Chapter 10- Exploding Bad People

Slavery was a concept that only existed on paper for Tian. He knew it existed, something perpetrated by the heretics of the Black Iron Gorge or some ancient dynasty that died drowning in its own sin. It was also, apparently, about twenty miles from Burning Flag City. Closer on some days, but never further than that.

“It’s a big part of why we are here. The border country really belongs to the Borski and the Reshuuk, and a few other big tribes. On paper, it belongs to the Kingdom and every time the tribes act up, the Kingdom dispatches an army and stomps ‘em flat. Usually, anyway.” Commander Attun’s tone made Tian think it wasn’t always quite so one sided.

“But there is a hell of a lot of grassland, not a lot of water, and no settlements worth mentioning. The tribes are less unified than you might think, so the army crushing one bunch might not mean anything to a different bunch. Bands raid each other all the time. Usually for horses, sometimes for women. Sometimes they raid another tribe or another band and they come away with more people than they need. Now, they could ransom them, or kill them, but the best results are going to be trading them for salt and weapons. The weapons they will use for raiding. The salt they sell to kingdom merchants for a fortune.”

The commander had a fresh cloth, dipped in cool water, draped over his eyes.

“I see. And, naturally, anyone not selling to the slave traders will have neither weapons nor gold.” Tian refreshed the commander’s cup.

“Exactly. Nobody’s stupid, so everyone trades. It’s made things a shitload more dangerous out here, but the Kingdom is barely doing more than keeping the roads safe. You guess why.” One of the aching soldiers leered nastily at Tian from over his teacup.

“Fiewer tribes to deal with both now and in the future, and they don’t really care what someone else does to get the salt so long as it reaches their merchants.” Tian said, doing his best to hide the screaming inside his head.

“Hey, look at the smart Tea Venerable! Except you missed part of it. There is another option for the tribesfolk- leave the steppes. Move into the city. Of course, they don’t know the language and can’t do any of the jobs here other than hauling, digging and carrying, but that’s fine. There is one place that will happily take every trained trooper with fighting experience and his own horses that the tribals want to give us.” The soldier’s leer hadn’t gotten any nicer.

“The army.” Tian nodded. He was feeling a fury bubbling up inside of him. He didn’t know any of these people. It was hardly any of his business what they got up to. Yet the phrase “Wash the city in blood” did keep occurring to him.

“Yep. It’s how my family joined up. I’m third generation army.” Attun’s breathing had steadied out. “You are easy to talk to, Tea Venerable.”

“Well, it’s how this little monk gets by. He makes tea and listens to people.” The wounded and the dying, mostly. Injured by heretics who grew strong thanks to the rich city of Black Iron Gorge.

“Good monk. Most monks want to preach at you.” One of the troopers grunted. He also looked like he was ready to fall asleep where he was sitting. It was on the early side of mid-morning, still a long way from lunch, but the soldiers looked ready to sleep.

The five colored qi was spreading through them. Gently, very gently, but even nourishment needs to be digested. They would sleep deeply, and wake without the accumulated damage a soldier’s life brings.

“Very kind of you to say, Benefactor.”

“Promised you a meal. See the iron token hanging by the door? Take it to the chow tent. Cook’s will fix you up a bowl. Then you gotta scram. No civilians in the military district unless they are doing work.” The Commander waved Tian towards a token hanging on a hook next to the door. Stamped on it were the characters for “Ration.”

“Thank you Benefactor. Benefactor?”

“Yeah?”

“Some slaves escaped, this little monk is sure of it. How does the Kingdom handle them?”

“How it handles any homeless, half naked person who can’t speak the language. Badly. Sometimes someone takes them in. Mostly they don’t. But the Kingdom doesn’t do shit to help.”

Tian bowed, and collected the token. He hesitated for a moment by the door. “Would you mind if this little monk said a prayer for you?”

“Keep it short.” The commander stifled a yawn.

“May you be safe. May you always find your way home. May you never starve.”

Tian pressed his hands together and bowed. He didn’t consider himself particularly religious. Being a Daoist was simply how he understood the world, no different from declaring he worshiped gravity because it was always there for him. There was the Mad God problem too. But the soldiers had been very kind to him. He could at least offer them the comfort of a stranger’s good wishes. And it’s what a monk should do.

The cook was willing to dish Tian up a bowl of badly cooked rice and a bowl of worse stew. It was, however, free, which made it fundamentally good. Navigating the spoon under the head-covering basket was a challenge, but he was committed to the part. Besides, he didn’t want to show his face. The urge to kill was staying at a gentle simmer. Keeping the basket on gave him some distance and helped him calm his breath.

Tian silently hung the token back when he was done. They didn’t notice him. It was alarmingly easy to move through the gaps in their perception. He had come a long way since his brothers first took him out for a stroll.

The aches in the soldier’s bodies from three hard days of riding, the tension of overworked muscle, the stink of them, were all artifacts of mortality he had shed. He had found the tea borderline undrinkable. He could taste the dreadful storage conditions and the cheap processing the leaves had undergone. Worse, he was certain there was some kind of filler in there. It might even be grass, dried and processed along with the tea. And they enjoyed it. They couldn’t taste it at all.

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It was what it was. They were content with their lives, or they seemed to be. He certainly couldn’t improve them. Immortality was not a road everyone could walk. You needed that extra something, and you were born with it or had to do something immense to get it.

Could he stop the slave trading?

No. He could kill individual caravans, but it would take mobilizing the whole Kingdom’s army to stamp it out. And maybe not even then. The thing about nomads in all those history books was that they could just move away and come back once you left. As long as gold and steel were offered, there would be someone ready to sell their kin into slavery.

The real solution was to choke it off at the source. Once Black Iron Gorge lost its ability to buy slaves, people would stop selling so damn many of them. But that just brought him right back around to…