Weapon of the Flame death of the Priest-Kings

[Daubee]

These were charged, cylindrical weapons, manually operated but incorporating principles much like those of the Flame Death Mechanism. Unused, they had lain encased in plastic quivers for a matter of centuries and yet when these quivers were broken open and the weapons seized up by angry Priest-Kings they were as ready for their grim work as they had been when first they were stored away.
Priest-Kings of Gor, page 229

[Daubee]

Flame Death by Priest-Kings

The Priest-Kings, keepers of the Holy Place in the Sardar Mountains, seeming knowers of all that occurred on Gor, masters of the hideous Flame Death that could with consuming fire destroy whatever they wished, whenever they might please.
Outlaw of Gor, page 18

The invisible barrier about the Sardar is evidence of that, and the policing, by flame death, of illegal weapons and inventions. The Gorean knows that there are Priest-Kings. He does not, of course, know their nature.
Marauders of Gor, page 57

[Daubee]

Where the Flame Death originates from and the room

'Nonsense,' said Misk. 'But perhaps I shall show you the
Scanning Room someday. We have four hundred Priest-Kings who
operate the scanners, and we are accordingly well informed.
For example, if there is a violation of our weapons laws we
usually, sooner or later, discover it and after determining
the coordinates put into effect the Flame Death Mechanism.'
Priest-Kings of gor, page 125

“I once saw a man die the Flame Death,” I said. “Is that mechanism also in this room?”
“Yes,” said Sarm, indicating with one foreleg a quiet-looking metal cabinet to one side possessing several dials and knobs. “The projection points for the Flame Death are located in the surveillance craft,” said Sarm, “but the coordinates are fixed and the firing signal is relayed from this room. The system is synchronized, or course, with the scanning apparatus and may be activated from any of the control panels at the observation cubes.”
Priest-Kings of Gor, pages 135-136

[Daubee]

Weapon Laws

"Do you believe in Priest-Kings?" asked Marcus.
"Certainly," I said.
"I do not," he said.
"As you will," I said.
"But how are we to explain the Weapons Laws, the Flame Death?" he asked.
"That would seem to be your problem, not mine," I said, "as I accept their existence."
"Something exists," he said, "but they are not Priest-Kings."
"That is an interesting thought," I said.
Magicians of Gor, page 209

[Daubee]

Why the flame death is used

“You wonder,” he said, “why the numerous, rather obvious deficits in our technology have not been repaired – in spite of the Priest-Kings. It crosses your mind that there must exist minds on this world capable of designing such things as, say, rifles, and armored vehicles.”
“Surely such things must be produced,” I urged.
“And you are right,” he said grimly. “From time to time they are, but their owners are then destroyed, bursting into flame.”
“Like the envelope of blue metal?”
“Yes,” he said. “It is Flame Death merely to possess a weapon of the interdicted sort. Sometimes bold individuals create or acquire such war materials and sometimes for as long as a year escape the Flame Death, but sooner or later they are struck down.” His eyes were hard. “I once saw it happen,” he said.
Tarnsman of Gor, page 19

It is Flame Death merely to possess a weapon of the interdicted sort. Sometimes bold individuals create or acquire such war materials and sometimes for as long as a year escape the Flame Death, but sooner or later they are struck down."
Tarnsman of Gor, pages 31 - 32

I had heard of the Flame Death from my father and the Older Tarl - that legendary fate which overtook those who had transgressed the will of the Priest-Kings. I knew almost nothing of the fabled Priest-Kings, but I did know that something of the sort must exist, for I had been brought to Gor by an advanced technology, and I knew that some force or power lay in the mysterious Sardar Mountains. I did not believe that the Priest-Kings were divine, but I did believe that they lived and that they were aware of what occurred on Gor and that from time to time they made known their will. I did not even know if they were human or non-human, but, whatever they might be, they were, with their advanced science and technology, for all practical purposes, the gods of this world.
On the back of my tarn, I waited, not knowing if I was to be singled out for the Flame Death, not knowing if I, like the mysterious blue envelope in the mountains of New Hampshire, so long ago, was doomed to explode in a devouring blue flame."
Tarnsman of Gor, pages 206 - 207

On a green field somewhere, I had no idea where, a man in the garments of the Caste of Builders emerged from what was apparently an underground cave. He looked furtively about himself as though he feared he might be observed. Then, satisfied that he was alone, he returned to the cave and emerged once more carrying what resembled a hollow pipe. From a hole in the top of this, pipe there protruded what resembled the wick of a lamp.
The man from the Caste of Builders then sat cross-legged on the ground and took from the pouch slung at his waist a tiny, cylindrical Gorean fire-maker, a small silverfish tube commonly used for igniting cooking fires. He unscrewed the cap and I could see the tip of the implement, as it was exposed to the air, begin to glow a fiery red. He touched the fire-maker to the wick-like projection in the hollow tube and, screwing the fire-maker shut, replaced it in his pouch. The wick burned slowly downward toward the hole in the pipe. When it was almost there the man stood up and holding the pipe in both hands trained it at a nearby rock. There was a sudden flash of fire and a crack of sound from the hollow tube as some projectile hurtled through it and shattered against the rock. The face of the rock was blackened and some stone chipped from its surface. The quarrel of a crossbow would have done more damage.
“Forbidden weapon,” said Sarm.
The Priest-King monitoring the observation cube touched a knob on his control panel.
“Stop!” I cried.
Before my horrified eyes in the observation cube the man seemed suddenly to vaporize in a sudden blasting flash of blue fire. The man had disappeared. Another brief incandescent flash destroyed the primitive tube he had carried. Then once again, aside from the blackened grass and stone, the scene was peaceful. A small, curious bird darted to the top of the stone, and then hopped from it to the blackened grass to hunt for grubs.
“You killed that man,” I said.
“He may have been carrying on forbidden experiments for years,” said Sarm. “We were fortunate to catch him. Sometimes we must wait until others are using the device for purposes of war and then destroy many men. It is better this way, more economical of material.”
“But you killed him,” I said.
“Of course,” said Sarm, “he broke the law of Priest-Kings.”
“What right have you to make the law for him?” I asked.
“The right of a higher-order organism to control a lower-order organism,” said Sarm. “The same right you have to slaughter the bosk and the tabuk, to feed on the flesh of the tarsk.”
Priest-Kings of Gor, pages 138-139

[Daubee]

Two from Koroba cannot be side-by-side

Could she be, like myself, an exile from Ko-ro-ba? Its peoples have been scattered, I said to myself, and no two stones and no two men of Ko-ro-ba may stand again side by side. I gritted my teeth. The thought ran through my head, no stone may stand upon another stone.
If she were of Ko-ro-ba, I knew that I could not, for her own welfare, stay with her or help her. It would be to invite the Flame Death of the Priest-Kings for one or the other, perhaps both of us. I had seen a man die the Flame Death, the High Initiate of Ar on the summit of Ar's Cylinder of Justice, consumed in the sudden burst of blue fire that bespoke the displeasure of the Priest-Kings. Slim though her chances might be to escape wild beasts or slavers, they would be greater than the chance of escaping the wrath of the Priest-Kings.
Outlaw of Gor, page 51

[Daubee]

Priest-Kings and Their own ends

That I had been returned to Gor to seek out once more my city and my love
was, I was sure, not the spontaneous gesture of generosity, or of justice,
that it might seem. The Priest- Kings, Keepers of the Holy Place in the
Sardar Mountains, seeming knowers of all that occurred on Gor, masters of
the hideous Flame Death that could with consuming fire destroy whatever
they wished, whenever they might please, were not so crudely motivated as
men, were not susceptible to the imperatives of decency and respect that
can upon occasion sway human action. Their concern was with their own
remote and mysterious ends; to achieve these ends, human creatures were
treated as subservient instruments. It was rumored they used men as one
might use pieces in a game, and when the piece had played its role it might
be discarded, or perhaps, as in my case, removed from the board until it
pleased the Priest-Kings to try yet another game.
Outlaw of Gor, page 49

[Daubee]

Effects of the Flame Death

Heedlessly, the insane old man tensed for the blow that would end the life of the girl. But in that instant he seemed to be concealed in a bluish haze, and then, suddenly, to the horror of all, he seemed, like a living bomb, to explode with fire. Not even a scream came from that fierce blue combustive mass that had been a human being, and in a minute, the flame had departed, almost as quickly as it had come, and a dust of ashes scattered from the top of the cylinder in the wind.
Tarnsman of Gor, page 167

Portus Canio, Fel Doron near him, drew from his pouch a heavy, shapeless object of metal, which seemed as though it had been deformed, perhaps twisted, bent in upon itself, and then fused, melted, in great heat."
"What is it?" asked Mirus.
"You do not know?"
"No."
"After we left our camp, of some days ago, Bosk of Port Kar, and his friend, visited the site of our camp, thinking we might still be there. Subsequently they followed us."
"What of your fellow, Tersius Major?" asked Mirus.
"No fellow of mine, he," said Portus Canio. "But Bosk and his friend found there only bones, pieces of bones, splintered, gnawed, shreds of clothing, torn, cast about."
"Sleen," said Mirus.
"It would seem so," said Portus Canio.
"Apparently sleen do not respect circles of forbidden weapons," said Mirus. "They, at least, are not prone to baseless superstition. They, at least, do not share your concern with Priest-Kings."
"Hold this," said Portus Canio, extending his hand, the weighty, shapeless object within it.
Mirus took the object, and regarded it. "It is a strange thing," he said, "possibly a meteorite, a star stone."
"Feel the weight," said Portus Canio. "Does it not remind you of something?"
Mirus turned white.
"Yes," said Portus Canio. "It is the remains of one of the forbidden weapons. The others were similarly destroyed. Bosk cast them away, into the grass. He kept this one to show me." So saying, Portus Canio took back the bit of fused, shapeless metal.
"Do you not fear to touch it?" asked Mirus.
"Not now," said Portus Canio. "It is no longer a weapon. Now it is nothing, only what was once a weapon."
"What force or heat could do this, and here, in the prairie?" asked Mirus, wonderingly.
"Surely the Priest-Kings have spoken," said Fel Doron.
"Do not be absurd, my friend," said Mirus. "There are no such things. You must overcome such beliefs."
"There is this," said Portus Canio, lifting the shapeless mass of fused, melted metal.
"There was a storm last night, to the north," said Mirus. "Lightning. Lightning struck the weapons. It destroyed them. It is an obvious explanation. They were metal, they were on a high place, on a knoll."
"That is certainly possible," agreed Portus Canio. Then he cast the piece of metal far from him, away, out into the grass.
"Priest-Kings do not exist," said Mirus.
"Even so," smiled Portus Canio, "I would advise you to keep their laws."
"They do not exist," said Mirus.
"I do not know," said Portus Canio. "But do not be afraid."
"I do not understand," said Mirus.
"If they do exist, perhaps in the Sardar Mountains, as many claim," said Portus Canio, "I think it is clear that we have little to fear from them, indeed far less to fear from them than from the caste of Initiates, which claims to speak in their name. The Priest-Kings, it seems to me, have little or no interest in us, in our kind, in our form of life, little or no concern with the doings of men, other than that their laws be kept."
"You suggest that they are rational? That they fear human technology?"
"Perhaps," said Portus Canio.
"They are real then?" asked Mirus.
"One does not suppose otherwise," said Portus Canio.
"Perhaps as real as mountains and storms, as real as flowers, as tarns and sleen."
"They do not exist," said Mirus, again.
"I do not know," said Portus Canio.
"No," said Mirus. "It is lightning, lightning."
"Perhaps," said Portus Canio.
"Lightning," repeated Mirus. "Obviously lightning."
"That is quite possible," said Portus Canio.
"It looks like a pleasant day for trekking," said Mirus.
"Yes," said Fel Doron.
Prize of Gor, pages 1173 - 1175