Lineage of the Sword

I am trapped

I have to say the banks of Gaia are so gorgeous. The area is not like your usual green forest on both sides. it's rather different. The river itself is about 450 kilometers wide. It's so wide that you cannot see the other side. There is a reason why the river of Gaia is used as the major border for the empires while most of the battles are actually done in the northern mountains. The shore itself is kind of interesting. During monsoons, the river floods. The flood itself can go inland up to 5-6 kilometers as the shore is very flat and easy to flood. This also happens during summer as the glaciers in the northern mountains start to melt during which the flood starts again just not as intense as the monsoon. Due to this flooding, the forest itself doesn't start unless you go inland for about 4-5 km. So it's similar to the beaches near the sea. But instead of being sandy there is more earthy and has a lot of grass. So during normal days travelers and merchants use the banks of Gaia as a travel route.

During the travels you can almost see various islands that are in the river. Going to those islands are basically a death sentence as there are 2 things that are likely to happen. You meet wild water monsters or you get the worser situation- Pirates. These sons of devils are as you may have guessed is very ruthless. The very existence of them kind of irks me off. They usually go for merchant ships in the water. They loot and loot and loot. If they find men they use them as slaves using slave marks. The slave marks itself is unfortunately a kind of magic seal that makes the person subservient. Unless a more powerful mage or wizard than the original caster comes and breaks the seal off, the seal is almost impossible to break. The seal is so powerful that if the said slave tries to run or tries to harm the owner the owner can make the slave feel excruciating pain, or self destruct. You might think why I know so much about these marks. It's because my mother was a slave. But hey that's another story. So the pirates make men slaves, but the worse part has yet to come. There are women and children. Women are used by the pirates. They use them and torture them so much that most of them lose their mind or die. If they still survive depending on their terrain the way they kill the women change. If they are on the main lands, they are most likely sold to lower nobles or merchants. If they are on their own islands they are usually made to be slaves of their slaves. If they are on water though, they are used as bait for the river monsters as corpses of river markets can go for a lot of money. But their biggest commodity is the children. They are not touched one bit they just sell for a much higher price than women as they have higher lifespan. Even though slave trade is banned in Pendragon Empire, there is unfortunately black-market's led by some rich merchants and low level nobles who are usually ignored by the higher level nobles. In the Brightwing Empire, slave trade itself is regulated by the government. These are some of the unfortunate things that happen on the banks of Gaia. Again you might ask why I am telling you this?

"Hey kid the Kingfin pirates are coming run inland." Yeah you heard that right. A pirate troupe is chasing me. God-level luck isn't it!

"Yeah I am not blind, you bald headed vertically challenged bipedal mongoose. You just had to fight with that dude with scars." Yeah also I am an asshole with strangers. Hey, when you are abused as a child you need some coping mechanisms.

"I didn't know he was related to pirates"

"What the hell do you mean? He literally has the logo tattooed on his forearm"

"Hey kid you do know I am older than you right?"

"Senor hairless, I can see your bald head from 50 km away since it shines more than the flippin moon."