Chapter 10 — The Transport

When the last of those in line were processed, Toren watched with interest as [Guards] took away the documents and testing equipment to a waiting carriage that the Officer Emeril mounted. The table was efficiently disassembled and secured to a rear luggage rack.

“The Slave Gate is opening!” a kid whispered not far from where Toren and Vim were sitting, and sure enough, the large two-storey-tall metal doors set in the three-storey wall past the platform were swinging open.

Toren tried to see through the darkness in the gap, but as midday was nearing, it was far too bright outside to discern much of anything on the other side even if his vantage point wasn’t partially obstructed by fellow enlistees and the platform’s far edge. Just like the excited kid, Toren was curious though. The Slave Gate connected the market square with the walled off Noble Quarter of the city, and he’d never been to the Noble Quarter.

The gate gained its name because debt slaves and crime slaves would be brought through the large doors on their way to the auctioning platform. In reality, the gate was used for more than that since merchants often used it for transporting goods from the Noble Quarter to the market square—particularly when the goods arrived via the intercity teleportation network.

Teleportation was very expensive and not often used by commoners. Though not explicitly stated, the main reason for the enlistment’s term of indentured service was likely to pay back the cost of being teleported to the new continent.

The idea of what a ‘continent’ was… was something he was still trying to wrap his head around: another land bigger than all of the kingdoms and empires of Yveras and an even larger sea separating them. The colonies were a distance so far away that, by airship, the risky journey could take almost a full week. And by carriage and boat, it would take months.

“Get ready to move, you lot!” a [Guard] boomed out at everyone gathered on the platform once the [Official]’s carriage was through the gate.

“About time,” Vim voiced, quickly on his feet and pointlessly patting dirt off his filthy cloak. “I was getting bored just sitting around.”

Sitting around scoping the enlistees for targets to steal from, the boy meant, no doubt.

Toren gingerly climbed to his feet, re-shouldering his heavy pack. To his surprise, he barely noticed the aches from his injuries, and his arm only twinged. Squeezing where the bone had cracked still gave a sharper pain, but the bone was clearly mending at an astonishing rate.

A loud grumble sounded from Toren’s stomach, and he fished another strip of dried meat from a waxed sack on his belt, letting his spit soften the meat so he could chew it. He had grown almost ravenous after arriving on the platform and had already eaten a hardtack biscuit and chewed on some dried meat but was already hungry again. The hunger had to be caused by his new Profession—the [Burning Blood] Ability most likely.

Being able to recover from broken bones in a matter of days or hours at Rank 1 was a tremendous boon, so the effect having a cost wasn’t a surprise. He could only hope that food was plentiful and inexpensive in the colonies, or he may have traded the infrequent expense of hiring a healer with the unending expense of having to constantly provide himself with budget crippling quantities of meat. Still, he couldn’t complain about the utility. Without the accelerated healing, would he even be able to walk right now?

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But to already be able to heal this well… if the Ability could be upgraded to the point where he could heal wounds in only a few breaths and he could keep his blood on the inside… and if he had enough strength to shrug off grappling and blows, he might truly become unstoppable!

He would need to get a helmet though. That blow to the head had taken him out of the fight quick.

Head injuries weren’t the only thing to watch out for. His thoughts went back to Yana’s screams as the giant locust ate her alive while he was falling from the cliff. Fending off a swarm and saving his companions would still be impossible.

Would a fire aura be enough? Is that something he should try for?

Toren followed the others as they were herded down the platform’s back ramp toward the open gate by the [Guards]. A smell of sweat and filth, both human and animal, assaulted Toren’s nose as they passed through the guarded doors.

“Ugh. The smell of slave pens. Welcome to the Noble Quarter,” Vim groused.

While Toren’s eyes were adjusting, he looked around, unable to miss the two large stone buildings that rose on either side, connected by a high ceiling overhead with grated openings to let just enough sunlight through to see by. Barred narrow windows dotted the stone facings of the upper floors, and the ground floor of both buildings opened into arched walkways with chaining posts and tunnels leading deeper inside. Sounds of suffering echoed out from within.

They passed through a second gate made of crossed iron bars at the end of the passage between the two oppressive buildings and entered a domed space that was larger than the temple sanctuary holding the Celestial Mirror.

“So high…” Vim breathed out, hood falling back as the boy’s gaze followed the support pillars upward.

Toren grunted agreement. The smooth ceiling was so high up that Toren couldn’t even guess the distance. A second row of pillars rose up around a grand arcane spell circle made of seamless glowing gemstone inset in white stone. Unseen windows high up in the multi-tiered dome let in a soft light bolstered by sconces mounted to the pillars.

The domed space was undoubtedly Greenvale’s intercity teleportation circle.

Ahead, large-boned leathery beasts, ‘orrogs’ they were called, were hitched up to three huge wagons heaped with barrels, sacks, crates, milled wood, bricks, loose cobblestone, and carefully secured stacks of expensive cut stone. Men and women in dirty coarse-woven clothing and sandals were chained behind the wagons. Toren counted nineteen. Debt and crime slaves.

A fate he had only just avoided.

That could have been him.

“Keep moving,” the guards ordered, ushering the group of enlistees and others forward onto the magic circle.

“That guy must be the [Mage] controlling the magic,” Vim observed, motioning toward an imposing guy in a very expensive robe and tasseled skullcap, holding a gemmed staff and standing on a narrow raised platform beside a boy in Greenvale’s colors. The platform had a railing around it and stone stairs curving down from the rear. The man’s mana density was almost painfully strong to Toren’s [Mana Sensing] skill.

“Certainly looks that way,” Toren agreed.

“Make room!” one of the guards yelled out, and they were all pushed closer together as a third group comprising two more wagons, a coach with [Guards] liveried differently than the city’s [Guards], and some mercenary-looking men filled in the remaining space within the transport area designated by the inner row of widely spaced pillars and arcane geometry.

Once the last group was in place, the boy next to the [Mage] on the platform cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled out, “LAST CALL FOR TRANSPORT TO FARHARBOR! ANYONE NOT TRAVELING TO FARHARBOR, PLEASE LEAVE THE TELEPORTATION CIRCLE!”

The large gems atop the [Mage]’s staff began to glow with a scintillating light that steadily grew in strength.

“Whoa…” Vim breathed out.

Toren gripped the shoulder strap of his pack to keep his hands from shaking as the powerful gathering of mana beneath his feet made every hair want to stand on end.

“TELEPORTATION ACTIVATING!”