novelraw Chapter 69 – Status Of A Slave
Chapter 69 – Status Of A Slave
— Freed’s POV —
The sun had long since dipped beneath the jagged horizon, bleeding its final gold into the coal-colored sky. Dusk pressed heavy on our backs as we stood in a crooked line, waiting. The earth beneath our feet was dry and cracked—like the bread we were about to receive.
“Come! Just take one piece of bread each! Quick! I want to go home. Tsk.”
The overseer's voice grated like rusted iron. I didn’t know his name, nor did I care to. Not even a muttered reply came from us; silence had long been beaten into our bones. We were forbidden to speak.
I hated him. I hated this place.
<“Now that I think about it… you're able to manipulate my status if I grant you permission, right?”>
【Yes.】
Azadia’s voice echoed in my mind—calm, unwavering. In two years of unending hell, she’d been my only constant.
<“Then doesn't it mean… you could also use my magic, if I allowed it?”>
A sudden, grim thought flickered through me. Could she, maybe, kill my master for me?
【Yes, Master. However, the slave collar currently prevents me from taking hostile action.】
<“I see. Too bad.”>
Frustrating… but hardly a surprise.
I stared at the misshapen lump of bread in my hand. It was hard, nearly stone. I chewed without tasting.
<“By the way, can you show me my current status? It’s been two years… and I haven’t checked it once. Is that still possible, even though I was ordered not to use mana?”>
【It is. I don’t need mana or aura to access your status.】
<“Good. Then show me.”>
As the dry bread crumbled between my teeth, a flickering screen materialized in my vision, suspended in the air like smoke.
⟦ Status Window ⟧
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Name:Freed
Age:9
Race:Great Human
Title:Otherworlder
State:Hungry
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
⟬ Essence ⟭
Mana:0/320
Aura:300/300
Vitality:1215
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
⟬ Attributes ⟭
Strength:1150
Magic Power:313
Mental Power:287
Agility:1325
Dexterity:1023
Magic Resistance:302
Mental Resistance: 300
Status Points:60
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
⟬ Element Affinity ⟭
Light, Fire, Wind
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
⟬ Skills ⟭
— Active —
Immortal Bonds, Appraisal (3), Light Ball, Fire Manipulation, Fire Blade, Wind Blade, Silent Fury
— Passive —
Language Comprehension, Breeze Footwork (6)
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
⟬ Innate Talents ⟭
Immortal, Double Natural Growth Rate, Status Manipulation, Elementalist, Learning Acceleration
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
A bitter smile crept across my lips. My basic attributes had climbed into four-digit territory—strong enough to rival low-tier adventurers. But everything else was lagging behind, barely scraping the three hundreds.
<“…If only I could train my mana and aura. Maybe they’d have caught up by now.”>
【No, Master. Your physical growth accelerated precisely because your training focused solely on basic attributes. Had you also trained mana or aura, your development would have slowed.】
<“I hate how you make that sound reasonable.”>
Still… it made sense. My life here was a loop: wake up, train, mine for twelve straight hours, then sleep for three, maybe four hours, if I was lucky that the nightmare didn’t haunt me. Moreover, my body was still that of a child, and I had the Double Natural Growth Rate talent.
<“That explains the four-digit stats, then.”>
【Indeed. Your regimen is intensive. And consistent.】
A gust of dry wind blew over the pit as I leaned against a stone wall, eyes still fixed on the glowing screen.
<“By the way, why is my state listed as Hungry? I don’t feel that hungry right now.”>
【You’ve simply grown numb to it. Your body, however, is constantly in a state of deprivation.】
<“...Is that how it works?”>
I didn’t know you could grow numb to hunger, even while your body still craved food. Well, my knowledge of human physiology is low. If Aza said so, then it must be true.
【You sleep 3–4 hours a day, train the moment you wake, mine until evening, and eat one meal of hardened bread. it would be strange if your body wasn’t hungry at all!】
Azadia’s tone shifted, just slightly—sharper than usual. Almost scolding.
<“…Are you sulking?”>
【I’m not!】
<“But you sound—”>
【I SAID I’M NOT! But I am hungry! You eat that god-awful bread every day and I feel it too! I didn’t want to complain because you were depressed every day but—ugh!】
I blinked, surprised. Then guilt crept into my chest like a cold draft.
<“...Sorry.”>
I muttered the apology instinctively, though I was supposed to be the master in this relationship. But Azadia wasn’t just some tool in my head. She felt everything. Literally.
<“I thought only our emotions were shared…”>
【So did I, at first. But I’m inside your body. What your body feels, I feel too. Even if your mind doesn’t register hunger, mine does.】
<“Strange how you still haven’t gotten used to it after two years.”>
【…One aspect women can't escape is their connection to food.】
<“…You mean women like to eat but hate gaining weight?”>
【Shut up. You should never talk about a woman’s weight. Ever.】
She had no comeback. I smirked. She clearly hated talking about things that make most women squirm—probably because she was one. This could be valuable information to stash away for future teasing.
<“When we escape this place… let’s eat. Properly. As much as we want.”>
【R-Really?! I want meat! And sweets! Lots of sweets!】
<“Wait… do sweets even exist in this world?”>
【No. But I remember the recipes! Chocolate, ice cream, pancakes… I’ll teach you how to make all of them!】
Her excitement made her voice lighter, warmer. For a moment, she didn’t sound like an angel soul—just a girl who’d suffered too long without joy.
<“...You really don’t sound like a divine being sometimes.”>
【Hmph.】
I chuckled. Our bond wasn’t something forced—it had grown, forged through endurance and the quiet comfort of shared pain.
<“Anyway… I remember my mana and aura being about 100 before the incident. Why are they above 300 now?”>
【It's the outcome of your battles. More precisely, it's thanks to your skill, Silent Fury. This skill enables you to accumulate more mana and aura than your body would normally allow. As a side effect, your body has adapted to this increase.】
<”Silent Fury…”>
I shut my eyes, recalling the moment that skill first awakened. Back then, my thoughts were consumed by the desire to eliminate bandits. I was engulfed in a rage that seemed to obliterate my rationality. However, it didn't imply I had no control over my body. On the contrary, every action during that time reflected my deliberate intent.
<“Show me the skill details.”>
⟬ Silent Fury ⟭
When the suppressed rage within the weak erupts into silence, a maddening force engulfs all enemies in view.
This skill can be activated when the following conditions are fulfilled:
The user's emotions must be fueled by anger.There must be a minimum of five enemies stronger than the user present.During this skill is active, the user will receive the following effects:
The user's aura capacity, mana capacity, magic power, and mental strength will surge to match the highest respective attributes among the enemies.Upon defeating an enemy, the user gains additional aura capacity, mana capacity, magic power, and mental strength, proportional to the fallen enemy's corresponding status.The skill deactivates automatically once the user's anger subsides.
User’s status will revert to normal once this skill is deactivated.
In the skill's inactive state, the user's aura may become uncontrollable when experiencing anger.
<“…That’s ridiculous.”>
It was a broken kind of power—born from desperation, bound to wrath. But it saved me once. It might happen again.
<”Setting aside the demanding conditions and the drawback while inactive, this skill could potentially turn the tide in battles against strong foes, don't you think?”>
【Not necessarily. Facing opponents with similar status makes it nearly impossible to fight against multiple enemies.】
Well, that’s true. For instance, one person with 2000 status is quite impossible to win against five enemies with 2000 status too.
【Moreover, your basic status remains unaffected. Your initial victories were due to the surprise attacks, coupled with your foes' exhaustion, rendering them unable to utilize aura. It was more about luck than anything else, Master.】
<”Ugh… You are so cruel.”>
【I simply wish to prevent overconfidence that could lead you to dire consequences.】
<”Yes, yes.”> I replied casually, though I know she wasn’t wrong.
<“About those 60 status points—those came from killing the bandits?”>
【Correct. More precisely, kill strong enemies—the bandits—when your anger reached the peak.】
<“But I can’t use them, since I’m banned from mana and aura usage.”>
【You can’t. But I can distribute them if needed. Do you wish to allocate them now?】
I pondered a bit before I replied.
<”No need. They're pointless as long as I'm still a slave anyway.”>
【Understood.】
I stared into the dying horizon as the others returned to the shabby building. The air smelled of ash and sweat.
<“So… the fire and wind affinities came from that day too?”>
【Yes. You met the conditions through your emotions and actions.】
At first I thought I may not be able to obtain fire element through the anger condition, but life is really full of unexpected things.
I sighed inwardly, then turned my attention to the new skills.
<“Then the Fire Manipulation skill…”>
⟬ Fire Manipulation ⟭
The art of crafting and commanding fire. The scale of the fire conjured or governed hinges on the quantity of mana employed.
<“That must’ve been when I incinerated that bandit.”>
【Correct.】
During that moment, I forged the fire and engulfed the bandit. Unfortunately, I skipped the step to control the winds but used wind magic directly, thus I didn’t obtain Wind Manipulation skill.
<“And these blade skills?”>
I might have a faint notion of how those skills would be described. Nevertheless, let's verify.
⟬ Fire Blade ⟭
A blade forged of fire. Its size expands with the augmentation of mana or aura.
⟬ Wind Blade ⟭
A blade formed from concentrated wind. Its size expands with the augmentation of mana or aura.
<“Pretty straightforward…”>
I stepped into the cramped quarters where the others had already fallen asleep. The wind blew harder now—cold, sharp, whispering promises of another day like this one.