BXBX NOVEL Chapter 138: Three Actors
Oras led me to the second floor of the building.
This room seemed to have a stairwell, and if I looked down, I could see the entire first floor.
The windows on the first floor were open and the sun was shining, but the second floor where I was was dark because the windows were closed.
Even if someone downstairs were to look up, it would be difficult for them to notice me.
The first floor, which was reasonably spacious, was equipped with a small sofa and a desk. It might be a room normally used for business meetings.
"Doran will now bring Rave to you, so please be quiet."
"Mm."
I was going to make a play, but I wanted to see how Rave was doing before I did.
I told him what I wanted, and he agreed to bring Rave to the first floor of this room.
This way, I could watch the current situation of Rave from the second floor.
I waited there for a while, and then the door opened with a small sound.
First Dolan, then a man who looked like an employee entered the room, followed by Rave.
I watched the proceedings, careful not to lean forward.
"Stand there."
"...... Yes."
Doran sat down on the couch and the employee stood beside him.
Rave, who was in an upright position in front of the couch, was looking at Dolan with a warlike expression.
Earlier, she had wondered what she would do if he looked up and their eyes met, but she didn\'t need to worry about that.
She was so frightened and alarmed by Doran\'s every move that she didn\'t seem to have time to look around.
"Too late! Move as soon as you\'re told! You\'re a sellout!"
"I\'m sorry, sir."
The strong, angry voice that sounded as if it was hitting me echoed well in the high-ceilinged room, making me feel as if I was being scolded.
I beckoned to Oras, who was crouched down beside me, and asked him in a low voice.
"Are you really acting?"
"I\'m used to it."
Doran is a slave trader who specializes in sex slaves, and naturally, many of the slaves he deals with are women.
According to Oras, women are basically very vulnerable to male abuse.
That\'s why the training of slaves begins with shouting at the slaves they buy.
Oh, so that\'s how they train their slaves.
Oras must have sensed my interest, because he opened his mouth in a reserved manner.
"Yes. May I tell you a ...... story? We\'re talking about when you train a normal slave. ......"
While concerned about the state of Rave and the others downstairs, he turned to Oras to indicate his affirmation.
Then, in a small voice, Oras resumed his talk about slave training.
It seems that all the girls who have been bought as slaves are more or less rebellious at first.
Some of them are actively rebellious, complaining to their faces, while others are passively rebellious, crying and refusing to follow instructions.
Even though she was a slave, she was a girl who had lived a peaceful life until a while ago. There was no way that she would want to be a sex slave, of course.
So Dolan continued to yell at them.
He would line up his slave girls and bang them against the walls and floor with a stick that made a nice sound when struck, shouting abuse at them until their voices died.
If any of the slave girls were frightened and fell on their faces, he would grab them by their hair and raise them up and shout in their ears.
Slave girls who don\'t give in at this point will be sent to the corporal punishment course, so the sooner you give in, the better off you\'ll be. The future of being a slave will not change anyway.
In this way, the slave girls who succumbed to the abusive training, the next thing that awaited them was the blatant discrimination training.
During the training, Dolan would find one slave girl who was weak-minded and obedient, and he would blatantly favor that girl.
He would give her different meals, no physical punishment, warm blankets, and kind words in front of the other slave girls.
Because they have endured abuse together, the slave girls have a kind of camaraderie, but it all falls apart in front of this discriminatory training.
The first slave girl who is given preferential treatment feels superior to the other slave girls.
She is given special treatment by Dolan, the overwhelming ruler. The other slave girls were being treated so badly.
It was the sweetest thing that could ever happen to a weakened slave girl. The euphoria is irresistible.
The other slave girls who saw the slave girls being treated well would want to be in that position too, and would obey.
Then Doran scoops them up and favors the other girl. He acted as if he had forgotten about the slave girl he had favored until then.
A slave girl who is thrown out of the protection of the ruler is miserable. They become more and more submissive because they don\'t want to lose that feeling they once had.
They want to be praised as much as possible, they want to be treated well, they want to be favored more than that woman.
The trick is to use a woman\'s instinct to monopolize the kindness of the strong, Oras said smugly.
Thus, the enclosed space will soon be filled with women who want to be slaves.
"I educate her about the attitude of a slave, imprint on her that there is no other way but to live as a slave, and brainwash her that serving her master is the supreme pleasure."
After six months or even a year of maturing, a top-quality slave girl will be completed.
"Oh ......, that makes me curious about the other girls."
"We also have a girl who sells sex technology, so if you\'re interested, please contact Doran."
It seems that virgin and obedient sex slaves are the best-selling product of the Gandolan Trading Company, but they also deal in slave girls that specialize in erotic techniques.
I\'m not sure if it\'s because of Oras\'s good sales talk, but I\'m feeling the urge to buy.
"Do you know why I brought you here, unsold?"
The story seemed to be going on on the first floor, and Doran was echoing a low voice to Rave.
For now I\'ll only buy Rave. As for the other slave girls, I\'ll discuss it with my crotch later.
"Ah ...... ah ......!"
Doran\'s line was not particularly worrisome, but for some reason, Rave let out a voice full of grief, and put her hands over her face, grieving.
"You look quite depressed, don\'t you?"
I asked Oras, who had turned into a commentator.
"You must think the day has come when the army will take you away."
"Oh, you mean that."
She was sold as a sex slave to the military, a lie that was told to Rave.
In addition, I\'ve never heard of the military having slaves for sex work. It\'s a complete myth.
But Rave is probably not familiar with the military situation, and more than anything, the trauma of being gang-raped by the Royal Army has probably prevented her from thinking about the truth.
She was standing in a cautious posture, but she began to sway so unsteadily that even from a distance she could be seen, and she sat down on the spot with her knees folded.
"Aaaaah!"
Holding her body with both arms as if she was freezing in the cold, Rave was distraught.
The memories of the days when she had been raped by the men of the royal army day after day, night after night, might be coming back to life in her brain now.
"Shut up! You sellout! Do you want me to hurt again?"
Doran raised one hand to shoulder height as he shouted at her.
When Rave saw this, she jumped up and down, kneeling on the spot and placing her fingers on the floor to ask for forgiveness.
"What is that?"
"It\'s a signal to activate the slave crest."
The slave crest is a curse-like magic that reacts to certain magical powers and inflicts pain on the person inscribed with it.
It is said to be useful in the military for torture, as it can continue to inflict pain without leaving any scars on the body.
Engraving, maintaining, and activating the slave crest. All of these require magical power, so there are almost no opportunities for commoners to get involved. If they do, it\'s more likely to be engraved.
Doran is not a magician, but the employee standing beside him is. I always have my magic detection spell active, so I know immediately.
It\'s probably a process where the magical employee activates the slave crest according to the signal from Doran, the store owner.
According to Oras, Rave, whose mind was already in a state of collapse, has rarely rebelled, so the slave crest has only been activated a few times.
But from what I saw downstairs, those few activations seemed to have left a deep scar on her mind.
I too had activated Eve\'s slave crest once, and she was in a lot of pain and suffering.
"Please forgive me. ...... Please forgive me. ...... Please, please forgive me. ......"
Her trembling voice was very melancholy.
I can feel that she is really scared and can\'t help it. Fear was no longer the only color in her mind.
"Stay like that and be quiet!"
The words were thrown wildly at her, but Rave was just relieved that the slave crest was not activated.
When Dolan saw that she had quieted down, he said in a tone of voice full of disgust.
"I\'m going to put you in a cage for display. Maybe we can sell you."
Then Dolan began to tell Rave about the situation.
Recently, a merchant was arrested for illegally enslaving commoners in the city, and the kind-hearted boy nobleman was upset about it.
The young nobleman said that he was going to see for himself whether the slavers\' association in Nambonan City was doing anything unlawful like kidnapping commoners, and that he was coming to visit the Gan-Oras Chamber of Commerce today.
So Doran thought of a plan to show the gentle boy aristocrat the defective stock of Rave and ask him to buy it. ...... is the setting of this play.
"He is a kind mayor, so he might even take pity on an unsold item like you and buy it."
"...really?"
Rave\'s voice is full of joy, as if she\'s been hanging by a spider\'s thread in hell.
"It\'s up to you ...... You know that, don\'t you? If this doesn\'t sell, you\'ll be tortured forever. It is a life of being raped every day from morning to night, giving birth to a child that belongs to no one, and if it is a girl, both parent and child will be raped until death. If you don\'t want that, then do whatever you can to get them to buy you."
Doran\'s detailed narration of how miserable the fate would be if taken by the army shook Rave\'s heart.
His narration was so skillful that it seemed as if he had seen it all before, and that the military really did have sex slaves.
It\'s better to say that you are an unmarried daughter, so that you can attract more sympathy than a pregnant woman. It\'s also cheaper to raise the price.
"What?"
Rave was married in her home village and gave birth to Eve. Because of her unworthiness as a virgin, she was gang raped by the kingdom\'s soldiers.
In other words, what Dolan is trying to do is a scam.
"If you say so, no one can be sure. Your race is long-lived and your age can be hard to pin down, which means there\'s nothing wrong with you."
Eve and Rave are a race of people who are beautiful to look at, live much longer than humans, have more powerful magic than their commoner magicians, or cousins, look younger if they are 100 or 200 years old, and have long ears.
For the sake of convenience, I translated this race in my brain as the Elves, because I felt that they resembled the race that was often raped by orcs and tentacles in the Japanese fantasy of my previous life.
By the way, Eve is 12 years old and Rave is 185. I\'m getting the right information from Dolan behind the scenes.
Rave, who was being lured downstairs to commit fraud, still looked like Eve\'s older sister.
She has pale blond hair that could be described as the color of sunlight, green eyes like Eve\'s, and despite her slender body and thin fingers, her breasts are swaying.
She had the impression of a calm and gentle older woman, a look that I never get tired of seeing again and again.
When he saw that Rave was having trouble speaking, Dolan said, "Or something."
"Why don\'t I just tell them you\'re a woman who\'s had a baby? Maybe they won\'t feel sorry for you? Where would you go if I did ......?"
Doran went on to give a real life example of how I saved a protected daughter, all thirty or so of them, all unmarried.
He went on to show that he had a track record of unmarried daughters being saved, and that this lie was something that made sense.
"...... I\'m not married ......."
In a shaky voice, Rave said.
I guess she is older than Eve and can make more mature decisions, but I still think she is terrified of going to the army.
I could tell from the tone of her voice that it was an agonizing decision.
"Did you have a daughter? No, you don\'t have one. You\'re a single woman. Am I right?"
"...... I have a daughter ......."
Rave did not receive the usual slave education by Doran.
I wanted her to miss me, but I didn\'t really want her to miss me because she was so steeped in the slave mentality.
So, I proposed a plan to get her to like me by saving her while pushing her as far as possible, and Doran gave her an individualized education accordingly.
After arriving in Nambonan City, Doran proposed a scenario called "disguising Rave\'s identity.
Right now, Rave was, let\'s say, a hundred percent victim without fault. If this is to be made into a slave, he said, it is likely to cause inconvenience in the long run.
It is said that this is due to the constant awareness that "I am a victim ......". It\'s a good argument, but depending on how it\'s handled, it can lead to aggravation and defection.
"What\'s wrong? You don\'t want to tell me? If you don\'t want to tell me, that\'s fine. It\'s your decision. We have no intention of putting a woman in front of the nobility who has no chance of being sold. We\'ll sell you to the army as planned."
This was a complete change from his previous attitude, and Dolan suddenly became cold.
If you push it, it will resist, but if you pull it, it will make you uneasy, and Rave paled.
"Wait, ......!"
"You don\'t want to do it, do you? You don\'t want to go to the army, so I took the trouble to show you the way to salvation, and you refuse it? I\'ll be kind and respect your wishes. Have a good time in the army at most."
"I\'ll do it! I\'ll do it! I\'ll do it! ......!"
"Will you do it? You don\'t have to force yourself to do it, because those who aren\'t prepared to do so will eventually come to blows."
When Rave seemed to be clinging to him, Dolan calmly admonished him.
The man who had been shouting at him earlier did not seem to be the same person, and he spoke in a relaxed manner.
"What do you want to do?"
At Doran\'s words, Rave shuddered and brought her face so close to his that she almost fell to the floor.
She then made a pained sound, as if she had squeezed it out from deep within her body.
"I don\'t ...... like ...... armies... So I want that nobleman to buy me......."
I can see how traumatic the gang rape experience is for Rave.
The experience of being raped over and over again in front of his own daughter\'s eyes was not a memory that could be easily erased.
"Well, what can I do about it then? I\'m not going to force you. You think, you decide, and you act."
Forcing someone to choose between the two worst options in a situation where there is no way out. From an outsider\'s perspective, there is no worse situation than this.
However, by making this choice, a drop of dirty water will be mixed in her clear watery heart.
It was the guilt of having lied about her identity and tricked her customers into buying her products.
"I am an unmarried woman. I don\'t have a ...... daughter."
"That\'s your choice, isn\'t it?"
"...... Yes."
A drop of sewage in a barrel full of wine turns it into a barrel full of muddy water. It reminded her of the words of a previous life.
In order to protect herself, she decided to deny the existence of her beloved daughter, Eve, and disguise her identity.
This prevents her from thinking that she is a perfect innocent victim. It will be a strong binding on her heart.
"Eve ...... I\'m sorry ....... I\'m ...... sorry ...... ne ...... Eve ......."
Rave burst into tears and repeated her apology to Eve, who was not here.
Perhaps I should say that by denying Eve\'s existence out loud, Rave had no way out.
The beauty of Rave\'s tearful voice as she continued to apologize to the void was inappropriate to behold.
It was a stark reminder of how much she loved Eve and how much she was afraid of going to the army.
After confirming Rave\'s situation, Oras and I quietly left the room.
After this, Doran would teach Rave how to flirt with the boy nobleman, so it would take a little more time before the next scene.
Oras led me to a room that looked like a reception room for upper classmen, where we drank tea and asked questions about the slave trade that we were curious about.
When I had finished asking what I wanted to know to some extent and my cup was empty, there was a knock on the door.
Oras looked at the employee who came into the room.
"What do you want?"
Oras looked at the employee who entered the room. He says everything is ready.
It seemed that my turn had finally come.
Oras was the first to stand up, followed by me.
"Let\'s go, then."
"Yes, lead the way."
Oras led me down the hallway of the building. The destination was the store side.
The border between the building and the store was clear, and when I opened the metal door in the middle of the corridor, I saw that the corridor had changed from stone to wood.
We walked along the wooden floor until we reached a slightly larger room.
"It\'s that way, sir."
"Good. Let\'s get started."
Slaves are displayed in the store like radishes or cabbages in a supermarket.
Basically, they are locked up in a prison at the back of the store, and people from the store bring in slaves that meet the customer\'s needs, meet them, and then go through the buying and selling process.
For this reason, there are often pillars and simple cages where the slaves are chained in a space where customers can enter.
The store of the Gan-Oras Chamber of Commerce was also built in such a way, with a permanent display corner.
The Rave was going to be on display as part of a final inventory sale.
This time, I was a kind-hearted boy nobleman who happened to come across such a wagon corner.
When I looked at the cage, I saw Rave staring at me, desperately trying to keep a smile on his face.
"Why are there people in here?"
I stopped in front of the cage where Rave was kept, wearing rusty handcuffs, an anklet with a round iron ball at the end of the chain, and a cheap-looking cotton robe.
The cheap robe is really disgusting because of the size of Rave\'s body, especially her breasts, which are all puffed up.
"It\'s a leftover. I\'m sorry to disturb your eyes with such a defective product."
In response to my question, Oras explained reverently and with a sense of sincere apology.
He is quite a good actor.
"That\'s not the point. It\'s not that. It\'s just that I\'m dressed like this on such a cold day. ......
"Don\'t worry. She is an elf, a race with magical powers, so there is no need to worry about a cold."
In addition, when you have a magical seal, you can\'t release your magical power, but you can still maintain your strong life force.
I listened to Oras\' explanation, and my expression became slightly distorted. Of course, it was intentional, but I think my expression naturally changed due to the fact that Oras\' performance was so good.
"This is the same girl ...... that you used to bring to me to sell? I think she was treated more decently back then."
"This is the story of Doran\'s visit, isn\'t it? At the time, I thought it would sell for a high price, but in the end, no one purchased it. ...... Just between you and me, I\'ve already decided to sell her off. If she doesn\'t die before we deliver her, that\'s all that matters. I know it\'s harsh, but I can\'t afford to pay attention to bad inventory that I can\'t make money from."
As Oras rambled on about how the Rave was unsellable, the life drained from Rave\'s eyes as he listened to it right in front of him.
She seemed to understand from his conversation with Doran that she needed to sell herself, but she couldn\'t help it when Oras neglected her like this.
"You said you were going to sell it? What sort of place would you sell it to?"
"That\'s an easy one. Isn\'t this girl beautiful to look at? Well, in layman\'s terms, she is a partner for men. A loving environment, if you will."
"Hahaha," Oras laughed, but Rave had a completely dead look in her eyes.
"...... You would put a young girl like this through such a terrible thing?"
Playing the role of a nice young nobleman with a sense of justice, I shook my fist.
In response to my complaint, Oras said in a slightly scornful and provocative tone.
"That\'s right. After all, she can\'t be sold, and that\'s the fate of a slave. It\'s a shame for us, too, to think that she will be tortured day and night by countless men. ......"
"Then you should stop doing such things. ......"
"But we are also in business, and we can\'t afford to be naïve," said Oras, admonishingly and irresolutely.
It was like a slap in the face of reality to a naïve little boy.
"You ...... don\'t mind, do you?"
I call out to Rave in the cage.
She responded to my question with a quiver of her lips.
"Please ...... help me, please ......."
A single tear spilled from her green eyes, a beautiful scene like a painting that made me forget my theatricality and gulp down fresh spit.
"The name is Rave, and it was captured by the Royal Army in the Land of Mists. ...... Oh, did Doran explain this to you before?"
"Oh. I don\'t remember much about it. ......"
When I said this, Oras called out Rave\'s name in an intimidating tone.
Perhaps this meant that she should introduce himself, and Rave opened her mouth.
"My name is Rave, ....... My name is Rave, I can read and write Eruo. I am ...... unmarried."
If the mayor buys her, she will be saved.
It was a nice follow-up for me, who had stopped acting for a moment to look at Rave.
"How much is ......?"
"Ho-ho? Please wait a moment. ...... Dolan!"
Doran, who must have been waiting nearby, walked up nimbly.
"What\'s up? Oras."
The mayor is very fond of this girl. I\'d like to give her to you, but I can\'t remember the price, so I called you.
With his hand on his chin, Dolan made a thoughtful gesture.
You will never be able to see him from Rave\'s position, but he is looking at me with a smile that is truly villainous.
He seems to be a master of the art of being invisible.
"I see ... but she, Rave,., has already decided on a prior contract, and if she is to be sold it to the mayor, she would cost reasonable amount of money."
When we showed our intention to buy, he immediately raised the price.
I was beginning to think that he was not acting, but just doing it.
I\'m not sure why I\'m so worried about my wallet, though I\'m sure I won\'t have to pay any new money since I\'ve already signed the sales contract behind the scenes.
"Tell me, ....... How much?"
Then Doran told him the amount.
The price was the same as the price I had paid for Eve. In other words, the price was insanely high.
Even Rave, who was from the land of mist, seemed to understand how much it was, and she had a pale face. She couldn\'t believe the idea of a merchant raising the price of a product that was about to be sold.
"Rave. You don\'t need to be afraid."
I smiled at Rave in the cage and quickly turned back to Dolan.
"I\'ll take that price, open the cage."
"Thank you for your purchase, sir. Of course, I will open the cage immediately."
The door of the cage was bolted shut with an iron bolt, so it was easy to remove.
I let Dolan open the door and I approached Rave.
For a moment, Rave\'s back trembled loudly, as if she had a fear of men, but she struggled to hold herself together so as not to be distracted.
"Hold still, I\'m taking this off you now."
The cuffs and anklets were made of iron and were not much, so I could easily rip them off with my magic power.
I destroyed the handcuffs while being careful not to injure Rave, and then destroyed the anklets as well.
Underneath the handcuffs and anklets, I could see her red, bruised skin.
Normally, Rave wears good quality handcuffs and footcuffs that are designed to prevent scratches, but today she was wearing cheap ones for this play.
"It must have been ...... painful to be so hurt. We\'ll heal you soon."
I concentrated my magic power and gave Rave a healing spell with a slightly enhanced light effect.
The bruises on her hands and feet were completely gone as aurora-like grains of light shone and gently caressed her body.
"Ohhhh ...... it\'s warm ...... thank you, thank you, thank you ......."
He was tempted to hug Rave, who was crying tears, but he didn\'t.
I\'ve been informed that she has a near phobia of men. If I hug her now, there\'s a good chance she\'ll reject me.
I want to welcome her to the pervert\'s mansion instead of here, and then I want to take care of her and make her mine.
The way she cries is somewhat similar to Eve\'s, but as an adult woman, it\'s less childish.
In fact, I can feel the beauty in the way she cries.
I took her home with me, hoping to have a mother-daughter hug competition soon.