After Surviving the Apocalypse, I Built a City in Another World - Chapter 617

Chapter 617: Dust Settles
A few hours later, the criminals for execution have all died. Their corpses were carried in a makeshift hand cart that they got the local carpenters to do.

These carpenters had been oppressed by Fargo to make the furniture in their houses, and they had barely enough sleep from overwork even until the war. However, when they found out what the handcarts would be used for, they did everything at record speeds.

Group by group, the corpses were taken out of the walls, each batch guarded by a soldier as they were thrown some hundred meters away from the walls.

Anyway, the decomposition rates in this place were much higher than Terran, so they didn’t really care much about it. The earth users just dug a mass grave and threw it inside after making sure no one was accidentally alive.

Back in the territory, while the cleanup was ongoing, the remaining criminals were being tried. Now, they were determining what exactly their punishments would be.

There were more than a hundred of them rounded up, some of whom had actually escaped during the war but were blocked by Sammy and the others.

Their transgressions ranged from assisting Fargo and his team, causing harm to brethren by malicious reporting, and to heavier transgressions like joining the abuse. Those who had murdered their brethren had already joined the executed people, so the ones being tried didn’t have blood in their hands—at least not directly.

Interestingly, there were also a few guards who didn’t have anything reported against them—either they were too new to the job or they had actively avoided the dirt.

One of these men was a big man named Ghetto, who had been a guard for a little over a week. He landed in Fargo not long ago with some other refugees after their old village had been destroyed.

Back then, Fargo was hiring a lot of guards and he happened to have been a security guard back in Terran. When the opening came, he applied immediately—thinking it was likely the best job in the territory—only to regret it soonafter.

Rather than help protect citizens, the guards in Fargo… were the harshest monsters the citizens had to fear.

Of course, he wasn’t naive enough to fight when he saw the abuse on his own. He was a weak level 8. He’d definitely die if he tried getting in the way of the other guards’ ‘fun’.

Hence, he volunteered to guard the outer wall, saying he didn’t want to remain stagnant. The ruling party gladly gave him the assignment—though he fully knew they were laughing behind his back, calling him an idiot.

Regardless of this, Ghetto was extremely dutiful in his job. He bravely guarded the outer wall with the best of his abilities, shooting his arrows at the mobs, and getting close to the outside as needed.

When Victor and the others were there to deal with the monsters, he might even jump down with them to assist.

However, he was captured because he was still a guard and there were still plenty of times he still had to follow orders, making him an accessory to the abuse. For instance, more than once he was asked to pull a woman the other guards were interested in.

Could you imagine pulling a helpless woman, taking her straight to hell with your own hands?

There was no day after that that he had managed to sleep for more than 2 hours.

The people who had gotten to Fargo with him had tried to appeal but he was afraid Altera would have a bad impression on them, so he asked them not to bother.

So now, they—the remaining Fargo guards and sympathizers—were being judged in front of everyone, awaiting the judgment lead by the Alterans.

The representatives for the politics were Jun and Silvia, who were part of Luis’ and Ansel’s teams, respectively. They were in-charge of handling this aspect of this war.

In front of them was a bunch of paper where a summary of transgressions was written by the interviewers and investigators before, listing down everything under oath. The duo would serve as the facilitators of sorts, determining the duration of their punishment based on what they had done.

For the most part, the ‘slavery’ would last for years. Silvia looked at Ghetto, “According to our records, you didn’t have a lot of sins to your fellowmen, though you did bring a lot of girls to the enemies.”

Ghetto pursed his lips, remembering those moments, and his shoulder slumped in guilt. To be honest, he didn’t mind getting punished—he knew he deserved it.

The two saw his remorse and looked at each other, deciding to be lenient on him.

“Six months.”

Ghetto’s head whipped as he looked at the two. He was startled. The others before him had at least 5 years. Someone even got 15. For example, Jall, who got Juni into trouble back then.

Speaking of Jall, his face was unrecognizable and bloated after being beat up so much. He could only curse at his sentence in silence, because speaking would just let out a fountain of saliva that would just humiliate him even more.

Jall received the highest sentence because he participated in a few abuses. It wasn’t as harsh as the mercenaries and he didn’t injure anyone, but it was still forced in the end. The women he had dealt with probably wouldn’t be able to approach men for a long time to come.

Anyway, hearing his light sentence, Ghetto felt teary and bowed a bit. “T-Thank you.”

“It just means you will have to work for a minimum of six months. If you were designated by the system as a slave, you would still have to work to free yourself after that.”

Ghetto nodded in understanding. Luckily though, he was not a system slave, and this meant he was a free man after six months!

His former teammates heaved a breath of relief to see him get past the ordeal, and he went to them to watch the rest of the punishments dished out.

There were very few people who had less than 1 year like Ghetto. The average was around 8 years of service—likely in the mines. The prisoners dreaded this, recalling what they knew about the state of the slaves in the mines before the war.

When all prisoners had been assigned punishments, the duo stood in front of the crowd. “These people will be prisoners of war, basically slaves. They will be the only exception to Altera’s no-slave rule.”

At this, many of the citizens’ immediately stepped forward, voicing out their concerns. “What about us?”

“Altera doesn’t keep slaves, and for those who were unlucky to have been assigned the role, you don’t have to worry.

“Altera will never use you as slaves. We are still studying the limitations and requirements, but there will be a rule that the citizens would not be able to order anyone as if they were a slave.

“Your money will be returned to you after you sign a detailed oath. If you don’t remember the exact amount of your money, we suggest you take an underestimation, because the punishment in the oath is harsh.”

“Other than this, you will be able to live freely, get jobs, hunt, et cetera.”

After the initial ‘stealing’ of property (that was, the automatic withdrawal of all the slaves’ money), the ‘slaves’ would be able to keep new resources and money that they earned afterward.

The only difference would be in status. Slaves were not counted as entities in various senses of the word. They could not even avail the most basic residencies. If they didn’t have friends or teammates, then they would be stuck in dormitories for an indefinite amount of time.

Of course, the dormitories were far superior to the average living conditions in the current Fargo, but they didn’t know this at this time, so they could only be worried.

The only bright side was that they wouldn’t have to pay the daily fees.

“When you gain enough money, you can officially buy your own freedom and residency.

“In fact, if the money you retrieved was enough, then you can free yourself immediately.”

Of course, they didn’t want lazy people taking advantage of Altera’s goodness as well.

Lazy people would always find a way to be lazy. For instance, because there was no entrance fee for slaves, some might just lounge around the territory, becoming beggars for some food and other resources when even disabled people could perfectly well find a job.

So, they still added a limitation regarding this. “However, if you do not have the ability to buy your own freedom within a year, the territory will pay for your freedom, but you will be in debt amounting to thrice the amount.”

This made a lot of people talk, but they also found it fair. At this time, they couldn’t imagine anyway willingly becoming a slave for Altera!

Other than these, the citizens also had a lot of other inquiries. “Are we staying here?”

“If you choose to stay, that is also perfectly okay. Fargo will be merging with Altera, making citizens here Alterans as well.”

Most slaves would be unable to transfer to Altera by the array. After all, that needed some funds.

At the same time, they also knew a lot of the victims would want to be away from this place. The normal citizens would be able to afford it, while the others would take a while.

“Regardless of whether you choose to stay or transfer now or at a later date, you are welcome,” Silvia said with a gentle smile. “Altera is open to everyone. And, as long as one wasn’t lazy and did not cause harm to Altera’s peace, you would definitely love a good life.

“So consider everything carefully, and good luck to everyone moving forward.”