Or so I thought. I woke up in what felt like a cart judging from how it moved. My hands and feet were shackled. He's awake! I reacted to Raishin's smiling mug who was a bit too close.
Never thought I'd be happy to hear your voice. What happened?
After your illusion dropped, we got found pretty easily. But I didn't know you were this good at illusions, only the last layer disappeared, but somehow you managed to keep the other 2 layers up after you collapsed. Gregory said as he was leaning against the side of the cart and peeling a potato.
Don't count on that in the future, I have no clue how I managed that. Are you guys alright?
Ted had a worrisome look an his face. he seemed roughed up but it looks that whatever did damage to him had happened quite a while ago.
Are you kidding me? You're the one who almost died, we just got captured, quite easily sadly.
Yeah, weirdly that Jeff guy helped out quite a bit, they wanted to let you bleed out and die but he convinced his reinforcements that you were probably the strongest out of us 4, so they healed you up. But man those 2 new guys were strong; it was like they were taking candy from babies.
Well, we don't have any combat experience so we might as well be. Anyways, my eyes hurt like hell so I'm keeping them closed, what is the situation?
Hmm well, it has been 2 days since we got captured, we were being transported in a cart. There are no other kids since this seems to be the only cart that has cargo, which is us.
We're in the regular dimension where the humans live now. I don't know if you can feel it but our home is gone.
Gone? Yeah, it got swallowed up in a dimensional rift or something.
I could feel that the mood was heavy.
I hope everyone there is okay…
They must be! Nobody ever has gotten the best out of our mothers! And even besides them, we have a lot of strong races that defend our city. They will be fine! Right?...
I hope so…
No use in thinking about what we can't change! We should focus on getting out of this and getting back home!
Even though this optimism is a little misplaced looking at the situation, he is right. Even if we were in the capital, we’d be too weak to even have an impact on the fight. All we can do is believe that our mothers keep everyone safe and focus on getting out of this mess.
Ted slapped his cheeks and seemed to get out of his somber mood.
You guys surely are positive, I can't afford to stay down when you guys are already looking forward.
I suggest we just reflect for a while on what happened and after that start thinking of how to get out of this mess.
Good idea!
“These brats sure turned out lively!” A voice said from the front of the cart. An old wrinkly light brown face appeared, peered at us, and said: Seems the other kid woke up. Just in time! We're about to reach our destination in under a day! I opened my eyes and looked around. We were in a covered cart that hid us from the outside. It was quite dark and the only things with me in the cart were my buddies and some potatoes.
Great, the first thing I see when I wake up are potatoes…
Yeah, maybe it was a good thing you were knocked out for two days because the only thing we got to eat was potatoes.
I shuddered and tried to not think of potatoes.
So, uh we’re gonna get sold as slaves, right? What’s the plan? We bust out and escape?
Hmm, that's a good question. I don't know about you guys but I haven't fully recovered and we don't know what kind of strong characters will be out there.
So what? Do we just get sold off?
I don't think there is any good answer here but the fact is we will probably get separated there.
Hmm, I don't like that at all.
Yeah, me neither.
Hmm, what are our options? I don't think asking them will be effective.
Hmm.
What's up Agnis? Gregory asked with a curious look.
If I remember correctly, nine-tail spirit foxes have an ability to probability manipulation and it could be used to raise the chances of us ending up together but I have no clue how to use it.
How about we run simulations?
Whud?
Hmm, we can let our tails run simulations about events in the near future or about perfecting magic. It does cost quite some energy though…
Well, luckily, we have a six-tailed lightning tiger that can make energy out of thin air.
We all looked at Raishin.
What?
Hmm ok, won't it become painfully obvious if you guys suddenly go all-tailed beast mode? Hmm good point, Raishin, can you summon thunderclouds? In response to that, I will cover our area in a shroud of darkness which will make the situation quite shitty to travel in. We can also use the darkness as a veil to lessen the burden on Agnis Illusion so that we can pull this off.
Can we use this to escape? Hmmm, I looked around a bit and the 3 guys sitting in front of the cart are about as strong as the guys who caught you guys. If we try to escape, we might get in trouble, but if we are just being quiet, we might get lucky. Raishin, did you already forgot how you tried to escape a day ago and they caught you quite easily?
That one doesn't count! How am I supposed to successfully escape with a potato-only diet? By the way, can you peel some potatoes for me? Hell no!
What kind of answer did you even expect? Gregory sighed.
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Raishin started summoning thunderclouds and Gregory made a veil of darkness descend accompanying the thunderstorm. What the! One of the men in front said. That is quite a sudden storm. Shit! I was hoping to arrive in Jubra city today. Said another man. It can't be helped, just make sure the brats don't try to escape again. The cart went on for a bit and then stopped. It was storming right now and the visibility was poor. We got dragged out of the cart and put in a structure that seemed to be freshly made from earth magic. Luckily the men made their structure some distance from ours. They were probably confident that they could deal with whatever we would try to attempt. Which was fine by me because this gave us the opportunity.
Ok, so the plan is to reduce the burden on Agnis as much as possible since he was kind of carrying us hard during our escape. Raishin, you make the energy, I manipulate it and make it compatible with Agnis and then move it to him, and Agnis does simulations to try that probability manipulation thing.
What about me? Ted said as he pointed at himself.
Maybe you could distract those guys, how about you just walk around, and look around a bit suspiciously, it is dark but they will notice and keep an eye on you.
The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
Ugh, decoy, eh? Fine. Won't they notice a massive amount of energy?
It will be fine, I will catch the excess energy and bank it in my shadow, no energy will make it past this hut for them to feel.
I am surprised, I thought all of you guys were good for making pranks and causing trouble, but look at you guys! Being competent!
Zip it, Ted, I need to concentrate!
Yeah, go get caught by those men!
Raishin our plan doesn't involve Ted getting caught we're trying to escape…
I still don't understand why we can't use this to escape.
How about after my simulations are successful, we try to escape? Won't hurt to try.
Yes! Aight I'll start producing some energy then! The more the better right?
Please keep it reasonable, if you make too much too fast, they will notice and even our escape plan will fail!
Fine!
Raishin said as he pouted.
We started up our plan and everything seemed to proceed smoothly. All the energy Raishin created, got converted and sent to me by Gregory, and the little excess got banked in his shadow. Something shadow cats can do well is manipulating and storing energy, they tend to use shadows for almost anything so it wouldn't be surprising if they stored energy in their shadows. I don't know what they will do with it but I guess I will find out one day. They also seem to have the ability to flip alignments and attributes. I heard a story of Nadila fighting an individual with an insane magical and physical defense that was impossible to bring down, and she flipped his defense to offense and one-shot him. If you ask me that sounds very overpowered but I guess we all have some overpowered traits from our races. I don't think Gregory has mastered this yet or even attempted it. Anyway, I started running some simulations in 3 of my tails. I spent the first half hour trying to simulate how to even use this ability and then started trying to use it in my simulations. After 3 hours I started to get the hang of it but time was running out because the thunderstorm was subsiding and to not make it suspicious Gregory had to gradually reduce the darkness with it. After getting some half-satisfactory results I signaled the guys to stop.
Did you get something?
Hmm not really, I have a good grasp on how to use it but the best I can do is probably add about 20% on top of the percentage we have to end up together. And yet again this is a skill that takes a lot of energy so if I could get some of that energy, you banked just now when attempting it that would be a great help.
Sure.
It's escaping time! Raishin was about to dash out but I grabbed his shirt and pulled him back.
How about we make something resembling a plan before we run out and get instantly caught?
Meh.
You can slow those guys down with shadow manipulation right Greg?
Yeah, but my crowd control isn't as effective as yours.
That is fine, you just need to slow them down temporarily.
What is the plan?
It is very simple, but it depends on how well you can match my speed, Raishin.
Oh shit, I can match it but not for too long, you’re crazy fast.
How does 10 minutes sound?
Ugh, this is going to suck for me but I guess I have no choice.
The plan is simple, Greg slows those men down a bit, you grab Ted, I grab Greg and we dash off, I’m going to make ice slides and ice ramps to augment our speed and to hinder the men when they pursue us.
So, what happens after 10 minutes?
I will probably be able to break my shackles by then and will be able to carry you as well
Ooh smart. I like the Idea, it's simple enough for Raishin to understand and the only thing that could go wrong is those men being able to catch up.
I rechecked the status of the 2 illusion layers I had on us from the beginning. Made some tweaks and gave the ready sign. The plan commenced, and we casually walked out of the structure. It was clear skies by now and the men were getting ready to resume the trip. Gregory applied the shadow bind, while they were standing still so that they would only notice when they would try to move.
Raishin grabbed Ted from behind his shirt.
What the…
I piggybacked Greg and we dashed off. The three men stood still for about a couple of seconds in surprise after which they tried to move but were struggling. They broke free in 3 seconds but those added to our head start I gotta tell you, it is hard to move fast with your hands and feet chained together. I had to use shorter steps but still try to keep up the speed I wanted to reach. It was also hard to balance with my hands chained and Gregory on my back. Gregory was trying to make sure the chain on his handcuffs didn't choke me because it wasn't easy for him to hold on either. I looked at Raishin and he seemed to have the same problem running but his hands were free.
What the fuck Raishin, why are your hands free?
Oh, this? Haha, I forgot that I broke out of them when I was generating energy.
Both Gregory and I were speechless. I decided to ignore this and started making ice trails and ice ramps to aid our escape. The men were hot on our tails but the ice I left behind seemed to hinder them quite a bit. It seemed like our plan would be a success because the distance between us and the men started to increase and Gregory was feeding me energy to speed me up... And then Raishin tripped. It was one ugly fall. I don't blame him because the leg shackles were a real pain in the ass but this couldn't come at a worse time. I went back to help Raishin up but the men caught up in the meantime. The men quickly overpowered us and put anti-magic shackles on us.
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Jubra city, a city of welfare and commerce, there were markets, stores, merchants, and carts carrying various goods and stuff everywhere. Also, what we saw were slaves. They were recognizable by a magic circle with a chain icon floating on the right side of their necks. It was kind of hard to miss. The chain came in 3 colors, Red, Blue, and Green but I didn't know what that meant. We were brought to a big square where the slave trading was held just out in the open. Due to the uncomfortable atmosphere and series of events there, I will quickly summarize what happened. There were about 200 slaves sold there and we were one of the last to put them on display. I ran my probability manipulation technique but I had no idea if it worked. Raishin tried yet again to escape and got captured almost instantly. We got sold for 1 gold each by a group of men who seemed to be well acquainted.
We didn't get sold to the same person but it seems these 4 men knew each other well so I could say it could be worse. The man who bought me seemed to be a blacksmith and needed help in his workshop, Raishin got bought by a hunter, Gregory got bought by an alchemist who needed an assistant, and Ted by a martial artist who seemed to be unable to get any disciples. All our slave marks were green except Ted’s which was red. My hypothesis was the nature of the master-slave relation, we three were bought to help out with something while Ted wasn't. But I didn't have enough information to say for sure. The men who bought us were quite nice but we all were in a bad mood obviously so we didn't want to associate with them. We got transported to their hometown in yet another cart. It seems that the strong desire to escape and acting on this desire by trying to flee sets off the slave mark and binds you and notifies your owner where you are, quite the pain in the ass.
The journey to their hometown would take five days. The scenery here was very different from Jubra city. Jubra city was on a plain but we were going through a mountainous area. Raishin, trying to look at the scenery, fell out of the cart and almost fell to his death. Luckily, I was fast enough to save him. The men were quite talkative and even though we still tried to associate as minimally as possible, we realized we were stuck with them for an undefined amount of time so at least Gregory and I tried to start building a friendly relationship with our owners. Mine was called Phillip and it seems he had a son who would've been about my age but his son got mauled by a bear. Gregory’s owner was called Pietro and it seems all his assistants were clumsy or had low intelligence. When slaves are sold some magic shows some traits of the slaves. Observant and accurate seemed to be mine, intelligent and studious seemed those of Gregory. I assume those of Raishin and Ted were some that made their owners buy them. On the fifth day, we arrived at Boshi town, their hometown. It was protected by a light purplish barrier that spanned over the whole town. It was invisible until something passed through it when you could for a split second see it appear and then disappear. It seems it doesn't let anyone through and some procedures were done by some customs-looking process. I got curious about how and what but I didn't get any answers.
The town looked like a slightly old town; it didn't seem to lag much behind in time despite how remote it was. At least from what I can tell, I compared it to Jubra city and Nadila capital. There seemed to be a lot of devices running on magic that I hadn't seen in Nadila, Jubra was full of it and Boshi town seemed to have them too. We realized that we knew nothing of this regular dimension of life. But I guess we will find out how too soon.
I wondered how long I had to keep up these illusions. It was draining. I decided to do something possibly very stupid. Before we split up to go and check where we would be working, I told Philip that I was hiding our appearance with illusions and that I'm gonna lift it. Which I did. Raishin was shocked of course but Ted and Gregory understood why I did this. The men were slightly surprised; besides Philip, it seems they made a bet about who could buy the best slave and it seems he won since he bought one who could use illusions. Besides that, they didn't care too much, they were even happy that we didn't look so bland anymore and that they got a good deal getting us relatively cheap. I found this inappropriate but I just went with it. These men didn't seem to live too far from each other so it would've been easy for us to meet up in breaks if we wanted to. I started my life as a blacksmith apprentice and got taught all there was to know about blacksmithing and forging, Philip's wife was into clothing making, or whatever term describes that. So occasionally I also got subjected to weaving stuff. It wasn't too bad and my speed and precision made it a piece of cake. Raishin started to be the hunters' sidekick. He seemed to enjoy it.
Gregory seemed to be a good match with alchemy and he even helped Pietro with a breakthrough in his alchemy research. Ted was ehh, happy I guess, he could keep punching stuff and he learned various types of martial arts. He was the only one who left the village to compete with his master in some tournaments. In our free time, he taught us martial arts since he seemed to be passionate about it. I and Raishin were quite interested in it but Gregory would have none of that. We still had plans of escaping slavery even though our lifestyle didn't turn out to be that bad and our owners were genuinely nice people. We got a lot of freedom and of course, we abused it. We started gathering as much knowledge as we could, we also practiced our magic and trained in martial arts, besides Gregory, and in general, we tried getting stronger. We didn't reveal that we were tailed beasts or anything. Any tailed beast can hide their ears and tails as a basic skill, even Ted could hide his ears and tail easily. I still had to apply an illusion on my hair though. But in remembrance of Yuna’s deed to protect us I didn't make it fully black but kept the ends of my hair silver. While living this new lifestyle but still making plans to escape, five years passed.