Love's Sacrifice [On Hold]

Prologue

We live in a small village, here in Gao. Mali's never been a very big country. Not since the war. When the virus swept over the world, and everyone's panic resulted in bloodshed. Only the west of Africa is left. The rest of the continent is either under the ocean or completely destructed, along with most of the other countries of the world. We seem to have control over the virus now. Every night, I pray to the Gods that it will never return. But that's just my problem. I believe in good so much that I think it overthrows evil, when in all truth, evil can be stronger. And I'll probably learn that soon enough, if it ever does come back.

The community is nice here. We're all different, even our nationalities. My mother was born in South America. Most of us have African names in order to fit in. And we're all very spiritual. We believe in stuff like souls and chakras. We also believe in three different Gods, our main one being Amare. He's the creator, and he values love and peace, and the belief that amity should be held between everyone, no matter their differences. The other two that we believe in are Libidine and Odite. Libidine is the preserver. She values lust and desire, and holds the belief that we can have the things that we want if we try hard enough. Odite is the destroyer, and she values hatred and disgust. She holds the belief that it is okay to hate if you have a suitable reason for it. We are told that we should not pray to Odite as she will only make situations worse, but I believe that she is the only one of them who can stop the virus from returning. After all, I know that I don't want to get it. It was awful. They had to hide in a dent of a cliff face, all of the people in this village. I never witnessed the effects, but I heard about them; turning against their loved ones, enhancing their ability to harm others. It affected their body and their mind. The hollow that they hid in is now a place of worship for the Amorists. That's what we call everyone who follows Amorism. There are three totem poles inside, each one telling the different stories of the Gods. To pray, we kneel in front of one and close our eyes. Then we talk. It's not that different to any other religion really, it's just that since this cave protected us from the war, we feel as if it was because of the Gods watching over us. That's why we feel so close to them when we're there.
And hopefully, they'll watch over our city from now on.