Slave Trade
Throughout the world, there are areas you can find slave traders. While it is not illegal to buy, sell, or own slaves, it is also not fully recognized as a legal trade.
Slave trading is a tricky business, as the product must be cared for and subdued. They must be kept healthy enough to impress the customers, yet beaten down enough to destroy their will for freedom. If choosing the immoral path of a slave trader, you are automatically looked down upon by most cultures. Even the cultures that openly allow the ownership of slaves will treat you slightly better than they treat their own slaves. Owning slaves is one thing, but selling them to profit is another.
Slaves have different pricing based on their statistics. To determine their price, add together all their statistics. They are always worth their value in gold coin. For each extra language that is not your native, the value will rise by ten gold.
Total of all statistics + 10gc per secondary language = Slave’s value in gold coin
Freedom from Slavery
Slavery is nasty and immoral. Those who become slaves are treated as the lowest of low. They have their will to live destroyed, their pushed beyond exhaustion, and trampled on, sometimes literally. Through all this, there is a way out. Every two copper the slave is worth they must work one year. Once they work their value in years, they are freed. However, any additional payments a slave owner must make on their slaves increases the slave’s debt. So, if a slave is injured or becomes sick and needs medicine, the cost of the medical supplies and doctor visit is added to their value. Which increases the number of years they must work as a slave. Slaves can, however, lower their debt by using the small amount of wages they make. A slave’s wage is five copper coins a week and they can use them for whatever they want, including paying off their debt.
Slave Branding
While slavery is a very disgraceful trade, it is still a legal one in most empires. Besides having documentation proving ownership of a slave, each empire also has their own slave brand that shows who is a slave. Such as the Empire of Ty’ Les using manacles that have the owner’s signet etched into them seared onto the wrists of the slaves.
Slaves get traded among empires, but their original branding remains. Each empire recognizes each other’s slave brands as legal trade. So, if a person was enslaved in Hotton but sold to a family in Grimslar, they would keep the chain loop ear piercings of the Hotton Empire.
Atsui
The small Empire of Atsui uses the same slave branding as their neighboring Empire, Ty ‘Les.
Coastal Forest
In the coastal forest fishing is an outlawed trade, and is looked at as a disgrace almost equal to slave trade. Therefore, the slave brand of the coastal forest is having a large fishhook piercing in the slave's lip.
Fureta (Midway)
The laws in Fureta are lax when it comes to slavery. It is common for slave owners to charge slaves for food and drink not just medical supplies. It is very rare for slaves to earn their freedom.
Grimslar
The Grimslarian Empire uses slaves as a large part of their workforce. It uses metal collars that are welded shut, so there is no risk of locks being picked or broken. The grade of the metal indicates the status of the slave. The more responsibility the owner has given the slave, the higher the grade of metal is used. Adamantine slave collars are rare, but show that the slave’s status is high enough to give orders to low-level servants and guards. Most slaves of this status see themselves as more than indentured servants than slaves; they also are treated as such.
Hotton
Being the Empire of floating cities connected to the rest of the world by massive chains, their slave brand is similar. Hotton Empire slaves have a thin chain loop that is pierced through each ear. The chain runs under the slave’s chin and around the back of their head, with the ear piercing being in the upper cartilage.
Page
Does not have slavery but also does not have laws against it. See the Krkn culture for more information.
Rafaite
Slavery in the Rafaite Empire is illegal, as it is a weakness. See the Rafaite culture for more information.
Tsumeta
The Empire of Tsumeta is has technology and clockwork aspects so closely engrained into their culture that their slave brand is a seared branding of a gear. The branding is placed anywhere on the body that does not cover up the marking. The back of the hand or forearm are the most common locations. A large X-shape is branded over the gear if the slave becomes free. This scaring cannot be removed from temple services due to the intensity of the branding.
Ty’ Les
Slavery in the Empire of Ty’ Les is the more ruthless and corrupt out of all the empires. Their slave brands are manacles that have been seared onto the slave’s wrists to ensure they will always be marked as a slave. The manacles are commonly marked with the family crest that owns the slave, but this is not a requirement. Having the manacles means they are a slave.
When a Ty' Les slave is released, a physician must remove their brands surgically to prevent damage to their hands. The scaring caused by the brands cannot be removed from temple services because of the intensity of the branding.
Umi
In the Empire of Umi, slaves have a V-shaped chunk of cartilage removed from the slave’s upper part of their ears. Both ears are clipped and if a slave does not have the external part of their ear, one of their nostrils is clipped instead. The nostril clipping is much smaller.
If a slave gains their freedom, they are given an earring or nose ring that is a wide band to cover the clipping.
Vroth
The desert Empire of Vroth does not use chains, piercings, or other physical objects to brand their slaves. Instead, they use facial tattoos that take up a minimum of forty percent of the slave’s face.
