The Flu

The Flu is a contagious disease disorder that causes your cat to start each battle with Slow 5 and Weakness 5. Slow reduces your movement range and turn order priority, while Weakness reduces your damage output. Starting with both at level 5 is a significant early-battle handicap that takes several turns to wear off, putting your cat at a disadvantage during the critical opening rounds of each fight.

The Flu is heritable and contagious, meaning it can spread to other cats in your party during adventures. It can also be acquired through events or applied with a Disorder Syringe from the Organ Grinder. Among the contagious disease disorders (Bird Flu, Covid, Ebola, Pox, The Common Cold), The Flu is one of the more debilitating because Slow 5 and Weakness 5 are high-value debuffs that significantly impair combat performance. The contagious spread means a single infected cat can eventually give The Flu to your entire party.

The Flu has very little strategic upside and should be replaced as soon as possible. The debuffs wear off over the course of a battle, so longer fights become more manageable, but the opening turns are severely hampered. Cats with debuff cleansing abilities or items that remove status effects at battle start can partially mitigate The Flu's impact. If you cannot remove it, prioritize keeping the infected cat away from allies to prevent contagious spread, and consider builds that do not rely on early-battle aggression.