What is evil?
When Ningals and the others were still kids, a little girl came out of nowhere from the north. She told the villagers that she and her parents had been attacked by bandits when they were on their way to Finisrepo. When told that she was in Finisrepo the girl was visibly relieved. They ask her why her parents would want to come there and she told them that they heard that children who were from Finisrepo were strong and somewhat special as they would become noticeable figures in the seven regions. Her parents wanted her to grow up there, train and become one of the kids that go out to the world and succeed.
She told them that her name was Flosbris Seriyere and her parents had died trying to hold back the bandits so she could run away. She told them that her parents were both third-tier apprentices on the verge of becoming mages and because of their fighting strength they were able to hold them long enough for her to get away.
They brought her to the village heard who was Vintas Lapisas at the time and after hearing her story, he had no problem with her becoming a Finis. He asked one of the villagers to look after her and Agna, an elder in the village who was never able to have a child of her own jumped on the opportunity to be a parent and started taking care of her.
The girl was strong-willed and smart. She quickly became friends with the other girl in the village who was exceptional, Ningal. Ningal who only lived with her sickly mother was driven in her hunts to get high-quality beasts so she can feed them to her mother since it was neutrinos but since she was hunting constantly and getting good at it, her mother become addicted to the beast meat, and right after she turned 9 years old, she passed away since Ningal could no longer go hunting unless she wanted to challenge the Trial Forest. She became a sad soul and to try and give her a new purpose, Numinima who was older than her started looking after her and teaching her War spirit, a technique passed down in her family.
Ningal started to distance herself from Flosbris as what being taught by Numinima meant was that she had become an Initiate and all her time went into learning the techniques. By the time she was 12 she went into the Trial Forest to get material for her spells and would come back which meant she had passed the Trial for that day. It also meant she come back with a beast core. The only bad thing about it was that she was worse for wear and did not want to ever go back to the Trial Forest ever again as she almost died. Numinima had told her to go as if she survived it, it would strengthen her fighting spirit which was useful in healing.
Flosbris was jealous and the villagers knew it as she would constantly tell lies about her, even going as far as to say that Ningal just wanted Vitula, who was Numinima's boyfriend at the time. Singal who was older than both girls by only two years was also showing interest in Ningal, but in a twist of faith, since Singal knew how much time, effort, and persistence it took to be an Initiate, he let her be, which gave Flosbris a chance to take Singal's attention away from Ningal. When she come of age at 15 years old, she did not waste time and married Ningal who was 17 at the time.
A year before she got married to Singal, Vintas had told the villagers that he wanted to go to the capital to ask them to make their village a teleportation point. He knew why they never put one in their village which was because they did not want outsiders influencing the village's culture. They brewed strong children who would become influential in the kingdom and the officials did not want to disturb that strong culture they installed in their kids. That is why they let them be and since they were far away from any other city, they would only check on them every other fifteen years or so. Since Vintas was the heard of the village now he thought they did not need to worry about that since he was strong. He knew that they needed to integrate themselves into the world so that they could be on the same stage of civilization with them.
Dunnam who was Vintas's son was left behind to be the village heard for the time he was gone. Dunnam had always liked both Ningal and Flosbris but since Flosbris was now married, he had his eyes on Ningal. He was afraid to approach her though as she seemed focused on where she wanted her life to go. He was surprised to be approached by a married Flosbris after three years of marriage to Singal. She had told him she was not happy with her marriage and wanted some comfort. He did not know that what she was looking for was anything his father left behind pertaining to his practice as a mage. When Flosbris got pregnant, she and Dunnam did not know who the father was. When the baby was born, they were relieved for it to have Flosbris's hair. If it was red or blond it was going to show who the father was and if it was his, it would put him in a very peculiar position with the villagers. Singal knew about them by using his techniques but just kept quiet as he was afraid of his wife by that point.
After Flosbris had stolen the compasses the people who sent her came. They called themselves the Luminexis. Which they said meant chasing light. They chased it because they were its shadow. There were third tier Witches and had a murderous aura around them. They did not have distinctive clothes but what was prominent was the tattoo of hands embracing a light sphere. One was a girl that looked young, hard her left eye missing, and wore clothes that a hand-to-hand close fighter would wear and the tattoo was on her left thigh. The other was a male who had a long hood that hid his face. His tattoo was on his left hand. The other hand was all bones.
They immediately killed 20 of the villagers without any provocation and resistance from them and it was almost like they wanted to be provoked. If any villagers were thinking of defying them before the massacre, they were now obedient as everyone was scared for their lives. They told them that they wanted their children who were 5 to 8 years old. They also said that they were going to train them to become Witches which made the parents of the children feel at least gratified that they would be training them wherever they were taking them since they had no choice. The parents that had the heart to resist were quickly taken care of in front of the others. Dunnam did not resist and quickly edged them to comply as they also told them that they would make each and every villager an Initiate. That made the villagers who did not have children quickly comply.
Ningal was and Vitula had lost Numinima at that point but since she had warned them that something bad would happen and as she had hidden her pregnancy, they had hidden Falgur in the basement. Since they were already Initiates, they just watched since they knew they could not do anything. Singal was just happy that his child would not be taken at that time while Flosbris was just standing next to the two Luminexis looking at Ningal.
Five days after they had taken the children, the two witches kidnaped Ningal and took her to Dunnam's place. It had a basement where his father used to do his experiments and train. When she got there, they threw her down at the center of the room that had weird symbols and runes written on the floor that all seemed to lead to the center along with a nine-pointed star. When she looked at the left side of the room, she saw that 9 of the children they had taken were kept there and they looked to be entranced. At the other side of the room, there was Ningal and Singal who was forced by her to come. She just wanted to torture him since she knew he still liked her.
Ningal heard the two saying that since they had their virgin that was pure of heart, they could start. The words made her mind spin in circles. The two started to say an incantation and as soon as they did, the symbols and runes started to light up. Ningal was pinned on the floor by an invisible force. Her clothes were torn off by the same invisible force leaving her naked. Dunnam who was in the room but that Ningal had not noticed as she was scared out of her wits came close to her. He was wearing nothing but a towel to cover his private parts which he took off in full view of Ningal. She knew at that point what was going to happen.
As Dunnam was on top of her, the children each moved to each point of the star. Even though Ningal was having what was happening to her, as evil as it was, she still had a sense of worry for the children as they moved. She prayed to All-mother to let only her suffer that night and help the children but her prayer was not answered. As soon as the last child reached his designated point, their heads were decapitated by the same force that was keeping Ningal pinned down. The two third-tier Witches were still saying their incantation but were in a trance at that point. Ningal's mind went numb and could not remember what happened after that. Flosbris was loving what she was seeing but Singal was thinking of killing himself with the thought of his son keeping him from doing so.
The blood that flowed out from their lifeless bodies went to each symbol and rune, then when the last rune was filled with blood they ignited with the flames being black but producing a pure white smoke that all went into Ningal's nose.
After the deed was then, the two witches were breathing heavily and fatigued. They made Singal take her to her house. He took her and as he was carrying her to her place, his mind was blank. All his actions were like a robot with no emotions. When Ningal woke up the next day, she did not know what to do with herself. What happened to her and watching 9 children be killed like that was too much for her heart. She went to Vitula's place and told him everything, she also needed a good cry and Vitula's shoulders were big enough to hold her tears.
After a year and repeated checks on her, she was still not pregnant. The two Luminexis then stopped checking up on her and focused on the villagers as they edged them to have more kids, but even if others wanted to have one, the stress brought by the incident made the woman of the village bodies unwilling.
Singal finished telling Sheyken the story and he was calm which Singal could not understand. No one would be calm after hearing of such evil.
What Singal and the others did not know was that since it was not a normal pregnancy, it took one year for Ningal to be pregnant and by that time she would not leave her house.
"Makes you think what evil is after you see something like that."
Singal said so to see if Sheyken was still listening to him.
"What is evil?" Evil? I lived with evil for two years. I will show you what evil is."
Sheyken said as he turned and jumped up to the open hole by the ceiling to check outside while holding on to the bars. There was noise coming from the outside. When he looked at what was happening, he had to blink twice to check if what he was seeing was real. Ningal and Vitula were tired upon a pile of wood with each opposite of each other standing upright separated by the pole they were tied to.