Mold

Mold is a kind of superorganism bacterium derived from the filaments of the extremely evolved fungus, the mutamycete, of an individual known as E-Series, like Eveline.

History
The Mold was developed by an unidentified B.O.W. manufacturer in a joint project with H.C.F. to develop a new form of bioweapon in 2000. It was a success in terms of a bioweapon, since it could turn enemies into allies, or hostiles into servants, eliminating the costs of sheltering prisoners-of-war and even combat, gathering negative attention from the bioweapon market.

Fabrication and results
According to the R and D Report (1 of 2), to fabricate the Mold, its genome should be introduced to a pre-Stage 4 human embryo under cultivation over a period of 38 to 40 weeks. To ensure blending into crowded populations without effort, the appearance of a roughly ten-year-old was selected as the subjects identity.

The individuals that resulted from this experiment were graded according to their usefulness, starting a Series of subjects, from A through D, flawed individuals, until the E-Series, the perfect creation. The first E-Series, Eveline, showed remarkable abilities, being capable of blending by hiding her mutamycete at will. Another astonishing feature was that Eveline was capable of a profound imposition over the body and mind of those who were hosts of the mutamycete. The creators of the bioweapons theorized that the mind control was possible much alike the action of autoinducer pheromones used for quorum sensing in pseudomonas bacteria.

In further analysis of Eveline's abilities, immediately after infection, subjects showed to see images of her, even though she was not present, having their will bent from companionship or assistance requests to self-mutilation or hostile behavior. Infected subjects also stated a schizophrenic state where the person hears Eveline's voice, even though it's inaudible to anyone else. This psychological shock helps to break down the mind's natural barriers and open the way to Eveline's brainwashing abilities.

Infection
The E-Series is capable of developing from his or her mutamycete's mycelia, the fungal filaments inserted during the aforementioned process, the bacterium, superorganisms formed of countless mycelia. This is the agent responsible for the infection of other individuals and the cause to symptoms stated above, being extremely resistant and contagious. Hereafter, the bacterium is referred as mold, and the subjects were called by the researchers as Molded, in a nod to be made of mold, but also in the meaning of "molded", as in "shaped".

As Eveline was the first and only E-Series subjects before the events of Resident Evil 7: Biohazard, the reports take in consideration the effects caused by her actions.

Initial infection
According to the Infection Report, the initial infection occurs when the mold ingests nutrients from the subject's body to propagate itself, and slowly takes over cells within the body, causing, as a side effect, remarkable regenerative abilities. Subjects infected are capable of coapting legs and arms within minutes if severed. However the subject still maintains it's mental state and has little to no physical changes.

Mid-stage infection
Once the mold reaches the brain, a mind connection is made with the E-Series asset, allowing the infected to experience the aforementioned hallucinations, including images of the asset and hearing voices. This can lead to hostile behavior, and eventually the infected become so connected with the E-Series that a process of losing its individuality starts, losing all of its sense of ego. some also get other abilities such as heighten senses, super intelligence, amazing strength, or creating and controlling bugs as seen with the Bakers and Mia.

Complete infection
When the mold takes every cell in the body, the infection is complete, causing severe physical changes, leading to the infected to lose their human form. The mutations differ from case to case, but all resulting in him or her acquiring incredible physical strength. To contain a subject in this state is considered to be extremely difficult.

Treatment
The only known cure to the state of infection by the mold is by a serum produced by a method that uses samples of the E-Series body tissue, producing a unique fungicidal serum, capable of destroying the cells of any subject infected by results of E-Series bioweapon model. However if the subject has reached the final stage of infection, injection of the serum is fatal

Effects
The pattern effect of the toxin is to calcify every cell that has been infected with the mold. As the infected in initial stages do not have a high number of cells corrupted by the mold, the fungicidal serum is advised to those at this point of contamination, since the calcification will have a small impact on the subject's health.

As higher stages include infection in the brain or in every cell of the body, if the serum is injected into an individual afflicted by the mold at this stage, the result is certain death, by the calcification of every cell. For that reason, the fungicidal serum is primary use of the disposal of initially infected subjects, rather than a cure.

E-Necrotoxin
In exploring the serum's potential, a currently unknown process is capable of enchancing its effects to extreme potency, becoming a compound known as E-Necrotoxin. Even in tiny amounts, according to R and D Report (2 of 2), seems to bring an unknown effect due to the censorship in the document. In the events of Resident Evil 7: Biohazard, the E-Necrotoxin is used on Eveline by Ethan Winters, but instead of immediately causing the calcification of the E-Series cells, it triggered an effect where it couldn't control its form anymore, and became an enormous mass of molded bio organic material, only to calcify after receiving enough damage.

Further notes

 * The H.C.F. was best known to be the private military attack force of Albert Wesker during the incident at Rockfort Island in 1998, events of Resident Evil CODE:Veronica. If the group served the NEXBAS Initiative, it's possible that Wesker himself was involved in the projects that would lead to the creation of the mutamycete, though it's currently unknown if he still directed the military force by 2000.
 * E-mails shared between Lucas Baker and the developers of the Mold, as also the audio commentary of Umbrella Corps' radio about them may indicate a possibility that the Rival company could be the aforementioned developers.
 * The NEXBAS project is not mentioned in the original Japanese script, and so should be seen as non-canon. The same goes for the word "mutamycete", which inaccurately depicts the Mold as a fungus while the script suggests a bacteria.