Now, with a few decades under my belt, I see things more clearly. I was born to luxury and carry a family name hundreds of years old. My family has lived surrounded by the finer things in life since they settled this beautiful land but that needs to change and the sooner the better.
I’ll start at the beginning... my family name is Krupt, of noble lineage in far off Cheliax. My ancestors, lured by promises of riches, came to settle what is now called Sargava. Several hundred years later and my family is the proud owner of vast tracts of lands where pineapples and figs are grown and where cattle roam the seemingly endless plains. My childhood memories are filled with plantations, lazy summers, and all the trappings of a noble family. I was taught to hunt and track and to wield the family sword, all in preparation for my brief but mandatory stint in the Sargavan Guard, whom my ancestors had the vision of founding.
As a member of one of the founding colonial families, I was quickly given command of a scouting unit that best suited my skills and interests. We were assigned to Kalabuto; it was 4702 and the third Mzali invasion was just shaping up.
I was never meant to go to war; my father tried his best to pull me out when he heard the news but by then it was too late. Under my unskilled command, my scouting unit was ambushed. Half of us perished right there and then; I was lucky to have been saved by a couple of old veterans, locals much to my embarrassment. My Colonial upbringing was about to clash head-on with the reality of Sargava. It was a tough couple of days but I finally relinquished command of my unit to those better suited for it. That single action saved my life and has since shaped my outlook on everything.
We managed to survived, the four of us that were left from the original twelve. It was during these months that I learned the true art of the wild. I was taught to move as silently and swiftly as the wind, to tell which roots to eat and which would kill you, which animals screamed the least when they died, and I was taught to hunt. Not animals, I already knew that; I was taught to hunt men.
As much as I learned from my practical lessons, my most important experience was the gift of sight. True sight, not the one where we imagine how things are because of what others tell us or because of what we want to see. This was unadulterated sight, really seeing things for what they truly are without adding any bias to it. So I saw how the Ivory Cross put down the Mzali rebellion when called in (and were paid handsomely for it) but did nothing to rescue the Sargavan Guard. I saw the Ivory Cross instigate native uprising so they could then be hired to put them down. And I saw how the natives were thought of and treated like second class citizens when they had a lot to teach on how to truly thrive in this land.
My new-found sight came accompanied with a new-found voice with which I confronted my family telling them the truths that had been hidden from me. Ignored and told to keep quiet to maintain the status quo, I learned that my family profited from the Ivory Cross contracts and our substandard treatment of the natives. Disgusted, I left my easy life, my estate, my plantation, and cut ties with my past. Elated with my freedom, I returned to the land and those that saved my life and taught me so much.
I still carry my name, much to my family’s discontent, because I believe that things can be different. I am as much local here as any of the natives but I want to change the way the Colonials treat the true natives.
After a few years of roaming Sargava and the Mwangi Expanse, I’m heading to Eleder to see first-hand how things are at the capital.
