We found ourselves holed up in a shelter of sorts. It was a bombed out building that at one point had been a library (sadly the books had been used for kindling). Xanthi was using a makeshift very large sword (it was part of a building girder and had pieces of some creature we'd found dead wrapped on to it with barbed wire, I'm telling you this woman was a genius of weapon construction!). The people there were all pretty beaten down, they weren't soldiers, they were survivors curled up and waiting for death. I didn't feel safe there if only because when people live to survive only they are more dangerous than any soldier. But we needed food and better information than two sides were at war so I decided to stop. I also hoped there might be a doctor there, but no luck so my shoulder remained hurt (yes I could have killed someone to feel better, but that would totally be a bad idea in an area gods were at war in, if only because the use of death magic might bring one of them down on my damned head).
"You two look out of sorts, even for here." Old guy scraggly beard serving what I assumed was stew out of a cast iron pan that had seen better days. There were small children eating first, most of the men looked like food was a distant memory, I didn't dare ask for any.
"We just came in on a ship. Trezlan Lorentino, and Xanthi Ramos." Xanthi gave me a funny look but I explained to her that in civilized areas everyone has two names, so this would be the second time I'd whole sale created a last name for someone.
"Ship? I hadn't heard a steam horn." Xanthi wanted to explain our spider corpse transport, but I shushed her, better not to let them know too much about us.
"Small sailing vessel, it sank shortly after getting here." The old guy sighed when I told him it sank, most of these survivors just wanted to find a way out, I couldn't blame them, things were getting pretty bad.
"Well you're in a world of shit my friend."
"What is this whole thing about? I get religious conflict, but what is the problem, different interpretations?" This is what I hate about religions, sure there are gods and someone should worship them (though again if no one does they die so maybe people shouldn't worship them).
"You're not from around here, so you don't know anything about the twins, so I'll be brief, this area worships twin gods, recently there was a split on which one should be worshipped, that lead to the gods and the religions going to war with each other."
"What are they gods of?"
"Everything." I snorted, no one was a god of everything, I had to assume they were the gods of delusion.
"So why did they break up?"
"Because one of them had to be the head god." I could feel my mind rebelling against the stupidity of this already.
"So two religions sprung up because each one chose the wrong god to put in charge?"
"Yes."
"That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard." He sighed and Xanthi shrugged at me, but seriously tell me I'm not wrong how is that not the dumbest thing you've heard today? HOW IS THAT NOT THE DUMBEST THING TO FIGHT OVER? WHO IS IN CHARGE!? SERIOUSLY!? I did have to almost laugh that in their effort to prove who was in charge they had basically wiped out a large amount of their followers proving definitively. NEITHER ONE WAS IN CHARGE OF SHIT!!! You'll have to excuse me, remembering this brings back my outrage.
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