Harpy

**Harpies** are a species of monstrous creatures that dwell within underworld and serve as agents of punishment to sinners who either committed a treasonous act against Hell's royal family or feast on sinners of suicide.

## Description

While each Harpy had a different face they all bore the same anatomy and physical characteristics. Many of them are depicted as having long or short hair, the faces and upper bodies of women, but the wings, tails, legs, and claws of birds of prey, with razor sharp talons.

Harpies differ from most demonic beings in Hell as they are often depicted as terrifying beasts with a single goal in mind and that is to abduct and feast upon sinners who try to escape from the Furies or their punishments within Hell. Harpies are considered pests within Hell with Cherri Bomb comparing them to Magpies from Australia except tens of times meaner and nastier. They were always ravenously hungry, and would steal food or even eat their victims before carrying away their souls.

Though the harpies have no proper hierarchy among their ranks they seem to obey the commands of Alkonost who is often regarded as the queen of the harpies and is the infernal counterpart of her sister Sirin. Seeing that this is the case, it is no stretch to say that the harpies serve as the infernal counterparts of the Chalkydri even though they were created under much different circumstances.

## Overview

Harpies were created by Morrigan, the goddess of death and doom, to serve as her personal "carrion" that tear into the flesh of deceased humans in order to take their souls to the afterlife. The first generation of harpies were called the Keres who were feared as goddesses that personified violent death and drawn to bloody deaths on battlefields.

Under unknown circumstances, most of the harpies would go on to act as agents for the Furies themselves who would sometimes send out the harpies to abduct sinners or demons and tortured them on their way to Tartarus with the Furies. The harpies that resided in Hell also took to Alkonost as their queen. They were depicted as vicious, cruel, and violent, which makes all the more sense as to how they ended up working for the Furies.

Harpies are abundant in the Violence Ring and can be found in the Suicide Forest where sinners who committed suicide reside. In the forest, harpies relentlessly hound and pester the sinners and demons who live there forcing them board up their own houses and essentially trapping them inside their own houses. Any sinner or demon who steps into the forest are immediately set upon by the harpies, mutilating and carving them into the very trees that make up the forest itself.

## Trivia

* Harpies are based on the creatures of the same name found in Greek mythology where they are half-human and half-bird personifications of storm winds.
	+ Harpies living in the Violence Ring is a nod to Dante Alighieri's poem which depicts the Forest of Suicides in the seventh circle of Hell being infested with harpies who feed on the damned.
* Though harpies are believed to be filthy they are surprisingly hygenic in certain aspects. Alecto states that they wash the dishes with lava which, according to her should kill 99.9% of all germs.