12

"We just have to be seen at the same time as the double," Sekka flopped back on the bed, "You'll have to show me just how good these doubles are later. If they're as good as you say they are then you can use them to do whatever you want."

I wanted to return to my true form, but thankfully this human form of mine wasn't uncomfortable, and it didn't drain mana. I wondered briefly if the will of the world was a sentient being. How else could it know that this kind of ability was exactly the kind of thing I needed? I leaned up against the wall, and looked out the window through the closed curtains. I had gotten used to the emotional hues that surrounded every living being I came across.

The myriad of colors had become easy for me to read. I could tell at a glance what the people around me were feeling. Fear, joy, happiness, anger, rage, bloodlust, and even sadness. Every single one of these emotions had a different hue of color. Even that elven lord gave off an emotional hue.

Seeing a slave with a weapon angered him briefly. Then his emotional hue had changed to disinterest. I was pretty sure that he'd decided to attack me the moment he saw my weapons. That only made me hate that lord even more. That wasn't even considering the number of cores he'd taken off of us.

He'd taken all the poison cores, and several of each of the others. Sekka's papers were real, but if they ever went as far as to test his purity then we'd be in trouble. He was half human. He definitely wasn't a pureblooded elf. The thread count on those curtains wasn't nearly enough to block my line of sight. I watched the people on the street as they carried on with their daily routines.

Imprinting the slave owners to memory one by one. Putting the abusive ones at the top of my list. Those were the ones I'd kill if I saw them again. The thought of killing them brought me more joy then it should have. The one I really wanted to go after was this city's lord but I wasn't going to do that just yet.

Attacking during the day really wasn't my thing, but then again it might be a nice change to my routine. A smirk crossed my face. I wouldn't pull anything tonight. Sekka was already worried that my antics would get us in trouble. That lord needed to die.

If he struck all his slaves as hard as he did me then he'd probably killed several of them. There were over a hundred slaves just in the room I'd been in. He had half a dozen other rooms just like the one I'd been in. It took a lot of slaves to run a household like his. They were probably only allowed to work at night, and they probably hadn't see a decent meal in a long time.

I didn't enjoy that sort of widespread neglect. It was common for slave owners to mistreat their slaves. It was just a piece of their property after all. Humans did the same thing when they went through their slave phase. I snorted to myself with a bit of irritation.

Owning people. I didn't understand how anyone thought that was a good idea. Eventually the neglect would become too great, and the masses that were once enslaved would decide to revolt. The only reason it hadn't yet happened to the elves was the enslavement collars. It was a lot harder to revolt when even the slightest disobedience resulted in a painful shock or death.

Granted the slave collars didn't actually shock the people they kept in line. They just caused every nerve to feel pain all at once so even though the slave wasn't being hurt their whole body told them they were being set on fire or electrocuted. No one wanted to feel the worst pain they'd felt in their entire life. If obeying was all it took to stop you from feeling that pain then that was what you were going to do. I didn't blame the slaves.

Whoever had come up with the runic inscriptions that made up the collars deserved the most painful death imaginable. Problem was that bastard was already long dead or I would have made a mission out of killing him just for the fun of it. It struck me as odd that I cared so much about the slaves wellbeing when just the night before I'd killed one without a second thought. Abusing your own kind in such a way seemed like an unforgivable sin to me. That, and I was just a little too pissed to keep my temper in check yesterday after the lord had pummeled my face not once, but twice.

I think that was what pissed me off the most as I rolled my already healed foot. The fact that he'd made me bleed, and I wasn't allowed to make him bleed back. That knight had made me bleed as well, but I'd done enough damage to him that he'd have a few hard weeks if he didn't see a healer soon after that fight. He might have died if he didn't get all that internal damage looked at. My physical strength was no joke.

All the punch of an adult dragon packed into a body the size of a humans. I could break swords with my bare hands, and warp armor with a flex of my muscles. My skin was harder then most enchanted metals, and each time I was wounded only increased my damage resistance. If I'd fought those poachers as I was now they wouldn't have been able to put a single scratch on me. Honestly I doubt they would have even been able to get anywhere near me.

A particularly painful pang echoed out from my core. Making my hand grip my chest reflexively. I'd gotten used to the dull ache, but moments like this just reminded me that I was still in pain. It helped that it was pain I was willingly causing myself, but that didn't make it any less painful. I glanced over to Sekka.