In the end, Augustus, the "King," was settled by Iver in the White Queen District for a temporary stay.
After settling him in, Iver and Isabel returned to the Silver and Tin Palace.
For his safety—and to keep him from slipping away while he had the chance—Augustus was actually placed under house arrest there. At least six inspectors took turns watching over and protecting him, while three servants transferred from the Silver and Tin Palace handled his daily needs and reported his every move.
Even so, the "King" was moved to tears.
What good people! Oh, no.
What good foxes!
Before this, he had even prepared himself to go to prison.
Avalon's prisons were different from Stibium's. The most common punishment and labor there was running on treadmills.
Each set of treadmills was like a hamster wheel for seven people, with partitions separating them to prevent the prisoners from talking to one another. An axle device was connected beneath it, grinding corn and other grains.
Once the mechanism started running, inertia would keep it turning without end. As a result, once all seven people began running, none of them could stop. Prisoners had to run for three hours at a time, twice a day, while serious offenders ran three times. The amount of exercise was equivalent to climbing a mountain three or four thousand meters high.
That way, the prison could also serve as a massive mill. With the machines completely draining the prisoners' energy, controlling their diets naturally left them with no extra strength to escape or fight.
The treadmills were not actually very fast. After all, they were not spinning idly—they had to grind grain. But the amount of exercise was essentially equivalent to climbing stairs without pause.
The most terrifying part of this forced labor was that