mother to stop feeling pain, he needs to take her with him. Her goodness, beauty and love will live for ever. As i see my mother's skin darken and fall off, to reveal corrupted and worm-infested flesh, sliding off in heaps to eventually reveal the bones turning into milky paste, i hear her last words: "Thank you...". Nurgle saved my mother and for that, i am eternally thankful. Nurgle is love, Nurgle is life.

Relationship with other Gods

• Tyranid Hive Mind : You might think that the Hive Mind hates Nurgle, as he causes biomass to go bad and be unrecyclable, but really the Hive does not care. Meat just becomes fungi and bacteria which are also in turn subsumed into the swarm. In turn Nurgle though dislikes the Tyranids as they not only have a high disease resistance and quickly become immune to any disease he throws at them, they also end the cycle of life and death by consuming everything and leaving nothing behind to rot anew.

• Tzeentch: Nurgle and Tzeentch are archenemies, though their relationship is still a great deal friendlier than Khorne and Slaanesh. Nurgle thinks that Tzeentch should accept people for who they are, consider the feelings of the people that he steps on in his many schemes and plots and be more loving to his followers and daemons - y'know, treat them like a family, instead of faceless pawns. Tzeentch's opinion was pretty difficult to understand, due to frequent tourettes-like outbursts of "JUST AS PLANNED". Half of our crew report that he thinks that Nurgle should stop dwelling on the past, get used to collateral damage and stop being such a wuss, while the other half think the complete opposite. Empirical evidence show that they are still far more likely to cooperate than Khorne and Slaanesh would be, if only for a little while. After all, one can flow into the other: grief and despair can be fertile ground for hope, and crushing someone's dreams can drive them into depression.

• Khorne: Nurgle isn't very comfortable with Khorne's "Kill 'em all, fuck sorting them out"-policy, though he likes the fact that Khorne refuses to allow his mortal followers and daemons to attack the innocent and helpless (except in most of Khorne's fluff, when the writers forget this, but hey, this is clearly Imperial propaganda to make Khornites look bad), even if the reason for it is... questionable. Nurgle thinks that Khorne should calm down, stop fighting anything that looks like it would present anything resembling a challenge and actively protect those who can't fight for themselves, rather than punishing those followers who can't live up to his expectations. When asked what he thinks of Nurgle, Khorne responded with a long stream of curses, oaths and obscenities, strung together while foaming at the mouth. Empirical evidence shows that they did, however, help to save Khaela Mensha Khaine from being killed, raped and eaten by Slaanesh, though Khaine unfortunately ended up being broken in pieces in the process.

• Slaanesh: Nurgle isn't big on Slaanesh's omniphilia and sadomasochism. Nurgle likes Slaanesh the least of all Chaos gods; the biggest reason to this has its root during Slaanesh's inception, when Nurgle watched in horror as the newborn hermaphrodite killed and raped nearly all the Eldar Gods and Goddesses. Nurgle saved Isha from the perverted freak and cheered Khorne on as he fought to save Khaela Mensha Khaine, while helping Cegorach to hide in the Webway. Our interview with Slaanesh on the subject of Nurgle took the longest time of all. The details of the interview shall not be revealed in public documents as these, but simply put, Slaanesh sees Nurgle as an ugly, fat, boring and "unsexy" amoeba. Slaanesh is in addition cranky that all STDs are accredited to Nurgle and not her/him/it.

• Nightbringer: Nurgle isn't very happy about how coldly and mercilessly the C'tan butchers all living things and then devours their souls. Nightbringer was surprisingly calm during our talk and even offered us a cup of tea. We sat down and listened to him talk for hours about how he can't fight his own nature, that he is rather upset with Nurgle often stealing his Grim Reaper schtick, as well as that Nurgle is a no-good two-bit youngster. These two apparently represent the polar opposites of how death could come for you.

• The Deceiver: Nurgle thinks that the Deceiver is like Tzeentch without all the magic, while having the dickish aspects of personality multiplied tenfold. When asked about his opinion, the Deceiver gave us a set of riddles, caused one third of our interview crew to walk away, convinced another third to attack us, and made the rest of us hallucinate as if on acid.

• The Void Dragon/Machine God: Nurgle isn't very fond of the fact that the Void Dragon eats the souls of those who have metal parts in their bodies and is quite unnerved of what he'll do when he wakes up. The Void Dragon was quite impossible to reach for an interview, since the Adeptus Mechanicus simply laughed in our faces when we asked for entry to the Noctis Labyrinthus.

• The Outsider: Nurgle isn't sure what to think of the Outsider, but then again no one is, because he doesn't want to come out of that big sphere of his. We knocked, left gifts outside and even detonated a warp drive a couple of kilometers away, but he wouldn't come out for an interview.

• The Emperor: When asked about the Emperor, Nurgle's typical goofy grin widened when he said: "I don't like referring to that old friend as The Enigma, but i sure love to irritate him in all kinds of ways. He is a nice chap, that one, but he really has no sense of humor.". Nurgle then proceeded to make most of our team fall asleep by nostalgically telling us of their poker nights and how happy he was when he invented the infamous nose-itch that has been irritating the Emperor for some thousands of years now. As for the Emperor's opinion, we will have to wait for Alfabusa's next Q&A video.

• Isha: Nurgle turned very serious when asked about his wife, which unnerved those awake and woke up those still asleep from his tales about poker nights with the Emperor. Nurgle gave us the impression of being overly protective, when he adamantly forbid us to get even close to the garden where Isha resides. He told us about how he rescued her from Slaanesh ten thousand years ago and how he cooks for her. His love is serious and very strong. In the end, Nurgle got so excited from talking about how he shows his affection towards Isha, that he showed some of his favorite food recipes to us, which accidentally made the majority of our reporters to hemorrhage or internally combust. For those unfamiliar with the Eldar pantheon, Isha is the goddess of life, fertility and healing, which makes her immune to Nurgle's cooking and infamously poor hygiene. This arrangement is begging for a romantic sitcom. In Warhammer Fantasy universe, she is known as Shallya and/or Kalara.

• Khaela Mensha Khaine: Nurgle is still upset that he and Khorne couldn't save Khaine from breaking during the fight with Slaanesh. Nurgle tries to be nice to the Avatars of Khaine that pop up every now and then, even if they don't often return the favor, since being the Eldar god of War and Murder precludes silly things like friendship and interviews.

• Cegorach: While Nurgle thinks that the Laughing God was more than a little selfish to hide behind Khaine and then Khorne, he is rather fond of the galaxy's greatest comedian and plays poker with him on a regular basis. When asked what Cegorach thinks of Nurgle, our interview crew died laughing, so we had to recruit a completely new one. Recording this joke would need the help of a typically humorless mechanicum tech adept, but recruiting one for this task is simply impossible. The joke would simply have to rest for now.

• Malal: Nurgle is concerned for Malal's self-destructing tendencies and self-inflicted solitary confinement. To demonstrate, he took some pastries and cooked a can of tea and took our crew out on a stroll to visit Malal. We knocked and the door opened just little enough for some anti-particles to escape the room beyond. Next moment, the door was slammed in our face with a force that sent everyone except Nurgle flying. Having the patience on the level not rivaled by anyone else, Nurgle simply put the tray down outside the door. On our way back, Nurgle told us that every next time he visits Malal, he finds the tray empty of its contents. That's nice.

• Great Horned Rat: A combination of a putrid, corrupted beast and Tzeentch, who squats in Nurgle's Garden. Nobody likes The Horned Rat and thus no interview was bothered to be made. After Slaanesh was kidnapped by Elves in Age of Skubmar, Nurgle joined the other Chaos Gods in voting The Horned Rat into the Great Game as Slaanesh's replacement. That being said, Great Horned Rat has been compared to an unwanted bastard child, and the analogy is well deserved.

• Gork and Mork: Whilst attempting to interview Nurgle about the Greenskin Gods, the one we assumed to be Gork smashed through the wall and crushed the coffee table, whereupon Mork burst through and attempted to disembowel him with a table leg. Our team was unable to describe what occurred next so we shall put it down to Warp trickery, but the next thing they knew Nurgle was holding them both at arms length while insisting that they make up. Mork begrudgingly held out a hand which Gork took, and as soon as they were put down, Gork heaved his brother over his shoulder and through the other wall. Sighing, Nurgle told us that they were good boys at heart, but that most of the time he had to repair the house after they have left. We managed to track down the two Gods while they were calmer and asked them for their opinions. "He's a good guy beneath all rotten flesh, and unlike a certain feathery c**t he doesn't cheat at cards" we assumed that this was Mork. "'at's roit." our suspicions were confirmed. "He doesn't try to interfere with our domains and isn't a dick to his servants" continued Mork. "'at's roit." Gork supplied. "Unlike Khorne and aforementioned feathery c**t. He also doesn't mind being stuck with driving duties come Saturday." Mork said. "'at's roit." Gork said, nodding sagely. "Shut up Gork. You sound like you're f**king brain-dead!" "'at's roit!" Finished a very happy Gork.

• Archaon: Nurgle's opinion of Archaon is the same as of the other Chaos Gods. He can test Archaon whenever he wants and Archaon always passes. Archaon can be counted on as being a useful tool that can destroy entire universes, but his hatred of the Chaos Gods ensures none of them will ever have any more control over him than anyone else. This resulted in Nurgle putting everything he has under Archaon's command.

• Ynnead: Nurgle isn't really big on Ynnead stealing his "God of death" shtick. More info soon.

Side Effects

Side effects of worshiping Papa Nurgle include (and are not limited to): mild discomfort of the neck, aches, pains, Boils, scabs, internal bleeding, external bleeding, bleeding from the gums, bleeding from eyes and ears, pissing blood, sweating, dehydration, carbuncles, rash, pus-filled sores, sore-filled pus, flatulent boils, nausea, vomiting, bloody vomit, black vomit, black & bloody vomit, Down's syndrome, Up Syndrome, Left-Right-'N-Center Syndrome, sneezing, runny nose, dry nose, coughing, dry cough, wet cough, not-so-dry-but-still-raspy cough, fever, hay fever, meat sweats, athlete's foot, athlete's arm, swimmer's ear, tennis elbow, farmer's tongue, ploughman's bottom, milkmaid's nipples, browning of the nipples, tender nipples, hard nipples, kitten nipples, shitting dick nipples, postman's anus, vertigo, drowsiness, suicidal thoughts, sleepiness, insomnia, mad cow disease, mad snail disease, mad postal worker disease, loose bowels, constipation, explosive diarrhea, implosive diarrhea, impulsive diarrhea, jiggly handles, nasal leakage, anal leakage, genital leakage, general leakage, Brundlepenis, black death, pink death, black eye, pink eye, genetic disorders, heart attack, lung cancer, loss of skin, blood clots, spilling guts, frothing mouth, rabies, puss excrement, moderate gas, medium gas, severe gas, holy-shit-who-died gas, mortality, sudden mortality, baby mortality, super-mortality, immortality, almost-but-not-quite mortality, nurglopromorphism, nurgleaproposism, nurgleabilia, smallpox, super small pox, large pox, medium pox, medium-rare pox, chicken pox, eagle pox, turducken pox, fox-in-socks-eating pox, the sudden urge to eat ham, baldness, blood clotting, AIDS, super-AIDS, STD's, STI's, zombification, artificial insemination, artificial exsemination, uncontrollable exsemination, uncontrollable exsanguination, uncontrollable lactation, uncontrollable Croatian, crabs, super-crabs, giant enemy crabs, spycrabs, spylobsters (AKA uncontrollable crustacean), typhus, malaria, Tom please come home your mother is scared and the cat is missing, yellow fever, red fever, green fever, fuchsia fever, rainbow fever, tuberculosis, dick rot, sniffles, jungle dick rot, dick sniffles, jungle dick sniffles, rotten dick jungles, raging murder boner, salmonella, sam-o-nella, spamonella, random and painful erections, random and painful injections, the condition known as hotdog fingers, Ebola, rectal ventriloquism, everything tasting of goats, reduced sex drive, spontaneous breakouts of "HEUHEUHEU", and moderate discomfort of the neck. In most cases side effects were generally in the extreme and permanent.

Nurgle is not for women who are nursing, pregnant, or may become pregnant. If you experience an erection lasting longer than four hours then please give Slaanesh your phone number seek immediate medical attention. Do not worship Nurgle while driving or operating heavy machinery. Consult your physician before worshiping Nurgle. Batteries not included, no purchase necessary; void where prohibited, see store for details.

Disclaimer

If you join Nurgle, we can't promise that you'll become the most attractive person in the world, or that you will be accepted in many places, but Nurgle has a place for each and every one of us in his great big ol' diseased heart.

Fun Nurgle Facts

• Nurgle, despite being the third most powerful Chaos God, has possibly the smallest fanbase in Warhammer 40k. Apparently having RAGE fits, being allowed to scream JUST AS PLANNED! and receiving PROMOTIONS is better than friendship and love, or anything else that Papa Nurgle offers. In contrast, he has the single largest fanbase in Warhammer Fantasy, partially due to how easy his models are to modify with greenstuff and how overpowered his army has always been.
• Despite being the God of despair and decay, he's ironically a lot friendlier than the God of change and hope.
• As discussed in a /tg/ thread, the "Garden of Nurgle" may be a metaphor for Isha and Nurgle being the same entity. This works great with the idea of Grandpa Nurgle in a dress, pretending to be a space elf princess and fits quite nicely with the "king of the Neckbeards"-theme some fa/tg/uys had developed.
  • Nurgle has a strong association with fungi, bacteria and virus, things which cause or profit from sickness and death. Funny thing about all three is that they also are were humanity's strongest medicines come from. Penicillin comes penicillium mold for example and it is hardly a one off. Could this be Isha giving us a hand? "Whispering" the cures of his poxes to us?
• According to Storm of Magic, when Nurgle gets upset or depressed, he wanders off into the many bogs of his region of the Realm of Chaos to hunt Plague Toads, squashing them to cheer himself up. They make a fun squishing sound (we're actually not joking here, this is legitimately canon).
• Nurgle's triple-circle symbol looks like a stylized fly (the animal most commonly considered holy to Nurgle), a stylized version of the bio-hazard symbol and also represents the cycle of death, decay and rebirth, over which Nurgle has dominion.
• Nurgle is the only Chaos God whose Daemons look just about like him. Plaguebearers don't, but that's because they're the possessed souls of fallen enemies.
• According to the Tome of Decay for Black Crusade, Nurgle sees his role in the cosmos as a sort of galactic recycler. Entropy rises when life grows so old that Order stagnates and decays, meaning it's Chaos's job to consume and destroy everything, leaving rot in abundance for new, verdant life to be born from; clean and pure, until the cycle repeats again. Imagine forest fires that occur naturally to set a clean slate to the flora, before it almost chokes itself to death by overgrowing. Nurgle's job, as he sees it, is to euthanize the galaxy as quickly and as painlessly as possible, and as far as he's concerned, the galaxy is well over due the time where it should have been cleansed to start a new life cycle.
  • Ironically, this is a valid argument for Nurgle and Tzeentch to work together in harmony for a common goal. Nurgle clears out the trash and gives Tzeentch the room to begin again. The galaxy becomes a blank slate for Tzeentch to experiment and coax new life to take shape and rise in the next cycle. Contradictingly, this is also an argument for Nurgle and Tzeentch to fight with each other, as the God of Change is not doing his job properly. Instead he is, ironically again, perpetuating the status quo for whatever reason, rather than letting Nurgle do his thing. It could also be that Tzeentch is still helping him, since his plans might appear to maintain the status quo, while really planing seeds for the final collapse. Even in real life scenarios, in many cases of stagnation, the measures that are applied to hold a society or system afloat, eventually become too many until everything eventually collapses all over itself.
    • He apparently succeeds at this goal in The End Times of Warhammer Fantasy. Perhaps fitting, along with the various analyses on this page. Tzeentch seemed mostly cool with the fact, while Slaanesh wasn't.
• Nurgle's main daemon unit, the Plaguebearers, are the second most fucking impossible to kill enemies in Warhammer Fantasy, surpassed only by Plaguemarines in 40k and Great Unclean Ones in Fantasy. Worth noting that the Plague Marines are just Plaguebearers with cool armor and guns, while Great Unclean Ones are miniature versions of Nurgle himself. Each one can soak up 13.5 bolter shots on average, before dropping dead (do not ever 100% trust mathhammer though), which some find unreasonable, considering that they cost one point less than regular space marines, meaning that a more expensive model will have little hope in killing it by the time it usually takes to complete a full game. You don't want to know how many lasgun shots is needed to be fired at one to kill it (36). Then you get into Fantasy, where you need fire, and as much of it as possible... and cannons. Lots and lots of cannons.
• Nurgle's the reason you're itching right now.
• Despite what you may think, Nurgle can fail. And he knows it. Case in point: Luke.
• Mentioning the name of Pasteur in front of Nurgle makes him go into such a rage even Khorne gets appalled, he still hasn't managed to catch the old doc's soul, hon hon hon. For that matter, count Jensen, Fleming, and Yersin among Papa Nurgle's blacklist too.
• Slaanesh pissed off Nurgle by constantly wanting to get Isha back. Nurgle in retaliation created STDs.
• According to the 8th Edition Chaos Codex, Nurgle once attempted to create a flesh-eating disease but accidentally created a disinfectant. Not even the bravest of Great Unclean Ones dare bring up the subject again. Again, this is legitimately canon. Even make sense if you think about it, Penicillin does come from a mold.
• Nurgle does not extend his "free hugs" policy to Tzeentch. Not out of hate, but because they will cancel each other out of existence.
• Nurgle once tried his hand at World of Warcraft. The result was the Corrupted Blood incident.
• Nurgle's daemons, particularly the Great Unclean Ones, are among the most characterful daemons in all Warhammer lore and literature, though this largely because they are among the only daemons actually allowed to have personalities.
• Junko Enoshima claims to be a loyal follower of Nurgle, as one of his aspects is despair. While he does appreciate her Slaaneshi-tier admiration for him, he does NOT appreciate a) her hatred for tradition, which she considers boring, b) her callous attitude towards her victims and c) her usage of Tzeentchian techniques in order to spread his will.

Famous Servants

• Bubonicus - Nurgle's version of Khorne's Doombreed, Slaanesh's N'kari, and Tzeentch's M'kachan. Like Slaanesh's second in command, Bubonicus has no chance of being a real life historical figure unlike M'Kachan and Doombreed since he was born a good deal after humanity became a space faring species and was not in fact, born on Terra, but instead hailed from the same planet as N'kari. He is something of an oddity among the four Great Daemon Princes, since he's not roughly as old as Nurgle, while the other three are about as old as their respective gods. He has a huge line of dancers on one planet that goes across said planet's equator and they keep on dancing until they catch Uber-Syphillis and become Plaguebearers, at which point they leave to fight for Nurgle while someone else takes their place. The absolute fucking life of the party. His primary rival among the Daemon princes is not M'Kachan as one would expect, but N'Kari, as they were enemies in their mortal life.
• Scabeiathrax - Nurgle's version of Khorne's An'ggrath, Slaanesh's Zarakynel and Tzeentch's Aetaos'Rau'Keres (say that five times fast). Famous for having T9 and 10 wounds meaning that he's completely impervious to any attack that doesn't at least have S6. He's the biggest and strongest of all of Nurgle's Greater Daemons and is probably the strongest of all of his servants in general. If Ulkair has 2,800,000 hit points, then Scabeiathrax would have 280,000,000,000.
• Ku'Gath - Ku'Gath was once a small nurgling sitting on the shoulder of Nurgle while he was concocting his greatest disease yet. Suddenly, Ku'gath slipped off of Nurgle's shoulder and straight into the pot he was cooking in, accidentally swallowing it all and becoming a Great Unclean One in the process. Nurgle laughed the whole incident off, but Ku'Gath felt guilty of robbing Nurgle of his greatest achievement. Since then, Ku'Gath has been trying to recreate the disease that he ruined in his ascension to greater daemonhood.
• Rotigus - A Great Unclean One worshipped throughout both the Mortal Realms and the Milky Way as a fertility god. Known as the "Rainfather" for his ability to conjure up Nurgle's Deluge, a rain of filth that perpetually surrounds him.
• Epidemius - A Herald of Nurgle and his greatest Tallyman.
• Horticulous Slimux - A Herald of Nurgle said to be his first Daemon he ever made (and by implication, probably was patient zero for Nurgle's Rot). Is Nurgle's chief Gardener, and rides a giant snail called Mulch.

40k

• Mortarion - Daemon Primarch of the Death Guard that hasn't done much since ascending to Daemonhood but to sit around all grumpy up until the Great Rift and Guilliman woke up. Mortarion has now reunited the Death Guard and are now having a party.
• Typhus The Traveler, Herald of Nurgle - A rational fellow, mostly famous for being a tough son of a bitch to kill which is owed to the fact that he is encased in Terminator armor and is fully pledged to Nurgle. Typhus to Nurgle is what Khárn is to Khorne, which means that he's Nurgle's favorite mortal servant. Also famous for grabbing guardsmen and Marines alike with his scythe to drag them closer to his hug-friendly arms as well as causing zombie-plagues. Too bad that everyone who gets too close to him rot away into a pile of green slop. Typhus is also the name of a disease, because GW are nothing if not subtle.
• Ulkair the Great Unclean One - Ulkair is notable due to his history with the Blood Ravens, and was imprisoned by Kyras a thousand years before the story line of Chaos Rising. Came back when Eliphas sacrificed a bunch of Blood Ravens and provided him with a Plague marine to possess. A notoriously tough bastard.
• Foulspawn - Foulspawn is the only known case where, after becoming a you-know-what, it did not die, but rather continued it's existence by swallowing its victims whole. Currently keeps the record of giving the best hugs in this galaxy.
• Cor'bax Utterblight - Cor'bax Utterblight is a daemon prince that was summoned by the Word Bearers during the Horus Heresy. He was created by Forge World for the Horus Hersey tabletop game.
• Deacon Mamon - A demagogue of Nurgle who ascended to become a Daemon Prince after his efforts in corrupting the planet Vraks. Another Forge World Nurgle Daemon Prince.

Fantasy

• Orghotts Daemonspew - The child of a human Witch and a Great Unclean One (don't ask, imagine the details yourself) who wants to join his father by becoming a Daemon. Tried to contract Nurgle's Rot and become a Plaguebearer, but when his already quasidaemonic nature made that fail he decided it was better to become a Daemon Prince. Leader of the Maggoth Lords.
• Festus The Leechlord - A man who fancies himself to be Nurgle in mortal form. Constantly makes concoctions from experimental diseases and forces his enemies to drink them.
• Bloab Rotspawned - A Maggoth Lord made up mostly of flies wearing a human skin as "punishment" for torturing tiny insects out of petty spite.
• Morbidex Twiceborn - A Maggoth Lord who resembles a Nurgling, and commands a vast swarm of them. Has a grudge against Tzeentch due to being severely burned as a child and his tribe believing that Tzeentch was the god of fire.
• Tamurkhan - An extremely successful Maggot Lord blessed with the power to claim the flesh and bodies of his enemies as his own if defeated in combat, albeit in a much more... direct way than his obvious comparison. Very successful, and almost claimed the Throne of Chaos before being undone in his hour of triumph by a carefully-orchestrated suicide attack.
• The Glottkin - A trio of Daemonic brothers: Ghurk - that has become something akin to a Great Unclean One, Otto - the tactician of the three, and Ethrac - the Wizard.
• Gutrot Spume - A highly mutated servant of Nurgle who's known for his arrogance. Leads a vast fleet of Nurglite pirates.

/tg/

• Puc'Kao - Nurgle's daemonic tooth rot fairy, gum disease and sweets. Often seen as an overweight, pus-dripping cherub who likes to play pranks on people, usually by removing healthy teeth from the mouths of unsuspecting mortals as they sleep. As you can expect he is a fun guy.
• Luke - I don't know where to start. Just... Ugh.
• Chris-Chan - obvious due to his lack of changing anything about himself, as well as any semblance of personal hygiene, Nurgle is easily the only person who could love this guy.
• Cystus The Malignant - The sickest fuck to inhabit realspace since Typhus himself. Fan created Chaos lord whose endeavors are still being written.
• Chairlord of Nurgle - A morbidly obese Ohio man whose very flesh became fused to his recliner, rendering him unable to be removed from it. There he remained seated in the recliner for multiple years soaking in his own filth and bodily excretions and covered in maggots, being fed by his underlings. When the news of his death reached /tg/ around 2011 they immediately recognized the man as a herald of Nurgle, dubbing him the Chairlord.
• Mary Mallon - The infamous "Typhoid Mary" herself. She was an asymptomatic carrier of the pathogen associated with typhoid fever - she had the virus and was immune to the virus herself but could infect others (like a true champion of Nurgle). Mary worked as a cook but after people she served started falling ill and her infection was discovered, Mary was put into quarantine. Despite this she was adamant she wasn't sick and escaped multiple times to go back to her cooking job before being recaptured incarcerated in high level security for the rest of her life (over 30 years). During her life she is presumed to have infected 51 people, three of whom died.
• Anti-vaxxers.
• Healthy At Every Size unactivists (so most, if not all of, the fat acceptance movement)

As a general note, the followers of Nurgle usually retain high levels of common sense compared to followers of the other Chaos Gods. Probably because they don't usually go insane to the point of uncontrollable defecation, they just defecate uncontrollably (sanity has nothing to do with it). They usually get creative in their conquests and tend to get cool gear and use it well. Plague Marines for example, got bored with regular frag - and krak grenades and decided to instead use the SEVERED HEADS of their enemies: zombified, plague-ridden, embalmed, severed heads.

Famous Diseases

You thought Khorne was bad? You ain't seen nothin'. Here's what Nurgle cooks up for his grandkids.

• Destroyer Plague - Plague flies burrow into every orifice and fill you with their eggs. This causes you to burst in an explosion of more plague flies, which literally fill the assholes of everyone nearby. Plague flies are also spread via reading about plague flies. This is the worst Nurgle plague.
• Bonewrack - Your own bones rip your body apart and suffocate you. This is a mild Nurgle plague.
• Doubtworm - A memetic virus which is spread by hearing a very specific phrase, "The Emperor Isn't Real." Those infected turn into zombies, turn back into humans, and then turn into big cuddly worms. This is the best Nurgle plague, because The Emperor Isn't Real.
• Fydae Strain - Basically turns psykers into Typhoid Mary. You, a latent psyker, are infected by the Fydae strain and are forever immune to it's effects. You are also likely immune to all diseases, forever. The downside is that you are now unknowingly and invisibly spewing out the Fydae Strain virus everywhere. You do just fine, it's just that everything else around you rots away, spreading to cover the entire planet. The disease is sapient, holy fuck, and does what it can to remain undetected. Everybody starts rotting away almost at the same time, and then they usually have seizures so hard they get killed. This also summons a bunch of Nurgle cultists, but honestly at this point it doesn't matter. This is the worst Nurgle plague.
• Obliterator Virus - You turn into guns. Not such a bad way to go considering the alternatives.
• Walking Pox - Similar to Zombie Plague, but worse. Instead of a regular zombie, you become a shambling, rotting abomination which is extra spiky and bloated. You are fully conscious and aware as you watch your disgusting rotsack body kill everyone you love. Walking Pox is spread by moaning.
• Nurgle's Rot - Your body and soul start rotting away. This is a slow process with no cure, because Nurgle is an asshole (not the kind that gets filled with fly eggs though). A disgusting seed pod is created in Nurgle's realm in the warp. When your body inevitably fails and your soul has been sucked into Nurgleville, the seed pod drops and opens. A new, much shittier version of you shambles out as a plaguebearer. This is the worst Nurgle plague.
• Witch-curse - You, a psyker, get supercharged so hard you kill everyone nearby.
• Let me tell you about Nurgle's plague flies.

Nurgle's diseases are far less damaging in the big picture than one would think. Given the literally crotch-liquefying horribleness of Nurgle's diseases, and the demostrated fact that a couple of Nurgle cultists can destroy a solar system's worth of planets, Papa N has remarkably little impact. Somehow everyone's not dead yet. The meta reason is that WH40K: Medicae would be a truly shitty game. In universe, it could be that these sicknesses are warp-augmented and are not viable in a place free of warp interference. The lack of challenging the status quo with a superplague could also be because Nurgle is literally the god of "status quo is god". We've also got some guardian angels watching over us, and a different god working constantly to fuck up Nurgle's plans.

Trivia!

Nurgle has been modelled after Nergal, the Assyrian deity of pestilence, disease, underworld, decay and hunting. He is the only Warhammer deity which has connotations to the real life deities.

Gallery

*WARNING! NURGLINGS ARE NOT THIS CUTE!*

This article contains PROMOTIONS! Don't say we didn't warn you.

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  A neckbeard dedicated to Nurgle.

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  He brings a lot to the table.

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  Nurgle's followers.

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  Nurgle also has daemonettes. Too bad they all have chlamydia. (Then again if you worship Nurgle, it doesn't really matter!)

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  Cultists devoted to Nurgle have a different relationship with their daemons than those devoted to Khorne, Slaanesh or Tzeentch.

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  At home with the family.

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  She slept with the judge!

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  Be vigilant, not everyone with the makings of a Nurgle champion look like one.

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  Greater daemon of Nurgle, the Great Uncle One.

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  The powers of Nurgle laugh in the face of chlorine.

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  Daemonette of Nurgle (don't fap, it'll fall off).

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  None loves his Pokemon more than the Nurgle Trainer.

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  The Herald of Nurgle, charged with organizing everything for the big guy's arrival at concerts, parties, etc.

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  It's so mushy that it causes disease. Literally.

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The Chaos Gods of Warhammer 40,000 and Warhammer Fantasy
Four Main Chaos Gods:	Khorne - Nurgle - Slaanesh - Tzeentch
Other Gods of Chaos:	Archaon - Hashut - Horned Rat - Nuffle Malal - Morghur - Necoho - Zuvassin
Chaos Gods of Law:	Alluminas - Arianka - Solkan the Avenger