Astral Infection

*Not to be confused with Astral Injection, or the debuff of the same name.*

*"This twisted dreamscape, surrounded by unnatural pillars under a dark and hazy sky."*

The **Astral Infection** is a Hardmode biome added by the Calamity Mod. Two veins upon defeating the Wall of Flesh, with the first crash-landing into the Dungeon side of the world via a meteor and a second one generating in a random location underground. The biome is filled with a sickly purple haze, and is populated by many alien creatures as well as dark monoliths of various sizes. The surface strain contains a large Astral Monolith pillar, which houses an Astral Beacon on top of it. Players are alerted of the Astral Infection's arrival via a status message: "A star has fallen from the heavens!".

The cavern strain is significantly smaller, however it is able to naturally expand over time at a rate twice as fast as the Corruption and Crimson. Astral blocks within this strain which have remained untouched for more than 20 minutes have a roughly 2% chance per minute to convert into Meld Gunk which is **completely** unmineable. It should be a high priority to seek out and either purify or at least contain the cavern strain before irreversible damage is done to your world. A shrine will also generate within the underground section of the surface strain, with a Monolith Chest containing the Astral Effigy.

The meteor itself is made out of Astral Ore, which can only be mined after defeating the Astrum Deus boss. Tiles in a large area around and below the impact site are converted into Astral versions of themselves, including Astral Dirt, Astral Stone, Astral Sand, and Astral Ice, among others. Trees are converted into Astral Monoliths as well. However, the infection does not actively spread; only the initial impact converts tiles.

Two bosses, Astrum Aureus and Astrum Deus, can be summoned in this biome.

## Contents

Big Sightseer
Small Sightseer
**On Surface:**

Aries
Astral Slime
Atlas
Mantis
Nova
**Underground:**

Astralachnea
Hive
Hiveling
Stellar Culex
**Desert:**

Fusion Feeder
Hadarian | **Critters:**
Enchanted Nightcrawler
Twinkler
**Bosses:**

Astrum Aureus
Astrum Deus | **From Shrines:**
Astral Effigy | **From all enemies:**
Stardust
Titan Finger
**From Atlases:**

Titan Heart
**From Small Sightseer and Big Sightseers:**
Astral Pearl
Stellar Knife
**From Astralachneas:**
Astralachnea Staff
**From Astral Slimes:**
Abandoned Slime Staff
**From Atlases:**
Titan Arm
**From Hadarians:**
Hadarian Membrane
**From Hives:**
Hive Pod
**From Mantises:**
Astral Scythe
**From Novas:**
Stellar Cannon
**When charging into Astral Ore:**
Comet Shard
**From Stellar Culexes:**
Starbuster Core
**From Astral Slimesafter defeating Astrum Deus:**

Astral Ore
**From all enemies after defeatingHydrabots Invasion**

Lethal Disease Canister | **From terrain:**
Astral Clay
Astral Dirt
Astral Ice
Astral Ore
Astral Monolith
Astral Sand
Astral Sandstone
Astral Snow
Astral Stone
Celestial Remains
Hardened Astral Sand
Novae Slag
Meld Gunk
Astral Beacon
**From Fishing:**

Aldebaran Alewife
Astral Crate
Twinkling Pollox
Procyonid Prawn
Arcturus Astroidean
Gacruxian Mollusk
Polaris Parrotfish
Ursa Sergeant | **On Surface:**
Music Box (Astral Biome)
**Underground:**

## Conditions

An Astral Infection meteor has a 100% chance of spawning after defeating the Wall of Flesh for the first time. After the first meteor has landed, defeating Astrum Aureus will always spawn a meteor in the world, assuming the limits have not been met yet.

No new meteors will fall if there are already a certain number of Astral Ore blocks above 0 depth.
The limits are:

* Small worlds: 200 Astral Ore blocks
* Medium worlds: 400 Astral Ore blocks
* Large worlds: 600 Astral Ore blocks

Alternatively, meteors will fall but not infect any nearby terrain if there are already a certain number of Astral-infected tiles in the world. Astral Ore blocks are *not* counted toward this total.
The limits are:

* Small worlds: 400 Astral-infected tiles
* Medium worlds: 600 Astral-infected tiles
* Large worlds: 800 Astral-infected tiles

16% of the world centered on the player's spawn point is protected from falling meteors. Meteors will not land within 25 tiles of a player, NPC, or a chest, nor directly on top of a platform.

Building a completed Skybridge across the entire world is not recommended pre-hardmode, as this will cause the Beacon to spawn on top of the skybridge, possibly out of reach. The biome will still spawn normally however.

## Notes

* Player-created Astral biomes are possible by placing more than 950 Astral Dirt, Astral Stone, and/or Astral Ore in an area. Astral Grass that grows on Astral Dirt also counts toward this total.
	+ Astral Ice biomes require 300 Astral Ice.
	+ Astral Desert biomes require 950 Astral Sand, Hardened Astral Sand, and/or Astral Sandstone.
	+ Alternatively, 300 Snow and 301 Astral Dirt, Astral Stone, and/or Astral Ore will also work.
* Although meteorites will avoid hitting chests, one may still hit the edges of a Floating Island or a Planetoid.
* Astral-infected blocks can be converted back to normal using Green Solution with a Clentaminator, however Purification Powder will also work. Conversely, blocks can be converted into their Astral Infection versions using Astral Solution.
* Enemies specific to the Astral Infection require Astral blocks to spawn on; if the player is in the Astral Infection but the block the mob would spawn on isn't Astral, they are replaced by a universal enemy spawn.
	+ In practice, this causes only ore slimes and Cosmic Elementals to spawn, which can be exploited to easily farm ores.

## Trivia

* The Surface Astral Infection's theme is **The Heaven-Sent Abomination**, which was composed by the artist DM DOKURO.
	+ This theme is a remake of the original theme that used to play in the biome: **Heaven's Hell-Sent Gift**.
	+ If the Calamity Music add-on mod is disabled, the Space biome's theme will play for the whole Astral Infection instead.
* The Underground Astral Infection's theme is **Treasures Within the Abomination**, which was also composed by the artist DM DOKURO.
* The Astral Infection can infect several blocks that are unaffected by the Corruption, Crimson, or Hallow, including Dirt, Snow, Clay, Silt, and Desert Fossils.
* The Enchanted Nightcrawlers which spawn naturally in this biome are clones of the original vanilla NPC, which drop the same item when caught with a Bug Net.
* The Astral Infection used to be only a mini-biome known as the "Astral Meteor", which did not infect any tiles upon its crashing and possessed a different color scheme of yellow and pink.