After this short subversion of expectation, I was actually led to a proper slave camp, located right behind the cattle pastures. I guess I could call this placing a convenient one since it was the slaves who took care of the domesticated animals that this city-village raised for food and skins. As soon as I reached the slave camp proper, it became obvious why it was located in this exact location.
While the entire place didn"t have any real roads to speak off, starting from the very centre of the camp, a well kept paved roads extended in all four directions of the world, with one leading towards the previously mentioned enclosure for the animals, while the other three allowed for a ma.s.s transportation of the workforce between forest area, sizeable plot of farmlands, deeper into the mountain and what looked like a primitive mine.
It was kind of funny how the overlord prioritised the means of ma.s.s transit of slaves from their camp into their workplace while disregarding the state of the roads all over his town!
But it not only somehow made sense, but also said a lot about the social structure of the place. If I were to draw an a.n.a.logy, I could only think of Sparta, where the great majority of the population was enslaved former owners of the land that spartans took over, with the ruling cla.s.s fully focused on warcraft, mostly for the sake of fending off any attempts at rebellion.
The thing with this place is… I didn"t see any sighs an organised military, or even some kind of tradition that could hint at its existence! Not even the army of primitives that fought against the rebels could be said to be advanced, not in terms of their equipment, nor their organisation or skills.
But I couldn"t just draw the parallel between the reality of my own, homeworld and this place. Just the existence of the Overlord was enough to warrant for such power distribution. If I were to take the strength of the average soldier as a higher-level one could achieve on this island, then it was no wonder that the conquered or rebellious tribes had only one shot at taking their lands back… And coincidentally, this opportunity happened only when the Overlord was away!
With my thoughts still lingering on this topic, I focused more on the people that were still in the camp, despite the sun already reaching the midpoint of its journey through the skies.
When one says slaves, the immediate image that comes to his mind should be of a person, that is malnourished, worked to the bone, dirty and barely clothed in some cheap rugs, that a free, sane person would never even use as wiping cloth!
Contrary to this popular belief, the people I could see wandering through the camp in the directions known only by themselves were actually properly dressed, but that might be caused by the subtropical climate on the island, that put the bar of the proper clothing really low.
But that didn"t explain the fact that all of them looked well-fed and healthy!
Dang, I got swayed once again…
There was no way that slaves could look better than normal citizens of this primitive town!
With the folks I met on my way here serving as the only way for me to compare, it became obvious that this was either the overseers of the camp or some actors planted by the Overlord for the sake of faking my view on the matter!
"We are in the slave camp, but I don"t see any familiar faces. You can either guide me to where your Lord wanted me to go and show me the things that he wanted me to see, but that won"t end nicely not only for you but for this entire place. If you want to see your family, friends and this entire place after midnight ever again, lead me to where the new slaves are located!"
While my voice was devoid of any anger or annoyance, it might be the complete lack of emotions included in such harsh words that scared the butler off.
With his face turning white as snow, he turned around to face me despite how the shaking of his hands betrayed how terrified he was, bowed by bending his entire body in half and moving his back perpendicularly to his own waistline.
"I wouldn"t dare to hide anything from the young master! It"s just that most of the slaves are currently working, and neither males or females do present a sight for the refined eyes of a young master!"
Ah, I shouldn"t terrify the old man like that, or his heart will stop at any given moment! It"s not like he is responsible for anything that was happening in this place anyway.
"I understand, yet I came here to see them. How I"m supposed to check if those people are really who I"m looking for if you try to hide them away?"
Since threats could only fasten the death of the old butler, I decided to approach him with a cultured tone. Even if I couldn"t hope to change the impression I just made him make of me, I could at least make any use of him, instead of readying myself to bury his cold body.
This time, I was guided to the places I both wanted and didn"t want to see.
Surprisingly, it was the men that had it better.
Despite being worked to the bone with their overseer constantly las.h.i.+ng their backs with the whip, I could still see a sizeable pot with some kind of vegetable stew being boiled in it. Since I never had the chance to catch more than a glimpse of the warriors, with anyone caught before my arrival being as foreign to me as the oldest slave in the entire village-city.
But it was actually what I saw in the poor women"s camp, that almost made me puke with disgust.