During the Thousand-Year War, the scattered tribes and minor forest states of elves came together to form an alliance now known as the Confederation of City-states. The reason for their unification was to drive off the encroachments of the more numerous werewolf and oni tribes that sought to plunder their forests for their high-quality wood and elven slaves. Ironically, it was their decision to unite that caused the war to continue far past when it should have, as the ratio of Masters to normal citizens amongst elvenkind was four or five times what it was compared to their neighbors.
The elves' tactics relied on utilizing their powerful Masters as captains leading mixed forces of one hundred to five hundred. These forces were feared by the werewolves and oni of the time, because they were capable of destroying an entire warband without taking losses. In order to counter the power of the united elves, the werewolves and oni also united and created racial nations, though these nations have mostly crumbled since. Utilizing large-scale wave tactics, they were able to counter the elite forces of the elves at great cost. Both sides, needing time to recover, settled into an unspoken truce with only minor scuffles for close to a century.
It was only when the nascent spirit fox Empire was brought into the war by an overenthusiastic werewolf raiding party that the stalemate created by this turn of events started the wars up again. It was unfortunate for the Empire and the Confederation were separated by the lands of their enemies, as both peoples tend to be isolationist to the extreme when left to their own devices. Their common interests would have inevitably led to the war ending much earlier, with near-genocidal results for the warlike werewolves and oni.
Toward the end of the war, the fecund werewolves and oni seemed to have an advantage, but a massive push by the elites of the Empire, made in tandem with the Confederation, burned the capitols of the two races and forced large swathes of their populations into permanent indenture. Individuals of those races fled to other continents, where they mostly ended up as serfs or indentures of the local populace, with a few exceptions like Gevaria, which is ruled by oni warlords, and Tradan, which is ruled by the Mercenary King, a werewolf selected every twelve years in a tournament of arms.
Ironically, today elves and spirit foxes on those other continents live alongside the werewolves and oni, neither of them caring much for the history of the central continent.
An excerpt from the memoires of the elven historian Iskea Ladrianne~
Four Years Later, The Elven City-state of Grun’er, Noble District
Iryun ran atop a pole placed in the yard behind his grandfather’s manse, rocks and blunted arrows flying at him from both sides. He jumped, flipped, and slid along as necessary to remain atop the pole, never losing his balance.
As he reached the end of the pole, a blast of wind threw him off the pole, slamming him into the packed earth below with a thud. He managed to prevent his head from slamming into the ground, but the last strike had taken him entirely by surprise, so he wasn’t able to prevent the painful impact against his shoulder.
His grandfather, an elderly elf (looking like he was in his late forties) with white-streaked silver hair chuckled and said, “I’ve told you again and again, boyo. You can’t let down your guard just because you are at the end of the course.”
The course, in this case, was an obstacle course formed by ropes hanging over a pond, a small wooded area full of traps, and the pole. The first few weeks, he failed to make it past the pond, his mother and grandfather gleefully firing off wind spells and throwing rocks to dunk him in the pond. The next four months, he was stopped in the wooded area, tripped into pit traps by invisible strings, slammed unconscious by swinging logs, and tossed head over heels by summoned wind spirits.
The last year, he had failed again and again to make it across the pole. The main reason was that, while he was allowed to choose his own route through the other areas, the pole was a single path, where he could only rely on his physical talents to get past his grandfather’s interference.
With a sigh, Iryun took a look at his status for the first time in four weeks.
Name: Iryun Liodosia
Age: 9
Race: Spirit Fox (elven bloodline)
Common Skills: Qigong 3, Sage Arts 3, Magic 2, Farming 1, Barehanded 2, Acrobatics 2, Athletics 2, Staff Weapons 1, Bladed Weapons 1, Bows 1
Passive Skills: Mental Contamination 8 (locked, hidden), Mental Resistance 2, Magic Resistance 2, Blunt Resistance 1, Pierce Resistance 1, Pain Resistance 1
Unique Skills: Divine Contract: Artifact Steed 1, Infinite Growth, World Inventory 1
Needless to say, his skill growth was impressive. It was common for most people to fail to pass level 2 in any skill before adulthood and he had already reached 3 in two of the three powers. Unfortunately, magic had fallen behind, as the formulae of spells grew exponentially more complex with each tier of spell.
Sage arts and qigong both came easily to him. His spiritual sense and energy grew easily (compared to other people) and he seemed to have a higher vital energy naturally than most spirit foxes or elves. Unfortunately, he was only a little more intelligent than the average young man, so magic didn’t come to him nearly as easily as the other two powers.
Unfortunately, he knew from his mother’s explanations that the ‘level 3 wall’ was where most people stalled on any given skill. The reason was that it was the first point where growth became exponentially more difficult, as people had to seek inspiration as well as train to exceed that level and reach 4. The average adventurer usually had a few level 3 skills, but most never got past that level.
The second ‘wall’ was at level 7, and the third was at level 9. Reaching 8 was something men worked at for decades, as opposed to the years of dedication needed to reach level 4. Reaching 10, the maximum level of any given skill, was something that was only achieved by two or three out of a thousand.
Iryun rose to his feet with a groan and glared at his grandfather, Siran, “Grandpa, I’m going to punch the life out of you.”
With a hiss of breath drawn into his lungs in the manner he was taught, Iryun circulated qi and leapt forward, unleashing a flurry of blows at his grandfather… which were all deflected with the index finger of the old man’s right hand, which glowed with the orange of focused qi, the combination of mana and vital energy.
Iryun’s grandfather, Siran, was the martial arts master to the City Lord, a prestigious position he had held for well over a century. Before that, he had fought as a mercenary and a soldier for over five hundred years. Iryun overcoming him, even with the old man’s gradually failing physical abilities, was impossible.
Iryun knew this. The faded part of him that had once been wholly Tajiri understood just how immense the gap between them was. He had little doubt his grandfather had at least one skill above 9, perhaps two or three, making him a Master.
However, Iryun was a child. The knowledge and experience Tajiri had given him when he decided to allow his consciousness to subordinate itself to Iryun was helpful, but he didn’t truly understand much of it on a gut level.
Because of that knowledge, he easily mastered reading, writing, and he could understand the histories he was forced to read by his tutors by utilizing Tajiri’s understanding. However, when it came to combat training, Tajiri’s understanding didn’t really connect with Iryun’s.
What they shared was a dislike of losing and a passion for growing in power that only grew stronger every time they gained a skill level. So it was that Iryun ignored Tajiri’s assessment of their chances of victory, and he was once again thrown to the ground with a casual twist of a finger when the old man grew bored of his grandson’s futile attacks.
Strangely, Iryun was becoming more reckless than the daredevil Tajiri had been with each year. Tajiri, as faded as he was, thought that somehow the parts of them that loved the flow of adrenaline a good sparring match or flying across the obstacle course were magnifying one another.
Iryun scrambled to his feet, a spark of lightning flashing from his left hand as he used the second tier basic spell, Flash. His grandfather easily blocked it with qi, smiling slightly with approval at the dirty trick. His grandfather ascribed to the school of thought that ‘everything is a weapon’ and ‘no tactic is too dirty’. As a result, his students were often seen as ‘polite bastards’ who acted polite outside the battlefield and were dirty fighters on it.
However, the flash of lightning was a distraction, the real attack was a knee-level dirt golem created with sage arts. The little creature looked like a thick-bodied humanoid with sharp claws instead of hands.
Before it could grab onto Siran’s knee, the old man pursed his lips and released a breath, enhancing it with sage arts so that it became a small whirlwind of wind blades that quickly dismembered the creature.
Iryun’s shoulders slumped in disappointment. He hadn’t really thought the trick would work, but it was disappointing that it didn’t even managed to touch Siran before it was destroyed.
“Your sage arts have gotten quicker, and you’ve gotten to the point where you can use a basic tier 2 spell without needing to think through the entire formula. You are also getting better at using what is at hand and using feints and tricks. If you had a weapon, you might have managed to land a hit on me when you used that little golem,” Siran assessed. He was only using the tiniest portion of his power, but it was still impressive for a child to be able to do that much. He was joyful that his grandson was as talented as his daughter, even if he was a half-blood.
“Thanks, Grandpa,” Iryun said happily, joyful at being praised by the strict old man.
“Your skill with weapons is still only adequate though… I’ll want you to pass the first wall with at least two combat skills before you are allowed to become an adventurer,” The old man warned.
That was Iryun’s dream. He wanted to become an adventurer like his mother, who was currently out hunting monsters near the borderlands. If his grandfather required that he get that strong, then he would do his best!
____________________________________________________________________________
Siran’s manse was a two-floor home with twelve bedrooms, a bath room, a kitchen, a formal dining hall, a formal living room, a den, and a study on the second floor. In addition, there was a grand hall at the front entrance, meant for greeting guests more than anything else.
The walls were of cut stone paneled with dark wood, and the floors were stone with simple woven rugs placed along their length. The impression one gained when one entered the main house was that of a poor noble house doing its best, but that was mostly because the old elf had little interest in beauty (other than women) or luxury (other than alcohol).
Siran was unusual for an elven noble in a lot of ways, not the least of which the fact that he was ennobled for his actions on the battlefield. One of the reasons was that his servants were all half-elves (though their parents were from various races), a fact that often disturbed the elven nobles who came to visit him (Iryun was pretty sure that was the reason he did it). As a result, he had a reputation amongst the more ‘enlightened’ nobility as a philanthropist, whereas the more conservative nobility considered him eccentric at best.
The fact that all the servants were beautiful (and youthful) women probably had something to do with that.
Iryun’s room was on the second floor, next door to his mother’s. Typical to Siran’s tastes, the bed was a simple box with a straw mattress and a feather pillow with a linen cover. The sheets were of decent quality linen, and a heavy white wool blanket lay on top. A night-stand made of oak sat beside the bed, with a pitcher of water enchanted to remain full and cold sitting atop it. The floors were covered with fur rugs to keep the heat in, as the winters in the area were bitingly cold. A brazier sat in the corner for use during the winter months.
He sat on his bed in the late afternoon, reading a history book his tutor had assigned him, called ‘The Thousand-Year War’. It was a history covering the period in which the mystics and spirit foxes were at war with the oni, werewolves, and elves. Though it was called ‘The Thousand-Year War’, the period actually had several times when there were fifty years or more without any conflict. The main reason it was all considered one war was that the leadership of each side remained mostly the same throughout that time (the longer-lived variants of each race tend to end up as rulers). As such, the collective recognition of those who made history by signing the peace treaties at the end was that it was all one long period of war.
This was reflected in how the book described the conflict, as it was written by a high elf who had fought through it from beginning to end, first as a common soldier, later as a general leading ever larger forces. The elf’s despair and grief at the losses he had suffered during the war were reflected subtly in how he phrased his assessment of various peaks in the conflict, and it was obvious that he considered the entire matter to be a black spot in the world’s history.
The war had ended two hundred years before, and most of the larger nations from that time had dissolved in the last century, the Mystic State and the Spirit Empire being the two largest nations to retain their national integrity after the war. In reality, there was more war across the face of the world then than there had been at the peak of the Thousand-Year War. However, because large swathes of each continent remained relatively peaceful, no one was assessing such matters in an objective manner.
Iryun closed the book with a sigh and began to consider ways he could use his skills to take his grandfather by surprise. The problem was the old man’s right eye was the Mystic Eye of Penetration, which passively allowed him to see beneath the skin of his opponents, meaning that he could predict how people were going to attack before they did (its active effect was even scarier). Moreover, he was a skilled user of Mana Sight, which let him view the flows of energy through the air and the user’s body, making it virtually impossible to get ahead of him.
It was a mark of how much Iryun was influenced by Tajiri that he took it as a challenge rather than giving up. Most children his age would have fallen into despair once they were told the reasons they couldn’t win, but Tajiri and Iryun found it exciting to try to think of ways to get around the old elf’s abilities.
Next to the wall opposite the bed were a wooden stand, where Iryun’s practice weapons lay. His grandfather insisted on him learning all the major types of weapons, so there was a halberd, a short spear, a battle axe, a katana-like sword, a short sword, a straight broadsword, a rapier, a circular shield, a main gauche, a short bow, a long bow, and two curved daggers. Iryun had yet to learn the use of the larger weapons, but the old elf had made his intentions clear.
So far, he’d learned how to use the broadsword, the short sword, daggers, the short spear, the rapier, the katana, and the main gauche. He was also learning the bow, but his talent for it fell well-behind even the least of the full-blooded elves around him. As such, his grandfather chose not to concentrate on it.
While he now had what stood for a passing familiarity with each of the weapons he’d tried so far (elven standards for weapon skills were higher than most of the other races), his grandfather was urging him to pick one to concentrate on in the future, The katana, the rapier, or the short spear.
That was Tajiri’s assessment. Iryun seemed to have a facility for light weapons, and the katana was a better choice than the short sword. The short spear he added because Iryun seemed to have a natural sense for how things were positioned around him, making the acrobatic style of spearfighting his grandfather had introduced to him a good match. The daggers he didn’t even consider, despite Iryun’s talents. Using daggers as a primary weapon was just asking to get skewered by the first spear-wielder you met, from his experiences on the training grounds.
Unless Iryun put on a lot more muscle than he thought likely when he reached puberty, they were unlikely to ever be able to use a battle axe effectively. The halberd had possibilities, as well as the war pike kept on the practice yard, but both weapons were somewhat awkward in comparison to the short spear.
The biggest problem they were having was the absolute advantage the old man had over them… the fact that they were under ten, and thus didn’t have access to the enhancements to body and mind from skill levels. Training their body with harsh physical work and qi circulation, as well as training their mind and spirit with magic and sage arts was having noticeable effects… but that was apparently nothing compared to the power that was gained once one could access the full effects of skill levels.
He shrugged, his ears twitching in agitation as he tried to dismiss the frustration of being so limited compared to those around him. His tail lashed back and forth furiously as he struggled to take hold of the turbulent emotions within him.
In the end, Iryun was still a child, though he would never admit it.
_________________________________________________________________________
A year later
I opened my eyes for the first time on the day of my tenth birthday. Iryun and Tajiri were both gone, and I now lived. Tajiri’s and Iryun’s experiences were distant to me, their emotions a mere echo of what I was sure I had felt only a day before.
I was both a combination of the two and a completely different person. Iryun and Tajiri’s souls had died the moment I became complete, sacrificed to birth me into their body. At the same time, the memories of Tajiri’s final hours before his reincarnation came to me, and I understood the ‘how’, if not the ‘why’.
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
The trickster god pretending to be an old man had reincarnated Tajiri into a body that already had a soul, then induced the two souls to fuse, in order to create a new being who possessed the powers the god had wanted. I looked at my status.
Name: Iryun Liodosia
Age: 10
Race: Spirit Fox (elven bloodline)
Common Skills: Qigong 3, Sage Arts 4, Magic 3, Farming 1, Barehanded 2, Acrobatics 3, Athletics 3, Staff Weapons 2, Bladed Weapons 3, Bows 1, Axes 1, Shield 1
Passive Skills: Fused Soul (concealed), Mental Resistance 3, Magic Resistance 2, Blunt Resistance 2, Pierce Resistance 2, Pain Resistance 2
Unique Skills: Divine Contract: Artifact Steed 1, Infinite Growth, World Inventory 1
Mental Contamination had become ‘Fused Soul’, a skill without a level. Iryun had read that skills sometimes evolved into a version that didn’t have a level at 10, depending on the results of their growth. I nodded as I confirmed what I already knew.
I still had some of the emotions – the deeper ones – possessed by Iryun and Tajiri. I still loved our mother deeply, respected our grandfather, and I believed I still enjoyed training to get stronger.
However, ‘lesser’ feelings that were not important to the core of either individual had not survived the fusion of their souls to create me. It was likely they had been burned away to fuel the refinement of the two souls.
‘Iryun’ and ‘Tajiri’ no longer existed… which was problematic. It was unlikely that I could fool my grandfather or my mother, so I had to consider how I would explain my situation. There was also the geas the trickster had put on Tajiri before reincarnation to consider. I was bound to obey up to three orders given by the god that didn’t involve me causing harm to family or friends. I would be incapable of disobeying those commands when they came, which might very well cause me trouble later.
Tajiri was careless… but I suppose that shouldn’t be a surprise from a man who had rock-climbing, bungee jumping and skydiving as hobbies, I thought with a wry smile. Tajiri’s carelessness about his own future was one of the major reasons why he had been chosen, most likely. I was fairly sure the god had killed him on purpose.
Suddenly, black mist filled the room, converging on a point just in front of my bed. A few moments later, a familiar old man with abyssal eyes and a long white beard stood before me. With a sigh, I rose from the bed and pulled a rough blue linen robe over my shoulders before turning back to him.
“So, have you come to collect, Trickster?” I asked sarcastically.
The god clapped, looking overjoyed, “As I thought, your souls fused nicely… and your potential has been increased enough that you might actually survive the tasks I have for you.”
I sighed, ignoring the oppressive aura that filled the room. Like Tajiri, I seemed to have a natural resistance to being influenced by others’ auras, even if it didn’t do much for the headache exposure to divinity was giving me.
“So, what is it you want from me?” I asked.
He caressed his beard thoughtfully as he brought up my status, as if it were his own. After a few moments, he nodded and waved his hand, dismissing the window, “You will need to get quite a bit stronger before you undertake the task I want you to fulfill… and you won’t get any stronger remaining here. Your grandfather was about to enroll you in the military academy, but they can’t teach you anything you won’t learn faster under the man I’m sending you to.”
A moment later, a magic circle made of purple light appeared under my feet, and the god tossed me a letter sealed with red wax, a seal that looked like a pen wrapped in ribbons that formed a vaguely star-like shape impressed in the middle, “Iryun, I command you by the geas. You will serve Diandra Corveas as an apprentice mercenary for the next four years.”
I felt chains wrap themselves around every aspect of my being, and a pulsing need to obey his command melted away any defiance I might have felt.
I looked down at my slender ivory-skinned hands with their silver nails that were gradually gaining a curve, and I noted I was quickly becoming translucent, Teleportation, maybe?
I barely had the will left over to articulate my thoughts as words, so I missed the malevolent smile the trickster gave me as I was swept away.
The teleport dropped me from ten feet in the air, causing me to plop onto the ground with a loud thud, pain shooting through my right shoulder and hip from the impact. If it was before my tenth birthday, I might have broken something.
A moment later, I was dragged to my feet by an iron hand on the back of my neck before something cold settled around my neck with a click. I was forced to turn around by a hand on my shoulder to face a werewolf with a heavily-scarred face, dressed in leather armor save for metal plates over his vital points. Two axes with a spike on the opposite end from the blade were swinging from loops on his belt.
Did I just become a slave? I wondered. I felt the geas press down on my thoughts, indicating that I was to obey the man before me.
“I’m Diandra, kid. For the next four years, you’re going to be an indenture trainee in my mercenary band. If you do your part, you’ll be fed. If you slack off, I’ll command the collar to take off your head,” He said roughly.
That was the beginning of the worst six months of my life.
_____________________________________________
Six Months Later
I cast a lightning bolt, the third-tier spell lightning strike, at the head of the elf in front of me, causing his head to burst into flames. I swept my spear under the legs of the werewolf fighting the man next to me, dropping him to the ground where my partner thrust his broadsword into his neck in a spray of crimson.
Fireballs flashed across the battlefield as mage-types on both sides tried to do as much damage to the enemy as they could. A few men on the front line with me were tossing first or second tier attack spells as they fought, but most couldn’t even manage that, given how desperate the situation was for both sides.
The clash of steel and the screams of the dying resonated in my ears as I caught a spirit fox’s burning axe on the metal rim of my shield, redirecting the power of the blow behind me, causing him to stumble forward. I thrust my spear through the gap in his armor beneath the armpit, releasing the shaft to draw the simple shortsword I’d been issued as my secondary weapon.
I was just in time to parry the spearthrust of a young elven woman with green hair who leapt over the burning corpse of the first one I’d killed. I slammed the edge of my shield into her face before blasting her off her feet with a second-tier force strike. I then slammed my armored foot into her throat, crushing her trachea to make sure she wouldn’t be getting up again.
After six months of this nightmare, I barely thought anything of the people I had just killed. This was the seventh battle I’d been thrown into since being enslaved, and I had grown accustomed to the killing to a degree I never would have believed when I awoke that fateful days half a year before.
We outnumbered the enemy slightly, but the battle was more or less on even terms. Knights in the service of the two lords trying to take one another’s territory rampaged across the battlefield, cutting into the flanks of squares of spearmen and trampling militia troops into a bloody mess. Archers and mages rained arrows, fire, and lightning on the infantry, and mercenary units like ours did our best to survive to earn our pay.
I could see Diandra gleefully cutting his way through the medium-armored infantry lines, slaughtering them as if they were unarmed peasants. The man was so fast and strong, his qi flowing so smoothly and powerful that the common troops truly couldn’t do anything to stop him.
I slammed my shield forward into the sword hand of a scarred oni woman, causing her to lose her grip on the weapon in her right hand. However, her second sword came close to taking my head off, as I only managed to slide under the blow in the bloody mud a moment before it would have hit. I slashed behind me, cutting her achilles tendon. My partner rammed his sword through her skull a moment later, only to be tossed backward by a second tier rock blast to the chest.
I fired off a second tier spark into the hand of the caster, stunning him for a moment before I tossed my shield, slamming it into his head. I sheathed my short sword and picked up a fallen katana, leaping forward and sweeping the weapon across his throat, splattering crimson across my vision before I quick-stepped around him and thrust the weapon through the knee of the next werewolf behind him.
The man dropped to the ground, unable to support the weight of the scale armor he was wearing on the ruined leg, and I removed his head. Unfortunately, the katana cracked when it went through his spine, so when I tried to parry the sweeping blow of a halberd from the man to my right, it shattered, causing the much-reduced force of the blow to toss me off my feet.
It hadn’t quite broken through my armor, but I could feel a bruise forming under it.
The man with the halberd tried to rush me, but two crossbow bolts appeared in his chest, dropping him to the ground before he could. I pulled myself to my feet just in time to see our reinforcements pour through the hole in the enemy lines made by Riandra. The militia behind the mercenary unit we had been facing off with melted away, leaving the corpses of the pitiful farmers and their poor-quality spears lying broken on the ground behind them.
The surviving mercenaries surrendered immediately, quietly allowing themselves to be stripped of their weapons by our fellows. If they paid their blood coin, they would be released after the battle. Otherwise, they were destined for slavery.
The opposing lord withdrew his knights a few minutes later, scattered infantry fleeing the battlefield in his wake. Our side’s knights pursued them, throwing javelins at their backs as they went.
I searched for my spear and found it still lodged in the armpit of the dying mercenary. The man was still alive, but by the amount of blood flowing from his armpit, he was doomed. I grasped the shaft and thrust it forward, deeper into his body to finish him off before twisting it and withdrawing the weapon, kicking the corpse so that it fell over on its side.
Despite being only ten years old, the last few months had caused me to go through a major growth spurt. I looked like a spirit fox in their mid-teens instead of a child. Apparently, my skills had forced my body to mature quickly once I passed my tenth birthday.
As I strolled through the battlefield, I occasionally kicked weapons that looked good, drawing them into my inventory. Mercenaries tend to go through weapons quickly, though the cheap trash most used made that mostly irrelevant. My spear was spoils from my last battle, and it had a shaft reinforced with a core of steel. The shortsword was the trash our unit issued to every newbie.
I went looking for my shield, but I couldn’t find it before I felt the collar tighten, telling me Diandra was calling me back.
Oh well, I managed to pick up a few more from the battlefield… I just will fail to mention I lost the damned thing, I thought resignedly as I began jogging in the direction of our camp.
I ran back to camp, ignoring the familiar sensation of my collar slowly constricting around my neck.
The mercenary camp was a lightly-fortified position on the edge of the battlefield, a partially-rebuilt fortified watch tower surrounded by a broken stone wall. Inside the walls, there were around two dozen canvas tents and a single large black silk tent near the entrance of the tower. Each tent was designed to allow four people to sleep inside, with room for their kit and a small travel chest. The large tent was Diandra’s, and it also served as a command tent. Two of the younger members of Diandra’s personal guards, both werewolves (all the central members of the mercenary company were werewolves).
They were of the ‘furry’ type of werewolf, looking like a wolf standing on two legs. They both wore steel breastplates and scale leggings, of higher quality than the scale and hardened leather given to newbies like me. The scales on my armor were of much poorer quality, and the leather had several holes in it (in the shape of blades, with a few arrow holes) from previous wearers. I had a few suits of good armor in my inventory, but I wasn’t stupid enough to actually use them where Diandra could find me. Until I became a member in good standing, those that already were could strip me of anything but the company issue weapons I’d been given without consequence.
They gestured for me to enter, their eyes apathetic. The werewolves that served under Diandra were only interested in him and fighting. Their emotions to the highly-disposable trainees like myself were nonexistent.
When I entered, I felt the collar loosen and felt a familiar sense of relief. Being choked never really got easier.
Diandra was being wiped down by a young werewolf girl (of the less furry type, with a human-like face and golden eyes) with a golden slave collar around her throat. Her figure was full and ripe, and it was obvious why she was present, even if I hadn’t already known.
Diandra was also a more human-type werewolf, with tanned skin lined with dozens of scars, large and small. His back had a foot-wide scar that most likely came from a sword running from his right shoulder blade to a half a foot above his buttocks.
“You did good kid. A few more battles like that, and your collar will come off,” He said, not bothering to wait for me to say anything. It was always like this with Diandra. He didn’t want a response from me, he just said what came to mind.
“You didn’t puke or hesitate this time, so you’ve definitely improved. Take this to the quartermaster and tell him I gave permission for you to get a new shield and a better quality sword,” He tossed me a crimson token imprinted with his personal seal, a wolf’s head biting into the throat of an elven maiden.
I saluted by pounding my right hand against my chest before departing, ignoring the sounds of intercourse that began even as the flap fell down behind me. It was at times like this that I was glad I hadn’t hit puberty yet. There were almost always nude women in Diandra’s tent when I came in...and he used them up pretty quickly. The lucky ones were trained as mercenaries, the unlucky ones said or did something that pissed him off and ended up buried head down in a latrine the next morning. He never kept a lover for more than a week.
The quartermaster was inside the tower itself, where our supplies and the spoils from the battlefield were kept. We would be departing the moment we got our pay (which was likely to be three or four days, given the need for the local lord to secure his new territory), but until then, our supplies would be kept inside the tower.
Barrels of salted meat and hardtack were stacked against the walls, with smaller barrels of whiskey, cheap wine, and beer kept in the bed of the wagon placed near the back, secured behind a steel cage of a similar type to that used for transporting slaves. A fat dwarf sat on the edge of the wagon, with a young elf girl bobbing her head between his legs.
I felt my usual surge of disgust at the sight. The girl was one of several captives taken in our previous battle who had turned out not to have any ransom value, since her family was wiped out. The other captives were probationers like me, and half of them were already dead on the battlefield outside.
I couldn’t do anything about the girl’s situation, so I tossed the chit at the dwarf, who placed it against his forehead briefly before shoving the girl off of him to sprawl on the floor. He pulled his pants on and turned to me, “So a new shield and a better sword, is it? You must’ve done good for the boss to give you this chit.”
The chits had the quality of storing a small snippet of memory inside them when accessed with sage arts, and that memory could be drawn out by simply ‘pulling’ instead of ‘pushing’. As such, they were quite useful when a commander wanted to be sure an underling got precisely what he wanted him to get.
I handed my old shortsword, sheath and all, to the dwarf and he asked, “What’s your preferred type? Since he’s letting you have a better sword, might as well be one you can actually use. A waste of good steel, otherwise.”
“Something with a curved edge,” I answered. In training, I'd discovered I did better with sabers, katanas, and other curved blades. Tip-heavy swords like falchions and machetes would do in a pinch, since they were great for chopping through limbs when you were too tired to swing a blade properly.
The dwarf grunted and turned to one of the weapon crates behind the wagon, rummaging through it for a few minutes before pulling out a long saber with a curve near the tip. The guard flared outward at the front, forming a knuckle guard with punch spikes extending half an inch outward from three points. The pommel was a simple steel ball, suitable for crunching skulls with a good backhand.
He tossed the weapon to me, followed by a leather sheath. I attached the sheath to the clip on my sword belt and went through the motions of a practice kata with the weapon before sheathing it at my left hip. While I was doing that, he rummaged through another of the crates and pulled out a metal-rimmed wood shield similar to the one I’d been using. It had a few holes in it (most likely arrows or spears, judging by the shape), but that wasn’t anything unusual. Probationers were never given good weapons, after all.
He tossed it my way, and I strapped it to my left arm, sighing internally because it was even more battered than my old one. It was better than nothing.
“Kid, ye should be careful. De boss likes te throw kids like ye to the wolves for fun,” The dwarf warned before turning back to the elf girl, who was quivering with trepidation. She was beautiful, but that beauty was marred by her obvious terror of the barrel-shaped man walking toward her.
However, just the thought of doing something about it caused my collar to tighten, and I forced myself to turn around, heading for the probationers’ area of the camp.
I was aware of what the dwarf had mentioned. Probationers that approached their last days in a collar tended to die during their last ‘test’. In the last six months, of the forty-three probationers who had made it to the last stage, only four had survived to be added to the company rolls. Diandra only wanted those who would survive everything he could throw at them in the main company, and probationers were easily obtained after a battle. The spoils always included a few dozen slaves, after all.
I looked at my status.
Name: Iryun Liodosia
Age: 10
Race: Spirit Fox (elven bloodline)
Common Skills: Qigong 4, Sage Arts 4, Magic 4, Farming 1, Barehanded 2, Acrobatics 3, Athletics 4, Staff Weapons 4, Bladed Weapons 3, Bows 1, Axes 1, Shield 2
Passive Skills: Fused Soul (concealed), Mental Resistance 4, Magic Resistance 2, Blunt Resistance 2, Pierce Resistance 2, Pain Resistance 4
Unique Skills: Divine Contract: Artifact Steed 1, Infinite Growth, World Inventory 2
I’d improved a lot in a number of areas, breaking through the first wall in qigong, magic, athletics, staff weapons, mental resistance, and pain resistance. As a result, my body was stronger and faster than most of the core members of the company… and I was fairly sure it was because of Infinite Growth. From what I could tell, Infinite Growth seemed to lower the hurdle to pass the walls and made it easier for me to get results from hard work and combat experience. Reaching 4 in all three powers had resulted in a vast strengthening and deepening of all three energies, but I wasn’t progressing in sage arts, as most of them were difficult to use in close range combat.
Diandra was close to being a Master, so I didn’t stand a chance in hell of standing against him for more than a few seconds. He’d pounded that into me in the first week, before he tossed me to his underlings for ‘training’.
I wasn’t sure if I could survive what he was planning for me, though. I had a feeling the difficulty was going to spike immensely compared to my recent experiences on the battlefield.
I arrived at the probationers’ camp. The tents there were visibly more battered and stained than those in the rest of the camp, and the atmosphere was grim and gloomy, despite the victory. Roughly half the tents had no occupants anymore, and most of the others were down to two or three young men and women.
I could hear desperate grunts and pleasured cries from a few of the tents, where the younglings desperately tried to forget the events of the day. There was little or no love there, just a need to forget the constant struggle to survive.
A young woman lay on a sheet outside one of the tents, her hands held over a blood-stained bandage on her belly. She was an elf with green hair and blue eyes that was from my latest team. As I approached, her pain-glazed eyes fell on me with a sense of vague recognition.
I could tell at a glance she wasn’t going to live through the night, which was probably why she had been dumped in front of the tent instead of being directed to the medical tent on the other side of the camp.
“Iryun,” She mumbled. The tent behind her was empty. Our team was gone, save for us, apparently… not that it mattered. I would get stuck with the newest and rawest recruits, as always.
The girl was seventeen, significantly older than me. The only reason she hadn’t ended up as an officer’s sex slave was because she’d been trained as a qi-warrior before she was captured. Not that that had stopped any of the officers from taking her innocence… none of the females in the probationers’ camp were innocent anymore.
“I’m going to die,” She stated flatly, obviously trying to restrain tears.
“Yes,” I replied, looking down at her with a deep feeling of helplessness welling within. I’d experienced something like this four times in the last six months of my life, and I was deathly afraid of growing numb to the deaths of those around me. However, there was little I could do about my situation with the collar around my neck.
“I don’t want to die,” She said, the tears welling forth and streaming down her face.
“What’s your name?” I asked, just as I had the other four times.
“Niia,” She whispered, looking confused at the question.
“Niia,” I said, imprinting the name into my memories, along with her face, “I will remember you.”
Her eyes widened briefly, and she started shaking, sobbing like a small child. I sat down on the grass beside her and grasped her left hand, my other hand gently caressing her head.
I didn’t know any healing spells. They hadn’t been a priority of my grandfather during my training, and the mercs weren’t interesting in teaching such spells to children like me. I had little talent for that aspect of magic, anyway.
Through the night, I continued to caress her head and hold her hand, ignoring the stiffness that crept into my limbs as I comforted her. The sense of helplessness threatened to consume me entirely again and again, but I held it back, not wanting to show Niia weakness.
Around midnight, she whispered something, a plea or thanks I would never know, shuddered, and ceased to breathe. Her eyes stared up emptily at the blue moon above us, and I reached down and closed them, placing a copper coin in her mouth as an offering to the ferryman. Hopefully, her next life would not be as painful as this one.
I carefully stripped her weapons and armor as was required of me by the rules of the company, enforced by my collar, then wrapped her in the sheet she lay on, hefting her surprisingly heavy body over my shoulders before walking out of camp.
Once outside of camp, I cast the fourth-tier earth spell, Wellmaker, and dug a deep trench, seven feet deep, in the earth before me. I got down inside the trench and lay her gently on the earth, caressing her green hair one last time before I climbed out.
I then commanded the earth to flow back into the trench, burying her body in the soil. A third spell compressed some of the excess earth into a simple stone marker that would probably be hidden by the grass within days. I felt a sudden surge of weariness, as my own mana well was expended from the overuse of my highest tier spells.
Inscribed on the headstone was a simple phrase in Elven, Niia, unforgotten.