Ake rushed up the stairs and it was utter chaos. The guards had pulled back and barred the door to the first floor. They weren't in enough numbers to hold the prisoners off so, they just trapped them in here.

Panic coursed through Ake's body. They were like rats in here and once these people gathered enough people they would kill them worse than dogs.

The other prisoners started banging at the door and Kogo just rushed past them. A few of them were making their way up. Perhaps, there were stairs on the other end of the building.

"Let's go up!" Kogo was the most clearheaded person in this situation. The party followed her up the stairs and up to the second floor. It was barred up as well.

They rushed up to the third floor and that one was barred up too. This was bad.

Kogo took a deep breath and looked around her. Going down was not an option and this was the last floor.

She looked up at the rooftop. There were two windows with metallic grates on both sides of it. They had to get up there. That was their best chance. She'd climbed up and down from windows like these tens of times. It was a handy skill for a thief.

"Can you make me fly?" She grabbed Shera's arm. Everything would be much easier if they could fly.

"N-no. I don't have enough mana for that."

"What about those grills, can you cut through them?" They used to have a washed-up mage in their group back in the day. He was more of an apprentice but his specialty was in breaking in.

"Yeah, but I need to get close to the grills!" Fair enough. Nobody said this was going to be easy.

"Ake nobody can come up here, now. Keep them down, by force if necessary." She grabbed her hair and pulled them back into a ponytail and wrapped it up in a bun. It was somewhat of a ritual for her.

She decided to go up first, she would pull Shera up afterward. Ake had moved on the top step of the stairs and Moon was tending to the strange man.

"How is he?" She asked for a quick second. Moon smiled with a bitter despondency. It was a helpless smile.

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His abdomen was just purple and black. His head was bleeding out to no end. Moon had tied up his head with a strip he'd cut off from his shirt.

It wasn't enough as blood was flowing out of his nose. Shera placed her hands on his chest and cast a simple spell, [Delay Bleed].

Kogo drew a sharp breath when she heard that, that was a blood mage's spell. A very low-level blood mage's but that didn't make it any better.

These people were making enemies of a very powerful lord and even if they got out where would they run off to. A rag-tag group like theirs would be obvious from a mile away. She firmed her resolve in a manner of seconds.

"Will you have enough Mana for what you need to do up there?"

"Yes, I just used a basic spell." Basic spell? Did that mean that she could use even better spells?

"Can you make a rope or something out of your magic?"

"No, I don't know any spells like that."

Well, whatever. Kogo shoved her fingers into the stone blocks and climbed up like a nimble lizard. She clasped onto the grills and wrapped her arms around it. "Shera, try to climb up."

She might not be as capable as her but she should be able to do something. "I got it."

Ake grabbed her by her arms and launched her up into the air. There was a moment of immense panic but Kogo reached down and clasped her hand. After some long straining and heaving, she managed to pull her up to the windowsill. It was made of stone and gravel.

Kogo had no idea what kind of spell could be used in this situation. This situation required metallic magic but only the Vein Priests had that kind of power.

Shera placed her hands on the stone blocks and they glowed for a brief second and then dimmed down. She had a bitter smile on her face. "These are enchanted with magic. We need Moon for this. Ake can you throw him up as well?"

A quick shot into the air and they grabbed Moon as well. It was getting quite crowded on this tiny windowsill.

He placed his hand on the stone surrounding it and closed his eyes. "I think they just dipped in frost lizard's blood. When was this made? This is a very old technique."

"Can you break it open though?"

"Yeah, sure. Shera can do it too. Can you freeze these blocks over?"

Shera placed her hand on the windowsill and half of it was frozen. "Now, just use your blood extraction spell."

Ok, Kogo had seen and heard enough with that [Blood Extraction] spell. This was more than enough information for her.

Kogo could see Shera straining, she had a difficult expression on her face but in a few minutes and the entire block of ice was covered in a dim red color.

"Guys, how long do you think this will be? Incoming!" There was an explosion on the lower levels and the smell of charred flesh wafted up at them. None of them were disgusted by that smell anymore. It was the norm for them now.

Shera froze over the rest of the stone on the left, right, and top and extracted the blood. The next step was to break it off with a strong enough force. That would take quite some time and they might need Ake for it. Kogo just had a single thought;

It's too late.