CHAPTER 64 [AGREEMENT]
‘Ping’ [Fist of Steel Level 693 / Pugilist Level 543 / The Right Hand Level 153] Has been slain. 10 points have been awarded.
‘Ping’ [Battlemage - Lightning] Has leveled up 2 > 4
‘Ping’ [Bladedancer - Lightning] Has leveled up 2 > 3
‘Ping’ [Nature’s Adept] Has leveled up 1 > 2
‘Ping’ [Wood Manipulation] Has leveled up 5 > 6
‘Ping’ [Accelerated Thoughts] Has leveled up 4 > 5
‘Ping’ General skill [Fist Technique] acquired
‘Ping’ [Fist Technique] Has leveled 1 > 3
“You… You killed him…” David looked at the corpse of his loyal companion with shock before he sighed.
“Goodness, I’m actually surprised. I didn’t think you had it in you. I guess I didn’t give you enough credit. What to do, what to do?” David tapped his chin while he stared me down.
I just maintained my overconfident smile. Fist had been easy to deal with because he was slow and over reliant on defense. I had no doubt that David wouldn’t make the same mistake.
“I think I have it, why don’t you join me?” He said while sticking his hand out.
“I’ll need someone with me to replace Fist, and it would be fitting to have the person who killed him take his place. Plus you’d be useful to have given that you can heal, the best part is you’ve just earned a reputation amongst everyone here as someone not to fuck with. So what do you say? It’ll be extremely beneficial for both of us.” David finished with a smile.
Nobody said anything, my eyes flickered across the group, nobody had moved and no one was meeting my eyes. If I needed to bounce out of here, none of them would try to stop me. More likely none of them would be particularly willing to attack me right off the bat if David ordered it.
I didn’t like David.
I really didn’t like him.
But he was right in that working with him would be better than trying to kill him. I knew it. He knew that I knew it. I could see it in his eyes. He also knew he could handle me, it might take a little work, but he was confident he’d come out on top if we fought here and now. I didn’t want to do it. But it was for the best.
I stepped forward to accept his deal, David smiled as I approached and stepped forward to grasp my hand as well.
As soon as our hands connected I instantly snapped a barrier in front of my face as David yanked me down and a dagger practically materialized in his hands and stabbed towards my face, only to be stopped by the barrier.
The barrier cracked all the way up, before breaking. I looked at my mana, it had dropped by 6,000 points just for blocking that one attack. Was he trying to kill me with that? Or was it an attempt to guarantee a maiming strike. Hard to tell, he didn’t press after breaking the barrier so my guess was just a show of force.
David clicked his tongue, “Tsk. You have good reflexes,” He said while flicking the dagger away, hiding it somewhere on his figure. “But that should serve good enough as a reminder of how this relationship is going to work. I’m in charge here, I’m not looking for an advisor, I’m looking for muscle. Understand?” He held my hand down low somewhat forcing me to be near his eye level, stooped over slightly uncomfortably.
I just gave him a smile, “With all due respect Mr. David. You need me far more than I need you, I can do far more for you than you could possibly imagine with my skill set. So if you’re planning to do something stupid, I’m sure as hell gonna let you know. But at the end of the day you’ll be the one to decide whether or not it’s the course of action you want to follow. I just killed your strongman, so unless you’re willing to force me into submission, this is a relationship of equals. We both know you’d win, but how much damage will you take to accomplish that victory? Losing an arm or a leg would be extremely detrimental, possibly even fatal if someone gets strong enough to challenge you over it. Is that a risk you’re willing to take?” I asked, cocking an eyebrow.
David stared at me for a very long time, holding my gaze with an unreadable expression.
Eventually he released my hand with a bark of laughter, “Hah! I like you. Very well, you’re right about one thing. If we fought I’d win. Fine I’ll allow your sass, just don’t toe the line too much. I’m not known for a good temper, ya hear?”
I gave him a friendly smile, “Understood.” I’d be fine with working with you. For now.
He nodded at me before turning around, then stopping again when he got to the edge of the circle.
“Well? What the hell is everyone still doing here, go back to whatever you morons were doing before!” The crowd parted to let David walk through and some people started to break through, David stopped and turned to calling out, “Oh yeah, your rooms. New meat can find an open spot. Gorlin! Show the elf to Fist’s previous room, if he’s taking his place he might as well take his room as well.”
“Righto boss.” Gorlin replied, stepping up to me.
Gorlin was… Not an attractive person by any means, he had greasy hair that looked like it hadn’t been washed since before he’d been arrested and turned into a slave, his teeth were a rotten yellow that he flashed at everyone as he had a dumb smile on his face. More than a couple of brain cells had been knocked out of this poor man, and his nose spoke of the number of times he’d probably been hit in the head with how squashed it was.
“Righto elfy. Follow ol’ Gorlin now.” He said slightly slurring his words to me, it didn’t sound like he was drunk, but it was impossible to tell from his breath that smells like mold and death. I was fairly certain that without my poison resistance skill I’d have been hit with something fatal.
“Right… Lead on then.” I said, trying my best to keep the disgust out of my voice.
As he led me on, people parted for us as we walked by. It was interesting being shown so much deference. I had struggled to get even just basic decency from a lot of people I had met on our first meetings. But now people were refusing to meet my eyes, more than likely out of fear, although that was mainly the tier two’s. Fear was a type of respect, in a way. Not one I cared to have, but it was better than nothing.
The tier three’s in the crowd had no problems meeting my eyes. More than likely in their mind, this was a chance to increase their standing. They believed they stood a chance of beating me in a fight, some of them probably did. But I definitely wasn’t going to make it easy for them. I fixed them with piercing stares, the unspoken words in my mind making it across to them with no uncertainty.
‘Try me, bitch.’
Now that I was here, I was pretty angry. My entire life had been completely derailed. I had gotten framed for a crime I didn’t commit, I was made into a fucking slave. I struggled to contain my indignation at the thought.
I sucked in some air and held my breath for ten seconds before letting it out slowly. It didn’t really help, but it allowed me to direct my attention to following Gorlin.
After a few minutes of walking across the cavern and through some hallways carved into the stone we eventually reached a flimsy wooden door.
Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.
“Righto, ‘dis your new room. Gorlin, go back now.” Gorlin gestured to the door before turning around to walk away.
“Thank you, Gorlin.” I said, nodding to him.
He just flashed me a toothy, yellow smile before continuing on his way.
I opened the door and walked into the room, my eyes widening in dismay.
This room was atrocious.
I wasn’t particularly one to talk, but this was worse than my room back on Earth filled with trash simply because I was too lazy to take it out. Half eaten food bones littered the bed and the floor, stains on the covers of the horrid bed, the covers were also starting to mold as well. Moldy food covered the corners among dozens of other problems.
I let out a sigh, guess I was cleaning this up instead of sleeping. I was almost tempted to just go see if I could share a cell with someone, but I’d rather have my own room if I could. It would give me a certain level of agency for certain.
I let out another bone deep sigh. Well I better get to work.
***
It didn’t take me terribly long to get things mostly cleaned up. A lot of it was just disgusting trash. During this cleaning spree I actually managed to discover something interesting. Mold counts as nature. Which was interesting because mold is not a plant, but rather classified as a fungi which is neither plant nor animal but some secret third thing. I wonder if I could grow mushrooms if I tried? Something I might get a chance to test here in a moment.
Needless to say, using my authority over nature I was able to get rid of all the mold on the blankets and in the room and turn it into something better. Like flowers. I turned them into cacti and had them grow in the corner. Cacti didn’t need a lot of water and could stay alive in harsh conditions. I felt like with a little mana as a substitute for sunlight and water they’d be able to survive, and I had to turn the mold into something and I hadn’t wanted to turn it into a plant that would also just instantly die. So this was the best course of action that I could come up with.
I think it worked quite well. I had managed to get in touch with Gorlin again and figure out what I could do with all the… trash in the room. Thankfully there was just a place to dump it all, there was a rotation among the shifts of prisoners that would go through and clean it up once a week. Our group was up to do it again in about three weeks, after that it’d be about two months before we’d have to come back to do it again. Which gave me a rough idea of how many separate groups there were.
Math told me there were about 8 groups. Four for day and four for night. What I also managed to figure out is that there was one leader per group, meaning that in total there were 8 cell-block leaders. Officer Salvin had not been one apparently.
The eight people in charge were Larks, Lurks, Caelin, Valler, Tork, Zoran, Aeldin, and Shalor. Although it was extremely unlikely we would ever have to deal with any of the other Leaders, it was still good to keep a general idea of what their names were and the general idea of their levels. All of them were tier four. Why did everyone have to be tier four? Why couldn’t more people be tier three?
Ugh, inconsiderate people leveling up and trying to attain personal strength. Absolutely ridiculous.
I still had a few hours before our group was up for our shift, so I decided to sit down and reform my arm. Having a stronger and better incorporated arm would work well for me going forward. It would also be something I could manipulate to create what I wanted.
I let the arm I currently had wither away before I got to work forming a new one, I poured as much mana into this one as I could in a reasonable time frame. The more mana it had the better enhanced it would be.
***
Several hours later I was sitting with a brand new arm that made me feel a lot better about my situation. I still hadn’t fully gotten used to missing an arm, I don’t know that I would ever truly get used to it either. But there wasn’t much I could do for the foreseeable future.
I stood up from where I had been sitting on the bed and stretched and looked around the room.
Hmmm… I used a little bit of mana and summoned some Heliotrope flowers around the room. The room still smelled kind of like mold and decay, not exactly something I wanted to sleep in later. If I left these flowers here, they wouldn’t live really but with enough of them it would overpower the scent of the room with vanilla. Which would be quite nice.
Or at least as close to vanilla as I could get without the actual extract. Time would tell.
Satisfied with my handiwork I left the room and went to the commons area. Chiseled into the stone wall on one side of the area there was something similar to a kitchenette. A couple of people manned it. I was feeling slightly hungry, so I decided I would eat something. Shouldn’t go into work too hungry.
I walked up to the counter, or I guess what passed for it given it was just smoothed off limestone like material. I’m not entirely sure what it was, but this whole salt mining operation seemed exceedingly strange. The salt existed in veins in the ground that we mined out like ores. Weren’t salt farms usually ocean or water based? I know there were some salt mines on Earth as well… Well, I didn’t really know a whole lot about the topic. I was starting to get curious now though.
I wish Wikipedia was a thing here, it would be nice to just pull everything I wanted to know up on a computer and read up on it. That had been way too convenient.
One of the people manning the kitchen, or in the case womanning the kitchen was a lady currently yelling at everyone.
“You ABSOLUTE fucking dipshit! You mix the liquid ingredients separately and then add them to the solids! Anyone with a basic understanding of baking knows this so why don’t you after being told for the SEVENTH TIME?!” The woman roared with apocalyptic fury at a man probably three times her height.
[Level 323]
‘Ping’ [Identify] Has leveled up 8 > 9
Huh. She was up there in level. Also nice.
“Yes ma’am! Sorry ma’am, I’ll do better!” The man responded with no small amount of fear in his voice.
“You fuck it up again and I’m going to fillet you like a damn fish and feed you your own intestines!” She retorted.
The woman stood probably about 5’1”. She was… Impossibly short. It was very amusing seeing her boss around someone nearly a foot taller than her and probably 250 lbs heavier. She had short red hair, not a pixie cut but a little bit longer in a sort of textured, wavy, bob cut. She was nearly short enough to be a dwarf, but she didn’t have their stereotypical physique. Nor did she have the strange proportions of a halfling. No, she just seemed to be a pretty short human.
She turned to me as I stopped at the counter and fixed me with a glare when she saw my smile.
“What’s so funny to you punk?” She asked, placing her hands on her hips.
My smile grew a little bit before I managed to school my expression.
“Nothing really,” I said while shaking my head, “Your attitude just reminded me of a good friend I had.”
She narrowed her eyes suspiciously at me. Eventually she just scoffed, “Whatever, we got a little bit left before you leave for your shift. I’m assuming you want some?”
I nodded, “Yes please.”
“Hah. Manners from an elf, now I’ve truly seen it all. You're new so I’ll give you one warning, waste this food or puke it back up and I’ll make you regret ever having been born.” She said while turning away and started fixing a tray.
I smiled again, she really was just like her.
“Hear you loud and clear.”
After a few moments she turned back around with a tray that had an assortment of… I hesitate to call it food, but so it was considering we were slaves. I guess I should be grateful to have anything.
“Don’t you dare say a damn thing. I know that face you’re making. I work miracles with the absolute fucking garbage they give us here. I turn inedible slop into something that’s quite a bit beyond just being tolerable. Trust me you don’t even want to see what this was originally. And without my skills we wouldn’t have nearly enough food to go around. So you’re gonna eat it while saying please and thank you.”
My eyes met her as she challenged me to complain.
I mimed my lips being zipped shut, “You won’t hear a single thing from me.”
She huffed, “Alright then. Take your stuff and get out of here. When you’re done just leave it on the table, someone will come around and grab it.”
I grabbed the tray and sat down at the nearest table looking at the food.
Was this even edible? There was… I assumed that was some soup, along with some bread and something that vaguely seemed like mashed potatoes. If I had still been on Earth I would’ve said this was all synthetically grown in a vat in some lab somewhere. Hell, that was honestly probably the case here too. Who knows what they were capable of when they used magitech. Or just plain magic and skills.
I grabbed the spoon and shoved it into the soup, it was extremely thick and goopy and was an extremely unpleasant gray with tons of lumps in it. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath before bringing the spoon to my mouth and shoving it in.
I nearly spat it back out, but I felt a steely stare boring into the back of my head. I slowly turned around and could barely make out the chef’s eyes over the top of the counter looking directly at me promising death and destruction if so much as a single drop fell out of my mouth.
I forced myself to swallow despite my bodies well intentioned efforts to keep the deadly poison out of my stomach.
She gave me a curt nod before turning away.
I sighed before turning back to my food and continued eating the single most unpleasant meal I’d ever had in my life.
I had just finished managing to force down the bread when I heard David’s voice yell out, filling up the entire area.
“Alright you sorry wastes of breath! Line up! It’s time for our shift!”
I stood up and started making my way over to where the crowd was gathered.
Time to see what this whole business entailed.