The Author's POV
chapter-180

Entering the castle, we soon found ourselves inside of a long and narrow corridor in which a red carpet dyed the floor.

-Clank!

Closing the door behind him, Kevin glanced at the bodies of the orcs that Silug had just taken out.

With one body inside of the trolley and two leaning against the wall of the hallway it was safe to say that they were not going to wake up anytime soon.

"Alright, if everything goes according to what I've observed, there shouldn't be another turn shift for the next twelve hours which is within our eight-hour limit."

Pausing for a second and staring at Silug and then the orcs on the ground, Kevin sighed in relief as he continued.

"Fortunately he held back and didn't kill the guards, else the situation would've turned troublesome"

...Although Silug had broken their necks, because of the orcs strong constitutions, they were still alive.

Albeit barely.

Had Silug killed the orcs, then things would've become troublesome as they would've immediately alerted the demons of their presence.

The reason being was because each of the orcs had signed a contract with a demon. If their contractee suddenly died, they would be the first ones to know as their souls would be damaged.

Looking at me, Kevin started speaking.

"Ren, now that we've entered the castle we should still not let our guard down as I'm not sure about how many enemies are hiding in the building..."

"mhm"

Listening to Kevin speak I absentmindedly nodded my head.

Although I was aware of what Kevin was saying, my mind was currently preoccupied with something else.

Staring at the door behind me for a couple of seconds, I couldn't help but think to myself.

'...something doesn't add up'

I feel like there was something missing.

Something that Kevin and I forgot to take into consideration when entering through that door.

I mean, if you think about it, there was no way that a huge castle with three enormous gates would have this small backdoor which was much easier to sneak through.

Yes, although it was indeed protected by two <B> ranked orcs that were under the contracts of the demons, I highly doubted that this was all of the security they had...there must be something else at play.

Frowning hard, recalling something, I quickly took out the red book and quickly skimmed through it to get a better idea of the situation.

-Flip! -Flip!

"Ah...I see now"

A couple of seconds after flipping through the book and skimming through the last page, I finally understood why the security was lax here.

...and what I found out instantly cleared all the doubts I had in my mind.

Prison.

What lay before us was a massive prison that trapped orcs and demons inside.

The reason why the security was so lax was because there was another layer that we had to go through before truly reaching the insides of the castle.

...now this was troublesome.

It already took us a long time to sneak into the building yet we were now presented with another annoying situation?

Just what in the world...

Massaging my forehead, I sighed as I mumbled.

"...talk about problematic"

Hearing my mumble, turning around Kevin asked.

"What's wrong?"

Glancing at Kevin, I lazily waved my hand.

"Ah, nothing, it's just that I've figured out where we are"

"Where we are?"

Staring towards the end of the corridor, I slowly said.

"Yeah, we are at the entrance that leads to the prison"

Hearing my answer, taken aback for a short moment and realizing why I was acting the way I was, an extended sigh escaped from Kevin's mouth.

"Ah...no wonder it was so easy to get in. Does that mean that we have to think of another plan?"

"No, not particularly"

Although there were indeed demons guarding the prison, according to what I read from the book, the situation wasn't that bad.

Although troublesome, it wasn't impossible.

FIve <B> ranked demons, which was well within the scope of acceptable.

Especially since we had Silug with us.

...normally there would've been at least an <A> ranked demon, however, given that the demons were at war with the orcs not so far from here, the only ones remaining here were the <B> ranked ones.

Thinking along those lines, a smile appeared on my face.

I guess all the preparations for this moment weren't for naught.

I was finally reaping the fruits of my labor.

"Alright, let's go"

Glancing at the long corridor, I urged Kevin and Silug to follow along.

...

"Is this the prison?"

"Yeah?"

Walking past the corridor, we were able to quickly arrive at the entrance of the prison. As I had already checked beforehand, there was no one guarding the area we were currently in.

From what I've gathered from the book, all of the demons were waiting on the other side of the prison.

Directly in the area that led towards the inwards of the castle.

"Go in"

"Yeah"

As we entered the prison, the first thing I noticed was how cold and humid the atmosphere of the place was.

It was as though I was in the middle of winter with how cold it was as I felt my cheeks instantly puff up as a red tinge appeared on them.

To make matters worse, the air inside of the prison tasted like stale bread and centuries-old stale water; extremely rancid.

The walls were bare, with faint scuffmarks marking the gray stone of the prison walls.

The cells barred with metal bars appeared everywhere as orcs and demons could be seen kneeling down with their bodies bound by thick chains.

"khhh..."

"Wu"

"Ahh..."

Groans and weeps of despair continuously echoed across the space.

Passing past the prisons cells, glancing towards the orcs imprisoned, noticing something, Kevin asked.

"What's wrong with the orcs over there?"

"Hm?"

Pointing towards one of the orcs in the cells, Kevin said.

"Look at the orcs over there, they have black veins tracing all over their body"

Looking in the direction of where Kevin was looking, I soon noticed the black veins that Kevin was talking about.

Instantly realizing what they were I explained.

"Ah, they are orcs that have been forcefully made to sign a contract with a demon"

From what I remembered writing, the black veins were a result of when someone was forced to sign a contract.

Because the other party didn't agree to submit to the demon, as they were forcefully made to sign a contract with them, they were put under a curse that subjected them to intense pains.

If they didn't agree to submit by a given period of time, they would be left to rot in jail under the curse.

Ruthless.

Closing my eyes, I double-checked with Angelica.

'I'm not wrong right?'

[Mhm, if both sides don't agree to the contract, the weaker party will suffer immeasurable backlash that is equivalent to being punctured by millions of needles]

'That painful?'

[What do you expect human? The contract binds the two contractor's souls, of course, it is going to hurt]

'...I guess that makes sense'

Since the contract involved the binding of both souls, the weaker party would obviously suffer more if they were resisting.

...and once the contract was signed and they were bound by it, if the other party refused, they would be put under the curse.

Nodding his head in understanding, after a bit of thought, Kevin asked.

"...If they are under contract, why leave them in prison?"

Hearing Kevin's question and snapping me out of my thoughts, placing my hand on my chin, I mused for a second.

"Hmm, I'm not too sure, but I think it's because they are resisting the contract. Unless they agree they would most likely stay in in their current state"

Understanding somewhat, glancing at the prison, Kevin asked.

"So what do you plan next?"

Pausing for a second and glancing at Silug who was standing next to me, Kevin asked.

"Should we just make Silug brute force his way through like before?"

Shaking my head, I smiled.

"No, there's a much easier way actually"

"Easier?"

With my smile deepening, glancing towards the cells before us, I extended my arms and said.

"Yeah, we just set free a couple of prisoners"

"Eh?"

Taken aback, barely any words escaped from Kevin's mouth as he somewhat understood what Ren wanted to do.

...was he trying to create chaos and then use the chance to escape?

Wouldn't that attract a lot of attention?

Seeing that Kevin had understood, I nodded my head.

"Yup, just like you're thinking, I'm planning on causing a commotion and force the demons to come into the prison and settle it down. Using the distraction as a chance we can directly enter the castle and do what we were planning on doing"

Pausing as I clapped my hands together I said.

"Easy peasy"

Massaging his forehead, Kevin nodded his head.

"Ah, alright...I guess that works too though I still think having Silug kill the guards silently is the best method"

Nodding my head, I scratched my nose as I vaguely said.

"You're not wrong, but....let's just say this method is the most ideal for me"

"What?"

Seeing Kevin's confusion, I just smiled and didn't elaborate.

What Kevin said was true.

Having Silug brute force his way through wasn't a bad idea, however, as I glanced at the prison before me, an idea irrelevant to the current situation had come into mind.

Rather, the idea stacked up with another one of my ideas that I had thought of before, helping me resolve a few of the problems I was having.

Thinking along those lines, a faint smile appeared on my lips as I thought to myself.

'I guess the prison still had its uses'

Staring at the prisoners trapped in their cells, pointing towards the thick chains binding them, Kevin asked.

"Hey, Ren, if we're freeing them, what are we going to do about the chains?"

"The chains?"

"Yeah, they seem really hard to break. At least not without making enough of a commotion"

Pausing for a second, and understanding what he wanted to say I waved it off as I casually said.

"Ah, don't worry about them, they are special chains made to block any aura flow. Therefore, they are actually quite easy to break. Especially if you are using mana"

These were the same type of chains that trapped Silug back in Gud Khodror.

They were specifically crafted chains that stopped all aura flow turning the orcs into powerless individuals.

However, it had to be noted that the chains only worked for orcs as mana could easily break through them.

This was also why I was able to free Silug so easily.

Nodding his head in understanding, glancing at the numerous cells before him, he asked.

"Who should we free? Everyone?"

Shaking my head, I responded.

"No, let's just go with the strongest"

Confused Kevin asked.

"Who?"

Smiling I pointed towards two cells in the distance where two orcs could be seen keeling down on the ground.

"Those two over there"

Both of the orcs had their head held down with one having long silver hair covering his face whilst the other having a thin red mohawk tracing down half of his head. The frames of the two orcs were huge as their muscles, which were the size of two footballs had green veins popping out from them making them look extremely intimidating.

Although I couldn't tell their strength because of the chains binding them and blocking their aura flow, judging from the fact that their chains were the thickest out of all the prisoners, I knew that they were the strongest.

...although they weren't as strong as Silug, they were still quite strong.

Staring at the two orcs in the distance with a smile on my face, recalling something, and turning my attention back to Kevin I asked.

"Hm, by the way, Kevin, can you take out two healing potions"

Raising his brow, Kevin was confused.

"Healing potions, for what? healing them? Shouldn't you have them?"

Raising my arm, my eyebrows twitched as I tried to wave it in his direction.

"You think?"

"Ah, right"

Although a lot of time passed since I lost my arm, I still couldn't fully use my arm as I would get continuous currents of electricity running through it.

...if I bore through the pain I could probably use my arm like normal, but honestly, wasn't too fond of pain so I refrained from using my arm unless necessary.

Naturally, I had used a lot of potions to heal my arm hence why Kevin somewhat believed my statement of me no longer having any potions available.

...which by the way was a lie.

I actually still had quite a few potions with me.

The reason why I asked Kevin for the potions, was because regular potions didn't work on orcs.

With them unable to ingest mana, regular potions couldn't work on them pretty much rendering them useless to the orcs.

However, there was a solution to this problem and his name was Kevin Voss.

With the system shop available to him, although expensive, Kevin could easily be able to purchase potions that worked on orcs.

Plus, with Kevin being relatively smart, he understood that I was merely using the arm as an excuse.

He knew that I knew something about the system, but he only thought that I only knew just a small fraction of what the system could do.

So he didn't really care and just complied which I liked.

-Fwua! -Fwuar!

Extending his hand forward, materializing before Kevin were two green-transparent potions. Admiring the potions in his hands for a couple of seconds, Kevin tossed one of them to me.

"Here"

"Thanks"

Catching the potion I thanked him.

Holding the potion with my left hand, staring at the two orcs I had set my sights on, smiling towards Kevin I said.

"Alright everything is set, let's free some orcs shall we?"