Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse

The **Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse** are a quartet of powerful entities that personified the four prime concepts that drive the Apocalypse.

## **Characteristics**

Each use a special totem that channels their core ability, without which, their powers are lost, excluding Death. Also, they each travel on a coloured steed, hence them being called Horsemen.

Pestilence's totem is a bow and arrow, War's totem is a sword, Famine's totem is a scale, and Death's totem is a scythe.

They are described in the last book of the New Testament of the Bible, the Book of Revelation, at 6:1–8. The chapter tells of a book or scroll in God's right hand that is sealed with seven seals. The Lamb of God opens the first four of the seven seals, which summons four beings that ride out on white, red, black, and green horses.

## **Four Horsemen**

### Pestilence

The first Horseman is Pestilence, and he is associated with infectious disease and plague. It appears at least as early as 1906, when he is mentioned in the Jewish Encyclopedia. Pestilence rides a green horse and appears sickly and pale. Pestilence carries a brass bow with poisonous arrows filled with the germs of all diseases.

### War

The second Horseman is War, and he is associated with war, violence, and bloodshed. His horse's color is red and in some translations, the colour is specifically a "fiery" red. He is often pictured holding a sword upwards as though ready for battle or mass slaughter. The color red, as well as the rider's possession of a great sword, suggests blood that is to be spilled. The sword held upward by the second Horseman may represent war or a declaration of war. He appears as a tall, muscular, well-build man wearing a battle helmet and carrying a sword.

### Famine

The third Horseman is Famine, and he is associated with lack of food and starvation. Famine rides a black horse and carries a pair of balances or weighing scales in his hand, indicating the way that bread would have been weighed during a famine. Others interpret the third Horseman as the "Lord as a Law-Giver", it is read that the indicated price of grain is about ten times normal thus the famine interpretation popularity, with an entire day's wages buying enough wheat for only one person, or enough of the less nutritious barley for three, so that workers would struggle to feed their families. Famine appears as an pale, emaciated man with his bones visible underneath his flesh.

### Death

The fourth Horseman is Death, and he is associated with mortality and death, of all the riders, he is the only one to whom the text itself explicitly gives a name. The colour of Death's horse is written as "khlōros" which can mean either green/greenish-yellow or pale/pallid. The colour is often translated as "pale", though "ashen", "pale green", the colour of his horse represents the sickly pallor colour of a corpse. Death carries a scythe, and appears as a rotting corpse, or a skeletal humanoid figure.

## **Powers and Abilties**

### Collective Powers

* **Super Stamina**- The Horsemen don't possess the capacity to tire, and furthermore, do not require sustenance to sustain themselves.

* **Immortality**- Horsemen do not age, and are able to live forever.
* **Advanced Invulnerability** - While Horsemen can take damage in their human forms, they are difficult to destroy.
* **Invisibility**- The Horsemen are naturally invisible, unless they choose to take form.
* **Telekinesis**- The Horsemen can manipulate physical matter through power of will.
* **Teleportation**- They can travel from place to place instantly, without occupying the space in between.
* **Astral Perception**- Horsemen are able to perceive an Angel's and Demon's true form.

### Individual Powers

**Pestilence**

* **Biokinesis**- Pestilence can create, manipulate, and control diseases, plagues, infestations, molds, and other ailments. He can also cause instantaneous illness in another being.

**War**

* **Super Strength**- War can exert superhuman amounts of physical force, enough for him to destroy larger objects with little effort.
* **Pathokinesis**- War can influence the minds of humans by causing them to feel intense anger, which drives people to violence.
* **Telepathy**- War can read the thoughts of other beings.

**Famine**

* **Biokinesis**- Famine can infect plants and livestock with disease causing them to shrivel and die. He can also control armies of locusts.
* **Chlorokinesis**- He can stop produce from growing to a limited extent.
* **Mental Manipulation**- Famine could enhance the sense of hunger in other beings, causing them to seek whatever it is they crave most until it resulted in their destruction.
* **Telepathy**- Famine can communicate telepathically with other beings.

**Death**

* **Necrokinesis**- Death can kill anything by touching them, except for Deities.
* **Weather Manipulation**- It is said that Death is responsible for Noah's flood, and is able to cause natural disasters.
* **Soul Manipulation**- Death is able to collect the souls of deceased humans.
* **Soul Reading**- He is able to sense the current condition of a soul.

## **Weaknesses**

* **Totem Destruction** - Destroying a totem of a Horseman will ultimately destroy them.
* **Totem Removal** - Separating a Horseman from their totems will leave them severely weakened and unable to manifest.
* **Physical Trauma** - The Horsemen's bodies are vulnerable to physical attacks, which causes them pain and can physically damage them. However, physical trauma cannot kill a Horseman.
* **Divine Weaponry** - A weapon of a god can kill them.
* **Deities**- Gods can effortlessly destroy any Horseman.