Volume 1: The Law of Magic and Souls
Chapter 1 The hall of death.
Freedom is the idea that you have every path available to you.
But to achieve freedom you only have one path; the path to power.
Rakisha, mother of all demons.
{26} Noxi (April) the 2nd 5778, the year of the red chimera.
Pain. Blurred vision. The world is on fire. A moment passes and the pain disappears, replaced by the feeling of a cold stone floor pressed against my bare skin. I blink and stagger to my feet.
I find myself in a large blue hall. The room is packed with bodies, some moving, some not, all naked, at different stages of consciousness. They all seem like young adults. No one here is above the age of thirty.
Where am I? How did I get here?
Along with the questions, a few hazy memories surface. I remember the day my life changed forever. Our castle was raided by a band of enemy soldiers. Many of the people I knew died before my eyes that day, but not me.
As the viscount's eldest daughter, they left me alive, bound me in chains of iron, and kept me as their toy for a while. Then sold me to a slaver when they realized my father can't pay the ransom.
But how did I get here? And where is here? Did someone buy me? Something is missing! Why can't I remember? What does this buyer want? And why are we all naked?! It doesn't matter. After five long years of slavery, I've grown accustomed to nudity, as for what this mysterious buyer wants I'm sure I'll find out soon enough, it's just a matter of time…
Apathy, stick to your apathy, this is the only way to get through this, the only way to survive! I'll be free one day, I just have to hold on!
"Congratulation my dear slaves~" A musical feminine voice comes through the walls. "Today you go through your first session of weeding~. Should you survive all three sessions you'll have the chance to become a powerful mage one day~" the sing-songy way she suggests we could become mages was as if she was dangling candy before children.
The room erupts in a buzzing chatter. "Mages? From the stories?!" Someone asks aloud. "Will I be able to ride a dragon?" A girl asks with a mix of fear and hope in her voice.
If I can become a mage, I won't have to fear anything! I'll be powerful myself! I'll be able to free myself! No one will be able to toy with me! No one will own me! I need to find a way to become strong myself! I can't count on my father to keep me alive anymore, he clearly can't help me…
"Silence!" The soft voice from the walls turns sharp, it is followed by a thundering lightning bolt streaking across the ceiling.
The room goes quiet in an instant. "This is a weeding! Only ten living souls are allowed to leave this hall. If by the end of the day there are more than ten souls left breathing - you'll all die!" After the death threat, her voice turns soft, almost seductive. "Kill each other my dear slaves~, may the strongest among you survive and grow on the path to power~"
I look around, terrified. There are men here, some of them look like they could break my neck with their bare hands. My thin, scrawny body stands in stark contrast to theirs. Five years of slavery on the verge of starvation didn't do me any good in terms of growth.
I'm a young malnourished woman with no weapons or any means to survive, and my only chance is my good looks. Even malnourished, I know my red hair appeals to some men. If I manage to gain someone's protection with the promise of sleeping with them afterward I might survive. But who would want to even look at me with all the other naked girls around here?
Am I doomed to die? NO! I WILL NOT DIE! NO MATTER WHAT! I'll become strong! I'll find my family! And if I have to use someone on my way to power I'll do just that!
A blond muscular man near me seems to be in his late twenties, and there's something about him that radiates pure power. I hurriedly hug his arm, pressing it against my breasts. "Hey," I say in the most seductive voice I can muster. It sounds frail in my own ears. "If you manage to keep me alive, I'll be yours to do whatever you wish..."
My freedom isn't my own anyway, I am used to giving men what they want.
I hate it, I hate it so much, I'm a nobleman's daughter!
But I'll always be a nobleman's daughter, that won't change, and right now I need to live. My only chance to get powerful one day is to live first, and that is the only thing I can come up with.
I won't survive a naked brawl with men who are stronger and bigger than me. If we had weapons maybe, but…
Glancing down, I can tell I have an effect on him. It fills me with some sense of relief, but it is short-lived. The man backhands my face, and I fall on my back, jaw throbbing in pain. I can see the disdain in his green eyes. "What a parasite." I hear him mutter under his breath.
Shouts erupt in the hall, loud protests that fall on deaf ears. The blond man pays no heed to me, he grabs the young man next to him and knocks the surprised youth to the ground, pounding his face into the glittering floor again and again.
Crimson blood stains the blue gem floor, and the poor sod loses his consciousness. A fat man stumbles on my left arm in an attempt to reach the blond guy. I yelp and twist in pain.
The blond man smirks and pounces on his attacker. I try to roll out of the way, but there are too many legs tramping above me, I can't get up to my feet.
The large hall breaks out into a brutal melee, everyone is trying to kill everyone, and I am down on the ground. Countless bare feet stomp me, young men and women going back and forth above my head in the attempt to kill one another, all filled with desperation to survive.
I curl into a fetal position, put my hands up to protect my head from the blows, and hope no one will target me. Laying on the ground saves me, at least for the moment. I am not a threat, and most people think me dead. I keep my eyes tightly shut, unable to ward my ears from the sound of bones breaking, people gasping for air, the groans, screams, and shrieks that fill the grim blue hall.
The floor beneath me is filled with a warm liquid. Blood. It washes my bare skin, staining it. Someone large falls on top of me. I gasp holding my scream in my chest, they cannot know I am still alive.
I squint peeking between my fingers and manage to tell it's a large dark-skinned corpse with a broken neck. Although the dead boy is heavy, his corpse provides extra protection and camouflage. Maybe I'm going to survive this after all…
Don't move! Don't make a sound! They can't know I am here or they'll kill me!
I don't want to die… I don't want to die…
A wave of heat streaks across the hall, followed by painful panicked screams. Another wave of cold air follows it soon. People gasp, beg, howl in victory, defeat, or pain. I can't see the sources of these temperature changes from under the large corpse, I have no idea what causes them.
After a time that feels like an eternity, the sounds of the brutal melee slowly die out.
"We're done! There are only ten of us left! Now let us go!" The baritone voice belongs to the same blond man who pushed me before this madness began.
"No, there are still thirteen souls living in this hall!" the soft feminine voice causes my heart to miss a beat.
"Great! What are we going to do now? Kill three more people?" Another guy asks.
"Gods no! There are rats hiding under the corpses, spread out and kill them!" The guy who pushed me orders. "Won't be hard, if they're hiding they shouldn't be too strong" he adds.
I'm not dying here! I'm not dying here! I can't die! I don't want to die!
My skin is covered in goosebumps, and my heart pounds like drums in my ears. I don't want to die, who would want to die naked and alone in a place like this?!
A shriek freezes me in place. I dare to peek with one eye and see a burly boy unearth a young girl in her late teens. She's slick with blood, and screaming in terror. "Found one!" he declares.
"Good! Kill her!" Orders the heartless blond man.
"P-please, I d-don't want to d-die. Please!" The girl cries and begs for her life between sniffs.
"Shhhhhh…" To my surprise, the man hugs her in a comforting manner. "Close your eyes," he tells her softly. She obeys sniffing, with a loud crack he snaps her neck, and her corpse falls to the ground like a puppet without strings. Her head falls close to me, and the expression of crying is still etched on her closed-eyed face. I'm not dying like that!!!
Another person is dragged from under another corpse. This is outside of my vision, but he sounds like a young boy who puts up a fight. "You're all monsters! You'd kill people just because some voice said so?! Let me go!" His voice keeps breaking from high to deep as he protests.
His desperate struggle to survive causes mocking laughter from the other survivors. To my surprise, I can hear feminine cackle as well. I thought only the men would survive such a brutal melee with no weapons to even the odds.
I can hear them toying with him, hitting him, they are all ganged up on him. "Move aside!" Orders the heartless blond man. A moment later another heatwave fills the hall, and the young boy screams in pain for what feels like an eternity. Then I can't hear him anymore.
I am the only one left, I can count the seconds I have left to live as my family goes through my head. My father's smiling gray eyes, the last time I saw him was seven springs ago before he went to that damned war. I only remember his eyes, I can barely remember his face.
I used to hate spending time with my younger sister and brother, they simply wouldn't stop pestering me. Now I wish I could see them one more time, just once. Even my stepmother who hated me with passion. Now I miss her too.
A muscular ebony-skinned man lifts the large corpse above me. This guy is larger than everyone else here. "Found her," he says with a deep calm voice. He has rows of sharp shark-like teeth in his mouth, an orc.
NO! I'm not dying here!
Laying on the ground I send a quick kick to his groin. The orc bends forward in pain, surprise goes through his large black eyes. Surprise that is swiftly replaced by anger. He grabs my leg and twists it on his knee. A sharp pulse of pain and a snapping crack causes an involuntary shriek to escape my lips.
My leg is on fire, my vision is blurred with tears. The orc kneels, grabs my neck, and blocks my windpipe with his thumbs. I gasp for air, my heart is bursting out of my chest. I fight. He is much stronger than me, but I fight. I want to live, I have to live!
I scratch his fingers and wrists, but I can't release his death grip on my neck. My vision darkens. I move my hands to his face, pushing my fingers into his eyes, trying to tear them apart, trying to tear his whole face apart.
I'm not dying here! I won't die! I refuse to die! You die! Disappear! DISAPPEAR!!!
My desperation turns to energy. It travels from my forehead to my arms, and *thoomb!* With a sound of a stopper plucked out of a bottle, half of the orc's head turns into a meat paste. A shower of blood, bone splinters and small pieces of his brain fall on my face.
I gasp for air. The death-grip around my neck loosens up, and the large man collapses on top of me, lifeless expression fills the single black eye which remained intact.
I crawl out from under the corpse covered in gore. I stand up panting and bite my lips in pain when I lean too much weight on my sore broken leg. I look around through blurred eyes, there are now ten of us left. I had survived.
"Hmpf" The blond man I attempted to seduce earlier sneers at me and turns his green gaze toward the blue glittering wall. "We're only ten now!" he calls out.
"Indeed~" The cheerful reply is too surreal. The hall is filled with naked corpses and blood. Most are twisted, but I spot a few charred corpses in the middle of the hall, accompanied by the heavy smell of burnt flesh.
A wave of energy passes through the hall. A moment later all of my physical pain is gone, replaced with a calm soothing feeling. I notice with astonishment that I can lean my weight on my leg again, it's no longer broken.
Some of the blood from the floor evaporates into a thick red smoke. The smoke fades into the glittering blue ceiling. I briefly spot an odd red fairy-like creature flying in the red mist. Then it's gone, along with the red fog.
A small patch on one of the blue shimmering walls sinks into the floor exposing a doorway. An elegant woman in red robes strides forward stepping on the dead naked corpses as if they were mere rocks and pebbles in her path. "Congratulations! You ten have survived your first weeding session~ Rejoice! Your life can only get easier from here, but much, much more dangerous. Life is boring without danger am I right?"
She appears to be in her early twenties. She has fair skin, a gentle face, and her black hair is tied up in a tight bun at her nape.
She smiles at us, moving her gleaming red eyes across the naked gory survivors. Her beautiful smile turns into a sneer at the sight of a muscular guy who pukes his guts over the pile of corpses, and she doesn't even glance at another who's sobbing on his knees while looking at his hands.
No one smiles back. The number of dead bodies on the floor would daze the worst of monsters. A girl at the back collapses, hugging her knees and mumbling nonsense to herself in a low voice swaying her body back and forth.
"Quite right mistress" the blond man smirks, unfazed. "What will you do with us now?" Who's the parasite now asshole?! Look at you, all fawning around that monster, hoping to get a better fate than the rest of us…
The red-robed woman steps closer to him and caresses his cheek. "What's your name handsome~?" She's shorter than him, but the power dynamics are clear here.
"Adir." He stands motionless letting the red-robed witch brush her hand across his naked bloodied chest.
"Now Adir~ you'll get a bath, get your number, and then, we'll begin the second phase of your weeding!"
The second phase?! there's more of this mindless killing?!
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Social status: A slave.
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