Deathseekers

Founded under mysterious circumstances in late 1180 PC, the Path of the Grey is a name used by a heretical order of bandits, in mockery of the Path of Divine Revelation. Despite the seemingly reputable title, the group is in fact a virulent death-cult, and one that makes no secret of its views. They are referred to more commonly as Deathseekers.

Obsessed with seeking "the Dark," a hellish vision of the Divinian Grey, its members preach not just the necessity of death, but the inevitability of it, and the insignificant nature of the mortal life. Their so-called goal is not only to find their own deaths in battle, but to deliver as many people to the Dark as possible in the process. There is an assumed trophy-gathering aspect to the belief, with those who bring the most suffering or take the most powerful kills gaining some assumed infamy or reward in the end.

They appear as an antagonistic force in the Chronicles of Paladin Wainwright.

Observed Behaviors
Deathseekers are raiders of the worst kind, setting upon unlucky villages and manors and wreaking havoc on their inhabitants. Their goals in these raids are simple, and sadistic: capture those who seem most powerful or formidable, and slay everyone else, with deaths varying from quick to agonizingly slow. Those slain are often dismembered or skinned, the results strewn and hung in chilling displays of gore that mark where they've been.

Along with taking prisoners and partaking in wide-scale slaughter, the Deathseekers also plunder their victim settlements, foregoing simple coin in favor of weapons and valuables. The reason for collection of the latter is unclear, as Deathseekers observe almost no normal, human behaviors, including partaking in trade. It is possible that those among them not yet mad or fully indoctrinated retain the bandit's drive to gain.

The cultists collect and wear parts of their victims' remains, foregoing traditional displays of bone in favor of wearing sections of skin, scalps and even faces. As a result, Deathseekers are often plagued by fleshflies, carrion-eaters often found lingering near corpses. The display might be meant to terrorize their enemies, or to disguise or "change" who they are, or were. It is thought that the practice may also hold some symbolic meaning, bringing them closer to the Dark by transforming them into walking cadavers.

As with much regarding the Deathseekers, the true purpose is unknown, but it remains an effective intimidation tactic nonetheless.

In battle, the Deathseekers range from menacing to formidable, armed with bloodied, blunted and aged weapons which they clearly do not maintain, many of them no doubt taken off the bodies of their victims. Despite being undeniably human beneath their horrific garb, few Deathseekers display the ability to communicate in words, with those who can often using fragments of sentences to make their points. Many seem to have a blunted sense of pain, with some failing to respond at all to even the most grievous wounds. Whether they are unable to feel the pain or simply ignore it is unknown. Even crippled, disemboweled or dismembered, most will continue to attack until properly put down.

Deathseekers rarely--if ever--flee, as their goal is their own death, and the deaths of anyone they cross until it is achieved.

Recruitment
Deathseeker ranks are split between two types: those who joined willingly, and those who were converted by force. The former are generally criminal types--thugs, outlaws, and other unsavory characters, who take part in activities through some chaotic desire for suffering and destruction, or in rare cases, for material gain. The latter are largely believed to be those who were caught--captives and prisoners of all ages. Race and age vary wildly, with members as old as forty and as young as fourteen.

The only thing that is consistent is their sex. All Deathseekers are male. Women, symbolizing life to their minds, are killed along with their other victims. They have no place in their ranks.

Conversion
Those unlucky enough to be captured by the Deathseekers are put through conversion, a form of conditioning intending to transform the victim into a new addition to their numbers. The process is largely unknown, as those who undergo it and survive are invariably left mad and broken, with little to no personality, sense of self or concept of pain remaining to mark them as human.

Most captives do not survive, dying from the extreme injury and ongoing suffering caused by the process. Those that do survive are reduced to little more than mindless foot-soldiers. They are possessed of a desire to inflict on others the suffering they have endured, in the interest of guiding the living to the hellish Dark, no matter the cost to themselves or their fellows.

Similarities
The grisly and horrifying feats of the Deathseekers in some ways evoke to the wives' tales surrounding the denizens of Riverenbeck. In truth, the bandits see a sort of warped kinship with Riverki laws and practices, in particular the refusal to leave survivors in a conflict, and the mutilation of enemies as a method of intimidation.

There are clear parallels between certain Deathseeker rituals and Riverki ones. The Riverki practice of creating grisly warnings from the bodies of hated enemies is almost parodied in the Deathseekers' torture method of impaling living people with spikes and spears, and leaving the corpses on display. The practice of leaving no survivors is also similar, though the Riverki do so out of strategic necessity, where the Deathseekers do so out of a desire to kill. The viciousness with which opposition is met is fairly similar. Even the Deathseeker's apparent invulnerability to injury seems in imitation of the Riverki's notorious pain tolerance.

The most egregious of their trespasses against the Riverki, however, is their perversion of their creed: serga vera. The phrase itself, meaning "all things die," symbolizes the Riverki belief that death is inevitable, even for the greatest man, but is therefore something that one should not live in fear of. The Deathseekers take this concept literally, accepting it to mean that all things should die, invariably. This distorted understanding of their dogma unintentionally informs their entire modus operandi, leading them to kill and--as the name implies--seek the death of every being they meet. While the Riverki face the promise of a glorious death in the name of their people with pride, the Deathseekers create chaos in the interest of attaining their own great death.

Though only peripherally aware of the cult, the Riverki do not find the comparison flattering. They consider this base imitation of their beliefs and culture to be appropriative at best, and slanderous at worse. Their response to the discovery of this cult has been to eradicate them whenever found, as the act of twisting their culture to such a degree is considered an attack on them personally, and constitutes violent action.

In combat, there is no similarity; Riverki have training and skill where the Deathseekers have zealotry and madness. There is no contest.