I paid no heed to them, the auctioneer was frozen speechless, he could swore I was going to choose one of the best samples he had there, yet, I decided to choose a little girl! He totally didn t know what to make of it!
But as I stood firmly on my decision, he had no option other to snap out of his shock and actually proceed with the auction!
- Oh Montecchio! I see this fine young lady has gotten your attention? Sure, sure! I can sell her to you! Something so precious like her isn t going for less than one hundred thousand dollars!
He was expecting me to haggle and all, but for some odd reason I wasn t in the mood for it, so I just did another thing that caught him totally off guard:
- Ok deal I said totally without emotions on my voice.
The auctioneer jaw just dropped to the floor, he wasn t expecting this at all! He would usually offer merchandise for that amount but after all the negotiations; it would drop to ten thousand at most! That little girl just made this entire auction worth a while!
So after the first noble round of offerings, all were free to bid on the slaves shown, I just bought what I intended (aside the little girl) and I was off as soon as possible, I got out, those kinds of auctions would always leave my stomach in a heavy upset.
After some time, we arrived at my castle, I knew there was a rough time ahead of us, until the newly acquired slaves notice things work differently here and learn their jobs, there could be some mishaps, to which was my duty to clear.
I bought 5 slaves aside the little girl, 2 big male ones, being one nekomimi and one human. I also bought 3 women being all 3 nekomimi ones, I always preferred the nekomimi women, thanks to the care Nina gave me.
I called Stephan and showing him his new fellow workers, he was happy and grateful I got him some help. He was worried that he would get sick and the house would lose the only one that was responsible for fixing stuff.
The newcomers seemed very surprised when I stepped forward and started talking to them as if they were workers, not slaves:
- Welcome to the Montecchio house, my name is Richard Montecchio, but you guys can call me Rick.
They looked at each other in either disbelief or like they were drunk, they couldn t believe that the head of a house was actually talking to them! They never had ever heard of something like that, usually slaves are treat worse than trash! They kept listening to my words with utmost attention.
The little girl, whose name was Akira, was shaking almost uncontrollably; the fear she was feeling was almost overwhelming to her. I don t blame her though; some stories of abuse of slaves would really scare someone to death, specially a little girl.
- Here, as you probably have already noticed, we are not regular slave buyers, actually, we don t even like to call you guys slaves per se.
I stopped and breathed, just to check how my speech was sinking into their minds.
- My family, no our family now, always saw you guys like people, with souls, not like some merchandise! That s right! The tales around Montecchio family are true! And I ask nothing in return for this treatment, you guys work for us, we take care of you and your family even provide medical coverage for you guys.
I noticed little Akira was still shaking, so I walked and stood in front of her, kneeing and gently touching her head and raising her chin, she had teary brown eyes, her black hair tied back with a blue string made perfect matchup with her cyan dress, while green bracelets would bind her arms.
Thinking that might be the reason she was afraid, I took them out and ordered Stephan do follow suit with the others, I was really careful to bring both of the slaves wife, so the family would be still together.
After I released her from her handcuffs, I smiled to her trying to give her the impression everything was going to be alright, she seemly calmed down a bit I then asked her, even though I knew what her name was:
- Hi! I am Richard Montecchio! What is this pretty little girl name?
After some hesitation, she stopped sobbing and replied:
- Akira Hikari Akira - Nice to meet you! I hope I can take good care of you!
As soon as I said that, I felt overwhelmed with a warm feeling I had only felt when being with Nina, so I just realized that I might be having the same feelings for her as Nina did too bad I am still too na ve.
