“Public executions had long been used as a way to make an example of certain people, usually criminals or defeated enemies, so that others would think twice before they tread in their footsteps.

In some cases, these might be mercifully quick, by way of beheading or other methods that killed the condemned near-instantly. Others make a point to visibly prolong the agony of the sufferer to further punctuate the message they wished to send out.

From this, various… creative methods of execution had sprung up in the past, from ones where the condemned were impaled on a stake and left to die of exposure over days, stuffed into a bronze effigy of a beast which was then set on fire, roasting the condemned alive inside, to slowly lacerating the condemned by way of thin, carefully controlled cuts, where a skilled executioner could make up to a thousand slices before the condemned gave up the ghost.

Truly, cruelty is one of the greatest inspirations for certain people.” - From a paper by Leigh Wainwrought, Sociology student at the Levain Institute for Higher Learning, Circa 689 FP.

Central Square, Norouz

Holy Kingdom of Theodinaz, western region

Western Alcidea

5th day, 1st week, 9th month of the year 2 FP.

That early winter day - where the weather cooled down but was not yet cold enough for snow or ice to fall upon the land - the people of Norouz gathered in the central square, where many looked at the raised platform with eyes that contained hope and hatred in equal measure.

Hope was for a possibly better future. After generations of life where the poor of the city was exploited and used as expendables by the rich and powerful, many were not exactly against the idea of the dwarves taking over, regardless of what the priests and the nobles preached all the time in their pasts.

After all, it had already been two weeks, and the new overlords had yet to mistreat them the way all the others they had known did. They were even helpful and kind enough to feed the poor. For many, the justification in their heads was simply “how bad could these new lords be?”.

Hatred was reserved to their erstwhile lord, and his family, who were carried up the stage by the dwarves, as both the Count and his son were clearly unable to walk on their own, their faces locked in painful rigors by the injuries they suffered. Reinhardt had to look away a bit when they brought the Count over.

Elfriede had not been the slightest bit gentle with the man, and had left him an utter cripple. With his arms and legs so badly mauled the dwarven doctors simply opted to amputate them by the elbow and knees so he does not die too soon, and his spine broken near the end, which left him insensate from the waist down.

He knew she likely did it on purpose, just to subject the defeated noble to the indignity of having to wallow in his own wastes and unable to do a thing about it. Much like the way she all but jumped at the Crown Prince’s offer to act as the executioner for today.

They had also discussed the child, the Count’s infant granddaughter, and both came to an agreement that they would not mind taking her in to raise as their own, especially since it would help them gain a good impression from someone likely to be the next King of the Mountain. When he returned to the Crown Prince’s office back then with their agreement and Elfriede’s request, the dwarf had sagely nodded, a look of a man who had his plans working as he expected.

Reinhardt had not minded being part of the dwarf’s plans in this case though, as it was of no detriment to his company, and besides, they needed both the payment and the goodwill of their employer to recover properly, since for the time being they were still based off Knallzog after all.

He saw Lars come up on the stage, along with Graf Harscape, who was temporarily the city’s overseer. The Graf listed out the crimes they charged the Count and his family with, including failure to provide for his people, negligence in keeping order, abuse of privileges, and many more.

All those were in dwarven, and were part of the dwarven law, though Lars had evidently done his homework as he translated them fluently into the local language. Some of the locals murmured as they listened to the announcement, many with surprised looks on their faces.

The very idea that a ruler could be charged for those crimes was an entirely foreign concept in the Holy Kingdom, where their rulers claim their right to rule by the God-King’s grace and accept no disagreement towards it.

When Graf Harscape ended his speech with how the whole family would be sentenced to death, the crowd cheered. Elfriede waited until the cheers died down before she went up the stage, a two-handed axe in her hand and her blades sheathed by her hips.

Some of the crowd looked at her questioningly, as her flaxen hair and features were a bit too similar to the Count and his son - and the heads of his younger two sons already set up on stakes by the sides of the stage - for them to not notice.

They quieted down though when she came to the first of the lined-up family, the Count’s daughter-in-law, who married into the family from the city of Eganiz to the north, a daughter of the Count there, who by now was probably also being strung up by the Ezramites who took over the city.

The young woman looked at Elfriede in the eyes, with a serene calmness unlike the panicked look in the eyes of the Count, his wife, and his son, and laid down her neck on the chopping block as she closed her eyes.

Her calm had a reason, as Elfriede had visited her the night before, and told her to at least die with dignity, with a promise that her child would be spared, and raised safely, far away from the Holy Kingdom. The young mother had clutched onto that promise as she chose to do what Elfriede said, and to pass from this life with dignity.

Elfriede raised the axe, and it fell down with a solid thwack as its blade met with the wooden block. The head of the Count’s daughter-in-law rolled down, the sharp axe having parted it from her body with ease, granting her a painless, quick death.

For the others, there would be no such thing.