Finding Contentus

Chapter 107: Optimized Optimism

Neo was saying that she was number one and the one she was. Neosa agreed as she spoke to herself outloud.

The first ember of light creaked through her dark prison bars as the Ghyppty guard stood there in her cell.

Although he was in control, Neosa could taste his fear like the heatwaves of Metro. "Are you ready to adhere to our demands, Prim Neo?"

"Primary Neo," she corrected, shooting him with a piercing glare. She was hanging upside down, blood was pouring down from her hair, forming a scarlet stream.

Her neck, wrists and ankles were chained by Optimer chains, making her skin raw and red. The agony was like a link of sizzling spikes constricting around her body.

"Ophentse, do you sense him lying?" She asked her sister in arms, imagining her to be a stocky crafter with golden brown skin and straight black hair.

"Ha,eh, he's practically soiling himself. They've collected them, all of our comrades in this city. They've been listening, they just wanted to mess around with you to make you scared of them when that's impossible."

"They won't kill you or torture you to death. You're too valuable every time they see Ramoth's contractual scar. Plus, as an added bonus, your screams haunt the shit out of them. Look at him shaking." Ophentse answered confidently, even adding a suave flick of her hair from Neosa's imagination of her as she heard her spirit in the chains.

It was true. The Ghyppty guard, Lanon, was shaking in his sand-coloured uniform. He had moderate brown skin, brown eyes and short black hair. He was holding a bloodied Jambiya dagger, another Optimer.

"Neo? Do you mind having thin lines on your face as well? Like a facial tattoo?" The spirit of Tsetso said from the short curved blade. A warrior with a cleanly shaved head, brown skin and a slim but sneaky build.

Neosa sighed, her head was spinning and she yawned from fatigue, hunger, thirst and boredom. "Not really. Actually. Kenosi will love them. We'll match somewhat. It'll just give me another excuse to have this one's ears bleed like the rest. Although Maro will be..."

A flicker of fear crossed her eyes. Ramoth's wrath was uncontrollable, disastrous when he was fully enraged when it came to her well-being. She'd only been imprisoned as a captured slave for one month that felt like a year.

She shook her head, rattling the Optimer chains that seared her.

I can't control him when he sees me, but I can control this outcome. I came here on my own accord to accomplish three things. Freedom of all the slaves, freedom of every Optimer and freedom of this city. Once that's done, we'll have all the ammo we need to launch a full on offensive attack on the East.

Neosa nodded as she ran over her plan, which, in true Neosa fashion, she didn't plan beforehand at all, it just came to her after she took action. In the month of the Twelfth, she gave herself up to be captured as a hostage in the hopes of being used as a bargaining chip to gain the information she needed.

I'll find every single last Optimer in Metro and destroy them so that every Racaan spirit can rest in peace."

"Rest... in... peace..." Neosa heard Pharaoh's disturbing, distorted and depressing voice. The more she heard her number one enemy, the more she felt... closer to him.

Death is a peaceful rest without pain. Life is a warring tribulation with pain. Ramoth has conditioned me to love pain for a reason. By taking away the pain of my people so that they can rest in peace, does that mean that our lives were pointless? If death is peaceful, then what's the point of life if it's so painful?