ΒΆ Summary
The Chainmen are a mysterious group of interstellar merchants primarily involved in the slave trade. The commercial legitimacy they enjoy in more disreputable ports does nothing to mask their cruelty, and most people struggle to even hear their name without also hearing the crack of a whip on soft flesh. Favoring strength and brutality, the Chainmen often employ orcs, the fiendblooded, and members of goblinoid species to manage their living freight, but it is far from uncommon to see sneering humans, dwarves, or anyone willing to hold another being's chains manning their slave pits.
Easily, the most feared symbol of the Chainmen are the black freighters. Helmed by mysterious humanoid beings whose faces are perpetually veiled, save for their disturbingly-wide smiles of jagged teeth, these large, sleek vessels are some of the fastest in the cosmos. What propels them is a dark mystery, and slaves who've survived their holds can only groggily remember a delirium of heat, confusion, and screams, as if they were inside the belly of a dreadful beast. Those who can pay their steep fees, often assessed in blood rather than gold, know that the black freighters are some of the most reliable couriers in the multiverse.