The First Steps

*Thud* The floor creaked lightly as the boy with ragged clothes made his way inside the old and slightly dilapitated house, his pitch black hair softly swaying as he dragged his feet from the exhaustion, his face, body and hair caked with grime, dust and dirt. 

The sharp features on his face would be rather attractive if it wasn't for the fact he looked like he came out of a warzone. 

"Sigh... even dogs don't live this damn way." The boy sighed and complained with an unusual demeanour from what children usually showed. 

He was slightly dizzy as he finally reached the hay stack he called a bed, plopped down and let his feet rest while the starry night sky shined through a hole in the roof with a brilliance not commonly seen anywhere else.

'At least the environment is a lot more beautiful and clean compared to Earth.' His thoughts drifted off while his breathing became slower and slower and finally calmed down, his previous exhaustion now slightly less apparent. 

His name was Tenebris, and albeit a bit weird, it was one of the only things that had meaning in the boy's measly life of 9 years. 

Tenebris' original name, though, was Cassius. 

'I really miss Earth... life here is too hard.' That's right, Tenebris was from Earth, a place where he had the name Cassius, although his memory was still a bit jumbled up, he remembered the critical details. 

'I was a successful and critically acclaimed politician... to think I ended up in such a miserable state.' Cassius had been one of the sole politicians of Earth to be independent of external sponsors, bribers and more. He was a powerhouse that conquered his country with sheer cunningness, political schemes, underground dealings and formed his own faction, with his own subordinates and backers. 

Unfortunately, even such a successful and cunning person cannot survive a bullet to the head. Not many could, of course. 

Tenebris' thoughts were halted by the sore spots in his feet and hands that periodically gave small bursts of pain. 

'This damned body of mine, I can't even work for half a day.' Tenebris cursed as he endured the pain, it wasn't normal for children to work in Earth, but that was not the case for Tenebris, who had transmigrated to a world with a seemingly medieval culture, as far as he knew. 

Tenebris was a child worker, as claimed by his supervisors, but the word slave would be more fitting. He had lost his right to an easygoing and carefree life the moment his sole family, his mother, died. He had been only 5 years old when his mother died, but with the mind of an adult, he did not break down over it, despite his unavoidable feelings of sadness and grief. 

Slaves were normal here, according to what Tenebris knew. It was even more normal to exploit them in mines, which is where Tenebris had just come from, bruised, tired and injured. 

The mines were a place where even the most veteran of miners did not enter so easily, let alone a 9 year old child who didn't have the minimum strength required. 

But he did it anyways. Why? Well, Tenebris wanted to survive. This world, this life was an opportunity to him, a new beginning which he vowed to utilize well, if only he could escape the shackles of being a slave. 

That was easier said than done. 

'It's no use thinking about it now... the other children have their eyes on my food stash, and the chief inspector is increasing the ore requirements day by day... I need to find a new way to make more-...' Tenebris' thoughts stopped mid-way as sleep inevitably took over him. 

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"Cassius, must you always resort to such methods to win the elections?" A stern female voice asked inquisitively. 

"If I do not resort to such methods, what stops my competitors from resorting to those methods? Don't try to convince me, Martha, I'm certain on what I do." Cassius replied while chuckling. 

"Oh please, did you really have to frame him? He's quite possibly looking at a decade in prison!" Martha quipped back.

"Martha, there are a lot of studies and theories on human behaviour, psychology and interpersonal relations between people. What do you think is the root of it all? I'll tell you what it is. The concept of push and pull is the most basic, and also the fundamental part of all that makes up human relations. One must balance between both push and pull to achieve the most desired result with that person. But what can you do if balance doesn't work with that person? What if resorting to just pulling doesn't work either? Then you must push. You must push with all your strength, so that their demise saves you from yours..." 

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*Yawn* Tenebris woke up with a yawn as the bright sun shone on his face. 

He sat up on the bed with half closed eyes as he rubbed his slightly less sore feet, and wrapped them in the animal skin footwraps provided to all the slaves. 

Stepping out of the small, dilapitated house, Tenebris raised his hand and covered his eyes, the sun brightly illuminating the entirety of the fifty or so clay and mud houses built around the worksite. 

He quickly found a boy and a girl walking side by side and ran up to them, joining them. 

Both of them smiled and greeted as they saw him.

"Good morning, Ten!" "Have fun sleeping in?" The boy and girl said respectively, they were Tenebris' or rather, Ten's, best friends ever since he had been sold to the mines by his mother's death. 

Even with his extensive background, it was impossible for Ten to succeed and escape his predicaments without friends he could trust, though his nature prevented him from trusting anyone besides himself. In his past life, he had even fooled and manipulated his own mother to believe he was innocent during a corruption investigation on him, due to the fact that his mother was not the type that could lie well to officials and interrogators. 

"Good morning, Nessie, Baron." Ten greeted his friends as he smiled at them. The girl named Nessie had fair hair, with blue eyes and commonly sported a teasing and fiesty expression on her face. 

Baron, on the other hand was tall, even taller than Ten, and much stronger, although he seemed stoic, he was actually a really humorous person, even his name was ironic, Baron, the slave. 

"Apparently the food for today is actually going to be fresh bread, cheese and dried meat!" Baron said excitedly as he walked on the right of Ten.

"Hm? How come?" 

"The girls on cooking duty said that they heard the inspectors say something about the mine's resources being almost used up, and today would be the last day of mining before it is shut down and closed for good!" Nessie said excitedly, clearly glad at the idea of not having to carry ores or transport supplies through the treacherous paths of the mine anymore.

Ten, although, turned grim the moment he heard this. As a politician, he had expert knowledge on how resources are allocated. Mines such as this required stable work force to be sustained. However, what happened to the work force after they had outlived their use? Another mine? Another worksite? Being sold off? Or worse, having their heads chopped off?

He had long ago realized that people shared no sympathy for the lives of measly slaves. The look that the inspectors sported on their faces whenever they oversaw the children during the mining process was one of indifference, and utter ignoration. Why? Because to them, he and all the other children were nothing more than animals. 

'Cordia is nothing more than a small territory consisting of a town, two villages, and this mine. It's hopeless if I want to remain in Cordia, it would only be possible if someone wanted to adopt me and paid off my price of a gold coin, but no-one I know would do that. Cordia is part of the Black Empire, from what I know, the mines in the Empire are few and scarce, the possibility of getting reallocated to another mine is slim to none...' 

Ten racked his brain as his grim expression was noticed by Baron. 

"Ten, what's wrong?" He questioned with a curious gaze. 

"It's... nothing, we need to talk after today's work, come to my hut after you both finish." 

"Alright then." Baron said with a worried expression while Nessie nodded.

The three made their way to the chow hall to have their breakfast, but in reality it was only a chow hall in name, because it consisted of a long, long table made of cheap wood. The children sat on rough stone blocks as the girls on cooking duty set down massive plates filled with fresh bread, cheese and dried meat. This meal resembled a feast compared to the usual food consisting of plain porridge, stale bread or rotten vegetables.

Ten quickly pocketed some pieces of dried meat as he slowly got his share of the food and started eating. A growing boy needed to eat healthy to grow up properly, and Ten ensured that he did his best to get more food, even though sometimes he had been whipped for it. Luckily, this time, no-one noticed. 

After having the breakfast, the children slowly began marching into the mine under the light of the oil lamps hung up on the posts inside of the mine. Dense darkness filled the cool and slightly stagnant interior of the mine.

Ten was moving along with Baron and Nessie as they walked with the group. Nessie pulled a wooden cart that had some water containers and rags inside, while Baron and Tenebris held pickaxes, which looked quite comical considering they were children. 

They finally reached the end of the mine after countless twists and turns. This was where they had left off the day before, the area had quite a few ores available for the taking, so Tenebris, Baron and Nessie used this rather discreet spot quite a lot. 

"Well, let's start." Ten said as Baron began striking the hard surface of the stone.

The co-operation between the three was very well developed. Baron handled the brute force of the work and chipped away at the hard rock surface until they struck ore, from which Tenebris took over, his finesse making sure none of the ore is wasted or damaged and reduced to crumbs from the sheer force that Baron used when mining. Nessie on the other hand was responsible for taking the cart to the collection point whenever it got full and also making sure the two boys were hydrated while they worked. She also often resorted to pouring water over their bodies to cool them down due to the tiring work that mining was. 

The three continued like this for what seemed like countless hours before they felt they had worked enough. 

"Hold up, we need around half a cart's weight worth of ores more than usual, the chief inspector increased the requirements." Ten said to his two friends. 

"Will they notice if it's just half a cart's weight?" Nessie asked in a pouting face. 

"They will," Baron said with a tired expression, "the inspectors have been monitoring every group's cart closely today." He gestured towards the inspector farther down the tunnel.

"They want to maximize the profits for today before finally shutting the mine down." Ten said in an indifferent manner, his sharp face stained with a little bit of black. 

The three quickly got to work again, slowly filling the cart up. 

Tenebris was both dejected and slightly curious, his anticipation towards what would happen with them after the mine shut down was evident, but it also set his original plans off. He had no idea what to do for the first time in his life. 

Right at this moment, as Baron was striking away at an exceptionally hard piece of rock, Tenebris noticed something, but his scream was too late.

"Wait! Hol-" *BOOM* The entire mine rumbled as the tunnel shook immediately and the support pillars collapsed, the roof of the cave starting to fall on them as the floor crumbled and split apart, dropping them down below the cold reaches of the cave. 

Ten had meant to scream hollow. The entire wall made of exceptionally hard rock was all hollow inside, and their striking caused it to set off a chain reaction. 

The only thing that remained was the distant, constant rumbling of the earth, as the countless children in the mines succumbed to their inevitable deaths, along with the inspectors. 

A cloud of dust surged from the mine entrance.