Slavery

Slavery is the practice of owning people like property in which the only one who benefits from such a relationship is the "owner" as a "slave" tends to have no real rights and doesn't need to be compensated for any work they do.

History
Unlike in the Northern Kingdoms or Skellige, slavery is widely practiced in Nilfgaard, where prisoners of wars or criminals are used not only for manual works but are even allocated in the army, fighting as a vanguard before the "real" army's attack.

Despite this, humans are not the only race to use slavery in their society. The elves, in particular the Aen Elle, used the human inhabitants of the realms they conquered as their servants. However, they only used female slaves and killed off any men they captured.

Citations from the books
"“You, Audegast, you will collect and cart all agricultural crops and plants. Everything that remains on the fields that has now been destroyed by Coehoorns knights must be collected... ‘I dont have enough men sir Chamberlain...’ ‘There will be enough slaves, get the locals to work."

- Time of Contempt "“Vengenberg fell after a week,’ added Dandelion. ‘You will be surprised, but there the guilds defended bastions and their sections of wall until their last breath. The attackers killed the castle crew, defenders of the city and anyone who lived therein, six thousand people total. A massive escape ensued after that. The crushed squads and civilians began to escape to Temeria and Redania. Crowds of refugees stretched through the Pontar valley and Mahakaman foothills. But many were not able to escape; the nilfgaardian light cavalry were hunting them, cutting them off... Do you know why ?” “I don‘t. I don‘t understand... I don‘t know much about warfare, Dandelion.’ ‘They wanted prisoners. Slaves. They wanted to catch as many people as possible. That is the cheapest work force in Nilfgaard. Thats why they were so focused on hunting refugees. It was a big hunt on people, Geralt. An easy hunt. Because the army was routed and no one defended the poor.”"

- Time of Contempt