Priest recruitment system

The priests are the highest layer of people in the Order of the Soulfaces. They are assigned high duties and are often seen as holy. To become a priest you must be a Soulface which fanatically supports the Perfect image. It also is of important descent. There are certain growing pods which are crowned holy and only people who have come from these specific pods can enter recruitment. Those who seem most fit are chosen out to go into training. Those who pass are awarded the title of a priest.

The recruitment starts with the trainees being brought to the heart of Prima Faca or Modar Tyrania. Here they will be stripped of all their possessions and are locked in a monastery for most of their training. Prima Faca has the netherscre Monastery and Modar Tyrania has the blacksilence monastery. All recruits will first enter into a giant hall in which they will kneel down. There will be a speech held by either a high ranking priest or a saint in which they are told what their duties will be as a priest. During the speech servants would walk around and carve “god will come” with a knife soaked in 9 paindust in the backs of each recruit. During this no recruit is allowed to show there pain. With anyone doing immediately being stabbed to death by the servant. Once the speech is over everyone prays and leaves the hall. Only around 1/10th of the recruits survives this first task.

After this each recruit would be locked away for 2 years in a process meant to strengthen the soul. This process is much like that in the arena where recruits would face multiple challenges which bring them to near death. After they complete a challenge they will he healed up and send right back into another challenge. Sometimes this is only 2 hours after the last one. This process would constantly continue for the 2 years and a recruit is always little away from death. In these 2 years there are 5 servants which accompany each recruit and also fill the room with agony incense. Because of this it’s also easy to guess that this process takes a lot of lives with only around 1/15 surviving it. After the 2 years a soul is claimed to he strong enough and the next stage of the process begins.

This is the studying phase in which a recruit will find their strengths and master them. In this phase a recruit will also be taught about the perfect image and other general things such as writing, language and manners. This process takes 5 years and is taught by multiple high priests. Each high priest would teach a specific branch which a recruit might have chosen, such as alchemy or politics. Each year a test will be taken on each recruit in their respective branch. If the recruit fails it’s executed. The study is extremely stern and recruits are often send out to be tortured for hours if they make even the smallest mistake. Around 1/8 people survive this phase.

If the recruits survive this phase they will go on to their crowning ceremony. Each recruit will be given a priest suit and infront of their fellow recruits and other priests they have to undergo a process called the Swear. First they are given a needle like pen. On the tip of this is 13 paindust, the strongest paindust out there. With this needle they have to write “in life we suffer, in death we shall thrive” in perfect Porymonian on their arm. If they fail this process they are forced to rip all of their flesh of the arm with one hand and the recruit will become something called a dark priest. Their arm will be replaced with a mechanical arm on which are still their bones and nerves attached as a punishment. Normally around 2/3 recruits here become dark priests. For those who are able to perfectly write it out a speech will be given and they have to swear their allegiance to the Holy spirit. After this they will be officially be a priest and will be dressed in a Materia suit. A ceremonial outfit that priest wear. It are white clean robes covering the entire body with a black stone mask over their face. After this the now priests will be dismmissed. In the entire training around 1 in 3600 recruits will live out to become a priest, with a 1 in 1800 change of becoming a dark priest.