Scion Tarso wakes up in the middle of a savanna. His head rests on the coarse and dry, under the shade of a lonely acacia tree. At the East, the sun is rising. Its joyous sunlight dances across the purple sky, dashing the black sky with brush-strokes of oranges. On the opposite ends of the sky, the moon glows an ominous shade of crimson.

Scion feels thirsty. He reaches for his sack of water just to recognize that there is hardly any left. Sighing, he stands up and put all his belonging on his horse: a mattress, a pot and a cooking stand. Simple stuffs, but just enough for a traveler like him to survive, with the sky as his blanket and the soil as his bed. Tighten his belongings on the back of his horse, Scion wraps his poncho a bit closer against the freezing breeze of dawn. The tightened cloth presses the revolvers strapped on his hip against his body. The sharp, cold steel is a regular sensation on his skin, whereby from his guns, or from blades of enemies against his neck. When everything is in place, he gets on his horse. His eyes dart at the tiny spot of fires far away, hiding in the shadow of a mountain, and he rides his horse there.

Scion is a young man, not older than the age of 30. His black hair has grown quite long after all these time wandering throughout the Savanna of Xarob, with some hair strands even cover up his black-eyes. His skin tans under the striking sunlight of Xarob. Under his poncho, he is wearing a brown shirt, with a darker brown jeans, blending in with the dry soil surrounding him. On his hip clasps the leather belt and his two trusty revolvers, Ima and Gak. Strapped to his body and beneath the clothes are also other various tools and relics he has collected on his journey.

He was born someplace else, some place far-away from this drought-stricken savanna. Here there is nothing by dry soils and a few settlements, but generally, it is still a lawless place. Order is upheld in those towns thanks to some upstanding citizens, but outside everything goes. Thieves, robbers, warlords, etc, any imaginable criminals, or even unimaginable, roam this savanna freely and do whatever they want, presenting themselves as the wandering threats on this savanna.

However, sin is not the only thing resides here. There are also the Nomads of Geluif. They are groups of people who travel the continent of Barzakh-Terra in search of… Well nobody really knows what they are looking for, or even what their purpose is. Yet, there are rumor that each group would worship a different pagan god, so the most people can speculate is they are conducting these travel to look for their respective gods’ relics. Some even claim to even see they conjure their gods’ power to perform miracles and wonders, or even destruction. All in all, they are mysterious group of people, with mysterious power.

And they are Scion’s targets. Or this specific group, who are settling down on the foot of the mountain where he is heading.

Slowly approaching their encampment, Scion dismounted his horse. His loyal mount stands still, around one kilometer away from their camp, waiting for its master’s next call. Using the remnant of the night sky as his guise, he steadily comes closer to the camp and scouts the member of this group.

The main tent in the middle is massive. It is made of lamb leather, with white fur outside, using the animal’s dried entrails to tie them together. “This should be their worshiping places.”, Scion thinks,”These morons always save the best for their gods, and the priests”. Surrounding the main tent are seven smaller tents, which should belong to the other followers, with darker and miscellaneous colors fur. The campfires are around the places, with pots of food boiling atop of them, but there is no one attending these pots. Instead, there are prayers and choirs from the main tent. Confident that these small group of nomads are too religious to have someone guarding the places while the others are performing their ritual, Scion slowly crawls over the fences, and enters one of the small tents.

The inside of this tent is dark, with just a lonesome candle lit in the middle of it. Looking around, Scion found mattress and blankets, as well as their chest of belonging. Opening them without hesitation, he looked inside to find some gold, as well as some scrolls. Taking the gold, he opened these scrolls. Similar to the other Nomad camps he infiltrated, there are just images and strange symbols on these scrolls that he could not understand, with an image of a lamp as their crest. Frustrated, Scion puts those scrolls back into the chest, and comes to the other end of the tent, as close as possible to the main tent.

From the largest tents, a prayer of sort from multiple people rings out. All is unfamiliar and alien to Scion, but he didn’t need to know. After all, he has already known enough from various sources of information, which he could understand, to target these nomads. Scion knows of their god Haavare, the Trickster, the God of mischief. While many may laugh at the silly tale of this god, Scion knows better to take these superstition seriously, from his own experience.

The myth was that this god were just a human, a mere mortal that walked the continent of Barzakh-Terra who had a great fondness of games and gambling. And, just as any other human, his time closely comes to an end. However, when Petta the White-Moon god, the God of Peaceful death, came to claim his soul, this man Haavare tricked him to play a card game, with the promise that the game would be so interesting that if Haavare won, Petta would let him live just for the thrill of beating him one day. Unbeknownst to Petta, Haavare was a gambler who was full of tricks and cheats during his time. Thus, the naive moon god found himself letting this man live for one more day, then one more week, one more month, one more year, and one more century. During these time, Haavare also collected and studied the secret and Majik of these gods, of Heaven and Hell. A century was more than ample time for this man to ascend to godhood, and achieve immortality. One day, as the last defiant act, or maybe just for his own amusement, Haavare deliberately revealed to Petta that he was cheating this whole time. The enraged White-moon god could do nothing but letting this new god go, as one god can’t kill another. Thus Haavare the man was gone, and instead birthed Haavare the God of Mischief.

A god who cheated death. Who else would be better for Scion to know further about this god, than these nomads, these devout follower of Haavare. After all, isn’t to triumph death something everyone craves of?

Drawing his revolvers, Scion slowly approaches the main tent’s entry. Looking inside, he can see the altar, with the statue of a lamp as the worshiped object. Scion doesn’t know why these nomad would represent a lamb as their god. How does an innocent white lamb can be a god of lies and trickery? Scion even questions this notion himself. Before the altar kneel around thirty people, with the priest, dressing in white furry lambskin attire, at the front of these people. When the priest turns around, Scion decides to make his entrance, gun aiming at the priest himself. A loud gasp was heard, with everyone silences at the presence of this dangerous stranger wielding these weapons.

“Who are you? What are you doing here? How dare you desecrated our ritual?”- The priest yells at the top of his lungs.

“Ain’t none of your business, you pagan horse-!@#$.”- Scion laughs menacingly. “I came for that” - His left gun motions at the priest’s amulet.

“The Amulet of Haavare? How do you know of this sacred relics? Do you know what it even does?” - The priest says, a tint of surprise and fear hidden beneath his boasting of holy authority. However, his defiance quickly ends when Scion shoots a warning shot at the altar, sending splinters of woods around.

“Again, none of your business. Just quietly give them to me, and I will leave peacefully.” - He cocks his guns “ No one needs to be hurt. But please, just give me a good reason.”

“Blasphemy, we will not give up this relics of…”- Before the priest can even finish his sentence, gunfires break out. Scion is swift, and skilled with his gun. With a few flashes, the first followers are already drown in their blood. Woman and children scream with fear and desperation, while the braver men attempt to approach Scion. Everything was chaotic. Gun powder smell fills the air, while the deafening roars of the revolvers fill everyone’s ears. A few more flashes, and eleven people are already lying on the floor, while their lifeblood seeping from their bodies.

The priest laughs hysterically .”You are out of bullets now, scoundrel. My followers, kill him in the name of Haavare.” A man, inspired by his priest’s encouragement and his faithful devotion to his god, springs into action to slash Scion with his knife, only to have a bullet deep in his head. Scion laughs, and raises his gun for all to see. On the side of his revolvers, symbols of an eagle are inscribed. The priest pales at the sight of this symbol.

“The insignia of Haukur. You…” - The priest trembles -“ You are Tarso, the Despoiler. You murdered the clan of Haukur, of which my brother is their missionary.” With the last of his bravado, he screams.”How dare you defile the symbol of the Hunting Ealge on your weapon of bloodshed, you filth. I will avenge him, my brother.”