52
For the umpteenth time, you tense your powerful muscles and try to bend the metal bars of your cage. Alas: the metal is too thick, too strong… But it is this daily exercise that keeps your spirits up in your despair.
A few months ago, you were on the battlefield, facing the countless hordes of soldiers from the kingdom of Belliquard. But while the individual strength of your tribe's warriors was undeniable, their collective power was questionable against the disciplined, metal-clad armies of your enemies.
You tried to fight to your last breath, like the others, but the cunning enemy managed to trap you and lock you in a cage. Though they haven't dared open it since, rightly fearing for their lives, they had the audacity to sell you. Thus, passing from hand to hand, your cage has traveled farther than you ever have. Displayed like a freak show attraction, living proof of the barbarity and primitiveness of the peoples of the barbarian kingdoms, you have long dreamed of wringing the necks of your captors to show them what the so-called primitives of your kind are capable of with their bare hands.
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The showmen who own your cage are unaware that, over the course of your wanderings, you have learned to understand their language. Thus, you learn that you are currently crossing the mountains of the Boût range and that you will soon arrive at a kingdom called Faraway. Knowing that you crossed a stretch of sea to get there, you have probably traveled farther than the greatest heroes of your tribe's legends, albeit in a considerably less glorious manner…
Suddenly, a terrifying cry rips through the air. Despite your many encounters with wild beasts, you are shaken: what creature could possibly produce such a powerful sound?
As you look up at the sky, you see a veritable torrent of fire and scales raining down. A jolt propels you to the other side of your cage. Just as you begin to regain your balance, you realize you're still falling: the straps holding your cage to the cart have snapped!
Uttering curses never before heard in this faraway land, you curl into a ball as you bounce through the cage. Leaving behind the burning, screaming, and running carnival performers, you roll painfully down the slope until the repeated impacts cause you to lose consciousness.
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