Consequences of Leaving a Corpse

Consequences. You insult a robbed young woman you meet on the road?  Or do you help her? It will lead to a consequence later in the adventure. The woman  might turn out to be a dark sorceress who was testing you. Your kindness rewarded, your insults result in a curse.

The same should go for players leaving corpses lying around, desecrating a graveyard or wearing the heads of enemies on their shoulders in the hopes of gaining +1 Stamina.

Many cultures have burial rites. A corpse left without performing proper ceremonial funeral rites leads to disaster.

The Consequences of Leaving a Corpse Table

Apply this to all corpses or only a single cadaver of your choice.

Roll a D10, this will be the number of hours or days (your choice) it takes for the below effects to kick in.

Roll a D8 for the table below.

1. The body (or bodies) festers and becomes putrid. The restless soul reanimates the corpse. The soul driving the body is restless and vengeful; it has no hunger or thirst, it's a corpse, instead it only wishes to cause violence and chaos. The reanimated corpse functions differently depending on its decay. It may be a shambling ghoul or a day old body with unnatural strength. 
2. The player notices the corpse of their victim(s) slumped over tavern tables. They are dead, gaunt, staring. The corpse haunts from behind the bar, sprawled on the ground. The corpse stares in through their living room window. Eventually, they wake and find the corpse lying next to them in bed. The corpse follows them, from a distance at first and then they find it everywhere, all the time. It will follow them until it is properly laid to rest as per the victims custom.  You can make this a hindrance. If the players neglect the corpse (s) then they will begin to block doors during combat, or fall from great heights in order to cause harm to its victim.
3. The player decays at the same rate as the corpse(s). Their skin rots, their lips wear away from their gums and their eyes begin to shrivel in their head. It is a length process and a painful one. Each day the corpse is unburied then the player rots further until eventually they are nothing more than bone. The player rolls 1D4 each day and removes HP permanently from their HP pool. They also suffer 1D2 to their Charisma. 
4. The player inherits the memories and the personality traits of the victims they have left unburied. They are not being possessed or taken over, these are additional memories and traits on top of their pre-existing ones. They must make a Save VS Paralyze when one of these memories takes hold to avoid being temporarily incapacitated by the vision. If they fail, they cannot move for one minute. The personality trait is overwhelming; if the corpse is has an anxious personality, so will the player, to the point of it being a hindrance. A sarcastic personality will only ever be sarcastic, resulting in terrible results if a player is trying to have a decent conversation. 
5. The body becomes a Rib Walker. The body turns itself inside out. It cracks open from the back and the ribs straighten out and elongate into hooked legs. Skin and muscle stretch over the skin to form webbing between the bones. The head of the victim also splits open with the teeth shifting alone the now exposed flesh. The brain pulsates and the throat opens up with the tongue lolling out, drenched in saliva. The Rib Walker crawls at 2 x the speed of a human, but its bones are brittle and once its ribs are broken it cannot walk. The Rib Walker will actively hunt the person who killed it and they do not rest, day or night.
6. The bodies become portals for things to cross over from the dimensions of hell. Each body casts a Summon Spell. The demon erupts in an explosion of viscera from the bodies orifices. Use this link or have it summon a demon of your choice. 
7. Vengeful spirits haunt the character who killed or had a hand in killing them. The player must make a Save Vs Magic every time they go to sleep to avoid being possessed by the spirit. The spirit will then seek to commit suicide in the players body as quickly as possible, in the hopes of damning the players soul in the same way they have been. The possessions will stop when the victim is buried or a Dispel Magic is cast on the possessed player. 
8. The player experiences terrible nightmares and dreams at random times. They are haunted by the voices of those who have been killed. They are now unable to rest properly and recover health at half speed in comparison to others. After 1D10 days of leaving the bodies unburied, they no longer regain any health while resting and suffer permanent insomnia. If this continues for a further 1d10 days, their intelligence and wisdom quarters daily until they die.
   
   
   Rib Walker: HP/HD (Determined by type of corpse)  AC 12  DMG 1D6 ChargeCrushing Embrace: Once per day, the Rib Walker lunges, wrapping its ribcage around the player and crushing them for 2D6, The player can make a Dex save to avoid or a STR save to break free.

One of the only ways to negate these spells is to perform a burial for the body. Burials can be performed in a number of ways. The more morbid or disgusting the practice, the better. 

Artwork from  Wiki Commons.