The chain yanks taut as he lurches; he falls backward onto his knees. His palms strike hard against the stone. The impact radiates up his arms.
Silence.
Then, a slow click, the sound of a metal key entering a lock. He looks up and sees the cell door begin to swing inward at a tortoise pace.
A slice of corridor light spills across his face. His pupils widen; frozen dread and confusion twist together.
Nico gulps. His mouth is dry. He tries to find words, but his voice fails him.
He swallows hard. The figure steps closer. He looks up and realizes for the first time how very tall this person is, cold, grainy light catching flat planes of unspoken authority.
The figure tilts its head. "Nico," the voice booms, deeper than Nico expected, and yet.
He tries again. A whisper. "Wh— why am I here?" There is nothing but a hoarse croak.
Nico's vision swims as the figure steps into the dim corridor, accompanied by a striking voluptuous woman whose beauty threatened to dissolve his fogged mind.
She walks behind the man, who was tall but wiry, the kind whose teeth show too much when he smiles.
Yet it's her that shifts the air: Oiled skin that helped absorb the glow of torchlight, silk that gleamed emerald in the gloom of the dungeon hallway, tight folds hugging an hourglass form so flawlessly balanced it looked sculpted.
Everything about her felt impossible in this place. Even in this dark place, her beauty shone so brightly.
She brushes her fingertips along the iron grating and peers in, her lashes lowering, pupils widening in mild surprise. "Is this the slave?" she asks, her tone both cold and intimately amused.
The trader, Kyle, nearly swallows his crooked grin. "Yes, Madam," he says, too eagerly. "The lanky one. He's quite a find."
He steps closer to the bars, nodding to Nico. "As you can see, he has a very pleasing face. His frame is raw bone, keen for conditioning. And his member size, he meets your… specifications, perfect for a sex slave."
His voice slides from business to boast. "One hundred gold," he makes counting fingers—"coins will make him (and you) yours." He pushes his own skeletal shoulder forward, his grin brittle.
Nico's heart stutters. "What? One hundred gold?" The words burn in his head, but he doesn't speak them; his throat feels parched and trapped. The word gold echoes like another cage.
'Where the hell did I end up!?'
The woman glides forward, observing him from beneath her dark lashes. A few strands of her dark her hand loosely onto her face.
Every curve of her is framed by opulent drapery fashioned to entice, not a hint of shame.
Her necklace, heavy and golden, clinks softly as she inclines toward the trader, voice silk over steel: "I expect he won't disappoint."
She extends a hand to the man. He responds by putting out his own palm as she hands him a thick velvet pouch. It clinks in his palm as he takes it and drops it into a hidden pocket at his waist.
She turns, steps back from the doorway, and gestures sharply: "I will put in extra. Prepare him." The syllables are crisp. "Clean him up, dress him in fresh linen."
She pauses just long enough to let her skirts rustle a ghost of invitation, then glides away with the assurance of the wealthy in full control, leaving the trader's grin in the stale silence.
Once she's gone, the man releases a breath, sharp but nearly inaudible, but charged with relief.
His voice changes, rougher, now rushed: "Rejoice, slave," he breathes out, "for you have found a master. Honestly, I would be willing to become a slave it meant fucking that beauty, Ahahahahahah!" He laughed out loudly, as if pleased with himself.
He claps his hands once, and from the shadows emerged another figure: a young woman Nico hadn't noticed. She bows her head as the man orders, "Fetch water, fresh clothes, and clean him properly. From head to toe, gentle. The mistress paid well for proper presentation."
The assistant nods without hesitation: "Yes, Master." Her voice is so soft that Nico doubts he heard it.
She hurries away, the soft slap of boots echoing, leaving the man alone. He catches Nico's shaking gaze. "Worth every coin," he chuckles, but it doesn't reach his eyes.
The young girl's soft-footed return echoed not long after.
She pushes open the heavy gate, burdened by a wooden basin sloshing with water, a stack of coarse linen, and a rag that drips sweat-brown brine.
With hesitant grace, she enters the cage and kneels in front of Nico
He flinches at the sight of fresh garments, but relief tingles at another chill, as she raises the cloth.
It dances between them with scents of herbs and salt. He's never felt such tenderness before: a slave cleansed by another's touch.
He flinches in pain as the warm cloth stings his skin, but he manages to catch himself quickly.
The girl dips the cloth into the water. She wipes Nico's shoulders first, rinsing the grime from hips to ribs.
Bits of dried straw crumble off his back, echoing faintly in the stone-cold dungeon.
He suppresses a shudder. The soap bubbles his skin, exposing each bruised muscle strand. His breath catches — not shame, but disbelief at how hollow his limbs have become.
The girl lifts strands of his long black hair and dabs cold water to his face.
Under her fingertips, he feels the pulse flicker: damp hair, damp eyelids, a reflection of himself coming into sharper focus.
He stutters, "W‑where am I?"
She pauses, setting the bowl down with a whisper. Scrubs softly slide across his chest, releasing a residue of sweat and fear.
Then she looks at him, her expression calm. "You're in Sundale City," she says, voice more confident than she looks. "You're here in Master Draven's Slave Market."
Her words ripple through his mind.
Slave Market.
Just like he'd murkily imagined hearing earlier, a place where people were bought and sold as troves of commerce.
He thinks of heaps of naked forms, iron cages, and investors examining flesh like fruit; his heart, a caged avian, flutters faster.
TV Tropes' definition flashes across his memory; the relentless power dynamic in slave markets was more than a trope; it was reality here
"I'm... a product, then?"
She lowers her gaze. "I—" she takes a breath, "I belong to Draven. I'm his assistant-slave. He called for a fine 'condition,'—he expected pristine, clean, presentable."
She tugs the linen robe once; the cloth falls around Nico's waist. "He said you matched the 'specifications.'"
Nico looks at his washed, hairless torso, now pure under the cloth's rumpled folds. He touches his throat, arms; a memory pulses so gently that he fears it's not real. But then another strikes: My hair was short.My name used to feel right.Where I come from, I had—
He stares at her face, as though she contains a map that might guide him back. "I... I think I—I remember another life," he breathes, faintly. Another me, but this body was not my own. Reincarnated in another world, it wasn't a dream. It was transmigration, so widely known in isekai tales. He had woken here, not with memory, but with scattered shards of before.
The girl stands. She refolds the clean cloth and nods. Privately loyal boss or not, to her, the truth is compassion: "Master pays for condition. He pays for silence. You're hers now." But there's something else there, something like sorrow, or pity.
He swallows hard. 'Transmigrated...'
She doesn't speak further but steps back and closes the basin. A single chain link dangles as she moves. It settles with a final click, echoing like a promise: nothing about this place is right, but he's not dead.