Obelisks and Exposition

"That's a big city," I whisper to myself. I woke up about an hour ago to find myself still in the wagon, unfortunately. Though I noticed that some people were gone, so I got more leg room. A win-lose situation, I guess.

While I was awake, I was keeping track of the environment and terrain we passed through. The area surrounding the city are just mountains and jungles, which sucks. Honestly, who likes jungles?

Currently, we are nearing the city gates. The city is gigantic. It honestly seems like it never ends. Most of the buildings look equal in height and width, more or less. I guess that they are the civilian houses while the more abstract buildings are shops, bathouses, government offices, etc. However, the most unique aspect of the city is the giant tower, which I assume is located in the middle of the city. The tower is so big that I couldn't even see the top of it.

I really want to know what's inside it. What if there is some ancient evil dragon? Wouldn't that be fucking cool?

One of my slavers gave the guards that were stationed at the city gates some papers, probably passports or something. I'm kinda surprised they can even see considering they're wearing those long hoods. I still haven't caught a glimpse of their eyes yet. Do they think they're Jedi or something? Disobeying the code, they are.

The guards motioned to open the gate to the guards standing on top of the city gates. The gate opened and we embarked once again.

The city looked even more incredible in person. Through the little cracks, you could really see just how huge it was. People of all colors, all races, and all backgrounds live here. It seemed like a melting pot of culture. It was honestly incredible.

There weren't just humans here either, but some lizard folks, walking birdmen, two legged dragons, and even some...evolved monkeys? There were plenty more but it is hard to describe them. Though, one of the more unique species I saw was one of those big grey ones. Obviously they were grey, but they also had one singular horn on their forehead and four shoulders, along with four arms. I also saw one managed to rotate their neck 360 degrees six times in a row.

That's kinda cool...and creepy.

Several minutes later, the wagons stopped. The other slaves and I are forced out of the wagons. The sun is shining down on us and it's pretty annoying. I would assume it's like 80 degrees at this place.

I look around and I notice that there are a lot less slaves than there were when I first got picked up. We must of made several stops before we got here.

In front of us, is the giant tower that I mentioned before. The tower is a lot more defined in person. It is a black material, almost obsidian looking, yet it has these weird see-through pipes going around it. The pipes were small and golden. A black and gold contrast. Interesting.

From the looks of it, the tower looks like an old sewer system. I have a theory that the tower collects water from the clouds and delivers it to places. I don't know the science or the logic of that, but that's the best I can come up with.

The klansman has us line up in front of the tower. I really wish we can get this over with. I'm sweating all over and I obviously haven't taken a bath recently. Though, at least I don't smell as bad as the others. They fucking stink. I guess I was lucky to only be in the wagon for a day.

My captors shout some gibberish and suddenly a red fluid flows through the gold pipes. When the red fluid reaches the bottom, a door appears in the tower and opens.

That's some Harry Potter bullshit right there.

They motions the other slaves and I inside the tower which is now starting to creep me out. This might be a torture chamber.

One by one, the slaves walk through the door. Eventually, it's my turn. I take one step then hesitate. And who can really blame me? From my point of view, I'm walking into an endless void. One of my captors shouts behind me so I finally walk into it.

The inside...is unexpected. I was expecting a lot of axes, needles, guillotines, and other gut wrenching devices, but instead there are a bunch of....chairs? This place reminds of a school assembly, but instead of decorations there are just stone ugly black stoned walls.

Well, it would be misleading to say there weren't any weapons here, because there are still a lot, just a lot more tame than my expectations. I guess Hollywood does lie.

Everyone else started sitting down on these chairs laid out before us, so I followed suit. The chairs are a bit low quality however. Hell, one of my chair legs is barely hanging on.

One of the Jedi wannabes walks in front of us. This guy is different from the rest of them however. Instead of wearing a hooded white shawl, it was black with golden stripes.

Not to mention he has a giant silver staff. At the top of the staff were silver hands that are firmly grasping the scarlet gem.

He raises the staff in the air and chants some random words. The gem glows and you could see his eye turning white. Well at least the bottom part. I still can't see most of his eyes.

During his chant, I feel an odd feeling in my mind. I don't know what he's doing, but I don't like it. Well it doesn't feel bad, but it doesn't feel good. A pretty neutral feeling. It is pretty uncomfortable, however.

Looking around the room, I notice my fellow slaves holding their head in pain and screaming. Does this actually hurt them? Maybe it's because of their biology. They might have a lower mental pain tolerance than most humans do.

"Oh, fuck!" I scream. Christ almighty, what the hell is he doing? It's like he is trying to overload my brain.

Random thoughts fill my head. I don't know what any of them means, partially because I'm in too much pain to start comprehending what they mean.

The pain lasts for another minute or so. Maybe five minutes, maybe twenty minutes. I don't know anymore.

"Listen up!" the black hooded shawl guy says. "Some of you might get random headaches here and there, but you should be lucky that I only transferred the common language of Trancia into you."

Ah, I see. The magic he used was some sort of knowledge transferring. It kinda reminds me of that one scene from Green Lantern: First Flight where Hal Jordan put his ring inside the power battery to learn the history of the galaxy and screams in absolute pain. Though, he was learning about thousands of years of history while I only learned a basic language. The principle stayed the same though.

It is fucking awesome that I can understand at least one language now.

"My name is Cyzi, Lord Cyzi to you uncultured savages," he says, his voice classy and elegant. "Unless you've been living under a rock, then I presume you have all heard of the Eden's Treaty, right?"

I haven't heard anything close to that, mostly because I only gained audio comprehension skills recently. Seeing how everyone else is also shaking their heads, I'll assume that I'm not the only one who didn't know what he was talking about.

Cyzi covers his eyes and sighs, "I guess it was foolish to expect anything more from some backwater barbarians." He starts walking back and forth, with his hand behind his back. "To make a lengthy story miniscule, the glorious Kingdom of Trancia had utterly defeated the forces of the Advel Republic, stormed the capital city of Yashji, and took the Advel's Parliament . At the neutral city of Eden, King Zaien and President Rursk signed the Eden's Treaty."

Eden, huh? Sounds like a place I should head for. Well, if I ever get out of this

predicament I'm in. A neutral city sounds ideal for someone like me. There I will hopefully be able to dodge conflicts and learn about the history and sciences of this world.

Though the name is kinda weird. Eden, as in the Garden of Eden. It's like God is playing some sort of trick on me. Like some sort of odd pun.

"The treaty resulted in the complete annexation of the Advel Republic," he states.

Damn. It's kinda like the Pre-Renaissance period of Earth, at least in Europe. The Bablyonians, Persians, Assyrians, Greeks, Romans, they all completely conquered their enemies and took them as slaves. That's a real simplified version of events that usually happens but you get the jist of it.

Cyzi points at us, "According to the Vienlia Code of War, we can either release you all and exile you from Trancia, grant you official citizenship, give you the privilege to be our slaves, or sentence every last one of you to death. Usually we will give our enemies mercy and let them become citizens. That is actually one of the reasons Trancia is as powerful and influential as it is. Assimilation."

God really did a nice job with all these references. The Romans used to grant other races and cultures Roman citizenship. This

Cyzi unhoods himself, revealing dark brown hair that is gelled to the side. His emerald eyes narrow at us in pure disgust. "But you Advel's animals, absolute scum, had the audacity to sack the Holy City of Veris?" He chuckles, somehow seeing humor in this odd situation. "The citizens of Trancia crave your blood. They wish your heads to be spiked on block, on every street, on every single lamppost."

Pause.

Pause.

Pause.

Now just wait a goddamn minute. I have no clue who these people are. I have no affiliations or connections with them. I consider myself to be a nice guy, but I'm no Jesus. I'm not about to die on the cross for these people.

But if I try to convince him that I'm not one of them, the odds of him actually believing me are close to none. First of all, telling him I'm from another world is off the table for obvious reasons. They might even lock me up or kill me for insanity.

Also, the odds are that many other people already tried to convince him that they are not Advelians or were just merchants passing through at the time. Sure, some of them were probably true, but I highly doubt that he just let them go. Maybe there is a passport in this world that they check? Either way, I'm fucked.

Not to mention that I can't single myself out from the rest of the slaves. Like I said before, all of them are very diverse in color and features. I think it's safe to say that the Advel Republic is also very tolerant of other cultures, just like Trancia. And since not a lot of us are pure Advelians, I assume that Czyi isn't talking about ethnicity but nationality.

"However, his majesty has granted you vermin mercy. Instead of your neck meeting the cold steel of the guillotine, King Zaien has given you the opportunity to redeem yourselves," Cyzi says.

He raises his silver staff in the air and chants something again. I don't understand any of what he is saying. I think the magic has its own language system. Kinda like the dragon language in Skyrim.

Pain fills me when he finishes chanting. Rather my brain is overloaded with knowledge, my left shoulder is burning in agony. I clutch my shoulder and I pull down my shirt so I can see my shoulder.

On my shoulder, several black lines are painting my skin. In the end, they formed an ankh. Other slaves got different symbols like pitchforks and pickaxes.

"Every single one of you is now branded. You all are now official slaves of Trancia," Cyzi starts. He points to his shoulder. "If you look at your shoulder, you'll notice that you have a specific symbol on your left shoulder. The pitchfork stands for farmers, the pickaxes stands for miners, and the ankh stands for mages. You and all your descendants will live the life of your selected role until death. You now live and serve Trancia, do I make myself clear?"

We nod our heads in understanding.

"At least you animals have basic comprehension skills," he says. Cyzi turns to tell one of his subordinates something. I can't hear due to the distance but suddenly his three portals open up in the back of the room.

Cyzi walks near one of them. "Now before you barbarians start screaming in fear, let me enlighten you. This building we are in is called a void obelisk. It is called that because the space in it exists outside space. The tower could be destroyed yet this room will still be here unschated. Because of that, we can teleport to any city or stronghold that has an obelisk."

That's extremely overpowered. No wonder they won the war.

"However, every time you use an obelisk, your mind deteriorates. Most can only withstand it three times before they reach insanity."

Oh. Well that makes sense. I wonder who created these though. Were they always here? Maybe some extinct race knew crazy advanced magic? I don't know, but I'm definitely gonna try to find out.

"Most people aren't really affected by their first teleport which is why we are using this now. The economy has plummeted because of the war so the farmers and miners need to get to the mines immediately." Cyzi says. I don't know if I wish to stay here anymore. Back on Earth, a bad economy equaled hell. Just look at the Weimar Republic.

"According to Minister Lilia, farmers will go with Captain Jasi over here to the Northern farmlands. She will supervise you and tell you your goals," Cyzi instructed as he points to Jasi to his right. "Miners will follow Captain Kaci to the Westfian Mountains. He will also supervise you. The few mages here will stay here under my supervision. I shall teach you basic magic so you can be of use on the frontlines. Now mages, follow me and I shall take you to your dorms. Jasi and Kaci, you may do as you please."

The farmers and miners walk through the portals with Jasi or Kaci. The other mages and I follow Cyzi to our dorms.

Now I don't know what I was thinking but the dorms were more like cells than actual dorms.

Each one could only be opened by a guard or Cyzi himself and there was only a bed, toilet, and sink in there. Not even a mirror. It's honestly disgusting. Not to mention the black stonish walls were pretty morbid.

Once he finishes showing us our dorms, he dismisses us so we can rest for tomorrow's training. It's a damn shame because I just slept on the ride.

Going back to how disgusting these cells are, this bed feels like it's made of rocks. I don't know if they are preparing me for Hogwarts or bootcamp anymore. It's going to be hard to adjust to this life.

Speaking about life, I'm apparently a mage now. Actually, the proper term would be "slave mage" or something. This is pretty exciting, if you ignore that I am a slave. There is so much magic to learn, some much places to explore, so much theories to make.

Despite this unfortunate upbringing, I'm going to make my mark on this world. My name will be featured in every book, in every record, in every school. I'm going to carve myself within the cracks. I'm sure of it.