“One easy way to tell if a nation was on its way out of the history books was to take a look at its outlaws and criminals. When the people of a nation viewed the so-called outlaws and bandits more positively than their own government, that is a sure sign that a nation was on its last legs.” - Ophemidus Regosiasis, Scholar of History from Knallzog, circa 319 FP.

“It’s sometimes funny how different two people from the same background could be,” said the old captain with a wistful sigh once more. “Hadrian was a street urchin much like meself, but he always had high aspirations in mind. Back when we were young I always dismissed those as him listening to one too many fairy tales, but as we grew older and he partially succeeded at what he wanted to do, I couldn’t help but respect his doggedness.”

“What did he aim to do?” asked Aideen with some curiosity.

“Why, the idealistic bastard wanted to climb the ranks of the nation, to change things from within, despite being a penniless street urchin drafted to labor on a ship till the day they toss us overboard, that’s what,” replied Arquivaldo with a fond chuckle. “That he not only managed to come close to doing it despite all the difficulties he must have faced, but also did it despite my being a big obstruction in his way… was something.”

“You were in his way?” this time the question came from Celia instead. “I thought you were good friends?”

“We were, and remained that way forever, but we were more often than not on opposite sides,” explained the old captain quickly. “It was during our third trip with the merchant ship, the two of us had one foot in the grave by then, since they worked us to our bones for so long. We probably wouldn’t have survived that trip at all, but as fortune willed it, the ship got hit by pirates shortly after it left port.”

“There were two small pirate bands that cooperated in order to take on a larger ship like ours. They butchered pretty much most of the crew, save those like us who were forced to be there,” reminisced Arquivaldo somewhat wistfully. “As for us, they split us amongst themselves much like the plunder they got from the ship. Hadrian was taken by one band, and I by the other. That was the last we saw of each other until over a decade later.”

“Did those pirates…?” asked Celia with evident worry in her voice. Perhaps it was her own experiences that prompted the question, but Aideen also noted the sympathy in the way she asked.

“Oh no, ye wouldn’t have guessed, but who’d think that being captured by pirates meant a better living for us?” replied the unliving captain with a broad grin. “For all that they be cast as scourges and villains who only knew how to plunder and rape, more often than not it was not the case. Some people were just forced by the circumstances to eke out a living outside the reach of the law. Mind you, some of them were definitely villains who only knew how to plunder and rape, so don’t be expecting too much either.”

“I understand what you mean, yeah,” replied Celia with a nod.

“Anyway, where was I? Oh right, captured by pirates. That night was the first time in months that I actually slept with a proper full belly, if ye can picture it. The pirates got plenty from the raid and weren’t shy about sharing it with us,” explained the captain as he picked up where he left off. “Then they asked those of us they took whether we wanted to join their band or not.”

“How many chose to join?” Celia asked out of curiosity.

“Maybe around half of us or so? Thereabouts,” said the old captain with a wistful smile. He brought out a flask of alcohol and three cups out of his storage and offered some to Aideen and Celia. The liquor was strong but also with a pleasant sweetness, and burned its way pleasantly down their throats. The captain raised an eyebrow when neither woman showed any discomfort from the liquor, as he didn’t know that the orcs in the plains often had stronger drinks for special occasions.

“Either way, they took those of us who chose to join them back to their hideout, while those who refused, got their throats slit and were fed to the fish,” continued Arquivaldo with an unperturbed voice. “Hadrian had gotten really lucky as I later found out that the pirate boat he was on ran into a naval patrol before they could sort out their captives, otherwise he’d have been fish food as well, knowing him.”

“And what of yourself, then?” asked Aideen as she sipped some more of the strong liquor.

“What else, milady? I joined up with the pirates with all the fervor of my teenage self, of course. Got myself accepted as one of them within a couple months and started climbing up their ranks since,” replied the old captain with a wide grin. “They don’t care if yer some street urchin from the boonies of if yer grand-maw’s a fishie or anything, as long as you can keep up with the rest, yer one of them.”

“So there I was, swashbuckling with the rest of the crew, even made it to third mate of the gang after five years. Did my fair share of plunder and pillage of course, though our crew was one of the nicer ones. We were just people forced to extremes by our own nation failing us, so we try not to take it out on other unfortunates if we could avoid it. That was around when I met Hadrian once more, ‘cept that bastard had somehow convinced people that he was not some random urchin and joined the navy, instead.”

“T’was just us, a couple former street urchins, but one became a pirate, and the other joined the navy by that point of time.”