Chapter 1

Peace was never an option.

Especially for the mighty Empire of Rasae. Most of its budget was burned on the military and almost everything the administrative personnel worked over was the integration of new territory into their land.

Of course, keeping such a hungry, expansionist power from going bankrupt was not an easy task. Thankfully, the people who bore that burden were not expected to live easy lives to begin with.

Indeed, the Empire was not shy of using slaves to fuel its economy. It proclaimed that they were "ethically sourced" so to say, meaning that most slaves were reduced to their status due to criminal activity. Unfortunately, what the propaganda spewing officials omitted to say was what level of crime might reduce one's life to less than human.

Of course, they won't slap a collar on your neck for minor stuff, but, well there was a reason most of the Empire's prisons were empty...

Still, not all slaves were treated the same. The bigger the crime, the heavier the chains and shorter the leash. Many slaves could actually return to being normal citizens after a few years.

But the others, the ones who were deemed too dangerous, lost that right forever. It was they that were used for the most gruesome work, chief of which was mining.

The Rasae Empire did not only pride itself in the quality of its soldiers, but also in the quality of their equipment.

Mithril was a common metal found the higher one went up the military totem pole. Special in its ability to store and conduct mana, Mithril was a precious resource that rested in various degrees of purity at the hips of distinguished officers.

However, the process of mining it was arduous and time consuming, not something a good citizen of the Empire should concern themselves with.

Slaves, on the other hand, were perfect for this kind of work. So the officials wasted no time in supplying their nation's largest Mithril mining site with thousands of them.

The island of Kass was a few days away from the mainland. Besides the city carrying the same name, the island also housed an enormous mountain range full of large deposits of magical ore.

However, as the Empire was a meritocracy, the officials overseeing the project were not fools. Stuffing so many criminals in the same place was a recipe that awaited disaster. So they took precautions.

A large fort was erected that housed an entire garrison of soldiers. Underneath it were the slaves "accommodation" in the form of what was basically a dungeon. Half of them worked, while the other half rested, stuffed underground under lock and key. The guards always made sure the number of working slaves was never too much for them to handle.

It was an efficient system, but the officials were still not convinced. What about the good people of Kass? It was an important port city with all the Mithril going through it so its population was nothing to scoff at. It even held a few noble houses.

They came up with a simple, yet complicated solution at the same time. A barrier will be constructed with the goal of trapping inside anyone who had the enchanted collar around their necks.

Everyone else could pass freely through it, but if a slave tried to? Well, the result would not be pretty…

Gold was thrown around and a group of the Empire's best mages were brought in to construct the barrier. It took them fifty days and fifty nights to complete a matrix of such large proportions, but they managed.

Everything was set up and the mages began the process. The wild mana savagely swinging around their bodies only to be tempered and forcefully domesticated by mere mortals was indeed a sight to see.

Seven beacons were placed around in a circle around that part of the mountain range, meant to act as coordinates for the massive influx of magic.

All mages raised their staves and simultaneously launched orbs of crackling light. The calculations were perfect and the procedure meticulous.

The orbs would connect high in the sky and the barrier would descend, using up all the invested mana right when it reached the beacons. Not a centimetre more or less. Everything would be mirrored underground as well, forming a gigantic sphere.

A thunder rang through the island. It was so loud, even the waves hitting the shore were disturbed.

The spheres connected and a curtain of light began to descend. The mages wore smiles, proud of their hard work and joyful to have succeeded.

Unfortunately their happiness didn't last long.

"Why isn't it slowing down?" one of them whispered, not having been part of the early celebrations.

Indeed, it seemed like the mana used to fuel the barrier was not running out as fast as they had calculated. At this rate the beacons would prove no more useful other than keeping the magical construct in a spherical shape.

In less than a minute, the barrier passed its intended limits and swallowed both the panicked mages as well as the whole Kass mountain range.

Unfortunately, the bad news didn't stop there. The barrier was stable now, but there was still an excess of mana inside it. Because of the electrical nature dominating the matrix, that excess manifested itself as lighting.

The first bolt of magical destruction descended like the fury of gods and completely severed one of the fort's guard towers.

But destruction was not all that it brought. Due to the environment created by the barrier and magical discharge, the Kass mountain range suffered a backlash from the chaotic mana.

Everything that contained magical circuits was instantly reduced to dust.

Including the slave collars.

One second of negligence was enough for the prisoners to revolt. The guards were too distracted by the destruction to notice the pickaxes descending on their heads.

In less than five days, the valley was under the control of the convicts.

With no collars on them, naturally they tried to leave, but the barrier acted entirely different from what it was supposed to. Anyone and anything could enter, but it was impossible to leave.

The barrier had achieved its purpose of becoming a prison, but it did so in the worst way possible. The largest source of Mithril in the Empire was now under the hegemony of criminals.

The officials were at a loss on what to do. Bring other mages to dismantle it? The matrix wasn't crafted by a novice as a school project, but by the best the Empire had!

Blast it apart with brute force? The barrier was restrictive, not protective. Spells, mana and objects would pass through it without any change. Humans on the other hand…

But what could they do then? Send in the army to try and take control? Were they willing to sacrifice their beloved soldiers, basically imprisoning them after defeating the convicts?

The Emperor had a headache. An entire year passed while they tried all sorts of methods. None of them bore success and some were even proven dangerous. The magical barrier was acting like nothing they had ever seen, certainly nothing like what it was intended to when it was built.

The Emperor was left with no other choice. He sent out his decree, they had to cooperate with the prisoners, otherwise the Empire would surfer from the lack of Mithril.

The prisoners, having found out that they couldn't leave, were also willing to talk. They had the magical ore, but they lacked in everything else. Food, drink, clothes, tools, etc. Even weapons were needed as the mountain range was quite a wild place.

A negotiation was set up, scrolls with numerous conditions and demands were thrown back and forth, until they finally settled on an agreement.

Each month an exchange would be made. Rails were placed and heavy carts were brought in. The mechanism was nothing complicated as people could not get too close to the barrier without getting struck by magical lighting.

The prisoners would send out the Mithril they mined and the officials would do the same with supplies and, much later, even luxury goods.

Many years later and this exchange still went on undisturbed. The Nest, as it was now popularly called, continued to provide the Empire with its much needed metal. It was a co-dependent relationship between a bunch of criminals and an international powerhouse.

The scholars were certainly having a field day with this whole situation.

Of course, the emperor, even after all this time, still tried to crack open the barrier, but with zero success on his part.

Criminals were now directly thrown inside without even bothering to enslave them first. Strangely enough, this whole debacle greatly reduced the severity of slavery in the empire. Now, one only became a slave until he paid off his debts or under other special circumstances.

Today, twenty years later, another month was coming to an end and the exchange of goods was beginning. This time, however, was a special day as another batch of prisoners were brought in.

Naturally, people were thrown inside the barrier quite often. But today a young boy, only 15 years old would experience the same thing. But there was something quite different about him in comparison to all the others before.

With his hands wrapped in thick chains and swinging left to right as the wagon he was in moved along towards the Nest, the boy lamented his situation.

"Motherfu*ker! Where's my otherworldly adventure!? Where's my magic sword and busty cat girls!?"

The other prisoners looked at him with pity in their eyes. Criminals they may be, but even they found a child's mad ravings to be a wretched sight to see.

"This daddy is too handsome to go to prison! What if I drop the soap!?