Why Is Leon Infected in Resident Evil Requiem?

Leon S. Kennedy is infected in Resident Evil Requiem because he survived Raccoon City. The t-Virus he was exposed to in 1998 never fully left his body, and 28 years later it has woken up and started to kill him. He isn't alone: the illness is hitting the other survivors of the outbreak too, and Leon is investigating their deaths while he gets sicker. (Resident Evil Requiem; GamesRadar+ review of Resident Evil Requiem)

Where the infection came from#

Leon spent his first night as a police officer in Raccoon City in September 1998, as the t-Virus turned the city's people into zombies. He fought through the police station, the sewers and Umbrella's underground lab before escaping with Claire Redfield and Sherry. Requiem doesn't show a single moment when he caught it. The point is simply that he was there, surrounded by the virus, and lived. (Resident Evil 2 (1998); Resident Evil Requiem)

Requiem's files describe what happened next. The virus stayed in the bodies of some survivors without making them sick, and over the years it changed. In 2026 it became active again, and once it does, it's fatal. Gideon gives it a name, Raccoon City Syndrome, and Leon reads it in his files at the Rhodes Hill care centre. (Resident Evil Requiem)

What the game shows#

Leon is already ill when the story starts. He's a DSO agent working the string of deaths among Raccoon City survivors, and Sherry, also infected, supports him as his handler. GamesRadar+'s review describes him as desperate for a cure to his mysterious illness when he first crosses paths with Grace Ashcroft. (Resident Evil Requiem; GamesRadar+ review of Resident Evil Requiem)

As the game goes on he gets worse. By the time he reaches the ARK lab beneath Raccoon City his illness is badly weakening him, and he's separated from Grace as it takes hold. That clock is why Leon keeps pushing on into the ruins: if Gideon and Zeno are right that Elpis matters, it might be the only thing that can help him. (Resident Evil Requiem)

Elpis and the two endings#

Gideon and Zeno believe Elpis is a weapon. Grace learns it's the opposite. It's an antiviral created by Oswell E. Spencer that can wipe out the viruses descended from his Progenitor virus, the t-Virus among them. Video Games Chronicle calls it an agent that can clear almost any infection from its host. (Resident Evil Requiem; VGC guide to the Requiem endings)

What happens to Leon depends on the choice Grace makes at the Elpis terminal:

• Release Elpis. Grace takes a dose and uses it on Leon, curing him. He then fights and kills Gideon, and in the epilogue Sherry is cured as well. (Resident Evil Requiem; GamesRadar+ guide to the Requiem endings)
• Destroy Elpis. The cure is gone. Leon stays behind to hold off Zeno so Grace can escape, and Zeno kills him as the two fall into the depths of the collapsing facility. (Resident Evil Requiem; GamesRadar+ guide to the Requiem endings)

The release ending is the longer one, with a final boss, an epilogue and a post-credits scene, and after the destroy ending the game offers to take you straight back to the choice. GamesRadar+ reads that as a sign the destroy ending isn't the intended outcome, but that's the outlet's reading. We haven't found a Capcom statement naming one ending as canon. (Resident Evil Requiem; GamesRadar+ guide to the Requiem endings)

Why it matters for Leon#

Our reading, and it's only a reading: the illness is Requiem's way of making the oldest part of Leon's story catch up with him. Raccoon City is where he became who he is, and it's the place that nearly kills him almost three decades later. The game sends him back into the same city and the same police station to find the cure. (Resident Evil Requiem)

For the whole plot, see the Resident Evil Requiem story. Leon's full history is on his character page, and the night it all began is in the Resident Evil 2 story. (Resident Evil Requiem; Resident Evil 2 (1998))