Chapter 2: 1.2: Unwanted Attention Arises

That unwanted rush of falling uncontrollably in a dream is always a horrible thing. The same couldn’t be said for James, who was curled up like a napping cat on the side of a very worn, but well-kept road. Around his body, leaves tossed and turned in the air currents. The gentle and shallow rising and falling of his chest matched a leaf, as it swung in the air, spiralled for a few seconds then came to rest on his cheek. 

As he came to, he squinted groggily, then reached up and gently flicked the leaf off his cheek with a flick of his wrist. Slowly opening his eyes, he was expecting to find himself back in a hospital and all that had been a dream. However, picking up the leaf he’d touched, he realised that it was all too real. 

He was in another world. 

< # # # >

It hadn’t even been a few minutes when he’d found himself pacing around aimlessly beside an oak tree larger than one he’d ever seen before. It felt as wide as a bus and whenever he had dared to look up every few seconds, it gave him vertigo. His hair, now sunset ginger instead of dark brown, was scrunched up in his hands as he gritted his teeth. 

‘What way do I go?! What if I stumble across some clichéd event? What do I -’

His thoughts pretty much followed a familiar character’s inner monologue, but he was so deep in thought that he almost missed the vehicle coming up the worn-down, underdeveloped road; a carriage pulled by a four-armed, four-legged creature he’d never seen before. The creature's legs protruded at weird but seemingly natural angles as it sped towards him. 

Without thinking, he tried to run but in the process of turning, it only took a few steps before he tripped up over a large, fallen branch. In the process of tripping, he stains his clothing with a few patches and smears of mud and grass as he uncontrollably rolled under a thick bush. Staying still, his heart started beating quickly, beads of sweat slowly moving down his face as his body temperature started raising, yet he felt an increasing gust of cold washing over his skin. 

It got even worse when he heard two gravelly, almost bass-boosted voices reverberating around him.

‘Hey, kid where’d you come from?!’

‘Who you talking to Rapheus? I don’t see any lowly scum out here.’

‘I swears I saw someone, Freuk. They must be in this hawth bush.’

A bead of sweat dripped from his chin, creating a quiet but audible “ploip” into a small puddle under him. Hoping it wasn’t loud enough, he let out a breath of air he didn’t know he’d been holding. Unfortunately, letting his guard down was a mistake. Within less than two seconds, the bush above him was yanked to the side and a bag was placed over his head.

‘GOTCHA you son of a b- OOF-OWW! ...I fink you broke by bose!’

Reiki had instinctively thrown his head backwards, and in the process managed to break his capturer's nose. However, this only encouraged the other man to get down from his seat on their carriage and grabbed him by the arms, his grip like a vice. He couldn’t see anything, but he felt the slam of his body against a hard surface followed by the sound of metallic clinks and clanks.

‘...are you okay?’ 

A gentle voice called out to him. It felt out of place to him, but the alluring voice calmed him down. Just a little, but enough to stop him from panicking. The bag that had been covering his head was removed, and a young face was looking down at him, her eyebrows furrowed and covered in a few splatters of mud.  and dressed in a torn dress. 

Flecks of pink and white tried to show through the ragged seams near the bottom of the dress, yet most of the dress was torn and ripped. Ragged and mud-stained hair hung from her head, clumped haphazardly together. A few scars and scratches were mostly visible on her exposed arms. 

‘I’m okay. Thank you for removing the bag.’ 

‘It’s no problem. I just hope that we don’t travel too far. WE’re all pretty much kidnapped you see.’

Flags went off in the boy's head, the ride getting bouncier every now and then, shaking him around as he struggled to sit normally. Whilst in the back of the old carriage, the time passed quickly, as the sky had done two full cycles and the driver and his assistant had managed to snatch up two more young children. Two males to be exact. 

After a while, the road, or what could almost be called a road, suddenly turned away from the increasingly backed-up main road and the barely awakened Reiki began to watch as the road turned into a small track with two lines of dirt surrounded by dense trees and bushes. 

‘Where are we going?’ 

A bead of sweat rolled down his cold cheek, his mind jolting awake from the sudden rocking and banging the carriage was experiencing off the main road.

‘I don’t know. I’ve never been this way before. I know roughly where we are, but I’d remember if this was a route I’ve been on before or not.’ 

It was the same girl from earlier. A few groans and grunts of pain from around him suggested that some of the people in the back with him were in need of medical help. One child suddenly fell onto the cold, wooden floor of the carriage. The sickening thud of his head bouncing every now and then caused an older girl to gasp over the sound of the struggling children. 

As he looked up at the rest of the children, all dressed in poorly maintained clothing and some even with patches of red in places, he finally saw the girl who stopped his head from banging on the floor.

‘No, Callam! Not now! No! Please! Please wake up!’ 

She wailed, tears flowing profusely down her cheeks as she cradled his head and body close to her chest, her hair draped over her shoulder on one side and the other with a short and badly made pigtail holding her hair up.  The boy had gone from groaning to shallow breathing. 

‘OI! What’s all the ruckus back there?’ 

‘It’s nothing.’ 

The young girl who’d taken the bag off his head replied almost instantly. The carriage came to a stop and the girl shifted and shuffled her butt to make her way over beside him. But Reiki wasn’t having any of it. He immediately got up, his back no longer awkwardly leaning against his bound hands. Unbeknownst to Reiki, his hands appeared to blur rapidly and randomly as he got up shakily to his feet and crawled towards the unconscious boy. 

‘Here, let me take care of that for you.’

‘But your ha— HEH?!’ 

Without even realising it, Reiki had forgotten his hands were tied up and instead they were both checking over the young boy's head, carefully sliding to check for a bump. Rope free. Two muffled gasps came from behind him, but he paid no attention as he started to gently press the boy's chest. A repetition of a few pumps of pressure followed by him leaning down, mouth to ear, went on as the cart slowed to a crawl. 

The sound of slurping and squelching echoed into the back of the carriage, the two kidnappers shovelling around the carriage as the patter on the roofing started to increase in volume when the boy's almost pale blue skin became erubescent. 

‘Phew… Close one.’ 

‘...’

‘... What?’ 

The sudden silence, not an awkward one, left him feeling embarrassed. A soft glow on his cheeks and a skittish movement to his eyes, combined with a hug of his knees, caused the eyes of the young beauty who spoke to sparkle through her crusty mud-covered face.

Without any thought, she grasped him from behind and rested her chin on his shoulder. A gentle sigh of relief escaped her lips as the corners turned up. The carriage started moving again once the pattering of rain started to ease. In the following twenty minutes, Reiki had started to open up to the rest of the boys and girls in the carriage, finding out they range from thirteen to seventeen years of age. 

‘I hope my father is putting a search out for me.’

‘I’m just glad nobody else has had any issues besides a few bumps and bruises.’

He flicked a piece of wood towards the tarp roof, where a small puddle rippled, then eventually slid off when they hit a bump again.

‘Curse that sudden downpour. It messed up with our schedule. We’re already ten minutes late!’

‘Don’t have to tell me twice. We had to dig out the parts that sunk into thick mud too.’

The two kidnappers grumbled their hatred for their job but still kept quiet as they trudged towards the city’s secret gateway. Reiki had allowed the girl who’d been compassionate to fall asleep on his shoulder as they trundled onto a horribly built brick road. The inside rumbled from the surface change, but they didn’t rock and bounce like earlier. The rain had stopped and the inside briefly dimmed as they made their way under the thick walls. 

A muffled conversation started at the carriage slowed to a stop, and then the carriage shifted shoddily as the two men stepped off. The view out the back, through some metal bars, showed the gate get a faint, deep green glow before it mysteriously shifted and dissolved. As if it was never there in the first place.  

As Reiki shifted his focus on the muffled voices, their conversation appeared to have introduced a third, and maybe a fourth voice. Out of nowhere, a face with a smile that almost reached from ear to ear and a scar from forehead to under their chin peered in from the top of the tarp covering everyone. 

‘Ooh! Lookie what we have here! More slaves for us to sell!’ A jarring laugh came from his throat as a glint appeared in his eyes.

Without warning, the metal door swung open and the man quickly swung into the carriage. Everyone that was still awake from the trip backed away in fear at his stance, his broad shoulders and straight back tied with his devilish grin. His eyes darted around, looking between the kids as they huddled in groups of two or three. Some scrambled backwards, some burst into silent tears. The reactions were varied, but expelled one clear emotion; fear.

'Who... Who the hell i—?!'

A voice rang out from beyond the gently wafting tarp.

‘Oi, Bruckel, get outta there! You’ll ruin the merchandise!’

The gruff voice made everyone flinch and leave the back in a similar way to how he entered. Reiki wanted to sucker punch him so badly, but after seeing the wall return to normal and hearing the number of voices around them. He didn’t want to risk his chances until he got an open window. After all, how was he to know he’d be caught up in an illegal slave trade ring, along with seventeen other teenagers.

‘I need to find a way out of here fast, but what should I do with this girl who’s grown attached to me? I bet they weren’t expecting me to ’ He thought as he found himself sitting with his hands hugged around his legs, and his chin positioned on top of his knees. 

A gentle breath of air slowly washed over the left side of his neck, coming from the direction of her head resting carelessly. They shared a cloth so thin, that he could barely keep enough warmth to himself. Especially with the girl sharing it with him. After waiting in the foul-smelling carriage, with the torn-up wood covering, it wasn’t even less than an hour later when the carriage ground to a halt, and bags made from a strange material to stop any light from entering them were harshly placed on all their heads. 

Someone had shoved him, but he couldn’t hear a thing. As he focused on his surroundings through his other senses, he instantly got a strange feeling tingling across his entire body that washed from his head and hands down to his feet and almost as if it flowed into the floor. Almost like his sense of touch briefly expanding from his immediate surroundings. 

But the moment didn’t last. As soon as he’d even sensed his surroundings in such clear detail, that feeling vanished.

‘Oi, move it. We’re not being paid for those that stand around doing something fishy!’

‘Ironic much?’ Reiki thought, then proceeded to mentally scheme a way out of the place whilst considering taking the girl with him.

Upon being shoved onto a floor, the cover over his head was yoinked free from his head. Finally looking around the room, he initially noticed smears of dirt across the unevenly tiled floor and numerous patches of mould between the bricks on the badly built walls. The room had lots of space, but that’s when he noticed four of the kids on the ride with him. 

‘Hey, mister.’ 

He turned his head in the rough direction the reverberating whisper carried from. There were three young girls and two young boys all huddled in a corner. The voice was very young and was higher pitched than any of the boys in the room. It was a hard time for him to realise it was the same sick boy from the carriage ride that was clinging to the older girl, the one who’d spoken.

‘Thank you for saving my younger brother earlier. He has Blue Skin Syndrome. Not many people know how to reduce it the way you did.’

‘Don’t mention it. Anyway, where are we?’

‘We’re either in Hibel or Froesé. At least one of their minor areas, I think.’

His eyes expanded a little, glinting slightly from the brightly lit torch on the wall outside the cell. His eyes shifted to the left slightly. The voice carried a yawn and a soft, yearning calmness to it that he recognised from the ride into he can now confirm was a city of some sort.

‘Hee-bell? Frows? What types of city names are those? Anyway, wait, is she—?’

His thoughts were interrupted as his gaze rested on the girl who’d been resting against him earlier that day. He immediately forgot about the city names, and after getting a good look at her, his heart felt like it was beating loudly in his ears. Not the odd illness kind, but the kind that left him with erubescent cheeks and a slightly fluttery feeling in his chest. 

‘Oh, okay then. Well, if it helps, I’ve kinda been orphaned just before I was captured. My parents kinda died after a dog-like monster attacked and I got away strangely unscathed. I’d been walking for ’ 

He had literally lied to everyone in the room, not even a bead of sweat appearing as he lied about his situation. Having said his part, something in his vision blipped up after scratching behind his left ear. For a few seconds, he just stared at the floating, green menu before him. 

‘… wait, I’ve heard of this trope. Is this an RPG hud?!’ 

The menu before him displayed a fuzzy window, angled down by his left side. A glitchy outline started to shift, the symbols and shapes within it shifting around until it resembled something startlingly similar to English. A quick raise of his gaze to check the room confirmed to him that the menu was only visible to him before he return his gaze to a better focused message box. 

 

[ Congratulations! You’ve created your backstory! ]

[ Would you like to view your stats? (Y/N) ]

 

He didn’t know how magic worked in this world and he could hear footsteps coming closer to the cell. He quickly flicked two fingers hidden behind his legs, as if swiping at something that was there, and the menu slid to the other side of him. When he snuck out his index finger to tap the yes button, it vanished in a puff of digital, glitch-filtered glass shards, then reformed into a bigger panel that displayed his personal statistics.

His eyes grew a gentle glint of appreciation at the stats he could see. Despite them being mostly blank, some displayed interesting base statistics for his current condition. 

 

[ PROFILE ]

[ NAME - Reiki Honoka ]

[ ALIAS - N/A ]

[ AGE - 17 ]

[ PROFESSION - N/A, N/A ]

[ STATUS - Kidnapped ]

[ LEVEL - 1 ]

 

[ SKILLS ]

[ Active Skills ]

Unknown - Lv. 1 | N/A  - Lv. 0

[//ERROR//]

[//ERROR//]

 

[ Passive Skills ]

N/A - Lv. 2 | Translation - Lv. 1

Analysis - Lv. 1

Leveller - Lv. ∞

 

He tapped the air, closing the panel, as he pondered what most of it meant. Right as it closed, a high-pitched yell came from a girl who’d just been grabbed by a guy with muscles that were pulsating strongly as they moved and flexed. 

‘I don’t want to get on his bad side.’

Just as he started to look away from the helpless struggle, his mind did a double take on the image of the girl's face. His eyes widened as he watched her being dragged away, a soft thumping increased in volume in his ears yet the sound of her struggling breath, albeit muffled and the ragged huffing of the guy who dragged her off was crystal clear whenever he closed his eyes.

He closed the stats window as he began to formulate a plan. Running out of time became a real risk now. He wished he could run away from this place. The start of his new reality couldn’t have been made any worse than an immediate kidnapping. 

‘I wanna go back to mommy.’ 

‘Shush, they’ll hear you!’ 

‘I don’t feel safe here.’

‘I hope that girl they took is okay.’

Some of the kids in the room started to worry about being in a room that started to stink similar to that of a body that hasn’t been washed in weeks. Some were holding their noses as they tried to avoid throwing up at the stench surrounding them. Making up his mind, Reiki noticed a small patch of loose dirt in the centre of the room. 

‘I have a plan to get out, but this is my first attempt at escaping from a place like this so I won’t be able to bring any of you along. So if you want to be able to see your families or friends again, please let me know you’re ready to wait for the rescue.’

Some of the older kids nodded their heads as he started to describe his plan, using hia pinkie finger to roughly sketch out an idea. The eldest girl in the room to him, a wolf-girl, was on the lookout in case they were to overhear his plan to escape. Turns out her race had an exceptional hearing ability and she desperately wanted to do anything to help out. 

A few times they almost got caught because she hadn’t been paying attention, but Reiki managed to pull out lines from Action-RPG’s that an online friend of his loved to play. Turns out in this world, some of them actually worked as distraction techniques. Waiting for the right moment to escape was going to take time and luckily, they all had nothing else to do. 

He hadn’t told any of them about his RPG ability, which he desperately wanted to keep hidden. This had unlocked his passive Hide Profile ability and levelled it up by two in the process of hiding it from everyone in the room. 

‘Okay, it’s time. Their schedule seems to have relaxed a little. I hope you can save that girl.’

‘I sure hope so. Promise me you’ll keep the kids safe whilst I’m gone.’

‘I shall. Don’t forget us once we’re free either, y’got that?’

‘Yes, I’ll make sure to find a way to keep in touch.’

The young girl had revealed that her name was Sapphire Simona the Third after she’d introduced herself as the lookout. He’d been taken aback at how similar her level of calm was to his, but hers was from the circumstances that lead her to be there with them. As waiting time progressed, she had also told him directly that she wasn’t of any royalty, upon him asking her, but she was the third female in a row in her family to share the same name, hence the number. 

The others were well-versed in knowing this of the Beast-kin race, yet a little slip of surprise still appeared on his face when he found that out. Luckily, when he snuck out of the cubicle, he immediately went to work. As quickly as he possibly could, without making noise, he started heading in the direction he’d been told she’d gone. The floors were sticky underfoot since they took his shoes. His clothes had taken the trip with him to this world and he didn’t expect them to only be interested in selling his sneakers.

‘That’ll be their downfall, as long as they can’t sell them.’

Changing his focus, he had covered more than the distance necessary to figure out things on his own, but a nagging thought kept his doubt that he could find her in time. The sun was setting as he made it up a set of stairs after avoiding what he thought were two patrolling slave traders, and the dimly lit corner where the door opened worked to his advantage. 

Looking into the centre of the room, he noticed that the girl from earlier was either asleep or knocked unconscious and still fully dressed. A few bruises on her face to match a few new open areas in the already badly torn clothing she wore, but that seemed fair in comparison to where his mind had gone regarding the tropes he’d read about back home. Looking at his stats window again, he found himself with some time to kill and found the window that displayed his agility, defence and strength stats. 

He was about to grab her and make a run for it when a heavy whumping sound resonated from the walls and heavily muffled yelling that was barely audible stimulated his ears with the deep tones. Dust trickled down from the exposed rafting, Once settled, after two gentler thumps that didn’t expose as much dust, it had covered some of the objects in the room with a light dusting. After scanning the room, he’d noticed the room looked like a closed-up blacksmith store with an unlit forge.

‘I gotta get her outta here with me. This looks like an illegal setup hidden within a blacksmith.’

He was about to go and grab her when he saw a shadow being cast at the foot of the door. Instinctively, he froze, then quickly but quietly tried to climb up to the exposed beams above. Luckily, after finding his upgradable ability window just a few minutes prior

‘Year after year, and we still don’t have enough to buy a better safehouse?’

‘Beats me. Besides, at least we can repair our tools here, unlike in our last place. We should be grateful that the Boss found us this spot after all.’

Two new voices from below changed his focus from the girl to the two guys below. One was a chubby guy, his baritone voice keeping in sync with his appearance. His chin had a thick brown beard, yet his hair only started from his ears downwards. The other guy, a more average-looking human, had a creepy squeaking that affected his usual speech patterns. His higher-pitched voice tied in with his small eyes and his constant grinning, on one side of his face. These features suggested to him that he must have had some major event to leave his face in a permanent half-grin. 

‘I’m gonna call him Smiles, and the other one Muscles.’

After waiting for what felt like an age to Reiki, it took them a while to take out some heavily damaged items and a few small bags that clunked like money when they landed on the table. He watched patiently, waiting for them to leave the room before he attempted stage two of his plan. Luckily, it seemed this room wasn’t as run down as he thought and he could use that to his advantage. 

Smiles and Muscles had started to professionally work on the items. They often discussed a few interesting details that are vital to keeping them running. He found that a little odd, but kept as still and as quiet as possible in the rafting beams as they quickly fixed the tools. After a minute, a pure black crow appears with a roll of something in its beak. Muscles promptly stopped what he was doing and snatched the paper from the crow, reading it thoroughly.

‘Hey, Sqeike.’

‘Yes, Argel?’

‘Could you come with me for a sec? There’s a heavy crate that’s just arrived for our package.’

‘Fine. I was hoping to sharpen my Pesnar.’ 

‘Guess I didn't need those nicknames after all.’ 

Around a minute after they left, Reiki immediately dropped to the floor. As quietly as possible, he attempted to unchain the girl bound by the shackles that attached her to the chair. Looking back at the table, he noticed the weapon looked something like a Peshkabz; the hardy, robust-looking handle with dinks and dents and the blade battered, with a chipped tip as if used in a particularly difficult battle. 

After removing every shackle holding her down, he checked the girl over for anything serious. In his mind couldn’t tell if she was either unconscious or sleeping until she started rousing. He sat her back down as she slowly lifted her head and looked around the room. It didn’t take her long to realise her surroundings. However, as soon as she saw Reiki, her eyes went wide when she was about to talk. 

He quickly covered her mouth with two fingers and furrowed his brows and straightened his mouth, as he focused his gaze on her. He waited for her to calm down enough so that she would be able to nod in response. 

‘Can you be quiet for me?’

She simply nodded in response. Like she knew he was going to help get her out of there. She watched and followed him as they both steadily worked their way through the empty corridors. Occasionally checking rooms carefully for food and drinks if they were left open. They were nearly at the exit to the world beyond when a hand wrapped in a cloth clamped over the girl's mouth and she let a loud yet muffled yelp escape. 

Before she could succumb to the weird smell that overpowered her nose and her senses, she managed to grasp the man's arm and wrench it enough that she could get a message to Reiki:

‘RUN! Forget about me, just RUN!’

‘I'll be okay.’ She expressed solely through her eyes. The determination shimmering in their glow of strength.

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At that very moment, everything seemed to slow down to just over half the speed it was moving previously. He stared at the girl, then the guy he missed. He had well-built arm muscles and big, muscular hands that stretched out from a patch of shadow.

Whilst watching her slowly getting yanked backwards, he was about to set his resolve to save her, when the look in her eyes connected with his. It felt to Reiki as if she trusted him with her life. Feeling a wet surface slowly shift from his eyes, he turned and ran off. 

Unbeknownst to him, what the girl saw was him standing there one second, then a flash of bright, electric green light flashed as she succumbed to the darkness the smell was forcing her to go to. He ran until his brief spurt of energy caught up with his lack of nourishment. Despite searching for food earlier, they had found barely any to almost no scraps at all.

‘I've gotta find someone to help me out! This place is a cesspool of illegal activity… At least I sure hope it is.’

When he stopped to catch his breath, he noticed a man in pale blue armour with a wide longsword on his back. Beside him, was a woman who didn't look a day over thirty in a purple and white outfit. The closest thing he could picture in similarity, from his time back home, was something akin to a kimono. The exception for this design had focused more on agility, and being battle ready. 

The first thing he noticed was the single red shoulder pad hidden behind the ponytail that hung over that shoulder. Without accidentally staring for too long, he noticed the bottom hem, knee-deep on the outfit, had a single black line with a red and purple lacy spiral flowing randomly along the centre.

Taking a few steps from the not so well lit alleyway, he barely sensed something coming from behind and quickly made his way to the two of them. The man noticed him first, his eyebrows furrowed slightly when their eyes met. His eyes shifted from their previous glow of joy to a darker, sombre look.  

After noticing that her friend was paying less attention to her teasing, she also shifted from a happy mood to the second pair of furrowed eyebrows. 

‘H-Hey. There are some people after me and I need your help.’

That got their attention like moths to a lamp. Unfortunately, the sound of raised voices was getting closer. He ran over to the two of them as quickly as he could and then grabbed the woman's soft hands. He’d never been so bold before, but this was a time-sensitive mission in his head. His expression and his actions made the woman’s eyes bulge a small bit, the guy placing a hand on his back.

‘Please, when they get here, please pretend you’re potential buyers and you caught me running!’

As if understanding what was going on, Reiki sensed a big shift in their behaviour. To him, it was like they were really good at shifting personalities. The wave of hostility overrode the sense he previously detected akin to a mother’s protectiveness. Partially worn out, he slumped to the floor by their feet. 

‘Aah, there you are. You filthy rascal. You should be grateful I found you wandering those roads outside the city all those miles back all alone. Back to the cell with you. Your new friend will be perfect for an important customer.’

Without noticing it, the boy, the slave trader and the adventurer never noticed the woman’s eyebrow twitch ever so slightly at the mention of him being chucked into a cell. Luckily, taking Reiki’s words on board, she steeled herself for the side-quest before returning to her current job at hand. 

‘I’m terribly sorry. This rascal ran into us and we didn’t notice he was one of yours. What’s your name again?’ 

‘Oh, I’m Geordo. Nice to meet you. What brings you to the town today?’

‘Nothing much, just looking for someone to do some stuff so that it won’t be traced back to us.’

The men began talking as the woman hastily grabbed Reiki by the wrist and hauled him awkwardly to his feet and continued to hold his wrist until they got to the entrance of what looked like a worn-down warehouse. Once inside, she let go as soon as the door was locked with an S-shaped key. Initially shoving him in front of her, she managed to steer him behind her as the two guys slowly walked down the abandoned halls. 

That’s when he noticed that they were in conversation about him and the girl he was hoping to save was not in the room they just entered. He had hoped to see her at least one more time, but it looked like she was moved somewhere else entirely.

‘Aah, so I take it that you want to hire this boy to do some of your deeds then? Seeing as he managed to get out from under my fingers, he might be a bit of trouble for you…’

‘You don’t need to worry about that. I know how to whip him into obedience.’ 

Clashing his knuckles together, the adventurer managed to create a short gust of wind that gently blew around the room as his smile stretched wide. In an almost convincingly mischievous manner. As he stood behind the other adventurer, Reiki noticed that after she’d walked in front of him, she was gesturing with her hands behind her back and out of sight of Geordo. Some looked familiar, like the fingers across the palm, but others he wasn’t sure of. 

He could make out words like “many”, “tap” and “count”. He didn’t know what she was asking until she repeated the hand signals after a brief pause to answer the question. That’s when he put it together. 

‘Oh, is she asking how many there are by tapping her hands? I guess randomly remembering some stuff from a BSL video has finally paid off.’

He mentally shook his head whilst keeping his head hunched over, hiding his face. He could hear heavy banging faintly through the wall and after tapping about seven times on her arm discreetly, she gave him a thumbs up. 

‘Seems like she’s been through this before. Why aren’t they recognising her though if she has?’

Pondering this, he started to focus on a soft shrill mixed with a muffled twang from the room over. He then considered it to be coming from the metallurgy room. The two adventurers and the slave trader then wrapped up the conversation and got up from their seats. 

‘I hope some of the kids in the cell with me are still there.’ 

Taking the route back down, the stench of the damp and sweat-smelling hallways assaulted his nose once again. Previously, he’d had a bag on his head. Now, he could see numerous cells on both sides of the corridor he’d snuck out from. 

The girl was nowhere in sight and he had to hold himself back from making another run for it. Upon walking past his cell, two of the girls saw him and they tried to get his attention. All he did was put a finger to his lips as soon as one of them went up to the crisscrossed bars and held onto them at head height. He pointed at the two undercover adventurers and gave a discreet okay-hand signal. 

‘So these first few cells house some of our latest arrivals. One of which was a very generous one, despite her clothes being the worst out of all of them.’ 

‘Oh is that so?’ 

‘Yup. Hey, Beomund!’

‘Bwuh, wha-?’

‘Get off your fat arse and help these fine couple out! They’re looking for another slave.’

A smaller, five-foot-four man with a gentle stubble walked up. He stifled a huge yawn when he saw the boy that escaped had returned with two adults in tow. He looked about Reiki’s age, but his deep baritone voice had a few telltale signs. 

‘Wait a second… THAT’S A DWARF!’

Reiki’s screamed to himself internally. 

‘He looks so… normal. Human-like even. Guess the stereotypes aren’t always true. Plus, he’s a good-looking guy too.’

The dwarf went through all their cells, using a poorly made pile of paper to describe what each one of them is good at. The list was small but detailed. Upon seeing all the kids, the lady accidentally let slip a display of her true, almost motherly side at the poor conditions the kids were in. Geordo even picked up on this subtle change. 

‘Are you sure you’re here to get a slave?’

‘Oh, definitely, Geordo. It looks like the one we’re specifically looking for isn’t here though.’ 

The woman attempted to place a hand on his shoulder, hopefully giving off that she was gentle enough to only do housework. However, due to Geordo and his team being on edge, he briefly took this to mean something else. Raising his hand to pinch the bridge of his nose, he let out a breath he didn’t know he had been holding.

‘Ey-ey, wotcha hands Miss… Come to think of it, I never caught your names.’

‘Oh, that’s on me! I’m Reya. Reya Mei.’

‘And I’m Brend Neuman. We’re good friends.’

Reiki noticed that the two of them didn’t courtesy or bow when introducing themselves. The guy had shown a mischievous glint along with one side of his mouth raising into a smirk. Despite being adventurers, they didn’t show any signs of either politeness or hostility due to it being a shady part of town that they were in. 

‘Right this way then, if you will, Miss Mei.’ 

Reiki couldn’t help but chuckle a little at the choice of words. Not out loud, but in his mind. He hoped he was portraying himself as a “well-behaved slave”. The halls he’d just escaped from continued just a little further, where they came across a strangely well-cleaned and highly maintained room just like here they had been discussing earlier. 

They sat down to talk about potential choices and they brought in an even mix of boys and girls. One of them stood out from the rest. That was the girl he’d bonded with earlier; between another girl with blonde, shoulder-length hair and a boy with auburn hair and long bangs covering one of his eyes. 

Her wrists had remnants of red marks. A large round one with four protruding around the rest. Reiki’s mind immediately thought of the straps that held her down. The girl’s eyes glistened briefly as she spotted him. He was a little captivated by how well they managed to clean her up from the tattered clothing she had previously been in. They must have some women on staff to tend to all the kids. 

‘Here’s today’s selection. One is currently under pre-order by an anonymous client, but we’re using her to display how our services are top-class. I hope at least some of these slaves today are to your liking, Master Neuman and Miss Mei. As the Head Trader, I hope there’s one we can come to an agreement over.’ 

When the Head Trader flicked his wrist and waved towards himself, the girl who’d recognised him stopped staring absentmindedly at him and stepped forward. When she bowed, only Reiki had noticed a circular mark on her neck that was previously hidden by her hair. This mark was on the opposite side to both the host and the two adventurers, so they were unable to see it. 

Letting out a sigh, he shifted his sight to the corner of a piece of yellow parchment that seemed to poke out of a small bag on Reya’s belt. The young lad only just twigged the two adventurers were using false names, as the two letters he could barely make out were “R” and “E”. 

‘On second thought, it looks like the girl we were looking for seems to be here. We should be grateful, instead of heading to the other place we were heading to. Isn’t that right, Brand?’

‘I bet we were gonna get some cheapskate price too... We’re lucky we found you, Geordo.’

‘I’m grateful to be in your service, you two. I would like to know who it was that had said their service had our merchandise.’ 

His left eyebrow twitched wildly at the thought of someone else in the same business saying they had his merchandise. To Reiki, who imagined how this was to play out from here, the two adventurers both seemed as if they’d found their chosen target; the girl he’d made some kind of friendship with. But the moment was short-lived. 

Without any notice, two hooded figures came from the doorway to the corridor and fell to the floor. The walls shook from the force of the door opening and the two were breathing heavily. 

‘Boss, you gotta help us.’

‘Yeah, what ‘e said!’ 

This only caused Geordo’s anger to erubess his face. He was trying hard to keep his emotion down whilst in front of his potential customers, albeit fake customers at that. 

‘One of the Guild Members was watching the alley these two came down when following you and they saw us coming from it and attempted to chase us down. We think we lost ‘em, but we didn’t look back to check.’

This just made his anger boil even further and it was almost as if steam was about to billow from his ears. Then, calming himself down, he rested his head in his hands for a few seconds then pinched the bridge of his nose once more. 

‘Get everyone here to watch the Topside. We don’t want them finding out there’s more than one secret entrance to these cells.’

‘Onnit, Boss!’ The fitter figure huffed, fixing his garment and snuck out the door.

‘Right. I guess it’s time for this merchandise to come with me.’ He grabs the wrist of the girl still standing forward and begins to storm out of the room. ‘Forgive me for this, but it looks like I’ll have t–’ 

He froze when he turned around to see the longsword and a gently glowing rapier pointed directly at his throat. Both the girl and Reiki weren’t expecting this to happen. A few beads of sweat slid down the Head’s face, before an awkward smirk darkened the atmosphere in the room. 

Out of nowhere, a black mist enveloped the room and it blocked the sight of mostly everyone in the room. The one person who could just see a vague haze of the surroundings and other people in teh room in the mist was none other than Geordo himself. Without knowing it, the boy closed his eyes and tried to focus his sense of direction based on his mental image of the girl. 

The world slowed ever so slightly, but enough that his senses heightened to the point that his hearing enhanced just enough to roughly sense the room around him. By this time, the girl had been dragged out of the room yet the black mist still filled the room.

‘I need to get to the girl.’

Pushing out his senses andfueled with an adrenaline rush of the sudden smokescreen from nowhere, he felt like he could not only sense the room, but feel it. It was as if his sense of touch and perception heightened wildly mixed in with the adrenaline and he. Opening his eyes, it was still pitch black, but his mind perfectly overlaid a three-dimensional mental map of the room. 

‘This is wild. It feels… It feels like a gentle hand… or a thin cloth enveloping everything in my surroundings. This feels surreal. But first things first; I need to save that girl. She’s in danger if she stays here. Including everyone else down below.’

Despite dwelling on his thoughts, he didn’t know what to do. As the sensory phenomena subsided, he still felt the want to race after the guy who had a vice grip on her wrist. His blood boiled aat the thought of any harm coming to such a gentle girl. The black veil suddenly lifted leaving only the two adventurers in the room with him. 

The male adventurer didn’t start with any pleasantries and immediately went to knock down the only door into the room. No good. It wouldn’t budge an inch, no matter how much effort he put into it. During their attempts to escape, Reiki’s blood began to boil at the thought that Geordo was going to take her somewhere he couldn’t possibly find her in, and then sell her to his private customer. He wanted, no, wished he could get to her as fast as he could possibly run.

He barely registered a window that popped up, swiping it away after briefly reading what was displayed. The energy in the room seemed to slowly drift towards the young boy, who stared at the door for what felt to him for a long few seconds when he started sprinting. 

To the two adventurers with him, one second they saw him glaring at the door as if daring it to burn from his gaze alone. The next, a sudden trail of vibrant, neon-green lightning stalks blasted backwards from the spot he was just standing in and connected straight through the door. The guy who had just stopped swinging twitched a little as a tip of a bolt grazed his elbow as they quickly faded into the door. 

At this exact moment, everything but the boy had slowed to a measly crawl no faster than a raindrop falling a centimetre. Relatively speaking, over the span of two seconds. Because he had reacted without thinking, and with his mind in a frenzy, his newly wished for ability to run to a place as quickly as possible had manifested itself and had briefly allowed him to phase through the door... and whatever had been blocking it. 

Finally noticing a strange sense of speed wash through his body, he stood still just down the corridor and looked back. Two large boxes had ever so slowly started to lift from the floor. On either side of the boxes, two unknown assailants appeared to be slowly knocked back by a wall of something invisible. It took him a relative time of two minutes, by which the bottom box had lifted twenty-five centimetres into the air.

Solidifying his resolve, his brows tighten and his eye glinted with determination. As he was about to reach the cells, his ability slowly disabled itself as he stumbled down onto the floor. As soon as he fell to the floor, a boom went off behind him and he cradled his head. He peered out from his obstructed face afterw the shockwave blewpast him, to see various kids in differently coloured and battered clothing. They started to move from protecting the younger kids. 

‘I’m glad they weren’t affected by that. I think I took the worst of it.’

‘Hey mister! What was that?!’

‘I don’t know buddy, but I do know one thing; those guards are out for the count.’

He had looked at the two guards when he added that second part. The boxes that had blocked the door had exploded into small fragments. In some places, it had even become sawdust. A spark or two of green lightning snaked across the tiles around the two bulky, unconscious men. Raising his hand, Reiki closed his eyes and focused on the electricity. He could feel it snaknig around, but it was fading quickly. 

‘Don’t think I have that ability yet. Wait, no, she’s the top priority right now.’

His eyes glinted again, this time accompanied with small sparks zapping briefly at the edges as his mouth widened into a mischievous but gentle smirk. To the kids who’d made it to the bars of their cells, the only thing they saw was him standing there one second, then a flash of green lightning at the same time all their cell doors opened simultaneously. 

Most were in shock. Two fo the oldest kids stepped out cautiously, they eyes bugging out of their heads and a single bead of sweat rolled down their cheeks as they saw the guards nowhere to been seen. They walked closer to the door, only to find the cells either side with each of them bound and gagged somehow. The two of them agreed to keep it to themselves, until the door opened up from the inside and the two adventurers walked out of it. 

Meanwhile, as they were getting consoled by the two adventurers, the speed of the young man had been breathtaking to him. He’d been running around looking for the girl, but somehow, two assailants with wide, devilous grins on their faces had escaped his sight. In the time since helping the kids escape, he’d stumbled a lot. His energy was not ready for what he was doing and he’d turned ihis new ability off to save some energy. 

During this moment with a lack of superspeed, two other assailants who had been watching from the side had hidden themselves to wait for that exact moment. Right now, he was being carried to the man who had orchestrated the entire system. He cursed to himself for letting his guard down. Just having an ability doesn’t mean you’ll always get it right the first time after all.

‘You’re coming with us, twerp. I think the boss would love to see you.’

‘Oh good, I was wondering where he went.’

The guy who spoke to him huffed and rolled his shoulders a little. He wasn’t expecting that response. As he was being hustled forward he could feel his body, albeit tired, starting to regain some strength and stamina. Closing his eyes, he focused on the image of the girl in his head. 

‘I wish I had the strength to save you…’

[…if only I could see where you are.]

[…e-ehh? Wh-who’s doing that?]

Reiki’s head snapped up almost instantly as he was dragged into a darkened room. He focused again on that sudden sensation and the voice. The sides of his mouth turned up when he realised what was happening.

[Calm down, it’s me. The boy from earlier. This is happening between our minds.]

As if sensing her calm dwn, he sensed a tightness on his own wrist briefly appear. But nobody had grabbed him there, as he was being lowered by the armpits into a chair. He waited for them to go before seeing another window briefly flash up to him saying he just unlocked an ability. 

‘Huh. Two abilities in one day.’

As he tried to imagine his abilities, a large wooden door swung open slowly and got his attention. The creaking echoed into the large open space. He saw Geordo enter the room, along with the girl. The two men who’d escorted Him into the room briefly bowed, dropped to a knee and a palm touching their foreheads, pinke and middle fingers raised, before takng their leave through the open door. 

[… Can you still hear me?]

[…Ye- Yes. I- uh, I’m here. They’ve roped you up good over there.]

Geordo placed her in a seat on a stage Reiki hadn’t noticed until just now.

[Listen to me carefully, do you know if any adventurers are on the way?]

[um… I saw the two who were with you, but it looked like he convinced them to leave. I don’t want to be sold. I want to get out of here.]

[You can trust me, okay? I promise you we’ll get out of this.]

[Wait, tell me yo—]

‘I’m gonna have to figure out how to hide my telepathy. It’s going to be a brilliant trump card someday.’

He broke the mental connection, which she noticed instantly. His attention briefly lapsed, but his attention turned to the pompou sman before him.

‘Listen here boy, you shouldn’t be able to escape this time.’ 

‘Yeah, like escaping wasn’t that hard earlier. Barely any guards around. Almost like it was a piece of cake!’

‘Oh, we have a bragger here! Let me teach you a lesson, Boy.’

Before he could react he briefly heard a scream of distress as a ringing appeared in his ears and heavy sting appeared on his cheek. Surprisingly, his pain was short-lived. Whatever had hit him just moments before now felt like a child had slapped him.

‘What, that’s not right! I backhanded your face with an enchanted leather glove! That obedience spell should’ve worked!’ 

Before he could respond, he felt a small woozying sensation briefly make an apearance, before a strong metallic taste flooded his mouth. He turn his head away from where he saw the girl and expelled the taste from his mouth. A puddle of blood glittered with a mixture of yellow and purple sparkles. Of which faded away into the air. 

‘NO! He’s immune?! But nobody’s ever been immune to that spell!’

‘Suck it up, fatty. Now then, let’s do things my way.’ 

The corners of his mouth curled up a little as he stood up from his chair. 

‘That’s not right! They tied him down! How is he standing?!’

‘Let’s begin, shall we? Let’s see if I can undo my shackles.’

The whites of his eyes widened, his previously shocked expression turned into one of pure terror. The clanks of the metal casing used to bind his legs and hands together reverberated around the room. A bright green, electrifying aura briefly glowed from Reiki’s body as Geordo watched in fear as his eyes were drawn to his ankles.

For some reason, he couldn’t fouson them. They looked out of focus, and as he stepped forward, they seemed to pass through the shackles on his feet before coming back into focus.

‘OI! I NEED HELP!’

The volume of the yell didn’t phase the boy. Until  the other battle-ready thugs of the illegal activities started to make their way into the room. Despite having an unaffected grin, he was panicking internally.

‘That’s more than I could handle earlier. I don’t think I have the time to knoc—’

‘DON’T GIVE UP! I BELIEVE IN YOU! PLEASE GET ALL OF US OUT OF HERE!’

That sudden shout from the girl who was terrified of the situation widened his eyes. He changed his stare at the guys befoer him into a glare that made even the stronger wince in fear. His aura returned, sparking all over his body, before he vanished in a puff of air. A sudden maze of electric green lightning suddenly appeared out of thin air. Geordo suddenly went flying when one of the wall.

‘Whuh?! What the f—’

To the thugs, their boss went from standing before the child, then suddenly finding him embedded in a wall. He was upside down, his entire back view exposed and unconscious. The neon-electric walls of electricity slowly moved closer to them and they immediately turned tail to escape the strange ability before them.

However, as soon as they found themselves outside the different warehouse, a group of about nine adventurers were all standing there, abilities at the ready and mid-march. Almost as if they were about to raid them that very moment. 

‘We’re screwed.’ 

Meanwhile, as the group of thugs were outside, Reiki had seen this as an opportunity and managed to gather all of the kids from the cells into the large open space. He had also locked Geordo up in the cell with the thickest bars and most-complicated looking lock system he could find.

After a short while, he found his energy draining as he made his way to the room with the last two kids in tow; the girl on his back and the boy in his arms he saved from earlier. Luck was on their side, right as he made it into the room; the female adventurer from earlier forced the door to open as quickly as possible on its creaky, well-worn, rusted hinges. 

‘Right everyone, make sure you— huh?!’

She raced forward to catch Reiki struggling, without his superspeed, to carry the two children. He was barely awake from all the effort he’d just gone through moving everyone from their cells to the room. 

‘I… did… it.  I… got…’

He only uttered those last few words before he conked out in the adventurer’s arms. He missed her questions entirely as the rest of her team entered the room.

‘…Did what? Wait, did you do this?!’

Her colleague came over and noticed who she cradled in her arms. He placed a hand on her shoulder as she stood up, carrying him gently. The two shred a silent gaze, with a smile, shared between them. 

‘He needs to be rewarded.’

‘Let’s tell him what he’s done when he wakes up.’

‘Sure thing.’

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