The Servants of War

A mighty warrior walks across a desolate field, pondering to himself. He thinks of the war he has left behind him, which has decimated the mightiest empire of the day to the point where it could never recover. The glorious empire and it’s proud warriors, now nothing more than flesh for Pestilence to infect, bones for Famine to pick, and dust for Death to claim. What power has War, when war ends? When those who can wage war are all dead?

Hunger soon strikes him, and the only meat he sees is a mouse-hole in the ground. He reaches inside the hole and pulls out a tiny mouse, no bigger than his own hand. When he moves to kill the mouse, the tiny thing bites him with all it’s might. The warrior barely feels it, but he is…amused at the tiny creature’s defiance. Such a tiny thing, fighting against what is undeniably a hopeless situation.

Such a bold thing deserves more than dull teeth to defend itself. The warrior thought to himself. Using power it had taken from a battle long before, War infused the tiny mouse with the power of lightning itself.

So the story goes…at least, this version of the story. There is a version for every animal, plant, fish and insect in the known world. And in a sense, all of them are true. Whatever the initial inspiration had been, War began an experiment that would shape the world forever.

When one asks a supposedly wise human scholar what War is, they will claim that the real face of war is soldiers dying in trenches of dysentery, starving on the marches for pointless causes, a sniper killing a hapless fool before he can accomplish anything.

But War is none of those things. Those are the domains of his brothers, Famine, Pestilence and Death. Inevitable side-effects of War, but not War itself.

No, War is battle. It is a duel, it is strength, it is power. It is swords clashing, will tested. It is courage and ferocity, facing one another and proving their mettle with all their might. With every strike, every blow, every battle, War is empowered, and his servants with him.

But War knew that, as things were, he could not strengthen himself without strengthening his brothers. Death he could do nothing about, but Famine and Pestilence, neither of whom he trusted, would always follow in his wake, feeding off the fallen before devouring the victors like carrion birds and scavengers. Was it possible for him to create a war that wouldn’t end up fueling his treacherous brothers?

He soon came upon an idea. Battles that could start, end and repeat again and again, with countless outcomes that didn’t involve death and disease tainting his victory. A world defined by fighting.

It took time before his plans fully came to fruition. Several…unimaginative humans regarded his servants as merely another weapon, using them the same way as they had used their original tools. But the problem with weapons that could think was that they might begin to think you aren’t fit to wield them. Realizing that they couldn’t call themselves the strongest anymore, they acquiesced to the demands of War and his servants. After a few… examples had been made, of course.

First and foremost, the humans had to prove themselves individually worthy. There would be no inheriting of warriors because of family names, no handouts due to abstract concepts, no purchases to favor the rich. You want a fighter? You have to earn it.

It wasn’t hard to come up with a way to make them work to get War’s servants…they had to come and find them, and then they had to fight them, before they would consider obeying the humans. They had to brave the weather, climb the mountains, forage and hunt themselves…they had to prove they were strong and capable enough to handle the creatures they wanted to command. And even after that, they had to take good care of them, prove themselves worthy and responsible owners. Those who weren’t soon learned how fragile they actually were.

Other things began to shape themselves as time went on. The church was still in power, after all, and they wouldn’t let this new movement pass without co-opting it. So the battles became about fighting representatives of the seven deadly sins. Wrath, Lust, Greed, etc. Seven trainers with specific gimmicks and types that would symbolize their respective ‘sin’. Once they were defeated, they gained a small sigil of their triumph that they would use to shed a drop of blood in honor of War. They eventually became pins that they could use to prick themselves easily.

When did it become eight, many have asked. My theory is the eighth sin was Blasphemy. A few humans, idiots at best and heretics at worst, got it into their heads that they could tame the gods the same as the other creatures. At least 3 cities were destroyed as a result of this foolishness. And seven sins became eight.

Naturally, trainers needed yet another way to filter out the best of the best, so they added another part to their journey. Anyone who could triumph against their own sins would battle against the four representatives of War, Famine, Pestilence and Death. Once they had defeated all of them, they would become…god? The church never liked that part.

It hardly mattered what they liked after a while. Their god, and their church, soon fell out of favor, but the battles continued. Even as the metaphors of sins and harbingers fell away, even as the sport became commercialized, even as children became the primary source of training. The fights remain, and really, that is all that matters.

In the end, all trainers serve War. Including my own. Sometimes I wonder how Ash would feel about knowing that. He’s the sort who would claim that War is a terrible, monstrous thing to be avoided, but the battles we regularly participate in are different because of friendship. Still, that naiveté can be forgiven in a child.

At least he understands that it’s our efforts that he gains his glories. Certain other trainers have gotten it into their heads that they and they alone are responsible for victory, regarding us as nothing more than tools for THEIR glory. Arrogant fools.

But they’ll learn soon. I’ve been hearing rumblings among my fellow servants of War. Murmurs of a poison seeping through the tournaments. Heretics and idiots repeating the mistakes of the past. Brats and bullies seeking to circumvent the rules so they gain more power for themselves.

They need a lesson in just who MADE those rules in the first place. And if they won’t learn?

Ash may need to learn how to appreciate War very soon…