As the door opened, a person with a dark complexion came into sight. He was wearing full black clothing. The darkness inside the room hid him even further. Carlo slightly nodded his head and the tall bald man returned the same.
The room was very dimly lit. It had a large black rectangular table in the center. There were eight candles placed on the table which too were black. The longer sides had three candles each meanwhile the shorter sides only had one. The candles had very small blue flames which only lightened a small area around them.
There was also a chair at the places where each candle was placed. Six figures in dark robes already filled the chairs along the longer sides. After closing the door, the old man and the man with the dark complexion went and took the remaining two seats on the opposite smaller edges.
Each of their faces was lightened by the blue flame. Nothing else was visible inside the room except the eight faces which were looking at Carlo. The atmosphere was nothing but eerie!
Most of the members sitting on the chairs were very old. Others looked to be in their middle ages.
After a few minutes, a middle aged man said, "You see Carlo; we have been closely observing your performance. Due to your extreme mastery in marksmanship and using 'Baruga', we want to offer you the highest position a knight can have. We want that you join us and become an 'Aastra Guard'."
"Aastra Guard? What is that? Is it related to the punishment, 'Death from Aastra'?" Carlo enquired. He was confused with the whole situation. He thought that he was going to become a Royal Guard and that nothing was above that position. However, it seemed like he lacked a lot of information.
To stop Carlo's racing thoughts and before he could ask more, one of the old men started to explain, "We are the 'Aastra Council'. It's time you must know what Aastra actually is. As you know, the forest is filled with monsters but why is it that only a small number of monsters rarely attack our village. Have you ever thought why the village, which lies in the middle of the dangerous forest, is still thriving?"
He paused for a bit when Carlo replied, "I thought the monster's number was very less. The only monsters that I have ever seen are some Lakéquses, Mokaka and some Lupii*."
After hearing Carlo's reply, the old man said, "If you thought that's all there was, you were very mistaken. The forest is loaded with so many kinds of monsters that nobody even knows the exact count. I must also tell you that Bulios is just a very small village on this planet called 'Vaikun'.
"Our village lies on the equator of the planet. Also, there is a huge human civilization across the ocean. Instead of appearing only five times a year, the sun appears and disappears there everyday. At the starting of the Feastus Era, our ancestors moved away from the inhabited lands and set up this village."
The old man then went on to explain how the village came into existence, how the Minder came to the village and how the 'Aastra' ritual started. Although his speech was similar to what the Princess told me, he had still omitted some parts that showed the Lord in a bad light. Instead, he glorified his Lord.
His version of 'truth' said that the Lord 'helped' the female Minder in subjugating the monster. Because of his 'bravery', the Minder fell in love with him and decided to spend eternity with him. He emphasized the fact that the villagers only benefited from the deal with the monster and that it was better to get rid of ugly women.
It was nothing but bullshit brainwashing. Nevertheless, I still listened to the exchange in hopes of finding some useful information.
***
After the exchange between the old men and Carlo was over, one of the elders asked, "So, do you want to become an Aastra Guard? Your ranking, your income and many more things will increase for you if you do. You will even be assigned a private slave.
"All you will have to do is to hunt more monsters, collect their organs so we could exchange them with the traders and take the slaves to the den once your credit scores increase. You will also have to keep this all a secret. So, what do you say?"
"Honestly, elders," Carlo answered with some hesitation. "All my life I dreamed of becoming a Royal Guard and protect the princesses. The offer is very good but if I could be given that position, I would be very grateful."
As Carlo finished speaking, silence ensued inside the room. All the elders started looking at each other and then started to think.
"You still didn't get it Carlo." One of the other middle aged men with whitening hair said as everyone looked at him. "The secrets we just revealed infront of you can never be exposed to others. Only the members of the 'Aastra Council' are allowed to know the secret. If someone from outside the council knows it, they will have to either be disposed of or their memories will have to be wiped clear.
"Keep in mind that erasing someone's memory is no different from removing their existence. Although erasing the memory is possible, it is still very difficult and nigh impossible to do. Hence why we use the 'curse of submission' to just kill the person. Destiny chose you to be an Aastra Guard Carlo, and it takes a very huge price to escape destiny.
"You have good records so we will not dispose of you. We give you two choices, first is to become an Aastra Guard and live your life filled with pleasure and the second will be to lose your name and become a mindless slave of the Aastra Council. The choice is yours."
Sigh!
There was a slight agony on Carlo's face but it went as it came. He then said while looking at the elders, "It's always fate before dreams huh. From the choices that you are providing, it's pretty obvious that I will choose to be the Aastra Guard. I hope I will be able to live a long and satisfied life."
'Why even put a choice and make the boy dream? Just say that he will be forced to work for you. These guys just want him to think that he chose to be an Aastra Guard. It's a manipulative tactic that not just the government but even some parents use on their kids!' I said in my head.
After all was said and done. The bald old man that brought Carlo here stood up and went into a corner of the room. From the dark corner, he brought out a black crystal ball. He then moved towards the table and placed it at the center.
The old man then said to Carlo, "Touch the crystal Carlo so we could now change your ownership to us."
The knights and guards were also slaves born from the breeders. The difference was just that they were either chosen by the nobles or it was obvious that they were their children. The knight with the most credits under the noble was to be their successor.
Carlo moved and touched the shining surface of the black sphere. First he felt nothing and lifted his sight to look at the elders. He then noticed that all of them were holding the black candle in their left hand and had placed their right hand over the blue flame. Surprisingly, all this time, the wax of the candle not even reduced by a bit!
Although the elders' palms must be burning by now, there was no sign of it. It was as if the flame did nothing to them! However, to his horror, Carlo started to feel a slight burning sensation on his right palm, right at the center.
He tried to remove it from the crystal but to no avail. It was as if he had lost all the energy inside his body. No matter what he tried, neither the crystal nor his hand, budged from its place.
The pain increased in magnitude as time passed. Within a few seconds it became unbearable for him. He tried to scream but no sound came from his mouth. So he just gritted his teeth, shut his eyes and bore through the pain.
After what seemed like eternity to him, the pain started to subside. The elders had already placed the candles in their original position. After he finally managed to remove his throbbing palm from the crystal, the middle aged, dark skinned man said with a smile, "Welcome to the Council!" Without holding back, Carlo just fainted.
***
Fwoosh!
The scene infront of me then fast forwarded and it showed how Carlo trained and subjugated the monsters. He never got to visit the den as his credit wasn't high enough. Until one day, while he was 'playing' with one of the breeders, he got the news that this year it would be him and his buddies taking the sacrifices to the monster.
Since childhood, Carlo had been bullying slaves to entertain him but since he became an Aastra Guard, he lost all interest in the slaves. Because, he received new 'toys', the breeders, and all his dreams and desires got fulfilled.
***
Bleugh!
As soon as the memory ended, I vomited everything I could from my empty stomach. It wasn't due to the effect of the sudden memory or because I felt any guilt from killing him. Instead, it was because what he did to those breeders. The scene was too much for me to take.
Bleugh!
I vomited again. Even remembering the state the breeders were kept, the way they were treated and all the disgusting things made my stomach churn! I took in deep breaths and calmed myself down. I stopped thinking about it and as if to help me, a notification sound ringed in my ears.
Ding!