Acid Grenade

Full Item Description
Much like the Saristreea Grenade, the Acid grenade is an unassuming weapon. Coming in a wax sealed five gallon barrel it has similar warnings to keep dry and away from water at all times. Inside the barrel is a granular powder that has a white-blue color, and a scent much like powdered onion. Sniffing the powder or excess handling can cause chemical burns to the eyes, nose, mouth and hands.

History
Another weapon deployed by the siege crews of the Cheelstat militias, the Acid grenade was unique in it's horror. As the battle of Nimz degenerated into a seemingly unwinnable stalemate that slowly bled both sides of young men and women, Cheelstat alchemists concocted an alchemical mixture that would turn standing water into a potent acid. Soon after rains, when the bottoms of the Nimzian trenches were a slurry of sucking mud and rainwater, the Cheelstater siege gunners would hurl casques of the powder into their enemies trenches.

In short order, the mud would be churned into an acidic slop that devoured boots, rotted wood in alarmingly short amounts of time and ruined many a man's feet and hands. Sometimes water supplies would be hit, and the men would drink thirsty gulps only to be left bent over coughing up blood as the acid burned away their throats.

The acid grenades were eventually countered by the basic awning that kept the powder from entering the trenches, and by the use of steam powered pumps that kept the water sucked out of the bottoms of the trenches. A few grenades survived impact and now present a hazard around old Nimz as the wood has since rotted and permeation by ground water has turned these into leg breaking tubs of acidic paste.

Magic/Cursed Properties
The alchemical powder in the acid grenade turns standing water into a medium strength acid. As an organic acid, metal and glass are unharmed by the mixture while wood, leather, and flesh are rapidly corroded. The resultant acid pool can last as long as the ground remains wet and in large enough concentrations, renewed rainfall can be turned into acid again. Telling acidic water from mundane water is very difficult as once the powder has been mixed, it causes no change in the color or scent of of the water.

Much of the land around Nimz has been rendered contaminated and barren because of these grenades and after a strong rain, many of the puddles that form in low places have a varying degree of acidic potency. Most of the scavengers and thieves who now lair in the ruins of Old Nimz have developed techniques to test water for it's quality. This ranges from the crass method of chucking something into the water to see if it burns in the acid to alchemist's kits that detect the acid itself in the water.