CHAPTER 13 - Slavers and Freedom Fighters

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Arty spent almost another three days inside the little village town she's staying in, planning to be ready and preparing herself to whatever tasks or goals that she needed to do, to search for the magical weapon and become the future heroine.

Firstly, of course, she'll need to find some ways to train herself as a good warrior and fight better in the battles she will face in the future once she finds the Fiery Blade.

That and also it would help her be able to overcome and pass the trials laid out from the Trinity Goddess if it turns out that some of the trials she might face will be about fighting.

Secondly, she'll need to find and discover more knowledge about the world she's in, despite that she was the creator and writer of it and its story so that she'll be able to learn and understand deeply more about it and be able to adapt in living in it.

Lastly, she'll have to learn and discover about the other characters that are pertinent and needed in the story she had written about, besides the main leading ones. She knew that with their help, then they'll be able to defeat the Mad King together along with the chosen wielder of the Fiery Blade and unite when the time comes.

She will need to remember what she can and recap where the other characters might be once she had retrieved the Fiery Blade, help out with their problems and try to persuade them to join her in the future rebellion against the crazy king that had tyrannized and terrorized the center capital of the world of Eden.

Speaking of which, about the crazy Mad King's tyranny over the central capital, it looks like Arty might get one of her plans to bear fruit and it will come true by the next day as she was making her ideas and doing her planning about what she'll do.

In the early morning at the shining sunrise, Arty had woken up a bit groggily from her sleep when she heard the birds chirping their day song and then she slowly got off her bed and went to refresh herself so that she would get out from the inn and go somewhere private and secluded to train herself to fight.

As she had gone down the stairs, she stopped a little when she heard voices and hide back to the shadows to listen to the conversation quietly.

They were talking with the innkeeper and apparently, they're talking about spotting some slavers that were roaming about in the woods near the village and became worried that the hostile people among them might choose to invade the town and enslave some of their people.

They talked in a worried and fearful tone of voices as they said that they also noticed that the group of slavers had the engraved symbol from the Mad King and became concerned that the tyrant king was so heartlessly cruel to even sanction such a group and let them loose out there to enslave people, both humans and other creatures alike.

As Arty has heard all of this, she almost forgot about this part of the story that she had written to, and she was surprised to feel enraged upon hearing that slavers are somewhere near here.

She figured that it must be her main character to act this way since she's the noble and heroic leading character in the story after all.

Nevertheless, she had found her chance to train herself to fight and battle now that there are nearby enemies.

After the people who talked with the innkeeper had left, she sneakily tiptoed down and left without letting the innkeeper know that she is gone until it was too late to stop her and warn her of the dangers that are nearing into the woods by the town village.

Arty was amazed that no one had seen her when she sneaked out of the town and went straight into the woods where the slavers were spotted, but then again, they were busy worrying about the news that the slaving enemies were near, it's like they went inside their houses and locked themselves in to be safe from the threats out there.

By the time that Arty had gone out with the weapons she had brought along, that is a small sword and dagger with her, and had made it into the dark deep forests, she started to search through the woods and find what she's looking for--which is the slavers that she's meaning to use them as practice for herself to fight against.

It didn't take long for her to find them, but then they must be stupid enough to think that they are safe hiding out in the woods when they didn't know that someone had already spotted them.

Arty scoped out the situation and saw that there were about a few men, all of them looking big and strong and meanly sturdy kinds. Then she saw that they have slaves in carriage cages that looked to be ready to be shipped off to parts unknown and be enslaved to the worst kinds of masters that will get them.

She saw that there was a combination mixture of abducted humans, elves, shapeshifters, and beast-people alike, from the ranging ages of middle elderly to the youngest children.

Arty felt enraged and furious again when she saw this but she managed to calm herself and think of a plan on how to deal with the enemies and save the innocent beings that were enslaved.

She was glad to see that the few slavers gathered around the campfire were distracted to themselves, trying to get themselves warm from the cold weather that's breezing from the dark forests.

And she saw that the cages were far away from the slavers so that she'll save them first before fighting against the enemies.

With that short plan made, Arty went off to do so, going straight towards the cages and ready to free them.

She sneaked in quiet as she could like the wind and when she had made it, she instantly made a quiet gesture when one of the enslaved children had spotted her and was about to cry out in surprise.

The elf child managed to quiet herself by her silencing gesture but then her mother noticed already and then the elf woman's eyes widened on seeing her and understood that she came to free them when she took out her dagger and used it as a lock-pick against the padlock on the cage they're in.

Soon, all of the enslaved beings have noticed Arty and they became quiet as well and watched her as she hurriedly tried to unlock the cages to free them all.

She managed to break out two of the cages and gestured the freed slaves to run to the forests for safety and be hidden for a while and they followed her orders as they went off.

Arty almost grunted out loud in surprise when one or two freed children hugged her legs in thanks for freeing them before they joined their parents to run into the woods.

Arty continued with her task to free the others but when she was about to come near the last cage that's holding a group of beast-people on them, a half-human half-pig squealed in alarm at her and Arty quickly reacted and turned around with a fatal stabbing strike from her dagger in her hands when she suddenly sensed someone about to attack her from behind.

She almost vomited at the sight that she strikes true at one of the slavers that were about to attack her with an ax and her dagger plunged right at his throat, and he died falling down with a bloody gurgle from her stabbing strike.

Arty held back her nausea before she heard footsteps running towards her and she readied herself to fight against them, but then when the other slavers came running to her direction, she was surprised and stunned at the sight she's seeing right now.

At first, she thought that she somehow got the attention of the slavers when she was freeing the slaves, but it turns out that they were being attacked by what looked to be freedom fighters who had come to free the slaves, but she got there first.

She realized that the slavers were about to get to the slaves and use them as hostages, but they didn't realize that all the beings they have abducted and enslaved were gone until they stopped in a halt and saw the empty cages, except the last one with the beast-people in it.

Before the slavers were about to react and then make a move to attack Arty who was the one responsible for freeing them, the freedom fighters struck first, attacking them from behind when they got distracted from seeing the empty cages and then killed all of the slavers until there was none left.

Once the group of freedom fighters has finished, they turned and stared at Arty who tensed on their gazes looking at her with an eerie caution.

But then one of the beast-people, a wolfman started barking and howling to the freedom fighters, telling them that Arty is a good guy and was the one who had saved them and freed them.

It relieved Arty completely that the group believed him and they relaxed and nodded to her in thanks for her help to freeing the slaves.

A few hours later, the freedom fighters and Arty went to free the beast-people and get them out of their cages, then the other freedom fighters went off to pick up the hiding freed slaves and Arty directed them to where they run off to so that they'll get them. By the time, the group has gathered around and were preparing to leave and send the freed slaves back to wherever they had come from, Arty decided to take a chance and asked for the fighters' help to train her to fight.

Even though she lost her chance with the slavers to get herself some fighting training, she wouldn't lose this other opportunity to learn to fight. It was fortunate or her good luck that the freedom fighters accepted her request. So right now, she's riding alongside the group of freedom fighters and freed slaves, riding on horse-pulling carts and going to some other place unknown that would send the freed slaves back to their homelands.

Arty had never thought that on the same day she would be meeting and dealing with slavers and freedom fighters at the same time in her course on trying to train herself to be a better fighter.

Hopefully, now that she was accepted with open arms from the group of freedom fighters when they had come and seen her freeing the slaves and saving them, then they would be able to teach her more to fight better and hone the skills that she needs for battle in the future.

She wondered what's in store for her wherever they are going and what or who she might face when they get there.

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