>>5344863
>Slave
I AM SPARTACUS

>>5344863
>Slave
FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEDOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMM

>>5344863
>Slave

>>5344863
>Slave
Cast revenge and justice upon those that did wrong not only to us, but over every unjust soul upon this land

>>5344863
>>Noble

Everyone always want to play the beta, its a shame

>>5344863
>Noble

Caesar but cooler

>>5344863
>>Noble

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>>5344863
>Freedawn Ink

Every night you dream of the peace you had in your homeland. And every night you waken to the nightmare of your oppression.

You do this by

>Words
Through wit, work, and guille you were able to gain your freedom. And despite the barriers placed on you you learned to write the language of the slavers. You distribute scrolls and speeches arguing against slavery and promoting the humanity of the captured peoples.


>Actions
You were young when a woman thought to be myth saved you from a life of bondage. You have joined her band, sneaking into slave camps and saving who you can, before guiding them back to your homelands.

>Family

You still remain in bondage. You have made a humble family and do your best to teach them about your homeland and traditions, despite the harsh watch of the slavers.

>>5344863
>Bureaucrat
The legalist path

>>5344948
>Words
I HAVE A DREAM!

>>5344948
>>Actions

>>5344949
Ah shit late, never mind
>>5344948
>Words
Seems like the best option

>>5344948
>Actions

>>5344948
>Words

>>5344948
>>Actions

>Words

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>>5344948
>Gondar, Amhara, Ethiopia, 18th century, Ink on Goat Vellum

“We were all ranked together at the valuation. Men and women, old and young, married and single, were ranked with horses, sheep, and swine. There were horses and men, cattle and women, pigs and children, all holding the same rank in the scale of being, and were all subjected to the same narrow examination.”
“Shut it, Māste!”

A rotten jahūma splalters your face. You’re lucky it isn't fresh this time, you still have bruises from last week's speech.

“Silvery-headed age and sprightly youth, maids and matrons, had to undergo the same indelicate inspection. At this moment, I saw more clearly than ever the brutalizing effects of slavery upon both slave and slaveholder.”
“I thought I told you to shut it!”

The heckler walks to your humble booth and picks up a stack of your scrolls. You spent weeks writing them by hand, none of the scribes would service you.

“I come here to relax after busting my ass on the water, not to hear some sawūta-skin whining.”

The Heckler rips your scrolls to shreds and throws them at your feet. You feel your blood rise.

“There it is. Come one, show me that desert savagery.”

If you strike him, you know how bad it would go for you, but you can only take so much...”

“We have a problem here?!”

“Deathmaster!”

The heckler runs as you turn to see

“Vusani!”

Your oldest friend walks through the street, the heavy jacāsa on her hip scaring off anyone who would bother her.

“You scared him off, I was this close to a donation!”

You laugh as Vusani helps you clean up your booth.

“You know, you really should come by the temple.”

“You found freedom your way, I found it mine.”

Vusani was sold to the temple when you were children and raised as a warrior monk. How did you become free?

>Escape
With a clever disguise, you left the fields and ran to the city.
>Purchase
You worked to the bone to scrape enough spare coins to buy your freedom from your master
>Liberated
You were working in the fields when a crew of Abolitonists freed you and others from bondage.

>>5345144
>Purchase

>>5345144
>Purchase
>You worked to the bone to scrape enough spare coins to buy your freedom from your master
Self made.

>>5345144
>Purchase

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>>5345144
>kaolin P

“You found it by making the man who owned us even richer.”

The comments stings with truth. You ground your muscles to dust farming fruits and vegetables to sell. Your enslaver raised your “price” several times. He only let you go when you were too weak to be useful in the fields.

“And you found it by killing people like us.”

Vusani’s brow furrows.

“The Way is mercy. I make sure no one will go through what we did. We give the ultimate freedom.”

You finish cleaning your wrecked booth and look her in the eye.

“A mercy I am glad to wait for, old friend.”

She walks off and says back to you.

“Stop by the temple, I can show you what I mean.”

You start to walk back to your home until a bureaucrat stops you. The brightly colored robes they wear make them stand out in the poor calpulli you’re standing in.

”Hey, you! Māste!”

You bristle at the word but know enough to let it go.

“Yes, tōnta?”
”You can read? And write? Real words?”
“I can read and write Antaxōni, yes.”

That and three other languages, though those aren't seen as “real writing” here. The bureaucrat shows you a scroll.

”I am a scholar of the wild peoples of the sands. I believe there is a market for civilization to learn about the foods and cultures of the Māste.”

“I would hope so, tōnta.”

You wait for them to give you permission to leave, but they seem intrigued.

”I bet my last gold that if you could transcribe some songs or fables, we could both grow rich.”

Your mind races. This is clearly an ignorant fool, but an ignorant fool who could help fund the cause. Coin to pay for more ink and parchment, or even a way to show your work to a broader audience. But is it really worth working with such a slime ball?


>Take the deal with the Buearcrat
>Visit the Temple
>Write some more scrolls and keep street preaching alone.

>>5346619
>Take the deal, but get the bureaucrat to sign a contract that the earnings will be split 40/60, and that if either of us reneges on the deal then the offender is liable to pay massive damages.

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>>5347521
>Neville Dear

“I agree to this arrangement, but for every ten pieces of jalōnni we are paid, I must receive six. Our agreement must also be sealed at the Beader’s Guild”

The Bureaucrat looks shocked that someone of your status has such a grasp of the law. Sadly every freed slave must be a master Beader just to stay out of chains.

”Very well, I shall have my Beader write the agreement as you say.”

You’re surprised that they took your deal so quickly, then you realize that in any dispute they are heavily favored by the courts. An issue you have written about at length.

“Then I shall return tomorrow with samples of scrolls to be copied and sold by your scribes.”
~
The next day you come, rather tired in fact, with a scroll you spent all night rewriting. You had so little time you could only bring one to present.

The Scroll you bring is...

>Dreams of Tomorrow
A heart-wrenching biography of your life detailing your capture, enslavement, and path to freedom

>Souls of the Sands
A feel-good cookbook of “exotic” cuisine you remembered from your family and fellow slaves.

>In Defense of Freedom
A thorough (some would say dull) analysis of slavery and why it is incompatible with an advanced society.

>>5347576
>Souls of the Sands
To win the peoples hearts and minds, you must first win their bellies.

>>5347576
>Souls of sand

Academia is required, but that is only when the attack claims it is the natural order.

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>Coin model: Endybis

You gave the Bureaucrat a copy of a text you called “Soul of the Sands.” You hope to capture the hearts and minds of the people of this slave power by showing them the value of your culture.

”Well tickle my pickle, this looks amazing. I’ll have Xēlarne cook some of it up myself. That woman makes a great fried jahāþa. We should have you over.”

You smile through your cringe and walk with your new partner to the Beader’s Guild. This place brings back bad memories, the last time you were here was when you got proof of your freedom. Having to barter and record your humanity like a bag of grain cut you deep.

”Slave tallying is to the left, tōnta.”

The Beader doesn’t even look up from their abacus.

”Oh this isn’t one of my slaves, good tōnta. I’m here to have an agreement sealed.”

”With a... really? Very well. Let’s see the scroll.”

You pass the written and signed contract over. Soon the beader has it marked in hard clay and stored in the archives.

”It’s thirty antēnni a month for storage.”

Your partner hands over a bag of coins.

”Your share of the fees will come out of your profits. Now hand me the master scroll and I’ll have the scribes get to work in a jiffy.”

And with that, the deal is done. Hopefully, you don’t regret it.
~
Your usual walking ground has changed over the past few months. Your writing was first used only by the elite, just another way their slaves could pleasure those who put them in bondage. But over time the recipes spread from the cookhouses of the Gardens to the palettes of the working class.

The smell of the docks are now mingled with fumes from food carts that remind you of home. Muddled, misinterpreted, and water down, but the smells of home all the same.

”Getcha Māstemeal here! Primitive flavors fresh from the desert. Two for three antēnni!”

You had just picked up your first payment. And for the first time in your life you have enough funds of your own, you don’t need to beg on the streets. What do you do with your newfound “wealth.”

>Scrolls
The work is never finished. Buy more ink and paper to write more literature.
>Donations
Your people lay suffering. Give the money to poor freedfolk , if you save up you might be able to buy someone free.
>Yourself
You have lived a hard life and have earned a small bit of joy, go to the market square.

>>5348320
>>Donations

>>5348320
>Donations
Maybe get a group together of ex-slaves and sympathizers to set up a non-violent foundation to help slaves free themselves. Although that may not be possible yet, it seems as though we've only made enough money to maybe buy a one room shack for ourselves or a night in a mid-class brothel.

Also I'm loving the quest so far QM, this is a really interesting premise and setting, I can't wait to see where it goes.

>>5348320
>Donations
The freedom of another who can free another and yet another still. The quest is never done.

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>>5348320
>Photo: Jack E Butcher

At the end of the day serving humanity is what you do this for. The writings are just a means to an end. Direct welfare is the best way to serve someone’s needs.

Over the weeks you keep your humble lifestyle and give what you can to the freefolk like yourselves. Those who escaped the chains of the slaver only to fall in the grasp of the slave society. It pains you to not give away all you can when you see your kin begging on the streets, but you know those coins have a greater purpose.

The Auction block. The closest thing you had to a family was destroyed here, piece by piece. People and all their needs and feelings crushed underfoot for the convenience of the callous and privileged.

The slavetrader walks toward a well-off onlooker and begins their sale.

"Step right up good, tōnta. You look like you have an eye for product. Kōra the Desert Prince. Perfect buck for working the fields or studding out. 19 years old and hardy as a jahāttam. Smells a bit worse though."

The crowd laughs at the cruel joke.

"Or if you want some help around the house, Lōla is just for you. 20 years and a whiz at that new māstemeal all the kids are into. A perfect gardenpet."

If you were a different kind of person, you would have attacked this abomination. Destroyed these simulacrums of humanity and freed the people they oppressed. But your way is of the word and wit, and you must help in the ways you can.
"Hey I get it, stuff’s a bit pricey. For you budget-minded folks we have Sīra. An old-timer given up by the cowardly savages on one of our raids. Not much meat on them bones but a good starter for all the new money out there."

You only can afford to free one of them. Which do you choose?

>Kōra
>Lōla
>Sīra

>>5348468
>Sīra

>>5348468
>Sira

One, the old don't survive on slave conditions.
Two, we are the man of wit and words, we can probably haggle him down through the usage of the sellers/crowds internal biases, threatening the slavers credibility. It will hurt Sira, to be picked apart like this, but it's for a good cause IE, avoiding him going into slavery.

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>Olajide Jimoh

You fight through the disgust and raise your hand to bid on another person.

“Unlock the elder.”

The crowd gasps in shock but the slave seller eyes your moneybag.

”The only color I see is gold. Sold to the Māste!”

The seller passes you the chain on the elder’s neck and you immediately take the key and unlock it.

“You are free now, as you always were.”

”Thank you, young one.”

You can tell from their accent that they’re from the East. In your homelands, you would have nothing in common but here, you share an identity through survival.

“What is your name? Your true name?”

”Kumi”

“Thank you. I am...”
~
Kumi has shown themselves to be a great companion. So many of your fellow freedfolk were so focused on making it to the next day, that they couldn't afford to fight your fight. But with Kumi, and the funds from your sales, you began something new.

Learning from leadership traditions from the homelands, you saved and freed more people, adding them to the freedfolk who had already joined your movement. You helped spread the word of freedom, guided each other through healing trauma, and forged families in the space of those destroyed.

By the time the season changed, a few dozen of you lived in a row of humble tents and shacks at the city's edge. And as your group grew, it drew attention.

”Terrible.”

Kumi stands in front of what used to be their home, torn to shreds while you were all spreading the message. Scrawled in black tar on the scraps is

“GET OUT MĀSTI!”

Few of you can read the language of your oppressors, but the message remains all the same.

You-

>Tell everyone around you that your community is not to be attacked.
>Defend yourself with force against any that would threaten your found family.
>Educate those who would wish you harm about your struggles.

>>5349928
>>Tell everyone around you that your community is not to be attacked.

>>5349928
>Defend yourself with force against any that would threaten your found family.

>>5349928
This isn't really a mutually exclusive option between tell everyone to stop it or educate them.

But I am more in favour of
>Tell everyone around you that your commnity is not to be attacked.
To prevent a three way tie.

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>M. Rosato
“It’s time to go.”

“Where are you going, Young One?”
“To speak our mind.”

You take a group to the local jatāsa. The midday market teems with vendors and workers. And slaves. At the center square, you make your speech.

“Hear me! I speak for the taken, the bloodied, the destroyed. Those like me who had childhoods stolen for the sake of the rich. Who with blood and toil unleashed their freedom and rebuilt families once shattered.”

”Silence, Māste!”

You ignore the jeers.

“We come in peace, but let it be known, our people, our homes are not to be harmed. We are no threat to you, but will not hesitate to defend ourselves.”

A few dockworkers see this as a challenge and surround your smaller group.

Really, now?

You stare down the dockworker, your fear fighting your honor.

”Thief!”

A vendor yells at a hooded figure running off with fruit, knocking a wall of fruit crates into the middle of the jatāsa. Dozens of the impoverished scramble for the free food, giving you cover to escape.

”Cowards!”

You dash to alleys, you’ll lose them in the tight space. You’re almost there until Kumi trips. You turn back to help them up and pass them off to one of your comrades, letting them flee in the ally while you’re left to the mob.

“Time for the lesson.”

You prepare for your death when the tell-tale whistle of a chakram flying between you and your attackers.
”I’ll do the lecture. Leave now or leave your hands.

The gang runs away you look at the figure in awe.

“Ka!”
~
As a child, you had heard fieldhand tales of Ka. The Child of no one, liberator of the chained. A hero who raids plantations freeing the oppressed and killing the masters. You idolized them until your slaver’s lash pushed you to less fantastical means of freedom.
What stands before you puts all doubt to rest. They are older than what you imagined but your mind makes you realize they must have been working for decades.

“I can’t believe it's you! I've dreamed of you since I was a child!”
“I read your cookbook.”

She sees your embarrassment.

”It was good. First time I’ve had proper ngarrbek in ages.”

She smiles once, then gets to work.

”We’re attacking the Cālaren birthday festival next month. While the slavers are drunk on foreign wine and the guards are with the gold, we’ll break into the bighouse and free everyone inside.

“Cālaren’s the second richest man in the city. He must have hundreds of slaves.”

”Which is why I need your help.”

What do you offer? Choose one or more.

>Have your scroll business sell writing in support of Ka’s campaigns.
>Encourage the freedfolk of Freetown to join her mission.
>Use your funds to pay for weapons and supplies.

>>5351292
>Have your scroll business sell writing in support of Ka’s campaigns.

>>5351292
Difficult question.

>Support Ka's Campaigns.
Try and trump up a message of two means to end slavery. Compassion or violence.

Slaves have no ability or recourse to exercise compassion, because they have no personal autonomy or control over their lives. There is nothing to be compassionate about because they are always the victim.
This forces many into violence. If however, the slave owners display compassion and recognise them as humans, we can come to a better tomorrow.

This sort of message acknowledges the requirement of violence, and offers a more palatable way forwards.

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>William Donohoe

You point to her chakram.

“This is your weapon.”

Then to your head.

“This is mine. I can write more scrolls, not just recipes but tracts in the name of justice. Let the people rally around your righteous cause.”

She gives a weak smile, like one would give a young child whose pet had died, and lays her hand on your shoulder.

”Thank you. You wear freedom well.”

With that, she left to the shadows and you went home to prepare your new piece.
~
”Daft Māste! Half our customers are Slaveowners! Politics talk is death for business!”

Your “partner's” sense of politeness seems to have left him. Small wonder.

“What’s right is right. I am a partner here and the truth will be spoken.”
“MY money is with the scribes. They won’t take your coin. ‘Truth’ is your desire? Sand will have your words.”

>Cut into the funds supporting the freefolk and try to hire your own scribes.
>Keep publishing cookbooks and drop the issue.
>Write-in.

>>5352117
>the local trend has secured us buissness for the foreseeable future. Nobody else produces cookbooks and nobody else thinks to ask for the recipes of my home. Your concerns over buissness are falsely made so long as we maintain the niche.

If that doesnt convince him, or appeal to his sense of expanding the market then we can simply search our free folk for those with an understanding of writing, polish their skills a bit and set to writing for a fair wage. It's not going to be swift or easy, but little is.
Hell, try and make the next few we free good at writing.

>>5352284
This is also ignoring us working oursleves double time to produce the scrolls ourselves.

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>Rogelio Olguin

“We’ve corned the market, no one else is selling our product. Until that happens, our customers will have nowhere else to go. Besides, politics is popular now, we can open a new market.”

[blue]You’re a wizard of words.[/blue] The promise of wealth cools the bureaucrat’s anger.

[b]“Very well, old pal.”[/b]

He takes out two message spheres. Far more ornate than the tablets of the Beader’s Guild, Carved in Elder Runes, objects such as these are used by the rich for the most important of documents.

[b]“Our invitations to Cālaren’s birthday. You’re their first Māste guest. Errr. First non-slave Māste guest.”[/b]

Cālaren is everything you hate about the world. Someone who committed the worst crimes against humanity just for idle luxuries. Going to this party will mark you a traitor to your people, though not going would put tension on your already strained business relationship.

>Accept the invite
>Don’t accept the invite

>>5353419
>Refuse.

There are many reasons. Just find one. Or agree and simply not turn up.

>>5353419
>Don’t accept the invite
"I'd love to my good friend, but if I spend all night wining and dining, I'll be out of commission for a while, on account of the hangover, and I wanna get the new scrolls finished as soon as possible. You go though, take your wife. You've earned it."

Let's spin it in such a way where he thinks we're doing *him* a favor by not going.

>>5353608
Agreed.

>>5353419
>>Don’t accept the invite

>>5353608
+1

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>>5353698
>>5353698
>Quotes from Fredrick Douglass, Statue Installation by Kwame Akoto-Bamfo

"It is an honor to be invited but such company is far too refined for me. I'd better serve our business by staying home and working on our product."

Your partner looks relieved as if he just dodged a stressful event.

[b]Good point. You're a swift worker. A Swift Māste worker is an eater of many melons![/b]

He chuckled at the insulting phrase you've heard all too many times.

At home, you burn your rage into your ink and paper.

"Slavery has no rightful existence anywhere. The slaveholders not only forfeit their right to liberty but to life itself."
"The man who takes the office of a bloodhound ought to be treated as a bloodhound, and I believe that the lines of eternal justice are sometimes so obliterated by a course of long-continued oppression that it is necessary to revive them by deepening their traces with the blood of a tyrant."
"It is plain that for the present no race of men can depend wholly upon moral means for the maintenance of their rights."

Powerful words. Dangerous words. Right words.

~
In the weeks leading up to the festivals, tensions rose with the humidity. The influx of “Eastern” culture, the growth of Freetown, and your incredibly radical scrolls boiled together to make a stew conflict. One that Ka served to Cālaren.

Part of you wishes that you had gone, if you had maybe you could have participated. You may have died, but you would have gone down for freedom.

Cālaren in his vanity paid messengers to spread his version of events, from which you could extract the truth. Just as Ka said, the guests were drugged by foreign wine and the bighouse was left unguarded. Aided by several free employees, swayed by your writings, the entire enslaved population of Cālaren’s estate was let free.
Ka was a victim of her own success. The large collection of freed slaves was enough to slow her down and she didn't have enough liberators to cover the throngs of the freed. By the time the escape was well underway the commotion had attracted Cālaren’s guards.
Ka and her closest allies made a last stand, holding back the guards long enough for the people to escape, giving her freedom for theirs. She now lies in Cālaren chains, displayed as a sick trophy, a birthday gift for the man who conquered a legend.
The city is under a reign of terror. Bounty Hunter’s egged on by Cālaren’s wealth roam the streets. Even freedfolk fear their lashes and chains.

What is your response?
Choose two

>Mass Mobilize all the freefolk you can through the city. Implore the people of the terrors and injustice you are facing

>Demand to publish Scrolls in favor of freeing the captured revolutionaries and calling off the bounty hunters.

>Raise funds to attempt to buy Ka’s freedom

>Attempt to organize the fugitives

>Try to talk to Cālaren in person.

>Appeal to Cālaren's enemies for help.

>>5354279
He enslaved the hope of a people in chains. This is honestly firebrand material.

>Organise the fugitives
Make them safe in free town. Make the bounty hunters disappear whenever they wander too deeply.
Perhaps reach out to our friend of the temple for some aid with this task. It will take some time but if we cut our teeth on this, we can take the head off of Calaren later, by swaying his remaining attendants.

>>5354560
Oh, it says choose two.

My second is
>Appeal to Calarens enemies
Hes already suffered a humiliation, let's make it a complete social blunder by having his only saving grace slip through his fingers.

Of course, we could also suggest that the escape would be bloody.

>>5354279
>Attempt to organize the fugitives
A riotous mob has it's uses, but a riotous mob that has carefully put together structure, roles and leadership is much better.
>Appeal to Cālaren's enemies for help.
I'm tempted to talk to him in person but I bet he's little more than a pompous idiot, threats and coercion probably won't work on somebody with more money than sense.

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>>5354704
>Jacob Lawrence

As the fugitives flee through the sprawling masses of calpoltin that make up the city you put the network you built over the past few months into action.
Freedfolk loan out their tablets of self-ownership, citizens radicalized by your writings shelter people from Bounty Hunters and Freetown becomes a hub of a society within a society, an underground community made from many nations.

While that goes on in the background you realize more overt actions need to be taken to free Ka and stop the Bounty Hunters. Cālaren is powerful, but power draws many enemies. Which of them will you work with?

>Citizen
They don’t have much wealth, but resentment of the nobility makes the citizenry a natural place to find enemies of the rich.
>Missionary
Some freedfolk have said the people from across the sea have a distaste for slavery, and that their religion forbids it.
>Zealot
Vusani has told you some Deathmasters at the temple resent their “domestication” by the nobility and would rather be free to “liberate” lives as they choose.
>Bureaucrat
Many bureaucrats loathe nobility for their luxury. Even if they often own slaves themselves, it won't be hard to find one or several who want to tear down Cālaren.
>Noble
The Nobility are in constant rivalry with each other on who can amass the most wealth, other nobles will see the attack as a weakness to take advantage of.

>>5354952
>Citizens

Now, is religious murderers a great basis to found a wave of freedom on? No.
Are they VERY hard to remove? Absolutely.

But at the same time, the poor tend to work for the nobility and are overlooked. They are the silent and unseen knife, simply due to their commonality.

>>5354952
>Citizen

>>5354952
>Citizen
Nobles and bureaucrats would be just changing the ones hodling the leash, the Zealots might fo too far and probably will disagree with our ways, and appealing to other foreigners is risk both and paint our people an even bigger target.

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>Authors and illustrator unknown

“All workers share a natural union. Whether forced by a whip or by poverty, we all toil unwillingly.”

This was the leading message of your latest scroll, a call for solidarity between slaves, freed slaves, and citizens. For long the nobility has fostered divisions between you and citizens. They push the idea that slaves take jobs from the free and use the false hope of becoming rich and owning slaves to keep the workers compliant.
It is time you find a local leader and appeal to them personally.

You have limited time, there is no telling what Cālaren will do to Ka, and every day more Bounty Hunters flood the streets. Which local leader do you reach out to?

> Tākaren
Foreman of the dockworkers and mid-ranked employee of the Fountain Guild. She is a long-time champion of the working class, but she resents slaves and freedfolk because wealthier nobility find it cheaper to use forced labor than to pay the wages of a worker

>Ōnnaren
An importer of goods from the East and a mid-ranked employee of the Kitchen Guild. Their contacts with trade routes give them a working knowledge of the languages and cultures of the Great Desert but their Guild is known for its running of the Slave Trade.

> Lūānetār
Owner of a local tavern and mid-ranked employee of the Hosts' Guild. Born unbound, several of his ancestors were enslaved. His mixed heritage allowed him more social mobility and his establishment is notable for hiring people from the East. (Though it won’t serve them.) You may find it easy to hold common ground with him, though many of the freedfolk feel he is too devoted to the elite class he aspires to be.

>>5356187
> Tākaren
Her anger with the slaves is easy to bridge, after all it's not a slave's choice to work. If a man send forces a dog to hunt another, do you blame the dog? If a man murder another, do you imprison the knife?
Get rid of slavery, and there is no more undercutting her wages.

>>5356187
> Tākaren
>>5356197
Well said.

>>5356197
+1

>>5356197
support.

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>Model, Te Mahi, Photo, Te Papa

On a muggy and misty morning you rise at the crack of dawn to meet Tākaren in a jacīla-infested mud pile she is working on. You haven't been up this early since you were in chains but she insisted you meet before her shift started.

“Good morning, thank you for meeting me, I hope we can come to a mutual understanding.”

*Hph. Fancy wordsayer. But words aren’t food. Words aren’t coin. I am with three hungry children and a hundred hungry workers. You? A helper of us? How?*

>Freedfolk, enslaved people, and citizens are united by poverty. The rich pit us against each other when we should rise against the common source of our problems.

>Slavery and freedfolk working starvation wages mean citizens won’t be hired for fair wages.

>As long as the Nobility can point at us and tell you that you are better, Citizens will never fight for their interests against a system that harms you. Your people will never cast off the boot on their neck if they believe they will wear it one day.

>>5357244
>Tell want you to stay poor and desperate, so we are easier to be manipulated. You just said you are hungry and nees put that above solving an injustice. Meanwhile your employers use the money that would be your fair wages to hire other desperate man to act as thugs in plain view, to feast until stupor. They would rather spend more money to drag people living in the desert to work to death, than to pay enough for their own to live well enough.
>They have you in chains as well, just ones you can't see. And as long as they hold it, the Citizens will always be hungry.
>Not all are evil, I know many are blind to the system, just living in it, thinking it is the only way, but you can only tell the cahff from the wheat when harvest comes. And I think it's way past the time for it.

>>5357269
Supported.

>>5357269
> Giovanni Battista Belzoni

Tākaren meditates on your words and decides to hear you out, for now.

*"What's your plan?"*

>A strike: Have all employees of “Cālaren’s firms refuse to work until Ka is freed and the hunters are called off.

>A boycott. Have everyone refuse to purchase “Cālaren’s products until Ka is freed and the hunters are called off.

>Asssination. Try to kill “Cālaren, leaving no one to collect the bounties for the slaves

>Raid
Attack “Cālaren’s compound and try to free Ka by force or stealth.

>Write-in

>>5357501
>>A strike: Have all employees of “Cālaren’s firms refuse to work until Ka is freed and the hunters are called off.

>>5357501
>A boycott. Have everyone refuse to purchase “Cālaren’s products until Ka is freed and the hunters are called off.
A strike will get the attention of other nobles, and their fears of the citizen organizing may let Calaren send his thugs unopposed. But a boycott will enpower his rivals, and let their greed cloud the fact that their time will too come.

>>5357501
>A boycott

It's the subtle method. We can push the assassination with Ka herself.

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>>5357897
>Felipe Dávalos
“Money is the source of the nobilties power. If we cut off their funds their evil goes with it.


*”A boycott?”*

“The people live their lives focused on ther own needs, ignoraznt ot the suffering they contribute to. With my words and your people, it’s time to separate the wheat from the chaff. The harvest must begin.”

*My people will have your scrolls. All will be with your messages.”

Your scrolls pass quickly from citizen o citizen. You canta fford to print many so they are shared. From dockhand to boat rower the idea odf the boycott spreads. Which of Cālaren’s many indusrites to you target

>Cuisine
Cālaren imports many exotic spices and fruits from the East.It will be the most impactful boycott, but there is a higher chance people wont participate.

>Weapons and Tools
Cālaren’s iron and copper mines are the source of many tools, weapons and armor. Most citzens dont have need of the weapons, just the household tools, so while this boycott will get a lot of participants it is less impactful.

>Entertainment
Cālaren is an investor of many of the storytelling amd music performances around the city. They form a moderate part of his business and most people have a 50/50 chance of boycotting them.

>>5358449
>Cuisine
This seems like the most natural progression, from making books teaching the people of our own peoples cuisine to getting the people to boycott the rulers produce wholesale.

>>5358449
>Entertainment
To help more people accept, suggest to replace Calaren entertaiment with ours.
The freedfolk and slaves still have some of their culture, than we can present to the citizens something new and exotic.

>>5358449
>Entertainment
>Replace it with our own, fables and acting troupes.

We will need some skilled wordsmith amongst them. But offering the street performance for begging money (cap on the ground) will do us better.

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>Sevlievo Orthodox Church Bulgaria, Artist Unkown,

The boycott is called. Your brilliant writing mixed with Tākaren’s organizing. The result was modest but not insignificant.
Most of the scrolls passed through the work crews went unread, but Cālaren’s “Grand Triumph” couldn't sell out the stadium.
It was a gaudy and disrespectful fiction of Ka's Raid, even citizens found it in poor taste.
In a moment of radical action, a few Freedfolk took some of their coins and shared them with the artists and musicians of Freetown.
The musicians sang songs of home and freedom. The griots told stories of wise scholars and crafty foragers. Weddings and funerals alike were held honoring new love and old.

Your boycott was small, but it still hit Cālaren in his moneybag, which is why the messenger with the gold-plated Message Sphere is so shocking.

“An-lūīkanen An-hōheran λi-Cālaren m-Āstañen mattūtōnte is a demander of your presence at his mansion at daytime, first prahara on the third day after the re-appearance of the tenth Moon of the Two hundredth year of the Fountain.”

The messenger is dressed in a colorful “imitation” of your people’s traditional robes. The pounds of gold and emerald are the least inaccurate things about it.
You can’t tell if the dress is born from ignorance or mockery.
You thought being invited to a noble's house would be the stranger thing that happened to you, but being invited to the same mobles house twice, while you are his public enemy is a shock still greater.

>Accept the invitation and meet him one on one.
>Accept the invitation and bring the largest crowd you can.
>Decline the invitation and request he meets you in Freetown
>Decline the invitation and write a scroll in response
>Write-in

>>5359814
>>Decline the invitation and request he meets you in Freetown

>>5359814
>Request he meets us in free town
We hold the court of public opinion. He has to come, or we will simply keep hurting his profits.
But if he does come, it is a recognition that a noble answered the call of a mastae

>>5359814
On the one hand, it is a big power move to show up to the richest guy in the cities house with your whole crew, I was thinking we could totally just mock him while we're there, but then we run the risk of him just calling his guards and killing us all then and there.

So instead, I'll go with
>Decline the invitation and request he meets you in Freetown
Like the other anon said, having a noble come to the house of a slave instead of the other way around is a big statement.

>>5359814
>Decline the invitation and request he meets you in Freetown
Be sure to word the invitation in the proper way of our people.

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>BryanMcMath

“I will speak with Cālaren, but it will be here, in Freetown as MY guest.”

The messenger's eyes look like they're about to pop out. Even Kumi seems stunned.

“You will bring the monster we face Right to our homes! This is arrogance, young one!”

“We’ll make sure everyone is far gone by the time he arrives. He can bring all the people catchers he wants, he’ll find only me.”

~

And so it was. At the crack of dawn, you sit in your empty shack in the deserted Freetown. You feel the steps before you hear them. The heavy boots and clinging irons of the people hunters. Those who shed their humanity for money, betrayers of life itself.

At your door, Cālaren sits nearly nude inside an ornate litter. The insides are heavily cushioned and the man himself is still in his luxurious nightrobe. So rich he didn't have to get out of bed to come here.

The litter is carried by five people, each shackled by golden chains that Cālaren holds like the reigns of a beast. Surrounding the litter are the Bounty Hunters and ...Vusani?!

I see you like my entourage. Amazing what friends at the temple can get you. I could have borrowed a normal deathmaster but...

He tugs on one of his victim’s chains.

Her color matches my other accessories.

“You’re trying to provoke me: a well-used tactic, but a failing one.”

Now, now. I come all the way to the mudholes to try some of that Māstemeal everyone’s talking about and all I’m served are sharp words? If I didn't know better, I’d say you don’t like me.

“You wanted to speak to me, speak.”

Ten spears aim at your head.

A mattūtōnte is not ordered. A mattūtōnte is an order.

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>>5360594
>Sintija
He notices his accent slipping alongside his composure. After having another victim comb his hair back, the spears withdraw.

Your little scribbles. Telling people not to give me business, they stop now.

“My words will flow until freedom does.”

Cālaren claps slowly.

What poetry. I can see why people chose you over my play. All the tar makeup in the world can’t replace that Māste passion. But here’s the truth.

He points around.

The clothes on their back, woven by slaves. The metal in our nails, mined by slaves. The ground we stand on still has the bones of the slaves who built the chinamitl. Every bite of food you take, every sip of water you drink, every rag you wrap yourself in, is stained with the blood of your own people.

He stares you dead in the eye and you swear a year went past before the silence broke.

Woooof! Okay, that was way too heavy for me. I’m here to have fun, same as everybody. See, my chocolate friend’s cult has it half right. The world is a den of shit and pain. Which is why the cattle will literally kill themselves to feel good for a moment. If you go around saying their favorite plays, and songs and foods are evil, you’re not fighting me. You’re fighting happiness. That’s a losing battle every time.

Cālaren waves and one of the slave hunters walks to you with a money bag. They’re so close you can see the bloodstains on the shackles they carry.

But I’m a lazy gambler. This is me hedging my bets. If the Māste do wind up getting more popular, it's never too early to earn some customers. You should spend that at my new tavern, the new slaves cook a mean negarbek.

The rage of a lifetime of pain builds in you. You

>Kill Cālaren right now.
>Tell him the boycotts will continue and get more intense
>Tell him if he doesn’t free Ka and call off the Hunters, the Harvesters will attack his business.
>Publish a Scroll declaring Freetown an independent slave-free nation.
>Publish a Scroll imploring everyone to fight, stop, and even, kill Slave Hunters

>>5360597
>Kill Cālaren right now.

>Publish a Scroll declaring Freetown an independent slave-free nation.

>Publish a Scroll imploring everyone to fight, stop, and even, kill Slave Hunters

>"You come to MY home, carried by MY people, whom you and your kind have raped and tortured and maimed for generations, and you expect me to take your gold?! Since gold is all that matters to you, then why not be stuffed full with it until you burst, you DOG!"

>Then beseech the slaves and our friend with him to turn on their master, to take out the rage of generations of anguish on the symbol of all those who oppressed them!

>>5360597
>Tell him the boycotts will continue and get more intense
>You think you know of pain, man of greed? More than a slave who worked himself to death for freedom, and yet lives? You think you know nore of happiness, man of lust? More than the people of the desert, who can smile even without water to live?
>Of course you think you do, I've heard of your play, and seem yours actions. Changing events to be great victories, while at the same time lashing out about the defeat, the actions of a great and smart man. Very well Calaren, Ifight the desert by buring yourself, keep making more martyrs and showing your weakness to your real enemies if you wish.
>And Vusani, great mercy you continue to give to our brothers and sisters. You once said I've gained freedom by making our slaver richer, but now you use yours to make all of them stronger.
The accent slip, was he speaking on our tongue or his? Because if he was his, end the converstaion by calling him a misguided son of the desert.

>>5360640
He was speaking his tongue in a way that made it easier for folks who had it as a second language to understand

>>5360692
Thanks QM, then ignore that last part.

>>5360597
We are not a man of violence, inherently. Attempting to kill him now, unless we implore the slaves to drop him down and rip him apart with our bare hands, we will die too.

We can't allow that.

>Publish a scroll imploring everyone to kill the slave hunters where ever you see them.
I support that >>5360640 mostly. the time of violent death is now.

Maybe push a verse "When the slaver comes to the home of the free, he brings his slaves, he brings the collaborators, and throws blood money at the feet of the free that they might bend their knee and become slaves again under a different name. Enough is Enough."

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> Art: Bart tyraknifesaurus. Adapted text, Frederick Douglass
You throw the coins into the mud.

“The people who need this are free to take it. You are free to leave.”

You turn your back to Cālaren. It's the first time since childhood he's been denied the last word.
But now it is time for *your* words. You forsake food and comfort, laboring to produce scrolls that no bureaucrat would attempt to sell. You work day and night until you faint, then work again. Until Kusi wakes you from a stupor.

Teach me.

Yes. You were never alone. You killed yourself trying to access the resources of your oppressor, no different than your stolen childhood spent “earning” freedom. Liberation was never in the coins of the empowered but in the arms of your community.

What was one becomes two, then more. Even if someone knew how to write only one western letter, they’d have it filled in in the right places on every scroll you had. Freetown became a fountain of ideas, healing water for the sickness of this culture.
~
The only way to make Cālaren’s Hunt a dead letter is to make half a dozen or more dead kidnappers. When these people took upon themselves the revolting business of a kidnapper and undertook to play the bloodhound on the track of their crimeless brethren, they labeled themselves the common enemy of mankind and their slaughter is as innocent as would be the slaughter of a ravenous wolf in the act of throttling an infant. We hold that they forfeit their right to live and that their death is necessary, as a warning to others liable to pursue a like course.
~
The scrolls are passed amongst freefolk and laborers alike. You thought the message would be too radical for the citizens, but they took to it with something close to glee.

A hunter found stabbed to death in a bar. Another drowned in the river when the boater found out their job. Cālaren and the temple may have been right on one thing. In this world of pain, people will take any distraction. An outlet for rage and frustration, an “acceptable target” to act out your worst impulses and deepest rage on, the abject violence and slaughter...

It is wonderful.

The catchers are so focused on protecting themselves that they hardly find time to do their toxic business. Some lay begging in the streets, now too scared to bind their fellow people and shunned by potential clients for past work.

The capitalistic vultures of the guilds are already trying to profit from the Harvest. Sales of weapons skyrocket and scrolls purporting to “decode Māste trickery” fly off the shelves. But still, your work goes on. Unabated, unconquered.
Cālaren tried to raise the bounties, willing to bankrupt himself for the sake of pride. But a dead person can’t spend money and the bounties go uncollected as your network of freedfolk grows stronger.
Even outside the city, whispers of liberation spread down the rivers like stones. Spreading your dream of freedom across the peninsula.

>>5361301
We tried being gentle.

But it looks like Blood is the only grease that the wheels of change will accept.

>>5361301
This feels too easy, we need to prepare for them to move against us again.

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>>5361301
>Art: Herb Kawainui Kāne. Model: Iolani-Luahine
>Text adapted from Frederick Douglass

It is this success that brings a stranger to your door. A woman of subtle mystery from a distant land.

Kusi suggested you move away, cautious of those who would do you harm, but you believe being open and accessible to all people can only help your cause.

You let her in and offer her a gourd of jahūma juice. She finishes the beverage in a single swig, without speaking a word.
When she breaks her silence, she, in eerily perfect pronunciation, quotes...you!

“‘Standing with God and the crushed and bleeding slave on this occasion, I will, in the name of humanity which is outraged, in the name of liberty which is fettered, dare to call in question and to denounce, with all the emphasis I can command, everything that serves to perpetuate slavery—the great sin and shame of this land!’ Powerful words."
“You’re some kind of preacher, yes? I imagine that line appealed to you.”
More than just the line. We’ve been watching your Harvest with much interest, you've been quite successful.
"There can be no success until no one dares to claim they own another."
You miss my meaning. The tall grass is the first to be cut. The powers that be won't take your revolution laying down.
“If you're trying to intimidate me miss-”

Lani of the Ahi, Grand Ambassador of The Island, and Druid of the Loa. And scaring you couldn't be farther from my goals.

She stands up and looks into your eyes with all the promise, power, and terror of the ocean itself.

Tell me Harvester. Have you heard the Legend of the Ratu Adil?
To be continued in... NATIONQUEST V: WAR OF STORMS!

>>5361319
>Nationquest Chapter I
https://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/qstarchive/2021/4960154
>Nationquest Chapter II: Rise of the Waves
https://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/qstarchive/2021/5009817
>Captainuest Chapter I
https://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/qstarchive/2021/5032045
>Captainquest Chapter II- Landfall
https://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/qstarchive/2022/5062211
>Nationquest Chapter III- The Return
https://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/qstarchive/2022/5293364
>Revolutionquest
https://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/qstarchive/2022/5344863
Thanks for joining me in this experience. It was different in more ways than one from one of my usual quests, but I liked the space we were able to explore.

I hope this quest was able to flesh out the world of the Nationquest setting. (Hopefully, the twist at the end was fun for folk who hadn't already noticed.)

The subject matter was sensitive but everyone was a class act maybe there was a bit of education in this entertainment?

As usual, the thread will be up so I can take feedback and answer questions. Once again thank your playing, and I hope to see you all next time!

>>5361319
Oh shit, Nationquest? I haven't followed it since Agana and her fleet building

>>5361328
Yeah glad to help you back.

>>5361337
>*Have

>>5361323
That peaceful protest is only the start of any change, and all actual change must be both radical and violentlly instated and sustained?

Not exactly a model life lesson.

>>5361370
The idea was to not preset any "wrong" options and leave it to the players to decide their own path to justice.

>>5361323
>>5361319
Great oneshot OP, never would have guessed this was a part of a larger thing. You also ran the Batman Quest a while back, right? That was great as well, and I can't wait for it to come back. I'm curious, will we run into our MC in the main quest?

>>5361617
Glad you liked it. And yes, you'll see more of all the characters shown here.

I'm glad you liked Batquest. "The Man Who Laughs" is coming this month.

>>5361617
>>5361426
>>5361370
>>5361328
For the next Installment in the Nationquest Setting.

See the next chapter:
Nationquest IV: WORLD OF TOMMOROW

>>5384661