After thinking the whole night about our next move, Munnji finally decided to go with my plan.

I was going to contact the merchant Faley Mint so I could make a deal with him. I was going to trade him some of my spoils I got during my time in the forest for identification for me,Munnji,the child and Onela.

Onela was the slave I bought. She was a 22 year old resident of one of the villages in the border between the Eternal Light Empire and the Elanor Empire. She lived a simple life of a village girl.Helping her parents plough and sow the land they lived of, taking care of some small animals they raised, helping around the house and taking care of her younger brothers etc.

When she was 19 she was the most beautiful girl in her village turning all the single means heads her way .Many suitors came to ask for her hand in marriage for two whole months until her farther accepted to marry her to the village elder’s nephew.

He was 20, one year older than her. He might not have been the best suitor for her, but he being the village elder’s nephew was an immediate leap in status for her poor family if they married.

After she married the village elder’s nephew she immediately becoming pregnant and after nine months gave birth to a baby girl.

...

Fast forward two years later while she was taking care of her two year old daughter and one year old son.

She was in her house doing the house chores and taking care of the children when her husband came running through the door.

“QUICKLY, take the children; gather some food, some clothes and get ready, we are leaving immediately."

“What, what is happening? Why are we leaving in the middle of the night?"

" I just found out that a battalion of the Eternal Light Empire is making an advance towards the border of the Eleanor Empire and their path of advance is right through our village, so we must leave as soon as possible and hide in the mountains until this whole thing passes.

I am leaving to tell the other villagers about this. You get ready and we will meet again in the village centre in half an hour."

Onela took a deep breath and immediately went to get ready.

...

After 25 minutes she went to the town square where she found all the villagers gathered around talking to each other loudly.

She looked around for her husband while holding her two young children that were strapped to her , one to the front and one to the back with a piece of cloth . She looked and looked but couldn’t see him anywhere making her even more worried until someone called her name.

“Onela, over here."

She looked towards the one who called her and saw her mother with two of her brothers 13 and 15 respectively.

She was 38 years old this year but looked like she was 50 with her worn out appearance.

She was a caring mother for all her children, having raised them with all her flesh and soul hoping that one day they could make something great for themselves and not be restrained to the life of a simple villager, but it was just wishful thinking.

...

Her husband and one of her sons had died last winter.

Her youngest son 5 years old ,was playing with his brothers in the frozen surface of the river where the villagers got their water from and where the women washed their clothes.

He was happily playing in the ice as a five year old would when suddenly the ice below his feet started to crack and break. The other two brothers immediately ran as fast as they could escape to the river bank, but the youngest was not that lucky. He slipped in the ice while he was running after his two younger brothers and when he tried to get up he would go down again and again making the ice breaking even faster.

The older brothers seeing this shouted to their younger brother.

“DONT MOVE, we are going to call dad, he will get you out of here."

“NO don’t leave me here alone, I’m scared older brother please come get me, I’m scared."

The youngest started bawling his eyes out while the two brothers looked at each other until the oldest said.

“You stay here with youngest while I go find dad."

“Okay, but hurry up we don’t know when the ice will give out."

The oldest ran as fast as he could and came back in five minutes with his father.

He was about 45 years old with a rough beard, a worn out face and very dark skin from working in the field all his life.

As soon as he arrived he immediately started walking in the ice towards the youngest.

“DADY, please come get me I’m scared, please come get me."

“Stay there, don’t move. Daddy is coming to get you so just stay put where you are doing you understands?"

*nod*

He tied a rope around his waist and then told his oldest sons.

"Hold the rope tightly and when I tell you pull the rope with all the force you have."

After that he slowly advanced trying to not make the ice crack any more.

*Step* *Step* *Step* *Step*

After a minute of approaching slowly, he was within arm’s reach of his son when the youngest not waiting anymore sprang up immediately into his father's arms.

"Daddy, I’m afraid, please takes me out of here."

*Uwaa* *Uwaaa*

"Okay, okay, daddy is now here so stop crying.

We are slowly going to go back the same way we came from, so stay put."

He again started to move slowly backwards, backtracking. He managed to cross half the way to the river bank when the ice suddenly broke and plunged both father and son into the icy embrace of the river.

*Splash*

*Gasp* *Gasp*

“Quickly....*Gasp*....pull the... *Gasp* rope."

Gasping, he told his two sons to start pulling with all their strength and with all their strength they pulled.

The rough rope cut the skin of their palms making them bleed and stain the snow at their feet red drop by drop, but they did not stop pulling the rope until they pulled them out of the frozen river.

"Hah....Hah...Hah..."

They were tiered, but they finally managed to get them out. The approached the two and knelt down to check on them.

"Dad, are you okay, say something? Dad?"

*Shake* *Shake*

They started to shake their father in order to get a response from him.

* Cough*

"I'm fine * Cough*, take a look at youngest *Cough* *Cough*."

As soon as he said that he lost his consciousness.

The brothers did as their father told them and took the youngest out of the hold of their father and started to shake him, to make him wake up, but to no avail.

His little body was devoid of any signs of life, his face blue and his little chest unmoving.

He was dead. He was dead and they can't do anything.

After trying for a while more they gave up just as the other villagers came to see what was happening. They saw what happened and helped to take the father and son back to the village.

The family was devastated by what happened, the youngest had drowned in the river and his father died not much after him from a high fever he developed after falling in the icy river water.

That winter was the saddest period of her life.

....

"Mother, are all the villagers here?"

"From what I saw, almost all the villagers are here, but I didn't see your husband anywhere."

"I don't know. He said he was going to meet with us right about now.”

After that they made some small talk, waiting for the village elders to come and guide them.

They waited and waited for 20 minutes, but no one showed up. The villagers were starting to become agitated seeing that no one was showing up.

“Where are the village elder? Why is he not here with us? "

"Yes, where is he?"

*Clop Clop Clop *

Their talk was interrupted by rapidly approaching sounds. It was the sound of dozens of hoses approaching, but there was no settlement around them that had that many horses.

After waiting for a while they finally understood. It was the Eternal Light Empires soldiers; they had come earlier than expected.

They rode right through the village entrance and without stopping they headed straight to the village center.

As soon as they saw the villagers they, without thinking for a second started to kill.

*Slash* *Stab*

The ground was quickly filled with cut of limbs and dead, but still warm bodies of the villagers.

They showed no mercy, paying no head to the pleading of the villagers.

“No please stop, spare us ... ahhh"

"No stop, we didn't do anything wrong..."

After five minutes all the men of the village and some unfortunate women had been killed, leaving only women and children.

"Stop"

The sound came from an Eternal Light Empire soldier.

He was bulky, about 185 cm tall with a slim face, small nose and cold green eyes. He also had a well groomed short beard, but the most noticeable feature was his missing right arm.

From the quality of his armour and his overwhelming aura he exuded, he was definitely not a normal soldier.

* Clop* * Clop*

Another soldier approached the one armed one and said.

“Sire, what do we do with the women and children now?"

“Hmmm, we don't have much time because we have to move to our next position as soon as possible so... take all the children under the age of 5 and then I will handle all the rest."

“Understood.

Soldiers, you heard your orders, go."

The children under the age of 5 were taken from the embrace of their mothers and took to the side while all the others were gathered in a circle.

The one armed commander of these soldiers raised his right arm towards the villagers and said.

"Die you heathens."

He then gathered some type of green energy in his palm and with a cold look he said “Blade Storm."

The green energy shoot out of his hand and into the middle of the villagers where it exploded in hundreds of small green blades that turned almost all the villagers into minced meat.

“Soldiers, move out.”

They left immediately after.

....

The next morning a group of 20-30 people come to the desolate village.

They were not soldiers , but a ragtag group wearing normal clothes and equipped with all kinds of weapons, from swords to axes for cutting wood.

They were the local bandits that pestered the nearby villages for money every month.

They weren't that strong so they lived by threatening the nearby villages for food and money.

They arrived at the centre of the village where they found the massacred villagers.

*Belrgh*

They vomited as soon as they saw it. Piles of flesh that were once humans filled the ground.

They released a horrible stench that penetrated even the pores.

“What savages. They massacred these villagers in such a brutal way; they make me ashamed of being called a bandit."

After recovering somewhat from the grusome sight they continued doing what they came for.

They searched the corpses for any survivors and surprisingly they found one.

It was Onela. She had survived the attack with heavy wounds on her back.

"Boss what we do with her?"

The bandits asked a tall man with huge muscles. He was their leader Makal.

He was a deserter of the Elanor Empire.

“Because the villages around here have been destroyed, we will face a shortage of money, so we will sell her to a slave trader for as much as we can."

This was the story of Onela and how she ended up in this city.

....

I was going to pretend to be the Childs father, Olean the mother and Munnji was my friend/helper.