With Ron’s help, things became a whole lot easier than I expected.

Instead of aimlessly wandering around the premises of Sector 24, I ran towards specific locations he had marked everyday, areas he claimed to be brimming with slave activity. All I had to do was find a hiding spot and wait for them to show up.

To my surprise, most of his information was scarily accurate, as I would usually find myself with a group of slaves to hunt down in no time.

However, I was always skeptical and questioned whether it was some sort of trap, so I decided to take the stealthy route. Whenever a lone slave had some distance from his peers, that’s when I would take the chance to knock them out and take him back to the mines.

Sometimes, it would end peacefully in silence, but other times, I found myself fighting against groups of slaves alone. It was never easy, so I would always find myself with some sort of wound or injury that I had to treat and cover up with bandages just to keep myself afloat, to the point where I had them completely wrapped around my torso, arms and legs like a mummy. But I always prevailed in the end.

At first, I’ve only been hunting for days. But the days turned to weeks and the weeks turned into a month. By that time, I stopped counting the amount of slaves I had captured. The more I hunted, the less remorse I felt about any of my actions. Their cries for mercy seemed even less audible as time passed on.

It worried me. Was I getting….used to this?

I had arrived back into the mines with a slave on my shoulders, dropping him off to one of the slave managers nearby. And by managers, I meant the people with the whips.

“You’re early again, pussyboy!” The slave manager gave me a mocking smile. “Good work.”

‘Pussyboy’ was what most of the members of the Midas Hogs called me. It was simply because Hector treated me like a pet and that I always submitted myself to his orders. It’s not like I wanted this anyway, but I just don’t have a choice.

I ignored him and walked to the fortress.

During dinnertime, I would always be seated close to Hector, which was something that I really hated. Everyone else would give these condescending looks towards my face while he pampered me like a little kitty.

“Say ah,” Hector smiled.

I quivered my lips and hesitated for a moment.

“Say. It.” Hector gave me a serious stare.

“Tsk,” I opened my mouth and he shoved the spoon right down my throat.

I almost felt like puking from the sudden intrusion, but I held it in and took all the contents from the spoon.

“Kahk!”

“Hahahahaha! That’s a good boy!” Hector patted my head.

I gritted my teeth and glanced around, hearing snickers coming from some of the slave hunters seated in front of me. This is just pathetic.

As soon as dinner was over, I quickly made my way to the hallway leading to my quarters. It was the only place I could be at peace, so I hurried over before-

“If it isn’t the pussyboy!” a man yelled from behind me.

“Damn it…” I muttered.

I turned around to see a big fat ugly bastard and his friends approaching me. And yes, in my eyes, he was the ugliest bastard I have ever seen in my life. I don’t mind ugly people, though. I could care less about his big fat nose, chubby lips and blubbery face, but when you pair it up with his ugly personality and the way he treats women slaves……I just hate him. Out of everyone in the Midas Hogs, Tusker was the person I hate the most. Even more than Hector himself.

His hand grabs onto my throat and slams me to the wall, cutting out the air from my lungs. I grabbed onto his arm with both of my hands, but that ridiculous grip strength of his was something I was unable to resist.

“Aw, the poor kitty can’t breathe. Boohoo!” Tusker looked at me with a sardonic smile.

Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.

“T-Tusker, you bastard! Let go of me!” I forced myself to breathe out those words.

“You know, this is your fault for constantly disrupting my work.”

You call it work, but it’s obviously just a way of pleasuring yourself with your sadistic tendencies, you fat pig!

As much as I hate what he does, you should have just ignored it for your own good.

You know I couldn’t just stand by and watch those things happen, Gray!

And here you are now, on the brink of being choked to death. You know, this would be easy if you could just summon Black and kill them all. Maybe Hector would give you a pass.

I told you, I won’t ever kill again! Ever!

Even if it’s to kill a guy as terrible as him?

If I let a bastard like him break my oath, I’ll never forgive myself!

Lars, as always, you’re an idiot. A stubborn idealistic idiot. That’s what I like about you, fufufu!

“Get off me!” I swing my foot right up his crotch, forcing him to let go of me and fall down the floor screaming in agony.

I cough off the excess air that had been trapped down in my lungs and pick myself up off the ground. His two fellow slave hunters try to help Tusker up, but he pushes them away and picks up a metal object from his pocket. The moment the item came into view, I felt my heart leap out of my chest.

He frantically held the pen-like device in his hand, pointing its red crystal tip right towards my face. Red Magium. That same red crystal as the one embedded in my collar.

“D-Detonator…”

“Did you forget that I have this?! If it weren’t for Hector, I would have blown your head off to smithereens ages ago!” Tusker glared at me with sweat running down his oily face.

Damn, is he seriously going to do this?

People tend to do explosive things when they’re mad, you know? Pun intended, fufufu!

This isn’t funny, Gray. I might actually die from this!

Nope, that's highly unlikely.

“H-Hey!” his friend panicked. “Hector’s gonna kill us all if you blow the boy’s head off! Are you crazy?!”

“Stop it, Tusker! It’s not worth it!” his other friend holds his shoulder.

Tusker’s hand trembles as he continues pointing the Detonator towards me, but he stops and clicks his tongue.

“Damned Enforcer, be grateful that you’re Hector’s favorite pet,” Tusker and his companions walk away, then looks back. “But once he finds something better to play with and throws you away, I’ll happily be your next owner,” he laughs.

“In your dreams,” I muttered.

I’m sure you’ve already noticed. Hector is feared by everybody in the Midas Hogs. To kill you would mean going against his power. No one would want to do that. They don’t have the guts, fufufu!

Once I entered my room and closed the door shut, I laid my back against it and slowly dropped to the floor on my knees with a big sigh.

Heh. I’m definitely losing it. I don’t know if I can take this any longer. It’s clear the Midas Hogs don’t want me in their ranks, so everyday is basically a big dose of social anxiety and paranoia. But I’m safe here, where I’m all alone, where no one can bother me, where-

Quit monologuing and stop wasting time. You still have something to do, right?

Yeah, right.

I got up and checked underneath my bed to pick up a few items.

A stack of books, a slave collar, a Detonator and a Blue Magium. All four were items that I had collected from my slave hunting routines.

The books were something I gathered from an old library, the slave collar was something they gave out to any slave hunter who wished to capture a new slave, the Detonator was something I picked up from a group of slaves who had murdered a Midas gang member and the Blue Magium was something I stole from the fortress’ Magium supply. No one would really notice, since the Midas Hogs had a surplus of Magium, all obtained from all the cruel abuse and overworking of the slave miners.

I’ve spent most of my nights working on this, reading up on books related to Alchemy, where I tried to study how Magium worked as a power source and how it was integrated into technological advancements and inventions.

To summarize my findings, I figured out that Red Magium was what caused a slave collar to explode due to its fire element. In order to trigger the reaction, it would need to receive a concentrated ray of energy coming from another Red Magium, which is provided by the Detonator. This would cause the Red Magium of the collar to overload and explode.

A Blue Magium, which is imbued with the water element can counter the effects of Red Magium and weaken its properties.

In conclusion, I would have to make a different version of the Detonator, where instead of it having a Red Magium tip, it would have a Blue Magium tip that would fire a concentrated ray of energy to drain the Red Magium’s power. I would call this invention, the Defuser.

The obvious solution would be to replace the Red Magium with the Blue Magium, but if that were the case, I would have been free by now.

I’ve done several tests with the Defuser and observed that Blue Magium energy tends to flow, rather than shoot out in a straight line like the Red Magium. This means that its power isn’t concentrated enough to neutralize the Red Magium.

Basically, I found myself stuck trying to figure out how to make it work. All I could do at this point was continue reading more books.

It’s tedious work, but if I succeed, I can get rid of this collar and be free.