Vol.3 Ch.45 - A buncha' blockhead bandits

Last night I slept surprisingly well. I woke up, ate the breakfast Lee gave me,and talked about the current state of the gangs with him. The other banditsdidn’t quite like him interacting with me as much, and he was often leadaway from me for whatever reason. No idea why, though, not like he had thekeys to the cage, anyway.“So from what I’m getting from this,” Lee repeated my words, “you, yourgirlfriend and your best friend are currently the heads of the largest gang inGreat Hiana? Come on, man, I wanna believe you but you’re making it hardfor me.”I understand it’s dif icult to believe, what with Ed being a General, but Ihave no qualms about Cecily being capable of standing at the top. I mean,if she can quell Nelly’s night terrors with such ease and diligence, a couplehundred gang members is nothing for her! In any case, Lee actually calledout some of the bandits with a Can you believe this guy? sort of tone, butwas utterly shocked when he realized what I was saying might be true.“ARA Gang? Don’t tell me that kid’s a gang member!? We’re in deep troubleif he’s a valued member there, those guys took over the entire underworld inalmost a year!” said one bandit.“Yeah, I’ve heard of them too.” Another bandit added onto the first one’sbanter, “I heard the Generals are quite weird as well, despite their adequacy.Some say the Generals, Aaron, Maxwell and Jorgen, made some kids theirVice-Generals!”Did I miss a page? In what chapter did this happen? Their sources arequite skewed towards lies as well, I see.“What!? Aaron, the leader of the legendary Blue Lions Gang, workingtogether with Bilgam Brothers? That’s unheard of! What happened to Jean?”the first bandit spoke up.“Yeah,” I slowly joined the conversation, “about that…”As I explained everything that happened from the beginning, starting from usinstigating a gang war between BilBros and Blue Lions, they all sat aroundmy cage, listening intently to every word I said. They mostly kept quiet, safefrom a few people who shouted stuff like This guy’s full of shit!, but theywere all shushed pretty quickly by the others who were, in fact, willing tolisten to my story ‘til the end.As I retold everything without holding back, I even had some of my audiencetear up near the end. Finally, as I told them about how I got drafted intoexploring the mysterious dungeon in Sibirus, I finished the story off with acliffhanger (much to their dismay).“What?! You can’t end it there! What happens next?!” They all shouted out,“When will you reunite with your loved ones? What happened to Ed? Gahh, Ican’t wait for the next volume, oh wait, this isn’t a book! Gahhhhh!”“…You guy’s serious?” I asked them just in case.“Oh come on!” a bandit spoke up, “At least tell us what happens in the storynext! We gotta know!”This proved that they were stupid beyond human comprehension. I couldn’tbelieve what I was seeing. A buncha’ grown-ass men gawking at myautobiography, wondering what happens after the present. You can’t makethis shit up.“How about you release me, and then when I get back from the dungeon, I’lltell you all about it!” I tried pleading.“Nah.” They all spoke out in unison, “You think we’re dumb?”Yes, in fact.“Hey!” Lem shouted out to them, “Get your asses over here! Stop talking withthat lying idiot and help me set the tables!”“What did you say, Lemmy?” Lee got up with an angry smile, “Did I hearyou swearing just now?”Lem immediately realized his mistake as he tried to cover it up, spoutingthings like Ass isn’t a swear word! It’s the name of an animal! and othersuch things, but alas, he got a good spanking from Lee and had his groundingtime doubled for it. Bet he won’t do that again…Just as Lee was about to leave me alone for the day, he handed me a neatlooking rock to throw around the cage, as I had no other way to pass the time.It’s a nice gest, but he could’ve given me something more modern, like abook or something…Just then I thought to use the rock to break the lock on the cage forcefully, butno matter how many clanks and dinks I made on the lock, it simply wouldn’tbudge.***Waking up on my second day here, I thought of various ways to talk my wayout. First I tried bartering my rock for something more useful, hoping toeventually trade my way to a knife, which I could use to cut through thewooden bars, but it didn’t quite work out…“The hell would I need some random rock for?” A bandit responded to myoffer, “I get you’re bored, but this is just sad!” He said as he walked away.No worries, I’ll try the next guy that approaches.“Hey sir, I happen to have this Runic Stone on me, would you be willing totrade it for say… a simple hammer? I’d say it’s a great deal!” I said, trying toput on my most believable merchant face.“Oh?” the bandit seemed interested, “And what, pray tell, can this RunicStone do exactly?”I immediately started to explain the concept of Runic Stones, masking the factit’s just a simple rock as I accentuated the pros whilst avoiding the cons (justlike a true salesman!)He immediately started laughing upon hearing my commercial review on it,“Phah! If it can grant you flight, why not use it yourself to escape?” He askedsmugly.“I’m in a cage. Even a bird can’t escape when it’s trapped in a cage.” I saidas a matter of fact.He stopped to reevaluate his point, before ultimately leaving in a fit of ragedue to overstimulating his brain. Just then, I caught a glimpse of a young,naïve and excited pair of eyes peek out at me from the bushes. There’s onlyone kid in this base, so calling him out was a simple way to get his attention.“Hey, Lem!” I called out, “Ya’ interested?”“Whuh-How did you see me!?” He jumped out of the bushes.“It’s the magic of the Runic Stone helping me, you see! It allows forforesight! Every adventurer has to have one readily on him at all times, it’s ano-brainer to have it, so what do you say? Want it?” I offered the rock to himin good faith.He quickly snatched it out of my hands before sprinting away from my armsreach, “Haha! Gotcha’ now! With this, I won’t ever be grounded again!Muahahahahaha!”I kinda felt bad I got my only trading chip stolen away from me, but I had funwatching that little pipsqueak try his best to fly from the ground (and failmiserably). Lee saw this spectacle unfold, before gifting me another coolrock he found on the ground, this time with some paper as a bonus. What’snext, scissors? We playing Rochambeau or something?***Third day was just as boring as the previous two, but at least these guys hadsome decency to them, as the food they fed me was quite good. I actually sortof prefer it to the war rations we ate back at ARA (don’t tell the chefs,though…)I asked Lee when I was gonna get released, he replied Soon before shiftingaway. I didn’t think anything of it, but the chunk of metal he handed me leftme confused. I think Lee might be… a bit weird, why else would he behanding me these weird, arbitrary items otherwise?I looked at the three items laid out in front of me as I pondered on what to do.My first thought was to use the rock to chisel away at the metal chunk, thusmaking a semi-sharp knife from it, but then what does he want me to do withthe paper? Or is he just handing me random things so as not to add suspicionand just telling me to do whatever I want? I don’t know him well enough, sothere is a possibility he’s just giving me this random stuff for no reason at all,though…“Well, best get to work then…” I said as I grabbed the rock to hopefullymake a blade out of the metal chunk.At the first dink, I actually missed and hit my finger full-force with the rock,causing me to yelp in pain. After rolling around in pain for a bit, I tried again,this time striking a bit more precisely. And just like that I struck the rockagainst the metal and created… fire?Fire? Wait no, just a spark… Wait! A spark?!?! I thought as I looked at thepiece of paper. Right, I can free myself and distract the bandits by makinga spark with these two and then further spreading the sparks onto the pieceof paper, thus making fire! Lee, you’re a genius!In just a couple more strikes, I managed to set flame to the grass around me,with it quickly spreading to the nearby trees… and the cage I was in.ShitshitshitshitSHIT! I cried out as I tried my best to avoid the fire as Iwaited for the cage to open up. Just as I was ready to yell out for help,realizing things are getting dicey, I heard a child’s voice scream out.“Everyone!” Lem shouted out, “That prisoner started a forest fire, he wantsto burn our home down!”When I heard him call this place his home, I felt a wave of regret hit me, but Ialso knew Lee wanted this, so there was no other choice. Cecily and Nellyare waiting for me at home, and I wanna get this over with as quickly aspossible so I can give them both a kiss on the cheek!I saw a slight opening form from the burnt wooden cage, and I definitelydidn’t wanna miss out on the opportunity, so I jumped out. Alas, a piece ofscorched wood burned me as I was making my exit, which reminded me ofthe day Carter and I tried escaping the burning building. My eyes startedtearing up for whatever reason, and my body got extremely nauseous, leadingto me puking out my breakfast just from remembering that day. Looks like Istill haven’t gotten over it just yet…I didn’t have time to look behind me, for all I knew there could’ve beenpeople troubled by the fire, but I didn’t care. It’s their problem now, theydeserve it for not letting me out.I ran and ran until I finally made it out of the forest and into a nearby city, noidea how it’s called though. I quickly checked my pockets after rememberingit, but thankfully Nelly’s picture was still there, if a bit scorched on theedges, but I could still make out her likeness, which was good enough for me.An old man who I was passing looked at me weird, which made me a bitself-conscious, so I looked at my reflection in a nearby window and…“It’s… gone.” I said, touching the burnt end of my ponytail, or at least what’left of it.“The fire took something important after all. It's burned the entire back of myhead! I'm gonna need to visit a barber now, and I don't have any money for it!Crap, and Cecily liked that ponytail, too…”