A few days later after he was rescued, Leon was wandering through the forest aimlessly. He got lucky that day, to have escaped from certain death. After having rested for a few days, he had regained his health, but the Seal that the goblins had placed on him was still there and so he still as unable to use his Mana. To lose the ability to use Mana, was a death-sentence to any mage and he was no different. Without Mana, a mage had no way to use any spell, offensive or defensive, and they were as fragile as a leaf without their ability to cast spells. But the few months he was forced to work as a slave by the goblin, had helped him to increase his STR and END, which was good.

But today was not his day and his luck ran out when he stumbled upon a five-man goblin patrol lead by a Level 10 Warrior goblin. He tried to run but was easily captured by the patrolling party. Without access to any of his spell, he was no match for them, even so as a final attempt to save himself, he tried to fight back, the increased STR and END did indeed helped him a bit but in the end, it was not enough to escape from his fate. They knocked him out and carried him back to the prison. And just like that, he was back to where he had escaped from, hell. The goblins bet him up very badly. They were laughing and yelling at him in goblin tongue, of which he understood nothing. After beating him up black and blue, they put him into a cell filled with many other poor souls just like him. A goblin said to him in broken common tongue, "No food, no water for you, for three days, this be a lesson to everyone. Next time you, you die."

After the goblin left him, other prisoners made room for their new inmate. "So, you are the lucky bastard who escaped these buggers eh, I heard that the goblins who were in charge of bringing you here, got a good thrashing." said a bulky fellow " So how did you get yourself caught again?"

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"Let's just say I wasn't thinking straight when I got myself into this," said Leon withering in pain,

"What do you mean?" asked another man, sitting next to the bulky fellow,

"you'll see, wait till nightfall, I don't want to give you false hope" replied Leon.

"OK now I'm curious," said the bulky fellow, "by the by I'm Brook and this is my cousin Faust we are both Level 12 Hunters, got ourself caught while on a hunting trip on the outskirts of the Grate Forest"

"I'm Leon a Level 13 Mage, I don't want to talk about the circumstance under which I got myself captured."

"OK that is fine by me, it's not something any of us want to think about." said the bulky fellow who identified himself as Brook.

Leon looked around himself, the cell wasn't all that big and it had around fifty inmates. "Hey Brook can I ask you something?" asked Leon,

"Well we've got all the time in the world and nothing better to do than just sit around, so way not, shoot."

"Why is there only fifty or so prisoners in here, in all other goblin camps I've been to, there were more than three hundred prisoners."

"Oh, that this is not the main cell, this cell is meant for rebellious prisoners like us, we won't get food or water and a lot of thrashing until our will to resist them get broken. The main cell contains more than two hundred people" said Brook

"So that makes a total of two fifty prisoners and how many goblins are there in this camp?" Leon enquired

"Why around a hundred maybe, why do you ask ?" said Brook

"Oh it's nothing just asking," said Leon with a smile

"If you are thinking of starting a riot, forget it you won't be moved to the main cell until they make sure you have no fight left in you, and even if you somehow manage to fool them and make it to the main cell, you'll find it very hard to find anyone to join your cause" warned Brook. Leon didn't even bothered to say anything in return and stayed silent.