Xasny

"I saw a pair of eyes in the flames, dangling from a skeleton still clinging to tendons and chunks of flesh, staring right at me. Behind him stood a wall covered in writhing faces, their mouths agape in agony." —The divination of a pyromancer, sought by the villager Chad before his disappearance. As incarnations of filth and chaos, the varieties of demons are as numerous as the stars. Some use fire and violence to bring catastrophe and slaughter to the mortal world, leaving only ash and swarms of flies feeding on the dead. Others use corruption and plague to spread fear, altering the physical laws of reality and life itself to reshape the world into their preferred image. Among these avatars of malice, there is yet another class of demons uninterested in large-scale disasters. Instead, they prefer to witness a single soul's descent into despair. By promising strength and fortune, they turn the misguided into their servants in the mortal world. At first, the tempted mortals commit minor transgressions for easy rewards, such as defacing the holy symbols of other deities or spreading slanderous rumors about certain priests or sects in taverns. Then, the demon will promise greater benefits and suggest signing a long-term contract with the mortal's soul as collateral. Once the contract is sealed, the demon will abandon its previously friendly demeanor, threatening the poor soul into completing tasks far more difficult than their previous errands. Most mortals trapped at this point are forced to abandon all their principles and become slaves, completely obedient to the demon's will. But there are always the arrogant few who believe they can escape the demon's control. They will try to seek help from exorcists, diviners, and priests, searching for a path to redemption. But once their attempt to defy the contract is discovered by their demonic master, their souls are branded as "Betrayers." A hunter from the abyss will, at the demon's request, pursue these Betrayers. Xasny is the name given to this hunter in folklore. It is said that he seeks opportunities to manifest in the mortal world, using his bone scythe to reap the lives of the Betrayers. Those whose hearts are pierced by his bone scythe do not truly die. They awaken to find their bodies embedded in a wall of flesh, surrounded by all the past Betrayers reaped by Xasny. These souls, now fused into the wall, feel the searing pain of the scythe's razor edge carving through their bodies, as Xasny's twisted form wanders before them forever to guard his prisoners.