Arlin’s name originates from the first emperor, the exiled Prince Arlin. After the first campaign which conquered the prince’s homeland, he renamed it to show that it was now the dawn of a new age.

***

Immediately, I was stuck in place, unable to make a sound. The face moved closer to mine, the eyes unmoving. The light from my palm was finally able to radiate onto them, and the first thing I noticed was the presence of salt and pepper hair. It was Elm.

“Stop this. Never do that again if you value your life.” Elm’s voice remained quiet, but it felt as though it reverberated throughout my entire body. The light from my palm slowly started to fade until both of us were left in darkness, the only thing I could make out being his eyes.

“This is your last chance. I will not save you again.”

Before I could react, he was already walking away from me and moving back to his bunk. I sat there, frozen in shock at the events that had just transpired. It was an overload of information, and I didn’t know whether or not any of it had been real. As I went to lie down again, I prayed that sleeping on it would help with my confusion. It did not.

***

A loud whistle pierced my ears, and I immediately sat up and banged my head against the bunk above me. The shock of the previous night hadn’t subsided and I was entirely on edge. I looked over to where Elm’s bunk was, and saw him getting up as though there wasn’t anything that happened. He didn’t even glance at me while he got dressed for the day and grabbed his tools. I started to wonder whether what happened the previous night was even real or was just an extremely vivid dream. I held my head, got up and prepared myself for breakfast.

There was a similar lively attitude to dinner, although the sense of dread for the work that would come soon after was palpable. I sat down with Elric and Sera, still stuck in thought about what was real and what wasn’t. Every once in a while, my eyes would wander over to Elm. It all seemed the same as usual with him having casual conversations with the other slaves and the guards. As I was starting to calm down and went back to focus on Sera and Elric, I could hear a distinct gruff voice come from behind my head.

“North. Come with me. We need to have a conversation about your sleep patterns.”

I turned back to see his stone cold face looking down at me. As I got up and followed him, I turned back to see Sera giving me a silent prayer and Elric seeming to ponder what ways he could save me from what must be my impending death. I gave them a weak smile as I exited the tent, worried for the fate that was about to befall me.

***

“I told them that I wanted to talk with you about you having trouble sleeping and it messing with some of the others in the camp. You won’t get punished, but it at least gives us a few minutes to talk.” Elm spoke in an almost vindictive voice, taking a quick moment to survey the area.

“You have a light attunement. It’s rare, and if you use it wrong you’ll probably end up getting killed for it.”

My brain took a moment to comprehend his words. I regained my senses and attempted to speak, but was immediately shut down.

“No. Listen. I never want to see you doing that again. If anyone who wasn’t me saw that, you’d be dead right now. None of the guards know that these things are imperfect and I’d prefer to keep it that way.” He said, gesturing towards the cuff on his right ankle.

“But, these things are supposed to block any usage of mana. How was I able to do that?”

“You’re an exception. These things block people from attuning to specific elements of the natural world. It stops people from connecting to the world through their mana and transforming it. Light’s rare as fuck because… nevermind. Just know that these things don’t filter it out because it only filters out those which are common.”

“But then why-”

“Because why would you? Light attunement is so rare that the only well known people who have it are the Empire’s healing pets who only do work for nobility. Most people here don’t even know what they’re attuned to, so why would you add another layer of work to a piece of tech that is already so useful? What, to protect against the infinitesimal chance that some dumb miner finds out he’s got special magic? It’s too much work, and the empire has much grander goals.” His voice felt almost sarcastic. It felt wrong watching a man who had been so untouchable now be musing about the state of the world.

I stood there, awestruck at him. Despite him being face to face with me, he wasn’t looking at me. His gaze was distant, stretching off in the distance to what I presumed to be some past memory. Whatever it was, I didn’t plan on asking. I’d already pushed him far enough and it was very clear that he wasn’t going to stick out his neck for me any farther.

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. It’s not like you could have known. Just don’t ever do that shit again. I don’t want you dying over what amounts to a magic parlor trick.”

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

I watched as he walked off into the distance back inside the tent. A sigh of relief made its way throughout my entire body just as another whistle rang out across the camp, signaling the work day had begun.

“Fuck… I didn’t finish breakfast.”

It was not going to be an enjoyable work day.

***

The water breaks found in the afternoon were a unique social event. The mines’ limited space certainly left people huddled together, so socialization was inevitable as people were refilling canteens and taking time to drink before returning to their position in the mine. This also included the guards, who took time to socialize as well as swap out positions with those who had been stationed outside as to limit long term exposure to magore, a luxury which was not extended to us.

“So, you’re not in trouble? I thought you were going to come back to us looking even uglier.”

“Elric, shut up. Still, I’m surprised he didn’t do anything to you. It was something with your sleep, right? I don’t know, I always thought you were a pretty sound sleeper.”

Elric and Sera had both come to question me about my interaction with Elm. It made sense, but it definitely felt less like friends being considerate of each other and more like a passive-aggressive interrogation.

“I already told you guys, I’m fine. It was a small conversation, and it was only about last night. I had some issues going on, and he noticed. I guess he just told the guards he wanted to talk with me and they let him do it.” I said, hoping that they didn’t push any further. My little magic incident was already a problem enough, and dragging others into it would probably only make it worse. Elric would probably start crafting ideas about how to exploit it, and his voice tended to get louder the more interested he was in something. Sera… was probably one I could trust. I’d known her for longer and she understood me a lot better than others. She was one of the few things that was helping to keep me sane, so burdening her with information like that would only give me grief. I mean, the work was already backbreaking. No one needed another burden to carry. As long as they could remain safe for as long as possible, it didn’t really matter.

***

The night was slightly different. Dinner was about the same quality, but the camp had been given a slight break. It was apparently a holiday for the Arlin Empire, although I never really learned the details. A majority of their holidays appeared to be around the dates of different nations being conquered or successful military ventures. Whatever it was, it seemed to put the guards in a good enough mood to let much of the slaves roam free during the night. There were guards on duty, but a good portion of them had relocated inside a large tent where festivities were apparently being held. I could hear music faintly coming from inside along with sounds of drunken merriment. I stood around a fire, huddled next to many others having casual conversations and admiring the night sky. Elric was next to me, his hands in front of him while he quietly hummed a tune from his childhood. Despite how hard I had looked, Sera was nowhere to be found. On the other side of the fire, Elm stood silently while watching all of us let our worries temporarily melt away with the flames.

He looked in my direction finally and gave me a slight nod, beckoning me to follow him. I moved slowly, Elric not even noticing my absence. We took a brief walk through the camp until we ended up on the edge of it, next to one of the guard towers which surveyed us. Elm gave a small wave to the guard before telling him that he was just taking some time to get a bit of the view. The guard gave an odd smile before turning back to the inside of the camp, not even looking at us. While it was just a guess, it was pretty easy to assume they were frustrated by being forced to stand guard while others partied.

The camp was inside a mountainous region, far away from any other settlement or village. Outside of where we were, it was a densely wooded area with the trees creating a thick roof for the forest below. The night sky only gave the faint outlines of the land in front of us, but it was still beautiful. Presumably, the area where the camp was looked the same as this but was completely cleared in order to build the structures.

“Your name is North, right?”

“Yes. Just North. Nothing else.”

“You must be from the Corith, then. Pretty sure they don’t have last names.” He said, staring at the landscape below.

“Yeah… I don't know many others from Corith who are here. Sera’s the only other person from my village, although I hadn’t met her before we both ended up like… this. Been 5 years since then.” That past was now long gone, along with the village. It wasn’t even on the maps anymore, just a pile of ash with the remnants of buildings scattered throughout. We had lived close to the ever-growing border of the Arlin Empire, and our destruction acted as a warning shot for the ensuing invasion. It only took a few weeks for the capital to declare surrender.

“You don’t look that old. You must have been young.” His eyes didn’t move from the mountains but his thoughts were clearly elsewhere.

“I’m sorry.”

I turned to look at him, confused by his apparent confession of blame. There was a mix of complex emotions on his face that I couldn’t really decipher. He let out a deep sigh before continuing.

“I’ve met one other person with a light attunement before you. He was a bit similar to you in a way. I only met him for a few weeks, but his personality was pretty easy to get a read on. He had a lot of life in him and wanted to use it for others. Joined the war effort a couple of years before I did…” His voice began to wander as his head tilted up to the stars. “I doubt he’s alive. Maybe he is, but it’s not like he can do shit for me now, can he?”

Hearing Elm reminisce on the past felt odd, but it was clearly cathartic for him. Although his face didn’t really show it, he was gaining some levity from finally being able to tell parts of his own story which he had held in for so long. Why he was telling me specifically wasn’t something I had fully deciphered, but I didn’t mind listening.

“North, listen. I saw that look on your face last night. I know what it means, and I don’t want to see that happen. You can’t do it on your own. You’ll just get yourself killed.” His stone cold facade had melted away to reveal one of a man who had outlived too many others. “It will only make things worse.”

I took a deep breath, mentally preparing myself to respond until I was interrupted by a scream from an all too familiar voice. One that shook throughout my entire body.

I ran as fast as I could, my only thoughts being about Sera’s safety.