In that exact moment a sharp scream was heard outside the town, and a rain of fire arrows came down, lighting the thatched roofs of the wooden houses on fire. Liz ran outside to see her village lit ablaze and a masked figure walking around, holding a bloody battle axe in one hand, and the head of a villager in the other. The figure dropped the head and ran towards his next group of victims, slashing through their bodies with surprising ease. Liz dropped to her knees as her brother Chuck came outside.
“What’s going on Liz?” Chuck asked as he looked up to see the carnage.
“Our village… we’re all going to d-”
“To die?” A gruff voice said from behind her.
She turned around to see the sheen of an edge on a bloody battleaxe. Liz looked up to see the masked figure she had seen slay so many of her friends.
“Where is he?” The same voice said
“Who” Liz replied
“The boy with the mask!”
Another rain of fire arrows razed the city as Liz cried.
“He’s.. he’s inside. Cell seven…”
The man walked into the building, as he did he dragged the side of his battle axe along Liz’s arm, wiping streaks of wet crimson on her clothes and skin. She immediately put her hands to her mouth to try to suppress the urge to vomit as tears poured out of her eyes. The masked figure walked into the jailhouse to see Sophia standing there.
“And you are?” The masked figure asked.
“I’m Sophia Ward, captain of the guard in this town” She said as she drew a heavy bastard sword from a leather sheath.
There wasn’t even any time to react. The edge of the double-bladed battle axe was brushing the hairs on her neck. Sophia dropped to her knees in terror, sending the man into a crazed laughter. The man hacked through the one and a half inch metal bars as the boy looked up.
“Wrath?” The boy said.
“Come with me.” Wrath responded.
“Why are you here?”
“To pick you up you irresponsible bastard!”
Wrath lifted Lust up with one arm and threw him over his shoulder, and strapped his heavy titanium battle axe to his other shoulder.
“New axe?” Lust questioned.
“Yeah, it cost one hundred and ninety thousand silver pieces.”
“Damn, I’m surprised Pride let you buy it.”
“I didn’t buy it, I stole it off the guy who did, then killed him with it.”
The two laughed, as the walked past the terrified Sophia.
“You..? You are Lust?” She asked with fear in her voice.
“Yep! I’m surprised you didn’t figure that out earlier!”  he said with a laugh.
As the two left the jailhouse, they walked through the burning village gazing upon the havoc that Wrath had caused almost singlehandedly. Building had been, quite literally, chopped into bits by Wrath battle axe. The six meter tall wall didn’t help much either as the stone and brick that made it up had been almost turned to dust. The ground was cluttered with bodies, and the mud was beginning to allow the blood that had been spilled to seep into the ground. As the two left through the now damaged village gate, they met up with another masked figure, who was carrying a large warbow, clearly made out of an ironwood substance, with a leather grip studded with gold on the edges.
Liz who had been trailing them since they left the jailhouse, ran up to the three. As she got to where they were standing, she put her hands on her knees and looked down, only to see the shadow of a battle axe hung above her neck, and a bow, with an arrow aimed at her head. She looked up nervously and backed up a few feet and began to speak.
“Who” she gulped. “Who are you?”
“Me?” The third figure said.
“Yeah, I already met Wrath and Lust.”
“I am Greed, you should be able to tell by my mask.”
Liz suddenly realized that all three of them had their masks on, and that they were all similar, but different. All of the masks were made of pure ivory, and painted with rare inks. Lust’s had a devious looking grin, and had a tongue sticking out appearing to be licking his lips. Wrath had a confident smile, and had many scratches on the mask that was bulkier than the other two. Finally, Greed had a large toothy smile, with wide open eyes, like he was looking at something with desire.
“I guess I never noticed before, but your masks are different..” Liz said.
“Yeah.” The three said in monotone unison.
“We have to go now Wrath, Pride might get angry.” Greed whispered to Wrath
“Fine.” Wrath replied
The three stole three horses from the nearby stable, and rode from the village, with quite a lot of stolen silver pieces and weapons. The boy who had turned around on his horse, making him ride backwards, and who was no longer wearing his mask, which revealed a huge grin on his face. Lust threw a box into the path and shouted.
“Lizbeth! That’s for you! I’ll see you aga-”
“Shut up!” She heard Wrath shout at him.
Liz smiled, and started running towards the box Lust had thrown on the ground. It was a silver necklace, with a large seven in the middle, and three on both sides of it. The box also has a scrap of paper in it, it was a note from Lust, with a picture attached to it.
“See you later, Lizbeth. Take a look at this picture, and tell me what you think of my work when we meet again.”
  -Love, Michael Moore
Liz looked at the picture and cried, spilling tears onto the photo of her father and mother, each impaled on an expensive looking metal halberd that has been stuck in the ground. There was a masked figure standing with his hand rested on the halberd his mother was on. The figure appeared to be Lust, who was sticking his other hand out with a peace sign. Some writing was on the picture that said.
“We love you Liz. Please take care of Chuck for us, and live a long life. Don’t be stupid.”
  -Love, Mavis and Raymond Drysdale
Liz started bawling as she read the final words of her parents, scribbled on a picture of the slowly dying, and decided to keep it a secret from her brother for now, as she thought it would be harder for her little brother to cope with.

As Liz slowly returned to her village of ashes, she met the few remaining survivors, her brother, the captain of the guard, three guardsmen, Klein Sherwood, Ralph Pine, and Nicholas Pearson. Along with Tabitha Sherwood, a barmaid, and a travelling eccentric known as Kenneth Lansford, and Victor Westmoreland, the mayor and two of his helpers. The group of eleven sat in a circle around a blazing campfire, and discussed what should be done next.
“So… What should we do?” Tabitha spoke.
No response
“I guess we rebuild?” One of Victor’s helpers said after a long period of silence.
“We can’t! We only have eleven people! It would take ages to rebuild this town!” Chuck yelled.
“Then what!? We sit here and rot!?” Ralph questioned as he threw a rock into the fire.
Again, the group sat in silence.
“We kill them.” Liz said with a grim tone in her voice
“Are you out of your mind? You saw what they did Liz!” Sophia yelled.
“We have plenty of resources for eleven people, and we have skilled men with us.” Liz said.
Nobody dared say anything as Liz looked up from the ground with a face that could scare away a thunderstorm.
“We kill them. We take revenge. We have strong men, and we have enough weapons in the armory to last a lifetime.”
Again, no response.
“What’s with you people? Don’t you want to take revenge!?” Liz shrieked.
“Yes.” They all said in unison.
“Then let’s get some weapons and go after them!”
The group stood up off of the muddy road they had been sitting on and slowly shambled down the muddy path turned bloody to find the burnt armory building that had been looted by the masked men.
“Where are all the weapons?” Sophia questioned.
“Gone it looks like.” Nicholas said.
“Thanks for that bit of obvious information Nicholas.” She replied sarcastically
“You are very welcome!” Nicholas said with a smile as the other people in the group started to lose hope at the lack of weapons in the armory.
“Well… We can always go check the storage in the tunnels.” Sophia said.
“We have tunnels!? That’s awesome!” Chuck shouted with an odd enthusiasm.
“Yeah. Sure it is.” Liz replied as she patted him on the head
Chuck stared at Liz with a grumpy expression as she smiled down at him whilst she left her hand on his head.
“Well, we should probably go to the tunnels then.” Liz said after finally looking up from her brother who had begun to get very angry at her.
Sophia led the way as the group quickened their pace in hope to find something to help them. They came to the dark, smelly entrance to the underground tunnels and grabbed a lantern off of the wall and lit it. The floors were covered with dead bugs and rat feces, and the cedar wood supports were finally beginning to rot.
“I… I don’t care much for dark places you guys... “ Kenneth said
“I thought you got excited about everything?” Tabitha replied
“No, not really. Mainly just mechanisms that are interesting and pyrotechnics.”

The group led by Sophia left Kenneth at the entrance, and Liz slowly watched him until they could no longer see him from the darkness of the tunnel. The light from the lantern cast a warm yellow glow on the survivors inside, and on the half completed tunnel walls. An occasional rock, or brick would sometimes fall out of the wall causing the group to suffer from a paranoid fear of the tunnel caving in. In the distance, Sophia could see a door in the right side of the tunnel and called out to the group, telling them that they were almost there. The door creaked as Sophia opened it, opening the door for sulfur scented air, and bats to break free from their prison known as the storage room. The room hadn’t been accessed for a long time, but the tunnels were still frequented by children looking for an adventure, and guards weeding out the homeless sheltered in the tunnels.
The group was told by Sophia to grab anything they could that would assist them in their final goal, but not many resources were still in the room. They managed to scavenge up a half empty barrel of gunpowder and some dynamite, six dusty bastard swords, some silver pieces from the town's emergency fund, which was long overdue from the calamity of the previous night. A heavy metal crossbow with seven bolts, and a few miscellaneous weapons that couldn’t have much use. The group carried the resources out of the dark tunnel and met up with Kenneth who was sitting underneath a shady tree, fiddling with some sticks and grass.
“We’re back!” Sophia shouted at Kenneth, who had not even noticed them emerging from the mouth of the tunnels.
“What did you find?” He said excitedly as he stood up with his sticks.
“Just a few weapons, some money, dynamite, and half a barrel of gunpowder, which we can use to make bomb if we do it right.”
“Gunpowder!?” He said with a beaming smile on his face
“Yeah… though we probably shouldn’t let you near it... “
“Please! I have an idea that could help us! Just give it to me and wait for a while.”
“What’s your idea?”
“You’ll see if you give it to me.” he said as he adjusted his glasses and smirked.
“Fine. Just don’t take too long, we should get moving.”
Sophia gave the barrel to Kenneth, and he waddled to the shoreline to begin his project that he seemed so excited about. Kenneth plopped the barrel down on the beach, creating a miniature angry sandstorm poofing out from the bottom of the barrel. Liz walked over and sat on the grass by the beach to watch the eccentric do his work. She was confused as he began digging in the sand and shouted out to him.
“What are you diggin’ for?” She shouted
“Clay!” he shouted back
Liz wondered why he was digging for clay, but didn’t bother to ask as it would probably just confuse her more. Kenneth finally struck a small clay pocket underneath the sand, and begun to dig it out. The clay was perfect for what he wanted to do, but he had trouble finding ways to fire it. Kenneth lit a small fire using a piece of flint and steel in his pocket, and began to fire his clay mold. Liz thought the mold looked like a small pipe, but one end was closed off for some reason. After about four hours of slow firing the clay Kenneth shouted to the group.
“It’s done! I think it’s finally done!” He shouted happily as his face was lit up in the darkness of the night by the superheated fire beside him. The group came over to see what he had made.
“A one ended pipe? What an invention!” Tabitha said sarcastically
“It’s not a pipe, grab me a handful of those silver pieces, it might help you understand.”
Chuck ran over to the bag that was sitting by where the group had been resting before, and grabbed the bag of silver pieces and ran it back over to Kenneth.
“Now everyone watch!”
Kenneth dropped a silver piece into a ceramic bowl he had made to sit over the fire, as everyone watched as the lunatic began melting their money.
“What are you doing! That’s valuable!” Chuck shouted loudly at Kenneth.
“Just watch you irritating boy!”
After a while of the group getting bored of watching the coin slowly melt, kenneth grabbed the crucible and casted the molten metal into a small area of tightly packed sand on the ground. he poured some seawater on it, and after a while, it cooled into a small silver ball, with a few grains of sand stuck to it.
“Now this is where it gets exciting!” Kenneth said happily as he packed the ceramic tube with gunpowder.
Kenneth grabbed the string that was tying the bag of coins off of the bag, and stuck it in a small hole he had made in the ceramic tube. he dropped the silver ball in the front end of the tube, and stuck the end of the string into the fire. The string quickly burned as he pointed the tube at a nearby tree.
“Everybody out of the way!” Kenneth shouted.
Everyone moved out of the path of the tube as it exploded in Kenneth's hands sending the silver ball flying, and leaving Kenneth with a bloody hand and burn scars. Kenneth didn’t even look at his hands as he ran over to the tree to see a hole going straight through it, and it being stuck in a tree behind it.

“Everybody look! I did it!” Kenneth shouted excitedly as he jumped up and down laughing happily.
The group ran over to see that there was a hole in the tree and a stunned expression fell on everyone's face, Kenneth had just created a primitive firearm.
“What the hell is that!?” Liz asked excitedly
“It’s a prototype for a handheld cannon, or hand cannon. I’ve been working on it for a while, but I’m too poor to afford a large quantity of gunpowder to run tests.” Kenneth said
“Well I’m not going to use that if it does THAT to my hands.” Liz said as she pointed at Kenneth’s bleeding hands.
“I’ll be fine, really, I just want to work on the hand cannon some more.”
“Can you make more than one? It might help us against the seven.” Tabitha said
“I suppose I will if I can.”
Kenneth got to work as Liz and Chuck walked off into the town to begin an errand that Kenneth had given them. He wanted them to find rocks small enough fit into the hand cannon, but big enough to pack enough of a punch. Liz and Chuck were walking through the unnoticable streets that had been covered in burnt pieces of wood and plenty of fallen tufts of thatch off of the roofs. Liz and Chuck shared innocent conversation as they walked through their village, to try to distract them from the recently roasted-to-perfection corpses on the ground that they used to call their friends. As the siblings walked around the village looking for any rocks they could find, they only found one or two small handfuls of rocks that fit the criteria that Kenneth needed for his invention.

After Liz stood up straight after picking up another perfect rock, she noticed a stagecoach from the capital of her district headed toward the burnt gate of the village. The stagecoach pulled up to the gate and a man got out, and began to walk around the village until he noticed Liz and Chuck after he finally looked up.
“You two survived?” The man asked
“Yeah… Who are you?” Chuck said
“I am an investigator for the capital building, do you two know what happened here?”
“Yeah. These two crazy guys in ma-”
“Shut up Chuck.” Liz said. “It was a fire that started in the iron forge.”
“Oh really?” The man replied
“Yeah.”
“I thought the little boy here was about to say something about two crazy guys?”
“No he wasn’t sir.”
“Well, what are your names?”
“Elizabeth and Chuck Drysdale.”
“Drysdales? Then do you know about what happened to your pa-”
“Yes we know what happened to our pants! Yeah, they got burnt up.” Liz said as she glanced at Chuck and mouthed the words “he doesn’t need to know” to the man. The man looked at her and then realized what she meant, and realized he probably shouldn’t say anything at the moment.
“Are there any other survivors?”
“Yeah there are a few more people down by the shore.”
“Well why don’t you go get them? I’ll bring you all to the capital.”
Liz turned around and began to walk to where the group was stationed by the beach. She put the rocks in a small bag, and tossed it in the barrel.
“Everyone, there is a man from the capital here that wants to take us to the capital, I don’t think we really have a choice as we won’t last long just staying on our own.”
“Now?” Kenneth said.
“Yes. Now would be when he showed up, I think we should stash our stuff in the tunnel and cover the mouth of the tunnel up, so we don’t have to bring along all these things on the stagecoach.”
There wasn’t much argument as the group realized that Liz had a point. There wasn’t much of a choice for them. They stashed their items back in the storage room, and walked to the stagecoach, where they then began their long bumpy, cramped ride to the capital.