With Duchess's help, I managed to find the way out of the basement. The bad news is that it's only accessible from the elevator. The elevator needs a key card that the armed guard didn't have.

Rob started chipping away at the concrete walls using his shovels, but that'll take way too long for it to be a feasible plan. I employed the help of the other prisoners to search around the basement area to see if there was any other way out. It appears that we're on the 2nd floor of the basement, there's another one above us.

The youngest of the prisoners, still older than me, managed to find an air duct that may lead outside. The problem is it's tiny, a human can't fit their head through the hole.

I send the Duchess on her very first solo mission. I cram her into the air vent and send her on her way.

‘

~

[Duchess P.O.V]

Why would my master send thisss one all by her lonesome? If I get caught by a group of ruffians, then it will be the end of me. Alas, this mission is one that only thisss one can handle. The hardest part was going straight up the smooth metal walls of the ventilation system, but the master was the one that ‘helped’ me up.

Thisss one wishes that he would be more gentle on my poor feathers.

Like any common snake, thisss one can ‘see’ infrared. The warmth of prey is almost blinding in the dark. I slither my way until thisss one finds a vent opening. There are two ruffians underneath the vent, facing away from the elevator doors, where the master and the prisoners are held.

I can’t take down both of them at once and any loud noises will betray a future sneak attack. The master is not the only schemer.

My instincts as a predator allow me to tell which of the two is the weak link. The one on the right has a more vigorous heart and emits more infrared than the left. I use my mental trickery to create a [Mental Illusion] and whisper sweet nothings into his ear using [Telepathy]. Now it’s only the question of how to do it.

~

The boss of the casino, the bald tattooed man, comes around the corner and approaches the two guards. He points to the stronger of the two guards, then to the weaker.

[You there, kill that one. I don't like the way he looks]

The surprised guard speaks up, “But sir, you know that he’s my brother.”

The other guard says in confusion, “What is the matter bro?”

[Ten million dollars should do it, and don't use a firearm. You know what will happen if you don’t follow my orders.]

The stronger of the two guards pulls out a combat knife from his belt and drops his gun. The other guard is startled and tries to talk to his brother.

“Hey, bro. Are you okay?”

The silent brother says nothing as his younger brother backs away from him.

“Come on bro, you are scaring me. This isn’t a funny joke.”

The older brother lashed out with the knife and planted it into his brother's chest. The younger brother falls to the ground, not willing to fight back against his older brother, even at the moment of death.

“Why…”

“You heard bossman, ten mil. How could I refuse the offer.”

“W-w-what are you talking about?”

“Right now, he's standing right ther-”

The illusion of the bald man has already broken. The older brother is momentarily frozen, as he doesn’t know what to do. But that is when thisss one strikes.

Thisss one falls from the vent, quickly wrapping my long feathered body around the neck of the strong one. Thisss one is not willing to allow a rebuttal. [Hypnotic Gaze] uses the last of the mana thisss one had, and will only last seconds against this foe. Good thing ischemia only needs that long.

The lack of blood in the brain causes the prey to fall into an unconsciousness that he will never wake up from. The younger guard has already bled to death, a knife in the heart will do that.

Thisss one is resorted to stealing from the bodies of the deceased. Too bad the prey is too big for thisss one’s mouth.

Thisss one manages to get a key card from the older guard and gets back into the vent with much effort.

~

[Ellis Vincere P.O.V]

I trust Duchess to go find a key card for me. Her craftiness and mental magic are a powerful crutch for her weak body. My 2nd plan was for her to take my phone out and call the cops, but since telepathy doesn't work over transmission signals that strategy wouldn’t go far.

I wait by the open vent, listening for Duchess's return. The only sounds are the ambient sounds of Rob scraping the walls with a shovel and the various freed prisoners muttering amongst themselves.

I hear her approaching. I stick my hand through the vent to catch her when she eventually falls. She impacts my hand and I pull her out. I got her, but she's not talking to me.

“Duchess are you all right, did you get the card?”

[...]

“Did you run out of mana or something?”

[...]

She doesn't respond though she nods her head.

“Where's the keycard did you find one?”

She pauses for a moment and then takes the time to regurgitate a key card from her gullet. I look at her like she's disgusting for doing that right on my hand. She looks at me like, what am I supposed to do? Or that's what I think she does. She doesn't have the facial muscles to show emotion.

She goes back to her spot around my neck as I head towards the elevator doors. I look back at the freed prisoners and fall into contemplation.

"All right you guys, I can't ferry all of you guys out of here. They're armed, and if we go out as a party they'll spot us. That is the worst-case scenario."

“So what happens now?” someone speaks out.

“So what happens is, I'm going to go on ahead by myself and come back for you guys, preferably with the enforcers. Rob, give one of them your gun.” Rob chatters begrudgingly and hands over his machine gun to the nearest person.

I go towards the elevator, and one last time someone speaks out.

“Good luck and stay safe, I hope you find your friend.”

I open the elevator doors and walk in with my tamed beasts.

~

Duchess managed to squeeze a few words out with her telepathy. We stopped by the floor where she killed those guards, and we put the bodies down in the basement. But we took the guns. Rob stared at me with his eyeless sockets. I knew he was pleading, so I allowed him to keep one of the guns. When I wasn't looking, he also stole one of their hats, a black fedora.

I'm not stupid enough to sweep this whole building floor by floor with just the 4 of us so I need to call for backup. I pulled up my flip phone. There's no reception in the basement so I made a call on the elevator.

I call Nelson the FIB agent.

"Hey Ellis, it's good for you to call me. I figured out that there's an internship program you could join. It's basically the normal job except you can't go into super dangerous fractures, and you don't get paid."

"Sounds cool Nelson, but what I really need is some help. Do you know how to contact that police captain that found me outside that fracture?"

“Yeah yeah, I could contact him what's up.”

“Nothing much, just stuck in a casino run by an evil follower of Merita, who swindled and imprisoned a bunch of people. A lot of lives are in danger, so it'd be helpful if you could get them to come to the downtown casino. They are in the basement and they're armed.”

“Uh, sure? You seem to get into a lot of trouble. I'm not too sure if I want you to join my team anymore.”

“So I don't need to come by the office at some point?”

“Never mind what I said, I'll get the police captain to get to that location as soon as possible. It should take a few minutes, stay safe.”

I close my flip phone and put it back into my pocket. I go up to the top floor where I know the boss's office is. There's no camera on the floor and only one guard.

He turns around but he doesn't expect the sight of an 18-year-old with a rock, a skeleton with a machine gun, and a feathered snake staring right at him. I smash his face as the Duchess wraps around his arm restraining him from his weapon. Rob knows not to make noise, so he conjures a shovel and starts beating the shit out of him. We managed to kill him before he could make any sounds of alarm.

There's not that much blood and the carpets are red so I don't worry about blood giving me away. I drag his body into a janitorial closet and hide there for a few minutes, Duchess needs to recover a little bit of Mana and I need to wait for backup. Sorry Charlie, wait a little longer I swear to Gods I'll help you.