The Bounty Hunter

Chapter 14: The Beginning of a Major Problem

August 20th, 2088

I managed to save Kira and Grandma Kuma, but that terrible emptiness persisted.  Based off of the last time this happened, I wont recover for a while.  But there was something far more concerning (although I couldnt feel concern at the moment), based on the information I extracted from the dead slavers soul.  

Thats right, those men werent bandits but were in fact heretics known in this world as slavers.  In this world there is only one religion, a monotheistic religion known as the Cult of Chains.  They worship one deity:  Adligo, the God of Freedom and Duty.  According to the Cult, Adligo recreated this world from the ashes of its predecessor which was destroyed by a civil war between the gods and their followers. 

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Each god had competed with each other to gain influence and dominance over each other, eventually escalating to war.  Adligo had been one of these gods and had been the only one to abstain from these rivalries along with his worshippers.  He let the mortals and gods fight as was their right as free beings.  And as the world burned into ash, he then chose to punish those who had abandoned the natural duty that every being had to the world they inhabited. 

He slaughtered his fellow gods who were weakened from the war and used their divine energy to provide the power necessary to remake the world.  The surviving believers of those gods were enslaved and forced to help rebuild the world under the watchful eye of his followers:  the Cult of Chains.  And so the world was reborn. 

No other religion has existed since and the only ones who didnt follow the teachings of the Cult were the heretics and the atheistic savage races.  True to their beginning the Cult of Chains are the only organization that deals with slaves, having a complete monopoly on the industry.  Their priests/priestesses, known as the Bound Ones, are able to create Slave Marks.  These are a type of magical insignia that are etched onto a person and turn them into a perfect slave.  Any order is absolute and they cannot rebel against their masters.  Only Bound Ones can give orders that supersede the orders of the owner.  These marks do not fade, cannot be removed and can be put onto anyone except wizards, who have an innate resistance. 

However, the Cult of Chains only enslaves non-believers and those believers who have broken one of Adligos 5 Chains of Duty.  And although the number of sinners is a very high amount, demand still far exceeds supply.  Naturally, this leads to a black market in an attempt to fill that gap.  However, it is a very small operation since only the Cult can use Slave Marks and that the Cult actively suppresses the illegal slave trade.  Anyone who attempts to enslave someone without the Cults involvement/approval are called slavers and are branded as heretics by the Cult of Chains because they are profaning the freedom guaranteed to all by Adligo.  They are then immediately hunted down and killed.

If I was in my normal state of mind, I wouldnt bother with the remaining slavers.  I would simply report them to the Cult of Chains and let them do the rest.  However, I was currently an empty shell of myself and thus proceeded to the base that I learned of from the slaver.  I didnt bother with strategy or hiding myself as I approached the derelict castle that functioned as the heretics stronghold.  My mana was surging to levels far beyond anything I usually possessed due to my altered state and so I chose to use brute force.  I lightly stomped my foot on the ground, sending a flood of magic towards the castle foundation and shattering it. 

With a large rumbling sound the castle started to fall to pieces, which I assisted with by increasing the gravity in the area.  Using magic I was able to observe as 87 of the 134 slavers died amidst the falling rubble.  There werent any captives in the castle, not that I would have cared in my state.  I am not a hero after all, so why would I care about a few more casualties in a world where life is so cheap?  The rest of the slavers were funneled out, with the exception of one man who was hiding in a room in the basement of the castle.  It looked like there had been an escape tunnel there that he was trying to use, but it collapsed when I destroyed the castle foundation. 

Ah, looks like the survivors are climbing out of the rubble.  I unholstered one of my 9mm pistols and started shooting the slavers as they appeared.  It really reminded me of one of those shooting games you see in an arcade, as a face popped out of the debris I shot it.  Bang.  Bang.  Bang.  Bang.  Bang.  Bang.  Bang.  Bang.  Bang.  Bang.  Bang.  Bang. Reload.  Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang. Bang. 

Dwarves and beast-kin lied on the ground with a single hole in their head.  18 slavers left and I had run out of ammo.  These guys were likely the ones on guard duty, they were fully equipped as they climbed out of the wreckage.  I enveloped myself with barrier magic and drew my rhomphaia.  The slavers drew magic tools and started bombarding me with fireballs, ice spikes, wind blades and the like.  I ignored it as the magic was blocked magnificently by my barrier. 

With my surging mana I felt no strain at all maintaining the barrier.  My rhomphaia easily cut through their armor and soon I had finished killing everyone except for the guy in the basement.  I slowly trudged through the corpses and down the exposed stairs in the rubble to the basement room.  As I entered the dimly lit room I saw an elf frantically trying to excavate the rubble blocking the escape tunnel.  He noticed my approach and panicked Are you the one who destroyed the castle!?!? He screamed at me.  I said nothing and merely ran forward with both of my ninjato drawn. 

He swore wildly and fumbled with something in a bag and then pulled it out.  I immediately went low and started to slide towards him.  BOOM!  A familiar sound roared out loudly and the wall behind me was blasted apart.  Before he could use that weapon again I rammed into his legs, causing him to fall forward onto my outstretched ninjato.  His own weight and momentum pushed his body down my blades as I skewered him. 

With his death my empty state dissipated.  A flood of emotions that had been repressed charged into my mind like a stampede, nearly causing me to vomit.  But the main emotion I felt was shock as I looked at the magic tool the elf had been using.  Impossible.  Thats simply impossible.  How could this exist here?  Lying there on the ground was a pump action shotgun with the words Made in the USA engraved on the barrel alongside shimmering magical runes.