I left the manor late at night. My plan was to reach a tavern in this district and raid its food stores. Part had told me where to find it – it was only a ten-minute walk away. But halfway there, I felt something was wrong – as if I was being followed. I didn't show it and continued on, but changed direction toward the districts near the wall. I was in stealth – to track me, the player would have to be…
I couldn't finish the thought. I felt a dull thud on the back of my head, and then I blacked out.
I came to from cold water being poured over me. A man stood before me – over forty, clean-shaven, with short hair. His figure was hidden by loose gray clothing. No system info was visible.
"Well, who are you? And how is it that a simple 'Warrior' class is so good at hiding in the shadows? Speak, beauty – who are you, and what did you want in my city? Though you don't have to tell me. On the day of the manufactory fire, you entered through the south gate, on the right bank of the river. Your face, you know, is quite memorable. Don't you want to tell me who you work for?"
I stayed silent, looking for escape options and cursing myself – arrogant idiot who should have fled long ago. She thought she was better than everyone, decided to take revenge. And now the Osm executioner would teach her otherwise.
"I hope you're not thinking about escaping right now. I'd advise you to forget it. You have only two options: tell me everything and die quickly and painlessly – or suffer for a long time and still tell me everything in the end. Which do you choose?"
I kept silent. There's always a way out of any situation. I knew I was completely screwed, but I also knew that could change – even if they tortured me.
"Adi!" he shouted loudly. "There's a beauty here begging to join your harem."
From the next room came a huge man with an ugly face – at least two meters tall and surely 150 kilos, not all fat. He looked me over with a maniacal smile, then examined me closely for a long time.
"A week. She'll last a week. Tough – not afraid of pain."
"You need to break her in two days – find out who sent her and what her plans were. But the rest… I don't need to teach you how to interrogate."
The giant's face darkened, then he punched me, knocking me out again.
I woke up naked, strapped to a semi-upright torture table. A few minutes later, the giant approached with a smile – and then the trash began. First, he tortured me with a hot iron rod, then started breaking my bones – toes first, then shins. I passed out, and he brought something like smelling salts under my nose, jolting me awake. The pain was unbearable – I screamed like a stuck pig. After an hour of torture, he started asking questions. I stayed silent. He continued – burning, then breaking bones again.
Three days passed like this. It was hell. The hardest part was keeping my arousal in check – that same evening, I raised Masochism to ten.
You have reached 10 in the Masochism stat. Choose a perk:
Safe Word (you stop feeling pain and pleasure – active skill. Duration: one hour. Cooldown: 4 hours.)
Long Games (your regeneration is increased by 400% and feeds on emanations of pain.)
The second one suited me better – my legs were shattered; even without feeling pain, I couldn't escape far. The second gave hope. I already had good regeneration – with this perk, I thought I'd recover faster.
On the third day, I lost control. That asshole shoved a red-hot metal rod – six centimeters in diameter – into my pussy. I had no strength to scream. Even Masochism raised to 17 couldn't save me from that pain. I passed out every two minutes. When they left me alone, I activated Long Games. The pain was monstrous, and the perk had plenty to feed on – unlike me, since they wouldn't even give me water. Every hour, they asked the same questions – and I kept silent.
On the fourth day, the troll-miscarriage approached me with a sad face.
"Your loss. In a couple days, Magister Turiy will return to the city – and believe me, he'll treat you far worse than I do. I only break the body – he'll break your soul. Sure you don't want to talk?"
I stayed silent. He resumed the torture. I felt like a piece of meat. In the evening, I was taken to a cell and thrown on the floor. It took me a long time to come to – the pain wouldn't go away. I couldn't even focus enough to check perks. Mana and ki were at zero – the torture table drained it from the victim. I lay on the floor, whimpering quietly.
After some indeterminate time, I managed to gather my thoughts. I opened the system logs.
You have reached 20 in the Masochism stat. Choose a perk:
Safe Word (you stop feeling pain and pleasure – active skill. Duration: one hour. Cooldown: 4 hours.)
Long Games 2 (your regeneration is increased by 600% and feeds on emanations of pain.)
Again I chose regeneration – though I really wanted Safe Word, just for an hour without pain.
I tried to concentrate and gather even a little mana, but there wasn't a drop in the air – as if the cell was isolated from the world. Same with ki. Over about fourteen hours, regeneration knitted my broken bones, but the pain from the burns in my vagina didn't ease.
It must have been morning – the cell door opened, and I was given a wooden cup of water and some bread. When the door opened, I felt mana seeping into the room from the other side – but it was quickly absorbed by the walls. I tried to speak to the guard to keep the door open a little longer, but he kicked me in the face and closed it. I went to the door and pressed myself against it. Through the gap in the viewing slit, I could feel mana entering the room – I managed to absorb tiny crumbs, while the rest was absorbed by the door itself. What kind of metal was that – and the walls were lined with it too. Still, I drew in mana. When I reached 20, I cast Minor Heal – it didn't do much, but drops wear away stone. After the fifth Minor Heal, I heard footsteps from the other side. I huddled in the corner. The door opened, and two guards grabbed me by the arms, dragging me somewhere.
Turiy must have returned. We were at the end of a long corridor – one end was the exit, the other the torture chamber, with cells on both sides. These freaks dragged me like an object. I played along.
"Why are we dragging her? Let her walk," one of them let go of my arm, and I hung from the other's grip.
"Adi broke her legs so she wouldn't even think of escaping."
While the other nodded understandingly and bent down to grab my arm again, I swiped the knife from his belt and drove it into his eye. Letting go of the knife, I straightened my arm toward the second guard's head and fired a Dark Arrow. They weren't system-users – they died instantly. I tried to stand. My bones seemed to have healed properly – magical skills in this world didn't follow physics or biology. Despite my weakness, dragging two bodies to my cell wasn't hard. I took their belts and sheaths – one across my shoulder so the sword rested on my back, and secured the scabbard with a second belt underneath.
First, taking two daggers, I returned to the place I'd hoped never to see again – the torture chamber. Adi stood at the table, lovingly cleaning his tools. Two strikes to the back of the head – he collapsed dead. How I wished I had more time and strength to torture him for a couple days – with feeling, with precision. But I didn't. I needed to get out – stealth might not work; the man who caught me had spotted me in a second.
I went to the stairs and climbed to the door. It was locked from the other side. A guard was apparently stationed in the room beyond. I couldn't pick locks – I had to take the dumbest approach: make noise at the door. From the other side came cursing and approaching footsteps.
"Please, sir, don't do this – it hurts," I moaned, the first thing that came to mind.
"Idiots – you're at it again! That slut is reserved for the clan heir," he said, and opened the door.
It hadn't even opened forty centimeters before I drove a knife straight into his throat and slipped past him. Thank the gods – the guardroom was empty. It was a closed room; through the gap of the half-open door, I could see a large courtyard ending in a three-meter wall – the prison was apparently in a mansion's basement. Guards patrolled the courtyard occasionally; fifty meters to the right stood another three-story building. There was no other exit – either into the courtyard in plain sight, or back into the prison.
First, I found a heavy man's cloak in the guardroom with the clan crest on the back. The problem: it had no hood. Lisa had told me about the clan's city residence, but I hadn't asked about the prison – I never thought I'd end up there. To the left were the barracks, to the right the servants' quarters – and above me, the clan's living quarters. I couldn't delay any longer – the soldiers who'd come for me would be expecting me; someone would be sent to check why they were late. Again, I had to improvise and rely on luck.
I left the building, covering my naked body with the cloak, and walked confidently toward the barracks. I shouted at a pair of passing soldiers: "What are you staring at, bastards? Has the father not taught you enough? Lost all respect?" – and walked past.
I quickly entered the barracks and headed for the stairs. The barracks were empty – most soldiers were either training on the parade ground to the right or on guard duty. I went up to the third floor and went to the window. Outside was about five meters of space and the wall. I grabbed a straw mattress from one of the beds, cursed all the gods, and stood on the windowsill. In normal condition, a five-meter drop was doable, but now I was hesitant.
Holding the mattress in front of me, I jumped toward the wall – it was three meters lower. I landed belly-first on the wall. The mattress softened the impact, but the air still shot out of my lungs. I didn't hesitate – I shifted to the street side and jumped down. The three-meter drop and poor landing sent sharp pain through my legs, but I limped to the nearest house and kept going, moving away from the residence.
The streets were crowded – many people stared at me. A bald head covered in burns was hard to miss. I'd gotten about two hundred meters from the wall when soldiers came out of the clan gate and ran in different directions, clearly searching for me. I broke into a run, shoving townsfolk aside – but thanks to the clan crest on the cloak, no one complained aloud.
I ran about a kilometer in ten minutes, reaching the poor districts. I'd activated anti-tracking before my leap of faith. Everywhere were tiny hovels; the city wall was five hundred meters away. I ducked into an alley, and when I was sure that guy hadn't followed me, I entered the nearest house. Some man was passed out inside – the whole place reeked of unwashed body and alcohol. A drunk. It was a one-room house with a latrine next to it; where he washed wasn't even worth asking. I tied the sleeping man up and sat on the floor, meditating to restore mana.
There was no food in the room – though I could have eaten anything. I'd be here for a while – during my run I'd stood out, and my approximate location would be calculated quickly. After an hour of meditation, I'd restored some mana and started casting Minor Heal on myself. After the 12th cast, it reached level 9 – after the 16th, I began feeling tolerable.
I found some rags that could barely be called clothes. A tattered robe replaced my cloak – I dumped the cloak in the latrine. I quickly attached a piece of gray fabric to the robe to make a hood. I untied the still-unconscious man and left the house.
Soldiers were patrolling the district – kicking open doors and dragging everyone out. After checking and kicking the heads of households, they moved to the next. Same scene from the other side – no escape over the roofs. I went back into the drunk's house; nowhere to hide. Four soldiers – two stayed outside, two checked inside. But not all of them were as keen-sighted and stealthy as the man who'd caught me. I moved to the corner of the room, into the shadow, and activated Stealth.
The door was kicked open as usual. The drunk barely stirred even when thrown outside. They scanned the room and moved on. And I remained in my new "friend's" house, thinking how to get out of this shithole.