“The soul takes nothing with her to the next world but her education and her culture. At the beginning of the journey to the next world, one's education and culture can either provide the greatest assistance, or else act as the greatest burden, to the person who has just died.”
― Plato, The Republic of Plato
Your shoulders sag with the burden you carry in place of the duties you failed. You sink deeply into the dunes of salt and several burning grains slip in through the mouth of your steel boots. They scorch the base of your ankles, causing the hair on your back to prickle with each gust of wind. The air is filled with a dryness that can only be associated with the blank madness of death. The salt lake chokes the wind, asphyxiating the flaky tree embedded in your chest whose leaves no longer reach for the sunlight.
Your chest angles forward, weighed down by the protective metal whose honeycomb structure knits itself over your upper body down to your wrists. Your forearms are covered by an exoskeletal structure, which is referred to as a vambrace. Yours is an ambiguous mixture of red, brown and white - stained by battle and rust before being glazed with a deposit of salt. The metal remains undented despite its amount of use. You revel in the sound of steel against brittle bone, their arms held above their heads with pathetic eyes imploring for mercy. Those who surrender are not be granted sympathy, for their minds are weak and their bodies useless. They are slain while still on their knees. Those who fight against you are vanquished for committing violence against the holy squadron. You make them toil for your people, harvesting crops and doing work until they die from exhaustion. Those who are lucky die on the battlefield before they are subjected to this. They are fortunate to die in your righteous hands.
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The rest of your body is left unprotected, guarded only by the holy spirit emblazoned as a crimson cross adorned across your chest. A symbol you have taken pride in, so much so that you are known in the battlefield to carve this into the abdomen of your enemies. Their entrails spill onto the floor with every carve of your sword, while quiet screams escape from their mouths.
Your fight is for your people, your dignity, and your salvation. Your people raid the surrounding lands, plaguing the grain and vegetables like locusts - incapable of comprehending concepts of growth and sustenance. Although these raids are not always efficient, a massacre is always a form of entertainment in an otherwise bleak journey. You say the souls of unbelievers go to hell anyway, so what does it matter if they left on their journey a bit earlier? Whereas for you...
Your name is Theodor, you have a wife and daughter, and you are now dead.