Mash heard the words and then processed them. Was Meson really going to try and turn Mash into a slave? That didn’t seem like it would work. But mash saw something begin to form around his neck. Crystal started appearing with no signs of mana or anything. It just started spreading around his neck. Mash jerked back but the process followed him perfectly. Within a few seconds, a thick crystal shackle had formed around his neck. It was pure black, and only when it finished did Mash begin to hear laughter from the other side of the room.

“Adventurers truly are as arrogant as you claimed my king!”

The Earl practically sang the words. Mash barely listened; his mind was racing. Rather he was furiously absorbing every bit of information he could. Priscilla similarly helped him follow the traces of the magic. The King rose from the table and walked over to Lisa. He spoke with a haughty sense of authority now.

“Vomit and drink this.”

He handed a thin vial to Lisa, and she did exactly as commanded. She vomited onto the table, her face coloring with embarrassment and sadness. Tears had begun to streak down her cheeks as she drank the proffered vial. The king shook his head slightly as he walked past her toward Mash.

“Did you really think he would save you? Him? He is nothing, but I will change that. Mash from this point onward you are mine.”

The king’s confidence never wavered as he walked close enough to Mash to offer him another vial. While the king spoke, Mash came to a few realizations about his situation. And Mash rose to his feet, and just watched the king's approach. The man was completely defenseless. He was so self-assured that he didn’t even blink as Mash rose to his feet. The king stood less than arm’s length away from him and spoke with the same authority as earlier.

“Stop moving. Vomit and drink this.”

The command was given, and it did nothing. Mash had already realized it, but the king’s skills hadn’t worked. The shackle had formed, and it was trying to enforce the king’s binding, but it didn’t stick. Priscilla had noticed a flaw in the king’s method. The man in question couldn’t actually tell if the binding had worked. As the king stood there, Mash stopped seeing a man. He saw a monster.

At that moment, Mash moved as fast as he ever had. One hand rose to the collar around his neck, as the other struck out. His arms changed as he moved. Scales grew over his skin. The king wasn’t completely inept though. His eyes widened slightly, and Mash felt mana shifting in his domain. Two more people appeared in the room. They appeared beside the king but were entirely unprepared for the situation. The only person who actually saw what was happening and responded was Lisa. However, she was slowed by the poisoned food and barely got out of her seat. It was all she could really manage.

Mash’s left hand crushed the shackled around his neck. His claw had easily torn through the crystal. His other hand struck the king. The dragon form made his arms slightly bigger, and a whole lot stronger and faster. His fist struck the king’s nose and pushed it in, along with his skull. The king didn’t go flying across the room or anything. He just dropped back onto the ground. He hit a chair toppling it over as well. The people who had just teleported into the room stared down in obvious disbelief. Mash stared at his own bloody fist for a second. Lisa was the only one to react quickly.

“The crystals! Destroy them!”

The Earl heard her just as everyone did. The man really should’ve run, but instead, he greedily lunged for the king’s corpse. The shackle around Mash’s neck fell to the ground in pieces, and he lowered his hand toward the Earl. A bolt of lightning came out. Within his domain, Mash felt the earl try to form a shield of some kind. With a little help from Priscilla, Mash stopped him. Mash didn’t know exactly what he was doing, but the Earl’s magic collapsed. The man didn’t even have time to realize what had happened. The bolt of lightning struck him in the head. He slumped forward, falling just beside the king. He was no longer recognizable as his head was charred.

Then the two who stood next to him truly began to realize what had happened. They were both over level 100, and Mash could tell that one was even a higher level than himself. They wore clothes similar to Lisa's. The king’s other guards? That made sense. The king had an emergency skill that had summoned them. Then both men turned toward Lisa.

“What happened?”

Lisa didn’t listen to either of them or just yelled toward Mash.

“Mash please destroy the crystals! We can’t, and they still hold our contracts. If anyone took them, they would own us.”

The two-man reacted to the words as well. Their faces contorted with horror as Lisa revealed the information. Although to their credit, they didn’t immediately try to kill Mash. Mash held one of his hands toward the two bodies. Wood started to grow from it, turning his hand into an impossibly large mouth. In one large bite, he crushed both bodies. Mash didn’t understand how his eating skills worked, but he knew that they completely destroyed what they ate. And it proved to work here. The bodies seemingly seemed to vanish from within the mouth, though some blood did leak out.

The two men stared at Mash, and then at one another. They laughed and cried and hugged one another. Lisa joined with a smile that was nowhere near as perfect as her previous ones. That made it the best one Mash had seen yet. The three embraced one another, hugging, crying, and celebrating with unhidden joy.

While all this was happening, Mash was thinking about something else. He had felt the rush of leveling several times. Enough times that he was beginning to grow worried. And he noticed other changes in his body. The hunger that had vanished was not back but changed. It felt like he was full. Overstuffed even. There was another more concerning change though. His anger was mostly gone. It felt like his heartbeat had slowed a bit. His muscles untensed, and Mash let out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding. A sense of contentment filled him. The feeling was so strong, his thoughts couldn’t change it.

He did still think though. Shouldn’t he have felt worse for killing another person? No, they were terrible, and he couldn’t even think of them as human. A person wouldn’t be so horrible, he just couldn’t believe that. It wasn’t the attempt at enslaving him that bother him the most. It was the moment when Mash saw the pain and despair that had flashed across Lisa’s face. The king had forced her to ingest poison and then shamed her. And for what? An act to convince Mash that the foods were safe to eat. Lisa still crying broke off from the group and walked over to him.

“Thank you. But what do we do now? Every slave the king had would know that they are free now. The army is outside of the kingdom, but they will surely return. They are the strongest people here. Was this your plan? To kill the king and let the army destroy the kingdom and free everyone.”

Mash paused to think, as Priscilla relayed events to the others. His own personal feelings and thoughts would need to be sorted out later. What came next? What did someone do after killing a king? Red certainly wasn’t prepared either, her messages back were just as panicked as everything else. The plan was basically ruined now. They were just going to take as many slaves as they could and escape into his world. Although the group they were going to kidnap had grown to include the guards and anyone that didn’t want to live in this kingdom.

It had to change now. If they just left with the slaves now, the army would return and raze the city to the ground. Probably kill everyone that ever held a slave. Red was discussing the implications. Luke was bringing up how catastrophic things would become. Their own kingdom had struggled with wars and fights after slavery had been abolished. This would be worse since the slaves held all of the levels. The rightfully angry slaves could do whatever they wanted to the people. Mash didn’t pay much attention to the internal conversation and asked Lisa a question that wouldn’t change anything.

“Were they terrible?”

Or had Mash just projected his knowledge onto them? The “or” went unsaid. Mash had to know, even if it was too late to change the situation. Even if the knowledge didn’t change how he felt. Lisa didn’t answer as one of the two men did.

“Yes. Both were as horrible as they seemed. What you did makes you a hero, nothing else!”

The man spoke with only gratitude. Not a single bit of hesitation or doubt as he condemned the dead men. Lisa nodded quickly, and the final man walked up and grabbed Mash’s shoulders reassuringly. And Mash really saw the newcomers for the first time. The man who grabbed him was plainly a human, while the other was a dwarf. Tears still streaked down their faces, but they smiled despite it. The dwarf spoke up.

“Well, I’m Argoth, and that’s Timothy. I feel like I need to introduce myself. But what is the next part of your plan? I imagine many slavers are currently being mutilated and many others are probably already dead.”

Mash didn’t know. He truly had no idea. Jill was apparently teleporting around trying to stop anything truly terrible from happening, but she couldn’t be everywhere. Red and Luke were doing likewise, but they were only three. Even if these three helped there would only be seven of them. It wasn’t enough. Red was basically assailing Mash and everyone with things to do. Although she was also out of her depth here. The two men in front of Mash looked considerably older than him, so Mash went with the seek wisdom plan. He sent a message to the others telling them he was going to ask someone what they thought. Red said she would reach out to the general. Mash liked that decision and started speaking to the three people before him.

“This wasn’t the plan. We have a secure way to get large groups of people out of the city. We were essentially just going to kidnap every slave or person that wanted to leave. So, we have no idea what to do, we're trying to figure it out. Do you have any ideas?”

Their plan was more complex than what Mash had mentioned, but it was enough to get the idea across. The three people looked at each other. Now they were just as concerned as he was. The human had an idea.

“There is a way to speak with the whole city. We can try and restore order with that and the guards. But I don’t know if everyone would listen to us.”

“Let’s try it.”

Mash didn’t want to waste more time standing around, so he followed as the three led him to a different room. The king had the device within his own room. It was a small red gemstone, and Lisa explained its use quickly.

“Just give it some mana, then speak freely.”

She was right. It was simple to use, and Mash funneled a tiny bit of energy into the crystal. Then he paused trying to figure out what to say. He wanted to see what was happening outside. He glanced at the wall and charged through it. The stone broke easily, and Mash stared into a city that was very much in chaos. Although, he had made a mistake. The crystal had been functioning when he crashed through the wall. The resounding noise of crashing stones caused the whole city to shake. Most people probably didn’t know what was happening, but many did stop what they were doing. Now it was his turn to talk.