A flesh-eating virus killed a Welsh man within 12 hours after he contracted it during a romantic Mediterranean cruise with his wife.
An inquest into the February death of Raymond Evans, 57, heard how a "blotchy blackness" spread from the back of the man's knee to the rest of his body within a couple of hours, the Daily Mail reports.
Mr Evans had contracted the deadly bug necrotising fasciitis and was dead within half a day, despite being transferred to hospital in Alexandria, Egypt.
He initially reported to the cruise ship's doctor after injuring his knee during a walk and was confined to a wheelchair.
But soon afterwards his wife noticed the black splotch on the back of his knee, which quickly moved to his chest, elbow and fingers.
Pathologist Christopher Simpson told the inquest the disease entered Mr Evans through "an inconspicuous portal in the body".
"I have no way of saying how it got in but, presumably, at some point in the leg," he was quoted as saying.
"Unfortunately it has a high mortality rate.
"It could not have been anything to do with his initial knee injury because this progresses within hours."
The condition caused Mr Evans' organs to fail within hours.