News of the Slave Market

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[Name: Stigma Falsus

Age: 10

Rank: Unique

Skill: Essence Reader, Poltergeist (1), Soul Eater

Current Souls Absorbed:

Pure Energy: 1.1%

Grudge Energy: 5.8%

Wrath Energy: 3.1%]

*

Skills:

[Cooking, Farming, Hunting, Blacksmith, Glass work, Masonry, Sewing, Calculation, Riding, Archery, Wood Carving, Animal Breeding, Herbalist, Pottery, Brewing, Dancing, Musician, Alchemy, Fishing, Throwing, Penmanship, Butchering, Decipher]

*

Skill to learn: [YES] [NO]

*

'*Sigh!* From the looks of it, I'll have to deal with the other skills later on and start with the 3 skills that are currently usable.'

After going through some possible scenario he could think off, Stigma had used his skill 'Essence Reader' to figure out a plan by using his current skills.

When Stigma saw the familiar status screen from before, he immediately checked to see if he can find any hidden function by selecting any of the skills, like finding their description on to use them.

So far, Stigma had found nothing on the first two skills but the moment when he tapped on the skill 'Soul Eater', he was soon greeted with a list of skills that seemed familiar to him.

Although he wanted to experiment out of curiosity, because of the unstable environment he was in, Stigma thought that he should put his desire to check each skill on hold until he was in a safer location.

All in all, out of all the skills he currently had, only three seem usable:

1. Essence Reader, a skill which allows him to see souls or more likely, life force from the surroundings.

2. Poltergeist, a skill that summon a ghost like monster that appears to follows every of his commands without hesitation.

3. Soul Eater, a skill that collects souls or foreign energy in the surrounding areas and lets him gain and store their respective attributes.

As there was no actual information on each skills, Stigma had to make logical guesses for their descriptions based on what he observed and that's what is troubling him.

With no accurate information at hand, Stigma had no choice but to guess on each of the skills abilities until he found the correct answer through trial and error. Unfortunately he did not have the leisure to ponder or experiment on each skill.

'Because of the whole incident with the shadowy figure jumping around, and the fact that the surrounding structure of the cave is already brittle, the place appears to only have minutes left until it completely collapses and buries me alive.'

After an extended and careful exploration in the available tunnels, the only way Stigma could leave was by going through the hole in the ceiling, and after climbing on top of the corpses, he could see a cliff at the top of the wall.

To make sure it was possible to climb out, Stigma had the Ghost creature climb up the wall.

Fortunately, it appeared as though the walls could hold its weight. Yet after seeing a number of cracks forming after its ascent, Stigma started to worry and believed that the walls would collapse all together if any more weight was added during it's steep climb.

Hence Stigma was in a dilemma on how he should get out, as one false move could result in his death, again.

"Wonder what should I do? Should I go up or not? I could have the Ghost go up first, but I don't have enough material to use as a functioning rope for it to pull me all the way to the top. There's also no way I can dig through this place without the possibility of an entire section of the tunnel collapsing on top of me due to the weight of the soil...."

"…Ah hell, it's do or die, I'll just have to move fast and I can't stay here forever. If I starve to death, I would have no choice but to eat some of the corpses, and I can't bring myself to do that..."

After making up his mind to leave by climbing up, Stigma had started skimming though his memories to see if they could be way to possibly help him escape safely.

'…Well I did play a survival game in where you would have to climb collapsing walls until you reach the top, but this time I have someone else do the climbing with my life literary on the line here.…I think the trick was to switch positions after you land. But since I'm on the back of someone climbing the wall, it will be more difficult... Well everything won't always be easy, like the old saying goes: 'eat bitter, taste sweet.[1]'

'Essence Reader!' After practising for a while, Stigma realized that he can either shorten the chant or whisper it. Also, so long there was a reflective surface like a small body of water, it was possible for him to see his own status without closing his eyes.

After looking at the top of the cliff a number of time, Stigma always found 2 spectral figures from above, but because he can only see some form of ghostly light he could not make out the figures completely.

'Wonder what's up there? Guess I'll find out if I get out.'

In the end, Stigma climbed on the back of the ghost, which apparently had a solid figure and had it climb the wall slowly. As an added precaution, he salvaged and collected some of rope that was tied to some of the corpses and fastened himself onto the ghostly figure's back.

.....

The moment Stigma placed his hands on the Ghost's back, the only thing he could compare it was that it was similar to feeling a human body.

If not for the shadowy figure's unique body structure, such as its long arms and claws, Stigma would have believed that he was on a human's back.

"OK, climb up!" After finishing his order, the ghost had immediately jumped to the wall and followed his succeeding instructions, showing no form of discomfort.

'Looks like its capable of carrying me all the way to the top. I wonder how long that would take?'

As Stigma slowly ascended to the top, he was quietly observing the figure in front of him as he looked around to pass the time.

---

"Damn! You! Gus! The booze from the merchant you described was expensive! You didn't tell me about the price, I had to use my savings for tonight and I had my eye on a new beauty!!!"

"You didn't ask, and unlike you and your spending habits, I was able to save up to bring enough food for both of us today. Even if you had extra, you would have spent most of your savings on the brothels every day, so it's not my fault. Hehehe."

At a tunnel near Red Rock Valley, as Frank continued to make his way up the road. Gus ignored the glare Frank was giving him as the former didn't appear to care about the later's ranting.

As Gus continued to chew on a piece of dried meat, he enjoyed the sight of Frank's haggard expression as he laughed at him.

After finishing the remainder of the food Gus had brought for them, Frank had left early yesterday to buy more liquor from the merchant Gus had described him.

Excited as he was to buy the rest of the liquor, never would Frank have expected that the liquor was from a very limited stock which lead him running around just to find enough funds to buy all the remaining liquor.

By the time he had enough funds, only several Jugs of wine were available which had forced Frank to use his hidden saving to buy all the remaining wine.

Because the wine being sold was special and in limited stock, the merchant would naturally increase the price , which meant that buying just one jug is enough to make someone like Frank's heart bleed from losing his hard earned wealth.

As for Gus, after seeing Frank buy the remaining jugs of liquor from a merchant while he was in town, the former could not help but snicker at his partner in crime as he saw the later weep from losing some of his personal fortune.

Unable to respond to Gus's further insult, and the fact that he also saw the extra food and liquor on the ground, Frank could only curse at him angrily.

"FUCK! YOU'RE PAYING FOR MY NIGHT PARTNER THIS TIME!"

"FUCK NO!" Gus shouted back. After hearing Frank's unreasonable demand, how could he not feel angry.

For all that Gus knew, brothels were one of the most common and cheapest form of entertainment.

Unfortunately, Gus knew that Frank would choose the most beautiful employee to bed with, which meant that he had to pay a large sum of gold coins that would leave a large hole in his pocket.

The argument continued on for over an hour and had left the two exhausted from the constant banter. To lighten the mood Frank remembered something important and gave Gus a question.

"Hey, did you hear about the group of travellers resting in the plains, it's full of 'special' merchants."

Frank asked the question with a look as if he wanted confirmation on the news.

The news Frank wanted to confirm was from a travelling merchant, whom he had bought from recently. Since he had recently gained enough money to spoil himself, Frank wanted every available information he can find to verify any news where he can enjoy himself.

"Yeah, I heard, what about it..." After Gus revealed a grin like expression, Frank was delighted that his buddy confirmed his suspicion and made him grin uncontrollably.

"Then it's true then!!! This news had just made my day!!! Haahahahaha!!!"

If Gus had heard the same news from another merchant, then it only made sense that Frank would find the information to be valid.

The reason behind Frank's delight was solely due to the news of a 'travelling slave market' entering their borders.

As the name implies, it's a group comprised of slave trader and they frequently pass by any large cities and set up camp to sell branded slaves.

Both men also found out that the slave market was only available for 15 days, and today was the 10th day, hence there was only 5 days left until the slave merchants will leave to the next city.

Of course, the market purposely circulated news ahead of time about their arrival, so most visitors would know about the products being sold and other than hearing the variety of the 'goods' being sold, there were rumours about slaves that came from other provinces.

Naturally, when such rumours started circulating among cities, those who have dark desires started making preparations by either accumulating their wealth through various means or try sending scouts to reserve some of the products being sold.

In fact, after hearing the news, Gus and Frank both had sold all their belongings which had high value beforehand and brought all their savings from previous jobs.

That was also the reason why Frank was hesitant in using his hidden savings for purchasing the expensive Liquor from the South. And like Gus, Frank desired to purchase a few personal sex slaves.

Like any individual who had obtained a small fortune, these two men desired to display their wealth by the use of slaves, so they had not even told others where they were going or when will they return to surprise them.

Of course, the most frightening thing about this thought was that it was considered legal to own a slave.

In this world, only the strong have the right to make the rules, but even the strong will be slave bound if they get tricked. Slaves are branded with a special sealing, so even if a slave was powerful enough to kill their master, slaves are bound to obey their contracted master.

If not, the slave will suffer a some form of backlash.

Most slave traders, try to advertise a high price for strong warriors to sell them to other families with weak military strength.

Slaves or higher quality are trained in certain subjects to please their master. If the buyer was willing to pay more, the slave will be added more restraints.

For example, if they want to forbid a slave from speaking, then their brand will be modified to either, make them suffer or instantly kill them if they do such acts.

In fact, because slaves are more commonly sold to large clans and cities, most slave traders often travel and settle to areas where other large cities exist and move to the next area while sending letter to their leaders beforehand to gain access to enter each city before they can go.

Another thing was that slave traders do not only sell slaves but even charge a special service to make personally captured people their slaves.

For individuals like Gus and Frank, paying for such services would be impossible, yet these two were contempt enough to find a foreign beauty for cheap and live a comfortable life.

With such thoughts circulating his mind, Gus then giddy grabbed a jug and licking his lips.

"Let's drink to it then!"

"Cheers then!"

After showing a savage grin, Frank could not help but feel excited and grabbed a jug followed by Gus.

After a few swigs from their respective jugs, the two then each took out a small map and talked about their plans.

---

While two men were drinking to their hearts content, Stigma was facing a dilemma.

In an abandoned valley not far from where Gus and Frank were, Stigma was currently latched on the back of a ghostly figure that was currently climbing on the walls of a valley.

Due to how unstable the area was, Stigma had ordered the ghostly servant to climb the wall at a snails pace. But because of the slow pace, Stigma realized that the sun had already gone down and the moon had been present.

After looking around for quite some time, Stigma was faced with the familiar sense of unease from the quiet atmosphere but quickly felt a sense of boredom as nothing had happened.

Naturally, without nothing else to do, Stigma had to find someway to entertain himself which lead him to talk to the ghostly figure.

"Hey, do you have a name?"

...

As Stigma continued to cling on the back of the ghost for almost four hour, he decided to ask the ghostly figure a question and waited to see if it could give a response.

Unfortunately, as he heard nothing but silence, Stigma could not help but laugh at himself a little as the reason as to why he had asked the question in the first place was out of boredom.

"Right, you can't even talk…Then let's call you, Dusk. Nice to meet you Dusk!"

...

'…Still no response huh? But it appears to be shaking a little after being named, hey! Stop it!'

*BING!*

[You have just named a monster and had acknowledged to being your familiar]

*Familiars, are creatures bound with trust to a contractor, they will evolve along with their master as they both get stronger, take note that having a one sided relationship will be short lived.*

[Dusk has accepted being your familiar, System has added the name: Dusk to your list of familiars]

Because of the sudden appearance of a notification, Stigma had almost let go of the rope he held and almost fell of the ghostly servant's back. Thankfully, Stigma tied his legs together ahead of time so he only felt a short shock from almost falling off.

After pulling himself backup and steadied his breathing, Stigma looked at the floating notification then his newly named familiar Dusk for a while and said.

"Familiars? Aren't those some kind of spirits under contract? I don't think I did anything, but I suppose naming them is part of the procedure… Still, being named appears to have him excited, I wonder why? Whatever, I'll figure it out later, Dusk can you speed up a little!"

After giving out his order, the newly named familiar Dusk began to pick up the pace causing Stigma to instinctively look up and find out that he was getting close to the top.

*Crack!* Huh? *Crack!* *Crack!*

After hearing the first crack, Stigma looked around to the origin of the noise and had changed his face into an ugly expression.

As cracks started to appear, Stigma could not help but look down and feel his skin crawl as he felt the tremors on the wall he was on

Because there was moonlight illuminating the night, it looked as though the wall had come alive and were trying to claw their way up, trying to keep Stigma from leaving as the walls around him were crumbling at a very fast pace.

"SHIT! It must be weaker than I thought! Hurry up Dusk!!"

As fear started creeping into his heart, Stigma broke his focus away from the cracks underneath and looked above his head.

After doing a rough estimate, Stigma believed that there was over 40 or so meter left and at the rate of his speed, Stigma believed that he could make it.

Unfortunately, Stigma noticed that the wall that he was currently on was crumbling underneath him.

Just as he was about to give the next order, Dusk had suddenly leaped away from the crumbling wall and had latched itself to another section of the wall with its claws, saving both it and Stigma's life in the process.

Looking at where the rocks landed, Stigma turned his head to Dusk and said.

"Looks like its learning from its previous mistake from before. But never mind that. CLIMB DUSK! CLIMB!"

Upon his order, Dusk had then raised one of its claws upward then continued to climb up.

As Dusk continued to scale up the wall, Stigma could not help reevaluate on how he should look at his shadowy familiar and became curious about it's origins.

Before Stigma even had a chance to give any orders, whenever a section of a wall was about to collapse underneath him, Dusk would instinctively leap off and land onto the next section and continued to climb up.

Stigma was also shocked to discover that Dusk's reaction speed was in the level of being superhuman as it was able to execute a consecutive number of acrobatic movements as it had managed to dodge a number of bolder from falling on top of him.

As much as Stigma wanted to stop and see what else Dusk can do, he soon realized that now was not the time nor place so he ordered Dusk to continue.

Faster! Faster! Faster! Faster! Faster! Faster! Faster!!!!

Because Stigma did not want to bite his tongue in the process, chanting like a madman in his mind was the only thing he can do in this situation. With each order being said, Dusk's pace had kept on increasing after each order, looking more like a beast trying to chase an invisible prey.

30 meter away…25…20…15…10…

The distance was getting shorter and shorter, but seeing numerous cracks appear one after another made Stigma's blood freeze from fright. As he had no way for him to tell when a large crack will appear ahead of him, Stigma had lost to his nerves and started yelling his orders to the best of his abilities.

"ALMOST THERE! ALMOST THERE!"

5 meter left….but before he could reach it, signs of breaking from the cliff were showing, and with him still clinging to it!

"DUSK! AT THE EDGE, JUMP TO THE OTHER SIDE!" With the sensation of the cliff falling underneath him, Stigma could not help but scream to the top of his lungs, fearing Dusk couldn't hear his orders.

Obediently, Dusk followed his master's orders and jumped at the very moment it was on the edge of the falling cliff.

At this very moment, Stigma heart stopped. After Dusk had landed on the ground with a thud, Stigma tightly closed his eyes to pray as a loud crack can be heard.

...

...

...

Stigma waited and braced himself for gravity to pull him to the valley, but for some reason, there was nothing pulling him down much less the sound of impact being heard.

He slowly opened his eyes and turned to take a look and saw that the cliff was hanging by the thread. Based on what Stigma could see, if anything landed on it right now, then it won't be a happy ending.

"Phew!!! Any more delays would have ended my life, again."

Realising he could not get off, he had Dusk cut the ropes of his legs and feet, and had landed on his feet. Because Stigma was on Dusk's back for the either journey, he felt a little numb from all the time riding on the trip.

After cutting the remaining ropes and dusting himself, Stigma looked around to see where the lights from before are.

'Essence Reader'

'Now where are those lights? OH!'

It did not take long for Stigma to find the specters he was looking and immediately exclaimed in glee.

After observing for a while, it appeared as though the specters did not have any intention of moving towards him, which greatly confused him.

Even after all the commotion that had happened, Stigma had expected that such a commotion would have caught the attention to the surrounding settlers.

"Well…not like doing nothing will change anything, Dusk, let's go."

After walking ahead, Dusk then walked behind its master, appearing as though it has not done any form of physical labour which greatly shocked Stigma when he looked back.

'Maybe it had fast recovery, gotta remember that!'

Going towards the direction of the lights, and with Dusk followed him like a loyal dog, Stigma walked towards the light.

Unfortunately, what Stigma did not know was that he was walking towards the perpetrators who threw him down the valley.

[1] Eat bitter taste sweet – no pain, no gain