I spent more than a day completely dazed until I finally regained all my functions, including speech and smell, which were the last to return.

One of the first things I noticed was the wind on my body, and indeed, I was almost completely naked, except for a few rags hanging from my body. My armor and weapons were nowhere in sight, but I still had my tooth necklace, so I somehow felt relieved. After all, Earth went through a lot for me to obtain this.

The second thing that caught my attention was the creatures surrounding me. Although they were anthropomorphic beings, their heads resembled those of hyenas, and their skin color was generally grayish – gnolls, if I considered the literature from my world. They were all poorly dressed and represented a significant majority of those transported in the cages, almost 90% at a quick glance.

In other cages, there were other species, some very similar to humans with minor differences like larger eyes and elongated ears, which I'll simply call elves. In the same line, I could also distinguish a few dwarves. These two groups were present in individual carriages, about ten of each.

"Excuse me," suddenly, a young voice caught my attention. A young gnoll with some kind of headscarf was speaking to me.

"Yes?" I replied, somewhat unsure. I didn't know why I could understand her since she definitely wasn't speaking English, and I wasn't sure if she would understand me.

"Are you the chosen one? Will you answer our prayers?"

"I really don't know what you mean. I don't believe I'm any chosen one. My world recently passed a test, and I was transported here."

I could see some disbelief on her face. For my part, I needed information.

"My name is Alex. Can you tell me what's going on, where they're taking us, and why we're chained?"

"It's a pleasure, Sir Alex. My name is Atasha, and I'm the youngest of the matriarchs. They're taking us to Minas Erat to work as slaves."

"Slaves?" I couldn't help but ask.

"Yes, Sir. My people have been persecuted and enslaved for decades."

"Decades? But you and the other species just arrived here, didn't you?"

"No, Sir. We've been here a long time. I'm sure of that."

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I didn't know what else to ask, and the young matriarch was busy comforting some of the children present in the cart, so I simply closed my eyes.

Unknowingly, I entered a state of meditation, and naturally, I began to produce ash energy and circulate it through my body. This process required a lot of concentration, and there was a limit to how much I could generate and circulate each day, so it was good to do it regularly.

"Atasha."

"Yes?"

"The wind is changing. Protect the children."

Atasha was clearly surprised, but when she saw me gripping the bars of the cage, she understood. She took the children and threw them to the floor, shielding them.

At that very moment, the earth began to tremble, growing stronger with each passing second until it became a true earthquake. Finally, the source of the commotion emerged: a stampede. First, there were many different kinds of felines running at full speed, clearly fleeing. Finally, a sort of hyper-muscled horse appeared, though it looked more like a rhinoceros, or with the amount of mass those things had, you could even call them tanks.

Quickly, our cages were pushed to the sides with each subsequent equine that passed until we were finally out of the stampede's path.

That was the moment to take action. With my head still spinning, I kicked the battered door and escaped. I was able to avoid our captors quickly, and ironically, the same cage that had held us captive protected us. The others weren't as fortunate; most were reduced to paste. I could only identify them by the bunch of keys, which seemed to be made of the same material as the bars and chains because they were very sturdy.

"Atasha, are you still with me?"

"Yes, Sir Alex, I'm not dead yet."

"Good, take this key and free as many as you can. Hurry, we'll have to escape with whoever we can."

Among the debris, I found a kind of staff with a head – a mace for beating slaves, I suppose. Although it didn't have the right weight for battle, it would do for now.

Atasha began by removing the chains from the children, and then we moved on to nearby carts, rescuing as many as possible. After about ten carts, we reached the dwarves and elves' carts.

These two groups seemed to be in better condition, and when we made eye contact, they started shouting things, but I couldn't understand anything. However, I still ordered them to be released.

There were ten elves, healthy and strong men by their weapon handling – clearly warriors. They were escorting a young elf woman, who seemed very important to them as they always surrounded her. Apparently, she had the final say in deciding to follow me.

On the other hand, there were ten muscular dwarves. From the way they took their weapons, it didn't seem like they were warriors, but at least they didn't seem afraid. There was one who appeared older than the rest, and he acted as the leader, though it didn't seem to be a chosen position – more like something that happened in the heat of the moment.

The gnolls, on the other hand, listened to Atasha in everything, and she, in turn, followed my orders, so it was safe to assume that I had been chosen as the leader of their group. However, this was probably because I was the only healthy one who could fight for them.

No side seemed to particularly trust the other, and everyone traveled in their own space, though the elves seemed much more reserved than the others. They even shielded anyone who looked in the young elf's direction.

We continued walking for about an hour during which the elves removed some of our tracks and left false ones. Finally, my senses told me that cavalry was approaching.