[ The Administrator ]

Part II Chapter 42 - Confrontation

It was early in the morning. The camp was deserted of almost any slavers, who had long gone to rest in their tent. Outside, the slaves were sleeping on the bare ground, trying their best not to invade each other's personal space. Had it been winter, they would all have slept together, snuggling up, but it was summer, so overcrowded places could soon become unbearable. Fortunately for them, this year's summer was relatively mild, so the nights weren't too hot.

It was still dark outside, and the air was still cool, filled with moisture. However, the first signs of life soon started to show, as the birds began their morning chorus. It was only a matter of time now before the early sun started to rise, dyeing the sky to a soft gray color. But amidst this musical silence, birds were not the only one that could be heard.

In the camp, a man was trying to make his way through the sleeping slaves. In a too great rush to watch where he put his feet, he stepped on a couple of them, as they groaned upon their brutal awakening. But the man didn't care to apologize. They were, after all, only slaves. He had something much more important on his mind. Something much more preoccupying.

Finally reaching his destination, he stormed into one of the tents.

"Ed!" he shouted, his eyes looking for someone.

Inside, another man was trying to finally find some sleep, after pulling an all-nighter. It was Eddie, the camp's accountant. Unlike most slavers, Eddie was not physically bulky. He was of an average size, not very imposing, and quite boring looking. But he was also one of the highest ranked slavers here. He was, after all, the brain of this camp. Eddie was one of the very few members of the slavers' gang to be literate. Among all the musclebrains, he was the only one truly proficient with numbers out there, which is why, despite not participating in raids, he was promoted to accountant.

These past few weeks, Eddie had been very busy. The gang had recently received a huge order of slave supply. Five thousand of them, regardless of their gender, age or race. It was the biggest order the gang had received ever since Eddie arrived, and naturally, they didn't have this many slaves in stock. The gang frequently needed to resupply the market in slaves, so they never accumulated more than a thousand of them at once. But this order was also a golden opportunity for the slavers. Slaves did not all hold the same value. While it was easy to find buyers for strong men and beautiful women, it was already much harder to sell children, elderly or weaklings. But this time's client offered to buy anyone. And not only were they willing to buy anyone, they also offered one silver coin per head. A total of fifty gold coins. A golden opportunity.

For the gang, it was absolutely out of question to miss such a great deal. In order to satisfy the client's order, they had temporarily stopped resupplying the market and recently multiplied their raids, capturing as many slaves as possible. In the matter of only a few months, they had achieved their goal, accumulating over five thousand slaves. But this sudden growth in the number of slaves also brought a few problems. The camp was not capacitated to hold this many slaves and quickly became overcrowded. Outnumbered, it was difficult for the slavers to keep an eye on everyone. It didn't take long before the first revolt emerged. Revolts were not so uncommon. They happened once in a while, so the slavers were used to it. But this time was more challenging considering the number of slaves involved.

All of this because of one man, Troy. The idiot had been enslaved a few weeks ago, after he failed to pay back his debts in time. Completely wild and dissident, the slavers had been unable to completely tame him. Too entertained by his behavior though, they had also completely underestimated the threat he represented. In only a few days, Troy had rallied hundreds of slaves to his cause, provoking a major uprising. Still, with the slave collar on, they didn't represent a real threat, and the rebellion was easily put down. However, dozens of slaves were killed in the process. And those losses weren't insignificant. Each one of them was worth one silver coin after all.