Adventure King (R-18)

Several Hours Prior

Inside the barrack's dungeon, a set of eyes peered out from the darkness. Staring perpetually at the shadows dancing across the floor, cast by the flickering of the dim torchlight outside his cell. 

Gawn licked his chapped lips, his tongue rough and dry from the days of deprivation. Being given only a thin gruel once a day, it wasn't enough to sate his hunger or his thirst, but just enough to sustain him until his date of execution.

Everything in his body hurt, he didn't think anything was broken yet, but his life had been hell these past few days. The Marcet family was in a precarious situation right now, and whether rightful or not, Jagen blamed him for everything. Gawn always thought Jagen believed in the same ideals that he did, that something was deeply wrong with the country, but here he was siding with that hateful and spoiled mage over his own people. He understood logically that Jagen had staked his neck out to save them once, the real problem was that coin. But why couldn't he see that bringing a kid like that to the capital, someone who was already warped with the lust for power, would be the biggest mistake in his life? Most of all, why couldn't he consider his daughter's happiness?

The lingering copper taste of blood in his mouth made him feel like spitting, but his mouth was too dry to attempt it. Jagen certainly wasn't making his life easy. 

His belly growled, protesting his body's condition, but the hunger was nothing compared to the gnawing that ate at him from inside, a dark burning hatred for the man who had ruined him and the one he loved filling his belly and giving his body the strength to endure. Focusing back on the shadows on the floor to pass the time. 

The shadows seeming to warp unnaturally before a sliver of light emerged from the floor,  radiant fire splitting the floor of his cell as a sword of molten rock emerged from the stone, moving slowly as it cut out a square shape. The floor melting like wax as it passed, falling in on itself to reveal a hidden chamber underneath. 

Marcella's shiny black hair popping up through the hole, reflecting the red glow of the rocks around her. Completely unperturbed by the heat as she stared straight at Gawn. 

Frowning as she saw Gawn's condition before pulling herself out of the hole, the glowing rocks not burning her skin in the slightest as it was covered in a thin layer of mana. 

"What took you so long?" He asked in a rough voice, his voice dry and raspy that made him sound harsher than he had intended. 

"Gawn... I'm sorry, I didn't know... I was in house arrest, they told me you were in house arrest too, I would have come earlier..." She sounded apologetic, unsure whether he blamed her. Gawn was angry of course, but not at her. 

"I never thought Daddy would be so mean," Marcella said dejectedly, still apparently in denial that her father had completely sold the two of them out. 

To be honest he had been expecting her earlier, it wasn't as if they had explicitly planned it beforehand, but the two of them had been fantasizing and planning over the idea of the running away together, and given her personality he had absolute confidence she would come to save him if he was ever in trouble.

"It's fine, you're here now is all that matters." Glancing at the chains around his wrists, rattling them for exaggerated effect. The chains dropping off in short order, cut cleanly with a searing flash that melted only the smallest needed portion. The heat not injuring him in the slightest. 

Rubbing his sore wrists as he stood up, faltering when he tried to stand. 

Marcella scooping him up in a princess carry, lifting him effortlessly. A surprising amount of muscle hidden under her adventurers garb. 

"I think this is supposed to be the man's role, " he could only say helplessly. 

"Oh, shush. I think it's romantic." She teased him, before jumping into the tunnel entrance she had created in the floor, bracing for the short drop down. 

"They're escape tunnels, in case we get attacked. Only my family knows about them," seeing the confused look on his face as he looked around the dusty hidden passageway, Marcella explained helpfully.

Marcella wanted to carry him more, but his pride as a man wouldn't allow it.

Following her down the tunnel, his steps gaining surety as he steadily recovered from the several days of being chained up. 

"How did you know I was down there? You said you were in house arrest right?"

She sounded pleased to be asked.

"You've got some pretty good friends, Gawn. How come I've never met them before?"

He almost groaned, having a rough idea about who she was talking about, he never wanted to involve her with these people but she had found it on her own.

There was a rot in this country, and Gawn and Jagen were hardly the only ones to take notice.

Everywhere you looked there was discontent, even out in a frontier city like Tromwell, where the population was few, and the harvests were abundant, peasants were still starving in the streets and farmers went hungry while they watched their crops shipped off to the larger cities. 

The seeds of revolt found fertile ground in places like these. Even knowing they would likely die, there were still those who chose to join him in fighting for the uncertain promise of a better world. He trusted them with his life, and that trust had now bore fruit. 

This particular tunnel coming to an end somewhere in the outer farmland, hidden by a dense thicket. The figures of three men, sheltering from the rain as they brought along twice as many horses, well packed for travel. 

"Goods 'ta see yous still alive boss," the biggest of the three said. Having been on the lookout for Gawn and Marcella's arrival. 

"It's been about two hours since we got Marcella out, guards will be all over the place soon, we gotta leave soon boss."

Marcella nodding along happily, as this was exactly the kind of adventure she had wanted in her life. 

While Gawn's focus was on another thing entirely. 

"There's a loose end here that we need to take care of first," his expression hardening as he said it.