Chapter 8 – Luke
7 0 0
X
Reading Options
Font Size
A- 15px A+
Width
Reset
X
Table of Contents
Loading... please wait.

We are brought to the common room where we are relaxing. Sebasan gets us some drinks and asks, “do you need something else?”

I reply, “actually yes, the king promised us 7 slave collars so people will not ask that many questions about us. We wanted to ask for a demonstration of all the functions of a thing like that. Is that possible to arrange? I assume you already know the circumstances around us.”

“I do indeed know your circumstances. I will see to it that it happens.”

We chit chat about some harmless topics and wait until the demonstration happens or we are called to the king.

Thomas is the first to cut a more dangerous topic, “the king seems to need quite some time to convince his advisors. Understandable from their cultural view. I was kinda hoping that a world with multiple species was a bit more lenient to differences.”

Elise wonders, “What are all the species on this world? Sebasan, could you explain that to us?”

Sebasan begins her exposition, “we have three important species as you call them. We call them Sapients. And a total of nine Non-Sapients. The Sapients are humans, dwarfs and elfs.

The three human-type-non-sapients are, wolf-kin, lizard-kin and arachne. The three dwarf-type-non-sapients are, rabbit-kin, bear-kin and lamia. Lastly the Elf versions are cat-kin, fox-kin and centaur. The Non-Sapients have behavioral patterns of both their animal and Sapient counterparts.”

During her speech I notest that she also would rather not talk to us just like that servant on the carriage that Thomas talked to.

“Thanks, that is all I need to know.” She brings her poker face back, but I am able to guess based on what I am smelling and seeing that she is kinda glad and kinda happy about not needing to continue. I have no clue as to the reason why.

A butler comes and whispers something into her ear. She turns to us, “the king needs some more time so we will proceed with the demonstration you wanted. Please follow me.”

We follow her outside to a training area where a wild looking middle aged man is standing with a collar around his neck, the collar left quite a bit of space around his neck. Around the sides are a total of 15 guards just passing the time or sparring.

Sebasan walks to the side and picks up eight collars that look identical to the man in the center of the area is wearing. She gives us one each. “Here, so you do not need to get close to that convict to see what I am talking about.”

What I see on the front side of the collar are 5 magic circle looking circles. The center one is around the opening. Sebasan starts to explain, “This is a slave collar. It has a bottom and top side, you need to hold the circular looking things to the right when looking dead on. The center circle is the lock, when it opens the full collar is reset. To the right the two circular looking things. If you put some blood on the rightmost one you can register as an owner or if the owner has placed blood on the correct part of the middle right one as.” She starts pointing out different parts. “A secondary owner, allow ordering commands, removing permissions or lastly as a new owner. Please remember that only the owner can register that just like the center lock. Let me demonstrate with this convict. Twirl like a little girl showing her skirt.”

The wild looking burly man does indeed twirl and holds his hands above his head. He does not even have anything to show I retorted in my mind.

“You can stop. Now, if you will. Can you try to command him?”

I command, “hop like a bunny.” He remains stoic. The rest also try a few commands.

Sebasan grabs a dagger and pricks her finger. She places a bit of blood on the part that allows commands over the slave. “Could one of you give some blood to register?”

“I will,” Berand says. He walks up to Sebasan and takes the dagger and cuts a bit on his arm. He dips his finger in the blood and places it on the collar of the convict. The blood disappears and Berand tries a command, “jump around like a frog.”

The convict promptly does that. He moves to Sebasan and tries to jump on her.

“Stay,” is the command Sebasan says, “be careful with how you word your commands even with absolute obedience they can still make choices within the commands. He still has a grudge against me so he will take any chance to hurt or annoy me.”

Sebasan takes some distance from the convict again, “the last part is the two square looking things on the left side of the collar, the middle left one is a mark that show what type of collar it is, the options are,” she starts to point it out on the mark, “absolute obedience, can kill and can turture. All of those are standard on a non-sapients’ slave collar. They tell what the collar can do.” She looks to the convict,  “feel pain all over your body.”

The convict starts to scream loudly and wriggle on the ground in pain.

Sebasan does not look fazed at all, “die.”

The collar contracts, choking the convict to death and completing the order Sebasan gave.

[Thomas to all. She might be the most dangerous person we have met.]

[Luke to all. So she did show us a full demonstration. A bit gruesome but a full demonstration nonetheless.]

[Elise to all. I say we all register Berand as the owner and not have a potential kill switch that is just a drop of blood and a word away from killing us.]

[Berand to all. Thanks for that trust.]

Sebasan looks over at us and announces, “that was the demonstration. One thing I forgot to say is that if no one is the owner, everyone can open the lock. Now if you could follow me back to the guest quarters.”

I try it out, I feel something getting ticked out of the depth of my being. I guess that is mana, it seems like we do not need to ask how to utilize that. The lock opens up, I close it again and try it a couple of times. I also switch out with Megda next to me and also try registering and seeing if Megda can open the lock. She can’t, but she can after I have opened the lock once.

[Luke to all. Seems like she did not lie about the lock opening resetting the owners]

[Thomas to all. No but the maker might have a backdoor or the king might be registered permanently as a secondary master. We might also want to hide that Berand is the owner of the collars, we might not get assassinated if we have potential as hero pawns. We only need to act like they can control us when they in reality can not.]

[Elise to all. That sounds like a great idea, faking a weakness and allowing them to exploit it only to be able to turn the tables when they rely the most on us.]

[Ratan to all. You guys want to start a bet on who will exploit it first? I am betting on the fat adviser, what was his name again? Grathick? Grafat?]

[Gradius]

[Thanks]

[Luke to Ratan. I am betting on a different high ranking noble. Just any other.]

[Megda to Ratan. I am betting on Sebasan. She seems to be hiding her disgust.]

Slowly the rest also start giving their bets. Dennis also bets on Gradius, Thomas bets on the back door, Berand on the blue robed dude. Elise joins Berands bet and Filia doesn’t bet.

0