It seemed there would be. However, since Daymon had no desire for material possessions, he had no intention of being greedy.
Of course, Increcia was surely overflowing with treasures worth far more than that.
“That is everything I possess. In any case, it seems it is time for you to pay the price….”
“What a shame.”
After uttering those ambiguous words, Baron Romain picked up the ruby from the table.
“Then I shall call the butler and have him bring the payment.”
Having finished speaking, he clapped his hands.
Clap, clap.
A little while later, the door opened, and a middle-aged man who appeared to be the butler entered. He quickly approached Baron Romain and whispered something into his ear. Daymon did not know what he had said, but judging by the sudden change in Baron Romain’s gaze, it could not have been anything good.
“So that is how it is?”
A wicked light, different from anything in his eyes until now, began to gleam in Baron Romain’s eyes. He shouted loudly toward the door.
“Everyone, come in!”
Clatter.
The door opened, and a dozen heavily armed soldiers poured inside. It was obvious that they had been prepared in advance. In an instant, they surrounded Daymon. The hostile air radiating from the soldiers revealed Baron Romain’s intentions in their entirety. With a satisfied smile, he approached Daymon.
“I’m afraid this has become rather unfortunate.”
Daymon silently glared at Baron Romain. In truth, he had already perceived that soldiers were waiting nearby. He had also realized that the smile on Baron Romain’s face was nothing but hypocrisy…. That was why he had already begun to pity the baron, who was about to leap into danger of his own accord.
‘Poor fool.’
Of course, Baron Romain had not the slightest idea that his opponent was a ninth-circle archmage. A number of soldiers like these could be dealt with easily using Magic Missiles, so Daymon had already gathered an appropriate amount of mana. Having made every preparation, Daymon smiled faintly.
“Are you saying you cannot pay?”
“Do you not think two hundred gold is a considerable sum? I am not the sort of person who wastes money on things I do not need.”
At the baron’s ingratiating attitude, completely oblivious to the situation, Daymon gave a bitter smile and shook his head. He had already made up his mind to give the baron and his soldiers a thorough taste of what they had coming.
“What a hopeless fool.”
Unable to understand the reaction of the rat in the jar, Baron Romain clicked his tongue.
“You certainly have plenty of nerve. But no matter what you do, your fate will not change.”
“Of course it will not.”
Daymon replied in a low voice and pushed back the hood concealing his face. His features were revealed in their entirety—the handsome face that had effortlessly shaken the composure of countless women. At the sight of Daymon’s appearance, a strange light appeared on Baron Romain’s face.
“My! This is a surprise. What an extraordinary beauty. You certainly do not look like someone who should be wandering about.”
“Why? Is there some law saying handsome men are not allowed to travel?”
“Of course not. But I know an even better way than sending you off on a journey.”
“……….”
By then, a peculiar sensuality had begun to creep into the corners of Baron Romain’s eyes. As though he could no longer restrain himself, he took a deep breath.
“Whew. I have just made a decision. I have decided not to kill you.”
“What do you mean?”
Baron Romain’s eyes, which roved over Daymon’s face with a lecherous gleam, were no different from those of a man aroused by the sight of a naked woman. Daymon felt a chill run down his spine at the sight. At the same time, an ominous thought flashed through his mind.
“You…. Could it be?”
“I believe your guess is correct. From now on, you will probably have to serve me for the rest of your life. But do not worry. I do not think my feelings for you will ever change….”
The baron continued in a lascivious tone as he looked Daymon over with lust-filled eyes.
“How dare you take an interest in me?”
In the end, Daymon’s anger exploded. He had not intended to kill the man, but the baron’s blatant preference for men had caused him to lose even his reason. He had never experienced anything like this in his life. He sprang to his feet. The startled soldiers thrust their spears toward him, but he paid them no attention.
“You bastard! I’ll grind you into powder.”
Daymon scattered all the mana he had rearranged. Magic Missiles would not be enough to satisfy him, so he intended to unfold a far more powerful spell.
A terrifying vortex of mana gathered around him and was rearranged into an entirely different form. Daymon had decided to blow the entire mansion away with Hellfire, the ultimate ninth-circle spell. Of course, Baron Romain would be blown away with it.
“Kehehehe.”
His murderous intent surged beyond control. Believing that the Chiljong Danggeumsul, the cursed restraint that had bound him for so long, had disappeared after his body changed, Daymon did not hesitate in the slightest. But that had been a clear miscalculation.
“Gasp!”
Daymon’s body, which had been drawing in limitless mana, suddenly stiffened as though struck by lightning. His eyes widened in shock, and his entire body began to tremble.
“Th-this can’t be….”
An indescribable agony pierced through his entire body. It was an all-too-familiar pain to him. No—it was a pain he had experienced many times but had never grown accustomed to.
It was the pain inflicted by the Chiljong Danggeumsul whenever he conceived murderous intent.
After being captured by the Red Dragon Verkis, Daymon had endured tortures beyond imagination. Yet even while undergoing all those tortures, he had been able to remain conscious. This was different in an entirely other dimension. The agony was like an iron hook scraping down the inside of his spine, making it impossible for him to hold on to the thread of consciousness.
“Damn it.”
Daymon’s consciousness was already tumbling into an endless abyss.
Thud.
His unconscious body collapsed limply onto the floor. The mana that had almost finished being rearranged scattered into nothingness. Baron Romain stared down at him with a thoroughly bewildered expression. The soldiers surrounding him were no different.
“What an incomprehensible fellow.”
After staring down at the completely unconscious Daymon for a moment, Baron Romain beckoned to one of the soldiers. The soldier nodded, hurriedly approached Daymon, and searched through his clothes.
“Here they are.”
The soldier found a heavy money pouch and several pearls, then held them up for the baron to see.
“Just as I thought.”
Baron Romain accepted them with a delighted expression. He rolled the pearls between his fingers, gauged the weight of the pouch, and then handed it to the soldiers.
“You may have this. You have worked hard, so you should have a drink, yes? And lock this fellow deep inside the underground prison….”
The soldiers, delighted by their unexpected windfall, hoisted Daymon onto one of their backs. Daymon, however, remained completely limp, unaware of anything.
In the pitch-black darkness, the only light came from torches hanging far apart, dimly illuminating the interior.
Iron-barred cells stretched along the stone walls, revealing that this was a prison for criminals. What was astonishing was that the prison was located beneath Baron Romain’s mansion. It was difficult to believe that the residence of Baron Romain, who was nothing more than a merchant, contained an underground prison of such size.
Yet only a handful of people throughout Lorbein knew the secret. This meant that the fact Baron Romain secretly dealt in human beings was hardly known at all.
As if to prove it, many prisoners stared out from the rows of cells with haggard faces. Most of them were women who appeared to be in the flower of their youth. Their eyes were mostly filled with resignation, and all of them carried vacant gazes, as though they had already realized their bleak futures. Their unfocused eyes remained fixed blankly on the empty air, as though they had lost all hope of living.
Countless kingdoms existed in Arcadia. Each kingdom possessed its own laws and system of government, and there were kingdoms that permitted slavery as well as those that did not.
Naturally, the slave trade was forbidden in the great kingdoms, including the Crosen Empire. No kingdom that upheld the ideals of Emperor Crosen would permit one human being to enslave another. However, the small kingdoms on the frontier and the city-states that had grown through trade had no choice but to tacitly permit slavery. To supply brothels with prostitutes and the frontier with mercenaries, there was no alternative more convenient than the use of slaves.
The enormous fortune Baron Romain had accumulated had come from the vast profits of this very slave trade. By selling women he had purchased or kidnapped to coastal cities, including Peirute, he had amassed his current wealth.
Countries that prohibited the slave trade did not even allow slave traders to pass through their territory with slaves in tow. If discovered, the slave traders were immediately imprisoned, and it was customary to set the slaves free. As a result, slave prices in the coastal country surrounded by the three kingdoms of Lotus, Fearnold, and Andrea had risen as high as they possibly could. Of course, the price of purchasing slaves from their place of origin was not particularly high.
Baron Romain had targeted precisely this difference in price. First, he scattered enormous sums of money among the high-ranking nobles of the three kingdoms that prohibited the slave trade. He spent his wealth lavishly without the slightest restraint, and frequently presented expensive gifts to nobles with whom he had become acquainted through parties and other gatherings. As a result, he was able to win the favor of the nobles who controlled the affairs of state in the three kingdoms.
“That’s done.”
After that, matters could proceed swiftly. The slave trade was a business that guaranteed substantial profits. Every year, profits exceeding twice the amount Baron Romain had scattered throughout the three kingdoms flowed into his coffers. Thanks to the bribes he distributed, carriages bearing the crest of House Romain were never inspected, no matter the circumstances. Wherever the influence of the bribed nobles held sway, the carriages passed through completely unhindered.
Through this route, slaves purchased from all over the region were transported en masse to Lorbein. The slaves were then sold to the coastal cities, bringing Baron Romain a fortune.
Most of the women imprisoned in the cells now were from the north. They had either become destitute after a bad harvest or had been traveling in search of a better future when they fell prey to the sweet talk of slave traders, becoming slaves partly by choice and partly against their will. Baron Romain’s underground prison was filled to capacity with such women.
However, the gender of the prisoners in the cell at the very back was unusual.
Most of the cells were packed so tightly with women that there was hardly room to set foot inside. They appeared to be in the prime of their lives, ranging from their late teens to their early thirties. But only two people were imprisoned here, and both of them were men. It was an astonishing sight.
Baron Romain never purchased male slaves under any circumstances. The only place male slaves were of use was the harsh plains of the north.
Although nearly the entire continent had been subdued in Arcadia, the north could not yet be called the domain of humanity. That was because a desperate struggle between humans and monsters was still taking place there.
The north was such a barren region that the other kingdoms had no particular interest in it. Although many ice trolls lived there, they saw no reason to send an army to conquer it. The land could support neither farming nor herding, and even its mineral resources could not be mined because of the eternal snow. Thus, although most of Arcadia had been developed, the north alone remained an unexplored frontier.
The only people who entered that region were settlers willing to stake their lives in exchange for land. That was precisely why male slaves were needed in the north—strong male slaves who would risk death to fight as soldiers. The north was so dangerous that free mercenaries would not go there under any circumstances, leaving the settlers no choice but to purchase male slaves and turn them into soldiers.
In the coastal cities, however, male slaves were utterly useless. The cities were already overflowing with men, and the only thing they needed was women. Young women who could satisfy hungry sailors and drain the money from their pockets. For that reason, Baron Romain had never needed to purchase male slaves.
And yet there were men in his prison….