Cruel Pacification

Cruel Pacification is how the Kingdom of Korma keeps its population of enslaved Halflings in check. Randomly targeting the innocent prevents would-be martyrs from rising up for fear of hurting their loved ones as a consequence of their actions. On the rare occasions when they do act, they are often ostracized by their own people for costing someone else their life.

History

After the mass enslavement of the Saamni, the Kingdom of Korma faced many attempts at rebellion. They found that these uprisings were led by those who were willing to give up their own lives for the sake of their people. So they devised a system by which they would punish these rebels by attacking the very people they were trying to liberate. The halflings and other outsiders came to call this practice "cruel pacification."
In the most extensive use of this practice, a multi-settlement uprising, the dwarves selected one tangentially involved settlement and completely leveled it. No life was spared; buildings and crops were burned. When they were finished, there was no evidence that the settlement had ever existed, except for the scorched earth that remained. There have been no major uprisings since.

Execution

The implementation of Cruel Pacification is simple. Whenever someone acts rebelliously, another person in their community is chosen at random and killed.