Sol’s POV

Nephthys and I got up from the bloodied bed which Theo didn’t seem to question at all. He still kept a distance and brought us towards the door we had been through yesterday. Once again, there was a weird series of knocking, then we entered the room. Nothing had seriously changed since the other night and I simply stood before Ivan, wondering what he would ask from us. He had not yet turned to look at us, so I took the time to look around the room - there was minimal sunlight because we were underground, but there was still a window high up in the room where the light shone from, much like our own room.

“You’ll start training today… both of you together as well as several others”

He didn’t bother to look up at us when speaking, which I found somewhat irritating… as if we were worthless in front of him. Also, I picked up on the fact that he said a few others would be joining and I wondered who they would be… I hadn’t seen anyone outside of Theo and the person that had opened the doors for us upstairs. I didn’t worry too much about it because we would meet them sooner or later, whether or not we wanted to. Beside me, Nephthys was slightly shaking similarly as when she saw the slave capturers in the woods - I didn’t want her to stay for long, so I simply agreed with everything Ivan had to say and left the room. It seemed that we would start training in a room in the basement - I wondered how big this place exactly was.

We walked behind Theo as our footsteps began to echo more and more as we walked further away from where Ivan was. The stones surrounding us were a dark color as if they could suck in anything that neared them regardless of what it was. Shortly thereafter, we entered a faintly lit room where there was a clutter of other ragged slaves sitting dejectedly on the ground, shackled like we were still in the caves - was a human town truly just as bad as a slave mine? I couldn’t believe it… We had essentially escaped from one encampment only to be lured into another one like an idiot. In hindsight, I probably should have been more careful to get dragged into something when hearing “Rosa and Nor”, but hearing their name made me irrationally agree to be lured in - I regretted my decision.

There was no guarantee that I would get information about Nor and Rosa at the end of the month… there was a chance that this was all just an exploitative scheme to keep me and Nephthys here for whatever reason it may be. There was a side of me that wanted to trust everything Ivan had told me, but that was highly unlikely considering who he was and what he was doing in this room filled with only slaves. As we walked closer to the slaves who were dispersed throughout the room, I had the feeling that I recognized some of them.

“Sol… they’re from the wagon yesterday”

“... you’re right”

It took me a moment to recognize some of them, but when I spotted the girl who had been burned with the metal rod, I realized that they were all from the wagon we had escaped from yesterday. I doubted any of them recognized us, but that was to be expected considering their condition in that wagon. Theo had already left us and closed the heavy metal door behind us which echoed loudly. The room was not completely dark, but it might as well have been considering how interspersed the lamps were throughout the room. Nephthys walked towards the only slave we knew here, although it likely would not matter because they all seemed as dead as they were in the wagon.

I followed behind Nephthys and sat down next to the girl who didn’t even realize we had sat down next to her - I still found it awkward to have to rely on Nephthys to sit down. Meanwhile, Nephthys checked up on this girl for some reason and we passed our time just talking and taking care of this one girl. Eventually, the metallic door creaked open and someone new entered the room… someone I had never seen before.

She looked around the age of Rosa and had dirty, blonde hair. I had never seen her anywhere in the short time I had been here and she seemed rather confident as she entered the room. She walked towards the front of the room and scanned the room with her eyes - they were sharp and it wouldn’t be an understatement to say that her looks could likely legitimately kill someone in this very room. After she entered the room, the atmosphere got much colder and the room seemed quieter than it already had been, which I did not believe was possible until it happened before me.

“QUIET!”

From first impressions alone, I could tell that she would not be the most reliable person I had met. Not only had she arrogantly stepped into the room of dead-eyes people, but she had also screamed at us to be quiet even though the room was already silent. So silent that dripping water could be heard from across the room. She seemed to be more of a maniac than many others I had seen - I found it hard to believe that someone as discreet as Ivan would have someone like her by his side. Nephthys and I sat quite a distance from her, so I was glad that she wouldn’t spot us too quickly, even if Ivan had warned her about us.

“From now on! I am the only person you will talk and report to! You are slaves and you’ll act like so for eternity! You are my slaves to experiment on! AHAHAHA~”

I wanted to retract my previous statement, she was not a maniac, she was the definition of insane. Once she saw my physical state, I probably had little hope for living - she would either try to experiment on me heavily or simply throw me out by killing me, regardless of Ivan’s instructions to her. Nephthys had been teaching me small bits of dagger use, but I did not know how to conjure a dagger so I could not even protect myself if I were to be attacked in any way. The insane, human woman ordered us to stand and those who were not able to were beaten until they could - if they could not, they were beaten to death without hesitation by that woman.

Once again, I only continued to live by Nephthys’s support… there would have been no way for me to stand up so quickly completely on my own. How long would I continue to burden Nephthys? That woman continued to circle the room, looking for any stragglers she could make an example out of, although I doubted she was making an example and she was more so enjoying the act of hurting the people who had been chained in metal shackles. None of them could run and none had any possibility of fighting back - all that could be heard were the horrific screams that echoed endlessly. The beating continued to enter my eyes from all around the room and my thoughts were being drowned out by the terrifying scenes that were happening around me - although I tried to avoid it, there was no way to ignore the scenes when it was happening so close to me.

Meanwhile, Nephthys was glaring daggers at that woman and seemed ready to unleash herself upon the woman even though she was likely to lose, but it was already too late. That woman had already mauled many slaves and their blood was splattered all over the room. It was petrifying to see the number of bodies that were laid out on the floor with blood still flowing out of them. Some bodies could be seen breathing, but others had completely stopped moving… as if they were dead. I couldn’t bear to see more dead bodies so I only focused on Nephthys and tried my best to block out everything around me. She came back to the front of the room and laughed hysterically before just leaving the room altogether.

When the metallic door shut once more, I was frozen on the spot. She had entered the room, murdered people, and left like nothing had occurred, laughing maniacally. I hated her… I hated her with an intense emotion of hatred, but at the same time, I was too scared to do anything against her. She had the support of Ivan behind her and she had the strength to back up her actions - something I still did not have. On the other hand, I had to hold Nephthys back from charging at that woman and getting herself killed.

“Why do you care so much about them all of a sudden?!”

“... I know her… S-she was there when I was sold and beat me like an animal!”

I could physically feel the intense anger pouring out of her voice as well as the immense weight in her voice. Although I did not fully understand her pain, I did understand that what she went through was significant enough that she had the desire to kill that one woman even if it risked her life. In the short time I had known Nephthys, she had never acted out like this before, so it had taken me by surprise, but thinking about it now, it was weirder that she never acted out in the first place. She had always been rather quiet and withdrawn, but for her to act like this against one person meant that what that woman had done was just that bad.

“I’ll help you get revenge on her, so please calm down for now! I don’t want you to die!”

She looked like she was still going to try to go after her, but after holding her back for a little while longer, she released her strength and relaxed her muscles. Fortunately, I had managed to calm her down for the moment.

“... you’re right, I have to stay alive… sorry”

After she had settled down, we went around helping anyone we could - unlike what had occurred within that wagon. It seemed that when she had left, she had concluded her “lesson” for the day and we were now allowed to leave this horrid room that would probably become the usual in the days to come. Theo led us out of the room while the other slaves had to stay within that bloodied cage - it was their “home” or so he called it. Even to me, it was the furthest thing from what a “home” was supposed to be. Although I did not know if they were able to comprehend what occurred around them, they had still witnessed what had happened to the people they had traveled with - that was not a place anyone would want to call home.

In the meantime, Nephthys and I were led back into our room, where I felt guilty for having such a place to even go to. I could tell that the sun had yet to even reach its peak in the sky, so I decided to talk to Nephthys about a few other things during this private time we had together. But before I could begin talking, Nephthys had already turned to face me on the bed.

“I guess I should explain who she was exactly”

And so began the long conversation about her past and the plan for our future.