Harem System In A fantasy World - Chapter 280: He will be fine

Chapter 280: He will be fine

After parting from Mira, Isolde and Tessa went to the market to stock up on potions and essentials for the dungeon. Once they were done, they immediately departed, walking out of the city gates while greeting the guards who wished them a fruitful raid.

It was odd that in such a large city, students of the academy were probably the most respected by the general populace, but they were more or less used to it by now.

Of course, the hustle and bustle of the tournament was still dying down, and there were many people leaving the flying city in one way or another.

Since it was not allowed to just ascend into the airspace, most people left the city and headed for the landing ports, where they were directed to depart in an orderly manner.

Soon enough, Isolde and Tessa had walked far enough along the paved pathway that the noise was now far behind them, and now they only met the occasional student or adventurer who was either leaving the dungeon to go back to the city or going into the dungeon just like them.

Up until now, they had both been mostly quiet. Isolde was not much of a talker, and Tessa was just not comfortable being quiet for so long; it was inevitable that she would break the silence.

She rolled her shoulders forward, shifting the robe she was using to cover her scantily clad body, and then looked at Isolde’s side profile.

She could never have imagined getting along with the elf girl a few months ago, no offense to Isolde; she was a great person, but their personalities were so far apart that had it not been their overlapping interest in Elion, they would have never become so close.

But now that she had come to know Isolde, she had realised that you did not need to have similar personalities to get along with someone, both people just had to be willing to meet halfway, and in fact, since Tessa liked to talk, and Isolde was more quiet, on top of being a good listener, they had ended up being a match made in heaven, as friends of course.

However, Tessa had also noticed that Isolde had been much more aloof than usual, she didn’t even need to guess why, the reason was as clear as day, she was worried about Elion, not that she wasn’t, but she believed in his strength, he was plenty strong, and if he could escape from all those powerful and shameless bastards with his life intact, then he would definitely be fine, wherever he was.

What did she have to say about Elion’s supposed heretic status?

Bullshit.

That was what she thought.

She had spent so much time around the guy, sparring, getting stronger together, and now these bastards who didn’t even know a thing about him were accusing him of something like that?

The Duke Dawncrest was truly shameless.

Her own family was nowhere near the Dawncrest family’s level of power or influence, but now that she could see what those with power used it for, she couldn’t help but think that she had been blessed to be born in a noble family as honourable as hers.

’The human kingdom’s nobility is rotten to the core,’ she thought.

“I think he will be fine, Isolde,” Tessa suddenly said with an easygoing smile on her face.

“Huh?” Isolde looked up sharply in surprise, the confusion on her face clear enough to show what she was thinking.

“You’re thinking how I knew,” Tessa laughed, “it’s written all over your face.”

Isolde’s ears turned a little bit red, and she looked down shyly. “It’s just…” she began, but never finished her sentence.

“Elion is strong,” Tessa continued, her tone becoming more thoughtful as she looked up at the sky, “and from what we saw during the tournament, he’s even stronger than any of us even know. I doubt anyone other than the higher years are his match at this point.”

Isolde’s eyes widened slightly in shock as she looked up at her.

“And I’m not even joking,” Tessa added, “I thought he might have been hiding his strength this whole time, but after thinking about it, it made no sense. Why would he do that?”

She paused briefly, her gaze still on the sky.

“Then it hit me… he was never holding back,” she said slowly, “he was just improving at a rate that was too impossible for me to accept.”

Her expression turned slightly melancholic.

“It made me think about how long I’ve been training,” she continued, “since the day I started walking, my father took me to his dojo back home, and since then, I haven’t rested for even a single day.”

She let out a small breath.

“And still… I have come to the realisation that all my efforts will never be enough to stand toe to toe with a genius like him…”

She paused again before shaking her head slightly.

“Now I understand what my father meant when he said life isn’t always fair…”

Isolde gave an odd look, and Tessa suddenly waved her hands lightly in front of her.

“Don’t get me wrong or anything, it’s not that I’m jealous,” she laughed, “it’s just that his existence has shifted how I see things.”

She looked forward again.

“Even if I know my efforts won’t be enough, I’ll keep working harder and harder to at least bridge that gap his talent creates.”

Isolde smiled faintly.

“Right,” she said simply.

This was how most of their conversations went: Tessa would go on a rant, and Isolde would give a simple one-word answer, and maybe a full sentence on a good day. Anyone who saw it would think them odd, but they were comfortable this way.

Isolde finally relaxed a bit; it wasn’t enough to completely offset her worries, but it was enough for her to steady herself.

’He will be fine,’ she told herself.

…

Meanwhile, the man in question…

Elion’s eyes fluttered open as he groaned awake, his eyelids feeling unusually heavy, like they had weights tied to them, and for a moment, he just lay there, his thoughts sluggish, his body unresponsive.

“What the fuck is going on…” he muttered groggily, his voice hoarse as he slowly began to feel sensation returning to his limbs, though he still couldn’t move them properly; it was like his body was waking up in pieces rather than all at once.

His vision was blurry at first, shapes and light blending together in a hazy mess, but after a few seconds, it began to clear, and the first thing he saw were his own feet straight ahead.

He blinked slowly.

Wait…

He realised he was lying flat on his back.

Then another thought hit him.

His brows furrowed slightly as he focused more, his gaze trailing down his own body, and that was when he noticed that he was only in his grey underpants, which barely covered his lower half, leaving his torso completely bare.

There was a simple, but thick bulge in the space around his underpants where his dick was sheltered beneath the thin fabric.

“…What the hell?”

He was genuinely confused, then he tried to think of the last thing he could remember doing, which ended up not being very difficult.

“I was bathing in that pool by the waterfall after Zenovia and Maya left…” he thought slowly, his mind still foggy, “or was that all a dream?”

It couldn’t be.

He would have been able to tell the difference. There was no doubt that it had happened. But everything after that… was a hazy blur.

“Odd…” he muttered faintly, a slight frown forming on his face as a sense of unease crept into his chest, because something had definitely happened to him, that much he was sure of.

Had he been drugged and kidnapped?

But how!?

The thought had barely settled when his body finally responded enough for him to try moving, his feet shifting slightly, only to immediately feel something tight around his ankles.

He froze.

“What the fuck!?”

He tried again, putting more effort into it this time, but his legs barely moved, the metallic clink of restraints and the feeling of something cold biting into his ankles only confirming what he had just felt.

His heart rate picked up.

Slowly, he lifted his head, straining his neck as his vision tilted downward, and what he saw made his eyes narrow.

They were chains wrapped tightly around his ankles, and not just that, he was lying on a cold, rectangular stone slab.

His body was secured to it using his legs.

He immediately tried to move his hands, but they were just as restricted, held down firmly by restraints that did not budge, no matter how much he flexed.

“At least…” he exhaled slowly, forcing himself to calm down, “my head isn’t chained.”

So he could look around

He was in a wide, but completely empty room, with two flame torches on either side providing dim but sufficient lighting in the otherwise dark and gloomy space.

The walls were made of thick, jagged granite stone held together by dark mortar, the ceiling was built in the same fashion, and though he couldn’t see the floor from his position, he could already imagine it being made from the same rough material, because that would only be natural.

He stayed like that for a good two minutes, his eyes moving slowly as he studied every inch of the room, taking in the details, the lack of furniture, the absence of doors in his immediate line of sight, until eventually, the reality of his situation settled in.

He needed to get out of here.

Since pure physical strength didn’t seem to be working out for him, he decided to try using mana to augment his body.

“This should work,” he said out loud, more to steady himself than anything else, as he began to channel mana from his mana core into the rest of his body.

But the moment he did, the chains glowed.

A faint blue light pulsed through them, and before he could even react, the mana he had just gathered was completely drained, ripped away from him as if it had never been there to begin with.

The glow faded, and just like that, he felt that familiar weakness again.

“What the fuck!?” he shouted, his voice echoing slightly in the empty room, “what the hell are these chains made of!?”

Now it made sense why there were no guards and why no one was watching him. They didn’t need to.

He clenched his jaw and tried again, this time attempting to act faster, channelling mana and immediately straining against the restraints in one swift motion, but the result was the same.

He tried again, doing it even faster this time.

Again.

And again.

And again, nothing changed.

After the tenth attempt, he stopped trying, letting his head fall back against the cold stone slab as he exhaled slowly.

“…That’s not going to work.”

He stared up at the ceiling for a moment, his expression flat.

“Well,” he muttered, “I am well and truly fucked.”

He couldn’t even cast a spell in this state.