Fjorgyn: A Rebel Rises

by RJ Castiglione

  I thought about this question for a second. I was no longer Creighton Dian-Cecht. Creighton died in a game. I briefly imagined the reaction of my company companions when I shattered the most valuable item we have ever found and dropped dead never to resurrect again. I can picture the bones of my corpse resting for a few days in that Dwarven chamber—that is until the game’s procedural algorithms clean them up. Will they ever know what happened to me? No one in the game knows anyone’s real name. There was a mental block preventing players from sharing personal information that persisted even when one was offline.

  I still wanted to be Dian-Cecht, though. The surname had significance for me as a reference not only to the Celtic god of healing but to my personal desire to heal others as my primary function. I also wanted to be Michael again. I didn’t want to forget that part of myself.

  “Michael Dian-Cecht,” I replied. They all smiled and offered their greetings, although some were a tad surprised with my unusual name. I possessed a name of a Trisian and the last name of an elf. But I was completely elf.

  A third guard rattled the side of the cage and ordered quiet. Silence and sadness washed over the group like a great thunderstorm meeting a quick end. What was missing now was desperation. It had been replaced by the smallest kernels of gratitude and respite.

  Congratulations! You have increased a skill! Observation. Current rank: 2. You are 1% more likely to glean useful information from people and things around you.

  Pleased with my character progress for the first time, I took my cue from those around me, rested against the cold iron bars of our cage, falling into a disruptive and shallow sleep. I was going to need my strength to face what was to come, especially if that involved escaping slavery.

  Secret name: Slanaitheoir (savior)

  Character name: Michael Dian-Cecht

  Race: Forest Elf

  Age: 27

  Class: Undefined

  Talent: Undefined

  Level 3 (274xp to next level)

  Health: 123

  Mana: 124

  Stamina: 123

  Fatigue: 0%

  Armor: 4 (.05% damage mitigation) – 1.05% with skills

  Strength: 12

  Intelligence: 13

  Wisdom: 13

  Constitution: 12

  Agility: 12

  Luck: 5

  Alignment: Chaotic Good (+1)

  Racial Traits: +5% to herbalism, +5% to all non-metal crafting, +5% to nature-based healing and damage spells, +5% to mana regeneration

  Profession: Undefined

  Company: Undefined

  Modifiers: Forest Elf (+10% movement in the forest

  Skills:

  Novice Blades 1: The ability to deal damage with knives and blades. Drains stamina. Increase in rank reduces stamina drain and increases additional damage.

  Novice Grappling 1: The ability to deal physical damage through hand-to-hand combat.

  Novice Light Armor 1: Wearing light armor grants a bonus to damage reduction. Increase in rank improves movement speed and reduces damage taken.

  Novice Observation 2: You are keenly aware of your surroundings. You are able to glean useful information from those around you to aid in your understanding of your world.

  Novice Stalking 1: The ability to stealth through the world. Increases fatigue. Increase in rank improves hiding, reduces fatigue increase and improves movement speed while moving silently.

  Novice Tailoring 1: The craft of creating cloth armor and goods.

  Novice Tracking 1: The art of finding your way through nature. Useful for hunting creatures or humanoids alike. Also aids in discovering new paths.

  Chapter 4

  “I’ve heard about these things before, you know: Invaders overwhelming a small village with torches and swords. When I found out about them, I tried to picture them in my head. Now I know that I never understood ‘real war.' It was the first time I experienced such things, but that didn’t stop over half of my village from being slaughtered. This always happened elsewhere. This always happened to other people. In my mind, those who were attacked and captured by slavers deserved it. That is what they told us. Slaves were deserving for their crimes against the Vrosian empire – that they sinned against the High Protectorate of Elatha; that they were criminals who were punished by having to earn their freedom again. Then the soldiers came in the night and captured my wife, my children, and any villager who couldn’t get away. They killed those who fought back. I learned then that it was all propaganda.”

  I listened intently to him. The guards had left us alone and we were now free to speak. “Go on,” I instructed. I was curious to hear his story.

  “We were simple farmers. Hardly one of us ever ventured out far enough from our village to reach level 10. We never caused anyone trouble. We provided enough to sell what we needed to the capital and feed our families for the winter. Moga –“ he gestured to the level 11 Nissean in the group “- was the most experienced of us - a hunter. The soldiers arrived fast enough where he didn’t even have a chance to grab his bow. We ran; my wife and children and I. We moved with the rest of the group as far as we could run for as long as we could run. It didn’t matter. The slavers caught us on their horses. Once they had our children, the fight was over. There was nothing more we could do. If we struggled, our kids would be orphans.”

  “But you would have respawned, right?”

  The man, now known to me as Cilden Thane, glared at me as though I were speaking another language. He had bright red hair with a beard to match. His hands were strong and dirty from years of working the land, although I would guess that he had never held a weapon before. He didn’t seem that type. He was innocent. He and his family were truly undeserving of the abuses they have experienced.

  “Oh yeah. I forgot to tell you. Others in this land do not respawn like you do. Once they die, they actually die. NPC’s do appear to take their place, but it is not them.” Vindur was “always” prompt with his necessary information. I pushed him off my shoulder to punish him for his tardiness with important details.

  “Sorry, my mistake. What I meant to ask is whether the soldiers really would have killed you in front of your children. They’re slavers. They make money by selling slaves… us. They have no profit if they kill a new slave who resists.”

  Cilden shrugged, expressing complete resignation. “I would not have us be parted.” He bounced his little daughter on his lap while his wife, Rose, tended to their son.

  It had been five hours since we arrived at the outskirts of Elatha, the capital city of Vros. The guards unloaded us, welded a black, leather collar around our necks, and placed us in a caged paddock for the remainder of the night. There were now fifteen of us waiting eagerly to be sold to our future masters. We had joined a group of five individuals who were already in the cage before us.

  I learned through my new friend that Vros was an empire on the opposite side of the planet from Skos. Where Skos was a free-market democracy, Vros was a meritocracy – an oligarchy if one was to be exact – with Elatha as her capital. It was also a nation that favored enforced slavery among the poor and downtrodden. Slavers were known to invade small villages and towns and capture people to meet their quota. Those captured, which now include me, were sold on the open market to members of the aristocracy as personal servants and house slaves. Some are sold to the mines. The prettier women and boys among slaves are sold to whorehouses. Enforced slavery kept the economy moving.

  “We can be back at Finlyon in a week,” Vinrud said. “Just get a guard to kill you.”

  It was a decent idea. I could best spend my time on leveling and improving my skills. Unless I was going to spend my time hunting forest rats, though, I would have to leave the forest eventually and would most likely find myself back here. And who knows. If I were to antagonize the guards and get them to attack, they might not stop with me. They could decide that our entire group was not worth the hassle and slaughter us all in a matter of minutes. Screw the profi
t loss. They could choose to sell the children into the worst positions possible.

  “No. My nation decided long ago that slavery was an abomination. I’m going to stay here and do all I can to help these people. Plus I’m going to live for another 350 years or so. I don’t want to escape through death whenever it is convenient for me, especially when I have to wait a week to resurrect again.” Vindur detested my stubbornness, hopping off my shoulder to explore.

  “Death fucking hurts!” I told the crow.

  “I’m sorry, Vindur. Am I upsetting you? Is this cage not to your liking? You can always fit between the bars. Go. Find out what you can learn.”

  Without hesitating, Vindur heeded my command and flew away.

  “Cilden, where I come from, slavery is unacceptable. We used to have slaves. My country divided in two: North for abolition and south for separation. Both sides waged a great war that cost hundreds of thousands of lives. The victors decided the question of slavery: never again." I measured my next words carefully. I never imagined myself a hero before. That's why I always liked healing. It let other people be the heroes. Still, these people needed me. I have found potential allies, and I wasn't going to abandon them to slavery. If they needed a hero, I could become one.

  "I will see you and your family out of this if it’s the last thing I do. I promise you this.”

  You have received a quest! “Let my people go!”

  You have promised to free yourself and your friends from slavery. Be a savior to your adopted people! Find them a new settlement. You will have six months to accomplish this quest. This quest is not optional.

  Reward: Unknown

  Bonus: Additional rewards will be given depending on the number of unknown individuals you also free. Additional rewards will be given depending on the quality of the settlement.

  The burly man smiled, not sure what to make of my proclamation. In his mind, I could tell that he thought my words were hollow. How could a level 3 elf get him and his family away from Elatha? And how could a man such as myself who was older than him be found at the edges of a forest and still only be level 3?

  Despite his apparent disbelief in me, I was brimming with resolve. I would see them through this and would free as many slaves as I could in the process. We will escape and we will build a new home out of reach of the arm of Elatha.

  Congratulations! You have discovered a new skill! Leadership. Your willingness to lead others results in their seeing you as a natural and efficient leader. Increase this skill to improve the loyalty of those who you lead towards accomplishing your goals and fulfilling your purpose. Current rank 1.

  “Tell me about Elatha.”.

  Children heard many stories about the dark city. Traders would come to the village, selling goods but giving stories in exchange for food. It was perpetually clouded in night – a darkness inspired by magical barriers maintained by the Wraithheart Company, a group consisting of the most wealthy citizens of the city. The oligarchs of this company, called the “High Protectorate,” ruled with an iron fist. One would only earn their respect by becoming rich and powerful like themselves. Their grip on the city’s economy made accomplishing that an impossible feat. The city consisted of four rings all divided by extensive systems of canals. There were 500,000 or so residents, two-thousand among them members of the aristocracy. The inner ring was for the ruling members of the Wraiththeart Company and their families. The second ring consisted of aristocrats who were members. The third ring consisted of non-membered, skilled laborers. The outer ring was made up of slums, housing unskilled freemen. On top of the 500,000 residents, there were twenty to thirty thousand slaves.

  He spoke of the cities economy, her people, and her politics. By the time he had finished, an hour had passed, and the barrier he alluded to began to glow, lit up from the outside by the morning sun. Despite the power of the company, even they could not create a complete and perpetual night. They could merely blot out the sun. The barrier was still impressive. I have never heard of or witnessed such a futile exercise in magical power. What was the purpose? This was the capital city. Surely everyone knew where it was. I could understand a protective shield encompassing her circumference. A protective barrier that blocked sunlight was another thing entirely. It was an exercise in blatant suppression.

  With the conversation completed, the fifteen of us sat in silence. I finally got my first chance to look at my fellow prisoners in more detail. Cilden was always the most visible, along with his children. The three shared shoulder-length, ginger hair. Cilden and Junta, his young son, both had square faces and broad shoulders. Analyzing Cilden, the man was rank 21 in agriculture and rank 8 in Construction. He was also rank 13 in “Creature of Burden,” most likely due to lifting heavy loads all day. His son, despite being only six, had the look of a boy who helped his father in the fields. Both Junta and Neeta, his daughter, had some softer features as well. Their ears stuck out of their hair, though, coming to a faint point – inherited from their mother, an elf like me.

  There was Moga, the Nissean hunter. He had scars crossing his face as though a large predator clawed him. He wore a green tunic and leather trousers that contained more patches than pant. I analyzed him. All of his skills were higher than his own level. He was rank 25 in stalking and rank 18 in archery. His light armor skill was also high.

  ------

  “Father, no! I don’t need them. Look at them. They’re all filthy!”

  The silence broke when a squad of soldiers escorted a stout man and his prat of a twenty-something son to our jail. The older man examined us, covering his nose in disgust. He evidently considered us beneath him. And for now, we were.

  “Nonsense,” he said to his son. “You already disobeyed me by not taking the wife I selected for you. Now that you’ve decided to run your own household, I’ll not see you servant-less. No son of mine is going to wash the dishes like a lowly kitchen bitch. We have a reputation to maintain.”

  If there weren’t bars between us, I would have broken the man’s nose. How could anyone justify prospering on the backs of slaves? He continued.

  “And this lot will do nicely once you clean them up. They’re low level, especially that cockroach of an elf in the corner.” He pointed at me. “Honestly. Why do we let them breed so much? You have men to do the heavy lifting, women to cook. You can even fuck them if you want. And look! Children to be your little spies!”

  He motioned over to the clerk and informed him that they would take the lot of us for 15,000 gold. My stomach lurched at the cost. 1,000 gold was enough to start a small village. And this man was paying the price for a cluster of slaves to do his son’s bidding. The pudgy clerk nodded and jotted down some lines in a small notebook he clutched in his petite hands. Once he gave the older man what appeared to be a series of fifteen scrolls, soldiers rushed into the cage and lined us all up, treating us like the prisoners we were. They threaded a rope through a ring in our collars to bind us all together, tying a knot to the end to prevent us from escaping.

  Note: You have been sold into slavery. The knowledge that you are now property owned by someone else weighs down upon your soul. All attribute points reduced by 3 until you secure your freedom. You now have the “mark of the slave,” a collar that cannot be removed by ordinary means.

  “Damn. That sucks,” I mumbled under my breathe.

  We were escorted out of the pen area, and I got my first glimpse of Elatha for the first time. I was asleep when we had arrived.

  Congratulations! You have found ‘Elatha.' +40xp

  It took us two hours to walk from the slave pens on the outer ring of the city. Elatha reminded me a fair bit of Beijing, not that I had ever been there. The concentric rings were connected only by crossroads in the shape of an asterisk. This made for a longer trek. We had to two miles before we encountered the first road that reached the second ring. We took a right and crossed through from the outer ring to the second ring. The buildings grew in both size and stature. The dirt and huts of the
outer ring became wooden houses and stone paths of the third. The second ring consisted of buildings made of off-white masonry and blue cobblestones. At the end of the road, we were required to walk a quarter mile back to the center of the city with a three-story, red wall on our left-hand side. Inside it was the inner ring, a large area containing the most wealthy members of this society. The entire capital seemed more like an underground lair than a prospering metropolis. It was cold and stuffy, absent the warmth of the sun on your skin.

  Our new owner wasn’t walking, of course. They had tied us to his wagon. It had taken a great deal of convincing and a lash or two before they allowed us to carry the children. Rose, Cilden’s wife, was inconsolable and in a silent state of shock once we were purchased. I had to take their daughter for them. This wasn’t easy. Neeta was about four years old. She weighed about thirty-five pounds. Her half-elven ears kept twitching whenever they picked up a new sound.

  The trek wasn’t entirely in vain. I learned a new skill called “Creature of Burden” and increased it to rank 5, reducing my fatigue drain when performing manual labor. And I improved my standing with Neeta to friendly. I learned that disposition of children was very easy to raise. They would trust anyone wholly when their parents did. Even though the girl was only four years old, I didn’t mind. I would take any ally I get, even if this ally’s particular gift is pinching my cheeks, tugging on my ears, and pulling my hair for amusement.

  There were worse things in the world. Like being a level 3 slave. In a city cast in perpetual night. Run by maniacal oligarchs. Who had more combined power than a thousand level 100 grandmaster wizards. I was really going to have to rethink my approach to life. When I played the game, I exclusively resigned myself to healing and professions. That certainly wasn’t going to cut it here.