Sphatikhana rebellion

A deceptively well armed rebellion

In the summer of 1373, the supervisors of Sphatikhana's mines were at first only mildly surprised when all 78 of their Resonators changed the litany that had accompanied their labour for the past several years. Only when the first one of them fell under the lightning fast swing of a pickaxe, they realized that their slaves were ready for a complete change of music.
Led by the former woodcarver Aurya ir-Aessus the makarids charged towards the exit of the mines, keeping their children protected in the middle of the group.
Unknown by the human owners of the mines and their paid workers, for months the slaves had been preparing for a mass escape, spurred by the intuition of Aurya of inserting Nezil dust and leftover fragments inside makeshift weapons and using their shared knowledge of the Dragon's chants to improve the efficacy of the rudimentary armaments.
After the first deaths under their unusually effective weapons, most of the mines supervisors decided their pay wasn't worth the risk and fled before them. The rebellion only found a last resistance at the entrance, where the mercenaries on the Apex Empire Company payroll were called to do their job.

A encouragingly successful outcome

The so called rebellion has been crushed at its beginning and no damage has been caused to the property of the Company. All the rebel workers have been dismissed from their work and the mine work will resume as soon as better suited replacements have been found.

— Apex's spokeman

Despite the numbers not in their favour, about half of the makarids managed to escape, including all of the children and only 3 of them fell under the guards' weapons, the others recaptured and sold.
While the Apex Empire was swift in publicly declaring that the rebellion was successfully sedated, the reality is that they lost all the resonators in one of their richest mines and had to stop the activity in the mine for more than two years afterwards while the numbers were built back.
More than that, the surviors spread the news in their new communities, and now the makarids had a blueprint plan to overcome their oppressors. Several rebellions sparked after that first one, some more successful than others, and as a result more and more mining companies have been coming to the realization that slavery is not as profitable a way to acquire manpower as it was before.
Backlash though, is still strong in particular at the hands of the Apex Company and their affiliates who launched a hunt campaign targeting in particular the communities those first rebels came from, effectively preventing most of them from reuniting with their families.
It is unnknown if Aurya survived the revolt and what their whereabouts might be in that case.

by Simo Mereu with Artbreeder