Chapter 6

After Jason made his oath he began to assess the situation. He had to put away his rage. It wouldn't help him right now. He cleared his mind and started looking around. It was late in the day. He could see the sun was setting and it seemed to rest on the tops of the trees at the edge of the clearing. A red glow suffused the sky. If it was under different circumstances he would have thought the sight beautiful.

He looked over to his right and noticed the cage closest to him contained Prisha. Her cage was less then three feet from his and if his hands were not bound and chained he could have reached through the bars of his cage and touch hers. She was looking at him through the bars of her own cage but her vision seemed clouded and dull. Hope had fled her eyes all together. Jason felt a pang of regret at that. "She had such bright and strong eyes before. They are still truly beautiful but now she seems like a lifeless mannequin." She lowered her gaze and stared at the bottom of her cage.

"I'm sorry." He said. Her eyes shot up and she looked him straight in the eyes when he said that confusion evident in her gaze.

"What?" She whispered , afraid of being heard and reprimanded for speaking.

Jason repeated "I'm sorry. I should never have let us come here."

Prisha understood. "Don't blame yourself. You couldn't have known. We all decided to come here. The blame isn't on you." Jason felt a little reassured on hearing her words.

"Don't worry I'll find a way out of this for us." Jason said as he begun to fidget and manipulate his manacles tugging and twisting them with force.

"Don't!" Pasha voice contained worry and panic but it was already too late.

BZZZTTT

Jason suddenly felt pain jump up his arms and travel through his chest and down his torso and into his legs. "Aaarrrghh" Jason tried screaming but even that was beyond him right then and It only came out as barely a gasp. It was like an electrical current was running up his arms.

It was actually more than like an electrical current as real arcs of electricity jumped from his shackles and entered his forearms and wrists. Jason floundered on the floor of his small cage banging into the sides of it as he flailed about. Some of the men in the camp seemed to gain pleasure at his pain and started laughing.

As the current slowly died down Jason regained control of his body. "Don't do that again." Jason told himself.

Prisha asked in a whisper "Are you ok? The manacles shock you if you mess with them. If you are caught talking to each other or disobey they also shock you."

Jason nodded his head and reassured her. "I'm fine just surprised." He said as he tried to steady his breathing and shake the numbness from his limbs. Jason came to the conclusion breaking or meddling with them is a no go for now. He wasn't strong enough yet. Not nearly strong enough. His qi was weak and his fire element was almost non-existent.

Jason thought about it and decided he might be able to break these manacles when he achieved second core. He could use the power of the water core to redirect the current away from his body while using the pure strength of body a second mortal core offered as well as an abundant amount of qi to break them possibly with the help of some extreme heat from his fire core. He couldn't be sure though. He had no understanding of the principles these shackles worked by.

"That's a concern for later. I haven't even fully formed the mortal fire core yet." Jason thought. Yes Jason hadn't even formed his first core yet. Earlier when he was meditating and the rest of the group was resting he thought he had formed it but now he knew better. "I was such an idiot. I thought I did it but that was like claiming to draw the Mona Lisa when all you had done was draw a stick figure." He had only started forming his first core. It was like a tiny and fragile glass shell with a match in it. Compared to a real mortal fire core which was like an inferno sorounded by an almost impenetrable shell, it was both weak and easily broken. It offered very little help presently.

"Damn" Jason cursed inwardly. "Are you alright?" Prisha asked a second time.

Jason quirked his eyebrows and looked at her. "I told you I'm fine. The electrical current just caused a little pain. I'm fine now." Jason was confused why she was asking twice.

Prisha shook her head and said "Not that..... you where screaming in your sleep before you woke up. I was worried. You sounded like you where in agony." Prisha's eyes seemed to regain a semblance of strength and focus. Her concern for him looked to distract her from the horrible state they were all in. 

"Yeah I'm fine. It was just a bad nightmare. Thank you for asking...... You're a kind person." Jason told Prisha as he smilled and winked at her. He wanted to keep his cultivation a secret and the best way to keep a secret was to tell noone. Two people can keep a secret only when one of them is dead. It's not that he did not trust her but this secret was far too big to tell anyone. Especially someone he had only known for two days. He had no idea what the consequences would be exactly if his secret leaked but it wouldn't be good. He knew that.

Prisha nodded her head and a blush presented slightly on her cheek. It was hard to see such a light blush with her light caramel like skin tone but Jason noticed it. His eye sight was much better since his time in the dark space. He thought "she's cute when she blushes." He felt a little joy in this horrible situation at provoking a blush out of the mature and stunning woman.

Breaking his sight away from the beauty he looked around at the other cages. The rest of the group was present but seemed uninterested in talking or in fear of talking as they stared at the floor of their cages or glanced around in fear. All save one. Darek wasn't in any of the cages around him. He wondered where the big fool was for a second before deciding he didn't give a shit. "I hope he was killed."

Before the ambush Jason would not have wished for the lustful arogant and stupid brute to die but the giant's act of cowardice , shoving the women out of his way as he fled pushed Jason's feelings for the gaint over the edge from extreme dislike and into the realm of hatred.

Putting the hatred for the man aside he continued his observation. Everyone was present. Actually not really. Bob wasn't. Jason thought of the old man. "He was a kind man." He couldn't say much more about the man as he really barely knew him but he still felt a pang of regret at the kind old man's passing. The old man reminded him of a chubby Morgan Freeman, with his steady and deep voice and calm demeaner. He seemed very wise beyond even HIS advanced years. The scene of the arrow piercing the man's chest and spraying pieces of flesh, lung and bone out his back with a splash of blood circled in his head.

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"I can't think about that now. Stop getting distracted!" thought Jason and continued his observations. There were more cages then the ones his group were in around him. Dirty and ragged people filled most of them, manacles on all of their limbs. They seemed lifeless and devoid of hope.

Jason was surprised to find the camp was actually pretty large. Many more men were present here then than during the ambush. Jason's hope for escape dwindled further at the sight. Jason started counting. " 1, 2, 3, ......" and stopped when he realized thier had to be at least 20 to 30 men he could see. And that was just what he could see. There where wagons spaced about everywhere. He counted 10 wagons. "For carrying their slaves no doubt." Thought Jason. Jason also realized all the men where white. So where all the slaves besides Samire , Prisha and himself. He didn't know if that was a bad thing.

"DAMN! How am I going to get out of this situation?" Jason's mind raced but came up with no solution. "Power... I need more power." Jason knew that if he was strong enough he wouldn't be where he was right now. "I need to cultivate and fast!" He was worried about the final destination of this cargo train of human lives. Just because they took their prisoners alive didn't mean their fates would be any better than being dead. Jason had no idea what the fate of slaves was in this world.

Seeing all he could and finding no more new information Jason decided to not waste time and begin polishing and forming his fire core. Each core would be a massive boost to his power. It did not only offer the use of the element power present within them. It also offered a large boost in physical strength and boosted his bodies defence and vitality.  Every time a core was formed fully the elemental power inside would wash his body and purify it, strengthening and boosting his physical power. 

In all honesty it may have been possible to break the manacles by straining his limbs to the very limit with only his first core formed and a healthy amount of qi use, if it was not for that electric current. They were only made of iron. Not even good iron it seemed. Even with the first core formed and its advantages put to use with qi as well the current was too strong for him to handle.

Electricity was unlike other elements. It jolted the body and mind. It also effected the soul. Jason doubted he could control his mind and body when shocked so powerfully even at the first core. His body would have to be much stronger to take that current and still be able to function properly. He would have to wash his marrow, bones, muscles, nerves and skin with elemental power and qi to make it possible.

Jason closed his eyes. " I have to start somewhere." Jason thought and then cleared his mind. The world outside his own mind faded away. He could still hear what was happening around him but it was far off. Seemingly at the end of a long tunnel. He wasn't completely unaware of his surroundings just very concentrated on his internal world. He pictured a pure black backdrop as his breathing began to calm and slow. His breathing was odd. It had a rythym to it. He felt every nook and cranny of his body with shocking precision.

He had improved drasticly in his efforts at meditation since his last try. No doubt a byproduct of his time in that black space with the voices. He had a much better understanding of the technique now. The meditation technique was called Dragons Breath and when he truly master it his breathing could sound like that of a massive dragon. Dragons Breath was the technique to gather from the surroundings and spread qi throughout his body and guide it while the system of cores itself was the chaos dragon inheritance.

On the black backdrop he saw the image of an almost imperceptible glasslike orb with a hint of a flame within. The contruct wasn't even a real thing yet. It wasnt even formed in reality and hadnt found a home in his body or made a true connection to his soul. As he breathed in qi flowed into his lungs and washed over his skin , muscles , blood and bones. It strengthened them very slowly but surely. It improved his nerves and quickened thier reaction speed. He wouldn't see any very large improvement all at once until the core was fully formed but the process reassured him.

As time passed he took the energy that washed through his body and circulated it like a river.... ok more like a small stream. But one day it would be a river. A massive one! He brought the qi to a spot resting above his navel. And bathed the spot with the qi using the power of his mind and soul to guide and control it and began to truly form his fire core.

The qi flowed through the area changing it slowly and started forming a fire core before traveling higher on his chest and forming a pool of qi. The qi that had flowed into his dantain had been purified. The qi in his dantain gathered and strengthened his dantain before another stream broke out of it and rejoined the cycle around his body.

To boost the strength of his body in the moment and use non elemental techniques he would need to use the qi stored in his dantain that was truly one with him like a motor uses fuel. To use the elements in his techniques he would pass the qi from his dantain through the cores and the qi would blend with the elemental power. The elemental power was actually drawn from his surrounding as he drew in qi.

In normal cultivation there would be no elemental cores. You would simply purify the qi of all external elemental power and impurities and put it in your dantain after circulation and washing the body. If you wanted to use elemental power in your techniques you needed an inherent bond with that element and the relevant element based cultivation method was needed. Under those circumstances the qi in your dantain would naturally have the properties of that element. That was one of the beauties of chaos dragon cultivation. All elements where at his fingertips. He just needed to form the cores.

In normal cultivation there was no stages or levels either. Whoever had more qi in his dantain, better control of that qi and a stronger body, mind and soul would be the victor in a fight. Strategy also played a role as well as the purity of the qi and reaction speed in combat. Battle between cultivators wasn't as simple as having more qi or being at some higher "level". It was not a game. There where no levels , ranks , realms or dividers between cultivators. Stength was strength. Skill was skill. Even a smart weak cultivator could kill an extremely strong stupid one in the right circumstances.

As he continued this process the tiny fire core illusion in his mind grew more detailed and more powerful. The tiny flame growing in size and the almost non-existent  shell growing larger and thickening. The process was slow. Almost agonizingly so but he kept at it. As the illusion grew stronger the location of the soon to be fire core inside his body above his navel changed as well. Ever so slowly.

The entire process also had the added benefit of strengthening his soul and mind as well. His spirit and mind came into contact with the qi and element power while manipulating it causing them to be improved and sharpened. The contact itself did it as well as the strain put on them to do it. Like a muscle they could be exercised. They could also be improved through his experiences in the world.

If a man spent a lot of effort on something and achieved it,  his mind and spirit would grow stronger wouldn't they? The concept was the same. If a man came to a realisation that improved his mentality it could offer a boost as well. Understanding your own soul would boost the power of your own soul too.

He could already feel his spirit sense growing. It was almost like a radar but a radar was slower and less detailed. He could see every detail of anything around him right now even with his eyes closed.... even the insides of objects. Too bad the range was currently less than a few feet. But that was already amazing progress. He had only been at this for a few hours.

His progress wouldn't always be so smooth and easy though. The road of cultivation was harder the further you traveled. To progress in some areas you needed to be strong in others. Without a strong spirit and mind you couldn't manipulate qi and element force properly. Without a strong body you could damage yourself trying to store too much qi. It was a process.

When the cores shell envisioned in his head trippled in size and thickness and the flame seemed like it could actually burn something and not go out with a light breeze or sneeze he heard a bang and felt a tremble. He opened his eyes realising the sound and feeling was not internal but external. Someone had struck his cage. When he saw the person who had done it he was shocked.

As he opened his eyes he nearly swallowed his tongue. Incredulity obvious on his face and with eyes wide Jason grit his teeth and snarled "What the fuck are you doing out of a cage?!"

Darek smiled at him. Glee and a gloating pride was evident in his expression. He was wearing basic leather armor like every slaver/bandit in the group besides the leader and there was a sword at his hip.

"The look on your face is priceless BOY!" He broke into hysterical laughter.