“Rise, Duke Vistrias”

“My king”

The blonde man with a ponytail remained on one knee, facing the ground.

“Has the oracle spoken?”

An old man, about the age of 50, asked. His silver gray hair and red eyes were a terror in the distant past. He wore a red and white robe, adorned with emeralds. On his head glittered a golden crown, shaped like an eagle. The gems on the crown glittered as the old man looked down upon the young man, with his head on his chin.

“Yes, my king”

“It’s message?”

“To hunt the chaos in the north. “

“Preparations?”

“Me and Sir Chernakoff, along with a contingent of 20 elite knights shall be heading out at the earliest.”

“I see. May you succeed, Vistrias”

“In the name of Theyios”

“In the name of Theyios”

*******

“Fumu…”

I stared at the request board, in order to find a gold ranked quest good enough to accomplish three of our goals.

1. An escort type quest which required us to move to Ugras.

2. A quest which paid well

3. A Platinum or Gold ranked quest, hard enough for us to get stronger.

The requirements were specific, so we couldn’t find a lot of requests that fit the bill. We found three of them, and none looked quite appealing.

Merchant escortRequestorUrkial trading companyDestinationUgras kingdomCalling all adventurers who are strong enough to become our escort to Ugras. Transporting a large quantity of goods, via the Yolvian highway. Must be able to take care of all monsters and bandits. (14 slots)Recommended rankPlatinumReward8 silvers per day. 2 extra for exceptional service

Noble escortRequestorMikuel sama’s aideDestinationUgras kingdomNeed Adventurers to travel to Ugras. The young miss needs protection from bandits and monsters. (8 slots)Recommended rankGoldReward13 silvers

Merchant escortRequestorDharka trading companyDestinationUgras kingdomTransporting a wagon of Kiril oil to Ugras. All able bodied adventurers are accepted. (10 slots)Recommended rankGoldReward6 silvers per day.

“Erm… These… huh?”

Even Maria looks displeased with these three, and who can argue with that? Aren’t merchants vile despicable and dishonest men who want to buy anything they see, if it has value, even if it means using underhanded methods? Merchants work on profit. So, there’s a good chance that they might try to steal from us. Probably. Can’t trust merchants blindly. So two of them are a no go.

I immediately move on, and so does Maria. We check out the next quest, a noble escort.

“Noble escort, huh.”

“It looks to be quite rewarding”

“It does, but it’s not what we need. With 10 people along with us, we can forget about training. Maria can just sleep along the way.”

There’s no doubt. Too many people aren’t good. Like they say ,’Too many cooks spoil the broth’. Can’t be any truer.

“In the end, there’s no quest that fits our needs huh?”

“Sigh….”

We relaxed in the chairs in the restaurant, depressed.

I keep my eyes on the door, since for some reason, I always feel sort of cautious in this place. Like I’m going to be attacked at any moment.

Then, a familiar figure walks into the guild. The Mohawk dude, Marcus. That was his name right? Don’t expect me to remember your name!

He wore a light brown jacket, which looked like leather armour. A knife was strapped to his side, with armguards and knee guards made of iron.

In his hand was a looped leather strap, which he was holding onto. The strap was tied to a chain. I followed the chain and it ended up at a collar.

A collar on a girl.

She was about 17 years old, appearance wise. Her flaxen hair lay disheveled, covering her dirty face. Her hazel eyes had no life in them, as if she were a puppet.

“Mar…co?”

Maria whispers, looking at him. Maybe she was shocked by the woman? Well, I sure was.

Marcu—Marco turns, and his eyes brighten when looking at Maria. He rushes over, pulling the chain as if it were a dog leash. The woman stumbled along, not even caring what happened to her. As I thought. A slave.

I clenched my fists, to keep myself from hitting that disgusting face of his. He looked happy, as if he got a trophy, and pulled the girl along as if she were a dog, in the truest sense. Damn it.

In this world, slavery is prevalent, almost everywhere. Except, ironically, in the Grimoi continent, where demons live. The demons, who were the evil that plagued the lands, didn’t do despicable acts like this. What an irony.

Slave traders, slave markets, it was like a deep rooted weed, which could never be truly pulled out.

Human rights are nothing more than garbage here.

He walks upto us, and greets us.

“Yo, Maria! Did you band together with the newbie now? Love at first sight?”

Maria turns red, and looks down, momentarily forgetting her shock at seeing the slave. What a fickle person.

“N-n-no way… Wh-wh-wh-what are you saying, Marco?!”

“Wow, that’s a surprise! The gangster Maria is actually behaving like a lady for once”

“Marco!”

I smile pleasantly. But in truth, it’s my poker face. Maria san, she’s just too dangerous. Whenever she gets flustered, I get this close to falling for her. Calm down, my wild heart!

“Oi Maria! Check this out! I got one of them slaves!”

He pulls the dog leash, and sends the woman crashing headlong into our table, her head planted on there.

I barely stopped myself from killing him.

The annoying thing is, whatever I do, I can’t exactly save her. There aren’t human rights for slaves, but there are rights for the owners. If anyone steals the slave, legal punishment is imminent.

What a shitty world.

I help her up. That’s the least I could do. I take out a cloth from my ring and wipe her face, ignoring the doofus in front of me. He totally ignores me, and smiles happily at Maria, with a ‘Praise me’ attitude. Oh yeah, I’ll praise you buddy, with my fists of course.

She looks up at me, as if she were dreaming. Her face looked delirious, like a person who couldn’t think anymore. I wonder, what’s she thinking about? In the end, what I’m doing, to her, seems useless. A person having good will against a slave. For her, it’s no different than the people who treat her like a slave.

I gave her a bit of bread, and forget receiving it, she doesn’t even lift her hands. She stared at it, as if not understanding what it was. What did those guys do to her?

Maria and Marco kept chatting, but I kept tending to her. I don’t mind if it’s useless in the long run. It eases my conscious, thinking that at least I didn’t just leave it alone.

I tear off a piece, and bring it to her mouth. She stays like that, without moving.

I bring my hand up, and open her cracked lips, and began feeding her. After the first few bites, she slowly began to eat the rest of the bread, and stayed as she was.

“—You know? This thing, a lot of men used her up, so I got it cheap! Only for a gold coin! I’m too damn lucky!”

I began to listen into their conversation, now that I fed the girl. Used her up? Cheap? It?

I could hold in my anger, somehow, before I rampaged.

I combed her hair, and washed her face with a bit of water magic.

True, she was quite a beauty. But a doll like beauty, without life.

Her dress was only rags, and her body was covered with too many wounds. On her neck, there were three deep red scars, stretching from under her chain till between her shoulder blades.

Nail marks.

Shit, I wish I could use healing magic.

Till then, I never noticed that everyone were sending strange looks at me, as if I were an odd creature. I glared back at them, releasing a bit of killing intent, and they turned back to doing their business.

I cleaned those terrible scars, and put a bit of herbs on them.

She winced when my hands touched her, as if she were scared. Marco, you bastard.

I was so focused in my work, that I didn’t even notice Marco and Maria staring at me.

“Yuuya? What are you doing?”

“Hm”

I didn’t pay attention to her question , and gave my full attention to the girl before me. Then—

“What the fuck you think you’re doing, huh?!”

Marco pulls on her dog leash ad kicks me away. I smiled.

“I was waiting for this, you bastard”

I muttered my true feelings.

I did an ukemi and jumped back to my feet. I raised my fists, challenging him.

He let go of the leash, and raised his fists. Good. Now this is an official match.

“I,Yuuya Nakajima, challenge you to a match!”

“What do you wanna wager, buddy?”

“3 gold. Good enough for you? I get the girl if I win”

Maria looks at me with shock, as if I were doing something stupid. Maybe I was, don’t care.

“Girl? What girl?”

This bastard.

I gesture at the girl, and face back at him.

“Oh! The slave! Fine. I can buy three more like her after I win then! I accept your challenge!”

“Yuuya Nakajima. Adventurer.”

The custom for challenges were simple. A wager, and an introduction.

“Marco Girares, you can call me with a sama. The great me is a Mi—“

“Annoying”

I moved.

******

WWWWha-what does Yuuya think he’s doing?! Challenging a Mithril ranked adventurer?! For a slave? Marco was dumb, but he was super strong!

Before I could stop him, he accepted the challenge. Too late! Everyone started laughing at the naïve boy. I would have to, if it wasn’t Yuuya .

Yuuyaa was oddly attached to the slave, and cleaned her up. He even fed her. What’s up with him? Slaves aren’t meant to be treated that way, you know?

I admit, I don’t like slavery, but I don’t think it’s something that can be stopped either.

And I have never tried to.

Yuuya introduced himself, and Marco began his speech. But he can do it, since he was a Mithril rank. Yuuya was Black gold at best. I need to stop this somehow!

“Annoying”

Halfway through, Yuuya stepped forward, and like an illusion, vanished.

*DOGGAAAN!!*

Marco crashed into the opposing wall, and just lay there. The entire wall broke and crumbled down, revealing the side street. Under the wreckage, was Marco. His nose was broken and bleeding, and his eyes were all white, with his mouth foaming.

“Wh-what?!”

Not only me, but everyone in the guild were shocked.

Marco, the Mithril rank, was downed in a single shot, by a Silver rank.