Chapter 105: Slave Merchant
The skeletons untied the ropes and approached the backs of the black-clad men. Their hands and feet were all bound, and their weapons had been taken away. To prevent them from shouting or crying out, Wade even had the skeletons seal their mouths with strips of cloth.
They were loaded onto the rear row of the snow sleds sideways, like cargo. After some time, Wade had captured the six black-clad men who had tried to escape and brought them back.
Mia drove the snow sled to the place where the pirates and the black-clad men had just fought. The pirates’ remaining intact equipment had been stripped off, mainly swords and axes.
Most of the leather armor was unusable; Mia’s ice spikes had pierced large holes through it.
Those swords and axes were mostly subpar, far inferior to the finely crafted gear of Sven’s Viking pirate group.
Among this pirate crew, only the two iron-rank swordsmen wielded genuine Viking swords; the others’ swords appeared heavily worn, likely used for many years. Rust stains that no washing could remove covered the scratches on the blades.
The tall warrior’s axe was decent—it was a massive battleaxe standing about one and a half meters tall, with a blade roughly half a meter wide on both sides. It was extremely heavy and required two skeletons to lift and move it steadily.
This was likely a fine-class extraordinary weapon. Wade had learned from Lucas and York about adventurers’ ratings of extraordinary weapons.
Common iron and steel swords went without saying, but if rare ores or extraordinary forging techniques were added during crafting, granting common extraordinary attributes like “durability” or “sharpness,” the weapon could be rated as fine-class.
Excellent-class extraordinary weapons needed two or more such attributes. Some had rare traits like “poisoning” or “burning,” which could also qualify as excellent-class.
By the radiant-class, weapons typically possessed battlefield-changing power. For example, “Radiance” is a prime example, but few radiant-class weapons reached that level.
The two-handed battleaxe’s blade emitted a piercing cold gleam. It should have the “durable” trait, just like Lucas’s Tania military spear.
However, its quality seemed slightly inferior to that spear, with several chips and dents on the blade—perhaps its previous owner had wielded it too roughly.
Wade placed the double-edged axe into the snow sled. The oak sled sank slightly under its weight.
The equipment and coins stripped from the pirates were all loaded into the sled. They also found wine skins and bags of powder on those men.
Wade discarded these items onto the snow; the undead couldn’t drink alcohol. The powder was the same substance the frenzied warrior had been consuming.
That guy was probably a berserker. Pure-blood orcs could use berserker power to multiply their strength several times for a short duration, but humans usually lacked this talent and relied on drugs to achieve similar effects.
These Viking pirates seemed to have mastered this technique. The powder appeared to be ground from certain herbs and mushrooms. In the powder bags, fragments resembling grass leaves and dried mushroom remnants were found.
Typically, such drugs had severe side effects and were considered poisons.
Moreover, skeletons couldn’t use human medicines, so Wade discarded everything together.
The bodies of the pirates and black-clad men were dragged together by the skeletons. Since there was no wood nearby to burn, Wade had Mia use ice and snow to cover the corpses.
This wasn’t out of kindness but to erase any traces of their presence as much as possible.
Wade didn’t want to expose his whereabouts. If Icelanders or other pirates passed by and found the oddly dead pirates, it would inevitably attract attention.
Mia buried the ice spikes and the bloodstained snow on the beams beneath the snow.
After handling it, the area looked as if nothing had happened.
Finally, Wade had time to figure out the black-clad men’s identities. They didn’t look like northern folk; their bone structures were smaller, and their skin was a sun-darkened dark black, different from both the Tanians and Icelanders.
They all had tattoos of a dragon beast on their foreheads—a wingless earth dragon—likely a symbol of an organization or cult.
One black-clad man was carried off the sled by two skeletons, who held his arms like prisoners being escorted and removed the cloth sealing his mouth.
The man babbled incessantly, tears and snot streaming down his face—probably begging for mercy.
Wade couldn’t understand his language. Surprisingly, he wasn’t speaking the common tongue; maybe they had fled from a remote small country. In distant regions and countries, people often spoke their own languages.
Even in countries using the common tongue, different regions had dialects and accents, so it was normal that Wade couldn’t comprehend this man’s speech.
Wade tried writing in the snow to ask about the man’s identity, but he just cried and buried his head, crawling on the ground. No matter how Wade tried to pull him, he even attempted to kiss Wade’s feet.
His will to survive was extremely strong. He seemed uneducated and probably illiterate.
These men were originally armed and should have belonged to combat units; illiteracy was common.
Literacy in this world was a rare skill.
Most people couldn’t even write their own names. If you could read and do arithmetic, you could apply to be an accountant at the merchant guild.
Nothing useful came from questioning this man, so Wade ordered the skeletons to rebind him and tried to question the other five.
However, the situation was the same. They couldn’t communicate with Wade, their writing was different, and they just cried uncontrollably, kneeling and begging for mercy, even kissing Wade’s feet while pleading.
They were terrified and probably regarded Wade as a god, swearing loyalty and offering their faith.
Wade had them tied up again and looked toward the icy sea in the distance, pondering what to do.
After some thought, he ordered the skeletons to bring down the man who had knelt the hardest and buried his head the deepest.
Wade cut the ropes binding the man with a sword, freeing him.
The man’s first reaction was to kneel before Wade, but this time Wade drew his sword and pressed it against the man’s neck.
Wade kicked the man’s backside, making him turn his back. Wade sheathed his sword and silently watched him.
The man’s face was full of fear and anxiety. Just as he was about to kneel again, Wade kicked him in the buttocks, knocking him to the snow.
The man seemed to understand something and suddenly began walking forward.
After a few steps, he kept looking back.
Wade quietly sheathed his sword, summoned skeletons to follow the man, and Mia perched on his shoulder.
All the black-clad men were brought down, and their hands and feet were untied. Wade left two skeletons to guard the snow sled; the rest followed the black-clad men’s pace and walked ahead.
They headed toward the Dragon’s Spine mountain range, apparently realizing Wade wanted them to lead the way.
Soon, Wade reached a valley at the foot of the mountain range.
Signs of battle surrounded the valley, with corpses strewn everywhere. Several small snow sleds were parked here, with reindeer harnessed to the sleds and remnants of pirates guarding the snow sleds and watching the cave entrance.
Without hesitation, Mia sent those pirates to their deaths with ice spikes.
The black-clad men shivered violently as they watched, several dripping pale yellow fluid from their armpits.
After clearing the pirates, the undead followed them into the valley.
Ahead came the glow of fire—torches planted inside the cave.
There was a secret base in this valley that seemed to originally belong to these black-clad men, but it had been looted by the Viking pirates. There were even more corpses inside the cave. Crossbows were planted everywhere, and overturned oil lamps burned on the rocks.
The men nervously led Wade into the cave. The cave was divided into various areas. Upon entering, Wade saw rusty iron cages and bloodstains.
He finally understood what these men did. Inside the iron cages were badly injured and shackled demi-humans: lizardfolk, dogfolk, catfolk, and even winged birdfolk. They all curled up in the corners of the cages with vacant expressions.
Even when a group of undead appeared before them, they showed little reaction.
The men did not stop in front of those demi-humans but led Wade to the deepest part of the cave, where there was a separate prison.
Inside the blue prison was a female demi-human Wade had never seen before. She had human facial features, but her arms were covered with distinct gray scales. She had a lizard-like tail, and her hands and feet were all claws.
Her golden vertical pupils emitted a dangerous light in the firelight. She looked similar to the lizardfolk but was clearly different.
She wasn’t a hybrid of dragon and something else—such dragons wouldn’t have human-like heads. This demi-human was a true Dragonborn.
Wade had heard stories about Dragonborn; they were rarer than elves. One of the five saints who opened the new era a thousand years ago, Oswaldor, was a Dragonborn.
As Wade discovered this Dragonborn, footsteps sounded outside—someone had arrived.
Wade heard heavy metallic armor clanking; their footsteps were orderly, like a well-disciplined army.
The guards at the cave entrance were eliminated. Wade received a message from the skeleton before it disappeared: a group of soldiers appeared at the cave entrance.
Those armored soldiers held up shields carved with black ravens—these were Icelanders’ troops.
An entire squad of fully armed Icelandic soldiers arrived at the cave, blocking the entrance completely.
Wade looked back as dense flames filled his vision. He heard screams. The flames inside the cave were extinguished, and the Icelandic soldiers slaughtered the demi-humans in the cages without mercy—none were spared.