After Surviving the Apocalypse, I Built a City in Another World

A/N: I'm making Theo, Maya, and Horus images next~! Any requests?!

...

____

The people weren't aware that their top healer had just been taken away. They were just relieved that the much-awaited announcement finally echoed in everyone's minds!

[Limestone Valley (Lv3) has won the war against Inko Village (Lv3)]

The screams and cheers resounded in the territory—some screamed, and some danced, while many of the enslaved just fell down sobbing.

Many of the citizens who had been holding themselves up also dropped down but, fortunately, they were just unconscious and tired.

The ambulatory citizens proceeded to help their brethren up, or at least move them to houses or shades. However, the new slaves from Inko— especially those from Voumi were all asked to stand aside.

Now that they had seen people really pretend to be slaves, they were reminded to be a lot more careful with how they handled their newcomers. Like Alterra, they would definitely make them all do the basic oaths at least.

And this was for the Inko slaves. The Voumi slaves were much more complicated because technically, they weren't Limestone Valley's, and therefore could not make oaths.

Anyway, the injured were gently handled by their logistics personnel. Limestone Valley also had a few broatbulances given to them, and each one was filled up in each round.

At some point though, one of the broat drivers went down as the others loaded the patients in. "Sir Victor."

"Your father asked me to tell you something," he said, feeling a bit awkward to be the one who was sending this information. But what could he do? All forces were mobilized to do something and he was heading here anyway.

He cleared his throat. "The Hospital was attacked—by Terran slaves from Inko—but they had been taken care of.

"Raffy is being treated now, and he seems to be stabilizing because someone kept a pharmacy-level healing potion with them."

Victor looked at the man, knowing there was still more. "And?"

"The problem is… your sister is missing," he said, making Victor flinch a bit, eyes narrowing. "What?"

"T-They… she apparently locked herself in a room, but then they found that she exited through the window for some reason."

"Is she just hiding?" "Have you checked the tunnels?"

They naturally kept the tunnel houses built during the Heat Wave. They were all still functional as residential units (though mostly for the goblins—who were all quite brave in this war, by the way—because many of them preferred to live underground). These places were also used as emergency hideouts and so on.

At this, Victor looked at some of the guards. "Send someone to check the tunnels please," he said. "Vanessa might be there."

"Miss Vanessa?"

"Don't ask," he said, just sighing in exasperation. Anyway, the guards nodded and went to do their tasks, leaving the cleanup to their teammates.

To be honest, he really disliked having to stretch the limited manpower they had, but he couldn't help but have a nagging feeling he couldn't ignore. Hopefully, everything was alright and Vanessa just decided to be a spoiled brat rather than it being in danger.

Anyway, after cleaning up and taking the injured locals to the hospital or the clinics, it was finally time to deal with the slaves.

He opened his mouth to give an order. "Slaves, go to the Center and make non-betrayal and Honesty oaths," he said.

"We will have a team interrogate you and, if innocent, you can live as a normal villager though you'd have to pay for some debts as well as save up to be able to buy yourselves from the system."

The Inko slaves flinched and nodded, their eyes watering with tears. They didn't care that they had to take all the oaths. The possibility of gaining a semblance of freedom back made them extremely emotional.

"We will treat your wounds after you make an oath," he said. "I hope you understand."

The hospital could not be attacked again, and it seemed like they had to update a lot of their standard operating procedures regarding that.

The Inko slaves were used to injuries—some of which they still carried after weeks or months—so they really didn't have the sense of entitlement that they had to be treated as soon as possible.

The hundreds and hundreds of slaves were ushered in two files, with a guard walking at each side. This way, even if there was someone pretending to be a slave, the oath would be enough to ensure they wouldn't be a direct problem.

This left the remaining Voumi Slaves, who were now down to about 80 or so people, half of whom were severely injured. In their case, the locals just handed some bandages and some first aid kits and let them do first aid amongst themselves.

After the rest of the slaves cleared out, it was an awkward silence between the two parties.

What now?

The locals were wondering what to do, while the slaves were wondering what would happen to them.

Their case was… not the Inko Villagers'. If this was a normal aborigine territory, they would likely get imprisoned or even killed.

After all… they were slaves from Voumi Town and therefore were not affected by the transfer of slaves.

This meant… that if a Voumi Resident arrived and ordered them, they would have to follow.

Essentially: They were ticking time bombs.

Gurnam was the first to bow his head, and the others' kneeled down directly, begging for life.

"Please give them a chance at life," he said. "Let us all stay here—"

It was here that a woman's shrill voice cut through the air. "NO!!!!"

They turned to see a woman with unruly hair and red eyes, her face messy from sobbing. The soil and blood from her own fights smeared and dirtied her face as she cried.

"Second chance?! Second chance—" she screamed, tone full of disbelief as she glared at them. If she wasn't blocked by guards, it was estimated she'd have attacked the 'slaves'.

For a moment, it seemed out of place in an area where barely anyone was speaking. "You dare ask for a second chance!!"

"Miss—"

"NO!" She screamed. "They killed my husband!!"

This made everyone pause, and they watched as she tried to get past the guards, though to no avail.

Knowing it was useless, her knees gave way as she sobbed, pointing at the Voumi group of slaves as if they were the vilest creatures.

"It was them! He had an arrow lodged in his throat—and it was because of one of them," she screamed at the top of her lungs. "To think I had to force his teammates to tell me what happened to my own husband—wuuu—"

"My poor husband..." she cried, pounding her chest as she felt the deep sorrow of losing the love of her life.

The Voumi slaves looked down in shame and sadness, accepting all the insults she threw at them.

Among them, there was Sarah, who knew for sure it was her arrow who took that woman's life.

Her heart was clenched in pain and she wanted to walk forward, but Gurnam held her hand. He shook his head.

This was not the time to say it. Saying it now would exacerbate the situation for all of them, even the woman.

The woman continued to scream and cry, trying to make people understand that they could not be taking these murderers inside their walls! "I don't care if they're slaves! It was their hands, their weapons, who killed him and many others!"

Victor looked at her and then at the Voumi slaves who were similarly sobbing in remorse. However, no matter how guilty they felt, it would not bring back the people they killed.

So far, there were probably more than a hundred deaths in this war—most of which were because of the aborigines they already killed or these people in particular.

All of those people had family and friends here, and it was inevitable they'd find out about this sooner or later.

Victor took a deep breath. His fight with Gurnam was not easy, and he honestly couldn't guarantee there would be no damage if they kept them.

At the same time, these were his brethren, and they were obviously forced to do what they had done so far.

He sighed in the end, succumbing in helplessness.

Let Alterra handle this problem.