It's a fantasy role-playing game.

DM: You are Vex Vex'ahlia, a half-elf ranger . You are the member of the famous group of adventurers. Previously, Ogden tells her the history of how the Trickfoots were first cursed. He explains that he has spent his life researching this curse, and once succeeded in exorcising it from Johann some years ago.
DM: "Okay." And she goes in to tell you what she knows of the curse, in fair detail, talking about how, long ago, there was people in the family that apparently killed a brother and pissed off a god, and ever since, the family was cursed, so they left what was once the gnomish city of Wittebach. And the curse seems to manifest when a Trickfoot falls too deep into the spell of selfishness or dark thoughts and habits, and manifests in these shades that eventually hollow them out to the point where they are nothing but a being of avarice and greed.
Player: Of greed, hm?
DM: "Well, it's part of the reason that we have such a bad reputation. Those that befell the curse kind of tore a path through the countryside."
Player: Now, you say 'hollowed out by shades'. Do you still look like a normal gnome, or?
DM: "I haven't seen anyone. I don't know. This is stuff that I heard from Uncle Ogden."
Player: Wow. I wonder what that looks like.
DM: "Hopefully we never find out."
