6.2 A Loser Receives a Warm Welcome
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My head feels numb. 

Once again I find myself trapped in some dingy hole being kept by some malicious fantasy entity. Fortunately, at least this time, I don’t have to have my leg amputated every time someone gets hungry. In this case, I think that might actually be doubly good. Though in however long I’ve been stuck down here no one has told me exactly why I was thrown in prison, I can only assume it has to do with the cannibalism thing. My mind is so foggy that I can barely keep my eyes open, but I think they said something about crimes against decency. I mean, when I first came into this world that would have been indecent exposure, but I was clothed by the time I was chained up. I don’t know how, but they must have found out that I have some pretty overpowered magical energy stored in my body. In the few times that I was lucid enough for these past few days, at least I assume it’s been days at this point, I was able to figure out what’s wrong with me and why I feel so bad when these strange cuffs are out on my arms. At first, they just kept exploding over and over, but when they dropped me in this dungeon, that thankfully stopped happening.

 

My current character information looks like this:

 

Arthur Callon

Lvl: 3

(Summoned Hero)

 

Health: 225/250

Stamina: 7/300

Magic Power 10/5000

Luck: 1,908,678,210

 

Strength: 10

Agility: 4

Constitution: 15

Intelligence: 11

 

They’re sucking my stamina and magic away. Just looking at the structure of the room around me, I can tell even in the dim light that this whole place is lined with that particular dangerous material. It’s only confusing now how any of those people manage to walk into this area without being drained of all they have too. There’s got to be some way to negate the effects of this stuff.

I hear a vague clattering from outside the metal door leading into the prison cellar and a bright light floods the dark room. A figure walks over to the bars and unlocks the door with a clank. Another two people who I didn’t see previously come around and grab my arms, lifting me to my feet.

“What kind of monster are you?” I hear a voice hiss in my ear. “Octas grace, you’re heavy. Stand up you lazy sack.” They say again, shoving me forward.

With two people holding my arms, I’m pulled out into the hall away from that terrible room. I take a deep breath, standing a bit on my own. The fuzzy feeling is still there, only around because of the strange metal cuffs binding my arms together, but the vast majority of the sucking force draining my stamina and magic power is gone. The air feels a lot lighter and I stand up as I’m continuously dragged forward.

I’m taken down a stone hallway and dropped into a room to my left. The two guards, who I now notice are wearing the same characteristic military uniforms that the people who captured me in the first place were also wearing, force me down into a wooden chair and faces the metal cuffs to a hook on the back. Looking around the room, the unnaturally bright light that I almost mistook for modern electricity is coming from a rock embedded in the ceiling. Squinting, I look closer at it and I can see that it’s got a similar pattern to the flashlight stone Melody lit for me back in that research cave.

Wait a minute… They’re using magic? No, that’s probably right. According to what I remember, everyone in this world does have some innate magic within them at birth. The way to increase that is to eat other people. Well, that’s kind of nice. I can expect some modern-like stuff such as a bath or an oven it seems. Magic isn’t a complete taboo.

Unfortunately, even if that’s pretty cool, that doesn’t help me much. One of the soldiers, a guy with spiky hair sticking up out of the top of his head, shuts and locks the door to the new room I have been deposited into. He turns around with his arms squarely crossed at his back and stands stock still on the right while the other does the same on the left.

Wait, that's not hair. That old man with orange hair has cat ears on the top of his head. It’s not charming when a guy like him has them, but that gives me some hope for the future. This world has genuine real biological cat girls. Nice.

The other soldier to the right just looks like a normal human. He isn’t nearly as interesting.

Done with that, I go to look behind me.

“Face forward!” I deep voice shouts which causes me to jump a little and turn back around immediately. I look back down at the wooden table without moving an inch.

Right. I’m in danger. I’ve become so used to the constant passage of time as a hostage that I wasn’t even considering this as a separate situation from being trapped in Melody’s cave. I can’t just do whatever I want, I’m a criminal. From how they’re treating me, I’m viewed as a particularly dangerous criminal. Again, I have to think that somehow they saw the amount of magic stored in my body. That’s not fair, I can’t even use it. I’ve tried to cast fireball at least 50 times by now back at the cave and still, the only time that ever worked was the second shot I ever gave it. I’m not some sort of dark mage that has killed thousands out of lust for power. That’s terrifying. That exists here. Now that I think about it, I really don’t want to meet the guy who they think I am. 

I look up cautiously at the two guards standing on the other side of the table. I do have a few questions that I want to ask and I wonder if I can get them to answer any of them. I’m not expecting much, but my track record for negotiating myself out of situations like this has so far been one to none. I was able to befriend a dragon.

“Can I-” I start

“Silence!” the man with black hair shouts causing the orange haired man’s cat ears to twitch.

Alright, maybe I can wait a bit, I see what’s happening here to an extent. This is an interrogation room, at least I’m pretty sure that’s what it is. When the interrogator comes in, I’m probably going to have to answer for myself. Before that, I have a few things that I need to know. 

First off, I need to ask someone how long I’ve been here. After passing out immediately after these strange cuffs were on my arms and having been in a daze in the depths of an old jail since then, I don’t know whether it’s been a day, a few days, or even a week. I have a vague feeling of some time passing… Wait, no. It’s the same day, obviously. If it wasn’t the same day then I would have reset in the middle of the night and regained all of my stamina and magic back. These cuffs would have exploded off my arms like the first two times and I would probably be in more trouble than I already am.

Secondly, I do want to know why I was arrested. That line about the decency of the king, or whatever it was that they said, doesn’t tell me much as an outsider why they would have thrown me in this place. If I can get them to admit that they have some sort of magic detection device outside of the power check that Melody originally did on me that means a couple of things. In that case, I will either have to avoid cities like this one when I get out of here or I will need to figure out some way of concealing my info so prying eyes cannot access stuff without my permission and knowledge.

Concealment, in general, would be really nice. I could use a transformation spell as well.

There is a click from the other side of the room that draws my attention.

The door is opened and a tall feminine figure struts in. She grabs the chair with a loud scratch on the stone floor and pushes it towards the man with black hair. He takes it and lines it up as she sits elegantly, glaring at me. With a deliberate movement, she crosses her left leg over the other. Because of this, I can see that strangely, rather than feet, this woman has hooves. Looking at her face, that shouldn't be too much of a shock. She has animal ears on the side of her head. Something like a cow, probably. I only guess a cow because of the two big horns tipped with sharp silver caps curving out of her forehead a little below her hairline. The man with orange cat ears closes and locks the door again with a loud clunk. The two in the back stand straight back exactly how they were before as the lady before me sits motionless, leading over the table, glaring at me with her sharp, black eyes.

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