I think I just accidentally reinvented Pokémon 😅

Most lamps were ancient heirlooms, often more valuable than their sulky male contents, and jealously guarded by the caravans that owned them. They were oiled and polished daily. The indignant moaning this elicited from within the lamp was typically ignored.

The slaving city of Alam crafted a handful of new lamps every year—rare enough that one could judge a woman's status by the clinking of brass slung on her hip. They were endlessly useful. They could be traded as currency, displayed as art pieces, or kept as pets. Some even served practical purposes, as fighters or advisors. Whereas in other nations a problem might be solved by a disparate group of adventurers, a single lamp-bearer, with a handpicked team on her belt, could handle almost anything.

The release of the year's supply was always a spectacle: competitions and combat. Ships set sail to bring back exotic slaves from every corner of the world to fill the bottles.

Eirik had no idea where he was or why, half-blinded by the strange, hot, yellow snow. The crowd roared in a language he didn't understand. All around him in the coliseum, the other men were burst into colored flame as they were caught, sucked screaming down spouts.