Tania settled in Iberia—something that had once been her dream—but she no longer cared about it. All she desired now was to kill and destroy. She planned to massacre Mars and crown herself Queen of Saturnia, the realm of the Roman gods.

  Commanding a remarkable man named Hannibal, she crossed the Alps and achieved great victories against several Roman gods. At last, before Rome itself, she came face to face with Mars once again.

  The god appeared as a Roman centurion, clad in white-and-red armor. He wielded a great sword and a Roman shield. His hair was a mix of brown and red, his beard thick and heavy, and his eyes green. Mars and Tania clashed, but this time Tania was far stronger and defeated him without difficulty.

  Defeated, Tania lifted Mars by the throat and began to strangle him.

  “Go and tell your father Jupiter and that circus freak Janus that I am now the Queen of Saturnia. Do you hear me, wretch?” Tania said, overflowing with bloodlust.

  “No matter how much you fight, Tannit, we will not be defeated by a monster who feeds on innocent infants to increase her divine power,” Mars replied, staring at her defiantly despite being choked.

  Tania threw him aside and fell silent.

  “Infants?” she asked.

  “Do you not enjoy watching your people burn newborns and babies in your honor?” Mars asked, coughing from the strangulation.

  “You lie!” Tania shouted.

  “Of course I lie. Look at the vast difference between our powers now, when only a few human years ago we were equals. You are now even stronger than my father Jupiter. How many babies achieved that? How much did their parents cry as they were burned alive? Or did you think your power appeared by magic?” Mars continued, planting doubt in her mind.

  “You lie! You lie!” Tania screamed, covering her ears.

  “You are filled with hatred, your eyes bloodshot. You are nothing but an addict to human sacrifice. How many children are being sacrificed in Carthage right now in your name?” Mars asked with a smile.

  Tania ordered her men to withdraw, and Rome was not taken. When she returned to Qart-Lel, she descended once more into the city—a place she had not visited since the wars began. Horrified, Tania saw that beside her temple there now stood a mound filled with hundreds of graves. That mound was called the Tophet, where the burned bodies of sacrificed children were buried.

  The Carthaginians had begun sacrificing children once the war started. They were burned and offered in honor of Tannit, and all those infants became part of her power.

  The gods gained power through acts of human faith; the greater the sacrifice, the greater the increase. And when a parent must kill—or witness—the sacrifice of their own child, it was the greatest test of faith that existed. Parents wept and tore themselves apart during the ritual, so musicians were stationed in the temple to drown out the mothers’ cries.

  Tania felt dizzy. She no longer knew where she was and began to vomit. Then she started hearing the cries of infants inside herself.

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  “Enough, enough! I didn’t know! Leave me alone!” the goddess screamed.

  The people around her looked on in concern and tried to help, but she violently attacked them with her fists.

  “You are a race of genocidal monsters! I will see this entire city burned to the ground, and each of you slaughtered one by one!” Tania screamed furiously, then fled into the sky.

  “Why didn’t you tell me about the child sacrifices?” Tania shouted when she once again stood before her husband, Baal Hammon.

  “Why should I tell you something so trivial? The gods of Lel have always used human sacrifice to grow stronger,” the Punic god replied indifferently.

  “Are you implying my mother and father did the same?” Tania screamed.

  “Of course, Tannit. That is why I told you not to mingle so much with the human world—but you never listened,” Baal Hammon replied.

  “You are monsters!” Tania shouted.

  “The gods should protect humans, not force them to sacrifice themselves for us,” she continued.

  “You? Protect humans? You can’t even protect yourself! You returned from Europe in fear when you could have won that war. You are nothing but a weeping coward who cannot protect anyone,” Hammon roared.

  “I will not take lectures from a genocidal monster like you!” Tania screamed in rage.

  “And what will you do now? Run away? Or do you wish me to kill you here for betraying your kingdom?” Hammon asked.

  “I will kill all of you!” Tania screamed and stormed out.

  As Tania left Baal Hammon’s chamber, she encountered Sid Babi, second-in-command of the Punic divine army, sword drawn. Without hesitation, she rushed him and tore off his head.

  “Tonight, all of Carthage will burn,” she said threateningly. A group of malakim tried to stop her, but she slaughtered them.

  Tania escaped and took refuge in Sicily, where she encountered Mars once more.

  “I spared your life, Mars. Now I want you to do me a favor,” said the goddess, her eyes hollow and ringed with dark circles.

  “What favor?” Mars asked.

  “Kill every inhabitant of Carthage. Every single one—even women and children. I want that entire race erased. Those who survive, sell them as slaves,” she replied.

  “I am not the kind of god who massacres innocents, Tannit. I am not like that Ares everyone confuses me with,” Mars answered.

  “Just this once, Mars,” she insisted.

  The god of war resisted, but Tania kept pressing.

  Mars closed his eyes and nodded.

  “I suppose it will prevent future rebellions in that region,” he replied.

  Tania wandered the world like a zombie—directionless, without the will to live. She barely ate or slept. She constantly heard infants crying inside her. She began drinking alcohol to silence the screams.

  Drunk and collapsed on the ground like a beggar, she ended up in the filthy streets of Barcino (actual Barcelona), now part of the great Roman Empire. Tormented endlessly by the cries of infants—crying, screaming as they burned alive.

  Tania, who had relived her past as if watching a film, began to see the spirits of babies appear. They crawled toward her and climbed onto her body.

  There were hundreds of them. They piled onto her, crushing and suffocating her. Tania screamed repeatedly, “Forgive me! I didn’t know!”

  But the babies kept climbing, covering her completely.

  Then masses of people she recognized as Carthaginians appeared before her.

  “Why did you abandon us? Why did you allow the genocide of the people you swore to protect?”

  Their eyes were dark and blood-filled, like the undead. Together with the babies, they continued suffocating Tania as she begged for forgiveness.

  Laughter echoed in the distance. Tania recognized the voice of her husband, Baal Hammon.

  “You cannot protect anyone. I told you so. You did not protect the infants sacrificed before you. You did not protect your people. You abandoned Qart-Lel, and now that kingdom is gone. You are a coward who cannot protect anyone,” the voice mocked.

  Then, in unison, they all began to chant:

  “Kill yourself! Kill yourself! Do it now!”

  “No… please, no…” Tania cried in despair.

  “You have brought nothing but suffering to the world, Tannit. Kill yourself so that, at the very least, you may serve some purpose,” Baal Hammon’s voice commanded.

  Crushed beneath the weight of infants and undead Carthaginians, the Punic goddess stopped struggling, closed her eyes, and accepted her fate.

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