Chapter 3: The girl in the Cell

After a period of time passed by, Ben continued to look at the girl that was still studying his eyes, he felt his eyes twitch seeing the girl so close to him. While, he had no power to resist against the pickaxe that was buried deep into the soil, as well as the girl who was just inches away from his face studying him as if he was a statue.

“Erm, since we established that you’re not going to kill me, can I get out of this predicament?” Ben grinned shyly as he looked down away from the girl’s face. Inwardly, holding eye contact with a girl was still something that went over his pay grade of social interaction.

Having taken notice that she was close to him, she slowly backed away from him and unhinged the pickaxe away from his neck, and simply waited for him to stand back up. Ben while he was rubbing his neck he looked back at the girl, who was patiently waiting for him.

“My name is Asada Limrich, your benefactor.”

Asada began to talk in fluent common (or english?). It was as if lighting had struck her making her an intellect. The tone of her voice was smooth and not raspy as if the the previous voice of hers was of a savage.

“Benefactor?”

“Yes, I’ve decided to invest the time to see if you’ll have any potential for growth, if you do not you shall simply perish within a day’s time.”

“R.. R..Right my name is Ben Scat” Ben simply scratched his hair and Asada quickly handed him his shovel back.

“So… why can you use magic when you’re just a summoned just like me?” asked Ben

Asada: “The ability to comprehend magic is useful even when in dire situations.”

“... such as?”

Asada: “The ability to eavesdrop upon the guards when they use magic to catch the escaped people.”

“Ahh… so what spells do you know?” asked Ben

Asada: “ Speed Enhancement, Bountiful Strength, mainly wind magic and a couple of self enhancement abilities.”

Asada turned around and started to thrash the pickaxe upon the dirt. Ben began to half-heartedly shovel the dirt and continued to look back at her.

“So… what are we looking for.”

Asada: “Some of the summoned people here try to find interesting things to keep themselves alive for a couple more days, while others simply dig as an exercise… or try and strengthen themselves by believing that the more hard work they go through they’ll get more muscular.”

“So… then why are you digging.”

Asada: “To simply form a stronger hand, forming the callus on my hand will allow me to punch harder for newcomers like you.”

Ignoring the short jab, Ben moved on towards another topic. “Ahh, do you know anything about the outside world?”

Asada: “A little, the guards did say something that we are located within the Kingdom of Lanners, and that group that have summoned us are called the Selections who serve a god named Lothcar, outside of this jail, is a town.”

“Certainly being inside here after being summoned will lead to a sense of hopelessness for we lack the information of the outside world… as well as being forced to live in the state of below minimum requirements for survival. Is this why you killed the other people who came in earlier…”

The Asada simply stopped working, she stood up straight and started to work again.

Asada: “There are reasons to kill, and those reasons are best kept silent.”

Ben simply nodded at her answers and started to shovel again. He himself came from a peaceful world, the idea of killing and death somewhat fazes him. Yet, again in his current situation he decided to go with the flow, seeing as to how Asada is still a mystery to him.

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Ben and Asada were in the cell again, Ben sat on the corner with a dirty rag beneath him while Asada was back inside her pile of dirty rags once again.

“Well… thanks for the rag to cover the ground, can I have any… never mind”

Ben gave up asking for more as she seemed cozy within the pile of rags, her eyes once again flickered within the dark and stared at Ben.

Asada: “Do you wish to assess your aura capabilities?”

“Well the aura stone that we used today apparently had no effects… just flickered on and off.”

Asada: “Aura stones have no capabilities in assessing aura, those stones are only made to contain your aura to prevent any overload within your cell... “

“Overload?”

Asada: “Overload, due to the drastic health of the people within the cell who are unable to move and exercise their abilities. Those who have an outstanding ability to use aura will eventually succumb to the poisoning effects of overload, either by letting excessive amount of aura seep out of them when the maximum have been reached or by the opposite by overusing the aura that will cause the user to slowly perish, there is no name for the opposite though.”

“Right…. So why are my eyes considered special?”

Ben asked this question and Asada merely stared at his eyes once more, slowly blinking and closing her eyes.

Asada: “Your eyes are considered special because they have the ability to sense aura, usually only accessible to aura users who use magic to strengthen their eyes to the extent to be able to see the aura’s source. However your eyes can somehow trace the usage of the aura, which is up to the class of elder magicians. That alone allows you to have an advantage in a fight whenever the needs arise, ambushing you with magical attacks will be unsuccessful.”

Asada’s eyes blinked again and looked back at Ben once more.

Asada: “That’s all I know, there are still more to that eye however it depends whether or not you’ll be able to develop it more by yourself.”

“You sure do know a lot…”

Asada: “My sources are secret.”

“Right….”

Ben looked upwards towards the ceiling and found some dark light floating above his head.

(What’s this? Is this what you call a Will O Wisp?, but weren’t they blue and that they signify souls? Well it could happen here seeing all those dirty rags that Asada has.)

Ben instinctively reached for it, as soon as his hand made contact with the black light, his hand was being enveloped within the dark. Ben felt something on the other side of the black space and grabbed ahold of it. Slowly retrieving it, the black lights that surrounded his hand slowly loosened and retracted back to its original space and slowly disappeared.

Ben felt the handle as being familiar, he opened his hands and saw the words “Dannie the Dango Lover”

(...what… why is Dannie’s Pocket knife here, and unscathed?)

Ben simply looked at the pocket watch with amazement, he then looked at Asada for any confirmation of the reality of this. However she fell asleep, Ben looked at the pocket knife and unflipped it, the stainless steel had a gray line going alongside the edges of the pocket knife.

(Strange, that wasn’t there before…)

Ben looked back up and saw the black lights still floating above his head.

(Perhaps I can move the black lights by focusing)

Ben focused an image for the black lights to float in front of him, the black lights responded to his thoughts exactly and went there.

(Jackpot!!)

Ben placed his hand into the black lights with the pocket knife and deposited in there. He made a hand gesture to disperse, and the black lights quickly dispersed and he made another hand gesture for the ball of black lights to form again. The black lights formed around his hand again and he could grab the pocket knife once again. Ben’s face grinned with joy.

Ben looked at Asada once more and back onto his own accomplishment, he decided to keep quiet about his secret. Ben’s eyes closed with joy and merely sank back into darkness, with a small grin.

(Ha, Dannie who knew your pocket knife would be useful)

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