The Roamer

Chapter 10: Grand Escape

“This… this is amazing!” roared Aeollus with vigor in his voice, with a smiling expression on his face. He felt that he had just taken a step into true cultivation, as if everything from before was a lie. ‘Is this how the soldiers of an army feel?’ Aeollus thought to himself, no daring to overestimate himself.

Right now, he was definitely one of the strongest in the prison if not the strongest, but in the outside world, he’d probably be considered normal, and he’d be considered weak in even more places. In fact, just comparing himself to an army soldier was already an overestimate, and he wasn’t at that level quite yet, but closing in.

To become a soldier of the army, you need a minimum of two layers, and though he has a layer that’s extremely powerful due to absorbing another, it still couldn’t compare with two layers.

Aeollus stood up, and flew towards the sky. He knew that he could no longer stay at this prison as he had probably angered the lord and many others. After developing his first layer and absorbing the announcer’s spirit and layer, he could fly for a whole minute now, which was good enough to get a fair distance away.

He dropped down to the ground on some rocky road that was surrounded by buildings. He looked left and right and saw many things that he did not know the reason for. For example, he didn’t know the purpose of the butchery.

‘Why sell meat? Just give it to people or eat it!’

As these thoughts cluttered Aeollus and his head, he heard footsteps rushing towards him from behind, like a stampede. Just like he thought, he saw an army of at least fifty guards chasing him, probably trying to bring him back or execute him.

He immediately booked it once he sensed their spirit, as every single guard was at least at his cultivation level, or higher! ‘I knew it, everything outside the prison is much stronger than within, I was living in a small conceited world when I was in there..’ Aeollus thought to himself, while realizing how vast the world truly was.

Even the normal people roaming the streets were at least foundation level, and many of them could mess up the slaves above the top four hundred as if they were nothing.

He suddenly reached a towering stone wall, which he assumed was the edge of the village. He flew over it, and landed on the other side. As it seemed that the guards did not have as good an affinity with the wind as him, so they had to open the gate and rush out, saving him some time.

He ran into the forest in front of him, and saw a glimpse of the location that he first worked in when he came to the prison, when he was cutting down trees. He continued running, hoping to lose the company behind him, and finally roam this world free.

***

Meanwhile, at the slave prison, the top ten slaves were assembled together for some reason, and they did not know that reason. Suddenly, the grand wooden door to their left burst open, and the person who walked in scared them to death, for he was a person who had reached the tenth layer!

Along with that, he was also the person who controlled everything from the shadows within this tiny little town, the lord! He strolled through and took a seat, and as soon as they made eye contact with him, they knew he was furious.

“Excuse my ignorance master, but may I ask what is the issue you’re facing that needs us here?” asked number eight, who was currently pissing himself terribly. He truly couldn’t handle the aura of a tenth layer, and most of them were about to vomit blood out as well.

“Damn slave, I’ll talk when I want to!” roared the lord while inflicting his aura onto them, making all of them vomit blood, while some experienced broken bones. If they were to truly fight this lord, they wouldn’t even be able to fight and would faint just from his aura!

“I-I-I am sorry for my insolence master!” said number eight in a stuttering voice, with his bones breaking more and more the longer the aura stayed.

“Fool, just stop talking completely!” roared number nine, with a clear hint of fear in his voice.

“You slaves dare to act so foolish in front of the master?” asked a servant within the mansion, who was preparing to blast them all away. All the slaves faces turned pale white, as they knew that they could barely handle anybody in the world outside of the prison.

“I’ve summoned all of you worthless scum to hunt down a slave that is escaping as we speak!” roared the lord, while stopping all the chatter within the manor with that one roar.

“Master, may you please give us an appearance and number?” asked slave number 6, with clear killing intent in his eyes. He wanted to kill the lord, but wanted to kill the slave that escaped even more since he was the one who was causing this whole commotion!

“Servant, speak!” roared the lord at the servant who was warning the slaves before.

“Yes, my lord. The slave that escaped has brown hair, brown eyes, and a somewhat muscular appearance. He is but a young boy, maybe around twelve?” said the servant, with apprehensiveness in his eyes.

“He also managed to worm his way into the top thousand of the leaderboard, and there have been rumors circulating around that he has developed a layer.” the servant added in with a calm physique.

On the other hand, most of the slaves were grinning, with only one of them not showing any facial expression. It was slave number four, the most careful of them all.

‘All the others heard his age and began to smile calmly, but if he’s strong enough to cause such a commotion, he’s surely not some normal child, and the first layer rumor is also an issue if it turns out to be true…’ thought number four to himself, then looked toward the lord again.

“My lord, is there anything else for us to know?” he asked willingly, as he truly thought that he needed to gather all the information he could get before attempting to tackle this child.

“Hmm, when he escaped from the arena, we found the body of the announcer there with blood flowing out, and his spirit completely gone.” said the servant in the place of his lord while giving number four a spiteful look for daring to ask the lord instead of him.

“This… did the child kill the announcer?” asked slave number six, clearly intrigued by the situation. It had been a while since he fought anybody good, so he wished to loosen up his body with a good opponent.

“Even if he did, killing the announcer if a joke to all of us!” roared slave number two, clearly pleased with the situation.

In fact, only the top hundred knew this, but one had to have two layers to enter the top twenty. Above that, all the people within the top ten had achieved the third layer, which was uncommon even in the real world. Number one had even reached the fourth layer!

“Do we know where this slave has gone to? Any leads or directions?” asked the only female of the group, number six.

“Heh, me smash the little human!” roared a troll, which would turn out to be number 3. Though this troll was only on the third layer like the rest, he was definitely the best within the top ten when it came to the physical body!

“Above all that, the lord will be issuing freedom and a first tier parchment with an attack on it to you all if you do manage to catch him!” yelled the servant in a domineering tone, clearly trying to gain their attention once again.

“Gee, master is too nice to us slaves to give us such delicacies!” roared slave number eight with his tongue hanging out of his mouth, as if he had just heard food was about to be served.

“All right, now get going you useless hogs!” roared the lord, clearly fed up with sitting in the same room as such filthy beings. Though all the slaves were powerful compared to the other slaves, they definitely weren’t in a position to stand up against the lord. They piled against the door and got out.

With the introduction to the escapee and his might be layer, all of them headed out in different directions. Only one of them stayed in town, number four, to carefully plan out what to do next, and besides, the escapee might be risky and hide in town, so he had to check out carefully.

“Ooo, the bodies of guards huh? Either one of the top ten came here before me and massacred them, or the escapee went this way!” yelled number seven, who had a silly expression on his face while staring at all the bloody bodies. He then looked forward, and saw that this patch led to the mountains, and realized that they could be a good hiding spot for the escapee, heading in that direction.

Meanwhile, the only slave to head in the right direction would be number nine, who had found traces of some sort of struggle near an edge of the town leading towards the forest. He had always been known as the most perceptive of all the slaves, his five senses rising to what he claims to be, ‘the very top’.

He sniffed blood up further ahead, and saw some broken trees cut in half by seemingly nobody. ‘This escapee, how powerful is he?’ he thought to himself, and began to raise his guard.

Just like that, he headed into the forest, and ultimately towards Aeollus.

“So, his self proclamation of being the utmost sensitive wasn’t completely off huh?” said number four to himself while watching number nine walk into the forest. He was witness to the look on number nines face, and realized that he might have actually found the escapee.

He immediately leaped into action, and jumped onto a tree, trailing number nine.

--- sequence 2 ---

Meanwhile, Aeollus had just emerged from the forest on the other side by covering his legs in spirit, letting him triple, no, maybe quadruple his speed. He looked up, and saw an ocean.

“This… is this what all the elders in the village called an ocean? It really is gorgeous!” he said to himself, while pleasing himself even more by continuously staring at it. Suddenly, he sensed a powerful killing intent from behind him, and he realized that he might not have completely lost the guards.

He immediately jumped into the ocean, trying to lose his pursuer, whoever it may be. Just as expected, a minute after he jumped into the ocean, some person walked out of the forest sniffing the ground like crazy!

On the other hand, Aeollus was crazily swimming towards the shore that was way off from where he had jumped from. Since he had jumped into the ocean, his pursuers sense of smell should be ruined by now, and he won’t be able to find traces of broken branch and sticks now!

Aeollus then booked it towards some rolling hills with many trees and a beautiful scenery. He could tell that his pursuer, whoever it may be, was definitely stronger than him, and could wipe him out in a single fist. For that reason, even using techniques to try and close up the gap was impossible to him.

What he needed right now was a safe place to understand everything that the announcer had within his layer, which was something that he could not find. The area he was in was a beautiful area with many open spots, barely any trees in sight. For now, he’d just have to keep running until he found a safe place.

‘I’ll break a few branches in this direction and try to throw my pursuer off, sending him on a bit of a goose chase!’ Aeollus thought to himself while doing exactly what he was thinking. He even chopped a tree or two in half, just to make sure it captures the pursuers attention.

Suddenly, some person jumped out from the ocean behind him, and made eye contact with him. Though Aeollus could tell that it was not the same man that was sniffing the ground crazily, it was definitely someone related to him, as he also radiated an extreme killing intent!

“Brat, do you know how far I’ve been trailing that damn hound for?” asked the mysterious person while pointing his finger at the figure crazily sniffing up on the cliff. “The amount of times he almost caught me was too much, you shouldn’t be rude to your seniors like that!” roared the mysterious person, while disappearing from Aeollus and his eyes.

Aeollus immediately recognized it as a technique which lets person go invisible, so he infused some spirit into his eyes to try and capture it. Yet, even after he did that, he could only see layers of spirit, but no body.

“Could it be… he isn’t using any technique, but just his physical power and raw spirit?!” Aeollus hollered loudly, while turning around to run after realizing he truly couldn’t confront him. If just his opponent’s physical body and spirit could do this, just how freighting would it be when he began to use attacks and actual techniques?

This was definitely not an opponent Aeollus could handle anytime soon, so knowing that, he flew into the sky and tried to escape. His opponent then flew after him, which shocked Aeollus greatly!

‘This person also has a decent affinity with the wind to be able to chase me in the sky!’ Aeollus thought to himself after flying for about half a minute with this mysterious man chasing after him. At that moment, he realized that his opponents wind affinity might exceed even his, which made his face as pale as one could get.

“Wait a minute, you said something about being my senior… could it be that you’re also a slave?!” Aeollus thought to himself, not willing to believe it at all. He turned around to see if his opponent would confirm it, but was instead met with a fist.

Aeollus was sent flying a thousands of meters away, and crashed into a building. It seemed to be some sort of inn, as the smell of drinks filled the air. He looked down at where he was punched and saw that there was just a big, bloody hole left there.

‘Well, at least it isn’t the guts again’ Aeollus thought to himself, while screaming in pain.

Then, he realized another thing that was extremely important.

“This area, this road, that huge destructed arena… did he send me flying with a single punch all the way back to town?!” Aeollus roared, not willing to believe that his fate was going to be sealed like this.

Meanwhile, the other top ten slaves also sensed a weak aura coming and going extremely quickly, and realized that something, no, someone just flew past them. They realized who it could be, and all of them began to return to town, ready for the final confrontation.

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ABOUT ME

Name: Abdul Kareem

Age: 13 (Almost 14)

Occupation: Middle school

Goal: Idk, I’m just making a novel for now

Location: Why would I say that?

Relations: I’m not married (duh)

Favorite food: da asian stuf!

Anyway, on a more serious tone, this is my first novel I’ve ever tried writing. Thanks for being with me on this first experience!