His Soul is Marching On to Another World; or, the John Brown Isekai

“They hung him for a traitor, themselves a traitorous crew,
But his soul is marching on.”

The land of Gemeinplatz is a land filled with fantastical creatures, adventurers looking to slay them, and heroes looking to distinguish themselves from the adventurers. The most common of these heroes are those who come from Earth, who enjoy a most leisurely time with their cheat skills. It’s a perfect world, the utopia of those who wish to become overpowered and get their own power fantasy, where even the most everyman of the everyman can pull themselves by their bootstraps and become a hero.

Yet, underneath this “Gemeinplatzer Dream” is a disgusting truth.

To satisfy the needs of heroes who can’t find function like a normal human being (which most of them can’t), the lucrative Gemeinplatz slave trade crushes the dreams and ruins the lives of hundreds every day. These slaves endlessly labor, in the harems of so-called heroes, at the mansions of the landowning “heroes”, as rare materials for various magical spells.

In a world that looks down at them as demi-human, where the ruling class has no incentive to end this profitable trade, in which their oppressors are overpowered as all hell, what hope is there for the slaves?
What hope is there, is named John Brown. This time, he’ll finish what he started.

_______________________________________________________________

This story was meant to be a more fast-paced, silly short story, written while I took a break from my main project, The Errant Otherworlder Watanabe. Yet, I have put in as much care as anything I produce into this work.