RISE OF EROS

The only one of the slaves who hadn't changed his expression on the whole way, was the one with the strange gleam in his eyes. He kept looking at me intensely, as if he wanted to discover something in me, but I ignored his gaze, although I feel uncomfortable of being watched.

Carlos and José were the first to see me, so they greeted me, I told Carlos to take the slaves to clean up, give them proper clothing, and then take them to my office.

They all obeyed, going with Carlos, while I walked to the office. There, I found Carolina, who was sitting on the simple set of furniture that was there, reviewing various documents.

"Should I get another desk for you?" I asked casually, walking over to my desk. Carolina looked up, seeing me she replied, "We don't have money to spend on that right now, for the moment, I can work here".

I could only smile awkwardly, as her comment was a bit painful, we really had no money, and there were still a couple of months to open the doors for business, but I quickly put that thought aside, and sat behind my desk to wait for the new slaves to arrive.

"I saw that you bought new slaves, how much did you spend?" Carolina asked without taking her eyes off the papers she was reviewing. "Don't worry, I bought them with my personal money, it doesn't affect the budget I had given you", I answered calmly.

When Carolina heard me, she looked at me suspiciously like telling me "If you had more money, you should invest it in the business", but I ignored her, avoiding her accusing gaze. When I was starting to sweat cold, I listened a knock on the door.

It was Carlos and the new slaves, so I let them in, they came at the perfect time, because Carolina was putting me in an awkward situation. The 5 new slaves lined up side by side in front of me, showing organization and obedience.

They wore simple clothes that Carlos and José had, they were practically all the spare outfits they had, so I had to buy clothes for them, but for now that was irrelevant, what I need right now was to get to know them a little better.

I knew that they had combat ability, they were at least as strong as a rookie soldier.

Certainly that was not very powerful, because a rookie soldier is no more than a normal person who trained for 3 months with the army, for the truly powerful, that strength is not much, but for the common person it is another story.

Initially only small merchants or people with money to spare will attend my brothel, so I didn't need extremely powerful guards, just the ability to restrain ordinary citizens was more than enough.

They all introduced themselves, their names were: Manuel, Oliver, Antonio, Daniel and Javier. They all had similar builds, were a bit stocky and of average height, nothing special.

Oliver was the slave who had been looking at me since I met him, his eyes didn't change and unlike the other slaves he was a little thinner after cleaned the dirt that covered him before, I could see that he was a handsome man.

He looked about 30 years old, but surely it was because for some reason he looked sick, if he returned to his healthy appearance, saying he was 20 would not be a problem.

I introduced Carolina, saying that she was the administrator and the second in command in this place. They have to know that, and must obey her. After, due to my curiosity about Oliver, I asked her to take the other 4, and explain to them how things work here.

When the two of us were alone, I went straight to the point, "You can speak honestly, why are you looking at me since you noticed me?", Oliver hesitated for a second, but realized that now being my slave there was no point in hiding things, In fact, telling me could help him improve his condition, so he started telling me everything.

It turns out that Oliver has a minor blessing, called Aura Eyes, which allowed him to observe certain characteristics of a living being or object through a dim glow of colors.

In other words, by activating that blessing, Oliver can see a soft glow around a person or an object. Thanks to that, he could identify when there was a special characteristic in something, whether it was a living being or an object, although it did not show him in detail what it was.

It could be this feature, it was like a talent or treasure detector, only it couldn't identify them.

The reason why he looked at me all this time, was this ability. Apparently he could see a bright golden light around me. He never saw something like this, so he was curious.

After eared the reason Fluffy old me, that it was the divinity in me what causes that phenomenon, so I understand, and ended the topic.

It was also a useful skill in battle, since that brightness that was the "Aura" betrays the person or being that is attacking, for example, if a person is going to kick, the aura is concentrated on the leg with which they will be attacking, allowing Oliver to set up and counterattack.

Thanks to that, Oliver can predict the movements in a fight, however, not all of them are benefits, since using this blessing consumes a lot of energy, that's the reason why his body looks so worn out despite eating the same amount, and food than the other slaves.

Having understood that, I decided to provide him with more food, since his blessing was necessary, in addition, I found out that he was not a hunter as the young lady where I bought him said, he was a hand-to-hand fighter, more specifically he used a katana, and thanks to his blessing he was quite powerful.

When I finished talking with Oliver, I asked him to accompany me to where Carolina and the other slaves were, adding Carlos and José, now there were 6 guards.

Once in front of them, I informed them that Oliver would be the captain of this group and would be in charge of organizing the surveillance shifts and the training.

Although no one understood the reason for that nomination, no one protested, because as slaves they only have to follow what the master said.

In addition, they had spoken with Carlos and José, and they had found out that their new master, that's mean me, was a good person, who gave them a roof, and food to live on as long as the work was done, so everyone was happy.

I didn't pay much attention to it, after, I finished my orders, I told Carlos and José to show them the kitchen, so they could eat something, so they left, and I went back to the office with Carolina.

"Why did you designate Oliver as the leader of the slaves?" Carolina asked as she entered the office.

I walked over to the desk, only after sitting down I reply, "Well, he's the most skilled of all despite his appearance." Carolina just nodded her head as if she didn't doubt my words, and since she didn't ask anything additional, I didn't continue the topic either.

The office had fallen silent, but it was interrupted after a few minutes when Carolina spoke again, "We need weapons and clothing for the new slaves." I remained silent like I was thinking, after a few seconds I took out a small leather bag and tossed it to her, while saying, "With that take Oliver with you and buy what they need".

Carolina caught the small bag and opened it, seeing 40 small gold coins and gave me an accusing look again, like saying, "If I had money, you should invest it", but now I had just over 100 small gold coins, and they were my insurance, I couldn't invest more.

I coughed slightly like trying to get out of the awkward situation she was putting me in, and said, "Spend 3 coins on clothes and shoes for all 7 of them, should be enough, Carlos and José already have swords, so just spend 30 coins on armor leather for them, and swords for Manuel, Antonio, Javier and Daniel, give the remaining 7 coins to Oliver, so he can buy the equipment of his choice".

Carolina had a confused expression on her always cold face, understanding her confusion I continued, "It's to show his status as group captain, plus Oliver is much stronger than you think".

The girl recovered her cold expression, took the money, and left, only then, I could let out a sigh of relief. "That girl is pretty picky when it comes to money", that's what I thought.