Chapter 6

General POV~

It was precisely at this moment that Aryan realized how bad he had messed up.

One of the worst case scenarios he had theorized previously had come to be realized, he had run into another even more dangerous group than before.

Now, Aryan cursed his past self for going towards the drum sounds with such vigor, if he had just stopped and turned back then and there, then perhaps he would be free and wouldn't be in such a situation at this moment.

Not only was he suppressed by the absolute monster of a man, who equaled him in strength and dwarfed him in skill, but he was also being looked at by the man named

'Tehkmen', who was supposedly the Treasurer of the Pharaoh's court.

One by one, the doors to the various houses opened up and the various people walked out. From the men and the woman to the children and the elderly, everyone got out of their houses and prostrated themselves before the Treasurer.

Aryan looked at this display in shock.

He wondered why a mere treasurer was being regarded with such high value.

Aryan looked up to gaze at Tehkmen, but before he could even get a good look in, his face was grabbed from the back and slammed into the dirt below.

"The Treasurer is the God's apostle and serve the Pharaoh, an avatar of Horus[1]. Pay some respect will you?" The man said.

Seeing this, the treasurer had a smile on his face.

"Now now, no need to be too harsh." He said in a serene and almost gentle tone, "He just needs to know his place and get the appropriate punishment for disrespecting me." He said.

He turned away from Aryan and said in a calm tone, "Take him away to the slave shop and whip him a hundred times. That ought to teach him."

Hearing that, Aryan's eyes widened and he shouted in protest, "Wha-"

Bam*

But his protest fell on deaf ears as the man slammed his face into the ground once again.

Aryan tried to resists using his strength, but the man held his body down with an iron grip, not letting him go in the slightest. The onlookers who were kneeling on the ground looked at him in pity and contempt.

They knew how bad an offence of offending an apostle of the Gods was. And they didn't want the apostle to direct his bad gaze at them.

The Treasurer was considered to be an apostle of the Goddess Renenutet[2] and if the tresurer was to be angered, perhaps he would curse their land in anger.

Some of the men that had come with the treasurer as a form of protection came up to Aryan and along with the one wearing the Nemes, held him tightly and began to drag him away.

Aryan could not even speak, for his mouth was tightly sealed by a hand from one of the men that suppressed him.

"Hmm. Poor fellow."

After saying that, he turned towards Ahmet who was currently prostrating himself onto the ground like all others.

"Ah, the slave trader. I did not expect to find you out of your shop!" He said in a surprised tone. The, he proceeded to hold his chin between two of his fingers and hum in contemplation.

"Hmm. What was your name again?" He asked with a mocking tone, as if telling him that his name wasn't even worth remembering.

"It was Ahmet, my lord." The slave trader replied almost instantly. He did not seem to be offended by his comment, rather, he seemed to be almost afraid of getting on his bad side.

Even if he did have any dissatisfaction in his heart, he had concealed it with the utmost precision; so much so that even a shred of distaste was not visible on his face.

"Ah, Ahmet. That's right." The man hummed, "So, why are you here may I ask?"

"Yes. It was because of that man that was dragged away just now." Ahmet replied with his head still on the ground.

"Hmm? That man? Was he one of your 'goods'?" He asked with intrigue.

"That would be correct. To be more specific, he was supposed to be part of the new batch that you have come here for."

"Is that so…" The man's lips curled into a smile.

"Yes. He came recently and was to be used as a work slave. Looking at his physique, I was going to charge a separate fee for his ownership." Ahmet said with a small smile growing on his face, which was hidden by his peculiar position on the ground.

'I was going to sell him to some noble, but I guess the treasurer taking him wouldn't be so bad either. I can make an even larger sum this way.'

"A separate sum for a slave? That's something I haven't seen until now in your shop, let's get to your shop first before we talk business." The man said with a smile. From the time the slaves had been brought from Ahmet's shop, the slaves had always been bought in bulk.

Meaning that Ahmet would make separate groups for the different types of slaves and the purpose they would serve. A group for physical labor, another one for mundane housework, another one for public entertainment, another one for pleasures of the nobles and government officials and so on.

And each group would have a certain amount of people that he would sell for a single sum of money.

For the modern man, it was the equivalent of buying an already organized food set instead of manually choosing the food items and buying them individually. Only in this case, it wasn't food being sold, but people.

"Yes of course." Said Ahmet as he stood up.

Inwardly, he was smiling. From the moment, the treasurer had expressed his curiosity in that man, he knew that selling him separately would be the most optimal course of action.

If he had simply stated that the man was a physical laborer, he would have to sell him in the group that he had prepared, but if he were to say that he was a multipurpose slave that could do a lot of things, surely his interest would be spiked.

Obviously, Ahmet remembered that the new guy couldn't speak, at least according to Cheruk. And as such, he really wouldn't be that much help in anything except for physical labor. But did it matter if the goods that were advertised were different from the goods that were sold? Of course not!

It would only make sense to make as much money as possible from any given situation. Such was Ahmet's thinking.

And what would the treasurer do if he were to find that the slave he had sold was absolutely useless except for physical work?

Ahmet was not worried about that. For Government officials like him, they stand second only to the Pharaoh[3]. And naturally, that position came with its added benefits of money, which was especially true for the treasurer.

Ahmet was sure that he would merely brush it off with a laugh or something.

'Rich Bastards.' Ahmet though as he walked behind the giant parade of people that the treasurer had along him.

All these people were there to escort the treasurer and to make sure that none of the slaves were to escape while travelling back to the capital.

Ahmet looked at Aryan who was being carried by the guards who were even allowing him to speak.

'I hope they don't rough him up too much. It would be less that ideal if he were to sustain damage and the treasurer lost interest because of that.' He thought with a grimace.

'Although...' The image of Aryan jumping off of the ground up to the roof appeared in his mind. With that image in his thoughts, he once again glanced at him.

'There might be more to him that meets the eye.' He concluded.

And without any other sound except for the sound of drums from the parade that the treasurer was leading, they proceeded towards Ahmet's slave shop.

***

After they reached the slave shop, Tehkmen and the others proceeded to go inside, while Aryan and the others stayed outside.

Not without reason, however.

Aryan who was still struggling in the arms of the guards was brought to the center of the road and made to kneel on the ground. With the various people that suppressed him, there was nothing he could do. Even with his monstrous strength that he had acquired, he wasn't able to break free.

'Shit, I need to do something…' Aryan thought, but nothing came to mind.

Without any delay, two wooden pillars were brought by the guards from who knows where and erected on either side of him. The pillars were buried into the road to prevent them from falling. And with that, his hands were tied with a thick rope, far thicker than the one Aryan had broken through before.

His captors were playing a part in the preparation and they were the ones to have arranged the rope.

"Wai! Thes is misunstanding!" Aryan screamed in the broken Egyptian that he knew but no one listened.

"Shut up!" The man with the Nemes yelled and punched his face with a loud sound.

Bang*

"Ho?! He can speak!"

"He can speak alright!"

Aryan's captors expressed their surprise at the sight of him actually speaking.

Aryan continued to protest, despite the beating from the man. Eventually, the guards let go of him after typing up his arms to the pillars and his legs together so he couldn't escape, even if he broke through the ropes.

To prevent any more rambling from Aryan, his mouth had a ball of cloth stuffed into it and then a rope was tied up over it.

'Shit shit shit shit shit shit shit! This is NOT GOOD! Let me go you pieces of shits!' Aryan tried to scream, but all that came out through the cloth was muffled groans.

Not long after, the man with the Nemes came behind him with a whip in his hand.

"The punishment for getting in the treasurer's way and staining his mood is a hundred whips! Although punishment of any magnitude is insufficient for atoning for such a heinous crime, pray that your sins will be punished and the Gods will take mercy upon you!" The man yelled and raised the whip in his hand.

A muffled scream came out of Aryan's covered mouth as his arms strained the rope, trying to escape the painful fate that was about to come.

Alas, it seemed like there was nothing that he could do.

Whip*

The loud sound of the rope imapcting Aryan's body rang out.

Mmmmmmmmhhhh~*

And with the same sound, Aryan's muffled scream was also heard.

Pain. Searing hot pain that shot through his very soul was what Aryan was experiencing at this moment.

The rope that bound Aryan's wrists dug into his skin as he pushed against them to escape.

His knees became weak and the feeling of pain awakened the first and the most primal law of nature manifest in his mind. To run away.

But how could he do that when he was bound like such?

Whip!*

Another sharp sound rang out, and the same muffled scream accompanied it, this time, with a bit more crack to it.

Whip!*

Whip!*

Whip!*

More and more whipping sounds resonated in the area and the onlookers stood by to watch. Normally, they would have cheered seeing such a scene, but they were all unusually quiet, as to not disturb the treasurer that had come to their city.

The clothes that Aryan had been wearing were now torn in various places, the whipping taking it's toll on them. The torn shirt revealed the deeply wounded skin below; the red blood flowed from his back, dyeing the shirt with a crimson shade of red.

Anyone that looked at his back could be able to guess how badly the man was whipping him. With just a few whips, he was already in such a condition.

Aryan's mental state was even worse. His face had now turned into a mess. Tears gradually flowed down his face and snot ran down his nose and his mouth which was filled with the ball of cloth was also leaking with saliva. His screams had gotten increasingly pitiful and his muffled voice cracked with hints of pain that no normal man in the modern era would have to bear.

And that was what he was, a normal man. He didn't deserve any of this!

'W-why is this happening to me?!' Aryan screamed in his mind before another whip was felt at his back.

"Mmmmmmmhhhfffff~!" He tried to scream again, but to no avail.

For the first time since he had arrived in the ancient era, he recieved a reality check. Although he almost died from heat in the desert, captured by slavers, ran across an entire city in an escape attempt, and got captured by even more dangerous people, none of that was enough for him to understand his situation.

He was too immersed in the sense of 'Adventure' and 'Exhilaration' that it clouded his thinking, and when he got the strange powers from the floating screen, it only fueled that thought.

He disregarded everything that his logical mind could come up with and was overcome with a sense of invincibility, a feeling that he could dominate the old world and that it would be easy to survive here.

One would think that it would be impossible for him to realize his situation if he didn't understand them in all of those life threatening situations. But nay, the oldest and most primal feeling of pain made him realize that this was not a game.

This was not some picnic that he had decided to go to. This was all very very real.

'I never should have filled out that damn survey!'

At this time, Aryan expressed his resentment in the form of regret for his actions.

If he had never filled out that survey, he would be at home living a good life.

If he had never filled out that survey, he would not be experiencing such pain.

If he had never filled out that survey, he would...

Thoughts of the same kind overcame his mind like a flood.

Whip!*

"Mmmmmmpphhhfff~!"

Once more, the whip and Aryan's muffled scream sounded one after the other.

Aryan looked at the onlookers. All of them looked at his pathetic figure with smiles on their faces, their gazes filled with contempt and pity.

'I see... it's this kind of world huh...' He thought, 'It's a dog eat dog world... I was too naive and stupid to think living here would be easy. I treated being transported here like a field trip...'

Aryan concluded amid his dark thoughts. Sure enough, pain was the best reality check for anyone.

Whip!*

And it seemed that he would be recieving even more reality check.

Whip!*

A lot more...

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[1] In ancient Egyptian mythology, the position of the king of Egypt was won by Horus(The God of Sky and War, sometimes also associated with Wind) after he defeated his Uncle, Seth(The God of Desert, Foreign Lands, Thunderstorms and Earthquakes).

It was believed that the Pharaoh is meant to be the Earthly Embodiment of the god Horus, because only the gods would be fit enough to rule the kingdom.

The various government officials are also considered as the apostles of the gods of their respective fields, signifying their position as being just below the Pharaoh himself.

[2] Renenutet was the goddess of Harvest in the Egyptian mythology. Seeing as there was no given god of currency in the mythology, I saw it fit for the treasurer to be an apostle of the goddess of Harvest as someone that would keep the royal funds plentiful.

[3] The Egyptian heirarchy goes like this: 1. Pharaoh, 2. Government Officials, 3. Nobles and Priests, 4. Artisans and Merchants, 5. Slaves and Workers.