chapter 35 :Life of a serf

"When i was 15 years old , i was son of a serf in korpon region, east of this kingdom .

My father was a lowly serf working under the ducal family the 'Blair family '. Korpon region is a flat land blessed with a big river . Therefore, many serf's grow crops there for the Blair family there.

Since i was little , i didn't liked the fact that , my father works hard all the year like thousands of serf's under the merciless sun heat in the vast fields. After working hard for a year, when the time of harvesting come, they don't even give us a single crops. Almost all are taken away by the ducal family. We are just given few gold coins to live for a whole year.

After winter, they give us seeds and tools to plant crops in the fields. And my father obey their commands and work hard for another year in the fields from morning to twilight, like all other serfs.

some year, Because of famine or beasts attacks, the crops may grow far fewer then expected. Then soldiers of the duke family will torture us and give us far less money to live for a year.

So, like my father, all other serfs will pray to many deities related to agriculture to protect their crops fields.

That year, i was 14 years old. I didn't wanted to be a serf who will die working for a noble family.

One day, One rank 1 'water elephant' magic beasts came out of the nearby river and ate almost all of my father and other 2 serfs fields crops which was about to be harvested.

The dukes soldier who monitors us become furious for missing crops and caught my father and other 2 serf and dragged them to the fields.

Even though everyone confirmed that a magic beasts ate the crops,these soldeirs didn't listen to them and started to beat my father and other 2 with whips mercilessly.

I can't stand still seeing my father being beaten by these rogues. I shouted at the, "My father is innocent, it is you soldiers job to protect the fields from the beasts."

Hearing my words, a soldier rushed and kicked me hard which made me fly a meter away like a rag doll. Before losing consciousness i clearly saw a soldier spitting at me and said something that i will never forget,

[ A lowly serf dare to reminds us about what to do. ]

I wake up next day with a high fever and with a broken ribs. My mother helped me to recover within 6 month.

That soldiers words will always buzz in my ear that time.

One day, i decided to run away from there. I didn't wanted to be a lowly serf who will work for his whole life for a noble but will be stamped as a lowly being.

I got into a merchant caravan's goods bags and escaped from there.Later i spend some money to erase the serf mark and started to live a new life.

I have always wanted to see my father,mother and my little siblings, but i didn't succeeded.

During the succession crisis 40 years ago, I take advantage of the the chaos to go there to see how they are.

It was already more than 20 years after i ran away. I saw an old men was working in a large fields. He has tanned so much that anyone will mistake him as a black men.The skeletons are clearly visible from long away. He was working with 3 young men then. Seeing their face, i can easily tell that they are my little siblings.

I didn't wanted to cause them any trouble because of me. as serfs are a personal property of the noble family, the serfs who are disobedient, will be executed. I wanted to see mother , but I can't as serf stay with the soldiers. So i reluctantly go away .

If I had money back than , then i would have pretend to be a rich men and brought my family from this kind of life . huh" After saying his life story he sighed heavily.

He saw that not only his three teammates but that mysterious black robe guy ,who is drinking same dwarves wine as his team was also paying close attention to his words .

He continues,

"Now today i am hearing that war with the Hussars has broken out . I will take this opportunity to pretend to be a rich men and buy my nephew's and niece and free them from this salvery. I hope at least one of my younger brother is still alive.

We have some commissions left which we have taken , after finishing these we will go to our separate ways . " saying that he gulped all of his from his wine glass and ordered more .

The previous smiling faces now all turned into gloomy face . If you can look through the black robes , you can also see that a teen is also saddened by the old man's talk.

The dark robe man said to Prosores in a mysterious voice , "Old man , i would like you to give a task ,i believe that you would like to hear it ."

Prosores has lived for a long time because he can control his emotions. Even though annoyed by this mysterious men but he still nodded .

" I would like you to give me some detailed information about the magic beasts near colos city you know so far in your 60 years career . It doesn't matter if it is rumors or assumptions or dead .

I will give you 1 gold coins for every magic, dark, giant, mysterious or other type of magic beasts."

Prosores's eyes lit up as soon as he heard this .He has been a mercenary for 60 years. He knows every single dangerous monsters near this colos city like the back of his hand .He also heard a lot of stories about dangerous monsters in the poison swamp north of colos city. In this poison swamp their are many poisonous animals are full packed .

In his long life ,he also heard about a lot of legendary beasts which used to live near colos city or may still out there.

Colos city is just a road city which is used by traveling caravans, merchants, travellers, pilgrims to rest and fill up their supply which is short. It's economy is heavily dependent on business .

It is only sorrounded by 3 baron family's who's population is not so much . After that ,there are no human settlements in a close proximity.

Colos family always stations a rank 1 magi in the north of the colos city where poison swamp is and another rank 1 magi in east of the city where thar mountain range to keep an eye on them. It is to make sure that those poisonous and magic beasts will not come to the colos city to damage their profitable business.

The mysterious man in black robe quickly understand that the old man has the intention to accept this mission .

He fetched out 1000 gold coins from his spatial bag and pushed them to the old men .The old men smiled and happily accept them .

"This is the advance money . Meet me in 1 week later right in this tavern. All of the information must be written neat and cleanly in a paper." The mysterious man said in a grand manner.

" Don't worry sir , i will do my best you can rest assured."

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Aetius has gone to the market to buy a voice changer from there. After searching for a little bit around ,he found a very weird voice changer prop .

This voice changer prop is very different from all of the props he has stumbled upon so far . it has shape of a maple leaf .It is very slimy like a chewing gum and it's very small ,about an inch .

The merchant told me that a person sold it to him just an hour ago !

I touched this and felt a sticky but slimy texture as if it is a real tongue. The merchant inform me in advance that it is a stolen good and he didn't washed it yet . I almost vomited and ordered the merchant to bring water .After washing it for a good while ,i stick it under my tongue as merchant said .

As soon as i touched it with my tongue,I received an electronic message. I didn't checked it now as i am busy checking this strange voice changers working principals.

I felt as if it melted with my tongue ! I quickly shove my right hand in my mouth to check and can still feel that its still there .

Hmm ,i think it is not a simple thing .As far as i know , props are made from metals only but it is same as if a tongue! Maybe i can win a rare alchemy prop now. Let me first check something.

"Merchant, this thing is a very bad prop i have ever seen . It feels as if i had a cow dung in my tongue. who sold this kind of stuff?" I said acting as if dissatisfied with this

" Sir ,I didn't check it after buying this from that thief girl . I was so busy that i almost forgot about this .I am also not very optimistic about this ,just give me 200 gold coins if you want it ."He said believing in my lie.

Thief's from outside of this city sells their stolen goods inside this city . Of course the magi station here will execute any thief if they dare to steal in this city .

ha ha ha , Looks like a thief sold it here not knowing anything about it's true value !

I didn't wanted to bargain as i fear the merchant might refuse to sell after hearing my counter offer .I quickly paid and left .

Then i gone to the the tavern, darank the famous dwarves wine ,give a task of collecting information about local beasts,myth and presumptions .After that i go outside to go outside of the Prosores eyes. I don't wanna let him know that i live in this taverns hotel!

After the mercenaries go away ,i started to eat my morning meal ,I quickly go upstairs to my room and closed it .

" I can't wait to see what kind of jackpot I got today!"