Famine

The black horse trotted into town ahead of its master, and the villagers screamed in anticipation. They had heard of what followed the black horse as it traveled from city to city. The way that crops seemed to wither and fall away with each click of the horse's footsteps, only to be followed by its enormous rider stomping after it. He was a giant of a man, standing over six feet tall at two hundred and fifty pounds, ever last ounce of which was muscle. And as he came through, he demanded the food of every house he came across, and those who resisted, he crushed.

He left the villages without a means to sustain themselves, doomed to starve to death. Some anticipated his arrival, armed with weapons and heavily defended food storages. They would try to attack his horse, but the moment their weapons came close to striking, the man was there, and their attention turned. But he was already on top of them, snapping the cores of their weapons like twigs beneath his feet, and leaving their bodies broken and useless on the side of the road so that they could watch as he broke into their storages and devoured their supplies.

It was a slow way of taking the life out of the planet - much slower than that of his comrades - but it was a painful one, and one that he took great care and joy from acting out. It kept him fit and strong, and he never went without a full belly. He needed not rely on the power of others, for he was powerful enough to wreak his own havoc. People were not tools to him, but obstacles to overcome. This world would not kill itself, as his comrades were always so certain of. Rather, it must be killed, slowly and painfully, knowing that it was on its way to death but unable to do anything about it.

But there was one thing that he agreed with his comrades on. He did so enjoy looking back at where he had been and what he had caused. He loved to look upon the people as he ate their food and rotted their fields, to see the despair in their eyes as they could do nothing to stop him. He feasted on that as well.

He heard whispers of his actions reaching further lands. The more crops he poisoned and killed, the harder it became for the larger kingdoms to sustain themselves as well. In time, the economy would become unsustainable, and the poor man would be unable to afford basic accommodations, making it impossible for them to work, and the rich man would therefor have less labor, and the crops that he had yet to kill would go unworked.

And the people would starve.

And the people would die.