Kenrich woke without any new ideas. He could hardly sleep at all with the excitement of the possibilities associated with the magic ring, and spent most of the night making up new scenarios of what he would do if he were to acquire a fortune by selling it. He designed an entire mansion in his head. He imagined all the beautiful women who would shallowly love him for his vast fortune as he shallowly loved them for their looks. He imagined hiring a military group to forever protect his village so he could retire from mining. That last thought did make Kenrich feel slightly sad though. Mining was what he remembered his father for. It was his father’s passion to mine until he could not physically move anymore. Kenrich’s passion differed though. Having to be the only miner in a mine that produces nothing of interest for years definitely had a hand in changing his priorities. Kenrich now only cared about protecting his village and finding a way to move on himself without the guilt of thinking he could have done better. And the ring finally gave him hope for both of these.
Kenrich got out of his lumpy, straw-stuffed bed and walked over to the cracked teapot on the table. Kenrich’s home was less like a cottage and more like a room with a roof. The kitchen, bathroom, bedroom, and storage were not hidden from each other by any walls. Kenrich had inherited this home from his father after his passing. Kenrich’s father never thought he needed much, so this home was perfect for him, though raising a family in it was difficult with the severe lack of space. Kenrich’s childhood mostly revolved around him spending time outdoors where he could explore the forests nearby and find some small semblance of privacy that he could never achieve otherwise.
After picking up the cracked teapot, Kenrich started a fire in a small fireplace in the corner of the cottage, then walked outside to the stream near his house to collect fresh water. On his way back inside, he had already lost half of the water through the cracks of the teapot, even though he tried hard to block the cracks with his fingers. He then placed the teapot on the metal stand in the fireplace to boil the water. He then grabbed a small wooden mug and a spoonful of ground coffee from the canister next to it. He saw that the coffee was getting low which caused an annoyed grumble to leave his mouth. With the inspector coming, he needed all of his money to buy magic stones from Gaen in order to show that the mine was not dry. There was no room for buying coffee in his budget. This annoyance quickly turned back to hope though when he spotted the ring on his finger. Knowing that it was in fact real, brought him back to an excited mood even with the lack of coffee in his future. After finishing his bitter coffee and eating a slightly stale bread roll, Kenrich left for Gaen’s Gems, hoping to gather more information from the only person within miles to have any knowledge of magic stones.
On his walk to the small shopping district of the town, he was once again bothered by his fellow miners who were upset to not see him going towards the mines. Kenrich made an excuse that he was grabbing some supplies from the tool shop before he got started, and they seemed to accept that although with worried looks on their faces. Kenrich kind of liked the feeling that they were worried about no one being in the mine though. He figured it might make them return to finally start pulling their weight in this town.
Kenrich walked into Gaen’s shop and Gaen once again looked quite happy to see him. Gaen figured that Kenrich was here to finally buy some gems since the inspector was coming. Once Kenrich stated his business however, Gaen’s expression changed to one of disinterest. Gaen had little interest in things that did not bring him any gez.
“I already told you that there’s no way for me to see what power that stone has,” Gaen said. “You’d have much better luck traveling to Fril to try and find that out. They have one of the most expansive gemstone markets in all of Admia. I’ve also heard they have a description stone, so if you could convince them to use it on the ring, then you would have your answer.”
“Fril is so far away though…” Kenrich said.
“Life isn’t fair, Kenrich. There’s nothing I can do for y-”
Suddenly, there was a loud crash of something solid slamming against the shop wall. Gaen and Kenrich’s attention were then thrust toward the entrance of Gaen’s shop where the door was forcefully pushed open by a heavily armored man. The man entered with four individuals wearing leather armor, carrying sheathed broadswords. There were three men and one woman amongst them.
“Good morning, gentlemen,” the heavily armored man said. “I am Tinsen Entilin, commander of the unit that has entered your village. We are with the Admian military’s fourth division, and we have urgent business with the citizens of this town. We ask you to join all the others by the well in the center of town. This is not optional.”
Tinsen Entilin was wearing full steel-plated armor from head to toe, so Kenrich and Gaen saw him as little more than a war machine due to the lack of human skin shown anywhere on his body. Tinsen was a feared man throughout the region of Southeast Admia which is where Millin was located. Southeast Admia has always been overseen by the fourth division which is considered by many as one of the most cold-blooded of the seven military divisions located within Admia, which is saying quite a bit considering the focus of war in every aspect of high government within the country.
“W-what do you want?” Gaen squeaked out.
“You will know when you are allowed to know,” Tinsen said. “Now, hurry along. We have little time for insubordination with the war going on. Violet, escort these two to the center of town. We’ll look for stragglers.”
“Yes, sir,” said the female guard who was apparently named Violet. “Follow me.”
Female soldiers are not very common in Nedluca, but Admia is known for having more than other nations due to their militaristic ways and obsession with having the most soldiers of any nation around them. Violet was covered in form fitting leather armor much like the men who were also present. She had black hair that was mostly hidden within her leather helmet, emerald-green eyes, and was around 5’8 in height. She had a cold look in her eyes of determination and was quite beautiful all things considered.
“So, what’s this about?” Kenrich asked as they walked. “You soldiers never show your faces here anymore.”
“It’s nothing good. I’ll tell you that much,” Violet said. “This is going to be a difficult time for you all. Forced labor isn’t something I support, but it seems that there’s no way to change the mind of the emperor.”
“F-forced labor?” Gaen said. “Are we being sold into slavery?!”
“It’s not as bad as that, but it isn’t much better to tell you the truth,” Violet said. “I feel for you all, but you should prepare to have your freedom taken away for a time.”
“For how long?! I’ve got a shop to run!” Gaen said.
“It depends on how quickly we find the artifact,” Violet said.
“What artifact?” Kenrich asked.
“We’re here,” Violet said. “Just stand with the others and the commander will explain it all.”
Kenrich and Gaen arrived in the center of town and saw that everyone in the village was waiting with them. Millin was a small village of only around three hundred people, so it was not a difficult task for the soldiers to track everyone down. Commander Tinsen then walked towards the front of the group of villagers and started speaking.
“Thank you all for taking time to be here today,” he said. “You have all been brought here to help with the most important task in the history of the great nation of Admia. You will all do your part to help make sure that our empire wins the war by helping search for the Ring of Life.”
There were murmurs from the crowd with many of them sounding very confused. Millin had never been a place associated with anything known as the “Ring of Life” as far as they knew, and the town itself had not been of any historical importance at all throughout its existence. The only time Millin was visited by outsiders in the past twenty years was when the inspector came. No travelers ever passed through, soldiers never came to check on the condition of the people, no trade caravans appeared either. Millin was by all definitions, insignificant to everyone except those who lived within it.
“Now, I know you all must have a plethora of questions, but there’s only one thing you all need to know. This stone is more important than any of your lives, and even my own, so you are all to mine, dig, and search every corner of this village until you find the Ring of Life. You will all get time to sleep at night, and three meals a day, but every other second will be spent looking for the stone without any exceptions.”
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“What about the women and children?!” screamed a villager from the group.
“They of course will be under the same schedule,” Commander Tinsen said. “We can’t have any exceptions. This stone must be found posthaste.”
“What if the stone isn’t found?!” yelled another villager.
“There is no ‘isn’t.’ The Ring of Life has been tracked to this location, and you will all search until it is found. That is all there is to this. I will not be taking any more questions. The last information I will leave you with is a description of what you are looking for. The stone is a white opal that is on a gold ring with ravens carved into it. Once it is found, we will take it, leave the village, and you all will be allowed to go back to your insignificant lives. You are all dismissed.”
Ever since Kenrich heard about an ancient artifact, he was worried that this would be the case, but now that Commander Tinsen gave a description, it was perfectly clear that the ring they were looking for was the one that he had in his pocket. Suddenly, Kenrich’s entire plan of saving the village and living a lavish life with the sale of the ring was shattered. There was no way he was going to make a single gez off of the ring now, not if the Admian military wanted it. Kenrich was now even less clear on what his next move should be. If this ring was something that the emperor wanted for the war effort then it definitely has immense power. If this ring will truly give Admia an edge in the war, then it most likely will be something that will then start new wars with other neighboring nations that will inevitably cause the demise of Admia and therefore Millin. Kenrich and the other villagers were already lucky enough to not have been conscripted into the war effort yet, but with new conquests, it would be nearly impossible to not find themselves on the battlefield eventually, which would certainly cause the end of Millin due him not being there to lie about the mine not having an absence of gemstones.
The villagers dispersed and were led away by guards who were taking them to different sections of Millin where they were supposed to dig, looking for the ring that Kenrich had in his pocket. Violet ended up being the soldier in charge of Kenrich’s group which was within the mine of Millin. Kenrich finally got his wish to see the other miners back in the mine with him, but this is certainly not the way he wished it.
“If any of you find the ring, I need to know immediately,” Violet said to us. “You are not to tell anyone else except me if you find it.”
Kenrich mined the rest of the day with Ren, whose back seemed to be just fine now, and his other fellow miners. After a large amount of time had passed, they, of course, found nothing. They were then all led out of the mine by Violet and brought to the center of town where they were first told about their unfortunate futures earlier that day. The villagers were all given rations that consisted of water from the stream next to the town and a single bread roll each. There was no doubt that the villagers would tire of these meals sooner rather than later. Kenrich took a seat next to the well away from the others. He looked up though and saw that Gaen was walking towards him. Gaen sat down next to him and immediately said exactly what Kenrich was expecting.
“Kenrich. Give them the ring,” he said. “Think of the villagers. They said they will leave if they get the ring.”
“Things will be worse if they get the ring,” Kenrich said.
“I guarantee whatever you think will happen is not going to be worse than the situation we are in right now,” Gaen said. “What the hell do you think is going to happen?”
“If this ring really is as important and powerful as they say, they’re just going to use it as an excuse to start more wars. That’s all Admia does when they find powerful gems.”
“So what?!” Gaen said. “We’re always at war!”
“If we start more wars, there’s a good chance that you, me, and all the others of fighting age in this village will be forced to join the military,” Kenrich said. “That would ruin this town and many others like it.”
“Who cares about Millin?!” Gaen said. “This village is on its last legs anyway. The only reason I stuck around is because you kept buying my gems. Everyone was going to have to go somewhere else eventually. That’s how these things go.”
“I promised my dad I’d protect the village. That’s all he did his entire life. I told him that I’d take his place, so I can’t just leave this place to die.”
“Then what’s your plan?! There’s no chance that you can save the village now! Either we are all worked to death, or more wars start thanks to the ring and we die anyway! Just give them the ring and everyone can try and flee. That way at least they’d have a chance.”
“God damnit…” Kenrich said, holding his head. “There has to be a way.”
“There isn’t! Give them the ring!”
“I’ll give it some thought…”
Dinner then ended and everyone was told they were allowed to sleep for the night. Kenrich, who thought his life was changing for the better, now had the responsibility of the entire village and its people on his shoulders with no idea of what the right course of action was. Days passed, weeks passed, and Kenrich and the rest of the villagers still worked hard looking for something that wasn’t there. Every chance Gaen had, he would urge him to give them the ring, but Kenrich kept refusing saying that he was going to think of a way to make everyone happy somehow. The villagers were looking more battered and malnourished by the day with no one having any time to cook any sort of nutritious food for the villagers to eat. Every time Kenrich saw the children, he got closer to giving Violet the ring. He kept convincing himself there was a better way though and never went through with it.
About two weeks into the forced labor of the village, Commander Tinsen called the villagers back to the center of the village for an announcement. Once Kenrich had arrived, he saw just how many people were suffering, and he couldn’t stand to look at them anymore. The guilt was too much for him to bear, so he just closed his eyes.
“This has been going on for two weeks now, and it’s going to be much longer if you all don’t start taking this seriously! You all aren’t looking too healthy these days, so I sure hope that you all find the resolve to actually commit to uncovering the ring. Us members of the military are tired too from watching over you all, and we’d really prefer that you speed up this process. To help make this quicker for all of us, we are reducing your meals to two a day, and your time to sleep will be divided in half. This is for the benefit of us all, and I really hope that this helps motivate you all in your search. Dismissed.”
The crowd erupted into negativity after hearing this news. Everyone was exhausted and hungry, so knowing that it was going to get so much worse was too much for most of the villagers to handle. Many fell to the ground in tears, many others were screaming at the military members who in response pushed the villagers to the ground, and others had no reaction at all. They had an absence of life in their eyes before the meeting even started.
It was another difficult day in the mines for Kenrich and the others that ended in intense exhaustion much like every other day, but this time also was accompanied by the hopelessness that they had to go back to the mines after only four hours of rest. Kenrich did not sleep at all, he thought as hard as he could about what he was going to do and convinced himself that he would put a plan into action the next day no matter what. He could not watch the villagers suffer any more. He had that choice taken away from him though once he heard a violent knock at his door.
“We know you have the ring, Kenrich!” someone yelled from outside the door. “You’ve been sold out! They said you’ve had it the whole time too!” Kenrich recognized the voice as that of Tinsen. “Do you take us for fools? You will give us the ring immediately, and then you are under arrest for resisting an order from the emperor!”
Kenrich panicked. He knew that if he was going to be charged with resisting the order of the emperor that it almost certainly meant his death, and with possession of the ring, that would almost certainly mean the death of Millin. Not knowing what to do, Kenrich felt his only option was to escape through the back window of his cottage. The knocking was getting louder, and it appeared they were trying to break down the door. The door was old and brittle, so it was not going to stay latched for long. Kenrich took his chance and leapt out of his window, where he saw two guards on either side of him. The cottage was surrounded. Kenrich struggled, but was able to shake off the guards and run past them towards the forest across the stream near his home. He knew he was being followed and had to lose them somehow, but he knew it was going to be difficult due to the magic gemstones the soldiers certainly possessed. He then felt an intense heat from his right side, and watched a fireball explode right in front of him. He shielded his face, and managed to escape being burned. He knew there had to be more coming so he started running in zig-zags trying to evade their projectiles. Kenrich was faster than the soldiers, but that and a knowledge of the land were the only two advantages he had.
Kenrich recognized a tree that he carved his initials into when he was young, and remembered there was a small cave that he had used when he was younger that he covered with branches to prevent others from entering. He knew that was his only chance, so he took a sharp right towards the location of the cave. He heard a fireball explode behind him after taking the turn and realized he would have certainly been dead if he stayed on that path for even a second longer. Finding the cave entrance exactly as he remembered it, he slid down the side of the cave wall into the dark hole. He covered most of the entrance leaving just enough space to let some moonlight in so he could see. Kenrich was breathing heavily, and while he felt safe for a small amount of time, he quickly realized that with the importance of this ring, they most likely would never give up on finding him.
Kenrich had no weapons, and no powerful gems of his own except for the ring which he had no knowledge of the abilities of, so there was no chance he would be able to fight his way out of the village. Knowing that the soldiers had fireball gems definitely cemented just how important this mission was for them. Fireball gems are usually only given to soldiers during very important battles as they are one of the most powerful offensive gemstones. Kenrich sat for what felt like hours, occasionally hearing the crunch of leaves from outside the cave which would make him hold his breath. Suddenly, he heard one set of footsteps coming closer to the cave than any had before. The crunch of leaves came closer, and closer until the crash of someone falling right through the makeshift roof onto the hard cave floor made Kenrich’s heart stop. Much more moonlight was now shining through the hole and he could see clearly that this guard was one he recognized from his weeks in the mines, it was Violet.