Chapter 91: Countdown to the Prison Break
“If hurt enough, slice open with a pair of hands, the curses of yesterday. When night falls awaiting daybreak, only scars remain…”
As the wake-up song sounded, the prison entered free activity time and all cell doors turned from red to green.
Ashe went to the central hall and happened to see the light screen broadcasting the weather: “…the meteorologist has announced, April 21st will be cloudy turning sunny, with a significant increase in goblin fertility rates today…”
Death row inmates came and went in the cafeteria, business as usual. When Ashe entered, quite a few people greeted him proactively with rather respectful attitudes—having won two deathmatches consecutively and survived the Blood Moon Tribunal, the “demon” Ashe was now seen by the inmates as yet another powerhouse who could break through the prison floor.
Ashe had just sat down when Igor took the seat across from him. They looked at each other without speaking, quietly finishing breakfast, then went up to the top floor Observation Deck. Langna and Ronald were already waiting for them.
Except for those harboring ulterior motives who wanted to observe the waters, no one would come up to the deck to bask in the morning sun. With just the four of them on the deck, Igor directly asked, “Is the miracle ready?”
Ashe clenched his fists and closed his eyes, recalling the feeling of resonating with the spirit. He gently exhaled, “All I can say is I’ve done my best.”
After many days of calibration and practice in the virtual world, Ashe had mastered the Slash Me miracle and even succeeded in getting it for free without spending any arcane energy in the virtual world. But he still couldn’t guarantee he could invoke the miracle 100% of the time. After all, the difference between reality and the virtual world could be as big as the one between a cafeteria and a restroom.
Igor nodded equivocally and looked to Langna and Ronald, “Having been locked up here for so long, can you still remember the fighting methods of sorcerers? If any problems come up later, you’ll have to take care of the troublesome ones.”
“I was admitted less than a month ago, no problem.”
After two days out of sight, Ronald looked even more haggard. It wasn’t that he had become emaciated, but rather his whole being—his spirit, energy and aura—had visibly deteriorated. In Ashe’s words, ‘he looked like a programmer who had been working 15 hours a day, eating, crapping and sleeping all in the office for a whole month.’
But his low voice was full of unspeakable vitality, as if there was light in his pupils and a burning fire in his heart, as if the decaying body harbored a life about to be reborn through fire.
So Ashe was even more worried.
Generally speaking, ordinary people would call this state—the light before death.
As long as he could make it through today… Ashe’s mind was full of the coldness of capitalists who would exploit temporary workers to the last drop before discarding them.
“I’ve been here for years, so I really can’t say if I can regain my past combat power.” Langna said, “But I’m a fistfighter, I haven’t neglected my combat skills even in here. Even if I can’t use miracles, just being able to invoke a spirit is enough to get me to 70% of my past strength.”
Among physical combat mages, especially unarmed ones like fistfighters, more or less all possessed spirits that could enhance their physical abilities.
After all, real fights don’t follow rules. The opponent won’t go easy on you just because you only use your bare fists. On the contrary, they are more likely to bludgeon you down with a tailored weapon. Therefore, unarmed combatants must possess spirits that can make up for the deficit in weapons, either by enhancing defense or increasing mobility.
As a Moonshadow werewolf, Langna’s physical abilities would rise quite a bit after transformation. With a spirit to boot, his combat power in the cramped dark environment here would probably be the strongest on the team.
“Transport ships generally arrive in the morning. After offloading new inmates and supplies, they return to Caimon City’s Shattered Lake Harbor.” Igor said, “But there’s a detail—the ship crew and Blood Mad Hunters eat in shifts in the cafeteria.”
“Blood Mad Hunters are required during training to finish meals within 5 minutes max. Adding transit time, we can assume that when the second batch of Blood Mad Hunters appears in the cafeteria, there are less than ten minutes before departure.”
“That is, when the second batch of Blood Mad Hunters steps into the cafeteria, it’s the signal for us to act. We must purify the chips and change into medical crow suits within ten minutes, then use the medical access directly to board the transport ship.”
“Understand?”
The whole plan was extremely crude and urgent. The slightest hiccup in any part would be total failure, and many sections relied heavily on luck. But Igor had somehow managed to cobble together a theoretically viable scheme in this near-flawless Shattered Lake Prison, and Ashe’s group was quite impressed, all nodding with looks of admiration.
“Since that’s the case, let’s all make our final mental preparations and meet up early in the cafeteria for lunch.”
Igor looked to Ashe, “This is your last chance to reconsider. You have the ability to survive in this prison, you could take a less dangerous path.”
Ronald and Langna also looked to Ashe. They all knew Igor didn’t actually have a strong desire to escape, and didn’t know how Ashe had managed to manipulate him.
Ashe said, “I cannot go gently into that good night.”
Igor nodded thoughtfully, “You mean your dignity cannot tolerate you clinging ignobly to life?”
“No, I mean if I stay here, I’ll definitely keep getting picked for the Blood Moon Tribunal until I die.”
“Maybe you should reflect on your past deeds, if you have to worry about retaliation even after being jailed.”
Seeing Ashe’s determination unchanged, Igor also gave up that last sliver of hope. He waved and left first—he needed to go take a bath and calm down.
There was still an hour or two until noon. Ashe didn’t know what to do. He had completely mastered the Substitute, Sword Heart and Circulate spirits, and could invoke them anytime. As for miracles, he didn’t dare practice randomly, because the Slash Me miracle required a specific target. If Ashe accidentally purified someone else’s chip, triggering the prison’s defenses prematurely, he’d be waiting for Igor’s mocking to death.
After wandering around aimlessly, Ashe found himself at the most familiar Deathmatch Society.
A thought arose and he didn’t go into the Society, but found a dim entrance behind it instead. The surrounding sounds suddenly became very distant. The entrance was a heavy, pitch-black iron door, exuding danger signals everywhere as if saying ‘cowards dare not enter’.
This was the infirmary.
Ashe pushed the door open. The medical crow on duty at the front desk glanced at him and said, “Go to treatment room 1, your assigned medical crow will come get you.”
Before he could even take out his ID tag [#222], how did the other know who his assigned medical crow was? Although it felt a bit strange, Ashe didn’t think much of it and directly headed into treatment room 1.
Watching his retreating back, the medical crow at the front desk chuckled under the crow mask, “Feel honored for your future.”
After waiting briefly in the treatment room, medical crow [#222] came in through the side door. She tossed an apple to Ashe, “Where are you hurt?”
Ashe caught the apple and bit into it without wiping. “I’m not hurt.”
“If you’re not hurt then why are you here? Although I hope you’ve come for cosmetic surgery, judging by your past resistance, you probably haven’t corrected your cowardly aesthetic views yet. So you must be here for…” The medical crow held her hands contemplatively, “Bio-modification?”
Ashe looked speechless, “Don’t you think you’re overestimating my courage a bit too much?”
“There’s no need for courage in bio-mods! Nowadays it’s trendy to swap a hand, swap a leg, swap an eye, all very normal!” The medical crow said in surprise, “Could it be you’re a fundamentalist Celestialist? An obstinate anti-technology fossil?”
“What’s wrong with an original body that it has to be swapped?”
“Because it’s not good enough! Don’t you want to be more agile, stronger, better vision, more acute hearing?”
“I think my current body is adequate—”
“We can also mod the lower body to enhance mating endurance and pleasure.”
Ashe’s eyes lit up, “Next chance I get I’ll consult you on the profound intricacies of bio-modification.”
“Although I’m delighted by your interest in bio-mods, I feel like your lower body may never get a chance to be useful in your lifetime…”
“I’ve said many times I’ll definitely escape from here! I’ll definitely regain my freedom!”
“Even adding your unrealistic premise, I still have no plans to modify my conclusion…unless you’re willing to accept my hot stud transformation surgery! Consider it!”
“It’s not that I don’t believe in the power of hot guys, I just don’t trust you.”
“Hmph.”
The medical crow sat on the edge of the bed, looking puzzled as she asked, “Anyway, you have no issues, so why did you come to the infirmary? This is your first time taking the initiative to come here!”
Indeed, previously Ashe had always been carried in, this was the first time he walked in on his own.
“I came…to chat with you! After all, death row inmates like me have plenty of free time.” Ashe spread his hands helplessly.
“But I’m not free! You think I’m like you? I’m very busy okay, researching techniques, learning new knowledge, writing research papers…I don’t have that much time to chat with you! I’ll make an exception this once, but don’t do this again!” The medical crow said indignantly, hands on her hips.
Even with the crow mask and voice changer, Ashe could hear the joy in her tone.
As expected, workers in any world have a strong desire to slack off. And the happiest part of slacking off is gossiping with others.
After the medical crow excitedly talked about her ‘senior who always targeted her getting driven away for stealing things’, ‘recent good luck in the virtual world’, ‘eating two yolked eggs for breakfast’ and other happy news, Ashe suddenly changed the subject.
“Oh, I just realized you’re quite good-looking.”
“Huh?” The medical crow froze, “R-really? I’m not that good-looking—which part do you find good-looking?”
It took a full five seconds before the medical crow reacted to what nonsense Ashe had just said.
As she turned and carefully picked a scalpel from the tool box, Ashe felt impending doom—the person before him was capable of dissecting him completely before sewing him back up again, all while grinding medical EXP!
“222, I don’t have much time left.”
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