Seven years have passed since the burning of the village. The carnage hasn’t
stopped and village after village is still being burnt and plundered.
Shai remembered clearly the die her children died, and the promise she made.
Beneath the rubble of her former village is a labyrinth of caves and rooms, all
of which were lit by torches hanging from the walls. This is the location of
Shai’s army, which she named using only one word: Vengence. For seven years the
group has been growing larger and larger.
The army is made up of all kinds. Men, women, and children. All of whom are
warriors. Anyone Shai sees as having the courage to fight, regardless of size,
she will accept.
Vengence is hidden away beneath the ruins, in the middle of huge stretching
fields. There is nothing to mark their location, and the only one’s who know of
this army are the people who Shai or her most trusted soldiers have personally
told. Their numbers have reached almost three thousand.
Outside of this man made cave, the word ‘vengence’ has no relation to any sort
of army. The only way to recognize a person in this army is by the mark, which
all the soldiers must wear. A two inch tattoo, which hides neatly away on the
left side of the neck. It is drawn to look like a human heart, but shows only
the darkest shade of black.
Shai has promised her soldiers that every single barbarian they kill will have
his heart cut out, and they will roast it and eat it. She tells them that to eat
the heart of these barbarians is to make sure their souls will never reach an
after world, and they must spend an eternity in nothingness.
To eat a person’s heart is to destroy their soul. They deserve no soul.
No mercy. It is a sentence she lives by, thinking of it as much as she can, so
as to make sure she will forever be inspired to destroy the wretched beings who
took her children. When she realized her army was growing, she made a vow to use
these people to go from village to village among these barbaric people, and kill
all of their children, and tie up and torture their adults and leave them to
die.
No mercy.
Every day, she thinks of those two words, and remembers the feeling of the warm
blood of her own children upon her face. She knows now that her children were
soulless. They were mere tools for what her deity wanted her to do to these
barbaric people. Every day her bloody war was becoming less of one for
vengeance, and more of a holy war. She hasn’t told her soldiers yet, of course,
but she will.
She has taught them about her god. All people, good and evil, are rewarded for
the struggles of life by a paradise in the afterworld. There are two exceptions
for this- suicide will send you to nothingness, and having your heart eaten by
man or animal will do the same.
It was a dream Shai had shortly after she lost her children. A great goddess
appeared to her, calling itself Aarae, and told her what needed to be done to
those barbaric people. Show them no mercy. It was the words Shai herself had
used only days before and now Aarae was reminding her, inscribing it in her mind
forever. No mercy.
Shai thirsted for blood. They must die.
No mercy.