Sword of Salvation

Beyond a distant star rests the lost planet, Trina. It is a realm of lush valleys, running streams, grand mountain ranges, and brilliant sunrises. On a world of such luscious beauty, serenity abounds from shore to shore. Creatures of land, sea, and air coexist in peace and prosperity. Then came the day that humanity discovered Trina’s shores with its lush landscape, possible riches…and likewise planet to cultivate amongst blameless creatures of land, sea, and air who would never protect themselves. Hence, as the settlers descended upon Trina, they arrived in two warring factions.

As the founding settlers arrived on Trina, the pioneers dedicated its land under the auspices of religious principle. The belief in a Great Authority governing their speech and actions guided the people to an unshakable belief that all that they ever said and did made them holy and righteous. All that they needed do was keep their actions, thoughts and speech dictated by loose translations of the Sacred Text. Seeing that the words, thoughts, and actions of the righteous were always correct, anyone who disagreed required additional guidance; at any cost. The bravest and most divine missionaries set out on missions extended toward the indoctrination of those who would arrive in their footsteps.

As the religious went out to petition new arrivals, they were introduced to the idea of the unreligious; equally devout, if equally stubborn, in their belief that they represented their own authority. As paths were crossed with the unreligious, it was not long before religious missions were viewed with a sense of contempt and offense. Still, the religious were determined to spread their guidance at any cost.

The Great War separating neighbors and even family members was the result. The unreligious sought to silence the notions of persecutions with swords and spears. The religious responded in kind and soon delivered fewer empathetic verses to convert the unreligious and delivered more spears and tridents to silence the oppression instead. The last differentiating factor between the two factions of settlers was gone; either side was more than willing to go to war for their cause.

As years turned to generations to centuries, the Great War pressed on. Children born to the governing religious continued to promise to work toward ministry through family interpretations of the Sacred Text. Those born of the unbeliever vowed for the end of religious persecution. Messages of ministry from either spectrum gave way to violence begetting violence for enough generations that no one remembered what the fight represented anymore. Beneath a hatred and suspicion of neighbors that could not have come from man, the war pressed on. Only one man could fight the evil guiding the actions of both sides in the Great War.