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At three in the afternoon, the passenger ship entered the waters of the Rorsted Archipelago. Although early winter had already arrived on land, a faint warm breeze still blew at sea. The ocean was forever synonymous with opportunity and chaos. All sorts of people mingled in the cities, bringing a lively atmosphere utterly different from that of either the Northern or Southern Continent.
Once the ship docked at the little port he knew so well, Richard Ernst undid the top two buttons of his shirt, picked up his small black suitcase, and slowly disembarked with the other passengers who had reached their destination. Most of the people working at the port were dark-skinned lower-class people from the Southern Continent and natives dressed in distinctive clothing. They worked under supervisors who carried canes and wore top hats. The slightest slackening brought harsh reprimands or even a whipping.
Colonizers from the Northern Continent enjoyed almost unlimited privileges here. Even if they beat one or two natives to death, the worst punishment they would receive was repatriation, and they could even grease the right palms with a little money. The bureaucrats of the civilized world would not turn down an opportunity to make money, and the locals were even less likely to make enemies of their betters over a human life. As for compensation... the price was so low that any merchant who could make it here would not care in the slightest.
Richard was unsurprised by all this, but he had not grown inured to it, because once upon a time, he too had been one of them.
An invader's child, a Feysac half-blood, a colonizer father he had never met, a mother who had been unable to support him and slowly wasted away.
The shoeshine tools in his shoulder bag,