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Raven remained perfectly still.
His breathing was shallow, not an ounce of aura was released from his body. His physical form was hidden from all kinds of tracking methods thanks to his runes. With all of this, it was no wonder why the three gloating escaped convicts remained clueless. Still, even with the confidence that he won't be seen nor tracked, Raven remained very careful. He didn't want to risk it now since he knew that dealing with all three of them at the same time is going to be troublesome.
Raven took this time to inspect the physical manifestations of the escaped prisoners.
The first one from the left had a short and shaggy hair, he had an unnaturally long arms. He wore black robes and a hood that covered his face. His lower body was somehow visible, he wore pants that only covered ¾'s of his legs, leaving his ankles visible and his charred foot with white nails. He wasn't wearing any footwear.
The one in the middle can almost be mistaken as a female due to how curvaceous his body was. If it weren't for Raven hearing his voice, he would totally guess that this one was a woman. He wore a tight fitting robes and his face was covered by his bangs. His hair was white, ears were somewhat pointy almost as if he was an elf. This one similarly doesn't have any footwear.
And the last one was the one that has the largest frame. His head was small yet his torso was unnaturally wide and bulky. This one was wearing a mask which has holes for the eyes and mouth only. His legs were similarly bulky as well and he has the biggest feet that Raven had ever seen. It all looked weird specially considering the fact that he was in a fetal position too.
They all looked mostly humans, but they had some differences as well. Right now, Raven couldn't tell who's who since their marks are hidden.
From the scriptures he read about the ten commandments, it says that each of them bore a mark given to them by the Devil Emperor. It isn't visible right now since their backs were facing him but it is said that the commandments take pride of these marks and tend to show it off.
Although Raven would like to get a little close to identify them, he didn't want to risk it.
"Hey 'Love'. Do you remember what the Heretics said? I can't remember it." The feminine one asked towards the one with an unusually large physique and was on a fetal position.
"They said they're going to send someone soon to free more of us. But it's been years since the last one came. Additionally, I don't feel like trusting those fools any longer."
'Wait, so the one who has a small head and large physique was Love? Okay...' Raven murmured inwardly as he listened to them some more.
"I can't say I blame you." The one with his face hidden by the hood commented. "I also don't feel like trusting them anymore. If anything, I'd venture that they just got lucky that time when they managed to send someone to loosen up the seal on our cages. I'm not even going to be surprised if they tell us that the previous agent they sent was already found and executed by our jailers."
"I guess your right..." the feminine looking guy sighed in defeat. "Still, I'm still hoping that they'd come and take us out of here. I want to go out and spread word about our Mighty Savior! I want to experience being adored by numerous fanatics of the Devil Emperor once more! I want to lead their prayers and worship our Lord and Emperor!"
'Ahh! This one might be 'Faith' then, so the hooded man was 'Piety'. Hmm...' Raven didn't know if he should be happy that they are stupid enough to tell him their identities or feel slightly annoyed since it was this easy.
"You aren't the only one. I too want to spread Love. I swear once we got out of here, I'll immediately start a cult, and drown myself in fleshly desires, have a massive orgy in the name of our god! Ahh! I hate this! I want out."
"Calm down you two." Piety told them while chuckling, "Seriously, can't you wait for a few more months? Patience is a virtue as they say here."
"The Patience I know is a whore and we're not from here so it doesn't count." Love retorted.
"Whatever. Let's just rest for now." Piety stood up and started walking out of the broken hut. "Seriously, we should move our beds out of the prison. That way we don't have to return there just to sleep."
"You can always sleep on the ground you know." Faith said as he too stood up. "And you know why we can't do that."
"It'll leave some clues, yeah I know. Let's just go. I'm about to pass out from boredom." Piety said as he was followed by Love and Faith.
Raven was alarmed and became perfectly still. He held his breath and didn't dare to move a muscle. He simply watched as the three prisoners walked out of the broken hut and went towards where their comrades were similarly imprisoned.
They all came dangerously close to him to the point where they were mere inches away from him. Thankfully, none of them seem to have felt his presence despite being close to him. Raven was prepared to clash as soon as he saw even the slightest sign of being discovered yet it didn't happen.
Even as they passed him, Raven continued to hold his breath and remained perfectly still. This proved to be a good idea since Piety looked back at the hut with narrowed eyes. However, he failed to sense anything at all so he merely shrugged and continued to walk away.
It was only after a couple of minutes when they disappeared that Raven felt safe and released the breath he was holding. He squinted his eyes and looked towards the direction of their prisons in a deep thought.
After that, Raven began walking towards the place with slow and measure movement. He remained alert and silent as he did so in order to not raise any alarms. He was on the look out for traps and such since he thought that with Piety being cautious, laying down traps wouldn't be out of expectations for him.
Raven was rewarded for his paranoia as he managed to sense multiple layers of trap barring him from reaching the prisoners. He smirked as definitely expected something like this. Unfortunately for the fool, he didn't expect Raven to outsmart him and be capable enough to bypass the traps by circling around them.
Raven already noticed that the traps were only concentrated at this area. Piety must be expecting that Raven couldn't see anything so he thought that this was enough, unfortunately he severely underestimated Raven's abilities.
After going around the traps, Raven continued on his way towards the prison cells. Still moving slowly and alert, he managed to get close enough to see the broken cells. He squinted and saw that the three were actually sleeping within their own cells.
At first, Raven thought that this might be another trap. He thought that they might feigning sleep in order to catch him in the act but when he heard how loud their snores were, Raven threw that notion out of the window.
He was actually quite speechless. They sure are taking this easy. Well, it's not like he's complaining. They were already helping him greatly by sleeping in their own quarters so if Raven let go of this chance, then he'd be a huge fool.
Raven discretely waved the Brush of Wisdom. He contained the fluctuations and prevented them from alerting the enemy. He used strong strokes to invoke powerful seals, he wasn't taking any chances, he only have one attempt at this and if he fails, he'll lose this golden chance.
Thankfully, Raven studied the structure of the seals beforehand and already had a way to not only fix them but also fortify them. Of course, since Raven only had a single chance at this, he wouldn't let go of the chance to fortify the seals on the others as well.
Ten Seals floated within Raven, each one was only visible to him and no one else. He looked at the peacefully sleeping prisoners at their comfort of their own cells. A sneer appeared on his face as he pointed forward and installed the seals towards their cells.
*Woosh!*
A glare of golden light erupted, alerting the prisoners. Unfortunately, they didn't move fast enough and could only stare as the doors of their prisons became covered with a golden-silver barrier, locking them in for as long as Raven remained alive.
Several roars of rage erupted, fluctuations of powerful probes flashed past Raven, none was able to see nor feel where he was. A huge sneer appeared on his lips as he felt them banging on the newly created barrier.
'Ahh, that was too easy....'
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