Ratchetmare (Patreon)

Author’s note: Hi guys.

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Here today with the first chapter of the second story - temporary title: Ratchetmare. This one may seem similar in many ways to Grandora - if anything it's the other way around, as I wrote this first - but that aside, the first chapters are more about the set-up and the story starts to more or less differ in the following chapters.
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Apologies to Tier 3 Patreons, as this is what they've already had a chance to read, only slightly edited.

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As with Grandora, I have to make a small disclaimer: 18+ content. Swearing, gore, suffering and so on. Again, basically everything you shouldn't be a stranger to from Lament of the Slave. Yet something that might not sit well with everyone.

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The story is about a young woman, not a slave, but living in very difficult conditions in a world that has long passed its golden years.

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Reminder: Grandora on Sunday.

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Enjoy the chapter!

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Chapter 1: Following in the Family Footsteps - Link: https://www.patreon.com/posts/95917463

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Chapter 1: Following in the Family Footsteps

[The era of Grand Workings has long since passed, and with it began the decline of the human race. Magic was gone from the world, the leylines harvested dry, the mana crystal mines now something out of fairy tales, and mana itself turned harmful. There was nothing to power the human Workings, the machines they so heavily relied on and which became their undoing. For with these mechanical marvels of mankind left to rust, the so-called 'Golden Age' might never return.]

Or so they believed.

Heck, I believed it. One look at the colossal Working in the mine was enough for me to know that no man would ever be able to set a machine of that size in motion ever again. Not without mana crystals. Not without magic. Not now that we as a human race have sunk so low that we had to mine coal with picks in our hands.

It must have been a breathtaking sight to see the forty-story-high machine moving, its bucket wheel digging into the ground and spewing tons of coal into the coal cars of the train behind it. But it's been more than two hundred years since the Working moved - nearly one hundred and sixty years since the last Working breathed its last. Now the giant mining machine was just a rusting monument to lost human glory.

Glory that now stood in the way of both the men and the belts that transported the mined coal to the wagons on the track. Those still stood. Train on them, serving the same purpose as centuries ago. Only the engine was not the same. Once gleaming in white and golden brass, powered by magic, it now spewed black smoke and steam.

I jolted when the train's whistle cut through the air. The wheels spun, and the engine - big when you stood next to it, but tiny compared to the behemoth Working in the pit - began to move. A reminder that I should do the same.

That was - if I wanted to eat.

The food wasn't free, and no coins were given for lounging. I had to earn them - by working. One talon per kilo of coal. Not the best bargain. The work was hard as fuck, filthy and dangerous at times. But the pay was fair. Well, the fairest around. What you mined, you got paid for.

The same could not be said about other jobs in Greymare, a mining town outside this hot pit. Farmers were dependent on the harvest, while their fields produced less and less each year. Courtesy of the mine polluting the air of the entire region. The frequent rainfalls then brought the filth into the ground, making it harder and harder to make a living off the land. Not that it was any different elsewhere. The vendors had the price of the stolen goods in the store deducted from their salaries, and there was a lot of what went missing every day. All thanks to a thriving local community of thieves. Another job I was reluctant to take. As lucrative as the benefits of their profession sounded, they tended to end up behind bars far too often for my taste.

Yes, I considered it once. But the prospect of rotting in a hole for the rest of my life, with the only way out being to catch blackpox and die or become a debt slave, was a big turnoff for me.

Factory work had its appeal: you were indoors, warm, protected from the weather, and if you made your quota, you were treated decently. I tried it, and it wasn't a bad job - until the quotas reached unrealistic levels. Instead of eight hours, it took ten or twelve hours to do the work they required you to do.

I quit and was beaten up when I demanded to be paid what I earned.

Never again.

Since I didn't have the education to do office work, let alone become an alchemist. I could only dream of becoming a machinist - the rare few who were able to weave the mana they were born with and breathe life into Workings, however small - while doing what my parents did and what killed them: coal mining.

Shifting my gaze from the empty basket in one hand to the pickaxe slung over my shoulder, I sighed, wiped my sweaty brow - which only smeared the coal ash on my face - and made my way back through this dust-bowl-turned oven in this unseasonably hot spring to my spot. Honestly, there was nothing special about it at all. It was a place like any other in this open pit mine. If anything, it was farther away from the conveyors and collector, farther away to carry the coal I mined.

A quick check: one guy on the left and two on the right working together. Definitely a faster way to mine coal. But I didn't have anyone I trusted enough not to run off with my coins.

Dropping the basket on the ground and throwing the pick off my shoulder, I adjusted my filter mask - essential equipment for working here unless I wanted to end up choking on my own fluids within a year. The same with the straps of my dungarees. There was nothing worse than a piece of fabric cutting into the skin of your shoulders or crotch. The risk of infection and the resulting pain aside, the price of the ointment to get rid of it had cost you a full day's earnings. So only after I was satisfied with the gear I got to work.

One swing of the pick after another, and chunks of black stone began to pile up under my feet. It was all about rhythm, technique, and finding the right place to drive the pick. Once you mastered that, it seemed almost easy.

It sure as fuck wasn't!

A few whacks and beads of sweat trickled down my face. Mining the coal was backbreaking work, no question, and as much as it pissed me off, guys had the advantage. They were bigger and brawnier. They could hit harder and carry more. Of course, after several years of working here, I was no feeble wimp myself. I could easily beat any rookie miner, woman or man. But - it still pissed me off.

Heck, all I had to do was look at the duo to my right and a pang of envy bit into my heart. They were like machines, pounding on the black stones without stopping - and they were idiots, too. Otherwise, I couldn't explain why they weren't wearing filter masks. Sure, wearing them made breathing a lot harder, which is why I had to take a break from time to time to catch my breath. But I've seen what the fine black dust could do to your lungs, a damn ugly way to end up. They? They either had no idea or just didn't care. I'd bet on the latter. Idiots. Either way, their health was not my concern.

Annoyingly, for what it took me to fill the basket, the duo managed to haul away three, and one of them was on my heels with the fourth as I walked back to the Collector, a name for both the place and the company person who collected the coal. The nearest one was a good six hundred meters away, and there was a hell of a line.

Seeing the same thing, the guy behind me picked up his pace. So did I. What little pride I had wouldn't allow me to be outpaced by such an idiot.

Only his stupidity worked to his advantage. I had my pickaxe slung over my shoulder; he left his with his buddy. I was breathing through my mask; he wasn't. I carried a coal basket and balanced it on my head; he hauled it in his hands. I was damn careful where I stepped; he didn't seem to care.

"Ha," he shouted triumphantly as he reached the end of the line first and by a good margin. "Eat my dust, bitch."

"I got this for the dust, you asshole," I pointed at my mask as I made it to the line, out of breath. The snide remark sounded better in my head.

The idiot shook his at the idea of wearing a mask. "Just a wasted coin."

I snorted, but said nothing more. It wasn't worth the trouble of explaining to these types what the dust did to their lungs, how unnecessarily strenuous it was to carry coal in your arms or on your back over this terrain, or that one false step could put you out of work for a fortnight. Happened to me a year ago, twisted ankle. Hurt like a bitch. The hungriest days of my life. I barely lived off my savings.

"Next!" shouted the Collector, and the line moved forward. And so it went, one fella after another, until it was my turn.

"Number?" growled the man behind the long desk, full of papers weighed down with lumps of coal to keep them from flying away. The bastard didn't even look up from the big book in front of him to look at me.

"F - 0 - 354-2-896-17," I recited my citizenship number, whereupon he flipped through the book, triumphantly jabbing his finger into the page when he found what he was looking for.

"Nika Hester Ratchetmare?"

"Yes, that's me." Not exactly a unique surname. There were a lot of mare's in Greymare.

"Coal on the scales."

The scales were on the left side of the table. A large bucket, the contents of which he could dump directly onto the moving conveyor belt after weighing. Knowing the drill, I did as he said, and although I had seen it many times before, I watched the hand on the scale with a tingle of suspense. My guess was 12.5 kilos. The basket was a little lighter than I was able to carry. Usually I hauled between 13 to 15 kilos. Once I even managed 20 kilos, but it almost broke my back.

"12.2 kilograms," the Collector roared aloud as the needle stopped on the number. "Do you agree?"

Even if I wanted to argue that their weight must have been rigged - which it definitely was - it wasn't worth it. Not when, judging by the faces of the folks standing behind me, I was the only one with an ounce of will to disagree. All I would have achieved was to be out of a job, one that was arguably the fairest. I couldn't afford that.

"Yes, I agree." Somehow I managed to keep my inner disapproval out of my voice. If I made it too obvious, it would only amuse the bastard.

The man nodded, turned back to his book and wrote down the numbers. "That makes a total of one hundred and fifty-seven kilograms today. At one talon per kilogram, that's a total of one hundred and fifty-seven talons. Do you wish to pay it off or continue mining?" His voice was monotonous and rather haggard. Not surprising. His whole job consisted of writing down numbers and asking the miners the same questions over and over again, hour after hour, day after day. Sometimes I wondered how much he got paid for skimming off the miners, or if he enjoyed it. But at the end of the day, no matter how angry I was with him, he was just another cog in the machine, a man doing his job to feed his family - or his hobbies.

"Mining." That was all I had to say.

The man nodded and bellowed: "Next!"

Stepping aside to make room for another wretch, I took another look at the colossal machine now looming over me and wondered what people actually did in the era of the Grand Workings, when the machines did all the work for them. They must have had a very easy life, free of worries. No fucked up uprisings that killed their parents, no starving on the streets because you were too young to get a job.

With a sigh, I pushed away the dark thoughts of the past, slung the pickaxe over my shoulder, and headed back to my mining spot.

Those two assholes were at it again, chiseling away at the black stone like senseless. Proper technique and rhythm were what mattered, I reminded myself, and after stretching my neck and shoulders, I got to work - in a sense, senseless, too. When I was focused on my work, nothing else mattered. Only a few things could distract me from my work, such as the return of the man to my left with an empty basket.

It was one of the unwritten rules here in the coal mine to know who and where were around you. A good rule to follow to avoid unnecessary injury to yourself and others. That was unless you were an asshole and didn't want to hurt anyone with a pick or a chipped rock, nor be hurt by it yourself.

Noting that the guy to my left had started work again, I sank back into the rhythm as well. One swing of the pick after another, each yielding one or more chunks of black stone to power our steam machines, prolonging the decline of the human race. But what did I care? It meant more talons in my pocket.

In other words, I would not be starving or sleeping on the streets today.

*CLANK!*

The sound of metal hitting metal snapped me out of my concentration.

*CLANK!*

A shiver ran down my spine. The sound didn't bode well. But it didn't stem from me whacking the black rocks.

"Stop!" the guy to my left yelled. "Stop! Metal in the ground!"

"Shit!" I swore into my dust mask. Metal in the ground meant only one thing: he had stumbled upon remnants of the Grand Workings era. It could have been anything, some kind of boring machine, underground storage, old tunnel, fucking pipes, or just some junk. Whatever it was, it was well advised to stop work in the area immediately and report the find.

Both for safety reasons, as some old, unused machinery could still function or rather malfunction with careless handling, and because the Greymare Coal Company, as well as all others like it, claimed ownership of such finds in their coal mine. Even a Grand Workins-era dump could be a treasure trove today.

Humans, especially the rich ones, were greedy bastards.

But to be honest, who wouldn't want to get their hands on something of value? I would. Countless times I dreamed of a pile of talons hidden somewhere, broken Working I could sell, old blueprints, artifacts, even a well-off guy who would marry me. Of course, I'd prefer a good-looking man, well-built with a big... heart.

My wet dreams aside, digging further just wasn't worth the risk. Even if I struck a jackpot that didn't blow up in my face, they wouldn't let me leave the mine with it in my hands. So I stopped mining, and so did the sounds of picks hitting rock all around me. Every miner came to the same conclusion.

Well, every miner except for the two assholes to my right. If anything, their pace seemed to have picked up.

"Hey, you two! Stop!" I yelled at them. "Haven't you heard? Metal in the ground!"

"Mind your own business, bitch!" snapped the asshole number one; the other followed suit: "What do we care? The old man is all the way over there, and who knows what he hit."

"Maybe his glasses fell off and he hit them," laughed the asshole number two at his own stupid joke, and number one laughed with him, digging away without breaking.

Well, I tried - no one could blame me for not to. But these types tended to have thick skulls. If you wanted them to do something, you had to beat it into them. I dared to think I had the muscles to do it, but enough brains not to. No point taking any chances with them. And so I bent down to get a basket, already with a new spot in mind. It wasn't that far from here and...

*CLANK!*

*CLANK!*

*CLANK!*

*BOOM!*

My eyes shot up. A stupid reaction, hardwired into our nature. First assess the danger, then respond. I should have ducked for cover the moment I heard their picks hit the metal. Not that I had a chance, anyway. It all happened in a matter of seconds. One moment the duo of assholes were pounding away at the black rock like nuts; the next, they were engulfed in the yellow goo that spewed from whatever they punched through.

By then I reacted as I should have. I dropped the pick and raised the basket in front of my chest, ducking my head behind it. The goo hit my would-be shield a heartbeat later - as well as my legs, and basically every piece of my body not covered by the basket.

There was a moment of tense silence as I dared to peer over the edge of my makeshift shield. The goo explosion was over, and now it was just flowing freely out of the ground, slowly expanding the puddle under the feet of the two assholes covered in it.

"What the fuck, man!" cursed one of them - the way they looked, I couldn't tell which asshole was which - as he tried to wipe the shit out of his eyes. The other was doing the same, but apart from being covered in yellow goo, they seemed fine.

Relief washed over me. I was not going to die. At least not today.

With that thought and the sight in front of me, anger welled up in my guts. This time, the two assholes would have a piece of my mind and most likely a taste of my fists as well.

A sudden cry from one of them broke my thoughts of fight, though. One of the assholes fell to his knees wiping the shit off him in panic while screaming as if his arm was caught in the cogs of a machine that was pulling him in. I saw it happen. Not a pretty sight - it stuck in my mind.

The other asshole quickly followed and collapsed to the ground screaming.

At that point, my brain figured out that I shouldn't be standing there staring dumb fuck at them when that shit was all over me, too. Way too late. I only managed to throw the basket away before a sharp pain cut through my body. My own screams pierced my ears and I slumped to the ground. The cold ate away at my legs, my stomach ... my hands. In the sweltering summer heat of the mine, I shivered. Cold burned its way into my bones… all too quickly.

I could even have sworn I heard them crack - my last thoughts before the pain took me away.

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Author’s note: Again, just one chapter. Damn little, drew any conclusion from it, but...any thoughts, now that you have something to compare?

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Thank you for reading :)

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