Souls! Kita needs souls if she's going to get out of this waste-scented prison. And getting Jan back would be far too difficult without it.

"Alright," She says to herself as she stands to her feet and shakes her arms to loosen up the tension in her body.

She turns to face two of the four prisoners sharing a cell with her and shrugs before raising each hand to a prisoner. They all look at her in confusion before she casts the spell in her mind.

Consume.

Two of the prisoners' bodies tense up and start shaking in a fit-like manner as black smoke slowly passes out their mouths and into Kita's palms. Just as she is about to close her eyes to enjoy the sensation of the souls, one of the remaining two prisoners stands up and stares at Kita with an enraged glare.

He doesn't say a word, and vaults at Kita as she finishes consuming the first two souls. But she's still exposed, and the man rams Kita with his shoulder. Throwing all his body weight at her.

Kita crashes against the cell bars, prompting one of the prisoners in the adjacent cell to grab Kita through the bars, wrapping his arm around her neck to keep her restrained.

Crap- This is a nuisance. Of course, they don't want to die.

The prisoner who'd just shoved her now has his hands raised in preparation to start throwing punches. He encroaches towards her when she notices the makeshift shiv in his hand.

He isn't planning on punching.

Like a newly applied layer of skin, the souls energize her body. She raises her hand at him before casting a spell-

Push.

A gust of energy blasts out of her hand, blowing the encroaching prisoners into the bars at the opposite end of the cell. The entire room vibrates with the force of his crash. His body drops to the floor, motionless. Either unconscious or dead- but her focus shifts to the guys grabbing her from the cell behind her.

She lifts a hand beside her head, with her palm facing where the man's face is most likely located and casts a consume spell. The satisfactory tingling she feels throughout her body confirms her method as she feels the grip around her neck loosen and the sound of a body crash to the floor.

That push was pretty hefty. It used up an entire soul. The unfortunate receiver hasn't twitched or breathed since- definitely dead. Kita raises her hand at the last person cowering in her cell- A middle-aged woman with fear radiating in her eyes as she clutches herself in the fetal position.

Consume.

Three souls, she notes. Looking at the remaining two prisoners in the cell behind her and the six in the cell ahead of her. They're all worried. Concerned and not one of them has dared to ask about her magic. How rude! Are they not truly afraid? Is it because the others died painless deaths?

She raises her hands at the two in the cells behind her and consumes their souls. Leaving the remaining six prisoners in the cell across from her.

"I'd prefer to make you suffer," She says, slowly stepping towards the bars. "The souls feel much better when they're afraid,"

She raises her hands as she picks two targets at random out of the six in the cell.

"Unfortunately, I'm in a hurry,"

•°•°•°•

Eleven souls surging through her body is as if she's at twice the peak strength she's ever felt. Her mind feels sharper, more aware. She can feel the ocean of souls radiating from the city above. Calling to her, like the scent of a great dish that's caught her attention.

Push. She casts against the steel lock of the cell door. Erupting the socket off of the gate and swinging it open. She hasn't had much time to think of a plan but her mind has been leaning towards the idea of casting an invisibility spell. How many souls will that cost?

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It would most likely use quite a few, so she'll ideally use it after she finds the kid. Ten souls remaining. She'll try only using three to get to the kid, and the remainder to get out of here.

So far, a shield and a push cost a soul a piece. Consuming doesn't come with a cost, thank God. This would be way tougher otherwise. And her body will use remaining souls on injuries… Automatically? Or if she's unconscious?

Having ten souls doesn't seem to be enough anymore. There are swarms of people on the floors above. She can feel them. Fear doesn't just make the souls feel better, it also makes these losers think they're hopeless. The fewer that fight back, the easier it is. Some of these basic spells might not do that considering the cost. If she can't think up a spell that costs more but kills more people in exchange, she might get better value out of it.

Killing more of them sounds good. Who's this bastard to tell her she has to work for him? She should take his life too. No- he wouldn't suffer that way. Taking everything he cares about sounds better... Maybe he has a family.

She slowly opens the door of the room to find it devoid of any protection. Exposing a hallway that leads towards a staircase at the end of it. "That's definitely where the others are," she says, looking up to the fifteen flights of stairs. Where's the kid, though? There are five different floors and she has nothing to work with, her memory of coming down here is blurred- A few random moments of consciousness.

She'll have to do it the long way.

Floor-by-floor.

She jogs her way up the stairs to the first door- Slowly cracking it open as it screeches briefly. And she peeks through the eyes-sized gap she's created to find that one end of the passageway is clear. She pulls the door open, raising a hand to face the unchecked side of the hall.

There's no one.

It isn't a passageway either. It's the outer walkway of a much larger hall. A storage room. Huge boxes, stacked on top of one another with a variety of steel cases peppered amongst them. Is this a product? Or the goods they stole? She doesn't have time to find out. She'd shower the floor further but it just isn't the place raiders would take a little kid that they're about to sell off.

She backs out of the storage room into the stairway and closes the door behind her before making her way up to the second floor. She uses the same method, slowly peeling the door open to observe the end of the hall.

This is more like it. She immediately sees a guard standing by a nearby door. He has a rifle-like weapon in his hands and a very focused look on his face. What could be in there?

It wouldn't be the kid- she concludes. Jan's most likely been taken to the boss's office. Where else would they do the trade? His office would have way more guards and a much bigger door.

Villains love big doors.

The sound of footsteps started chugging their way down from the floor above- It must be the guards. She confidently steps into the passageway of the second floor, trying her best to act as if she belongs. The guard by the door notices her but doesn't pay too much attention to her sudden entry. She turns to look at the other end of the hall, to find five other guards staring at her in the same manner. Each is stood by a door. Another prison?

She nods her head at the all, promoting a nod in response before a butch lady guarding a door at the end of the hall asks, "You the one that's going to question the princess?"

"Uhhh,” Kita stutters, "That's me,"

"She's in here," The lady shifts her body to start unlocking the door.

Kita walks down the hall, passing a glance at each of the guards that couldn't be bothered by her being there. She steps into the now open room to see a woman slightly older than her laying on a mattress on the floor. She has the same rags on as the prisoners from downstairs, her pale skin and baby-blue hair are her only discernible features.

"Knock twice," The butch lady says before closing the door behind Kita. Leaving her alone in the room with the… Princess.

"You know what I'm here for," Kita improvises, trying to understand what this is about before she blows her cover.

"Why would I tell you?" The lady's posh voice softly objects as she remains laying on the mattress with her eyes closed.

"For starters… I could hurt you,"

"Your friends tried that already," She responds, still unbothered.

"I'm not like the others,"

"Clearly," She scoffs, "You do an awful lot more talking,"

"Like I said. I'm different," Kita shrugs at her own response. "For the right price, I can tell them something… Untrue,"

"I do not have any coin,"

"You're a princess, aren't you? Coin isn't the only currency,"

The girl's eyes shoot open, and she sits up on her mattress to look Kita in the eyes. They're the same colour as her hair- baby blue. Glistening like an ocean in the dim light.

The girl's head tilts, as she notices something in the eyes of Kita.

"I can tell you where the dark one is," The blue-haired princess offers.