"Thank you for letting me visit on such a short notice." Mogamett said with a small bow towards the man in front of him.
"Don't mention it, master Mogamett. The mage guild exists for situations like your's in the first place anyway." The guild master said with a smile. "Not to mention that you are one of our greatest alumni. There were many who were devastated when they learned that you ended our contract with us and pledged yourself to Mansour household." He said with a laugh but realized his error immediately when he saw the sad look on Mogamett's eyes.
"I'm sorry, I guess… I guess it's too soon to make jokes about that."
"There is no need for apologies old friend." Mogamett said with a sigh. "My lord's will has been inherited by his son and now my duty is to support him. That's why I'm here." He said and looked into the eyes of the guild master.
"I need capable mages with potential, Prospero. And I need them yesterday."
——————
Gazeff Stronoff would easily admit that his current task was very uncomfortable for him.
He was a common man who had been granted status through merit instead of nepotism, though one could argue that lord Mansour being the only man who would do such a thing be nepotism, and had tried to keep his morals and values no matter what kind of obstacle he had faced.
Yet he could not deny that his young lord was right that their honor and morals were not worth letting their people starve. But even though he had managed to calm his mind when it came to using slaves...
"Hey, Beardie!"
...he had not imagined...
"Come on, give me a reaction!"
...that this kind of problem would arise.
"You know I'm just gonna keep talking till you talk back to me." Seriously, could he exchange this annoying slave back for his moral crisis?
"Come on man! You already bought us all, at least you can tell us where you're taking us!" The slave that had been making the ruckus was a lizardman, though compared to rest of his species this one looked more like a crocodile. Gazeff was also curious about why one of the man's arms was far bigger than the other but he also couldn't help but think that the answer would only make things worse.
"We are going to the lands of my lord in Melromarc, near the borders." He finally said, praying that the man would finally stop talking.
"Melromarc? Isn't that the place with that Staff weirdo?" But no gods cared for his prayers. "By the way, what's your name man? I can't just keep calling you Beardie. I mean, I guess I can but I got the weirdest feeling that you wouldn't like that."
"...it's Gazeff Stronoff."
"Well nice to meet ya Gazeff! Name's Zenberu, Zenberu Gugu." The lizardman said with a laugh and did not speak again for a while.
Honestly, as much as he had groused about Zenberu's chattiness, Gazeff realized that the talk had been something to appreciate as the silence made the solemn air among those he was taking back far more obvious and he knew the reason why.
Most of the slaves with him, they had had their levels reset.
It was a rather abominable practice that was practiced mostly in Zeltoble. To take away the power of those they enslaved, power they had spent years obtaining. It was all about driving the 'product' deeper into despair.
But it also had the side effect of lowering their prices and Gazeff knew that reseted levels were easier to regain compared new levels. Something about their bodies remembering how to be powerful, Mogamett would likely have a better theory about it.
Not that the logistic likely mattered to these people. Gazeff could see a wide variety of demi-humans and several humans, all of them in a different state of despair except for three.
First was Zenberu, who seemed laidback about the situation though Gazeff wasn't sure whether that was because lizardman knew something others didn't or because he was an idiot.
Second was a little girl with pointed ears, likely elvish blood, and pink hair. Her eyes looked empty but rather than a case of hopelessness, it seemed more akin to a case of simply not caring about anything around her. He didn't like to think this way, but she was likely broken long before.
The last one was a young boy with long hair that the other slaves were staying at least two steps away from. The one that the merchant had warned him about. Young Aotatsu boy that had managed to kill his captor even with the slave seal and being de-leveled.
Gazeff could only hope that this plan would not blow up in his lord's face.
-----------
"What do you mean he left for the forest?!" Wilhelm could feel a vein on his forehead bulging as the manners he had spent years learning in order to serve his lord take a backseat as he yelled at the farmer who looked upon the angry form of the Sword Demon and suddenly realized that he feared death.
"I-I didn't think that he was going in alone! I thought that someone would be going after him soon, or maybe that the part he went to was cleaned of monsters before he went in!" The old farmer yelped, trying to excuse letting the young lord in and not notify anyone about it.
Wilhelm breathed out slowly as he tried to calm himself. He could deal with dumb farmers after he made sure that his lord's safety was assured.
He drew his swords and ran to the forest, trying to find his lord. His search went on till he heard the sound of a twig snapping followed by the sound of bushed rustling, making him turn to the source of the noise and found himself gripping his swords tightly as he came face to face with a giant beast with red fur, snout as big as Wilhelm's head and tusks that looked akin to swords.
Red Boar, one of the stronger beasts in the forest. One that Wilhelm intended to finish as quickly as possible but before he could do so, the beast fell to its side with a huge thudding sound. Revealing that the beast was already dead and was simply had been carried...
"Wilhelm, what are you doing here?"
...by his young lord!
"Lord Kyros!" Wilhelm tried to make his disapproval of... whatever it was his lord was doing before he realized that his lord had somehow killed a Red Boar with, going by the bruises on his knuckles, his bare hands.
"Shouldn't you be back in the manor?" Which his lord seemed to care very little for as he picked the boar carcass and put it on his back. "I'm going back, make sure to return before sunset." He then walked away, leaving Wilhelm alone as he tried to comprehend what had just happened as he turned around and his eyes widened as he saw the scenery his lord had left behind.
The whole area was destroyed, it looked like a small war zone with craters and fallen trees all over the place. But the most astonishing part of the view was definitely the huge amount of Red Boar carcasses all over the place.
"You can leave the boars! I'll send somebody else to bring all of them back when I get back to the mansion!"
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